#soft!joel miller | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

damneddamsy · 4 hours ago

Text

falling | joel miller x fem!oc (part xi)

summary: Joel is too far from home, travelling and surviving once again, for a purpose.

a/n: buckle up, this is a looooong one. I wanted to share all the journey and the loss in a single chapter, initially, I wanted to break it into two, but it only made sense here to have it done with. Please take this with a grain of salt, and understand the world of TLOU is difficult and irredeemable. bad shit happens, you can't stop it. okay, let's do this!

word count: 19,000 + [ I had an ask from a sweet anon who wanted this included. hello! I hope you can estimate your reading time now, thanks for letting me know :) ]

DAY 1: EN ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES - APPROX. FOURTEEN HOURS SOUTH OF JACKSON, SOMEWHERE PAST SALT LAKE CITY.

Regrets and worries. Joel knew now—they weren’t the same. Not even close. Two different beasts, pulling in opposite directions. One stalked behind you, the other ahead. He had both nipping at his heels.

Regret caught up fast enough. It had already happened, and there was no undoing it. Hated that shit to the core. And worry? Well, he was so used to seeing its back before him now, just waiting for it fuck up. Together, they twisted in his gut. Frayed wires, snarled and buzzing, so tangled he couldn’t tell which was which anymore.

Not here, not now—lying on the splintered floorboards of some half-collapsed home, walls paper-thin against the hiss of falling snow outside, air cold enough it bit the inside of his nose when he breathed too deep.

The cabin was barely standing. Roof half gone, one wall caved in, and wind came through the boards like breath through teeth. It was shelter in the loosest sense—four walls and a place to keep his back to. That’d have to be enough.

The stew sat like lead in his stomach. Came out of a battered can, label long gone. Might’ve been beef. Might’ve been dog food. Probably expired a decade ago. He didn’t care. Shoved it down like punishment. Energy was energy. Didn’t matter how it tasted going in—only that it stayed down. Now, though, his gut churned like it disagreed. Violently.

With the rifle close at hand, Joel sat with his legs stretched out, boots frozen stiff with slush, snow melting slowly off his jacket shoulders. He hadn’t bothered stripping out of his gear. No point. Cold like this, alone out here, you didn’t sleep long anyway.

He’d been riding for fourteen hours. Maybe more. He’d stopped keeping track somewhere past hour ten. Through rough terrain, past the last of the patrol lines, past roads that weren’t really roads anymore, just veins through snow-covered land that didn’t feel real. The map crumpled in his jacket wasn’t worth shit now. Just paper soaked with sweat and hope.

And fuck this snow. It wasn’t just cold—it was fucking brutal. It soaked through seams, dulled the edges of his vision, and turned the horse into a slipping mess of nerves and bone. He couldn’t wait to hit the open heat again—past Vegas, past the mountains, back where the sky turned gold and didn’t bite.

Vegas. Jesus, he’d be riding past it soon. What a weird thought. He’d never liked that place. Clinking noise and vice and strobe lights that didn’t mean anything. Still, the thought of it almost felt like an assurance now—like anything would be better than this stretch of cold emptiness.

The sun had set and risen without his permission, and the horse was starting to limp. He’d have to rest it come morning. If there was a morning. This part of the country didn’t feel like it had days anymore—just gray stretches of silence between dusk and deeper dusk.

And still, sleep wouldn’t come.

He rolled something between his fingers—small, brass, worn, warm from the heat of his palm. A button. Not from anything he’d owned. Probably from a coat someone lost before the world went to hell. Maya had picked it up off the road during the summer, on their way back home from dinner at Tommy's. He remembered her squealing when she spotted it, stubby fingers plucking it out of the dirt like gold, and handing it to him later, bestowing him a treasure, her tiny gummy smile vast as anything.

He’d kept it ever since. Didn’t matter what it came from. The button was hers, then his. It hadn’t left his pocket since.

He squeezed it between his fingers, thumb brushing the grooves, meeting his lip just once, and tucked it away again.

He hadn’t said much when he left. Tommy met him in the barn before sunrise, lit only by a lantern swinging from a nail. The horses had been restless. Cold was coming in through the slats, and Joel had cinched the saddle like it was the only thing keeping him upright.

Tommy had offered to go—thrice. Said it didn’t sit right, Joel riding out alone. But Joel had shaken his head.

“You stay here. For my girls.”

He didn’t trust anyone else to watch over them. Not the way Tommy would. “Just make sure they eat and sleep. That they know I'm doin' fine. You hear me?”

Tommy didn’t argue after that. Just handed him the reins and clapped his shoulder once. It was enough, maybe more than enough.

He’d ridden out before the light touched the mountains, the sound of the gate swinging shut behind him like a period at the end of a sentence.

Just yesterday—just yesterday—he’d been home. His home. The big white house, on the edge of Jackson with the bramble bushes out back and Leela’s cursive handwriting on the walls in pencil, tiny indelible equations scrawled between coat hooks and door frames.

Maya had held onto his finger compliantly, in her too-thick coat, dragging her plastic basket across the frost-hardened ground, and crouched beside him in the garden beds as they picked out what her mama had wanted for dinner. Carrots, lumpy and sweet. A head of cauliflower. All collected in her basket, while Joel wondered out loud to her, that maybe Leela was making that spicy stew of hers, with sumac and saffron.

And that night—he’d had Leela’s breath in his ear, her hand latched around his. They’d curled up together under that white duvet, head resting close, her thumb drawing soft, slow circles into his palm until he drifted off.

Now here he was.

Cold. Dirty. Bone-tired. Alone. Chasing ghosts toward a city he hadn’t seen in decades.

He leaned back until his head tapped the wood behind him, and let out a breath. It fogged up in front of him and vanished.

“Screw it,” he muttered.

The backpack was by his side, half-buried in snow-dust. He pulled it closer, unzipped it with numb fingers. Inside, wrapped tight in old linen, was Leela’s notebook—the one with her proofs, her ideas, the kind of math that gave him a migraine. The one he was risking everything to deliver.

Tucked beneath it were two small tape recorders. But—there were two of them, same make, scratched from use. He’d grabbed both in a rush. One of them had her logs, her working thoughts on the Riemann Hypothesis. The other… who knew.

It didn’t matter. He needed her. Her voice. Even if it was just numbers and theorems he didn’t understand. Even if it was her being brilliant in a way that left him in the dust. Something to make the world feel less far.

Joel held one to his chest a moment. Closed his eyes. Thumb hovering over the play button for a moment before he pressed it.

The machine clicked. The static cleared. A brief hiss.

And then, for a second, all Joel could hear was the wind scratching at the seams of the broken-down cabin. Then came her voice—soft, unsure.

He smiled, exhaled, and let the recorder rest on his chest. Ready for sleep.

L.REED MAYA INFANCY DEVELOPMENT LOG – AUDIO FILE #9

(Click. The soft static of the recorder kicks in. There's a rustling sound, like someone adjusting a blanket or shifting in bed. Then, Leela's voice—gentle, low, a little breathless, like she’s just settled in beside someone small and wriggly. Maya.)

“You wanna say 'hi'? Hi?”

(Maya hums. Coos softly before saying—) “Hah.”

(Leela laughs.) “Close enough. Okay, so. It is August the seventeenth. Time is… very late.” (A soft snort.) “Um, two-twelve a.m. Bedroom. Maya, age eight months.”

(A soft, gurgling coo interrupts. Then a thump-thump—like a baby kicking her feet against the mattress. Leela exhales a smile into the mic.)

“Baby girl is vocalizing consistently. Her consonant-vowel chains are stronger. Lots of ‘ba-ba’, ‘ga-ga’, ‘ta-ta’, occasionally ‘da’. This morning, I caught her mimicking Joel yawning and singing. She’s watching his lips more, listening to intonation. Repeating the pitch, if not the structure.”

(More babbling now. Higher-pitched. Happier. Leela’s voice quiets slightly, as if leaning in.)

“But just now…” (a pause, soft disbelief flickering in her voice) “…she said ‘Mama.’”

(There’s a quiet moment. A little sniff from Leela, then a huff of a laugh.)

“I was holding her, rocking her. She had her hand on my lips, just as I taught her to express ‘I love you’. Looked me dead in the eye. And said it.”

(Maya giggles, wet and delighted, then says it again—muffled but distinct) “Mamamamama.”

“That. Right there. Did you hear that?” (Leela’s voice wavers, thickens with emotion she’s trying not to name.) “Omigosh, baby.”

(We can hear Maya closer now, her soft breaths, her curious coos.)

“You wanna say that for me, please? Can you say 'Mama' one more time?”

(Soft, adorable, Maya speaks.) “Mama.”

(Leela giggles.) “Yeah?”

(She's excited, seeing her mother smile.) “Maaaa!”

“Maya's first word. Not just a sound. Not just noise. She meant me.”

(Another pause, the rustling of blankets. Leela’s voice softens even more, almost like she’s speaking to herself now.)

“My baby is growing so fast, learning, laughing daily, and it's all Joel. He speaks to her so much, it's no wonder she wants to talk right back at him. But I don’t know what I expected. I mean, I’ve studied this a little from that old baby book Mom had lying around in storage. I know the milestones. The phoneme acquisition timeline. But hearing it…”

(She stops. A breath. Then, quieter—) “It made me feel real. Like I didn’t just survive her. Like maybe I was meant to be her mother after all.”

(Maya babbles in the background, then lets out a little sigh and flops back against the mattress. Leela chuckles softly, tired.)

“She does this cute thing with her hands when she’s trying to form new sounds. Presses her fingers to her mouth like she’s shaping the word. Like she’s building it.”

(A beat. Then Leela's voice dips into playfulness—dry, teasing, a rare glint of humor.)

“She’s smarter than me, I know it. It’s totally fine. I’ll just be the one who cuts up her fruit and explains Hilbert spaces until she’s old enough to tell me to stop.”

(The door creaks open. Joel’s voice enters the room, low and gravelly, but softened with affection.)

“You still up, darlin'? Jesus, go to bed already.” (His boots thud quietly against the floor as he steps in. A pause. Then the sound of a kiss—quiet, slow. A press of lips to Leela’s temple.) “Doin’ experiments with the poor kid again? Hi, baby girl.”

(Leela hums, leaning into him whilst Maya squeals in excitement at Joel's arrival.) “Infancy development log for future purposes. Joel, come sit. Listen, listen. Maya said her first word.”

(There’s a beat. Joel exhales like he’s trying to hide a smile. He shifts closer—more rustling, the mattress dipping slightly under his weight as he sits beside them. Maya lets out a soft coo.)

“Yeah?” (His voice is quieter now, touched with awe.) “What’d she say?”

(Leela pauses. Her voice is a little breathless when she finally answers.) “She said 'Mama.'”

(Joel is quiet. Then—he laughs under his breath, low, warm and a little stunned. A laugh that carries years in it.)

“Course she did. Trouble and a traitor.” (A kiss, this time to his baby’s head.) “Smartass, just like you.”

(Maya babbles off-screen—happy nonsense, punctuated with a triumphant little—) “Mama!”

(Leela half-laughs, disbelieving) “Hear that? Again and again. No prompting, Joel. Just—‘Mama.’ Like she knew.”

(Another tiny voice from the baby.) “Maaaaaama.”

(Joel sighs like a man personally betrayed.) “Wow. She’s on a roll.”

“You seem jealous.”

(Joel, in mock offence) “Psh. Jealous, schmealous.” (Then addresses Maya directly, lowly.) “You know how many nappies I’ve changed for you, trouble? How many times I’ve walked you around this house at two in the damn morning?”

(He leans closer, pitching his voice hopeful and coaxing.) “Say Da-da. Come on, baby girl. Just once. Da-da.”

(Maya hushes. Then lets out another cheerful—) “Mama.”

“She’s doin’ it on fuckin' purpose.”

“She’s a baby.”

“She’s my baby. Which means she’s bein’ a pain in my ass on purpose.”

(The static is filled with the sound of Joel scooping her up, lifting her overhead with ease—Maya giggles, squeals, kicks her feet.)

(Joel playfully threatens.) “That it? You say 'Mama' one more time and I swear to God, I’m throwin’ you in the trash.”

(Maya hiccups out another: “Mama!” then laughs like she knows exactly what she’s doing. Leela bursts out laughing behind the recorder.)

“Right, you're with the raccoons now. C’mere, you lil’ menace.” (He smothers a chuckle with a deep kiss against Maya's cheek.)

(Leela's teasing does not cease.) “Go ahead. She’ll climb back out.”

“She’s got your damn mouth. And your attitude.”

(Leela’s voice, still recording, drops into a whisper—proud and fragile.) “Cannot believe she picked me.”

(Joel snickers.) “Yeah, baby. But we’re all hers now.”

(Click.)

DAY 2: EN ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES - APPROX. TWENTY-SIX HOURS SOUTH OF JACKSON.

You know how when you're completely alone, and there’s nothing left to look at but the walls, nothing to hear but the ticking of your own breath? When there’s no noise, no job, no person, no purpose to pull you away from the one thing that's been haunting the edges of your mind?

That’s where Joel was. No goddamn purpose except forward.

The road stretched ahead like a savage scar across the earth—silent, broken, endless. The only sound was the dull rhythm of hooves on packed dirt and the occasional creak of the saddle under Joel’s weight. His ribs throbbed with every breath.

No talking. No laughter. No baby cries. Just him, the horse, and the wind. It was in that kind of silence—complete, bone-deep—that the memory found him. The quiet made space for things he didn’t want.

It wasn’t even something big. Not some major milestone, holiday, or sweet, cinematic moment he could cling to like a lifeline.

Just a soft thing. A quiet day. It had been raining since morning, their first wave of summer storms.

It was not hard, not a downpour, just that steady mountain drizzle that turned everything gray and soft, that blurred the windows and hushed the world, made the house smaller and cozier. Inside this cushy room he'd made for his little girl, the air was scented of old cotton, wood, and whatever Maya had wiped on his shirt earlier.

Joel had stood in the nursery, one arm braced on the crib’s rail, the other setting down a freshly folded onesie on a small, lopsided pile. The window had been cracked, just an inch, enough to let in petrichor and the patter of water on the roof. The rhythm of it folded itself into the room like background music—so familiar he barely noticed it anymore, like a breath or heartbeats.

The laundry was warm from the dryer, and the little pink crib had become a makeshift laundry basket—tiny socks, soft bloomers, onesies with Leela's sweet embroideries of bears, owls, stars, and moons, all heaped together like a colourful cloud.

Maya, just a hair past eight months, sat squarely in the middle of the pile, the clean laundry heaped around her like a nest. She had one sock in each hand, neither matching, and looked at them like she was weighing philosophical truths. Her dark curls were sticking up in fuzzy snares. Her legs were crossed, her posture oddly regal—like she’d appointed herself queen of the sock mountain.

Joel glanced at her, then down at the onesie in his hand. It had a bear on the front, kind of wonky, with one eye stitched lower than the other.

He let out a soft huff through his nose. “I keep meanin’ to ask your mama to patch that bear’s eye. Looks like he’s been through some shit, right?”

Maya blinked at him, then looked back at her socks, utterly unbothered.

Joel folded the onesie and stacked it. “Yeah. Damn garden’s gonna be drowned if this rain keeps up,” he muttered, rubbing at the back of his neck. “See, I told Mama not to put that basil down near the low spot, but she won’t listen. You’ll see when you’re older—ain’t no one listening to the man with the shovel.”

Maya scrunched one of the socks in her hand, held it up, and gave him a look like, Is this even a sock or is it something greater?

Joel chuckled. “Yeah, I know. Socks. Don’t make no sense, huh?”

He reached over and gently tugged one of the matching pairs out of the pile. “This your big contribution?” he asked. “You fold this one? Looks like it got run over by a possum.”

Maya made a quiet noise—something between a hum and a grunt—and waved both socks in the air like streamers. Joel looked up again, and this time, he softened.

“I see you, baby girl,” he murmured. “Workin’ real hard.”

She blinked at him, pleased with herself, and stuck one sock on her foot over the other one she was already wearing.

“That’s it,” Joel hummed. “Yeah, two socks on one foot. Tyra Banks, you are. You’re gonna revolutionize the whole town.”

And suddenly she was a firecracker of excitement in her double-layered socks. She was up on her feet, squealing, “Da-da-da-da!”

Her little bare feet thudded softly on the crib mattress as she twirled, arms stretched out like wings. The flannel dress—a new one, made by her Mama, cut from one of Joel’s old shirts—fanned out around her like a pinwheel. The plaid knots at her shoulders bounced with every turn, and the fabric spun around her legs with a gentle swish, like the hush of wind through leaves.

Maya made a breathy sound with each spin—a little “hah!” like surprise was bubbling out of her chest. Her curls, puffed up from the static, lifted with each whirl, a halo of chaos above her head. She looked like joy personified: loose, unselfconscious, free.

Joel, sock still half-folded in his hands, couldn’t help but watch. Something about her face in that moment—the pure glee, the trust in the world—grew a warm ache. The kind you didn’t know how to carry, because it was too good. Too fleeting.

“Look at you,” he said, quiet. “You like that dress, huh? That’s Daddy’s old shirt, you know.”

Maya squealed but didn’t answer, too caught up in her spinning. Until her balance gave out. She toppled sideways into the cloth hill with a wild, delighted shriek, caught herself on her hands, and let out a giggle.

He opened his mouth to warn her to slow down—when the thunder cracked.

It came like the snap of a tree limb overhead—sharp, sudden, alive with force. The windows rattled in their frames.

The sound wiped the joy clean off her face. Her arms dropped. Her breath caught in her throat. She pivoted toward the window, her expression one of stunned betrayal—like the world had just raised its voice at her for the first time.

Then she moved.

Ran straight at Joel, flung herself against the crib rails, fingers latching onto his jeans like she could climb up into his skin. She didn’t cry, not yet. But her whole body was taut and trembling. Her face was still turned toward the glass, mouth parted, trying to understand the sky.

He saw the tiny tremble in her lower lip, the way two fingers picked at them nervously, the way her eyebrows drew tight, a wrinkle forming between them like a shadow.

Another thunder roll followed. This one longer, deeper. It crawled over the house like a prowling animal, ploughing into the roof.

Maya let out a whimper—not loud, but helpless. She looked up at him, big eyes wide, uneasy, and in a voice cracked with fear, she whispered, “Da-da, mhmm. Up, pease.”

Joel didn’t answer. He moved first.

In two strides, he was at the open window. He reached up and slammed it shut with the heel of his palm. The muffled silence afterward was almost a relief, just the soft percussion of rain on the roof.

“There we go. Nothin', it's gone now.”

Then he came back to her, crouched down, arms open before she even reached him. She crashed into his chest with a panicked little cry, climbing up him like he was a tree, tiny fingers clawing for purchase in his shirt, breaths shallow.

“I got you, honey,” he murmured to her as he stood, lifting her up against him. “You’re alright. I got you, baby girl.”

Another boom rolled over the mountains—long, low, rumbling—and she whimpered, her face pressed into his neck, her whole body trembling against his.

He gathered her up and lowered himself slowly to the rug. Sat cross-legged, grunting, settling herself in the crook of his chest. He curled himself around her like a shelter, drawing her in until she was tucked fully against his chest. Her bare toes nudged under his arm, one arm trapped between their chests, the other clutching his collar in a death grip.

“It’s just the sky talkin' to you,” he said, soft against the crown of her head. “Ain’t nothin’ but the sky being all big and loud for its favourite little girl.”

Another crack of thunder, and she jumped.

“Ahh, no, no, no da-da!”

“Okay, okay. Ssh.”

That’s when Joel gently brought his hands up to her ears—those big, calloused palms, rough from years of labour but soft now, careful as he cupped her tiny head. He didn’t press, didn’t smother—just curved them over her ears like a living shield. Just enough to hush the worst of the world.

“There,” he whispered, voice tucked low in his throat, like a secret just for her. “That better, baby?”

She only sagged into him, her whole weight melting down like her bones had gone soft. Her breath came fast, shallow little gasps against his neck, her cheeks hot and wet where her tears were soaking straight through his shirt.

Joel’s chest clenched.

“Shh, hey now,” he murmured, rocking her gently, like he’d done when she was still small enough to fit in one forearm. “Ain’t no storm gonna touch you. Not while you’re right here with me.”

He pushed a kiss to her temple—warm, lingering—then rested his cheek against her curls, letting himself sink into her warmth too. Her curls were soft against his stubbled jaw, but still quivering like a frightened baby bird. Every flinch of hers felt like a blow to his own ribs.

The next clap of thunder rolled in, less sharp now but still loud, echoing through the valley.

She flinched again—hard—and bowed into herself even tighter, like she was trying to disappear inside his chest. Her lip quivered, her little shoulders jumping beneath his hands.

Joel tucked her closer, wrapped himself around her, every muscle taut with the instinct to protect. To cover.

“It’s okay,” he soothed, peppering kisses wherever he could. “Almost over, sweetheart.”

His hands moved—slow, pacifying—one cradling the back of her head, the other rubbing small circles between her shoulder blades. He could feel her heart racing under his palm, tiny and frantic. Like a hummingbird. But with each pass of his hand, it began to slow, just a little.

Outside, the thunder rumbled again. Softer now. Farther away. Tired, fading.

Joel didn’t move his hands. Just kept holding her, kept being the still point in the storm, the rock she could anchor to.

“You hear that?” he said, reaching down to brush his thumb against her eyes and wipe the tears away. “Storm’s gettin’ tired. Runnin’ outta gas.”

And as the rain gentled on the roof, Maya’s breath began to slow. Her tiny fists, once knotted in his shirt, loosened, fingers going slack. Her lashes fluttered against his collarbone like moth wings. Not asleep—but safe. Settled.

After a minute, she shifted. Pulled back just enough to sit upright in his lap, still nestled between his knees. Her legs folded beneath her, toes peeking out under the hem of her dress. She didn’t say anything—just found one of the buttons on his shirt and started turning it slowly with her fingers, brow furrowed.

Then she looked up. Big, brown, still-wet eyes. A pout like a petal turned down, cheeks sticky with the last of her tears. Her curls were a damp halo, and her bottom lip wobbled, just a little.

Joel leaned in, forehead leaning gently against hers. Let their warmth meet in the middle.

“Hey. Doesn’t stand a goddamn chance against you and me, right?” he asked in a whisper.

Maya blinked up at him. Then touched her fingers to her lips—soft and sweet—and pressed them to his. That little 'I love you' trick again. She gave it off so freely sometimes, to Ellie all the time, to Maria, even Tommy, who bugged the hell out of her.

He gave a breath of a laugh, quiet and rough-edged. His eyes closed as he felt her tiny hand against his mouth.

“I love you too,” he murmured, catching her little hand between two cautious fingers, rubbing the bare lines there. His fingertips barely spanned her palm, this tiny little thing that trusted him to hold her through her first storm.

Let it thunder, he had thought then. Let it break the whole damn sky. It wouldn’t get to her. Not here. Not while he was breathing.

That memory bloomed behind Joel’s eyes like a flame in the cold.

He blinked, slow, pulled back to reality by the enduring rhythm of the horse’s hooves. Wind whipped around his straight collar. His ribs ached with every breath.

Forever was a grandiose fucking myth. That soft, rainy day might as well’ve been a dream. A world made of cotton and woodsmoke and spinning plaid dresses. Twenty hours behind him. Maybe a thousand miles. Maybe gone forever.

And if she was scared now? If the thunder came again and she reached for him, he wouldn’t be there.

All he had now was the ghost of her breath on his neck. The echo of her trust. The weight of his baby girl he could still feel in his arms, though she wasn’t there.

Joel hunched deeper into his coat, reins pulled taut, leather digging into his palm.

Because the storm hadn’t left him. It had just moved inside.

DAY 2: EN ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES - APPROX. TWENTY-SEVEN HOURS SOUTH OF JACKSON, JUST PAST GRAND JUNCTION, COLORADO

The first thing that hit him was the same goddamn cold.

Not the kind he was used to, that stung his fingers or turned his breath white—but the kind that stole. That lung-squeezing, bone-hollowing cold that came with being slammed headfirst into a river in the middle of no-fucking-where.

It engulfed him whole.

Joel’s skull cracked against stone. He barely had time to curse before the water closed over him. It was an aggressive silence, all muffled roars and bubbles, blood rushing in his ears. His body spasmed on instinct, legs booting, hands clawing for something—anything.

His face broke the surface with a sharp gasp, just before a boot came down, hard, and shoved him under again.

He went back under with a strangled snarl, teeth bared in the dark, throat filling with river. He thrashed—unseeing, feral, like a dog tangled in barbed wire, hands scraping across riverbed rock. Something thick and ugly filled his chest—not just water, but rage. Blind, instinctual, living within his very marrow.

It wasn’t supposed to go like this.

He didn’t even know where the trap had sprung from—just that one second he was crossing that busted-out bridge, cold wind at his back, and the next he was flying sideways, skull and ribs screaming as they hit the bank. A flash of movement, then mud, then water.

Now his gear was scattered, his rifle somewhere downstream to the Gulf of California, and the weight on his back was not budging.

Had to give it to him, the guy was strong. Not smart. Sloppy, wild. But strong as fuck.

Joel twisted, spine screaming, hips torquing. A crack of pain lit up his ribs—he didn’t have time to wonder if they were broken. He got one knee up in the current and drove it backwards—boot connected with something soft. The man grunted. Joel surged, body arching, hands fumbling. His fingers closed around something slick. A stone, maybe. Maybe a piece of his own gear. He didn’t look. Just swung it upward.

There was a crack of bone. The weight lifted.

Joel broke the surface like a corpse pulled from the deep. He choked, spat, and coughed, the sound raw and ragged. His whole body was trembling, muscles stuttering from the cold.

He had half a breath in him before the guy was on him again.

“Sonuva—” he bit out through chattering teeth.

Big, ugly, one of those loner types. Eyes wide and bloodshot. Beard crusted with something black. Stinking of rot, blood, sweat and boots that’d walked through worse places than this.

Joel didn’t waste time—got a hand on the man’s face, fingers clawing for the eyes, gouging. The other hand dropped to his belt—the knife was still there. Thank God. He drew it, fast, but his wrist was shaking and his grip was off.

He wasn’t thinking. He was moving. This wasn’t the first time someone tried to kill him. And it wouldn’t be the last.

The blade found flesh—but not where it needed to. It glanced off the bastard’s side, shallow, not enough. The guy roared and drove a fist into Joel’s temple. Stars burst behind his eyes.

His boots skidded on slick river stones. He went down hard.

The weight came again. Pinning him. Crushing.

The man’s knee jammed into Joel’s chest, ribs shrieking under the press, full body leaning in. Joel felt something crack. Pain ripped through him like lightning. The knife slipped from his hand.

Shit—

“You're fuckin' dead, asshole.”

Alright. Bring it the fuck on.

The guy was growling in his ear, teeth gnashing, breath hot and putrid. Hands clawing at his throat. Joel struggled, arms scrabbling. His body was giving out. Water dragged on his clothes. His lungs were still half-full of the river. His legs were kicking, but they felt far away.

Too tired. Too fucking slow. Too fucking old.

A knee jammed into his chest. His own vision flickering. The sky above him was a fair smudge between barren tree branches.

Not like this.

He saw her face. Maya’s. Then Leela’s. Ellie’s. Faces he’d left behind to protect. Faces he wasn’t ready to forget. Just a little more time. One more chance. Go back home, forget this whole damn thing. Just live.

Not like this, not like this, not like—

BANG.

The body on top of him jolted. A spurt of red bloomed across his shoulder, steam rising from the impact.

BANG.

Closer this time. Blood misted across Joel’s face. The man slumped. Collapsed. Dead weight, sudden and slack.

Joel lay there for a second, breath snagged in his throat. The silence came back—but it wasn’t tranquil. It was sharp. Expectant.

He eventually gasped furiously, chest heaving, struggling to pull air through raw lungs. Hands numb, shaking. His ears rang. Blinked the blood out of his eyes.

Then slowly, painfully, he shoved the corpse off and rolled onto his side. Coughing. Wheezing. The river soaked into his bones like poison. His fingers dug into the pebbles just to remember what solid ground felt like.

A third gunshot wasn't coming.

He turned his head, half-expecting a hallucination, knife still in hand—every nerve sparking. His body was coiled, heart pounding in his throat, soaked through, freezing, half out of his mind—

And standing there, staring at him with wide, shit-scared eyes—

Ellie.

Still holding the pistol two-handed, her arms locked, face pale and furious and terrified. Her breath ghosted in the cold, breathing hard, like she’d run all the way here. Snow dusted her hair, melting into her collar. Hair messy, sleeves pushed up, a smear of blood on her cheek—he didn’t even know if it was hers.

She looked like a goddamn kid again, that shock in her.

Joel stared at her for a moment that felt like the world had paused—like time itself needed a second to understand what the hell just happened.

She took a step toward him, lowering the gun.

“Joel—” Her voice broke halfway through his name.

And then, behind her, out of the trees—Leela.

Moving quick but steady, wrapped in that old worn coat of hers, fur-lined, hair tied up into a big, tight bun, eyes locked onto Joel like she’d been hunting him through a warzone. Her hand was clenched around something that looked cobbled together from broken bottles, tubing, and copper wire, rigged with metal scraps and cloth. A bomb, crude and half-melted, glass fogged with something dark and hissing inside. Acid, maybe. Of her own damn making.

A fucking acid bomb.

He stared at them both, still on his knees in the water, stunned, soaked, heart clawing its way back into his throat.

For a split second, he thought he was dreaming. Thought maybe he’d finally cracked. That maybe he died in that river, and this was what his mind made up on the way out.

But unfortunately, no.

Ellie was still holding that pistol, shoulders tense. Leela was here, real as anything, her breath catching when she saw the blood on his face.

“Jesus Christ,” Joel rasped. He staggered upright to his feet, knees buckling, one hand pressed to his broken ribs. His voice was hoarse with cold and panic. “What the hell are you doin’ here?”

Ellie didn’t answer. She was staring at him like she couldn’t decide if she wanted to hug him or shoot him for leaving her like that.

Joel was still dripping, clothes ungainly, cuts stinging on his hands and face. His fingers flexed around the knife hilt, but he let it drop, slowly. His voice, when it came again, cracked with cold and fury and fear.

“Have you lost your goddamn minds?!”

He didn’t care how raw he sounded. Didn’t care that his legs were shaking. Because what the hell were they thinking?

Jackson was safe. He left them there for a reason.

Joel turned his gaze to Leela, eyes wild. Still couldn't believe this shit. No, he was definitely imagining this.

“You—you brought her out here?” he rasped to Ellie, the words stumbling out, shredded at the edges.

His voice cracked with wrath, but beneath it was something else. Something jagged and terrified. He wasn’t yelling at her—he was yelling because if he didn’t, he might fucking break.

But Leela didn’t move. Just stood there. Still as a statue, wet snow clinging to her sleeves, her mouth parted like she couldn’t speak. And her eyes—no.

She looked at him like she didn’t recognize what she’d found. Like she’d expected someone else. A stronger man. One who wasn’t half-drowned, bloody, and shaking from the cold. A man who didn’t have someone else’s blood running down his neck.

She’d come all this way, and this was what she got.

He wasn’t even sure he was breathing anymore. This was the whole reason he’d left. So she wouldn’t have to see this version of him. The one he tried to keep locked up in the dark.

The bleeding one. The broken one. The furious one. The one who failed and lost—over and over again.

Joel’s lungs seized. His ribs ached like something inside had torn loose. Not broken, just bitterly bruised. He didn’t know if it was the pain, the grief, or just too many nights without sleep.

“I told you to stay the fuck back,” he growled, staggering forward, fury spilling out of him just to cover the terror underneath. He took a step forward, wet boots dragging in the muck. “Do you even know what the hell I’m walkin’ into? You think this is a joke? You've just killed yourselves!”

He wasn’t shouting at her anymore. He was shouting at the world. At himself.

But Ellie’s voice cut through the fog like a blade. “He would’ve fucking killed you. How about a 'thank you'?”

“Coulda blown my goddamn head off,” he grunted.

“You scared the shit out of me, Joel! You just—” she rubbed her wrist against her nose, to quiet a sniffle, “When she came to my door with the kid, crying her head off, I thought you were... God, you're such a fucking asshole!”

Joel stopped.

Her hands were shaking. The gun still hung in her grip, barrel down, smoke curling from the muzzle. Her eyes were glassy, but she wasn’t crying. Ellie never cried, not where he could see it.

He wanted to argue. Tell her she shouldn’t have been here, that she was reckless, that she’d risked everything—

But he couldn’t. Because she was right.

So instead, he looked away. His jaw clenched. Hands flexed uselessly at his sides, fingers twitching with adrenaline that had nowhere to go. The cold came creeping back in.

He didn’t know what the fuck this was anymore. Didn’t understand how they’d followed him this far. Didn’t even understand why. All he knew was that the two people he’d tried to protect by walking away were now here—wet, cold, bleeding. Standing in the wreckage of his silence.

And for a second, it felt like the whole damn universe had flipped inside out.

Then he muttered, hoarse and quiet, almost to himself, “I ain’t sure what’s what anymore. Stupid kids.”

He barely had time to let the words settle before Leela moved. Past Ellie. Past the smoking pistol still loose in her hands. Past all the invisible lines she obeyed—the ones built of silence, of distance, of dignity too scarred to name.

She moved like he had finally broken open inside her. And all he wanted was to just bring her close, sink her into his chest, all her warmth and strength, be grateful she had come all this way, and she was still alive. His good arm opened to do just that.

Until she hit him. Hard.

Joel didn’t even register the motion. Just the crack—a sharp, ringing pop against his cheekbone, like someone had fired a shot next to his ear. His head snapped to the side, mouth open in dumbfounded silence. The cold air lit up against the raw skin like fire on ice.

He barely managed to turn his head, blinking, confused, lips parting to speak—the fuck—to find her eyes, to demand something, anything—

When the second slap landed. Harder.

Across the opposite cheek, this one sent him a half-step back. His balance rocked. His knees gave a warning lurch. His vision blurred at the edges.

Ellie, though, came through with a hollow, “Jesus.”

The ringing in his ears drowned out everything. Even the birds had gone still. The only sound was that awful, hollow rush of blood in his head. His jaw ached. His mouth tasted of copper.

He didn’t know whether to be infuriated or stupidly impressed.

Leela was small. Smaller than him by a long shot. But she had those arms—those long, welder’s arms. He’d seen her rip stubborn rusted bolts loose like paper tabs, carry piping half her weight over her shoulder, hold Maya in one arm and stir sauce on a pot without breaking for a full hour. All that strength—he felt it now, blistering across his jaw. Twice.

She stood before him, chest rising and falling too fast, few loose curls clinging wet to her cheeks, lips parted like maybe she was about to say more—but didn’t.

And Joel just stood there, wordless.

The cold didn’t exist anymore. The bruising in his ribs didn’t matter. His back could be broken for all he knew, and he still wouldn’t have felt it.

Because all that existed now was her.

Leela. Storm-eyed. Livid. Trembling. Hot, if he might brainlessly add. And something else—something behind all that rage. A breaking point.

He had never seen her like this. Not once. Not even in the worst moments. Not even when Maya was screaming from frequent colic at two in the morning and Leela hadn’t slept in days. Not when the generator blew and she spent a week hauling scrap in snow up to her knees to get the lights back on. Not even when he'd practically roared at her for taking up that supply run with Tommy all that time back.

She always held the line. Quiet, astute, controlled. Too benumbed, sometimes. Too in her head to react. Never like this.

Then—her hand was on him again.

But this time, not to strike, but he did flinch though. Her slaps hurt like a bitch.

Her fingers curled into his scruff—rough and fast, like a wrench clamping down on rusted metal—and she yanked his face back toward hers.

He tried to look away. Tried to drop his gaze, tried to vanish into the pain, the shame, the damn noise in his skull—oh, she didn’t let him.

Her grip was iron. Her eyes locked with his, and what he saw wasn’t just rage. It was worse than rage.

It was finality.

“Listen good, Joel. I left my one-year-old daughter behind to travel for two days through stinking shit, trying to find your dumbass. And when we get back to Jackson after this,” she said, her voice low and flat, steel cooled just before it cracked. “I’ll make sure you never touch a goddamn hair on Maya's head again.”

She let go, just like that.

Her fingers unhooked from his chin like she was cutting a rope, severing the last thing tethering them together.

And he—well, he didn’t fall, not exactly. But his spine bent, his head dipped, and his shoulders slumped like something inside had gone slack. Like the immaterial weight he carried every day had finally doubled, and he’d just let it.

She stepped back, stiff, her breath catching now, arms trembling—whether from rage or the cold or the crash after adrenaline, he couldn’t tell. The acid bomb still dangled from one hand like a fucked-up metaphor—glass, cloth, something sharp—as if she didn’t even realize she was still holding it.

Joel didn’t move. Couldn't force another word out.

He stood there in the destruction of it—soaked to the bone, shaking, cheeks stinging red, the blood of a stranger drying on his collar. His pack and rifle, drenched. His bearings were lost. Everything that had once made him sure of the next step.

And now—that one sentence—rattling around his skull like a bullet in a spent chamber, louder than the gunshots, louder than the river, louder than the slaps.

Leela meant what she said. And there was no fire, no flood, no click of a rifle or scream of infected that disturbed him more than those words.

He’d lost her for good. Not in some hypothetical, not in a nightmare. He lost her, in truth. In the cold light of consequence.

And he was losing Maya too. Not to death or sickness.

To himself. To the choices he made, trying to keep them safe.

He swallowed hard. It felt like glass going down. His eyes, dull and sunken, drifted sideways—to Ellie.

She hadn’t said a word through all of it. Just stood there, in the dying light, watching. Her eyes were too sharp, too old for her age. Her mouth set in a line like she was biting down on something jagged to keep it from spilling out.

She didn’t say I told you so. Really didn't have to.

Joel straightened up, rolling his shoulders. Slowly. Felt every snap and creak in his spine. His breath shuddered through cracked ribs. His jaw clenched once. Twice.

Then he did what Joel always did. He put it all in a box—every shattered piece—and shoved it deep, where the other shit festered, where it couldn’t get in the way. Where it couldn’t slow his hand if the trigger needed pulling. Where it wouldn’t matter.

Because they were still alive. And that meant the work wasn’t done.

So he cleared his throat. Almost a cough. And nodded once at Ellie. Then, he spoke in a voice low, steady, already shifting back into the man he had to be.

“We gotta get movin’.”

Ellie blinked at him. Leela didn’t turn.

The stinging wind picked up around. Joel looked toward the trees—branches swaying. The river was still coursing around him, still loud in his ears, but fading now.

He adjusted the straps of his pack on his shoulder and shook out the water from the rifle. Pocketed the revolver and a knife he couldn’t remember drawing.

He didn’t ask if they were ready or reach out. He just started walking ahead.

Because there were still threats out here. Still ground to cover. Still two people behind him who might not want him anymore—but they needed to make it back home.

And if that was the last thing Joel could give them, then by god, he’d give it. Even if it broke him for good.

Now, Leela knew everything.

It wasn’t about how much she knew—it was how deep it cut. And worse, how much she must hate him for it. There was no middle ground left. No soft place to land. Whatever warmth she’d once kept lit for him—whatever delicate belonging he’d built with her and Maya—it was probably gone. Extinguished.

They made camp off a deer trail, tucked under a collapsed ridge where the wind didn’t bite quite as hard. The sun was long gone, dragged under by the tree line, and the cold had come thieving in.

A fire snapped to life with Ellie’s careful work, dry bark and pine needles catching under flint sparks. It cast a low amber glow, flickering over ash-stained hands, over their little circle of silence. They were three bodies, orbiting the same silence. One fight too many.

Joel sat against a stone, one knee bent, the other leg stiff with bruises. He pressed the heel of his hand into his ribs—each breath was a blade. A cracked rib, maybe two. It'd heal in some time. His cheek throbbed where Leela’s palm had landed square beneath the eye. There was still the taste of blood in his mouth from the split inside his cheek, and he didn’t spit it out. He kept it there. Felt like something he owed.

But the rest—the real pain—had nothing to do with flesh.

His knuckles were broken open again. Skin peeled back, raw and crusted with blood. They hadn’t been torn like that in months. Not since Maya. Not since he swore to himself that those days—those versions of him—were done.

He found a patch of old snow, tucked in the roots of a fallen tree, and jammed his hand in it without thinking. The sting cleared his head for a second. Not long. But long enough. Better that than thinking about what he'd lost in the last twenty-four hours.

Across from him, just past the fire’s reach, Leela sat hunched against the bark of a maple, her knees to her chest, arms wrapped tight. Her silhouette was tense. A wire pulled too far. Her face was turned away, but he could still feel the gravity of her silence.

She hadn’t said a word since the fight. Since the slap. Since she told him he’d never touch Maya again.

Joel didn’t blame her.

He couldn’t look at her too long. It felt like staring at something holy that you’d already shattered with your own hands. Like the moment before a deer bolts—only this time, the deer had every reason to tear you apart instead.

Ellie passed around rations—some real food for once, not the dog-food shit Joel had been choking down since he left Jackson. Canned venison. A half-stale biscuit. Dried apples.

Leela barely took a bite. Just lifted the fork, stared at it, waited for the appetite that wasn't coming, and handed it back to Ellie with a quiet shake of her head.

“C'mon, Leela,” Ellie tried. “You can't just—”

“It's okay. You need more energy than I do,” she reasoned. “I'm really fine, honey. Thanks.”

Of course, she wouldn’t eat it. She wasn’t built for this kind of hunger. She could stomach a hundred theorems, burn through chalk and paper and sleepless nights like they were fuel, but this—this fire pit, this blood-caked survival shit—he never wanted her to have to endure it. He’d promised her safety. Comfort within their big, white house with walls thick enough to keep the world out.

But he’d dragged her right into it.

Joel watched her movements like they were coordinates. Markers of the damage. Not one bruise on her skin, but she looked like she’d been through hell. Not the kind he was inured to. The parent alone kind. The watching every shadow in case it takes your child kind. And he’d left her in it.

He cleared his throat. The words scraped coming up. “You two ate somethin’ on the way?”

Leela didn’t respond. Didn’t even twitch.

Ellie glanced between them. Her voice filled the space like a thread trying to stitch up a wound that wouldn’t close. “She foraged,” she said. “I had rations. We got by.”

Joel nodded, though it didn’t ease a damn thing. Getting by wasn’t the point. One day was enough. One day without Maya, not knowing where she was—what she needed. Whether she’d cried herself to sleep. Whether she’d asked for her dad.

His hand throbbed inside the patch of snow he’d buried it in, and he left it there. A self-inflicted punishment that didn’t go deep enough.

He glanced across the fire again.

Leela hadn’t moved. She looked fossilized—ancient and delicate, trapped in amber. Beautiful, brittle. Ready to break under the wrong kind of breath. He wanted to go to her. Kiss her palms. Her feet. Kneel, grovel even. Say anything.

I’m sorry. I did this for you. I didn’t know what else to do. I’m here now. I’m here. Take me back.

But he didn’t move. Didn’t trust his legs. Didn’t trust her to want him near. Didn’t trust himself not to ruin something worse.

“Who’s got Maya now? She okay?” he asked instead, softer this time. Barely a whisper.

Ellie shrugged. “Tommy has her.”

Yet, something in Leela shifted.

She turned her head toward him slowly, like a hinge rusted from disuse. Her eyes gleamed amber glass in the firelight—not soft, not tearful. Eyes that used to flinch from cruelty now dared it.

“Oh, you care so much all of a sudden?”

Joel shrank back. Not from the words—he could handle words. It was the disgust behind them, the truth he could hear in the marrow of her voice.

“Of course I fuckin’ do—”

He stopped himself. The old Joel—the one with fists and fury and pride—wanted to bark something back. But the man in front of her now? All of that had caved inward.

“It’s all I care about,” he said instead, quieter, shriveled on the way out. “She’s all I care about.”

Ellie glanced between them again, saw the scene for what it was, and without a word, she got to her feet with a grunt.

“I’m gonna go scout the area,” she sighed, a quiet, nonsense excuse. Her voice didn’t carry judgment—just tired understanding. And wise enough to leave broken things alone until they stopped bleeding.

Joel barely heard her leave. His eyes were on Leela. On the streak of dried dirt down her neck. The way her free hand curled into a fist at her side.

Leela’s glare didn’t soften. If anything, it sharpened. Her mouth twisted, barely restrained.

“If you did care,” she continued slowly, “you wouldn’t have left her, you lying coward.”

Joel stared into the fire. His ribs ached with every breath. His hand stung. But none of it compared to that.

Coward. That one fit. And still, all he could think was—you deserve it. Every word. Every second of this.

“You nearly cost my daughter her father,” she went on. “The one you promised you’d be. All for your self-righteous, noble bullshit that I never even knew about.”

Our daughter, he wanted to say, but it caught in his throat. It rose halfway up his throat before dying there, stuck in that place where pride and sorrow went to rot. Because maybe it wasn’t true anymore. Maybe that word—our—was already gone.

Joel stared into the fire. His ribs throbbed. His knuckles ached. But none of it hurt like her voice.

“I left to protect what is mine,” he muttered. “I left because—”

“Because what?” Leela cut in. “Because you didn’t think I could handle it? Because you thought sneaking off in the middle of the night was kinder than just letting me choose with you?”

Joel blinked, and it hit him in the gut: she wasn’t exclaiming because she didn’t need to anymore. Because maybe she was done needing anything from him at all. It was worse this way—each word a clean and precise incision, a scalpel gliding through flesh. Pain wearing the skin of rage.

Grief had taken root behind her eyes, and it had teeth.

“I don’t care that you didn’t tell me about LA sooner,” she said. “I don’t even care that you thought you were loving me by keeping it all to yourself—because you’re a dense, selfish, sad, angry bastard, Joel, and I knew that from day one. I chose you anyway.”

His mouth opened. Closed. Hollow. Stupid. Like a man reaching for an apology after the fire’s already burned down the house.

“I hate your goddamn nerve,” she spat. “I hate that you thought you were sparing me. I hate knowing that if you died out here, I wouldn't even know where to bury you.”

Her voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to. That calm—that cutting calm—was worse than rage.

Joel tried to speak again, defend himself, make her understand. Nothing came. Just breaths. Just fire.

“I hate that you thought you were protecting me,” she said. “You always think that you know what’s best. That you can carry it all on your own. That if you just bleed enough, it counts as love.”

Joel leaned forward. His cracked rib barked in protest, but he barely registered the pain. “I wasn’t tryin’ to—”

“Yes, you were,” she snapped.

She turned her face back to the fire, as if looking at him hurt worse than the memories. “You don’t get to decide what I can survive, Joel.”

His hands shook now. Tremors he couldn’t hide anymore.

“I do,” he rasped. “I fuckin’ do. I’m the only one who does.”

Leela laughed. Not from amusement—but something bitter and jagged that barely passed for a laugh at all. “You think that makes it better?”

Joel looked down at his hands. At the crusted blood, the swollen joints. The man they belonged to.

“You haven't seen what I've seen. Fought, bled, and starved with this shit. Leela, there are slavers out here,” he said, eyes dropping to the fire. His voice was unraveling. “And if you get away from that, there are people who try to eat you. Hunters. Raiders. Rap—”

He stopped. The word stuck like a bone in his throat. A single syllable, too heavy to lift up. Don’t say it. Don’t fucking say it.

But they both heard it anyway.

Leela flinched like she’d been struck. In half a moment, her shoulders straightened, eyes steel again.

“You think I don’t know that?” she said, sharp as shrapnel. “I have been living with it in every breath I take.”

Joel wanted to disappear. Not walk away—vanish. Just cease. Be unmade.

“I left because I thought I could do something for you,” he said, voice low, cracking open at the seams. “Find someone. Anyone. Get them your proof. Make it count. That way, maybe everything wouldn’t just sit there in the dirt and rot, like you said. That is what you wanted.”

The fire popped. A spark shot upward, fizzled, and died in the cold air.

Leela stared at him. And in that look was every sleepless night. Every muffled sob she’d buried in Maya’s curls. Every second of silence and solitude he’d forced her to carry alone.

“You think I needed you to go fix it for me, Joel? What are you, my partner or some god?” she asked. Her voice was raw now. Stripped to the bone. “You don’t get to disappear and say it’s for our own good. No. You don’t get to wrap your guilt up in goddamn sacrifice and act like it’s some kind of gift.”

His lips parted, then closed again. His throat constricted like it was physically rejecting words.

Because what was he going to say? That he did it for them? That he didn’t tell her because it would’ve broken her heart that he kept from her this long?

That he thought maybe—just maybe—if he made it out to LA, if he delivered her precious legacy, if he gave the Fireflies her working theory, maybe then he wouldn’t have to carry the guilt anymore?

He was supposed to carry it. That was the deal. That was the role he’d carved out for himself after all the blood, after every goddamn life he'd taken and every one he'd failed to save.

But Leela didn’t see it that way.

All she saw was the door closing. The boots gone from the threshold. A child wailing at night with no arms strong enough to lift her.

And all Joel could whisper—quiet, hollow, useless—was: “I needed to do the right thing for you.��

She stood. Slow. Heavy. Like her joints were made of stone. The firelight curved around her, throwing shadows under her eyes, painting her tired skin gold and gray.

“I needed you to stay. To talk to me, to trust me.”

And that was the kill shot. It landed clean.

Presence over preemption. That was all it was to her, only he realized too late.

“I didn’t need some far-off maybe or prove yourself to someone who knows you,” she said. “I needed you. Here. I needed to step outside the house without worrying if she’d choke or fall or cry herself raw. I needed her dad to hold her so I didn’t have to do it all alone. I needed someone to watch her grow with me. Because that is what is real, Joel.”

Joel closed his eyes.

And he saw her—Maya—small and warm in his arms. Her tiny fist tangled in his shirt collar. Her big, bright, brown eyes blinking up at him. The way she said Dada like it meant safety.

He’d traded all of that for an empty road. A mission. A maybe.

And now here he was—blood dried on his collar, ribs cracked, knuckles split, and heart hollowed out like the carcass of some roadkill he hadn’t even seen in time.

He’d gone looking for hope. Thinking he could trade blood and sweat and scars for redemption. For Ellie. For Tess. For Sarah. That if he walked far enough, bled hard enough, proved his love with enough miles and silence and pain—he’d earn something back.

But Leela was right. He’d dressed his guilt in duty. And called it love.

And now all he had to show for it was this—The wind in the trees. The crackle of dying fire. A man lost.

He wanted to go to her. To hold her back, take her hand, press his forehead to hers, say the words he couldn’t ever seem to find.

But he didn’t move.

He just sat there, broken and burning, his only fallback left to survival. The fire crackled on, spitting cinders into the dark.

And Joel—protector, survivor, fool—just watched it, and hated the man he’d reverted to.

DAY 3-5: EN ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES - APPROX. SIXTY HOURS SOUTH OF JACKSON

“We're seeing this through. So I'm not leaving, and neither is Ellie,” Leela had finalized for him outright.

“Look, I can't—”

“I don't need you to. I said I'm not leaving, Joel.”

Stubborn fucking mama.

And Joel didn’t fight them on it anymore.

He should’ve. He told himself that. Told himself it the morning since they saddled up and rode out together—that if he were the man he used to be, he’d have grabbed both of them by the arm, dragged them back into Jackson, forced them to stay where it was safe.

But Leela had made her choice. And the truth was, he didn’t have it in him to push her away again.

So now, they rode.

The world around them unspooled like a reel of forgotten film. Dry plains gave way to rocky scrub, sagebrush rustling under the winter wind. They passed old highways cracked wide with weeds, a rust-eaten railroad bridge swallowed half by floodwater, a small burned-out town swallowed whole by silence. The road south stretched endlessly ahead, its shoulders littered with bones of the old world—billboards sun-bleached to blankness, gas stations gutted, houses like open, parched mouths.

The cold had let up somewhere past Idaho. By the fourth day, they’d started peeling off their outer layers, stripping down to threadbare flannel and undershirts. The sun was sharp now, almost springlike in the way it bore down around noon. Nights were still bitter, but the frost no longer clung to their boots come morning.

Ellie named every strange cactus they passed, tried to make him laugh by pointing out skeletons shaped like they died mid-dance. One, half-buried in the sand, was hunched like it was tying its shoe; another leaned back, arms splayed, the skull twisted toward the sun.

He gave her a few hums in response, nothing more. His attention kept drifting behind her—to the woman riding pillion, quiet as a shadow.

Leela didn’t speak much. Not to him. Just to Ellie. She wasn’t angry anymore. That was the worst of it.

Anger had a shape, volume—one he could understand, parry, push back against. This silence was weightless and permanent. Like the ash after a burn.

At night, she curled in close to the fire, wrapped in her own coat. She didn’t sleep easily, just like old times. Joel noticed the way her body stayed curled too tightly, like she was bracing for something. And sometimes, when it was his turn to take watch, he’d hear her stir behind him, restless, breath catching in her throat.

She’d wake with a sharp noise, legs thrashing, hand flying to her side like she expected something there.

Joel would glance over, pretend he hadn’t noticed. But he always did.

One night, she jerked upright so fast her hood fell back. Her breath came fast, shallow, and she folded forward with her arms around her knees, head ducked low like she was trying to disappear inside herself.

“Darlin’, you alright?” he had tried to call to her once.

“I—I wasn’t sleeping, just...” she drawled off, voice dry with exhaustion.

He nodded. “Okay. I'm right here.”

Joel turned his gaze back to the dark horizon, giving her that thin veil of privacy she always clung to. But when he heard the rustle of her coat, the soft scrape of her boots in the dirt, he realized she hadn’t lain back down.

Instead, she stayed awake beside him. Didn’t say a word. Just sat there with her arms folded, eyes watching the fire.

This happened more than once. Sometimes she’d wake from those dreams and never return to sleep. Other times, she didn’t even bother lying down—just sat with whoever was on watch, a silent shadow, her eyes rimmed red and distant come morning.

Joel didn’t ask. He wouldn’t push her, not about that.

He knew the ghosts that came back louder in the quiet. Knew how the wilderness could turn remembering into something sharper, hungrier. How it could whisper the worst things back to you in your own voice. And even if she didn’t say it, he knew exactly what kept her awake. What she was afraid of.

Sometimes he wondered if she thought Maya would be safer if she’d stayed behind. If she questioned the math, the risk. If she blamed herself, the way people like them always did.

But even like this, she was still… same old Leela. Which meant she was still incredible.

She knew how to move through this land, the way a bird knows when to migrate. He caught her one afternoon scaling the knotted side of a tree that had grown wild across the ruins of a collapsed overpass. She gripped the bark like she was born to it, legs coiled beneath her, moving with deft efficiency. She tossed down a fistful of small, yellow apricots, slightly underripe, and a few wild pears with bruised skins that thudded onto Joel's waiting jacket. Later, he watched her dig up something near the riverbed—root veg, maybe burdock or wild carrot—and clean it carefully, rubbing the dirt off with her sleeves, pressing them to her nose, testing if they were sweet or poisonous.

Joel lowered himself beside her with a grunt, his knees stiff. He held open her pack as she added more roots, careful not to crush the fruit she’d wrapped in a handkerchief. Woodsmoke wafted through the air from the fire that Ellie had just started uphill.

“You always know what to look for,” he said, keeping his voice low. “The stuff that won’t kill us, I mean.”

Leela didn’t look up. “You get good at it when you’re tired of throwing up pine bark.”

He huffed a quiet laugh. “Pine bark?”

She picked up another root, brushed the dirt from its ridges. “Good for the heart.”

Joel nodded, chewing the inside of his cheek. “I'll take some of that when we get back home.”

She doesn't say anything more. His sentence hung in the air, almost shaping into a misreality.

He kept looking at her hands—fast, continued, precise. She wasn’t being cold. Just simple. Honest. It was a fact of the earth, same as everything else she pulled from it.

Evidently, she hated canned food. Always had. Joel remembered how she used to nudge the tins aside, which he'd brought her from patrol, grimacing at mushy peaches and synthetic meat stew like they were poison. So now, she gathered what she could. Built fires. Let the fruit and roots roast slowly over the open flame.

That night, he found three apricots—peeled, pitted, still warm from where they’d sat on a flat rock near his sleeping bag.

Didn’t let him go hungry.

And in the morning, when he stirred against the half-deflated camping mat, shivering from the cold ground, ribs smarting, there it was—her jacket draped across his shoulders, fur tickling his nose. That puffy green one she always wore, the one patched at the elbows. Smelled faintly of smoke and lavender soap. She must’ve covered him sometime before dawn, when the fire died low and the frost crept back in. His fingers curled over it without thinking, bringing it to his nose. He didn’t want to let it go.

Didn’t let him freeze either.

“Take care of your own damn self out here,” he muttered to her that afternoon, when Ellie had wandered off to check a sound in the brush. “I’ll be fine.”

Leela didn’t answer. Maybe she’d heard it too many times before.

Soon enough, they were moving through the shell of a city—some old Vegas township gutted by time and flame. Dust coated everything like it had fallen just yesterday and never stopped. Storefronts with sun-bleached awnings sagged in silence, windows cracked or blasted clean through, their displays long since picked over—or left to rot. An old jewellery store stood crooked between a payday loans kiosk and a shuttered vape lounge, its signage hanging by one rusted chain.

Joel didn’t like it. Too many angles. Too much open space.

Ellie pushed open the busted glass door.

“Gimme a sec,” she called over her shoulder. “Might be something useful in here.”

Joel stayed out on the sidewalk, scanning the street, back set against the tilt of the wind. Leela had wandered across the way, squinting up at a streetlamp that had snapped clean in half and was tangled in telephone wires like a dead limb. Her coat tugged in the breeze, hair pulled back tight today.

Joel kept half an eye on her, the other on Ellie.

From the inside, Ellie’s voice floated out through the cracked window. “Ooh, now this is romantic. Joel, check it.”

Joel let out a harshened sigh. “Don’t, kiddo.”

“C’mon,” she said, grinning, holding up an old velvet ring box missing its jewel. “Little shiny thing like this? She’d probably cry.”

“She doesn’t want all that,” he muttered, eyes tracking the rooftops. “Doesn’t want anything from me. The way she's goin' about this, I might have to move out again when we get back.”

Ellie snorted, still rummaging. “Sure, that’s what she says. But I dunno, man—if I survived the apocalypse and the kind of shit you two been through? I’d want some credit. Maybe a bouquet of barbed wire. Something symbolic.”

Joel gave her a flat look through the broken window. “You done yet?”

Ellie wiggled the ring box again, then tossed it onto a dusty counter. “You’re no fun. What happened to carving rings from bone for her?” She held up the sign of the horns. “Disgusting, but metal as hell.”

Joel huffed through his nose, but the corner of his mouth twitched.

Leela turned back then, catching his eye from across the street. She didn’t wave. Just nodded—barely—and returned her attention to the crumpled lamppost, fingers brushing the wiring like she was piecing something together.

And then came the gunfire.

No warning. Just the sudden crack-crack-crack of it, echoing off old brick, and Joel flinched sideways as the sharp hiss of a bullet splintered stone inches from his ear.

“Down, down, move!” he roared, rifle up in a second.

Ellie hit the floor, crawling fast toward the back exit, already firing through the jagged window glass. “Joel!”

Joel ducked behind a rusted truck frame, adrenaline flattening his breath. The street flared with gunfire, loud and close. Somewhere to his left, Leela had disappeared from the sidewalk. Goddamnit, where was she? Where was she?

“Ellie,” he growled, crouching low as he swung around the corner of the car, “head down, c'mon!”

“Yeah, I got it!” she shot back, sharp with focus. “You see Leela anywhere?”

“I dunno,” he muttered. His heart punched harder. Maybe she found cover nearby. Dammit, that stupid ring joke didn’t feel so funny now.

Ellie ducked and returned fire without hesitation, pushing herself into the side of a rusted-out car. Joel followed suit, rifle up, stock tight against his shoulder.

“Fuckin' ambush,” he grunted. “You see that? Two o’clock—rooftop. Gotta be fast, kiddo.”

Ellie scoffed. “I know, I ain't blind, old man.”

They’d walked right into it. Fucking scavenger crew—hunter types, the kind that circled ruined cities like vultures. Not Fireflies. Not FEDRA. Just the kind who didn’t blink at killing for shoes or rations.

Shots tore through the air like thunder cracks. Joel’s head snapped to the sound—figures ducking behind a flipped bus, another peeling off to circle left. Four, five, six—too many.

His gut tightened.

“Ellie, no. Stay down!”

“I got it, Joel!”

She broke cover, darting low. But she didn’t get far.

One of them—tall, fast—slipped out from the wreckage like a fucking shadow, got behind her, arm around her throat, dragging her back behind a wall.

Joel stopped breathing.

Everything else—gunfire, shouts, the pounding of his own heart—fell away. The world narrowed to that one point: Ellie being taken.

He saw red. And he pushed forward.

Not tactical. Not planned. Just rage and instinct.

He exploded from cover with a snarl caught in his throat, moving like he had a purpose and a goddamn clock ticking down. His revolver barked—once, twice. The first man went down with a bullet in his chest. The second—gutshot—dropped screaming. Joel didn’t blink.

He was already on the third.

The one with his arm wrapped around Ellie’s throat.

Joel hit him from behind, slamming him into the wall with bone-cracking force. The man grunted, tried to turn, but Joel hooked his elbow and wrenched—shoulder dislocated with a wet pop—and drove a knee into his spine, once, twice, until he dropped Ellie with a choked gasp.

She hit the ground, coughing.

Joel didn’t stop.

He fell on the bastard like a dog on a carcass, knife already in his hand. It wasn’t quick. He didn’t want quick.

First strike—base of the neck, just above the collarbone, angled down to sever the artery. Second strike—lower, ribcage, a twisting motion that made the man buck and scream.

Blood sprayed warm across Joel’s chest, his hands, soaking into his shirt. His knuckles were already skinned raw from impact. He drove his boot into the man’s hip when he tried to crawl. Then the knife again, this time straight into the chest.

Between the ribs. In and out. Faultless. Practiced.

Joel didn’t stop, grunting, letting the man bleed, until the man went still.

And even then, for a moment, he just crouched there—knife dripping, chest heaving, the silence crushing.

Then he heard it. Not Ellie. Not gunfire.

A gasp.

Joel’s head whipped up.

Leela.

Ten feet away, half-shadowed by the remains of a splintered awning. Her boots frozen mid-step in a puddle slick with oil and blood. She wasn’t crouched, wasn’t armed, wasn’t anything but exposed. Frozen. Not moving. Not blinking. Her hands had lifted halfway—toward her mouth, toward her wide eyes, he couldn’t tell.

Not just the scene. Not the blood. Not the body crumpled beneath him, throat torn wide, chest leaking into the cracked pavement.

Him.

Joel. The man who traced the outline of her ribs under cotton sheets. The man who kissed her slowly as breakfast sizzled on the stove, called her ‘darlin’’ until she broke out a grin, danced slow with her in the living room to the record player, Maya on his hip, all honey and drawl. The man she let in, trusted, after all she’d been through.

But he wasn’t that man now.

Only this was left. This feral thing she’d never seen before.

Blood up til his elbows. Wild-eyed. Panting like a fucking animal. Knife still tight in his broken fists. He didn’t know how long he’d been on top of the guy. Didn’t remember the last stab. Couldn’t even tell where the screaming had stopped and his breathing had started.

And she saw it. All of it.

Her expression—it gutted him more than the fighting ever could.

She didn’t look angry.

No, she looked like she’d just walked through a door into another life, and one she hadn’t agreed to. There was fear there—not loud, not flailing—but silent. Contained. Like someone who’d learned a long time ago that panic didn’t save you.

“Leela—” His voice was gravel, torn and rasped and nothing soft.

She flinched when he stood. Not away—just a jerk of her shoulders, like she’d been struck once and braced for the second.

And that—was the fucking worst of it.

Because Joel had seen her scared before. Seen her tense up in the dark, eyes scanning for shadows that didn’t exist. Seen her sit up from a nightmare with her hands clenched into fists, her breath short and strangled.

But she’d never looked like that at him.

He didn't get to go to her. Get to explain. He wanted to wipe the blood off his hands, off his chest, off the whole goddamn world. But it was too late. Because right then—

“C'mon, we have to go!” Ellie’s voice splintered through the space between them. She was already pulling on Leela’s wrist. “Now, now, go, go, go!”

Joel heard the shot before it echoed. Close.

He saw Leela’s fingers twitch—like she might reach for him, or maybe just steady herself. For one splinter of a second, he felt everything—her horror, her disbelief, the silent question in her eyes: Is this the man I love? The one Maya sweetly calls da-da?

And then that old, festering and terrible being in him took the reins. The hunter. The killer. The man who always fucking survives.

“MOVE!” he barked, voice cracked open by fury and urgency. A dire command.

Leela jolted. Her head ducked. Her feet moved.

And they ran.

They didn’t stop running until the city was a smear behind them—just smoke and ruin on the horizon, softened by distance and dust.

They found cover in a half-collapsed service station half-sunk into the dirt, the roof bowed like a snapped spine, windows blown out, desert wind whistling through the hollow bones of what used to be civilization.

Joel sat slumped against a concrete pillar, elbows braced on his knees, hands stained and stiff. Dried blood mapped across his knuckles, under his fingernails, along the creases of his palms like some fucked-up tattoo he hadn’t earned but couldn’t wash off. His shirt clung to him, crusted dark across the chest.

He hadn’t changed. Couldn’t. Didn’t deserve the comfort of clean clothes just yet. No river around to wash off in any way, and even if there had been, it wouldn’t scrub out what was under his skin.

He hadn’t looked at her. Not once.

She sat maybe too far away. Back to a wall. Her pack in her lap, unzipped. She wasn’t cleaning a weapon like methodical Ellie—not Leela. She didn’t carry guns. Joel would never let her.

Instead, she was threading a needle.

Or trying to.

He watched her from the corner of his eye, head bowed like he wasn’t. Her hands—usually so steady, precise—were quivering. The needle slipped from her fingers twice. She picked it up again, quietly, without swearing or sighing, and tried again. Her knees were drawn up. The strap she was stitching had only a small tear, maybe half an inch—but she worked it like it held her together.

He’d seen her sew before. Months back, she once fixed the lining in his jacket in less than three minutes with the same damned needle. She’d repaired most of Joel’s clothes back home, stitched her own strappy little tops, embroidered tiny designs into Maya's clothes, humming while she did it, threading them with ease, her fingers confident and graceful.

Every stitch is a solution, she'd say to him when he watched her, and the design is just the equation. A measure, a numeral. Now she looked like she didn’t even remember how to hold the damn thing.

Because every so often her eyes slid to him.

No, not to him. At him.

The difference. His hands. His shirt. His boots, still stained from when that last bastard had coughed blood all over the ground and it had splashed up onto Joel’s shins.

And she’d seen it all.

The way he’d moved. Not just fast. Not just angry. But precise. Like he knew the exact spots to hit to ruin a man. Like it wasn’t new. Like he’d done it before. Because he had. More times than he could count.

And she knew that now.

She’d seen what was under the soft Texan drawl, the morning coffee, the warm, calloused hands that tucked Maya’s curls behind her ears when she ate. She’d seen what that tenderness was built over.

Violence. Unapologetic, unflinching, survivalist violence.

And Joel couldn’t scrub it off. Couldn’t fold it up and stash it away before she got too close. He almost wished she had screamed and told him he was a monster. Asked how the hell he could do what he did. At least then he’d know where to place her in all of this.

Joel swallowed, jaw tight. A vein throbbed at his temple. His heart had slowed, but it still kicked, irregular, like a motor trying to start after a crash.

What the hell was he supposed to say? Sorry you saw me gut a man alive? Sorry I turned into the thing you’ve spent a year convincing yourself I wasn’t?

He’d been brutal before. She just hadn’t seen it.

Only now she’d seen what he truly was. The old world didn’t raise kind men—it bred survivors. And Joel had survived every way a man could. Through pain. Through blood. Through choices that never stopped echoing even now.

The only thing he managed to say, finally, low and gruff and barely louder than the wind scraping across the station floor, “We’re still a full day out. We’ll keep movin’ at first light, so get some rest.”

And look, Joel was trying to rest. Trying and failing, but still.

His head was a goddamn mess. Static. Replay. A loop he couldn’t break. Blood. Breath. The sound that bastard made when the knife went in—wet and sudden, a choke of surprise right before the silence.

Joel exhaled hard through his nose. Closed his eyes. Let his head fall back against the cracked concrete wall, cool against the sweat on his neck.

And then he heard it. Soft at first. Half-whispers. Barely there.

“I’m Leela.” A pause. A breath. A shift of cloth behind the shattered doorway of what used to be a bathroom. “Leela... no. Leela. I want to tell you—no. I have solved—my parents and I have solved—no.” A frustrated exhale. Then, quieter, “I am Leela… dammit. C’mon.”

Joel opened one eye. Turned his head.

The light in the bathroom was dim—barely a glow from some scavenged flashlight she’d propped up near the mirror. He couldn’t see her, but the words carried, echoing off tile and porcelain. She must’ve thought she was whispering. Must’ve thought no one could hear.

Across the room, Ellie was propped up on her elbow, her face lit faintly by that same flicker. She was grinning, eyes alight with mischief.

“Been goin’ on for ten minutes,” she snickered, voice hushed, like sharing a secret. “It’s adorable. I think she's nervous to meet these Firefly folks.”

Joel didn’t smile. Just raised an eyebrow. Looked back up at the ceiling.

Adorable. Maybe. Or maybe it was a bad sign. A red flag waving itself stupid in the middle of the dark.

Practicing your own goddamn name. Stumbling over words like they were bricks in your mouth. That wasn’t adorable. That was pressure. That was fear, chewing at the edges. That was a person so wound up she didn’t trust herself to say hello without screwing it up.

His jaw tightened.

There was a part of him—a stupid, reckless part—that wanted to get up. Walk over there, nice and quiet. Knock on the doorframe just once. Let her know she wasn’t alone. That she didn’t have to rehearse anything. That if she needed to talk, he’d sit there and listen, no matter how long it took.

But the other part—the bigger, meaner part—kept him pinned down.

Because he still hadn’t earned the right. Not after what she saw. And the last thing she needed was him looming over her, making it worse.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. Exhaled slowly. He was a complete fucking idiot.

“You’re an idiot, Joel.”

For a moment, he thought he had been the one to say it out loud.

He blinked and turned his head again. Ellie. Still watching him. Smirking now, like she’d been waiting for him to figure it out.

He grunted. “Not in the mood, kid.”

“You’re never in the mood,” she shot back, flopping onto her bedroll. She rolled her eyes, but there was no real bite behind it—just the kind of tired, familiar sass that came from too many nights like this. “Doesn’t stop you from being a total dickhead.”

He gave her a look. One of those long, dead-eyed stares that usually shut her up. The kind that said, Don’t push me.

Not tonight.

She just grinned, hands behind her head. “You really think she came all this way—through all those cities, with people trying to kill us every ten miles—just to tell you to fuck off?”

He didn’t answer. Not right away.

“She cares about your hardass, just as much as I do,” Ellie muttered.

So, maybe Ellie saw all the things Joel didn’t let himself see. Or maybe she was just better at hope.

Because he had thought it.

More than once, he’d pictured it—that she’d reach the Fireflies, hand off whatever math magic was burning a hole through her skull, nod her thanks, and go. Cut the thread. Return to Jackson. Return to their—her daughter. Back to her life before he bulldozed into it like he always did with anything good. Maybe she’d have the decency to leave a note at the door when kicking him out.

Joel, please just leave us alone. I don't want a psychopath raising my daughter.

Maybe he deserved that.

He sat there a moment longer, thumb working absently along a notch in the stock of his rifle, tracing the smooth edge over and over. The kid was right. She had come all this way. Across states, through wasteland, through gunfire and ash, and sickness and silence. She’d fought beside them. Saved his life once. Slept with one eye open, traded warmth for distance, wore her grief like it was stitched into her coat. All of that. And not just for some cause.

She left Maya behind.

The thought hit like a hammer to the sternum.

Maya. His baby girl. His sweetheart, who barely fit in his arms anymore, yet so small she could tuck her frightened face under his chin when it thundered. He’d seen it. Seen the way Leela held her now, so different from all those months back—no fear, just pure maternal instinct. Even when she was dead on her feet, her touch was protective. Fierce.

You don’t leave that kind of love behind unless you got no goddamn choice. Unless whatever’s out there—the person, the reason—is worth the risk of not coming back.

He ran a hand down his face. Felt the rough scrape of beard under his fingers. Closed his eyes for a second. “Jesus,” he muttered. “Goddamn.”

Because no matter how many times he tried to tell himself she’d come for the Fireflies, for the math, for the cause—every time he looked at that bathroom door and heard her voice cracking around his name—he knew better.

She’d come for him.

A tangle of shame and wonder and raw, stupid hope in his chest made him feel like a little boy again. A dumb, dangerous feeling.

But his eyes slid back to the thin light under the bathroom door. The edge of her pack catching a sliver of glow. The sound of her voice still faint, repeating those words, again and again, as if she was willing herself into belief.

I am Leela.

Joel sat up.

His joints popped in protest, old aches coming to life as he rose slowly to his feet. The room tilted for a second—blood loss and no real sleep—but he steadied himself with a hand on the wall.

“Wipe that smile off your face, you little shit,” he hissed to Ellie.

“Whatta marshmallow,” Ellie mumbled, just watching him go, her smirk softening.

The door wasn’t fully closed. He nudged it open with two fingers.

The bathroom was dim and damp, smelling faintly of rust, infection and old mildew. A cracked mirror stretched above the sink, fractured down one side like a spiderweb frozen mid-snap.

Leela, hunched over the filthy porcelain basin, arms braced, hair falling around her face and body like a curtain. Her bare shoulders, under that black tanktop, rose and fell with shallow, controlled breaths. She hadn’t heard him yet. Or maybe she had and didn’t move, too far gone in whatever loop she was caught in.

Joel stepped in.

Quiet, like muscle memory. Like coming up behind her at the kitchen counter, when she was at the chopping board or scribbling on paper. In that quiet way he used to do, just to let her know he was there, he wanted her near, that he didn’t need her to talk.

He slid his hands around her waist.

Her body tensed.

Not a flinch exactly—but enough. A subtle stiffening beneath his palms that made his chest cave in a little. His heart fractured in that single instinctive reaction.

He didn’t pull away. Because as it had been established, he was selfish fucker. He stayed and didn’t say anything.

Just rested his forehead against the back of her head, where her hair smelled faintly of soap and smoke and salt. His eyes shut. He couldn’t bear the mirror. Couldn’t look up and see the condition of them—this makeshift version of a life that should’ve been warm, and home, and full of sweet nothings.

He’d had a picture in his head.

Them, side-by-side at a clean sink, still damp from the shower. Brushing their teeth together while Maya babbled from their bed outside, waiting to be put to sleep. Arguing about whether to fry the rice or save the eggs for pancakes. Leela nudging him with her elbow because he always hogged the mirror.

That was the image. The one he clung to.

Not this. Not her hands shaking just barely, gripping the sides of a stained sink as she tried to convince herself she still belonged to something greater than this broken world.

He didn’t speak at first. Just breathed her in—like maybe that alone could calm the blood in his veins. His hands were splayed over her powerful middle now, warm through the thin fabric of her shirt. She was too still. Not pulling away. Not leaning in.

So he moved slowly.

Pushed her all her thick, long hair gently over one shoulder, careful not to tug. It slipped between his fingers like threadbare silk. Then he bent forward, kissed the shell of her ear. Just once. Just enough.

“There’s a part of me that—I never wanted you to see that, darlin',” he whispered, the words nearly breaking in his throat.

She didn’t move.

Joel’s forehead pressed to the side of her head again. He closed his eyes. “That… thing. That man with the knife. That’s what’s left when I run outta reasons. When I think I gotta protect somethin’ I already lost.”

Silence buzzed in the air.

He wanted to tell her exactly that he’d do it all again to keep Ellie safe. That sometimes you didn’t get the choice to be gentle. That the world didn’t work in softness and she should wake the fuck up. But all of it sounded like a goddamn excuse, and worse—it sounded like the truth.

His voice faltered off. “If you hate me… I get it. I ain’t askin’ you to forget what I did. I just—”

God, what was he thinking? He wouldn't want her apologies anyway.

His chin lifted a little. “But I’m still me, Leela. Still Maya’s. Still yours, if there’s any part of you that wants that.”

There was no dramatic pause. No breath held in hope. He said it like a man naming his failures in the dark. Mum. Certain. Not because he thought it would change anything—but because it was true. And because she deserved to hear it out loud.

Maybe she was remembering what it meant to let something dangerous that close. Maybe this was the moment she realized she couldn’t love him. Maybe this was the moment he proved he didn’t deserve it.

He didn’t blame her.

Then he felt her shift. Just barely.

Her hand came up and back, platting into his hair. Her fingers scraped lightly at his scalp, a slow, grounding motion—not tender, not affectionate, not forgiving. Just there. Present. Real.

She didn’t say it’s okay. She’d never needed to wrap things in softness. Sadly, she knew what it meant to be ruined.

To be taken apart and put back together with pieces missing. She’d lived in the wreckage of her own skin, patched herself up with logic and reason, with equations and notebooks, trying to make sense of something that defied sense.

And still—he loved her. Not in spite of it. Not around it. Just through it. All the way through. So what if he’d split a man open like kindling? What if she’d been split first—by someone who’d never deserved to touch her in the first place?

She was here. She’d come. With her voice cracking in the dark and her hands braced on a sink like it was the only thing keeping her upright. She was still herself. Still trying.

Joel let out a breath against her neck.

And then, quiet—low and splintering—she said, “I’ve been dead before, Joel. This is not what kills me.”

The words lodged in his chest like a nail. No dramatics. No trembling voice. The truth. Her fingers kept moving, dragging slow circles in his hair.

And when she turned her head—just scarcely—he saw her in the mirror. Saw the red-rimmed eyes, the taut mouth, the exhaustion etched so deep into her face it looked like it might never fade.

She met his gaze in the cracked glass. A long moment passed.

There was a change, not in her body, not in the set of her jaw or the tremble of her breath, but in the way she looked at him. Like seeing a wound that hadn’t stopped bleeding and finally understanding why the bandages never worked. A clarity there he was familiar with.

Joel just watched her eyes, the way they softened and steeled in the same breath. The way grief and love could live in the same goddamn face.

He saw her swallow. Her throat worked once, twice, like the words weren’t forming—they were fighting their way up.

And then, without turning fully, she said, “It’s horrible. How grateful I am that you can become... that.”

He blinked. His heart gave a slow, brutal thud against his ribs.

“Because it means no one will ever touch her. Not Maya. Not while you’re breathing.”

And just like that, he had to bite the inside of his cheek. Hard. To keep from falling into whatever that was curling up inside him. All that shame and pride and an ache so old it had turned quiet.

Her head stayed dipped, his mouth just a breath away from her skin.

The silence between them wasn’t hollow anymore. It had mass. Weight. Like a room full of smoke that they’d both learned to breathe in.

Joel didn’t move, didn’t dare. His hand remained at her waist, palm flat, fingers barely curled. He could feel the heaves of her breathing—still tight, still not stable. But alive. Still with him.

He should’ve said something. He knew it. Should’ve said I’m sorry, even if it wasn’t enough. Should’ve said you can hate me, I’ll still kill for you. Should’ve said you can take Maya away, and I’ll still be at your back the rest of my life.

But every sentence that came to mind sounded like another wound. Another wrong turn.

So he stayed quiet. And waited. Let her have this moment to leave—if that’s what she needed. But then—

She turned. Just a little. Enough that her shoulder brushed against his chest. Enough that he saw her face not in the mirror, but right there—real and close. Red-rimmed eyes. Lips chapped from the cold, pale, parted just a bit.

There was no invitation. No demand. Just presence. And that—God help him—was what crushed him.

Joel raised his hand, slowly. Let his knuckles ghost across her jaw like he was scared to touch her too hard, like she might shatter.

She didn’t lean in. She didn’t lean away. She just stood there. Breathing still.

That was all the backing he needed.

The kiss he prompted was not soft. Not romantic like the hundred before. It was dry, cracked and laced with grief. His mouth moved over hers like he was memorizing the shape of her pain, and hers opened to him with something like surrender—not of will, anything but.

They didn’t move or deepen. Didn’t gasp or moan or pull or want or seek anything more.

They just connected. Two broken things, sealed at the seam for a single breath of repose in the storm.

Joel’s hand stayed on her cheek, rough thumb grazing the edge of her temple. His other hand, the one still resting at her waist, gripped just a little tighter, like he couldn’t bear the thought of letting go now. Not after everything. Not after seeing the worst of each other and still not walking away.

He didn’t know if this meant anything, if it was the beginning of the end. Or just a flicker of what used to be.

But when they pulled apart—slow, wistful, just inches—her eyes opened again.

Clear. Tired. Still full of all the rage and grief and brilliance that made her who she was.

“You’re still in there, Joel,” she whispered. Not accusing. Not forgiving. Just observing. Like she was taking stock of a fire that wouldn’t quite die, even after the smoke had choked the sky.

Joel held her gaze for a moment, and then dropped it—couldn’t take the weight of it. He exhaled, slow and heavy, eyes closing. His voice came low and coarse, barely brushing the air between them.

“Don’t know if that’s a good thing.”

He leaned in, pressed a kiss just below her ear. A whisper of a thing. A thank you. An imprecise I’m sorry. A Jesus, what the hell are we now?

Outside, the wind pushed against the walls of the small bathroom like it wanted in. The fire crackled somewhere in the next room, Ellie’s shadow moving quietly near the doorway, always vigilant, giving them space.

Inside, Leela didn’t speak. But her fingers—still trembling—moved to cover his on her abdomen. Held them there. No tighter. No looser.

Just there.

Joel let the moment breathe, let the silence settle. His throat worked once before he spoke again, voice barely a rasp.

“When we get to California, whatever happens… I just…” He paused, brow furrowing. “You don’t gotta decide anything yet. I just need to know I’ll still get to see my little girl.”

A flicker passed through Leela’s eyes. She didn’t flinch or draw back, but she didn’t soften either.

She looked at him like she was trying to hold him in focus through a haze of old pain and newer fractures. Behind her gaze, where he lived, there it was—subtle, distant.

Her fingers didn’t move from his. But her voice, when it came, was quiet. Neutral. Like she was choosing every word as if it could tilt the precarious balance in this world.

“Let’s see what happens first.”

That was all. Not yes. Not no. Not never. But not enough either.

Joel’s jaw worked. He almost nodded—but didn’t. Almost pulled away—but couldn’t.

Instead, he kept his hand where it was, over her belly, where Maya used to sleep once, safe and tiny. Where Leela had once felt the flutter of her little feet and hands through her skin, long before she had her pretty name.

“You don’t gotta do it for me,” he said at last. “But she’s mine too. I need both of you.”

Leela didn’t argue. Her silence said she knew. Said she’d always known. But knowing didn’t always mean trusting.

Still, she kept his hand where it was.

DAY 7: CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, PASADENA, CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES - APPROX. EIGHT-FOUR HOURS SOUTH OF JACKSON

The sun stretched long over the broken streets of Pasadena in the Golden State, just as much, casting amber behind a veil of smog. The quiet clip of hooves on cracked asphalt echoed like a heartbeat in a place long hollowed out. Joel rode just a pace ahead, his rifle slung low, boots scuffed from days on the road. Ellie was beside him, reins loose in her hands, a sliver of calm in her eyes. Behind her, Leela fidgeted with her hair again—first the braid, then a ponytail, then nothing, then the braid again.

She’d done it twice in the last hour.

Not out of vanity. Joel knew that. It was nerves. Restlessness. That same rhythm she used to have with a pencil—tap, scribble, flip a page, start again. Always thinking. Always fighting something unseen.

She hadn’t said much since sunrise. None of them had. The weight of what might be waiting ahead pulled the air taut between them.

“Do you think we could stay for some time when we get there?” Leela asked, not looking at either of them.

“Sure thing. I wanna see the beach, too,” Ellie replied without pause, smiling and all loyal, already craning her neck for the first sign of the Caltech buildings.

Joel said nothing. But his hands tightened just a little on the reins.

Stay. Stay for what?

See, if there were scientists there—real ones, still working on things like cures and vaccines—then it wasn’t just Leela they were walking into that place for.

It was Ellie. It was the blood in her veins. That cursed miracle pulsing just beneath her skin.

His mind was running ahead of him, tearing through what-if after what-if. What if they were here? What if they had the equipment, the knowledge? What if they looked at Ellie like she was the key again? What if they asked—no, expected—the same sacrifice?

And Joel—he knew himself too well by now. Knew the panic that twisted up in his gut and tried to claw its way out. He didn’t let it show. Not in his face or voice. But it made him nudge his horse forward just slightly, pace picking up, eyes scanning rooftops and blown-out cars and anything that might look like trouble or, God forbid, hope.

They crested a slight hill, and Caltech unfurled below.

Golden light skimmed the cracked concrete and broken signage like it was trying to remember what wonder looked like. Ivy crawled up the old physics building, curling over shattered windows, draping across the once-grand entrance like a shroud. Palm trees stood like sentinels over long-dry fountains.

Joel pulled his horse to a stop beside Ellie’s, her body swaying forward slightly with momentum before sitting back straight.

For a moment, no one spoke.

They were here.

This was it.

“This is where they're supposed to be,” Joel murmured, more to himself than to either of them.

Or what was left of it.

Buildings, sure. A few were still standing proud. Brick and steel and glass, scabbed over with vines and scorch marks and time. But no movement. No guards. No posted signs or perimeter watch. No sound beyond the dry creak of trees and the hum of wind through broken fencing.

Joel felt it like a gut punch before anyone said a word.

The front of the building looked like it had been blown out from the inside—glass scattered across the steps like a trail of brittle petals, black scorch marks clawing up the stone walls. Half the Caltech signage still hung above the arched entryway, its metal frame twisted, under layers of ash and grime.

Joel dismounted first. His boots crunched over the broken glass, rifle already in hand. Ellie hopped off behind him, lighter on her feet, but just as alert. Leela stayed on the horse a beat longer, her eyes locked on the faded lettering above the entry. ‘California Institute of Technology for Advanced Research.’

She whispered it aloud like it was something sacred. “Wow. We're here.”

Joel motioned for her to stay close. Light slanted in through fractured skylights above, catching on overturned desks and moldy file boxes. Drawers like mouths wide open. A bunk with a Firefly logo stamped on the wall above it—old, faded, forgotten. Emergency cots folded and stacked like they'd been waiting for orders that never came. A faded banner still hung across the far end of the lobby, reading proudly:

‘INNOVATION FOR THE NEXT CENTURY.’

Oh, what a big fucking joke.

You try to innovate, you end up like this. You pick up a gun, you get to live. The world they lived in now.

Now, what they hadn’t expected was the smell.

The moment they stepped inside the physics building, it hit them—thick, wet, and metallic. Like mold and meat. Old rot. The kind that stuck to your tongue. He knew what it was already. Joel raised a hand, signalled Ellie behind him. Leela paused just inside the threshold, her face blanching.

“Get back outside,” Joel said to her. “Don’t need you in here.”

But Leela didn’t move.

She stared down the hall like she could still pretend it was just dust and old desks and the smell of something dead not walking.

Until the first one came.

It staggered out from a lab at the far end, skin sloughing off in ribbons, yellowing mouth open in a wet click-click-click. Ellie didn’t hesitate—she dropped to one knee and put a bullet through its eye. But the goddamn Clicker wasn’t alone. From the shadows, they came dragging, stumbling, clicking—two, three, five of them—some already burst open with fungal bloom, their faces split by time and Cordyceps.

“Shit,” Joel muttered, rifle already up. “Leela—go, get out of here!”

She bolted off. He didn’t watch where.

The gunfire echoed in the narrow halls. Joel moved with brutal efficiency—tight shots, clean execution. Ellie flanked him, nimble and fast, clearing corners. They moved like they'd done this a hundred times. Well, because they had.

But Leela was new to it. She waited outside, pacing, clutching the straps of her bag so tightly her knuckles nearly bled. Her eyes flicked to the windows, to the flashes of movement inside.

She hadn’t come for this. To watch them both die at the end.

When the last echo faded, Joel emerged from the stairwell, blood on his sleeve and a tight grimace on his face. “All clear.”

Leela didn’t answer. She pushed past him, boots scraping on tile as she made her way deeper into the building. Joel wanted to hold her hand back, tuck him into his side.

“Maybe they were Fireflies?” Ellie muttered, nudging one corpse with the toe of her boot.

Joel didn’t respond. He didn’t want to think about it, even if he knew the signs.

This wasn’t an outpost.

It was an exodus.

He pushed the doors open into the next wing—a long hallway flanked by glass-walled rooms, some still scrawled with chemical equations and 3D renderings of gene splicing. Dust hung thick in the air, swirling in lazy spirals, disturbed only by their presence. The deeper they moved in, the clearer it became: this had been a research hub. State of the art. Once.

Now it was just dust and silence.

Ellie was the first to call out. “Helloooo? It's Dr Leela here with your math magic miracle! Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

Her voice echoed down the empty walkway. And no answer.

“Shy buncha nerds,” she harrumphed.

“Ellie,” Joel sighed.

Leela drifted toward one of the labs as they moved up to the second floor, climbing over debris, her hand brushing against the edge of a metal table. There were still beakers here, clipboards thick with faded paper, broken monitors, glass casings. Her fingers hovered over them like she didn’t know whether to read or weep.

Joel had gotten used to failing so much, this didn't hurt anymore.. He’d brought her all this way. Let her believe.

Now, he stood in the doorway of the ruined lab like a man caught between two times—one where hope had still been breathing, and the one he was in now, where it lay stiff and cold on the floor.

Joel’s eyes were drawn, inevitably, to the skeleton, slumped against a bank of monitors, mold climbing up one arm like ivy.

It wasn’t the first dead body he’d seen. Not even the hundredth. But this one was different. There was something almost edifying in the way the figure was wilted—propped against the monitors like they’d died mid-thought, clinging to some last hope that didn’t pan out. What had they been hoping to see? A breakthrough? A miracle? A sign someone else had made it?

The bones were dressed in a lab coat, name badge still clipped to the collar. YAMADA. What was left of the face was caved in, probably from the gun still lying on the floor beside them. A personal choice, Joel figured. Easier than turning, for sure.

But it was the recorder nearby that made his stomach knot.

He watched Leela reach for it like she was reaching for her own fate. Slow, careful, fingers trembling despite all her control. She glanced back at him—asking for what? Permission? Support? For him to tell her this wasn’t what it looked like?

He gave her the nod because it was all he had.

And because he couldn’t lie to her anymore. Whatever that device held, bad or worse, he had her always. What were another hundred miles? Perhaps another boat, a storm in the ocean, another open city, another ten years on the road? He'd do it with her if she wanted to.

Leela pressed play.

As the recorder whirred to life and that ragged, weary voice filled the silence, Joel’s heart dropped to somewhere cold inside him. Every word was another nail in the coffin.

“This is Dr. Kichiro Yamada. March twenty-third, the time is four-twenty-four in the evening. If you’re hearing this, then you’re too late. Or maybe you’re lucky. Jury’s out.”

Joel stared at the monitors. The screens were dead, cracked, and flecked with grime. Whatever brilliance had once flickered there had gone out long ago. There were notes on the desk, too, curling with rainwater. He couldn’t read half of them, and didn’t understand the other half. But he recognized the desperation in the handwriting. Bold strokes turned frantic. Numbers blurring. Whole pages scratched out. A slow unraveling.

“We gave it everything. Years. Two whole decades. All of us. There were twenty-four of us here once. Distinguished faculty of professors, scholars and dedicated students—from aeronautics, biochemistry, theoretical physics to fucking art history—working toward a common purpose. Persevering in the face of extinction. Then we dwindled. Nine of us, then four. Then Dr. Connelly, now it's... just me. See, the world didn’t wait for us. Supplies dried up. People got scared. We had raiders come in once or twice, and butcher some of our best. Most of them left. Some went east, to survivor settlements. I stayed until the end. I made it this far.

Joel looked over at Ellie. She was still. Watching Leela. Watching him.

“To whoever finds this... you’re standing in the last Firefly outpost in California. Maybe the whole goddamn continent. Shit, I don't know anymore. We had data. We had hope. And then we had death. I’ve just managed to upload everything we had and researched to the central terminal. If you’ve got the brains to use it, maybe it won’t be for nothing. Help yourselves. Save yourselves.”

A long silence. He thought of how long they must’ve laboured in here, chasing answers. How much belief it took to type that much down.

“This place was supposed to save the world. We were supposed to make a difference. What a fucking waste.”

Click.

Joel let out a long-suffering sigh. Ellie hovered near the door, her jaw set, eyes wide, trying to take it all in, trying not to crumble.

Leela stood motionless, eyes fixed on the blank recorder. Her shoulders started to tremble, slow at first, then all at once—tight, pulled inward, trying to keep from flying apart.

She didn’t cry.

She just knelt down beside the desk, knees hitting the floor in a slow, mechanical motion, folding over her own legs like her body had given up on standing. Her hair—braided, unbraided, ponytailed, undone—hung limp down her back, as if it too had finally settled into stillness. No tears, no words. Just the quiet shape of someone who’d hoped too hard for too long.

Joel stood there, unsure if he’d made her kneel or if the world had.

He swallowed hard.

He’d brought Leela here. Not just her—her hope, her faith, her genius, all bundled into that same quiet determination she wore like armor. She had believed in this place. Believed in the people who’d once lived here. She’d believed him, maybe worst of all.

And now? Now it was just another tomb. Another place the world had forgotten how to care about.And maybe all the brilliance in Leela’s head, all the years she’d clawed her way through loss and theory and impossibility—maybe even that had nowhere left to go.

Joel clenched his jaw. “Wasn't supposed to end like this,” he said softly. But the words felt hollow the moment they left his mouth.

And yet, somehow it always did.

The world didn’t care about minds like hers. It didn’t give a damn about brilliance or sacrifice or the people who tried to fix what was broken. It just… moved on. Swallowed the light whole. Buried the good with the bad and let it rot in the dark.

Behind him, Ellie spoke, her voice quieter than usual. “Hey, we should check out that terminal.”

Joel nodded once, not looking back. “Yeah.”

He moved slowly, boots scuffing against the floor. That terminal—an old monitor, half-sunken into the desk, still humming faintly—blinked as they approached. He expected nothing. Expected it to flicker out, dead and useless, like everything else.

But somehow, when he moved the mouse, it lit up.

“C'mere, baby,” he called out, trying to will what he had left into her. “Let's see what this is.”

Leela had already started typing. Her hands trembled, but she typed anyway—quick, practiced keystrokes, as if her muscles still remembered how to do this even when her heart didn’t.

Lines of data filled the screen. Pages and pages of it. He didn't know what the fuck it was. Research logs. Complex equations. Genetic markers, timestamps, decay models. Scans of buildings and servers. Plant growth charts. Vectors and resistance patterns, and computational models he didn’t understand, but recognized by the sheer significance of them.

She stared at the formulas like they were the names of the dead.

Joel knelt beside her, slow, as if any sudden movement might shatter her.

He didn’t reach for her. Not yet. Didn’t deserve to. Just stayed near, let his voice reach across the inches between them.

“You did what they couldn’t,” he said, hoarse. “You're a goddamn saviour, Leela. You did it all.”

Her eyes didn’t move from the screen. “They were supposed to be here.”

Joel glanced toward the body by the monitor, the fingers still curled like they’d meant to hit save and didn’t make it. “They left it behind for you,” he said. “They wanted it found. You found it.”

Leela turned to him, finally. Her eyes were dry—but there was nothing behind them. No fire. No fight. Just a dull, hollow ache where everything else had been scorched out.

“It’s not enough, Joel.”

“No,” he whispered. “It ain’t. But it’s all we got.”

And he couldn’t stay away any longer.

He reached out. Gently. Palms callused, hands unhurried.

This time, she let him pull her into his arms. She didn’t fall apart. Didn’t cry, or shudder, or whisper anything dramatic. She just leaned—slow, silent—against him, her face resting into his shoulder like the grief was too dense to lift her head anymore.

It wasn’t forgiveness she gave him. It wasn’t peace. It wasn’t even warmth. And for the first time in days, Joel didn’t feel guilt, or fear, or even that thick, choking regret.

Just the excruciating, quiet ache of being alive.

He turned his head, pressing his cheek to the top of her hair. She smelled like the road. Like leather and firewood. Like survival. Like the kind of person you meet once in a lifetime and never again.

He almost didn’t hear the footsteps—soft and measured.

Ellie, framed by the last of the sun bleeding in through the broken glass. She crossed the room slowly, past ruined dreams, past rusted lab equipment and flickering terminals, past the slumped skeleton and the shattered hope. She didn’t speak. Just knelt beside them, her shoulder bumping gently against Leela’s other side.

Joel looked at her just in time to see her hand reach out—hesitant, hovering for a second—then settle across Leela’s back.

Not in comfort or even empathy.

Recognition. Kinship. Guilt.

Leela was everything Ellie wasn’t—older, brilliant, composed—but in this moment? They were the same. Two people who gave their hearts to something that’s gone.

Ellie's fingers splayed across the jacket, tentative at first, then firmer. She didn’t look at either of them. Her face stayed turned, eyes down, jaw clenched. Simply being there.

Joel could see it in her—the way she held her breath, the way her lips were pressed into a thin, white line. That familiar cyclone behind her eyes. The echo of so many other losses.

He didn’t say a word.

Because in that lab, surrounded by failure and rot, the three of them formed something that had no name. Not victory, hope or even survival. Just austere, tangible proof that they were still here.

He looked at the recorder lying in Leela's palms like a gravestone, and as she hit rewind, that last line rang in his ears like a verdict:

“...What a fucking waste.”

Joel closed his eyes. He didn’t know if the voice was talking about the science, the building, the people, or the whole damn world.

But whatever it meant—however it was intended—it felt right now. And maybe all the brilliance in Leela’s head, all the years she’d clawed her way through loss and theory and impossibility—maybe even that had nowhere left to go.

He knew this one all too well. The one that told him some endings weren’t explosive or tragic or heroic.

No last stand. No meaning. Just a hush. A breath. A door that closed without ceremony.

Some endings just... stopped.

The storm comes, you crawl into shelter. Find something—someone—to hold onto. And when it's over, you are left to breathe in the quiet afterward.

Waiting for the next storm. The next door.

taglist 🫶: @darknight3904 , @guiltyasdave , @letsgobarbs , @helskemes , @jodiswiftle , @tinawantstobeadoll , @bergamote-catsandbooks , @cheekychaos28 , @randofantfic , @justagalwhowrites , @emerald-evans , @amyispxnk , @corazondebeskar-reads , @wildemaven , @tuquoquebrute , @elli3williams , @bluemusickid , @bumblepony , @legoemma , @chantelle-mh , @heartlessvirgo , @possiblyafangirl , @pedropascalsbbg , @oolongreads -> @kaseynsfws , @prose-before-hoes , @kateg88 , @laliceee , @escaping-reality8 , @mystickittytaco , @penvisions , @elliaze , @eviispunk , @lola-lola-lola , @peepawispunk , @sarahhxx03 , @julielightwood , @o-sacra-virgo-laudes-tibi , @arten1234 , @jhiddles03 , @everinlove , @nobodycanknoww , @ashleyfilm , @rainbowcosmicchaos , @i-howl-like-a-wolf-at-the-moon , @orcasoul , @nunya7394 , @noisynightmarepoetry , @picketniffler , @ameagrice , @mojaveghst , @dinomecanico , @guelyury , @staytrueblue , @queenb-42069 , @suzysface , @btskzfav , @ali-in-w0nderland , @ashhlsstuff , @devotedlypaleluminary , @sagexsenorita , @serenadingtigers , @yourgirlcin , @henrywintersgun , @jadagirl15 , @misshoneypaper , @lunnaisjustvibing , @enchantingchildkitten , @senhoritamayblog , @isla-finke-blog , @millercontracting , @tinawantstobeadoll , @funerals-with-cake , @txlady37 , @inasunlitroom , @clya4 , @callmebyyournick-name , @axshadows , @littlemissoblivious } - thank you!! awwwww we're like a little family <3

65 notes · View notes

lilyinmysoul · 2 days ago

Note

always loved sub!joel with a mama kink kink instead of mommy, just feel like it'd sound so good in his texas drawl

YESYESYESSS this is everything to me

I will make this but I need to think of a plot for it hmmm……🤔🤔🤔

#ask #sub!joel #soft!joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fic #youaskbowie #joel miller smut

25 notes · View notes

dilf-docs · 1 month ago

Text

I Can Fix Her (No Really I Can)

jackson!joel miller x younger fem!reader

summary: jackson's loud mouthed spoiled princess has suddenly gone quiet. what or who could be behind such miracle?

warnings: 18+ (minors dni), age gap (20s/50s), pwp, p. in v., oral (m. and f. receiving), brat taming, dacryphilia, pussy spanking, fingering, humiliation kink, dom!joel, sub!joel if u squint, soft!joel (look at that switch sandwhich fr), brat!reader (she's annoying and v mean, you've been warned), denial is a river so take this before the world mourns joel miller again

word count: 5,391 words

side note: new layout my citizens! will eventually update all of the blog but as for now, enjoy this one and the masterlist. quick thing, i just wanted to say that i had a very shitty week and for the life of me, can't find a way to make ttdik pt. 4 not oversaturated with angst bc i wish all men a very pleasant die or how to connect what i've written so far. note that this was kinda rushed; i feel confident of some parts and not the whole thing. just hoping it works for y'all! (based on this request)

Joel Miller isn't who he used to be before.

Life in Jackson has made him... soft. This version of him, tired of a life of killing and running, tainted with blood and regret. But he's now an uncle and a father. Well, used to be. Ever since Ellie had found out the truth and wanted nothing to do with him, he had somewhat become downright pathetic. Joel could be both Jackson's most useful man, even at his age, while also being their biggest wretch. Ah, yes: Joel Miller, the man who lived in the house down the street, alone and certainly worth the townsfolk's pity.

Maybe that's why you couldn't bother to be nice to him. In your eyes, a man like Joel just didn't deserve your time or respect.

But it wasn't personal, really. He happened to, unfortunately, be in charge of your patrol. That, in your eyes, made him your enemy: a person to be defied and picked apart. And the worst part is, in his current position, Joel just didn't have the energy to fight you back.

"You want me to cross that wearing this?" your protest comes in the form of a whiny pitch. "Ew, no. I'd rather be dead"

At least dead, you wouldn't be a bother. He rolls his eyes, rubbing his face tiredly. The rest of the group watches the interaction in silence, expressions pretty much the same.

"I promise 'cha, princess. Ya' wouldn't want that"

The nickname should irk you, but you let it pass. It is no news to anyone that you are indeed a princess: Jackson's resident little spoiled brat.

Sheltered from early starts of civilization's downfall, maybe your parents had done more bad than good trying to protect you and settling early on in Jackson. You had grown to be a pampered bitch who made Joel's patience wear thin. Of course, to keep him busy and distracted, Tommy had assigned you to Joel. And while he'd rather not spend his days on a house too big for a person, he too wasn't exactly excited about having to deal with you on your patrol shifts.

(If you could call them that. You did anything but patroling)

You cross your arms, petty. "I'm not moving unless you carry me"

Maybe your need to defy him also came, partly, because of this: the way he's looking at you right now, a quiet rage simmering in those big round brown eyes that remind you of a kicked puppy, but when they burn, they seem like a forest fire, old remnants of the hunter that had been tamed by domestic life and a broken relationship resurfacing.

It excites you.

All your life, people seemed to bend to your will-- a force of nature: to your cruel harsh icy wind. You kept Jackson down at their knees, but it wasn't kindness, rather your shoe up their throats what put them to your feet.

Yet, Joel... he could be a loser to you, but he was probably the only one you'd met to be insane enough to defy you. The only man who didn't succumb to your fluttering eyelashes, pink lips and princess manners. No, he ignored the way you looked at him and your constant begging for attention, leaving the job to those men who seemed to follow your every step, ready to be themselves a carpet for you to step in. He'd roll his eyes and walk past you like you were the most bland, boring and uninteresting thing in the world: not worth a second of his attention. Joel simply wouldn't entertain your spoiled attitude past replying to a few snarky comments.

And that revolted and aroused you in equal parts.

It's not like you could escape your obligation, but perhaps, the bigger reason you chose to not skip patrol like you used to before his arrival, is to see Joel Miller's sinking ships for eyes try to wash over your rebel flame.

"Be free to stay then" he replies, but you don't miss the way his grip on his rifle turns white. "I ain't carryin' no one"

"I can carry you" one of the guys from your group offers.

(You can't remember his name)

"Sure" you chuckle, victory smile dancing on your lips at the sight of him looking above his shoulder in a barely stolen glance, thinking you won't notice.

But you do.

Joel Miller fucking hates you.

After five decades alive, he simply can't stand the idea of breathing the same air as a spoiled little brat like you.

Joel's seen destruction, loss, hopelessness and blood up close, and the thought of you walking around like the world owes you a favor fills him with vitriol.

He's been alive for fifty-six years so he's simply just tired. Too tired to give a damn about your attitude, despite how you manage to press all his buttons every time you open your mouth.

He still remembers the first time he met you, how you laughed like people did before all civilization was destroyed. You walked with a confident strut, boots clicking against Jackson's streets, every step made with determination. Like you knew just where you were going.

He envied you, in a way. After Salt Lake City, he seemed to have lost his path, all in the name of love. Then, that warm feeling had turned cold and cruel like all things in this world ravaged by pain, and he felt even at more loss than the first time he experienced grief.

But you? You lived everyday with a dismissal so cold it seemed like nothing could hurt you.

He missed that part of him who just survived: hardened by the world around him.

But Jackson tamed him. Ellie made him soft.

And then you brought up that old dark part of him: the putrid black liquid that spewed through the cracks of his new character that made him loved by Jackson. The same one that made people fear one of Boston QZ's most brutal smugglers. It was that vicious anger, red on his vision like the ichor that would splatter on his clothes or cover his bruised knuckles.

He hated you for it.

But that was in the past, and Joel Miller simply didn't care.

Yet, you made him care. Outright forced him to.

In a way, it seemed like you enjoyed this: the banter of contained rage and practiced patience, dripping as a leak until it overflew. You'd shot your bratty remarks and petty complains until he'd turn around and see you. Then, you'd smile, like that's all you needed to feel better. Far superior. And he hated it. Knew your little game, and fed into it, even as he told himself he wouldn't. Like a drug: a destroying addiction.

Joel didn't understand why you took the time to enrage him, having even heard once when he was late for patrol (he overslept), how you talked bad about the, in your words, Lonely Pathetic Man From The House On The End Of The Road.

Joel Miller has been patient. God knows he has. But he isn't religious, and was never the type to let things pass by.

No. Joel Miller was born with impel, and no matter how many love he had to give, the world around him constantly reminded him of the power hidden behind the exertion over others, how alive he'd felt with the gift he'd been given by heaven.

He isn't patient. He isn't a fool. He isn't pathetic: and Joel Miller will take matters between his rugged hands.

Tommy had arched an eyebrow first, looking at just his and your name on the patrol schedule.

"What's going on?" he narrowed his eyes suspiciously at his brother.

"Found a cabin deep on the forest" curt, "I'ont need lot'a people to scavenge the place"

In the end, he agreed. Who didn't? You, obviously, the reason so many before him had gotten rid of their obligation of you. To flirt with you at the Tipsy Bison? Hell yeah. To have you in their patrol team? God, no.

"Where is everyone else?" you cross your arms above your chest, bracing yourself because of the weather. "Also, isn't this climate not patrol appropiate?"

Joel's not dumb, of course he knows that-- he can feel his aching joints shiver and bones creak because of the temperature. But he also knows he's sick of your shit.

"Ain't you little Ms. Know it all" he mocks, brushing past you, shoulders clashing with the same harsh force the icy breeze does to your face.

"And you're an asshole" you're quick to counter, "bringing us out here in the cold. If you wanted to kill me, you could've made it easier for both of us and done it way back in Jackson"

He rolls his eyes at your incessant bickering.

"Watch y'er mouth" is all he says, the brat hanging dangerously close to the tip of his tongue.

"I'd rather watch my step, thank you very much" you purse your plush pink lips, annoyed. "Have you seen the size of this roots? I will trip and break myself"

He chuckles at your hyperboles and the way you jump in a rather exaggerated manner, more in amusement than irritation.

"Don't think ya' can handle all'at?" Joel taunts. "Gon' break like a doll?"

Doll. It hangs in the air, like the snowflakes that fall into your hair and his eyebrows, the white fusing with his own.

"I'm strong" but it comes out weak.

"Don't seem like it" he's laughing at you again, a sharp annoyed edge to it. "With all that complainin' ya' do"

You huff, your incredulity condescing in the air.

"What's wrong with that?"

"With bein' annoyin'?" Joel quips.

"With voicing out my concerns"

He's walking ahead of you, yet you see his shoulders slump, like he does when he disagrees.

"Those ain't concerns, jus' moanin' and bitchin'"

It's still inside the fun banter you're carrying, harmless, but for some reason, it strikes you in the face.

"If you can't stand me so much, why don't you quit on me, like the others?"

You may seem cold, but there's that cut that always bleeds. Or it may be the need for something that blurs the line between you and those survivors out there who've outlived the worst a man can endure.

Like Joel.

You just can't help wanting it all.

Joel stops on his tracks at your words, response barely above a whisper:

"'Cause I ain't a quitter"

As if that could bring any sense into what had started the moment he layed eyes on you.

You finally reach your destiny in silence, the old cabin hanging by a thread.

"This looks like shit" you comment out loud.

Joel lets out a laugh, a deep rumbling sound coming out of his chest. For a reason, red dust makes it's way into your warm cheeks.

"No, doll. In this world, this ain't shit. It's decent"

You don't miss the way your breath hitches and heart skips a beat at the petname. He doesn't miss the way his tongue burns and his jeans squeeze at the sight of you: powerless.

God, Joel could go to hell for this. (But he'd probably be fine)

"Decent? You're one to talk" it spills out, your fear attacking the only way you know how when you're nervous.

Bite.

You hate feeling weak. You hate how your own game has turned on you.

It seems, Joel Miller isn't just a pathetic man but one who knows how to play.

(You knew this. But now, it's real, not the image you touch yourself to during nighttime, and it's equally both exciting and scary)

The red desire for hunger is there on his eyes. "What's that s'pposed to mean?"

You tilt your head, tone feigning innocence. "I think you know what I mean"

He paces around the room, like your floral scent is too suffocating and the cold isn't enough to shake the fire that burns inside him.

"Spit it" he dares, stopping midtrack. You remain silent, so he walks over to you, face so close, some spit lands in your face. "I said, spit it"

"I think you're pathetic, Joel Miller" yet, for some reason, your heart wavers. What were you even doing? Never had you doubted yourself once, sometimes even finding pleasure in the wicked cutthroat words you'd spew, but today, as his face stands dangerously close to you, his breath ghosting over your lips as his eyes roam over them and you count his wrinkles, it feels wrong.

"'S that what 'cha think, doll?" he chuckles, leaning forward. His lips barely brush against yours by mistake, yet it's enough to send shivers all over your body. "Wanna know what I think? I think you're da' real pathetic burden here. Fucken annoyin' and unuseful. All you know how ta' do is complain' and be a bitch"

"A bitch?" your voice is loud as your roar back, probably because it's coming into your face with the force of a train. But that's how truth feels, and it hurts like hell. "Did you just call me a bitch?"

He laughs, bitterly so, equally irritated as fascinated by how easy it's to see you crumble.

Joel made you out to be this unbreakable force, but at the end of the day, you're human, just like him.

"And y'called me pathetic, s' I guess we're even"

You look crazy: hair disheveled by the wind, chest going up and down and that same craze look on your eyes.

"Fuck you, Joel Miller" you seethe.

It's a simple comeback. No witty retort, no elaborated plot. Just four words, yet it's the way you said it, venomous, with such hostility, like his presence alone made you sick. Your skin crawl. Like the thought alone of being equals couldn't pass through your thick skull, and you had to get rid of just the concept; an ofense.

You pull back, realizing how truly close you were. You then march to the bedroom, slamming the door behind you.

With Joel, there's always a first when it comes to you.

(The first man to catch your attention. The first man to show lack of interest or amusement to your well-known tactics that worked every time. The first man to make your skin crawl like seeing yourself in the mirror. Like you would stare until your image would imprint on your brain, and you'd pick apart every small detail you don't like about you. That was Joel fucking Miller, rolling like thunder, ready to strike over your walls, like he knows where to hit to make you crumble, as if the façade you've built is as much in vain as the hate you carry even with the easy life that's been given to you)

He may be the first man to make you cry.

"Come here!" he shouts, roaring voice reverberating against the walls of the cabin. He swings the door of the bedroom open, finding your satisfied expression as you sit over the old worn out mattress, wiping your tears quickly with a harsh tug of your sweater, coat lying on the dirty floor.

"What?" you ask, as if you hadn't started the fight five seconds ago.

"Ya' think y' can shout and then leave like that?" he spits, "you fucken brat!"

A weird wild spark settles in the pit of your stomach.

"I can do whatever I want"

(The fire. It burns)

He scoffs at your childish response. "Not when y'er under my watch. Like it or not, y'r ma' damn responsability, kid"

Now it's your turn to sneer. "Don't call me that. I'm not a kid"

Of course you fucking weren't: he's got eyes. But goddamn, didn't you act like one all the time?

"Good" his voice adquires a weird tone to it, dropping. "Then strip"

It's like the air's been knocked out of your lungs.

You scoff. "Excuse me?"

"I know you ain't deaf" tone stern, "nor stupid. Are you?"

"Did you just call me stupid?" you raise your voice. Was he going to pull out every single insult from the book? Fair, you think, after you had told him to fuck off in the way you did.

(You were aware your words shoot to kill when you were mad. You had a lot of regrets about that)

"I asked 'cha if ya' were. If there's no answer, I s'ppose that's it"

"I'm not stupid" you counter.

"What?" he's asking you to say it again, like he hasn't heard you.

"You aren't deaf" you repeat his earlier words, eliciting a chuckle out of him.

The windows of the cabin rattle, the cold winter slipping inside the cracks. You shiver yet stand still, not wanting him to misinterpret your body language.

As if you'd ever surrender to him. As if.

"I'm sick of your bullshit" he seethes, "thinkin' ya' can make a clown outta me infront of everyone else, and then look at me like I'm sum piece of meat. Now it's your turn"

"My turn to what?" but this time, your voice wavers. You walk closer, eyelids fluttering.

His uneven breath condensces in the air with a shaky gelid exhale.

"Y'e don't know what you're gettin' into" he warns.

You smile at his barely contained temper. "I think I do"

Joel's body is completely surrounding yours in the bedroom. Before you register, he pulls you by your jaw with his hand.

"Still thinkin' that?" he mocks, thumb pulling your bottom lip down, forcing your mouth open. "Answer me"

But he's pressing his finger on your tongue. You feel yourself starting to drool.

"Ya' really want 'tis, don't 'cha?" his eyes darken, "droolin' like a fucken cockstarved slut. Now strip" his grip tightens, "I won't ask again"

Your body shivers, but no longer because of the temperature drop. A treacherous jolt runs in between your legs at the very first instance of someone putting you in your place. It feels too good to backtrack, but the last remaining drops of sanity plead you to quit.

"Joel" you say his name like a prayer, and he thinks he'd like to see you beg. "I was fucking around-"

"Don't make me repeat myself"

You sit on the edge of the bed, getting rid of your clothes. It's like your mind has stopped working and your body belongs to someone else.

But you want this. Fuck, you had begged for this: sharpening your knife to make your words cut deeper with him until the bleeding was too big to ignore.

You wanted this. Craved it. Needed to satisfy whatever foreign feeling you'd now attribute to your rebellious and spoiled nature.

(You had never been denied anything, and even now, Joel knows this, but can't help and too give in)

"Not so loud now, are we?" he jests, "but 's worth the view, lettin' 'cha run your spoiled tongue off"

He hums with approval at the sight of your body, your pliant energy making his hard cock twitch in his pants.

"You like what you see, Joel?" you ask softly, despite your resistence.

He groans at that, calloused digits grazing the soft skin of your virgin collarbones.

"I do, princess" he answers, lifiting your chin up. "I'll show ya'"

He takes your hand into his bigger one, moving it right onto the spot between his legs.

"You've been bad, little spoiled brat" Joel's voice rasps as your thighs rub together. Y'er lucky I like that"

He pats your cheek. "Wanna make it up to me?" you eagerly nod, desperate for Joel's approval. You hate not having the upper hand, and a part of you thinks you'd get it back if you behave well. "Good girl. Now sit"

He sits next to you, patting his thick thighs. You salivate just at the thought, moving your body over his denim clad lap. "Right'ere"

"Look at 'cha" he parts your legs, a hoarse tks falling from his lips. Joel chuckles at the wet mess that's created. "So fucken wet and I ain't even touched yet"

You feel his rough digits ghost over your dripping cunt, just as his lips had done minutes ago. The teasing sets you on edge, thrill coarsing through your veins. Without warning, his big palm slaps against your cunt, and you feel yourself soaking your folds like you had never ever before.

"Fucken dirty whore. You ain't no princess, gettin' wet to 'tis" he mocks, "what would daddy say"

"Shut up" you sneer, but your body is full of hormones and treason.

"Not when I'm above 'cha, darlin'. Wouldn't wanna piss me off when I'm the one who decides if 'tis pretty pussy comes or not"

"What makes you think I'll take shit from you?" but it comes out as a whimper. Smack. A jolt runs straight from your pussy, stinging from the contact. "Didn't take it when we where in patrol, why should I do now?"

He laughs, darkly. It's haunting.

"'Cause you want 'tis. And I know you'll be a good girl for me to get it"

You feel yourself dizzy, head spinning as you land on the floor.

"Let's see if I get 'cha to shut up if that dirty bratty mouth of y'rs is stuffed full of ma' cock"

He pulls down his worn-out jeans, getting rid of his belt on a harsh pull. The clinking sound makes you rub your thighs together in a new found anticipation, instead of taking the time to run away from this, whatever the hell this is.

No. He's right.

You want this as much as he does.

(Isn't that the scariest part?)

"Ya' like what 'cha see, y/n?" he's smart to use your same words back, but it's the way he's said your name, like he was always meant to say it, or the angry throbb of his cock, what makes you drool at the red furious tip, dripping with rage and need.

"I think it's your dick who's more excited than me" you taunt, tracing the inner soft skin of his thick thighs. "Practically begging for me to lick it"

His adam's apple bobs.

"Tell me, Joel, when was the last time someone made this pretty big cock feel good?"

"Enough" his fingers grab your hair, pulling you harshly until he drags your mouth onto his cock. "I'm tired of y'er bullshit"

You aren't a stranger, he thinks, with the way you kiss his tip, tongue making a wet circle through the head of his cock. You take him into your mouth, pulling out in a second.

"W-what you do that for?" he asks, breathing rapidly. Strained voice.

You smirk.

"To watch you"

To watch how his eyes had closed as soon as your breath ghosted over his leaking cock, how he threw his head back and gripped the sheets viciously at just your shameless lazy circling. Joel Miller could be in charge, but God, wasn't he touch-starved?

(And for a reason, that was so fucking hot. And, in a way, adorable)

"J-just 'cause I'm-" he cuts himself off, probably out of need or out of embarrassment. "You're not in charge, so don't fuck around with your chances, slut. Imma show you y'r place real quick"

His grip tightens in your hair, forcing himself back into your mouth. Joel was punishing, with the way he's pushing your head down until it was at the base of his cock. You gagged for a moment, eyes closing at the weight of his thick girth on your tongue.

"Takin' it like a champ, princess. Usin' that mouth of y'rs for good" and then, with a softer tone he adds, "like ya're made for me"

You moan around him as he starts fucking into your mouth, pulling you off quickly, saliva slipping out of your mouth as you gasp for air.

"Joel" you whine his name, legs pressing together in order to get any friction.

"Now you beggin'? 'S gonna take more than jus' that, doll" he taunts, but there's a certain wicked softness to the way he traces your cheek as you scramble an attempt. "Try harder, princess"

"I'm sorry, Joel-"

He moves his head, clearly dissatisfied.

"Not Joel. Ya' call me sir when I fuck you"

A mewl escapes your lips.

"Sir" comes out like a faithless prayer, begging to be heard. "I'll do anything, sir, please, touch me"

"Al'ight, but still, it ain't 'nough"

Oh.

The hot tears in the corner of your eyes shouldn't arouse him this much, but the watery promise makes his cock twitch.

"I-I'll do anything, I swear" you beg, the salty tears stream down your cheeks in cascades. "It hurts, Jo-" you whine, "sir, please. Just fuck me goddamit!"

Your once poised voice, now reduced to a whimpering begging mess. Your red rimmed eyes, beginning to puff. It's the way a gloss seems to coat over them, making you look like a doe-eyed deer and not the brat who challenged his every decision and word.

Fuck, isn't he aroused.

"Lookin' so pretty when you cry" he smiles, but instead of wiping the tears, it's his tongue that licks them off your face. "You beggin' that bad to take my cock"

You nod, eagerly so.

"Please, Jo- Just, please. D-don't make me beg" your face feels hot and wet again, "I-I can't take it anymore. Just fucking give it to me!"

"Easy, baby. Can't understand a thing you sayin'" Joel teases. "Where your manners at, besides?"

"Please, sir" he gently pulls you up, humming in satisfaction.

"Goin' crazy over my cock, baby? Y'sure have a nerve to call one pathetic if you gon' act like this, you little brat"

But he is the one moaning when his lips cature your mouth with a fierce impulse, like he wants to devour you whole and swallow your vocals, as to never speak up again.

(But then, he wouldn't hear his name on your sweet albeit snotty voice, and that's a privilege he can't forbid himself from, no matter how annoying you can get sometimes)

"Please" you whisper one last time. He wipes a stray tear with his rough thumb. "I'm yours"

"See, baby? It ain't that hard to shut that mouth of y'rs"

He guides you to the old bed while renewing the kiss, tongues now engaged on a battle for dominance, like even without using your words you'd still need to assert your power over the other. You moan into his mouth when your body slams against the mattress and Joel lands on top, his weight sinking you in the old bed, that creaks.

"I just want to be a good girl for you" you whimper.

"You sure of that? Not gon' be a brat?" and despite his harsh tone that seems to humiliate you, his wandering fingers are gentle with each touch, like if he were to put any more force, you'd break. Joel thinks it's not necessary with you: just with you begging for his cock, he's broken you.

"No, sir" and then you whimper as his mouth dives to the collarbones you had taunted him with before. Joel takes his time, inhaling the musk and savoring the sweet of your skin. Needy whines leave your lips, and he's having the time of his life seeing you surrender so easily, like you had no idea what limits to push, where they'd take you and how you'd pay for that.

"C-Can I touch you?" you whisper, hands itching to tangle on his grey parted hair. He chuckles at the eagerness and tenderness you don't seem aware of.

"S' you can be sweet if ya' want to, huh?" he leaves a fluttering kiss to your chin. "Needy and desperate too. Do ya' want to touch, princess? Remember to use y'r words"

"Yes, sir. I-I want to touch you"

"Thought I disgusted you, hmm? I take you've learnt y'r lesson now?"

"Yes, I've learned. Please, sir, won't do it again" you plead.

"I'll allow ya' to touch, doll" he gives you a smirk, "but 'ts all you get for now"

He lets your hands cling to his coat, taking it off. Then, you proceed to his buttoned shirt, fingers flidding with buttons until you grown annoyed and desperate, pulling the fabric over his head with need.

"Look at 'cha" but there's only adoration, proven so when he starts to kiss the trail of soft skin that goes from your neck to your stomach, making you squirm. "Easy, baby. 'M gettin' down there"

He finally reaches your core, kissing the inner side of your thighs with wet and sloppy lips. His hot breath tingles over your clit, and a beat later, his mouth presses into your cunt, your back arching at the cold contact of his chapped lips against the humid hot of your folds.

You muffle a moan, embarrassed at the whole situation.

"Ain't need to worry 'bout nothin', doll. Nobody can hear us" he grins, tongue flicking your clit. "Wanna listen to your pretty whimpers as I make 'cha feel good"

You cry out of pleasure, the sound escaping past your lips. Joel has a laugh.

"Good girl"

Joel rewards you with another series of minstrations on your bud, licks made with determination only the expert man knows of. He then slides one finger into you, slowly moving it in and out of your soaked trembling heat.

"M-more" you beg, eager to get more fingers inside you. "Please, more, sir"

You buck your hips to try to get closer to him, meeting his thrusts.

Joel tuts, "What're you doin', spoiled brat? Did I tell ya' to move? You were doing such'a great job... guess I gotta punish you-"

"No!" you shout. "Do anything you want, but touch me, please- touch me!"

He introduces a second finger, raising his brow at the immediate way you clench around him. Joel curls them, robbing another moan out of you.

"Feels good?" you can't answer, as a hard thrust robs another moan from you. "But I'ont want 'cha to think we done, princess. Think I'd let you come, jus' like that? After all's happened?"

"Need you" you tug him closer with your arms holding onto his. "Joel, sir- please"

"Oh, princess" he smirks, "I think you don't know what you askin' for"

Joel grabs his hand around his length, coating the tip in your slicky juices, and then, he presses his length into you in one thrust.

"You're big-" you pant as he gives you time to adjust to his size. Joel then picks up an unrelenting pace that makes moans spill out of you like a fountain, the pace of his thrusts sending you closer and closer to the edge.

"N-need to-"

"Don't" he seethes. "Ya' won't 'till I tell ya' can"

All you could do is moan, helplessly pinned between his body and the bed. Your whole body shakes in an effort to contain as his hips loose their rhythm, his groans louder as he gets closer and closer to the edge.

"Al'ight. 'Cause you've been good" his cock drives through your walls with rhythmic melodies. "Cum, princess, but when ya' do, look at me"

You're seeing stars the moment your toes curl and his head falls to clash against your forehead.

(The beads of sweat roll down out of him like trails to follow, and his scarred rugged skin doesn't compare to your soft one, painted with the maroon of his bites and kissing at the skin of your collarbone. The dried up trails of tears. Your begging and desperate voice. His name on your lips)

It only takes a few more thrusts before he spills in you, cock twitching until every last drop of thick hot white cum is pumped into you.

Joel then pulls out gently, pressing a kiss to your forehead before flopping onto you, the mattress dipping even further. With his hand, he removes a stray strand of damp hair, putting it behind you ear with such tender kindness, your heart strings pull.

"In fact, I want ya' to look at me next time y'even think 'bout defying me. See if that mouth of y'ers can talk after 'tis"

A week later, you're back at patrolling.

"Anyone got anythin' to say?"

The group looks at you. You're about to open your mouth, but Joel cocks an eyebrow.

Just like that, and you're gone. Great job, y/n.

"Whatever" you sound meek as you push past him, yet he catches a glimpse of your warm cheeks. "Let's go"

The rest are too stunned to speak, the silence only cut off by Miller's laugh.

"Would 'cha look at that?" he whistles. "Ain't nobody tell ya' miracles don't happen anymore on this goddamn world!"

credits: divider @kodaswrld / gif @chappellsroans

1K notes · View notes

dilf-hunter-fantasies · 3 months ago

Text

[900 words of fluff and cock worship]

daydreaming about…

Older boyfriend Joel who is so patient and tender with you. He slips out of the bedroom without turning on a light in the mornings, not wanting to disturb your sleep. But he never forgets to press a gentle kiss to your forehead, murmuring something sweet, before he leaves.

And on the weekends it’s the same. Except he comes back in an hour or two, just to leave a coffee on the nightstand for you. Doting without smothering, or risking your morning attitude.

Some days you don’t wake up until you smell the earthy coffee, steam still swirling from the mug. But most of the time he barely makes it to the doorway before you croak out a quiet, “Wait.”

“Come here,” you lilt in your rich timbered morning voice, stretching your arms toward him. It never gets old to him, no, he thinks it’s one of the sweetest sounds he’s ever heard. One of the most heavenly sights.

You can only grin lazily at him. Your gaze drags down, over his handsome smile, over the rippling muscles of his chest and arms under his worn tee, and skimming over the bulge in his loose sweats.

You scoot toward the middle of the bed, hold up the cover, inviting him into the warmth you’ve been nestled in. He climbs in and scoops you onto the broad plane of his chest.

“Morning, pretty girl,” he rumbles beneath you, voice deep as the ocean. It’s so serene to be in his strong arms. Nobody has ever grounded you like this, anchored you, physically and emotionally.

It’s not that being older makes him smarter or wiser than you, rather, he’s the first to brag about your accomplishments or support your goals. It’s the way that time has taught him gratitude.

Joel is present with you. So alive. Flesh and blood, warm and firm. He’s not in a rush, not sacrificing his energy chasing benchmarks or brushing you off to prove something.

He’s there with you.

Sometimes he just holds you in a peaceful quiet. You listen to his breathing and his heartbeat. Until the sun gets higher in the sky and the world comes to life.

But most of the time you can’t resist wiggling your hips against him and biting your lip. Fucking with him, just until you feel his dick start to stir.

Joel’s heart flutters at your breathy giggles, but when your laughter is cut off with a gasp, the heat rushes lower. He likes the game you play, always teasing him and acting surprised at how fiercely he wants you. How badly he needs you. It never takes long before he’s rock hard, straining against his sweats, precum leaving a little dark patch against the soft material between you.

Sometimes everything stays slow and syrupy, just grinding and rubbing against each other until Joel can’t take it anymore. Until he has to roll you over so he can sink into your soft, warm cunt. Sometimes you take turns spoiling each other with greedy hands and mouths until you’re both sweating and sticking to each other.

But sometimes you do this thing that sends him right over the edge. You sit up and perch your ass on the meat of his thighs, far enough down that you can pull at his waistband freeing his throbbing cock. The way you grin just playing with it makes him dizzy.

You’re so fucking hot without even trying.

You’re always fascinated by his dick, hard or soft.

Always amused with the bounce it makes when you let go of his shaft and the weight makes it slap against his lower belly. You like the mess of it, the precum that beads, and rolls from his slit, the string of it connecting to the dark hair on his stomach. You’re easily infatuated by the heat of his length in your palm, the silky smooth skin, the veins and the angry red tip. The lust on your face is unmistakable.

Joel could cum just seeing the ardor in your eyes and the greedy way you wet your lips. But then, matching his gaze and lowering your body, you lick a hot, wet stripe from base to tip. His entire body shudders, overwhelmed with the heavenly bliss.

When you finally envelop him in the wet furnace of your mouth, he’s on another planet, groaning and praising you, encouraging you with a massive palm wrapped around the back of your head. Completely at your mercy, he’ll do anything you want. You get him so blissed out he’s nearly incoherent.

He rarely lasts long enough to fuck you properly on those mornings. But when you finally let him get his hands between your legs he could nearly cum a second time just feeling how wet you are.

Drenched.

So absurdly turned on, he barely gets to sink his thick digits inside of you before you’re gasping and crying out his name. But you love it. Nobody has ever made you burn with such intensity and ache with such desire.

And he’s generous. Joel never stops until you’re tugging at his wrist, pulling his arm away as you tremble and spasm.

And some days when you come back to yourself and find yourself staring into his deep brown eyes you think you’d like to spend your mornings like this for the rest of your life.

🍒 🌸

click here for more of my writing

#mickey's daydreams #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller #joel miller smut #smut and fluff #soft!joel miller #boyfriend!joel miller #pedro pascal #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal character fanfic #drabble

1K notes · View notes

littledes1re · 16 days ago

Text

Him having enough of your attitude after a long day of you being a brat…sitting down in front of you like this.

„over m’lap now. Not gonna repeat myself, baby“

But being the softest dom…even when you pout and sigh. Gripping you softly as you climb on his lap, feeling his big hands on your waist and bum while he helps you get settled. You being already in your pretty nightdress that he bought you, all naked underneath, making you feel small with the sensation of his rough jeans and shirt on your body.

„knew you could listen to me, hm?“ as he gently strokes waist down your butt. Making you feel relaxed in his arms, his presence clouding your head making you feel dizzy.

One rough and loud slap on your bum snaps you out of the trance, making you whimper and squirm in his lap.

„Shh, shh. That‘s it.“ knowing it’s too much for you but oh his sweet girl takes it so well. He takes his time to calm you down gently but firm and when you are least excepting two more rough slaps echo in the empty room. Tears are forming in your eyes now, you look up at him making him coo. He could never stay mad at his baby.

„Oh, baby girl.“

„giving me those pretty doe eyes, yeah, i know, angel. I know it hurts.“

Gives you the rest of your punishment, as you cry out , being so proud of you that you took it all. Lets you cry on his lap while massaging the area until he only hears your sweet breathing— in and out, knowing you relaxed in his arms again. Knows how to properly handle you, gripping your body and making you sit on his lap, your face into the crook of your neck.

Knows that you need the praise so he whispers sweet nothings into your hair. „that‘a good girl now, hm?“ „Don‘t like having m‘girl being all bratty, baby“ stroking your back, rubbing firm circles as he admires the pouty lips and swollen eyes looking at him full of love and drifting slowly to sleep, safe and content in his arms </3

Yeah I can‘t do this anymore. Need this man😭

gif by @unabashednightmarepizza

#joel miller smut #joel miller #soft!dom joel miller #soft!joel miller #blurb #oneshot #des1resdrabbles #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller tlou #tlou #pedro pascal #pedro pascal smut #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you

688 notes · View notes

milla-frenchy · 7 months ago

Text

In the cold night

3k1 | Joel Miller x fem reader | ao3 | Masterlist

Summary: being on patrol, Joel and you spend the cold winter night together in a small house

Warnings: 18+ mdni. mention of a past SA attempt (not by Joel), protective!joel, feral!joel saving reader, friends to lovers, one bed, soft!joel, praise kink, masturbation (f), thighs rubbing, oral (f), piv. No age specified

a/n: this is written for @justagalwhowrites 's “Joel Miller birthday celebration”. I chose Jackson!Joel/one bed- Thank you for this event 🙏 Thank you @arcanefox207 for the gif in the mood board ❤️ Please, check out the full gif here and some others, they are stunning 😍 Thank you, Ally 🙏❤️ @aurorawritestoescape thank you as always for beta-ing, baby 💕🫶 dividers @saradika-graphics 🙏

The crunch of your footsteps in the snow echoes in your head. Two rabbits are hanging from Joel’s back, clinging to his shoulder. His brown jacket has lost its shine long, long time ago, and the leather is frayed at the elbows and sleeves. Every time you pass him, the smell of old leather rushes into your nostrils. A reassuring, familiar scent.

You’re heading to an outpost, as you have done so many times before. You know each other's reflexes by heart, the way your bodies tense in case of danger, the glances that make speech useless. You no longer count the number of infected you have killed during patrols.

You look around a small wooden house. Searching for footprints, anything that might put you on alert. You scan the area, whether for infected, or worse- hunters or raiders.

You feel safe with Joel, ever since the day he snatched you from the hands of raiders. Two dirty, skinny men. They surprised you, during one of your first long patrols. They knocked Joel out, and dragged you on an old mattress of the shelter you just arrived at. They did not even pay attention to the dead duck that you planned to eat that evening. In this world, with some men, food is not the first thing they crave.

You punched one of them, then tried to grab your knife, but two men were too much to handle. When they threw you onto the mattress, you struggled, screaming, biting, then one held your arms while the other removed your pants. Tears obstructed your view. You would have preferred to be bitten by an infected, rather than that.

Just as the first man was about to lie down between your thighs while you were crying with rage, you heard a dull, cold, unexpected noise. A knife thrown from the opposite side of the room, just stuck in the skull of the man, holding your arms. As soon Joel threw the knife, he rushed to rip the man off your body, and then punched him so many times that his face got swollen from the blows and turned unrecognizable.

“Piece o’shit!” Joel growled from the depths of his chest. You looked at him, still half in shock at what had almost happened to you, feeling relieved. The man was lying on the ground, barely breathing. Joel let go of his collar and retrieved the knife from the second man’s skull. He pressed the tip of the blade against his heart and slowly pushed it in, his dark gaze fixed on the man’s. The raider’s feet twitched for a few moments, before they froze for eternity.

Then Joel rushed over to you and covered you with an old blanket pulled from the foot of the bed. As soon as he sat down on the mattress, his worried eyes fixed on you, you wrapped your arms around his waist. Wanting to forget your fear, to curl up against his reassuring presence. He took you in his arms, rocking you slowly, holding you close to him.

“ ‘m sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. I didn’t hear them coming, because of my damn bad ear.”

“It’s ok, Joel, it’s ok. They didn’t do anything to me,” you muffled in his chest.

“No it’s not. They did way too much. But I got you, now. I got you. Won’t happen again. Not on my watch.”

He held you against him for several minutes, patiently, one hand caressing your back, the other resting on the nape of your neck, until you stopped crying. He then asked if you were feeling a little better, if he could get the bodies out of the outpost. He didn’t want you to see them anymore. You nodded, watched him as he dragged the bodies out into the surrounding woods.

He was sitting next to you until you fell asleep. He stood guard all night, staring at the shadows of the trees through the window, letting you rest.

From that day on, you knew that nothing would happen to you as long as you were with Joel. He was the type of man who, when he said something, stuck to it. He was reliable, loyal, and serious. He was your patrol partner, and you couldn't have asked for a better one.

Once you reach the shelter, you prepare the fire in the hearth of the old fireplace, while Joel goes around this old house, half buried under the snow. It is the first time that you patrol here in the middle of winter, and the walls and the ground are icy. You eat one of the rabbits, trying in vain to warm yourself by the fire. As you get ready to go to bed, Joel puts a blanket on the floor.

“What are you doing, Joel? You can't sleep there. You're gonna freeze and die, it’s too cold!”

“There's only one bed, sweetheart. Ain't gonna sleep with you.”

“Of course you're gonna sleep with me. Come on, Joel, don't be silly. We can share the bed, we have to keep each other warm or the next patrol will find our two skeletons in this damn house.”

“Jesus, you’re so stubborn! Alright then.”

You smile, thinking that you had never met someone as stubborn as him, and if he hadn't noticed your slightly blue lips, he probably wouldn't have changed his mind.

You undress and slip under the thin blankets, wearing your t-shirt and panties. Grimacing at the contact with the cold and damp covers. He joins you in the small bed, and even though warmth radiates from his body, your teeth still chatter.

“Christ, you're freezing. C’mere, I’ll keep you warm,” he says, as you take off your t-shirt and he discards his too, leaving only his boxers.

“Told you we had to sleep in the same damn bed… and I'm the stubborn one?”

He chuckles, and takes you in his arms, his chest pressed against your back.

“Better, sweetheart?”

“Yeah, you’re as warm as a boiler. How is that possible? Icicles are practically falling off these blankets.”

“Alright, you’re exaggerating a bit, don’t you think?”

You scoff and muffle a laugh, then fall asleep.

You wake up during the night, Joel's light snoring in your ear. His arms are still around you and you're much less cold. His scent surrounds you. You shift slightly, putting the blanket that had slipped back on both of you. The movement makes him mumble in his sleep and you smile, getting ready to fall back asleep, until you feel him twitch against you. His cock, asleep until then, has just woken up in his boxers when your ass brushed against it.

You open your eyes suddenly. It’s been a long time since you felt a body- a hard cock - against you. You try to move away from him a little, to not wake him up, to not create awkwardness between you. But he holds you tighter against him, letting out a sigh of contentment when his cock finds its place against your ass again.

You get a rush of arousal and you're not sure if you'll be able to fall back asleep. Your walls are contracting painfully, calling for a release of the pressure from your crotch. You close your eyes, placing your hand under the pillow. Trying to think of something else, until his cock jerks again. Once, twice. There’s no way you’re gonna be able to fall back asleep.

So you think that maybe, if you do it discreetly, you can make yourself come. Even though he's lying against you, his chest against your back.

You slide your hand south, slowly, so as not to wake him, and start brushing your swollen folds through your panties. But it's not enough. You slide your hand under the hem, finally whirling your clit under your finger. Joel growls against your ear and you freeze for a few moments, until his breathing becomes calm, steady. Gently, you stroke yourself, finally starting to feel the fire in your crotch calm down a little.

You vaguely feel his nose brush your hair, not paying much attention to it, thinking he does it in his sleep. Then you feel his hand slowly slide down your arm, and you jerk, hastily removing your fingers from your panties, realizing that Joel is awake and that he has caught you.

“It’s ok, sweetheart,” he whispers softly in your ear in his sleepy voice, taking your hand and gently bringing it back to your pussy.

You feel the heat reach your cheeks and think about getting up, but you're too ashamed to face him. There had never been any sexual tension between the two of you. You're what you could call friends, in this lost world. You trust each other, he told you about Sarah, you told him about your late husband and son. You trust each other, and honestly, you never thought about him as more than a friend. And you don't want to ruin your friendship.

“I just want you to feel good.”

You stay silent for a few moments. Thinking about what he's telling you. You know he's sincere.

You feel your clit pulsing and you bite your lip.

“Ok, Joel,” you breathe out.

You're unsure of what will happen between the two of you after, but you let him lead your hand and slide your fingers under your soaked panties. You're already moaning at the first touch and you feel your nipples hardening.

Delicately, the tips of his fingers pressed against yours, you let him lead the dance and travel through your folds. Then he slides both your hands into your panties, and makes you touch yourself so delicately, as if you were the most fragile thing in the world, that new moans escape you.

“Keep going, Joel, please…”

He hums, grazing your ear with his nose. You hear his breathing deepen, then he presses his forehead against your shoulder blade, still using your finger to brush your clit. You feel your pussy dripping. The fact that he is using your fingers, so perfectly, is perhaps the most sensual thing you have ever done.

You feel his cock stuck in his boxers harden even more as he keeps touching you. You crave to feel him against you, without any fabric between your bodies. You forget your shyness, your reserve, your worries.

“Would you… pull down your boxers? So I can feel you?*

“Of course, sweetheart.” He lets go of your hand to pull down his underwear. His hard cock springs out and this time you feel it fully against you. Big, hard.

“Between my thighs, please…”

He kisses your back and grabs his cock, slides it into this tight space, then comes to rest against your fingers again, in your panties. You slowly move your pelvis back and forth, rubbing yourself against his shaft.

“Christ, sweetheart… Feeling you against me, like that…”

“I know, Joel. It’s… good, really good.”

You no longer remember your fear that this will change things between you. The feeling is too good, too powerful, to think about anything else.

His shaft slides easily between your thighs, your pussy soaking him continuously.

“You’re so wet for me, baby”, he whispers in your ear, and a new flow trickles from your walls. His free hand caresses your shoulder, then he kisses it. You feel his mustache brush your skin, and your moans fill the room.

“You’re gonna come for me, sweetheart?”

“Fuck… fuck yeah, I'm gonna come, Joel.”

He keeps playing with your fingers with the same rhythm, feeling that you are close. Your mind goes blank. You only think about the pressure growing inside you, ready to explode.

“Come on baby, be a good girl for me,” he murmurs.

The orgasm washes over you, and you arch your back under its power, your ass pressed against Joel’s crotch. “Always such a good girl for me,” he praises, holding you against him, your hand in his, until your jerks stop.

Your breathing slowly goes down. “Damn”, you say. “That was so hot.”

“It was,” he smiles, kissing your shoulder. He doesn't ask for more, doesn't put any pressure on you, but you need more. You need your bodies to be one. You don't think too much about it, then add quickly, “Joel… I need to…” before shyness overwhelms you again, and he asks softly “tell me, baby. What do you need?”

The soft tone of his voice reassures you, and you add “I need to feel you… I need to feel you inside me.”

“Turn around, sweetheart. Lemme look at you.”

You do as he says, and face him. You barely see his face in the darkness of the night. Just enough to perceive the intensity in his gaze, behind his usual sweetness with you, as he strokes your cheek gently with his thumb.

“Can I kiss you?”

You nod, of course. Ready to take whatever he wants to give you. His warm lips land on yours and press against them. You hear him take a deep breath, then his nose rubs yours. He kisses you again, with more intensity, and sensations you thought forgotten forever jostle throughout your whole being. His tongue tastes your lips, then slides between them and finds yours. He moans as your hand grabs his shaft softly, wet with his precum and your desire. You jerk him off slowly as you continue to make out. He's big. So big. But you don't wonder if your body can accept it, after all this time. You know it will. And you know Joel will be soft. You nestle his cock at your entrance after pushing your panties aside, murmuring “I wanna feel you,” your forehead against his.

You tilt your pelvis forward and his tip slides inside you, making you hold your breath for a few moments.

“You’re ok?”

“Yeah. I just have to… get used to it.”

He doesn’t move and lets you handle the rhythm. You kiss him again, and you feel your pussy dripping, eager to be filled. You put your hand on the back of his neck and squeeze his bicep with the other, sliding further down his shaft. Your walls spread as you glide on his tip and again, you feel that forgotten feeling. Your breasts are pressed against his chest, nipples tense. Your hand runs through his neck, and you feel his prominent veins under your fingers.

“Oh my god,” you whine, when he is fully inside you. You pull back then push forward again, to reassure his worried eyes on you. You are so wet that the sounds echo in your ears and the whole room. Joel holds you against him, gently, sensually. One hand on your hip, the other on your back.

“Joel?” you ask.

“Tell me, sweetheart.”

“Can you lie down on me? I'd like to feel you deeper.”

He caresses your cheek and tells you yes, of course.

You lie on your back and he removes your panties, kneeling between your thighs.

And he looks at you, from your face to your cunt. "You're beautiful," he says. His stare stops there, then he glances at you. As if he was asking you silently if he could taste you. You nod and he settles between your thighs, spreading your folds with his fingers.

“You're so wet for me, baby,” he adds, before licking your pussy in a long stroke. Pointing his tongue at your clit, then running over your folds again. Your knees are bent, legs spread as wide as possible. His head moves between your offered thighs, your hands lost in his curls, while his tongue laps at your dripping pussy. He pushes two fingers in your core, and places his lips around your clit, sucking it. Then swirls it under his tongue, while his fingers thrust in at a perfect, regular pace.

“Joel,” you whimper. “I'm gonna come again.”

Your nails tighten on his scalp as you come on his tongue, your walls squeezing uncontrollably around his two fingers. He pulls them out and replaces them with his tongue, drinking in everything that flows from you. The feeling is so strong, forgotten for so long, that you feel like you're going to burst into tears. But he stops, careful not to overwhelm you, and lies down between your thighs. He places his hand on your cheek and searches for your eyes before pushing his tip into you with his other hand, eyes lowered to you.

“Damn sweetheart,” he breathes. “You feel so good around me.”

His words envelop you and lull you. His voice is low, calm, as slow and sweet as the rhythm in which he sinks into you.

All his weight is on you and you have never felt so safe in your entire life. His arms surround you as you kiss. Your hands roam the top of his body. His arms, his shoulders, his back, his cheeks, his neck. His cock slides inside you, pushing your walls in the most perfect way with each thrust. Your knees are spread wide to welcome him between your thighs. He straightens up, leaning on one hand, and looks at you. Looks into your eyes filled with desire.

He watches your neck throbbing. Your chest heaving.

He watches where his cock is digging into you.

“I'm not gonna last. Can you give me one more, baby?”

“Yeah, it's... yes.”

He lies back on you, eyes locked on yours, and slides his arms under your shoulders. Your hot, sweaty chests rub against each other. He doesn't take his eyes off you as he thrusts into you, his shaft rubbing exactly where you need it. Your fingers dig into his flesh as you come on his shaft and he stops moving. Eager to keep watching you twitch beneath him, but trying not to come too. Not yet, not inside you. He wants to let you come until the shaking stops.

He looks at you, and focuses on a mole, chosen at random. To focus on something else, than your pussy perfectly squeezing him. When your trembling finally stops, he grabs his cock hastily, just in time before his cum coats the inside of your thighs and your lower stomach, then his heavy body rests against yours.

“Christ, sweetheart… that was amazing,” he says, smiling at you. You kiss and then nestle against his chest. You feel his heart beat hard, then gradually calm down. You fall asleep without even realizing it.

When you wake up, it’s daylight. The smell of coffee rushes into your nostrils. For a moment, it’s like life is almost normal.

You sit up in bed, holding the blanket against you.

“Good morning, sweetheart,” he says. Smiling, warm. Joel.

You smile back at him, thinking that you would like to wake up next to him every single day, from now on.

Thank you for reading 🙏

Comments and reblogs are greatly appreciated ❤️

Follow @millafics and turn notifications on for fics updates

@littlemisspascal @pascalsanctuary @survivingandenduring @iamasaddie

npt: tagging those who showed interest in the wip wednesday post, love you ❤️

@mountainsandmayhem @thundermartini @schnarfer @itwasntimethatdidit40 @sawymredfox

@almostfoxglove @604to647 @ace-turned-confused @pascalssbabyy @pedrospatch

@mermaidgirl30

1K notes · View notes

mountainsandmayhem · 3 months ago

Text

BDSMaid - Chapter 9

Series Summary: In order to save money for law school, you accept a job working as a maid for high end clients. You aren’t supposed to know whose home you’re cleaning, but your curiosity is peaked by your first client, and when the two of you have a shocking and surprising run in more than just your curiosity peaks. Word Count: 5k CW: see small red lettering below the cut AN: I'm going to miss them!! I'm absolutely heartbroken that I'm done, but so fucking proud of myself for what I've created. Thank you to @lotusbxtch for being my beta from pretty much the very beginning. I am so grateful to you and so honoured (yes, with a u because I'm Canadian lol) to call you my friend. Also little shoutouts to @for-a-longlongtime, @alltheirdamn, @mermaidgirl30 and @littlevenicebitch69 for listening to me go on about them for 80% of 2024. As always, graphics and dividers by @saradika-graphics

My Masterlist || Series Masterlist

TW: unprotected p in v, one spank, multiple orgasms and Overstim hinted at, pining, heartbreak

Eight Months Later

Joel

“I got yelled at by a feisty brunette last night at that gala,” Tommy says as the two of them sip whiskey at the bar of the club.

“Probably deserved it.” Joel deadpans and closes the folder of invoices he’s looking over.

He should be doing this in his fancy, and newly renovated, office across the street. He was in the large office for all of three minutes the day after you left when he could only see the ghost of you. From the chair you sat in when you first asked him to teach you how to be a sub, to the door he pinned you against and confessed how out of his mind he was over you, everything was you, and it had to go if he had any chance of following what you needed from him. Joel hasn’t even been in his room at the club out of the fear of what it would do to him. Would I still be able to smell the lavender of her shampoo in there? Still be able to hear her beautiful cries of pleasure and pain bouncing off the walls?

“She thought I was you,” Tommy says, glancing over at his brother and interrupting Joel’s impending spiral.

Joel sighs, slipping his reading glasses from his face before taking a long pull of the amber liquor from his crystal glass. Tommy looks straight ahead as he continues.

“She’s doing great, by the way. Or at least that’s what her friend said when she was scolding me.”

Joel winces at his words, “Of course she is, Tommy.” Even though it's been almost a year since you left, just the mention of you rips his barely-mended heart back in half. It doesn’t seem to matter how much time passes, he still feels like he did in his kitchen.

The very fibers of his being ache just as hard for you now as they did then. He longs to see you and touch you, to feel your warm, soft skin under his hands again. Anyone before you was always, ‘Yes, Mister Miller,’ even when they weren’t in a scene; but not you. You weren’t afraid to be curious and unapologetically yourself. He hasn’t laughed as hard with anyone, including Tiffany, as he did with you. But the part that he misses the most is the way you look at him the first time you see him. Your eyes soften, velvety pink lips parting slightly before they curl into a smile that makes his heart hammer behind his ribs. Then, he watches your shoulders relax and it makes him feel like he hung the moon and stars for you, and if he could have, he would have.

He clears his throat and then rasps, “She’s too smart to not be doing well.”

Tommy stands, bringing his hands to rub at Joel's shoulders. He squeezes his tense deltoid muscles and with a hint of mischief in his voice he says, “Lots of pretty girls here tonight if you feel like moving on.”

Joel shakes his head and pulls away from Tommy’s grasp with a grunt. “Never gonna happen. Get outta here before you get yelled at two nights in a row.”

“Just too bad for me that you aren’t a hot brunette,” Tommy says with a laugh.

“I have brown hair,” Joel replies defensively, running his fingers through the grown out curls.

“Not to kick you when you’re down, but it’s mostly grey at this point.”

Joel holds up a single finger at Tommy over his shoulder as he laughs and walks away.

Two and a half years later

You

You’ve been up to your eyeballs in studying as you prepare for your finals. These last few years in California have been the hardest yet most fulfilling time of your life. Two nights in a row now, you’ve fallen asleep in the library, only waking when your Spotify would switch from the white noise playlist you use to help you focus, to your “getting ready” playlist. After dragging yourself to your dorm room in the dead of the night, you’d get a few restless hours of sleep before heading right back to your favourite studying spot. You can’t believe that in just a few short weeks you’ll be graduating and stepping into the life you’ve always envisioned for yourself.

The unmistakable FaceTime jingle fills your AirPods. Jamie’s name is splayed across the screen of your phone, along with a photo of the two of you at Albany Beach when she visited this past Christmas break. You put your highlighter down and slide the answer toggle over.

“Hey!” She says, her warm smile shining up at you. You squint, trying to place where she is. You don’t often let yourself think of Joel, but the cracks across your screen make FaceTiming difficult, and the selfish side of you always wishes you had grabbed that new phone before you left. Your head cocks to the side; broken screen or not, you don’t recognize the background.

“Where are you?” You ask.

“Oh, I’m good, thanks. How are you?” She jests with a mocking eye roll. “I’m at a cabin.”

“What cabin?” You say, glaring at her jokingly. A deep laugh comes from the otherside of the phone and your eyes widen. “Who’s that?”

The man's voice comes from offscreen, “I can’t believe you thought she wouldn’t ask where you were. She’s going to be a lawyer, for god's sake.”

“Jamie, who is that? What is going on here? Blink twice if you need rescuing!” You joke.

Jamie blushes, looking over the phone at whoever that voice is coming from. “I just wanted to call to see how the studying is going, and to let you know that I got the graduation tickets.”

A glass of white wine appears in front of Jamie and she smiles before puckering her lips in a kissing motion towards the man in the room with her. “Ok, seriously, who the fuck is that and where are you?”

“I was also calling to let you know that Laren can’t make it anymore and Odette is in New York,” she takes a small sip of her wine.

“Oh, well that’s ok,” you say, trying to squash the disappointment and hoping it doesn’t show in your voice or face. You wished that at least two of your three best friends would be there for you. “It can just be me and you, baby!”

“Well…I’m wondering if I could maybe bring my boyfriend? Might be a good opportunity for you two to meet.”

“What? What boyfriend?” You say, officially abandoning all study materials until you get some answers. Jamie raises a perfectly manicured finger and calls the mystery man over.

You swallow hard as Tommy Miller appears beside her.

Jamie glances up at him, her bright green eyes full of admiration, his mirroring hers. The starry look in their eyes tells you everything you need to know; they’re so far gone for that even a search and rescue team wouldn’t be able to save them. She looks back at you. “Meet again, I guess.”

You try to push for answers, but either of them give in, claiming you need to focus on finals. Before you hang up, Jamie promises to tell you the entire story when you see each other next. You’re happy for your friend, especially seeing the way Tommy looked back at her. Even through your cracked screen you could see the love, but as you try to go back to studying you have a hollow feeling in your stomach.

Graduation Day

You

The late afternoon sun fills your dorm room, boxes of your belongings stacked haphazardly around you. After walking the stage tonight, you are going out to dinner with Jamie and Tommy, and then he has paid for a hotel suite so the two of you can have a girls’ night. You can’t wait to hear how Tommy went from, in Jamie’s previous words, “my dad’s new asshole friend” to her boyfriend.

You step in front of your floor length mirror, zipping up the black graduation gown over your knee length, form fitting, deep emerald velvet dress. The California sun has been good to you, your tanned legs and sunkissed nose and cheeks are glowing. You place your blue and yellow Berkeley Law stole over your head and then grab your cap, ensuring the ‘Class of ‘28’ tassel is secure. You fluff your curls one last time as a light knock comes from your door.

“Ready to graduate, gorgeous?” Ronan smiles at you, eyes trailing down your gown. He’s the type of handsome that’s almost painful to look at, but more importantly - you wouldn’t have made it through these last three years without him. You met the first day - the lock on your door wasn’t working, and he waltzed in on you half naked when he mistook your room as his.

You smile at him in your doorway now; remembering the way you screamed at him that first time, trying to cover your chest, and him scrambling to close the door. His eyes were clamped shut, and he slammed his finger so hard that you had to take him for stitches. Now, several years later, he fills out his graduation gown perfectly with those wide rugby shoulders, a sight you couldn’t even have imagined back then. Whichever angel made him didn’t make a single mistake - he’s tall and insanely broad, with dark sandy blonde hair, and clover green eyes that in the right light are a golden hazel. He’s easily one of the smartest men you’ve ever met and an incredible athlete. The cherry on top, because of course there’s more: he’s an international student and has a panty-melting Irish accent.

“Beyond ready. Let's become lawyers, babe.”

He steps aside, one arm out in a ‘ladies first’ gesture. Handsome, charming, and thoughtful - a dangerous trifecta. You slide your hand in the crook of his muscle-lined arm and walk across campus together.

Ronan jerks his head towards the coffee cart. “Remember when you spilled your entire coffee on your new puffer jacket?”

You glare up at him, you saved for weeks to buy that jacket. “No, but I remember you throwing up in that trash can after the Halloween party last year.”

“Well, if Beach Party Barbie had helped Lifeguard Ken with all those shots we wouldn’t have had that problem, would we?” You laugh as Ronan puffs out his chest, but you both know he was more than willing to take your half of the ‘Best Couples Costume' shots.

Finally, you reach the courtyard where the law students will be walking across a stage that acts as the symbolic bridge to the rest of their lives. I’m a lawyer, you think to yourself and try to force a smile. The magnitude of the day only really starts to sink into your bones as you see the friends and families of your classmates start to take their seats. The excited feeling you had earlier starts to morph. You’re proud of yourself for what you’ve done these last three years, and this was just the first step. You have so much to look forward to, so why do you feel a sense of dread building in the pit of your stomach?

Ronan walks you to where you need to line up alphabetically, kissing your cheek and then, after leaning in and placing his large hand on your lower back, he whispers a joke about how you better not trip. You glance around the thick crowd for Jamie and Tommy. After realizing it’s hopeless to try and spot them in a group this large, you slip your cap over your hair and get in the procession line.

You try to soak in every minute of the day, from the speeches to the birds chirping in the background, but something akin to loss flutters at the base of your spine. You’re just as sad to be leaving Berkely as you are excited to carve out your future. Leaving here isn’t what’s causing you to feel this way, however. You try to tell yourself that maybe it’s just nerves; even with all the job offers coming in from your internships, it’s normal to be nervous about what comes next.

As the student union president gives his toast to the family and friends, you look down at your lap, pushing back the cuticle on your left thumb. Maybe it’s leaving Ronan. He’s been an anchor for you, grounding you almost every day of the last three years and you don’t know how you let yourself become this dependent on anyone, especially a man, again.

You shake your head at yourself and try to move your focus to the cuticle on your other thumb. Seeing the skin clean from the nail bed eases the tension slightly for you. ‘I’m allowed to be nervous when leaning on people, but not everyone will leave me,’ you recite almost automatically in your mind, the mantra you’ve had these past few years whenever you feel yourself getting this anxious. Just as you finish the thought, a car revs in the distance and the realization of what - or who - you’re actually missing slams through you so hard that you almost feel winded. Your lungs ache, tears pushing behind your eyes as his name rings loudly through your mind.

Joel.

You kept yourself busy since the minute you left Austin. The busier you were, the less time you had to focus on the void in your heart. During the school year, you didn’t have to find things to stay busy with; law school nearly chewed you up and spit you out. Over the summers, you worked as an intern and visited your friends. There was never a quiet moment, never too much time alone with your thoughts, and it was better this way. You can confidently say that you’d only thought of Joel six times since you walked out of his house that day: when you fell asleep on the beach and were so sunburnt you could barely move for three days; when you failed your first test; when your rusted SUV, that acted as your ticket to freedom at eighteen, died on the freeway in rush hour (from that point on you had to rely on public transportation to get you to the homes you cleaned). When you experienced your first earthquake; when you stayed up for forty-two hours straight after your partner in a group project didn’t have their side of the work done; and, lastly, this past New Year’s Eve when you were in Austin and thought you saw him at a party.

“Is he here?”, that little box of feelings that you shut away in a vault long ago wonders. “Has anything changed for him in the last three years?”

The small smile that pulls at your cheeks, and the excited flutter of your heart when you think about the possibility of seeing him again, proves that maybe nothing has changed for you. As the minutes tick by, your mind races with all the possible scenarios for after the ceremony. What if he is here? What will you say? What will he say? How will Ronan react, you know he has strong feelings about what happened between you and Joel. Even worse though, what if he’s not here? But maybe he’s at the hotel where Tommy and Jamie are staying?

Before you know it, your row is standing and walking single file towards the stage. With each strike of your high-heeled strappy sandals against the concrete, a memory of Joel floods your system. The toast he made you in his kitchen, the kiss in that dimly lit hallway on your birthday, the way he walked you through his club and how calmly he talked about you being in charge before going into the voyeur room. The multitude of orgasms he gave you within the four walls of his private room. Him singing on the small stage of the dive bar you found, followed by him spanking you right there in the bathroom with his hand clamped to your face to keep you quiet. His strong hand grasping your thigh as he drove you to his house. The way he tasted on your tongue. The smell of his skin: all ash and leather, occasionally mixed with whiskey or mint. The feel of his body: hard, broad and hot. His shuddered breaths as he confessed so many things in so few words.

‘It’s only you, sweet girl.’

‘Just call me Joel.’

‘I know, and I’m so proud of you, sweet girl.’

You carefully walk up the stairs, forcing the thoughts of Joel from your mind, just in time to hear your name announced as a graduate of Berkeley Law. You float across the stage, grabbing the piece of paper that acts as your degree until the real one comes, shaking the hand of the Dean who flips your tassel before you walk to the stairs on the other side; the stairs that symbolize the ending of your time here and the beginning of the rest of your life.

As you reach the top of the steps, you look out into the audience and see Jamie. She pumps her fist in the air and before you can process the empty seat beside her, you feel it; a strong tug from behind your navel. It takes you less than a heartbeat to find him and the sight before you floods your body with a familiar warmth. Standing under a large tree at the edge of the audience, dressed in all black, and holding his Stetson hat to his heart, is Joel. For the first time in years you feel whole again.

You keep your gaze on him, worried that if you so much as blink that he’ll be gone. You are supposed to follow your classmates, but you veer left, walking towards Joel. The closer you get, the more at ease you feel. He’s real, you think, he’s here. You stop a foot or so in front of him.

“Hi, Freckles,” he whispers, his voice cracking slightly. His eyes dance around your face, almost as if he’s trying to memorize this moment. You can’t help but wonder if he’s feeling exactly how you are.

“Hi, Sweet Cheeks,” you say, the same tremble in your voice, as you try desperately to hold it together. “You’re here.”

He nods and you give him a tight-lipped smile as your mind races. There’s so much you want to say, but now that he’s standing right there in front of you after three years, you don’t know where to start.

Joel breaks the silence, jutting his chin in the direction of the other graduates as he says, “I saw you come in with your boyfriend. When I saw you kiss, I was going to leave, but I made you a promise.”

You knit your eyebrows together and take a step closer. “Boyfriend?”

“The man you walked over here with,” Joel says, his black Stetson sliding down the chest you so desperately want to touch as he drops his hands to his sides. He’s left no barriers between the two of you except the heartbreak that’s evident on his face.

You laugh quietly, “No, he’s - that’s Ronan.”

Joel nods. “Okay.”

“He’s my friend,” you clarify, and when Joel’s face stays the same, you add, “And he’s still as gay as the day we first met!”

Joel lets out a whoosh of a breath and closes the distance between the two of you, his free hand comes to one of your curls, twirling the end of it around his thick fingers. Soft and silky meets rough and calloused. “I’m so proud of you, Freckles.”

You don’t miss how he watches your tongue dart between your lips, “Thank you.”

“So? How does it feel?” He gives you a soft crooked smile, his dimple carving into the short facial hair of his salt and pepper beard. Between that smile, and the way his brown eyes wash over you, you’re overcome with affection. He let you go. He did exactly as you asked him. He didn’t chase you or try to convince you to stay. You told him if he really loved you, then he’d do exactly this; and in turn, he did what he said he would.

He showed up.

“I love you,” you state and the air between you turns electric, almost like this moment could either set you both aflame or act as a generator for your future together. Joel gives you that look, the one that makes you feel like you’re the center of his universe. He lets the curled end of your hair slip from his fingers, reaching up towards your graduation cap but hesitating.

“May I?” He rasps and swallows hard.

You nod, and knowing exactly what he’s going for, you take the Stetson from his other hand and place it on your head after he removes your cap. The brim of it blocks out everything but the two of you.

“Say that again, sweet girl,” he murmurs.

“I love you,” it’s barely a whisper this time. “Even after three years apart, you are everything to me. I asked you to let me go so I could accomplish this, and you did. You’ve always done what I asked, what I needed. I’m not sorry for what happened between us, but I am sorry that I missed out on getting to spend the last three years with you looking at me how you are now. I love you, Joel Miller.”

He brings his lips within a breath of yours, and your body practically vibrates with the knowledge that if you leaned just a bit forward, you’d finally have his mouth on you again. You can almost taste the mint on his tongue as the familiar fragrance of ash and leather surround you. “I have dreamed of hearing those three words leave your beautiful lips more times than I can count, baby. You’re it for me. I’ll do anything for you, even if it means breaking my own heart, but I’m always going to be here for you, rooting for you and encouraging you. I’m glad you’re not sorry, because I’m not, I’m so fucking proud of you. I love you, too, my sweet girl.”

Finally, he presses his warm, firm lips against yours while pulling you tight to his body. You wrap an arm around his neck, holding the black cowboy hat against your head with your other hand. It doesn’t matter that the ceremony isn’t done, or that there are hundreds of people to your right. For the first time in three years, everything goes quiet. He hums contentedly and you feel yourself melt against him, tilting your head so he can deepen the kiss. He parts his lips, letting you take the first swipe of your tongue against his. Need floods your system, and based on the way he grinds into you, he’s feeling the same.

He breaks the kiss, but doesn’t go far, resting his forehead against yours. “Take me home,” you practically purr.

“Where do you want home to be? I’ll go anywhere,” Joel rasps, running his nose down the bridge of yours.

“Austin,” you respond, your breath catching as his lips ghost along the side of your mouth.

“I sold my portion of the club to Tommy and Tess. I don’t have anything holding me in Austin anymore, sweet girl. If you have a job offer you really want, that’s where we’ll go.” You pull back to look at him. You can tell by the set of his jaw that he’s serious.

“I want to go to Austin. I have a job offer there.”

“Good thing I told Tommy not to touch my room at the club then.”

“That’s a very good thing,” you moan and then pull him in to kiss again. The audience behind you erupts into cheers, celebrating the accomplishments of every student in that crowd.

You’re a lawyer, and suddenly, the future doesn’t seem so scary.

Joel

Taking you home to Austin that night unfortunately wasn’t an option. After finding Jamie in the crowd, and being formally introduced to Ronan, he called the car to pick up the three of you. You all met Tommy at the restaurant, celebrating with all the expensive homemade pasta and overpriced wine that you wanted; even though seeing you in that curve-hugging velvet dress was slowly killing him. Joel had kept at least one hand on you since seeing you again, and he doesn’t plan on changing that anytime soon.

He didn’t want to rush you on your big night, so he waited patiently, listening to you tell stories of your last three years, and revelling in the evident joy that you and Jamie share over being together again. When dessert comes around he catches Tommy’s attention and gives him a small smile. It’s fitting that the two brothers, who have been so close their entire lives, would fall in love with best friends.

Once in his room, he spent two hours stripping you down at an almost painfully slow pace. He kissed every inch of your skin twice over and has pulled five orgasms, and counting, out of you so far.

Now, Joel is seated in the wide velvet arm chair in the corner of his hotel suite. His cock is buried deep inside of your tight cunt as you straddle him. Your skin feels like butter under his hands as he trails them along your back and the globes of your perfect ass. He’s missed tying you up, but this is what he longed for: the earth shattering intimacy he feels with you in these moments.

“Please,” you mumble into his neck, desperate to move your hips.

“Not until you answer me,” he demands softly. “How many times was it that you needed me, but were too stubborn to reach out?”

Earlier tonight you told him about the six times you really needed him. He’d kissed you softly after each confession, returning the trust with a time he needed you. After the last one, he’d pulled back to look at you with dark eyes. He’d hated that you needed him and he couldn’t be there. He’d clenched his back molars twice before he said you’d be denied six orgasms the next time you were at the club, but tonight you have permission to come as often as you need to.

He swats your already reddened ass cheek and your pussy flutters as you cry out. “Mister Miller, stop. Please, just let me move.”

“Do you need to use your safeword?”

“No,” you respond with a pout.

“How many times?” He says again through gritted teeth, even though already knows the answer.

“Six,” you sob.

He tuts and then growls, “That doesn’t sound like my good girl, does it?”

You shake your head against his throat and moan a sound of disagreement.

“Do you want to come for me again?”

“Yes, Mister Miller. Please!”

He trails his fingers up and down your back again, the thin sheen of sweat on your skin makes it easy for him to caress you. He smiles to himself at the shiver that racks through your body at his touch. You react so beautifully to him. “Yeah? You wanna grind your swollen little clit on my piercing, baby girl?”

“Please,” you whine again, stretching out all the vowels in the word.

“Show me. Ride my cock, take what you need.”

You lift your head from the crook in his neck and pull back slightly, rocking your hips back and forth; a sultry laugh leaves his lips at your eagerness. You look at him with hooded eyes, hair stuck to your forehead. His eyes trail down your neck to the bruises he sucked into your collar bone earlier and then to your breasts; both of which are covered in his marks. He watches the little gold nipple clamps, and the chain that connects them, bounce with each flick of your hips.

“That’s it, sweet girl. You look like a goddess, my goddess. Who do you belong to?”

“I’m yours, baby,” you say through shallow breaths. He pulls at the chain and you cry out in pain. “S-sorry, Mister Miller.”

“Again, sweet girl. Tell me who you belong to.”

“Oh fuck, y-you, Mist -” his hands come to your face and when he whispers your name the rest of your sentence dies on your tongue.

“Just call me Joel.” The commanding voice of his alter ego is gone as he says it.

Your hips slow, changing from a frantic back and forth to a sensual swirling motion. “I’m yours, Joel. Forever.”

He kisses you softly, a silent telling of how vulnerable he is at this moment. “Don’t ask me to let you go ever again.”

The smile you give him causes his heart to skip, “I won’t.”

“You might, sweet girl. I won't survive it if you do, so I’m going to remind you of this moment as often as possible for the rest of my life. Remind you how much you’re loved and supported. You’re mine, Freckles.” Your hips swirl and he feels you tighten up around him. “Come for me, my sweet girl.”

“Fuck, fuck, Joel!” It’s a cry and moan all at once.

“I’m here, it’s ok, baby.” With that, your body shudders and you fall into him as you shatter. Your pussy clenches and releases rapidly around his length. His cock twitches, and once he can’t hold it anymore he relaxes, letting his orgasm rock through him in time with yours.

“I’m yours, too,” he gasps as he melts into you.

The End

Coming Soon:

Curious how Jamie ended up with her "dads new asshole friend?"

Part 2 of the BDSMaid Trilogy coming mid 2025!

Also, stay tuned for the epilogue for Joel and Sweet Girl.

512 notes · View notes

slowdivinqs · 6 months ago

Text

Magnetism

Joel Miller x f!reader

joel photo by dinasawrus on pinterest, banners by cafekitsune

Summary: Having a steamy make out session behind the Tipsy Bison with a certain soft spoken Texan.

Warnings: 18+! There’s NO actual smut, just the make out session. Hidden relationship vibes ( they don’t wanna be caught ). Images in the header are just for aesthetic purposes. Subby Joel vibes but also not, we got a mix of both. Soft!Joel and Jackson!Joel. Can imagine either Pedro or Game Joel.

A/N: I’m back! I was so shocked by the love on my last fic, thank you so much! This one is really rushed and quick - the idea came to me because of a reel on instagram. Yeah.

Do not copy or repost my fics anywhere! No AI bots either, I will find you

Tommy’s put on Alice In Chains again for the fifth time Tonight.

Joel groans against you, but not like how he’s been groaning for the past 20 minutes. He’s irritated this time.

“Goddamnit. Someone oughta knock him over the head.” Joel mutters breathily, scowling at the back entrance to the bar like Tommy will sense his ire through the exposed brick and wood.

You take the time to admire his roused hair. Your head hits the outside wall of the Tipsy Bison with a soft thump, and your eyes are hazy and heavy from the sight of the man in front of you.

Joel Miller. Thee scary, grumpy, tense, asshole, tommy’s-goddamn-brother Joel Miller.

He’s a sight to behold. Flushed cheeks and, cutely, ears. Messy hair from your fingers and unbuttoned collars of typical flannel shirts.

All because you’ve been kissing him. Like teenagers, actually.

You’re not sure why you’re still standing outside the bar in the chilly air instead of being buried under his warm body screaming his name.

Well, that’s a lie. You do know.

It’s the sound he makes when his lips caress yours, the little sharp intake of air through his nose as he tilts his head to the side; nose poking your cheek. The way he groans as you bite his plump bottom lip when you dance your tongue back and forth with his.

The way he holds your waist like you’re all he’s ever wanted like he’s a man obsessed, possessed. Whatever you want to call it.

Your hands come up to rest just under his jaw, cupping behind his ear, and feel his hair tickling the tips of your fingers - guiding him back to look at you.

“Pearl Jam sounds the same sometimes,” you say to him, looking at his kiss swollen lips.

“You must be losin’ your hearin’, darlin’ girl.”

He looks drunk. Not just from Seth’s conspicuous beer, but from your kisses. His eyes are soft-blown wide, locking onto your eyes with a haziness that implies they actually want to flutter shut like they have been doing the moment your lips touch. His eyebrows are semi-lifted, not set in their usual, gravity-demanding scowl.

You run your thumb over his jaw, pulling him back to you so lightly it seems like magnetism. His brows furrow, eyes give in and flutter before he’s molding his lips against yours like it’s a drug. Groaning against your mouth as he rests his clenched fist on the wall just above your head. His other hand coming up to the soft skin underneath your jaw.

The sound of you kissing - the little smack and strangely erotic sound of salivating mouths moving together. His soft moans and heavy breaths pushing against your skin as a huff.

You don’t blame him, you feel drunk on this too.

The weight of your arms feels heavier when you lift them to wrap around Joel’s shoulders. Those damn, broad shoulders. You can feel the muscle of them along that soft inner part of your forearms, Can feel them shift and move as he leans in closer to wrap his arms around your waist and leave no atoms between you, his lips against yours like a lifeline - like it kills him every second they’re not.

He fucking moans when you grip the awkward-length hair on his nape.

You’re broken out of the haze by your screaming lungs, pulling away with a wet smack as you pant. Your fluttery eyes - damn it’s contagious - see your breath move through the cold air. The image of how your make-out must’ve looked from the third person, big bad Joel Miller kiss-drunk and desperate - your panting breaths mingling in the air around your faces as you two make kissing seem like something that is as erotic as straight sex outside of the Jackson bar.

You feel the arousal zing through your body before it drips out of you.

His scruff nuzzles against your neck, leaving the same burn you feel around your lips and cheeks. Everything is tingly.

“Joel, someone is going to come out here,” you whisper into the chill. Those lips of his don’t stop their sloppy caress of your neck, making you turn in his direction and try to contain a little noise you know will make him reckless.

He whines - whines - against your neck, not stopping his ministrations, only pulling back to kiss you again, eat you like it’s what he’s been waiting for his whole life.

“Then come back to my place“ he murmurs, but he’s lost in the haze. Almost as if he’s finally reached that hazy high from your mouth that he keeps coming back for.

You melt into him again, pulling him closer until you can feel the rapid rise and fall of his chest against yours. He’s practically a wall you’re holding onto. Breathing in and molding your mouth around.

There’s a loud squeak and a bang as the bar door opens and knocks against the wall, your hands are still around Joel’s neck as you both look over in surprise. Moments later Tommy’s thrown out right on his ass, which makes Joel laugh immediately.

Tommy looks over with a scowl before looking back to his friends who threw him out.

“C’mon guys!” he huffs, still on the ground

“You’re banned from the jukebox.” Seth grumbles before slamming the door right in Tommy’s face.

It looks like Tommy might go rogue, start a revolution against dictatorship of jukeboxes, but ultimately decides to take his comical frustration out on Joel.

Tommy turns to look at the both of you. Joel is still chuckling slightly, wiping the corner of his eye, still standing right up against you.

“Shut up. You’re busy suckin’ face when I needed backup.” Tommy huffs, wiping stones and dirt off his ass, grumbling to himself, glaring at the door - similarly to his brother - like he could take control of the jukebox with his mind and play Alice In Chains again like a poltergeist.

“Priorities, brother.”

Tommy lovingly gives Joel the finger, before grumbling and walking home, a hand on his probably bruised backside.

Tysm for reading! If you enjoyed pls lmk as well as reblogging! ◡̈

#joel miller x reader #joel miller #the last of us fic #joel miller x y/n #joel miller x you #joel miller smut #pedro pascal x reader #pedro pascal #joel miller x f!reader #tlou fanfiction #soft!joel miller #tommy miller

952 notes · View notes

baronessvonglitter · 10 months ago

Text

Blue Hour

outlaw!Joel Miller x runaway hitchhiker!f!Reader | wc: 2.8K

Summary: hitchhiking in the cruel Texas desert, you're picked up by a handsome stranger

WARNINGS: outlaw!Joel (not mentioned exactly what criminal activity he's involved in, but he does bear scars and looks as if he's been in a fight recently), also he's on the run, brief mentions of parental abuse and alcoholism, strangers to lovers, loss of virginity, unprotected p in v sex (birth control is briefly discussed), soft!Joel (he's respectful of boundaries)

Author's Note: I had initially wanted to do a trucker story, but thought that the criminal element fit better here. I would absolutely love to see a trucker!Joel fic if it doesn't already exist. Please do tag me if it does! Also this is lightly edited but the love is there..

JOEL MILLER MASTERLIST | FULL MASTERLIST

You're both running from something; that's how you find each other.

On a lonely stretch of highway in West Texas, Joel Miller picks you up on the side of the road, his mindset one of penance. If he does a good thing by saving someone maybe he can save himself. You're just glad to get away, as far away as possible from a mom who drank all the time, berated you, beat you, and was only at her most peaceful when she was passed out cold.

It's a danger in and of itself to get into Joel's truck, and a danger to come into his motel room, but to you, any other place is safer than where you grew up. The little roadside motel is brightly lit, welcoming, the sign neon against the cerulean summer evening sky.

By the fluorescent glow of the cheap TV screen with its staticky channels you exchange your stories. Joel doesn't tell you much apart from the fact that he's headed to New Mexico, and the scar on his nose, the way he's healing from a black eye you surmise is probably from a couple weeks ago. He carries a gun and his wallet is thick with cash. You can tell he's bad news but you don't care. You're just happy to have a roof over your head for the night and a plan of some sort of future taking shape in your mind.

With only one bed he offers to take the floor, but you insist it's fine to share. He's been a gentleman so far, despite the obvious flirtatious vibes you've been giving. It's impossible to keep to yourself as you both settle down to sleep. Your new life started the day you walked away from your home. You're a different person in this bed, laying on a cheap mattress with a handsome stranger. And, though you've never gone much farther than kissing, the newness of desire tugs at you from deep within.

"Joel.." his back is turned to you and he barely catches you calling for him. You press your hands to his back, which immediately gets his attention. He looks at you with slight confusion, as if he'd forgotten you were there, and when he sees the meaningful look in your eyes he knows what it is you want, and you don't stop him when he pulls you close.

Joel's fingers tangle in your hair, his other hand roaming over your waist and hip, caressing and claiming you with a hungry and desperate fervor. You moan softly, your tongues dancing against each other, and you melt under the sweet shared pleasure. Your fingers slip beneath his shirt, feeling the broad smooth expanse of his back.

His senses are afire as your fingers trace along his bare skin, and his own hands continue to wander, skimming along your sides, gently caressing the curve of your hip. He pulls back just enough to take a breath, his forehead coming to rest against yours, breathing in short, shallow gasps.

"I like the way you taste," you tell him, your confession soft and simple in the twilight glow of the room, your words caressing his lips. Joel's eyes darken with desire as he gazes at you in the semi-darkness.

"Yeah? And how do I taste, darlin'?" There's an edge of a growl to his words, his fingers stroking softly along your cheek, a fusion of longing and restraint etched into his expression.

"Like cinnamon, and whiskey," you whisper. "You taste like pleasure.."

He pulls you closer, nudging his nose against yours as a low, possessive growl rumbles in his chest. "You taste like sunshine and sweetness, sugar.." He dips his head back down to capture your lips in another searing kiss, his tongue slipping between your lips, swallowing your moans. Every sound, every gasp you make, fuels the fire burning within him, igniting an intoxicating blend of desire and hunger.

One arm wrapped around your waist, his other hand slides down your back, trailing fire along your skin as he moves lower, gently cupping your ass and pulling you against the heated length of his body. You gasp at the intimate touch. The way he presses you to his hardness awakens and excites something in you. "Joel!" you gasp.

The sound of his name, breathed out so sweetly from your lips, sends a shiver down his spine. "That's it. darlin'.. say my name.."

You whimper at the sweet friction as he continues to deliberately press you to his hardened arousal, kneading your cheeks. "Joel.." you say obediently, whispered in innocent pleasure.

He groans softly. "That's my good girl.." He presses you against him once more, allowing you to feel the full extent of his arousal, the heat and weight of it grinding against your core. Desire floods your veins and you slowly undulate your hips, finding little comfort in merely rubbing against him. "Fuck, you drive me crazy, darlin'," his voice is husky and raw with need.

"I want you.. please don't make me wait.." you tell him.

"Yeah? You want me.. like this? Is this how you want me to fuck you?" Joel's voice drips with primal need as he grinds against you, feeling the heat and wetness, his own arousal painfully hard at this point.

You nod, your breath catching in your throat. "I can't think about anything else right now. Just you.. with me."

"Darlin', I can't hold back anymore.." he warns, but he takes time to ask about birth control, and you assure him you are covered.

You reach up to kiss him, before breaking apart a moment to take off your top and help him remove his own. The feel of his warm flesh against yours is heavenly. He bears scars and old wounds upon his flesh, evidence of a life lived in danger. But right now you only think about how warm he feels, how strong he is. "I just want to feel your skin against mine for a little bit.."

Joel's touch is almost reverent as his large, calloused hands roam your bare skin, learning the contours of your soft supple flesh, cupping each breast. "My sweet girl.." he whispers in awe.

Likewise, you trace every little scar, thinking on how each of those fights, those deadly interactions, brought him one step closer to you. "I need you," he whispers, feeling more alive, brand new under the heat of your palms on his chest. His fingers find the waistband of your panties and his eyes quickly flick to yours, seeking permission. "Is this all right?" You nod eagerly, "Lift up your hips for me," comes his quiet command, and he gently tugs at the elastic, slowly pulling your panties down your thighs. He sees you laid bare before him, your inner thighs moist with desire, the curls on your mound dewy with want. "God damn.. you're so beautiful.. I wanna taste you.." he groans, pressing a heated kiss against the sensitive skin just beneath your hipbone.

You sigh at his kiss, his beard pleasantly scratching your skin. "Yes.. please.."

Joel's tongue flicks out to taste the heated flesh between your thighs, groaning softly at the flavor of you on his tongue before he begins to lick through your slick, puffy folds. He smiles as you gasp, your eyes wide and mouth parted in an O. "Joel!" you moan, panting as his tongue explores you. When he said he wanted to taste you, you assumed he meant more kissing. You hadn't expected this, hadn't known this was possible. Your fingers fist in his hair as he continues. He groans against you, the sound vibrating deliciously against your cunt. "Taste so sweet,.. like heaven.. my sweet girl.." he whispers between long, languid licks, his arms wrapping around your trembling thighs, holding you open for him as he feasts. His tongue flicks and dances over your clit, swirling and teasing, wanting to learn every inch of you, what makes you scream and what makes you whimper, getting drunk on your taste like a thirsty man lost in the desert.

Your hips arch up to meet each lick, each worshiping swipe as his pace becomes more insistent, following the sound of your moans and sighs, feeling the shivering in your body, his tongue flicking and circling in a hungry rhythm, determined to bring you to the brink.

Your thighs start to quake but he expertly keeps them spread open, feasting on you. "God! Joel, I'm coming!" Pleasure uncoils from the very center of you, radiating outward, controlling every other sense and thought. His hands grip your shaking thighs, lapping up all your sweet nectar. "That's it, darlin', let go for me.. I got you.." he whispers. He gently eases you through your orgasm, tongue slowing, savoring every drop he can. "God damn, sweetheart.. you taste so damn good.. you doing okay?"

"Yes," you pant, a light sheen of sweat forming on your skin. "Oh, Joel," you moan, bringing him to you for a kiss and tasting your flavor on his lips and tongue. He rises, crawling up your body until his weight is draped over you, his arms caging you in as you kiss, sharing your taste with you. He gazes down at you, the way you trust him implicitly ignites a mix of feelings: a raging, possessive need, a deep sense of responsibility, and a swelling of unbridled affection and adoration. He lifts a hand to gently caress your cheek, his thumb tracing soft patterns against your skin. You can see his heart and soul bared to you in that simple touch. Your skin is flushed, hair mussed, eyes bright. You've never looked more beautiful.

Joel shifts his weight, pressing closer against you, the pressure of his hard length against your hip undeniable as your eyes meet. You take him gently into your hands, grasping and feeling him. He groans at the softness of your hands wrapping around his arousal, eyes glazing over with pleasure. "God.. I want you.. need to feel you around me, sweetheart.."

You sense now that you have the power. Slowly you run your hands over his rigid cock, swiping your thumb across the tip, wiping away a bead of moisture. "Is it going to fit?" you ask, feeling the heft of it, both length and girth.

A guttural groan rumbles from his chest and his head bows down to bury his face against your neck. "It'll fit, sugar, I promise. Just take your time."

Your heart skips a beat. This is the ultimate thing that can bring you together, and will forever change what you mean to each other. "I'm ready for you.."

Joel's hands gently grip your thighs, guiding you to move and open further as he positions himself between your legs, the head of his cock resting against your entrance. His heart pounds as he looks down at you. "You sure, darlin'? I promise I'll go slow."

"I'm sure. I've never been more sure of anything in my life."

"Okay, just tell me if you need me to stop. I don't wanna hurt you." He presses to you a little more, eager to fill you but waiting on your word.

"Kiss me," you whisper.

He pours all his love and need into the kiss, swallowing your gasp as he presses forward, his thick cockhead just barely breaching you, his groan joining with yours at the feel of your tight heat around him. You break the kiss, resting your hands on his shoulders as he enters you, a little at a time. His fingers dig into your thighs, his expression a cross between pleasure and concern as he pauses, giving you a chance to adjust to him. "How is that, sweetheart? Am I hurtin' you at all?"

"Wait." You press your hands to his chest. "Wait a little bit," you pant, forcing yourself to relax around him in order to accommodate him.

Joel nods. "Take your time, sweetheart. I ain't goin' anywhere." He stills himself, using every inch of willpower in his possession, "Just breathe, darlin', you're doin' so good," he coos. "You feel so damn good... touch yourself, darlin'," he growls.

Your breath falters as you acquiesce, fingers flitting lightly over your distended clit, adding pressure, circling the cluster of nerve endings, making yourself wetter, letting him slide in a little bit more. Joel fights to maintain his control. "Fuck, you feel so good, so tight."

Despite his willingness to take it slow, your hormones are asking for something else. "Take what's yours," you whisper. "I want you to."

A deep groan rips loose from his chest at your words, the sound thick with need and desire, his control fraying at the thought of claiming you with a hard and deep thrust. "Take a deep breath, darlin'." He takes your hand, lacing your fingers together, his grip reassuring. "I love you, my sweet girl, my sunshine.." He pulls out slightly, his body tensing as he prepares, and his eyes lock with yours as he thrusts forward, hard and deep. You cry out in surprise and pain, which is little more than a brief shock before you become acclimated, leaving you with a lingering dull throb.

"Hey, shh, it's okay, it's okay darlin', breathe for me. You did so good, you took me all, such a good girl," comes Joel's praise as he cups your cheek with one hand and stroking your belly, easing the pressure there from his length taking up room so deep inside you. When you inadvertently squeeze around him, stretching to fit him, it sends a shock of pleasure spiraling through him. "Damn.. if you keep squeezin' me like that I ain't gonna last long, darlin'," he warns. He takes a deep breath, slowly pulling out, savoring the drag of it, before slowly pushing back in, starting a gentle, deliberate rhythm. "You're perfect, sugar."

Soon the friction begins to cancel out the dull ache, more so with each thrust. "Feels good," you sigh.

Joel's eyes flutter closed, his rhythm remaining slow and gentle, the feel of you surrounding him, the feel of being buried inside your warmth as the most perfect sort of pleasure, his breath coming in short pants. "Sweetheart.. oh sweetheart.. oh god.. damn you feel so right, like you were made for me."

"You were right," you smile, "you do fit."

"Yeah darlin', I'm right where I'm meant to be, buried so deep inside my sweet girl." He keeps moving against you, spine tingling with delight as he feels you moving with him, naturally, your bodies in sync with one another. "Yes, just like that.. move with me, sweetheart."

Your brows furrow in pleasure, heart swelling at his praise. "Joel.. give me more.."

He groans, his eyes darkening as his pace quickens, hips rolling forward with a little more determination, the sounds of your flesh slapping together filling the air. "Like this, sugar?"

"Yes! Fuck!" you groan, lightning filling your veins as you move quicker together. Your words shoot straight to his soul, heat pooling and coiling in his gut. "God, Joel, I'm so close!" you whimper. His breath comes in sharp pants as he drives you closer to the edge, his rhythm growing rougher, less controlled. "Me too, sugar. I'm right there with you.. wanna feel you come around me, wanna hear you say my name. Say it, darlin', come for me and say my name."

"God!!" Eyes scrunched tight you let go, coming hard as your cunt clenches around him, fluttering hard and fast. "Oh!! Joel!!" you scream. Joel's pushed over the edge, giving a few jerky thrusts before you feel him twitching and pulsing inside you, filling you with his cum, his thighs shaking from the force of his pleasure. "Oh, fuuuucckk," he groans, burying his face in the crook of your neck, chest rising and falling with ragged breaths, heart pounding wildly.

You feel his heart racing next to yours, almost as if beating with the same cadence, both of you trembling, spent, satisfied. He raises himself on his arms to look down at you. "You're so damn gorgeous, you know that? Especially when you're all breathless and flushed, still quakin' from comin' so hard."

Despite the breathtaking passion you'd just shared, you still blush. "Came hard thanks to you," you give him a soft kiss.

Joel grins, a cocky, proud smirk tugging at his lips, feeling a warm glow in his chest. He gently brushes back a strand of your hair. "How you feelin', sugar?"

"A little sore," you admit. "But I think, considering what we're working with, a little pressure was to be expected," you smirk, still feeling him inside you.

He chuckles, the sound of it making your heart thrum, as he slowly pulls out, knowing your still sensitive. "You took me like a goddamn champ, sweetheart."

You whimper at the loss of him, feeling his cum dribble out of you, and your eyes light up at his praise. "Really?"

"Really." He gazes down at you, his eyes a mixture of speculation and resourcefulness. "You wanna come with me to New Mexico, darlin'?"

divider by @saradika-graphics 👑

796 notes · View notes

tightjeansjavi · 1 year ago

Text

The Rite of Movement | part one

“honeymoonin’”

part two | first impressions

A/N: I ehm. May or may not have gotten the inspiration for this bc of a porn channel that I watch 🫣 this is not proofread btw! P.S this is my smutty little treat for y’all b4 I drop chapter 11 of slow hands 🥲

~word count: 1k~

Summary: the morning after your honeymoon with your pornstar husband, Joel Miller

Pairing | pornstar!husband! Joel Miller x pornstar!female reader

Warnings: smut, NSFW, mentions of the porn industry, fluff ,established relationship, husband!joel, intimacy, bush love!!, 30’s reader/40’s Joel , oral (f!receiving) Joel has a big cock (canon) silly vibes, sex tape, pet names, reader has no physical descriptions, +18, minors dni!

You and your husband Joel Miller met through the porn industry. The first time you met him before you were set to film together you were immediately hooked by his southern charm. “Well, hello gorgeous. Ain’t you jus’ the sweetest, n’prettiest thing I’ve ever had the pleasuring’ of layin’ my eyes on. Goddamn. Names Joel, and what might your name be, darlin?’” You told him your name and shook hands. After that initial meeting..You kept things professional, but everytime you did a film with him, your pussy and your heart would flutter. You had never said yes faster in your life than when Joel requested to take you out to dinner one night after a late shoot. Burgers, fries, a milkshake for two, and Joel Fuckin’ Miller’s big cock, and his Texas twang.

Once you and Joel officially started dating, you started your own porn channel together and your videos were a hit. The intimacy and chemistry on camera was never faked, and there was real love blossoming between the two of you. People loved it. There was something about casual, real intimacy that really got your viewers going.

The money earned on the films went straight to buying you an enormous rock to put on your pretty finger. Joel spoiled you in every aspect, and you were over the moon when he asked you to be his wife.

One impromptu wedding in Vegas later, Pornhub paid for your entire honeymoon to the Fiji Islands.

In the middle of the king sized bed was a gift directly from Pornhub with a new camera, toys, lube, and a congratulations letter from some of yours and Joel’s fellow adult filmmakers.

You put that camera to good use immediately.

The following morning you awoke to an empty bed, but a note left on the dresser in your husbands penmanship

Goodmornin’, babydoll. I went out for a run, but I’ll be back in a jiffy. Can’t wait to fuck my wife and then feed ya some fresh fruit, and then fuck ya some more. Oh, and I booked us couples massages later this afternoon! Love you so much, honey.

-Joel xx.

You let out a girlish giggle and kiss the note before setting it down on the nightstand.

When he returns he’s drenched in sweat that seeps through the fabric of his t-shirt that adorns his body in all the right places. He’s got that twinkle in his eye, and that dimple poking out of his cheek that you love so dearly.

“Have a nice run, baby?” You grin at him over the rim of your book as he approaches.

“Mhm. S’gonna be an absolutely gorgeous day out there.” He drawls and watches as you set your book down on the nightstand.

“Yeah? Well, I think my husband should gimme his cock so that we can go out and enjoy this gorgeous day.” You curl your pointer finger inwards in a come hither motion for him to come closer.

“Oh, you want my cock? Hmm..what a temptin’ offer that is, honeybun.” He teases.

“But I want you to strip for me first, Joel. Give your wife a little show.” You wink and reach for the camera on the nightstand and flip it on.

“A strip tease, eh? I think I can handle that.” He chuckles and reaches for the hem of his shirt and slowly pulls it over his head just as your thighs slowly spread open over the comforter and your hand slips down between them to lightly play with yourself.

He grabs the waistband of his shorts and playfully snaps it against the lower part of his stomach with a grin before he slowly tugs it down over his hips. His cock is semi-hard beneath the confines.

“Fuck.” You breathe, “I’m the luckiest woman alive.” You beckon him closer and obliges. He takes his lower lip between his teeth when your soft and warm palm wraps around the underside of his shaft, fondling him gently while you hold the camera steady in your freehand.

“Shit. Y’got that all wrong, sugar. M’the luckiest motherfucker alive with the hottest, kindest, most beautiful wife. Fuck.” He hisses between his teeth.

You giggle softly at his reaction and slowly begin to pump your hand around him and twist your wrist in a corkscrew motion.

“And this cock is all mine, right baby? Fuck, it’s so pretty. I fuckin’ love you and your cock.”

“All fuckin’ yours, sugar plum.” He groans and leans down to slot his lips with yours, slipping his tongue past your mouth in a heated, bruising kiss. His cock grows hard and heavy beneath your soft touch and he pulls away only to climb on the bed on his knees, and grab the underside of your thighs to spread you apart further.

“And this pussy is all fuckin’ mine, ain’t she?” He rasps and looks up at you and the camera that is now angled downwards.

“All fuckin’ yours, baby. And she’s absolutely dripping for you right now.”

“Can see that, honeypie.” He chuckles and nips at the sensitive skin of your inner thighs and bites down playfully. He doesn’t mind the coarse, thick, swirling hair on your pussy tickling the patches on his beard. He fucking loves you in your natural state, and he lets you know it by devouring your cunt whole. He kisses and suckles on your clit like it’s the sweetest candy he’s ever had the pleasure of tasting. His jaw goes slack as he laps up your arousal that seeps out of you like sweet honey from a hive. He groans against you, the bridge of his nose buried against the hair on your pubic bone. He inhales your scent, musky, erotic, and all you. He drinks you in, feasts, and feasts while you cry out his name.

Loving Joel Miller came easy, and while he has the biggest cock you’ve ever seen, it’s his ginormous heart that really sealed the deal for you.

When he hears the camera click shut and fall to the unoccupied space on the bed, he grins and continues to eat his favorite fucking meal; you. Until your tugging on the roots of his scalp and reaching down between his thighs to grasp his heavy cock once more and pull him into you.

Fuck your wife like you mean it, Joel.

Don’t gotta ask me twice, sugar.

banners made by the lovely @saradika 🤍

I no longer have a tag list so please follow @tightjeansjaviupdates for fic notifications and updates!

#joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller smut #joel miller fluff #soft!joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x female reader #joel x you #joel x reader #joel miller fic #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal fanfiction #husband!joel miller

931 notes · View notes

mermaidgirl30 · 4 months ago

Text

✨Saving What Was Lost Part 5: Friday Night In✨

Pre-Outbreak! Joel Miller x fem! reader

Series Masterlist

A/N: I love this story so so much, and this chapter was the best to write 🥹 Joel is so soft for reader 😭 I can’t wait to bring you more of their slow burn journey 🩷

Chapter Summary: It’s just a misty November Friday night in, but Joel’s spending it with you as a movie night.

Rating: 18+ only MDNI

Word Count: 5.3k

Chapter Tags: Soft! Joel, protective! Joel, a little angst, lots of fluff and yearning, slow burn, Joel and reader have a movie night, lots of feelings, dual POVs, age gap (reader is late 20’s, Joel is in his late 40’s)

Dividers by @saradika-graphics

It’s just a casual Friday evening in Austin, one where you’re curled up on the couch and Joel’s on the opposite one adjacent to you. It’s become kind of a normal thing, maybe even something you’re comfortable with. Except this time you’re not reading a book, and he doesn’t have a newspaper or his phone in front of him. This time, the flat screen tv is flickering to life in front of you while the fire crackles and pops in the living room. This time, it’s a movie night. Something that he suggested to you first.

“Why don’t you pick something out? Whatever you like.” He pushes the sleek black remote toward you on the coffee table, and you reach out and take it carefully.

You slowly thumb through the movie channels, taking your time to read over and assess each title that comes up on the glow of the screen. Some are brand new, ones you’ve never heard of, but a lot of them are movies you’ve seen once upon a time ago.

You’ve been wondering what kinds of movies Joel’s into. He’s not usually the type to sit down and watch something. Not that you’ve seen, anyway. Sure, you’ve seen him click through the news a few times, maybe to see the weather report, but you’ve never seen him really sit down to indulge in any sort of show or movie. You wonder if he’s ever been into that.

You love movies. Movie nights used to be your favorite thing in the world. It used to be your safe place amongst the chaos at home. A place where you could hide and disappear into the screen for a few hours to escape the noise. You wonder if Joel ever does that when his job gets rough. He needs his own escapes too from the horrors he sees from his line of work. You wonder what brings Joel Miller peace. You have a feeling it used to be his guitar. The one he never plays anymore…

Going back up the list, you pause when you see Gone with the Wind. That was always one of your favorites. One you’d keep going back to. You’d play it so many times that the DVD player eventually quit reading the scratched-up disk. It’s been such a long time since you got to watch it. So, so long.

“You wanna watch that one?” Joel asks from the other leather couch.

You tap your thumb against the edge of the remote, nervously looking at him as if he’ll walk right out of the room if you say yes. It’s a romantic movie. Joel won’t want to watch that, would he?

“Yes, if that’s okay with you. You can tell me if you don’t want to.” You flick your eyes back to him, watching as he leans back against the leather, one leg thrown over his knee, big arms crossed over his chest, pulling at the red flannel he has on. But he’s not frowning, he’s smiling.

“Sweetheart, I told you I’d let you pick. We can watch whatever you want. If you wanna watch Gone with the Wind, then that’s what we’ll watch. I meant it when I said whatever you want.” His kind brown eyes say the same. Whatever you want.

You pull the wool blanket over your lap and click on the title, hovering over the play button as Rhett and Scarlett appear on the main menu. You glance back over to Joel and ask him once more, “You sure?”

“Positive,” he answers automatically.

“Okay then, Gone with the Wind it is.” As you tap on the start button, the movie comes to life instantly, playing back that old theme song that’s been ingrained in your brain all these years. A little spark of joy ignites in your mind. It’s like you’re back in your old bedroom, having a movie night with just yourself. Except now you have Joel.

“Ya know, this isn’t my first time watchin’ this.”

Your head snaps in his direction at his response. “You’ve watched this before?”

“Once or twice,” he chuckles.

“Twice?” you gawk, mouth open as if he just said pink was his favorite color.

“What?” he laughs. “A guy can’t watch romance movies?”

“Oh, no. Of course they can. I just didn’t pin you as a romantic movie type.”

He shrugs and smiles. “Well, guess there’s still some things you don’t know about me, sweetheart.”

“Guess you’re right.” Your eyes fall back on the colorful screen as the opening scene takes place. But you can’t quite shake what he just said.

After a few minutes of silence, except for the crackle of the fireplace and the voices on the screen, you say something a bit out of character. “I’d like to know.”

“Hmm?”

You clear your throat and faintly turn your head toward him, afraid if you look him dead in the eyes you’ll chicken out. “I umm… I’d like to get to know you more, I mean.”

He gives you an easy smile, one that tugs at the corners of his lips and makes his eyes sparkle. It makes your heart stop for a second. “That can be arranged, angel.”

Angel. There’s that nickname again. One that sends your heart soaring out the window.

You turn back to the tv and readjust your position, pulling your knees against your chest and biting down on your lower lip to keep your smile at bay. God, you hope you’re not blushing. You’re definitely blushing.

You’re not just falling for Joel Miller. You’re crashing and colliding into the unknown. Forget airbags, they’d be no use to you now. He’s… perfect.

As Scarlett flashes across the screen, Joel scoots to the edge of the couch, grabbing your attention. “You want some popcorn?”

“Only if you put extra butter on it for me.”

He chuckles a breathy laugh and shakes his head. “How’d I know you were gonna ask for that?”

Shrugging your shoulders innocently, a shy smile curls across your lips. “Guess you just read me well.”

He ticks his jaw and stares at you a second, a look like he is reading you. You don’t know why, but it makes butterflies flit through the pit of your stomach. “That I do. And ‘course, extra buttery popcorn comin’ right up for you, sweetheart. Let me go get it started.” He exits the room, taking his woodsy scent with him.

You fiddle with your bottom lip, focusing back on the colorful scenes on the screen, but all you’re really thinking about is how Joel is in the other room, making popcorn for the two of you. Going as far as getting you extra butter. But he’s always like that. Always going that extra mile to make sure you’re comfortable and taken care of.

He’s an acts of service kind of man. You see that now. Not just with you but with everyone. Even with all the girls he’s saved or his daughter or just someone he cares about. And that in itself tells you enough. He’s kind and caring, more so than you ever expected him to be. And somehow, he still surprises you every day.

He slips back into the living room, two full glasses of water in hand, and then he’s setting one down on the coffee table in front of you. “Here ya go, sweetheart. Figured you’d need some water.”

You reach out to take a swig and give him a smile after you swallow. “Like I said. Always think of everything, don’t you?” He only chuckles and takes a sip from his own glass, and then he’s sitting against the back of the couch, just waiting for the popcorn to be done cooking.

A moment of silence slips across the room, only the low murmurs of voices floating through the speakers. You have this inkling in your chest to tell him something personal, something from your childhood. So, you do. “I used to love Friday nights. I’d always run home after school to watch reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And then I’d stay up way too late watching old black and white romance movies. Sometimes I’d stay up the entire night and then pass out for half the day Saturday.”

He rakes a hand over his dark scruff, eyes falling back on you as he chuckles. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer, huh? Sarah used to beg me to buy her the DVDs.”

“Well, she’s got good taste.”

He stretches his arms behind his head, adjusting his position on the leather. One leg crossed over the other, completely at ease in his own house. “Wasn’t half bad a show, actually.”

“It was the best,” you confirm.

He takes a good look at you, stretching his smile wider as one of his hands laces through his tousled locks. “So, you really like movies then?”

“Mmm. I guess you could call it a safe haven. At least, it was for me.” You pause for a minute, watch his eyebrows knit as he registers the pain behind your eyes. “Mom and dad used to fight a lot. Sometimes all day long. So I kinda fell into a habit of locking myself in the bedroom with the tv turned up loud enough where I couldn’t hear them. It was either that or stay at a friend’s house.”

He watches you carefully, his jaw twitching while he thinks before he speaks. “M’sorry ‘bout your parents, sweetheart.”

You brush it off like it’s nothing. “It’s okay. It was a long time ago.”

“I’m also sorry for how you lost them,” he says slowly, like he’s watching you walk across a frozen lake that might open up and swallow you whole.

Your eyes drop to the leather couch, fingers flexing around the warm wool blanket. If you don’t hold on to something, you might just fall through that icy lake that’s now cracking beneath you. “I lost them way before they died. Like I said, I’m used to being alone. Or I was…” You fight to hold in the tears. Instead of letting them go, you swallow them down and act like they were never there in the first place.

Joel’s soft drawl makes you pull your eyes back up to him. And when you look into those caramel pools, you feel a sob get lodged in your throat. “Doesn’t add up to much, but you’ve got me now. Ya know, if you need me. You’re not alone anymore,” he murmurs quietly. You fear you’ll always need him now.

You force out a smile, giving him the best one you can conjure up when you feel like you’re in pieces. “And that means the world to me, Joel.” He smiles in response and lets his gaze shift back to the movie that’s playing across the flat screen.

Your imagination starts to tick in your mind, thoughts of Joel’s family suddenly flashing like a scene through the wires in your brain. Are his parents still around?

Darting your tongue across your bottom lip, you look back over his way and ask what’s on your mind. “Do you still see your parents?”

His fingers flex around the leather as he cautiously looks up at you. “My dad moved up to Colorado to start a tree farm a few years ago. I see him when I can, but it’s not often. Not like when he used to live here. He calls a lot, so we do talk frequently. But it’s been a few months since I’ve seen him. And my mom…” He pauses for a beat, and you don’t miss that sparkle of a held back tear shimmer in his eye against the muted lighting. “She… she died of cancer right before Sarah was born.”

The room is suddenly heavier as you digest the information, letting it hit you right in the heart where it hurts most. “Joel… I’m so sorry. That must’ve been an awful thing to go through.”

He nods slowly with heavy eyes. “It was. I really could’ve used her help with Sarah ‘cause her… Well, Sarah’s mom walked out on us about a month after Sarah was born.”

Your eyes blow wide, and there’s nothing you can say to take that kind of pain away. You’re stunned in place. How could anyone ever leave him?

Shifting in your seat, you give him your most sincere, apologetic look you can muster up. “Oh, that’s… Joel. I don’t even know what to say.”

He gives you a sad smile and shakes his head like he’s fine, but he’s not fine. You can see it deep in his brown eyes. “S’okay. You don’t gotta say anything. Happened a long time ago. And she never wanted to be a mother, so I should’ve known she’d do that. Still hurt like hell, but I was more torn apart for Sarah ‘cause she never got to have a mother, and she deserved one. She deserved a good mother.”

And Joel deserved someone that loved him right…

You pause and then whisper across the room, “If it’s any consolation, I think she has the best dad.”

“Best dad, huh?” he chuckles out with his head cocked in question. The little sparkle in his brown eyes makes your heart stop for a beat.

You nod in agreement. “The very best. Even though I haven’t met Sarah, I know you love her very much. And from what you tell me, I know she loves you more than life itself.”

A warm smile cracks over his lips. “She is my world, and I do love her more than anything. Guess she’s kinda kept me in one piece all these years. Her and Tommy...”

“She’s lucky then. Not everyone gets a loving father or just family in general.” Your eyes fall to the ground, locking on a tiny scratch that could have easily been missed by the naked eye. You just stare until your mind blurs together, until you forget exactly how badly your heart still hurts from your childhood.

Joel’s low timbre shakes you from past memories. Memories you don’t want to relive. “Sweetheart, I—” The faint beeping from the microwave interrupts his sentence, and you don’t dare let him finish.

“The popcorn’s done,” you breathe out, finally having the nerve to look up into those concerned pools of honey.

“Right…” He looks at you for a beat like he wants to say something else, but he leaves it alone, and then he pushes himself up with a grunt. “Be right back.” He disappears into the other room, leaving you alone with the flickering tv screen and the lit sandalwood candle in the middle of the coffee table.

You get lost in the scene, silently laughing at all the men trying to win Scarlett’s affection. You feel a little lighter, a little less sad than you were mere seconds ago. The cozy wool blanket seems to help ease it away.

It doesn’t take long to see Joel’s large figure reemerge in the living room. Butter and salt permeate through the air, feeding your hunger for a delicious movie snack. His large hand brushes past your knees and then he sets the bucket of fresh popcorn right in front of the coffee table for you. “Here ya go, sweetheart. Extra butter, jus’ like you like it.”

You flash a smile his way. “Thanks, Joel.” He gives you a nod as he falls back into the leather of the couch, getting comfortable with a glass of iced water and the comfort of the television.

Falling into a comfortable silence, you can’t help but keep a smile on your face as the movie plays on. This is actually the most relaxed since you’ve been here. It feels like a normal Friday night. No kidnappings, no auctions, no fears of being taken at any second. It’s just still and peaceful and warm. Like Joel’s big chocolate eyes.

As the movie goes on, you sneak a peek over at Joel, watching as he enjoys the film. His knees are spread wide, one hand perched on his thigh, the other resting comfortably on his cheek. He’s got a soft smile curved on his mouth, his eyes almost starry-like as pictures flick across the gold flecks in his eyes. He looks… happy, relaxed, like he’s enjoying this.

You get lost in the way his easy laugh floats across the room, get a bit dizzy as he laces his fingers through his salt-and-pepper locks. You’d like to do that one day, maybe. Run your fingers through his curls, let them sink and tangle around the dark strands. You’d like to try your luck when you’re brave enough. You guess you haven’t noticed before, or maybe you were too traumatized by fear. But right now, under the soft lighting of the living room, you realize he’s so beautiful. Inside and out. He’s perfect.

Joel breaks his contact from the tv and looks over in your direction. Like a mouse caught in a trap, you’ve just been caught red handed gawking at the very essence of him. Your cheeks flush red from being caught. Snapping your eyes right back to the television, you pretend you weren’t just caught in the spotlight. But there he is out of the corner of your eye chuckling under his breath. Maybe it wasn’t the worst thing to be found out.

A few moments later, the urge for more salty goodness draws you to the popcorn bucket. You reach over, eyes still on the lit-up screen, and just as you slip your hand into the bucket, your fingers meet the back of a strong, calloused hand. Gasping, you snatch your arm back and break the connection of warm skin on skin. “Sorry,” you say hurriedly, apologizing for the meet of hands.

He lets out a soft chuckle and reels his hand back, popping a piece of popcorn in his mouth. “S’alright. I don’t bite,” he smirks. And just by the flash of that mischievous smirk, your cheeks are painted crimson once again.

You fall back into a comfortable silence, but you can’t seem to stop thinking about how warm his hand was. Calloused and rough, but it felt… good. You secretly hope your hands meet again. Maybe you’d let yours linger a little longer this time.

The deep sound of Joel clearing his throat makes you turn toward him. “Ya know, if you wanted to, we could make movie night a weekly thing.”

A hopeful smile stretches over your mouth. “You’d want to do that?”

He shrugs and grins. “Why not? I like movies and popcorn. And besides, I’m in good company.”

He’s in good company. He likes watching movies with you. He likes spending time with you. Wait. He likes spending time with you?

You let the thought churn in your head, letting it spin a few times to realize this is all real. You want to have movie nights with him. You want to spend more time with him. Maybe… maybe you like him too. “Okay. I’d like that a lot,” you smile just as you take a sip of cold water from your glass.

“Friday nights work for you?” he asks. “Or would another night be better?”

“Fridays are perfect.”

“Looks like it’s settled then,” he smiles, crossing his arms behind his head, comfortably glancing over at you. “I’ll write it on the calendar. Mark it in ink.”

Mark it in ink. Permanent ink.

Joel leans into the plush of the leather, legs spread comfortably, his palm gliding down the scruff of his beard. The tv flickers in the near distance, the fire crackling softly as warmth radiates through the open room.

When’s the last time he really sat down to watch a movie? Maybe when Sarah was back home.

His eyes trail over to you, not being able to help himself. His breath nearly catches when he sees the smile painted on your pretty mouth. Eyes wide and full of light as you watch the television with your soft blanket thrown across your lap. He’s never seen you look so… alive.

That’s it. That’s the word. You look so full of life, which makes a soft smile spread over his mouth, filling him with a warm fuzzy feeling buzzing in the base of his chest.

He loves to see it. Eyes sparkling like Christmas lights, hope saturated in your soft glow, hair thrown carefree across your shoulders. You. The perfect reflection of a bottle of hope.

He’s so soft. Soft like melted marshmallows overflowing in a cup of hot chocolate. And that little flutter he gets in his chest every single time he sees a faint hint of a smile meet your lips makes him lose his balance, makes his axis tilt just a little off center.

He’s just so fucking soft... for you.

Sighing, he lets his fingers drag slowly over his mouth as he watches you instead of the movie. Watching every turn of your head, every curl of your lips, every single fucking thing you do. He can’t seem to take his eyes off you. You’re just so… breathtaking. Not just that. He thinks you’re the most beautiful angel he’s ever seen.

So fucking beautiful…

He groans to himself, lets his head fall back so he can close his eyes and clear his racing mind. And through the thick fog, he finds his way back to you and your twinkling eyes. Finds the peace he needs to know you’re safe, you’re healing, and you’re going to be just fine one of these days.

For now, you’re safe and comfortable in the comfort of his space. One day you may drift away, might spread your gorgeous wings and fly far, far away. But deep down, he hopes you’ll stay.

Please, stay…

“Joel?” you call, your head turning to look over at him while the movie runs.

“Hmm?” he hums out, eyes looking into your sparkling ones.

“Thank you for watching Gone with the Wind with me.” The softest of smiles curls over your pretty lips, making his heart skip a beat.

He smiles over at you and falls a little more. “You’re welcome, sweetheart.”

He loves watching movies with you.

The end credits of the movie start rolling just as the clock strikes one in the morning. He rubs the backs of his hands over his eyes, fighting off a yawn as a wave of tiredness crashes against his body. Leaning forward, he pulls himself up and glances your way. “Sweetheart, that was—” He stops himself the second he sees you passed out, blanket up under your chin, soft breathing leaving your pretty lips.

A gentle smile spreads across his lips as if he’s seeing you in a new light. You’re so relaxed, so peaceful. No nightmares, no thrashing in your sleep. Just at ease. A calm serenity that surrounds you like a soft cloud.

Even though you look comfortable with your fingers curled around the wool blanket and your head pressed against the leather cushion, he really doesn’t want to leave you on the couch. You’d be more comfortable up in your own bed, tucked into your warm sheets.

He slowly makes his way over to you and crouches down to where he’s eye level with you, gently brushing his palm against your shoulder. “Sweetheart?” he asks quietly, hating to wake you up from a deep sleep.

“Hmm?” you groan out, curling yourself into a ball as you tuck the blanket into the crook of your neck, too tired to open your eyes all the way.

“You fell asleep,” he says, voice low so he doesn’t disturb your peace.

“What? No,” you shake your head, eyes still half closed, denying that you fell asleep. ”I saw the whole thing.”

He chuckles and cards a hand through his tousled locks while he tries not to think about how adorable you’re being right now. “Afraid you fell asleep somewhere in the last half,” he says, remembering how you kept dozing off little by little as the clock got closer to midnight.

“I was still watching,” you pout with a puffy lip as you let out another tired yawn, stretching your arms like a napping cat.

Christ. You’re adorable.

“Oh, still watching, hm? Then how come your eyes were closed?” he chuckles softly.

You grab for the remote but miss it by mere inches. “Just turn it back on. I’ll watch what I missed.”

He clicks his tongue and grins from ear to ear. “Nuh-uh. It’s late. There’s always tomorrow.��

“But I’m not tired,” you whine out, pouting your lips as your eyelids flutter closed.

Such a sleepy girl.

“Oh, yes you are,” he laughs, his voice bouncing off the walls as it ricochets and floats right back to him, making another giant grin curl over his mouth.

When did you become so… cute? Yeah, that’s what you are. Cute. Playful. Adorable.

“But I…” You try to protest, but he stops you before you can finish.

“C’mon, sleepyhead. Let’s get you up to bed.” He scoops you up in his arms safely, holding you carefully so he doesn’t shatter or break you. He would never do that. Won’t even register the thought in his mind. You’re fragile, delicate like a flower, but he’ll always be so careful with you. Just like this. Right in his arms. As long as you’ll let him.

You don’t try to push away from him, you just let yourself fall into warmth. You just sink against his broad chest, let your dainty fingers curl into the cotton of his flannel, your face nuzzling snuggly into the crook of his neck. There’s no hesitation, no ounce of fear. Maybe you’re too tired to process his arms around you, hugging you like a thick jacket against his body. Or maybe it's because you’re starting to trust him, starting to see he really doesn’t want to hurt you. But maybe it’s because you just feel safe like this. Tucked against the body of a man that risked his life to save yours. Or maybe it’s because you don’t want him to let you go just yet. No. Maybe you’ll stay just like this. Your face tucked away into the collar of his flannel shirts that smell like him, pinewood scent surrounding you and covering you like a thick blanket you just don’t want to let go of.

So you stay. For now, you latch on like a magnet and let yourself drift to sleep. Because this feels good. This feels right. And in the thick haze, you let him hold you. Just this one time. Just for the moment. Because he feels like he was made to hold you just like this.

Joel tiptoes up the winding steps, careful not to jostle you awake, afraid he’ll disturb this guarded moment. Scared he’ll rustle you away from the peaceful slumber you’re in.

Carefully stepping down the dark hallway, he quietly opens your bedroom door and carries you to your comfy bed. With his arms folded like wings around you, he holds you close to his chest, guarding you with his life to make sure you feel safe. No more monsters to steal your soul. No more grabbing hands that lash and bite at you with razor-sharp fangs. No more slipping into darkness while they take what isn’t theirs. No more taking advantage of the delicate flower who lost all her vivid petals. Petals you’re slowly growing back.

He takes one hand and pulls back the purple comforter, untangling your silky sheets while he keeps one flexed arm around you. When he makes enough space for you to slip in, he gently nudges your shoulder to let you know you’re back in your room, and you have to let go.

He doesn’t want to let you go. Not just yet, but he can’t be selfish. Can’t keep you to himself.

Your slow breaths blow against his neck, fingers lock tighter around his favorite flannel. It’s like you don’t want to let go either.

“Gotta let go, sweetheart,” he whispers into your ear, careful again not to disturb you. But you don’t jar awake, only fold tighter into the crook of his neck till your light breaths kiss the shell of his ear.

He sighs and carefully untangles you from his arms, gently laying you down into the safety of your bed. He chuckles quietly to himself when your hand still doesn’t register to let go. So slowly, unwantedly, he delicately pries your fingers from his shirt and places your hand softly on the bed. He already misses the warmth of your palm, misses the way you oh so carelessly just folded your weight into him.

He thinks he likes that. Holding you in his arms where you’re safe, where you’d be out of reach from anyone that wanted to hurt you. He thinks he could hold you forever just like that. If you were ever his, he would until you told him to stop.

God. How could anyone have hurt you? You’re so… precious. Just like a gemstone. So delicate and rare and special. So just like the most unique diamond in the world, he’ll make sure you stay safe.

He lingers on the edge of the bed, carefully tucking the blanket up over your shoulders, making sure you’re warm and comfortable. He watches you turn ever so slightly his way, but your eyelids don’t flutter open. You just hum softly and fall back into whatever peaceful dream you’re having.

Without thinking, he gently grazes the tips of his fingers against a lock of your hair, feeling how soft and velvet-like it feels against the pad of his thumb. He ever so slowly slips the lock of hair behind your ear, letting the back of his knuckles graze your cheek as he takes in the faint blush of your skin.

“You’re so beautiful…” he silently whispers, the words floating effortlessly off the tip of his tongue as he stares in awe at the stunning angel that’s safe in his presence.

He stays like that another few seconds, until he finally pushes himself off the bed and makes his way to the door, his eyes on you the entire time he moves.

Beautiful… you’re so fucking beautiful.

He said he’d never fall for one of the women he saved. That was never his intention, but what’s this? Sweeping back a piece of your hair, lingering his fingers on your smooth skin, telling himself how stunning he thinks you are, praying you won’t get out of bounds of him.

It’s like a slow burn candle, flame flickering in and out against the wind rushing in from the crack in the window. Wax slipping down the wick, the flame still burning bright while the air tries to blow it out till it’s nothing but smoke and memories.

That’s what this is. A slow burn of feelings that’s threatening to snap any day now. He’s getting attached, and he doesn’t know if he can stop them from growing into something he can’t control anymore.

He should pull the reins back, stop whatever this is that’s starting to ignite between the two of you, but he can’t seem to blow out the flame. He can’t seem to stop wanting you…

Maybe it’s the way you wear his flannels around the house, or maybe it’s the shy smiles and the way you nervously flutter your long eyelashes at him when you try to hide your gorgeous smile, maybe it’s even the way you make this house feel more like a home instead of an empty nest. You make him feel not so alone, and your company is something he doesn’t want to lose.

He doesn’t want to lose you… So maybe you’ll stay. He hopes you’ll stay. For as long as possible. Because if you choose to leave, which you probably will one day, he’ll surely lose a piece of himself the day you do.

Stay. Please… just stay.

Tag List: @clawdee @jellybeanxc @lotusbxtch @thebeldroramscal @laurrrra

@whxtedreams @sawymredfox @sanarsi @mountainsandmayhem @bitchytimetravelqueen

@southernbe @katinasweeney @pixelspunk @amyispxnk @mysterious-moonstruck-musings

@christinamadsen @aurorawritestoescape @evolnoomym @littlevenicebitch69 @alltheirdamn

@inept-the-magnificent @maried01 @la-vie-est-une-fleur29 @fandomdaydreamer @elliaze

@callmecath1 @kulekehe @yorkshirewench @untamedheart81

@tateypots @stylesispunk @o-sacra-virgo-laudes-tibi @mellymbee @pascalsbae

@locaparapedrito @ladyofmidlo72 @readingiskeepingmegoing @copperhalfcent @axshadows

@here-briefly @cozylittlepigeon @pastawench @keylimebeag @joelsoftie

@romanarose @captainredspade @megangovier @bishtrouille @almodovarispunk

@papipascaaaal @mrs-hardy-hunnam-butler @bambisweethearts @puddles221b

@valkyreally @northennlights

#joel miller #pedro pascal #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller fic #joel x female reader #joel miller tlou #soft!joel miller

338 notes · View notes

damneddamsy · 1 month ago

Text

falling | joel miller x fem!oc (part viii)

summary: As Joel entirely embraces new fatherhood, it becomes glaringly obvious that it isn't what it was cut out to be—it's harder, messier, and terrifyingly real.

a/n: oh yeah, this one's got it all. it's biiiiiig. you want cowboy joel? you got it. you want flirty joel? you got it. you want a daddy joel? you. got. it! might be one of my favourites until now, can't wait for you to read this one! WARNINGS this time, alcohol abuse, substance abuse, light smut.

Joel realized, maybe too late, that raising a kid meant surrender. Not in a way that made him feel small, but in a way that made him feel like everything he was, everything he did, mattered. Really mattered.

Who you were, what you believed, what you let your kid see in you—every single second of it meant something. It was stamped onto them in ways you wouldn’t even notice until you caught a glimpse of yourself staring back. And God, did he see it in her.

Months passed in a slow, golden stretch, summer giving way to autumn. The heat receded, but the sun still burned, casting everything in deep amber, draping the world in honeyed light. The days, despite their quiet toil, had taken on a kind of sweetness. He didn’t think much about it at first, but one evening, as he watched Maya toddle across the porch, her curls catching the last of the light, he felt it sink in.

His days were sweeter because of her.

Maya was at the age, where she knew what she wanted with no second-guessing, what she liked and what she didn’t, and it wasn’t a surprise that she was turning out just like him. Stubborn in one way, expressive in others, passionate to understand the world in her own little way.

And—well, it felt like a miracle, but she liked his guitar. She liked his music. She liked to sing with him.

Whenever he let out that familiar grunt as he lowered himself onto the porch swing, Maya’s ears would perk. From wherever she was—inside, out back, tucked into Leela’s arms for a story—she’d drop everything and make her way to the front door.

He’d hear her small, eager footsteps pad against the wood floor, and then—there she was, peeking around the big front door, wide-mouthed and grinning, her four little teeth on full display.

And then the clapping. Always the clapping.

“Yeah, yeah, trouble,” he’d grumble, settling the guitar on his lap. “I’m gettin’ to it.”

He’d strum a chord, throwing in an extra flourish, and she’d giggle, her small hands patting at the strings, feeling them hum beneath her touch.

“Maya's here to see me play her favourite song,” he'd first idly sing in tenor, and strum the strings, leaning down to push a kiss on her soft curls.

And her favourite song of the moment? Handy Man. He fucking loved that song now. And damn if she didn’t know the words already. Well, sort of, whatever her baby brain could comprehend. When he hit the chorus, she’d push close between his knees, mouthing along, all serious concentration, her tiny fingers gripping at the air like she could pluck the notes right from his hands.

“Come-a, come-a, come-a, come-a, come, come,” he would sing to her, and she'd tune with him with that big, pretty smile, “Oh, now, they'll come runnin' to me.”

“Comma, comma, comma, me-hee!” she'd laugh after the song was over, plucking the strings herself.

And Leela—she stood in the doorway, watching all of it. Always watching, never interfering. Sometimes, when Maya was wrapped up in his arms, conked out, she’d reach over, smoothing a hand over Maya’s growing curls, meeting Joel’s eyes with something so complete, so warm, it made his entirely too at home.

She didn’t say much, not with words, but she didn’t have to. He saw it in her face, in the way she touched their daughter, in the way she looked at him.

She loved him. She loved him in the same quiet, unconditional way that Maya did. God help him, he loved her too. He loved her 'til he was bursting at the seams.

And by that same front door, Maya waited for him. On the dot. Four o’clock sharp. His very own homecoming.

She’d perch on the porch step, her toy horse clutched tight in her hand, rocking back and forth, big brown eyes fixed on the street like a tiny sentry. And when she did spot him—dust-covered, exhausted, rolling the stiffness from his shoulders, pack in hand—she didn’t run straight for him. Not at first.

No, she’d squeal loud enough for the street to hear, all shy excitement, and scurry back into the house like she couldn’t bear to face it head-on.

That never lasted long. By the time he reached the porch steps, there she was, barreling into him at full speed, arms open, curls bouncing, calling for him in that desperate, earth-shattering little voice that never failed to gut him. His little shadow.

“Da-da-da-da—”

Joel never grabbed her up right away—not yet, not until he wiped every last trace of the day’s grime from his hands and face. She’d linger by his boots, gripping at his pants, all but vibrating with the need to be held.

“Hey, now, hold on, baby girl.” He held up his hands, palms out, dirty from the day, trying to walk his way around her. “Lemme—hey, hey. I'mna squish you, Maya, jeez.”

Maya bounced on her toes, impatient, grabbing at his pant leg with a whine. “Up, up, up—”

And she followed him all the way to the kitchen sink, opening and closing her fingers, teetering on her tiptoes, tugging at his pants like she could climb up his leg if she tried hard enough.

“Alright. What’d you do today, sunshine?” he’d ask, crouching down, draping the kitchen towel over his shoulder.

Maya, thrilled to be heard, would babble a response, half-gibberish, half-words, expressive as anything. One day about her clothes, one day about the fruits in the garden, one day about her lunch.

“Mm-mm…” she hummed this time like she was keeping secrets. Then, suddenly, “Mama ‘n me,” more incomprehensible gibberish, pointing out the window, “...bird.”

“Yeah?” He pushed a ringlet behind her ear, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “You saw a bird?”

She flapped her arms, mouth forming a perfect little ‘O.’ “Biiiig bird.”

And he’d nod along, utterly rapt, hanging onto her every word. Every single time. Ever since she started to talk, he couldn't go a moment without hearing it.

And Maya—she was far more interested in his hands than her own stories. She grabbed at them, little fingers poking into his palm, inspecting. He chuckled, letting her turn them over, palms up, palms down.

With a knowing smirk, Joel reached back into his jacket pockets, bringing his fists between them, closed tight. A familiar game. One she never got tired of.

Her eyes lit up instantly. Excitement fizzled through her tiny frame, her little fists curling at her sides like she could barely stand the suspense.

Joel pulled his lips to a smile for her. “Which one?”

Maya let out a high-pitched giggle, practically thrumming, as she tapped her tiny fingers against his fists. She took her time, bottom lip jutting out in concentration, brows knitting together, her nose scrunching. Then—she tapped his right hand.

Joel uncurled his fingers. A small handful of blackberries spilled out of his palm, violet, ripe and plump.

Maya perked up. Letting out a curious sound, she carefully plucked one between two tiny fingers, examining it like it might reveal a secret if she looked close enough. She turned it over, squishing just a little before deciding it passed her test.

Joel popped one into his mouth, chewing slow.

Without hesitation, Maya followed, mirroring him like she always did, stuffing the berry into her mouth. Her cheeks rounded out as she chewed, her tiny jaw working. Then, as if suddenly remembering something important, she tilted her head back and grinned. Berry-stained, toothy, pure delight.

And by that same front door of her house grew the one thing she despised—to watch him go as the day came to an end.

Some days, she was content to wave from Leela's arms. Tiny hand flapping in the air, so dazed, until he crossed the street and closed the door behind him.

“Say 'bye,'” Leela coaxed her.

“Bye,” Maya echoed, watching him go, although not with that sweet spirit that always laced her voice.

And those nights—strangely, selfishly—were his favourite, even though the hardest. Because as much as it ached to walk away, it meant something. It meant she loved him in a way he could feel in his bones.

That carried him through the door, through the long hours, through the world beyond this big, white house of his. And when he returned—when he stepped onto that porch and saw her waiting there, chewing on her breakfast, beaming at him with her whole little heart—he swore, there was nothing on earth that could ever feel better.

Other nights—God, those nights—Maya wept like her whole world was caving in.

She’d stand at the door, fists rubbing furiously at her eyes, her lip trembling so hard she could barely get the words out. But she tried anyway, between big, shuddering breaths. “No go, no go, da-da.”

Again and again, like a prayer, like a plea, like she thought if she said it enough, it’d undo the fact that he had to leave. She’d cling to him, her small fingers curling into his shirt, her whole body pressed against his legs like she could anchor him there, keep him from slipping away.

And every single time, Leela would murmur knowingly from the doorway, arms folded, watching him with those calm, dark eyes.

“Guess you’re staying over tonight.”

And every single time, she was right.

He wouldn’t dare sleep in her bed—his courage only stretched so far—but he found his place in the nursery. The expensive memory foam mattress was properly equipped for a man of his size, but even then, he always woke up aching, every knot in his back a little worse than before. Not that he minded. He liked being close. Liked that if Maya so much as moaned in her crib in a sudden bout of loneliness, he’d hear it, could reach for her, could whisper, Shh, I’m here, and she’d settle instantly.

Some nights, he ended up in the basement instead.

Just to be near Leela.

She was always down there. Gloves rolled on, hair tied back, brow furrowed in concentration. Fixing something, building something, welding something—whatever it was, she did it with that singular focus, hands steady, mouth set, utterly in control.

And he was always there too. Hovering, passing her tools, handing her protective glasses, lifting the heavy things when she needed him to.

He told himself it was enough.

It was enough just to be close, just to hear her murmur thanks when he tightened a bolt for her or held a panel steady. It was enough to watch the way the glow of the welding torch lit up her face, how she wiped the sweat from her temple with the back of her hand, and how she chewed absently at the corner of her lip when she was thinking. It was hard to find common ground in the way he did with Maya—he didn’t have the brainpower for her technobabble, the same way she didn’t have the patience for guitar.

He told himself that. Over and over. It was totally enough.

“Y’know,” he muttered one night, leaning against the workbench as she tightened a bolt, “I got no goddamn clue what you’re doin’ half the time. S'like watching Top Gear. Can't understand shit, but it's fun as hell.”

Leela huffed a quiet laugh, not looking up. “I figured that out when you handed me the wrong pliers three times in a row.”

Joel rolled his eyes but smirked anyway. That was entirely her fault; those little shorts of hers were a daily nuisance and blessing. “Still doesn’t stop me from helpin’, does it?”

She finally glanced up, the corners of her mouth tugging upward in that soft, knowing way. “No,” she admitted. “I like it when you're next to me.”

Except—except sometimes it wasn’t.

Because every time he was near her, every time she was just within reach, he had to force himself not to touch her. Not to brush his knuckles down her spine. Not to stroke the delicate dip of her lower back. Not to slip his fingers just under the hem of her crochet top and feel the curves and planes of her skin against his calloused hands.

She was just so—beautiful.

It hurt sometimes, looking at her.

The smooth lines of her body, the way her throat moved when she swallowed, the effortless way she existed like she belonged in the world in a way he never had.

Sometimes, helpless to his wants, he'd reach out—slow, testing—just to brush the backs of his knuckles along the bare, soft skin of her thigh. Not much, just enough to feel the heat of her, just enough to see if she’d let him. God, he wanted his mouth there, he wanted to sink his teeth in, let his tongue taste what it was like there.

She didn’t move at first, and that was enough to make his breath catch—maybe, maybe—but, just as quick, she effortlessly shifted away, like she hadn’t even noticed. Like she hadn’t felt it.

She reached for a pen instead, silently scratching down something on a paper, brows furrowing in concentration.

Joel let his hand fall, flexing his fingers once before he curled them into a loose fist against his thigh. He told himself it didn’t sting. Not really.

Instead, he forced out a rough chuckle, trying to cover the way his heart still hammered up his throat. “You always this cruel, or am I just special?”

Leela hummed to herself, lips quirking like she might actually be amused. “You’re special, Joel.”

Joel grunted, shaking his head, but he couldn’t quite fight the smirk tugging at his own mouth. Damn tease, this girl.

It was getting maddening, waiting for her comfort. Waiting for her to want him.

Yet, here they were.

On his birthday, side by side in the Maranello, seats reclined all the way back, hood rolled down, the garage door cracked open behind them while the car lingered out on the huge driveway, the night breeze blanketing them. The scent of rain lingered from an earlier shower, mingling with the faint, distant burn of woodsmoke.

The sky stretched wide above them, endless and dark, stars scattered like someone had dragged their fingers through a bowl of salt. Crickets hummed, a lazy song against the quiet, broken only by the occasional clink of their beer bottles. A perfect, warm night.

Joel sighed, lifting his bottle to his lips. His gaze drifted over the dashboard, over the leather interior, over the sleek frame of the goddamn Lambo he was sitting in.

He still couldn’t believe it. Leela had gifted him this thing. Useless in the apocalypse. But fucking cool.

A snort rattled from his chest, and he thumped a fist against it to cover a burp. His stomach was full from his birthday dinner, grease and sauce still coating his tongue. Cheeseburgers, french fries with the little holes in them, cold beers. Classic. Having a grinning Maya pass him the glistening keys in the morning at breakfast? Adorable. Leela had outdone herself big-time.

“Burgers were top-notch, sweetheart,” he muttered, tipping his beer toward her in a lazy toast. “I 'preciate it.”

Leela pulled the bottle from her lips, raising a brow. “I believe the word you used for the burgers was 'gut-busting'.”

Joel huffed a laugh, shifting to glance at her, fully amused.

“Gut-busting, greasy-ass cheeseburgers,” they stated in unison.

Leela giggled, a hand over her mouth. His grin lingered, slow and easy. “A fast car and a fat burger. Hands down the best birthday I’ve had in twenty years.”

And just like that—just those few words—it struck him. Twenty damn years.

Joel rolled the bottle between his fingers, staring up at the sky, watching the way the stars flickered in and out of the clouds, how they dimmed and reappeared, shifting, changing—like they were alive. Like they had always been there, even when the night felt too dark to hold anything at all.

Twenty years.

This day had been a gaping wound for so long, torn open year after year, over and over, until it barely bled anymore. Just a dull, aching thing, carved into his ribs. A black hole that seemed to conquer him, again and again.

Twenty years ago, the world had ended. His world had ended.

He could still feel it if he let himself—the heat of the pavement. The smell of fire. The deadweight of her in his arms. The desperate, shaking press of his palm, Stay with me, baby, please stay with me—The silence after. The void. Sarah.

He swallowed hard, taking a slow sip of beer. Let the taste settle on his tongue, rich and bitter, grounding him to the moment.

Now. Now. Stay here.

Joel blinked, staring up at the stars, at the dark stretch of sky.

Because somehow—somehow—he was here. Sitting in the front seat of a convertible. Beer in hand. A belly full of hot food. A beautiful baby girl waiting for her goodnight kiss. A woman at his side, stunning and easy in her skin, fulfilling his dreams.

For the first time in twenty years—this day didn’t feel like hellish grief.

It felt like something else. Lighter, better, easy.

Funny how life does that to you. How it yanks you under, pulls you apart, spits on your face, leaves you with nothing—and then, somehow, years later, it gives you this.

Because if it weren’t for them—if it weren’t for Maya or Leela—he wouldn’t have left his house. Wouldn’t have stepped foot outside that goddamn pullout. Would’ve let himself rot in it, hollowed out and mourning, still letting the world pile itself on top of him until he disappeared beneath it.

But she had given him this. Not just the car or the amazing dinner. The moment. The peace. Hope in himself.

“I planted onions just for these burgers. They don't usually last the winter,” she mused all of a sudden, pulling him back to reality.

Joel turned his head, blinking and eyeing her. “You did?”

She nodded. “Can you believe that? And now you just belch it up like it's nothing.”

“Chrissake.” Joel groaned, throwing his arm over his eyes. Only she could make him sound that disgusting.

Leela laughed. A real laugh, warm and taunting, something she saved just for his ears. “But hey, you know what?”

Joel peeked at her from under his arm, and—shit. Shouldn’t have done that.

Because she’d rolled onto her side, head propped up on her palm, body stretched out, long legs draped lazily over the seat, the hem of her pretty yellow top riding up just enough to show a teasing sliver of skin. His gaze caught on the curve of her waist, the faint dip of her stomach, and the soft swell of her breasts pressed against the fabric of her top.

He had to collect his jaw back up and clear his throat. “What?”

She didn’t try. That’s what got him. Didn’t preen or pose. Didn’t shift under his gaze like she knew what she was doing to him.

She just was. Existing in the way she always had—effortless, untouched by his wanting, yet somehow still the sexiest goddamn thing he’d ever laid eyes on. Best fucking birthday ever.

“We missed something crucial,” she murmured, eyes gleaming in the dim glow of the dashboard lights.

Joel swallowed thickly. “That so?”

She nodded. “Sodas. My favourite was—”

“Cherry Coke,” he finished, tongue-in-cheek.

She rolled her eyes. “Good to know I've become that predictable.”

He grunted, shifting onto his side too, trying—but failing—to move as smoothly as she did. “Well, actually, I missed a birthday kiss.”

Leela’s lips curved. Slow. Knowing. “I can fix that.”

Then she leaned in, putting his heart in overdrive.

Not hesitant. Not rushed. Just sure. Soft, just a brush of warmth against his mouth, so fleeting it almost didn’t happen. A whisper of heat, a promise more than a kiss. One more soft kiss on his nose before she pulled away.

“Only because you asked nicely,” she said, wiping a thumb over his mouth.

And that just pulled the rug right out from under him. He managed a smile as she leaned onto her back, head resting back over her arm.

She'd only kissed him because he wanted it. God, what a fucking joke he was.

She liked him. That much he knew. She liked his presence, liked that he was there, liked the easy simplicity between them. Liked just being with him without expectation or pressure. And yeah—after everything she’d been through, that was a good thing. A great thing. She saw him as someone she trusted. Someone she felt safe with.

But sometimes—sometimes, it almost felt like she didn’t see him.

Not as a man. Not as someone she wanted.

Look, he wasn’t some goddamn heartthrob. Wasn’t James Dean or Paul fucking Newman. He wasn’t expecting her to look at him like that, wasn’t expecting her to ache for him the way he ached for her. But was it so much to ask that she did look?

That she saw him, really saw him, as more than just Maya’s dad?

Because he saw himself. And what was there to want?

He’d caught his reflection in the mirror earlier. Stared at it longer than he should’ve, cataloguing everything he hated.

There was a paunch in his stomach, slight sagging muscles beneath the too-tight flannel, a scatter of age spots across his forehead, deepening creases in his brow, endless white creeping into his beard and temples, and years settling into his skin like old grief.

He gave his chest a scratch. Jesus. Ancient, worn down, unexceptional. Maybe that was why she didn’t kiss or touch him much. Perhaps it was easier to see him as something safe and constant—because there was nothing desirable about him anymore.

Once, he found an old packet of men’s hair dye while rummaging for an electric razor, set on plucking away those stubborn white hairs from his beard.

He’d held the dye packet, turning it over in his palm, giving it more thought than he wanted to admit. Wouldn’t hurt, right? Just to try?

But before he could shove it away, a voice.

“Are you going to use that?”

Leela stood in the doorway, arms crossed, her mouth twitching like she was holding back a laugh.

Joel gritted his teeth, fisting the pack so tight his knuckles went white. “No.”

She hummed, stepping closer, and Christ—he wanted to die right then and there. Or flush the damn thing down the toilet.

But instead—she reached for him.

Her fingers dragged through his hair, combing it back, nails barely grazing his scalp. And fuck—he sighed, head tipping forward, catching her wrist in his palm, pressing a slow, reverent kiss against her pulse. Felt it flutter beneath his lips.

“I really like this though,” she murmured.

Joel lifted a brow, not trusting himself to look at her fully. “I’m gettin’ old, darlin’. Nothing left to like.”

She nodded, her smile small, a little shy. “Oh, I don't know.” A pause. “I know I can’t wait for my hair to get like that.”

He frowned. “Like what? A zebra?”

She gave him a look, like are you really making me spell it out?

So, softly, she said, “So we’ll look the same, Joel.”

His chest caved in with a tight breath.

She didn’t just see him. She wanted to be like him.

His heart felt like it was too big for his ribs, pressing up against the inside of him, aching in a way that had nothing to do with desire and everything to do with love. He was the king of the fucking world, alright. Jack Dawson had nothing on him.

He swallowed hard, gripping her wrist a little tighter, as if maybe—if he just held on long enough—he’d finally figure out how to put it all into words. How to tell her that she was everything. But all he could say was—

“You've got a long way to go,” he said, teasing.

She pushed her lips out to a pout. “Another few years?”

Joel huffed. She wasn’t even American. Her hair wasn’t going grey any time soon. He figured she had a good decade before she had to start worrying about it.

“Longer,” he said.

She hummed, tilting her head a little, studying him like she was trying to figure something out. And then, before he could process it, she leaned forward on her toes, pressing her lips to his. His hands instinctively came to settle on her waist.

Soft. Warm. Unhurried. Her fingers brushed along his jaw, the pad of her thumb stroking over the rough bristle of his chin. She lingered there for just a second before pulling away, pressing one last kiss to his cheek, like she was sealing something in place.

Because that single statement from her, that simple act, changed it all. Made him braver. Made him feel like maybe she did see him the way he wanted her to.

And come morning, he had his answer.

She was there at the kitchen island, waiting for him at breakfast, greeting him with another kiss—this time at the white hair on his temple, fingers curling into the curls at his nape as she slid a piece of toast onto his plate.

Yeah. He got the message.

There were bitter, darker days.

Less frequent than before, but still there, waiting beneath the surface. Days, where the loads settled too heavy on his chest, pressing him down, making the simple act of breathing, feel like a goddamn effort.

Yesterday had been one of those days.

From the moment he woke up, he'd known it, a dull, aching fog clouded his mind. His limbs felt sluggish, his body unwilling, his muscles all crumbs. He’d barely moved from bed, save for dragging himself to the kitchen, only to stand there, staring at nothing, gripping the counter's edge like it might keep him from drowning.

Sarah’s birthday. And he’d forgotten.

The realization had hit him out of nowhere, sucker-punching him in the ribs, making his breath catch.

How? How the fuck had he forgotten?

For years, her birthday had been a bare, uncleaned wound, a day spent drowning in liquor if it was nearby, in silence, in the unbearable pricks of memory. He’d counted down the days every year. Her age, had she been by his side. What she would've been doing.

And now?

Now he had let it slip past him, let it fade into the haze of normal days—just another morning, another afternoon. He had laughed yesterday. Laughed. He had eaten, spoken, kissed, sang, loved—without realizing what day it was.

A sickness had curdled in his gut. That painful guilt of living came unbidden. It made him disgusted with himself. So much, so that he couldn't dare face anyone around him. Not even Tommy.

So he did what he used to do.

He grabbed a bottle from the bar, kept his head down as he left, and took the back route home before Maya could spot him from the porch. He had seen her there, though. Tiny thing, peering down the street for him, waiting.

And he hadn’t wanted her to see him like this. He didn’t want anyone to see him like this.

He had shut the door behind him, the bottle clinking against the wood as he sank onto the couch, letting the liquor do what it always did—burn through the hollow parts, dull the sharp edges, and take him somewhere else.

And still, it hadn't been enough.

When evening crept in, it came slow. Shadows stretched long across the walls, the last of the day bleeding out in streaks of dull orange, then fading to blue.

He barely heard the knock at the door. A soft pat-pat-pat. And then—a voice. Small. Muffled through the wood.

“Da-da.”

Another knock, more rigid and insistent. “Joel?”

Joel barely moved. Didn't even turn his head. He wanted to, he really did. His body felt leaden, pinned beneath—this day, this year, all the years before it—pressed too deep into his bones, sinking him down into the mattress. His head throbbed, a slow, punishing ache, that faded at the edges but persistent. And that wound—the one no one could see—still wouldn’t close.

He couldn't face them like this. This broken shell of a person. What if they never came back after this?

“C’mon, Maya,” Leela murmured, gentle but firm. Obviously attempting to tuck Maya back into her side. “He’s probably tired. He’s sleeping.”

A beat of quiet. Then—Maya, in that soft, curious little voice— “Sleeeeepy.”

“That's right,” Leela hummed, warmth threading through her words. Like it was the easiest thing. Like sleep was something you could just slip into. “We’ll come back later.”

“Da-da dinna’.”

Something rustled outside. A soft thud. Joel blinked slowly at the ceiling, tracking the sound.

“Very good. Put the lid on top.” A pause, that gentle patience he had seen in her when she was with her daughter. “Do you want to go back home, and Mama will put some music for you?”

A clap. Small hands smacking together. An excited squeal. “Comma, comma, comma, Mama.”

A breath of laughter. Light and soft. “Yeah, baby. Let's go.”

The warmth of their voices drifted away, their footsteps fading down the porch, swallowed by the quiet of the night. He wanted to walk out, stop them, follow them, hold them—but he imagined how his ribs might crack, or the lead in his lungs might choke him.

So, Joel stayed where he was, his gaze unfocused, tracing the cracks in the ceiling. Leela wasn’t wrong. He was tired. But not the kind of tiredness that sleep could fix. Not the kind that ever really went away.

Time blurred. Hours, maybe. Minutes. He couldn’t tell. Nothing made sense in the darkness.

The whiskey had burned low in his veins, leaving behind only the ache, the hollowing out. Everything hurt, but not in the way anything could soothe away.

Eventually, exhaustion took hold. Not rest. Not peace. Just a slow descent into the depths, dark and familiar.

At last, he dreamt.

Of Sarah. Of her arms around him, small, warm, clinging tight, her face buried in his chest, breathing deep. Of her laugh. The way it used to sound—radiant, uninhibited, lighting up the spaces inside him that he hadn’t even known were empty.

For a second, he could almost believe it. Almost feel her again.

But then—the cold came. Took it all away.

Cold that seeped into the marrow, nailed in deep, wrapped tight around his ribs and never let go. The kind that pulled him under, again and again, no matter how hard he fought it. And fought so goddamn hard.

And yet—somewhere, in the edges of that darkness, something else lingered. Something little.

The echo of a laugh. Not Sarah’s anymore.

No, this one was lighter. Younger. Breathless. He liked it. It didn't hurt to hear it as much.

A weight against his chest—but different this time. Not loss, not emptiness. A little palm, splayed over his ribs, forming a fist into his collar. A warm, sleepy body curled into his chest, tap-tap-tapping away like she was making sure he was still there.

Maya.

Joel’s breath stuttered. Even in sleep, his body knew before his mind did. The warmth of it, the shape of it—what he had now. His reality.

And for once—for just a glad moment—it kept him from sinking. A life vest in his raging ocean.

Morning came too late, in slivers of light through the blinds. Pale. Reluctant. Afraid for him. Like even the sun wasn’t sure if it was welcome here.

Joel blinked, groggy and slow, rubbing a heavy hand over his face. His throat felt raw like he'd screamed too loud for too long, his mouth dry, the taste of stale whiskey clinging to his tongue. His head was thick, his thoughts sluggish, and beneath it all—beneath the crusted-over exhaustion and the dull throb of his skull—the hurt was still there.

That same old invisible bullet lodged somewhere deep, that never fully dislodged, pressing into the places he didn’t like to look at too closely. The kind of wound that never fully closed, never let him forget it was there.

Still—he pushed himself up like he always did.

Didn’t know why. Didn’t know what the hell was pulling him forward, keeping him upright, but he moved. Swung his legs over the edge of the bed. Dug his palms into his knees. Breathed through it.

Got the hell on with it.

He dragged himself to the sink, and planted his hands on the cool porcelain, gripping it hard, like it might hold him up if his legs finally gave out. His reflection stared back, hollow-eyed, lined with years and misery, the past carved deep into every crease, every shadow. He despised himself with every inch of his being. He hated it all.

He brushed his teeth with patience he didn’t have.

Splashed water on his face, cold and biting, shocking his skin like maybe that could shake him loose from the bullet pressing into his ribs.

It didn’t.

Still, he moved.

The morning light hit harder here, slanting golden through the windows, indifferent to the man standing in it. The world had the nerve to keep turning, to keep moving forward.

Joel squinted against the sunrays, his gaze landing on the coffee table.

The bottle sat there, emptied, toppled on its side, amber remnants clinging to the bottom.

And by the bottle—a sandwich. Small. Wrapped neatly with careful hands. He'd evidently bit into it and left the rest to rot overnight.

Joel exhaled, dragging a hand over his jaw.

He didn’t remember drinking. Didn’t remember setting the bottle down. Didn't remember walking to the door. Didn't remember staring out the window, across the street at the big, white house that had gone dark now. Didn't remember breaking down right there, feeling like a fucking failure to the dead and the living. Didn’t remember eating. Didn’t remember closing his eyes, or dreaming, or waking up.

Didn’t remember much of anything. Except for the pain.

But even that felt faded now—like an echo of something sharper, something that had already done its damage and left him to sit in the wreckage.

Still—he moved.

Stepped outside.

Joel blinked against the morning light, the world stretching wide and clear around him, washed in pale blue, moving on without him, uncaring, like it always had, and then—his body betrayed him.

His knees bent before he could stop them, hanging onto the rails, and he sank onto the porch steps, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes. Winded all of a sudden.

Count to ten, he recalled. Slow. Even. One, two, three.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

His ribs ached. His skin felt too tight, like it was trying to hold in something too big, something pressing outward from him.

And still—he counted. Four, five six...

By the time he looked up, the knot in his chest hadn’t loosened, not really, but—they were there, too.

Them. Across the street.

Leela and Maya. Standing in the wide front lawn, bathed in the softness of morning.

Leela had clearly been sidetracked—again—always halfway between duty and distraction. He knew how much she hated these chores. The clothesline stretched out, strung with damp sheets, but the laundry basket at her feet sat untouched, still full of what she’d meant to hang.

She wasn’t folding anymore.

Instead, she was holding up a long, white bedsheet, grinning at Maya's small hands curled into fists of excitement.

Joel watched as Leela ducked behind the sheet, disappearing—Maya’s breath hitched—and then—

Leela reappeared, hands lifting, fingers wiggling. “Boo!”

Maya shrieked, her whole body jolting in surprise before she collapsed onto the grass, giggling so hard she lost her balance, tumbling onto her little butt. Her laughter was bright, high-pitched, breathless, shaking her tiny shoulders.

Leela laughed too, full and warm, head tipping back just slightly.

And Joel just sat there. Breathing in, breathing out. Eight, nine, ten. Barely thinking about it anymore.

Because fuck.

After last night. After the whiskey. After the emptiness. After the memories had clawed their way out of their grave and wrapped around his throat like they wanted to drag him back under—

Here he stopped.

Watching this. Warm. Real. Close enough to touch.

Something that hadn’t been there twenty years ago, but was here now, right in front of him.

And he still didn’t think he deserved it.

But really—maybe he didn’t need to.

He didn’t move. Not right away.

Just sat there, hands braced on his knees, watching. Letting it settle into him, this moment. Something to dig his heels into while he caught up with the world again.

Leela exhaled, dramatic, hands on her hips. “Phew,” she huffed, glancing down at the still-full laundry basket. “Still got to hang these up.”

Maya, fresh off her giggling fit, sat up, rocking forward onto her hands and knees before clambering to her feet. Her dress—soft cotton, faded at the edges, patterned with tiny yellow flowers—was rumpled from rolling in the grass. A few strands of dark curls stuck to her forehead, but she barely noticed, too busy eyeing the basket with newfound purpose.

Joel could see it happen—that little shift.

The way her expression turned serious, brows knitting in focus, her lips parting like she’d just discovered the most important job in the world.

She reached down, fingers barely big enough to grasp the edge of a sheet. She grunted, giving it all she had, but it didn’t budge.

Leela glanced down. “Hm?”

Maya huffed, squared her tiny shoulders, and tried again—both hands this time, using her whole little body to tug at the fabric, little theatrical 'hng!' of hard work escaping her chest.

Still nothing.

“Mama.” She stomped her foot. “Up.”

Leela’s mouth twitched, amusement flickering in her eyes. She crouched beside her daughter, resting her hands on her knees. “Oh, I see. You’re helping me, huh?”

Maya nodded. Firm. Determined. “Gimme, gimme.”

Joel palmed his mouth, hoping the world didn’t take his smile away too soon.

Leela reached into the basket, fingers brushing lightly over Maya’s before gathering up the sheet properly. “Thank you, baby,” she murmured.

Maya beamed. Like the baby girl had just been handed the keys to the kingdom.

She toddled after her mother as Leela walked to the line, big eyes fixed on the way the fabric billowed like a cloud as it caught the light.

Joel exhaled. Sat frozen, watching.

The simple rhythm of it. The way Maya—so small, so certain—kept reaching down, picking up the next thing, both hands now, learning from last time, lurching after her mama with that same eager little voice.

“Mama, up.”

And every time—every single time—Leela patiently answered the same. “Thank you, baby.”

Again, and again. Again, and again.

Joel swallowed. His throat no longer felt tight. His head still ached, still held the despair of last night, of everything before it. But right now, here, with the cool air on his skin, the smell of damp earth in his lungs, the sound of Maya’s tiny voice chirping “Mama, up” over and over—

He could breathe. Really breathe.

And when his feet finally moved, when he finally pushed himself up from the steps and started walking toward them—it wasn’t some grand decision. It wasn’t something he had to force himself to do.

It was simply inevitable.

Leela didn’t hear him approach. Too focused on her daughter, on the task at hand, on the rhythm of their little world.

His fingers moved, apart from his control, found the frayed waistband of her shorts, just there, and hooked in. A gentle tug, a slow pull toward him.

Leela flinched—not much, just a hitch in her shoulders, a half-second's worth of instinct before she recognized him. Still unlearning old habits. Before she softened right against his chest.

And when she laughed, soft and knowing, she reached up without hesitation, fingers brushing along the side of his bristly cheek, a gentle, familiar warmth.

“G'morning,” she whispered.

Joel didn’t care anymore.

Didn’t care about the ghosts still clinging to his ribs. Didn’t care about the way exhaustion stretched him thin, about how last night still loomed in the back of his mind, dark and swollen and waiting to be acknowledged. Didn’t care that he probably looked half a corpse, standing there in yesterday’s clothes, smelling like whiskey and relapse.

He only cared about this. Only this.

The strings of her top tied at the nape of her neck, the curve of her spine beneath his fingertips, her skin warmed at his touch as he leaned in, pressed his open mouth against it, and let himself taste her where he could.

Leela sighed, tilting just slightly, like she always did—like her body always made room for him, even before her mind caught up.

His fingers slid forward, skimming beneath the loose hem of her top, smoothing down, trailing slowly over the smooth plane of her stomach.

A reminder. That she was here. That he was here. They were here. And that some things in this world were still good.

“Mornin',” he murmured into her skin.

Leela blinked, only half-registering the words. Then—

She sniffed and grimaced at him. “Jesus, Joel,” she muttered, nose wrinkling, “did you drink?”

Joel let out a quiet breath, pressing his forehead to the curve of her shoulder.

He shook his head. Not a yes. Not a no, not really. Just not now. “I don't wanna talk about it.”

Leela didn’t push. She only turned, facing him now, studying him like she was flipping through the pages of a book she already knew by heart.

His sunken eyes. The pallid, drawn look of him. His hair, a complete mess. His shirt, wrinkled like he hadn’t even bothered taking it off before collapsing somewhere.

He felt the attention in her stare. Not pity, she just understood. She knew because this had been her for some time, minus the alcohol.

So, all she said was—“Do you want to wash up?” Her voice was quiet. Only there for him. “I’ll make you some coffee and you can sit by the garden. Get some fresh air.”

Relief punched through him, sharp and unexpected. He nodded. Squeezed at her waist. “Yeah. Thank you.”

Leela didn’t look away, still watching him. Seeing if he needed anything else. Not even when he tried to smooth his voice out, tried to make it sound like he was okay.

“I'm alright, darlin’,” he promised—lied. “Had a rough night. Thanks for the sandwich.”

She patted his cheek before her lips curved into a meaningful smile. He really needed her with him, like the air he breathed.

“Maya,” Leela called, her eyes still anchored on his. “Look who's here, baby.”

Maya, busy untangling the last set of laundry from the basket, glanced up at her mother. Then her company.

Her face lit up, her mouth opening wide with a smile. And then she was off like a shot, legs pumping through the grass, a firecracker of squeals and giggles and wild, uncontainable joy.

Joel barely had time to brace himself before she crashed into his legs, clinging to him with all the strength her tiny body could manage.

“Da-da!”

Fuck.

He shut his eyes for half a second. That little voice, that little word, scraping a five-fingered claw so raw inside him, into something that shouldn’t be touched. But when he opened his eyes again, when he looked down and saw her, saw the absolute unsought delight written across Maya's face—

He couldn’t refuse her. He never could.

“Hi, baby girl,” he rasped, hoisting her up with one arm. “C'mere. Gimme a kiss.”

Maya fit perfectly against him, the way she always did, all carved in for herself, her arms impossibly small where they wrapped around his neck. And Jesus, the way she grinned at him—then leaned forward to smack a tiny, wet kiss on his cheek.

“You're breakin' my heart in that dress,” he told her, brushing a thumb over the little yellow flowers. “Did you pick it out?”

Maya gasped and pointed at them for him. “'S-h-f—s’flowers, my f-d-dwess,” she stammered, words tumbling over themselves in the excitement of seeing him.

Joel huffed a laugh, tucking his chin against her head. Christ, how did she get sweeter every goddamn day?

But then she started squirming, leaning right out of his arms, stretching her little fingers toward the clothesline as far as they could go. “Hang!”

Joel caught her before she toppled, laughing despite himself. “Woah, yeah, I know you did.” He glanced at Leela, who was watching them with that quiet, knowing expression. “Biggest little helper in the world.”

Maya nodded. Like it was a fact.

Joel pressed a kiss to her temple, still holding her close. “Listen, sunshine, I gotta hit the shower, okay? 'Cause your mama said I stink, and I can’t have that.”

Maya wrinkled her nose, scrunching up her whole face. He pinched at it.

Leela arched a brow. “Mama's only concerned,” she murmured.

“Mama ain't gotta be, yeah?” Joel shot back. But his voice was softer than before. Not so hollow.

Leela studied him for a second—like she knew that wasn’t true. Knew exactly what had happened last night. Knew exactly what he’d been trying to drown. But she didn’t say anything or call him out. She only did what Leela always did—she helped. Without condition. Without question.

“Now,” Joel cleared his throat, adjusting Maya in his arms, “which one of you pretty ladies is gonna fix me up a nice breakfast?”

Maya clapped her hands, a little burst of glee. “Yay!”

It started with Ellie. Because of course, it did.

That kid had a way of getting under his skin, of digging her nails into the parts of him he didn’t even realize were still soft. Poking. Prodding. Needling. And she’d done just that—smirking, goading, dangling the bait in front of his face like she knew damn well he was gonna take it.

“Well, sourpuss, Leela’s coming,” she'd convincingly said to him as they were returning their horses to the stables after patrol.

Joel had laughed at her face. Scoffed, even. And, what? His Leela? At the Tipsy Bison? At a goddamn party? With all the noise, all the music, all the drunk, sweaty fools two-stepping on the wooden floor? No chance in hell.

Yet, Ellie went on.

“I dunno how Tommy convinced her,” she had said, grinning like she’d already won, shoving her hands into her pockets. “But—yeah. She’ll be here with Maya.”

And that was all it took.

Which was how Joel found himself here. Stood stiff by the bar, one hand wrapped around a sweating glass of beer, the other clenching and unclenching at his side. His leather jacket felt too damn hot under the press of too many bodies, the heat of the string lights, and the music—Christ, the music. That twangy, knee-stomping, boot-scuffing, banjo-heavy bullshit rattling through the rafters—loud enough to set his damn teeth on edge. He'd hated it back then, and he hated it now.

The annual hoedown at the Tipsy Bison.

The world couldn’t give him a break. How in God’s name had he ended up here? How the hell had he let this happen?

This was not his scene. And it sure as hell wasn’t Leela’s. They would've been at home, curled up for dinner, amusing themselves with Maya like she was their favourite show on the television.

All it took was to establish that Leela was going to be there.

Because now, here he was—standing in the corner like a goddamn joke, cleaned up like he had any business being out on a Friday night, his boots polished, his hair combed back, his leather jacket slung over a shirt he actually bothered to button properly. Dressed to the fucking nines, he was.

And for what? To sit in a sea of drunken idiots and wait? Wait for her to walk in, looking like she was some kind of myth, some rare, elusive thing, something too glorious to be real? Wait for every goddamn person in the room to notice?

Because they would. Of course, they fucking would. Even the straightest of women would be turning their heads for her if they'd seen what he'd seen. Those never-ending legs, that face, that smile—shit, yeah, he was in big trouble.

Because fucking Maria had gotten her hands on Leela, and Maria was up to no good.

He’d tried. Lord knows he’d tried. He had stomped up the stairs at the fifteen-minute mark, knowing damn well this whole thing was taking too long, and had called, “Alright, well—sweetheart, nothing too showy, right? Y’know, these people don’t ‘preciate that as much as—”

“Oh, get the fuck outta here, Smeagol!” Maria had shouted him off.

Now, he was here... all because of her. And she wasn’t even here yet.

Joel exhaled sharply, jaw ticking, eyes darting to the door for the tenth time in five minutes. Nothing. He dragged his fingers along the rim of the bottle, still scowling at the bar like it owed him an apology.

Because the longer he stood here, the clearer it became what was really getting to him.

It wasn’t that Leela was coming.

It wasn’t that she’d let Maria fix her up—touch her pretty face, brush out her hair, maybe even put her in a pretty little dress.

No. It was the eyes. The way they were gonna watch her.

Hell yeah, Joel was jealous man. One of the many sins he had the privilege of bearing. He could get territorial as fuck, no doubt about it. All that sharing and community crap was bullshit. He had what he had, and it was splendid. Perfect, even. It was his because he kept it that way. He wasn't about to flaunt it to everyone in this town, have everyone poking at the green-eyed monster. And now was not the right time to test it, especially with his shocking self-esteem at an all-time low.

Damn it, this was his Leela.

She wasn’t just pretty. She wasn’t just easy on the eyes. She was—God, she just was. Unknowable. Untouchable. Something soft and sharp and utterly fucking stunning—and worst of all? She didn’t even realize it.

But they would. And Joel—fuck, he was pissed. Not at her. Never at her.

At them.

Because they didn’t get to see her the way he did.

Not in the morning, curled up and soft, her voice all husky and groggy. Not when she was tired in the afternoons, tucked into the couch with Maya, absentmindedly stroking her little girl’s hair. Not at night, in the flickering warmth of the fireplace, barefaced and undone, tucked between her blackboards and chalk pieces, humming the rhythm of equations under her breath.

They didn’t get that. They didn’t get her. But that wouldn’t stop them from looking. From trying.

Joel was still scowling at the door when Ellie appeared at his side, grinning like a fox. Before he could say anything—something landed on his head, slumping into his eyes. A ritzy, cowboy hat.

His whole body went rigid.

“Hat-asaur, yeah!” Ellie whooped, slapping the brim.

Joel exhaled sharply. The Lord was really trying him tonight. His hand went up automatically, ready to rip the damn thing off, but—

“Wait, Joel, c’mon!” Ellie slapped his hand away. “You look good, Maya will love it.”

Joel sighed and dragged a hand down his face. Then—begrudgingly, muttered, “Fine.”

Ellie whooped again, nudging him hard enough to make him stumble a step forward.

He grumbled something under his breath, eyes still glued to the damn door. Because any second now—she was gonna walk in. And already, it felt like his ass was on fire.

He flexed his fingers, shifting on his feet, too aware of the way the hat sat a little too low over his eyes, the way his collar felt like it was choking him. He wasn’t nervous, alright? Not nervous. Just—

Shit.

The door opened. At first, it was just a blur of movement, people shuffling in and out, but then—there.

Leela stepped inside. And Joel was simply a man who’d been gone a long time and just found his way home.

Her head was tilted slightly down, eyes lowered in that way of hers, like she wasn’t sure if she clicked in a place like this. Maya was tucked close to her side, her little hand securely fastened within her mother's, but she was already wriggling, already whining, ready to tear herself away and make her own little discoveries around the place.

Little thing was decked out in tiny denim overalls, small curls pulled into two bows, soft white boots barely keeping up as she stomped at the floor, still fighting against Leela’s hold, squealing her frustration, saying, “Mama, go, me go!”

And well—thank you, Maria. Because Jesus Christ. Leela wasn’t wearing anything particularly more catering to her strappy tastes, nothing that showed more skin than usual, but somehow, it was worse—because of course it was.

The soft brown dress unevenly swayed at her calves, the deep plunge of it down to her sternum until it nearly blended into her skin, the measly beaded strings tied around her neck. Her black hair all loose and wild around her waist. Effortless as anything.

And those goddamn embroidered, leathery cowgirl boots. Stopped his goddamn heart. Sexy as hell. All he could think about now was having them over his shoulders, that dress pulled to the seam of those arch legs, lips tasting, moving against that sweet, sweet—

He closed his eyes to collect his scattered wits for a second. Oh, Christ, he was already losing it.

See it didn’t matter that the dress was modest, that she wasn’t trying to draw attention to herself. People were still fucking looking, alright.

Leela hadn’t spotted him yet, her focus on a sniffling Maya as she crouched low, murmuring something in her ear, pressing a warm kiss to her palm, before handing her off to Maria with a soft, “Sorry, I’ll be right back.”

She searched the crowd, weaving carefully between bodies, until she looked up and spotted him. No other flicker in her eyes, just recognition, as she didn't waste another second and made her way straight to him.

Joel barely had time to say anything before she reached for his hand, cool fingers slotting through his as she dragged him aside, away from the crowd, away from the noise, into a quiet corner near the stairs.

“Come with me,” she murmured to him.

He could feel the eyes burning through him, the silent stares pressing in from every direction. And for a split second, he had the strongest urge to make it known. To push her against that wall. To kiss her. To stake his claim, loud and clear for the whole damn bar to see.

But before he could do a thing, Leela was stopping.

She was unfolding something. A piece of paper, scrawled with numbers and symbols smoothed out between trembling fingers.

Her eyes darted to his, wide and glowing with something almost feverish.

“I did it,” she said, voice a mere breath and almost shaking. “I solved it, Joel. The Riemann Hypothesis.”

Joel blinked. The who-what now?

“Took me ten whole years,” she whispered, hands trembling slightly as she held up the paper. “And my dad’s entire life. I-it’s a milestone in the field of mathematics. I just solved the biggest unsolved problem out there, Joel. Oh, I—I don’t know what to do—I don’t—Omigod—shit, I can’t breathe—”

“Hey, hey.” Joel reacted before he could think, his hands reaching up, long fingers networking at the back of her head, cupping her face, grounding her to him.

“Daggum, girl, you're incredible,” he murmured, close to her ear, pressing a kiss there. “You make me proud every damn day.”

Leela let out a breath, squeezing her hands to her mouth, eyes bright and almost disbelieving. “Thanks.”

She exhaled again, shaking her head a little, like she was still trying to wrap her mind around it.

A thought hit her. Then—her gaze snapped back to his, sharp and alive. She held his elbows tight.

“Do you know someone we can tell?” she asked, the words tumbling out. “This is really revolutionary, Joel. Would Tommy or Maria know? Someone outside of Wyoming maybe, a professor or a student? Radio them? Or someone who—um, can get this notarized?”

Her words started rushing out, full of hope, full of expectation—but Joel had nothing. He just stood there.

He was a man used to thinking practically, used to reading the world for threats, for weaknesses, for what mattered in the immediate sense of survival.

This was out of his hands, out of his understanding. Leela’s excitement, the breathless urgency in her voice—it’s not something he was used to handling. It’s not something he can fix with his fists, with a gun, with a little death. This was bigger than him, bigger than Jackson, bigger than this world they’re barely holding together.

And that’s the part that was eating at him.

Because she cared about this. He could see it in her eyes, feel it in the way she shook when she pressed that crumpled piece of paper into his hands. This wasn’t just numbers to her. This was ten years of her life. This was her father’s legacy.

And all he could do was stare at it.

Because what the fuck was he supposed to say? What could he tell her when there’s no one left to hear it? Anyone worth anything was gone? When there’s no university, no award, no history books to remember her name?

It made him angry in a way he couldn’t explain. At the whole fucking world. At the way it had stolen so much from her already—and now it was going to take this, too.

She saw it in his face before he even spoke. He tried to think, tried to come up with something, but he was taking too long.

And that was the worst part. Because that spark, that glow in her eyes—it was already dying.

She swallowed and managed a faltering smile. Folded the paper back up, like it was nothing. Like it was just another thing she had to let go of.

“So silly,” she mumbled.

Joel wanted to stop her. To tell her it mattered that what she’d done was worth all the awards, golds and notaries in the world. But what would that mean coming from him? What the hell does he know about numbers or legacy? He'd shit all over his own.

So he just watched as she tucked the paper away. That familiar, bitter rage simmered at the back of his throat.

“Darlin’,” he said softly, stroking the back of her head.

She shook her head. “No, it’s fine,” she said quietly, running a hand through her hair. “I just—I don’t know what I was expecting. World's different now.”

Joel clenched his jaw. She should’ve expected more. She deserved more.

The world was too small now, and she was too big for it.

A moment passed, heavy and quiet, and Joel really tried to work his mouth, distract her, pull her out of her head. He didn't need to.

So softly it barely made a sound—

“I like your hat.”

Joel blinked at her, and felt something in his chest ease, just a little, at the quiet humour in her voice. He exhaled a small laugh, tipping his head slightly, letting the hat slink a little lower, playing along.

“Yeah? Reckon you’ve never been hit on by a real cowboy before,” he drawled, all gravel and honey, emphasizing his accent, thumb hooking into his belt.

Leela let out a soft laugh, her fingers brushing her lips. “Never even been to a bar before.”

Joel whistled, low and slow, shaking his head like he’d just laid eyes on the Mona Lisa. “Damn shame for a pretty young thing like you.”

He really was trying, pulling out all the big guns. Laying it on thick, thicker than he had any right to, but goddamn—if she deserved the world, and he couldn’t give her that, at least he could make her smile. At least he could lift that weight off her shoulders, even for a minute.

So he leaned in a little more, let his voice drop to a slow, easy drawl, and let the heat of his gaze do half the work.

“Well, now,” he murmured, watching her just a little too long, letting his gaze drag over her like a slow hand, “lucky for you, darlin’… I got a real nice record of showin’ a lady a good time. My saddle ain’t the only thing gettin’ ridden hard if you said it.”

Leela raised her brows, sceptical but not immune. “...saddle? Oh.”

Joel felt it the moment it landed. The way her breath hitched—not much, just enough. The way her fingers tightened around the folded slip of paper in her hand.

And he wanted to feel it—wanted to feel that tension in her, the kind he swore he could taste in the air between them. It had been a long goddamn time since he felt this—since he wanted something enough to reach for it.

Slow, steady—like breaking a skittish horse. Like testing the waters, making sure she wouldn’t spook. His hand hovered, calloused fingers just inches from her skin, giving her the chance to move, to pull away, to tell him no.

She didn’t. So he took what she gave.

His fingers found her chin, the pad of his thumb barely grazing the plush curve of her bottom lip. He tilted her face up just a fraction—just enough to make her look at him, to catch that moment her lips parted on instinct, like she was already breathless.

Jesus. His control didn’t do much when she blinked up at him like that, lashes and lips fluttering—just asking to be pinned to that wall behind her.

His smirk came easy—lazy, dangerous, wolfish. Yeah, he knew that look. Knew it because he felt the same damn way.

He casually let go, and her eyes followed his hand down to his side.

“See,” he continued, angling his body toward hers, close enough to catch the way her pulse ticked at the base of her throat. “A cowboy’s got a duty, y’know. Gotta show a fine lady what a proper gentleman’s like.”

His fingers dipped under the brim of his hat, tipping it just so—shadowing his eyes, letting his gaze drop, nice and slow, just long enough to let her know exactly where he was looking.

Then, a slow shrug—broad shoulders rolling under his shirt, casual, easy—like he wasn’t laying a goddamn trap.

“Well,” he drawled, voice turning downright sinful, “‘d be mighty honoured to be called yours t’night.”

And there it was. And Joel knew right then and there—he had her. Because she didn’t roll her eyes. Didn’t laugh or stop him.

That telltale little pause—like maybe, just maybe, she was picturing it. He knew he was.

Instead, she just stood there, watching him, lips parted like maybe she had something to say—something that got lost somewhere in the space between them.

And for one wild, reckless moment, Joel thought she might just lean in, kiss the crap out of him. But then—she blinked, and the moment was gone.

She let out a breathy laugh, shaking her head. “You're funny.”

Joel grinned, even though he felt the shift. The retreat. “That so?” he drawled, still not letting up.

“You sound like you walked out of a Western.”

He smirked, tipped his hat lower, and let his voice drop just for her. “Now, sugar, that ain’t no way to talk to the man who’s about to teach you how to have your first bar fight. I quite like a girl with some fire in her belly.”

That got a laugh out of her. A real one. And Joel soaked it in, every damn inch of it.

Leela snorted, rolling her eyes. “Absolutely not.”

“C’mon, now,” he teased, nudging her arm, his fingers just barely brushing against the soft skin there. “You’ve been missin’ out, angel, bein’ all locked away in that big house of yours.”

She raised her palm up in surrender. “Excuse me for having more pressing matters.”

Joel let his gaze drift over her, taking his time, dragging over the curve of her dress, the shape of her legs in those maddening boots. And then—he looked her right in the eye.

“Well,” he murmured, deep and sure, “maybe it’s time you stopped thinkin' about it.”

And just like that—the mood swerved again. Leela’s smile flickered, fingers twitching at her side.

She wasn’t looking at him anymore. Joel hated that he understood what that felt like. Hated that she deserved so much more than this world could ever give her. But before he could say a thing—

A little body slammed into his leg, nearly knocking him off balance.

Joel let out a breath just in time to feel Maya’s tiny arms latch around his calf, her face tipped up at him, all big eyes and a hopeful little four-teeth grin.

“Pease, pease, da-da,” she whined, hopping in place, her little hands patting at his jeans. “Up!”

Joel exhaled, running a hand down his face. Jesus Christ. Tic-tac-sized cockblocker, he was raising.

Leela laughed, faint and knowing, shaking her head as Maya demanded his full attention. But Joel couldn't even be mad. Baby girl was looking at him like he'd just walked straight out of heaven.

“Alright, alright,” he muttered, already reaching for her. “C’mon up, trouble.”

Maya squealed, her little body kicking excitedly as Joel lifted her into the air, her arms flung out like she was ready to take off. He swung her once, twice, before tucking her close, and she immediately latched onto him, her tiny hands gripping at his collar like she owned him.

Hell. Maybe she did.

She smelled like baby powder and whatever sweet stuff Tommy had probably snuck her earlier, and her little curls were tickling his jaw as she wriggled against him. She was always moving, always vibrating with energy, her whole body alive with it.

Then, suddenly—her wide eyes locked on his hat. Oh, hell. Joel knew that look.

“Gimme, gimme,” she demanded, tiny fingers already reaching.

He playfully narrowed his eyes at her. “Gimme?” he echoed, raising a brow. “That how you ask me?”

Maya pushed her lips out—big, dramatic, a whole damn performance. All that, he had no idea where that came from. Then she reached again, ready to rip it off him if she had to. “Gimme.”

Leela sighed beside them. “Maya, you have to say plea—”

“Pease!” Maya cut in quickly, blinking up at him with too much innocence.

Joel shook his head, letting out a low chuckle. “Goddamn, you’re trouble.”

Then, without another word, he took the too-big hat off his head and plopped it right onto hers.

The thing swallowed her whole. She was just this tiny little baby, her grinning cheeks barely visible beneath the brim, only the tips of her fingers peeking out as she held it up with both hands.

Then—with all the theatrics of a seasoned performer—she bent all the way back, her whole body arched beneath the hat, peering at him, flashing him a big, toothy grin.

And when she let out that breathy giggle—sharp, bright, real—Joel felt his chest squeeze. Too damn much.

“You havin’ fun under there?”

Maya nodded so hard the hat nearly flew off, and she had to grab at it, still giggling.

Then, out of habit, he glanced up—toward Leela.

No, she wasn’t really there. Her body was, sure—standing right beside him, arms crossed, eyes aimed at Maya. But she wasn’t watching. She was elsewhere, stuck somewhere in her own head, her fingers twitching like she wanted to grab at something—her pocket, that damn folded-up paper, something to keep herself busy.

Joel’s grip tightened on Maya.

He knew that look, the feeling. The way the body stayed standing but the mind wasn’t anywhere close.

His mouth opened, but before he could get anything out—

“I’ll go get a drink,” Leela muttered.

It wasn’t a suggestion. It was her way of saying—don’t follow me. So, he just let her go with a quiet nod.

But the second she disappeared into the crowd—he moved. His jaw was already tight as he reached for Ellie, snagging her by the arm and pulling her away from whatever dumb thing she was about to get into.

“The fuck... Joel?” she snapped, yanking at his grip.

Joel ignored her. Nodded toward the bar.

“Leela’s out of it,” he muttered, voice low. “Get her with your friends. Make her relax or somethin’.”

Ellie’s brows pulled together, her sharp little gaze flicking toward where Leela had gone. “What, so you’re just pawning her off? Your precious darlin'?”

Joel shot her a don't-test-me-look.

Ellie rolled her eyes. Dramatic as hell, now he knew exactly where Maya was getting it from. “Fine, whatever,” she muttered. “I got it.”

And with that, she disappeared after Leela, not without giving Maya's nose a little affectionate boop.

Joel stayed put, jaw still clenched, a hand on his hips, gaze locked on the door.

A small, warm hand patted his cheek for his attention.

“Da-da,” Maya mumbled. Her tiny fingers gripped his collar again, her cheeks still half-swallowed by his hat, her dark eyes big and certain.

And just like that, his body eased.

Joel sighed through his nose. “Yeah, baby girl. I'm here.”

Then, slowly, he leaned in and pressed a kiss to the top of her tummy.

“C’mon,” he murmured, shifting her higher against his chest. “Let’s get you somethin’ to drink, too. You want to share a beer?”

Maya had been swept away by the time Tommy had caught up to Joel with a bottle and a few guys, practically pried out of Joel’s arms before he could blink. Maria had her now, parading her like a carnival float, making a whole damn show out of her.

And why wouldn’t she? The smallest baby in dirt road Jackson. Hell, Maya was practically town property at this point.

Joel watched, a little amused, as Maria lifted her high, twirling her around like a prize before setting her on her shoulders. Maya squealed, fisting her tiny hands into Maria’s hair, kicking her little boots, having the goddamn time of her life.

“Miller baby’s gonna get spoiled rotten,” Tommy muttered beside him, arms crossed.

That name still rubbed at him wrong. “Already is,” Joel mumbled.

He hummed. “And she’s eatin’ this up, little peacock.”

Joel made a derisive noise in his throat. “Ain’t her fault everyone here treats her like the second comin’.”

Tommy chuckled, shaking his head. “Can’t blame ‘em. Cute as hell.”

Joel couldn't argue with that. Just watched Maya beam at the attention, watched Maria spin her like she was royalty, watched as people—grown adults—cooed and clapped like she was putting on a Broadway show.

Yeah. This kid had them all wrapped around her little finger.

Joel exhaled, rubbing his jaw, his fingers pressing into the rough scrape of stubble like it might ground him. Tommy stood beside him, his stance easy, but Joel knew his brother too well—there was a thought in the way he was standing.

And then—the nudge. So casual, it almost had him fooled.

“So, back to the point,” Tommy started, quieter now, like he didn’t want the words to carry. “Leela’s big breakthrough. Hypothesis or whatever. Shit, I knew she had it in her.”

Joel ran his tongue over his teeth, nodding, preferring to stay silent rather than give anything away.

Tommy sighed, bracing a hand on his hip, eyes lazily scanning the room before he went on. “Listen, man, there are—people. Some folks I knew way back. When I was with the Fireflies. Dunno if they're still around, but...”

Joel turned his head slowly, his jaw tightening like a steel trap.

Tommy met his gaze, serious now. “Way outside of LA.”

Joel didn’t say anything. Just waited.

“They’re still keepin’ the science goin’,” Tommy said, voice lower now. “Not a lot. Just—pockets of ‘em, doin’ what they can. Research and stuff. Pretty legit. The kinda thing she’d wanna hear.”

Joel’s fingers flexed against the worn leather of his belt.

He didn’t like where this was going. Or the thought of giving her something to hope for, just to rip it out of her hands when it all went to hell. He also didn’t like how much this conversation was starting to matter to him.

Tommy let out another sigh, rubbing at the back of his neck.

“But we keep off the radar,” he said firmly. “No radio, no messages, nothin’ that could get the wrong kinda attention. You know the rules.” He levelled Joel with a look, voice final. “So, I won’t tell her a thing.”

Joel swallowed, his throat tight, something hot and sour curdling in his gut.

It was the right call, but that didn’t mean he liked it. He despised knowing that there were still people out there who gave a shit about knowledge, about discovery, about the old world. Knowing that Leela might’ve had a place there, if things had been different.

He grunted. “Good.”

Tommy exhaled, long and slow, like he’d been holding his breath. “Maria and I were thinking.... it'd be nice if she helped out at the school.”

Joel sniffed a, “What?”

Tommy shrugged, shifting his weight. “Y’know. Teach the kids.”

Joel furrowed his brows, fully turning to face him now. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”

“I mean, she’s sittin’ on all that knowledge,” Tommy said. “And she’s stuck in that damn house all the time.” He lifted a brow. “Might do her some good. Get her mind off…” He waved vaguely, eyes flicking in the direction Leela had gone. “Everything.”

Joel just stared at him.

Tommy shrugged again. “Think about it.”

Joel did. It wasn't the worst idea. But he didn't know if she’d be up for it or even consider stepping into that kind of role. He was about to say as much when—

A burst of murmurs and hoots erupted from the centre of the bar, cutting through the low hum of music. Chairs scraped, people turned, and a few whistles pierced the air.

Both brothers looked toward the noise. Tommy raised a brow. Joel narrowed his eyes.

“What in the...”

And then he saw her.

Leela. Right there in the centre of it all. She was surrounded—by Ellie, Dina, Jesse, and a few others forming a loose, laughing circle around her, dancing along. Encouraging. Egging her on.

She wasn’t two-stepping. This wasn’t a country song anymore. The band had taken a break, and someone had thrown on an old record—something slow, sultry, snappy, the kind of tune that slinked through the air, curling into the bones, pushed you to move.

And she was feeling it.

Joel had never seen her dance like that. Way too much for his heart to handle. Not his Leela, who never strayed too far from the walls, slipping between shadows, never let her guard down, never let herself be seen.

When Soft Cell sang about having the burnin', yearnin' feeling inside on Where Did Our Love Go, he felt that deep. Right now—she was a goddamn sight. Pure, wicked temptation.

Body swaying, hips rolling in slow, leisurely motions. Hands tangled in her own hair, then sliding down her neck—down—over her chest, grazing her ribs, curling over the curve of her waist.

She had no idea what she looked like right now—how that loose dress clung to her body with every billow, shifting and stretching with every movement. How the dim, golden light caught on her skin, illuminating her like some sort of deity.

How nearly every person in this bar had stopped to watch her.

It pissed him off.

And yet—he couldn’t look away.

Joel’s fingers twitched at his sides. Didn’t know whether to stop her or—pull her close.

Drag her against him, press his hands to her waist, and let her roll those hips against him, sink his teeth into her skin, deep enough to leave his mark. Hold her still, just for a moment, just long enough to feel her body fit into his—see if she’d let him.

So soft, willing, entirely elsewhere. Like she wasn’t in Jackson anymore, wasn’t in this old, rough-edged bar, but in some smoky club, where the lights were low, sequins danced off clothes, and the air was sweaty and nobody cared about pasts or promises.

The way her skirts fluttered as she moved, clutched loosely in her fingers, lifting just enough to show the lean muscle of her legs. The way she smiled—full, unguarded, head tossed back, a laugh cruising out, teeth gleaming in the dim light, unrestrained, a sound so full of life it hurt.

He’d seen her smile before. But never like this—wild, free, daredevil. Ellie must’ve really gotten more than three hard drinks in her.

Joel swallowed hard, forcing his feet to stay planted where they were.

Because something about this—about her—about the way her body moved, the way she felt the rhythm like it was something sacred, the way she tilted her head, eyes fluttering shut for a moment like the music sunk under her skin—

Something about it made Joel feel like his skin didn’t quite fit around his bones. Like something was gnawing at him. Feeding into his insatiate hunger. He curled his hands into fists, shoving them into his pockets. Because the way he wanted to touch her right now? Not fucking appropriate.

Tommy doubled up with a hoot. “Oh, hell, man.” He clapped Joel on the shoulder. “That’s a whole different Leela right there!”

Joel exhaled slowly, forcing his jaw to loosen. He knew he should be worried. Should be thinking about why she was drinking that much, why she was like this all of a sudden. Relaxing was different. This was goddamn spinning in outer space.

But she wasn’t reckless. She wasn’t stumbling, wasn’t out of control. She was just—happy. And how the hell was he supposed to take that from her?

Joel shook his head, mouth twitching into something dangerously close to a grin. “Just let her be.”

Tommy shot him a look. “Yeah?”

Joel exhaled, watching as Leela did something almost like a body roll, slow and smooth, skirts flicking as she spun. He dragged a hand over his beard. “Never seen her smile like that.”

And God. He wanted her to keep smiling like that. He wanted to keep her like that. That lightness. That freedom. That untouchable, golden, weightless feeling. She’d been carrying that unspeakable shit in her chest since the day he met her. And now?

Now, she looked free. Like she was burning it all away. Let her, the world owed her that much.

She threw her hair forward, fingers raking through the strands before she whipped it back, shaking it out, arms in the air, eyes half-closed, a small, lazy grin curling at her lips—

Joel was staring. Unblinking. Jesus, just look at her. All of that belonged to him. He really did all right for himself, didn't he?

And he wasn’t the only one watching.

“Holy shit,” Tommy murmured, his amusement barely contained. Joel didn’t have to look at him to know that stupid grin was plastered all over his face. “You lucky old bastard.”

“Shameless jackass.” Joel smacked him upside the head, but hell—he wasn’t gonna argue.

Because Leela was out there, a careless grace, hips swaying, head tilted back just enough for the dim glow to catch on the slope of her throat. She wasn’t dancing with anyone, not really—just herself, the music, the air around her.

And then—she spotted him. Their eyes locked.

Joel watched, not backing down, cocking a brow, casually lifting the rim of his beer to his mouth. Go on, then.

Her lips curled slow, teasing, teeth catching on the edge of a grin as she raised her index finger, a silver ring glinting off it—beckoning him. A clear come-hither look if he'd ever seen one. Dance with me.

Joel exhaled sharply through his nose. She was being such a goddamn tease tonight.

Where the hell was this girl all along? He was halfway to forgetting himself, forgetting how his boot was planted firm against the bar wall, how he wasn’t the kind of man to drift into the thick of things, but hell if she wasn’t making it too damn tempting. His feet nearly moved on their own.

The little flirt brought the fingernail between her canines, watching him back through dark lashes, still swaying. Oh, she knew exactly what she was doing to him, drunk or not.

Then someone grabbed her.

It happened fast—a rough hand curled at her elbow, breaking that moment clean in two. Yanking her back, that playful grin dropped from her face as she stumbled back.

“You wanna fuckin' dance like that, you take it to the fuckin' streets where you belong,” the man sneered, his grip tight, stance aggressive.

Joel didn’t spare another thought, pushing past people, single-minded on one thing, one thing only. Fucking this guy up.

He was already moving, already cutting across the floor before Ellie’s sharp “Hey—!” had fully left her clenched teeth. Before Dina had raised her voice louder or Jesse had shoved his drink onto a nearby table.

Joel got there first.

His fist caught the guy’s collar, violent and hard, hauling him back so fast his boots scraped the floor. The man let out a startled grunt as Joel shoved him, sending him staggering.

“Get the fuck off me!” he barked, regaining his footing and immediately shoving back.

Big mistake—he might as well have tried pushing a brick wall. Joel barely moved a muscle.

That dark, familiar thing flared in his chest, searching for fuel, the way it always did before things got really bad for someone else. It thrived in moments like this. His jaw locked, teeth gritted.

Tommy got between them fast, hands up. “Alright, hey. Back off.”

The man’s lip curled, face twisted. “She’s makin’ a damn scene. Grown men tryna enjoy a drink, and she’s out here—” he waved a hand, scowling, “—doin’ that sleazy shit.”

“She was dancing, motherfucker,” Ellie snapped.

Dina stepped forward, unhesitant. “You got a problem with a girl having some fun?”

The bar crackled with tension.

Joel hadn’t looked away from the bastard. His chest rose slow, calculated, shoulders squared. He could already feel the heat of his pulse through every vein.

And the son of a bitch had the audacity to hold his gaze.

Joel was one word, one breath away from ripping his fucking teeth out of his head.

His fingers curled at his sides, hot with the need to do something, to wipe that smug look clean off the bastard’s face. It was an old, ugly feeling, one he knew too well—one that had kept him alive, carved into his bones like instinct.

“Don’t, Joel.” Tommy’s voice, quiet, firm. A name. “Maya.”

Joel’s breath hitched, like a hand gripping his collar, yanking him back before he could step over the edge.

He flicked his eyes past Tommy—past Maria—toward the far end of the bar. And there she was. His baby girl, small in Maria’s arms, being bounced in a steady rhythm. Distracted enough, but still watching. Big, dark eyes locked onto him, lips parted, fingers idly picking at her mouth like she did when something upset her.

Joel forced himself to breathe a calm breath in.

The man muttered something under his breath, took a step back.

Joel let him go. For now.

When he turned for Leela, she was stock-still, eyes fixed on the ground like she was trying to unsee what just happened. Her breath came shallow, uneven. Her fingers twitched at her sides, curling and uncurling, like they hadn’t quite gotten the message that the danger had passed.

Joel moved toward her without another thought, reaching for her. His hand found her face, a thumb grazing over her cheekbones. “Hey, we're done here.”

She blinked up at him. Swallowed. Lips parted like she meant to answer, but nothing came.

Joel didn’t wait, didn’t want to stand in this damn bar any longer with all these eyes on them and the sticky air pressing in. He guided her out—out of the noise, out of the murmurs, out into the cooler air beyond.

He barely heard the bar door swing shut behind them, noises within muffled by the night. His grip around Leela didn’t loosen until they reached the railings, and even then, he kept a steadying hand at her arm as she lowered herself to sit.

She sagged against the cool wood, breath coming uneven, gaze distant.

Joel inhaled deeply, trying to work the fire out of his blood. It only eased a fraction—just enough to let him think past the need to hit something. But something was still very, very wrong.

Dina, Jesse, and Ellie weren’t far behind. He barely registered them at first, too busy watching Leela.

Then it hit him.

This wasn’t just liquor. He’d seen it before, the unfocused sway, the way her pupils were just a little too blown, the sluggish, too-long blinks like her brain was catching up to reality in slow motion.

Joel had seen this before. Dealt with it before.

This stupid girl was high off her ass.

His breath came out sharp through his nose, and Jesse—fucking kid—must have caught onto his mood, because he held his hands out, cautious.

“Okay, Joel, before you lose your shit—”

Joel’s head snapped up, and the look he gave Jesse could’ve killed him right there. “The hell is wrong with you kids?”

Ellie threw up her hands. “You said to relax her! What else am I supposed to assume?”

Relax her. Joel almost laughed.

Because what kind of idiot was he, thinking they’d understand what he meant? He’d asked them to look out for her, to make sure she wasn’t overwhelmed—not drug her up and leave her swaying like a goddamn candle in the wind.

A headache started curling at the base of his skull.

The door opened again. “All okay out here?” Maria’s voice sliced through. She stepped outside, arms empty—Maya was with Tommy now. One long glance at Leela, and her expression sharpened. “Who got her high?”

Silence.

“I did.”

Dina, sounding less defensive and more resigned, shoulders dropping as she rubbed at the back of her neck. “Look, she was miserable, okay? I didn't want her to cry so... I just helped her out a bit.”

Joel pressed the heel of his palm against his eyes, fingers digging in. A few months ago, he might’ve laid into the poor kid. Might’ve let his anger tear out of him in something sharp and punishing, because what the hell were they thinking?

But right now—now, there was Leela.

And she was leaning into him, forehead coming to press against his stomach, fingers loosely gripping the fabric of his shirt. Seeking warmth, steadiness. Him.

His hand found the back of her head, fingers threading into her hair, stroking down in slow, absent motions. She was still warm, her breath soft against his stomach.

“Booooo-berries,” she slurred into him. It was the way Maya said it to them with that toothy smile, the one that never failed to get the two of them cracking up every morning.

Joel shook his head. “Christ.”

Maria sighed. “Take her home, Joel. I’ll take care of these three and send Tommy with Maya once you’ve got her sobered up.”

Joel didn't need to be told twice. He just nodded, tightening his hold on Leela, and braced himself for the slow, messy walk home.

Leela had surprisingly good depth perception for someone downright hopped up on drugs.

She’d asked him to dance with her to the music in her head five times, been refused all five times, attempted to spell some long-ass word while balancing on her tippiest toes, yelled that they'd lost Maya at least three times to which he'd assured her three times, and even showed off her ability to wiggle her ears like it was the greatest goddamn achievement in the world.

And well, Joel was having the time of his life.

Because everything about her at this moment was a person frozen in time, immature, stopped somewhere around nineteen, probably the same age her parents had passed. Like the weed had stripped everything else away, dulled out the grief, the hardship, the relentless millstone of responsibility.

Something she probably hadn’t let herself be in a long time. The Leela before Maya came along.

He sighed, steering her toward the house with firm hands at her waist, shuffling her through the door with the patience of a saint. She giggled at something—probably nothing—and the moment she was inside, she made a halfhearted attempt to kick off her pretty boots but ended up dropping onto the bottom step of the staircase with a huff, stretching out like a damn cat, arms over her head, smiling up at him like he’d just given her the world.

He shook his head, fighting the twitch in his lips. “Stay put, darlin’. Gonna get you some water.”

“Sure thing, darlin’,” she teased, stretching the words out, thick and syrupy. Her eyes glittered, mischief curling at the edge of her lips.

Jesus. Joel exhaled hard, rubbing a hand down his jaw as he turned toward the kitchen. He needed a second—just one—to get ahold of himself.

The faucet hummed as he filled a glass, and he let the sound drown out the heat still prickling under his skin. She’s just high. Just loose. That’s all. But damn if she wasn’t making it hard to remember that.

By the time he came back, she’d sprawled out even more, a lazy sprawl that had no right looking as ravishing as it did. Dark hair spilling like seaweed on the steps, one arm bent behind her head, the other resting just below her collarbone—fingers ghosting slow, absent patterns over the bare skin there.

His pulse ticked at his temple. He needed to look anywhere else.

He set the glass of water down, just beside her head, looming over her, leg stretched on a step, and patted her cheek. “Drink up, c'mon now.”

Leela blinked up at him, hazy and warm, and smiled like she was about to do something thoughtless. Oh, then she did.

Her hand lifted, fingers threading into the front of his hair, tugging through the strands before dragging down the rough line of his jaw. He exhaled sharply through his nose, caught between amusement and the low hum of shattering want.

“You're so hot,” she mumbled.

Pretty sure he'd blown a fuse. Now, it would be so easy to let himself sink into it, just let himself fall.

Instead, he huffed. “You’re so high.”

“I know,” she murmured, almost pleased with herself. Then, just as easily as she touched him, she let her hand drop. Then, like she’d been turning it over for a while, she said, “You know, Joel… if we got married, I’d be... Leela Miller.”

Joel froze, then—damn him—grinned his teeth off. He hadn’t ever married before, hadn’t even thought about it past the young, fleeting kind of love that got tangled up in dreams of a life he never really had. He was barely in college when he had Sarah, and after that, everything had been for her. Marriage, romance—it had been so far from his mind it might as well have been another country.

But hearing it now? So late in his life, in this broken, rebuilt world, and from a woman like Leela? It felt—strangely—like a promise. Her, standing there, hair tucked into a veil, teeth gleaming in a smile, a big white dress on a long aisle, walking towards him—it was what it was. A fantasy.

“Mrs. Miller,” he drawled, tasting the words. He shook his head. “No, actually—I like Dr. Miller more. First one in the family.”

Leela sighed like it was some faraway dream. “Dr. Leela, PhD.” She shook her head, biting down a smile. “Can you imagine that? I’d be published, be on planes, lecture students… maybe get tenure.”

He could imagine it, beyond question. Leela, all sharp intellect and sophistication, standing in front of a lecture hall full of wide-eyed students, knocking socks off with her brilliance. He saw her in crisp suits, red-bottoms clacking on marble floors, shaking hands with scholars, debating theories over glasses of wine, running circles around the best of them.

But then her expression shifted, something more distant creeping in. “But I think I’d rather take up my parents’ names. For legacy.”

Joel nodded. Made sense. If she wanted to honour where she came from, if she wanted that, who was he—

“Legacy,” she snorted, cutting through his thoughts. She carelessly patted at her skirt, fishing through her pockets, and pulled out a note—a small, crumpled scrap of paper, worn at the edges. She waved it absently in the air.

The numbers meant nothing to him, but he knew what they meant. The solution to one of the biggest unsolved mathematical problems out there. The kind of thing people used to kill themselves trying to solve. The kind of thing that would have her face and name splashed on headlines, maybe get her one of those Nobel Prizes. And she just held it like it was nothing.

“What’s the point anymore?” she muttered.

Then, before he could blink, she dunked it straight into the glass of water.

Joel lurched forward. “What in—” He snatched at the glass, pulling the soaked paper free. “The hell is wrong with you?”

“It doesn’t matter, Joel,” she dismissed him with a sigh. “There isn’t anyone out there who cares about this anymore. Just… let it go.”

Joel stared at her, then at the dripping remnants of her work. He pressed the ruined paper to his chest as if, somehow, he could will it back into existence, but it was too late. The ink had smudged, the numbers running into each other in unreadable streaks. The thin paper had started to break apart.

His jaw tightened. “You don’t get to decide that.”

Leela didn’t look at him. Her gaze was fixed somewhere beyond the walls of the house, out past Jackson, past whatever limits she had drawn for herself.

Joel exhaled hard through his nose, rubbing at his face. He looked around the small space of the stairwell, the dim light catching the curve of her cheek and the sharp slope of her nose. She looked tired—and not just in the way that meant she needed sleep.

He leaned back on his haunches, resting his arms on his knees, watching her like he was trying to figure out the right words.

“Y’know,” he started, “I used to think that too. That things didn’t matter. That people—ideas… that they could just disappear, and the world would keep going like nothin’ happened.”

Leela blinked at him, somewhat interested. “And?”

“And I was wrong.”

She scoffed, barely there. “What changed?”

Joel tilted his head, brooding. He wanted to say Sarah. But that wasn’t the definitive truth. Losing Sarah had been the reason he stopped believing in things, in himself, in the good of the world. But finding Ellie, loving Maya, falling for Leela, learning to give a shit about anything again—that was what made him realize he was wrong.

So instead, he just said, “I did.”

Leela studied him, still in a daze. Then, she dropped her gaze to the water-stained paper. “It’s not the same, Joel,” she murmured. “No one’s out there waiting for this anymore.”

He shook his head. “That ain’t the point.”

He gestured vaguely at the note, at the numbers that were little more than smudges now. “You put your time and life into this.” He glanced back at her. “You cared. Your people cared.”

She didn’t say anything. Just sat there, shoulders drawn in, staring at her own hands.

Joel sighed, rubbing at his jaw. “Listen, I ain't some goddamn philosopher. I don’t know shit about legacy or what’s supposed to last. Or have one. But I do know—things don’t stop matterin’ just ’cause you’re tired of carryin’ ‘em.”

Leela swallowed, but her throat bobbed like it was hard work.

Joel reached down, nudging the damp paper toward her. “You wanna throw it away? Fine. But don’t tell yourself it never meant nothin’ in the first place. You wisen the fuck up and find somethin' else. Another big idea.”

Leela stared at the ruined note. He could see the war going on in her head, the part of her that wanted to believe him, and the part that had already convinced herself it was all pointless.

And he wasn’t sure if it was because she was thinking about it, or because she was already too far gone.

That being said, Joel barely had time to react when it began. The very first notch on his epitaph.

Leela lifted onto her elbows, fingers curling into the collar of his shirt, pulling him down over her until her breath ghosted over his lips—warm, teasing, heady. He could smell the impulse, the weed, the sweetness of her skin, everything that made up this living ideal. And then, just like that, she closed the distance and kissed him.

Slow at first, careful. Like she was figuring it out as she went, learning the way their mouths fit together, the way he tasted, tongue searching for his. And then something shifted—her hands slid up, fisting at the leather over his shoulders, tugging at him, voicing a small, needy sound in the back of her throat that just about undid him.

Joel breathed out sharply, his restraint unravelling like a frayed rope snapping under too much tension. Wrecking him, ruining him, pushing him, making him lose his head.

“Joel,” she murmured a plea.

“Christ, Leela,” he hissed against her lips. “We—”

We what? Can't do this? Are not ready? Need to do this on your big-ass bed so I don't throw my back out? Need to talk this through, and set some boundaries? What was he, an idiot?

She was fucking with him. Just had to be.

But, the joke's on her because he was fucked to begin with.

His closed, shaking fists found her ass, opening only to press into the softness there, mapping the curves and grooves he’d spent too goddamn long depriving himself of.

And then she was pushing his jacket back, fingers clumsy but determined, impatient.

He could tell, she clearly didn’t know what she was doing—not entirely—but she was following instinct, and it was killing him. She had no idea what it did to him, the way she was just handing herself over like this. Like she wanted it just as badly.

So, he let her work it off him, let it fall with a soft thump, not caring where it landed, his own hands greedy now, focused and unstoppable—sliding up her ribs, the dip of her waist, down to the soft skin between her thighs. She was supple beneath his touch, melting into every press, every slow drag of his fingers, his own callouses catching into her skin.

Joel wasn’t sure if he was breathing. Didn’t care if he wasn't.

He had to rip himself off her to kneel back on a creaking step to find his pace, unbutton his cuffs one by one and roll back his sleeves to his elbows, like a dedicated man about to knuckle down and give everything.

Because this was how he should’ve had her—how he’d wanted her from the start. All fingers and touch. Desperate. Awed. Like she was something he’d been dying to claim.

“You okay?” he had to pant out, that one last instinct pushing him to ask, but he couldn't stop himself to one more deep kiss into her neck. “Jesus, I can't stop. Fuckin' want everything... you alright, sweetheart?”

No response, but he was met with a quiet, feeble nod when he looked at her. It was all he needed.

“S'okay, I've got you. I'll make it good, real good for you, baby,” he made his promise, feverish.

Now utterly too immersed in her, trailing his lips, beard scratching a little too hard into her skin—on the thin, useless straps of that dress, slipping off her shoulders like they had no right being there in the first place.

He dragged his mouth down, nudging slow, deep, open-mouthed kisses against the inside of her arm, the slope of her shoulder, and the sharp line of her collarbone. He let himself linger, let himself taste—the wet, sweet, hot summer in the flesh, tongue flicking against the hollow of her throat, feeling the way she swallowed.

Fucking dress. Driving him insane, the way it barely covered her, how easy it would be to pull it down, to strip her bare, and—shit, he had to get his head in the game.

He let out a breath, hot and heavy, dragging his lips down lower, between her chest, kissing the bony little space there, hands smoothing over her breasts, squeezing them into his palm, pressing each one with a lingering, rolling, attentive kiss, revelling in the softness there. His teeth grazed the soft flesh, just enough to make her gasp, to feel her fingers tighten where they clutched at his arms. He soothed the spot with his tongue, tasting the salt of her skin, his hands roaming lower, gripping, kneading, pulling her deeper into his mouth.

She arched into him even, like her body was learning how to react, and he groaned, half-mad with want, barely holding himself together. “Oh, baby…”

His fingers found the hem of her dress, gathering it up, slowly pushing it up over the curve of her stomach.

He was like a goddamn kid opening a present on Christmas day.

The muscle there—taut, toned, fucking sexy. Deep stretch marks from pregnancy settled into her skin like the rings of a tree, or his own uncharted map, leading him down, down, to the space between her legs. From there, it was all long limbs and those maddening cowgirl boots—boots he had big plans to enjoy. He clenched his jaw and pressed his mouth against the dip above her navel, lips parting, teeth scraping, biting down just enough to feel the resistance of her skin against his tongue.

Then—his senile little brain caught up all at once, like a heart attack. “Gotta be kiddin' me. Look at you.”

Black. A little faded, like they’d been through too many wash cycles. A tiny white bow stitched into the hem of those soft, ruffled panties. He had half a mind to ask if she liked them—if she’d mind him tearing them off with his teeth. If she wouldn’t, well… he sure as hell wouldn’t.

He nearly felt a spark against his fingertip as he slid his fingers over the bow, over the fabric, his mouth watering, his longest finger pressuring in, feeling her slit through the softness, so warm, a ready little ridge in her body waiting just for him.

Well, fuck, if that wasn't a slice of heaven, he didn't know what was.

His breath hitched, and for a second, a strange dread twisted in his gut—tight and sharp, a visceral reaction to seeing her like this, vulnerable and unharmed in ways that had nothing to do with her body and everything to do with the way she just laid there.

Because she wasn’t here. Not completely.

Her hands were on him, but barely. Just resting. No urgency, no fire, no need that matched his own. Her fingers curled into his shirt like she didn’t know what to do with them. Like she wasn’t even thinking about what they were doing, like she was just letting herself be taken.

Her eyes—half-lidded, unfocused, watching him but not seeing him. Allowing him, not needing him. He couldn't tell if that was the weed or just her instinct.

And suddenly, all that desperate, consuming heat turned ice-cold in his chest.

No.

Not like this. This wasn’t how he wanted her. This wasn’t how he wanted them. Not when she might not even fucking remember it in the morning.

Joel blew out a sigh, pressing his forehead against her stomach, forcing himself to breathe, to reel himself in, to fight the fucking starvation clawing at him from the inside. His fingers twitched against her ribs, aching to keep going, to give in, to be selfish for once in this goddamn relationship.

But he couldn’t. He knew his own strength, knew how easy it would be to press too hard, take too much. He’d spent too many years being careful. Watching himself. And right now, it wasn’t just himself he needed to be careful of.

And he was in this for the long run.

He leaned back, jaw clenched so tight it hurt, forced his hands to loosen, to let her go.

She glanced at him, sluggish, blinking like she didn’t understand why he’d stopped.

Joel brushed her hair out of her face, his thumb stroking gently over her temple, his touch mindful now, like she might break.

“Hey,” he murmured, rough, still thick with want. Forced himself to smile, small and lopsided, like none of this was pulling him apart at the seams.

“Where’d you go, darlin’? You with me?”

And he hated how desperate it sounded. Because he wanted her here right by him. Wanting this as much as he did. But if she wasn’t, if she wasn’t entirely here, then he wasn’t going to fucking take it.

She didn’t answer right away. Just looked at him, half-there, half-somewhere else, something unreadable flickering in her expression.

Then—slowly, consciously—her fingers lifted, skimming along the stubble of his jaw, then lower, slipping behind her own neck. “It's okay.”

His breath hitched as she undid the thin strap at the back of her neck, her dress loosening, slipping ever so slightly. The curve of her shoulder, more of that smooth, bronze skin—fuck.

Joel closed his fingers around her wrist before it could go further, her pulse jumping beneath his fingertips.

And for a moment, there was only the ragged pull of their breathing, his harsher than hers, his mind a coil of need and restraint, and something dangerously close to guilt.

Without a word, he turned her hand over, brushing his lips to the centre of her palm. The way a man might kiss a cross before prayer.

Leela’s fingers twitched, then curled slightly.

She swallowed, then hesitated. “Did I do something—don't you...” Her voice was quiet, too careful. “Don’t you want to, um...?”

Joel's throat constricted. The words shouldn’t have made him feel like this—shouldn’t have sent something sharp and aching curling deep in his chest. But they did. They scoured against him, somewhere he hadn’t realized was still bleeding.

He exhaled sharply, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes for a second, like he could rub out the frustration clawing through his chest. His jaw was tight, his pulse hammering—his whole body still wound too fucking tight from everything that almost happened, from everything he wanted to happen.

Then he dragged a hand down his face, shaking his head.

“Jesus, Leela.” His voice was low, rough-edged.

She just watched him, slow-blinking, her head tilting slightly—something indistinct crossing her expression. She looked… lost. Like she wasn’t sure how they got here.

Then, quieter now—“Don’t you want me, Joel?”

Joel inhaled. Exhaled. Fought it. Fought the goddamn instinct to pull her right back in, to let himself take, to let himself lose.

Instead, he pushed a hand through his hair, let out a sharp breath, and muttered, "More than you fucking know."

His voice came out hoarse, almost gutted. Because it was the truth.

He wanted her more than anything. More than he wanted to breathe, more than he could goddamn stand, more than he despised himself. He’d spent too many nights pretending not to, spent too many mornings waking up with her ghosted across his senses, still tangled in his bloodstream, in every part of him. He wanted her in ways he shouldn’t. In ways that scared the living shit out of him.

And she was right there. Warm, soft, half-lost in the haze of the weed, but still her. Still Leela. Still, the only thing he wanted.

But not like this.

He shifted back, forcing space between them—except her warmth was still there, still lingering, still wrapped around him like she hadn’t realized yet that he was trying to let go.

Leela blinked at him again. Slow. Fuzzy. Making sense of this. “Okay.”

She reached behind her, fumbling with the ties of her dress, shoulders shifting as she tried to fix them, needing to close the space between them with something more real.

But before she could—he beat her to it. His hands moved without thinking—secured the knot at her shoulder, fingers brushed against warm skin.

He sighed. “You are so beautiful. And smart. Make me so damn unworthy of you.”

And then—a pause. A moment he shouldn’t have let himself have.

Softly, he pressed his lips to the lune of her shoulderblade, just once. A slow breath against her skin. And then, finally, he pulled the fabric back over her legs, smoothing it into place.

Not because he didn’t want her. Because he refused to take her like this.

It was entirely too heartbreaking, the way she was looking at him now—lost and waiting, her fingers curling into nothing, like she wanted to hold onto something but wasn’t sure if she could.

Leela watched him, unmoving. Something flickering in her eyes, something deeper than the haze, something real trying to surface through the weed.

He cupped the side of her ribs, palm splayed over warm skin, then moved lower, pressing his hand firm against her lower stomach.

Leela inhaled sharply, lips parting slightly, something flickering behind her gaze. A breath hitched in her throat.

Joel swallowed hard, his jaw working as he stared at her, his thumb stroking once over the fabric of her dress, over the smooth skin beneath. Trying to make sure she felt it.

Right there. Right where he wanted to be.

“But the truth is, I love you,” he rasped. A promise. A warning. He didn't have to force it out anymore, it was written all over him.

“So, one day, when I'm real deep inside you, Leela, I am all you're gonna think about. Just me, loving all of you.”

Her lashes fluttered. And for the first time in the last few minutes, she really looked at him. Like she was coming back. Like his words had cut through the fog and pulled her back down to him.

Joel’s breathing was ragged now, his self-restraint stretched thin, nearly breaking—but he didn’t move. Didn’t close the last inch between them, didn’t let himself pull her under.

Instead, it was she who moved. Right toward him.

Slowly, carefully, she shuffled forward, and slid down onto the step beside him. The movement was hesitant, like she wasn’t sure if he’d let her. Quietly curled into his side, slipping her arm around his bicep, the warmth of her soaking into him, settling beneath his skin.

Joel let out a slow, shuddering breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. The muscles in his shoulders eased, just slightly, before he let himself lean into her, pressing his nose into her hair, breathing her in.

Her fingers found his, twisting together, small and warm and so fucking delicate.

Then she lifted his hand to her lips, pressing a soft kiss to his knuckles, barely there—but she ravaged him.

Then, quiet—hesitant—

“You're good for me,” she whispered.

Joel closed his eyes for a second.

It wasn’t a question. Wasn’t a plea. Just a simple, quiet thing, like she’d finally let herself believe it. And maybe that was what ravaged him the most.

Because he wasn’t good. Had never been. He was a man shaped by hard choices, by regret, by suffering, by all the things he’d done just to survive. He was pretty sure the gears in his heart were rusted, black sludge pumped through his veins, merely broken in ways that time hadn’t fixed.

But for her—with her, with Maya—he wanted to be. God, he wanted to be. Maybe he already was. Maybe she saw something in him that he never let himself hope for before he ever did.

His fingers curled tighter around hers, like he could hold onto this moment, keep it from slipping through the cracks. His thumb traced slow, absent circles against her skin, memorizing the feel of her, in the press of his calloused hand against hers.

“You're good f'me, too,” he muttered.

She just leaned in closer, her body soft against his. Yeah, Joel let himself believe it now.

He's good for her.

{ taglist 🫶: @darknight3904 , @guiltyasdave , @letsgobarbs , @helskemes , @jodiswiftle , @tinawantstobeadoll , @bergamote-catsandbooks , @cheekychaos28 , @randofantfic , @justagalwhowrites , @emerald-evans , @amyispxnk , @corazondebeskar-reads , @wildemaven , @tuquoquebrute , @elli3williams , @bluemusickid , @bumblepony , @legoemma , @chantelle-mh , @heartlessvirgo , @possiblyafangirl , @pedropascalsbbg , @oolongreads -> @kaseynsfws , @prose-before-hoes , @kateg88 , @laliceee , @escaping-reality8 , @mystickittytaco , @penvisions , @elliaze , @eviispunk , @lola-lola-lola , @peepawispunk , @sarahhxx03 , @julielightwood , @o-sacra-virgo-laudes-tibi , @arten1234 , @jhiddles03 , @everinlove , @nobodycanknoww , @ashleyfilm , @rainbowcosmicchaos , @i-howl-like-a-wolf-at-the-moon , @orcasoul , @nunya7394 , @noisynightmarepoetry , @picketniffler , @ameagrice , @mojaveghst , @dinomecanico , @guelyury , @staytrueblue , @queenb-42069 , @suzysface , @btskzfav , @ali-in-w0nderland , @ashhlsstuff , @devotedlypaleluminary , @sagexsenorita , @serenadingtigers , @yourgirlcin , @henrywintersgun , @jadagirl15 , @misshoneypaper , @lunnaisjustvibing , @enchantingchildkitten , @senhoritamayblog , @isla-finke-blog , @millercontracting , @tinawantstobeadoll , @funerals-with-cake , @txlady37 , @inasunlitroom , @clya4 , @callmebyyournick-name , @axshadows , @littlemissoblivious } - thank you!! awwwww we're like a little family <3

415 notes · View notes

lilyinmysoul · 27 days ago

Text

Incomprehensible

JacksonJoel x F!Reader

WC: 4k

Summary: Old man Joel is having trouble lasting a whole round on top.

Warnings: Smut, piv, sub joel, kinda angsty, comfort, Joel feels all sad and like he’s not good enough, Joel is 57 with back problems, handjob, vivid descriptions of bodily fluids, soft dom reader, reader calls Joel ‘old man’ once or twice, joel grips the headboard, (implied) age gap

Note: I’ve wanted to write subby Joel for a while, and I don’t think I went subby enough but I still love this fic. I took way too long writing it, so, no proofread. If there’s any mistakes, tell me. If you have any tips, tell me. Please reblog if you like, and if you want more fics like this, tell me, because I love my Jackson Joel and I have a kink for babying old men

As Joel trudged tiredly up the driveway, he watched the porch light flicker and dim, only to return to its original warm glow a moment later. The bulb was old and it would be difficult to find another; he didn’t want to think about it, he had a long enough list of things to do already.

As more people moved into Jackson, more babies were born, and more houses built, there was more work to be done around town and more responsibilities to be dealt with. Joel’s hair had greyed significantly in the past year, and still his patrols were getting longer. Even though his muscles felt extra sore after a long day of scavenging, he’d still have to get up the next morning and do it again.

Joel was fifty-seven two months ago, and as winter settled upon the town and rain puddles took a permanent residence on the sidewalks, he was becoming increasingly aware of it.

In recent weeks, light dustings of snow would fall from the sky, previews of the inches yet to come as the cold months approached. Joel’s heavy boots clomp against the cement path to your shared home, stepping in slush that crunches, half frozen, under his feet.

In his age, his fingers were especially sensitive to the cold, and it was likely that his brown leather gloves were the only thing protecting them from turning purple in the frosty air. Even so, he feels numb, and he rubs his covered hands against each other. Joel steps onto the porch, the only sound being his bulky shoes against the hollow wood of the deck. With a deep and breathy exhale and a glance up at the glowing window—you were awake—he fishes the house key from his pocket and slides it into the lock. It was a rewarding sound, one he looked forward to each day. It meant a night of rest, a warm plate of food, and the chance to see you.

He turns the cold brass knob and the door creaks open, emitting a squeal from its old and rusty hinges. The house was clean and tidy, but it had been built so long ago. No matter how clean the two of you kept it, the wood in the walls was weakening and the roof tiles continuing to wear under the rain. It reminded Joel of himself. He breathes in and closes the door, turning the lock as he takes in the smell, a fusion of both of your unique scents, traced with the aroma of old books and wood.

His boots are muddy, so he makes sure to rid them by the door. Under his feet, the floor creaks lightly and once you register the sound of movement downstairs, you practically prance down them.

You find him in the kitchen, still in his jacket and gloves as he leans on the counter with a glass of water. He takes a sip and places down the cup, its clink against the surface obscured by his deep, southern voice.

“Sweetheart,” he greets, the bags under his eyes deeper than usual, and his voice less steady. You could practically feel his exhaustion—now, and in weeks past. Regardless, your mouth turns up in a smile.

“Long day?” Your hand takes one of his, fingers working to peel the leather from his skin. “I made dinner. Chicken, the way you like.” You move on to his other hand before setting down the gloves and lacing your fingers with his freezing ones. You squeeze.

“Thank you, baby… s’just… freezin’ out there. Cold gives me a damn headache.” He presses a kiss to your forehead as your fingers find the brass zipper of his big brown jacket—the one he always wore and that you’d never tire of seeing him come home in. You pull down and free his strong arms as he stretches them above his head, sighing. You hear a pop from a joint of his, a hollow crack that rang out habitually each time Joel broke free from a spell of motionlessness. Soon, his jacket is forgotten and draped over a chair as you fetch a plate from the wooden cabinet.

The plates were china, their condition nearly mint and preserved for all these years. From the pot on the stove, you heap his plate with food. It was warm and steaming, and you found little as rewarding as watching him scarf down your cooking or drink down your tea after a long day of work. Perhaps it was your love language; a humble exchange for the drawers he’d fix and mend, or the shelves he’d put together when you needed more space for the trinkets he’d bring back for you, swiped from the shelf of an empty home he’d cleared.

You place the dish in front of him on the table, setting a fork next to it and a topped off glass of water. Across from him, you sit, having already aten. This felt optimal, allowing you to rest your chin in your hands and watch him, talk to him, hear about his day.

Joel nearly groans as he takes the first bite, his exhaustion even more evident. “Tastes like heaven, baby,” he mutters between bites.

“I made extra for you to bring on patrol tomorrow. Lunch, or something.”

He hums in acknowledgement, a quiet thanks as he enjoys his meal. A drink from his glass, then he breaks the silence, a hand palming at the back of his neck. “‘M so damn sore.”

You frown. It upsets you to see how much Joel is working, and saddens you further to witness how it affects him. More often than not, his back is sore, or his legs achy. As prideful as he was, it was clear that he needed a break. And although Joel warned you against bringing it up to Tommy, the idea was getting increasingly tempting. It’s becoming a priority of yours to get him off that damn schedule.

“I’m sorry,” you soothe and stand up, topping off his glass once again, before your hands come to rest on his shoulders as you stand behind his chair. Your fingers squeeze at the muscles there, taut and stressed as he inhales deeply and takes another bite. “I can massage it if you want.” A beat, before you speak again. “Maybe you should ask Tommy if someone else can pick up your shift.”

Joel says your name in a stern, yet exasperated tone that says, ‘drop it’. You wonder what exactly it is that stops him from asking for help.

“Okay,” you agree, forcing the topic out of your mind and out of your mouth, hands still working at his tense and knotted muscle. “I just worry about you. I just don’t want to see you hurting, I want you to feel good.”

“I’m just… gettin’ old, is all. Ain’t got nothin’ to do with work, I’m… I’m okay.” Joel grunts as your hands work, and you don’t believe him one bit—not even a little. Either way, you don’t argue. Instead, you lean down and kiss the top of his head, your lips pressing against his soft, graying hair.

“Alright,” you agree. He hums as he feels your lips.

“Plus,” he adds. “I can still keep up with you, I reckon.”

“Sure can, old man,” you squeeze one of his arms, a thick bicep only barely softened by age. You very strongly appreciated his strength—muscles formed through vigorous labor; initially, fixing roofs in the sun, and eventually, fighting infected with his bare hands. Granted, he is more comfortable now. His life is stable in Jackson, allowing his tummy to soften up a bit because he has food to eat and a bed to lounge in. Even so, he could still pick you up and carry you out in the snow, and when he would grunt a little deeper now with the effort, you reveled in the sound.

He takes a bite. “So long as you don’t get sick’a me.”

“Never.”

A deep chuckle from Joel, and his plate is clean. He looks up at you, and you take the opportunity to lean down and press a kiss to his cheek, hands finding the sides of his face as your lips move to envelop his. Your mouth moves tenderly over his as he emits a soft hum.

You pull your lips away softly, a string of saliva connecting your mouths before it breaks and your eyes rake over his face as it still rests in your hands.

“I feel better already,” he states.

“I’m sure,” you smile, gaze flicking down to the bulge in his pants, a tent beginning to form.

“Feels nice,” he says, referring to nothing in particular. It was all so pleasant—the way you made him dinner and fed him with such care, how you worked out the stiffness in his muscles and kissed away his trepidation—he never had enough of it. He was never entirely sure why you chose him—grumpy and hardened, old and weary—but you never let him spend too much time mulling it over. You loved him so entirely that it was nearly impossible to doubt, every past loss and failing managing to fade to nothing when he would meet your eyes.

Your hands drop from his face and you pick up his plate and empty glass, your feet carrying you the short distance to the kitchen sink. Over your shoulder, you see him watching you, on his eyes a look of admiration combined with a hint of lust. Joel’s absolute love for your nurturing nature was something that he would rarely voice, and that nobody else would ever guess. You wipe the plate clean and set it in the sink, rinsing your hands and wiping them dry.

By now, Joel has stood, meeting you again in the dim light of the dining room. You smile lazily at him, relieved that the day’s responsibilities were done and dealt with. To you, having Joel around in the evening after a long day is the best gift, and you find his occasional night patrols to be cruel and unusual punishments. When your arms wrap affectionately around his middle, his hand rests on the back of your head, fingers splaying over and entwining with your hair. He presses a kiss to your temple.

“You’re s’beautiful…” he murmurs into your skin, his words so honest and caring. He hums softly before tilting your head up and taking a kiss. Joel felt that it was the most reassuring thing and so wholly intimate. Your lips, he felt, belonged on his, slotting onto one another like pieces of a jigsaw. Your hand rubs up his back as one of his cups the back of your neck, guiding your head gently. He pulls your body lightly against his, the movement firm but not aggressive. He’s sleepy and sapped, but that doesn’t stop his hands from coasting greedily over your body. Your warm skin always soothes him—evidently, he is harder now, and you feel the pressure wedged against your lower stomach.

Your lips drift apart, still tangled in the other’s arms. It’s clear where Joel wants this to go, and you second the thought.

“You’re gorgeous…” he mutters another compliment, pushing aside a strand of hair from your face. “Just wanna have you forever. I could. Again and again…”

It isn’t clear if Joel entirely knows what he’s saying, but his musings sound promising either way. “You sure you have the stamina for that, old man?” You tease him into his shoulder, your close embrace both tempting and comforting.

“Yes, ma’am,” he states, paying no mind to his own lassitude and achy muscles. How could they even cross his mind? He had you in his arms, your body at his fingertips.

In a mediocre attempt at assuming Joel’s southern drawl, you ask, “Are you fixin’ to prove it to me?”

He chuckles, his voice low and thick. “If that’s what you want,” he feigns nonchalance—albeit, poorly. “I don’t sound like that.”

“Mhm…” By now, your mind is empty, save for one thing. Memories of Joel’s busy schedule have departed from your head, along with all of your external worries, and he is leading you upstairs.

When your back hits the mattress in the palely lit bedroom, you smile softly up at Joel, who is unhooking his belt, pulling it free from the loops. His gaze is roaming over you hungrily, and you can tell that his day has been particularly long by the wanting look in his eye.

You squirm out of your shorts and pull your top over your head as you lay against the cold covers. Dropping the discarded clothes on the floor by the bed, you catch Joel’s eyes as he pushes down his worn and worked jeans, faded dirt staining the heels. His boxers are dark and tented, his necessity for you abundantly clear. He’d like to crawl into your arms, but first, he has to give you what you want and assuage his own frustration. He lifts his shirt over his head, dropping it absentmindedly on the floor.

The bed dips slightly when the weight of Joel’s knees comes to rest on it. You peer up at him as he looks down at you, a dazed and loving smile on his face as his hands are set on your knees, pulling them apart and making room for his broad body between them.

Joel’s lips kiss along your jaw, nipping lightly at your neck. He props his body up with one elbow, the other hand coursing over your skin, trailing over the lace of your bra and down to the fabric of your soft panties. He mindlessly toys with the band, his mind focused on your neck, but quickly shifts his attention to the rest of your body.

Joel is particularly desperate tonight, his hands both restless and spent as they hook under and pull at your underwear. They come off fully, tossed aside on the bed. The air in the room is chilly, but Joel’s form radiates warmth, encasing you with it. You smile softly as his briefs are finally let down and a strong, veined hand wraps around his length. Joel pumps it a few times before teasing his tip along your entrance, and you inhale through your teeth.

You chuckle breathily at the focused look on his face as he nudges himself into you. You brace yourself for the stretch as your eyes watch where his cock hitches inside, before your gaze coasts up to the trail of hair that leads to his belly button, then at his strong chest, and ultimately his face. He slides in before you can look back down, and your eyes narrow as your mouth falls open slightly.

The look on your face was priceless—one Joel had seen many times—but priceless, nonetheless. His first few strokes are slow and relishing, but his impatience forces him to speed up. He has spent the day thinking about you, and will continue to do so long after he drifts to sleep; so, his energy has nowhere to go but into his movements, his hips tapping yours as the room fills with the soft click, click, click of your bodies touching, fluids exchanging.

Your husband’s mouth no longer has the power to contain his grunts of pleasure, soft noises escaping his throat with each movement. Your heavy breaths align with his like a melody, sounding synchronously into the dim bedroom, limbs tangled in blankets and damp skin.

Above you, Joel’s brow is slightly dampened with sweat, his body trying not to succumb to his enervation. Of course you couldn’t hear it, but you could only guess that his heart was beating a bit quicker than it usually did. His hands grip at your hips a little harder as his thrusts hasten, your velvety skin on his fingers consoling him.

Joel might be getting up there, but he was still big. He always would be, and a sound no short of a whine leaves your mouth as your hand rests over his on your hip—a comforting gesture to both him and yourself. The insides of your thighs are slippery, and they slicken Joel’s in turn when your bodies touch.

“Baby…” Joel grumbles, his voice low and nearly inaudible.

Your response is a feeble hum, an affectionate reassurance. “Hm…”

“I’m… shit, I…” his voice trails off. One hand of his is still tightly holding the bone of your hip, guiding and grinding it against his own as his cock disappears into you. His other wipes away the perspiration on his forehead before landing to tightly grip the wooden headboard, the structure bracing Joel’s weight as he drives into you.

“So good, Joel…” you mutter, your eyes drifting shut as he moves inside of you, tip kissing your cervix again and again. Repeatedly, your insides stretch and your pleasure mounts, your eyelids still closed in sheer bliss, stomach tingling from your approaching orgasm, along with your proximity to the man you love.

You swear you hear the wood crack with how hard he holds the head of the bed. His movements become more tense, deliberate. His breath huffs deeply, and at first you suspect that he might be getting close. He usually takes longer than this, but you cannot blame him—his day’s been hard, and he’s needed you. But soon enough, almost as abruptly as he had started, his movements cease. He doesn’t slow, or pull out to finish on your stomach—he stops. Your hips buck imperceptibly at the cessation.

“Sweetheart…” Joel mumbles defeatedly, his hips drawing out a few more slow and shallow strokes before coming to a complete halt. “I can’t. M’ too tired.”

You blink at his admission. You fish deep in your brain for something to say, a caring response, but before you do, he does all he can to hide his reddening face in the crook of your neck.

For a moment, he stays there. His head rests on your shoulder in silence before he breaks it. “I’m sorry… I’m sorry baby.” He mumbles something about a hard day and getting old. You can’t help but card your fingers through his hair, dark and streaked with silver like a tree turning red in autumn. Except, when his leaves fell, they would not be growing back. They would not rejuvenate themselves come spring, ready to dance again in the summer breeze. But you don’t think that winter needs to be hopeless or sad. There isn’t a bone of Joel’s that you don’t love, or a wrinkle you won’t worship. Every doubt—if there ever were any, at all—is waved away, lost to what you love the most about him; and so you giggle into his hair.

“Don’t laugh at me…” he murmurs, embarrassment still permeating his voice.

“I’m not laughing at you, baby. It’s okay,” your head pats lightly on the back of his head. “It’s okay. You’re working like hell.”

“I’m sorry,” he apologizes again. He’s a proud man, and letting you down feels like a firm blow to the chest.

“Don’t say sorry,” you smile sweetly as you tilt his head up towards yours. After laying a gentle kiss to his forehead, you add, “It’s alright, Handsome.”

He scoffs under his breath, but can’t stop a sheepish smile from spreading across his lips. He buries his head back into the crook of your neck. As soon as he does, you tilt his face back up again and speak.

“What, you don’t agree?”

He avoids your eyes, looking up off to the side. “I just… y’sure? You think I’m handsome? Y’don’t think… I ain’t enough for you?”

The question catches you off guard and you continue to gaze down at him, your thumb gliding over the side of his face. “Are you being serious?”

No answer on his end, just the same apprehensive look on his face as he refuses to meet your eye.

“Of course I do, Joel. You’re so handsome. Don’t be ridiculous.” You say before adding, “And I think you’re the best guy I could ever ask for, and it doesn’t matter if you’re a little tired sometimes.” You smile.

Joel only grunts when you shift your body until his back is on the pillows. You’re now sitting on his hips, his cock still buried in you—throbbing but forgotten. His hair is disheveled and he looks rather dazed, gazing up at you with a look of admiration and necessity.

Your hand finds its way to cup the side of his face, a position it often assumes; the spot feels like its home. You feel the prickle of his beard on your skin, and you lean down to press a kiss to his lips, wet and a bit chapped from the cold outside. Slowly, you begin to rock your hips, a gentle and slow movement that Joel reacts to, one of his hands coming to grip onto your hip and the other draping over his eyes out of both insecurity and overwhelment.

A heavy breath leaves his mouth as you pull his hand away from his face. He still isn’t quite able to look you in the eye, so you tilt his face toward you once again, your hips rolling in treacherous circles.

A hum leaves your mouth, the look on Joel’s face fueling the fire between your legs. As you move, you let your mouth drop open slightly, wanting to make your pleasure clear to him.

“Feels so good, Joel…” you murmur. “Keep looking at me,” you instruct. You weren’t sure exactly how to get his confidence back up or make him feel better. His head seemed to be in another place, one of penitence and embarrassment. “Y’never told me how nice it is to be on top. Might have to try it more often.” You feel him twitch inside of you. Your fingers continue to trace along his jaw.

Joel groans as your hips grind into his a bit faster, the view of you peering down at him heating up his stomach. “It’s… okay? You’re not disappointed?” He asks, more so to reassure himself.

You chuckle lightly under your breath, his still moving as you choke out, “Of course not…” You hear something close to a whimper leave Joel’s mouth, and you take one of his hands and hold it to your center, between your legs as his thumb begins rubbing your clit. “There you go…”

He is happy to help. Any way you can make him feel appreciated will make him groan under you.

“Oh, wow, Joel…” you continue, your noises growing more prolonged. By now, you could almost cum from his sounds alone, desperate and almost pitiful. His fuck-up hit him hard, and has left him yearning to either make it up to you or push it from his head. His thumb circles you in just the way you like, sending jolts through your body that further energize you, hips still rocking with care and want. A hand laced up into his hair, you murmur, “I’m gonna cum… you’re making me cum, Joel… shit.”

“I’m… me too,” you hear him choke out. He looks entirely out of it, his gaze shifting from your face down to where your flesh surrounds him. You smile, taking a few more rolls of your hips before slowing, pulling out of you his thick length, tip angry, red, and swollen from being still without release. You let your hand run up and down his cock, further smearing the liquids that coat it as you rub him, his mouth falling open slightly.

“Yeah… you’re so pretty, Joel. You’ll always be pretty. Handsome… sweet…” you list, mumbling off whatever kind words you could think off as you stroke his cock, rubbing it occasionally against your clit.

He hisses, pleasure mounting at your tenderness of your touch and the sweetness of your words. Each time your hand travels up his length, he gets closer, and he’s unable to stop himself from spilling over your hand. His thick ropes of cum leak from his weeping slit, a low grunt sounding from somewhere deep in his throat.

A smile spreads across your face, the dribble of white down your hand doing something to you—it always does. “There you go, baby,” you coddle, a kiss to his cheek. “As simple as that.”

Thanks for reading!! feel free to send me an ask

1K notes · View notes