#this is also partly based on Hal's backstory from Picnic | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

abovethesmokestacks · 5 years ago

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A Home For the Heart

Title: A Home For the Heart

Pairing: Hal Carter x reader

Rating: General audiences

For @the-ss-horniest-book-club Drunk Drabbles picture prompt special. My image prompt (seen here below) was sent in by @marvelgirl7, and it... got away from me. I still hope you like it!

He almost scares the living daylights out of her. The small train station is all but empty, and she’s pacing the platform, rubbing her arms to stave of the chill drawing in. September slowly bled away until suddenly she seemed to wake up in October. Leaves have already started falling from the trees and it will get colder. There was a plan, she was going to go places, there was going to be an adventure. Now she’s here, halfway to the middle of nowhere, no money for train fare, and yet she can��t make herself move away from the platform.

A cargo train pulls in, the brakes jarring and making her cringe. Maybe that’d be something. Train hopping like a drifter, going from place to place. Living the great American roadtrip on the rails, experience the world as she never would have before.

She’s lost in some romanticized dream of what it might be like when a gentle hand shakes her shoulder. The squeak she lets out might possibly be described as more of a shriek, but she claps a hand over her mouth, the dream lost in favour of a worst case scenario where she won’t ever leave town, let alone this platform.

“Sorry if I scared ya, miss.”

There is a man standing next to her, rugged and a little travel worn, with bright blue eyes regarding her under a long fringe that is just shy of being able to be swept behind his ears. There’s a rip in his shirt, a duffel slung over his shoulder that looks like it’s staying together by hope alone, scuffed boots on his feet.

“I tried calling out for ya, you look a little lost,” he offers, removing his hand and taking a step back. “I’m Hal Carter, miss.”

“I’m...” She fumbles for words. Does she offer her name? “I’m... lost.”

Hal smiles, shoves his hands into the pockets of his faded jeans, “Well, I know this place pretty well, so if you need directions, I can probably help.”

It prompts a story. Because directions, yes, she could use them, but they would all lead to places with things she can’t afford because her last bit of cash was stolen, and food and shelter generally require funds. Hal nods, and though her cheeks heat with the shame of having to admit she has no money, no plan, no idea what to do, he doesn’t berate her, doesn’t dismiss her.

“C’mon,” he says, motioning with his hand for her to follow.

He is a stranger. He could be dangerous. But there is an ease to his expression, a flash of something like kinship in his eyes. She can at least walk a bit with him. Walking will keep her warm. She’ll need it.

“It’s tough being out on the road alone,” he tells her as they leave the station behind. “Been doing it myself most of the past season. Hopped on a train, rode until I got somewhere, worked for anyone who needed a hand, moved on when I wanted. Frightens me every damn time to get off that train.”

They exchange stories. A carnival down in New Orleans. Farms dotted all over the Midwest. The forests of the Olympic Peninsula. Trains and car rides and travels that have neither a beginning nor an ending. She doesn’t even notice they’ve strayed from the road leading into town, instead walking along a smaller dirt road. She’s about to ask where they’re headed, fear simmering in the pit of her stomach when she looks ahead where the road bends into a gentle downhill curve. It opens up to a landscape she could only have dreamt about. A worn wooden rail lines the road with string lights wrapped around them, pumpkins and lit lanterns dotting the way down to a red farmhouse nestled in a little clearing before a sprawling forest that burns with red and yellows and browns.

“W-Who lives here? Is it another job for you?” she asks, mouth agape as she takes in the sight, the warmth radiating from the picturesque setting.

Hal only smiles, keeps trudging down the road. She can do nothing but follow, looking up only when she hears a door open and spots a woman stepping out onto the porch, arms crossed over her chest.

“And what time do you call this?” the woman calls out to Hal, mirth and playful irritation mixing in the lilt of her accent.

“What can I say, trains don’t always run on time. Told you I’d be home on the 11th, though, didn’t I?” Hal replies, hurrying up to the woman and pressing a kiss to her cheek.

With a “hmph”, the woman turns her gaze from Hal. “And who do we have here?”

She wants to shrink away from the attention, but Hal come back down to join her, wraps an arm around her, “Ma, this is our guest. She’ll be staying for a bit til she can get back on her feet.”

Ma? She tries hard not to let her eyes bulge. Ma doesn’t seem to even bat an eyelash, only tells them both to get on inside and out of the cold. It’s a bit of a blur from there on out; she’s shown to a room, offered some warmer clothes and a chance to wash off the dirt of the road, and when Hal knocks on her door to suggest something warm to drink, she already feels like she’s been here for weeks.

“You live here?” she asks later. They’re back on the porch, each wrapped in a blanket with a mug of hot apple cider cupped between their hands. “She’s your... She’s-”

“Oh, no, she’s not my ma. Not my real one. I’ve known her since I was a kid, my own mother wasn’t- I just kept calling her Ma so often that it stuck,” Hal explains, looking down at his mug. “She takes care of the place while I’m away. ‘S been hard keeping this place going, but I couldn’t bear getting rid of it. So for the summers, I roam around. I see the country, work like a dog, while Ma takes care of the place. Sharp as a tack that one. She keeps hoping one day I’ll stop. Says it’s no good for the soul to be as uprooted as mine. Keep telling her I gotta find something to make me stay first.”

She looks around, from the illuminated path to the barns and golden fields that lie like muted gold in the fading light. “I don’t think I could ever leave,” she confesses, taking another sip of the cider, eyes fluttering close at combination of rich spices and tangy apples.

“You’re free to stay as long as you’d like, ‘s long as you don’t mind lending a hand.”

“Of course.”

She thinks maybe it’ll be a few days. A few weeks. Maybe a month or two, tops. But like September vanished seemingly unnoticed, so does time. She helps out during the days, sometimes with Ma, sometimes with Hal. Some days, she wanders around, goes into town, but never once does she feel the call of the trains passing through. There are dinners and lunches and stolen glances and lingering touches. There are pumpking pies and first snow and a warm hand in hers around a table laden with food. There’s Hal and talks on the porch and snowball fights that end in both of them soaked to the bone and Ma shaking her head like they’re teenagers and whispering things to him that make him blush. There’s a new year, coldsnaps and a sprained ankle, and one February night there is a kiss so brief that if it weren’t for her tingling lips, she thinks she might have dreamt it.

Everything melts. The snow. Her heart. The seasons are turning, and she wakes one night feeling like the last flash of winter is holding her heart in an icy grip, filling it with a dread that has her knocking on Hal’s bedroom door in the middle of the night. When he opens, he barely gets a word out before her arms are slung around his neck, face pressing against the warmth of his chest.

“What’s the matter?”

I gotta find something to make me stay first.

“Please, stay. I don’t want to leave, I don’t want you to leave. Please, I can’t, I don’t want to go back.”

“Sweetheart...”

“Hell, I don’t have anything to go back to at this point, I don’t know what to do,” she rambles on, clinging to him as if he might at any moment dismiss her and push her away.

Her heart nearly breaks when he steps away from her, holds her steady so he can look at her. It’s going to happen. No more days working. No more dinners. No more nagging him with Ma. No more talks on the porch. No more kisses.

“Sweetheart, look at me... It’s okay, you’re okay, please, lemme look at you.” Even in the dark, she can tell the exact shade of blue in his eyes. “I’m gonna be honest with you, okay? I had almost forgot that I usually leave in the next two months. In... God, in four months, I haven’t thought about it once. You know what I have thought about? You. You and how I want to show you everything. I barely even know how this place works in the summer months, and Ma will chew me out for every bit I don’t know, but god, I want to be here with you. I want us to be here.”

“You said you always left,” she says, voice small and nearly muffled against his skin.

“Because this never felt like a proper home. Ma’s here, and I love her, but there’s... a lot of memories attached to this place. And sooner or later they begin to eat at me. So I leave. I leave so I can come back and live in this house without a shadow constantly weighing on me. But darling, you’ve... I don’t remember this house ever being this happy. From the day you came home with me from the train station, you made me feel at home. And I was fearful you’d leave eventually. ‘S not a glamorous life after all, and I’d’ve understood if it wasn’t for you. I still do. But as long as you want to stay, I’ll stay with you. And if ever you want to leave, I want you to know, I ain’t gonna keep you from the road. But this house...” He cups your face, smiling like he’s about to fall to pieces before you. “This house is a home because of you.”

“You... won’t leave?” It’s the only thing she can think of, the only thing she can focus on, hope bubbling like sparkling wine inside her.

Hal smiles, closes the distance to kiss her soft and sweet, lifting her up and swaying them around. “How could I leave when there’s a home for my heart now?”

#HBC Drunk Drabbles #Hal Carter x reader #Picnic fanfiction #hell ye I'm drunk #DRUNK ON FLUFF AND LOVE FOR MY BOY HAL #this is also partly based on Hal's backstory from Picnic #which if you haven't read up about it #will 100% make you want to hug the poor guy

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