— Chapter summary: The rain doesn't stops and the trip extends another day as you and Joel sift through your memories. But a disagreement about what your future might hold leads you to a fight that pushes him to a dangerous precipice and, later, to many more. wc: 10.5k
A/N: I swear, writing about these two stresses me out a little hehe. Thanks for reading <3 (TAG LIST OPEN)
Day four. At home. Late morning.
He was dreaming of you.
He didn't know what, exactly, or why, only that you were there. It couldn't have been anything bad, nothing strange, because when his eyes flew open and the sun hit his face, there was no panic, no dread.
He was alone in the room. Your sleeping bag beside him was empty, and the sun seemed already high in the sky while the rain kept up its steady tattoo on the roof. It hadn't stopped all night. But judging by the light pouring in, it was probably closer to ten or eleven in the morning.
He dragged himself out of bed, his eyelids heavy, and stumbled to the bathroom. His reflection in the mirror made him frown. The swelling was gone, but now he was left with bruises and cuts that were already healing. Quick healing had always been his superpower; from scraped knees as a kid to now, when he needed to recover as fast as possible for the sake of survival.
Under the sink was a bucket of water with a plastic cup inside. You must have left it.
Joel didn't question it, just washed his face and walked out of the bathroom a few minutes later.
Downstairs, he found you on the sofa in the living room. The coffee table in front of you was covered in books, notebooks, and two wooden boxes with papers on top. You were focused on a notebook and took a moment to look up, but when you did, you smiled instantly.
The gesture was bright, even with your eyes still puffy from crying.
“How did you sleep?” you asked, straightening up and shifting a little to the side, clearly offering him a seat.
“Better than yesterday.”
Joel hesitated but eventually settled beside you, wincing as a sharp pain hit the wound on his back. Instinctively, he pressed his palm to the area closest to the ache but didn't say anything.
Not that he had to; you were already looking at him with concern, head cocked, clearly bracing yourself to speak.
“I’m fine,” he cut in, stopping whatever question you were about to ask.
“You were rambling in your sleep. More than usual.”
“I was, huh?” He met your eyes.
You nodded, glancing back at the notebook in your hands before flipping the page.
“Maybe I should check that out for you,” you said. “Make sure nothing funny is going on.”
“Ain't nothing going on, I'm sure of it. It’s just a wound. It's normal for it to hurt.”
“I know,” you sighed, closing the notebook. “Just to be sure, though.”
Joel held your gaze for a couple of seconds, then sighed, moving back a little and lifting his arm as an invitation for you to come closer.
Your hands were gentle as you raised his shirt and pressed lightly against the skin of his back. He felt a faint ache when your fingertips sank around the wound, and he heard you murmur something low before you pulled the fabric back down.
“All good, sir. Oh, I left water in the bathroom,” you said, your hand sliding down his arm almost unconsciously. It was like you didn't even notice you were doing it, but his eyes followed the movement. “I put some clean buckets outside and the rain filled them up.”
“Smart girl.”
You smiled, shy. “I'll go get them now, I was thinking I can—Where are you going?”
With another grunt, Joel stood up and walked toward his jacket, which was hanging on a wall rack near the hallway.
When he took hold of the fabric, he turned back around to see you with your arms crossed and a frown creasing your forehead.
“Gonna get the water. Are River and Ares—”
“I already gave them food and water.”
“Good. Well. Be right back, then.” He turned, walking the short distance to the front door.
“Joel,” you laughed behind him.
He turned back, raising his eyebrows in question.
To your right, the take-along pile: books you figured you might not ever cross paths with again, so they were necessary luggage; notebooks jammed with sketches (yours, Sophie's) and a handful of dates and crucial scribbles; a few movies that were useless here but, hallelujah, might actually play in Jackson where the electricity gods smiled; decorations that somehow held weight (Sophie's ceramic kitten, the wooden tulips that stood by the window, and a set of nesting dolls you'd found with Frances and joked represented the two of you), a couple of rings with tiny rose quartz and amethyst stones, and, most important, photos. The few pictures you had left of your whole life and the ones you loved.
“They’re in the backyard. Go out the back way.”
To your left, the pile of dead weight: books ruined by time and nearly illegible or missing entire pages, notebooks filled with useless things, and a few other things that simply didn’t make the cut.
It was all laid out before you, spread across the coffee table.
You had woken up early, well before Joel. And you figured it was the best time to open Sophie’s room and face everything that came with it. So you braced yourself and turned the lock, and when you opened the door, you were greeted by her room frozen in time. Only dust veiled the memories, just like the rest of the house.
Sunlight poured in, warm, comforting and golden. And, strangely, you didn't feel sadness, no... it was something else. Longing, maybe. But happiness, too, because you were finally here, and if you were being honest, Sophie’s final moments in this room hadn’t been particularly happy, so...
You had plenty of good memories in the kitchen, the living room, and your own bedroom. But Sophie’s room represented her final rest. Those nights she spent nearly unconscious in bed, with you beside her, while the seconds slipped through your fingers like sand.
You didn't want to look around much, either. After Sophie died, you'd tucked everything away beneath a loose floorboard and left it there, almost as if you knew you’d eventually flee the house. So you went straight for it, lifting the section of flooring and pulling everything out, hoping it was still intact.
And most of it was. The photos and drawings were, which was the most important thing of all.
But now, sitting on the sofa, you still hadn't looked at the photos. You weren't being brave enough yet, and they sat face down beside the stack of books.
Then the sound of the door and Joel's grunt startled you. Against every instinct his body must have been screaming for, he’d gone out for the water buckets; an attempt, you suspected, to do something rather than stay put. He probably hadn't appreciated you checking his wound, or something along those lines.
Joel reminded you of those tough, stubborn street dogs who, when hurt, didn't seek help but went off alone to lick their wounds. And you knew it was true, because he’d spent the whole night muttering things and hid every flicker of pain behind a perpetual scowl that had rooted itself on his face like the default setting.
“This damn rain don't seem like it’ll ever quit,” he griped, raspy voice as you heard him wiping his boots on the rug by the door. His footsteps followed, and he walked into the living room, running a hand through his damp hair and starting to peel off his jacket. “It's comin’ down in sheets. Everything’s mud. We ain’t goin’ nowhere until it stops.”
“I figured,” you said, crossing your legs. “I’m sorry about that.”
“Nah, no need to apologize.” He tossed his jacket onto the armchair beside him. He looked at you. “Ain't like you can just make it stop, now, can you?”
You smiled. “No, I can’t.”
Joel nodded, a soft smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. He stood there for a second, then finally walked over and settled back down on the sofa, right where he'd been a few minutes ago.
His hair was damp, and the collar of his shirt was faintly marked with a few drops. Your eyes traced the path, across his neck, and up to his jaw, mouth, nose, and finally, his eyes.
Joel had incredibly warm eyes. You were certain he didn't realize it. They were deep, dark, and expressive... very, very expressive.
Objectively speaking, he was seriously handsome. He radiated competence entirely, or at least that’s what he did to you. Because you felt safe with him, right from the first moment he’d saved your life.
Maybe that's why you had felt so comfortable with him in the office, even when he was being an ass. And there was something about his face, his eyes, every gesture he made, that was just... sweet to look at.
Last night, when you were crying into his shoulder and he was staring straight ahead in the candlelight, his eyes had looked particularly warm. Familiar. Safe. And it was a little embarrassing to admit that for a split second, in the middle of that emotional gut-punch, you’d wanted to kiss him.
Yeah, it was embarrassing. And you had no idea why this was blooming inside you for him. It was ridiculous and inconvenient. But you also knew you didn't get to choose these things and, at best, all you could do was acknowledge it and clamp down on it.
It's just that... last night made a sort of sense; you were a mess, and he was being comforting. And no matter how tough he acted, that meant something to you.
“Wanna see Sophie?” you asked, the question coming out in a soft rush. You hadn't even thought about it; it was just out. You still hadn’t looked at the pictures yourself, and maybe seeing them with him would feel better.
He seemed a little taken aback, which you caught in the slight lift of his eyebrows. “Sure, of course.”
You nodded and reached for the stack of photos. There weren’t many, and when you flipped them over, the first one wasn't of Sophie but of you and Frances. A polaroid.
Frances had found the camera while you were scouting an abandoned mall, and she’d spent the next week hunting down any kind of film and working batteries. She wanted memories, she’d said, and she took as many photos as she could during moments she declared "really important."
“This is Frances,” you said, handing the polaroid to Joel. “And, well, me. We were… eighteen or nineteen.”
You watched him study the photo, then your eyes drifted to the image. In it, you and Frances were posing, heads pressed together with wide smiles. She had a fresh gash on her cheek from an encounter a few days earlier with a clicker.
“She’s Sophie’s mom,” you commented, passing him another photo. “And this is her dad, Gabriel. Robert is beside him.”
Joel took the other picture, placing it on top of the first one, and studied it in silence.
“Robert was married to Pia. They were both amazing,” you said, smiling. “They looked out for us, a whole lot.”
You looked through the photos in your hands, searching for one of Sophie.
When you found it, you went still.
You were holding the camera, pointing it down from above your head. Sophie was small, maybe eight or nine years old. She was hugging your waist, her face tilted up with the biggest, brightest smile in the world. She had her light brown hair in two braids, just like Frances.
You ran your thumb over her face. “This is Sophie. Look.”
Joel leaned closer to you, his eyes dropping to the image in your hand. He looked in silence for a few seconds, and you desperately wanted to know what he was thinking. Just because.
“She looks a lot like Frances,” he finally said. “But that smile, that there looks like her dad.”
You smiled back. “That’s right.”
“You wearin’ a Mario Bros shirt?” he grinned.
“Yeah, I found it in a trashed comic book store.”
“They took every damn thing but the Mario Bros shirt, huh?”
You laughed. “What’s wrong with my Mario Bros shirt?”
“Nothin’,” he chuckled, shrugging. “I like it.”
“Huh.”
You looked at the photograph a little longer, feeling the sting behind your eyes and nose. But you didn't want to cry anymore. You'd been crying so much, too much, and your head was already pounding from it. So you gently set the photos back on the coffee table, even though there were still a few you hadn't looked at.
“Sophie was a beautiful little girl, looked happy,” Joel said, and you recognized the carefulness in his voice. His eyes suddenly looked a little heavier. “I’m sure Frances and Gabriel would be grateful to you.”
You looked at him. “Thank you, Joel. I mean it.”
“Ain’t nothing to thank me for.” He glanced down at the photo still in his hands, the one of you and Frances. “Your hair was shorter here.”
“It was.”
“Looks good on you.”
You smiled. “Thanks.”
He let out a breath, then looked at you. “Not that longer hair looks bad or anything, what I meant was... I mean, short hair looks nice on you.”
“I know,” you laughed, feeling your cheeks warm. “You think I should cut it?”
“Huh? No, no, not at all.” He shook his head. “It suits you fine now, too. Unless you want to... well, unless you want to cut your hair.”
Oh. What a sight. It was entertaining, almost endearing, to watch this hulking man trip over his own words like a nervous boy.
You smiled. “No, I don’t think I’ll cut it.”
Joel pursed his lips and nodded. He put the photos down on the coffee table and let out a breath.
“I think you should take the paintings in the kitchen, too, or the ones in the dining room,” he said. “I can strap ‘em on for you if you like.”
“You think so?”
“Course. You can put ‘em up in your kitchen in Jackson. Be a nice way to take a piece of home with you.”
You looked at him again, not bothering to hide the intensity of your gaze. “Well, okay. Now I wish I could take the whole house with me too, huh.”
Joel looked back in silence, the quiet knowing in his eyes telling you he understood. He pressed his lips together and nodded slowly, reaching out to pick up one of the books from the discard pile.
“This place ain’t that far from the West Yellowstone community, you know,” you said, tilting your head. “It’s not as big as Jackson or as self-sufficient, but I know a couple of people there.”
“Is that right?”
You nodded. “Well, I haven't seen any of them in a long time. Don’t know if they’re dead or alive, or if they even remember me right.”
Joel chuckled softly.
“But that’s how Sophie and I kept stocked. After our first month here, once or twice a week, two guys from there would come and bring us things.”
“What’d you give 'em in return?”
“Nothing. They were friends of Robert’s. They knew who Frances and I were, which meant they knew whose daughter Sophie was, and that she was sick.”
“Just a good deed, then, was it?”
“Something like that,” you smiled. “There are still good people in this world, thankfully.”
Joel didn't say anything, just nodded and put the ripped book back on the pile. He settled back, leaning against the sofa and stretching out one of his legs. His head tipped back, his eyes fixed on the ceiling, while a relaxed sound slipped from his throat. Your eyes unconsciously traced the length of his body.
You could talk to him about it. Right now. About this idea of yours. You had thought about it a couple of times on the way here, coming home, but it had felt sort of crazy.
Now, though, sitting right here, the size of the idea didn't feel so terrible.
No, not at all. It was even feasible. Possible. Even on your own.
“Joel?”
He turned his head, hummed a reply.
“You know, I was thinking, I know this area and the surroundings pretty well, and, well, West Yellowstone isn't far, and maybe…” you ran a hand over your thigh, mapping it out “… I could stay here.”
Joel didn't move, just looked at you in silence, and slowly, his eyebrows began to knit together. Still, he said nothing.
“It’s not far, it's just a couple of hours away.”
You waited a second, but he remained still.
“And, you know, I've been thinking that if I stayed here, it wouldn't be so crazy if actually—”
“No,” he cut in, now sitting straight, his voice suddenly heavy and firm. Any trace of the previous softness vanished completely.
Your mouth opened, then snapped shut. “Um Joel—”
“No, that ain’t happenin’.”
“I wasn't... I'm not asking your permission, Joel, and besides, I,” you hissed out a breath, stress immediately coiling in your chest. “I was just considering the idea of—”
“The idea of what? Stayin’ out here by yourself in the middle of nowhere?” He gestured sharply with his hand, the anger in his voice now more than evident.
You shook your head. “This place is quiet, nothing happens out here. And West—”
“West Yellowstone, you said it yourself. They ain’t well stocked. You don't know if your friends are alive or dead.”
You frowned, shaking your head. “The community, they were growing pretty fast—”
“I doubt it.”
“Joel, what is wrong with you? I’m just telling you something I've been thinking about, and you’re...” you waved a hand, pointing at him.
And you're getting worked up over nothing. That's what you wanted to say.
He sighed, shaking his head, shoulders tight. “I brought you all the way out here from Jackson, a three day trip, we almost got killed, and now you’re tellin’ me you’ve been thinkin’ about stayin’?”
“No, I said I’ve just thought about it. Just that.”
He grimaced in rejection.
“And you’re rattling off all the reasons you could pull it off. Yeah, Yellowstone is close, but you’d be all by your lonesome in the goddamn middle of nowhere,” he waved a hand dismissively. “And what makes you so sure you'd be safe?”
The tone of his voice, the way he said it; here came the two things that made you lose your patience with him.
“You know good and well I’d be safe.”
“No, I don't, do you?” He smiled cynically. “You saw those guys at the camp, you saw how they came at us. Yeah, you handled yourself well enough, but there were two of us, and I was a distraction for one of ‘em. What makes you think a group like that couldn't show up out here? And what do you think they’d do with you if they find you all alone?”
You sighed, crossing your arms as if that might stop something reckless from slipping out. You turned your head away, refusing to meet Joel’s eyes; because if you did, you might actually say it.
He stood up with a grunt that, honestly, made you feel ridiculous for even trying to hold your ground.
When you finally looked at him, he was by the fireplace, one hand braced against the mantel, jaw tight. His mouth was pressed into a line, and his nostrils flared the way they always did when his patience started to crack.
“I know…” he started, lifting a hand, then stopping mid-thought. He exhaled, thinking. “I know this ain’t easy for you. Comin’ back here, seein’ the photos, her things. But this… this ain’t your home anymore.”
Your brows softened, but inside everything pulled tight.
“I get why stayin’ feels like holdin’ onto her somehow,” he went on, voice lower now, “but she’s not here anymore.”
You took a few seconds to digest those words.
No, to digest the audacity with which he had said those last words. So casually, so carelessly. And you also noticed the look on his face when he saw the change in yours.
“She is here, Joel.” You pushed to your feet, taking a step toward him, though the coffee table still divided you. “She’s right out back, in the same spot where I buried her almost two years ago.”
He shook his head, steady but firm. “Her body’s there, not her. And the sooner you can see that for what it is, the sooner you’ll start breathin’ again.”
A laugh slipped out of you, sharp and breathless and chased by disbelief. You shook your head like his words physically stung and you needed to shake them off before they burned through.
“How the hell can you say something like that?” you demanded, stepping closer to him. “Every damn time I think we’re getting somewhere you have to go and ruin it by being an asshole. And you know what?” you spat, voice cutting sharper now, angrier, “staying here was just an idea before, but after hearing that, it’s the only thing I want.”
Joel shook his head. “I’m just bein’ honest.”
“Oh, I know. I’m familiar with your honesty.”
He was silent for a moment, pursed his lips and looked to the side. The bruises on his face were still strong marks on his skin, although they were now softened by time.
“So you just used me then,” he said, his voice rougher now. “Used me to get here, and what, tell me you’re stayin’? That was the plan all along?”
“I didn’t use you, don’t you dare throw that at me.” You pointed at him, hand trembling with anger. “I didn’t even want you to come! I only agreed because you threatened to rat me out to Tommy—”
“You’ve been packin’ things up to haul back to Jackson, right, sure,” he said, nodding toward the pile on the coffee table. “You must think I’m damn stupid.”
You shut your eyes, frustration burning behind them. “I was just thinking, Joel! Just wondering what it’d be like to stay here. if I wanted to, if I did. I could, you know. This is my house, whether or not you think it counts as a home.”
“You’re not thinkin’ straight, you need to be rational,” he said, voice rising, teeth clenched, the color high in his cheeks. “You gotta move past this, this grief, for your own sake.”
“What the hell do you know about being rational?”
“I know goin’ back to Jackson is rational. I know not stayin’ here alone is—”
“Oh yeah? And what the fuck do you know about getting over grief?”
Joel gave a humorless laugh, lifted a hand, and pointed at you. “You better watch your damn mouth and be fucking careful what you say to me.”
Your whole body buzzed with anger and hurt, your hands trembling at your sides while your breath came uneven and shallow.
You swallowed hard, stomach tightening like a knot.
“Tomorrow,” you said, voice shaking but steady enough, “or as soon as the rain stops and the sun’s up, we head back to Jackson. I’ll go with you as far as I can, then I’m coming back here.”
“That's ridiculous.”
“No, it's just not what you want.”
“River has—”
“You take River. Take Ares too. I’ll walk back.”
“It’d take you days!”
You crossed your arms, blinking against the sting in your eyes. “Don’t worry about it.”
Joel exhaled sharply, dragging a hand down his face; tired, exasperated, maybe angry, maybe all of it.
You didn’t care anymore.
“You sound ridiculous right now,” he said, voice rising. “You should hear yourself. You’re mad at me, mad at this, mad at everything, and you think stayin’ here’s gonna fix it—”
“This has nothing to do with you.”
“Then what the hell does it have to do with?”
“I told you already, Joel!” you snapped, arms falling to your sides. “What’s your fucking problem with me staying here? It doesn’t affect you at all! Go back to your life in Jackson and stop worrying about me. It’s not like you were dying to see me around town anyway, were you? So what difference does it make?”
“No, no,” he said, shaking his head and raising a hand. “Don’t twist this. You’re safe in Jackson. You’ve got a house, a community, you’re doin’ somethin’ that matters. Where exactly do you think you’ll go from here? West Yellowstone? You know damn well it’s not the same as what you’ve got in Jackson.”
“What do I have?” you shot back. “Tell me, Joel, what do I have? A quiet, empty house? Well, this is a quiet, empty house too. Yeah, there's people in Jackson, sure, but I feel completely hollow every single day—”
“The people who care about you, ain’t that enough?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You’ve got something to do, friends, food on the table. I think you’re too caught up in what hurts to see what’s right in front of you, but you gotta get past it.”
“You keep saying the same shit, and you’re not listening to me,” you said, shaking your head as a warm tear slid down your cheek.
“I am listenin’,” he said, rubbing at his eyes with a rough sigh. “I am. But... There’s the office. Go back to it. You’re good at it, you think I didn’t hear what people’s been sayin’? How easy it is talkin’ to you?”
“Joel,” you said quietly, tired now, “you don’t want me there.”
He opened his mouth like he was about to say something, then shut it again. For a moment, he just looked at you.
This was ridiculous. It had only been an idea, a spark of one, really. If you wanted to stay here, you could. You knew how to take care of yourself; you’d done it before, when Sophie was still alive. You could do it again, now, for yourself alone.
It wasn’t even that you were sure you wanted to stay. But Joel had this uncanny ability to drag the most stubborn parts of you right to the surface, to make you dig your heels in just because he was trying to push you the other way.
He moved.
“If I’d known this is where bringin’ you here would lead, I wouldn’t’ve done it,” he said, pointing toward the floor, frustration in his voice. “And I know you don’t give a damn about that. So fine, you wanna stay? Stay. Never met anyone so damn stubborn in my life.”
He moved off to the side, heading toward the chair where he’d left his jacket. “I’m done wastin’ time tryin’ to talk sense into someone who’s already decided to thrown it all away—”
“Joel.”
“No, enough,” he said, waving a hand like he could cut the whole thing off. “I get what you’re goin’ through and I… I just…” His words faltered, his voice breaking as something flickered across his face; pain, sudden and sharp. “I can’t believe… you’re this goddamn impossible. Shit—”
He doubled over, bracing one hand on the chair where his jacket lay, the other clutching at his chest.
You froze. For a second you couldn’t move, couldn’t even breathe, just watched as his face twisted and his eyes squeezed shut, a low sound escaping his throat. Then your body reacted before your mind caught up; you rushed toward him.
“Joel, hey, what’s wrong?” you asked, grabbing his arm, your voice trembling harder than you meant it to.
He shook his head, eyes flying open, breath coming uneven and jagged. For a split second his gaze met yours. It was dark, wild and scared. And then he yanked his arm free from your touch.
“No… don’t,” he rasped, his voice barely more than air. “Don’t touch me. I need… I need to get away from you.”
He straightened with visible effort, shoulders rigid, and stumbled toward the front door, running, fleeing, like the very air between you was suffocating him.
You heard the door slam, the sound swallowed by the steady drumming of rain against the roof. And because you rarely did what Joel told you to do and today would be no exception, you went after him without thinking twice.
The moment you opened the door, cold air bit at your cheeks. Rain spilled from the roof in heavy, steady drops that gathered into streams, pooling in the mud and soaking through the wild grass. But you barely noticed any of it. Your eyes went straight to him.
Joel stood at the edge of the porch, both hands gripping the railing, his head bowed. His back rose and fell in uneven bursts, his breathing was jagged and unsteady.
He didn’t hear you come out, not over the rain, but the second the door clicked shut behind you, his head snapped up. He looked fragile in a way you’d never seen before, and his voice came out thin when he muttered:
“Jesus, can’t you give me one damn minute? Go back inside.”
“Are you okay?” you asked, guilt crawling its way through you.
“I’m fine.”
You stepped closer, laying a hand on his shoulder. He shifted away, just slightly, but enough.
“Joel, please,” you said quietly. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“I said I’m fine,” he answered, meeting your gaze at last, his eyes dull and exhausted, like even standing there was costing him something.
You locked eyes with him, holding that gaze for a moment, silently acknowledging that, for some reason, this was just as hard for him as it was for you.
“I’m not gonna leave you alone,” you said softly. “You don’t look good.”
“I just need a bit of air. I’ll be fine.”
You waited a second, and then nodded, letting go of his shoulder and stepping back, a hollow ache opening in your chest, along with a sudden urge to wrap him in your arms.
But that was how it was with him, wasn’t it? He had been confusing you more than anyone else ever had in your life, and yet, in just a few months, you wanted him both near and far at the same time.
Right now, he wanted distance. And you were going to give it to him. That didn’t mean, of course, that you wouldn’t press yourself to the window, just to make sure he hadn’t collapsed or (God forbid) worse. Not that you were pessimistic or anything.
Turning away, you stepped back inside the house.
Thirty minutes later.
Yeah, thirty minutes, was that enough?
You stepped up to the window and spotted Joel out on the porch, sunk into the old wooden chair. From where you stood, you could only see the top of his head, his fingers propping up his temple, elbow hooked over the armrest.
The rain hadn’t stopped, just softened, and you made up your mind. You grabbed your jacket (well, his jacket) and slipped it on as you walked to the door.
Joel didn’t turn when you stepped outside. Not when the door clicked shut, not even when you made it obvious you were there. But his eyes tracked your feet as you crossed the porch and sat beside him.
“You feeling any better?” you asked, hands flat on either side of your legs, eyes fixed ahead.
“Yeah.”
You nodded, your gaze drifting from the trees to the porch steps, to your feet, his, and finally, his face.
“You looked bad.”
That got his attention. He glanced at you. “Yeah? Guess I usually pull off the bruised look just fine, my bad.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“No worries, I’m fine.”
You exhaled and leaned back against the seat, letting the quiet stretch between you. You weren’t sure how long it lasted. Minutes, maybe. But it didn’t feel awkward. It probably should’ve.
Joel’s hand rested on his thigh, and you found yourself watching it without meaning to. His knuckles were scraped, the skin rough and pink. His fingers were long, thick, made for holding on to things. You’d noticed before, every time he steadied you climbing up, going down or caught your hand before you could slip.
“Has this happened before?” you asked, eyes still fixed on his hands.
“Yeah.”
You glanced up at him. “Did you talk to Dr. Hale?”
“No need. It’s nothin’.”
“Joel,” you turned more toward him, “you can’t be serious.”
He shook his head. “Don’t wanna talk about it, alright?”
Did he ever want to talk about anything? You doubted it.
“Okay. Sorry.”
You cleared your throat and leaned back against the wooden bench again, watching the rain hammer down, the smell of wet earth drifting in with the wind, brushing against your cheeks and ears.
“You asked me what I knew about gettin’ over grief,” he said suddenly, and your eyes snapped back to his face. He was looking right at you. You didn’t say a word. “And if I’m bein’ honest, I don’t know a thing about it.”
“Joel, it’s okay.”
He gave a small shake of his head. “I’m sorry I said it like that. I know it came out harsh. Not sure there’s a better way to say somethin’ like that, though.”
“You think so?”
His gaze dropped somewhere near your feet. “All I know is I couldn’t find one a moment ago.”
You sighed. “You were angry. You’re not exactly gentle when you’re angry.”
Joel stayed quiet.
“I was about to tell you it’s fine if you don’t understand me, that I don’t expect you to,” you went on, looking at him, “but the truth is, I do expect you to.”
“I do,” he said, meeting your eyes. “I do understand you.”
“But how much?”
He exhaled, ran a hand over his mouth, and stared straight ahead.
“I know why you feel the need to stay here. And I know what it’s like to wake up every day feelin’ hollow,” he said, looking back at you. “I know it ‘cause that’s how I’ve felt for damn near thirty years.”
Your eyes lingered on his face, then his chest; his shirt half unbuttoned, the soft cotton tee beneath.
“My daughter, her name was Sarah,” he went on, his voice low, like he was speaking inward rather than to you. He wasn’t looking at you anymore. “She was twelve. Same age as Sophie. From what you’ve told me about her, I figure they’d have gotten along just fine.”
He nodded. “She was brilliant. Real smart. And she had this wicked sense of humor. You’d’ve liked her,” he said, meeting your eyes.
You smiled, trying to suppress the impact of his words. “Yeah?”
Sarah.
“I’m sure I would’ve.”
A faint smile touched Joel’s lips as he looked at you, though it never reached his eyes. Slowly, he turned his gaze away.
“I went years without saying her name out loud. Still feels wrong somehow. Like I don’t got the right to say it.”
“Joel, I had no idea, I’m so sorry,” you murmured, reaching out to rest your hand over his, where it lay on his thigh. Joel shifted his fingers slightly, catching one of yours between his.
He let out a slow breath, then looked at you, almost ashamed. “I couldn’t save her. I couldn’t… be who I should’ve been. That night, the first one, you remember it?”
You nodded.
“We were tryin’ to get out of Austin and… we crashed. She hurt her leg, and I tried... I tried to get her somewhere safe. But I couldn’t. I just froze.”
You squeezed his hand. “That day was terrifying, Joel. It wasn’t your fault. No one knew what was happening, you did the best you could.”
He shook his head, barely. “I failed her. Doesn’t matter how scared or confused I was, I still… didn’t do a damn thing.”
Your gaze dropped to your joined hands, a hollow ache spreading through your chest.
God, last night must’ve been hell for him. Hearing you cry about Sophie...
“I’m so sorry,” you whispered, lifting your eyes to meet his. “I am. If I’d known how painful this was for you, I never would’ve asked you to come with me. Or last night I, I wouldn’t have said half the things I said.”
Joel straightened a little. “No. No, it’s not that. Don’t go blamin’ yourself,” he said, shaking his head. “I just... what I’m tryin’ to say is, of course I understand you. Every bit of it. Every damn feeling, you don’t gotta explain it to me.”
You didn’t say anything, feeling your eyes sting against your will.
“Have you ever been back home?”
Joel’s lips pressed together, his brow tightening just slightly. “No. Tommy has.”
“Why not?”
“I couldn’t.” His gaze dropped to where your hands were joined. “My girl ain’t there. That place stopped bein’ home a long time ago.”
A lump rose in your throat, and hot, heavy tears slid down your cheeks.
You squeezed his hand. “How did you keep going? All this time. It’s only been two years for me, and I’m already falling apart.”
Joel looked at you quietly, maybe with pity, maybe with something gentler. Then he slipped his hand out from under yours and placed it on top instead. His touch tightened, steady, before he lifted your hand slowly, guiding it upward.
You frowned in confusion until he kept raising it, higher, until your fingertips brushed his temple. Beneath them, you felt the scar. You parted your lips, but said nothing. The skin was soft, the ridge thick and small, warm under your fingertips.
“I pulled the trigger,” he murmured, his dark eyes locked on yours. “And missed.”
He let go of your hand slowly, though it lingered there, your fingertips still resting against his skin. You lowered it a second later, realizing your eyes were still locked on his, and maybe you were crossing a line.
“And Tommy was with me,” he said after a pause. “I think the need to be useful, to keep him, us, safe, ended up bein’ stronger than the part of me that wanted to fall apart.”
You gave a humorless smile, folding both hands in your lap, watching your fingers fidget against each other.
“I was a mess too,” he said quietly. “Still am. And if I had a place to go back to... I’d probably want the same thing you do. But this,” he looked at you, “this ain’t gonna save you. And I know maybe you don’t even want to be saved. I get that. But—”
“But what?”
You met his eyes, and Joel straightened a little.
“You gotta keep goin’,” he said, his voice steady now. “You keep goin’ for every one of ’em. For Sophie, your parents, your family. You spent all that time fightin’ for them. Now it’s time to find somethin’ else.”
“I don’t… I don’t know—”
“What do you want?” His fingers brushed yours again, just a light touch. “Start small. Little things.”
“I want… I want…” you hesitated, eyes flicking from his chest back to his face. “I want to feel calm. To feel good.”
“What makes you feel good?”
You smiled, suddenly shy. “Joel—”
“Tell me,” he said softly. “What makes you feel good?”
You looked at him for a moment, quiet. Then, “Well, I, I like plants. I feel good in the greenhouse. It’s peaceful. And I like the colors, the smells.”
“You could have a garden at your place,” he said. “Would you like that?”
“Yeah, I would,” you said, smiling.
“Alright. What else?”
You looked ahead, a gentle sigh leaving your chest. The rain was still falling, relentless.
“I like reading. It helps. I don’t think about bad things when I read.”
Joel nodded, humming low in his throat. “We could get you more books. Maybe even build you a library at home. Those walls are solid.”
You turned your head toward him. “You mean that?”
“Yeah. And I don’t know how much you’ve heard,” he said, a crooked smile tugging at his mouth, “but I happen to know a damn good contractor in Jackson.”
You smiled back. “I’d really like that.”
Joel nodded, his index finger brushing lightly over the back of your hand.
“Make the place yours. I told you, we can take your paintings. I’ll frame your photos if you want. The garden, the library, whatever makes you feel at home, you can have it in Jackson.”
You nodded slowly. “I know. I just… I hate feeling I’m leaving everyone behind.”
He leaned a little closer, his face just inches from yours.
“Living doesn’t mean forgetting the people you lost. You gotta understand that,” he said, his voice catching for a moment. “Last night, when you asked me how you’re supposed to keep living, knowing you’re still here and they’re not… sometimes you can't, but you just do. And It never really goes away.”
“Is it that hard for you?”
“It is.” His gaze flicked down to your mouth, then back up. “But you keep goin’ anyway.”
“Well,” you said with a faint smile, “you’ve got Ellie.”
He let out a long breath. “I got Ellie. And you got a lotta people too. I’m pretty sure if I show up in Jackson without you, Zach’s gonna kill me. Him and about ten others.”
“Yeah? And what about you, Joel? You nearly gave me a heart attack a moment ago,” you said, giving his forearm a light smack. “Don’t you even think about dying now.”
He smirked. “Darlin’, let me tell ya somethin’. If there’s a woman on this earth who could kill me from stress alone… it’s gotta be you.”
Your mouth dropped open in mock shock, and you smacked his arm again. He just grinned, leaning back slightly and looking the other way.
“Sorry,” you said, still smiling in your voice. “But if it makes you feel any better, nobody in my life’s ever driven me as crazy as you have.”
He rolled his eyes without looking at you, and you turned your face the other way too, smiling, but trying not to make it obvious. You didn’t know why; it just felt right. Then, as if remembering you were allowed, you sighed and let your head fall onto his shoulder.
Maybe you could afford it today. And if not, well. Joel didn’t complain. Not that he would’ve said anything even if he did.
“Tomorrow, if the rain lets up, we head to Jackson, alright?” he said after a moment.
“Mhm.”
“Say it.”
You lifted your head from his shoulder, looking up at him. Joel’s face was so serious, brow suddenly furrowed and all.
“Yes.”
“Yes what?”
You smiled, holding back a laugh. “Yes, we’re leaving for Jackson tomorrow.”
“Good.”
“Now,” you said, pushing yourself up, looking at him and holding out your hand. “Food. Heaven forbid we starve.”
Joel glanced at your hand, then at your face. “Not with all the apples you brought.”
You huffed. “Joel, come on.”
He let out a long sigh. “Yes, ma’am.”
He took your hand.
An hour later.
The day passed quietly, the rain drizzling on well into the afternoon.
After your porch conversation, you both went inside to grab some food, and you suggested eating outside.
“Can you take this little table out?” you asked, carrying the food in both hands.
Joel nodded and lifted the folding table from beside the kitchen counter, setting it outside. Though the rain still fell in light drops, it had eased, and the sky had cleared just enough. Sunlight slipped between the thick clouds, landing right in front of the stairs, and the air smelled like wet earth.
You ate in calm silence, a quiet reprieve after the intense start to the day you’d shared.
Joel knew he’d overreacted. He realized it the moment he was left alone outside and his heartbeat slowed. Then the guilt hit; guilt for snapping at you, for saying what he said, for everything. But on the bigger picture, he didn’t regret his thoughts.
You had to figure out how to get through this without tearing yourself apart. And he was a hypocrite for doling out advice so freely when he wasn’t exactly a shining example himself. If he’d been alone, if he’d never had Tommy, Tess or found Ellie, he’d probably be long gone.
But you weren’t like him. You were bright, young, alive, kind, and loved by everyone in Jackson. You had so many chances at happiness, or at least to get closer to it, that if he could help, he’d do everything he could to make sure you got there. Help you, if you let him, in the only way he knew how.
He thought about it as you ate, watching you slice your apple. He chuckled quietly to himself, nudged a bit of his own food (not an apple) closer to your side, and tried to lose himself in the book you’d given him to pass the time.
You were holding Pride and Prejudice, fully absorbed, while he couldn’t seem to get into Labyrinths. Not that Borges couldn’t hold his attention, he just couldn’t focus on the words without his glasses, which were in his backpack upstairs on the second floor. And he wasn’t about to get up.
“Have you ever written a letter?” you asked then, not looking at him.
He exhaled. “A letter? Yeah.”
“Really? A love letter?”
“Sure.”
“Seriously?”
He turned to you, intrigued by the incredulous tone in your voice. You were staring at him with raised eyebrows.
“What’s got you so surprised?”
“I dunno… it’s hard to picture you writing a love letter,” you said, glancing back at your book. “Though I guess that used to be a thing, right?”
“Not really. You wrote letters if you liked a girl or a guy and were too shy to say it out loud.”
“Were you?” you asked, looking at him again. “No, don’t answer. I can tell you were.”
He didn’t say a word, just went back to his book.
Then, he stopped again. “Have you written letters?”
“No, never. That’s why I asked.”
“And nobody’s ever written to you?”
“No,” you laughed. “At least, not that kind of letter. I’ve exchanged notes, but they were about stuff totally unrelated to romance. Or messages, you know? Things like ‘meet me at this place’ or ‘if you’re not there, wait at this building,’ that sort of thing.”
“Ah, got it.”
“Every time I read these kinds of books, I think… everything was so romantic and intriguing, you know? Nobody talks like this anymore. Nobody writes like that.”
“You should listen to the Walkers,” he murmured.
You stifled a laugh. “Right. The Walkers. They’re going to take over Jackson.”
“Hope not. They’re too loud.”
“Or maybe you’re just too grumpy.”
He stared at you for a long moment, and finally, you met his gaze. Serious, he said,
“C'mon, they are.”
You pursed your lips. “Fine. They are.”
Without another word, you turned back to your book, flipping the page with a sigh. Curiously, they didn’t bother him anymore.
A few hours later. At night.
You closed the door behind you and wiped your boots on the rug. Even though the rain had stopped, the mud clung stubbornly to them.
You fed River and Ares and brought in the bucket of water. Joel had offered, but you’d gone ahead before he could say anything, maybe as a way to feel useful; you hadn’t done much today. Joel had put away your things, organized your books and the paintings. Maybe he was feeling guilty too.
That’s how the rest of the day slipped by; each of you busying yourselves with whatever you could find around the house, sorting through things, deciding what to take and what to leave behind. Maybe it was just your way of giving each other a little breathing room for a while. And later, at dinner, everything felt lighter. You ate in quiet, quick and tired, and by the time the clock edged toward eight, you’d already agreed it was time to get everything ready for the morning.
Night had fully fallen now; the moon shone bright through the gray clouds, making it feel earlier than it was. You could see your feet in the mud, the horses’ faces, and the tall, imposing trees surrounding the cabin.
“All good?” he asked, his face bathed in the soft glow of the two candles on the nightstand beside him.
Inside, it was darker. A single candle sat on the little table by the door, and you grabbed it after hanging your jacket on the coat rack and carried it upstairs.
When you opened the bedroom door, Joel was sitting on the edge of the bed, hands resting on the mattress by his legs, head slightly bowed. But he lifted his gaze the moment he saw you walk in.
“All good,” you said, stepping past him to the other side of the bed. You set the candle down on your own nightstand and padded over to your backpack by the door.
Squatting, you unzipped it and pulled out your small bag.
“Rosewater again?” Joel teased from behind you.
You grinned, standing up and shaking the bottle. “I can share if you want.”
He smiled, holding out his hand. “Gimme some.”
You hesitated for a heartbeat, then slid down next to him. Your hip bumped against his, and Joel reached for you without hesitation.
Heat flushed your cheeks. “Your hand is cold.”
You placed the tiny bottle in his palm, holding his gaze. In this light, his skin looked golden beneath the bruises, and those dark, endless eyes locked on yours.
Before you even realized it, Joel closed his hand around yours, enclosing the bottle, and you, in his cold fingers.
His upper lip twitched into a faint smirk, eyes wandering over your face. When he let go of your hand, his fingers lingered, gliding over your skin in a slow, delicate caress that left a trail of fire on your skin.
Joel rested his hands on his legs, shifting his attention to the small bottle. He rolled it between his fingers, fiddling with the cap, while your eyes traced every line of his profile, drinking in whatever details you could; the curls at the nape of his neck, behind his ear, across his forehead. They fell even more now, with his head tilted slightly down.
You wanted to touch him. The need hit sudden and sharp, like always. And without thinking, after a quiet inhale, your hand slid up to the back of his neck, fingers brushing the soft skin and tangling into the curls there, holding on.
Joel froze, just for a breath, before turning toward you. The candlelight carved gold across his face, shadows collecting in the lines by his eyes. And when his eyes met yours , there was no trace of accusation, only a quiet, unreadable kind of permission.
But your fingers trembled as they moved again, tracing the back of his neck, slipping higher until they brushed the soft curls behind his ear, the edge of his temple, the warmth of his forehead, then drifting back down, following the curve of his jaw. Your thumb lingered there, against the stubble, and that was when his hand came up.
He caught your wrist. Not harshly, just enough to hold you there. His fingers pressed lightly into your skin. And his eyes didn’t waver; they drank you in.
You realized, then, that you weren’t breathing. Your lungs refused to move, like any sound might shatter whatever this was.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered, your fingertips still against the back of his neck.
Joel’s grip tightened, barely, almost imperceptibly, as his eyes searched yours, and his hand slid down your arm, slowly, the drag of his skin over yours setting every nerve alight. Your pulse jumped under his palm, hard and insistent and suddenly greedy.
You reached for him again, fingers slipping back into the hair at his nape, your head tilting before you could stop it. And in one sharp, breathless motion, Joel pulled you closer with his hand at your arm, your chest brushing his, and his mouth found yours, all heat and inevitability.
A choked sound, something close to relief, caught in your throat and was instantly swallowed by his kiss. You slid your hand higher, threading your fingers into the short hairs at his nape, gently but firmly tugging him closer.
Joel let the bottle fall. The thud was soft on the floor, the glass rolling away with a negligible, distant rattle, and with that now free hand, he clamped onto your waist. The grip was instantaneous, a sudden, possessive heat that shoved you backward onto the mattress.
Your hips hitched back, so eager, an immediate response as you dropped to your spine. He followed you down; his body heavy, a suffocating blanket of muscle, all broad shoulders and raw solid weight, a testament to pure, unyielding strength. Your hands, needing to hold on, met and locked behind his neck, smoothing down his tense back and hauling him even tighter against the length of you while he settled his weight above you, deepening the kiss as his thigh drove between yours, forcefully prying your legs apart and pressing down in a deliberate move.
A raw, helpless sound tore itself from your throat, and your head arched back against the mattress after his lips released yours with a ragged groan and a wet, dizzying sound that left you breathless. Your eyes squeezed shut, the world narrowing to sensation as you felt his mouth travel a desperate, hungry path: down the line of your jaw, then plunging into the sensitive skin of your neck. Joel was biting and kissing the flesh with the simple, urgent desire of a starving animal.
And it had always been the natural way between you two, hadn't it? From the very first moment, you’d been nothing more than clashing impulses and raw tempers, instinct against instinct, fueled by some strange, powerful force that both repelled and drew you in.
"Joel," you gasped, eyes sealed shut, your body dissolving into something gelatinous as his mouth ravaged your skin. "I need you right now."
He let out a shuddering sigh against your neck, pulling his head up just enough to capture your lips again. Simultaneously, his hands began to move; one reached overhead, fingers digging into the sleeping bag above your ear; the other skimmed your figure, mapping the curve of your hip and waist.
And then, you bit. Your teeth closed down on his lower lip. Your mouth instantly watered at the taste, and you slowly pulled your head back, deliberately breaking the kiss, teasing him, melting entirely beneath his weight.
You parted your lips wider, letting him take more of you, your tongue meeting his, tasting, wanting to consume him whole. And then, a sudden metallic tang flooded your mouth, yet there was no pain, only the sharp, thrilling urgency.
Joel groaned deep into your kiss, his hips sinking harder into yours, the friction a delicious, heavy grind while your hands flew up, more desperate than ever, cupping his face as your heart hammered a frantic rhythm against your ribs.
Joel responded with a low growl, clamping his teeth onto your jawline; the sudden, sharp sensation spiking your pulse. You felt him kiss lower, and then, abruptly, his mouth was gone.
You waited a second, and then your eyes fluttered open, lids heavy with lust. You found him hovering above you, his gaze bright and lustful, yet an undeniable flicker of confusion washing over his features. Below him, his mouth was smeared dark with crimson.
"Joel," you gasped, ragged, hand flying up instantly toward his lips.
"You're hurt," he stated, his voice tight.
"No. Your lip is bleeding."
It clicked for him then. He instantly released your waist and brought his fingers to his mouth.
The tips of his fingers came away stained with blood, and he jerked back, his wide eyes fixed solely on you.
You immediately sat up, your hand reaching for his shoulder, then cupping his cheek.
"Let me see," you murmured, leaning toward him and gently tilting his face toward the candlelight.
The cut was centered on his lower lip; it had opened wide. Joel's mouth was full of blood, and the dark stain was smeared across his lips and chin, spread during the kiss.
"Does it hurt?" you asked, your fingers resting on his jaw.
"No. I didn't realize."
"I can see that," you said with a slight smile, and you noticed his gaze drop from your face to your neck.
Joel let out a defeated sigh and abruptly stood, leaving you alone on the bed. He flung the room door open in a rush.
You stared at the door, confused, wondering if you had said something wrong, or if it had all simply been too much. But before you could settle on an answer, he was back, holding a mug. He placed it on the nightstand next to the candles and said:
"Your bag, you have clean—"
"Yes, in the small pocket."
He nodded, turned, and knelt in front of your backpack. He pulled out the small bag, extracted a clean piece of cloth, and then sat beside you on the bed. He took the mug, which was filled with water, and dampened it a little.
"Hold still," he instructed, cupping your face with one hand. With the other, he moved the wet cloth, carefully wiping your neck, then your jaw, your cheeks, and finally, your mouth.
When he pulled his hand back, you saw the white cloth was now completely stained.
He frowned at it, dunked it back into the mug, and wrung it out before trying again. His brow was drawn tight, his expression all focus as he wiped at your face and neck carefully.
Your eyes, though, were fixed on his mouth. On the small cut still bleeding there. A drop of red gathered on his lower lip, and a second later, he caught it with his tongue.
“I didn’t know,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” you murmured. “Really, it’s fine.”
When he finished cleaning you up, he dipped the cloth in the water again. But before he could bring it to his own face, you reached out and took it from him.
“Let me,” you said.
Joel froze, but didn’t argue. He let you tend to him the way he had to you. Wipe, rinse, wipe, rinse. Until his skin was clean again and only the cut on his lip stayed red.
“Sorry I bit you,” you said, cheeks warming.
“It’s alright,” he muttered, shaking his head. He took the cloth gently from your hand and set it on the floor. Then, he crouched to grab the rosewater bottle, passing it to you with something close to shyness.
You took it, but left your hand resting over his.
“Do you regret this too?”
Joel’s lips curved, a quiet huff of air leaving him. He shook his head and slipped his hand from beneath yours. Then, slowly, almost cautiously, he leaned in again.
His tongue swept over his broken lip, and his fingers came up to tilt your chin. He pressed a soft kiss to your mouth. Then another. And one more, lighter still.
When he drew back just an inch, a sigh slipped from him, low and resigned.
“You know this ain’t smart,” he said.
“Why not?”
He hesitated, his jaw working as he tried to find the words.
“It’s just… it’s not smart. People would talk.”
You tilted your head. “People? Talk about what?”
Joel exhaled, eyes flicking from your throat back to your face. “You’re too young. And I’m—”
“You’re what?”
“I’m too old for you.”
You could tell he didn’t believe what he was saying. Not really. He was lying.
You shook your head. “Joel, that’s ridiculous.”
He opened his mouth, closed it, tried again. “It’s not smart.”
“And if it’s not smart, then why do you keep doing it?”
He gave a humorless little smirk. “’Cause I’m an idiot.”
You watched him for a moment, still and quiet, until a soft laugh escaped you. You shook your head in disbelief.
There were so many things you could’ve said. Arguments waiting on your tongue, clever retorts you didn’t quite have the energy for. But his eyes were tired, and if you were being honest, so were yours.
“Maybe you are,” you said finally, nodding once. “I’ll tell you again in the morning.”
Joel gave a crooked little smile, it looked like it hurt a bit. He shook his head as he turned onto his side, bending to untie his boots, and you watched him in silence.
Then a yawn overtook you, and that was reason enough to move. You grabbed your bag and the rosewater bottle and stepped quietly into the bathroom.
You lingered there longer than you meant to.
The mirror caught the glow of candlelight, and your reflection looked almost unfamiliar; flushed, undone. Every inch of you was still humming from what he’d woken inside you. The wanting hadn’t faded. You felt it in your skin, in your pulse, in the places his hands had been. Every part of you was different now, altered in a way that couldn’t be undone.
You let the rosewater glide over your skin, your fingers moving in slowly. But in your mind, they weren’t yours. You imagined his hands instead, his fingers pressing into your skin, mapping you. And God, you felt a little foolish for it. For how far you’d let yourself go with this man, knowing full well he’d leave you tangled up in confusion in the morning.
You could pretend the two of you would talk about it, that you’d wake up and laugh, maybe even make sense of what had happened. But deep down, you knew Joel.
He’d act like it hadn’t happened at all. Like his mouth hadn’t tasted your skin, like his hands hadn’t found their way across your body. Like he hadn’t, in his quiet stubborn way, admitted he understood exactly what was happening between you, and still hadn’t wished it away.
You exhaled, the sound soft and small against the walls.
What was the point in losing sleep over it? Tomorrow, if the sun dried the rain, you’d start the road back to Jackson. And whatever this was, whatever it had turned you into, would stay here, tucked inside the walls of this cabin, like it had never happened at all.
What happens in the cabin, stays in the cabin; every confession, every secret, every kiss and touch. All of it.
That’s why, when you stepped outside and found Joel fast asleep, his arm stretched over your spot, you blew out the candles one by one and slipped back into bed. You nestled against him, your head resting on his arm, your back to his warmth, your fingers brushing against his before gently threading through them. He was out cold, his breathing steady and calm. But just a heartbeat after you closed your eyes, his hand tightened around yours.
divider by: omi-resources
(if you want to be added or removed from the taglist, let me know!)
FALLING.
RATING
Explicit (18+ only)
PAIRING
Joel Miller x BIPOC OFC (Leela)
FORMAT & SETTING
Joel's POV & Post-TLOU Jackson AU
WORD COUNT PER CHAPTER
approx. 12,000+
STATUS
Complete
SUMMARY
It is said that every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future. Now, Joel Miller wasn’t looking to be a saint. Trust was a liability. Love, a memory too painful to keep. But if a sinner like him still had some future, and if that future starts with one night—a baby’s relentless cries cracking through his walls and breaking him open—then maybe, just maybe, he hadn’t lost everything yet.
Against all instincts, he steps into that big, white house across his street. Nothing drives Joel to linger, but he does. For the baby at first—nascent Maya, with her bright eyes and fistfuls of Joel’s collar. Then, the strange new mother.
What begins as an uneasy coexistence grows into something deeper, which neither of them dares name. Haunted by a narrative she never chose, brilliant but reclusive, Leela’s mind runs into the theoretical—proofs, patterns, chasing solutions to an unsolvable equation—while Joel’s hands are scarred by the practical: protecting, killing, enduring.
When that peace becomes fleeting, when a fragile hope in the shape of a mathematical discovery begins to bloom, and the world, as always, threatens to take it away, Joel confronts what it means to fall—not just into the impossible, but into love, into hope, into the fragile rhythms of Leela and Maya’s life, and their quiet home that becomes a rare thing in this decaying tomorrow: a reason to stay.
This is a story of healing, found family, and the abnormal, slow math of love—how we factor grief, multiply hope, balance the unknowns, it never adds up but somehow makes perfect sense.
INDEX (might be subject to change as the story progresses.)
part i -> EVENT HORIZON
part ii -> MICROFRACTURE
part iii -> FALSE EQUILIBRIUM
part iv -> MINIMUM VIABLE HOPE
part v -> RECONSTRUCTION ALGORITHM
part vi -> LIMIT APPROACHES GRACE
part vii -> FREEFALL FUNCTION
part viii -> SOFT INFINITY
part ix -> STITCH THEORY
interlude
part x -> DECOHERENCE
part xi -> ZERO CROSSING
part xii -> THEOREM OF BECOMING
part xiii -> HEURISTIC BLOOM
part xiv -> THE FINAL INTEGRATION
epilogue
acknowledgements
FALLING MOODBOARD (a huge bear hug, thank you and shoutout to the incredible @jolapeno !!)
FALLING MOODBOARD (2) (so many kisses and so much love to the talented, sweet @mrsmando !!)
CHARACTER STUDY A deep dive into Joel, Maya, and Leela, answering an ask from one of my sweetheart friends @jodiswiftle who followed along!
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Have loads of fun with this masterlist! took me a while to think up a different way to potray these chapters, I'm so glad it came through so great!
TAGS
your (ultimate) fix-it fic, The Dad™️ Joel, softest Joel you've ever seen, he is also an old yearner cuntstruck hardass, Joel being down bad for a teeny baby girl, OFC is arabic, OFC being an academic nerd and STEM girlie, the cutest baby (Maya) ever, baby is an actual character, Miller family dynamics, Tommy-Joel-Ellie hooliganisms, life in Jackson town, Ellie being the generally awesome older sister, neighbours-to-lovers trope, found family, slowburn, a lot of math references, lotsa door metaphors, epistolary interlude.
CONTENT WARNINGS
eventual smut (the whole kaboodle), big griefs, depression, unbearable angst, violence, gore, blood, alcoholism, substance abuse, post-natal depression, the pains of motherhood, mentions of rape and suicide, childbirth.
Summary: Plans aren't supposed to go this horribly wrong. But then again, maybe between you and Joel there's just not much more good luck left for you to bank on.
Word Count: 6.5k
Warnings: canon typical violence, canon typical language,, outbreak fic, darker fic, adult language, reader has no canon name but has a commonly used nickname, reader is mostly blank slate but has hair that can be pulled back, fighting, references to injuries, blood, strained relationship dynamic, internal self-depreciation, long distance relationship, joel feels like an absent father, this is super angsty, off page deaths, canon death of characters, um i think that's it but let me know if i've missed any?
A/N: this was a hard edit, but i hope it reads well! last chapter is done, but i'll post it sometime next week once i get ahead of my schoolwork and can edit it c:
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“You think he’s in trouble?”
He doesn’t respond with words, but he doesn’t have to. Tommy’s been able to keep up minimal responses on your end, but you doubt he’s as open with Joel as he’s been with you. The man beside you, the one you’re curled up against with his arm draped over your back as you rest your cheek on his chest- he had been right to be a tad jealous of his little brother.
“Tess and I are working on an exit plan, it’s time.”
“Frankie is getting worse and Rosie…she’s only five, Joel.”
“We’ll figure it out, we have to.”
“I’ll…talk to them.”
“This’ll be the last time we say goodbye, I swear to you.” He’s suddenly shifting, crowding you as he leans over you to press his lips to your forehead. His hands press heavily into the mattress on either side of your hips, his broad shoulders blocking the room.
“I fuckin’ hope so, Miller.” His eyes soften a bit as he spies the way you swallow thickly, the rapid blinking before you pin him with a stern look.
“You know I love you.” His voice is dipped low, his nose brushing yours and your eyes flutter shut.
“Doesn’t make this any easier.” Your forehead thumps into his, breathing in the fresh scent of him deep as you wrap your arms around his middle. He does the same, adjusting himself to lay against you and pressing his face into your chest, taking the moment to simply exist with you. You mumble the sentiment back to him, feeling the weight of the words more so than ever.
The morning is soft. It’s almost peaceful, Joel dares to think the word as he settles on the back porch with a steaming mug. Coffee. Coffee and you are what makes it almost dangerous to think that at least a little bit is all right in the world, that he has something to claim once again. His blood thrums in his ears a touch too loud and the brightening horizon hurts his sensitive eyes. He knows it’s a sign of the withdrawal he’s about to face. Something huge he needs to overcome in order to be better, to be sharper for the plan set in motion.
As if summoned, Joel turns his head to watch you curl up beside him with your own cup of coffee, left for you to indulge in. You take a sip from the mug before resting it on the table off to the side, eyes trained on the spot where Joel found you all those years ago.
“I didn’t know I ever wanted to be a parent,” Your words are quiet, contemplative in the early hour as the sky’s deep blue begins to lighten on the horizon, turning into soft orange. “Not in this world, not in the zone. There’s too much bad in this life, too many things to work against- I’m just one person, you know?”
“I want to find somewhere for her to call home, somewhere for her to be a child with nothing to worry about. To just…be herself. That’s all I want for her, Joel.” Your voice dips, a heavy breath floating into the air between you two. “But is that too much to ask for? Is it possible to give her that?”
“No.”
The matter-of-fact response is quick, but not rushed. It just is and Joel turns to catch your worried gaze with his own.
“We can find that for her. And if we don’t, I’ll make it with my own two hands, whatever it takes. She is the most important thing, she won’t face the mistakes we’ve made so far because we know better now. It would be a dishonor to not give her everything we can, it would be a shame to those that came before her.”
You silently slip a hand in his and you know that he’s going to do everything that he can to help you find exactly that. Hell, you know he’d dig and pack and hunt with everything in him to help make a even a little bubble of better and good for his daughter, the weight of one already on his soul. His fingers tangle with yours and you both sit in a comfortable silence watching as the sun begins to crest over the horizon and bring in a new day.
And of course you will do the same, fight and defend Rosie against anything that gets in the way of finding something for her. You would give everything to make her happy and safe, the urge to snarl and bite at anything that so much as thinks of threatening that almost too much to bear.
The rest of the day is a soft blur of helping Frank and tending to Rosie, Joel lending a hand where he can without trying to overstep. It’s at lunch, when Rosie turns the plans of him helping Bill with something in another building over completely.
“I think I wanna camp for my birthday.”
“C-camp, sweet girl?” Frank smiles widely at her, his light eyes sparkling as he takes in the way she’s fidgeting in her seat. He gently coaxes her to elaborate, trying and sending a soft pang through your heart when he reaches to take her small hand in his own.
She’s not been raised to be afraid to speak up or say something when she notices things, but she does have a bit of a shy streak when it comes to outright asking for something that she might think is deemed ‘unnecessary’. She hasn’t gone without, your hands tirelessly working to sew and mend cloth for her once she’s gone to sleep, to ensure she has blankets and clothing, socks and shoes that grow along with her. You go out once a week to scavenge and find things for her to play with and work her mind, to help with her critical thinking and engagement- though you’re sure the area is sufficiently cleared out after five years of doing so.
“I wanna sleep in a tent, I wanna cook stuff on a fire and look at the stars and read bedtime stories cuddled up in sleeping bags and-“
“Rosie, bebita, that’s…” You share a look with Joel, knowing that if it all works out, that will be the exact way she spends every night while traveling. Frank see’s it and smiles sadly to himself, sensing the shift of wanting more, of needing more.
“We can make it happen.” Bill scoops another spoonful of roasted vegetables from the garden onto her plate. “But only if you finish all these carrots, so you can make your eyes really strong and see all the stars that come out.”
He has it all planned out, who he’s going to trade with, what he’s going to trade with and for, how it’s going to go down. All of it, down to a backup plan in case something goes awry- because it always does.
Joel just doesn’t expect it all to go so fucking, terribly wrong.
His right hand stings, his knuckles bloody and split. He’s pretty sure beneath all the swelling that his hand is either sprained or seriously compounded. He wishes he had been as quick as he had been last night all those years ago…
He sighs, chest heaving and eyes now burning as he blinks back tears. He misses Sarah, his old life, the semblance of a life he had with you in the zone, the shadow of something with Tess he never dared to put a label on for fear of disappointing her too.
Rosie. He misses Rosie so much that the sob that claws its way through his throat nearly strangles him. It echoes around him, catching in the bushes and the trees, rebounding back to him over the sound of the gently stream he’s crouching at the shore of. He swallows another as he dips his hand beneath the cool water in front of him. His boots dig into the gravel of small rocks around him, the damp crunch of them causing a shiver to wrack his shoulders.
Just five miles away, your own feet drag through the damp earth of the early morning as you trek back toward Lincoln. The night far too long and the Rosie is quick on your heels despite the sleepy way her eyes droop and her head bobs around a little too freely with her pace. She’s tired, still getting used to doing this with you, learning how to hunt, how to track, how to survive.
But it’s important, she needs to know. You want to make sure she has every tool and skill available to her to understand how to make it on her own, just in case. You feel the pressure of Joel’s last visit in your bones, pressing on your hips that ache to keep moving and searching for what you two talked about.
He…was supposed to return to in a few weeks time with Tess. To make the journey out west.
But he never came.
Something Frank consoled you over even if you didn’t outwardly show a reaction, used to only seeing the man once a year. Used to the way that despite trying with everything in him, sometimes it’s just not enough. Too many outside factors, to make risks.
You still prevail, gathering things for the truck parked in the garage. Survival packs and weapons, camping gear and supplies all being sorted into main bags and then secondary bags. The possibility of losing the truck very prominent and then you would need to carry a majority of everything to keep you and Rosie alive. Bill helps you as much as he can around looking after Frank and you still spend as much time at his side as you can.
There’s a prevalent air of change that hangs over the house. Unspoken and unacknowledged, but it remains and crackles as the days continue on.
The gate hums a little louder for a split second before the locks click open and you guide Rosie through with a hand to her back. The straps of your pack dig into your shoulders and the gun in your arms feels like it weighs a ton. You still smile at her, letting her know everything is alright and she did a very good job on this overnight trip. A little something to hone her skills even further and prepare her for the world outside of your little bubble here.
Quiet always falls over the cordoned off streets but something feels….wrong this morning.
Your heart thumps quicker, limbs tingling as your mind works through the motions of checking the areas you walk through. When the main house comes into view, you stop so suddenly that Rosie runs into the backs of your legs. But your eyes are focused on the house, the way it seems…empty. Lifeless.
When Joel approaches the gate, there’s a pair of dogs. They’re hiding in the shadows of buildings and he’s sure there’s one that’s followed behind them the moment they left the old convenient store. One of them slinks away, drawing his eyes away from the entrance of the fence.
“Woah, holy fuck! You came outta nowhere!” Ellie moves to grip Joel’s arm in surprise, but he sidesteps her as his attention snaps back. A little girl he hasn’t seen in nearly a year is standing as tall as she can, gun poised at them and a growling dog standing in front of her.
His daughter, your little clone decked out and on the defense.
She looks mad, her little face blank in the same way he knows his own pulls when he’s simmering. Her brows furrowed and her dark eyes trained on him. He told her he would be back but it seems she’s finally got a good grasp on the passage of time and he’s late.
“Joel?” She asks, making sure to heed the orders to refer to him by his name that you both urged when around people she didn’t know. It stings a little, but he knows it’s better, safer; practical.
“No fuckin’ way!” Ellie pins him with a shocked expression, eyes wide and mouth open wide. She can see the resemblance even if she doesn’t voice it outright.
“Hey, sweetheart. Is your momma around?”
“She’s in the bunker, going over the communication records.” She stutters over ‘communications’, it’s a big word for her and Joel’s heart softens as her little voice works over it. She speaks well for her age, no doubt due to your constant vigilance on the matter, wanting her to be able to communicate properly.
As Joel reaches for the dial pad to input the code, the dog begins to grumble out a low warning, the sound gaining volume the longer Joel stands there. No doubt, they’re on alert because of his sporadic visits and the figure of Ellie beside him now during this unexpected one. Normally he’ll leave word of when he’s planning to make the trek, to give you the chance to patrol the area around Lincoln and to give the small pack of guard dogs an old pair of his boots to get acclimated to his scent. A precaution you’re adamant about, as you’ve been the one to train the dogs since they were pups and stumbled upon them out in the forest beside their passed mother.
“No, that’s Joel.” The dog quiets down but still stand guard from behind the fence. “She doesn’t recognize your scent.”
“I know, sweetheart. Things…things got a little-“
“Complicated, that’s what momma says all the time.” And it hurts, the words not meant to be biting but their teeth catch his skin all the same. All the time, all the time, all the time…all the time he’s missed out spending with her, with you, with making his plan for finding a better place a reality. He feels the drag of her words as they shake in his head, digging in deep before they release him, if only for a moment before he manages a response.
“Exactly, things got complicated.” Joel looks around for a brief moment, seeing the dark figure of the dog that’s been following them disappear around the far-off corner of the fence line. “Can you let us in, I need to talk to your momma about some stuff.”
Your figure rounds the corner of the street, and you raise a hand in greeting, the three other dogs tight on your heels.
“Who the hell is that?” Ellie’s voice is almost awed, as she takes in the formidable image you make walking up to them calm as can be. You’ve got a shotgun secure in your hands, one shoulder raised higher to accommodate the weight of it, another handgun in a holster attached to your right thigh. Hair pulled back into a braid that is pinned up so there’s nothing to grasp and pull your balance off should someone try for it. You’ve got fingerless gloves on to help with your own grip, a knife glints against your hip as you turn to take in spaces between the buildings you walk past. The little girl in front of them smiles wide, the missing tooth in her bottom row obvious now.
“That’s Cane.” Joel raises a hand up in response.
“I’ve heard that name before…” Ellie murmurs, wracking her memory for why the name sounds so familiar. And then it comes to her, she’s heard it from Marlene when they were planning a more detailed out from the zone. Whispers from the boys in her ‘academy’. “She’s the one everyone talks about in the zone, the one who got out.”
“Yeah, she definitely did that.” Joel’s eyes cut to her but quickly move back to your approaching form, so many things on the tip of his tongue and ghosting his lips that he wants to tell you. He knows everything will have its time, but his hackles are raised all the same as he sees the emotions swirling in your eyes.
Something’s changed, and not just on his end.
“To have this one, huh?”
“Safer here, yeah.”
“I’ll say, this set up is sick and those dogs. I wouldn’t fuck with ‘em.”
“You say a lot of bad words.” Rosie admonishes her as well as a five-year-old can.
“I would appreciate it if you cooled off on those, at least until a situation calls for it.” Your voice is smooth, controlled. Eyes talking in the young girl beside Joel. But there’s no sign of Tess, sparking your instincts even more so than the sudden arrival. Well, not so sudden now that you’ve checked the communication log and glimpsed the last song relayed over the airwaves for him to hear. It was broadcast just for him, after all.
But you weren’t the one to program it, so Bill must’ve done so before going about setting up… You shake your head, not dwelling on it at the moment, needing to be present and prepared. Something is obviously wrong if Joel is suddenly here, promising to return months ago and with a young girl who you’ve never seen before. Jean’s face flashes in your mind’s eye, your heart panging and your blood flashing impossibly hot at the memories of her last moments. You wouldn’t do that that again, you won’t.
But Joel has a bleeding heart, even if he’s loath to admit it.
The fact that it’s been buried and hardened over the last decade and a half means nothing when faced with someone who truly needs his help.
“Bill and Frank? Expected Bill to be the welcomin’ party, not this lil one.” Joel offers a half smile to his daughter, though you see how his eyes pinch around the corners. Take in the grey that lightens his hair and scruff, his jaw is tense as are his shoulders. He’s on alert the same as you. Something is wrong and not just on your own front, but his too. It’s in the air, in the clouds that linger too low and too grey to the ground. Storms put you on edge now, and one is brewing both up in the sky and down here on the ground.
“They’re around, it can wait. Who’s this?” You sling the shotgun around your shoulder and move to input the code on the dial pad situated on your side of the fence. You reprogrammed it once you got back and found…you shake your head slightly, refocusing on the present. The code Joel had not working to let him in and you don’t want to longer outside longer than necessary. It beeps as the mechanism clicks heavily, and Joel’s large hand pushes it open and he ushers the girl inside with a stern look and quick nod of his head.
She follows suit, not arguing with him though you see the slight hesitation in her shoulders and behind her watchful eyes. She’s not had it easy, you would guess. But then again, no one in the zones has it easy. Too many people, too little resources, more and more of them falling, crumbling, giving way to worse conditions and regimes as time draws on and the world that once was becomes more tangled memories than the goal of what to return to. The world is fucked, simple as that.
There is no going back to how it was before, but there’s also very little hope of turning into something even remotely good. People altered by the cordyceps virus whether they’ve been infected or not.
“I’m Ellie! Are you actually friends with this asshole? He’s been nothing but a grump the whole way here.” The young girl chirps, eyes sparkling as you focus your attention on her as she moved about. She’s masking, but so are you. She’s a little scuffed up, there’s ash and dirt smeared on her cheek and forehead, her clothes are rumpled, and her hair is frizzed all to hell in her ponytail. Your hands itch to smooth it out, comb through the tangled tresses and urge her to let you foam up shampoo through it. To give her some semblance of comfort and cleanliness, but she also looks like she would fight you on it every step of the way.
“Been his friend for nearly a decade or two now, he’ll warm up to you in about three years.” You and Joel brush against each other as he walks through the opening, eyeing the dogs that sniff and snort around his ankles. Around Ellie’s. They begin to bark harshly, alerted to something that he knows will be an issue when it comes to the girl. They circle her but don’t lunge, they simply make it to where she’s separated from the small group, while the dog beside Rosie sticks by the little girl’s side. Protective and alert.
“You got any food, I’m fucking starving.” Ellie holds her hands up by her chest, not wanting the dogs to nip at her should she move in a way that can be perceived as threatening. You make a clicking noise, pitched high and then low- the dogs back off and begin to trot along the inside of the fence. Patrolling the area with rapt attention.
“Yeah, let’s get you girls settled and we’ll go from there.” You nod your head toward Joel. “Can fix up your hand too, while I’m at it.”
“Bill cookin’ up something?” Joel watches the way you keep Ellie in your view, the dog’s behavior obviously telling. He trails behind until the two girls lead the way, Ellie asking if the younger knew how to use the gun and how lucky she is to have one.
“I’ll be doin’ it. He’s a bit busy at the moment, Frankie isn’t having such a good day.”
“Those are the guys you told me about, they’re…cool right?” The teenager is suddenly tense, her tiny shoulders arched up but not quite up to her ears as she turns around. She’s like a cautious pup, ready to run at the faintest sign of trouble. But the reason remains a mystery to you as to why the caution at new people…
“Yes, but Bill isn’t going to like this.” Joel does very little to settle the girl’s nerves, if anything his words give her more reason to be anxious. Her eyes scan the area, peer through the windows that have collected a bit of dirt and grime from the wind that frequents the waning summer days.
“It’ll be okay, trust me. He’s…it’ll be okay. Come on in, we’ll get everything settled.”
“Hey,” Joel whispers low as he walks side by side with you behind the girls who are chatting away. You’re barely able to look at him, eyes glancing away the second his soften when they meet yours. He knows something is wrong, that something isn’t right and it’s affecting you. That you’re putting on a front for your daughter, for the new teenager he has found himself in charge of. But not for him, secrets no longer something kept from each other.
“We can talk later, it’s been…it’s not been good lately. First with you going radio silent for months and then…I’ll fill you in once the girls go down.”
“Okay.” He reaches for your hand with his good one, surprised that you let him wrap his fingers around yours to squeeze them in an attempt to comfort you as you walk through the town. A lot has happened since the last time you saw each other, arguably too much. He knows he’s messed up, things out of his control making it so and no matter what he’s grateful for you still being here, waiting for him. But his grip tightens painfully when you ask after Tess.
“Got bit.” Was his clipped answer, unable to delve into it just as much as you were unable to delve into your side of things. You both can so easily read each other, even if years have passed. Attuned to each other at the very core, bonded.
The girls settle in the sun room, the dogs now circling the house with near silent communication with each other. Ellie is ferocious with how fast she eats, using the bottom of her shirt to wipe her mouth from the sauce that drips down her chin, the chicken tender and the rice fluffy. Joel doesn’t ask why the doors to the dining room are closed off and locked, though his gaze does linger down the hallway at them as well as the closed and locked bedroom door across from the kitchen.
“Ellie, why don’t you go on upstairs and shower. I know it’s early, but you must be tired from the trek, it’s a long one.” You address her after she’s had a second helping and enough water to fill her glass four times over. She deserves a good meal, a filling meal after the trip out of the zone. “Rosie, please set up the second room once you show her, okay baby?”
“Yes, momma.” She goes to stand, but when she reaches for her plate, you tell her you’ll take care of it.
Ellie picks up her empty one and takes it into the kitchen, your eyes following her until Rosie’s voice pulls your attention back to the man still seated on the loveseat you two occupy. The plates gathered in your hand from her and Joel don’t rattle, even as the girls voice softens.
“I missed you, papa.” She tells him in a loud whisper, snuggling her face into his chest as she wraps her arms around his neck, crawling into his lap. His long arms wrap around her, pulling her tightly to him and he breaths in the scent of her clean, curly hair. It’s darker than his, like it used to be before the world aged him and his bottom lip trembles as he recalls trying to end it all after the last time he held a small body to his this desperately.
“I missed you too, sweetheart. You have no idea.” He clenches his eyes tight, tears springing up as he feels your hand gently cup the back of his head. You lean over the two and press a kiss to his temple, right over the scar you know he’s thinking about.
“Are you gonna leave again?”
“No, baby girl, I’m gonna stick right by your side, okay?”
“They’re gone.” You finally admit, handing over a dripping plate for Joel to dry with a kitchen towel. Side by side at the double sink, he turns to catch the side of your grim expression.
“What happened?”
“They…Frankie- he, he was getting worse and worse each day. Couldn’t even really get out of bed and didn’t want to, but he was, god he was so nice and kind to Rosie still. And I shouldn’t have left, should’ve stayed because then maybe, I should’ve known, Joel. He…he had Bill dose him up, so many pills in that bottle of wine. They both…they both drank it. Laid down for bed and never woke up. There’s a letter for you, with the one they left me. They were tired and old, Joel, they were done.”
“Cane…” Joel’s chest feels heavy, the news too much on top of losing Tess. It’s as if what little support the two of you had is suddenly gone, leaving you both the only ones to shoulder what is left. He truly felt alone in those moments, hours as he traveled with Ellie at his side. Everything seeming almost too overwhelming until the thought of getting back to you helped to ground him. But now, he’s finding out your own troubles have made you feel exactly like he does.
“It’s…it’s okay. They were…they…” You're unable to stop the hiccup that stalls the breath in your lungs. Joel is moving before he can even think that it was the wrong thing to do. Even if it turned out to be, he needed to take care of you, comfort you. He would take the aggression should there be any, but as you wrap your arms around his neck and curl into his chest with still dripping hands, he knows he did the right thing. He knows the anger you feel for the situation has waned, if it ever caught in the first place.
His arms wrap around your back, cradling you to him, running them across the soft fabric of your shirt to help sooth you.
“Frankie was my family.” The words sneak out of you, broken and cracked, your voice low and so unlike you.
“I know, darlin’, I know.” Joel’s arms flex as he holds you, giving you a moment to just feel. You’ve no doubt been holding everything down here, doing everything you can for the little homestead and making sure everyone was taken care of and protected. He can give you this, even if it doesn’t feel like enough, like it will never be enough to make up for the mistakes he’s made with you in the attempt to make things easier.
“You still got me, I’m here.” He presses his lips to the crown of your head, inhaling the light scent of your shampoo. His eyes flutter shut as he thinks of Tess’s last words and the way she looked at him before shouting at him to run. “I’m here.”
It was confusing for the girls, no doubt, the sudden shift from the house they slept in the night before.
But you couldn’t stand another second of being in the final resting place of your two companions, not wanting to disrespect their final wish to be in the home they shared and remain there even after their last breath. Thankfully Bill and Frank had begun to convert one of the other homes in the cordoned off town for you, the hope that Joel would stay one time instead of returning to the zone unspoken but prepared for. You gathered things as quietly as you could while the others slept, Joel rousing every so often from where he laid out in the couch in the living room- not willing to leave you alone despite how sleep gently tugged at him.
The master bedroom was set with supplies and decorated much like your own room in the main house, the rest of the rooms acting as a backup. Rosie quickly adapted to her new room, her determination to carry lightly packed loads in a little wheeled wagon tiring her out and she slept easy that same time after dinner. Ellie too adapted quickly, though you could see the exhaustion in her small body and the trauma flashing behind her eyes.
“Can I ask you a question?” She reached for your hand, though she seemed to think better of actually touching you at the last second and her hand fell back to her side.
“Of course, Ellie, whatever you have on your mind.” You linger in the doorway of her room, just down the hall from Rosie’s on the second floor. Joel was puttering around her room as she drifted off. The heavy conversation of explaining what happened to Bill and Frank taking it out of her.
All of her questions, her wide eyes, her tears, it was all so much to handle, and you don't ever want to have to tell her news like that again. Joel held her in the cradle of his arms as you both talked her through it, her heart so small but so big at the same time. You blink back to the present, Ellie's face coming into focus in front of you.
“Are you…you’re okay with sharing your supplies like this?” Her silent ‘with me’ hangs in the air and your hand drops from the doorknob you were grasping to pull the door shut behind you. You lock your eyes with her and cup your hand over her small shoulder.
“I’ll give you whatever you might need, well within reason.” You offer her a small smile, wanting her to understand that you mean the sentiment.
“I’m not, I mean, I don’t…you don’t know me.” Her eyes rove across your face, gauging your reasons and reaction, searching for something she won’t find.
“So?”
“So, you don’t have to…put up with me just because Joel got stuck with me.”
“Ellie, I don’t do anything I don’t want to. Regardless of whatever Joel’s gotten himself into.” You reach for the doorknob again and hold it steady. “We’re going to do everything we can to get you to where you need to be, I promise you that. Now get some sleep, okay?”
She nods once, her brows furrowing much like Joel’s do. She’s not been handed an easy life, but then again no one is these days. She’s just a child who’s been tossed to FEDRA for whatever they might need use of her for before Marlene and her crusade decided to pull her. But then again, you don’t think the woman has the best intentions if she’s the one who put Ellie there in the first place.
She softens, the past few days and then the company of Joel ringing her like a shock collar. Her full face still carries youthful characteristics, her freckles and excited nature envious even if it’s tamped down at the moment making your chest hurt as you see Jean in her as much as in Rosie. You watch as her shoulders slump and walks over to the bed, gripping a small book in her hands and curling with it underneath the covers before you turn away and close the door behind you.
Sighing you make your way down the narrow steps to the first floor, the locks and windows checked before you stand in the doorway to the kitchen. Joel is huddled over the dining table set in a corner of the space, map laid out in front of him.
“We’ve got the three dogs. They’ll stick with the girls. I want them protected, in case anything happens, and we can’t get to them immediately. Commands are easy, they’ll heed Rosie’s voice.”
He looks out the window to see two of them rounding this side of the house, on alert and doing their own thing now that the sun has set. He admires the dedication that it took you to train them, something he never would have thought to do. Too preoccupied with the trade in the zone and keeping Tess safe, let alone taking on another task to keep tabs on. You and Rosie already behind every action, even the bad ones that he’s now completely clean of.
“The truck workin’?”
“Yeah, Bill made sure to maintenance it every so often. Supplies for a new battery are in the garage, we don’t use it much because of the noise. It’ll get us as far as we can manage it, but I’m sure we’ll run into either a blockade or a backed-up road at some point. We just need to stay clear of major highways, but it’s not completely avoidable at certain junctions.”
Joel traces a route with a thick finger all the way from where you are to Cody, Wyoming. The last place either of you can recall Tommy mentioning before the communication cut off completely.
It’s far. But not impossible.
“Marlene said something about a Firefly base there and one in Colorado. That’s where Ellie is supposed to go.” It’s two different destinations, but you only intend to head to one.
“No, Marlene can fuck off. I’m not interested in helping her. I’m more concerned about keeping Ellie as far away from whatever they have planned just as much as I am about finding Tommy.”
“Kid might have something to say about that.” He knows he’s smirking, reveling in the way you seem invigorated by the prospect of finally, finally getting out on the road and toward something with him.
He’s not loath to admit like he once was- but you’re so sure of yourself and skills, not taking shit from anyone if you could help it. He recalls the way you knew all along the way him and Tess were going to confront you that first time once they learned who had the most power in the underbelly of the zones activities. You had known they would find your apartment, hide out, try to ambush you for information, you had known before they even knew it themselves.
“Don’t care, she’s in your charge- my charge, she’s young, she’s got to understand that sometimes what you’re told to do and what is best are different things.”
Joel had been upfront, about Ellie’s immunity. You don’t dispute it, the events line up with Marlene trying to pull out of the zone that steadily worsened. Taking the one resource she has out of the environment and moving her entire set up to another base, another location, the only thing that truly bothered you about the whole thing is that there is absolutely no way to even attempt at making a ‘cure’ with only one test subject. Without subjecting them to either a lifetime of pain and suffering in the endeavor of research or outright killing them to gauge the inner workings of someone with such a compatibility to the cordyceps.
You’ve been around people with incurable diseases for a lot of your life, first with your mother and then Frank. And while it’s painful and a lot of wear on the soul and heart, some things just are the way that they are. The infection and spread of cordyceps is one of those things that nature decided to make untreatable, lethal, fatal. Ellie bearing the weight of the entire human race on her young shoulders, is a lot to ask, even for Marlene. Whatever connection the two of them have, it’s not a good enough reason to convince you that the girl would be on board with either scenario that the Fireflies have planned for her.
You didn’t have anyone to watch over you and the path you ended up on was harsh. The demeaning and inhumane way you were sold like common goods forever burned into your psyche, but with Ellie you can prevent the same faith. It may not be exactly the same, but her body wouldn’t be hers if she were to go along with the plan laid out for her. Her autonomy no longer hers and you don’t think she even realizes it. What’s worse is that she could but has been told so many times that it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. But it does matter and it always will.
You won’t let another girl fall victim to the way the world has fallen.
Not Ellie and not Rosie. Not if you could help it.
As if to accentuate the dour mood that’s fallen over the wrecked plans, thunder rumbles in the distance before rain begins to pelt down in relentless sheets.
I need fanfics. I SAID FANFIC NOT SMUT. I’m so tired of seeing only smut when I try to find some good stories. No I don’t want to read that, I need Angst, I need to cry, to feel good, I need fluff. I need to read some masterpiece who’s going to feed my imaginations. I want to read actions. I mean when did we get to this point? These good fanfics years ago were amazing and now all we have is sex like wtf ?? I don’t need that. So pls write some proper stories.
I get that a lot of people want to read different genres of stories, but please, before coming in here with a demanding tone or straight-up rude comments like “write proper stories” remember that you’re talking to real human beings. People who have responsibilities, like work, studies, or mental health struggles, and who STILL take time out of their day to write stories they willingly share with you for free!!!! without asking for anything in return!!!!
I don’t want to start any kind of conflict by saying this, I just happened to see this in my feed and wanted to share my thoughts on the matter. I think people can try other approaches if they’re frustrated, look for authors whose style you enjoy, ask for recommendations, filter tags, or even write and share the content you want to see. Again, I understand the frustration of not finding what you want to read, but demonizing smut, claiming it can’t have a good story behind it, or treating writers like they owe you something isn’t the way to go, people.
I just wanted to say this because it makes me a little sad to see people complaining all the time and treating writers as if they’re your employees rather than creators sharing their passion, especially since writers have every right to write whatever they want.
My two cents. You are not just venting here when you post this sort of thing. You are shaming writers (and readers of smut) and demanding the food be prepared the way you like. You are not a customer at a restaurant. People write for themselves and share it in this space for other people who enjoy the work. Tag list exists for a reason. Learn how to use it and shut the fuck up.
Summary: Time doesn't stop. The years come and go. The need for hunting and gathering, for planning and teaching- raising a child fills your days. Joel is absent without meaning to be, showing up when it counts but that errant thought of a different time and a different life with him fills the space between your thoughts.
Word Count: 6.9k
Warnings: canon typical violence, canon typical language,, outbreak fic, darker fic, adult language, reader has no canon name but has a commonly used nickname, reader is mostly blank slate but has hair that can be pulled back, fighting, references to injuries, blood, pregnancy and pregnancy symptoms, brief descriptions of birth, illusions to birth, birth complications, strained relationship dynamic, internal self-depreciation, postpartum troubles, long distance relationship, joel feels like an absent father, use of narcotics, alcohol abuse, degenerative disease, medical jargon, smut, unprotected p in v, thigh riding, joel is lowkey a menace (respectfully and disrespectfully) this is super angsty until it isn't? time skip! um i think that's it for this one
A/N: so, after reading over the nearly 15k i have in the document for this fic, i decided to split it into an even 12 chapters total. i think i was struggling with tying up the story perfectly and it wasn't working out. but that's good for y'all and for me lol, gives us a little more time with these two! please lemme know what you think?
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Your entire body hurts, every muscle is lit up like you’ve just been electrocuted or struck by lightning, your brain is frazzled and even your teeth ache and cinch in your mouth as you scream out to release some of it, any of it. The calm stillness of the room is broken by your sudden surge, your body jerking back to consciousness harshly as you sit up from the bed you realize is where you’re resting. The scream you let out was more of a growl that echoes in the silent room as it rips through your sore throat.
Your hands fly to your middle, where the burning feeling that consumes you is the most concentrated, almost blinding in its intensity when your eyes flash open only to reveal how blurry your vision is. But something is wrong, you don’t feel anything but the swollen skin of your stomach. There’s no movement beneath the bulge there and it’s smaller than when you- did you even fall asleep? The last thing you remember is being so fucking exhausted and then nothing.
Your mind struggles to recall just how you ended up in the bed, there was booming thunder and loud rain… And then the sound that feels more like an alarm buzzing in your ears becomes clear- a cry.
A baby’s cry.
But…you recall the desperation and panic that seized you when you cradled Jean’s baby, flashes of her difficult and short birth red and stark in your mind’s eye. Tears well up, frustration and heartbreak but then there’s movement, a figure approaching the bed and sitting on the edge beside you. Your attention and vision snap back into focus, into the present. Understanding seeps into your muscles as hands reach for you and a firm body cradles you- calming you.
Joel.
It’s Joel.
You croak out his name and he repeats yours in a whisper, his lips chapped and the wrinkles that show his age come into focus when you blink the tears away from stinging eyes. He looks so handsome, so strong despite the exhaustion that’s clear in his own expression, the exact same that saps all your sudden energy from awaking in the way you did. You slump forward, upper body against his as you realize how stiff your legs are, how you still feel a dull fire between them.
“Shh, shh, it’s okay. You’re okay,” His deep voice is soothing, his warmth calms the frazzled nerves that light up every inch of your skin as you press your face into the column of his neck and try to suck in a full breath. But you hiccup instead, the events before catching up with you far too quickly. “You did such a good job, darlin’. You did so fucking good.”
“W-where’s my baby?” You manage to get out, barely audible from where you press so closely to the man that you walked away from. “Are they-“
You feel his pulse rachet up against your forehead before you pull away slightly. But he’s suddenly quiet and your own heart thuds as you realize you don’t hear any sounds other than Joel’s breathing and your own. Panic flares like the chill of a strong breeze in winter, stealing the breath out of your lungs and freezing you in your spot. The heavy feel of a slack body weighs down your arms and you worry you’ll feel it for real once again. But then the door opens further from where it wasn’t closed all the way.
“She’s right here, honey,” Frank’s voice is suddenly there, cradling a small bundle in his arms. You see a small fist rise up and you’re practically throwing yourself toward him. Joel’s arms wrap around you as you flinch, breath punching out of your lungs at the stinging pain that courses over your entire body.
“Easy, easy. Body is a little tired, darlin’, she’s right here.” Joel adjusts you carefully, to lean back against his chest where he slipped in behind you to lean against the headboard. Your skin feels so hot to the touch, but you feel cold despite it- reveling in the heat that radiates from Joel. The panic still residing in your body despite the reassurances spoken to you. He settles a hand over your chest to get your breathing under control, as he shares a look with Frank.
“Frankie, I-“ Your eyes betray the barrage of feelings, the memories of the last time you were conscious- what an intense set of events that occurred.
“You’re okay, honey, everything is okay. We’ve got everything under control, right now you just concern yourself with feeding your little girl.” He’s soft and in control of his motions as he sets the wiggling and softly cooing bundle in your ready arms. With a little uncomfortable shifting, you lean back fully against Joel, his thighs bracketing you and allowing you a supportive space as you realize each little ache and pain from the birth you don’t fully recall.
Frank stands there for a moment, making sure a small collection of items is within reach for you and Joel, that you’re both set before he quietly closes the door behind you with a watery smile.
“You did so good, darlin’, you really did.” Joel presses the words to the side of your head as he leans down a little to peek at the little girl in your arms. “She’s mighty hungry, but if you can’t…or it doesn’t work, we’ve got a bottle of formula right here.”
You barely hear him, the words more of a feeling as they vibrate through you. Focus trained entirely on the light weight in your arms, fingers carefully adjusting the blanket she’s wrapped in to see her wide blinking eyes and her chubby cheeks. Her skin is like Joel’s, a little tan but not as much as his, though you imagine as she grows and spends more time out in the sun it will. Her head is covered in a thick cap of curls that are flattened from being protected by a little beanie, the one you worked hard on stitching together from leftover clothing.
Her eyes are a glittering brown, golden hued and it makes your stomach clench when they land on yours and she wiggles a little harder. Spit bubbled over her little lips and a watery laugh hiccups out of your own as you lean down and nuzzle your nose against hers. She kicks her feet wildly, little huffs of her voice bouncing around the room before she takes a deep breath and cries.
“Oh, oh, none of that now, little one,” You whisper as you shift her a little lower. One of Joel’s hands comes around to help support her underneath the arm you keep protectively curled underneath her so you can unbutton the shirt you woke up in. You guide her to your chest, and she begins to fuss something fierce until she clamps onto you and it’s both alarming and amazing how quickly she begins to feed.
“There you go, hungry little thing,” You whisper, awed by the foreign feeling. You hiss out a heavy breath at the pull.
“She’s been waiting for you, wailin’ her little head off the whole time.” Joel keeps his voice low and the sound of it pulls something taut deep inside you. He’s suddenly wiping the tears that waterfall from your eyes with a little cloth. You both sit in heavy silence for a moment as she feeds, the exhaustion of the past couple of days finally settling. And then- you begin to hum a melody you forgot you knew, an old thing your parents would soothe you with way, way before the world fell apart. Joel’s own humming joins seamlessly after a verse and you feel far more content than you ever thought you would be after witnessing your first infected nearly sixteen years ago.
“Steady, steady.” Joel’s voice is a low hum, his arms out for you to use for stability as you step into the running shower. The stall is cleared of everything, to make it easier for you to move about, but also…your eyes go over the stuff collected in a bin through the plastic curtain- all of Jean’s personal items. She hadn’t made it, the two men startling her so badly that it triggered a heart attack you couldn’t bring her back from. The spray is warm, steam curling around the small room and you try to remember her smile instead of her final frown.
“There we go,” He keeps one arm out for you, stepping in to join you underneath the spray. His underwear is still on, and he catches your downward gaze. “Didn’t want to impose more than I already am.”
You just hum as his hands wrap loosely around you, helping to keep you steady as you run your hands down your arms in a self-cradling motion. You lean back into his chest, taking the support willingly, gratefully.
“You were out for a long while, passed out right after I cleaned her a bit and put her in your arms, but you did so, so well,” His fingers splay over your still swollen stomach. “Just wanna let the spray wash you off a bit, but a bath would be best.”
“Just…just lemme stand here for a bit. I don’t…I don’t remember much of it other than the pain.” Flashes are all that come to mind. Of shooting out of bed at the crack of thunder and the boom of gunfire, urging Jean to remain hidden and safe, tending to Bill alongside Franke, the seizure, the sudden labor that hit you as you tried to help keep Jean calm, the attack of the two men you didn’t think could make it all the way into the fence let alone the sanctuary that the house has become. A little body refusing to breathe, Joel and then nothing but excruciating pain and the feeling of your stomach shifting.
“You didn’t tear, it went as smoothly as it could. But you bled a bit, probably a little too much so we did a transfusion once you were out. Good thing we have the same blood type, Bill too.” Joel’s hands are light on where they caress your stomach, trying to help ease you in whatever way he can.
“How long was I out?”
“Most of the night and some of the morning Reckon it’s about midday now.”
You hum, letting him know you heard him but as your legs begin to tremble after a while, he reaches around to shift the shower to the tap. He keeps the quiet as he lets the tub fill up halfway, settling across from you in the small space and uses a damp cloth to rub body wash over your skin. You don’t feel any kind of way about being bare in front of him, knowing that it’s about tending to you.
You never anticipated being here, in this moment, when you first slammed your front door into him as he tried to hide behind it. Firing a warning at Tess across the room to turn a knife on him in the same breath. Threats that literally walked up your front steps and breached your front door.
But every breath caught in your lungs, every close call, dig of a blade, and shot fired- all of it brought you to this moment and you feel lucky the opportunity to grow and change and fight the circumstances you found yourself in to make it to this moment. You’re willing to do it all over again, to continue doing it if it means your daughter can have a life, can live and experience the good parts of the world that still linger and not just merely survive.
You want to live and experience as much of her life as you can- you will. And you know Joel will do the same, he’d claimed you both on the cusp of her birth. You can only hope he will fight even harder now to make that reality.
“They’ve started cracking down on runs, even more so now. FEDRA is paranoid and hangings are happenin’ on a nearly weekly basis.” Joel murmurs as you try and stretch out your sore legs. Both of you occupy chairs set up on the front lawn, a chance to get some sun after a rough first few days of random bouts of sleeping and feeding, feeding and sleeping. He’s staying- for now. You don’t question for how long.
“Did they put up check points between the districts?”
“I- yeah, how did you know?” His head turns from where he was whittling a small block of pine he swiped from a box in the garage. Eyes questioning as he looks you over from the top of your messy updo, to the still swollen bump of your middle, to your bare feet resting in the grass. You can see by how something flashes behind his eyes, a past conversation- past conflict coming to his mind in that moment.
“Couple a guys sent messages through the air for me, coded.”
He’s quiet, and you feel the tension build between you two.
“Joel, I…I never actually worked at the brothel. I was only there to put up a front to get the girls more in exchange for the work they did there.” The reasoning is on the tip of your pointed tongue, you know why you do the things that you do- used to do. Anything to help the girls who felt like they had to subject themselves to that realm of the new world order as a means of survival. Your own sordid past of being forced into that realm something you don’t often think back on, but something that has shaped you and your mentality all the same.
It was one of the things that tipped you both into what you are now. His jealously and anger at the image of you walking out of the brothel too much for him to handle- tipping him over into confronting you. The fire you matched, the attitude you matched. The challenge is still there as the tension in his shoulders as he flicks his gaze away but refuses to say anything.
“I’m not going to apologize for helping those girls, for how it looked.”
“You don’t owe me an explanation, Cane.” He begins to move his hands again, guiding the pocket knife in his grip against the block of wood. You watch his hands, skilled, strong, scarred, as they work to transform the mundane into a small dog. Much like the one you keep tucked against the lamp on your bedside table. The one you’ve begun to let your daughter finger and coo over as her little pink fingers slide over the smooth texture of it. “I didn’t exactly give you a reason with Jean and then…”
“Survival is…it looks different for everyone.”
“It looks ugly for some people, it is ugly for some people.”
“If you came back with me…” He doesn’t look over at you this time, instead his focus remains on his hands, his ministrations. Though you know it took so much for him to voice that very thought. Your silence is answer enough, the reasons many, the doubts taking root that this would’ve played out any differently.
“But you won’t.” He doesn’t ask, he doesn’t tell, he states is as a strict thing- something you don’t want to argue. Because you don’t want to return and you won’t. Not even for him, not even for Joel Miller.
“Tommy mentioned finding something out there.” Is your response, quiet and contemplative. You hadn’t dared to hope, something squashed and beaten out of you by what the world turned people into. But it bloomed all the same when Tommy’s voice quieted after saying how beautiful the land was all around him. The flourishing forests and woods, the trees as tall as could be once left alone by humanity. Rivers flowing and fish abundant in them, tracks of animals nearly miles long as they migrate between the seasons. It instilled that hope deep inside you, settled heavy in the back of your mind as you busied yourself with growing a new life here away from the zone.
“He’s been silent on our front, last I heard he was settling in somewhere in Colorado.”
“He…has, yes.”
Bill comes outside then, helping you back into the home and leaves to fetch the plates of lunch while Joel hovers as you sit as straight as you can in a seat at the dining table. Making sure you’ve got a blanket folded atop the hard wood to help you be more comfortable. Afterwards, you settle back into your room with Joel. Silently he takes up the spot against the headboard and lets you settle up against him, helping to support your tired arms as you hold your daughter to your chest.
“He’s more talkative with you. It’s almost like…when he left, you two would’ve-“ He mumbles it out, the idea that’s bothered him for some time now. Guilt at not seeing you for so long, at not seeing his brother for even longer. Just seeing people who depend on him in some way and doing whatever it takes to ensure survival.
“It doesn’t matter, Joel. I’m here, right now, very much with you and we- we found each other, it doesn’t matter like that, he never mattered like that.” You lean back into him, shimming your shoulders a little to get closer to him. Your fingers tangling with his as they cup under the feeding baby in your arms.
“He’s closer to your age.”
“It’s the end of the fucking world and you’re worried about the decade and a half you have on me?” An eyebrow arches as you turn to look at him a little over your shoulder.
“A little, yeah.” He confesses into your shoulder, his chin hooked over it to gaze down at the small figure in your arms, the way she fusses and twitches until she settles and her eyes drift closed. “You deserve more time; she deserves more time.”
“We have time, for now, that’s all that matters.” You feel the roll of his lips, the brush of his scruff as he noses along your neck.
“You won’t be saying that when I can’t get out, when I can’t come back.”
“Then don’t go.” It’s the most selfish thing you’ve said since you announced you were leaving the zone for good. But you mean it just as much.
“I have to, for Tess. She’s-“
“She’s important to you.” You don’t ask if he’s fallen back into her bed, the treacherous, juvenile thought sticking in the back of your mind like chewed up gum on the sole of a boot. “She’s important to me too, but I know that you two…”
“Have history, yeah.” You don’t want to be jealous and you aren’t, not really. You know she’s a big part of his life long before you crossed paths. That he will always hold her in his heart and mind, ensure her own survival alongside his own- probably over his own. You hold the same spot inside of him, deeper somehow. As long as he continues to show up, to visit, it’s enough to sustain you.
“Give me a year. We can pinpoint Tommy’s whereabouts, see if it’s safe.”
“Joel…we can’t travel with a baby.” You fix your shirt back into place and rest her little body in the dip of your thighs, her sleeping face twitching. With careful fingers, you caress her chubby cheeks, reveling in how soft she feels.
“I’d do anything to protect her, to protect you. All of you.”
“Joel.”
“I’ll ask after Tommy. I’ll find us a better place. A real place.” You want to believe him, want to believe that there is something out there. But the reality is bleak, the travel is long, the journey potentially deadly. You only have one thing to say about it.
“We have to be smart about this. Smarter than we’ve ever been, she’s the most important thing now.”
“She is. She’s…I’d give my life for her.” He presses face against yours, gazing down as her little body stretches.
“I don’t want that, Joel. I want you to live for her.”
You can only hope that your words strike a cord and resonate with him when you part ways. He manages to stay for the first couple of hurdles of new motherhood, helping you to get as much rest as possible alongside Frank. Bill takes it upon himself to keep you supplied with snacks and drinks, it’s the easiest way for him to care for you, to give you a little peace of mind.
A month, that’s the time Joel spends with you before it becomes too risky. The threshold on which his decision to stay or go depends on. The time is enough for those to begin to question is whereabouts back in the zone, the perfect amount to push a story of him being sick with something that kept him confined to the apartment. Any longer and it becomes suspicious, not only to those he trades with but the soldiers that keep tabs on the population.
Joel begins to ask more specific questions of Tommy when they talk once a week on the radio. The connection more secure with how Bill’s set it up. Less so once he returns to the zone, to Tess. To the streets that seem to have gotten only more filthy in his time away, to the apartment that no longer feels like some semblance of refuge at the end of a long day.
But the questions remain the same, even if Tommy becomes more vague and communication becomes strained.
Where is he?
Is it safe?
Is there refuge for others?
If he left the Fireflies like he’s alluding, does that mean he found something else to fight for to protect?
Did he find someone like he found you?
He’s vague, but he’s not evasive.
Until he is evasive, giving only half answers that don’t reveal anything. Their once close and loving connection splintering even more so as time moves on. Fifteen years and it’s completely broken down, the bond they once had in a different life. Guilt and remorse, the realization that he’s different from when he last laid eyes on his brother in person makes Joel feel like he’s failed him in just another way he didn’t expect to. He’s changed, been changed by you only to resort back to the same bad habits v
And then- nothing.
It’s been six months this time around and nothing. He can only assume he’s stopped responding to you as well, safe outside of the zone, but he has no clue. He can’t get through the airwaves like he used to, the signals getting weaker and weaker as they regulate the power, the resources. The goddamn ability to run electricity and water in their own apartment. The songs that display sporadically are signals for all clear, for safety.
The only clue as to what’s going on is a lack of connecting the signal to where he was- or had been. He’s either moved on or the connection was lost to the tragedy that always inevitably plays out.
He starts to stockpile supplies, take lingering looks toward every vehicle and plans on how to even repair one he’s seen outside of a common meeting place in the ruins of the surrounding city. It’s been five years, nearly a whole one since he’s seen you. Seen his daughter. Going back on her birthday each year is all he can safely manage but even so, he feels…absent. Going back to the drinking and drugs, to trading with increased threats of violence to numb those feelings that he’d failed you in some way.
It’s the only way to rid himself of the guilt that he feels, the failure he feels. He’s not doing anything for you, for the child you two share. He’s not living, he’s just surviving- and that’s not what you asked of him.
He may not have lost this daughter, but it feels like it all the same as he exists completely apart from her.
Tess guides him, with instructions on where to go and who to trade with. Keeps him in the apartment, her apartment, when he’s overloaded and lost to the world as the drugs and alcohol consume him. She’s doing her best to look after him like you requested. But it’s not just for you, it’s for herself too- the love she carries for him and the bond they still share even if it’s not the same as it once was.
The morning goes smooth enough, a simple one. Bill making breakfast for everyone, making sure that Frank’s food is bite sized and his medicine is dosed correctly while you and Rosie sit on the other side of the table, you keep a watchful eye on her and Frank, both of them prone to choking or not chewing their food completely. But they are so positive and magnetic, though the scowl the little girl adopts when she’s trying to focus on something is all Joel Miller.
Your smile falters a little, mind consumed with thoughts of the man who you haven’t seen in years. The quality of life in the zone deteriorating drastically in the time you’ve been away, the implementation of check points and segregated areas of the zone making it hard for people to move beyond work detail and the slum apartments that were given to them. Overpopulated, nearly impossible to get in or out, the smuggling trade turning into scraping what could be found or taken from others. And you picture it so clearly, Joel’s lumbering form parting the crowd as he ambles down a street, his furrowed brow as he does the work required for ration cards, the slump of his shoulders once he retires at the end of the day- and you miss him.
Rosie shrieks suddenly, when the juice in her sippy cup is gone and it shocks you back to the present. You hush her gently, reminding her that everything is okay and that she can have some more at dinnertime if she’s a good listener all during the day. Frank’s eyes catch yours and he can see where your thoughts went as if you announced it. He knows you miss Joel, worry about him, but that you try and hide it because there’s nothing to be done about it.
There’s something else behind his eyes, something in the way he moves today- as if he’s savoring and paying extra attention to everything. Bill too, seems a little more silent and serious, but you just assume it was a rough morning for them. Some days are worse than others.
You may stray far from Lincoln, but you don’t dare go within the city limits of Boston. It’s too risky.
But today, you feel something in the air- the need to push the boundaries. Supplies are still abundant, the hunting is good, especially with the help of the dogs you’ve gotten trained over the years. The four of them doing more than just protecting and maintaining a good alarm system. But medicine, and specific modifications for everyday things for Frank are harder to come by or make, even if you and Bill do your best.
“Gonna go a little further out today, unless you need me here.” You gently wipe the mashed up potatoes from around Rosie’s smiling face, the fried pieces spectacularly mushed up from her enthusiastic bites.
“Make sure to take a long range,” Is Bill’s response as he begins to stack the empty plates and serving bowls everything was in. Family style meals were easiest, unless he decided to be a little fancier to cheer Frank up after a particularly rough day or you after a long bout of tending to a rambunctious five-year-old. He’s a good man, even if he’s more than a little rough around the edges.
“I can help!” Rosie claps her hands, causing the dog curled at the base of her chair to pick up its head, on alert at the loud tone.
“Honey, you’re gonna paint with me today, how does that sound?”
“We haven’t painted in so long!” the high pitch and excitement lights up the room, giving you the energy to push unwanted thoughts away and focus on what’s in front of you.
“It’s been a week,” Bill deadpans, though you see the corner of his lips turned up and the soft glint in his eye as he looks picks up the girl’s plate and then your own.
“That’s like…forever!”
“A week can feel like forever, baby, but it’s really not all that much time.”
“Papa goes for a long time,”
“Your papa visits when it’s important, baby, that’s what matters.”
Frank watches carefully, but you know he can sense the melancholy that sets in every year as Rosie’s birthday draws near. The day holds a lot more than her birth, but also two deaths that weigh heavily on you. The date is nearing and with it your hope for another return of Joel. He hasn’t missed one in the years that have passed but each year you worry all the same. This time is no different.
“Papa’s here!” Rosie announces the moment you’re within eyesight of the house. She’s out on the front lawn, her hand clasped tightly around his larger one. The dog beside you silently stays at your side, though you can sense the tension in his muscles. He’s never met Joel, though you know his scent lingers on a shirt that hangs in your closet. Your stomach flutters when your eyes catch Joel’s, he looks good. Something about the big, broad man unashamed to soften for the little girl at his side makes you realize how far you’ve both come since the early days of your tracks circling each other and then falling in line beside each other. “He made it early this time!”
“Two days early.” Your eyes rove over him, taking stock of him as he does the same. You know you must look a sight. Your pack is heavier than when you left this morning, though it’s the one you primarily used for hunting, lined with a protective tarp on the inside to prevent any blood staining and scenting the fabric. Partially to help with keeping you inconspicuous and partially to prevent predators from stalking you. You’ve got dirt smeared on your cheeks, clumped in your tied back hair, there’s a tear in your dark jeans from the snare trap you were checking on snaping wildly to catch at your thigh, and sweat dampens you in more places than you’d like. “Everything okay?”
He nods an affirmative, reaching with one arm to encompass you in a fleeting embrace. Rosie’s eyes glitter as she watches the way Joel presses his cheek to yours before pulling away, his voice a low rumble as he says something directly in your ear. She giggles and swings the arm attached to the hand still in her grip.
“It’s almost time for dinner, Uncle Bill said so.” Rosie singsongs as you kneel down to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. Her giggle as your fingertips tickle along her jaw light you up in the best way and you can’t help the smile that breaks out on your face. She tries to lower her voice, but it comes out as more of a stage whisper. “He was grumpy about making more, but I know he didn’t mean it.”
“He likes cooking, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, mama, he makes the best food always.”
“Yes he does, we’re lucky he likes us enough to share, huh?”
“He’s also grumpy because you were out alllll day.”
“I know I was out a long time, baby,”
“Did you get anything good?” When you shake your head imperceptivity, Joel scoops the girl up into his arms, hanging her over his shoulder like a sack of flour. You stick your tongue out at the girl as she hangs over his shoulder, jostling her with every exaggerated step back toward the house. You pivot from them heading into the living room and into the kitchen where Bill is steady at work over the stove.
“Rabbits galore, some snakes, nothing too crazy but I did see a lot of deer tracks. Can go out for a few days after Joel’s gone.”
“Take him with you, would make me feel a little better.”
“I doubt I’ll run into anyone. Again.” You don’t want to pull Joel away from Rosie, to make him feel like he’s missing out on more than he already does. You’ve placated him as best you could, but you’d be a goddamn liar if you didn’t admit to feeling a little jilted yourself. It’s been five years, five years since her birth, she’s turning six this year. And while he always makes a point to be present for her birthday, you see the signs of his addiction as clear as day and it worries you. You don’t blame him for how he copes with the things he’s experienced, but you do blame him for pushing off the plan he told you would only take a year.
“It’s not a matter of that.”
“I can take care of myself, Bill.” The words come out a littler harsher than you intended, internal anger and worry over Joel seeping out through them. You can take care of yourself, of Rosie, of Joel. You can take care of everyone but that doesn’t mean it’s tiring or that you wish you had a little help.
“Had to patch you up last time you went out that far. Frank was beside himself, beating himself up for not being able to go out like that anymore.” His goes back to what he’s doing, his hands busy stirring and adding things into a large pot. Looks and smells like gravy, something that is only an imitation of the real stuff what with the use of powdered milk. But it causes your stomach to grumble all the same as you busy yourself with tending to the spoils of your day.
“It’s not his fault, it’s just how the world is.”
“We need you to come back in one piece. All of us.” He pins you with a serious look, his eyes glinting as emotions rarely displayed bubbles to the surface as if they’ve been simmering just below. All you can do is nod, knowing that each day is a blessing in this life, something that could turn in a split second if you weren’t careful.
It’s a comfortable silence while you ready for bed. Joel filling the normally empty space beside you at the dining room table, his large hands expertly cutting up the smallest serving for the giggling girl who can’t keep her eyes off of him, in the sunroom for a cup of tea after, an extra set of hands to help you wrangle the little wiggly piece of your soul as you try and get her into bed, an extra set of hands to help you soothe your tired muscles underneath the hot spray of the shower, he fills the other side of the bed now, a lamp beside him the only light in the room.
Without a word you drape yourself over his stretched out body, hands slowly peeling the book out of his grasp and setting it down on his bedside table. When you look up from where your chin ghosts over his exposed chest, his eyes are already on you. The heat that swirls in them lances through your body and your legs tighten around one of his own. His arms move to drape over your back, hands spanning wide across the fabric of your shirt, the feel of them sparking tingles as they sink into you.
He breathes deep, chest rising underneath you as you press a kiss to his collarbone. The dusting of graying hair there is soft against your lips, invisible between your teeth as you nip the skin there. Your hands run up along his sides, feeling the width of him expand from the narrow hips your own are aligned with. His heart rachets up, beating fast underneath your exploring lips. Your own breath hitches when he adjusts the leg between your own to prop it up slightly. The feel of his muscled thigh firm at the apex between yours. Snaking his hands down your body, he palms the globes of your ass and grinds you down against him to stutter your breath again.
You push yourself up enough to connect your lips with his in a searing kiss, groaning into it as he flexes his thigh against you. The fabric of your oversized shirt moves and bunches around your waist, allowing him the pleasure of feeling the heat of your cunt directly through your underwear. He groans as you rut against him, gently guiding your rocking movement in the perfect way. His own arousal is trapped in his boxers, the friction of your hips allowing him fleeting brushes.
“Want you to sit on it,” He suckles along the curve of your jaw, nipping at the column of your throat and flexing his hands into your soft skin. “But first I want you to take what you need.”
A quiet whine is your only response, body humming and the heat of his hard body beneath you, around you, all over you is intoxicating. You try to move your hips in a steady rhythm, but when you catch your swollen clit on the fabric of your underwear when his hands grip it and pull it taut, it jolts your body harshly and you cry out.
“That’s it, just like that,” He murmurs, his own hips jerking up to meet yours as you begin to pant and whine against him. Your body misses him. From his smell to the feel of him against you, both carnally and casually. The few days you spent with him a year never seem to be enough, but they are what you have. You always connect like this, like magnets with opposite charges, like dogs in the pitches of heat.
Just as your pleasure crests, his hands move back up your body to cradle your face, framing it to watch as you give into it.
“Fuck, baby, you always look so beautiful like this,” His forehead connects with yours even as your hands begin to scramble, your fingers hooking soaked fabric to the side and pulling down the waistband of his own damp underwear. In one fluid motion, your legs straddle his waist and you lower yourself down onto him with a sigh of contentment. Through heavy breath and heavy eyes, you watch his mouth screw up with the hiss he lets out, reaching for his hands and securing them on the flare of your hips.
“Hold on tight, old man,” His throat bobs with a deep gulp of air just before you bounce, the exhale coming out as a strangled moan.
You feel warm, full, content as your body comes down from its ecstasy. But then again, you always do this time of year. Your life is better than you ever imagined it could be with your daughter and the presence of Bill and Frank. But the absence of the man beside you now weighs on you as it eclipses the time you can physically see him, feel him. You know how this world is, how cruel it is. The hands of fate twisting and tearing anything it can grasp, no matter how it would affect anyone or anything.
But the plan you once both agreed on fell to shambles the moment he returned to the zone. The reality of traveling already daunting without the added complication of a young child. Three people can move easily enough through open spaces and abandoned cities alike without detection. But children, even as well behaved as Rosie, add a whole lot more danger to a journey like the one that lingers in the back of your mind far too often.
The supplies that Bill accumulated lend a lot of aid, but they can only get you so far. Three people and a growing child is a lot to support, add in the declining health of Frank and it becomes even more strenuous of a situation. Joel and Tess help to fill the gaps, trade common when you do see each other.
It’s a stark and stressful fact of the matter that eventually, something needs to change.
And it seems that Joel is having the same thoughts as you. He speaks the words that have been weighing heavily on him. The very words you’ve been struggling with even as you shared them with Bill and Frank just a few days ago- the very words that set your life on a whole new course.
Summary: Time doesn't stop. The years come and go. The need for hunting and gathering, for planning and teaching- raising a child fills your days. Joel is absent without meaning to be, showing up when it counts but that errant thought of a different time and a different life with him fills the space between your thoughts.
Word Count: 6.9k
Warnings: canon typical violence, canon typical language,, outbreak fic, darker fic, adult language, reader has no canon name but has a commonly used nickname, reader is mostly blank slate but has hair that can be pulled back, fighting, references to injuries, blood, pregnancy and pregnancy symptoms, brief descriptions of birth, illusions to birth, birth complications, strained relationship dynamic, internal self-depreciation, postpartum troubles, long distance relationship, joel feels like an absent father, use of narcotics, alcohol abuse, degenerative disease, medical jargon, smut, unprotected p in v, thigh riding, joel is lowkey a menace (respectfully and disrespectfully) this is super angsty until it isn't? time skip! um i think that's it for this one
A/N: so, after reading over the nearly 15k i have in the document for this fic, i decided to split it into an even 12 chapters total. i think i was struggling with tying up the story perfectly and it wasn't working out. but that's good for y'all and for me lol, gives us a little more time with these two! please lemme know what you think?
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Your entire body hurts, every muscle is lit up like you’ve just been electrocuted or struck by lightning, your brain is frazzled and even your teeth ache and cinch in your mouth as you scream out to release some of it, any of it. The calm stillness of the room is broken by your sudden surge, your body jerking back to consciousness harshly as you sit up from the bed you realize is where you’re resting. The scream you let out was more of a growl that echoes in the silent room as it rips through your sore throat.
Your hands fly to your middle, where the burning feeling that consumes you is the most concentrated, almost blinding in its intensity when your eyes flash open only to reveal how blurry your vision is. But something is wrong, you don’t feel anything but the swollen skin of your stomach. There’s no movement beneath the bulge there and it’s smaller than when you- did you even fall asleep? The last thing you remember is being so fucking exhausted and then nothing.
Your mind struggles to recall just how you ended up in the bed, there was booming thunder and loud rain… And then the sound that feels more like an alarm buzzing in your ears becomes clear- a cry.
A baby’s cry.
But…you recall the desperation and panic that seized you when you cradled Jean’s baby, flashes of her difficult and short birth red and stark in your mind’s eye. Tears well up, frustration and heartbreak but then there’s movement, a figure approaching the bed and sitting on the edge beside you. Your attention and vision snap back into focus, into the present. Understanding seeps into your muscles as hands reach for you and a firm body cradles you- calming you.
Joel.
It’s Joel.
You croak out his name and he repeats yours in a whisper, his lips chapped and the wrinkles that show his age come into focus when you blink the tears away from stinging eyes. He looks so handsome, so strong despite the exhaustion that’s clear in his own expression, the exact same that saps all your sudden energy from awaking in the way you did. You slump forward, upper body against his as you realize how stiff your legs are, how you still feel a dull fire between them.
“Shh, shh, it’s okay. You’re okay,” His deep voice is soothing, his warmth calms the frazzled nerves that light up every inch of your skin as you press your face into the column of his neck and try to suck in a full breath. But you hiccup instead, the events before catching up with you far too quickly. “You did such a good job, darlin’. You did so fucking good.”
“W-where’s my baby?” You manage to get out, barely audible from where you press so closely to the man that you walked away from. “Are they-“
You feel his pulse rachet up against your forehead before you pull away slightly. But he’s suddenly quiet and your own heart thuds as you realize you don’t hear any sounds other than Joel’s breathing and your own. Panic flares like the chill of a strong breeze in winter, stealing the breath out of your lungs and freezing you in your spot. The heavy feel of a slack body weighs down your arms and you worry you’ll feel it for real once again. But then the door opens further from where it wasn’t closed all the way.
“She’s right here, honey,” Frank’s voice is suddenly there, cradling a small bundle in his arms. You see a small fist rise up and you’re practically throwing yourself toward him. Joel’s arms wrap around you as you flinch, breath punching out of your lungs at the stinging pain that courses over your entire body.
“Easy, easy. Body is a little tired, darlin’, she’s right here.” Joel adjusts you carefully, to lean back against his chest where he slipped in behind you to lean against the headboard. Your skin feels so hot to the touch, but you feel cold despite it- reveling in the heat that radiates from Joel. The panic still residing in your body despite the reassurances spoken to you. He settles a hand over your chest to get your breathing under control, as he shares a look with Frank.
“Frankie, I-“ Your eyes betray the barrage of feelings, the memories of the last time you were conscious- what an intense set of events that occurred.
“You’re okay, honey, everything is okay. We’ve got everything under control, right now you just concern yourself with feeding your little girl.” He’s soft and in control of his motions as he sets the wiggling and softly cooing bundle in your ready arms. With a little uncomfortable shifting, you lean back fully against Joel, his thighs bracketing you and allowing you a supportive space as you realize each little ache and pain from the birth you don’t fully recall.
Frank stands there for a moment, making sure a small collection of items is within reach for you and Joel, that you’re both set before he quietly closes the door behind you with a watery smile.
“You did so good, darlin’, you really did.” Joel presses the words to the side of your head as he leans down a little to peek at the little girl in your arms. “She’s mighty hungry, but if you can’t…or it doesn’t work, we’ve got a bottle of formula right here.”
You barely hear him, the words more of a feeling as they vibrate through you. Focus trained entirely on the light weight in your arms, fingers carefully adjusting the blanket she’s wrapped in to see her wide blinking eyes and her chubby cheeks. Her skin is like Joel’s, a little tan but not as much as his, though you imagine as she grows and spends more time out in the sun it will. Her head is covered in a thick cap of curls that are flattened from being protected by a little beanie, the one you worked hard on stitching together from leftover clothing.
Her eyes are a glittering brown, golden hued and it makes your stomach clench when they land on yours and she wiggles a little harder. Spit bubbled over her little lips and a watery laugh hiccups out of your own as you lean down and nuzzle your nose against hers. She kicks her feet wildly, little huffs of her voice bouncing around the room before she takes a deep breath and cries.
“Oh, oh, none of that now, little one,” You whisper as you shift her a little lower. One of Joel’s hands comes around to help support her underneath the arm you keep protectively curled underneath her so you can unbutton the shirt you woke up in. You guide her to your chest, and she begins to fuss something fierce until she clamps onto you and it’s both alarming and amazing how quickly she begins to feed.
“There you go, hungry little thing,” You whisper, awed by the foreign feeling. You hiss out a heavy breath at the pull.
“She’s been waiting for you, wailin’ her little head off the whole time.” Joel keeps his voice low and the sound of it pulls something taut deep inside you. He’s suddenly wiping the tears that waterfall from your eyes with a little cloth. You both sit in heavy silence for a moment as she feeds, the exhaustion of the past couple of days finally settling. And then- you begin to hum a melody you forgot you knew, an old thing your parents would soothe you with way, way before the world fell apart. Joel’s own humming joins seamlessly after a verse and you feel far more content than you ever thought you would be after witnessing your first infected nearly sixteen years ago.
“Steady, steady.” Joel’s voice is a low hum, his arms out for you to use for stability as you step into the running shower. The stall is cleared of everything, to make it easier for you to move about, but also…your eyes go over the stuff collected in a bin through the plastic curtain- all of Jean’s personal items. She hadn’t made it, the two men startling her so badly that it triggered a heart attack you couldn’t bring her back from. The spray is warm, steam curling around the small room and you try to remember her smile instead of her final frown.
“There we go,” He keeps one arm out for you, stepping in to join you underneath the spray. His underwear is still on, and he catches your downward gaze. “Didn’t want to impose more than I already am.”
You just hum as his hands wrap loosely around you, helping to keep you steady as you run your hands down your arms in a self-cradling motion. You lean back into his chest, taking the support willingly, gratefully.
“You were out for a long while, passed out right after I cleaned her a bit and put her in your arms, but you did so, so well,” His fingers splay over your still swollen stomach. “Just wanna let the spray wash you off a bit, but a bath would be best.”
“Just…just lemme stand here for a bit. I don’t…I don’t remember much of it other than the pain.” Flashes are all that come to mind. Of shooting out of bed at the crack of thunder and the boom of gunfire, urging Jean to remain hidden and safe, tending to Bill alongside Franke, the seizure, the sudden labor that hit you as you tried to help keep Jean calm, the attack of the two men you didn’t think could make it all the way into the fence let alone the sanctuary that the house has become. A little body refusing to breathe, Joel and then nothing but excruciating pain and the feeling of your stomach shifting.
“You didn’t tear, it went as smoothly as it could. But you bled a bit, probably a little too much so we did a transfusion once you were out. Good thing we have the same blood type, Bill too.” Joel’s hands are light on where they caress your stomach, trying to help ease you in whatever way he can.
“How long was I out?”
“Most of the night and some of the morning Reckon it’s about midday now.”
You hum, letting him know you heard him but as your legs begin to tremble after a while, he reaches around to shift the shower to the tap. He keeps the quiet as he lets the tub fill up halfway, settling across from you in the small space and uses a damp cloth to rub body wash over your skin. You don’t feel any kind of way about being bare in front of him, knowing that it’s about tending to you.
You never anticipated being here, in this moment, when you first slammed your front door into him as he tried to hide behind it. Firing a warning at Tess across the room to turn a knife on him in the same breath. Threats that literally walked up your front steps and breached your front door.
But every breath caught in your lungs, every close call, dig of a blade, and shot fired- all of it brought you to this moment and you feel lucky the opportunity to grow and change and fight the circumstances you found yourself in to make it to this moment. You’re willing to do it all over again, to continue doing it if it means your daughter can have a life, can live and experience the good parts of the world that still linger and not just merely survive.
You want to live and experience as much of her life as you can- you will. And you know Joel will do the same, he’d claimed you both on the cusp of her birth. You can only hope he will fight even harder now to make that reality.
“They’ve started cracking down on runs, even more so now. FEDRA is paranoid and hangings are happenin’ on a nearly weekly basis.” Joel murmurs as you try and stretch out your sore legs. Both of you occupy chairs set up on the front lawn, a chance to get some sun after a rough first few days of random bouts of sleeping and feeding, feeding and sleeping. He’s staying- for now. You don’t question for how long.
“Did they put up check points between the districts?”
“I- yeah, how did you know?” His head turns from where he was whittling a small block of pine he swiped from a box in the garage. Eyes questioning as he looks you over from the top of your messy updo, to the still swollen bump of your middle, to your bare feet resting in the grass. You can see by how something flashes behind his eyes, a past conversation- past conflict coming to his mind in that moment.
“Couple a guys sent messages through the air for me, coded.”
He’s quiet, and you feel the tension build between you two.
“Joel, I…I never actually worked at the brothel. I was only there to put up a front to get the girls more in exchange for the work they did there.” The reasoning is on the tip of your pointed tongue, you know why you do the things that you do- used to do. Anything to help the girls who felt like they had to subject themselves to that realm of the new world order as a means of survival. Your own sordid past of being forced into that realm something you don’t often think back on, but something that has shaped you and your mentality all the same.
It was one of the things that tipped you both into what you are now. His jealously and anger at the image of you walking out of the brothel too much for him to handle- tipping him over into confronting you. The fire you matched, the attitude you matched. The challenge is still there as the tension in his shoulders as he flicks his gaze away but refuses to say anything.
“I’m not going to apologize for helping those girls, for how it looked.”
“You don’t owe me an explanation, Cane.” He begins to move his hands again, guiding the pocket knife in his grip against the block of wood. You watch his hands, skilled, strong, scarred, as they work to transform the mundane into a small dog. Much like the one you keep tucked against the lamp on your bedside table. The one you’ve begun to let your daughter finger and coo over as her little pink fingers slide over the smooth texture of it. “I didn’t exactly give you a reason with Jean and then…”
“Survival is…it looks different for everyone.”
“It looks ugly for some people, it is ugly for some people.”
“If you came back with me…” He doesn’t look over at you this time, instead his focus remains on his hands, his ministrations. Though you know it took so much for him to voice that very thought. Your silence is answer enough, the reasons many, the doubts taking root that this would’ve played out any differently.
“But you won’t.” He doesn’t ask, he doesn’t tell, he states is as a strict thing- something you don’t want to argue. Because you don’t want to return and you won’t. Not even for him, not even for Joel Miller.
“Tommy mentioned finding something out there.” Is your response, quiet and contemplative. You hadn’t dared to hope, something squashed and beaten out of you by what the world turned people into. But it bloomed all the same when Tommy’s voice quieted after saying how beautiful the land was all around him. The flourishing forests and woods, the trees as tall as could be once left alone by humanity. Rivers flowing and fish abundant in them, tracks of animals nearly miles long as they migrate between the seasons. It instilled that hope deep inside you, settled heavy in the back of your mind as you busied yourself with growing a new life here away from the zone.
“He’s been silent on our front, last I heard he was settling in somewhere in Colorado.”
“He…has, yes.”
Bill comes outside then, helping you back into the home and leaves to fetch the plates of lunch while Joel hovers as you sit as straight as you can in a seat at the dining table. Making sure you’ve got a blanket folded atop the hard wood to help you be more comfortable. Afterwards, you settle back into your room with Joel. Silently he takes up the spot against the headboard and lets you settle up against him, helping to support your tired arms as you hold your daughter to your chest.
“He’s more talkative with you. It’s almost like…when he left, you two would’ve-“ He mumbles it out, the idea that’s bothered him for some time now. Guilt at not seeing you for so long, at not seeing his brother for even longer. Just seeing people who depend on him in some way and doing whatever it takes to ensure survival.
“It doesn’t matter, Joel. I’m here, right now, very much with you and we- we found each other, it doesn’t matter like that, he never mattered like that.” You lean back into him, shimming your shoulders a little to get closer to him. Your fingers tangling with his as they cup under the feeding baby in your arms.
“He’s closer to your age.”
“It’s the end of the fucking world and you’re worried about the decade and a half you have on me?” An eyebrow arches as you turn to look at him a little over your shoulder.
“A little, yeah.” He confesses into your shoulder, his chin hooked over it to gaze down at the small figure in your arms, the way she fusses and twitches until she settles and her eyes drift closed. “You deserve more time; she deserves more time.”
“We have time, for now, that’s all that matters.” You feel the roll of his lips, the brush of his scruff as he noses along your neck.
“You won’t be saying that when I can’t get out, when I can’t come back.”
“Then don’t go.” It’s the most selfish thing you’ve said since you announced you were leaving the zone for good. But you mean it just as much.
“I have to, for Tess. She’s-“
“She’s important to you.” You don’t ask if he’s fallen back into her bed, the treacherous, juvenile thought sticking in the back of your mind like chewed up gum on the sole of a boot. “She’s important to me too, but I know that you two…”
“Have history, yeah.” You don’t want to be jealous and you aren’t, not really. You know she’s a big part of his life long before you crossed paths. That he will always hold her in his heart and mind, ensure her own survival alongside his own- probably over his own. You hold the same spot inside of him, deeper somehow. As long as he continues to show up, to visit, it’s enough to sustain you.
“Give me a year. We can pinpoint Tommy’s whereabouts, see if it’s safe.”
“Joel…we can’t travel with a baby.” You fix your shirt back into place and rest her little body in the dip of your thighs, her sleeping face twitching. With careful fingers, you caress her chubby cheeks, reveling in how soft she feels.
“I’d do anything to protect her, to protect you. All of you.”
“Joel.”
“I’ll ask after Tommy. I’ll find us a better place. A real place.” You want to believe him, want to believe that there is something out there. But the reality is bleak, the travel is long, the journey potentially deadly. You only have one thing to say about it.
“We have to be smart about this. Smarter than we’ve ever been, she’s the most important thing now.”
“She is. She’s…I’d give my life for her.” He presses face against yours, gazing down as her little body stretches.
“I don’t want that, Joel. I want you to live for her.”
You can only hope that your words strike a cord and resonate with him when you part ways. He manages to stay for the first couple of hurdles of new motherhood, helping you to get as much rest as possible alongside Frank. Bill takes it upon himself to keep you supplied with snacks and drinks, it’s the easiest way for him to care for you, to give you a little peace of mind.
A month, that’s the time Joel spends with you before it becomes too risky. The threshold on which his decision to stay or go depends on. The time is enough for those to begin to question is whereabouts back in the zone, the perfect amount to push a story of him being sick with something that kept him confined to the apartment. Any longer and it becomes suspicious, not only to those he trades with but the soldiers that keep tabs on the population.
Joel begins to ask more specific questions of Tommy when they talk once a week on the radio. The connection more secure with how Bill’s set it up. Less so once he returns to the zone, to Tess. To the streets that seem to have gotten only more filthy in his time away, to the apartment that no longer feels like some semblance of refuge at the end of a long day.
But the questions remain the same, even if Tommy becomes more vague and communication becomes strained.
Where is he?
Is it safe?
Is there refuge for others?
If he left the Fireflies like he’s alluding, does that mean he found something else to fight for to protect?
Did he find someone like he found you?
He’s vague, but he’s not evasive.
Until he is evasive, giving only half answers that don’t reveal anything. Their once close and loving connection splintering even more so as time moves on. Fifteen years and it’s completely broken down, the bond they once had in a different life. Guilt and remorse, the realization that he’s different from when he last laid eyes on his brother in person makes Joel feel like he’s failed him in just another way he didn’t expect to. He’s changed, been changed by you only to resort back to the same bad habits v
And then- nothing.
It’s been six months this time around and nothing. He can only assume he’s stopped responding to you as well, safe outside of the zone, but he has no clue. He can’t get through the airwaves like he used to, the signals getting weaker and weaker as they regulate the power, the resources. The goddamn ability to run electricity and water in their own apartment. The songs that display sporadically are signals for all clear, for safety.
The only clue as to what’s going on is a lack of connecting the signal to where he was- or had been. He’s either moved on or the connection was lost to the tragedy that always inevitably plays out.
He starts to stockpile supplies, take lingering looks toward every vehicle and plans on how to even repair one he’s seen outside of a common meeting place in the ruins of the surrounding city. It’s been five years, nearly a whole one since he’s seen you. Seen his daughter. Going back on her birthday each year is all he can safely manage but even so, he feels…absent. Going back to the drinking and drugs, to trading with increased threats of violence to numb those feelings that he’d failed you in some way.
It’s the only way to rid himself of the guilt that he feels, the failure he feels. He’s not doing anything for you, for the child you two share. He’s not living, he’s just surviving- and that’s not what you asked of him.
He may not have lost this daughter, but it feels like it all the same as he exists completely apart from her.
Tess guides him, with instructions on where to go and who to trade with. Keeps him in the apartment, her apartment, when he’s overloaded and lost to the world as the drugs and alcohol consume him. She’s doing her best to look after him like you requested. But it’s not just for you, it’s for herself too- the love she carries for him and the bond they still share even if it’s not the same as it once was.
The morning goes smooth enough, a simple one. Bill making breakfast for everyone, making sure that Frank’s food is bite sized and his medicine is dosed correctly while you and Rosie sit on the other side of the table, you keep a watchful eye on her and Frank, both of them prone to choking or not chewing their food completely. But they are so positive and magnetic, though the scowl the little girl adopts when she’s trying to focus on something is all Joel Miller.
Your smile falters a little, mind consumed with thoughts of the man who you haven’t seen in years. The quality of life in the zone deteriorating drastically in the time you’ve been away, the implementation of check points and segregated areas of the zone making it hard for people to move beyond work detail and the slum apartments that were given to them. Overpopulated, nearly impossible to get in or out, the smuggling trade turning into scraping what could be found or taken from others. And you picture it so clearly, Joel’s lumbering form parting the crowd as he ambles down a street, his furrowed brow as he does the work required for ration cards, the slump of his shoulders once he retires at the end of the day- and you miss him.
Rosie shrieks suddenly, when the juice in her sippy cup is gone and it shocks you back to the present. You hush her gently, reminding her that everything is okay and that she can have some more at dinnertime if she’s a good listener all during the day. Frank’s eyes catch yours and he can see where your thoughts went as if you announced it. He knows you miss Joel, worry about him, but that you try and hide it because there’s nothing to be done about it.
There’s something else behind his eyes, something in the way he moves today- as if he’s savoring and paying extra attention to everything. Bill too, seems a little more silent and serious, but you just assume it was a rough morning for them. Some days are worse than others.
You may stray far from Lincoln, but you don’t dare go within the city limits of Boston. It’s too risky.
But today, you feel something in the air- the need to push the boundaries. Supplies are still abundant, the hunting is good, especially with the help of the dogs you’ve gotten trained over the years. The four of them doing more than just protecting and maintaining a good alarm system. But medicine, and specific modifications for everyday things for Frank are harder to come by or make, even if you and Bill do your best.
“Gonna go a little further out today, unless you need me here.” You gently wipe the mashed up potatoes from around Rosie’s smiling face, the fried pieces spectacularly mushed up from her enthusiastic bites.
“Make sure to take a long range,” Is Bill’s response as he begins to stack the empty plates and serving bowls everything was in. Family style meals were easiest, unless he decided to be a little fancier to cheer Frank up after a particularly rough day or you after a long bout of tending to a rambunctious five-year-old. He’s a good man, even if he’s more than a little rough around the edges.
“I can help!” Rosie claps her hands, causing the dog curled at the base of her chair to pick up its head, on alert at the loud tone.
“Honey, you’re gonna paint with me today, how does that sound?”
“We haven’t painted in so long!” the high pitch and excitement lights up the room, giving you the energy to push unwanted thoughts away and focus on what’s in front of you.
“It’s been a week,” Bill deadpans, though you see the corner of his lips turned up and the soft glint in his eye as he looks picks up the girl’s plate and then your own.
“That’s like…forever!”
“A week can feel like forever, baby, but it’s really not all that much time.”
“Papa goes for a long time,”
“Your papa visits when it’s important, baby, that’s what matters.”
Frank watches carefully, but you know he can sense the melancholy that sets in every year as Rosie’s birthday draws near. The day holds a lot more than her birth, but also two deaths that weigh heavily on you. The date is nearing and with it your hope for another return of Joel. He hasn’t missed one in the years that have passed but each year you worry all the same. This time is no different.
“Papa’s here!” Rosie announces the moment you’re within eyesight of the house. She’s out on the front lawn, her hand clasped tightly around his larger one. The dog beside you silently stays at your side, though you can sense the tension in his muscles. He’s never met Joel, though you know his scent lingers on a shirt that hangs in your closet. Your stomach flutters when your eyes catch Joel’s, he looks good. Something about the big, broad man unashamed to soften for the little girl at his side makes you realize how far you’ve both come since the early days of your tracks circling each other and then falling in line beside each other. “He made it early this time!”
“Two days early.” Your eyes rove over him, taking stock of him as he does the same. You know you must look a sight. Your pack is heavier than when you left this morning, though it’s the one you primarily used for hunting, lined with a protective tarp on the inside to prevent any blood staining and scenting the fabric. Partially to help with keeping you inconspicuous and partially to prevent predators from stalking you. You’ve got dirt smeared on your cheeks, clumped in your tied back hair, there’s a tear in your dark jeans from the snare trap you were checking on snaping wildly to catch at your thigh, and sweat dampens you in more places than you’d like. “Everything okay?”
He nods an affirmative, reaching with one arm to encompass you in a fleeting embrace. Rosie’s eyes glitter as she watches the way Joel presses his cheek to yours before pulling away, his voice a low rumble as he says something directly in your ear. She giggles and swings the arm attached to the hand still in her grip.
“It’s almost time for dinner, Uncle Bill said so.” Rosie singsongs as you kneel down to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. Her giggle as your fingertips tickle along her jaw light you up in the best way and you can’t help the smile that breaks out on your face. She tries to lower her voice, but it comes out as more of a stage whisper. “He was grumpy about making more, but I know he didn’t mean it.”
“He likes cooking, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, mama, he makes the best food always.”
“Yes he does, we’re lucky he likes us enough to share, huh?”
“He’s also grumpy because you were out alllll day.”
“I know I was out a long time, baby,”
“Did you get anything good?” When you shake your head imperceptivity, Joel scoops the girl up into his arms, hanging her over his shoulder like a sack of flour. You stick your tongue out at the girl as she hangs over his shoulder, jostling her with every exaggerated step back toward the house. You pivot from them heading into the living room and into the kitchen where Bill is steady at work over the stove.
“Rabbits galore, some snakes, nothing too crazy but I did see a lot of deer tracks. Can go out for a few days after Joel’s gone.”
“Take him with you, would make me feel a little better.”
“I doubt I’ll run into anyone. Again.” You don’t want to pull Joel away from Rosie, to make him feel like he’s missing out on more than he already does. You’ve placated him as best you could, but you’d be a goddamn liar if you didn’t admit to feeling a little jilted yourself. It’s been five years, five years since her birth, she’s turning six this year. And while he always makes a point to be present for her birthday, you see the signs of his addiction as clear as day and it worries you. You don’t blame him for how he copes with the things he’s experienced, but you do blame him for pushing off the plan he told you would only take a year.
“It’s not a matter of that.”
“I can take care of myself, Bill.” The words come out a littler harsher than you intended, internal anger and worry over Joel seeping out through them. You can take care of yourself, of Rosie, of Joel. You can take care of everyone but that doesn’t mean it’s tiring or that you wish you had a little help.
“Had to patch you up last time you went out that far. Frank was beside himself, beating himself up for not being able to go out like that anymore.” His goes back to what he’s doing, his hands busy stirring and adding things into a large pot. Looks and smells like gravy, something that is only an imitation of the real stuff what with the use of powdered milk. But it causes your stomach to grumble all the same as you busy yourself with tending to the spoils of your day.
“It’s not his fault, it’s just how the world is.”
“We need you to come back in one piece. All of us.” He pins you with a serious look, his eyes glinting as emotions rarely displayed bubbles to the surface as if they’ve been simmering just below. All you can do is nod, knowing that each day is a blessing in this life, something that could turn in a split second if you weren’t careful.
It’s a comfortable silence while you ready for bed. Joel filling the normally empty space beside you at the dining room table, his large hands expertly cutting up the smallest serving for the giggling girl who can’t keep her eyes off of him, in the sunroom for a cup of tea after, an extra set of hands to help you wrangle the little wiggly piece of your soul as you try and get her into bed, an extra set of hands to help you soothe your tired muscles underneath the hot spray of the shower, he fills the other side of the bed now, a lamp beside him the only light in the room.
Without a word you drape yourself over his stretched out body, hands slowly peeling the book out of his grasp and setting it down on his bedside table. When you look up from where your chin ghosts over his exposed chest, his eyes are already on you. The heat that swirls in them lances through your body and your legs tighten around one of his own. His arms move to drape over your back, hands spanning wide across the fabric of your shirt, the feel of them sparking tingles as they sink into you.
He breathes deep, chest rising underneath you as you press a kiss to his collarbone. The dusting of graying hair there is soft against your lips, invisible between your teeth as you nip the skin there. Your hands run up along his sides, feeling the width of him expand from the narrow hips your own are aligned with. His heart rachets up, beating fast underneath your exploring lips. Your own breath hitches when he adjusts the leg between your own to prop it up slightly. The feel of his muscled thigh firm at the apex between yours. Snaking his hands down your body, he palms the globes of your ass and grinds you down against him to stutter your breath again.
You push yourself up enough to connect your lips with his in a searing kiss, groaning into it as he flexes his thigh against you. The fabric of your oversized shirt moves and bunches around your waist, allowing him the pleasure of feeling the heat of your cunt directly through your underwear. He groans as you rut against him, gently guiding your rocking movement in the perfect way. His own arousal is trapped in his boxers, the friction of your hips allowing him fleeting brushes.
“Want you to sit on it,” He suckles along the curve of your jaw, nipping at the column of your throat and flexing his hands into your soft skin. “But first I want you to take what you need.”
A quiet whine is your only response, body humming and the heat of his hard body beneath you, around you, all over you is intoxicating. You try to move your hips in a steady rhythm, but when you catch your swollen clit on the fabric of your underwear when his hands grip it and pull it taut, it jolts your body harshly and you cry out.
“That’s it, just like that,” He murmurs, his own hips jerking up to meet yours as you begin to pant and whine against him. Your body misses him. From his smell to the feel of him against you, both carnally and casually. The few days you spent with him a year never seem to be enough, but they are what you have. You always connect like this, like magnets with opposite charges, like dogs in the pitches of heat.
Just as your pleasure crests, his hands move back up your body to cradle your face, framing it to watch as you give into it.
“Fuck, baby, you always look so beautiful like this,” His forehead connects with yours even as your hands begin to scramble, your fingers hooking soaked fabric to the side and pulling down the waistband of his own damp underwear. In one fluid motion, your legs straddle his waist and you lower yourself down onto him with a sigh of contentment. Through heavy breath and heavy eyes, you watch his mouth screw up with the hiss he lets out, reaching for his hands and securing them on the flare of your hips.
“Hold on tight, old man,” His throat bobs with a deep gulp of air just before you bounce, the exhale coming out as a strangled moan.
You feel warm, full, content as your body comes down from its ecstasy. But then again, you always do this time of year. Your life is better than you ever imagined it could be with your daughter and the presence of Bill and Frank. But the absence of the man beside you now weighs on you as it eclipses the time you can physically see him, feel him. You know how this world is, how cruel it is. The hands of fate twisting and tearing anything it can grasp, no matter how it would affect anyone or anything.
But the plan you once both agreed on fell to shambles the moment he returned to the zone. The reality of traveling already daunting without the added complication of a young child. Three people can move easily enough through open spaces and abandoned cities alike without detection. But children, even as well behaved as Rosie, add a whole lot more danger to a journey like the one that lingers in the back of your mind far too often.
The supplies that Bill accumulated lend a lot of aid, but they can only get you so far. Three people and a growing child is a lot to support, add in the declining health of Frank and it becomes even more strenuous of a situation. Joel and Tess help to fill the gaps, trade common when you do see each other.
It’s a stark and stressful fact of the matter that eventually, something needs to change.
And it seems that Joel is having the same thoughts as you. He speaks the words that have been weighing heavily on him. The very words you’ve been struggling with even as you shared them with Bill and Frank just a few days ago- the very words that set your life on a whole new course.
I don’t care how disgusting or fucked up a fic is. NO writer should EVER be harassed for writing taboo fics, especially when the warnings are properly tagged and you choose to go ahead and read them on your own free will.
you’re not morally superior for harassing real people for the sake of fictional characters and fictional stories. you’re just a bully.
𓈒⟡𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩: the apocalypse is a strange thing. on day one, everything is chaotic and falling apart. the next, you’re surviving with nothing but the clothes on your back. now you and your father, after countless years of moving from one place to the next, have settled down in jackson, wyoming. where your father has integrated nicely and has become good friends with the millers. meanwhile, you’re still adjusting to the cold…but with a little help, maybe you’ll eventually get used to it.
𓈒⟡𝐟𝐭. dbf!jackson!joel miller x fem!reader
𓈒⟡𝐰𝐜. 6.4k
𓈒⟡𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞𝐬: mdni, nsfw, large age-gap, joel is in his 50s, reader is mid 20s, reader is a substitute teacher in jackson, alcohol use, no use of y/n, pet names are used in place of it, sexual tension, making out, public sėx, secret sėx, forbidden love(if you squint ofc), mutual håndjob, both m & f receiving, cursing, joel is and always will be a gentleman.
𓈒⟡𝐚/𝐧: told myself to stick with shorter fics for the sake of my muse…and here i am, planning a multi part dbf series like a fool…yall better love this the way i do jshskhk <3
𓈒⟡₊⋆∘
You had lived in Jackson for a couple of months now and you still weren’t adjusted to the cold. When you had arrived in Wyoming with your dad, it had been Spring. A little chilly in the mornings, but nice by the afternoon. Plus, the summer was bearable as well— not overly horrible and the heat was manageable, even for the apocalypse. Fall was similar to Spring, chilly in the mornings but warmer in the afternoons…till about October. And ever since then, the cold chill of Jackson was harsh.
It snowed the very first day of November and hasn’t stopped since. Most mornings you wake up to snow, clear up to your shins. But what you really hated was how the chill seeped into everything, no matter the layers you wore or the extra socks you bargained for. Some days, you think you’d never get used to the cold.
“Hey kid!” a familiar voice calls to you, interrupting your daily “I hate the cold” monologue.
You turn to look at your father, the only other remaining family you had left in this fucked up world, as he walks back from the stables. He had just gotten off patrol while you were heading off to your own job at the school; where you were a substitute for a couple of the children’s classes.
The only other thing that you would never get used to while staying in Jackson, besides Winter, would be seeing the Millers.
Joel walks with ease right behind your father. The two had been scheduled for a morning patrol but that was normal. It was often that you, or anyone around Jackson really, saw them together. If Joel wasn’t with Tommy, he was certainly around your father and vice versa; if Joel was nowhere to be found, your father and Tommy were most likely tucked away in the Tipsy Bison. All three of them had become best friends since you and your father had arrived at the settlement and it was very obvious to anyone and everyone who lived inside of Jackson that they got along.
“Hey,” you answer back, waving just a little as your father and Joel come to stand before you. “How was the patrol?”
Your father laughs, playfully patting Joel on the shoulder at your question. “This old man fell asleep an hour into it.”
Joel cracks a smirk, knocking off your father’s hand. “Easy. You ain’t so far from this age too, ya know.” Joel responds to your father before glancing in your direction. He clears his throat, as if he’s suddenly remembered you were there and that he has a “tough guy” act to keep up. He drops back to his usual nonchalant manner, tipping his head in your direction. “Miss.” He greets you— calm, cool, and collected.
You were anything but.
“You headin’ to the school?” Joel asks, adjusting and shifting the guitar strap he wears further up his shoulder. Something else you’ve never seen him without.
You nod your head back towards Joel, picking at the seam of your coat arm.
You didn’t exactly have the most innocent thoughts about Joel. Guys your age were cute, sure, but Joel was just something else. He was fucking beyond handsome. From his good looks— the dark eyes, the gray hair, the strength he carries himself with— to his personality. He was charming. In his own quiet way, of course. But he was also a gentleman who had helped you and your father from day one. And thanks to that, you certainly had more than a few dreams involving Joel; dreams that would make the average person blush.
“Look at my daughter, all grown up! Being a good person, teachin’ the kids and shit.” Your dad fake sobs. Large crocodile tears threaten to fall as he lays a heavy hand on your shoulder.
You give him a sideways glance, shrugging off his hand. “I’m not 12, dad.” You sigh yet let him fix your coat up, since he’s the one who messed it up. “But yes, I’m heading to the school now. Their teacher is out sick this morning.”
Your dad, still pretending to cry about the growth spurt you’ve had for more than a decade, begins to fake wipe his “tears” away from his face. If your dad was good at one thing, it was certainly playing the part. “And just know, when you’re all done at the school, we’ll be at the—“ your dad starts but you interrupt him.
“The Bison, yes I know. You go every night.” You finish your father’s sentence before he gets the chance to. Of course you would find him and his buddies at the only location in town that served alcohol. Not like there was really anywhere else to be in Jackson…or the world, so to speak.
“Actually, we’ll be at town hall, thank you. There's a dance tonight so wear something nice. I’d like to see my only daughter be in some kind of relationship before I die.” Your dad says with that of a thirteen year old’s attitude; effectively and directly throwing you under the bus.
Your skin crawls with uncomfort. You were in the middle of an apocalypse…not really the setting to find “true love” like your father hoped for. Plus, he wouldn’t like exactly who you had in mind for said “true love” either.
Joel clears his throat, saving you from the embarrassment your father has thrown you in. He places a large hand against the back of your father’s neck, giving it a good squeeze but your dad laughs anyway.
“We best leave her alone. I don’t want you dyin’ tonight, we got a 4 am patrol to be on tomorrow.” Joel teases, throwing you— what you can only assume is— an apologetic glance.
“Alright alright, dammit!” Your father laughs, attempting to shake off Joel’s hand but Joel doesn’t give him a chance; leading the both of them out of your path.
You watch, briefly, as Joel and your father walk away— entirely watching Joel. The thought of scratching down his broad back crosses your mind and you curse yourself before rushing off towards the school; leaving the thought behind in the snow.
𓈒⟡₊⋆∘
After you had finished up at the school, you rushed home in a hurry to bathe. In the shower, you specifically use your good shampoo and that really good smelling body soap you traded some serious shit for as well.
And despite your dad’s comment on “dressing up” for the dance— you still attempt it. Not because of what he wanted…well not entirely. You did want to look really good but only for a handful of people. Names you didn’t want to name, just yet; didn’t want to jinx it.
After your everything shower, you now stand in your room. Where every decent shirt and pair of jeans that you had managed to own, lay out across your bed. You stare at every simple color of t-shirt and the nicer flannels you own. And every time you glanced between them all, you come back to the same conclusion— nothing looked that good and it was driving you nuts.
You glance at the clock beside your bed, reading the sharp hands that point towards the 7 and the 25. The dance had certainly started by now and you were still here, more than an hour later, still deciding on an outfit.
Short on time and refusing to look at the same six shirts anymore, you give up on finding anything better than a simple, black, long sleeved shirt. Throwing the shirt on and a light pair of blue jeans to match, you hurry off to the bathroom to somewhat salvage your hair.
Fifteen minutes later you finally leave home. Bracing yourself against the Jackson cold as you hurry through inches of snow and chill towards town hall.
Once you arrive, you’re greeted by the entire town being there. Not that you had expected any less. Several bodies hang outside the massive building, chatting amongst each other but they’re kind enough to wave in greeting as you come closer. A man standing by the door, whose name you probably know but can’t remember at the moment, stops you briefly to tell you that your father is already inside. Most likely next to the bar or somewhere messing around with Joel and Tommy.
You didn’t expect anything less, again.
You say your thanks before heading into the crowded hall. You knock the snow off your shoes as you enter and before you can move any further inside, a nice lady offers to take and hang up your coat. You smile and hand off the battered coat, facing to turn the large crowd in search of any familiar faces.
You smooth your palms down the front of your thighs in an attempt to wipe away any anxiety that lingers but it doesn’t really help.
“Oh, heya there,” a familiar voice calls to you.
You turn to match the voice to a face and find Tommy Miller. A glass of bourbon sits easily in one of his hands, along with a couple of beers in the other. He’s dressed super nice, looking damn good in a maroon button up shirt and leather jacket with a dark pair of jeans and boots to match.
You smile towards Tommy, relaxing just a little at seeing someone you finally knew. “Hi Tommy.” You hum sweetly, moving just an inch closer towards him and out of the way of the doorway.
Tommy smiles back at you, glancing over your appearance quick enough that you barely register him looking at all. “Yer’lookin’ pretty tonight.” He compliments before he gestures towards someplace behind you. “Go get yourself a drink darlin’. You’ll find your dad in the back.”
And without waiting, Tommy turns to make his way to the back of the hall; where you’ll most likely find him, your dad, and Joel.
But you don’t move an inch. Your face burning hot. You weren’t often complimented but somehow…one coming from Tommy kind of made your entire heart skip a beat.
Joel certainly hadn’t been the only man you were having impure thoughts about.
You try your best to squish any and all of those feelings down before heading over to the area Tommy had gestured at. Something in your gut told you that you were going to need at least six drinks to survive the night, so might as well start with one now.
After getting your choice of drink, you make yourself comfortable against a wall next to a tall table towards the side of the room. No where near your dad and co. Where you stand for most of the night, only leaving your cozy little spot every so often to get another drink before making your way back.
You interact with a few other familiar faces you’ve seen around Jackson. Like Jesse, who was the first to stop by and see you. You two talked pleasantly. Most of the conversation being about a few recent patrols Jesse had been on…and his mention of wanting you to begin training for patrols. You remind him gently, again, that you weren’t sure if you were ready for it just yet and he respects it, leaving to mingle amongst the crowd.
Next Dina and Ellie say their hellos. You and Ellie stand by each other, silently, while Dina goes to get another round of drinks. Both of you looking about as uncomfortable as someone could when inside a large crowd; until Dina comes back. And they stay for a moment until deciding to go dancing.
Then it was just you.
Leaning against the wall, alcohol in hand, staring out at the sea of bodies, doing your best to enjoy the music. And you think you’re going to stand there the entire night, alone, until a man appears quickly out of the corner of your eye. You turn to look at whoever was approaching you, only to find one of the men you were trying to simultaneously ignore and impress that night; Joel.
“Tommy said you were here,” Joel’s voice carries like a sweet melody over the sound of the music. He comes to stand beside you, a charming smile on his face. “Thought you’d run off home already.”
You could tell he’s had a couple of drinks, for the tension in his shoulders is entirely gone and the smile on his face comes to him easily.
You shake your head, taking a sip off the potent liquid inside your glass. “Yeah, I’ve just been kinda over here.” You respond, glancing towards the older man again.
“Didn’t want to be seen with your dad and his friends?” Joel teases, sipping on his own glass of alcohol.
You laugh, shrugging a little at his words. No, you didn’t really want to be seen with him…just because everyone in Jackson already knew you as “so and so’s daughter” and nothing else. But you also just weren’t sure if you’d be able to survive sitting around Tommy AND Joel teasing you the entire night.
“Maybe,” you answer with as much honesty as you can. So technically you weren’t lying to him but not telling the full truth either. “It would just kinda be lame as hell to hang around my dad the entire night, don’t ya think?”
Joel chuckles, nice and easy like the whiskey he drinks.
The noise rattles your brain. Itches a part of you that you didn’t know needed to be itched. Something about the low rumble of his easy laugh sends shivers down your entire spine.
“Mmm, yeah, it would be kinda lame.” Joel reiterates, shamelessly teasing you as he sips on his drink.
You roll your eyes at him— another chuckle, another shiver— stifling your own laugh as you return to your drink.
“Think I’m too lame to hang around?” Joel hums as he leans back against the wall you’ve been holding up all night.
You hide your worried frown behind your glass as you take a sip of the vodka. On one hand, anything you say is going to give away too much. On the other hand…maybe you wanted him to know. Maybe it was time to just lay all the pieces out onto the board.
“I don’t think you're lame.” You finally respond.
Silence gaps between the two of you with only the live music filling any space left open. You glance in his direction again, watching as he knocks back the rest of his whiskey before taping the glass on the table that stands between the two of you.
“Well, I guess if a pretty girl like yourself doesn’t think I’m lame, then I guess I’m doin’ alright.” Joel finally breaks the brief silence.
“You think I’m pretty?” You blurt out before you can bite the words back.
Joel jumps at your words; as if he’s suddenly realized what he’s said and that you definitely heard him say it.
Your face burns hot with a crawling blush. And while you stare at him, he stares right back at you. He opens his mouth to say something but he can’t quite find the right words so he just stays quiet, fiddling with his empty glass.
“What…else do you think of me?” You ask quietly, wondering if he can even hear you over the sound of the music and the people inside the hall.
But the way his eyebrows knit together tells you all you need to know. He definitely heard you.
Joel clears his throat, straightening his shoulders and trying his best— and failing— to avoid your gaze. “I uh, think…” he finally speaks, glancing in the direction of the front door to the hall. “I think we should get some air.” Joel finishes his thought, pushing up and off the wall. He doesn’t move right away to leave though, stopping to wait for you. And when you realize he’s serious, you practically scramble to follow after him.
He grabs the glasses left behind, carrying them back over to the makeshift bar and dropping them off on the way out before he’s holding the door open for you.
Maybe sooner, rather than later, you’d get used to the cold.
𓈒⟡₊⋆∘
When you are once again greeted by the snow and chill of winter, the only thing you can concern yourself with is hoping your father didn’t see you leave just now. You didn’t know which would be worse; your dad obviously seeing you leave with Joel for “no reason” or following Joel and getting your hopes up that something might happen.
And you really try to remind yourself that this was just…getting some air, like Joel had suggested. Nothing more, nothing less. Just a moment to cool down. You weren’t going to think this was some sneaky way for your midnight dreams to come true.
This wasn’t what you wanted…air was just something Joel needed.
You tuck yourself a little tighter into your coat as you walk a step behind Joel. Following him as he circles around to a quieter, more secluded area of town hall that wasn’t occupied by the patrons of Jackson.
You have to pinch yourself to remind your damn head, and heart, that this was just an easier spot to talk to each other— away from the noise and the crowd.
Joel takes in a deep breath, filling his lungs with the cold air as he leans against the building. “Gotten used to the cold yet?” Joel asks, shuffling inside his jacket for a pair of gloves.
You dryly laugh, shaking your head as you stand in front of him. You kick at the snow underneath your boot, showcasing how much you have “gotten used” to the harsh winter. “Oh yeah, I love it, can’t you tell?” You respond, tone full of sarcasm, rolling your eyes.
Joel chuckles, nodding his head a little. “I don’t enjoy it much either.” He drawls, slipping on the gloves he’s taken out of his pocket.
“What…do you enjoy?” You ask without skipping a beat. His comment from earlier still echoes in your ears. And you needed to know exactly what he meant by it. It was far more than just a compliment. His reaction spoke louder than any words he’s said all night.
The soft look, the easy laugh, the tenderness of it all.
Every action had a purpose.
“Listen sweetheart,” Joel sighs, crossing his arms over his chest. “I…dammit, you know that whatever I say, or whatever you say, it’s not goin’ to end well.” Joel grumbles.
“Why not?” You ask, as if you didn’t know why or exactly what he meant. You mirror his stance, crossing your arms in front of your chest. “We’re both adults.”
Joel chuckles, a darker laugh than you had heard inside at the party. A dangerous laugh. “Darlin’,” Joel warns, straightening his shoulders back. “You’re a pretty girl. You’re smart. Don’t waste that on…this.”
“On what? What is this?” You question, gesturing towards the small amount of open space left between the two of you.
“This? Shouldn’t be anything.” Joel counters, avoiding the question while also answering the question.
“Why? Scared?” You snark. Enjoying the way Joel huffs and rolls his eyes.
“Don’t,” Joel warns, for the second time. He shakes his head at your accusation. And if there was one thing about Joel you knew for sure— it was that he was never scared to act. You just wanted to see him unravel. “You know what I mean. This can’t go any further than it already has.”
“What is this, Joel?” You exclaim, taking a step closer towards him, gesturing once again at the air between the two of you.
“This is me holdin’ back.” Joel snaps. His tone is anything but aggressive or harsh, more so firm and matter of fact.
And yet, his words still make you stumble. Just ever so slightly. Because what the hell would he hold back from?
A string of voices catches your attention. You freeze like a deer in headlights when you glance in the direction of the voices, heart pounding at the feeling of being found. Not that you and Joel were doing anything…at all, other than arguing, but word would spread like wildfire around Jackson if you two were seen together; especially tucked away in some dark little corner. Word would get back to your father and he would be more insufferable than he already is.
But Joel is quick to act. He reaches out for you, grabbing your arm in a firm, yet gentle, grasp and giving you a tug. He pulls you into him, bringing you into his chest and flipping you around until your back is pressed up against the building he had previously been leaning on. He shields you from view while also keeping his face hidden away from the string of voices coming a little too close for comfort. He knew the risks as well.
You’re closer to Joel now than you’ve ever been. Close enough you can smell the whiskey he had been drinking earlier. Your heart feels like it’s about to burst from its cage and drop dead in his hands with how hard it beats inside your chest. You stare up at him. Watching his face as he watches over his shoulder for any signs of unwanted guests getting too close.
And after a few painstaking seconds tick by, the further and further the voices seem to drift— leaving the two of you alone, once more.
Joel breathes a sigh of relief.
But you continue to hold your breath.
“Think they’re gone.” Joel mumbles, the tension in his shoulders eases just a little.
But you can’t relax as he still towers over you.
At your silence, Joel drags his gaze from over his shoulder and back down to you. And when your eyes meet once more, air finally returns to your lungs.
You suck in a small breath as his face comes within a few inches of your own.
“Joel…?” You whisper his name, softer than soft. Blinking up at him as he stares down at you.
Both of you are unmoving. Every puff of breath he exhales, tangles with your own. Your chest rises and falls with rapid breaths as the tension builds.
Your mind falls blank. No longer worried about being caught. Any anxiety you had felt earlier leaves you entirely, it was nothing but a memory to you now.
The world fades away. You can no longer hear the distant sound of music or the laughs or cheers of the crowd.
All of your focus was on just him. And you knew it had to be the same for him.
For when his hazel eyes slowly dip to move across your bottom lip; everything snaps.
Joel lurches forward but you meet him half way. His lips smash against yours but you kiss him back just as hard. You taste the whiskey he’d been drinking all night on his lips, already wanting more.
A strong hand smooths down your thigh before giving you a yank, tucking your body in close to his, flushing your hips together.
You gasp his name but it’s swallowed up by Joel. Tongue and teeth alike collide as you kiss. You snake your arms around his neck, fingers pushing into the curls that lay on the top of his head. You give his hair a tug, enjoying the grunt that slips from his mouth into yours.
You roll your hips forward, grinding into him and Joel stutters. Your name leaves his lips like a curse and he returns the favor by pressing his tongue briefly into yours. Just enough to keep you wanting more. Even brief, a shiver runs down your spine; and it isn’t from the cold.
His other hand wades past your coat before his fingers push beneath the shirt you wear. The leather of his gloves is cold as he skims across your hip and along your lower back. You’d prefer skin on skin than the feel of his gloves but you don’t complain. Scared that if you do, Joel will suddenly snap from his entranced state.
Instead, you untangle your hand from his hair, moving to brush your chilled fingers against his skin. You press into the back of his neck, skimming past the collar of his shirt, scratching just a little across his back before you drag your fingernails down the front of his chest. You ball his shirt up into your fist, yanking the fabric free from its tucked place beneath his jeans and belt.
Oh god, how you wish you were home. Wish you were in some kind of light— that didn’t involve the moon— so you could see him better. Wishing you could see the way his brows knit in satisfaction as you touch him or the way his muscles flex as he touches you.
Joel grunts, hips jerking up against you. He grabs ahold of your hip, giving it a possessive squeeze, before his fingers expertly unbutton the front of your jeans. He wastes no time, slipping his hand beneath your jeans and over the front of your underwear. He presses his fingers heavy into the curve of your cunt.
You break the kiss at the feeling of him sliding against your core. “Joel!” You gasp, sucking in a harsh breath.
“Quiet sweetheart,” Joel orders, skimming his lips across your throat. “Don’t want anyone else to hear.” He hums, fingers flexing with his words. His teeth scrape against your skin, sending a tingle down your spine.
You clamp your mouth shut, biting at your bottom lip to keep any loud noises from slipping out. Your fingers scramble to undo his belt; you weren’t going to be the only one exposed, vulnerable, and feeling good.
Managing to undo his belt, you slip your hand against the front of his underwear. You stroke against the obvious bulge in his pants, biting back a whimper at the feel.
Another reason you liked him more than guys your age.
Joel groans at your touch. His hand picks up the pace, rubbing harsh circles into your cunt.
You briefly adjust yourself into somewhat of a more comfortable position as you can with one leg up and pinned against a wall. You mirror his actions, palming the front of his underwear. You can feel his girth fill out beneath your hand the more he stiffens up. Can feel how big he is, even still hidden by his underwear.
You really wish you were in a home right now. You wanted to see him. Wanted to see every inch and vein and how big he is compared to your fingers. You just desperately wanted more than this; more than a mutual handjob.
Joel grunts when your fingers bump close to what you assume is his tip. His voice pulls you back into the moment. You wanted more than this— and maybe one day— but for now you’d just enjoy it. You don’t know if you’ll ever get another chance like this again, so you were going to enjoy every second.
You lift your hips, grinding into his hand with a whine. You pull at the lip of his underwear, yanking the fabric down as far as you can, savouring the groan that Joel releases.
Your fingers wrap around the base of his cock, slowly stroking up along the curve of his shaft until you press into his tip.
“This is…such a bad fuckin’ idea.” Joel hisses against your throat, groaning when your fingers finally wrap around him.
“Shut up and kiss me again.” You demand and Joel listens. He leaves your neck— sure to be beautifully marked for tomorrow morning— moving his lips back up to yours, kissing you once again.
His fingers slip and follow against your seam, pressing into your clit. Your hand mirrors his pace; stroking him faster, brushing your thumb against the slit of his tip.
With each slip of Joel’s hand your entire lower half begins to burn against the cold. Your hips surge forward in search for more. You want more, want him, but you’re not going to push your luck anymore than you already have tonight.
If he were to lead, you’d follow him then.
“Fuck it.” Joel curses against your lips, breaking the kiss. He slips his hand out from beneath your jeans and brings his fingers to his mouth. He bites down on the leather of his glove and yanks his hand free from it. All in one swift motion, he pushes his hand back into your pants— but this time, it’s beneath your underwear.
His warm fingers slip between the folds of your soaking wet pussy. He easily presses two fingers inside of your aching cunt. Jerking his hand back and forth, thrusting his fingers quickly and deeply inside your seam.
You try your best to keep up with his new found pace. Skimming your hand faster along his twitching shaft.
His fingers curl deep inside of you, hitting sensitive spots you didn’t know you had, forcing stars across your vision.
Your mouth falls open but you somehow manage to keep yourself from moaning his name too loud. You clamp a hand against his shoulder, gripping onto him for any kind of support. Your nails dig into the thick of his shoulder but his pace doesn’t falter or slow down. He continues to thrust his fingers inside, winding the coil inside of your lower half tighter and tighter.
“Joel,” you gasp, thighs trembling with every damn flex of his fingers. “I won’t last.” You practically sob, trying your best to continue to move your own hand along his throbbing cock.
Joel chuckles between rugged breaths. His palm rubs heavy against your clit while his fingers spear inside your core. He rolls his hips, fucking into your hand and you tighten your grip instinctively. You press your thumb into his tip, feeling Joel shiver beneath your touch. He may not be as vocal about it but you can tell he’s also reaching a limit. His cock throbs under your touch, his hips thrust forward faster, his breath is quicker, his fingers inside you curl a little tighter— he wasn’t lasting much longer either.
Meanwhile, a fire burns hot in your lower half. His skilled fingers push you closer and closer to your orgasm. If he wasn’t supporting you, you’re sure at this point your legs would’ve given out on you. Pleasure pumps hot— like lava— through your veins and you know your climax is going to come rushing up any second. And you know you’re going to be far too loud.
You release your grip on his shoulder, snatching the glove out of Joel’s mouth before returning your hand back to his shoulder; glove in hand.
“Fucking kiss me, I’m!” You hiss through clenched teeth.
Joel presses his lips hard into yours just in time. He silences you as your orgasm rocks through you. You cum, hard, around his fingers. Hips jerking erratically to ride through the fire burning beneath your skin. You sob into Joel’s mouth and he keeps it contained, so no one else can hear it but him.
He swallows all of your moans. Tasting his own name off of your tongue as you cum, crying out to him. But Joel doesn’t stop moving his fingers until he knows you’ve finished. His hand continues to move until it becomes too much; when his palm drags across your overly sensitive clit, you quickly tap on his shoulder to get him to finally stop.
He removes his fingers at your request, quickly wrapping them instead around your hand that grips his shaft. His slicked hand caresses your own as he swiftly moves both of your hands now.
He breaks the kiss with a grunt. Hips stuttering at the contact of both hands on his lower half now. He tangles his fingers up with your own, guiding your hand along his thick, and very stiff, cock.
“Yeah sweetheart, just like that.” Joel grunts, helping you in jerking himself off. He moves both of your hands over his shaft, hard and fast, his hips jerking with every stroke. He groans your name, low and quiet, making sure to keep his own voice in check. It's a deep rumble from within his chest that sends a wave of warm pleasure to the very tips of your fingers, encouraging you to keep up with his pace.
His breath picks up and you can feel him tighten beneath your fingers, closer to his own end. He turns his eyes to stare down at your connected hands and you follow his gaze.
“Dammit.” Joel curses under his breath. He grunts as his orgasm rushes over him. He presses the head of his cock into your lower abdomen; pressed right into exposed skin and against the waistband of your underwear.
You watch as he cums. Feeling every twitch and throb beneath your fingers as he ropes out every last drop. The warmth of his orgasm smears across your body. You bite down on your bottom lip to keep from groaning too loud as you watch it all unfold with an exhausted gaze.
After a few more strokes, Joel finishes entirely with a groan. You’re both left sweaty— despite the cold— panting hard in an attempt to catch your breath, and now you’re left with the evidence of the night sticking to your skin. Silence stretches between you two. Both of you are just staring at the mess he’s made against your body and clothes.
Your mind is blank until the noise of the world slowly comes back into your senses. You suddenly remember where the two of you are. The distant voices, the laughs, and music of the party snaps you back into reality.
“Joel—“ you begin to say but he stops you from speaking, as he comes back down to Earth too.
“Go home and get cleaned up.” Joel interrupts, shaking his head a little. His post clarity sobers him up real quick and he’s suddenly realized everything that has happened. The confessions, the touching, the kissing— all with his best friend’s daughter.
“We’ll…talk…tomorrow.” Joel whispers, the sour of guilt and regret heavy in his tone. He drops the leg he had been holding up for your brief encounter before quickly, and embarrassingly, he adjusts himself back into his pants. All while avoiding your gaze.
You nod your head, again not wanting to test your luck more than you already have, fixing your own pants up. You wipe the sticky mess away with your shirt before zipping your jeans back up.
“I’ll walk you home.” Joel mumbles, his hands move to gently fix up your messed up coat.
Always the gentleman, despite everything.
You stay silent, handing Joel back his glove before tucking your hands into the pockets of your coat. You cross your arms, hiding the front of your jeans and your shirt with your coat, as you turn to make your way home.
It doesn’t take long for the two of you to make it back to your house. Luckily, you managed to make it back without anyone stopping you or seeing the two of you together. Plus, no lights on in the house next door; which meant your dad wasn’t home yet or he was dead asleep in bed already.
You think for a second that never in your life would you get as lucky as you have tonight, ever again.
Joel keeps his promise though. Walking you all the way home and up onto your front porch. He waits until you unlock the door to relax his shoulders.
“I, uh,” Joel clears his throat, stopping at just the threshold of your front door. He flexes his fingers, smoothing his thumb into the center of his palm while he searches for something, anything, to say to you. After everything, he isn’t sure what either of you could say to make it all somehow magically return to normal.
It would never be normal again.
You didn’t want it to be normal again.
A few seconds tick by before he finally gives up in his search. “Goodnight, darlin’.” Joel says softly, slightly leaning against the doorframe of your front door.
Your heart skips a beat. Tears prick at the corner of your eyes. Because no matter what, Joel would always be tender. He’d always look out for you.
You take a deep breath in, calming your nerves, before you take a step closer towards Joel. You lean in close, placing a kiss on his cheek before stepping away from him once more.
“Goodnight, Joel.” You reply.
“Alright…” Joel hums, clearing his throat again as his fingers fiddle with the strap of his watch. He takes a step back from your home, dipping his head in his last goodbye for the night.
It almost gave you the feeling that he didn’t want to leave…but he had too.
He turns on his heel, making his way back down onto the road from where you two had just come from. And you watch him walk off into the cold night, waiting until he disappears from view before closing your front door.
You groan at the cold you suddenly feel, shivering as you rush off to your bathroom. You strip quickly, shoving your stained clothes down to the very bottom of the laundry basket. Something you’d deal with on a later day.
You clean up in the shower while the night replays in your mind like a movie. And it doesn’t stop playing until you crawl into bed, curling up with every single one of your blankets to somewhat recreate the warmth you had with Joel, and finally falling asleep.
𓈒⟡₊⋆∘
Waking up the next morning makes everything from the night before feel like a fever dream. You can’t tell if it was just a really good fucking wet dream or if it was in fact something that happened. And the only way you’d confirm everything, was to speak with Joel. And the only way you can get some uninterrupted, alone time with him is by doing something you’ve been putting off since arriving in Jackson.
You wash and get dressed before going next door to your father’s home. It was already late enough that he should be back home from his patrol and you find him in the kitchen, doing whatever it is that he does. When he looks at you, he’s a little confused but happy nonetheless to see you.
“Hey kid, what’s up?” He asks, wiping his hands on a nearby towel.
You take a deep breath, picking at the seam of your shirt sleeve, standing awkwardly in the doorway. “I want to start patrol training.” You respond, finally making your mind up.
Your father, thankfully, doesn’t ask why you’ve suddenly changed your mind about patrols. Or your disappearance from last night. And while he’s a little confused about it, the smile that splits his face tells you he’s more excited than anything.
If only he knew.
“I’ll speak with Tommy then.” Your dad confirms, offering you a cup of coffee.
joel miller/reader. jackson settlement, best friend’s daughter au.
rated e for explicit! age gap (joel is late 50s, reader is mid-20s). canon-typical violence. graphic depictions of sex. dbf!joel in tlou universe.
Coming Soon !! i. prayers through a throttled neck ii. love i don’t get back iii. any way but softly iv. nothing hurts like the way you say ‘i love you’
PRETTY RICH PUSSY | HARRY CASTILLO
PART 4 of 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐑 𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐃𝐎
A DECENT THIEF, A SMITTEN BILLIONAIRE, ONE VERY INCONVENIENT ATTRACTION. SEX, LIES, LARCENY—ALL BEFORE THE SUN COMES UP. EASY PEASY... RIGHT?
-> READ MASTERLIST HERE.
A.N. -> these two really have me fawning with heart-eyes, I just love their dynamic so much, it's so sexy and fun UGHHH🦋🥺 Harry's really out here down bad for her
W.C -> 17k+
C.W -> 18+ MDNI, sexual themes, third person POV, fem reader, thief reader and she's a bad bitch, car sex (✨), oral - fem receiving, harry is fucking rich with a big dick that's what, age gap, luxury brand and pop culture references, witty repartee, cat-and-mouse dynamics, romcom everything.
“Da! Da, Victor, da, ah da, da!”
There were certain things in life a girl would come to accept as hazards of the species—needs, wants, wants masquerading as needs, and consequences that came bound in lust, loneliness, or an Amazon Prime box. She was no stranger to this philosophy.
Some of them included: credit card debt, wearing hoops while trying to take off a sweater, a bleach job that promised “sunset copper” and delivered “burnt dogshit,” and sleeping with a man who still lived with his parents (although in this economy, that was essentially a retirement plan.)
And now, a new addition to her personal catalogue of inevitable hazards: fantastic Russian dick.
She hadn’t partaken herself, but she was currently being made an auditory witness to someone else’s glorious orgasm.
“Da, da, da... ooh, slozhneye, da...”
Because nothing—nothing in her checkered, poorly moisturised, SRO-housed life—compared to the soul-piercing, joint-dislocating, wall-banging opera of a couple rearranging each other's guts in the shared bathroom at four p.m. on a Friday.
How erotic and apocalyptic.
She stood in the hallway, nothing short of lifeless, clutching a tote bag full of pilfered shampoo samples. She wasn’t sure what she was feeling. Jealousy? Horniness? Existential fatigue?
It couldn’t be all three… Could it?
To clarify, this was not her bathroom. This was the bathroom.
The ‘renovated-for-convenience’ industrial-tile hellhole that everyone on her floor shared—meant for brisk showers, suspicious Craigslist subletters, and weeping about life while sitting under a coughing jet of water.
It was also, if you were morally flexible and quick-handed like her, the best place in the dump to swipe toiletries or Dysons from frazzled people who brought them in their travel kits and then got distracted.
Now it was occupied. Loudly, with abandon. And she needed a goddamn shower.
She was already late—she had somewhere to be, a play to be at in two hours, a life to pretend was intact. But here she was, stuck in the hallway, mentally calculating how long it would take to bash the door in without breaking a knuckle, when another problem entered stage left.
About four feet tall, grinning, wearing second-hand Nikes and a stained karate uniform that had never once seen a dojo.
Meet Barry. Nine years old, or possibly ten, unclear. A subway rat in the rough disguise of a human child, a menace with an inflated ego, and had a massive, transgressive, revolting crush on her. Scratch that: delusion.
He sidled up next to her, elbow propped on the wall, nailing the whole underpaid noir thriller detective. “Why the long face, baby girl?”
It was nice to know she even appealed to younger audiences.
“Kick rocks, Paw Patrol,” she muttered, stepping away from him. “Not in the mood.”
Delusional little Barry, unbothered, made an exaggerated kissing face. “Don’t be like that. Give daddy some sugar.”
She didn’t think—she just yanked the cap off her deodorant and fired two short, decisive spritzes straight into his face.
Barry yelped and stumbled back, smile faltering. Then—sniffed deeply. Horny little punk. “Mmm.” A dreamy look up at her. “Gonna have you on me all day.”
“Ugh,” she gagged and fired off two more spritzes.
“Hey, watch the hair!”
She was surrounded: by perverts, by chaos, by sex noises echoing off tile and echoing louder in her brain. Not a single soul in her immediate vicinity was tolerable, let alone useful. Not a woman, not a child, not a Russian Victor.
And just then, as if to underscore the absurdity of her life, the crescendo arrived—a full-throated climax, muffled only by drywall and her crumbling sense of self-respect.
“Ya idu, Victor... Da, oh, daaa!”
“Even the drywall’s getting more action than us. C’mon, girl,” Barry whispered to her.
“Shut up, you're like five.”
“I'm ten!”
They stood there, listening to what could only be described as the collapse of civilisation in moans and gasps and the soft rhythmic thud of a shampoo bottle being knocked to the ground.
On any other day, she might’ve been amused, or even impressed. Today, she just really, really needed a goddamn bath.
But allow her, just this once, a sliver of justification.
Life had started to dull around the edges. Her blackbox plays were either understaffed, underpaid or unwatchable (usually all of them), her last attempt at Gypsy had been a head-on collision—literally, they’d staged it in an abandoned warehouse because, according to her director, “grit sells”—and her latest audience consisted of six tourists, three of whom left at intermission. Apparently, the production’s only real hazard wasn’t the exposed wiring or the collapsing mezzanine.
Tonight promised more of the same.
So, yes. When rent reared its monthly head and her landlord began sending suggestive “just checking in” texts, the universe auspiciously scattered its affluent, unbothered targets across town like breadcrumbs.
This particular breadcrumb was found alone, statuesque, on the steps of Rockefeller Centre. Brooding, gorgeous, a man practically embellished by fate. And then, a rock fell—figuratively, not literally—on him. That rock being her, knocking him off balance with a well-rehearsed little “oops”, complete with fluttering lashes and an apology that could win over the Academy.
“Sorry! I am so, so sorry, omigod!” she feigned a bluster, brushing a little too quickly at his coat sleeve.
He tilted his head, amused. “You always crash into strangers, or am I just lucky?”
“Depends,” she quipped, laughing breathless. “I thought you could take me on.”
He smirked—one eyebrow lifted as if he had just confirmed what he already suspected about her.
“Jack,” he said his name was, and she believed him about as much as she believed in ethically sourced billionaires. But he was tall, drawlingly Southern, whiskey on his coffee breath, corruption behind his smirk. Powerful arms under an obscenely expensive shearling jacket—all privilege and pilferable possibilities.
And—this was key—a complete and total social media blackout. Not so much as a LinkedIn profile, no Facebook, no Instagram, no vague tweets about golf retreats or market fluctuations. A digital ghost. She’d squealed in the public bathroom where she had slunk away with a bullshit excuse.
A man like that, floating under the algorithm? Dangerous or delicious? Oh, fuck it, Jack was both. And he really didn't need her to play any part here. Just be a living, breathing human ear as he monologued about market corrections.
“So, New York suits you?” she asked, gauging him.
“It’s too loud,” he said, leaning back on the steps. “But eventually, money buys quiet.”
Oh, wow. That was a line. But an admission nevertheless: rich, insulated, and arrogant enough to equate silence with solvency. Reminded her of a certain someone who had been on her mind...
“And what do you do with all that quiet?” she prodded.
His lips twisted. “Think about the noise.”
She laughed, tipping her chin up. An evasive asshole-answer—confirmation he was exactly the kind of man she could mine for more than just conversation.
All she’d really needed from him was an apartment—a not-so-little, luxurious foothold in the unattainable slice of Manhattan known as Billionaire’s Row. He’d made a passing comment about it between sips of nine-dollar coffee, all nonchalant—“my place overlooks the Park”—as if he weren’t dangling keys to a kingdom she had no lawful right entering.
She had a birthday coming up, so she made a simple wish: a good view of New York’s skyline, and a comfy bed big enough to stretch her sins across.
Okay, fair enough, maybe it was amateur hour. But she was willing to go the extra mile—sex with a mark was never the standard procedure, despite what Ocean's Eleven might imply—but this was for her. Birthday tax, right?
“Dinner tomorrow?” he asked, slow grin cutting across his face.
She bit her lip. “Are we talking burgers predictable, or are you brave enough for omakase?”
Perfect. She twirled her metaphorical strings, and the puppet danced. Tonight, Jack was taking her to omakase, and she would be ready—red-lipped, leggy, and absolutely the best and worst thing that had ever happened to him.
It wasn’t until Barry started waving a rolled-up newspaper under her nose, clutched like a diplomatic dispatch, that she was suckered back into reality.
She batted his hand away. “Back off, or I swear, I’ll mace you—”
Before she could fire off another round of deodorant at his eyeballs, he cut in. “Dude on the street asked me to give you this.”
He held out the newspaper as if it were an offering. Or a threat. It was becoming increasingly difficult to tell with Barry.
Those words—in that exact, deadpan order—should not have sounded as ominous as they did. Her life was stupid like that. The paper could contain anything: a demand letter, a bribe, photographic proof of her many misdemeanours (alright, fine, crimes), an unsolicited dick drawing, a literal pipe bomb.
Frankly, she’d take the bomb. At least that’d put an end to all this and simplify her schedule.
She reached for it, but Barry yanked it back with a gleam in his eye.
He scanned her, head to toe. “Let me smack that fine ass, just once.”
She wrinkled her nose. “You kiss your mother with that mouth?”
He grinned, one incisor missing, “I’mma kiss you with this mouth.” Then puckered up his lips and started to lean closer.
That did it. She yanked the newspaper from his grimy little hands and cracked it clean across the back of his head.
“I don’t kiss Cocomelon rejects,” she muttered, storming down the hallway.
Behind her, his tiny voice rang out: “I’m the only reject for you, baby girl! I love you-hoo-hoo—”
And she slammed the door shut, rattling the frame. Jesus Christ, the balls on men these days.
Which brought her back here, to this sad excuse for a glorified coffin.
Technically, it wasn’t a home so much as it was a room. A narrow, rectangular box pretending to be a living space, where she stored her twenty-something years of mistakes, memories, and half-realised ambitions.
Twin mattress on the floor, layered with a pile of Salvation Army thrifted blankets that were riddled with ghosts of better sleep. A tiny drafty sash window that opened to a dead street with too many parked cars. Ventilation was so bad that it fogged up just from her yawning too hard. Teenagers beatboxing on the stoop until dawn. No closets, no insulation, no plans.
It was pathetic, how someplace so small—barely seven hundred a month, with utilities if you begged—could contain the entirety of her life. But it definitely didn’t lie, it refused to fill her head with pipedreams, didn’t promise marble countertops or a view or that anyone was coming to rescue her. It was what it was: small, faulty, mouldy.
Her dreams didn’t live here any more than she did; they loitered, slouched in corners, crammed into creases, too big for the space, too silent for the noise. But they were still around, trying to fit into the mess and miracles.
She’d once told herself it was all temporary, but had been “figuring things out” for years. Because that’s what dreamers did, didn’t they? They waited, fucked up, suffered, budgeted, cried on public transit and microwaved oatmeal twice a day, and called it meal planning.
Still, there were a few little things she adored about the place. Because some mornings, if the weather didn’t screw her over, the morning light would angle, slant just right—fourteen, fleeting, golden minutes across her mattress—and for a blink of time, she almost believed she was still in the running. Sometimes, the couple two floors up who freestyled sweet hip-hop tunes until 2 a.m. Somehow, over time, she’d stopped resenting it.
Because if your entire life fits in a room the size of a walk-in fridge, you have to believe you’re there on purpose. Otherwise, what was left? Just another pretty-faced crook in Brooklyn, one fuck-up away from caving in.
She dropped her tote bag on the mattress and collapsed beside it, unrolling the Daily News across the bed. A Post-it note greeted her on the front page in even handwriting and black ink:
PAGE 13 :)
Cool. That wasn’t terrifying at all.
She flipped it open, ready for… who knew what. Her name in a police report? A cursed crossword? Instead—
“Holy shit.”
She sat up so fast her neck cracked. No way, no way, no way, this had to be some fake newspaper—an inspection later told her, yes way, because this was too expensive a joke to be played on a poor person.
She took a second, scrubbed her eyes, squinted and leaned in. No tricks here. Twenty-twenty vision still.
There it was, in full-colour glory, nestled between celebrity divorces and a taxidermy gallery opening, was...
Her pussy.
Okay—not literally. Or anatomically.
But the cartoon she’d mindlessly doodled on a cocktail napkin last week, blown up inside a five-by-five panel between paragraphs. A goofy, grinning feline caricature of a lioness, glammed up, sipping a martini, surrounded by her takings. It was one of those dumb little things she drew when she got fidgety and self-deprecating—and just a little too bored.
She’d meant to chuck it in the trash, but apparently, he had kept it. Someone who could pull strings. Not just anyone would send a newspaper through Barry, the demon offspring. Not just anyone would turn her dumb napkin sketch into a full-page art-world flex.
Now, who did she know along that vein....?
She stared at the byline, at the tiny, captioned sketch, “Pretty, Rich Pussy,” with her name, in elegant italics, floated in the Pop Art section, and at the world that didn’t make any goddamn sense.
One name cut through the static.
“Jesus,” she breathed.
Not that Jesus, he hadn’t shown up for her since she passed a surprise pop quiz in fifth grade with pure guesswork.
No, this was her personal Jesus. Flesh, blood, regal Cuban curls and a cashmere voice. No more deity points for him, though—her thighs were still wet from the last time his mouth said grace between them. A slow, divine, echoing demise, and honestly, to be touched by him was religion, and she was a born-again non-believer with her legs wide open.
He was here. Outside.
Like someone had lit a match under her ass, she sprang up, bolting across the room to her window. The ancient sash hadn’t been opened in weeks—it resisted her, swollen with rust, humidity and apathy—but with enough “come on, you fuck,” and hip leverage, it finally gave way.
A gust of dusty air hit her, along with the very inconvenient realisation that she was leaning halfway out to a death wish and of a third-story walk-up in nothing but a vintage tee, breathless, and slowly soaking cotton underwear.
Universe, thou art a messy little bitch.
Because there it was, the big-shit, black Maybach parked at her curb, obscene in the way a caviar tin would be on the gas station floor. Next to it, a sagging Camry blinked in defeat, along with every dented Honda for six blocks.
He hadn’t even stepped out yet, but she knew. It was like watching light bend around a star before you saw it—your body knew before your eyes did. And then, there he emerged, brown Rockports first, back to the car, backlit, haloed by late-afternoon sun.
The feeling was simple, almost childishly so: she hated how seeing him felt as though her bloodstream rearranged itself, every atom in her body was just a duplicate of his, convulsing in his orbit. There was no other reasonable explanation for the way her body reacted—cellular, gravitational—just from glimpsing him.
Her ears caught the first recurring notes of a piano—the couple two floors up had launched into another early-evening ballad—and then the girl’s angelic voice, the soundtrack to her life kicking in:
“You walked in, caught my attention... I've never seen a man with so much dimension…”
Of fucking course, not even she could have scripted it better.
He, the inspirer of her inner whore. She—standing half-naked in a window like a 21st-century criminal-intent Rapunzel—feeling the infuriating awe bloom inside her, turning her into poetry and poor decisions.
Harry stood there, a tall, ridiculously broad, toe-curlingly handsome—yes, she’d use that phrase and suffer the consequences—and wore a black linen shirt that seemed so accidentally immaculate, sleeves rolled up like he couldn’t be bothered by how sexy his forearms looked. His parents must've drafted a committee of obsessive sculptors to whittle at that face, that nose, that neck, those shoulders, that body, that perky ass, that everything—goddamn, what a specimen to mankind.
The undying phone was pressed to his ear, of course—because naturally, men like him never came unattached. Emotionally, temporally, or technologically. And still, despite always knowing better, she had that unhinged, cinematic impulse: to allow herself to fall to her death, as if reason were optional, and he were worth the dented spine and pride.
Harry Castillo in her meatspace.
And somewhere upstairs, the lyrics continued: “Got me daydreamin’, with my chin in the palm of my hands, about you, you, and only you...”
Alright, universe, we get it now—you’re hilarious.
To hold even a sliver of Harry’s attention was like cradling the moon—brilliant, impossible, far too celestial for her hands that did not know its value. Nothing in her life had pulled at her with the power of his eyes: dark, cavernous things, drawing her in with the tides. And it was unnerving how much she needed it.
So, she did what any sensible, well-adjusted woman would do for her needs: she shoved two fingers between her lips and let out a piercing whistle, a “FWEEEEET!” loud enough to make every head on the block tilt skyward.
Eventually, his.
And that smile spread like a spark, beautiful, wrinkling, knowing.
She could’ve sworn traffic quieted for him, why not, because time certainly did. Everything else dissolved: the blistered gum on the pavement, the shouts from the bodega, the rising jam session upstairs.
She watched that devious mouth move, murmuring into the phone, whether to end a deal or start one, she did not know. He hung up.
She could see it already: ten thousand calculations inside his big, gorgeous head, half of which were filthy, all of which featured the words “pretty, rich pussy.” Not at all ideal for the public setting.
He simply dipped his head back to his phone. A thumb moving fast... typing.
Somewhere behind her, her phone pinged. She moved like Road Runner on a mission, cartoon dust cloud in her wake—as she launched off the windowsill, snatched her phone off the floor and scrambled back into position at the sill.
There was exactly zero chance she was going to ask how he got her number. That ship had sunk weeks ago, right next to the one labelled “boundaries.” She wasn’t going to ask why he hadn’t texted since either—and no, she wasn’t going to stop smiling like a loon.
His text simply read: 👌?
She peered over her screen and met his eyes three floors down. He was grinning now, all teeth. She could see it in the way he leaned back slightly on one foot, like he was ready to bolt or strut or pounce, depending on her answer.
Oh, so this was about the little newspaper stunt. But she was not going to give in that easily.
She texted back: 👉?
His head tilted, and then, from way down below, that sound—his little, boyish laugh.
Her phone buzzed again: 🤟
She let out a scandalised gasp, giggling. Oh, that deviant motherfucker.
He followed up immediately with: 🤔…
Thoughtful? Curious? Feigning innocence? She bit her lip, pretending to consider her verdict, even though her heart was doing cartwheels against her ribs.
She went soft on him and typed: …❤️
Dangerous territory. His satisfied grin and reply came instantly: ⬆️?
Her stomach flipped. The implication was clear—Can I come up?
She placed the phone by her side and leaned into the sill, exhaling aloud. She could not fuck things worse than they already were. Having him here—in her real world, in her slightly lopsided room with the crooked shelves and the stale dinner on the sink—felt suddenly much more serious than flirting through stolen moments and her pink crimes. He took up too much space, even from the curb.
Three floors down, and she already felt the judgment, the electricity, the exactitude of his eye. She didn’t know if she wanted to kiss him or ask him what took him so goddamn long.
Her thumb hovered over the floating keyboard. She bit her lip, weighing the risk of crossing the line they'd been circling for what felt like a year of mad fucking disguised as psychological warfare.
Then—decisive, unapologetic—she texted him: I'll be down in 20
The truth of it was that she wanted Harry in her space, to touch the part of her life that wasn’t curated or dressed up, to make this flirtation—their game—real. Insanely frightening, and she would sooner swallow her phone whole than let him see any of that.
When he read it, his eyes flicked up, a silent exchange sparking there—his look fluent in accusation and amusement. He tapped his watch twice, reminding her that the clock was running.
She blew him a kiss, then shut the window before she could change her mind.
Before she let herself be swept into the storm-with-no-centre that was Harry Castillo, she reached for mental bubble wrap—harmless thoughts to keep from getting sucked under. Anodyne things. Nothings.
Dirty bathroom… that Russian couple fucking. Somehow, Harry and her.
Ice cream cone… licking his two scoops and his cone. Harry and her.
Kittens… nope, she wasn’t even going to go there.
Yeah, conclusion: she was spectacularly, cosmically fucked.
Meanwhile, her body was driving like a one-woman pit crew gunning for the finish line: deodorant under the arms while blow-drying her hair, brushing her teeth while jamming in gold earrings worn down to their last bit of gold plating, curling her lashes in the same breath she was slicking on lip gloss. She could take this show to Vegas and clean up.
The true enemy of the night, however, was the fucking zipper—stuck halfway up her back. Midnight blue, lace-edged, unapologetically short, the dress she reserved for strategic seduction. It framed her collarbones, crowned with a virginal little white bow—a designer’s wink at men who liked to feel dangerous. Perfect for Jack, the walking chequebook. Jack, who would take her to the most visible table in the most visible restaurant, then bend her over his quartz kitchen island before the view of Central Park.
So when the zipper refused to obey, she stopped fighting it. Let her hair down, pretended it was the newest fad, and walked out anyway.
By the time she hit the street, she had to pause—half to catch her breath, half to take him in.
She might have been hot enough for Jack, but Harry was… another category. Another planet, another universe.
Maybe it was just that she’d never seen him like this—in daylight, the sky set to the Harry Castillo filter, no shadows doing the work. All their other encounters had been lit in a restaurant half-glow or club neon, his mouth always busy with her skin or the meaningless until she forgot the difference.
But now… she saw the bare architecture of her expensive, dangerous taste. The Castillo heir apparent was standing on her cracked sidewalk, grinning at her, doting on her, wanting her.
“You’re one sexy fish, stalker,” she said, as she clicked down the grimy stoop, her shoes already chewing at the edges of her toes.
He extended a hand to steady her, amused. “Should I say thank you?”
“For a fish out of water,” she added, sidestepping the hand and leaping down the last step.
When she bypassed his gesture, he let his arm drift past her waist, pulling her in close enough to graze his smile against her cheek. “I expect congratulations for fraternising with the riff-raff, too.” His mouth brushed her skin there for a kiss.
“Oh, sure,” she said breezily. “Pants off.”
“I think you mean ‘hats off’.”
“Pish posh, Castillo. I need a ride.”
His eyes went cartoon-wide. Grin, too. “Well, sweetheart, I’ve got stamina for miles. Got the stick ready for you to change gears.”
She laughed as his mouth drew a constellation of hot kisses from the spot beneath her ear to the notch of her collarbone. “Walked straight into that one.”
He punctuated his next sentence with a deluge of lazy kisses. “Incomplete businesses, and I'm all yours. So, which are we tackling tonight?”
“Tempting, but I have work,” she said, pressing a palm to his chest and pushing herself just far enough out of his orbit to remember her schedule. “I’m already late to—”
“Get your hands off my girl!”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
Harry turned his head in the direction of the high-pitched battle cry, brows knitting. “What...?”
Bodyguard Barry came out of nowhere—half-pint fury with a deep conviction that he was Daniel LaRusso reincarnated—launching himself, fists windmilling, shrieking, “Haiii-ya!”
She intercepted mid-charge, planting her hand firmly on the crown of his greasy head and steering him back. “Return to sender, you little shit.”
Barry staggered but recovered into his fighting stance, feet apart, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Imagine a flamingo, about four tequilas deep.
“Step aside, baby girl. This bitch about to catch these hands. You see these moves? I'm like a damn cobra!” He hissed. “Pstttt!”
Harry cocked his head toward her, only a little fazed. “What exactly... is this a family member? I don't recall—”
“Local wildlife,” she grumbled. “We try not to feed him.”
“Talk shit, get hit, player!” Barry declared, swinging his fists closer.
And he lunged. She shoved him back by the head again, her patience thinning. “Barry, I swear, I will knock the checks off your dumb Nikes if you don't back off.”
Barry jabbed a fist toward Harry, his punches slicing harmlessly through the air, his voice rising. “You tryna touch my girl? You think you can just touch my girl in my block?”
Harry glanced at her, too amused. “My girl?” he quoted, even inserting the air quotes with a hand.
She opened her mouth to explain—though honestly, there was no awesome explanation for Barry—but there was a pause. Harry’s pause. Quiet, risky stillness that meant the man was calculating...
The temperature between all of them changed; even Barry seemed to feel it, pausing. Because the odds were looking like this: a chihuahua barking before an eighteen-wheeler.
Without breaking eye contact with Barry, Harry reached into his pants pocket, pulled out his wallet, and thumbed through bills.
“What’s your going rate, kid?” Harry asked, nonchalant.
Barry snorted. “Rate?”
“For walking away.” He peeled off a crisp twenty, then a fresh fifty. “Twenty. Fifty. Hundred...”
Barry’s eyes widened. Then, Harry added another hundred and folded the stack neatly in half.
He held it out between two fingers. “This is a little finder’s fee. I’m taking the girl. From here on out, she’s mine.”
Barry stared at the money dangling. His eyes ping-ponged between the bills and her face, as if calculating her worth in rare sneakers and sandwiches.
“My girl’s worth more, but—” and he sighed.
Harry’s mouth curved into a smile. “Then keep the change, player.”
Barry snatched the cash, the boy knew not to haggle twice, then backed away with a solemn nod and a muttered “We cool. Respect,” before climbing back up the stoop.
Harry slid his wallet back into his pocket, then reached for the car door. “Smart kid.”
She arched a brow. “So, that’s your method for handling a child.”
His smile didn’t budge. “That’s how you close a deal. Now get in—before I have to buy off any more lovesick strays.”
“Just the one,” she said, slipping past him into the cool hush of the car. The air-conditioning struck her skin in a polite shiver, threading down her spine before melting into the plush leather seat. Yeah, she could get used to this—being chauffeured around like trouble in a pretty costume.
Trouble, apparently, that was already on the chauffeur’s radar. Ben’s glare was fully weaponised in the rearview.
“Hi, Ben,” she sang out. “Like my dress?”
He adjusted the mirror for a better look, jaw tight. “Ma’am. You wore that on purpose?”
She flicked her hair over her shoulder. “Jealousy’s a bad colour on you, Benny. So’s that shirt.”
His nostrils flared. “Listen—”
“Ben,” Harry’s low voice cut clean through.
He slid in beside her, the door shutting with the final click of a lock. His hand found the inside of her thigh—little strokes, up and down, touch that was both claim and warning. The fun part (for her) was that she let him.
Ben cleared his throat, snapping his eyes back to the windshield. “Sir, I tried.”
“To be nice to moi?” she cooed, dragging the word out just to watch the vein in his temple twitch.
“Thank you,” Harry said evenly. “To the Tank, please. I'd appreciate some privacy in the meantime.”
How cute. She wasn’t about to ask how he knew where she worked—or what else he might know. Questions like that had a way of rearranging the air, and she was enjoying the climate just fine.
Ben’s jaw worked like he was chewing rocks, then he stabbed the ignition button, AirPods going in. The car hummed forward, floating on the asphalt, central display and screens before her blooming to life with the Mercedes logo—elegant, expensive, all smug.
Harry’s gaze, though, was on the rear window, watching her block dissolve into the distance, an artefact already erased.
She crossed one leg over the other, the leather sighing beneath her thighs. “Smaller than your place, huh?” she asked, mostly to jab at him.
“Only a little,” he murmured, still watching the past disappear. And then—finally—his head turned, and there it was: that grin, crooked, conspiratorial, cutting sideways toward her.
“Do you like living here?”
“It has its ups and downs, and close to the subway,” she said, giving him just enough truth to pass inspection, dressed with a small smile to hide the barbs.
He didn’t take it at face value—a talent of his she’d come to loathe and admire in equal measure. For all she knew, he could’ve been looking straight through her. Pity, maybe. Or the slow dawning of a reality he’d been too polite to name: that the girl he was circling wasn’t just from a different league, but an entirely different sport. One where you pray the elevator works and hope the ceiling doesn’t leak on your shoes.
His gaze dipped to the lace trim of her dress, the small white bow at the centre. It turned accusatory. “So. A new mark tonight?”
The hit was clean. Its truth was secondary to the fact that it was his first reaction. His first assumption of her was: dress up, work a mark. She hated how right he was.
She rearranged her smile, more sharp-edged. “A new Jack. Dinner date.”
That got him leaning in, closing the polite space between them. “Jack,” he repeated, tasting the name.
“Short for Jackpot. Fitting.”
“Very funny.”
She winked. “I aim to please.”
“And what is it you’re after?”
Caught between interrogation and an inside joke she wasn’t included in, the tone rattled her. And to which she smoothly replied, twirling a strand of her hair, “Still working on that part, so hmm... redacted.”
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing as though peeling layers off her. “Tell me this, then. Are you planning to sleep with him?”
Her laugh came out a beat late. “Woah, counsellor. Bold question.”
“Familiar with the pattern now,” he said, calm as only how the guilty or the jealous could be.
A phantom pin pricked beneath her ribs, because of course that’s what he thought—that her body was currency she tossed around like business cards. She let her smile sharpen. “Would it bother you if I did?”
His jaw tightened, which was answer enough, but he still said, “For someone so hard to get, you’re surprisingly easy to give away.”
The words stung more than she wanted them to. A slap disguised as observation. Easy, disposable, as though none of this was worth more than the clothes on her body.
She forced herself to tilt her head, lashes batting. “I think I struck a nerve.”
“No, you burned through those. More surprised anyone’s still buying the act.”
Which was, annoyingly, true. She’d almost forgotten what Jack was for... oh, right—Billionaire’s Row apartment, floor-to-ceiling views, great sex on a big bed. Technically, this was just a casual date. Nothing new. She’d been on plenty with Harry in the past few weeks (fine—two, but they were intense enough to count double).
She turned toward the window, letting the slowly perishing sunlight shadow her face in and out. They were still crawling out of her neighbourhood. Twenty minutes, maybe, until she was in someone else’s world pretending she belonged there.
Jesus, what was this feeling? Being cracked open just to thumb through the worst bits—stained parts of herself she’d kept folded away, unsightly and half-hidden, now lay out under the worst possible light. She’d never wanted anyone like she wanted Harry—never felt that ridiculous thrill at seeing him leaning against his car outside her building. The feeling of something enormous and rare being hers, even for a night. A breathing space that wasn’t suffocating with money or clutter.
And Harry was content with this, brushing the dust off her secrets with fingertips that had never touched anything hideous.
Those same cold fingertips ran down the bridge of her nose. “Did I upset you?”
She gave a short sniff, followed by a cough meant to disguise the thickness in her throat. “You’d have to matter to upset me.”
“There you go again, flirting like a villain.” He laughed under his breath. “I love it.”
She sighed. “Just feeling cold.”
“C’mere then.”
It wasn’t a suggestion so much as his gravity pulling her across the console. His arm slid into position, a dock welcoming a drifting boat, guiding her over. She felt the flex of him against her hip as she eased onto his lap, strong thighs flexing beneath her, crossing that invisible border into his space.
Her gaze flicked to Ben in the front seat, past the partition, who, if his rearview mirror had any say, now had the world’s most awkward front-row ticket. Poor guy probably deserved hazard pay tonight, forced to witness this in Dolby surround.
That flicker of anxiety—that this was all a little too visible—lasted about two seconds before something substantial and very tenacious pressed into her ribs. A situation, in every sense.
A massive erection, in truth.
“My space heater comes with a big perk,” she purred into his ear.
“I am mad at you,” Harry said, his mouth grazing up the slope of her jaw, tasting the grudge for flavour. “So goddamn mad at you, sweetheart. Can't think straight.”
She had no idea what the crime was this time—probably something she’d enjoy hearing about later, ideally while naked—but the fury radiating off him was scrumptious. He burned hot, hotter than he knew, like someone running at a thousand quiet suns.
She let one fingertip trail down his zipper, slow enough to feel the heat and the twitch of that big, big muscle underneath. His abdomen tightened. Good—enough to tell her she’d landed a hit back at him.
“Parts of you tell me different,” she whispered.
His laugh came low, a little contemptuous, almost swallowed. “Fuck Jack, alright?”
She brushed her mouth against his cheek, the grin there pure provocation. “Ooh, you wanna join us? A little ménage à trios?”
That earned her a palm to her neck, broad, hot, certain, tilting her face until their mouths shared the same breath. She could smell the heady scent of bergamot, perfectly Oud Le Castillo, and the spicy, expensive bite of his aftershave—designed to linger long after he was gone.
“I’ll make it worth your while if you stay with me tonight,” he said, and her spine liquefied. “Hell, I’ll bribe you even.”
She bit her lip, but she’d already lost the hand. She knew it. He knew it. Still, she pushed the chips back across the table. “No can do, baby.”
His gaze tightened. “Stop saying no to me.”
“No,” she repeated, faux sweetly.
He traced his thumb along her neck, his voice dipping. “No?”
Her chin tipped up. “No.”
His damning fingers eased her hair aside and found the low dip of her back where the zipper had given up, sitting half-fixed. The bastard worked it down the rest of the way without breaking eye contact, slow enough that she felt each tooth release.
“Harry.” She chided, her arms crossed over her chest, the dress bunched in her fists. “Behave.”
“No,” he murmured.
His languid, confident fingers travelled the length of her spine like he was reacquainting himself with old territory—each notch of bone, each vertebra, every dip, every heat-warmed hollow. His touch was an exclamation mark against her racing pulse.
“What are you so afraid of, sweetheart?”
She rolled her eyes. “Not much, but thanks for the support.”
“There’s a look you get whenever you want me. Can’t tell if it’s fear, or anger… or sadness,” he said, gaze narrowing as though he could pin her down with it. “It’s very effective.”
She met his gaze, unflinching. “Nothing scares me.”
“It shouldn’t. I’ve got the whole world right here.” He held up his fist for her, then uncurled it, palm warm against her cheek. Offering instead of taking. “Still feels worthless without you in it.”
Ooh-la-la. The syllables might as well have been a loaded gun. “Way to kiss ass.”
“I can think of about five feet of you I haven’t kissed yet.”
The quip barely left his mouth before his head dipped, curls tickling her chin, the faintest graze of stubble an electric warning shot. His lips found the curve of her breast, tongue darting to taste before his teeth closed just enough to demand a reaction. He sucked once—just enough to pull her breath right out of her.
Her head tipped back on instinct, the ceiling blurring. “God, Harry,” she exhaled. “Here?”
“I called dibs,” he mumbled.
Her brain stuttered over a beat. “But you... I... wow, that feels...”
He gave a low, smug ooh, and then he was gone from her face entirely—only to reappear lower, tugging the hem aside until his lips sealed over her nipple. The first pull and suck was deep, and so obscenely wet she swore she felt herself soak between her thighs. Pleasure radiated through her spine like a live wire, and whatever mental scaffolding she’d been propping herself up with collapsed into white noise.
She moaned at him, but he didn't give two fucks. So very hot, so very tempting.
“Real fast, I promise,” he assured breathily.
“Harry, I need to get off soon!”
“I know, I'm on it,” he said, laughing. “Need to loosen up this uptight little problem. She’s all tense.”
She hissed at him, eyes on the back of his chauffeur's headrest. “If you were any hotter, I might forgive the talking.”
His palms were everywhere, greedy, shaping her, and then—because one taste wasn’t enough—he angled her, thumb brushing over the other peak before catching it in his mouth. Heat licked outward, a twin ache building in both breasts, and she realised she was panting—soft, urgent. The car’s air had thinned all of a sudden.
Did she want this? Out in daylight, in a moving car, tinted windows, with traffic and strangers and Ben up front?
Apparently, yes. God, yes, yes, yes!
“I never get to give these beauties some love,” he murmured, mouth dragging wet heat as he spoke, every syllable vibrating against her nipple. “Tastes like heaven.”
He sucked again, harder, tongue swirling before a slow, teasing roll over the peak, branding it into his memory—and also hers. She pushed his face closer, burying her fingers in the thick curls at his nape, and her back arched in surrender, and she was aware—dimly, recklessly—that her skirt had ridden up, hem grazing the tops of her thighs, a secret invitation she couldn’t take back.
Then his big, substantial hand slid over her knee, climbing with a patience that was somehow filthier than a grab. Fingertips skimmed bare skin, pausing just enough to make her wonder if he’d stop. He didn’t, he traced higher, parting her with a slow, almost absent-minded ease, as though his mouth on her breast wasn’t already turning her brain to liquid.
When his fingers found the damp ache under her panties, she made an involuntary “Oh, fuck, baby”—small, sharp words she prayed no one else heard. He was carefully stroking her dewy little clit in lazy circles like he had all the time in the world, and the road wasn’t flying by outside. The friction built, winding her tighter with every pass. Each upward, inside, downward stroke was an unspoken reminder: you don’t own this moment—I do. And worse, you like that.
Up here, it was his mouth—heat, suction, and the faint scrape of teeth and stubble. Down there, his fingers—coaxing, calibrating, coming...
Harry’s mouth never left her skin. “You like me having you like this,” he murmured between licks, a long finger laving a stroke up into her bud and pressing. “Can feel it... all tight and pretty.”
Her head tipped back, lips caught between her teeth. She wasn’t even conscious of her hips at first, how they’d started keeping time with the slow orbit of his fingers, started to move with the wet click-click-click from somewhere down there.
“You wanna come for me? In my car, huh?” he murmured.
She nodded before her brain caught up. “Yeah.”
“Come all over my hands?”
“Mm-hmm.” It came out as a helpless little whine. Great. If he wanted proof he owned her, there it was.
He nibbled a little at her neck. “Yeah, you’re all mine, aren’t you?”
“Yours, only you,” she promised—though her head and heart were holding entirely separate press conferences. No explanations there.
His face was now framed between her breasts, his mouth pressing reverent kisses, fever-warm. He lingered at the peaks, drawing one into his mouth, teasing, suctioning the tip until her toes curled in her heels. And all the while, his fingers were working her below with irritating confidence—hooking, twisting, wheedling.
It was all just too much. Sensory overload—mouth and fingers and heat and Harry—and the wave of climax hit her hard and clean. She came in a tight shudder, eyes screwed shut, a quiet gasp swallowed in the dark tangle of his hair. One little writhe against his lap, and she was a wet goner.
“There you go, there’s my girl,” he murmured against her ear, his voice a rough, fond scrape.
She could only manage a shaky laugh into his shoulder. How? How did he get to reduce her to this? Not just the technicalities—she could map those out if she had to—but the audacity. The alchemy. How he could pull her apart with his mouth and his hands and his words until she was a mess, she didn’t remember agreeing to be without so much as taking his shirt off.
And worse—how much she wanted him to do it again. She’d take round two right here, in the back seat, without a care in the world.
“That was not a free sample,” Harry murmured, still close enough for his breath to skim her ear. “You’re paying me back tonight.”
She made a show of cherubic innocence—wide eyes, lashes batting—then reached down, pried his hand from between her thighs, and guided those fingers into her mouth. Filthy, sharp—her own heat still clinging to them—and yet she made a slow performance of it, raised to appreciate her most decadent sins.
The hitch in his breath, the way his lips shaped an involuntary oh—worth the price of admission.
“Payback, huh?” she asked sweetly, her tongue curling along the pad of his middle finger. “Should I pencil you in after Jack? Or are you cutting the line?”
His mouth curved, but the look in his eyes said he wasn’t amused. “Careful.”
“Oh, I’m always careful,” she murmured around him, letting her pout deepen as she sucked him in like she was trying to pull the smug right out of his bloodstream. “You’re the one who just parked your hand inside me without a safety net.”
He withdrew his finger abruptly, leaning back in his seat with a long, restrained exhale that sounded more like a growl. “If it wasn’t for our current audience, I’d be fucking you so hard, sweetheart, you couldn’t crawl your way to that date.”
And that sent a guilty, treacherous curl of heat through her belly.
Her gaze slid to Ben in the driver’s seat. On the surface, he was Zen itself—eyes locked on the road, posture easy—but she clocked the truth in two small details: the steady flex of his jaw and the neat, treacherous twin rivulets of sweat tracking down from his temple. AirPods or not, the man had front-row seats.
Harry’s gaze came back to hers, glinting with satisfaction.
“Are you shy?” he teased, low, private, meant only for her. “Who are you, and what’ve you done with my sweet little liar?”
“I cannot believe I just came with your mouth on my tits, in front of your guy Friday,” she replied—though the traitorous thrum in her throat begged to differ.
“Okay, noted: no audience participation next time.” Then, after a beat, leaning in with a smirk: “Spiritually, he’s not even here. He’s got AirPods in.”
Right, she forgot that part. Then noticed flatly—“But he’s sweating.”
“The poor guy’s diabetic.”
Her giggle burst out before she could swallow it, almost shocking in its betrayal of composure. Harry’s smile deepened like a hook sinking in.
“See? You want my mouth on your tits.”
“I did like that.”
“And you still like me.”
“I like a good mouth and a gag, excluding yours.”
“Same difference,” he said, his hand sliding along the outside of her thigh, thumb tracing lazy arcs. “Now, are you to drive me mad all night?”
“Hmm, depends. You gonna keep acting like Jack’s some phantom limb I have to cut off for your ego?”
That earned her a laugh, sexier than it had any right to be. “I just want all the limbs that’re mine.”
“You make that sound spookier than you think.”
“Baby, I'd trade every quiet moment I’ve ever had for one more hour with you,” he murmured, and she felt the ghost of his breath trace down the side of her neck.
Harry’s fingers found the zipper again, tugging it up, reeling his claim by fastening her dress. Each click of the teeth felt indecently loud between them, a metronome marking out the seconds he had his hands on her.
She adjusted the bodice around her breasts and ribs, trying not to notice the way his gaze—predictably, shamelessly—dropped. Typical. If the Y chromosome were a muscle, it was flexing hard enough to strain his third leg of a dick. She gave him a deliberate lift of her breasts into the cups, if only to make him earn the staring.
He didn’t even have the decency to look away. So she hooked a finger under his chin and tilted his face back to hers, forcing those infuriating eyes up where she could see them.
“Now you’re just playing house,” she said, raising her brows.
“Afraid I might be too good at it?”
She snorted softly. “You’re wasting your time.”
His mouth tilted up. “I think I’m investing it very wisely.”
She let her eyes narrow, assessing. He seemed like a stubborn man who could spend years on a single resentment—or an obsession—and she couldn’t quite tell which one she was.
“How’s that now?”
“Because,” he said, leaning just close enough for the faint scent of him to find her again, “I never waste time when I’m getting exactly what I want.”
Goddamn persistent fucker. She had to hand it to him—he was annoyingly persuasive. Too bad she didn’t trust a word of it.
She clicked her tongue. “Then—how far are you willing to go to keep it?”
It was hard to go from being the apple of Harry Castillo’s eye to the butt of a bad joke.
It was even harder to play Grumio—gender-bent, slapstick, stuffed into a straightjacket of a skirt—without haemorrhaging every last drop of sexual mystique she’d ever cultivated with Harry. She was pratfalling her way through a radically reimagined musical version of Taming of the Shrew, a production where the dumbass fuck of a director said things like “disrupting the text” and she wanted to put his head in a wall.
She was pretty sure he’d cooked up this fever dream mid-bong-hit, congratulating himself on reinventing Elizabethan comedy into something that could “speak to the modern age,” i.e., turn Shakespeare into an improv circus no one asked for.
And she was left to embody that absurdity.
When she’d auditioned, she’d gunned for Katherina—the fiery, razor-tongued bad bitch who could still own the room even in tragedy. But apparently her face had been saying something else to the casting panel. Something along the lines of the idiot sidekick. She couldn’t even blame them; she was allergic to staying on script. The panel had called her undisciplined, but she preferred to see herself as artistically spontaneous.
That is not to sugarcoat her acting chops either; they were glorious crap. This wasn’t her dream—it was supposed to be her “finding myself in this big city” phase. The blurry, uncharted space where cluelessness met the luxury of doing absolutely nothing and still managed to come out ahead.
So far, her life goals had boiled down to: get rich and die. Acting seemed like the easy way to it at one point.
Every time she caught herself in the mirror—pink periwig, rib-crusher corset, big bucket of skirts—she had to mutter the mantra: It’s for the paycheck. You are the embodiment of feminist endurance. Which was ironic, given she spent half her scenes getting kicked, tripped, covered in stage wine, and making sure the audience’s laughter was always at her, never with her.
Subtlety was DOA, and judging by the empty rows tonight, the audience numbers had followed suit.
Nevertheless, she felt it before she saw him—a hot pin pressed between her shoulder blades.
No surprise there, Harry had found his way in.
Because nothing said respecting boundaries like completely ignoring her valiant “stay the hell out of my business” tirade, buying a ticket, and planting himself somewhere in the dark where she wouldn’t dare look. She could see him in her mind already: stretched out, classifying her every stumble, drinking in each stupid wig, each bawdy pun, each flicker of her losing composure.
The fucker was probably loving this—her, playing the fool.
Well, if she had to play it, she might as well sharpen the bells on her jester’s cap. Two could play this game.
She pitched her voice louder, cutting through the stagnant air of the half-empty theatre, and lobbed a line high toward the section where she imagined he sat. Then she kissed it into the rafters—big, filthy, unpretentious—so sly that only someone who knew her would know it was for them.
“Fie, fie on all tired jades, on all mad masters, and all foul ways!” she bellowed to the plunk of the piano, pouting, skirts bunched in her fists, stomping across the stage in an exaggerated limp.
The front row tittered in response.
The limp was in the blocking. The skid on the uneven plank wasn’t.
Her boot caught and pitched her forward, momentum carrying her into what could have been a very public humiliation. Reflexes saved her. She rolled with it, sweeping into a flamboyant bow, cap in hand, as though the whole thing had been planned. A smatter of claps answered her; the gullible were always the easiest to please.
Her scene partner’s eyes widened with alarm, and she shot back a wicked wink, then stuffed more bravado into her next line.
“Was ever man so beaten? Was ever man so rayed?” she cried, dragging out the syllables.
The audience was sparse tonight—half the seats empty, their absence making the room feel colder, her mistakes louder. Every pause echoed, and every laugh felt rationed.
And somewhere in the dark, she knew Harry was grinning like the devil. That deep, low laugh of his was probably pressed into the back of his throat, just for her. A small, treacherous part of her took pride in making him laugh.
The rest of the scene blurred—muscle-memory performance tooled on autopilot—until the curtain call.
She scanned the back row and there—slouched broad shoulders, the tilt of his jaw, the crown of unruly curls catching a bit of stage glow, one long arm draped over the bench.
She dipped into her curtsy with the others, but her smile was entirely her own. Already, she was drafting the post-show greeting: yeah, I made an ass of myself, motherfucker, and you don’t get to enjoy it for free.
But later, as she peeled herself out of the makeup, skirts and periwig, that grin stuck. She’d never had someone she knew in the audience before, someone rooting for her. Even if he sat there like the Sphinx, even if she could never quite tell what Harry’s brand of “support” meant—it felt worth holding on to. She felt like a real superstar. Maybe she’d even pay him back tonight, let him cash in whatever it is he thinks he’s owed.
She slid her dress and shoes back on, leaned toward the mirror, and perfected her lipstick and the curl of her lashes. Half-lidded, catlike, the way she loved. Somewhere down the green room hallway, footsteps echoed—probably the stage supervisor coming to complain about the lights still burning backstage.
“Hey, Scott, it’s me—”
Not Scott. Not even close.
A man stepped into the doorway, university sweatshirt, hood up, beanie smashed low over his curls. A black surgical mask looped over the lower half of his face as if he’d just wandered out of a pandemic. Ninety degrees back here, and he was still blowing into his hands as if warding off frostbite.
She didn’t need the slow-reveal—she knew this particular magic trick. She wasn’t stupid. This was movie shit—bad movie shit.
Her mascara wand was in her fist before she even thought about it, angled like she could stab this bitch right through the eyeballs and into his brain.
“Sorry, buddy. I don’t do autographs until I’ve at least got one eye on...”
He tugged the mask off his ears.
Her synapses fired, realisation clicked, and then—“Oh my fuck. The grifter returns.”
What are you supposed to feel when you see an ex? Closure? Bittersweet nostalgia? A small pang in the chest, a forgotten bruise?
She didn’t fucking know—because all she felt when she saw Dieter was a knife. A rusted, jagged thing, shaped from expectations, wrenched out of something far more precious than her guts.
Her hope. Once, her young hope had been a neon sign lit up for him—bright, stupid, fluttering with what-ifs, soft-focus dreams, and trust so complete it bordered on idiocy. Now it lay somewhere in her apartment, a brittle, bloodied residue, clinging to the bones of someone she used to be.
He rubbed a hand over his mouth, exhaled like he was bracing for her, and said, “Okay. Let’s get this over with.”
She clapped a hand to her chest. “Aw, the rat comes back to see if the trap got cleaned out. Curious if I’m still alive, or just need a refill of the guilt?”
He dared to grin. “Missed you.”
“And you can get hit by a car and go fucking paralysed.”
She wanted to be angrier, to tear into him, punch him, spit fire, demand to know how he could hollow her out like that—strip her for parts, pawn off the best of her, and vanish like she was nothing but a particularly boring pit stop on the highway of his life.
But the anger wasn’t there; the pure, searing anger she’d been saving for this moment.
He was older now, with ear piercings, the Hollywood bedhead hair, and the manchild charisma. The betrayal was still there, written into the lines of his face, etched into the way his eyes didn’t quite meet hers. Time, the patient crook, hadn’t weathered him as much as his own selfishness had.
And time has passed—hasn’t it? It has passed with the weight of every overdue bill she covered alone, every made-up apology she imagined to herself, every little lie she clung to just to keep functioning. She rebuilt herself, piece by relentless piece, glueing back the edges he’d left ragged, learning to live with the cracks rather than carry them.
Now, standing here, his presence was a sour memory with a pulse—one she thought she’d buried in the landfill of her late-teens, suddenly dug up and reeking, daring her to pretend it didn’t still stink.
Dieter had the decency to look wrecked. Hollowed cheeks, hands fidgeting in his jacket pockets. Not the golden boy who used to kiss his way out of trouble with her.
“I saw your little... play. Outside. And you were... how, uh, how've you been?” He started, then cleared his throat anticlimactically.
She looked away, sighing. “Getting by.”
“You look good—”
“I know.” She let the words slice clean, and her unimpressed eyes rake over him once, up and down. “And you look like shit.”
His shoulders slumped, like he didn’t even have the energy to argue. “Appreciate that.”
She raised an eyebrow, arms crossed tight. “Are you on drugs right now?”
“Rehab,” he corrected, quietly, almost clinical.
The way he said it, with no theatrics, no excuses, caught her off guard. It was the cold matter of fact.
“Good for you,” she said dryly. “I’d say ‘congratulations,’ but I’m not sure surviving makes you a winner.”
He visibly gulped.
“So, what step are we on? The one where you bother your swindled exes?”
“I just...” he sniffed, “had to see you. I wanted to for a long time now.”
She hated herself for how familiar he still felt. How his voice, his face, even the careless tilt of his head could still pull her toward that stupid girl she used to be—the one who believed him. She had trusted his fucking guts, trusted him to carry her when the floor gave way, so much in fact, she’d staked her whole escape on him.
And look where that trust got her: capsized, drowned, forgotten.
She had been barely fifteen. Fifteen, dumb, wild, reckless—a kid with a big wad of stolen bills lifted from her father’s bedside locker and enough delusion to think it was freedom money. She thought if she ran fast enough, if she handed him every last piece of herself, she’d outrun the ugly mess she left behind. Forgiveness could come later, time could come later.
Dieter had been the now, the getaway, the promise. “You and me, babe,” Dieter had said to her that night, clutching her hand. “The world’ll never forget us.”
There had been a whole year of young, hopeful love—and she knew it had been real, at least to her. She remembered the matchbox room they’d rented in that crumbling apartment at Sunset Park, the thin walls, loud arguments, leftovers for days. They’d shared a double bed that wasn’t big enough for two growing teenagers, let alone their dreams. But there was a sweet compromise: he’d give up cigarettes the weeks she had to buy sanitary napkins, and she’d pretend not to notice the empty beer cans piling up in the corner of the room.
But she got it. In their strange little world, they both needed their vices. It wasn’t about the cigarettes, the beer, or the pads. It was about proving to each other that they could make it work, even when the math didn’t add up.
They survived on sacrifices that felt romantic at the time, only to realise how suffocating it had been. Splitting a single burger, biting down ego and getting free dinner at the homeless shelter, pawning off jewellery they swore they’d never part with, walking instead of taking the subway so they could save it for rent. She worked odd jobs, hands blistered from scrubbing, while he swore both their big breaks were around the corner.
“Just wait,” he’d grin. “Next year we’re gonna have more than this. A car. A big bed. A walk-in...” and he’d blow into her palms to warm her up, breath visible. “And heat. My baby’s never gonna be cold again.”
And because she loved him, she believed it. That’s what you do when you’re young and stupid, right? You believe the boy who swears tomorrow will be brighter if you just hold on through tonight.
And there was sweetness too, moments that still came back to her in the quiet when her guard was down: falling sleep on his bicep which had been pillow for a long time, the two of them laughing over nothing, so hard their ribs ached, so hard the neighbors banged on the wall to shut them up, the way he kissed her, as if to rewrite their hunger. She remembered the way he touched her, too, with that desperate gentleness only boys who have nothing can muster. They made love in the crooked light through the blinds, on a mattress that dipped in the middle, and it wasn’t glamorous or cosy, but she’d believed that it was theirs.
She clung to those fragments as though they were proof she hadn’t imagined it all.
But the sweetness was a trick, a sugar coating for poison she didn’t taste until too late. Because when it got hard—when the hunger gnawed too deep, when the bills piled up, when tension turned to silence, when his patience thinned... it was too late.
Just two nights before, when the radiator wheezed and her stomach pinched from skipping two meals, she’d tried to reach for him.
“Dy,” she murmured, brushing her thumb against the back of his hand, “we can’t keep living like this. We need... more. I can pick up more shifts. Try for a nanny job or something.”
He pulled his hand away, rubbing at his temples. “Jesus, do you hear yourself? You think scrubbing shit till your hands bleed is gonna save us?”
“It’s more than what you’re doing,” she shot back, sharper than she meant. “You keep saying tomorrow. Tomorrow, tomorrow. But tomorrow never pays right.”
His eyes cut to hers, jaw tight. “So I’m the problem now, huh? Not the world, not the bullshit stacked against us—me. It’s all me. And fucking money.”
“I didn’t say that.” But she had, kind of. And he’d heard it.
That was the night she realised love didn’t keep the lights on.
He left her for dead, left her broke, left her chewing on the bitter rind of her own bad decisions.
And now, with years between them, she could even laugh at it, the absurdity of her own devotion. A whole year of giving him her heart, her body, of bleeding herself dry in the name of “us.” And what did she get for her trouble?
A year wasted on a boy rehearsing how to leave, an empty drawer where their “our life” funds were stashed, and a crash course in what it meant to build your life on a man’s promises. If that wasn’t love, she didn’t know what the hell was.
She remembered that last night with a cruel clarity, the shitty room and its peeling walls, how she sat up all night, staring at the door as if her devotion alone could make him walk back through it. One night. Then another. Two days of waiting, starving, bargaining with the silence. She made a shrine out of the threshold, prayed to the footfalls that never came.
By the second morning, she understood. He hadn’t gotten lost.
And then a month later—Dieter was back in her hands, his face was plastered across every magazine cover, every glowing screen, glossy and airbrushed, the new golden boy of Hollywood at twenty.
While she was counting coins for the next meal, he was flashing teeth and shaking hands on red carpets. While she was scrubbing floors for cash under the table, he was being hailed as the face of a blockbuster franchise.
The runaway bastard hadn’t just left her behind—he’d cashed her in.
“Look, I...” Dieter pulled in a breath, nodded, like he deserved that. “Back then, I wanted more. I thought I was chasing dreams. I was going to come back, come back to you. Really, I was just… running.”
She snorted. “Well, you caught the whole cliché. Needles, powders, fame, girls. How’s the narcissism holding up?”
This time the wince was real, not practised. He shifted, rubbing the back of his neck, eyes darting to the floor. “It didn’t. That’s why I’m here.”
She let out a sharp scoff, her cynicism scrambling for a foothold. “Here to do what? Give me the redemption speech? To get the forgiveness ‘gold star’ stamped on your permanent record?”
“Not exactly.” He reached into his jacket and pulled out a battered envelope, the flap gone soft, creased from being handled too much. He held it out between them, as if the thing in his hand was a live grenade.
“I came to pay you back. Every cent. With interest.”
She stared at it. Then at him. This was not how ghosts worked. They were supposed to haunt you, not show up with penance in hand.
Her laugh was brittle. “Wooow. So this is your big scene, huh? Twelve steps, cue the swelling music, fade to black? Sorry, but I don’t do Hallmark endings.”
He shook his head quietly. “It’s not redemption. It’s just… not leaving it the way I left it.”
“Do you know how much I don’t care about your fucking closure?”
“Every last cent,” he emphasised.
Her arms stayed crossed. “Funny,” she said. “You always owed me more than money.”
“I know, I do. I do.” His voice was almost a whisper. “But money’s the only thing I can give back without...” hurting myself? Hurting you?
When he didn't finish, it got under her skin. Because he wasn’t lying, wasn’t charming, wasn’t bullshitting. He was standing there with the bare, awkward truth, and it made her want to hurl something at his head to break the spell.
So she scoffed instead. “Well. At least you finally figured out you’re not special.”
And the fucker nodded—slow, resigned. “Yeah.”
Not once had he looked at her. Not at her eyes, not at her face. His head was on a swivel, watching everything but her, twitchy and restless, sniffing as if he could magic out of this with one more hit.
God, it was glorious watching him squirm. Years late, but still worth it.
“Look at me.”
He kept the envelope extended stubbornly, the weakling using paper as his shield. “Everything’s in there. Ten thousand—”
“Fucking look at me, you piece of shit.”
It took him a long war with himself, a coward’s pause before he obeyed—just a reluctant flicker from the corner of his eye, like she was radioactive. His hands planted on his hips, lips pressed tight, eyes shimmering wet with guilt and restraint, and he’d never dignify it as tears.
She laughed, but it came out raw, like broken glass. “You know what the worst part is? I need... I need the—” Her throat caught, a betrayal, and she bit down hard, started again, seething.
“I have no dreams left but to make money. That’s all I get now. You know what that feels like?” Her vision began to blur. “To wake up every morning, drag yourself to work, grind down to the bone, and know the only thing waiting for you is rent and another bill? That’s my life now. No passion, no art, no future. Just the treadmill.”
She sniffled, angry at herself for it. “Because you took everything else. You stripped me down to gears and paychecks.”
He flinched, enough for her to notice, and enough to taste victory.
“I’m a machine now,” she went on, almost trembling. “An efficient, bitter, greedy machine. And you made me this way. So bravo. This is your masterpiece.”
He opened his mouth: “I never got to explain—”
She cut him off with a sharp shake of her head, a growl. “Don’t. You had your turn when I was stupid enough to listen and trust you.”
The useless envelope sagged in his hand.
She stepped closer, letting her face hover inches from his, malice in the sweetness. “You want to make amends? You want a pat on the head for crawling back sober with a half-assed apology? Guess what, you pathetic fuck: money can’t buy my life back.”
And then she plucked the cash from his fingers, turned on her heel, and left him standing there—merely another ghost she’d finally learned to outlive. Her voice carried back, tossed like a blade over her shoulder, sharp enough to leave a scar:
“And ten grand doesn’t even cover the interest.”
A small fortune lay in her hands, and not a single cell in her body itched to spend it.
Settlement, unsettlement—pick your poison. The money was hers, not honestly earned, but not exactly stolen either. A cosmic refund. And now the question everyone fantasised about—what would you do if you suddenly had the money?—was on her lap like an untrained dog.
She should’ve felt free. Instead, she felt cornered by possibility.
She could drop acting, sure. Finally. Acquire her GED, finish what she abandoned, pick up a certificate in something “stable.” But in what? What did she like? Business, economics, chemistry, math, or English? She pictured herself carrying laminated flashcards around and pulling all-nighters to submit an essay.
Although what she preferred was doodling cartoons in the margins of half-filled notebooks, curating playlists for her moods. Once, she wanted to carry a briefcase to work; another time, she wanted to stay home and write a book. Then there were the daydreams: café owner, dog whisperer, popstar, pastry chef. If wanting counted for anything, she was already overemployed.
So maybe: she wanted everything. Which was just as useless as wanting nothing, because a few thousand dollars was too much to ignore and not nearly enough to change a life.
She shoved the envelope in her bag and walked out the door.
The city hit her first, no philosophy left in her body—diesel exhaust, the thrum of traffic, some guy shouting into his phone like it was a megaphone. Then a sight that made her halt—the glorious Maybach, gleaming like a lion in the sun, and Harry, leaning against it, arms crossed, eyes down at the pavement, appearing as the spread in a magazine titled Luxury, Loitering, and Mild Narcissism.
“Didn’t realise the night came with my own shadow,” she called out.
His head lifted, and there it was—that goddamn smile that made him look equal parts predator and idiot. He straightened, adjusting nothing but making it look choreographed.
“Hi there, hotshot. Honestly, I haven’t laughed that hard in months. I now also own twenty glorious photos of you wiping out in—oh, woah.”
She surprised herself. Surprised him, too, if the microsecond flicker in his expression was anything to go by. Because she didn’t answer with wit, or bite, or even a smirk—she just walked up and hugged him hard. Arms fully wound around his ribs, face mashed against the ridiculous expanse of his strong chest.
“Hey,” he muttered into her crown, palms sliding to her back, fingers pressing into her spine. “If this is some kind of exposure therapy, I’ve gotta say, sweetheart—it’s working.”
She let out a laugh that snagged into a sniffle. “Shut up.”
He kissed the top of her head, once, twice. Punctuation marks. “Told you I’m good for your nervous system. Basically human Advil.”
“Seriously. Shut up.”
“Copy that.”
She stayed put for another second longer than she should have, holding him closer, tighter, because, right then, shutting up sounded like an excellent idea.
For a breath, she stopped being someone who catalogued everything—faces, words, risks, exits. The city surged around her in full sound, background music instead of static: car horns, revving engines, a pedestrian cursing out a cyclist, the crosswalk beep. And for the first time in forever, she wasn’t apart from it, floating detached. She had a place in it, belonged right here, in the crush of him.
“Harry?” she mumbled into his shirt, fully aware she was redecorating his black linen with lipstick smudges.
“Right here, beautiful.” His hand dragged up and down her back, broad palm radiating heat through her bones.
She breathed out, “How about a nightcap before we fuck?”
He chuckled, the noise thrumming from his chest in her ears. “You know, there’s a gun in Ben’s holster, and if I ever say no to that, feel free to shoot me with it.”
She tilted her chin just enough to catch the twitch of his mouth, then deadpanned, “Beer, pizza. On me.”
His gaze flickered, recalibrated. “I’ll eat anything with you, on you, off you—”
She pushed a palm into his mouth. “My treat.”
That shut him up, which was already worth the price of the pizza. His brows lifted, as if she’d just spoken in tongues. She could almost hear the machinery in his skull grinding—Harry Castillo, silenced, parsing whether she was joking, testing him, or—God forbid—meaning it.
He leaned back from her hand, squinting to figure out the loopholes in her face. “As in—you’re paying.”
“Yes, it’s what ‘on me’ means.”
“Now, that’s not how this works.” He let out a disbelieving laugh. “Do you have any idea how wrong that feels, to let my girl pay?”
My girl. Again. Twice today. It was like a contraband slipped into her palm—illicit, thrilling, sticky with meaning. Pussy drenched.
She arched a casual brow. “Dinner. Food. That thing normal people eat before they… perform vigorous sports.”
“Sports aside, it’s the principle, my love. I take you out, I cover it, you get spoiled. That’s the whole arrangement.”
Baby. My love. My girl. Sweetheart. Oh, he was just handing them out tonight. They’d clearly passed the point of pretension and games.
“I don’t remember signing a contract. Did I miss the fine print in bed?”
“My fine print’s always oral.” And he winked.
There, another flood in her panties. “Cute. Still paying.”
He stared at her like she’d just slapped a contract down on his mahogany desk. Utterly knocked off balance. Which was, frankly, the most fun she’d had all week.
Her brain ticked: of course, he’d fight it. Harry’s money was part seduction, part shield, part signature. Paying for her meant she was inside his orbit, spinning on his terms. But the second she reached for her wallet, she knew what it really was—staking a greasy claim. A pepperoni-scented coup d’état. Flipping the balance, even if only over a stuffed crust.
And if the look in his eyes said anything, she’d just flustered him more than a stolen emerald ever had.
“Eve,” he said slowly, voice edged now, “you sure you want to start keeping score with me?”
Fucking Eve. She smiled, leaning in, savouring the look on his face—equal parts arousal and affront. “We already are. And you can leave the tip, because I’m generous like that.”
He chewed the side of his cheek, grinning away, considering it. “I am sincerely hoping that was metaphorical.”
Perfume and paranoia, that was Central Park after midnight. It was an imbroglio of humid nightmares and chill daydreams, yes—but that only scratched the surface. Lovers pretended no one could see them slouched on benches, tangled in whispered promises and too much Trader Joe’s wine. Near Bethesda Terrace, synths glittered in the night air, wrapping a pop ballad around the crowd—some busker-turned-starlet whose voice was soft enough to make strangers link hands.
“Is it cool that I said all that? Is it chill that you're in my head? ‘Cause I know that it's delicate,” the singer sang, airy, tinsel, weaving a spell around Taylor Swift's lyrical genius.
Wow, a tragicomic script, muted colours, unsymmetric lines. Her life really was the director’s cut of a low-budget indie nobody asked for.
All around, the park was its usual tangle of contradictions: halal carts hissed and steamed cumin and lamb, their scents clinging to joggers and insomniacs alike, and if you squinted past the saxophone player bent by the fountain, past the dozing dog-walker and the skater kids doing tricks under the lamplight, somewhere, you’d notice it—
The choreography of pickpockets, the slick little ballet of fingers and wallets, a heist ensuing in plain sight.
...Any other night, that might have been her, depending on hopelessness.
Tonight, though, whatever watch, bag, or carelessly placed phone was waiting in the dark wasn’t hers for the taking. Tonight she was half-inching something else: the illusion of normalcy.
“Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it... delicate?”
A night with Harry.
Dieter—the piece-of-shit, stinking excuse of an A-lister—had returned her money in five-hundred-dollar bills, the denomination of a parting insult that said, here’s your life, babe, oversized and unusable. Try tipping with that. Try not drawing suspicion when you break one down for a twenty-five-dollar pizza and a six-pack. Even Harry’s eyes—calculating whether it was the Hublot of his she’d sold to get it—flickered with suspicion when she laid a bill on the counter. She could almost hear him think: what’s her angle? What’s the con?
She caught him discreetly patting his pockets, checking his wallet, his watch, his ring. She didn’t even blame him.
“Wow,” he muttered, watching her fold the receipt. “You really paid.”
She smirked. “You’d rather I ask if they take trade-ins for your watch?”
His eyes narrowed, but he couldn’t hide the laugh that escaped. “Normal people don’t peel off five-hundreds for a pizza.”
“I’m not normal people, babe. And neither are you.”
Now the two of them walked without purpose down the Mall, tearing through greasy slices. She was hyper-aware of her bargain-bin Prada pumps. They pinched, drew blood, but she enjoyed the sting; a little tax for looking like someone who belonged in his orbit.
And Harry—her impossible, maddening Harry—was good at this kind of thing. The dating thing. Gentleman down to his molars, even when she tried to bat him off, insisting on carrying the pizza box and the beers for her.
He chomped on his slice with unbothered delight, and before she could crack open another beer to give her hand something to do, his fingers twisted between hers.
First—well, this is new.
Then, eventually—what the fuck do I do with this hand-holding business?
She wanted to pull away, diffuse this warmth crawling up her spine. But the humiliation from earlier (her stupid stumble onstage, the way her ex’s shadow still managed to stretch across the evening) had weighed too heavily on her wit. Her schemes felt limp, charms half-spent.
So she stayed like that and played the role. Harry’s girlfriend, his girl, hand in hand, pizza grease and all. She didn’t exactly hate it.
Oh, what the hell. She really, really liked it.
She liked the silence of it, how it was a presence, no filling the air with bragging or bullshit. His bad day, her bad night—knotted together in a truce of warm fingers and palms.
She even liked imagining—for a nonsensical beat—the ending to this little pantomime: they don’t part ways. She doesn’t ditch his dumb, dollar-sign heart with some clever send-off. Instead, she invites him home. They fall into bed, have sex without the usual frantic tearing or goading, and maybe, against her better judgment, she lets him fall asleep next to her.
The fantasy was so absurd, she squeezed his hand once, and that was her tell.
Because the second she did it, Harry’s mouth quirked. As though he knew the scam she was running wasn’t something she could pull with sleight of hand.
“This is nice,” Harry said, swallowing down the last of his third slice. “With you, like this. Still tasted better pizzas.”
The classic boohoo-little-rich-boy-in-mean-world line. If a truffle wasn’t shaved on it, it wasn’t worth his palate. She wanted to roll her eyes right out of her sockets, but she forced herself to empathise—because wasn’t that the whole point? Being the girl who got him to slum it?
“Please tell me this isn’t your first time here at night,” she said, wary.
She wasn’t expecting the sheepish nod he gave her. Her brain honestly short-circuited. Mr. Five-Star-Everything, never been to Central Park at night? It was so obvious, and yet somehow unimaginable.
She covered her surprise by biting into her slice, chewing hard. It begged the question: what did she really know about Harry Castillo, past the labels—Billionaire, Successful, Headache, Enigma?
He broke through her little fugue state, lifting her hand up to his lips to press a kiss to her knuckles.
“One thought at a time, please,” he teased, eyes darting toward her. “No overloading my favourite processor.”
“Mm-mm, it makes sense,” she countered, refusing to bite. She shrugged like she was just stating facts. “You’re elevated and isolated. Classic castle-on-the-hill syndrome. I don’t get you rich people.” She didn’t let him interrupt, words tumbling out. “What the hell do you do with all your money then?”
He bumped his hip against her. “Blow it on a beautiful girl like you.”
“Liar.”
He boomed out a laugh. “The wallet’s open, heart’s open. I’m trying here.”
“Try again, Gatsby.”
“Hmm.” He made a show of thinking, which she found infuriatingly sexy. “I use it to… get richer. Money makes money, that’s what it’s trained to do. And so it goes.”
Great insight. Stunning revelation, Castillo. Useless, unhelpful. She chewed, and her brain spun off anyway, about her own tiny pile of cash—paltry in comparison, but enormous to her. How would she stretch it? Could she parlay it into more? A casino run? Buy sketchy shares? Learn crypto? Her financial literacy was laughably dense.
He must’ve sensed the silence growing teeth, because he offered up: “Retail therapy, sometimes. Or—” he gave her a sly look, “—awakening the giant within.”
She almost choked on her crust, laughing. “What the hell does that even mean?”
“That you’d rather spend than save. Which is also fine.”
So this was it. The mystery of rich people was unravelling right before her eyes: it was never “enough.” You just keep running (solved a lot of the Dieter mystery here.) Get rich, stay rich, get richer. Rinse, repeat. No finish line, no sweet relief of “making it.” God, he was making richdom look so stupidly mundane.
She peeked up at him, caught his gaze already on her, and nearly tripped over the sincerity tucked into his smile.
“What?” she asked, though she already knew.
“You know, you’ve got the air of someone who came into a mint.”
Her throat tightened. “And if I did?”
“I’m curious what you’ll buy first.”
That was the million-dollar question. Or ten thousand dollars, and the vague sense it was already slipping away.
She tilted her head, smirking. “I was hoping you’d help with that, but you’ve completely bored me, you big fossil.”
He chuckled, unbothered, kicking a rock down the pavement. “Boredom’s misconstrued. People spend fortunes chasing it, then panic when it shows up.”
She gave him a look. “You actually believe boredom’s worth anything?”
He nudged her hand tighter within his. “I believe you’d reinvent it if given half the chance.”
She bit down a smile.
They crossed a statue and a junction until the city spat them out onto a calmer patch of lawn. Fifth Avenue hummed past the treetops, all that office light burning through other people’s exhaustion. The lamps here hummed faintly, chasing away bugs but not the occasional mosquito. She plopped down anyway, skirt brushing damp grass, claiming a square foot of the park for herself.
Harry sat down behind her without question, drawing her back against his chest until her head fit neatly into the crook of his shoulder, under his jaw. Her own sexy furniture. Whatever, let him have his moment in the sun... or moon.
She glanced sideways, past the bar of his forearm. Sure enough, his two-person shadow crew had stationed themselves at the pavement’s edge, loitering, black suits in loyalty, never out of sight.
“Amazing bastards,” she muttered. “You should give them a raise.”
Harry kissed the corner of her jaw instead of answering.
“Harry?”
He was too busy dotting idle kisses along her hairline, so what she got was a distracted “Mm.”
“You promise you’ll be serious?”
He kissed just above her ear, lips curving. “As a heart attack.”
She rolled her eyes but let it slide. Maybe it was the way everything felt softer tonight, the languid glow of lamp lights and his warm hand stroking her waist, or maybe it was the exhaustion catching up with her, loosening her guard. Either way, the thought slipped out before she could cage it.
“What if…” she started, then halted.
“What if what?” His voice was muffled against her temple, but the fluctuation in his tone was immediate—alert now, listening.
“What if I,” she sighed, “missed the part where everyone else figured out what they’re good at?”
That pulled him still. His mouth settled on her skin, waiting.
“It’s hard to tell,” she went on, staring at the grass, “where effort ends and talent begins. You know… am I supposed to just grind myself down until something sticks? Or have a magical calling? Because I don’t see a cello in my closet or a trust fund to float the years it takes to ‘find myself.’”
He chuckled low and deep in his chest; it thrummed in hers. “Hate to break it to you, but neither do most people.”
“Pfft. Bullshit.”
“I’m serious.” His lips left her temple. “People just find something they can endure and then—voila—they have talent.”
“That’s so,” she wrinkled her nose, “bleak.”
“That’s so true. You start with what interests you, stick with it and survive the boring parts.”
“But I’m not a child anymore,” she muttered.
“I think you missed out on that part, sweetheart.”
The jab landed sharper than he meant, but he wasn’t wrong. Childhood had never been homework and extracurriculars; it was a fire exit she never got to use. She missed the days she never had—scribbling notes in labelled binders, trying on silly dreams before it was time to leave the nest, failing in safe little ways that didn’t cost you rent. No one ever told her to work harder at anything, or try something new, or that she was allowed to. Her whole life had been about getting by, not getting good.
Leaning her cheek deeper into his shoulder, she muttered, “So… what, I’m gambling with my future and no one’s holding the odds?”
“Dice, darts—doesn’t matter,” he said, smoothing back a strand of her hair, combing it behind her ear. “You try something. You fall on your pretty ass. You try again.” He kissed her ear, the warmth lingering. “Welcome to being a real person.”
She smirked faintly, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “Damn. I was really hoping for a 30-day trial.”
“No refunds.”
“Super. So what happens if I bomb the whole thing?”
“Then you’ll be in terrific company,” he supplied with ease. “Look around you: everybody’s winging it.”
She tilted her head up, catching the sly tug at his mouth. “How is that helpful?”
“At least,” Harry murmured, “you’ll be the sexiest loser.”
She scoffed, rolling her eyes. “My looks are doing all the heavy lifting.”
“Yeah, well,” he said lazily, “your personality clocked out ages ago.”
She smacked his chest. “Rude fogey.”
“Oh, I'm sure you have plenty of experience in that variety.”
Her brows shot up. “Uh, excuse you—I do men with distinction and wallets fat enough to bruise a thigh.”
“How romantic.”
“How realistic,” she corrected, poking at his neck. “And, speaking of, can’t believe I blew off an omakase dinner with Jackpot for you.”
She made a move to push off his chest, feigning irritation, but Harry’s firm arms locked tighter around her waist, pinning her neatly in place, his laugh muffled against her shoulder.
“Dibs, remember?” he murmured.
She tipped her head back, scanning the black, starless sky as though the universe might file a complaint on her behalf. Out of all the men alive, she had to draw the one who treats possession like divine law.
“Harry,” she sighed, “if I wind up being yours, that would be a detriment to my lifestyle choices.”
“You mean your little bait-and-switch game.”
“Something like that.” She wriggled a hand free and tapped his shirtfront. “You’re talking to a girl with a thriving portfolio of ethically questionable initiatives.”
He gave a mock-solemn nod. “A true entrepreneur whom I respect. Which also brings me back to this...”
He shifted, lifting one hip with theatrical effort, sliding a hand into his back pocket. She arched a brow.
“If that’s a butt plug, I’m walking.”
“No one's going near your ass, relax.” A beat passed. “Yet.”
“You’d have better luck colonising Mars, Castillo.”
He produced a folded slip of paper and held it up like a winning card. She took it hesitantly, unfolded it, braced for a dumb stunt—and nearly snorted. A cheque. A cheque for two hundred and fifty-eight dollars and thirteen cents. She had been half-prepared for a deed, even another ring.
“Oh, you don’t have to pay me to go out with you,” she said slowly, squinting down at the numbers again. Maybe an extra zero might materialise nearby. “And undervalue me.”
“You’re jacking up my gravitas, sweetheart.”
She held it up between two fingers. “What is this?”
“That,” he said, with purposeful pomp, “is your first stipend from the newspaper.”
No way. She slapped her hand over her mouth, choking on a laugh. Her dumb cartoon. The stupid, raunchy doodles she’d half-jokingly drawn on a napkin. What—did the universe declare it gratis money week? She was getting richer by the hour!
“You’re joking!” she laughed aloud.
He cocked a brow. “Do I look like I’d joke about pussy?”
Compared to the ten grand in her bag—humming like a live wire against her conscience—this cheque felt like a holy relic. Two hundred and fifty-eight dollars and thirteen cents, and every cent of it was hers, without claws or compromise. No swiping rings, no running plays, no pretending to laugh at dull men over nigiri.
“Consider it seed money,” he offered.
She smirked to cover the sting of sincerity. “For my empire of filthy cat cartoons?”
“Exactly.” His grin was smug. “I’m your first investor. You’ll remember me when you’re rich.”
She hugged the cheque to her chest. “Oh, this means so much to me.”
He hummed. “This one is… cleaner?”
“It’s all mine.” She looked him square in the eye, still half-laughing. “Just me and my dirty brain.”
Even though it was like winning a tiara in a dumpster raffle, it was hers. In pen strokes, in punchlines, in messy, obscene honesty.
Harry gave her a look that hovered somewhere between appraisal and amusement, then settled with that half-smile she wanted to wipe off his face. “Wow. You’re actually proud.”
That made him laugh again. “Sweetheart, if two hundred bucks buys integrity, I’ve been underselling myself.”
“Don’t worry.” She tapped the cheque against his arm. “I’ll make sure you’re properly credited in my memoir: ‘To Harry—occasional armchair, involuntary muse, part-time accountant.’”
“Accountant?”
“You handled my first royalties. That makes you legally responsible for all my future tax fraud.”
He groaned, dropping his forehead to her shoulder. “I always knew your success would ruin me.”
She dragged a hand through his hair, ruffling the soft curls with the careless familiarity of someone pretending she wasn’t cataloguing the sensation. Too easy, too good, too right. That was the risk of him—how easy he made it feel, to lean, to laugh, to belong. And wasn’t that the most dangerous comfort?
She realised, with an awkward constriction in her chest, how comfortable it would be to actually be with him. To stop posturing, to stop the little shell games she played with everyone else, and let him see her past all the smoke and mirrors. And worse—he looked like he already did, and didn't mind it one bit.
Wasn’t that a gift? A man who could clock the racket she was running, still stick around, still tuck her under his arm like she wasn’t a liability with legs?
She blinked, startled at herself. Had she just—was she entertaining this ridiculous idea?
Her brain snapped back with the cynicism that had saved her life more than once: gifts always came with receipts. People didn’t just want you—they wanted something. Attention, leverage, proof they could tame you. The minute she let herself believe otherwise, she’d be back on the treadmill, running herself ragged, dancing behind a gilded cage and calling it freedom.
And yet…
“All this,” she murmured, eyes flicking to him, “just to have me?”
Harry lifted his head, close enough she could see the unspent laugh tucked in the corners of his mouth. That look—mischief lacquered over purpose. “Did it work?”
“Most cults start smaller.”
“Only needed one convert. Looks like I got her.”
Her lips curved. “I’m not a half-measure, Harry.”
“Which is why I’m all in.” His voice carried that infuriating steadiness because he wasn’t bluffing; he knew the hand he was playing would eventually be the winning one.
She sighed, “Suit yourself. You’ll wish you hadn’t.”
“Calculative risk.” A crinkling grin aimed at her heart. “I ran the numbers, like with any good acquisition.”
He made this investment word sound flattering, not transactional, and that was what disturbed her. Investments could grow; they implied time, patience, and dividends. Nobody in her life had ever stuck around long enough to see a return—they just cashed out when it stopped being fun. Exhibit A: Dieter.
Fucking Dieter. At least, in some part of herself, even back then, she knew they weren’t going to make it to the finish line. He was too glitter-soaked, too high on his own fumes, a man addicted to applause, a thirst to make a name in Hollywood even at the expense of his conviction. She’d played along back then, maybe because it was easy, shiny, and giddy.
So what the hell did she know about Harry?
She knew he could give a masterclass in eating pussy, for starters. She knew he was absolutely obsessed with some version of her she’d curated—‘Eve’, a sexy, quick-witted distraction. She knew he loved to tease her back, to corner her until she had to bare her teeth just to keep balance. She knew money was his gospel, and he preached it with alarming conviction, and she found that devotion oh-so-erotic. And she also knew he was gorgeous enough to be a problem.
So why was she the one hesitating now?
“Might the investment make a request?” she asked, feigning indifference, laying down the first card.
“Please.” He said it without hesitation, with that little flicker of curiosity in his gaze, as though he’d already decided to grant it.
Now it seemed almost laughable, given the circumstances. As a woman who had robbed him blind, they’d done everything but the conventional. Foreplay before formality, intimacy before introductions, power games before pleasantries. And here she was, about to ask him for the one thing she’d sworn she didn’t want: normalcy.
“I want a date.”
His amusement basically purred across his face. “Is this another extortion? Another test to see if I pass?”
“You think too much.” She savoured the surprise in his eyes. “All I want—” she leaned in, syllables clipped like the conditions of a contract—“is a proper, wise, first date with you.”
The word wise hung there, ridiculous even to her own ears. A proper first date. With Harry, of all people. What even qualified as wise in his world? Choosing the Gulfstream over the yacht because of the carbon footprint?
In the end, she wanted to see him stripped of the games for once. No leverage, no buzz, no hot pursuit. Plain, old Harry Castillo, sitting across from her, nowhere to hide, and that would tell her more than any kiss to any part of her ever could.
He laughed his wonder. “That’s the first time anyone’s ever asked me to be wise on a date.”
“Try it on,” she grinned widely. “Might even suit you.”
He examined her for a quick beat, the humour lingering but tempered by something else. “And what does a proper date look like in your book? Coffee? Champagne? Shopping spree? A trip to Milan?”
“See?” she arched a brow, ignoring the dollar signs flashing in her head. “You already think you can buy it off me.”
His grin sharpened. “I was two fingers deep in you a few hours ago, baby. Now you’re angling for dinner and a show.”
“Ugh, grow up.”
He didn’t move to stop her when she pushed up to her feet, brushing grass off her thighs, tugging her skirt back down before the few picnickers around them started composing scandals.
Harry stayed exactly where he was, leaned back on his palms, head tilted, watching her, his grin growing. His eyes dragged leisurely—ankles, calves, hem, hips, breasts—as if he had not done it twice tonight already.
She bent, snatching a discarded champagne cork from the grass, flicking it at his chest.
He plucked the cork from his shirt without flinching, smirking. “Fine, guilty as charged. But in my defence—it’s not like I can hire a consultant to figure you out. Believe me, I wish I could.”
She slipped her heels back tighter, fastening the straps with sharp little tugs, refusing to give him the satisfaction of watching her wobble. “I’d stop trying to find my price tag.”
“I don’t think you have one.”
She glanced at him, lips tilting. “Careful, honey. I might surprise you.”
“I’m not worried.” He took his time answering, which was his real tell. “You’re priceless.”
The smooth motherfucker deployed his checkmate. She bit her lip, tossing her hair back, fighting down a smile that wanted to bloom too goddamn wide.
Her pulse was Morse-coding inside her ribs, every stuttered beat spelling out the same humiliating truth: fucked. She was thoroughly fucked. She’d dealt with older men believing themselves to be clever, but Harry was better than that. He was fluent in her—her rhythms, her feints, the weak spots she never let anyone close enough to touch.
When he rose, brushing soil from his palms, she caught the subtle motion: the casual hike of his sleeve, the checking glance at the white-gold Vacheron Constantin strapped to his wrist—classy, understated flex. Always time, always money, always image, and he couldn’t help himself.
That in itself should’ve repulsed her, but instead, it grounded him in her eyes, made him convenient.
“One Hublot is enough for me,” she said, meeting his eyes, a flicker of susceptibility masquerading as sass.
He sighed. “If you’re gonna rob me, at least aim high. I cost more.”
Her fingers found his hands, guiding them to her hips, pulling him into her orbit. Their chests brushed, his musky cologne rose up around her, lips close enough that a single reckless breath would bridge the distance. A kiss hovered there, but she wasn’t ready to give away that currency—yet.
“I want to flip through your file, Harry,” she whispered. “All I’ve got to work with is your Wikipedia page, and that’s just the brochure version. So—I want to overindulge my curiosity first. Hence, our date.”
His grin spread slow, devastating, and he dipped his head lower, eyes hooded. “You’re hard to resist when you speak my language.”
She bit back a laugh, nearly giddy, and stole a kiss—just a brush, light, fleeting, enough to tease, enough to keep him hungry and her in control, enough to hold until the next round.
Pulling back, she whispered against his mouth, “Don’t think of it as me saying yes. Think of it as me giving you… a provisional guarantee.”
His laugh was deeply pleased. “I’ll take that action.”
She tilted her head to peer over his shoulder, eyes darting over the darkened park. Trees hemmed them in, the lamps throwing uneven pools of yellow on the gravel path. Families had gone, only the odd straggler jogging past, Harry's shadow crew still with their watchful eyes on them. To her, it felt like the world had narrowed to him, his hands stroking at her waist and back, his breath at her temple.
“Now,” she murmured, surveying their limits with a sly smile. “Where should I have you...?”
“Not here,” he said softly, brushing the words across her skin.
She huffed out a laugh, incredulous. “Oh? A prudish streak?”
“I'm particular,” he said, voice darkened, kissing the hinge of her jaw.
“Possessive,” she countered.
“Obsessed.”
“Outrageous.”
“Devoted to you,” he finished.
Her laugh died in her throat, pulse stuttering at the certainty in his tone. He was extraordinarily proficient at giving her heart a workout.
“Wow,” she waved off with a shake of her head, masking the jolt of heat with a shrug, “that almost sounded like romance.”
“Almost like,” he echoed.
She tapped her lip, squinting. “The car then?”
She’d never been shy about stating the facts—and the fact was, cars were humanity’s greatest neutraliser.
You could be rich, poor, genius, idiot, saint, or sinner, but once you tried to have sex in one, you were diminished to the same uncoordinated, sweaty contortions. Man’s greatest invention had doubled, in her private ranking, as man’s cruellest stage.
Best place for sex? Absolutely. Hardest place? Without question. A performance broken down, mathematically, into 50% passion, 20% public indecency, 30% avoiding a concussion. Furthermore: 100% adrenaline, 0% dignity, and 1,000% worth it.
Terrible math aside, it was acrobatic chaos—seatbelts tangled, door handles bruising, buttons popping like gunfire. And still it left you breathless, wrecked, laughing despite yourself. For her, now, it raised the question in the aftermath: was this mindless fucking or, absurdly enough, some warped version of making love?
Harry clearly didn’t share her need for definition. Within moments of contact with the Maybach, he was already sending Ben and the suited entourage away with a series of clipped syllables that barely qualified as words. Dismissal had never looked so feral, and she only made it worse by trailing her fingers through his belt loops, brushing her knuckles across his broad back—tiny vandalisms, teasing him right in front of his loyal little army.
Watching him juggle composure while she was feeding his hunger was hilarious... and intoxicating. And, if she admitted it, a little terrifying.
Because whatever hurricane raged in her was doubled in him, only his felt honed—six feet of masculinity, in control, iron-willed until she cracked him. Then it spilled out, unstoppable, once he managed to drive them over to a quiet brownstone neighbourhood past Midtown, parked up by the curb.
All of it hit her like a bullet when he finally manhandled her onto his lap in the backseat. The car was in park, AC on full blast, the sophisticated leather reclined at an angle. Honestly, this Maybach was less a luxury vehicle and more a living archive of their sexcapades, one memory seared into the leather after another.
Foreplay was foregone; she peeled her dress up to her hips without ceremony, baring herself like she was opening a curtain on a one-act play. His fancy linen shirt fought back, resisting her fingers at the last buttons. He couldn’t keep his own hands disciplined either, lacking another pair, hurrying everywhere at once—her cheeks, her neck, her arms, her waist, her ass—each touch impatient, greedy, worship bordering on desperation she basked in.
So when she asked him why this was so, his sudden murmur cut through the chaos, catching her off guard.
“Trying to make the most of my time.”
The words struck oddly. No lust or dominance. She blinked, and for a moment, she felt sorry for him—though not nearly as sorry as she felt for herself. Why was she denying him? Why was she resisting the gravity of the most perfect man she’d ever touched, one who made her feel less like prey and more like a co-conspirator in ruin?
She fisted her hands in his dark, beautiful curls, tilting his head back, needing his eyes on hers.
“Take your time, baby. Take whatever you want,” she whispered, brushing a kiss over one eyelid, then the other. A benediction disguised as a taunt.
It was like handing him the key to the city. Whatever discretion he had been clinging to shattered. His lips, teeth, and tongue turned feverish, claiming every inch of her he could reach, biting in, dragging a trail of wet kisses, his grip bruising at her ass as he pulled her harder against him. The wet grind between them ratcheted higher, raw, almost unbearable.
And when she unzipped him—oy vey, Harry, the man, the myth, the legend—springing up, his incredible cock was a fucking miracle of architecture. Built to devastate, dark, curved, flushed, hard as it got, an instrument of fortune that made her believe maybe there was a higher power.
She rubbed a palm down his length, feeling every twitch, every rope of vein that made him so obscenely alive beneath her touch. She leaned into him to say, “You’re completely ruining me for every other man ever.”
He breathed through his teeth. “That’s the dream.”
Bastard said it as though she should’ve always known he’d come along and end the competition before it even began. And he probably was right.
Because he’d been extremely helpful to her tonight—saviour, fanatic, chauffeur, furniture—she allowed herself a rare indulgence, coy as she nipped at his lip, stroking a hand down his cock.
“How do you want me?”
“Inside,” he breathed, voice husky.
She flashed him a wicked grin. “My mouth?”
He shook his head. “The real thing.”
She laughed through her nose, brushing hers against his. “You better mean that.”
But she didn’t get a chance to keep teasing. Her gaze stayed locked on his as he guided her down, gingerly, reverently. He eased into her inch by inch, and it felt as inevitable as the tide. He was big—just as ruinously, unfairly big as she remembered him—stretching her full, opening, yielding, until there was no more room left. It wasn’t just sex; it was some strange, sexual Lego. And she knew, with the absolute conviction of a sinner mid-confession, that this was right. This was coming home.
And that she was so fucking screwed, literally and otherwise. Because if he kept doing this, if he kept seeing her like this—bare, breaking open and still wanting more—she might actually start believing in things like fate.
“Eyes on me, yeah?” he ordered, and Jesus—his voice. Deep, ragged, utterly insatiate.
His dark eyes caught the amber spill of the streetlamps outside, turning molten, glistening gold, and he never looked away. His hands bracketed her face, holding her still so he could drink in every micro-expression: the pinch of a wince, the quiver in her jaw, the disbelief written in every gasp at just how much of him she could take. She mirrored him, unwilling to blink, unwilling to miss the play of strain and want across his features—those tight lines around his mouth, the twitch of silver hair near his temples, the furrow between his brows, the way pleasure softened him and sharpened him all at once.
It was ridiculous, really, how close two people could be in a moment like this. Absurd, and scary, and holy. Peak longing. So, naturally, her brain—traitorous little gremlin that it was—served up the most inappropriate thought possible.
“Harry…”
“Mhm?” His voice was wrecked as she clutched him from the inside, holding him there.
“Do you still buy rubbers?”
The look he gave her could’ve killed a thousand brain cells. A sex-dazed you’re-shitting-me stare.
She met it with her own sex-dazed no-I’m-not-shitting-you stare.
“You can’t just ask me if I’m seeing anybody like a normal person?” His grip on her hips tightened as if to keep from throttling her. “You had to wait until I’m this deep inside you to—ohh, Christ.” His head fell back when she rocked down harder.
“Do you want to buy some?” she needled.
“Believe it or not, I’ve had my hands full for a long—holy... shit. Just like that.”
“Like this?” She let her body answer for her, merciless, hypnotic, slow-rolling her hips, dragging every inch of him along her walls.
“Jesus,” he groaned, voice fraying. “You feel so good.”
She smiled through her own unravelling. “So, are you?”
“Am I wh—don’t test me right now.” His hand slid up her back, tangled in her hair, yanking her head back just enough to bare her throat. His mouth found her jaw, biting down. “Can we table this?”
“Are you screwing other girls?” she insisted, sing-song, even as pleasure punched holes in her lungs.
He let out something halfway between a growl and a laugh, snapping his gaze to hers. “Honey, if you don’t shut that pretty mouth…” His thumb found her nipple, tweaking until she gasped, while his other hand snaked lower, lower—finding that sharp little nerve that had her seizing against him. “I will stop fucking you right now. And trust me—” his teeth grazed her ear, “—I haven’t even begun to do to you the things I’ve been dreaming about for too long now.”
Oh my fucking fuck. Her brain wanted to clap back, but her body folded first. “Yep, I surrender, I yield, whatever—just fuck me.”
His laugh was dark, triumphant. “Good girl.” A pause, then softer: “And no. I’m not screwing anyone else. Haven’t wanted to.”
She meant to fire back a clever remark—but then he shifted, driving deeper, and her neurons fried. All that came out was a strangled sound, a fucked little moan-prayer.
“Harry,” she gasped. “You’re—god, you’re—”
“Huge?” he offered, wicked grin flashing as he ground up into her.
“—despicable,” she corrected, yet her nails were carving bloody little constellations into his chest.
“Mm,” he hummed, thrusting nice and deep, savouring her, watching her. “Say that again when you’re begging.”
Her body had already turned traitor, trembling on the edge, every nerve ending screaming his name, every muscle attuned to him. It was combustion, conspiracy, communion. Too much, too soon—
“Shiiit,” she dragged the word out, teeth clenched, thighs trembling around him, suspended in that delicious freefall. And all he did was grin up at her, cocky bastard, like he’d already won.
“Ride me, sweetheart,” he breathed. “Nice and easy.”
Galaxies imploded behind her eyes at the sound of him. Nice and easy. Sure. Meanwhile, her pulse was begging for reckless, destructive speed, for oblivion. She shifted, tried, but it was a bitch. Her whole body screamed for him—more, harder, faster—still, he dared to play the gentleman about it.
And then it happened. Something small, catastrophic. A sound—rrrrrrip!
Both pairs of eyes snapped downward. Her pretty blue panties, once worn and respectable, now lay torn and dangling from beneath her dress as a casualty of war.
“Aw, c’mon.” She slid them out and dangled the scraps accusingly. “I liked these.”
Harry, shameless, grabbed her chin and tipped her face back toward his, thumb smoothing away her pout. His lips curved, wolfish.
“I’ll get you ten more,” he murmured, “all for me to rip.”
A laugh burst out of her, aroused, exasperated. “You’re so sexy when you do that.”
He unassumingly tucked the scraps away into his pocket. Perv. “Buy you new panties?”
“Just spend,” she said, arch and daring. “Doesn’t matter how. On me, for me, because of me.”
She clenched around him deliberately, watching with a predator’s curiosity how fast it disentangled him. The moan that broke out of him wasn’t just a sound—it was a nerve yanked open, an oath, a weakness he’d never show anyone else.
She nearly laughed. God, look at him. The big, bad, immovable man, who carried the world in a single fist, was reduced to his knees by the tiniest twist of her body. His face strained, the veins in his neck straining, his mouth broken open around a strangled “sonuva bitch.” There was divinity in that reversal: him, all brute strength and domination, offered up as a gift to her small will, exacting tithes with every swerve of her hips.
“Shit, baby, ‘sokay,” he hissed, trying to hold her in check, his thick biceps fastened around her, stomach rippling beneath. But she could feel the tremor in his grip, the edge of panic in his restraint. “I—goddamn!”
She almost wanted to stop just to torture him, to prolong the exquisite wreck of him. But her own body betrayed her—every nerve lighting, every beat urging faster, harder, now, now, now. She sped up, hips snapping forward, backwards, forward, forward, forward... lost to herself, a frenzied cry tearing free. Her fingers scrambled for purchase at the nape of his neck, twisting in his hair, feeling that sweet pressure build beneath while the world tilted away.
“Please, please, please, please,” she gasped—not even sure who she was begging. Him? Herself? The universe? It didn’t matter. She was already gone. Almost there, so close...
An orgasm slammed through her, white, static, breaking glass and starlight punched through her skull, shattering her apart until all she could do was hold on, claw at him, his hair, and burn with it.
He seemed to sense it before she did, his hands feverishly gripping her—claiming a breast, the other dragging her down by the curve of her ass, desperate to fuse her closer with every spasm of hers. She was dimly aware of his head pressing against her sternum, of his muttered curses muffled into her skin, as if he couldn’t stand to breathe without her.
And still, even wrecked, she kept moving. Because pleasure had turned into hunger, hunger into obsession. Her hips rocked with the lazy insistence of someone drunk on it, unwilling to let the high collapse.
“Just a little,” he rasped, urgent in that way only men on the edge are. “Just—give me a bit more…”
“All yours,” she breathed.
His desperation was intoxicating. She ground down with renewed intent, greedy, feeding off the way his control slipped inch by inch. The slick slide of him, the pressure of his arms, the look he managed to pin on her even while unravelling—it was all too much. He squeezed her waist so hard she thought she might bruise, not a single care—she let him leave the proof of it. She wanted his ruin carved into her, permanent.
“Baby, oh fuck,” he groaned, and then he broke. One heartbeat, he was holding on, the next he was gone, eyes flying shut before his head crashed against her chest, teeth sinking into her chest to keep from howling. His whole body shook with it, jerked, bucked, poured into her in hot, helpless pulses of thick heat, and still he drove himself deep, desperate to leave nothing of himself ungiven.
For a poised moment, she only watched him—watched this fortress of a man collapse in her arms, undone and helpless and hers. His ruin was beautiful. And with a clarity that startled her, it was apparent—she’d done this. She’d folded him. Bent him. Made him hers.
And then, inevitably, her own body answered again, a second pulse of ecstasy rolling through her at the sight of him breaking.
As the tremors ebbed, she let herself collapse against him. His arms wrapped tight around her waist, erratic, greedy, even in exhaustion. He was cooling down, trembling a little, his breath a hot mess against her chest.
She kissed the crown of his head, stroking the damp curls at the nape of his neck with absent-minded affection. Her body was still thrumming, her brain lagging behind the sensation, and she thought, with brutal honesty only oxytocin allowed: I’m not sure if I actually like him, or if I’ve just imprinted like a duckling onto his frankly indecent dick.
“Get your ass over here, you little minx,” he laughed, agog, wrecked, still high on the afterglow. “I’m not finished with you.”
He slipped out carefully—her wince was involuntary—and dragged her into his arms before she could gather herself. She wanted to scramble back to her seat, return to some illusion of composure, not sit around freshly fucked on a residential street.
Harry didn’t give two shits. His shirt hung open, his chest gleaming, the very picture of post-coital respite. He looked like he could light a cigarette and whistle while the world burned down around him.
“Harry?” she murmured, listening to the lurch of his heartbeat, hiding her grin in his chest. She was trying to tether herself back, and of course, he made it harder by pretending to fall asleep on her.
He hummed, lazy, non-commital, dragging his nose lazily up her temple, eyes closed.
“You put the oh—” she gasped the word, mimicking herself from minutes earlier, “—in Toyota.”
His chest shook with a laugh, and he scrubbed a hand over his face. “Christ.”
But she was gone now, wit and lunacy colliding, her brain-to-mouth filter fried. “You May-broke-my-bach.”
That did it. His laughter wheezed out of him in disbelief, head tilted back against the seat. “Only you, sweetheart. I never know what’s next with you.”
He tipped his head back against the seat, but there was something softer there, too—about the fact that she could unravel him with nonsense as easily as she had with her body.
Her gaze wandered, like it always did when she got too close to a good thing. In their hands that he had entwined... oh my, his hands. She knew them too well by now—the soft ridges, the grooves where the skin folded, the permanent calligraphy of wrinkles. If there were ever a police line-up of hands, she could identify him blindfolded, single-handed. Hell, she could identify him by touch alone, a mortifying thought she quickly buried.
Midtown at one a.m. was too quiet. Streetlamps flickered, the avenue nearly deserted, the cinematic backdrop you’d expect for people who had their shit together. Not for her, tangled up with a man in the backseat of a fancy car.
Was this her I-made-it moment? Money in her bag, gorgeous outfit still (mostly) intact, orgasmic glow courtesy of Harry, who happened to be handsome, rich, and—currently—entirely taken by her. Boon or bane, that was to be determined.
Except… ambitionless. Still. The city stretched out in all directions, teeming with people who knew precisely what they wanted; meanwhile, she was toggling between becoming a pastry chef, a doodle-master, or—on other days—a vet. Didn’t vets need major degrees? Years of school? She could barely commit to a skincare routine.
Harry’s fingers brushed over her lips, derailing her spiral. “I love this smile on you.”
The softness was too much, so she did what she always did: bit down. Hard enough to make him hiss and playfully flick her nose.
She propped herself up on an elbow, studying him. The scruff under her palm, the heat of his skin, his hair sticking up in ridiculous, sex-rumpled tufts. Her hand lingered there, smoothing it down. Goddamn, her rich boy was sexxxy—yes, spelled with three x’s, thanks very much.
“What?” he asked, catching the smirk tugging at her mouth.
“Did you just fuck me in front of your parents’ house?”
She thumbed toward the brownstone behind them with its gilded CASTILLO plaque gleaming like a family crest beside the intricate oakwood double doors.
He snorted. “It’s one of mine.”
Just like that, like he was talking about spare cufflinks or an extra suit. How many was “one of”? Two? Four? A baker’s dozen scattered across Manhattan? A moiety of the world?
She squinted at him. “Well, thank goodness. I thought we were dabbling in some front-yard exhibitionism kink. Which—no judgment—but I wasn’t quite prepared for that.”
He chuckled, shaking his head, but she wasn’t finished.
“Hold on. You’re telling me you could’ve had me with—air conditioning, furniture, maybe even a mattress—and you chose…” She tapped the fogged-up window with a nail, “…to put glass in the hole of this sweatbox?”
His admission came with a sly grin. “I’ve always wanted to do the tailpipe tango.”
Her laughter broke out so hard it filled the car, ricocheting off the tinted glass. “The what? Who even says that?”
“You know... dashboard diddling. Fender bender.”
“You’ve officially broken the language, Harry. Hope you're proud.”
He only grinned wider, softer now, his hand sliding up her cheek into her hair, catching strands in his fingers. “And I just really, really wanted you. Can’t help myself.”
And there it was. That softness again, the thing she didn’t get, the thing that didn’t compute. How could someone like him look at her—a thief, a hustler, a girl who conned old money out of their baubles like it was bloodletting—and still manage to glow at her like she was the prize? People didn’t do that. People usually saw a distraction. Men saw sex, leverage, game, and Harry Castillo, of all men, had every reason to file her neatly into the “use-and-discard” category.
Which was exactly why her breath hitched at the way he said it.
He was consuming her, her little world, too fast, at the hurricane speed he usually operated at. She wasn’t used to being looked at like this, touched like this, wanted like this. It was a drug, tapped at a vein, and mainlined straight in. She’d barely known him, and already he was becoming the itch under her skin.
Her finger traced the faint crescent under his eye. His gaze flickered, darkened. “And I really, really like when you can’t help yourself.”
“Close enough to a confession,” he murmured.
She tilted her head, smiling. “I can do better.”
“Then do better with me.”
God, this man. No—men. Men always wanted more. More proof, more trust, more surrender. They couldn’t just take the piece you handed them and be content—they had to pry open the box, strip you down to wiring, rewire you until you sparked. It was exhausting. It was dangerous.
So, she deflected. “What, like financially? Spiritually?”
“Funny,” he touched her nose, “but I'm here for the real thing.”
What terrified her more was that she wanted that, too.
She could already feel the blueprint etching itself across her mind: taken apart, inspected, but—miraculously—still wanted. That was the trap, wasn’t it? The possibility that someone like Harry might see the mess inside and decide to stay anyway. The fantasy of being unspooled and kept, instead of discarded once the shine wore off.
Maybe it was the money. She wasn’t naïve enough to ignore what it felt like to sit in his car, breathe his cologne, know he could afford to waste time and cash in the same casual breath. Money made you believe in convenience, made you imagine tranquillity. But maybe... it was Harry. He stared too hard, and he saw the edges of her sleight-of-hand and didn’t give two shits.
She wanted to sneer and puncture the feeling swelling in her chest, but nothing came. What the hell was it, anyway? Relief? Joy? Fucking hope coming back for the last hurrah? The truth was—oh, it felt good. It felt good to want a good thing, one that wasn’t survival, wasn’t pawn slips and IOUs scrawled on matchbooks. It felt good to imagine leverage that wasn’t stolen, to imagine someone holding her without keeping score.
She wanted the fantasy where she wasn’t always running the math—how much to take, how much to hide, how much to leave behind before it all went bad. She wanted the absurd, glittery fraud of “normal”, and she hated herself for it, because nothing rusted faster than illusions.
And Harry—well, he made her feel like maybe she could reach for that illusion without breaking her neck in the process.
He rapped his knuckles gently against her forehead, a smirk tugging at his mouth. “Don’t fry a wire in there over that.”
She startled, half-laughing, half-irritated at how he always seemed to catch her in a spiral.
“I’ve to get going,” she muttered abruptly, scrambling for practicality before her body betrayed her further. She slid off him, tugging her dress back down her thighs, busying herself with the hunt for her heels in the footwell. If she didn’t move now, she’d stay. And if she stayed, she might forget that she was supposed to be the one holding the leash. “I… have work in a few hours.”
A sharp tug on her elbow had her toppling backwards onto him, his arms locking around her waist. “Skip it. I’ll reimburse.”
She wriggled in his grip, breath catching. “You think you can buy my time?”
“I was hoping to lease it until I’m satisfied. Consequently, I’m freeing up my weekend for you,” he told her, like he was rearranging empires. “What are you going to wear for me tomorrow, sweetheart?”
How could he ask a question like that and make it sound pure sex? Her mouth tilted in a slow grin. “I was going to wear my intentions.”
He ran the knuckles of his fist to caress the skin between her collarbones. “Would they come off as easily as they go on?”
“You’ll like them—my intentions come in red.”
He slid a hand into his back pocket, drew out his Montblanc leather wallet, and out came a card. A sleek, ominous slab of status. Black, heavy, Centurion. Her thighs clenched reflexively. Oh, he was making her so wet it was humiliating.
“Go ahead,” he said, holding it out between two fingers. “Get yourself something nice. Make capitalism blush for me. Call it a little thank you for dinner tonight.”
Did this man never learn? Or was this exactly the kind of bait he knew she wouldn’t resist? He was dangerous, yes, but he was also dumb. Dumb, hot, handsome, rich man.
She didn’t reach for it immediately. “And if I max it out?”
He pressed his tongue into his cheek, amused. “It’s cute how you think there’s a limit.”
Her laugh was caught halfway between arousal and calculation. She bit her lip, letting him see the wicked edge of her smile, gears turning in her head. “I am so fucking hot for you right now.”
Finally, she plucked the card from his hand—the stupidly dangerous token, slippery with promise—and pressed a soft kiss to the arc of his scruffy cheek.
“If I spend too much,” she murmured against his skin, “you can take it out of me.”
He raised a brow, parsing the meaning there.
She winked, tapping the card against his lips and slipping it between her breasts. “One night at a time.”
He watched her leave, a smirk playing at the corner of his lips. “Counting on it.”
Grabbing her purse from the seat nearby, she clicked the door open and stepped into the night. The warm air caressed her bare thighs, a reminder that this was the second time she was stepping out of a car with Harry, no panties on. She wondered if that was going to be her new signature—drive with him, walk home half-dressed, try not to think too hard about what she was leaving behind.
But first, she needed distance. Perspective. She needed to get home and sort through the shit that had unfolded: the money, the sudden shimmering glimpse of a future she thought was buried, Harry fucking Castillo, and the weekend rush that wasn’t going to staff itself. Priorities. She needed a list, and Harry—if she had any sense—did not belong on it, not when he came with that aftertaste of inevitability.
She’d made it three cars down before the crash of his door echoed after her, his footfalls quick.
“Eve, honey—just—woah, hey, hold on. Stay the night with me, I'll drop you off in the morning.”
She didn’t glance back, just flicked a hand dismissively. “Nah, don’t bother. You’re already home, so…”
A huff behind her, the sound of fabric shifting, footsteps catching up, and in her periphery, she caught the absurd sight of him trying to tuck his shirt back in. “Thank you for your compassion, but this isn’t where I stay. Would you please—”
He caught her wrist in one swift, fluid move, tugged her back, and she stumbled into his chest with a sharp “oof.” Her glare snapped up to him—stupid, stupid, desperate man.
“What is the matter with—”
His hand tightened around hers even more. “This isn’t some throwaway thing. I'm not wired that way.”
She scoffed. “You might want to get rewired, then.”
“I can’t stop it, I can’t stop anything when you're around,” he rushed out, words tumbling like he’d been holding them in for days. He snapped his fingers. “The second you leave, it’s like… I lose the version of me that only exists, and makes sense, when you’re here.”
That one hit, sharp in her chest. And she hated that it did. So she cut him with a smirk. “That sounds like a dependency issue. Should I send you an invoice?”
His granite jaw flexed. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Turn it into a joke anytime I’m honest with you.”
She laughed, incredulous, but it carried more edge than humour. “What exactly is this, then? What do you want from me, huh?”
The question flew out with more bite than she meant, trembling underneath. She despised herself for giving it breath, for letting him see the bruise-colored doubt she usually kept stitched under her skin.
Did he see her as a distraction, too? Just another novelty, a shiny object, a warm body, the fantasy he could trade in for a cleaner model when the mileage showed? Did he want a younger, prettier, fresher version of the same old story—someone pliant, uncomplicated, good for booze and sex and nothing else?
That would’ve been simple. Manageable. Safe, even.
What if he was selfish enough, stupid enough, reckless enough to actually want her? Wanting her for her—the objective, inconvenient, complicated her.
Did he want her devastatingly earnest? He saw a girlfriend? Date nights. Trading stories after work. Someone to fuck like the world was ending and then, against all logic, build something that didn’t dissolve with the sunrise. And eventually—if she let it get that far—the domestic slide into something resembling Nick’s dialogue in Basic Instinct: fuck like minks, raise rugrats, live happily ever after.
That was the most dangerous possibility of all: not that he was playing her, but that he wasn’t. Especially when she was unequivocally convinced she was not built for ‘happily ever after.’
“There’s just no word for this yet,” he whispered to her, as if reason would patch the cracks. “You. I want you. Period.”
She snorted. “What a load of horseshit.” She jabbed her purse in his direction. “You want the chase. You got to fuck your way into the poor, little, finessed thief's head, and now you want the win because it gets your dick hard. And once you’ve got it—game over. That’s who you are.”
He leaned in, eyes burning flint. “Then why am I still here?”
Her pulse kicked, her throat dried, yet she forced a scoff. “Because you can’t stand being told no.”
His lip twitched, half-snarl, half-smirk. “And you can’t stand admitting you want my attention.”
“Fuck you.” She yanked her hand free and strode off.
His voice chased after her, thinned by distance. “Fuck you, too.”
Fuck him. Fuck him sideways. Every minute she spent with him stripped another piece of her, dulled another blade, until she was walking around half-naked—bare hands, bare heart—and she loathed him for it. How easy he was making her. She hated herself more for letting it be.
“Then you win, sweetheart!” he clamoured after her.
She rolled her eyes so hard it nearly hurt, stomping the pavement with extra force just to drown him out. Win what? What the hell did she win here? He had an ego he could drown in a phonebook full of women who’d spread for him on command, a cushion of wealth, a world that bent for him. She had… overdue bills? Endless drudgery? And a house of cards she couldn’t afford to topple?
“Take the game, take the prize, take everything!” His voice chased her still, booming enough that some neighbour’s light flicked on. “Do you hear me? Keep walking, baby. Pretend you don’t care, but we both know you do.”
She spun on her heel, exasperated. “You’ve no idea.”
He spread his arms wide, maddeningly serene, grin flaring back. “I’ll wait for you tomorrow.”
She laughed bitterly and threw her hands up. “Well, bring snacks, asshole. You’ll be waiting a long time.”
“That’s perfect. Because apparently I love a challenge!” he shot back.
She slammed her foot down, a wordless growl rumbling from her throat. What a frustrating, no-balls, dumbass bitch trying her patience tonight.
She turned her back on him before he could say anything else. The nerve. The absolute nerve of that motherfucker.
She forced herself not to look back, not even when she could feel his eyes burning a hole between her shoulder blades, not when she heard the bang of his car door. Every step forward was a silent dare—don’t flinch, don’t falter, don’t give him the satisfaction.
Anger kept her upright. God, she was so angry. Angry at him for mistaking determination for some twisted affection. Angry at herself for letting his words seep under her skin, make her feel cornered without even touching her. And anger because he had a way of making this feel like a prelude instead of an ending.
Her stride picked up, sharp, smattering, as if trampling the pavement could buff out the confusion clawing at her ribs. But the more distance she put between them, the louder her thoughts got.
He’ll wait. Of course, he’ll wait. A man like that doesn’t lose—he just bides his time until the odds lean his way.
She hugged her purse tighter, as though that might steady her, when she felt something stiff pressing against the fabric of her dress near her chest. Frowning, she slipped her fingers inside her neckline and came up with...
The sleek, black glint of his Centurion card.
Her lips parted in disbelief. Un-fucking-believable.
Heat flooded her, all parts angry, perilously close to thrill. She hadn’t even tried this time, hadn’t angled or teased. It was absurd now. Insulting. And yet… her laugh broke free anyway, choked, breathless.
Somehow, she always ended up the thief. With him, it didn’t matter if she wanted to play straight or keep her hands clean—the story twisted around her as if he’d decided her role for her: the girl who stole. The girl who ran.
She slid the card back into her dress, catching her reflection in the dark pane of a shop window. For a second, the glass doubled her—one scowling, the other ‘Eve’ smirking, and both of them wondering when the universe decided to make theft her native language. Even when she wasn’t stealing. And wasn't that just the cruellest trick?
“Stupid, stupid girl,” she muttered.
And still, her heart wouldn’t slow down. So she did the only thing left: she got on home, heels striking pavement, each step a promise she wasn’t coming back. She just needed to get home before she believed the trick was hers.
warnings: eventual smut, age gap implied, jackson!joel, grumpy x sunshine, fluff, angst, jealous joel hehe.
wc: 2.3k
You make a pact with yourself.
You’re going to make Joel Miller smile.
No particular reason — except maybe how miserable he always looks. All scowls and silence and stiff shoulders when he passes through Jackson. Like if someone ever tried to hug him, he’d go up in flames.
And yet, there’s something in you — maybe it’s that stubborn spark that somehow survived twenty years of death and ruin — that won’t let you leave him alone.
You start small.
A nod at the gates.
A cheerful “Morning, Joel!” at the mess hall.
Fresh bread left on his doorstep.
The first time he finally acknowledges you, it’s with a grunt and a very clear “You don’t need to keep bringin’ me things.”
You just smile. “You’re welcome.”
He doesn’t thank you.
But he doesn’t stop you either.
Joel Miller isn’t mean, exactly.
Just…tightly wound. Shut down. Like a man made of iron — forged by heartbreak and sharpened into something no one is allowed to hold.
But you keep showing up. You talk to him like he’s already your friend — teasing, warm, undeterred by the way he crosses his arms and huffs like you’re some inconvenient little storm.
You’re the only person who calls him Joel and not Mr. Miller or sir.
And when you call him “Sunshine” once — ironically, playfully — he nearly chokes on his coffee.
You don’t know that it kills him — the way you glow. The way you treat him like he’s worth knowing. You have no idea how much he wants to like you.
And how much he refuses to let himself.
——
When you offer to join Joel’s patrol run, you aren’t expecting applause. But you do think he might be at least a little grateful.
Instead, he says nothing. Not during prep, not on the trail, not even when you hand him half your rations just because you know he never eats enough.
The silence doesn’t scare you. It’s Joel. It’s how he is.
You’ve come to like the quiet little ways he shows things — the way he double-checks your gun for you, the way he walks slightly ahead, always between you and the open.
But this silence is different. It's tight. Icy.
And then, on the second day, after hours of walking through mud and thorns and awkward tension, you say something — lighthearted, harmless, maybe a little too cheerful — and Joel stops dead in his tracks.
“Do you ever stop talkin’?” he snaps.
You blink.
“I mean—shit, you just never quit, do you?” he says, voice harsher now. “It’s like you don’t even get how dangerous it is out here. You're distractin’. And honestly? You're annoyin’ as hell.”
Your heart sinks.
You blink once. Then again.
“…Right,” you say, voice quiet now. And for the first time since arriving in Jackson, you stop smiling.
He tries to apologize.
That night, by the fire, you sit apart. Not huffy — just distant. Withdrawn. You hand him food without a word. You wrap your own blanket tight and turn away.
He watches you for a long time before finally clearing his throat.
“I didn’t mean that, earlier.”
You don’t answer.
“I was just… I don’t know. Tired.”
Still, you say nothing. Just stare into the fire.
He shifts beside you, clearly uncomfortable. “You were just tryin’ to help.”
You hum, noncommittal. “It’s fine.”
“It ain’t.”
You look at him, finally.
“No,” you say, calm but cold, “it’s not.”
Then you turn away again, and Joel doesn’t know what else to say. He’s never been good with words — not when they matter.
So he lets the silence settle between you again. And this time, it’s him who can’t stand it.
Back in Jackson, you don't avoid him, not exactly.
But you don’t seek him out, either.
Your usual greetings are gone. You don’t drop off bread or linger by his porch. No little jokes. No big grins. You’re polite, sure — but distant.
And Joel feels it.
It guts him.
The gifts start small, it starts with a tin of coffee.
Left on your porch. No note. No explanation.
Then some new gloves — thick and warm and obviously not from the communal stock.
Then a jar of wild honey you know only Joel has access to.
He never says a word.
You know it’s him. Everyone knows it’s him. But he pretends he doesn’t notice when you glance at him in the mess hall, eyebrows raised.
He keeps leaving things anyway.
A flower. A new knife. A book you’d once mentioned in passing.
Little offerings. Quiet apologies. His own awkward, wordless way of saying:
Please forgive me. I miss you.
You don't give in yet.
You almost knock on his door one night.
Almost.
But you don’t.
Because part of you still remembers how it felt — being called annoying. Being seen as a burden. A joke.
He’ll have to do more than leave things on your porch to fix that.
You want him to say it. To mean it.
To show up.
One week later, he sees you near the stables.
You’re laughing.
Head thrown back, a soft sound slipping from your lips that he hasn’t heard in over a week. The guy standing with you — Jesse’s cousin or some new recruit, Joel doesn’t care — is clearly eating it up. He says something that makes you laugh again, and this time you touch his arm. Light, casual, familiar.
And Joel feels it in his chest. Like a punch.
Because that laugh — that spark — used to be for him.
Even when he didn’t deserve it.
Even when he hadn’t earned it.
He hasn’t heard you laugh since that day in the woods.
He thought maybe you were just tired. Thought maybe the gifts were enough.
But now you’re smiling for someone else.
And Joel’s stomach twists.
Burns.
He turns and walks away before he does something stupid. Before anyone sees the look on his face.
He spirals, slowly. Quietly.
The next day, Joel snaps at Maria for asking a simple question. He rebuilds a section of the fence that didn’t need fixing. Tommy watches him hammer the same nail three times before finally muttering, “You alright, brother?”
Joel doesn’t answer.
He doesn’t sleep much that night. Just lies in bed staring at the ceiling, remembering the sound of your laugh in someone else’s mouth.
The next morning, you’re in the mess hall, talking to the same guy.
He’s handing you a bowl of eggs, something stupidly charming in the way he grins a little as he offers it. You take it, smiling, and Joel feels something ugly claw up in his chest.
He doesn’t finish his meal.
Doesn’t even sit down.
He turns around and walks straight back out the door.
He can't take it anymore.
That night, you hear a knock.
It’s soft. Two short raps. Then silence.
When you open it, Joel’s standing there.
He looks tired — drawn out, jaw clenched, eyes dark. There’s a weight to him that wasn’t there before. Something frayed.
“I know you don’t wanna talk to me,” he starts. “And I get that. You don’t owe me nothin’. But I can’t keep walkin’ around like I ain’t losin’ my goddamn mind.”
You blink. “Joel—”
“I see you smilin’ for everyone else,” he says, voice rough. “I see you givin’ them that look you used to give me.”
You blink. “Joel—”
“I see you smilin’ for someone else,” he says, voice rough. “I see you givin’ him that look you used to give me.”
His throat works around the next words.
“And I know I don’t deserve it — but fuck, darlin’, I want it back.”
He takes a step closer.
“I want you back. Even if it means startin’ over. Even if you never look at me the same again.”
His voice lowers, quieter now. A rasp.
“I’ll take scraps if that’s all you’ve got left for me. But I can’t stand bein’ on the outside anymore. Not when I remember what it felt like… havin’ you close.”
You don’t speak. You just watch him.
He exhales sharply, like the silence is crushing him.
“I miss your voice,” he says. “Your talkin’. Your laugh. I miss how you looked at me like I was somethin’ worth knowin’. I ain’t. But God, I wanted to be. For you.”
There’s something raw in the way he says it. Quiet. Cracked open.
“I know I messed it up. But I don’t want anyone else gettin’ what I threw away.”
He looks at you then — really looks — and his voice is barely a whisper.
“Please. Let me try again.”
There’s a long silence after Joel finishes speaking — his heart in pieces at your feet, voice still trembling with it.
You don’t rush. Don’t rescue him. You just look at him — really look — like you’re trying to decide if he’s telling the truth this time.
Then you nod.
Soft. Quiet. Almost shy.
“...Okay.”
Joel’s lips part, like he wants to say more. He doesn’t.
He just nods back. Once. Clumsy and stiff like a man who’s not sure how to handle something fragile.
Then he leaves.
You don’t show up on his porch the next morning.
But when you pass each other near the stables, you smile. It’s not the full-beam kind he used to get — not the glowing, unfiltered sunshine of before.
But it’s real.
And it hurts a little. In a good way.
The next day, you say hi first.
The day after that, you stop and talk for a minute. Ask him about a repair on one of the town gates. He grumbles an answer, and you chuckle — just a small one, a puff of air — but it makes something in his chest crack open.
He gets your laugh back.
Not all at once.
It happens on a patrol briefing.
You’re standing with Maria and a few others, Joel just a few paces behind, arms crossed. Someone makes a joke about Joel being allergic to fun.
You snort. “Yeah, I offered him a cookie once and he looked at it like it was a loaded weapon.”
Everyone laughs.
Joel… doesn’t.
But you do.
Loud. Bright. Real.
It slips out before you can stop it. And Joel turns just in time to see the corner of your mouth twitch up — and for once, it’s for him.
He doesn’t know what to do with it.
That laugh.
That warmth.
It’s back.
And it terrifies him.
Because now he knows what it feels like to lose it — what it’s like to wake up and not have your voice in his mornings, your face lighting up the path ahead of him.
So he starts... fumbling.
Tries to joke with you once and stumbles so badly you have to clarify if it was sarcasm or a head injury.
Carries too many things for you without asking. Offers to fix things that don’t need fixing.
Once he just stands next to you silently while you talk to someone else — doesn’t interrupt, doesn’t even look at you — and only when you’re walking away does he grumble, “Wasn’t even funny.”
You laugh then, just to spite him. “Jealous, Miller?”
“Of him?” he scoffs, but he’s red behind the ears for the rest of the day.
You talk more now.
Not like before — not all brightness and flirting — but warmer, slower. Softer around the edges.
Joel doesn’t rush it. He doesn’t ask for more.
But every smile you give him feels like sunlight filtered through his ribs. Every laugh is a tiny miracle.
He catches himself watching you sometimes — long, thoughtful looks when you’re not paying attention. Like he’s still trying to figure out how something like you exists in a world like this.
And how the hell he’s supposed to deserve it.
You’ve been out on a short recon trip — nothing dangerous, just checking the perimeter with a few others. You weren’t even gone long.
But when you come back, it’s late. You’re cold. Mud on your boots, fingers stiff.
Joel’s already back in Jackson. You don’t expect to see him.
But when you reach your front porch, there’s a folded blanket on the step. Heavy. Familiar.
You stop.
It’s his. The one he keeps on his couch. The one that always smells like woodsmoke and worn cotton and him.
It’s his. The one he keeps on his couch. The one that always smells like woodsmoke and worn cotton and him.
You pick it up slowly. It’s still warm.
And there — tucked underneath — is a thermos.
You unscrew the cap and breathe in the scent: tea with honey.
Your favorite.
He must’ve left it minutes ago. So you decide to find him before he holes up for the night.
You find him walking to his house.
He doesn’t hear you at first — until you call his name.
“Joel.”
He stops. Turns.
The porch light behind you glows like a halo, and he stands there in the dark, hat pulled low, hands shoved into his jacket pockets.
You walk up, still holding the blanket.
“You left this,” you say softly.
He shrugs. “Figured you’d get cold.”
You smile, small and full. “You remembered I like honey.”
He shifts, suddenly uncomfortable. “Wasn’t a big deal.”
But it is.
To you, it is.
So you step forward — just a little — and place your hand on his arm. Just above the elbow. Light. Gentle. Warm.
“Joel…” you murmur.
And he freezes.
He doesn't know what to do with it.
Your hand is still on him — soft and still. He doesn’t pull away, but he doesn’t move either. Just stands there, staring down at where your fingers touch his sleeve like it’s something dangerous.
You feel the tension in him — the stiffness in his shoulders, the locked muscles under your touch. Like he’s afraid to breathe.
Like he wants to lean into it but doesn’t trust himself to.
“I know it's a big deal,” you say quietly. “You don’t do stuff like that.”
His mouth opens. Closes. “It’s just a blanket.”
“No,” you say. “It’s not.”
Your fingers squeeze gently before falling away.
Joel looks down, lost.
Like he doesn’t know how to hold something that isn’t already broken.
He says your name, soft.
You look up, heart thudding.
And for a second — just one second — you swear he’s going to kiss you.
But instead, he just says, “You were never too much.”
It slips out.
Quiet. Cracked.
And before you can reply, he shakes his head and turns, walking off into the night with his shoulders hunched and his heart in his throat.
If you don’t like a specific genre of fanfiction, don’t read it. If you don’t like a specific kink, don’t read it. If you don’t like a specific trope, don’t read it.
It is not the responsibility of the writer to tailor their writing to your preferences. Read what you like, scroll away from what you don’t. It’s as simple as that.
And remember, if you don’t like something, do NOT take the ‘holier than thou’ position and act like the writer is personally trying to attack you. Fanfiction is FICTION and does not reflect what the writer is, who they are, or what they’ve experienced.
You are responsible for keeping yourself safe while reading. You are responsible for the things you decide to read.
Fanfiction has always been a please of creativity and expression. It’s not your place to judge someone else’s life.
tags/included:not proofread, agegap(reader is 37,joel is 56), spoilers for tlou2, takes place after abby attacks joel & ellie(joel lives), joel is a mean old man(for now), reader is a smartass, slowburn, eventual smut, angst(death,ptsd, other mature themes),major argument, canon typical violence, reader has little care for their life/wellbeing, reader is still grieving, joel has ptsd, mention of suicide(attempt?) ellie and joel's relationship withers away, wc: 4.5k
an: if you would like to be added to a taglist, let me know!
divider credit: @enchanthings-a
It's earlier than when you're usually up but on the account of a nightmare, you're wide awake. The dirt and grime has caked up enough to bother you so you've taken the liberty of fixing that, there's a river not far from camp that you happen upon. It was technically Joel's turn to take watch, which he was, but you're not sure he even noticed when you left. It's not like you wanted him to notice anyway, it was rather helpful that he didn't.
You undress completely, the cool morning isn't cold enough that you're shivering and the water glistens under the sunlight above. The water is on the colder side but again, not unbearably cold so you get in to the narrow yet deep waters, the river being clear to the bottom proved helpful. It's the only reason you got all the way in, otherwise you would have just leaned in, washing your body part by part.
Though your mind was plagued with thoughts heavy and tiresome, the water soothed you in a way that allowed you to refresh yourself. The long grass swayed to the right of the river, pebbles made up the riverbank and you could hear Silver and Carrot snorting with heavy exhales by the trees they were stowed at. You passed a few glances towards the camp, though you were well aware of Joel's capabilities, it just made you feel better.
Unbeknownst to you, Joel had spotted you. He'd been spending more time looking the direction you two were supposed to be headed today but when he heart more splashes in the water than the usual splashes of waves over rock, he turned. He saw you. Your back turned, hair damp and skin glistening with beads of water rolling down your exposed skin catching his eye. He froze. It was unlike him to freeze but he did. You were using a shirt to wash yourself with, getting the grime off your body and face. He swallowed hard before turning his head back around slowly.
It was no secret that he was a complicated man, hell, sometimes he didn't even understand himself. That happened more often then late. No one every truly knew what he was thinking, sure it was obvious when he was pissed off, dissaproved or outright against something...that was easy. Telling when he approved? When he was happy? That was damn near impossible. Right now, it was clear what he was feeling even though he damn sure didn't know himself.
He practically stomps his way over to you, water up to your chest giving you somewhat some privacy as long as he didn't look down into the water. He made sure to stop when the sun gave him some help, striking a glare in the reflection of the water so he couldn't see more of you than he should.
"Get out." he orders harshly, his voice sending shivers up your spine.
You turn around, the shirt in your hand and your brows narrowing intensely. You look him up and down, fighting the urge to laugh in his face at his orders. He stood there with his rifle slung over his shoulder, fist balled and jaw ticking just at the sight of you. The sun behind him made him look more intimadating, you can admit. The way the light outlined him and his shadow hghlighted his front, darkening the seriousness all over his face. His leather jack heavy over his red and white flannel, both faded from time like his jeans.
"Excuse me?" you replied, raising a single brow and dropping your hand from washing over your shoulder.
"You heard me." is all he says, all he allows himself to repeat of what he said.
"I was hoping that I heard incorrectly because surely you couldn't be talking like that to me?" you tilted your head to the side dramatically, droplets of water dropping from the strands of your hair.
"You heard right...and I ain' gonna say it again," he remarks coldly.
To that, you scoff and turn back around rather than give him the time of day. You refused to be bothered by him, you hardly wanted to talk to him in the first place. You can feel him behind you still, staring at you like he's waiting for you to give in and obey him. But you don't. When he realizes it, he let's out a heavy exhales and you can visualize his jaw clenching right about now.
"When a clicker comes through here, I hope you're comfortable fightin' naked—"
"Sounds like a me problem so why don't you mind your own business already? I've never asked you to protect me...I've done exact opposite, Joel." you cut off, every word sounding more sour than the last.
What get's him in particular is the way you say his name. You say it like it's a curse, like it taste bad on your tongue and you want nothing more than to spit it right the fuck out. That's practically what you do and when you hear his boots walking(stomping) off, you sigh with relief. You don't shut your eyes again though and it's not because you're afraid of a clicker all of a sudden after what Joel said. It's because you want a clicker to come through here, you want to see it just so you can kill. Not for Joel's sake, to prove a damn point, you couldn't care less about what he thinks you should be doing.
What you want lies deeper within you, though you feel it etched on your skin too, almost like it's just as eually surface level as it is deep in you. The thoughts have plagued you for good, there's no cure for what you feel and you're not sure you want one.
You don't spend that much longer in the water, when you're done you whistle for Silver, loud enough for him to hear but low enough to not draw much attention to yourself. He trots on over and you step out of the river and grab some fresh clothes to put on while packing away your dirtied ones, figuring you'll clean them at the next river you come across. Once you're all dressed you take out a snack for Silver, feeding him a carrot mainly because you love the sound of the way he snaps down on the carrot in one big bite. You smile at that, trying your best to find something to smile about these days. So far, this is the only thing that makes you smile.
"Good boy...come on," you brush his mane before tugging him along, heading up to the camp where Joel's making it a point to avoid your gaze.
He doesn't even tell you the direction you're heading for the day like usual, he simple climbs on Carrot and gives a snap of his reins. You mount Silver and follow after him, everything's already been all packed up from before you even got in the water so all you do is ride on. You have no desire to argue, no need for a petty back and forth, it's like the fight in you is gone. Or rather reserved for one thing, the peace and quite that you find when killing a clicker...even at the risk of your own life.
It's like a gamble, you'd never played poker or anything like that but you imagine that this is what riding that adrenaline high is like. You can't get enough of it, no matter what it costs you. Ironically, you're the only one like that, even if he won't admit it. He's out here risking his life for some damn coffee beans, not a necessity, not like before with the medicine but just for a want. He didn't give you any more to work with than "You're not the only one who's got nothing to come back to,". You think of his daughter, or whatever she is to him and it makes you curious when you shouldn't be.
You shouldn't give a damn about what's going on in Joel Miller's life but given how often you've been put next to him during your time in Jackson, you figure it's natural to be curious. He does have something, or rather someone, to come back to but him claiming different irritates you. You don't know their story and you don't feel you need to, she's alive and so is he. That's all that matters.
There's nothing you wouldn't give to have your Dad back and yet Joel is here sitting on his high horse, acting like he has nothing in the same way you don't. But he's wrong and you don't care about the specifics of his life. Though maybe you should but you damn sure aren't asking. You can't help but curse the fact that if something were to happen to her, he sure as hell wouldn't be writing her off the way he does now. But that's not your place and you try to remind yourself of that as you ride alongside him, growing more pissed off by the second.
After a few hours of riding, the sun still beaming and bright since you got an early start, he speaks.
"Headin' east from now on. Shouldn't be much further...we'll be there in an hour or two." he clears his throat, pointing as he speaks but not looking back at you.
You don't give a response, just follow after him when he starts picking up the pace. He's spot on with his estimation, you arrived in the abandoned neighborhood in just a little over an hour, taking a little longer only because Silver got spooked by a funny shaped rock. When you arrived you find yourself hit by a wave of nostalgia, forgetting that you didn't even remeber what neighborhoods used to look like. After the outbreak, you'd never left your house except when your Dad was teaching you necessary skills like how to shoot and how to skin an animal. Even then, that was the woods. Anytime he needed to outsource, he went alone, even as he got older and shouldn't have been handling so much alone.
The town was more country looking than suburban, there was a little corner store you spotted on your right. Joel doesn't tell you to follow him, doesn't say to stay close, he doesn't say anything at all. And yet you follow him anyway, approaching the abandoned corner store. He scans the area with every trot of Carrot's hooves approaching closer. It's an abandoned small neighborhood but essentially surrounded by nothing, just an open Wyoming field of straight grass. When you both dismount, you're both in sync with grabbing your rifles and you double checking for your knife strapped to your thigh.
He moves slow but calculated, searching the area as he walks up the heavily creaking steps. There's a little bell that rings when he pushes open the door, the white paint is peeling from all the wood covering the store, dusty windows you can hardly see through and the "Open" sign just dangiling. No sound retaliating against the bell chiming sends relief through you both, allowing the two of you to move freely through the store without the fear of infected. A good bit of the store is on the emptier side but not in a way that makes it look like it was raided for supplies but rather before the outbreak it had just been busy.
There's still a lot left for the taking, some of it still good and some not. The two of you split, Joel heading to the left where there are a few aisles still decently stocked. You take the right, your mind set on finding something more important than coffee beans. You walk along the wall of the store, looking over the shelves. You find a few first aid kits, their small but you figure it's worth taking so you shove those into your backpack. You grab some jerky you find, it looks more homemade than mass produced so you find your hopes for the taste of it skyrocketing.
As you move more towards the back, you hit the jackpot and find some ammo, you fit more ammo in your bag than anything else, deciding in the moment to pack your bag in on that. You skip the food aisle all together, caring little and less about it at the sight of all the ammo you were able to get. You find a backroom and you don't hesitate to enter, it was equally as empty and creaky as the rest of the corner store. You scan the room for anything that calls out to you, your eyes settle on a cabinent in the corner of the room.
When you open it, you find it riddled with medication. You assume it had been tucked away for before the outbreak to keep people from stealing it or taking what they didn't need. You knew how badly the people of Jackson needed it and though most of them hadn't been the kindest to you, you shoved it in your backpack anyway. Half of the stuff you didn't even know what it was for but you figured there'd probably be a special case of someone in need of it. By the time you finished your bag was full to the brim with medicine and ammo and a little jerky too.
You don't waste time waiting around in here so you start the path back out of the corner store, just when the bell chimes again, you're stopped.
"We shouldn't split up. This area ain' been cleared by anybody...don't know what's around," he calls out, still to the left stopped in the middle aisle.
As much as you want to protest, just because you don't care about you're own life doesn't mean he doesn't either. Even though you suspect he doesn't given his previous statement. Either way, you shut the door and just wait there instead, he continues going up and down the aisles but you can't tell if he's found the coffee he came for. It's not until you see him walking towards you with his nose in a large yellow container that you roll your eyes and turn around. His backpack looks a little fuller too so that settles you. At least he didn't come here for coffee and only take coffee back to Jackson. He wasn't an idiot, as much as you'd like to write him off as one.
"What did you take?" he questions, walking behind you down the stairs.
You don't reply, for some reason you just don't think he's talking to you even though theres only you two out there. His gaze finds you as he closes the lid to his coffee and whenever he looks at you, you swear the hairs on the back of your neck stick up.
"You talkin' to me?" you hummed and he doesn't waste a second scoffing out you.
"No, I'm talkin' to God. Who else is out here?" he breathes and you huff in annoyance.
"Why do you care what I took? You got your coffee, didn't you? Hell you need from me?" you snap, more annoyed that you looked like an idiot than at him.
"Jus' asking...Christ," he grumbles and grabs Carrot's reins just for you to do the same.
He starts walking around the corner, down the neighborhood. It's not like you have anymore space to take anything so you just follow behind mindlessly. Above you, thunder claps and dark clouds swarm in what seems like out of nowhere. You and Joel both look up, the horses stir nervously and Joel makes his way towards a house that looks slightly less worn than the others. There's a garage slightly cracked open, he leans down and with a heavy grunt opens it up. You both wait for a beat for any infected but none show up, not even from behind. The garage is empty enough for you to bring your horses in so you do, he let's Carrot roam around and shuts the garage with another grunt. You settle Silver with whispers of reassurance and pats to match.
"We'll hold up here for the night," he informs without looking at you, just working on getting the door open to the house.
He has to give it a hard push with his shoulders before it flies open, you give Silver one last pat before heading off inside with Joel. The house is quiet at first, but then window blows and the house howls and creaks all around you. You're looking into the rooms you pass by on your way to the main part of the house, there's a decent looking leather couch just sitting there. You wipe it off with your sleeve, dust coating it before plopping down and pulling out the jerky from your pocket.
There's no access to the second story, the staircase is blocked with furniture and you're in no mood to even try and move it all. Joel see's it after you do and realizes he's going to be on the second couch across from you. He moves to it, taking out the blanket from the basket and putting it ontop of the couch before he sits down. For some reason that get's a little smirk out of you.
"Shit," he curses under his breath, you look up and see him looking at his watch.
The grass is crumbling into little pieces all over his wrist, he makes it worse when he tries brushing it off the top the glass left on the watch. You don't even say anything, just watching him knick himself repeatdly trying to clean up the broken watch.
"No," he says firmly, looking up at you looking at him.
"I didn't say anything,"
"Didn't have to. You're thinkin' it," he corrects. "I'm not throwing it away and 'm not gettin' a new one," he shakes his head, refusing the suggestion for the hundreth time.
"Feel's like you're baiting me to ask why...but I know you won't answer," you mutter, letting your interest in him slip.
A part of you hopes he didn't quite hear you over the sound of thunder, you didn't mean to say that outloud but you did. When he sighs and leans back, rubbing his hand over his beard, you know he's heard you. There's a long silence, thunder crashing over the silence.
"My daughter gave it to me...it's over twenty years old. So yeah, it's old and no I'm not gonna replace it," he confesses.
You raise your brows, flashing your eyes wide for a split second. You wait for a beat, allowing yourself half a second to think before you speak.
"Ellie doesn't look that old," you pointed out, moreso to yourself than to him but you happened to say it outloud.
"Ellie's not..." he gulps, tensing up more than before. "I'm not Ellie's dad," he grunts, clearing his throat and suddenly taking an awkward look with the way his eyes go left to right, away from you.
"Oh." is all you manage to muster out, finding yourself burdened with more curiosity than you had before about him.
It's a curiosity you want to voice but you're smart enough to not ask any further. Instead, you reach down and untie your laces, taking off your boots to get comfortable even though you know you won't be sleeping. Even though you'd been told before that Joel wasn't her father, you didn't exactly believe it given the nature of their relationship and how upset she was when he left Jackson without saying anything. Not to mention, him calling her "kiddo" certainly confused you.
The nature of their relationship really did confuse you now. Instead of asking him a bunch of questions like a maniac, knowing it wasn't your place and that he wouldn't tell you, you bothered yourself with your own ideas of what they were to each other. You laid back on the couch filling the the heavy blanks of not just their relationship but Joel in general. You didn't realize he was looking at you, watching you lay back on the couch lost in your own head. You filled in the blanks to the attack too, when you first were brought to Jackson and going through physical therapy with him in the same room.
You wondered what that was about, wondered who "Abby" even was. Though there was no point in thinking about her, you'd already been told that she was dead when they saved Joel from her. Even that made you think. Joel was a big man, he was more than familar with a gun, handling himself in general was something he seemed very skilled at. So what the hell happened for a guy like him to be taken down? What did he do to piss someone off enough to have the strength to nearly take him down?
"Why'd you stop goin' to...physical therapy?" he questioned, he said "physical therapy" like it pained him to do so, like the admisson of it and him being there with you made him weak.
Him questioning you alone shocked you, you turned your head towards him, away from the ceiling you were so comfortable looking at and just stared at him for a minute.
"You questioning me now?"
" 'ts only fair. I gave you somethin' so you gotta give me somethin'," he shrugs, rubbing his hands over his thighs.
You chew the inside of your cheek, wondering if lying to him would roll off your tongue easier than the truth. You're head's still turned, you're both just looking at each other as he waits for the truth and you consider a lie.
"Didn't need it anymore," you answered forwardly.
Like an idiot, you raise your arm to tuck your hand behind your neck and of course, it shakes as you move it. Your body betrays you, making your lie obvious if he saw that and you're just hoping he didn't.
"I have a hard time believin' that," he gruffs out, rubbing his hand over his beard again while his eyes scan on.
"What's it to you? I'm not your problem,"
"Long as you're with me you are," he corrected, watching you rest the back of your head on your hand.
"I'm not." you refuted, for the millionth time.
"Why're you so hellbent on killin' yourself?" he scoffs at you, the irritation in his voice is as obvious as the wrinkle of his nose.
The sharpness in which he questions you feels more like a stab at you than anything, you snap your head around at not just the question but his tone. He speaks to you like you're an idiot, not bothering to hide his dissaproval of your actions in the slightest.
"I'm no—"
"You are. Call it what it is 'cause I can't keep dealin' with you getting pissed at me for not lettin' clicker tear you apart. I don't care about our fucking deal, it's not how I operate when we're out there and you're my partner. My job is make sure you don't die and you keep fighting that," he snaps at you, his jaw ticking in rhythm with the furrowing of his brows.
"That's your problem, not mine. That's how you feel...not me. You keep your goddamn opinions to yourself because you don't shit about me, Joel. You keep acting like you do...you wanna hear it true? Maybe if you spent a little time worried about me and more time focused on your daugh—Ellie, whatever the fuck she is to you...you wouldn't be saying that you have no one to come back to! Worry about your goddamn self, Joel!" you yelled at him, snapping up from the couch with your fist balled in anger.
"You don't shit about me either...don't be a hypcorite goin' around makin' claims about shit you have no idea about!" he argues back, standing up to match you.
"Take your own fucking advice...that girl was by your side every day for physical therapy and you got the goddamn nerve to say you have nobody waiting for your return. You know who doesn't have anybody waiting on them? Me...you piece of shit," you refuted, your finger pointing at him.
"You knew I was willin' die...that was what we saw eye to eye on, I never told you to save my ass out there. I was willing to die for the fucking photos and you took that from me! My photo we're all I had of who should be waitin' for me...just 'cause you fucked up your own life doesn't mean you had to do it mine!" you accused sharply, anger pulsing through your veins unforgivingly.
He moves fast, snatching the gun out that's tucked in his jeans behind him and holding it out in front of you.
"Save us both the trouble then and end it here. If you're so hellbent on dying then why the hell should I bother dragging you around with me?" he suggests, his words are meaningless in reality because he's gripping the gun tighter than he knows you can pull out of his hand from.
Still, you don't know that. Your eyes flash wide, flickering from the gun to his face and you physically suck in a sharp breath. You pull your hands up and shove him away from you, shove the gun away, shove the whole damn idea of death away for the first time in a long time.
"Fuck you, Joel," you curse, your eyes swelling with tears at the notion and your throat tightening.
"Yeah well—"
"No," you cut off. "Fuck. You." you say again, harsher this time with your eyes locked on his.
"You've got nothin' but nerve goin' for you...I'll give you that much," you scoff, you feel your heart drop and create in a pit in your stomach as you turn around.
You grab your backpack off the floor and toss it over your shoulder, not bothering to look back when the tears start streaming down your face. The truth within the gun in front of you made something inside of you snap. It was the audaicty of him...to let you choose to die now over esentially nothing but refuse to let you choose when you were fighting to get your photos back sent you over the edge. All you wanted was the photos, you wiped your nose with the back of your hand as you stormed out down the hall. He watched you the whole time but you didn't see the way he cursed himself, rubbing his hand over his face and even take the liberty of stepping forward like he was going to go after you.
But he didn't.
You didn't give a fuck about the rules, you weren't supposed to seperate but you refused to stay with him any longer. Him getting back was his own buisness and you getting back was yours. You slammed the garage door shut and grabbed the reins of Silver, your bottom lip trembling. You allowed yourself a minute to cry, leaning your head again Silver's before wiping your tears and going around to lift up the garage door. The rain was coming down hard, both horses were startled by it but you were just going to have to take your chance.
You grabbed Silver's reins, soothing him out of the garage slowly before you could even reassure yourself. Your continued to tremble and your arm was back to shaking but you didn't care, your tears were drowned out in the rain you stepped in to. You reached forward and shut the garage door carefully before stepping up and swinging your leg over the saddle. Mounting Silver and taking the storm just get away from Joel goddamn Miller.
Summary : You were sent to Rome as a symbol, a marriage forged not from love, but from politics. He was the Empire's golden General, already tethered to someone else. But Marcus Acacius keeps his heart locked behind duty and old scars. But from now on, you are his wife in name, a stranger in his bed, learning that silence can be more painful than cruelty.
Marcus Acacius x f!reader
Warnings : historical themes and patriarchal dynamics, arranged mariage, mentions of politics, smut, cold behavior, age gap ? (not really mentioned or important), infidelity, emotional neglect, toxic relationships, manipulation, slow burn, secret relationship, angst (each chapter will have warnings !)
⋆.⋆༺𖤓༻⋆.⋆
𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐲𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭
⋆.⋆༺𖤓༻⋆.⋆
𝐈. The woman he sees when he closes his eyes
𝐈𝐈. The woman who waits in silence
𝐈𝐈𝐈. The woman behind the door
𝐈𝐕. The woman holding back the night
𝐕. The woman who holds her breath
𝐕𝐈. The woman who knew too much
𝐕𝐈𝐈. The woman whose name he forgets
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