poison

[ohangeleyes]

alright, i'll be the one to say it. ao3 and tumblr becoming "mainstream" did so much damage to the community and the writers. i have seen loads of videos and posts about:

1. people hating on writers and fics. writing is something we do for free and for fun. if you stumble upon a fanfic that isn't necessarily your cup of tea or you just don't like, scroll. dont read it. literally leave their page. you don't know if this could be the author's first work that they're so excited about, you dont know if the language they're writing in isn't their first language, you dont know that the writer could be a literal teen and loads of other reasons. fanfictions don't HAVE to be perfect. you write what you want to write because we do it for fun and enjoyment and we want to share that to the world. seriously, what is the wrong with that?..

2. x reader consumers getting WAY too entitled. the number of tiktoks i've seen that say "i run a strict program when it comes to reading fanfics." girl you aint running shit. this is FAN FICTION you're reading. F A N F I C T I O N. there is no denying that most fanfiction writes are beyond talented but just because you read one fanfic that exceeds your expectations doesn't give you the right to talk down on others that don't. people have their own personal writing style, their way of doing things and you talking shit on that isn't right.

at the end of the day, we are all humans, reading and writing is what we do and what we're meant to do. and for you to talk shit about a person WRITING is so insane. we are humans. not some robots that you can tell what to do so you can consume it.

i've seen so so many authors take down their fanfics and losing all motivation to write because of a hate comment. DONT LIKE DONT READ‼️

and to every author reading this, this community values your work and your contribution. we love u and, please, never let anyone's negative words have an effect on you.

[joelscure]

the thought of him going to play guitar after ellie yells at him makes me so maternal

[milanesa42]

“The employees need a larger salary” “hmmmm large celery”

[milanesa42]

“The employees need a larger salary” “hmmmm large celery”

[tvguts]

yesterday i had a nice southern teenager call me "ma'am" and then look at me and go, in a well-meaning tone, "uhhhh, if you go by ma'am. sorry if not." and i had to be like yeah man ma'am is fine. appreciate you being inclusive though. i could almost see the little warning pop up in his UI-- hold up! people with blue hair often have pronouns. are you sure you want to address this individual with a gendered term?

[syllysmot]

Grandpa Yuji

[allthingswhumpyandangsty]

Wattpad: pay me monthly 🤩 and we will remove ads for you. also free offline stories I guess as long as you keep paying me. but we have censorship so keep your kinks to yourself. what we don’t have is tagging systems, so good luck trying to find what you want or avoiding what you don’t want to read lol

meanwhile AO3: so everything is free in our house. read whatever you want offline. also no ads. no capitalism. no censorship. be as wild as you want with your fics. also we have tagging systems so you can search or avoid any specific tags, pairings, relationships or characters. whatever you want.

I’m sorry but if you’re still complaining, you don’t realize how good you have it with AO3, one of the last platforms on the internet that is free of capitalism and censorship. just artists and writers creating and sharing their works with the community for free and for fun. just authentic love between artists, their works, characters, stories and audiences.

[liana333]

Wattpad, look at me. This isn't you! LOOK AT ME!!!

[jurisffiction]

"? No" is such a foundational linguistic construction to my psyche. a hieroglyph. it should be a standard emoji

[damazcuz]

The lion is concerned. The lion is honestly really fucking worried.

[writing-prompt-s]

Temples are built for gods. Knowing this a farmer builds a small temple to see what kind of god turns up.

[sadoeuphemist]

Arepo built a temple in his field, a humble thing, some stones stacked up to make a cairn, and two days later a god moved in.

“Hope you’re a harvest god,” Arepo said, and set up an altar and burnt two stalks of wheat. “It’d be nice, you know.” He looked down at the ash smeared on the stone, the rocks all laid askew, and coughed and scratched his head. “I know it’s not much,” he said, his straw hat in his hands. “But - I’ll do what I can. It’d be nice to think there’s a god looking after me.”

The next day he left a pair of figs, the day after that he spent ten minutes of his morning seated by the temple in prayer. On the third day, the god spoke up.

“You should go to a temple in the city,” the god said. Its voice was like the rustling of the wheat, like the squeaks of fieldmice running through the grass. “A real temple. A good one. Get some real gods to bless you. I’m no one much myself, but I might be able to put in a good word?” It plucked a leaf from a tree and sighed. “I mean, not to be rude. I like this temple. It’s cozy enough. The worship’s been nice. But you can’t honestly believe that any of this is going to bring you anything.”

“This is more than I was expecting when I built it,” Arepo said, laying down his scythe and lowering himself to the ground. “Tell me, what sort of god are you anyway?”

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth. I’m a god of a dozen different nothings, scraps that lead to rot, momentary glimpses. A change in the air, and then it’s gone.”

The god heaved another sigh. “There’s no point in worship in that, not like War, or the Harvest, or the Storm. Save your prayers for the things beyond your control, good farmer. You’re so tiny in the world. So vulnerable. Best to pray to a greater thing than me.”

Arepo plucked a stalk of wheat and flattened it between his teeth. “I like this sort of worship fine,” he said. “So if you don’t mind, I think I’ll continue.”

“Do what you will,” said the god, and withdrew deeper into the stones. “But don’t say I never warned you otherwise.”

Arepo would say a prayer before the morning’s work, and he and the god contemplated the trees in silence. Days passed like that, and weeks, and then the Storm rolled in, black and bold and blustering. It flooded Arepo’s fields, shook the tiles from his roof, smote his olive tree and set it to cinder. The next day, Arepo and his sons walked among the wheat, salvaging what they could. The little temple had been strewn across the field, and so when the work was done for the day, Arepo gathered the stones and pieced them back together.

“Useless work,” the god whispered, but came creeping back inside the temple regardless. “There wasn’t a thing I could do to spare you this.”

“We’ll be fine,” Arepo said. “The storm’s blown over. We’ll rebuild. Don’t have much of an offering for today,” he said, and laid down some ruined wheat, “but I think I’ll shore up this thing’s foundations tomorrow, how about that?” 

The god rattled around in the temple and sighed.

A year passed, and then another. The temple had layered walls of stones, a roof of woven twigs. Arepo’s neighbors chuckled as they passed it. Some of their children left fruit and flowers. And then the Harvest failed, the gods withdrew their bounty. In Arepo’s field the wheat sprouted thin and brittle. People wailed and tore their robes, slaughtered lambs and spilled their blood, looked upon the ground with haunted eyes and went to bed hungry. Arepo came and sat by the temple, the flowers wilted now, the fruit shriveled nubs, Arepo’s ribs showing through his chest, his hands still shaking, and murmured out a prayer. 

“There is nothing here for you,” said the god, hudding in the dark. “There is nothing I can do. There is nothing to be done.” It shivered, and spat out its words. “What is this temple but another burden to you?”

“We -” Arepo said, and his voice wavered. “So it’s a lean year,” he said. “We’ve gone through this before, we’ll get through this again. So we’re hungry,” he said. “We’ve still got each other, don’t we? And a lot of people prayed to other gods, but it didn’t protect them from this. No,” he said, and shook his head, and laid down some shriveled weeds on the altar. “No, I think I like our arrangement fine.”

“There will come worse,” said the god, from the hollows of the stone. “And there will be nothing I can do to save you.”

The years passed. Arepo rested a wrinkled hand upon the temple of stone and some days spent an hour there, lost in contemplation with the god.

And one fateful day, from across the wine-dark seas, came War.

Arepo came stumbling to his temple now, his hand pressed against his gut, anointing the holy site with his blood. Behind him, his wheat fields burned, and the bones burned black in them. He came crawling on his knees to a temple of hewed stone, and the god rushed out to meet him.

“I could not save them,” said the god, its voice a low wail. “I am sorry. I am sorry. I am so so sorry.” The leaves fell burning from the trees, a soft slow rain of ash. “I have done nothing! All these years, and I have done nothing for you!”

“Shush,” Arepo said, tasting his own blood, his vision blurring. He propped himself up against the temple, forehead pressed against the stone in prayer. “Tell me,” he mumbled. “Tell me again. What sort of god are you?”

“I -” said the god, and reached out, cradling Arepo’s head, and closed its eyes and spoke.

“I’m of the fallen leaves,” it said, and conjured up the image of them. “The worms that churn beneath the earth. The boundary of forest and of field. The first hint of frost before the first snow falls. The skin of an apple as it yields beneath your teeth.” Arepo’s lips parted in a smile.

“I am the god of a dozen different nothings,” it said. “The petals in bloom that lead to rot, the momentary glimpses. A change in the air -” Its voice broke, and it wept. “Before it’s gone.”

“Beautiful,” Arepo said, his blood staining the stones, seeping into the earth. “All of them. They were all so beautiful.”

And as the fields burned and the smoke blotted out the sun, as men were trodden in the press and bloody War raged on, as the heavens let loose their wrath upon the earth, Arepo the sower lay down in his humble temple, his head sheltered by the stones, and returned home to his god.

[sameenbyhat]

Sora found the temple with the bones within it, the roof falling in upon them.

“Oh, poor god,” she said, “With no-one to bury your last priest.” Then she paused, because she was from far away. “Or is this how the dead are honored here?” The god roused from its contemplation.

“His name was Arepo,” it said, “He was a sower.”

Sora startled, a little, because she had never before heard the voice of a god. “How can I honor him?” She asked.

“Bury him,” the god said, “Beneath my altar.”

“All right,” Sora said, and went to fetch her shovel.

“Wait,” the god said when she got back and began collecting the bones from among the broken twigs and fallen leaves. She laid them out on a roll of undyed wool, the only cloth she had. “Wait,” the god said, “I cannot do anything for you. I am not a god of anything useful.”

Sora sat back on her heels and looked at the altar to listen to the god.

“When the Storm came and destroyed his wheat, I could not save it,” the god said, “When the Harvest failed and he was hungry, I could not feed him. When War came,” the god’s voice faltered. “When War came, I could not protect him. He came bleeding from the battle to die in my arms.” Sora looked down again at the bones.

“I think you are the god of something very useful,” she said.

“What?” the god asked.

Sora carefully lifted the skull onto the cloth. “You are the god of Arepo.”

[stu-pot]

Generations passed. The village recovered from its tragedies—homes rebuilt, gardens re-planted, wounds healed. The old man who once lived on the hill and spoke to stone and rubble had long since been forgotten, but the temple stood in his name. Most believed it to empty, as the god who resided there long ago had fallen silent. Yet, any who passed the decaying shrine felt an ache in their hearts, as though mourning for a lost friend. The cold that seeped from the temple entrance laid their spirits low, and warded off any potential visitors, save for the rare and especially oblivious children who would leave tiny clusters of pink and white flowers that they picked from the surrounding meadow.

The god sat in his peaceful home, staring out at the distant road, to pedestrians, workhorses, and carriages, raining leaves that swirled around bustling feet. How long had it been? The world had progressed without him, for he knew there was no help to be given. The world must be a cruel place, that even the useful gods have abandoned, if farms can flood, harvests can run barren, and homes can burn, he thought.

He had come to understand that humans are senseless creatures, who would pray to a god that cannot grant wishes or bless upon them good fortune. Who would maintain a temple and bring offerings with nothing in return. Who would share their company and meditate with such a fruitless deity. Who would bury a stranger without the hope for profit. What bizarre, futile kindness they had wasted on him. What wonderful, foolish, virtuous, hopeless creatures, humans were.

So he painted the sunset with yellow leaves, enticed the worms to dance in their soil, flourished the boundary between forest and field with blossoms and berries, christened the air with a biting cold before winter came, ripened the apples with crisp, red freckles to break under sinking teeth, and a dozen other nothings, in memory of the man who once praised the god’s work on his dying breath.

“Hello, God of Every Humble Beauty in the World,” called a familiar voice.

The squinting corners of the god’s eyes wept down onto curled lips. “Arepo,” he whispered, for his voice was hoarse from its hundred-year mutism.

“I am the god of devotion, of small kindnesses, of unbreakable bonds. I am the god of selfless, unconditional love, of everlasting friendships, and trust,” Arepo avowed, soothing the other with every word.

“That’s wonderful, Arepo,” he responded between tears, “I’m so happy for you—such a powerful figure will certainly need a grand temple. Will you leave to the city to gather more worshippers? You’ll be adored by all.”

“No,” Arepo smiled.

“Farther than that, to the capitol, then? Thank you for visiting here before your departure.”

“No, I will not go there, either,” Arepo shook his head and chuckled.

“Farther still? What ambitious goals, you must have. There is no doubt in my mind that you will succeed, though,” the elder god continued.

“Actually,” interrupted Arepo, “I’d like to stay here, if you’ll have me.”

The other god was struck speechless. “…. Why would you want to live here?”

“I am the god of unbreakable bonds and everlasting friendships. And you are the god of Arepo.”

[corancoranthemagicalman]

I reblogged this once with the first story. Now the story has grown and I’m crying. This is gorgeous, guys. This is what dreams are made of.

[threefeline]

[writing-prompt-s]

This is amazing!

[acred-rebogs]

got the pleasure to reread this once again

[liana333]

Thank God for Tumblr

[beatbizzle]

I overheard a woman at my job say "Your whole personality revolves around what you hate instead of what you love and thats an awful way to live." to the resident vocal Maga in the breakroom.

He was stunned into silence for at least 60 seconds so that was nice.

[bee2124]

When tumblr refreshes itself and the fic I was reading fucking disappears forever 💔

I’ve been searching for a smau I was reading for three days 😔

[madphantom]

"I'm just a girl☺️🥰💖💞💅🌺🌷🦄" when you were eight and the teacher said she needed some strong boys to carry something you used to be furious, and when you convinced them to let you help, you carried twice as many chairs as the boys with the righteous anger of a girl who knew she was just as capable as them. Where did that go?

[teaboot]

Alright kids say it with me

My thoughts don’t make me a bad person

My feelings don’t make me a bad person

My thoughts, feelings, and impulses only exist inside my head, and none of it matters unless I act on it

Nobody can see my thoughts or emotions

The only things anyone can see and judge me on are my actions

There’s no such thing as a thought crime

thank u

[lastoneout]

Sorry we really went from free the nipple, take back the night, slut walks, and ending gender/sex segregation in sports being fucking milquetoast feminism 101 concepts to fucking girl dinner and "I just worry about fairness if we let trans girls play against cis ones" and "it was right of that woman to call the cops on a black man for existing near here in public during the day time because men are all violent monsters" and "radical feminism isn't transphobic we just need to kill all men including trans ones those oppressive traitors" and I will legit never be able to be normal about it. What the FUCK happened. I'd say I wonder what the feminists of my youth would say about this but I'm one and lemme tell ya I want to throw up. Go fucking read bell hooks or do something else useful please because all of this learned helplessness, gender essentialism, and transphobia dressed up as feminism is actively holding us back.

[millermouth]

Epilogue

Summary: In the time between when he took you to now, something changed. His hands grew gentler. Your fear turned quiet. And somewhere in the stillness, love kindled. || angst, Joel POV, Pre-Boston QZ, Tommy cameo, dark!joel, MORALLY GRAY JOEL, honestly both of them are pretty bad in this sorry, raider!joel, captor!joel, dark!joel, canon compliant, kidnapping, dark themes, mentions of violence, abusive family, this is a little dark im sorry, lore!!! || notes: easter eggs are linked to clips in game

The house stands quiet, half-swallowed by the wild grass that creeps its way up the siding, soft wind weaving through the porch beams like a lullaby for the ghosts inside. A single horse grazes nearby, tail flicking in slow, unbothered rhythm, the jangle of its bridle the only sound against the hush. Smoke drifts up from a dying bonfire out in the field, curling into the pale sky like a question.

It is a beautiful morning. That is the worst part.

Joel feels the wrongness of it down to the marrow. How the earth can look so gentle after what it takes. How the light can spill golden like it doesn’t know better. The sun, the sky, the soft snort of the horse in the grass… it all carries on. As if the world hasn’t just cracked open and swallowed the only good thing left inside him.

He kneels in the garden, the morning thick with dew and the scent of fresh soil. His hands are ruined—filthy, raw, streaked with blood and dirt from digging through the night. His knees ache, his back screams, but he can’t make himself care.

There are two mounds in front of him, one larger than the other. He stares at the cross planted in the center of the bigger grave. He carved it himself, spent hours hunched over it, sanding it smooth until the pads of his fingers blistered and split. It’s plain—no name, no inscription. Just a clean, perfect joining of two pieces of wood, worn down with more care than he’s given anything in years. He didn't stop sanding it down until it was so smooth it started to feel like your skin. Only then did he have to put it down.

His hand trembles slightly as he reaches into his pocket, pulling out the polaroid picture. It’s the one he’d taken of you at the creek.

You are in his lap, skin still wet from the water, sunlight scattered across your shoulders like dust from the heavens. The image is framed from your collarbone up, your bare chest modestly out of sight, hidden by the angle and by grace itself. The treetops blur behind you, green and gold and endless, while your eyes look down at him—soft, curious, with that little secret smile you give when you don’t know what to say. Your hair clings to your skin in damp, curling strands, water droplets catching the light like pearls. You look like a myth, something holy and half-remembered. Something not meant to last in a world like this.

Joel knew he loved you when he took it. Knew it long before that. He thinks about leaving it. Letting the picture go the way you have. Tucking it beneath the dirt, giving the earth your memory, your face, your smile. But his hand doesn’t move.

His fingers stay locked around it, the paper creased and damp now with sweat and dirt, the image smudged where his thumb presses too tight. His body rebels against the act of letting go. So instead, he carefully slips it into the front pocket of his flannel, right above his heart. Where it belongs. Where you belong.

His eyes drift to the smaller mound. The cross there is crooked, not as polished. A bit of knotted rope lies draped around it, the little engraved wooden pendant dangling down. It’s still damp from where he’d rinsed the blood off. Samson’s collar. Joel crouches, resting his hand over the soil.

“Take care of her for me, boy.”

His voice barely makes it out.

He rises stiffly, turning without another look. The gelding that seemed to have stayed behind during the aftermath of it all waits for him there. Like it knew he’d need a way out, a way to get far, far away. The horse nickers as he approaches and swings himself into the saddle, boots heavy in the stirrups. He reaches into his pack, and pulls out the map. It is creased, damp, and shaking just slightly in his grip.

He drags a finger east, pausing when it lands on—

“Boston, huh?”

Joel’s voice was low, skeptical. His arms were crossed tight over his chest, one boot planted on a fallen log.

“Woman on the radio said somethin’ about a group that’s fightin’ back,” Tommy answered, checking the saddle straps on the horse. “They’re tryin’ to restore civilization, brother. You’ve seen what’s happened to the QZs—it’s fucked up. Someone’s gotta see it through. Think she said they call themselves the Fireflies.”

Joel frowned, jaw working as he looked out past the treeline.

He didn’t believe in causes, not anymore. Not after Texas fell apart, after they saw what the military zones really were. The screaming, the starvation, the guns turned inward. Joel had stopped hoping when the soldiers opened fire on the crowd and never looked back. 

They’d survived by doing what needed to be done. No mercy, no pause, no softness. Just the job in front of them, day by day. That was how they made it. That was how he kept Tommy alive.

So they hunted. Raided. Killed.

Joel thought there was too much blood on his hands to ever step back into civilization and pretend he belonged there again.

The old saddle groaned as Tommy adjusted the girth, the horse shifting beneath it, restless. They’d only managed to keep the one after a fight with another group. Nasty, violent men with better gear and fewer morals. By some miracle Joel and Tommy made it out. Most of their supplies hadn’t.

But Joel had seen something—someone—in the aftermath. A man with a shotgun and a whole lot of their stolen gear and food. He watched the man slink off after the fight into the woods. So he tailed him through the trees, all the way to a house tucked back in the woods.

He wasn’t sure what to expect, really. Maybe a tent, maybe a fortified hideout. But the house…It all looked so normal. All except for the fact that there was no garden or livestock, no traps or defensive setup. Nothing that made it a home. Just a weather-worn cabin with smoke curling from the chimney and a porch swing that creaked in the wind.

Joel had crept around back, careful not to step on broken twigs or leaves, and looked through the window.

What he saw stopped him cold.

A family. An actual family. Inside the house, sitting at a crooked table and moving through the space like they did this every day.

There was a woman, older, hair pulled into a bun, her back straight despite the weight she clearly carried. Her face was drawn, mouth pulled tight. She didn’t smile and looked like she hadn’t in a long, long time. Joel understood that.

The man he followed—thick around the middle, red-faced, movements sharp and angry—stormed through the living room, tossing his shotgun against the wall like it was someone else’s job to pick it up. He slammed the stolen food and supplies down onto the table, shouting at the top of his cigarette-stained lungs, loud enough that the whole house seemed to shake under the weight of it.

Joel squinted from his hiding spot, watching the way the man moved, how he loomed. How he filled the room with noise and rage and the stink of rot. 

Then he saw the girls.

One of them looked to be about thirteen or fourteen—young and terrified, hair knotted and clothes stained. Her eyes were hollow and filled with moisture as she looked at the angry man. 

But it wasn’t her that rooted Joel in place.

It was the other one. The one sitting beside her.

You.

You didn’t see him. You were too busy keeping the girl behind you, your body protectively blocking her small frame, held taut like a barrier. Your face was expressionless, but your eyes—God, your eyes—were sharp. Watchful and heavy with knowing. Not just of what was coming from the man stomping across the floor, but of everything that had already been done. 

You were so thin it made his stomach twist. So marked up, so covered in black and blue it made his grip on the siding go white-knuckled. Your cheekbone was stained deep purple. Your lip was split, the wound still raw and cracked through the center. There was a smear of blood across your collarbone, clearly old and dried, left there like it hadn’t mattered enough to be cleaned.

And your hair.

It was tangled, filthy, matted in places like it hadn’t seen a brush in weeks. Like no one had cared to run so much as a hand through it. He could barely see your face for the way it clung to you, clumped in strings and knots. And something about that made his vision narrow.

If he could just get his hands on you.

If he could drag you out of that house and sit you down in front of him, he’d start there. He’d untangle every snarl, slow and careful, until your scalp stopped flinching. Until your hair slipped clean and weightless through his fingers. Until you never knew a knot again.

It didn’t take much to piece it together. What happened here.

Joel could see it plain as day. The way you held yourself. The way you stood in front of the younger girl like you’d done it a hundred times. Like you’d taken every blow meant for her. Like your body had learned how to catch a fist.

You weren’t crying. You weren’t flinching. You weren’t begging. You were bracing for the fight.

Joel’s mouth had gone dry. He couldn’t tear his eyes off you.

He didn’t know you. Didn’t know your voice, your name, the sound of your laugh. But in that moment, staring through broken glass at the way you kept going, something in him changed. Not a decision or a realization, but more like gravity shifting.

You looked dangerous.

Not in the way Joel understood, with guns or blades or bad tempers. No, this was something deeper, quieter. The kind of danger that came from enduring too much for too long. It was silent and waiting, ready to explode on itself to save those around it.

His stomach turned with certainty. Like something in his blood had shifted without permission.

His pulse kicked up, fast and hot. There was a pressure behind his eyes, in the hollow of his throat. His jaw tightened so hard his molars throbbed.

He forgot about the food, about the gear he’d come to take back.

He needed to get you out.

He needed to take you from that place, from that man, from the way your mother kept stirring a pot on the stove like she’d been tuned out for years. She didn't say anything or bother to intervene.

But Joel would.

And the worst part—the part he’d admit only once, years later and only to himself—was that he didn’t feel like a good man standing there. He didn’t feel righteous or noble or like a savior. He felt possessive.

Like he’d seen something that was his. And someone else was ruining it.

“I just, uh…” Joel cleared his throat, boots shifting in the dirt as Tommy filled his pack that tied to the saddle of the horse. “I got one last favor to ask you.”

Tommy didn’t look up, but he sighed as he said, “Here we go…”

And so, Joel told him.

Told him about the man he’d followed through the trees hours ago, one of the raiders who’d survived that last ugly fight. Said he’d tracked the bastard all the way to a house tucked so far back in the woods it looked like it had grown there. Told him how strange it was—no garden, no livestock, no traps. Just smoke from a chimney and the smell of something bitter on the wind.

He told Tommy about what he saw through the glass.

A woman—older, brittle, worn out. A little girl, hardly more than a shadow. 

And you.

How thin you were. How quiet. How you held yourself in front of your sister like she was the last thing keeping you upright. How you moved like every step had been rehearsed. How your face didn’t flinch, didn’t twitch, didn’t look like anything until the man behind you came into the room and then, and only then, that darkness stirred behind your eyes.

He didn’t go into detail about what it did to him. About how something inside of him had cracked open like old bark. About how it felt suffocating, seeing you and not being able to breathe.

But he told his brother enough.

Tommy was quiet for a long time. Then he said, “Okay. So you pull her out. Then what?”

Joel swallowed. His voice was quieter now. “If I go in guns blazin’, she’ll never trust me. She’ll think I’m the same as him. I need you to… finish it for me.”

Tommy narrowed his eyes. “Finish it?”

Joel looked at him, and without even blinking, he said, “I need you to go in after me. Take care of the rest of ‘em.”

Tommy recoiled. “Are you outta your goddamn mind?”

Joel didn’t answer.

Tommy’s face darkened. “Jesus, Joel. You said it’s a family. A kid. A woman.”

“I ain’t askin’ you to shoot the little one,” Joel said quickly. “If you can take her with you, do it. I don’t care. She’ll only be another mouth to feed, though.”

“And your girl ain’t?”

Both men went quiet.

Joel’s jaw worked as his head tilted slightly to the side. He clicked his tongue once, slow, against the back of his teeth. The kind of sound that filled a silence without breaking it. He didn’t feel like he had to explain himself, he knew he just had to let his brother see what this was doing to him. That it wasn’t as simple as just a girl in a cabin.

Tommy stood there beside the horse, reins tight in one hand, his other still braced against the saddle like he didn’t trust his knees. His mouth opened once, then shut again. He wasn’t looking at Joel anymore—just staring past him, past the edge of the clearing. It was almost as if Joel could see the gears turning behind his brother’s eyes. Tommy was still trying to line it all up, to make sense of it, to see any semblance of a way out of this.

Joel didn’t speak. He knew better. He just stood still, hands loose at his sides, eyes on his brother, watching the war play out in his face.

Tommy’s jaw worked and he scrubbed a hand over his mouth, exhaling slowly through his nose.

Finally, with a quiet, bitter finality, he said, “Alright.”

Joel’s chest stayed tight, unmoving.

Tommy shook his head, more to himself than to Joel. “I’ll do it,” he said. “You need it done, fine. I’ll do it.”

He shifted his weight, shoulders hunched slightly, like something had settled in his gut that he didn’t want there.

“But after this?” His voice was sharper now, aimed straight at Joel as he looked him in the eye. “After this, I never wanna see your goddamn face again.”

Joel met his eyes, unflinching, and nodded.

Tommy let out a bitter little laugh and looked away again before rising up onto his steed. “This world changed you, brother. I don’t even know who you are anymore.”

Joel didn’t argue. He didn't have anything to offer in defense. Tommy was right. He had changed. Not because he wanted to, but because life forced his hand. 

The silence stretched, heavy and final. Then, after a beat, Tommy exhaled again, slower this time, steadier, like something inside him had finally settled, even if it made him sick.

“Just tell me one thing,” he said.

Joel blinked, his brow tightening slightly as he looked up. 

Tommy’s gaze was steady now, but hollow.

“Why her?” he asked. “What makes this girl so damn special?”

There was no pause. No thinking. Joel didn’t have to search for the answer. He didn’t think Tommy would understand even if he told him. So, he shifted slightly, his voice low, quiet, but his lips twitched up at the corners.

“We all gotta get wrangled up at some point, baby brother.”

you guys :')

thank you so much for being on this journey with me!! ugh, the story that broke my own damn heart. I loved every second of writing it. getting to know these two broken people clinging to each other in the middle of nowhere...it all came from a week long listening to that house in nebraska on mf repeat. when I like a song, it becomes my whole personality for about a month. and honestly that was the entire album for me.

thank you thank you thank you for all your love, all your comments and messages and crash outs in my DMs. you made me want to keep writing, you continue to make me want to keep writing. I love you all so dearly!!!

another thank you to my boo @cavillscurls for always letting me tell you all the spoilers and screaming into the void with you about this story. and im also so sorry for doing all the above lol

taglist: @orcasoul, @ilovetoomanymen, @niceforcum, @glaszdoll, @therewastherewas, @axionn, @aleariixx, @izzy698, @shivispunk@demonsasss, @pedropascalsbbg, @urlivingdeadgirl, @televangrl, @mani-pedro, @erska777, @samarav, @levlli, @harriedandharassed, @tomie-it-girl, @streamermattsgf,@uravitsy, @lostinthestreamofconsciousness, @umadirectioner, @quistals, @cinnxmxngxrl, @ithinkimaslutforharry

[liana333]

Imagine losing your home, your livestock, your dog, and your lover. Then having to bury them and make a cross for their grave??? Joel Miller, I can't be like you because I would instantly follow them. My hope for humanity would drain straight away.

Nevertheless, this series IS SO GOOD! Definitely one of my favorite Joel Miller fanfiction. Thank you @millermouth for this masterpiece! 💞

[millermouth]

chapter 10

series masterlist Summary: In the time between when he took you to now, something changed. His hands grew gentler. Your fear turned quiet. And somewhere in the stillness, love kindled. || angst & fluff, violence, blood and gore, main character death, animal death (im so sorry), Pre-Boston QZ, Stockholm Syndrome, slow burn, raider!joel, captor!joel, homestead, kidnapping, dark themes, I also just learned what whump means so we're including that too || a/n: this is unlike anything i've ever written, and this is the scene the entire story was written around. please heed the warnings as this is a very heavy chapter. sorry to those who wanted to see joel kicking ass, he does it but you can't see bc im so bad at writing action lol / yes the formatting is intentional. yes i know it hurts. please be kind in your comments, I'm just a baby

It all happened very fast.

And yet it felt like it was all in some horrible, mind altering slow motion.

The handlers at the edge of the clearing let go of their leashed infected like hellhounds surging forward, screams and snarls excited by the sudden noise. They ran into the clearing as gunfire cracked through the trees. Your vision didn’t catch up with it all until Joel moved, turning on the spot and shoving you hard toward the porch, yelling for you to Run!

You stumbled up the steps, heart jackhammering, the world turning into sound and chaos behind you. You crossed the threshold, barely turning the knob with your sweat slicked hands, and were halfway through the door when you felt something rushing past you in a big, furry blur—

Samson.

He shot around your legs with a burst of movement, all muscle and fury, teeth bared as he tore toward the sound of Joel’s voice, toward the chaos.

“No, Samson!” you cried, reaching too late.

The dog vanished into the fray just as the door slammed behind you, Joel still outside. You could hear the crack of his revolver now that he’d reached the porch steps, but there was no time to dwell. He told you to hide, to get into one of the rooms, to lock it behind you.

And so you did– you turned and ran, nearly tripping as you flew through the house, ducking into the first bedroom and throwing the lock shut behind you. Your breath came too fast, too thin, lungs barely working as you collapsed to the floor and backed up, feet sliding across the floor until your spine hit the old radiator.

You sat against it gasping. Hands fumbling, you reached for the knife in your pocket, flipping it open with a trembling thumb. You stared at the blade, its cold, familiar edge waiting for the threats that screamed outside the house.

Your heart slammed into your ribs like it was trying to punch its way out. You stayed locked in that room, pressed to cold iron at your back, while Joel fought outside. While Samson tore across the dirt, brave and loyal and so, so stupid.

And you—what were you? You felt like a child hiding beneath the covers, a coward with a blade she barely knew how to hold. You told yourself you’d be ready, that you’d be strong when it mattered. But now that it was here, you were trembling alone, praying as if that alone might be enough.

You sat there with the knife clutched in your fist, pressed so tight your fingers had gone numb. The room felt like it was shrinking, the edges blurring, and the only thing keeping you grounded the rhythmic pound of your own heartbeat slamming against your ribs. The radiator dug into your spine, but you didn’t move. Your mind wouldn’t let you.

And after a while of only being able to hear your own blood roaring in your ears, you realized the chaos outside had gone quiet.

No more shouting. No more gunfire. Just a hollow, buzzing silence. Your ears strained, clinging to any sound, but all you could hear was the rasp of your own breath and the thud of your pulse in your neck.

Maybe it was over. Maybe Joel had driven them off. Maybe he’d already be climbing the porch steps, bloody but alive, Samson at his side, ready to take you into his arms and tell you it was done.

Please, you thought. Please let it be done.

Then came the sound of shattering glass.

You flinched hard, knife jerking in your grip, nearly falling from your grasp, but you kept it tight. Somewhere outside the door, a window had broken, the sickening crunch of splinters and shards spraying across wood. You could hear footsteps, but— no, not quite footsteps. A scraping sort of noise, a slapping of feet, wet and off-rhythm, stumbling too fast, like something wearing a human body but not quite knowing how to use it. You got up, slowly crawling to the door, and pressed your ear to the wood.

You could hear the ragged breaths, those waterlogged lungs breathing in the air of the house. It was a low, starved, inhuman rattling of breath.

Your blood froze.

No. No, no, no, no—

But then, there was more. A padding of movement suddenly on the glass, the infected screaming at the sound of it, and a snarl matched it, loud enough to travel through the door and shake the walls of your heart. And you knew. Knew who it was. Samson’s bark echoed through the house, sharp and feral. He was after it. That sweet, dumb, brave boy had gone after the infected. You heard his claws scraping against the floor, the snarl in his throat, the heavy thump of his body throwing itself toward the thing that dared to trespass into your home.

Samson’s voice, if a dog could even have one, went raw and ragged, erupting into a series of snarls and screams so violent they didn’t even sound like him anymore. And as you pressed your ear harder to the wooden door, the sound of him rattled around your skull like a loose train over rusted tracks. You felt it in your bones, could hear the wet thud of bodies hitting wood, the skitter of claws trying to find purchase on the floor.

But worse than that, worse than a dog fighting for its life, fighting for your life is that high, shrill, gut-wrenching cry that cuts clean through the noise and leaves silence in its wake. It shattered you—froze your lungs mid breath.

And suddenly, when your lungs filled again, it wasn't with air, but with cold, burning dry ice fury. You realized you didn’t care that you could die, that if you opened the door, there was a strong possibility of a nightmare on the other side.

You ripped the door open, slamming it on its hinges. The creature turned unnaturally fast, all instinct and no humanity. As soon as it saw you it lunged, and its body collided with yours so fast it knocked the air from your chest. It was heavier than it looked, wiry and wrong, all muscle and hungry hungry hungry. Its hands clawed at your shoulders, jaws snapping inches from your face, bloodied teeth gnashing as it screamed that shrill, inhuman sound right into your skin.

You hit the wood floor hard, but the pain didn’t matter. All you could feel was that earth-shattering vehemence—the kind that made your blood churn and your vision blur. A scorching ice storm tore through your veins, wild and merciless, for your dog, for your home, for this sacred little life you had carved from the dirt with blood and sweat and aching hope. Anger for Joel, who had fought tooth and bone to keep you safe. And as the infected’s face loomed closer, snarling, breath rank with rot and death, all you could think of was him. Joel. Your Joel. The man who thought he was no good, who still stood between you and the fire, who was out there now, doing just that. You hoped he was still breathing. You prayed. And as you prayed for his life, you screamed and sobbed and thrashed beneath the weight of that thing, your hands searching with desperation. One found its jaw and shoved, just enough to shift its balance, just enough to move. The other rose like instinct, like fury given form, and drove your blade up through its mouth, straight into the soft ruin of its brain.

It collapsed on top of you all at once, heavy and lifeless, and still your sobs came wracking, splintering through your ribs, aching deep in your chest. You shoved it off with trembling arms, gasping as you scrambled backward, until your spine met the cold, comforting iron of the radiator once again. You pressed against it like it could hold you steady, like it could anchor you to something that still felt like home.

By the time your breathing began to steady, your body came alive with reality. You ached in places you hadn’t even felt the impact. Your skin prickled with heat and cold in turns, a clammy sheen sticking to your neck and chest. A buzzing sensation crept through your limbs, like your nerves were trying to fire all at once. Just the adrenaline wearing off, the shock. 

But as you waited there and the silence thickened, your heart began to beat harder again, not with panic now, but with fear. Real fear. The kind that settled into your bones, the kind that felt like knowing. Where was Joel?

As if your prayers were suddenly answered, you heard the front door open, accompanied by low and steady footsteps padding through the front room. But then, that instinctual part of you that was responsible for keeping you alive shot a flare of panic through you. You clutched the blade tighter, heart thudding like a war drum in your throat. What if they had found you? What if they’d killed Joel and they were coming to finish you off now?

The footsteps were slow and uneven, floorboards creaking under their weight as they got closer. There was no voice, no words, just the echo of boots and the soft drag of an undeniable limp.

You saw the shadow looming closer to the doorway before his familiar, big, rough hand pushed the door wider and stepped through. He was looking down at the body on the floor, the blood that was pooling around it, before looking up at you.

Joel.

His shoulders filled the frame, blood smeared all over him as his face was drawn pale and utterly familiar. He held his hand against his side, cuts all down his face and neck from the fight. For one fleeting breath, your soul unclenched. He was alive.

But then he stepped forward, and your breath caught like a fishhook in your chest. Your spine went stiff.

“Stop,” you gasped, “Don’t— just stay back, don’t come any closer.”

Your hands came up between you like a barrier, shaking but firm, with eyes wide and glassy. His boots halted on the threshold, and for a moment, he looked like he’d been shot. Your pulse skyrocketed again, fear icing your veins and blood rushing to your ears. You couldn’t tell if the light headedness was from being forced to the ground in the attack or the panic that thrummed through you now.

“What—?” he began, stepping forward again, both of his hands reaching, open and supplicating.

“Joel!” you shrieked, scrambling and keeping your hands up, one with the knife still clutched tightly, “I said stay back!”

He stopped cold, breathing hard, and for a moment, something flickered behind his eyes, something more painful than all the cuts and bruises and wounds on his body. You wondered, then, if he remembered the way your voice echoed the same way against the walls when you demanded for him to let you go all those months ago.

How that felt like such a far, far away dream now.

Your chest heaved, skin feeling lit on fire, feeling like it was screaming, wanting to peel away from the inside. The adrenaline was fading, and what was left behind felt like flames in your blood.

“What happened?” he asked, void of softness and gentleness now. 

You didn't answer. 

Instead, you reached for your shirt, bloody fingers pulling at the collar, and shifted it aside.

His eyes dropped, and all the color drained from his face as he exhaled every ounce of air left in his lungs, “Oh, Christ.”

It was as if his entire demeanor crumbled in front of you. He remained standing, but his face fell into an awful, splintered, painful look of grief, so pure and immediate. Like the pain was so sharp it gutted the breath from him.

You watched, frozen, as he sank to his knees in front of you, looking at the angry, blistering red bite on your shoulder.

“Baby…” he breathed, voice cracking on the word. It nearly shattered you then and there.

“I’m sorry,” your voice broke, lips trembling as tears blurred your vision. You looked at him, at this man who had lost so much, survived despite it all, and fought so hard to feel again, now sat in front of you unraveling.

“I’m sorry,” you said again, a useless whisper, “Is Samson…?”

He closed his eyes, answering only in the way his jaw tightened, his head dropping forward with a silent sigh.

You let out a strangled sob, knees curling into your chest as it hit you all at once. The dog, the bite, the way Joel picked his head up and looked at you like he couldn’t bear to breathe without you.

He began to crawl forward, reaching—

“No!” you cried out, jerking back so violently your shoulder throbbed with pain against the radiator behind you.

“Please,” he said, breath stopping in his lungs, “Don’t do this.”

“Stay back Joel,” you warned again, voice stern and barely holding together, “I mean it.”

But he didn’t. He couldn’t. 

He shook his head as if trying to wake from a nightmare, eyes locked on you with that same desperate ache that once made you fall for him,

“I don’t want to hurt you,” you whispered, voice small and broken. 

“I don’t care.”

He pushed forward again, steady and unstoppable, like he’d decided if this was it, he’d meet it holding you.

You shoved at his chest as he got close enough, dropping your knife with a clattering to the floor, “No! Joel, stop! I said no—I don’t want to hurt you!”

But he was stronger, always has been. And now his arms wrapped around you, holding you like he’d try to keep you tethered to him, to the world.

You still shoved at his chest fruitlessly, sobbing as he said, “Stop fighting me, please, baby, just—just let me hold you.”

He didn’t flinch against your weak punches, he didn’t move, just held onto you tighter, soothing you with soft whispers, “I’ve got you, I’ve got you.”

You were shaking, every part of you trembling like your bones wanted to come apart when finally your hands stopped fighting him. Like whatever had sunk its teeth into you was burrowing into the deepest parts. But Joel’s arms never loosened, if anything, they held tighter, his hands splayed across your spine, touch heavy and grounding.

“Please,” you whispered, though you didn’t know what you’re asking for anymore. For him to go. For him to stay. For this to not be real.

But Joel just pressed his lips to your temple, to your hair, to the damp skin at your hairline. Again and again and again. His breath stuttered against your scalp as he kissed you like a prayer, like he’s trying to memorize the shape of you through touch alone.

“It’s okay,” he breathes, “It’s okay. I ain’t gon’ leave you.”

You let out another sob, quieter this time. Less wild, the panic still there, coiled tight in your chest, but it dulled beneath the weight of him, his body anchoring yours, his voice soft and sacred.

Your hands gripped the front of his shirt now, no longer pushing, just holding, clutching fabric like a lifeline as your head sank against his chest. His scent wrapped around you, that firesmoke burn, the smell of sun kissed leather and something undeniably him. The most familiar thing in the world.

You cried into him, hiccuping as his hands slid up your back, one cradling your head, the other splayed wide over your spine. He didn’t tell you to stop, to breathe. He just held you, steady and unshaken, as your whole world caved in.

“I’ve got you,” he said again, barely more than a whisper.

You lifted your eyes to his as your sobs slowly began to fade, your breath still stuck in your throat. His hand came to your face, cupping you so gently, so softly you almost started to cry again. Your hand came up in return, fingers red with blood, cupping his face back.

“I’m s–”

He shook his head, cutting you off, “‘Nough of that, please,” he whispered, hazel eyes pained and aged, “This ain’t your fault, baby. I’m sorry I wasn’t here in time. I should’ve…I could’ve…”

It was turn to cut him off, but this time you leaned up, kissing his lips so, so gently. 

You pulled away just to meet his eyes again, and they glistened, but no tears fell from them. 

“I love you.” you whispered.

His mouth pulled together in another tight frown, chin wobbling, his hand petting your hair over and over like he was trying to soothe the both of you.

“I love you too, sweetheart.” he whispered to you, kissing you back. His mouth was shaking, breathing uneven as his lips molded to yours.

He eventually lifted you off the ground, carrying you with the intent to make your way to the bedroom. But you stopped him suddenly as you came into the main room, your hand finding his chest.

“Will you…” you looked over at the chair, old and worn by the empty hearth, “just one more time.” you whispered.

His hands tightened around you, and he nodded, “Yeah, alright.”

He set you down, not before making sure the moth-eaten blanket was down so your knees were comfortable. He began to bring over the firewood, pushing it into the hearth and getting it lit. The warmth was welcome against your clammy skin, your blood beginning to heat and make your skin rise in goosebumps.

When the fire was lit, he moved to sit behind you, and called to you.

“Come here.” His voice commands. Though it’s…soft. Not cruel, not mean.

Not anymore. 

It hasn’t been in a long time.

You move without hesitation, the old floorboards warm beneath your skin as you settle in front of him. The fire in front of you reminds you of everything that’s come before this. The first day, when every snap of the burning wood made you flinch, uncertain and raw. Of each quiet meal shared in the hush of survival, each pot of water boiled for a bath, a kindness, a ritual.

It glows now, steady and golden, casting both of you in ribbons of amber and shadow despite the afternoon sun still reaching through the windows. And for a moment, it feels like time has folded in on itself, like you're still there at the beginning, and somehow at the end all at once.

Joe’s old armchair groans when he shifts, knees spread, a hand already reaching. His fingers are warm and gentle when they gather your hair, undoing your braid. The brush is missing bristles after all this time, its wood worn soft. 

He doesn’t speak. Just parts your hair, gently combing through it in slow strokes, smoothing it back from your damp temples as if this were just another morning, not the end of anything.

With each stroke, your body melts more and more. When the brush catches slightly on a knot near the base of your skull, to the side of your neck where your skin throbs and screams, you flinch slightly. Your breath hitches, the pain searing through you. Slowly, he pulls the knot free, keeping your locks away from your shoulder, and you exhale, your eyes locked on the flames.

When he finishes, you don’t move right away. Just sit with him in the hush, the fire casting flickers of gold across your faces. Then, quietly, you turn toward him, not yet reaching, though every part of you aches to. 

“Joel,” you say, soft as breath.

He doesn’t answer right away. His eyes are fixed on the fire, like he’s been staring into it for years.

Then he blinks and looks at you with silent reverence.

“You promised me,” you murmur, voice tight with everything you’re afraid to say. “You promised that if—”

“I know.” His voice breaks like a snapped branch. Just those two words, and already it sounds like the weight of them might crush him.

That’s when your hands move. Shaking, you cup his face, thumbs brushing over his thick beard, the roughness of his face. His eyes shut hard, lines deepening across his face as if he’s trying to hold something back. His hands find your hips, pulling you closer until you’re leaning into him, flushed against his chest.

You lean in, resting your forehead to his, and for a beat, neither of you speak. There’s just breathing—yours fast and shallow, his slow and unsteady.

“There’s so much you don’t know,” he whispers, “so much I could’ve shown you. I should’ve taken you away from here when we had the chance, taken you far—”

You kiss his lips gently, only brushing against him to silence his anguish, “Stop,” you whisper, “Everything you’ve done, everything we’ve done…it’s been…I never thought I’d have a life like this Joel.”

He kisses the corner of your mouth, pulling you into him completely, his head tucking into the crook of your neck. After a moment, his hands wrap around you, and he lifts you into his arms.

You curl into him automatically, arms wrapping around his neck as he carries you. Your cheek presses against his shoulder, eyes fluttering shut as you breathe him in. Sweat, firewood, the faint scent of your soap still lingering in his shirt from the last time he washed it. The smell of home.

He carries you to the bedroom upstairs and lays you down like something sacred, like setting you down too fast might shatter you. The covers rustle around you as he tucks them in tight, one hand smoothing over your arms, your chest, as if he could keep everything from unraveling if he just holds you close enough.

You’re trembling now—harder. Your skin burns, sweat trickling down your temples despite the way your teeth chatter.

He slides in beside you, wrapping his arms around your shaking body, cocooning you in the warmth of him. The way your body interlocks with his, chest to chest, belly to belly, your arms around his waist and his around your shoulders, your head between his jaw and shoulder. It couldn’t be coincidence, could it? You were meant for this. To be here, with him. To be held by him. Like your bodies had always known how to find each other, like they'd been waiting their whole lives to remember.

And for a few minutes, there’s nothing but silence. His heartbeat thuds steady and strong where your palm rests against it, your breath stuttering in your chest.

But then the dizziness starts.

The edges of the room blur. The floor tilts. You shut your eyes tight, trying to force it away, but it doesn’t stop.

Joel feels it and he shifts, hand sliding to your cheek, tilting your face toward his. “Hey. Hey, look at me. What’s wrong?”

You try to speak but your tongue is heavy and throat thick. “I feel…” you breathe, voice shaking as you shake your head, “something’s happening.”

Your eyes flutter open, vision swimming, but he's right there, face close, eyes wide and scared.

“I can feel it,” you whisper. 

Joel swallows hard. You can see it in his throat the way his jaw clenches, his hand flexing against your back like he’s bracing for impact.

“You have to,” you say, voice breaking. “Joel, you promised.”

“I–I…” he says, the words stuck in his throat.

“I can’t be one of them. I won’t. I won’t hurt you.” You try to keep your voice steady, but it fractures, your lip wobbling as tears rise fast. “Please.”

He doesn’t respond. Just stares at you, his face lined with pain, his mouth pulled tight like he’s holding in a scream.

“I always wondered,” you whisper, “how much of the person is still in there. In those first moments. When they’re still… runners. The way they sound, Joel…when they’re screaming and crying while tearing into someone. Do you think it’s the real them in there? Watching it all?”

Joel shakes his head slowly, his eyes steady on you, “I don’t know,”

“If I turn… if I see myself hurting you… if I know it’s happening and I can’t stop it—” Your voice cracks and you cover your mouth as a sob punches out of you. “Don’t make me live through that, Joel. Please.”

Tears stream down your cheeks, warm and silent, soaking into the pillow beneath your face. You don’t even feel them anymore. Your whole body is pulsing with heat, the fever blooming beneath your skin like wildfire.

Joel doesn’t speak right away. He just pulls you into him like he’s trying to fuse your bodies together—his arms crushing around you, chest to chest, heart to heart. He buries his face in the curve of your neck, breathing you in like he’s trying to commit it all to memory.

“I won’t let nothin’ happen to you, baby,” he murmurs, voice thick, shaking, lost. “I promise. I promise.” It sounds more like a prayer than a vow. Like he’s begging God for more time, even though you both know it’s run out.

Your body shakes in his arms, but slowly, the violence of your cries dull. His warmth seeps into you again, grounding you for just a few more moments. Just enough to open your eyes and look at him, your lashes heavy, breath shallow.

Your voice is barely more than a whisper when you say it for the second time.

“I love you,” you whisper. “I don’t say it enough. I didn’t tell you how you saved me—how much of my life has been because of you. And I want you to know... even after everything, even now—I’m yours. I’ve always been yours, Joel.”

His throat works, his eyes shining. He nods, just once. Like that’s the most sacred thing he’s ever been told.

“And I’m yours,” he says in return.

You both fall quiet again.

For a moment, there’s peace. Just the rhythm of Joel’s hand on your back. The warmth of his chest against yours. His mouth brushing your forehead, your hairline, the corner of your eye. He kisses you like he’s trying to chase the sickness from your skin, as if he could just hold onto you hard enough, it won’t take you.

Your breath stutters. The heat becomes unbearable—coiling in your stomach, your spine, spreading through your limbs like liquid fire. Your fingers twitch, and at first you barely register it. Just a flicker, a reflex.

But Joel goes still.

You feel the shift in him. His breath catches, his hand falters.

Another twitch. This one stronger as your arm jerks, your leg following. Your muscles pull in ways you’re not asking them to.

No. No, not yet.

You force your eyes open. The room spins and blurs around the edges, but Joel’s face is there, close and stricken. Your vision swims, but you find him. You always do.

“Joel…” you whisper. It comes out garbled, slurred, like your mouth doesn’t quite belong to you anymore. You can’t stop shaking. Your hand fists in his shirt like an anchor, like maybe he can keep you here if you just hold tight enough.

His voice breaks as he leans in, as his hands cradle your face. “I’m here. I’m here, baby. I love you. I love you, I love you—”

Your limbs jerk violently. Your jaw tightens until your teeth grind. Your head lolls forward, then back. A low groan builds in your throat—not yours, not really, but it comes from you all the same.

Still, you feel him. Hands on your face, his lips at your temple.

“I love you,” he’s whispering, again and again, panicked now, broken. “I love you, I love you—”

You try to find him again. Just one more time. Your fingers claw weakly at his shirt, but you can’t see his face anymore. Can’t see anything through the blur and fire and blood pounding in your skull. There’s only heat, only screaming inside your veins.

You don’t hear the whisper of metal against cotton, the shift of weight as he reaches for his knife.

You’re somewhere else in your mind, through the fire and the heat. Lost in the noise, the tearing of your own mind. In the last fragments of what made you you. Like sinking below the surface of a lake in winter—frozen on top, black and endless underneath. Your mind is a room with all the windows shattered, wind howling through the broken panes. You're still there, somewhere in the wreckage, but your body is a distant thing, just meat and memory.

But you can hear him, from somewhere above the frozen ice in your mind. Joel’s voice moves back through the static like warm water through it, slow and thick, muffled at the edges but still his. Still him. It trembles, low and wrecked, but it reaches you, finding some last corner of your mind not yet taken. 

“You’re okay. You’re so good. So good, you hear me?”

You think you try to nod. Maybe you do.

“I love you,” he says, as if it’s the last time he’ll ever be allowed to speak it aloud. 

“I got you. I got you.”

You want to tell him it’s okay. That you’re not scared anymore. That he made this life feel like something real. That even if it was short, even if it ends here, it was still worth it. Because it was him.

But you can’t. Your lips won’t move.

And his voice starts to drift, the edges blurring like it’s being pulled back into that darkness, that lake. 

Then, with a quick pressure to the back of your skull, there was nothing.

No darkness.

No light or sound or warmth.

Nothing.

As if someone pulled the cord to the stars.

taglist: @orcasoul, @ilovetoomanymen, @niceforcum, @glaszdoll, @therewastherewas, @axionn, @aleariixx, @izzy698, @shivispunk @demonsasss, @pedropascalsbbg, @urlivingdeadgirl, @televangrl, @mani-pedro, @erska777, @samarav, @levlli, @harriedandharassed, @tomie-it-girl, @streamermattsgf,@uravitsy, @lostinthestreamofconsciousness, @umadirectioner, @quistals, @cinnxmxngxrl, @ithinkimaslutforharry

[liana333]

I didn't know that a transition from italic to unintalicized words can violently hurt me. Thank you for this discovery (question mark) 😟