Give Your Heart a Break
Part 1: Meet & Greet
Summary: While on vacation with your brother and adopted son, you meet Josh Dun. Pairing: Josh x Reader Word Count: 1035 Warnings: Mentions of divorce and briefly implied fertility issues. A/N: I decided that @adversaryproject needed a drabble based on the picture below the cut. It turned into a one-shot, and that has now turned into a mini-series. Such is writer life, I suppose. Anyways, enjoy :)
Photo found on @joshdunverified via sjcdrums.com.
Your brother shifted from one foot to the other, shifting your foster son from one hip to the next in the process. The line at the drum store to meet Josh Dun was longer even than you had anticipated, but your foster son, Charlie, couldn’t wait to meet the Twenty One Pilots drummer. This whole last minute vacation had been scheduled around Josh’s appearance. If keeping the little boy happy meant waiting in line that long, then so be it.
“Mommy, I tired,” Charlie sighed, reaching out for you.
You took him in your arms and he immediately leaned his head on your shoulder. “Why don’t you close your eyes for a little bit, sweetie? Me and Uncle Nate will wake you when it’s time to meet Josh, okay?”
You felt him nod against your shoulder; a few minutes later, the child’s dead weight told you that he had indeed fallen asleep. Your brother caught the too-large ball cap that fell off of Charlie’s head, fiddling with it as the three of you continued to wait in line.
“Thanks for coming with us, by the way,” you told your brother after a while of silence. “It means a lot. To him and me.”
Your brother side-hugged you, careful not to wake Charlie. “I’ve got you guys. No worries.”
The tight smile you gave him was all you could manage in reply. The little being in your arms had come into your life a few months shy of his first birthday, and had been with you for almost a year now — and it hadn’t been the easiest year. After a long time of trying to have your own children, you and your husband had decided to give fostering a go — a sort of trial before going ahead with the adoption process. While you loved being a mother, to any child, your husband had not felt the same way. You knew he struggled, but the divorce papers had come out of nowhere. It was only by the grace of God, your position in the community services center, and your regular full-time job that you had been allowed to keep Charlie on your own. In three more weeks, his adoption would be finalized, and he would forever be your son.
An elbow nudge from your brother drew you out of your memories. There was only a couple of people left in front of you, so you shook the kiddo awake and told him it was almost time to meet Josh. You expected tears and maybe even some whining or screaming when he had to be woken up, but the moment Charlie spotted Josh, his flushed cheeks pulled into a big, toothy grin. Your brother positioned the ball cap backwards on Charlie’s head, and the three of you waited just a few more minutes before it was your turn.
“Here, would you take him? I want to get a picture of him meeting Josh.”
Your brother obliged, and Charlie didn’t care, as long as he got to meet Josh. Phone in hand, you got some really great shots of that meeting, including one of Josh high-fiving Charlie’s chubby little hand. Finally, Nate motioned for you to come join them.
“This is my sister, Y/N,” he introduced. “This guy’s foster mom.”
Josh smiled and shook your hand. “Nice to meet you. Fostering, huh? I hear that’s no easy feat.”
“It’s not, especially with what we’ve been through,” you sighed, then reached over to squeeze your son’s hand. “But we’re going to be just fine.”
“I’m sure,” Josh agreed, seeming confident about that fact despite having just met you. He signed the pictures you had brought and would later frame for Charlie’s room. “Are you guys from around here?”
“No, we’re making a vacation out of it,” you shrugged. “We’ll do Disney and the beach before we leave.”
“That’s a big trip for a little guy,” Josh chuckled, reaching out for your son’s hand again. “I’ve actually got some passes for Disney, if you guys want them — they’ve got my name on them though, so you’d have to deal with me tagging along.”
Your eyes grew wide. “Really? You’d — you’d want to go to Disney with us?”
“Yes, I want to go to Disney with you,” Josh smiled, then quickly added. “You know, all of you, I mean.”
He cleared his throat and a sweet blush lightly dusted over his cheeks. You blushed too when you realized why he had corrected himself; Nate watched the whole exchange with the usual glee and mischief younger siblings manage to work into their expressions. Josh raised his brow, and you realized you hadn’t given him a definite answer yet.
“Oh, sorry — yes. Sure. That would be amazing. We’ll meet you at the front gate at nine?”
“Sounds perfect.”
Feeling brave for a moment, you took the pen from him and jotted your number across the back of his hand. “In case your plans change — and I’ll — we’ll — understand if they do.”
Josh assured you that he would do whatever he could to make sure his plans didn’t change. As the three of you moved on to let the other fans have their time with Josh, he waved to Nate and Charlie first, then made sure you caught his gaze as he said goodbye specifically to you.
Once out on the sidewalk, you stopped in your tracks. “What in the world just happened?”
“You just made a Disney date with Dun, that’s what just happened,” Nate laughed.
“Disney date with Dun!” Charlie repeated, clapping his chubby little hands and clearly not understanding the full extent of the situation. All he could understand was the Josh Dun was taking him to Disney — and it probably didn’t matter to him at that point if you or your brother went, too.
You weren’t going to make a big deal out of this, you decided. As long as your son was happy, that was your priority now. Maybe something would happen with you and Josh, maybe it wouldn’t; either way, you would chalk it up to am amazing experience.
Yeah, right, your mind told you, and quite sarcastically at that. Keep telling yourself that.
