I’ve been a loyal Joel girlie since tlou1 came out in 2013. He inadvertently influenced my type in men since I met the character at the ripe age of 10 (when you know, you know). Imagine being a 12-18 year old rejecting any advances from appropriately aged guys bc I was “only into older men”… and girls, lol.
Masterlist here !
Story synopsis:
The very core of who you are is hypocritical. Every day is a reminder of what you've lost, of who you've allowed yourself to become. Your walls are built around your heart like the fortress of Jackson, until… a certain man tries to pry his way through. How long can you withstand such intrusion? Will your heart ever open, will your soul ever heal, the way you have helped so many others do? Will you ever learn that you're worth saving too?
Slow burn, outbreak!au // Jackson!Joel x f!reader // angst
incomplete; 7 chapters, WC: 26.1k
[on hiatus]
(Last update Jul.28.2025)
Masterlist here !
Story synopsis:
You told him you were just visiting for the summer. Gave him a name that wasn’t yours. From the moment he saw you across the bar, he knew you were trouble—sunlight and sharp edges, all heat and laughter and something he shouldn’t want, everything he’d been devoid of for so long. What began as a fleeting summer fling burned into something neither of you could name. You left without saying goodbye, it seemed easier that way. But now you’re in his classroom. And he’s your professor. You told yourselves to pretend it never happened. To forget. But how could you forget the way the world only made sense when you were together—and how nothing had made sense since?
Slow burn, no outbreak!au // professor!Joel x f!reader; Rated E. 18+ MDI !!
incomplete; 17 chapters, WC: 120.1k
[active]
(Last updated May 18)
Masterlist here !
domestic fluff/ smut; Joel wants another baby.
no outbreak!au, established relationship, gratuitous smut
husband/dad!Joel x wife/mom!reader; Rated E. 18+ MDI !!
WC 7.1k - A run-in during winter break leads a tense interaction of people who only know of the summer versions of you and Joel // the Spring semester starts.
Chapter content/warnings: no sexual content but entire fic is 18+ only!
wee bit of power imbalance, tension, forbidden attraction, moral boundaries and conflicts, internal dialogue, switches of pov, mutual longing/pining/yearning, being complicated and frustrating as always. Mentions of grief, family trauma. Use of nicknames exclusively with friends, mentions of medication, implications of past intimacy, slow burn.
· · ──────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒───────── · ·
Early December
You were curled on the couch with a blanket when Em appeared in the doorway with her coat already on.
“Come on.”
You didn’t look up. “No.”
“Yes.” She crossed the room and snatched the blanket off you in one dramatic sweep. “You’re coming with me.”
“To what, exactly?” You sat up, teeth clenched against the sudden chill.
Em grinned, far too smug for someone about to ruin your night. “Hockey game. My brother scored me free tickets. Front row!”
You groaned, dragging a hand down your face. “Em…”
“What? You like hockey.”
Your voice softened as the memory rolled over you, “That was me and my grandpa’s thing. He’d take me to games and we’d start the wave.”
You smiled despite yourself, though it faded quickly.
Your dad’s dad had been your best friend. Your safety. Your home. He was the only parental figure you’d claimed as your own, the one who nurtured your patience, your kindness, your stubborn insistence on being good in a world that wasn’t. Always be the best version of yourself you can be, he used to tell you. Protect the people you care for, even when it costs you something.
But he was gone before you’d even finished high school, taken by the kind of sudden cruelty that left you unmoored. He left you alone with the rest of them, with their money, their cold dinners and colder rules, their way of measuring worth in deals and profits instead of decency.
You hated it. Hated the lineage, the family name they were so proud to brand on everything. Hated the weight of their expectations, the way every holiday turned into another chance to remind you who you were supposed to become. They called it a legacy, but you knew better. It was a damn leash.
Your grandfather had been the only one who told you you didn’t have to take it. The only one who believed you could make something of your own.
They claimed you represented them through your father’s name, but to you, it was your grandfather’s. Every choice you made, every time you bit back against the pull of your family’s legacy, it was for him. You lived like he was still watching, like you could still make him proud. That thought kept you moving when everything else threatened to drag you under.
Which was why hockey still hurt. It wasn’t just a sport, it was him. It was the smell of cheap beer and popcorn, the roar of a crowd, his hand gripping your shoulder as he shouted at the refs like they’d hear him. That lopsided smile he’d shoot you when his team got a goal or his favorite player won in a fight. And now that was gone, just another reminder of something of your own that you didn’t get to keep.
—
Yet somehow, Em still managed to drag you to the arena.
The cold hit you first, sharp enough to sting your cheeks as you stepped into the arena. The echo of blades cutting into ice, the crack of sticks against boards, the low thunder of a crowd already worked up, your chest tightened instantly. For half a second, you almost turned back. But Em hooked her arm through yours and dragged you down the steps, weaving past kids clutching foam fingers and parents balancing hot dogs and plastic beer cups.
By the time you found your seats, the rink glowed under the lights, brutal white against the dark stands. Players in padded uniforms cut hard lines into the ice, helmets flashing under the fluorescents. Center ice, cocky grin plastered across his face, was Em’s brother. Helmet tucked beneath his arm, tapping his stick against the ice as his teammates called out.
“Showoff,” Em muttered with a smirk, but you saw the fondness there.
You couldn’t help but smile too. He always had been a show off. From the time you were kids, with him in skates and you in cleats— you’d crashed into each other like magnets, never missing an opportunity to compete, to one-up the other. Soccer drills versus slapshots, track sprints versus suicides down the ice. The rivalry was built into you, into every glance across a family barbecue or sideline.
You thought he might’ve become your grandfather’s favorite if he were here. That easy confidence, the way he fed off his teammates’ energy, the spark in his eye when a fight was about to break out, your grandfather would’ve called him “a real scrapper” and cheered him on like he was his own.
You hadn’t realized until recently, thanks to Em, that the rivalry between you and her brother had been lopsided in more ways than one. Apparently, you hadn’t just been his competition. You’d been his first crush. According to Em, he’d been carrying it since he was old enough to know what a crush even was. And it never faded. Even after you left, he followed your soccer career at Vanderbilt like it was a lifeline, watched every game he could, memorized your stats, brought your name up in conversation as though you were still just down the block instead of hundreds of miles away.
It had been overwhelming to learn, after so many years, that he’d harbored something that enduring. You couldn’t quite comprehend it at first, the kind of affection that stretched across time and distance, unshaken by absence or change. But now… now you understood it perfectly. Because another man came to mind. One whose memory was stitched into your ribs in a way that made your chest ache.
Em bumped her shoulder against yours, softening her grin. “See? Not so bad.”
The game started with the sharp blast of a whistle and the crack of sticks against ice, and the noise of the crowd rose in a wave that rattled the boards. You settled deeper into your seat, scarf tucked up to your chin, the cold from the rink biting even through the heat of the crowd around you.
Em was on her feet almost immediately, hollering for her brother as he darted down the rink, puck flashing in the lights. You couldn’t help the tug in your chest at the sound of skates carving clean across the ice, at the way bodies collided against the boards hard enough to shake the glass.
The first period unfurled in a rush of adrenaline and cold air, the kind of fast-paced rhythm that pulled you deeper with every breath. Em’s brother had racked up an assist and nearly picked a fight with a guy twice his size, an inevitability that made Em scream loud enough to turn heads, her voice cutting through the hum of the arena with unrestrained pride. By the time the second period settled into its cadence, you found yourself loosening, letting the familiar sweep of the game pull at the old parts of you. The rise and fall of the crowd, the metallic ring of the puck hitting the post, the way thousands of people could inhale and exhale in unison when the play tightened.
You clapped when their team scored, even grinned when Em grabbed your arm and shook it like she was the one on the ice.
By the final horn of the second period, your throat felt rough from the cold air and the shouting you hadn’t realized you’d given yourself over to. The crowd began spilling toward concessions, waves of bodies wrapped in jerseys and winter coats, and Em nudged you with a pointed elbow, with a wicked glint in her eyes which could only mean one thing.
“Your turn.”
You groaned, but she only grinned wider, already pushing you toward the aisle as she insisted that front-row tickets came with snack-duty obligations. The concourse was thick with noise and motion, the smell of hot pretzels and spilled beer clinging to the air, and your thoughts drifted past the rink, past the noise, past the entire present moment. You were drawn quietly back toward memories of your grandfather, of the warmth of those long-ago games, the echo of his voice raised with the crowd as if he were still right beside you.
You were so lost in it that you didn’t see the group of kids cutting across your path until the last second. You turned sharply, too sharply, and collided with someone solid and unyielding. The world pitched, your bag slipped, and you would’ve gone straight to the floor if not for the hands that caught you with the kind of steadiness that hit you like déjà vu.
Joel.
His palms steadied you like he’d done a hundred times before, hot and anchoring through the fabric of your coat. For a moment neither of you moved, the crowd spilling around you, noisy and oblivious.
You ascertained that he had been coming back from the bathrooms, broad shoulders filling the space even in a worn flannel and jeans. It’s been awhile since you’d seen him like this… No blazer, no tie, no classroom walls around you or essays to grade between you. Just him. The Joel who’d leaned against door frames with arms folded, who’d kissed you like he couldn’t help himself.
“You alright, hun?” His voice cut through the concourse with a rough, unfiltered warmth, the kind of endearment that used to melt straight into your spine. He swallowed immediately after, as if the word had escaped before he could stop it.
Your lips parted, breath stuttering, because hearing him call you that again made your ribs ache in a way you weren’t ready for.
You managed a nod, barely. “Yeah,” you whispered, though your legs still felt unsteady beneath you, “yeah, I’m alright.”
His jaw tightened, but he didn’t let go of you right away. His hands lingered on your arms for a moment that stretched out far longer than it should have, the kind of moment where breath and memory tangled, where neither of you seemed willing to be the first to move. When he finally stepped back, his fingers grazed your sleeves on the way down, a faint ghost of touch that left your skin tingling in its wake.
He shifted his weight, jaw flexing once, then again. His eyes traced over you, “Y’here for the game?” The words came out stiff in the way someone sounds when they’re pretending that’s all they wanted to say.
You have to stifle a surprised laugh at that, what else could you possibly be here for? “I know someone on the team,” you managed, gesturing loosely towards the rink.
His eyes met yours once more, flickering with something you couldn’t name, and then he dragged them away to scan the crowd around the two of you. As if seeking to keep this moment to himself, uninterrupted.
He shoved his hands into his pockets, leaned back on his heels, and cleared his throat before his eyes found yours again, “good crowd tonight.”
“Loud crowd,” you corrected, though your eyes had already betrayed you, tracing the familiar width of his shoulders beneath the flannel, the way he seemed both exactly the same and somehow more human outside the classroom. He shifted under the weight of your stare, just enough for you to see it.
“Didn’t expect…” He trailed off, shook his head. “Didn’t expect t’see you here.”
You swallowed hard, fingers tightening around the strap of your bag, “well, I haven’t been to a game in years… my… my grandpa used to take me.”
Joel looked like a man trying to find footing, shoulders tense, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from you.
You were about to say something, anything, to fill the ache in your chest when another voice cut clean through the noise.
“Jo… oh, hey, it’s you,” You both turned. Tommy stood there with two beers in hand, brows pinched in mild surprise. His gaze moved from Joel to you, lingered too long, and his mouth twitched like he almost smiled. But the weight behind his eyes said different. There was weight behind them like he’d walked in on the two of you and seen more than he was supposed to.
And then, like fate couldn’t resist twisting the knife, Em appeared beside you, someone who had walked in on the two of you before. She stopped short when her gaze landed on Joel, recognition flooding her features. “Oh,” she blurted, eyes flicking between the two of you.
Joel’s face goes pale as he sees her, his eyes flicking between the two of you, expecting something to snap, or for the whole damn earth to swallow him whole. Joel’s hands were still buried in his pockets when Em’s voice cut through, sharp as glass.
“Oh, hell no…” she took a step forward, chin tipped up, eyes cutting between him and you. “You’re the one who…” her voice dropped, but it carried anyway, “…who broke her heart.”
Blood roared in your ears. “Em, stop,” you tried, but she was already heating up, protective anger sparking bright.
Joel’s jaw locked as Em’s words hit the air, and though his shoulders bunched and his stare sharpened, he still didn’t move. He stood there with a steadiness that only inflamed her anger, as if his refusal to defend himself somehow confirmed everything she believed.
Before you could get another word in, Tommy’s low drawl slid in like a warning shot. “Slow your damn roll,” he muttered, stepping half in front of Joel, half toward Em. His eyes narrowed, the weight of his gaze heavy, “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”
“Oh, the hell I don’t,” Em snapped, shifting her snacks under one arm, jabbing a finger vaguely toward Joel without quite pointing. “I live with her. I saw what you did to her. You think I didn’t hear her crying at three in the morning? You think I didn’t notice how she couldn’t eat for days? Only recently getting back to her normal self… she never talked about it but I know it had everything to do with…” she raised her finger accusatorily but saw the pleading in your eyes.
You see Joel tense, his brows furrowed as he takes in her words. Confused as to why you had been distraught when you had been the one to walk away.
Tommy bristled in turn, protective now, his voice tight, “You don’t know a damn thing.”
The tension between them snapped like a taut wire, sparks threatening to catch.
And then Joel finally moved before Tommy could say anything to retort any further. “Enough.” His voice cut through the tension, sharp enough that both their mouths clicked shut. His hand closed heavy on Tommy’s shoulder, dragging him back a half step. His gaze flicked briefly to you, apologetic and almost pained, before turning back to Em, “This ain’t your business. Either of you. We had a collision ‘n she nearly fell, alright? Ain’t nothing more than that.”
The words landed like a hammer. Em stiffened, lips parting in disbelief, but Joel’s expression left no room for argument.
He jerked his head toward the stairs, already steering Tommy that way before offering a final, “Enjoy the rest of the game.”
His eyes flickered back to you again for a brief moment. Like he couldn’t leave a moment like that without acknowledging what you both knew and what the two of them clearly didn’t.
He gives a tight nod, but not before you notice that flicker of regret, of longing, something that looked like it could crack him wide open if you touched it.
And then he was gone, swallowed by the press of the crowd, Tommy trailing at his shoulder.
The line for concessions moved slow, the hum of voices buzzing like static in your ears. You shoved your hands in your pockets, trying to will the heat from your cheeks to fade. Em was too quiet beside you, a sure sign she was cooking up something you weren’t ready to hear.
“So… his brother’s kind of a dick, huh?” She rocks back on her heels as she tries to subtly bring it up again. She’s terrible at being subtle.
You didn’t answer right away, focused too intently on the candy display. She nudged you with her elbow, sharper this time.
Your throat tightened, “It’s really not what you think.”
Em arched a brow. “Oh, so it wasn’t the man who had you walkin’ around like the embodiment of misery since July? The one you won’t say a word about, no matter how much I push?”
“Em…” You exhaled hard, shaking your head. “It’s not his fault. It wasn’t like that.”
She scoffed. “Not his fault? He broke your heart, or ghosted you, or something. And now he has the balls to look at you like… like he still wants you, like he deserves to even look at you,” She stopped herself, threw her hands up. “I mean, Jesus. Do you blame me for being pissed?”
You stepped forward in line and ordered a drink and some snacks without responding to her. The noise from the arena drifted through the corridor, muffled but insistent, announcing that the third period had already started. Em watched you with a mix of confusion and frustration, clearly unsure how to navigate a wound she didn’t understand.
You wished you could explain the pieces she couldn’t see. That she would understand the mess wasn’t his doing, that the heartache had been entirely your fault. That she would let you be alone in the consequences of the choice you’d made before you even knew who he would become to you.
But more than anything, you wish you were still in that moment… his strong hands on your arms, those big, brown eyes focused on you with worry and care, with the low timbre of his voice referring to you, his hun once again.
The façade of the classroom decency stripped away for a second. And for that second… it had been just you and Joel. Your Joel. Those endlessly soft and reverent eyes always trying to make sure that you were okay. That you felt safe and cared for even if it had been more than either of you had bargained for.
You’d wanted to fold into him. To bury your face in his chest and feel something quiet, something safe, something that eased the loneliness you’d been carrying since your grandfather died. You wanted the ease and the warmth and the refuge that Joel had once been without even trying.
But the world didn’t work like that.
And the universe had a particularly cruel way of giving you glimpses of the things you weren’t allowed to keep.
—
The buzzer sounded with a sharp metallic cry that sent the entire arena into motion, the crowd rising in a wave of jerseys and noise as the home team circled the ice in victory. Joel stood too, more out of instinct than anything resembling excitement, Tommy clapping him on the back as the players began their celebratory lap. The ice gleamed under the lights, a white-blue sheen that should have been enough to draw Joel’s attention back to the moment, but his eyes drifted, pulled toward something else entirely.
He saw you in the rows below, leaning forward against the glass, your face bright with pride, the cold glow of the rink lighting your cheeks in the softest shade of winter. For a moment, all he could do was watch the way your breath fogged the glass and how your shoulders relaxed in a way he hadn’t seen in months, as if the arena itself had offered you a kind of peace he never could.
Then a young player skated toward your corner, the blades beneath him cutting clean lines into the ice before he stopped directly in front of you. He tapped his stick against the boards and tugged off his helmet, shaking his damp hair back with a grin that seemed aimed only at you. Joel felt the moment hit him in the gut, a hard, visceral twist, as the kid lifted his gloved hand and motioned toward the tunnel leading to the ice access door, unmistakably calling you down to him in front of everyone.
Joel watched you stand, watched you murmur something to Em as you collected your bag, watched the way your scarf swung as you slipped past the people in your row. Em followed behind you, still holding her half-empty popcorn bucket, and together you moved toward the tunnel where players were already making their way off the ice. The kid waited at the entrance, leaning casually against the boards while the rest of the team clattered past with sticks and gear.
Joel’s chest tightened when he saw the way your smile changed for the player, softening into something familiar and warm. The kid bent down and pressed a quick kiss to your cheek, the gesture affectionate and easy. You wrapped your arms around him in a hug that was brief but close, your face tucked near his shoulder, and Joel felt the familiar sickness of jealousy coil low in his stomach, hot and unwelcome.
Tommy guided them through the throng of fans leaving their seats. He walked a few paces before slowing just enough to glance sideways at him, a look passing through his features that Joel recognized immediately. It was the expression Tommy wore when something just didn’t add up, when he had reached the limit of letting things be.
He waited until they reached the quieter hallway near the exit, where the noise of the crowd fell into something manageable. “Alright,” Tommy said, stopping with his hands resting lightly on his hips. “What the hell was all that.”
Joel blinked, caught slightly off guard. “All what?”
Tommy huffed out something between a laugh and a sigh. “Joel. Brother of mine. You were in deep. I ain’t seen you look like that since…” He trailed off, but the meaning was clear. Since, well… never. Not even Sarah’s mom when he’d been young and stupid and full of delusion that things would always just work out if you tried hard enough. “So yeah, I recognized her. And all that teenage hormones that rolled around you during the summer.”
Joel swallowed hard, and rolled his eyes, trying to force the tension out of his shoulders. “It’s complicated.”
“It’s always complicated with you.” Tommy crossed his arms, leaning his weight against one hip. “But explain this to me. Why in the hell are both of you walking around like ghosts when you look at each other like that. What happened?”
“It’s nothing, Tommy.”
Tommy studied him in a long quiet that made Joel uneasy, because Tommy had always been able to read him better than anyone. “You can say that as many times as you want,” he said, lowering his voice, “but that ain’t what I saw. I saw a whole mess of feelings fly through the air the second she looked at you. I saw you look like you’d been kicked in the chest. And I saw her friend ready to burn the place down.”
Joel’s jaw tightened. “She got the wrong idea.”
“And what idea was that?” Tommy asked.
Joel hesitated, because the truth lived too close to the surface, “She thinks I hurt her.”
Tommy let that sit before nodding slowly. “Did you?”
Joel shook his head, a small movement heavy with something deeper. “No, f’course not.” Joel rubbed a hand over his jaw, the stubble rough beneath his palm, trying to find a version of the truth that didn’t make him sound like a fool. “She walked away,” he said quietly.
Tommy’s brows shot up. “And?”
“And I let her,” Joel murmured.
Tommy stared at him, incredulous. “That’s it? No fight? No talk? Just… poof?”
“As I said, complicated,” Joel looked away, eyes drifting toward the arena doors as if the ice itself might offer a better excuse.
Tommy raised a brow, his voice softening. “C’mon, Joel. I’ve known you my whole life, I know you better than I know myself half the time and you’ve been off since the summer. Y’look wrecked half the time and don’t ever mention a damn thing. And now I see her for five seconds and suddenly everything makes sense.”
Joel let out a breath that tremored at the edges. “Don’t, Tommy.”
Tommy scoffed and shook his head. “Jesus Christ, Joel. I saw the way she looked at you. And I saw the way you damn near stopped breathing when she stumbled into you. You care about her.”
Joel shifted his weight, the words tightening in his throat. “I can’t.”
“You already do.”
Joel’s eyes closed for a second, pained and exhausted. “I can’t.”
Tommy let that settle, let the weight of the confession fill the stairwell. His patience worn thin but affection still threaded through every line of his face. “Just talk to her. Or hell, if that’s too hard, then do the next best thing and fuck her. Clears a whole lot of confusion for most people.”
Joel’s jaw clenched. “That ain’t funny.”
“I’m not joking,” Tommy said. “And y’know I’m right.”
Joel shook his head and turned toward the exit, the cold from the outer doors brushing his face like a reminder of how far he’d fallen and how much farther he could still go, “I can’t.”
Tommy followed, sighing heavily. “Can’t or won’t?”
“Fuckin’ can’t, Tommy. I’m her goddamned professor now.”
—
Early January
You were back. In his classroom. Standing there like the winter break hadn’t shifted a thing, like you were glad to be here again.
Most TAs didn’t bother showing up before the semester’s first week was ironed out. Scheduling changes, system errors, dropped classes… there was nothing useful to do except chase down IT for technical difficulties and finalize the syllabi. Joel knew the drill. He’d meant to handle the new projector installment by himself, but the tangle of wires still sat accusingly on his desk.
He preferred paper anyway. Books, pens, things that didn’t need a password to work. Things that remained virtually the same over the span of history.
“How was your break?” you asked, unwinding your scarf, cheeks still pink from the cold.
“Fine,” he said, a little too quick. “‘n yours?” Not that he’d admit how he’d actually spent the last month, knuckles white around himself in the dark, pretending it would shake you loose from his head. Only ever seemed to make matters worse, but hell… what else was a man to do?
Sarah hadn’t made it home for Christmas, and Tommy was off in Wyoming meeting his girlfriend’s family… what’s a man to do but ponder the warmth of a body when the harsh, bitter cold threatened to undo him every time he stepped outside.
“It was good. Quiet. Em was on a cruise, so I just picked up shifts at the café. Stayed busy.”
He hummed, noncommittal, though something low in his chest tightened at how easily you spoke or seemed to want to speak. Chatty. If he rationalized it, he’d known you were just lonely over break and missed having someone to talk to. But he liked to imagine it was because you just liked talking to him.
He hums in that contemplation, playing it off as if he was solely listening to you, “Seems Jamie switched departments, won’t be back with us this semester.”
Your smile fades as you shake your head, “Yep, he told me a few weeks ago. So.. just me then?”
Joel nodded, jaw tense. “For now. ‘S’alright. More work for us both, but we’ll manage. You’ll lead sessions, run office hours if nobody else applies. Can y’handle that?”
The grin that spread across your face, bright and unguarded, almost knocked the air from his lungs.
“I can also handle… that,” You gestured to the cords spilling off his desk.
“Oh yeah, I- uh…” He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling the heat creep up it, “Tech guy’s supposed to fix it. Called me ambitious for even tryin’.”
You bit back a laugh.
“Don’t,” he warned, pointing at you. “I ain’t good with tech.”
“Seems simple to me,” you teased, crouching to trace the cords.
He scoffs and gestures to it, “Then have at it, ‘d love to see ya try.”
You take a few moments, tracing the chords from the outlet to his computer, “Well, I need you to unlock your computer for me, Professor.”
He sighs and approaches his desk, bracing himself on the desk as he waits for it to load. He catches your eyes dropping in his peripheral, the way your eyes trace the lines of his hands and jaw as if he can’t see you. Surely, you knew? Surely, you weren’t so oblivious to the well-known, universal fact that he could see you out of the corner of his eyes.
He taps in his password and side-steps out of the way so you can do whatever it was you needed to do to get the godforsaken thing working.
“Cute,” you say, as a picture of Joel and Sarah from her twenty-first birthday appeared on the screen.
He swallows harshly, knowing this was mere days after you’d disappeared without a trace before he even realized, “last time I saw her.”
And he saw your eyes flick to him again, “no Christmas?”
He stuffs his hands in his pockets and gives one shake of his head.
“And your brother?”
“Wyoming,” Joel muttered. “Visitin’ his girl’s family.” The words landed heavier than he meant them to, leaving him standing there exposed, sounding too much like he was admitting he’d been lonely, too.
Joel leaned back on the desk, arms crossed, watching as you bent over the projector controls. He shouldn’t have been watching at all. Should’ve had his head buried in finalizing the syllabus schedule or fine-tuning the essay prompts in advance... But it was easier to stand there, let the hum of the machine booting up to fill the silence between you. Drag his eyes along the curves of your body as you out-tech him.
“That oughtta do it then,” you say, wiping your hands on your pants in finality.
He hums, eyes flicking between the projected screen and his computer screen, he purses his lips in approval and nods his head, “Well, I ‘ppreciate it, darlin’. Sure makes my life easier.”
He hadn’t even realized what he’d called you, but the subtle shift of your stance and eyes flicking towards his, had him doubling back over his words with a sharp inhale.
“Sure, anytime.”
He boots it up, adjusting the camera of the projector and testing it out, “it works perfect,” and it almost sounds like disbelief, “thought I’d have at least a few weeks of class bein’ a bumblin’ idiot as I try to make this damned thing work.”
You huff a laugh and it sounds like music to his ears, how he’d missed you. He glances over to see a gentle tint of red to your cheeks.
“Well, kinda have to know this shit to get by nowadays,” you gesture widely, and he knows you’re just being modest.
—
You’d mentioned something about your friend joining a debate team, one that happened to meet after classes on Wednesdays and Fridays. You made it a point, detailing Jamie’s new schedule as if he cared a single iota. He’d say ‘thank you for letting me know’ as if it truly affected him at all. He knew he should at least continue to maintain the farce that hiring both of you was because of ‘how well you work together,’ but he really can’t be bothered now that there’s really no value in fooling you. He knew you saw past his excuses anyway.
He glanced at you, the corner of your mouth curved in a small smile that carried a brightness he hadn’t seen from you in months.
Something inside him softened, then tightened almost immediately, because the more you felt like yourself, the harder it was to pretend he didn’t miss you.
You stepped around him to the other side of the desk, your fingers brushing the spine of a thick textbook. “It feels strange being back. Like the air’s different.”
Joel leaned back against his desk again, his arms crossed loosely. “Does it?”
You nodded, “Yeah. I don’t know. Guess I missed being around people I enjoy the company of.”
He stills at that, his breathing shifting into manual, “good to be back around your friends?”
“Yeah,” You nod thoughtfully, “them too.”
He has no clue how to react to that. Thankfully, you move on immediately, “So,” you said lightly, “are you a big hockey fan? Go to games often?”
Joel blinked, caught off guard by the gentle change in subject, “Well… uh, Tommy’s girl bought us season tickets. Since she’s from Wyoming she told him bein’ a hockey fan’s a right of passage into her family. So Tommy drags me along.”
You smiled at the way he said it, warm and unpretentious. “Did you like it?”
“More than I expected,” he admitted. He hesitated a moment, then added, “You go much before?”
You exhaled, the sound quieter than before, touched with something tender. “Yeah. I used to go all the time. My grandpa took me when I was younger.” You traced your fingertips along the desk again, almost absent-mindedly. “It was our thing.”
“He’d yell at the refs,” you continued, a small laugh slipping out. “Like he thought they could hear him over everyone else.”
Joel didn’t interrupt. He just watched you, absorbing every detail like it was something he wasn’t allowed to touch but couldn’t help wanting anyway.
“He’d point out all the players he liked, tell me to watch their footwork, and if a fight broke out… God, he’d light up like it was Christmas morning.”
Joel’s chest pulled tight, something warm settling under his ribs. “Sounds like a good man.”
“He was,” you said softly. “The best.”
Was. He noted the tense you used for him. A man who makes you smile so wide, and he seemed to be gone. He can’t help but feel a pang in his chest, all he wanted was for you to be happy. To have people around you who make you happy. Knowing tiny snippets of history about your family, your grandfather must have been the one you’d confided in.
You let your hand fall back to your side, inhaling slowly. “So… about that night.”
Joel’s eyes flicked up immediately.
You cleared your throat gently. “I’m sorry about Em. She shouldn’t have gone after you like that. She didn’t know the whole story. She just… she thought she was protecting me.”
Joel nodded once. “Ain’t on you.” His voice stayed low, “She was lookin’ out for her friend. I respect that.”
You searched his face for something you weren’t sure you’d find, but his expression was unreadable in a way that told you he was holding himself very carefully.
“And… I’m sorry about Tommy,” he added after a moment. “He thought he was helpin’. Didn’t expect things to… escalate.”
Your breath caught at the realization of what the moment had truly meant.
Because even without naming a single detail, the apology placed the truth directly between you.
Tommy only reacted like that because Joel had told him something and had at least been aware of you and Joel’s summer together. The same goes for Em. Their assumptions had collided with a reality they couldn’t see, only having the aftermath of disaster which had apparently had affected you both in similar ways.
You drew a slow breath. “They were trying to protect us in different ways. They just didn’t understand what they were stepping into.”
Joel nodded, watching you with an intent gentleness that made something warm spread through your chest. “They’ve got good intentions.”
The air thickened. Everything that was still alive between you settled into the room, patient and heavy, like it had been waiting for its chance to breathe for months.
Joel cleared his throat gently, shifting just enough that it didn’t look like retreat but felt like it. “So that hockey player,” he said, his voice low and measured, “the one who pulled you over after the game… how do you know him?”
You blinked, surprised by how carefully he approached the subject. As if he had forced the question through several layers of restraint before allowing it out. As if he wanted to sound neutral but hadn’t quite gotten there.
“Em’s brother,” you answered, watching the subtle tension in his jaw. “We grew up together. I was at their house a lot.”
Joel listened with sharp attention, the kind he gave only when something mattered more than he would admit, “oh, makes sense.”
You felt a small tug in your chest. Not from the memory of the player, but from the awareness in Joel’s observation, his eyes finding you in a crowd.
“He’s like a brother,” you said, the words warm, “Proud of him.”
Joel didn’t let out a relieved breath, but he may as well have, “must be excitin’ to know someone on the team s’all. Tommy was wonderin’.” Oh, sure he was.
You gave him a look that said plainly you did not believe a single word of that, but you didn’t call him on it. The lie sat between you for one suspended second, obvious and harmless, and then you let it go with a soft hum.
Joel swallowed, the motion slow and visible.
“You look…” He stopped himself, forcing the words back down. He shook his head, trying again. “You seem… lighter.”
Which stunned you, somehow, because how the hell could he tell? Your eyes softened. “Yeah,” you said quietly. “I feel it.”
—
You’d noticed the difference sometime in early December, after that awful week where you’d been sick enough to lose track of everything. Five straight days of fever, chills, sleeping on and off with no sense of time. You hadn’t gotten sick like that since high school, and being alone in the apartment had made it worse.
It took you five days to call Austin.
He didn’t hesitate. He left his hometown and drove two hours, brought antibiotics and electrolyte packets and slept on your couch until your fever broke. He stayed another day just to make sure you were eating again.
By the time the fog lifted, you felt clear in a way you hadn’t in months. At first you chalked it up to being relieved to not feel like death. But then you saw the untouched row of birth control pills on your counter, the week-and-a-half gap in your routine, and the clarity made a different kind of sense.
So, you tested that hypothesis. Since you had no need or desire to do anything requiring that sort of protection, you decided to take another week off and see if it was truly the cause.
You’d been on birth control since you turned eighteen. It had been the simplest choice then, so easily settled into your routine. Any mood swings, fogginess, or heaviness that crept in over the years blended too easily with the stress of high school, college, your family, and everything else you carried. You never saw the pattern clearly because you were already exhausted, already anxious, already stretched thin. The pill only magnified symptoms you assumed belonged to you.
You hadn’t meant for December to turn into a science experiment on your own body, but between the flu, the forgotten pills, and the aftershock of crawling out of that fever, everything came into focus in a way you hadn’t expected. The birth control break explained part of it, the sudden lightness in your chest, the way your thoughts weren’t slogging through wet cement, the way your emotions finally felt like yours instead of something manufactured.
But it wasn’t the whole picture.
Because somewhere between being sick for a week and trying to drag yourself back into a routine, you finally let your doctor talk you into taking your ADHD diagnosis seriously. You’d brushed it off for years, convinced the symptoms were just stress, or personality, or something you were supposed to muscle through.
But after a week of a new prescription, for the first time in years, you felt present inside yourself.
Thoughts moved fluidly instead of sinking. You could finish your thoughts verbally more often, they were linear and trackable.
You didn’t feel detached from the world anymore. You felt awake, capable of breathing without effort. Your body wasn’t fighting you. Your mind wasn’t drowning you.
And standing here now, across the room from Joel, you could feel the distance between who you’d been in the fall and who you were now with startling clarity. You weren’t performing stability. You weren’t forcing calm. You weren’t holding yourself together by sheer will.
You finally understood why your smile had come easily when you walked into this room today. Why speaking to him didn’t feel like pushing against a wall inside your own mind. Why the tension between you was no longer tangled with fear or confusion, only a clean awareness you could actually make sense of.
You felt lighter, yes. Clearer. More present.
You weren’t manic or buzzing or over-compensating for your anxiety. You had more than just your fear of failure to help you achieve things.
—
He was trying to be a better man.
He really, truly wanted to be.
Which meant that he shouldn’t have noticed, let alone catalogued the differences. And shouldn’t have let the warmth of your steadiness get to him.
But Joel had never been good at pretending with himself and he sure as hell couldn’t deny how natural it was for him to note anything and everything about you.
You looked steadier now, rooted in yourself in a way he’d only glimpsed in the summer, and the shift tugged at something low in his chest that he’d tried for months to keep dormant.
The more you came back into focus, the harder it became to keep himself blurred in the context of you.
The desire was familiar. He could live with that ache. He’d lived with it since he met you. But, this was different. This was the ache of wanting you happy, wanting you grounded, wanting the light in your eyes to stay.
Not that he didn’t want it for you before, but now that he saw that sparkle in your eyes as you watched him organize some files and as your the fingers brushed against his as he handed you the schedule for the semester… it transformed into the ache of realizing you were finally breathing without the heaviness he remembered haunting your expression throughout the fall.
It brought an astounding degree of relief to him, knowing he hadn’t been the sole source of stress. The sight of you smiling in his presence, almost leaning toward him without realizing, almost effortless in the way you spoke, it made something inside him go painfully tender. And threatened his composure at every turn.
It was going to be another long semester. And hell, was he going to enjoy every second of it. Every second of you, like this… with him. Even if it was barely a taste of what he’d once had of you… he’d be greedy all the same.
And all he could think about was what a better man was supposed to do with that.
· · ──────── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒───────── · ·
As you can see… there is some progress happening! But yeah, so much still to go!
This depiction of birth control is not necessarily accurate for everyone. I’ve never been on it so just disclaimer but I’m sure everyone knows how much it sucks in general or from what I’ve heard. Anyway, hope you enjoyed! And no, of course I’m not done with the angst yet, who do you think I am? Or maybe this is how you find out.
So my semester is ending 😇😇 of course I finished this chapter instead of the 2 essays I have to write, that’s just how things go right?
I’m going to miss my professor Dr. Dimples, what a man, what a muse… tragic!! I’m not in the history department but damn for a second there I would’ve switched majors 🫡🫡 (I’m joking…).
taglist as requested (please let me know if you want to be added/removed): @magicxmiller @yslgreen @mallingcalling-blog @anheloamores @ddiana111 @faiantas-blog
Part 6 of my family!au fic should come out around the same time 🫶🏼🫶🏼
once again thank you for the tag hun @simpingforjoel 🫶🏼😚
This one is easy but also hard because I listen to 1 on repeat in phases, and some additional insight bc why tf not, unprompted data about me:
1. Konstantine - Something Corporate (early 2000s music will do that to a gal) my professor’s wife recited a line from this after I mentioned it’s my favorite song when we were out drinking, the friendship lust I have for them is insane. (If you’ve read my professor!au… this is mostly unrelated and ironic! But I’m learning about stuff behind the scenes for research purposes).
2. I Really Want to Stay at Your House - Rosa Walton, Hallie Coggins (on repeat and repeat and repeat, an entire new music taste was acquired through this. angsty ass music video of cyberpunk)
3. Hot Blooded - New Constellations (YEAH, listened to it on a car ride with my man and i was like well, that’s my new song phase. on repeat right now)
4. Killshot (slow + reverb) - Magdalena Bay (same as above, holy hell i love this song)
5. All These Things That I’ve Done - The Killers (autumn ‘24 anthem, making its comeback as a remembrance to all the shit i was going through last year!)
6. Head in the Wall / Crush - Ethel Cain (summer ‘25 anthem, had these 2 songs on repeatttt)
7. Shades of Cool / Mariners Apt Complex - Lana Del Rey (haven’t listened to her as much as I usually do because of my weird musical side missions, but she still makes her rounds)
8. Sailor Song - Gigi Perez (the yearn of this song is crazy)
9. Chicago - Sufjan Stevens (aforementioned professor got me onto Sufjan Stevens and this music perfectly encapsulates his vibe.)
10. LET THE WORLD BURN - Chris Grey (very relevant as an Aries idk, just feels right when i listen to it)
I cheated by giving some 2 BUT WHATEVER.
@littledes1re and anyone who wants to participate! Im not anti-social I swear! (Okay….. a bit, xoxo).
Absolutely Fantastic blog here, thank you for your work 🙂↕️
🥹🥹🥹 thank you for being here! this means so much to me! it’ll always be crazy to me that people read the results of my daydreaming mayhem 😳 but so grateful, I love it here 🫶🏼
search each of the following words and choose the first (non-ad) that comes up: fashion, pantone, mood, food
favorite style (it’s me, brown pants, and my turtlenecks against the world), favorite color and favorite dessert… Pinterest, I love you!
The mood is so real, literally this morning when my husband took a big glug of the energy drink i just cracked open and I’m like whoa big guy, back off. Too much goin’ on for you to be fiending caffeine rn.
i’m not very social on here (although im open to it!) so I never know who to tag, but gotta tag shawty @littledes1re and here are some other mutuals I greatly admire/ friend lust over @blasphemoussinkk @studioghibelli @reedispunk @cinnxmxngxrl @millers-angel @umadirectioner
Thank you to all writing Joel birthday fics this year, love celebrating that old man on the same day I get to celebrate my old man (yes my husband happens to have the same bday as Joel 🤭).
Libra diva queen babygirls are the best.
Happy birthday Joel!!
And happy birthday husband o’ mine and his big 38!! I can’t wait til he hits 40 😈
I’ve been so busy with school and with life in general but under the surface there’s always something brewing. Being back to school has been incredible, maybe I missed the deadlines or the challenge or maybe I’m grateful to have taken the truth that “fear is temporary” to heart.
All the Wrong Ways to Know you fic chapter 14 is coming soon!
