Chapter 34 - The Tipsy Bison
Tags Suggested Listening: 'What's The World Coming To' by Fleetwood Mac Word Count: 4.8k words
Previously: In an effort to boost morale in the settlement, Tommy hosted another movie night in the community hall. Joel convinced Joey to come along in an effort to try and beat the looming darkness he feels consuming him, but when he realised the movie of choice was Anna's favourite movie, Joey's grief started to spill over. Needing support, Joey took hold of Joel's hand, which Joel snatched away when it appeared someone might see. Joey left in a state of hurt, and when Joel followed him home to talk, Joey decided to end things.
Summary: Michelle and Arron manage to drag Joey out of the cabin to spend the night with them in The Tipsy Bison. All three of them could regret it when someone steps through the doors.
June 29, 2024
It’s a typical Saturday night in The Bison. Well, typical for everyone else there because that’s where they normally would spend a Saturday night. It’s completely atypical for you to be there, but you had no choice other than to be there.
After a week of pretty much only existing on the couch and early nights in bed, Michelle showed up on Jeremiah’s doorstep earlier this evening with her hair already brushed and the sole intention of dragging you out no matter what excuse you had stashed and ready to hurl at her. Not being in the mood, feeling too tired and not wanting to be around other people because of recent events were all swatted away. She simply wasn’t going to leave until you were going to leave with her.
Arron came along too of course, and while he’s at the bar getting the first round in, you’re sat in the booth going through the motions and trying to do a convincing job of looking like you actually want to be there.
It smells of warm wood and stale spilled beer. The lamps are lit low, creating a cozy, honey-coloured glow in every corner. You notice the red fabric lining the booth seats, the jewel green curtains pulled back from the windows and the sheen of smudge stains on the surface of the bar.
A handful of guys you recognise from the construction crew occupy the far corner where the dartboard is situated, throwing wide and teasing each other. They’re only a fraction of the noise though. Around them, the laughter lapping over conversations and the clink of glasses being set down or slid across tables almost becomes overwhelming before it has even reached its peak. No unwelcoming stares yet. Maybe it’s just a case no one has noticed you.
Being there isn’t doing anything to help yet either. You’re still mentally back in Jeremiah’s dark, narrow hallway staring at his front door, knowing Joel is heartbroken and lost on the other side of it, wondering why he couldn’t do enough to save things. You’ve been stuck in that hallway all week.
“So, how are we doing?” Michelle asks, realising you have a couple of minutes alone without Arron.
You snap back out of your head and into the room again. “Ugh, not great. I think I did the right thing, but it still doesn’t feel right, you know? I just keep seeing the look on his face… It’s hard to explain without sounding crazy.”
She reaches a hand across and takes a hold of your forearm. “You’re not crazy, Joey,” she says. “It’s what you needed to do for you. He’ll be fine. He’s a grown man.”
“It’s not that— It’s… I just wish things had’ve gone differently because… I miss him. A lot.”
She presses her lips together sympathetically and gives you a gentle squeeze. “I know, but it’ll pass. You just have to keep yourself busy and do things like this. Being around people will help.”
You’re about to quip back with something pessimistic and laced with sarcasm when Arron returns precariously holding three pint glasses and placing them down extra carefully.
“Okay, so,” he sighs as he sits himself down next to you and points over towards the small stage nearby. “I’ve just been told there’s going to be live music tonight. The town band put together a couple of songs or something. They should be here any minute to start setting up.”
Even pre-outbreak, whether you were in Kildare or Brooklyn, you were never a fan of loud music in bars despite how hard you tried to enjoy it and how ingrained it was in your culture. It took away from the conversations and connection and left you with a sore throat the next morning from shouting into someone’s ear all night and saying WHAT? millions of times.
“You excited?” Arron asks with a nudge into your side and a wink, taking his first sip of beer. He’s animated and far more enthusiastic about tonight than either of you.
“Can’t wait.”
Arron and Michelle exchange a look, both silently acknowledging the fact that tonight is going to require some heavy-lifting from the two of them to keep it light and fun. Well, that’s on Michelle. She insisted on you being here. You tried to warn her.
The candle embers flicker from a draught as the band, made up of three men and one woman walk through the Bison doors not much later, holding their instruments with a sense of easy confidence. Arron has already made it through his first drink before you and Michelle are even a third of the way through yours.
Everyone stirs with the brewing excitement for the night ahead, meanwhile you’re genuinely just trying.
Just as the conversation between the three of you gets interesting enough that you start to loosen up, the band kicks into their first song of the night with nothing more than a count-in. It’s a wall of sound that fills the room so suddenly that it makes you jump a little.
‘What’s the World Coming To’ by Fleetwood Mac. The opening track of the last album they released before the outbreak. It became somewhat of a morbid anthem in those first years as cordyceps wreaked havoc across the country and it has maintained its legend ever since. It’s almost custom to perform it at gatherings where music is played as a way to honour those lost and to remember the world as it once was.
Some people sit back and start tapping their feet while others return to their discussions at a much louder volume. It’s already beginning to get overstimulating when the worst possible thing happens.
Candle flames flutter once more as the entrance door swings open again.
Joel.
Immediately, your eyes unintentionally find each other. Fuck. The moment he sees you, he stops cold in the entryway. You freeze too, even though you’re seated. The band continues to play and the room carries on like nothing’s wrong, because to them, nothing is wrong. His eyes stay on you for what is probably five or six seconds, but it feels considerably longer than that, both of you deciding what to do with yourselves.
Then he forces himself to look around the rest of the space and moves towards the bar with his hands in his jacket pockets trying to appear as casual as possible but doing a terrible job of it. He props himself onto a stool next to Tommy, who you genuinely hadn’t even noticed was here. Joel says something into Tommy’s ear, causing him to look up across the room at you and then back to his older brother.
More annoying than anything is the fact he specifically chose the stool directly facing your booth. He could’ve picked the one on the other side of Tommy that would have put his back to you, but no. Now you have to see him in your line of sight for the whole night.
“Don’t react,” Michelle says without moving her mouth too much.
“Is he fucking serious? Can we move?”
“Joey— Chill. I don’t think there’s any other free booths. Don’t worry. Just drink your beer and don’t look over his way.”
Much easier said than done. Within the first minute, you’ve already got caught looking three times. Heat climbs up you neck every time to the point you’re pretty much squirming in your seat, eager to get up and leave.
Eventually, Arron picks up on the change of energy and angles himself forward across the table. “Who are we looking at?” His breath is already yeasty with the smell of booze.
“No one,” Michelle replies. “Mind your business.”
Back over at the bar, a glass of whiskey is placed in front of Joel. He lifts it and knocks it back in one go, sets the glass down and nods to the barman. Another one arrives a moment later. He chucks that back too with little effort, then dabs his lips with the back of his hand. Tommy murmurs something into his ear with a grin, probably telling him to slow down because the night’s just getting started.
The band shift into their second song in the set, one you don’t recognise, resulting in voices climbing to sing along and bodies swaying to the music. You watch Michelle’s pained expression as she tries to hear what Arron is yelling into her ear and asking for him to repeat himself. The dart players have drawn a small audience now too who cheer and clap between rounds. Then, worst of all, someone in the booth behind you laughs. And they have the most obnoxious, grating laugh you’ve ever heard.
It’s becoming too much, but you just keep sipping on your pint, waiting for it to do its thing and you stop becoming aware of everything around you. Particularly, the man whose heart you broke a week ago, sitting at the bar and won’t stop looking in your direction.
As the evening rolls on, The Bison fills up in increments until there’s not a single spare seat or spot to stand left anywhere. The space near the stage has become its own small ecosystem of listeners moving side to side and holding their drinks carefully to avoid spillage. Even the dart players have resigned and drifted closer to the music instead.
Arron is now fully, joyfully drunk.
It happened so quickly that you and Michelle barely had time to notice. It happened at some point after the sixth song. It was like you turned your head for a split second, turned back and his eyes were gone uneven and his cheeks went blissfully rosey.
Something you’re learning about Arron is that when he’s this drunk, he loses all spatial awareness, becomes even more obnoxious somehow and gets a little handsy. You don’t mind it so much because you’re starting to feel your own comfortable buzz from your third beer, but his arm has been resting over your shoulder for the last five minutes or so. And when he has something to say, which he has a great deal to say about everything in this state, he shouts directly into your ear in a way that suggests you’re a lot further away than you are.
“—AND THAT’S THE THING I LOVE MOST ABOUT SEAHORSES,” he explains with eardrum-bursting loudness, “THE DUDES ARE THE ONES THAT GIVE BIRTH. ISN’T THAT SO FUCKING COOL?”
“Arron,” you say at a much more normal volume because he’s three inches away from your face. “I can hear you perfectly fine, you know.”
“WHAT?”
You raise your voice a little. “I can hear you—” You decide it’s pointless. “Never mind. Yeah, the males give birth. Really cool.”
Michelle watches from across the table with a face that’s both fond but clearly teasing you for having to bear the brunt of his antics for the night.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get your payback when he has a killer headache in the morning,” she says to you.
“He’s going to have a killer headache in about five minutes because I’m gonna thump the fucking head off of him,” you reply, half-joking.
Michelle tips sideways in laughter, and you can’t help but laugh as well because Arron is too preoccupied singing along to the music at the top of his lungs to even hear you.
Then he pulls you closer into his side and sings into your ear like you’re a microphone, his breath even hotter with the smell of alcohol now. He sways to the music so that you sway with him.
“You’re a really good guy, Joey, you know that?” Arron says. “I know a lot of people here don’t trust you and think you’re a bad omen or whatever, but I think you’re a good person. I really do.”
You attempt a thankful smile and nod, but you’re totally hung up on learning that some people have been referring to you as a bad omen without your knowledge.
Arron plants a huge, wet kiss on your cheek and that’s when everything changes, because you immediately look over and find Joel staring straight at the two of you, his eyes dark and fixed on the man you’re unintentionally tucked in against. Automatically, you manoeuvre yourself away from Arron and out of his grasp, creating a space wide enough that an entire other person could fit between you. Arron barely notices. He’s too merry and distracted by what’s going on onstage.
The only thing more rigid than your shoulders right now is the grip Joel has on his glass of whiskey.
The barman reappears offering him a top-up, to which Joel tips his chin once without looking at him. Once the glass is refilled, Joel absorbs it swiftly, throwing it back without hesitation.
Tommy notices the change in his older brother. He glances at him first, and then follows in the direction of Joel’s gaze, arriving at your table. Michelle is sat there nursing her pint, bopping along to the song currently playing. Arron is sloppily leaned over the edge of the booth, clapping his hands together off-beat. And then there’s you, sat upright with your hands clasped together between your thighs trying to make yourself look small enough that maybe you’ll disappear.
Tommy murmurs something inscrutable to Joel, but he doesn’t answer. He sits still as stone, still in a way that he doesn’t know what to do with himself.
It was a guileless, harmless act, but from across the room, whether Joel believes it was something more than it was, he simply does not care. He saw something that reminded him that you were no longer his and he was no longer yours, and he still hasn’t begun to accept that.
Arron plants both palms on the table and leverages himself up, and it becomes clear just how gone he is based on how wobbly he’s become on his legs.
“I need to take a piss,” he announces with a slurred voice. “Be right back.”
“Maybe grab a glass of water on your way back,” Michelle replies with a touch of genuine concern. “I think you’ve had enough alcohol to last you the rest of the year.”
He gives her a middle finger, swats away her suggestion like a frustrated toddler before stumbling off into the crowd, leaving you and Michelle to watch him walk like a man crossing a rope bridge, one misstep from tumbling to the floor.
It should be hilarious. It should be a memory to bank and bring up again some evening in the future when the three of you are having dinner and Arron says something laughably untrue like “I don’t drink often”, but tonight is a night you’d do anything to forget.
You’ve become hyperaware of your posture and how your shoulders are sitting, how the hot stare of Joel is still on you. The band have launched into another song you don’t know, this one more uptempo, and it feels like practically everyone is on their feet now to dance. Now you stick out like a sore thumb staying in your seat.
Michelle says something to you, but your brain doesn’t catch up fast enough to register it.
“Sorry, what?”
“I said are you okay? You look like you’re going to barf.”
What you don’t see while she snatches your attention, is Joel sliding off his stool.
“Yeah, yeah…” you nod. “I’m fine. I’m just getting a little tired. That’s all.”
—
Arron is at the urinal, listing slightly to the left and whistling along to the chorus of the song playing back in the bar which has compressed into muffled rumbles through the walls. The contrast of light in the bathroom is borderline aggressive. White tiles illuminated with bright, clinical lights that would wake someone out of a deep coma.
The door swings open behind him. He doesn’t even notice the brief intrusion of the noise spilling into the bathroom because he’s floating someplace entirely different.
It’s only when he zips up and turns away from the urinal that he sees Joel standing in the centre of the room, not moving or saying anything. He just stares with his hands hanging loosely at his sides, measuring up a man half his size.
“Oh—” He startles with his hand on his chest. “Hey, Joel.”
He gets no response.
Arron makes his way over to the sink, turns on the faucet and assesses himself in the mirror up close. “Pretty good night so far, huh?”
“What d’you think you’re playin’ at?”
The deepness in Joel’s voice makes him freeze with his hands still under the stream. He blinks blankly at Joel. “Huh?”
“I said what d’you think you’re playin’ at?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about—”
“Joey. Why can’t you keep your hands off him?”
Arron looks utterly confused now. He turns off the faucet, shakes the excess water off his hands and then pats them dry on the front of his shirt. “We’re just having a good time listening to the music. Why? Is that a problem?”
“Yeah,” Joel says flatly. “Big problem.”
“What’s it to you?”
“You kissed him.”
Arron’s brow furrows so harshly that he loses the boyish look his face naturally holds.
“It was on the cheek,” he replies, running out of patience and reason. “We’re friends. Why’s that such a big deal?”
“Because he looked uncomfortable, that’s why. You keep your fuckin’ hands and filthy fuckin’ mouth to yourself. You understand me?”
“Jesus, Joel,” Arron scoffs. “Look, I don’t know what your problem is, but it’s not like that at all.” Arron starts to move to bypass Joel and get to the door. “Joey’s not my type. I’m not into dudes, so if that’s your thing, he’s all yours—”
THUD.
Joel’s fist slams into Arron’s face so hard that it almost goes through it. His head snaps sideways and he goes back into the urinals and then crashes in a heap onto the tiles. A lone, white tooth skitters away from him into the corner of the room.
There’s words lost somewhere in the cry that comes from his mouth that is already filling with his own blood. His hand comes up to his jaw like he wants to check and make sure it’s still there.
Joel crosses the space between them and takes two handfuls of his collar, hauling him back to his feet with frightening ease. He waits until Arron has found his footing to some degree before he speaks very, very directly.
“You don’t touch him again. You hear me?”
He’s too woozy and disorientated to pick up that he’s being spoken to. Even with the amount of alcohol in his system, the pain of his entire head throbbing pushes through.
Joel shakes him and barks. “I said do you hear me?!”
Arron nods, trembling and swinging like he’s fading in and out of consciousness.
Joel releases him, sending him back into the sink to keep himself upright, blood now running down his chin and onto his shirt. Once Joel has stepped back, the bathroom goes into grubby silence for a moment before Arron collects enough balance to dart back out into the bar.
As he reappears, the people in attendance start to notice him in sections. Gasps and heads turn in ripples until the laughter and conversations die down. The band, oblivious for a moment longer than everyone else, eventually halt and let the song lapse into nothing to see what the commotion is.
Arron walks unsteadily towards the bar with a hand clamped to his jaw and groaning in agony. From the booth, it takes a moment to understand what you’re looking at. As soon as you see the blood on his fingers, you’re on your feet. Tommy gets up and rushes over to him, placing a hand on his shoulder and trying to get a closer look.
“Arron— What the fuck happened to you? Who did th—”
The bathroom door swings open again behind him and out walks Joel with his shoulders dropped and a look on his face like he’s turning himself in to the authorities. Every pair of eyes in the bar is on him, piecing the scene together and adding up the evidence.
In the aftermath of the music cutting, confused and horrified mumbling start to move through the bar. Tommy steps forward, placing himself between his brother and the rest of The Bison.
“Joel? What’s goin’ on?”
The room goes unnervingly quiet waiting for an explanation.
“We just had, uhh…” Joel begins, searching for a suitable word. “We had a little misunderstandin’.”
Tommy’s face says it all. He knows his brother well enough to know that there’s significant detail Joel is choosing to leave out for one reason or another. You’re not sure if Tommy says what he says next as his brother or as the leader of Jackson.
“You need to leave. Now.”
Joel doesn’t speak, doesn’t argue. He looks at Arron, and what he’s done to his face, and then at you. Judging by his expression, it’s hard to know whether he’s expecting you to react a certain way or he’s sobering up and realising how it looks to everyone else.
Before Tommy needs to repeat himself, Joel walks away, pushing the entrance door open and disappearing through it, allowing some to turn their attention to Arron again and some to continue their hypothesising on what just transpired.
Michelle speeds across the floor to Arron’s side, pulling him carefully into an unoccupied chair and ordering the barman to wrap some ice in a towel. Looking at him properly now, the damage done makes something lurch in your gut. His eyes are unfocused and watering, and his jaw is hanging at an unnatural angle.
With everyone distracted, you decide you need answers, so you sidestep out of the booth and make your way around the room to follow him outside. The door shuts behind you, sealing the warmth and the presumed confused murmurs of the band regrouping and deciding whether or not to play on inside.
It’s a very different setting out here. It’s dark, even with the streetlights casting pale circles of light onto the pavements below. It’s eerily empty too, except for the single six-foot figure halfway up the street with his hands buried in his pockets.
You start walking fast and with purpose, then increasing to almost a light jog when you don’t reach him fast enough.
“Joel.”
He stops and turns at the sound of your voice.
Using both hands, you shove him square in the chest, forcing him back a couple of steps. Although he is considerably stronger than you, the fact that it moved him at all, and taking into account the look on his face, suggests he was not anticipating that at all.
“What the fuck was that all about?” you say, almost loud enough that it carries down the street. “What is your problem?”
He opens his mouth, but nothing comes out at first, presumably still processing the fact you just shoved him.
“I was— I was lookin’ out for you.”
“What are you on about?”
“Arron. He was all over you all night and I thought you— you looked uncomfortable. I just wanted him to keep his hands off you.”
You shake your head and let out an exasperated breath. “Uncomfortable? The only thing that made me uncomfortable was seeing you sat directly across from me and staring at me all night.”
His mouth presses shut and he looks down at the ground for a moment. When he comes back, the streetlight reveals something in his eyes. The whiskey is starting to retreat, leaving behind nothing and no one to blame other than himself. He’s here now, fully and regretfully.
“I haven’t seen you since— I been worried about you. I wanted to make sure you were alright.”
“You don’t need to worry about me. I’m fine. I came out tonight to have a good time with my friends, and you’ve fucking ruined it.”
“I know,” he says, frustration and urgency building in his voice. “I went too far, and I’m sorry—”
“Sorry isn’t going to cut it, Joel,” you interrupt. “You could’ve broken Arron’s fucking jaw. He’s seriously hurt in there.”
For another long moment, neither of you speak. The streetlight above hums faintly, waiting for one of you to break the silence.
“I was just trying to look out for you,” he says, quieter than he’s sounded all night.
“I don’t need you to look out for me. I can take care of myself.”
That seems to break him a little inside more than anything. His eyes start to glisten at the edges, almost appearing hopeless now.
“Go home,” you say, the anger still simmering underneath but it’s lost its peak. “Sleep it off. And stay the fuck away from me and my friends from now on.”
His shoulders drop another inch, and as you turn away, he closes the distance faster than you’d expect and takes your hand. His fingers close around it and stop you in place. Before you can find any words, he lifts it to his mouth and presses his lips against your knuckles.
“Please,” he whispers. The blue beaded bracelet catches the light, slightly worn from months of wear because you haven’t taken it off once. “Come home with me, Joey. I need you, baby. Please, I’m beggin’ ya.”
It tests your heart in every way imaginable seeing him like this. The desperation, the refusal to accept the circumstances as they are.
“I miss you,” His voice has reduced to almost nothing. “I can’t— This is all wrong. It’s not supposed to be this way.” He catches his breath. “Just— Gimme one more chance. I’m gonna make it right.”
“Joel—”
“What happened last week was a mistake.” He sounds somewhat more sure of himself now. “You know it as well as I do. We’re supposed to be together. It’s supposed to be me an’ you. So please. Stay with me tonight.”
The sheer gravitational pull of him standing there, his body towering and waiting to welcome you back into it the way it’s perfectly constructed to do, is hard to fight. You can feel every cell in your body burning with electricity, daring you to do what you’ve craved for since things ended. Like a plant bending itself towards the light, you feel yourself incline towards him.
But it has been a week. Just a week.
You take your hand back, feeling your own eyes start to warm at the edges.
“No,” you say, your voice barely holding steady. “I— We can’t do this.”
A tear breaks loose and trickles down his cheek. He doesn’t even bother to wipe it. His chest goes still like he’s stopped breathing and then stares at the ground beneath you for a minute.
“Are you ashamed of me?”
The same question as before. Reopening the same wound. A week has passed since he last asked you, since you broke his heart on Jeremiah’s doorstep.
What angers you the most is things could’ve been so different. So good. If you could hate him for making you fall for him despite everything, for spoiling something you wanted so badly, you would. But you can’t.
Even after the hurt of pulling his hand out of yours, even after tonight, you stare back into his longing, dark, brown eyes, watching his lip quiver, and you don’t just see the man standing before you. You see him as a young boy, unable to make sense of why he was different to the others. You see him as a teenager, trying to find his place in the world and realising that there isn’t one for him. A young father, wondering how he got himself into that situation and hating himself for it.
And yet, when you needed him most, he still had to snatch his hand out of yours.
“No,” you reply, just like last week. “But I think you should be ashamed of yourself.”
Somewhere internal, he flinches, enough that it’s visible.
You turn again, taking back off in the direction of The Tipsy Bison, where you’ll rejoin Michelle and Arron and a community that doesn’t fully trust you, because that’s a better option than going home with Joel Miller tonight.
Behind you, you hear him try. Like a wounded animal, his voice barely calls out your name, completely cracked and swallowed by the emptiness in the street.
You don’t stop.
Joel fades into the distance behind you, stood alone in the circle of pale light from above with tear-filled eyes and a hand clutching his chest.
AN: Surprise! As a special thank you for 5000 hits and 200 comments on Ao3, I decided to double-up on chapters this weekend for you! I say it all the time, but it means the world seeing you share my work and commenting on it. You know by now how much I love discussing all the details with you, so thank you thank you thank you again.
I also want to dedicate this chapter to one of my readers and dear oomf Brit (mothmandalorian on Twitter), who's family home burned down in wildfires recently. It's an unfathomable loss that really broke my heart, so wanted to send her some love here too.
This chapter was one of my favourites to write. The sensory atmosphere and the drama and the ending... Woof. Was anyone else also clutching their chest at the end? 🫠
Currently still working on ch 37 which is very different to anything I've done and taking way longer than anticipated, but I'm still doing pretty well with keeping ahead of myself, so no prolonged breaks planned even with a double-post this weekend. I'll keep you posted if that changes for whatever reason in the future!
Until the next time, stay safe and healthy and sending you all my love!
