the prompt with the guitar soemone sent in was adorable - i have another? maybe joel and ellie are playing boggle and ellie is winning by far and bragging and then eventually joel sees the word 'tickle' and ellie gets all nervous and he tickles her as revenge for winning ?
ANON THIS PROMPT IS EVERYTHING TO ME. i had sm fun with it and as always i get very carried away, pretty sure this is my longest fic yet lol
ALSO i literally had to look up the rules of Boggle bc I had never played so if you haven’t either I would maybe watch like a minute tutorial vid on yt just so you get the premise.
here is the one i watched!
https://youtu.be/BJAdXnGAb7k
tw: very mild underage drinking, swearing, lots of sarcasm and fluff
AGAIN I only write Ellie and Joel as a father-daughter relationship, no one be weird or ill punch u
Feelin’ like a Winner Yet?
“Tommy what the hell you have to stay for one more game!”
“Kid, I gotta get goin’ ”
“Ehem Stick in the mud ehm-ehem”
Joel held his fist up to his face and gruffled out a not so subtle cough as he shot his brother side eyes followed by a smug look on his face.
Tommy playfully shoved Joel in his shoulder as he stood up.
“You sir, are the real fuckin’ stick in the mud, and you,-” He raised his eyebrows and pointed at Ellie who was sat criss-cross applesauce across the table from the brothers.
“-you just wanna beat my ass again”
Thursday nights were the best in the Miller house. Often the only night both Tommy and Joel weren’t patrolling and no movie night until tomorrow for Ellie and her friends she’d made in Jackson, so the trio often gathered in the cozy downstairs living room of Joel’s house. The fireplace tucked away in the corner provided warmth throughout the floorboards where we would find the three sat upon surrounding a small coffee table. It also provided the homily cedar smell that lingered throughout the house that Ellie was always quiet fond of, it reminded her of nights camping in the woods with a certain someone. But tonight their was no camping for Ellie, only war against the two brothers in a Miller family classic-Boggle. Ever since Joel picked it up in Salt Lake City on their trek across the US, It had been a game he routinely pulled out whenever Ellie needed reassurance that she was better than Joel at something. Not to mention it it most often ended in laughter filled fights over all the words Joel cheated with. With no surprise, Ellie had dominated 6 out of the last 7 rounds they played tonight by a landslide, only to tie with Tommy in the first, mentioning that she was “just warming up”. But now, her only somewhat worthy competitor was walking out the front door, and she was doing everything in her power to keep from the rest of Boggle night being a snooze fest.
“If you stay i’d let you win!” Ellie pleaded sarcastically.
“Well im stayin’ why don’t you let me win”
“Shut upppp” The whine in her voice was evident as ever as she shot a look to Joel that meant exactly what she had said.
Tommy barked out an entertained scoff at the duo bickering as he slipped on his jacket that was hung on the coat rack by the door.
“Maria needs help with the baby El, you know how much I would love to stay and watch you kick that old man’s ass—again” He threw up apologetic arms.
“If you stay around much longer your ass might get more than just a kickin Tom”
“Anndddd that’s my cue, good luck kid, adios big brother” And with that, Tommy slipped out the front door into the freezing cold of night and headed off towards his and Maria’s house.
Joel leaded his back against the couch he was sat on the floor in front of. He picked up his beer bottle from the table and stared down into it as he swished the remaining liquid around the bottom of the bottle.
“Anddd then there were two” He took a pull from the bottle as he kept his eyes focused on Ellie across the table, who happened to be watching him emphatically.
She drew her eyes to her fingers which were tracing the grain of the dark wooden floorboards, eventually trailing her gaze to the half finished case tucked away on the side of the couch.
“No” Joel’s stare hardened, this wasn’t the first time she’d asked and it sure wouldn’t be the last.
“One sip?” Ellie threw up her eyebrows as a cheeky little grin crept up on her. She had this man in her back pocket.
He mulled it over in his head for a few seconds while staring up at the ceiling. It always felt like their was no winning with her, in Boggle or argument.
Ellie sniffed as tried to stifle her growing grin as she caught the bottle as it slid across towards her. What did I say, in her back pocket.
She took a pull of her own with Joel’s judgey stare searing into her but she didn’t care and made it last until she couldn’t fill her mouth any longer. She swallowed hard and grimaced but with the bottle still in hand shot eyes over at Joel, a classic myestvious grin appearing on her face.
Joel leaned across the table to snatch it from her hands but it was too late, she had leaned away in time to tip the bottle back and finish off the last of it, taking breaks with each gulp to manage the taste of the foul liquid. Cheeky bastard.
Joel just slumped his elbows onto the the table in defeat.
“What the hell am I gonna do with you”
“Hey, just think, you’ll have a better chance of beating me now-hic”
Her last word got caught in a hiccup from the chug as she slid the empty bottle back to him which he caught and placed with the others.
“Shall we?” Ellie made a grand gesture at the game sprawled on the coffee table.
Joel sighed and rubbed his temples.
“10 rounds like always,, 3 more if your too old to do the math”
Ellie shook the board as she spoke while Joel rolled his eyes and very lazily grabbed the notebook and ripped two pieces of paper out for them.
“Annnnnnddddddd…..” Ellie held her hand over the cover in anticipation.
She removed it swiftly as Joel flipped the timer and the pair began studying the board.
Ellie pick up her pen immediately and began scribbling down words, Joel taking a few more seconds before following her. He always pretended to look over at Ellie’s words so she quickly put up a hand barrier to block his view.
“Asshat” Joel mumbled, directing his focus back to his own list.
The bickering was non-stop throughout the round until about the last 30 seconds, where both sides became frantic in the search for their final words to connect.
“Times up!” Ellie blurted out as she dropped her pen and began swatting at Joel to stop writing.
Joel swatted back as he finished writing a few last letters. Jesus he needed to practice at this game.
“Welllll how’d ya doooo?” She sat with her list held in her hands.
Ellie was smug as ever this round, with no Tommy there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that she didn’t win, so she obviously needed to rub it in Joel’s face as much as possible.
“Don’t patronize me girl” His southern drawl was ever present.
“Fine, I’ll go first then”
She began listing off her words, stopping to cross one off whenever Joel blurted out a mumbled “mine”, to which they would both scribble out the word with their pens. Ellie was quiet surprised with the first 5 out of 8 words they matched on.
“Since when’d you get so smartttt?” Ellie shot him a smiley smug look.
“Don’t push it” Joel paid her no attention and kept his eyes on his list.
But, as Ellie went further down her list, the call outs from Joel became far more seldom, leading her to finish with a whopping 63 points. It was lower than her previous rounds, but her brain function seemed to be slowing down with the night growing later and the alcohol settling into her system.
Ellie twiddled the pen in her hands.
“Soooo you don’t even need to read yours I definitely won right? We can save you the embarrassment.” Ellie reached across the table and went to grab his list when Joel snatched off the surface.
“Uhhh no, not how it works, I could still kick your ass with my crazy good words.” Joel held the list up to the light and put on an imaginary pair of glasses as he squinted up and down at his list.
“Yeahhhhh these look like winners to me alright, buckle up for failure kid”
When in the right mood, Joel loved playing Ellie’s silly antics with her, especially with his brother now gone home he could bring out some of that vulnerability that Ellie always dug out of him one way or another.
“Alright alright start readin’ ya cheater” Ellie crossed her arms she was already for the slew of imaginary words that were headed her way.
To her surprise, Joel started mumbling out more words than he had said all night during this game. After the fourth consecutive actual word, Ellie scurried to her feet and sat over on her knees next to Joel peering over his shoulder as he read to make sure we wasn’t making shit up on the spot.
Ellie flicked him in the back of the head.
Joel shot her eyes and leaned over to grab the pen from the table.
“can’t even get away with one goddamn word” Joel sarcastically mumbled under his breath as he scribbled out the word.
He went further down his list until he reached the end when he paused and looked back at Ellie once again.
“ I mighta beat ur ass huh?” A menacing grin appeared on Joel’s face as he shook the shoulder she was leaned up on.
“Just count the goddamn points” Ellie was getting a bit frustrated, Joel hadn’t even come close all night, but now he comes outta left field with all of these words? She stared at Joel as he counted up his score, watching to make sure he didn’t try to pull a fast one on her.
Ellie could feel the tension in Joel’s body as she leaned up against him. If the Millers were anything, they were competitive as hell.
All at once, Ellie felt the tension drop in his body as his shoulders slumped forward whilst writing in his final score.
Joel threw his pen across the room as he leaned back onto the couch hard. He had a gruff look on his face and turned his head away from Ellie, who had leaned forward to see that his final score had come 2 points shy of hers.
A grin so big she had to bite her bottom lip to keep if from growing couldn’t help but plaster across Ellie’s face as she stared down at the paper.
“Well well well Old man Miller. You talk a lottttt of shit for someone who just lost to a fourteen year old-again.”
Ellie was pulling herself to her feet as she bragged down to Joel who was trying very hard to ignore her, dawning only an angered deadpan stare at the Boggle board in front of him as she spoke.
“I declare, that on this divine night we dub me, thy champion of the Boggle!” Ellie put one foot up on the couch as she shook both her fists wildly in the air. The voice she had taken up reassembled that of a 17 century herald announcing the arrive of a king.
“Now, I see it only fit that thy loser must announce my trrrrriumphant title, as he was indeed, the smartest of asses and therefore-”
Joel exclaimed and threw his hands in the air before violently smacking his head with his palm and resting his fingers on his temples.
“What the fuck was that for?…motherfuckin sore loser” Ellie a bit irritated that her celebration was interrupted so quickly, she took her foot off the couch and slowly sat back down, puzzled as to what set Joel off so quickly.
Joel took his head out of his hands and shot her a look of irritated regret. He looked back at the board before pointing down at it.
“ I coulda’ fuckin’ spelt tickle”
Ellie looked over at the board as Joel spoke but when he finished his sentence she didn’t think she could move her body a single inch. She froze and involventarily gulped with her wide eyes glued to the outline of the word Joel had just uttered on Boggle board. She knew if she sat there much longer staring Joel would think something’s off, but there was not a single coherent thought floating in her head at that moment. Somehow with a simple word she had been shut down within seconds. So, she finally mustered up the courage to sit back, where she immediately looked down at the floor and began twiddling her fingers.
Jesus Ellie really? That’s it? Yep?
Ellie shook her head at her own ridiculously suspicious answer, luckily for her, Joel was in a whole other world, eyes still fixated on the board. He scoffed, absolutely infuriated that he hadn’t seen such an obvious word sooner. He sat back up and started tracing over more new words on the board with his right index.
“Shittt and tickles..and tickled..and-”
Everytime he said it Ellie could feel her entire body involuntary cringe. You could hear the shakiness in her voice underneath the irritated tone while she picked at the dirt aggressively from underneath her fingernails, never daring to look up at Joel, who’s attention and glare she could now feel on her due to the interruption.
Joel knew Ellie at this point, maybe sometimes more than she knew herself, and if there was one fact about her that he knew to be true, it’s that she was never shy. especially not with him.
“What’s with you? Seems like you were all hunky dory unti-” Joel cut himself off and stuck his tongue in the bottom of right cheek as his thoughts interrupted him. After a few seconds, his confused expression softened and developed hints at a devious smirk.
He pursed his lips and looked down at the floor as well, almost embarrassed at the knowledge he just acquired. buttttt unfortunately for Ellie, not embarrassed enough.
Ellie stopped and looked up at him when silence filled the air, eyebrows furrowed but she didn’t dare say anything, she just waited. just waited and prepared to run.
Joel sat staring at the floor for a few more seconds when he finally broke the silence.
“Ya know kid,, you have done quite the job wininn’ tonight.”
His gruff nature made it seem like everything he said was truth, but Ellie could hear his familiar sarcasm laced within his words. Her eyes seared into him, meanwhile Joel was simply tracing the designs in the side of the couch.
This was all just a joke to him.
“I feel like I owe you some sort of compensation…whatayouthink?”
Joel finally looked up with the most shit eating grin you could imagine whilst Ellie’s cheeks began filling up with color out of embarrassment.
She was taking no chances. She scurried to her feet and bolted across the room looking for an escape down one of the hallways so that she could climb out a window run to Tommy’s and then-
Without even making it halfway across the room, Ellie sealed her own fate. She slipped on the shag rug that sat by the fireplace and had now made friends with the floor.
Unfortunately someone not so friendly was headed her way.
Ellie attempted to return to her escape plan but Joel had jumped up and stomped his way over to her, he now looked down at the girl with one of her ankles in his grasp.
Joel smirked as he mocked her while she flipped herself over to be facing upwards.
“You aren’t quite in the position to be making demands El’. In fact you’ve been talkin’ a bittt to much for my likin’. Especially when you got a big secret like that.”
Ellie braced herself for what was coming although she couldn’t help but show her nerves as she twitched aggressively against Joel’s grasp.
“Don’t be an asshole please” nervousness once again settled in her usually snarky demeanor.
With that, Joel dropped her ankle to the floor and dove in with both hands, latching them around her torso. He began digging into the soft spots of her sides with his thumbs while his fingers danced on the backside and let’s just say Ellies composure didn’t last long.
“okokOkHOHOEHEheaoKk JOEHEHEEL” bubbly giggles erupted in the teen causing her to sway side to side across the warm floorboards. The electric ticklish shocks being sent through her body dumbfounded her, causing her to twitch and jerk consistently. She pushed down at Joel’s big calloused hands that was bunching up her t-shirt at the seams but there was no use, the lack of strength from being rendered into a pile a of giggles mixed with Joel’s determination for the task and strength was an impossible combo to beat. She threw her head from side to side as if she was trying to forget about Joel’s rhythmic squeezes that had made their way up to her ribs, but this too had no promising results other than putting a bigger smile onto Joel’s face. He briefly paused his torture but didn’t let up his grasp.
“Feelin’ like a winner yet?”
“Johoheoelllll weHE-we can TAahlk abohout tHiISI-AHAHHAH”
Unbeknownst to Ellie, Joel has pulled her t-shirt up so that it lay on her ribs so that he could bear down and give her the most brutal raspberry’s one had ever seen.
While Joel will admit he is quite shit when it comes to Boggle, this was one game he knew very well. Sarah was always the ornery type with her father, so while Joel hadn’t always been an expert at physical connection, he had plenty of practice at this game, enough to be able to drive Ellie insane.
Anything that Ellie had been holding back up until this point was out the window as Joel’s prickly scruff combined with the eruption of the raspberry on her stomach drove her to madness. Loud laughter and giggles poured out of her as her thrashing became more violent. Joel then pulled her shirt back down and grabbed her flailing arms and held them pinned to the floor at her side.
“JOHAOAHEL AM I FUFHUCKING TEHEEN” Ellie yelled, embarrassed by her flushed red face and post-attack giggles still flowing out of her as she looked up at Joel in anger.
“Nohot cool” She continued to squirm but there was no use, she was still completely stuck.
“N-Noho, what’s not cool is you thinkin’ your all that an a bag of chips for winnin’ ” Joel looked down at her trying to cover up his amusement with her struggles.
“Ever heard of uhhh bragging rights? ohhhh waittttttt you’ve never fucking won so I guess not ” A slightly angered but smug look dawned on her as she sarcastically sassed Joel directly to his face.
Another thing about Ellie that Joel knew was she never knew when to stop pushing, and right now was the not the time or place for her to flaunt her cockiness.
“Huh, so you just wanna get tickled is that it?”
Joel’s nonchalant tone and distracted gaze was met with tension in Ellie’s body at his utterance of that word. She reallly needed to learn to quit whilst she’s ahead.
“You see, cause I think yo-”
Joel’s far gaze was met with something, interesting. To his surprise, laying a few feet to the left of him and Ellie was the black pen he had launched earlier in frustration at his loss. Ellie turned to see the pen as well, but couldn’t quite put the pieces together. Meanwhile Joel’s gears were turning and already ready to put a final revenge attack in motion.
“Welllll since you seem to be so obsessed with titles tonight”
Joel swiftly dropped the grasp on her arms, reached over to grab the pen whilst swinging an arm around to entrap her ankles in his grasp. Like I said, he’s had some practice at this.
“Let’s give you an official one hm?”
Joel removed one of her tattered socks and uncapped the pen with his teeth.
Ellie up until this point had genuinely been confused, but now panic was beginning to set in as she felt the harsh tip of the pen meet the top of the sole of her foot.
“noOH I dOHnT NEHeD it JOEL”
She tried to sit up and push him away whilst squirming her foot, but during her retaliation, Joel saw the resistance and scribbled harshly on the middle of her sole to combat her.
Ellie screamed in response falling back onto the floor and burying her face into her hands at the devilish sensation etched upon her foot. Joel seised the scribble fairly quickly seeing her response and looked back at her.
“Now hold still or this will take longer”
Ellie paused and went to lean back up, but knowing Joel and his word, she leaned back down and braced herself for the sensation.
To her surprise, the process wasn’t quite as torturous as she had expected. While a trail of giggles and “nohoho’s” did seem to escape her when Joel insisted the letters need to be colored in, plus a few complaints from Joel when Ellie couldn’t sit still for the letter positioned in the center of her sole, other than that it was a few minutes of smiley recovery and pure artistry for the pair.
Joel finally threw the pen to the ground and released her ankles from his grasp.
“Now we can show Tommy who won”
Ellie sat up and grabbed her foot to turn it around and look at Joel’s hard work.
Ellie scoffed as she shoved Joel in the shoulder at the results on her sole.
the bend of her heel read the old man’s name in the tiniest, scragglyist font imaginable.
Joel threw up his hands in amusement while Ellie was now doing her best to rub off the very permanent reminder of tonight’s events.
“He’s never gonna believe you beat me at Boggle”
“Who said anything about Boggle?”
