#super!Joel au

[pedrostylez]

The Gray: Chapter 5

pairing: Joel Miller x fem!reader

rating: 18+ (no minors please)

chapter summary: Joel's infatuation with you seems to grow, as he likes having you around. He goes to repair some of his equipment and brings you along, where you both finally admit what you have been feeling for weeks.

word count: 5.7k

warnings etc: mean!Joel, super!Joel, SMUT!, pet names, violence, mentions of SA, and abuse. Angsty as all get out, deeper feelings mentioned, there's a lot of fluff here too...masturbation mentioned, oral (female receiving) p in v sex, unprotected sex (please be safe), NO USE OF Y/N.

A/N: Please read the warnings and understand that each chapter will have its own separate set of warnings as well. Be mindful, and control your own reading experience. Eeeeek first chapter of smut! I hope you guys enjoy and can see the struggle Joel and Sugar are having with admitting their feelings for each other. At the end of the day, I love a good love story so I hope I get that across. I just want to thank everyone- I saw that I just passed 200 followers and I know that isn't a lot for some, but it's really nice :,)

If there are additional tags I should be placing for filtering purposes please let me know!

Your thoughts are in red, Joel's thoughts will be in blue

Joel’s hands shook with anger, standing on the roof and looking down at his partner with the civilian they just saved. He couldn’t move, wouldn’t dare to step in the way of AJ. 

“Come on, don’t be like that.” AJ snarled, the squeak of the girl coming up to meet Joel’s ears. 

Joel’s anger overtook him, free falling into the alleyway to see wide eyes staring back at him. She thought she was going to be saved. 

As Joel stood up, AJ’s hands twisted around her jaw, giving a quick snap and looking smugly over at Joel. “Too late, partner.”

Joel blinked at you, fuzzy from his dream and still very much wanting to be in it. 

You pulling him to the bedroom

A laugh escaping your lips as he kissed your neck, tickling you with his facial hair

A moan leaving you as his face traveled down, moving your shirt up, up up–

“Your lair is ringing.” You stated, pointing to his wall of screens. Your eyes searched over his face, eyes softening as you watched him process waking up so quickly. He hoped you didn’t see the tent that had started in his pants. 

He looked over, seeing a yellow warning sign flash across the screen, and grunted in annoyance. He stood up quickly, stepping toward his computer and clearing his throat. Get out of your head, Miller. 

He would have to be blind to think that you weren’t attractive. And to top it off, he had always been a sucker for a woman in distress, even though you could take care of yourself. That had been what he was known for, even with the stoic demeanor and little to say when saving someone. He was there to save the day.  But the way that you had willingly let him help you, even after all the nasty things people said about him in the media…

He typed a password on his computer, pulling up the full warning sign and squinting to read the fine print. You looked up to the screen which allowed him to adjust his pants quickly while he read that there was a dead battery in one of his camera locations. He sighed, looking over to you waiting with your hands clasped together, shirt falling almost to your knees. Why did I suggest you sleep in my clothes? Even the ones I never wore? “Just a dead camera s’all sugar.”

You audibly sighed, not chastising him for calling you anything but your name. He took note of it but filed it away for later. You went over to his pantry, grabbing out the cereal. “When do you go change it out?”

He mulled it over in his head, going to the fridge to pick out the milk while you grabbed bowls and spoons. A routine you both had started, prepping breakfast together. He would wait for you most mornings, turning on the coffee pot to wake you slowly, let you get up and stretch out your limbs before sitting down together silently and eating your designated boxes of cereal. He noticed you gravitate towards the Cheerios more than the Rice Krispies. “Maybe today, I don’t want the system to be down for too long.” He let you pour him a bowl full of cereal, noticing the box was almost empty. “I should probably check my mail too.”

You scoffed, glancing over at him as you filled up your own bowl and he poured the milk. “You actually get mail?”

Joel smirks, looking at you while you look down, not aware of his gaze. “I have to get those care packages of cereal sponsorships from somewhere sweetie.” He laughed, sitting down next to you and adjusting his chair to be turned toward you instead of the screens. 

He watched your face turn red, his heart beating faster at the thought that his words made you feel something. “How are you still sponsored by Honey Nut Cheerios if you’re considered a villain?”

Taking a bite, he put his elbow up on the table and pointed at you with his spoon. “Don’t hate on my hussle.”

You laughed, full-bellied, almost choking on your cereal. Joel watched you, smiling to himself. He shouldn’t get used to this, but he wanted to. 

Joel’s feet felt heavy on the sidewalk without you next to him. He had gotten used to being with you all the time, making sure you were keeping up and felt your absence deep in his stomach. You had both agreed that changing out the batteries in a camera would take two people-one to do the change and one to keep watch, but the post office could be quicker and easier in the daylight. This walk alone gave him time to think about his dream that you had woken him up from, and he reveled in the opportunity. 

Your sighs were light, leaning toward a high pitched moan that made the base of his spine shiver. His mouth traveled down, pushing your shirt up with wet kisses to your smooth skin. “Please Joel.”

“I’m no good for you.” He growled, glancing up at your face as his fingers hooked into the elastic of your underwear. Blue like the sky, mesh, see through. He groaned. 

“I don’t need good.” You whispered, keeping your eyes down on him as he slid your underwear down your legs. “I need you.”

He shook himself out of his trance, approaching the doors to the small post office on the outskirts of the city. He had to stop thinking about you; you were a means to an end, helpful for what he needed for his ultimate desire - revenge. Nothing else is important. 

The keys felt cold as he pulled them out of his pocket, opening his post box to find 3 more keys to access larger packages. He smirked at the thought that there would be more cereal for you to grumble over; not that he minded your grumbles much anymore. 

The boxes were light weight, easy to fit in the oversized bag he had started bringing with him when he went to the post office. It made it look like he was carrying groceries, when really it was the obscene amount of postal packages. 

His thoughts drifted back to you as he began walking again, eyes down on his path. He came to the conclusion quickly that his infatuation with you, his dreams about you, and his tendency to be soft around you were only because of the proximity. There was no way he would act like this if you both had met at the Organization, or under different circumstances. 

I wouldn’t even give you a second glance at the post office. He asserted to himself, rolling his eyes at the thought that he probably would in fact give you a second glance, only because your legs were so long and because your hair was so shiny-

He stepped through the side door to his hideout, glancing up into the main room to see that the bathroom door was closed. He set his bag down on the table, glancing up at the cameras to take note of which ones were down and mentally map out the fastest route to get to them. Being lost in his thoughts didn’t last long when he heard the shower start to run and a soft moan escape under the door. 

He froze, feet stuck to the floor as he whipped his head toward the bathroom door. She must not have heard me come back? He knew what you were doing, and he had to hold on to one of the chairs to ground himself into thinking about anything else. The idea that you were touching yourself a few feet away from him, behind a closed door with water running down your body made him twitch.

“J-Joel.” Escaped your lips, through the sound of the water and under the door, coming to his ears. He groaned out loud immediately after, swaying away from the chair and finding himself in front of the bathroom door. He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, debating whether or not to knock, on if what he was doing was creepy, or what exactly he was thinking, but by the time he had made a decision you had pulled open the door wrapped in a towel. 

You jumped back, Joel scaring you by looming in the doorway and clutched your towel tighter around you. Your hair was still wet, a mess on top of your head, and you looked at him expectantly. “Do you need the bathroom?”

Joel’s eyes slinked up and down your frame, making your face go hot as you remembered what you had done in the shower. You felt your heart stutter at the realization that maybe you weren’t as quiet as you originally thought. His eyes came back to yours, a small smirk crossing his face. “Did you need any help?”

Frozen. Both of you were frozen. Did I just ask her if she needed help?

What? “What?” You repeated your thought, suddenly very aware of his hand twitching. You felt your nipples harden at the thought of those fingers brushing against you and you slid your eyes back up to his. 

“I said,” Here goes nothing Miller. Joel took a single step into the bathroom toward you, his socks sticking to the bottom of his feet with the humidity of the room. The tile was slippery and if he wasn’t careful he could fall. “Did you need help? You sounded like you were in a predicament.”

Your jaw went slack, understanding fully that he had in fact heard you. “I don’t know what you mean, Joel.” You didn’t know what else to do. You couldn’t just admit it, no matter how childish it made you seem. 

Joel’s smile grew, the buttons of his shirt brushing against the threads of your towel. He wasn’t going to lean in to you more than what he had already, but he felt the pull to you. He began breathing heavily, overly dramatic as he moaned out his own name to imitate you and watch the blood rush from the top of your chest to your cheeks and ears. “Were you not calling out my name, sugar? Did you need me?”

The double meaning was not lost on you, and you felt yourself leaning into him slightly as your breath caught. “I-I…just almost slipped.” You squawked, eyes widening when you let your nose brush against his. 

He tutted at you, tilting his head to allow you to lean your face towards him more if you wanted to. “Don’t lie to me sweetie.” He breathed out, fingers twitching again to just reach out and touch you. 

You were both frozen again, breathing heavily and waiting for the other to do something, anything. You bit your lip, making his eyes immediately glue to them and groan. His groan made you gasp, lunging forward to lean your full weight on him. His arms wrapped around your waist, one hand skimming where your ass was hidden under the towel to hear your breath catch again. 

The tension was ready to snap, a rubber band barely holding on when Joel sighed, moving his hands back to your hips and pushing himself away. He glanced down, avoiding the line of your cleavage to look at the floor. “I uh, brought back the packages.” He cleared his throat, taking a full step away from you. “We should get ready for changing the cameras out tonight.”

You felt like you had been taken on a roller coaster, not sure what Joel really wanted or why he was changing the subject. “Okay.” You stepped around him, your feet sticking to the tile. “I’ll get dressed.”

He heard you leave the room, walk across the concrete to the bedroom and shut that door as well. He sighed heavily, running his hands through his hair and yanking lightly to bring himself back to reality. God, I’ll be a goner sooner than I thought.

Little did he know that behind the bedroom door that you closed you were leaning your full weight, hand up to your forehead and breathing erratically. Joel Miller was officially under your skin, and you didn’t know how to avoid him. 

The day went on with you both avoiding each other, sticking to the bedroom with the door ajar in case he needed to ask you a question, him in the main area watching the cameras. As it grew darker, your anxiety increased with the knowing that you and him would have to travel around town together, possibly in the eyes of Marianne and AJ. 

A knock came to the door frame of the bedroom, making you look up at Joel who had changed to all black clothing and a dark flannel layered on top. “Get changed, we are going to head out shortly.”

You nodded, watching him step away quickly to let you put on a jacket and hat to cover up identifying features. When you were both ready, you stepped out into the street, walking side by side awkwardly. You wanted to reach out and touch him; you hadn’t touched him since this morning, and while you didn’t typically get close to Joel, you had this urge to be near. 

Another couple was walking toward you both, making you step closer to him and reach your hand out to his arm. He jumped lightly, not expecting you to reach for him as he looked at you. “Part of the disguise, remember?” You said, referencing pretending to be a couple to further the facade that you were not a superhero on the run. 

He grunted, pulling his hand out of his jacket pocket and sliding his fingers to yours. You didn’t ask if he felt the tingle that you did. 

He pulled you into an alleyway, walking to the back corner before turning back around to see if you had been followed, unlocking a door that was hidden by the shadow. “We need to go here.”

You didn’t respond, feeling your anxiety increase with not knowing where the door would lead. Small, dark spaces were not your forte, and while you hid it well, the idea of embarrassing yourself in front of Joel wasn’t on your “top picks” list. 

He glanced at you, seeing you tense when the door opened and wondered why you were suddenly tense. He reached for you, guiding you by the elbow to go ahead of him and shut the door behind himself and relock it. When he turned back around to you, you hadn’t moved forward, frozen in place. “Alright?”

You hummed in a high pitched tone, breathing in sharply and trying to blink to have your eyes adjust. “I can’t see.” You squeaked, feeling the heat of Joel behind you but not being aware of anything else besides fear. 

“Just step forward, sugar.” He said quietly, moving his hands to your hips to push you forward. “Your eyes will adjust.”

Him pushing you was the only reason you took a step, but Joel quickly realized that he couldn’t let go of you if you were to continue forward. “I really can’t see, my eyes won’t adjust.” You whispered, trying to hide the shake in your voice. 

He paused, sliding his hands along your hips as he stepped around you and in front. He let his touch tell you where he was, brushing his fingers up your arms to your shoulder and to hold your face in place. He let his forehead touch yours as he felt you shake. He briefly remembered your first night in his hideout and how you asked how to escape. “You are not stuck in here.” He whispered, letting his breath fan across your face. 

You sighed, closing your eyes tightly and shaking your head. “I’m stupid, it’s fine.” You huffed, bringing your hands up to hold his wrists. 

“You’re not stupid.” He said quickly, holding you firmly and stepping closer to you so both of your fronts were flush together. “There is a room at the end of this hallway. I won’t let the world tumble in on you.” He pushed, leaning his head away from yours to bring his lips to your forehead. I can’t help myself. 

You sighed, feeling the tingle he left behind on your forehead as you nodded. He slid his hand down, grabbed your fingers, and walked slowly along the hallway to bring you to some of his camera access.

At the end of the hall there was in fact a room that Joel could light up. Wires ran up and down two walls, red and green lights reminding you of the holiday season. “The battery compartments are here.” He grumbled, letting go of your hand reluctantly after looking you over. You were no longer shaking, but stood awkwardly while you waited. 

You tried smiling, not daring to look behind you into the dark. You watched as he crouched down, hand gliding over the different stations and popping some batteries out of his pocket. He wasn’t really concerned with you keeping watch at this point; he had done this enough times alone. But he wanted you to be closer to him. 

“What happens if one of the wires goes bad?” You ask quietly, letting him turn around to look at you before continuing what he was doing. 

“It hasn’t happened yet, but I would replace the wire. It doesn’t go very far, just to a wireless router that lets the visuals come to me virtually instead of the wires being all around town.” He explained, looking back at you and letting the corners of his mouth tilt up. “Not too complicated.”

You nodded, biting the inside of your cheek and glancing away from him. “I’m not a very good watch person.” You chuckled, still not turning around. You had only just calmed down enough to breathe normally, and you didn’t want to revert back. 

He chuckled, balling up the trash from the batteries in his hand and shoving it back in his pocket. “S’alright. Your company is enough.” He stood, turning to you and watched your face blush lightly at his words. 

“You’re just saying that.” You whispered, glancing at him quickly. 

He shrugged, stepping toward you and reaching out. He was done playing it safe. Here goes nothing. His hand slid around your jaw, pulling you towards him slightly. “Do you want me like I want you?” He said gruffly, looking from your lips to your eyes. 

He watched your eyes widen, your pupils dilate, and listened to the way your breath sped up. His thumb moved slowly over your cheek, across your bottom lip and back again, satisfied with the shiver that you couldn’t hold back. 

He had to wait. He had to be sure he wasn’t just imagining things. That it wasn’t all just a dream. “I need you to talk to me, sugar. Anything.”

You tried to open your mouth but it was too dry, too sticky to even think about words. You attempted a swallow, reaching your hand forward slowly to clasp at his forearm. “I don’t know, Joel.”

He waited, freezing his thumb against your cheekbone and blinking roughly. He moved his head down, releasing you from his grip even though yours was now on him–not letting him walk away from the rejection. He deflated even though it had been too good to be true. “I’m sorry.”

You squeezed as he tried to step away, and he shuffled slightly unsure of what to do. Your hand on him felt like stepping through a fire, like climbing into a warm bed on a cold day, like taking a dip in the ocean while the sun beats down on you. He wanted to always feel that way, but only if you felt the same. Maybe it’s the proximity, but I don’t care.

He could spiral on his own. He didn’t need you to witness it–he knew where to go so he would be hidden from his own cameras but out of the public eye. He could run away long enough to get his head on straight but still keep you safe. He would take you back to the hideout and then go out again, just to be alone.

“Where did you go?” You whispered, squeezing his arm tight again as he drifted back out of his thoughts. “You don’t have to be sorry.” You pushed, pulling him toward you again.

“I shouldn’t feel this way.” He sighed, hands coming up to run through his hair and back down to his sides. He didn’t want to touch you again if you didn’t want that. 

“Why not?” You emphasized, reaching forward for his flannel and curling your fingers tighter. 

“You don’t feel the same.” He resigned, feeling like a fool. He had misread the whole thing-even this morning when he heard you moan his name. It was just to get off, not anything more. 

“I didn’t say that, I said I didn’t know.” You sighed, exasperated with his dismissal. It’s more complicated than that. 

“That’s practically the same.” He grumbled, trying to step away from you again but his shirt stretched when you didn’t let him leave. 

“No, it means I’m confused.” You sighed, letting go of him and began pacing. The dark and tight hallway was no longer in your mind. “What if you only feel like this because I’m in your way all the time? Or if I feel like this because I don’t know where I am going to end up?” You worried out loud, continuing your pacing in a circle practically around him. 

Joel crossed his arms in front of his chest, watching you. “Is that how you feel?”

You grunted unhappily, pointing a look at him. “I don’t know how I feel. That’s what I’m trying to say! I’m saying there’s so many variables and I don’t understand how to sort them all out. What if I’m overthinking–

“You are over thinking.” He said quietly, trying to not smirk at your thought process. 

“But what if I’m not overthinking it and the rational part of my brain is telling the irrational part to slow down.” You sighed.

“I dream about you.” He blurted, hands coming down to his sides again as he kept his eyes on you. 

That made you stop in your tracks, turning to him quickly. His cheeks were red with what you thought was embarrassment, as he started to pace in his own track–back and forth in front of you. “I literally dream about you every night. About you getting hurt, about me hurting you, about AJ and Marianne hurting you. But I also dream about how you look at me, how you feel when I hold you in my arms, helping you, picking you up to fight them again. About…more. You are growing like a fucking weed inside of me.”

You laugh lightly, watching his own smile creep up on his face at the statement. “That doesn’t sound pleasant.”

He shook his head quickly, getting himself to focus. “It’s not. I wake up and sometimes you’re in front of me and other times you’re asleep or worse you’ve gone out and I don’t know where you are and I panic, sweetie. I literally–” He grabs at his hair and pulls on it to try and ground himself. “I need to know you’re safe. And I fucking care if you’re safe. There's a lot going on up here and I’m confused too, but I know that much.” He rushes over to you and grabs your hand, a zap of what feels like electricity zipping through you before the familiar dull hum continues when he touches you. “Don’t you feel that? How it buzzes? How everything gets loud and crazy? And then how it quiets down, how I can only see you?”

Your breath is caught in your throat, your eyes searching his face. “Yes.”

He nods, bringing your hand up to his chest and pressing it into where his heart is beating. “I don’t know what it means but it's something. And I want you when it gets loud, and I want you when it gets quiet. I only see you when it goes quiet.” He breathes heavily, leaning his forehead to yours again. “Please tell me you want me. Just your first instinct. What do you want to say first before you stop yourself?”

You pause, closing your eyes and trying to focus on breathing. “I want to say yes.”

It's like all the air has left him as he processes what you said while he has leaned in to kiss you at the same time. His lips mold to yours, hands grasping around your shoulders and up into your hair. “Say yes then.” He pauses, kissing at the corner of your mouth. 

You sigh heavily, grabbing at his shirt and pulling him impossibly closer. You still can’t speak, not wanting to admit it to yourself, to him, to the universe. How did you end up here with him? “What if it’s not real?” You sigh, upset with yourself for saying it. 

He pauses long enough to smile, kissing you again briefly. “Then let’s be delusional together, sugar.”

Getting back to the hideout was a blur. Joel had ushered you down the hallway, small spaces and dark corridors forgotten and then kept you close to travel back to the lair and get you inside quickly. He pulled off your hat and wrapped his hand around the back of your head to pull you close to him. “Kiss me.”

When you did that buzz of electricity surged through you again, unable to be swallowed down now that his tongue was sweeping over your lip and a grunt of satisfaction escaping when you opened your mouth for him. You sighed happily, fingers working his flannel open to expose the black t-shirt underneath. His hands gripped your hips, pulling your lower body into his with a dull thump that made him smile into the kiss. 

He felt unsure, pulling away for a moment. “Do you want me?” It was rough to his own ears, hands pulling away from you to yank off his flannel. He hovered over his belt, tempted to move forward but wanting your input. 

You nodded eagerly, pulling off your jacket and then reaching forward to where his hands were. “Only if you want me.”

He sighed happily, leaning forward again to kiss you and worked down your neck roughly. His hands left his belt to let you figure out, his fingers skating along the skin that was exposed at your stomach to push your shirt up. He slowly let it lift above your bra, pulling away from your neck with a pop to look down at you.

Your fingers undid his belt, pulling down the zipper of his jeans and glancing up to watch him observe you. His pupils were blown out, lip caught in his teeth briefly before he knelt down. “I have to have you.” He growled, kissing at your stomach and bringing his hands around to the back of your jeans. You quickly pulled your shirt over your head, reaching down to Joel’s shoulders to hold yourself steady as he opened the button of your pants with his teeth. 

You threw your head back, looking up to the ceiling for a moment to collect yourself before his fingers dug into the back of your jeans and yanked them down, a gasp escaping you. Your underwear went with it, his calloused fingers running back up your thighs to coax you to step out of the puddle of clothing. 

Your fingers dug into the muscle of his shoulders, making him groan out as he kissed at your mound briefly. “Get down on the ground.”

“Here?” You squeaked, looking behind you to see the concrete. You glanced over to the doorway that led to the bedroom before looking back down at him to see he was already smiling at you. 

He chuckled, stroking his fingers at the back of your knees. “Is that okay?” He asked, tilting his head and glancing back down to your center. He couldn’t wait to taste you. 

You bit your lip and nodded slowly, watching as he quickly pulled at your knees to make you jerk back. His hand came up to your hip, guiding you back slowly as he leaned forward, following you up your body to then catch your head. A feat all on its own that ended with your bare ass on the cold concrete, making you inhale sharply. You giggled, throwing your hands up to grab at his wrists. “It’s cold down here, Joel.”

He smiled, leaning forward to kiss at your chin and back down your body, pulling at one cup of your bra with his teeth and letting it snap back in place. “Let me warm you up, sugar.”

You released a sigh the minute Joel’s mouth was on you, shuffling between your legs to lay himself flat on the ground with you, his tongue meeting your center with a quick swipe. He pulled back to see your reaction, controlling his urge to dive deeper into you while you caught your breath. He wrapped his arms around your legs, holding you open as he leaned back down to suck on your clit and swirl his tongue around it. 

Your back arched off the floor, hands reaching for something to hold on to and finding purchase in his hair already messed up from the activities. Your eyes closed, mouth dropped open as he continued to swirl lightly, sucking erratically. You moaned out his name, making him groan into you and sending vibrations up your core. “Keep saying my name, baby.” He spoke quickly against you, going back to his ministrations and closing his eyes in bliss. 

He couldn’t get enough, his tongue traveling down to your opening for a quick taste before rolling his eyes in the back of his head. He pulled away, catching his breath to watch you catch your own. “So god damn sweet. I fucking knew it.” He mumbled breathlessly, surging forward to push his tongue into you while his nose held pressure on your clit. 

“Fuck-Joel. Holy–” You felt like you could black out from the intensity of his tongue, unable to form a coherent sentence. 

Joel felt you clenching around his tongue, pulling away from you quickly to sit up and remove his shirt. “I’m sorry sweetie, I just have to feel you. I’ll let you be comfortable any time after this.” He said quickly, shoving his pants down to his mid-thigh and kissing up your body again. “I can’t think straight.” He confessed, kissing your jaw and letting his hands push himself up, framing your shoulders. 

You sighed, laughing lightly and reaching your arms around his middle. “I can only think about what you’ll feel like inside me.” You whisper, biting your lip as he groans and looks down at your center to line himself up. 

He looks back up at you, pausing with his weeping head at your opening. It’s like you’re already pulling him in, legs spreading wider to accommodate. He slowly pushes in, the head of his cock being squeezed by you and making him groan loudly. “Fuck–relax for me darlin’.” He coos, looking down again to where you are connected and shifting his hips slightly.

Your moan urges him forward, suddenly pressed fully against you as you both breathe heavily. Your fingers dig into his skin, leaving moon shaped marks that will likely be red in the morning. “Joel, don’t fucking move.” You squeak, eyes wide with discomfort. 

He looks back up to you, the haze lifting slightly to see your discomfort and he freezes. His hand comes to rest on your face, leaning down to pepper kisses on your skin. The way he speaks to you has you shuddering, slowly relaxing your body. 

Relax for me baby, you’re okay.

You’re doing so well.

That’s it, I can feel you. So fucking tight for me, huh?

Doing so fucking well, you tell me when to move. 

When you give Joel the okay to move, he groans loudly, hand wrapping tightly around one of your arms as he pulls out and in, moaning your name. You shifted your hands to wrap around the back of his head and pull him to you, your mouths intertwining roughly. 

You didn’t know when he decided to, but he snaked his arm in between you both to move your clit in circles. “You’re so fucking wet for me sweetie. Think you can come for me?”

You nodded quickly, closing your eyes quickly as the pressure from his fingers increased, his pace of fucking you not slowing down. The base of your spine began to tingle, your world going white for a moment as you fell over the edge. 

Joel watched you, sweat gathering at his temples as you rippled around him. He held out, continuing to push into you and talk you through your finish. “I’m so fucking close darlin’, I don’t think I’m going to last much longer.” He strained, lifting himself up off of you enough to watch himself go in and out again before pulling out completely. He wrapped his hand around himself, pulling into his own spiral as he finished on your stomach. 

You both were breathing heavily, sweating profusely and jaws slack staring at each other. Your eyes felt heavy, half lidded as you looked up at his mess of hair. “You’re going to have to help me up.”

He chuckled, leaning down and kissing your knee. “I’ll help you up, don't worry, sugar.”

AJ stared at the screen in Marianne’s office, waiting for her to appear. The cameras didn’t lie-you and Joel walking down the street with his arm over your shoulder, glancing around in all the wrong places to miss the newest camera. “Fucking slut.” He grumbled, taking a swig from his glass. 

When Marianne appeared, she paused for a split second before continuing to her desk. She looked up at the same screen that AJ was, holding her breath as she saw Joel on the screen. A gasp didn’t leave her until she realized that he wasn’t alone, and who the person reminded her of. “Where is this?”

AJ turned, laughing ruefully. “Around King’s Circle, like you said.”

Marianne hadn’t seen Joel on camera in over two years, surprised that he wasn’t aware of this camera, no matter how new. “His guard must be down for him to not have spotted the camera.”

“He’s infatuated with her.” AJ snarked, looking back at the screen. “We will use it to our advantage. Kill him first instead of the other way around.” Marianne couldn’t take her eyes from the screen, holding back tears at the thought of taking another person’s life. “But now, I can have fun with her before we do it, in front of him preferably, to ruin his fucking day.”

Marianne held back her gasp, swallowing roughly and sitting on her shaking hands. She hoped you were okay. 

#pedro pascal #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal fanfic #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal smut #joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller smut #joel miller au #super!joel au #superhero au

[fantasykiri5]

Luca smallidarity AU Luca smallidarity AU

Additionally, shoutout to Grian who looks like he could be going to a fucking carnival. I’m not changing his hat design it’s fucking perfect

#my art #it’s weird drawing Grian human looking he doesn’t seem like he should be human looking #anyways haha yeah gay fish #ok Joel is Alberto Jimmy is Luca and Grian is Gulia #I’m not sure who else is who but I was rambling about it in this tag -> #Bad Boys Luca AU #or at least I hope so. anyways #smallidarity #empires shipping #traffic shipping #jimmy solidarity #jimmy solidarity fanart #joel smallishbeans #joel smallishbeans fanart #Grian #Grian fanart #super fav #bad boys #the bad boys

[muchmossymess]

GUYS okay hear me out majoras mask boat boys au

I love legend of zelda I love boat boys this is like the ultimate combination of my interests you cannot understand the brainrot. Idk what to call it yet tho... majoras minecraft? Anyway prepare for an essay

OKAY so we have the Hero of Time, Etho, who stopped ganons plans before they started, and would be stuck in a child's body if not for the fact I think that'd be a lil weird for the more shippy aspects of this au that all the running through time aged his soul and his body followed suit (he's still got a young appearance, and the mask doesn't make him look older like he thinks). Same reason he has the scar over his eye (from the ganon fight); no matter how much the body may heal or rewind the mind will not forget.

Then navi (maybe bdubs?) left him, and he went with epona (maybe bdubs instead? (eponas a horse iydk)) and he sets out on a journey aka the beginning of mm:

Wandering through the woods on epona, gets jumped by skull kid. For those unaware, there is skull kid, a lonely lil sweetheart, and he wears the mask, an entity on its own. He also has two fairies, siblings tael and tatl.

So I was a little unsure about this for a while, but I think I've decided on grian for the skull kid and Jimmy for tael, grian bc watchers and Jimmy bc skull kid is not very nice to tael (bc of the mask) and like a listeners reference or smth blah blah blah

TATL. that's who's interesting. At the beginning she gets separated from her friends and becomes your companion. So naturally for this au she is our favourite joel smallishbeans. It works so well. Tatl is mean but cares, and that's joels dynamic with the bad boys and with etho, guys it's literally perfect idc what you say

I think it doesn't change much throughout like the story of the game, but just taking dialogue tatl says to link and its so perfect for a sassy joel to a "can't believe I'm dealing with this shit again" etho. Uh one thing different though; in hylian form etho doesn't have an ocarina but instead a mini marimba. Just because. I think it's cool, and for potential things later on.

Now, fairies in this au are just tiny glowing people shaped things with wings. The glow around them is their magic, and depending on emotions/energy the brightness changes (thats why they look like flying balls of light). Some fairies have the ability to make projections of themselves, more hylian sized in nature. This can be intimidation or distraction or w/e, but they cant do it for long periods of time bc its exhausting. These forms aren't physical. Just sized up light projections of their actual bodies.

So for a lot of their journey, joel is just a cute pocket sized ball of rage and sarcasm, who helps with ethos aim for fighting. Bc that's a game mechanic and also ethos like half blind. But like when joel calms down imagine him crawling into ethos hat and just dozing off. He can fit in the palm of your hand like guys it's so cute. But he is also capable of being worse than a mozzie

Oh probably a good point to put in what I imagine etho looks like. So it's typical link green (maybe a bit dampened?), weird pointy hat, short hair (white ofc), his shirt is more of a jacket with a fluffy cold weather collar, it's a bit too big for him but he knows he'll grow into it, he's all knobbly and thin (underfed a lil, boy was never taught how to care for himself beyond basic survival). His injured eye is red bc of ganon, and often gives him phantom pains. It can't be healed.

Anyway, at some point in their journey together, etho and joel learn a song that let's fairies have a larger physical form, no wings, sorta like the great fairies (who they learnt it from prolly). It isn't permanent, slowly draining ethos magic meter, the spell ends when you run out of magic. This is because I want them to actually be able to stand side by side or maybe hug, and also bc its hard to block a blow with your body when ur tennis ball sized.

Aaaaand, this ties back in with with marimba. What if ethos injured, or unconscious, and he obviously can't defend himself, so joel panics and plays the marimba in what he hopes is the right order to give himself a body. I imagine that being that small, you could not play an ocarina. And hey maybe joel carries etho away after that, and when the spell ends he has barely any light emitting from himself because he spent nearly all his magic (what he is made of) saving etho.

But this song isn't used much, because of its draining nature, and you can't really do any other magic things while it's going. So it's mostly just in the final fight (over and over) or tough moments or maybe joel wants to experience something like hoe hylians do. It's obviously inferior to how he experiences things as a fairy, of course, he's just curious thats all. He totally doesn't want etho to do it more.

Okay I think ill sorta stop here, I am NOT done, I will probably post some art I've done for this later lol, and I want help with who everyone else is (mumbo is the moon. You cannot stop me nor change my mind) with mcyts to npcs

#oh it feels so good to get this out of my system i have been sitting on this for MONTHS #apologies of it isnt SUPER coherent i never said i was eloquent and i was really just word vomitting my ideas onto the screen #if anyone had any questions or stuff to add i would cry /positive #yeah like yall are so good if you want to take your own spin on this or anything i would love to know so bad #i need to like scream from the rooftops #majoras minecraft au #joel smallishbeans #smallishbeans #jimmy solidarity #grian #ethoslab #etho #majoras mask #boat boys #smalletho #majoras mask au #trafficblr #moss' madness #i think thats all the tags...?

[princesssmars]

thinking of meeting abby at your college's club awareness day. she's tall and big so you think she plays something like hockey or football but when you ask her she says golf. she also mentions how she nearly got kicked from the team because she got into a little accident with the popular campus dealer and her foster dad?? but who cares because god does she look amazing when she swings.

#im super late to the abby train #but i havent heard of a fleshed out golf!au #so #golfer!abby #college!abby #abby #abby anderson #abby anderson x reader #ellie williams x reader #joel miller #hole in one

[mariatesstruther]

okay but wait @bumblepony u GENIUS. you gave me an idea:

mariatommy step up au

in which pro-dancer maria miller is in desperate need of a waltz partner for the american dance championships. to her rescue comes tommy miller, the younger and more troublesome and secretly phenomenal swinging-dancing brother of famous ex swing-dancer, joel miller

guess what i did 😋 i made it long

so we start with pro-dancer maria miller as she wins as many dance titles as she possibly can, trying to prove to her mother that quitting law school for dance was worth it. she’s already been taking home a fuck ton of titles as a ballet and lyrical soloist, but lately she’s been interested in smooth forms of ballroom, like the waltz and tango

a good friend of hers, frank, has been her partner for three months, and they’ve been unbeatable so far. literally every competition she they shows up at, other dancers will groan and rolls their eyes like “aw come on bro this is unFAIR” because they already know who first place is going to: maria motherfucking miller. every goddamn time

then, four titles in and two months away from their biggest competition, frank tragically breaks an ankle doing some stupid gardening shit with bill. and it is exactly that: a tragedy. he’s maria miller’s partner, and now he can no longer be that. he might as well be a dead man

frank makes bill tell maria, both because it was his idea to have sex do work in the garden and because he’s too scared to. when he does, she cusses him out so bad that, for once in his life, he has no grumpy smartass response. maria is fucking pissed—because that entire competition, that title, that trophy is supposed to be fucking hers. they already have the perfect choreography, the perfect costumes, the perfect music, the perfect everything. she’s already made space on her awards wall for the crown, the sash, and three-their trophy. this is a batrayal, frank. how could he do this to her????? how could he?????

but maria miller does not dwell on problems: she fixes them. she has replace bill or withdraw from the competition—which she has never done in her entire life. withdrawing, like losing, is not an option. she needs another partner, and she needs one fast

of course homegirl tess would come through—her best friend, retired fellow dancer, and one of the most reputable talent managers in the region. maria calls tess hoping to get in touch with her ex-partner, joel miller, because she wants only the best. he’s known and respected in the dance world as an amazing swing dancer and phenomenal lead in partner-work—much to her chargrin, unfortunately, he’s not dancing anymore. he’s apparently too busy with a new baby, which—great, beautiful, kids are great—does not help her. maria needs someone available, someone good, and someone now

enter tommy miller 🤠 who maria is at first not even willing to consider, because he’s never danced competitively in his entire fucking life (“are you fucking with me, tess? are you trying to fuck with me? i thought we were past the point of fucking with eachother. i though we were friends.” she says, when tess tells her. she gets an eye-roll in response)

to his credit, tess tells her, he’s been dancing alongside his joel all his life. he’s watched him and learned from him and is apparently just as good—he’s even danced with tess, and he impressed her. this impressed maria. when she asks tess why he hasn’t done anything officially to actually prove himself, tess says he’s “not the competitive type,” which is a major turn-off. maria is more than the competitive type—she’s the competition entirely.

still, tess convinces her to give him a chance. they basically meets blind-date style because tess is just like “dude just trust me trust me TRUST ME. meet him at our studio on saturday and freestyle with him. one song. then tell me what you think”

so maria goes, and she waits. she’s dutifully ten minutes early, as she is to every rehearsal. what would be five minutes before their meet time, she hears the studio doors open behind her and lets herself be only a little pleased that he is early. then she turns around to him—and boy, is she very much so pleased

tommy is broad-shouldered and well-dressed and tall, but not too tall, and well-groomed for a man—especially with one with so much hair. my god, just this man have a beautiful head of hair. as admires him, she also appreciates that (aside from his audaciously hot suede fur-lined jacket and cowboy boots, lord help her), he look’s ready to dance: black loose muscle tank, black breathable joggers, and black sneakers held in his left hand. in his right hand, to her suprise, is a single red rose.

is he fucking with me? she immediately thinks. a rose. a fucking rose?

“what’s that for?”

“uh, the rose? it’s—,” he hesitates, clearly thrown off guard. somehow, with only three measly words, maria notices that his voice is nice and low and gravely and— “it’s for you, ma’am. you’re maria, right?” —southern and sexy and distracting. his voice is far too distracting. it will present problems for her.

“right. i’m maria,” she repeats, mostly to remind herself who she fucking is—maria fucking miller. maria miller, who does not get distracted by tall sexy cowboys at dance rehearsals. “you’re tommy?”

“yes, ma’am.” he has to stop. he has to stop with the ma’am thing. it’s another distractor.

no distractions. she’s at a rehearsal, albiet an unofficial trial one. it is still a rehearsal—one for a competition that she will win.

maria straightens her shoulders, gets her head on straight, and steels her voice to say coldly: “well, tommy, i don’t like flowers. i like trophies. you think you can get me one of those?”

at that, tommy smiles as bright as the sun, white and pearly and perfect. distraction number three. she’s fucked. “i reckon i can,” he says, amused and sure.

“then prove it,” she responds, voice still steely. “let’s dance.”

and they do

for @bumblepony for your amazing writing as always and @marceltheshellwithflipflopson for your loveliness and inspiration and @clickergossip wifey and @ameerawrites miss u baby and @liveandletcry23 MISS U CAT and @hypnotisedfireflies because the work youve been doing with IO????? INCREDIBLE????? its been making me want to get back to writing so bad

all my mariatommy truthers love u guys kiss kiss kiss

#hiatus WHO #hiatus WHERE #maria being a super intense type a dance type who wants NO distractions and NO funny business: 👩🏾‍🏫😤💃🏾 #tommy who is a broad tall sexy distraction that LOVES funny business: 🤠🕺🏽😋 #the way this took me way too long i definitely need to edit and post this #bumble u really did something to me earlier i hope this returns the favor kiss kiss #step up au #idk if this is the plot of step up tbh #i think it counts #tommy x maria #maria miller #tommy miller #tess servopoulos #bill and frank #bill and frank finally being in one of my aus just for me to break franks leg 😭😭😭 sorry bro #tess x joel #there is a joeltess subplot in here somewhere i swear #their dance/love story would be the perfect prequel #and then they get back together in the sequel #OMGGGG #WAIT I CAN MAKE THIS A THREE PARTER IF I REALLY DEDICATE MYSELF #okay might do a dance au weekend #dance tag #tlou #tlou au #the millers #the tipsy bison #joel miller #even though hes not technically in this at all lets tag him for vibes #i didn’t finish my onboarding but i dont care lmfao i got all week

[lovesbiggerthanpride]

Pairing: AU!Joel Miller / Diner owner F!Reader

Note: This just came to me as I was eating brunch. Joel is an OTR driver, stopping for a meal, as he transports cargo. This is my first time writing Joel, so please be kind. And yes, I’m inspired by P’s portrayal of Joel.

_________

“Hi there, what can I get for you?”

The most soulful pair of brown eyes finally met yours, as you began to assist him. He definitely wasn’t a regular, because you recognized everyone who sat at these tables.

It felt as though he was in deep thought when you greeted him. Shoulders slumped, furrowed brow, very reserved, in stark contrast to the bustle of the other customers in the diner you called home.

Home also was this sleepy town, where families, college students driving cross-country, and hard-working OTR drivers passed through, temporarily pausing at the rest stops and your diner. A place to take a beat, get some shut-eye, have a good meal, before moving on. That was the norm and you were used to this.

But this one appeared to be different.

“Sorry… Hi. I’ll have a coffee, black. Biscuits and some bacon, please.”

“That’s it?”

A short “yup” came your way as the man handed you the menu. “Don’t need much.”

An easy order, no need to write anything down. You were going to make sure this new customer would receive the best biscuits and gravy on this side of the Mississippi.

As you observed, you had to admit he was one of the more handsome visitors lately, so there was incentive to impress, hoping he would return during a future trek.

With a smile, you answered, “Sounds good. It will be here before you know it.”

With a curt nod, the man spoke. “Thank you, ma’am.”

It had been a while since you heard such a formal title. You giggled, insisting the man call you by your first name.

The newcomer’s eyebrows raised, confused. “Ma’am, that’s not how I was raised.”

“I appreciate your manners, but here, everyone is a friend. First name basis now.” Leaning over, you whispered, “Owner’s request.”

Seeing that you weren’t budging, and he did not want to offend, a deep sigh arose.

“Alright, fine,” he relented, repeating your name slowly, in a tone that honestly made your insides tingle with desire. “Joel.”

“Nice to meet you.”

_______

Let me know if you’d like to read more of this. 💙

@moralesfish @heythere-mel @wildemaven idk who else would want to check this out lol

#super short #Joel Miller x you #Joel Miller x f!reader #maybe something more in the future? #untitled #Mel writes #OTR driver Joel / female diner owner #AU Joel Miller #Pedro pascal character fanfiction #ficlet #a preview?

[multicolour-ink]

Oh I can imagine that when mario and luigi find survivors they will freak out when they see that Luigi has been bitten and think he will turn into a zombie,and tried to kill him, only for mario to kill them instead to protect his brother

referring to this and this

While Luigi may act sort of the same, I imagine his appearance would change a bit. Maybe a more grayish skin tone and/or altered irises. So it's very easy for people to pick him out of a crowd. He can't just walk up to anyone like normal anymore (except for Mario).

So when they do find survivors, they are in no way able to accept that Luigi is harmless. One even pulls out a weapon. And that's when Mario snaps. Unable to stand by and let them kill his brother, he does what he can to protect him....

Oh! 👀 Now that opens up a lot of doors!

Let's assume for simplicities sake that the events play out similar to TLoU.

Mario and Luigi have managed to survive together, just the two of them - until one day on a scavenging hunt (or whatever job it is they are doing) they are ambushed by infected, and Luigi gets bit.

And at that moment Mario's world starts to crumble, because it's suddenly no why him this can't be happening I was supposed to protect him I can't lose him please

The next few days of waiting are torture; Mario even starts to consider the crazy idea of asking Luigi to bite him, just so they can turn together.

But Luigi doesn't turn, much to Mario's sheer delight; word of this soon spreads to a resistance group, who ask Luigi to come to them so they can figure out a cure from his condition. Mario is reluctant because - even though you did mention Mario is a nice guy who just wants to help others - this is still a zombie apocalypse. TLoU proves that desperation always sets in during the worst of times. So even though Mario tries to help as much as he can, he soon learns he has to turn many down, even if it goes against his very nature.

So the journey plays out pretty similar to TLoU - heck even the confrontation between Joel and Ellie in the house, as well as this line from Ellie could fit into the story

"Stop with the bulls***! What are you so afraid of?! You think I'm gonna end up like Sam? I can't get infected! I can take care of myself!"

This is pretty much almost word for word on what could happen between the Bros. Luigi knows that Mario has always been protective, but considering he's now immune, Mario, in his opinion, is just throwing himself in front of a sponge. There would definitely be conflict, and the Bros would have to work on that new trust in order to get to the resistance group.

Now at the very end...the moment Luigi needs to be sacrificed for a cure.

Much like Joel - Mario snaps. He can't, won't, have his brother come this far, only for once again there be another chance he can be taken away from him again. The world has already given up on itself, but the Bros have never given up on each other. They need each other as their own cures for this bleak world.

So Mario goes on a rampage, until he rescues Luigi, and manages to get them away before they are caught again.

Now...for the ending. I thought long and hard about how I believe this would play out, and from what I've decided - Mario still lies to Luigi, but Luigi immediately picks up on it. Neither brother confess to each other out loud (something they have had to do for the very first time in their lives) but they both know the truth. Luigi doesn't miss the look in Mario's eyes, the blood on his hands. But he's not angry, because he knows he would've done the same thing. They both know that they need each other, and they would never give each other up willingly.

On a side note: I legit thought that this was what they were hinting at during the end of TLoU with Ellie. The way she replied "Ok" to Joel's lie seemed to hint that she knew he wasn't being honest, but chose not to bring it up because she knew she would've done the same if it was him.

Only for that to get completely blown out of the water by having Part 2 say that Ellie wanted to sacrifice herself, even though there was no hint of this at all in the first game 😑

Perhaps later on down the line, Luigi tries to research how his condition could help people, without the need to sacrifice others. Mario tries to get him to give up on it ("It's all useless now") Luigi challenges his brother by asking if he would give up on him....

Cue a slightly awkward and guilty Mario....

#this is really interesting #because you essentially have two pairs of characters all about family - #but it's their different bonds and experiences that make the outcomes slightly different #also mario slaughtering a hospital of doctors like Joel #that is never an image you find yourself picturing! #super mario #mario #luigi #super mario au #mario au #mario and luigi #brothers #tlou #the last of us #tw zombies #tw horror #tw apocalypse #tw violence #tw blood #the super mario bros movie #super mario movie #mario movie #the super mario bros #mario bros

[smalliishbeanss]

Joel is so Mitski coded

#joel??? joell???? || ooc #every version of joel imo #<- but rn ESPECIALLY hero/vigilante au joel #i'm super hyperfixated on this au lol #i just heard the “you're the one. you're all i've ever wanted. i think i'll regret this.” and thought of JOEL #LORD!! SAVE ME!!!! #hero au save me... save me hero au #🍏

[kiwisbell]

Red Light [landlord!joel miller]

The men you keep bringing home are no good for you. It's up to your landlord Joel to protect you from heartbreak. 

my masterlist!

pairing: joel miller x f!reader

rating: 18+ (mdni)

tags and warnings: AU - no outbreak/modern day, obsessive!joel, dark!joel, but also soft!joel, landlord!joel, violence, death, murder, stalking, jealousy, truly creepy behaviour, unprotected sex (lead by example; just not mine), creampie, dubious consent, reader’s serious lack of self-preservation, sexual tension, abuse of power, spanking, spitting, squirting, praise kink, degradation kink, joel is a munch, somnophilia, possessive behaviour, dirty talk, a smidgen of gaslighting, the general filth you should expect from me by now, a spoonful of genuine intimate connection™️, implied age gap, submissive reader, dominant joel, daddy kink, knives, mild torture, light anal play, voyeurism, unreliable narration, inappropriate use of a necklace, panty sniffing, ambiguous(?) ending

word count: ~ 15.8k (uh, oops!)

read on ao3!

hello, all! this fic has been tossing and turning inside the proverbial sheets of my head for a while now. when i tell you it's darker than anything i've written, i mean it, so please, please mind the tags. this story does not depict a healthy relationship; joel is a total creep and both he and reader are heavily delusional. with that said, please enjoy this (super long) one-shot!! xoxo

PREFACE

Stars, hide your fires; Let not light see my black and deep desires. — Macbeth, I.IV

~

THE TENANT

You're beginning to think it’s a built-in bad luck charm. A microchip implanted in your skin or a flaw you have yet to pick out. Every single one of your prospective boyfriends has disappeared off the face of the Earth since you moved into town. 

It isn't you. It's not. There is nothing wrong with you. It isn't your fault that either they decide after one date that you aren't worth seeing again, or they stand you up before the date can even begin. Your profile pictures are decent. You followed the rules meticulously: a shot of your face, a group picture to show you have friends, a selfie, a candid. You've examined them time and time again for flaws and find none that a man would care about. You're pretty. Sexy. Confident. They're just intimidated. Fuck, you're turning into your mother.

And yet—

Since moving into this apartment—this beautiful, once-in-a-lifetime deal of an apartment—your luck with dating has abruptly ended. 

It's a lovely building. A stout brownstone with wrought-iron stairs and an old, but functional, elevator, it's traditional and charming. Perfect for a single woman. 

Six months. This is your first second date in six months. David is just fine. He's handsome in a frat-initiate kind of way, with a nice smile and a good sense of dress. He doesn't ask many questions about you, and he's a little pretentious about films you don't give a shit about, but he likes you. You didn't have a horrible time on the first date: he wasn't afraid to spend his money on you at the nice restaurant. And he has a car. 

Raised as an optimist, you learned to see the good parts of a situation. David can work out. 

On the way out of the elevator, you spot your landlord Joel speaking to the concierge. You instinctively smooth down your hair and wave at him as you walk by, shrugging your purse onto your shoulder. “Hi, Joel. Hi, Sam.”

Sam the concierge waves back, but Joel puts his back to the conversation and gives you his full attention, bracing his hands on the edge of the desk. Your heart leaps and your head goes fuzzy with nerves. You barely manage to force a giddy giggle back down your throat. Relief coats your bones when Sam excuses himself to take a call.

Joel Miller’s an older guy, his tousled dark hair threaded with silver on his head and in his beard. One look at him and a person could know that he works with his hands for a living; he’s broad-shouldered, strong, with big arms and a capable air about him. He’s proven his mettle a hundred times over already with the miniscule repairs he’s made to the building. He turned it into a good place to live; he even trims the hedges outside and polishes the doorknobs when they get rusty. 

He’s wearing a green T-shirt today, which is another member of the typical summertime circulation of blue and grey T-shirts, and a pair of jeans. “Evening,” he says, his rich brown eyes sparkling. Sometimes, you can see him smile when his mouth isn’t showing it. It’s charming. Enthralling. “How’s that new lock workin’ out for you?”

You grin. He remembered. Joel installed a new deadbolt on your door last week, since the chain on the last one broke. “It’s perfect,” you tell him. “Are you in a chocolate or lemon mood this time?”

His gaze flickers down your body, taking in your yellow dress, before meeting yours again. “Lemon,” he says.

You bite the inside of your cheek. Talking to a handsome man feels like tossing your heart in the air and trying to juggle. Flirting with a handsome man is like toeing a tightrope between two mountains and forcing yourself not to look down. Your stomach swoops with the path of his eyes over your body, and you cannot convince yourself that you imagined it. “Lemon squares it is. Thank you again, Joel.”

“Just my job to keep my tenants safe,” he says, lifting one shoulder in a shrug. You can see a pair of keys in his pocket along with his cell phone. The mere sight of his belt makes your cheeks hot. Why are you looking at his belt? You’re going on a date with another man, for God’s sake. Relax.

“Helps when I like my tenants so much,” adds Joel, and you forget why you were scolding yourself in the first place. 

“Yeah?” You tilt your head to the side. “Maybe you should be baking for them, instead.”

Joel steps away from the desk, working his jaw as he seems to fight down a smile. “It’s for the best this way, believe me. Can’t cook for shit.”

“Big, strong man like you can’t work a stove?” you tease. Don’t look down. 

“I only fix ‘em.” There’s a crooked smile on his face now, and your heart beats your ribs to shrapnel. “You look real nice. Goin’ somewhere?”

That simple validation calms your nerves more effectively than a half-hour of repeating affirmations into the mirror before leaving your apartment. You give the skirt of your sundress a little swish. “A date, actually,” you say, feeling sheepish. Your landlord certainly doesn’t need to hear about your track record as of late. “He’s taking me to Sunfest, in the park.”

A minute twitch of his brow is the only reaction he gives to the news. “That so?” he says. “Lucky man.”

“More like lucky me,” you say with a small laugh, tucking your hair behind your ear. Stop talking, you plead to yourself. Too much information. Shut up, kindly excuse yourself, and leave. 

Joel shakes his head, and now is the first time you notice that his eyes haven’t once left you. It warms your body. “He’s the lucky one. Trust me.”

“Okay. I concede.” You chew on your lip for a moment and, sure enough, his gaze hones in on your mouth. The air in the lobby crackles white-hot. You clear your throat, turning your head to find David’s car parked on the street outside. “I should go. But I promise I’ll get started on those lemon squares soon.”

It’s a possibility that you only imagine Joel’s eyes flitting from the car outside back to you when you turn your head back to face him. “Do me a favour?” he says, a scrape to his deep drawl. 

“Anything, Joel.”

A muscle in his jaw ticks. “Be safe,” he says. “You have my number if anything goes wrong.”

You give him a grateful smile. “I’ll be safe, Joel. And if I’m not, you’re the first person I’ll call.”

“Good. That’s…” He trails off, still watching you, his eyes trained in their path across your face. “You’re good. Smart, beautiful, good. You deserve to have somethin’ real.”

The simple, small praises melt your bone marrow and recast it in the shape of him. The old chandelier hanging from the ceiling casts him in a soft light, stark against the hard muscles and profound depths in his eyes. He's breathtaking. You've always known it, but…

He sees something in you, too. 

David honks his horn and makes you jump out of your stupor. You walk backwards out of the lobby just to keep looking at Joel for as long as you can. “For the record,” you say, “you’re a good man, Joel.”

“Don’t be so sure, honey,” he replies, his tone playful. 

You laugh, hurrying out to David’s car as the door closes behind you. 

“This place is beautiful,” you said to Sam, the concierge working the front desk of your prospective apartment. The appropriate paperwork was in your arms, your eyes scanning every inch of the old building. Of all the places you'd seen in and around the neighbourhood, this was the most promising. You hoped to get a glimpse at a unit before you signed, though. Assuming the landlord even wanted you to live here. 

Sam smiled at you. “Lots of people just see the cracks.”

“There's so much character,” you replied, admiring the crystal chandelier. The walls were a calming, aged white, the floors genuine hardwood. The lobby was decorated with plush chairs upholstered with burnt orange fabric, the corners filled with real potted plants. 

The door opened behind you, and you turned to see a handsome stranger, dressed in a pair of dirty jeans and mud-caked shirt, wiping his forehead with his forearm. Behind you, Sam said, “This is Joel Miller. The landlord.”

“Oh!” You were flustered, floundering to stretch out your hand to shake as you introduced yourself. “I’m sorry to catch you at a bad time. This building is gorgeous. You've done a great job with it, Mr. Miller.”

The landlord did not once look at Sam, his eyes fixed solely on you as he wiped a hand on the cloth slung over his shoulder and shook your hand. His hand engulfed yours, warm and rough. The touch jolted you like an electric shock. Your hands must have been clammy and shaking with nerves, but the contact steeled you. 

The intensity of his gaze, however, made you shift on your feet. He didn't waver, didn't stray, like a man set on a mission. Nothing about him was shy. He drank in the sight of you, indulging without shame, his eyes travelling to the next destination once they'd had their fill. It made you feel stripped to the bone.

“It's nice to meet you,” he said. “Sorry for the dirt. Just finished weeding.”

You shook your head in dismissal. “You really take care of this place.”

“It's good work,” he said plainly. “Serves me well. I like gettin’ my hands dirty, fixin’ things.”

“Where were you when my sink broke every week at my old place?”

“Fixing the sinks in this one.”

You laughed. “Well, for what it's worth, the outside is beautiful, too. Not a weed in sight.”

“Pleased to hear it,” said Joel, his dark eyes glittering under the chandelier. 

“You're from Texas!” you said suddenly. Oh, God, kill me now. I sound like a stalker. 

But Joel smiled, a raspy laugh leaving his mouth. You wondered if he laughed often. He looked like a serious man. “You familiar?” 

“I was born there,” you supplied. “Left when I was young, but my dad lived there all his life.”

“Lookin’ good on you already,” he said. “It’ll be nice havin’ another one of us around.”

“Does that mean you're considering me?” you couldn't help but ask. Fuck, you wanted this apartment. 

“I've already considered,” said Joel, his eyes sweeping your body. “You're the only applicant.”

Your hands were trembling and your heart thrummed with excitement. “Oh, God, thank you!” you gasped. “Joel, thank you.”

You could swear his chest swelled a bit at your graciousness. “I can show you the unit, if you’d like. It needs some TLC, but I’m happy to help with the process as best I can. Unless you have someone to…”

You realised what he was hinting at and shook your head. “Oh, no, it’s just me. I’d love to take a look.”

You noted the slight drop of his shoulders and followed him into the elevator. A part of you was surprised to see there was no gate that closed you in; they were plain, somewhat modern elevator doors. “Fixed it last month,” Joel said, looking sideways at you. “Just in time, apparently.”

You grinned at him, bouncing on the balls of your feet. “Nice to see there's no creepy operator in here.”

“Just me.” He punched the button for the third floor and rode with you to the top. 

This was the start of your new life. 

You shut the passenger’s side door and situate yourself inside David’s Lincoln. He’s dressed in a pair of black shorts and a clean Henley. “Hey, beautiful,” he says, leaning in to kiss you across the console. 

You hum, smiling against his mouth. “You clean up nice, too.”

He places a hand on your thigh and pulls away from the curb. He's a touchy person, which is perfectly fine considering how long your latest dry spell has lasted, but at least he isn't inching his way up your dress to cop a feel while he drives. 

The festival is bustling with people, tented stands, and the smell of fried dough and beer. It’s almost dinnertime, and your stomach growls. When was the last time you ate? You spent hours agonising over what to wear until you were sweating and had to shower all over again. You wish you’d snuck an apple into your purse. 

David pulls you into him as you both walk through the winding paths between vendors. “It’s a beautiful night,” you say breezily. 

David squeezes your waist. “Mmm. You’re beautiful.”

A bit too corny for your taste, but you let it slide. “Don't tell me you're allergic to powdered sugar, because I’ve been eyeing the elephant ears.”

“God, if I eat that shit, I think it’ll set me back a month at the gym,” he laughs. “Let’s get one for you, though.”

Great. Now you're the expensive date who eats while her date watches her stuff her mouth with an elephant ear. “Uh. Maybe later.” 

You stop at a jewellery vendor and spend a good while eyeing up a beautiful gold necklace and the heart-shaped pendant dangling from it. David doesn’t notice your staring and breezes by with your hand firmly in his. “Let's check out the grand stand. My buddy’s band is playing before the fireworks display.”

“Sure,” you say, turning your head to watch the necklace disappear slowly from view. 

The gigantic domed stage houses a group of musicians currently tuning up their instruments. David sidles right up to the front and releases your hand to execute an elaborate handshake with his friend, who’s fine-tuning his bass. 

“Hey, man,” greets the bass player. “Good to see you. Who’s this?”

You open your mouth to introduce yourself, stretching your hand out, but David says, “My date for tonight. Baby, this is Ray, of Uncontrolled Bleeding fame.”

The bass player shakes your hand politely. “Very nice to meet you.” 

Because it doesn’t seem to matter much to David, you decide it’s worth the time to tell Ray your name. “It’s nice to meet you, Ray. I’m excited to hear you play.”

Not that you've ever heard of a band called Uncontrolled Bleeding. Still, Ray seems nice enough, and you're on a date. You should give them a chance. 

David squeezes your waist and kisses you lightly on the temple. “You mind if I go backstage for a bit to say hi to the other guys? Won’t be long.”

What?

“Oh!” you manage to eke out over the great swooping nosedive your heart has just performed. He’s here to see his friends. He’s not on a date. “Of course. Take your time. I’ll just… walk around.”

David departs with Ray for a personal backstage tour while you bite down on your tongue and turn back in the direction of the main strip. A few vendors catch your attention, and you take your time because God knows David is taking his. A little bit of you revels in your own petty victory when, a half-hour later, Uncontrolled Bleeding begins to blare their metallic, screaming anthems across the park and you haven’t returned to the grand stand. 

You find your way back to the jewellery vendor to ponder over your favourite necklace some more, but your night gets worse when you find that it’s disappeared from the headless display mannequin. You solemnly slide your wallet back into your bag and pause when you hear your phone ringing.

“Hello?”

“Where are you?” It’s David’s voice, presumably, though it’s so loud on the other end of the line that you can barely make out his words. “I can’t… where… left?”

You plug one ear and look vaguely in the direction of the grand stand across the park. “I can’t hear you very well, David.”

“… afterparty… downtown… going… Uber home?”

You press your lips together and look down at the ground: at your pretty sandals, your new dress. Your entirely wasted potential on a guy who wanted you to find your own way home. “Yeah, David,” you say tightly. You don’t particularly care if he can hear you. “You have fun with your friends.”

“Can’t hear… talk later… okay?”

You hang up and wander back toward the vendor selling elephant ears. 

~

“Miller.”

“Hi, Joel.”

“Honey, it’s loud. Can barely hear you. Are you safe?”

“I’m safe, Joel, I promise. It’s just—Uncontrolled Bleeding.”

“What?”

“No, I mean, the band. They’re really loud. I hate to ask, and I know it’s late, but—”

“What do you need?”

“I, uh… I need a ride home. I can’t get a cab, and all the Ubers around are taken, and the busses are rerouted all the way—”

“I’m comin’ to get you. You just wait for me at the entrance, okay, baby girl?”

“Thank you, Joel.”

“You know I said you could call me for anything. I meant it.”

“Okay. I’ll see you soon.”

“I’ll see you soon.”

“Oh! Wait—”

“What? What is it?”

“Do you want an elephant ear?”

~

Joel is white-knuckling the steering wheel when he arrives to pick you up. Despite the congestion around the festival grounds and the fact that your apartment is at least fifteen minutes away, Joel makes it to you in a mere five.

“Did you blow every red light to get here, Mr. Miller?” you ask with a playful smile as you secure your seatbelt and settle on the truck bench.

“I was in the area,” he says with a crooked smile, looking your way. “May have pushed forty a couple times, though.”

You sheepishly extend a cardboard takeout box filled with fried, powdered dough. “Will you take this as my sincere thanks, or will you expect a separate batch of lemon squares?”

Joel answers by dipping his head and taking a bite of the flattened, doughy bread. You watch every minute movement, his strong jaw working as he chews, indulging you even though he’s already done far too much to get you out of this rut. He doesn’t once break eye contact while he eats; you begin to chew subconsciously on your bottom lip.

“Ain’t bad,” he declares at last, and your shoulders deflate with a kind of relief, “but if you let me take you for some real dinner, I’ll forget about that extra batch.”

You tentatively reach for his mouth and swipe some powdered sugar from his moustache with the pad of your thumb. You feel his eyes scanning your face all the while. “Look at me, the lucky girl,” you say softly. “One date goes wrong, and there’s a strong, handsome man waiting to take me on another.”

From the very first day, Joel Miller has always taken his time when it comes to looking at you. It’s a penetrative stare that makes your skin heat up from the tips of your ears down to your chest. His eyes are so dark, pools of warm melted sugar, and you feel yourself leaning, trancelike, slow, into that cavernous gaze. Your body is not your own. It seeks the subtle warmth, the familiar scent—sawdust, coffee beans, rich, dark cologne—and the violent torrent of sensation that erupts from the contact point when he cups your cheek in one hand. 

You’re in the throes of attention, warm as a candle weeping fat waxen tears.

“Told you before,” says Joel, his thumb sweeping fondly across your chin, “you deserve somethin’ real.”

“Yeah,” you sigh happily, feeling all-too complacent under the touch of his rough palm, “maybe I do.”

Behind you, a car honks its horn, and Joel curses, pulling away from the curb. He takes you to Turner’s, a bar by campus that would be crawling with students if it weren’t for the festival. Joel comes around to the passenger’s door and opens it for you, helping you hop out with your hand enclosed in his. His palm is a steady weight on your back as you both walk inside the dim, stuffy bar. 

The back is bustling with activity—drunk folks playing pool or watching the Huskies’ football game or splitting their attention between both—but the bar itself has enough spaces open to fit the two of you. Here, the light is burnt orange, and it makes the strands of grey in his hair shimmer gold. His eyes observe his surroundings with a military precision before they flit back to you, magnetic.

“Shame to waste this dress on that asshole,” says Joel, sweeping his gaze down, back up, barely perceptible. “You’re too goddamn pretty for any of ‘em.”

You’re deliciously abuzz with the incisive way he compliments you. It feels like being punctured down to your very soul; you will never forget the shape of the stain his words leave. “Do you spy on all my dates, Joel?”

He smirks. “Don’t need to spy on ‘em, baby. They’re a bunch of obnoxious kids.”

You huff, resting your cheek against your palm. “I just don’t get it. I thought David was just fine. Then, he takes me on a date just to abandon me for his friends and tell me to find my own way home.”

Joel shakes his head, scoffing as he runs his fingers through his beard. He does that when he’s frustrated sometimes, and you wonder if his hair is soft or coarse. “Piece of shit doesn't know how good he got it.”

“You must know something I don’t,” you say mirthlessly, watching the bartender approach from the other end of the long honey-oak block. “I haven't been able to get a second date since I moved in.”

Joel is silent, eyes still firmly fixed to you, until the bartender arrives, a charming middle-aged woman with a particular Texan twang you could recognise from a mile away. “What’ll it be, Joel?” she asks, giving him a sweet dimpled smile. “Hi, honey. This old man botherin’ you?”

“Only in a nice way,” you reply, squeezing his shoulder. 

Joel hides his grin with a swipe of his fingers over his bottom lip. “Coffee for me, Rina. Drivin’ home.”

Rina’s eyes slide to you, and you ask for the same. You don't want to drink alone. She reappears moments later with two small, chipped mugs of dark roast in her hands. Setting them in front of you, she takes your food orders: a BLT for Joel and a veggie burger for yourself. It’s almost ten o’clock now, too late to eat, but your eyes droop sleepily and your stomach growls for a taste of real food. The powdered dough, shockingly, did not suffice. 

“You ever miss Texas?” Joel asks once you're halfway into your respective meals. You notice that he only digs into his sandwich when you aren't eating, and abstains briefly to watch while you take your bites. It's an exchange of energy, a steady vigil by your side, the hypnotic pull of his warm body. You cannot scoot any closer to him, but your leg brushes his where you rest your foot on his barstool. 

“I wish I remembered more of it,” you tell him. “I grew up a big city girl. Even lost my accent a year into being away. My dad would tease me about it all the time. Said I’d been gentrified.” You fondly shake your head. “Miss him like hell.”

“I can still hear it sometimes,” says Joel, tilting his head to the side, “when you get all passionate about somethin’. Like the time I installed your deadbolt and you tried to explain away your Backstreet Boys CD.”

You put your head in your hands. “Oh, God. I thought you'd forgotten.”

“Nuh-uh, baby, you ain't easy to forget. And I like when you get excited. You get this look in your eye.”

“Yeah?” You slide your foot up his ankle and bring the leg of his jeans with it. Up, down, you keep going, letting the relative darkness embolden you, his sweet little pet names and his silent adequacy enabling what is most definitely inappropriate behaviour. “Tell me about this look, Joel.”

He rests his elbow up on the bar and squares his broad shoulders to you. They eclipse all the other patrons behind him. “You've got pretty eyes,” he tells you. “First thing I noticed when I met you all those months ago. Saw how they lit up when you smiled. Heard your happiness when you told me about Texas. It was nice to be the reason you smiled, ‘n’ I just wanted to make it happen again. I couldn't say no to you. Don't know how any man ever could.”

The revelation stuns you in your seat. His expression telegraphs little save for his attentiveness, his posture locked parallel with yours, singularly focused on the way you react to him. 

You try for a joke. “And I was the only applicant.”

It crumbles, sand in your mouth. Something has shifted. Joel isn't the type to shy away from a conversation, but his gaze hasn't once shifted from your face. It feels like flames licking your cheeks, the heat of that look pushing in on both sides, inescapable. You find that you enjoy the way his attention makes you preen; you want him to look at you. 

He thinks you have pretty eyes. 

“You know that ain't the reason why,” he says, whisper-quiet and gruff amid the vague chatter in the bar. 

“Why, Joel?” you ask, spine straightening, teeth sinking into your bottom lip. As you suspected, his eyes flick down your face, lashes obscuring the precise shade of his irises. 

His Adam’s apple dips. “‘Cause I like you,” he says, the feeling of it like the slide of suede down your spine, “and I wanna keep you safe.”

You shrug slightly, giving him a smile. “I feel pretty safe.”

Joel’s hand drops to the bar top and his fingertips brush yours. The touch jolts your sleepy mind awake. “You're too good for every single one of those assholes you bring around. You know that, right?”

“I’m beginning to understand.” 

“You deserve someone who's gonna be good to you. Give you all the attention you need. Make you… happy.”

You swallow thickly, the candle flame pressing in, sucking the oxygen from your lungs. “Thank you, Joel.”

His fingers begin to creep up every ridge of your knuckles, slowly turning over your palm so it faces the ceiling. The rough pad of his thumb traces the long lifeline inside. 

“Repeat it.”

His eyes lift to yours, and for a moment, there’s something in them that ignites an instinct inside you to flee. There's danger in those eyes: the careful, measured restraint of a man who knows more anger than he lets show. A flicker, brief but incandescent, passes through your head, an electrical current. 

He’s the reason you never had a second date. 

It disappears the instant it comes, the Paterian glimpse of an idea in its entirety fleeing for the horizon, and the instinct recedes in favour of the warm, melting sensation his fingers disseminate through your bones. 

“I deserve someone who will be good to me,” you repeat, like a mantra. “I deserve someone who’s going to make me happy, and keep me safe.”

“That's right,” says Joel, brushing his thumb along the veins in your wrist. You feel the shiver, but you're locked to him, your eyes unable to take in any information apart from the way he feels, looks, smells. “You're a good girl, baby.”

Your lashes flutter and a sweeping rush of pressure descends on your core at the way those words sound on his tongue. You picture him directing you to your knees and calling you a good girl while you take his big cock between your lips, imagine the way he would hiss through his teeth, good fuckin’ girl, that’s it, baby girl, while he fucks you from behind, merciless. Hands and tongues and limbs would mould into one another, amalgamate, becoming indistinguishable. 

He would be good to you. You know it. He’s always been good to you. 

“Joel?” 

“Hmm.” Fingers still make idle patterns on your forearm. 

“I think you should take a look at my sink when you get a chance. It might be broken.”

No amount of coy suggestion could make him ignorant to your desire for closeness. You can feel your body screaming for it, grasping at him with buffed claws. Joel smirks, looking down at your foot making a path up and down his ankle. 

“I’ll take a look tomorrow.”

~

It’s two o’clock in the morning when a shuffling outside your bedroom door guides you out of a decent sleep. In total silence, the most minute noises can be deafening. But it sounds, to your sleep-addled brain, like the hasty retreat of footsteps. 

You blink awake, shifting onto your other side to peer above the darkness of your doorway. Through the bleary haze in your eyes, you notice a tiny red light in the upper corner of the room.  

You squint, rubbing your eyes furiously to pry them open wide, but your vision is the static grain of an old television, and your eyes refuse to adjust. Instead, you grumble, pulling your comforter over your head, and go back to sleep. 

You’ll tell Joel tomorrow.

THE LANDLORD

He cannot wait until the morning.

The nighttime, he discovered long ago, is a friend. It’s the gentle descent of darkness, the horizontal fall of the golden-hour sunlight scanning the entirety of the apartment before it at last succumbs to silent, tar-black night. Occasionally, a car will pass below, or the honk of a horn will tear jaggedly through the quiet, but most times, Joel can sink comfortably into the dark and assume his post.

Six months ago, he showed some restraint. 

Of course, the connection was instantaneous—the pretty girl standing in his foyer with a radiant smile on her face, drinking in the chipped paint and ancient railings and furniture imprinted with years of use, arrested all movement of his heart. You wore a white dress and a pair of strappy sandals, not suited whatsoever for walking the city but perfectly tailored to make an impression. You arrived punctually, all smiles and handshakes and Southern politeness despite your insistence that you'd left it all behind. You shone. And when Joel slid his rough, work-worn hand into yours, dipping his gaze to watch the way he dwarfed your fingers, he felt a tremor roll gently from your body to his, thunder over a mountain. He wanted to chase the next lightning strike. 

It began leisurely, like a hobby, something he could go to when life got a little much. He watched you come home, examining the way your shoulders rounded slightly when you were upset and the way you wiggled your fingers in a wave to those passing by when you were happy. He watched, typically from the garden out front, as you pranced about your balcony on cool mornings to the electronic croonings of Britney Spears, curled up in a chair with a blanket over your legs and a coffee mug warming your hands, or watered your thriving plants from where they hung in the direct morning sunlight. Your day-to-day became his day-to-day. 

And then, he was doing more than merely watching. He was following. 

Your favourite coffee place by the apartment building, just a block away. He lingered far behind that first morning, his fingers twitching in your direction before the rest of his body steered him. The neighbourhood wasn't so great back then, prone to muggings and the like. He wanted to keep you safe. That was all.

You ordered something cold, too sweet for his tastes, and sat for a while as you worked. The barista spent the rest of your time there eyeing you up whenever he could. Joel scoffed. He wouldn't know what the fuck to do with you. Just a goddamn kid. 

He followed you to work and back, on those rare days he wasn't occupied maintaining the grounds. You sat in a corner cubicle with a decent amount of sunlight and typed away on your laptop all day. Joel monitored the company’s publications just so he could have a glimpse of the way you wrote; he wasn't interested in makeup, but he bought a subscription to Viva because he wanted to trace his fingers over your name in those small italic letters. MANAGING EDITOR. 

Your writing is clean, efficient, and smooth. It reads like velvet. He keeps a pile of magazines and newsletters tucked in the back of his bookshelf. For the August edition, they printed your interview with a local prizewinning novelist; you beamed in the picture, photographed in your favourite coffee shop, so happy and so generous, sharing your talent with others. 

He was so fucking proud. 

Five months ago, he watched you bring a date home for the first time. 

It blindsided him. He could not prepare, plan, or sabotage. He could not do a thing as you guided the man—a fucking kid with a too-big ego, grinning smugly for his imminent conquest—inside the elevator. Joel could only watch helplessly, wiping his brow from his precarious place on the ladder, as you walked past him with no more than a soft, sweet smile. He never forgot the painful imprint of that smile on his eyelids. It still burns his eyes late at night, when he stays awake inside his office, monitoring his dual screens. He will pinch the bridge of his nose and close his eyes just to replay the memory of that look. 

The kid left the next morning, before you woke. He never contacted you again. You trudged into the lobby that day, a weariness in your eyes that did not match the vibrant colour of your dress. You spoke idly to another woman in the elevator about your broken thermostat, hugging yourself to keep warm. 

It was working perfectly a few hours later, and there was a bouquet of roses waiting for you at the concierge’s desk. Fiddling with the red ribbon, tears welling in your eyes, you asked who the admirer was. Sam shrugged his shoulders, but when you turned to look out the front windows, you saw Joel tending to the red roses in the garden bed. 

It earned him the first taste of your baking. Biting into one of those moist, warm brownies felt like melting a little piece of you down and moulding it into the shape of his mouth. It felt like taking a piece of the girl he’d coveted for weeks and rolling it over his tongue, keeping it. Swallowing it down. There it rested inside his stomach until the next time he did you right. 

He wanted to tell you no. To insist that he would do anything to make you feel good even if you wanted nothing to do with him. To make it clear that he did everything for you, not for some feeble professional relationship between a landlord and his tenant. He breathed you. He needed you. 

So, four months ago, he began to watch you through the cameras.

They’re small, discreet, tucked into holes in the wall that have been spackled over, repainted, re-sanded. He ran the wiring while you were at work, listening to your CDs on loop to get a better sense of the earworms you hummed on your way out the door every morning. One in the living room, one by the entrance, and one in the bedroom. 

He could keep you safe this way. This way, he would know if those men you brought you home were treating you right—fucking you like you deserved. 

You were so goddamn pretty when you came. For months Joel had sat in his office, slicked-up cock in his hand, jerking himself hard and fast to the pictures of you in Viva. For months he’d spilled over his fingers, on his belly, on the glossy pages of the magazines. The heady, cloying scent of his own sweat and cum stuck to his nostrils. It wasn’t enough. He could imagine wrenching open your tight little pussy all he wanted—the slow, heavy drag of his cock between your hot, wet walls and the sweet noises he’d steal from your tongue—but it wasn’t the satisfaction he needed. 

Joel needed you. Your body, your smile, your voice. He needed to wrap you tight around every vein, a tourniquet, squeezing until all feeling was lost.

You would be his, in time. He just needed to make it so.

The first time he watched you pleasure yourself, rain pattered gently against the window panes and thunder echoed in the distance. A couple grids had already lost power, and Joel had a backup generator if the apartment was next, but you did not seem to mind one bit that the storm drew closer. You clicked off the television, retired to the confines of your bed and its soft white linens, and slipped your hand beneath your flimsy shorts. Joel sat upright, his back creaking in protest, his knuckles white around the edge of his desk as he watched, unblinking, the way your fingers gently circled your clit. 

He didn't touch his cock once that night, no matter how deeply his own need tugged at him. He couldn't look away from the camera feed for fear that he may miss the moment you reached your orgasm. 

When it arrived, it was delicious to watch. Your back arched, your lips parted, and your eyes fluttered shut, fingers rapidly rubbing your slick pussy as you seized under your own ministrations and slowly settled, melting into the mattress. He needed to see more. He needed to be there. 

You were a chiaroscuro of savoury, sultry magnetism and the ichor of the morning sunlight. You were kind and thoughtful. You were gentle, patient, attentive. You were one hell of a baker. You were so fucking sexy it made his tongue prickle with the prospective taste, the anticipation of touching your soft skin engulfing any sense. Reason had no place in Joel Miller’s mind when it came to the sweet girl upstairs. 

Three months ago, you had recovered from the evident betrayal inherent in expecting more from your date than a one-night stand. The next man was older, a partner at a law firm, and took you to dinner at a nice restaurant. He asked questions about you and reciprocated your enthusiasm for good cuisine. He was kind and treated you well. But an incendiary rage ignited in Joel at the sight of the bastard’s hand on your lower back. Another man was touching you. Another man was getting close to you, making you smile, whispering in your ear. Another man was attempting to claim what was rightfully his. 

Joel followed your date home that night instead. He lived in a high-rise downtown, the sort of building that had a doorman and a valet. 

Joel followed him down to the underground lot with a lead pipe in hand. 

“‘scuse me.”

He shut his car door and turned around, giving Joel a polite smile. “What can I do for you?”

A calculated sheepish scratch on the back of his head. “Just… ah, shit, I don’t mean to bother, but my engine isn't turnin' over and my phone died. Mind if I used yours?”

He patted his pockets for his cell and gave it enthusiastically. Joel did not take the phone. He used the proximity to pull the man close and bring the pipe down across his head. 

Blood bloomed, pretty and potent and rich as the roses he planted for you. The body made little noise, the skull shattered upon impact, the legs crumpling. It could never have been much of a man, going down so fucking quick. Should've put up a fight. 

The man must not have liked you very much to let himself die. Joel, whose eyelids were tattooed with your radiant smile, would have crawled his way back out of a certain grave. Joel loved you. You belonged to him. This was a necessary consequence. 

The pipe was dented by the time he was finished. Joel sank to his knees once the body fell, bringing it down again and again, the meticulous arc of the rusted metal uniquely stirring. It felt so fucking good, battering the skull to pieces, blood and brain and bone fragments accumulating on the ground and the pipe and his face. It felt good knowing he had kept another man from betraying you, hurting you, fucking you only to leave in a blur. He was being altruistic. He was becoming a good man for you. 

Joel, kneeling in the pool of warm blood until his jeans were soaked crimson, rubbed his hand down his face and smeared the blood across it. Chest heaving, he let the grin stretch his face. 

He had found his calling. 

Two months ago, he slipped inside your apartment while you were asleep.

You had a rough day. Your boss insisted the company could not afford to give you a raise despite skyrocketing share prices and all the fucking work you’d done for them. The rain started just before you left the building, holding back tears, and a car splashed icy, muddy water on you during your walk home. Salt in the wound. You were sniffling as you let yourself into the apartment, your hands trembling with the effort of shouldering your bag and your misery. Joel approached you from behind and lifted the bag onto his shoulder. 

“Hi, Joel.” Sad and soft and still so polite despite it all. 

“Hey.” He opened every door for you on the way to the elevator and rode it up with you for good measure. “Wanna talk about it?”

You just shook your head and sidled up next to him, your cheek resting on his shoulder. He held his breath, overcome with the sensation that if he moved an inch, the spell would break, and the comfort you sought from him would slip between your fingers. Your arm brushed his, your dewy lashes fluttering as you finally let yourself relax. Joel inhaled, and the scent of you cleaved him down the middle: rain and perfume. 

“Would you give me a raise?”

He looked down at you and smiled. “For a batch of those cupcakes, I’d give you whatever you like.”

It was a half-truth. He’d give you whatever you wanted, cupcakes or no. The sound of your laughter dripped into his bloodstream, saline. It cleansed him of the wrongs he'd committed. He was doing what needed to be done. The world had to realise it turned for you, and then all would be right. 

Hours later, when the sun finally dipped below the horizon, shrouded by distant skyscrapers, he sneaked his way inside. His master key made easy work of the lock, but he had to pull the chain lock off with a pair of pliers because his hands could not reach between the gap. He made clinical work of it and stepped inside. 

There was a chair in the corner of your bedroom for days you felt like reading by the window. Joel lowered himself into it and began his vigil. 

It was a science to study the way you slept. He began to learn the patterns of your breathing, the minute movements of your limbs and how they translated to the moods of your dreaming. The amount of times you turned around, groaned, or hummed correlated directly to the sort of day you'd had. He began to map your tells in his head, drawing them out, formulating blueprints of the simple things that made you. 

To Joel, it was like connecting a red string between thumb tacks, like pouring the varnish over a finished painting, sealing a promise, closing an envelope. He enjoyed the satisfactory slotting of each puzzle piece into place, creating your image, finally knowing you.

By then, he’d caught the virus. He’d let himself get close, and now he was infected with it—that insatiable need to be near, to watch, to admire from mere feet away. 

He continued to acquaint himself over the weeks with your sleeping self to supplement the time he could not spend with you while you were awake. On more than one occasion, he got careless, letting himself succumb to sleep in that corner chair, joining you in the dream world. In those dreams, you were wrapped up in his body, warm and soft and tight, and he was taking. He was behind you, on top of you, beneath you, forcing you to look in the mirror as he spread you open on his cock and wrapped his fingers around your throat. In those dreams, your eyes rolled back and your lips moulded to the shape of Joel, yes, oh my God, and he'd whisper back to you—my sweet girl, my good fuckin’ girl, all mine. 

And you were. You were his. 

Tonight, he followed you to the festival. 

He watched you make a beeline for the necklace you wanted only to pout when you saw it had disappeared. He watched your face fall as David’s rejection sank bone-deep. He reeled in his own gnawing rage, pushing deep down that urge to storm right in and rip out the asshole’s throat with his goddamn teeth, and waited until you called him. 

He knew you would. You trusted him. You needed him. You needed a strong, capable man to take care of you the way you deserved. So he waited inside his truck by the phone, happy to at last hear your sweet voice on the other end of the line. 

Thank you, Joel. 

He tucked those words under his ribs, letting them flower and spread. Those words gave him purpose, made him buzz with erratic energy, validated all his actions. He was doing everything right. 

Your dress was so fucking pretty. Jesus, he wanted to slip his hands under the hem, finger the waistband of those pink panties he knew you were wearing, and bunch the fabric up around your hips as he stuffed you full of his dick. Fuck, he would fill you up with his cum and tuck your panties back over your abused pussy, keeping all of him safe inside. You’d be so happy. You’d get drunk off his cock, begging for it, crying for it. He’d give you everything. 

You do feel safe with him. You said it yourself. 

Now, leaning against the doorway in your bedroom, Joel turns the heart-shaped pendant over and over in his palm, rubbing his thumb over the smooth gold surface. It’s cool and quaint and will kiss your skin beautifully. But he needs to wait for the right time. He needs to make sure you’re ready. 

The sense memory of your fingers on his skin, gracious and gentle, the way you always are, is pushing at the edges of his control. 

There's no one like you. He’s never been more certain of anything. 

You're so goddamn sweet in those tiny silk pyjamas, your body curled up on the bed and your leg slung over a large pillow. You may feel cold and lonely at night, but that's only for now. He won't let you feel alone much longer; his body calls to you, singing your name. He has only so much restraint, and he's been waiting for six months. 

Your lips are slightly parted, your face smooth and serene under the spell of sleep. You're the reason he fixes what's broken. The world needs to be better for you. It needs to be safe and bright and perfect. 

He planted tulips today. You’ll appreciate them, he thinks. He wants you to wake up to vibrant colours every morning and go to sleep knowing that he thinks about you. 

You shift slightly in your sleep, a soft moan leaving your mouth as you hug the pillow closer. Joel straightens in the doorway, wondering if your mind can sense him nearby. He doesn't know what he would do with himself if you were dreaming about him. His eyes move from your pretty face down your chest, barely concealed by the tiny top you're wearing, to find the apex of your thighs, temptingly spread on the mattress. 

He won't. He can't. You’ll never trust him if he loses himself to desire. Joel grits his teeth, his cock achingly hard in his jeans, and unbuckles his belt as silently as he can. He pulls out his dick and squeezes himself at the base, staving off what he knows will be a too-fast orgasm. You move again, your body stretching out on the bed. Joel spits into his palm and begins to stroke his cock. 

He can see a sliver of your waist where your shirt rides up, half of your ass where your leg is slung over the pillow, and your tits smushed together just over the hem of that scrap of a top. You're all of his fucking fantasies rolled into one. Joel breathes hard through his nostrils, his fist tight around the tip of his cock. 

He wants to shuck down those little shorts and put his face in your pretty pussy. He wants to grab your hips and guide his cock inside you. He wants to slide into your addictive cunt until you forget your name. Until you forget every name but his. Your soul will be stained with him. His has never forgotten your shape.

God, your tight pussy would feel so fucking good around his cock. He jerks himself roughly, bracing his hand against the doorframe when a little whimper leaves your mouth. Fuck, he mouths, gritting his teeth so hard that his jaw begins to ache. He fucks his own fist, sloppy and unrefined, eyes fixed to your waiting pussy between creamy-soft thighs. His cock dwarfs your slit, eager to spread you open—he’ll fix so nicely once he gets you ready. 

Joel feels his stomach tighten, his balls pulling up, his jaw taut as he brings himself to a high over your body the way he has so many times. He switches so he can jerk off into the hand around which his gift to you is coiled, spilling his cum all over his fingers and the necklace as he bites into the heel of his palm. His spine decompresses and his cock slowly softens in his hand, the tension briefly relieved. His fist gradually loosens around the cum-slick necklace; the heart has imprinted its shape into his palm. 

You stir, turning over in your bed, and Joel hastily departs, tucking his cock back into his jeans. He has enjoyed this brief interlude, but he has work to do. 

Besides, he’ll see you in a few hours. He knows damn well the sink works just fine, but he’ll take any excuse to see you again. And it seems you’ll do the same. 

~

Joel keeps him in a spare apartment in the building, one whose walls have been padded for soundproofing. 

Joel’s sleeves are rolled to his elbows and he's occupying the chair across from David, who's taking his sweet fuckin’ time waking up. Joel’s been pacing for a half-hour, rubbing his fingers over his bottom lip, contemplative, but the bastard won't move. 

So Joel takes a seat, grabs a fistful of the kid’s hair, and yanks it forcefully so he’s staring him right in the face. 

One eye is already blackened—Joel got a little carried away. The sedative worked perfectly, but David has a punchable face. It took all he had not to keep going. 

“Mornin’, sunshine,” says Joel as the kid slowly blinks awake, bleary and unfocused. “Eyes on me, now. Don't want you slippin’ away again.”

David only stares for a moment, gears grinding gently to life in his brain Once that animal instinct kicks in, the kid starts writhing against his restraints, bucking hard in Joel’s unrelenting grip. It's useless, of course. He’s tied by the wrists and ankles. Helpless. 

Good. 

“What—why the fuck… let me fucking go, man, please,” groans the kid. 

“You made a mistake, David,” says Joel. “Think I’m gonna forget about that?”

David whimpers, flexing his hands subconsciously as pain undoubtedly prickles his scalp. Joel hasn't let go of his hair. “Please just let me go, man. I swear I didn't do anything. If you want money, I’ve got money.”

Joel smirks, a scoff slipping out. This is rich. The delectable flame licks up his throat again, indistinguishable from the pleasure of a good meal, a good fuck. It's craving. It’s darkness. He sinks deeper. 

“You think it's manly to leave your date for your friends and leave her to find a way home herself? You think it's funny to treat her like a little toy and then leave her when you're done?” Joel sneers. “You didn't even call her back, David.”

He whines out another please, his ankles ineffectually kicking out. “I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Just let me go. Fuck, it hurts.”

“You don't know,” says Joel, repeating it, slow and savoury, rolling it around in his mouth. “You wanna know the most insulting part, David? You don't even care. You made her upset, and you didn't get on your goddamn knees to beg her forgiveness. You didn't do everything in your fuckin’ power to get her back.” Joel brings the knife from his pocket and idly pushes the tip into David’s cheek. “You think she ain't worth that, David? Tell me the truth, now.”

David shrieks, hysterical, the terror and pain so fucking delicious that Joel gulps it down and yet still wants. 

“Are you fucking kidding me? No bitch is fucking worth it. She was cute, but that's it, I swear. I didn't know she had a boyfriend. I wouldn't have—”

The knife digs, gouges, splitting skin and prodding muscle. Joel can feel the edge of the blade slot between the kid’s teeth. He howls, screaming for help to nobody that can help, not quite gone enough yet to realise his utter hopelessness. Joel will have to rectify that.

“Oh, I ain't her boyfriend yet,” Joel says calmly. “But I am hers, way she's mine. And you hurt what's mine. I can’t forget that.”

The knife retreats to admire its handiwork. The cheek is split, the edges jagged, spitting blood. The kid’s tears slip down his face and dip into the wound, salty enough to hurt. He screams and he cries and it’s beginning to get on Joel’s nerves.

“Please stop,” he cries, watching his assailant rear back and grip the knife tight, like an ice pick. “Please… fuck, please—!”

He’s getting real sick of that word. Please. A mere please can’t excuse the look he put on your face last night. A please will not absolve him of the cardinal sin. 

No one—no one—makes you frown. 

Joel sinks the knife into David’s knee, using both hands to drive it to the hilt. The kid’s face is ashen, white and grey as clouds rolling in, and his frail screams begin to peter out; he’s losing consciousness. Joel won’t have that—not until he’s finished.

“Stop whinin’, David. A real man falls in front of his woman and makes things right. A real man fixes what's broken. And a real man”—he twists the knife, gorging, glutting on the feeling of making amends on your behalf—“does everything in his power to show her he loves her.” 

“Please…” The final, feeble attempt of a doomed man to return from the cliff’s edge. 

Joel stands, adjusting his grip on the kid’s hair, and brings his knife just beneath his chin. When he drives it upward, he can see the shimmer of the blade through David’s slack, open mouth. 

“I told you to stop whinin’.” 

~

He’s in your bedroom again. 

He felt the need calling to him, vibrating with a particular intensity he could not ignore. He rarely comes to see you twice in one night, but now that he's here, he knows it was the only way to settle his nerves. 

You're asleep, lips parted against your pillow and a piece of hair fluttering in front of your face with every exhale. Joel approaches your bedside and tucks it safely behind your ear. You don't wake, but you hum sleepily, hugging your pillow closer. Joel smiles, satisfaction sinking deep and assured into his core. He's done right by you. You’ll go happily to him. Moth to a gemlike flame. 

He wanders around the edge of the bed, gaze lazily indulging in your body as he goes. His cock twitches again with a need he cannot yet meet, the desire to move your panties aside and fill you with him. He does not. He kneels at your bedside, closest to where your legs have scissored apart beneath your sheets. The temptingly sweet call of that warm place between your thighs has Joel shifting your comforter aside and ghosting his fingers across the soft skin of your calf. 

Your breathing deepens slightly, like you're sucking in a long mouthful of air, and then you settle. It's the only indication you give that you can feel his presence. And then it’s gone, and he’s hooking his fingers in the waistband of your pretty panties and bestowing upon himself what he's only seen through screens for months. 

You're spread open and glistening, an indication of some preceding dream or fantasy playing out in that keen, busy mind. Your body is wholly pliant, so soft and glowing in the faint silvery light streaming in from the window, and it would be so easy to—

No. He will not taste you. If he does, he won’t stop. You need to trust him. There is blood on his hands that hasn’t yet washed clean, and he will not imprint those rust-red fingerprints on your body. You’re his world—what kind of man willingly imparts such pain onto a world he loves?

Some infinitesimal fractal lodged in Joel’s head obliged him to return to you tonight, to cleanse himself of the events that transpired under the illicit cover of night. The very sight of you reminds him what he’s doing this for. He crushes his nose into the wet spot that darkens your panties and inhales deeply, acquiring some sense of what you will taste like. The smell makes his head go fuzzy, intoxicated, tang and sweetness and impending gratification. In your sleep, you sigh, melting against the mattress.

Joel brings your panties back up over your pussy and thinks, Tomorrow. 

THE TENANT

You're miserable when Joel knocks on your door the next day. 

“He hasn't called me,” you tell him, letting yourself stew, sulking from the feeling of yet another man deciding you weren’t worth a follow-up phone call. “Am I repulsive? Am I a total freak? Is it something in my perfume?”

Joel looks down at you, lips parted as if on the precipice of a response, sweeping his gaze up and down your body. You’re wearing a simple sweater and skirt, but fuck, he can make you feel naked. His gaze penetrates deeper than flesh. It’s only then you realise he’s holding coffee. 

Two cups of coffee. 

“Oh, Joel,” you sigh, licking your bottom lip. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess,” he says with a crooked smile, his voice a bit raspy, as if caught off-guard. He hands you your favourite drink—caramel macchiato, double espresso—from your favourite place down the block, and you could kiss him with how good it feels to hold the cool, condensation-slick cup in your hands. Your entire body deflates with the first sip. 

“You’re my hero,” you tell him. “I mean it.”

Joel shakes his head fondly. “You got a funny sense of heroics.”

“They taste exactly like this,” you say playfully, tracing the rim of the plastic cup. “Thank you, Joel.”

He swipes his thumb across your chin. “It’s only coffee, baby.”

Since last night, something is inexplicably different. A new, once-forbidden boundary has been crossed. It may be technically inappropriate for your landlord to bring you coffee, touch you so intimately, call you baby. But it makes you feel like warm melting honey, and who is to say a feeling like that is wrong?

He’s wearing a blue T-shirt today. His hair is tousled like he slept on it, and your fingers tingle with the anticipatory sensation of how it would feel to take fistfuls of his locks in your hands. He’s stunning. And you catch yourself staring too late, tearing your gaze away the way one retracts their hand after burning it on the stovetop. Your heart skittering, you direct Joel to the sink and plan some excuse in your head for why it has miraculously fixed itself overnight. 

But he doesn’t even spare a glance toward any of your appliances. He’s only looking at you. 

“I got somethin’ else,” he says, almost shy, reaching into his pocket for a tiny box. 

He grimaces when your eyes, wide and obviously panicked, meet his. “Jesus, I didn’t really think about how this looks. I’m not… proposin’, I swear.”

You both release a nervous laugh, but you cannot deny that your nerves are still fluttering at the sight of that simple suede box in his big hands.

He opens the lid and you gasp. It’s your necklace—the very same heart-shaped pendant you had been eyeing up at the festival. It’s shiny and polished and precisely, undeniably, the same one. “Oh my God,” you whisper, gently sliding your finger over the cool golden pendant. “It’s beautiful. Joel, how did you…”

“Turn around,” he says softly, the gentle direction guiding you better than any hand could. You obey, and Joel steps forward until his hard chest is flush to your back. He’s warm and sure and smells so good—cologne and coffee and mint and something potent, like iron—and all your questions fizzle to sparks in the air. You can no longer grasp for them. You reach out and you only find him.

His touch is careful. The heart-shaped pendant settles against your breastbone and shimmers in the afternoon light. Your chest briefly shimmers with the thought that you were made to wear this necklace. His large, rough hands ghost across the back of your neck as he secures the clasp, and you shiver. A single knuckle trails slowly down your spine, bumping every vertebrae on the way. 

“It ain't your perfume.” His deep, grumbling voice is equivalent to the scratch of his beard against your temple as his jaw moves with each word. “And you're nothin’ close to repulsive. Look in that mirror and tell me what you see.”

There is a mirror, a full-length one by the entrance to your apartment, and it's surreal to watch your own body turn to face it, to watch yourself defer entirely to the man behind you. It feels nice to just let him steer you every which way. 

“I see you,” you tell him, your hand lifting to the pendant on your throat. “And this.”

Joel clicks his tongue, his nose sliding up your temple. “What else do you see?”

You watch your lashes flutter, your head listing slightly to the side. “I see myself.”

“Hmm.” It’s a sound of approval, his palm now sliding around your waist and his arm banding across your body. He presses his hand to your hip bone and pulls you back against him. “Such a beautiful girl in that mirror. Ain't that right?”

“Joel, I…” You can feel his swelling erection prodding your ass and your head feels hazy with a heady, lustful desire you can no longer ignore or dismiss. “I don't think we should be…”

“No?” His mouth curves against your temple and you shiver at the coarse scratch of his moustache on your skin. It feels deliberate, premeditated. “I won’t tell a soul,” he murmurs, his thumb stroking your hip right where the hem of your sweater begins to inch upward. You can see a strip of your own bare stomach in the mirror. He’s making your eyes droop, your lashes flutter, your body light up from one nerve ending to the next, a closed circuit.

Oh, God. His touch is measured, gentle yet barely restrained. It is dipping a finger into the water just as it nears its boiling point. Months of staring and dreaming and retreating to your bed to touch yourself to thoughts of someone you cannot touch have led you here: his necklace, his gift to you, sitting prettily on your throat, his capable hands moulding you slowly to the shape of him. He’s touching you. 

“You like me?” His voice rubs hard on your ears, sanding you down, smoothing the rough edges. He lets you linger on the precipice, a firm grip on your hand, letting you make the choice: to let go, or to reel yourself in. 

“I like you,” you whisper, snapping the tether and plummeting to the warm, wet earth below.

You watch Joel’s eyes close in the mirror, something like a prayer falling from his lips. It does not take the shape of words—it is gruff and yet soft, hardly loud enough to discern over the ringing in your ears—but it’s so reverent that you can picture yourself falling to your knees at the sound of it. 

His hand skims up your waist until he finds your throat, gently pinching your jaw so he can direct the turn of your head. You go easily, tilting your gaze back to rest your temple on his shoulder, as his other hand slides up from your hip to your ribs, grazing the underside of your breast. “You like me enough to touch you like this?” 

You gasp, finding an anchor in the deep brown—nearly black, now—of his eyes. They’re warm  but they’re dangerous; once you look, the cage door slides shut, and you’re trapped. 

This must be one of your many dreams.

“Yes, Joel.”

“Mmm.” He smirks, teasing his tongue across his plush bottom lip. You watch the movement and feel yourself tightening, want want want a chorus in your ears. “You wanna kiss me, baby girl?”

Silently, you nod, your fingers gently sliding through his silky locks while your other hand seeks the strong balancing force of his shoulder. His smile sobers to a deep, stunning severity, and you cannot think to let it frighten you when you’re already slanting your mouth over his. 

It starts slowly. His mouth is soft, his hands deftly returning the fervour with which you hold him, cupping the back of your neck with his other hand warming your ribs. A small gasp escapes you, and a rumble of satisfaction passes from his chest through yours, and it flips an ineffable switch inside him. 

Joel turns you in his arms, his chest pressed to yours, his hand shooting out to brace against the wall as he walks you back toward it. Sufficiently cornered, you let your body melt into him, his palm now warming your lower back, his tongue feverishly seeking the seam of your lips. You let him pry you open, tasting the coffee and mint on his breath and inhaling the rich scent of him, sticking it with greedy hands to the walls of your brain. You’ll never tire of him, of this. 

He kisses you like a glutton seeking more fulfilment, like an aesthete seeking that exhilarating, fleeting moment in time, desperate and unwavering and famished. Tongues slide together, hands grope and wander, fabrics shift. You can feel your sweater lifting at the same time your fingers finally find the hem of his T-shirt, but he beats you to the chase. You’re dizzy by the time he breaks away to remove your shirt, but you dutifully lift your arms to help him. 

You seek his mouth again to resume the kiss, but Joel is decidedly feeling pious. He kisses his way down your throat, the necklace dangling from it, your sternum, your belly, sinking to his knees as he goes along. His hands are firm on your hips, squeezing, keeping you in place, while his mouth draws a map of you, eliciting the honeyed sensation of warm water dripping down your body.

“Oh, God,” you whisper, your head knocking back against the wall. It's so much. You've never been the object of attention quite like this, the marble statue at which the devout kneel, obsessive in their worship. You've never had a man fall to his knees to put his mouth all over you. 

Has he wanted you as long as you’ve pined for him? 

Joel grunts, his lips dragging open-mouthed kisses from one hip to another, his fingers hooking in the waistband of your skirt and yanking it down. You yelp, grasping his shoulders. 

Joel only growls into your skin, his hands dropping to your ass and kneading you while he continues down past your hips. “So fuckin’ beautiful,” he grumbles. “So goddamn pretty. Don’t know how I waited this fuckin’ long. Jesus, baby girl, you're perfect. Goddamn perfect.”

His ramblings are poison. Every word infects, squeezing out your healthy cells, replacing them with the delicious scrape of fire against the ceiling of a room. The scratch of his beard. The sweet nurturing sound of his voice. The cared-for sensation of being kissed and touched and spoken to like you're someone worth a second date. Like you're worth the price of all the world and a couple stars, too. 

And so the words slip out, shy and whisper-quiet and your cheeks burning hot enough to blister. 

“Please, Daddy…”

Joel’s hands tighten on your body, a fractional movement that kicks up the frantic beating of your heart. He tilts his head back to gaze up into your eyes and you feel more naked with that single stare than ever before. 

“That what you need, sweet thing?” he says, pressing his lips to your inner thigh. “You need Daddy to make you feel good?”

“Mhm,” you whine, the pitch of your voice pathetic and needy. You watch him crush his nose into your inner thigh, nipping at your sensitive flesh, and his name leaves your mouth in a sob. 

“‘m gonna need words,” he commands, biting you again in reproach. “Talk to me, baby girl. Tell me what you want.”

“I want you to make me come,” you plead, grasping his soft greying hair in your fingers. “Please.”

“You gonna call me what you wanna call me?” he prompts, smacking your thigh. “C’mon, baby, lemme hear it.”

“Daddy!” you cry out, your hand tightening in his locks. “Fuck, Daddy, please make me come.”

Joel growls, bringing your soaked panties down your legs. Your knees nearly knock together, but he’s shouldering his way between them, bringing one up onto his wide shoulder. You're spread open like this, bared plainly for your landlord to feast upon at his will. The sight of his lips parted, waiting and ready to take your pussy into his mouth, has you trembling. 

He gives a slow, experimental lick, sliding the flat of his tongue through your wet slit. You shudder, your head lolling against the wall. One teasing drag of his tongue and you’re butter, humming and whimpering for more, Daddy, please as he takes his fucking time tasting what you have to offer. 

“Goddamn sweet,” he grumbles, his blunt nails digging crescent moons into the flesh of your ass, pulling your body flush to him. “Waited so fuckin’ long for this.” You watch the fire ignite from red- to blue-hot in Joel’s eyes, his gaze shuttering as he loses himself, devoted entirely to the process of unravelling you. 

The next time he dips his tongue between your folds, he does it deliberately, calculated, as if he has already memorised your shape and now seeks to pry you open. He parts your lips to make way for his mouth, hot and soft against your clit. Softly, you cry out, watching as he presses a featherlight kiss to your pearl. You try to grind against his face, needing more, but a resounding slap to your ass stops you dead. 

“No takin’ what I don’t give,” he says. “You understand me?”

You pout, but you nod your head anyway. 

He decides it isn’t good enough and abruptly takes your clit between his teeth in a scolding bite. 

“Repeat. It.”

“I’ll only take what you give,” you tell him. “I’ll be good.”

Apparently satisfied, he hums, diving back in and finally—finally—sucks on your needy clit. “Oh!” He’s eager, sure, but he’s practised. He’s meticulous in the way he applies pressure to your clit, lapping at you greedily and pulling back to draw your pleasure into measured tidal waves. You crest only to recede from shore, and then his lips suction to you again, his hand snaking around to your front and pressing down on your lower belly. 

“Fuck!” you squeak, your stomach tightening as the dizzying pleasure overcomes you. “Joel, I’m gonna—!”

The orgasm pulls you under, drowning you with a forceful hand, your lungs sucking in mouthfuls of air. You seize, your heel digging into Joel’s muscled back, your fingers fisting his hair, your cunt clenching desperately around nothing, begging to be filled. Joel keeps his mouth on you all the while, licking you through your high, and you think it’s a benevolent act until your orgasm gently fades and he continues to make out with your pussy as if it never happened.

“Ah! Joel, please—” It’s so much. Too much; your pussy contracts relentlessly at the endless attention from his tongue, happily licking your clit and relishing the faint throbbing underneath it. It’s like he’s starved. His eyes are closed, his beard glistening with your wetness, his fingers dimpling your flesh as he pulls you right along to another high. 

Two thick fingers gather up the juices you’ve leaked onto your thighs and push them back into your hole, insistent in their desire to enter. You gasp, your heart in your fucking throat: “That’s only two?”

He chuckles, but the vibration only makes you jump, letting his fingers sink inside your cunt to the knuckle. “Oh, fuck, fuck, Daddy, that feels so good, please make me come again, I need it, please—!”

Joel groans into your pussy, curling his fingers toward him so they press against a spongy spot inside you that sends your head spinning, your mind folding in on itself. All you know is the next orgasm, the best way to get him to give it to you, the fastest way to reach that indelible place once more, just once more—

Joel’s hand applies more pressure to your belly, and you scream, clawing desperately at his shoulder as you give yourself over to something much, much stronger than an orgasm. It’s foreign, the creeping sensation of an invader taking up residence in your body. You cannot see, cannot hear. It assumes control, tearing a cry from your mouth and locking all your limbs tight and splashing your wetness all over Joel’s chin, beard, shirt. 

You think he only stops because you begin to list; he catches you around the hips and presses a soft kiss to your used little clit. “Mmmmm,” is vaguely how you manage to thank him, your eyes peeling slowly open. 

“I know, baby girl,” he says, stroking your hip bone with his thumb. He litters kisses all over your thighs, coaxing you through the minute twitching of your muscles as they relax. “You did so good for me, pretty girl. So fuckin’ beautiful. My sweet girl.”

You shiver in his grasp, watching as he makes his way back up your body. He swipes his forearm across his wet beard and you moan a little at the sight. “Nobody’s ever…”

Joel crowds you, his hand cupping the back of your neck so he can guide your gaze up to him. “That's what you don't understand, sweetheart,” he says. “You can try to find another man to make you happy, but he won't be me. I’m the only one who’s gonna treat you right.”

“Joel…” Sense begins to push at the edges of your brain, but you only slump further into his touch, letting him secure your hair behind your ear. “This isn't right,” you whisper. “I pay you every month to live here. People will know. People will talk about me.”

“People have suffered worse for a hell of a lot less.” 

You have no time to decode his words because he grabs your hand and presses your palm over his chest. Beneath the shirt and the warm, tanned skin, you feel a strong, rapid heartbeat, hammering away at his ribs. He maintains eye contact, the gaze incisive, peering right into the cluster of wiring inside your head that calls his name. “You feel my heart and you tell me this ain't real. You think this ain't love? You think it's obsession? Infatuation? Think I can’t see you lookin’ at me the way you do?”

His words pin you to the ground. They’re possessive, covetous—jealous. He wants you, and he knows you want him. All these months, he’s wanted you the way you’ve craved him; all the comforts and the roses and the baked goods in lieu of payment for substantial repair jobs; the times he’s let slide some late payments because I know it’s tough sometimes, the inexplicable kindnesses in your everyday. 

Joel Miller dedicated himself to you the second you arrived to see the prospective apartment. 

“You’re mine,” he says, his thumb stroking your jaw. “And I wanna hear you say it.”

People will call you a whore. They’ll think you’re pimping yourself out for cheaper rent. They’ll send you filthy looks. But the man in front of you makes you feel wanted. Desired. You’re better than all the dates that failed. You’re better than a shitty boss who won’t give you the raise you deserve. Joel is good to you. He’s always been.

“I’m yours, Joel Miller,” you say, resting your forehead against his. “Now please take me to bed.”

He grins, taking your hand and leading you to your bedroom. You get grabby straight away, fingering the hem of his shirt with a pleading look in your eye. You can still see the evidence of your orgasm staining the collar. “You can take it off, baby,” he says with that cocky smile, letting you lift the shirt over his head. In the sunlight, the grey in his hair shimmers, and his chest is bared to you. You lick your lips, placing your hands on his broad shoulders just to feel the way your palms contour to his dips and curves. 

You lean in and put your lips to his neck, tracing the shape of him down to the hollow of his throat, He tastes faintly of fresh air and sweat, and he smells like you. Your hands admire the warmth and strength underneath them, his body so tangible when only yesterday it was a distant dream. He lets you indulge, though his hands flex at his sides, and your fingers fumble with his belt buckle. 

“Help,” you mumble against his chest, bumping your nose into him. Joel chuckles, relieving you of your burden and shucking off his belt. It clinks along the floor somewhere nearby, and you can unbutton his jeans to bring them down, freeing his hard, throbbing cock. 

Your mouth waters at the sight. He’s thick and slightly curved, the tip leaking precum onto his belly, his balls heavy with the need to come. During those long nights after long days of work, you would imagine, for hours on end, what lingered just below his belt; the little trail of hair leading down his soft belly to your destination; the way his wide shoulders would bracket your body, shelter you from all the tough shit you could possibly suffer. You would picture all the ways you could thank him. You bite your bottom lip and ready yourself to sink to your knees, but Joel is having none of it. He attacks your mouth, kissing you deeply, his hands sliding up your back as if he's trying to count every vertebrae. He doesn't relent even when your knees hit the edge of the bed and you collapse backward onto the mattress. He only crawls over you and pins you beneath his hard body. 

“So pretty like this,” he says, lowering his head and nudging your chin upward with his nose to give himself better access to your throat. He sucks and nips at you all the way down, pausing at your heaving breasts. His fingers gently toy with one stiff nipple while his mouth occupies itself with the other, teasing it with his tongue and his teeth. You moan softly, content to watch him explore your body, squeezing your tits before he migrates downward. 

“Daddy,” you whisper, stroking his hair away from his face, your head falling back onto the pillows as his fingers part your folds once more. “Fuck, please, touch me. I need you inside me.”

Joel settles in between your open legs and takes his cock in his hand. You mewl for him, determined in the face of his big cock to fit it nicely inside you. “Mmm, you ready for me, baby girl? You need Daddy to fill you up, use you like a pretty little toy?” 

You’re nodding frantically, the words igniting you. “Please take me.”

Joel slaps the head of his cock against your clit, once, twice, watching your thighs twitch. Spreading the slick wetness from your pussy onto the tip, he finally guides himself to your hole and notches just inside. 

“Jesus,” he utters. “Jesus, you're a fuckin’ dream.”

“It’s real,” you pant, “I’m real.”

He begins to disappear inside you, wrenching you open, your poor pussy disused from going so long without decent sex. You feel the pinching pain give way to a delicious pressure in your core as he eases into you, taking it slow despite his taut jaw, his gritted teeth. Your cunt forms a tight seal around his length, your arousal lubricating his entry, and you feel lightheaded. He’s so fucking big—and he’s still going.

“Oh, my… Joel—”

“I know, baby.” He brings his thumb to your clit and helps you relax with every circular swipe. “I know what y’like.”

You keen up against him, your thighs squeezing his hips. He's only halfway inside you and it feels like being filled up to your throat, choking on the air you breathe. Your head falls back, your hands flying up to your tits and squeezing. 

“Daddy…”

One of Joel’s hands overlaps yours where it grasps your breast. “That’s my girl. You can take me. Always knew you could.” Still, he's panting with the exertion of holding back. 

“You thought about me?” you say coyly, trying to pull him deeper inside you. He obliges, if only because you're being so petulant, and his hips finally knock into yours. You release a bone-deep sigh of relief.

“All I do”—his hips thrust shallowly, baring his teeth as he paws at your thighs—“is think about you.”

You cry out at the angle, the depth he reaches, how thick and heavy he sits inside you. Your pussy sucks him in, begging for more, and Joel obliges by hooking his hand in the back of your knee and pushing your thigh toward your chest. 

Your vision whites, a ragged cry leaving your mouth. “Oh, fuck! Yes, yes, yes, that feels so good—”

“‘s right, baby girl. I’m the only one’s gonna fuck you this good,” Joel grits out, dragging his thick cock along your walls, spreading you open, forcing himself to fit. The head of his cock kisses your cervix with every thrust, measured in their intensity, just enough to drive you up the goddamn wall but never enough to sting. “I’m the only one you want.”

Your mouth is open and his pounding urges a steady rush of ah, ah, ahs up your throat. Joel leans over you and tilts your head back with a hand in your hair to slant his mouth over yours. He lets you pour your cries into his mouth and he swallows them down, fucking you so hard that your hips begin to ache. 

He smatters your jaw with sloppy kisses. You lift your hand to his face and trace the patches in his beard, your brows drawn together in your perpetual haze. 

“I dreamed about you,” you whisper, taking his earlobe between your teeth to make him growl against your skin. “Touched myself thinking about you.”

“I know,” he says, his hips grinding hard against yours, rubbing up against your used clit. He answers your gasp by nibbling your throat, and you keep him fixed to you with your hand at the back of his neck. His soft hair is matted with sweat and you want to bury yourself here, etch the shape of him into your stone. He's strong, capable, so present in this moment that your heart begins to throb to the beat of his. 

Joel surges upward and takes you with him, forcing you to sit on his lap. At this angle, his cock reaches deeper, somehow, your mouth falling open and your forehead dropping to his shoulder. His palm is a soothing presence on your sweaty back as he tells you things that make you flush from your chest to your ears. 

“Thought about takin’ you on the goddamn bar last night,” he grunts, guiding your ass in a rolling rhythm along his lap, his cock gliding slowly along your walls. You moan, your thighs shaking around his hips. “Thought about spreadin’ you over my desk and fuckin’ you dumb with my cock.” 

You sob into the crook of his neck, grinding down on his cock, the pressure of his navel against your clit sparking hot in your lower belly. “What else?” you ask, nipping at the strong muscle where his shoulder meets his neck. Your tits are pressed up against his chest, his warmth engulfing you, your body slowly lowering over him as he guides you the way he likes. 

His palm coasts down your spine until he finds your puckered asshole. His name is jagged and rubbed raw on your tongue. 

“Shhh, baby girl.” The pad of his finger teases your hole with just enough pressure to ooze electric ecstasy down your spine. “Feels good, doesn't it?”

Fuck, his voice is so gentle, so knowing. You curl your fingers in his hair, your nose tickled by the locks that curl over his ears. 

“Mmmhmm,” you mewl, lifting your hips as best you can despite the growing aches, telegraphing your desire to be touched by him—played with. 

“Thaaat’s it,” he coos, his nose nudging your cheek as he turns his head. His finger continues to prod your asshole while his hips buck up into you. “Openin’ up for me like a good girl. You’d let me take you wherever I want, hmm? Whenever I want?”

“Yes, Daddy, yes,” you moan, your mouth perpetually open against the skin of his neck. You can’t think. You can't breathe. You can only drink down mouthfuls of him and let your body succumb to the delicious weight of his cock inside you. “Yes, I’ll be your little slut. I’ll be whatever you want. You make me feel so good.”

He seems pleased with your babbling, grinning into your cheek as he keeps you spread wide and pounds up into you. His finger continues to tease your tight hole until he feels your body contract around him and apparently decides that he isn't quite through with you. 

“Turn around. Hands and knees.”

Who are you to refuse?

You lament the brief loss of his cock as you shift into your knees, resting your forearms on the bed and teasing him with a wiggle of your ass. Joel hums appreciatively, sidling up behind you and grinding his hard cock between your asscheeks. You jolt forward, but he catches you around the waist and warms his palm at your ribs. 

Something warm and wet lands in a glob on your asshole, and you realise he fucking spit on you. Your head spins, dizzied by your own arousal, and soon, the warm, wet head of his cock slips back inside your hole, and you relish the refuge of being taken by him all over again. 

“You wanna know what else?” He begins to fuck you hard and fast and almost angry in its intensity. His thrusts knock against your ribcage and rattle the bars, your heart floundering for a way back to the surface. “I thought about knockin’ on your door every goddamn day and putting my dick in this pretty fuckin’ pussy. Thought about your tight fuckin’ body every single time I saw you walk by and a long time after. I thought about the noises you'd make and Jesus, I was right. So goddamn sweet.”

You’re drooling onto the pillow, your eyes rolling back in your head, your fingers uselessly clasping handfuls of your white sheets. Joel is an animal, mounting you from behind and taking you hard, deep, the slick squelching noises of your coupling so crude and indecent that they burn through your ears like a lit fuse. It's wrong. You never should have kissed him. But wrong shouldn't feel like this. 

Wrong shouldn’t taste like mint and coffee, shouldn't smell like roses and sawdust. Wrong shouldn’t feel like his cock sitting snug inside your pussy, some obscene jigsaw, seeping saplike pleasure down your spine. 

This must be right. 

His hands are rapacious, one wrapping around your hair and the other guiding the bend of your back, arching you perfectly to fit him while he takes you the way he likes. “Such a tease in those pretty dresses. Such a prim and proper girl ‘til she gets the right dick. You’ll get on your knees for this dick, baby girl, won't you? You’ll beg for it like a goddamn whore.”

“I will!” you moan, your cheek pressed into the mattress. The force of his thrusts have you travelling up the bed in minuscule movements, his thighs slapping hard against yours. “Fuck, I will, Daddy! Please, Daddy, I wanna make you feel good, I’ll do anything.”

“You're doin’ such a good job already, sweet thing,” he says, using his leverage on your hair and your waist to yank you upright, his chest pressed to your back, your ass now firmly sat in his lap. You moan long and low at the new angle, your back arching and your toes curling. 

Joel groans against your jaw, his mouth travelling along the line of it in sloppy kisses that indicate he's about as close as you are. “Yeah, baby. Fuckin’ drunk on my cock. Fucked you good and dumb, hmm? Fucked you so good you can't even think.”

You can only manage a low whine, the sound of it a fleeting puff of air from your lips, the oxygen in your lungs depleting and replaced with the smell of him. You try to bounce on his dick—you really do try—but you cannot remember how to work the muscles in your thighs. You cannot remember what you had for breakfast nor the colour of the skirt you wore today. You can only vaguely understand the shape of the man behind you, the name that belongs to him, the way you curve and fit into him. You’re falling, the technicolour world outside your window fading to the sound of soft, beating wings—that may be your heart, fluttering in your ears—as you seize, yielding to the pleasure. 

You will not recall the sounds you make when you come, grasping blindly at his thighs to keep yourself from falling over, your ears ringing. You feel his moustache scratching your jaw and his cock working you through your high, slowing his thrusts to help you land softly on solid ground. You may cry out his name, and you may call him something else entirely. But it's vibrant. It's radiant as the sunlight now dipping behind the distant buildings. It tastes just as sweet as the golden hour. 

Joel does not stop fucking you when your body goes limp in his arms. No, he resumes his brutal pace, using you like a fucking toy to get himself off. You happily take it, your head lolling back against his shoulder and your eyes drooping. 

“Nnh, fuck… I’m gonna… Jesus—oh, fuck—”

His hips press flush to your ass and he nuzzles his face into your throat, depositing kisses and love bites all over your skin as he pumps shallowly into you, his hot cum filling you up and leaking generously around the seal of your cunt. You gasp, your fingers threading through his already-tousled hair, keeping him glued to you as he flexes against your body and comes hard enough to double himself over. 

He collapses on top of you, forcing you to bend at the hip, little puffs of air escaping his mouth and seeping into you. You whine, your sore hips battered and bruised, your pussy deliciously abused as you pulse continuously around his dick. “Joel, please…”

He comes slowly back into his body, his lips trailing down your spine as he lifts himself upright. “Shit. ‘m sorry, baby girl. You feel okay?”

You hum happily, letting yourself pant into the mattress. “Feels so good.”

Joel pulls out, savouring the tight drag of his cock out of your pussy, hissing through his teeth and watching his thick cum dribble slowly out of your hole. “Such a fuckin’ pretty sight. My sweet girl, all used up.”

You drop your face into your forearm and giggle. Joel smooths his hand over your lower back. “What's so funny?”

“Just…” You sound a bit hysterical as you continue to laugh. “I’m going to be late on rent this month. I put a down payment on a car.”

Joel lowers himself next to you and gently pulls you into him, his moustache tickling your cheek. “Planning on gettin’ the hell outta dodge?” he says playfully, nipping your earlobe. 

Your eyes droop and you sink into him. “Think I’ll stay here for a while.”

“I know you will, baby,” he murmurs.

“Joel?”

“Hmm.”

“Thank you for the necklace.”

~

It’s night when you next wake, and Joel is next to you. 

For someone so stern and strong, he looks utterly serene in his sleep. His lips are slightly parted, half his face pressed into the pillow, his hair curling around his ears and his arm lazily draped over you. You gently sweep a lock of hair away from his face. 

Through the dark, the red light beams, and the arm around your waist tugs you closer.

THE END.

#kiwisbell's fics #pedro pascal #joel miller #the last of us #joel miller x female reader #joel miller fic #joel miller x reader #joel miller x f!reader #dark!joel x reader #dark!joel miller #joel miller smut #joel miller x you #tlou hbo

[whippedcloudsofcream]

Getting all the domestic niceties I can from the show that are so obviously absent from the game.

#the last of us hbo #tlou hbo spoilers #im so glad in an AU ellie and joel get a damn break #to be in a nice house and get supplies and decent showers and food #None of this happens in the game #everyone stays grungy and gross and scraping the bottom of the barrel #bill is doing so bad and worse off without frank #there’s no damn deodorant or cleaning supplies or showers #everyone dirty and Stays dirty even in the sequel when they’re supposedly more well off #dina has greasy tangled hair and super visible pit stains and apparently she’s the most attractive person at a dance party

[caraphernellie]

country girl ellie x city girl reader headcanons

oh fuck yeah so excited i love this kind of au!!

warnings: suggestive stuff, femme reader, obviously ellie’s a country gal, reader is wealthy, uhhh . these are super disorganised and probably really lame just things that i thought of ??

✧ ellie moved to the city from the countryside to pursue dreams of becoming an artist (with a scholarship to art school)

✧ she has a southern accent don't get me started

✧ u met her on her way to school. u bump into her and her phone falls to the ground and cracks

✧ ellie definitely has her own judgements about city girls, coming from the south, but she doesn't want to anger u, she's apologising profusely because ur gorgeous and just look expensive

✧ only for u to own up to it, and offering to pay for her phone damages

✧ and ellie's absolutely shocked. she tells u it is really not necessary but u insist by writing down ur number for her and then hurrying off

✧ did someone say u-haul lesbian trope or...

✧ because she wasted no time in pursuing u. there's something about her growing up in the country with nobody but joel raising her that made her extremely unhinged and this was something she couldnt let go

✧ she's so laidback despite u living every day like it's ur last (anxious queen or party girl whichever one u are 💀)

✧ she's so calm, never afraid to get her hands dirty

✧ coming from the countryside where the nearest other human civilisation was the small town twenty miles away, she definitely had some safety concerns and paranoia when it came to the city. definitely a protective gf

✧ u have to constantly remind ellie that she cannot just punch people if they stare at u too long even if it makes her jealous. she will get arrested

✧ she does feel kind of bad and a little insecure at times, wishing she could provide but u spend so much money on her (guitars, art supplies, comics, food) and she's so grateful but feels like a burden sometimes even if u continuously tell her u WANT to

✧ after moving to the city and dating u she finally understood where the stereotype about girls getting ready for ages comes from. it has only ever taken her ten minutes max to get ready in her life and yet u start getting ready three hours before an event

✧ she's kind of super clueless

✧ softdom ellie my beloved

✧ in summer break u went with her to the countryside and she thought it was the funniest thing ever watching u be scared to get dirty

✧ she taught u how to ride a horse and out of nowhere afterwards says "i'll teach you how to ride bareback later, yeah?" with that stupid smirk on her face, patting your thigh while helping you onto the saddle

✧ so reputation coded. so cornelia street coded

✧ she definitely helps u loosen up and become a little less uptight

✧ there was definitely a few times where she'd shovel up horse shit and chase u with it on the shovel just to laugh at ur screaming and "ellieeee-uh!!!!!!!!"

✧ she's the epitome of being super confident about things she's never done before. thinks she's fucking invincible just because she can lift heavy and tolerate the smell of manure

✧ rolls her sleeves up and gets into it

✧ the first time she got into the bedroom with u... did she know entirely what she was doing? no. oh but she had the confidence as if she did know what she was doing

i cant keep going im gonna get carried away i kinda wanna turn this into a proper fic or somethinggg but i have too many ideasss :((

#ellie williams x reader #ellie williams x fem reader #fem reader #ellie williams #tlou2 x reader #ellie williams headcanons #⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ headcanons

[pedrostylez]

The Gray: Chapter 2

pairing: Joel Miller x fem!reader

rating: 18+ (no minors please)

chapter summary: After encountering Joel, you've agreed to help him with his revenge on your current partner, AJ. Days go by and you finally think you know how to fix your super suit when AJ corners you to ask what happened with Joel. Joel is slowly becoming obsessed with you but won't admit it to himself

word count: 2.4k

warnings etc: mean!Joel, super!Joel, eventual smut, pet names, violence, mentions of SA, and abuse. Hints at the beginning of SA, please read with caution. Masturbation, thoughts of smut, NO USE OF Y/N.

A/N: Please read the warnings and understand that each chapter will have its own separate set of warnings as well. Be mindful, and control your own reading experience. I've been struggling with how I want to write these chapters so bear with me as I get it figured out!

Your thoughts are in red, Joel's thoughts will be in blue

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me Marianne, the guy is a fucking–”

“Don’t say another word, Joel.” She hissed, pointing to her door for him to leave. “Go back to your quarters and forget about being AJ’s partner.”

Joel laughed ruefully, shaking his head and opening the door. “You can forget about me being anyone’s partner, I’m not working for you or this corrupt corporation ever again.”

“I’ll brand you a villain if you think about leaving the Organization, Miller.”

He paused, turning back to her and scoffing. “Rather a villain than the partner of a rapist, Marianne.”

When Joel quit the Organization, he was known as the rebel. He wasn’t the first and was surely not the last to go against the grain of the all-mighty Marianne. But what he didn’t expect was the Organization to target him so heavily. 

He went into hiding as quickly as possible, having his own place underground with security cameras being his only luck as all heroes seemed to look for him. Villains took it as an opportunity to try and find him to get back in Marianne’s good graces, or to cause more disturbances that would be blamed on Joel instead of them. 

He was everyone’s scapegoat. 

He became obsessed with the cameras he had put up when he got the suspicion that AJ was fucking around. He snuck around town, placing discreet cameras all over the city and in abandoned buildings, watching them from his hideout all night long and then going back to his assigned living unit for the morning to make appearances. It ended up helping him catch what his old partner was doing in the dark. 

In ways he missed being part of the Organization; having sponsorships and helping people were some of the positives, even if no one could tell that he liked it with the permanent scowl on his face. Ten years down the line he started to feel differently when the media was on him constantly. He was the go-to hero; always stopping the bad guys, always bringing the money back to the bank–the works. As time went on, he found that things weren’t so black and white, and now he had evidence of it.

When he brought it to Marianne, someone he thought he could trust, she scowled back at him for the first time. Instead of being rewarded for finding the internal issues with those supposed to serve the public, everyone in the organization turned on him. He became an outcast quickly, becoming the rebel and having to stay hidden. 

Eventually, he gave up on trying to show the public and the organization what was really going on, only coming out to make those that hurt him hurt worse. He used his connections to corner AJ when possible, cause issues for the Organization, and continued to be bitter, angry, and spiteful as he moved about the world. It wasn’t the life he thought he would lead, but now he was content with it. He was still called upon by those that knew his reasoning-just to find the truth, no matter how ugly.

Now he was out of practice, not having seen AJ for two years and he had a nagging worry deep in his stomach that he might not be as talented as he was before. 

Your plan was simple: act like you had to figure out how to get home from the fight, complain to Marianne that AJ left you again, and gather information for Joel in exchange for help escaping what was becoming clearly a death sentence. 

Joel’s plan was less simple: figure out how to protect you so that you would give him the information he needed to get revenge. 

He had basically dropped you in the alleyway, half conscious again and slinking away without another thought. 

“Then let me teach you, sweetie. I’ve got a few things up my sleeve.”

“What do you me–” Your sentence was cut short with the impact of Joel’s blow to your face, immediately knocked out. 

Joel sighed, catching you and hauling you over his shoulder to bring you to the same building he found you at. 

He watched you from the shadow, shaking your head and grumbling at how he was an asshole for knocking you out after shooting you; as if you didn’t have other injuries to deal with. He sighed heavily, slinking quickly back to his hideout to watch you on the cameras during the end of your walk home, shoulders sagging with relief as you stepped into the main street that led to the headquarters. He hoped Marianne and AJ wouldn’t grill you too hard. Joel wanted to tell you that he wouldn’t let AJ hurt you before you left the alleyway, but he knew he couldn’t promise that while also sending you back to the lion's den.

Watching you on the monitors for the next few days became a habit he couldn’t break. Finding himself still on the couch, opening his eyes and dragging himself over to his cabinet that had rows of cereal, making a bowl and sitting down right as you were entering the main drag of the city. He would watch all day, eventually moving to the couch until you returned to your living quarters and would pass out, doing it again the next day. 

He found that the best way to protect you was to keep an eye on you, watch for any sign of distress, and hope that the issues from the rooftop would die down enough that he could send you a message. A bit too out of practice old man, how are you going to send her a message? 

Joel found himself dreaming about you and thinking about them during the day. He assumed it was because he was watching you intently if not more than AJ and Marianne now. He was not willing to admit that it could be an obsession.

He dreamed of how he had shot you, blood seeping out of your leg onto the blue fabric covering your smooth legs. The groan that left your lips when he stepped on your wound. The way your eyes traveled up his arms as he crossed them, waiting for you to answer him. How the blush crept up your neck when you were caught. The way he wanted to press his lips to the heated skin–

The dreams always made him jolt awake, sometimes sweating from how intensely he saw you and sometimes with something harder below the belt. You’re a weak man and she’s a pretty girl. It’s normal. When that happened, he always groaned and typically ignored it but this morning it wouldn’t go away. 

In fact, today it got worse once he sat down at his table, eyes on the screen and spotting you immediately. You were running through the crowd, looking to be late with your super suit less pristine than usual. Your zipper had a larger pull, circular in shape typically hidden behind velcro up at your collarbone, but today was lower showing the plumpness of your chest. 

Milk dribbled out of Joel’s mouth from the shock, spoon full of cereal in mid-air and dripping onto his table. You accidentally shoved into someone, smiling spreading across your face and biting your lip as you apologized. He recognized who you ran into-Robbie, flying abilities. He watched Robbie blush like he was in middle school, eyes glancing down at your fallen zipper and then back up to your eyes quickly. You lucky fucking bastard. 

As soon as you were there you were gone, disappearing into the headquarters building. Joel grabbed his remote, clicked the pause button, and rewound. He watched you bump into Robbie in reverse, stepping back out from your living quarters, and then pressed play. 

He was ashamed of himself for only an instant before his eyes were trained on you again, glued to the zipper. His cock stirred and he rubbed himself through his pants briefly before deciding he needed to take care of this in the shower. He could think of this and his dreams there. 

Running late into the office was not your favorite thing to do, however, last night you couldn’t get any sleep. It had been five days since your encounter with Joel and you hadn’t found any information that you thought was worthy to give to him. You spent the first day perusing the archives, trying to see if anything was there. No one asked you about the issue of Joel showing up the night before–only a voicemail from Marianne asking to see her in her office later in the week. 

After the archives, you played nice with some of the older heroes, asking for advice which didn’t really give you anything. You mentioned heroes that had been fired and if there was an opportunity for that “I want to make sure I do everything right!” “Oh don’t worry, you’re the current favorite. You won’t fall from grace.” when you didn’t get anything, you spent another two days in the lab, working on your super suit issues. 

Today you thought you were on the right track, having a dream of a specific method that could be of use and had overslept while having the vision. You rushed into the elevator going down and did a double-take when you saw AJ standing there. 

His face was blank, nodding at you and pressing the elevator button for the lab floor. “I’ve been looking for you.” He said quietly as the doors closed. His eyes glanced down at you before looking at the wall. 

You scoffed, crossing your arms and feeling your fingers brush against the zipper. You glanced down to see it was not in place and sighed. “That’s interesting since you left me on that roof to be shot and figure a way out myself.” You grumbled, looking over at him with sharp eyes. 

The elevator dinged after an uncomfortable silence, stepping out into the hallway and moving towards the lab. You didn’t need to speak to AJ now; you wanted Marianne to be present later for the planned meeting about this. Keep moving keep moving keep–

AJ’s hand wrapped around your upper arm making you internally wince. “Where are you going?” He hissed, pulling you through the hallway. You thought he was going to stop at the alcove just outside one of the offices, but continued on into the women’s bathroom and shoved you toward the sink. 

You grabbed at your arm, looking down to see if he was going to leave marks. Your super suit was able to help for life or death injuries, as well as debilitating ones, but you typically found bruises on yourself from being clumsy in the training room. You worried this would be another. “What the fuck, man?”

“What the hell happened the other night?” AJ asked, pacing back and forth in front of the door. “Where the hell did Joel come from? I thought this was just for media, but he got there and I–”

“You abandoned me.” You seethed, gripping on to the countertop. 

AJ paused his pacing, turning his head to you slowly with a smile forming. “That’s what you think happened huh?”

His voice had gone dark, chilling you to the bone but you stood your ground. “That’s what happened. And he shot me and I had to talk my way out of it. You let Joel fucking shoot me, ran in the opposite direction and didn’t even check to see if I was still alive. I should go to Marianne right now–”

He started laughing, leaning against the door and crossing his arms. AJ was in general attractive; not your type but you could see how people swooned. He was a fan favorite, and you had been told that your looks with his made you the perfect team, a perfect “pretty pair”. How he spoke now did not match his looks. You wondered briefly what Joel’s issue was with him besides just not getting along. “We have the meeting later but I wanted to see what you would say first. You tell her that Joel was there and she will just ask you where you were the whole time. Sure, you were pathetically bleeding out on the roof, but she will want every detail spelled out for her to make sure you aren’t lying. Do you want that?”

You kept your mouth shut, eyes glued to his as he pushed himself off the door and started taking steps toward you. 

His smile fell as he reached you, hand reaching up to the back of your head and pulling your hair to force you to look at him. You winced, scowling up at him. “You could just get on your knees now and prove to me that is what happened. And I’ll back you up with Marianne when she asks us later about this. I ran as part of the plan for the cameras and didn’t realize until too late. Joel shot you and ran after me. Easy.” The gruffness in his voice sent an uncomfortable shiver up your spine, fear coursing through your veins. Is this what Joel was referring to?

You felt the blood drain from your face, your mind going blank at his suggestion. No. Please don’t. Your eyes shut, wanting to stop tears from even forming. “Get your fucking hands off me.”

AJ didn’t let go of you for a while, watching you react to him to see if you would break. When you didn’t he sighed, stepping away from you and out the bathroom without another word. 

You counted to 60, letting yourself feel the terror in your chest before moving out of the bathroom and headed back to your assigned living quarters. Working in the lab could wait for another day.

Joel felt relaxed after his shower, finally at ease and tension gone as he stepped out in fresh clothes. He glanced up to the screen, doing a double take at seeing you back in the street so soon after going into the Organization headquarters. The look on your face struck a chord deep in him as if he had seen that look before. Pale, hair messed up in the back even after you smoothed it down with your hand the whole way back to the other building. He wasn’t sure if he could see tears starting to form in your eyes as you run into someone again, but this time moving past them quickly and not giving them a second glance. 

Joel knew that AJ was either on to you, or would be soon.

#pedro pascal #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal smut #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller fanfiction #super!Joel au #tw sa mention #tw sa implied

[jobean12-blog]

All Mine

Pairing: Joel Miller x reader (Biker!Joel AU)

Word Count: 2,064

Summary: You're not a fan of Joel's neighbor and after he hears what happens, he isn't either (not that he ever was).

Author's Note: I was just thinking about how hot Pedro is and especially the idea of Joel as a biker and I missed my biker!Joel so I thought this would be a fun way to revist him! Thank you all so much for reading! Much love always! ❤️❤️❤️Divider by the lovely @firefly-graphics thank you sweet Daisy 🥰The edit below was done by my amazing friend Ellie @mrsmischief209 isn't he gorgeous? Thank you beauty! 💕

Warnings: there's some tension at first over the neighbor bc she stinks, but it's soft and sweet and there's fluff and some funny parts and then it gets super se-x-y and sp-i-c-y at the end.

Joel Miller Masterlist

The front door to Joel’s house opens before you even grab the knob.

“Hey there darl…”

You stomp past him with clenched fists and turn with a huff.

He stares at you and takes a tentative step forward, his arms outstretched.

“Your neighbor…” you start before crossing your arms over your chest and mumbling out something he doesn’t quite catch.

“Neighbor?” he asks with raised brows as he steps into your space and pulls you against his chest.

“This isn’t exactly the greeting I was hoping for,” he lightly teases as his head dips and he places a soft kiss just below your ear. “What happened?”

When his lips press to your skin you melt into his embrace, your whole body going pliant until you’re curled around him. His lips trail along your throat then ghost across your lips as he takes your face in his hand and forces you to look at him.

“Your neighbor needs to take a hint Joel!”

“What neighbor and what do you mean?” His expression hardens and you can feel his muscles tense. “Are you ok?”

You start to get wound up again and wiggle in his grasp but he doesn’t let go. He leads you to the couch and sits, taking you with him and placing you on his lap.

He waits as patiently as he can until you’re ready to talk, his fingers gentle along your skin as he rubs your back.

“She was outside when I pulled up and as soon as I got out of the car she scoffed. I mean who scoffs so loud someone can hear them from across the yard!?!”

Joel’s brow furrows in confusion as he continues to listen.

“On this side?” he asks, pointing to the left of his house.

You nod before you go on.

“Then, being the nice person I am,” you say as if it’s so obvious, “I said hello and asked how she was.”

He smiles reassuringly before giving your cheek a kiss.

“Do you know what she said to me?”

You huff out the words and your face scrunches up in anger.

“What darlin’?” he growls out. “Tell me before I go over there and find out myself.”

“You can relax…it wasn’t that bad.”

He looks at you expectantly.

“She said…and I quote, ‘oh, it’s you. I can’t believe you’re still around. Thought he would have been through with you a long time ago.’ Then she looks me up and down like I’m a piece of poo!”

“Poo?” he repeats and the corner of his mouth twitches with a smile even though his muscles are still taut.

“Don’t you dare laugh! THIS IS NO LAUGHING MATTER! THAT BITCH WANTS MY MAN!”

“What?” he says, making a disgruntled face.

“She totally wants you and she’s acting like if she gets rid of me you’ll be all hers!”

“What?” he says again, tightening his hold on you.

“What do you mean WHAT?” you screech. “You heard me! UGH! The audacity!”

“What’s her name again?” Joel asks.

You spit out her name.

“Oh right,” Joel says dismissively. “Who cares darlin.’ I’ve never looked her way. Not even once. And I never will.”

You study his face, his eyes full of sincerity, and soften against him.

“I know,” you whisper. “But it wasn’t nice and I don’t want her trying to seduce you or something when I’m not here.”

You bury your face in his neck and hide.

He starts to shake with laughter and when you peek up at him his eyes are crinkled and he’s wearing a wide grin.

“That’s ridiculous!” he says between laughs.

He softens when he sees you’re worried expression, his large hand lifting to cup your cheek.

“Darlin’,’ he murmurs. “No one could ever take me away from you.”

“And you’re right it wasn’t nice. Honestly, I have a mind to go over there and tell her to fuck off.”

“God I wish you could,” you huff.

“Why the hell can’t I?” he asks.

“Because…it might make her try harder.”

“That makes no sense.”

You pat his chest. “I know but trust me.”

He presses a calloused fingertip under your chin and keeps your eyes on his when he asks, “then how can I make his better darlin’?”

“Stop being so hot?” you pout with a small shrug.

His head falls toward his chest and he chuckles.

“Darlin’…”

You hop off his lap, evading his grabby hands until you’re standing between his spread legs. You look him over.

“For one…stop sitting like that.”

“Like what?” he asks and looks down at himself.

“Like that!” you say with a stomp of your foot. “You’re manspreading so bad you’re practically taking up the whole couch and those legs!”

“I’m comfortable,” he says defensively. “Besides…what do you want me to do with this thing.”

He points between his legs with a playful smirk.

“JOEL!!!!!!!!!!” you whine. “That’s exactly my point. She’s probably daydreams about how big it is!”

His eyes go wide and he shifts uncomfortably.

“You should probably stop wearing such tight jeans too.”

“I’m not changing my wardrobe for nobody! Like I said, she can fuck off.”

“Ughhhh,” you sigh as you fall dramatically onto the couch. “Forget it. Even if you wore a bag you’d be hot. It’s no use.”

“You should talk,” he says as he grabs your ankles and pulls you down flat.

He positions himself above you, caging you in with his arms. “You’re the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”

You smile and play with the fabric of his shirt. “But the neighbor doesn’t give two shits about me. She likes you.”

“These arms,” you sigh dreamily and lightly scrape your fingertips along his biceps. “The tattoos…”

You emphasize the last word with a poke to his solid chest and his smile grows. Your fingers comb through the hair lining his jaw before they slide between the soft strands on his head.

“You know she probably goes nuts over your bike too,” you state with a roll of your eyes.

He presses into you, letting just enough of his weight settle on top of you so you can feel every inch of him.

“Pretty sure you went nuts over my bike…”

“Well YEAH. Of course I did,” you say, your expression full of ‘duh.’  “You…on that bike…pretty irresistible.”

He winks down at you, leaning closer until his lips are just a breath away.

“You…bent over my bike…that’s irresistible.”

You giggle and give his hair a tug, pulling his lips to yours.

“You wanna come help me?” Joel asks as he ties up his boots.

For a brief moment you just watch him, taking in his dark jeans pulled tightly across his thick thighs and his muscled forearms flexing with every movement he makes.

“I’m not letting you out of my sight,” you state decisively and lift your chin.

He gives you a lopsided smirk as he stands and takes your hand. “Good.”

He holds the door open for you and ushers you outside, stopping at his pickup truck to grab his tool box before he carries it to his bike that’s parked further down the driveway.

The neighborhood is quiet and when you peek over to the house next door it looks dark.

“She better not show up,” you mutter to yourself.

“What was that darlin’?” Joel asks, as he kneels to search for a tool.

“Hmm? Oh nothing,” you say and wave him off. “How can I help?”

As Joel’s kneeling down on one side of the bike and you’re on the other, hidden by the large machine, you hear a voice that makes you cringe.

“Oh Joel! There you are! I was hoping you could help me with something.”

You go still and wait. You can hear Joel’s sigh and see him stand and turn to your favorite neighbor.

“Hey,” he says blankly.

She smiles brightly and holds out a jar. “I just can’t seem to get this jar open for anything and I knew you’d be just the guy to ask…and here you are!”

She bats her lashes and steps closer to him. He quickly shoots his hand out and grabs the jar, effectively stopping her advance.

He takes it between his hands and twists the top once, easily popping it off.

“There ya go,” he says and hands it back to her.

She stands at stares at him in awe. “Oh wow. Thank you! You made that look so easy. You must have very…”

That’s as much as you can bear and you stand abruptly, causing Joel’s bike to wobble. The neighbor startles at your sudden appearance and her face goes sour.

“Oh yes,” you start with a saccharine smile. “His hands. They’re so big and strong and he knows just how to use them.”

Joel chokes out a cough to stifle his laughter and turns your way, winking knowingly. The neighbor drags her eyes away from you with a roll and pins them back on Joel, letting her gaze move down his body with appreciation.

“I love your bike,” she says to him.

You saunter over and stand next to Joel. He winds his arm around your waist and tucks you into his side.

“Beautiful, isn’t it,” you agree. “And the ride is even better.”

You lean into Joel and slip your hand inside his leather jacket. The way you emphasize the word ‘ride’ doesn’t go unnoticed and his fingers dig into your skin.

The neighbor ignores you completely and asks Joel, “is something wrong with it? I see you have all your tools out.”

“No,” he replies. “Just doing a tune up before we leave.”

With those words he releases you with a kiss and goes back to work.

“We’re going on an overnight trip,” you explain.

She gives you a look that screams, ‘I didn’t ask you.’ You go on anyway.

“We’re going to sleep out under the stars. It’ll be chilly at night…but Joel knows how to keep me warm.”

You giggle with your last words and lift your shoulders sweetly. The neighbors face scrunches up in anger.

“Alright darlin.’ Everything looks good. Let’s go.” 

You twinkle your fingers at the neighbor and wait as Joel puts the helmet over your head and secures the strap. He then takes off his leather jacket and puts it on you, zipping it up to your chin. You snuggle into it with a big inhale and say, “smells so good.”

The neighbor face gets even more sour but both you and Joel ignore her and hop on the bike. He revs the engine a few times before taking off down the road in a blur.

Once Joel reaches your destination he pulls over and moves deeper onto the soft dirt before stopping. He holds the motorcycle steady as you climb off and start to remove the helmet.

His hands settle on your waist and he looks you over.

“How’re you doin’ darlin’?”

“Better,” you whisper. “She got the hint. And I think I’m really starting to understand why riding is so enjoyable.” 

He chuckles and raises his brows questioningly.

“The speed, the wind against your skin, your body pressed to mine…all the vibrations.”

With those few words Joel’s entire focus shifts and his voice drops when he asks, “you like that?”

“Mm hm. I love it.”

“Darlin’,” he murmurs.

He closes the space between you, kissing you hard and grabbing your ass. He kneads your flesh and you arch into his touch. He doesn’t stop and gives your ass cheek a hard slap.

“Ohhh,” you moan. “Was that because of what I said earlier?”

“I liked everything you said. Now how about you turn around and bend over my bike darlin.”

Even as he says it he doesn’t wait for you to do it and spins you himself, pressing gently until your resting on the seat. He runs his hands down your back, reaching the waistband of your jeans. His hard cock grinds against you and you hiss in pleasure.

He leans over you, pressing a line of soft kisses down your neck while he makes quick work of your jeans, helping you wiggle out of them until they lock at your feet. His rough fingertips caress your newly exposed skin and he hums in appreciation before dropping to his knees.

“Look at you,” he murmurs. “Fuck darlin.’ I can’t wait to taste you.”

@hiddles-rose @littleseasiren @lorilane33 @blackwidownat2814 @kmc1989 @lizette50

#joel miller x reader #joel miller #biker!joel miller #joel miller x you #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x y/n #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller imagine #biker!joel miller x reader #biker au #pedro pascal #pedro pascal x reader

[mariatesstruther]

a list of some of the videos joel would send to sarah after she goes off to college because he misses having her around, for @clickergossip @bumblepony and @ameerawrites 🫰🏾

- joel and tommy going to the zoo because the tiger sarah has been obsessed with for years has cubs now, and theyre finally letting them out today for the public to see: “wow, would ya lookat that—hold on, can you see em? hold on—here. that’s good, over there, you see em? i remember when you were that little, babygirl. wow.”

- joel in his work shed whittling another “super-sarah” action figure to send off to her as he talks about how work and the sites have been, stopping once in a while to explain what he’s doing to her just like he did when she was little and sitting there to constantly nag him with questions

- him cleaning up her room and changing her bed at least once a week, even though there’s s nobody there to mess things up or dirty the sheets. what he discusses with her during these tidying sessions varies from week to week, but lately he’s been updating her on tommy and his new girlfriend: “so they’ve been goin steady for just about f—can you believe it? just about five months, now. tommy keeps talkin about celebratin their sixth month anniversary, and i keep tryin to tell him that makes no damn sense, logic-wise—but anyway. i guess i’m proud of him. you’d be teasin him to all hell, seein how gone he is for her. so head over heels, his boots might as well be in the sky. i know you said your too busy ti be dating right now, but just for the record: you ever get that over the moon for somebody, i’d better not be meetin em over videochat”

speaking of tommy!

when uncle tommy sends sarah a video one time, it’s him drunk off his ass in joel’s backseat, phone pressed way too close to his face, singing out a slurred but impressive “sarah sarah bo barah banana fanna fo farah, me mi mo marah sarahhhhhhhhhh. good god, bubba, do me and your daddy miss you. he’s over here drivin me nuts—,” “i’m drivin you to your place, you ungrateful little—,” “shut up! anyway, hope you’re havin fun over there in the big apple—my lady’s from the big apple, did ya know? she’s amazin. i hope you’ll get to meet her when you come down for break. just callin because i felt like talkin to ya—you know, your daddy’s a fuckin asshole and never lets me in his fuckin videos, so—,” “tommy!” “what??? im talkin!!! anyway, miss you so fuckin much, buggaboo—,” “tommy!” “what???” “watch your goddamn mou—better yet, just get off the fuckin phone! drunk dialin like youre 19 again, you fuckin idiot—” “asshole! you’re the one cursin!” “at you! doesn’t count! hang up the fuckin phone!” “it’s a video, stupid! and you’re calling me an idio—OW! JOEL! JOEL! GIVE IT BACK—!” “seeya later, babygirl. your uncle’s a  nuisance. i love you.”

#thinking about joel and tommy creating a superhero alter ego for sarah when she was little #and now super sarah is a whole entire thing #joel misses sarah au #best dad joel #the millers #joel and sarah #joel miller #sarah miller #tommy miller #him calling sarah bubba and buggaboo came out of nowehere but now if anyone tries to take it from me ill cry #bubba 🥺 #tlou #maria #maria x tommy

[starry-eyes-love]

Darlin', You're Beautiful

Pairing | Best Friend Joel Miller x Curvy F!Reader, AU (no outbreak)

Summary | After having been stood up from another date yet again, you went to the park with Joel Miller, your best friend, to hang out. You're lost in your own head, not believing that you're beautiful when Joel reminds you of where beauty truly lies, from within.

Warnings | 18+ Minors DNI, age gap (she's mid 20s, he's early 40s), reference to reader being curvy, language, self esteem issues and discussions, terms of endearment (honey, sugar, baby, darlin'), heavy kissing, sexual tension a bit, brief reference to smut, fluff.

Word Count:  2.6K

A/N: This one comes from a space that's been taking up my personal headspace for far too long. She’s a little emotional, but that’s ok. Remember, beauty comes from within. Enjoy :) 

Joel's words lingered in the air, “baby, I’ve wanted you for so fucking long,” he whispered, while slowly thrusting inside of you. He was giving you a gentle reminder that beauty, true beauty, was seen from inside a person's soul. 

Main Masterlist

Joel leaned back against the old oak tree in the park, the soft rustle of the leaves above him providing a calming backdrop. His heart was pounding in his chest, nerves taking root in his body. Man, she’s beautiful, the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.  And you were, you were beautiful.  You were beautiful because you had a beautiful soul.  

For all of your life, you didn’t believe that you were beautiful.  Society had a specific version of what beauty was, and you felt like you never lived up to that expectation. You were not skinny with a flat stomach, you had a little bit of a tummy on you.  You were sitting in the park, watching the Texan sunset with your best friend, Joel Miller, and you were silently scolding yourself yet again. Your second date with a guy last night didn’t go as planned, the man never showed up.  Somehow once guys saw that you weren’t the super skinny woman with a big chest, they didn’t want to be with you, and they’d bail on you every chance that they had.  

Joel hated seeing you like this, berating and belittling yourself over not being what boys thought were beautiful.  And that's who you were attempting to date, boys.  Joel, being a man in his early 40s, saw women differently than what men in their 20s did.  You weren’t a baby in life, being in your mid 20s yourself, but the men that you attempted to date were.  They were too egotistical, caring more about getting laid and the final score at the end of the night than treating a woman with any real respect. 

So after sitting with his back against the tree for a bit, and taking in the beautiful Texan sunset, Joel tipped his baseball cap back slightly to look at your face. As he stared at you, he noticed that your once warm eyes that were full of life and happiness, now looked lost. Without giving it another thought, Joel opened his mouth and said the thing that he’s wanted to say to you for a long time. 

"Darlin', there's been somethin' on my mind that I wanted to tell ya," he stated, his voice heavy with that slow Southern drawl.

Glancing over at Joel with curiosity you said, “What is it, Joel?"

While grabbing a blade of grass and beginning to twirl it between his fingers, a nervous habit that he had, he said "well, sugar, I've been thinkin' a lot about the type of men that you’ve been tryin’ to date. And well honey, they’re just little boys. Little boys who think they know what’s right for a woman, but they don’t. They don’t know what’s right for ya.”

You told him “ok” in a voice that you didn't quite recognize as your own, one that was so meek and mild. You weren’t the girl who usually got down on herself so much. But recently it had been too much with being stood up on dates, or just being told no in the most embarrassing and rude way possible.  Usually a few situations like this wouldn’t bother you, but recently, it has become too much. 

Joel, shaking his head, looked back over at you and said “Darlin’, when are ya going to stop believin’ all the garbage these boys say, and start believin’ in something that matters?”

“What matters Joel, huh?” you said, straightening up and shooting him a dirty look with your eyes. This was not the conversation that you wanted to have right now, one that discussed your choices.  Yes, Joel was right, but you didn’t want to hear him say it right now.  You didn’t want him to rub your nose in the fact that you couldn’t seem to pick a good guy to go out with ever. 

“Ya gotta start believin’ it honey, that you’re beautiful, and not waiting on some dumbass guy to say it to you. Y/n, you are beautiful.” Joel said, looking at you tenderly, trying to communicate the feelings that he’s felt for you inside for a long time.

You just stared at Joel, pondering why he would go to this length to say this to you. In the last 5 years that the two of you have been friends, not once did Joel Miller ever say that you were beautiful.  It’s just not something that the two of you have ever talked about before. And if you were being honest, you wondered why now he chose to bring it up. 

"Joel, you're sweet. But come on, let's be real. I'm not exactly the definition of beautiful." you said, looking over at him.

Joel sighed, trying to make you understand what he saw. "You may not see it darlin’, but I do. I see it every time you smile with the way your eyes light up. Or the way you snort when you laugh, especially when you find something really funny. When you talk ‘bout things that you love, I see you open your heart up to the person you’re talkin’ to. Or even that cute little blush that ya get when you get embarrassed. Beauty isn't just about appearance darlin’; it's about the way you carry yourself, the kindness in your heart, and the way you make other people feel."

Shifting uncomfortably, clearly not used to receiving these types of compliments from anyone, but especially a man and your best friend. "Joel, you're exaggerating. I appreciate it, but I'm not the type of girl people describe as beautiful."

Joel once again shook his head. He wanted you to see what he saw, the beauty that you had within you. "That's where you're wrong darlin’. You have this unique charm that goes beyond what people think is beautiful. It's about you being genuine, and baby, you are as genuine as they come."

“Well, I’ve never felt like it.” You looked over at Joel with soft eyes, wanting to believe everything that he was saying to you.

“Well that’s what’s wrong darlin’. You are the best type of beauty possible.  Beauty of the soul. And baby, I can’t get enough of it if I’m being honest.”

“Joel, what are you- what are you saying?” you asked softly, with slight irritation in your voice at how in-depth this conversation has gone. 

Joel scooted closer to you, and tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear. “I’m saying that it’s your uniqueness that makes you beautiful darlin’. That it’s something rare to find, that you’re something rare to find. And baby, I find you incredibly attractive because of it."

A soft blush tinted your cheeks at Joel saying that you were attractive. "Do you- do you really mean it?" you asked, trying not to get your hopes up, but secretly hoping Joel was flirting with you.  Sure, you two have been friends for five years, but you’ve secretly have had a crush on Joel Miller ever since the start of your friendship. You didn’t think he’d ever look at you the way that you hoped, that he wanted to be with you in the capacity of being ‘more than friends.’  You always thought that he liked women that didn’t have curves like you did. 

Joel looking at you with hooded eyes said, "Baby, I've spent enough time with ya to know that there's more to beauty than what meets the eye. It's about the way you make people feel, the way you make me feel.  That genuine kindness you show me and others. That’s what makes your truly beautiful darlin’."

A thoughtful silence hung between the two of you, as you absorbed his words. It wasn't that you didn't believe him. But when people, specifically other men, have made you feel less than beautiful for many years, it took its toll. You couldn’t help but slowly start to believe those inappropriate statements by others, when it was others that were constantly saying it to you that they didn’t find you beautiful or sexually attractive. 

"Joel, it's not that I don't appreciate your words, I do. It's just that, it's hard to change when other people are mean for so long, and where they have made me feel less than beautiful as a woman.”

Joel slowly nodded, understanding the depth of your silent struggle. After a moment he said, “I get that darlin'', I do, it's just that-” Joel found himself standing at the precipice of no return with you. After contemplating his choices, he decided to throw caution completely out of the window, and he decided to act on the feelings that he’s had with you for a long time.  Joel leaned forward and cupped your cheek, gently running his thumb up and down it. “If ya don't believe my words darlin'', then please believe this.” He then leaned forward and gently kissed you softly on the mouth.

What started out as a gentle, soft kiss quickly turned heated. You softly whimpered into his mouth when his one hand went to the back of your neck, that spurred something deep inside him. As soon as he heard you moan he took the kiss a step further and gently ran his tongue along the seam of your lips, asking you for access into your mouth. When you opened for him, he dove his tongue in and started a slow caress. Gentle and smooth strokes, back and forth, inside your mouth, against your tongue. You two were doing a slow dance of passion and love behind your kiss. Nothing rushed, just gentle exploration.

When you moaned into his mouth, that’s when caution once again completely went out the window. A switch inside of Joel had flipped, and his kissing became more heated. Joel gripped the back of your head in a firm hold and tilted your chin up so he could lean forward and deepen the kiss into your mouth. It was at this moment that you realized two very important things. One, Joel Miller was an excellent kisser. And two, you wanted to sleep with your best friend really bad.

As you pulled away, gasping for air, you heard Joel let out a low growl. When you looked over at him he had very dark eyes.  His pupils were blown wide, and the air around you two crackled with sexual tension.  Joel moved back towards you and started kissing down your neck, nipping and biting over your pulse points and the areas of your neck that he knew were your most sensitive zones. “No one's ever kissed me like that before” you said, while moaning softly at what Joel was doing.

“That's a damn shame darlin''. A beautiful woman like yourself should be kissed like that all the goddamn time.” He said while sucking on your neck and then running his tongue over the love bite that he just made to soothe it. 

“I want more” you gasped, moaning again at Joel’s minstrations on your neck.

“Good, you should want more.” He said, moving to the other side of your neck and continuing his exploration. Joel was trying to find out what made you moan, squirm, and call out to him; making sure to keep doing that to intensify what he wanted to do again, and that was kiss you once again. He wanted to make sure that you knew without a doubt what he felt for you, and that any real man would know how to make a woman feel beautiful.  And goddamn, you were hot as hell and so sexy that he barely could think straight. 

With a slight smile, you gently shook your head while pulling away from him and finally admitting out loud to him, the thing that has been your biggest secret. “No Joel, I want more from you, with you. I have for a very long time.” You then reached out and gently cupped Joel’s cheek, running your thumb over his patchy beard. 

Joel looked at you with intense eyes, heart pounding hard and fast in his chest at the realization of what you were asking. Finally, after all these years you wanted him the same way that he wanted you. When you two first started hanging out he didn’t think you’d like him in a boyfriend type of way, as all your interactions were more based on friendship than anything else.  Now he felt stupid, hooking up with random women periodically over the years, having you play wingman with him at the bar, thinking that you never wanted more. I’m not gonna fuck this up anymore with her, he thought, focusing on showing you what he wanted.

Joel leaned forward and gently whispered in your ear, “well darlin’, why didn't ya say something. How ‘bout this, I take ya back to my house and show you what a real man does to make a woman feel so fucking sexy. Would you like that baby, for me to show you?”

When Joel pulled back to look at you he saw that you eagerly shook your head yes for him.  He tsked at you while resting his forehead against yours and said with his eyes closed, “Now come on baby, ya know better than that. Use your words, darlin’ tell me what ya want, please.”

When Joel pulled away from you gently, you nodded your head and then leaned in. Your mouth was right next to his ear when you gently whispered “fuck me Joel, that’s what I want. I want this, I want you. Help me forget about all those other men.”

Joel's eyes glazed over at your admittance. Pulling back he whispered “filthy girl” but then gave his own head a little nod, telling you that he understood what you wanted.  When Joel stood up, he reached out to help you up.  As the two of you walked back to his truck, he laced his hand into yours, showing you how much he actually cared. Once inside his truck, Joel kissed you passionately yet again, telling you with his actions of what he intended to do with you when he got back home. As he pulled away he then ran his hand through your hair for a moment, enjoying the quiet intimacy that was present.

 “I'm gonna treat ya right baby, the way you should’ve been treated all along. My only wish is that I wish I would've done this a lot sooner. For that honey, I’m really sorry.” And with that admittance Joel gave you another tender kiss on your lips. Once he settled into the driver's seat of his truck, you silently reached over and took his hand in yours. The 30 minute drive back to his house was done in silence.  But this silence for once wasn’t awkward, nothing with Joel ever was. You didn't know why you didn't see any of this feelings before, but now you were glad that the two of you communicated.

As the sun faded and dipped below the horizon, two souls were intertwined and connected. Joel's words lingered in the air, “baby, I’ve wanted you for so fucking long,” he whispered, while slowly thrusting inside of you. He was giving you a gentle reminder that beauty, true beauty, was seen from inside a person's soul. Joel spent the rest of his life, and yours, reminding you of this. And with each reminder it always ended the same way, you two wrapped up into each other’s arms. He told you each and every day how much he loved you, both inside and out, with saying just one simple sentence, “Darlin’, you’re beautiful.”  And you were, you were beautiful both inside out. Not because a man told you, but because you finally started to believe it yourself. 

The End

Taglist: @punkshort @shotgun-shelby @strawbunnyx @orcasoul @pedritoferg @chiogarza @jesfreedark @untamedheart81 @rainbow12346 @nandan11 @swiftpascal @eliza-8 @joeldjarin @vickie5446 @nastiasnow @staywildflowahchild @ratoonstown @l3laze @its-always-420-on-the-moon @kirsteng42

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[beardedjoel]

pretty little wife | meet cute, part 1

joel miller x f!reader one shot collection

series masterlist | main masterlist | ao3 | ✨kofi ✨ summary: 8.3k words; you didn't feel like going out for your friends birthday that night, but it turned out fate had very different plans for you. or a flashback to the night joel and pretty wife met. warnings: 18+ MDNI! no apocalypse au, relationship not established here like the other chapters, unprotected piv, public sex, rough sex, sub/dom relationship, dirty talk, pet names for reader, alcohol consumption a/n: this was getting super long and has been so much fun to write so i'm splitting it into two parts to also show their first date! i'm actually so obsessed with them its getting delusional and not even funny anymore but i digress

You hadn’t particularly wanted to go out tonight, but it was your friend Hanna’s birthday and her soft, doe-like eyes when she’d begged you to come had you giving in quickly. Sure, you had what felt like a million things to study for, homework piling up, but the more you thought about it, the better a night out sounded. 

She’d picked a relatively nondescript dive bar as her venue of choice, saying that it had cheap drinks, and seeing as it was her 21st birthday, she wanted to get drunk for as little money as possible. 

You and about ten other girls file into the bar, immediately having what feels like every set of eyes in the room on you all. You’d bet it’s not every day that an overdressed, loud group of young twenty-something’s walks into this place ready to get plastered. 

You all crowd around a few tables, pushing them together, and Hanna spots a jukebox, excitedly gushing over the way she’s going to put on all of her favorite songs later and dance when she gets drunk enough. 

After your first cocktail, you’re already having so much fun  that you wonder why you even had any doubts about coming out tonight. You laugh hard at something one of your friends, Rachel, says and your face falls immediately as your attention catches on something across the room. Not something, but someone. 

A man, who you’d guess is somewhere in his forties or fifties from the looks of it, is sitting with his own group. Even in the darkened shadows of the room, you’re mesmerized - he has a grumpy smile on his face as he chats with the person next to him. He runs a hand through grown out, dark curls and you can see the top half of his body above the bar top, muscled and broad and so inviting. 

You force yourself to blink, about to look away, when you see his eyes catch on yours. You feel your heart sink, hoping he didn’t catch you staring so intently, but swear he gives you a little wink before turning back to his beer that he’s nursing in one hand. Your insides flutter at the gesture, hoping your delusional self didn’t just imagine him sending that wink your way. 

You feel your stomach twist, and realize that despite how attractive you think he is, you’re typically way too shy to make the first move, so it’s unlikely much will come of this newfound attraction. You couldn’t help but continue to glance at him while you chat with your friends for the next hour, drinking in his mannerisms and ruggedly good looks, wishing you could hear what he was saying across this crowded, noisy room. 

You’d never felt like this before upon simply seeing someone, and it made your brain buzz more than the alcohol was, a steady little humming in the back of your mind. In fact, you hadn’t had more than a cocktail at this point, and were actively trying to blame this crazy feeling you were having on anything other than the handsome stranger you just couldn’t seem to stop staring at. 

You decide maybe another drink would help, so you break off from your friends to go up to the bar and order something.

You’re looking over the list of cocktails on a concerningly sticky laminated menu, scrunching your face up in disgust. You knew this place was divey, but their list of cocktails is downright depressing. Your first one hadn’t been very good, either, so you decide to change directions and order a beer instead. 

You glance around the room as you wait to catch the busy bartender’s attention while they flit around, taking orders and making beverages. Your eyes widen a bit as they land on Handsome Stranger, who is now openly meeting your gaze without shame.

You try to avert your eyes out of pure embarrassment, but you keep yourself staring for a moment too long before nervously chewing your lip and gazing down at the bar, pretending to be overly interested in the menu again. 

When you gather the courage to glance back up at where he was sitting, Handsome Stranger is gone, and you survey the area in a tiny panic, swinging your head to the side only to see him curving around the edge of the bar and walking straight towards you. 

He’s coming over. Oh god. 

He settles himself against the bar right next to you and clears his throat a little, cocking his head.

“Hi, there,” he says, and your jaw nearly drops at the husky, rasping accented voice that drips off his tongue like one of the sweetest sounds your ears have ever heard. You actively fight a shudder that wants to wrack your body, thinking of what that deep rumble would sound like against your neck, your lips, your everywhere.

You give him a nervous chuckle and swallow hard, hoping he doesn’t notice. “Hey,” you reply, wishing you suddenly felt less shy under his dark, brooding gaze. You suddenly are overly aware of how loud the room is, a myriad of classic rock, pop, rap, and everything in between blaring through the speakers from the jukebox the entire night. The realization hits you that you two may have to get closer to hear each other coherently and your stomach twists a little in anticipation. 

“Listen, I don’t usually do-“ he starts, but you can’t catch what he’s saying over the noise, so you scrunch your brows together and cup your ear in his direction. 

“What’s that?” You feel like you practically yell the words to him, your cheeks heating as he starts to lean closer. His face is merely inches from yours now, his mouth angled towards your ear. You get a better look at his face now, his dark, wiry beard with a few graying patches, and some deeper set lines in his face surrounded by speckled, tan skin. He’s rugged and handsome and everything that turns you on personified. It’s actually insane, now that you think about it, to see someone so seemingly perfectly made for you looks-wise, let alone have them interested in talking to you. 

“I said…” the man says, clearing his throat again. “I don’t usually do this kinda thing, but…” he trails off, studying your face for a few moments. You watch on intently, already enraptured by his words, not even able to form a follow up to prompt him to continue speaking. 

“But you’re so damn beautiful I had to say somethin’ to ya before you snuck away,” he says. His voice hits deep in your core now that it’s closer, sending you belly swirling in a sickly addictive feeling, one that you already know will be hard to shake tonight. You blink hard, wondering if he’d managed to speak to the wrong girl, but he’s looking right into your eyes without an ounce of doubt hidden behind those dark irises. 

“I… don’t know about that…” you mumble, but he cocks his head further, brows knitted together. 

“Would never say somethin’ like that if I wasn’t telling the truth,” he replies a bit more seriously. You bite your lip and decide that maybe you do trust him - that this handsome, mystery man really does have eyes for you in a bar full of attractive women. 

“Well, thank you,” you say, puffing your chest up a bit with a smile. “You’re not too bad looking yourself,” you add on, finally feeling a bit of your icy shyness melting away. 

He chuckles lightly, rubbing a nervous hand behind his neck, leaving a red mark in its wake. “Would you have a drink with me?”

You lick your lips and then bite the bottom one, contemplating. You don’t fail to notice Joel’s eyes flick down to that exact spot, then to your throat where you swallow again.

“I’d like that.”

“Somewhere quieter?” he calls out towards your ear, and you nod enthusiastically. He orders you two drinks, shooting an eyebrow up when you request a beer as well, and leads you to a small, cozy booth off to the side where there at the least aren’t speakers directly over your heads. 

“Now,” he rumbles out, folding his hands on top of the table  “What’s a girl like you doin’ here?” he asks as you slide into the seat across from him and settle in. 

You breathe an amused laugh through your nose. “My friends,” you say, motioning with a thumb over your shoulder in their direction, where they’re seemingly still having a great time together, a fit of giggles as they all sip their drinks. “One friend wanted the divey experience tonight for her birthday, I guess. Cheap drinks.”

Handsome Stranger’s eyes flick past you to your friends, and you see a flash of recognition as he processes Hanna’s extremely gaudy 21st birthday sash. You can see the gears turning, see him putting the pieces together as his lips part from the tight line they’d been settled in. 

“Hmm,” he grumbles, eyes back on you and seeming to consider you for a moment, taking in your face and making you feel your body temperature suddenly rising. You want to tug on your collar, do something to alleviate it, but can’t give him the satisfaction. 

“Shit,” you mumble under your breath, breaking completely under his stare. “I- I’ll be twenty two soon, so… I’m not…” you trail off, losing all conviction in whatever message you were trying to convey. Handsome Stranger has been too quiet, too guarded regarding this new information, and you feel your stomach turn nervously. 

“Did I just mess this up?” you blurt out, your face betraying you completely and contorting into a worried expression. He gives you a tired sounding chuckle, running a hand through his beard then back around to his neck. 

“No, darlin’, sorry. I - I don’t have a problem with it. Jus’ needed a second. You look… a bit older, so I was surprised, I guess.”

Your shoulders sag in relief - you hadn’t expected to be so devastated at the prospect of losing your new acquaintance’s attention so quickly, and only because of your age. You’d always been interested in older men, and had even been on a few dates with some, but nobody that pulled you in immediately like the stunningly gorgeous man sitting in front of you now. 

You lower your eyes to your lap, wringing your hands together. “You don’t have to be nice, I understand if you’re not interested. I’ve ended up being too young for a lot of guys I’ve talked to.”

“You’re talkin’ to a lot of guys my age, are you?”

Your eyes shoot back up to him, finding a new confidence that he’s still flirting with you. You shrug casually, fluttering your lashes a bit as you smirk. “Maybe, maybe not.”

He crosses his arms over his chest, frowning. “I gotta say, I don’t think I like that.”

You lean forward on the table, folding your arms in front of you as you rest your forearms down to support yourself. You stare into his dark yet warm eyes and try your best to cock an intimidating eyebrow. 

“And why is that?” you ask, upping your voice an octave, trying to sound more innocent. 

Handsome Stranger takes a deep breath, sighing and mirroring you by leaning himself closer to you. You can inspect him even closer now, smell the beer on him and whatever that musky, manly scent is that he carries with him, something you can already tell will be addictive. 

“‘Cause I want you all to myself.”

You stun at his words a little, knowing that your face is giving it away - your confident, fierce facade fading in an instant. You lick your lips nervously, his dark, desirous tone digging deep inside of you, lodging itself in your core and starting another pooling of arousal between your legs. You finally turn your lips up a little, meeting his gaze with a hard stare again while you put your chin in your hands. 

“You’ve got me right here, don’t you?”

He seems to like that, breaking the intensity between you two with a small laugh, leaning back and taking a long sip of his beer. 

“I’m Joel,” he says, and your smile widens as you consider the name on him, finding it suits him perfectly. It dawns on you that you’d been so absorbed in the conversation you didn’t even realize that you had no clue what his name was, that you may have even been content to fall in love with the man right here tonight and not even know his name. 

You tell him your name in return and it gets a genuine grin out of him, like hearing it for the first time was an answer to a question he’d long been asking himself. 

“You know, I could ask you the same thing - what’s a guy like you doing in a place like this?”

“Don’t think I look like the kind of guy who spends his nights in a place like this?”

“I mean… sort of…” you say shyly, trying not to laugh nervously. “You come here a lot?”

Joel seems amused by the way he’s getting you to blush and stutter. “Sometimes, with some crew from work. But that‘s what I'd expect, not… someone like you, honey. Ain’t no place for someone like you.”

“Well,” you twist your lips to the side teasingly. “I’m here, whether you like it or not.”

“Or not?” Joel chuckles incredulously. “Think I made it clear I certainly like it.”

You just give him a smug smile and sip from your drink, trying not to make a sour face in front of Joel, who seems to actually be enjoying his beer quite a bit. You’ve never been a big fan of beer, but it’s at least better than those stomach churning cocktails. 

“So, here with people from work… what do you do?”

“Contracting. Jus’ started my own company, actually. With my brother.” Joel tells you, and you give him an impressed raise of your eyebrows. 

“That’s really cool. Very impressive that you’re the big boss.” You lean in again to show your interest and toss your hair over your shoulder.

Joel’s eyes flash a little darker. “Like hearin’ that name from you,” he chuckles, “Otherwise it’s been a lot of pressure to be the boss, I guess.”

“Is it going well, though?”

Joel nods with a little shrug. “S’okay. Pickin’ up now so we’re doin’ good.” 

You give him an encouraging smile, trying to think of what to say next, feeling like a nervous mess around him, wanting him to think you’re interesting and worth his time, not just some young girl with nothing to offer. 

“Now what about you? Assume you’re in school?” he asks.

You try not to roll your eyes at the sore subject and breathe out a sigh. “Yeah, I am. I just… I’m not really into it.” 

Joel looks on curiously. “Uh-huh. Boring classes?”

“Not even that. I just don’t… like it. I’m so tired of having no clue what I’m doing. I thought about teaching, doing something like that, but I don’t know…” You let out a small sigh. “Sounds entitled or stupid maybe, but I just can’t find my passion there.” You feel your frustration coming out unfairly onto Joel, dropping your hands onto the table with an irritated thud.

“Not at all, sweetheart,” Joel says, laying one of his hands on the table, offering it to you as he slides it over, resting it on top of yours. “Some people ain’t meant for school. I didn’t really have a choice to not go to college, but worked out alright for m’self, right?”

You nod with a thoughtful look, despite barely knowing much of anything about how things worked out for Joel, but you believe him. Or at the least, he sounded happy enough to be owning his own contracting company.

“Thanks,” you say simply, offering him a grateful smile. 

Joel leans forward again on the table, not moving his hand from yours, and you feel hot all over. “‘Course. Now how ‘bout I help you find what you’re passionate about, hm?”

An hour and several more drinks later, you’ve moved over to Joel’s side of the booth at his insistence, where he pulled you nearly onto his lap, your thighs crossed over his as your ass is planted in the booth right next to him. A steady arm of his is wrapped around your back and pulling you close to him, stroking relaxed circles as you two chat. You feel perfectly content, buzzed from the alcohol and comfortable in Joel’s embrace, despite this being the first night you’ve even met him Something about him has put you at ease yet excited you, a consistent skittering of electricity across your skin where it connects to his.

You’ve discovered that you have more in common with a man in his mid forties than you might have thought. But along the way you’ve noted enough differences that you two have to keep the conversation balanced, having different interests and perspectives to add into the mix. Your banter has some kind of alluring pull with Joel, never stopping the beautiful flow of chatter and laughter you’ve found together until he leans in on a quieter moment, kissing your cheek and then moving to your neck. You feel your breath hitch at the warmth of his lips, your body stiffening yet going soft for him, breathing out shakily. 

“Mm,” you whimper quietly, unsure if he can hear it over the noise of the room. 

“Like it when I kiss you here, hm?” he rumbles, moving his lips to your ear where he ghosts his lips over your sensitive earlobe then back down to your neck. 

“Uh-huh,” you manage to say, eyes fluttering as you lean further into him. He keeps kissing every sensitive little bit of skin on your neck, trailing down to your collarbone and inward. “Jesus…” you whimper as he suddenly sucks lightly on your neck, testing you. 

“I gotta mark you, let everyone know…” he murmurs, sucking another spot not even inches away. You squirm, grinding your ass into the seat as you rub your legs together, something that doesn’t go unnoticed by Joel. “You’re mine tonight.”

You feel your cunt clench around nothing, squeezing tightly and wishing some part of him was filling that void, letting you squeeze around it while he practically makes you come just by putting his lips to your neck. 

“Mhm… yours…” you mumble, lolling your head back in the throes of your pleasure. 

“Taste so good, sweetheart, bet you’re just as sweet everywhere else, too,” Joel says, his tongue flicking along where he’s just sucked harder, testing the waters.

You can only moan quietly, not even daring to think about the other people in the crowded bar who could be witness to your overly raunchy public display. In fact, you find that you barely care, not with the way Joel’s lips feel like heaven every time they touch you, the way he’s making little satisfied noises next to your ear as your body responds to him.

“Joel…” you moan wantonly, starting to go more limp in his hold as he continues teasing you. He slips a hand between your tightly squeezed together thighs, bringing his palm up to cup the outside of your jeans. You know he must feel how warm and damp you are, even through the few layers there - he’s thoroughly teased you to a point where you’re hurting, your cunt aching and pulsing for him, dripping and soaking your panties.

“Christ…” you hear Joel exhale, his breath catching for a moment in his throat. “Fuckin’ soaked for me. Someone needs to get taken care of, doesn’t she?”

You only nod as he palms you harder while he’s speaking, desperate and unable to even find the words. You’re completely undone, trying to come to terms with the fact that Joel is about to ruin any other man for you in just a few short moments together.

“C’mon, then, let’s go,” Joel announces, patting your thigh, urging you to move. You follow him, beckoning you out of your seat with him, grasping your hand as he leads you to the bathroom. Your skin tingles where he holds your hand, his fingers intertwined with yours, and your palms sweat as heat courses through you, settling and pooling deep between your legs. 

You two burst through the door, saying a silent thank you that it’s just a single person restroom at this bar - no stalls, no other people to shoo out of the way. Joel slams the door behind you with built up aggression and you hear the lock click.

He’s on you before you can even register that it’s happening, pressing himself close and wrapping one of his large palms around the back of your head, fingers threading through your hair. He pulls your head towards his eagerly, crashing his lips into you, not giving you an inch of space with the way he’s tugging your head closer. 

You both ravenously clash teeth and tongues and lips until you’re practically breathless. One hand bunches on his shirt, clutching him to you, the other wrapped around his neck, burying itself in the dark hair that curls down. Your bodies draw together over and over, starting a steady grind on each other, barely even registering where one body begins and ends as you both chase pleasure using the other's body. 

You moan quietly when you start to feel him against your steadily aching cunt, his erection warm and pressing against his jeans. Your hands shake a little with excitement as you reach in between your bodies to grab him outside the denim, and he groans into your mouth.

“Fuck,” he breathes out, finally pulling his lips away from yours. He looks down at your swollen, puffy lips, chin red underneath from his scratchy facial hair. He can’t take his eyes off of yours though, so bright and eager for him as your pupils blow out with desire.

“Don’t usually do this either, get random girls into the bathroom with me, swear,” he adds, and you laugh a little against his lips. 

“I’m hearing a lot of that from you tonight,” you tease. 

“Jus’ the effect a girl like you has on me,” he quips back, and you find your cheeks warming and flushing at his words. Despite having just met him not even a few hours ago, you find that you believe him, that you are someone special to him. This strange connection, this pull you feel towards him has you questioning many things, and especially the fact that you’re fully about to fuck someone in a public restroom - something you’d never have imagined yourself doing. 

Until Joel. 

He seems more in control now, leaning forward to pepper your face with kisses, catching the corners of your mouth and pulling away just before you can meet his lips again. You pout as he does it for the third time, moving his lips right underneath to your chin, soothing the irritated skin there from his beard hairs. He finally gives in, kissing you with an open mouth, lapping his tongue sensually against yours, while his hands slip down your back and to your ass. You nearly melt, the intense softness of the way his mouth is moving on yours is starting to make you dizzy. You lean closer for support and Joel catches your chin between his thumb and forefinger as soon as he pulls away from the kiss.

“Get on your knees f’me, hm?” he says, studying your expression to read your reaction to his request.

You only consider it for a moment, the hardness of the floor on your knees, the dirtiness of it all, but your body and mind both tug at you, your knees feeling a buzzing, like they need to go down and touch this cold, unrelenting floor for him. You’d never considered yourself a very dominant person in your past relationships, but you’d also never had anyone trying to dominate you.

Not like this, at least. Not with the tone he’s using, the way he’s looking at you like he knows you’ll do it for him, like he knows you want to listen to him. To be good for him. 

Your knees bend, settling in front of him as you place your hands on his hips. You lick your lips absentmindedly, thinking about them settling around the cock you can see pressing against his pants. You feel a new flood of arousal at the thought, the way you’d never have considered doing something like this in the bathroom of a bar, but you like this side of you that Joel is bringing out. 

“Fuck. Good girl,” he rasps, and you stop, your lips popping open at his words, like something in your brain suddenly clicked into place at what you heard. 

“Can you s-say it again,” you ask quietly, reaching up slowly to his belt.

“What? Like being called a good girl, do you?” Joel’s smile curls into something sinister, and he tucks his fingers under your chin, making sure you’re looking up at him from where you kneel. “Jus’ happens I like to fuck good girls, so you’re in luck.”

You can only remind yourself to breathe as his words flood you, douse you in complete and utter arousal on every inch of your body, leaving you speechless. Your skin practically tingles as you wait for his next move, hands frozen on his belt.

“I’ll be good for you,” you whimper when he releases your chin, your head falling down a bit with the sudden loss of his support. Your hands get back to work, and Joel watches with satisfaction, a hand coming down to stroke the back of your head. You nearly find yourself purring like a cat, feeling a rumble of satisfaction deep inside of yourself at the gesture.

“Mm,” Joel says, his eyes narrowing down at you. “Much as I want your mouth on me, we’ve got our whole lives for you to suck my cock, pretty girl, and tonight… I need to fuck you. Like nothin’ I’ve ever needed before in my life.” 

Before you can even reply his hands tug you up from the floor and you stumble into his arms, caught by the sheer size and strength of his entire body against you. He swings you as you crash into him, pressing you back against the sink counter. His hands expertly unbutton your black, skintight jeans, unzipping them and starting to shimmy them down over your ass, his lips still attached to yours.

“God damn it, makin’ it hard, ain’t you, with these tight little pants…” he murmurs, moving his full attention to pulling down your jeans, finally getting them to your ankles.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t like my jeans?” you ask innocently as you step out of them, and Joel takes in your black lace panties, wetting his lips at the sight. Joel just growls in response, a resounding yes, bumping you so that your ass hits the counter again.

“Up” A simple command, but you’re too lost in the moment, feeling every inch of his body burning into yours, so you hesitate. “Don’t make me ask again,” he snips, and you feel your insides twist, your cunt clench around nothing inside of your soaked panties at his commandeering tone. You stand on your tip toes and let him help hoist you onto the counter. He steps forward between your legs, his face now level with yours and his hips coming flush with you. 

“Look at that… perfect fit,” he comments with a smirk, looking over the way your bodies are coming together, the way his cock will shortly have the perfect angle to slide into your tight hole. 

You give him a little giggle. “Perfect…” you echo, smiling as you look between your legs and then back up to his face. 

Joel’s thumbs dig under the waistband of your panties, starting to pull them down with the help of you lifting your hips. He holds them up, inspecting the slick, shiny stain you’d left, taking up most of the underwear. He simply shakes his head, fingering the wetness and smirking before balling it up and stuffing it into the back pocket of his jeans. 

Amused, you smile dazedly at him and reach out to grab at his arms, pulling him closer. Your fingers dig into his muscled biceps and you bite your lip at how absolutely fucking hot it feels. 

“Look at that little pussy, doll, so pretty, ain’t it. Gonna be all mine,” Joel says, peering in between your legs as he works on his belt and zipper. When his cock springs free from his jeans you try to hold back your stunned gasp, but Joel notices it, the way your eyes widen as you breathe in sharply. He’s not just big, he’s thick, and while you have some experience, this is certainly new and uncharted territory for you. 

“Hey,” Joel says, pulling you back to reality as he puts both hands on the sides of your face. “I know, but we can go slow if you need. Won’t be upset.”

You’re reeling with so many different thoughts - the rational part of your brain wanting to take Joel up on that offer, but the absolutely batshit crazy for him part of your brain doesn’t care one bit, only wanting him to take you, make you his. 

You slowly shake your head, meeting his stare from under your brows. “Don’t…” You wet your lips, pouting them out for him. “Go slow. Fuck me like you mean it, like I know you want to.”

Joel completely breaks, shaking his head and his expression twists into something completely feral, part of him gone to that other side of him, the one you know that needs you just as badly as you need him. 

“So fuckin’ obedient. Such a good girl.” You clench at his words, finding your body practically has an involuntary response to hearing his praise, drunk on it and desperate for more. He smirks, pressing himself close, both hands snaking around to the globes of your ass as they sit on the counter and squeezing. He delivers a swift slap to one of them before tugging hard, bringing you flush with his cock now resting at your entrance. You moan and gasp with the pain and pleasure of his palm smacking your flesh but give him a needy look as encouragement. 

“Gonna take me like the dirty little slut you are, lettin’ me fuck you in this bathroom,” Joel growls out as he presses forward, the head of his cock bursting into your entrance with one swift push of his hips. You whimper and nod to answer him, completely distracted now. 

You can feel yourself clench all over, just the thickness of his head is overwhelming, but he doesn’t stop, just slides into you inch by inch and you swallow hard and try not to tremble too much. You feel his head kissing deep inside of you, and your mind is swimming, wondering how you’re even taking so much of him right now. 

“Good girl, that’s right, take it so good…” Joel mumbles, his eyes hazy and dreamy as he feels you tighten and contract around him. He gently kneads where he’s holding onto your ass to try to soothe you. 

Your hold on his shoulders reaches a death grip as he starts to move inside of you, slowly at first. You find yourself appreciating that despite telling him to fuck you hard, he’s still being careful at first just in case. You buck your hips forward, pressing him just the tiniest bit deeper. Joel hums a little and chuckles at your insistence. 

“That eager, are you?”

“I told you to fuck me like you want to,” you snip back, rolling your hips into his again.

Joel leans forward to bury his face against your neck, sighing. “Gotta stop sayin’ that, darlin’, makin’ me crazy.” 

His lips flit down to your chest, where your low cut tank top is askew now, tits half falling out. He palms one of them before pulling your shirt down so that they’re both spilling out. 

“Don’t keep these pretty things from me, wanna watch ‘em when I fuck you,” he says, and you smirk, seeing how worked up Joel already is over you. It makes you feel so good, so desired, so unlike any other man you’ve been with before. 

He slides his cock into you a little faster, picking up speed with each thrust until you’re sure you can’t take it anymore. You know your face is contorted into a mixture of pleasure and pain, unsure how your body is even accommodating his girth right now, feeling like you’re being split open, your insides completely full of him. 

“My god, oh my god,” you mumble breathily, your brows knit in a concentrated look, trying to focus on the pleasure rather than the pain. 

“Thas’ it, babydoll, you got this, focus on me,” Joel encourages you, and you try to relax your body, feeling yourself finally adjusting more to his size. “Good girl, take it so good, yeah.”

He looks down to where your bodies meet with a satisfied smile, seeing you stretch over and over as you take his cock repeatedly. He’s starting to hit a heavenly pace now that your body is molding to his, taking him like you were made for it as he starts to jackhammer into you. You moan his name quietly under your breath, holding back as you hear the drone of the muffled music outside the bathroom, reminding you that you’re in a public space.

“Feels good, don’t it?” Joel grunts out as he, “Be a good girl and be loud f’me. I can see you holdin’ back.”

“Feels so good… so big, Joel,” you moan out a little louder,

“Thas’ right, baby, my big cock fits perfectly in this tight little cunt, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, yes,” you nod eagerly, wrapping your arms tightly around his neck, anchoring yourself to him while he pounds into you. You’re deliriously accepting all of it through the pain, the kind that’s nearly addicting because your body knows it’s good. You respond heartily to him, squelching, pornographic sounds reverberating in the bathroom as he pumps his length in and out of you.

“Christ, you’re so fuckin’ eager, so fuckin’ wet… c’mere,” Joel says suddenly, pulling out of you and yanking you by the hips off the counter where you land on shaky feet. He spins you and thrusts you against the counter, fumbling slightly as he grabs at your ass cheeks and spreads them apart. One hand slams onto your back as his cock slides between your legs and splits you open again, the sting of the stretch coming right back to you for a moment as you gasp. He pushes down, laying you flat onto the cold countertop, your bare tits pressed against it. 

“Up a little, let me see those perfect tits, honey,” Joel says, a hand going to your hair to yank on it, making you arch your back enough to get your chest off of the linoleum. “That’s right, there we go, so fuckin’ pretty,” Joel says, keeping his hand buried in your scalp, your locks gripped tightly in his palm to continue keeping you right where he wants you. You feel your tits bouncing like he wanted, your nipples grazing against the countertop each time he thrusts you forward. The sensitive buds send wave after wave of arousal through you each time they contact the cool surface, and as he lifts your hips slightly you nearly choke as he hits something deep and pleasurable inside of you.

“Oh… oh… n-no it’s too much…” you mumble, feeling like your eyes could start to cross every time you feel him pressing near this part of you, so you flutter them shut.

“Uh-uh. Eyes open, wanna see you lookin’ in this mirror at how pretty y’look right now.” Joel yanks tenderly on your hair, not as hard this time, keeping your attention. You pop your eyes open, and look at yourself, heavy lidded, cloudy, hardly recognizing yourself or anything around you. Only able to feel the way Joel is impaling you with the strangest, most intense, pleasurable feeling you’ve ever had inside of yourself.

“Wh- wh- it feels so - o-oh my god, I c-can’t,” you cry out at the tail end of your sentence as Joel jolts his hips harder, flesh slapping against flesh repeatedly.

“S’okay, you’re takin’ it so good, doll, that’s jus’ your g-spot, baby, don’t worry,” Joel says soothingly, switching over to a protective mode for a moment when he can see the worry flash in your eyes.

Your mouth falls open and you let out a languid, fraught moan as he tilts your hips a little more, catching the spot on a new angle. If you were being honest, you’d never stimulated your g-spot before - not by yourself, and certainly not with any other men, and now you were wondering how you’d lived without doing it for so long. It felt like the sweetest build up of pleasure, filling a hole deep inside of yourself with warmth, starting to tingle all the way through your body to the tips of your limbs.

“Fuck… don’t stop, don’t stop, please,” you cry out, feeling your knees shake, supported by Joel as he presses against you and keeps a tight hold on your hips. “I’m - shit - I’m coming, Joel. Harder, please.”

“So,” Joel spits out with a thrust. “Fuckin.” Thrust. “Polite.” Thrust. “Pretty girl.” He ups his pace even more, something you weren’t sure was possible and you’re bouncing forward, the edge of the counter digging into your torso and head nearing the mirror as he gives you his all. 

You explode, a scream of his name clawing out of your throat when the pressure snaps suddenly, sending you practically convulsing, limbs taut and shaking as you clench in spasms around him.

“Babygirl, she feels so tight, squeezin’ me like that,” Joel murmurs in a wavering voice, continuing his unrelenting pace. He wraps his hands underneath where you lean against the counter, cupping your tits and pulling you up as he leans down to meet your body - flesh against flesh, the sweat forming on your back soaking into his soft flannel shirt. You can feel the damp warmth of the fabric, like he’s been sweating through it this entire time, and it smells earthy and like sex already. You feel your orgasm reach a peak at the thought of leaving your scent on him tonight.

“J-joel, come inside me, fuck,” you cry out, meeting his gaze in the mirror with a heady look. For once, Joel follows a command instead of giving one, grunting with a final push of his hips, shooting his spend deep inside of you. 

“D-dirty little cumslut, wantin’ me to fill you up, make you mine, mmm” Joel says with a groan, his hips bouncing a few more times while he rides down his high. 

You can only nod, feeling fully fucked out and limp while he finishes using your spent cunt. You know it’s risky, that you should have thought more before tossing the idea of a condom aside in your mind, before asking a virtual stranger to pump his seed into you, but you truly don’t care. You only care about Joel, about giving to him what you knew he wanted. He didn’t even have to say it, but the way he fucked you, so rough and unrelenting, he wanted this, wanted to mark you in some way that would stick with you long after he pulls out. He wanted you to go home, find his cum leaking out of you onto your legs for the rest of the evening, be reminded of what he gave to you, how he ruined you.

You both stand in place, breathing heavily until Joel makes the first move, pulling himself out and tucking his cock back into his jeans. You feel raw, achy in the best way, and Joel notices your hesitation to move and wraps an arm around the front of you, bringing his lips to your ear.

“Good girl,” he whispers, biting the lobe and you shudder. “Good fuckin’ girl, y’know that? God…”

“I like being a good girl for you, Joel,” you say lazily, shutting your eyes as you lean back into him.

“Music to my ears, sweetheart. Now let's get you outta here, it’s late and you need some rest.”

Joel leads you out of the bathroom after you both adjust yourselves back to some semblance of normal, a hand on the small of your back as you enter the loud bar, seemingly much less crowded now than when you’d entered the bathroom. 

You see your friends, still grouped together but with a few more young, attractive men in the mix, crowded around a tiny table. Your friend Georgia spots you, waving you over with a slightly tired, exasperated look on her face. She’s the assigned designated driver for the night, and you can see that she’s more than ready to start heading out. You peek at the time on your phone and it’s after one in the morning.

“Come on,” she mouths, beckoning you dramatically and you can see your friends gathering up their things, saying their goodbyes to their new male counterparts.

You turn to Joel with an anxious look, and he grasps one of your hands, squeezing tightly.

“Go on, then,” he says softly, “Don’t keep them waitin’.”

You nod with a disappointed smile, wondering if you should have offered to go home with him instead. But the fact that he didn’t ask has already gotten in your head, so you lean forward to kiss him goodbye instead. He gives you a hungry kiss, one you could easily fall right back into, drag him to the bathroom again and let him do everything he just did all over again. 

He lets you go, nearly pushing you away with a small growl. You hurry over to your friends, who are shoving your purse and jacket back into your arms and ushering you away. You sneak one last glance back at Joel, standing with his hands in his pockets, wondering how your life could ever be the same after tonight.

You’re in a complete panic, only minutes from your house, tears brimming in your eyes.

“Please, Georgia, we have to go back, we have to - I don’t,” you feel around your bag for something that isn’t there, that you know isn’t there. A scrap of paper, a note, anything.

“Babe, you need to calm down and tell me what’s going on,” she replies, cool and collected as usual.

“Th- the guy. The one I was with. I didn’t get his phone number. Fuck, I don’t even know his last name. I -” A small sob escapes you, and you don’t know where all this emotion is coming from all of a sudden. It’s like when you’d been with Joel, you felt so calm, so even, and you hadn’t even had a chance to think about your emotional investment in what happened tonight. 

“Shit. And you think he would have wanted you to have it?” Georgia asks.

You blink, looking over at her, stunned that you hadn’t even thought of whether he wanted to see you again or not. You two hadn’t had a chance to discuss it before you’d been dragged out of the bar, but you’d gotten the sense he was intoxicated by you just as you were him. 

“I - think so? It seemed like maybe he would have. But now I’ll probably -” your voice cracks and shakes a little bit. “Never see him again.”

Georgia squeezes your shoulder softly, rubbing circles on it. “I’m sorry, honey. It’s going to be okay though, alright? You never know, the world has weird ways of working things out sometimes.”

You sigh, knowing the chances of that are slim, seeing as nothing that spectacular has ever happened to you before, and you don’t see why the universe would start now. “What if he’s still there, though? We could go back, please…”

“The bar closed twenty minutes ago, you know he’s not there anymore. I’m sorry,” she replies, giving your shoulder a final squeeze before putting both hands on the steering wheel and pulling up in front of your apartment. The last thing you want is to go up to your cramped space, shared with two roommates, nothing feeling truly yours. You want to scour the streets, walk around Austin until you find Joel again, until you can throw yourself in his arms and know you’re going to see him again and again and again. You can’t believe it took you losing him to realize just how much of a hold he has on you after those few short hours spent together.

You hug Georgia a teary goodbye and trudge up to your apartment, each step feeling heavy and painful, until you reach your bed and lay down, crying until you finally find it in you to get up and get ready for sleep.

You’ll be okay, just like Georgia said. You’re still drunk, and that’s it, that’s why you’re so emotional right now. Tomorrow you’ll just be happy you had incredible sex and can move on with your life. Surely, that’s exactly how it will go.

In the morning, you find the pit in your stomach hasn’t dissipated in the least, flashes of memories from last night torturing you as you try to function the next morning. You could barely sleep last night, the few drinks you had not even able to lull you into any kind of rest. You pace your room, thinking hard with a hot mug of coffee clutched between your hands.

You know now that you have to see him again, talk to him again, even if just to confirm whether or not it’s what he wants to do. Then you could have something definitive - closure, or a new, budding relationship with the man who absolutely fucking ruined you.

You stop dead in your tracks as an idea hits you, one that could potentially lead you back to Joel. Your heart pounds anxiously as you pray that the idea works, that there’s something there, not just delusional, hopeless hoping. You rush over to your phone and quickly dial Georgia’s number.

“Georgia!” you call out a bit too loudly, barely able to hear yourself over the rushing in your ears. “Hey,” you say more timidly.

She groans sleepily on the other end of the line, and it’s not until then that realize you’re up way too early for how late all of you stayed out last night. 

“Shit, s-sorry, I know it’s early, but…”

“What, babe? What could possibly be this important?” she groans into the phone teasingly, and you feel your cheeks heating up in embarrassment and shame that you woke her for something as silly as this, but you’re a woman possessed, on a mission to find Joel.

“I know, I know. I just couldn’t sleep. I feel like… he’s the one, or something. The guy from the bar. The connection was so crazy, and the sex, and I’m rambling now, god, sorry.” You take a breath, steadying your nerves. “My point is, you were sober last night. Joel said he was there with his work crew, so did you see anything? Any shirts or trucks or anything with a logo or a name for a construction type crew? Please,” you say, murmuring the last, begging word more to yourself or whatever higher power is in control of your current predicament.

You can hear the rustling of Georgia’s sheets on the other end and another sleepy sigh. “Let me think on it, okay? When I can wake up some more. I promise I’ll text you about it later.”

You two end the call and you start pacing again, your heart thundering in your chest, knowing every minute is going to be agony waiting to see what Georgia ends up texting you. The day drags on, hour by hour a wasted mess of a day, with your nerves too frayed to concentrate on much of anything - homework, studying, TV - none of it helps to distract you enough.

When your phone pings that afternoon you pounce on it, flopping down onto your bed with shaky hands, opening the notification from Georgia.

Miller Contracting.

Two words and you’re off to google after shooting her a thank you text with as many exclamation marks as you could slam out in the few seconds you wanted to spare before moving on in your search.

You find his business immediately, their shoddy little website that’s clearly was not made by any professional. It kind of makes you chuckle to think of Joel trying to make a website. The page features an uncomfortable looking photo of Joel and another man, who you can only assume is the brother he said he owns the business with. You immediately smile looking into his eyes, his hair looking a little more cropped and coiffed in this photo than it had last night. Underneath it, their phone number is listed, and your eyes widen, mouth going desert dry as you punch it into your phone. 

You hesitate, your finger hovering over the send button, needing to be sure of what you’re even going to say. What if he doesn’t answer, or it’s his brother, or they even have a secretary or something? Your mind spins but you force yourself to dial the call, anyways, driven forward by an unseen force that you’re quietly grateful for as the line trills in your ear.

Ring. Steady breath. Ring. Another. Ring.

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