huntingingoodwill - Tumblr blog

huntingingoodwill · 2 minutes ago

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thanks for the rb bb 🫶

aren’t you gonna tuck me in? (j.m.)

masterlist

pairing: brat!reader x joel miller

prompt: goodnight kiss

a/n: a lil sumn for @janaispunk’s 1.5k kisses challenge!!! with a bit of a grumpy x sunshine dynamic smirk smirk... congrats babes 💕

“You crazy old motherfucker!” Your screams were tinged with laughter as Joel slung you over his shoulder, carrying you out of the Tipsy Bison.

“Who’re you calling a crazy old motherfucker?” Joel grumbled, locking his arm tight around your thigh and kicking open the door as he pointedly ignored your friends’ whoops and whistles.

You blew them a kiss before they disappeared behind the swinging door, at which point you gestured to the desolate road Joel had carried you out onto.

“Don’t see any other crazy old motherfuckers around.”

The slice of light that fell upon the road from the open door reduced into nothingness as it swung shut, leaving you and Joel awash in blue moonlight.

“If I’m crazy, it’s only ‘cause you drove me to the brink-” He paused in exasperation, landing a smack to your thigh that prompted a delicious, ticklish pain to shoot up your leg, and peals of laughter to come falling out your mouth,“will you stop wiggling up there?”

“Sure thing.” The saccharine words dripped off your tongue before you halted your movements, muscles slackening as you draped your dead weight over his shoulder.

“Jesus,” He huffed, suddenly exhausted as he had to literally shoulder the burden of your lax body. “Y’know what, just get down.” He said, quickly lowering you to the ground.

“Joel Miller, you are quite the party pooper.” You chuckled, stumbling to your feet.

He had stormed into the Tipsy Bison, locking eyes with yours as he pushed past a crush of people, causing your lips to twist into a smirk and your heartbeat to quicken in time with the beat of the warbling song blasting from the jukebox. He had barely given you time to shoot off a sly remark before he tossed you over your shoulder and whisked you away, an act much more interesting to you than the drunken conversation you were enjoying with your friends.

“I did not poop any parties.” He said, watching you stifle a laugh as you walked beside him. “Maybe you don’t recall, but we’re on patrol together tomorrow, and I am not gonna play nurse to you when you’re hungover on a horse.”

When Tommy had first put the both of you on patrol together, he had thought his brother was pulling some sick joke. He probably was. You had taken a particular interest in Joel whenever you saw him around Jackson, never failing to deliberately bump into him and engage in some teasing that would render Tommy helpless with laughter as Joel stood on, unamused.

As much as Joel hated to admit it, and as much as he felt he really was being driven crazy on his patrols with you, he had almost come around to it.

The gleam of your smile in those dark forests as you told him corny jokes around a crackling fire. Like sunlight peeking out from behind a dark cloud.

He pushed the thought away. Maybe you really were driving him to the brink.

“Please,” you rolled your eyes, gait leisurely besides his focused march down the road, “I’ve been hungover on that horse before and you never had to baby me. I just think you hate fun.”

“I do not ‘hate fun’.” He said, his monotonous drawl sounding pretty fun-hating, “...But maybe you were having too much fun. ‘Specially with that boy of yours.”

He regretted letting the words slip as soon as he said them, but he couldn’t deny the flare of heat that simmered under his skin when he entered the bar to see you laughing your head off with one of the guys that always seemed to trail after you around Jackson.

“Oh. My. God.” You said, a thin sheen of dust rising around your boots as you screeched to a halt.

“What?” Joel said, heart pounding as he whipped his head around.

“You’re jealous!”

“I am not-“ Joel spluttered, heat blooming across his collar.

“I’m walking home with a green-eyed monster!” You grabbed him by the jaw, and Joel prayed you couldn’t feel the heat from his cheeks searing the pads of your fingers. You turned his head, prompting him to look in your eyes. He had to fight off the urge to melt against your touch under the intensity of your stare, his jaw clenching beneath your fingers.

“Nope. Not green. Still shit brown.” You said, killing the moment with a grin.

Joel shook you off, quickening his pace rather unsteadily as you continued to walk beside him.

“You’re obsessed with me. First, you’re carrying me out of the Tipsy Bison, and next, you’ll be carrying me over the threshold after our wedding." You laughed.

That made even more heat blossom in his cheeks, and he tried to push that image out of his mind as he cleared his throat, biting his tongue as he let you carry on.

“Don’t be too jealous, Joel.” You purred, slipping your arm through his, nuzzling up to him in a way that made blood roar in his ears, “That guy’s not really my type. I like older guys.” You placed extra emphasis on the last phrase, making Joel’s head swim.

After making him squirm under your gaze for a couple seconds, you burst into laughter.

“As mean as you look, you get flustered so easily. It’s adorable.” You said, punctuating the sentence with a coddling pout.

“I’m glad you think it’s funny.” Joel grumbled, eyes trained straight ahead.

“It’s hilarious.”

Your footsteps trailed off as the both of you arrived in front of his house, staring at its squat silhouette in the dark.

You turned to grin at him, Joel shooting a sideways glance at you, debating whether or not to take the bait.

“What?” He mumbled, taking the bait.

“Miller, you devil. You could’ve at least bought me a drink before bringing me back to your place.”

He rolled his eyes, walking up the porch steps as you trailed behind him.

“Your place is all the way on the other side of Jackson. So you can either sleep here tonight, or we’ll spend another hour walking around in the dark.” He said, opening the door.

“Excuses, excuses.” You clucked your tongue, shaking your head with false disapproval, "As much as I'd like that long, romantic, moonlit walk, I am getting a little sleepy. I'll stay the night."

He held the door open for you, gesturing for you to head inside, a motion that you simply returned with an expectant stare.

“What?” He said, trying not to shift under your gaze.

“Aren’t you gonna carry me over the threshold?”

“Get your ass in the damn house.”

Your laughter rang, clear as a bell, through the sparse rooms of his house as you kicked off your boots, flouncing up the stairs as if you were right at home.

He heard the sound of his shower turning on and the syrupy hum of your voice over the splash of water.

He reached for your shoes, overturned and muddied, before straightening them and placing them next to his. Staring at the both of them next to each other, your voice ringing in his ears as you sang a discordant melody in the shower, a flicker of strange emotion shot through him.

The realisation he wouldn’t mind picking up after you, putting your shoes next to his. They would have a place next to each other, where they belonged, whenever you came home.

The realisation that he wouldn’t mind if your voice filled up every room in the house, where once he thought he was content with silence.

As he poured a glass of water for you and began carrying it up to his bedroom, he realised he wouldn’t mind bringing up a glass of water for you every night, and a cup of coffee every morning.

“I’m going insane.” He muttered to himself, rubbing a hand over his tired eyes.

“You decent?” He called out, knocking on his bedroom door.

“Hardly ever. Come in!” You sang.

The scent of his soap hung in the air, clinging to your skin. You grinned at him, a soft glow haloing you from his bedside lamp as you towelled water out of your hair, one of his flannels hanging off your frame.

“Is that mine?” He swallowed, the words flying out of his mouth so quickly they almost sounded accusatory.

“Yeah.” You turned to look at his furrowed brow. “What? I can give it back to you if you want.” You said, beginning to unbutton it.

He averted his eyes, that familiar heat shooting under his skin again. “Jesus- just- you can keep it on.”

You burst into laughter as Joel rubbed the back of his heated neck.

“You can sleep in my bed tonight. I’ll sleep on the couch.” He mumbled.

“Thank you, Joel.” You whispered, your sincerely grateful, soft voice sending his walls tumbling down.

He cut his eyes at you one more time, a vision in his worn, old flannel, before making a move to leave.

You cleared your throat, the noise exaggeratedly loud in the quiet room. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

He looked at you, his deep brown eyes wide in confusion, a furrow set in his brow.

“Aren’t you gonna tuck me in?”

His cheeks reddened as he stared at you, swallowing thickly.

Hiding his trepidation behind an exasperated eye roll, he crossed the room. His hand, the skin rough in contrast to the soft blanket, pulled the fabric over your body, covering you. You smiled up at him, that evil glint in your eye that drove him crazy shining up at him.

“Goodnight kiss?” You whispered with feigned innocence, glancing up at him through thick lashes.

“Christ.” He whispered, heartbeat pounding in his ears, his heart somewhere between wanting, annoyance and restraint.

“Please?” You whispered, lips turning up at the corners into the sweetest smile he’d ever seen.

He felt his resolve crumble to pieces, and he couldn’t resist. He leaned in, heartbeat kicking in his chest as he pressed a chaste kiss to your cheek.

He felt dizzy as he felt your hot breath against his ear, the soft skin of your cheek nuzzling into the scruff on his cheek.

“Oh, c’mon,” you whispered, lips ghosting his cheek, “you can do better than that, can’t you?”

He melted against your touch, barely able to formulate a smart retort before he felt your teeth digging into his cheek.

“Jesus!” He recoiled, the bite radiating with a dull pain.

“That’s for pooping my party, Miller.” Laughter bubbled from your lips as you watched him run his fingers over the grooves your teeth left in his skin.

“You’re fucking crazy.” His wounded tone just made you even more amused, your smile growing on your face.

“Don’t sulk.” You pouted, hand reaching up to skim a thumb across his cheek, and he couldn’t help leaning into your touch. “Let me kiss it better.”

He let you press a kiss to the quickly fading bite mark, his head swimming as your tongue darted out, giving him a playful lick before you laughed against his skin, breath fanning out over his cheek.

He turned his head, forehead pressed against yours as his nose brushed yours, his eyes screwed shut.

“You’re driving me crazy.” He mumbled.

“I know.”

He pressed his lips to yours, that strange, floaty feeling he had felt downstairs washing over him. You held him close, fingers entangling in the soft curls at the nape of his neck as you pulled him onto the bed.

Lying on his back, he let you press your palms against his shoulders. He stared at the ceiling, feeling barely there, as if he could have just slipped away, your hands the only thing pinning him to earth. He felt it with every kiss you pressed to his lips, when your lips ghosted the line of his jaw, his neck. You were everywhere, and he wanted to keep it that way.

“All better?” You said, voice barely audible over the roar of blood in his ears.

“Yes.”

“Y’know,” you whispered, tracing the line of his jaw with your lips, “I just realised something.“ You looked down at him, the smile that meant trouble returning to your face. “We have a really early morning tomorrow. Goodnight, Joel!”

Just like that, you had rolled off of him and turned off the light, plunging the both of you into darkness. He laid there, barely registering what had just happened, his body already missing your warmth.

He turned to look at you, your face slackened with sleep as your breath evened out, completely calm in the embrace of sleep as his heart still pounded in his chest, giddy as he turned back to stare at the ceiling.

He was definitely going crazy.

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