#40s straw hat

[nyc-looks]

Lexie

“I'm wearing a 40s Mexican bicycle straw hat, Rare Bird Aesthetics bolo tie, 40s Hungarian blouse, 50s collapsible hoop skirt, 70s Georgio Sant Angelo paneled midi skirt, Betsey Johnson fishnet tights, 70s green buckle socks, and mismatched 80s Gucci loafers. The inspiration for my outfit came from a desire to stand out and spark joy in the imagination of my fellow vintage lovers. I wanted to find an intersection between psychedelic and clown while also pushing the boundaries of what fashion is ’supposed’ to be.”

Apr 8, 2022 ∙ Chelsea

[chio-chan2artbox]

Sanji week Day 6: Future

Some things will never change 😅

[inoreuct]

i actually desperately need 40y/o zoro with reading glasses. thin wire frames with teensy rectangular lenses perched on his nose as he peers down at one of sanji’s french romance novels to see what all the fuss is about— after so many years with his husband he’s picked up a bit of the language and sanji has a stack of them on the nightstand and he’s bored, alright? sanji has something to wrap up at the restaurant and he might as well. he’s farsighted and squints at everything near him and it makes him look even grouchier than usual and the fact that he’s graying at the temples doesn’t help. he looks terrifyingly severe with all his scars and his frowning, until he smiles— he’s been doing that a lot more lately, and then people realise that’s why he has crow’s feet around his eyes. i need him to have a collection of bottles that he’s fiercely protective over; they’re all empty and the labels are faded to hell, but point to any one and he can tell you where it had been drunk. there’s a beer bottle from the first night he’d sailed with luffy. a sweet rum they’d popped to celebrate usopp’s return. the champagne from when he and sanji had gotten married.

i need 40y/o sanji with long, long hair that he ties and pins and styles differently every day. sometimes he makes decorative sourdough and he matches his braids to the patterns. i need him taking on protégés in his restaurant, guiding a new generation of culinary genius even though teenagers are fucking terrifying and annoying and argumentative, because he remembers being exactly like them and at the end of it they’re good kids. they listen to him (…to an extent). they’re sweet and talented and they do absolutely crazy shit in the process of trying to push their boundaries; sometimes they trip and fall, but it’s fine. that’s how they learn. that’s what sanji’s for, as their safety net and their mentor— he’ll give them shit for it and pick them up anyway, nag them while brusquely brushing off their knees. but sometimes, sometimes, they come up with something extraordinary, and sanji gets so proud he could cry. zeff drops by and nags at him for everything under the damn roof. sanji doesn’t mind it.

i need them in their kitchen, in the morning, when sanji’s far too chipper and zoro’s not awake enough, nursing a cup of coffee and half-asleep again at the table as sanji fries their eggs. i need zoro to have one of those old man rocking chairs that he settles into to watch the sunset and drink tea, because sanji’s managed to get him into tea of all things. he’d have never imagined liking matcha a decade ago. i need that rocking chair to be big enough for two so that sanji can curl into his side and thumb through yet another of his novels. i need zoro braiding his hair and falling asleep halfway. i need sanji pulling his glasses off when they slip down his nose and dragging his husband to bed so that he doesn’t bitch about his back hurting the next day. i need them at sanji’s restaurant, teaching the kids about food and liquor pairings— they’re a little terrified of zoro until he squints and pulls his specs out to read the labels, after which they’re running around calling him old man and grandpa roronoa. zoro fumes because for fuck’s sake, he’s forty, not ninety. he’s not old. he brings a bottle of wine three inches away from his face and sanji does nothing to stop the kids at all.

just— zoro with reading glasses. sanji with long hair. doing mundane, boring things that make them happy because they never expected to live this long anyway. zoro’s down to two earrings and sanji has one. their rings are woven straw pulled from luffy’s hat. they have a little motored dinghy out back that franky made for the times they need to go haul their captain’s ass out of trouble (as usual), but none of the crew are ever very far from each other. they stay at sanji’s restaurant in the all blue and occasionally fend off people from their past looking for revenge. or money. or to eat them out of the house and home, in luffy’s case, which then leads to zoro den den-ing the rest of the lot and sighing that they might as well come over for a cookout.

they’ve all gotten older; a little banged up and scruffed around the edges, but alive and well. nami’s making bank as a mapmaker who caters to the wealthy/insurance agent/financial advisor— zoro scoffs and calls her a swindling witch, to which she smiles at him all sweet before stomping solidly on his foot with her red-bottom heel. out of their conjoining workshops, franky and usopp have started a wildly successful demo-smithing company that specialises in custom explosives and bespoke carpentry. robin owns and maintains the most extensive archive of books any of them have ever heard of, and it’s pretty much lauded as one of the greatest libraries of all time; brook does gigs in jazz lounges and bistro bars, jinbei’s a diplomat who’s well-respected for campaigning for equal rights, and chopper runs his own medical practice. luffy, as usual, is doing whatever he wants, which is a little bit of everything. y’know, taking down corrupt governments and all that.

sanji feeds them like he’s always done and zoro brings out the good alcohol to pass around.

life’s good.

[maligned-kitty]

Luffy has infatuated me

[basedkikuenjoyer]

And now we party! Exactly what we expected last time. Papa Cora wants to meet Law's friends! Especially if he wants to be all edgy about Bepo and the gang not being friends. Best part of all this by the way, know how they found Law's secret bunker house that has another secret bunker to spy on Doffy? They run into Barto/Gambia and ask the latter's grandma. Absolute legend.

Like I've said before, I wanna see it with Izo so bad but it's so cool how this spinoff can allow for more silly interactions between characters that wouldn't get to. Fingers crossed Bellemere is still alive too! Maybe Chopper's still staying with Hirluk? But we'll always have Luffy going straight for calling this clumsy doofus "Corao."

[love4luffy4lufe]

Me when 40yr luffy 🗣️‼️‼️

[frankencanon]

hey. look at my hats

[devilfruitdyke]

my ultimate playoffs outfit would be monkey d luffy and i think i could do it (unrealistic)

[thychesters]

dammit i knew this was gonna happen but yesterday i got a fic idea that i thought was neat but i can’t properly execute it without at least watching another 900+ episodes or reading 90+ volumes … amazing

[koalas-koalas-everywhere]

Jimbei and Luffy's relationship is so special to me. Like, Jimbei only knew him as Ace's little brother and he already established that that only went so far with him, but then Luffy freed him and they fought together and by the end of it Jimbei decided that he'd protect him with his life. He rescued him physically, but also mentally and emotionally. He saw Luffy bleeding his heart out and said, "I'll cradle your innards until you're ready to shove them back in through sheer force of will," and Luffy did. When they parted ways, they already planned to see each other again and, when it looked like they might miss each other, Jimbei sent a message so Luffy would still be able to find him. Literally shared blood, an act whose significance is exponentially increased by the fact that they're a human and a fish-man. Right in front of a kingdom watching them spit in the face of lifetimes of prejudice, Luffy asked Jimbei to join his crew, then went nuts when he asked him to wait until he wrapped up his business. He was immediately like, "I gotta live up to their expectations, earn my place in the crew, live by the straw hat, die by the straw hat". Huggies and piggyback rides. In the middle of all this, he apparently gushed so much about Luffy to his crew that they expected their own captain to leave them. When Luffy talked about the end of his dream, even though Jimbei thought it was ridiculous at first, he ended up taking it seriously because it was his captain's dream.

Jimbei's like, "I believe this man and his crew will achieve what the greater powers in the four seas have been attempting and failing to do for the last 40 years and more. He's the key to ending the oppression of our race and leading the world to the light. While he hasn't achieved his full potential yet, what he is now is enough for me to swear my undying loyalty to him. His cause is my cause. His name is Luffy-kun~."

[powerfulblob]

puts on my clown hat

behold, as requested: The Trans Franky Essay. Like most of this is still jot notes and I wrote this when half-asleep so like. I don’t know

Please don’t shoot me.

Section 0: Most importantly...

Due to the Somerton stuff, I really am trying my best not to plagarize.

Unlike TikTok user @theyboss._.franky, I’m not planning to talk about if he’s trans based on physical features, personality, etc.

I’m here to talk about the narrative in particular, and allegory.

also kudos to @punkitt-is-here

[ID: A screenshot of an X post by @punkittdev that reads “this is also partially why i am a franky one piece trans man truther” It features Franky, a cyborg with a shirt that reads “I HRT”.with a sun between the words “I” and “HRT” Franky is a tall man with tan skin and blue hair, and has part of his arms replaced with blue metal with a star at the end. end ID]

Section 1: Cyborgs are inherently trans

I’m literally just going to link The transgender cyborg: an inexhaustive primer because the article does a much better job than I can, but to summarize:

Trans people are not only cyborg-adjacent because of the transphobes who call us that, but primarily because we are used in the same way cyborgs are in text: As a talking point, a disruptive metaphor about humanity as a whole.

That brings us onto the next place...

Section 2: Cyborgs are extra trans in this case.

The reason why I latched onto this in the first place is this character’s backstory.

Franky, who eventually becomes the Straw Hat’s shipwright, starts as a joke character in the Water Seven Arc.

He’s a 40-ish year old man who runs around in a speedo and shoots lasers at people, making a living off of dismantling ships.

However, as more information is revealed, the story starts to humanize and give him a backstory.

quotes from Chapter 358:

“My body got wrecked and parts of it weren’t working anymore... So I transformed myself using scrap metal. It’s how I survived!” 

“Waste wood, scrap iron... I fit right in. First I’ve got to... ... Do something about this useless body of mine!” 

What do these have in common? Retrofitting the self, and rebuilding the body. I think there’s something trans there but IDK

Deadnames (partially joking here): As said by another character “Cutty Flam of Tom’s Workers is dead. As long as you don’t use that name... ... There’s nothing connecting us”  (for context, Franky was changing his name to evade government capture, but shhh let’s just pretend we’re talking about deadnames)

Actual Section 2: The Boats are trans now

speaking of the self as a construct...

I think it would be giving Oda too much credit for doing this on purpose.

But, he also accidentally created one of the best analogies I’ve ever heard for gender identity and against gender essentialism:

And of course, it has to be boats.

chapter 353: “Franky, there’s no such thing as blueprints for a pirate ship!! If the sailors who board that ship run up a skull-and-crossbones, then it’s a pirate ship. If they fly a seagull flag, it’s a navy ship. Build whatever you want to build, Franky.”

Like again: It’s the idea that there’s no instructions for a person, it’s what you decide to create out of oneself?

Alright. So, in terms of most manga, he actually does a rather good job. One Piece is primarily a series about misfits and outcasts: The series is goofy and over-the-top as a rule. So, one could argue the extreme way in which he portrays trans people up until the Wano arc is just a part of the series.

yeah idk

[cozage]

The Daughter's Return Table of Contents

Hi friends! Tumblr hates me and won't let me add more links to my post, so I'm adding all of TDR here and will update it on this post instead of my Masterlist!

Meeting 1. The Promised Position  2. The Strategist of the Second Division  3. Some Friendly Advice 4. Secrets Exchanged 5. Parting Ways 6. Truth or Dare 7. Infiltration Plan  8. The Captain and the Barmaid 9. A Family Affair 10. Secrets in the Files 11. Uninterrupted 12. The Morning After Falling 13. Stories from the Vault 14. Stories Around the Breakfast Grill 15. Under the Falling Water 16. Jinx 17. A Steamy Situation 18. The Road to Love 19. Bad Mood

Running 20. Sick with Dread 21. Revelation 22. Changes 23. Doctor's Visit 24. In Paradise 25. Straw Hat Luffy 26. Redirection 27. Promises Broken... 28. And Promises Kept 29. Change in Plans 30. Lava and Ice, Together Again 31. The Call Home 32. Shared Sake, Shared Secrets 33. Returning Home 34. House Arrest 35. Let's Talk Strategy 36. The Old Man in the Bar 37. Ace's Perspective - Prison 38. The Morning of War 39. The Battle of Marineford 40. Freedom 41. A Painful Departing 42. Uncertainty 43. Where to Go from Here 44. Decisions 45. A New Beginning

[sibmakesart]

I had seen/read a few Time travel AUs with future!Sanji being thrown in the past and interacting with younger Straw Hats (especially with ZoSan from their pinning phase or even before it) but never found a good one with future!Zoro lost *blink-blink* in the past. Do you have any recomendations? Extra points if said future!Zoro is old married or at least in an estabilished relationship with future!Sanji and present!ZoSan in their pinning phase or before it. If you don't have any, how do you imagine his interactions?

i cannot, cannot, recommend enough 20 year waltz by @wellfine

its a 40 pages (!!!) comic about married 40zosan meeting pinning 19zosan ITS SO GOOD i have it on my phone (you can get it on their gumroad in pdf ) i re read it something like 8 times its just too good

i cant think of a fic with this trope but if anyone has recs dont hesitate to give them !

now that you point it out i cant think of seeing this trope with just zoro 🤔

ig its because hes a very reserved character, especially in the new world

and hes too blunt to make the tension last more that two minutes

like baby sanji would try to get a raise out of him and hed just "omg stfu i know you want to fuck me you told me"

and both baby zoro and sanji would instantly die

[simandy]

“If a tree falls in a forest, but there is no trunk, neither marks on the grass, was there even a tree?”

Yes I am back with one more specific-ass cc pack nobody understands... Yet! This was supposed to be the part two of my MAGIC Pack, which consists of hairtyles for male framed sims, but I got carried on while writing my book, halloween was next, so I thought... “Why not?”

Here’s a pack with the 9 planned hairstyles + 7 clothing pieces + my Halloween gift for you! 1 extra hairstyle, 2 extra versions of the clothing pieces and a mask, for your evil purposes, it being destroying my patience or not.

BIIIIIIIIG ENORMOUS THANK YOU for @pandorassims4cc​ who made the header poses for me ♥ I was going nuts trying to find something like that! Thank you for your ABSOLUTE KINDNESS ♥♥♥

PLEASE check the cc items bellow the cut for more details ♥ Also the Hair 360º

BGC

All Lods

TOU

More details under the cut;

DOWNLOAD ♥

PLEASE CONSIDER DONATING ON KO-FI OR BECOMING A PATRON. I’m trying to pay for my meds and therapy, also college. Please, consider sharing too, if you can’t pay. Thank you for the support :)

All Hairstyles are under the same specifications:

BGC

All Lods

Hat Chops

24 EA Colors

40 Puppy Crow Colors (You will need the mesh with the EA colors)

TOU

Exceptions: Enan, Ashay, Kea and Rael Hairs are high poly. Be cautious.

Cloth Belt is located into GLOVES,

Tempos’s mask is located into HATS.

Known Issues:

There’s something up with a tiny hair straw in Cain Hair, but is usually covered and in a very had angle to be noticed.

Prince Cloth Belt has 1 (one) problematic vertex next to the thighs that hate me and you too. It is a REALLY small bug but might make you “eek” at first glance but you will forget about it. The Diplomat Uniform shares this trait.

If you have any issues with the Kea hair, please contact me. It is unstable for no reason at all, works with me but now for everyone, I’ll try to fix it after halloween.

[eroguron0nsense]

Late Night Luffy's Dream Theory

So I've heard a fair amount of speculation about what Luffy's dream is after he becomes Pirate King, and by extension, what Roger's dream was (recall Yamato's flashback confirming that Luffy's dream–which Ace shared with him in their long tipsy conversation/totally not a night of passion–is "the same thing the Pirate King" said.) Fan speculation about Luffy's real dream ranges from things like "host the biggest party in the world", to "go to the moon", "make a country of pirates" etc but I've always found something fundamentally unsatisfactory about these, and I'll throw my hat in the ring to narrow down the possibilities.

To recap, the information we have about Luffy's dream is as follows: -Both times the dream is alluded to, it's at the end of what I and probably a bunch of other people personally conceive of as major sagas pre and post TS that both culminate in a major battle featuring EVERYONE WE'VE SEEN AND MORE –It's something that Roger, battle-hardened and well into his 40s or 50s–shared with Oden, that was documented in Oden's journal and partially inspired Yamato's unshakeable faith in Luffy –The Straw Hats, Ace, and Sabo are all shocked to hear it and ask if he's fully serious, but several of them support it immediately and the others remain protective over it and swear they'll see Luffy's ambition through. Jinbe, Nami, and Usopp are in disbelief, Chopper and Franky are excited, Robin is stunned, but looks hopeful or contemplative rather than derisive or amused, etc. –Ace and Sabo laugh as children, but swear to themselves that they'll protect Luffy's dream and won't let anyone mock it. As he's dying, Ace tells Luffy that he truly, truly believes Luffy will pull it off, and he's only sorry he couldn't see him make that dream a reality. –Shanks found it really funny, but is repeatedly shown stating he thinks that this ridiculous fucking child he met is going to be the future of the next pirate era, implying that he has some degree of faith in this child he (likely) recognizes as the inheritor of Roger's will Luffy's dream is repeatedly referred to as "crazy", or in some cases, "a child's fantasy", but also implied to be something really pure, ambitious, and highly unlikely but theoretically possible.

When I come up with fan theories, I tend to approach them less from a "textual evidence" standpoint than a "what would pack the biggest emotional punch and tie into the message/arc/etc that we've been shown thus far" one, and that tends to inform which popular ones I buy into (e.g. I am about 50-60% convinced that Law death will be a thing because, Chekhov's gun aside, Law's been in fucking crisis and unsure of what he'll do as his own man free of Cora's legacy and tries to emulate him in Wano. And while I think there's still a good chance he'll survive to the end for other reasons, there's also potential for a LOT of bittersweet beauty in him repeating what happened to him in childhood by quite literally passing on his heart and life to someone else). Considering what would be emotionally resonant and feel anywhere near as earned as what it's been built up to over two whole fucking sagas, Luffy's dream has to be something absurdly ambitious and thematically resonant. I do not think, if Luffy's dream were something like "I want to go to the moon", that Yamato would hold faith in him through impossibly oppressive circumstances, or that the audience would care like, at all. So if the dream is tied to something at the core of Luffy's character and the underlying themes of the entire series, what does Luffy represent, and what's the point of One Piece? Luffy is, at this point in the story and honestly long before, the embodiment of this sort of radical, almost anarchic humanism pervading the entire series that seeks to bring genuine freedom, joy, and peace to people everywhere he goes. Even before any divine or joy boy associations, he's a bringer of dawn, a warrior of liberation, and a worker of miracles because he sees injustice happening around him and instantly rejects it. He tears down oppressors everywhere he goes, and he's eventually going to bring that reckoning to the World Government and Blackbeard and every other might-makes-right, brutal, thoughtless hierarchical oppressor stopping their helpless victims from living free, full, happy lives. And critically, he's the inheritor of a crazy, radical dream that'll shake the world because god knows One Piece loves to talk about inherited will/dreams/legacy.

One Piece's broadly radical leftist humanism isn't based in naïveté either; it's very clear that this liberation is preceded by endless failures. Joyboy fails to stop any of what happens and writes letters of apology, Roger dies before he can realize the dream, and all the while countless atrocities are going on with at least 3 Islands we know of and two whole races having their genocides all but done to completion. Kuma suffers immensely waiting for the Dawn, and effectively loses his life and humanity before it can come, still holding on to his belief in Nika. But none of these things will stop the coming of liberation. Every genocide and attempt to purge the politically inconvenient–Ohara, Flevance, the Lunarians, the persecution of the Buccaneers–leaves survivors or inheritors, with Law, Kuma, and Robin in particular playing central roles in saving or aiding Luffy, the bringer of Dawn. The purge of Ohara fails to destroy the records permanently. The fucking biblical infanticides at Baterilla and the end of Roger's bloodline doesn't stop Luffy from inheriting Roger's will and his brother's legacy. Luffy isn't so much a predestined messiah as he is the inheritor of a legacy of resistance and hope that cannot be killed because as long as someone lives, they will dream of the brand of hope and justice that he embodies. No matter how hard you try, or how violently you suppress people, how many legacies or bloodlines or rebels you put to death, people will survive and carry on those legacies or pick up where your victims left off because you can't kill ideas, you can't kill truth, you can't kill dreams, and you can't kill the basic human desire for joy and freedom. I think the "Child's Fantasy" thing we see associated with Luffy's dream is key to this whole mystery. Wano's the arc in which we get the closest, most explicit declarations of Luffy's ideals, in which his core motivation for defeating Kaido–besides helping Momo and his friends seek justice and overthrow an oppressor–is to make sure everyone in the country can eat their fill. It's the kind of thing you wish for as a child–an end to world hunger, world peace, homes for the homeless, an end to prejudice–before a thousand and one adults feed you the lie that it's impossible to redistribute resources, that being crushed by hierarchical oppressive power is natural, or that some people are undeserving of life or basic rights and therefore deserve to be harmed by the powers that be. Before your parents and teachers and other people lecture you on the necessity of Authority and Capitalism and Hegemony or what have you and convince you that a certain number of people simply have to suffer and die to preserve the Proper and Legitimate Hierarchy, that the powerful deserve to be where they are and that victims of these systems deserve it. It'll be something very much like his hopes for Wano in the face of the oppression of Kaidou and Orochi, or the World Government creeping up on them afterward with Ryokugyu loudly announcing that the oppression of the have-nots is the rightful and good state of the world. It'll be a simple, basic hope for good things for him and his friends and all the great people they love, something perfectly possible and right and just and joyful that people have been raised to think of as an impossibility. A place where people can eat their fill, where there's water in parched lands, where people aren't being strangled by heavenly tributes. A world where they can be free. A reality where everyone can be happy, where dreams come true.

[justagalwhowrites]

Homecoming - DBF!Joel x Female Reader

It's been years since you moved away from home but you never stopped wishing your dad's best friend Joel Miller saw you as something more. Request from @reds-ramblings!

Pairing: DBF!Joel Miller x Female Reader

Warnings: No Outbreak AU, legal age gap (Joel is 40 you are 26), SMUTTTTTTT oral (f receiving), p in v sex, one shot. No use of Y/N. Minors DNI 18+ only!

Length: 4.4k (sorry guys, I got carried away)

You sighed, looking up at the ceiling of your childhood bedroom. It was still that popcorn shit. Your mom had redone most of the house since you’d moved out but your room was still intact. Still had the movie posters, the caricatures of you with your best friends from trips to Six Flags in the summer, the mountain of stuffed animals that were covered in a fine layer of dust in a hammock that hung from the ceiling. 

It was a little like being in a museum, relics of who you’d been a decade ago when you’d first moved into this house in the Austin suburbs with your parents. You hadn’t known how to drive yet when you moved in here. You were a different person now. A different person who lived in Chicago and had a job you loved and still came running home to your childhood bedroom when shit got hard. 

You sighed, bouncing a tennis ball off the popcorn ceiling. 

“Fuck it,” you muttered, getting up and rifling through your suitcase. 

Your parents weren’t home. They wouldn’t be for a few more days - too busy lying on a beach in Maui - so you had the place to yourself. At least there was the pool. 

You found the sluttiest bikini you had since you’d be too embarrassed to wear it around your parents anyway but dammit you’d bought the stupid thing so you were going to wear it. You slid into it, admiring yourself in the mirror for a second. This would have looked way better on a beach in the Caribbean. This was a swim suit meant to make a man fuck you in the ocean. It was not a swim suit meant to be worn in your parents’ pool. But you needed something to feel good about. 

You put your earbuds in and pulled up your favorite playlist, dancing a little as you put on the gauzy white coverup, straw hat and flip flops before heading downstairs. 

It was almost like the shuffle mode on your playlist was reading your mind. Lizzo came on just as you made it to the kitchen and you turned it up as loud as you couldn’t without fully deafening yourself. 

“Why men great ’til they gotta be great?” You more yelled it than sang it, grabbing the tortilla chips and salsa you’d picked up on your way to the house the day before. You went into the freezer next, grabbing the frozen margarita pouch. 

“You coulda had a bad bitch, noncommittal,” you nudged the drawer closed with your leg. “Help you…HOLY SHIT.” 

You almost leapt out of your skin, dropping the plastic container of salsa and the bag of margarita to the tile floor. You clutched your heart that felt like it was threatening to burst out of your chest with one hand and tore your earbuds out with the other. 

Joel Miller was leaning against the counter, watching you and smiling, arms crossed over his chest. 

“Jesus Christ, Joel!” You panted, dropping the earbuds to the counter before leaning against it to keep from falling over. “What the fuck, man?” 

“Don’t stop on my account,” he smiled a little wider. “You were puttin’ on a great show…” 

“Ha ha,” you glared at him. 

“No, really, stadium quality performance there, Princess,” he said. “I’d buy tickets…” 

You rolled your eyes before bending over and picking up the mercifully still intact containers of salsa and frozen margarita, trying to not think about the fact that you were in the sluttiest bikini you’d ever owned in front of Joel fucking Miller. Joel Miller, your dad’s best friend. Joel Miller, guy who lived across the street. Joel Miller, man you’d basically been in love with since you were 16 years old. 

How was it that he’d gotten better looking? There should be limits on this shit, men who were as gorgeous as Joel Miller shouldn’t be allowed to get hotter as they aged. His graying hair made him look experienced, wiser somehow. The wrinkles around his eyes made his already gorgeous chocolate brown gaze look softer and sweeter. It was a dangerous combination. 

“What are you doing here?” You asked, heart rate returning to normal. Or, normal for when Joel was in your immediate vicinity, anyway. 

“Your dad told me I could borrow a ladder,” he shrugged. “Said it was in the shed out back. Told me to let myself in. DIdn’t mention you’d be here. Promise I wasn’t trying to scare you.” 

“What kind of contractor doesn’t have a ladder?” You frowned. “Sounds like you’re falling down on the job, Miller.” 

“I don’t have it at my house because I left it on a job, Princess,” he stepped closer, smile shifting to more of a cocky smirk. “But needed one at home and didn’t really feel like drivin’ clear across Austin to pick it up. 

“But that’s beside the point, what are you doing here?” He asked. “Ain’t you some big time city girl now?” 

You rolled your eyes. 

“Just decided to come home for a visit,” you replied. 

“While your parents are on vacation,” he said, skeptical. You narrowed your eyes at him. “C’mon, what’s goin’ on.” 

You sighed and groaned a little. 

“I was supposed to be in The Bahamas this week,” you said. “Booked it a few months back.” 

“So why aren’t you in The Bahamas this week?” He asked after you were silent for a minute. You rapped your fingers on the counter, nails clacking on the granite. 

“I got dumped, alright?” You groaned. “It was supposed to be a trip with my now ex for our one year anniversary but we broke up a month ago and now he’s in The Bahamas with Laurel from accounting.” 

“Shit,” Joel’s face fell a little. “I’m sorry that…” 

“It’s fine,” you sighed. “I wasn’t really that into him, honestly. I was surprised we lasted as long as we did. But I wasn’t about to sit in Chicago in April when I’d already bought enough bikinis to last a week on the beach. And hey at least there’s a fucking pool and it’s above freezing here.” 

When you mentioned the bikinis, his eyes finally left your face, quickly trailing up and down your body before looking back at your face. 

“He’s a fuckin’ idiot, Princess,” he said. “Promise there are better ones out there than that and lord knows you deserve better.” 

“Thanks,” you smiled a little. “Anyway, you’re here for a ladder, not to keep me company.” 

“Depends,” he nodded at the margarita pouch. “Got another one of those?” 

You scoffed. 

“C’mon,” you went into the freezer and grabbed another pouch. “The hell do you take me for?” 

You poured the drinks into the plastic margarita glasses your mom had bought for a party when you were a teenager and handed one to Joel before you both went outside. Joel sat on a lounge chair but you set your glass down on the edge of the pool, stepped out of your flip flops and draped your coverup on a chair next to him. 

“You’re getting in?” He asked. “Thought that was more of a… layin’ around swim suit thing you girls like to wear.” 

“Didn’t fly across the country to not get the suit wet,” you glanced over your shoulder at him. His eyes immediately rose from your ass to your face as you did. “You’re welcome to join me.” 

You jumped in the water, sinking down to the bottom, water so cold that it made your nipples harden and press against the thin fabric of the suit. You swam back to the surface and to the edge of the pool, grabbing your margarita. Joel was watching you. 

“You coming in or not?” You teased. 

“Don’t think I feel like goin’ and getting changed,” he said. 

“Never said you had to,” you said, taking a sip of your drink. “Come on. You saw me dancing around my parents kitchen and heard my sob story. I think I can see you in your underwear.” 

He looked away from you for a moment, a twitch in his jaw, before he shook his head for a moment. 

“Alright, Princess,” he stood up and pulled off his shirt in one fluid movement. You were trying not to stare. It’s not like you’d never seen him without a shirt before. He’d been swimming at your house with your parents before. He took his shirt off when mowing the lawn and you’d peer through your window and watch him when you were a teenager. But this was the first time he’d taken his shirt off because you wanted him to and that fact almost made his biceps seem more sculpted, his chest more beautiful. His hands went to his jeans as he stepped out of his boots. He unbuttoned and unzipped his fly, starting to pull the denim down. “Your wish, my command.” 

“That is how I like it,” you took another drink. 

He stripped out of his jeans and down to his black boxer briefs. You resisted the urge to lick your lips at the sight of him, just a thin layer of fabric covering his thick, long cock. 

You shook yourself mentally. Yes, you’d had a crush on Joel for 10 years. Yes, you wanted him to fuck you six ways from Sunday. Yes, it looked like his cock would be far and away the largest you’d ever had. But he was your dad’s best friend and 14 years older than you. His daughter was closer to your age than he was. Nothing was going to happen. 

He jumped in the water, purposely landing close enough to you to splash you with it and you laughed, wiping the chlorinated water from your eyes. 

“Fuck that’s cold,” he said when he came up. “Feelin’ like you got me in here under false pretenses…” 

You swam for a bit, catching up on life, drinking your margaritas. Joel told you about Sarah, how she was doing at A&M and about one client he’d been stuck with who kept changing shit half way through the project. 

“Swear to God the next time this woman changes her tile, I’m driving off a fuckin’ bridge,” he said. 

You told him about your life in Chicago. The promotion you’d just gotten at work, the fact that you’d become enough of a regular at the bar down the street from your apartment that the bartenders knew you now. 

You’d been in the water long enough that your drinks were long empty and your fingertips were starting to prune, leaning against the edge of the pool with your arms propped on the ledge, close enough that your elbows touched. 

Joel’s eyes ran over you, from your hairline to your face to your throat to your chest. Your nipples were still peaked against your suit and your wet hair clung to your neck. 

“What?” You asked, smiling a little. 

“Any plans later?” He asked. “Can’t have you sittin’ at home all by your lonesome when you were supposed to be havin’ a good time this week.” 

“Offering to show me a good time?” You teased. 

“Don’t tell your dad that,” he teased back. “But I’m going out with some of Tommy’s friends later. Think you’d have fun if you wanted to come along. Just some drinking, music, dancing. Usual shit. Assuming you don’t have plans with any old friends from school or somethin’.” 

“Ah yes, my vibrant social life in high school,” you said, smirking a little. 

You’d been a wallflower before you went to college. You hadn’t fit in well with your classmates, you hadn’t really grown into your body yet - all awkward limbs and unruly hair. College had been your chance to reinvent yourself and you’d leaned into it. You still remembered the first time you came home on break from school your freshman year. 

You and your roommate, Carolyn, had become fast friends and she was easily the most fashionable person you’d ever met. She’d helped you come into your own in your first semester away and you’d basically replaced every item of clothing in your closet with finds from every thrift store within a 20 mile radius of Northwestern. You’d changed your hair, figured out that blue eyeshadow was NOT your thing and just started feeling more confident. 

That Christmas break, you had just grabbed a package off the porch for your mom and were carrying it around to the garage to stash where your dad wouldn’t find it when Joel stopped you. 

“Hey,” he said, sounding a bit defensive as he jogged over to you. “That yours?” 

You stopped, frowning, before turning to face him. His eyes went wide. 

“I mean, it’s my mom’s…” 

“Shit, I’m sorry Princess,” he said, looking you up and down. “Didn’t even recognize you! Must be liking Chicago…” 

You definitely liked your new sense of style even more after that. 

“I’d be down to go out,” you said. “Better than playing catch against my ceiling all night.”

“Pick you up in two hours?” He said. “We’ll hit the town.” 

Once Joel left with the ladder, you focused on calming yourself down while getting ready to go. 

Yes, it was Joel. Yes, he might have checked you out a bit in the pool. Yes, you’d do more than you were really comfortable admitting to get him into bed. But he was still Joel, your neighbor and your dad’s best friend. That made him pretty much off limits. 

Right? 

You’d brought a few of the dresses you’d bought for The Bahamas and you slipped into the one that hugged your curves in just the right way. Just in case. 

“Shit, Princess,” Joel said when you answered the door. “Think you might be a bit overdressed for this crowd.” 

“I can change,” you frowned. 

“No!” He said quickly. Then cleared his throat. “No, don’t… Don’t worry about it.”

Joel drove you to a bar with live music and a table full of people he seemed to know about half of. Tommy, his brother, clapped him on the back and whispered something in his ear that made Joel glare at him. 

He’d been right, though, it was fun. You stuck close to Joel at first, bodies near enough that your arm would brush his chest if you picked up your beer. But then one of Tommy’s friends asked you to dance and pulled you onto the dance floor. His name was Jim and you were pretty sure he was closer to Joel’s age than Tommy’s. His hands slid down your body, pulling your hips against his as you moved with him. Joel’s eyes were on you the whole time. 

You only danced with Jim for a song and a half before Joel appeared over his shoulder. 

“Mind if I cut in?” He asked, giving Jim a look that made it seem like he didn’t have a lot of other options. Jim stepped back just as the music started to shift to something a bit slower. Joel took one of your hands in his and slipped the other around to your back, his fingers splayed wide against you, pulling you against him. 

“DIdn’t take you for the dancing type,” you smiled a little as you started to sway. 

“M’not,” he said. “Not usually, anyway.” 

“Really?” You teased. “So I’m a special case, hm?” 

“Somethin’ like that,” he said. “Can’t let my best friend’s little girl go runnin’ around with some old man.” 

“But what if I like old men?” You asked. 

“Should pick a better one than Jim then,” he replied. 

“Never said I liked Jim,” you said. “Not my type.” 

“What is your type?” He asked, his eyes drifting over your face to your neck to your breasts. 

You swallowed, hard. 

“Contractors.”

He ground his teeth for a moment before stepping back from you and leaving the bar. 

“Shit,” you muttered, trailing behind him to the parking lot. 

“Joel!” You called out to him. “Wait!” 

He stopped and turned to face you. 

“You don’t know what you’re sayin’ in there,” he said. “So just give me some space, OK?” 

“I know perfectly well what I was saying,” you said. 

“No,” he shook his head. “You don’t. You shouldn’t go around sayin’ shit like that…” 

“Oh, so you wanted me to lie then?” You asked.

“Princess,” there was a warning in his voice. “You don’t want to go here.” 

“Yes, I do,” you said. “It’s not like I’m some little kid, Joel, I’m 26 years old…” 

“That’s too damn young,” he snapped. 

“It’s not like I don’t know what I want,” you replied. 

“You’re my best friend’s daughter,” he said. 

“So?” 

“Get in the truck,” he growled. You frowned. “Want to talk about this like adults? Get in the damn truck.” 

You hesitated for a moment before you obeyed. 

“You don’t know what you’re sayin’,” he said again after he’d been driving for a few minutes. 

“Do you really think I’m that stupid?” You asked, offended now. “That I just say shit I don’t mean with no understanding of the consequences?” 

“No, I think you’re young,” he snapped. “Too young to be even joking about getting involved with someone closer to your dad’s age than yours.” 

“Wasn’t joking,” you said defiantly. He glanced over at you before looking back to the road. 

“Princess,” he said, the warning tone back in his voice. 

“Joel.” 

He glared at you. 

“We’re not doin’ anything,” he said. His grip tightened on the steering wheel. 

You stared out the window, the ache between your thighs warring with the hurt in your chest. 

He dropped you at your door and you practically jumped out of the truck, not saying a word. He sighed and followed you, catching you as you were trying to unlock the door without crying.  It was hard not feeling stung by it. Yes, he was your dad’s best friend. Yes, he probably had better options. Yes, there were plenty of reasons why you shouldn’t fuck or anything more. But this rejection hurt somehow more than your ex dumping you for fucking Laurel in accounting. 

“Princess,” he said quietly. 

“Look it’s fine if you’re not interested,” you said, sniffing a little. “But don’t act like you’re doing it for my benefit. It’s shitty.” 

“Not…” he touched your shoulder, making you turn around. “You really think I’m not fuckin’ interested?” 

You shrugged. 

“How the fuck would I not be interested?” He asked. “Jesus Christ, spent half the goddamn afternoon thinkin’ about baseball stats so I wouldn’t get a hard on in your fuckin’ pool. All I am is interested.” 

“Interested in what?” 

“Interested in fucking you until you can’t see straight,” he said. “Interested in makin’ you cum so much the only thing you remember is my goddamn name. Interested in eating your pussy til I drown in ya. Interested in your dad punching me in the fuckin’ face over you because I’m too old for you but I don’t give a shit, bein’ with you is worth it. I’m interested.” 

He stepped closer to you, your back against the door. 

“You should come inside then,” you breathed. 

He kissed you then, pressing his body against yours, his tongue slipping into your mouth. You could feel him through his jeans, thicker and longer than what you saw in the pool before. You fumbled with the door until it opened, both of you spilling into your parents’ entryway. 

You didn’t make it past the living room. 

Joel slid the straps of your dress down your arms and you pulled his shirt over his head, throwing it to the floor. You backed up until you were against the arm of the couch, his hands ranging over your skin. He pushed the dress lower until it was over your hips and it fell to the floor. You were just in your panties and your shoes when he nudged you down onto the arm of the couch. 

He kissed down your body, over the swell of your breasts and down your stomach until he reached the top of your panties. He guided your hips off the arm of the couch for a moment and slid your underwear down and cast them aside before kneeling in front of you and spreading your legs. 

“Fucking hell you’ve got a pretty pussy,” he reached out and ran his thumb over your slit, pressing down a little when he reached your clit, making your back arch as you moaned. “Can’t wait to taste you, Princess.” 

He ran his tongue over you, delicately pressing the tip into your folds. One of his hands slid up your body to your chest, gently pushing you back until you were lying on the couch as his mouth worked your slit. 

“Fuckin’ perfect view,” he said before thrusting his tongue into you. You groaned, rocking your hips against his face, his nose pressing into your clit as you did. You could see his eyes devouring the rest of you the way his mouth was devouring your pussy, like there was no part of him that could get enough of you. 

His fingers dug into your thighs, spreading you open wider so his tongue could get deeper, your core tightening around him. Just as you were getting close, he slid his tongue from you, making you whimper as he kissed up your slit to your clit. He took the delicate nub into his mouth, licking and sucking as he thrust two fingers into your dripping pussy, making you gasp and your hips stutter. 

“Good girl,” he pulled his mouth away from you just enough to praise you. His fingers pressed deep, hooking into you and finding the spot inside you that made you gasp. “Want you to cum for me baby, don’t be shy now.” 

He went back to sucking, his tongue unrelenting, his eyes drinking you in. Your hand flew to the cushions of the couch and you gasped as you came, moaning his name. 

His mouth stayed on you until your body stopped pulsing, his fingers gently working you through your orgasm. He almost reluctantly pulled himself from you and licked his lips as he stood, unbuttoning and unzipping his jeans, stripping off the last of his clothes as you came down from your orgasm. He reached out and took your hand, pulling you back upright on the arm of the couch. 

Joel kissed you again and you could taste yourself on his tongue. He guided your legs around his waist and slid his hands below your thighs, picking you up and making you gasp. 

He didn’t take you far, only to the couch. He sat down, making you kneel on his lap as he reached between your legs and started stroking himself, close enough to you that his knuckles brushed your overwrought slit as he did. You looked down between you, the first chance you really had to see his cock. 

Your eyes went a little wide at the sight of it. He was so thick and long with a slight curve, you were almost afraid he wouldn’t fit. 

“Take it at your own pace, Baby,” he said, all but reading your mind. “M’not in a rush.” 

He adjusted his cock a bit, making it so the edge of him rubbed your clit as he worked himself. The contact made you needy, a sharp ache growing in you, a feeling deep inside that you knew you couldn’t reach but he could. 

You rose up on your knees, your hands on his shoulders, and he rubbed his thick head against your slit, your wetness spilling over him as he worked it lower down his shaft, coating himself in you. 

“So fucking wet for me,” he groaned, lining his head up with your entrance. 

“All for you,” you breathed, lowering yourself onto him. 

You moaned at the intrusion as you pressed him into you, a spark of pain with the pleasure as he stretched you. 

“Fuck Baby,” he groaned, his hands going to your hips, guiding you down over him as you sank lower onto him. “Fuck, so tight, so goddamn…” 

You couldn’t help but smile a little, watching him start to lose himself in your body, his head falling back, eyes closing, fingertips sinking into your flesh. Your body opened for him, his cock parting your inner walls and stretching you. You groaned when you finally took all of him, his head pressed flush against your back wall as his hips ground against your own. 

“Good girl,” he gasped it out, his hands traveling up from your hips to your waist. “Knew you could take it all…” 

You started working over him, rising and falling on his cock, working your hips down against your own. His hands slipped up your back as he looked up at you, kissing your neck, your chest, trailing his tongue along the swell of your breasts. 

Joel pressed you close to him before he thrust deep into you and shifted, laying you down below him on the couch and sinking somehow deeper into you, making you moan. 

He started fucking into you harder and faster then, angling your hips so your clit was pressed against him with every stroke. 

“Fuck, Joel,” you groaned, pressing yourself against him, wanting to feel him everywhere you could. “Harder… need more…” 

He groaned. 

“Fucking perfect,” he buried his face in your neck as he started working you harder, faster. “You’re goddamn perfect…” 

It wasn’t long before you were cumming around him, your pussy gripping him so tight it almost hurt to hold him that way. He fucked you through your orgasm, his breathing faster, his kiss sloppy. 

The second your walls stopped fluttering around him, he pulled out of you. He sat back and fisted his cock. 

“Where?” He said quickly. 

“My clit,” you panted. 

“Fucking hell,” he moaned, jerking his cock just twice before pressing the tip against your swollen nub and spilling his warmth over you, making your ultra sensitive pussy shudder again. He collapsed on top of you, his face buried in your neck as you both caught your breath. 

“Please say you’ll visit more,” he said, not moving from on top of you. 

“Think I’ll be visiting a lot more.” 

A/N: So this was my first request and my first one shot! I am NOT good at keeping things brief lol so I appreciate any and all feedback. Thank you for reading! Love ya!