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mermaidgirl30 · 3 months

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✨My Paper Heart Will Fold✨

A/N: Another unplanned little fic. This just came to me this morning as I was listening to Dayseeker. Joel trying to run from his feelings because he doesn’t want to be hurt again and doesn’t want to admit he has feelings. But he finally admits they’re there 🥹 I am never getting over this man. This is mostly in his POV 😭 I see nothing else but a struggling Joel so in love as I listen to “Paper Heart” by Dayseeker.

“The weight of the world is too much for me to hold. My paper heart will fold.

It's safer if I don't reply. Stay locked up for weeks at a time. 'Cause nothing can hurt me if I wait 'til the chaos collides

It's safer if I don't reply. Stay locked up for weeks at a time. 'Cause nothing can hurt me if I…”

- “Paper Heart” by Dayseeker

Summary: Joel fights himself over his feelings for you, not wanting to admit they’re there. He finally comes to blatant terms that he can’t lose you. He can’t ever lose you. Not ever.

Word Count: 1.5k

Rating: Mature for language (18+ Only)

Tags: Angst, feelings, Joel not wanting to admit he loves you, Joel finally giving in to what he wants

Divider by @saradika-graphics

The sunset slips under the soft, fluffy clouds. Shades of violet and orange bursts of marveling red seem to collide together as they mix into a sea of mixed paint. There’s no noise. The world mute, only the hum of the quiet engine and the low vibrations of a Guns N’ Roses song plays softly through the gravel on the road.

Joel rakes a hand through his rough beard, letting his calloused fingers scrape against every grain like he tries to get rid of every single blaring thought in his mind. He pushes the feelings down, letting them fade into complete darkness as he lets his heartstrings unattach to every single memory of you. He can’t do it though. He can’t.

He grips the leather steering wheel hard as he continues to drive and drive and drive. Putting as many miles and distance away from your house that he possibly can. He wants to turn around so badly. It’s like he’s desperate, clinging to any form of you as he digs his nail beds into the worn leather. He can’t break, can’t let himself slip into feelings he wants to avoid.

You’ll hurt him. You’ll hurt him. But you really wouldn’t. You never would. It’s all in Joel’s mind. In his dark, conflicting mind that twists and twists until he doesn’t even know which direction he’s driving anymore. He just lets the fading sunset drive him down the narrow road as the music changes over to a more somber mood.

He sees the violet color clashing with amber in the sky, and it reminds him of your eyes. Your fucking beautiful eyes that he spent all night gazing into as he watched you lay across his chest as ragged breaths ran swiftly out of your relaxed mouth. Your eyes melding into his like sparks coming off a lightning strike. Bright, encapsulating, blinding.

He feels it in his chest then. That deep, aching feeling as he remembers your fingers curling around his tousled locks, soft lips crashing against his as he inhaled your strawberry scent that seemed to encompass his entire being. He can still smell you on him, on his fingers, on his skin, everywhere.

He clenches his fist at the thought of it all, of the thought of you. He didn’t want to leave. Not really. Not when you just laid your entire heart out to him. Not after you spent the entire night wrapped tightly in his arms as he rocked you to sleep. Not after he realized how he felt about you, too.

Pain sears through him. Hot, coursing pain that seems to take over every single joint in his hollow body. He’s not good at this, terrible at expressing his feelings. He’s been hurt too much, can’t stand the thought of withstanding another heartbreak. He can’t even imagine it. Not with you, not when he’s so deeply in love with you that he can’t even express it himself.

He’s a fool, a fucking coward as he just drives and drives, pretending like this could all go away. Like he can just forget every single feeling you made him feel over and over again like it means absolutely nothing when in reality it means everything to him. You are what drives him to be good, you are what makes him feel complete. You, you, you. It’s always fucking you.

You are the reason he gets up every morning and tries to do better. You are what keeps his battered heart beating. You are what makes him come alive every single night as you tell him how good he is to you, how you can’t see yourself with anyone else. And he realizes then that he can’t lose you. He can’t fucking lose you. He just can’t.

He slams on the brakes so hard that the entire Chevy jolts and throws him forward as his seatbelt pulls hard against his chest. His eyes go wide as he realizes what he needs to do. He turns the truck around so fast that he swears he sees stars. He presses on the gas pedal firmly, going faster and faster and faster until he’s going fifteen miles over the speed limit. He doesn’t care, he needs to get to you. That’s all that matters.

He needs you to hear just how much you mean to him, how much you make him feel alive. For you brought a dead man back to life. A torn, bruised, broken man. You made him feel complete, whole. A feeling that no one else had been able to do. It was you, it was always you. From the moment he met you. He should’ve fucking known.

He can’t run away.

Not now.

Not ever.

He drives and drives and drives until he’s stopped in front of your house. The one where the porch light blinks as moths dance across the shadows and the light blue shutters sit stark against the midnight dark sky. He jumps out of his truck and slams the door with a bang, his leather boots scuffing across cement as he runs up the sidewalk, right to your porch, right to your solid wood door.

He stares for a second, a blank page until every single feeling inside his broken body comes to life like a sharp spark ignited. He feels it all. The way you made him feel the very first day he saw you standing in that busy diner, the way your fingers curled around his calloused hand that second week in the movie theater, the first time your lips brushed against his as you sat in the passenger side of his red Chevy, and the first time your bodies melded into one on those delicate pink bed sheets of yours. Your porcelain skin. So soft, so pure, so very tender.

He knocks once, twice, three times as he raps against it desperately. His knuckles crash against the wood just like his heart beats wildly out of his chest as thunder crashes in the far distance. A storm is coming and not just any storm. A storm so violent it’ll knock him to the ground as he wears his fragile heart on his sleeve.

Vulnerable. He’s so fucking vulnerable as he stands under the shade of your porch, awaiting the moment he’ll crash against the surface and take the breath from you as he confesses it all. Lets his heart pour violently against the roaring wind as he gives you every single thing he’s wanted to tell you for months. He can’t hide from the past pain anymore, can’t disappear under a damp rock as he hides it all away like a blinded coward. He can’t run from you anymore. He needs you. He needs you.

You open the door, pulling it wide as you see him standing there. A mess, his face wrecked as his eyebrows knit together and his brown eyes water, lips trembling as his thick fingers play nervously with the bottom button of his deep blue flannel shirt. He’s such a wreck, but he’s here. He’s standing here on your porch, in the middle of the night. He’s here.

“Joel?” you ask confused, thinking he wasn’t coming back anytime soon. Not after he left without an explanation. Not after he fought battles with himself in his mind. Not after he told you he had to go.

“Sweetheart, I… I…” he stutters, muttering nonsense under his breath until his eyes go wide and an expression you’ve never quite seen settles over his weathered face. He’s so beautiful in the glow of the moonlight, even if he’s a total wreck.

Without anymore hesitation, he crashes his lips firmly over yours as thunder erupts in the sky, blinding lightning lighting up the sky as he slots in between your lips and tangles his tongue with yours. It’s desperate, frantic, full of pain he lets flood out. It’s also tender, soft, endearing as he holds your face in between his calloused hands, fingertips brushing up against your jawline.

It’s loud, stifling as he releases his lips and hangs over you, foreheads drawn together as he looks deep into your glistening eyes. His deep, chestnut eyes say he’s in love. He’s so in love. With you.

He takes a deep breath and lets it all out, no longer able to keep it in. “I love you. I love you so goddamn much that I can’t breathe when I’m not around you. It’s like I’m suffocating on my own air. It’s you, baby. It’s always been you. My girl, my sweet flower. It’s you.”

His lips fall back on top of yours, and it’s like the world stops. It’s just you and him. Only you and him. So you invite him in, lock the door and get tangled up into his entire being as you sink into your velvet sheets. The world dimming as the only light that shines is him on top of you as passion burns through the room.

You let the night slip away as you get lost in each other, collectively revelling in each other until you fall into pure bliss. It’s just you and Joel. Nobody else matters, nothing else exists. It’s just you and him. Two flames igniting a wildfire that can’t be controlled any longer. It’s just warm, fiery love.

Love. It’s love.

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