#joel and tommy

[tightjeansjavi]

The Rite of Movement | part four

“so move me, baby”

A/N: so like the little slut that I am…I was kicking my feet and giggling at my desk yesterday while writing this 🤭 I surprise myself with just how filthy I can get, woo doggy! Please read the warnings and if this isn’t your cup of tea, just scroll on by baby love! No harm 💗 thank you to my bug @strang3lov3 for the moodboard!! I love u so much & a big thank you to @itsokbbygrl for betaing 🥺

~word count: 6.4k~

Summary: you meet Tommy Miller for the first time, and he takes you for a spin ;)

Pairing | pornstar!joel x pornstar!tommy x pornstar!female reader

Warnings: smut, fluff, established relationship, Joel is in his 40’s, reader is in her 30’s, mentions of alcohol and smoking, consent, unprotected piv, fingering, pussy play, f!masturbation, semi-public sex, reader and Tommy fuck and Joel’s into it, amateur porn video in the back of Tommy’s truck, language, filthy talk, praise kink, daddy kink, over stimulation/fucked out, light degradation (by Tommy but in a sexy non-offensive way), dumbification kink (endearing), readers nickname is baby love, reader has no physical descriptions, reader, Joel, and Tommy, are sexually liberated individuals, NSFW, +18 minors dni! Please let me know if I missed anything!

playlist🎧 series masterlist

“Joel…” you trailed off, picking at a loose thread on your denim skirt absentmindedly. “What if your brother doesn’t like me?” You questioned in an unsure tone.

He turned to face you, leaning over the dashboard while he rested his elbow along the steering wheel, “baby love, you ain’t got nothin’ to be worried about with my brother, okay? Think y’all are gonna get on like a house fire.” He winked in an attempt to soothe your budding nerves. “What about meetin’ him is gettin’ ya all worked up? Talk to me, darlin.’”

He gently grasped your bare knee in his big, warm, palm.

“This is going to sound so fucking stupid, Joel. But what if he finds me annoying—repulsive? I always get nervous when I’m meeting new people. I’m surprised I didn’t completely shit a brick when I first met you for instance.” You stifled a nervous laugh as you looked over at him.

He gave you that warm reassuring smile of his, dimples peeking through as he gently squeezed your knee. “Y’all are gonna get on just fine, ‘Kay? And listen, between you and me, Tommy and I—we uh—we discussed the possibility of the three of us filmin’ somethin’ together at some point. Now, there ain’t no rush for any of that, okay? Last thing I want to do is make you feel uncomfortable or pressured to get along with him.”

Your pupils dialated, thighs clenching inwards at the prospect of fucking…Tommy? Holy fuck—was this real life?

“You, and Tommy—fucking me?” You spluttered out, feeling the heat rise to your cheeks. There was no denying that Tommy Miller was a real hunk, with the personality of a horny golden retriever. He was the complete opposite of Joel, but that intrigued you nonetheless.

“Only if you’d be interested in that, baby love. You don’t gotta decide right now, okay? Tonight’s all about you. If you’re feelin’ my brother, I want you to act on it only if you’re comfortable. He’s a real looker, but I’ve made sure that he’s a good Texas gentleman.” Joel reassured you as he was silently trying to gauge how you were feeling thus far based off your body language.

“And you’d be okay with him and I…?” You trailed off, meeting his gaze as you reached for his hand on your knee, interlocking your fingers through his.

“Of course I would be. I’m not gonna get weirdly jealous or possessive if you want to fuck my brother, baby love. That’s why I wanted to have this conversation with you ahead of tonight, because Tommy? He’s interested, but I told him to let you feel it out, and to not spring it on ya right away.”

He watched the subtle clench of your inner thighs, your pupils blown wide and your lips parting. He knew you were turned on by the prospect of fucking his brother, and your arousal inherently turned him on as well.

He dropped his forearm from its resting spot along the steering wheel and brought his hand to your other knee where he proceeded to coax your thighs open just a tad. You didn’t need much coaxing at all as your thighs naturally parted open, thoughts running wild.

“Look at me, baby love.” He rasped, rubbing soothing circles into the sensitive skin of your inner thigh. “Is the thought of fucking my brother turnin’ you on, darlin?’ Ya drippin’ all pretty for him already?”

“Fuck.” You breathed out, eyes rolling back into your skull. Joel had barely even touched you yet, and you were leaking like a damn faucet through the gusset of your thin panties. You could feel a droplet of your arousal drip down and create a wet patch through the fabric. Your eyes met his, lower lip harshly taken between your teeth, pupils darkened like an oncoming storm, blown wide like a doe’s.

“I never thought the possibility of fucking your brother would arise, Joel. It’s like—a fantasy coming true.” You breathed out, head lolling to the side, “I think he has such a nice fucking cock.”

Joel preened, leaning the upper half of his body further over the center console as his fingers trailed closer to your covered core. He could feel you pulsing already, the anticipation of being touched igniting a fire in your veins the closer his fingers drew nearer.

“A fantasy come true, huh? You think about my brother a lot, baby love? S’okay if you do. Got yourself all worked up now…almost creating a mess on the seat with how fuckin’ wet your pussy is gettin’, baby.”

You whined out his name, letting yourself fully succumb to your depraved thoughts of fucking Tommy. Your brain felt fried, imploded to complete mush, and yet your Joel didn’t show a lick of judgment towards your arousal. In fact, he encouraged it and therefore you had no reason to feel shameful.

“Why don’t you get me all ready for him, Joel. C’mon baby, please. Play with me a little. Play with my pussy while I think about fucking your brother’s cock, Joel.” You shamelessly shifted your hips towards his hand, chasing his touch with unabashed desire.

He checked the time on his watch, a coy smirk playing on his sinful lips as he looked over at you, “Think we can afford to be fashionably late, baby love.”

-

Joel and Tommy’s local watering hole was exactly how you expected it to be: not the classiest, and certainly not your first pick, but if Joel were any other man, you would have hightailed out of there. But this was your Joel, and his warm palm guiding you to a booth that was tucked away in the corner. You were grateful for the outfit that you chose to wear for the evening could grant easy access. And with the residue of your release still coated between your thighs, you felt the trepidation and anticipation of what was to happen when Tommy would inevitably show up.

The thought had you buzzing all over again as you found yourself tucked into the wall seat of the booth, Joel’s hand finding purchase around your bare thigh as he leaned in, the tip of his aquiline nose brushing against your pulse point.

“Want anythin’ to drink, baby love? Or just water for now?” He rasped low and deep, sending goosebumps rising on your skin.

“Tequila, on the rocks.” You purred out your request, gripping on the edge of the booths worn leather for dear life.

“‘Kay, baby love. One tequila on the rocks comin’ right up.” He pressed a sweet kiss to the side of your face, leaving a whiff of his cologne and musk on your skin.

You watched as he slipped out of the booth and made his way over to the bartop, sleeves rolled up revealing broad, tan, forearms. His fingers that had only just been plunged deep into your pulsing cunt twenty minutes ago, were now casually flipping through a stack of twenties.

“S’cuse me, ma’am. This seat ain’t taken, is it?”

You peered up from your phone at the sound of the stranger's all-too familiar voice. A deep Texas drawl straight out of a western film, paired with two dark espresso colored eyes, a broad nose, and a head of dark, luscious curls that fell in ringlets.

Tommy fucking Miller, and that shit eating smirk of his that sent your thighs clenching together in tandem.

Holy—I need a glass of water.

“Oh, no. It’s not taken. Please, sit down.” You gestured to the empty seat across the booth with a nervous smile.

Tommy slipped into the booth with ease and reached behind his ear and pulled out a single cigarette, twirling it between his fingers before he placed it between his lips. He reached across the booth's table, hand outstretched in your direction. “Y’must be my big brother’s baby love. M’Tommy, the hotter Miller brother. It’s a pleasure to finally meet ya.”

You blinked, registering in your brain that Tommy Miller was in fact sitting across from you and looking like a goddamn snack nonetheless.

You reached for his hand, shaking it firmly, “charmed.” You grinned.

“Damn. And she’s polite too? My brother got the whole package with ya huh, sweetheart?” He chuckled smoothly, shaking your hand a moment longer before he retracted his. “Y’don’t mind if I smoke do ya?”

“Oh, no. Of course! I don’t mind.”

He nodded, reaching into his pocket and pulled out his lighter, lighting the cigarette with ease before he leaned back against the worn leather cushion, stretching his arm to rest along the backside of the booth, long fingers stretched out—flexing.

“Where’s the son of a bitch anyway?” Tommy asked casually, the lit end of the cigarette dipping downwards between his lips.

“He’s right here.” Joel had returned with your tequila on the rocks, and two glasses of neat whiskey. He slid one over to his brother with a small nod. “And you can’t smoke in here, Tommy.” Joel reminded him as he slid into the seat next to you.

“Says who? Doreen don’t give a damn.” Tommy quipped back as he reached for his glass, tipping it in yours and Joel’s direction.

“That’s cause Doreen’s got the fattest fuckin’ crush on you and that big head of yours.” Joel scoffed against the rim of his glass taking a sip before he turned his attention towards you. “Gotcha a water as well, baby love.”

“Who the hell you callin’ a big head, huh?” Tommy wiggled his eyebrows playfully and grasped the cigarette between his two fingers, replacing it with the rim of his glass as he took a sip. “How’s y’all’s evenin’ goin’ so far? Gettin’ into any trouble?”

“Believe I called you a big head, Tommy.” Joel chuckled, letting his free arm gently drape across your shoulders, squeezing them gently as you took a sip of your tequila on the rocks, letting the liquor burn down your throat and warm your stomach. “S’goin’ pretty good. First time baby loves been here, ain’t that right?”

You didn’t register that Joel was talking to you, his voice sounding fuzzy in your ears as you took a bigger sip of your drink. “What?” You questioned softly, being brought back down to earth when you felt his warm palm gently squeeze your shoulder. The heat rose to your cheeks fast and you cleared your throat, turning your face to the side to hide how flustered you were.

“Whatcha ya gettin’ all shy on us for, sweetheart? You don’t gotta do that with us. I swear, I don’t bite, unless ya want me to.” Tommy said with a coy wink.

“She’s just a lil’ bashful is all, cause on the way here she was—”

You cut Joel off, squeezing his bicep firmly in your palm. “I’m gonna head to the bathroom really quick, okay?” You kissed his cheek sweetly, and before he could even get up from the booth, you were slipping past him when you saw an opening.

Joel and Tommy both watched as you quickly walked to the nearest bathroom before they looked back at one another. Tommy took a long drag of his cigarette when Joel spoke again,

“She’s got the hots for you, little brother. She made a goddamn mess all over my fingers on the way here cus’ she was thinkin’ about your cock.” Joel said in a hushed, low tone.

Tommy’s brows raised as he leaned over the table, resting his cigarette off to the side. “Fuck. Y’serious? Goddamn. She make a mess all over the seat too? Bet she fuckin’ did.”

“Mhmmm.” Joel hummed, leaning back against the seat. “She told me that you have a nice fuckin’ cock.” He chuckled, shaking his head to the side before he leaned forward, “Now, when she gets back here after composing herself, I want you to flirt with her a bit. Let her come to you, okay? Y’gotta play nice with her, Tommy. She’s a sweet thing, and I know y’all are gonna get along jus’ fine.”

“Good god.” Tommy said lowly, holding back a groan. “You hit the fuckin’ jackpot with that one, Joel. I’ll play nice with her, scouts honor. Y’know I’ll take extra good care of her.”

“I know you will. She jus’ couldn’t believe it when I said that you and I discussed the possibility of filmin’ a video with her. Absolutely blew her fuckin’ mind with that one. But god, she looked so pretty all flustered and turned on thinkin’ about the two of us fuckin’ her.” Joel reached for his glass, swirling the amber liquid around and took another slow sip.

“Fuck, I bet she did look goddamn gorgeous like that. You got yourself a real filthy and nice girl, Joel. A man’s fuckin’ dream, you lucky son of a bitch. Don’t think I’ve ever seen your grumpy ass smile that much in my whole life. It’s refreshin’ seein’ you grinnin’ like a sinner in church.” Tommy chuckled warmly.

Joel preened as he thought about you. “She’s really amazing, Tommy. She’s been so supportive and brave, and we’re having so much fun with it. It’s been so long since work has felt fun, you know? Who’d’ve thought fucking would get old.” He chuckled with a small grin playing on his lips and a flush rising on his cheeks. “Never really met anyone quite like her, honestly.”

“Goddamn. Who’s in here choppin’ up the fuckin’ onions, huh? Fuck. You’re in love with her, ain’t ya? That’s amazing. I’m seriously so fuckin’ happy for you, Joel.”

“Fuck.” Joel said suddenly, feeling his heart lurch in his chest. “Shit. Yeah—I think, I think I am in love with her. It’s not too soon, is it? I mean—we jus’ we get eachother. I’ve never felt more comfortable with another person before. She gets me, Tommy. The real me. She sees my heart before she sees my job, and no other woman in my life has ever seen me in that light.” He sniffles, feeling tears prick the corner of his eyes at his emotional confession.

“Yeah, you got the love bug bad, brother. Really, really, bad. But y’know what? I know you ain’t bluffin’ about this one either. You’re speakin’ from your goddamn heart. I hear it in your voice, and that’s a beautiful fuckin’ thing, Joel. Cus’ if anyone deserves love in this world, it’s you. So you keep holdin’ onto that, ‘Kay?” Tommy said earnestly and reached across the table to gently squeeze Joel’s shoulder

“Shuddup, Tommy. Or you’re really gonna make me cry.” Joel chuckled through his tears, quickly wiping at his eyes. “I’m gonna keep holdin’ onto her for as long as she’ll have me. I’m hopin’ she’s endgame for me.”

“I reckon she will be.”

-

After you splashed a bit of water on your face and gave yourself a detailed pep talk in the women’s bathroom, you finally mustered up the courage to face Joel and Tommy again. Joel had reassured you in the car that nothing had to happen right away. He always wanted you to be comfortable and this was something that you were still getting used to. The idea of someone caring about you that much? It used to be unfathomable .

You never realized just how good it could get until you met Joel Miller. You were hoping that he would be your endgame too.

After taking one last glance into the mirror you left the bathroom with a new confident stride as you approached the booth. Joel greeted you with a warm and reassuring smile, and when he went to get up, you gently placed your hand against his chest, easing him back down onto the leather seat before you slid in beside him.

Tommy gently nudged your ankle with the toe of his boot, testing the waters with you and heeding Joel’s words to let you come to him.

“Y’feelin’ alright, sweetheart? Can we getcha anythin?” Tommy asked softly, brown eyes looking warm and inviting across the way.

“I’m okay.” You reassured him with a small smile. “It was just—getting really hot in here.” You said with a light laugh to ease the tension.

“Tends to happen when you’re feelin’ flustered.” Tommy added as he leaned in over the table. “Y’know, sweetheart,” he started, “S’okay if I call ya that?”

You nodded, reaching for your glass and took a quick sip.

“I watched one of your films the other day, and I gotta tell ya, you have some real talent. Not jus’ sayin’ that either. I mean it. You’re gorgeous, and I jus’ wanna let you know that there’s no pressure or anythin’ alright? We don’t even gotta do anythin’ tonight if you ain’t feelin’ up for it.”

Joel leaned in close to you then, warm whiskey coated breath kissing your skin as his arm gently wrapped around you, giving you a squeeze.

“Wouldn’t believe how good that pussy is, brother. Like nothin’ else you’ve ever had. Never wanna have another, truly.” He preened, pressing a kiss to the side of your head.

Your thighs clamped together immediately and you could feel the corners of Joel’s lips upturn into a small grin.

“Don’t doubt that for a second, Joel.” Tommy nodded and ashed his cigarette along the rim of his empty glass. “Sweetheart, you’re such a natural, babygirl. And I have no doubt in my mind that you’re gonna become a star.”

You felt the heat rise to your cheeks from both Joel and Tommy’s words and if you were already on your way to hell, well—you just bought yourself a first class ticket!

“You really think I’m gonna be a star, Tommy?” You leaned forward against the table to match his energy, feeling yourself gravitating in his direction.

“Absolutely.” He nodded. “Now, Joel here wants me to take care of ya for a little. Y’okay with that, sweetheart? He’s gonna sit here nice n’comfy if you wanna—”

You were already up from the booth, reaching for Tommy’s hand in a haste and pulling him down the aisle and towards the door of the bar.

Tommy stumbled after you, his palm warm in your grasp as he followed you to the door. But being the gentleman that he was, he held the door open for you, letting you walk past first before he followed suit. “Where do you wanna go, babygirl?” He rasped against your ear, broad arm swooping around your waist, pulling you flush against his side.

“Your truck.” you said confidently, slipping your hand into the back pocket of his dark washed jeans.

“Fuck. You wanna make a mess all over my seats too, babygirl?” He reached for his keys, twirling them around his fingers.

Goddammit, Joel. You thought.

“Did he tell you that?” You squeaked out, feeling the heat rise to your cheeks.

“He sure as fuck did, sweetheart. He also told me that you think I have a nice fuckin’ cock.” he chuckled, guiding you towards the direction of his parked pickup truck.

“Well, you do have a nice fucking cock, Tommy. And while your brother was playing with me earlier, all I could think about was you and your cock fucking me.” You lowered your voice when an unsuspecting couple walked past the two of you.

“Mmm. I knew that you were a little freak under all those nerves, babygirl. Gonna take real good care of you, okay?” He pressed a kiss to the side of your head, letting his hand curve around your hip. He was thankfully parked in a secluded spot in the lot where people would really have to pay attention to even see the debauchery that would soon be taking place.

He unlocked the back door for you, but before you could climb in, he gently pressed you back against it. “Before I fuck your brains out, I jus’ wanted to let you know that even though you’re consentin’ now, you can change your mind, okay? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve gone with blue balls, babygirl. I want you to enjoy yourself and if you end up not wantin’ to continue, jus’ let me know, ‘Kay?” His words were genuine like Joel’s, and as much as you appreciated them, you were going to lose your mind any second now.

“Tommy, respectfully, thank you. Disrespectfully, I’m not sure how much longer I’m going to last without your cock stuffed inside of me.” You breathed out, letting your hand drop from the side of his truck and palm him through the tight confines of his jeans. “Please, fuck me.”

That’s all it took for Tommy to surge forward, his hands coming to rest on either side of your head as his lips met yours in a bruising kiss that was all tongue and teeth, very different from Joel’s style but you fucking loved it already and wasted no time to wind your arms around his neck, carding your fingers through his thick curls, giving them a good firm tug as he reached around you to pull the door latch open.

He bit down teasingly on your lower lip, tugging it out before chasing the kiss once more. “Get that sweet ass of yours in the backseat, babygirl” he mumbled against your lips and quickly pulled the door open.

Your lips detached from his for a moment only for you to climb into the backseat, falling onto your back as you blindly reached for the hem of your shirt and yanked it over your head.

Tommy was between your legs in seconds after the door slammed shut behind him. His hands grasped at your thighs, spreading them open and positioning your calves to rest over his shoulders. He had a direct view of your covered cunt, a fresh new wet patch blooming through the fabric that sent him grinning like a devil.

“Fuckin’ hell, sweetheart. You that wet already? Those little panties of yours are practically ruined, babygirl.” He tsked under his breath as he situated himself as best as he could on his elbows. “Can you show her to me, baby? Show me that pretty pussy.” He nipped at your exposed inner thigh, dragging the stubble along his jaw against your skin while keeping his eyes locked on yours.

“I almost thought about touching myself in the bathroom when I was in there.” You let out a soft sigh as you dragged your hand down over your bare stomach and underneath the hem of your skirt. You looped your thumb around the outside of your panties, pulling them to the side revealing your puffy, soaked cunt to Tommy’s lustful gaze.

“You shoulda, babygirl. Little slut like you probably needs it all the time, huh? Fingers, a cock stuffed in you, a mouth on that pussy?” He chuckled with a grin. “Spread her open for me, sweetheart. Wanna see all of her before I fuckin’ ruin you.”

You let out a soft whimper from his words just as a droplet of arousal dripped down from your opening and slid down between your cheeks. You used your middle and forefinger to delicately spread yourself open, playing with your arousal that began to coat your fingers, and you couldn’t help but slip one finger in before slowly pulling it back out.

“Is she wet enough for you, Tommy? Maybe you need to give her a taste. See how wet she is for yourself.” You encouraged him with a subtle grin.

“Mmm. Try daddy, babygirl. Think you can call me that? You’ve got such a pretty pussy. My god. She’s already making a goddamn mess all over the seat. Go on and play with yourself for me, sweetheart. I wanna watch.”

“Oh, fuck. How did I already know that you were into the daddy kink?” You giggled softly while your fingers began to play with yourself in a teasing motion. You lightly played with your clit, letting out a soft moan as you dragged your fingers lower, teasing your entrance before slipping two fingers in. “Oh, fuck, daddy.” You moaned, watching him with hooded eyes as he began to palm himself through his jeans.

“That’s it. Good fuckin’ girl. Such a good little slut playin’ with her pussy for daddy. Gettin’ her all nice and ready for daddy’s cock.” He preened and reached for his belt buckle, undoing it so he would have a bit of relief. “You okay if daddy takes a video of this? That way you can watch it later and remember just how good I took care of you, babygirl.”

You nodded enthusiastically as you began to shallowly pump your fingers, curling them inwards before slipping them back out. “Of course you can take a video, daddy. It’ll be your souvenir.” You shot him a playful wink.

“Fuck. You’re really a naughty little slut, babygirl. Touching yourself in daddy’s truck. Gonna have to get it detailed after I’m done with you.” He snickered and reached for his phone and pulled it out of his pocket. He typed in his password quickly before opening the camera app. “Smile for the camera, babygirl.” He angled his phone towards your face and you responded with a cheesy grin, fingers working over your clit to keep yourself stimulated.

“Daddy’s here with his newest slut and her pretty pussy that’s going to be stuffed to the fuckin’ brim with daddy’s cock soon.” He brought his phone down between your thighs getting a good view of your fingers playing with yourself. “Drippin’ all over daddy’s fuckin’ seats like the naughty little slut that she is.”

“So fuckin’ wet for you, daddy.” You moaned, holding steady eye contact between Tommy’s phone and his face. “Show me your cock, please. I want to see it.”

“Ask and you shall receive, babygirl.” He shot you a wink and popped open the button of his jeans followed by his zipper. He pushed his jeans down over his hips along with his boxers. Your eyes went wide for a moment when his cock sprang free and slapped up against his taut stomach.

Tommy’s cock may have not been as thick as Joel’s, but it was longer, and curved at just the right angle.

“Get on all fours for me, baby girl.” He requested while he wrapped his fist around his cock, giving it a few languid strokes from base to tip. You couldn’t help but watch as he spit over the bulbous head, rubbing in his saliva for extra lubricant as you worked your skirt and panties off, tossing them into the front seat before you flipped over onto your stomach, situating yourself on your hands and knees.

“Well, if that ain’t a sight made in fuckin’ heaven.” He whistled and grabbed a handful of your left ass-cheek, kneading the soft flesh between his fingers before he gave it a good smack, watching it recoil back as you lurched forward, looking over your shoulder at him. Your pupils were blown wide, lower lip harshly taken between your teeth as you rocked your hips back towards him.

“Please fuck me, daddy.” You arched your back, wiggling your ass in a tantalizing motion just as he brought his hand down over your right cheek in a swift motion eliciting a surprised yelp to slip past your lips.

“You want daddy’s cock that bad, huh? Such a desperate little slut wantin’ to be stuffed full of daddy’s cock.” He slapped your left cheek then before he let his hand drift upwards against your spine, and to your shoulder blades. He gently pressed you further against the seat so that your back was arched even more.

"gonna stretch you out, gonna be ruined for anyone else." He growled against the shell of your ear. “You’re gonna be daddy’s favorite fuckin’ slut when he’s finished with you, babygirl.”

And then you felt the head of his cock press against the seam of your dripping cunt, teasing your folds and bumping against your neglected clit. “Look at you already creamin’ all over daddy’s cock. Barely even inside of you yet, sweetheart.”

You lurched forward when you felt him begin to press you open inch by inch till he was bottomed out with his hips pressed firmly against your ass. Your mouth fell open in an ‘o’ shape as he set an immediate punching rhythm that knocked the air from your lungs.

“Oh—oh fuck!” You moaned, listening to the lewd sounds of skin on skin slapping together. The squelch of your pussy and his heavy, guttural grunts as he pounded his hips into your ass over and over again.

“God, you're such a slut, babygirl. Daddy’s perfect little slut. You give it this good to all the boys, huh? God, your pussy is huggin’ me so goddamn tight.” He groaned out, almost forgetting that he had his phone in his hand still as his forehead came to rest upon your upper back. He slowed his thrusts down momentarily so you could catch your breath and he could check in on you.

“You good, babygirl?”

“Mhmm. Never better.”

He ground his hips against your ass, rolling them forward so you could feel all of him inside of you. Just when you had a moment to catch your breath, he picked the pace up once more and tossed his phone to the side so he could wrap both arms around you, yanking you back against his chest.

"such a whore, babygirl. Workin’ your way through our whole family, aren't you?" He whispered against the shell of your ear, biting down on it with his teeth as he fucked up into you at a new angle.

One hand groped one of your breasts while the other rested along the base of your neck. He was careful to not apply any pressure and get too caught up in the moment. He could feel your pussy fluttering around him, squeezing him like a vice with each pull and drag of his cock. Your eyes were shut in bliss, unabashed moans slipping past your lips as the coil in your belly was pulled tight.

The windows in Tommy’s truck had significantly begun to fog up from the steam that your activities were producing. And despite the discreet location that Tommy was parked in, you couldn’t help the rush you felt when you thought of the possibility of someone—or even Joel catching you and Tommy in this position.

Would he join right in? Fuck—

“Daddy—don’t stop, please!” You cried out, feeling that coil being pulled even tighter as your thighs began to tremble, and tears flooded your eyes: tears of overwhelming pleasure.

“That’s it, babygirl. Such a good fuckin’ cockslut for daddy. Good fuckin’ girl. You gonna come all over daddy’s cock? C’mon! Wanna see you fuckin’ coat me, sweetheart. Come all over my fuckin’ cock.” He snapped his hips forwards then, feeling his own release begin to catch up to him, but you always came first. Tommy would never let you, or any of his girls, not come before him.

He dropped one of his hands from your breasts to thum at your already sensitive clit to push you right on over the edge as you cried out his name, pulsing around his cock and seeing stars dancing behind your closed eyelids.

“There you go, babygirl. There you fuckin’ go.” His tone was much softer now as he slowly slipped out of you, his cock gleaming in your release. He gently flipped you over onto your back, cradling your face delicately in his big hands.

You had a cockdumb look on your face. Completely blissed out and in a whole other world. Your thighs fell open, as your own release drooled down the the seam of your fucked out hole and onto the interior leather seats. In this relaxed position, your pussy let out a squelching sound of air being released, causing you and Tommy to both laugh.

“Fucked her pretty good, didn’t I?” He chuckled to himself and pressed a kiss to your sweaty forehead. “You okay if I take a little look at her, babygirl? I wanna see the mess you made.”

“Mhmmm.” You hummed, lashes fluttering shut as you stretched your arms behind your head in a languid, relaxed movement.

Tommy reached for his discarded phone bringing it back down right over your still pulsing cunt as his fingers gently spread you open, sliding through the milky residue of your release.

“Fuck. So pretty, babygirl. You have such a pretty pussy.” He leaned down and pressed a light kiss to your clit, getting just a little taste before he pulled himself back up. “Definitely gonna have to get my truck detailed after this, sweetheart.” He ended the video, falling back against the seat beside you to catch his own breath.

You let out another soft, cock dumb giggle, peeking one eye open to look over at him. “You really think my pussy is that pretty, Tommy?” You dropped one of your hands to lazily rest along your stomach before dipping it between your thighs, missing that stimulated post-orgasm feeling already.

“Baby, she’s so fucking pretty. Like seriously I could happily watch you play with her for hours and easily get off to it.” He tilted his head to the side to look over at you, grin playing on his lips. “How are you feelin’?”

“Mmm. Joel loves to watch me play with myself too. Guess it’s just a Miller brother thing, huh?” You winked with a giggle. “I feel fucking amazing, Tommy.” Cock dumb and satisfied, you thought.

He preened at your response, resting his arms along the backseats as he let out a relaxed sigh. “Good, baby. I’m real happy to hear that. Means that I did my job right. And what can I say? Joel and I are big pussy lovers.” He chuckled and reached for his phone, texting Joel that they would be back shortly, and attached the video as well.

“Yeah, you guys sure are.”

-

After about twenty minutes, Tommy had to physically help you to sit up and redress. Your entire body felt like jello and you were still positively fucked out. He helped you out of the backseat, keeping his arm wrapped around you for support as he guided you back inside to the booth.

“Easy now, babygirl. Back into my brother’s lap you go. You just cuddle up with him now, ‘kay? Pussy took a real poundin’, let her rest.” Tommy cooed softly against your ear as Joel gently eased you into his lap, letting you bury your face into his neck and lazily wrap your arms around him.

“Mhmmm.” You mumbled against his neck, face scrunching up as you breathed in his natural aroma while he pressed a kiss to the side of your head, rubbing soothing circles into your back underneath your shirt.

"Did such a good job, baby love. Tommy showed me how sweet you were to him, let him feel how soft and warm you are, hmm? My good girl. Here, baby, I got you water. Need you to take a sip, you worked hard out there." Joel murmured softly to you.

“It was so much fun. Tommy was so good to me, baby. He thinks I have such a pretty pussy.” You softly giggled and blindly reached for the glass of water, pulling your face out from where it was pressed against his neck to guzzle the liquid down before cuddling right back up against him.

“I’m happy to hear that, baby love. I knew y’all were gonna hit it off. M’so proud of my girl. And yes, baby. You do have a pretty pussy. Rest now, ‘kay?”

You were out like a light then all curled up in his lap like a koala without a care in the world.

“Whatcha do to her, huh? Got my baby all cock drunk, Tommy.” Joel asked softly, reaching for his fresh glass of whiskey and took a small sip, careful to not disturb you.

Tommy was back across the booth, a new cigarette between his lips and his arms crossed behind his head in a relaxed position.

“Took ‘er for a real good spin.” He grinned, tapping his fingers along the worn, frayed leather. “Gonna have to get the truck fuckin’ detailed though.”

“That so? She make it all messy?” Joel asked.

“Fuck. Yeah, she made it real messy alright. Had her drippin’ all down the seats.”

Joel grinned at this, glancing down at your sleeping form in pure adoration and pride. “Mmm. I believe it. She’s always fuckin’ drippin.’ Doesn’t matter what time of the day it is, my baby love is always soakin.’”

“That right? Pretty slutty cunt like hers always ready to have a big cock in her, huh?” Tommy stifled a chuckle as he sank further against the seat.

You thought you were just having a wet dream, until your hand found Joel’s and discreetly tucked it between your thighs, pressing the pads of his fingers against your ruined cunt that was pulsing once more. Little needy breaths slipped past your parted lips when he gently began to play with you, understanding that you were silently asking him to make you come one more time. You kissed along his neck, open mouthed with little nibbles here and there as you came in his lap, falling back into a relaxed state.

“Okay, think I gotta get my baby love home and in bed. She’s gonna sleep so good tonight.” Joel softly announced as he nudged you gently.

“Oh, I reckon she will be. You take good care of her, Joel. And text me when y’all are home safe, ‘kay?” Tommy nodded in Joel’s direction.

“You know I will, Tommy. I’ll text ya when we’re home.” He gave his brother a little nod and helped you out of the booth and towards the door. Once you were outside, the fresh air seemed to help you wake up a little more as you leaned all your weight into his side.

“You’re so beautiful, baby love. I’m so thankful for you, y’know that? You did so fuckin’ good. I’m so proud of you, so fuckin’ proud of my girl. Let’s get you home, okay? You’re gonna sleep so good tonight.”

“I love you, Joel Miller.” You murmured into his shoulder, one arm draped around his middle for support. You may have been cock dumb, and completely fucked out, but you words were true. You loved Joel, and he deserved to hear it.

“I love you too, baby love. My beautiful, beautiful girl.”

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[katiexpunk]

okay i’m feeling a little delulu and playing pool with the boys right now. ideas are rolling and i want a fic where joel fucks reader on a pool table (breeding kink maybe?!?) you’re the best

Run the Table | Pairing Joel and Tommy Miller X Fem!Reader

Summary: You're home for Christmas, only to find yourself there for the New Year. You decide to blow off some steam, only to end up at Joel's Place, your old local watering hole. Bits of your past get dredged up, and before you know it, Joel and Tommy have you bent over a pool table. Word Count: ~6K Warnings: Dubcon from the perspective that the reader is a little drunk, but she's definitely a willing participant. Family feuds. Alcohol. Age gap implied but not referenced explicitly. Flirting and bantering. Threesome with the Miller Bros. Betting. Pool. Oral (m and f receiving). Fingering. Praise. Use of daddy. Fucking on pool table. Pool. Suggestive use of a cue stick. Dom undertones from Joel. Hard core breeding kink. References to pregnancy. Cum kink. Cum swallowing. Praise kink. Unprotected p in v. Creampie. Use of pet names. Tommy and Joel are suave in this, but reader gives them a run for their money. Use of slut. No descriptions of reader, except that she has boobs and hair. Minimally edited. Filth, filth, filth. Authors Note: Thank you so much for the ask, Abby @javipispunk/@barzalmatty! This was such a treat to write. You naughty girl, I hope this inspires you, or at the very least, makes you O. Thanks for submitting this ask in babe, ily. This will be my last fic of 2023. Thank you all so much for your continued support.

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The living room, which was all holiday cozy a few days ago, now feels like a battleground in the weird liminal space between Christmas and the New Year. You can’t remember the last time you spent more than three consecutive days with your family, and now you remember why. 

The family drama has hit an all-time high, with arguments about the dumbest stuff echoing through the house – your mother yelling that someone put her Pyrex in the wrong cabinet, your father yelling at your brother for adjusting the settings on the remote. Hell, even the dog is over it; spending most of the day lounging in front of the LED fireplace that your mother picked up at Costco last winter. You never really understood that one, given your living room has an actual functioning fireplace. 

Of course, you all love each other, it’s just that the festive candle is now nearly snuffed out; not to be lit again until Thanksgiving. Or if your mother had it her way, Easter, but you haven’t cared much for Easter since that one year that your cousin Ron ate way too many hard-boiled eggs and couldn’t stop farting all night. Never again, you swore to yourself then, and still swear to yourself now. 

You come back to your hometown maybe once a year, twice if someone dies. You haven’t lived here in years, and yet the streets bear the weight of nostalgia, each corner holding echoes of memories that time has both polished and weathered. The town is a paradox, frozen in a bittersweet dance between familiarity and change. 

You’re cozied up under a blanket on the couch, a glass of red swirling in one hand, the Eve Babitz novel your roommate gifted to you in the other. Try as you might, you just can’t seem to relax; the words on the page are blending into a snarled blob of ink. The tension is too much; the heavy air in the house makes it difficult to concentrate. Fuck this. 

You throw on your coat and slip out of the house. I’m going out, be back later, you call out but you don’t wait for your words to be acknowledged before the front door slams shut, not that anyone was listening in the first place. 

You pause on your front stoop in the cool night air and take a deep inhale, tilting your head up to the sky, the moonlight coating your face like a veil. The winter air that fills your lungs makes you feel alive, and it’s then that you realize how close you were to suffocating mere moments ago. 

You stand under the stars and consider your options before eventually landing on the best of them. Your old watering hole from college; the one with the heavy pours and the best pool tables in the town – Joel’s Place. 

The snow crunches under your feet as you make your way there. In the silence, it’s easy to let your let your mind wander. You haven’t been back in years, and yet, your mind still drifts to thoughts of dimples and salt-and-pepper curls. You wonder if he’ll remember you – not likely, you think. 

Your stomach flutters at the thought anyway.

++++ 

The door to Joel’s Place creaks open, releasing a gust of frigid winter air that clings to your coat. Note to self, bring a scarf next time. The warmth inside is a welcome contrast, and the familiar scent of the aged wood and whiskey acts like a time machine and transports you back in time to your early 20s. It’s just the same; the mahogany bar, stools with cracked leather seats, and vintage beer signs adorning the walls. 

While aspects of the town may have changed, you’re pleased to find that Joel’s Place has not. 

As the door swings shut behind you, you find yourself in a familiar dimly lit space, except – it’s not – it’s quiet. A little too quiet. The pool tables in the distance stand untouched, their felt surfaces waiting for the familiar crack of balls colliding. The hanging lights above them cast a warm, dim glow, illuminating the emptiness that seems to linger. It starkly contrasts the energy you were surrounded by earlier in the night. 

The place is empty, except for one customer at the bar. The bartender – Joel, you hope – is nowhere to be seen. You hesitate for a moment, taking in the scene before deciding to sit an appropriate two stools away from the man, not wanting to be awkward. You don’t think he would mind, not really, but you suppose the rule in a situation like this is similar to public transport etiquette. If there’s more than one open seat, you never sit directly next to anyone. 

“Excuse me, sir – is this seat taken?” You ask, a hint of sweetness and formality behind your voice. You know it’s not, but the manners that were hammered into you from your tidy upbringing are hard to shake.

The man looks at you, the neck of the beer he’s nursing parting from his lips as he does. Now that you have a full look at him, he’s quite gorgeous. Olive sunkissed skin, dark curls, deep brown eyes that all but scream trouble. 

“All yours, sugar,” he responds. And oh, he’s southern to boot, with a hint of a twang behind his inflection. 

You slip your puffy coat off your shoulders, revealing your ensemble for the night; a simple pair of jeans and a tight long-sleeve cashmere sweater that cups the curve of your breasts and lifts them just right, a lovely slit down the middle that exposes just enough. You hook your coat under the bar and pull out the stool, its metal legs scratching against the floor as you do. 

“So, the producers didn’t have enough to pay for some extras for this show, or what?” you joke, a slight smirk on your face as you settle yourself onto the stool. 

“‘Spose not,” he responds, a hint of a smile on his face as he brings the bottle back to his lips, his eyes locking with yours as he does. 

“And the uh–bartender, Joel, if I remember correctly,” you say, a questioning tone behind your voice, “he here, or is this just a one-man show?” 

And wouldn’t that be something, you here all alone with just him. 

“Can’t be a one-man show with you here, darlin',” he responds, his dark eyes drinking you down like the beer in his hand. “He’s here, just in the back hooking up a new keg,” he adds. 

“Oh,” you respond, your voice a smidge too high – like you’re some fucking school girl about to see her crush in 3rd period. “Good, that’s good. Can’t have all of our friends here go thirsty,” you retort, making a vague gesture with your palm to the empty space in the bar in an attempt to recover yourself from your very obvious interest in the bartender being here. So stupid. 

“Can’t have that, they’re a rowdy bunch” he responds with a wink and you flash him a warm smile. “You’re funny, I like you,” he adds, “name’s Tommy, by the way, and you are?” 

You give him yours with an extension of your hand. His swallows yours, but he’s gentle and discerning with the shake he gives it. He holds you there, just looking, and you feel a warmth creep up to your face. With your hands still interlocked, a broad figure pushes through the door from the kitchen with a resounding thud. 

You turn to face him, and his amber eyes immediately find yours. Your breath hitches in your throat, your pulse quickens, and you’re now acutely aware of the fact that you’re still linked with Tommy. 

“Well, I’ll be damned. Either ‘m getting old and my eyes are deceiving me, or it’s little Miss Shark sitting at my bar, chatting up my brother,” Joel lets out, his voice low and even. The corners of his mouth lift and you think he might smile, but his face goes just as unreadable as always as he grabs for a bottle behind the bar. “Been a long time since I’ve seen you around here, sweetheart. Good thing, too. You ran out some of my best-paying customers."

You don’t dwell on the comment, your mind is too absorbed, drunk off the fact that he remembers you. It’s been years, but you swear he hasn’t aged a day. You can’t help but eye fuck him as he slides a glass in front of you, and pours you a finger of whiskey. Not only does he remember you, but he remembers your go-to drink, as well. 

As you lift the edge of the glass to your lips, you see Tommy shift his gaze from Joel and back to you, his face twisted in an expression of disbelief. 

“Wait, little Miss Shark,” he begins, tipping the bottle in his hands in your direction as if to point at you, “Yo–you’re the one who ran the tables here for years? Shit, darlin’,” he says, dropping his gaze to the bartop for a moment, trying to hide the fact that he’s impressed, before looking back at you under his lashes. 

“That so hard to believe?” you respond, your voice coated in the warmth of the alcohol. Your cheeks are hot, but you’re not confident it’s just from the liquor; more than likely it’s a result of Joel’s eyes, heavy like boulders, that haven’t left you since he walked in.

Tommy doesn’t answer you. 

“Not my fault they underestimated me,” you retort, nursing down the amber liquid in your glass. 

Joel laughs. 

You and Tommy both turn to face him. 

“Bullshit, sweetheart. You knew exactly what the hell you were doin’,” he adds, nodding his head slightly to you, the bottle hovering in his hand, signaling you for a refill. He pours a glass for him and Tommy this time, too. 

You look at him, mouth slightly agape like you’re waiting for him to finish his side of the story. He turns to face Tommy, one hand resting on the edge of the bartop, his knuckles bleaching under his weight. The other grips the glass in front of him. 

“This one used to sit at my bar, let men buy her free drinks, and then she’d work pool into the conversation,” he says, pausing to take a sip. “She’d be all, ‘I’ve never played, maybe you could teach me blah, blah’ batting her pretty little eyes until they’d cave. By the end of the night, she’d have them makin’ bets and melting like putty in her hands.” 

You try to hide your embarrassment behind your glass. He’s not wrong. You used to do that. You’re not sure if you did it because you were bored, not like there’s much else to do in this shit town anyway, or because you liked the attention, but whatever the reason you have to admit it was fun. 

Besides, most of them deserved it anyway. If losing a few hundred dollars was the biggest price they’d have to pay for flirting with a young college girl while their wives sat at home waiting for them to come home and half satisfy them, well then, you were okay with that. Plus it kept your rent paid.

But that was a long time ago; it’s been ages since you’ve even picked up a pool stick. You just hope that the old idiomatic expression, old habits die hard, rings true for you now. 

The alcohol that courses through your veins gives you a sense of confidence to be a bit bold. You prop your elbows on the sticky bartop and gaze up at Joel. “You gonna kick me out then, Joel? Punish me for all of my wrong-doings?” you flirt, testing, teasing. You flint your eyes over your shoulder to look back at Tommy, and can’t help the surge of arousal that you feel when you notice his eyes are already on your backside. You look at Joel and see the clench in his jaw, the furrow in his brow, his pupils blown wide open. 

“No, ‘m not gonna kick you out, sweetheart,” he says, filling the glasses once more. Between that and the wine from earlier this afternoon, you’re already feeling quite buzzed, and more than a little reckless. You watch him complete the pours before reaching for your glass. 

“But you are gonna have to make it up to me somehow,” he adds. Your pulse doubles and there’s a familiar tug at your navel when you think of what he might mean. Before you have time to respond, he adds “Tell you what, I’ll make you a bet this time. You see Tommy here is a bit of a pool shark himself, and well, baby you already know what I am.” Both of them look at you with dark, hungry eyes. “You beat us, you can have whatever you want,” he adds. 

Your skin feels hot, and you suddenly wish you opted for something cooler than a sweater. “And if either of you wins?” you ask. 

“Guess you’ll just have to wait and find out,” Joel responds, downing the last of his drink, shooting Tommy a knowing look. 

It’s a trap, you know it is. 

And yet you agree.

++++ 

Joel rounds out from behind the bar and leads the way. He walks past the front door and locks it before pulling the plug on the neon open sign that hands in the nearby window. As you three approach the pool table, Tommy picks up a cue stick leaning against the nearby wall – he twirls it in his hands and hands it to you. He picks up another and passes it to Joel, before finally grabbing a third for himself. 

“Hope you’re not a sore loser, Darlin’,” Tommy says with a wink. 

You playfully roll your eyes. “We’ll see,” you cheekily respond, toying with the end of the cue stick and rubbing chalk on the tip end of it, being a little suggestive with your movements. Both Tommy and Joel notice.

You gather around the table, and Joel sets up the balls. “Alright, break time. You’re up first, sweetheart,” Joel says. You lock eyes with Joel for a moment and fuck, this is gonna be rough. He has you so flustered and you haven’t even started. 

You refocus your gaze on the triangular arrangement of balls. You steady your feet and bend over the table, smiling a little when you feel both of them look at your ass. With a swift motion, you strike the cue ball, scattering the rest across the table, sinking a solid and a stripe into two adjacent pockets. Not so bad for being a little rusty, you think. 

Joel lets out a low whistle and looks at Tommy. “Shit, brother, we might be in trouble here,” he says. You smile at the compliment, and round around the table so you’re directly in front of Tommy. You look at Joel as you bend over the table, lining yourself up to hit the solid ball with a clear path to the pocket in front of it.

Your ass skirts against the front of Tommy’s crotch and his breath hitches in his throat. As you’re about to take your shot, a large palm ghosts over the curve of your hip, and the sensation causes you to miss the shot. Fuck. 

“Aw, what’s the matter sweetheart, you a little distracted?” Tommy coos.

They wanna play dirty. You can play dirty.  

Joel’s up next. His broad frame rounds around the table, and his shoulder brushes against you as he does. He finds his best angle and deftly lines the cue stick up, his biceps straining under the cloth of his shirt at the new position. You walk over to the line of his shot and bend over on the opposite end of the table, your tits spilling out of the slit in your shirt, effectively distracting him. He takes his shot and misses.

They wanna play dirty. You can play dirty.  

“Ooo, good effort on that one,” you tell Joel, placating him, “better luck next time,” you conclude with a wink. Joel clears his throat and steps back from the table. 

Tommy circles the table next, attempting to find an easy shot. “So I’ve been thinking, we should make this game a bit more interesting,” you say. You watch as Tommy bends over and lines up his turn. He pulls the cue stick back, and just as he’s about to knock it against the ball, you finish “For every shot we miss, we have to strip a piece of clothing." The shock of your words causes Tommy to miss his shot. 

“Guess that means you’re starting us off,” you tell Tommy. He shoots you a look. His hands find the buckle of his belt and he undoes it, discarding it on a nearby chair. 

The three of you play like that until both Joel and Tommy are clad in nothing but their boxers and socks. You, on the other hand, are still mostly clothed, except for your sweater. Your game started rough, but despite their best efforts to distract you, you’re running the table. 

With only one ball left on the table, you walk up to where both of them stand side-by-side. You stand there facing both of them, and they allow their eyes to linger on your chest. Tommy is standing with his hands cupped in front of his crotch, in an attempt to hide his growing bulge. Joel, however, is unreadable as ever.

You lock eyes with him as you snake your arms behind your back, fiddling with the clasp of your bra. You unhook it, your nipples stiffening in response to air. He casts a quick gaze down to your breasts but doesn’t allow them to linger before he looks at you. His jaw is stiff, and he looks at you like you’re something to eat. Keeping your eyes peered into his, you hold the bra out and give it to Tommy. The moment is so charged. So many things being said with no words, all body language discussion. 

You take a few steps back before turning around to grab your cue stick that’s resting against the edge of the pool table. You walk over to the other end of the table and line up the final shot of the game. “So I’ve been thinking about what I want as my prize,” you say, bending down far enough that your tits smush against the felt on the table. “And what’s that, sweetheart?” Joel asks.  You let out a little hum of satisfaction, dragging the cue stick back. “Want you both to fuck me, right here on this table,” you add, punctuating your statement with your final shot. You watch with bated breath, releasing it when you see the last ball on the table fall into the pocket. 

The three of you stand there in silence, waiting for someone to make the first move.

“You heard her, brother,” Tommy says, advancing towards you. “A bet’s a bet.” His hands find your hips from behind, and he pulls your backside against his firm body, dropping his head to nip at your neck. His lips trail up the side of the sensitive skin there and you let out a little purr as his tongue darts out to lick your pulse. 

Your lusty gaze watches as Joel closes the gap between your bodies, and he pauses inches from you. He lifts his palm and uses the backside of it, trailing his knuckles down your cheek, over the soft swell of your chest, until his hand opens up and cups your breast. 

It’s all dizzying touch, your vision already a little fuzzy from your buzz, and with Joel’s hand on your body in addition to Tommy’s mouth, you’re the one who’s putty in their hands this time. Joel brings your nipple to a stiff peak using his thumb and forefinger, before he lifts them back up to your face. He hooks two fingers under your jaw, tilting you up to face him.

“You’re such a fucking tease, you know that?” Joel says, voice low. You look up at him with doe eyes.

“I know. Now what are you going to do about it?” you taunt. 

Tommy stops his affections on your neck and looks up to lock eyes with Joel. He gives a knowing smirk and Tommy reaches his arms around your body and begins to undo the button on your jeans, the zipper following, before he's pulling them down far enough for you to step out of them. 

“Oh, sweetheart. We’re going to fucking ruin you. Right here on this table, just like you asked,” Joel says. 

“Think you can handle that, hmm? Want both of your daddy’s to stuff that pretty little cunt of yours until you can’t think straight?” And fuck, he’s filthy. His words go straight to your core and you feel slick pooling in your panties, your pussy just begging to be touched.

Before giving you time to respond, his large hand comes down to cup your sex. 

“Shit, baby. All this for us?” Joel asks. Your eyes close when you feel Tommy continue his assault on your neck. You’re pinned between both of their bodies, their hard cocks pressing up against you from both angles. It’s already so intense. The want, the sheer desire you feel for both of them is almost overwhelming. 

“Use your words, Darlin’, we wanna hear it,” Tommy rasps against your skin.

“Ye–yes, all for you both, want you so bad,” you respond with a moan. A groan reverberates through Joel’s chest, and he gives Tommy the same knowing look they’ve shared all night. 

Tommy steps back and comes to stand by Joel’s side. “You’re gonna have to earn it. On your knees, baby,” Joel commands. 

You fall to your knees and feel the hard, wooden floor against your bare calves. You position yourself in front of both of them and fold your hands in your lap, waiting for one of them to give you further instructions, practically worshipping at the altar of the two gorgeous men above you. Joel reaches down and brings his pointer finger to lift your chin to face him. He runs his thumb over your lips.

“So pretty like this,” he rasps. As he releases you, they both nod and you take that as permission to release both of them from the confines of their fabric prison. 

You start with Tommy, dipping your fingers beneath the band of his boxers. Instinctively, your eyes find Joel’s and you glance at him as if to ask for permission again. He nods once more, and you drag them down to the middle of Tommy’s thighs. The cock that springs free is fucking delectable; a perfect width and a sizable length. The tip is prominent and there’s a thick vein bulging along the side of it. He’s well endowed, and thank fuck for that. Your hands reach up to grasp the base of it, and your tongue darts out to lick the bead of pre-cum that’s welled at the tip. It’s salty and delicious, leaving you wanting more, more, more. 

You pull your mouth away from Tommy and replace it with your hand, slowly and firmly stroking the length of him, his skin smooth like butter under your palm. He starts to protest when he realizes what your next move is. You use your free hand to release Joel from his fabric confines and moan at the sight of his cock. Of course, they both would be blessed below the belt. As delicious as Tommy’s cock is, his older brother has a bit of a lead on him.

Truthfully, you’re not surprised in the slightest. Joel’s cock is well above average in length, but the main attraction is the thickness. Just from the looks of it, your fingers probably wouldn’t meet if you wrapped your fingers around him. His girthiness intimidates you, but you don’t scare easily. You were hungry before, but now you’re positively ravenous. You kitten lick Joel’s tip then fully suck on it, eliciting a throaty groan from him. You smile around it, pleased at yourself for being able to affect him like that.

You want to please the pair of dangerously handsome brothers, but you’re aching for praise from Joel. 

“Lay back, baby,” Tommy commands, guiding your hips up to rest against the grain of the pool table. And you do, the texture of the felt rubbing against your back in a soft embrace. Both of their hands find your chest with flat palms, and they drag them down over the expanse of your breasts and stomach. They pause, both of them face-to-face with your cunt. ‘Go ‘head brother, all yours,” Joel says to Tommy. 

And shit, the hot mouth that greets your wet core is inviting in more ways than one. His lips lock around your waiting clit and you moan in response to the sensation. As Tommy sucks at your center, his tongue making perfect rotations on your clit, you can’t help but let go.

“Shit, that’s so good – need more,” you beg, and Joel can tell the ask you’re making is for him. He slips his middle finger into your pussy, and your wall clenches around him. The pressure that Tommy applies to your clit is so good, you could probably come just from him, but the added drag of Joel’s finger sawing in and out of you reminds you that you want more, need more, need him. 

“Joel, yes – fuck, yes, please don’t stop,” you beg. Tommy continues tracing patterns over your clit and Joel adds a second, then a third finger, which you greedily accept. “More!” you beg, and Joel obliges, slipping a fourth finger into you. “Such a tight fucking cunt, not sure how I could fit another, but happy to stretch you out baby, gotta get you ready f'us,” Joel says. Tommy purrs as he laps up your release, and Joel groans, wishing he was the one at your chef’s table, sampling all of your flavors.

With the way both of them work at you, you feel like a helpless fish, caught on their hook. They dropped the bait and you were quick to bite, now having to pay the price for your decision. The both of them reel in their line, pulling you closer and closer to your orgasm. They drag you to the water line of your orgasm, and you give up any hope of staying below the shoreline.

Your release washes over you like a wake from a boat, an inevitable. You let the waters fall from your shore before you open your eyes and see both of them, their hard cocks staring you in the eyes. Giving you a moment to come up for air, Joel gently strokes your cheek, an act of tenderness amongst the debauchery taking place. 

Tommy gives Joel a knowing look and lifts his right leg to help hoist him onto the pool table. With you spread out underneath both of them, he positions himself right above your head. You all but drool at the sight of him stroking his cock from this vantage point, Tommy looking down at you as if he were seeing his reflection in a pond for the first time. His jaw hangs slack as he works himself from base to tip.

Meanwhile, Joel’s hands find your hips and he deftly tugs you down, so your waiting pussy is just barely hanging over the edge of the pool table. He puts your legs over his brawny forearms, bearing the weight of your lower half, and spreads your legs wide, fully exposing your glistening cunt to him.

You’re almost shivering with how badly you want his cock inside you. He grabs the base of it in one hand, the tip of him barely ghosting against your wet and dripping seam. He collects some of your arousal on him, before using his thumb to drag it over the length of his member. 

He knows he could fuck you just like this, lord knows you’re wet enough, and he's done his due diligence to stretch you, but he knows he’s a lot to take. He leans his head down and spits, his saliva falls onto the tip of him, partially covering himself and your clit. He taps the mushroom head of his cock on your clit a few times, a thin string of saliva connecting both of your bodies as he pulls it back. 

As much as you would love to focus on Tommy’s length in your face, your sole attention is on Joel, who’s about to fill you to the hilt. “Mouth wide open, baby,” Tommy begs above you, calling you back to his attention. You feign your hardest to listen. You open your jaw wide, and he places the tip of his cock on the tip of your tongue, dragging the heaviness of it over the expanse of it.

Just as he slides in deeper into your wet and waiting mouth, Joel bunts his hips forward, pressing half of him into your tight hole. It’s so much, and they’re both not even halfway in yet. 

They lock eyes with each other and synchronize their thrusts. Joel pulls back and thrusts into your cunt, and Tommy pulls back momentarily before your mouth welcomes him deeper into your throat, so deep in fact that the tip of him bumps up against the back of it, nearly causing you to gag. The corners of your eyes prick with tears, and whether it’s from the stretch of Joel’s cock, or the head of Tommy’s knocking on the back door of your throat, you’ll never know. 

“Shit, brother. She’s taking this cock so well, Jesus fuck,” Tommy mutters, thrusting his member in and out of you with a relentless pace, his hands now tangled in your hair like a bird's nest in a tree.

“God damn, you’re telling me. Little cunt is taking me so well,” and his words cause you to clench harder around him. 

“Gotta ease up baby, or both of your daddy’s are gonna fill you sooner than we both want to,” Tommy rasps behind a breathless voice, “so good, so fucking good, my god.” You revel in their doubled praise and you can’t help but clench tighter, and Joel notices. 

“Ah fuck, brother. I think that’s what she wants. Little slut wants us to pump her full of our cum,” Joel rasps, continuing his relentless pace, dragging his cock in and out of you. You moan in response, your words muffled around the expanse of Tommy, “Fuck, want you to fill me up so bad, both of you.” 

“You hear that,” Tommy says in a breathless voice. “You heard her, give the girl what she wants,” Tommy encourages Joel. And fuck. These two are going to be the death of you. 

“That what you want, sweetheart? Want Daddy Joel and Daddy Tommy to pump you full of all of our seed, want us to leave you dripping with both of us,” Joel says, his pace quickening, his grip on your hips strong enough to bruise. “Yes, fuck, fill me up, want every last drop of both of my daddy’s cum.” 

Joel looks up at Tommy.

“Wouldn’t that be quite the fucking sight? Her all round from your baby, her pretty tits engorged with milk, me fucking dribbling out of her mouth," Tommy says.

"Such a dirty little slut, so good for us,” Tommy praises. Had anyone else uttered those words your skin would crawl, but it’s different coming from the pair of them. You’d let them spread you open wide and fuck you full of their come any day. 

“Fuck, I think she likes the thought of that, I can feel her clamping down on me, gripping me so goddamn tight, brother,” Joel rasps. Your lips tighten around Tommy, and they both continue to use you, fucking you like they want, like how you know you need. They abuse both of your holes in their relentless chase for their own orgasm. 

“Shit brother, ‘m close, not gonna last much longer,” Tommy groans, and you can tell. His cock stiffens and his pulses become more and more erratic.  

“Not yet, need her to come again for us first,” Joel demands, dropping his thumb to your clit, beginning to drag slow and near-perfect circles over your sensitive bud. 

“Need you to give us one more. C’mon, you can do it,” Joel continues to egg you on. “You’re so pretty when you come, give us one more, baby. Our perfect girl, let us feel it.”

With that, your whole body convulses and your vision goes white. You can’t help the shakes that follow, your entire body trembling like an earthquake. “Fuckfuckfuck, yesssss,” you cry out, your release taking over you like watercolor paint spilling onto paper, blurring the lines your pleasure has always been confined to – until now. 

Joel and Tommy continue their movements, slowing as they reach their own peaks. “So close, baby, gonna come down this pretty fucking throat, gonna be a good girl and swallow your daddy’s thick load,” Tommy grunts out before he stills and shoots his spend down your throat. It’s so much, some dribbles out the corners of your mouth and down your chin. 

Joel watches as you greedily swallow his brother's load. “Such a good girl. You gonna tell your pretty little cunt to swallow all of me too, hmm? Gonna flood that little pussy with my load, fill you so full,” he raps. “Gonna plug you so good after ‘m done, not drop is gonna go to waste, baby.” 

You gulp, swallowing the rest of Tommy’s spend before answering, “Yes, Joel, p-please fill me up with your come, daddy,” you squawk out, voice hoarse from Tommy’s crusade on your mouth. 

“As you wish, pretty girl,” Joel teases, as if he wasn’t the one to come up with the idea. 

He thrusts once, twice and he’s filling you with his cum, just as he promised. He stills inside of you, and his forehead comes to rest on your chest. The sticky sweat on his skin makes it tacky, clinging to you in a way that parallels how you’re clinging to this moment. Both of your chests are heaving, ragged breaths coming out almost in sync. 

After a few long moments, Joel reluctantly lifts his head up and slowly pulls out, but before any of his load drips out he uses a finger to plug your hole. You gasp and your body jolts from the oversensitivity. “Makin’ sure it sticks, darlin’,” Joel coos in your ear and gently moves the stray strands of hair from your face.  

Thoroughly fucked out, you ask the pair of them, “So just out of curiosity, what would you have asked for if either of you had won?” 

They both look at each other as if to decide if they want to tell you the truth or not. 

“Come back next year for a rematch and we’ll tell you,” Tommy says. 

With the way both of them look at you, how could you not? 

It’s not even January and yet, here you are – excited for Easter. 

What a fucking plot twist that is. 

END

Tagging moots and those who I think might like this: @endlessthxxghts @sydneyinacoma @bastardmandennis @untamedheart81@lavema @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog @dugiioh @nervoushottee @milly-louise @ghostwritesthings@josephquinnswhore @drunk-and-capable @peachmy @survivingandenduring@darkheartgatita @hotgirlbedtimescenarios @ohheypedrito @joeldjarin @nerdieforpedro @joeldjarin @nerdieforpedro @amyispxnk @paleidiot @brittmb115 @ghostwritesthings @kulekehe @darkheartgatita @goldenhxurs @javiscigarette @morallyinept @tobesolovelysstuff @notsosecretspy @alokaerza @ro-nahime-things @gwendibleywrites @morgaussy @missladym1981 @pedrostories

As always, feel free to let me know if you'd like to be added to my tag list, or removed (even if we're moots, no hard feelings). I'll still be using my tag list for now, but I just started a notifs blog, so will be transitioning to that eventually. Please follow @katiexpunkupdates to get notified when I post fics.xx

Happy New Year!

[mdawgswizzleinthehizzle]

i don’t think it’s talked about enough how awful joel’s death was for tommy too.

…like that was his big brother who basically raised him alongside sarah. tommy is like 4 or 5 years younger than joel so i can only imagine how much he just adored his big brother as a kid.

tommy, when he was younger, would do things like this…

little tommy fr sent a letter back home to joel when he was away at camp just because he missed him. he looked up to joel so much as a brother, a mentor and a best friend.

even after they came back together at jackson, they goofed around as brothers…

after joel’s death, and by the end of the game, tommy literally lost an eye after getting shot in the head, could barely walk right and split with maria.

not to mention, he probably carries a ton of guilt about joel’s death like ellie does. he was literally with joel when they were attacked. i’m sure he feels like he should have been able to do more and save him.

i know a lot of people get mad at tommy when he goes to ellie and dina’s ranch to talk about abby. admittedly, he does push ellie, guilt tripping her a bit. realistically, he shouldn’t have pushed ellie like that… but he’s grieving just as much as ellie, if not more so, since that was literally his brother of 50 years. he’s bound to do rash things like that.

joel was absolutely tommy’s best friend, and even if they had that separation for those 20 some years, joel was always his big brother, no matter what. they never stopped loving each other.

i have a sister and i couldn’t imagine losing her like tommy lost joel.

[boopernatural]

Fuck- this letter from Tommy on Joel’s cork board in his office in Texas has me absolutely wrecked 😭😭 this is obviously a childhood letter AND JOEL HAS KEPT IT THIS WHOLE TIME

Joel was just his big brother- the big bro who took care of him and looked out for him and he was so cool he built bikes and fixed stuff and protected him and I’m absolutely losing it

I know it’s tough for all of us when Tommy comes to the farm in tlou2 but we need to remember he’s lost in his own grief too. He was Joel’s baby brother- he lost the only family he had left from before. He lost the boy he wrote this letter to- the big brother he was missing when he was alone at camp!!!

That man with the wounds and scars and anger is this little boy and all he wants is his big brother back 😭

[starry-eyes-love]

My Journey to You | Series Masterlist

Main Masterlist

Summary | (Post Outbreak) For the past year Joel Miller (age 52), You (Female Reader age 27), and Ellie (age 14) have been searching for Joel's brother Tommy. Recently someone had told you that he had settled in Jackson, Wyoming and now that is where you three are headed. Somewhere along the way, you have fallen hard for the broody, quiet, and sometimes grumpy man named Joel Miller. As the two of you navigate the wilderness together you also have to navigate your feelings for one another in the presence of a teenage girl named Ellie. Survival in the wilderness does not come easy and neither does a relationship with Joel Miller. The question is, can you survive the journey?

Pairing | Joel Miller x F!Reader. Ellie just is a travel companion and a teenager who is often difficult to deal with.

Fic Warnings | 18+ Minors DNI, Explicit Smut, language, unprotected sex, no use of Y/N. See each chapter for specific warnings

Fic Notes | Welcome to my first ever Joel Miller x F!Reader fanfiction. I hope you all like it, as I am enjoying writing it.

No longer doing tag lists, turn on notifications to see when I post new stories.

Chapters

Prequel: Just This Once

Ch 1: Frozen Desire

Ch 2: Blood & Pain

Ch 3: Even Tough Hearts Break Under Pressure

Ch 4: Please, I Need You

Ch 5: Woodland Fun

Ch 6: You're Forever Mine

Ch 7: A Silent Promise to You

Ch 8: A Christmas Story

Ch 8.5: Dance With Me

Ch 9: Blood Within Me

Chapter 10 (in progress of writing)

going to be more than 10 chapters, unknown total yet.

[softlyspector]

choices

Summary: Joel is dying. He reflects on the choices he made.

Word count: ~2.2k

Relationship(s): Joel & Sarah, Joel & Ellie, Joel & Tommy

Warnings: spoilers for tlou part 2, a whole lot of grief and love, descriptions of violence and injuries and death, confusion, trauma, written in like two hours and edited only lightly, not my usual writing style

A/N: Hello, remember when just this morning I said no golf on this page? I lied a little bit. We're going golfing in this one, but I think the fact that I can write about this without having a breakdown means the big ball of grief in my chest is easing just a little. Maybe that's silly, considering he is Not Real. But it is what it is. I don't expect many of you to read this lil fic but if you do, know I love you and appreciate you. I would love to hear anything you have to say. Thank you for reading <3

“What if she’s still alive, Tommy?”

Tommy’s head snaps in his brother’s direction, Joel still waiting to receive medical attention.

It's warm. The weather is nice. He can hear crickets chirping in the grass. Feels like a fucking crime.

Pandamonium, everywhere, still, in the triage center; but between the two of them it’s quiet, the whole world far away. It has to be, with Sarah’s blood still on his hands, the feeling of her little hands clawing at his bicep still wasping over his skin.

“What the hell are you talkin’ about, Joel?”

“S—” Her name gets caught up in his throat, wads up against the back of his tongue and sticks it to the roof of his mouth. That first letter is sour and anxious, a bitter candy in the maw of his grief.

Daughter, child, baby.

His baby, warm in his arms, her blood threading through his fingers, life draining away.

All he could do was watch and watch and try to stop that horrible red.

He had looked away for one second, and she’d left. Gone.

Two days ago, her body cooled in his arms. Two days ago, he had to close her eyes forever with trembling fingers. He hadn’t been able to look into them again, and would forever be missing that color, trying to remember it, match it to some shade that would never be right, never be her.

“Sarah,” he manages and clears his throat.

Tommy is the one that wants him to get looked at. Because Joel can’t tell if something is wrong or not, from running and falling and being shot at. He doesn’t feel fucking anything, just numbness, just the pull of his skin too tight against his organs and bones. Just a pulsing dark hole, raw and torn at the edges.

Part of him got ripped out when she—

Where had he put it all before, he wonders, all that love? His body isn’t big enough for it. And it certainly ain’t big enough for this much grief.

“What if she was still alive? When we buried her. I want to check.”

Grief.

It will bend over backwards just to look you in the eyes. Denial of its gaze will break even the best of them.

Joel looks away, sees a daughter that might claw free of the fate she suffered.

The memories are sunbursts behind his eyes, blinding and impossible to look at, but not something he could ever forget. Cradling her to his chest, can’t leave her behind, bury her at least, put her bones to rest, but what if she’s alive? Are they sure she was dead? Maybe she’d just passed out?

Tommy shifts, looks away, across the emergency tents and the families still hoping to find a loved one, everyone wondering what the fuck was going on as night falls again, another day in this new world. Forever changed.

He doesn’t need his brother to say it, that she isn’t alive, that Joel had held her and felt for a pulse for hours afterwards, intermittently pressing fingers to neck just to be sure. He doesn’t need Tommy to tell him that even if she had been, they’d buried her two days ago, and she certainly was now.

A wave of grief pulses through his chest again. That’s the only time the numbness abates, just those little moments where love washed away too soon, overpowers.

“Joel—”

Joel isn’t listening. He’s thinking of blue eyes opening six feet under the ground, inhaling dirt, panicking, confused about how she ended up there, suffocating, and Joel had been the one to put her there.

A new wave of emotion passes over Tommy’s face.

“She was gone.” His hand lands on his shoulder.

Little brother who he’d always looked out for and played third parent to, or maybe he was just the second.

“You’re right,” Joel nods, his throat constricts again, glassy pearl of grief swelling against his skin until it feels like it might burst. “I know.” His voice cracks right up the middle.

Joel still hasn’t washed her blood from his fingers, it feels like the last moment of loss, the very last thing he can hold onto.

He still believes in the world, then. That he can hold onto for a second.

And then, him and Tommy are at the border to a quarantine zone a few days after that. Joel still has his kid’s blood staining his t-shirt. Someone checked him out at the triage center, and wiped away the blood before he could stop them, told him he sprained his shoulder.

How did that happen? And did it matter, if he couldn’t feel it at all? He doesn’t feel pain or hunger or anything else, just wave after wave of grief. He doesn’t even feel angry.

But then they’re there, truck confiscated, in the processing center to the Austin QZ, with backpacks and the clothes on their back and a promise that they’d be able to get a letter to his mother when he is waved in and Tommy is not.

Then, the anger sets in and the world changes in his mind and he sees it for what it has become. The thing that took Sarah and wrought hell and wanted to take more.

It would not happen again.

He argues with the officers and gets angry, the kind of angry that used to follow him before Sarah arrived and mellowed him out. They won’t hear sense, even though taking Tommy would be the same as taking Joel. They have most of the same skills. His brother is better than him, anyhow.

But maybe that’s the problem. Similar skills and one with ideals.

“It’s all right, Joel, I’ll figure somethin’ else out. I’ll head to Arlington.” He never would have let that happen, not then, not at that moment, but if he had, he knows he never would have seen Tommy again.

He’s on the knife’s edge of being restrained when he walks back through the gate to his brother’s side.

It’s a relief.

Not again.

They never find their mother; they never get to send a letter.

He makes the choice for them, even though Tommy tells him to go on. “They wouldn’t have me now, anyhow. We’re better off this way.”

Joel doesn’t hear any arguments and eventually Tommy stops trying.

It’s the same kind of change that would bloom dangerous and righteous in St. Mary’s twenty odd years later. The same kind of relief when he finally finished his terrible task, choice made, crisis averted, for the time being.

Tommy came to resent Joel for the choices he tried to make for both of them, so it’s no wonder Ellie would one day, too.

When Joel dies, when he’s dying, when he’s being beaten to death, and his mind finally parts from his body and the pain fades—he thinks of that moment, Tommy staring at him through that fence.

He thinks of Sarah, her tiny frame in his arms, the way she was so small when she died and when she was born. So fragile against his chest, baby hair like yellow fluff, both times.

He thinks of Ellie, smiling at him, fearlessly leaping from great heights and scaring him half to death, thinks of dinners together before everything went to hell, thinks of hats on dinosaurs, books about space read aloud, the desperate clawing, asking to stay close when he could feel her slipping away.

He thinks of Tess, how she wanted to lie low and take a break, after. He thinks of that bite on her neck and the sprawl of her broken body on a chilled marble floor.

Joel never got enough time with anyone.

Reviled, always, for what he would do for them.

And still he would do it again and again and again.

The nine iron comes down on his shoulder, the reverberation of it echoing through his body, the vast cavernous, cancerous space of it. Pinging off ribs and around the blackened, singed accordion of his lungs, sluggishly billowing open and closed, like the end of a song he never knew how to sing.

What kind of hell did he end up in? Inflicted with a beating he can no longer feel; slow; the end long overdue.

A merciful one, maybe.

A deserved one, maybe.

But it is the end.

Violent, like it should be. Like it had been for so many others. The way he had made it for so many others.

Sarah, bleeding in his arms. Her eyes blank and unseeing and the fear that he had buried his blood before her time, that somewhere in the earth she still writhed. Undeniable, then, that it was his fault.

Ellie, machete raised above her head, bringing it down, over and over, blood on her face and then crying in his arms. He would never be able to say what he said to her then to soothe her, his skin frozen cold against hers, sweaty and tacky with fear and adrenaline.

The fire had felt much hotter than it was against the cold, her body fitted into the cradle of his. She was so little against him. Just a kid. He would be, and was, sorry about that for the rest of his life. What she had endured alone, that she had had to save him.

Again.

The point of no return, a fate sealed in blood.

Tried to deny it, even after he decided to take her to the university. Muttered promises he had to fulfill, or else.

Or else, he’d lose what little of his soul he might have left.

Well, I’m not leaving here without you.

With Sarah’s picture in his pocket, he had kept that promise.

He cracks an eye open, and there she is.

Maybe he should wonder why she’s there, be afraid that she is. But all he is, is glad.

See you around.

A promise to try her hand at forgiving him, and here she is, trying.

Ellie's voice.

He wishes he could hear her. She’s looking at him, and that’s fine. He misses her and wishes he would have said that.

Joel blinks, once, slowly, the image of her flickers. The little girl that hadn’t wanted to go anywhere with him, had wanted to stay with her friend Marlene, the leader of the Fireflies. He sees the child Tess had looked him in the eye over and said look, I get it and nothing else, because what else was there to say? Tess knew about Sarah, and Tess knew him.

Terribly transparent, a horrific liar.

He feels the weight of her in his arms through the thin cotton of that hospital gown and then the warm press of her palms shoving him away. All the heaviness of his sins, the break of teeth against untruth, the hard skin of lies. He hears the wracking sobs, the betrayal. A flare of real pain accompanies it, washes cold like a wave across a shore.

And still, he’d do it again.

If he had to, and even if he didn’t. Because it matters. Ellie matters.

The pit of love inside him, that saving, healing, mellowing thing that shouted in colors of grief and made him smile again, play the guitar again and sing again, that made him miss in a way that stung a little less.

Her grave, without a marker.

Dirt on a little body that they couldn’t even put in a pine box. Tommy crying, Joel silent. He’d done his howling.

When Ellie pushed him away, held him at arms length and decided she hated him for the choice he made for her, even if no one was going to have one either way, there hadn’t been howling, either.

There was nothing to mourn after all.

She lives, she breathes. She is safe and has other people to support her.

He wondered, after, when they got back to Jackson and she stopped talking to him, if all that love had only ever gone one way, choked in an artery that spilled out onto the wrong avenue, like everything inside him had been built backward.

Maybe she stopped caring about him, but there had been love there once, and that’s all someone like him could ever hope for.

Just a split second, of being enough, of being the right thing at the right time and making the right decision in the right way.

He sees the decisions lined up, like glass bottles on a wall, like he was a kid with a BB gun. Sarah and Tommy and Tess and Ellie. Maybe if he’d done one thing different or everything different, things would have ended up different and better.

Maybe they would have all gotten to make the choices they really deserve.

He blinks again and the little girl is gone, replaced with the woman she grew into. The one he’s proud of and keeps tabs on, because that’s his kid and that’s what a parent does.

There are tears, and he can hear her a little. Her voice is breaking. He wants to tell her it’s okay.

That’s what he does, tries to do anyway, make sure everyone and everything is okay. He did that, too, even when she didn’t know it. Made sure she came home and got enough and listened with pride when people said she was doing well.

But this is the end and the executioner’s blade is raised high.

Joel twitches, reaching, fingers curling, wants to say it, but he can’t. His own blood pools cold and sticky beneath his head.

He's tired.

He’s sorry that she has to see.

Sorry that it takes him so long to die.

He doesn't regret anything.

He would do it all over again.

Thanks for reading if you got this far 💕 Would love to know what you think!

[elliespuns]

Many people talk about Ellie, Dina and Tommy's trip from Seattle to Jackson but what about THE TRIP to Jackson RIGHT AFTER JOEL DIED like WHAT DID THEY DO? HOW DID THEY CARRY HIS BODY? THERE WAS A WHOLE BLIZZARD!

Also, Tommy was out when Joel died so they probably had to break the news to him once he woke up.

ALSO, them entering Jackson with Joel's body, the people's reactions...

TOO MUCH.

[actual-changeling]

Joel and Tommy have a relationship to repair, too, not just Joel and Ellie!!

Sarah's death tore them apart just as much as it brought them closer together, and the estrangement that happened as a consequence of their darker days isn't something you can fix with one hug and a talk. There's grudges and regrets, bad shared memories and nightmares only one of them has because of the other, concerns and worries, resentment and so, so much love they want to put into each other again.

Past trauma will come up both slowly and all at once, and while Tommy is probably a lot more well-adjusted already, he is still struggling and they both need to learn how to properly talk about it.

They both blame themselves for Sarah's death, Tommy is 100% traumatized by Joel's suicide attempt(s), the shit they did haunts them, they lost their trust in each other.

Joel came looking for him out of obligation and love, and Tommy was FINE the entire time. He lost Tess for nothing. Fully realizing that will fucking sting, and, honestly, Joel deserves to get one punch in for that and that alone.

Sibling relationships are complex and complicated and rocky but also one of the strongest bonds you can have if you do it right, and I fully believe they will come out the other side even closer than they were before. People just need to start paying attention to it! It's such a good, interesting relationship to write about! Do it!

(I already am, more Tommy fics incoming)

[the-djarin-clan]

Miller Family!

[tightjeansjavi]

The Rite of Movement | part two

“first impressions”

part one | honeymoonin’

A/N: well, well, well, fancy that we’re all meeting up here, huh? 🥵 first, I just wanted to give a big thank you to @itsokbbygrl who has been feeding my brain rot all day. I appreciate you so so much and your input is extremely helpful 🥺 I do not have a lot of knowledge on the adult film industry, but I’m eager to dive into it with y’all. We all have our different preferences and tastes when it comes to porn, (if you choose to watch it) but for me personally, I’m into porn that is catered to women. And guess who else is? Joel fuckin’ Miller! I hope these impromptu drabbles give you all the warm, fuzzy, and hornknee feelings. In this household, we support sex workers 💗 we also support healthy communication during sex, safe sex, and sexual liberation for everyone. Thank u also to @strang3lov3 for the title 🤍

~word count: 5.0k~

Summary: it’s your first time meeting Joel Miller, your new adult film partner

Pairing | pornstar!joel miller x pornstar f!reader (and a sprinkle of pornstar!tommy miller. More to come in later chapters!)

Warnings: 30s reader/40s joel, general discussions of the porn industry, brief discussions of workplace trauma, mild swearing, kissing, slightly inappropriate workplace relationship, boss/employee power dynamic but it’s only lightly explored in this chapter, voyeurism, light smut, f!masturbation, reader has no physical descriptions, mentions of cigarettes and alcohol consumption, +18, minors dni! Let me know if I missed anything!

When you moved back to Austin Texas looking for a fresh start after a rather rocky experience doing unsatisfying pornos as a regular on screen talent for the mega studio, Brazzers, you never expected to rejoin the industry through a professional studio. After being fired, you settled on making solo amateur films in an attempt to pay your bills and make ends meet. The only problem was rent in LA was nowhere near affordable, and the pay was significantly less than you’d been bringing in from the studio. That’s when you made the decision to leave the state of California entirely, looking eastward towards a once-familiar home.

Your roots were in rural Texas, and although your parents ultimately disowned you for joining the adult film industry, you still had a support group of fellow transplants in Austin that had missed you terribly.

The porn industry was always evolving, but with these changes came an influx of new content. You had a decent following for a small time account, but without the promotion budget that came with films produced at larger studios, your homemade solo films were inevitably pushed to the bottom of the pecking order, making it difficult to expand your audience. You thought about quitting entirely and getting an everyday job as a receptionist at some corporate office, until one night you stumbled upon a channel account that was based in Austin. “Miller-Co, Real people, real sex, professionally produced for your pleasure.” Surrounded by unpacked moving boxes on your single, sad, sofa, you poured yourself a tall glass of wine and clicked on the first video that appeared on the channel’s page, its male lead catching your eye immediately and you clicked the video details to find his name.

Joel Miller was big in every possible sense. From his hands, to his biceps, to his strong thighs. His cock was stunning. It wasn’t the longest cock you had ever seen, but it was deliciously thick, a girth that had you salivating immediately. Not only was it big, but the more you watched, the more you learned he sure knew how to use it. Despite Joel’s brooding nature, his attentive care to his partners on screen was something you had never seen before. He was a talker, a praiser and it seemed he only did scenes in positions where he could see his partners face while they came. The studio lighting was softer, inviting, and very, very intimate.

You clicked through more videos. Joel’s apparent brother, Tommy Miller, was also a big talker, but he reminded you more of a sweet frat boy with some serious golden retriever energy. In simple terms, Tommy liked to pound it. His style seemed more physically intense and fun, lighthearted even. He could do more sensual, intimacy based scenes, but that was more Joel’s forte, you gleaned as you continued to consume their content. Tommy’s cock had an inch or so on his brother, but his cock wasn’t as thick. What it lacked it girth it made up for with how it was curved, and you could only imagine how easy it would be for him to hit that spot inside of you that sent you keening.

The more you watched these two brothers in their element, the damper your flimsy panties grew. It had been so long since you had gotten off while watching porn that you weren’t even sure if you could have a successful orgasm from it. Boy, were you wrong.

Your clit was soon overstimulated and pulsing beneath the soft silicon of your vibrator. You tossed the toy to the side and paused the video while you caught your breath for a few minutes, coming down from your high. A sense of post-orgasmic clarity settled in your mind and something was telling you that working for this channel’s studio might end up being your calling. A wonderful, horny twist of fate. Your ticket back into the industry that had left you both emotionally and physically bruised.

You couldn’t help the gleeful giggle that slipped past your lips the further you scrolled down the channel’s main page, looking for information on Miller-Co’s parent studio, and discovered a link at the bottom: Auditions.

You scrambled to update your resumé, and threw together a portfolio of your past work and clicked on the link. You submitted your application and downed the rest of your wine before closing the screen to your laptop with a decompressing sigh.

No one could say that you didn’t try.

On the other side of town Joel Miller was just closing up the studio for the evening to meet Tommy at their usual watering hole for a drink. His phone buzzed, notifying him that he had a new email and while he walked to his truck, he opened the email.

He had been recently looking for a new film partner outside of his current talent pool. Things were going well at his and Tommy’s boutique adult film studio, they were starting to see growth, and that meant making sure there was regularly fresh content for their growing audience.

Despite receiving 100s of applicants a day from his online posting on his studio’s PornHub channel, none of them were quite what Joel was looking for..until he opened up your application. Joel got a sudden overwhelming feeling in his chest that you were exactly the type of on-screen partner he was looking for. He exited out of the email and sent a quick text to Tommy. Hey, I'm gonna be a few minutes late. Got an applicant that I think will be perfect.

After sending the text to his brother, he opened the email once more. Your resumé was brief, and a noticeable frown crossed over his face when he saw that you were ex-Brazzers. When Joel was 18 and fresh to the industry, he worked for Brazzers. Being so green, he hadn’t known what exactly to expect, so he suffered through in the name of independence and regular pay, but he had hated it, and especially hated the way it made him feel. The culture there had led him to never wanting to partake in making that type of porn again. There was no emphasis on the comfort of his female partners, little to no communication between the actors, and Joel ultimately was uncomfortable with following through with the things he was requested to do. Half the time it didn’t even feel good. And what the hell is the point of making porn if both participants aren’t having fun and feeling pleasure?

For this reason, he felt wrong viewing the content that you had made with Brazzers. Given his prior experience, he could only imagine what you had gone through, and he didn’t want to see you that way. His business was solely based around respect, consent, and comfort as a top priority.

He opted to view your solo amateur content instead. You were a natural, and he knew that he could easily make you a star, if that’s what you truly wanted. Joel knew that mixing pleasure with business, in this industry in particular, could end up messy, but he never felt so physically and emotionally attracted to another human being till now.

His fingers worked fast on the screen as he responded to the email.

Hello,

It’s after working hours for me, but I just went over your application. You’re a natural, and I would be extremely interested in meeting for an official audition. Here is the address to the studio, and my personal work number.

I am off tomorrow, but if you are interested, I can go ahead and schedule a meeting for noon?

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Joel Miller.

He receives an email response from you five minutes later just when he starts the engine of his truck.

Hello Joel,

I would absolutely be interested in coming in for an official audition tomorrow. Noon works for me as well.

See you then!

He lets out a sigh of relief at your response and despite his goal to remain professional, he can’t help the flush that rises to his cheeks at the thought of filming with you. He sends a calendar invite to your email address with the meeting time of noon tomorrow. He tosses his phone into the cup holder and finally drives to the bar.

“She’s ex-Brazzers. Moved all the way from LA just like you and me.” Joel discusses with Tommy over a beer. He takes a sip from the rim and slides his phone across the table to the opposite end of the booth where Tommy is sitting.

“And she’s only been doing solo amateur content as of late?”

“Yeah, she’s only got a few videos up, but it sounds like she’s ready to dip her toe back into the industry. She’s a natural, Tommy. Real captivatin’ on camera.”

Tommy glances down at your application and lightly taps out a bit of ash from his cigarette in the ashtray resting near his elbow. “That so? Well, guess I’m just gonna have to see for myself jus’ how captivatin’ she is.” He looked over at his brother with a knowing grin and pulled out his earbuds from his jacket pocket and slipped them in.

Joel intently observes his brother watching one of your solo films and when he sees Tommy reach down to adjust himself, he couldn’t help but grin.

Tommy’s cheeks have a bright flush to them as he hits pause on the video, taking out one of the earbuds and makes direct eye contact with his brother. “Holy fuck, she’s gorgeous. Those eyes? Brother, I feel like I was being sucked into the screen! God, and her little whimpers? The way they kept gettin’ higher and higher—” Tommy said animatedly.

Joel feels a twinge of jealousy zip up his spine like he was shocked. Tommy’s never been shy, and neither has Joel, but he’s already feeling protective over you and he hasn’t even met you yet. “Yeah, she is a thing of beauty, ain’t she? I don’t know what it is about her, but I love her energy.” Joel comments thoughtfully.

Tommy, being the horndog that he is, can't help but look back down at the screen and the part where the video has paused. Your thighs are spread wide, fingers playing with your clit, teasing yourself while making occasional direct eye contact with the camera. “And god, that pussy? Y’ever see somethin’ so pretty? Bet she tastes like fuckin’ honey.” Tommy drawls.

“Tommy.” Joel snaps his fingers in front of his face in a quick motion. “Don’t go gettin’ too excited now. I’m the one meetin’ with her.” Joel gently reminds him.

“Well, I can see why ya like her so much already, Joel.” He winks and slides the phone back in his direction. “Don’t go gettin’ your panties in a twist. I think just based on this single video, she’s gonna be a good fit. On a serious note, I hope that Brazzers didn’t fuck her up too much.” He reaches for his beer and takes a sip.

“It’s her energy man, it’s infectious. She seems so gentle, soft, but you can tell that she knows exactly what she wants just by looking into her eyes alone.” Joel said rather dreamily.

“Y’gonna give ‘er the ole Joel Miller razzle dazzle then?” Tommy wiggled his eyebrows playfully with a chuckle.

Joel rolled his eyes and flipped him off before taking another sip of his beer. “All depends on her comfort level during our first interaction. I want her to know that she gets to call all the shots.”

Tommy tips his beer towards Joel in a mock salute. “And yet they say chivalry is dead.”

At first you wonder if Miller-Co is just another too good to be true scam and Joel had played you, providing you with the wrong address on purpose. Maybe this was a sign for you to never try studio work in the adult film industry again. You were standing outside of a hardware store, triple checking the address while simultaneously looking up at the sign: Miller-Co

Joel is sitting behind his desk when he sees you teetering around outside. He checks the time on his watch—quarter to noon—and smiles. He’s a punctual person himself and always had this philosophy of showing up earlier than planned out of respect for everyone’s valuable time.

He gets up from his desk and walks towards the door just as you’re turning on your heel to walk away.

The door swings open behind you with a sweet chime, and then you hear the raspy timbre of his voice, his smooth southern accent that already has you feeling weak in the knees.

“Are you my 12 o’clock?” He grins a boyish grin that oozes a level of natural confidence and charm that men dream of possessing.

“Oh.” You laugh and fiddle with the strap on your purse. “I totally thought I had the wrong place for a second there.”

“Sorry ‘bout the confusion, darlin.’ Folks ‘round these parts can be…sensitive to what we’re doing here. Gotta be sure they ain’t have a clue what they’re walkin’ by, be discreet, y’know?” He holds the door open with his shoulder effortlessly, and you get a good look at his handsome features. Joel Miller is tall, well-groomed, and there’s something immediately comforting about him. You can’t quite put your finger on what that thing is, but it might have to do with the selfless energy that radiates from the depths of his soft, espresso colored eyes. Or maybe it’s the endearing heart-shaped patches in his gray speckled beard.

“Oh, thank god!” You laugh again, hoping he didn’t notice your staring, and he chuckles. Something flickers in your eyes that Joel registers as unabashed curiosity. He clocks the slight hitch of your breath, your pupils dilating.

“I take it you’re probably used to dingy warehouses, unkempt garages, and the occasional sketchy office building?” Joel quips. He slips one of his hands into the faded pocket of his denim jeans.

“Yeah, how did you know?” You retort with false sarcasm and a small smile.

He shrugs his shoulders. “Lucky guess?”

“Well, you didn’t not hit the nail on the head, Mr. Miller.”

You swear you see him blush, the tops of his cheeks turning a flushed pink color. “Oh, please, call me Joel, darlin’. Mr. Miller makes me feel so..old.” He laughs and subtly gestures to the open door. “And hope ya don’t mind me sayin’ this, but ain’t you jus’ the sweetest n’ prettiest thing I’ve ever had the pleasure of layin’ my eyes on.” He winks. “Shall we?”

“Oh, please, you aren’t old at all, Joel,” you brush away his self deprecation as his compliment leaves you feeling flustered, the heat beginning to rise to your cheeks. “So, your videos weren’t lying then? You really are a sweet talker?” You flirt back.

“Some days I feel like I am, got a bad back and ‘a that. And, oh, I am quite the sweet talker, darlin’.” He holds the door open for you as you slip past him, brushing up against the rough denim of his jeans due to his sheer mass taking up most of the entryway.

Your heart sinks to the pit of your stomach when your eyes zone in on an all-to familiar black leather couch pressed up against the side of the wall. He notices your immediate discomfort and hesitation and clears his throat alongside you. “We uh—don’t film anythin’ on that, darlin’. It’s there more as a joke than anythin’.”

He sees you visibly let out a sigh of relief as your shoulders relax. You don’t see his face, but his lips are set in a deep frown and he genuinely feels bad. “There’s no leather couches or bright, headache inducin’ lights where I film, darlin’,” he adds softly and steps around you to pull back the chair at his desk.

You’re not even sure what to think or say as he pulls the chair back and you quietly sit down and watch as he sits across from you. “Hey, before we get into talkin’ business, I’m aware that you worked for Brazzers at one point, saw it on the application you submitted, and I jus’ wanted to let you know that me sayin’ ‘lucky guess’ back there was to ease your nerves. I understand what it’s like coming from that world, could tell that you were feelin’ a bit apprehensive, and I didn’t wanna jump right on into discussing your portfolio out in the open, y’know?” He held steady eye contact with you which was something that you normally would be intimidated by, but Joel wasn’t trying to make you feel small, his concern was genuine.

“It’s just been awhile for me since working there, but I appreciate you trying to ease the tension, Joel. I swear I’m not always this jumpy,” you add softly and he smiles.

“S’alright. I understand. I jus’ wanna start off by sayin’ that I want you to be comfortable, darlin’. That’s our first priority. We can film in the studio if you want. Now, personally, I never film here. All feels a bit too sterile for me; got a set up at home to film there. Feels more natural, but if you would rather be here, we can make that work.” He clicks a few buttons on the desktop mouse and pulls up your application so he has it to directly reference.

“Your first priority is that you want me to be comfortable?” The question tumbles past your lips and your pupils are blown wide. In past jobs your comfort was always pushed to the very bottom. It was viewed as insignificant and something that you were told you’d just have to suck up and get over. There was always a limited budget, which meant limited time, which meant little care given to anything other than hard and fast, turn and burn shoot days. And the studio executives cared about little except increasing profits year over year, so time and time again, you’d endured a lack of connection with your scene partners and set crew alike, never more than a quick direction thrown your way. No, comfortable was a far cry from what you were used to.

He’s not taken aback by your response at all. It’s something that he’s all-too familiar with, unfortunately. “Of course, darlin’. That’s the key to makin’ good porn, ain’t it? Both parties gotta be comfortable, otherwise the audience won’t feel connected to what they’re viewin’. All sex sells, but intimacy sells more.”

“I’m just not used to this kind of treatment, Joel. I honestly didn’t even believe that it existed in the adult film industry. The whole notion of comfort above all is just…new for me.”

“I know it is, darlin’,” Joel takes a breath before continuing, “I’m ex-Brazzers, too. Started there when I was 18, and left on my 30th birthday.” This was a piece of Joel’s past that was especially private, it came with baggage he still wasn’t entirely ready to unpack, and yet sharing this with you felt comforting for him.

“Oh my god, did they fire you too?” You lean forward in your chair feeling shocked that someone else in the industry shared the same awful experience as you did.

Joel’s heart shatters when he learns that you were fired. It makes him angry for you and the other women in the industry that were often released from their contracts for frivolous reasons. How could they let someone like you go? You have all the potential in the world with real, raw, talent, and on top of that, you were an absolute knockout. Those motherfuckers had a goldmine with you, and yet they couldn’t see what Joel sees.

“No, darlin’,” he frowns, “they didn’t. My brother and I made the decision to quit on our own. We stayed in LA for awhile with some old costars and made some amateur films before we moved back home to Austin, and started our own studio. I’ve strived to make porn that is catered to women. It’s a market that’s been largely untapped, and I’m lookin’ to shift the industry by showing how profitable it is,” he explains honestly. “And folks deserve to see real sex full of connection and intimacy and even sometimes some bloopers,” he chuckles. “It’s something that I’m incredibly passionate about, and that’s why it’s my utmost priority to make sure that you are respected and feel comfortable.”

You shrink in on yourself when the wave of sudden emotions hit and you don’t even realize your crying till Joel is getting up in a haste with a few tissues in his hand. His eyes are laced with concern as he crouches in front of you. “Hey, I’m sorry, darlin’. Didn’t mean t’make ya cry. I jus’—know how harmful the industry can be, and ‘m tryin’ to build a safe space within it.”

Fat tears begin to roll down your cheeks as you try to laugh through the tears. You feel pathetic for breaking down in front of this man who you have only just met. He must think you’re a lost cause in the industry if you can’t even hold yourself together for more than five minutes. You sniffle as he gently brings the tissue upwards towards your face and gently brushes away your tears. “I’m sorry, Joel. I don’t mean to turn into this blubbering fuckin’ mess.”

“Hey, ain’t nothin’ to be sorry for, darlin’,” he coos. “Maybe we wanna get outta here for some fresh air? If you’d like? Know a nice quiet coffee shop jus’ down the street. How do you feel about that?”

You look at him through wet lashes and parted lips when you slowly nod. “Uh—yeah. That would..be great. I’m just not exactly comfortable in this environment,” you murmur.

“I understand. No hard feelin’s taken or anythin’. Would you like some help gettin’ up?” He offers you his freehand.

“You’re not..upset?” You question softly and grasp his hand in your palm as he gently helps you up from the chair. His palm is warm against yours and massive in size.

“Upset? No, not at all. I meant it when I said that your comfort is a priority, darlin.’” He affirms.

After you’ve composed yourself a bit, you let Joel lead the way to the quiet coffee shop down the street. He holds the door open for you and lets you pick a secluded table in the back. When you offer to pay for the coffees, he interjects with a small grin and shakes his head. “S’on me, darlin’. G’on now and make yourself comfy,” he nudges you gently towards the table.

It’s a depressing thought to have, but you think about how no man has ever treated you with the kindness and respect that Joel Miller has thus far. It’s the bare minimum, but you appreciate him for it deeply.

He returns with two lattes and places them on the table before taking a seat across from you. “Y’jus’ let me know when and if you wanna continue the conversation, alright? There’s no rush. I ain’t got anywhere else to be.”

You grasp the mug between your palms and let the warm steam wafting from the mug kiss your skin as you look over at him. “Well, I figured it would be okay with me to share with you a list of things I’m not comfortable with?” You lean over the side of the chair and reach into your purse to pull out a folded up piece of paper that you drafted up after submitting the application last night.

He nods and takes a sip of his latte. “Of course that’s okay for you to do. I’ve got a form for you to sign back at the studio that includes a section disclosing your limitations and your personal comforts. We like to keep it on file so we can prepare everyone before shoot day, that way there ain’t any accidental crossed boundaries.” He reaches across the table and gently takes the paper from you.

Despite everything Joel has told you thus far, you’re afraid that he’ll end up being judgemental based on your list. It’s pretty much everything that mainstream porn runs on: bondage, punishment, gang bangs, overstimulation, and anal to name a few. You’re already thinking of getting up from the table, and protecting what’s left of your ego when he sets the paper down, reaches for your hand, gently picks it up and kisses the back of it while looking into your eyes. “This is it? We can absolutely work with this, darlin’. Don’t you worry none,” he reassures you.

His lips against your skin are like two plush pillows. Soft, silky and it’s hard to not imagine what those lips would feel like pressed against either of your own. You expected shame, and instead were greeted with the complete opposite. He validated you, and that alone was making your head spin like a ferris wheel.

“I know you ain’t have any pleasant experiences in the industry, and that’s a damn shame. But I can promise you that you won’t have to worry about none of that with me. Okay, darlin’? Sweet girl, I’m gonna be honest with ya because that’s jus’ the kind of man I am. Y’got some serious talent that I think has been severely overlooked. I can make you into a real star if that’s what you want. I’m simply jus’ actin’ as a guideway for ya. And between you and me? I love my job, and I hope that maybe I’ll be able to turn those bad experiences you had into somethin’ good.”

Your eyes focus on his lips and their movement with each word that flows past them. Neither of you realize how close you’re leaning over the table till you can practically taste the hazelnut latte lingering on his tongue.

“Joel, I swear I heard every word you just said, and please tell me if I’m being unprofessional given the circumstances, but I really want to kiss you right now,” you breathe.

His brow raises and a dimple pokes through his cheek as a grin tugs across the corner of his lips. He chuckles softly, “Well, lucky for you, it’s totally appropriate given the circumstances. Jus’ one of the many perks of bein’ in this industry, darlin’. Unbridled desire is personally one of my favorite things.” He leans in closer, his tone dropping down to an octave that made you tingle with desire, and admits quietly, just for you, “If we weren’t here in this coffee shop right now, I’d show you just how unbridled my desire can be.”

You gripped the edge of the table for dear life. It took everything in you to not rip that man’s clothes off right then and there. That part of you that had laid so dormant was crackling to life again, and he could see those emotions swirling in your eyes. “Maybe we should get those papers signed so that you can show me if you’re really just all talk?” Your brow quirked upwards, mouth lifting into a flirtatious smirk just as his nose brushed against your own.

“Think you’ve seen enough to me to know that I ain’t bluffin’, darlin’.” His hot breath fans your lips as you reach across the table and rest a hand on his shoulder, the other steadying your balance on the table. Joel lifts his hand to your face and gently guides you by your chin. His lips brush yours, testing the waters while your tongue swipes confidently at his lower lip. He surges forward, hand moving from your chin to cup your face where your jaw meets your neck and deepens the kiss. You unconsciously let a soft moan loose, lost in the feeling, and Joel feels his cock come to life at the sound. It’s a good thing the barista behind the counter is too busy watching a YouTube video to see you and Joel practically gorging on each other's faces.

You can feel him smiling against your mouth before he leaves you with a final press of his lips and pulls back, sitting back in his chair, shit-eating grin plastered on his face as he brings his thumb up to the corner of his lips and wipes away a stray strand of saliva. “Think I’m gonna get a little somethin’ to eat. Y’want anythin’?” He rasps and reaches for his wallet in his pocket.

“Yeah.” You grin and rest your chin in your palms. “Something..sweet.”

A flush rises to his cheeks as he stands up from the chair and discreetly adjusts himself in his jeans and you giggle at the sight. You’d think it was his first rodeo by how quickly he had grown hard from just kissing you. Then again, Joel did say that he loved his job. And if he treated the less significant parts of his job like that, you were more than looking forward to seeing, feeling, him do the other parts of his job he loved, too.

You sat in that coffee shop for hours getting to know one another. It felt like no time had gone by at all, and it was obvious that you both were feeling that spark of an immediate connection blossoming. There was no denial that you and Joel were physically attracted to one another, but you had no idea what doors were now opened because of this first meeting. The chemistry was palpable, electricity ricocheting off the walls, and that unspoken language between one another was apparent.

“Hey, Joel? I think I’m ready to sign those forms now,” you spoke, wading through the building sexual tension.

“Perfect.” He grins. “Let’s go n’get ‘em signed.” He pats your thigh gently.

Once you’re back in the studio, Joel goes over every section of the documents and answers every single one of your questions with direct thoughtfulness and professionalism. You can hear your pulse beating in your ears when you sign the last page, clenching your thighs to abate the need growing between your legs.

“Now, there’s no rush to filmin’ anythin’ right away, okay? We don’t gotta dive head first if you wanna go home and process all of this, I completely understand. But, if you’re interested, I can give you my address and we can—”

“How about you drive me to your place instead?” You coyly interjected with a grin.

banners made by the lovely @saradika 🤍

I no longer have a taglist so follow @tightjeansjaviupdates for fic updates and notifications

[thesimulationswarm]

Double Shot | Series Masterlist

pre-outbreak Joel x reader x Tommy

Finally making a masterlist for this smut!

pairing: pre-outbreak Joel x reader x Tommy rating: explicit, 18+ minors dni series summary: A gorgeous man walks into your coffee shop and introduces himself as Tommy Miller. Then his equally gorgeous brother shows up. You can’t decide which you like better… but maybe you don’t have to. series warnings/tags: no use of y/n, female afab reader, sibling rivalry, threesome, fingering (f), oral sex (m), unprotected PIV, facial, mild bukake, size kink, soft dom! Joel, a lil bit of aftercare, pwp series length: 7.6k

One Two Three Four

[mdawgswizzleinthehizzle]

gabriel congragulating pedro as “big brother” makes me emotional 😭🥲

[kkcauseway]

Life

Pairing: Joel Miller x f!reader Summary: Just a little fic, no outbreak, Sarah doesn’t die, nor does she have a deadbeat, stupid ass mom. Cus that girl deserves so much more. Plus you get to live out the fantasy of having babies with Joel what's more to like <3 Not much smut, but its just a cute ass story. With a happy ending. Characters: Joel Miller, Sarah Miller, Ellie Williams, Tommy Miller, Maria Miller & You Content & warnings: Depictions of childbirth, family fluff, protective!Joel, Joel being the best Dad, no use of Y/N.

Read from Joel's POV I Main Masterlist

You wake with a gasp, clasping at your lower stomach, breathing heavily. You’ve been having pains on and off the past few hours before bed, but you and Joel, both put it off as Braxton-hicks, as they were really irregular. But when you try to sit up and you feel the pain travelling from front to back, it's different, you know what it means. You’ve actually been labouring all evening. It’s the middle of the night, the house dark and silent, Joel’s splayed out next to you on his stomach, his arm over your legs, but you know it’s time. Three days from your due date, there's no denying it. You know the signs and having already had Sarah, you can tell your body is ready.

The pain doesn’t last long, but it’s definitely worse than any of the others you’ve been having over the course of the day. It’s time.

Carefully you remove Joel’s arm from your legs. He stirs slightly, but not enough to wake. You bring your legs over the side of the bed, giving yourself a second, before quietly getting up. A bath is the best thing right now, a way to relax you in the beginning of labour, and there’s no need to wake Joel any earlier than necessary. He’s a worrier, and you don’t want to put him through that.

You quietly walk into the bathroom and begin running the bath. Leaning against the sink as you wait for it to fill. But before you can say or do anything, another contraction takes over you. You begin to sway your hips in an effort to help you through the pain and take deep breaths. Trying your best to remain quiet, breathing softly through it. Once it’s over you finish preparing the bath, adding in some lavender bath salts to calm you. You step in, the lifting of your leg causing a twinge in your back that makes you wince. You then settle yourself down slowly, letting out a soft moan as your stomach hits the water. It’s the best you’ve felt in a while.

About an hour passes, you’ve managed to get through the few contractions you’ve had quite well, the water really helping. You sit and think. Appreciate the life you have, the people you’re surrounded by you take a moment to think back to little ten-year-old you, who dreamt of this every day and didn’t think it was possible. We made it! And we are so happy! It brings tears to your eyes. You feel so complete, so full of love for your family, you could burst. A family of three will soon become four, that thought lingers as you breathe silently through a pain, it makes it all worth it.

You wish you could stay in that moment forever, but your fingers now look more like prunes than fingers and the water has begun going cold. Looking across the room, you can see Joel has left a fluffy towel there for you. Remembering you had told him before you went to sleep, that you were going to have a bath in the morning if you still felt the same. God that man is amazing! He really does think of everything!

As you begin to lift yourself up to get out, another contraction comes over you, much stronger than the ones you’d had previously, and it really hurt. Crippling almost. Realising you’re going to need Joel’s help you have no choice but to call for him.

“Oh Shit. Joel!” you shout.

“Joeeel!” you shout again sounding much more defeated this time, but still in agony.

“I’m coming baby!” he shouts half asleep.

The bathroom door swins open, and a naked Joel finds you on your knees in the water, gripping the side of the bath, gritting your teeth as you scream your way through the contraction.

“It’s okay shhhh, Baby breathe” Joel strokes your lower back, you can hear the worry in his voice.

When you manage to catch your breath back “Fuck Joel, that one hurt”. You say lowering yourself back onto your heels in the tub. Joel moves with you coming to squat besides the bath as he faces you.

“It’s okay, you’re doing amazing Baby” he kisses your forehead, “is it time?”.  He says rubbing your arms as he looks into your eyes.

“I- Yeah, I’m pretty sure it is”. You whine as a tear runs down your cheek.

“Oh Baby, why didn’t you wake me earlier?” he wipes the tears from your eyes before holding his hands on your cheeks.

“I’ve been okay, I didn’t wana worry you any earlier than I needed to. And this is exactly what I was afraid of, and it happened anyway. I’m sorry.”

“Baby, you should’ve woke me earlier and don’t you dare say sorry, you aint got nothing to be sorry for.”

“Honestly Joel, I promise you I’ve been okay. Was no point us both been awake when there was nothing we could do, but I’m gonna need your help now with getting out please. I swear you make big babies Miller and right now, they’re pushing right down.” You half laugh.

“I got you Darlin, come on” Joel stands before helping you out of the bath, grabbing the towel to wrap you up in and bringing you into his arms. Holding you tight. You stay like that in a comfortable silence for a moment. Snuggling into Joel’s chest.

“Y’know I knew second babies were faster, but this seems super-fast.” It’s muffled as you say it into his chest. He hums in response. You look up at him then “Can we go back into the bedroom? I wanna go sit on the bed; my back’s killing”.

He kisses the top of your head then “Course baby, come on let’s get you comfy.”

Joel walks you into the bedroom and helps you sit on the bed. He helps you to dry off and put on an oversized lounge set, he then gets up, grabs some fluffy socks out of the drawer and puts them on your feet; knowing how cold your toes get. Finally decent, you move to sit against the headboard, propped up against the pillows, resting your hand on your stomach whilst you stare at Joel. “Thank you for always being so good to me Cowboy”. You smile.

He looks at you so full of admiration and love you think he might burst, and he takes your free hand in between his; “Baby I love you so much, and the fact that I have this amazing life and I share it with you, and you’ve given me Sarah, now this baby too, I am so so grateful to you, I’ll do anything and everything for you, always.” He kisses your hand, and when he’s sure you’re comfortable (well as comfortable as you can be all things considered) he goes and grabs some clothes for himself. You struggle through another pain whilst he’s preoccupied this one bearable alone. You think just knowing Joel is near helps. His presence alone enough to calm you through the pain. The pains are getting stronger and closer together, which you know means you’re progressing as you should be, but it’s definitely progressing faster than it did with Sarah.

When Joel is dressed, you can tell he’s petrified, even if he’s trying to act like he isn’t. You know it’s hard for him especially considering he strives through life making sure you’re happy and healthy, you know this is the only situation ever, that he’s felt helpless in, and it scares him that he’s going to witness it again. He’s pacing back and forth, and so, settles on checking all the bags are packed ready to go by the door, then he finally calls Tommy.

‘Tommy, hey bud sorry it’s late, we need you to come over’-

-‘yeah, it’s time’-

He laughs

-‘Okay perfect I’ll let her know, see you soon, thanks Tommy.’

He puts his phone back in his pocket before making his way back over to you on the bed, sitting at you side. “He says they’ll be twenty minutes max, should’ve heard the squeal Maria let out.”

“Anyone would think it’s her baby! But amazing thank you” you take a deep breath, before hitting your knees with your palms “right shall we go wake up our girl, let her know her sibling wants to say hello?” You giggle at the thought; wow Sarah is going to be a big sister.

“You know what; I still can’t get over that we are doing this again” he smiles, then walks up to you and bends down to kiss your forehead “I love you Baby”.

“I love you so much” you say before kissing his lips and then go to get up, Joel is there to help you. He really is the best husband you could ask for.

You walk or rather waddle across the hall to Sarah’s door, with your husband at your side. A hand rests softly on your lower back. He only leaves you then, in order to knock, before slowly pushing it open. Sarah is fast asleep, her nightlight highlighting her gorgeous features. She really is the most beautiful girl you’ve ever seen, and no you aren’t just biased in that opinion because she’s your daughter. It’s 100% true. She begins to rouse as Joel steps a foot into the room. “Daddy?” she mumbles sleepily. Just as you go to enter, another contraction washes over you, so you hang back against the outside wall, riding it out, nodding for Joel to continue in. You bite your arm to remain silent. You don’t want to scare Sarah.

“Hey Baby Girl!” it’s an excited whisper.

Sarah looks to the window and notices it’s still dark. Rubbing her eyes, she looks back to her dad. “Daddy, it’s not morning.”

“No Baby, I know, listen, me and Mama have something to tell you.” He replies as he takes a seat on her bed.

She yawns as she sits up straighter in her bed, intrigued.

“Where is Mama, was she shouting?” the concern evident in her voice.

He strokes her head “She will be in, in a minute Baby. Now listen your new little brother or sister wants to say hello, so we need to go to the hospital, Uncle Tommy and Aunt Maria are on the way to come and stay with you, while me and Mama are gone okay.”

“The baby’s coming?”

“Yeah Babygirl, the baby’s coming”

“Yay, okay!” it’s an excited squeal, one that reiterates the adoration and love she has for her unborn sibling already.

With the pain gone and the sweat mopped up, so you look somewhere close to ‘half decent’, you walk into Sarah’s room.

“Mama!” she bounces in her place on the bed.

“Hi my pretty girl!”

“You okay?” Joel quickly interrupts as he turns to look at you.

“Fine, honestly” you smile.

He nods in response.

“Can you come and sit with me Mama?” Sarah taps the place on her bed next to her as she shuffles over slightly.

“Of course, Baby”

You slowly sink yourself down onto the spot free next to her on the bed, with a groan. Joel moves to be sat near to her feet, so you have space to stretch out. You place an arm around Sarah and the other on your stomach.

“So, the baby is coming tonight, Mama?” she asks as she cuddles into you.

You rub her arm as “Maybe tonight, or maybe tomorrow.”

You sit in silence for a moment then. Cuddling Sarah soaking up her love; the last few moments of it being only the three of you.

Then Joel adds in as he taps her foot “Hey Sarah, last time to put your bet in, what’s it going to be a boy or a girl?”

“It’s a sister I know it, she told me” certainty on her tongue.

“Oh yeah, and when did ‘she’ apparently tell you this?” you reply with a giggle.

“When me and her were talking one day, you know we like to talk” she says it like she can’t believe you’re asking, that you’re stupid for not knowing exactly how she knows.

“Well, we will soon see, me and Daddy think it’s a boy” you boop her nose as you laugh.

“But I don’t want a - Oh- Mama? Are you okay?”

As Sarah begins to reply to you, another pain washes over your body, causing you to yelp slightly, but you try your best to hide the pain. As to not scare Sarah. You squeeze your eyes shut as you breathe your way through it.

“Mama’s okay Baby” Joel reassures as he strokes a hand up and down your leg “this is just your baby brother or sister trying to get out”. He then adds “Breathe Mama”.

“Oh” Sarah moves slightly in your arms, so she can rub some hair out of your face and behind your ear. Kissing your check once she has done it. Sarah copies what Joel says “breathe Mama”

Once the pain has subsided you squeeze Sarah as hard as you can, “Thank you so much for helping me through that pain, that kiss was very nice” you kiss the top of her head. Sarah then moves a hand to your belly and wriggles out of your arms, so she can move to bring her mouth to your belly. She lifts up your top to expose your belly and whispers against the skin; “don’t hurt Mama please baby sister” she kisses your tummy and adds “I can’t wait to meet you.” She really is the most beautiful six-year-old ever, the most considerate little girl.

You sit there embracing and soaking in every last second as the three musketeers, life is never going to be the same again after this. So you really do soak up every last second. Eventually there is a distant knock drawing all three of your attention’s. Joel is quick to stand up and is out of the room in the same breath.

You turn to Sarah again; “Come give me a big big hug, I’m gonna miss you soooo much.”

“I’m going to miss you too Mama, will you be gone long?” she mumbles into your chest as she hugs you tight.

“We shouldn’t be Baby; I think we will be home by tomorrow night at the very latest, but I will call you so that you know okay?”

“Okay, Mama, oh and you know something?”

“What’s that Baby?” you stroke her hair.

“I am so happy you’re my Mama, and I’m so happy you’re baby sisters Mama too, we have the best one in the whole world” the sentimental thoughts this little girl has melt you. You’re amazed that she knows exactly what to say, and when to say it. She makes every situation good or bad 10x better.

“Oh, thank you Baby, I really love you so much. You know that?” you can’t help the tears that begin to fall down your cheeks then. You sniffle, which gains Sarah’s attention, and she looks up at you.

“Oh, I’m sorry Mama, I didn’t mean to make you sad” she reaches a hand to wipe the tears from your cheeks.

“You didn’t make me sad Baby, I promise, these are happy tears, you made me really happy”. You kiss her forehead.

The bedroom door opens again, and Joel, Tommy and Maria all walk into the room. Both you and Sarah look towards them.

“Hey stinker!” Tommy shouts

“Hey Uncle Tommy, hi Maria!”

Joel notices that you’re crying and is straight to your side “You, okay?” he then reaches to Sarah’s bedside table to get you a tissue.

You take it from him with thanks “I’m fine, I promise, Sarah was being Sarah, and now I’m crying. You know how it goes”. You laugh wetly as you dab under your eyes with the tissue.

“Oh, I do.” He turns to Sarah, stroking her cheek “You’re the best aren’t you Babygirl”. She giggles in response.

He then looks back to you “Right Baby, you ready to go?”

“Yeah” you smile and take a deep breath. “Let’s go have a baby!”

Joel holds out both his hands to you and he helps you to swing your legs back over the side of the bed. He then helps to pull you up with a groan. You take a second to catch your bearings, now you are back on your feet. Joel helps to walk you slightly to the middle of the room, so Tommy and Maria are able to position themselves on the bed by Sarah. You watch as Maria takes your position, she cuddles up to Sarah and strokes her head. You’re so happy she’s in good hands whilst you’re gone. Tommy and Maria have always been so good to Sarah.

Still holding one of Joels hands; “right Sarah, you have to be really good for Tommy and Maria okay Baby- you need to make sure- ugh” you say as you place your freehand under your bump feeling a pain beginning, Joel grabs hold of you tight then- “make sure to listen to-f-fuck!” you grip onto Joel’s arm like it’s a lifeline and move back to face him. Joel shushes you and offers you his other arm too, so you can hold onto him properly and sway. You push your forehead into his shoulder. You can’t help but be vocal this time, in too much pain to be able to control the moans that come out of your mouth. “You got this baby” Joel whispers into your hair. As the pain begins to subside you can just about hear as Tommy tells Sarah you didn’t mean the ‘no no’ word you said. Sarah just laughs in response.

When the pain is completely gone, you look Joel in the eye, he can see you’re already beginning to feel deflated. Yet he also has a cheeky half smile on his face, and you remember what you had just said. You stand up tall again and turn back to look at Sarah. “Mama is sorry for saying that Baby, I didn’t mean it, be good for Tommy and Maria, listen to what they say okay? I love you.”

“Love you too Mama!” she blows you a kiss and you pretend to catch it and placing it on your heart, before blowing her one back.

As you begin to walk out of her bedroom Joel turns to look back at the three of them; “Tommy, I’ll be in touch, thank you for having her. See you soon Babygirl, be good, love you”!

“Love you too Daddy, make sure to look after Mama”.

“I will, I promise!”

Tommy and Maria both shout good luck and you make your way downstairs, grabbing the hospital bags that you left by the door, and then you’re on your way.

🩷🩵🩷

You’ve been at the hospital about an hour when your midwife comes into the room.

“Hi, I’m Sally your midwife, how are we both doing?”

“Good thanks, but definitely progressing much faster than I expected.”

“Well, there’s never really been a time scale for these thing, your baby must just be super eager to make an appearance! Are you okay if I check you, just to see how far along you are?”

You nod, but are sidetracked by a very painful wave, overtaking your body once more. You sit up taller in the bed, breathing and moaning your way through the pain. Joel is rubbing your lower back, ‘counterpressure’ her remembers the midwife at Sarah’s birth called it, it doesn’t really do much, but you enjoy feeling his presence and care. Once the pain ends, Joel helps you to shift in the bed, so you’re able to get into a suitable position for the examination; offering his hand. You take it gratefully and part your legs so the midwife can get to work.

“Okay, six centimetres, coming right along, well done! Won’t be too much longer now hopefully” she snaps her gloves off.

“Oh, thank goodness” you groan.

“Now am I right in thinking it’s in your birth plan to have a water birth, if we have a room with a pool free? Is that still what you want?”

“I would Love that! I really regret not having a water birth with Sarah.”

“Okay, no problem, I’ll get onto the case and find out if we have a room, I’ll be back with the verdict asap, in the meantime, I’ll be right outside if you need me, okay? That red button to your right, press it if you need me, I’ll come running, literally! Especially if your water breaks okay, shout me!”

“Will do, thank you nurse.” Joel responds.

With the door shut and the midwife out of the room you turn to Joel.

“She’s nice” you smile.

“Yeah, I like her” Joel agrees.

“Hey not too much longer Baby and we will be a family of four, how crazy is that!” you add excitedly.

“I can’t wait. Do you think Sarah is right about it being another girl?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. I know she really wants a sister, so I would love to give her one. But either way she will be the best big sister, I know that much.”

“Oh, she most definitely will, I have to agree with you there Darlin’.”

Joel moves his hand out of the grasp of yours and begins to caress your belly. Making gentle work of it, as he knows just about any pressure on it right now is painful. You let out a pleasurable moan in response. His palms tickling your belly in a really relaxing way. His baby kicking in response every so often.

“God, I really hope I can have a water birth.”

“I’m praying for you Baby”. He says as he leans down to kiss your stomach.

🩷🩵🩷

Two hours later, again, your breathing begins to speed up as another pain takes over you whilst you lie on your side in the hospital bed. You grab onto Joel’s arm as you moan with the pain. You lean into him, curling your body tight. He uses the arm you don’t have a hold of, to rub up and down your back.

“You got this Baby, I’m so proud of you”.

“Ugh, it really hurts” your voice breaks and you can’t help the tears that begin to fall “I can’t do it anymore”.

“You can Baby, you can. You’ve got this, you’ve done it all before with Sarah. Just think of how amazing life is now because you brought her safely into the world. You did that! Endured all that pain to bring her into the world, and now you’re going to do the same again with this baby. We are all so lucky to have you. You’re so strong.” He kisses your forehead as the pain begins to subside.

With the pain gone, you have the ability to sit up straighter. Joel moves out of your way so you’re able to sort yourself out, however you wish to. Rather than sitting against the pillows, you bring your legs over the side of the bed, so you can sit directly facing Joel. You hold your hands out on either side of the bed to help you stabilise. Joel then kneels in front of you, so you put your arms around his neck, in an effort to hold him closer. He’s your safe space. You pull each other into an embrace, and you rest your head on his shoulder as you cry.

“Shhh Baby, you’re okay, you got this”.

You don’t say anything, you just continue to hug him as you shake and cry. Joel brushes his hands up and down your back. “Hey Baby, look at me”. It’s a whisper into the quiet room after a few minutes of silence. You don’t move, just shake your head no into his shoulder. “Baby” he pulls away a little. “Please, look at me” this time it’s much sterner, but still drowned in concern.

You slowly lift your head up; your hair falls in front of your face as you do so. Your face red and shiny with tears. You looks exhausted and defeated. Joel brushes your hair behind your ears and smiles at you. He then wipes your wet cheeks to free them of your tears. “Hi” he smiles “see you’re so strong. So much stronger than I could ever be. I promise you, you’ve got this”.

“I don’t” you whimper.

“Baby” he laughs “you do! Look at you, you’re literally doing it as we speak!”

“I don’t feel strong” it comes out like a moody grunt.

“But you are, come on take a deep breath. It’s all going to be worth it”.

You take a deep breath in before exhaling, keeping eye contact with Joel as you do. You bring a hand to your lower back with a wince.

“Can you help me up please? I wana walk for a little?”

“Course Baby, whatever you need”.

Joel takes hold of both of your hands and pulls as you begin to lift yourself off the hospital bed. You then proceed to pace; breathing deeply as you rub your belly.

“You up for some music? We can dance for a bit, will that help?”. Joel asks enthusiastically.

It stops you in your tracks “Aww Joel, you cutie you still wana dance with me? Even when I look like this?” you gesture to your hospital gown.

“I always wana dance with you Darlin’.”

Joel grabs his phone and puts on a random playlist of slower songs. He takes you into his arms and cuddles you close swaying with you in his arms. Stopping with each contraction that hits you, rubbing your lower back. He kisses the top of your head every so often. Mumbling into your hair how much he loves you. You continue to do this for a while, seemingly more relaxed until “Shit, wait Joel stop, I feel weird”.

He immediately stops swaying with you but continues to hold you “what do you mean?”

“I- I, it feels weird down there, I don’t know” you grab the underneath of your stomach.

“What can I do?”

You begin to stand straighter in his arms“I- I just need to move, just need t-“

You’re interrupted by a gush of water, falling from between your legs. Soaking your bare feet, and Joels boots.

“Oh shit, well that’s what that was” you laugh, but then keel over with another pain. Placing your palms onto the hospital bed as you sway and moan.

Joel pushes the red button, then is right back at your side helping you through it. The nurse is in the room within a couple of seconds.

“Hey, I was just on my way back to you guys, what’s going on?”

Joel, noticing you’re still getting over your pain, responds on behalf of you “her waters went”.

“Oh goodie! Progressing as we should and to top it off, we have a room free. We will take you there when you’re ready Sweetie” she rubs your shoulder in concern.

“Oh, thank God, I would’ve cried even more if I couldn’t have a water birth”.

🩷🩵🩷

Once settled into the new room Joel helps you to strip completely, then helps you to put on a bikini top. The midwife is filling up the tub and Joel helps you in once its ready. You’re straight on the gas and air.

After an hour of contracting in the water, you’re sat against the tub, a flannel over your forehead and Joel is rubbing your shoulders. You’re focusing on breathing calmly between contractions, but the next pain that hits you is excruciating. There’s something much more primal about this scream. Despite the pains everything seems calm till the sudden urge to push overcomes your body.

You sit up taller in the bath, pulling a face as you try to move to get more comfortable, which is just impossible.

“You okay Baby?” Joel asks noticing the distress on your face.

“There’s so much pressure down there I think-  I feel like- like I need to push” you take a second to get a proper feel for what it is you’re feeling. “Yeah, I do- I need to push Joel”.

Joel quickly jumps up and presses the red button and it takes all of ten seconds for Sally to return.

“How we doing?” she asks genuinely, but it’s obvious she knows the answer she’s about to get.

“I need to push” you say before a pain takes over you that has you almost screaming in pain. You turn in the tub to face Joel and put your arms over his shoulders. He hugs you close.

“You’re okay Baby, you’re doing so good.”

“Okay, when this pain is over, I’m going to check you, whatever you do, do not push, okay?” Sally says in a rushed tone.

You nod into Joel’s shoulder in response. And it takes ever fibre of your being not to push. You don’t move whilst she examines you, continuing to cuddle into Joel as you try to suppress the urge to push.

“Okay it’s go time angel, baby’s head is right there I can see it.”

“Oh, thank God” it comes out like a cry.

“You hear that Baby you can push” Joel utters to you so softly, it’s almost a whisper.

“You can start pushing as soon as you’re ready angel, how do you want to do this? You happy in the position you’re in or do you want to move?”

“No, I want to stay like this” you’re determined but exhausted.

“That’s absolutely fine. Now on the next contraction, I want you to push with everything you’ve got, okay, I’m going to count to ten and I need you to push that whole ten seconds, okay? You’re no quitter, so I don’t want any giving up.”

“Yeah, okay” it’s about all you can manage response wise.

It doesn’t take long till the next contraction happens, they’re basically on top of each other by this point.

You bare down as you grip onto Joel, and you give it all you’ve got. “Good!” the midwife shouts. “Keep going that’s it, 8, 9, 10.”

You stop pushing with a gasp.

“You did so good Baby” Joel whispers in your ear.

“Ready to go again?” the midwife asks, and you nod before baring down for another ten. It takes a few more pushes before the head is completely out and you’re nothing but glad that the ring of fire is long gone.

“Okay good the head is out! Well done! Take some deep breaths for me. Just a few more pushes and your beautiful baby will be here!”

“The heads out?” it’s almost a cry.

“Yes, it’s out!”.

“Can I feel?”

“Yeah, course go for it” the midwife adds. You move out of Joel’s grip slightly, bringing one of your arms back to feel the head between your legs.

“Oh, Joel, I can feel them, wow they have a lot of hair” you say as you look at him.

“Yeah? Lotta hair, just like Sarah?” Joel asks.

“Oh yeah beautiful full head of hair I can see it” the midwife adds in.

“Good, hey almost there now Baby” he replies before kissing your head as you lean back into him.

With the head finally out, you know you have to push even harder for the shoulders and you’re exhausted.

“Give us a really big push on this next contraction, okay?” Sally asks.

“I can’t” you shake your head into Joel’s shoulder.

“Baby you can, what do you mean you can’t?” Joel adds.

“I can’t do it anymore, I can’t” you cry.

“Baby, you’ve been doing so well and you’re so near the end now, hey look at me.” You lift your head from his neck to look at him. “You’re so strong you’ve got this, okay? You push, give it everything you’ve got and lets meet this baby of ours, okay?”

“Y-Yeah, okay”

“Good girl” Joel replies kissing your forehead.

The pain begins to wash over you and you push until you can’t anymore. Joel and Sally coaching you through every second of the push.

“Few more pushes and Baby is out” the midwife adds.

“Good you can do this Baby come on!” Joel shouts enthusiastically and that’s all you need to hear.

You scream as you bare down gripping onto Joel’s shoulders. It takes three more pushes to get the baby out. The midwife is there to catch and when the baby is finally free from your body you immediately sit back so you can take the baby from her. “It’s a girl!” the midwife announces as she places your screaming daughter in your arms.

“Another girl Joel” you cry at him, and he comes over to kiss you on the head before placing a hand on the back of his new daughters head.

“She’s so beautiful” Joel cries back.

“Sarah was right” you laugh, “she got the sister she always wanted”.

“Look at all of her hair!”

“She gets that from her Daddy” you laugh.

You’re crying, Joel’s crying, the baby is crying. You all just stay like that for a minute.

“Dad do you wana cut the cord?” Sally questions Joel, bringing you both out of your new baby bliss bubble.

“Y- yeah” he replies.

You move the baby to be cradled in your arms as he cuts the clamped cord. The midwife then takes the baby and gives her to a nurse to clean her off whilst you deliver the placenta.

🩷

An hour later you’re back in the hospital bed in your own comfy pj’s as your newborn daughter sleeps against your chest. She makes little purr like noises as she does. Skin to skin is your favourite thing to do with a newborn. Joel is sat at your side and rests his palm against your daughters head.

“What should we call her?” he whispers to you.

You turn your head to the side to look at him briefly. You whisper back “I think she looks like an Ellie.”

“Ellie?” he looks to her squished, pouty face then. “It’s perfect” he replies, before leaning to kiss her tiny head.

As if she hears herself being talked about, she stirs awake and lets out a little grouchy cry.

“Oh, Baby Ellie, you’re hungry again huh?” You coo at her angry scrunched face. You then move, Joel quickly grabbing her from you, so that you can undress yourself ready to feed her. Joel helps to position her at your breast, and she latches almost instantly. And you quickly settle back into the feeling of feeding a baby, it’s the best bonding feeling ever.

Joel just sits back and watches you both for a moment, before getting out his camera and taking a snap of you feeding your daughter.

“Babe, stoppp I bet I look a mess”.

“You look gorgeous Baby.”

This birth had been much less traumatic than Sarah’s and you were raring to go home. Thankfully you got the all clear to go which you were more than thankful for. You didn’t want to have to spend the whole night away from Sarah if unnecessary. Ellie was born six hours ago; she had fed easily and was going to the toilet normally. And so home time it was. Joel is getting Ellie ready in the car seat whilst you get out your phone. You’d promised to call Sarah when you were coming home and so you call Tommy’s phone to speak to her.

It only rings twice and surprisingly Sarah is the one to answer.

“Hi Mama!”

“Hey Baby, are you okay?”

“Yeah Mama, are you coming home?”

“We are coming home!”

“So, the baby is here!”

“Yes, the baby is here, and you’ll get to meet them very soon!”

“Yay I can’t wait!”

“See you soon Baby love you!”

“Love you too!”

There’s a welcome home sign on the front door, clearly made by Sarah, when you make it back home. Joel carefully helps you out of the car and then makes his way into the back to get Ellie out whose sleeping soundly. You then walk up to the front door together, Joel unlocking the door and allowing you to enter first. He enters behind you with Ellie in tow.

You walk into the living room and Sarah runs straight to you. Jumping up and down in front of you. ‘MAMA!’

“Hi beautiful girl!” you gently hug her. “You wana meet someone special?”

She nods, as she looks behind you to watch Joel walk in the door, baby carrier in tow. “Babygirl, this is Ellie, your sister” he announces excitedly.

“Sister? It’s a girl! See I told you!”

“Yeah, you were right baby, now if you go and sit nicely on the sofa, you can hold her if you want?”

“Yes, yes pleaseeee!”

Sarah runs hurriedly over to the sofa and sits nicely kicking her legs. You come to sit next to her and put an arm around her. Joel places the carrier down onto the floor and bends to carefully to unclip her to get her out. Maria and Tommy both coo from the other sofa when her tiny body is lifted out of the seat. The newborn scrunch is enough to set you off crying again and when Joel gently helps Sarah to position her arms to hold her new sister correctly, you’re a mess. Sarah’s one arm is propped against a pillow to further help her in supporting her baby sister.

“Hi Ellie, I’m your big sister. She’s so tiny wow” she strokes her cheek gently.

“She is huh? Joel adds “she’s going to get so much bigger though, one day she will be as big as you.”

“She’s so beautiful” as if on cue, Ellie opens her eyes then and looks straight up to her big sister in curiosity.

“Look Sarah she recognises her big sister; she remembers your voice from all those times you spoke to her when she was in my tummy. God, you look so big holding her baby girl” you bend her head towards you gently then to kiss her.

Joel reaches into his bag and gets his camera out once more.

“Girls look up, lets get a picture of the three of you”.

You and Sarah both look up at once, you quickly wipe the now drying tears from your face and Joel takes multiple pictures.

“Right daddy I think it’s time you got in too, don’t you?” Maria asks from behind him, he quickly passes her the camera and sits the other side of Sarah, you all smile once more at the camera, and Maria also take one of the three of you looking down at Ellie as she makes her tiny little noises.

"Okay enough you lot, think it's time Uncle Tommy had a cuddle don't you?" Tommy questions excited.

You all laugh then.

This is family, this is love, this is the life you’d spent your whole life dreaming of. And here you are finally living it, and it’s so much better than you could’ve ever, ever imagined.

Read from Joel's POV I Main Masterlist

[starry-eyes-love]

Main Masterlist

Summary | Joel Miller x F!Reader AU (no outbreak). Joel and you are married and share in the typical husband and wife dynamics. You're trying to navigate married life with two kids, and another unplanned baby on the way while still navigating the waters of a rocky marriage. These stories are sometimes cute, funny, sexy, and sometimes hard arguments, hence true Marriage Dynamics. (If you want to read these two's origin story, read the series Love Never Fails).

No longer doing tag lists, turn on notifications to see when I post new stories.

Prologue (Conception story and leading up to finding out)

Part 1: Happy Halloween

Part 2: Texting with Hubby

Part 3: Relaxin' is Hard Work

Story Chapters (Pregnancy Story)

Chapter 1 (more coming soon)

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

One Shots

Old Man | Joel feels a little self conscious that he has to admit to you, his wife, that he has erectile dysfunction, and that he’s out of his little blue pills. You, being the understanding and loving woman that you are, remind him just how sexy he is, even with his little problem and that love doesn’t come with conditions. Happens later in the storyline than series parts above.

[apolloskazoo]

Ellie: ARE YOU-

Tommy: Fucking.

Ellie: -KIDDING ME?! YOU-

Tommy: Fucking.

Ellie: IDIOT!!!

Joel: ... What was that?!

Tommy: You banned Ellie from swearing, so I’ve volunteered to help her out.

[lokischocolatefountain]

Purpose

Fandom: The Last of Us

Word count: 12.7k

Rating: PG13 for violence (Fluff, angst, hurt/comfort, hurt/no comfort, mention of sexual harassment, minor character deaths, major character death, death of a child, grief, blood and gore)

Summary: “I think if he (Joel) could do anything or be anything, he would be a dad, raising his daughter. Whether it’s Sarah or— he can’t quite get there yet to say it’s Ellie but that's what he was put on this Earth to do. That’s why he’s been wandering around a little like a zombie himself for 20 years. He’s trying to find his purpose because it was taken from him.” -Craig Mazin

A/N: I’ve been writing bits and pieces of this for moooonths! Since the last episode aired. So I really really hope you guys like it. I love all the Joel & Ellie fics out there but there’s a hole in my heart where the Joel & Sarah fics should be. So here you go, a one shot of Joel Miller and his purpose in life, how he earned it and how he lost it.

20th July 1989

What do you want to be when you grow up?

It was a question that adults asked way too many times. Way too casually. It was as though they had forgotten what it felt like to be a teenager with a whole world of possibilities, the overwhelming feeling of wanting to be everything from an astronaut to an actor. They never accepted the answer they got from the kids. At least that was Joel’s experience. They always laughed when he said he wanted to be a singer. That’s not a real job, they’d say. So, he made up something that he didn’t even want to do.

Accountant. That’s what he told people he’d become. He didn’t even know what that job entailed. He just blurted it out, possibly because his new classmate’s dad was an accountant and that was the first thing that came to his mind. And because it was a real job unlike singer.

That also didn’t quite cut it for adults. You need to be good at math for that. They were right. He was no good at it. As he sat on the hospital chair, too afraid to move or breathe, he wished he’d been better at math. Maybe that would’ve gotten him a better job than building. He’d be in an office and make enough money for this.

The baby stirred in his arms and let out a low whine and his heart almost fucking stopped. She was so little, so fucking fragile. One wrong move and she could wake up. His mother told him to put her back in the crib, so did the mother of the girl who was fast asleep on the hospital bed. His mother-in-law. But he couldn’t. He was afraid that once he put her down, she’d disappear. She would. Both their parents were in contact with some adoption people and they were going through a list of names of respectable men and women with respectable jobs and good loving homes. There were some accountants on the list. They were probably good at math and didn’t have to get yelled at everyday for buying the wrong valves and choosing the wrong brand of grout. The prospective fathers were all at least a decade older than he was.

But he couldn’t put her down.

So he stayed awake on the chair throughout the night, his back hurting just a little but his heart full.

Wanting to be a singer was just a childish fantasy. Accounting was just something he made up to look serious in the eyes of grown ups. There were other ideas too— soccer player, fireman, cop. None of them felt right.

And what was it they always said about jobs? Do something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life? He’d never loved anything. Until now. Never found a purpose. Until now.

He cradled her close to his chest, supporting her tiny soft head with his hand. Fuck, her head was so little, so soft. His large hands already marked up by construction jobs felt unworthy of touching such pureness.

Sarah.

He can’t give her away. Not after the name popped into his head. He didn’t know why, couldn’t explain it to anyone who asked. But she was Sarah.

Sarah Miller, he thought when he realized he had a purpose for the first time in his life.

They told him he can’t do it, that he shouldn’t. They told him he didn’t know the first thing about babies. The girl he got pregnant— his wife—is hurt, said he can’t go back on their promise to give the baby up for adoption so that she can go back to school to be a lawyer. She said it will ruin her life and he had to agree. It will. The innocent little thing that continued sleeping on his lap did kind of ruin her life. She had to take a break fro, school, put up with morning sickness and bloating and back pain and fucking everything because of the baby. Raising her for 18 years? That would be the nail on the coffin of her dreams.

But he wasn’t the dreaming kind.

“I ain’t askin’. I know it’s not fair to ya. You already done everythin’, but…” I can’t imagine a life without Sarah. He had known her for less than 10 hours and life already seemed meaningless without her in it. “I’ll do it myself, okay? You don’t gotta do anything. You never have to visit. I just… I can’t give her up, darlin’. I promise I won’t rope you into this. I’ll fuckin’ disappear, never call you or write to you.”

“Joel…”

His mother thought she was a cruel girl to want to leave her baby behind when he, the father, stepped up to provide. But he had no feelings of anger towards her. They made a promise to each other. He was the one who broke it, not her. He would break all his promises to everyone in his life, no matter what, just to be his little girl’s dad.

“We’re too young.”

He nodded. He knew that. He’d been an adult for a grand total of four years and most of it, he’d spent drinking and working on construction. No transferable skills there. He was still kind of a kid and knew fuck all about raising a whole new person. The prospect was terrifying. It was even more terrifying to lose her, though. It felt like if he was taken away from his baby girl, he would fucking die.

“It’ll be harder to do anything. Parties, work, college, sleep. Everything will be harder.”

“Yeah,” he croaked, feeling tears well up in his eyes. He was only now old enough to legally get very drunk and illegally continue smoking joints in the storage shed with his friends. They had only recently bought themselves a proper plate and silverware. Eating out of the pot used to be more than enough before.

He’d just started taking care of himself. Just started doing his laundry in the local laundromat instead of driving his dirty clothes all the way to his parents’ for his mom to wash and fold up for him. He’d just started separating his whites from his coloured clothes.

It felt like his heart could fucking leap out of his chest when he wrote it down.

Name: Sarah Miller

Father’s name: Joel Miller

When I grow up, I want to be a father. This would not have been an acceptable answer to the adults. They liked hearing that from little girls, but not from boys. Adults thought boys should have more ambition than that. Fuck, he was an adult. Fuck. Fucking hell.

She asked for a divorce, reluctant and scared. He could tell she still loved him. It may have been their parents’ idea for them to marry, but they did have a good 7 months of marriage. They were friends, kind of. Despite the young parenthood and the anger about damaged condoms and who was responsible for getting drunk enough to have sex using a broken condom, they didn’t fight much. In another world, they would have been a good couple. Not this one. Losing her hurt, but he had to choose between her and his baby.

He signed the papers.

She visited the baby a few times, but never held her. Her older sister dropped off breast milk from her a few times and he was so grateful. He heard that it was very important for the baby’s health. He gave her formula, but this was more important according to the doctor. She said the mother’s milk had some stuff in it that the baby really needed. He didn’t know what the hell it was, he tried his best to remember the complicated words but they didn’t stick. He was just happy that Sarah could be healthy.

3rd August 1989

Bullshit. What a load of bullshit.

Do something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life? He wanted to backhand whoever said that.

“I got you baby, Daddy’s got you,” he said, rubbing her back as she cried into his chest. “Here’s your bottle. Just a few seconds and you’ll have your milk, okay?”

Tommy looked at him like he was a space alien. Yeah it was fucking weird, alright. He was in his shorts in the kitchen, wearing a smelly t-shirt and talking to his baby who didn’t know how to reply. But what did Tommy know? He didn’t have to be the one with no human company other than a little baby who didn’t know shit about shit.

He loved Sarah. He never knew what love was until Sarah. He thought he loved his parents, he might love Tommy just a little even though he was fucking annoying and got into trouble all the time. He fell in love a few times before Sarah’s mom and he was in love with Sarah’s mom. But maybe he didn’t love them. He didn’t love any of them. They should either invent a new word for whatever he felt for Sarah or a new, less stronger word for what he felt for every other person.

He really truly loved her. But that still didn’t make him feel like he wasn’t working. This was the most work he had ever done in his life. Even the sleepless week he spent building that shop, fuelled by energy drinks and coffee to afford baby clothes and medicines when his then wife was 8 months pregnant didn’t come close.

Sarah woke up crying all the goddamn time.

He knew babies always cried. They couldn’t talk or write or do anything else to communicate. So they cried. But it always felt like a personal failure when she did. Like he was the bad dad everyone expected a 22 year old single father to be.

“She always do that?” Tommy asked when Sarah finally quietened down as she sucked on the bottle he held to her mouth.

“Pretty much. She can’t talk or nothin’, so…”

Tommy nodded and then yawned. God, this boy. Joel had a lot to worry about now and everything he worried about involved Sarah. But he couldn’t not worry about his baby brother. Before he was a father, he was Tommy’s big brother and he will never stop worrying about him. He always got himself into trouble trying to do something good, something noble. The latest one was talkin’ ‘bout enlisting in the fuckin’ army.

He seemed to really really want to be in the army, but that didn’t say much. Tommy really really wanted to do fucking everything. While Joel was the brother with no strong ambitions other than Sarah, Tommy was the brother with too many ambitions. He fought off kids bigger than him if they bullied his classmates, spoke up against teachers who said somethin’ racist, punched a grown man for looking at his female friend wrong. And it was always on Joel to rescue him.

He would run off to a bunch of wars to protect his stupid little brother again. But for the first time he didn’t want to. He had a purpose now. His baby brother needed saving all the time, but his baby needed him for everything.

Tommy would have to handle himself. No big brother to shield him from bullets.

“Don’t fuck up, alright? Ma don’t need that now. I’m already fuckin’ up and she don’t need you to fuck up too.”

“You’re not fuckin’ up, Joel. Ma loves Sarah,” Tommy says, his voice soft as he gently taps Sarah’s cheek with his finger. She looks up at her Uncle Tommy and he swears she’s a little annoyed at him for disturbing her third dinner time. There was no way he was imagining that. He didn’t know if babies were smart enough to be annoyed, but Sarah was. She was a smart one. Tommy had to see that too.

“Yeah yeah, sorry,” Tommy laughed as he apologized to her. He could see it, Tommy also loved Sarah. He was an Uncle and shit. His baby brother, an Uncle. Wild.

Of course Ma loved Sarah. Everyone loved Sarah. He didn’t think it was possible for anyone to look at his baby girl and not fall in love immediately.

“I’m serious, Tommy. Don’t fu—” Fuck! No swearing. Ma warned that if he kept swearing around the baby, her first word might be fuck or shit or goddamn it. “Don’t mess up, okay?” He quickly corrected himself.

“Ma loves Sarah, but that don’t make me any less of a failure. I’m a twenty one year old divorced single father with no chances to go to college and no prospects other than construction. You gotta be better than that.”

He nodded, looking stern and a little too grown up for his age. He was too grown up to be an uncle, too grown to be shipped off God knows where to shoot at other kids but it was what it was. “Yeah…”

After a couple minutes of silence, Tommy spoke up again. “At least she won’t bug me for grandkids, right? You already gave her one.”

“Yeah, the perfect one. Gonna be difficult for your future kid to meet Ma’s high expectations.” He said, smirking. He was never competitive. Never did anything just to be better than someone else at it. The age gap between him and Tommy made him more of of protective older brother than a competitive one. But he was pitting Tommy’s non-existent kid against his baby and it didn’t even feel wrong.

“Fuck you, dude,” he laughed.

“No swearing ‘round her. Don’t want her first word to be that.”

Tommy burst out laughing. “It’ll be funny, though. Just imagine that in a little baby voice.”

He chuckled and conceded, “Yeah, it’ll be funny. But I’m serious. No swearing.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

25th December 1989

“Look at that! Ain’t it pretty?” He cooed, exaggerating the beauty of the scene in front of him. Her eyes were brighter than any Christmas light on the tree in the living room. They were brighter than the sun and the moon and all the stars in the night sky he pointed out to her.

She was wrapped up in several layers of clothes. For a baby, she had too many clothes and it was a pain in the ass to wash and fold. But she looked so adorable in all those layers. It was like she was a soft, formless ball.

He laughed as she moved her arms around and bounced on the couch. She was propped up by two pillows and he put a couple more on the floor just in case. He wouldn’t let her fall, but just in case. She pointed at the bauble he plucked off the Christmas tree, her baby bird-like mouth forming into a little O shape. She laughed and reached her arms out for it. He let her touch it. How could he not when she looked at it like it was the most wonderful thing in the universe.

She looked at everything like it was the most wonderful thing in the world.

He picked her up from her fortress of pillows and held her on his waist, carrying her closer to the tree. Carefully, he placed her higher on top of him, her legs on his shoulders and her hands gripping his hair for dear life. The mirror above the fireplace framed them like a photograph, their first Christmas together. One hand still on his hair, she reached out for a bauble, a present from an aunt for his shotgun wedding.

It should make him sad, but he found himself…happy. Sure, life would be easier if he had Pam to share the duties of parenthood. Sure it was shit to be a divorcee at the age of twenty two. But he had Sarah at the end of the marriage and that was worth everything.

While he was preoccupied with the meaning behind the ornament, his daughter was completely unconcerned with events that occurred before her birth. She inspected the ornament with a kind of gentleness he hadn’t seen in many babies— he remembered Tommy to be the kind to break things with his enthusiasm and cry over the destruction he’d wreaked. Sarah tapped on it gently with her hand and squealed with delight.

“It’s cool, huh?” He said, making conversation with her. She hummed in response and moved to an unusual ornament shaped like a butterfly, her eyes wide with curiosity and her fingers cautiously inspecting the antlers. Father and child stood in front of the Christmas tree all night long, inspecting every single ornament and making conversation in the language only they knew to speak.

If she loved the tree so much, he decided, he’d keep it in the living room in the fucking summer. Who said you couldn’t have a Christmas tree in June? He fucking loved being her dad.

18th January 1990

He fucking hated being a dad.

He would never let her know. God, he would never ever tell her that.

“Daddy’s got you, daddy’s got you. Everything is fine, baby girl.”

It was like she didn’t even hear him. She kept crying those heartbreaking, soul-crushing cries. He gave her the medicines that the doctor told him to buy. He did fucking everything but she still wouldn’t stop crying. He had to be doing something wrong. He told Ma that, but she said that was how babies were and he just had to take care of her, hold her close and wait for her temperature to go down.

But what until then?

“Ma! Ma, she won’t stop crying.”

“Did you give her the medicines?” His mother’s drowsy voice came through the phone. He shouldn’t be disturbing her after the day she had, but he couldn’t be bothered about her comfort. His baby was crying, goddamn it!

“Yeah, I did. Still won’t stop,” he said, his voice breaking and he bounced the baby, hoping that would soothe her.

“Did you check her temperature?”

“Yeah. Hundred and two.”

“It’s gone down then. She’s getting better.”

“Why’s she still cryin’ then?”

He was a grown man, a father, but god he felt like a fuckin’ kid again. He wanted his Ma. He wanted her to drive all the way to his place and tell him what to do to fix her, make her pain go away.

“That’s how it is, Joel. This is normal. I’ll be there in the morning when your old man can drive me, okay? She’ll get better, kid. Don’t worry too much.”

Ma was right, she did get better. But it was the worst night of his life and he would put her in a medically sealed safe room for the rest of her life just to never have to relive it.

She got sick again, of course. She was a kid and as he learned, kids were germ magnets. It was intolerable and it made him hate being a father. That made him feel guilty. It was stupid, he knew that. What could he even do? Punch germs in the face? Throw hands with the daycare mom who didn’t vaccinate her kid who ended up coughing on his baby girl?

He hated what being a father made him think and do. He felt unhinged, irrational. But it never felt wrong. And he never hated being her father. This was his purpose and he didn’t mind being a fuckin’ psycho who thought of fighting the baby who gave his baby a fever.

28th April 1991

“Can I have one, please?”

Joel brought the hammer down on the nail, looking up every now and then for glimpses of his daughter sitting on her uncle’s lap.

She looked at Tommy with her perfect angel eyes, hand messy and gripped around a disgusting soggy cookie she’d soaked with her saliva. She shook her head at Tommy before putting the cookie back in her mouth.

“Please? Uncle Tommy is hungry. And your dad won’t feed me.” He gave her his best puppy-dog eyes, but his baby girl didn’t budge. She hugged the packet of cookies close to her chest like Tommy was gonna snatch it from her and it made both of them laugh. He dropped his hammer on the floor and walked up to them.

He got on his knees next to Tommy’s chair and looked at her. “Please can I have one? Daddy’s hungry.”

She took her cookie out of her mouth and stretched her hand out to him. He leaned in, no hesitation and took the entire soggy piece in his mouth.

“Duuuude! Seriously? I bought those cookies and you’ll share it with your daddy but not with me? What a pair of scammers.”

Joel sent a smug smile his way before returning back to work. Babies were pretty selfish and Sarah was no exception, but he was an exception and that made him feel like the most special man in Texas.

“Miller,” a stern voice interrupted his family. He didn’t know whether it was directed towards him or towards Tommy, but the both of them apologized and left Sarah to her own devices before returning to work.

“Clients are such meanies, aren’t they?” He whispers to Sarah when the client is out of sight.

“Meanie!” She exclaimed, throwing her hands up in the air and lifting the packet of cookies with her. He laughed. That was a new word. She was a smart one.

They work all night, both of them. Sarah sleeps in the baby seat he bought for his truck. The daycare moms suggested it and he was so glad he bought one. It was damn expensive but ‘twas helpful for when they’re both working and Ma couldn’t take Sarah.

16th October 1992

Kids asked a lot of questions. Sarah did too.

Why is the sky blue? Why are some trees tall but other trees short? Why are soap suds all white no matter the color of the soap? What is a library? Why does Grandma have grey hair? Why does Uncle Tommy have long hair? What is a housing loan? What is concrete? Why is concrete gray? Why won’t you let me touch concrete?

He didn’t have a problem with the non-stop questions like other parents did. It was better for her to channel her curiosity into questions than get into trouble trying to find answers herself. His problem was that he wasn’t smart enough to answer ‘em.

He eventually did. Or hoped that she’d forget that he said he’ll ask someone and get back to her with the answer. But this wasn’t something he could ask someone else. It wasn’t something he could hope she’d forget. If she forgot now, she’d ask again later at some point in her life.

“What’s my mommy’s name?”

“Her name was Pamela.”

Was, he said. Like she was fucking dead. It had been years since he’d said that name. What a strange turn life took. Once upon a time, his whole world revolved around Pam and now he’d half forgotten what she looked like.

“Where is she?”

Last he heard, somewhere in New York. She became a lawyer. Good for her.

“I don’t know, baby,” he lied. What was the point of telling her where her mother was? She didn’t even know where New York was. She hadn’t even thought to ask about her mother in all these years. Well, she couldn’t even speak for a good portion of it but still…

“All the other kids have a mommy. Why don’t I have one?” Was he not enough? A lot of people reminded him that kids needed a mother more than they needed a father. That little girls needed a mother. That he wouldn’t know what the hell to do when she wanted cookies for the school bake sale or wanted a cute braid or got her period. He told all of them to go fuck themselves. Politely.

Her tiny hands held the stuffed animal he spent too much time and money on to win at the fair. Her innocent little eyes begged him for answers, reminding him where she got ‘em from. They looked like when Pam told him she was pregnant, scared and confused and begging him to do something, help somehow.

He might get a heart attack in his mid twenties.

“It’ll be harder to do anything. Parties, work, college, sleep. Everything will be harder.”

He didn’t know it would be like this. He knew the question would come up but he wasn’t prepared.

“I…”

She was patient. He picked her up from her chair and held her to his chest, wishing she’d go back to just babbling and looking cute.

“Most babies have two parents. A mommy and a daddy. Do you know why?”

She shook her head and kept her attention on his every word.

“Because they’re all so naughty.”

That got a laugh out of her. An easy smile found itself on his lips. It was hard to not smile when he saw her smile.

“Jason has a mommy and daddy,” he said, referring to the boy she had a few play dates with. “He gets in a lot of trouble so he needs to parents to take care of him. But you’re such a good kid, the best kid in the world and God knows that. So he just gave you one parent. Because Daddy is enough to take care of you.”

He was enough. He was enough to take care of her. He could pay for her daycare and clothes and health and everything. He read her bedtime stories and took her to work and kept her away from the tools.

He was enough.

“Is she taking care of another kid then? Is that why she’s not here?”

Jesus Christ, this girl.

“I don’t know, baby.”

“Oh. Can we go to the park?”

And just like that, she was over it. Thank fucking God.

He held her curls and gave her a kiss on her head. She was so special, she was so perfect. She deserved everything, deserved the whole universe, deserved a mom. He would spend his whole life and more giving her whatever she needed.

1st September 1993

“Here’s some snacks for you. I’ll leave it in your bag. Don’t forget to have it, okay?”

She nodded, munching on her cereal as he packed her backpack for her first day of school. He was nervous, but she looked completely fine. So did Tommy on his first day of school, but he ended up throwing a tantrum at the school gates and refused to let go of their parents. Joel had to promise him a full bar of candy to get him to finally walk into school.

Just so it was not too jarring for her, he made it a point to drive past her school every now and then. As they passed by, he explained to her that she would be going there everyday very soon and make a lot of tiny friends.

Construction work meant that schedules were all over the place. Sarah, having had no independent life of her own so far, was forced to stick to his messy days, waking up and sleeping at different times. Joel changed that to prepare her for waking up early to go to school.

With her bag packed with her pencil case, water bottle, snacks, color pencils and the books and notebook her school asked her to bring, it was time to move on to the next task.

“Daddy, I want the purple bows today. The new ones Nana bought.”

“I know, baby girl. I got them here already,” he said, pulling out the bright purple hair accessories from his pocket where he’d also shoved her hair brush, handkerchief and socks. He pulled her hair together in two pigtails, proud of himself for how far he’d come in doing her hair from a confused man asking his very few female friends for help to a natural dad who did this every morning.

He clipped a bow on each side, the little purple things sitting at the base of her soft rounded hair style. She climbed up the table without notice and checked herself out on the mirror nearby, grinning as she touched her hair.

“Thank you, daddy.”

“Aww, you’re welcome baby girl,” he cooed, pulling her close and placing kisses on her cheeks and forehead. He couldn’t believe she was ready for school already. It felt like she was born just yesterday. Each day was long and difficult, but together they’d all passed by in the blink of an eye. He didn’t know if she was prepared for such a big step, to be in school everyday for a couple hours without him.

“Tickles,” she giggled as his mustache scratched her cheeks. He kissed her again, making her fill the living room once again with her squeals and laughter.

“I want the orange shoes today,” she said, placing her foot on his chest.

“Sure? You picked the black socks with the green aliens. Shouldn’t you wear black shoes?”

“You don’t know fashion, daddy. You wear only boring tops without cartoon characters. And you don’t even have Barbie clothes.”

“Yeah, yeah. Orange shoes it is then,” he said, slipping the shoes she demanded on her feet. At least they were Velcro and she could remove them and put them back on easily without help.

Soon, Tommy had arrived at their door and like the menace he was, brought some candies.

“Tommy,” he spoke in a stern tone.

“Come on, Joel! It’s a big day. Our baby girl is all grown up and going to school!”

“I’m a big girl!” She exclaimed, pumping her little fists in the air like she’d won a medal.

“Yeah, very big,” Tommy laughed, putting the candies in her school backpack. “Now, be nice and share some candy with your classmates. That’s the quickest way to make friends.”

She listened to his advice intently and Joel wondered if she’d take a pen and notepad out to take his advice down if only she knew how to string alphabets together to make words.

While he usually sat in the front and let Sarah sit in the back of the truck, he chose to sit in the back this time, offering her the comfort and confidence she needed to take this big leap.

“…be a good girl and listen to your teacher. And don’t use any rude words, okay? Stuff you hear at daddy’s work, it’s only for grown ups. You understand?”

She nodded, beady eyes focused on the glittery designs of her backpack rather than his words. As much as he tried to speak properly around her, he couldn’t stop her from learning the crass words spoken by the people he worked with at the construction sites. And because daycare was expensive and he didn’t feel comfortable leaving her with strangers for such a big part of the day, she had to be at his workplaces, heart no those words.

“Don’t be scared. It’s just school and it’ll be fun. You’ll get to read new stories and make new friends. It can be scary in the beginning but it will be so much fun,” he continued on, caressing her back as he held her close.

“What do you do if you’re scared or if you want daddy?”

“I’ll tell my teacher you’re waiting outside and I want to go to you,” she repeated the words he’d been drilling into her head for months. He had taken the entire week off work to wait for Sarah outside school. Just in case she really needed him before the end of the school day. God forbid there be an injury or something.

“You’ve seen your classroom before, remember? With the colorful stickers on the walls?” She nodded, walking next to him as she looked around at the other kids and parents on the campus for their first day. He averted her eyes from the crying kids, afraid that seeing them might make her cry too.

Joel dreaded the waterworks, dreaded how her sparkling eyes would brim with tears and her little lips would pout before fat tears rolled down her cheeks. She was too precious for that and her tears always made him want to tear up anything and anyone who caused it. It didn’t matter that she also cried for the silliest reasons and cried when she threw tantrums. They never stopped having that heartstrings-pulling effect they had when she came crying and screaming into the world. Those cries that convinced him that he shouldn’t give her up, that he couldn’t trust anyone else on the planet to comfort her the way he could.

When they reached her classroom and met Mrs. Moore, he handed her backpack over to her. Kneeling in front of her, he gave her a few kisses on her cheeks. “Be good, okay? Daddy’s right outside and I’ll pick you up when school is over. Yeah?”

“Okay, daddy!” She said cheerfully. He turned his cheek to her for a kiss, but she didn’t notice, walking off in the other direction with her backpack. She dipped her bag on the table before introducing herself to another kid with her standard script for meeting others— her name, his name, her favorite cartoon characters and a handshake while she said it was nice to meet them.

“Dang, she couldn’t wait to ditch ya,” remarked Tommy as he watched Sarah socialize and show the kids the cartoon characters on her backpack.

Joel’s vision clouded with tears as he sat on his knees in the middle of the classroom. His lips trembled and his chest clenched at being left just like that by her. She never left him. Even when she was with her grandparents, she came running to their porch when she heard him and Tommy pull up in the drive.

Tommy dragged him away from the classroom when it was time for parents to leave. While he left, Joel’s heart stayed right there in the classroom.

“Goddamn,” he muttered as he wiped his tears off with the sleeves of his shirt. To think he was worried about her crying… Here he was, crying like a child while his actual child faced her first day of school with a big smile on her face.

“Can’t believe she’s in school already,” Tommy said and he nodded, not confident that he could speak without sobbing.

How was he supposed to do this everyday? Just leave her in a building with complete strangers and be confident that when he went back, she would be there, safe and happy. Other kids could bully her, her teacher might be rude to her, she might be hungry even after eating the snacks he packed her. How was he supposed to know how she was doing in all these hours she’d spend in a place with none of the friends and family she knew?

It was like taking your heart out your chest, putting a backpack on it and sending it away to fend for itself while praying that nothing bad would happen to it.

30th November 1994

Joel Miller would beat up anyone who made his baby girl cry. He didn’t care who it was. This time though, he had no one to blame but himself. She wouldn’t let him near her. She was crying, but she was also incredibly angry. Where did she even get anger from? He couldn’t believe that such a tiny little girl could have so much anger in her.

“I’m leaving the house and I’m never ever coming back!” She squeaked into the phone between sobs.

He was disappointed in himself. She was being especially difficult, yes. He had to drop her off at daycare and run to work, but she wouldn’t stop running around in the backyard in her pajamas. He’d had enough and yelled.

So here she was with her pink backpack full of her things that she packed herself— mismatched clothes, hairbrush, hair wrap, hair tie, teddy bear. She didn’t pack any underwear. She was stood on the couch to reach the landline phone, holding the receiver to her ear and asking, no demanding, that Uncle Tommy pick her up.

“Who made my baby girl cry? I’m gonna kick their butts,” Tommy declares as he walks in, popsicle in hand. He was gonna kick Tommy’s ass. She wasn’t supposed to have that shit. It was unhealthy. But apparently it wasn’t up to him anymore. It was Sarah and her Uncle Tommy’s world and he was just living in it.

“I’ll get him, okay baby?” He reassured her gently and Sarah nods before hugging Tommy.

Fucking drama queens, the both of them.

“Go wait in the truck and have this popsicle, okay? I’ll beat your dad up.”

She grinned— what the fuck. She grinned, took the stupid popsicle and ran off to the truck which neither of them asked to borrow. Fucking thieves.

Tommy burst out laughing as soon as she left.

“If you wanna be cool Uncle Tommy beatin’ her dad up, the least you can do it babysit her until she stops hatin’ me.”

“She doesn’t hate you!”

“You said you were going to beat me up and she fuckin smiled like you promised her a pony. Take her for the weekend,” he said, handing him the bag that he packed for her. And this one had her underwear, matching set of clothes, her favorite blanket and the story book she was currently reading.

He loved her but goddamn it, he needed a break. The teenage years were going to be hell.

26 September 1996

His hands are cover in glitter. And they’re also sticky for some reason. Something happened here. He didn’t know what, but he would find out. There’s a pair of scissors on the floor. He didn’t put them there and the only other person in the house was told very clearly to not touch them.

Rules were more like suggestions in this household.

“Sarah!” He calls out, walking around the house looking for her. Where the hell was this kid on a school day? It usually took waking her up a million times, took begging to get her to make her bed and some threats to get her outside her bedroom.

He almost yelped when a something, roughly the weight of one Sarah Miller, landed on his back and began giggling.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADDY!!!!” She screamed into his ear. His ears rang from the sound and his heart beat faster, but his heart also grew warmer.

He pulled her to his front and she wasted no time giving him wet kisses on his cheeks. “Thank you, baby girl,” he said, laughing from her enthusiasm. She had never remembered his birthday before, not that he expected her to. She barely remembered her own and made him count down to it from 3 months before the day. So it was a surprise that she remembered.

“I made you a gift,” she said, showing off the gaps between her teeth as she smiled.

“Whaaaat? A gift? For me?”

She nodded and wriggled out of his grip before running off. Her footsteps grew distant and then closer until she emerged with what he could only hope used to be paper. It was a sparkling red sheet. Under all the glitter, there had to be some paper left. There was paper and on it were the words ‘Happy birthday daddy’ written colorfully in crayons. He opened the card to find a drawing of him— beard, power tools, truck and all. It was labeled ‘daddy’.

On the right was a message from her, in her writing that started big and became smaller with each alphabet.

‘Happy Birthday Daddy. I love you.’

“Do you like it?” She asked, wide eyes looking at him expectantly.

“I love it! It’s perfect, baby,” he praised, picking her up off the ground and smothering her with kisses. She was the sweetest, most precious thing in the world. His Ma gave him a new shirt and Tommy bought him a bottle of good whiskey, but they paled in comparison to the card that he tucked away safely in the file with all their important documents, glitter be damned. The card collection grew over the years.

2nd February 1997

“You’ll like her, I promise!”

“Where have I heard that before?” Joel snorted, getting back under the truck to look for whatever the hell had gone wrong underneath for it to not start. They did take a bus to the construction site that morning, but they couldn’t do that again. The buses were unreliable and the walk to the bus stop took up half an hour. Sarah was already annoyed at him for not coming home on time. Last thing he wanted was to leave home earlier and come back later.

“Okay, that was one time! And she was a friend of a friend of a friend. I’ve met Judy and she’s definitely your type.”

“Sure,” he grunted, extending his hand out to get the tool he needed from Tommy.

“Curly hair, kind of tall. She’s clever. A math teacher, actually. Out of your league in that department so if you could pull her, it would be a miracle.”

“You settin’ me up for failure then.”

“Listen, she’s new to the city and she’s open to meeting people. It’s not gone be a date, Joel. Just drinks with her, a couple of her friends, my roommate and his sisters. You need a break.”

He hated to admit it even to himself, but Tommy was right. Not about dating, but about needing a break. He had been working a lot more recently. The contracting business was still in its infancy and needed a lot of his time and attention to just stay afloat. He didn’t have enough capital to invest in more monpower, so he had to take every call and make every decision and do every task he didn’t have enough guys for.

“I’ll think about it,” he said, wiping his face with the greasy cloth, getting more grease on himself than off.

“I’ll ask Ma to take Sarah. You know she’s dying to see that kid,” Tommy offered. He knew that it was meant to get him to feel better, less guilty about getting rid of Sarah for the night to get drunk. But it only made him feel worse about shirking his responsibilities to go get drunk and try to sleep with someone. The last time he did that, he became a father.

But he does it anyway because he told Tommy he would. He goes on a couple of dates with the girl and it feels nice to be around someone who is interested in him for himself, not for what he did for them or because they were stuck with him.

It doesn’t last long. Sarah and work always take priority over everything else in his life and she understandably doesn’t like being his last priority. He never tries again.

16th June 1998

“Sarah!” He called for the fourth time, again with no response. He plated the food for her, grabbed his own plate and walked upstairs to her room.

“Been calling out your name for ten minutes now, baby girl.”

She looked up at him, a weary smile on her lips. “Sorry. I was just finishing up my assignment. Didn’t hear you.”

He put the plate on the table in front of her and ruffled her hair, making her pout. “‘S nice to focus on school, but you need to keep your ears alert,” he said, sitting back down on her bed with his plate.

One glance at her books told him she was doing her math homework. Geometry, to be precise. At least it was something he knew this time. Last week, she was writing her social science essay and went on about the different parts of the United Nations or some shit. He only remembered a bunch of abbreviations and not what they stood for. She could make something up like UNCPS, call it United Nations Child Protective Services and he’d believe it. Wait, was that what UNICEF was?

Math was the only thing she learned in school that he still understood, that made him feel like a smart dad capable of helping his kid out with her homework. Not that she needed any help. She’d taken after Pam in the brains department. Thank god.

Nevertheless he checked her answers. He didn’t want to be completely useless.

She’d done well. There were one or two mistakes she’d made, repetitions of the kinds of mistakes she’d made before in long division. Just careless ones that she corrected easily when he pointed them out to her. Nothing he had to teach her.

“Oh, before I forget…” she said, pulling a plastic file out of her purple backpack. “I need your signature on this thing. It’s the permission slip for a talk from a retired army officer.”

He rifled through the pens in her pen stand, taking too long to find one that wasn’t purple, glittery, or purple and glittery. “Military? Why they teachin’ you that?” He asked, wary about his kid learning anything about wars. It’d gotten Tommy a little too excited and before they knew it, he was off getting shot at somewhere in the gulf. The dangers of that were lower with a daughter than with a son, but he was still wary. Gender equality better not creep its way into jobs that could get his kid killed.

“Yeah, you ain’t going to this thing. Take the day off.”

“No way, we might have a social science pop up quiz on Wednesday and I’m not going to miss it.”

“Aren’t pop up quizzes supposed to…I don’t know, pop up? Like surprise,” he said, earning an eye-roll from her. Wasn’t even a teenager yet and she was rollin’ her lil eyes at her dad. He’d lucked out in the baby lottery, got himself a smart, mostly well-behaved one. But it still confused a man to have the little thing that used to depend on you for everything from food to wiping her butt now rolling her eyes at you.

“Yeah, yeah. I can’t just skip classes. I’m sure this,” she said, waving the piece of paper at him. “—is just formality. And it’s just going to be some boring talk from some old guy. If you don’t sign it, they’ll still make me go and then my principal will call you up to my office and ask you why you didn’t sign the slip. Merel’s older brother didn’t get his signed and the principal asked his dad if he was a communist.”

“The worst that could happen is this old man calling me a communist? You’ll have to do better than that.”

“Uncle Tommy said that communists are evil,” she said, her eyes widening for effect.

“Your uncle also says that two plus two is five and that ice cream is good for your health.”

“Because it’s milk and milk has calcium!”

“Sure it is. And it’s a shitload of sugar.”

“But if I’m having sugar, isn’t it better to have it with milk? That way I’m also having something healthy,” she asked, showing off her missing teeth as she grinned.

“Or you can just drink milk.”

“Milk tastes like sh— garbage,” she quickly corrected herself. His little girl knew bad words. That shouldn’t be as much of a surprise as it was considering how much he and Tommy cursed around her. But it was…disturbing. It was evidence she was growing up, using these words around her little friends and hiding that from him. He used to know her better, be able to read her from the smallest facial expressions. He used to be able to anticipate her needs, predict her behavior, but it was getting harder nowadays.

“And you know what garbage tastes like because…?”

“I grew up eating stuff you cook, that’s how.”

“Walked right into that one.”

“Yeah you did,” she said, sticking her tongue out at him. He chuckled at her silly behavior, pinching her nose between his thumb and index finger before letting go. Maybe she wasn’t growing up after all.

“Whatever garbage I fed ya, it’s kept you strong enough to talk crap ‘bout it.”

He thought back on the days of fighting out how to cook. Before Sarah, he’d been surviving on takeout. Having to clothe and feed an entirely new human being left little money in his wallet to spend on food. So he learned to cook. For a little thing, she’d made big changes in his life— made him a father and a man. He remembered waking up at odd hours when she so much as stirred in her crib that he kept beside his bed. He remembered how his heart would ache with her little whines that turned into cries of hunger. How he cursed her mother who was meant to be feeding her as he fixed her a bottle—a cheap substitute for her mother’s milk.

Nine years.

Goddamn.

It was hard to believe it’d been that long since she entered his world and changed everything about it. Even when the evidence sat right before him, doing her homework and doodling on her desk. Her hand, while bigger, still held her pencil the same way it did when he taught her to write. Now it wrote faster, wrote long words beyond his understanding in pretty cursive handwriting.

He waited patiently as she ate the boxed mac ‘n cheese, ashamed that he couldn’t feed her anything healthier. It’d been a long day and he didn’t have the time or energy to make something better. But she ate it up happily, not complaining even once. It induced both guilt and satisfaction, the former from the lack of nutrients in the food and the latter because he still made his little girl happy.

He covered his mouth as a yawn took over, making her laugh. “You yawn so funny.”

“I do?” He asked before faking a yawn, making silly sounds as he did. She giggled and yawned back, producing her own silly sounds. It had quickly turned into a competition, leaving father and child making the silliest sounds until the latter crumpled on him, breathless from her laughter.

“Alright. Time to sleep, okay? And remember, Grandpa is picking you up from school tomorrow. So don’t walk home by yourself.”

“Alright dad,” she said, settling under her purple blanket. He bent down and pressed a kiss to her forehead before turning her bedside lamp off.

Dad.

Not daddy, but dad. The little girl was adamant on growing up. He left her room, remembering that she hadn’t asked for a bedtime story in months. She read on her own, borrowed piles of books from the library and narrated the stories to him and Tommy and anyone who would listen.

She didn’t need him for that anymore. While it was a comfort in one way, to lessen the duties of parenthood, it clawed at his chest to know that one day she wouldn’t need him at all. He’d had her for nine years and in another nine, she would be off to university, leaving him alone in this house with nothing to do for the first time since she became his life.

23rd December 1999

“Ma…” Tommy called out, his voice breaking as he turned to him, tears already streaming down his cheeks. Joel stepped forward and threw an arm around his little brother.

First dad and now… His chest felt heavy and his throat prickled from all the sobs he held back. He needed to be strong. There was one more funeral to arrange, a little brother to comfort…god, Tommy had seen too many deaths in his lifetime already. This wasn’t going to be easy for him.

And Sarah. She had never seen death before. Loss, yes. Her mother, her best friend who left town, the goldfish that died because he forgot to feed it. But death in the family, that was new.

He let go of Tommy and gave him an awkward pat on the back. “I’m going to call the funeral home.”

The call had been made, their mother was taken away from their family home to join her father and he drove the two of them back to his place. It wouldn’t be wise to stay there, with all the memories of growing up with their parents, especially with the holiday decorations cheering up the place in the most offensive manner.

They were supposed to celebrate together, just the five of them. But god had other plans it seemed. He poured Tommy another drink and leaned back on the couch, mind reeling with all the paperwork he had to take care of and who would take care of Sarah when he was away handling it. Not Tommy, not in his state. He sipped on his beer, watching Tommy as he followed suit.

It had been decades ago, but he remembered quite well what Ma had said after Tommy ran off to complain to her about Joel yelling at him for scribbling on his homework.

“When your dad and I are gone, Joel, you’ll be the one to take care of him. He’s little and he will make silly mistakes. But you oughta forgive him, take care of him.”

Somehow, Tommy looked just as pathetic as he did that day. Innocent, vulnerable and needing comfort. He had seen so much, so much more than what Joel could imagine in his worst nightmares. But Joel would still see him as his little brother.

“Alright, Tommy. You’ve had enough,” he said, prying the bottle of beer from his grip and taking it to the garbage. Tommy didn’t resist, only crumpled down on the couch as he stared at the ground.

“Dad?” Said a low voice, heavy with sleep. He looked to the other side to find her, rubbing at her eyes as she walked further into the living room. He’d just tucked her into bed after she spent almost an hour badgering him about what Christmas presents Santa would bring her that years as he worried himself sick about how he’d tell her that grandpa was dead. Just the thought of her festive excitement breaking to make way for grief… That was when Tommy called him, sobbing and sputtering out the words.

He’d gone to cook something for Ma and found her unmoving on her bed.

“Hey baby girl…” he said, his voice soft as he walked to her. “Did we wake you up?”

She whined and hugged him, placing her weight on him as she let him lead her to the couch. Tommy, realizing his niece was there, wiped his eyes with the cuffs of his shirt and plastered a smile on his face. “Hey Butterfly…” he addressed her in his trembling voice.

“What happened?”

Joel didn’t know how he did it. But he did it. The girl’s eyes were wide as she listened to him, her little hands wrapped around his arms like she was afraid to let go.

“We’ll never see grandma and grandpa again?”

He shook his head, his heart breaking for her. He never had the misfortune of experiencing his own grandparents’ deaths. Half of them were gone before his parents had him and the other half passed when he was too little to remember them.

“There will be a funeral for them. We’ll all get together as a family and say goodbye at Church.”

Her lips curved down and tears brimmed in her eyes, the realization of the true nature of death hitting her. With a wail, she wrapped her arms around him, her bony knees digging into his thighs. “I don’t want them to go,” she cried, her tiny fist punching his chest. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close and kissing the top of her head.

“I know, baby… I know.” He whispered into her ear, cradling and rocking her in his arms the way he did when she cried as a newborn. “It’s going to be scary because we have always had grandma and grandpa. But we’ll get through it, okay? Together. Daddy’s here. I’ll get us through it.”

“I don’t want them to die.”

“I know, I know,” he breathed and for the first time since he lost the first two people he ever loved, the sorrow caught up to him. Her innocent words, how she thought to speak them to him- as though she believed he could prevent her dead grandparents from dying. In her innocence, he finds his own. For the first time, he allows himself to be more than the responsible older brother who made funeral arrangements and took care of his grieving little brother. His love for his parents, his remaining childlike belief that they would be permanent in his life— They dug their claws into his chest and ripped his heart right out, piercing it, making it bleed.

“Does everyone die?” She asked meekly, fear and curiosity battling each other and plunging them both into the remains of her innocence.

“Yeah. Eventually, everyone dies.”

“Even you?” She asked, pulling back, sweet brown eyes staring back at him. While he thought she had her mother’s eyes, everyone else said their expressions were his. His eyes that he got from his father. For the first time, he saw what they all said. Just like dad’s eyes.

“You don’t worry about that now, baby girl,” he said, caressing her hair. “I’ll be here for a long time. You’ll be a big girl by then. Have a job ‘n all.”

“I don’t want you to die.”

“Oh, darlin’…” He pulled her to his chest and patted her back, setting a rhythm that he used when her back was the size of his hand and she needed the rhythm to fall asleep on his chest. She relaxed under his touch, the rhythm still having an effect. “It’ll be fine. Everything will be okay,” he lied, a habit that’s come easy to him with fatherhood. Lying was second nature when it came to comforting her, lulling her into a false sense of security about life.

17th May 2000

He pulled up the hem of his T-shirt and wiped his sweat, hoping to look better for Sarah’s game. He was late. By over an hour. Sarah would already be angry at him and seeing his face in the stands so fucking late would only add insult to injury. But he had to try. After all the games he missed, he had to keep his promise to be there for the final match.

He spotted Sarah instantly as he walked close to the field. But she wasn’t playing like he hoped. She was taking a towel from her friend Candace, her lips weighed down by a frown. Candace’s mother offered her a bottle of water and she accepted it politely before walking away and settling down on the stands. Alone. The back of her soccer jersey is stained with sweat and his guilty mind reads the big bold Miller on it as an accusation. Where were you, Miller? Other kids were with their families and his sat alone.

“Baby girl…”

She looked up at him but quickly dropped her eyes back down to her lap, her fingernails scratching at the label of the plastic water bottle. From the frown on her face, he guessed that her team didn’t win. Such a shame since she worked so hard practicing while also keeping her grades up.

“It’s okay you didn’t win,” he began gently, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. She tsked and shrugged his hand off her shoulder. Oh she was angry. “You came this far. Finals and all. Second place is still good, you know?”

Silence.

Maybe it would help to regale her with one of his own failures, show her she was doing much better than her old man, maybe even make her laugh. “I was always on reserve and hoping nobody gets injured so I didn’t have to play,” he said, his laugh coming out awkwardly as her frown deepened. Humor wasn’t it, apparently.

“Sarah!” An older woman called out from across the pitch and she looked up at her. From her outfit- tracksuit, whistle at the end of a lanyard around her neck, he assumed she was a soccer coach. “It’s time for the pictures.”

She put her water bottle down on the seat next to her and walked in the woman’s direction. It definitely hurt, her walking away from him without hesitation in the direction of someone who wasn’t family. Like a visible representation of her rejecting him for someone she saw more than him these days.

He let out a defeated sigh and walked up to the pitch and found the huddle of backpacks. Finding her purple one with the butterflies wasn’t hard. He picked it up and threw it over his shoulder and watched as she stood with the kids on her team for the picture. The coach brought a trophy over, big shiny one with ribbons tied to it. Her little friends cheered as the trophy was handed to the girl in the middle, the captain presumably and they all put their hands on it, smiling wide as their picture was taken. His little girl finally managed a smile too, encouraged by Chantal grabbing her shoulder and shaking her.

“She played well, huh?”

He looked to his side to find the owner of the voice, a man older than he was, wearing a red tee, the color of the opposing team.

“Tony,” he said, introducing himself. “I’m your Sarah’s math teacher. And the dad of the losing team’s captain.”

Joel squinted, confused. Sarah’s team didn’t lose? On the other side of the pitch, the red team stood together for a picture, looking a little less happy and holding a trophy much smaller than Sarah’s team.

“Joel,” he said, introducing himself. “Sorry for…uh-” he struggled to find a way to say something nice about his daughter’s performance. But he wasn’t at the game and didn’t know who the man’s kid was. “They played well, your kid’s team.”

“Oh, you’re being kind. Don’t tell my girl I said this, but they played like shit,” Tony said and he laughed awkwardly. Was he supposed to agree or disagree? Which would be more polite?

Joel instead changed the topic to school. “Is it hard? Teaching and having your kid in the same school?” He asked like a fucking idiot. Where did that come from? Why would that even be hard? He would kill to work at the school, see his kid more instead of working mad hours far away from home while she ate at the Adlers’ and went to bed alone. But the job paid shit.

“Well, a little…” he answered, scratching his beard. As the man spoke, Joel’s attention was elsewhere, on the pitch with Sarah. Her team won. The games she'd been stressing over for so long had come to an end and she had won. But she still had that frown on her face. Realization hit him like a ton of bricks.

She looked sad because he wasn’t there. After he promised he would be.

“…and you’d think she would be much better at math with me teaching her at home and another math teacher teaching her in school, but she’s hopeless. Soccer is life for Dolly. Your Sarah is very good. I’m guessing that’s why I never see you at the parent-teacher meetings. Never nothin’ to ask your kids’ teachers about if they’re doing perfectly well in school, right?”

“Right,” he said, nodding as he felt the guilt eat away at his heart. She had been raving about this match for so long, was so excited when they made it to the finals and drilled the date into his head. But he still forgot. He would lie to her on the drive home, say he had so much work that he couldn’t get to the match on time. But he would know the truth- that he forgot about it until he heard a soccer match inside the house of the client whose deck he was redoing.

“Now, I know your girl is very busy with the debate club, soccer and art. I asked her to join mathletes but she said she was too busy. I think it would be good for her. On her CV and stuff when she applies for college. Plus she needs a challenge.”

He felt smaller in front of the teacher despite having a couple inches over him. Sarah was a smart kid. Took after her mother there. But he wasn’t. He didn’t know art or debate and Sarah had long ago gone beyond the math he knew, taking advanced classes he never took and getting grades he never had on his report card. And did Tony say the math thing would help her with college?

“Yeah, she does,” he agreed, not even knowing fully what he was agreeing over. “Umm… I’ll talk to her about it.”

He traded some words with her teacher, the two of them agreeing to meet at the next game before he left to find his daughter and console her over her team’s loss. In a while, he found Sarah walking to the parking, holding a gold medal and a certificate. He followed and opened the truck door for her and she climbed in wordlessly.

“Come on, you gon’ be like that the whole time?” He asked, a couple minutes into their ride.

“You forgot about the game, didn’t you?”

“What? No!” He lied. “I wanted to come, baby girl. I swear. Just took too long at work today because of the sub-contractor. He installed the wrong plumbing for the kitchen and wouldn’t admit to it, so—” he stopped abruptly, feeling bad about his string of lies. But he did nothing to correct it. What was he supposed to say? Apologise for being a shit dad who forgot?

“I didn’t forget, I swear,” he lied again. Lying was second nature to him now. It was easier to lie than to confess to your kid that you forgot about something that was important to her. Plus, it wasn’t going to be worth the fight. She was a teenager and on a goddamn debate team. She knew how to argue. Whose idea was it anyway to teach children how to argue better? No one from the south, he was sure. Had he argued with his mama, he would’ve gotten a belt to his ass.

“Fine,” she huffed, folding her arms over her chest.

“A’right,” he said, feeling a weight leave his shoulder. “How ‘bout we get some pizza and celebrate your win? We can watch a movie too.”

“Okay fine. But I get to pick.”

“Yeah yeah, we’ll watch Toy Story again,” he said, smiling as her grumpy face lit up for a moment before stretching thin into a neutral expression. He had watched that movie a million times because of her. Their CD had given out from scratches from the number of times they watched it and he had to buy her a new one.

“I didn’t say Toy Story,” she said defiantly. Right… She was growing up now, watching fewer movies from when she was younger to make herself look older and cooler around her friends. He remembered that stage with Tommy.

“Sure, baby girl,” he teased, driving in the direction of their favorite pizza place.

27th March 2001

“Don’t be scared, a’right?” He said, holding her face in his hands. She nodded, putting on a brave face even though she was afraid. “I’ll be right behind you. Won’t let those assholes do anything. Uncle Tommy is inside the store too. We’ll take care.”

She took his word and got out of the truck, following the path she usually took when she walked home from school. She came home crying the other day, talking about how she didn’t want to go to school anymore ‘cause a bunch of guys stood outside a store leering at her and talking shit.

He was ready to go to prison for murder immediately, but Tommy chose to be the smarter Miller for the first time in his life and hatched a plan. Nothing elaborate. Just intimidating the whichever boys dared to fuck with his kid.

He followed Sarah at a safe distance, close enough to protect her from danger while also making sure to maintain enough distance so as to not alert the guys into running away. A few minutes in and he spotted them. Not boys. Not misguided teenagers like he was expecting. Men. Grown men older than him. He caught how their eyes crawled over his kid, how she squirmed under the gaze and he immediately wants to slam the three of them into the fucking ground. Pull their eyes out and kick them to their fucking death.

She was twelve.

He stopped outside the store. A little bodega he frequented. Tommy seemed to have similar thoughts running through his head, his hands curled into fists at his sides as he burned holes into the men’s head. They communicated with just their eyes. We’ll wait for Sarah to get home.

Joel didn’t know how he managed to wait until she walked into their street. From a distance, he could see her opening their front door and letting herself in. She better have locked the door.

Intimidation would not work on these men. Not was it enough for their disgusting act. Joel’s stomach turned as his mind replayed the way they looked at her. No wonder she was afraid. His poor girl.

They took the men out back, hand on their back, words exchanged about needing to ask something. He didn’t remember how much punches and kicks he and Tommy landed, but it seemed enough. Sarah walked home peacefully again. But peace eluded Joel from then on. He was raising a girl. He could remember how his female friends in school had to keep themselves safe- keys in between their fingers, a trusted male walking them home when it got dark. He thought nothing of it then, even walked some of his friends home to keep them safe.

It was different experiencing it as a dad. Now men were part of the list of things he had to worry about- concussion from football, period cramps, eating too much chocolate, fucking terrorists taking out goddamn buildings— He cursed the part of him that once wanted his little girl to grow up faster so he didn’t have to change diapers anymore. He would take diapers over this any day.

4th March 2002

“Uh huh,” he hummed as the client hammered on about his good for nothing son who he caught smoking weed and sneaking out to some party. He would’ve whipped out the picture of Sarah in his wallet and rubbed it in the man’s face that his kid never got into trouble and was a straight A’s student. But part of being a contractor was not being a complete fucking asshole to his clients. So he shut up.

Plus he was in no mood to brag.

He returned home late. Again. It had become the topic of all his fights with Sarah. He could understand why she would be angry. But understanding didn’t put money in his pocket or food on their table. It most certainly did not go towards Sarah’s college funds. Animals were what took up her thoughts these days. She brought home a ton of books from the library, ranting off about the different animals and how she wanted to take care of them for a living.

This obsession had stayed longer than the last one. She he believed their neighbor’s dog was to blame. And the stray cat that followed her home to get some scraps of food.

He would’ve brushed it off as his sweet daughter being kind to every fucking thing all the time. Well, he did. Until she dropped the bomb.

Veterinary medicine.

Curious, he slipped into the library close to a store he was building and sat in front of the computer. The number had enough zeroes in it for him to need a doctor and since he couldn’t afford the human one, a veterinary doctor like his kid wanted to become. It wasn’t something he could afford. Not a pet to satiate her obsession with, not a doctor for himself and certainly not enough to make Sarah an animal doctor.

He had just finished paying off the house and now this… Couldn’t she have chosen a different job to do with animals? Or relegated puppies to hobby instead of career. But the puppies weren’t the problem. He was.

No matter what education she decided on, it would end up breaking his back. When at the library, he had gone over a few other degree costs. While not as expensive as medicine, they were still significant costs. There was a little bit of inheritance from his parents, he had started an account in her name and kept his share of the money in it. But it wouldn’t be enough for a college degree.

Sarah’s anger over him not coming home on time hurt. Missing her games and not cooking her the best meals made him realize the failure he was as a dad. But by god he wouldn’t fail to give her a good education. Had he had that, he would be able to give her a better life. And he would be damned if he didn’t try his hardest to give her the education to reach her dreams.

27th September 2003

Sarah Miller came into the world crying when the doctor handed her to him, small and covered in blood. He took her into his arms then, his hospital gown red with her blood and he held her to his chest. His voice trembled as he introduced himself to her.

“Oh, baby girl…” he’d said as he looked down in wonder at the person who would become his entire world. “It’s daddy,” he said as tears of joy streamed down his cheeks. There would be no one adopting her. He wouldn’t give her to anyone else. No one could care for her the way he did.

She left the world the same, crying and gasping for breaths. She was still light in his arms, too easy to carry and still so little. The blood her father gave returned to him, oozing out of her bullet wound and covering him in his failure. He was supposed to have cared for her much better than anyone else could have.

His mother had taken her from his arms then, telling him she knew better, excited to see her grandchild even though she’d thought until then that they would give her away to another family. His brother tried to take her from him now. He held her closer, a whimper akin to that of a wounded animal escaping his lips. The chaos reeling on around them and the sobs that wracked his body weren’t enough to convince him that his world had ended.

A pole marked her grave, dug hurriedly by her beloved uncle.

“We’ll be back, okay?” He reassured the girl’s father, his hands squeezing his shoulder. Stifling a sob, he removed a chain from around his neck, a pendant shining silver from the light of the moon that sat peacefully in the sky as though unaware of the chaos underneath her.

He wrapped his chain around the pole.

MILLER

THOMAS R

9913387701

B POS

CHRISTIAN

A lot would change in the next two decades. But the dogtag would stay on the pole above her. Marking the grave of a child well loved, a name she shared and the type of blood he could’ve donated to her to save her life. The little girl would rest, but the man who had to be dragged away from her grave never would. He would wander, much like the zombies themselves, trying to find his purpose.