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farmerlarrry · 3 months

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Orange Slices (Joel Miller x f!reader)

masterlist | chapter fifteen | chapter fourteen | read on ao3 | playlist

story summary: A story about finding companionship and love in the midst of chaos.

word count: 6047

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Chapter Sixteen

A heat radiating across your cheek draws you from your drunken sleep. Your eyelids are heavy as they slowly flutter open. Immediately, you are blinded by a bright light. Instinctively, you bring your hands up to cover your eyes, slowly spreading your fingers to acclimate your vision.

A sunbeam sneaks through an uncovered corner of the boarded-up window, spreading a thin streak of warm light across the darkened room. The corner of the cardboard used to board the window began curling in on itself most likely from the melting snow leaking through the poorly sealed edges.

Your head feels fuzzy, a tingling sensation quickly forms at the base of your neck as you swing your legs over the side of the couch, propping yourself upright. As the fuzziness intensifies and your head begins to spin, a small painful groan escapes from your throat and you slump back against the cushions of the couch, pressing the heels of your palms firmly against the sockets of your eyes. The pressure seems to soothe the ache a bit, offering you some sense of relief.

Steadily sucking in some of the stuffy air, you take a few deep breaths, desperate to gain a sense of clarity before having to go on patrol. You desperately hoped the influx of oxygen would solve the painful state of your hangover.

A soft snore causes you to drop your arms and open your eyes. Joel is sprawled out on the couch in front of you. One leg is bent, his foot firmly pressed against the concrete floor; the other leg is straight, his ankle propped up by the cushioned armrest and his ankle dangling just past the edge. He has one hand resting just below his ribcage, his shirt had become twisted against his torso at some point during the night, exposing a sliver of skin just above his pantline. You continue to let your eyes wander, your lips parting slightly as your mouth becomes dry.

Another soft snore comes from him, drawing your attention away from his lower section, and you slightly smile to yourself, now watching his silhouette as a whole; specifically the smooth rise and fall of his broad chest.

You let out a groan as you push yourself off the couch, tugging on the light pull of one of the lamps. You didn’t want to wake Joel–not yet. However, you wanted enough light to move around freely.

As the room illuminated, you looked toward Joel, partially afraid the much brighter light than anticipated would wake him. He remained still, another snore filling the silent room.

Running your hands along your face, you lightly slap your cheeks in a desperate attempt to wake yourself fully. You take in the now lit-up room before you as you turn slowly on your heel. Empty bottles of liquor lay on their sides, both on the coffee table and the floor. The records had been spread across the floor in front of the player that remained on. You slightly cringed at the fact, wondering how much power it must have drained from the generator.

Between the empty bottles and records, the events of last night flooded your memory. Joel holding you against his body, the steady sway of the two of you becoming one, the low vibration from his humming in your ear, his breath moist and wet against your neck.

A small shiver crawled down your spine the more you thought of it.

The rest of the night was a blur, honestly. The two of you drank…endlessly, apparently. And you talked–about what? You can’t remember. You don’t exactly recall when you laid down, if it was you or Joel who called it night, or how late you stayed up. And although patrol would surely be a bitch to do with your hangover, you weren’t entirely sure if you regretted any of it–the drinking, the dancing, the talking.

You let out a drawn-out exhale, bringing you back to the present moment. Staring for a moment longer, you decide to tidy the place up. It’s not a crime that you and Joel were there–the forgotten building wasn’t owned by anyone–but it’d be the best if no one suspected you were there with him, alone.

Starting with the bottles, you gather them up one by one; to hold them all, you end up having to use both of your arms, clutching them tightly against your midsection to keep them from clinking together and dropping. The hard part came when it was time to dispose of them in the bin. It was already half full with dozens of other glass bottles. Thankfully, you managed to keep the noise to a minimum.

Then you turned your attention to the records, stacking them how you remember James did at one point. The lone vinyl still on the player was returned to its respective sleeve, and the player was switched off.

For the most part, it looked as if the building remained untouched. In a few hours, the heavy scent of alcohol was sure to air out and then no one would know anyone had been there.

Turning away from the table that held the record player, now facing the entrance of the building, your eyes glaze up past the clock. Your heart drops as you process the hand positions and you look at it again. The clock reads half past eight, your stomach now twisting in a tight knot.

You and Joel were late for patrol.

“Shit,” you spit the profanity through your teeth, rushing to your boots that sat neatly at the side of the couch. “Joel… Joel,” You peer up at him through your brows as you frantically lace your boots. The flimsy laces kept getting tangled with your fingers, and the fact Joel had not moved a single muscle, despite you yelling his name furthered your frustration.

Before your mind could process it, your actions becoming a blur in your state of mind, you were by his side, your hand slightly hesitating before gently shaking him. He let out a groggy moan which resulted in you shaking him a bit more aggressively. This time, his eyelids fluttered a few times before opening and narrowing at you in annoyance.

He incoherently grumbled something, bringing his hand up to his eyes and covering them. You glanced once more at the clock, turning on your heel toward the door.

“We’re late. Time to get up.” Your tone is sarcastically sweet as you grab his jacket from the coat rack and toss it toward him. It lands just short of the couch and Joel grabs it midair before it can fall to the ground.

“What?” Joel asked in a low and heavy tone, his face twisting in confusion.

Zipping up your jacket, you put one of your hands on the threshold of the door. “Patrol,” you simply state.

Joel scoffs, standing from the couch and shrugging on his jacket.

“What are you talking about, it’s only–” He starts and you poke your head in one last time, just enough to see him glance up at the wall clock. “Shit.”

–

Joel is trailing behind you as you rush through the town square toward the entrance. Your backpack straps keep slipping off your shoulders, so as to not waste any time, you decided to not adjust them properly against your body–you’d do it once you were on Lucky and past the gates.

Joel kept whispering profanities to himself, trying to adjust his belt, the straps of his backpack, kicking at his loose shoelace all while trying to keep up with you; you wanted to tell him that doing that would only slow him down more, but decided to keep your mouth shut, and just focus on getting to your destination.

“You know, I’ve never overslept,” Joel calls out after you, his voice breathy and strained. “Not once.”

“Me either,” You respond somewhat bitterly. “Guess there’s a first time for everything, right?”

Joel responds with an amused snort.

As you come closer to the stables, you see James’ back, in a conversation with one of the stable hands. Your lungs were now burning and the cool air was steadily making each breath feel like glass shards in your chest.

“Fuck,” The word came out sharp. Joel let out a small hm, seemingly curious of your dismay.

You look over your shoulder at him, his hand is fumbling with the buckle of his belt–a sight you’d usually relish, but right now…all you could think about was James and whatever bullshit he was going to stir up now. You hate admitting this, you deserved to be scolded for being late. The thing that bothered you the most was the fact that James would be the one doing it.

Blinking once, then twice, you jut your chin in James’ direction. Joel quickly caught on, letting out an annoyed groan.

The stable hand made eye contact with you, his eyes widening before glancing away, focusing back on James; his mouth moving–saying something–and admittedly nodding. One more glance toward you, he then lifted his hand pointing a curled finger in your direction, trying to be subtle. As James turned, the other male quickly retreated into the stables.

James was pissed, you saw it all over his face; his cheeks stained pink, his mouth set in a deep frown, and his eyebrows tightly knitted together. A fire burned in his bright blue eyes when he noticed Joel straggling behind you.

You slowed your pace, a part of you wanted to go back to last night and live in that moment forever. You didn’t want to deal with James or his animosity toward you or Joel, you just wanted whatever was between the two of you to be done and over with; for the two of you to just pretend that you were nothing more than strangers.

Setting your eyes just past James on the wooden gate leading to the stables, you start toward him angling your body so you will just barely pass by him. If James was smart, given the past week, he’d keep quiet, not daring to make a move toward you. Sure he was a nice guy, like Charles said, but he had no idea how to take a hint–and when he finally got it, he acted like a child going and telling on you to Maria and Tommy.

Just as you are about to pass him, a breath of relief about to escape your lungs, James takes a step in front of you. The undesired closeness causes you to stagger back, putting a few feet between you and him. His nose crinkled as he squinted in the morning sun, shielding his eyes with his hand as he took you in.

“You’re late.” He said quietly, his tone had no fluctuations and wasn’t portraying the anger previously portrayed on his face. If anything he just sounded bored.

Glancing over your shoulder, Joel stayed a step behind you, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket. You could tell he was trying to seem uninterested in James, and maybe if you didn’t know him it would appear that way; but you knew James was one smart-mouthed remark from being socked in the face.

“Yeah, thanks,” was all you could manage to get out. You tried to step around him, but he reached out grabbing your arm, pulling you back toward him. Joel instantly came between the two of you breaking James’ hold of you and pushing him back.

James frowned looking between you and Joel as he staggered backward, grabbing the fence to steady himself. “I mean that you’re too late,” he continued, peering past Joel and looking directly at you. “I already sent Drew and Nora to cover your patrol.”

“We’ll go out and send them back.” Joel grumbled, his knuckles white as he gripped onto the strap of his backpack. James shifted his stance, now looking at Joel. The anger showed on his face again.

“It’s too late,” he stated again, this time more firmly. “I’m sure you’ll find somewhere else to be useful today.”

Before James could completely finish his sentence, Joel stormed past him, knocking his shoulder firmly into James’. James let out a small yelp, shooting a death glare in Joel’s direction. You didn’t move a muscle, watching Joel push open the gate with so much force it slapped against the wooden fencing, faintly mumbling something to himself that you couldn’t hear clearly.

When you look back at James, he’s rubbing his shoulder, his lips tightly pressed together.

“It’s not like I just sent them off in your place, I hope you know that.” He said as he took a step toward you now that Joel was gone. His eyes locked onto yours. “I went to your house when you didn’t show up. You weren’t there so then I went to Joel’s… I tried looking for you, I didn’t have to do that.” He was shaking his head.

You just nodded, tugging on your bottom lip with your teeth. It seemed as if the longer you didn’t say anything, the more desperate looking James became. After glancing between the open stable doors and James several times, you walked past James.

“Wait,” He called after you, and without thought, you stopped, keeping your back toward him. “Can we talk real quick?”

You let out a small scoff, rolling your eyes. “Now you want to talk?” You raised your eyebrows as you turned to face James.

“What? I–” His tone raised loud enough for you to look around. The few people lingering shot some glances toward you, a feeling of insecurity taking over.

“Keep your voice down.” You abruptly cut him off, glowering at him, before he could say something you really wish he wouldn’t say loud enough for others to hear. He kept his face as hard as stone.

“I don’t like us being mad at each other,” He said much quieter this time. His words nearly made your jaw drop and a flash of anger flooded your veins.

“Are you being serious, James?” You kept the same tone as before; harsh and dry. James cocked his head to the side, his eye darting between yours. “You tried getting me kicked off of patrol duty by lying and then you actively avoided me. I tried several times to talk to you and then it got to the point where Charles had to talk to you for me.”

Embarrassment washed over James and he looked down at the ground, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “I’m sorry,” His voice was quiet but sounded sincere. “Charles did talk to me, and–and he made me realize how stupid I was acting. I’m–”

You stared at him a moment, running your tongue over the grooves on the roof of your mouth, your lips pursing as a result. His shoulders were hunched making him look small and vulnerable. You couldn’t tell if it was all an act and a way to get sympathy, or if he was truly just that; small and vulnerable.

“Are you only sorry because it backfired and you got in trouble instead?” You narrowed your eyes at him and crossed your arms. He glanced up to you, only to return his gaze to his boots.

“I was upset–” His voice sounded weak.

“Then be a fucking adult and deal with it,” The words came out much harsher than you intended them to. James looked up at you through his brows, this time holding your gaze. You could have sworn you saw his eyes glistening with tears; the thought made your stomach go sour.

James simply nodded before you brushed past him.

–

When you entered the stables, the stable hand whom you never learned their name immediately looked up from fumbling with one of the tangled hoses. A hint of judgment lingered in their eyes, tracking you as you walked in. As quick as the expression came over them, it disappeared, giving you a single nod, dropping the hose, and exiting through one of the side exits to the training grounds.

Embarrassment flooded your senses. Whatever he had been talking about with James, surely it was about you. Your eyes scanned the rotting wooden beams that needed replacement, biting down hard on the inner part of your cheek.

Clattering from the back of the building tipped you off as to where Joel was and you made a beeline to him, distracting you from your embarrassment.

Walking down the aisle, you realized most of the stalls were empty and there were no other stable workers aside from the one that had been talking to James. You and Joel were the only ones there. Quite an uncommon occurrence, but not entirely implausible. Perhaps they were out loading hay from storage to bring back and considering how many empty stalls there were, a good majority had taken the horses out for rides.

When Joel finally came into view, he was throwing one of the saddles up and over onto Callus, a small grunt coming from his throat.

“James was serious about not letting us go.” You yelled out to him as you entered the larger space. For a short moment, he stopped, only to continue, initially not saying anything in response.

Walking up to Lucky, you ran your hand down her forehead toward her muzzle. She quietly neighed, pushing into your touch. A small smile spread across your face, one that quickly disappeared.

“I’m not staying here all day.” He eventually responded. You gave him a single nod as to say fair enough, and took a seat on a low wooden stool, kicking at the stray hay that sparsely covered the floor.

Once Joel finished, he took a seat on an overturned half barrel next to you. You gave him a sidelong glance before focusing back on the two horses. Joel crossed his arms, letting out an exhausted sigh.

“What the fuck is his problem?” He finally said. “We were never, I don’t know… on good terms, but since I’ve come back, he’s actively gone out of his way to be a dick. I just want to fucking–” Joel let out a low grunt, stopping himself from going further.

You sucked in some air while shaking your head. “It’s me, Joel.” You half lied, knowing that it's not entirely you; it’s because of how much time you spend with Joel that has James so pissed off. Joel narrowed his eyes at you, seemingly confused. “He’s upset with me, so he takes it out on everyone else. I wouldn’t take it personally.”

You put your elbows on your knees and dropped your face into your palms. Joel’s eyes were burning a hole through you and you desperately hoped he wouldn’t press further. Surely by this point, he’s figured out that the petty drama you originally told him it was… was not just petty drama.

Your head began to buzz, likely induced by a combination of your hangover and stress.

Joel’s sigh caused you to give him a sidelong glance. It didn’t appear that he was too focused on you–it didn’t seem like he was focused on you at all in fact. It was good that he didn’t press further on the matter of James, because finally, things were moving in the direction you’ve been wanting to with Joel.

“We could go for a hike, take the long way to the outlook.” He suggested and leaned one arm on the knee farthest from you, shifting his body toward you. A hint of a smile appeared on his face; somewhat sympathetic looking, but you liked it when he smiled, no matter the cause.

“I’d like that very much,” You replied, returning his smile.

–

Joel wasn’t kidding when he suggested taking the long way. This path winded up and down, around small hills and past fast moving streams. It took about twice as long to get there, but it was nice to get your heart pumping.

Naturally, Joel took the lead. It seemed like it would be a good idea for the both of you to burn off some of your pent up emotions, so neither of you said much other than the occasional direction from Joel or a random comment about the surrounding nature.

The path you took today eventually led to the much shorter main path. When you finally arrived, you passed Joel who took a seat at the base of the boulder, opting for a seat closer to the edge of the cliff. The sky was clear today, bright blue and not a single cloud in sight. The air still has a chill to it, sending goosebumps up and down your arms and legs. Instinctively, you rub your hands against your limbs, trying to warm them up and cursing yourself for mindlessly forgetting your jacket on Lucky’s saddle.

“Here,” A warm voice appeared behind you and you twisted your torso to face the sound. Joel came up behind you, outstretching his jacket to you.

You give him a small smile, shaking your head, which prompted him to quickly roll his eyes. Before you could reject him further, his jacket was already draped around your shoulders. He took a seat next to you on the cliff and stared out toward Jackson.

“I know I’ve already sort of told you this, but it's nice that you’re back.” You say breaking the oddly comforting silence. He snapped his neck toward you, a look of surprise took over his expression; a look that you just stared at with wide eyes.

“Yeah?” Joel replied breathily. “I don’t think a lot of people feel that way” He shook his head.

Opening your mouth, you found yourself at a loss for words. You weren’t quite sure what to say back. Joel wasn’t exactly well liked in the community. He definitely wasn’t hated–by most–he was just…misunderstood, causing a lot of people to just ignore him. You knew firsthand how unpleasant he could be at times, plus you doubted he was ever around long enough to make any sort of deep connection with anyone. You weren’t even sure if that was something he desired.

Joel cleared his throat, snapping you out of your thoughts. “But I suppose I’m glad one person does,” He immediately followed up, flashing you a smile and nudging you with his elbow. You just shrug, the corners of your mouth slightly turning upward.

“When you were gone, I used to come up here quite often, usually after I got done with patrol. That was part of what James told Maria, saying it was unsafe and was a poor decision that he advised against,” You said, mimicking James’ claims in his tone of voice which made Joel chuckle. “Sometimes I’d stay a few hours, other times I’d stay until dinnertime. It was… um… this place was really the only place that brought me total peace, so I guess what I’m trying to say is thank you for showing it to me.”

“What would I do out here?” He sounded curious.

You let out a long hum. “It depended on my mood, really. Sometimes I’d write, a lot of the time I’d read–it really made the time go by fast. Other times I’d just think. I don’t know, I just felt like this is the only place I felt like I could just… be me.” Your eyes were locked onto the edge of the cliff, your eyes frozen and unmoving.

“And here I thought all you did was drink with your friends who aren’t really your friends.” He joked.

You scoffed, half rolling your eyes as you shifted your attention to him. “Now that’s…complicated. I mostly tolerated them for Nessa’s sake. Sometimes they were fun, I won’t lie, but most of the time they were pretty–”

“Insufferable.” Joel completed your sentence, his eye shooting toward you with a petty smile on his face. You let out a low laugh, agreeing with him with a nod. A laugh escaped past his lips, one he quickly stifled with a dry cough.

“Remember how I told you I met Nessa at boarding school?” Joel hummed in confirmation. “Before Tommy found me…before I came to Jackson, all I could think about was her. Out of everyone I could have yearned for, I just wanted my best friend. I knew it wasn’t going to change the situation or make it any better, but…”

You dropped your head and loose strands of hair now cover your face.

“I love her to death, but she’s so different now. I never thought it would be in the realm of possibilities to see her again…now it just feels like the universe is laughing in my face.” You forced yourself to swallow against the lump that suddenly manifested in your throat. “She’s like a stranger and part of me resents her for that, and I feel like shit for feeling that way.”

In your peripheral, you can see Joel staring at you, a blank expression on his face. Suddenly you feel stupid for expressing your feelings, ones that you should probably confine to your journal. You’d never confront Nessa about it, so what was the point of dwelling on them?

“I’m sorry, you don’t…care. This is stupid.”

“No, I’m…” He began. “People change, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. Either way, a part of you will always want the old them back. Don’t apologize because I get it, trust me.” Tucking your hair behind your ears, you look at Joel. “Every time I come back, Tommy seems like a whole new person, it's always sort of a shock. I still think of him as my unresponsible little brother who can’t handle his alcohol or emotions for shit. It leaves me…stunned when I realize how much he’s grown and changed. And sometimes I miss who he was because he’s become so serious in a sense. I’m sure he has some of the feelings about me, perhaps Nessa does with you.”

You let out the breath of air you had been holding in and allowed your eyes to wander back to Jackson, roaming all over the different parts of the community. It seemed so small from up here. You narrow your eyes to where the stables are, letting your vision blur a bit.

“It seems like she hates me.” You say lazily. “I don’t know what I did that made her feel that way toward me. Am I that bad of a person?”

“No.” Joel nearly snapped back, the word coming out quick and harsh. “You aren’t a bad person, not even close.”

Dropping your head slightly, you slowly turn your head back to Joel. He has his legs stretched out, leaning back onto the palms of his hands. His chin is tilted upward as the sun caresses his tanned skin. Your heartbeat quickens as you look at him, a feeling of breathlessness coming over you.

You begin tracing your eyes along where his jawline would be if it had not been hidden by his salt-and-pepper facial hair. His adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, his eyelids fluttering closed for a moment and a peaceful look overtaking his expression.

You couldn’t stop yourself from taking his looks in. Rugged and worn down, but so damn attractive.

Beads of sweat begin to form on his forehead. As one begins to slide down smoothly past his temple, your eyes lock onto the scar. Deep and twisted looking, yet small enough to remain unseen if you weren’t looking for it. Your stomach went sour the longer you looked, not out of repulsion, but because of how you received your own scar, the one identical to his.

“Ca–can I ask you something?” Your mouth moved before you could completely commit to the question, causing you to stumble on your words.

He raised his eyebrows, before opening his eyes and shooting a sideways glance toward you. Joel gave you a slight nod as to tell you to continue.

“What's your scar from?” The words seemed illegal as they came out, causing you to slightly cringe. It was dangerous territory asking these kinds of questions nowadays.

There was a hitch in his breath before he dropped his head. He drew in a deep, long breath as he peered up toward you. Immediately all you saw was pain in his eyes, a darkness that you couldn’t explain, but could understand.

“I'm sorry, never mind.” The words came out quickly as you wrapped your arms around your torso.

“No, no it's uh…” Joel responded, trailing off. He inhaled sharply before smoothly letting the air out of his nostrils. “A gunshot.”

He nodded distantly, his thoughts leading him a million miles away from you. You waited for him to elaborate but it was apparent after a few long seconds of silence that was all he was going to offer up. You weren’t going to push him further on the matter.

You just nod, eventually pointing up to your own scar “I ask because I have one too…”

A complex look comes over him and he seems to hesitate, “How–how’d you…” His eyebrow twitched as he stumbled over his words.

“Same as you. It was a FEDRA soldier that I had been doing some work for under the table. I guess I pissed him off somehow and he came to my place in the middle of the night with a gun—with the intention to kill me, not sure why he opted for a gun when everyone would have heard, but he seemed upset enough to not care if anyone heard. One of his buddies followed him though, he and I had sort of an understanding of one another and we…we were close in a certain sense. Anyway, he grabbed the gun just as it went off…the bullet grazed me, some of the shrapnel from it hitting a metal beam also hit me, so…” You brought your index finger up to your scar, running the pad of your finger over the rough edges as you recounted the night of the incident, excluding many details from being spoken. The fear you felt when you awoke to a dark silhouette standing over your bed, the cold sweat that ran down your back, the feeling of the metal against your skin, the ringing in your ears after the gun went off and how days passed and it felt like you were trying to hear underwater, until it miraculously came back. After that night you never saw the soldier you fucked over, but his friend that intervened–you saw him all the time and he was adamant about avoiding any interaction with you. When he couldn’t avoid it entirely, he never looked you directly in the eye.

“Christ,” Joel said quietly, almost as if it was meant just for him. “Well… I’m glad it didn’t work out.”

You let out a near silent sarcastic laugh, turning your attention back to the view.

“Yeah, I didn’t always see it like that. After Houston fell… I didn’t have anyone; family, Nessa,” You shook your head. “I didn’t even have myself really, I was careless because of how bad I wished I was de–” You stopped yourself before finishing completely. Surely he knew what you were going to say anyway, but you couldn’t bring yourself to actually say it out loud. “I’m happy now that it missed, though.” Your voice sounded tight.

The chirping of the birds above filled the silence that took over. If you strained your ears enough, you could have sworn you could hear the soft murmurs of the bustling community below.

“May I ask you somethin’?” Joel suddenly asked.

“Of course.” You responded immediately, focusing on two figures approaching the front gate, most likely Drew and Nora.

He took a moment before following up as if he were deeply contemplating his question. The pause made you slightly anxious prompting you to look over to him. He was running his thumb and index finger over his chin over and over.

“Why were you at boarding school?” The words finally came out and it wasn’t the question you were expecting from him.

“Oh geez,” You said breathily, your words portray how caught off guard you were. “Well, initially I had no idea why I was being sent away. My parents told me they wanted a school that would offer me much more than an education, but experiences as well. I was annoyed, but I was 15.. 16 years old at the time so I couldn’t do much about it.”

You drew in a smooth breath of air, the feelings all rushing back to you and becoming overwhelming.

“A few weeks after the spring semester started, my mom flew me out… Nessa was in the room next to me, so that’s how we met. Immediately we became best friends, inseparable, really,” You continued. “I found out a bit later that the reason they sent me away was because they were having marital problems, they wanted to get their affairs in order before deciding if they wanted to continue trying or if they should separate… I guess they didn’t want me in the middle of all of it. I was so upset with them, I refused to come home for the summer and to add insult to injury, I refused to talk to them after that.”

You paused to gather your thoughts, your eyes beginning to brim with tears. “The last conversation I had with my parents was May 15th of 2003, it was the week before school got out…I told them– I told them I hated them, that I wasn’t coming home. They tried calling many times, sending letters and packages, but I just ignored them.” The words came out weak, your chest burning with guilt.

It was like you could hear the silence on the phone between your parents and yourself all over again. You felt yourself caught between the reality with Joel and your conscious state in the painful memory of your final interaction with your parents. The realization hit you like a rock, sending your emotional state spiraling.

“Oh my God Joel,” The words came out between your heavy sobs; nasally and forced. You looked over at him with tears now streaming down your face, your chin quivering uncontrollably. “The last thing I said to my parents was that I hated them.”

Without any hesitation, Joel pulled you into his arms. His warmth engulfed you completely as you nuzzled your face against his chest. Your chest heaves as you let your emotions flow, a tightness completely taking over your chest, your muscles tensing and untensing under the emotional stress.

Joel ran his hand smoothly up and down your back, his chin resting gently on top of your head. His grasp on you was firm as if he was trying to convey to you that he wasn’t going to let you go, not until you felt like you were okay.

The birds in the surrounding trees went silent, the only noise was your muffled sobs and the whistling of the gentle breeze.

Joel squeezed you a bit tighter, “I had–I had a daughter…before.” He spoke, the words immediately piquing your attention, distracting you from your own pain. “Her name was Sarah, and she… she–I should've been there for her more, but I–” A deep sense of pain radiated from his words.

Joel struggled to speak. You heard his heartbeat quicken when he said her name and the pain in your heart only grew stronger. For you. For him… especially for him. He had a daughter before this, all the anger and resentment… it all made sense now.

You untucked your arms from your chest and wrapped them around his torso, opening your eyes to be present. You were staring at the ground; rocks and leaves and sticks.

He cleared his throat, loosening his grip around you, but not letting go completely. With one hand he grabbed your shoulder, gently squeezing it, the other hand firmly planted on the middle of your back.

“Coming from someone who was a parent, they knew… know that you love them.” His mouth is hovering over your ear as he speaks. His voice is now more stable and clear than before. “No matter what you told them, they knew.”

chapter seventeen coming soon!

painting divider | credit: @cottage-writings

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