pairing *:·゚ afab!reader x boston!qzjoel miller
wc *:·゚1.6k
warnings *:·゚ mention of being catcalled, reader being cornered by a group of men, joel saving the day the only way he knows how (with his fists), mentions of stitching, openish wounds, blood, and alcohol, slightly insecure!joel/soft!joel worried about being too much, just some pretty pure fluff, methinks :)
an *:·゚this is heavily inspired by this post, because i saw it earlier today and couldn’t get this idea with joel out of my mind! nothing crazy, just a little ficlet with some tender joel. hope y’all enjoy!
synopsis *:·゚ joel rears his big, brown puppy dog eyes at you while you’re stitching him back together. a promise is made.
“Stop lookin’ at me like that,” the words are muttered, accompanied by the sharp snip of your scissors and the slight rumble of thunder in the distance.
The hand on the back of your thigh squeezes you gently. “Like what?”
There’s something playful in his voice, in his usually rough and rich voice. It’s not the typical tone that someone who just got into a fight with three other men would usually have. But then again, Joel Miller wasn’t really the typical type of man.
Your eyes narrowed at the man sitting on the bathtub ledge before you, taking in the bloody mess he was. He had a gnarly gash on the top of his head, one that had required you to dust off your stitching skills. His nose looked like it had been broken (again) and there was an array of blood and dirt littering his face like a dark constellation of stars.
You weren’t even sure if half the blood on him was his own.
The alcohol bottle made a gulping noise as you tipped it onto your towel, the glass clinking as you set it back on the bathroom counter before returning between Joel’s spread legs. His hands, which were also bloody from split knuckles, cupped the back of your thighs. His thumbs worked softly against the outer seam of your jeans, though his fingers dug into your thighs as you gently pressed the towel against the cut between his eyes.
“I don’t know,” you replied, gaze narrowed in on the bridge of his nose as you cleaned the area. You couldn’t miss his big brown eyes watching you, though; the one hanging light in the bathroom reflected in the darkness of his irises as he stared up at you in… “Awe. You’re lookin’ at me like you’re in awe of me or something.”
A chuckle passed through his lips before his eyes winced a little, the laughter no doubt causing the split on his lip to widen. This man had been beaten to hell and back, and all of it had been for you. As cheap as it was to say it, though… you should’ve seen the other guys.
Earlier this evening, you had been walking through the lower end of the QZ with one of your friends, watching as the local kids took turns running through a broken fire hydrant that was spewing water everywhere. When you left, taking back alleys and walking on broken sidewalks, you had been cornered by a group of men who seemed to have been drunk.
A catcall here, a few misplaced hands there, and one swift tug of your bag was all it took before the biggest of the men had been pulled out of the group, exclaiming loudly as a fist connected with his cheek.
You hadn’t even realized Joel had been around, though you should’ve known better; he had a tendency to lurk around the apartment building when you stayed out later in the night. You had a clear view of the front door to the building from where you were cornered, so you could imagine that Joel had witnessed, well, everything.
The fight had ended quicker than you expected, if you were honest. Joel had a lot of pent up anger that he was always happy to expel with the help of his fists, and even though it wasn’t a fair fight, he held his own. He was bleeding and bruised, sure. But he scared the hell out of the other men enough for them to stumble away from the sidewalk without sparing another glance at you.
“Well, maybe I am. Whatcha goin’ to do about it?” There he was again, with that teasing tone. As if you weren’t wiping off blood from his face after stitching his forehead back together.
Your eyes rolled. “Someone’s feeling charming tonight, huh?”
You tossed the alcohol-soaked rag onto the counter behind you, reaching for the clean one you had placed on the toilet lid right next to all the other supplies from the first aid kit. Joel reached behind him, helping you run the faucet in the bathtub long enough to get the towel wet, his hand resuming that spot on the back of your thigh after shutting it off.
Gently swiping at his skin, the once pristine (well… mostly pristine) white towel soon became a mix of red and brown as you cleaned off his face. In this position, you were barely taller than Joel, but that still meant he had to lift his eyes upwards to look at you. He looked like a damn puppy, gazing up at you as if you were about to give him his favorite treat.
As if you had hung the sun and the moon and all the stars in the sky yourself, but just for him.
“‘m always charming, baby.” He winked one of those big eyes at you, causing your face to heat up as you brushed his hair back to clean off the top of his forehead. “That’s why I have you cleanin’ me up right now after I defended your honor.”
“My honor?” You couldn’t help but snort, pulling the now dirty towel away from his skin to fully face him. “Joel Miller, you are ridiculous.”
You moved to step away, to go grab another towel to help with the cut on his bottom lip, but his grip on your thighs tightened and he hauled you into him. The squeal that left your mouth would’ve made you embarrassed if it hadn’t made Joel laugh out loud, his chest rumbling against yours as he held you tight to him.
“Yeah, I might be. But you still love me anyway, don’t you?”
And there it was.
That slight desperation in his voice that had you realizing why he was acting so playful. That neediness in his tone, the one seeking out the affirmation that yes, you still loved Joel, despite his darker tendencies. That you still cared for him, still wanted him to care for you in the only way he knew how sometimes. That he hadn’t turned you away by his actions tonight, even if he was just trying to protect you.
He knew in his mind that he may have gone a little too far with some of the men surrounding you, but when he saw you pressed up against the brickside of the building, clutching your bag on your shoulders and trying to evade the dirty hands of the men trying to take advantage of you, something in him just snapped. He had no excuse other than pure hatred for the men trying to touch, trying to claim you.
As if you weren’t his and his alone.
Joel didn’t often lose control like that in front of you though, and he hadn’t missed the way you watched the event with eyes blown wide, the way you had flinched each time his fists landed on someone else, or when someone else’s fists connected with his body. It was only when you were helping him into the apartment, his arm slung over your shoulder, that he felt worried that he might’ve scared you away.
And you recognized that now, with his question. With the way his eyes were big, unwavering on your face as he looked for any sign of you backing out. Of you leaving him.
Your hands rested on either side of his face, gently brushing back his hair and being mindful of the fresh stitches taking up space on the right side. “Joel, there is nothing you could ever do that would make me stop loving you.”
Your words were firm, giving Joel no room to look for any hidden meanings or hesitant feelings. His eyelids fluttered for a brief second, and you could see the relief that flooded his body afterwards; his shoulders dropped down half an inch as his posture went from rigid to relaxed. His chest expanded as he took in a big breath of air, letting it pass through his nose with a quick nod of his head.
“Promise me?” His hand found its way to the base of your neck, tilting your head ever so slightly so that your forehead rested against his. You inched it to the side, avoiding the cut, and nodded your head.
“I swear.”
Even though it had to have hurt him, he pressed his mouth against yours, capturing your bottom lip in between his in a deep, desperate kiss. The taste of blood lingered on your lips afterward, but you could tell that he needed this. That he needed some proof that he wasn’t as unlovable as he felt, that he wasn’t undeserving of love, your love, specifically.
And you were more than happy to provide that proof, for however long he needed it.
Latest update from Robbie Williams, the tumblr'est man not on Tumblr. I particularly like his suggestion of starting mental dumpster fires as a method of emotional regulation.
Transcript:
Top left, a humanish figure with a heart for a head; text written on the figure reads "Let your light flood out; spread that shit everywhere."
Top right, a cassette tape (kids, ask someone over forty) done in pastel colors and labeled "mix tape". It has a larger label reading "The demons will not die. Fight them bravely."
Center, a drawing of a green dumpster, open, with a gas canister nearby; it is captioned "Put your thoughts in this Dumpster. Cover them in Petrol, set fire to them. Close hatch. Walk away."
Lower left and right are typewritten text on cream colored paper. On the left, it reads "Oh, how nice. Life advice from an idiot." On the right, "When I mentioned hysterectomy I really opened a can of wombs."
Epic and cool Papered Jam reference be upon ye (og PJ by @7goodangel)
YA so this is that PJ variant I’ve posted a couple times and made that dtiys for, and yes the mc just stands for main character. I’ve called them mc pj as a placeholder for the longest time cuz I’m slow with names, and so it just ended up sticking for me even after the story was later dubbed PJ’s resolve ;3
Under the cut is an alt ref sheet with updated versions of my other PJ outfits from this post, plus some rambling about the designs lol
Like og PJ, the only non-ink garment she wears is the scarf gifted to her by Ink. But for mc pj, that wasn’t always the case. The outfit you see on the little PJ was also created by him, and they’re hydrophobic clothes meant to help maintain PJ’s form and keep the strings from being exposed. And for the rain boots, I really liked a headcanon I came across that little kid PJ could wear them to keep ink from tracking everywhere (they just gotta be emptied from time to time lol)
Years later, PJ would start to create clothes for herself that look and feel pretty close to what Ink could do, but that’s only as long as she’s in contact with them, because like with pretty much all of her creations, they’ll melt back into ink if left alone for too long. (And for the shedding, rather than tracking ink everywhere she goes she usually just throws away the shoes she wears after a while and then remakes them with newer ink)
The blotch change on the right side of his face is because of error’s tear tracks, I kinda wanted this PJ to take a little bit more after him forrr reasons (would’ve been more obvious if it stayed fully cyan but I colored it before remembering there’s already so much cyan in top half of the design… so now there’s a yellow outline like the pink splotch)
What are they in the bedroom? (Sub, Dom, or Switch): (NSFW)
With Kid, Killer, and Heat
Kid:
Switch, leaning toward sub:
Starting off strong with our hot tempered captian, I believe hes a switch mainly because hes the captain everywhere else except the bedroom.
Dont get me wrong, he'll have your ass in the air if that's what you want. But god damn it does he want to be the pillow princess sometimes.
Hes not gonna tell you that tho
He'd rather die than tell you that, so pick up on his mood why dont you?
He's the biggest brat in the grand line and you cant tell me otherwise, walking by and smacking your ass in front of the crew, calling you crude nicknames; the works.
He's also not gonna make it easy to dominate him either, just to piss you off
When you get him down hes not gonna stop complaining until you have him overstimulated and his eyes are rolled to the back of his head.
Killer:
Switch, leaning toward dom:
He's a pleasure dom mostly.
Top or bottom he's gonna be in control manually while you tell him how you want it.
Like he'll nut on the bed while giving you the best head of your life, but your gonna have to ask him for it.
You want him to treat you like a queen in the bedroom? Cool, he'll have you squirting by the end of the night.
Want him to toss you around, spit in your mouth and call you names? Ok, what's the safe word?
He's also a tease, the kiss everywhere but the place you need him to and then proceed to give attention to that spot only till your climbing away type of tease.
But he makes up for it with massages and kisses
Heat:
Sub:
Oh my sweet Heat, with those big sad eyes and permanent frown.
Please call him a good boy while riding his face
Pull his hair while you blow his back out with your strap
Treat him sweet and tell him hes doing a good job pleasing you
Ride him and ask him if he deserves to cum.
Make him whimper and whine and please, please just let him cum he's been such a good boy. (I have a favorite)
Let him cum, but then keep making him cum until hes a pretty drooling whiny mess.
Please take care of him after, poor baby is exhausted
I tried filling in a genshin ship chart I found on the hoyoapp, though I edited in some Fontaine characters and changed the categories.
You can't even see most of it because I like so many ships.
Literally, I'm just oh yeah they exist? Why not try putting them together in a box shake them a few times and see what chemistry experiment results we achieve. I do have pictures of these where I separated the likes and everything so it's easier to see but... does it matter wwww
I'm almost fully fed with my otps. If I write Lumine would anyone write chilumi with me--- //smacked
Edit: I did make separate files but the yellow is still a spiderweb.
I might just go on a huge tangent on here so I sincerely apologize, but I think this is something you've slightly touched on before, so maybe it's interesting to you? About the fact that literally Nobody on the staff/people who work behind the scenes of everything in the kpop industry are credited, mentioned or acknowledged for their work (other than, for example, the surface level “the designer deserves a raise!!!” that i so often see in mv comments :/). What I wanted to talk about specifically though is the company’s complete lack of crediting of these people?? I wanted to look into who directed this new mv that just dropped that I really liked the artistry, editing, and general composition of, but I found absolutely nothing across the group’s yt videos or their pages of who the director is, perhaps the set designer, editor, etc. Utterly taken aback, I checked the descriptions of other kpop music videos, from the most popular to more unknown groups (Twice, Dongkiz, to name a few), and again, nothing. I thought I was going insane, so I looked at mvs for like Amercian bands, and their video details are completely filled with the information of the producer, the recording studio, mixer, master, etc. etc, my point is: so much more than just the group’s twitter or merch page??? I’m like what is going on?? I noticed the kpop mv's only list licensing info at least, but so did the american ones? Idk. It’s either me not knowing where to look, or maybe I’m late to the fact that that is just how things work with kpop group companies or the industry as whole, just giving you no details as to who the hell else worked on this mv or song. I love my biases and appreciate their contributions, but I do not buy for a second that, more often than not, they wrote or produced or mixed absolutely nothing. I think it’s a huge shame that this is done because it reinforces the false idea that the idols are the ones responsible for everything we’re seeing and listening to. Maybe that’s the point, and that’s exactly what the industry wants you to believe, which that just makes it really sad. (Wait also maybe it all gets hidden because its work for hire or the companies buy ownership copyright...)
so i want to clarify some things for you, from the perspective of someone who works in the arts industry. firstly, and most importantly: visible credits exist in western filmic media because of unions. and there are still a LOT of fields that are not unionized. for thousands of years it was fundamentally understood that no performance based art form was done singularly by an individual, so there was often not a reason for there to be 'credits' in the first place. the whole assuming the face of the project is the person who did the most work thing? that's a very new phenomenon in the history of art, and it's capitalism's fault.
secondly: um. you are definitely not looking in the right places bc people are ABSOLUTELY credited? especially music production staff? i guess if you only look at a music video then sure yea there's not always credits there, but companies literally release tracklists and highlight medleys on their main social medias AS PROMOTION that have LISTS of their arrangers and composers. hell, tan's most recent tracklist has their fucking midi programmer on it????
also..............the fucking ALBUMS HAVE CREDITS IN THEM. i can't believe i have to say this but THE ALBUMS ARE THE MAIN PRODUCT AND THEY HAVE PAGES OF CREDITS IN THEM. i...????
like???
i got addy (@hoforwonho) to send these to me, these are from a lucy album and nayeon's album, and they literally have pages of credits???
lastly, and most importantly: the only people who are being 'fooled' into thinking that idols are 'producing' most of the content are western fans. because that is the stereotype promoted BY THE WESTERN MUSIC INDUSTRY. so that is the lens through which you view the korean music industry. koreans and korean fans are well aware that idols do not produce their own artistic content, there is quite literally a stigma around idols in sk about how they are not viewed as artists SPECIFICALLY because of this. gdragon and jonghyun were HUGE deals for being some of the first idol producers + songwriters. music is a huge part of the korean entertainment industry and people who make music are very much a visible part of it. kim eana is a very famous lyricist and she has a popular radio show. kbs just did a whole competition show featuring producers as the contestants. companies are not required to put credits in music videos because music videos are only one part of a kpop cb, and they are also not obligated to put those credits in english. just because you can't find something doesn't mean that it doesn't exist and the whole industry is at fault for it.