No. 1 - Lufthansa
We begin with a large fish even by the standards of the large pond in which we operate. A very intentionally chosen large fish. Deutsche Lufthansa is Germany’s flag carrier and the second largest carrier in all of Europe by passenger volume. In 2018, they unveiled a new standard livery for their fleet of airplanes, and it...well. It’s this.
Even the presentation - good lord, is this an auto show?
My feelings on Lufthansa’s 2018 livery are visceral. There’s no mental evaluation required, no taking it in, thinking about the choices made - I look at the modern Lufthansa livery and immediately, profoundly know that I hate it. And that’s not just because of the specific choices made - which are bad - but because of the space they occupy amidst a creatively barren wasteland within livery design. This is going to be a very long post, which isn’t standard for this blog, but my goal for an introduction is to break down exactly the sort of design that made me feel the need to start doing this to begin with.
But in reality that’s only the beginning. Yes, Lufthansa’s livery is specifically disappointing, but it is so much more than that. It is the purest distillation of the greatest challenge aviation faces today, far weightier than scheduling issues, outdated IT, and runway incursions. It is not the worst example of it, not in the slightest, but it is a large airline which has a very textbook presentation of symptoms and thus feels like a great example to describe exactly what I hate about this sort of design. Let me explain.
Essentially, airlines have found a formula. It goes as such:
Almost entirely white body. (There is a name for this trend: Eurowhite.) In some cases, there may be a colour on the underside, generally either a light grey or whichever secondary shade the airline has committed to. In the case of this Lufthansa livery, it is just white.
Aside from the white body there will be either a single colour (generally some dark blue, or less often some sort of red) or a few colours, usually but not exclusively on flag carriers to match their national branding. (The proliferation of red, white, and blue flags out there means that a disproportionate number of airline liveries are these colours.) Unless it is literally just a white plane meant to be as generic as possible for short turn-overs when leasing, it will at least attempt to have some sort of design, but it will be minimal, and:
All of the detail will be on the tail. There may be coloured winglets or engine nacelles, but other than that it is only at the rear of the plane that you begin to see any interest. Usually this is just a logo, though it may be an abstract design which looks like a default tumblr header. It will often only be on the tail, with nothing at all on the body proper.
The name of the airline written in a sans-serif typeface which is set as default on at least one word processor. Rarely will anything creative be done with this. It will (usually, except in egregious cases) match the impotent attempt at graphic design which has been confined to the empennage and it will have all the charm of a large retail chain’s flyer describing the benefits you’ll definitely totally get if you work for them - sickeningly corporate. Low-cost airlines may slightly vary the theme by putting their website onto the livery, either towards the back or just instead of the airline’s name. The brave will also write it on the ventral fairing, but most don’t even bother with that simple act. Some airlines have their name written in the language spoken in the country they’re based in, usually beside the English text, but most are only in English despite operating in countries where this is not the most widely spoken language.
Not every livery which has these features is badly designed, as seemingly small changes can make all the difference. There is the occasional livery that fits most, if not all of these features that has some clever tweaks or design choices which makes me actually think it’s fine, acceptable, maybe even decent. (I have taken the initiative of making sure a few of these are among my early posts, just to demonstrate that it can be done). And some airlines depart from this entirely and come up with something even more hideous. Yet I somehow find myself respecting even these more than I do Lufthansa.
The Corporate Standard Livery Design (Lufthansesque design, if you will) is - and I do not think I am being dramatic at all here - an epidemic. Taxiing through most airports, you sometimes have to actually try to tell the planes parked around you apart in the sea of red, blue, and mostly white. And I spend a lot of time looking at planes.
These liveries do not only fail to inspire me. They instill in me a profound disgust. They are not trying to be good. They are trying to be what I described earlier - decent, not worth complaining about, because that’s cheaper and easier than designing something good. Graphic design is not anyone’s passion here. They’re just trying to toe the line. They’re so poisoned by the modern minimalist-design brain virus that they don’t realise that to be acceptable a livery this simple needs to do something interesting. There must be a creative decision made somewhere, a compelling feature, or you may as well be flying an MLA-formatted plane. In their striving for adequacy they become not just ambient, but lukewarm. They are a bottle of water which has sat in the sun for so long that when you drink it, even though you’re overheating and parched, it feels only negligibly better than the air you’ve been breathing in.
To be fair, I do not only hate the Lufthansa paintjob because it exemplifies whatever-ness. Even in an industry saturated with gross in-flight nothingburgers served with some stale biscuits and a paper cup of Lipton tea, Lufthansa manages to offend in specific and unique ways.
Throughout its long history Lufthansa has had a handful of different liveries, but from 2018 onwards this has been the situation. They’ve never been brilliant, but it’s only gotten worse over time. I normally would commit to a separate post for historical liveries, but in a move that I don’t foresee becoming particularly common I’d like to talk about the history and evolution of Lufthansa’s liveries from the golden age to now - the fall, if you will.
(image: lufthansa bildarchiv)
Their early liveries were already pretty much plain white or metal, but they still had a few features that made them seem a bit less like photocopy paper which was meant to be printed plain blue but only got through a tenth of the sheet before ink ran out. To begin with, they used a lighter blue and combined it with a vivid yellow to add some actual visual interest. The layering of the yellow over the blue where it curves around and below the nose and on the ends of the tailplane actually draws the eye. The font choice is nice and legible, spaced apart in the center of the fuselage. I imagine it was easy to read even from far away. (Shame it’s a bit blocked by the wings from some angles, though.)
(image: lufthansa bildarchiv)
This early 707 design keeps the cheatlines extending past the nose but makes them sharper than the ones on the Connie to match the sleek profile of the jet. Back when this plane was painted adding white to your plane was a choice rather than the thing everybody was doing, which allows me to respect it for the choice it was instead of considering it the factory default. The bottom half, denoted by the cheatline, is left unpainted, which only adds to the sleekness of the overall profile, and the text is clear and plain but still aesthetically pleasing. The 707 is by modern standards pretty antique-looking; you can take one look at one and tell it isn’t particularly streamlined. This paint scheme, though, makes the plane look sharp and aerodynamic, despite not being revolutionary. I would go so far as to say I like this particular livery. This is, unfortunately, as good as it gets.
Oh. Oh no...
Let’s assess the damage here. The cheatlines now simply meet at the front without wrapping down to the belly of the plane and the nose is a simple black tip. I like it when airlines paint their planes’ radomes, and I wouldn’t mind it here if not for what it was replacing. The font has been replaced with a generic sans serif font which is closely spaced and put up into a corner, like the name on a homework assignment - it’s not really part of the total package, just there for administrative purposes. Most upsetting to me is the tail. While I wouldn’t say I love the little section on the old plane, it at least felt like it belonged there, creating a second blue-and-yellow layer above the white. Its placement on the fin above where it begins to taper gives the plane a bit of an aerodynamic feel. It’s certainly not changing the world, but it feels at home in the livery.
The new fin is a sharp downgrade. With nothing to mark the transition the fin abruptly goes from the white of the upper fuselage to a shiny blue which contains an enclave of the only yellow to be found on the entire aircraft. This makes the yellow stand out, as it has nothing to tie it in with the rest of the plane, and the fin itself feels almost like it’s been Frankensteined onto the fuselage from a different plane by a different airline. There’s nothing to mediate the transition from a block of white to a block of blue, like how the cheatline separates white and grey. It just is blue now, stop asking questions. This also means that the only part of the plane that the eye is really drawn to is...the tiny portion of the whole that is the fin, which may as well be floating detached in midair.
This is foreboding. Knowing what I know now, it feels like looking back at when a romantic partner began to act strange years later, after the divorce, as you walk by the house he bought with his mistress.
(image: g najberg)
The most recent, and only, time I flew on Lufthansa was in 2014 and was aboard one of their 747-400s. (Actually, if you’d still like to fly on a passenger 747, Lufthansa is basically your only option.) At the time, they looked like this. This is...just sad. They got rid of the cheatlines, because that’s trendy now, and they painted the whole plane white and made an attempt at lip service to the old metal lower half by painting just a bit of the plane grey, like if a human stepped into a puddle of paint that only covered the very sole of their foot. And I’m being generous by showing a 747, a plane which inherently makes any livery look less boring by being interestingly shaped itself, instead of the classic slightly pointy single-decker tube. Not to mention the double-decker design makes the text vertically centered instead of the default Lufthansa look of awkwardly shoved nearly all the way up the fuselage.
In defense of the modern livery, it’s possible to argue it’s an improvement on this. Honestly, looking at them next to each other, it’s difficult to pick out which one I find less defensible.
But then you see D-AIDV, an A321 painted in a heritage livery, and you feel the immediate, visceral “no!!! no go back!!!” as you remember that this is a false dichotomy and we could have something so much better if they weren’t peer-pressured into generic modern design.
And for what? For this?
(image: hvdfonts)
For the third time, I remind you of what we have been reduced to. We have achieved a state of reductio ad absurdum where this barely qualifies as a design. This plane is more or less a white blot. You can put as many insets as you want and it is still a white blot.
I am relatively sure that the font used is literally Helvetica. EDIT: I have been informed that it is not, in fact, Helvetica, but a custom typeface that happens to look almost exactly like Helvetica. This is, in my own opinion, worse! They did apparently use Helvetica in the past, though. Here is a very detailed description of the design process of the font, which manages to contain a grand total of zero ideas.
I would hate this on its own already, but it’s also so closely spaced and located so far up that it makes me feel like I’m suffocating. In my own experience as a dyslexic person, kerning is the single weightiest feature when it comes to if I can easily read something or not. While Helvetica, ugly though it may be, is generally considered a very legible font, any benefits from that are more than cancelled out by committing to making sure the entire name of the airline fits between the frontmost two doors with room to spare. It feels almost hostile.
Now, all given, I at least somewhat enjoy the shade of blue used for this livery, which is darker than the normal fare. I do miss the way the grey broke up the endless white space, though, and I mourn the yellow even more - in addition to being something to look at, losing it has also lost any visible reference to the flag of Germany, the country for which Lufthansa is the flag carrier. They don’t even have the black part of the German flag despite that being basically free. If they went for black instead of dark blue I would honestly respect this a hell of a lot more. One of the most recognizable flags in the world and instead your airline looks like a discount SAS.
Yeah, I said it. If we want to go even further with comparisons by including airlines that aren’t Lufthansa, this is basically the SAS livery. Except not, because the SAS livery does a lot that this doesn’t.
This is about Lufthansa, not SAS. I’ll look at SAS soon enough, because comparing their look to Lufthansa’s has made me appreciate it in a way I never used to. But I don’t think I need to elaborate too much for it to be clear why SAS’s livery works and Lufthansa’s doesn’t, despite the superficial similarities. SAS took their absolutely horrid previous livery and turned it into something which might not wow anyone but at least feels uniquely theirs, while Lufthansa had something which accomplished much the same and then diluted it into nothingness, Eurowhite writ large. Two washes and you’d wonder if your Lufthansa flight is actually a Smartlynx lease.
The way that the blue slices into the bottom of the fuselage and doesn’t fully cover the tailfin is...something? It’s a design element. It’s not nearly enough to save it, but it’s a design element. However, this presents another issue specific to Lufthansa’s paint job, best demonstrated with a specific plane:
(image: lufthansa)
Lufthansa is the world’s largest operator of the Airbus A340, a somewhat eccentric airplane which is perhaps best thought of as a four-engined A330. I love this airplane, and am delighted seeing it overhead on my walk home from work, because Lufthansa is kind enough to operate a daily service with it to my home airport, but that’s beside the point. The point is this: what I have pictured is specifically the A340-600, which is the world’s second longest in-service airliner. Yes, longer than the A380 and the 747-400, and, in fact, only shorter than the 747-800. With a plane this long, the Lufthansa livery creates an incredible look of rear-heaviness. This plane looks like it should uncontrollably pitch up until it’s perpendicular to the ground every time it takes off. Of course this effect is less pronounced on shorter aircraft, but it’s still there, and I dislike it.
You can barely even tell there’s paint at all on a much smaller plane! And the white bit on the front of the rudder which looks okay on a conventional empennage looks downright horrible when it’s only on the very tip of the t-tail’s forward point.
Oh, and when you take the windows out for a freighter conversion it gets even worse.
This is a generic-brand airplane. It genuinely reminds me of generic branding. There is a specific brand that has this exact appearance and I can’t remember what it is but it’s right there and I’m fairly sure I’ve seen it at CVS. I don’t think that’s what you want to go for when designing an airline livery, especially for an airline representing a country, but if Lufthansa wasn’t going for that they’ve failed.
__________________________________________
Overall, Lufthansa’s livery is superbly boring and not terribly well thought out. It’s not worth this absolute dissertation on its own, but I’ve singled it out to complain about general trends, and for that I probably owe it an apology. Said apology is predicated on the fact that it is still a very underwhelming and bad design which could have used a lot more thought. There are a million ways this could have been made decent, and none of them were implemented because that would have taken effort and time and creative vision. I think this post actually required more time and effort than Lufthansa put into designing their planes.
That said, Lufthansa gets a final grade of D. It’s...bad, it definitely is. There’s the vague flavour of the start of something, like the very distant smell from a barbecue happening three blocks away, but is that really even a redeeming factor?
No. The second-largest airline in Europe should be able to do better. If I have to stare at rows upon rows of their planes any time I’m at a German airport, they should have the decency to make them interesting to look at.
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hello love! can i make a request for gaz x f!reader she a civilian and a florist and he keeps visiting her and they slowly fall for each other and he calls her his sunflower or something cute like that? you can make up the rest, sorry if it’s not super detailed!
Gossamer Silk Smiles
Pairing: Kyle 'Gaz' Garrick x F!Florist!Reader
Synopsis: You loved your job more than anything, and at the end of the day, even with pricked fingers and cramped muscles, you went to bed happy. It had all been going well, insanely well. You were focused; self-assured... Until he showed up.
Word Count: 6.1k
Warnings: Insane amount of fluff, this is the definition of a soft fic, beginning of a relationship
A/N: I know this man would treat me right. Also changed the nickname around a bit, but sunflowers are still prominent. Enjoy, Anon!
*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*
When you opened your flower shop, you told yourself there was no going back – no distractions or second options. This was what you loved more than anything and at the end of the day, even with pricked fingers and cramped muscles, you went to bed happy. It had all been going well, insanely well.
Until he showed up.
It had been a shitty day, one for the record books, in your opinion. Shipments for Larkspur, Zinnias, and Sunflowers had come to the shop damaged. The boxes had been so beaten up you half-believed the mail carrier had gotten into a personal disagreement with them. All initial humor aside, you were now out of this week's product as well as a good chunk of money – the flowers couldn’t even be considered that anymore, seeing as they were really just broken stems and stray crumpled pedals. Then came the unusual amount of rude customers and the building of minor inconveniences.
But to your credit, you didn’t let it get to you.
Well…externally, at least.
“Have a great rest of your day,” you force out with a strained smile to an older woman who only huffs. She stalks out of the shop with a vase full of Daylilies, Purple Cornflowers, Yarrow, and Taro leaves. “I hope your brother gets well soon–” The glass door shuts with a clatter of the small silver bell attached to the frame.
Leaning back on your heels, your eyes close; taking down a deep breath, you hope your lungs won't explode in your chest as you hold it there.
“Fucking hell.” The air flies from you in a weak groan.
Your fingers tap against the countertop, and a small, humorless, chuckle later you’re walking out to change the window sign to closed instead of open. It was well past your usual shift anyways, but the previous customer had been relentless about the ‘perfect bouquet.’
“Like there’s even such a thing,” your lips twist into an annoyed frown as you speak to yourself in a grumble. “...Should have just denied her service… Didn’t even leave a tip.”
You really wouldn’t have minded helping her that much if she had just been kinder towards you.
Grabbing the small paper sign held up by a suction-cup hook, you flip it around with little thought, already trying to plan out a way to make up for the weeks worth of ruined product. You don’t even notice the man speeding down the sidewalk until his desperate face is staring right into yours – only separated by a thin piece of glass.
Yelping, your shoulders tense at the sudden visage.
The man was around your age, tall, and had a handsome face inlaid with eyes reminiscent of deep amber. Light reflected off the iris in ways you can only describe as the glinting sun does off waves of water; gentle. Nearly soft, really. He was wearing a ball cap with an embroidered British flag on the front and had a panicked look set on his lips.
Close to the door handle, his long fingers freeze mid-air and you find the prominent muscular build and set of his shoulders staining the back of your eyelids like a movie screen. Whoever this guy was, it didn’t stray from the fact that he was attractive.
You’re not happy about it, but your mind blanks as you stare with wide eyes; heart steady in your breast.
He blinks at you, square jaw loose, also double-taking from beyond the see-through barrier. His flickering eyes flew quickly over your form just as you had ogled him moments prior.
Silly, perhaps, and childish at best, but you felt your throat tighten with stilled breath. There was a small chunk of time that you both just gawked at each other – as if Cupid had suddenly stabbed you both with one of his blots; gazes inexplicably locked as blood dripped to the floor from copper arrowheads.
If you were more gullible, you would have called it love at first sight. But you were anything but that.
Sighing, you rip your eyes away and take a breath. Opening the door with more questions than answers, you were praying that it didn’t get dark before you could help this man with whatever it is that he needed.
I can see the fucking veins on his forearms. You think as the chilled air hits your face, recalling the peek you sent to the rolled-up sleeves of this stranger’s blue button-down.
The bell above you dings as you set the door in the crook of your shoulder, leaning out halfway. Clearing your throat, you ask steadily, “Can I help you, Sir…?”
He sets his stubbled jaw, vision snapping to the side for a split second that was so fast you almost missed it.
“Erm…my apologies, Ma’am, for rushing up like that.” He lets off a chuckle, and the flag on his hat is quickly explained away by the prominent accent. “Hope I didn’t worry you.”
Fighting the uptick of your lips you feel your chest let go of a sliver of tension. He was smiling slightly at you, the khaki pants he wears creasing as his feet set themselves; his brown eyes never leave your face.
Respectful, you think.
“Not every day you have people trying to barge into a flower shop. Trust me, Sir, I sleep well knowing no one wants to rob me.” Attempting a light joke, the stranger's chest jerks in a silky laugh. The tips of your ears heat, the blood under your skin rushing.
His laugh was like a blanket during a storm; a cup of hot chocolate during a blizzard. Could you be attracted to a laugh? You seemed to ask yourself. Already your mind was coming up blank at this, all of a sudden, welcome intrusion.
“Well, I’d imagine that’s a good thing, then?” He teases showing off pearly white teeth.
“Incredibly.” Opening the door wider, you beam. “You’re lucky I was still here. I’d normally be all locked up by now.”
You should be closing – telling this stranger to leave and come back tomorrow – but something inside of you told you to just open the door. It was illogical, unprofessional, and downright strenuous on your already foul mood…but this individual had such an air to him that you wondered who exactly he was. He made your skin pule with goosebumps.
“Thanks,” the man utters as he slips inside, nodding his head to you and fixing the position of his hat with one hand. “Yeah…I’m incredibly sorry about this but I’m runnin’ on a bit of a time crunch, to be honest with you. I’ve been checking every shop in town – you’re the only one with the lights still on…” He looks to you, “I really hope I’m not causing any trouble for you, Ma’am.”
Slipping your fingers into your work apron’s pockets, you let the door shut and tilt your head to the side, gaze softening at the pure candor of his words.
“Emergency flower orders are always my favorites to work on. It’s no problem, really.” You say your name as an introduction and ask what he would like to purchase as he scratches at the back of his neck with a boyish twist to his lips.
“Kyle Garrick.” He sticks out his hand and you shake it instantly. Kyle’s hands are warm despite the cold weather outside, and you have to stop yourself from melting into him as you pull back. But already your skin tingles. “Actually, I was wondering if you might be able to help me on that front. What flowers would be the best for an apology?…just not something too flashy, if that’s possible.”
He trails with an awkward chuff, obviously not used to being in a flower shop before. You wondered if he even had a favorite flower. You hoped he did.
You could really tell a lot about someone based on the types of flora they surrounded themselves with.
“Apology?” You wonder, tilting your head. Quickly falling into work mode, you continue, “I can work with that. Do you have any preferences? Colors?”
“Well, she likes orange, yeah?” He speaks and your heart sputters for a moment. Smile freezing. “I don’t suppose that’ll help very much, but it’s really all I have to go off of. I’m a bit of a hopeless bastard when it comes to flowers.” Kyle lets off a huff of laughter.
She. Of course, he’s already in a relationship.
Nodding, you swiftly walk past the man, catching the scent of fresh-tilled earth and rainy grass as your shoulders nearly brush. You can’t help but feel a little disappointed. It wasn’t every day you found yourself attracted to someone. But, oh well, life continues on.
“Well,” heading towards the wall baskets, your body feels heavy, but you quickly force it to the side. You really shouldn’t be surprised. “You said orange? I have about seven you can pick from.”
“Affirmiti–erm, yes, Ma’am.”
“Hm.” You hear him come up behind you, following at a respectful distance. Throwing a glance over your shoulder, you watch as his eyes slide over the various types of flowers, all separated by color, with deep thought.
A slight furrow was in his dark brow. His dedication was adorable.
“What’s this one called?” Kyle asks, moving around you to a bushel of orange poppies and accidentally bumping into your side.
Grunting, you lightly jerk forward until a hand swiftly grabs your shoulder. Eyelashes fluttering, you look up with shock at the embarrassed face slightly leaning over you.
“Shit, I’m sorry. That’s my bad.”
“N-no, you’re fine.” God, this was so awkward. Smiling shakily, you feel the press of his hand over your skin, separated only by the thin barrier of your shirt. Kyle squeezes your flesh before letting go.
He was staring at you, though. Brown eyes set into dark skin with a soft expression like Pygmalion staring at his marble-wrought Galatea. But as quickly as it was there, the look was gone and the man was clearing his throat, snapping his neck back to the basket and shifting his feet.
Even if you couldn’t explicitly see it, you knew he was blushing – just the same as the heat in your capillaries mirrored. Swallowing to get rid of the dryness of your throat, you realize you’ve been gawking before sliding your hands into your pockets and quickly looking away.
Why won’t my heart stop beating so fast?
“Those are Orange Poppies. Papaver orientale.” Speaking, you reach forward and grab the stem of a single bloom holding it to him as he gazes down at you from your side. “Common in ‘get well soon’ bouquets, if you were curious.”
Holding it up to him, you watch his fingers delicately pluck it from you like the flower was made of glass. It nearly made you laugh, but you settled on a small smile instead.
“It’s pretty…” Kyle pauses, and you read it well enough.
“...But not what you were looking for.” Settling on the answer, you giggle when he passes off a sheepish smile and a nod. “I kind of guessed. Here – how about this.”
He ends up buying a handful of orange Tulips, Myrtle leaf for greenery, and a small gathering of Baby’s-Breath. Behind the counter, you try to stay focused on setting the flora perfectly in the clear vase as your clippers lay beside it. Frowning, you take the long stem of a Tulip and snip the end at an angle, placing it to the far left of the rest with a concentrated set of your eyebrows.
“So,” Kyle says, breaking the silence, and your fingers twitch as your spell is shattered. Soul stilling, you look up at him as he waits on the other side of the counter with his arms comfortably crossed. He leans back on his heels, feet shoulder-length apart. “Busy day today, then? Other places around here are mostly dark by five.”
Standing straighter, you politely smile before going back to the arrangement, hand reaching for the small white tufts of Baby’s-Breath.
“Mostly, yeah.” You cock your head to the side, “I was supposed to be home two hours ago, but one lady was very adamant about getting the most ‘perfect’ flowers, as she told it.”
Chuckling humorlessly, you step back and stare at the vase, not aware of the eyes stuck on the tired slump of your shoulders or the slight frown staining the man’s lips.
“Two hours? Well, that’s a bit excessive.” Kyle remarks, eyelids creasing, “I’d hope she at least left a tip for you?”
That gets a laugh out of you, lungs jerking for a moment; focus once more brought back to the present at the preposterous words that just left your customer’s mouth. Those brown eyes suck you back in to a point where you wonder if you’d ever be able to look away.
“Now that’s funny, Mr. Garrick.”
He lets the subject drop, but you notice a slight crease in-between in brows – a narrowness to his eyes that wasn't there before. You try not to think too much into it, but Kyle certainly did seem like the man to get upset when people aren’t treated respectfully. The thought warms your heart.
Or maybe I’m just reading too much into this.
“Is there anything you’d like me to rearrange, Sir…? Do you want a note to go with it?” Seemingly lost in thought, Kyle comes back to you with a diligent shake of his head.
“It looks perfect, Love. And, please, just Kyle’s alright. You’re makin’ me sound like an old man when you talk like that.” He chuckles, and it’s a rich, velvety sort of thing – twisted with blue satin and wrapped in a gentle breeze. Your stomach twists.
“Then I suppose that’s it, then. I’ll get you the bill and you can be on your way.” Turning around to calculate the total price, you make a quick comment in passing, not really thinking about it as you tap on your calculator. “I hope your girlfriend and you make up.”
A stunned silence falls, but you only focus on the numbers, jotting down the total on a sticky note and turning around after re-running the costs a last time. When your eyes lock with him, your feet stall at the dumbfounded look on Kyle’s face and the confusion ingrained in his body language. His head had pulled back slightly, hat tilted.
“What’s that?” He asks.
“Your…girlfriend?” You say slowly, walking closer and passing him the sticky note, “you said you were getting her apology flowers?”
The handsome man blinks at you before realization lights in his eyes like fire. Kyle laughs deeply, putting a hand on top of his head and pressing down on his cap.
“Oh, Bloody hell, no.” He takes a deep breath and you feel your lips pressed together in confusion, innocent intrigue taking place in your skull. “I’m sorry, Sweetheart, I should have told you right off. This is for my mum.”
Blinking in surprise you pause, looking up with wide eyes.
Sweetheart?...Mum?! Your face heats to an intense level. Oh.
“O-oh I didn’t…” He’s reaching for his wallet with a large lop-sided smile on his face and understanding eyes, watching you as he flips it open. You settle with a single laugh and say, “sorry, I guess I just assumed.”
But you can’t help the sudden relief that sprouted out of nowhere that leaves your lips pulling back in a mirrored grin. You’d been doing that a lot, as of the last fifteen minutes.
“It’s no problem,” Kyle admits, “Thing is, I’ve been off on deployment for a while, and I missed my return date party, unfortunately. Just got back about noon today and I decided I was going to surprise her tonight.” The man pulls out a large stack of bills, “Thought she’d like that, yeah? Can’t go wrong with flowers, can you?”
“You’re in the military?” You ask smoothly but internally swoon at the thought of a son giving his mother flowers out of the kindness of his heart. Whoever she was, you know the woman who raised this man would be overjoyed with the prospect of simply having him home safe and sound before anything else.
Did not Penelope, wife of Odysseus, care for her son Telemachus more than anything? Above danger and possible death? They protected each other. You supposed it was the same in this situation.
Being able to be a part of it made your legs weak.
“Something like that, Ma’am.” Kyle’s lips flick into a smirk as he hands you the bills. “Feels like I’m surrounded by children most days, but there’s no place I’d rather be…When I’m not nearly getting my head bloody blown off, that is.”
You huff in amusement, and slight concern, taking the payment and settling it on the counter without checking the numbers; never doubting whether he gave you the right amount or not.
“Well, it seems like you’ve got it all figured out.” Garrick looks to his feet for a moment, pocketing his wallet, and clears his throat near mutely. He tilts his head back up to you.
“Nearly,” he whispers under his breath, a delicate wrinkle on his forehead as his lips pull in a minute, closed, grin. Sheepishly, you look away from his intense brown gaze before you can make a fool of yourself as giddiness sparks in your racing heart. What was happening to you? You have to ask yourself. Where was all of this blatant scatterbrained activity stemming from? No one had ever made you act like this before.
As you look away, your eyes unintentionally land on the wall clock across the room, and your thoughts still like water in a puddle. Eyes widening comedically, you feel your lips part.
“I really need to be closing up.” You say apologetically, looking back to the man who touches one of the Myrtle leaves carefully, running it between his thumb and forefinger. Under you, your feet shift over the floor. “Is this all you’ll be needing?”
“Pretty sure.” Garrick answers easily, “I won't keep you any longer, eh? I’d hate it if I made you go home by yourself after dark.”
“That’s very thoughtful, Kyle, thank you.” Pushing the vase over the counter, he takes it up and pauses as if he wants to say something. His mouth opens before closing – looking at his feet for a moment and itching at his neck with his free hand.
“I…don’t want to make you uncomfortable, Ma’am,” your breath hollows, watching carefully as you listen. “But, uh, I,” Kyle shifts his eyes to your face, standing a bit straighter as the corner of his lip flicks up, “You’re just about the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met – if that’s not overstepping, of course.”
He laughs stiffly to dispel tension, and the air suddenly gets ten times hotter at the brutally honest, if not mildly stuttered, confession. You can nearly hear the blood rushing to your head like a flood of ocean water – more violent and immediate than a tsunami. In your ribcage, your bones ache at the beating organ and the swell of your lungs. Having to take a deep breath to not forget yourself entirely, your mind rages.
Did he really just say that? He…he called me beautiful.
When was the last time you had been called that? By such a lovely and kind man nonetheless. Kyle seemed like a confident person, his profession telling you that already, but the way he was acting now he seemed hesitant; like he was appalled by the fact you would take what he was saying the wrong way and come off creepy.
But that was so blatantly opposite of how you were reacting.
“I-” You stutter, eyes snapping away and hands coming to hold themselves in front of your abdomen, “well, I think you’re very handsome, yourself, Kyle.” A meek expression spreads your visage as you see the breath in his chest hitch, “and I wouldn’t call that overstepping at all. Not by a long shot.”
His eyes widen, and a second of intense eye contact later, he smiles and glances away. Garrick sneaks looks as you bite your lip, and finally, he nods firmly before his phone starts to ring in his pocket.
As if a switch had turned, his hand snaps down and grasps the device, peeling it out of his khakis and checking the contact. Immediately he utters.
“Oh, Shit, this is her. I’ve got to run.” He walks backward a few steps before turning and lightly jogging to the front door. Following with your eyes, you’re somewhat entranced by the man.
Before he can walk through the door, he stops in his tracks.
“Sorry, again,” Kyle turns back around, and his dark eyebrows crease, “but, uh, what days are you open?”
The giddy smile that forms on your cheeks leaves your skin hurting.
“All of ‘em except the weekends,” you say, confidence suddenly sprouting in your veins, “but I’m sure if you told me ahead of time that you were stopping by, I’d make an exception.”
“I’d imagine for emergency flowers only?” Kyle teases, a smirk on his face. His eyes promise you, though, that this will not be the last time you see him.
“Of course.” You reply, raising a brow. “I’m a florist, after all, Garrick. Emergency flowers are my specialty. If you’re ever in need of more, I’ll be here, waiting.”
He laughs, stares for a few seconds longer with a distant sheen, and disappears through the door. You don’t follow when his form fades from the windows entirely. You don’t ask for his number, even if you knew you should have. You don’t look at the amount he gave you as you put it in the register, knowing, even by your intuition, that it is double the amount he was due.
You’d just tell him all about it when you saw him again.
Until Kyle Garrick showed up you had been focused; as immovable as a mountain, but then as the days drew on, you faltered. Your eyes would linger on the glass as people pass by, heart in your throat and feet tapping as you bound stems. Flowers had taken up so much of your life, but now another was trying to push its way in – slowly infecting you like a parasite in your mind as the days went on.
And as he kept showing up, month after month, he had taken to calling you Persephone. A goddess of spring and nature; beautiful flowers of all colors and shapes growing on hills and in vibrant meadows. It was perhaps the greatest compliment someone like you could have been given. At first, it had been a nickname until it had become as common as your actual title, and Kyle used it so much even regular customers teased you with it with smirks and side-eyes. You only rolled your optics with a burning under your skin and a small smile.
“Well, look, it’s Persephone…”
“That boy of yours here, Persephone? Hiding in the back room perhaps?”
“Persephone – you have any Peonies this week?”
You didn’t mind it…really, you didn’t. If anything, you thought it was precious. A man comparing you to a goddess that danced in green fields as flowers sprouted at her feet? Yes, that was quite alright.
Quite alright, indeed.
—
The office room was cold, he thought. Nearly a meat locker.
How in the hell can he stand to work in here, Kyle asked himself. Bloody place is like a damn winter storm just minus the snow.
He was seated in one of the two chairs in front of the mahogany desk, hands on the armrests and feet tapping the floor. When the Sergeant had gotten the order on his radio to come to Captain Price’s office ASAP, he had expected the man to already be here, but five minutes later he was still sitting in silence.
That wasn’t to say he was bored, though. He was thinking of you. He could never be bored when he did that.
It brings a small smile to Garrick’s face as he relives your last interaction, lips unconsciously twitching as his eyes grow distant.
You’d made him a flower crown, mostly as a joke, but had been left in raging fits of laughter when you’d placed it on his head.
“Hold still,” you grunt, sitting on the front counter and keeping the weaved headpiece in your grip as it hovers above the man’s scalp, “I want to get it centered on the first go.”
“Y’know,” Kyle chuffs, “I could always do it myself – I do have working hands, Love.”
“Shush!” Exclaiming, your breath fans his face, leaving him more still than a statue, if only to smell your scent and be content with your body so close to his. Kyle was still working out the best way to ask you out officially, but that didn’t seem to extend to his instinctual actions when it came to you. It was increasingly hard to stop his head from leaning just that tiniest bit forward and connecting his lips to yours.
The pressure on his head brings him back, and his eyes blink as if they could force all the rogue thoughts from his mind. Kyle clears his throat when you lean back, acutely aware of the longing set of his dark brows as he had stared off at you.
“Well, then,” The Sergeant clears his throat and smiles at your concentrated face, though he notices the hitch in your chest with a strange sense of pride. “How’s it lookin'? Is just as you imagined, eh?”
Your face scrunches, head tilting. Kyle couldn’t remember a time he’d let someone put a wreath of flowers on his head, woven with Forget-Me-Nots, Silver Dollar Eucalyptus, and Tiger Lillies. The others would make fun of him for this.
But he found he cared little. If you kept smiling at him like that, he’d let you do anything to him in a heartbeat.
“Perfect.” You chuckle. “You should have let me do this earlier.”
The shop was closed – it was a weekend, after all, and that was the time for restocking and number crunching. Not really the time for making crowns for a man who was totally smitten with you.
“You sure that you don’t need these?” Kyle asks, a hand reaching up to his head to touch the flora. “I’d hate to not pay you for them, Love. Can only imagine how expensive they are to order.”
“Eh,” rolling your eyes, your legs brush the Sergeant’s hips from where they sit around them, and the man has to remember how to breathe properly, “they’re the old product, anyway. I’d have to get rid of them by Monday. Better for such a handsome individual to have a crown of his own, with all the gallantry he practices in his job. It’s the least I could do, hm?”
You’re teasing him, a smirk taking up the frame of Kyle’s vision. He returns the action, hands coming to rest on either side of your hips; leaning forward until his nose with mere inches away. He hears your chest rattle with a slow breath.
“Are you teasin’ me, Persephone?” He asks sneakily, as you begin to giggle. “Insinuating I need a flower crown to be recognized at work? It’ll certainly get me attention, that’s for sure, yeah? Just not the kind I want. Soap’ll have a field day.”
“He’d just make a few comments, I’m sure.”
“You’ve never met him. The bloke would never let it go until the day I kicked the bucket.” You’re laughing, one hand coming up to cover your mouth.
Kyle hates himself at that moment because you’ve never looked so beautiful, and he can’t quite pick up the courage to just lean in. So he watches with a matching look of happiness and an embarrassing, yet adored, flower crown on top of his close-shaven head. He watches with an ache in his chest and a violent beat to his heart as your body heat melts into him; urging him, prompting him.
But he just smiles and watches a moment longer before taking a step back.
“Sir,” Garrick asks, settling back down and watching the older man slink behind his desk, “What’s all this about?”
The door opens with a firm hand. Kyle startles to his feet, tuning and about to go into an instinctual formal greeting before the Captain speaks, beating him to it.
“At ease, Sergeant. Take a seat.”
Price sighs as he takes a seat, slapping a large file that was previously in his hand to the wood before opening his drawer with a grunt. Gaz watches with narrowed eyes as his superior ignores his question, pulling out a large cigar from a lockbox and slotting it between his lips. A lighter follows soon after, and soon the smell of burning tobacco enters the air.
“...Captain?” Kyle was starting to get nervous now. Why was he looking at him like that? Blue eyes seem to dig deep into Gaz’s soul, trying to find something that was hidden behind layers and layers of flesh and bone.
John pulls the stick from his lips and holds it between his fingers, smoke now entering the air and rising to perforate like mist. Feet shifting over the floor, Kyle’s heart skips a beat.
What in the hell is going on?
That’s when the bearded man speaks.
“Well, who are they, then?” Price asks, tilting his head forward as his bucket hat sits where it usually does atop his brown hair. The Captain’s eyes are squinted; curious but still laced with that authority that never seemed to leave no matter how many years the two had known each other.
“Pardon, Sir?” Gaz has to ask, confusion prominent in his expression. “They?”
John raises a thick brow as if the answer was obvious.
“You’re distracted. Been checking your phone like it’s going to explode the last few days. So,” the Captain stares at him heavily, taking another drag before placing the cigar in his ashtray and breathing out a cloud of smoke. He leans forward and places his hands on the table, as Kyle watches, perplexed, “who is it, Sergeant? No use hiding it.”
“I…” Gaz trails before blinking dumbly, lips parting, “oh, hell, was it that obvious?”
“Painfully.” The answer makes the younger man cringe and his skin pulls tight. A pause leaves the room silent, the Sergeant avoiding his Captain’s gaze as he tilts his head away for a moment. He clears his throat.
“She’s just…” Kyle clears his throat, “someone I met in the city. A florist. Down on Main Ave.”
“A florist, eh?” Grunting, John nods his head to himself. “Asked the bird out, then?”
“What?” Snapping his head up, Gaz says loudly with stuttering lips, “N-no, Sir. Not yet.”
The man ahead of him hums, leaning back and flipping his file open, taking a moment to pick up the first page and skim the contents with small eyes. He looks over the top with a blank expression.
“I’d get on that, Son.”
—
Today was different, you knew. Something was going to happen. An unexplainable feeling was in the back of your mind, making you somewhat anxious even if you didn’t know exactly why. It was like a sheet had been thrown over your head and someone had just told you to run in circles without hitting a wall; feet tied with a rope.
The morning had started off normal, as had everything else that followed, but there was an air of expectation wafting in front of you.
What’s going on? You ask as you wipe down the counter with a wet rag, swiping stray leaves and petals into the garbage bin at your feet. Why am I feeling like I’m expecting something to happen?
It was Tuesday – nothing astounding ever happens on Tuesdays.
The front door opens with the ringing of a silver bell, and you say absentmindedly, still caught in your thoughts, “be with you in a moment!”
A cough startles you, your hand squeezing the rag a bit tighter as your neck twists upwards.
“Hope I’m not interrupting.”
“Kyle,” you laugh and take a breath, “I didn’t expect you today…”
Freezing, your lips part in a silent gasp when you see it. The man you had come to have quite the crush on was standing a few paces from the door, dressed in a nice shirt and dress pants, jacket in the crook of his arm. He holds a single Sunflower in his grasp.
It wasn’t anything overly impressive, a bit small and dead at the tips, but nonetheless, your heart stuttered at the gift. Staring at it silently, you turn your gaze to Kyle as his feet shift over the floor nervously. A strange look had overtaken his face, but he had a confident air to him that you’d been seeing more and more of the last few visits.
“What’s this?” You ask carefully, body going hot all over and lungs swelling.
You’d loved flowers for most of your life; worshiped them like the people of Delphi worshiped their god-chosen Oracle. But never could you recall a moment when you had been given any out of free will. Everyone always assumed you disliked getting them because of your job, but, oh, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Flowers were like declarations of emotions – they could mean so many things to so many different people. They were the truth laid bare in nature as plainly as it could be, wrought with promises.
Your breath stills, eyelids pulling back delicately; lips parting.
Kyle speaks softly, raising the flower in his grip.
“I remembered you saying you liked these more than roses – you called them ‘tacky’ if I’m…remembering correctly. The roses, that is.”
He was remembering correctly. But that had been just a passing comment to another customer you had been helping before him. Unimportant. A quick piece of yourself that hadn’t mattered while you were cutting stems and looping twine.
But he remembered it.
A giggle falls from you until your hand snaps up, trapping it behind parted fingers and an awe-filled face.
“I wanted to give it to you,” he continued, walking forward with measured steps, “and ask you a question, if you’d let me.”
“Of course, I would.” It’s breathless, the way you say it, and suddenly you know exactly why you've been so on edge today.
You’d been waiting for him.
And when he smiles at you, your mind runs to gossamer silk. Such a delicate thing; that smile, comparable to the millions of strands a spider spins in a lifetime. Gorgeous and so very easily missed if you weren’t looking at just the right moment. Gossamer Silk.
Since when has his grin become so important to you? To where you craved it just as violently as water or food? That look in his amber gaze – the one that left you breathless even when you simply thought about it, that was what you wanted to witness when you woke up in the mornings. You wanted his arms around you. You wanted his lips pressed to yours. You wanted him to be in your kitchen making you dinner as the rain fell outside and the flowers in your back garden grew strong and beautiful.
You wanted him to be yours.
Kyle stops behind the counter and hands you the flower. You reach for it without complaint instantaneously, wondering momentarily if he had just happened upon one and taken it in a moment of passion. Both of your fingers brush, and the imaginary sparks that fly make you turn slightly shy, head tilting to the side for a moment.
But a finger hooks under your chin, moving it back as delicately as bird wings, gentle feathers tickling your flesh and nerves.
A hum resonates in your chest, eyes crinkling as you stare into amber brown with flecks of gold. You could get lost in them if you looked too much.
But you didn’t seem to mind in the slightest.
“Persephone, would you do me the great honor,” the two of you laugh at the wispy and teasing tone, and suddenly you wish the counter between you would disappear into thin air, “of going on a date with me tonight?”
Tuesdays, perhaps, might have just become the best day of the week, and a small Sunflower with dead tips and fading yellow, your new favorite flower.
Ironic, how that works. He ended up distracting you more than you could ever imagine.
—
“Don’t you have to be back on base soon, Garrick?” You mutter into a warm chest, street lights shining into the windows of the apartment.
“Bloody hell, yes…But I’d crawl back to you, if you asked it of me.”
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CAN YOU WRITE A PRE-OUTBREAK ONESHOT WHERE JOEL TAKES CARE OF HER WHEN SHES SICK?? THAT WOULD BE SO CUTEE
Hi Bestie!
I know I said nothing new today but... I ended up with like 2 hours of writing time and decided to finally respond to an ask. I loved this prompt! Thank you SO MUCH - both for sending it in and (hopefully) patiently waiting for me to get to it. I love you!
Sick Leave
On a visit to Texas, you come down with appendicitis and Joel looks after his girl. Can be read independently, but is within the timeline of Lavender, found on Tumblr here.
Pairing: Joel Miller x Female Reader (Lavender reader)
Warnings: None :) Just fluff
Length: 2.1K
Late July, 2002
“And who’s he?” You asked, all but swallowed by the nest of pillows at the head of the bed.
“That’s Sonny,” Sarah said, curled up beside you, her head on your shoulder. “He’s a mobster, he’s like… the dangerous guy in town?”
“He’s kinda cute,” you nodded. Sarah’s nose crinkled. “What? If he grew a mustache he’d kind of look like your dad…”
“Oh, ugh!” She elbowed your ribs lightly, the way she normally would if you hadn’t just had surgery. You winced. “Oh, crap! I’m sorry…”
“It’s ok,” you adjusted a bit, the spark of pain already fading. “I asked for that, calling your dad cute and all.”
“Yeah, you kind of did,” she agreed, adjusting, too, so she was snuggled in around your arm. “Plus if you think he’s cute, you should see his body guard, Jason. He’s… ugh, he’s just so good. Oh, look, see? There he is.”
You giggled a little.
“He is cute,” you conceded. “Think I like Sonny more, though…”
“Ugh, you would,” she scoffed.
Sarah watched the melodrama intently and you just rested your head against hers, enjoying the chance to snuggle a bit with your favorite kid. It had been an unusual visit to Texas this time around. Instead of trying to cram as much fun stuff into the few weeks you were down as you possibly could, you’d come down with appendicitis just after you got into town. That had meant no trips to Six Flags, no midweek beach trips, not even any matinees to watch movies in the comfort of overpowered air conditioning.
But it had also meant Sarah giving you a thorough education on her latest summer obsession - a soap opera called General Hospital - and Joel, waiting on you hand and foot.
“Baby Girl?” You heard the front door close as Joel came in. “You forgetting that conversation we had about boundaries again?”
“No!” Sarah called, rolling her eyes.
Joel came into the bedroom, a drink carrier with three Diary Queen cups in hand. He shook his head.
“Sure looks like ya are,” he said, setting the ice cream on the dresser. “Thought we decided to give her some space? Make sure you’re not jostling that incision and giving her time to rest?”
“But Dad!” She groaned. “I never get to do this…”
“She’s right, you know,” you said as Joel passed you your Oreo Blizzard. “I’m usually too far away for good soap opera girl time and we’re usually a little too busy when I’m in town to keep up with all the goings on in… where is this again?”
“Port Charles,” Sarah said. Joel handed her a milkshake with a roll of his eyes.
“Port Charles,” you said, smiling up at Joel. “So this, really, is vital stuff. Plus, I’ve learned that Jason is, apparently, cute.”
“Cute, huh?” He asked, getting his own ice cream from the carrier and delicately climbing in on the other side of you.
“Oh yeah,” Sarah said. “I mean, have you seen him? Those arms!”
“I do know a thing or two about liking men with nice arms,” you said, giving Joel a teasing look. He shook his head, grinning slightly.
“Aren’t you a little young to be lookin’ at men’s arms?” Joel asked, leaning over you a little to look at his daughter.
“Dad, I’m 13,” she rolled her eyes.
“You’ve been 13 for a week,” he muttered.
“13 is 13, love,” you took a bite of your Blizzard. “Better get used to it.”
When Sarah got up to run to the bathroom during the commercial, Joel adjusted your pillows and tucked you against his side.
“Seriously,” he said, his voice low. “You need to be resting, I can take her out of the house…”
“Hon, I’ve been in bed for three days,” you smiled at him. “I am resting.”
“Just worried about you,” he kissed your temple. “Scared the hell outta me…”
He’d been like this since you’d gotten sick in the first place.
The first few days of your trip had been fine. There was the ceremonial visit to your favorite Mexican place in town - always the first stop you made besides dropping bags off at Joel’s house.
Sarah was old enough now that she could stay home on her own in the evenings, so you and Joel went with Tommy and a girl he was seeing - you hadn’t bothered to learn her name, you could already tell she wasn’t going to stick - to listen to music the night your flight got in. The next day you spent in the pool, watching Joel grill from the inflatable lounge chair he’d gotten just for you, margarita in hand.
“You’re lookin’ mighty comfortable there, Baby,” he teased.
You shrugged and sipped your drink.
“Might just have to move in,” you said. “Poolside cocktail service is a really nice perk…”
You woke up the next day feeling like shit.
It was like a switch had flipped. You went to bed feeling fine - slightly tipsy, but fine. More than fine after Joel got done with you. And then, right around six in the morning, you were running to the bathroom to puke.
“Shit, baby,” Joel was sitting on the bathtub next to you, one hand on your back, rubbing in broad circles between your shoulder blades, the other holding your hair in his fist. “Maybe I didn’t cook the chicken all the way through…”
“When have you ever fucked up on the grill?” You asked, resting your cheek on your arm as it draped against the toilet seat. Joel’s eyes went a little wide.
“You don’t think you’re…” he broke off. You raised your eyebrows and tried not to laugh.
“Don’t think morning sickness, shows up two days after you sleep with someone,” you said. “And it’s been a few months since I was here over spring break, I think it would have started sooner than now if I were knocked up.”
“Right,” he nodded, looking relieved. “Right…”
“I just picked up a stomach bug at the airport,” you sighed. “Make sure you and Sarah wash your hands a TON, they’re nasty little fuckers…”
You totally lost your appetite and a fever showed up that afternoon. Joel refused to keep his distance, sending Sarah to stay with Lizzy while he brought you a steady stream of Jell-o, chicken broth and popsicles.
“You’re going to get yourself sick,” you said the second night you felt like crap. You were lying on your side, Joel wrapped around you, his broad shoulders enveloping you, his hand splayed over your stomach.
“Don’t care,” he kissed the crown of your head. “Need you at least this close. You’re too fuckin’ far away all the time, not going to let a little stomach flu keep me from touchin’ you while I can.”
You weren’t noble enough to fight him on it. You had nasty stomach cramps all day on top of everything else. Being held by Joel was about the only thing that made you feel better.
It was about four in the morning when the feeling in your stomach went from cramps to sharp, stabbing pain. It jerked you out of a sound sleep, your hand flying behind you to Joel’s hip, your nails digging into him as you fought to breathe through the agony of it.
“Baby?” Joel’s voice was thick with sleep. “What’s goin’ on, you OK? Need somethin’?”
“I think I need to go to the hospital,” you managed through gritted teeth. “I don’t think this is a stomach bug, I think it’s appendicitis…”
Joel was wide awake then, rushing to put on a shirt and helping you sit up in bed. You winced as you moved, gritting your teeth, the pain sharp.
“Hold on, Baby,” Joel tucked an arm below your knees and the other around your ribs, tugging you to his side. “I’ve got you…”
He lifted you off the bed and carried you down the stairs as gently as he could, cradling your feverish body to his chest. He lowered you gingerly into the passenger seat of his truck and buckled you in before he drove to the hospital, going at least 10 over the speed limit the whole way.
Joel paced the whole time you sat in the ER, going up to talk to someone at the nurses’ station every five minutes until they got you back to be evaluated.
“Oh,” the doctor said as she looked at your stomach on an ultrasound. “We need to get you back now. Right now. This looks like it’s about to rupture.”
“Shit,” Joel paced, like a caged animal. The second the doctor left to go arrange emergency surgery, he took your hand, holding it tight.
“Baby,” you said, voice calm. “It’s an easy surgery, it hardly even counts as surgery, you don’t need to be worried…”
“They were ready to leave you in the damn waiting room all day,” he frowned. “Then what would have happened?”
“The surgeon would have had a harder job,” you said. “Joel, hon, it’s fine.”
He was like that until they took you back for surgery, glaring at doctors and nurses as they whisked you away.
When you woke up a few hours later, he was there, bouquet of daisies in his hands and a relieved smile on his face.
“Do me a favor and try real hard to not scare me like that again,” he said, brushing your hair back from your face.
“I’ll try my best,” you smiled a little.
But ever since, he’d stuck close by.
“You know,” you said, looking up at him, poking at your Blizzard with the long, red spoon. “I was thinking…”
“Always dangerous when it comes to you,” he said. You glared at him.
“Anyway,” you said. “I was thinking… I should probably start doing a bit more. It’s been a few days, I’m feeling pretty good…”
“Baby,” he sighed.
“Come on,” you pouted a little. “I’m getting restless.”
He sighed again.
“What were you thinkin’?”
You smiled.
“Nothing crazy,” you said. “Just… could we do BBQ for dinner? Maybe try to go see a movie tomorrow? We haven’t made it to Men in Black II yet and Sarah really liked the first one…”
“How about we start with the BBQ and see how you’re doin’ in the morning,” he kissed your temple. “Not gonna let you push it…”
Joel made sure you had plenty of water and a book before he and Sarah went to pick up dinner, giving you a lingering kiss on your forehead as he left.
They came home with enough BBQ to feed a small army and made you a plate with brisket and Mac and cheese, your favorites. But they also picked up Men in Black from Blockbuster, along with an ample supply of Mike and Ikes, popcorn and Sno-Caps. While you were getting cleaned up in the bathroom, Joel and Sarah set up the bed with three tray tables and a nest of pillows big enough for all of you to recline and watch the movie. He even lit a candle - lavender scented - on the nightstand.
“Joel!” You gaped at him. “What’s all this?”
“Figured we can do it up right,” he said, tucking you into bed and setting the tray table over your legs.
The three of you had dinner and cuddled close in bed, laughing at Will Smith getting thrown around by aliens. Sarah fell asleep, her head against your shoulder. Joel put on When Harry Met Sally once the first movie ended.
“I’m sorry this trip has been such a bust,” you said softly as he ran one hand gently up and down your arm.
He frowned.
“What are you talkin’ about?” He asked. “Hasn’t been a bust. You know how grateful I am this happened when you were here and not all the way in New York? How glad I am that I got to be the one to take care of you? I’d have been fuckin’ terrified, you all the way up there with just your grandmother to look after you, somethin’ like this happens. Besides, I’ve gotten to spend a week laying around in bed with my girls, not arguin’ with that.”
You smiled a little.
“Still,” you said. “Think we should try for the movie tomorrow. Not sure Sarah’s soaps are quite my speed.”
“If you’re up for it,” he kissed your temple. “But if you need another day or two of rest, don’t fight it. Just let me look after my girl, OK?”
You closed your eyes, content.
“OK.”
A/N: I hope you all enjoyed this little drabble of Joel being all soft and caring! It was really fun to write him being all fluffy and worried.
For those wanting some insight into who they're talking about at the beginning, I give you Sonny Corinthos from General Hospital:
And Jason Morgan from General Hospital:
You know. For science.
I'm going to go ahead and tag the usual Lavender crowd here. I hope that's OK!!! I'm sorry if it's not and I hope it's not too annoying!
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