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𝕜𝕖𝕖𝕡 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕔𝕠𝕠𝕝!

summary: sometimes, zoro really can't handle your praise... pairing: zoro x afab!reader cw: mdni, choking, praise, creampie wc: 600sih an: a little blurb of smut bc i was getting too fluffy •`_´• jk we love fluff here

the hold you have on the swordsman is immeasurable.

you have him wrapped around your finger, even in moments like this when his large hand is wrapped around your throat.

“so, so good, zo’!” you manage to whine out, the sound barely audible over the sound of wet slaps and his rasped breaths. one of your hands is over his, tracing his knuckles as he chokes you, while the other plants itself higher up on his forearm where you can feel the muscle tensing underneath. "m'want more, i need it!"

he grits his teeth, squeezing just a bit tighter until your eyes flutter closed. he knew you liked it though, at least he figured you did judging by the way your walls pulsed around him.

he needed you to stop talking.

his cheeks are burning, the reddish hue on them darkening with every bit of praise that spilled from your lips. "be quiet, will ya?" he grumbles, perhaps a bit too sharply, not knowing how much more of your cloying words he could take.

his thrusts get harder, his hips hammering into yours with an intense passion. the tip of his cock kisses your cervix and coats it with pre-cum, desperate to spill into you.

you’re so sweet to him.

it’s a blessing so foreign to him that sometimes he forgets it’s okay to be seen, to be vulnerable. even though he knows you’ve seen the depths of his soul, there are moments where he reverts to old habits and puts up a tough front.

that’s why he’s trying so hard to keep his cool.

your pretty little pussy squeezing around him like a damn vice is one thing, but the praises that dripped like honey past your lips was a completely different story. when you struggle to take an inhale, gasping sharply, he loosens his grip. the feel of your rapid pulse under his palm only drives him closer to the edge and he hopes, for his sake, that you're too fucked out to spoil him with more undeserved praise.

he should've known better though.

a solid intake of air is followed by a shaky exhale turned moan as your head becomes light with ecstasy. your lashes, dotted with tears, make you look like an angel underneath him and he growls, his abdomen tensing as he tried to stop himself from cumming too fast.

he always made sure that you came first. your pleasure was priority and he takes a deep breath, closing his eye as he focused on maintaining some sort of self-control. he could hold out, he thinks, continuing to fuck you at a steady pace.

it all goes out the door when you open your mouth again. "y'make me feel so good!" you moan, desperately bucking your hips to his tempo to drive him deeper. "cum inside me, baby, please!"

the hand on your throat squeezes once more, his hips losing their rhythm as he begins bucking into you uncontrollably. "stop talk-" his breath hitches, the coil inside of him snapping as he snarls and throws his head back. "fuck!"

his whole body shudders and he bites down on his tongue, almost pushing you into the headboard of the bed as he buries himself deep inside of you. there's no point in keeping his cool anymore, his muscles relaxing and mouth falling open as he let out a sinful groan.

you're overflowing with his release, the thick, hot liquid dripping out of you and onto the bedsheets below. when you look up, the smile you give him is much too innocent and he clicks his tongue at the sight. you know damn well that he's putty in your hands and you know that he loves it.

even now, as he looks down at you with furrowed brows and reddened cheeks, his exasperated tone does little to hide the affection he feels toward you.

"damn you, woman."

Virgin - Billy Loomis and Stu Macher x reader

Warnings: Dubious Consent, coercion, fingering,unprotected sex,dacryphilia,  degradation, praise 

Tatum and Sydney are not dating Stu and Billy in this fic, they are all just friends.

1.9k words

You were in the living room with Sidney and Tatum for the weekly movie night at Stu’s place, Stu and Billy stood in the kitchen, getting some popcorn and drink. The boys could hear the giggles from rooms away. 

“Wait what!” Tatum almost shouted.

You shushed her, but the boys were officially intrigued, listening. 

“No way, there’s no way. No offense Sydney.” Tatum was shocked. 

“I just never got around to it, that’s all.” You sounded embarrassed. 

“There’s no fucking way that you are a virgin.” 

Billy and Stu whip their heads around, looking at each other. They had to have misheard her. You, fishnets and short dresses, Y/n, a virgin? No way. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” You were a bit offended. 

“Well, to be honest, we all thought you had sex with Randy.” They could imagine the look on your face when she said that. 

“What!” You quieted down quickly. “Why would you think I had sex with Randy?”

“Probably because he follows you around like a lost puppy.” Sydney interjects. 

“He does not!” You said, flustered. 

“Randy’s got a massive crush on you, y/n.” Tatum states. 

At that moment, Stu and Billy decide to enter the room, causing all three girls to immediately stop talking, and start watching the movie. 

But throughout the whole movie, Billy and Stu can’t focus. Their minds elsewhere. Billy thinks of all the things he could do to you, to ruin you for any other man (or woman). Stu is stuck on the way your dress slides up when you move your feet in their spot on his lap. 

Billy sits at the farthest part of the couch from the TV, and Stu is at the other end, You lay between them, your back pressing up against Billy’s side, your feet draped across Stu. Tatum and Sydney sit on the floor, in front of the couch, intently watching the movie. 

Before Billy and Stu know it, the movie is over and Tatum and Sydney are grabbing their stuff and making their way towards the door. 

“Bye Tatum, Bye Syd.” You say, you decided you would stay for just a bit longer to hang out with the boys.

The boys bid their goodbyes to Sidney and Tatum.

Stu closes the door, and you walk back to the living room and plop yourself onto the couch, sprawling out across it.

“You want some food?” Stu asks from by the door with Billy. 

“Yeah sure!” You yell back, staring at the tv. 

Billy and Stu head to the kitchen, and Billy trifles through the cabinets searching for some form of food. 

“So what are we gonna do about the Y/n thing?” Stu asks quietly, leaning against the counter next to Billy.

“Oh, you wanted to do something?” He asks, “I thought we were just gonna go with the original plan.” 

“No man, this changes everything. We’ve got to make our move tonight.”

Billy pulls a box of cereal out of the pantry, and turns to Stu. “So what’s the plan?”

Stu and Billy return to the living room with a box of your average cereal, and hand it to you. You nod in their direction as a thanks, but are too engrossed in the movie to realize when they sit on either side of you. Trapping you.

But you do notice when Billy lays a soft hand on your fishnet clad thigh. Stu immediately takes notice of how your breath hitches and you clench your thighs together. Stu looks at Billy and then puts his arm around your shoulders. 

Billy takes this as a sign, and slowly creeps his hand up your thigh. You attempt to hide how your breathing picks up and your face grows red. His hand stops, but he’s dangerously close to your heat. And he's so close he can feel the warmth radiating off of it. 

At this point, you aren’t paying any attention to the movie, and your breath comes out in deep pants. When Billy goes to move his hand even closer, your hand rests on top of his, stopping him. 

“B-billy.” Your voice is scolding, this behavior isn’t like him and you think that maybe this is a prank that Stu put him up to. “What- what are you doing?” 

Stu cuddles into your side, his hand moving to your thigh as well. 

“What’s the matter, sweetheart? Uncomfortable?” Stu teases, and you squirm under his hardened gaze. Like he’s enjoying how nervous you are. 

“N-no, it’s just that-” You swallow the lump in your throat. “We are watching a movie.” You squeak as he dips his head down to lay opened mouth kisses on your neck. 

“Well then watch the movie,” Billy says it like it's the simplest thing in the world. And you gasp, when he slides his hand underneath your dress, and makes his way into your underwear. 

You moan embarrassingly loud when his pointer finger swipes across your slick cunt. Stu laughs against your neck, and pulls away to smile wide at Billy. 

“Dude she’s so wet.” Billy is shivering with pride. 

“No way, let me see.” Before you can even scold them for talking about you like you aren’t there. Stu dips his fingers into your underwear as well and slides his fingers across it. You moan again, and Billy moves to rubbing slow circles around your clit. 

It all feels like too much and not enough at the same time. And you’re so confused, why are they acting like this? They’re your best friends, friends shouldn’t touch each other like this. 

“Billy, Stu.” You whimper. “Why are you doing this? Friends shouldn’t- they shouldn’t touch each other like this.”

“It’s okay, beautiful.” Billy starts, as Stu gently rubs your cunt. “You’re our best friend. Best Friends are different. Me and Stu do stuff like this all the time.” 

Stu sends Billy a dirty look for sharing that information, but doesn’t miss the way your cunt clenches at the thought of them together. 

“wha-” You begin to question, but Stu shuts you up by slipping his finger into you. Billy pulls his hand away, and you unintentionally whine in protest. 

Billy then grabs your underwear and fishnets and tugs them down your legs in one swift motion. Stu’s fingers leave you so Billy can sit on the couch, and pull you into his lap. He grabs your hips and pulls you down to rub against his confined cock. 

“J-jesus.” He stutters, the feeling of your warm cunt against his clothed length is heavenly to him. “She’s so warm, Stu.”

Stu hums in approval, coming up to stand behind you. HIs hands slide underneath your dress, pushing it up and over your tits. You’re basically naked, sitting on Billy’s lap with his cock pressing against your virgin cunt. You're shaking mostly from arousal but also from confusion and anticipation. 

“She’s shaking like crazy.” Billy laughs at you.

“I can tell.” Stu responds, his hands massaging your tits.

 One of his hands goes to your nipple, pinching it harshly. You whimper at that, but a few seconds later you moan loudly with Billy’s lips wrapped around the opposite nipple. Billy sucks on one, grazing it with his teeth, and Stu takes the other in between his fingers, pinching and pulling on it.  

You're so distracted by the pleasure you don’t even notice Billy shimmying off his pants and underwear. You gasp loudly when he presses himself against you.

“Billy.” You pant. “I can’t.” 

“Why not, sweetheart?” Billy tilts his head at you, and pouts. 

“I- I just can’t.” He looks at you expectantly, he already knows why you don’t want to, but he wants to hear you say it. “I’m a virgin,” You wince when you say it, expecting him to push you off and tell you to get out. 

He laughs, and Stu giggles, laying wet kisses across your neck. Billy pulls you into a kiss, it's open mouthed and down right dirty. One hand grips the side of your neck, and squeezes. You choke back a moan into his mouth. His other hand is on his cock, gently rubbing the tip against your clit. He breaks away from the kiss and you moan at the feeling of his cock against you. You’re rocking your hips, rutting against his dick. 

Stu begins sucking dark hickeys into the side of your neck that Billy’s hand isn’t on. But you stop all together when he moves his dick to your hole, pushing at his chest. 

“You can’t.” You beg, Billy think’s it's adorable. Stu laughs, his hand going to your hips to hold you still. 

“Shhh, it's okay.” Billy attempts to coerce you. “Just the tip? please baby.” 

“But we don’t have condoms.” You gasp, as he begins to push in. 

“I’ll pull out,” He promises, but he knows he won't. He’s got you exactly where he wants you. And you think he’s going to miss out on the opportunity to cum inside of you? So dumb of you. 

You begin whining when he gets the tip in. “It hurts.” You murmur, tears welling in your eyes. 

“Oh babe..” Stu says, mockingly sympathetic. 

Billy moans at the feeling of your pussy clenching at the intrusion. He groans when he notices the tears falling from your eyes. 

“Fuck man, she’s crying.” He moans again, pushing a little further inside you. 

“Billy!’ You squeal, he’s more inside you than the tip, and you're a little upset that he lied to you. 

“C’mon baby, just a little more. I won't go any further than that,” Billy says, pushing in just a little bit. 

Your hands go to his shoulder, and you attempt to hide your face in his neck. But Stu grabs your shoulders and leans around to pull you into a kiss. Suddenly, Bill grabs your hips and slams them down, pushing all the way into you. You cry out, pulling away from Stu.

“Damn dude, You’re gonna break her,” Stu laughs. 

“If you could feel how tight she is you’d do the same thing.” Billy groans, and you babble incoherently about something they can’t understand. He’s hitting something so deep inside you that you can’t speak properly. 

“Awww, look at her.” Stu mocks. “She’s so cock drunk she can’t even speak.” 

You instinctually start rocking your hips, and Billy pulls out a bit before shoving back inside of you. You moan, really loud.  Stu seems entranced, staring at where you and Billy are connected. 

“Doing so well, Baby.” Billy grunts, pressing into you and then pulling out just to repeat the action. “You’re so beautiful.” You moan at the praise. There's a tightness in your stomach, and it seems to be getting tighter by the second. 

“Babe, You’re so dumb.” Stu says, lips next to your ear. “You thought that if you let Billy fuck you raw he wouldn’t use the opportunity to cum inside you?” He laughs. “You sweet, dumb little thing.” 

“Huh?” You say, confused. “What?” You moan again, squeezing down on Billy’s cock. 

“Listen here, Billy boy is going to cum inside you, and then I’m going to fuck you, then I’m gonna’  cum inside you.” 

You whine in protest, trying to pull away from Billy when his dick starts twitching inside you. Stu reaches around, and rubs your clit, gently pinching it once before rubbing it again. That tightness in your stomach snaps, and you cry out, clenching around Billy’s dick. 

 You quiver in Billy’s lap, waves of pleasure flowing through your body.You feel warmth flooding your cunt as he spills inside of you. 

“M’ not dumb.” You whine, panting. Billy pulls out of you, his cock softening. 

“Yes, you are sweetheart,” Stu says. “My turn.” He pulls you off Billy’s lap, slamming you down on the other end of the couch and positioning himself in between your legs. 

—--------------------

Part two with Stu’s turn?

Oblivious - Zoro Imagine

Pairing: Roronoa Zoro x Reader

Summary: Zoro isn't known for being nice. Quite the opposite actually but with (Y/N) it's different. The problem? Everybody seems to notice but her.

Requests are closed

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"Hey, can I get a Cuba Libre, please? But could you maybe use lemonade instead of cola?", (Y/N) leaned over to the barkeeper to order her drink.

"No", the man deadpanned.

"What? Why?", the girl furrowed her brows.

"Because that's not a Cuba Libre", he retorted.

"Well, yes obviously. That's why I'm asking to put lemonade instead", she questioned him - seemingly more confused than angry.

"No accomodations. Just order what's on the menu"

"But Cuba Libre is on the menu?", she inquired.

"Yes"

"And you do have limonade?"

"Yes"

"Then just swap the two ingredients?", her voice grew louder, not understanding why the barkeeper was being so difficult.

Zoro silently watched the interaction. He was sitting only a few barstools over drinking his rum.

"It's easy, sweetheart", (Y/N) and Zoro both pulled a face at the condescending nickname, "if I start accomodating your request, soon everybody in this dump will want to have their own special creations", the barkeeper ended.

"Fine! Just a beer then", she exclaimed.

"See? Was that so hard?", the barkeeper said as he slid the bottle over towards her.

(Y/N) sent him a mocking smile as she slammed a few coins on the counter, grabbing her beer and then leaving before she did something that would result in a house ban for her and the crew.

Zoro's eyes followed the girl as she took a seat with the others, who managed to find a table in the corner of the room.

It only took a few minutes for Zoro to follow her aswell - in his hand a drink that, for some reason, was still full.

"Here", he shoved the drink towards the girl.

"What is this?", she asked but didn't even wait for an answer as she already took a sip. Her eyes widened when she realized what it was that she was drinking, "That's a Cuba Libre with lemonade! How did you do that?"

"I asked nicely", he grinned.

"Oh god. What did you do to that poor man?", she scrunched up her face, knowing her friend likes a hands-on approach to conflict.

"Nothing he didn't deserve, sweetheart"

"Uh, don't call me that...", she shuddered, "Anyways, what do I owe you?"

"Oh no, it's fine...", he shrugged.

"Are you sure?", she asked again just to make sure but when he confirmed yet again, her face spilt into wide grin, "You're the best! Next round's on me!"

Nami raised her brow at the interaction. It wasn't like Zoro to be so nice - especially not without any type of reward.

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"Oof, I'm tired", (Y/N) moaned not feeling like doing the night watch at all.

"Too bad, it's your turn", Usopp mocked the girl, a happy laugh leaving his lips which earned him a raised middle finger.

"I need my beauty sleep", she whined knowing there wasn't a chance to get out of the situation.

"What? No! You don't need any beauty sleep, (Y/N)-san! You're already so beautiful ~", Sanji gladly protested.

"Oi, whose side are you on?", she scolded the cook, "Do you want me to suffer?"

Sanji started to back paddle immediatly. It wasn't his intention to upset her further but rather to compliment the girl.

"I'll do it", Zoro's voice cut through the discussion.

"Huh?", (Y/N) thought she misheard the swordsman.

"I'll do the guard duty for you", he repeated.

"What? No!", now it was her time to protest, "I can't ask you to do that for me! It's not that bad... you know, I was just being silly"

"It's no problem at all. Really!", he insisted.

"Are you sure? You love sleeping even more than I do", she wasn't quite convinced yet.

"Yeah, yeah! Don't you even worry. You said it yourself, you need your beauty sleep and I'll be napping anyways", he shrugged.

"Hmmm", she seemed to consider it for a moment before finally shaking her head.

"If it's that important to you, you can keep me company until you get too tired. That way you didn't completely abandon your responsibility while still getting at least some sleep", he grinned sheepishly.

The girl hugged the taller man happily, "You're the greatest!"

"Oi, how come you never offer to take over my guard duty", Luffy furrowed his brows.

"Do I look like a charity to you?", Zoro's voice was harsh. The kindness replaced by a holler.

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"You're tired, go to sleep", he told (Y/N). He had lost count of how many times he's seen the girl's eyes flutter shut only for her to jolt awake immediately after. She was struggling to stay awake.

"Nu-huh", she weakly protested.

"It doesn't make sense for the both of us to lose sleep", his voice was soft.

"It's fine, I'm awake. You can go to sleep", she mumbled, eyes already half-closed as she leaned her head on his shoulder.

"Yeah, I can see that", he chuckled but didn't get an answer anymore as her even breaths indicated that she had finally fallen asleep.

He looked down at her. There was a strange feeling in his chest and he thought to himself that he could get used to this. He laid his arm around her to make sure she wouldn't start freezing later on as he prepared to spend the rest of the night like this - his plans for a nap long forgotten, not wanting to miss any moment of this.

The sun was already out when Nami found the two of them like this.

"You really like her, huh?"

"Do you even know what you're talking about, woman? I was just helping her because now she'll have to do me a favour in the future... Quid quo pro or something", he denied Nami's accusations but couldn't hide the soft blush that turned his ears a deep shade of red.

The navigator defensively raised her hands. Usually she would've kept pushing but she noticed how uncomfortable the swordsman was.

"Well, night watch is over. Sanji is serving breakfast as we speak. Wake her up and come eat before Luffy eats your portion"

With that Nami left Zoro to deal with waking the sleeping girl tucked underneath his arm.

"Hey, uhm... (Y/N)?", if he was completely honest, Zoro didn't feel like disturbing their togetherness just to be confronted with these other idiots, but he knew that wouldn't be fair to her as she was probably pretty hungry, "You have to wake up now... Uhm, breakfast is ready..."

(Y/N) groaned as she woke up not wanting to leave her perfect pillow but when she realized what position she was in, she immediately slipped away from him.

"Oof, Zoro, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to fall asleep on you! Why didn't you wake me?"

"I uh- Don't worry about it. It was only for like twenty minutes. We had to be up soon anyways so I just didn't bother", he lied, not wanting her to think bad of him for not re-positioning her.

"Oh... Still though. I owe you one", she laughed happily, "Twice actually. Once for saving me from guard duty and twice because of the absolutely amazing nightsleep I just had"

Zoro was glad that the girl was already stood up with her back towards him so that she wouldn't see the stupid smile that he couldn't fight back. What was wrong with him? He already gathered that he had a crush on (Y/N). As much as it pained him to admit but he couldn't deny it any further. The thing that bothered him about it was rather that he couldn't conceal it better.

"I sure hope Sanji made pancakes", she said more to herself than to him.

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Zoro stared daggers across the room. The bar was loud but he still clearly made out (Y/N)'s laugh - he would've loved the sound if it weren't for the guy who was the reason for her happiness.

The swordsman knew he should probably look away. That he'd only hurt himself if he continued. But still his eyes were glued to (Y/N) and the way her hand reached out to touch the stranger's arm.

"You should ask her out, you know?", Nami seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Usually he'd be more aware of his surroundings but at the moment he wasn't thinking straight.

"Don't you have anyone else to annoy?", he answered her without taking his eye off of their target.

"You know? I'm just trying to be nice here. You're making it hard though", she retorted.

"Did I ask you to be nice?", his question was clearly rhetorical.

Nami raised her hands in defense and left the man standing. If he wanted to stay there and wallow in his self-pity, then so be it.

Zoro's heart skipped a beat as (Y/N) came over towards him and the crew - her little flirt seemingly forgotten. The swordsman felt stupid when he realized how giddy it made him.

"Hey guys", she smiled at her friends, "We're staying here a little longer, yes?"

"Uh, sure", Nami was confused, "We're staying for at least another night until the Log Pose recalibrates"

"Great, don't wait up for me", (Y/N) grinned, "Because this gentleman over there has asked me to dinner"

(Y/N) turned around and sent a flirty wave towards her suitor, who was already waiting for her by the door.

"My drink's empty", Zoro murmured.

"Can you bring me another one, aswell?", Usopp shouted after the swordsman.

"No", his answer was short as he left the group to make his way towards the bar. Nami's eyes following him closely.

"Uhm, (Y/N)? Can I talk to you for a minute?", she didn't even wait for an answer as she already grabbed (Y/N) by the elbow, dragging her away from the group.

"So what's up?", the other woman furrowed her brows. What was the problem?, "Do I look bad?"

"No, no, no! You look great actually"

"So what's the problem?", (Y/N) didn't want her suitor wait for too long.

"I'm not trying to spoil the mood but you do realize Zoro's got a crush on you, right? I mean, you can do whatever you please but maybe don't do it infront of the mosshead" - there was no sensible way to soften the blow, so the navigator just said it.

"What? Zoro? Nah, he's just being nice", (Y/N) waved away her concerns.

"Yes, exactly!" - how oblivious could one person be? - "When did you ever see Zoro being nice to any of us? Except for maybe, MAYBE sometimes Chopper?" - Did she have to spell it out for her?

(Y/N)'s eyes moved rapidly as she thought about what her friend just told her. But when she finally realized what Nami was not so subtely implying, her eyes widened.

"Oh my God! I think you're right...", she could've slapped herself.

"Yep", Nami popped the 'p'.

"Shit, I-I need to go", and with that (Y/N) let Nami stand there as she made her way towards the man that was still waiting for her by the door.

Nami shook her head. She didn't have a problem with innocent flirts and sometimes even one-night stands but to say she wasn't at least a little disappointed would be a lie. The red-head shrugged as she made her way back to the table - she did her due diligence in telling (Y/N) about Zoro's feelings, now it wasn't in her hands anymore.

Back at the bar, Zoro downed his cup for what must've been the fourth or fifth time. He stopped counting after a while. He didn't even know what he was so upset about. (Y/N) didn't owe him anything. She had every right to go back home with that guy. This didn't mean that it hurt any less though.

"Hey, is this seat taken", he didn't look up from his drink as (Y/N) greeted him.

"Shouldn't you be with your date?", he asked bitterly.

"Nah, told him I changed my mind", she said almost nonchalantly.

Zoro was shocked when he heard that - finally looking up from his drink.

"Why?", there were a thousand thoughts running through his mind. He was happy to hear that she decided against leaving with some stranger. He knew that she could take care of herself and he knew that he didn't have a chance with her anyways but the thought of some random man placing his hands anywhere near her made his blood boil.

(Y/N) shrugged, "I thought, I'd rather spend my evening with you"

"You- you don't have to", he hated how insecure she made him feel. He was a master swordsman goddamnit! Why couldn't he think clearly whenever she was close to him?

"I know that I don't have to, Silly!", the little nickname made Zoro's heart skip a beat, "But I want to"

(Y/N) slowly maneuvered her hand towards his own, interlicking their pinky fingers. Usually the swordsman would've pulled his hand away - not a big fan of physical touch - but with her it was different. When she realized that he allowed her advances, she decided to test the waters a little further. Almost gently, she leaned her head against his shoulder like she had during their guard shift together. The position felt right to her.

As she looked up at him, she met his eye. His gaze was so full of love and she asked herself how she didn't notice sooner.

"Zoro?", she casually continued, "You know, I was promised dinner..."

"Dinner?", he didn't catch on to her proposal immediately, which made her chuckle.

"Yeah... I don't think I should have to miss out just because I changed my mind"

Finally the pin dropped and a goofy smile lit up his features.

"I could eat", he said as he hopped off the barstool, helping (Y/N) down in the process.

With his hand on the small of her back he guided her towards the entrance.

"Oi, where you going?", Luffy yelled over to the two lovebirds when he noticed them leaving.

"Dinner", (Y/N) yelled back - a happy smile on her face.

"Oooh, dinner sounds good", he already was about to join the two when Nami held him back.

"Nope, leave them alone. Sanji can make us something back on the Sunny. Right Sanji-kun?", she knew how to play the cook to get what she wanted and of course the blonde man was like putty in her hands with the way he immediately started to assemble a possible menu for the crew. Nami only listened with one ear though - too occupied with patting herself on the back for successfully playing matchmaker.

Once outside, (Y/N) turned towards Zoro. That same happy smile that made his heart beat fast and his mind go blank still on her face. She laced her fingers with his calloused ones and decided she liked the feeling of it.

"So, where are we going?", he awkwardly asked. He still couldn't believe that this was really happening.

"I think I passed a nice little restaurant on the way here", she already pulled him with her towards the direction she remembered the restaurant to be. But then she stopped abruptly. She didn't want to overwhelm the poor guy but decided to press a sweet little kiss on his cheek anyways. A dreamy smile lit up his features and (Y/N) asked herself yet again how she never noticed how handsome the swordfighter was.

"I'm sorry for not noticing sooner", she almost whispered but Zoro didn't care at all. What mattered to him now was that he finally had the girl of his dreams right next to him, holding his hand.

"You should probably thank Nami though", (Y/N) continued, "If it weren't for her I'd probably still be oblivious..."

"Ugh, she already has such an inflated ego to begin with", he dismissed the thought - not wanting the red-head to boast about her achievement. In fact, he didn't even want to think about her at all at the moment. The only thing on his mind was getting (Y/N) to that restaurant and having dinner.

"C'mon let's go", he told her as he lead the way.

A soft chuckle disrupted his plans though.

"Zoro... the restaurant is the other way!"

If I leave here tomorrow

Summary: Joel used to know her, before the outbreak. All these years, he told himself she was dead, that she was just a ghost.

Pairing: Joel Miller x f!Reader

Word count: 7.4k

Warnings: smut (piv, fingering, f!receiving oral), canon typical violence, mention of past rape, grief, angst, emotionally unavailable Joel, emotionally unavailable reader, (until they're both not oops), hopeful ending and a lil fluff

A/N: Thank you for reading! As always, I would love to know your thoughts! I'm apparently only capable of writing about loss and grief and trauma these days. Disclaimer: I have not played the video games and this was written before episode three came out. If there are in world inconsistencies, its fanfiction, I'm sure you'll get over it. Let me know if any additional warnings need added.

Like the first bite of sun after winter, like a fox emerging from a den. 

Joel remembers thinking she was entirely feral. 

Before the outbreak. 

She was loud. She couldn’t hold a job down to save her life - hopping from one to the next like it was a game, never still. She ran on luck and caffeine and whatever bit of cash she had. 

Somehow, she was always laughing. Somehow, things always worked out for her.

She was never late on bills, always had food on the table. She was always ready with kindness to spare someone who needed it, and was never one to look away when trouble came knocking or when someone needed help. 

Especially, he hates to admit, when it came to him and his. 

She was resourceful, clever. Knew when to owe people favors and when to be owed favors. 

Chaotic as she was, she was stable where it mattered. And where it mattered - usually it was with him and Sarah. 

She’d baked cupcakes one year, for Sarah’s birthday. It was a year he thought he’d known struggle in, struggling to balance work and home, being a single father to a little girl. 

And then, she’d just kept doing it. She’d baked cupcakes for Sarah every year after that. 

She’d watched Sarah for him more times than he could count, when he was late coming home. 

“There’s always a light on here for her, Joel,” she used to say, holding the screen door open with her hip when he came to collect his daughter. “Anytime.” 

He’d appreciated it because things were always hard and she didn’t have to offer. Tommy couldn’t always be around, they both worked more than they should have. 

She liked folksy country and anti-war music and the sun. She liked books and long drives. 

Any time he stopped over, she’d have a record on the turntable. Bob Dylan and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Fleetwood Mac and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Bruce Springsteen. Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson. 

“Your girl needs to know when it's okay to burn her draft card,” she’d say with a laugh. 

Tommy would roll his eyes, and Joel would always say, “Don’t pretend you remember the 70s.” 

She listened to Free Bird so many times, Tommy started calling her Birdie. She’d just closed her eyes and said, “That song was written about me.” That had only concerned him slightly, considering what the song was about. 

Sometimes she’d disappeared for days on end, and scare him just a little. But Joel always knew she’d come home. 

Even if she disappeared, she was always there, somehow, when they needed her to be. 

And - 

Sarah liked her.  

Sarah loved her. 

Sarah had loved sitting on her front porch. Liked baking with her. Liked listening to her wax poetic about 70s rock and the dime paperbacks she picked up in the line at the grocery store. Liked reading with her in the light of the lantern she kept out front, swatting away mosquitoes. 

The big, loud of her stuck out before the outbreak, in a charming, chaotic kind of way.

It sticks out even worse on the other side. 

That big personality that Joel had pretended to be annoyed by, sticks out like a sore fucking thumb.

Mostly, because she’s supposed to be fucking dead. 

It makes sense, maybe, that she’d survived, found a way to survive when she’d always done so badly with fitting into the structure of before. 

Of course, she’d survived.

Of course, eighteen years later, she’d still be alive and kicking. She might even be thriving.

In this world. 

Surviving is a daily struggle for Joel, time passes slowly, agonies linger. 

When she emerges from the treeline, she’s alone. There’s a rifle over her shoulder, and a backpack. It’s like seeing a ghost, and the pit inside his heart, that thing he thought long dead, flutters. 

Against his will, it kicks him in the ribs, sucks the air out of his lungs. 

She only looks at him with a lifted brow, a wry twist of her mouth, like she isn’t surprised at all, and says, “Damn Joel, ya look like shit.” 

He hadn’t known she was the smuggler they were meeting. How could he have? 

Still, it’s like looking into a mirror and seeing another face peering back. 

Joel presses a hand over his face, unable to believe the past could still sneak up on him like this. He sweeps a hand down his face, cups his chin and glances away, up at the blue, clear sky, the swaying tops of the trees.  

The past could still sneak up on him. 

Like this, like her. 

“Shit,” he mutters. 

Tess glances between them, eyebrows raised. “You know each other?” 

“Used to,” she says, unfazed as she crouches down to unzip her pack. “Neighbors. Once.” 

Neighbors. 

They’d been a little closer than that. They’d been a little more than that. 

She’d been like - well, she’d been almost like family. Once. 

The trees sway with a light breeze. It carries the scent of spring, decomposing undergrowth, wet leaf and new life. 

And sage. 

She’d always smelled like sage. 

Tess raises her gun, sharp eyes on her hands digging through the bag. “Relax,” she laughs. “Here.” She tosses a plastic bag across to them, over the pine needles and wet earth. 

It lands at their feet.

Pills. Oxy. 

Way more than they’re used to seeing all at once.

“Holy shit,” Tess mutters and lowers her gun. 

“Go ahead and count ‘em if you’ve gotta.” She zips the pack up, slings it on and leans back against the bark of a tree. “Got all day.” 

Tess stoops to pick up the bag before snapping it open. 

Joel glances back at the ghost standing across from him and doesn’t look away. Casually, as though she hasn’t been dead for years. 

Decades. 

In his mind, she died with Sarah. In his mind, she still lives in a Texas that no longer exists. 

Birdie, he thinks. Finally gone away. 

That’s what he’d always told himself. 

“Calm down,” she grins at him with bared teeth, mistaking the cut of his gaze for something that it’s not.

“I’m not staying, just passin’ through,” she continues, glancing away from Joel, jaw set, brows tucked inward. Her accent is as thick as the last time he’d heard her voice. When she’d shouted from down the street that last morning in normalcy. 

She’d playfully wolf whistled at him from the step of her front porch. 

Hands cupped around her mouth as they drove by. Happy birthday, Miller! You don’t look as old as you could! 

Sarah had laughed, whispered, yeah, dinosaur, under her breath. Tommy had laughed too and waved at her as they drove past her house.

She’d been smoking a cigarette, a habit she’d recently taken up again, leaning against her porch railing. 

And Joel remembers suddenly how she’d stopped smoking the first time. Because of Sarah. When she started watching Sarah when she was still little, still practically a baby. 

She hadn’t just stopped smoking when Sarah was around, but stopped smoking period. 

She’d been so goddamned loud and beautiful and -

He hadn’t seen her after that, but with all the neighbors turning right around him, he hadn’t even considered the possibility of her survival. He hadn’t seen her on the street that night, just the couple across the way and next door. 

He hasn’t thought about that part of that day in a long time, too busy replaying that morning’s breakfast, the failed pancakes, and that day’s evening, a movie with his girl and no cake. 

She looks older, but not old, not like him. She’d been younger than him then too, not by much, and certainly not so young that he felt bad about fucking her. About seeing her and wanting her more than he should have. 

The mere sight of her, here, is wrong. She’s supposed to be back there, in the past, standing on the porch while a record played inside, ribbing him with Tommy when they invited her over for dinner, offering poorly wrapped presents to Sarah every Christmas morning they knew her. 

“What do you mean you’re just passin’ through?” He has to look away from her, diverting his gaze up to the tops of the trees again, the blue of the sky. He doesn’t have to be looking at her to know she’s rolling her eyes at him. 

He feels Tess’s gaze cut to him, sharp as a knife. 

“I mean exactly what I damn well said, Joel.” Something shuffles, and his head whips down, eyes fastened on her, gun already raised. She has her backpack twisted around her front, digging through one of the pockets. She doesn’t seem fazed, doesn’t even glance up. 

Her hands are bruised, bloody, cracked skin showing lines of red beneath. Her lip is split too. 

He doesn’t like the flicker of concern it drags up out of him, the feeling kicking and screaming all the way up the back of his throat. 

It’s hard to look at her, not just because of the split lip and bruised knuckles, but because she’s not supposed to be there. 

She’s not supposed to be there.

He wishes viciously, suddenly, that she were dead. 

Dead is easier. 

Dead means she never lived through the last eighteen years. 

It means that protective, preserving instinct inside him, of him and his, rises up. 

“Jesus, calm down, just adjustin’ some stuff.” She grouses. “If I was gonna shoot you I woulda done it by now.” 

Joel watches her, the twist of muscle in her arms, the shape of her hips beneath the jeans she wears, the cut of her collarbone under the frayed hem of her t-shirt. 

“Listen, if I knew I’d be meeting you,” she snaps suddenly, hard gaze meeting his, “I wouldn’t have fuckin’ come. Trust me on that. I don’t like seeing the past either. I don’t wanna see you either.”

That’s not what he’s thinking, but he doesn’t correct her.  

Joel lowers the gun, taking the bag of pills from Tess when she offers it to him to inspect. “Gotta be kidding me. Where’d you get this much?” He’s never seen this much of it at once. Tiny bags, tiny amounts, that’s what he’s used to. 

“I wouldn’t worry about that.” She crosses her arms over her chest and juts a hip out. “Want it or not?” She kicks up one brow.

“You came here all the way from Atlanta by yourself?” Tess asks. 

“No,” she answers simply, not clarifying whether she didn’t come from Atlanta, or if she isn't alone. “You want ‘em or not?” She asks again. 

She smiles at them and it's like looking into the teeth of a wild animal. 

She’s always been feral though, he thinks again. 

And he always liked the slightly sharp cut of her.  

Things he thought had died a long time ago come swirling back, fingers of feelings crushed beneath the cold boot of reality rear back to life. 

She’s exactly what he remembers, almost exactly how he remembers her. 

Birdie. 

Like the fox out of a den. 

She tilts her head, blinking long and slow at him.

“It hasn’t been so bad,” She answers a question that he doesn’t ask, her eyes boring into his. “Lotta scary stuff out there,” she shrugs. “But a lotta good too.” 

Joel scoffs.

“You wanna believe the world is so bad, huh?” She shakes her head, and holds out a hand when Tess steps forward with what she’d agreed to trade the Oxy for. 

“Look around you,” he snaps, waving a hand at the space around them, though it's peaceful at that moment. The wind is light, spring is in the air, and the dead apparently rise in ways that aren’t always bad. “What good is there left?” 

She shakes her head. “Not everywhere is here. And not everyone is you, Joel.” 

Joel doesn’t answer her, chest heaving with emotions he wishes the boot of the world would stomp back down again. 

She unwraps the cloth of the package Tess handed her, a soft expression shifting over her face at the sight. 

It’s a book, flat and thin. 

It’s fucking Goodnight Moon.

She’d just traded a fortune for a children’s book.

They’d just grifted her. She’s not stupid. She knows, she just doesn’t care.  

The expression on her face makes her look much younger. “See y’all around,” she says, not looking back as she tucks the book away and disappears into the treeline behind her. 

She’s gone but the memories she leaves in her wake don’t dissolve. 

Joel dreams of her. After that. 

His subconscious is subsumed by his past not being as dead as he thought it was. The keys to his humanity dangling in front of his face, within reach. 

He dreams. 

Of that fatal night. That last morning. That first brutal day in his cold new reality. 

Happy Birthday, Miller! 

He hasn’t thought about that part of that day in years, in decades. The memories of that morning had been eaten away at, consumed by what came later. He’s almost surprised the memories are still there, cupped between his ribs, stuffed back in the dark corners of his spine that he can’t reach himself. 

He dreams of her and Sarah pressed side by side on the couch, a picture book opened on their laps, tiny fingers tracing pictures and letters. They’d had a favorite book, one with a hidden mouse on each page. 

Sarah had liked to find the mouse, read each word slowly. And Birdie only laughed when Sarah pretended not to be able to find the mouse, despite the damn thing never moving, always in the same place on each page. 

He dreams of the meals left on the counter in his kitchen, a little voice telling him we made it together!

He dreams of the days she was gone, having to reassure Sarah, yes, she will come home. He dreams of the music on her porch, in the kitchen. 

Joel dreams of other nights too. 

The first night they fucked, the wet push of her bottom lip, the graze of her teeth against the flesh after she smiled at him and glanced at his mouth, lashes soft around her eyes. 

It had been one of those rare nights he was alone. Sarah was at a friend’s place, no parental responsibilities. He should have been asleep, catching up on something any parent knew to be elusive. 

Should have been. 

But he wasn’t, couldn’t. 

So, a cold beer on Birdie’s front porch sounded good. 

He dreams of the walk across the road, right up onto her porch where he knew he’d find her, feet up on the railing, a record spinning on so low he almost couldn’t hear it over the crickets and cicadas. 

He can’t remember, not now, what they’d talked about, how exactly they’d gone from her front porch to her bedroom. But he knows a Cash song had been playing.  

Joel just knows he had. He’d followed her, through the dark. To her bedroom. 

Her air conditioning was busted which was why she’d been on the porch in the first place so late at night. 

He remembers her being warm. The soft channel of her cunt hot. 

“Jesus, sweetheart,” he’d murmured into her damp skin. “You feel like fire.” 

He remembers the way she’d tasted, the way her belly clenched under his hands, the rise and fall of her ribs beneath his fingers, her hitched breath when he’d clutched at her sides, dug into her flesh like he could have pressed his fingers right through her ribcage, between the slats of her ribs, into the meat of her. 

She hadn’t held it against him when he left before she woke up. 

He’d had to go, to pick up Sarah from the friend’s house. But he’d wrestled with it, whether to wake her or let her go on sleeping. He’d settled for kissing her forehead, and leaving her be. 

When he wakes from that dream, he wishes she was dead for the second time. It’s only a distraction, what she’s caused. 

Weeks later, she’s in the QZ.

Another drop off, this time inside the walls. He doesn’t know what she smuggled in, what she’s trading. It doesn’t matter. It matters that she’s there. 

There’s a girl with her, too similar in coloring and size not to be her daughter. 

Joel doesn’t mean to approach them the way he does, doesn’t mean to grip her by her upper arm and drag her into a nearby alley. Her daughter is smart enough not to make any noise when she follows. 

“What are you doin’ here? I thought you weren’t hanging around.” His eyes cut to the girl. She looks eighteen, maybe younger or older. “Why would you come back here?” 

She shakes his arm off and leans back into the brick of the alleyway. “We had to circle back. There’s more here for us.” 

“More of what?” 

“Books.” 

Joel stares at her. 

“And music. CDs mainly. Somebody’s got ‘em.” 

Her daughter moves closer to her side, hand hovering over the knife at her side. He’s forced to look at the daughter then, really look at her, the shape of her face and eyes. They look similar enough, but Joel has to blink away the features that layer over hers. 

He tells himself that he doesn’t see himself in her, that he doesn’t see Sarah in her. 

She lies a hand on her daughter’s arm. “It’s okay. Joel’s an old friend.” Her daughter lowers her arm, relaxes into an easier pose but doesn’t take her eyes off him. 

Good, she’d been taught well.

“Joel, my daughter Daisy. Daisy, Joel.” 

Joel doesn't acknowledge the introduction and neither does she. “You should go. If you aren’t stuck here, you don’t wanna be.” 

“I came to collect,” she says, fingers still circled around her daughter's wrist. “There’s someone here that has a book I need.” 

“Need?” He rumbles. “Really? Need?” 

“Lotta books were destroyed. Fire. Neglect. Water damage.  More is lost every year. Music too. And that needs electricity, batteries.” She shrugs. “Some people will pay a lot for that.” 

Joel knew she was a smuggler, that was obvious. This he hadn’t expected.

People traded in necessities, food, drugs, contraband - not this. 

“Like you?” 

“Like me. It’s worth it.” 

He doesn’t see how, not when she had to risk so much for - all for sound and paper. 

“Building a fuckin’ library or somethin’?” 

She lifts a brow, nudges her daughter toward the street with her knee and a jerk of her chin. There’s a new bruise on her jaw, discolored skin disappearing into the top of her shirt. “So what if I am? Just don’t look too closely. Just look away.” 

They’re gone in second, disappearing into the crowd. 

Joel feels the worry, the care, he’s tried to tramp down, rise back up, bite into his lungs with sharp teeth. 

Just look away. 

Right. 

Joel sees her every couple weeks after that. 

For some reason, she sticks close to Boston, comes into the QZ every so often. 

She isn’t stupid, must know the risks of sticking around the QZ. But maybe she’s finished running around. 

“Daisy is moving on,” she says when Joel passes her the book she’d been looking for. He watches her pull back the cloth and inspect the spine of it. He’s still not sure if it's her daughter’s real name, or something she’d made up and given to him that day he dragged them into an alleyway. 

He’d spent too much time looking for the book. Denies that the smile it tugs her mouth into does anything for him. “Movin’ on? Without you?” 

“She’s that age. Needs to go on by herself,” she shrugs. “We’ll come back together if we need to. She knows how to find me. Knows how to handle herself. And I’m tired.” She rewraps the book - a banged up edition of something called American Gods. 

Joel watches her hands, the shake in them. She looks drawn. Tired. 

Something old and long dead makes him say, “You hungry?”

“Almost always,” she answers without hesitation.

When she first moved in down the street from him, all those years ago, they’d said almost the same thing. She’d been getting her mail, and he and Tommy had been barbequing. It had been the neighborly thing to do, to invite her over. 

If she remembers, she doesn’t show it. She follows him without a word, lets Joel guide her with a hand at the small of her back. 

She sits at the kitchen table, relaxes, but doesn’t talk, like its her home and she’s always been there. 

She used to talk, she used to talk a lot. 

He says as much to her. 

“Yeah,” she answers. “And you still don’t.” Her nails drum on the wooden table. The first time she’d had dinner with him, after that impromptu barbeque, with all of them, his little family, they’d had pizza. It wasn’t good pizza but it was better than what he sits in front of her now. 

It occurs to him then, that she’s never asked about Sarah. 

Not once, in all these months. 

She knows him well enough to know that if Sarah wasn’t there with him, something must have happened to her. That if she were alive, she’d still be with him, and he’d be different.

He wonders if she grieved them, him and Sarah and even Tommy. If she looked for them in the days after the outbreak. 

Joel hadn’t looked for her, there wasn’t time, and he hadn’t thought of it, not with the new wash of grief in him, the loss of his whole world. He’d only thought of her once, when they drove back down the street past her dark house. 

If she’s grieving all over again, she doesn’t show it. There’d been a closeness between her and Sarah that only existed between a mother figure and daughter. 

It reminds him of her hand on Daisy’s arm in the alleyway. 

Daisy, who kind of looks like him, who looks mostly like her. 

“Is your girl okay?”

She glances up and nods once, slowly, not meeting his eyes. “Fine. She’s smart, resourceful.” 

“How old is she?” He ventures, not sure he wants to know. 

She shrugs, “Eighteen, about.” 

Joel doesn’t even have to do the math on that one. It’s been nineteen years, about, since the outbreak. He figures in the time she would have been pregnant, and the reality of a situation falls into place in his mind. 

“Is she mine?” He asks, voice gruff. 

Her head jerks up from the plate in front of her, eyes flat and unamused. “Are you fuckin’ serious Joel?” 

“Is she? Timing’s right.” 

They’d fucked a few days before the outbreak. An early birthday present, she’d said then. There’d been a lot of sun that day, warm spears of late September heat. She’d smiled into his skin, promised he wasn’t old even if she teased him about it. He’d kissed her, thought about how things could be settled like that forever between them if she just let it.

She scoffs, “Fuck off.”

“I’m serious,” he growls. “Is she?” 

“What would it change, Joel?” she snarls suddenly. “I wish she was, but she’s not.” 

He doesn’t pause to think on that, on how she wishes Daisy was his. “Don’t fuckin’ lie to me-,” 

“She’s not,” she slams down the fork in her hand, the dishware rattling on the table. “She’s not, Joel.” 

Joel stares at her for a long moment, unrelenting and hard. He doesn’t believe her. 

“Jesus,” she mutters, running her fingers over her face and down the side of her neck, squeezing her eyes shut. “Jesus, she’s…Joel. I was raped. Okay? A month after the outbreak. Thought I could trust this fucker -,” her rage surfaces before she takes a breath and glances up at him. “It doesn't matter. I was raped. Next month, I missed my period. I wish she was yours but she’s not.” She shakes her head and looks down, brows pulling together, “She’s not.”  

He stares at her, reaches out and tips her face up. 

Rage, inhuman in its intensity crawls up the back of his throat, lights a holy fire he only feels when him and his are in trouble. It’s a years’ dead wound, a decades’ old trauma. It was twenty years ago. “Who?” 

She laughs, low and bitter, but doesn’t look away. “I was lookin’ for you, y’know.” He tries not to show how that guts him. “Or Tommy, I dunno. That fuck from the gas station down the road? We were gonna head north together, didn’t know what else to do. Anyways. It happened. He’s dead.” 

“Mm.” He presses his thumb to the center of her chin. He doesn’t want to release her just yet. He strokes a thumb over her cheek, shifts to cup her face between his palms, fingers rubbing slowly against the side of her neck, the space behind her ears. He traces over her jaw slowly with the pads of his thumbs. “Are you sure?” 

“Stabbed him through the fuckin’ throat so if he’s not we got bigger problems.” 

“You did?” He’s not surprised. 

“First one, for me. Not counting the infected. You think I’d let him walk away after that?” 

No. He knows she wouldn’t. “Atta girl,” he releases her gently, picks up his fork. “You did good with her. With Daisy.”

It had been hard, those first years. He can’t imagine it - the added stress of pregnancy, a baby. Going through it alone, pregnant and then with a child. A baby, a toddler, a child, who didn’t understand the world, the need to be quiet, the need to hunt or be hunted. 

She’s always been strong, but he wishes she didn’t have to be that strong. 

“What would you do? If I said he was still alive?” 

He remembers thinking once that she reminded him of summer. Beautiful, warm, wild - brutal in excess, harsh enough to kill if he didn’t watch himself, if she was crossed. There’s that brutality in her eyes now, she wants to know that he’d do something about it. Despite the years and the distance, the improbability of ever finding that man again. “He’d get a knife through his throat.” 

There’s a gleam in her eyes, a sparkle that glitters as her brow quirks and she resumes eating.

Joel follows suit, quiet again.

“You used to listen to them.” 

She taps her nails along the edges of the tape case. “Lynyrd Skynyrd,” she smiles. “Yeah I did.” 

Her favorite. It’s her favorite, but he doesn’t say that. 

“You already got it, don’t you?” He drops into the seat next to her when she sits down at the table.

“Yeah,” she says, “But mine skips. The tape is fucked up.” She opens her backpack, pulls out a walkman. “Yours might not be.” 

She sticks the headphones on, stuffs the tape into the player, and slams her finger against the play button. For a moment, her eyes flutter closed, and Joel is back on her porch, watching her from the front step, head tilted back in the sun while a record player crooned away. 

Fleetwood Mac. Lynyrd Skynyrd. The Beastie Boys. Pink Floyd. 

“Is it?” He asks.

“What?” Her eyes flicker open.

“Skipping.” 

“No,” she takes the headphones off and offers them to him. “Careful now, I gotta conserve the batteries.” 

Joel takes a moment to listen to a few verses of a song he listened to probably thousands of times with you, hundreds of minutes. All nine damn minutes of that song, over and over. 

“What do I owe ya for it?” She asks. 

“Nothin’.” 

“Seriously,” she tilts her head at him. “C’mon. Can’t be outta the goodness of your heart. These aren’t easy to come by. I should know.” 

Joel gives a tight shake of his head. “It’s really on me. Wouldn’t be able to play it anyways. Only got the radio. Y’know how that goes.” 

“Sure,” she nods, eyes cutting into him. She tucks the walkman and the tape into her backpack. “Am I makin’ you soft or something, Miller?” 

She means it as a joke, but Tess had only argued with him the day before about it. That he loses his head around her, that she reminds him of who he used to be.

It pisses him off, that she’s right. 

The tape is enough evidence of that. It took him forever to find, cost him too much.

A distraction, a liability, a softness, that his world does not allow for. 

He stands, rounds the table, leans down over her. She looks up, eyelids lowered and gaze calm. Joel anchors one hand to the back of her chair. He doesn’t answer her question. 

She has lines by her eyes, gray is just starting to creep into her hairline. Like it's taken her a long time to age. She tilts her head up, not off put by the sudden movement, the closeness. 

“Sorry.” 

“What for?” 

“Makin’ you remember. I should just move on. Stop comin’ back.” 

He doesn’t know where she goes when she leaves the QZ, when she disappears for weeks, sometimes months. She has a home, a place, something clearly closer to normal, to before, than here. 

“Yeah,” he says. “You should.” 

Before he can think better of it, he leans down and kisses her. 

Her lips part beneath his, tongue readily meeting his. 

It’s not a gentle kiss, not by any stretch of the imagination. 

But she only moans when he jerks her up from the chair, pushes her back into the nearest wall.

Joel presses a hand to the nape of her neck, and slips his tongue into her mouth. She moans into him, fingers scrabbling for purchase against his sides, tangling roughly into his jacket. 

She tips her head back when he pulls away from her mouth. Her skin is like lava, warm like summer, like sun. The past. Like a warm night and a busted air conditioner. 

He presses the edge of his teeth into her throat, tongue laving over the spot. “C’mon,” he whispers against her, mouth moving down toward her collar. Her head lolls back, eyes fluttering closed. 

She hooks her fingers into the loops of his jeans, tugs him closer to her. His thigh falls between hers, and she digs her nails into his waist, fire hot hands fitted beneath his shirt, sliding over his ribs, his stomach. 

Her touch isn’t gentle. He knows if he looks, he’ll find crescents marking his skin, maybe bruises too. 

Her teeth snag against his bottom lip. 

“Fuck,” he hisses, jerking back. 

“You gonna fuck me?” 

“Not yet, sweetheart.” 

She crushed between him and the wall. Her lungs heave in tight little breaths. 

She smells like the breath of the woods, a little like that sage he knows, though he can’t see how that’s possible. Layered beneath that, the scent of her want, the need that buzzes on the surface of her skin. 

Maybe she didn’t think about him all those years, but she certainly never forgot him. Her body folds into his, her other hand curling around his shoulder and digging into his hair. 

Joel hisses when she tugs on the strands, nails raking along his scalp. He fumbles with the button of her jeans, but finds her bare when he shoves his hand between her legs. 

She’s already wet, slick with heat.

It’s unceremonious, the way he shoves his fingers between the lips of her cunt. She buries her head against his shoulder, biting back a whine. “Lemme in honey,” he whispers, winding his free arm around her waist. 

She hikes one knee up against his hip, thighs parting for him. He slips the pad of his middle finger against her clit before thrusting two fingers inside her. A startled gasp echoes around the room, the sound of her wet. His cock strains against his jeans, eager for her, the clasp of her pussy. 

She shifts the hand against his waist to the outline of his dick, teasingly running the pads of her fingers along him. 

The walls of her pussy are soft, the sheath of her warmth clenching around him. “Gonna come for me like this, sweetheart?” 

Her hips buck forward, his fingers sliding deeper inside her with the movement. “Don’t be a fuckin’ tease, Joel-,” He presses his thumb against her clit and her voice clips off in an agonized moan. 

“Mm, you asked for it.” 

He fucks her hard, fast, the squelch of her wet cunt taking his fingers the only sound in the room. She breathes his name out, tugs at his hair, rubs his cock through the thick material of his jeans, but he doesn’t feel it, focused on the way she sucks him in, the press of her breath against his cheek, the damp feel of his skin against his. 

He feels it when she comes, when her cunt clamps down around his fingers and she shakes around him, head thrown back. 

Joel doesn’t give her a moment to breathe, to catch her breath. 

He has to have her, has to feel her around him. 

On watery legs she follows his insistent hand, lets herself be pushed face down on the couch. “Hold on,” she pants, not looking at him. “Christ, Joel.” She shoves his hand away, chest heaving, so she can take off her jeans. This time, she gets her knees under her, positions her thighs wider. 

Joel slides a hand down her spine, rests his hand at the back of her neck. He takes only a second to look at her cunt, the wet glistening strands of her release between the lips of her pussy. 

A thought breaks through the need, a reminder of what she’d been through, but when her hand reaches back for him and pulls him closer, pleas on her lips, he forgets it. She looks back at him, cheek pressed to the sofa. Her eyes are hazy, lids lowered to half mast. 

Joel ignores the flutter of feeling the look in her eyes inspires. 

He frees his aching cock from his jeans and sinks into her warmth, the fit is tight. She feels just like he remembers. She must run hotter than most people, the warmth of her so molten it almost burns.

Summer, he thinks as he presses one hand to the back of her neck, the other traveling to her waist, holding her flush against him. She still reminds him of summer. 

He knocks the thought away, irritated by it. 

Annoyed with the feeling attached to that old sentiment. 

Her fingers clench into fists, when he pulls back and slams into her again. She keens, voice muffled by the cushion she buries her face into. Joel can’t look at her, focuses on the tug of pleasure wrapping around his spine, the familiar way her body feels against his. She bites down the moan that tries to wriggle past her clenched teeth, moving with the press of him against her. 

Joel fits himself against her back, laces their fingers together for just a second before he releases her again and presses a demanding hand to her cheek. She turns her face into his, kisses him hard with tongue and teeth. 

“Joel-,” 

“I know,” he whispers, pressing his other hand against her soaked cunt. “C’mon.” 

She clenches hard around him, her eyes fluttering closed. Joel thrusts hard, sheathes himself inside her and stills, the aftershocks of her orgasm threatening to bring to him his own.  

“C’mere, c’mere,” he hears himself muttering, pulling away and turning her over, tugging her down the couch. “Fuck, c’mere.” 

He goes to his knees on the floor, joints protesting all the way down. Fingers dig into her plush skin, divoting the muscle, when he covers her cunt with his mouth. 

She whines and squirms, his name on her lips, repeated over and over. Her fingers dig into his hair, tugging hard. He moans into her, the taste of her like sin, musky and slightly sweet. 

“I can’t,” she whispers, one hand flying to grip behind her head, scrabbling at nothing, at anything to latch onto. “Fuck, I can’t-,” 

“Yeah,” he lifts himself just far enough away for her wet heat to whisper. “Yeah, ya can.” 

He closes his eyes, unable to look at her, tongue circling her clenching hole, nose bumping against her clit. He fists one hand around his cock, the ache impossible to ignore. He’s going to fucking come in his own hand, face buried between her thighs. 

She pants out his name again, “Joel, please-,” Her fingers push at his head, then tug him closer, pain radiating from his roots. 

Joel slips his other hand beneath her shirt, broad palm resting flat against her belly, the pulsing breath sliding through her lungs vibrating against his fingers. He slides his hand high, to rest between her breasts. He still wants to sink his fingers into her, all these years later, wants to feel the air in her lungs with his own hands. 

When one of her hands presses down on his, holding it against her chest, he sweeps his tongue up through her pussy, seals his mouth around her clit and sucks. 

She goes still, a silent cry frozen in her mouth, back arching away from the sofa. He blinks up at the sight, twists his wrist along his cock and comes hard, eyes fastened on the ecstasy pulled across her face. 

He allows himself to briefly press his forehead to the inside of her thigh, breathing her in deeply, the scent of her skin and arousal, before he staggers to his feet. She’s still shivering, still trembling, but he can’t make himself stay with her. 

Joel doesn’t look at her when he zips himself up and stumbles to the bathroom. 

He can’t decide if it's a mistake, twitching fingers gripping the sides of the sink for a few long minutes as his breathing settles and evens out. Too long, he spends too much time standing alone in the bathroom, trying to crush the familiarity the intimacy has just brought him. 

No time at all might have passed. He might as well still be in Birdie’s bathroom, twenty years ago, still thinking he might have a chance with her. 

He decides not to try to categorize what just happened, or compartmentalize it. He’s a fucking asshole, though, for leaving her shivering half-naked on the couch. 

Joel finds a spare cloth and wets it, intending to bring it back to her to clean up, but when he emerges from the bathroom, she’s already gone. 

The sofa is still warm from her body, but he doesn’t try to go after her. 

It’s a sharp contrast to the first time they’d had sex. The way he’d left her before she woke, but she doesn’t know he’d struggled with it, considered calling Tommy and asking him to pick Sarah up. She doesn’t know about the kiss he’d pressed to her forehead. 

He doesn’t see her after that. Not for a long time. 

Daisy meets with him and Tess, once. 

But that’s it.

It’s winter again, when he finally sees her. 

She’s waiting for him, and doesn’t say anything when she sees him. 

Joel stops, watches her shift from foot to foot on dirty paving stones. “Got somethin’ for you.” 

He doesn’t move, wary of her. 

She just rolls her eyes and steps closer, digging in her bag when she swings it around to her front. This time, unlike the first, he doesn’t flinch, doesn’t reach for his gun. 

“Here,” she pulls out a CD. “Noticed you had a CD player on the radio.” 

Joel takes it from her, flips it around in his hands. It’s blank, so it's clear she’s burned songs onto it somehow. 

“Did you make me a mixtape?” 

“Don’t make me regret it,” she says, arms above her head, clasped hands pressed to her forehead, eyes squeezed closed. 

He chuckles, just a little. “C’mon,” he kicks at her ankle and walks away. 

It takes a second, but she follows. 

This time, when he fucks her, its not so distant. He holds onto her, hard, his grip tight. Fingers that will leave bruises on her skin. He leaves part of himself with her, the part he thought dead and long buried. 

He talks her through it, mouth against her ear, her legs wrapped around his hips. 

“That’s it, beautiful, just like tha’,” he coaxes, forehead against hers. 

She whimpers and clings to him, the knot of her fingers on his skin like burning coals, falling stars. 

Joel tugs her closer after, doesn’t move. His heart races. It feels strange, after all these years, this kind of intimacy. He does better with it this time. 

If it feels strange to her, if there’s been anyone else she’s done this with over the years, she doesn’t mention it. 

“Remember how Tommy called you Birdie?” He asks, her burning fingers tracing over his chest, the cut of his collarbone. “Because of that song?” 

“No,” she touches his mouth. “I remember how you used to, though.” 

“You know,” she starts one morning, her back turned to him. She’s wearing his shirt and nothing else. Joel hasn’t seen her in a month. “Sarah told me she was gonna get you that watch fixed.” 

She turns from the counter, settles at the table, one leg folded beneath her. “For your birthday.”

He glances down at the broken watch on his wrist. Joel knows it's as close as she’ll come to actually asking about her.

“She did,” he says, nodding. “It was.” 

“Uh huh,” she nods. “Asked me about it. Told her about a shop downtown that worked on clocks and watches.” 

Joel closes his eyes, flashes of that evening flashing through his mind. The forgotten birthday cake, the movie, the watch, Tommy’s call. The end. 

“She didn’t make it,” she says suddenly.   

“No.”

She takes a stuttering breath and stands, paces away from him. Joel’s only a little surprised by her reaction. 

He’d supposed - he’d figured - she’d already put it together, that Sarah hadn’t survived. It’s different to know for sure, to know for certain, he supposes. 

She’d spent a lot of time with Sarah, baked cupcakes and bought Christmas gifts even when she didn’t have any money to really be spending. She’d babysat Sarah when she was still a toddler. 

Many nights, he’d come home to the image of her and Sarah together on the couch, book in hand. And when she’d gotten older, music. She’d shared all kinds of music with her, and indulged the new artists Sarah liked. 

Goodnight Moon, he remembers suddenly. It was fucking Goodnight Moon, the book with the mouse they looked for on each page. 

That book that she traded a fortune of Oxy for. It had been the one she read with Sarah when she was still small. 

She turns back suddenly, eyes rimmed red. “I knew. I mean, fuck, of course, I knew. Tellin' myself maybe she was with Tommy or somethin' but-,” 

“I know,” he rumbles. “I know, honey.” 

“I didn’t wanna know what happened to you either, y’know,” she shakes her head, sits close to him. “I told myself you died. Both of you.” She nods. “For a long time. I couldn’t think of it any other way.” 

He nods, inches his hand closer to hers, untangles them and folds one between his. Joel shifts so he can look at her head on, smooth his free hand against her chin and cheek.

There’s nothing to really say about it, and so he doesn’t say anything. “Why’d ya want Goodnight Moon so bad?” He asks instead. 

Her eyes shine, “Me and Sarah always looked for the mouse when you came home late. I still had it when…I took it with me, that night. Read it the same way with Daisy, ‘til we lost it. I needed to have it again. Been lookin’ a long time.” 

So, maybe it was worth that Oxy. 

“I’m sorry.” 

“Me too.”

Later that night, when she’s asleep in his bed, he plays the CD you gave him weeks ago. 

The first song isn’t Free Bird. He figures that means you’re sticking around. 

💞 Thank you for reading! Comments and feedback are so appreciated. 💞

THE LAST OF US (HBO SERIES)

+18 MINORS DNI !

blue jeans n’ Texas dreams

(Pre! Outbreak Joel x horseback riding instructor f!reader)

Summary/Blurb:

Blue Jeans Playlist

Joel Miller

Sarah Miller

Tommy Miller

Reader (nickname is clover/clove)

Part 1 (out now)

Part 2 (out now)

Part 3 (out now)

Not A Survivalist Girl

(Written by @tightjeansjavi & @chaotic-mystery)

(Coming soon)

(Joel Miller x f!reader)

Burning in a Hopeless Dream

(TLOU Joel Miller x f!o/c)

Joel Miller x Reader Playlist

(Ongoing)

Joel Miller

Tommy Miller

Tess Servopoulos

Ellie Williams

o/c : Gwen Brooks

One shots/blurbs :

Love me Tender

Feeling more human **sexual content**

Tongue Tied **sexual content**

Like Real People Do

Sing me a Lullaby Darlin’ **angst**

Who Do You Belong To Mr. Miller?**sexual content**

Burning in a Hopeless Dream Chapters :

Boston QZ part 1 (out now)

Boston QZ part 2 (out now)

Boston QZ part 3 (out now) **sexual content**

Boston QZ part 4 (out now)

Boston QZ part 5 ‘Long Long Time’ (out now)

Boston QZ part 6 ‘hoax’ (out now)

Boston QZ part 7 ‘illicit affairs’ (out now)

Boston QZ part 8 ‘Dust to Dust’ (out now)

Boston QZ part 9 ‘Rescue’ (out now) **graphic depictions of violence**

Boston QZ part 10 ‘Safe & Sound’ (out now) **sexual content**

Boston QZ Part 11 ‘NFWMB’ (out now) **sexual content & graphic depictions of violence**

Boston QZ Part 12 ‘Hearts Don’t Break Around Here’ (out now)

Boston QZ Part 13 “l can’t breathe”(out now)

Boston QZ Part 14 “Chest infect me, waste my days” (out now)

New people in town | Prologue

Post-outbreak!Joel Miller x Ex-lover!Fem!Reader, OC!Daughter!May Miller x Mom!Reader, OC!Daughter!May Miller x Dad!Joel Miller (future), Ellie Williams x Platonic!Fem!Reader (future), Ellie Williams x Platonic!OC!May Miller (future)

Chapter I

Summary: May discovers how the new man in town, who was accompanied by a teenage girl, and her mother were closely and intimately related once, and how almost two decades after they last saw each other, their reunion could possibly turn their worlds upside down.

Warning: swear words, mentions of death, violence and sex, possible smut in the future, mentions of possible SA, angst, etc.

A/N: This idea came to me because of a dream I had during my nap. I'm not sure if I'll write about it, if so it would be a one-shot or possible mini-series. Who knows.

Tag list: Open!

Feedback is very much appreciated ❤️

"Hey, mama!" A young woman with curly brown hair said coming through the door. The young adult was 18 years old, tall and slightly tanned. She had a beautiful, radiant smile, which made her nose, identical to her mother's, wrinkle slightly. But undoubtedly her most distinctive features were her huge chocolate eyes and the freckles that adorned her cheeks and nose - a trait her own mother did not know from whom she had inherited them.

"Mi amor, what's wrong?" Her mother, a woman no more than 43 years old, replied as she looked at her daughter curiously. "How did your first expedition out of Jackson go? Did you do what we agreed, May?" she asked, arching an eyebrow and crossing her arms, waiting for an answer.

"Always do what Aunt Maria says. Yes, mama." The young woman said as she leaned against the kitchen counter, and watched intently as her mother prepared the evening's dinner, for them and Maria and Tommy. "It was quite unexpected what happened today. You see, a man and his daughter, whom we found near the river of death, was asking for Uncle Tommy."

"He'll be an old friend of his, anyway. You know, from when he was with the Fireflies." The mother said to her daughter as she opened the oven door, then picked up the large tray she was going to put in the oven.

"No, not exactly. That man was looking for his brother, Uncle Tommy."

CLANK!

Once the tray made contact with the floor, silence reigned in the kitchen for a few seconds. The young girl approached her mother, concern and nervousness flooding her face.

"Mama, are you okay?" the chocolate-eyed girl asked. "Mommy, do you know that man? Do you know who he is?" May asked in a whisper, as she stroked her mother's back.

She could only nod awkwardly and slowly, as she was unable to look her daughter in the eyes. She swallowed and went to one of the kitchen stools, where she sat down and hid her face in her hands.

“Babygirl…” She sighed regretfully, before opening her eyes and pushing her hair behind her ears. "Yes, I know him -- Well, I knew him. That was a lifetime ago, my love. But that was before you were born."

"Did he know... my father? Or may he know what has become of him?"

The woman looked at her daughter, and took a hand to the stool beside her, inviting her beloved daughter, the thing she loved most in this broken world, to take her place beside her. "May. You should sit down, sweetheart, I think it's time I told you about him. It's time I told you about your real father — Joel Miller."

The young girl knew that the time had come and that she had to hold on tight, she knew that there were curves coming, and that what her mother was about to tell her was very possibly going to rock her world.

Maybe for better, maybe for worse.