Chapter Text
1-BOND: “Jesus christ Joel. What’d you do?” Tommy sat, appalled by the detailed story his brother had just admitted to him. “I saved her,” Joel admitted. Next to Tommy, you sat with your face buried in your hands, unwillingly reliving the haunting day all over again. No, you didn’t see what happened, and no you didn’t know that Joel was going to do what he did but you damn sure knew about it now.
A silence passes over you as the room settled, creaking the silence away as you released a heavy breath that you’d accidentally been holding. Every day of your life- since it all happened, you were expected to remember and pity the lives lost. Every day that you looked at Ellie, you also had to thank and pity your father, Joel.
No, he’s not your biological father but he had you around since you were six years old. Some say Joel had a knack for raising kids but, the old man just had a good heart. After losing his own blood, he still opened up his heart and arms for you… and years later, for Ellie. Though the freckled-faced girl came in years after you, you swore that you’ve known her for your entire life. It’s hard to remember anything before you met because it was always ‘Ellie, Ellie, Ellie’.
If you were gone, everyone knew you’d come back with that crude-mouthed girl latched in your calloused little hands. If you’d come back from anywhere with a new scraped knee, it was always Ellie’s influence. She overtook you like the plague, and despite her immunity, you’d done the same to her. No other person could make her feel the way you did and that left you to be the only couple of things that sway her nowadays. Not Dina, not Kat, and she even pretends to not care about Joel.
She’s not the easiest to understand but she was the easiest person you’ll ever love.
Pain clouds Joel's face as he pauses his motion, settling the white rag that he was cleaning his guitar with, onto his lap. First, you catch the gaze of your uncle Tommy before fully sitting up to look Joel square in the eye. “I still fight with her about that… she says it could’ve worked.”
He blinks and then he nods before glancing at the decaying floorboards as you barely shrug. “Your guilt will do nothing but kill you, Dad,” you spoke sternly, settling your elbows on your knees as you folded your hands together. “Ellie feels guilty… she hates herself more than she hates you.”
Tommy nods along, looking at Joel as well. The man in question doesn’t tether the gaze, instead opting to rub the tight bunch in between his eyes.
Having the two people that you love the most be against each other has been a long, hard ride but, you always do what you can to make sure that neither of them lives with any ill emotion toward one another. Well, you were certain that Joel had zero ill feelings for your girlfriend but you couldn’t say the same on her part. She was persistent and vocal. Ellie didn’t care whose feelings she’d hurt when it came to speaking about Joel. And sometimes, that included you.
But no matter what, you can’t imagine losing
your family and you’d always do anything to keep them safe. It was hard for Ellie to understand that concept but, it’s reasonable. You, on the other hand, couldn’t stand all the times you’d argue and she’d bring up the fact that she should’ve died in the fucking hospital. Even thinking about it now sparks a fire within you, causing you to tightly shake your head and stand up.
All eyes follow you as your face scrunches into one of subtle anger. “To hell with the fireflies… They got what they had coming.” Tommy bristles, glancing at Joel before stammering and shaking his head. “Maybe you shouldn’t be thinking like that, sweetheart.”
You shake your head, staring him down with a solid expression. For so long, you’ve always suppressed what you wanted to say, what you really thought about the world. Sure, let’s say Ellie's brain does have a cure that is indeed salvaged during a killing surgery. Now what? Do we slowly rebuild civilization while the vaccine reaches other countries over a decade? Fuck that.
“I don’t give a shit about who died—“
“Alright alright, calm down…” Tommy stood, slowly inching his way to you until he was able to settle his hands on your shoulders. “Let's just…” -he paused, glancing at Joel before patting your shoulders. “Let's just head on back, okay?”
Your chest heaves with grief of your own as you nod, tightly shutting your eyes to avoid the sympathetic stare that Joel was sending your way. He knew that after this, your relationship with Ellie would twist and bind in different ways. One day, she would find out and she’ll definitely ask if you knew about it. Joel dreads the day to come but he can only worry about what it’d do to the two of you. You kids were like bread and butter.
He didn’t want to risk your love but you were more than a willing listener.
Just as he thought you were going off to get on your horse, Joel is winded by a crushing hug that you force him into. Your round, cool cheek presses against his wrinkled and tired features as a tiny smile blooms across your face.
“Thank you for everything.”
Merely days later
“I am not gay. I like boys… I’m in love with a boy…” you smirk, casually spewing blasphemy as you juggled a couple of plushies whilst lounging back onto Ellie’s bed. She’s 2 hours deep into that new sketchbook that you got for her and you were far too comfortable to even bother getting up to see what she could’ve come up with. Even if you did, she probably wouldn’t notice anyway. Once that girl got the music in her ears, she was gone.
Just as you raise your arm to throw a round dog plushie at her head, a knock comes from the door. You pause, sitting up as you inquiry the visitor. “Who is it?”
Ellie doesn’t move an inch.
“Joel… can I come in?” you smile, glancing back at Ellie before shrugging and throwing yourself back in the bed. “Join me, she’s trapped in that book again.”
In no time, Joel slithers in through the door. His intrusion brings a gust of the evening's wind but Ellie once again failed to react. This time, it's understandable. Sleeping in the cold garage made her immune to the cold. Sometimes, she reminded you about this children’s movie that you’d been told about. It was something about… and ice princess…
Anywho.
“When’s the last time she spoke?” he closes the door behind him, stepping into the middle of the room to join you in watching Ellie. She was like a zoo exhibit. Badass girl in her natural habitat.
“2… going on 3 hours.”
Your father nods and a gentle old-timer smile spread across his face as he settles a hand on your head, purposely making sure to disturb the colorful rubber bands that you’d worked so hard to turn into shapes. “Hey, watch it.” the attempt to swat him away is as fruitless as ever.
“It’s cozy in here… looks like she let you put those posters up.” Joel took a moment to look around the room as he was already rounding to bother Ellie. “Yea took a lot of begging and bargaining.”
He raises an eyebrow but didn’t question it, instead kicking the leg of Ellie’s spiny chair. She startles and turns to see Joel doing his best not to smirk. “Jesus. You almost gave me a heart attack.”
“Your partner here let me in…” he gestures towards you, the person begrudgingly fixing the rubber bands in your hair. You make no move to claim your innocence which made Ellie swiftly toss a pencil in your direction. It easily misses you, giving nothing but a yellow blur as it passes by. “Work on your aim, your life is precious.”
She makes a sound of mockery before laughing and turning back to Joel. “Do not scoff at me… you are… very… untrained,” you spoke in intervals as your fingers kept getting stuck in your infinite loops of bands and strands of hair. Joel shrugs, siding with you as Ellie can only shake her head at the two of you.
Like strangers, the two quickly fall into an awkward silence that clearly bothers Ellie as she leans back against her desk, jittery and avoiding eye contact. “So… what’s up, Joel?”
“Just checking in…” he nods, glancing at you before continuing. “Folks are… y’know, talking about how impressed they are with you and how well you’re helping out.”
“Once again, untrained, I am in your grace, Williams.” Joel crossed the room to ogle a lava lamp as you and Ellie began to bicker.
“Oh bullshit, you didn’t teach me anything.”
You make a sound of shock, stiffly rising from the bed as if you’d awoken from a permanent slumber. “Who taught you how to clean those damn hooves? Shimmers an asshole and you know how many times that prick kicked me.”
Just as Ellie was going to rebuttal with more swear words than you did, Joel cuts through, having enough of hearing it. “Hey—“
Instantly, the two of you cast daring glares at one another seconds before he continues. “Tommy, Y/N, and I went out riding the other day, and Tommy, uh…”
You flutter, eyes a little wider than before. A feeling within your gut sinks, draining you in an instant. If he was going to get honest and start spilling his guts, he’d better not do it now. But luckily, Joel was easy to read. He wasn’t going to admit to anything right now, not while he was crossing the floor and chuckling about something in his head.
“He told me a joke and I thought about you, it’s, um…” he trails off, pretending to think. He clicks his tongue, furthering the awkwardness to a point where you heavily sigh, kicking your feet against the wood of Ellie’s bed frame. “Wow, dad… I notice that social skills rank in age. You and Maria are the weirdest people I know.”
Joel can only look at you with his lips parted, surprised that you legitimately thought that. Ellie puckers her lips, swiveling towards you with a quizzical expression. “Maria? I thought you liked her?”
“I do. But have you ever heard her talk about anything non-work related?” you raise a finger… waiting for either one of them to defend her... which they do not do. “Exactly.”
Humor circles the air but the awkwardness comes back just as fast as it left. “Man you guys are… weird.” you hop off the bed, sliding next to Ellie to lean on the desk. “Dad… I love you with all of my cells and bones but this is getting so painful that I would almost rather talk to Maria.”
“Yea. I’ve gotta… get up in a couple of hours anyway-“
Joel raised his hands, winded by the teenage sass and he took a few steps back. “Yeah Yeah, I know, I know, and I’m gonna get out of your hair, I just, um…” he seems to look around the room for a second before raising a finger and jogging to the door. “I wanna show you girls somethin’. Just gimmie one second.”
He leaves the door open as he stepped through the darkness of the night, fetching something that you couldn’t wait to see. Ellie huffs and rubbed her cheek against her shoulder, suffering under embarrassment. A smile spreads across your face as you crossed your arms, now moving back to fully sit on her desk as you waited for Joel.
“Who knew old people could be adorable?” you beam, bumping your elbow into her back just for her to roll her eyes. You often called your father an adorable old guy which… he always shook his head at. He just had a lot of quirks and things that six-year-old you remembered to always look for…
Just as you get lost in memory, Joel steps back into the garage with a classic guitar in his left hand and a black material in his right. Ellie can’t hide the way that her eyes light up at the sight, instantly speaking with a newfound interest in her voice. “What’s this?”
First, he displays his right hand to you, letting you take the black fabric from his hand. You unfold it to see that it wasn’t fully black and that it had a cute white star ☆ next to the right eye of it. It was a balaclava that showed only your eyes and man were you overjoyed to see that?
“Oh hell. Yes. You’re the best, I'm convinced you’re just the best ever.” you promptly shove the mask over your head, fixing it to make sure none of your hair was in the way as you did so. Ellie seems to scrutinize your new look as a guilty smile began to plague her features. As much as she wants to act like you don’t look sick, she can’t help but admit it. “Damn, you actually kinda look badass…”
People always thought you had piercing eyes when you were in a bad mood but being able to only see nothing was sure to give you cookie points for intimidation from now on.
Your eyes scrunch so much that they disappear. “This is gonna be so cool to train with now…” your voice shows nothing but awe as Joel smiles at you, proud that he made you happy with such a simple gift. “Thanks to Tommy… he mentioned how good you’ve been with snipers as well as your stealth.”
Ellie elbows you, smiling at the dumb way that you silently beam.
Joel lifts the guitar, now holding it in both hands as he finally answers Ellie’s question. “Some folks call this here, a gee-tar.”
You shake your head, disappointedly squeezing your eyes shut to suppress the cringe. “Funny,” Ellie says.
He gestures to the instrument, puckering his lips. “Y’all wanna hear something?”
“Okay.”
“Hell yea.”
Joel chuckles and sat down on the coffee table with a subtle grunt, fixing himself to properly hold the instrument to play it. You hop off the desk, instead moving to Ellie's spiny chair and scooting next to Joel. Though you don’t have a knack for music as Ellie did, it’s more than interesting to see how he’ll strum and move his hands around the board this time. “Promise me… no laughing.” he looks up, gaze shifting between the two teenagers as one stifles a laugh and the other shrugs.
“What’s a memory without a laugh.” you tease, dramatically spinning in the chair as Ellie takes your spot, legs dangling from the desk. “Well, I won’t laugh.”
“Thank you…” he trails, turning to you. “And don’t you laugh… I’m trustin’ you.”
You nod, rolling your mask up to your forehead. Joel takes a breath before he began to strum a relaxing tune. It seems to come naturally and he has no trouble playing the correct notes. It takes nothing but a second for you to move with the tune, your head bobs as you make a “what?!” face at Ellie.
She nearly laughed but forced herself to calm down as you turned back to Joel.
“If I ever were to lose you
I’d surely lose myself
Everything I have found here
I’ve not found by myself
Try and sometimes you’ll succeed
To make this man of me
All my stolen missing parts
I’ve no need for any more
‘Cause I believe
And I believe ‘cause I can see
Our future days
Days of you and me”
By the time he’s finished with the lyric segment, you’re trying to distract yourself from the stupid tears pending on the rim of your eyelids. Curse that heart of yours for still being soft in a world like this. Those stupid lyrics make you think about a lot of things… but they mostly made you think of your family. Joel, Ellie, Tommy, and Maria.
Since you were tiny, you’d already decided that you didn’t want to experience the loss of your father, Joel. The song makes you think about his age… walkers… fucking everything that made him mortal. Obviously, he’s healthy and able but everything and everyone dies eventually. Man, you can only see yourself losing it if something happened to the ones you love.
Everyone has lost somebody but some people, you just cannot bear to be without.
You’re so lost in your thoughts that you don’t even register that he’d stop playing. “There you go…” he spoke, somehow looking shy as he looked up at Ellie, who was sitting attentively the whole time. “Well…. that didn’t suck.”
He chuckles in response, ready to take the guitar off his lap when Ellie calls your name, immediately snapping you out of your whirl of thoughts. “You okay?”
“Yea-! Um…” you sit up, eyes fluttering to subtly get rid of those tears building up. “That was like… beautiful but… ykno I could like… do better.” you grab a strand of your banded hair, twirling it around your finger with an ego bigger than yourself.
“Oh yeah, I totally saw you crying.”
“DID NOT! MY EYES WERE WATERING, ITS FREEZING IN HERE!” your weak voice cracks, making you look twice as small.
“No, no, that's okay Y/N. You’ve always been a crybaby.” Joel said, proudly smiling at the guitar in his grasp. Ellie makes an explosion sound, egging you on further. “I cry over no being.”
“Yea yea.” he stands, rounding you to hand the guitar to Ellie. “She’s yours.”
“No. No, no, no. I don’t know the first thing about this.” she rejects it but still got the guitar put into her grasp. “I promised I’d teach you how to play.”
She isn’t able to protest anymore and allowed herself to comfortably settle the instrument in her lap. “You did.”
“So what do you say, tomorrow night, first lesson?”
“Deal.”
“Okay.”
“Dad stealer.” you jest.
“Oh don’t be like that, I’m sure your uncle Tommy is your favorite.” Joel pulls the balaclava down your face, causing it to messily sit crooked across your face. Still, you laugh “Dude, nobody pit pockets like him….”
Both Ellie and Joel tilt their head, wondering what you meant. The silence makes you realize that you probably should’ve kept that a secret. Tommy did say that if someone found out that he was sneaking the breakfast bagels for you, he’d be forced to stop due to the wraith of Maria. So instead of waiting for them to even began questioning, you loudly stretch and stood up, awkwardly laughing as you stepped to Ellie.
“Man! I'm beat! Gotta be up and at em tomorrow. See you soon-“ you hug Ellie, squeezing her cheek in tandem.
“Now wait a minute.”
“Nope, see you in the morning! Love you guys, ka chow!” and with that, you make a mad dash out the door and immediately headed home, deciding to let Ellie have her time alone tonight.
Joel stares door that is left ajar, already making his assumptions of what you could’ve meant. He sighs, and throws his hands up, stepping back. “Well, alright…”
But before he gets too far, Ellie perks, tilting her head as she asked. “Did you remember the joke?”
Joel is more than happy to oblige, even leaning on the door frame to prep the masterpiece of a joke. “Um… What is the downside to eating a clock?”
Ellie merely tried to think for a couple of seconds before shrugging.
“It’s time-consuming.”
A beat of stale silence breaks when Ellie chuckles in disbelief. “That’s so dumb. Y/N is so lucky she ran away before hearing that.”
“Yea, you say lucky, I think the opposite.”
The two share a small smile before Joel straightens his posture and reached for the door handle. “G’night, kiddo.”
And he’s gone.