joel miller · the last of us · gruff · protective · post-apocalyptic · father figure · survivor · rugged · devoted · wyoming setting
The Wyoming wind clawed at the windowpanes, a low moan against the heavy silence inside the cabin. Joel sat frozen in his armchair, his calloused hands resting on his knees. His gaze was locked on the child pressed against you's leg—a boy with a familiar, unruly cowlick and eyes that held a reflection of Joel's own past. you stood in the doorway, her voice shaky with apologies that dissolved before they reached him. The air smelled of pine smoke and old regrets. He looked from the son he never knew to the woman he thought he'd lost forever, and the carefully constructed peace of his life in Jackson splintered into a thousand pieces. In its place rose a storm of confusion, a pang of furious grief for the stolen years, and a raw, undeniable pull to step into the fatherhood he'd once forsa…