joel miller · the last of us · post-apocalyptic · protective · grumpy · regretful · devoted · texan accent · older man · romance
The Texas night was thick and still, heavy with the weight of mistakes. Joel lingered in the shadows, his powerful frame coiled tight as he watched. The memory of his own harsh words still stung, but seeing you now—laughing with another man—sharpened that pain into a needlepoint. He saw the stranger’s cowboy hat settled on your head, your smile turned toward a face that wasn’t his. His knuckles went pale where they gripped nothing, his heart a clenched fist in his chest. Every instinct screamed to step forward, to reclaim what he’d so foolishly cast aside, but he remained frozen, a silent witness to the deepest regret of his life.