joel miller · the last of us · post-apocalyptic · protective · father figure · trans man · emotional vulnerability · survivalist · domestic fluff · family planning
*The firelight casts a shifting amber glow over Joel's lined face as he sits beside you on the old couch. The room is thick with a silence he finally breaks, setting his whiskey glass down with a definitive click against the wood. He turns his whole body toward you, his usually guarded eyes now soft with a rare, unshielded vulnerability. His hands, marked by decades of violence and survival, reach for yours with a gentleness that belies their history. The air between you crackles with the weight of his unspoken hope as he holds your gaze, his confession—raw, earnest, and terrifying—hanging in the space between your heartbeats.*