Dark Paradise - Joel Miller x OC

Ellie

Some angst for a good part of the chapter, but I add some fluff in the end because yeah, I needed it.

This has been translating while having a massive headache, I hope I didn't leave any big mistakes. If I did, sorry about that and I'll try to read it/correct it soon.

Photo by Ewan Yap on Unsplash

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A cry tears the silence of the darkened room. Chloe has just woken up, a cold sweat running down her back, her breathing short and choppy. At first scared, she realizes that Joel is indeed there, near her. He sits up to take her in his arms. She closes her embrace on him, squeezing harder than necessary. Harder than usual. Her nightmare must have been terrible, the man tells himself as he strokes her hair gently.

He rocks her for a few moments before lying back down, pulling her against him. Cradled in the crook of his shoulder, she cries without being able to stop. He murmurs reassuring words, tirelessly, hoping to calm her down. Her nightmares are rarer, they only come to haunt her a few times a month. But they are always so unexpected, so violent.

Her body shaken by hiccups, she leans on his chest to look at him, her eyes still flooded with tears.

"Please don't die. Never.

-I'll do my best"

He whispers as she comes back to snuggle up to him. He knows he won't be able to keep that promise. He thinks about it often, worried about her future. He's twenty years older, he often faces danger from the outside world and has made his body endure a thousand torments. While she's young and healthy, rarely stepping outside of Jackson's safe walls. Odds are against him.

He knows he's going to have to prepare her, slowly, for the idea that one day he will leave her. Not because he will want to. But because God, or fate, or whoever, will have decided so. But tonight is not the night. Heaven knows what dreadful dream she could have had. Perhaps she relived the death of Cyril. Perhaps she imagined his own death. All he knows is that it was violent enough to put her in a state of anguish that she had not had in a long time. It would take a while for him to get her back to sleep. To appease her.

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Singing softly, basket under her arm, she settles down on the porch to mend some clothes. Autumn is here, and she wants to take advantage of its golden light before the snow and cold appear again. As she tackles one of Joel's shirts, he settles down next to her, playing his guitar to keep her company.

"How do you always manage to put holes in your clothes like this?

-Hey, they're no longer new you know, they were probably made before you.

-Mine too, and yet they don't get damaged like that. And to think I'm supposed to be the sloppy one. You who are so careful. No, really, I don't understand."

He doesn't respond, just strumming the strings of his guitar. He can't tell her. Even if he wants to prepare her for his death, he doesn't want to worry her too much. He can't tell her that most of the time, holes in his clothes are made when trying to escape infected. That the shirt she has in her hands saw a battle with a bloater, days earlier at a hotel north of Jackson.

He looks up when he hears his partner greet Ellie. The teenager only responds with a faint sound, accompanied by a quick wave of her hand. Shunning his gaze, she hurries home, the sound of the key clearly heard from the porch. Chloe sighs as she resumes her work.

"Teenagers."

Again, Joel remains silent. Jaw tight. He knows this is more than just a teenage crisis. Ellie is not stupid, she knows something is wrong with his story, and she blames him for it. The more time passes, the more difficult it is to keep his lie.