when you need me, call my name
Her breaths have just evened out enough that he thinks she’s asleep again when he hears her mumble thickly, “‘M sorry, Dad.”
Immediately, his eyes fly open, flooding with tears, and his heart lodges itself in his throat as he tries to— tries to process that this is the first time Ellie’s spoken to him in days, and she’s apologizing for… Well, he doesn’t even know what, and she’s calling him Dad, and—
— and he hasn’t been a dad in a long time, and it hurts, it hurts so damn bad, it feels like he’s cracking open from that one single word, it feels like it’s tearing through him and reminding him of how he failed the last little girl who called him that, and—
—and he loves Ellie with a fierceness that scares even himself, and hearing her call him Dad has mended something at the very same time that it’s broken something else.
He remembers back in Jackson, when he so cruelly said You’re not my daughter, and I sure as hell ain’t your dad.
Oh, how wrong he’d been— how foolish, to think he could ever give her up.
or,
5 times Ellie calls Joel Dad and they don't talk about it, and 1 time she doesn't call him Dad and they do talk about it.
joel & ellie || 15.5k || 5+1 || family bonding
56 notes
·
View notes
when you go through all of orv wondering what makes han sooyoung so important, why she's also on the main cover, why she's a part of the trio when she doesn't even show up that often. and then you finish the novel and realize that she is more present any other character in the entire story -- she's been here this whole time, speaking directly to you, on every single page.
27 notes
·
View notes
the fact that in Canon in 2006 iroh said oh shit sorry for misgendering you, my bad. like. holy shit
3 notes
·
View notes
May 2022
The path is built on sand
A thousand years' worth
Firm and narrow directing your feet
Keep going forward
And there is no chance of getting lost
Flowers line both sides
Pale pink bell-shaped and
Fat thistles budding and
So many small orange poppies
Cups eagerly open to collect the fog dew
All peaceful quiet except
The ocean surf below
Gently crashing waves
And the funny bark of elephant seals
Lazing on the beach
To your right the hill crests
You scramble up it
Anticipating
Breathless
The beauty still catches you by surprise
Blue ocean and
White surf and
Tan beach and
Grey sky
Everything vast and timeless
Limitless
Like the breath in your lungs
Your mind is empty
But in the best way
Revelatory
You don't need to get high when
You have this
Quail on fence posts
Deer roaming where they will
Cows in the road
You drive past slowly
And stop to stare
Locking eyes with a badger
For the first time in your life
This was a wrong turn
But it doesn't feel wrong
Knowing you would have missed
The quail and the cows and the hawk and
The badger with its mouse dinner caught in its teeth
If every path takes you somewhere
Maybe there is no getting lost
12 notes
·
View notes