Orange Slices (Joel Miller x f!reader)

Chapter Eleven

Roughly a year and some months later

Summer is quickly coming to an end, the leaves have started to turn into warm tones of red, orange, and yellow. The lush greenness of the land disappears with each new day. It's just about midday and you've been sitting at the base of a boulder for about an hour now, simply staring off into the distance. A layer of freshly fallen leaves coat the ground. You feel wholly at peace. A chill runs down your spine as a slight breeze begins to pick up. The sound of leaves rustling reminds you of a thousand little whispers, making you not feel so alone up here. You tuck your knees in closer to your chest, regretting not wearing or bringing anything warmer than your thin long sleeve shirt out on today's patrol.

It's a very serene day. Patrol went perfectly fine, you had a longer trek than usual as it was your day to check on the dam. Of course, nothing was out of the ordinary and you sort of went into a state of autopilot. From there, you circled around, heading straight for the outlook as you do most days. Everyday is pretty much the same, and have begun to blend into one another. Wake up, patrol, outlook, dinner, sleep. Rinse and repeat. Every. Day. The one thing that you never get tired of is coming here. The view is just as beautiful as the first time you saw it. In some sort of strange way, when you're here, you can still feel the strong, intense presence of Joel, as if a part of himself still remains up here even after he's left. Today in particular, it's extra strong and in an odd way, it's comforting.

You take a look next to you, looking at the barren ground. A bittersweet feeling overcomes you, one you have to immediately ward off before you become nauseous or it turns into something more. The feeling comes and goes.

When you first started coming out here on your own, it was in the dead winter. You'd only stay a few minutes, sometimes a half hour at most, but never longer. The reasoning not really being the weather, how the cold seeped in through your thick winter coat chilling your right down to your core, or how your nose was so cold it'd take the rest of the day to regain feeling. Sure you'd use that as an excuse to yourself, but deep down you knew the real reason. The memory of the last time you saw Joel haunted you for months after his departure. You couldn't escape the guilt nor the hurt it caused. It took you a while to build up to spending more time up here. When spring came and your emotions subsided, you started staying for longer periods of time. Soon you began to bring your lunch with you, slipping books in your backpack to sit under the shade on the warm summer days. For your birthday, Nessa gifted you a beautiful leather bound journal. She told you she had it made special for you by someone in the community, remembering how you loved writing and journaling back in high school. After that you started carrying it with you everywhere you went. You haven't quite gotten into the routine of writing regularly, but on the occasion you do, you've found it to be therapeutic. This is how you've learnt to deal with things, with pen and paper.

Tucking the pen between your lips, you pull out your leather bound journal and flip open to the last entry, there's about a half page worth of writing.

Sometime in mid July.

Tommy and I just came back from a couple day trip. It was just him and I this time. We ended up coming back empty handed, not that it really matters, since we just go out for fun, to get out of the community and have some time to ourselves. Spent a lot of it hiking. It was a peaceful trip this time around, we weren't bothered by no one or came in contact with any infected (unfortunately the number of infected popping up outside of the city has been increasing as of late) Nessa said she wants to come along next time... Tommy told her she could just to make her happy, but we both know she wouldn't be able to last a night out here without throwing some sort of tantrum. The ground is too hard, she can't sleep because she's scared, she's cold, she's hungry.... I love Nessa to death, but taking her out on a trip like this is not my definition of relaxation or fun. Tommy was telling me on the way back he wants to take an extended trip soon, it's been awhile since he's done one (last one was when he found me). Maria has told him no multiple times already, telling him it's not worth the risk and that Jackson is already doing so good on its own. He sort of alluded to his want to go east. I didn't say much, I hope he invites me along if he does end up planning something.