But when he showed his wife, Ana, she said tactfully.  “This is great research baby,” for one perfect shining second, he thought he was off the hook, “but I still need to see what we’re getting.” Fuck.

So, there they were at 10am in Berkely, California walking through an elaborate maze that Javier was certain had been expressly designed by Swedish intelligence officers as some sort of social experiment designed to torture fathers with college aged children. As if sending his baby girl three states away wasn’t cruel enough.

So that morning Javier grumbled as he slid a short pencil behind his ear, wishing it was a cigarette instead.

“If you’d like,” Ana said cooly, too busy to indulge her petulant husband, “we can leave you in the playroom with the rest of the children, if you intend to pout this entire time.”

“No mi reina, I’m sorry, let’s get this over with.”

By the time they’d gone through the kitchen and living room showrooms, Javier’s eyes were darting around looking for an exit sign, as though he were a caged beast, “How big is this fucking place? This has to be the near the end right?”

“Javi, have you never actually been to an Ikea before?” Ana asked. They’d shopped for their house furniture at far nicer places, investing in pieces that would last for their cheerful San Antonio home. And truth be told, Javier had always just bought what Ana said would be best anyway. She had great taste and it minimized the time in the store. The only time he was remotely interested in a piece of furniture they bought, it was so he could plan what way he might be able to ravish his wife on top of it once they brought it home.

Shopping for his 17-year-old daughter’s dorm room furniture, Javier was very much hoping absolutely NO ravishing would be done on the items they purchased that day. He eyed the pressed manufactured wood. The good news there was that he doubted the cheap college furniture would be up to the task. Was there a bed that could automatically collapse if more than one person was on it at a time?

Javier stood hand on hip as he watched his wife and daughter discuss the pros and cons of each single bed. Then sighed quietly while they went over what comforter and sheets paired best together.

“Javi! Did you hear me?” Ana, he realized, was staring at him.

“Sorry, I was looking at this…” he lifted the tag on the nearest bed frame, “KL- KELPSTAAD?”

“Well, we’re going to go with the HERMANS it’s a little bit more expensive, but it seems more sturdy, we wouldn’t want it to break, and it has drawers for more storage underneath.”

Javier pinched the crown of his brow, “Great.”

“Anyway, I said we’ll grab lunch now.”

He brightened up instantly, freedom! He couldn’t believe they were getting out of there already. Though it had been nearly two fucking hours of torture. “Okay what do we feel like, Italian, Mexican, Chinese…”

“Swedish meatballs.” Hels said cheerfully.

Javier heart sank as they turned the corner to the in-store restaurant, “I can’t believe there’s a fucking restaurant in the middle of a fucking furniture store.” This place really was a Swedish fucking prison.

P.S. He liked the meatballs but he wouldn't admit it.

Materlist

If you want to know how the rest of the college drop off week went I wrote this one shot of them dropping their daughter off at her dorm then going for a little vacation in San Francisco (it get spicy once they ditch the kid😏): With Somebody Who Loves You

The blood trickles down your thighs from the three new cuts you’d given yourself there. One on your inner left thigh and two more on your right leg about seven inches up from your knee cap. You’d gotten used to the pain in the past couple of months you’d been doing this. You can’t even really remember when you did it for the first time.

You lean back against your window and shut your eyes, your tears drying into your cheeks. It felt wrong to be doing this on your window seat, the cushions beneath you being the same ones Dad had bought you sixteen years ago.

Your little reading nook, you’d call it. You would sit here with dad on this very ledge, perched on his knee while he’d read you one of your many Winnie-The-Pooh books until you drifted off to sleep.

Now you were destroying your skin as a result of your stress. What else were you to do?

Just as you were about to stand up and head to your en suite bathroom to clean up, the sound of your father outside the door shot through your ears. “Gonna stick a pizza in the oven if you —” the door opens and Joel stops mid sentence, freezing in the doorway as you jump and attempt to pull the legs of your shorts back down.

But it was too late. He’d seen it. Seen everything.

He froze in the doorway, his face twisting in horror at the sight of his baby girl covered in blood. In cuts. Cuts that.. that by the blade in her hand must mean that she.. she did them herself.

Why were you doing this? Were those cuts deep enough for you to bleed out? Did someone hurt you? Is that why you were doing it? All of these thoughts circled around his head rapidly, terrifying him, enraging him, devastating him.

He quickly snaps out of it, coming back into his body and quickly making it across the room to you. “Baby what.. what did you do?” He drops to his knees in front of you, his face level with yours. “What did you do?” He repeats, his voice coming out harsh and worried.

You feel your face burn in shame, shame of being completely exposed in front of him. Your shorts being pulled down now covered the cuts on your thighs but not the blood that had dripped down further than the cut off of them. “I’m..” your voice breaks. “I’m sorry.”

“No.. no, no, no,” his voice softens, his hands hovering over your legs before coming up to land on your face. Cupping your cheeks. “No, I didn’t mean that. You don’t.. need to apologise. I just.. why..?”

He didn’t know what to say. What questions to ask or how to comfort you. He wanted to just take the pain from you. Take it and put it on him. He could take it. But not.. not you. Not his girl.

The question hits you square in the chest. How to answer it? There was so many reasons you were doing this. So many things were happening in your life. So much stress. But these were things that almost every other person your age dealt with and they didn’t feel the need to slice themselves up over it. Your breath trembles and you open your mouth to speak but when you do, a sob comes from your chest.

Then another. And then it all let loose.

You completely caved in on yourself, pulling back from Joel so his hands were no longer on your cheeks and covering your face with your own hands. Your back shook as you sobbed softly into your palms, everything coming spilling out as you did.

“It’s just everything. It’s school, it’s my asshole of a boss, my friends who ghost me and barely fucking talk to me anymore, I’ve gained like.. ten million pounds so i look disgusting, it’s too much, too much, I can’t,” you cut yourself off with more tears, feeling utterly pathetic. It was true though. College was a fucking nightmare. You felt like you couldn’t get on top of your assignments, and you were continually getting grief from your professors for handing them in late.

Your boss — Joe — was constantly picking on every little thing you did. You got the job at the cafe downtown four months ago, and ever since you did, he always found something to critique you on. You knew how to do your job, you were good at it even. But he made you feel like you were useless.

Your body, too. Everyone always put on a couple pounds in college, but you just felt disgusting in yourself. None of your clothes looked good on you and every time you left the house you felt mortified with your looks.

And your friends, god, they were the worst of all. In the past year they all started to slowly turn on you. Dirty looks, dry replies, no effort to hang out anymore. They were like middle school mean girls and it made you feel so fucking stupid. Like a lost puppy following them around because you had nowhere else to turn.

“I just don’t know what else to do. I hate.. how I look, I hate my job, I hate school. I wanna quit everything, but I can’t.” You drop your shaking hands from your face. You’d almost kind of forgot that Dad was there. He was so quiet. Was that good or bad?

Joel was completely still. A part of his heart broke hearing you talk about yourself like that. About your life. About your struggles. About how much you were struggling and dealing with it all on your own. His beautiful, smart, sweet girl. There was also that silent rage in his chest. At your friends, at your boss. For leading to this, for contributing to it.

You noticed it though. The anger. And immediately wished you hadn’t said anything. “I’m sorry, I.. I shouldn’t have — it was stupid i—”

But Joel cuts your off, lifting you off the window ledge like you weighed nothing and wrapping you in his arms. He loops your arms around his head and legs around his waist, cradling your head in his hands and rocking you side to side as he took a seat on your bed. “Shhh,” he hushes gently, rubbing your back in slow circles, fighting back his own tears but not the crack in his voice. “None of this is your fault. And you shouldn’t feel like you have to hurt yourself like this. Hurt your body like this.”

You fist the fabric of Joel’s flannel in your hand, resting your forehead against his chest. Your tears dampen his shirt and he pulls your face back from his chest to look at you. First, he swipes his thumb across your face, drying your tears. “Listen,” he murmurs, cupping your face to ensure your eyes stay on him. “I’m here now. And I’m not gonna let you go through this on your own anymore. But first, i need you to let me check out those cuts.”

You huff a sigh and stand up away from him immediately. You weren’t showing him them up close. No way.

Joel shoots up immediately and follows you across the room, holding his hands up defensively. “I know, i know you don’t want to but we have to, baby. We can’t have them getting infected. I promise I’ll be gentle, but we need to do this for your health.”

You shut your eyes, running a hand through your hair and sighing shakily. You nod slowly, cautiously. “Okay.. okay.”

Joel had placed you on the bathroom counter and immediately got to work on your wounds. He’d carefully hiked up the legs of your shorts to uncover the cuts you’d inflicted on yourself, and tried his best to keep his face impassive.

There was a medicine box in your bathroom cabinet and he’d taken it out and rifled through it. He lay a bottle of rubbing alcohol, cotton pads and a roll of bandages beside you and got started on pouring a generous amount of the alcohol on the cotton.

He cringes slightly at the thoughts of it hurting you and says gently, “this’ll sting a little.” You nodded, leaning your head back against the mirror with a distant look in your eyes. Joel took that as consent and pressed the pad against the first cut on your inner thigh.

You didn’t even wince. He supposed that you were used to the pain of such things by now. As he cleans three cuts, he can’t help but wonder how many times you’ve had to do this yourself. He tries to keep his eyes on the wounds you’d inflicted upon yourself tonight, but he can’t help but notice the multiple other scars on your legs, all healed thankfully but still there.

The sound of you pulls Joel from his thoughts. Pulls his eyes back to your face. You were crying. Softly. Little sniffles rather than full on sobs. He knew just by the sound of you that they weren’t from physical pain. That they were from shame and embarrassment.

Joel blinks back his own tears, not wanting to be emotional in front of you when right now, you needed him to be strong. He drops the cotton pad into the trash bin when he finishes, all the blood now cleaned from your legs. He then reaches up and takes your hand and brings it to his lips, pressing a gentle kiss of comfort there.

“I know, baby. Just gotta wrap them and then it’ll be over, okay?” His voice is soothing and he surprises himself with his ability to keep it together, especially with how devastated you looked.

You nod, using your other hand to wipe your stuffy nose. You were eager for this to just be over with. Honestly, all you wanted to do was just collapse into bed.

Joel quickly cuts off enough wrap for the two cuts lower on your thigh that were close together, and the one on your inner thigh. He starts on the low ones first and you lift your leg for him so he can wrap the bandage all around your leg before he starts on the other one.

He assists you this time on lifting up from the counter for him to wrap it the whole way around for the higher one , and when he finally does, you loose a sigh of relief. You quickly pull your shorts back down to cover yourself back up.

Joel notices you turning awkward, your eyes averting to the floor and quickly uses his finger to tip your chin up. “Hey — look at me,” when you do he smiles sadly. “There’s my girl.”

And there’s just something in his voice, the pride and love in it, that breaks your heart. How could he still look at you like that. After what he’d seen, what he’d witnessed.

He continues on. “My smart, beautiful girl. My whole world, hm?” When you don’t nod, he tries again, his voice serious but still gentle. “That’s never gonna change. No matter what you’re going through. I’m not gonna judge you for hurting. But i am gonna help you. Help you however i can, because i love you.”

You bite your lip and shake your head. “But how?” Your voice is low and still raw from crying. “How can you help me? I can’t even help myself.” You murmur.

Joel shakes his head, clicking his tongue once. “None of that. We’ll figure it out. Together, okay? Starting tomorrow. We put an end to this, though. To.. hurting yourself. We take it at your pace and we do what you need. If you need me to get you a therapist, I’ll do that. If you wanna quit college, it’s not the end of the world. And as for those friends of yours? You’ll find new ones.” You roll your eyes at that but Joel forces your attention back to him.

“And i know that’s easier said than done. But you will find your people. People who’ll love you and care about you and value your time, baby girl. Hell, you’ve already got one right here.” You chuckle at that, drying underneath your eyes.

“Point is, these things? We can fix ‘em. I promise you, we will,” his voice breaks slightly at the next sentence and he clears his throat to try and steady himself. “But.. but I never wanna see you hurt like this again. I never wanna hear you talk about your body the way you did earlier. Because you’re beautiful. In every way. And maybe you don’t see that because you’re a young woman, but i do. You’re beautiful.”

Your lip trembles slightly and you loose a heavy sigh. The words hit you hard. You’d never thought of yourself as beautiful. But hearing the truth, the love in which Dad spoke to you, maybe you could believe it. Just for now. Suddenly, you threw your arms around him and he caught you with a grunt, lifting you off the counter and back into his arms once again.

“I’m here, baby. Daddy’s gotcha.” He murmurs into your hair.

And he did have you. And for a moment, in that bathroom with a bloodied blade and cotton pad in the trash, with bandages wrapped around your thighs. You believed it.

This is another suuuper personal fic so pls stay respectful in the comments. Let me know if you enjoyed this! As always, reposts and asks are always welcome.

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