Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jason goes easily, arms staying over his face to keep him hidden because the embarrassment persists.  Dick tossed him around like a fucking ragdoll, for fuck’s sake.  Jason didn’t even realize what was happening until he was falling from nearly six feet in the air, landing on a mat that’s not nearly as cushioned as it should be.  The position makes it hard to fully catch his breath though, so Jason gives up, throwing his arms wide instead.  Letting them fall with heavy thumps to the floor.

He purses his lips, glaring at Dick despondently.

“Barely.” Jason gripes. “I saw my life flash before my eyes.”

“Drama.” Dick tells him, but his lips still quirk into a small smile.  Humored and fond.

“You don’t get to ‘drama’ me.  I’ve said it before:  pot.  Kettle.” Jason quips, heaving a sigh and just letting himself melt into the floor beneath him, enjoying the stability that is solid ground.  Despite how alarming it was to be tossed like he was, Jason still smiles, snickering to himself at the incredulity of it.  He can imagine how he must have looked between the panic and the flustering.  He reaches out, shoving at Dick but missing him entirely, “Fuck, you’re so over the top.  You threw me.”

Dick laughs under his breath too and admits, “You’re not that hard to toss around.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Jason scoffs, all sarcasm when he banters, “You’re a big strong man, I get it.”

“Maybe you’re just tiny.” Dick quips back, easy and comfortable.

Jason glowers at him, lips pressing into a subconscious pout that has a smile breaking across Dick’s face even when Jason threatens him with a warning, “I’ll fight you.”

“Pint-sized.” Dick taunts him back and Jason can’t help himself–he laughs, shaking his head in disbelief at what a fucking menace this ridiculous man is.  

“Rat bastard.” Jason mutters under his breath, stretching his arms over his head in a languid stretch before he lays out again.  More than content to have a break.  They’ve been sparring for a while now–long enough that they deserve a minute to catch their breaths.  Or Jason does.  The way he sticks to the mats with sweat is gross.  It feels good though, his body aching pleasantly.  Maybe being tossed around isn’t such a bad thing–Jason kind of feels great.  Forget all his crossed wires and fucked up associations; all the times he’s been beaten will be long forgotten things after enough stupid happenings like this.

Jason smiles to himself, content, then turns his face into the mat to look at Dick.  The way Dick’s gaze immediately finds his and becomes something soft and warm leaves Jason feeling similarly.  It makes Jason feel a little shy, a little bashful.  Dick’s attention–it’s so damn nice.  It’s almost overwhelming, but he wants more.  Always.

“Punkass brat.” Dick retorts, falling out of his crouch to sit beside Jason properly.  Their hips nearly pressed together, though they face opposite directions.  If Jason were to lean forward, he could bump his forehead with the side of Dick’s knee.  A part of him wants to–he nearly shivers at just the thought; the intimacy of such a simple and small thing.

Jason smiles, propping himself up so that he can level Dick with a haughty smirk, leaning forward into Dick’s space when he calls back, “Dickwing.”  

When Dick reaches past him to pull Jason’s hood over his head the way he likes, he can’t help how his cheeks flush.  Dick’s hand accidentally brushes up against Jason's skin, adjusting the hood and fixing Jason’s sweat-matted fringe.  It’s affectionate.  Tender and gentle and so damn nice.  It almost feels like his breath is stolen straight from his lungs again–sucker punched right out of him.  Dick leans back into one of his hands, but the distance that puts between them is negligible.  They’re so close; crowded together.  Dick’s gaze drops for a fleeting moment, his lips pulling into a ghost of a smile before he looks into Jason’s eyes again.  Blue, blue, blue.

“Little wing.” Dick retorts, but it doesn’t have the same impish edge as their other name-calling.  This is softer.  It’s said in the same tone that Dick calls for Robin.

All the eye contact is too much.  Jason shies away, head ducking.

“I’m not that small.” Jason complains, schooling his face into something more petulant and sulky.

“Nothing wrong with being small.” Dick counters, leaning back and looking Jason over–his stature, his build.  Between Jason’s big personality and the bulky layers he wears, Jason knows he comes off larger than he actually is.  It’s a good and purposeful illusion.  Safe.  Although Dick and he spar and grapple regularly, Dick still reaches out, fingers brushing over the heavy cotton of Jason’s sweatshirt until he finds where Jason actually hides beneath it.  Once he does, Dick huffs a laugh at just how oversized the clothing is, pinching the fabric between his fingers and billowing it when he says, “More advantageous for acrobatics.”

“Yeah, you seem to really be suffering with that extra height.” Jason counters playfully, lighthearted as he smirks at Dick.  He reaches up to swat Dick away from him, but in an unsurprisingly surprising turn of events ends up having Dick grab hold of his hand, instead.  The touch startles Jason, honestly.  He flinches, but Dick holds steady, stretching his fingers up and guiding Jason’s along with them until their hands press together properly.  Palm to palm, fingers to fingers.  Dick’s hands are warm and calloused beneath his; rough from training and fighting.  His fingertips curl over the tips of Jason’s fingers, the span between his thumb and pinky further than Jason can reach.

Jason’s hand is smaller.  He scowls, curling his fingers to hide the fact and turning to look past their hands to find Dick grinning at him like the moron he is.

“Everyone who says you’re nice is a fucking liar.” Jason gripes, which makes Dick laugh in earnest, curling his fingers between Jason’s to keep Jason from pulling away.  

“I like that you’re smaller.” Dick tells him.  That combined with how Dick holds his hand leaves Jason flustering, a blush dusting across the high points of his face.  He huffs to try and hide it, cutting his head to the side to look away.

“Dick.” Jason scoffs.

“Yeah?” Dick asks, knowing full well that said ‘dick’ was full-derogatory, no-affection.

Jason makes a face at Dick, nose scrunched as he accuses, “I think you just like tossing me around like a ragdoll.”

Dick smiles, brilliant and wicked.  Wonderful thing about that is that the reaction is involuntary, surprising Dick to the point that he pulls his hand away to cover his own mouth with the back of it.  Eyes a bit wide because oh.  Soon enough though, Dick is smiling again, his eyes lit up with mirth and wild wonder.

“Fuck,” He curses, so thoroughly exposed by himself that all he can do is laugh.

“Yeah, fuck.” Jason sputters around a laugh of his own, reaching out to shove Dick’s shoulder.  The man sways back a bit, but inevitably he returns to Jason’s space.  Jason is much the same, always drawn into Dick’s orbit.  Both of them content to crowd one another and be crowded in turn, talking in hushed voices between them although it’s just the two of them in the tower.  Laughing softly over an increasing number of stupid inside jokes.  Enjoying each other’s company; the easy banter, the lighthearted teasing.

Dick’s gaze keeps sweeping over him and while at first Jason rolls his eyes, he eventually scowls and challenges, “Call me small one more time, I swear.”

“Would ‘petite’ be better?” Dick asks, taunting him with a devilish smile.

“You’re just looking for trouble, aren’t you?” Jason says, lifting his chin haughtily as if to tell Dick to try him one more time–do it.  See what happens.

“Hah,” Dick says around a breath of laughter, lifting his chin similarly to mirror Jason but with an entirely different effect. With a smirk on his lips, he banters, “Don’t need to go looking for it when you’re here.”

Jason rests his weight on the hand closest to Dick, bringing him that much closer into Dick’s space.  With a cheeky smirk he taunts, “Don’t need to go looking at all.  You’re trouble all on your own.”

“The good kind?” Dick asks, bending his leg so that it can bump against Jason’s fingers.  It’s hardly a brush between them, but it’s a point of contact and Jason’s fingers curl reflexively, subconsciously pulling his hand closer.

Jason’s attention drops to that line of pressure between them, a ghost of a smile on his lips before he flicks his attention back up and catches Dick watching him, waiting with an easy sort of contentment.  A quiet laugh escapes him, head tilting to the side as he considers Dick and teases, “The kind I wouldn’t mind getting into some trouble with.”

There’s something bright in the light of Dick’s eyes:  warm and wild and wicked and wonderful.  All good things that draw a shiver up Jason’s spine and have him mirroring the gentle smile Dick gives him.  Dick reaches out, straightening the drawstring of Jason’s sweatshirt, gaze lowered until a playful, impish smirk pulls across his features and he catches Jason’s attention.

“Let’s get into some trouble then.”

If that isn’t a line for the ages, Jason doesn’t know what is.  It’s something straight from all the books Jason reads; something that has always been sweet, a promise of a shared adventure.  There’s something decidedly provocative when Dick expresses the same sentiment though and Jason—hell.  He doesn’t know what to do with it.  His heart was never prepared; it damn near skips a beat with how badly Jason flusters.

There’s a pointed moment where Dick openly observes Jason, Jason’s doe-eyes and his rosy cheeks, before Jason grimaces under the weight of how he flusters and Dick laughs at him.  It spurns a groan of embarrassment from Jason, who takes the drawstrings of his own hoodie from Dick and pulls them as he falls backwards.  Away from Dick and his gravity and his stupid, most adored pastime of making Jason blush.  What a fucking dangerous man.

With a scrunched up hood and arms thrown over his face, Jason complains, “I’ve been Richie’d.”

“Not Dick’d?” Dick asks.

Jason laughs, startled and incredulous and ridiculously charmed.  He pulls the material of his hood loose just to make a face at Dick and snicker, “You’re the worst.”  Such a moron, but Jason likes that silly lightheartedness.  In between small bouts of titters, Jason rests his arms over his stomach, holding loose to the heavy cotton of his sweatshirt before contorting his body so that he can shove at Dick—Jason’s foot to Dick’s shoulder, nudging him playfully.  “Get outta here.”

“After training.” Dick says, laughing under his breath.  When Jason groans, reluctant to move after having made himself so comfortable on the mats, he nudges Dick again in protest.  It only serves to make Dick roll his eyes, grabbing Jason around the ankle and–oh.  Jason stares distractedly at how Dick’s hand wraps around the entirety of it.  It makes Jason feel small again, though not necessarily in a bad way.

(It might be a first for him, feeling more safe than threatened in circumstances like this.  Maybe it’s because Jason is Robin now.  Maybe it’s because Jason is with Dick).

Although he’s sure Dick notices, Dick doesn’t comment on it.  Rather, he squeezes Jason’s ankle before rubbing his thumb up the back of Jason’s calf.  A thoughtless affection that has a shiver racing up Jason’s spine, his toes curling as Jason watches Dick from where Jason lays across the floor, cheek pressed to his shoulder as he waits until Dick notices and meets his gaze.  When Dick does, his head tilts towards his own shoulder in a subconscious mirror of Jason.

“What happened to getting into trouble?” Jason banters, a cheeky smirk pulling at the corners of his mouth.

Dick smirks back at him and shrugs, “Don’t think you can handle it, after all.”

Jason splutters.  “Oh?”  He asks around a laugh. “That so?  Alright then, let’s just–”

It catches Dick by surprise when Jason twists himself and hooks his foot around Dick’s neck to knock him over.  To his credit, Dick reacts quickly, tussling with Jason until Jason gets Dick pinned:  sat on the man’s hips with a foot on his chest as Jason cackles at his victory.

“Who can’t handle who here, Dickiebird—ack!”

Dick flips them, Jason’s back hitting the mats again with a soft ‘thump.’

“What was that, Little wing?”

There it is again, that unexpected endearment.  Just as soft.  Just as dear.  It makes Jason tremble because it’s such a gentle affection.  Maybe Dick was right about Jason not being able to handle it—he’s in trouble just with something as sweet as this.  It’s too good for someone like him, he thinks, but it warms his heart and Jason clings to the intimacy in it.  Savoring it before it’s forgotten or cast away.

“‘Because I’m Robin?” Jason asks, smiling toothily as Dick breathes a sound of amusement because Jason asks this question at any and every opportunity just to hear Dick say it.

“Because you’re Robin.” Dick hums in acknowledgment, leaning further over Jason because that’s just how it is with them now—always drawn close.  Always wanting closer.  Finding comfort in the crowding, especially when the atmosphere feels so languid and hazy between them.  His hand splays low on Jason’s abdomen after having flipped them; to keep Jason still, as if Jason would ever want to leave.

“Because you’re you.” Dick continues, open and honest and shameless in that way that Jason loves and hates because while it makes understanding easier, what’s understood is sometimes entirely too overwhelming.  It’s easy though.  Dick makes it all so damn easy.

He’s dangerous in ways that Jason isn’t used to, but it’s thrilling.  It’s addictive:  the easy comfort and easier affections, the lighthearted banter and playful provocation; all the support and the praise and so much more Jason can’t place or doesn’t have the words for.

Easy as their tussle was, Jason can feel how disheveled he is; sweatshirt askew enough that he’s surprised he didn’t notice before.  It’s only because Dick’s fingers are warm over his shirt, but his palm is like a brand on Jason’s bare skin.

It’s something that Jason thinks Dick might realize, too.  Might be aware of if only because Jason can get prickly when he feels too vulnerable even if it’s a small thing like this.  And Dick does notice, Jason thinks, but it’s an afterthought.

Jason watches as Dick pauses, distracted as he takes notice of where his hand holds Jason down, head turning just barely to look.  Dick’s hand shifts, his knuckle brushing over a years-old cigarette burn as he pulls Jason’s shirt down to where it’s more comfortable.  A part of Jason feels flustered by the courtesy while another part damn well preens.

Once righted, Dick’s hand returns and with it a look of bewilderment as Dick marvels, “Because you’re actually so small, what—?”

For a moment, Jason is also bewildered.  Then he’s caught between amused and petulant.  He hasn’t decided which he wants to be, so he’s lost somewhere in between when he scoffs, “You’re still on about me being bite-sized?”

“Robin-sized.” Dick quips absentmindedly.

Jason huffs, “You’re dumb.”

“Hm.” Is all Dick replies with, effectively distracted as his fingertips brush low over Jason’s stomach.  A thoughtful and yet thoughtless gesture that makes Jason startle.  The muscles in his abdomen contract before Jason takes a shuddering breath and relaxes.  Confused, but keeping himself still despite how nerves spike his heart rate and steal his breath.  Jason exhales, trembling at the feeling of anticipation that crashes over him.

‘You’re dumb,’ Jason had told Dick.  Joke is on Jason now, huh?

Dick’s touch is so gentle though, feather-light and unlike anything Jason has ever experienced before. Even when Dick spreads his fingers wide across the expanse of Jason’s lower abdomen, pinky and thumb stretching to reach either of Jason’s hip bones, there’s a feeling of reverence and wonder there.  Jason holds his breath; feels a fine tremor just beneath his skin that makes it feel like he might fall apart at the seams.  Dick has barely done anything at all and yet Jason’s chest heaves, flushed red with a blush that burns through his whole body–an embarrassing and splotchy flush that leaves him feeling too warm, too hot.

His head is decidedly empty as he looks down at how Dick touches him, focused solely on the press and warmth of Dick’s hand.  That point of contact and how small Jason looks beneath the span of Dick’s fingers.

The way Jason’s heart races, the way it stutters and skips and beats so harshly that his chest aches, makes him feel lightheaded.  He bites his lower lip to keep it from trembling and tries to keep the rest of himself still too, nails digging into the training mats beneath him.  Toes curling as Dick caresses his thumb over top of his shirt where that years-old cigarette burn is.  Mapping and soothing old hurts.

Dick’s gaze shifts minutely up to where Jason’s sweatshirt is still askew at his waist before dropping back to his hand.  There’s no way of telling if Dick thinks it or not, but Jason does:  his waist is smaller than his hips, more narrow.  If Dick’s hand can span from bone to bone, then what if?

Although Dick moves his hand up, it’s only to fix Jason’s sweatshirt before Dick settles his hand again, thumbing lightly along the worn hem.  Lost in thought.

They’re hip to hip although they face opposite directions, Dick’s hand a gentle pressure low on his stomach.  Slowly, tentatively, Jason reaches out, too.  Until Dick and his fingertips touch, until Jason can tangle their fingers messily together and just–hold on, for starters.  But also so that he can hold Dick still because Jason can’t breathe.  He can’t catch his breath.

Stop, he needs to say, but he can’t.  Because he loves it–the attention.  The gentle affection and tender intimacy.  It’s scary to be touched at all because it’s only ever hurt before, but this is different.  Still terrifying, but also thrilling.  

Jason’s dad always warned him that Jason was a greedy bitch.  He thinks he might understand what the old bastard meant now.  There’s a fine tremor where his fingers tangle with Dick’s.  It chases up his arm and through his body, leaves him trembling.

He wants more.  More and more and more.

But he settles for this, letting his hand slip away from Dick’s.  Resting it over his own chest, fingers curling just slightly at the feeling of his own heart pitter-pattering away.

“Kind of do want to toss you around.” Dick says, so easily disarming that Jason is settled in an instant.  It’s such an incredulously humorous thing to have admitted that Jason sputters a laugh.

It’s not the first time Jason’s been told such, though it is the first time he’s liked hearing it or felt a heady sense of power in it.

The audacity of this man to have called Jason trouble (although Jason is; Dick isn’t wrong).  With a pointedly accusatory look that implies Dick is more menace than Jason will ever be, he asks, “What kind of trouble am I again?”

Dick snickers quietly and gives Jason’s stomach two pats before standing, offering a hand to help Jason up.  With a smile that’s all boyish charm and impish wickedness he says, “The kind people want more of.”

He can’t help but smile just a bit.  The way Dick bolsters Jason’s confidence might be dangerous.  The last thing Jason needs is to get carried away with his own sense of worth, but despite knowing that he still titters and takes Dick’s hand.  Letting himself take, take, take because he’s always been a greedy little thing.

And Dick—he gives.  He gives Jason so damn much.  That doesn’t make him special, he knows, but he feels it at least in that moment as Dick helps him up off the ground, tricking him by crouching at the last minute, a hand on Jason’s hip to help steady Jason when Dick tosses him over Dick’s shoulder.  It pulls a startled shout turned cackle out of him.

The kind of trouble people want more of—Jason can understand the sentiment.