The last thing Jason expected when he came out of the shower after patrol, exhausted and ready to fall into bed, was Dick in his bedroom, leaning back against his window with a hand clamped around his calf, which was leaking blood steadily onto Jason's floor.

"What the hell happened to you?" Jason blurted out, his hand falling from the towel around his neck that he'd been drying his hair with.

"Hi," Dick said weakly. "Got shot a little bit."

"Jesus christ, why didn't you go to B or something?" But Jason was already going over to him and wrapping an arm around his waist, pulling Dick's free arm over his shoulders and starting to help him to the bathroom.

"Was nearby," Dick got out before gasping in pain as he jostled his leg. "Fuck. Don't think I could've gotten all the way to the Cave."

"He has the Batmobile, idiot, he would've picked you up."

Dick was silent for a moment. "I'm going to be honest, I've lost a lot of blood and that did not occur to me. You should be nice to me, I've been shot."

Jason snorted and helped him to sit down on top of the toilet before hastily rummaging under his sink for the medical supplies. "Alright you big baby, what's the damage?"

"Fuck you, you try being shot right now," Dick snapped back. And then, "It went all the way through, it should be easy to stitch up."

"Good." Jason opened a fresh suture needle and a sachet of surgical thread, and threaded the needle, setting it back in the packaging before uncapping the iodine and soaking a gauze pad with it. "Come on, you gotta take your hand away."

Dick reluctantly unclenched his hand from his calf, and the blood immediately started running down his leg faster. Jason helped him roll up the leg of his suit and then swiped over the whole area with the iodine as best he could on both sides before deciding to just get stitching.

He got both sides closed up fairly quickly and neatly, if he did say so himself, and soaked another gauze pad in iodine, cleaning over the area again, finally clearing it of blood.

"Nice work," Dick said, startling Jason out of his head — he'd gotten so focused on the steady rhythm of the stitching and cleaning that he'd entered a quiet, sort of meditative state. Dick tilted his leg to the side to get a better look at the stiches. "Thanks."

"No problem." Jason taped a clean gauze pad over the wound on each side of his leg. "You're lucky it missed the bone and didn't break your leg."

"Well I did get shot, so I'm not sure I'm that lucky."

Jason recapped the iodine and started gathering up the trash. "Really milking the sympathy on that one."

"I think it's deserved."

Jason tossed the trash and started putting the medical supplies away.

"Hey..." Dick spoke up again. "Can I crash here tonight? I don't think I'm up to making it all the way to one of my safehouses."

Jason looked up, fulling intending to say, 'Well suck it up, big bird — I patched you up and let you bleed all over my floors, that's my limit of good deeds for the night,' but then he made the fatal mistake of looking into Dick's big, pretty, pleading, puppy dog eyes and his mouth wound up saying, "Fine." before he even gave it permission to speak. Fuck, shit, goddammit.

Dick beamed at him.

"Thanks Jay," he said warmly. "Can I use your shower?"

"Uh, yeah, just...hold on." Jason got up from where he was crouched on the floor and got the cling film from the kitchen, bringing it back and wrapping it tightly around Dick's leg and sealing all the edges with medical tape so the wounds wouldn't get wet.

"Thanks," Dick said again.

"Yeah. Lemme, uh, get you something to wear."

He grabbed Dick a pair of boxers and a t-shirt like he was wearing and set them on the side of the sink since Dick seemed to be rather busy trying to pull his boot off without pulling on his stitches. Jason closed the door behind himself and went to go clean up the blood all over his floors.

He had barely been settled into bed for five minutes when his bedroom door cracked open.

"Why are you in here?" He demanded tiredly.

"To sleep?"

"Couch." It came out in an exasperated sigh.

"I'm an invalid, Jason. You wouldn't make me sleep on the couch, would you?"

"I think the fuck I would."

"Oh come on, nobody's ever made me sleep on the couch."

"Yeah, I bet they haven't," Jason muttered. Everybody else had probably been trying to get into his pants.

"Please, Jay? Please? I won't bother you anymore after this, I swear. I'll even make breakfast."

Fuck. Jason couldn't even see the stupid puppy dog eyes, but he could hear them. Oh, he was weak, weak, weak. "Oh for fuck's sake, shut up, shut up; fine." He huffily pulled the covers aside. "And don't you dare try to make breakfast, that's a fucking threat coming from you, I don't want to have to put out a fire tomorrow."

Dick closed the door and limped over to the bed, sliding in beside him, and Jason scooted over a bit to give him more room. 

"Thanks, I knew you weren't heartless." Dick settled in with a satisfied sigh.

Jason just gave a noncommittal grunt.

It was only a few minutes before Dick's breaths evened out slow and deep in sleep and Jason was left staring up at the ceiling thinking about his stupid life decisions. 

Or, well, he was stewing on his stupid life decisions right up until Dick rolled over right onto his chest and threw an arm over him and Jason's brain fuzzed out for a few seconds. Of course Dick was a fucking cuddler in his sleep. How did Jason always end up getting himself into these situations?

Dick's hand curled lightly over his chest and he gave a small sigh, turning his face further into Jason's chest. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, what was Jason supposed to do? It would be an asshole move to wake him up, wouldn't it? Jason scowled at the ceiling and resigned himself to his fate of being a living plushie.

Aʀᴛ ʙʏ ᴘᴇɴᴛᴀᴘᴏᴅᴀ ᴏɴ Tᴜᴍʙʟʀ

• ◇ •

Jason awoke to Dick gently pushing away from his chest and sitting up, making Jason's traitorous arm — which had apparently wrapped around Dick's waist in his sleep — fall back to the bed.

"Good morning." Dick smiled down at him, apparently entirely unbothered and unsurprised by the cuddling.

"Hnn," Jason grunted. He needed his morning tea.

Dick ran a hand through his hair, yawning, and Jason had to look away. Utterly unfair that someone could look so fucking good when they'd just woken up — did Dick have to be perfect at fucking everything? Jason hadn't even known waking up was a thing you could win at, but leave it to Dick to find a way. It was fucking obnoxious is what it was. He could've at least had a stupid crease in his face from Jason's shirt or something, but no. Knowing him, even if he did, he'd probably manage to pull it off anyway, the bastard.

Jason got out of bed, leaving Dick to be perfect by himself or whatever the hell it was he did, and headed to the kitchen.

He made himself a nice, strong cup of tea and leaned back against the counter, closing his eyes and taking a sip. When he opened his eyes, Dick was right there, sitting on the counter across from him, casual as anything. Jason didn't jump, but it was a near thing. Fucking bats — too damn quick and stealthy for their own good, apparently even with a bullet wound in their leg.

Jason just let a slow breath out. Bitching at him about it would probably just encourage him. And it was really too early for that much talking anyway. Ugh. He turned away and set down his tea, opening the fridge and pulling out a carton of eggs. He held them up until Dick answered his unvoiced question.

"Oh. Sunny side up."

Jason pulled a medium pan from the hook on the wall over the stove, turning the burner on, pouring some olive oil into the pan, and cracking four eggs into it. He turned away to bin the eggshells and wash his hands, and opened the fridge again, tossing a loaf of bread onto Dick's lap. 

Dick blinked down at it, and then looked up at Jason, apparently lost. 

Jason gave him a look that told him exactly what he thought of his intelligence and nodded to the toaster on the counter beside Dick, before returning to the stove.

Dick began to chatter aimlessly to Jason as he started the toast, swinging his legs back and forth over the side of the counter as he talked, and Jason found that it was surprisingly relaxing, the endless stream of chatter without expectation of reply as he sipped his tea and intermittently poked at the eggs with a spatula, turning his own eggs over easy.

Dick's chatter suddenly cut off with a thump and a, "—Fuck!" Jason turned around to see Dick clutching his leg where he'd been shot. "Goddamn, oh fuck me sideways that hurts."

"What'd you do?" Jason finally asked, voice still scratchy from sleep.

"Smacked it on the counter like an idiot," Dick said, his voice strained.

Jason turned the burner off and put the spatula down — the eggs were about done anyway, they'd finish cooking on their own — and grabbed Dick's foot, stretching his leg out. Dick loosened his hold on his leg and Jason brushed his hands aside, picking carefully at the tape and pulling back the gauze pad to check that Dick hadn't fucked up the stitches. The first side was fine and he pressed the tape back down, turning his leg over and looking at the other side. It was a little irritated, but the stitches were fine, and he pressed the tape back down on that one too.

He started to release Dick's foot, when—

"Not gonna kiss it all better?"

He rolled his eyes. He knew Dick was just fucking with him, but some impulse in him made him lean down and press a kiss to Dick's shin before releasing his foot. "Happy?"

When he looked up, Dick had the biggest Cheshire grin on his face he'd ever seen. "Thrilled."

The toast popped out of the toaster.

They ate, and then Jason washed the dishes while Dick dried, all while Dick carried on a conversation all by himself, which Jason thought he should find annoying, but really wasn't.

"So can I borrow some clothes to go home in?"

Jason sighed, but he couldn't very well refuse, since all Dick had was his Nightwing suit.

He was very not bitter when Dick came out of the bathroom wearing Jason's clothes that didn't even fucking fit him better than Jason did. Not bitter at all. Not even a little.

Dick pulled him into a hug, because of course he fucking did, because Jason couldn't apparently be let to forget that asleep or awake, Dick Grayson was a fucking cuddler. "Thanks for everything, Little Wing, you're the best."

And then Dick walked out of his front door and Jason tried not to examine the part of himself that kind of maybe wished he would stay.

• ◇ •

Dick ended up going to the Batcave instead of home. It wasn't that he didn't trust Jason's medical care, it was just that he liked to have Alfred look things over, just in case.

Tim was the only one in the Cave when he arrived.

"Hey, what are you still doing here?" Dick asked. "Go to sleep."

Tim turned around and then stared at him for a moment. "Did you get laid?"

Dick paused on his way to the stairs. "What?"

"Those aren't your clothes and you're limping a little."

"No— I didn't— god, mind your business."

"And you have that stupid look on your face."

"I don't have any look on my face!"

Tim spun himself slowly in his chair. "You do. You have a big, stupid, satisfied grin."

Dick forced his face into a frown. "I didn't get laid. I got shot."

"And you're...happy about it? Suddenly into masochism?"

"Jason was nice to me, okay? Can I not be pleasantly surprised? He stitched me up and let me spend the night."

Tim raised his eyebrows. 

"He even hugged me, Tim."

"Oh no," Tim said, pulling out his phone. "Whatever that thing is, it's not Jason."

"Okay, okay, so I hugged him and he didn't outright tell me to fuck off, but that still counts."

Tim lowered his phone. "Still suspicious territory, but I'll accept it."

"I'm telling you, he was so nice! But in a very Jason way, that was no imposter."

"Hmm. And you look like your birthday has come early because...?"

"I can't appreciate this?"

Tim paused. "You can," he said eventually. "You just seem a little..." he trailed off. "Oh no, do you have the hots for Jay?"

"No? I was just pleasantly surprised that he actually stitched me up and didn't just kick me out on my ass, bullet wound and all." And that he'd let him use his shower. And sleep in his bed. And cuddle him. And he'd made him breakfast. And kissed Dick's leg all better. And let Dick borrow his clothes. And hug him. Okay, put together all like that, it did sound a little homoerotic. 

That didn't actually mean anything though, and Dick would surely know if he was actually into Jason, right? Right?

He turned away and headed up the stairs. The idea that he would be into Jason in that way was ridiculous — Jason who had stitched him up with utter concentration and a slight squint around his pretty aquamarine eyes, who had looked so soft and sweet in that spare moment just before he'd woken up that Dick had found himself wishing he could see him like that more often, who had rolled his eyes but still kissed Dick's leg better which had made Dick's heart beat just a little faster— Dick's foot paused on the stairs. Oh no. Shit. He was into Jason that way.

He was definitely not telling Tim.