Chapter Text
Grif doesn’t hear Simmons scream his name. He only knows that he does because he registers his mouth falling open and his face twisting in horror, but his own focus is more on the entire slab of metal that seems to moving in slow motion over him, his surroundings blurring out of focus and his body refusing to respond.
Then all of a sudden the slow-mo ceases, everything happening so fast he doesn’t even see it. All he knows is that he’s on the ground one second, expecting to be crushed, and the next he’s squinting up, in tact and unharmed, mysteriously un-crushed. The giant fucking piece of metal that dislodged itself from their makeshift wall is hovering above him, somehow.
And that somehow is one Richard Simmons, who fucking managed to not only dash in between him and the wall in time to protect him, but is, with one hand, holding the entire thing up.
He cannot resist gaping. The robotic hand is spitting a few sparks and making some worrying noises, but is otherwise holding up. Fucking impressively.
And it’s at this point he notices where Simmons’ heroic move has placed him. He is directly between Grif and the wall, using what appears to be every bit of his strength to keep the thing up, and is practically face to face with him, body literally lying on top of him.
He can feel his heaving chest against his own with every huffing breath he takes, and can see every freckle on his exertion-flushed face. His eyes are a honey kind of brown, he notices for the first (inopportune) time, and they look very intent as his face scrunches up in concentration. Simmons manages to shove the wall up a fraction, and lifts himself an inch off him.
The easing of weight should feel a lot better, but for some inexplicable reason, Grif kind of wishes Simmons hadn’t moved. Simmons continues to shove upwards, slowly but surely getting to a standing position as he shoves the slab backwards so it can land the other direction with a heavy, resounding whump.
Grif can feel his eyes drying as he stares the whole way, but he doesn’t dare fucking blink.
“I…fucking…told you…” Simmons wheezes out, now bent in half, hands on his knees as he tries to regulate his breathing.
Grif has to shake himself from whatever trance he was fucking in to process what he says. Shock, he tells himself. He was just in shock.
“Who fucking cares dude?!” He exclaims. “You just lifted like a million pound wall with one arm!” He knows he probably sounds like a child seeing a superhero on TV for the first time, but fuck him, that shit was cool.
Simmons is still red from all that effort, but Grif would bet money his pasty, Dutch-Irish skin would be blushing again anyway from the way he starts stuttering.
“It’s-it’s not like it was me!” he denies. “It’s Sarge’s robot arm! It’s not like I could do something like that normally!”
“Okay, first off” Grif responds indignantly, “That literally does not make it any less fucking awesome, and secondly, Sarge’s robot arm didn’t fling itself between me and falling debris. You did.”
Simmons looks back at him wide-eyed, like he was completely thrown by what Grif just said. “Oh,” is all he manages.
“Whatever.” Grif says, already uncomfortable. “Go be weirdly humble somewhere else, I wanna smoke in peace because I almost just fucking died, and I don’t need you nagging me about it.”
Simmons, uncharacteristically wordless, stumbles from the room like he’s in a stupor.
And that would have been that, if it had fucking ended there. It hadn’t.
Grif swears to god, if he had known he would wake up that night in a sweat after dreaming about Simmons fucking bench pressing him, he would have let the wall just crush him instead. Why.
It doesn’t get much better after that. Not only was he having weird ass dreams littered through his naps, he was having his precious daydream-while-doing-nothing time invaded too. By fucking Dick “Superhuman Strength” Simmons.
Who did the guy fucking think he was, going around lifting things all of a sudden like it’s nothing, looking like Clark fucking Kent while he swoops to his rescue? Rude fucking asshole.
Grif snorts to himself over his own Clark Kent analogy, because Simmons actually does wear glasses and looks like a major fucking nerd despite the apparent strength he’s packing underneath it all. Then he frowns, realizing it makes himself the Lois Lane in this scenario.
…Who would Lex Luthor be, he wonders?
Sarge. Definitely Sarge.
Grif is having a very masculine chuckle with himself—definitely not giggling—over the idea of Doc as Batman, and Donut as Robin fussing over the color of his tights, when Simmons comes in the room.
“Ha!” He shouts. “I can hear you! You can’t pretend like you’re sleeping this time!”
Grif is still laughing. “Whatever, Clark Kent.” He snorts.
“Clark Kent—Superman? Is that why you’ve been acting weird around me lately? Are you still hung up on my robot strength?” Simmons asks, like he’s just discovered something.
“Uh, what?” Grif answers, like he doesn’t know what he’s been talking about. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Simmons’ face does that thing it does when he’s irritated with Grif (so pretty much his default expression,) looking like a cross between pissed and sucking on a lemon.
“Dexter Grif,” and oh no, Grif realizes, that's his boring-ass lecture voice. “You know good and well you’ve been avoiding me for days, making up bizarre excuses so we don’t have to be in the same room, pretending like you’re sleeping until I leave, and then staring at me incessantly when we actually have to be in the same place at the same time. You've been weird.”
Simmons takes a breath, and then his tone takes on a note of insecurity Grif really doesn’t like as he stares down at his prosthetic hand.
“Does it actually bother you that much now?”
Grif’s mouth dries and his instincts push him to correct him and stop that pathetic kicked-puppy sound from coming from his mouth ever again, before he can even process what I’m saying at all.
“No! Dude! It’s because I fucking love it!”
Simmons does a completely visible double take, and Grif would have probably laughed if he wasn’t just realizing he had put himself in an unintentionally uncomfortable position.
“..What do you mean?” Simmons asks, suspiciously.
This is precarious territory, Grif tells himself. On one hand, he might be able to bullshit his way out of what he just said, his good old tried and true method; but downside, then Simmons would sound like that again
…Or he could just go with it, since h’s already incriminated himself.
His foot scuffs the ground as he kicks it back and forth, considering his options.
“Okay,” he finally allows, biting the bullet with the concession that he can’t keep this shit up forever without inadvertently outing himself again. “It was kind of…hot, alright?”
Simmons still looks like he’s not buying it and Grif groans in exasperation.
“Look, I’m having fucking fantasies about you being all macho-strong and heroic, manhandling me and shit, being all noble. It’s annoying as hell and all your fucking fault, so I’m mad at you and don’t want to be in the same room. Are you happy now?”
Simmons looks at him like Grif had just pulled a few wires from the mess of them in the back of his head. One of his eyes is even twitching. And then all of a sudden, it’s like a switch is flipped. Literally, as it would be for a cyborg like him.
He charges from his rooted spot on the floor, and Grif immediately starts reversing towards the wall when it’s clear he’s not stopping on his way over. He crowds up in his space as Grif’s back hits solid rock, and his robotic hand slams beside his head. Grif forces a gulp past the sudden lump in his throat.
“Like this?” Simmons whispers, and jesus christ when the fuck did that asshole get smooth? Grif internally pouts. That’s not fucking fair.
He doesn’t feel his mouth fall open, but Simmons apparently notices because he takes advantage of it; his is there all of a sudden, too—lips touching lips, and oh shit, Grif realizes, he’s kissing him. Richard Simmons is kissing him. While he’s got him pinned to a wall—fucking…shit. He throws himself into the kiss too, abruptly very into the idea.
Simmons may be shy and repressed in general, but his tongue certainly isn’t, and it makes its way around Grif’s mouth, as his lips move against the other’s. The heat of his breath mixes with Grif’s, making a visible cloud in the slightly chilly room. Grif nips back at his lower lip when one of his teeth catches his, and Simmons makes a really nice groaning noise.
Simmons pulls back way before Grif ready for him to, but he doesn’t give him shit because he knows he’s had breathing problems ever since he stole one of his lungs.
His freckled face is burning up, and any confidence he had just displayed is apparently since evaporated, a much more familiar, sheepish expression making itself at home on him.
“I-I don’t know why I did that.” He stammers.
Grif gasps out a short laugh. “Dude, who fucking cares?” He pulls him back to him, arm behind his back. “Just do it the fuck again, Superman.”