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Dex enters the Haus after his last class of the day and immediately freezes, eyes going wide at what he’s met with.
In the middle of the living room is Nursey, eyes equally wide, a look of absolute panic on his face. And there, on the couch beside him... is a baby.
“What the hell?” Dex asks.
Nursey is the physical embodiment of the complete opposite of chill. “Dex, save me.”
“Who in their right mind would give you a baby?”
“Right?! I’m kinda afraid that if I touch it I’ll break it.”
Dex narrows his eyes at the kid, who is thankfully fast asleep in its carrier. “It’s not yours, is it?”
Nursey’s panic manages to recede enough for him to give Dex a flat, unimpressed look. “No, Poindexter, it is not mine. Tango got it from somewhere.”
“Tango got it from somewhere.”
Nursey throws his hands up in the air, at a loss. “I don’t know, man! It’s Tango! He literally dropped by five minutes ago, told me to watch the thing and then bolted.”
Nursey doesn’t seem to realize the volume level of his voice until after he’s done speaking, and then his head whips around to assess the damage. The baby moves a little, stretching one pudgy arm up. Dex and Nursey both hold their breaths...
But then the baby stills and remains asleep.
They both exhale. Dex rubs a hand over his forehead. “Is Bitty around?”
“He’s at Jack’s.”
“Ollie? Wicky?”
“You and I are the only people in the Haus right now and I am two seconds away from having a panic attack.”
Dex drops his backpack to the floor and moves to stand in front of Nursey. He puts a hand on Nursey’s shoulder and squeezes. It’s rare that Nursey lets himself get this visibly flustered in front of another person, but Dex has known him long enough to be able to usually talk him through it.
“Listen, you’re fine. The baby’s asleep and now you have an extra set of hands. I’m gonna call Tango to yell at him, and then call my mom so she can explain to us how exactly not to kill an infant.”
Nursey nods his head and swallows, looking a little calmer. “Right. Okay, yeah. Chill. We got this.”
“Got your back.”
Nursey actually smiles at that. Ever since they stopped living in the same room, their relationship has been improving by leaps and bounds. Nursey gives Dex his space when he needs it, and Dex lets up on hounding Nursey about shit that honestly isn’t that big a deal. It’s been good.
And, as it turns out, they actually end up spending more time together in the living area or the kitchen than alone in their respective rooms. As though choosing to be in a room together instead of feeling forced into one was the big difference maker.
Dex pulls out his phone to call Tango. When it goes straight to voicemail, he sends an all caps text and then calls his mom.
“Did Tango mention a name?” he asks while it’s still ringing.
“No?” Nursey leans over the baby, squinting at it. “Maybe there’s a tag on it or something.”
Dex resists the urge to facepalm, but only just barely.
“Will!” his mom answers brightly. “You don’t usually call in the middle of the week. Is everything alright?”
He explains the situation, and once his mom is finished laughing at them, she gives a rundown of basic baby care. It essentially boils down to: feed it, change it, don’t drop it. There’s a bag of diapers and formula and other baby related stuff beside the carrier, and she walks Dex through making up a couple bottles in the kitchen, while Nursey stares after him from the living room with a betrayed expression for leaving him alone with the tiny human.
“You’re a smart, capable young man,” his mom tells Dex as they wrap up their crash course in babysitting. “You’ll be fine. Consider it a test run for when you have kids of your own.”
Dex pauses and glances sideways at where Nursey is obviously listening to his end of the conversation. “Mom, we talked about that. I’m not...”
“There are plenty of ways for you to still give me grandkids if you end up marrying another man. How does Derek feel about adoption?”
Dex chokes on his own tongue. “Mom, what? Why would-- Nursey and I are not--”
She starts laughing at him again, because his mom loves him but is also mean like that.
Dex rolls his eyes even though she can’t see it. “I’m hanging up now.”
“Alright. Love ya, kid. Good luck.”
“Love you too.”
He gets off the phone and turns to Nursey, who’s looking a little harried around the eyes again. “Okay, I was starting to feel better with how confidently you made those bottles, but now your face is bright red and I’m nervous again.”
“We’ll be fine. My mom just likes to make fun of me. You’d think that after all this time I’d know better than to tell her about my crushes, but she always gets it out of me in the end. It’s like mom magic or something.”
“Yeah, moms are wily like that.” Nursey agrees, turning back towards he sleeping baby.
They both stare at in for a long moment of silence. Then Nursey clears his throat awkwardly. “So, you, uh, you got a crush on someone, huh?”
Dex feels his ears go even hotter than they already were, and he keeps his eyes steadfastly on the baby. He wonders if it’s a boy or a girl. The triceratops onesie doesn’t really hint in either direction. “Like I’d tell you guys if I did. My mom gives me more than enough shit already for falling for unattainable people.”
“Unattainable?”
“He is so far out of my league it’s not even funny.” The moment he realizes what he just said, he freezes, heart pounding. Fuck. Did he really just...
Nursey turns his head to stare at him, while Dex opens and closes his mouth a couple of times without words.
He is saved, in a manner of speaking, by the sudden shrill cries of the baby before them.
“Oh shit,” Nursey curses, immediately panicked. “How do we turn it off?”
Dex steels himself, puts on his game face, and picks up the baby.
He sniffs it a couple times, but it just sort of smells like baby. So he holds it close and puts a gentle bounce in his step as he heads to the kitchen for one of the bottles.
As soon as the nipple is in its mouth, the crying stops. Dex heads back to the living room and sits down on the coffee table so that he can better hold the bottle and the baby the way his mom described.
Nursey is looking at him like he just cured cancer and defeated Voldemort.
Dex ducks his head, embarrassed. “You’re not gonna be nearly so impressed when this thing spits up all over me.”
“I will still be exactly this impressed, and I will also laugh my ass off.”
“I would flip you off right now but I’ve kinda got my hands full.”
It’s quiet for a long moment, the only sounds coming from the baby in Dex’s arms. Nursey stays standing pretty much where Dex originally found him by the carrier on the couch, watching him.
“Listen,” Nursey starts, and then stops. When Dex looks up, he’s chewing his bottom lip, his eyes darting around uncertainly. “I can pretend I didn’t hear anything if you want? Like, if you want a take-back. A do-over or whatever. You should get to say it how you want. If you want.”
Dex swallows. “No, it’s okay. I’ve actually been meaning to tell you for a while. Some of the other guys know. And obviously my mom.”
Nursey shuffles his feet. “And what about the crush?”
“Oh he knows. Not that it makes a difference.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, Poindexter. This guy would be an idiot not to like you back.”
“Oh, he’s definitely an idiot, but not because of that.” Dex hesitates, licks his lips nervously, and then goes for broke. “I mean, we couldn’t even live in the same room for more than a month, I’m not sure you’d be up for exploring what a disaster dating would end up being.”
Time seems to stand still as Nursey gapes at him. Dex forces himself not to look away. He’s put it out there now, he can be man enough to deal with the consequences.
“Wait--” Nursey stutters out. “You-- I--”
And then the front door bursts open and Tango appears. “Hey guys! How’s Addie?”
Nursey immediately throws his arms in the air and redirects his focus to their tadpole teammate. “Oh my god, man, never do that to me again!”
Tango gives them a confused look, but that’s pretty much his default expression. “Was she not good for you?”
“Anthony,” Dex begins carefully, “whose baby is this?”
“My sister’s? Did I not say that? She got into town yesterday and I told her I’d take Addie for some playtime so she could have a break.”
“Okay. Follow up question. Why on earth did you think leaving her with Nursey was a good idea?”
“...Because he was the only one here?”
Dex shakes his head and sighs. “You know what, it’s my fault for asking. Get over here and take your niece already.”
Tango does so happily, cooing at the girl in a way that makes her laugh and clap her little hands together even though her bottle’s been momentarily taken away. Of course he’s magically good with babies. Sounds about right when it comes to Tango.
Dex grabs his discarded backpack and heads for the basement, emotionally exhausted. The last thirty minutes have been a bit of a rollercoaster and he will be happy to hole himself in his bungalow and not deal with people for the next several hours.
Except that Nursey follows him.
He stays a couple steps behind Dex and doesn’t say a word all the way into the bungalow.
Dex tosses his backpack onto his desk chair and stands facing the bed instead of Nursey. He closes his eyes and exhales, feeling his entire body deflate with it. “So I guess I don’t get any take-backs on that last one, huh?”
“If you really want one I’ll give it to you, but I’m kinda hoping you don’t.”
Dex’s eyes snap open, but his body remains rooted to the spot, scared to face whatever Nursey’s expression is doing behind him. “And why’s that?” he asks, a little shaky.
“Come on, Poindexter, you have to know.” Dex feels a gentle hand on his shoulder. “I’ve been pigtail pulling for years now, Will. It’s kinda gotten embarrassing.”
Dex finally turns around, struggling not to smile. “You’ve always been embarrassing.”
Nursey’s face is a thing of beauty. On any given day it could probably launch ships and start wars, but right now, broken open in Nursey’s apparent happiness and wonder, it’s the most breathtaking thing Dex has ever seen.
“I have it on good authority that you like me anyway.” Nursey smirks.
The smile Dex was fighting breaks free as Nursey closes the distance between them. He starts to lean in, but Dex puts a hand up to stop him. “Wait.”
Nursey’s brow furrows in confusion, his lips forming a small frown that’s almost more pout. It is totally not adorable.
“I meant it about this probably ending in disaster. We don’t share a room anymore but we still do live in the same house and are on the same team and share the same best friend. There’s a lot of ways for us to fuck things up.”
Nursey tilts his head to the side, considering. After a moment he nods. “Alright, what if we did, like, a contract? Kinda how we probably should’ve done for the roommates situation. We can go over boundaries, and possible consequences, and... I don’t know, just make sure we’re on the same page and are playing by the same rules.”
Dex blinks, a little stunned. “That is a surprisingly mature suggestion for someone who nearly just shit himself at the prospect of being responsible for a small child.”
“Hey, babies are scary!”
“Don’t tell my mom that.”
“What? Why?”
“Because on the phone earlier she asked me to get your opinion on whether or not we should adopt.”
Nursey chokes on air. If he’d been drinking something that would’ve been a legitimate spit take.
“Okay, rule one on this contract,” he tells Dex firmly, “is that all discussions of future child acquisition get tabled until after we graduate.”
Dex smiles. “You think we’ll make it all the way to then?”
“Well I’m gonna damn well try to, Poindexter.”
And how can Dex not kiss him at that?
It’s slow at first, lingering presses of lips against lips, over and over again because neither of them want to be pulling away at all. And then eventually it turns a little more heated, Nursey’s hands in Will’s hair and wrapped around his waist, Dex’s hands fisted in the back of Nursey’s shirt.
“Okay, okay,” Dex pants against Nursey’s kiss swollen lips, “anymore than this should probably wait until after the first couple dates.”
A low noise escapes from the back of Nursey’s throat that could almost be described as a whine, but he swallows and nods, his nose brushing up and down the apple of Dex’s cheek with the motion. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re probably right.”
“Contract first.”
“I hate how much it turns me on when you’re being all responsible and shit.”
“I hate how much it turns me on when you’re being all self-aware and shit.”
Nursey snorts. “I’m still working on that one, so don’t expect it to come up often.”
Dex takes a step back so that he’s no longer tempted to keep making out, and then sits down on the edge of the bed. “Wanna go get dinner with me tomorrow? As a date, just to be clear.”
Nursey makes a show of thinking this over and then stretching, the movement lifting his shirt up enough that Dex gets a nice view of his lower abs and the trail of hair that leads down into his jeans. The show off.
Not that Dex is complaining. But he is still gonna chirp the hell out of Nursey the next time he does it.
“Yeah, count me in,” Nursey replies with a smile. “As long as we’re considering that our first date, and not the Adventures in Babysitting we had to go through today.”
“Deal.”
From upstairs they can hear the clear sounds of a baby’s laughter, before the sound of the front door shutting as Tango leaves with Addie. They both breathe sighs of relief, and then meet eyes and grin at each other.
“If we can successfully handle a surprise baby, we can fumble our way through a relationship,” Nursey says matter-of-factly.
Dex hoists himself up briefly and kisses him again, quick and certain. “As long as I keep my mom on speed-dial, I think we’ll be okay.”