Work Text:
“Did you actually go to medical before coming down here?” Bucky asks as he walks into the lab, expectant look on his face, freshly showered and gorgeous and-
Tony viciously shoves down that line of thought, instead holds up his arm and shows off the neat line of stitches on his forearm “I did,” he says smugly, “and you can tell, because these are much neater than when I do it myself.”
“Your stitches are terrible, I’ve seen literal evil scientists with better needlework than you,” Bucky says agreeably, stepping close to inspect Tony’s arm before giving a satisfied nod.
“That’s hurtful,” Tony says, dropping his arm and turning back to his worktable before he does something stupid like lean in and try to get a big whif of the shampoo Bucky uses. “Now where’s my treat, that was the deal, I went and let the ‘professionals’ sew me up and you better not be backing out on your end of the deal, or-“ Tony cuts off when a ziplock bag of homemade cookies lands on the counter in front of him, straight from Bucky’s secret stash that no one has been able to find. “Yay,” he says gleefully, ripping into the bag.
Bucky’s hand is suddenly resting on top of his head, gently ruffling it, and Tony is uncomfortably aware that his hair is a sweaty mess because he may have gotten distracted on his way to the shower. Then Bucky pats his head and coos “yeah, tha’s a good boy.” His voice is equal parts teasing and amused, maybe a hint of condescension and underneath it all a fond warmth, like he really is pleased Tony dragged his pitiful human ass to medical after a relatively routine fight.
Tony flushes hot, nearly chokes on his giant mouthful of cookie and the only saving grace is that Bucky has already wandered away to play some kind of elaborate game with the bots. Tony still does not understand the rules, and he wishes he found it less endearing that Bucky refuses to explain it to him.
Okay, so. That... happened. Tony turns his attention back to the gauntlet he’s trying to repair, tells himself it’s not like it’ll ever happen again. It’s fine.
It kind of spirals out of control from there.