Archive of Our Own

You can’t breathe, and it’s three in the morning. Seated on the edge of your bed, you hug your stomach tightly. The pain is bright and bursting, stabbing through your abdomen with a ferocity that leaves you sucking in sharp breaths. But your lungs feel clenched, as if your body is inwardly bracing for each punch of pain. 

Period cramps aren’t uncommon to you, but this feels different. This feels like someone is thrusting a knife straight through your gut over and over, viciously. 

The thought of getting Panadol briefly strikes you, and you slowly stand on unsteady legs. The gritty wool of the carpet feels rough against your feet, and you shuffle through the inky darkness of your room. 

“Oh, geez…” your hand smacks against the doorframe to your bedroom, your body halfway out into the hallway. The black and white tiles are cold, gleaming under pale light from the singular window at the end of the hallway. 

Sucking in a shattered breath, you squeeze your eyes shut and let the sharpness of the pain fade back into a steady, pulsing ache. You don’t bother turning on the hallway light, knowing that the dull pain in your temple will erupt into a piercing headache. 

Reaching the small, dim bathroom feels like an eternity, your feet sluggish and your eyes bleary. The thought of a warm shower flickers in your mind, and you feel as if your skin is begging for heat, for something to soothe the agony. 

Dropping to your knees in front of the square cabinet beneath the sink, you pull the doors open and hear the hinges squeak in protest. Blinking, you try to make out the shape of the box of Panadol, and just as you do and reach out for it, your abdomen twists violently. 

Gasping, your hand drops to slap against the tiles, and you let out an audible whine, the sound broken inside the cramped bathroom. If it weren’t for the long, rectangular window above the shower, you would have thought the sound made the shower curtains quiver, and not the wisp of wind drifting through a crack in the glass. 

Your breathing feels rushed, erratic as you try to focus on the chill of the floor beneath your palm, the biting edge of the grout lines against your knees. But the ebbing of pain doesn’t ease, and instead, a wave of nausea floods over you. 

Scrambling, your hands fly towards the rim of the toilet, fingers shaking as you curl over the porcelain. Bile bubbles in the back of your throat, your stomach churns. Though you’re ready to double over and vomit what little you were able to eat before bed, nothing comes. Frustration burns inside you. 

Tears spring to your eyes, and you can’t tell if it’s because you’re angry or because of the pain—perhaps both. Gritting your teeth, it feels as if the pain is compressing down on you, enveloping you in a tight grip that you can’t escape from. You’re so focused on the sting in your throat and the throb in your gut that you don’t hear the window in your living room sliding open, nor the soft thud of boots hitting the bare floors. 

Everything is too hot and too cold at the same time. Your stomach unclenches for a brief, respiteful moment, and you suck in a rattling breath. The corners of your eyes are blurred by warm tears.

“Sweetheart?” 

You shriek, your body jerking and nearly slamming into the side of the bathtub. The rapid movement of your body and the painful flutter of your heart sends your abdomen spasming with hot pain. Your chin dips and your teeth ache, and a croaked whimper escapes past your cracked lips. 

“J-Jason?” 

Heat vibrates from Jason’s body as he crouches beside you in a swift flash of movement, and large, warm hands reach for you before flinching back, unsure if he should touch you. 

“(Name)? What’s wrong?” Jason’s voice is hushed, but there’s a sharp edge to it. Worry bounces inside his chest, his fingers feel suddenly cold. He’s never seen you like this—bent and curled inward like a dying animal, eyes misty as they lift upward and find him. 

You want to feel humiliated, disgusted by the state you’re in and the fact that Jason is seeing you like this—but you can’t. The sight of his blue eyes dark with confusion and concern sends relief surging through you. You hadn’t realised how much you were craving him. How much you needed him. 

“Jay…” the word is choked around another spasm of pain, and your hands shake as you reach for him. Jason doesn’t stop himself this time, and his hands bring you to him. 

“Sweetheart, tell me what’s wrong, please—” 

“Cramps,” you gasp out into his shoulder, fingers gripping tightly onto the creases of his leather jacket. He smells like gunpowder and ash, dried blood and soap—your soap. Jason’s eyes flutter closed as he breathes a sigh of relief against your scalp; he hates that you’re hurting, he can’t bear the sight of you in pain, but at least it’s something natural, and not something someone had done to you, or something you had done to yourself.

He can feel you shaking in his hold, and he splays his hand against your back. He can feel the knobs of your spine as he rubs up and down, and even through the thin fabric of your sleep-shirt, he can feel how cold you are.

“You should have called me,” he says quietly, his voice rumbling inside the bathroom. He tightens his hold on you, caging you inside his warmth.

The thought had occurred to you before, to call his burner phone and ask him to come over, but you had buried that thought away just as quickly as it had come. You were not going to tear Jason away from his nightly duty, the work he does out on Gotham’s dirtiest streets. This city needs him, and you’ve handled period cramps like this before.

“Jason,” you push your face into his neck, ignoring his comment, “can you—I’m sorry—can you bring me Panadol?”

Jason glances at the open cabinet, and then the scratched lightswitch on the wall next to the door. For a moment, he thinks to switch on the light in order to find the painkillers, but your strained breaths dashes that thought away. 

Shifting with one arm still curled around you, he stretches his other arm out and fumbles around for the box of Panadol inside the cabinet. It’s hard to find it, the bathroom still dark, but the pale light from the window is enough for him to make out the shape of the box. 

He brings his arm back, snaking it around you, and his hands work at the small of your back, fingers pulling out a foil sheet and pushing two pills out into his gloved palm. 

You bite back another whine as a burst of pain skewers through you, shoulders hunching forward. The urge to cry grows stronger, and you want to bury yourself into Jason, drown in his warmth. 

A finger lightly taps close to your ear, which isn’t the nicest feeling as a headache threatens to cross the line of bearable to down-right splitting. Lifting your head away from the shelter of his neck, you take the gleaming white pills laid out on display in Jason’s palm. Your fingertips graze the thick, tightly-woven fabric of his gloves, and even that radiates heat.

Bracing yourself, you tip your head back and down the pills, feeling Jason’s gaze resting heavily on the dark shadows of your face. You mutter a small, ‘thank you’, your voice cutting out and dropping to a whisper. 

Jason’s fingers deftly reach upwards, and brush away the strands of hair that have fallen across your face. 

“Baby,” he murmurs, the gruffness of his voice subdued and gentle, “what else do you need?” 

Jason doesn’t know how to handle this—he’s never been forced into this situation before. But you’re you , and he knows he’ll do anything, you just need to point him in the right direction. 

Inhaling sharply, you feel the dregs of nausea begin to ease away, like dirt disappearing down a drain. Jason’s hands are heavy, warm. The ache in your abdomen throbs, and you want to simply fall into Jason and close your eyes. You want to wake up again when the pain is gone. 

“Just hold me,” you whisper, and Jason’s heart splits open. The desperation in your voice is subtle, but intense. You sound like you’re battling demons and not just agonising cramps. 

The muscles beneath Jason’s jacket flex as he scoops you up, and the jostling of your body has you whimpering softly, though you try to bite back the sound. 

“M’sorry, sweetheart—sorry,” Jason soothes beneath his breath, his large frame moving out of the doorway and down the hall. It’s still dark, not even dawn has reached its pale fingers into the sky yet. You hold onto Jason tighter, not bothering to keep track of where he’s taking you. 

Your body is softly dropped onto the cream cushions of your couch, and for a moment, you feel Jason pull away from you. Your hands shoot out against your will, fingers grasping for purchase on his jacket as your stomach churns. 

“Jason—”

“It’s okay,” Jason reassures, his body pausing in movement. His fingers move to wrap around your wrist, and he can feel your pulse beneath his thumb. It’s erratic, like the violent beating of a bird’s wings. 

“I’m just getting a blanket, okay?” 

You stare at Jason’s face, gaze flickering across his strong features—but it’s his eyes you’re truly studying in the pale light that barely filters into your living room.

“I’ll be back,” he whispers softly, his free hand reaching to the back of your head and pulling you forward lightly. He presses his lips firmly to your forehead, though it’s achingly soft at the same time. You visibly relax, and you let Jason’s touch slip away from you. 

You shift to lay comfortably on the couch, wincing as your abdomen clenches. You can hear Jason’s footsteps along the floorboards, the thud of his boots, and the sound of a cupboard door groaning open. Most of the hinges in your apartment are old, grimey and loud. 

When Jason returns, there’s a bundle of wool in his hands, and you recognise it as the blanket you bought while you were both out shopping in Gotham’s Upper Districts. The colour looks nearly black in the darkness, but you know that it’s a rich green, reminiscent of moss. 

Jason fans the blanket across you, and you thank him quietly. The fabric isn’t warm yet, but it feels soft against your chilled skin.

“Jay?” you crane your neck upward, and Jason’s already moving before you ask him to. Gently nudging you further against the back of the couch, Jason maneuvers himself to slot against you. He’s taken off all of his holsters and guns already, getting rid of any hard ridges that might dig into your skin painfully.

“You wanna try and get some sleep?” Jason asks, voice lowered. You’ve nestled into his side, and you hum with a small nod. 

For a moment, all you can hear is Jason’s breathing, the way each exhalation of air brushes against your temple. His fingertips graze against your arm, the touch fleeting like butterfly wings. You can feel the ache in your abdomen pulse, and you glance down at his hands. Gently, you bring one of them up to you, pinching the fabric between your thumb and pointer finger, and you tug his glove off. Jason doesn’t say anything, though his eyes follow your movements, his brows pulled inward. 

Then realisation dawns on him as you drop his hand against your stomach. Pulling you tighter against him, he dips his hand under your shirt, and presses his palm against your abdomen. His skin is warm, rough. Calluses live under his skin, but the feeling is comforting to you. 

“Feel okay?” Jason asks, and you nod. 

“Yeah. You’re warm.” 

Satisfaction bubbles inside him, and he hums quietly. The rise and fall of his chest is steady, consistent. His arms are caged around you, trapping you in a cocoon of heat. Though pain prickles under your skin, shooting through your abdomen as if something were piercing through your intestines, you let yourself surrender to the feeling of Jason, rather than the ache inside you. 

You hear Jason murmur your name, and you shift just enough to tilt your head up to him, your cheek resting on his breastbone. 

“Hm?”

There’s something hard inside his eyes, like he’s thinking about something troubling—something that hurts. It sends your chest clenching this time, rather than your stomach, and you wonder if you’ve done something wrong, if he’s uncomfortable with helping you like this. 

You’re about to open your mouth and utter some sort of apology, but he beats you to it. 

“Call me next time, okay?” 

There’s nothing in his tone that offers the chance of refusal or protest. His brows pinch forward, the frown lines between them deepened. It dawns on you that you’ve hurt him by not calling, by not reaching for him when you needed his comfort. 

Guilt gnaws against you, and tears spring to your eyes because it all feels like too much. The pain, the shame and humiliation of being seen like this, the guilt that’s flooded through you. It;s too much. 

“I’m sorry—”

“No,” Jason cuts you off, his free hand, the one not pressing against your stomach, curls around your jaw, thumb brushing against your cheek. The touch sends your skin prickling, your heart jumping. 

“I’m not asking you to be sorry,” he says, “I’m just asking you to call me next time, okay? I— (Name) —I want to help you.” 

The first tear falls, and it’s hot against your skin. It’s not given the chance to linger though, as Jason brushes it away swiftly, as if the sight of you crying personally offends him. 

You feel him bend a little, neck stretched forward to place another sweet kiss against your forehead. That does linger, the warmth of his mouth, and you sink further into him. 

“I promise—” you croak out, “I promise I’ll call you next time.” 

There’s a deep inhale from Jason. His lips then move against your skin, his breath warm. 

“ Good. ” 

His fingers flex against your stomach, and the room dives into silence. It doesn’t weigh down on either of you, and it’s broken by the inner groans of the apartment, the outside noise of the city—cars cruising down streets, shouts floating along the wind, sirens wailing distantly. 

You don’t fall asleep instantly, nor does Jason. You both lay with your eyes hooded, open and watchful of the shadows that drift across the room, but your skin feels warm, and the pain starts to ebb away as time passes, like a scar softly closing over. 

thank you for reading, God bless <33