Work Text:
“You have to be more careful.”
“And you have to stop worrying so much,” Iris huffs, arms crossed, as Caitlin fusses over a cut on her cheek. “Seriously, I know what I’m doing, Cait. It’s my job. I made it out in one piece, didn’t I?”
“Barely,” Caitlin mutters, disapproval heavy in her tone, patting down a bandage over the cut and kissing it once it’s covered. Just in case. “Arms up.”
Iris complies with only minimal complaining, and she hooks a finger underneath Iris’s shirt and pulls to make sure there’s no serious damage underneath—no bruised ribs or the like. She doesn’t even bat an eyelash when Iris finishes tugging the shirt over her head all the way for her, tossing it carelessly to the side, and she’s confronted with Iris’s bare chest. They’re long past the point of modesty, and it’s certainly not the first time she’s seeing it all, anyway.
“Well, like I said. It comes with the job,” Iris says, defiant as always and stubborn to boot, shifting a little as Caitlin’s cool fingers brush against her skin, no doubt resisting the urge to remind her just how freezing her hands are again. “How am I supposed to get a good scoop if I—ahhh—if I—s-stop that!”
Caitlin pauses in the middle of feeling around Iris’s ribs, where she’d been gently massaging the skin there and trying to gauge the damage. She bites her lip, worried that she might’ve hit a sore spot, that Iris really is hurting more than she’s letting on.
“Did that hurt? I’m really sorry, but I’m going to have to feel around some more, then, you could have a broken rib or—”
Iris mumbles something, glaring at Caitlin’s hands like they’ve personally offended her and swatting her prodding fingers away when she tries to reach for her again.
Caitlin pauses, narrowing her eyes at Iris, carefully observing her features for signs of distress. It wouldn’t be the first time Iris has tried to downplay an injury—just the fact that she’s even showing she’s in pain at all is worrisome. “Sorry, I couldn’t hear you. What was that?”
“I don’t have any broken ribs,” Iris finally says after a fair bit of mumbling and grumbling, refusing to meet Caitlin’s eyes, “I’m fine.”
“Iris, come on, we talked about this. I need to know if you’re hurt, or I can’t help you, and you’ll just end up making it worse—just. Let me help you.”
Iris reluctantly lets Caitlin feel around the area again, weak to that big-eyed, pleading expression that never fails to work (which Caitlin knows, of course, and isn’t afraid to play dirty), but gasps again when fingers graze just below her ribs. She clamps a hand over her mouth as Caitlin’s hands keep moving, not pulling away this time but searching quickly and efficiently, determined to find the cause, but she can’t help the short burst of laughter when her hands hit a particularly sensitive spot.
“Iris…” Caitlin says slowly, fingers dropping down and stilling on Iris’s exposed stomach. “You really aren’t in pain, are you?” Iris glares at her, can see in her eyes that Caitlin is already catching on—not missing a thing, as usual.
“Shut up,” Iris hisses through her teeth, resisting the urge to bite down on the hand still over her mouth when Caitlin starts to move her hand again, this time not prodding but dancing lightly over the skin of her stomach, not searching for injury but looking for a reaction.
“Iris…” Caitlin says again when Iris fails to hold back another breathless laugh followed by a groan, a slow, mischievous smile spreading across her face. “Are you…ticklish?”
Iris shoots her a dirty look, trying and failing to move away when Caitlin suddenly leans over her, pressing her back and pinning her down to the bed, full-out smirking now. “N-no,” Iris manages through gritted teeth, thoroughly contradicted by the bout of laughter that follows as Caitlin digs her fingers into Iris’s side.
“Hey, hey—you can’t use my medical information against me in the bedroom,” Iris says, voice shaking with laughter and pushing feebly at Caitlin’s chest as Caitlin’s fingers dance around her ribcage, and then back up and down again, suddenly wishing she had just let Caitlin check her out back at STAR Labs like she’d wanted to do in the first place. “That’s probably like—unethical on so many levels.”
Caitlin laughs, eyes sparkling with mischief and affection. “Iris, being ticklish is not medical information.”
“Yeah, well—your hands are—are f-freezing. You—no—hey—stop—” Iris says, eyes widening as Caitlin’s fingers move higher, inching closer and closer to Iris’s neck—her ultimate weakness. “This isn’t fair!”
“Okay,” Caitlin says, stopping abruptly, still pinning Iris to the bed but letting her hand rest innocently by the side of her neck, fingers not so much as twitching. Iris fights back a pout, refusing to admit she actually sort of misses the sensation, pleasantly weird and tingly. She watches Caitlin carefully, trying to predict what evil scheme she’s planning next.
Instead, Caitlin just leans down, and whispers in her ear, breath tickling her skin lightly in place of her fingers—and really, how does she even do that? “Let’s even the playing field then,” Caitlin says, sounding breathless. “I’m ticklish too.”
Iris breaks out into a devilish grin of her own, easily flipping them so that she’s the one on top this time, straddling Caitlin and smiling even wider at the pleasant little squeak of surprise Caitlin makes. Iris feels a rush of warmth at the laughter in her girlfriend’s eyes as she inches her fingers closer to Caitlin’s stomach. She wonders how long it’ll take her to find where Caitlin is most ticklish, and if it just might coincide with her most sensitive areas when they’re up to other activities in this very same bed.
She’s thoroughly looking forward to finding out.