#dexrans

I just saw you mentioned 55! I might get to that later tbh. Also apologies in advanced, I’ve been DYING to teach this fandom the finer points of Greek partying culture.

for @dexrarepairweek

It’s mid March of Dex’s Frog year. He’s trudging back to the Haus after his CS 225 midterm. He’s exhausted, done with classes, and all he wants to do is unwind. He gets as far as laying his head against the armrest of the green couch when a loud mechanical screeching startles the ever living fuck out of him. It continues long enough for him to recognize that it’s the sound of an electric sander roaring from somewhere below.

Against his better judgement, he follow the sound to the basement door. Which, coincidentally has a paper signed taped on it reading “busy: do not disturb.”

“Too late,” he grumbles.

Down below, Lardo has donned a paint mask, and is sanding the shit out of a beer cooler. He can faintly hear her growl as he continues his descent.

She turns off the sander, practically ripping her mask off.“What part of ‘Do not disturb’ do you not get, Poindexter?”

“The part where you’re sanding something at two pm on Wednesday,” he argues.

“Fuck, it’s two already?” Lardo grabs her phone, checking the clock. “I don’t have time for this.”

He stares at the cooler for a long moment. “What is this?”

“Ransom’s birthday gift,” she answers impatiently.

“You’re destroying a perfectly good cooler for his birthday?” he asks incredulously.

“I’m painting it with shit he likes and then resealing it with famowood.”

Dex whistles, impressed.

“Or I will,” she mutters. “If I ever get this done on time.”

Truth be told, Dex was all too aware of the fact that Ransom’s birthday was coming up. He’d been wracking his brain for something to impress him.

Because Justin’s a good captain and a great friend. And not because Dex has been crushing on him since the first day of his Frog year. No, he definitely doesn’t blush every time Justin smiles at him. And neither does Dex feel his stomach drop every time he hears Ransom’s laugh. It’s not like he looks at Justin and wonders if he’s the kind of person he wishes he could be; or if this is what love feels like.

No, Dex has never felt any of those things.

So when the opportunity to both use power tools, and help out with Justin’s birthday present themselves, he has to ask. “What do you still need to do?”

Lardo blanches at him. “Well…I need to finish sanding. Then I have to spray a primer and let that dry. Then I need to put two base coats of cheap acrylic on the lid and all four sides. And that’s everything before I even start figuring out the designs. ”

“I can do that,” he concludes.

“Really?” She tilts her head quizzically. “No offense, Dex. But why?”

“He deserves a good birthday,” he puts simply.

Lardo crosses her arms, clearly unimpressed with his answer. “Uh uh.”

Instead of interrogating him, however, she hands him her mask. “Don’t forget to use this. Keep a window open when you’re spraying primer. Read the instructions on the can. I’ll be back by eight.”

He nods. It’s simple enough.

Dex misses working in his Uncle’s hardware shop. Half the time, his work was comprised of helping clueless people get started on their home renovation projects. On a good day, a few answered questions about outdoor paint lead to impromptu jobs the next Saturday. He breathes a little easier as the pulse of the sander numbs his hands. His mind drifts off to the first time he ever thought of kissing Ransom.

_/.\_

They were on a roadie, driving through upstate New York. Nursey and Holster were comparing notes about the latest episode of Brooklyn 99 while Ransom typed away on a lab report. Dex, meanwhile, was struggling with an MP. He was sitting across the aisle from Ransom, trying to not disturb him as he fought off the urge to throw his laptop across the bus. He didn’t notice how furious his coding had gotten until he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned slightly, ready to snap at whoever was interrupting him. But there was Justin, with a level and empathetic gaze.

“Homework kicking your ass again?” Ransom chirped.

“Yeah,” Dex reluctantly admitted.

Ransom made him scoot over to the window seat, claiming Dex’s old one. “Tell me what’s going wrong,” he instructs softly.

So Dex walks him through the basics. What the program is supposed to do, how he structured his logic, and what syntax errors he’d found so far. In the middle of rambling, an epiphany hits Dex.

“Fuck, this function is completely off,” he mutters.

“So…you know what to fix?” Ransom asks.

“Yeah,” he nods absentmindedly.

“Good,” Ransoms says. “I knew you could do it.” Maybe Dex knew what he felt for Ransom wasn’t purely platonic. But the look of certain pride on Ransom’s face as Dex fixed his MP was the final nail in the coffin.

Lardo comes back around eight, as promised. By that point, Dex has sanded, primed, and applied the base coats on all five sides.

“Bro, nice,” Lardo declares. She offers him a fist bump.

“Really?”

She crinkles her nose. “Yeah? You just saved me three days.”

“Swawesome,” he says quietly.

Dex steps back. He scratches the back of his neck awkwardly. He’s enjoying the work. He liked painting the base coat. It was soothing.

“So I was, uh, thinking,” he starts. “I don’t know a lot about real painting but I’m pretty neat, and I can follow directions well. Maybe I could help you out with the rest?”

Lardo raises an eyebrow cryptically. She purses her lips, ultimately nodding.

“Ok we have five sides to work with and technically the corners,” she explains.

“What do you put in the corners?”

“Small stuff, like solo cups or bowties. But that’s optional.”

“Ok,” he tries to keep the disdain out of his tone.

“The lid is going to be a Lilly Pulitzer design with his monogram in the center.” Lardo pulls out her pocket sketchbook, scribbling down some quick drawings.

“One side is going to be several Nigerian flags layered around each other. Then the hockey side is gonna be our beer pong table during a kegster and that Gretzky quote ‘you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take’.”

“Of course,” he sighs.

She ignores him. “One side will be the Toronto skyline but the clouds are gonna look like the cover of Drake’s ‘Nothing Was the Same’.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t know how to make an entire side based on Degrassi without binge watching it,” she says. “Which I really don’t have time for.”

“Fair,” he acquiesces.

“I think one side should be the chemical compounds that make up whiskey.” Lardo shrugs. “Y’know nerdy enough that he likes it. Vague enough that he doesn’t feel awkward looking at it if he doesn’t go to med school or something.”

“Cool,” he hums. “So that’s four sides.”

“Yea, I’m…unsure about the last one,” her eyes narrow.

“What are you thinking?”

“I feel like I’m missing something,” she groans. “Coolers should tell a story y’know?”

He stares at the cooler for a while, imagining what it might look like when it’s done. It hits him, “you’re missing Samwell. Not the kegsters, but actually living here.”

“Huh,” she clicks her tongue. “Ok, what do we do?”

An image of Ransom staring out a fourth floor window on a cool fall afternoon enters Dex’s mind. “Have you seen his favorite study room?”“The one in the library that overlooks the Pond?”

“Yeah, that one.”

She stares at him again like she’s trying to figure out what he’s about. “Okay, let’s do it.”

They spend the next few afternoons working individually. Lardo would come in and sketch what she needed for each layer of paint. Dex would comply with great precision and the most liberal use of painter’s tape imaginable. On sunday they apply a thin coat of finishing glaze and set up a secure perimeter around it.

Throughout this time, only Bitty is allowed in the basement for secret keeping purposes. Which, incidentally, pisses off Holster who is down to his last pairs of underwear.

Dex is proud of what they’re doing. Still, he wishes there were something else he could do that wasn’t co-opting off Lardo’s idea. The next Saturday is Ransom’s birthday. They haul the cooler upstairs for everyone to see.

“Happy birthday,” Lardo announces as they set the cooler on the kitchen table in front of Justin.

“No,” Ransom gawks. “You didn’t.”

“Oh, but we did,” Lardo preens. She elbows Dex gently in the ribs. “Dex’s soft hands were a big help.”

“Guys this is perfect,” Ransom murmurs. His gaze goes from Lardo to Dex. “Seriously, thanks.”

Dex clears his throat, trying to hide his blush behind a cough. “No problem. Happy Birthday, Rans.”

_/.\_

After presents, they start to set up for Ransom’s birthday kegster. The cooler is stowed away safely in a corner of the attic. Sometime during the kegster, Ransom decides they might need more beer storage. So he decides there’s no better time to break in his birthday present. The lid is a little loose so he pops it open to readjust it when he notices a giftwrapped box.

Since no one will miss him for a while, Ransom sits down on Holster’s bed and opens it. There’s a terrarium and a note inside.

I saw this and thought of you. So I got it just because I thought you might like it.

Justin chuckles as he recognizes the handwriting. Of course Dex thought helping Lardo wasn’t enough of a gift. He places the terrarium carefully on his desk. Then he goes downstairs to find Dex who’s chatting with Shitty on the front porch.

“Dex.” Ransom waves him to follow. They end up in the kitchen, which is very dark and mostly empty.

“Thanks for the gift. The other gift,” Ransom clarifies.

Dex shrugs, trying to look nonchalant as his face brightens. “I remember you saying the only downside to winter is that there’s no foliage to appreciate.”

Ransom chuckles. “Is that the only thing you’ve noticed?”

“No,” he admits. “I’ve noticed the way you only listen to music when you’re not doing anything else. And I’ve noticed the frown you get when your assignments are too easy. That’s why you procrastinate so much, right?”

“Guilty.” Justin leans in closer. Close enough so their faces are only a centimeter apart. “But it’s not procrastination if you’re doing something you like, y’know?”

“No I don’t,” Dex banters playfully. “Tell me about it.”

“How about I show you instead?”

For Day Four (Summer Lovin’) of @dexrarepairweek ​ . Posted to ao3 

Dex is sweating in places that he doesn’t want to think about and shifts uncomfortably, trying to to find a position where his skin isn’t sticking to itself. He’s in the shade, no use denying he burns even under cloud cover and with a fresh layer of sunscreen, stretched out on his stomach and wondering when Ransom’s gonna get bored of lying out on the patchy grass that passes as the Haus’ front lawn.

From the looks of him, it won’t be any time soon. His skin is glowing in the sun, and Dex can see a lot of it what with his shirt being used as a pillow and his shorts rucked up for “maximum thigh exposure”, and he doesn’t look grossly sweaty like Dex feels, long limbs sprawled across his towel like he doesn’t have a care in the world. This heat suits him. Dex makes a face; he’s better suited to heat if it’s countered by the spray of waves but he’s not going home this summer. Neither’s Ransom, who’s staying at the Haus until he goes to Boston to start consulting, so they’ve taken to lying out on the front lawn on their days off, just enjoying being still and together before real life starts up again in August.

“You’re staring babe,” Ransom says, eyes closed behind his sunglasses.

“It’s hot,” Dex grumbles, wiping his sweaty forehead on his arm. It does nothing but transfer the grossness; blond arm hairs plastered to his skin now. “Ugh yuck.” Wiping it on the ground is even worse; dirt and pebbles get mixed in with the sweat on his arm. He rearranges so he can rub the mess onto his towel.

“It’s summer.” Ransom’s turned on his side, elbow bent so he can prop his head in his hand, and looking not unlike he’s posing to have his portrait painted like a French girl. It gives him a height advantage to look down at Dex over his sunnies. “You can’t tell me you don’t sweat in Maine?”

Dex tuts and pushes himself up, sitting back against the Haus porch and resting his elbows on bent knees. “Yeah, but I was always doing something to like work up the sweat. I dunno, I didn’t just lie and marinate in it.”

for @dexrarepairweek

“Hey, isn’t that my hoodie?!” 

The biggest thing Dex has learned since he started college is to bring a jacket. It should really be a bigger lesson like “always expect the unexpected” or “don’t count your chickens before they hatch”. But really, he needs to remember that just because he can handle near frozen temperatures in a thin tshirt, doesn’t mean his needs to put himself through that.  

So once again, Dex finds himself with a nasty fall flu. Only this time, he’s a junior living in the Haus. The biggest benefit is that he isn’t freaked out when Bitty comes in and out of his room at all hours of the day. 

His nose is so stuffed he can barely breathe. He tried holding down lunch, and was generally successful…generally. Dex groans, snuggling further into his blanket. At least he isn’t missing anything important in class. Just a discussion section for his intro level history course. 

He’s doses off until the sun is high in the sky. Dex is startled awake by the sound of his room door creaking. 

“Nursey, shhhh,” he hisses. 

“Wow you must be really congested,” Ransom’s voice comes through instead. 

Dex struggles to lean over the top bunk. Ransom is taking off his suit jacket, folding it neatly over Dex’s desk chair. 

“What are you doing here?” Dex murmurs. “I told you I’m sick.”

“Was that code for ‘don’t drive down to take care of me’?” 

Dex squints. “Kind of? More like, ‘don’t come here, I’m infectious’.” 

“C’mon, Dex,” Ransom chides. “I got your back, remember? What kind of boyfriend would I be if I can’t take care of you in your time of need.” 

He wants to argue that a flu isn’t that big of a deal. Ransom doesn’t have many days off, and he’d be better off using them for something other than Dex. Then again, Dex has learned better than to stop Ransom from doing what he thinks is best. 

Dex scoots over, waving Ransom up. He kicks off his dress shoes, scaling the ladder quietly. Ransom nudges Dex over closer to the wall, spooning him from behind. 

“Thank you,” Dex says as his eyes flutter shut. 

“Of course, Dexy.” Ransom pecks the rim of his ear. 

Ransom buries his face in Dex’s shaggy red hair. His nose nudges the hood of Dex’s pullover. Dex hums in contentment. 

“Hey,” Ransom protests. “Isn’t this my hoodie.” 

In fact, it was. Dex, however, simply chuckles. “You said ‘what’s mine is yours’.” 

Ransom huffs. “I’m gonna need this back.” 

“I know,” he admits. 

“Eventually,” Ransom clarifies.