A/N: sapphireglyphs said: "So I see you are drowning in angsty feels. Let's talk about something happier shall we? SIMMONS FINDING OUT WARD IS TICKLISH! I'm sorry, dear, but this needs to be written. :D"

It was probably inevitable.

After all, Simmons is essentially the team's medic and, by virtue of his position, Grant is the member of the team most likely to require her services. So, it really was inevitable that she'd find out eventually.

It happens on a Wednesday. The team has spent the past three days tracking down a man who has been terrorizing a small town through the use of Asgardian tech, and they've finally managed to apprehend him. The arrest doesn't go quite as smoothly as they were hoping—when does it ever?—and Grant takes a pretty hard hit to the head with a pipe.

He's only unconscious for a few seconds, but it's long enough for Skye to notice, and once they've safely deposited their prisoner in the Cage, she promptly tattles to Simmons. Which leads him to his current position: sitting on a table in the lab while Simmons checks him over.

"Agent Ward, please stay still," she says sternly.

Usually, he doesn't mind check-ups with Simmons. Letting a beautiful woman put her hands all over him is no hardship, for all that she (sadly) remains entirely professional. This time, however, he's having a little difficulty. This is because he was hit on the side of his head, and, in her efforts to examine the point of impact, Simmons' hand keeps brushing against his ear where he's ticklish.

It's humiliating. He's a highly trained specialist, one of SHIELD's best, capable of resisting torture and interrogation of the worst sort, but he can't keep himself still when someone touches his ear. He still hasn't lived it down with Skye, and the last thing he needs is for Simmons to find out, as well.

"Agent Ward," Simmons snaps.

"Sorry, Simmons," he says, forcibly stilling himself.

She shakes her head at him. "What is wrong with you today? Usually you're such a good patient. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were…"

"I'm not," he says quickly, as she trails off with wide eyes. "Just a little restless, that's all."

"You are," she says, delighted. "Aren't you? You're ticklish."

"No," he denies. "No, I'm not. Like I just said, I'm—"

"That's adorable," she says, ignoring his protests.

"Okay, whoa," he says. "First of all, I am not ticklish. Second, if I were ticklish, it wouldn't be adorable."

"There's no shame in it, Ward," she says, patting him on the shoulder and stepping away. "It's a perfectly natural reaction. Both biologically and by the process of socialization. It's actually very fascinating…"

She crosses the room, still talking, but he mostly tunes her out. He catches the occasional word, but since those words are all along the lines of somatosensory and cingulated and cerebellum, he feels safe in assuming that even if he were listening, he'd have no hope of understanding her.

So he just watches her as she moves around the lab. Even as she chatters happily, her movements are…graceful isn't quite the word. She's too deliberate, too purposeful, to really be described as graceful—at least right now—and yet, it's the only word he can think of. Well, aside from things like beautiful and lovely and really fucking gorgeous, that is.

He sighs, shifting slightly on the table. His increasing attraction to Simmons is proving just as impossible to suppress as his ticklishness. It's a problem.

"Now," Simmons says, pulling him out of his thoughts. She's standing in front of him again, holding some kind of scanner attached to a tablet. "Turn your head to your left, please."

He obeys, watching in his peripheral vision as she holds the scanner up to the side of his head. There's a brief hum, a beep, and then Simmons lowers the scanner.

"Thank you," she says. "You can look back at me now." She pauses. "If you like, that is. You're not obligated to look at me. That would be strange."

He does look back at her—because why wouldn't he—and frowns, a little confused. She seems really flustered all of a sudden, and he has no idea why.

Flushing under his scrutiny, she looks down at the tablet attached her scanner.

"This all looks in order," she says. "No sign of bleeding or swelling. You said you were only unconscious for a moment?"

"Yeah," he nods absently, mind still on her strange behavior. "Just a few seconds, really."

"I see," she murmurs, setting the tablet/scanner down. "Well, as long as you're not experiencing anything worse than a headache…"

"Nope," he confirms. They already went over the basic questions, but it's not a surprise that she's asking again.

"Very well, then," she says. "There's no visible wound and no signs of internal damage. We'll keep an eye on you for the rest of the day, and I want you to come straight to me if you begin to experience any of the symptoms we discussed earlier, but I think you're all right."

"Good," he says. It finally clicks, as she makes eye contact, that she's not just flustered. She's attracted. He doesn't know why, but she's suddenly started displaying all of the visual cues he's trained to look for when seducing a mark.

Not that he's seducing her—at least not on purpose.

"Good," she echoes. She takes a few steps back, making room for him to slide off the table. "Do you have any questions?"

In for a penny.

"Just the one," he says, standing. "What about finding out that I'm ticklish made me attractive to you?"

Simmons stammers a denial, obviously caught off guard.

"Your eyes are dilated," he points out. "And you're blushing. You were completely calm and professional until you found out that I'm ticklish, at which point you walked away and started babbling for no apparent reason. So…what changed?"

She narrows her eyes at him, recovering her composure. "You must have been paying very close attention to note all of that, Agent Ward."

"I was," he agrees. "I always pay close attention to you. Which is why I know that while you think I'm attractive, you've never displayed any signs of being attracted to me—and trust me, I've been looking. So?"

She blinks a little, taking in the indirect confession, and then smiles, a little smugly.

"You've been looking, have you?" she asks.

He nods.

"It's not so much that you're ticklish," she says, taking a step closer. "As it is that you're embarrassed by it."

"You've got a thing for embarrassment?" He may have completely misjudged her.

"No," she laughs. "But I also don't have a—a thing for the stoic sort. Being embarrassed over something as silly as ticklishness makes you seem much more…approachable."

"And you like it when men are approachable?" he asks.

"I do," she confirms. She steps closer again, which puts her firmly within his personal space.

He's pretty sure he's reading the signs right. And, if he's not, he can always claim concussion.

So, without further ado, he bends down and kisses her. Fortunately, she responds with great enthusiasm.

(He's pretty sure that, despite her apologies, the way she keeps brushing her fingers against his ear is entirely deliberate. But, whatever. He can live with that.)