#electriceell

“I’m helping you,” Foggy said. “Think of this like training. We have to know how good your senses are at detecting projectiles aimed at your head, right?”

“I’m well aware of their range, thanks,” Matt drawled. “You know I don’t actually need your help with this.”

He had the feeling Foggy was raising his eyebrows. “Huh. Sounds like someone don’t think he can take everything I give him.”

Matt paused.

Then he pushed his chair back and stood up. “Okay,” he said. “Bring it.”

Ten minutes later he was parkouring around the office, bouncing off the walls and furniture to catch every random item Foggy lobbed into the air. Foggy giggled breathlessly as he scooped up a calculator and chucked it at Matt’s head - just as Matt head footsteps in the hall outside.

He froze.

The door opened. “ - think you’ll be very impressed with Mr. Murdock and Mr. Nelson,” Karen was saying to their new client as they walked in.

The calculator bounced off Matt’s forehead and clattered to the ground.

“Eep!” said Foggy.

*

“Oh well,” said Foggy twenty minutes later. “There are other clients.”

*

2. Culinary or Scientific “Experimentation” Involving the Kitchenette Microwave

“I am going,” Matt announced dramatically, “to die.”

Karen frowned at him. “You said you only got stabbed ‘fleetingly’ last night. Which I don’t think is an appropriate modifier in this situation, but still.”

“Not from that,” Matt said, waving a hand as if his skin being perforated by goons with knives was an implausible cause of death. “No, I’m going to die because somebody - ” he raised his voice “ - decided to use the office microwave for his audition for Chopped last night.”

“You know, I may not have super hearing, but I can still tell when you’re being passive aggressive at a normal volume,” Foggy said placidly from his office. “You don’t need to shout.”

“Curries from three different cuisines do not go together!” Matt said. “In fact, curries from any cuisine should not be reheated in the office microwave! Do it at home!” He paused. “No, wait, I visit your apartment. Do it at Marci’s.”

Foggy batted his eyelashes at Karen, because it would’ve been a wasted move on Matt. “I didn’t realize this was an open relationship, but all right.”

“If you could smell what I smell…”

“Is it better or worse than gunpowder?” Foggy asked.

Matt’s mouth snapped shut. Karen, who had been giggling behind her hand, looked from Matt to Foggy and back to Matt again. “Wait, what?”

Foggy rested his chin on his hands, smiling beatifically. “Matthew, did you not tell our silent partner about the homemade explosives you created here last weekend?”

“WHAT.”

Matt glowered in Foggy’s direction. “Dirty pool, Nelson.”

“MATT.”

Matt turned back to Karen, spreading his hands with a guileless expression. “Okay, in my defense they were just flash grenades, and they worked very well in stopping those arms dealers I took down on Tuesday.”

Karen scowled at him. “...I’m giving myself a raise.”

“That’s fair.”

*

3. Excessive Bleeding

“...so Matt and I will speak to the opposing counsel, and I think we’ll be able to settle this in your favor by the end of the week,” Foggy said, smiling at Mrs. Gupta across the conference room table.

She beamed. “Thank you both so much. I know how hard you’ve worked on this, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

Matt gave her his good Catholic boy smile. “It was our pleasure,” he said, reaching across the table to shake her hand.

Foggy glanced over at Matt and blanched. “Yep, yep, it was great, love that hard work, but I’m afraid we have another meeting coming up so Karen will just show you out. Karen!”

Karen appeared in the doorway, looking perplexed. She wasn’t the only one - Matt had his “confused terrier” expression on, and Mrs. Gupta was staring at Foggy. “Yes?”

“Can you please help Mrs. Gupta with any paperwork, at your desk, and then walk her out?” Foggy said, lifting his eyebrows at her significantly.

“Uh...sure. Right this way, Mrs. Gupta,” Karen said, gesturing to her desk.

The minute they were out of the conference room, Foggy closed the door, locked it, and yanked back the side of Matt’s jacket to reveal that his white shirt was soaked through with blood - visible only when Matt leaned forward just right. “Matt!”

Matt winced. “Stitches aren’t holding, huh?”

“I can’t believe you,” Foggy hissed, pushing the jacket off Matt’s shoulders and helping him ease out of it. “You said you were fine!”

“I thought I was,” Matt protested. Foggy started to unbutton his shirt. “Hey, no hanky-panky in the office.”

“You really wanna test me right now, Murdock?”

Matt bit his lip. Foggy got his shirt unbuttoned and tugged it back to reveal a three-inch gash in Matt’s side, bleeding merrily on one end through popped stitches.

“Jesus.”

“It’s not that bad,” Matt tried. “Even Claire said so.”

“Couldn’t you tell it was bleeding again? Couldn’t you smell it? Didn’t it hurt?” Foggy asked. Matt hesitated. “What.”

“I always smell at least a little bit like blood, these days,” Matt said. “And…”

“...And you always hurt,” Foggy finished for him, and Matt nodded. Foggy sighed and leaned forward to rest his forehead against Matt’s temple. “Oh, Matty.”

“I’m sorry,” Matt said.

“You’d hurt worse if you didn’t go out there,” Foggy said. “Of course, that doesn’t mean we can have you scaring our clients away by bleeding all over them. I’d say I’ll check you over before our meetings, but that might lead to breaking the hanky-panky rule.”

Matt smiled, and turned his head to meet Foggy’s lips. “I’m willing to risk it.”

*

4. Pets

“A dog,” Foggy said.

“You know I don’t need a dog, Foggy,” Matt said.

“Screw you, Murdock, I want a dog!” Foggy said. “This office could use a mascot. Besides Daredevil, I mean.”

“I am not a mascot,” Matt said, hiding a smile.

“Well, then, we definitely need a dog.”

“Oh, can we please get a dog?” Karen asked. “A therapy dog! Who in this office doesn’t need a therapy dog, honestly.”

“Or therapy,” Foggy pointed out.

“Dog’s cheaper.”

“True.”

“No dogs!” Matt protested, but he was laughing outright now.

“Cat?” Foggy suggested. Matt shook his head.

“Parakeet?” Karen tried.

“Chinchilla?”

“Bunny?”

“Iguana?”

“Stop!” Matt said. “You two really want an animal in here, don’t you?”

Foggy as he perched on the edge of Karen’s desk. “What gave you that idea?”

“Would you like me to tell you exactly how many rats I can hear in the walls at this exact moment?”

Foggy and Karen exchanged glances. “You know what, why don’t we just get a few more plants?” Karen suggested.

*

5. Hanky-Panky

“Karen’s gonna yell at us,” Foggy panted as Matt loosened the knot in his tie to get better access to his neck.

Matt nipped at Foggy’s pulse. “Karen’s a block away already and getting further as we speak.”

Foggy huffed. “I can’t believe you’re hyper-sensing someone else while trying to get in my pants.”

“I wasn’t trying to get in your pants,” Matt said. He dropped his hands from Foggy’s tie to his waist and started untucking his shirt. “Now I’m trying to get in your pants.”

“I’ll have you know, counsellor, that...mm...this is a respectable place of business...oh, fuck...and these shenanigans will not stand.” Foggy’s protests would probably have sounded more assertive if he hadn’t been using a two-handed grip on Matt’s ass to haul him closer.

“They don’t have to stand,” Matt suggested. “There’s a perfectly good desk right there.”

“Ugh, that’s your worst line yet,” Foggy groaned, head tipped back. “Done. Dumped. Divorced. Fuck, do that again.”

Matt pulled back - just a few inches, but back. “I thought we were divorced.”

Foggy glared, hair wild and cheeks red. “Get back here and put your tongue back where it was.”

“But what about Karen?” Matt asked innocently.

Foggy paused. “You’re sure she’s not going to walk back in for a while?”

“Positive.”

“I want to be wooed,” Foggy says, even though he’d also liketo be fucked, kind of. He hasn’t actually done that and he kind of doubts Matthas either but—he’s had solo exploration and some thoughts. Perfectlyunderstandable thoughts.

“I think I can do that,” Matt says. “I already know what youlike.”

“Tell me,” Foggy says, curiously.

“Dancing—regardless of skill level.”

“I can’t believe you’re starting off the wooing process byinsulting my moves.”

“Sorry,” Matt says, dutifully. “Uhm. . .Mel Brooks movies, MontyPython, showtunes, classic rock. . .cheap wine but expensive beer. . .”

“That’s your fault,” Foggy interrupts. “You swayed me withyour craft beer hipster ways and no longer will PBR cross these lips.”  

“You’re welcome,” Matt says, smiling. “I think maybe I’d takeyou out for ice cream, though.”

“. . .that’s adorable,” Foggy says, hiding his face in hispillow. “Tell me more.”

Matt tells him about getting ice cream cones in the lateafternoon, so it’s not too hot for them to walk around the neighborhood withthem—how he wants to hold Foggy’s hand and let everybody see and how he wantsto kiss him when his mouth is sweet and cold and—

Foggy interrupts him with another kiss. Their second.

“Tomorrow,” he says.

“Of course,” Matt agrees.

*

Over the course of the next eight hours, they both end upgetting elbowed and kicked and Foggy’s pretty sure he almost gives Matt a blackeye, but it’s been a long freaking time since either of them has had someoneconsistently sleeping in their bed— nevertheless attempting cuddling, which isapparently a health hazard for them.

He still feels well-rested, though, when he wakes up with Mattpulling him close and pressing soft close-mouthed kisses to his neck.

“You’re still here,” Matt mumbles, against Foggy’s skin.

“Did you think I was going to ditch you after the promise offree ice cream?” Foggy asks, reaching up to stroke fingers through Matt’s hair.

“Once you came to your senses.”

Foggy’s always loved Matt, in one way or another. Now that he’sgot full permission, though—he’s gonna love the hell out of him.

“Pretty sure I’m the saner half of this relationship,” hesays, “and—I’m still here, Matty.”

Matt sits up to smile softly at him and kiss him on the mouthinstead; they trade cautious, not quite sure what they’re doing kisses, movingalmost awkwardly until things suddenly click. Level unlocked: Matt’s handsbelow his waist, hot shaky breath in Foggy’s ear as he squeezes his ass throughhis boxers.

“Sorry,” Matt says, laughing softly. “Couldn’t help myself.”

“Can’t fault you,” Foggy says, taking a shaky breath.

*

He saw it all on Matt’s face, a little crumpled when he says, “I can just leave, Foggy, I should’ve called or—”

“Shut up,” Foggy says, laughing. “You’re already here.”

“You’re laughing at me,” Matt says, like he’s not sure how to feel about that.

“A little bit, yeah, Murdock,” Foggy says. “Come here.”

Matt takes a hesitant step forward and Foggy fills in the gap, wraps his arms around Matt and breathes out another laugh when Matt immediately clings to him, pressing his face into Foggy’s shoulder.

“Thanks,” he murmurs. “Thank you, I just—wanted to see you. Don’t make a blind joke.”

“I won’t,” Foggy says, smoothing a hand up and down Matt’s back.

*

He almost let Matt sleep in his bed, but they don’t really do that. They have all these lines that Foggy mostly built himself but Matt seemed to understand; they toe them sometimes but only that.

So, after Matt drinks a few glasses of water and they talk as much as they can when Matt looks like he just wants to crawl into Foggy’s arms again, Matt settles into Foggy’s couch with an excess of pillows and blankets and falls asleep almost immediately.

If Foggy watches him sleep, it’s only for a minute.

Now, he’s walking a hole in his floor until he sees Matt stir, waking up and immediately groaning and swearing hoarsely.

“. . .Foggy?” he asks, sitting up slowly. His hair’s a mess and he’s making a sleepy, pained face. It’s more adorable than Foggy’s seen him in a long time, which does something old and familiar to his stomach.

“You survived,” Foggy says.

“Did you—put an ice pick through my eye, maybe?” Matt ask, rubbing his temples. “I probably deserved it, but—ow.”

“You did that to yourself, buddy.”

“Right,” Matt says. “Sorry for coming here. I was thinking about you.”

“And the whiskey guided you?” Foggy asks. “I made a pot of coffee. You should drink most of it, probably.”

“Thanks,” Matt murmurs, starting to get up and making a long, pained noise before he sinks back down again. “Nope, not yet.”

“Just stay there,” Foggy says. “You were not sure on your feet last night, I’d rather not have you break something. I dropped my Matt Murdock insurance after we split up.”

“Sounds like we divorced,” Matt says, smiling wryly, kind of sad.

“Well, close enough,” Foggy says. “Bacon?”

“. . .yeah, please.”

*

Matt looks a little less dead after he eats and takes a shower, coming out in nothing but a smile and pair of Foggy’s sweatpants because it’s entirely possible that Matt is allergic to shirts. After all the time they lived together, Foggy has enough evidence to support this theory.

“I can leave, if you want,” Matt says, for probably the tenth time.

“How are you feeling?” Foggy asks.

“Like my—brain is too big for my skull,” Matt says, after a moment.

“You’re still dehydrated,” Foggy says. “Sit down.”

Matt seems to like Foggy telling him what to do, gets this soft, perplexed smile on his face as he sits down. It opens up something inside of Foggy that he’s never quite let himself feel before. Matt drinks the water bottle that Foggy gives him and then turns to him expectantly.

“. . .lie down,” Foggy says, shifting to give him more room on the couch.

“Here?” Matt asks, hesitantly.

“My lap.”

Matt’s mouth drop opens for just a moment before he nods and moves to lie down on his side, head resting in Foggy’s lap, moving around until he’s comfortable and making a soft noise when Foggy slides fingers into his hair.

They’re both quiet as Foggy pets him and rubs his temples and feels a dumb thrill at the satisfied sounds that Matt makes, shifting and moaning softly.

“Why were you thinking about me, Matt?” Foggy asks, breaking the silence.

“. . .I can’t stop,” Matt says.

“Matt,” Foggy says, sternly, and Matt sighs and rubs his cheek against Foggy’s knee.

“I just can’t believe that I lost you when I was just figuring out what you really meant to me,” Matt says. It takes him a few attempts, stumbling over words, stopping to take a shaky breath. Foggy thinks he knows what that means. It just didn’t take him as long to figure it out.

He lets his fingers brush over Matt’s mouth and Matt kisses them.

“I can leave,” he whispers.

“Kiss me,” Foggy says, and Matt sits up slowly, touching their foreheads together. “We can sort out all of our shit later, Matt, just—just kiss me, okay?”

“Okay,” Matt echoes, and he kisses Foggy on the mouth softly, chaste. Foggy laughs.

*

Foggy spends the next several hours in and out of sleep, the out of sleep parts spent wheezing miserably and attempting to study despite said miserable wheezing. He’s asleep when Matt comes back, but he’s woken up by Matt’s frankly adorable attempt to move quietly despite holding several plastic shopping bags.

“Little retail therapy?” he asks, hoarsely.

“Kind of,” Matt says, dropping the bags on his bed, sounding embarrassed. “I went to a pharmacy and got overwhelmed by guy who was showing me the options, so I just bought you—all of the cold medicine.”

“All of it?” Foggy asks, sitting up and smiling as Matt comes over and upends a bag that genuinely looks like he just took everything that had the word cold on it. “Oh my god. Matt.”

“I also got you, uhm—a trashy romance novel and a lot of disgusting snacks that you’ll probably like and cough drops and—orange juice, probably too much orange juice,” Matt says, going back to his bed to retrieve all of it, including the gallon of orange juice that will never fit in their mini-fridge.

“That’s good,” Foggy says, warmly, touched by all of this. “Vitamins and stuff.”

“Yeah,” Matt says, smiling. “My, uh—my dad never really knew what to do when I was sick, but he’d always get nervous and buy too much orange juice.”

“Those good Murdock instincts,” Foggy says, picking up the romance novel to read the blurb on the back, laughing too loudly. “How did you know how trashy this book is?”

“I might’ve had the guy who helped me pick the trashiest one,” Matt admits, shrugging.

“There are sexy pirates,” Foggy says. “I feel better already. You’re the best, buddy.”

“It’s no big deal,” Matt says, but he looks pleased with himself as he gathers everything up again and puts it all on Foggy’s desk. His fingers brush over the different bottles and boxes of medication, turning back towards Foggy. “Pick your poison?”

“I’ll just take them all at once,” Foggy says, stretching out before he moves to sit on the side of his bed, picking a box at random and reading the back. “That’ll knock it right out of me.”

“It’ll knock something right out of you,” Matt says, smiling wryly. “Start with one. Do you want tea? I have tea.”

“You don’t have to, Matty,” Foggy starts, but Matt’s already industriously feeling through his desk drawers to pull out a small box of teabags, tracing the line of Foggy’s dresser to find the big coffee mug on top of it.

“Tea coming up,” he says.

Foggy grins as Matt leaves the room, turning to bury his blushing face in his pillow. He’s having a lot of feelings and some of them are about how he really wishes he could breathe through his nose and that his head didn’t feel like it was full of cotton—but most of them are about Matt caring about him so much that he’d make a pharmacy clerk pick a bodice ripper for him.

*

Foggy’s a little high on cold meds when he demands that Matt sit with him and listen while he reads the romance novel aloud between fits of coughing, but Matt dutifully sits on the bed next to him, shoulder to shoulder with their backs to the headboard. Foggy gets increasingly lower until his head’s on Matt’s shoulder and Matt’s arm finds its way around Foggy’s waist; Foggy’s a big fan of the whole situation.

Halfway into a dramatic rendition of a poorly written sex scene that takes place on the plank that one of the sexy pirates was supposed to be walking, Matt makes an uncomfortable noise and starts to move away.

Foggy’s saying, “Sorry, is this too awkward?” and turning to look at him when he sees why Matt’s uncomfortable. “Oh.”

“Oh, god,” Matt murmurs, tipping his head back like he’s imploring God to strike him down. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be!” Foggy says, which might be too enthusiastic, so he tones it down when he nudges Matt and says, “This is one sexy book, Murdock. If I wasn’t overly medicated and definitely dying, I would probably also be—uhm—god, I know there’s a good pirate euphemism somewhere.”

“. . .you can probably get something out of shiver me timbers,” Matt offers, faintly and pained, and Foggy laughs.

“Shit, you’re good,” he says. “I would probably also be shivering me timbers.”

That gets a reluctant laugh out of Matt, but it’s short-lived and replaced by a grave expression, like Matt’s steeling himself for something that he might not even do.

“Alright, kid,” Foggy says, turning to cough into his arm. “I know that face. Lay it on me.”

“I—want to kiss you,” Matt says, after a moment. “It’s less the pirates and more—you.”

Foggy’s not convinced that this isn’t a hallucination.

“. . .are you sure that you didn’t take these meds, too?” he asks.

“I’d prove it to you, but I don’t think you want me to kiss you right now,” Matt says, rolling his eyes but without much annoyance. “I just thought you should know—considering the situation.”

“You can absolutely kiss me if you’re willing to be so close to my disgusting, germ-ridden face,” Foggy says, doesn’t mean it as a challenge but not surprised that Matt takes it as one, making a face before he finds Foggy’s cheeks with both hands and leans in to kiss him softly on the mouth.

“There,” he whispers, smoothing down Foggy’s terrible bedhead before he sits back.

“. . .you really like me,” Foggy says, kind of awestruck.

“I really do.”

Foggy tries to lay this situation out in his brain, but everything’s clouded over in a haze of drugs and sickness and joy, so instead he throws the book across the room and says, “You don’t have to kiss me again, but you should prove your love by cuddling with me on my deathbed.”

“You’re not dying,” Matt says, but he seems happy to curl up with Foggy under his sheets, holding him close.

*

A few hours later, Foggy wakes up to Matt touching his face and makes a questioning noise at him.

“Shh,” Matt murmurs. “I want to check something.”

He cups one of Foggy’s cheeks to keep him where he wants him and leans down to press a lingering kiss to his forehead.

“Fever?” Foggy asks, smiling up at him.