S3 alternative for clouded_heart

[thoughtbubble]

The nuns urge him to stay still but Matt starts walking very slowly with a cane as soon as his legs no longer give away whenever he stands. Stubborn as he is, even with nowhere to go, he leaves his bed and the wheelchair behind to pace in the halls while kids play outside. His body resists the movement, stiff joints, soreness, and sudden sharp pains in muscles and shooting through wounds, before subsiding when he clutches his side or shifts to the other foot. With his powers missing, everything seems muffled, like he's trapped in a giant container and can't truly touch the outside world. He wonders if he'll ever be able to get his gift back, if maybe God decided he didn't deserve it.

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[blessmefather]

Matt tells himself he might be misunderstanding what Foggy means but what else could he mean? His eyes sting with tears at the thought. Maybe some part of him had felt abandoned even though he was the first person to volunteer excuses for Foggy's distance. It wasn't as if they had been poor reasons either. Matt didn't dare assume he'd get anything more from Foggy.

"No, it's okay," Matt tries to remind him, "I screwed up. I was lucky you wanted to talk. For the jobs you sent."

The awkward exchanges over drinks might have hurt more than helped in the moment but they were well intended, he knows.

[clouded_heart]

"It's not okay," Foggy whispers. He's also not letting go. He's far too scared of what will happen if he lets go to risk doing it. His hand strokes very, very gently over Matt's back, surreptitiously checking his injuries in a move meant as much to comfort both of them. "I should have made more effort to reach out, to try and check on you, to patch things up."

Matty was scarred. Foggy knows that. Life left huge scars and he let Matt's actions from that damage get to him in a way he said he wouldn't.

[blessmefather]

"You shouldn't have to- shouldn't have to force yourself." He could be more specific but anything and everything feels like it's included right now. He was just weighing the damage of his presence in Foggy's life a few minutes ago.

"I don't know how to make things better for you. I don't know if it's right to keep trying or if I'm going to make it worse." Then again he doesn't know the next step in so many ways.

[clouded_heart]

Foggy hiccups on his laugh, leaning back to press a hand to Matt's cheek, looking at his dumb, lovely and wonderfully alive face. "Matty, I had to force myself to walk away, force myself not to call every morning and make sure you were okay, that you had made it through the night. I gave you jobs because that way I felt like I hadn't completely sold out you and us and myself, which I knew I had." He thinks he's crying but doesn't wipe his face to check. "I know my life has not been better thinking you were dead."

[blessmefather]

Matt's head bows slightly, eyes pointing downward. He wasn't sure Foggy was better off knowing a moment ago. "I don't know where I'm going from here. I can't go back to how it was those months since the firm closed. I don't know... If I can go back... Maybe it's for the best."

Not for Matt- he's feeling absolutely pitiful. But Foggy, Foggy has an entire "new life" that he still hesitates to invade.

[clouded_heart]

"Shh." Foggy steps back in, so Matt's brow is touching his shoulder instead, leaning there. "You don't have to go back to limbo. I'm not letting you push me away again. I was wrong to let you do it at all."

Marci had insisted he wasn't wrong, that there was a line between supporting a friend with issues and being in a friendship where you always gave until you had nothing left. She'd been trying to be tactful, since Matt was dead and she didn't want Foggy to start crying again.

"You're going to stay here for now. For tonight, definitely. I'm going to make sure that the sisters know that I know and know that I'll be back tomorrow. I have some of your things and I know you'll be more comfortable with your own clothes and belongings." He runs his hand over Matt's back again softly. "I'd be dragging you out to eat somewhere if you didn't look like you had half Manhattan dropped on top of you."

[blessmefather]

"No, no, you already- Done too much for me- I can't-" Half sentences get out, the knot in his throat cutting him off before he can share each thought in its entirety. It's pitiful, he knows, to cling to him and cry on his shoulder while telling him to go but he's beyond caring. The fabric on Foggy's shoulder soaks in the tears, giving him a weak reminder to stop the crying and breathe. He can practically feel the tip of the old man's cane jab at his throat. Head up. Speak up.

"I can't go back. I'm always going to be that person you don't want. I can't pretend it's not who I am." He lifts his head and shakes it, his grip on Foggy loosening, trying to let go against his instincts.

Even God taking his powers hasn't convinced him.

"It's always going to be a part of me."

[clouded_heart]

It's so rare that Matt lets himself be vulnerable. Foggy understands why a tiny bit more, hearing about Matt's 'training' (abuse) from an older, blind ninja. But it just makes him hug a little firmer, more determined to be there while it happens. "Matty... He wasn't the reason I was hurt. I mean, did I worry, will I worry? Yes, of course. It's scary and even knowing that you're apparently more unkillable than a cockroach won't stop that. I can cope with it."

The Devil is part of who Matt is. Sometimes, there's glimpses of him in the court, or when they walk the street from home to business, but he's always been there and Foggy can admit that now. The Devil is Matt's trauma and protector and everything else complicated that can't be covered by "Matt Murdock".

Matt starts letting go.

Foggy doesn't.

"I'd rather worry and fuss and get upset over a hundred nights like that night I found you in your place than think you're gone. Or worse. Not knowing."

[blessmefather]

That revelation is enough to make his heart jump in his chest, sending a dizzying wave through his fragile body. His hold on Foggy goes tighter again.

"I- I thought you wanted the vigilante and your best friend to be separate people," he says cautiously, like he might have misunderstood Foggy just now. He had been convinced when they were at their worst. "I thought you couldn't accept it. And you might... Blame me, like I blame myself, for the danger. For what happened to Karen and the other people at the warehouse... For what happened to you."

[clouded_heart]

"Oh, Matty. No. No. It was never about that." Had it been hard? Of course. Hard was no reason to stop. "You really thought I was ending the partnership because you wouldn't stop your night stuff?" He had thought he was being clear about why he was ending it but just maybe, he'd been unclear. Unclear in Matt's language.

"Hey, is there somewhere we can sit down? I don't think you're meant to be walking around with those injuries yet." He looks around and then back where Matt came from. "Come on, I'm not going anywhere, but I want you resting."

[blessmefather]

Very unclear if Matt's worn and puzzled expression is anything to go on. His aching legs agree with the idea that they sit down soon and he steadies his weight against the cane again.

"Uh yeah. There's a... Room back here I've been staying in." He turns a little to gesture behind him back through the doorway to the hall. It's one of the rooms packed with beds, not the one he had been in growing up, but innately familiar nonetheless.

[clouded_heart]

"Okay, give me an arm, that cane isn't made for leaning on and you know it." Foggy takes Matt's hand and wraps it around his own, to let him lean on Foggy, and let himself be guided (not that Matt ever really needs it). "Come on. Horizontal time for you, then we can talk more."

It's at least easy to find the right room and bed. The nuns are keeping everything as clean and neat as possible, but there's tell tale marks of Matt's injuries, treatment and frustration if you know how to look.

[blessmefather]

"Thanks," Matt murmurs as he moves with Foggy so he can lean some weight on him while they walk. Matt was stubborn enough to pace in the hall but not stubborn enough to make his bed perfect. It's easy to spot the one with the wrinkles, sheets pulled up lopsided, and the bandage roll on the nearby stand in the lineup of otherwise perfectly presented beds. Matt holds back a groan when he bends to sit on the bed but his face wrinkles and says plenty on its own. Some of the skin of his torso peaks out from under the sweatshirt he has on when he bends, showing bruises and scrapes that are still healing, and the edge of a dressed wound.

[clouded_heart]

Foggy helps Matt back onto the bed and immediately starts trying to get him to lie down instead, because even sitting has to be aggravating those wounds on him. "I'll sit, you can lie back and let yourself focus on being able to breathe." He also starts fussing with the sheets, trying to arrange them over Matt, smoothed down.

"Can you, tell me what you think happened. I need to know what you think before I can start trying to explain things." Because he had thought he was clear, but he apparently wasn't and so he needs to re-calibrate where they both are about what happened.

[blessmefather]

Matt gives in- his body agrees with Foggy's suggestion and his head feels heavier at the suggestion he lie down. He lies on his back and tries to relax in spite of the sore areas in his torso that can't be helped.

Was the last time Foggy helped him out like this after Castle took a shot at him? That had devolved into an argument, one of the ones that had made him so sure about what Foggy was or wasn't against.

"I knew you were worried, that it got worse when Castle started killing. When he was turned in, when we started talking about taking his case, I was trying to take a break from it. That's why I made it to Josie's with you, that's why I thought I'd try to date Karen. I hoped that things between you and me would get better. I knew that the Castle case was risky, I knew you were uncomfortable, I could tell that you were stressing about it." He has to pause and grimaces, thinking about how badly he proceeded, how it went nothing like he had planned, the guilt is nowhere near done eating at him.

"And I failed you. I put the mask back on. I let my guard down and..." He shakes his head. He should have known better. "I wasn't there when I should have been. And Elektra messed with the case and I should have seen it coming."

[clouded_heart]

Foggy watches the way Matt lays himself down and then fetches another pillow from a different bed, tucking it in against Matt's hip and side to take a bit of the strain off, let him stop twisting into it with pain.

Frank Castle. That was a clusterfuck and a half. And no, Matt's behaviour with himself and Karen had not helped. "You begged us to take the Castle case, to defend him. And I did. And then you left it basically all up to me. All the research, all the interviews he'd allow, the medical reports, the psychologists, I had to do everything on my own for a case I didn't even want to take. That was really unfair on me, professionally. And then when you went and blew the whole thing out of the water after the weeks of work I put into everything, that I managed to find a way to plea incapable without relying on PTSD, which he wouldn't allow, that really gutted me. That case would have made our firm." If Matt had let it.

He's not ready to talk about Elektra yet. He has a lot of resentment to her and she's dead, so it doesn't do any good.

"The only time I really wanted you there was in hospital, after I was shot. I woke up and Karen was there. I had a time that Marci was there. And I kept asking them and the staff if you'd been to visit and-"

He trails off.

Matt had never visited him in hospital. And sure, Matt was more hurt, regularly, but Matt was insane and Foggy had never been seriously injured before and he'd been scared and wanted his best friend there to reassure him. "I know being shot isn't a big deal to you, but it was to me."

[blessmefather]

"I know. You deserved better, I should have been working beside you on the case the entire time. I regret how that whole thing turned out. If it hadn't been for you it would have gone nowhere." Matt wraps an arm around his side. The upset made his breathing pick up and it strained his side.

Foggy might not be ready to talk about Elektra but Matt can't leave her out of his story. "I thought Elektra was going to do something bad- I couldn't trust her to tell me- so I followed her and she lead me right into the war against the Hand. I stood over the hole they were digging at Midland Circle all those months ago, before the building construction was even complete. They were already kidnapping people to use for their ceremonies. I thought that could keep up with the case and do the rest but I was in over my head and I didn't realize until it was too late."

He squeezes his eyes closed. If he had been less stubborn and paused long enough he might have realized, he might have admitted he had bit off too much.

"I'm sorry Foggy."

Foggy focusing on the hospital comes as a surprise though. Matt was going to bring up the attack next but he thought it was the danger in that moment that Foggy would be most upset about, not the aftermath when he thought he should stay away.

"It was a big deal to me that you were hurt," Matt rushes to counter, raising his voice unintentionally. "After I had already messed up the case... and you- you were only there in that office because I asked you to take it. If I hadn't- If I had kept it from getting that bad you never would have been in the line of fire." His voice gets caught in his throat at the thought, tears rising in his eyes.

"I didn't think I could visit you, I-I thought I'd only make it worse showing my face. It was true, what you said, that I was the problem. And maybe if I stayed away, I thought, you'd be safer and better off."

[clouded_heart]

If he'd just listened. But Matt never listened when Elektra was involved. And while Matt can talk about her, Foggy doesn't want to, because he tries not to speak ill of the dead and he knows that Elektra is the great love of Matt's life, the only one who ever understood him.

"I wasn't upset at you because some nutcase that wasn't Frank Castle shot us up. I was a bit upset that you ran off while they were still loading me into the ambulance but, I got it. You needed to chase it while it was still hot. And I was going into surgery anyway." And then he'd come to after surgery. And after that.

Elektra turns up and Matt gets dumber and more self destructive than ever and Foggy doesn't like who Matt is with her, but he can't say that.

"You were on the visitor list. Allowed people. Family, you, Marci, Brett and Karen." Foggy looks to Matt's face and can't help himself, reaching to brush a thumb under one eye and swipe away tears. He knows he's crying himself, but he keeps his voice steady and his tears from hitting Matt. (As though that makes any difference with Matt's senses.)

[blessmefather]

Matt grimaces, berating himself for not asking someone if Foggy wanted to see him at the hospital. He didn't want to ask, he didn't want to hear that Foggy was too angry to see him. Or something worse.

"I thought I'd upset you if I showed up and you were already hurt... I stayed on the roof of the hospital and listened, waited for Claire to tell me the details. I was worried for you, Foggy."

[clouded_heart]

Knowing Matt had been listening, did care, it's a bit of cold comfort because he hadn't known that then. "I told myself you had more pressing things to deal with. And then that there was other stuff you had to clean up after the ninja thing."

He had sort of assumed that Elektra had distracted him. It's an unkind thought and he knows it. But then Matty wasn't always kind when he was with her.

"The whole debacle sort of, felt like you prioritising other things over our partnership and friendship," he admits softly, maybe too softly. No such thing with Matt.

[blessmefather]

"By then I honestly wasn't sure if you wanted to be friends any more. I was worrying that you'd say that. Even after the firm shut. I wasn't sure that wouldn't come out of your mouth."

He takes a slow breath, trying to ignore how the thought alone stings.

[clouded_heart]

"Matty, we're not 'friends'. We're family." He doesn't leave a pause, no space for Matt to think he's saying it's over or anything like that. "I'm not saying everything will just be magically back how it was before... well, before what, I don't even know anymore. But I'm not going anywhere, okay?"

In his mind, he never went anywhere. He just... stopped clinging to Matt. Who, in turn, held onto Elektra and got swept up in her all over again.

"I'm sorry you lost her. I know how you feel about her." He hopes who 'her' is is obvious.

[blessmefather]

Foggy's answer is too much for Matt's weak resolve not to really cry. The breath he takes to calm himself trembles audibly and breaks off into a barely repressed sob as his eyes fill with tears. His chest and torso sting where his muscles clench and when he inhales too sharply. He stirs without thinking, reaching to wipe his face, trying to cover it, turning aside against his back and shoulders objecting to the position.

"I shouldn't..." He doesn't specify what he's thinking but the next words makes it possible to guess. "You're too good for me."

[clouded_heart]

Matt hates crying in front of people. Foggy knows that. He also knows that he's not going anywhere and not letting Matt hurt himself. He can't haul him upright and risk hurting him, so he goes for the only option he can think of.

He shifts and folds down over Matt, hugging him without him sitting up, not letting his weight rest on him, but pressed close as he dares, head resting lightly on Matt's upper chest. "If that was true, you wouldn't have ended up where you did."

[blessmefather]

He doesn't have the heart to try pushing Foggy away, he goes still so he doesn't shove a shoulder or elbow in Foggy's face. He wipes his eyes but his tears get quickly replaced.

"Ended up where, here?" He can't think of a place or position that proved he was the kind of friend he wishes he had behaved like. The old man's voice intruding on his thoughts often lately never helped when he was trying to be optimistic, especially about himself.

"I never wanted to hurt you, Fog. After everything, the last thing I want is to make it worse. I don't know if I can come back."