Disclaimer: the characters and concepts in this story are the property of Marvel and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
Summary: It's beautiful right up until the moment it isn't.
A series of whumpy one-shots set during Matt and Elektra's college days.
Author's Noes: These three one-shots were written for Whumptober – the first being 'fever,' the second being 'harsh climate,' and the last being 'stranded" – and being that they featured Matt/Elektra, I thought it fitting that they all get posted together. I'll be posting the remaining installments once they're edited.
Readers, you're wonderful. Thank you! Please, enjoy!
Sweetbitter
-One-
The appointment with his ophthalmologist is in Midtown. Matt subsists on a steady diet of Aspirin and determination until then, assuring his doctor that he's fine, he's just in law school; but afterwards, when the adrenaline has worn off and there's no one left to impress, he's uncertain if he has the stamina to make it back to campus. HIs shirt clings to him from perspiration. His throat burns with every breath. His joints ache. It's one of the rare times when admitting he can't do something is the less humiliating prospect. Falling asleep on the bus, getting lost in the city - those are very real possibilities that he cannot abide.
He can already hear the whispers, feel the stares. He's getting turned around while standing still with how much his head hurts. There has to be somewhere to go sit down for a few hours, regain himself. Elektra's place is around here. Well, one of her places. He's been enough times to know the way, and he has a standing invitation. A key, even, but Matt's only ever been there with her and always leaves before he overstays his welcome.
She's out of town this weekend. He can pop in, rest a bit, then head back to campus when he's feeling better.
He wants to refuse. The mere thought of it, that it even occurred to him, leaves him sicker than whatever bug he's picked up. He can't just go to Elektra's place, make himself at home, use her space, use her. She would drop him so quickly if she saw him like this, heard what he was thinking.
Matt starts to walk in the direction of the bus stop. A sudden fizzle in the air stops him. Rain patters against the sidewalk up ahead, slow at first, but the downpour is imminent. He moves quickly, ducking under awnings, and finally decides to stand in her lobby. That's it. Until the rain stops.
The doorman's heartbeat spikes at his appearance. Matt opens his mouth to speak, but he doesn't have to words. "I'm sorry," is the best he can manage before he tries to leave.
"Mr. Murdock," the doorman says, "Welcome back."
Matt stops, fear replaced with something else, something worse. Revulsion. Disgust. He turns around to meet his fate.
A couple hours: that's all Matt allows himself. No going in the bedroom. No eating her food or using her wifi. He swallows the last of the Aspirin he brought with him dry and hopes they kick in soon. Then he sits on the couch, waiting for his head to stop spinning.
The rain patters against the window panes. Matt diffuses to the sound. He clutches his arms around his stomach to stretch at the ache in the joints. He tries to work the pain out of his legs, too, but that's more futile than the efforts with his arms.
His dizziness worsens. He leans forward, burying his eyes between his knees, but he needs to lie down completely before he can focus, before he can get his breathing under control.
The shivers finally claim him. Matt tucks his legs up tight between his torso and the back of the couch. He clutches his arms to his stomach and breathes, just breathes. A few hours. He'll feel better in a few hours. Then he'll get the hell out of her apartment, and he'll let her know that he was there, that he's sorry, and maybe she'll call him again, just to let him know how pathetic she thinks he is.
And he is pathetic.
"Matthew."
He's stuck to the cushions. Dried tracts of perspiration snap as he rolls over towards the sound of her voice. Is he dreaming? He must be dreaming. Her heartbeat presses into his spine like a hand giving a massage, detangling the knots in his shoulder blades, in his neck.
"I'm sorry," he says, moving to sit up. One of his arms is asleep. His legs are cramped.
Elektra settles herself onto the couch near him, her hips fitting perfectly behind his bent knees. She drops one arm in front of his waist, pinning him to her; the other goes to his cheek. "Whatever do you have to be sorry for?"
God, her voice is so soft. How can she keep it that soft when she's so disappointed? And she must be disappointed. She's come back from her trip to find him drooling and sweating and occupying her couch.
"I'm sorry for coming by. I didn't mean to." Matt rubs at his eyes. "What time is it?"
"4 o'clock."
Matt inches a little higher on the cushions, his headache temporarily at bay. The Aspirin must had kicked in while he slept. "I'll go."
Elektra stops him. "In the morning."
Adrenaline flows like ice in his veins. Matt hikes himself higher on the couch, out of her grasp. He doesn't want her touching him when she knows how long he's been here, how long he's been sleeping. "I'll get a cab."
"You'll do no such thing."
"I'm sorry."
"So you've said." Elektra brushes a hand through his hair. "But you're sick, Matthew. You don't have to apologize for being sick."
"I'm apologizing for coming here."
"You have a key."
"I shouldn't have. You don't deserve this."
"Matthew." The way she says it makes it sound like a command, one Matt can't help but obey. "You're not going anywhere."
Elektra makes him a cup of tea and a piece of toast. She fetches him fresh capsules of Aspirin, sitting with him while he takes them. She's on her phone, cancelling things, clearing her schedule for the next day, arranging for groceries and meals, and then, before he can say it, "Don't say it, Matthew."
She finishes with her business on the phone and tosses the device aside. Her hands wrap around his, gently removing the half-finished cup of tea from his limpening fingers. "Let me draw you a bath."
Matt laughs lightly withdrawing his hand from hers. "No."
"Why not?"
"I'm not four."
"Were there people drawing you baths at four?"
He shakes his head, frustrated already. Elektra Natchios, queen of bad faith arguments, isn't going to win this one based on rhetoric. "I'm not a child."
"You'll feel better."
"I already feel better."
Elektra takes hold of him again as she rises off the couch. "This will be even nicer."
"Elektra."
"What?" She hasn't let go of his hands. "It's nothing I haven't seen before."
"It's not –"
"Then what?"
Matt can't explain it. There are no words. What she's suggesting, the rawness of it, the childishness of it, the neediness of it. He's a grown man. He shouldn't. He can't. He mustn't.
She gives his hands a soft tug. "You'll like it, Matthew. You'll feel better."
That's what he's afraid of.
They've shared the tub before, but they aren't going to this time. Elektra sits on the edge and runs the water hot enough that Matt feels the plumes of steam caressing his skin. He listens to her adding things and turns away from the scents of lavender, vanilla, and sandalwood permeating the room.
He keeps hoping she'll change her mind. That he'll change his mind. His headache is a dull throb, the dizziness has dissipated. He's a little warm still, but he could walk out right now. Elektra's hand hits the water, though, and he listens to that sound the liquid makes as it breaks and splashes against her fingers, and he's already unbuttoning his shirt. He's reaching for his belt.
Elektra joins him. He shies away from her. "We don't have to do this," she says. But yes, yes, they do. She's already done it. He's just trying to catch up.
The water does feel nice. It unsticks the sweat from Matt's skin, looses the tension from his muscles. He stays curled up, not wanting to relax, not wanting to enjoy it, but his skin betrays him, lulled by the heat at first, followed by Elektra moving a sponge over his back.
Matt inches forward. "What?" Elektra asks with a laugh, doing it again.
"It's weird," he says.
"What's weird?"
"This," he admits. "You, me, this. It's weird."
Elektra draws small circles with the sponge at the base of his neck. "Has no one ever been sweet to you before, Matthew?"
"People have been nice to me."
"I didn't say nice," Elektra says, dousing the sponge back in the water. She swoops it up Matt's spine and one of his legs unfolds into the water, muscles happy and relaxed as the strain of sleeping on Elektra's couch is eased out of them. "I said sweet."
Matt tucks his leg back into formation. He doesn't answer her.
Elektra nudges closer, holding the sponge at the base of his neck. Her lips brush along his cheek. "Am I the first?"
Again, he doesn't answer her, but for different reasons. He doesn't want to give her that kind of power.
How quickly he forgets that she doesn't need it given. She rubs at his back, his arms, his knees, her face lingering just inches from his. She touches him until Matt is melting into the water, his legs stretched out in front of him, his arms bobbing in the water, his head balanced on the back of the tub, the last of his strength having left him.
Elektra's arm is wrapped all the way around him, pinning him to her. Her lips brush his as she asks him again. "Am I?"
Matt doesn't move. The answer simply emerges with his next breath. "Yes."
Elektra beams, kissing his cheeks, his forehead, the tip of his nose. It's so chaste and so tender, and Matt crushes his eyes shut, lamely attempting to block her out, block all of it out. How much he likes it, how much he wants it, how easy it was for her to convince him, how quickly he gives himself to her. Elektra hushes him, and that hurts too, that tenderness, that intimacy. "Matthew, stop," she says, "It's alright," and the tone she uses breaks through, gives him the stones to let her help him out of the tub, let her towel him off, let her lead him to bed.
She tucks him right up against her, his head on her chest, ear over her heartbeat. Her hands stroking through his hair. The revulsion simmers away inside him, how he twisted her up like this. How he conned someone so perfect into loving someone like him, someone so terrible, and how he hopes, even now, that she might forgive him for being so weak, so foolish, so much the man she doesn't deserve.
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