Additional Tags:
Marital Counselling; Avocados at Law; Karen Page needs a hug; Karen Page Gets a Hug; Matt Murdock Gets His Act Together; Foggy Nelson is a Saint; Foggy Nelson Is a Good Bro; Foggy Nelson POV; Matt Murdock Learns to be a Good Bro; Awkward Situations Restart Relationships : The Fic; Little Old Ladies Run New York; OHANA MEANS FAMILY; I Sink Karedevil and I'm Not Sorry; In Which Foggy Nelson Mangles Quantum Physics; brOT3: Avocados at Law; Canon Typical Levels of Profanity; Christian Takes on ForgivenessAU where Jessica and Matt have met before The Defenders. Presumably in a dumpster one night.
I haven't seen Daredevil season two, nor am I likely to, because it will reduce me to five feet six inches of emotional rubble. If I get any of the background details wrong because of this, I apologise, and feel free to point them out in the comments. (Whether I'll have time to fix it is debatable, but I feel like I should try.)
The marital counselling bits are all loosely adapted from Danny Silk's 'Keep Your Love On' material, as well as Carol and John Arnott's Grace and Forgiveness. They're good books, and I wholeheartedly recommend them. They've actually been hugely helpful for me in terms of improving my relationships.
Foggy's views about Jesus are not my own. Mine are considerably more positive, and considerably more evangelical. However, I refuse to make Foggy OOC in order to talk about my views on salvation, God, and the universe. If you want to talk to me about that – in a sane and respectful manner, that is – I'm on tumblr at martial-quill.
You are obviously free to disagree with the views presented here on love, life, relationships, and how they work. But this is what has worked for me, and I really just want these three to end in a pile of hugs and reconciliation. So this is how I chose to do it.
The thing about Foggy's mom was that she looks innocent. Sweet. Round-faced, plump, a soft bow-like mouth under a button nose, and long-lashed blue eyes, along with a perfect 'butter-wouldn't-melt-in-my-mouth' expression. It was at odds with her calloused hands, but few people looked at her hands first. Foggy has practised that expression until he could fast-talk anyone out of anything, and there were only two people in the world on whom it had no effect.
One of them is his now ex-best-friend, Matt Murdock. He had an excuse, being blind.
And the other one is his Mom.
That makes sense, of course. She is the one who invented the look, which she has prefaced this conversation with. That should have been Foggy's first clue to run like hell.
"I'm sorry, you did what?" Foggy asked.
"I signed you and Matt up for marital counselling," his mother repeated, sipping at her mocha. "Bess and I thought it was for the best."
Foggy groans, massaging his brow. "Mom, for the last time, Matt and I aren't married. As if I would have gotten married without telling you!"
"Foggy, sweetheart, don't give me that crap. You never dated, sure, but by your senior year in college, you had a retirement home picked out," Anna said, continuing to sip from her mocha. "I've already made all the calls, and your first appointment is tomorrow. At six. Five sessions, it runs during the evenings. If you want to get out of it, you had best take it up with Bess."
Foggy stares at the coffee, frantically trying to calculate a strategy that wouldn't result in him needing to flee the country to escape Bess' wrath if he doesn't go to the counselling.
He comes up empty.
His mother's innocent expression is still firmly in place.
Goddammit.
"I'll call Hogarth," he sighs. "I can't promise she'll give me the time, Mom." That sounds sane and reasonable. A perfectly sanctioned excuse, along with Hogarth as the person that Bess and his mom would have to call if it she saved him. If nothing else, Foggy should eavesdrop on the call, transcribe it and then make a considerable profit off the entertainment factor.
"Of course," his mother says, with a smile into her coffee.
Hogarth raises a perfectly plucked eyebrow.
"Marital counselling, Nelson?" she asks, voice very cool, and it was at that point Foggy experienced a flood of memories, triggering the realisation of exactly how deep in the manure pile he really was. Very, very deep. Eyeballs deep.
"Uh…yes, ma'am," he says, squaring his shoulders unconsciously.
"I didn't know you were married," she says.
"Neither did I," he mumbles under his breath.
Hogarth's eyebrow rises further.
"Uh. I mean to say. That is. It's complicated. Ma'am."
"Isn't it always," Hogarth muses, reaching for her coffee. "Very well. Yes, of course, go attend your –" the left corner of her mouth quirks up into the shade of a bitter, bitter smile – "marital counselling. We can spare you for five evenings. I wish you luck."
"Thank you, Miss Hogarth," Foggy says, and books it out of the room.
But in a very dignified, corporate-shark style of booking it, that is. He wants absolutely no confusion on that point.
He finds Matt waiting outside the church where the marital counselling is taking place. It seems like a nice place. Baptist, maybe? Foggy's never been too clear on the whole separate-denominations thing. He's standing there, sunglasses on, with Jessica Jones standing right beside him – wait, how do they know each other? – and from the way Matt's body is angled towards hers…
Huh.
Abruptly, his mind flashes to something he'd said at the very beginning of Nelson & Murdock.
Well. She fits the profile.
But then Matt's head cocks to the side in a gesture that's so familiar that Foggy's heart constricts a little in his chest. Dammit.
"Foggy," he says, his mouth quirking up in a slight smile. There's a silence for a second, with neither of them quite sure what to say. Jessica is looking between them, her brow furrowing with exasperation, one hand going to her hip. And then Matt breaks the silence with: "Did Bess call you?"
"No. My mom told me. Not asked, told. I take it that Bess called you?"
"Yeah. Same deal."
"Well, I can see my work here is done," Jessica Jones cuts in, levelling a sharp look at Foggy, almost…protective. Foggy's eyebrows skyrocket. He's not sure if he's more concerned that she thinks Matt needs protecting – especially from Foggy, of all people – or if he's flattered by the implication that she thinks Foggy could actually harm someone. Or exasperated by Matt's charm continuously working on people who were well-known to be un-charmable.
Actually, no, he does know how he feels. It's the last one.
"Murdock, text me when you actually learn what decent vodka tastes like," Jessica continues, smirking at him.
"The answer to that would be 'anything except the stuff you drink,'" Matt retorts, the smile deepening. "Later, Jones."
She snorts, turns on her heel, and strides off.
Foggy raises an eyebrow at Matt. "Remember what I've said in the past? About you and stunning women of questionable character?"
Matt, unbelievably, looks a little embarrassed, which is…new. In fact, if memory serves correctly, Matt hadn't been even a little bit shy about a girl since Greek Girl, back in undergrad.
"Foggy," he says. "It's not – I mean–"
Foggy snorts. "No, seriously, Murdock. That wasn't supposed to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Also, do you think our moms are ever going to work out that we haven't been dating for the past decade?"
"You could always propose to Marci," Matt points out, his eyes crinkling up with the force of his smile. "That'd probably put a crimp in it. For a while, at least."
Foggy flinches at the very thought of Marci's potential reaction. "I prefer not being castrated."
"Good call," Matt agrees. He does not say, Although I would have thought with Marci, that was more or less a permanent concern. Not aloud, because Saint Agnes did not raise a fool who trash-talked women.
But because Matt's still a dick, his expression more or less says it for him.
Foggy shoves at his arm. "Stop doing that face."
"What face?" Matt asks innocently, his brow furrowing.
"That face."
"That's very helpful, Foggy, thank you," Matt says, before his head swivels slightly to the left. There's a middle-aged couple in their forties approaching the church. The woman is Japanese, he thinks, and short, while the man is Caucasian, with a heavy stubble on his jaw, calluses on his hands, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt.
"We should probably go inside," Matt murmurs to Foggy, and Foggy nods.
They slip inside the church, but they're not three feet two the door when Matt's eyes widen and he spins ninety degrees to his left, dragging Foggy around with him and clutching at Foggy to steady him, when Foggy nearly overbalances right into the door-way.
"Hey, there, Matt," Karen Page's wobbly voice says, from the back-most row of seats, and just like that, the semi-comfortable ease is shattered.
"Karen," Matt manages. "Uh. Hi."
Karen's smile is small, but genuine. "Hi. And hi there, Foggy. Didn't realise that everyone would be here."
"What a coincidence," Foggy says. Karen smiles at him, and pats the seat beside hers in a clear invitation, and Foggy's anxiety goes up a notch, before Matt's hand finds his elbow and squeezes gently. A quick, silent, it's fine, Foggy, relax. Foggy is skeptical of this, given that he remembers Matt saying exactly the same thing prior to contracting pneumonia in their sophomore year of undergrad.
"So how did you end up–?" Matt begins, as Foggy slides into the seat beside Karen, his brow crinkling, and it's a question Foggy very much echoes.
Karen's laugh is a quick, exasperated huff, that gets caught between her teeth. Matt sits down on the seat closest to the aisle. "Did you know that Doris and Bess are related?"
Matt's look is pure horror, like the time Foggy had suggested – just as a joke, mind you – using an aerosol of Axe body spray in order to impress a girl from his theatre class.
"No," Matt says, his tone low and almost awed. With good reason. Foggy knew Bess Mahoney was good, but wow.
Karen nods, solemnly, blonde hair swinging forward in a curtain-like motion. "Yep. Bess crashed the party when I was having lunch with Doris a few days ago, and, well, here I am."
Foggy sighs. "How do the super-villains even get a foot-hold in New York? Haven't the little old ladies got the monopoly on Machiavellian plans?"
"And they're going to outlive us all," Matt says, the corners of his mouth tilting up in that familiar, teasing little smile, the one that Foggy used to pride himself on bringing out.
God.
There's a silence, with none of them not quite sure what to say. There are too many lingering emotions. They're all angry with each other. (Okay, correction: they're all angry at Matt, and Matt's angry right back.)
And then:
"Good evening, everyone," says a voice from the front of the crowd. "My name is Rosalind, and I'll be your M.C. this evening. I hope you're looking forward to it!"
Matt just tilts his head, presumably to better enjoy the ringing silence that follows this pronouncement. None of the other people in the room – of whom there are about twenty or so – say a single word.
Foggy bites down on a smirk.
Apparently, Foggy's mom had been a sneaky troll, and had done some discreet gender-changing of names, so that Kirk Page and his wives, Mattea Murdock and Francine Nelson, were attending the evening.
"I always thought I'd make a very fetching girl," Foggy says, reaching for his name-tag, where it's neatly printed on the laminate table-top. Matt's fingers scrabble awkwardly, and Foggy automatically pins it to his suit jacket for him.
"There you go, Mattea. That's your name now, by the way. And Karen has become Kirk."
"Thanks, Fran."
"Now you're just fighting dirty, Murdock."
Karen just wrinkles her nose as she pins her badge to her blazer. It's a pretty blue colour, with lapels sharp enough that they could probably be weaponised, expressing the part of her that's whip-smart and dangerous. She must have had a meeting at which kicking ass was particularly important, because she's wearing black slacks with it, and heels, instead of her combination of pretty prints, pencil skirt and flats.
"I don't know about this, guys. Does this mean I have to stop wearing florals?"
"It's 2015, Kirk, you can rock a floral if you want to," Matt breaks in, his lips twitching again, his burgeoning crows' feet crinkling.
"Says the blind girl," Karen retorts, and Matt throws back his head and laughs.
There are ice-breakers, because of course there are.
And Foggy's a little grateful for it, because there are moments when the silence lingers, and instead of it feeling comfortable, like it would have been, once upon a time, it's filled with all the lingering emotions they don't dare to name aloud: Matt's guilt, Karen's fury, Foggy's grief.
Karen is giving the tiny Japanese woman her most polite smile.
"So how do you, all, uh– how did you–" the woman asks, her eyebrows nestling somewhere near her hairline, gesturing between the three of them, and Foggy is shifting nervously in his seat. How do you explain your semi-codependent relationship with your former-business-partner/ex-best-friend/"I took him home for Thanksgiving in freshman of undergrad and the rest was history" buddy and your former secretary that you used to have a crush on, back in the day?
In a way that makes sense to sane people, that is.
"Uh–" Foggy starts. How should this work? Are they transgender Mormons? (Wait, is that a thing? Foggy's not sure. He's never met many Mormons.) That could explain things. Sort of. If they decide to run with the fiction of being married in the first place.
"We're–" Karen tries.
But this is the part where Matt truly shows his heroic colours, because before Karen can do more than flinch, Foggy hears the magic words.
"We're avocados," Matt blurts out, his eyes wide behind his lenses.
Foggy can't hear the rest of Matt's explanation over the sound of his own laughter, because Matt Murdock, Charmer in Chief, just blurted. Matt doesn't blurt. He thinks fast, he quotes Thurgood Marshall, he graduates summa cum laude from Columbia Law– a feat known to be damn-near mathematically impossible – and he just blurted.
The woman is inching away from them, her smile frozen on her face to the point where it resembles a rictus of fear.
Karen's quickly-stifled giggle resounds like triumph in Foggy's ears. From the slight uptick at the corner of Matt's lips, it sounds like victory to him as well.
"…Is that, like, a sex thing?" her husband asks, his forehead crinkling up, and Matt sighs, rubbing at his own lofty brow.
Foggy decides to have mercy, and manages to choke out between laughs: "Business, actually."
"You grow avocados?" the man attempts to clarify.
"Something like that," Karen says, somehow keeping a straight face.
It's at this point that Foggy decides he really needs to start taking poker lessons from Karen.
After that, things are a little easier between them, as they return to their seats. Karen is in the centre of Matt and Foggy this time, and she has taken off her shoes, taking advantage of being seated in the back to sit cross-legged, her feet tucked up behind her. Somehow, she makes it look comfortable. Her head is leaning on Foggy's shoulder, but her hand is resting on Matt's arm.
It's a start, Foggy thinks, but then the seminar giver – who might be a reverend, but then he could be almost anything, priest, pastor, whatever – starts talking. Foggy decides the man qualifies as Schrödinger's reverend, until his exact title is established.
"Hello, everyone, my name is Mark," and Foggy sometimes wonders if Matt is psychic, because before the thought can so much as form – hey, look at that, where are Luke and John? – his head is swivelling and he is pinning Foggy with a deceptively level stare over Karen's head, which is ducked as she gives a yawn that should be truly jaw-cracking.
Foggy gives Matt his most innocent smile, hoping he can hear it over Karen's yawn and the reverend's voice.
Matt huffs and turns his attention back to Schrödinger's reverend.
Huh. Perks of ninja best friends, it seems.
"Play nicely, boys," Karen mumbles into Foggy's shoulder, apparently deciding to compete with Matt for the title of "ninja best friends with eerie abilities." "Wake me up if we need to do anything."
The unfair thing about Karen Page, Foggy thinks, is that she's all slight and blonde and big-blue-eyes. Especially before he considers how they met her, there's always been this instinctive urge that Foggy knows both he and Matt have felt, to comfort her, protect her, and just generally make sure that Karen Page is okay.
He's pretty sure there's a term for it. Moe, or something that Molly had kept talking about last time he had called her.
Whatever it is, it makes Foggy curl an arm around her shoulder, and Matt gently swing Karen's feet in his lap, before he covers them with his jacket.
Karen makes a contented hum, and closes her eyes.
"Still avocados, huh?" Foggy mumbles, knowing Matt will hear it.
He has to strain to hear Matt's response.
"Always, Fog."
It's barely a breath, and there's a plea in it, a hope-against-hope. If you know Matt Murdock well enough. Always, Fog. If you two will have me. It's "I love you" and "I'm sorry" and "you're still my family, Foggy."
"Above all," Schrödinger's reverend is saying, "we're here to learn about how to best love the ones we love best."
Foggy flinches at the ham-fistedness of the repetition, but he takes the point.
The rest of the hour is him talking about a lot about what he calls "the basics." Unconditional love as the foundation for a healthy relationship. Cycles of trust and mistrust. The importance of forgiveness, which is scheduled for day after tomorrow. Every line in Matt's body goes tense at that, and Foggy bites down on his lip hard enough to draw blood.
Matt's gaze turns towards him, concern in the furrow of his eyebrows and the slight pout of his lips.
"Foggy?"
Foggy licks his lips.
"Don't worry about it, Matt," he says.
Matt swallows.
"Okay."
Foggy shakes Karen awake, when the reverend stops talking. The M.C. is getting up, presumably to wrap things up for the night. There's an invitation to stay and linger, but Foggy's not really in a mood to do the whole "awkward-small-talk" thing with strangers as well as with his friends. He only has so much emotional energy, after all.
"Did I miss anything important?" Karen yawns.
Matt shrugs. "Just the outline for the next few days. Nothing too important."
Karen hums, and then shrugs, evidently deciding to let it go. "Okay."
"Are you, though?" Foggy asks, helping her into her coat. "You just had a nap, and you're still yawning."
Karen's expression falters for a moment, and then she smiles. "It's a story I've been working on. I got a tip about embezzlement at one of the hospitals."
Foggy can almost see Matt's ears perking up.
"Uh-uh," Foggy says.
Matt visibly droops. "But, Foggy–" he protests, a hint of a whine entering his voice.
"No," Foggy says, shrugging on his own coat.
Karen pats Matt on the arm. "I appreciate the offer, but maybe let me handle this one. If I get wind of needing a lawyer involved, I'll come to you."
Matt nods, clearly reluctant but apparently accepting Karen's decision. "Deal."
Foggy scowls. "Hey, we're both lawyers here. What's with the favouritism, Page?"
Karen's nose scrunches up with the force of her mirth. "Are you seriously telling me Jeri Hogarth isn't working you to the bone?"
Foggy pouts. "She gave me the time off to come to this, didn't she?"
Matt's eyebrows rise. "After the events of the past year, I'd have been surprised if she didn't."
And that was way too close to the fire for sane people to be talking about, and Foggy needed to lighten things up, stat.
"Careful, Matt. It sounds like you think Hogarth might have a soul."
"I have never disputed Hogarth having a soul," Matt says, holding the door open for them, because he may be a vigilante, but he is chivalrous. "I just happen to think she did a Faustian deal in exchange for her record."
Foggy snorts as he walks out, into the chill of the winter air. "Just because she smacked you down when she gave a guest-lecture at Columbia–"
"It wasn't a smackdown," Matt interrupts.
"Drinks at Josie's, anyone?" Karen asks, bright and hopeful.
Foggy grimaces. "I wish. Part of the deal was coming in an hour earlier than normal. Junior associates have no life whatsoever."
"They do, however, get shoe bonuses," Karen points out, smiling.
"Yeah," Matt pipes up, "if that's not Italian leather, I will eat my gloves."
"You," Foggy says, unable to stop a grin at Matt, because God, he has missed this, "are creepy."
"Not the first person to tell me that today," Matt smirks. "I'm gonna head home. Tomorrow?"
His voice is soft and hopeful on the last word.
Foggy and Karen exchange long glances.
I'm still not happy with him, her lowered eyelashes say.
Me neither, Foggy says, with a twist of his mouth. But I miss him.
Me, too. He doesn't know how he knows that's what she said. He just does.
Matt is swallowing, his hands clenching around his cane.
"Um?" he manages.
"Yeah, Matt," Karen says, sighing. "We'll see you tomorrow." She stepped forward and gingerly wrapped her arms around him, there and gone.
Matt's expression was along the lines of mildly concussed.
"Okay," he says. "Okay. I'll see you guys tomorrow."
Once, they both would have insisted on walking Karen home, before turning in the opposite direction to Matt's apartment. Instead, Foggy pats Matt on the shoulder – he can't quite bring himself to hug Matt yet – silently takes Karen's arm, and they start walking south towards Karen's place.
Once again, Foggy arrives at the church to see Matt there, talking to Jessica Jones again. She seems to be fighting a smile, even as she balances a pair of coffees in a four-cup tray and a pair of paper bags in the crook of her elbow.
"You jackass," Foggy thinks he hears her say. "We both know you're perfectly capable."
Matt looks at her, his lips twitching. "Ms Jones, are you refusing to help a blind man?"
She scoffs. "Duh. I'm a bitch, remember?"
"So you insist," Matt says, his tone filled with amusement, and then he leans forward into her space, to whisper something into her ear. Whatever it is that he says, it has an electric effect. She jerks back, eyes wide and wild and vulnerable, her mouth parting a little, before she shoves coffee and paper bag at him, and turns on her heel, marching away without a word.
And Matt looks–
Well, it's not his Handsome Wounded Duck Face. It's more like an "I-broke-it-and-I-don't-know-how" face. Foggy's seen that face a few times.
Foggy whistles. "Damn."
Matt's head snaps around to face him. "Foggy. Hi."
"Hey, man." Foggy's nose twitches as he walks up to him. "Wait, did you–"
Matt cracks a smile as he hands one of the coffees over. "French vanilla. And decaf, because otherwise you'll never sleep."
Foggy sips at it, and closes his eyes, letting out a sigh. "Thanks."
Matt's smile widened a little. "Anytime."
"So what did you say?" Foggy asks, even as Matt presses one of the paper bags into his hand.
Matt shrugs. "How much did you hear?"
Foggy sighs. "Buddy, if we're going to do this whole 'marital counselling' thing, I think clear, open and honest communication might be at the top of the list of things to work on."
Matt pouts, but Foggy waits. His blow has landed, he knows it, because it was a frickin' coup de bas. (What? Foggy took French in high school.) But there's really no point in keeping Matt Murdock as your friend if you're not going to occasionally exploit the hell out of his personal Catholic guilt mountain.
"How much did you hear?" Matt repeats.
Foggy shrugs. "Last thing I heard was her claiming that she was a bitch."
Matt nods. Hesitates, and then, admits with a long sigh. "I just…said she wasn't. That she cared."
Foggy lets out a long breath. "Might not have been the smartest thing to say."
"Kinda worked that one out, given the fact that her pulse went through the roof right after I said it," Matt replies, one hand coming up to massage his forehead. "Any ideas on how to apologise?"
Foggy sighs. "I'll ask Hogarth what her favourite whiskey is. You owe me."
Matt's smile is a little relieved. "Thanks. It's just–" he looks down at the ground, his knuckles tightening around his cane before they relax a little.
"Clear, open, honest," Foggy says.
Matt exhales. "I've hurt enough people these last few months," he says, simply.
Foggy's throat closes up, because now he realises? Now?
Matt goes very still, his head cocking to the side. It's an unfairly puppy-like gesture. "You're angry," he says.
"That's still creepy," Foggy feels obliged to point out.
Matt very deliberately crouches and sets the second coffee down, along with the paper bag, before rising to his feet.
"What do you think it means, Foggy?" he asks, his tone flat and hard, all resemblance to a puppy gone. "Do you think I'm trying to do this? I can't not pay attention to the people I care about. I can't not want for them to be safe, protected. I can't. And I won't. And living the way I do, experiencing the world the way I do, yeah, it's a little creepy." Matt shakes his head. "We spent four years of undergrad together. Three years of law school. We lived, worked, and slept, side-by-side. It's not about the senses, Foggy. I know when you're angry, because I know you."
"And despite that, it still feels like I don't know you," Foggy snaps. "You want to do this here? Fine! We're doing it here! It's not about the senses, Matt! It's about taking on cases without telling me. It's about the unilateral decision-making. It's about lying to the people you care about. It's about asking me to set up a law practise with you, and then not realising that in order to make a difference, you can't just take pro bono cases. It's about the fact that in all the time I've known you, you've never let me have enough information to choose you!"
"Because I knew you'd leave!" Matt's chest is heaving. He swallows, fists clenching and unclenching. "Every time. Every time. You let someone in, start caring about them, and they leave, one way or another. Until I met you. I started caring, and you stayed, and as long as I was just mild-mannered Matt Murdock, that was fine, but I'm not just that guy, Foggy, I never have been, this thing's been part of me for as long as I can remember, and the second you realised that, you walked out of my apartment. You know I was eight when my Grandmother told me I had the devil in me?"
Foggy's brain screeches to a halt.
"Wait. What?"
"When I was eight, my Grandmother–"
"No, I heard. Damn." Foggy pinches the bridge of his nose. Shit. Okay.
Sometimes, Foggy hates his brain. Because honestly, when he looks at it that way–
He's never known what it's like to be alone. The Nelson clan is both close and extended, like a tightly-knit sweater. But Matt is lonely, and Foggy has always known that. Been able to sense it on him. Lonely handsome wounded duck man that he is.
But he's never really considered before just how much that would shape his shitty communication skills. A need to push the other person away before they could abandon him too. And – assuming Matt's grandma was talking about his temper, and wasn't just being borderline verbally abusive – the need to hide.
"Do you–" Matt begins.
Foggy reaches out and claps his hand across Matt's mouth.
"Shut up," he orders. "I'm thinking."
Matt's mouth continues to move against Foggy's palm. It tickles.
Foggy sighs, lowering his hand. "Fuck. We have issues, don't we?"
Matt nods.
Foggy takes a deep, slow breath, and closes his eyes. Thinks about late nights at Nelson & Murdock. Of Matt's smile, and his unshakeable moral compass, pointing true north, no matter what kind of temptations – that's what Catholics called money and fame, right? – the universe threw at him. Of his unparalleled ability to ground Foggy, to surprise him, to make him love the people around him.
"Okay," Foggy says. "Let's go inside and fix that."
Matt's Adam's apple bobs in his throat. "Really?" he asks, his voice raw and almost frightened. Matt Murdock, of whom there is video footage where he breaks men's bones with his bare hands, is frightened of what Foggy potentially has to say.
The last of the flames of lingering fury uncurl from around Foggy's heart.
"Yeah," Foggy says. "I'm sure."
They walk inside.
Karen is already there, sitting on the same seat as the one last night.
She looks between them and her eyebrows shoot up.
"Mom, Dad, are you fighting again?" she says, her tone less joking than she probably intended, and more resigned. Instinctively, Foggy reaches out and squeezes her hand.
"It was a good kind of fight," he says, and he might not have super-senses, but he can hear the surprise crashing through every line of Matt's body language right now. Foggy thinks about it for a second, and then rolls his eyes. Of course. Mom gone, just him and his Dad. He'd probably never seen a case of fighting with the other person, not against them. "We came out of it kind of seeing where the other person was coming from."
Karen lets out a relieved sigh. "Oh, good. I really hate it when you guys fight. I always feel like I did something wrong, or like I need to fix it, or whatever."
Her eyes widen just after she says that, like she didn't mean to say it. Apparently, Foggy has two best friends with Catholic guilt complexes, despite the fact that as far as he knows, Karen has never so much as set foot in a cathedral. Church. Whatever. Which, kudos, Page, for managing to pick up the guilt complex while leaving that oh-so-famous forgiveness out of the equation. It's kinda impressive.
"What?" Matt asks.
Karen blushes, which is adorable, but Foggy is going to ignore that in favour of marvelling at how the two most brilliant people in his life are simultaneously the most idiotic, because that, too, is impressive.
"Karen," Foggy says. "You are bright and brilliant and beautiful, so I'm sure you already know this, but just in case:–" he takes a breath, locks eyes with her, and slows his words so that every word sinks in. "You don't get to shoulder Matt's shit. Or mine. Okay?"
She bites her lip.
"It's hard to remember, sometimes."
"Then we'll just have to remind you," Matt says, index finger gently closing around his sunglasses to take them off.
Goddammit, Murdock, Foggy thinks, feeling a flash of amusement, because his best friend is a drama king sometimes. We get that you're sincere. No need for the dramatic glasses removal.
Karen's smile is thin, but it's there, so Foggy's gonna call that a victory. "Okay."
Matt smiles back, and so does Foggy. "We brought you something," Matt says, because he is a) a lying liar who lies and b) a gracious friend who thinks that credit is something to be shared and guilt and sin are something to be shouldered alone, because apparently Catholicism teaches you that it's not enough to be like Jesus, you're supposed to pretend to be him.
Karen's smile becomes an outright grin as they hand her the cup and the paper bag. "Is that a blueberry danish?" she asks, opening the bag, the smile growing. "And – and a caramel latte? You remembered!"
"Of course we remembered," Matt says, and in that moment, he is all gentle Matt. Whose fingers Foggy can still remember dabbing at a cut over his eye in college, when Foggy had drunkenly tripped into his bedside table. Who, at his first Christmas with the Nelson clan, when Foggy's mom had handed him a scarf she'd knitted for him, had cradled it in his hands like he'd just been given the Culinan One diamond. Who got Foggy hammered on tequila when Marci broke up with him in law school, and then said nothing when Foggy sobbed on his shoulder, just held him as he cried.
Karen smiles, squeezes Foggy's hand, and then reaches out to squeeze Matt's as well.
The smile he gives them both is soft and warm, even as his eyes are bright.
Come to think of it, Foggy can feel a certain pressure building up behind his eyes as well.
"Shit," Foggy says. "Schrödinger's reverend hasn't even started talking yet."
"Schrödinger's reverend?" Karen asks.
Matt is clearly picking up on the cue to lighten the mood, because he says: "Out of curiosity, which one of us is Mom, and which one's Dad?"
"Foggy's the Dad," Karen says, then laughs at Foggy's slightly open mouth, because he was not expecting that one. "I mean, you jumped my attacker with a baseball bat. And then Matt's the Mom who spends way too much time helping other people and keeps forgetting to cook dinner."
Matt ducks his head a little, and then says: "Sorry, sweetheart. Should we order Chinese or Thai?"
Karen flicks a pen at him, but her stomach grumbles. She blushes again, and Matt, the bastard, grins.
"Question stands, Page," he says.
"Pad thai, and we're going straight after this," she says. "Foggy, I don't care what you say about Hogarth's hours, you're coming with."
Foggy sighs dramatically. "As you wish," he says, sweeping her bow, as he settles in the far side of her seat. Once again, Matt takes the aisle, and for a moment, just before the reverend gets up to speak, it's right. It's going to be okay.
"Another name for love is 'total and unconditional acceptance'," Schrödinger's reverend says. At this point, Foggy's never calling the dude Mark again. He's gotten all attached to the moniker and everything. "We live in a love-starved world, and more than anything, what people want is to be seen – for someone to see us, in all of our mess. In all of our sin. In our darkest moments. The point where we can't tell where darkness begins or light ends. Where we've screwed up again. And to be loved anyway."
He takes a breath. "Ovid once said, 'Let he who wishes not to be idle, love.' And learning to love like that is the work of a lifetime. But a good place to start is…look at someone. And try and see who they are. See their virtues, see their flaws. See their triumph, see their struggle. What they hope and dream and desire. And recognise that they are not you, and that that is okay."
Foggy blinks.
It can't possibly be that simple.
"See, what goes on in a relationship – most frequently in marriage, but also in families, also between friends – we go beyond the surface level of conversation. We get to the point where ideas, and opinions and emotions intersect. And we are confronted by difference. 'That's not what I think!' And we get scared. So we argue. We try and control, through various ways. We somehow get it into our minds, that if you and I are the same, then I can ensure that you can't hurt me." The man smiles, a wry tilt to the corner of his mouth. "Doesn't exactly work like that."
He continues in that vein, and Foggy tilts his head, thinking about it.
See the person. Recognise that they are not you. And that is okay.
I was eight when my Grandma told me I had the Devil in me.
That burning need for justice, to make the right people pay, had been a part of Matt for as long as he could remember, according to him. Just like Karen's need for the truth, above all else, seemed to be ingrained in her, blood and bone.
"But this is a two-way street," the man says. "Because in order for us to be completely seen and understood, we have to first let ourselves be seen. Most people in your life don't get to see you. They haven't earned the trust, or the intimacy. Or it's just not their job. But some people do. And if you're wondering why the most important relationships in your life are somehow lacking in connection, maybe ask yourself this. When was the last time you let yourself be seen?"
Karen's knuckles are going white around her pen. She's sitting bolt upright in her chair.
Matt leans in, breathes a question in her ear, and she gives him a tight shake of her head.
"Do you need to leave?" Foggy whispers, and her golden hair spills over her shoulders.
"I…yeah. Give me a minute," she says, standing.
To the reverend's credit, he doesn't so much as falter, just continuing on with his…sermon? Argument? Foggy really needs a glossary for this place.
"Do you know what that was about?" he asks Matt.
Matt bites his lip. "I have a hunch, but I don't have anything more than that. And it's not my story to tell," he murmurs.
Foggy sighs and drops his head into his hands.
"I should've been a butcher," he mumbles.
Matt lets out a huff of laugh, and kneads the nape of Foggy's neck with callused finger pads.
Foggy has to jam his knuckles into his mouth to keep from moaning. Somehow, he doesn't think it'd be particularly appropriate in church, even if they are there for marital counselling.
His phone buzzes.
"Text from Karen," he reports to Matt. "She wants to meet us at Great Wall, as soon as the sermon is over."
Matt's eyebrows rise. "She changed her mind about the food. She must be stressed."
Foggy tilts his head to the side, hoping Matt can pick up about it.
Matt huffs. "She gets Chinese whenever she's sick or on her period. Physical or emotional stress, or a combination thereof."
Foggy blinks, several times. "Wait, you can tell when–"
"Why do you think the kitchen always had aspirin, and a heat pack in it?" Matt asks him, shrugging.
Foggy shakes his head. "You're a creepy ninja, Murdock," he says, slinging one arm around Matt. "But at least you use your powers for good."
Matt smiles, genuine and soft. Like he's touched.
"I try," he says, quietly, and even through Foggy's concern for Karen, there's a feeling of contentment tugging at the corners of his mouth as well.
Tiny Asian Lady and her husband approach them, but Matt and Foggy brush them off as politely as they possibly can. In their speed to leave the church, Matt damn near forgets his cane.
"Great Wall, right?" Matt says, already turning to the left. Foggy is damn-near trotting to keep up with Matt's stride.
"That's what she said. I'm texting her now, telling her we're on our way," Foggy replies, not looking up from his phone. It's a risky move in New York City, but it's one he's willing to take for Karen Page. See: the earlier dissertation on the woman's magical ability to make people want to protect her, care for her, and generally go to the ends of the earth for her.
He really needs a shorthand name for that. "Karen Page is Precious: An Explication", maybe.
"So, you gonna tell me about that hunch, now?"
Matt's mouth twists.
"I'm deeply unsure about the ethics of this situation," he sighs. "Alright. Hypothetically speaking."
"Hypothetically," Foggy agrees, dodging around a drunken man with a beer in his hand.
"I think something happened to Karen, something just before we took down Fisk," Matt says. "She's been in a lot of danger since we knew her–"
Foggy snorts. This is perhaps the understatement of the milennium. Right up there with the hypothetical candidate of Matt ever saying, I may have misplaced my self-preservation instinct as a child.
"But hypothetically, something happened," Matt continues. "Something – it's not just danger, Foggy. It's bad." Matt's jaw clenches. "And she hasn't been telling us. Because she doesn't want us to know."
Foggy raises an eyebrow. "Buddy, you are in no position to lose your temper over concealing things from people allegedly for their own good."
Matt blows out a breath. "I'm beginning to see why it's so frustrating."
"Well, that's a start," Foggy retorts.
There's silence for about thirty seconds, before Matt sighs. "I'm – I'm sorry. For pushing you away," he says.
Foggy grew up in a house with four sisters. He knows a half-truthful apology when he hears one. But he also knows that for things to work, you have to swallow your damn pride sometimes.
He stops in his tracks, and Matt stops with him, cocking his head to the side. Good. He's listening.
It's the hardest thing he's ever had to say. He opens and closes his mouth and opens it again at least five different times. But he says it.
"I'm sorry for not loving you for who you are. For all of who you are," Foggy says, and shit, they both have tears running down their face. Matt's even doing his unattractive-cry face behind his glasses, Foggy can tell by the way his forehead is wrinkling. They're both sniffling, and shit, why didn't Foggy listen to his mother?
Matt's chuckle is watery. "Why were you supposed to listen to her this time?"
"Rule number nineteen of the Nelson household," Foggy says, wiping at his face with his hands. "Always carry a pack of tissues."
The silence as they walk the next few blocks is companionable, like the air has been cleared somewhat. Matt takes a deep breath. "We're there, right?" he asks Foggy.
"Yeah, can't you smell the–"
"It's a little hard over the salt," Matt shrugs, and then they walk inside.
Karen is seated in a corner booth, giving her a perfect line of sight to the doors. Her back is to the wall, and she keeps clicking her pen back and forth. From the irritated expressions on the face of the couple near her, Foggy guesses that this has been going on for a while.
"Hey," Matt says, seating himself in the booth next to her. He takes her right, while Foggy takes her left. "You okay?"
Karen swallows, and then takes a deep breath.
"I am about to tell you guys something, and I need you to not freak out, because I have been doing exactly that for the past forty minutes," she says, looking at them, blue eyes big and serious as wind blowing through a cemetery. "Promise me."
Foggy's a lawyer. He knows, inside and out, all the reasons why you should never agree to a promise like that.
Matt's a lawyer. He knows the reasons even better than Foggy.
Neither of them hesitate to swear, "We promise," anyway.
Karen takes a deep breath, and lowers her voice until Foggy has to strain to hear it.
"I shot James Wesley."
Foggy blinks.
Karen is still talking. "He jumped me. It was when you and Matt were fighting, and the Fisk case was spiralling out of control, and I'd just alienated Ben, and it felt like my entire world was coming apart at the seams. And outside the office, Wesley chloroformed me. I woke up, and I was in a room with him, and he – he tried to recruit me. He wanted me to convince Ben that there was nothing going on with Fisk, convince everyone." Her mouth twists into a bitter smile. "I said I'd rather die first, and I can still remember exactly what he said next." Her voice drops a semi-tone in imitation, and Foggy shudders, remembering Wesley's cool, collected tones. "'You won't be the first to die, Miss Page. Mr Urich will have that honour. Then we'll go see to Nelson and Murdock. After that, your friends, your family. When you have no tears left, then we'll come for you.'" She swallows. "He had left his gun on the table. In grabbing reach. His phone rang, and I grabbed it, and I shot him. I emptied the clip into his chest." She shudders. "And I can still see his blood on my hands."
Foggy closes his eyes, and breathes.
"Karen," Matt says, his voice quiet and soft.
"I fucking know, Matt. I know 'thou shalt not kill', and I know, but I did, and it's too late to change that, and even if I could, I am not sorry," she hisses, tears coursing down her cheeks.
"Karen," Matt repeats. "Come here," he says, opening his arms, and Karen leans into Matt. Foggy reaches out and cards his hand through her hair; she likes to leave it loose so she can fiddle with it, and he knows Candy finds the motion soothing.
Karen cries until Matt's suit jacket is damp, and Matt hushes her, even as Foggy hums off-key to try and calm her.
"You get to choose you, Kare-bear," Foggy says. Perhaps the nickname shouldn't trip over his tongue so easily, when something as big as someone's life has just been plonked down on the table. But it's the truth, and Karen needs the truth like most people like oxygen, so Foggy repeats it. "It was him or you, and you get to choose you. And you don't have to be sorry for it."
He rubs soothing circles on Karen's upper back, above where Matt's arm is banded tightly around her waist. Eventually, the awful, strangled half-sounds of Karen trying to mute her sobs stop, and she eases back.
"I'm sorry," she says, wiping at her tears. Her mascara has run so that there are rings around her eyes now. Foggy picks up one of the serviettes, and dabs at it, gently.
"Don't be," Foggy says, so fiercely that even he is shocked by it. "Listen. You're Karen Page, and nobody fucks with you. You get to choose you, you get to fall apart if you need to, and none of it makes us love you any the less."
That makes her wipe at her eyes harder, but she gives a shaky nod.
"I might need you guys to remind me," she says, staring at the table.
"Until you believe us," Foggy swears, and Matt nods firmly.
There's a beat and then Foggy realises.
"Damn. I totally missed the whole memo on needing some element of personal tragedy to be in this club, didn't I?" he sighs.
Matt smirks. "Dating Marci doesn't count?"
"Oh, fuck you, Murdock," Foggy sighs.
It wins a smile from Karen, and the rest of the night, they eat in silence, with all of them unsure how to deal with the uncomfortable amount of emotions dangling in the air.
But nobody's screaming at each other, so Foggy counts it as a win.
The next day, Foggy comes prepared, stopping at the CVS to pick up make-up wipes and a box of tissues. Yes, a box, screw your judge-y face. Foggy and Matt are modern men, and they have feelings, okay?
He groans as he realises that his mother's plan is working out perfectly, and dials Matt without thinking.
"Foggy?" Matt picks up instantly, his tone worried. Foggy frowns. Why is Matt so worried?
"Can we just get my mom to run for President already? It'd alleviate her boredom, and then we could make our own decisions, like adults!" Foggy whines.
Matt chuckles into the receiver, and Foggy smiles, as he walks to the counter.
"She and Bess would fight for the position of VP," Matt says, a gleeful note in his voice. "They'd each be saying, 'No, you should be President–'"
"No, you!" Foggy says, pitching his voice to a falsetto, thanking the cashier. "We could sell tickets to it, Matt!"
"Mr Nelson, are you proposing turning your mother's modesty into an entertainment niche?" Matt asks.
"Leading questions to the witness, counsellor," Foggy says, clucking his tongue, walking out of the store again. "I'll see you in a few, okay?"
"Yeah. Did you find out about the whiskey?"
"Bourbon, as it turns out. Jim Beam is the most frequent one, but she likes most types. Depends on how much you want to grovel." Matt hums into the receiver.
"Okay. Thanks, Foggy."
"Anytime," Foggy says, hanging up.
Well.
That had felt eerily normal.
The second Foggy hears Schrödinger's reverend–
"Seriously?" Karen asks, smiling, and shaking her head. "You do realise that's not how that theory works at all, right?"
Foggy pouts. "I should have been a butcher," he grumbles. "No-one would have banned me from mangling quantum physics then."
– announce the evening's topic as "The Importance of Forgiveness", both Matt and Karen tense in their chairs beside him, and very carefully do not look at each other.
Well, Karen very carefully doesn't look at Matt. If Foggy knows Matt, he knows that Matt is probably focussing on Karen with every ounce of sensory input he can muster.
Schrödinger's reverend's smile is gentle.
"I can see a few panicked faces around the room," he says. "So let's start by talking about what forgiveness is. It is not saying that what the other person did was okay."
Karen lets out a very controlled, slow exhale.
"It doesn't mean you have to trust them again. It doesn't mean that things go back to the way they were again. But someone once said that holding a grudge is like drinking poison, and expecting it to kill the other person."
Foggy can hear the gears turning in Karen's head.
"So let's talk about what it is," the reverend says. "One of the best definitions I've ever heard of it? To remit; to let go; to cease to resent." The man continues, and Foggy takes notes, because that's a new concept. He's never, ever heard forgiveness framed in terms of a way to take care of your own emotions, and that's…kinda cool. It's difficult, and he can already anticipate days like when he was back in law school, grappling with the concept.
Karen's eyes are wide, and Foggy can see Matt's fingers twitch, probably desperately wishing he had his rosary on him. The tension in the air is thick, as the man talks about practical steps towards forgiveness.
This is the part where Foggy zones out. He talks a lot about giving the anger, the pain, the negative emotions to God, but Foggy's never met the guy, and he doesn't really think that – assuming He exists – handing over all his emotional shit is really a great way to first meet Him.
"Ultimately?" the man says. "Forgiveness begins with a choice. You choose to do it, or you choose to not forgive. There is a mindset that says that some pain is too great to let go of, but that's never been what Jesus says."
Well, Foggy can respect Jesus, but he's gonna have to disagree with him on that.
The man continues to talk for a good twenty minutes, and then says, "So, if anyone needs to talk about it, feel free to come to the front."
Karen silently picks up her coat and her bag, slips into her flats, and walks out of the church.
Matt's lips clench into a thin line, and Foggy reaches over and squeezes his arm.
"Please don't tell me it will be okay," he says, softly.
Foggy closes his mouth, and then sighs, before patting his thigh.
"Come here," he orders Matt, yanking him off balance so that his head falls into Foggy's lap, because if there's one thing he remembers from drunken nights in college, it's that Matt Murdock in some ways, bears a resemblance to a cat, and one of those ways is that he enjoys people playing with his hair.
Matt sighs into the touch, and neither of them say anything when Matt's tears soak through Foggy's slacks.
It's just water, with a little bit of salt. It'll come out.
Half an hour later, Matt's phone buzzes. About half the couples have come away from the front by this point, and most of them look as red-eyed as Foggy feels.
Matt reaches for his phone, sets it against his ear, and his intake of breath is quick and startled.
"Karen?" Foggy asks.
"We're getting lunch tomorrow," Matt says.
Foggy nods. "Okay. Want me to call you? Make sure you won't chicken out?"
Matt's jaw clenches. "I won't chicken out. I'm done running."
Foggy smiles. "Attaboy."
Matt snorts. "I'm ten months older than you."
"And never do you ever let me forget it," Foggy says, continuing to card his hand through Matt's hair.
(What? Matt has really nice hair. That's all Foggy's saying.)
Foggy calls Matt anyway, at 11:30.
"Hey."
"Foggy, I told you, I'm not gonna chicken out."
That's probably true. Matt Murdock is many things, but a coward is not one of them.
He lets out a long sigh. "True. But moral support is also one of my duties as your best friend, no?"
"I–" Matt's voice breaks. "Really?" he asks, low and soft, and so frickin' hopeful that Foggy shuts his eyes because yeah. No. Since when has he ever been able to tell Matt no anyway? He can make hopeful-puppy faces over the phone. Boy has superpowers.
"Yeah, buddy," Foggy says into the phone. "I mean, you're still coming home for Christmas and everything."
"Foggy, I–"
"Shut up. You're family, Murdock. Deal with it. And good luck with Karen."
There's a long silence, and then Matt says, very softly, "Thanks, man."
Foggy smiles. "Anytime."
He frets all through the rest of the day at work. Fidgets, and paces, even as he prepares for depositions and makes his computer read the briefs to him. When the clock rolls around to five-thirty, he grabs his coat, the make-up wipes, the tissues, and he stops for a bottle of Scotch at the nearest liquor store. Just in case.
Matt is there, and Karen is there too, when Foggy gets out of his cab. And they're talking. They're standing further apart than Foggy is used to seeing them, but they're smiling.
Foggy doesn't even bother pretending to be subtle.
"So?" he asks them.
Matt arches an eyebrow, and pretends to be confused. "So?"
Karen smacks him in the bicep, and smiles at Foggy. "We're not dating anymore. We just want different things, and it's not really going to work. But it's like he said," she says, her mouth quirked up at the corner. She smiles like Matt now, just like she plays with her hair like Foggy used to, before he started working at HC&B. "We're avocados."
Foggy lets out a long, relieved breath, dumps his bag on the side-walk, and wraps them both in a hug.
"Murdock, I swear to God, you are the worst," he mumbles into Matt's shoulder.
Matt just hums, wrapping his arms around Foggy and Karen both.
"Hey! Assholes! Stop blocking the side-walk!"
"The sweet, sweet sounds of New York City," Karen says, grinning, disentangling herself gently. "Josie's, anyone?"
Matt's smile blooms across his face, bright and warm and delighted, and Foggy feels a matching smile spread across his face.
"That sounds like an excellent idea, Miss Page," he says, offering her his arm. "Shall we?"
So they do.
Matt's still a one-man crusader for justice. Karen Page is still clinically incapable of not pursuing a mystery. And Foggy's still a guy with a little bit too much of corporate shark hedonism in him.
Nelson & Murdock & Page. Avocados.
Foggy breathes in the night air.
Yeah. He can live with that.