1
“The left side is loose.”
“I thought you said the right side was loose.”
“It was. You fixed it. Then the left side came loose.”
Matt felt around for the offending piece of fabric and gently tucked it beneath Peter’s back. “Like that?”
“Yeah, that’s...Nevermind. He kicked it out of place again.”
Matt sighed and started over, gently pulling the edges of the blanket apart and laying them out to the side. He started on the right, pulling it across and over before ever so carefully tilting Peter to secure it behind him. “You, sir,” he said softly, more to himself than Jessica or the child in front of him, “are the wiggliest little baby I have ever met.”
The feeling that drizzled through Jessica’s chest, then, the warmth in her veins; it was new, but becoming increasingly familiar as she watched Matt spend more and more time with Peter.
It had been exactly two weeks since he showed up on her doorstep, freshly not-dead and apologizing for his absence. Two weeks since Jessica told him that during said absence, she’d carried and delivered his child. Jessica wasn’t sure how people were supposed to react when they found out they had a secret kid, but all things considered, Matt appeared to be taking it surprisingly well.
Peter squirmed in his swaddle for a moment and then, apparently deciding it wasn’t worth the effort, finally settled. It was well past his bedtime and Jessica and Matt had been trying to get him down for over an hour, but it was apparently one of those days in which Peter was going to make Jessica’s life as difficult as possible.
Matt’s too, now.
“Okay, there,” Matt said, sliding his hands beneath Peter where they had him lying on Jessica’s couch as a makeshift changing table. He got up from his knees with a grace Jessica still didn’t quite understand and inched his way toward the bedroom.
Matt motioned to the open doorway with a nudge of his chin, hands otherwise occupied bouncing Peter in his arms. “May I?”
“You don’t need my permission to put the baby in his crib, Matt.”
“The crib is in your bedroom.”
“You act like you’ve never been in there.”
“I haven’t.”
Jessica thought it over. Matt had been over several days in the past few weeks and never left the office or the kitchen. “Well holy shit. You haven’t, have you?”
Matt chuckled. “Our original meetup wasn’t exactly traditional.”
“You mean we had sex on my couch.”
It may have been the low lighting, but Jessica could have sworn Matt’s cheeks went pink. “Everything you say has to have shock value. Why is that?”
“Keeps life interesting.”
“If you say so.”
“And yes, Matt, you can go in my room.”
He nodded in thanks and slipped into the bedroom. Sometimes Jessica was still surprised by how silently he moved. No sight, and he could still navigate any space well enough to not make a sound. It paid off on nights like tonight when putting Peter down was exceptionally harder than usual.
That first day Matt came to the apartment, Jessica could tell the idea of going home was killing him. He just found out he had a son. Had a son with a woman he wasn’t in a relationship with, who didn’t live with him. A son he’d only be able to spend time with if he put himself in Jessica’s personal space. His deeply ingrained manners were at war with his paternal instincts and it was driving him crazy.
So Jessica tried to be lenient, to allow him time with Peter (and in turn, her), whenever it seemed appropriate. He hadn’t been too pushy, only coming for a few hours here and there and never overstaying his welcome.
Until tonight he hadn’t asked to stay until Peter’s bedtime and Jessica hadn’t suggested it. It felt too...personal. Too domestic for Peter’s father to put him to bed in Jessica’s apartment, especially when it had been Jessica doing it for the entire first month of Peter’s life. The sheer idea of someone else sharing the workload overwhelmed her sometimes.
But then there were moments like these when Jessica could just barely hear Matt whispering to Peter over the sound of her rickety heater, maybe even humming an unfamiliar tune as Matt set him in the crib. In those moments, she reminded herself that straying from her hyper independence a bit could do her and Peter a lot of favors in the future.
Matt came out a few minutes later and tiptoed back to the couch. “He’s out,” Matt whispered, leaning back and settling into the time-flattened cushions.
“You sure? Sometimes he just closes his eyes for a minute and lets you get comfortable before he starts screaming again.”
Matt’s head twitched and tilted in that way it does when he’s listening to something. “Heartbeat’s steady. Should be asleep for a little while.”
Jessica scoffed. “Until he’s hungry again in a few hours. He’s a monster, your kid. Always wanting something.”
“Oh, is that right?” Matt asked, words laced with a laugh. He crossed his arms and aimed himself in Jessica’s direction, eyebrows raised.
Jessica went about starting her own nightly routine, just generally tidying things up for the coming day. Cleanliness hadn’t been much of a priority for her in the past, but after tripping over dirty shirts and loose burp rags a few too many times she decided she should try getting her shit together. “For sure. Demanding, just like his father. I’m hungry, mom. I’m tired, mom. I wanna come over to see my son again, mom, I know I was just there yesterday but would you mind if I showed up one more time? Just for a little bit.”
Jessica didn’t feel the tone shift in the room until she looked up from her desk, three empty styrofoam unsweet tea cups in her hands, and saw the sour look on Matt’s face. The worst part was that she could tell it wasn’t aimed at her. Whatever Matt was feeling, it was all turmoil directed inward.
“Jessica, if you feel like I’ve been intruding—“
“Shit, I didn’t mean that. I just wanted to give you a hard time, I don’t—“
“—I can stop asking to...to be with Peter so much.” It was almost pathetic, how quick he was to assume he’d done something wrong. To drive Jessica away. Especially when she knew how much not seeing Peter would affect him.
“No, Matt. I don’t want you to stop seeing Peter.”
Both of them paused. Matt cleared his throat. “Well, technically, I’ve never actually seen Peter.”
She was relieved to see that Matt wasn’t mad; his lips were pulled into a shy smile. “Oh my god, Matthew Murdock, did you just make a blind joke? You’re basically the patron saint of avoiding jokes of any kind.”
Matt feigned offense. “It’s like you said, Jessica. Gotta keep life interesting.”
The conversation ceased when a sharp cry sounded from the other room. Jessica groaned. “Seriously? Already? What was that, twenty minutes?”
“Tops,” Matt agreed.
Jessica made to toss her tea cups in the trash and head to the bedroom. She was surprised to see Matt standing when she came back from the kitchen. “I can go in there,” Matt offered, “If you wanted to keep cleaning.”
“Sadly I think this one’s on me. But if you’ve got another way to feed him I’m all ears.”
“Right, right. I, uh, I think I’ll be going, then, if that’s alright with you.”
“Yeah, okay. It’s whatever.”
“I don’t want to be a bother.”
“It’s fine, Matt. Seriously. Go.” She waved him toward the door, attitude rolling off her tongue before she could really consider what she was about to say. “We’ve survived this long without you. We can do it another night.”
The apartment was anything but quiet with Peter wailing like a banshee in the other room. Despite that, Jessica’s ears were ringing with the force of her own dismissal. She hadn’t meant to be so harsh. She rarely meant to be as harsh as she came off. That layer of mental armour had been nailed into place years ago, a result of her own grief and longing solidified into something she could use to block out even more heartache.
The thing about armor is that even though it protects you, it’s cumbersome. Heavy. Hard to take off.
Jessica was still learning to disarm herself, one piece at a time. Maybe she’d get there one day, to a point where she didn’t feel like pushing against vulnerability was her only option.
That day wasn’t today. Today, she chose the coward’s way out. She pushed Matt away before he could disarm her himself. Because every time Matt asked how Peter liked to be held, or traced the bridge of his tiny nose with the tip of a finger, or aimed his unseeing eyes toward where Peter was laying against his chest like if he just tried hard enough he’d get to properly look at his son, Jessica felt her resolve crumbling. The resolve was a dam holding back every insecurity and fear and bit of uncertainty she’d collected since finding out she was pregnant almost eleven months ago, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to give up on it now.
She was never sure she’d be able to raise Peter alone. Not properly, at least. Not in a way he deserved. But she’d had enough common sense from the start to realize it was her only choice and perseverance was no longer a goal, but a necessity.
Now Matt was here. And he wanted to help. And if she wanted to prevent the dam from breaking, he couldn’t get too close.
Matt leaned toward the bedroom once more to listen to Peter’s sobs, looking defeated. He waited for a moment, maybe waiting for a placation from Jessica that would never come, then gave up and went to grab his cane from where it was tucked into the corner by the front door. “Lock the door behind me?”
“Obviously.”
“Yeah. Obviously.” His knuckles were white around the knob as he undid the deadbolt and swung the door open, exposing the darkened hallway beyond. It was so at odds with the warm glow Jessica had felt in her own apartment only minutes before. That is, until she extinguished the glow with whatever oily, writhing thing inside her liked to ruin her personal relationships.
“Goodnight, Jessica.” He turned away, pausing at the threshold, and Jessica could have sworn something that sounded like “Goodnight, Peter,” slipped out before he kicked himself into gear and shut the door behind him.
It may have been a fluke, her imagination playing tricks on her. But for a moment, Jessica could have sworn Peter’s cries tapered off before starting anew. Just long enough for him to hear his father’s voice.