Matt’s stacks of books somehow always managed to look more impressive than Foggy’s and he was trying not to be mad about it.
The number of books in your stack does not make for a better argument, he told himself at 2am, 6 hours before his submission was due.
Matt had nodded off sometime around 1:30 and was drooling attractively all over his desk. One hand edging dangerously close to his energy drink, itself hovering halfway off the edge of the desk. It was hard to tell if he was going to startle himself awake as he usually did, or if Foggy was going to have to break out the big guns and give him a tap.
He was a great friend. A great, benevolent friend. So he was going to let Matt sleep for five more minutes before he executed The Tap.
He extricated himself from the fake wood paneling of his own desk and managed to complete two more citations before he heard a soft mechanical chirp on the floor below them. Matt snorted a little in his unconscious state. Foggy wasn’t even going to pretend it wasn’t just a tiny bit endearing.
He got through the title of the third citation before a godawful shrieking slammed through the room.
Matt jerked so hard he cracked his head against the desk while simultaneously slapping the energy drink off the edge of it. Foggy slammed his hands over his ears and swore.
“WHAT THE FUCK?” Matt screamed at him over the din, following suit and slapping his hands over his ears.
“FIRE ALARM,” Foggy shouted back. He saw Matt groan more than heard it. He grabbed his phone and keys and ID and shoved his feet into some slippers. Matt groped around for his shit too, and then they shuffled out the door irately. Matt didn’t bother with his stick, one the way out the door, he tucked a hand into Foggy’s elbow.
They were hot. As in, a hot fucking mess. Foggy with his giant red Mets hoodie and baby blue Columbia sweats, topped off with teddy bear slippers from Marci. Matt with the black Columbia sweats, one ear-bud, no glasses, and incredible bed-head. Matt hadn’t even fucked with finding matching shoes, Foggy realized once they’d gotten to the evacuation zone. It was wet and cold and lit by street lights.
It rapidly became clear that the entire building was not, in fact, in danger of imminent explosion or collapse, which, frankly, made everything even more irritating. Foggy instinctively jutted a hip out and crossed his arms. Matt vibrated irritably next to him as the alarm carried on blaring, he’d let go of Foggy’s elbow and had covered his ears again. Foggy figured they were probably ringing, Matt was sensitive to stuff like that.
“What the fuck,” Marci greeted them as she made her way over in a pink and white fleece bathrobe and flip-flops, “What the fuck.”
Matt bobbed his head sagely in agreement.
“Who the fuck is lighting up in the fucking stairwells,” she spat, wrapping fluffy arms tight around her ribs.
“Undergrads,” Foggy told her flatly. He was too old for this shit. He’d already done the whole smoking pot out the window, burning ramen at 3am thing at his old university; he hadn’t come here to be woken up by eighteen-year-olds reliving his bad decisions for him.
“I was almost done; five minutes—just five more minutes,” Marci grumbled, glaring up at the fourth floor where someone who had decided the alarm wasn’t worth their time was being harangued by RAs in front of their window.
“Like, 10 more citations,” Foggy told her. He looked at Matt, “Were you even close to done, buddy?”
Matt tipped his head way over as if he couldn’t even remember himself.
“The one for Zhang?” He asked, as if there was some other paper everyone in their cohort was losing sleep over. Oh god, was there another paper he needed to be losing sleep over?
“No the other one—of course for Zhang, asshole,” Marci answered for him.
“Nah, I just finished that one,” Matt said, and Foggy realized that the distressed noise Matt had made at 1:30 had been a triumphant one. He must have legitimately just passed out on the desk.
Marci side-eyed him.
“I hate you,” she declared, before turning her attention back to the building. RAs in stupid neon yellow vests stood at the entrance, muttering into walkie-talkies. The alarms finally stopped. Matt cautiously pulled his hands away from his ears. Someone shouted “all clear!” several times and students started huffing and shuffling their way over to the stairs.
Marci grumbled a good bye and abandoned them for the crowd. Matt tucked his hand back where it lived in Foggy’s elbow and they hiked back up to their sixth-floor dorm behind a puffing mass of fellow grad students and three suspiciously sheepish undergrads.
Once inside, Foggy dropped into his chair and groaned while Matt threw himself face-first onto his bed, legs hanging off the side.
“The end is near,” Foggy announced to the room, “This is it, buddy, this is how I die. Ten citations and—”
“Just do ‘em fast. Get ‘em over with,” Matt told him, muffled by bedclothes.
Foggy groaned louder in response, then, receiving no answer, resigned himself to work. It only took twenty minutes in the end. Matt hadn’t moved and Foggy groggily decided that A Tap was in order; the guy was only half-on the bed and maybe a third under the covers. That was like a 2/10 in bed skills, a crime against humanity.
Matt nearly busted his chin from the tap. Foggy’s brain could supply little more than vague shooing, encouraging sounds and waving gestures to convey Matt’s poor bed usage, but surprisingly he seemed to get it and squirmed until he was entirely on the bed and maybe half way under the covers. Foggy tugged off his sweater and finally, blessedly crawled into bed, only to realize he forgot to turn off the light.
Matt laughed at his moan from his pillow and levered himself up, he felt his way over to the light and clicked it off. What new bliss. He stumbled back to bed and dropped down heavily enough to make the springs squeak.
The quiet was so fucking nice. Foggy could still hear white noise in the back of his head.
Matt shuffled around a bit getting comfortable. Foggy sighed.
Matt shuffled some more.
And then some more.
“Matthew,” Foggy snapped.
“Sorry,” he answered. But that didn’t stop him from his shuffling or his fucking expedition to China, Jesus Christ, he could not possibly burrow any deeper into the mattress.
Then once again, blissful quiet.
Interrupted by more fucking rustling.
“Matthew,” he drawled in warning.
“Sorry, just can’t get comfortable,” Matt pouted.
“This from a guy who literally fell asleep on his desk.”
Matt was unsubtle about his huff; he rustled over, presumably onto his other side.
“Ugh, fine,” Foggy sighed, “Get over here.”
Matt scrambled out of his bed in record time, taking his enormous covers with him of course, and crawling gracefully (not) over Foggy to cuddle up against his back. He sighed happily.
“Dude, you are a-fucking-lot, you know that?” Foggy told him over his shoulder.
“Yes. You’re comfy.”
“You’re clingy.”
“Foggyyyyyy—”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, whatever, just go to sleep.”
Matt tucked his face into Foggy’s spine through his duvet. He was warm and Foggy knew that he’d be dying from their combined heat in a few hours. He just had to pretend that Matt cuddled up behind him wasn’t in his top ten most amazing things ever for long enough for Matt to fall asleep. No biggie. They did this all the time. (They did not do this all the time, they did this only when they were drunk off their faces.)
“Hey, did you do the online submission?” Matt asked the nape of his neck.
“GODDAMNIT.”