First Born

Midterms.

Midterms were the bane of Foggy’s existence.

Sure, they weren’t finals…Most definitely not as hard, but just as important. Not only that, but this was the last semester of second year. All of his prerequisites had been finished, all of the easy classes were gone- it was straight up hard work at this point. Not only was there a shit ton of memorization involved in law, but a lot of improvisation practice. Foggy was wonderful at improvisation, but the memorization part was the thing he just hadn’t got down yet. Which was a shame.

And thus, he researched. Researched the hell out of everything, studied his ass off and hoped to God he would have the self-confidence to not freak out during testing. He had three written exams, one presentation, and four oral arguments. He wasn’t entirely worried about the oral arguments, those were his strong-suits. But written exams. Written exams. He hated them.

He took a deep breath and buried his head in his hefty law book. If he had to read one more paragraph about Goddamned evidence law he was going to chew his arm off. Hearsay, authentication, relevance, privilege, opinions, expert testimony, blah blah blah. Why did he want to be a lawyer again?

Oh yeah, money. He thought to himself, his stomach growled. Money to buy food. He frowned, he couldn’t afford to buy himself a bottle of water, much less a full meal at this point. He had a review session in an hour, he should probable eat.

And then, as if sent from God, Marci sat down next to him and handed him a sandwich. It was wrapped in brown paper, and tied with a twine bow. Which meant it came from Cafe Amrita, which meant that it was delicious.

“I doubt you’ve eaten today,” Marci said as he took it in his hands. “It’s Italian meat deluxe with extra pickles.”

“Marci, love of my life, thank you,” he carefully unwrapped the paper and smiled at the sight before him. “I’m starving,” he said as he pushed aside the book in front of him and took a bite of the sandwich.

“As you know, Foggy. I’m not one to skirt around things,” she said as he ate. “Consider the sandwich a peace offering. I’m breaking up with you.”

He was halfway through a bite. A pickle hanged from his mouth and he swallowed, before frowning. The sandwich suddenly didn’t taste so good. In fact, he felt like he was going to be sick.

“What?” He saw this coming. Of course, he saw this coming from a mile away. He knew it was going to happen- he was considering breaking up with Marci. He had even practiced it in the mirror before he decided to wait. He saw this coming. So why did it feel like his heart had suddenly dropped out of his chest? Why was it so tight, and painful?

“Foggy, I want this to be on good terms. I don’t want to be one of those people who break up, and then never talk to each other again. I can’t talk to you for a while- I need some time to rest…but romantically? We’re over.” Marci gripped her bracelet with her hand, it was a nervous fidget he had noticed she did when she was anxious.

“Oh,” he set down his sandwich and shook his head. “Yeah, yeah. I mean, we’re obviously not working out…We haven’t been for a while, I understand. It’s,” he took a deep breath. He wasn’t going to cry, for God’s sake. He wasn’t going to cry. He was an adult. He couldn’t cry like a child whenever things went wrong. “It’s fine, Marci.”

“Good, Foggy. Enjoy the sandwich,” she stood up. “Good luck on your midterms.”

“You too,” he said as she walked away. He picked up his sandwich again and frowned at it. He wasn’t going to enjoy this kind of sandwich for a while. Which was a shame, because he loved it.

He got up, walked to the nearest trashcan, and threw the sandwich away. When he made it back to the library table he closed his book, gathered his things, and began to head back to his dorm.

He wasn’t going to go to his review session. He just wanted to take a nap, maybe have a few drinks. Maybe he could invite Matt- No. No, Matt was probably out with Elektra today. He shouldn’t bother him just because Marci broke up with him. Then again, Elektra wasn’t a good influence on Matt, maybe he should pull him away from her-

No. No, no, no, no. Just because he felt horrible, doesn’t mean he should ruin Matt’s relationship. That’s a shitty thing to do- and Matt is a million times more emotional than him. Imagine when Matt and Elektra break up? Not pretty. He doesn’t want to be the one who causes that.

Wait, since when did he start thinking of Matt and Elektra’s relationship in terms of ‘when they break up’ not ‘if they break up.’ He frowned to himself, and shook his head- the emotions from what just happened over the last few minutes catching up to him.

He’ll be fine. He’ll deal. He’ll be fine.

He continued repeating the mantra in his head over and over again- his satchel cradled against his chest as he made his way back to his student housing. He opened the door and threw his bag against the wall before walking over to his bed and collapsing. He buried his head into his silky sheets and sprawled.

He’ll be fine. He’ll deal. He’ll be fine.

“Foggy?”

“Oh hey, Matt,” he said into the sheets. “I didn’t even notice you were there.”

Foggy didn’t bother to turn his face toward Matt. He could already feel tears staining his cheeks…even though he knew Matt couldn’t see it- it still felt odd to reveal his face. He felt like a teenager again, crying over some girl…Like when Debbie Harris broke up with him in High School.

Matt walked up to his bed and sat by Foggy, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Talk about what?”

“You know what.”

Foggy sighed, “No, I don’t want to talk about it.” He grabbed his pillow and tightly held it to his chest. “How do you even know, anyway.”

“I just do,” Matt said in what Foggy knew was an obvious lie. Marci probably warned him beforehand, she was just the kind of person to do that.

“Did Marci ambush you.”

“Sort of.”

“Hm,” Foggy gripped his pillow tighter. “Do you want to go out for drinks? It’s a Saturday. I know you can.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Matt asked softly. “You know that you can drink too much when you’re upset.”

“Then you can be the half-way sober friend, Matt. Watch me. Make sure I don’t get alcohol poisoning,” Foggy turned over and sat up next to Matt. “We’ll have fun, maybe I can even convince you to dance. How about that? We can go clubbing, Matt.”

Matt laughed, “Foggy what did I say about dancing? Two left feet, Fogs. Two left feet.”

“Come on!” Foggy whined, not smiling yet, but feeling a bit better. He hadn’t had a genuine conversation with Matt in forever. It was always about classes, or something stupid like the weather. “It’ll cheer me up, Matt. Seeing you dance! I’ve never seen you dance before.”

“Foggy, I’m not sure how well things will go over if we go to a club.”

“It’ll be fun, Matt. Come on.”

“No.”

“Matt.”

“No.”

“Matt.”

Long story short, this club was fucking insane.

Foggy was on his, fourth? No, fifth drink. He was grinning like a mad man and staring directly into Matt’s eyes. Lights were flashing all around them and there was booming music in the background. Several hoards of people were on the dance floor, dancing to whatever the hell kind of music that was. It just started, and some girl was talking over dance music, wait no, she was a part of the song. Techno? Pop? It sounded super familiar. Fuck. He didn’t care.

Matt’s eyes were beautiful. Like fucking, like, like um-

“Like marshy pools, dude. Just…gor- gorshu- gorgeous,” Foggy hiccuped and giggled. “Buddy… Why do you cover those bad boys up with glasses all the time? You should always keep them off. Keep ‘em off, Matt.” Matt’s eyes were hazel, with specks of green and in this lighting looked fairly dark- brown at first glance. “P-People might just be like, hey, they might just say your eyes are brown right? But they’re not just brown man! They’re this…really pretty hazel.”

Matt seemed slightly tipsy, judging by the tinge of red in his cheeks- but he was only on his second drink. He was nursing his whiskey and shook his head. “You’re really drunk, Foggy. Give me back my glasses.” He held out his hand and then Foggy frowned at Matt’s palm.

Foggy gripped the glasses in his hand. Oh yeah, he just took them off without permission. That was probably a shitty thing to do. “Sorry, buddy,” he said as he handed back the glasses. Then a thought hit him, “Hey Matt! Do you know what color eyes I have?”

Matt quickly put his glasses back and sighed, “No.”

“Well, first of all, I’m Latino.” Foggy pointed at Matt’s face.

Matt frowned for the briefest of moments before he let out a startled laugh. “No, no you’re not, Foggy. Don’t say that to a blind man. You’re very white.”

“How would you know, Matt?” Foggy persisted, “I c-could have brightly colored purple hair and green skin. There’s…there’s not a limit to what you may not know about me.”

“You’re white, Foggy. You watch reruns of Full House and complicate Starbucks orders,” Matt rubbed at his temples while smiling.

Foggy put up his hands in defeat. “Fine, Mister-Detective-Murdock-Future-Esquire. At least I don’t have a hissy fit every time my food isn’t organic.”

In Foggy’s mind that came out very smooth, in real life however, it came out more like: ‘Misser-Deteckiv-Murock-Footer-Eskire’, and then a series of mumbles.

“I’m white, I have blue eyes, kinda green, but mostly blue…Like a teal. I have blonde hair- but that dull blonde. A dirty blonde. It’s…sandy?”

Matt shook his head. “Foggy you can describe yourself later, when you’re not drunk.” Matt stood up, “Can we go now?”

“We’ve only been here for like an hour!! I haven’t even danced yet. Dance with me, Matt.” Foggy stood up quickly from the bar stool and then nearly tripped over himself. Matt held out his arm to catch him and Foggy would probably be suspicious of the action if he weren’t drunk off his ass. “Woah, good catch.”

Matt sighed again, “I don’t even know if you’ll remember this the next morning, Foggy. What’s the point of me dancing if you can’t even remember the next day?”

“Fuck your lawyer logic, Matt.” Foggy walked slowly out onto the dance floor and Matt gripped his arm and followed him out. “What kind of music is this?”

“EDM.” Matt said, letting Foggy lead him into the middle of the hoard. If Foggy weren’t so drunk, he might notice that Matt’s face looked uncomfortable and he was flinching at the music.

“Eedeeyim? Is it foreign or something?” Foggy turned toward Matt and gripped both his shoulders and began swaying him in odd directions in the hoard of people, horribly out of tune with the music. “Sounds weird.”

“EDM, Foggy,” Matt broke a smile and chuckled. “Electronic dance music. I don’t know what the song is called though.” Matt just let Foggy sway him in whatever directions.

“It’s a really weird song…You see, you’re a good dancer Matt.” Foggy said admiring his work at leading Matt. “Look at that. We’re so in sync with the music!” Foggy raised his voice louder over the sound, which had just reached some sort of climax as everyone began bouncing around them and cheered. Matt laughed and Foggy could feel him loosen in his arms.

Things seemed good for half a moment before a piercing sound erupted over the music and everyone started scrambling around them. The fire alarm had went off, Foggy brought his hand to his ear over the loud noise and frowned. Somebody must have set it off with a cigarette, or some equally stupid reason.

Then he looked back up at Matt who had taken both hands and was covering his ears like his life depended on it. Foggy could see Matt’s eyes darting around behind his glasses and he was crouched over with pain. He immediately took Matt’s arm and held him close.

“We need to get out of here, man. Are you okay?” Foggy wasn’t slurring anymore, but he did find himself struggling to understand himself over the music and the loud ringing. “Matt? Can you hear me?”

Matt was frowning and his face was scrunched up. Foggy only gripped him tighter and they made their way slowly out of the club. The mass of people were at the door, covering the entrance. Foggy only pushed his way out and finally they were out of the club.

The ringing was still loud, but not nearly as piercing. Matt had attached to Foggy like a suction cup, his left arm was firmly gripped around Foggy’s midsection and his right hand had come up to squeeze Foggy’s left shoulder. Foggy made his way further away from the club and tried talking to Matt again.

“Hey, Matt. You hear me? You okay?” Matt flinched, turned his head toward Foggy and nodded.

“Y-yeah,” he said in barely a whisper. “Can you just speak… quietly?”

Foggy nodded and spoke very softly. “You’re really that sensitive?” Matt still flinched which made Foggy speak even quieter, “Do you want to make our way back home?”

“Yes.”

Foggy acknowledged with barely a hum and Matt closed his eyes in quick successions. Foggy’s buzz had all but fizzed away, and left him with a headache and nausea. The journey to their apartment wasn’t all that long, but felt like it was forever away.

Just as Foggy went to open the door with his key he frowned and looked at Matt. “Hey Matt, where’s your cane?”

Matt tilted his head, in his classic Matt way, and spoke. “I left it at the bar before we went out to dance…You don't have to worry, I have a few spares in a box under my bed.”

Foggy smiled, of course Matt was prepared for anything. He continued to open the door and they both walked inside. Foggy lightly placed Matt on his bed, and sat next to him, “You sure you’ll be fine?”

Matt nodded, seemingly less sensitive to the noise, but still obviously in some sort of pain. “I’ll be good, Fog. I’ll take some aspirin, drink water… and get some well-deserved slee-” Matt very abruptly stopped, stood up and clenched his hands. “For fuck’ssake!”

Foggy gaped and stood in front of Matt. “What’s wrong?!”

Matt sighed, took a deep breath and shook his head. “Somebody just summoned me, back in Hell’s Kitchen. I have to go.” He pressed his hands together, “Accipio.”

Just like that, Matt had disappeared from the spot he was before and Foggy jumped back. He would never get used to that. A sudden wave of concern overtook him and Foggy walked back to his own bed and sat down.

The entire Witching system was completely, and utterly fucked. It was ridiculous, Matt was practically a slave to whoever had summoned him. Foggy cringed to think how it would be if more people summoned Witches. If more people didn’t care about the consequences? That would overwhelm Matt.

Foggy had plenty of good arguments, based upon the constitution, why it would be extremely illegal for Regulars to summon Witches. Why the entire community was constantly breaking people’s rights- but because of some stupid treaty a group of terrified Regulars signed over 200 years ago…The coven had free reign to determine the laws of their community completely as they deem fit. Even though their community was intricately woven within other countries. It wasn’t like they were a sovereign nation!

Though Foggy admitted it wasn’t entirely the coven’s fault, maybe not even mostly. It was also the kind of benefits Regulars got from the Witching community- without summonings, so many things couldn’t happen…And Foggy’s chest tightened to know that without a summoning, his mother would be dead.

His moment of clarity was then interrupted with his own headache- so he went to sleep and had dreams about Matt

Several months later, past the summer, and Foggy was fully over Marci. In fact, they’d been hanging out and doing well, sure they didn’t talk to each other nearly as often as they had before…And Marci was off climbing the social ladder, but they didn’t dislike each other and that was a start. It was the first semester of their last year, people were scrambling to find internships and jobs. Both Matt and Foggy had applied to an internship at Landman and Zack - and were hoping to get their confirmations by the time they graduated.

It was already dark, Foggy was editing his resumé on his laptop and finishing a term paper. He was settled on the bed with his laptop in his lap, the screen illuminating his face. He was halfway through another paragraph when Matt showed up in their dorm, as in, just suddenly showed up out of nowhere- didn’t even walk through the door. Foggy startled and jumped up from his bed, his laptop bounced up and flopped on the floor.

“Shit!” He looked at his laptop and quickly picked up, then set it down on his bedside table. “Shit, don’t scare me like that.” He looked at Matt who was now just standing silently in the darkness, his shoulders were slumped and he was clenching and unclenching his fists in steady movements.

Foggy blinked once or twice before walking over to the light and flicking it on. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust before he could fully take in the sight before him. Matt’s knuckles were heavily bruised, his glasses were on but Foggy could tell he’d been crying from the puffiness of his cheeks.

“Buddy…” Foggy slowly walked toward Matt and took his hands. “What happened?”

“Me and Elektra are over,” Matt said quietly.

Foggy could feel his heart suddenly race. He took a glance at Matt’s knuckles again, he was in a fight- not even a fight, he beat someone. Did Matt beat Elektra? What the hell? They’re ‘over’? What did that mean? What was going on? Foggy quickly let go of Matt’s hands and stepped back, about to speak before Matt interrupted him.

“No- that’s not- we broke up. My hands are messed up because I went to the gym. I didn’t put on gloves, it was…” Matt turned away from Foggy and walked to his side of the room. “I just worked too hard on the bag after what happened. I wanted to get out some frustration.”

Foggy slowly calmed down. How could he ever think Matt would hurt someone like that? Matt couldn’t hurt a fly. “Oh, well buddy, I’m here for you. Do you want to talk about it?”

“I actually don’t,” Matt said, backed up, and then fell on his bed with way to much precision then Foggy would usually give him credit for. “I’m gonna take a break for a while.”

“What?” Foggy furrowed his brow. “What kind of break?”

“From everything.”

Foggy shook his head, “Matt you can’t just take a break ‘from everything’. It’s our last, and most important year of law school. You’re going to be graduating Summa Cum Laude…if you take a break now, well your grades will fall for one. For second, you'll hate yourself.”

Matt took of his glasses while he still laid on the bed an rubbed his eyes, “Why does that matter?”

“Why doe-” Foggy took a steadying breath. “Says the man who studies his ass off and refuses to go out with me because he’s in the library. Why does it matter? It matters because it matters to you. You’ll move past this, Matt.”

“Fuck the grades, Foggy,” Matt let out a resigned groan and carefully clenched and unclenched his fists in steady movements. “And hating myself? Well, I've hated myself for most my life. That's not going to change.”

Foggy knew Matt didn't exactly like himself, but hate? He decided not to comment on it, instead he sat down next to Matt on the bed and observed at the tension painted in his friend's shoulders.

He knew this would happen sometime, Matt becoming depressed over a breakup with Elektra. As much as Matt tried to act like he was the more stable of the two, his entire persona was emotionally compromised. It didn’t help that Matt was quite simply alone. Yes, he had Foggy for a friend- but now that Elektra was gone? That’s all he has.

Foggy carefully put out his hand and brought it up to Matt’s hair, Matt tensed for a moment, and Foggy froze. When Matt relaxed, and there was no sign of protest, Foggy ran his fingers through Matt’s hair slowly. His hands were steady and with every touch Matt’s muscles unknotted.

“Go ahead and sleep Matt, get some rest and we'll talk more in the morning," the when you're more like yourself went unspoken.