On the first night — Matt's night — they went to the symphony. The Berlin Philarmonic was in town performing Bach's oratorio, St. Matthew's Passion. "One of my favorites," Matt said, "and not just because of the name." His mouth twitched into a rueful half smile and Claire knew that no matter how she felt about three hour choral symphonies in German — hint, not great — she was going to have to go with him if only so she could make St. Matthew's Passion jokes forever.

Afterward she wouldn't say she regretted going, though when the intermission arrived and she realized they were only halfway through she almost made a run for it. The music was beautiful, even Claire could tell that. There was even something to look at, since the singers moved around the space almost like they were acting out the story, though without props or scenery or anything else that might help her understand what was going on. (She'd asked Matt about the story before they went and he'd chuckled. "It's the Passion, Claire. I'm sure you heard it in church on Easter." She could never bring herself to tell him what she'd done in church when she was a kid — pretty much everything besides listening — so she let that one go.)

She just couldn't attach to any of it. She tried to follow the melodies, different singer's voices, anything that could pull her through but her mind simply over the notes and away. She thought about church, but most of her memories were of playing tic tac toe with Rosa in the margins of the church Bible, or passing sacrilegious notes with Ryan, the boy who sat in the pew behind her, and the hard pit of guilty laughter that would form in her stomach. Then she would manage to pull her attention back to the present for a moment, and remind herself of the piercing beauty of the music, and believe it, and then she would be off again, wondering if she'd remembered to change the dressing on the bike accident patient in Four.

But it was worth it because every once in a while she would turn her head and look at Matt and that view was mesmerizing. The expression on his face made her wonder for the first time ever if the word rapt was related to rapture. There was something perfectly still and focused in the set of his mouth and the tilt of his head and yet every subtle change in the music seemed to ripple across his face. A rising violin would make his nostrils flare, a baritone would make his lips part or firm, the children's chorus would soften the tension in his jaw. If her attention had not eventually drawn his own, she would have watched him all night. More than once she thought she caught the sheen of tears on his face: when Jesus stood alone in the cavernous space behind the audience and sang to His father; when a woman sat at the feet of a violinist singing an aria so beautiful and sad that it caught even Claire's attention, "a plea for mercy," Matt told her after.

He must have known better than to ask what she thought. As they were going down the steps to the subway he said, "Thank you for going with me," his first words since the music ended.

"Thank you for taking me," she said, which was not a lie. He smiled, knowing but knowing not to push.

When they were sitting on the train she said, "I thought maybe a concert would be overwhelming for you, since your hearing is so good. It isn't too much?"

He shook his head no, and then hesitated. "It is overwhelming, I guess, but in a good way. Most of the time I have to choose what to pay attention to and what to block out. But in a concert, there's only the music. It's so much that everything else just… falls away. It's like I am inside the music, inside each musician as they play, each breath the singers take… I can't describe it. It's incredible, Claire. I never wanted it to end."

He was trying to smile for her, but she could tell it was an effort. He was so beautiful when he was sad; she never could tell if it was the beauty or the sadness that made her heart ache. She lay her head in the crook of his neck and threaded her fingers through his. It was no comfort for a loss like that, but it was all that she had to offer: something to focus on, and let the rest all drift away.

"I feel like that sometimes with when I'm with you," he said softly, turning his mouth into her hair.

"You feel like you're inside me?" she teased. "Because, um, that's not just a feeling."

He laughed but she could tell that the sadness was still there, or maybe they were both just tired. "Like the rest of the world disappears," he said.

Oh Matt, you goddamned romantic. Claire turned her head enough to tuck a kiss underneath his ear. "Luckily for you, that's never going to end," she said, and meant it. That was the trick she'd found to lying to Matt: lying to herself first.

On the second night — Claire's night — they went to a Knicks game. "I can't believe Foggy never dragged you to a basketball game," she said as she guided him into his seat.

"He took me to baseball games," Matt pointed out, "Easier to narrate."

Claire scoffed. "Sure, because nothing ever happens." The arena wasn't full but there was still a palpable buzz in the area as people settled into their seats. They'd come early so Matt wouldn't have to pretend to trip over so many people.

"You're going to tell me everything that happens in this game?" Matt asked skeptically.

"I said I would, and I will. Now stay here, I'm going to get snacks."

"Not going to move a muscle," he promised. He settled back into his seat, at ease, cocking his head to listen to the conversations around him and she took a moment to admire the lines of him and the cockiness of his smile before she departed on her errand.

He wasted no time when she came back in tugging on one of her braids and whispering, "According to our neighbors over there, the Knicks are going to lose tonight."

"You gotta believe, dude," she said, shaking her head, "or no beer for you."

The Knicks did lose but not as badly as they could have. Claire kept up an almost perfect running commentary for the entire first quarter before Matt told her he didn't know who any of the players were and her telling him who had the ball was not particularly helpful.

"Can you just… tell what's going on?" Claire asked quietly, draping his arm around her shoulder.

"Sort of, but there's… a lot happening in here. It's difficult to sort through." Fair enough. That was part of what Claire liked about it: the thousands of people all thinking, doing, saying their own thing, until suddenly Carmelo Anthony made a perfect backhand layup and then everyone was on their feet together.

"You want to go?" she asked.

"No, no. Just enjoy it. You don't have to take care of me all the time." Claire straight-up rolled her eyes at that but took him at his word and stopped playing announcer, settling in to watch the game instead. Occasionally she'd glance over and he would be smiling a little, head cocked, and she wondered what he could hear in the crowd, if he could sort through all the complaints and exhortations and the squeak of shoes on the floor and the vendors yelling and the chants to find something of interest, something real.

"It's a community," she said on their way to the subway.

"I get it," he said. "It was like going to a fight when I was a kid — everyone's in the moment, emotions running so high — but then you get to step back and let it go, because it's not your life. Plus it's kind of a trip to be in a room with 15,000 other people. Fascinating, and a little bit terrifying."

"Does it give you hope for humanity?" Claire asked, not sure what answer she actually wanted.

"I always have hope for humanity," Matt said, which Claire noted privately was an excellent dodge.

The whole thing was a dodge really, or a lie you told yourself until you believed it: this is a normal relationship, this is all going to work out. It had been Claire's idea. "Something I've never done, then something you've never done. It'll be fun. Push us out of our comfort zone."

It wasn't so much a comfort zone as a zone of things neither of them wanted to say. Maybe a pretend-we're-comfortable-here-so-we-don't-have-to-face-the-fact-there-is-no-there-to-go-to zone.

"Sounds great," he said.

On the third day — Matt's again — they went to the boxing gym and Matt taught Claire how to throw a punch. "I know, I know," she said, when he curled her fingers up and tucked her thumb neatly below.

"Okay, then hit me," he said.

He didn't wear his glasses in the gym, just a tank top and gym shorts and his hair growing too long. She aimed for his solar plexus but his hand darted out and caught her wrist before she even got near. "Not like that," he said gently, "you'll hurt your hand."

He showed her how to aim with her knuckles and keep her wrist aligned with her forearm so that it didn't bend. He corrected her stance, leveling her shoulder, showed her how her hips should flow with his hands there, all business but still making her heart beat faster. Then he told her to hit him again. This time he let her connect and she could feel the hardness of him, the force she'd applied, the impact of the two all the way up her arm. She could tell from his face that he felt it, that she'd landed a real one. He smiled when a normal person would have winced, at least.

"Good. Now the bag."

He made her practice a jab-cross until her arms felt like they were going to fall off. "If I can't treat my patients tomorrow because I literally cannot move my hands, I am blaming you," she told him.

"But if someone tries to hurt you, your body will know what to do," he said, trying for levity but hitting grim determination instead. When someone tries to hurt her, she knew he wanted to say.

Thinking about it in the shower later, she couldn't decide if the lesson was a warning that she shouldn't be around him or preparation for his inevitable absence. Probably both.

The fourth night, Claire's, she tossed the coil of rope onto the bed and said, "Take your clothes off."

His head turned sharply in her direction but he didn't say anything. He was already barefoot so he took off his shirt first, pulling it over his head and dropping it to the ground, and then his pants, one leg at a time. He hesitated then but she didn't tell him to stop so he took off his boxers too, stood before her entirely naked. His muscles and his scars both made her mouth dry and her eyes prickle, but for different reasons.

"Lie down on the bed," she said.

She bound him in a spread eagle position, tying his wrists and ankles with knots she'd looked up on the internet. Not a muscle, she thought, but this was different: that had been a bargain in which they'd each sacrificed something. Tonight, Claire wasn't intending to sacrifice anything, or bargain away a single chip.

"Claire." His voice was hoarse, unsure. She leaned down and kissed him, softly, just until he arched up toward her and then she pulled away and climbed off the bed.

"What do you want, Matt?" she asked, pulling out her bag of tricks and beginning to rummage through it. Some of these things she'd had used on her but she'd never used them on another person. A night of new things for both of them.

"You."

She sighed. "That's not a very good answer." Her hand closed around the riding crop and she stood up and walked back toward the bed. She trailed it down his right side, over his perfectly outlined abs, his scar, the jut of his hip and his lightly furred thigh.

"What do you want me to say?"

"I want you to tell me the truth."

"That is the truth."

She slapped him with the crop then, lightly across his chest. It still left a red mark and for a second she thought, I can't do this, but then she saw the look on his face and she thought, I have to.

"What do you want, Matt?" she asked again.

"To know why you're doing this."

She hit him again. His back arched up as if to meet her blow. His breathing was a little faster now. "You know why."

"To try something new?"

She laughed and hit him again. "Don't be a smartass."

He was hugely erect now, his cock straining upward even if the rest of him seemed to be quiescent.

"What do you want, Matt?"

"To fuck you until you can't walk." Claire nearly creamed at the dark promise in his voice but she kept her own steady and hit him again, across the pelvis this time. The crop made an audible smack against his skin.

"It's not your turn," she said. "What do you want, Matt?"

To hurt you. Smack. To hurt other people. Smack. To protect people. Smack. To rest. To be good. To be bad. To come. To die. To protect you. To destroy you. To be alone.

"To be absolved," he said and Claire cried then, with relief, and took him inside of her, fingers digging into his scars and the red lines she'd left on his skin and, "Mercy," he said, "mercy, mercy, mercy," as she moved above him, seeking her own oblivion, her own absolution.

"What are we doing, Claire?" he asked much later in the dark, after she untied him and they made love again and she wept on the marks she'd left on his skin until they both were utterly wrung out.

"Trying to believe," she said into the warm dark mass of him, glad that for this moment they were equally blind.

"In what?"

"In anything." Another half-truth. She forced the words past the hardness in her throat. "In a future for us."

"It might not be this way forever," he said. "I could — I could stop. Someday."

She breathed in the scent of him: sweat and the faintest remnant of aftershave and sex and tortured hero. "You can't. You won't. And I don't want you to. That's the point. I don't want you to stop."

"What do you want, Claire?"

She thought of all the things she didn't want: to go home alone; to have a house in the suburbs with a lawn; to sit through any more three hour German symphonies; to be like her father, always running away from the good things in his life; to be selfish; to be a martyr; to stop feeling so many things. "You," she said finally.

"Not a very good answer," he chided her gently.

"I know." She smiled then, in the dark, and knew he could see her. "Absolute shit on so many levels, really."

"Maybe instead of trying new things we just need to keep… trying."

Claire groaned. "You are such a cheeseball. Damn. What does that even mean?"

"I am not, and it means I think you have a tendency — and maybe I do too, with some things — to see all the problems and decide they're insurmountable and then never try. We almost didn't try this at all because we were too scared of how it would end. But even if it does end someday I'd never give this last year back, not a single second."

"Maybe a second here or there," Claire said, remembering several choice bloody evenings.

"No, not even one."

"That's just because you're unconscious for all the really bad parts."

"I know," he said smugly, and she punched him in the arm, a mini version of her newly perfected technique.

"So you're saying, keep trying," she summarized, "even if it sometimes feels like a dead end."

"Keep trying," he repeated. "I am pretty good at escaping from dead ends."

"Except when you get shot."

"Except for that. But then you save me, so I think it comes out okay."

In the utter black, she didn't even know where her own nose ended, though she thought she could feel tears dripping off of it. "It does come out okay," she said, and this time to her surprise she really seemed to mean it.

He gathered her closer, tucking her head fully beneath his chin and hooking his leg around her thigh. She closed her eyes and murmured sleepily, "But the only kind of St. Matthew's Passion I want in this relationship is the kind that's not in German, okay?"

"Ja mein leibling," Matt whispered and hummed melodic lines from the oratorio until she fell asleep.