Hesitate (I See Said the Blind Man – Part 3)

A/N: Portions of dialogue are lifted from the episode.

"Are you okay?" Matt asked again as Foggy fished in his pocket for the key to their room. He'd been asking, with increasing frequency, all day, and Foggy was entirely too exhausted and achy to keep lying about it. But he was not getting sick. Not when they had so much to celebrate.

"I'm already regretting letting you talk me into this haircut," he replied. "And I just spent more money in a single day than I ever have before. In my life. Combined," Foggy continued. "Other than that?" He pushed open their door and dropped his heavy load of packages and sacks onto his bed and tried not to gasp for air while the pain in his head made the room spin. "Dude, I'm walking on sunshine."

Matt set down his purchases, pocketed his dark glasses, and walked over to Foggy.

"What the..." Foggy began when Matt reached up and pressed the back of his hand to Foggy's freshly shaved neck, just below his ear, concern written all over his face. "Don't give me the kicked puppy look, man. You know I can't take it."

"You're burning up," he said.

"You're just feeling the residual hotness from my new suits," Foggy insisted. "All five of them. Damn you and your expensive insistence on propriety and professionalism."

"You bought four new suits," Matt corrected as he handed Foggy two Advils and a bottle of water. "I keep telling you, a blazer is not a suit."

"Details. Besides, it's better. Two pairs of pants, not one. In case I spill."

"Foggy." Matt rolled his eyes, but as soon as Foggy lowered the bottle from his lips, Matt was back at him, his hand on his forehead now. "I should have..." he muttered.

"Not spent five times as much money as I did on the same number of clothes? Not gone so monochromatic with the new wardrobe? Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Sure, you said you need everything to match, but I may throw a pink shirt into the mix, just for fun."

"Why didn't you say something?" Matt said, not reacting to Foggy's joke.

"No, man. Procedure stop. Don't be a buzzkill or rain on our parade."

"We shouldn't have done this. Not when you're sick."

"Matt, buddy, relax. Let me catalog our awesomeness because you seem to be forgetting. We just finished acing finals. We were both asked to be on Law Review in the fall. We won." Foggy couldn't resist pounding Matt's chest in triumph even though the movement made him question his ability to stay upright. "We won the moot court competition when most first-year teams don't even qualify to enter the damn thing. We shocked the hell out of everyone! You should have seen their faces. I wish you had seen their faces, man."

"I wish I had too," Matt said. "But I will admit the gasps of horror were the stuff of legend."

"We are the stuff of legend," Foggy said. "We just spent more than we will make this summer on fancy clothes for our internship at one of the best firms in the city. We are riding this wave, drinking from this cup of glory, and we are celebrating."

"You're sick," Matt repeated.

"No."

"Probably the flu."

"I don't get the flu. I never get sick. I am not sick."

Matt carefully cleared all the packages from Foggy's bed, and Foggy didn't resist when Matt guided him to it. As soon as his head hit the pillow, Foggy had to close his eyes and swallow back a groan.

Jesus, this was not a drill. This was, unfortunately, happening. For-real, sick spins without all the fun memories of drinking to maybe balance it out and make it seem at least partially worth it.

"We're going out tonight," Foggy insisted even though he knew it couldn't happen as Matt took off his socks and shoes. "I have a grown up haircut for the first time since I've been grown up. I let an old man take a straight razor to my neck. It's a miracle I lived to tell the tale. I'm showing off, dammit. I look good. You would totally agree if you could see me now. I wish you could see me."

Matt's fingers found the ends of Foggy's hair that, while much shorter than it was that morning, would still be considerably longer than anyone else's at the firm. Good thing he had the chops to pull it off, or he'd be forced to go all-out Young Republican, and wouldn't that just suck.

"I like it," Matt quietly said. He fingered it off of Foggy's sweaty forehead and once again smoothed the back of his cool hand across Foggy's cheek.

"Yeah?" Foggy hadn't realized how much he needed Matt's approval until he offered it.

"Yeah."

Matt reached for Foggy's belt and started unbuckling it. He thought, for just a second, he should protest being treated like a child, or the fact that Matt was undressing him in his bed because, well, awkward on so many levels. But his hands were shaking and the room was still spinning and he didn't think he could find his own feet if he tried.

"I promise I'm not looking," Matt gently teased as he eased off Foggy's jeans.

"You're missing out. These are my good boxers." Matt smiled and helped Foggy get comfortable, pulling the blanket up to his chin. "You can still go," Foggy said, and his voice sounded very small and far away. "Without me."

"Never."

"You should. Celebrate."

"I would rather be with you than anywhere else," Matt said. "We will celebrate together. When you feel better."

"I want to watch all the movies," Foggy slurred. "And eat all the Cheetos."

"Absolutely."

"And drink all the beer."

"All of it," Matt agreed. Nothing had ever felt as good as Matt's hand resting on Foggy's fevered forehead. "Should I call your mom?"

"Hell no. She'll hover."

"I'm hovering."

"S'different," Foggy sighed. "I want you to hover. I like it when you hover. You hover nicely. Everything about you is nice. Why are you so good to me?"

"Do you even need to ask?"

"Yeah. I do."

As he drifted off in a fevered sleep, he thought he heard Matt whisper, "Because I love you," but he could never be sure if it was a dream.

"Just tell me one thing, Matt," Foggy says, trying to keep from yelling. "Are you even really blind?"

Matt doesn't answer, but his head dips down, and Foggy watches as he swallows. Matt's swallowing like maybe he wants to cry, but fuck him because he doesn't get to have tears. Not now, not when he's never cried before, not in all the years Foggy has known him.

"I never wanted to lie," he finally says. "Not to you."

"Yeah. Save it. We're so far past that."

"It's complicated," Matt quietly admits.

"No," Foggy insists. " It's really not. It's simple: can you see shit or not?"

Foggy has difficultly tracking the words when Matt begins explaining about the accident and the chemicals that blinded him. He talks about the hazy cloud that crept across his vision and blocked out the sky. How grateful he was the last thing he ever saw was a beautiful, blue sky. Foggy tries to understand as Matt describes waking up in the hospital hearing and smelling and feeling the impossible in a fiery world that is somehow the opposite of the perpetual darkness Foggy always imagined Matt lived in.

Foggy sips his beer, holding it in his mouth instead of swallowing right away to keep from screaming "Liar! You fucking liar!" as Matt's explaining about air density and temperature variations and the subtle vibrations that accompany movement. Matt matter of factly recites, in that staccato way he has of speaking, short bursts of simple words. Clipped fragments about sensitivity to smells and textures, as if Foggy hasn't lived with him and doesn't know that already.

Foggy thinks it sounds rehearsed. Memorized, even. Like maybe Matt's practiced telling him about impressionistic paintings of the world around him. Only he never said anything. Until now. Because he has to.

How the fuck does Matt even know what an impressionistic painting looks like anyway, since he was blinded when he was just a kid?

"So you can see?" Foggy finally says after Matt's shpeal, when the silence hums between them with angry tension Foggy can't take anymore.

"That's not," Matt begins. "You're not." He sighs, as if he somehow didn't forfeit his right to be put-out ages ago. Like maybe the second they met and he started bullshitting Foggy. "Are you even listening to what I'm saying?"

"Yeah. World on fire. I got it. But you can see, right?"

"In. In a manner of speaking."

He still sounds infuriatingly exasperated. Fuck him.

"No. No manner. How many fingers am I holding up?"

It's a stupid test. Matt knows Foggy. He knows exactly which finger even without air vibrations or whatever the fuck his spidey-senses are picking up that lets him see Foggy's fiery middle finger hovering in front of his face.

But Matt looks guilty as his tongue weakly wets his lips. His eyes still don't focus, and Foggy stares at them. Studies them. Tries to see how Matt can possibly see anything, impressionistic or not, when his pupils don't dilate and his eyes don't track or do anything but sit there and look absolutely un-seeing and wet and ashamed.

He really and truly is fucking blind, but he can see Foggy's finger, and he swallows again before whispering, "One."

The word hits Foggy like a fist to the gut. He knew it was coming. He knew. He isn't surprised. Of course Matt knew how many fingers. But he's somehow still shocked. Because Matt is blind, but he can see. He can fucking see. Has always been able to see.

Matt is the Devil of Hell's Kitchen.

Foggy has to sit down. He thinks there's a good chance he's going to embarrass himself and cry. Or maybe throw up. Or both. Then again, what's a little vomit when the floor's already covered with blood anyway?

"Foggy," Matt calmly says. "Breathe."

Even now, when he's the one who caused it, Matt is trying to look out for him. Fuck him for that too, dammit. If Foggy could not breathe, just to spite him, he would.

"But," Foggy finally stammers, trying to get his head around what he knows must be true. "But I've seen you," he begins, knowing Matt will know exactly what he means.

Because he's seen Matt catch his foot on the edge of something and go sprawling. He's seen his fingers search for small things, like his glasses or his keys, or large things, like the desk or the sofa. He's watched him memorize new spaces and need to orient himself in ones he already knows. He's seen him be absolutely fucking blind.

"It's hard," Matt says, sounding as weary and pained as he looks. "It's really, really hard. I have to concentrate. Or it doesn't make any sense. It's just." He sighs and looks up at the ceiling he can't see, like maybe what he's trying to say is hiding in the wooden beams. "I don't know how to explain."

"Try."

"If I'm not completely focused, it's... a nightmare," he says. "Overwhelming and distracting and just too... too much. So much. Of everything." Matt sighs again. "If I'm not concentrating, it's useless information that doesn't make sense."

"You already said that."

"I'm trying," Matt snaps. "I'm trying to do what you asked and explain."

"So what you're saying is that you're sometimes actually blind when you're around me?"

"I'm always blind, Foggy." Matt closes his eyes. "But yes," he whispers. "With you, I don't have to..."

He turns his head and not-looks at Foggy, the way he always has, as if he's somehow looking through Foggy's clothes and seeing every single bit of him uncovered and exposed, every inch and every thought and every secret. For all Foggy knows, maybe he can. Maybe Matt can see through walls or look into souls or read minds too. Nothing seems impossible anymore.

"I don't have to work so hard," Matt finally says. "I can relax. I know I'm safe when I'm with you."

"No," Foggy says, getting up from his chair to pace again. "You don't get to say that. Not now. Probably not ever."

"Foggy."

"No. Don't. Just." Foggy's so angry he punches the air in Matt's general direction and watches as Matt involuntarily flinches away. "Yeah," he says. "That right there. Fuck you, too."

"Foggy," Matt says again.

He says his name like it's a plea and a beg and promise, all rolled into one, and it's enough to make Foggy's eyes burn with tears again, and no. Just no. He is not going to feel badly because he is the one who's been lied to.

"Did you blow up those buildings? Shoot those cops?"

"Do you?" Matt swallows and winces. "Even need to ask that?"

He looks like the question Foggy already knows the answer to hurts even more than the blood-smeared stitches across his chest. Foggy knows he's being a dick, but he's glad it hurts. Because, well, just. Good.

"Yeah. I think I do."

Foggy sits down in time to see the tear shimmer in Matt's eye before it slides down his cheek. He clutches the arms of the chair and holds on for dear life, anything to stop him from falling to his knees and begging for forgiveness because he is being cruel, and as much as he hates Matt right now, he hates himself even more.

Hours had passed, or maybe days or weeks or a century, before he slowly drifted back to consciousness like coming up from the bottom of the deep end of the pool. He laid unmoving, his eyes still closed, aware that he was no longer sweating and shivering in his bed. He felt the warm weight of Matt pressed against him and heard his voice, soft and lyrical:

"'Master, what is it that I hear? Who are those people so defeated by their pain?' And he to me: 'This miserable way is taken by the sorry souls of those who lived without disgrace and without praise. They now commingle with the coward angels, the company of those who were not rebels nor faithful to their God, but stood apart. The heavens, that their beauty not be lessened, have cast them out, nor will deep Hell receive them - even the wicked cannot glory in them.'"

"Matt," he finally said, opening his eyes in the dim quiet of their room and realizing he was in Matt's bed.

"Welcome back," Matt said with a grin.

"What time is it?" Foggy asked.

His voice sounded weak and scratchy, and Matt handed him a glass of cold water with a bendy straw stuck in it so Foggy didn't have to sit up to take a drink. It tasted so good he moaned just a little. Matt reached towards his clock and fumbled until his fingers found the button.

"Nine seventeen pm," said the soft, mechanical voice.

"So I was out for an entire day?" Foggy asked.

"Two."

"I don't remember," Foggy muttered, handing the empty glass back to Matt.

"You kept insisting you were dead and burning in Hell."

"That's on you, man. Damn Catholics."

"I thought Dante was just the thing." Matt held up the book he was reading from.

"Dante? Jesus."

"Virgil, actually."

"Details." Foggy sighed and snuggled closer to Matt. "I like your sexy sheets, buddy."

"So you've said. After your fever broke, I thought you'd be more comfortable if I cleaned you up and changed your bed," Matt explained. "And then you wouldn't leave."

"Good plan," he agreed. "I'm never leaving. So what does it mean?"

"What does what mean?"

"That even the wicked cannot glory in them?"

"Oh. Um." Matt looked at the closed book in his hand. "It's the part people mean when they say Dante said 'The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.'"

"He didn't actually say that?"

"No."

"Well, either way, that's cheerful." Foggy shifted so he could see Matt's face in the dark. "Uh-oh. I know that look."

"I'm not looking."

"Dude, you're looking. What's wrong?"

"I just." Matt sighed. "I just want my life to mean something. I want to help people."

"Says the guy who spent the past two days playing nurse to my flu-infested ass?" Foggy asked.

"That's not what I meant." Matt shifted and looked away. "You're my best friend. Of course I would. I would do anything..."

Matt sighed again, and Foggy was too tired to press for more. He just let himself relax into Matt's silk sheets and waited.

"I want to make a difference," Matt finally said. "Not just to the people I care about. But to people who need a break and haven't gotten many. People who can't go anywhere else. People who really need help. And I just don't know if Landman and Zack is the best way to do that."

"Christ," Foggy muttered. "You and the guilt thing. It's killing me."

"Foggy," he began.

"It's just an internship, Matt. An internship we worked really hard to get. We can check it out. Ride the shiny elevators. Wear our new suits. No matter where we work, we can help people. We don't have to decide anything right away."

"You're right."

"Of course I'm right," Foggy agreed. "Sure, it's probably the fever talking, but that doesn't mean it's wrong."

"Foggy," Matt gently chided.

"'Nough talking. Keep reading."

"I have to talk to read."

"You know what I mean," Foggy sighed as he settled his head against Matt's shoulder. "You always know exactly what I mean."

"Wait." Foggy stands quite still and stares at Matt. "Are you telling me that, since I've known you, anytime I wasn't telling the truth, you knew?"

Matt's face is all the answer Foggy needs.

Jesus.

Foggy's not a liar, not about the things that matter. Mostly. But no one tells the truth all the time. Foggy thinks of all the times he stared at Matt because he knew Matt couldn't see him doing it. All the times he said everything was fine when it wasn't. When he lied about the things he did with girls on dates. When he said he had enough money or enough to eat or wasn't tired or felt confident in an answer.

He always knew Matt knew him better than he knew Matt. He never harbored delusions about that. Matt obviously wanted it that way, and Foggy accepted it as the price of being friends. But this? This is a whole new level of unlevel playing field. This is Foggy not having a moment's privacy since Matt walked into their room all those years ago.

"And what?" Foggy finally asks. "You just. Played along?"

Matt has the decency to look ashamed. "Basically."

"If you weren't half dead I would kick your ass, Murdock." Foggy rushes the couch and points an accusing finger he knows Matt can see right in his face. Fuck him because he knows his breath stinks too. "Am I lying about that?"

Matt eyes are wet with tears when he softly replies, "No."

"Was anything ever real with us?"

"Foggy," Matt whispers. "Please. I didn't mean." He swallows. "I never wanted."

"To fucking lie to me? To invade my privacy? To make me question everything I thought I knew to be true? What? What exactly didn't you mean or want?"

Matt sniffs and wipes his cheek with the back of his hand. Foggy's heart breaks just a little knowing he's the cause, and then he realizes that Matt probably can tell. Probably knows all about his stupid, fucking heart, and that just pisses him off all over again.

"At first, I wasn't going to tell you," Matt quietly admits. "Because I never told anyone. But then."

He shrugs, wincing because he probably just pulled out stitches somewhere because a ninja almost killed him last night. Because he's blind but he's also the Devil of Hell's Kitchen.

Jesus.

"Then what?" Foggy finally asks.

"You're you," he simply says, blinking back fresh tears. "You're you, Foggy Nelson, but by then, I didn't know what to say. Because you'd think I'd lied. And I couldn't." Matt closes his eyes and lets his head rest on the back of the couch. "I couldn't lose you. So I just."

"Kept lying?"

"Yeah," Matt has the decency to agree. "I intentionally don't focus on you. Not like that. Not unless I think something's wrong and I can help. I try to let you have your secrets."

"Like you have yours?"

"I never asked for this," Matt snaps. "For any of it. It happened. It just fucking happened."

"Like the ninja-guy just happened?" Foggy asks. "Like you running around in a mask just happened?"

Matt glares at him but doesn't say anything, and Foggy isn't ready to deal with all the details of Matt's extracurricular activities. He doesn't want to think about Wilson Fisk blowing up their neighborhood or sending a fucking ninja to kill Matt. Because Matt is the fucking Devil of Hell's Kitchen. Or that Matt somehow knows how to not get killed by a ninja because an old blind man named Stick taught him how to fight. Or the fact that Karen called Matt first because something tells him Karen will always call Matt first. And then Foggy lied instead of telling her Matt was nearly killed by a ninja. And Matt knew he was lying because he could hear Foggy's heartbeat from across the room. He has always known when Foggy was lying. He has always been able to hear Foggy's heart.

He can't think about this.

The list of things he doesn't want to think about right now is long and distinguished, so he wanders into the kitchen and grabs another bottle of water for Matt. He's tempted to throw it at the back of his head, just to see what would happen. Would he sense it coming and protect himself? Foggy loiters by the fridge, hefting the weight in his hand, and wonders how much he would hurt him if what he said was true, that he doesn't try not to be blind around Foggy.

It's heavy for how small it is. Would probably cause a concussion. Maybe break open Matt's thick skull and force Foggy to call for Claire for more stitches. Unless he caught it first, which Foggy thinks would somehow be worse than him getting hit with it.

In the end, Foggy hands over the water like a normal person because he doesn't want to risk it, any of it, and pulls out his phone and texts Claire.

'He's awake. Will live to tell the tale. I've got this.'

She looked so tired and so sad, and Foggy knew she spent the night working, not sitting around like he did. She should go home, if she wants. Go to bed. No sense in everyone Matt knows being miserable because he's a lying sack of shit human lie detector asshole.

'Make sure he drinks a lot of water,' she texts back. 'And eats. I'll come if he needs me.'

Of course she will.

Foggy wants to be shitty back. Say something mean and hurtful because everyone always loves Matt more than Matt loves them, but it's not her fault. She seems nice, and she saved Matt's life, and Foggy thinks she's hurting already, in her own way. So he thanks her and adds Hotty McBurner phone to the list of things he doesn't want to think about.

Matt is just sitting there on the sofa, silently sipping his water and looking miserable, so Foggy goes back to the kitchen and starts banging around, looking for something to feed him. His kitchen has even less food than Foggy's, which is really saying something. He's eaten relish straight from the jar because sometimes that happens, but he figures Matt needs something with more substance to it. Probably protein and iron.

In the end, he calls a nearby place Matt likes that delivers. Two spinach salads, one black-and-blue with extra steak and one salmon. Beet salad. Spinach quiche. Oatmeal with apples, pecans, and dates. A couple greek yogurt parfaits. He adds six hard boiled eggs and freshly ground peanut butter and a six-pack of beer as an afterthought.

He's not paying for all this shit when it arrives.

"You hate salad," Matt quietly points out.

"They're for you."

"Thanks."

"Whatever," Foggy mutters on his way to the bathroom. "If you had fucking food, I'd cook for you." He lets the water run hot and wets a washcloth. He hands it, still steaming, to Matt. "You have blood all over."

"Thanks," Matt says again before wiping his face and neck.

Foggy rinses it when he's done and finds a zippered hoodie and a thick pair of socks. Standing in Matt's bedroom, he watches Matt sit on the sofa, not-looking at him. The socks are a lot softer than a water bottle.

He throws the rolled socks as hard as he can at Matt's head. At the last second, just before they hit him, Matt jerks to the side to avoid them. He groans and clutches his side, the movement obviously not the best thing for a newly stitched-together abdominal wound.

"Shit. Sorry," Foggy says, retrieving the socks from the other side of the sofa. "I wanted to see what you would do."

"What was that?" Matt asks as he gingerly pulls on the hoodie.

"Socks," Foggy says, handing them to Matt.

"Should have let them hit me."

"Yeah. Probably."

"You done with that now?" Matt asks.

"Probably not," Foggy honestly answers.

Matt nods. "Okay."