I hope this is okay. It's modern day Matt and Foggy talking about college. Hope that's okay!
**
It was two months after Fisk’s arrest before Foggy confronted Matt about it. Matt had half been expecting it and half hoping that Foggy was going to let it go, the longer it went on the more relaxed Matt got. He should have known better, Foggy was an expert at picking the best time to have a fight. He was the opposite of Matt in that way, he disliked letting anger rule his head so he’d wait until he could talk about it logically and calmly. Matt always found Foggy’s calm more devastating than anyone else’s anger.
“Hey Karen,” said Foggy around lunchtime on an otherwise unremarkable Friday. Big smile that Matt could tell from Foggy’s heartbeat and the faint smell of nervous sweat was fake. “You should take a half-day, we’re really not busy and it’s a beautiful day. You should get a start on the weekend for us.”
Karen must have smiled back because Foggy’s heart did that little half-jump that Matt associated with Foggy’s affection for Karen. “You’re not coming with?” she asked, turning her head to look at both Foggy and Matt.
“Alas!” declared Foggy before Matt could respond. “The life of law partners is not all glamour. Me and Matt have a load of paperwork to complete, but you should not be caught in its evil clutches as well. That’ll be next week when you have to file it all.” Foggy must have grinned at her because she chuckled and started to gather up her things.
Karen left and the atmosphere changed.
“We don’t have paperwork do we?” he asked Foggy.
Foggy shook his head. “I shook my… sorry. Even after all this time I still forget.”
“No,” said Matt on reflex his mouth suddenly dry. “I like it, its familiar… comforting I guess.”
Foggy sighed. “That’s good. Good to know.” He pulled a chair up to Matt’s desk and they sat on opposite sides, Foggy watching him across the table. “Do you know what I want to talk about?” asked Foggy eventually.
“I’d guess something about my senses, things I know about you because of them,” said Matt carefully. “I’ve been expecting you to ask about it for a while.”
Foggy took a deep breath. “Just one thing. The other stuff, probably doesn’t matter in the long term. I just need to know about this one thing. And… Matt you can’t lie, okay? I need to know the truth about this. It’s… it’s really important. It’s driving me crazy.”
Matt couldn’t force words out to answer so he just nodded. He was pretty sure he knew the incident Foggy was talking about. He really hoped he was wrong though.
“So,” started Foggy. “Do you remember? It was maybe five months into the first year we shared a dorm room. There was a big, stupid, frat party that you didn’t want to go too. I wasn’t going to go either but then I got asked on a date. I never told you who with,” Foggy paused waiting.
“Mark Taylor,” said Matt eventually.
“Right,” said Foggy. “Mark, I never told you that.” It would have been easier if Foggy sounded mad. Anger Matt could deal with, but this was just the same tone Foggy used when he was gathering information from clients he didn’t much like or trust. It was horrible.
“I heard you on the phone the day before,” said Matt. “I recognised his voice.”
“You were eavesdropping?” asked Foggy, still not sounding mad, just gathering information.
“Dorms were difficult. Lots of people living on top of each other, it was hard sometimes to block it all out. I found it easier if I could focus on one thing. Your voice was always easy to focus on. You were always easy to focus on. I wasn’t really listening to the words, but I recognised his voice on the other end of the call. When I realised it was personal I tried my best to shift my focus somewhere else,” explained Matt. He didn’t try to apologise, taking his cue from Foggy. Just the facts, whether they liked them or not.
“That’s why you weren’t all that surprised when I told you I sometimes dated guys a few weeks later?” asked Foggy.
Matt couldn’t help but smile a little at that. “Foggy you are a terrible flirt with everyone, and I think you were worse back then. No, you liking guys wasn’t a surprise.”
Foggy chuckled at that and Matt let himself believe that was the end of it. That it was over and Foggy wasn’t going to drag them through the rest. But then Foggy spoke again. “I came home early. I told you that the party had been great, that I just had a headache. Probably from too much studying, you normal laugh at jokes like that, but you didn’t laugh. I wondered if you knew somehow, but how could you have known, right? I went to bed early.”
“Yeah,” said Matt. “That’s what happened.”
Foggy hung his head for a moment then raised it again to look at Matt. His heart was racing. “Please Matt. I… I can’t…”
“You smelt like blood,” said Matt slowly, in case Foggy needed him to stop. “You’d cleaned it up but I knew something had made your nose bleed. You smelt like blood and tears. Yours and a girl’s. Your shirt was ripped. And you were scared, had been even more scared earlier in the evening.”
“How did you know that,” asked Foggy mechanically.
“Fear-sweat smells bitter,” said Matt. “It’s different to other sweat. You’d been really scared, something, someone had terrified you.” Matt could hear the anger creeping into his voice. “And over the top of all that I could smell his stupid overpriced aftershave. That was all over you, like he’d been…”
“Yeah,” interrupted Foggy. “Yeah.”
“But you didn’t tell me anything,” said Matt. “And I couldn’t ask. I couldn’t do anything, Foggy.”
“But you did, didn’t you?” asked Foggy, his voice gone sharp, like he was making a closing argument in court. “Because a week later Mark transferred out of Columbia. I didn’t think much of it at the time, I was just glad he was gone. But you… did you hurt him?”
Matt tried to pretend to himself that he didn’t hear the fear in Foggy’s question. He’s never ever wanted Foggy to be scared of him. “I really wanted to,” he admitted. “But I just threatened him. He laughed at the blind guy threatening him. So I punched him once. Just once I swear. I told him, I told him that if he didn’t go I’d hurt him worse. That no-one would ever even believe it was ‘the blind guy’. He ran, I never saw him again.”
Foggy was back to staring at the desk top. Matt could tell he was trying to keep his breathing under control but his heartbeat was all over the place. “You used to get cross with me if I ever stood up for you, went people were being dicks to you. You told me that it was your problem and that you’d deal with it. And I didn’t like it Matt but I did it! I didn’t tell you for a fucking reason! You had no right to get involved. I didn’t ask to assault someone for me!” Foggy was angry now, voice loud and harsh with it.
“I wasn’t like he pushed in front of you in a cue, Foggy! He didn’t give you the wrong change or rearrange a classroom without telling you. He…” Matt stopped suddenly, not wanting to put words around it.
“He tried to rape me,” said Foggy standing and turning away from Matt. “I was there, Matt. I know what he did. Doesn’t change the fact that you went behind my back to… what? Protect my honour? Avenge me? I didn’t need you to.”
“You cried,” said Matt softly.
“What?” asked Foggy turning back round.
“That night, after you went to bed. You cried. For hours. I could hear you, it wasn’t loud, it was really quiet, like you didn’t want anyone to hear,” said Matt.
“I… don’t remember that,” said Foggy.
Matt could feel tears in his own eyes now. “I tried not to listen but… I was all I could hear. I guess like when people can’t look away from an accident. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to hug you and kill him and… make it stop. But I’d only know you a few months back then, I didn’t know how to help you. I was all I could hear, for days afterwards, whenever it was quiet. I could hear you crying in my head. And you hadn’t told me, so I couldn’t talk to you about it.” Matt took a deep breath; he was going to tell Foggy all of it. “I’d smelt a girls tears on you, and there was the smell of the conditioner that little Jen from Ethics class used. I thought maybe she’d been there. I found her the next day. She didn’t want to tell me anything. She said you’d asked her not to. But I told her you’d already told me. I knew enough about it that she believed me. She said she seen you and him at the party. Then you’d disappeared into a room. Then you came back out later, you were covered in blood.”
“From my nose,” said Foggy. “He… we were making out. He wanted more than that. I said no. He didn’t want to hear that…”
Matt felt his fists tighten and he wanted to move, but he was scared of what he’d do if he did.
Foggy continued. “I pushed him off and he took a swing at me. Hit me in the face. I got out the room but he was still hitting me. Jen shouted and other people came. Someone pulled him off.”
“Jen said he was shouting horrible things at you,” said Matt.
“She tell you what they were?” asked Foggy.
Matt shook his head.
“I remember them,” said Foggy bitterly. “I never wanted you to know. But honesty, right? That’s what I asked for.”
Matt wanted to tell Foggy that it was okay, that he didn’t have to do anything or tell anything he didn’t want to. But he couldn’t make the words form.
“He called me a ‘fucking cock-tease’ he said that was the only thing I was good for anyway. That I was a slut and everyone knew I was spreading my legs for ‘that fucking blind retard’ anyway. I went to hit him but Jen pulled me away. I spat blood in his face as Jen pulled me away. She took me to her dorm room and let me use her shower.”
Matt felt the anger in him, as strong and inescapable as it had ever been. “I should have broken his jaw,” he said darkly.
“Didn’t want you to then, don’t want you to now,” said Foggy, wrapping his arms around himself. “I could use a hug though.”
Matt was by Foggy’s side before he’d even registered moving. He wrapped his arms round his friend. Foggy buried his face into Matt’s shoulder and his own shoulders were shaking but he wasn’t crying. Matt could feel the tears on his own face.
“I’m sorry for not telling you that I knew,” he whispered into Foggy’s ear. “I’m sorry for not telling you about what I could do, I will always be sorry for that. But I’m not sorry for hitting him.”
Foggy just clung a little tighter.
Eventually they separated and Foggy insisted the go to Josie’s, so they did. And if Matt was a little bit protective, putting himself firmly between Foggy and the world, then just for that night, Foggy didn’t mention it.
Fill: College!Matt and Foggy whump, possible non-con, Matt finding out
**
It was two months after Fisk’s arrest before Foggy confronted Matt about it. Matt had half been expecting it and half hoping that Foggy was going to let it go, the longer it went on the more relaxed Matt got. He should have known better, Foggy was an expert at picking the best time to have a fight. He was the opposite of Matt in that way, he disliked letting anger rule his head so he’d wait until he could talk about it logically and calmly. Matt always found Foggy’s calm more devastating than anyone else’s anger.
“Hey Karen,” said Foggy around lunchtime on an otherwise unremarkable Friday. Big smile that Matt could tell from Foggy’s heartbeat and the faint smell of nervous sweat was fake. “You should take a half-day, we’re really not busy and it’s a beautiful day. You should get a start on the weekend for us.”
Karen must have smiled back because Foggy’s heart did that little half-jump that Matt associated with Foggy’s affection for Karen. “You’re not coming with?” she asked, turning her head to look at both Foggy and Matt.
“Alas!” declared Foggy before Matt could respond. “The life of law partners is not all glamour. Me and Matt have a load of paperwork to complete, but you should not be caught in its evil clutches as well. That’ll be next week when you have to file it all.” Foggy must have grinned at her because she chuckled and started to gather up her things.
Karen left and the atmosphere changed.
“We don’t have paperwork do we?” he asked Foggy.
Foggy shook his head. “I shook my… sorry. Even after all this time I still forget.”
“No,” said Matt on reflex his mouth suddenly dry. “I like it, its familiar… comforting I guess.”
Foggy sighed. “That’s good. Good to know.” He pulled a chair up to Matt’s desk and they sat on opposite sides, Foggy watching him across the table. “Do you know what I want to talk about?” asked Foggy eventually.
“I’d guess something about my senses, things I know about you because of them,” said Matt carefully. “I’ve been expecting you to ask about it for a while.”
Foggy took a deep breath. “Just one thing. The other stuff, probably doesn’t matter in the long term. I just need to know about this one thing. And… Matt you can’t lie, okay? I need to know the truth about this. It’s… it’s really important. It’s driving me crazy.”
Matt couldn’t force words out to answer so he just nodded. He was pretty sure he knew the incident Foggy was talking about. He really hoped he was wrong though.
“So,” started Foggy. “Do you remember? It was maybe five months into the first year we shared a dorm room. There was a big, stupid, frat party that you didn’t want to go too. I wasn’t going to go either but then I got asked on a date. I never told you who with,” Foggy paused waiting.
“Mark Taylor,” said Matt eventually.
“Right,” said Foggy. “Mark, I never told you that.” It would have been easier if Foggy sounded mad. Anger Matt could deal with, but this was just the same tone Foggy used when he was gathering information from clients he didn’t much like or trust. It was horrible.
“I heard you on the phone the day before,” said Matt. “I recognised his voice.”
“You were eavesdropping?” asked Foggy, still not sounding mad, just gathering information.
“Dorms were difficult. Lots of people living on top of each other, it was hard sometimes to block it all out. I found it easier if I could focus on one thing. Your voice was always easy to focus on. You were always easy to focus on. I wasn’t really listening to the words, but I recognised his voice on the other end of the call. When I realised it was personal I tried my best to shift my focus somewhere else,” explained Matt. He didn’t try to apologise, taking his cue from Foggy. Just the facts, whether they liked them or not.
“That’s why you weren’t all that surprised when I told you I sometimes dated guys a few weeks later?” asked Foggy.
Matt couldn’t help but smile a little at that. “Foggy you are a terrible flirt with everyone, and I think you were worse back then. No, you liking guys wasn’t a surprise.”
Foggy chuckled at that and Matt let himself believe that was the end of it. That it was over and Foggy wasn’t going to drag them through the rest. But then Foggy spoke again. “I came home early. I told you that the party had been great, that I just had a headache. Probably from too much studying, you normal laugh at jokes like that, but you didn’t laugh. I wondered if you knew somehow, but how could you have known, right? I went to bed early.”
“Yeah,” said Matt. “That’s what happened.”
Foggy hung his head for a moment then raised it again to look at Matt. His heart was racing. “Please Matt. I… I can’t…”
“You smelt like blood,” said Matt slowly, in case Foggy needed him to stop. “You’d cleaned it up but I knew something had made your nose bleed. You smelt like blood and tears. Yours and a girl’s. Your shirt was ripped. And you were scared, had been even more scared earlier in the evening.”
“How did you know that,” asked Foggy mechanically.
“Fear-sweat smells bitter,” said Matt. “It’s different to other sweat. You’d been really scared, something, someone had terrified you.” Matt could hear the anger creeping into his voice. “And over the top of all that I could smell his stupid overpriced aftershave. That was all over you, like he’d been…”
“Yeah,” interrupted Foggy. “Yeah.”
“But you didn’t tell me anything,” said Matt. “And I couldn’t ask. I couldn’t do anything, Foggy.”
“But you did, didn’t you?” asked Foggy, his voice gone sharp, like he was making a closing argument in court. “Because a week later Mark transferred out of Columbia. I didn’t think much of it at the time, I was just glad he was gone. But you… did you hurt him?”
Matt tried to pretend to himself that he didn’t hear the fear in Foggy’s question. He’s never ever wanted Foggy to be scared of him. “I really wanted to,” he admitted. “But I just threatened him. He laughed at the blind guy threatening him. So I punched him once. Just once I swear. I told him, I told him that if he didn’t go I’d hurt him worse. That no-one would ever even believe it was ‘the blind guy’. He ran, I never saw him again.”
Foggy was back to staring at the desk top. Matt could tell he was trying to keep his breathing under control but his heartbeat was all over the place. “You used to get cross with me if I ever stood up for you, went people were being dicks to you. You told me that it was your problem and that you’d deal with it. And I didn’t like it Matt but I did it! I didn’t tell you for a fucking reason! You had no right to get involved. I didn’t ask to assault someone for me!” Foggy was angry now, voice loud and harsh with it.
“I wasn’t like he pushed in front of you in a cue, Foggy! He didn’t give you the wrong change or rearrange a classroom without telling you. He…” Matt stopped suddenly, not wanting to put words around it.
“He tried to rape me,” said Foggy standing and turning away from Matt. “I was there, Matt. I know what he did. Doesn’t change the fact that you went behind my back to… what? Protect my honour? Avenge me? I didn’t need you to.”
“You cried,” said Matt softly.
“What?” asked Foggy turning back round.
“That night, after you went to bed. You cried. For hours. I could hear you, it wasn’t loud, it was really quiet, like you didn’t want anyone to hear,” said Matt.
“I… don’t remember that,” said Foggy.
Matt could feel tears in his own eyes now. “I tried not to listen but… I was all I could hear. I guess like when people can’t look away from an accident. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to hug you and kill him and… make it stop. But I’d only know you a few months back then, I didn’t know how to help you. I was all I could hear, for days afterwards, whenever it was quiet. I could hear you crying in my head. And you hadn’t told me, so I couldn’t talk to you about it.” Matt took a deep breath; he was going to tell Foggy all of it. “I’d smelt a girls tears on you, and there was the smell of the conditioner that little Jen from Ethics class used. I thought maybe she’d been there. I found her the next day. She didn’t want to tell me anything. She said you’d asked her not to. But I told her you’d already told me. I knew enough about it that she believed me. She said she seen you and him at the party. Then you’d disappeared into a room. Then you came back out later, you were covered in blood.”
“From my nose,” said Foggy. “He… we were making out. He wanted more than that. I said no. He didn’t want to hear that…”
Matt felt his fists tighten and he wanted to move, but he was scared of what he’d do if he did.
Foggy continued. “I pushed him off and he took a swing at me. Hit me in the face. I got out the room but he was still hitting me. Jen shouted and other people came. Someone pulled him off.”
“Jen said he was shouting horrible things at you,” said Matt.
“She tell you what they were?” asked Foggy.
Matt shook his head.
“I remember them,” said Foggy bitterly. “I never wanted you to know. But honesty, right? That’s what I asked for.”
Matt wanted to tell Foggy that it was okay, that he didn’t have to do anything or tell anything he didn’t want to. But he couldn’t make the words form.
“He called me a ‘fucking cock-tease’ he said that was the only thing I was good for anyway. That I was a slut and everyone knew I was spreading my legs for ‘that fucking blind retard’ anyway. I went to hit him but Jen pulled me away. I spat blood in his face as Jen pulled me away. She took me to her dorm room and let me use her shower.”
Matt felt the anger in him, as strong and inescapable as it had ever been. “I should have broken his jaw,” he said darkly.
“Didn’t want you to then, don’t want you to now,” said Foggy, wrapping his arms around himself. “I could use a hug though.”
Matt was by Foggy’s side before he’d even registered moving. He wrapped his arms round his friend. Foggy buried his face into Matt’s shoulder and his own shoulders were shaking but he wasn’t crying. Matt could feel the tears on his own face.
“I’m sorry for not telling you that I knew,” he whispered into Foggy’s ear. “I’m sorry for not telling you about what I could do, I will always be sorry for that. But I’m not sorry for hitting him.”
Foggy just clung a little tighter.
Eventually they separated and Foggy insisted the go to Josie’s, so they did. And if Matt was a little bit protective, putting himself firmly between Foggy and the world, then just for that night, Foggy didn’t mention it.