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On their way back from the last mission, if that is even the correct term, the trio plus the new meta woman, didn’t said a word. Sitting in the cab, Karen in the front sit while Matt, Foggy and Ellen in the back, the only thing that keeps them away from a totally awkward salience is the radio.
The first stop is at Foggy’s apartment.
“Thank you again, for everything you’ve done for me, really.”
“Don’t even mention it, Ellen.” Says Foggy.
“Yeah, that was the right thing to do.” Continues Karen, who follows the man out of the vehicle.
Not even an hour ago they were in an abandoned warehouse near the river, Daredevil was fighting with ten, or so, men of a criminal boss, Mr. Glover. His new business was trading meta humans, especially to powerful war lords, to use them as a weapon.
Karen first found out about the boss thanks to Mr. Glover employees that were smart enough to leave the job without any consequences and report anonymously what was happening. With the help of Foggy, who was able to find out everything about the boss, the whole team succeeded to stop the trading that was currently going on. But they promised themselves to soon stop Mr. Glover for good, once and for all.
That was how they met Ellen.
The second stop was at Ellen’s house and with a surprised look she watches Matt managing to get out of the cab too, and she decide not to go inside right away. Just after having paid the driver Matt settles in front of the woman.
“I need to ask you a favour, but not out here.”
“Of course, let’s get inside.” She says while taking the lawyer’s elbow to lead him in the new environment.
Once they are comfortably sitting on the sofa, Ellen offers a drink, which Matt declines politely.
“So, what exactly did you mean earlier?”
“If I understood correctly, your power consists in switch bodies with another person, right?”
“Well, if you want it to put it simple, yes. More precisely, I have the ability to transfer my consciousness in someone else’s body, and vice versa. I still don’t have fully awareness of it, so usually, when I use my power, the other body faints. It’s kind of useless, I know.” Just as she started the sentence with such an excitement in her voice, she ended almost disappointed.
“That depends on how you’re going to use it.”
“What do you exactly mean with it?”
“And now we get to the part of because I asked you to allow in. I am no one to tell you what to do with your abilities, and don’t let anybody ever tell you. I perfectly know that what I am about to ask is selfish, but I also know this opportunity will not show up ever again.”
Ellen keeps listening, even if a little confused.
“Would you agree to use your power with me? Or better, on me?” Matt can’t believe he actually said it.
Just as she’s about to speak, hesitation printed on her face, Matt continues.
“I know it’s a lot but, it’s the only opportunity that I have, you know? The only chance that I could get to…”
Emotions take over him and he must stop, just a few seconds.
“To see him.”
Luckily there’s no time for the silence to become embarrassing, because Ellen has perfectly understood who this him is Matt talking about.
“Oh, Foggy. You are talking about him, aren’t you?
“Yes, Foggy.”
“This may sound indiscreet, but I have noticed, how you act when he is around. The way you look more cheerful and easy-going. I assumed right then.”
“You indeed have. Just… It’s complicated. We have been friends since the very first day of law school, but never something more than that. I cared for him from the beginning, even if we were still in the process of knowing each other.”
“Okay, I agree.”
Matt’s hopes rise incredible fast. Excited like a kid on his first sleepover. He hides it almost completely, though.
“But I must warn you, as I told you before, I do not hold full control of this situations. Noting irreparable has ever happen before, but a small possibility remains.”
He doesn’t think this through as long as he should, but as Ellen said -nothing bad happened before-.
“I suppose you want to do this as soon as possible.” She continues.
“It really shows, doesn’t it?”
“Honestly? Yes.” She says, and Matt can say that she did it with a smile from her voice.
“Fine, so let’s do this. Sit in a firmer way, to avoid tumble down from the sofa. Oh, and last thing, I don’t know how this could last. So try not to spend a lot of time walking around. You could pass out suddenly without seeing it coming.”
“Understood.”
Ellen lifts both Matt’s hands and locks with him by gripping his wrists. He does the same.
The grip tightens, and Matt starts to feel something like a slight pinch. Initially just where Ellen hands are, but with the seconds passing, the feeling goes up on his arms, shoulders, neck until he feels his head heavy and faints.
The first thing he can perceive once he recovers his senses, is the light coming from the big window situated on the wall in front of him. It’s not bothersome, neither blinding. He sets up properly, adjusting to the weird sensations, and he finally realises that he can see. This just means it all worked out. In fact, he turns on the other side of the sofa, to see him, or better his body, laid in a quite uncomfortable manner.
The thing he can’t help himself from doing is looking at himself. How he changed during the past years, how he grew old; he kind of always wondered. After a moment he gets up and looks at his surroundings, curious. When he spots a mirror, he approaches and looks at the reflection, right into Ellen’s eyes.
“Thank you.” He whispers, totally aware that he’s talking to himself and that the woman can’t hear a word.
With the intention of going out he takes some of his money along with Ellen’s handbag, already thinking about when they will wake up back in their own bodies. It feels weird to hold one, he thinks.
He calls a cab once he locked the main door, gets in and gives directions to the driver for Foggy’s place.
During the trip he can’t get his eyes off the car window, admiring everything he can. When he hears the man’s voice, telling him they arrived, he takes a second to unwind, then pays the driver and gets inside the building.
On the way up, on stairs he hears Karen’s voice getting closer. She’s in a hurry and speaking on the phone, probably a work-related call. She’s to busy to notice a woman half turned on the wall to stop and realise it’s Ellen, but on the other hand, Matt has spent each moment to observe her, from head to toe, to put a face on the so familiar voice. He thinks it’s better to hide and make this quicker as possible, even if he would very much like to stops and look at her with more attention. Smiling, he continues his way up.
Before knocking, he takes a couple of deep breaths, keeping his hand in hold a few centimetres from the wooden door. Finally, he knocks.
It doesn’t take long for Foggy to open.
Matt doesn’t even have the time to say a word because the colleague barely looks up and all he does is sign Ellen to come in and he returns in the leaving room.
Matt is totally moved by his sight. His breath is short, almost missing, and can’t stop staring. Foggy is absolutely the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. Tears start to fall, but he can manage to hold them back; for now, at least.
Once he comes in, he closes the door behind him and reaches the living room, he keeps himself standing by holding up on a wall. Never leaving his gaze off of Foggy despite him being one of those people that can’t stay put while calling. Looking at his surroundings is completely out of question, due the situation.
“Sorry about that Ellen, just a busy day at the office. Can I do something for you?”
He doesn’t get an answer, so he keeps going talking words that Matt can’t say he hears, until he lands a hand on Ellen arm, causing her to jump a little.
“Didn’t want to scare you, is everything all right?” he says taking a step backwards.
While locking his eyes with Foggy’s and making a hint of a smile, he finally speaks.
“Yes, yes, everything it’s good.”
That’s all he says even if he doesn’t want to. What he really wishes for is to be able to speak out all the truth. For an easy start he could begin with a “Hey, it’s me, Matt, thank Ellen’s power.”. This would help him build up step by step the courage to add all the rest, as a following “I really wanted to see you.” Then “I wished for this from the first time we met.” And finally, “I didn’t need to see how you look for falling in love with you.”
There he said it, at lease, almost. Now all he needed to do was repeating the exact same words out loud. All he could manage to do though, was gently reach for Foggy’s cheek with his hand.
it felt all so good and right for a moment. Never before the two of them, had shared a so-called display of affection between each other, expect maybe once or twice at college, after a long day of classes and a whole bottle of cheap liquor.
Then suddenly Foggy steps back. All considered is a normal reaction, he an Ellen have barely just met, a soft touch like that is not usually what comes out of these situations.
“Sorry I may have misled you. I don’t – I‘m not looking for – for this.”
His cheeks are now blushing a little, he could face criminals and ferocious advocates in court without even batting an eye, but this is a circumstance of another kind.
It’s all a little awkward, they are now both looking down on a different spot of the floor, until Matt repeats his action of a few minutes before, rising Foggy’s head and trying until he won’t escape from the touch.
“Once he's calm” Matt tells to himself trying to delay as much as possible the inevitable, “I’ll start talking once he is calm, and listening to me.”
He eventually manages to do that; they are now looking at each other without really doing anything else.
“Franklin. Hey, Franklin. Listen to me, OK? Please, will you?”
Matt can feel tears coming up, on the other hand, Foggy seems to start understanding what’s going on.
“Franklin? What – How do you -?”
There was something, he couldn’t say what or why, but there was something different, weird of familiar (maybe all of three together). He was somehow feeling it. He met Ellen not long time ago, he couldn’t tell he knows her, but he just felt that the woman in front of him, wasn’t totally her.
“Foggy…”
“Hold on. Matt – Matt is it you? Is it really you?”
“Yes, yes it’s me.” Now tears begun falling on his cheeks.
The first step was taken, now all Matt had to do was proceeding with the following. You’re almost there.
“But why - Why did you take this risk? Coming all the way here, it’s dangerous, you know that Ellen is still learning how to control this.”
Matt is holding Foggy’s face with both hands.
“I know but, I couldn’t let this occasion slip away just like that. I really had to see you. It’s something I’ve been wishing since – well, basically since the first moment I heard your voice. Despite your clever observation about me-“
“Being blind. Yeah about that, I was young, you know?”
With tears now wetting both of their faces, they laugh a bit while remembering their first meeting at the campus dorm back in the days.
For Foggy, it’s just about a matter of second, forgetting that even if who he sees is Ellen, it’s not really her. All he can see is Matt. All of him is printed in his mind so well that he doesn’t even need to close his eyes to imagine Matt. His lost brown eyes even if they are constantly hidden by those red glasses, his hair always so well brushed (Foggy still wonders sometimes how he manage to tided them so well, for obvious reasons, and giggles a little those mooring when he himself spends more time that needed, and still get to work with his hair being a mess).
And for the first time, Matt can finally see with his own eyes his lifelong friend. Not that he ever needed that to feel what he feels for him. Of course, throughout time he built his own image of him, but after a life lived with just sensations and noises, with almost faded memories of what the simplest thing looked like, he stopped caring of physical appearances. He knew that what he was feeling was real and the sound of Foggy’s voice greeting him in the morning was equal to a smile. The curiosity died, not long after their first meeting, but coming across Ellen and her powers, did nothing but bring that curiosity back to life. If those said powers stopped working know or in an hour, it wouldn’t change one thing: Foggy’s image would be printed in Matt’s mind for the rest of his days.
“You’re so beautiful.” That’s all he’s able to say, but it’s enough to make Foggy’s cheek blush. “And I mean it. I know this is the most famous cliché of all but that doesn’t change. And not only that, I think you’re the best person I have ever met. You have never treated me any different because of my condition, you have always supported me, you have always been there for me, yeah and sorry if there were moments in which I couldn’t be there for you.”
That’s it, I’m about to tell him, I’m telling him.
“You make me a better person; thank you for everything. I don’t know why this sound like a damn goodbye but what I’m actually trying to tell you is that, I love you Foggy. I do.”
Foggy listened to every word, remaining speechless, so he decided to use actions instead of words, so he leans in, slowly, still considering the fact that Matt could step back. He feels so relieved when he doesn’t; it’s a stupid fear and he acknowledges that, but he can’t help it.
As soon as their lips touched the sensation felt so new yet so familiar. They both have secretly dreamed about this moment for so long: it was initially a more physical desire but once they grew closer it became almost prohibited, since they never believed the other felt the same.
Foggy lock his arms behind Matt’s neck, getting a bit closer, and Matt’s hand slide to the other’s waist. The kiss doesn’t get much more heated, but this doesn’t stop the to keep going. Matt still believe he had to courage to confess to Foggy after so much time, after everything they have been through, but yet here he is thinking about happy he is, about how thing will change in good from now on, until he feels his head dizzy and his knees can’t hold his weight anymore, and as he falls, Foggy catches him, concern plainly visible on his face. Without overthinking he carries Ellen’s body and lays it on the couch. Just once he sits on her side, he feels a little bit more reassured, because he understands what’s going on: Ellen powers don’t last as longs as she wants, they will fade eventually, usually without her being able to avoid that.
While waiting for her to wake up he shake off his nervous by walking back and forth in the living room, then he heads to the kitchen to prepare a drink for Ellen, he opts for tea while he pours himself something way stronger. After the second glass he hears noises from the other room and rushes out when he sees Ellen try to get up.
“Hey, what are you trying to do?” he keels once he’s sure she won’t stand in the near future again, and hands over the mug. “Here, drink.”
“Did it work?”, her eyes looking a little tired.
“Yes, it did, it did. Thank you, Ellen, for real. I know you didn’t have to do this, but I’m so glad you accept to help.”
“Yes, I had, I mean I guess we could say that. After what you all did for me back with Mr. Glover, I owned you one. Right?” she smiles.
“It’s late now, why don’t you stay and spend the night?” says Foggy now sitting by Ellen’s side.
“Thanks, but I don’t wanna be bother.”
“You won’t, really. Here you can sleep in my room.” He gets up and leads the way.
He goes back to the couch and spreads on it, loosing his tie and with the bottle of liquor on the coffee table, thinking about the day he had.
When start to feel his eyes getting heavy, he hears a knock on the door, and takes a moment to understand what is happening and surrounding him.
The one knocking is discovered to be Matt, the actual Matt, once he opened the door. As soon as that information comes in, he impulsively jumps on him and kisses him.
“Hello Foggy.” Matt’s smile can’t go more wider than it is right now.
“Hello Matt.”
They kiss softly one more time before heading in, and set again on the sofa.
When Matt is cuddled against Foggy, with his head looking up so that they are facing, kissing and soft caresses is all they share until they both fall asleep.
In the early morning, Ellen wakes up and decide to leave just with a signed note on the scratchpad on Foggy’s desk. She is very grateful with what Karen, Foggy and Matt did for her, and she highly reckons that, but she just thinks it’s best if she stops being something more to think about for a while. She grabs her belonging and leaves the apartment while Matt and Foggy are still embraced on the couch.