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The night is cold, but it gives Matt an excuse to stay even closer to Elektra as they’re walking the streets. It’s New Year’s Eve, and Matt feels… well, he feels optimistic. Not in the manic way that pulls the corners of his mouth far apart in not quite a smile, the way that makes him throw himself into something only to crash and burn, burn himself and everything around him to cinder, no. Not this time. This time, Foggy won’t have to pick up the pieces, Maggie won’t have to sew him back together.
He’s just… happy. Content. Full.
Right against him in the winter cold, Elektra feels light too, light as if nothing was weighing her down anymore. He knows she’s been trying to be… not a new self, but her best self, perhaps. Still prowling and violent, but on her own terms and on her own agenda. Matt doesn't buy she’s doing it just to be with him like Foggy is afraid of, but rather that it’s out of a genuine desire to find out who Elektra Natchios actually is. She’s doing it for herself, and he might be part of the journey; they’ve got history together after all, and a lot of it painful. They’ve got too much in common not to know each other well, sometimes too well.
But now she’s just Elektra Natchios, reborn into a second life, now a free agent no longer bound to any shadow organization. The Hand is no more. The Chaste is no more.
She’s the only one left and she died and killed for both; and now that she’s free to choose she chooses this. Matt tugs her a little closer to kiss the small patch of skin between her scarf and her woolen hat, right where her jaw curves. He can feel her smile. There was blood there on Christmas day, when he came back from his day with Foggy’s family. She said she didn’t kill anyone, as promised, just left them trussed up on the NYPD’s doorstep. He suspects that’s her idea of a present: keeping watch over Hell’s Kitchen for him so he has time to rebuild and strengthen the bridges he tried so hard to destroy, and doing it all according to his wishes and not hers.
Matt’s really not sure she wants to kill, but he knows she will not hesitate if she sees no other solution. She’ll never lose sleep over it. Sometimes, he envies her ruthlessness. Her efficiency. If she ever teamed up with Frank, nothing could stop them. But he doesn’t envy what made her like that. He doesn’t envy not knowing the name she was born with, if she ever had one. He doesn’t envy her path, because what he shares of it sucked and what he doesn’t sucked too. But they’re here and they’re now, and the past and Stick and the Hand… they’re all behind for good.
The cold is biting, but for once Matt doesn’t hate it. It’s winter, but he’s wearing a warm coat and the gloves Elektra gifted him and she’s right next to him and nothing feels wrong. It’s almost unsettling, but… nothing feels wrong. In a few hours it will be a new day, a new year; and Elektra will be right by his side and he by hers. Oh, she’ll still be flitting around the world in her mission to clear her parents’ assets from shady investors and rooting out criminals and the remnants of any organization that ever hurt her, but she’ll come back. She’ll have her fun and her revenge and then come back, to him.
Cars are driving past them, and Elektra stops and turns to wait as one slows down and stops by the curb.
“They flashed their lights at us,” she says. He raises his eyebrows and waits for the engine noise to cut off.
“Hey, aren’t you freezing out there?” It’s Colleen, leaning out of the car window.
“Oh, it definitely looks like they’re keeping each other warm, the way they’re walking.” Detective Knight. He remembers she lost an arm at Midland Circle. She lost more than he did, after all.
“Hi,” he says. “Girls’ night out?” He waits for a beat and – yes.
There are a few thumps from the back seat and Danny’s voice floats up to them. “M’not a girl!”
“Well, maybe you’re the child then, relegated to the back while the grownups decide where to go.” Matt doesn’t need to see Elektra’s face to know she’s grinning.
“I’m hurt.”
“I thought you were the Immortal Iron Fist.” Stifled giggles from the front seats, hah.
“I’m an Iron Fist, and I hate you all. Hey, you hungry? We’re going to get some food, uh, somewhere. Where are we going to get food?” Danny asks Misty and Colleen.
“You said, ‘anywhere that’s open.’ So we’re driving around until we see something we like while you’re sleeping in the footwell.”
“I’m meditating.”
“Definitely the child,” Elektra says. She sounds teasing and relaxed, but Matt can feel the tension in her biceps. She’s still not sure they’re all accepting of her, the dead and reborn assassin who did her best to hurt and kill and hack them into bits. Matt knows Danny, Luke and Jessica blamed her for his choice to stay under Midland Circle. They’re not even wrong. He’d do it all over again, too. (He doesn’t say it out loud. They all know.) But it is a new year, and maybe even a new life. When he found out, Danny said, shit happens and ordered dim sum and asked Elektra to come spar in the dojo he basically lived in, and that was that.
“Sorry, Danny, we’ve already eaten,” Matt says.
“Aw,” a few more thumps as Danny changes position again. He’s like a teenager who doesn’t know what to make of his limbs sometimes. “Well then, come by soon, yeah?”
“Sure,” Matt says. They still haven’t, because Elektra has always found a reason not to go so far.
“Both of you, all right? Or, like, separately. But you’re both welcome. Both of you.”
Elektra’s muscles relax a little in Matt’s hand. “I’d love to,” she says. She means it, too. Sparring with blades, against a metal arm and/or the Immortal Iron Fist (etc etc) might be more of a motivation than making nice with them, true; but Matt suspects she’s genuinely looking forward to both a rematch of her Midland Circle fight with Danny as well as a good session with a skilled katana fighter like Colleen. Elektra likes her sai and she likes her blades.
The car drives away and they’re left alone again, the crowd parting around them as Elektra sighs, long and happy.
New Yorkers are a bit more forgiving on this particular evening and they don't get jostled by pedestrians on the move. Maybe they sense the coiled power in her, and choose to let them be. Matt doesn’t really care, and he’s just grateful that he doesn’t have to choose between her and the friendships he still has in spite of himself. Well, Danny is the forgiving kind, and Claire said Luke came in, saw her and Elektra sitting around the kitchen table and chatting, and just rolled with it; but even Jessica seems to have reached a truce with Elektra.
A few minutes after they start walking again, Elektra turns her head and says, “Smell that? Mulled wine!” A lock of her hair tickles his nose and off they go. She doesn’t wait for an answer, it wasn’t really a question and he’d have said yes anyway. Mulled wine does sound good right now, warm and spicy and just right for the season. Matt thinks of Maggie and her hot toddies, and imagines she probably likes mulled wine too. There are many things he doesn’t know about her, not yet.
Before they get to Union Square, however, his phone starts vibrating in his pocket. Foggy, it says. Foggy, Foggy, Foggy. He pulls it out and tugs Elektra in a building entrance to answer it away from the flow of pedestrians.
“Hey, buddy. Thought you’d be a little busy tonight.” He can’t imagine why Foggy would call right now.
“Matt! Matt, she said yes!”
“Well, what did you expect, Foggy?” It’s not like Marci would say anything else. “So, couldn’t wait until dessert?”
“Nope,” Foggy says. His voice is breathy, like he doesn’t quite believe it yet even though everyone knows it was a done deal. “Matt, I’m getting married!”
“Well, Fogs, congratulations to you both. You deserve each other.”
“Tell him Elektra had better help me or I’m giving back your ring!” Marci’s voice is muffled but still easy to understand, and Matt can picture them nestled together around Foggy’s phone.
“Do you really need to have a terrifying bridesmaid, Marci?”
“Oh, I do. She’s going to help me choose the venue, the colors, the dresses…”
“And the shoes,” Elektra says into the speaker.
“Oh, definitely the shoes.”
“Oh my god, Matt. We’ve created a monster.”
“Who is it you’re calling a monster, Foggy bear?”
Matt tries not to giggle. It’s true that a Marci & Elektra team-up sounds like a powerhouse nothing and no one could resist. Matt hopes he never has to go up against Marci in court, and he knows he could never win against Elektra; they’re both cut-throat, even if only one is literally so.
He doubts Elektra ever had time to make or keep friends, not that Stick would have let her. Matt's glad she’s making her own now, even though Foggy is probably once again cursing the day Matt stepped into their college dorm and they hit it off instantly. Matt sneaks in another kiss to her cheek, cold and rounded by her smile.
“And hey, Matt,” Foggy says.
“Yeah?”
“Would you, um, care to be my best man?”
Matt’s world suddenly contracts around the phone. After all the shit he’s put Fogs through? He can’t quite believe it – he can’t deserve it. “Foggy, but… your brother? Brett?”
“Theo’s going to be too busy fighting with the parents over the catering, and Brett’s officiating.”
“What?”
“Yeah, Bess made him get registered for his sister a few years ago, remember?”
“Oh.” Matt feels very monosyllabic right now.
“So?” Foggy sounds worried. Why does Foggy sound worried? “Matt?”
Elektra takes the phone from his slack fingers. “Matthew’s having a little freak-out, but it means yes.” She pauses. “Thank you.” She sounds more solemn than she usually does.
“We have an understanding,” Foggy says. Matt tilts his head to get an ear closer to the phone. He feels he's missing something here. “If they’re happy, we’re good.”
“We’re good,” she answers. “Enjoy your man, Marci!” she sing-songs in before hanging up and tucking his phone in his inner pocket. Elektra’s hand may have lingered a little on his chest, and Matt feels the world rushing back into focus.
“Yes,” he finally says. “Um, did Marci just… squeal?”
“I think she did, yes.”
“Wow.”
Matt’s still in a bit of a haze as they walk closer to where the mulled wine stand is set up, and for once he’s grateful for his cane even if he’s just holding it and not sweeping it left and right, left and right. He lets Elektra lead them forward, but he knows seeing it in his hand helps clear the path in front of him, and right now he’s not sure he can focus well enough to avoid bumping into people. Elektra doesn’t say anything and leaves him to his thoughts, and he stops when she stops.
“Oh my, what have you done to him?” It’s Maggie’s voice. How can it be Maggie’s voice? How can he not have recognized her? “Matthew, are you with us?”
“He’s still trying to process Franklin asking him to be his best man, I think,” Elektra says.
“Oooh, will you wear a tux then?”
“I will definitely make him wear one and enjoy it.”
What is happening? Someone knocks a cup against his fingers; he reflexively takes it and his cane clatters to the ground. Maggie snickers. “But,” he says.
“Relax, Matthew. You look really nice in a tux, I promise.” He hears Elektra pick up the cane and fold it. “Here,” she says as she slides the strap over his free hand.
“So what brings you to our humble mulled wine stand, then?”
“We followed the smell of cinnamon,” Elektra answers. “Do you do this every year?”
“We don’t usually set it up here, but the spot was free this year and it’s a good way to make some more money for St Agnes. Not that we’re not grateful for your generous donation, but every little bit helps.”
Elektra steers him to the side so the people queuing behind them can get their drinks, and he hears Maggie talking to another nun – Sister Joanne, he thinks – to let her know she was taking a break. “Best man,” he says.
“Yes, Matthew. How is that a surprise to you?”
“And you’re a bridesmaid.”
“Yes.”
Maggie joins them. “You know what they say about weddings.”
“That people… get married?”
“Don’t be a smartass, Matthew.”
“What do you mean then?” he asks.
Maggie ignores him. “Are you going to try and catch the bride’s bouquet, then?”
Matt is starting to feel nervous. What are they talking about? He thinks he knows what they’re talking about. But they can’t, right? A small, strong hand slides under his coat and pulls him forward, and he feels Elektra’s breath on his face. She’s about to – “You’re not going to kiss me in front of my mother,” he says.
She does before he fully realizes what he’s just said and it’s only later, much later in the evening, that he remembers his mom’s little hitched breath.
Foggy is the only one to get married that year, but Elektra does catch the bouquet and dries it carefully and leaves it on his (their) bedside table, and it’s as good as the real thing.