Chapter Text
It’s sometime during their third semester at Columbia, when Foggy has finally stopped feeling extremely guilty about forcing Matt to go to the check-up clinic that one time and has downgraded to merely ‘very’. Matt himself has mostly stopped feeling the doctor’s hands at night and falls asleep easily in Foggy’s presence again, which helps, seeing as the elective he chose - Spanish - is held at the seriously ungodly hour of 7.15 am on Thursday mornings.
At least Matt is able to wake up from a rather quiet alarm that doesn’t rouse Foggy when it goes off (even if Foggy told him that would be fine , and while Matt has known Foggy for over a year now, the idea of an owner not only not punishing you for accidentally waking them up, but actively allowing you activities that run the risk of doing so sometimes still seems like a dream. Matt also knows Foggy would have preferred his company in Punjabi class, which makes him permitting Matt, his study aid, to choose something else even more ludicrous.)
For today, though, Spanish is over and Matt is on his way back to their dorm - and then he pauses. Foggy doesn’t have any classes on Thursdays until the early afternoon, so he’s usually still asleep by the time Matt comes back from his, but today he’s already awake.
Not only awake, but very awake, standing in the middle of their room, his heartbeat going far faster than usual. Matt pauses for a moment in the corridor, knowing he must look like a blind person who’s lost count of his steps or something, but he doesn’t care - Foggy is alone in the room, just standing in the middle, and there’s also the smell of… cake?
Matt frowns.
Is Foggy just for some reason just very excited about cake?
At least, he is now also able to detect that there aren’t any scents of worry or stress or anger in the air, so his owner does seem to be happy-excited. Nothing to fear, then.
Which is the moment Matt also just about catches a sharp smell of something burning , and he’s at the door in two seconds out of reflex.
“Foggy?! Is every-?”
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”
Matt freezes.
“Hap...happy birthday?” he croaks. “You mean...is it….?”
“Yours, you dolt!” Foggy cheerfully exclaims. “I know, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snoop but when I was cleaning up yesterday I found your papers again and there was your birthdate on the front page and I felt like a total idiot because I never thought to ask…”
Foggy’s voice falters. This may be because Matt knows he is certainly making some facial expression now, but he has almost no control over his muscles at this point, so it may look pretty frightening.
“...Matt? Matty? Is everything - oh god, should I not have - did you not want - because of - Matt, I’m so sorry- !” Foggy is starting up again, hurriedly setting the cake he had been holding aside on his writing desk and stepping closer to Matt, hands hovering close enough to touch Matt’s arms.
Maybe because Foggy had also just realized that the last time Matt’s birthday had held any meaning for him had been the day he had been collared at 18.
“Matt. I’m so...I’m so sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I’m so stupid. Please sit down, can I get you something, I didn’t - I didn’t mean-”
And it’s probably Foggy’s genuine panic that finally lets Matt snap back together again, and he manages to clear his throat, one hand coming up to gently grasp Foggy’s forearm where his owner has been trying to lead him to sit down.
“No, Foggy, it's...it's fine,” he manages.
“Uh,” Foggy swallows. “You didn’t look fine, buddy.”
“No, I am, really it’s just…” Matt tries a wavery smile. His voice is still a bit shaky, because yeah, the memory of that awful day when the collectors came to the orphanage, when he had still considered running away but decided against it, because maybe it wouldn’t be too bad (hah), maybe he could find some legal way out of it if he worked hard enough (double hah) - that memory was still there, but what was also there where the memories of all his other birthdays before that, birthdays where there had been cake and candles and presents, first from his father, but then also from the nuns who really tried to make you feel special and important, just for a day.
“It’s just...it’s just been a while,” Matt whispers, and he can feel some tears pricking at his eyes (which he hopes his glasses conceal or else Foggy will get the wrong idea again), but he also manages to force his expression into a firmer, more genuine smile, and his voice to sound just a little not like an adult man having a mini-breakdown over a chocolate tart. “So,” he therefore manages instead, “is there a birthday cake?”
“Wha - yes! Yes of course there is! What do you take me for, Murdock?” Foggy exclaims and turns around, lifting the baked confection from the desk again, and it shows up as an intense spot of heat and cocoa to Matt’s senses. “I even decorated it with twice as many candles because we didn’t get to celebrate your birthday last year!” (Which had probably been mostly due to the fact that Foggy had owned Matt a grand total of three months by the time it came up and they had been busy with mid-terms. They also hadn’t really celebrated Foggy’s birthday, because it had been during their first finals phase - Matt had only found out about it later, all of this happening during a time when he had still been rather hesitant to ask about personal information from Foggy - but it does explain why to Matt the cake seems to mostly consist of fire).
“Twice as many, huh?” Matt says.
“Yeah! And I know you can’t see them, but trust me, they look amazing. Also I figured it might still be fun to try and blow them all out in one go?” Foggy asks, sounding a bit uncertain, but hopeful.
“Yeah. I remember that being fun,” Matt says, and it’s a relief to finally find a bit of their habitual playfulness back in his voice. “And I can tell they’re there, Foggy, the smell of burning wax and the heat of a mid-grade furnace is a bit of a giveaway. I’m surprised the smoke detectors haven’t gone off.”
“Excuse me? I’m a responsible person,” Foggy defends himself. “I looked up a youtube tutorial and disabled them. Or…” the hand that isn’t holding the cake plate goes up to rub the backside of his head, “well, maybe broke them, I’m not sure.”
“Foggy, that’s a punishable offence under dorm rules,” Matt can’t help but genuinely laugh now. “They’ll think we’re smoking in here!”
“Bonafide rebels, that’s us,” Foggy says and even with the jocular tone, Matt doesn’t miss the undercurrent of genuine affection and seriousness in there that still lets his own throat close up whenever he hears it.
“Well, then I should probably blow them out before they actually set something on fire, right?” Matt asks and smiles. “Don’t worry, I can tell where they are by the warmth.”
“Yeah, go for it!” Foggy cheers, lifting up the plate so Matt won’t have to bend down for it. “Don’t forget to make a wish!”
Matt doesn’t forget, and blows. Foggy doesn't ask him what he wished for - they both know there's only one thing Matt wants above all else.
“Got all of them, nice!” Foggy informs Matt unnecessarily and happily. Then he drops his voice and adds, somewhat more quietly, “It's gonna come true buddy, just you wait.”
Matt only smiles back. He knows that freedom is insanely unlikely, so he can’t let himself dream just yet. “Thank you, Foggy,” he says instead, because that applies in any case.
“Hah, don’t thank me yet - we haven’t even done presents yet!” Foggy says and then puts the plate back on the desk to grab something else, a flat rectangle wrapped in crinkly paper. “Happy birthday, Matty,” he repeats as he prods Matt into the chest with it until Matt’s hand comes up to take it.
“Foggy,” Matt finds his throat clogged up for the second time today. “You shouldn’t have.”
“Bullcrap, Murdock. Open it.”
Matt knows it’s not an Official Order, the new system they have worked out over a month ago which delineates what kind of orders he’s free to ignore and which he isn’t, but he clings to it as if it were, because he feels like he’d otherwise fall apart all over again, hands working quickly to obey.
It's a book, Matt can tell before the paper is gone, a book bound in really nice, soft leather, too - apparently Foggy has been paying attention to which books Matt likes touching in particular. It's an attention to detail that would be absolutely terrifying in any other owner, someone who knows you so intimately that he knows exactly how to hurt you in so many ways, but now all it does is close Matt's throat up.
When he has removed the paper, he runs his fingers over the braille-embossed title.
“The Devil in the Grove,” he reads the words aloud, then quirks an eye brow. “Sounds religious?”
“Read the subtitle,” is all Foggy says, and Matt does.
“ A...Thurgood Marshall autobiography?”
“Yeah!” Foggy enthuses. “Remember how Reynolds mentioned that one quote you really liked once? We were all bit too drunk to manage to google it, but I remembered it the next day and turns out it’s by this Marshall guy and he...kinda sounds really like someone you’d like, and his autobiography had good reviews and for birthday present options within my budget it was either this or a tie with cartoon gavels on, so…” Foggy trails off a little. “I hope you like it?” he manages, sounding a bit apprehensive, probably mostly because Matt so far hasn’t said anything.
Because Matt knows what kind of ‘presents’ slaves usually get, when they get any. A blanket. A fidget toy. A new collar. A better basket to sleep in.
Matt has gotten a present you'd give to a person.
“Because if not, fear not, there’s more where that came from,” Foggy says hurriedly, and then bends to pick up a paper present bag Matt only now realizes had been standing at his feet.
“I didn’t have time to wrap it, but maybe just imagine it has a giant red bow on it, alright?”
“...a bow. Yes. Sure, Foggy,” Matt says, knowing he sounds like someone whose vocabulary is on vacation in Canada, but helpless to rally. He tugs the book under one arm and reaches out to take the bag, noting that it’s heavy and smells of...hemp?
He reaches inside.
“You got me...ropes?” he asks Foggy, now even more at sea, and there’s a slight hitch of apprehension - did Foggy get these to tie him up with, there’s a lot of owners who buy toys that are really for their pleasure and pretend they are “presents” for the slave - but, no. Matt knows by now that Foggy is repulsed by the idea of doing anything like that to Matt while he owns him, and he has also never even forbidden Matt to leave the room, much less restrained him physically.
“Are we going to be practising for a late scout badge in tying knots?” he manages to ask instead, because right now Foggy is sounding nervous that Matt doesn’t like his presents and even if he were free and that notion wasn’t completely ludicrous by itself, Matt would never want that.
“No, it’s…” Foggy gives a slight huff. “You know how you’re off to that boxing gym four nights a week at least? And that’s totally fine and man, you put on some serious muscle, super impressive, seriously,” Foggy rambles, before catching himself. “But also...you keep coming home with your knuckles sometimes super busted up. So I went to a sports store and asked about some gloves or wraps - but then they also had these really cool-looking asian rope type things. For stabilizing your wrists and protecting your knuckles, the guy said." Foggy rubs the back of his head. "Also I realize now that youtube tutorials how to tie them probably aren’t going to be helpful and I feel a bit like an idiot, but I’m happy to help you learn how to wrap them. Um. Matt? You’re doing that face again,” Foggy says and succeeds in pulling most of Matt into the present again. He doesn’t know what his face is doing, but if it’s upsetting Foggy, he can’t have that.
“Do you....did I get good stuff?” Foggy asks and sounds more hopeful again, even if still a bit apprehensive. “I still have the receipts, so-”
“No. I. They’re,” Matt manages, one hand clenching around the ropes, the other tempted to reach out.
Foggy has given him a book about justice, ropes for fighting and what is possible the sweetest chocolate cake in the world.
“They’re all absolutely perfect, Foggy,” he manages. “Best birthday ever.”
xxx
It’s two days later, on the weekend, when they’re both sitting on Matt’s bed, laptop open beside them, laughing while Foggy has Matt’s forearm in his lap and is trying to imitate the wrapping style for the ropes the youtube video is showing, cursing whenever he needs to rewind the video while Matt is following along with his free hand to get a feel for the knots.
Usually, feeling someone tie a rope around his wrists would be reason for panic, but Matt thinks that right now, there’s no place he’d rather be than here.
He already suspects, very faintly, that at some point these ropes might be painted bright red with blood, but he hopes that day is a while from coming yet.
Fin