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Matt is not fond of having to climb in through his own window, bruised and battered and bleeding. He hurts, and he's tired. Climbing through the window is difficult, but it's not like he can just walk through the front door of his apartment like this. He kind of just wants to sleep, but he can tell that he's going to need actual medical attention.
He's halfway through the window when he realizes that there's someone else in his apartment.
"Who's there?" he asks, trying to sound threatening, but he breaks off in a whine of pain immediately after and the effect is lost. "Who? Ah!"
"Matt?" comes a voice, and Matt breathes out a sigh of relief, of course it's Foggy. He should have known. His friend has taken to hanging around Matt's apartment when he knows that Matt's out. He's worried. Considering the shape that Matt's in now, he can't really blame him.
"Foggy.." he murmurs, but he falls the rest of the way into the room and lands on his back. He groans.
"Shit! Matt!" Foggy exclaims, and Matt can hear him racing through from the kitchen. There is the faint smell of beer on his person, Matt grimaces. He doesn't like the idea that he's the reason his friend drinks. "Shit man." Foggy says from above his head and Matt manages a weak smile.
"Hello." he says softly, and he can hear the tension in the muscles of Foggy's hands, hovering uncertainly over his chest. He's said the wrong thing, somehow.
"You can't keep doing this Matt." Foggy says, voice grim and serious and pained. He helps Matt stand, and leads him to the couch.
"I can." Matt counters, stretching himself out on the couch, wincing when he stretches the wound in his side. But it's shallow, probably won't even need stitches. "And I will."
Foggy scoffs, moving away to dig around in something, a bag? Looking for something. "I don't know if that's worth this, Matty. What if you get killed?"
"I'm helping people." Matt insists, finally relaxing, and he smells the sharp scent of antiseptic as Foggy opens a bottle.
"But you're scaring me!" Foggy exclaims, the bottle slips slightly in his hand and he drops the cotton balls in his other. His hands shake as he readjusts his grip and picks them back up. "What- What if it was me out there, Matt? What then?"
"No!" Matt says sharp, thinking of all the work that Foggy and Karen had put into trying to stop Fisk, those months ago. Their plans to try and do something. "No, Foggy, no, you- I can't..." Matt breaks off because it has suddenly gotten so much harder to breathe.
He thinks back to the first night on Claire's couch, and wheezes. But he doesn't remember hurting his ribs? But his chest is throbbing and he cannot breathe. What other explanation is there?
"Matt?" Foggy asks, voice softer than it had been, concern lining it, but for once he has no idea where his friend is. His senses are all over the place, he can't hear over the dull roar in his ears, he can't hear where Foggy is.
"Matt? What's wrong?" Foggy repeats and Matt gasps pathetically.
"I-I can't..." His hand grasps at his chest as his eyes roll around uselessly. He's suffocating. "Chest." He chokes out and Foggy's hands are pushing Matt's out of the way, pressing gently on Matt's ribs while Matt slowly suffocates to death on his own couch.
"Matt. Matt!" Foggy's voice sounds a thousand miles away, but Matt hears him. "Matt your ribs are fine."
His ribs are fine? But that doesn't make any sense. He cannot breathe.
"Matt, I think you're having a panic attack." Foggy says, and the fear that Matt is already feeling amplifies because Foggy's voice is so far and his hands are not touching Matt and Matt can't hear where he is. He doesn't want Foggy to leave, it's very important that Foggy stays right here where Matt can keep him safe.
But Foggy's hand clasps his and some of the fear fades. Foggy presses Matt's hand against his chest and he can feel Foggy breathing, can feel his heartbeat, and breath comes easier.
"I need you to breathe with me, Matty, breathe when I breathe."
Matt is still partially convinced that his lung has collapsed. But Foggy says it hasn't and Matt trusts Foggy, and so Matt will try the best he can.
There's a hand stroking through his hair and so Matt focuses on that and on the feel of Foggy's breathing beneath his palm, and he struggles to breathe the same.
As the roar in his ears dulls and the dizziness fades, and Matt can hear Foggy murmuring to him. Quiet words of comfort as he tries to get Matt to calm down, carefully carding his fingers through Matt's hair. His senses come back online and it's all a little too much, but Foggy is there. He pays attention to Foggy and Foggy anchors him like always.
He breathes out shakily, but it's a full breath and that's what counts.
"Christ." Foggy breathes, once he realizes that Matt's breathing is actually breathing, not just sharp and panicked half breaths. "Sorry." he tacks on, and Matt manages a weak laugh.
"It's fine." he says, "Thanks."
"No problem, man." Foggy says, his hand fumbling at the bottle of antiseptic he put down earlier. "I'm... I'm sorry. I shouldn't have pushed."
"No. You-I..." Matt doesn't know what to say, because Foggy is right and wrong at the same time. He wants to help the city but he hates knowing what it does to his friends.
He almost wishes that they never found out. But the idea of doing this alone makes his breath catch in his chest.
"It's fine." he settles on, forcing himself to lay still as Foggy cleans the wound on his side. Thankfully, it's the only serious one he has, it's over quickly.
"You're still all gross, with sweat and blood." Foggy says, taping a bandage over the wound carefully.
Matt snorts, "Yeah, I can smell myself."
Foggy laughs, long and loud and relieved. "That must be fucking awful, dude."
And Matt laughs with him because it is awful, and so Foggy helps Matt's sorry ass to the bathroom and into the shower. And Foggy waits, sitting on the toilet, "just in case Matt falls" and the two of them talk, idly, until Matt fumbles for a towel and gets out, a little unsteadily.
Later, as they lay beside each other in Matt's bed, Matt hears Foggy turn his head to face him and so he does the same, even though there's no point.
"Just..." Foggy's voice tapers off, but Matt stays silent, waiting. "Just take care of yourself. For me, yeah?"
Matt drags his fingers lightly over his sheets until he finds Matt's hand, and he grasps it tightly. "Of course I will."
Foggy squeezes his hand, and Matt smiles, and he finds it easy to fall asleep that night with Foggy at his side.