Chapter Text
She first ran into him while undercover at Columbia Law School. The mission was simple, just some basic reconnaissance on a suspicious individual, intended to ease her into her new job as a SHIELD spy, but it was her first solo mission since the fateful day Clint chose not to shoot.
Although she would never admit it, Natasha was glad that SHIELD had assigned her something simple. Following the rigorous interrogations she had been put through as soon as Clint had walked her through SHIELD's doors, Clint and Laura had taken her in with open arms, and Natasha had spent the better part of the past year slowly learning to be human again. Their unconditional familial love and support still felt unnatural to her at times, but gradually, she found herself reciprocating their feelings more and more, and their farm steadily grew into her first true home in years.
Having just about survived the mandatory mental evaluations, and passed the physical competencies tests with more than flying colours ("What do you mean, she destroyed all of our agents in every field? Yes Barton, excluding archery, shut the fuck up. Phil, we need to talk to Agent Collins about the standards of his trainees"), she was then cleared for field duty, although only for low-stakes assignments. Natasha couldn't blame them for being wary; she wouldn't trust the highly-trained ex-child-soldier ninja-assassin only recently removed from the top spot of SHIELD's 'extremely dangerous, kill on sight' list either. (She saw it pinned to a wall in the briefing room before leaving, her name neatly crossed out with Clint's signature beside it and a terribly drawn winking face that had made her smile).
A low stakes test mission though it may have been, a mission still it was, and so that is how Natasha ended up posing as a law student in order to investigate the "potential threat": law professor Albert Marlow. A very unremarkable man, Natasha managed to observe precisely nothing of interest during the first few weeks, other than the fact that his tie collection was concerningly large, and absolutely hideous. (Honestly, how can a person with working eyes look at a vomit green tie with polka dots of weak piss yellow and uncomfortably saturated pink, think, "yep, this is the one," and spend actual money on it. Who even sells those monstrosities? The retailers are the real "potential threats" in this story).
The joys of learning about the law, surprisingly enough, were not enough to make the terribly monotonous classes remotely tolerable. Natasha is a spy, not a lawyer, and the intricacies of civil litigation simply do not stimulate the mind in quite the same way as gun fights and car chases through the streets of Venice do (all parties involved in that particular incident remain unidentified by the media even to this day, but Natasha had no doubts that Clint's recent deployment to north-eastern Italy was purely a coincidence). Her subtle envy towards Clint's far more exciting mission firmly ignored, Natasha managed to maintain her character as a studious young woman for yet another tedious lecture, and breathed a deep sigh of relief when Professor Marlow concluded his lesson and left the room.
Intending to follow him, she quickly made her way through the lecture theatre when a long stick was thrust into her path without warning and she tripped over it abruptly. One impromptu Looney Tunes audition later, Natasha whipped around to glare at the oblivious imbecile responsible, some very colourful insults about their lack of spatial awareness at the ready when she was halted by some very important details. Firstly, the stick was in fact not a stick, but a red and white cane; secondly, the owner of said cane appeared to be blind, as evidenced by the cane, sunglasses and textbook blank of print poking out of his bag; and finally, the man in question looked absolutely mortified.
"I'm so sorry, are you alright? That sounded terrible, I should have been more careful, I'm so sorry," he babbled out in an apologetic rush.
"I'll live, it sounded much worse than it actually was, don't worry."
"Phew, that's a relief, it really sounded quite catastrophic. I guess that's just what happens when I wave this thing everywhere without looking around first" he replied, the last phrase coloured with mischief, causing the blond man beside him to groan dramatically and punch him lightly in the arm.
"Enough with the blind jokes, Matt, that's, like, the fifth one in the last fifteen minutes" he chided exasperatedly, but Matt just cackled in response. Natasha smiled as she watched them bicker like children, but she had a professor to investigate, so she quickly excused herself and hurried out of the classroom to hunt down professor Marlow once again.
As the two of them leave the classroom a couple of minutes later, Foggy turns to Matt and hisses, "How do you always know?"
"Know what, Foggy?"
"Do you have some kind of magical hot person radar that alerts you to every 9/10 or above in the nearby vicinity? You've never 'Blind Matt Murdocked' your way into anyone below an 8 in your life."
Matt scoffs, "You can't just use 'Blind Matt Murdock' as a verb, that doesn't even make any sense."
"Nuh uh, nice try Matt, but you didn't answer the question. I see through all of your tricks."
"I don't," Matt smirks. Foggy groans even more dramatically than earlier, "Oh my god, not again."
"Blasphemy."
"Gah! You are truly insufferable sometimes, Matt, why do I put up with you?"
"Because I'm your best friend, your roommate and the only reason your diet consists of more than mac and cheese, noodles and beer?"
"Objection! I eat pizza too." Foggy thinks for a moment. "Actually, you have a point." In a grand voice, he adds, "Rather a convincing case, counsellor. I shall tolerate your presence for at least another day or two." Matt laughs, and they squabble lightheartedly all the way back to their shared apartment.