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Day 5: Matt and Foggy find Max for Frank as a birthday present.
Pups and Porcelain
Foggy had no idea how he’d gotten into this mess. He threw a side glance to see his former (?) best friend asleep in the passenger seat and then looked in the review mirror to see that the drooling ball of gray fur was still wiping snot on the window in the back seat. Nope, Foggy didn’t have a clue how this had all happened. He wasn’t willing to admit to himself even for a second that when Bret told him that Daredevil had been asking around after a dog that had been brought in with the Punisher—that’s right a fucking mass murder who had shot him for Christ’s sake—he’d been compelled to figure out just what the hell was going on. And he certainly hadn’t called Matt to ask why the fuck he was asking about said psychopath’s dog. None of that happened at all. He was completely at a loss…
Okay, that wasn’t exactly true.
If he were completely honest with himself, Foggy had to admit that he had actually been glad to have a bullshit reason to contact Matt that was just barely on the amusing side of crazy rather than taking on the mob with sticks kind of crazy. Matt had actually been reluctant to say anything at all when Foggy showed up at their old office demanding answers.
“You’re not a dog person, Matt. Well, you always said you weren’t a dog person,” Foggy corrected himself as he flopped uninvited into a chair. “Why are you looking for the Punisher’s dog?”
Matt grimaced and shrugged. “I guess I was just curious… Frank seemed to care about him.”
“The man has as much feeling for human life as he does a potato, and you think he might care about a dog?” the blond man demanded incredulously. He had obviously been wrong about the exact level of crazy Matt was heading into.
“It’s complicated.” Matt did that weird thing with his jaw he always did when he was making a horrible decision, and Foggy’s heart dropped.
“You actually like this looney-tune…Fuck! Matt, hasn’t your prior relationship history taught you not to stick your dick in crazy?”
“It’s really complicated,” Matt argued. “Nothing’s going on between us...”
“Yet!” Foggy interjected. “Don’t forget the word ‘yet’ in this sentence.”
Matt sighed. “Nothing’s going on between us yet, but the more times I run into Frank the more I realize that there is a lot more to him than just what he’s done. Foggy, I may not agree with the man, but he has his reasons. I didn’t mean to, but I actually care about Frank. The kind of loneliness he’s carrying around with him isn’t easy…” He reached out almost like he could pull the words he was looking for from the air, but still struggled. “He really loved that dog. He would rather they tortured him than hurt that dog. I’m not a dog person, but Frank is and just maybe having someone around who doesn’t give a shit what he’s done with ease up that loneliness.”
“So you are suggesting we track down a specific pitbull out of the maybe hundreds in pounds around the city so we can pack him off to live with the man who by the fucking way SHOT ME?!”
“Well, when you put it like that...” Matt snarked.
“Fine.” The word was out of his mouth before he could stop it. God knew there was no actual reason behind agreeing to this insanity, but it was at least insanity that probably wouldn’t get Matt killed. Also, Foggy had been missing his friend more than he was willing to admit. It may not be a good excuse to hang around, but at the moment finding the Punisher’s pitbull was the best reason he had.
“What?” Matt demanded in shock. “What do you mean ‘fine’?”
“I mean let’s track down this poor, innocent animal and hand him over to a psycho with a gun.”
“You don’t have to...”
“I know I don’t, but I’m doing it. Just tell me what you know. Maybe between the two of us can figure this out.” Foggy pulled his laptop from his bag and began setting himself up across from Matt just like he often did when they were partners.
“Foggy...”
“Just don’t.”
As it turned out, there were an ass-ton of pit rescue groups in New York alone. The number was actually kind of mind boggling. What was even more mind boggling was that it didn’t seem the mutt had ended up in any of them. After being turned over to animal control by the police, it seemed that the Punisher’s faithful Fido had vanished. He’d been shuffled around a bit and then just...gone. Luckily for Fido, Foggy Nelson was too stubborn to believe that things just went poof. It took four days and an annoyingly long phone call to a shelter in Jersey City, but Foggy actually managed to find the damn dog.
“How did he end up in Pittsburgh?” Matt asked when Foggy called to tell him the good news.
“Honestly, I am not really sure. There seems to be some sort of weird underground railroad sort of shit to how these things work,” Foggy sighed into the phone. “I took a look at the pictures that I was able to get Brett to release to me from evidence, and it looks like the same dog. So my next question is: can you be ready at six tomorrow so we can drive down there?”
Matt was silent on the other end so long that Foggy almost thought he’d hung up. “Foggy, you really don’t have to do this… You didn’t have to do any of this. You have every reason not to. I’m just...I’m sorry that I ever dragged you into any of this—and I don’t mean hunting down the damn dog.”
“You can thank me when this is all said and done by not almost getting blown up again like you did last week. I saw the Youtube video of that, by the way,” Foggy said still trying to banish the image of Matt’s limp form in Frank’s arms as the building blew.
“Fuck,” Matt swore. “Has everyone seen that video?”
“Well, it did get knocked out of the most viewed listing pretty quickly by the latest Thor sighting...” Foggy drawled. “Pick you up at six.”
“Thanks, Foggy.”
The next day Foggy pulled up at Matt’s door in a rental. There was a grocery bag full of snacks on the back seat and a few cans of Coke in a mini cooler on the floor. Foggy’s phone was set to his 90’s alt-rock station and ready to go. On the surface it almost felt like that one road trip they took back in college, and Foggy had to keep reminding himself that this was no joy ride. All of this still stemmed from Matt’s habit of running out and beating people up at night. In a way, Foggy wished he’d never found out about any of it. It would be easier if he didn’t know that Matt was a vigilante on the verge of starting a relationship with a wanted criminal, but he did know…
The first hour of the drive was mostly spent in silence with only Better Than Ezra playing to distract them. Matt looked exhausted and Foggy was surprised that he didn’t fall asleep. It occurred to him then that the music that was just comfortably loud enough to his ears could be annoying to Matt. He wished he didn’t care, but he found himself turning it down.
“I can turn the music off, if you want to sleep,” he offered.
“No, I’m okay,” Matt protested. He reached to the radio controls and found the volume, turning it back up to exactly where it had been. “I like this song,” he said softly when “Porcelain” came on.
“It’s a good song,” Foggy agreed.
“I’ve missed you,” Matt said suddenly. “I’ve treated you like shit, and I’m sorry. I wish things could be different.”
“Me too, buddy.” Foggy tried to swallow the knot that suddenly formed in his throat and kept his eyes on the road.
They made it to Pittsburgh just after lunch. Foggy was instantly astounded by how many horrible drivers and fucked up roadways could be crammed into one small city, but it didn’t take too long until they were rolling down a little suburban side street. The houses was all neat little copies of one another with chain link fences dividing the yards. He didn’t have to guess if he was in the right place because there were five large dogs frolicking in the front yard—one of them a gray pit with a slight scar on his forehead.
Beside him, Matt was wincing and pinching the bridge of his nose. “That is a lot of dog shit,” he muttered.
For some reason, Foggy found it hysterical and started laughing uncontrollably. “Dude, there are times your super powers have to suck.”
“Remind me to tell you about the time I ended up in a dumpster behind a day care center,” Matt groaned with a slight chuckle. “Sucking doesn’t begin to describe what that one was like.”
“Worse than being shot?” Foggy asked—testing the waters.
Matt’s smile faltered slightly. “Probably pretty close.”
The pair spent the next hour and a half using every once of their charm to convince the pitbull’s foster mom to let the adopt Fido. Even though he seemed friendly enough, she argued that he had come from a fighting background and would need more time to truly see if he would be a good fit for re-homing. Judging by the amount of slobber on Matt’s pant leg and the smile on the dog’s face, Fido was more than ready to go home with them. By the end of it, Foggy wasn’t entirely sure the foster mom couldn’t have been Reyes’ long lost psychological twin, but it still ended with Fido in the backseat of the car.
On the way back home, Matt eventually succumbed to his exhaustion. Foggy had the radio turned down a bit lower, but being that his friend was sleeping through it, he didn’t worry over it too much. Eventually, “Porcelain” came back on Foggy’s Pandora—an acoustic version this time. As Foggy listened to the lyrics, he was suddenly thinking about things that he usually kept under pretty heavy lock and key. He replayed the a certain verse in his mind over again:
Just the other day I felt I had you by a string.
Just the other day I felt we could be everything.
But now when I see you, you're somebody else.
In somebody's eyes and your skin...
Swearing under his breath, Foggy pulled off of the highway and on to the shoulder. He took a long ragged breath before reaching over and tapping Matt on the shoulder. Matt instantly tensed and made a move to shield himself. “What is it, Foggy?” he asked, still sounding more than half asleep.
“Can you just be honest with me for a minute here?” Foggy asked, forcing his breath to remain as steady as possible.
“Yeah.” Matt sounded far from convincing. “I’ll try. Things are just...”
“Complicated,” Foggy finished with an eye-roll. “I know, but just try… Do you love him?”
“What brought this on?”
“Just answer the damn question! Do you love him?”
Matt sighed and raked a hand through his hair. “I don’t know. I think I could… Maybe I already do. Things are just complicated. This can’t end well, Foggy. I know how this all plays out, but I can’t not care about him. I’m probably falling in love with him, but even if I am, it doesn’t matter. Everyone already knows how this story is going to go.”
“Christ,” Foggy laid his head on the steering wheel. “Can’t you ever fall in love with someone boring? Like an accountant maybe?”
“I wish I could have fallen in love with a lawyer.” Matt said the words so softly that Foggy wasn’t entirely sure he’d heard them.
Years ago even that much of an admission from Matt would have brought Foggy into another orbit, but at the current moment he wasn’t sure if he should laugh or cry. Finally, he just shook his head and put the car in drive. “Makes two of us.”
The next three hours were probably the most awkward of Foggy’s life. When he parked back in the same exact spot they’d left nearly fifteen hours earlier, neither one of them moved or said anything at first. Finally, Matt bent down to grab his cane off of the floor.
“I’m sorry...” he began.
“Don’t be… not about falling for lawyers. The other shit, yes be sorry,” Foggy said trying to be funny and failing even to his own ears. “Tell Frank I said ‘Happy Birthday’ and try not to lose the damn dog again.”
Matt frowned. “How did you know I was doing this for Frank’s birthday?”
“I can run a Google search.” Foggy rolled his eyes.
“Thanks for everything, Foggy.” Matt gave him one of those sad smiles, the kind that never failed to break his heart. “Despite everything, I’m glad I got to spend some time with you.
“Me too,” Foggy agreed. He forced a smile that he knew Matt could “see” right through. “Now get your ass out of my rental so I can play some Selena Gomez and sing horribly without being judged.”
Foggy waited until he was a good three blocks away to turn off Selena and dial Marci’s number. She answered on the second ring as always.
“Hey, Foggy-bear,” she purred into the handset.
“Hey,” he mumbled in return. “Do you remember when I confessed my love to Matt while he was pass out level drunk on his twenty-third birthday?”
“Ugh...that bad?”
“Worse,” he admitted.
“I’ve got vodka and chocolate ice cream,” she said without missing a beat. “We can watch Golden Girls and have meaningless sex if that helps too.”
Foggy smiled. “You are the best thing in my life.”