Work Text:
So the thing about being a fledgling law firm (and by “fledgling” Foggy means a law firm so new the ink isn’t even dry on their loan) is that, other than Mrs. Cardenas, they don’t have any clients.
Foggy amends that statement-- he’s a lawyer, amending things is his right-- they also have Mrs. Phelps from Matt’s church. Her nephew is trying to get back on unemployment benefits after his employer denied his claim and Matt, who is apparently unaware that they’re defense attorneys and not labor lawyers, wandered in with Peter Phelps on his elbow, a sob story, and Mrs. Phelps’s famous chicken pot pie wrapped up in tinfoil. It’s not exactly a full workload. Karen could handle Phelps’s case with a google search.
Foggy drums his fingers on his empty desk in the way he knows Matt hates. The folding chair is digging into his ass, and he can hear Karen yawning in the main room.
“I’m bored.”
Matt, sitting at his monitor-less computer with his fingers running over his braille reader, throws him a patented ‘Matt Murdock is Unimpressed With You’ look that falls in his general direction. He’s wearing his glasses, the ones that make him look like one of the Beetles, and the effect is intensified with the illusion that Matt is actually looking at him, and not somewhere near his ear.
It’s intensified further when Matt The Mother Nun says, “Foggy, no one is forcing you to stay here. You’re free to take the afternoon off, we’re not at Landman and Zach’s anymore. You’re a partner.”
Matt has a smug look on his face, like he knows saying the word “partner” will instantly make Foggy break into a grin. It’s not his fault that Matt’s right-- even if they’re paid in chicken pot pies, it feels amazing to have their own practice. He cracks and sticks his tongue out-- Matt will never know.
“Oh come on, like you’re doing work? You’re probably reading porn on that thing.”
“You’re welcome to cop a feel,” Matt The Troll says, and lifts his hands from the refreshable braille reader. His glasses slip down his nose, exposing his grinning eyes. Foggy’s not sure how that works. It’s not like they’re focused on anything, or pointed anywhere in particular. But they still definitely grin.
“Cute, Matt. Cute. But seriously, my brains are going to start leaking out of my skull here, any moment now.”
Karen sticks her head in, hanging off the door jam like a monkey. Her hair, somehow a curtain of gold-- his hair never looks like that, he needs to figure out what shampoo she uses. Matt probably knows, he definitely knew what brand of shampoo Foggy used in college by smell alone-- in the afternoon light hangs off her shoulder. “I’ve filed everything four times,” she says, and there’s something manic in her eyes.
“I didn’t think we had anything to file...” Foggy isn’t sure they’ve even written down their interviews with Mrs. Cardenas, let alone Mrs. Phelps’s nephew. It’s all on the recorder tapes that Matt keeps in his drawers, and on Foggy’s little notepad, bent in half and shoved in his back pocket.
“I made files. To file. Please, you guys have to get work. Not only do I want you to be able to pay me, but I also want to actually have a job to do.”
“We pay you,” Foggy says, even though he only knows this fact because Karen made him sign the check she cut for herself.
“I mean pay me with actual revenue, and not loan money.”
“Oh.”
Matt has a look on his face, another Murdock Special. This one is: I’m Personally Responsible for All Tragedies. It’s a Catholic two-for-one, paired usually with: Soul Crushing Sadness.
Foggy can see it happening in slow motion. “No, Matt, you’re not allowed to do that with your face.”
“Do what?”
“You know what.”
“It’s not like I can look in the mirror, Foggy.”
Matt Murdock is a little shit.
“Paperclip castle!”
The good news is that Karen shakes Matt out of his self imposed doom spiral. The bad news is that their office help might be a little bit insane.
“What?”
“You guys don’t have post-its, or even notebooks. But you have paperclips, lots and lots of paperclips.”
Foggy believes in truth and justice and, more than anything, honesty. He adds: “We stole them. We stole all the office supplies, actually. Even the little creamer packets you’ve been using in your coffee, it’s all from Landman and Zach. We got the loan, but,” he waves an arm at their dour office, and shifts his ass on the shitty folding chair. “Blame Matt. He has this thing about fiscal responsibility and spending ‘within our means.’ Never heard of it myself.”
She smiles, wide and like a shark. “All the more reason, then, to have a little fun.”
According to Karen, the purpose of paperclip castle-- a game born from her time at Union Allied Construction and an apparent plethora of equally-bored engineers-- is to build a structurally sound castle out of wire paperclips.
“No binder clips allowed,” she told them solemnly, although Foggy is pretty sure they didn’t steal any of those anyhow. “And then we shake the table, and see whose castle is left standing.”
Matt yanks his braille display from its USB cord-- gently, that thing cost a fortune-- and tucks it into the desk drawer. “I bet I can win.”
Foggy cracks his knuckles. “Oh, it is on, batboy.”
It takes roughly a half hour for five cartons of paper clips dumped in the middle of a folding table to become three “castles,” if Foggy is generous enough to give their creations that title. Foggy’s is, he’s proud to say, the only one who looks anything remotely castle-like. Karen’s is a squat little box, and Matt’s...
Foggy wonders if he should feel guilty for challenging a blind man to an architectural challenge. He considers it, and dismisses the jury.
Matt’s is a literal pile of paperclips, lovingly arranged.
“Matt, are you ... finished?”
“Yes.”
Karen looks between them, stands up silently, and gives the card table an almighty shove.
Foggy’s creation collapses instantly, in a sparkling explosion of silver metal that looks, to his dismayed eye, like Christmas tinsel. “Oh, come on...”
A second shove, and with a little help from Matt who stands up and accidentally hip-checks the wobbly table, and Karen’s slumps over onto its side. “God damn it.”
Matt is still grinning. Foggy is pretty sure this is his Matt Murdock’s Shit Eating Grin Is Better Than Yours face. It usually comes out when the tequila bottle gets near empty, but apparently stolen office supplies also generate it. Noted.
“I take it I won, then?”
Foggy huffs, and starts to pick up the hundreds of his ‘castle’s’ paperclips off the floor. Karen’s too nice; if he doesn’t she’ll feel obligated to. “Please, that wasn’t even a castle to begin with. It’s...”
Karen is biting her lips trying to hid a smile.
“It’s a sound structure, Foggy.”
“It’s a pile! You moved one third of a large pile of paperclips into a smaller pile of paperclips. One at a time, but that’s what you did. Councilor, I call foul play and poor sportsmanship!”
There’s a knock on their door.
Foggy starts, and so does Karen, and they look up-- both of them still on the floor sorting paperclips into their hands one at a time-- when Brett Mahoney walks in.
He stares at them.
They stare back. Well, Foggy and Karen stare back. Matt stares vaguely behind the Sergeant's shoulder.
“Ah...” Foggy stares back at his hands. His life could be summed up by this situation-- on the floor picking up the pieces of his shattered attempts at building a foundation, holding shiny objects with no value that he stole from the one place in his adult life that offered him a steady paycheck, a place that he willingly left in a move his Uncle Rich still calls, “the dumbest thing you’ve done since law school.”
“Can we help you, officer?”
He’s never sure how Matt knows who is who, but he does. Maybe Brett has a favorite shampoo, too.
Brett stands stock still. He thrusts an arm out towards Foggy, holding a hot pink Thank You card in his hand.
“My mom is convinced someone is stealing her mail, so she asked me to drop this off for you,” Brett says. He sounds just like he did back when they were in elementary school together, a little kid sent on an errand from his mum. “My beat passes through here. It’s not like I went out of my way or anything.” He shifts on his feet, and Foggy dumps the paperclips on the table in order to relieve Brett of his terrible burden.
“Thanks, man.”
The card has what Foggy hopes are several cigars hand drawn on the inside. “Thanks for keeping me in smokes,” it says. “Love, Bess.”
“Aw, your mom loves us. Thanks.”
Brett shuffles. He looks like he definitely would rather be walking in the cold air getting nasty looks from people than in here with them. “If she gets lung cancer I’m going to find some other lawyer and sue you, Nelson.”
“It won’t stick,” Matt pipes in.
“Whatever. Karen, nice to see you. Let me know if you want to get that coffee.” Brett turns on his heel and maneuvers his tall frame out of their office. He closes the door behind him, and the little cardboard sign that reads, “Nelson and Murdock,” topples backwards onto the floor.
“Karen?” Matt is sporting Wounded Duck Face. Only he can’t quite keep it together, bits of a smile are crackling on the outsides of his lips.
She looks at him, deadpan, and then winks at Foggy. “I forgot to tell you the other rule of Paperclip Castle. Winner buys everyone drinks.”
“Josie’s?” Foggy suggests.
Matt loses the face entirely, and he’s got a full on Murdock Found Joy smile. Foggy fucking loves those.
“Josie’s.”