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“A costume party?” Matt says, when Foggy broaches the topic over dining hall lunch. His eyebrows arch over his glasses in a way that says doubt, but his lips quirk in a way that says I'm listening.
Sometimes Matt forgets that a facial expression is a sum of many parts, and about all the parts his pretty face contains. Foggy couldn't forget a single one if he tried.
“It’s gonna be on the thirteenth floor. You know, you either run from superstition or you embrace it? From what I hear, they're embracing the hell out of it. Halloween party for the ages. Nobody gets in without a costume. Nobody leaves sober.”
Matt hmms at his turkey sandwich. “So there's gonna be beer.”
“So much beer, buddy. The RA up there is Darian, you know Darian? He's pretty chill. Should be great.” Foggy pauses for a bite of meatball sub, and then to chase marinara sauce at the corner of his mouth. “Saturday, then? You, me, a pocketful of change, and the best Manhattan’s thrift stores have to offer?”
“I'm not sure how I can say no,” Matt’s mouth says, but the eye crinkles peeking out from behind his glasses say, and I'm not trying to, either.
::
Saturday afternoon is crisp and cool, with just enough sunshine to make the trek down Broadway pleasant. Still, every time a breeze whisks along the street, sending dry leaves scuttling like spiders running from a broom, Matt presses a little more snugly against Foggy’s side.
Not a complaint: an observation. A corollary to that observation: Matt feels good there.
Matt's eyebrows of doubt don't make another appearance until they're elbows-deep in second hand clothes. Or at least Foggy is, pushing through racks in Coats and Outerwear while Matt hovers nearby, wearing the aforementioned eyebrows plus a nose wrinkle of displeasure.
“What,” Foggy says.
“No, I’m just - I'm not sure this was a good idea. Are you expecting me to have actual opinions on costumes? Because….”
“Oh please, Matthew. Like this -” Foggy waves a hand at Matt's… everything - “isn’t a carefully crafted image you’ve got going on. And like you aren’t secretly dying to get your mitts on all the pretty pretty people in the hot costumes they’re gonna be lining up to show you. I’m going to have to disinfect you before the end of the night.”
Matt’s nose wrinkle deepens. “You’re probably going to have to do it before we leave here. How many people do you think take the time to wash their old clothes before they donate them to Goodwill, Fog?”
“Eh. You’re gonna make it.” Foggy claps Matt on the shoulder. “I have faith in you.”
::
Coats and Outerwear turns up a gem in the form of a long, flowing, only slightly moth-eaten black cape. Foggy lets loose a crow of triumph. “This is what I'm talking about! I could be a vampire, and, how about this, you could be my pet bat! You could wear all your own clothes, just black ones. We could make you wings out of… I don't know, something, and both wear some of those plastic fangs -”
Matt glides a hand over the fabric, then flicks his fingers like he's trying to rid himself of the touch. “Definitely not wearing plastic fangs.”
“They would impede beer consumption, it's true.” Foggy sighs. “All right, tabling vampires.” And any possibility of nibbling Matt's neck, you know, all in the spirit of Halloween fun. “Saddle up, Murdock. The world of Men's Sweaters and Vests awaits.”
Two aisles over is a veritable gold mine bursting with sweaters ugly enough to count as costumes in and of themselves. But Matt vetoes everything he touches as well as a few things he straight up refuses to, hands darting behind his back when Foggy thrusts the offending garments in his direction.
But then Foggy hits on a sweater vest so soft that his fingers reflexively curl into it as he pulls it off the rack, and he feels sure he's found a winner. The tags have been torn out of the inside, but he has no doubt it's famous maker, and possibly real honest-to-God cashmere - one thing’s for sure, it cost a hell of a lot more than $4.50 the first time around.
He puts it in Matt's hands, and watches Matt's jaw go slack with unexpected bliss.
“Okay, I'm gonna mark that down as a yes,” Foggy says, when half a minute’s gone by and Matt still hasn't said a word, just turned the vest over and over in his hands. “Sit tight, I'm having ideas….”
The vest is steel gray, and goes perfectly with a pair of round-lensed reading glasses Foggy finds over in Accessories. “Try these on,” he says when he makes it back to Matt, who's still standing in the middle of the aisle feeling up knitwear. “Now hold the vest up -”
Foggy swallows. It's difficult, because his mouth’s suddenly gone dry. “Yeah. That works. You as Harry Potter, that definitely works.” Not just aesthetically either, although the aesthetics are staring him in the face, holy shit. But there’s all the rest of it too, the stuff Foggy definitely isn't going to bring up, like the tragic orphan childhood and the prepubescent tendencies towards heroic deeds and self-sacrifice…. “I could dye my hair,” Foggy continues, “pick up one of those ugly sweaters, go as Ron…. What’s wrong? Your mouth is doing a thing.”
Tactical error. See the thing, find a way to deal with the thing, but never ever mention the thing, or Matt would plaster on a smile and deny deny deny. Now that Foggy’s screwed up, there’s only one option left: jump in before he can start. “Are you too Jesus-y for Harry Potter? Is that it?”
“If I were too religious for Harry Potter, I’d probably be too religious for Halloween,” Matt points out logically. He's silent for a moment, chin tipped down, but when Foggy inhales to speak Matt beats him to the punch. “If glasses are going to be part of my costume, I'd - I'd prefer tinted ones,” he says quietly. “These aren’t, are they?”
Oh. Oh shit. “No buddy, they aren't. Hand ‘em over. Let's go shake down a glasses display.”
::
None of the spinny racks have Foggy’s back when it comes to dark John Lennon glasses. It's a damn shame, because costume dreams aside, “Round glasses suit you, FYI,” Foggy says. “File it away. Future reference.”
Matt colors faintly. It's a hue that Foggy used to label as “don't scare the straight boy pink,” but there are moments these days when he’s less and less sure of that interpretation. Foggy looks away before he does something stupid like ask what he should call it, and applies himself to searching the very last rack.
Jackpot.
“Matt Matt Matt. Matty McMatt. We got it.”
“Got what?” Matt asks, already grinning. In reply, Foggy breaks into a soundtrack-worthy chorus of Hiiiiiighway to the danger zone! while his fingers close around their prize.
“What we have here is a pair of high-quality, maybe not even knock-off, Ray-Ban aviators. Lenses are scratched like a son of a bitch -”
“Oh no,” Matt says, grinning harder. He’s already pocketing his own glasses; Foggy bumps the back of his hand with the new pair, and Matt slides them on.
Foggy’s struck speechless. Fourth-grade-spelling-bee speechless, unable to force his tongue to form a single word. Probably because it thinks there’s no point; he wouldn’t be able to hear over the pounding of his heart anyway.
Come to think of it, it was probably around fourth grade that Top Gun first entered Foggy’s psyche, with all of its extremely good-looking people looking extremely cool jumping in and out of Navy jet fighters in their flight suits and aviators. And since Sunday afternoon cable tended to rotate through the same catalog of movies every few weeks, it had plenty of chances to settle into Foggy's subconscious and really make itself at home.
Matt in that pair of aviators is - it's -
That indefinable warm hue is staining Matt’s cheeks, and with a heroic effort, Foggy rallies. “Welcome to New York, Mr. Maverick,” he says.
“Maverick was his call sign, not his last name.” Matt's grin is out of control, pedantic pink-cheeked loon that he is.
Foggy waves this detail away. He's got more important things to worry about, like mapping the nearest military surplus store on his phone.
::
In the end, all Brown’s Army & Navy contributes is a handful of insignia patches. Even the secondhand flight suits are out of their price range, and not only that, the nose wrinkle of displeasure comes back with a vengeance when Matt gets his first good whiff of one.
It's all good, though. “Nelsons are a resourceful people,” Foggy tells Matt, phone to his ear, and it's true. Once in motion, the wheels spin quickly: a few calls, a Sunday afternoon trip down to the Kitchen, and by Halloween all the pieces have fallen into place.
The patches add a certain air of authenticity to a pair of green mechanic’s coveralls borrowed from Foggy’s uncle. He safety-pins them on with his head bent resolutely over his task, ignoring the action on the other side of the room - namely, Matt stripping off his sweatpants and dragging on battered jeans. They’d settled on Maverick’s casual look; Foggy's uncle could’ve provided another “flight suit,” but coveralls that were kinda loose on Foggy would’ve left Matt swimming in fabric. So they’d turned their attention to the depths of Foggy’s high school closet instead, and found an option both of them liked better.
Make that a lot better.
Foggy glances up just in time to see it happening: Matt shrugging into Foggy's old black leather jacket. He'd always felt vaguely silly in it back in high school, but he'd worn it until it got too snug anyway, because his grandpa had given it to him and by God Nelsons wore their presents. But now -
“It’s official. The jacket has found its true master,” Foggy says, and Matt beams like a damn lighthouse.
They’ve been pre-gaming, of course, but Foggy hasn't made it to the bottom of his first beer yet, and he's way too sober to take that smile in stride. The fact that Matt's not wearing his glasses just makes it worse; everything about him is happy and soft and so, so bright that Foggy has to clear his throat before he can speak. “Hold on, I’m almost with you,” he says, stepping into the coveralls. They’ve got a long crotch-to-neck zipper, and when Foggy gets done with that - leaving it pulled down far enough for his film-accurate white t-shirt to show nicely - he risks a glance over. Matt’s doing a head-tilt. “All done,” Foggy says, figuring that’s what Matt’s trying to work out.
“Mm. Mmhm. Is - is everything still on straight?” Matt pats at the chest and shoulders of his jacket, wreaking havoc on the patches Foggy’d attached for him earlier.
“Everything was,” Foggy says, moving closer and batting Matt’s hands away. “Cease. Desist. Let me.”
“Yes sir.” Matt flutters his fingers in a vague salute. “You smell like engine grease.”
“Jet engine grease, and don’t you forget it.” Foggy straightens the American flag patch on Matt’s left shoulder. “I’m surprised you haven’t been complaining about that coat. The closet of my youth was home to many smells.”
“You think the closet of your college years is any better?” Matt says, but Foggy barely hears him, because his words are accompanied by something else that clamors for his attention: the slow lip-curve that says -
Well.
That particular translation’s a work in progress.
Trouble is, Foggy doesn't trust his own judgment. It's so easy to see things through a filter of wishing - of hoping - of wanting - that he's abandoned that work every time. But now, tonight, with Matt looking so perfectly at home in Foggy's clothes, ready to go out before God, the thirteenth floor, and everybody in a costume that marks him instantly as Foggy's other half, he wonders -
What if he's going about it all wrong, trying to interpret it through sight?
What if it's meant to be read by touch?
Foggy's heart pounds in his chest like it's suddenly decided to run off and join a marching band. It only gets worse when Matt says, “So - are you - can I - can I feel up my first hot costume of the night?”
There’s only one right answer to that. Foggy croaks, “Sure, buddy. Knock yourself out.”
Matt proceeds to provide a textbook demonstration of the word thorough. Starting with a hand on each of Foggy’s shoulders, he works his way inward until his palms come together just below the hollow of Foggy's throat. His left hand settles there, broad and warm, while his right keeps moving, trailing down the open neck of the coveralls, fingers taking a detour over the collar of Foggy's t-shirt along the way.
Breathing is becoming something of a challenge, as if Foggy'd gone schlepping five miles down a parade route with that marching band. From what he can tell, Matt’s having some trouble too; occasionally he pulls in a long, dragging inhale, chest visibly rising and falling with it. Still, he’s painstakingly slow and intent as he learns Foggy's costume with his hands, coming to rest on the F-1 fighter patch pinned over his heart.
“It's already on straight,” Foggy says softly, fingers curling over Matt's.
“Yeah? You sure?” Matt says, completely overplaying the eyebrows of doubt - they're so exaggerated that Foggy snorts gently.
“Yep. I gotta say, though -” Foggy's voice is remarkably steady, for all his heart’s doing a percussion solo, so loud and so hard it seems like Matt should be able to feel it vibrating in his fingertips. “I'm starting to wonder if you might have a thing for men in uniform.”
There goes that lip-curve again, slow, slow, slow. “Depends. Does it have to be a general thing? Or can it be specific?”
“How -” Foggy swallows. “How specific?”
“One man in uniform?”
Foggy nods. Not because he’s forgotten Matt can’t see it, but because his head wants to get in on the action, be part of the yes, yes, yes, his mind is screaming. “One man counts. Yeah.”
“Well, if that’s the case... guess I do.”
Matt just stands there, his pretty lips bowed sweetly in his pretty face, until Foggy leans in to find out exactly what they’re saying for himself.
::
It truly is a Halloween party for the ages.
The hallway on the thirteenth floor is lit by blacklight, and fake spiderwebs are draped over every available surface. Foggy narrates the first for Matt for the sake of ambiance, and the second to give him a heads-up before he inevitably gets some plastered to his face. Foggy may be an excellent navigator, but his powers do have limits.
They arrive fashionably late, and very well-kissed. Foggy's lips are pink and tingling, and he can still feel the weight of Matt's palms on his cheeks - it turns out Matt likes to cup Foggy's face, hold him still and close while he maps his mouth, and it also turns out Foggy is very much okay with that.
Foggy is a fingers-in-hair kind of dude himself, so even though Matt ducked his head and let Foggy tackle the damage with a wet comb, when they hit the party it's still something of a sexy mess. “Because you needed to look even hotter in that costume, Jesus,” Foggy’d said, and Matt had bare-tooth grinned like the world’s dorkiest predator.
No one wants to see an RA as cool as Darian get axed, so people do a fairly good job of keeping alcohol in the rooms and out of the hallway. Foggy's favorite room is the one offering Jell-O shots made in little Halloween molds: cats and bats and pumpkins. He’s always kinda loved Jell-O shots, and he learns he really loves watching Matt lick each one thoroughly before popping it into his mouth, all in the name of guessing its shape.
It's a game Matt wins every time, but that doesn't lessen the entertainment factor one bit. Foggy isn’t the only one in the room shamelessly enjoying the proceedings, but he's the only one who gets to kiss Matt in the stairwell afterwards, and taste the sweetness on his tongue.
Matt’s lips might just be his new all-time favorite Halloween treat.
The first time they cross paths with Marci, just inside the door of an overcrowded dorm room, she laughs so hard the contents of her Solo cup nearly end up down the front of her flowing white dress. It’s an impressive last-second save, Foggy has to give her that, and he’s even more impressed by her ability to laugh in the face of Matt in his Tom Cruise get-up, because seriously, the hotness is no joke. Nobody else has given them the slightest bit of shit about their coordinating costumes, and while Foggy figures logic like if he's gonna be hanging off his arm all night, they might as well match is probably running through people’s heads, there's no way the hotness isn't a factor.
“You two,” Marci gasps, “you’re too much - too much -” She shakes her head and glides away, apparently too overcome to expound on her rudeness. Foggy thinks that counts as a win. Leaving Marci lost for words always does.
“What was she supposed to be?” Matt asks.
“I don’t know, some goddess, probably? White dress. Leafy gold thing in her hair. Big gold bracelets. Judgy expression.”
“Ah. Playing to her strengths, then.”
“Yeah.” Foggy snorts. “Um. Are... are you sure you didn’t want to see for yourself? Or, you know, not with her, she’d probably eat your hand, but with anyone else? You were probably expecting to experience a lot more in the way of hot costumes tonight. And, hey, I saw some sanitizer in 1309, so….”
Matt squeezes his arm. His grip is ridiculously strong. “Shut up,” he says, “and come let me check yours out again. On the landing.”
The evidence soon suggests that the zipper on Foggy’s costume might be Matt’s new all-time favorite Halloween treat. With his mouth on Foggy’s and his other hand pressed square over Foggy’s heart, he drags it up and down, long slow pulls and quick fiddly twitches, until Foggy’s very glad for a wall to lean against because his knees are out of the game entirely.
But it’s not only the stairwell that sees all the action. As the night wears on, they get a little too drunk on potent Halloween-themed drinks (something called “Death Punch” lives up to its name and then some) and a little too drunk on each other to keep all the fun to out of the way places. Finding out that Matt will glow like a jack o’lantern when Foggy nuzzles his jaw right out in the hallway leaves Foggy spinning in a new and perfect way.
The second time they cross paths with Marci, she’s down the hall talking to someone in a Chewbacca suit, and Matt’s got his nose pressed to Foggy’s temple. Foggy’s the only one who knows she’s there - that white dress glows like a beacon under the blacklight - or about the softness that steals over her face when Matt replaces his nose with his lips. Like now that she knows it’s actually like that, she can’t help approving in spite of herself.
Damn straight, Foggy thinks, humming to signal how much he likes the little kisses Matt’s peppering into his hair, since Matt’s the only one who can’t see it all over his face. Then he steers Matt back towards the stairwell, because, well. Sometimes it’s just the perfect place.
The decorations, the liquor, the room full of people drunkenly attempting the Thriller dance - Foggy will remember these things in flashes, scattered snapshots in a shoebox, pops of color in the background of a keepsake frame. But it’s moments like this that will be front and center: the weight of Matt’s fingers on his face. That pink flush darkening on Matt's cheeks, the one Foggy’s almost decided means yes and please and sometimes a very emphatic more. The warm, wide curve of his lips that says -
Maybe it’s okay if Foggy doesn't have that translation ironed out perfectly yet. Maybe it’s meant to take a little time. But it's sweet, and it's real, and it reads an awful lot like love.
