Chapter Text
You’ve got it bad.
You sniff inwards, nose starting to drip on account of the weather. The bottom of the paper cups sting and dig into your fingers. This is a timed event, a regular one by all accounts. These coffee runs see you return to Matt’s office precisely when his cup sits empty, the faint ring of dried espresso at the bottom the only evidence of his last drink.
He’s never in peril of having to go without. Your eight months as secretary to Nelson, Murdock and Page have seen to that. Like second nature you’ve memorized the rhythm of his days. You can have his files ready before he asks, organized exactly how he prefers: contracts first, discovery second, correspondence last. If you’re lucky enough, his lack of vision will be enough to veil it, protect your affections for him a little longer, under the guise of simply doing your job well. All of it banked on your hope that he’s not that perceptive.
So, a losing battle.
To say you’re pushing it would be an understatement.
How else to explain the stupid, painstaking braille notes you started leaving three months ago? The first one itself cost you fifty-five minutes and a headache (not to mention one stolen slate-and-stylus set, courtesy of the rarely-opened file cabinet), fingers aching from all that gripping and punching just for five words—
Made completely worth it by the smile that had broken across his face once his fingers had finally brushed over those dots.
It’s routine now: arriving early, with coffee from the good cart or brewed yourself, and while it cools to drinking temperature on his desk (never too hot, he burns his tongue), you hunch over, punching away at whatever silly thought, whatever sweet contemplation that’s crossed your mind that morning.
Coffee machine plotting against us / Can feel it
Foggy ate all good donuts tragedy strikes NMP
Happy Friday. All done!
You’re working on today’s (Printer can smell fear / demands human sacrifice. Hire intern?) when the door opens and Matt enters, shaking snow from his dark hair. He’s early. December in New York has been merciless, of the particular wet slush kind rather than the cold, postcard-picture type you’d dreamed about as a kid, but Matt at least navigates for himself well enough to still be charming.
“Morning,” you call out, all casual-like as if your heart hadn’t just kicked into double-time.
“Morning. That fresh coffee I smell?”
“Yeah, just how you like it,” you say, quickly finishing up, and stand to smooth your shirt out, cross his office with the gathered files. To watch him hang his coat and fold his cane gives you the impression of a hot spike sinking between your brows; it’s not hard for you to superimpose apartment walls and picture frames onto the sight, imagine it domestic.
Oh, you’re so gone.
Matt luckily doesn’t notice. He inhales and groans appreciatively, much to the prickled pleasure at the back of your neck. “You’re an angel.”
“Hardly!” You set the folder down on his desk, punched-out index card included. “Um, okay, you have a meeting with a Mr. Meyer from BMP at ten, then the people from the Lust—sorry, Lutz—case are coming here to see you at two… They should have those files you requested. And Foggy wanted to go over the plan for the Gillespie deposition before noon… I left some out, but you can check the rest in the file I sent you.” All of it comes in a rush and you’re straight short for air, but still, with affected nonchalance: “Oh, and your note.”
“...My note.” With the way his fingers search the desk and find it immediately, you’d think nothing you said meant anything to him but just that. You chew on your cheek, bouncing on your toes slightly, watching as he reads. His expression softens and a huff of laughter escapes him, the smile tugging at his mouth.
“What? The printer?”
“Yup. Keeps jamming.”
“I didn’t know you had such cutthroat tendencies in you.”
“Consider it, Matt. Lots of kids out of work there looking for something to do.”
You’re backing toward the door before you can do something stupid, like stay too long. He’s still smiling, and it’s so bright and beautiful it makes you feel stripped bare.
It’s ridiculous, because Matt Murdock is just kind. That’s who he is — kind to everyone, sweet to the elderly clients and charming to the young ones. Beloved by the whole neighborhood. This smile isn’t special. You’re not special.
“Okay, then. Let me know if you need anything else,” you squeak, already fleeing.
“Wait—”
You don’t trust yourself enough to turn around.
“Thanks for the note, it’s sweet.”
Fuck fuck fuck fuckity fuck.
Heart pounding in your chest, you feel like you’re going to pass out. You should say something witty. Something light, biting. Instead, you mumble, “Okay, s’nothing,” and escape to your desk, thankful he isn’t aware of the flush creeping up your neck.
You pass Karen’s office on your way out, and she glances up with an eyebrow raised. She’s caught you staring at Matt’s office door more than once, but to her credit, she’s never said anything.
“You okay?” she asks.
“Yup! Fine!” You collapse into your chair, pulling up the planner on your screen. “Just fine.”
A printer demanding human sacrifice.
Matt can’t help smiling like an idiot far after you’ve scampered back off to your desk. He knows he shouldn’t encourage it—he knows it’s wrong or at the very least, doomed. You’ve been leaving these notes for months now; he should tell you that you don’t have to.
Exploiting his listening ability isn’t something he’s proud of but he does it all the same. Your heartbeat kicks up whenever he’s near. Call it selfish, self-centered, but Matt knows what that means. There’s a sweetness to your scent when you’re near him, warm and coaxing, and it makes him want to gather you up and just—
And just nothing. He can’t. He won’t.
Ruining good things is what he’s best at. Sweet things, of which you’re the epitome— genuine kindness.
It’s not that he’s a nihilist; in fact, he’s been more optimistic as of late. But even if it were all in good fun, all light and casual—he can’t consider the point of starting anything at all. Maybe if he were younger, he supposes, a little less scuffed and clipped by life, he would’ve risked it for a chance at something like this. But you deserve better than a life of constant lies and waiting up at night wondering if he’ll come home at all.
Still, it’s utterly endearing to him, hearing every muttered curse and frustrated sigh from you first thing in the morning as you work on the notes. You spend your lunches sometimes at your desk, just practicing, and he’s heard you prick your fingers more than once—the whispered ow, dammit—as punctuation to countless mistakes.
To tell you to stop would mean not getting these notes anymore. These little windows into your thoughts he’s intoxicated with.
So, there’s nothing else to do but be kind to you in return without crossing that line. There are no dinner reservations, no lingering touches nor confessions. He can’t covet that much. Only this: kindness, sweetness, a mirror to your own thoughtfulness, perhaps more than he should. That’s all he can do.
The coffee is perfect again, he isn’t surprised by that. Tracing the note one more time, Matt sighs and pulls open the drawer.
The card finds its place with all the others.
One way or another though, illusion must give way to reality.
It’s a Thursday. Business as usual. You’re at your desk, slate and stylus in hand, and there’s nothing clever to write. Not even anything particularly funny or interesting. The well has dried up, and your senses instead dedicate themselves to eavesdropping: the conversation is drifting from the break room, where Matt’s getting water.
“You should ask her out,” Foggy is saying. “She was into you, buddy.”
“Ah, I don’t know.”
“Come on!” You hear a thump, and recognize it for the good old-fashioned Foggy Nelson empathic gesticulating. “A, she gave you her number. B, she’s gorgeous, and B point five, she’s a lawyer, so you’d actually have stuff in common.”
A pause, then Matt laughs, soft and a little self-deprecating. “Sure. Maybe.”
“Maybe meaning you’ll actually call her or maybe meaning you’ll lose the number and pretend you never got it?”
“Meaning I’ll think about it.”
You stare down at the slate, at the empty index card holding nothing of note.
Of course.
There’s a gorgeous lawyer from a bar. Probably sophisticated, brilliant, someone who drinks wine without getting her mouth stained and talks legal jargon and doesn’t need to Google half the terms that cross her desk. Someone who fits into Matt’s world.
It’s not like you were thinking you had a chance. A girl who leaves silly notes and can barely manage basic braille.
You set down the stylus. Even many minutes later, the note sits unfinished on your desk, and you stare at it for a long moment before crumpling it up and tossing it in the trash.