My Devil

Chapter 4

Your scream silenced the entire precinct as it echoed through the building and you fell to your knees with a thud, tears streaming down your face. Your mind blurred, your heart plummeted and your breath became a rapid and panicked pant; a mirror image of Matt when he was stressed. It was only when Karen pulled you into a tight hug, her shirt muffling your mouth that you became semi-conscious of the pained and animalistic sobs that were escaping your lips. The small groups of the other families and friends that had been stuck in the police station with you for the last two days, all stood in their corners, quiet and watching the scene unfold in front of them.

Matt? Matt was gone? How? How could Matt just be gone? Only days ago you had been tucked up safe and warm in bed together; from the moment he had asked you to trust him with one last Daredevil quest, to the moment he had asked the three of you to the precinct for your own safety, to the last time he had kissed you just that night before he left for what you now realised was the last time, had you encouraged this? Had his death been not some act of god or random chance, but if you hadn't lent Foggy your key to the apartment to pick up Matt's damn Daredevil suit maybe you wouldn't be screaming on the floor mourning the loss of the most important thing in your life right now. You had basically signed Matt's death certificate with your own hand.

But what else could you have done? Matt wouldn't have listened to anyone when he had been there, acting both lawyer and hero. No one could talk him down from that fight. He had promised one last one and then done. He had promised he would come back but that an old friend needed him. He had promised. And yet here you were. Without him.

"Y/N?" Foggy asked carefully and a fog of pain and rage washed over you. It couldn't have taken you more than a minute to shake your head and stand. "I'm fine" you lied smoothly, wincing a little, you had never really experienced grief like this before. It was strange, this pain was different; when your parents had died it had been a numb kind of acceptance of grief, but now it was disbelief, a gut feeling that Matt couldn't be gone, a physical pain in the gut that was actually becoming quite painful now. "I'm fine" you lied again, wincing again when quite literally everyone in the room looked at you in utter shock and disbelief. It was as if a switch had been clicked inside you and the pain that had filed your scream had let out any sorrow you felt in one burst. Even you were struggling to believe your words, your stomach churned and you sprinted for the door, shoving Karen out of your way as you did so and made for the bathroom just down the hall.

It was with a loud bang that you slammed the toilet stall door shut behind you and sat down, almost doubled over in pain. But the point at which the emotional pain became physical was difficult to pinpoint. Matt couldn't be just, gone? What were you supposed to do without him? You knew somewhere in your gut that perhaps you were being selfish; Matt wasn't yours and he had... died... doing what he knew was right and protecting other people. But he couldn't just leave you like that?

As you sat there, mind a blur of thoughts both rational and not, the province of the bathroom gave you a moment to cry, something only a few, including Matt, had ever seen you do. Something warm pooled on your leg and at first, you thought it was tears, dripping from your nose and onto your jeans in little drops. But it was as you looked down through the blur of tears you saw red seeping through your clothes and you realised. A sobbed gasp escaped your lips as you realised the pain was real, had it been a different day the pain would likely have been no worse than regular cramping, but today combined with the emotional pain it was a searing loss. "Y/N?" called Karen but you didn't reply, only looked at the blood on your fingers and jeans in pained silence. "Y/N?" she called again. This time a choking sob escaped your lips as you tried to reply, but no words came. All you could do is reach up and bolt the stall door, letting it swing open with a squeak and an eventual slab against the wall. "Oh Y/N" Karen signed on seeing you and made to move towards you but paused in her tracks when she saw what you were looking at. "Y/N?" she asked cautiously "What's going on?"