Distract Me: A DareJones Fanfic

The Haunting Scent

Seems Matt has his own issues to deal with. Luckily for him, Jess is just as good at distracting in her own way. 

****Notes: It's not really explained in the fic, but what Matt is reacting to is the scent of cloves, which is one of the main ingredients in choji oil for a katana. It is canon that Matt figures out that Typhoid Mary and Mary Walker are the same person. Just different personalities. After some idea tossing my friend who writes Jess and I decided that it would be the choji oil that would tip him off because Mary Walker would have no reason to use that stuff. Cloves are also used in a lot of autumn scents. So, I could imagine Matt becoming even more volatile around that time when EVERYTHING has it.*********

He used to love the smell of autumn as a kid. Crisp leaves, pumpkins, and apples brought about happy memories for him. Before he was blinded, he remembered the scent of the next door neighbor baking pies while he did his homework. That was before Mary.

Foggy still didn't know everything that happened between him and Mary Walker. He didn't like to talk about it. Who would want to talk about the woman that gets a kick out of waltzing into your life at random moments and try to kill you?

Matt never talked about Mary to anyone. Hoping that he would never have to deal with that nightmare again. So, whenever autumn rolled around, no one understood why he would suddenly get agitated. Not just grumpy, but there were times he would get right down hostile.

A good example was the time that Karen tried to freshen up his office with an Autumn Mist candle. His smile was tight and forced. There was no laughter. Barely a thank you, which was very unusual for him. Once she left the room, he launched the candle out the window as if it stung.

The whole incident would have gone unnoticed if one Jessica Jones hadn't been walking under the window right at that exact moment. The candle didn't make it. It also got her attention.

Walking into the office, she set what was left of the poor candle on his desk with a confused Foggy and Karen looking on as she asked, "Do you make it a habit of throwing candles at people or were you trying a new way to get my attention?"

Matt's ears turned pink in embarrassment at being called out. Quickly, it was replaced by him tensing up and clenching his teeth. It was obvious that there was a war going on with him and he was losing.

Jess understood the look very well. She had that look after she came back. She was surprised to see it on Matt's face. She also didn't know what a damn candle had to do with it.

Deciding to bring some humor into this, "You know you beaned some weird guy in a trench coat cuddling a toy unicorn. He wanted me to tell you nice arm."

That didn't really help. If anything, it made it worse. Matt's head snapped up with the grim expression on his face. Grabbing the cane that he really didn't need, he moved to leave and the look on his face made it clear that it would be unwise to get in his way.

When the door slammed shut, she turned to Foggy, "What was that about?"

He just shrugged, "Don't know. He always gets irritable around autumn. Been that way since law school."

Jess waited to see if he would say more but from the way Foggy was acting, he wasn't going to say anything else. He might not know or it might be some weird Bro Code thing. She didn't have the time or the patience to find out. She needed to get to Murdock before he did something stupid. Like try and find another building to fall on him.

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It seemed that luck was on her side this time because the only thing he did was go home. She could have left it at that and went to do her own thing, but she admitted to at least herself, that she was worried. She also knew from personal experience that it probably was not a good idea to leave him alone. Not only that, he wouldn't leave her if the roles were reversed. Sometimes it really sucked giving a damn.