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Peter: Death certificates don't issue themselves.
Neal: No, coroners do—for around $500, in my experience. I may or may not have faked my death on multiple occasions. Panama City, Bangalore—
Peter: —Monterey Bay. I remember. Gored by a great white shark.
Neal: Thought you might appreciate that.
—4.10 Vested Interest
The first time was a blow, and Peter didn't even know Neal that well then. Peter was sitting in his office on a Monday morning in mid-August, leafing through Interpol reports, and he turned a page and found himself staring at a Certificado de Defunción from Ciudad de Panamá with the name "Caffrey, Neal George" clearly printed on it. A death certificate. Peter's jaw clenched, and he scrabbled through the pile of papers in search of a translation. There was one, stapled to the certificate, cause of death listed as accidental, fatal injuries to kidneys and lungs after a fall from a third floor balcony onto a bicycle.
"Dammit, Neal," muttered Peter, crumpling the page in his hand. The kid had been brilliant, irrepressible, elusive— and now it was over. Case closed. What a goddamned waste!
It was easy to imagine the circumstances surrounding the accident—Neal running from local law enforcement or a mark, missing his footing, falling onto an abandoned, rusted bike—and even easier to picture him lying still and pale in a morgue, eyes forever closed.
Peter slammed his hand on his desk, grateful for the sting, the impact jarring his arm right up to the shoulder. It drew Jones' attention, and he came running up the stairs. "Everything okay, Agent Burke?"
"Yeah," said Peter. "No. Close the Caffrey case. We're done."
"Someone caught him?" Jones looked surprised.
"In a manner of speaking." Peter smoothed out the death certificate translation and handed it over.
Jones' brow drew into a frown. "Damn shame. You okay?"
"I'm fine," said Peter, but the rest of the day, he was like an automaton, filling out routine reports, answering questions, planning a stake-out on a local check forger, none of it meaningful because the biggest, brightest fish had got away for good.
"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry," said El, when he met her for lunch and the news spilled out of him, unchecked. She looked genuinely regretful, sympathetic, as though Peter had suffered a personal loss. He hadn't. None of this was supposed to be personal.
"Damn fool," said Peter. "He thinks he's Superman, the way he jumps off and over things, from frying-pans to fires and back again. Jumped." The past tense made him feel hollow.
"Maybe not Superman," said El softly, tucking her hand into the crook of his arm. "Robin Hood?"
"I don't think Neal Caffrey did a lot of charity work," said Peter. Unless enlivening the dull days of an FBI agent counted, but he couldn't say that. It was over.
Three days later he got a postcard from Costa Rica: Hi Peter, Reports greatly exaggerated, etc, etc. Didn't want you to worry. XOXOX Neal
"I'm going to kill him," swore Peter, light-headed with relief. He strode to his office door and called, "Jones! Bring me the Caffrey file. We're re-opening the case."
*
The second time, it was a drug overdose in India. Peter frowned at the fax, torn between concern and eye-rolling. They had no evidence Caffrey did drugs, but methamphetamines would explain a lot about his propensity for risk-taking and his general lifestyle choices. It was possible, just possible, this wasn't a hoax.
Peter put out feelers, rang around and finally got a phone number for someone at the coroner's office in Bangalore who spoke English. "I believe you have the body of Neal George Caffrey there. Can you tell me if he has any identifying marks, tattoos, scars—?"
"The body has been misplaced," said the coroner's assistant. "I'm very sorry." She hung up, and Peter snorted and got back to work, but such was the power of official documentation that it wasn't until a cheery postcard arrived—from Thailand, this time—that he relaxed completely.
He called El. "I'm taking you out to dinner."
"Okay, honey. What's the occasion?" She was at the printer, ordering stationery for her new business, and she sounded distracted.
"No occasion," said Peter. "It's a good day."
*
The third time, a shark attack in Monterey Bay, Peter just laughed, and when Neal called from an unlisted international number a few weeks later—something he'd taken to doing from time to time—Peter told him to stay out of the water.
"Aw, Agent Burke, were you worried about me?" There was humor in Neal's voice, and Peter thought he detected a note of affection too.
"Not anymore," said Peter. "I know your tricks. And I know something else—you were born to be hanged." He drank a mouthful of coffee. He was alone at the dining table. El had already gone to bed. If Neal was in Europe as they suspected, it must be the middle of the night for him.
"You could be right." Neal didn't sound tired—or the least bit concerned. "Guess I'll have to develop some new tricks, if you know all my old ones. Need to keep you on your toes, after all. Can't have you getting stale."
"Come back Stateside and we'll see who's gone stale."
Neal's tone went quiet and provocative. "Is that your government-authorized way of saying you miss me, Peter?"
"Yep," said Peter, surprising a laugh out of Neal. "Come back and distract me from all these half-witted criminals with more weapons than sense."
"You like a challenge."
"That's right." There was no harm in saying so. Stroke the suspect's ego, lure him back into Peter's jurisdiction. Besides, it was true—none of their quarry could hold a candle to Neal. Certainly, none of them called his home on a semi-regular basis just to chat. "How's Paris?"
"C'est très bon," said Neal. "Warm breeze off the Seine, rich coffee, good pastries, wonderful bookstores, and you know, the Louvre is like a candy store. But I'm not in Paris."
"Where are you, then?" Peter kept it casual, just on the off-chance Neal would tell him. As if.
"Oh, I can't make it that easy for you," he said, somewhere between teasing and reproof. "Where would be the fun in that?" A woman's voice murmured in the background, and Neal replied indistinctly and then came back on the line. "Have to go. Take care, now."
"You're the one who keeps dying," said Peter. "Good night, Neal." The call disconnected almost before he'd finished speaking, and he put down the phone and took another drink. It was too late for coffee, really, but he wouldn't sleep for a few hours yet anyway. Not now.
Somewhere out there, Neal Caffrey was planning heists, stealing treasures, risking life and limb and always emerging unscathed. It was comforting, somehow, all of it. It shouldn't be, but it was.
END