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Peter Burke knew that he didn’t know everything about Neal Caffrey, but he was confident that he knew the most about Neal Caffrey. And the things he did not know, he could make a reasonable assumption. So far, he’d been right nearly every time the opportunity arose.
And on the days when he was wrong, he managed to gleam just enough details to make his next guess all that much more likely to be correct.
Being the resident expert on Neal Caffrey meant that when he did, inevitably, get something wrong, it stung worse than expected.
He didn’t get caught up in the small things, like figuring out that Neal took his coffee in different ways depending on his mood or time of day. That his tastes changed seasonally but also on a whim. For a while, Peter thought it had something to do with the alias they had him using; part of his methods for getting into character may have extended to his choice of beverage.
His theory was disproved quickly when Neal accepted Elizabeth’s offer to make them coffee after a series of late nights spent pouring over federal documents in their dining room. Peter had answered for him, telling Elizabeth he drank it black. He’d seen Neal drink nothing else for the entire week, and in that time he’d been going under as Steve Tabernacle.
Neal was all too quick to correct him, telling Elizabeth he’d take it with a splash of cream–flavored, if they had it–and six sugars.
Peter stared at him aghast for several seconds too long, if the look Neal gave him in turn meant anything. For all of the half-dozen coffee orders Peter had come to associate with Neal, he’d never seen the man take more than three sugars in a single cup of coffee. He knew that Neal knew how big their mugs were; it wasn’t like he was getting upwards of sixteen-ounces and needed to double his add-ons.
For a brief moment, Peter thought Neal may have been pulling a prank on him. It was outside of his normal purview, especially considering it involved Elizabeth, but Caffrey liked doing the unexpected.
Watching Neal drink the sugary concoction, Peter couldn’t stop himself from asking, “Is this a prank?”
“What?” Dick looked up, having finished his coffee in one long gulp. He blinked with renewed fervor, looking more awake than he had five hours earlier.
“Your coffee. I’ve never seen you drink it with that much sugar.” Peter eyed him, “Or as quickly. Please tell me you didn’t burn yourself.”
“Of course not,” Neal shrugged his shoulders, glancing around the room. Peter thought he might have been looking to see if Elizabeth was still downstairs, or if she’d left the carafe in reach. “I’m pretty sure my throat built up a tolerance when I was a kid.”
“A kid–”
“Teenager, same difference,” Neal dismissed Peter’s alarm. When a second glance around the room didn’t procure more coffee, he reached for Peter’s mug, “If you’re not going to drink this, I can–”
“Hands off my coffee, Caffrey,” Peter narrowed his eyes but caught himself laughing in spite of himself. There was an edge to Neal that was more whimsy than usual, and Peter was curious to know more.
::
Mozzie did not like Slade Wilson.
That had been clear from the very beginning and it was likely never going to change.
On any given night, Mozzie was likely to be found questioning how Neal Caffrey got on Deathstroke’s radar, much less lived so long while keeping permanent residence.
At the beginning, he’d tried to weasel information out of Neal but was happily surprised to see how long the man could continue to best him in a game of underhanded barbs and thinly veiled attempts at gaining information. From then on, it became more of a game and less of a tactic between the two.
When Keller came into the picture, Mozzie was even more wary of Neal Caffrey’s connections. He’d first met Caffrey and assumed he was as green as the grass after a sunny rainstorm on a Spring morning, offering to take him under his wing and shape his obvious skills into something that would be mutually beneficial.
Once he learned that Neal was often two steps ahead of him, especially in those early years, Mozzie understood that Neal enjoyed their comradery more than his desire to become the best con man and was thus willing to do most of the spontaneous ideas Mozzie brought him.
They didn’t all end successfully, but for each failure Mozzie understood Neal’s strengths and weaknesses in a way that would only help them the next time they had to work an angle together.
Mozzie appreciated that Neal did not use firearms. It kept things a whole lot safer for the two of them, and made sure that while Neal was catching the attention of the feds, it wasn’t because they were destroying literal lives in their wake. Most of the men they scammed were more than capable of helping themselves; they weren’t playing a game of life and death.
The first time Mozzie saw Neal Caffrey shoot a gun, he was seconds away from taking the firearm out of Neal’s hands to keep him from having to do something as devastating as shooting at someone.Turns out, his caution was unnecessary, and Caffrey was more than capable of standing his ground and forcing someone to play into their hand, quite literally.
Mozzie had a dozen questions he was itching to ask Neal, especially when his skills were not a matter of chance and continued in the following months, but each time he went to broach the topic, he saw a look pass over Neal’s features. It wasn’t anger, or sadness, or any expression he’d come to catalogue to aid his understanding of Neal Caffrey. If anything, it reminded Mozzie of the resignation he felt when he was seconds away from having to explain to someone that No, he did not have a family. No, he did not know his birth history. No, he hadn’t had his DNA tested and he wasn’t about to spit in a tube only for some half-baked scientists to use it for their own experiments.
All of that to say, Mozzie had grown accustomed to making an assumption about Neal Caffrey, but expected half of those ideas to be immediately torn to shreds. Any notion he had for what would have made Neal Caffrey become so familiar with guns that he could shoot one with a perfect bullseye was immediately tossed when Deathstroke came into the picture.
Mozzie did not like the guy. He kept his distance and continued to warn Neal to follow his lead. He accepted this was one of the few lines in the sand that they’d draw and keep as a point of difference between them, and Mozzie didn’t think that was necessarily a bad thing. It could be good, having someone who wouldn’t immediately agree with you able to provide some of the best advice he’d ever get.
But, why did it have to be Deathstroke the Terminator? Of all the other people out there in their world and the next, and Mozzie was forced to work with Slade Wilson.
He wished he could understand what Neal was thinking.
::
Elizabeth spent years learning who Neal Caffrey was through second-hand information. She always asked questions about the cases Peter was working, asking about his day without asking him to divulge protected information. Peter hadn’t immediately told her his name, but she knew who he was as the investigation continued. Elizabeth felt like she was really getting to know the man when Peter would recount story after story about how Neal Caffrey had avoided capture yet again.
Given the nature of the stories Peter shared, she made the assumption Neal Caffrey was a loner. Someone who preferred to work alone and move through the world worrying about noone but himself; someone, who would have no care for people like Peter and Elizabeth, likely scoffing at the very notion of living in the quiet suburbs and building his own community.
Elizabeth noticed when Neal didn’t share details about his own time off of work. The only time he appeared to go out was when he was with someone related to the bureau, either directly or indirectly. The moment was never right for Elizabeth to ask Neal more about his relationships outside of work, although she itched to do so.
She’d had a friend in college who was quite similar to Caffrey, right down to the feigned facade of indifference. Effervescent smile to their faces, but when everything was done she’d be the first to announce her plans to leave. The relief Elizabeth saw on that woman’s face was something she was sure she’d seen from Neal, happier when he was no longer having to be ‘ on’ or present for others.
Neal Caffrey had been in their lives for almost a year when Elizabeth finally asked him about it. There had been an attempt to talk to Peter, months prior, but Elizabeth aborted that idea almost immediately. She knew how conniving Neal could be and wanted to watch him answer her questions firsthand, thinking that would help her to understand if he was telling or stretching the truth.
In the end, Elizabeth regretted her decisions to ask Neal directly. She regretted her previous assumption that Neal Caffrey was a loner who didn’t care for others, looking out only for himself. It became painstakingly clear in the months that followed her botched question. He hadn’t changed anything about the way he worked with others or what he did in his free time, but Elizabeth was more attuned to the hurt he’d felt when she questioned if he enjoyed being alone all of the time.
Neal noticed the important things about people. He was constantly watching and listening, and not just because he wanted to know every detail he could possibly impress you with at a later date. Someone who was indifferent to others wouldn’t waste their energy on the little things, as Neal often did.
The more the time the team spent together, the more obvious the contrast became when Neal was alone or with one person compared to working in a group. On one of the rare days he shared with her, Neal had remarked that he always felt most comfortable when he was working on a team. For the good, the bad, and the ugly, it was still one of his favorite places to be, so many years later.
Elizabeth never managed to get Dick to elaborate again, but she did go out of her way to make sure Dick felt welcomed into the home and family. She gave him the same physical affection she saved for her closest family friends, and always knew it was the right move when Neal would lean into her embrace. On the days when he tightened a hug minutely, Elizabeth made sure to hug him back just the same. Her team may have been small, but it would never not be important to her.
::
The thing about Neal Caffrey was that Dick put more effort into making the man resemble his true self than the opposite in recent years. Early on, he’d had fun crafting the persona and paid special attention to making sure it was different in all of the ways that mattered to avoid raising suspicion. It was more important to think about survival, even when having his fun.
Now, he found that it was far easier to be Caffrey when half of the things that made that man were second nature to Dick. Or, on the days when he started to feel more disconnected from who he was, Dick would make the decision to change some fundamental part of Neal Caffrey. He didn’t stop worrying about remaining off of the Justice League and Batman’s radar, but he knew better than to let core parts of himself slip away when he could do something as simple as modify the Caffrey persona.
By making the switch, he knew he would have to eventually address the assumptions others had made over the years. Incidentally, most of the people he cared for were quick enough to notice the change and accepted it without saying a word.
That didn’t mean he couldn’t have his fun with it.
–
“Which junior agent is making the coffee run today?” Dick asked Jones before immediately directing his attention to the probie in question. “Hey! Make sure you get mine with eight sugars, got it?”
“Are you trying to set a world record?” Diana questioned. Jones mirrored her curious expression.
“Nah,” Dick shrugged, leaning back in his desk chair with his feet on his desk. He threw his rubber band ball up in the air and caught it lazily. “It’s just how I like my coffee.”
–
“All I’m saying, Neal, is–”
“Slade investigated them four months ago,” Dick interjected. He avoided looking at Mozzie’s face when it contorted at the mention of his husband.
“Does that mean you’re out or you’re in?” Mozzie’s voice was strained with exasperation.
“I’m in, Mozzie,” Dick started, “All I’m saying is, they’re going to be harder to crack than you’re expecting. They increased their security–”
“Thanks to Deathstroke, no doubt”
“–and updated the technology for the safe,” Dick finished. He waited to put down the updated schematics he’d printed until after Mozzie nodded. Dick waited while the other man took a hastened look a the papers, but found himself grinning when Mozzie nodded his approval.
–
“Elizabeth, do you think Peter would give us the okay to create a White Collar baseball team?” Dick asked Elizabeth. They were sitting in her backyard, taking turns tossing a ball for Satchmo to fetch. He wasn’t rushing to retrieve it and they weren’t throwing it back with haste.
“He might,” Elizabeth shrugged. “You know he loved to play. He hasn’t tried to seriously get back out there since college, but doing it with friends may make it worth it. Even if he stumbles.”
“I saw one of the agents from Counterintelligence hang up a sign in the lobby.” Dick explained, “They’re trying to start a rec league at the bureau, with each department as the teams.” He paused, tossing the ball up in the air and catching it two more times before throwing it for Satchmo. “I was going to offer to be the Team Captain.”
Elizabeth looked like she wanted to ask him about it. Dick could assume she was wondering if he had any experience playing the sport to begin with.
“I think Peter would like that,” Elizabeth eventually said. “He would ask about being Team Captain initially, but he’d eventually realize the amount of work needed is more than he wants.” She smiled, watching Satchmo run and catch the ball in mid-air when she threw it. “I think he’d be happy having you as Team Captain, too.”