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The plane coasted through leaden clouds that hung low and heavy like a pall over the ground, descending slowly to find St. Louis encased in snow and ice. Neal blinked. The harshness of deep winter hadn’t yet reached New York, and the dull, murky world outside was an unwelcome sight. He’d forgotten how bitterly cold Missouri could be. The heat was all he remembered.
Neal took a deep breath, distantly aware of the cheerful welcome announcement rattling off onward connections and the hum of voices around him. His whole body was tense, braced for the jolt of the runway and everything that would follow; the brief suspension of time and place had given him a momentary sense of calm, allowed him to imagine he was headed for some far away city, new and full of possibility. He left St. Louis three days after his eighteenth birthday, drawing a careful line east, away from the cloying summer air that had suddenly become too thick to breathe. In all these years it never occurred to him that he would be forced to return.
The jet touched down hard, kicking up plumes of vapour before coming to a shuddering halt on the slick runway. Neal threw on his coat as soon as they reached the gate, moving out into the aisle ahead of the other passengers. He didn’t have long – a few days grace if he was lucky and neither Jones nor Diana came to see whether or not he really had the flu. If his new aliases held up. If Mozzie could keep the FBI at bay and buy him some breathing room, the tracking anklet tethering him to Riverside Drive in Neal’s place (Peter’s key borrowed from the evidence box at the police station for the occasion). “Neal in absentia,” Mozzie had said, flipping one of Byron’s fedoras onto his head and raising his glass to toast the plan – a well-worn habit that was practically superstition by then. It wasn’t a particularly inspired plan, no more sophisticated than two high schoolers playing double bluff with their parents to sneak out to a college party. But Peter was going down for Pratt’s murder and refinement wasn’t a luxury they could afford. If it came down to it, Neal could live with the consequences of getting caught a thousand miles outside his radius. There were always options for men like him.
Stepping out onto the concourse, Neal headed towards the parking lot where Mozzie had arranged for a car to be left by an old associate he knew from the time he and Hale spent in Des Moines in the 1980's. (They'd been testing out Kerouac’s theory, Hale had once told Neal with a wink). Snow had started to fall over the elegant peaks of the terminal building, little flurries that twisted and danced in the wind. Beyond, St. Louis was a glimmering line on the horizon. Neal felt a flicker of nerves, a nauseous wave that was nothing like the electric kick he got before slipping into a darkened museum or art gallery. He pulled his coat more tightly around his body and forced himself to keep moving forward. Peter, Neal was sure, would tell him to trust his instincts, to leave this old wound like he should have left the others and come up with another plan to find James, preferably one that didn’t involve raking up more of Neal’s fractured history. But that would be the easy way out, and the things Neal wanted were never easy.
*
He only has snatches of memory of their home in Washington, like a world glimpsed at behind half open fingers. He remembers an empty, crumbling place full of dust sheets, the smell of fresh paint heavy in the air. There had been very little furniture, roughly sanded floorboards and walls that had been stripped back to a colour chosen three generations before. There was a front yard and a flowerpot full of cigarette ends and sun-cracked earth. He doesn’t remember if they were happy, but he does remember feeling content with his plastic sheriff’s badge and the soft red cape his mom must have made. It was nothing like the house in St. Louis – small and empty, still, but crumbling in an entirely different way.
Turning off the highway, Neal headed south through the now unfamiliar landscape of the city towards the address he and Mozzie hacked from the Marshal’s database days before. He knew there was a good chance his mom would refuse to speak to him, let alone help him, the gulf of twelve years silence stretched between them like a concrete wall. Their relationship had always been volatile, her dispassionate expression and sharp flashes of anger driving him out to the edges of what constituted their life together. Occasionally they would find their way back to each other and his mom would tell him stories that sounded like they were ripped from the pages of a film script or a novel, about how she and his father swept out of some small, Podunk town in Pennsylvania, after a shotgun marriage and with a baby on the way. She would tell him how handsome his father looked in his dress blues and they would spend hours making Neal his own cap and badge out of salvaged cardboard and felt.
But it was a fractious alliance, one that always left Neal adrift when it inevitably ended, taking the fall for all the wrongs he couldn’t possibly right. It wasn’t a history he was keen to revisit, especially not now when he had yet to find a way to reconcile himself with his father’s betrayal, to settle the pieces in some semblance of comfortable order.
Neal slowed the car to a stop at a red light and wiped a hand over his face, the exhaustion of the last few months pulling at him. People bustled past on the streets outside, arms laden with their weekend shopping. Neal thought about Peter, under house arrest and awaiting trial, still dressing in a shirt and shoes everyday whether he was talking with his lawyers or cleaning the kitchen, Satchmo following him around inquisitively. And Elizabeth, Neal could still see her expression when she laid eyes on him at the police station, filled with so much anger and betrayal that it shook him to the core. He would give the world to put it all right again.
*
Dusk had fallen by the time Neal reached the intersection of Marmaduke and Clifton, stepping out onto the sidewalk before he could think to hesitate. He hadn’t expected his mom to still be in Missouri, but the address he and Mozzie had found was in the west of the city, not all that far from their old neighbourhood considering. No one had ever came looking for her, he supposed.
The house was modest, but clearly loved. There were painted window boxes and little garden ornaments in the flowerbeds, frivolous things he would never have associated with his mom. It made Neal braver, gave him a glimmer of hope that perhaps she had changed as much as he had in all these years.
Everything in the street was still and calm, and with the fading embers of light glowing behind the buildings, felt like a stage built and lit with care. It was all suddenly so strange and distant, like he was holding the world in a snow globe on an outstretched palm. And as he stood there, the front door of the house opened, shards of light spilling out onto the ground. A woman walked down the steps and across the front lawn towards the neighbouring house carrying a package. It was a long moment before Neal recognised his mom. Her blonde hair was tied up in a loose bun, silvery in the fading light, and she was smartly dressed, as though she'd just returned home after a day at an office somewhere. Neal watched as she knocked on her neighbour’s door and saw the smile that she was greeted with. It was odd, he thought; he could barely remember seeing her outside the confines of their old house.
Moments later, the neighbour closed their door, and his mom started to walk back across the lawn, pulling her jacket close around her. Neal moved forward, and his mom turned and her gaze flitted over him. For a second, her expression was unreadable and he thought she might walk by him entirely, but then fear flickered across her face and she froze in her tracks.
Neal took a careful step backwards. “Do you recognise me?” he asked.
His mom nodded and her hands tightened in the fabric of her jacket. “I always wondered what happened to you.” Her words seemed to tumble out in one unsteady breath. “If maybe you would show up like this one day.”
“I know it’s sudden. I – ” The breath caught in Neal’s throat and he realised he had no idea what to say, how to explain.
“How did you find me? It’s – ” His mom shook her head in disbelief. “It’s been a very long time.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Danny – ”
“Neal. It’s Neal.”
A fragile smile pulled at his mother’s lips, but it was fleeting. “I always did love that name.”
Neal nodded and looked down, keenly aware of the weight of that history, the enormity of it. “I don’t really know what to call you either,” he said.
“No, I suppose you don’t.” She looked around, as though checking no one was watching. “I stuck with Maria,” she offered. “You look...” Maria started, shaking her head again. “The same, in a strange sort of way.”
“Well, I hope I’m a little taller.” Neal smiled tentatively. “Otherwise I’ve been very misguided." He hunched his shoulders against the biting cold, only then realising that his whole body was trembling.
After a moment’s hesitation Maria gestured to the house. “Come on.”
*
Neal sat at a little Formica table in the kitchen while Maria set the kettle on the stove and pulled two clean mugs from the steaming dishwasher. The house was cluttered and homey, filled with the belongings of several people as far as he could tell. Books lined the shelves in the living room, and there was a cat-shaped clock above the sink, its tail swinging rhythmically from side to side. There were photos and postcards stuck on the fridge with the kind of novelty magnets people buy at airports and gas stations, some shaped like Florida or California, or bearing Greetings from Texas. Children’s drawings too, lines colourful and full of abandon, the edges of the paper dog-eared and slightly yellowed from time. Sitting there, seeing a whole, full life, Neal could only feel relieved. There was little of the jealously or resentment he would have expected at seeing what she had created for herself without him, all the things that had seemed so impossible and unreachable before.
Maria pulled out a chair and sat down opposite him. Neal nodded to the thin gold band on her wedding finger. “You have a family I take it.”
She curled her fingers around her mug, and Neal could see the tension lurking there. “We’ll have been married five years this spring – Eddie and me. He’s got two kids from his first marriage, but it works, you know? We make it work. He’s a good man.”
Neal smiled softly. “I’m glad.” He looked down for a moment, almost afraid to ask. “So what changed?”
Maria let out a breath and waved her hand absently. “What does it ever take for people to change? Something and nothing, I suppose. It’s never one thing that does it. I know I was – ” She trailed off, and Neal could see the fragility of her façade, could see a little of the woman he used to know underneath; it twisted something in his chest uncomfortably. “I had my demons to fight. I guess we all do.” Maria ran her teeth over her bottom lip nervously and for a second Neal thought she might apologise, acknowledge all the terrible things that drove Neal to leave, but she didn't. “Anyway,” she smiled. “I’m far more interested in hearing about you.”
Neal shrugged and stirred milk into his tea. “I live in New York now, but I’ve travelled a lot. Seen the world once or twice.” He thought carefully about what to say next, weighing up how likely it was his mom would know about his criminal history from the papers or the news. “I work for the FBI now.”
Maria raised her eyebrows in surprise. “You’re a cop?”
“Consultant.”
“That - I wouldn’t have expected.” She looked at Neal appraisingly, as if he was suddenly a different person sitting in front of her.
“Would that have been so strange?” he asked. “You know I always wanted to join the force when I was a kid.”
Maria’s expression went blank for a moment, her green eyes drifting over his shoulder as if the memory would somehow materialise there. “You did?” She shook her head dismissively, and the vagueness in her tone was like a scent memory, pulling Neal back to the stifling quiet of their old house. Maria took a long sip of her tea, before setting her cup down. “So why now? What is it that’s brought you back here?
Neal hesitated, nerves fluttering in his stomach. “I found James.”
Maria looked at him sharply, her body going very still. “You’ve met him?” Neal nodded and she put her hand over her mouth. “Jesus. What good could you have possibly hoped would come of that?”
Neal bristled. “I wanted to know the truth. I wanted to know whether he was a hero or a villain or something in between.”
“And what did you find?” Maria asked, pointedly. Neal tightened his jaw and looked away, berated. Maria nodded knowingly. “So what is it that you want from me then?”
“I let him into my life and I didn't see him for what he was - " Neal paused, uncertain how to make sense of the past few months. "He killed a man and ran and now a friend of mine is going to take the fall for a murder he committed. I need your help to find him again – ”
“No – ” Maria stood abruptly. “No. Don't you dare. You don’t get to come back here after you left like you did and ask this of me.”
“I know. I know. I’m sorry that it has to be like this,” Neal said. “To bring all this to your door again, but he’s gone to ground and I need more information to find him. Just - " his voice broke, his throat tight with emotion. "I don't know what else to do. I don't have anywhere else to turn."
“This friend, does he work for the FBI too?”
Neal nodded.
“And how do you know he didn’t do it? What if he’s a crooked as the rest of them?”
“He’s not,” Neal said firmly. “I would trust him with my life.” He held her gaze until he could see the moment when she started to waver. "I'm - I'm just trying to make this right."
Maria looked away, shaking her head. “I don’t know what to tell you.”
“Tell me anything, anything you remember about him, the places he went, the people he knew.”
Maria walked over to the sink and stood, arms braced on the counter. Neal could see she was shaking. The clock ticked loudly in the heavy silence that had fallen, broken only by the snow tapping against the window.
“There was Michael,” she said, after a long moment.
“Michael?”
Maria turned and nodded. “Jefferson. He was a friend of James’s from high school. You would’ve been too small to remember him. He moved to Washington not long after we did. He and James would go out drinking after work, or he would come back to our place to smoke and play poker until two or three in the morning.”
“They worked together?”
“No. Mike never really held down a job, drifted from one scam to another. Bar tended occasionally. But they stayed close, even after James confessed.”
“He believed James was innocent?”
“I don’t know. I suppose he might have, but – ” Maria started, a shadow crossing her face. “I don’t know how much innocence mattered to a guy like Mike when loyalty was involved.”
There was a crunch of car tires outside and Neal glanced out the window to see an SUV pulling up in the drive. He turned back to see panic in his mother’s eyes.
“I’m sorry, Dan – Neal. You have to leave, right now. Please. I’m sorry.”
The engine died and a man Neal assumed was Eddie climbed out, followed by a girl in an oversized UMSL hoody. Cold realisation dawned on Neal then, the whole scene reforming and evolving in front of him with startling dissonance, like seeing fireworks but hearing thunder.
“Please." His mother's voice was barely above a whisper. "I can’t do this now. I’m so sorry.”
The front door clicked open, and Neal could hear the sounds of shoes and coats being shaken out and discarded in the hall. Honey?
“Please.” Her eyes were bright with fear.
Neal’s vision wavered and he nodded sharply, wishing she would just stop apologising. The blood rushed through his ears as he moved through the room, distorting everything until it was just noise. He slipped out the back door, feeling his mother’s touch ghost across his back as he went.
*
Neal had almost reached the airport before he pulled over and vomited at the side of the road. His heart was quivering like a bird in a cage, hands tingling. He wiped his mouth and flicked on his hazard lights as he leaned back into the car. Breathing carefully through his nose, he tried to ignore the scent of the old, cracked leather seats and faint trace of gasoline that never seemed to fade no matter how long you left the windows open. In the near distance, he could see the planes leaving the runway, climbing slowly and heavily into the sky.
He had known that seeing his mom again would be difficult, had prepared for her to be cold, or distant, angry, or happy. But he hadn’t been prepared to see shame in her eyes, the sudden desperation for him to disappear like he was some disgusting wound she couldn’t cover or hide, something that would make her ugly in the eyes of others. It was his fault, he knew, for being naïve enough to think it could go any differently, for forgetting that they were cut from the same cloth, both wired for self-preservation above all else – that was why he had left, and it was why he came back, after all. But he survived. He got what he wanted and he had survived.
The sharp buzz of his cell phone startled him. He took a deep breath, steadying his voice before he picked up. “Moz. Hey. Everything alright?”
“All quiet on the western front. You’re still a free man – or, an imprisoned man as the case may be. So – ” Mozzie stretched out the word and Neal could picture him waving his hand impatiently in the stillness of his apartment. “How did it go?”
Neal fumbled for something to say. “Good. It was really good, Moz. Listen, there’s a guy I need you to look into - Michael Jefferson. He was an old friend of James' and it sounds like he’s got form.”
“You think he’d be the kind of person your dad would still be in touch with?”
“Yeah, I do.”
There was a clink of glass and Neal could hear the glug-glug-glug of wine being poured. “I’m on it. Hey, so what was your mom like? She didn’t slam the door in your face, clearly.”
“She was - the same person but completely different."
There was a pause before Mozzie asked, “That’s good though, right?”
Neal let out a shaky breath, unsure how to articulate the way his chest ached and how deeply and keenly he missed Ellen.
“Neal?”
“Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's - ” Neal reached for the key that was still in the ignition and turned the engine over. “Look, I should go. The last flight back to New York is in an hour.”
“Okay, safe travels, mon frère. Oh, and hurry back would you? Did you know this anklet chafes like a motherfucker?”
*
The next morning Neal took a taxi from Riverside Drive to Cobble Hill without thinking twice. The inside of the cab smelled of cheap aftershave and pine tree air freshener and Neal willed the traffic to open up as they crawled across the Brooklyn Bridge.
It was just past nine by the time the car dropped him in front of the townhouse and Neal knew Elizabeth would have left for work by now. Things between them were still strained so he was keeping a respectful distance, hovering at the edges until something changed and he could bring her a solution. Neal could understand it; he was the guy who breezed into her life and upended everything, forcing her to draw lines where she shouldn’t have to. He was good at that, he supposed. But after the last twenty-four hours Neal needed to see Peter, needed his steadiness and reassurance until he felt less liable to fly apart at the slightest provocation.
Peter answered the door after a few moments, holding back an excited Satchmo by his collar. Neal gave the dog’s ear a scratch as he passed by. “He’s got cabin fever too, huh?”
“It’s only sympathy cabin fever, I think,” Peter said, closing the door and giving Satchmo a wry look. “Or maybe he’s just happy to see you. You haven’t been around much lately.” Peter’s tone was light, conversational, but Neal could hear the accusation underneath. He shrugged off his coat and sunk down onto the couch.
“Yeah, things at the bureau have been pretty full on with this arms smuggling case and Calloway’s got a reputation to restore, so – ”
Peter nodded, taking the brush off for what it was. Shooing Satchmo out from under his feet, he sat down in the armchair opposite Neal, studying him. “You doing all right? You look a little worn out.”
Neal smoothed a hand over the back of his hair and smiled. He was functioning on two hours of restless sleep and far too much airport coffee, most of which he’d brought up in the cramped airplane bathroom, but he had thought he’d pulled himself together enough to avoid looking as bad as he felt. “Yeah, I just took a couple of sick days, but I’m okay – there’s some kind of stomach virus going around the office. That time of year, I guess.”
“It’s the mild winter we’re having,” Peter said, rising and walking into the kitchen. “You need a cold snap of weather to kill these things off,” he called back over his shoulder. “At least, that’s what my mom always says.”
Neal gratefully accepted the glass of orange juice Peter returned with, taking a long drink. The house was quiet, only the hum of the refrigerator and the occasional static tick of the radiators disturbing it. Neal set the glass down and reached into his shirt pocket. “Well, worn out or not, I come bearing news.” He slid the sheet of paper across the coffee table towards Peter. “This is Michael Jefferson.”
Peter looked at Neal questioningly, before scanning the information. “Petty crook, grifter, unlicensed firearms, couple of outstanding parking tickets. An all ‘round trustworthy guy – ”
“Yep, and he also just so happens to be one of James’ oldest friends. Now take a look at where the arrest warrants from ’99 and ’05 were issued.”
Peter smiled. “Billings, Montana.”
“Sounds like they stayed in touch despite the whole pesky WitSec thing, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah, yeah it does. And I’m guessing he wouldn’t have a problem with James’s recent troubles either, would be willing to help him hide out until things blow over.”
“Precisely.”
“This is good, Neal. This is a really good start.” Peter leaned forward in his chair and Neal could see a spark of hope in his expression, a little of the vibrancy that had been slowly ebbing away with week and months of dead ends. “So where do we go from here? I mean, we track this guy down and maybe he leads us to James, but what then? It’s still his word against mine.”
“I’m not entirely sure yet. But I’ll know. When I see him, I’ll know,” Neal said, surprising himself with the truth of it. There was something building in him, like it had after Kate’s death, as though the current of his blood had changed somehow, rushing through his body with heat and energy, channelling his focus to an absolute pinpoint. He could be more ruthless than most people would expect when the balance of the world shifted in a direction he didn’t like.
Peter sat back, his expression softening. “Well, I’m glad you came over. I’ve missed this.”
They sat together in comfortable silence until Neal could feel himself start to drift off, lulled by the warmth of the room and the familiarity of Peter’s presence. He rubbed a hand across his eyes and pushed himself to his feet. “I should head back home, or else Diana’s definitely going to think I’m faking.”
“I’m sure the thought’s never crossed her mind,” Peter said, lips twitching in amusement. He stood and walked with Neal out into the hallway, squeezing his shoulder as he passed by. It was a simple gesture, one Peter had made a thousand times, and maybe it was the exhaustion, or the image of his mother’s terrified face that kept flitting in the periphery of his mind, but somehow it twisted something inside of Neal, brought all the longing and grief to the surface of his skin in sharp, bright pinpricks. Impulsively, he turned and leaned his body into Peter's. For a second, Peter stilled in surprise, but then Neal could feel the heavy weight of Peter's hand on his back, on the nape of his neck, and it was all Neal could do to just stand there, arms by his sides, taking quiet, shuddering breaths.
“It’s gonna work out,” Peter said, firmly. “We’ll figure this whole thing out.”
Neal nodded and quickly broke away from his hold, embarrassed. Peter’s expression was dark with concern and Neal suddenly wondered what Peter would say had he known that Neal’s own mother knew nothing of his crimes, of all the great and terrible things he was capable of, but was ashamed of him anyway.
He turned to leave, but Peter reached for him again. “Have you eaten breakfast?” he asked.
“Are you offering to cook for me?” Neal said, recovered enough to give Peter a look of exaggerated wariness, even if his eyes were probably a little too bright for it to be convincing.
“Well, I’ve had a lot of time on my hands recently, so I like to think I make a pretty mean bowl of cereal at this point. Perfected the milk to flake ratio like it’s an art form.”
Neal huffed. “Okay, well now this I have to see.”
“Prepare to be amazed,” Peter said, and pulled Neal into the house.
*
End.