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[abrightboy]

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[abrightboy]

“Paris certainly has a lot more history than New York. It sounds romantic, the way you describe it. Even more than its reputation. Is… do you have someone waiting for you there?” he asks carefully.

Maybe Neal just wants a friend. Maybe what Malcolm thought was flirting was just the way he talks.

[conning]

He makes a soft sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “Amis-amants. Nothing serious. I’m mostly there for the history, the art, and the work. There’s plenty of places that want to consult someone with my skill set, not just museums. How about you? Anyone back in New York?”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm laughs. That’s funny.

“I have a parakeet named ‘Sunshine’ that probably misses me.” He pauses a moment. “Do the places that consult you know you used to be a thief?”

[conning]

“That’s why they want me,” he says, amused. “No one can stop a thief like a thief. I got some consultation requests from R&D at a few tech firms and security companies while I was… in the states, but I couldn’t take them at the time.”

[abrightboy]

“The FBI kept you busy, huh? I have some long work days too. Crime never sleeps or… something like that,” he acknowledges.

[conning]

“You could say that.” It’s not wrong. Neal straightens a little, bracing his free hand against the railing.

“I didn’t mind the hours when the cases were interesting, but my agreement with them saw me doing a lot of day-to-day mundanities like mortgage fraud too.”

[abrightboy]

“Is that why you left it to go to France?” he asks. It would make sense that he’s want to be able to choose what he works on.

[conning]

“That was a part of it. Not the overwhelming reason, but one of them.” He considers his further answer. “The FBI kept demanding more without making it worth my while, too.”

[abrightboy]

“Yeah, they do that. Everyone is a tool to be used,” he agrees. “Until they’re used up.”

[conning]

Neal makes a noise that isn’t really amusement.

“I realized that about half-way through a contract I couldn’t break. They got close, with me. Fortunately I have a very thorough lawyer.”

He smiles faintly at the thought of Mozzie, thinking about how much he would love this whole situation. A whole new world of conspiracy theories to explore.

[abrightboy]

“I’m glad you got out in time,” Malcolm tells him. “Even if… you subsequently ended up here. Not that. I’m not glad about that. It’s just. A bit of a double edged sword.”

[conning]

“I had a leisurely year in France before this. I’ll live.”

Then hopefully go home. He’ll make it, if that’s an impossibility, he can adapt, but he held out some hope he’d get to see his people again.

A pause. “Is it better or worse for you? Given what happened with your dad.”

[abrightboy]

“Being here? …I’d like to know if he survived, but… a close friend of mine from home is here. And I think overall it’s healthier for me that I can’t see him and he can’t call me. So I guess…. net positive, yeah.”

There’s a knife in his bedside table, though, reminding him of what he did.

[conning]

“That’s good.” A light laugh. “Comparatively speaking, anyway. I’m sure there are plenty here who don’t feel that way. We got lucky, I guess.”

[abrightboy]

“In a way, yeah.” He pauses. “I was worried you were calling to cancel,” he confesses.

[conning]

Neal goes quiet for a moment in surprise, pleased at the same time and marking that as another thing to watch.

“When I’ve got such interesting company to look forward to? Definitely not.”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm swallows. Does he mean that? Maybe it’s just a nice thing to say.

“I’m glad. That. You’re still going to come. I… wanted to call but. I thought. I mean. I didn’t want to bother you when you were going to be coming by in a few days.”

[conning]

“It’s no bother. The only time I wouldn’t be able to answer is if I’m getting eaten by a werewolf or in the middle of extracurriculars.”

Theft. Sex. Things like that…

“…Are werewolves actually a thing here? Maybe I should take that back.”

[abrightboy]

“There have been some mysterious maulings in Dogtown,” Malcolm points out. “Can’t rule it out.” He pauses. “Do you think… “ He trails off and huffs a laugh at himself. “Nevermind. I don’t know what I’m…” He picks at a piece of lint that isn’t there on the blanket by his knee. “Are you going to go to the job fair?”

he’s totally not ignoring it because I haven’t read stuff yet >.>

[conning]

Neal ignores the question about the job fair for the moment.

“Do I think what?” It’s a gentle prompting.

[abrightboy]

It was a lame attempt at changing the subject anyway. He’s silent for almost long enough for Neal to wonder if he’s still there.

“Do you think that maybe next week you’d want to… do something? With me. After work. It’s too soon to ask, right? Tomorrow could change your mind.”

[conning]

He’s about to check if the line is dead, so to speak, when Malcolm says something.

Says that.

Neal’s breath catches a little. Of all the possible scenarios, Malcolm asking him out and doing it so soon was not one he thought of. “I…”

All at once, there’s Rebecca smiling face. Rachel’s, not Rebecca’s, expressionless, open eyes in a face pale from blood loss.

Keller’s smirk, the monologue that drove home for Neal how much he put in danger of the Panthers figured out he was a mole. Keller’s morgue-blue face, perfect little circle on his forehead, the back of his head opened like a dropped tomato. Neal had gone to see the body just before he left for Paris. He’s still not sure why he did that. He hadn’t been with Keller for years. Neal hated him for everything he’d done.

Rachel he knew was a lie, even if she saved him in the end. She was a lie, and after almost two years he should be past it.

He’s been too quiet. Neal clears his throat.

“It’s not that I wouldn’t,” he says softly. “It’s really not that. You’re smart, curious, kind.”

A tiny smile. “Absolutely gorgeous.”

Another pause. “The… last person I was with—-”

He cuts himself off. Suicide is too blunt. “I lost her. I haven’t… It’s not that I wouldn’t go out with you. It’s that I don’t think I could be a very good partner.”

[abrightboy]

“No. Right. Yeah.”

It’s not you, he says, it’s me. He’s just looking for a friend. In truth, Malcolm is maybe very slightly relieved that he’s cleared that up. It is, in fact, definitely a relief and not a sinking lead weight in his chest. Definitely good to know and not a devastating disappointment.

“That’s. Understandable.”

Say something. Be cool.

“I… do you want us to… get a dessert or something?”

[conning]

“I’d like that,” Neal says quietly. God, he wants to fix this, he wants to make it better, but he can’t, not really.

But God he wants Malcolm to know it’s not because he wouldn’t.

“Her name…”

All I can see is the girl I fell for.

Remember her like that, Peter had said.

“Her name was Rebecca,” he finally says. “We… I was going to—-”

He laughs breathlessly, clearly pained. The only proposal he’s ever gotten to go through with was for part of a con. No matter how much he wanted it, how much Sara did, how much he really meant it—-they couldn’t be, in the end.

And then Rachel-not-Rebecca.

“We met when I was pulling a job at the gallery where she worked. She lost her job, because of what I did. I tried to make it better, somehow, and we ended up…”

He trails off again. “We we’re together almost a year, and she—”

Neal steels himself to say it. “She killed herself. That was almost two years ago, now, but. I can’t do it. Not yet. If I could, I would love trying with you.”

It’s true, at least, every part of it. No details, sure, but no lies.

[abrightboy]

“I’m sorry,” Malcolm says softly. “I… get it. I do. The last girl I went out with… I found out she was looking for information about one of my father’s victims. She said she really cared about me, but once my father didn’t have any more information about the person she was looking for, she left. They found her body in the river. The man she was investigating put an assassin on her. I do get it.”