Fic: Ol' Blue Eyes is Back
Title: Ol' Blue Eyes is Back
Rating : PG
Crossover: White Collar/Glee
Characters/Pairings: Neal Caffrey, Will Schuester
Spoilers: none
Warnings/Triggers/Enticements: Some UST
Word Count: ~3,300
Summary: The cracky White Collar/Glee crossover nobody really needed… When Neal is told he must finish high school to stay with the FBI, he chooses to do so at the school he dropped out of: McKinley High!
A/N: For yourebrilliant and queenaeron .
Also, This is crack. The situation is utterly ridonk, and I know it. Just go with it.... Timing is early S2 Glee, so Kurt is still at McKinley.
----
Neal Caffrey stood on the large expanse of lawn in front of his old high school, strangely reluctant to set foot on the school’s grounds. It was ridiculous, really, him being there. On the list of the places he thought he’d be least likely to find himself in his lifetime, back at McKinley High ranked just above the mouth of an active volcano.
“Say that again?” he’d said to Peter in his office at the FBI in New York not one week before.
“A high school diploma is a requirement for a position with the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” Peter repeated, his voice strangely weary.
“Give me a week and I’ll produce one for you,” Neal replied.
Peter gave him his patented Cut the Shit look. “You know that won’t do.”
“So what, am I supposed to just matriculate at PS 586 next Monday?” Neal asked, half kidding. When Peter didn’t meet his eyes, he knew he was serious. “Fine,” Neal had said. “If I’ve got to finish high school, then I’m going back to the one I dropped out of.”
“What, in Ohio?” Peter had asked, incredulous.
“They’re your rules, lawman. I just live by them,” Neal had answered, his tone flippant, but his intention more than half-serious. Why not try to go home again?
Why not, indeed, he repeated to himself as he stood on the edges of the school grounds. It was later in the afternoon, and most of the student body had gone for the day. Only the football team remained, running drills on the baseball field, and a group of cheerleaders in McKinley crimson and white, practicing lifts on the actual football field. He didn’t give that much thought as he trudged up the walk and through the doors, turning left and heading towards the administrative offices. His thoughts were elsewhere, on the things he’d left behind when he left, on the people who had made such an impact on him when he’d been here all those years ago, on the crazy shit he’d gotten away with.
He found Principal Figgins’ office with no difficulty; hell, he’d been a pretty frequent visitor to the place in his time. Figgins had not been principal then, of course, had instead been an ESL teacher, sending whole generations of immigrants out onto the streets of Lima speaking Indian-accented English.
Neal entered the office, removed his hat and waited patiently to be acknowledged by the staff. It didn’t take long, the matronly administrative assistant looking up at him and rushing over to see to his needs. “Can I help you, sir?” she said, batting her eyelashes.
“Neal Caffrey. I’m here to see Principal Figgins.”
She consulted her calendar. “Of course, Mr. Caffrey. Will your wife be joining you?”
“I’m not married.”
“Oh,” she said, sounding strangely hopeful. “You’re here to enroll someone though, yes?”
“Yes.”
She looked behind him, looking for a child, and he turned, following where her eyes led, turned back to look at her expectantly.
“Well, um, I’ll tell the Principal you’re here, then, shall I?”
He smiled his widest smile, and, transfixed, she smiled back. She didn’t move and after 30 or so seconds, he looked past her to Figgins’ office. “Is he in, or -“
“Oh! Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, coloring. She pulled the gate that barred entry to the admin area toward her and ushered him inside. “I’ll just announce you, shall I?”
Five minutes later, Neal was seated in front of Figgins’ desk, the school administrator giving him the stinkeye.
“Mr. Caffrey, it says here that you are a convicted felon on work release to the FBI in New York, helping them to solve crimes using your unique skills as a confidence man and thief.”
“Wow, when you put it that way, it sounds like some kind of lame TV show,” Neal commented.
Figgins ignored him and continued in his nasal monotone. “Tell me why I should allow you to matriculate among the children of this school. This is madness. Their parents will be after my head on a silver plate!”
“I had anticipated your reluctance, Mr. Figgins. And so I offer the following assurances: one, I will be under constant and very tight surveillance by the FBI’s Cleveland field office. The tracking anklet I wear is tamper-proof and tracks my every movement to within a yard.” He lifted his pant leg to show Figgins the anklet and Figgins made an impressed face.
“Second, while I am, in fact, a convicted felon, I have paid my debt to society and have placed myself firmly on the path to redemption and righteousness, as my work with the FBI is a daily testament. And finally, in order that my education here not place an undue burden on the taxpayers of Lima, and in the interest of supporting my beloved alma mater, I would like to make a substantial contribution to the school’s athletic fund as a gesture of good faith.” Neal handed Figgins an envelope he’d pulled from his inside jacket pocket, and when Figgins caught sight of the number of zeroes on the check, all doubt was banished from his mind.
“When will you start classes?”
----
His paperwork completed and his courses chosen, Neal took the opportunity to re-familiarize himself with the layout of the school, wandering the empty halls he had left over thirteen years earlier. Funny how much smaller they seemed to him now; no doubt they’d seem even smaller when they were filled with students.
Before long, his wanderings brought him to a very familiar place: the choir room. When Neal was a freshman, he’d had to try out for the Glee club on more than one occasion, finally making it in after the Winter break when a sudden outbreak of scarlet fever had all but wiped out the club’s baritones. Being a freshman, he was relegated to the chorus for that year, but the team was fresh off its victory at Nationals the previous year, and he didn’t mind in the least, if only he could bask in their reflected glow.
Those had been happy times for him, though uncertain. His home life had not been ideal, and so he had thrown himself into Glee and his other school activities with as much enthusiasm as he could muster. He sighed at the memory, smiling ruefully as he recalled the thousand petty dramas, devastating crushes and seemingly tragic happenings that befell a fifteen year old boy in middle America.
Seeing no one was around, he moved into the empty space, towards the piano that dominated the center of the room. He touched the keys, the notes that came out seemed louder than they ought to have been, a product of the superior acoustics he remembered well. He let his fingers coax more notes out of the instrument, tunelessly at first, but he was reminded of an old song, so he sat himself down and began to play, singing softly to himself:
“I know I said that I was leaving,
But I just couldn't say good-bye.
It was only self-deceiving
To walk away from someone who
Means everything in life to you.
You learn from every lonely day
I've learned and I've come back to stay.
“Let me try again.
Let me try again.
Think of all we had before,
Let me try once more.
We can have it all, you and I again.
Just forgive me or I'll die.
Please...........let me try again.”
He continued to play the melody, but found he couldn’t continue with the lyrics - they hit him a little too close to home - and let the final notes die out under his fingers, hanging his head with a sigh.
His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a pair of hands clapping for him. Startled, Neal turned around and found a tall, slender man with an open, handsome face standing in the doorway. “You sing beautifully, Mister…?”
“Caffrey,” Neal answered, standing and closing the fall over the keys.
“Is there something I can help you with?” Will Schuester asked. His eyes searched Neal’s face as if he recognized him.
“No, I was just…reminiscing.”
“Do you have someone enrolled here at the school?”
“You could say that. I am. I’m enrolled here.” A confused look crossed Will’s face. “It’s a really long and boring story,” Neal supplied.
“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time.”
“I used to go here a long time ago.”
“I thought I recognized you! Nate, right?”
“Neal."
Will looked abashed. “Right, sorry. The old memory - not what it used to be.” He poked himself in the head and smiled sheepishly. He walked further into the room and dropped a sheaf of sheet music onto the desk.
“I wouldn’t expect you to remember me. You were a senior when I was a freshman.”
“That’s right. You were in Glee too, right?”
Neal nodded. “Just in the chorus. I never got any solos.”
“Well, you should consider joining. The old club’s a lot smaller than it used to be. I’d say you’d have a pretty good shot at landing a solo or two.”
“Thanks, but I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“Well, come on, a 30-year old man joining a high school show choir? It’s a little strange.”
“No stranger than a victory-obsessed cheerleading coach injecting her squad with stem cells.” Neal gave him a look. “Allegedly,” Will amended. Neal nodded, a puzzled expression on his face. “Come on, try out,” Will urged.
“OK. Maybe.” Neal smiled and nodded, giving it serious thought.
“Great. You won’t regret it. We meet every day at 2:30.” Will slapped Neal on the shoulder companionably and went about his business cleaning up the choir room.
Neal wandered toward the door, chanced a glance back at Will. All these years later, and the sight of him still made him weak in the knees; Will Schuester, his first serious crush. And now, as then, he didn’t have a clue who Neal was. Some things never changed.
----
Neal started classes two days later, largely keeping to himself, maintaining as low a profile as possible. While his teachers knew why he was there, the students did not, so he contented himself with sitting at the back of the room, pretending he was an observer and not a student like anyone else. He thought it best to maintain his detachment; he was there to achieve a goal, not be a distraction.
Despite all his efforts, however, he did not go unnoticed.
“Who is that?” Mercedes asked Kurt as the two switched books at their lockers after lunch.
Kurt watched Neal walk past, his eyes giving the older man a very critical appraisal - the three-piece suit, the pocket square, the hat - and liking what he saw. “I don’t know. New teacher?”
“Well, sign me up for that class,” Mercedes said.
“It’s nice to see someone else besides us taking up the sartorial mantle around here,” Kurt commented.
When Santana saw Neal approach, she stepped into his path, forcing him to slide to a halt in his hand-made Italian leather shoes. “Where have I been all your life?” she said to him, raising a perfectly groomed eyebrow.
Neal smiled. The girl was beautiful, but in her cheerleader’s uniform, just a tad young for his tastes. But it didn’t mean he couldn’t toss back a little bit of what she was dishing out. “Far, far away, it seems,” he answered, a regretful note in his voice.
She looked him up and down and Neal thought he could understand how an antelope felt when being stalked by a lioness on the African savannah He went on his way, but could swear he heard a low growl coming from her throat.
The day passed without further incident, and he was about to head back to the small but comfortably furnished condo Mozzie had found him in town when he passed the choir room and glanced inside. There he saw the students sitting around, laughing and chatting and kidding with each other, and he found himself lingering in the hall, a wistful smile on his face.
“Neal, so happy you could make it,” Will said as he approached from down the hall. He grasped Neal’s hand in a warm shake and gestured for him to enter, a welcoming smile on his face.
Will walked in and dropped his bag on the desk, clapping his hands to get the class’s attention. “Everyone, your attention please. I’d like to introduce Neal Caffrey, a former student at McKinley High, who is returning to finish his education. I know you will all give him a warm welcome!”
“Go Warriors!” Neal said rather lamely.
The students all looked at him, a variety of expressions on their faces, most of them welcoming and encouraging. The cheerleader who had accosted him in the hall earlier in the day looked like she might want to dine on his liver.
“Neal’s going to audition for you all later - you can take a seat over there, Neal - but for now, we’re going to go over ideas for the set list at sectionals…”
Neal let most of the class pass him by without listening. He’d managed to get through the day without much effect, but for him to be in this room, and all the feelings it dredged up for him, was almost too much. He wanted desperately to be out of there, to go home - home to New York where his friends and his life were - and forget any of this had ever happened. He should have let Peter enroll him in the adult night school in Brooklyn near the Burkes’ house. He missed Peter and El and their big dog and their bigger bed, and what was he thinking, he didn’t belong here. He could feel a slight bit of panic rising in his chest, which he knew was completely out of character, but being here - in this place - just brought it out of him.
“Nervous?” a voice said to him, and he felt a small hand rest lightly on his knee.
“What?” The young, dark-haired woman seated next to him was talking to him. He noticed she wore an incongruous red sweater that featured a plaid-clad Scottish terrier and coordinating plaid miniskirt.
“Are you nervous? You look nervous. Here.” She held out a bottle of water to him. “My dads say that staying hydrated helps to calm the nerves. I don’t get nervous, not anymore. But you look like maybe you are.”
He accepted the water with a smile, opened it and took a large swig. “Thanks, that helps,” he said. It wasn’t true, but she looked like she needed to have helped someone.
“You’ll do fine, you know. You’re Neal Caffrey!”
“Excuse me?”
She seemed uncertain of herself suddenly. “Well, I mean, you’ve obviously done well for yourself, despite your failure to graduate high school. That’s got to mean something, right?”
Neal blinked. Despite the unwitting insensitivity of her words, she’d said something very important. He was Neal Caffrey. His name meant something - granted, it was to a lot of the wrong people, but still. He had never lacked for self-confidence a single day in his life, and he wasn’t about to start now. These last two days, walking these halls, he’d allowed the strangeness of the situation and the shame he felt from never graduating make him forget who and what he really was. He’d lost himself, his mojo, and he knew just how to get it back.
“So,” Will was saying at that moment. “I think Neal was going to audition for us today. Do you have a song prepared, Neal?”
Neal looked up from his reverie and smiled. “I do.” He strode over to the members of the jazz band and gave them their cues, then made his way to the center of the room. He stood with his back to the students, and looked down at the lid of the piano. The wood was highly polished, and he sang the first few words to his reflection, gathering his confidence back around him, like one of his perfectly tailored suits.
“Hello, I've waited here for you, everlong.” He turned around and faced the class, continuing, “Tonight I throw myself into; and out of the red, out of her head she sang.”
He took his hat off his head, gave it a little flip and placed it atop the piano. “Come down and waste away with me, down with me.” He clenched his fists at his sides, and moved his body in time with the beating of the drums. “Slow how you wanted it to be. I'm over my head, out of her head she sang.”
He began to play a little air guitar for the chorus, spinning midway. “And I wonder, when I sing along with you! If everything could ever feel this real forever. If anything could ever be this good again. The only thing I'll ever ask of you, you've got to promise not to stop when I say when...she sang!”
Neal swayed his hips, shifting his weight from foot to foot as the music played between verses, spun once or twice for emphasis. He was really feeling the beat and rhythm of the music, which the band was playing so well and faithfully, and actually felt for the first time that the lyrics meant something to him personally.
He turned, took up his hat again and, flipping it, tossed it to the dark-haired girl who had helped him. She caught it, jammed it onto her head and jumped to her feet.
“Breathe out so I can breathe you in, Hold you in,” she sang to him, and her voice was strong and perfect. “And now I know you've always been out of your head, out of my head I sang!”
They sang the chorus together, “And I wonder, when I sing along with you! If everything could ever feel this real forever. If anything could ever be this good again. The only thing I'll ever ask of you, you've got to promise not to stop when I say when, she sang!”
The song ended, and the room erupted with applause. Not thinking, Neal threw an arm around the girl’s shoulders and gave her a grateful hug - so much for keeping his distance, he realized.
“Well, I guess you’re in!” Will said, clapping Neal on the back. “Bet it feels like you never left, doesn’t it?”
Neal beamed. Yep, he’d say it did. Neal Caffrey was back.
----
Thank you for your time.
A/N: The first song is “Let Me Try Again” by Frank Sinatra, from the album “Ol’ Blue Eyes is Back,” naturally. The second song is “Everlong” by Foo Fighters.
And a sequel: Five Things Neal Caffrey Taught the McKinley High Students and Staff