A/N: This is my first story EVER posted on FanFiction, so please go easy on me! I kind of sort of don't know what the heck I'm doing. :P
Hope you guys like this! Really trying to delve deeper into the emotions of Peter instead of Neal this time, like I've done in the past. Mr. Burke needs some love, too! 3
Just a short little drabble about waking up for the very first time in Peter and El's bed and finding Neal there... And how it feels. We'll see how this goes, shall we?
XOXO- Shannon
TITLE: Same, Different
GENRE: White Collar
FANDOM: Neal/Peter/El
WORD COUNT: 1,003
WARNINGS: None.
He didn't know whether or not it was the fact that a warm body was pressed up against an unfamiliar form, or the fact that he could smell him... Neal, smelling his usual French vanilla and crème as he breathed heavily, breathily beside him. Either one sufficed, because Peter Burke let a small smile spread across his face as he looked from his point buried under the pillows to see not one, but two beautiful humans resting lazily in his own bed.
It made him feel proud, like a hunter, displaying his beautiful treasures and knowing that both were positively his and no one else's. Both of them were marked and both of them tasted like Peter from the night before, smelling distinctively of sex and sweat and his own cologne. Peter wanted to capture that smell forever, and keep it in his pocket like a fragrant trophy.
The form pressed tightly to his own naked body shifted slightly, nuzzling into Peter's chest before relaxing again in his arms. El's long arms were wrapped around Neal's waist and her chin was resting between his shoulder blades. Her brown hair was fanned out in disarray on the puffy clouds of pillows behind her, and the soft comforter caressed her soft, creamy skin. She was beautiful. Neal was beautiful. They were his.
It was only when the blaring of his alarm clock spliced through the stagnant, musky air did the two forms jolt awake, Peter gritting his teeth in frustration as he untangled himself from his two partners to slam his hand on the snooze button. Neal was wide awake instantly, almost as if he had been awake the whole time, his beautiful blue eyes observing the somewhat new surroundings and soaking it up like a sponge. El, on the other hand, grumbled something and held Neal down, forcing him to be her pillow and clamping her eyes closed yet again.
Peter let a low laugh escape from his chest, shaking Neal's frame, as he watched his wife grumpily pull the covers over her head like a pouting child. Neal smiled, too, his brown hair ruffled and his face carrying the creases one accumulates from the many folds in the pillowcases. Peter didn't know what made him happier; the fact that this was the first time Neal had felt comfortable enough, at home enough, to stay throughout the night and wake up next to them, or that their normal, every-day morning was so accustomed to having Neal smack in the middle of it. He fit perfectly, he made it better, like an enhancement, like the final piece to the puzzle.
El did the same thing she always did in the morning. The room felt the same, the light was the same, even Satchmo was scratching at the bedroom door like he always did every morning. There was only one difference.
Neal was there.
And it was absolutely perfect.
With great effort, the two men slipped out of the warm bed and into the terrifyingly cold New York air. Peter threw on a robe and Neal slipped his boxers and a t-shirt on hastily, the t-shirt inside-out and backwards, as he followed the older man into the bathroom. The light in there was too bright for Neal's beautiful blue eyes, and he covered his face with a small groan as Peter flipped it on and began to splash water on his face. They both shaved in silence, and Neal tried to fix his terribly mutilated hair.
A hand caught his wrist—large, capable, callused—and he knew it was Peter the second it hit his skin. Their eyes met, and Peter whispered softly, "Leave it like that. I like it."
Neal registered the comment a second after, sleepy still, and let a smile spread across his face. "Don't you think Diana'll be jealous?" he said smoothly, kissing Peter's fingers, before letting them drop back to his sides. Peter smiled, and they continued to get ready, before Neal turned groggily to leave the bathroom. Peter cut him off once again.
"What?" Neal questioned, raising an eyebrow. Peter didn't answer, but he backed the smaller man into the cool tile wall of the bathroom and boxed him in with both of his arms pressed to the tile behind Neal's head. He let his face come to linger at the side of Neal's neck, Neal giving an involuntary shudder as his warm breath crept up his skin.
They didn't touch, but Peter hovered there, whispering something into his skin with an almost timid statement: "You didn't leave..."
Neal let his eyes close, taking in his partner in such a simple way, it was refreshing. "And it felt right," he finished, feeling his stomach swell as he admitted something he knew had been true from the very beginning. Peter brought his face to Neal's and kissed him, their bodies pressing up against each other instinctively.
It was almost twenty minutes before they finally made their way back to the bedroom to get dressed, and El had already made her way somewhere downstairs by that time. They took their time getting dressed before hurrying downstairs into the small, homey kitchen. Three cereal bowls sat on the wooden table, waiting for their contents to be filled and then eaten again. Peter let a finger graze the tip of the third bowl. It was shiny, new...
Three.
They ate quickly, El finally coming inside from letting Satchmo out, wearing a two-piece business suit and a purple blouse. She smiled at her two men, kissing them both briefly before they all ate the same bland cereal and tall glasses of milk. They didn't say anything. They didn't need to.
And as Peter looked at the two of him from the top of his newspaper, he felt content. He felt right. It was right, to have Neal , to be not two, but three, and to have a third place at his table.
Neal was the last part of the puzzle. And he fit perfectly.