Here's Looking At You, Kid

by Ursula4x

Moz met Neal before he was Neal. He helped him through the last two hard years to adulthood. He never meant for Neal to take the fall for him.

Title: Here's Looking At You, Kid

Author: Ursula

Rating: rating: R

Genre and/or Pairing: Slash without sex Prequel to Stay, pre-series to White Collar

Notes: How far back does Moz go with Neal?

Spoilers: not many except for series general facts

Warnings: I see the world with slash colored glasses and the rest of world got bifocals

Word Count:

Summary: There was this kid and a young con man

1. Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

OooOooO

It was one of the better days. Moz had scored with some cleverly forged bonds and beat it out of New Hampshire before anyone was the wiser. He had an apartment; okay, it was a housekeeping room, but a big one with its own bathroom. Moz took a bite of his meatloaf special and washed it down with a beer.

There was that kid again. Cute kid. Too young for Moz, but cute. Big blue eyes, a mop of thick brown hair, great skin, good bones, way too skinny for his height.

Two days ago, the kid had been playing a fair to decent shell game, not as fast as some of them and patter not exactly distracting, but he did good anyway, batting his eyes and machine gunning a blinding smile. Yesterday, the kid made a few bucks selling some sketches. Moz wandered over long enough to see there was real talent there. Today, the kid was just slipping around tables, collecting leftovers; Marge, the big waitress with the bigger heart, turned a blind eye.

And, shit, shit, shit. The kid assumed that Rolly was done and gone, but the chicken hawk had merely gone to the can for a long time. Rolly had a look on his face that made Moz think that his long absence was purposeful; the pimp had been watching the kid like the bird of prey for which his role was named. Putting his hand on the kid's shoulder, Rolly said, "That's my lunch you're eating."

"I'm sorry," the kid said, giving Rolly one of those flashing smiles.

Kid, that was the wrong move. That look in Rolly's gray eyes was the dollars adding up that he expects to earn from selling that pretty mouth, that cute little round ass, and everything between and surrounding.

Rolly sat back down, waved Marge over. The waitress shook her head at the kid, trying to warn him, but didn't say anything. Rolly was one mean snake of a guy and he carried some clout on the street. Marge had kids and she didn't want anything to happen to them.

Before Rolly could order food for the kid, Moz rolled over there and said, "Kid, your life ambition doesn't happen to be sucking dick on the street, does it?"

The kid stood up; face flaming, fists balled up. He said, "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that your new friend will have you drugged out and selling ass if you walk out the door with him."

"Moz, I know where you live," Rolly said. "Shut it up."

"No, you know where I lived," Moz said. He always kept his bags packed. His job choice led to a lot of sudden moves. "Bye, Marge, it was real. Jersey is getting old quick."

Casting a backwards glance at the kid, Moz said, "You coming, kid, or you really looking to work for Rolly?"

The kid grabbed a backpack and said, "I'm coming."

OooOooO

In the new room in New York, Moz carefully edited the birth certificate he had obtained from storage. "You like the name, Neal Caffrey?"

"Neal Caffrey," the kid said. "Sounds good." He told Moz that his name was Todd Bankens, but Moz doubted that was his real name. Moz also assumed the kid's face was on a milk carton somewhere, but that 'Todd' was probably not some rich family's lost son. No doubt he would quickly become an abandoned file in a room full of records of broken kids and shattered families.

"You know someone with that name?" 'Neal' asked.

"Nephew. Son of a bitch that my sister married beat 'em both to death. Kid got buried under the bastard's last name, which means this is a clean birth certificate. I just got to up the date a little. What age you want to be?"

"Eighteen," the kid said, with a cheesy grin.

"Sixteen, it is," Moz said, inking in the new date.

"Hey, I'm seventeen!" the kid claimed.

"Yeah, right. You're sixteen now. We'll get you a shiny new social security card next week."

"Do I really need all of this?" Neal asked as Moz took out an immunization form and filled in dates from a recommended vaccination chart.

"Yes, I got to get you into school," Moz said.

"School?" the kid said, voice changing over higher in the middle of the word.

The kid was still young enough for his voice to crack every once in a while. Moz remembered that stage vaguely. He had hit puberty young, accounting for his short stature. Moz looked older than he was, a hard life with some stretches in prison, aging him quickly. He was less than a decade different in age than his new 'nephew' but seemed much the elder.

"You are going to high school, college maybe if I can scam you a scholarship," Moz said. His head was full of plans. This was a smart kid. He could go far in the game with his looks, his smarts, and his talent, but Moz stopped seeing him a protégé two days ago. Instead he wanted the world for Neal Caffrey.

Moz admitted to himself that he liked looking at Neal, but the boy was safe with him. Maybe when the kid was older, but Moz doubts it will ever happen. He can live with that. He loved beautiful things, but he couldn't own most of the things he coveted. Neal was just a living example of works of arts that passed through Moz's hands. Meanwhile, it was good to have company.

"You have a choice," Moz said, "Go to school or go out the door. I'm no foster parent. I'm your friend, Moz. Either way is good."

Big beautiful blue eyes. Neal killed Moz with that look, but Moz was determined to save the kid.

Capitulating, Neal asked, "Can you get me into high achievement? Fake me a transcript that will fly me though the next two years?"

"You got it," Moz said.

"I want to learn to do what you do," the kid said.

"I'll teach you, but it's like theoretical," Moz said. "You get it? You don't use what I teach you."

"Sure, Moz," Neal said as he picked up one of Moz's brushes. "I won't use it."

Moz figured the kid would, eventually, but there was a part of him that hoped Neal would not. Moz has pilfered a lot of things in his life, but he has never filched someone a future before.

The reason Moz taught Neal was that Moz was the spiritual son of a long proud line of con artists. His teacher was the legendary Billy Bunko, the best confidence artist you never heard of. Billy Bunko's teacher was Johnny Hooker and Hooker was mentored by Henry Gondoff, who, legend said, learned his craft from Beelzebub himself. It was a proud legacy and Moz doubted that he would ever have a kid so his mock nephew was as close as it was going to come.

OooOooO Five Years Later OooOooO

Moz was so proud that he was walking in the clouds. He wasn't the only one sitting there watching Neal Caffrey graduate from college, but he was the only one who knew that the shining young artist standing there in the black robe and the cardboard hat didn't really exist until Moz drew him onto a yellowing birth certificate with a fine tipped pen.

'Here's to you, Neal Caffrey Junior,' Moz toasted the long dead child to whom his sister gave birth. All he could really remember of his nephew was his big smile and even that might be overlain with this Neal's grin. "Here's to the high school prom you never made. The first girl or boy you never got to kiss. Here's to you. May this Neal live a good life in your place!'

Moz had an armful of Neal a few moments later. "Thanks Moz, for coming, for everything, for…"

All that joy. It made the hard times worth it. Even washing dishes at Denny's for two fucking years to keep a roof over their heads. Those first twenty four months, Moz had to be careful. The kid wasn't legal age and Moz couldn't trust his skills to keep him out of jail. If he went to jail, Neal would either have to take up the trade or worse, fall prey to another Rolly.

It was the longest period of straight that Moz had pulled in his life. After the kid turned eighteen, Moz dabbled a little, but still played it cool. Neal was such a feeling kid that Moz getting busted might have put him off his game and Neal was up for a scholarship that would give him a free Masters of Art.

Neal was talented. Moz was a dreamer. If his life had sucked less, he would have been a good professor. He was a good teacher, as an artist lacked something, finesse as it were. When he looked at Neal's original work, it made Moz want to sit down and weep. It was beautiful. Everyone thought so except some son of a bitch professor that said Neal's work was derivative. Neal took that too seriously. Years of passing around in foster care had cracked, but not broken the kid's heart. He didn't feel he was good enough. He worried that people would see through his façade and they would know he wasn't as bright, as good looking, as talented as he seemed.

Moz sometimes took Neal a few pegs down when his mock nephew strutted too much or when he wanted to take the easy way when the hard way was needed. Moz still wanted to punch Professor Apple's skinny long nose the day Neal came home and slapped Winsor Newton Lamp Black all over one of the most beautiful paintings he ever created.

"You got to grow a skin," Moz advised Neal.

But Neal wasn't ever going to be a tough guy and that was probably a good thing.

All the bonds, the stocks, the faked art, the web of cons that Moz had ever created and the best move of his life was the day he plucked Neal out of that miserable pimp's hands.

OooOooO

Neal was halfway through his Master's, the day Moz got caught passing some green for a friend of his. It's was Moz's second major strike and the third one would not be the charm. Moz looked at Neal's frantic face from the other side of the Plexiglas and said, "Do something for me, Neal."

"Yeah, anything, anything," Neal said.

"Get that degree, have a good life, don't be me," Moz said.

"I'll try," Neal said, his face buried in his hands.

"You do it, get that degree, settle down with some nice girl or boy, and become the great artist I know you can."

"I will, Moz," Neal said.

Neal walked a little on the wild side. He liked them male or female. He was always falling in love with the wrong guy or gal. The married professor who wasn't out. The pale chica who cut on herself until she was scooped up and sent to a hospital for therapy. The linebacker who beat Neal up when he couldn't stand how much he liked Neal's ass. Moz just hoped that somewhere, some when, Neal would meet someone who would steady him and love him with the deep, humble, and patient love he needed…the way Moz loved Neal.

Moz admitted he was pathetic. The funny thing was all he had to do was reach and Neal would have given him any part of him. Neal loved Moz, just not the way he wanted to be in love. Neal Caffrey was a hopeless romantic. Moz was his Chevalier Mal Fet, but Neal would never be his Guinevere.

Somewhere out there was Arthur.

OooOooO

By the time, Moz got out, even with all the good time he earned by slaving away in the library, tutoring the younger inmates, and drawing cards for the guards, Neal was out of college, at some art workshop and he was passionately in love with Kate.

Kate wasn't the worst thing to ever happen to Neal. She was a good match for him physically. Heads didn't just turn when they entered rooms; they spun.

Moz crashed on their couch, kibitzed on plans, showed Kate the ropes of the game, and silently accepted that Neal had slipped from his cloud into the earthly coil while Moz had been gone.

From what Moz understood, it was making good on some bad checks Kate wrote that made Neal forge a painting and sell it.

It happens.

You get a taste for it. Not just the money, but the rush. Oh, Moz loved the rush of the game too, so he couldn't blame Neal.

Then Peter Burke. FBI. Smart cop. Scenting on Neal's trail, right on his ass, like a bloodhound on speed. The bad thing was that Neal was sniffing the air around Burke like he smelled something interesting.

You don't fall for a cop or you take a fall, Moz lectured Neal.

Neal laughed it off, pointing at Kate. He was in love with Kate.

Moz could have warned him, but Neal was Neal and wouldn't listen. Moz knew Neal better than Neal knew himself. He defined what his protégée had with Kate was a case of being in love with the idea of being in love.

OooOooO

Watching Neal, Moz fell into old ways. He wanted the big score and then he wanted to retire to the good life. So he started working on some elegant bank bonds. They were beautiful, gorgeous. Moz thought they were his best work. Naturally, he did them at Neal's apartment because he was between residences as they say.

It was such a teensy weensy mistake. Just forgetting to change a couple serial numbers. Neal wouldn't have slipped up that way.

Peter Burke had the case and he wanted Neal for it. The thing was when Moz told Neal about the bonds, Neal just had to see the templates and Moz, being rather proud of them, had shown him. Neal's finger prints were all over the equipment. Moz had cautiously worn gloves, but Moz was sure that Neal would be able to dispose of the plates so he wasn't worried.

Neal put Moz on a plane to Cambodia with a falsified passport. Moz stayed there for eight months before he punched out some dude who was abusing little boys in the village and had to leave. A letter from Kate reached him when he passed through Phnom Penh. The news made Moz soul-sick. He had never been the suicidal type but that was as near to the urge to self destruct as Moz had ever felt.

OooOooO

Naturally, Moz paid a visit to Neal as soon as he was back in the states. The kid looked terrible, gone pale, hair limp, eyes surrounded by darkness. Moz had faked a chaplain's ID so he had a chance to talk to Neal privately more or less.

"You are not doing my time," Moz said.

"I'm doing it," Neal insisted. "I've already done eight months. Think of it as a long stretch of self imposed artistic isolation. I'm a martyr for my work."

"Not letting you," Moz whispered fiercely, as the guard unplugged his illegal I pod ear phones.

"Moz, if you try to explain you did it; Burke will just find a way to pin it on me as your accomplice. You have no idea how hot Burke is for me."

Shaking his head, Neal said, "Chaplain, I've had enough of you trying to save my soul. Guard, guard, get me the hell out of here."

As the guard collected Neal, Moz heard his whisper. "Take care of Kate. Take care of her."

Moz would. If he could find Kate, he would look after her.

He would spend the rest of his life trying to make it up to the kid if that's what it took to save his soul.

The end