Dude.
"What's up with you?"
Neal looked up from his pillow in surprise to find the blurry form of Peter Burke in his doorway. Neal narrowed his eyes. "I'b sick. Whad duz id look like?"
The fuzzy Peter seemed surprised, but Neal had covered his face with his sheets and curled up in the warm darkness. He was just falling asleep again when Peter's voice broke the peaceful silence. He was talking to Elizabeth on his cell, but Neal couldn't make out what was being said. He merely gave a pointed groan and prayed that Peter would shut up and leave him alone.
No such luck.
"Hey, Neal, El's coming over with some soup and meds. Just hang in there, okay?"
Neal gripped the blankets tightly and tried to imagine it was Peter's neck. "Doh!" Neal whined. "Weave me abone!"
"Not going to happen, kiddo," was Peter's cheerful reply. "Just gotta cowboy up—"
Neal threw back his blankets and sat up, glaring at the all too healthy FBI agent. "Dude," he said as best he could. "Leave. Me. Alone!"
For a moment his sinuses were miraculously clear; then they were spilled all across his face, much to his embarrassment. Peter sighed, handed Neal a box of tissues, and shook his head again, still grinning as Neal trumpeted into a handful of Kleenex.
Sometimes Neal's youth astounded Peter. At times like this, though Neal was in a foul mood and obviously a very under the weather thirty something year old, the ex-con was as childlike as ever. Possibly more so.
Peter chuckled. Who, aside from teenage girls from California, said "dude" anymore?
Apparently California girls and Neal Caffrey.