Across the Street

A very belated post about my White Collar story Across the Street...

When I wrote the first fics in the Caffrey Conversation series -- which features Peter as a father figure for Neal -- I thought about writing something that showed them more as brothers. With so many ideas and time going into the Caffrey Conversation, I just never got around to it.

Then I started writing for a set of Flufftober prompts, with a fluffy idea for an AU: what if the Marshals had sent Neal, his mom, and Ellen to upstate New York instead of St. Louis? What if Neal grew up across the street from Peter and the Burke family?

This started as a set of unconnected scenes, one per year of Neal's life. 

Of course I had to complicate it. Eventually a plot emerged, tying these scenes together. Neal's mom gets support when she's "there but not there," and recovers. Neal learns about his dad earlier, running away earlier, and is found and brought back home by Peter. 

Then they take on Vincent Adler much earlier, and a younger Kate makes different decisions about her role in Adler's schemes.

I also brought in versions of some of the Caffrey Conversation OCs, just for fun.

Fun for me the writer, or fun for the readers? Hopefully it's both.