Even when the flower dies
Something's by its side
A helping hand or a kiss goodbye
To ease it on its way
- And If My Heart Should Somehow Stop, James Vincent McMorrow
Ease It on Its Way
She doesn't even see it. She hears it, the gunshot, feel the muscles of her spine and her shoulders contract in response, drawing in, in, preparing to fight. She pivots on the spot, disregarding her stance and her sweep of the room entirely. A second shot sounds and she watches their suspect crumble in on himself, body folding as he falls to the floor.
Ryan and Esposito appear from the doorway, check their suspect for a pulse. She watches, frozen, waiting for her writer to emerge.
"Where's Castle?" Her mouth is dry, her words acerbic on her tongue. She doesn't want to know. She can't wait for an answer, her body thrumming with the need to move, to be active. She stumbles out into the hallway.
He's slumped, half sitting up against the wall. She runs to him, falls to her knees and cups his face in her hands, lifts his head to look at her. His eyes are open and she meets them.
"Rick, what happened?"
He opens his mouth and she almost gags as a line of blood slides from his lips down his jaw, her diaphragm forcing inwards sharply. "He shot me. I guess I sort of staggered back."
Her head bows, forehead meeting his in a crumbling kiss of grief. She can hear Ryan calling for a bus behind her, his voice a low base note to the screaming soprano of panic lacerating her every nerve ending.
She pulls back to look at him, runs her fingertips over the strong line of his jaw. "Rick. Please. The ambulance will be here really soon. Just hold on for me."
His pupils are enormous, eyes rolling in their sockets. His back arches and he coughs, blood spilling unbidden from his lips. "Kate-"
"Shh. I know." She does. She can see it in his eyes even now, through the cloud of terror and pain.
He won't give up, won't stop fighting, and she's inordinately grateful. "Love." He coughs. She doesn't think it's ever going to stop, lifts him to lie in the cradle of her folded legs. Strokes at his hairline, gentles him as he struggles for oxygen. He sucks in a trembling breath and she feels his lungs fill against her palm. "Love you."
She doesn't understand the moisture collecting on his face until he tries to reach up and touch her. Those are her tears decorating his pallid skin.
She wipes them away, kisses his forehead. He's burning up, skin like fire against her lips. "I know. I know. You make me feel loved every day. Every day, Rick."
She wants her words to calm him, needs to give him something to fight for, but his body is rebelling, shutting down even as he tries to fight.
He closes his eyes for a second, his eyelashes dragging as he opens them again. "Do you…Kate? Do you love? Me. Me back."
Oh God, Rick. Oh. This is what she did. This is how she broke him.
"Yes, God yes. I love you Rick." She chokes the words out, sobs catching in her throat.
He closes his eyes and she realises too late that she's given him all he needs to let go. She pushes on his chest, pounds her fists into him. "No. Don't you leave me. Don't you dare leave me Rick. Please. Please don't leave me. Please."
She can't see him anymore, her vision swimming. She feels Javi's hand on her shoulder, feels him trying to pull her away. "No. No, I'm not leaving him. No. Javi, please let go."
He crouches down next to her and catches her head in his hands, forces her to look at him. "Kate, the paramedics are here. Let them do their job." The two uniformed men lift Rick from her lap onto a stretcher. Cold air rushes in to fill the space where he is not.
She falls, then. Falls into Javier's arms and trembles there, closes her eyes to pretend he is someone else. He tries to sound reassuring as he hushes her. "I called Lanie; she's going to meet you at the hospital."
Rick is strapped in when his eyes open, wide and panicked, rolling in his skull, searching for her.
She stands up, feels like this is her first time using her legs. She locks her knees, sways on the spot. One of the paramedics turns to her and she can't even see his face. "Are you coming?"
She chokes out something that might be confirmation, forces her treacherous muscles to follow them to the bus.
They take him away. In the ambulance she'd been allowed to stroke his hair back from his damp forehead, whisper soothing strings of nonsensical syllables. It had been her hand that had tethered him to life, her bones, her skin, bearing the evidence of his arduous fight.
But when they get to the ER, they wheel him away from her. Her knees give and she falls down in the middle of the corridor, back against the wall. Every notch of her vertebrae is pressed against the cool mortar. She draws her knees up to her chest, protecting her heart, pressing them against her sternum.
She doesn't open her eyes until Lanie's voice sounds out, so close to her ear that Kate jolts and hits her best friend's jaw with her shoulder. She can't apologize, can't open her mouth lest the keening cry of her fractured heart spill out unbidden.
Lanie pulls her to her feet, holds on to her as she sways for a moment. "Come on honey. Let's get you to the waiting room and then I'll find out what I can."
Lanie is gone. Lanie has gone to find out what Kate already knows. She felt it happen, felt the moment her partner fell into another world.
She felt the moment she lost him, could only watch her heart splinter into shards of glass in her chest, mute.
She doesn't know how long it has been when Lanie comes back, and then she's bouncing on the balls of her feet in the doorway, beckoning for Kate to come over to her.
Beckett stands up, every muscle in her long legs protesting; a forever thing. And then she's up, walking across the floor to reach Lanie, crossing the vast distance. "He's out of surgery, he's stable."
White noise, static, radio silence rushes through her brain and she can't hear Lanie, can't hear anything. He's okay.
Lanie's hands close around her upper arms. "Kate, honey, do you want to go see him? You can, if you want."
She shakes her head, brain rattling against her skull. "I have to call Martha, Alexis."
"No. I'll do it. They don't know when he's gonna wake up, could be soon. And you need to be there when he does." Lanie wraps her arms around Kate, squeezes her for a second and lets her go.
He doesn't look like she'd thought he would. She'd prepared herself for pallid, translucent skin. She'd prepared herself to face the reflection of her own self last summer. But he looks okay. Lines travelling out of his chest beneath the hospital gown, an IV in his chest, his arm in a sling, but he looks peaceful, his face unmarred by pain.
She sinks into a chair next to his bed, tries not to tremble. A nurse is writing something in a chart and then she turns to Kate.
"His vest altered the bullet's trajectory. It hit his shoulder, shattered his shoulder blade. There was some minor internal bleeding, that's why he coughed up blood, but he's going to be fine. Just needs a lot of rest, and some PT for his shoulder."
His vest. Right. She didn't even notice he was wearing one, hadn't been able to tear her eyes away from his. She nods, eyes scanning the woman's face blankly. The nurse smiles at her and then leaves. Leaves Kate alone with him.
She rests her head on the bed next to his hand, the weight of relief forcing her spine to curve. She mutters into the mattress, tells him she's sorry, begs for his forgiveness.
When his hand flutters next to her she sits upright so hard that her spine smacks against the back of the chair and she winces. Her eyes find his face and he smiles at her, his own eyes twinkling.
"Hi. Oh, God. Hi." She beams at him, leans in and rests her forehead against his for a moment, breathing in the scent of him. "Do you want a drink or something?"
He coughs, flinches as it jostles his shoulder. "No, just. What happened?"
She takes the hand nearest to her, the good one, cannot even imagine not having a tangible connection to him. "You remember we went to the suspect's house? Well, he shot you. But your vest deflected it. It did some damage to your shoulder that they fixed in surgery, and there was minor internal bleeding, but you're gonna be okay."
He nods, shuts his eyes briefly and then opens them again. "Mother? Alexis?"
"Lanie called them, I'm sure they're on their way." She smiles again, can't contain it. He's here, alive, talking to her.
He squeezes her hand and they lapse into an easy silence, just looking at each other, smiling softly.
She should have known that wouldn't last.
"Kate?"
She blinks a few times, clears the hazy daydreams from her vision. "What's up?"
He swallows hard, steadfastly refuses to meet her gaze. "You're a cop."
She lets out a startled bark of laughter, looks at him with her brows furrowed. "Are you done stating the obvious?"
He sighs, no hint of a smile on his face. "Could you just let me finish, please?"
"Sorry, do continue."
"You told me once that you don't get to rewrite the ending." It still astounds her, how much of what she says he retains, uses against her at a later date. But the look on his face-
She doesn't think he's trying to use it against her now. "But Kate, I'm a writer."
"Mm." She has to bite her lip to stop herself from telling him to get to the point. She can see he's following some sort of logic and she does her best to pay attention.
"I do." He finally meets her eyes and his are wide and pleading with her to understand. "I do get to write the ending. And I'm writing ours."
It takes her a moment to find words, get past everything he hasn't said. "What does that even mean?"
He smiles softly at her, squeezes her hand. "Someday, we'll get there Kate. Our ending. We're on the porch, nestled together on the loveseat, watching our grandchildren play out the front. Listening to our children talking in the house. Drinking tea. Laughing about how long it took us to stop being so blind, so stupid."
She can see it. She can see all of it; hear their children's voices, the shrieking peals of laughter that their grandchildren release. It burns in the corners of her eyes and low in her abdomen, the visceral need for it.
"Castle." He doesn't give her a chance to finish and she's glad. She has nothing but his name.
"I know. I know you've got the wall. I know you're not ready yet, Kate. But it's a long and exhausting road, and I think being able to see the end of it will help us both." His eyes are scanning her face over and over, looking for a tell. It's habit, now, to hide how his words reach parts of her she didn't know she was hiding. A habit that needs to be broken. She stops.
She just stops, allows her face to break open, allows him to see everything. Allows the light that has enveloped her heart to spill from her eyes. He smiles and she does too and then their lips are meeting, so very carefully.
She wants to spread her hands out across his shoulder blades, pull him against her, feel the weight of him over her, her shield. She pulls away on a sigh, tugs her bottom lip between her teeth. He laughs, reaches out to rescue it with his thumb.
His mother and daughter walk in then, concern etched in every line of their faces. Kate stands from her chair, nods at them and almost, almost makes it to the door.
"Kate?" She turns around, can't deny him anything, not now.
"Hmm?"
He hesitates for a second, glances at his family and then seems to make a decision. He swallows and she watches his throat move, transfixed. "Come back later."
She nods.
Where else would she be?