This Is the Dreamworld 2
as before, in response to seilleanmor's fic filius est pars patris
in which Castle is allowed to be alive for the birth of his child
This Is the Dreamworld follows the events of 6x02 'Dreamworld' where Castle did not die of the toxin and also managed to get Kate pregnant that night he surprised her in DC
Rick Castle jerks awake in bed, his loft awash in darkness but the phone jangling on his nightstand. He's answering before he even realizes it, his legs tangled in the sheets on a hot night in June. He feels suffocated.
Her words are nuanced and weighted over the phone, laced with emotions he doesn't have the awareness to decipher. She sounds like she's been awake for a long time. "I'm having contractions and I'm not ready for this. It's not okay with me. I'm not ready."
"Kate?" he mumbles, half-asleep and two hundred and thirty miles away from her. "What?"
"Not here," she says. "It can't happen here. Why aren't you here?"
"I'm at the loft," he answers dumbly. "And you were the one who left."
"I didn't leave you-"
"No, I mean to drive home - Are you crying?" he asks, bewildered. He's awake now; he's awake. Where's the light? Did she say contractions?
"No, yes. I'm - it's just those Braxton Hicks again, I'm sure. But I don't want to be here. Not here. I don't want you to be there. Why are you there and me here?"
"You don't want to be in DC?" He fumbles with the switch and finally the light clicks on and blinds him, makes him duck his head and squint. "What about the task force?"
"That's Monday. It's Fright night."
"No, it's Saturday morning," he says.
"You're not helping. I can't fly; I'm not allowed to fly, but I-"
"I'll come to you," he says quickly, not even thinking about it. "And if you need to be in New York this weekend, then we'll drive up here. And then I'll drive you back on Monday morning and I'll stay at our place in DC for as long as you're having Braxton Hicks. I won't let you do this without me."
She's quiet on the other end. He finally hears the ragged echo of her breath and he takes a breath himself.
"I'm sure it's just the Braxton Hicks. You've had them for months," he says.
"And they don't hurt," she says tonelessly. "I'm sure you're right."
"Kate. Do you want me to come to you?" Stupid to ask; stupid of him to ask. He should just go. "No, never mind. I'm driving down right now. Okay?"
"It's one in the morning," she says weakly.
"So stay on the phone with me," he answers. So what if he's over forty and he hasn't done a midnight road trip since his early thirties? He can so do this - he can prove to her that they can do this.
Castle puts her on speaker and finds his pants, the shirt he pulled off earlier. When she left this afternoon for DC, she was so confident and blase about their arrangement, winking at him as she kissed his cheek, walking out the door. She has a task force meeting on Monday and it's just desk duty because she's on maternity leave in two weeks, and they were both feeling really good about all of this - their plan.
"Castle?"
"Just getting dressed." His bag is packed - it's always packed; they've gone back and forth between their cities so often now - and he scoops it off the floor of their closet and then goes back for his phone. "Gonna find my shoes and keys, and I'll be on my way."
"This is stupid," she mutters. "It was stupid to call. I'm - I might be freaking out a little. We have four weeks to go and that feels like no time at all to be prepared."
"I'll be there in about three hours, Kate. Less since it's so late and I can drive faster."
"Don't be reckless," she murmurs.
"That's exactly what I'll be," he shoots back. "Wreck-less."
"What?"
"Without wrecks," he grins. He wriggles his eyebrows but there's no one to see it and he feels a little stupid now himself. "Hey, we've figured this out, Kate. All you gotta do is trust that this is right for us. It's right. Have a little faith."
"It's right," she echoes.
"He'll be a well-traveled kid," he insists.
"Or her," she answers automatically.
He smiles. "Or her."
It is right. They've worked it out; they've gone to every ultrasound appointment together, they've decorated two nurseries in pale grey and yellow in each of the cities where they live, and this is the first week in months they would've had to spend apart.
"I know it's fine," she says.
"Hey, the Universe brought us together, Kate - in more ways than one. And we've survived everything it's thrown at us. Trust the Universe."
"That's not very helpful. My trust in the Universe is not that great."
He closes his eyes a moment and sinks down on the edge of the mattress. She told him not to come. She told him, wait for your flight next Friday. She told him she was fine; it would be fine - they have four weeks.
"Castle, you should just wait until Friday."
"I should've driven down with you tonight." He shoves his feet into his shoes. "You need me; I'm there. That's how this works, remember?"
"I don't want to have this baby in DC."
"You won't. I'll drive you to New York. Whatever we have to do, Kate."
"I know," she murmurs.
He stands again, finds his keys on top of her bureau, rubs the elephant statue there for good luck. "Stick to the plan, Kate. I'm coming down there."
"What if it's not Braxton-Hicks?" she says quietly.
It's stupid and impossible, but he promises it anyway. "Then I'm bringing you back to New York tonight."
"You mean this morning," she echoes back to him. "And if it is?"
"I'll come back here on Monday for my meeting. No problem." He locks the door behind him and hikes the bag up on his shoulder. "You going to keep me awake, Beckett?"
"I'll keep you awake."
"Good thing I drove down," he whispers in her ear.
She moans and curls her arm around his neck, so tight he almost falls to his knees, and then that piercing, curling cry bursts into the delivery room.
Kate gasps and lifts up on her elbows, but she falls back to the hospital bed, her body trembling. The look they share is electric and time-stopping, and he can't feel his fingers. Or toes. Or anything really, and the doctor is saying, Here we go, Daddy. Castle straightens up, breath caught, and Kate is shoving on him to move.
"Go," she croaks. "Go look, go see if it's-"
"It's a girl," the doctor announces, beaming at them with the baby. "Seven pounds, two ounces. Twenty inches."
Castle walks as if in a dream, takes the sprawling newborn into his hands, holds her against his chest. She's a mess, half cleaned off and eyes shut tightly as she mewls, fists in the air, a shock of dark hair.
"Oh, wow," he whispers. Even though they're in DC, even though it's not the midwife they planned or even the hospital they picked out, it's still so perfect.
He's rooted to the spot, at Kate's hip with the baby and staring down into his daughter's fierce little face.
"Ten on the Apgar." The doctor cleans her off with a quick swipe of a cloth, and his daughter is startled into quiet by the intrusion, eyes open and staring up at him with shared surprise. And then her face scrunches and her lips pout and that pitiful, healthy cry begins again.
"Castle."
He turns, dizzy and filled with it, and Kate is anxiously looking for him - no, for her, for the baby - and he comes back to the head of the bed and lowers the girl into her mother's arms.
Kate is trembling, her whole body pushed past fatigue, but she holds the baby against her and skirts her fingers over the tiny nose, brushes against those pouting lips. The little thing takes a deep breath in and makes a sucking noise at Kate's fingers, smacks her lips as she settles into an exhausted, retreating quiet.
"Oh, look at her," Kate whispers. "We made it work."
"We did," he croaks out. He has to clear his throat a few times to keep his voice from cracking. "And it's a girl."
"Are you disappointed?"
"Never," he says intensely. "She's beautiful. You're beautiful. Kate, I can't believe she's here." He strokes over that soft down of dark hair. "Do you have a name for her?"
She lifts her hand to him, her fingers around his ear and tugging him into her again for a kiss, her breath shaky and fast. "You tell her," she murmurs. "Since it's my city, it's your name."
"I wish I had one," he husks. "I can't think of a single one from our list. Nothing sounds right."
"Then just tell her hello," Kate murmurs, her eyes on the baby. "Tell her hello and let her hear your voice calling her first."
His smile is sappy and his eyes are tearing up, but he reaches down to cup the back of his daughter's head. Eight minutes old and those little fists are already trying to escape the swaddling, punch out into the world like a champion.
"Hello, my baby girl. I'm your Daddy. Hey, there, I'm so proud of you for waiting on me. You were good to your mommy even if you kind of threw off all our plans, sweetheart."
Their daughter opens her pink little mouth and yawns as if she couldn't care less.
Kate laughs and the sound makes those little fists release, fingers splaying and eyes opening, staring up at them. But not for long. Soon their daughter is turning her mouth into Kate and falling asleep, completely oblivious to her city, to her unusual world, to her parents' promises.
"I have to think of a name," he sighs.
The whole night - early morning - has been a blur; when he got to Kate at their apartment in DC she was grim-faced and turning him right around, pushing him back to the car with her contractions coming only five minutes apart.
He rubs his thumb over the red spot on the baby's forehead. "She waited for me; she shouldn't have to wait for her name."
"It will come," Kate tells him. She brushes her lips over the baby's crown, and her confidence renders him speechless. Kate lifts her head and nearly unmakes him with one of her rich, beautiful smiles. So much certainty in those eyes. "It doesn't have to be now, Castle. We've got time. We're going to be good at this."
continues in Chapter 10 of Castle Christmas Special:
s/9892375/10/Castle-Christmas-Special