guidance
Castle honestly can't believe he is here, considers turning around for like the fifth time. He really doesn't think he should have just shown up, definitely should have called first.
Yes, that would have been the proper thing to do, but every time he went to pick up the phone he chickened out. He couldn't come up with one excuse as to why he would be calling, asking to come over, nothing that wouldn't have to make him explain.
And that's the problem, he doesn't know how to explain, doesn't have a clue what he really wants from this whole visit in the first place.
Well maybe he does, maybe he has an idea of what he really wants. He wants to be enough, for her, for his family, for whatever future she may have in mind. But he is terrifyingly afraid that he doesn't know how to do this, how to make a future for them, how not to completely screw it up.
He is almost positive he is doing it already though, messing it up, letting it slip through his fingers. He doesn't know when it happened or how or why. He thought he was doing a good job, he thought that they were doing just fine.
But he is starting to see that he was wrong. That maybe he is supposed to be doing more, being more, giving her more. The problem is he doesn't know how to do that, not without messing everything up, because that is what happens next, the messing up part, the agreeing to more part that then turns into the messing up part, when everything that started begins to end. He can't let that happen, it can't, no way. But he doesn't know what to do.
He needs to talk to someone, ask for help. Richard Castle needs someone to help him, make him not screw this up.
And in a startling moment, when he thought about things he doesn't usual do, he realized that he doesn't have anyone to talk to. Not about this anyway.
He couldn't go to his mother. He loves her, respects her, but she can't help with this. She herself couldn't figure it out. He's had forty years worth of step-dads and almost step-dads and one-sided awkward conversations with men he never cared about, to know this. For all her wonderful exuberance and wealth of wisdom, she did not set the best example of love and commitment.
He doesn't have a dad. Well, yes, he does have a dad, a real one too, an actual man, no longer the one he made up in his head. But that man chose a career as a spy over love and his family, and that's not the kind of commitment Castle wants to understand. Not that he could ask anyways.
There was Roy Montgomery. He could have helped. Castle misses him with a fierce longing he hasn't felt in quite awhile. Roy would have known, would have had answers. He should have asked him when he had the chance. Even if it was too early, even if they weren't together yet, but he knew it was possible someday. Roy knew too. Castle knows the Captain wouldn't have been surprised at Kate's and his relationship. So he should have asked when Roy was still here, learned everything he could have.
However that is not the case. Roy is dead and his parental examples leave lots to be desired. So he stands at the door of what he believes is his last and only option. A door he is not entirely sure how he knows the address of, but he does, and he is here and if he could just get over himself he could knock and maybe get some answers.
So he does. He knocks and holds his breath.
For a terrifying moment he doesn't think anyone is home.
"Dammit," he mutters to himself. "Shoulda called."
But then he hears the lock turn and door slowly opening.
"Rick?"
"This is a surprise."
"Jim," Castle nods at the older man.
Second part to come soon.
Thanks so much for reading.