Disclaimer: Nope, "Castle" still doesn't belong to me.
Author's Note: In rewatching the arc from "47 Seconds" on through the angsty awesomeness that was "Always," it occurred to me (again) that everything between Castle and Beckett, about her lying about what she remembered, got resolved too quickly in "Undead Again"—as happy as I was to see it, since more episodes like "The Limey" and "Headhunters" might have killed me. So I decided to write my own take on how Castle and Beckett went from Castle deciding that the zombie case would be his last one to the beginning of "Always," where he's comfortable with inviting her over for a movie night (after he's made it obvious that they'll be alone!) and she's comfortable with accepting so easily.
Getting Closer to Always
"Richard, where are you off to this morning?"
His mother's question stopped him cold in his putting away of breakfast. Damn, he should have known his mother would ask. And he didn't want to talk about this, not when he was still so uncertain of what he was doing. Maybe he should have snuck out of the loft at dawn or something this morning and just killed time somewhere until then, he thought ridiculously. And for half a second, he momentarily considered lying to his mother but no, he couldn't lie to his mother and damn it, he was a grown man. He shouldn't need to be sneaking out of his own house to avoid answering questions from his mother. Even if he wasn't sure what he was doing and was afraid he was being a colossal idiot.
"To the precinct," Castle answered carefully.
"To say goodbye to everyone?"
He sighed. "No, Mother. Just to take Beckett her coffee and see if there's anything going on, like I always do."
"Oh, Richard, I thought you said this zombie case would be your last."
He sat down at the island facing his mother. "I know, Mother, and at the time, I meant it but then… Beckett and I talked, a little…"
"She explained why she lied about not remembering?"
"Yes. Well, sort of," he corrected himself. "She said she couldn't deal with it, with everything that happened to her at the time, that she needed to work through it on her own first."
"And is that explanation enough?"
He hesitated for a long moment. Was it enough? At the time, at that moment, it had seemed like it; it had been more than she'd been willing to admit to before, certainly, about being in therapy. And the admission that she'd been in therapy had hit him in the chest and left him breathless because how could he not have known this, how could he not have noticed? Because he knew Beckett; he knew how hard it was for her to admit she needed help from anyone. So for her to have voluntarily gone back to therapy—how much she must have been going through to get her to go back to therapy. (And he knew enough of NYPD regs to know that she would have needed to go back voluntarily; she would have needed to pass a psych eval before she could return to work but once she had passed it, he had expected that would be it. But no, she had gone back, had admitted she still needed professional help.) The thought of it had made him ache for her and abruptly put from his mind any thought of his own hurt.
It's going to take everything that he's got to just put one foot in front of the other and get through the day.
"I think so," he finally said. "At least, I'm not angry at her anymore." Well, that wasn't completely true, part of him was still angry, but his anger was muted now. She had taken all the wind out of its sails with her admission that she was in therapy.
"But since she does know how you feel, how does she feel, Richard? Did she say anything about that?"
"Yes. Well, no. I don't really know. She said she thinks she's getting close to accepting everything that happened and she… she wants me to be around when she gets there."
"So she wants you to wait. Still."
He grimaced. Put like that…
His mother sighed. "I'm sure Beckett cares about you as her friend and her partner but I worry that she'll hurt you. Again. Are you sure you know what you're doing, Richard?"
"No, I'm not," he admitted frankly.
God knew he'd spent the better part of last night wondering this very thing. A part of him, the part of him that was still hurt, was raging at him that he was being a fool, that he was playing right into Beckett's hands by giving in so easily. That this was exactly what she'd done to string him along for the last 8 months, giving him just enough hope through subtext to keep him coming back but never committing, never saying anything outright.
Another part of him, the stronger part of him at the moment, insisted that he had to give Beckett a chance, that she couldn't, wouldn't, just lead him on like this for nothing, that all her words, cautious and somewhat vague as they were, had to mean something. That all her looks, her soft smiles, had to mean something. And she'd been in therapy; surely he could understand her needing to take time after all that she'd been through.
He wished he could decide if he was still angry at her for lying or not. And how crazy was it, how confused and tied up in knots was he over Beckett, if he wasn't sure if he was angry? He was a writer; he was in touch with his emotions, always knew what he was feeling.
He understood, now that he thought about it with a little more objectivity, that it would have taken her some time to accept and come to terms with everything that happened in the cemetery, her shooting happening right on the heels of her devastating discovery of Captain Montgomery's involvement with her mother's case and then his murder on top of that. She hadn't had time to process any of it, let alone his own declaration of love. It had quite possibly been the worst-timed declaration of love in the history of the world, although he didn't—couldn't—regret it. He'd thought she was dying—he still shuddered at the memory—and he couldn't let her go without telling her he loved her. But it didn't mean he didn't understand it might have been too much for her. Physically, she'd been in no condition to deal with it and mentally, emotionally… well, he could understand. Now.
He could understand—but with understanding came the end of anger, even the beginning of forgiveness. And without anger to hold on to, he was left with hurt. And it did hurt. He still wished desperately she could have let him in, could have let him help her the way he wanted to, the way he ached to. But he knew her, knew how self-reliant she was. And he could accept—or wanted to be able to accept— that she would have needed to recover, become stronger, on her own; acknowledging or accepting his feelings wouldn't have solved any of her problems. He wanted to think it would have but this was no fairy tale; this wasn't something where all would be fixed with "true love's kiss" or something like that. And Beckett was no damsel in distress to let someone just ride up and slay all her dragons for her, even if he could have.
So he could understand. Mostly. He thought he could understand. And if she hadn't even been able to come to terms with her shooting, let alone his declaration of love, then he couldn't read anything about her actual feelings for him in her months of silence. Could he? He didn't think he could—and with the memory of her looks, her smiles, her tone, from the last day running through his mind, he was even less sure of what her feelings might be. But there it was, he had hope again. A pale, invalid cousin of the hope he'd been living on for something like the past year but it was still hope. Hope that he hadn't been played for a fool these past months, hope that he hadn't been deluding himself—or been deluded by her these past months. Hope that she did want to be with him, after all.
He wasn't sure, was still afraid that he was being influenced by his own wishful thinking more than actual facts. But, well, this was who he was. He was an optimist. He believed in things like fate and the supernatural and magic and, yes, he still believed in her, in them. Still believed that he and Beckett could be—would be—amazing together.
No, he wasn't sure about this. All he really had was a tentative, cautious hope based on what might turn out to be wishful thinking. "But, Mother, I—I'm not sure I have any choice. You were right when you said love's not a switch I can turn on and off. I can't turn it off and I can't stop and, as long as there's any hope, I can't just give up on her." He sighed. "I won't wait forever, not now, not this time. I can't. But I'll wait a little longer."
"Oh, darling," his mother sighed, lifting her hand to touch his cheek in one of her rare caressing gestures, before patting his arm. "I just don't want to see you get hurt."
"I know, Mother, but I'm a big boy. I can handle it." A lie, he thought with a fleeting stab of pain and dread—if Kate ever told him outright that she didn't want to be with him, that she didn't love him, he knew it would decimate him for a good long while, possibly forever—but what was he supposed to say?
"All right. I hope you know what you're doing, kiddo."
"Yeah, me too." He managed a smile for his mother and then, standing up, moved around the island to give her a fleeting kiss on the cheek. Another rare gesture between them but right then, it felt appropriate. Now, when he was so uncertain, all his emotions wrung out and turned inside out over Kate, he was grateful for his mother, for the very simplicity of the love and trust between them that didn't need to be thought about. "I'll see you later, Mother."
"Until tonight, Richard."
He gave his mother a wave as he left the loft, heading to the usual coffee shop down the street from the precinct to pick up his and Beckett's usual order. And so armed, he made his way to the precinct.
She looked up when he arrived, her face lighting up with one of her beautiful, soft smiles, as she accepted her coffee. "Thanks, Castle."
He managed a small grin, trying to act normally. "I may not help you with paperwork but I figure I can at least keep you caffeinated while you work."
"A useful public service," she smiled.
And damn, if his stupid, hopeful heart didn't flip at the sight of her smile. Still. Again. He suppressed a sigh. He was so doomed. And he couldn't give her up. Not yet. Not now. He knew that, felt it in his very bones. He wasn't going to be able to get over her. There was no getting over Kate Beckett.
He'd been honest when he said he wouldn't—couldn't—wait forever for Beckett. He would give her a little more time for the wall to come down but at some point, he knew he would have to stop. For his own sanity's sake. Going on like this, in this limbo, for much longer would shred his heart entirely. So he couldn't wait forever. For his own sake. For his mother's sake, for Alexis's sake.
But he knew that if the day came that he needed to just give up on her, on his dream of them, entirely, he would need to give up everything, completely sever even the smallest connection to her, cut off ties completely to everyone at the 12th, possibly the entire NYPD, to Lanie and everyone at the ME's office. He would probably need to give up on writing Nikki Heat, no matter what his current contract said.
It would hurt damnably—he suspected, without hyperbole, it might half kill him—but he knew it was the only way he could do it. She was… an addiction and he could no more keep some little corner of her and not have it consume him than an alcoholic could have just one drink.
"Oh, Castle, I wanted to mention the DA's office called and they've officially dropped all charges against Kyle Jennings. He's home free. And they've filed the charges against Tom Williams."
"That's good to hear."
"It was a clever plan," she said somberly. "Williams was such a cool customer, he might have gotten away with it. If it hadn't been for you and your plan to scare a confession out of him."
He shrugged but allowed himself a little smug grin. "Ah, well, I figured it might be our best shot after taking a run at Greta didn't work. He was a coward, not wanting to do any of his own dirty work, so I thought he might break if it looked like he might have to pay for what he did to Kyle."
"You were right." She paused and then added, "Thank you, Castle."
He lifted his eyebrows in surprise. "For what?"
"For coming up with that plan. I—I'm not sure it would have occurred to me to use Kyle against him like that." She laughed softly. "I certainly don't think it would have occurred to me to dress up in Kyle's zombie costume."
"I guess that's what you need me for, Beckett." He said it lightly but as happened sometimes between them, the careless words seemed to fall into a sudden charged silence.
Their eyes met and held and he suddenly found it hard to breathe.
That's what you need me for…
Stupid, he scolded himself. What was he thinking saying something like that, even in jest, now?
"I mean, to come up with crazy plans involving zombie costumes," he added quickly.
She blinked, her lashes lowering to hide her eyes, before she met his eyes again. "Right, of course."
And he wondered if he was imagining the slight breathlessness in her voice, the tinge of… uncertainty… in her tone as she agreed with him.
Damn it, he was doing it again, he thought in annoyance. Hoping, imagining, building up on subtext and silences and imagined looks. He could be imagining it. God knew he had a vivid imagination and where Beckett was concerned, it seemed like his imagination tended to work overtime.
She wasn't ready yet, the wall hadn't come down. She'd said so. And she still hadn't said, directly, that the wall coming down would be for him, for them.
After all, it hadn't been all that long ago that she'd seemed all too willing to be charmed by the admittedly-charming—drat the man!—Inspector Colin Hunt.
He was her friend and her partner and maybe that was all she meant, that she wanted him to be around, as her friend, to see the wall come down.
He hoped—but he still didn't know. And he needed to know. Hoping wasn't enough—not anymore. Not when he knew she'd known how he felt for months and hadn't said anything. And that was really what it came down to. Metaphorical walls were all well and good but surely, if she just weren't ready but she wanted to be with him, she would have said something? Would have told him, asked him to wait—something? He would have waited, would happily wait for years, if she only asked him to—but instead, she'd said nothing. Said nothing for months.
He suppressed another sigh. He was going to drive himself crazy thinking about this, wondering about this. "Well, if you're only going to be doing paperwork today, I guess there's not much need for me to stick around. I might just head home, try to get some writing done since I'm behind on the latest chapter I owe Gina. Call me if a body drops?"
She looked up at him. "Of course, Castle."
He headed towards the elevators when she stopped him. "Castle?"
He turned. "Yeah, Beckett?"
She gave him a rather tentative smile. "If no body drops by the end of the day, want to meet at the Old Haunt? I'll buy you a drink."
"Sure. Count me in," he agreed automatically and then wanted to kick himself. Spending more time with her outside of work wasn't what he needed right now. He was trying to be cautious, to be careful, trying to protect himself even as he waited. Because, damn it, it hurt to be around her now, not quite as much as it had after he'd first found out she'd lied—that had just about ripped him apart—but it still hurt, even now, even if she'd said she thought the walls were close to coming down. It hurt to be so uncertain around her, to doubt everything she said. "Have the boys and Lanie come too. We haven't had a night out at the Old Haunt in a little while," he added hurriedly.
"Sounds good. I'll tell them."
"Until later, then."
"See you tonight, Castle."
He went home but if he'd thought he might actually get some writing done, he was sadly mistaken. As it was, he spent the day alternately playing computer games or staring—brooding, really—at her picture on his electronic story board of her sniper case while memories, images, from the last year played through his mind as he tried to determine for the thousandth—no, millionth—time since he'd found out she remembered her shooting, if he'd really been so wrong about how she felt, what she wanted. And tried to decide how much he should read into her saying that she thought she was getting closer to being able to accept everything that had happened that day at the cemetery. Accept—what? That he loved her? But did that just mean admitting she heard him, that she knew how he felt, or did it mean she loved him too? He didn't know, he couldn't decide. He knew what he wanted to believe—but that was the crux of the problem. He wanted to believe it too much. He wanted to believe she loved him—had always wanted to believe it—so how could he know he hadn't talked himself into believing it?
She thought the wall was coming down. I know I won't be able to have the kind of relationship that I want until the wall comes down. But had she really meant that she wanted to have that kind of relationship with him? Or just a real relationship with anyone, another Dr. Motorcycle Boy or another Inspector Hunt?
He didn't manage to reach any conclusions. He wasn't sure it was possible to reach any conclusions. All he managed to conclude was that he was developing a healthy dislike of subtext. So much for being a writer, he thought rather bitterly, where the trick was always to leave just enough up to the reader, hide just enough of the ball from the reader to keep them interested, give the reader—like the heroes—just enough clues.
And maybe that was the problem. He kept thinking of his relationship with Beckett as being a story, as if there were some prearranged happy ending for them set in stone—but that wasn't the case, was it? This was real life and there were no real, clean-cut endings in life and life didn't play out the way stories did. There was no guaranteed happily ever after. There might just be this—four years of shadowing her, of falling in love with her, of waiting for her—until she finally told him that she didn't feel the same way, that he was her friend and her partner but she didn't want him as a lover. He flinched at the thought but forced himself to acknowledge the truth of it. It was possible. It was just as possible—maybe even more so—than the dream he had of the two of them, together, of Kate in his bed, in his life, as his partner in every sense of the word.
He walked into the Old Haunt to see that she and the boys were already there. She looked up and smiled at him—and his heart reacted. No, he really could not give up on her now. He was in this too deep, loved her too much. He would wait a little longer until the wall came down. And then—well, and then he would ask, directly. No more subtext; no more dancing around the subject. Because he needed to know, for sure, how she felt before he could give up on her, on them.
He sent a general grin around the table as he slid into the booth beside Beckett. "Hey, guys. Getting started without me?"
"It's not our fault if you're late, Castle," Esposito shot back.
Beckett grinned and shook her head a little, pushing a glass over to him. "I already got you your drink, Castle, so stop pouting."
He lifted the glass in a half-salute before taking a drink. She had ordered him his usual scotch that he ordered when he was here—and his heart warmed, ridiculously. Of course she knew his usual drink order. They came to the Old Haunt often enough. It didn't mean anything. Really. He knew her drink order too just like he knew how she took her coffee. He could probably guess Esposito's and Ryan's orders too. Except, he thought, he really couldn't. Beer of some sort but he couldn't remember which brand either of them preferred.
"Say, Castle, explain to us again how when we have to spend a day writing up a case report about zombies, the writer somehow never sticks around to help us?" Espo interjected.
"Ah, never mind him," Ryan cut in. "He's just cranky 'cause he got a paper cut and he's a big baby."
Espo turned a mock glare on Ryan, pointing a finger at his partner. "Just for that, you are getting the next round."
Ryan grinned. "You can try but I don't take orders from you."
Espo turned to Beckett. "You tell him, Beckett! He takes orders from you."
Beckett laughed. "Oh no. I know better than to get in between partners."
Espo made a face at her. "Hey, I'm your partner too!"
She shot Esposito a teasing grin. "Wrong again. You're on my team but I already have a partner, remember? A certain writer who refuses to write when it comes to paperwork," she added, nudging Castle with her elbow.
"Okay, okay, here we go again," Castle exclaimed, pretending offense. "Why is it always pick-on-the-writer day whenever you guys get stuck inside doing paperwork? We all know Gates wouldn't accept a report I wrote."
"Yeah, Castle, your charm seems to be lacking since it clearly has no effect on Gates," Espo cracked.
"No, that's just proof that she's somewhat less than human," he quipped. "All real humans are susceptible to my charm and likability, ask anyone!"
That resulted in another round of sarcastic laughs and teasing rejoinders and he felt himself relax. This, he could do, this camaraderie with the team. Yes, he was hyper-aware of Beckett sitting next to him but that was nothing.
"So, Castle, did you manage to get much writing done?" Ryan asked.
"Not so much writing as just working out some plotting problems in my head," he answered—and told himself he wasn't lying. He had been working out plotting problems; no need to mention that the plot was his own life and his relationship with Beckett rather than anything Nikki Heat-related.
Beside him, Beckett laughed a little. "Working out plotting problems? Is that some new euphemism for playing computer games all day?"
"I was working!" he protested, even as something inside him twisted rather painfully at this evidence of how well she knew him, right down to his procrastination habits from his writing. She knew him—and he couldn't help but wonder at each instance of her knowing him if it meant anything, if her knowing him was evidence of her feelings just as how well he knew her was evidence of his.
"I should have gotten a job where playing computer games all day counted as work," Espo interjected.
"I know, right? What were we thinking, becoming cops?" Ryan quipped.
"Maybe that you don't have the talent to become a writer," Espo shot back before he finished his drink and nudged Ryan. "Come on. Time for round 2 and it's on you."
"I don't remember agreeing to that," Ryan protested but he slid out of the booth and accompanied Espo to the bar.
Leaving him and Beckett alone. Damn.
He took refuge in sipping his drink but it wasn't as if he could keep staring at his glass forever. He debated, trying to come up with a neutral topic of conversation, but before he could, she beat him to it.
"We're not taking you away from something else, are we?" she asked.
He looked up at her. "What? No, of course not," he answered.
She smiled slightly. "Oh. Good, then. I just wondered…"
"Wondered what, Beckett?"
"If you might have another date with Jacinda."
Stupidly, crazily, it took him a second to remember who Jacinda was—and he honestly could barely remember what she looked like. "Oh," he said lamely. "No, no date. She, ah, had to leave the City again for work," he lied, since he had no idea what her work schedule was like since he'd said goodbye to her a couple weeks ago. Come to think of it, he possibly owed Jacinda an apology since he'd been very abrupt in telling her he couldn't see her anymore. He might have only kissed her a couple times—almost willing himself to want to kiss her but he'd found that the only woman he wanted to kiss was Kate—and he was afraid that Kate was the only woman he would ever want to kiss and how pathetic was that?—but he wasn't usually so curt with women. Or he never had been before.
Beckett wasn't looking at him, was staring at the circle of moisture left by her glass on the table. "So… do you think you'll see her again when she does come back?"
Did she… care? He couldn't tell if she was only curious or if she actually felt something.
"No," he said finally, honestly. "I think that's… done. It's over."
"Oh, really? I thought… well, it seemed like you really liked her, liked that she was fun and uncomplicated."
He inwardly winced. Okay, that had been punishing Beckett. He knew it. And he was abruptly ashamed of it. Yes, he'd been angry at her but she deserved better than that sort of cheap crack; if only for the sake of their friendship, she deserved better than that. "No, well, you know, fun and uncomplicated only goes so far. It's… a distraction, but it's not… real… Uncomplicated becomes boring. It doesn't last."
"Is that what you want, then, something real, something that will last?"
Only with you, he wanted to blurt out and had to bite the inside of his lip to keep from saying that out loud. His heart slammed against his rib cage and he found it hard to breathe and all the noise in the Old Haunt faded away into nothing as he stared at her. She wasn't smiling but she had met his eyes and why on earth couldn't the lighting be better in bars so he could try to read the expression in her eyes?
But then he realized, this was what they always did. She would say something or he would say something and he would start analyzing every minute change of her expression, every shift in the color of her eyes, every shade of her tone, for the subtext behind her words, her reaction. This was how she'd kept him hoping, kept him following her, for all these months, knowing perfectly well how he felt.
No, no, no, he suddenly thought with a flare-up of his old anger. He was done with this, done with this subtext thing. She either loved him, wanted to be with him, or she didn't. And he wasn't going to respond to her subtext anymore. Really.
"Did I mention that Alexis made her decision about what college she's going to?" he asked instead, not even caring that his change of subject would be pitifully blatant.
"No, you didn't mention it. Which did she decide on? I'm assuming it wasn't Oxford," Beckett added with a small smile, "Or you would be in here drowning your sorrows in multiple whiskeys."
He managed a real smile at the thought of Alexis. "She decided on Columbia so she'll be staying close to home."
"Wow, you must be happy about that."
"I am. Believe me, I am."
"She wasn't worried that it would be too close for her?"
"She made me promise that I would try to give her space, not drop in on her every day or insist she come home every weekend."
"Good for her," Beckett nodded approval. "It's a great school. I hope she likes it."
"Yeah, me too." He finished off his drink with a last couple gulps. "I just can't believe she's decided what college to go to. I swear it seems like only yesterday she was running to me for help in tying her shoe-laces."
She laughed. "Alexis hasn't been that little for about 15 years now, Castle. Get used to it. We all grow up eventually."
"I didn't," he protested automatically.
She grinned at him. "Yeah, well, you're the exception that proves the rule."
He pretended to make a face at her but then the boys returned with their drinks and Lanie arrived at the Old Haunt to join them and the rest of the evening passed without any more opportunity for him and Beckett to talk alone—and he couldn't decide if he was relieved about that or not.
She gave him one of her soft smiles as they were breaking up for the evening. "Thanks for coming, Castle. This was fun."
He shrugged, biting back the sudden urge to say that she'd asked him to come and he couldn't refuse her, could never refuse her. "Yeah, well, it is my bar. What kind of owner would I be if I didn't encourage patronage?"
"Still, thanks."
"Hey, girl, you coming?" Lanie called from the cab she was going to share with Beckett to get home.
"So, see you tomorrow, Castle?"
"Tomorrow," he echoed, trying to pretend he wasn't mesmerized by the play of the lights of the City in her eyes, the warmth in her voice and in her smile.
She gave him a last smile and then hurried to get into the cab with Lanie and he stared after the retreating taxi for a long moment.
He remembered the times when her saying "see you tomorrow" had taken on additional significance—to show him she'd forgiven him for looking into her mother's case three years ago, to tell him he'd be welcomed back as her partner after his summer away in the Hamptons. And yesterday, telling him she wanted him to be around when the wall came down.
That wall I was telling you about? I think it's coming down. I'd like you to be there too.
See you tomorrow. It wasn't quite "always," and it was definitely not an "I love you," but it had to mean something, didn't it?
He was trying to analyze the hidden meanings behind a fairly conventional form of leave-taking, he suddenly realized. He, the man of big, romantic gestures, had been reduced to analyzing the subtext in synonyms for saying "goodnight."
It occurred to him, not for the first time, that he was so doomed.
Protect his heart even while hoping? Who was he kidding? His heart was a lost cause. And this tentative hope while waiting for the wall to come down might just kill him.
He remembered how his mother had asked him if he knew what he was doing. No, he really, really didn't. He had no damn clue what he was doing. He was very possibly setting himself up for a brutal heartbreak or… Or something else. All he knew was that he felt some tentative, wispy beginnings of hope—hope that somehow he'd been wrong about what her months and months of lies and silence might mean—and his hope, rather like his love, was too stubborn, too much a part of him, to die.
Author's Note 2: Reviews would be much appreciated! I'd love to know people's thoughts on my characterizations of how Castle is feeling and what he's thinking.