When Rick meets Kate his first thought is that she was beautiful once. He focuses on the slopes and curves of her features raising and bowing beneath the burns.
His second thought is a correction; she still is beautiful.
The first time he sees her she's sleeping with the kind of soft expression that would hint at peacefulness. He records her faint pulse, checks the drip and leaves in silence.
It was always sad to see young faces and soft skin withering with damage. Usually he could separate himself from his patients, but he realises quickly that with Kate it's always personal.
On the second day her inky lashes flutter against the taut skin of her cheeks and he knows her eyes before he can see them.
"Richard Casttllee?" She blinks hazily and yawns, "Am I dreaming?"
"Hi Katherine, no you're certainly not dreaming. I'm your new doctor, Mr. Castle."
Kate scrunches her nose. Adorable. "No one calls me Katherine."
"What would you like me to call you?" He asks gently.
She lets her head fall back onto her pillow with a soft puff.
"Kate. You can call me Kate... Or honey. Or baby." She giggles, "You, Mr. Castle, can call me whatever you want..."
Castle laughs and she joins in after a moment, her voice a mingling harmony to his, although he gets the idea that she doesn't know why she's laughing.
"Let's stick with Kate for now, wouldn't want the other patients to get jealous."
She yawns. "M'kay.
"How are you feeling?"
"Good." She pauses, thoughtful, "I can't feel my butt."
Castle chuckles and she watches him, her smile tilted with dizziness.
"That would be the pain meds. We're going to lower your dosage over the next few days.
Kate nods.
"I like your books, Dr. Castle."
He watches her and the gentleness in his gaze makes her hear beat faster.
"And I like your smile, Kate."
She grins wider, and yes he really likes that smile.
Her first week she makes him regret the soft blue of the singular rooms; the empty space a stretching reminder of the loneliness she must be feeling.
He doesn't need to ask why no one visits; doesn't offer to contact anyone because he knows why no one is here. It's because she told them not to come.
When he meets Kate he regrets a lot of things.
They see each other regularly over the next few weeks.
Her skin heals slowly, simmering blistered and painful, smooth ridges that pucker under her fingertips. Sometimes, she thinks she can still feel the flames licking at her skin; the smoke crawling into her lungs and making it hard to breathe. But when Rick visits she's hot and breathless for an entirely different reason.
"How are you feeling today?"
She hears the catching of his breath and ducks her head, tucking a soft lock of curled hair behind her ear and wishing he would look away. But he won't.
"I'm doing okay." She lies; placing the book she was reading on the table next to her bed and straightening the firm cotton sheets.
Rick raises an eyebrow but doesn't say anything, draws closer until he's sitting on the chair that she's started to think of as his.
"How's the pain?"
"It's been worse."
Rick nods. He'll let her be brave if that's what she needs.
He pauses and asks, "Can I?"
Kate nods and he leans closer. Sometimes she forgets that he's her doctor.
When his face is level with hers he brushes the slipping locks of her hair aside with a kind of gentleness usually reserved for lovers.
Except that he's wearing plastic gloves.
Kate allows her eyes to flutter shut at his touch; can't bear to face his fathomless blue eyes.
"The burns seem to be healing well. No sign of infection. You're doing great." He tells her. Somehow, the fact that he's so kind and gentle makes it hurt more.
"How are you coping?"
"The pain is better than it was."
"That's not what I asked."
She looks at him for a moment, a staring contest that she isn't winning and then says "I can't sleep."
"Nightmares?"
She nods.
"What can I do?"
Kate shakes her head, shrugs, "There's nothing anyone can do. I just need to get through it."
"You don't have to do it alone." He points out.
"I don't want them to see me like this." Her voice comes out weak and gravely and Rick's shoulders slump. He wonders what happened to her.
"I know you think you're protecting them and I don't want to overstep but-"
"You already have." She snaps. She softens at his wounded expression, "look I'm sorry; I know you're just trying to help." Guilt flickers over her features and she looks away.
"No you're right, it's not my place."
"I'll call them when I'm ready."
"Until then I'll be your visitor." It's not a question. "I know how lonely it gets in here."
Every time he visits there's this tentative smile tugging at his cheeks like he's somehow happy to see her, (like anyone could be) and he's taken to bringing her a cup of coffee from Starbucks in his rounds after she'd complained to him about 'crappy hospital coffee'.
She doesn't want his pity, or the kindness he seems to feel he owes poor damaged Kate. She doesn't need anyone. But Rick's warming presence makes it easier, makes the days pass faster. He makes her happy.
"Tell me about yourself." He says sometime between two and six. His white coat lies forgotten on one of the empty chairs and his eyes are open and blue in a way that makes her feel like she's drowning.
"Um, I'm Kate. I was in a fire a two weeks ago whilst solving a case where our victim was killed by an arsonist-"
"No, don't tell me about the accident. Tell me you." He pauses. "You say you solve cases? Does that mean you're in the FBI? Ooh CSI?-"
He raises his eyebrows and even that reminds Kate of the way a puppy's ears lift with interest, and all the while he's juggling his stethoscope impatiently.
"I'm starting to think I might like another doctor to administer my medication." She laughs.
He mimes being wounded, "Aw, why?"
"I'm pretty certain that there isn't anything in this room that you haven't touched- you're like a twelve year old on a sugar rush!"
He knocks her book off the bedside table, mumbling a low "oops".
Kate snorts. "Make that an eight year old."
He grins and she doesn't stop her returning smile. He makes her feel lighter.
"Thanks for sitting with me, Dr. Castle. I really appreciate it."
A sudden seriousness overcomes his features. "I think that in visiting hours you should call me Rick."
"Rick." She repeats, admiring the way it rolls off her tongue; the way he watches her mouth as the sharp 'k' falls away.
"I want to hear your story." He says with a note of finality. He's intoxicated by her and it's nearing on ridiculous.
"My story?"
"Yep. There's always a story. I'll go first?" He starts before she has time to answer. "I'm Rick, I used to be a novelist, and I live with two beautiful red-heads; my flamboyant mother and my level-headed daughter." He has to stop himself from telling her that he's told them about her; about how smart and funny and strong she is- that they want to meet her immediately, as in this Friday, if you're free.
Kate's frown softens. She pauses, forgetting who she is outside of these walls and wondering why it matters.
"I'm Kate and I'm a homicide detective." She says after some time, "And I like comic books and oatmeal cookies."
"A homicide detective, huh?" Rick asks, leaning closer and she laughs; the sound loud and ringing in the empty space.
"Yep, and I like comic books and oatmeal cookies." She teases, grinning.
And he thinks that they fit in a way he never knew two people could; her sentences completing his broken ones- he quickly decides it's the best kind if magic he's ever known.
"Now tell me something, Rick."
He'd decided sometime into her second week that he'd tell her anything she wants to know.
"Why did you kill Derek Storm?"
Oh.
"I was bored." He says simply, wishing he has a better answer, because to him she's a superhero fighting villains in the dark and it makes him want to be more.
"So you became a doctor?" She prompts.
"Yeah."
Kate waits.
"I guess I just wanted to do something meaningful with the rest of my life."
She nods slowly and says, "I think that's pretty amazing."
The next day he visits her at five past two with a bag of oatmeal cookies in one hand and bundle of comics under his arm.
On the third week they transfer her to a smaller room. This one is a faded purple and has a mirror in the bathroom.
She cries for two hours.
Rick finds her half an hour into the second. Tears sting at his own eyes when he sits next to her.
Kate's shaking with the urge to run, her bare feet straining against the bedclothes.
"The colour that bad?" He jokes. Stupid.
When he looks at her she squeezes her eyes shut.
"I used to be pretty you know." She says finally.
"Still are." He says without thinking.
Kate scoffs, scrunching a tissue and catching the breath she'd been chasing.
"I mean it."
He scoots closer and she fights the urge to turn away.
"You just need to look deeper."
She doesn't say anything.
"You know why I bring you a coffee every day, Kate?" Rick asks.
She shakes her head. "No."
"It's so I can see your beautiful smile."
Kate shakes her head again, slower, wishing he wouldn't be so kind because it's not under his job description to make her fall in love with him. And she's blushing and it's modifying because Kate Beckett simply does not blush. He does that to her.
"The first time you smiled at me I felt so dizzy that I thought that I was the one on morphine."
Kate bits her bottom lip as they till upwards into a smile she can't let him see.
"You are extraordinary Kate."
"You hardly know me."
"You're right. I think we need to fix that."
Kate laughs huskily, "Are you asking me out on a date Dr. Castle?"
"Yes." He replies simply.
She's looking at him now; looking at him like he's as beautiful as he thinks she is.
Eventually Kate clears her throat. "That's really sweet, and I appreciate everything you've done for me but you really don't have to..."
He reaches out for her, untangles her clenched fist from the sheets and cups her hand with his bigger one, letting his thumb stroke the scarred skin there like he could heal her. Like there's anything left to heal.
"I mean it." He says softly.
Kate watches him, her mouth dry and head swimming, but she doesn't try to move away.
"This is ridiculous." She whispers.
He smiles, slow and stretching, crinkling at the pools of his eyes.
"I should to stop now before I cross some kind of doctor-patient line." He says finally.
Kate laughs, a little croakily, "that line being the first of The Hippocratic Oath?"
Rick shrugs innocently and Kate rolls her eyes.
"I'm pretty sure you crossed that line a long time ago."
Rick sighs, "Your fault for being so damn..." He trails off.
Somehow he's gotten closer, wide set shoulders blocking out everything but them and trapped she's trapped in the safest way.
"I get out in a week." She whispers.
"I know." He says, pulling back and releasing her hand, "I have it in my calendar. I was going to ask you for your phone number on your last day here."
"What made you think I'd say yes?" She raises an eyebrow. She'd always have said yes.
Rick smirks and Kate thinks that he shouldn't be allowed near the weak-hearted.
"I'm your favourite author." He reminds her.
"Actually it's a close call between you and Stephen King." She teases, leaning back on her bed with a smile.
"Well we've got to fix that."
He pauses, brushing a piece of hair away so that he can see her eyes, "we can fix it together."
Later that day Kate calls her dad and tells him she's ready for visitors. Jim Beckett turns up an hour later with a bouquet of flowers and the slippers he picked up from her apartment, calling her Katie and making her smile.
When Rick visits her later that day she tells him that she's all her dad has and that she forgets he's the parent sometimes. She tells him she refused to have a nightlight as a kid, but that she's starting to understand that it's okay to be scared of the dark. Rick's heart just about bursts with pride for this stranger he barely knows; for the stranger he's falling in love with.
When Kate comes out of the bathroom he's waiting by the window. She greets him with tear-stained cheeks and he knows that this is just the beginning.
For now she looks at him like she could find herself in his eyes. He looks at her and she doesn't want to hide anymore.
"I can see you, Kate." He reminds her.
And for the first time since the accident she feels like she can see herself too/
For those of you reading All That Remains, a new chapter will be posted in a few days. Thanks for reading!