A/N: Hey! This is my first Castle Fic, and is going to be based on a series of songs that inspire me to write one-shots on Castle. This may be heavy in Caskett. None of the characters or songs belong to me.

Castle belongs to ABC and the producer, and this song is Every Day by Rascal Flatts. Each paragraph goes with the verses. metrolyrics dot com has the lyrics in the format I wrote from.

Why? Why couldn't he just take care of himself and stay out of trouble? He twitched a few times grimaced in pain, and she touched his face, and squeezed his hand. His body calmed.

Beckett gave a watery chuckle as she held her partner's hand. She remembered his loose mouth when he had been given morphine. Yet in all that time, he had kept a closed mouth about Montgomery, her mother, and every other secret she had told him. It was so like him.

Beckett thought about all the times he had come around when she had needed him most. All the times he had taken the bullet for her. The sniper. The freezer. The dirty bomb. The daily coffee. This attacker. His jokes. The teasing light in his eyes.

Beckett remembered crying late at night at the precinct a mere few hours after Josh dumped her. She hadn't known where else to go. Like magic, he had come with comfort food and an open door and an escape. Blindly, she had gotten in his car, watched a movie in his loft, and spend the night on his couch (alone). The next morning she tried to slip out, but he had breakfast ready faster then she could move, and so she finally saw the place he got from the coffee from and managed to pay for hers for once. They had carefully made it so that nobody saw them get to work together.

Day to day life was hard as a homicide detective. And Beckett knew what she had signed up for. What she hadn't imagined was him making it easier. She didn't know she needed the comic relief until there was none. She didn't know how much she'd miss the ridiculous theories that, incredibly, turned out to be part right half the time. There was a hole in her that only he could fill. He had to be there to fill it, or she'd go crazy.

Beckett remembered his jokes that always seemed to be just what she needed to hear. She remembered how he could make a freaking murder seem light and comic. She remembered the change in the team. Ryan and Esposito got friendly and more joking. Lanie enjoyed seeing the detective in her morgue because the detective brought him with her. Even Montgomery softened.

Every day, every day, every day

Beckett was nearing that dangerous edge where thoughts of living her life without him clouded her mind. How would she cope without him? How could she? What would happen to her? To all of them?

"Get better. You have to, we need you... I need you!" Beckett whispered. He was comatose. He couldn't hear her. And she'd never repeat these things. She was too prideful.

He blinked. He coughed. He opened his eyes and deep blue met worried green. The teasing glint was gone, replaced by pain in the blue. The green's somber quality had returned after a period of laughter that was brought by him.

"Beckett? What happened?"

"You idiot Castle! You got shot... Protecting me. Don't you ever scare me like that again! I was wearing a vest!"

"So was I!" the writer protested. Beckett looked at the cast on his shoulder and arm.

"I guess it wasn't very effective."

Castle blinked and smiled softly. "I'm sorry. I'll be on my feet in no time, but I'm sorry I worried you?"

"Worry me? In your dreams, Castle."

Castle chuckled at the lie and said, "I told you I wouldn't let you get hurt." Then he hesitated before adding, "Will you stay with me, for a while? I don't want to be alone."

Beckett smiled despite herself and squeezed his hand. "Always."