Summary: Oneshot. A brief snapshot into Kate's life and state of mind during Castle's missing time.
A/N: I know the whole Castle missing story line is a sore spot, but I always felt particularly robbed that Kate's life without Castle in those 8 weeks was summed up in around a minute which left me feeling a bit cheated, apart from the exceptionally heartbreaking scene with Espo and the coffee. So here's my input on it :) It's inspired by Ed Sheeran's song Photograph.
Photograph
So you can keep me
Inside the pocket
Of your ripped jeans
Holding me closer
'Til our eyes meet
You won't ever be alone
Wait for me to come home
Xxx
Kate had thought the first night would be the hardest; their wedding night, but she had thrown herself so quickly and headlong into every possibility that she didn't notice when the gentle light of the new dawn broke through the windows of the precinct. For the first week she didn't stop, she was in perpetual motion, every moment filled with a phone call, a question or a witness account. It were as though she were a spinning top, afraid that if she began to wobble then she would come crashing down, and if she came crashing down, the one person who could pick her back up wouldn't come. So she worked. She worked until her eyes stung with exhaustion, until her mind could no longer form a coherent thought, until her colleagues and friends stood around her and begged for her to go home.
Home.
That was the problem. Where was her home now? She'd tried to visit the loft one night, when the darkness had become too much and threatened to consume her. But looking into the desperate faces of Alexis and Martha had broken her again. She had moved away from them, wandering through his office, her fingers trailing across his chair, his desk, his laptop, imagining his fingers in her stead. All she found was the empty void where he should be. So she'd packed a bag, threw in a few shirts, her own mixed in with his, and from his bedside table she took a photograph which she pressed into the top of the bag. She ran her fingers across the cotton sheets of their bed and knew she could never lay in its vastness without him. So she left. She made sad excuses to Martha at the door, unable to meet her eyes for fear she'd see the shame hiding in there; she was running. Martha had pleaded with her to stay but Kate had only shaken her head, spouting lies about needing a change of clothes at the precinct, promising to come back soon. As she closed the heavy door behind her, she had rested her forehead against it, feeling the storm swirling within her and the tears threatening to overspill.
Kate had began to walk through the streets of the city, still in a haze as she blindly followed wherever her feet were leading her. Part of her believed if she just walked impulsively for long enough she might just appear before him, finding his long fingers entwined with hers and his voice leaving soft whispers in her ear. Instead she found herself at the swings.
She ran her fingers through the chains as a flood of memories cascaded through her, each moment as blinding as lightening. Explaining her wall, her revelation in the rain, their reunion when she was on the run and the proposal. Kate could feel it crashing down – the wall around her heart she was using to protect herself from this pain. Each brick was slipping out and shattering to the floor, as the hole became wider she was hit by a tornado of memories.
His thumb stroking the back of her hand; the heat from the flames dancing across the wedding car; the depth of his blue eyes; the twisting of metal at the car lot; the feel of his tender lips on hers; laying her wedding dress back in the box; the way he would study her with concern etched into his brow; when she unconsciously glanced to his chair and the heart crushing realisation when he still wasn't there.
Kate found herself on her knees in the dirt, in her hands she cradled the photo of him as the last brick in her wall crumbled, and the tears fell hot and heavy creating a rainstorm over his image. The pain and fear she had been holding in all week came pouring out of her, the sobs escaping her body in a violent motion, her engagement ring digging into the flesh of her opposing palm.
As she broke next to the swings, a question swirled within her mind, had it been worth it? Her wall, all those years ago, was to save her from this kind of pain. Yet here she was, in pieces, with uncontrollable pain wrecking her. As quickly as her inner storm had started, it stopped, her inherent shame at the question she had just thought shook her to her core. Had it been worth it? She looked at the photograph of the man that she loved; every damn minute.
She brushed off the dust from the ground and the remnants of her crumbled wall. Folding the photo carefully, she placed it in her pocket, she would carry him with her always, in her heart, in her mind, in her choices and in her pocket.
Kate returned to the darkened precinct, straightening the photo of him on the murder board, staring at his image for a few long moments before sitting at her desk. She opened the folder labeled with his name and turned her tired eyes back to the screen and began to search.
Anyone that passed her would see the form of a weary woman working hard, if they looked a bit closer they might see the strain of grief in the lines around her eyes. But the only person who would be able to tell she was broken, who would know just from the line of her body, wasn't here to speak. So she continued to work, her mask back in place, and her touchstone in her pocket. Whenever it became too much; the grief, the stares, the unknown, she would find a darkened corner and pull him out of her pocket.
"I'm coming for you Castle, I'm coming" she would whisper, allowing herself to feel for one brief moment, and then she would return. She would continue to look for him and to wait for him. Always.
Xxx
When I'm away
I will remember how you kissed me
Under the lamppost
Back on 6th street
Hearing you whisper through the phone,
"Wait for me to come home."