N.B: As the description states, this came from a prompt. The original request was for it to be set post 4x19 and 4x20 (and for it to be angsty, which is a given I think) but my mind went straight to 4x09 'Kill Shot', where Kate has the panic attack in the middle of the night. It also brought to mind one of my favourite plays, '4.48 Psychosis' by Sarah Kane, and it fitted so well with the prompt and the ideas I had that I've incorporated it. No pre-reading necessary, as it's contained within in parts, although I have edited it for language.
I'm also taking this little note section as an opportunity to remind you of the trigger potential; there's nothing too descriptive, but the prompt itself does give away to the nature of the fic. Thank you for taking the time to read it.
Flicking her eyes to the clock, Kate wipes away the tears that are all too present and paws at her face roughly, sweeping her hair away from where it's fallen to obscure her vision.
4.40am.
The bright red numbers are so bright, so blinding, she has to squint to lessen their impact on her tired, tearful eyes. Her head hurts, her injuries hurt, her mind is exhausted. Hyper vigilance and panic are not fitting states for a Police Detective; someone who should be able to control her feelings, to control her body's reactions at least enough to stop the trembling. To stop that panic, to quieten down the crying and screaming; she'd let herself go too far, even in the relative safety of her own apartment, had lost control so much that her neighbour had knocked to see if everything was ok. She assured her it was, obviously, that she was; proffering hollow smiles and well rehearsed laughs, all the while hiding her bandaged arm and the broken glass of the table behind the door as she peeked around it, one hand on her gun. A convincing effort. She'd left, anyhow, so she must have done something well enough to convince her.
Her eyes close reflexively as they fill up once again with tears, and she brushes them away angrily as she reaches to her side, searching with her palm out flat to feel the cool, heavy metal of her gun. Her protection, against someone who is after her with the very same 'protection', possibly the very same weapon. Her mind skips and jumps, offering unbidden snapshots that have played themselves out to the point of exhaustion; the thump of the shot as it pierced her chest, the thud as she hit the ground, the heavy, dead weight of Castle on top of her. She swings her legs to the side of the bed, touching at the bedside lamp as her feet land on the floor, squinting again at the unwelcome brightness. She rises fluidly, tugging at the cotton of her t shirt, to right where it's risen up and the NYPD logo is bunched up underneath her bra line from all the tossing and turning. Her mind wanders. What was that play she'd auditioned for in college? By that obscure British playwright, the one who'd offed herself the night before her play was due to open? Sarah… Sarah…
Scanning the bookshelf at the corner of her bedroom, her finger makes a 'thump thump thump' as she drags it over the spines of her college books, searching; a rhythm that pairs with her heartbeat in both its speed and its intensity. The noise stops as she finds the thin, well worn spine she's searching for.
Sarah Kane, that's it. She pulls it from the shelf, glancing momentarily at the black hole of negative space it leaves behind. She remembers from her art days – and from Castle's pumpkin carving 'masterclass' last Halloween – that negative space is most important. Funny, how a black space of nothing can be important. If only she could return her mind to a vast, negative space… Her legs cross automatically underneath her as she slides down, opening the book; it automatically falls wide at her favourite scripted part, tagged with a post it note that pulls other lines from their pages to form a sensible, lengthy monologue.
'Your truth, your lies, not mine.
And while I was believing that you were different and that you maybe even felt the distress that sometimes flickered across your face and threatened to erupt, you were covering your arse too. Like every other stupid mortal.
To my mind that's betrayal. And my mind is the subject of these bewildered fragments.
Nothing can extinguish my anger.
And nothing can restore my faith.
This is not a world in which I wish to live.'
The well learned lines come back out from the darkest recesses of her mind as she pulls at the post it, unsticking it from the page and holding it inches from her face, continuing to read her flowy, student writing.
'How can I return to form now my formal thought has gone?
Not a life that I could countenance.
They will love me for that which destroys me
the sword in my dreams
the dust of my thoughts
After 4.48 I shall not speak again.'
The paper falls from her hands as she closes her eyes, taking a deep, steadying breath and flicking back to the very beginning of the book.
"(A very long silence.) But you have friends.
(A long silence.) You have a lot of friends. What do you offer your friends to make them so supportive?
(A long silence.)What do you offer?
(Silence.)"
The panic begins to rise again; choking her, restricting her breathing until all she can hear or feel is the pounding of her heartbeat in her ears and the cascading of water down her cheeks. She throws the book, flinging it angrily against the wall; watching as the fragile binding loses its hold and gives out, scattering pages across the floor like the russet red leaves falling quietly, almost silently from her favourite tree in the autumn.
Friends.
She thinks, wiping at her cheeks robotically to catch the tears as they tickle at her blotched, salt raw skin, an unnecessarily itchy addition to the pain and feelings already threatening to burst out of her body.
Friends… to support…
…Castle.
'Will he mind, being woken up at this hour? Probably not… but what if he's got someone with him? That would be awkward…Shit, no, what am I thinking. Pull yourself together, Kate.' Her mind races, and she flicks her eyes to her bedside table, squinting again to make sense of the bright red numbers.
4.44am.
Her eyes dart from side to side before they close again briefly, searching her mind, trying to remember the lines once more.
'I had a night in which everything was revealed to me.
How can I speak again?'
Castle.
She drags herself to her feet, ignoring the crack of her knees as she straightens her legs, an unequivocal tell of her lack of recent exercise. The kill shot had damaged her in more ways than one; her body was not as strong as it once was, unnaturally so, the same way as her mind was weak now too. Getting weepy over a couple of scars was so alien to her, so preposterous, as someone who had always been strong and steadfast – in the face of everything, even her mother's death. But not now… having something happen that was so beyond her control had changed everything. As Espo often joked: watching her deal with something she couldn't control was more fun than shark week. But it was true. Only this time it wasn't fun to watch, or be in the midst of. Stepping over the broken shards from her instinctive high-kick out at what turned out to be nothing more threatening than her glass occasional table, she leans to pick up her phone from the nightstand. It's heavy and cold in her hands, like her gun tucked into the thick waistband of her pyjama bottoms, and her chest heaves under the thin grey cotton of her police issue shirt.
She looks down at the screen, her finger poised to 'swipe to unlock', and her eye catches the white-bright time as it lights up in her hand.
4.45am.
