A/N: Partly inspired by the 20 second promo for season 7. This is a bit shorter than what I normally write so not sure whether to leave it as an angsty one-shot or add more. Either way, I hope you like it and feel free to let me know what you think.
Disclaimer: I do not own Castle or the characters.
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He wasn't in the car. And that was the only thing that kept her going as the day turned into evening and her brain cruelly continued to measure time by what they should have been doing. But simply not being in the car wasn't enough, because he still wasn't where he was supposed to be.
They'd have had their first dance by now and would be mingling with their family and friends. He'd probably be dancing with Alexis, and she'd be with her dad. Fathers and daughters together, with Martha on the sidelines waiting for the appropriate moment to cut in and dance with her son or her daughter-in-law's father. Two small and fractured families joining and hiding the gaps that death, and lies and the harsh realities of life had created. The tears in her eyes should have been for a very different reason.
"Sweetie, let's get you out of that dress." Lanie's voice gently suggested, as the medical examiner placed a hand on Kate's cool arm and tried to draw her out of the hazy half-existence into which she had descended.
Her friend's voice and touch failed to have their desired effect, as Kate began to replay the events of the past five hours in her mind. Five hours – had it really only been that long? It felt as though time had never recovered from the slow motion spin which began at her first sight of the car.
She'd watched through watery, stinging eyes as the angry glow of the flames slowly died away under the jets of water and foam. And as the fire took on new shapes and licked across the seats, she convinced herself that she could see the outline of his body underneath. The vehicle's charred black interior morphed into his form and, almost involuntarily she had rushed towards it, as if she could somehow bring him back from the ashes.
But then the driver's seat had come into view and she'd realised it was empty. All that remained was the burnt out shell of the car. And she was soaked to the skin, with confetti-like flakes of ash falling around her, and the smoke from the smouldering metal corpse catching in her throat and forcing yet more moisture from her eyes.
It was like some kind of dark magic trick. Put the man in the car. Put the car in the ravine. Throw in some pyrotechnics. And poof – the crowd goes wild!
Only, here, there was no secret compartment from which he could emerge to the cheers of the awe-struck spectators. Here, the firemen and police officers saw only the blackened wreck that had once been a car and a dripping wet and shivering bride who glanced around with a look of disbelief as she tried to imagine where her groom could be.
"Come on, Kate," Lanie's voice drifted through, more forcefully than before, and accompanied by a squeezing sensation around her fingers.
Kate looked down into the worried eyes of the woman who crouched before her but her gaze seemed to look straight through the medical examiner. There was only one person she was interested in speaking to right now and that wasn't the person who was in this room and holding her hands. It was the one that should have been there.
"Let me help you," comforted the voice of her friend, concern becoming more evident with every syllable she spoke.
Before she knew what she was doing, Kate found herself in the shower. The hot water felt odd when it first hit her cold skin, but the numbness, or at least that which could be attributed to a physical reaction, gradually disappeared. Yet no matter how long she stood under the warm jets, the hollow sensation which filled her chest refused to move. The way her heart beat; the way time moved – it all felt wrong because he wasn't there. And she didn't know how to make that right.
Steam soon filled the room, drawing the acrid smell of smoke from her hair and skin and causing it to swirl away into the atmosphere. She'd picked up his shampoo, hopeful that his scent would close some of the unknown distance between them and ease the physical ache. But the fragrance which she inhaled wasn't that of Castle, but of an overpriced male beauty product. The fresh scent infused the steam replaced the smoky taint, but it didn't bring her any comfort; it didn't bring him home.
Anger rushed through her veins as she thought of how he should have been the one waiting outside for her to finish washing her hair. She leaned against the shower cubicle and suppressed the urge to scream as she thought of how wrong everything was. It shouldn't have been Lanie who carefully unfastened her wedding dress and no words of comfort or sympathy should have been required to accompany the process. He should have been the one to slide the garment from her body, as they shared the first private moments of their life together.
And that life should have been guaranteed, for at least one night, before they returned to the real world where nothing was certain.
They'd been through so much and it wasn't right that this night had been taken away from them; that instead of waking up as Mrs Richard Castle, she faced waking up alone. Kate was only too aware that life wasn't fair. She'd seen more good people die than she would ever like to quantify. And it was selfish to wish for one life to be spared from all those that were lost.
But just this once she needed the universe to let her be selfish – she needed Castle to be with her. Always. Just like he'd promised; just like she'd let herself believe against all better judgement.
Just once. And then reality could return to being as cruel as it wanted.