A.N. Hey, Guys! So, I have set myself to a challenge: 1 drabble per day for the Castle fandom. I started this a week ago and have 7 quick drabbles for you to read. I have the next chapter of Human Psychology 101 ready, so hopefully that will be up later today and I'm working on A Missing Detail. Slooowly. But, it's summer, so I might as well take advantage of my time. Most of these will be Salt & Peppa. You can read them as slash if you want, but I know that both Seamus and Jon are not fans of a slash pairing and some people do get offended. These are written to be read both ways. Here I go!
Meat
Esposito could never understand why his partner was vegetarian. He could never eat a hot dog, never have a burger, never even have a steak! But Ryan chose to not eat meat, so that meant that Esposito could keep any form of meaty item in his fridge and not live in fear that one day it would disappear. It did make eating on the job difficult. If Esposito needed to eat, he could just pick up a hot dog from one of the admittedly questionable stands scattered in the city. Ryan had to carry food with him if he wanted to eat something. There aren't that many vegetarian fast food options. But that had only been a problem once. After Esposito chewed him out about eating healthily and not skipping lunch and then picking at dinner all because there was meat in the food, Ryan had learned to always have a vegetarian option on him. But Esposito could still never understand why his partner stuck to that diet. Nevertheless, it gave Esposito another thing to worry about his partner.
Minute
One minute is sixty seconds. Sixty seconds to jump in the bleak river and fight his own lungs. Sixty seconds to stare around the muddy water to try and spot the sinking body of his partner. Sixty seconds to slash at the ropes that tied the weight to his partner's legs. Sixty seconds to grab him and kick as hard as possible to try and bring them to the surface. Sixty seconds is a long time to not know whether your partner is ok. But sixty seconds is no time at all to save him.
Relief
Every time that they finished a bust or a case, both Detectives Ryan and Esposito felt a sense of relief. Sometimes it was relief that they had actually found the person. Sometimes they were relieved they could go home after a grueling case. And sometimes the relief was just that they had survived another day. It was hard to be a cop and to throw your life on the line everyday. But it was harder still to watch those who you cared about throw their lives on the line as well. Once they had caught a killer or arrested a dangerous suspect, it was nice to finally know that the other partner would make it to the next day.
Fiction
Ryan had always liked to read science fiction books. Time travel, futuristic society, all that sort of stuff. He had read some of Castle's books, but never any seriously. What homicide detective, other than Kate Beckett, wanted to go home and read about murder? But he did often wonder why some people did what they did to others. So he had read some of the books, just out of curiosity. He had, of course, read Heat Wave as soon as it hit shelves, but he only had a few other Castle books on his one book shelf. Esposito was almost the same way, but he never liked science fiction. He preferred the sports novels. He and Ryan would have debates all the time over which was better. But they both agreed: Murder mysteries should be approached with caution.
Chemical
Esposito hated science. He didn't see the point in learning about concepts of physics or chemistry or biology in school because he didn't think he'd need them in real life. Ryan, though, had always loved science. He had had little chemistry sets as a kid, blowing things up. He had minored in chemistry in college. But neither of them expected for him to have to put his skills to use. Poison. And with only a few clues, Ryan had mere hours to figure out the poison used. He read through his clues again, and began to scribble furiously on the paper. Esposito didn't even try to figure out what Ryan was doing. Eventually, Ryan emerged from his trance and bolted to get the antidote from Lanie. Thank God for chemistry.
Behavior
Over the years, Ryan and Esposito had got used to each other's unique habits. Every cop had them. Little superstitions that they needed to do in order to keep their sanity. They both knew that Beckett always had to keep the cap of the murder board pen on the end of the pen, or else she wouldn't be able to think. Captain Montgomery always cleaned his badge clockwise. Ryan always needed to check the locks on each of his drawers when he came into work, and then again when he left. Esposito had always rolled his neck counterclockwise before entering a battle in the military. Now, as a cop, he rolled his neck before a bust. It was something that you only really accepted that your partner knew about. That's why Ryan knew about Esposito's neck, and Esposito knew about Ryan's drawers.
Intelligence
Being a cop didn't require off the chart SAT scores or an unbelievable IQ. It required street smarts, not book smarts. And as street smart people go, Ryan and Esposito were certainly up there. But in book smarts, neither had been top of their class. In one case, they dealt with a young teenager, around 13, who could outsmart both of them without any hesitation. It was at that point that they decided to bring in the big guns: Castle. The author was one of the brighter kids in his class when he was younger and would, hopefully, save the interview from being a 'Let's see how stupid I can make the cops look.' fest. When Castle sparred against her mind, he kept up much better. While admittedly he lost the mental battle, he did manage to get the information that they needed. Ryan and Esposito both felt incredibly stupid after that. Once the interview was over, she told them both not to feel bad. They both had slightly higher than average IQs. Her's was just higher.
A.N. I hope you like it! I'll post my next seven drabbles next week. I'm going to try and keep up this drabble a day thing for as long as I can, but I don't know how long that is going to be. R&R!