A/N: A post-ep for 5x17. I was struck by the way Castle just threw out there that he'd had Kate at the top of his bucket list for three years, how unabashed he was about admitting that. So I thought it maybe warranted further exploration...
"A heart is not judged by how much you love; but by how much you are loved by others"
― L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
"It's always best to start at the beginning - and all you do is follow the Yellow Brick Road"
Glinda, the Good Witch's advice to Dorothy about starting her journey on the Yellow Brick Road. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
Follow The Yellow Brick Road
They're lying on the cooling sheets, Castle on his back, one arm behind his head, his eyes staring unfocused at the bedroom ceiling, a dreamy, sated smile on his face, and Kate lying on her side, curled up, her own head on the pillow, a swathe of creamy Egyptian cotton draped low over her hips, her stomach, breasts and legs exposed either side of the meager sweep of sheet.
She's watching him - her partner, her lover - the silence comfortable and soothing across the damp spot that lies between them on the mattress, where the ice cubes finally melted when she lit his body on fire.
Her mind keeps flitting back to the sofa. And she still can't quite get over it – his stupid, optimistic Bucket List. Number one on that list: his need to have her, to be with her.
#1 Be with Kate. The words whisper round and round inside her head, over and over.
Three whole years.
The patience he has shown, the persistence and ingenuity, the bright, shiny optimism; overcoming every roadblock boyfriend she dangled in front of him, every emotional obstacle and hurt, until he got what he wanted.
What they both needed.
She can't quite relate those qualities to the man she first met over four years ago. A man she either badly misjudged or a man who has grown and changed beyond all recognition, right along with her, possibly even because of her.
She watches his eyes glow and pale, an icy blue in the shaft of pure white light the moon throws across the room. A mere minute and it's gone, moved on to grace another with its illuminating presence, leaving the bedroom bathed in the golden yellow light of flickering candles and warm, earthy walls.
He's beautiful. Not in a classical way – not pretty or symmetrical like a male model. No, his face has character. His nose slightly crooked, his top lip thin, the lines that crinkle at the sides of his eyes when he smiles or laughs…and oh, his laugh. She almost smiles to herself just conjuring one up. They are sillier with one another these days. Well, she is sillier, he has pretty much always been this goofy. And now somehow the over-the-top theories that she hated so much in the beginning are one of the things she loves most about him, loves about having him by her side as she works; how he lightens her day, lightens up the day of all those around them, pushing death and its attendant darkness to the far corners of the room, while his shiny yellow optimism lights up their thankless little corner of the world.
And he does all of that for her – supports her, bolsters her, carries her when her mood gets low or she loses faith in finding a solution. And yet, here she is: the one on the bucket list - the desired one, the ultimate prize. And how did that even happen, she wonders? With her darkness, her sorrow, her attendant reserve, her tight controlling grip on life enough to dim even the brightest spark of hope. That he overcame all of these obstacles speaks to this man's strength, his character, his belief in her and a life filled with better things for both of them. He makes her want to give back - to him - rather than run from this.
He makes her want things…
"What's the last item on your list?" she asks eventually, breaking the silence, smoothing her legs across the sheets, enjoying the sensual brush of high-thread count cotton as it skates over her skin.
"Hmm?" asks Castle, snapping out of his own reverie at the sound of her voice and the draw of a question he seems none too keen on answering just yet.
"Your Bucket List. If I was the first item, what was the last?" Kate probes, leaning up on her elbow to get a better look at his face.
"The threat of imminent death has passed," he tells her, rolling over to face her, and she sees the reluctance in his eyes; that he's keeping something from her. "I think the Bucket List can wait."
He was so open and unabashed about admitting he had her on there at number one for three years. Three years he wanted to be with her, and she's pretty sure he didn't mean as a notch on his bedpost either; another item to score off his list of conquests and random, crazy life experiences.
But wait…
"Wait. So…if you had me down as number one…" she asks, a smile flirting with her lips, as she leans over to press a teasing kiss next to his nipple, before she flicks it playfully with the tip of her tongue.
"Mmm?" purrs Castle, stroking his fingers over her hip and dislodging what little sheet she's wearing as it is.
"Does that mean you thought I'd be easy? The one item you could score off quickly? Because if ever I write a To Do list, that's what I do. Put the easiest thing at the top so I can reward myself with a quick score-off."
"Ha! You? Easy?" he laughs, pulling her closer to him.
"Wet patch!" warns Kate, trying to avoid the damp spot left by the melted ice cubes.
"Oh, right," he replies, rolling over on top of Kate and then rolling again so that they're both lying on her side of the bed.
"So? Stop avoiding the question," Kate scolds lightly, prodding him in the chest.
She can tell from the look of resignation that eventually crosses his face that he realizes she seriously wants to know, that she isn't giving up or letting him off the hook. So he swallows, looks her in the eye, and then tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, ever tender with her in ways that throw her off her stride even now.
"Three years ago," he begins quietly, "when I wrote that thing…being with you was the single most important goal in my life. That's why you were number one. But…it was still a pipedream, Kate. You saw the rest of the list…well, most of it. William Shatner? How am I ever going to fix things with William Shatner?" he laughs, and she smiles with him, at the excitable little boy still hiding inside the responsible, brave, tender-hearted man.
"Was there a trigger?" she asks, looking up at him sideways, his handsome face cutting a diagonal across her field of vision.
"For the list? Or for you?"
"Me…both. I don't know. Just…I like to hear you talk about that time…way back then. Makes me realize that however much I was in denial, I might have felt it too."
"I wish I'd known there was…something. Might have saved me a lot of sleepless nights."
"You can't have failed to notice there was 'something', Castle," she scolds lightly, making air quotes with her fingers. "Even you're not that optimistic."
"Okay," he admits, brushing his knuckles across her cheekbone, making her eyelids drift closed for one long blissful moment. "I may have felt a slight…" he pauses, a smirk on his face that she knows means he's about to make her laugh.
Laugh, or hurt him somewhere soft and tender.
"Go on," she urges, arching an eyebrow. "Out with it."
"A slight thawing. I may have felt a slight thawing from you."
"Thawing? Oh, how…romantic. No wonder you put me at the top of your list. How could you resist the Ice Queen?" she laughs, shaking her head.
"Actually, it was more fire than ice that made me face my…eh, fate."
"Oh, your fate, now is it?" grins Kate, her eyes roaming his smiling face, delighted, since she knows that this is her fate now too – to be with this man as long as she possibly can, and the thought thrills her rather than terrifies her, a knowledge she needs to find a way to share with him.
"Mmm-hmm. A fate I am completely and utterly resigned to, Detective."
"So what did fire have to do with it?"
Castle scrubs a hand down over his face, frowning at the memory when he finishes. Then he regards Kate thoughtfully before beginning.
"The night I stood out on the street opposite your old apartment building and watched it get blown up. The night I thought I'd lost you before we even had a chance to started, Kate. That night, while you slept in the guest room upstairs, I sat in my office, got out a piece of paper, and I…I started that list."
"I didn't get much sleep that night either," she confesses, dropping a hand to his arm.
"Bad dreams?" he asks, circling her elbow with his thumb.
"Nope," says Kate, ducking her head, and then raising her eyes to his with a bashful smile.
"What?" Castle asks, watching her until the answer dawns on him.
And it's the way she's looking at him - like a naughty schoolgirl, her eyes glittering with mischief and teasing.
"You…? Wait. You were thinking about me?" he asks, watching her grin grow, her head start to nod slowly, her eyes shining, her lower lip drawn between her teeth.
"Dammit!" curses Castle. "That is so not fair!"
"Not fair to whom?" asks Kate, amused by his extreme reaction. "You were in bed one floor below me," she adds, shrugging, as if this is all the explanation he needs.
"To us! Not fair to us. You were up there," he says, gesturing over his shoulder, "and I was down here. Both of us alone? God, I hate that. The time we wasted," he grumbles, thumping his pillow in frustration.
"Yeah, well, I can't disagree with that. But at least we made it in the end, right?" says Kate, being the positive one for once.
"Right," sighs Castle, still not wholly convinced. "I just…I saw you naked," he whines, remembering the moment after he found her in the wreckage of her destroyed apartment building, the surge of relief he felt when he realized she wasn't dead being overtaken by a jolt of arousal when he saw her cowering without any clothes on in her bathtub, her perfect body marred only by soot, instead of the burns or worse he had conjured up in his mind.
"So you lied to me?" laughs Kate, but she's not really surprised. The man had been ogling her with her clothes on since the very beginning. As if he was going to pass up a chance like that!
But Castle is caught up in his own reminiscence. That night had changed things utterly for him – the shock of imagining a world without her in it, however momentary; his surprise when he realized how deeply he felt about her; taking her home to stay with him, after having pushed his way in to stay in her home because of some dumb need to protect and stay close to her even before the bomb.
He'd been reading a self-help book – 'Write It Down and Make It Happen' – around the time he met Kate, feeling lost as Derrick Storm slowed to a crawl in his mind, his story slowly petering out, the ideas drying up. The habit of putting his goals on paper had formed after reading that book, since 'Find a new source of inspiration' had been his top priority during that period of his life.
And then the universe had delivered him Kate.
The Bucket List he drafted the night of the explosion had started out with only one item on it, and it had stayed that way for a very long time. Until gradually he realized that being with Kate might take longer than he'd hoped, and that one dream needed others to keep it company in order to make it seem more real; as if it was part of a bigger life plan he was actually working his way towards achieving.
"You weren't on it because you were easy. You're on it because…because you know how I feel about you and…I needed some place to start. Some place to put it that would take it out of my head and start to make it real. Acknowledge it to myself. Find some way to work towards making it a reality. I'm a writer, so putting it on paper seemed like the next logical step," he confesses.
Kate is left speechless by how easily he can say these things, admit these secrets to her face – how badly he wanted to be with her, how he failed at first but never gave up. She wishes she could be more like him, and she hopes that maybe she's getting there, opening up just a little. She just hopes she isn't rubbing off on him too much, closing him down. Because since they've been together, he has never again uttered those words he just alluded to – 'you know how I feel about you' is about as close as he gets to 'I love you' these days. And she knows it's all about her as usual. About keeping the pressure off until she's ready.
He knows her well enough by now, she hopes, that through looks and touches and her overarching physical need for him, she shows him how deeply she feels for him. That by meeting her father and caring for his mother and daughter he sees the signs. It's the last piece of the puzzle for her and she's not sure what's stopping her saying it, because she knows how strongly she feels it – that she loves this man with all her heart.
"Let's make our own Bucket List. One we can work on together," she says instead, an offering to him that illuminates a pathway to the future, a future she hopes they will share together - their own little yellow brick road.
"What's number one?" he asks cryptically, ever the egotist, lightly trailing a finger up her arm just to watch her shiver. "Be with Castle?" he whispers, pressing a kiss to her bare shoulder.
"We scored that off already," chides Kate, nudging his thigh with her knee. "Or did you sleepwalk right through that part?"
"I always wanted to take you skiing," he replies instead, rather wistfully, surprising her.
Kate wrinkles her nose in puzzlement.
"Any particular reason?"
"Hmm?" he asks, obviously off slaloming down the slopes of his mind already. "Oh, eh…it's kind of embarrassing," he admits, giving her a winning grin.
"When isn't it with you?" laughs Kate, watching Castle's cheeks heat up. "It's the pants, isn't it?" she asks, shaking her head so that her curls dance around her shoulders.
"The pants?" asks Castle, bemused. "No. No, it's the thought of being able to go off-piste together, find an undiscovered trail, virgin snow, maybe come across a little cabin in the woods, light a fire, create a little après-ski entertainment of our own," he says, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.
"Or start an avalanche…" laughs Kate, until she sees the look on his face, how much this means to him.
"Okay. A ski trip goes on there. But only if we can add Paris to the list too? We've both been separately. But I'd like us to visit together," she says quietly, her turn to blush a little as she reveals something of her own tender, romantic heart. "Banish a few ghosts in the City of Light."
"Then Paris it is," he agrees, reaching down to kiss her slowly, his fingers slipping behind her neck to cup the back of her head, feeling her open up to him, so warm and pliant and willing in a way that was beyond his most creative imaginings when he wrote her name at the top of that list.
"You make me so happy, you know that?" he tells her generously, when they finally pull apart. "We are going to have so much fun with this," he promises, and they both smile knowing how true these words are.
Kate is dressing the next morning when she spies his wallet lying on the nightstand. Castle is still in the bathroom, and her fingers twitch with an inquisitive itch she just can't let go.
She casts a quick glance over her shoulder, hears him singing while he shaves. She's got about five minutes before he comes out looking for her, she knows from past experience. Because he can't seem to resist knowing where she is and what she's doing whenever she's here at his place. She suspects he'd love to ask her if she's happy all the time too. But he bites his tongue and that question only slips out now and again, when he's tired or she's tired and their guard is down.
He's still singing, adopting a squeaky falsetto now, providing his own high-pitched backing track to the song he's currently murdering, so she grabs his wallet and quickly flits through it to find the small slip of paper he carefully folded away last night.
She trails her finger across the first entry again and she smiles to herself, a pleasant ache filling her chest. Then she skims the stuff she already knows, snorts at #10: 'Land on the moon and check out my plot', and then she flips it over to find the last entry he has written, carefully scripted in his tight, boyish cursive to fit on the back of the small piece of paper.
The last goal on his list.
She smiles in anticipation, until she sees it. Then her throat constricts, a painful spasm of the muscles, and her eyes begin to burn, tears pooling to blur the familiar handwriting, making it appear as if she's viewing the words through the orb of a crystal ball. And how she wishes she had one of those right now: a crystal ball that would tell her how things turn out so that she would be able to say to him, to promise him, 'We can cross off the last one too, Castle. That one's going to be easy.'
But she can't predict the future anymore than writing it down will make it happen for him. She can love him, she can let him love her back, and she will work her hardest to give him the life he deserves. Nothing is certain, she knows from bitter experience. But then she thinks of something Castle once told her early on in their relationship. He said, 'We don't have the answers. We just have to live with the questions and find our way.' And they've been doing that, with great success, getting better and stronger all the while.
So maybe she doesn't need a crystal ball after all. Maybe Castle is right, that they will continue to be amazing.
She drops the list on his nightstand and rushes off to find him, throwing open the bathroom door and giving him her brightest smile.
"Can we make a start on the list today?" she asks, hope beaming from her eyes.
#20 - Make a life with Kate.
Yellow, noun: commonly associated with gold, sunshine, reason, optimism and pleasure. The yellow wavelength is relatively long and essentially stimulating. In this case the stimulus is emotional, therefore yellow is the strongest color, psychologically.
The meaning of yellow is very happy, warm, stimulating, and expansive. Yellow draws people out and makes them more talkative. It helps to focus one's attention and stimulate the intellect, confidence, self-esteem, extraversion, emotional strength, friendliness and creativity. Yellow also encourages hope and optimism, and is very grounding and supportive when muted.
A/N: I'd love to hear your thoughts, or suggestions as to what else might be on a Caskett bucket list. I changed the last entry from the Richard Castle list and made it shorter than 50 items simply because that tiny piece of paper would never hold a list that long. ;) Liv