Additional Research
Castle fills in some of Nikki's back story. Set in the second half of season one.
AN- probably works better if you've read Heat Wave, but I think it's okay even if you haven't. Let me know
Spring 2009
"So," he says casually, running a finger down the back of one elephant after another, "I'm thinking of going to Boston this weekend…."
She's busy writing up a report and really she's not paying much attention to him. "Mnmmm hmmm."
"I was wondering if you want to come along."
That stops her. She looks at him with one eyebrow raised. "Why would I possibly want to go with you to Boston, Castle?"
"Excitement? A nice change of pace? You're not working this weekend…C'mon…it could be fun" He hopes he doesn't sound as needy as he feels.
She looks back down at the forms she's working on. "Hmm lets see, hang around my apartment in my jammies, drinking coffee, reading the newspaper… or haring off to Boston, a city that I don't find all that exciting, with a famous, and I use the word loosely, author that will probably end up with our picture on page 6? It's so hard to choose…" she fills in another line. "What are you going to Boston for anyway?"
"Ummm… just doing a little research" he says vaguely; the image of her in her jammies lounging around his apartment seems to be crowding out anything else in his mind.
"I thought that's what you were doing here?" She's got that tiny bit of hurt jealousy in her tone that seems to surface every now and then; as if she's a little angry that he might be researching someone else. It's one of the things that both titillates him and drives him crazy.
He shakes his head a little to help focus. "Well yeah, that too…but you know… every character needs a good back story… I'm just doing a little… you know… filling in."
"In Boston?"
"Well I tried Washington, but it didn't really seem right."
She looks at him now. "Castle, what are you talking about?"
"Nikki Heat"
She rolls her eyes and looks back at her paper work. "Now I'm definitely not going with you."
He goes alone. Alexis wants to stay home and study, and really she'd be too much distraction anyway, so he leaves her and Martha alone for the weekend, charging his daughter with the responsibility of keeping her grandmother out of trouble.
He stays at the Marlowe near MIT. It's a quirky, classy little place he discovered one book tour about a decade ago, where they call him by name and ask after Alexis. He likes the area and strolls through the MIT campus, but it doesn't seem Nikki friendly. Nikki's more of an Arts girl he thinks… someone who reads great literature, Russian novels, Mamet plays… MIT seems too geeky. He noses around Harvard a little, trolling through the back streets between the river and the Yard, but this doesn't seem like Nikki's kind of place either. Kate Beckett, yeah… he could see her here at Harvard Law in some kind of parallel universe, her scarf draped casually around her shoulders, watching people pass from the windows of the Peet's on JFK street as she lingered over a nonfat latte with a couple of pumps of vanilla.
He finds U Mass too stodgy, too red brick, and just not cool enough. Tufts seems more promising. He's checked on line and it has a good solid liberal arts program, but it maybe a little too high end for Nikki. He doesn't plan on her having a trust fund… more middle class than Beckett, but sharp as whip, and independent as all hell. He sighs to himself. What on earth is he letting himself in for? He's been obsessive over characters before; Sophia Turner springs to mind, and he certainly enjoys the dance, but there's something about Kate Beckett that makes him feel he's not quite coming up to the mark. Something that makes him want to try just a little harder, write just a little better, be just a little funnier.
On Sunday morning he heads out to the Museum of Fine Arts. It's somewhere he thinks Nikki might have gone as a student. … he's starting to see her in some kind of fine arts program, he's just not quite sure what yet. He takes the T downtown and transfers to the green line, navigating his way through the morning riders: young families on an outing, older couples on their way to church, and college students trailing back to campus for brunch after a Saturday night sleep over. Feeling out the city that Nikki might have known.
The MFA is beautiful. He hasn't been here for years, not since Alexis was doing a school project on the French Impressionists and he brought her here to see the Monets and Renoirs. There's a travelling exhibit of art from Kyoto that fascinates him; he thinks Beckett would like the clean lines of the ceramics. He wanders through the galleries and somehow finds himself stuck in the American Impressionists gallery, bound to the floor by John Singer Sargent's portraits. He likes the little Boit girls' portrait, sure, but there's something about the painting of Mrs Charles E. Inches that reminds him of Beckett; the dark hair, the firm jaw line, the caste of sadness around the eyes. There's another portrait of a little girl lighting a lantern… he's caught between the two of them; the innocence of the child, against the grief in the woman's eyes. He gazes at them for nearly half an hour, then wanders dazedly out into the early spring sunlight. The pale brick of Northeastern University calls to him and he drifts down along Huntington Avenue, searching for something he can't quite recall. Coffee maybe? It's too early for a drink.
There's a Starbucks just a couple of blocks away, and grabs his order then sits looking out across Huntington at the façade of the Boston University Theatre. He's haunted by the Sargent portraits. Sadness about the eyes….the innocence of childhood. He remembers another Sargent painting, one he's always liked, of two little girls lighting lanterns in a garden. He thumbs open his phone and looks it up. Ah yes, at the Tate; Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose. Somehow sweet and nostalgic, without being sentimental. Oh right. The piece he saw in the MFA must be a study for that larger painting. Stupid of him not to look at the information card. His mind is buzzing with half formed images. The look on Beckett's face when he said 'You're wounded, but you're not that wounded'. The tremor in her voice when she told him the story of waiting for her mother. How her father's watch makes her wrist look small and childlike. He gazes across the street, and registers the theatre… Studio 210…Avenue of the Arts banners on the light posts and down the other direction the brick buildings of Northeastern University. And just in that moment ideas click into place, full formed scenes and places. He pulls out his notebook and starts to jot things down….scene descriptions and back story ideas; sculpting and molding and creating whole characters to move through his skeleton of a procedural. He'll anchor the Heat family in the Arts instead of in law; the mother a musician, Nikki an aspiring actress. He sees it in Beckett too, her ability to slip into a character; something that must have been invaluable when she was in vice. He steals unabashedly from himself, from his mother, from the cases he's been part of and most of all from Kate. It's Nikki's story but it's part of Beckett too. He hopes she'll forgive him for it.
He loses track of time, ends up missing lunch and takes a taxi back to the Marlowe to grab his stuff before racing to the airport, only to find his flight's been delayed by 45 minutes. He has time to grab something quick at Legal Seafood before heading to the gate. He boots up his computer and starts writing as soon as he's on board, and the hour and a quarter flight zips right by. He's still in a creative haze when he gets home, and Alexis laughs at him before shoving him gently towards his study saying, "Oh dad just go write and get it out of your system, and I'll talk to you in the morning."
He nods, and gestures with his thumb, "Yeah… I'll just go and.. you know… ah…was there something important I should…..?"
"No, Dad, seriously… go write… I'm going to go study math now anyways."
A little part of him feels guilty, but mostly he's just relieved to sit down with his laptop and continue spilling scenes out. The skeins of story weave themselves into a whole cloth, a whole historic tapestry of Nikki Heat. Some of it he knows will have to wait for later; and god he hopes there will be a later; another book, or two, or three, because he's caught now. Stranded in some kind of romantic comedy/mystery world that he's never managed to find before. He's been the Master of the Macabre. Gritty, sexy, adventure series, never this …deliciously mysterious, flirty, funny, and smart... Hmmm. Kate Beckett. That's what that is… Kate… better not get used to…
The call startles him awake at 5:30 am, and he almost drops his laptop while juggling for his phone.
"H'llo?"
"Castle?"
"Beckett?" he asks, both pleased and surprised that she's actually calling him.
"Yeah, uh… we've got a body… you in for this?"
"Absolutely," he beams, brimming with confidence, "Where are we meeting?"