Broken Pieces
Alexis
Alexis Castle had sat at the table she had reserved for herself and her mother for mother's day for nearly two hours before she finally gave up and accepted the fact that her mom wasn't coming. Both Grams and dad had tried to warn her not to get her hopes up, but she had really, truly wanted to believe that this time would be different.
She and her mother had spoken on the phone almost daily through the entire infatuation with Pi, her dad's disapproval of him and her unreasonable desire to punish him for it. Even after she came to her senses and realized that Pi not only wasn't "the one," but that she had made a terrible mistake moving so fast with him in the first place,Meredith had answered the phone every time she called. Encouraged her to spread her wings and telling her all the things she'd really wanted to hear from dad.
Alexis really thought that her mother had changed this time that she'd taken a genuine interest in her. Only now, when it was too late did she realize that mom had just been trying to use her to shake her father's world up again, as always. Once again trying to use her as a wedge between him and Detective Beckett. Like she had last year when she had pushed her way into the loft during her bout of mono while Kate was there.
Alexis couldn't bring herself go to dad or Grams with this. Couldn't bear to see the "I told you so" in their eyes. She didn't want to see him tie himself into knots trying to soften the blow, like he had every other time mom had ever disappointed her for as long as she could remember. He would hug her, offer the same empty platitudes over ice cream and try to play peacemaker. All the while trying unsuccessfully to hide how furious he was on her behalf. She wished, just one time, that dad would just let himself get angry. She was.
Alexis had been able to see through her father's facade since she was six. He'd known that for years, but yet, he still had that one blind spot. That singular delusion that he could somehow protect her from her mother's true nature. In the vain hope, like hers, that one day Meredith would be different, that she would change. His relationship with Detective Beckett had only made him try harder, since he had learned how much worse it could be.
Thankfully her dad was near the end of a week-long book signing tour down the East Coast to promote his upcoming second ever dual book release. Storm Front and Deadly Heat going head to head had been such a big hit last year that Black Pawn had him doing it again with Raging Heat and Wild Storm. Dad had really outdone himself on "Alexis' education fund" as he liked to call Derek Storm's revival when he thought she wasn't listening.
"Gina must be thrilled." Alexis thought to herself. She'd always known (contrary to her father's best efforts, even as their marriage inevitably imploded) that Gina's marriage to him had always been a little mercenary on her part. Even the less than subtle ways Gina had tried to interject herself between her and her dad had been a calculated effort to keep him on the hook. It was why she was never able to let the woman in. Would never bend and call her "mom" like she knew Gina secretly wanted.
Alexis had barely come out of her last relationship debacle with her dignity intact. She had been stubbornly determined to accept responsibility for the mistake she had broken her father's heart for. To pay her penance and finish out the lease for the apartment in Washington Heights herself.
She had nearly driven herself into the ground in the process, when Kate of all people, had convinced her to come home and let dad help her. Dad had called his lawyer and his accountant who, between the two of them, had broken the poorly written lease with laughable ease. They had "allowed" the landlord to keep most of the second hand furniture she never wanted to see again for a discount on the outstanding rent. "Uncle Chris" had even made the skeevy little weasel of a man return her security deposit.
Just like he had during her , dad never once entertained the notion of letting her down. Unlike her mom, who never seemed to think twice about it. Because she could face neither her grandmother nor her father this time, she found herself, sitting on the couch in the loft's living room with a pint of Hagen Das sniffling, trying her best not to cry and failing miserably.
Kate
Kate Beckett had spent the better part of Mothers day either in her father's apartment, making him lunch, or at the cemetery sitting on her knees cleaning and rearranging her mother's stone. She had always spent certain days of the year doing certain things that always led back to her mother's passing.
On Christmas Eve, she had long taken the overnight shift so someone with a family wouldn't have to. Something she knew she would soon need to change, now that she once again had one that took Christmas as seriously as her mother once had.
On the anniversary of her mother's death, she had always taken the day off, locked herself in her apartment and looked at her mother's case. Each year hoping to see something different than she had the last time she looked. Something she had been forced to stop doing two years ago when she had made the deal with the man whom she now knew was responsible, but could not legally touch. A discovery she would not have made without the man she would soon call her husband.
On her parent's anniversary, she would have dinner at her father's. This year, that would change too. It would soon become a true family affair again, because there would be new faces at her father's table. Namely Rick and Alexis Castle, with an invitation to Martha if she had time to attend.
Everything in her life was changing, growing, opening up because of the Castles. A man she had started out wanting to despise, in spite of the words he had written that had tugged at her soul. Who, because of the life he shared with the fire-haired fresh-faced daughter he adored and had raised alone, had warmed her heart. They made her believe she could have both a family and a life untarnished by her mother's murder. That she not only could, not only should, but that she actually deserved to be...happy.
But today she isn't. Today she hasn't been since January the ninth nineteen ninety nine. Today she never would be again. Even when she had children of her own, which seemed more and more likely as time went by. Because the one person in the world she most wanted to share Mother's Day with was gone. Snuffed out forever by one twisted man's lust for political power.
She didn't want to go back to her apartment. Didn't want to sit in her living room with the shuttered window documenting her failure to find justice for her mother. So, even though she knew he wasn't in town, (they had texted back and forth every day and skyped every night and morning since he left) she went to the place that was more and more becoming her home.
This was how Kate Beckett found herself turning the key Rick gave her and walking into the loft. (Eduardo hadn't even given her a second glance in the lobby after saying "Good evening Miss Beckett") Finding Alexis on the couch, a discarded empty pint of ice cream on the coffee table, crying her eyes out.
Kate and Alexis
"Hey, Alexis...what's wrong?" Kate whispered having run to the couch as soon as she kicked off her shoes.
"Why doesn't my mother love me?" The girl whispers before breaking down in her arms.
"Shh Alexis, it'll be okay...I'm sure it isn't..." Kate began, but Alexis stopped her.
"Please Kate...don't...defend her...or make excuses..." Alexis whispered between sobs, "Dad...always does that...but it doesn't...it doesn't change who mom is...she doesn't love me...not really."
"That bitch," Kate raged in her head, even as her eyes filled with fat ugly tears, "my mother is dead...but at least I know she loved me. That she would never have done this to me."
That was how the two of them found each other. Two daughters without their mothers, one through murder, the other through selfish neglect consoling each other on the couch. Crying in each others arms. Finding themselves knitting together their broken places...forging a bond between them that would never be broken.
Becoming family.
*Author's note* Try not to cry too much. This was a Tumblr prompt for someone else...but they took too long writing it...so I did it myself. I know...I write far too many of these. I should hand out packets of Kleenex or something.
Mark.