"You are not giving me a sponge bath," she growls, gripping the towel too tightly around her torso, refusing to follow him into the bathing area set up for her.
Castle sighs but knows better than to push. He already offered her the option of a female nurse, the same offer she's received multiple times throughout her ten-week stay in the ward for her hydrotherapy sessions, but he knows this isn't about comfort for her. Kate Beckett doesn't want to risk him seeing her naked because she's ashamed. He saw it clear in her eyes as she assessed herself in the bathroom mirror while he started the bathwater.
"It's not a sponge bath, Beckett. Well, unless you want it to be," he quips, wiggling his eyebrows at her and receiving a scowl in return. "All I'm going to do is assist when necessary, make sure you're comfortable doing this on your own so you're all set for discharge. You can even pull the curtain around if you want your privacy," he suggests, tugging on the sterile white plastic that lines the regular bathtub.
Kate casts another glance to the mirror and physically shudders, turns back towards the door. Castle catches her good hand before she can try to escape.
"Hey, talk to me, what's the matter?" he implores, squeezing her fingers but she doesn't budge. "You've been dying to get out of here since you woke up from the coma, I thought you'd be excited for some independent bathing."
Her lips twitch with a flicker of amusement, but it's gone just as quickly, the despair lining her features prominent once more.
"I'm normal here," she whispers, withdrawing her fingers from the cradle of his, covering the damaged hand holding her towel in place. "I'm not - I'm just another burn victim like everyone else here. Out there, outside these hospital walls… Rick, you know how people are going to look at me."
Castle drifts in closer to her, his hand rising to graze her bicep on its own accord, a habit she's never denied him of, and dusts his fingers along the blotches of skin she can't feel. He understands her hesitation, her fears, has dealt with them through multiple patients, but he's unashamedly biased when it comes to Kate Beckett. He still finds her beautiful and has a hard time imagining others viewing her as anything but.
"I know you've heard this a million times, but what people think of your appearance doesn't matter, Kate, you're still-"
"You're right, I have, and it's bullshit," she snaps, shrugging out of his touch but not pacing away from him. "I'm an NYPD detective. You think a suspect will ever take me seriously again looking like this?" she demands, waving a hand over her face, swiping her fingers over the scar along her jawline, the damaged flesh claiming her neck, in disgust. "My entire appearance is a weakness in every sense of the word."
"Or it could be a strength," he points out, scrambling to explain before she flays him alive with her glare. "People see this," he mumbles, smoothing his fingers over the scarred skin of her throat, traveling up to caress her jaw and the spill of pink skin that branches out from her temple to color the outer edge of her eye socket. "They see someone who survived something, who fought for their life, someone who could take on anything that came their way."
Her eyes squeeze shut, but Kate leans into his palm when it cups her cheek.
"The only people comfortable seeing me like this are you and Lanie, and that's only because you see this all the time and she's used to viewing deformed bodies for a living. Everyone else…" The line of her throat bobs. "They can barely meet my eyes."
"You think that's what you are?" he murmurs the question, waiting for her eyes to slide open before he continues. "Deformed?"
She doesn't answer him, a small sigh slipping past her lips as her eyes fall from his gaze.
"You have some skin damage, Kate. You have some scars and discoloration-"
"Is this where you tell me I'm unique, beautiful in my own way or some other pretty speech about embracing my differences?" she huffs, dislodging his hand from her cheek to shift away from him. "Because I really don't want to hear-"
"Nope, this is where I tell you to stop feeling sorry for yourself," he quips, smirking when her brow hitches in surprise, indignation flaring in her eyes and rising to her lips. Castle carefully grips her by the shoulders before she can speak it, turns her to face the small rectangle of the mirror over the sink. "And to look in the mirror and accept the person staring back at you."
"You or me?" she murmurs, training her gaze on his face next to hers in the reflection, his cheek pressed into the softness of her hair.
"Mm, preferably both. But more importantly, you." He places his hands on her hips, squeezes the bones he knows are unscathed. "You aren't defined by your appearance, Kate. You're more than what people see."
A smile flutters at the edges of her lips and Castle moves to step back, aware that too much unprofessional contact has already occurred between them, but Kate leans back against his chest. He watches her wince at the pressure on her back, where the worst of her burns lie, before relaxing against him.
"Thank you, Castle," she sighs, finding his hand at her side and tentatively drawing his arm around her waist. It's too much, to hold her like this, especially when she's adorned in nothing but a towel, but he doesn't let her go, has no hope of letting go of her when all he wants is to hold her tighter.
"Nothing to thank me for, Beckett. If I had it my selfish way, I'd keep you here forever."
She grins at him in the mirror. "You act as if you'll never see me again. We still on for a pity date?"
"The moment you are settled back into everyday life," he confirms, excitement fluttering through his stomach at the idea, pleasant surprise that she's taking him seriously. Even if she is still referring to it as a date of pity. "Or if you need a sponge bath at any point, you call me. Day or night, I will be there for you."
Kate rolls her eyes and steps out of his embrace, starting towards the bath water that has likely cooled beyond her preference. The towel begins to slip down her spine, exposing the roughened terrain of her flesh, the patches of pink and strips of scar tissue, the rare glimpses of untouched skin beneath her shoulder blade, along her tailbone-
"Turn around, Castle."
Rick blushes and turns his back to her, allowing her to slip into the tub and ease the curtain shut around the rim. When he glances over his shoulder, only her bent knees are in his line of vision.
"Okay?" he calls quietly, hearing her adjusting to the water, her movements slow and wary, but eventually, he listens to her hum of contentment.
"Yeah, I think I'll be able to handle this on my own," she answers, sounding so proud of herself for something so simple. He smiles; he's proud of her too.
Kate soaks for a few minutes, applies the soap he hands her, and washes her hair with the hospital issued shampoo. She accepts the towel and the hand he offers to step from the tub once she's finished.
"Feel better?" he asks while he drapes another towel at her shoulders for her hair, drying the dripping strands while she slips into the hospital brand slippers.
"Much. I hated relying on Rosie to scrub me down," she chuckles, walking with him to the sink where her clothes sit folded and ready for her.
"Oh, she's going to miss you," he says, smiling with her over the elderly nurse that he's certain everyone in the ward harbors a soft spot for. "Who else is she going to lecture about attitude adjustments?"
"That was one time," Kate huffs, nodding for him to turn around again, allow her the chance to step into her underwear and sweatpants, slide the thin, oversized t-shirt past her head.
He helps her ease her arms through the sleeves of the material once she's facing him again, continues to towel dry her hair for her even though she doesn't really need the help anymore. Doesn't need him.
"Regardless, rest assured that it is I who will miss you the most," he informs her, skimming his thumb along the healed skin of her ear, the shell permanently pink, but no longer seared raw.
Kate reaches out to hook her fingers in the fabric of his scrub top, reeling him in close enough that their hips bump and his lungs stutter in his chest. His body is torn between staggering backwards and tugging her closer at the contact. She's drifting into him, though, seeking in that silent way he's grown to recognize, could never deny.
Despite his hesitation, Rick laces his arms around her tender upper body, combs his fingers through the damp locks of hair, and waits on her.
"Since the explosion, since I was brought here, there have been so many moments, days, where I hoped I would die," she confesses, her lips at the v of fabric his scrub top creates beneath the hollow of his throat.
Castle sucks in a breath at the admission. He's seen many patients turn suicidal due to their injuries, the traumatic changes applied to their bodies, their lives. He's known Kate's misery, witnessed both the physical and mental anguish she's undergone, but the idea of her being gone, dead…
He presses his lips to her hairline, splays his palms at her back to gingerly draw her in closer against him.
"The pain was so intense," she continues, her voice as soft and careful as his touch. "And my life felt like it had burned with my apartment. It still does sometimes, but you… you've made it easier to keep going, to wake up each day, and I just want you to know I'm grateful for it. I'm grateful I have you."
He refuses to cry, he has absolutely no reason to cry, so he takes a moment, forces the lump in his throat to recede and resists the urge to press his own gratitude against her lips.
"I'm grateful I have you too, Kate."
And now, he doesn't want to let her go.
There are other patients in the ward that he could be dedicating his time to that day, but he spends the majority of his shift with Kate. They go over her discharge plan, her physical therapy schedule and at home routines, celebrating her approaching freedom with balloons and a small cake that makes her laugh once his work day is done.
"This was highly unnecessary, Castle," she chuckles, batting away the congratulatory decorations when they drift towards her hospital bed. "How much did you have to pay your intern to blow all of these up while I was bathing?"
"I didn't pay Peter anything," he huffs, handing her a plate of the red velvet cake he picked up from the bakery down the street this morning. "He offered to grab them from the party store for me. And, don't get too excited, but I got you a present too."
Kate's eyebrows crease with concern. "Rick, I hope you didn't-"
"It's nothing extravagant," he promises, abandoning her bedside to retrieve his jacket from the chair in the corner, where it always lies draped during his time off spent in her hospital room. "A homemade present, actually."
Kate places her dessert off to the side and waits patiently for him to return to her, grinning when he takes a seat near her hip and hands her the gift-wrapped box.
"No jewelry this time?" she teases, her eyes flickering to the prized possession of her mother's ring on the bedside table, her father's watch, repaired and propped up next to the chain.
"You wouldn't want me to become predictable, would you?" he hums, pursing his lips in anticipation as she fumbles with the tape holding the purple wrapping paper together, peeling it back to reveal the plain box beneath.
Kate lifts the lid, reaches for the notebook inside with intrigue tugging on her brow and spreading through her eyes. He doesn't speak, for once, doesn't try to explain, and instead holds his breath once she finally plucks the book from its box and opens to the first page.
"This is your handwriting," she murmurs, but her focus is on the pages she's flipping through, filled with his handwriting, with stories he never planned to share with anyone. Stories about her. "Castle, you… you wrote for me?"
Her gaze finally rises to see him, that beautiful tenderness he remembers from the day he returned her mother's ring to its rightful owner flaring bright through her irises, shimmering with something he refuses to recognize as tears.
"Had I gone down a different path in life, I think I would have chosen to write," he tries to explain, fiddling restlessly with his hands while Kate attempts to divide her attention between him and the words spread across her lap. "I normally don't have the time to get much writing done, but after spending all this time with you…" Castle sucks in a breath as he shrugs, does his best to play this off as no big deal. The last thing he wants is to overwhelm her by placing his heart in her hands. "You inspire me, Kate."
The charred tips of her fingers dust over the scrawl of his writing on the lined page, her eyes skimming before she eases the book shut and cradles it to her chest.
"This is beautiful," she whispers, extending her hand to caress his cheek, coaxing him to lean in closer. Close enough that he could simply tilt forward, kiss her if he wanted to, if he were allowed to. "Thank you."
Castle smiles at her in return, turns his head to graze his lips along her palm instead. "I'm just glad you like it."
He should pull back, he knows, but Rick can't help lingering when she takes advantage of his proximity, drifting forward to rest against his forehead. Her eyes slip shut, her fingers climbing his cheek to curl around his ear.
It takes all he has to breathe through the intimacy of her touch, the yearning it ignites within his chest.
"Can you stay a little longer?" Kate murmurs, opening her eyes to skim her lashes along his cheek.
"Of course," he answers without hesitation, covering the hand at his ear to squeeze her fingers, draw them back down so he can shift from his position on the edge of her bed. She scoots over to make room and he settles beside her on the spacious cot.
It isn't appropriate hospital conduct, but his shift ended an hour ago and by tomorrow morning, he'll no longer be her attending nurse.
"While I'm here, we should schedule our date," he quips, resting his shoulder beside hers, waggling his brow in the way that always elicits a sound of amusement from her lips, but she doesn't laugh at him this time.
Kate leans into his side, a pleasant warmth infusing every inch of his body she comes into contact with, and meets his inquisitive gaze with a grin.
"Go ahead."