Author's Notes: Next instalment. No real thoughts on this one, other than to say: I watched Knockout twice through before starting this and I started wondering about what might have happened between the shooting and the funeral. This is the last of the filler chapters though. We'll get to the post-shooting days next.
Biggest thank you ever to each and every one of you who reviewed or favourited or subscribed to this story. I really appreciate all of your feedback. And to the person who commented asking to up the rating, I couldn't tell if you meant I should or you wanted to get to the higher-rated stuff sooner, heh. You did bring it to my attention that I sort of accidentally rated this 'T' when I first posted. My bad. Apologies! Definite 'M'. But you'll have to hold off a little longer for that folks. Sorry.
And finally, happy Castle Monday!
Chapter Two: The dream-ghosts of two worlds walking their ghost-towns almost address each other.
The funeral was on a Thursday. She slept fitfully the night before, so much so that at two in the morning, she'd thrown herself out of Josh's bed, pulled on her jeans and walked home eight blocks in the dark. There was no use in the both of them suffering from her insomnia.
It was still cold, for May, though the air no longer had winter's bite. In her coat pocket, she felt the weight of her cell phone and curled her fingers around it, debating internally. They hadn't spoken since first light Tuesday morning in her apartment, when Ryan and Esposito had stopped by before they all gave statements to the New Jersey State Police.
She was avoiding the repercussions of that night for a multitude of reasons. It wasn't just that she had no idea what it meant, how to compartmentalise it or how to move forward from it. There were other things to think about – the precinct was a flurry of activity in the wake of the appointment of a new boss and in the midst of all the chaos, she was still trying to solve her mother's murder.
Not to mention that there was Josh and a certain guilt that had started to gnaw at her insides whenever they were together. A kiss as a rouse on the job was one thing, even if it was the flimsiest of excuses. This was something else entirely, but she still wasn't sure whether confessing their crime was the fairest course of action.
The need to be forgiven wasn't a good enough reason to hurt him.
Then again, perhaps part of her wasn't ready for him to leave her. She sighed, audibly. The air was thick with dew and it came out in a huff of condensation even though the temperature was well above zero.
Castle hadn't been any more forthcoming about his true feelings either, and had begged off the past few days leaving her alone at her desk, something about re-writes that had to be done by the end of the week. Part of her was grateful for the space, and rationally she knew he was waiting for her to invite him back. It was his way of trying to make it easier for her to work in the midst of her grief, but most of her ached for his presence, the way he had of lightening her mood and his habit of reading her well enough to know what she meant when she couldn't say it. And she wished he would call in a way that made her disgusted with herself. She hated feeling as though she needed him, or anyone else.
At the end of a block-long debate she pulled the cell out of her pocket just to be sure he hadn't but it was free of unanswered calls or messages. It was also far too late to call him, at least, if she was going to be polite about it.
She texted him instead. Just, remember that the funeral is at 10 am, and she regretted it immediately.
He texted back by the end of the block. I know. I'll be there as promised. Why are you awake?
She sighed. Couldn't sleep.
No, me either. Need help with your eulogy?
Theirs would hardly be a Shakespearean affair, but perhaps that was a product of the age. All of her wanted to say yes, and it was far beyond the hour of rational thought. Her hands flew across the keys. If you don't mind.
I'll meet you at your place in 20 minutes.
She folded her arms and quickened her pace, concerned he might beat her to her door. In fact, she had time to deposit her belongings in the appropriate places and actually find the notepad with her hastily scrawled ideas for a eulogy. Evelyn had asked her to do it personally, said she wasn't going to be able to keep it together enough to speak. She also pulled off Josh's shirt in favour of one of her own, which said something to her about where her principles were lacking, but she swallowed it down.
The whole week felt like fate, like they were caught up in something so much bigger than themselves, players in the universe's sick drama. She could almost delude herself into thinking that it didn't matter what she did anymore.
The buzzer was unusually loud in the quiet of early morning. She hurried to silence it, in case it woke the neighbours. He appeared in her door way seconds later, but she waited until she'd looked through the peep hole to unbolt the door even though he was expected.
It never hurt to be too careful.
When she'd let him in, she followed him to the sofa. "How are you?" she asked, sinking down beside him on the cushions and folding her legs beneath her.
"Fine, I guess." He dragged a hand across his face. "Sorry, it took me longer than I expected. I've been writing."
"Gina will be happy," she commented, picking at a loose thread in a sofa cushion idly.
"I don't think it's really sunk in yet." He plucked it from beneath her fingers and held it in his lap. "That he's really dead, I mean."
She sighed. "I know."
"How are you?" he threw her question back at her. "And how're things at the precinct?"
"Tense." His arm was flung out over the back of the sofa. She reached up and let her hand rest against his, tentatively at first. His eyes observed it, casually, but he didn't move away. She swallowed and his gaze flicked back to hers. "It's quiet without you."
"You haven't called," he pointed out. "I assumed there haven't been any murders."
"Except for the one," she murmured.
"I didn't think they'd let any of you investigate that, even if it did fall under your jurisdiction."
"You're probably right." She curled her fingers against his wrist, experimentally. He reached out and caught her hand.
"Relax," he told her.
The ease with which he toed her physical boundaries was paradoxically reassuring. She found she did actually relax a little, even when he didn't release her fingers.
"Esposito and I may have called in a few favours," she filled him in, "He's assisting in a formal capacity, but they agreed that I would be kept in the loop. Jersey State Police weren't too keen to have me on the case." She made a face that told him exactly what she thought about that. "Because we were there when it happened," she paused. "And because of the links to my mother's case."
"That might be a good thing." He gave her a cryptic look, which she interpreted as a kind of criticism for her methods of late. He was right though, and she hated him for it. She had been sinking in the case after Lockwood, her last lead, had escaped. And now he was dead and Montgomery was too. She swallowed back her retort and let him continue.
"Esposito knows the investigation well enough," he reminded her. "Maybe not as well as you, but well enough, especially as it pertains to Montgomery."
"I know." She pursed her lips. "But you know I don't like to be side-lined."
"Yeah. I do."
They fell comfortably into a lull in the conversation.
"Do you know what you're going to say at the funeral?" he asked her, after a long pause.
She yawned and shook her head, "I have a few ideas. I thought I'd just stand up and be honest."
"Always a start." He rubbed his thumb against the inside of her wrist.
"Why'd you say you'd come?" she uttered quietly, knowing as she did that she was crossing yet another line.
"It can be lonely," he spoke from experience, "At this time of the morning. And I didn't want you to be alone."
"Maybe I wasn't," she challenged, but the passion and volume wasn't behind it like it once might have been. Her entire manner was muted, as though they were trading secrets and she didn't want to be overheard. Maybe they were.
He narrowed his eyes at her, though, and called her bluff just as quietly. "Why did you text me?"
"I," her sentence was interrupted by a sigh, "I don't know Castle. Maybe I wanted to not be alone with you."
He tilted his head to one side and said it matter-of-factly, "So what if you did?"
"I …" She paused, wondering how many of her cards to play.
It was all unfortunate timing and maybe it always had been. Demming's entrance and Castle's untimely exit the year before, the hot and yes, lonely months of June through August, when she'd met Josh, the first man who she'd met and thought maybe I could like himsince the ides of May. He'd made her laugh, even after she'd quite steadfastly resolved that she could do without the insights of a certain writer, at the precinct and in her life.
And then suddenly it was September and she did like Josh but – and there shouldn't have been one, but there was. And at first, it was fine, because as Castle had once succinctly put it, she was his work wife; they could be partners without her reading too much into it. Just because Lanie liked to tease didn't mean there was anything between them. Except with time, she'd realised that was a neat little lie she had fed herself and him to keep him at a distance. She wished she knew the reason. Self-preservation, sure, but it was more than that.
Maybe it was real, and maybe she didn't go for real, just as she'd once accused him of doing. Maybe it was Josh. Maybe it was easier to risk it for someone who hadn't so firmly installed themselves in every aspect of your life and (if you were going to be privately dramatic about it after a few too many martinis) your heart. Which wasn't to say she didn't love them both; she had recently come to the realisation that she did, which was somehow all the more confusing.
She'd long thought that history was never really history – that was the problem, in love and in life – it all came back to haunt you, even if all it was was twelve months of ambiguous signals and the pressing need to discover all the answers to the what ifs.
She wet her lips, realising her sentence was hanging. "I feel like no one else understands. I'm not even sure you do, but…" She half-shrugged, kneeling closer to him. "You can at least imagine."
"Couldn't even come close to the reality," he promised her, "But you can tell me, if you want."
She shook her head mutely. Then, after a pause: "I don't think I could. I wouldn't even begin to know how. It… I need to know. It's who I am; a character flaw, probably. But I feel as though for so long I stopped myself from living because I didn't know why she died. I don't wantto do that anymore, but maybe by now it's habit."
"The same reason an alcoholic doesn't drink," he quoted. "I think that's what you called it once."
"I fell into it," she confessed. "A little."
"I know. It was hard to watch."
She bit back her apology, feeling as though it wasn't really owed. She'd never asked him to save her from herself, nor did she want him to. "We were making progress."
"You're so stubborn," he observed, fondly. "But that's why I'm here, to help when you feel like you're falling in, if you let me."
"Are you here?" She looked away, over their entwined fingers, at the opposite wall where her make-shift murder board lay hidden beneath the shutters. "Because the other night, when you came over here saying we weren't going to win it, it sure as hell didn't sound like you were."
"Hey." He dropped her hand and reached out to turn her jaw, fingers slipping along the line of it lightly. He tapped her chin with his thumb. "You know I am."
"Whatever it takes?" she found herself whispering. They were so far from neutral territory. His thumb slipped against her lips this time. She reached up and held his hand in place, just barely kissing it.
"Anything but your life," he swore, "I … Beckett, I can't lose you. I don't know how. And this is me saying this, but I can't imagine it."
She nodded once and held his hand between her palms. "I know. I'm not sure I'd know how to lose you either," she admitted.
"That's a turnaround," he said it under his breath, but she didn't think he was being petty. It was probably a point that warranted some discussion.
"I thought you said you figured I'd always forgive you eventually," she tried, hopefully, but it didn't pull a grin from him. "Castle. We both said things, in anger, that we probably didn't mean."
"Imeant what I said," he declared. "Maybe not with the way it was said, but the words? Every one."
She pulled her hand free and wrapped it around her body. "I meant some of it too. That doesn't mean I should have said it."
"Beckett, I'm tired of not talking," and he did sound weary of it and a score of other things, as though they were all there in the room, sitting on his shoulders. "There's only so much we can say without actually saying it."
She sighed. "I'm not sure that now is the time, not when we have to bury Montgomery in a few hours."
"No," he did concede her that, "Ok. Read me what you've got."
She startled, but momentarily. Ostensibly the reason he was here, she remembered, briefly thinking that an emotional affair was almost worse than a physical one.
That conjured an image of the two of them on the rug beneath his feet, kissing like she had been reminded they were capable of the night of Montgomery's death. It wasn't as though the thought was new, but she found herself struck by it more often of late, and each time, it more steadfastly refused to let her go.
Licking her lips, she nodded to shift the image and reached for the notepad behind her. That more serious subject matter was immediately all-consuming; funny how her desire could so readily shift to make way for her grief, and vice versa. Perhaps it was just the primal nature of it all.
She tapped her fingers against the lined paper. "He was reminding me of the first night I met him," she told him. "That night, after you left my apartment, I went back to the precinct. And he was still there… just him. He didn't even blink when I told him I wanted you gone. He just said it didn't matter who your friends were, if that's what I really wanted."
He interjected when she paused. "Was it? Isit?"
Her expression was sad and the words were bittersweet. "Part of me does." She handed him the notepad and he took it. She wanted to complete the sentence, but most of me wants the opposite, but she kept her silence. His eyes were skimming her notes anyway.
She swallowed it all back and continued the story. "And when I told him what you said, about not being able to win it, he agreed. He said there are no victories, not in what we do."
"He was a good man," he lamented. "In spite of, maybe even because of everything."
"I know." Her lip twisted beneath her teeth. "And I can't let one mistake ruin his memory... he was so much more than that Castle."
He reached out to hand her the notepad. The look he gave her was loaded, and she caught onto something in it and didn't let go.
"We all are."
She nodded. "God I hope so."
His hand caught her cheek, thumb trailing across the prominence of her cheek bones and fingers brushing where her hair caught behind her ear. He pulled her closer, until her side was pressed to his, her head resting against his shoulder. At first she was surprised that he'd taken the liberty – it was unlike him – but she welcomed it. She'd never been very good at asking for what comfort she needed, partly out of wanting to believe she didn't need it, and partly out of fear it wouldn't be offered. She reached out and let her hand curl around his knee. Beneath her weight, her feet had started to tingle, but she didn't shift.
They were quiet for a long moment.
In the silence, there was a kind of resolution, or at least the illusion of it. This was another reason she wasn't ready for words; she wanted to hold onto to the only place in her life she had found quiet – unexpectedly and almost ironically – for just a little bit longer, at least until the loss was less fresh a wound. She didn't think she could handle any new ones.
"I'm sorry I kissed you," she whispered.
"I'm not," he said with quiet humour, a huff of air against her hair that approximated a laugh and the curve of his lips into a smile against her temple.
She shook her head in mock-disproval, but the gesture was muted. "You know what I mean. I shouldn't have."
"What? Made me the other woman?"
She grinned in spite of herself. "In a manner of speaking. You don't deserve that. I just… I don't know how all the pieces fit, yet."
"The romantic in me is righteously offended and wants to tell you it should be obvious, but I'm sadly not naïve enough to think it's simple," he let his chin rest atop her head, "To be honest, I don't think the ones that last are meant to be."
"You think it would last?" she asked as though the thought had just occurred to her.
His instinct was to dismiss it, but it did bear consideration. "Past evidence suggests I'm not the best at predicting these things."
"True." She lifted her head to look at him. "But maybe you just pick the wrong people."
"And you?"
She swallowed. "Like you said, maybe I'm just never in it."
"I don't believe that." He was looking at her in a way that made her feel like nothing he could ever say would compare to what was written on his face. "You're reserved Kate and you don't trust easily, but you're not cold."
"I know that." She tilted her head to the side and braced her elbow against the back of the sofa, shifting to unfurl her legs and stretch out her toes. Pain shot to her extremities as the blood flow returned. "But it's not the same thing."
"Maybe not."
She yawned, "And you never answered my question."
"Yes I did," he was being wilfully cryptic and there was a punch line coming, she could tell. "I told you I didn't know. Because I don't, and neither do you; you couldn't possibly," he studied her reaction, and evidently decided he wasn't going to like her answer, because he sat forward and leaned his head on his hands for a moment before turning back to her. "It's late."
It stung, though she knew it shouldn't have. She was feeling a little raw though, with grief and the slow realisation that her mentor wasn't quite the man she had thought he was. It was a betrayal of sorts, and she was still coming to terms with it. And as much as she wanted a quick fix, a distraction, to pour all her emotions into something(a case, her mother's murder, another one of those heated kisses that momentarily left her incapable of specific hurt), she knew the only thing for it was time. She ran a hand through her hair, shaking it loose at the ends and nodded. "Yeah. I guess it is."
Stay. It stalled somewhere between her mind and her tongue. Instead, she stood and threw the notepad down on the sofa behind her. He followed her to the door.
When he was framed by the door way, she reached out and curled her fingers around his sleeve. "Thank you, for your help."
"Always happy to be of service," he was trying to make light, but was distracted. His expression remained thoughtful.
She took a breath and plunged into the sentence. "After tomorrow, I promise, we'll talk."
He nodded, "We've got the time."
She twisted her head in wordless inquiry.
"Well, we've waited this long." He reached out and pulled her closer, hands slipping against the hair at the back of her neck. She bowed forward, obedient. "Let's just get through the next few hours," he murmured as he pressed his lips to her forehead.
She found herself burning with it, even though it was delicate and brief, long after she closed the door to him and allowed herself to collapse into bed, still clothed.
It was a stalemate to be sure, one they would have to find their way out of, but she was glad that it would be later rather than sooner. Time, that was what they needed, all of them – to forget if not to forgive – and then maybe, she would be ready to confront everything that was changing around her.
