The Long Weekend
"Ooh, wait, baby. Careful of Daddy," she says, catching Dashiell before he can lunge onto his father.
Castle is laid out on the bed with wet towels draped over his back, but he cracks one eye and lifts a hand to tug on Dashiell's foot. "I'm okay. Just hot."
"You've never complained about that before," Kate winks. He rolls his eyes at her and she realizes they've switched places - her with the lame joke and Castle with the Beckett-patented dismissal. "Dash, sit with Daddy while I lock up after the guys."
Castle gives her a thumbs up, meaning he's got this covered, and she leaves her son to crawl around on the bed with his father. Last night, she ran to the pharmacy in town for aloe, and the woman at the checkout counter suggested soaking towels in cold water and applying them to his sunburned skin. Castle seems to like that best.
Downstairs again, Kate moves through the smaller living room to the sliding glass doors, locks them and lays the bar into the track at the base to keep the door from being opened. Outside, the clouds have rolled in for a summer squall, threatening rain and already rumbling thunder, ruining their plans for a cookout.
Castle shouldn't be cooking outside anyway. She'll figure out something to do with the steaks, even though the main kitchen is still in disarray. At least the wine cellar is stocked; after the past couple days, they need it.
Kate moves to the connecting door between the two wings, opens it up to inspect the new floors. They were laid late Saturday night after the painters were finally through, and the bamboo flooring has been left all day today for the glue to dry and the thin boards to set. It's really gorgeous, and even Castle was impressed with the work done in the foyer. It looks as special as it feels, but it's not too grand, not too overwhelming.
Just unique.
The furniture is slated to arrive in about four weeks, so they'll come back and see to the final touches, plus new appliances in both kitchens. Bedding and curtains will come then as well, and it's all coming together.
If a little harried.
Kate locks the through door - a few construction crews still have the keys to the main wing, and she feels a little better with at least a couple doors between them.
"Kate!"
She hears Castle yelling from upstairs, and she turns quickly, knowing it's about Dashiell.
"Kate, incoming!"
"I got him," she calls, already spying Dash as he darts down the hall for the stairs. "Dashiell Hammett, not one more step."
Dash halts, comically stopping himself at the top of the staircase. Castle is lurching down the hall after him, a wet towel hanging from one shoulder, but he stops when he sees her.
"Oh, good," he sighs, sinking back only to yelp and jerk upright when his sunburn touches the wall.
Kate takes the stairs two at a time and scoops Dashiell into her arms, heads for Castle. "You okay?" She lays her hand lightly on his shoulder, his skin slick with water and aloe. "Dashiell, no running. Especially when Daddy can't chase after you. The stairs are very dangerous."
"We need baby gates in here. Holy... I thought he was going straight down."
"Head first, no doubt," she mutters. She can't help squeezing her son a little for that, even as Dashiell whines in her ear to get down. "No. Come on, we'll all go downstairs. Castle, let's grill those steaks."
Thunder booms above the house and Dashiell jumps, wrapping both arms around her neck in fierce clutch. "Mommy."
Castle raises an eyebrow. "We're not grilling anything."
"I meant in the oven. Or stir fry?"
"Maybe the oven. I'll see what I can do." Castle moves past her, draping the damp towel over his shoulder like a toga. She follows him down the stairs, reaching out once to adjust the towel before it can fall, a little smile on her lips.
Bare-chested, still in swimming trunks in deference to the wet towels he's had on his back all day, he looks rather island-native and rough-edged, a man who works with his hands. When Kate was in high school, she took a trip to the Outer Banks with a big group of friends; all of the girls ogled the life guards who would plant umbrellas in the sand for them, working the poles back and forth, back and forth to dig them deep.
Whew. That's what Castle looks like right now, his biceps bulging as he pulls the meat out of the fridge where it's been soaking in steak sauce, his nose reddened, his skin so brown that it sets off his eyes. Sharply, intensely blue.
"Kate Beckett, you can't look at me like that when I have no chance to do anything about it."
She laughs, caught, and waves a hand in front of her face. "Can't help it you're so... hot."
He shoots her a look for that and she leans in with Dashiell on her hip, kisses the burn of skin at his shoulder, just below the draped towel. She catches Dash's outstretched hand before he can slap his father for his attention, pulls the boy away.
"Dash, let's go watch the storm come in. Huh?"
"He hates that and you know it," Castle calls after her.
He does, but if she can show him how amazing it is, how awesome, then maybe he'll stop being afraid.
The second she steps up to the sliding glass doors though, Dashiell's face is buried against her neck. "You're just fine. We're inside our house where nothing can get us. Come on, baby, turn around and look."
"In my house?"
"Yeah," she says softly, nuzzling his cheek. "Come on, the thunder can't get you. It's just letting you know the rain is here. Turn around, baby."
Dashiell doesn't turn, but he does shift his body so that he's only half-hidden against her. He cracks open one eye and watches the wind tossing the palm trees, the sand blown up, and far off, the angry whitecaps in furies on top of the ocean.
"Ohhh," Dashiell sighs. "Not get me."
"No. Can't get you. Not when you're safe in our house."
"You think he'll sleep?" Castle asks her, glancing down the hall towards Dashiell's door.
"No," she admits. "But I won't sleep much either."
"Kate," he sighs.
"Not because of that," she promises. "Just all the work that still needs to be done, making lists in my head."
"It's my fault." He winces, rubbing a hand down his face. "I just... assumed we'd get up here a lot more than we have, be able to check on things. I guess I thought we'd come up here all the time, now that..."
Now that we're married.
She made him wait such a long time, didn't she? To Kate's way of thinking, they were a family before their wedding at the cabin, but maybe Castle wanted all his threads tied up, just like any good writer - no loose ends.
She can see that.
"It's not your fault," she says, reaching out to take his hand. She leads him away from Dashiell's room and towards the stairs.
"We made good headway, though," he says, and it sounds like a question.
"I promise, Castle. I'm enjoying it." She nudges him down and they go quietly, trying to keep the steps from creaking, not wanting to Dashiell to think there's any fun going on without him.
"I've enjoyed it too," he says finally, giving her a shy smile. "You've got good ideas."
"Thanks." She smiles warmly back at him, a little stupidly proud that he likes their redecorating so far. "Besides, I needed something to force me to take the time off. To be here."
"You have been here. You've been doing a really great job, Kate. Getting home in time for dinner and his bath time. Really. You've-"
"Yeah, but weekends in the summer should be spent here. You're not wrong to want that for us, Castle."
He swallows and nods, takes her hand and leads her to the kitchen. Their wine glasses are sitting empty on the sideboard, but he snags a bottle of red and uncorks it, pours them refills.
She holds hers up in cheers. "We've done a good job, together."
"We have," he says softly, clinking glasses with her.
It's not just the 12th she needs time away from - she really needs this break from them, their existence in New York inside that loft. Now that Alexis has moved to Chicago, there isn't the buffer between them, and this stuff with Dash has probably made her a tad bit obsessive. Okay, a lot obsessive.
"The book is at the editor," he tells her suddenly. "I've got a ton of edits, and I'm behind."
Her mouth drops open, glass arrested. "You are? Why didn't you say something?"
What did he say about doing really well? No. They're not doing well at all. It's a good thing she hasn't gotten pregnant yet. They still really suck at communicating.
"I'm saying something right now," he pleads, shrugging, not looking at her.
"Castle, I don't - I don't have the time to take off again-"
"No, I'm not asking you to take off. No. You did that once already, and it's not that bad. I'm telling you so that you know I'm going to have to spend a lot of late nights into early mornings working on it."
She lets out a breath. "Okay. I can get Dashiell ready in the morning. It'll be good. Just the two of us. You sleep if you've edited all night. Or edit in the morning. I'll take him to preschool."
He lifts his gaze to hers, a hesitant hope there. "Really?"
"Castle," she sighs.
"I don't want to miss out on-"
"You and Dash," she mutters. "You always think something exciting is going on in the other room without you. Give me the mornings with him, will you?"
He closes his mouth and nods quickly, takes a gulp of his wine. She winces and sips at her own, wonders if this is how it usually happens. Conversation faltering off into nothing, no real words except about the kids, and then it's over.
"Overseeing this mess hasn't exactly been a vacation," Castle starts.
"It's fine," she assures him.
He nods again, taking her at face value, some of the anxiety easing from his eyes. "Well, yes, we've managed, but I was, uh, talking more about maybe us going somewhere?"
She darts her eyes to his and sees him standing there, nervous and yet blundering through, determined to do good for them.
"Go somewhere," she echoes. "Is that a good idea?"
They nearly broke back in April. There's still fallout from those arguments, the fights about the money and her lack, the role she's taken and her shaky confidence in being a mother, his tendency to keep quiet and not trust her to be able to handle it.
And of course, since the beginning of May, they've been going around and around one diagnosis for Dashiell that scares them both, though neither of them will say it.
Autism.
But Dashiell does at least talk to them; he has language and he seems to learn easily, he's hit all his milestone. It's just the rest of it - the sleeplessness and sensitivity to light and sounds, the obsessive compulsive tendencies - they fall so perfectly in line that it makes her want to hide in the bathroom and cry.
Castle won't talk to her about it. He refuses to see it. He's just a boy, even though Castle has never raised a boy. He hasn't grown out of the colic, even though his night-time, real-tears crying feels like desperation rather than discomfort. Desperate to sleep.
"Go somewhere," Castle repeats. "A real vacation."
A real vacation. A week or more off work when she already took a week and they're not even halfway through the year. The timing of it is just really bad right now.
Well, Dashiell wasn't good timing either, was he? Her life seems to be a series of fate-interventions, as if she needs to be hit over the head with the best thing for her.
Castle himself wasn't particularly great timing, but she loves him, loves them. She is fighting for her family. She hopes he sees that.
"Okay."
Castle raises both eyebrows.
She shrugs. "Okay. A real vacation. Oh, wait. You didn't - Did you mean - honeymoon or-?"
"A honeymoon?" he says, perking up, standing straighter. He takes a step in her direction, curiosity crawling all over his face. "You'd do that?"
She blinks.
He's tugging on her now, pulling on her hips and bumping their bodies together. "Hey, just - don't overthink it, Kate. You were right about needing a break, both of us, and really, all I meant was-"
"Honeymoon?"
He smiles slowly. "Someplace good, like you said. Paris or the Greek isles. Anywhere you want. I was thinking it would be nice. Just you and me."
She lets out a breath. "Just you and me," she says finally, her eyes searching his. "That's - we haven't really had you and me."
Castle eases back against the kitchen counter, one of his fingers irritatingly tucked into the pocket of her shorts. "No, we really haven't. Unless you count all the years I followed you around at the 12th."
"Partnered me," she interrupts.
He tilts his head with a smile. "Partners, then. We had all of that. And after..." But he stops, won't say it.
"Yeah. Before Dash," she emphasizes. It might be after the Butcher case, but she wants to redefine it as before their son.
He nods. "There's not much before Dash that was... still ours. And it's a good time to go. Before we try for a second."
She softens, smiles at him. It's such bad timing, the whole idea, but when has it ever been good timing for them? "All right." She reaches out and takes his hand from her pocket, their fingers lacing. "A honeymoon. Before we try to get pregnant."
Castle's lips twitch and he leans in to take her wine glass, deposits it on the counter. "Come on. Long day. Long weekend. Let's go to bed."
"We're not trying now," she laughs.He wants to take her on a honeymoon.
"Oh no? Doesn't mean we can't have fun."
She might be looking forward to just you and me.