A Season in Hell


X

There was a rare and soft quiet in the room. He was just enough weighed down by the pain medication that he didn't mind drifting here, watching her through his partially-closed lids.

Kate was asleep in the chair, her head turned his way and her cheek against the tall back. Her hair curtained the side of her face, but he could see the dark shadow of her lashes and the part of her lips. Her throat was an ivory column leading to the sharp rise of her collarbone, the rise and fall of her chest, the shimmering fabric of her loose shirt.

Her palm was up on her knee, as if she'd pulled the chair close enough to hold his hand and then fallen asleep in the middle of reaching for him. Ambient light glowed around her, a grey morning through the window, her body framed by that pale pearled color of coming storms.

He came awake again when the rain started, a soft drizzle against the window. His eyes opened and he didn't know what time it was, only that Kate still slept. The rain was pleasant, and for once the drugs seemed to hold him entirely in their soft fingers, keeping him subsumed in painlessness.

The tap of rain, Kate's face in the grey light, sleeping together.

Castle's grin slipped slowly across his face, a huff of breath like laughter, and then he heard the door snick open. He turned his head, but his reactions must have been delayed, the sound triggering his response, because he saw Alexis already standing at the foot of his bed.

"Alexis," he said, gravel in his voice.

Her face brightened. She turned to look at him, her eyes dragging away from the view of Kate in the chair and up to him.

"Stop it," he mumbled, flexing his fingers for her. Drugs kept him from extending his reach, but Alexis caught on fast and came to him, taking his hand.

He sighed and squeezed her hand, trying to put some strength into it. Alexis dropped in close to his side and kissed his cheek. "Sorry, Dad."

He was just enough drugged that the words came out of his mouth. "Don't hate her."

"No, Daddy, I don't hate Detective Beckett." She patted his shoulder and sank a hip against the bedside railing.

"But?" he got out, marbles in his mouth. It was hard to stay here. "I hear a but after-"

"But you got shot," she hissed. Alexis came in close, kissed his cheek again as if in apology. "You got shot, Dad. Nothing else is important."

"What about school," he mumbled. "Did you - when are exams?"

"I don't - I've got them rescheduled."

"Good girl," he whispered. He was exhausted. He ought to have a conversation with her; things were murky and they shouldn't be. "Go to school."

"Dad, I will. When you're better."

"Long time," he sighed. "You finish the school year."

"Of course, Dad. Of course. It can be arranged around-"

"School's important. I got shot; don't make me make you-"

"Okay, Daddy," she whispered, close to his face, hands framing his face. "Okay. You got shot. I'll do anything you like."

"Be nice to Beckett."

"I am. I will be. I'm being nice; I promise." Her fingers stroked through his hair and down his face; she was crying.

"Alexis," he got out, trying to lift a hand and catch hers. "Pumpkin, it's all right. Gonna be fine."

"You were shot," she cried out. She was already swiping the tears from her cheeks. "It's just hard to - but worse for you, I know; I'm being selfish. I'll be nice to Detective Beckett."

Castle groaned and brought his arms up, caught Alexis around the shoulders and dragged her into him. "It's okay. Okay. Come here, Alexis, right here, pumpkin."

She collapsed into the bed; he held back the grunt of pain and kept his teeth clenched, fighting it off. Alexis curled an arm over his torso and laid her head there, and he could feel the tears she was trying to sniff back.

"It's okay," he told her, feeling the pain awake in his back. "I got shot, but it's okay now."

Alexis's shoulders heaved under his arm. "I just - can't help thinking about it. Over and over. You were shot; you were shot. What were you doing?"

"I know," he mumbled, trying to tighten his arm around her. "I know."

"Why would you do that, why would you-"

"Wasn't trying to get shot," he reassured her. "Not trying to."

She shuddered out a breath and her arm squeezed, made the pain ripple up and down his spine. He lifted his hand anyway, combed through the bright flame of her hair, trying to comfort her where he wasn't sure there was any comfort.

"I do like her," Alexis said quietly against his torso.

"Thought you did." He felt very tired now; the energy it had taken to reassure his daughter was gone, drained out of him. "Was sure you did. Important to me."

Alexis shifted against him and lifted her head. His hand dropped heavy to the bed and he couldn't find it in him to lift it again.

His eyes were closing.

"Dad?"

"Hmm?"

"I'll be nice," she whispered. Her dry lips against his forehead. "Gram already threatened to bring her theatre company to the loft for practices if I wasn't."

His lips curled into a grin that fell too fast, his facial muscles failing him.

Alexis. Her arms thin around his chest as she hugged him. "Just don't get shot, Daddy, please. Just don't get shot again."

X

He swam back to consciousness at the commotion in the room: a clatter of a tray, the greasy scent of food, his daughter talking, Beckett's low tone of response, the nurse, shoes on linoleum, a door shutting.

He could only get his eyes half-open, lashes still tangled together and obscuring his vision. But he saw Alexis sitting back on the cot with her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms wrapped around her legs, saying something earnestly.

Beckett was sitting beside her, a foot of space between them, her elbows on her knees as she leaned forward, her back bowed, her head nodding. The sound of her voice carried easily to him, though he couldn't make out any words. Still. They were talking together.

They were talking.

Castle closed his eyes and relaxed again, sliding off into darkness.

X

He woke on a shout and the room was lit like a nightmare. Strobed by blue-white, ghastly. A face came into his vision, Beckett, Kate; it was Kate, snap out of it, Castle.

He grunted as the awareness jolted through him, ragged edged, and he struggled to grasp time, place. It was a thunderstorm. Lightning licked the room. Mid-day darkness, no sun.

A hand on his shoulder. "Just a dream," she was saying, close to his ear. He couldn't see her any more. He couldn't make sense of what he saw. "Just the storm."

"No, I don't know," he rasped. His throat was raw. The world didn't make sense, streaked and disjointed. "Confused."

"It's Thursday," she said. Her voice was close; the fall of her hair. She sounded like she was giving him a report on a homicide. "Thursday after the funeral on Saturday. You were shot. They've put you on your side to keep pressure off your back. Feel this? Foam wedge-"

"Oh." The world clicked into place, upside down. His cheek against a starched pillow, his chest to the foam, half on his stomach this way, the bed flat. The ski slope of her shin where she sat in the chair, legs crossed. "Thursday?"

"I took the day so Alexis would go to school," she said quietly.

"Oh, good," he groaned, closing his eyes. His breath was shallow, hard. Less drugs now, he thought, and the anesthesia was out of his system. "School. That's important."

Her fingers combed through his hair and his shoulders drooped, his breathing beginning to even out.

"Was it a dream?" she murmured. "Or just the storm."

"Don't remember," he sighed. No idea. Just - awake.

Just awake, and another flash of lightning was followed by a rippling roll of thunder, like the whole sky was being torn in half. He barely moved, lulled by her fingers, lulled by the sound of rain.

"How many times you have to tell me that?" he mumbled. "The whole thing."

"Only twice today," she said, and there was a little amusement in her sound. "A few times last night. Alexis wrote it down on a card by your bed, just in case. I'm not sure she trusts me."

"Sorry," he slurred. He always made a terrible patient; he was whiny and moody when he was sick. He complained, and bitterly, and he liked for everyone to be around him, to cater to him, to baby him.

"No, it's fine, Rick. Just the drugs, make you confused at first. It'll be fine."

This was going to be bad, the two of them. He was going to annoy her; he wouldn't even be able to help it. Such a bad idea, such terrible timing.

But her fingers in his hair were so nice. Just so nice.

"It's okay," she said softly. "Go back to sleep."

He struggled to give voice to it before he fell asleep again, before confusion. "Don't let me... don't hate me, Beckett."

"No," she whispered, a hum in her throat. "Never."

X