Author's Note: With yet more talking…

The Space Between Us

Chapter 10

Castle was suffering from emotional whiplash. The way his emotions had veered all over the place over the course of the last 24 hours—god, had it really only been 24 hours?—had left him almost physically dizzy. He felt as if his emotions had been thrown into a blender or something and now were a formless, messy blob so he couldn't even identify what he was feeling any more. An emotion smoothie where the individual ingredients were unidentifiable. And good god, he really couldn't believe he was thinking in terms of such tortured metaphors. He really must be exhausted and sleep-deprived. At this point, he'd be incoherent in a matter of minutes.

He sighed, poured himself a cup of coffee (another one; this would be his fourth in the last three hours), and then retreated into his office to try to get some order into his thoughts.

He was in love with Beckett. That was still true. (Would always be true.)

And ironically, even though Beckett was the cause of all his emotional turmoil, that thought somehow helped to ground him, served as an emotional anchor. (He thought idly of the line of F. Scott Fitzgerald's: I love her and that's the beginning and end of everything. It was true.)

He and Beckett had talked. She had explained, at least mostly, why she'd lied to him about remembering her shooting. Understanding why she had immediately lied in the hospital that day was easier. He could accept, acknowledge, that it had not been a good time. She'd just undergone a major surgery, had been under the influence of painkillers and likely not thinking clearly, and perhaps most importantly, she'd still had a boyfriend.

(After all, Dr. Motorcycle Boy's existence had been one of the main reasons he hadn't told Beckett how he felt until that day when the words just couldn't be kept in any longer because he was terrified that he might never get another chance to tell her that he loved her. Until then, he'd been too nervous, yes, but also, it wasn't the sort of thing he did. Castle didn't cheat and that extended to not getting involved with women who were in other relationships. He wouldn't do that to Beckett. He could not declare himself to Beckett when she had a boyfriend and it didn't matter that he was sure Beckett didn't love Josh. He might have resented Dr. Motorcycle's Boy's existence but as long as Dr. Motorcycle Boy did exist, he was a barrier between Castle and Beckett.)

Okay, moving on. He shoved the thought of Dr. Motorcycle Boy out of his mind. He didn't care about that anymore. (That wasn't true but he could move past it.)

The first lie in the hospital wasn't the problem. He didn't like it, hated that she'd lied to him. But honestly, he hated just about everything that had happened as far as Beckett was concerned this summer. Except their phone calls; those were precious, he wouldn't give them up for anything. He just didn't like that even while they'd been talking, she still hadn't told him, had lied by omission every day. Taking from him just enough friendship and support for what she needed while not telling him she knew how he felt. That still stuck in his craw.

He was thinking in circles.

Yes, she'd lied but she'd also apologized. She'd asked for his forgiveness—and Beckett didn't ask for things and she didn't apologize either. From Beckett, just the fact that she'd asked for forgiveness was the equivalent of getting down on her knees and begging. And for Beckett to do that—well, she had to care about him a lot, maybe even… but he wasn't ready to go there yet.

But she'd said—implied—that she wanted a real relationship with him. (He could read between the lines.)

He should be happy. He was happy. Sort of. Tentatively happy? He poked at the idea as if at a sore spot, testing the edges.

She was open to a real relationship with him. He thought—hoped—that one day, she could… care about him the way he wanted her to. (God, he was pathetic. Dancing around the words even in his thoughts as if that would really protect his fragile heart where Beckett was concerned.)

And that was the problem. His heart was fragile where Beckett was concerned. He had no defenses against her.

She'd said she wasn't ready yet. That she didn't think she could have the kind of relationship she wanted until she put "all this" behind her.

But what did that even mean?

She said she wanted to be better. Better how? Better physically, mentally, emotionally?

He knew Beckett—or thought he did—well enough to know that she tended to be a perfectionist. She was methodical and detail-oriented in her paperwork for One PP; she followed the rules of procedure in solving cases and was always, always, driven to be the best, do the best that she could. She set high standards for her team and for herself and expected the best and, in turn, gave the best that she had. It was admirable and he couldn't even describe how much he respected her for it but he also knew that her projected confidence hid a deep vein of insecurity, of doubts. He remembered the way she'd hesitated before going in to interview Dick Coonan last year, the way she'd blamed herself after the trap they'd set for Rathborne hadn't panned out, the way she'd accused herself of letting her mom down.

She was also the most independent, self-sufficient person he'd ever met. (Frustratingly so.) She didn't let people help her. Acted as if even needing anyone's help was a personal failure on her part and therefore unacceptable.

But that didn't really bode well for a real relationship. If she still couldn't let him in, couldn't let him help her, it wasn't going to work. If she tried to keep him at arm's length. To have her but not really, to just be… a warm body in her bed (he ignored the automatic tug of lust at the very thought of being in her bed)—it would kill him slowly.

It was, he thought, in a way, what she was doing now, this summer. Yes, she was healing and needed time and he understood that, he did. But if the last night—hell, their calls this past week and more—had proven anything, it was that he could help her. She'd said that he had helped her, asked him to keep talking to her to help her relax again after her panic attack. She even seemed to want him to help her, to cheer her up, want him to talk to and keep her company. But even so, it was only through the limited medium of telephone calls. They weren't even doing Skype calls where he could actually see her, for god's sake.

Yes, he loved their phone calls; it was a million times better than the silence of the weeks before. But he wanted to do more. He wanted to be the one to cook for her, to keep her company as she walked a little further every day, to drive her to physical therapy if she needed him to and then run a bath for her afterwards. He wanted to be the one to wake her up and soothe her when she had nightmares, wanted to hold her when she had panic attacks.

He wanted to love her. And she knew that—and she wasn't letting him. Even though she appeared to want to have a real relationship with him at some future time when she'd put some vague "all this" behind her.

How long did she want him to wait? Why did she want him to wait—them to wait? Why did she want them to wait for something they both knew they wanted?

For some unspecified "right" time when she was however she defined "better"?

He understood—or thought he did. It was like Beckett to think like that, that she needed to get back to her normal self alone before she should start a new relationship. Orderly, methodical, and never wanting to rely on anyone.

He just wasn't sure he agreed. Because life didn't happen in the right order, wasn't something that could really be planned to happen in sequence. He'd tried that once, marrying Meredith because she'd been pregnant and the "right order" for these things was for marriage to come before a baby and he'd wanted to do things right. And look how that turned out.

Alexis hadn't been planned. He'd been terrified because he hadn't felt remotely ready to become a father at the age of 24—23 when he'd learned that he was going to become a father—he'd barely felt like more than a kid himself but again, life hadn't happened according to any plan he'd had and Alexis had been the best thing that had ever happened to him.

And he could help Beckett now, wanted to help her now. (She had her dad to help her but Castle was relatively sure, knowing Beckett the way he did, that she wouldn't have been relying on Jim to help her with her flashbacks and panic attacks. At most, she would be relying on Jim to help her with her physical recovery, helping her out by doing the things like cooking and cleaning which were still hard for her to do.)

It wasn't that he was impatient. Or fine, it wasn't only that he was impatient. For Beckett, he would wait (hadn't he already waited for her?) if it was what she really wanted or needed. He just wasn't sure it was.

She didn't have to do any of this healing alone. And he wanted—even needed—to be there for her.

Now he just needed to persuade Beckett, the most frustratingly self-reliant person he'd ever met, to let him help her. (This was not going to be easy. Then again, where Beckett was concerned, nothing was ever easy, was it?)

Kate felt her heart leap, a little flutter of happiness mingled in with some nervousness coming to life inside her chest, when she saw Castle's picture on her caller ID that night. Even as she felt a little shamed that when Castle asked for some time to think, he took less than a full day and agreed to talk, whereas she asked for time and left Castle alone without a word for almost six weeks. He was more of a people person than she was but it was still a salutary reminder of how badly she'd treated him.

"Hey, Castle."

"Hi." He paused and then added, half-apologetically, "I know I said we'd talk tomorrow but I hoped you wouldn't mind too much if I called tonight instead of waiting until tomorrow."

"I don't have some sort of quota as to how much time I'm willing to spend talking to you in one day, Castle," she tried to tease.

He gave a huff that might have been a laugh if it had been allowed to grow up. "Right. Good to know."

There was a brief silence that Castle broke. "I thought we should talk more about… everything."

Of course she shouldn't have expected that they would be done with the serious talking about her lie and her reasons. And if they were going to have a real relationship and make it work, they would need to get used to this, actually talking about things, she reminded herself. But it didn't make the flutter of nervousness, the niggle of apprehension, go away.

God, she really was so bad at this.

"I guess you're right," she agreed, trying to sound braver than she felt.

"Right." He hesitated, another silence humming over the line between them for a moment, before he went on, "You said that you're not ready, that you don't think you can have the kind of relationship you want until you're better."

"Yes." She was finding it hard to breathe suddenly. Was he—was he about to tell her he didn't want to wait? (Why should he wait? Castle could be with any woman he wanted.)

"I can wait. I will wait if that's what you really want. I just…" he huffed and then went on, "Look, Beckett, I'm not quite sure how to say this but how long do you think it'll take to be ready?"

She sucked in a breath. "How… long?" she repeated rather dumbly.

"Yes, how long do you want me to wait? A month, a year, more than that?"

She choked a little. "Are you… giving me a time limit? So that if it takes me too long to… to be ready… you won't wait?"

Oh god, oh god. It was happening again. Just like it had before, last summer with Gina. He didn't need to wait for her. Castle wasn't a man who liked to be alone, after all…

She might be sick.

"What? No! Did I say that? That wasn't what I meant. Do you—do you really think I'd do that, give you some invented deadline and then, what, just walk away from you if you don't meet it? Do you really think that of me?"

"You did before," she blurted out before she'd thought. Shit. She hadn't meant to say that, hadn't meant to bring up last summer at all. She tried to tell herself she was over it, didn't blame him for it, but apparently she'd been wrong. Even after the last year and how much their relationship had changed, strengthened, the hurt still lingered. It played into all her latent doubts, her insecurities, the lingering fear that she wasn't good enough, wasn't worth waiting for. She didn't think that Castle wanted her only to be some notch on his bedpost, not now, not anymore, but she did wonder if she could really be good enough to hold him for long. He was Richard Castle, famous, rich, handsome—what was it that silly woman at the MADT fundraiser two years ago had called him—oh, right, the white whale. He could be with any woman he wanted. And she was… just a cop, a broken, damaged one, who couldn't seem to keep herself from hurting him.

"I did what?" He sounded thunderstruck and just a little angry. "What are you talking about?"

She shut her eyes. God, she really, really shouldn't have brought this up. She didn't want to talk about this, relive that humiliating day in the precinct. The pity in Lanie and the boys' eyes as they watched her watch Castle walk away with Gina. "Last summer," she began, trying (and failing) to sound unaffected, as if she were telling a story of something that had happened to someone else, "I wanted… to go with you to the Hamptons, was going to ask you if you still wanted me to come..."

"Beckett... no… you never…" He began, not so much a denial as it was incredulousness.

She winced a little (even now, at the memory of that moment.) "That's what I was going to tell you out in the bullpen, when I pulled you out of that little farewell party."

"But then Gina showed up," he finished for her, sounding devastated. "Beckett—Kate—I don't—I had no idea—I'm such an idiot. God, Kate, I'm so sorry. I…"

Oddly, his self-recrimination did more than almost anything else could have to heal the lingering hurt from that day. Maybe because he so clearly blamed himself for it when it wasn't his fault.

"Don't, Castle, it wasn't your fault," she interrupted him. "It was mine. I can see that now. I didn't tell you—I didn't give you any reason to think I'd go with you. I'd already turned you down and… and I'd started dating Tom," she added, her voice lowering.

"But you broke up with Demming."

She grimaced, feeling the little pang of residual guilt she still felt at the thought of Tom. She'd hurt him, she knew. They might not have been dating for long but she knew he'd liked her a lot, was starting to really fall for her, and she… She had never liked Tom as much as he liked her; she'd known that but she'd told herself that was a good thing, kept her safe, to like Tom just enough but not more. Now, she understood just how unfair that had been to Tom, how wrong. That sort of imbalance in feelings that gave her all the power, all the control, and put him at such a disadvantage because she risked nothing while he was so much more vulnerable.

(That, too, was what was so terrifying about Castle, what had always been so terrifying about Castle. Because she hated not being in control, hated being vulnerable, and with Castle, she knew she was, would be. If she ever gave in to her feelings for Castle, she'd somehow known that she would go up like straw when a match was held to it and now, look at her. Irrevocably in love with him.)

"You broke up with him because you wanted to go with me," he reiterated. (Ridiculously, she felt a little flicker of warmth at the flat certainty in his tone, the way he never questioned for a second that she had broken up with Tom before that moment when she'd been about to ask to go to the Hamptons with Castle. She hadn't told Castle exactly when she'd broken up with Tom but he didn't doubt it. It was, if she'd really needed it, yet more proof of how much he trusted her—and another reminder of how poorly she'd repaid that trust by lying to him about what she remembered about her shooting, what he'd said.)

"God, Kate, I'm sorry," he said again. "We could have—I wish I'd… I shouldn't have turned to Gina like that."

"No, Castle, you don't have to apologize. You didn't know; you couldn't know. I didn't say anything. I didn't give you a reason to wait." She hadn't given him a reason to wait. And that was on her. That was what she needed to do differently now. If she wanted him to wait—and she did—she had to give him a reason.

"No, you didn't," he agreed and although there wasn't even a particle of reproach in his tone, she flinched a little anyway. "But I still shouldn't have turned to Gina. I was… using her… to try to forget my feelings for you and that wasn't fair to her."

"Castle," she gasped, forgetting (almost) her fluttering heart in reaction to his bald confession of having real feelings for her even back then in her dismay at his words. "You weren't using her, not like that. You were with her for another six months; you tried to make the relationship work."

He sighed. "I was fooling myself, though. I think some part of me always knew that but I didn't want to admit it."

Fooling himself about trying to forget his feelings for her… God, he'd had feelings for her so long ago. She might not ever be able to really like Gina but she thought that, finally, the last lingering bits of hurt, of jealousy, over Castle choosing Gina over her had been exorcised. Because he hadn't. She could move on. They could move on.

"It's okay, Castle. It was… a long time ago. We're… past that now, aren't we?"

"Are we?" he returned. "You said… I didn't wait long enough, gave up too soon, and you're right, I did. I'm not going to do that again. I might be an idiot a lot of the time but I'm not that stupid."

He would wait. He was going to wait for her.

She managed a wobbly smile that faded as he went on, "Earlier, when I asked how long it would take, what I was trying to ask—very ineptly, I admit—is what you mean by being ready. What do you think you need to do before you're ready?"

She blinked and frowned. "I just… I want to be… better. Better than what I am now."

"Better how? If this is about your physical recovery, I wouldn't—you know I'd never push you into something you're not ready for, right?"

She felt herself flushing at even this somewhat oblique reference to… a physical relationship, a hot wash of heat flooding her body at the accompanying mental images. Oh. Oh god. She hadn't really thought… Now, she was picturing it, him, his lips and his hands on her body… Uncovering her scars. The thought of her scars acted like a bucket of cold water abruptly dousing the flames of rediscovered desire.

No, she really wasn't ready for a relationship with him, was she? As much as she wanted him (and she did—god, she really did), she wasn't ready yet. Didn't want him to see her like this yet.

"I know," she managed to say. "I trust you, Castle." That, at least, was easier to say.

He let out a huff of breath. "Thank you, Kate."

"It's not about… that. I mean, I'm not sure I'm ready for… that… yet," she stumbled over her own words, feeling ridiculously shy like some Victorian prude who couldn't talk about sex except in vague euphemisms. "It's… me. I just…" God, he wanted her to put this into words, tell him how broken she was? To him, the person whose good opinion she cared about the most? The one who thought she was extraordinary? "I want to be better than what I am," she said again, aware she was repeating herself. "I want to… not have nightmares anymore," she added lamely. That wasn't all but it was as much as she could say. Nightmares were… more normal. Everyone had nightmares sometimes, right? It was… everything else, the flashbacks, the panic attacks, the way she startled so badly at every unexpected sound, the way she still shied away and was reluctant to so much as accompany her dad on his trips to the local grocery store because it felt too open, too loud—and that was a small town, basically a village, especially when compared to the City.

He sighed. "I have nightmares too. You know that. You don't think it makes any difference to me, do you? And I just… I think maybe we could help each other?"

Help each other. Oh, she wanted to. It was a surprisingly seductive idea (odd as the word seemed in this context but it fit), one that tempted her.

But he didn't really know how damaged she was. And of course, he would say such a thing. He was, as she told herself, a kind man and she knew how much he would do for the people he cared about. It would be so easy, so terribly easy, to give in and let him drop everything to help her, to spend the rest of the summer holding her up, soothe her. But she couldn't do that-she wouldn't take advantage of him. She wanted to be good for him, needed to know she wouldn't somehow hurt him because of her issues, her damaged self. He had a daughter to think of, a family, and he had already done so much for her. If their relationship was going to work, if they were going to make it, she needed the balance between them to be more equal, needed to be able to do for him what he had already done for her.

"I'm not good at that," she admitted. "I told you before, I don't let on what's on my mind."

"You didn't used to but that was before, when we never talked about anything. It's different now. You—you've come so far already. We've come so far. I'm not saying it's going to be easy—I'm not sure you and I will ever be easy—but I think… we can make it work. I at least want to try."

Oh, Castle…

Did he think she didn't want this, want him, now, that she wanted to stay apart? But she was doing this for him, for them, because if she started something now when she wasn't ready, when she still couldn't stand on her own two feet (figuratively speaking), she was terrified that she would wreck this, would break them for good. Even now, look at what it took for her to tell him what little she had. Lying to him about knowing he loved her for weeks because she couldn't admit aloud she'd heard him.

"I'm… I'm not ready yet. I need to be… better first, stronger."

He sighed and there was a long pause in which she wondered wildly what he was thinking.

"Look, Beckett, can I say something?" he finally ventured.

She managed a wobbly smile. "Since when do you ask permission before talking?"

"Touché." She heard a faint smile in his voice but then he sobered. "I don't know for sure… I think it's obvious that I can't read your mind but I think I know you by now and I just wonder…"

This hedging was making her nervous. Castle, the impulsive, the one who spoke without thinking so often… "Spit it out, Castle."

"I wonder if… if you think you need to be perfect or something before you can be in a real relationship and that's… I can understand that but the thing is, Beckett, it's not true. There's no such thing as perfect. It's a myth."

"Says the man who believes in aliens and ghosts," she automatically riposted, trying to tease.

He paused and for once, didn't respond to her attempt at humor. "I'm just saying, if you think you need to be… completely healed, totally back to normal as if… all this never happened, you're wrong."

"So I'm just supposed to give up, stop trying to become better?" Accept that she was never going to be healed enough, good enough? Did he really not want to wait?

He gave an exasperated huff. "No, that's not what I'm saying. Does that sound like something I'd say? All I mean is that you don't need to be perfect to be in a real relationship. Because nobody is. Being a work in progress is just part of being human. Someone once told me that we're more than our mistakes."

She choked a little at the words, the reference.

"By the same token, we're more than our faults too. You don't have to be totally healed to be in a relationship." He paused and then added, his tone becoming somewhat warmer, "In case you haven't noticed, I happen to like you as you are now."

She gave a watery smile. "You're not so bad yourself."

He huffed something approaching a laugh. "Thanks. I just want to say… you shouldn't need to change or whatever it is you think you need to do before you're… ready. You might still have some healing to do but that doesn't change the fact that you're extraordinary, remember?"

"We haven't seen each other in months, Castle. You don't know… how messed up I still am…"

(Of course, whose fault was it that they hadn't seen each other?)

He sighed. "Okay, maybe you're right. I don't know everything you're still going through."

He left unsaid but she heard anyway that he didn't know because she wasn't telling him. She still couldn't let him in. And how could she ask him to be in a relationship like that, when she was still tiptoeing around the subject of her feelings, still couldn't tell him everything, tell him how she felt?

He paused and then went on, "I don't want to fight with you about this."

"I don't want to fight with you either."

"Well, I guess we can agree on that. Will you at least think about what I've said?"

She managed a faint smile. "Yes, I'll think about it." She hesitated and then blurted out, "Castle, we're… okay again, right?"

There was a brief pause and then, "Yeah, Beckett, we're okay. I think… we'll be fine. We'll get there."

There, where they could (finally) be together. That future time when she could love him the way she wanted to and be loved by him.

She had to give him more, give him a reason to wait, to know… what they were waiting for.

"Castle?"

"Yeah?"

"I miss…" She stopped, swallowed. She could do this. It was the simple truth. "You." (It was so stupid the way even saying those words had her heart rabbiting inside her chest.)

He let out a long breath that was almost a sigh. "I miss you too, Kate." But what she heard was, I love you, Kate. She shut her eyes and breathed and thought that, maybe, the next time he actually said those words to her, she could be—would be—ready. Ready to hear them and ready to say them back.

"Talk to you tomorrow?"

"Til tomorrow, Beckett. And this time, I really mean it."

She managed a smile at his attempt at humor. "There aren't that many more hours in the day so I think you'll manage."

"You shouldn't tempt fate like that or I might have to call you at one minute before midnight."

She huffed a soft laugh. Silly man. "How do you know my phone will even be on?"

"You never turn your phone off. Never know when a body will drop after all." He stopped, apparently remembering that she didn't have to worry about body drops right now. "Oh, well, I suppose you can turn your phone off now."

"I have been for most of the summer," she admitted, "but yeah, it does feel weird."

"Well, enjoy it while you can," he offered.

"I can think of better ways to take an extended vacation but sure," she agreed rather dryly.

He gave a soft laugh. "That's the spirit. Look on the bright side."

"Isn't that your job?"

"I'm willing to delegate," he returned airily and she found herself smiling for real. Oh, this man, who could always make her smile, who made her look forward to tomorrow.

"Good night, Castle."

"Sleep well, Beckett, and as the song says, dream a little dream of me," he said lightly.

"Maybe, but I don't dream and tell," she quipped, even as she flushed at the memory of some of her dreams starring Castle over the last couple years.

He coughed and then responded, in mock affront, "Well, if you're going to be mean…"

She laughed. "Good night, Castle," she said again.

"Night."

And, finally, she heard the tone that indicated he'd ended the phone call.

She ducked her head to hide her silly little smile, not that anyone was around to see it.

Yes, they were okay now, again. And this time, there were no more secrets, no more lies, between them. There was only… hope…

~To be continued…~

A/N 2: Not quite sure how this chapter turned out so all feedback is welcome. Thank you, everyone, for reading.