Thursday, December 12th
The sunlight comes in too quickly and Kate groans, screws her eyes closed and buries her face against her husband's chest. Rough night.
Half of it was spent in the rocking chair in Jack's room watching over him, cleaning him up every time he got sick again. He's been through nearly every pair of pyjamas that he owns, finally passed out with exhaustion around five. So that's two hours ago, and two hours is not nearly enough sleep.
Castle's fingers curl around her bicep and he drops a kiss to her crown, the thunder of his voice stirring underneath her ear. "We made it through the war zone."
"Poor little man." Kate hums, heart breaking all over again. The image of her son's tiny body hunched over the basin and convulsing as he threw up too clear in her mind, too painful. Nothing in his stomach to even bring back, and now he's got to be seriously dehydrated. "I might call Lanie, see if she can check him over."
"Sounds like a good idea. You gonna go to work?"
She doesn't want to. It's stupid, she knows, because he has his father, but she really doesn't want to leave Jack. Her baby boy, and he clung to her so pitifully with her name crumbling in his mouth. "I think I'll see if I can just be on call today. Stay with him for as long as possible."
"Good plan. I'll get Bea up and to preschool, then, if you're good to stay with him." Castle murmurs, slipping out from underneath her and dropping a kiss to her cheek, arranging the sheets around her again. Pointless, since she'll have to go check on their son, but the gesture is sweet all the same.
Kate arches her spine and then relaxes back to the mattress again, scrubs a hand down her face. Okay, she can do this. Her baby needs her, there's no other option.
Stepping out of bed, Kate showers quickly and secures her hair in a ponytail, pulls on jeans and a sweater. There are no socks of hers to hand so she pulls on a pair of Castle's, strangely cavernous around her slender feet. No time for any makeup, every second she's not with Jack the chokehold of fear grows a little tighter.
Surely Castle will have checked on him, made sure he didn't choke in his sleep or anything. Even so, the rush of panic in her veins won't abate until she knows for sure. Kate heads for the stairs, stopping a moment to give her daughter a good morning kiss where she sits at the kitchen island.
Upstairs, her son is sacked out on top of the sheets, his little mouth parted. At least there's that, at least he has some respite from the misery of last night. Kate backs out of his room and tugs her phone from her pocket, dials Gates as she moves back downstairs.
"Good morning, Beckett." The older woman answers. Sometimes their captain's kindness still catches her by surprise. It took them a while to warm up to each other, but they got there. And ever since Kate had her kids, Gates has been even more sympathetic.
Not for the first time, Kate is grateful for the fact that the captain has kids of her own, understands how hard it can be to manage a career with a family. "Morning, Sir."
"Family emergency?" Gates chases her words with a breath of compassionate laughter, not a trace of resentment there, and it helps to ease away the tension in Beckett's body.
She comes into the kitchen and slips onto the stool next to her daughter, sets her free hand at the girl's little knee. "Yes, Sir. Jack was sick all last night. I know he has Castle, but I really don't want to leave him."
"I'll put you on call for today, Detective. Let me know if you need to take leave." Gates offers.
Kate manages a wan smile for her husband, scrapes a hand through her hair. "Thank you Sir."
"Is that Cap?" Bea shrieks, withers a little when Castle hushes her.
"Yes, it's Cap." Beckett laughs, hears her own amusement echoed in her captain. "Sir, Bea says hello."
"Hello to her from me, Detective. I'll let you go take care of your son. Just keep me up to date, okay?"
"Yes Sir." Kate says, hangs up and lets herself collapse against the wall of her husband's body at her side. "She put me on call. But Espo'll take point, they might not even need me at all."
"Fantastic. Okay, Little Bean, let's get dressed. Very quietly." Castle says, wrapping his hands underneath their daughter's arms to lift her off of the stool and usher her over towards the stairs. He takes a moment to kiss Kate, humming gently against her mouth. "You're the best mom they could ask for."
"I love you." She murmurs back to him, feels it rich and overflowing up from somewhere pure and true inside her. Honestly, she has no idea how he did this by himself for Alexis.
She has no idea how she'd do it without him.
Having ensconced herself in the rocking chair in Jack's room, Kate is the first thing her son sees when he opens his eyes. She gives him a tender smile and kneels down next to the bed, cards a hand through hair damp with sweat. Sleep and fever and exhaustion all coming together, the poor kid.
"Hi, my sweet boy. How are you feeling?"
"Hungry." He says, blinking hard and frowning as if he doesn't quite know who she is. "Tired."
Kate pulls the sheets down off of him and lifts his shirt at the back, hopes the rush of cool air will rouse him a little more. "Okay baby. Do you want to come curl up on the couch and we can try some toast? Yeah?"
Jack reaches up to curl thin arms around her neck, whimpering a little when she lifts him. Lighter than she remembers, and that's ridiculous, but it's there all the same. "I called Aunt Lanie and she's going to come help you feel better, okay?"
"I feel bad, Mommy." Jack moans, rubbing his face back and forth against her shirt.
Kate skates her palm up and down his spine, tries to hum as soothingly as she can against the shell of his ear. "I know you do, sweetheart. I know."
When she gets him downstairs, Kate settles him on the couch and drapes a blanket over him, moves to the kitchen to start on some toast for her son. The heavy footsteps of her husband move across the loft, Castle obviously having heard them from the office.
"Hey, my man. How are you feeling?" The rumble of his voice carries easily to her where she stands, feeling a little lost in the middle of the kitchen. She loves him, all the time of course, but maybe most like this. The love he has for their children, the way he extends it outwards to include her.
Kate puts bread in the toaster and fills a glass of water, brings it back to her son with a straw. Castle's on the couch now, their son's head pillowed in his lap as he scrolls through the television channels. "You and Daddy both are here."
"That's right, baby. Mommy and Daddy are both going to take care of you." There's a knock at the door and Kate kisses her son's damp forehead, moves to let Lanie in. "Hi. Thanks for coming."
"Anything for my nephew." Lanie says, moves straight for the couch and kneels down in front of Jack. "Hi buddy. Mommy says you're not feeling good."
"I got sick lots of times." He whines, turns his face into Caste's thigh.
Lanie has her bag with her, but she makes no move for it and Kate fills with gratitude for her friend's thoughtfulness. Jack hates the doctor's surgery, screams all the way through every check-up, and the appearance of medical instruments would only upset him.
"Do you still feel like you're going to get sick again?" Lanie asks, settles a gentle palm at the tiny boy's back.
He glances at his father as if for permission, gets a steady nod from Castle and turns back to his aunt. "I don't know. There's nothing in my tummy to come out."
"Right, but maybe if you put something in your tummy it might come out?" Lanie says, offers their son a nod of encouragement. Kate is surprised to find herself still standing in the middle of the room and moves to sit at her son's feet, curling her fingers around his ankle.
"Yeah."
"Okay, well let's try some dry toast, hmm? Go slowly, and we'll see what happens. Can you drink all of this water up for me buddy?" Lanie says, lifts the glass so he can get his mouth around the straw. Jack takes a careful sip, grimaces and gags a little, but keeps it down. "Nice and slow, good boy."
Lanie passes Castle the glass and sets her hand at Kate's shoulder in askance, moves with her to the kitchen under the guise of helping with the toast. "He'll be fine. Just a bug. He's a little dehydrated, but not anything I think you need to worry about. See how he does with the toast and the water, keep it nice and slow. Don't push him to recover faster than he's ready for."
"Lanie," Kate rails against her friend's raised eyebrow, a hot wash of shame ripping through her. "He's my son. Do you really think I'd push him?"
"Of course not. My point, Kate, is that it's okay to take a little time to recover."
Beckett sighs and rolls her eyes, but only because she knows Lanie is right. She does have a tendency to push herself too hard, too fast, hates feeling like an invalid. Not that there's been much cause for it lately. She's careful, obscenely so, doesn't ever want to rob her children of their mother if she can help it.
And of course, now she has Castle, who really won't let her go and go and go until she collapses. He revels in every opportunity to take care of her, and guilt for the summer she disappeared has her giving in every time.
Lanie opens her arms for a hug and Kate accepts it, takes a moment to recollect herself in her best friend's arms. Lanie, who has been here for all of it, seen how the broken, tragic shadow of a woman she once was has blossomed into someone Kate is actually proud to be.
A reminder of how hard she fought for this, how much she owes Castle. "Thank you, Lanie. For everything."
"You'd do the same for me." Lanie shrugs, plates up the toast and hands it to Kate.
Raising an eyebrow, Beckett casts a slow glance at her friend's abdomen, purses her lips. "Yes, I would. You gonna give me occasion to?"
"You just shut up, Katherine Beckett. We're not all as lucky as you."
Kate laughs, doesn't even bother to dispute that statement. There's no need. Lanie knows how hard a fight it was to get here, how many times she thought it would never happen. "Okay, okay, I'm saying nothing. Just- you know he wants it, right?"
"I know he does. So do I. But wanting it and actually having it are very different things. Neither of us can stay at home. Who'd take care of them?" Lanie says, so ashamed that Kate pulls her back in for another hug.
"Lanie, just go for it. All of that stuff has a way of working itself out. And you know Rick and I and the Ryans would be willing to help out. The amount of times you've sat for us Lanie, please. We owe you big time. Just jump in. It's worth it."
The outburst surprises both of them, Kate casting a furtive glance over to her husband. She didn't know how true it was until just now, how even the hardest parts pale in comparison to how amazing the rest of it is. She nods slowly, comes back to meet Lanie's eyes.
"It's worth it."
