Enlightenment 14

They had fallen asleep under a blanket on the couch, curled around each other in their pajamas with his injured leg draped over hers.

When Alexis came in about an hour later, Kate roused and rubbed Castle's chest to wake him.

"Alexis is here, sweetheart. Wake up."

The endearment came out without any permission from her sleep- and emotion-muddled brain.

The magic word seemed to be 'Alexis,' as his eyes shot open and he shifted to sit up.

She shifted with him, still unwilling to let go despite the side of her psyche that yelled at her for clinging, literally.

Alexis crossed the room and knelt by the couch in front of them. She kissed his cheek.

"Hey, Dad. I hear you're gonna have a cool scar."

He smiled back at her, looking more awake every second.

"I can only hope."

"They couldn't even put in stitches because his jeans apparently scraped off to much skin."

"Ew! Too much information, Kate."

"I was sparing you your dad's much more graphic play-by-play from his time in the ambulance."

"On second thought, thank you, Kate. I'm sorry I wasn't here when you got home for the official wound inspection. Kate called me when it happened, and she said I was okay to stay in class, since it's my only one."

"I forgive you, daughter. And the paramedics did a pretty decent wound inspection. I even have Vulcan stretchy gauze to keep the bandage on. But they didn't use any Scooby Doo bandaids."

"And they didn't have the wand."

"True. You know, I have to change the dressing tonight." He raised an eyebrow with a little grin.

"I'm home all evening. Better late than never."

Kate was just staring with a bemused smile on her face through this little exchange.

"It's kind of a ritual. We started it when I was little."

"Speeds healing, relieves pain, endows the recipient with princess privileges for varying lengths of time, depending on the severity of the injury."

"Princess privileges, huh?"

"Oh, absolutely. It's totally the best part. Getting waited on hand and foot, favorite meals, extra ice cream."

"And there's the crown."

"Yeah, but we haven't actually used it in a while. We could resurrect it for demonstration purposes."

"Excuse me, Rick, you wear a crown?"

"Alexis gets a feather boa, too."

The girl was pointing at her father surreptitiously and mouthing: "He wears it too."

"I would pay money to see you in a crown and a feather boa." She poked him in the ribs.

"I think it could be arranged." Alexis narrowed her eyes with a sly grin.

"Why do I think Martha may have had some role in this?"

"She provided the crown and the boa. At least, the first crown and boa."

"I don't want to know how many there are…"

Alexis took that as her cue to change the subject.

"Speaking of Gran, she said she'd be home for dinner."

"Thank you for calling her." Kate hadn't even had to ask.

"I could hear things getting a little out of hand on your side at the end of our conversation."

"That was probably just our suspect sobbing."

"I'd figured it was Dad."

"Hey, give me some credit. I don't sob like that—in public anyway. Hey, speaking of dinner, what time is it, anyway?"

"It's only four." Alexis raised her eyebrows at the windows, daylight still shining in from outside.

"My time must be off since we fell asleep."

"There's always ice cream if you need a snack before we order dinner," Alexis offered.

Rick's eyes lit up, but he schooled his features after looking at Kate's disapproving look.

"Fine, no ice cream before dinner, even though I did get shot today."

"How about a movie and some popcorn, instead?" God she sounded just like her mother.

"Maybe." He was still pouting.

"You can pick the movie," Kate acquiesced. He grinned ear-to-ear at that.

"And I'll make popcorn."

As Alexis moved to stand up, she stopped halfway and reached around both their shoulders in a tight hug. Kate squeezed back, wondering at this sense of total and complete assimilation into their little family. As quickly as the hug started, Alexis was standing and heading for the kitchen. Apparently around here, giant hugs came with no explanation required.

"So what'll it be?" Kate stood and crossed to the bureau holding their DVD collection.

"Goonies? Spaceballs? Ooo. Bueller…"

"Like the 80's much, and what are you, twelve?"

"You're giving him too much credit, Kate."

"Those are classic, stay-home-sick standbys."

"I would have thought 'Pretty in Pink' what with the crown and the boa…"

"Hey, now, don't knock it 'til you've tried it. Fine, if you don't want any of those, how about Ghostbusters?"

"I guess I can handle ectoplasm."

Alexis put two bowls of popcorn on the coffee table.

"Do you mind if I go put on my PJ's, too?"

Kate was browsing the drawer and looked up at her question.

"Why do I think you were the one behind organizing this drawer?"

"Could it be the two-level organizational scheme? By genre, then alphabetically by title?"

"I'm not even allowed to put DVDs away," Rick groused.

"It took me three seconds to find the movie." She slid the drawer closed and returned to stand by Alexis near the couch.

"Precisely. And if it were up to dad, he'd have them grouped by what kind of ice cream they go best with."

Kate scrunched her nose and shook her head. She pointed toward the bureau.

"This is much better." She gave the redhead a conspiratorial look and bumped her hip against Alexis'. "Go put on your PJ's before your dad eats all the popcorn."

The relative in question was, in fact, stuffing an entire giant handful of kernels into his mouth all at once.

"Woo, ee? Neh-er."

"Dad, I don't want to have to Heimlich you again," Alexis called behind her as she headed upstairs.

"Again?" She didn't know her idle threat at breakfast a few weeks ago had precedent.

"I'll tell you about it when Gran is here. She does the sound effects."

Almost two hours later, Martha opened the door as the credits were rolling.

"I didn't know we were having a pajama party! I'd have hurried home sooner."

She circled around the couch to kiss Rick on the cheek.

"How is my poor, injured little boy?"

She winked at Kate, who was sitting propped against the arm of the couch with Castle leaning back against her.

"Hey, I saw that, Mother. I'm touched at your concern for me after I've been shot."

"Well, I heard it was just a graze." She patted the spot where her lips had been and thumbed off the smudge of lipstick.

Kate couldn't help but smile at his switch from downplaying the whole thing in front of her and the boys to milking it for all it was worth at home.

"Ok, yes, it was a graze. I didn't even get stitches."

"No stitches? Then what are you complaining about? Buck up, kiddo." She smacked his cheek a little now. "How are you even sitting there with him, Kate? Isn't the incessant whine making your ears ring?"

"She and I have been harassing him, don't worry," Alexis piped up from her end of the couch.

"Can you wait about ten minutes before you put on your pajamas, Mother? The Chinese food will be here and then you could open the door—"

"And bring it in here so none of you loafers actually has to move."

"I can get the door." Kate couldn't stand being accused of laziness.

"I'm just kidding, dear. Don't move; you might open up his wound…" Her voice rose to melodramatic proportions as she raised her arms in the air and stepped away.

"And don't worry, I already put it on my credit card over the phone, so you just have to tip him."

"Yes, yes, fine." She had made it to the kitchen and was pulling out a bottle of wine. "I assume you and Kate would like some of this?"

"Since I'm not getting any good drugs, I think I'm allowed."

"Sure." Kate was doing her best to suppress her instinct not to be waited upon. The giant warm lump of laziness in her lap was helping.

When she'd sat down at the start of the movie, putting herself on the far end of the couch, she wasn't sure how she felt about cozying back up next to Rick. Alexis was going to be sitting there with them, and despite all their progress, she hadn't wanted to step on teenage sensibilities of parental cuddling. But the decision had been made for her as Rick forcibly snuggled her into the corner of the couch and settled in front of her. Alexis' only comment on returning in her pink flannel pajamas and Uggs was a threat about blanket-hogging to her father.

So, here she sat, wrapped around Rick on his couch, sharing a blanket with his daughter, accepting a glass of fantastic red wine from his mother. Oh, how far she had come.

When her eyes opened in the darkness of his bedroom, her chest tightened with the last gasps of her nightmare. In her brain's version, the bullet hadn't hit his leg. Her heart was pounding, she had broken out into a cold sweat, and she was having to consciously inhale and exhale to get her breathing under control. But then she felt Rick curled behind her, well maybe over her was a more appropriate description. He'd taking to flinging his injured leg over her hip, encasing her and supposedly taking pressure off his bandage.

As she felt his chest expanding steadily behind her, his breath ruffling the curls at the nape of her neck, she tried to focus on their night rather than their afternoon.

Martha had, in fact, put on her pajamas after delivering their feast to the coffee table. Somehow turquoise leopard print satin didn't seem out of place on the theater maven. She'd snuck in between Rick and Alexis for dinner, then stayed for "The Thin Man."

Kate hadn't been familiar with the series of films, though she'd heard of the book. The Castles had taken great pride in introducing her to Nick and Nora. By the way Rick kept squeezing her hands at the characters' repartee, Kate deduced he saw a few similarities between their partnership and that of the silver screen couple.

Alexis had made good on her promise of wands and crowns and feather boas, though after about five minutes, the boa made it on to Martha's shoulders and the crown on to Alexis' head. Thankfully Kate took her Princess Castle photo undetected before he started shedding girly items. The one thing he hadn't relinquished was the wand, which he would periodically lift into the air and point at whomever he wanted to command.

There was ice cream, with whipped cream and sprinkles and two cherries from Alexis. His slippers appeared courtesy of Martha. She, on the other hand, kept getting tapped on the head without explanation by the sparkly pink ribboned scepter.

When they retired to his bedroom and he headed to the shower, she figured out what all the tapping had been about. He wanted her in there with him. She'd agreed, wary of Rook and Nikki scenes that might be playing through his head. But really he'd been sweet. He wanted her there to help him. She took off the dressing and the green stretchy gauze, looked over the scrape, proclaimed it to be in good shape, considering.

He'd gotten in the shower but tugged her in right behind him. They had touched, stroked and caressed, but despite hot water and steam and naked skin, they had gone no further. When his leg started oozing a bit, she ushered him out to their stash of bandage supplies and started to work re-dressing.

He had a look in his eyes she hadn't seen before as she cleaned his leg, kneeling on the tile as he sat on the edge of his tub. She had promised there would be at least one Scooby Doo bandaid, and she managed to work in two. They hadn't found any green stretchy gauze at CVS, so plain white would have to do. As she had tucked the end under after her final wrap around his thigh, he had reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear, drawing her focus up to his face.

"Do you know how much I love you?" He was smiling slightly, speaking low and gentle.

"I think I have some idea, yeah." Her voice was deep, so deep she almost didn't recognize it.

She rested her hands on his knee. He reached out and pulled them to his lips, kissed her fingers, rose and pulled her into bed. No Herculean wounded sex scene had ensued. He'd just pulled her under the covers and hugged her tight, breathing into her hair, the feel of his chest rising and falling lulling her to sleep.

Now she was in much the same position, just facing away from him. She wished she could see his face.

"You think so loudly you wake me up sometimes."

Wow, she hadn't even felt his breathing change.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you." She shifted and gave in to the urge to turn over, look into his eyes.

"Dream?"

"Yeah."

"We were supposed to be working on sweeter ones."

She smiled at that.

"I haven't had a nightmare in over a month, actually."

"Until now."

"Until now," she confirmed, burrowing her cheek into his chest.

"Yeah, I haven't had any either. It helps to have you here, I think. Even my subconscious knows you're right next to me."

"I'm starting to understand that."

His breathing was lulling her again. Hypnotizing.

"No more nightmares."

"I don't really care about the dreams so much, as long as I'm waking up with you."

She wasn't sure if she'd said that or only thought it before sleep took her under again.

A/N: Oh, ye of little faith! Just because I start an angsty ghost story does not mean I am abandoning lingerie. Incidentally, if you want to read the angsty ghost story, it's called "Grail," and I posted chapter one yesterday. Now if I can just keep from being schizophrenic over the decidedly different plotlines and emotional character development, this will go just fine! Stay with me… I'll do my best.

-KC