Disclaimer: The only part of Castle that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

A/N This is the final chapter in a three-part Hanukkah-Christmas arc.

I got home from school at lunchtime and wanted to talk to Docky, but I had to wait the whole afternoon and the weather was all sleety so we couldn't go outside. And I was mad at Otis because he kept knocking down everything I was building. So I told Dad.

"Dad! Otis bad."

"Well, remember, he's only eight and a half months old. He doesn't always know what he shouldn't be doing."

"I tell no."

"What did you tell him?"

"No push."

"Otis pushed you? He can't even walk yet."

"No push me. Blocks."

"Oh, he knocked over what you were making with your blocks?"

"Yeah. Mine."

"Okay, well, you know you have to share things with him. The thing is, he's little so he thinks it's funny to knock things over."

"No. No funny. Otis bad."

Dad gave me a hug. "We'll try to figure something out, okay? Maybe we can make a special place for your blocks that Otis can't get too."

"Abby push."

"Abby pushes things over, too?"

"They hellions."

Dad laughed even though he looked like he knew he wasn't supposed to. "Don't call them that, buddy. It's not nice."

"Scrap and me no hellions."

"You're right. You and Scrapple have been very good. I think you've just been cooped up too long today. Why don't we leave the twins here with Sarah and you and Scrapple and I will walk around the block? And we can go on the roof and yell as loud as we want for a minute. Let off some steam."

"Team?"

"Steam. Let off steam means, um, getting rid of some extra energy. Like today you haven't been able to play hard and run around the way you usually do, and doing something like yelling outside at the sleet will help."

We went around the block even though Scrapple really hates rain especially sleet, which is rain with ice in it. We took him home and Dad dried him off in a big towel and then Dad and I went to the roof. It's called a deck, which makes three things I know called a deck. A deck is kind of like a porch and it a is like a floor on a ship or a bunch of cards that you play with, like Mom and Dad's poker game. But yelling on the deck was fun! Nobody told us to shhhhh. I think the hellions should go up there when their teeth hurt and they can yell all they want.

Finally it was five o'clock and I could talk to Docky on Dad's computer.

"Hi, Docky! How are you?"

"Much better now that I can see you."

"Thank you. Can I tell you Chapter Two now?"

"Yes. I've been looking forward to it all day. I'm typing Chapter Two right at the top here, so you can start the next part of your book. I want to tell you that your last bit of Chapter One, about how your heart can hurt, was especially good. That's a very grown-up thing to realize."

"Mom explained it to me, how you can hurt. Like when a boy at school kicked me on the playground it hurt but when somebody said something mean that really hurt, too, just not the same. It hurt my feelings which Mom said are in your heart and sometimes that's worse."

"You're right, that can be much worse. On to happier things. I'm ready to start Chapter Two if you are."

"Okay. Here I go. 'Detective Beckett's heart hurt, too. It hurt for a long time because her Mom died and she missed her but there was another reason. It turned out that she was in love with Richard Castle too but for some reason she thought she couldn't tell him. They didn't talk about it to each other the right way for a long time so they were both mixed up. Martha Rodgers told her son over and over, "What we got here is a failure to communicate," which is what a guy says in one of her favorite movies which is Cool Hand Luke. Communicating is like talking.' Hey, Docky?"

"Yes?"

"Did you know Gram says that a lot? 'What we have here is a failure to communicate.' It makes me laugh because she every time she says it with a different voice."

"I can just hear her doing that. I'd forgotten about Cool Hand Luke. When you're older maybe you can watch it with your grandmother."

"I wanted to but she said, 'Kiddo, you are far too young for this movie. Ask me again in ten years.' So I have to wait a long, long time."

"That's true, but you have a lot of other things to watch until then. Shall we go back to your story?"

"Yup. I'm starting again. 'It's kind of a mystery how it happened, but finally one night when it was raining Detective Beckett knocked at the door on Broome Street where Richard Castle and his mother and daughter lived. She was cold and she came inside and told him that she loved him. You're probably thinking that this is the end, with they lived happily ever after because it happened on Broome Street, but it's not. There is a lot more of the story. They loved each other, but it took a long time for Richard Castle to ask Katherine Beckett to marry him, and when he did it was by some swings that they liked to go to, even though they were grown-ups. She was sitting on a swing and when he asked her she was so surprised that she jumped right off it into the air. It's lucky that she didn't crash into him because he was kneeling in the grass and holding out a ring to her and if she had then the ring could have rolled away and they would have lost it.' Do you like that part, Docky?"

"I do, I can really imagine it from what you wrote."

"Me, too. I made Dad tell me that a million times. He said he popped the question and Mom popped off the swing!Here's my story again. 'They were engaged for a long time which drove everybody cuckoo but finally they got married next to the ocean at their house in the Hamptons. Most of the time they lived in the loft on Broome Street and when they found out they were going to have a baby, Martha Rodgers moved and got her own apartment not very far away because she said the baby needed the room. Alexis wasn't at home most of the time because she was in college so there really was plenty of room. At the police precinct everybody liked to bet money on things and there were a lot of different ones about what the baby would weigh and when it would get born and if it was a boy or a girl." Docky, I need to have another footnote."

"Let's see, that's the third one, so I'll type a three here. Okay, ready when you are."

" 'The person who won the bets was Doctor Perlmutter. He was so smart. And he was the person who typed this book because Eliot didn't know how to write yet and Eliot asked him because he was his best friend.' That's the end of it, Docky."

"I'm very honored to be a footnote in your first book. Thank you. "

"Do you think I'll write more books?"

"I'd be very surprised if you didn't. But let's back to your story."

"Okay. 'The baby was a boy, and his birthday was August 31st. Richard Castle and Katherine Beckett called him Eliot and for his last name they put both of theirs together so his whole name was Eliot Beckett-Castle. And then he went home and lived with his Mom and Dad on Broome Street even though he really already lived there before. That was when he was still in Katherine Beckett's stomach so he didn't know what home looked like until he came back from the hospital. While Eliot was still a baby they got a dog, a dachshund named Scrapple who was Eliot's bed friend besides Doctor Perlmutter. When Eliot was turning a year old they all found out that there was going to be another baby. And pretty soon after that they found out that was wrong, there were going to be two babies, twins. Katherine Beckett was very worried about having two more babies at the same time and even though the twins, who were Otis and Abby, were born in an emergency in the stuck elevator at the precinct, everything turned out fine. It was on Saint Patrick's Day while Eliot and his Dad were at the parade. But luckily Doctor Perlmutter was in the elevator and helped the babies get born. And they got to go home soon, too. And they lived with their Mom and Dad and Eliot and Scrapple on Broome Street. Everybody was glad, even if sometimes the twins made Eliot mad by hogging his toys. And they still all live happily ever after.' Docky?"

"Is that the end, Eliot? You did a great job. You should be very proud."

"No, there's one more special chapter. It won't take too long. Can you help me do that now?"

"Of course, if it isn't time for your supper. Why don't you ask if you have to eat now."

"Okay. I'll be right back."

I didn't know Mom was home but when I came out of the office I saw her and Dad sitting on the sofa. She said, "So, Eliot was upset because Otis knocked over his blocks?"

"Yeah, he was. The thing is, I sometimes forget, you know? He taught himself to read when he was fifteen months old and does math in his head and can probably beat anyone in this city at checkers, so I have some unreasonable expectations. He'll probably be speaking six languages by the time he's in first grade. It's just—he's so advanced in so many ways that I forget that emotionally he's the same as other kids his age. He's not even three."

It was like Dad was looking inside my head. It's call mind reading, which Gram told me about, when you know what somebody is thinking even though they haven't said it out loud. It felt like Dad was reading my mind because that was some of what I was going to write in the last chapter.

I said "Hi, Mom! Hi, Dad!" kind of loud so they would know I was there.

Mom got up and kissed e and said, "Hi, sweet pea. Dad told me that the twins were knocking over your blocks. I'm sorry they don't know better yet. Did you have a good day other than that? Dad said you got to go on the roof and yell."

"Yeah! Fun!" Then I pointed to Dad's office. "I talk Docky."

"Are you still doing your project with him?"

"Yeah."

"Did you want to spend more time on that now?"

"Lil bit, Dad."

Dad came into the office and asked Docky if he had time right then to work with me.

"Eliot says he'll be through soon, almost done. Is it all right with you and Kate?"

"Sure. Dinner can wait. Thanks again, Perlmutter, for whatever it is you're doing for him."

"It's my pleasure, Castle. You have no idea. Really."

I waited for Dad to leave so he wouldn't hear about my book. "Docky, could you write something under where you put Chapter Three?"

"Certainly. What would you like to say?"

" 'The first two chapters of this book, It Happened on Broome Street, are for anybody who wants to read. Chapter Three is a special one for Richard Castle and Katherine Beckett.' Now comes the regular part, Docky."

"All right. I'm eager to hear this special chapter."

"Here it is. 'Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad. It's me, Eliot, but you figured that out. I hope you like the book that I wrote you for Christmas. This is the extra part about why I wrote this book. I know I am not like other kids, even though we have fun playing. Some kids who are different like Matthew who wears a hearing aid feels weird. You never make me feel weird. You give me special things like letting me go visit Ernie in the afternoon and learn lots of stuff with him that I don't learn at school. I wasn't going to put in this next part but today I heard Dad say I might know six languages by the time I am in first grade. I would like that. I want to speak French like Mom. And Russian. That's two, plus I already speak English, so six take away two and one makes three so I could learn three more languages. Other people might think that was weird but you won't. You don't think it's weird that I could talk to the twins when they were still EB and Obi in Mom's stomach even though I know I am not supposed to tell other people because they might think I was telling a fib. You told me it was magic that I could do that and I love magic, so that makes me happy. I think maybe I'm a magician. One time when Mom was giving me a bath she told me that it was magic that she and Dad found each other out of all the millions of people in New York City where we live. So that must be why I turned out to be a magician. Thanks, Mom and Dad. Merry Christmas. Love, Eliot.' That's the end, Docky."

"What a wonderful book, Eliot. You want to put some of your pictures on the pages with the story."

"Yeah! A picture book! Can you help me some time before Christmas?"

"I can. In fact, I'll call your parents and ask if Saturday afternoon is all right. It won't take us long. I'll ask your father if it's all right if we can use his computer with your file of photos."

"I'm excited about what it's going to look like."

"Me, too. You go eat your supper now and I'll call your parents after that."

"Okay. Night!"

Dad told me the next day that he and Mom talked to Docky and we could use his computer on Saturday. And we did! We picked out a whole lot of my pictures to go in the book, like of the precinct and Dad working in his office and the wedding and Mom when I was inside her belly and Scrapple with Docky and me in the snow and the twins trying to stand up. I sat on Docky's lap while he made all the pages. It was amaze balls!

"How many copies would you like me to print out, Eliot?"

"Just for Mom and Dad."

"All right. We can always make more since I made a file, okay? May I ask you a favor? Would you mind if I printed out a copy for myself? I won't show it to anyone."

"You can have one, Docky. You helped me."

"Thank you. I loved hearing you tell me your story, but I'd like to be able to read it again. I don't have the memory that you do, so if I have my own copy I can read it any time."

"Okay, two copies. I'll press the button when you tell me it's ready."

"It's ready."

And that was my book! Docky took me to the paper store around the corner and we picked out a blue folder to put around my book so the pages wouldn't get wrinkly. Then we made a label and put it on the front. It said

IT HAPPENED ON BROOME STREET

By Eliot Beckett-Castle

Docky helped me wrap it up. We were going to put it under the Christmas tree but I knew Abby and Otis might tear off the paper and I would be really mad. So instead we put it in my room on top of my dresser and on Christmas I will give it to Mom and Dad. I'll let you know what they say.

A/N A short Christmas-morning chapter will follow.