Chapter 1
Kate Beckett was amazed when she found all the boxes hidden in her new husband's storage space. Upon first glance, she knew most of it was leftover research from the many books he had written, but there were other things that stood out more. There were old book galleys and doors that looked like they were being used to learn lock picking. There were manuscripts and a whole box of rejection letters that had all been folded neatly, so they appeared as if they had been mailed just yesterday. It was as if Castle kept everything, but the things of the most importance were hidden away the best.
"It's interesting to go through these things" thought Kate as the two of them went through the boxes, neither of them really talking about what was inside, but as she watched Castle go through it with her all in the guise of making room for her things, she saw sometimes the way his eyes seemed to linger on certain things. It was an opportunity to know the secrets he might have boxed away.
"He has so many stories all boxed away right here" thought Kate as they went through it all, not truly understanding how true that was until they came across the boxes marked by year filled with things far more personal than anything else, they had found so far.
They were shoe boxes, all plain with no indication as to what was inside except for the year scrawled across the lid. There was more then a dozen, each collecting dust, but Castle seemed to pass over them altogether when they were found. They didn't need to be gone through in his mind, because they weren't going anywhere unlike all the rest, but Kate always found herself returning to them. She was curious to know what they were, so when she could she took to going through them alone, and found she almost felt giddy at the thought of what could be hidden within them.
"There's something here, he doesn't want to go through again" thought Kate when she first brought the boxes up to the apartment in the back of her mind remembering how they had given him pause when they'd first been uncovered.
"It feels as if I'm looking at evidence" whispered Kate as she opened the first box finding that the inside just like the lid was marked with a year. They started out in the 80s. The first few boxes were filled with pictures of a time Castle didn't speak of. He was a kid in these photos. He stayed that way in the first few boxes, a skinny small kid wearing high tops and jeans, and if it hadn't been for the eyes, Kate knew she wouldn't have recognized him. There was an innocence to him that she knew he didn't have anymore. Maybe that was why she lingered on them until those boxes ended to reveal a different time in his life. It wasn't until she got to 1992 that she saw a great change in the pictures.
Suddenly, she wasn't just looking at pictures anymore, but postcards and letters. Kate also found that Castle wasn't alone in the pictures anymore. Where before he had mostly been alone, with the occasional picture of Martha and himself as the exception, now Kate saw in these pictures people that she didn't know. It only served to intrigue her more as she went through the boxes.
"Who are you?" whispered Kate when she noticed that most of the pictures in the box marked 1992 had the same pretty girl in them. Kate had just started looking at it when Castle caught her.
"I forgot those were in there" said Castle after startling her as he came home approaching her only to take the photo she held right out of her hand. Kate instantly felt as if she were reminding him of a memory he would rather forget. As he looked at the picture, Castle sat right next to her, but he didn't seem to remember that she was there. His eyes were fixed on that photo and the light in them had dimmed. Melted almost and Kate found she was almost shaken by the sadness she saw there, so much so that she couldn't find the words to say to him that would break the silence.
"I found it in this box marked 1992. It was with those others. I noticed she's in a lot of these pictures" said Kate, looking at the girl, curious to know who she had been to her husband.
The woman didn't look like any of the women she'd seen Castle with before. She was beautiful, almost classically so, with a kind honest face that Kate recognized even in a photo. There was something trustworthy about her, Kate somehow knew that without having known her, and as Castle looked at her, he seemed suddenly very vulnerable.
"She should have been Alexis's mother…I should have married her, but I was still a stupid kid when I knew her. I didn't think about those things back then, all I knew was that I had met this gorgeous twenty something girl with perfect brown hair that sparkled every time we walked in central park and eyes that were so green, they always reminded me of emeralds, and I was in love with her. I just never had the courage to tell her that" whispered Castle his voice heavy with emotion as he spoke and his hands shaking the more, he did. Her hair fell over one shoulder and was perfectly feathered.
"She was someone I loved. Someone I hurt…just before I met Meredith before Alexis was born. She was someone very special to me" whispered Castle glancing at her even as he held onto the picture.
"Who was she, Castle? You can tell me" said Kate in that moment finding she couldn't help being choked up herself as she leaned close to him until her arms were wrapped around his neck and shoulders.
"I know there have been other women before me, just like there have been other men before you; you can tell me about her. Whatever happened between you, I've here for you, Castle, you can tell me" said Kate when she kissed his cheek, he looked her directly in the eye. He kept eye contact with her for awhile as he seemed to take in what she was saying. Kate couldn't tell if she was getting through to him at all until suddenly, he was looking at the picture again focusing on it completely as if it would somehow help him make up his mind.
"I don't think I have the strength to tell you the whole story—" whispered Castle his voice seeming to crack in that moment. Kate didn't know what more to say as he first started to utter those words, but as she saw the look in his eyes it came to her suddenly that she recognized it. She had had that look once. Whenever she looked at her mother's case file or worse whenever she looked at her photo there was a longing for the truth in her eyes that Castle had now except in his eyes, she saw a subtle difference. He wasn't searching for the truth as she had been but asking for forgiveness. For redemption from someone that she guessed wasn't there to give it and never would be.
"I love your long stories" whispered Kate drawing him close into a kiss.
"And your sure you want to know about my love life? I was a kid, but that's no excuse for the things I did" whispered Castle for a moment he had gotten his humor back, but it left him just as quickly. She saw in him that he didn't want to be judged, even as he did somehow at the same time. Kate sensed that this was the love story that had happened before they had met. That would have halted their life now if things hadn't played out as they did. It left her oddly curious as she waited for him to make up his mind to tell her this elusive story that seemed to begin with that picture.
"I want to know, Castle, your my husband. This is an important part of your story" said Kate simply as she spoke, she leaned back until she sat splayed out on the couch with him at her feet. Even as she was saying that she watched as he continued to make up his mind and just like that he was leaning back too. That picture never left his hand and as he started his tale his eyes stayed there too constantly scanning the image shown there. Before speaking though, he turned his head one single time to look at her, but Kate knew he wasn't really seeing her by the look in his eyes. He was seeing the woman in the photo and for some reason that didn't bother her as they sat in the weird yet comfortable silence. They stayed that way for an unprecedented amount of time. The night ticking away as he looked into space seeing the tale, he was about to tell her playing out before him. Castle found it had to in order to tell it to her and not until he had seen it through to the end did, he turn away. He was focusing on the picture again and everything was still silent, but somehow this silence was far different then the one from before.
He was silent for a long time.
"Why doesn't it feel longer?" thought Castle in that last second his mind suddenly focused on that summer back in 1991 when he had been lucky enough to bump into Elizabeth Alston.
"I was just getting started in my career as a writer. I hadn't been published, but I hadn't been rejected either. I was on the street when this woman got out of a taxi. She hit me with the door. That was how I met Elizabeth Alston" said Castle being sent back to that time as he recounted that moment.
"Oh my God…what have I done? Are you alright? I'm so sorry, I didn't do that on purpose, I swear. I wasn't watching what I was doing" said Elizabeth her voice high pitched in her frantic state. As she spoke, she had slammed the door to the taxi not seeming to care as it drove away. She had him pressed against a street sign and was inspecting his arm her eyes squinting as she seemed to be searching for any sign of serious injury like blood or a broken bone poking out somewhere, but there was nothing. Castle had actually found it quite funny even as he was looking into the pretty shape of her face.
"I'm fine, really, no damage done. I'll probably have a bruise tomorrow, but that's no problem…besides, it was as much my fault as yours. I should have been watching where I was going too" whispered Castle as he spoke, he took her hand finding he liked the way it fit in his almost immediately. Their eyes met in that moment and it was as if they were in a world of their own.
"I was awed by her from the first moment I knew her name. She was like something that walked right out of a dream…there was nothing she didn't think I could do. The only difference was that she had it all together. She always had her life figured out while mine never was" said Castle her voice stuck in his head all of a sudden as he remembered her, the way she had looked that day, but most of all the way she had simply said her name with that breathy grace that had reminded him of the old movies his mother and he had watched and how they had been like two lovers from one of those movies once, walking hand in hand down the streets of New York with only the dreams of two romantics in their heads.
"We were meeting one moment and dating the next" whispered Castle drawing another picture from the box.
The picture before that had been solely of the woman. She had laid on the floor with her hair feathered out around her face. Kate guessed that maybe Castle had taken the photo, but the second one he held was different. In it, Castle and Elizabeth stood together on the streets of New York, and Kate knew as she looked closer just where they were. They were standing in front of central park.
"He holds me like that now" thought Kate as she took in the way he held this woman, with his arm around her, and his body hard against her back.
"We would take a walk through the park every day. Maybe that's why I can't even enter central park now without thinking of her. Without seeing her…sometimes, I swear, I can feel her too. We would walk hand in hand…hers were always so soft…and there was no one else there except her and I" whispered Castle for a split second feeling her hand in his, but when he looked the picture was the only thing there. Elizabeth had been his greatest strength when he was young. Because she believed in him when no one else dared to. There had been times when all she had had to do was look at him and he knew that he had more in him to give. Every time he even considered giving up and finding a normal job, she had told him that he was too good to even consider that, and Castle knew he wouldn't be sitting there if she hadn't done that back then. Castle remembered the day he received his first rejection letter, the same one he kept on his wall now.
He hadn't taken it in stride at first, but it had been Elizabeth who opened something up within him. He had sat on his couch with the letter in his hand. He couldn't smile or say anything until Elizabeth had ripped the letter out of his hand. Somehow, she had avoided ripping it, and when she was straddling his lap, Elizabeth demanded all his attention. She had held his face in her hands and made him look at her. When he looked into her eyes, he found them filled with a unique wisdom that had made him fall for her all over again, but that hadn't happened until she started to speak.
"Richard Castle, you are a brilliant man. That letter doesn't mean anything. It just says that you haven't found a publisher who understands you. Even Scott Fitzgerald got turned down before becoming a sensation. You just need to look at your book and rework it and send it off again. Someone will publish it, I know it, you just can't give up hope" whispered Elizabeth when she had finished, she had kissed him. That kiss had begun simply, with her hands always on his face, and his at the small of her back. When he laid her on the couch, she had let him, and they had made love afterward. She had been a balm to his heart that day. He did exactly what she told him, and he knew it had gotten him here today. That was how he liked to remember her.
"She was my Zelda…though in a much less destructive way. If she hadn't of said what she said that night…I might have given up altogether…and my life would be very different" whispered Castle looking at Kate suddenly as he realized too that if that moment had never happened that they might never have met.
Kate drew him from his revelry with the mere sound of her voice.
"You were madly in love with her, weren't you?" said Kate feeling awkward as she asked the question. She knew his answer, but some part of her needed to hear him say it. He had said he loved her, but the way he talked about her made it seem something more then that. Like they had been the type of star-crossed lovers that she hadn't thought really existed until that moment. Part of her wanted to feel jealous, but she found she couldn't. Instead, she found she was glad that he had had someone back then, and part of her even wished she could thank this woman for that. Besides, Kate had seen him with many other women. She had known he had a past, but what surprised her was that she had known about all of them. This woman was an enigma that he had nestled away to keep all to himself until now. It filled Kate with the urge to know her as he had and that urge just wouldn't go away the longer, they sat there. This woman had come out of nowhere.
"I was. Elizabeth was my first love and my best friend. One moment with her was like a year. She made me feel proud to be who I was" whispered Castle something tender in his voice.
"She turned out to be right. After I did as she told me to, I sent my work to more publishers, and I got rejections, but I also got published too. She was so happy for me when I did. We had celebrated like we really were Scott and Zelda, singing and dancing the night away, and drinking as much Champagne as we could get. We couldn't lose…all our dreams and hopes were suddenly destiny…it turned out to be the last good days of our life together" whispered Castle his memories suddenly bittersweet. He had been laughing at first, but as his words ended all that stopped. Instead, he looked wounded and Kate knew that his story didn't have a happy ending. His story was ending and to Kate it felt like it had only just begun. It saddened her even as she sat there with him knowing all along that if it didn't that she wouldn't be sitting there now. There was something else about their relationship that really resonated with him. That Elizabeth hadn't so much as taken care of him and he didn't take care of her. They really took care of each other, they lived their lives, and at the end of each day they came together again. They had shared something that was unique in both the way they loved and the way they lived. Together, yet somehow apart at the same time. She had been the center of his life then.
Castle recognized that he had been looking for Elizabeth in every woman he had dated since her, even Kate. He hadn't found anyone like her, but looking at Kate, he found he was okay with that. Because his time with Elizabeth wouldn't have been as special if there was someone like her around every corner. And yet when he thought of the relationship he had shared with Elizabeth, Castle felt happy. That happiness was akin to the one he felt now when he was with Kate and looking at her, he knew this was right. He had been simply living since Elizabeth had been gone, but that had changed all too suddenly. Kate had made him stop longing for a woman that was never coming back and begin to live again. He had centered his life around his books and his daughter and even his mother but finding Kate had given him a new outlook on what he thought he wanted. He had been inspired again, in the way Elizabeth used to, and his mind had stopped drifting. It had become active again and it wasn't until that moment as he was holding her picture that Castle realized how he had missed the inspiration she provided until Kate had come along to be that inspiration again. He suspected that had been what he had been looking for too. Someone to nurture the writer in him and give him the courage to never give up on the thoughts rolling around in his head. He had needed someone to be there for him and he had found that again. It made him look at the woman who was now his wife and he felt a sudden warmth in his chest. He looked at Kate in that moment and he kissed her.
"Without Elizabeth, I wouldn't have found you, Kate. I wouldn't have become a writer, not really, I would have given up, and she never let me. She showed me what I wanted my life to be and what I wanted a relationship to be. A true partnership where two people work together. That was what Elizabeth and I had, and it is what we have now. I'll never be ungrateful for that" said Castle his eyes kept lingering between her face and the pictures he held. In that moment, it felt like he wasn't just speaking to her, but to Elizabeth. To her ghost as she existed in that room and Kate found she didn't mind that in that moment. Castle gave her the photos then watching as her eyes ran over them too.
Kate found her eyes did the same thing his did. One moment she was looking at him then at the woman he had loved long before they'd met. Kate found herself all the more grateful to her, so much so that when she looked into his eyes, he saw it. Castle seemed to take her hand then and there was a tranquil moment of silence between the two.
"What happened?" whispered Kate hating the words the second she said them. The tranquility in their silence seemed to fade away and Kate knew the outcome of this tale just as she had since he had begun. At the question, Castle had looked away altogether, his hand in hers suddenly cold, and for a moment Kate thought he would cry. There was a hollow sadness that said more then words could and when he finally had the courage, Castle looked at her, and she knew he was replaying their ending in his mind again.
"My book hadn't been released yet and we had gotten into a fight. I have no idea what it was over, but now…it just feels like it must have been something really stupid. She left, she got into a taxi and…that night I got a call telling me that there had been an accident. When I got to the hospital…she was already gone. They told me she died on impact" whispered Castle still feeling the ache of that moment. He only looked at her again when her hand touched his cheek. In his eyes, she saw pain and guilt and a lack of understanding that she understood too well. She had questioned many times why God let these types of things happen and Castle was questioning that now as he sat there with her. And yet, she knew that ending had made him who he was when she met him. It made him the man he was sitting next to her now and Kate suddenly wished she could thank Elizabeth for helping him to become that man in that moment. Castle couldn't remember the months after that.
He had become this playboy trying to drink the pain away, but as it ebbed away, it was still there too. That was how he met Meredith, and, in the end, he got Alexis out of that, but Elizabeth would always be apart of the history of his life. Kate didn't ask anymore that night.
"He's had enough of the past for one night" thought Kate as they set those photos aside to simply embrace each other. Castle didn't want to talk about it anymore. Kate sensed that and understood it as they sat in each other's arms in their mutual silence. It was all just bitter irony to Castle. Their relationship had begun with a taxi and ended that way too. He was still thinking back on her all these years later and yet he still couldn't embrace the ending they had come to. Because he truly enjoyed thinking of their beginning but could never bring himself to think of the ending much less the fight he couldn't remember. That was still heavy on his mind long after they had stopped talking about it.
They went silently to bed, but in the middle of the night, Castle found himself in the living room looking at her photo again. In his head, he liked to idealize Elizabeth.
"She was the love I should have ended my life with" thought Castle having no regrets about where he was now with Kate but having many when it came to how things had ended with the woman who would always be his first love. She had kept him on track and looking at her now, Castle knew if she hadn't of died that he would have married her, and she might be Alexis's mother. When it came to Elizabeth there were so many what ifs. So many things that might have been if she hadn't gotten into that taxi or if she hadn't of died at all. And yet, he was no worse for having lost her. He had found another woman who he was hopelessly in love with. He had a daughter who he loved and who made him so proud. He knew Elizabeth was with him still and that she was happy for him even as he held onto his memories of her. In that moment, for Castle that was enough as he stood in the darkness holding onto her picture with his head and his heart.
Elizabeth and him, what they had was real, they were the last of the young romantics, and though what they had wasn't the stuff they wrote poems about, it was the stuff of what he called the cheesy romance novels. The stuff of fairy tales and myths, but it didn't always have the happy ending.
"I'll always remember us as the last of the great lovers" whispered Castle before placing the photo back in the box and returning to his happy ending even if it wasn't with the woman who made him believe in them.
