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

She slides off his lap to get the thermos, and pours more coffee into their mugs. And then, unexpectedly, she laughs. "It's so weird, the door thing."

"The door thing? What's that?"

She settles down next to him on the bench. "In your two dreams, I showed up at your door, unannounced. You did the same in mine, more than once."

"I thought this was one dream," he says, wrapping his arm around her.

"It was, but you kept showing up in it. Kind of like at work, at the beginning, when you kept showing up even when I didn't want you to."

"You did."

"No arguments, Castle. Let me tell you my dream."

"Do I get to eat a cookie while you do?"

"Go to town," she says, and hands him the bag. "Last night I dreamed that I was reading the newspaper in my living room when I heard a knock on the door. I was surprised because it was really early in the morning and I wasn't expecting anyone, but I got up and looked out and there you were, wearing bunny ears."

"Bunny ears? You mean like Bugs?"

"Well, no, like Easter. The Easter Bunny. And you also had enormous bunny feet on over your shoes. I said, 'Castle?' and you said, 'May I hop in?' Which of course you did without waiting for an answer."

"The Easter Bunny is an irresistible guy, Beckett. A lovable lagomorph. I must have assumed that of course you'd invite him in."

"Right. Well, anyway, hop in you did, carrying a big basket. You said, 'Happy Easter, Beckett.' I said that it was October—which it was, at least in the dream—and you said, 'You know how I like to get a jump on the holiday.' "

"That's true."

"To continue. You hopped into my kitchen and took off the napkin that was on the top of the basket. Inside there was a carton of eggs—"

"Dyed your favorite shade of purple?"

She shakes her head. "How do you know my favorite color? Never mind. No, they weren't dyed, they weren't even cooked yet. That was the point. You also had a bottle of white vinegar and several little bottles of food coloring. 'I brought these supplies, Beckett, which should be staples in every civilized kitchen, but I was pretty sure that you didn't have them, am I right?' Before you interrupt again, yes, you were right. And then you got a big saucepan and put a dozen eggs on to boil. And while they were cooking we had breakfast, which of course was also in that basket. Muffins, rolls, jam, orange juice, a fruit salad. You asked if there were coffee, so I got you a cup and when I turned around there were four little chocolate bunnies on my plate."

"They must have multiplied in the basket. I bet when I left home there were only two."

"Doubtless. By the time we'd finished eating, the eggs were hard-boiled and we decorated them. One of other the things in the basket was a white crayon. You said, 'This is so we can write secret messages on some of the eggs and once we've dyed them we'll be able to read them.' You know what you wrote on mine? BAD ASS BADGE 41319."

"Geez, that's pretty strong language from the Easter Bunny, 'bad-ass'. What did you write on mine?"

"SOME BUNNY. And you were quite a bunny. Even had a tail on your jeans. Pretty cute, I have to say. You didn't put it on until you got to my apartment, though. Said you didn't dare wear it in public. When we finished decorating the eggs you asked me if I had any white underwear." She can hear him snort, but she's not stopping. "I said, 'Who are you, the Playboy Bunny?' and you told me that when Alexis was little she always wanted to tie-dye her little white socks with the leftover Easter egg coloring. And I said then why didn't you ask if I had any white socks and you said because underwear was so much more interesting."

"It is," he says, squeezing her thigh dangerously close to the top.

"Hmph. When I wouldn't agree to dye any underwear you said that was okay, you had to be getting home and you left. I went back to the living room and picked up the paper to finish the story I was reading when you'd arrived, and I heard knocking. I figured maybe you'd forgotten something, so I opened the door and there you were in a Santa hat, saying, 'Merry Christmas.' I said, 'It's October, Castle, remember? You were just here.' You told me you hadn't been here in ages and that it was the middle of summer, and sure enough, my air conditioner was going full blast. You held up a red velvet Christmas stocking that you'd been hiding behind your back and said, 'It's Christmas in July!' Then you waltzed right into the kitchen and got us each a cup of coffee and put a candy cane in mine. Surprisingly good, by the way."

He's almost bouncing with excitement. "Did you open the stocking? What was in there?"

"You do remember that this was a dream, right? The stocking wasn't actually real."

"Don't care. I want to know what I, your Dream Santa, put in there."

"It was kids' stuff. Jacks and a ball, a light-up yo-yo. Let me see. Oh, earmuffs that looked like mittens, one red that said STOP and a green that said GO. A neon pink jump rope, a pack of cards."

"Pack of cards could be for adults." He helps himself to another cookie. "Strip poker."

"Uh, yeah, well, funny you should mention."

Now he's almost flying off the bench. "We played strip poker!"

"Calm down, Saint Nick. No, we did not. However, the last thing in the stocking, right in the toe, was a little book. Inside the cover it said 'Limited Edition. One of Two Copies'."

"C'mon, c'mon, what was it?"

"The book was illustrated by hand—you had one copy, I had the other. It was called How to be a Sizzlingly Hot Stripper by Nikki Heat."

"Oh, my God. I have to see this, Beckett."

"Castle! It's imaginary!"

"Well, your imagination came up with it, and you could at least tell me. It's really kind of a coproduction, right? Since I'm the one who writes Nikki Heat."

"Sorry to disappoint you, but that's when I woke up, so I can't tell you anything about it."

"That's the end of the dream? I am totally disappointed."

She takes the bag of cookies back and peers inside. "You ate all of them?"

He quickly kisses her on the cheek. "What can I say, Beckett, you really stimulate my appetite."

"No, it's not the end of the dream. I woke up for some reason, and I wrote down what I could remember of the dream because I was afraid I'd lose it. And then I went back to bed, and I swear I wasn't asleep for more than a minute before you were back, knocking on the door."

"Not Santa anymore?"

"Nope, Uncle Sam. You had one of those red-and-white striped top hats, with a blue band that had white stars on it. You barged right in, grabbed my hand and said, 'Follow me, Beckett,' and we went up my little flight of stairs to the roof. It was chilly up there. You pulled a box out of your jacket pocket, and a book of matches. And all of a sudden there you were with two sparklers. You handed me one and said, 'Happy Fourth of July!' When I said it was the fourth of October, you said no matter, it was a holiday somewhere. And then you remembered that Mexico became a federal republic on October Fourth, so that would do. When I accused you of making that up you got your phone and Googled it and showed me." She looks hard at him. "You are really weird sometimes, the things you know."

"The real me or the dream me?"

"Both. God, Castle, I'm starving and you ate all the damn cookies."

"Hang on." He starts patting all his pockets, and smiles. "Aha!" He undoes the top of his coat, reaches deep inside and comes up with an oversized Snickers. "Here you go," he says, offering it to her.

"You came here with a huge candy bar?"

"Can you blame me? I didn't know where we were going or for how long. You said to dress warmly so I gathered that we'd be outside and probably not near a food source, and I was right."

"Hey! I brought eight cookies."

"I didn't know you were going to, and besides, one of mine landed in the river and you had one, too. Snickers is my go-to emergency backup."

"Good, I'll be eating it now then. I need fuel to tell you the rest of the dream."

"So what happened with the sparklers?"

"We went through the whole box. Eight of 'em. Like the cookies."

"Did we do anything special?"

"Well, you leaned over the wall—nearly gave me a heart attack, by the way—waving your sparkler around and yelled, 'It's the glorious fourth!' to some guy on the sidewalk. And he yelled back 'Of October, asshole!' And you said, 'Quick, Beckett, how do you say "we're Mexicans" in Spanish?' I told you and you leaned back over and shouted, 'Somos mexicanos, pendejo'!"

"Pendejo?"

"Yeah, I'm still trying to figure out why you couldn't say something as simple as 'we're Mexicans' but you knew the word for 'asshole'."

"That's the beauty of dreams, Beckett."

She pokes him in the ribs. "You're proud, aren't you?"

"Of course I am, swearing in Spanish. What else did we do on the glorious fourth?"

She moves slightly, as if she's hesitant about what to say next. "Oh, you know, the usual."

"What usual?" When she doesn't answer, he presses her. "You embarrassed, Beckett? I told you the embarrassing stuff in my dreams."

"Okay, okay. We wrote stuff, the way everyone always does with sparklers."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Jesus, Beckett, this is like pulling teeth. What did we write? No, amendment, what did you write?"

She takes a while before answering. "It wasn't just what I wrote, it was that it stayed there."

His eyes widen. "It stayed there? You mean the sparkly thing you wrote? How could it stay there?"

"You're asking me? You're the one who believes in magic. Plus, may I repeat, it was a dream."

"You're not getting away with not telling me."

"Okay," she sighs. "I drew an enormous heart and inside it I wrote KB + RC."

Now it's his turn to be quiet, until finally he's asks, "How did I respond to that?"

"You smiled and said, 'That's all I need to know.' And then, poof, you disappeared, but the heart with our initials stayed in the air. I stayed up there for a while, looking at it, and then I came back down because I was cold."

"So, that was the end of the dream?"

"No, but it's the last part that I remember well. You came to the door a bunch more times, once as Saint Patrick with a shillelagh and a bouquet of shamrocks, and also as Saint Valentine. You were wearing a red sweater and a halo and you said you wanted to come dressed as cupid, but you were damned if you were walking into my building wearing nothing but a 'ribbon over my naughty bits,' as you so daintily put it, carrying a bow and arrows."

"Was that the last one? Valentine?"

"No, it was—." She puts her hands over her face.

He pulls them down, and even in the dim light can see that she's blushing. "It was?"

"Oh, God. I remember it now!"

TBC