Wonderful Life
"Kako si, zlato moje malo?" she murmurs against the top of his head.
He stirs and rubs his face into her chest. "Feel hot."
She's not surprised he knows the meaning - she's asked him so many times now tonight if he feels okay that it probably sounds exactly the same no matter what language she uses. "Your temperature is back up now that the medicine has worn off."
"No, Mommy. No more medicine. It tastes so bad."
"I know. But you'll feel so much better. Idemo popit lijek."
"I don't want to."
"Just a little bit. And then a Benadryl chaser. You like that one, remember?"
"What's 'chaser'?"
She presses her lips together and shifts him off her chest as she explains. "It's when you drink something that's easier to swallow than the first. So we'll do the medicine - which will taste bad, but you'll be okay - and then we'll take the Benadryl so that the last taste you have on your tongue-"
"Ohhh, Mommy you're so smart."
She laughs and leaves him sprawled on the couch, brushes her fingers over his forehead. "Thank you, baby. I have my moments. Stay cool; I'll get the medicine."
While she's pouring out the right measurements, her phone rings from the coffee table.
"Hey, see if it's a picture you recognize," she calls out. "And answer it if you-"
"It's Daddy!" Dashiell crows, scooping up her phone.
Kate listens as her son answers, excitement crackling through his voice. And maybe some dehydration in it too. Hm. She needs to get him to drink more water.
"Hi, hi, hi," Dashiell chirps into her phone.
Rolling her eyes, Kate fills a water bottle for him as well, brings everything back to the couch, sitting in front of him on the coffee table.
"Yes. I got bumps all over me. But Mommy is itching them-"
Dash's explanation is cut off; she watches him listen.
"No, it's not too bad," he says. "Mommy's a good itcher."
Kate holds the water out for him, nudges his elbow with it. Dashiell takes the sport bottle and sucks down a mouthful as he listens to his father. She wriggles her hand for the phone.
"Hold on, Daddy. Mommy wants to talk-" Dash thrusts the phone at her and attacks his water bottle.
She takes the call, picking up Dash's old cup from the floor, shaking it. Ah, he was out. Okay, makes sense. "Castle?"
"Hey. I got out early. How's he doing?"
"Doing good. Had an oatmeal bath, trying to get Dash to take a little more medicine. Right, buddy?'
He makes a face.
Castle sighs. "Good luck with that."
"Here, baby, take this." Kate tugs the water out of his grip and hands him the dosing spoon filled with bright pinkish-red liquid tylenol. Dashiell sighs loudly but takes it from her.
"Need me to talk to him?" Castle asks over the phone.
"Nope, cause Dash is going to take it, no problem. Right, my man?"
He grimaces and puts it to his lips, slowly, agonizingly tilts his head back.
"Sure he is. Right," Castle grumbles into the phone. "If he takes it for you-"
"Oh, good job, baby," Kate grins around her praise, hands him back his water.
"No," Dash says, choking a little, making a terrible face. "Chaser. Chaser, Mommy."
"Right." She gives him the Benadryl in a similar dosing spoon, hears Castle gasping on the other end.
"He drank the kool-aid? You are kidding me."
"Dash is a big kid," she encourages, talking to both of them really. "You got it, buddy. Benadryl chaser. And then your water."
She watches his throat work as he swallows roughly, the way his gag reflex kicks in and his shoulders hunch. Kate smooths her hand over his leg, letting him know she's there.
"How'd that go?" Castle rumbles from the phone.
"Going good. You got it, Dash. Very good. Oh, good job. Okay, drink your water, wash the taste out."
"Worked good, Momma," he says, croaking around the combination of tastes in his mouth. "Chaser."
She grins back. "Chaser." At that moment, the buzzer sounds from downstairs - the doorman letting her know that her father is coming up. "Here, want to talk to Daddy?"
Dash takes the phone from her, letting Kate hop up and cross to the door, unlock it. She leaves it open a crack so that they can come on in, as usual, and Kate heads back to the couch in time to catch the last of Dash's comments.
"-baseball game?"
Ohh, darn. She forgot. They were supposed to go to the game this weekend in celebration of Rick getting back in town. She sighs and shakes her head at Dash. "Not likely, sweetheart. You're contagious."
Dashiell sighs. "Mommy says I'm - I don't know that one, Mommy."
"Contagious. You'll spread chicken pox to everyone."
"You gonna get chicken pox?"
"I've already had it. I can't get it again." Hopefully. She's had it twice because the first time was such a light case, and then of course, there's shingles too. Oh, maybe her father and Kelly should stay clear of Dash tonight.
"Daddy, you already have my pox?"
Kate grins to herself and hears the elevator ding from down the hall. She picks the pillows up off the floor, lightly clobbers Dash with his, making him giggle, and then gets up to greet her father.
Ellery is first through the door, barreling into Kate's legs and squeezing, face pressed into the denim of her jeans. Kate leans over with a soft laugh, rubs her daughter's back as her dad and Kelly come inside the apartment.
"Hi, Katie." Her father reaches out and hugs Kate tightly, even as Ellery scrambles to climb Kate's legs, trying to get up.
"Words, baby girl," she mutters, a hand darting out to catch her daughter before she slips. "Use your words. Hey, Dad. Thanks for trying to keep her."
"How's Dash?" Jim asks, heading further into the living room. He gives Dashiell a high-five, nods to the phone as he looks back to Kate.
"It's Rick. Ellery, baby, don't pinch. Here." She leans over and scoops the girl up, kissing her neck to silly her out of the fierce scowl on her face. "Were you sad?"
Ella buries her face in Kate's shirt, making her mother sigh and rub her back slowly. "It's okay to be sad, to miss your mommy and Dash-"
"And Daddy," she whispers softly.
"Oh, I know. I miss Daddy too." Kate rubs her nose against Ellery's cheek, kisses her ear. "Come see your brother, but don't get too close. He's sick. And then you can talk to Daddy on the phone, okay?"
Ellery lifts her head and squirms to get down, so Kate sets her feet on the floor and watches her run to the couch.
"Not too close," her father says, reaching out and catching her before she can scramble up. "Wait here."
"Hey, it's my sister," Dash says into the phone, waving at Ella with his free hand. "Here, Daddy wants to talk."
"Whoa, wait, wait," Kate calls out, grabbing the phone before Ellery can take it. "Hold on, Castle."
"Yeah, clean it off or something. I think there's wipes under the kitchen sink," he says.
"Good idea." She rubs her hand through Ellery's hair, trying to dislodge that frown. "Wait, cricket. Let me clean it."
Her father picks up the little girl and sits in a chair while Kate heads for the kitchen, looking for clorox wipes.
"Hey," Castle says quietly over the phone. "I miss you."
She squats down behind the kitchen island in front of the sink, opens the cabinets and closes her eyes for a moment, letting his voice wash over her.
"Miss you more," she sighs, opening her eyes again and looking for the wipes.
"You're a good mom," he murmurs. "I love you."
She finds the wipes at the back, pulls them out, puts her forehead against the wood of the cabinet, sighs. "I love you too."
"Okay, clean the phone, hand me off to Ellery. I guess she got homesick?"
"Yeah. Dad just brought her up."
"She scowling?"
Kate laughs as she stands back up, heads for the living room. "Scowling something fierce."
"I'll laugh it out of her," Castle says, and she can hear the relish in his voice. Nothing he likes better than being silly for his kids.
"You're always good at that," she answers. "You do the same for me."
"Yeah, where do you think I got all my practice?"
She laughs and tugs a wipe out of the canister. "All right, cleaning the phone. Call me later?"
"Usual."
"Good."
Kate wipes off the phone's screen, the protective case, then hands it over to Ellery, taking a moment to kiss her daughter's forehead. "Daddy wants to talk to you, sweet girl."
As Ellery holds the phone up to her ear, Kate retreats to the couch, giving her father and Kelly both a smile, and then sitting beside Dashiell.
He curls up around her, head in her lap, and sighs. "Itch me, Mommy."
Right. Yes. Itch the boy with the pox.
After her father and Kelly leave, and Castle has hung up, it feels like all the fun has been sucked out of the room. Ellery refuses to sit alone in the chair while Kate and Dash get to curl up together. Kate really can't blame her for not wanting to be left out, but-
Oh well. Screw it. They'll both get chicken pox. When Kate got it the first time, she remembers her best friend's mother sending the girl over to Kate's house so that she'd catch it too, get it over with.
"All right, fine. Climb up," she says, lifting her lips into a smile for her daughter.
Ellery grins back and uses both hands to push her hair out of her face, then scrambles up onto the couch.
"Come sit on this side of me, not near your brother. He's too hot." And contagious, but let's say feverish.
Ellery climbs over her lap to settle at her other side, both kids burrowing in closer, little bodies trying to compete with each other for how much of mommy they can claim.
Kate glances down at Ellery's fierce little face, then over to Dashiell's exhausted, itchy one. Both kids look a little worse for wear - she probably does too. They all miss Daddy.
"Okay. How about this. Let's have a Pox Party," she says, squeezing both kids closer.
Dash sits up, looking at her. "What's a Pox Party?"
"It's a party for a kid who has chicken pox. So here's what we'll do. Ellery, go find every pillow and blanket from all the beds and the hall closet, okay? Dash, you find the Calamine lotion and get your water bottle, all that stuff, and start a camp out here in front of the tv. Help your sister if she needs it."
"Like a huge blanket fort?"
"Exactly like it. I'm going to make us hot fudge sundaes while you both work on the fort-"
"Yay! Sundaes!"
"Then we can watch a movie-"
"Not Totoro," Dash says quickly, shooting a glance at Ellery. Not that Ella was going to say anything at all, but apparently Dash sees she was thinking it. Loudly.
"Okay, wait. Hold on. No fighting," she interrupts. "We'll pick a few movies we each like, and then we'll try to agree on a couple. Okay?"
Both kids nod at her.
"All right. Ready? Go."
Ella is the first to scramble off the couch, heading for the master bedroom and the best fort-making blankets. Both kids know exactly what to do - they've done it before.
Kate pushes on Dashiell's shoulder. "You going?"
"I'm going," he says, then gives her a slow grin. "I get a pox party. This is gonna be awesome."
Kate certainly hopes so. Maybe she can be just as much fun as Daddy.
Okay, probably not. But she can get close.
Kate fishes for her phone in the nest of pillows and blankets in the floor of the living room, answers it when she can finally get her fingers on it.
"Hey, Castle," she says softly.
"Kids asleep?"
"Mm, yeah. All over me." She's propped up in one of Castle's video game chairs, which is basically a cushion with a back to it, while the kids are sprawled in her lap, Dash on her right, Ella on her left, the huge tent strung up with blankets from the couch to the doors of the entertainment center and back to the windows.
"What're you doing?" he laughs.
"Pox party in the living room floor. I let Dash eat two bowls of ice cream and Ellery had nutella on toast - four slices."
"Ooh, they're getting away with murder."
She laughs back and Dashiell stirs; Kate lowers her voice. "We made a blanket fort. Like you always do with them."
"Oh yeah? I did that with Alexis too."
"Yeah," she grins, can so picture a little red-haired girl curling up with her dad. "We watched movies."
"Totoro?"
"Yeah, Dash gave in on that one. And then Star Wars."
"Score."
She rolls her eyes and strokes her fingers through Ellery's dark hair. "We played hide and seek after Star Wars, to wear them out a little."
"Dash can play?"
"Yeah, actually, helps to keep him distracted so he doesn't think about how scratchy he is."
"Ahh, there's the culprit," he murmurs. "You're the one encouraging him to say it wrong."
She grins, tries to keep the laugh from coming out of her throat. "Caught me."
He gives a melodramatic sigh and she can just picture him, shaking his head at her. "Aiding and abetting, Beckett. You know you can serve time for that."
"You the grammar police?"
"Yes," he growls.
"What're you gonna do to me? Punish me?"
He gives a breathy laugh that makes her toes curl, and she really wants him here. And the kids not piled on top of her. And mostly him here.
The silence stretches on between them for a little longer; she can hear him breathing in the phone, the way he putters around his hotel room as he gets ready for bed.
Eleven o'clock, their usual. She's just been dozing in the floor, enjoying being with her kids while the television is on mute, one of those late show guys, and now she's suddenly missing him all the more.
"Hey," she says.
"Hey."
"Tomorrow, yeah?"
"Flight leaves at two."
"Kids miss you."
"You miss me too," he says.
"Yeah. Definitely."
"Ditto - all around."
She grins and smooths her hand down Ellery's back, her thumb over the ridges of the girl's spine. "So what did you do today?"
"Hm. Got up. Had coffee that tasted like heaven. It was so great I'm almost ashamed to tell you because you'd be so very jealous of me."
"I'm not jealous," she says easily. "I'm lying in the floor with two sacked out kids at the end of a very successful pox party. Not a bit jealous of some measly great coffee."
"Ah, you are so right. I'm jealous now."
"You should be."
"Take a picture for me."
"What?" she laughs, cradling her phone against her ear with her shoulder so she can adjust Dashiell's hold on the blu ray player's remote control, slide it out of his grip now that he's deep enough asleep not to wake.
"Come on, hold your phone out and take a photo and send it to me."
"You're nuts."
"No, just - not where I want to be right this minute. So take a picture, Beckett."
"And rub it in?"
"Sure," he laughs.
Kate does as he asks, fumbles with her phone one-handed as she sends it to him, then gets back on the line. "Sent. To your email."
"Ah okay, hold on."
She listens to him on the other side, hears something creak, so he must be in bed now.
"Oh, that's beautiful," he murmurs.
"I'm not sure how you could even see anything. The only light that's on is the kitchen light."
"Dark and cozy. I can see enough."
She smiles to herself. "So. After your great coffee?"
"After my abysmal coffee-"
Kate laughs.
"-I had that interview with EW magazine-"
"Oh, yeah. I forgot about that. How'd it go?"
"Uh, well, pretty great actually. It was fun. We'll see what it looks like in print. They did ask for a family photo shoot-"
"Oh?"
"So um, up to you, Kate. They want to send a photographer out when I get back, or else have us meet one at a studio."
"Are you serious?"
"Yeah."
She bites her bottom lip. "Well. If that's - what does your publicist say?"
"Don't worry about that."
"What do you think, Rick?"
His silence is just a moment, really just a hesitation before he goes on, but it tells her all she needs to know. "It's up to you, Kate."
"You think we should," she murmurs. "Okay. Do we get to keep any of the photos?"
He chuckles softly down the line. "Want me to make that a part of the deal?"
"Well, I think after Dash was born, we did a pretty good job handling the issues about photographs the paparazzi took. So - more of the same, right? We give them a little, then they're more willing to work with us on keeping the kids out of the spotlight."
"Yeah. It seems to work. And it's not like I'm really that famous."
Kate laughs hard, dislodging Ellery's head from her thigh, having to catch her. "Oh, oops. Wow. You just admitted that?"
"I figured I'd get that in there before you could. Just, you know, pre-empt you there."
"Consider me pre-empted," she chuckles. "Okay then. Set it up, Castle. We'll do it.
He laughs back, something rich and good and intimate in his voice that wraps around her just like he was there, like she had him right in front of her.
"Thanks, Kate."