Andrew stares at her, mouth open as if about to say something but nothing seems to be coming out. She raises an interrogative eyebrow, but still he says nothing.
All of a sudden Castle is speaking. "We were just having a drink, getting acquainted with your…brother?"
"He's no brother of mine." Kate quickly retorts giving Andrew her steeliest expression "Not anymore." The last part comes out less fearsome as hoped as her breath hitches revealing a small amount of her frustration and distress.
Maybe she's not strong enough for this.
So he's having a drink with Castle and the boys, so what? No big deal. He'll be moving on again tomorrow and they can forget all about this little episode. She's way too tired to deal with this now anyway.
Having lost the momentum she had walked up to the table with she simply turns around and starts her slow journey back towards the entrance of the bar, fresh air would do her some good.
However when she gets outside it's raining, hard. How could it have started raining so quickly? She's sure it wasn't raining when she'd first arrived. Doesn't look like she'll be able to get a cab in this weather so she hugs her arms around herself trying to maintain enough warmth as possible and heads quickly for a nearby alleyway, failing to hear the muffled "Wait Kate!" from behind her, so is shocked when Andrew grabs her arm, going into full on cop mode and almost breaking his arm like a twig.
"Andrew!" She shouts tugging on his arm one more time before finally releasing him.
"Wow, you've gotten strong Katie." He shakes his arm out trying to make it look as casual as possible and failing miserably.
"What do you want Andrew?" She might as well get to the point, like ripping off a band aid; quick and easy. Then she can go home, sink into a warm bath with a glass of wine (somewhat larger than usual) and one of Castle's books, one of the Nikki Heats. His words, especially written about her; how extraordinary she is to him, how much she inspires him etc., always make her feel better, special even. Though she'd never admit this to him, his ego is already big enough and she will not be held responsible for adding more to it.
"You. You and me. Back like it was. Well I know we could never get back to before. But something. Anything; a letter, the occasional phone call or we could grab a coffee or dinner and just…talk. You and me. Just like we used to. We could tell each other anything remember?" He looks at her so hopefully but is only met with another threatening stare "Or we don't have to talk. We can just sit and eat. You and me. Anywhere you want to go, anything you want to do. Please Katie just give me a chance." He doesn't care that he's practically begging, he'll do anything, say anything if she'll give him a shot.
Kate only hugs herself tighter looking at anything but his eyes. "It's not that simple…" but before she can finish Andrew has already started talking again, he always did that when they were younger; interrupting people mid sentence. Their mother would scold him for acting in such a rude manner.
"It can be that simple, we can make it simple! I know it's been so long and I've missed so much, but it's me Kate! You're big brother Andy! We can work something out!"
He keeps talking. He just won't shut up. Every word that comes desperately spewing out of his mouth, every suggestion, every attempt. It makes her sick. How dare he? Come back here after all this time. No letters, not even a Christmas card. And he just expects her to come to dinner with him and 'work something out'. There's nothing to work out! He pummelled and destroyed every last piece of their relationship that there's nothing left to work with. She wants to scream at him, tell him how much it hurt her when he left, tossing the family aside and not looking back once for almost fifteen years. But she knows if she even raises her voice slightly she'll break and she doesn't want him seeing her like that. Weak. He doesn't get to see what he's done to her, to their family, if that's even what you could call them now.
So she tries to keep her voice even and get him off her back forever quickly. "You left…" She's quite proud that her voice does come out rather strong only coated with her immense bitterness towards him. She takes a deep breath about to continue when Andrew tries to interrupt again and she can't stop herself this time. No amount of deep breathing or counting to ten can stop her now.
"No!" her voice is deafening, filled with aggression like Andrew has never seen from her before, from anyone really. It's enough to make him stumble backwards, stunned for a moment. "You left and everything fell apart! Mom was dead! The police were doing nothing! I had to drop out of college because they were threatening to take the house! Dad! Don't get me started on Dad…
A 22 year old Kate Beckett enters a bar.
"Where is he Hank?" The bartender gives her a sympathetic smile, the kind she hates but has learned to just accept lately, then he points down the far side of the bar towards the shadow of a man she used to know.
"Katie!" he yells then turns to the man next to him whom by the look on his face has had quite enough of him for one night "That's my girl! The one I was telling you about! Beautiful isn't she just like her mother!"
Kate sighs, it's been like this for months, spending the day working in whatever bar, club, diner or shop would take her on in order to pay the bills then cleaning up the house that she had once called her home. Formerly filled with constant commotion, the good kind: laughter, embarrassing stories, the rush to get to the bathroom first and above all, love. But now riddled with bottles and cans, broken appliances and smashed photo frames containing pictures of her mother.
After she was done there it was off out again to find her father. It wasn't that hard. It had been at first as he'd move from bar to bar so quickly with no apparent routine just wandering into one then when he got kicked out, wandering around for a while until he stumbled across another. But now he just went to Hank's bar. They'd known Hank for years; he played the occasional game of poker with Dad and had even taught her a few tricks. She'd once asked him why he didn't stop him, kick him out or something. She was grateful that she knew how to find her father much quicker but had thought as his friend he would try to put a stop to this chaos. He'd just said that at least here he was with friends, people who would make sure he didn't get into too much trouble, people that would keep him safe. She'd argued that what he was doing was far from safe. But he had been adamant that if he kicked her father out, he would just go to another bar full of strangers and probably do something stupid and end up in jail or worse.
"Come on Dad, time to go home." She says tiredly grabbing onto his arm and pulling him up off the bar stool.
"But Katie" he whines like a small child "I'm talking to my new friends! I just met them today." This is the first stage he goes through, the friendly stage. "Great bunch of men. Really really great bunch of men. Their names are…what's your names again?" At this point he is shouting across the bar as Kate has just continued dragging him towards the exit waving off Hank's regular offers of assistance.
When she finally gets him in the car and starts the short drive home (technically she could have walked but didn't trust her father in this state walking around near roads) he's gotten into his childlike stage; his innocent confusion as he mutters different names still trying to recall his 'new friends' then he is yawning but fighting sleep like a child that wants to stay up past their bedtime, not wanting to fall asleep just yet. It continues as she gets him out of the car and through the front door.
"Time for bed." She tries to sound as firm as she can.
"But I don't wanna go to bed Katie!" She's not put off by his whining and just keeps trying to coerce him up the stairs into his bed.
"Come on Dad, you can have a long sleep and everything will feel better in the morning." She knows it's a lie, that things never really feel any better, the only reason she isn't sitting on the couch with a bottle of scotch or some kind of strong whiskey right now is because she has to be strong, for her Dad. If they both crumble now, eventually there'll be nothing left of either of them.
But her father seems to have come to the final stage of his drunkenness, anger.
"You're my daughter and you'll do as I say!" His voice echoes around the empty house as he violently yanks his arm out of Kate's grasp. He looks over at the photo Kate had salvaged from a broken frame. It's one of their family: him, Andrew, Kate and a very happy looking Johanna Beckett.
"She's gone. Left me. Went ahead and got herself killed over one of her 'fighting for justice and the truth' cases! And Andrew! He's gone too! All I've been left with is you! And you know what? It would be so much easier if you had died, not her!"
"Dad you don't mean that." She says quietly backing away from him knowing how he can get when he's like this.
"Don't' tell me what I do and don't mean!" He picks up the closest thing to him which happens to be a vase and hurls it at her. She jumps, the vase only narrowly missing her, instead smashing against the wall then collapsing into tiny pieces on the floor. She runs up the stairs and locks herself in her room before collapsing on her bed sobbing into her pillow as the crashing sounds continue downstairs.
She knows it's just the grief coupled with the alcohol that's making her father say such things, do such things, but it doesn't make it hurt any less. And maybe he's right. Her mom was strong, knew how to handle her father, she would at least know what to if it had been Kate who been murdered instead.
She's signed up for the police academy; she's going to find her mother's killer no matter what or how long it takes. 'Random gang-violence' didn't cut it for her. She hasn't told him yet and the dates getting closer. The one where she has to leave him and focus on finding her mother's killer, she's dreading it. Leaving him alone he could do anything to himself. She'll have to ask Hank and some of their other friends in the neighbourhood to keep an eye on him, because if anything happens to him she won't be able to forgive herself. But if she's really being honest she's kind of looking forward to it, relieved in a way, she doesn't know how much longer she can last here, doing this, it's taking away all the strength she has left in her. The crashing downstairs has stopped which means he's probably passed out on the sofa. She'll try to get some sleep, she needs to get up early for work tomorrow and start the whole cycle again.
Her last thought before she drifts off into a restless sleep. 'I wish Andrew was here.'
Andrew's looking at her in such a heartbroken shock. She wasn't supposed to tell him all that. He wasn't supposed to think she had needed him, that she hadn't coped. Why did she have to tell him?
"Kate…" his voice is so raw with emotion "if I… if I had know-"
"You what!" She cuts in. "What would you have done Andrew?" She feels new, warmer water sliding down her face opposed to the cold rain that they are now drenched in and realises she's crying. Tears are streaming down her face and no matter how many times she furiously wipes at her eyes they won't cease coming.
"And don't even pretend you didn't get my message." He looks down ashamedly.
"Look at me you coward!" His eyes shoot up to meet hers instantly. "I asked you. No I begged you to come home. I told you that I didn't know what to do, that I was so lost. That everything was a mess. I screamed down that phone, pleading with you to come back and help me."
By now her whole body is shaking and it has nothing to do with the bitter cold water all over her, the pure fury she feels towards him is stronger than she has ever felt towards any suspect, even the most sadistic of murderers. "You promised me!" She cries because that's all she has the energy left to do. "You said you'd always protect me."
She's not used to this, never shows this much emotion. It's too much. She's got to go, got to leave, go far far away from here, from Andrew. And the next thing she knows she's outside her apartment, apparently having ran all the way home. She fumbles with her keys trying to open the door as quickly as possible before slamming it behind her and sinking to the floor sobbing violently.
So what do you think? A bit more intense and a bit longer. I apologise if anyone thinks I got Kate's emotions wrong in this as she's never acted upset on this kind of level like with the whole 'protect me' thing but I thought since it's her brother and looking over a horrible time for her it needed this kind of emotion and also reminded me of the emotion in that whole 'everyone's gone' scene in the season 4 premiere. I also apologise if there are any grammar, spelling, tenses etc. mistakes, I didn't have as much time as usual to check it so if I missed something then like I said sorry! Let me know what you think and thanks for reading.