A note from a very guilty author: It has been ENTIRELY too long since I've updated this. I know this. If you've been waiting, I'm so sorry! But I have been working on it, however intermittently, and this chapter is finally actually done and ready for you to read. I hope very much that you like it. Let me know!

"You ready to go?"

He glanced between the clock on his phone and then out the window at the sky. "I thought you said sunset? It's still early."

"Yeah, well we have a couple of stops to make. Plus you're probably going to slow me down."

He'd always been an excellent selective listener. He focused on the parts of what she'd said that he liked and ignored the rest. "So you're letting me come?"

"Would you have it any other way?"

"No, but it's better if it's voluntary."

She shrugged. "Well, you've seen just about everything already, so I don't see any point in holding back now."

Again, he focused on the part that he liked. Beckett always held back. No matter how much he tried to learn, how much information he could glean from talking and pushing and just being around her, there was always more buried beneath the visible surface. Learning Kate had become, in and of itself, almost a full-time job. The fact that she was willing to let him have this one, to allow him to drive her to her mother's gravesite, was big. It was progress. "Very good point. Yeah, I'm ready whenever you are."

"Just let me get my jacket."

He nodded. She met him by the door a minute later holding her purse. "Okay, let's go." She stood by the door, key in hand, ready to lock it.

"Just a second," he said, an idea occurring to him. He spotted a small box of tissues on an end table and grabbed it before joining her on the other side of the door.

She nodded. Since he'd arrived, he was incredibly grateful that he'd been able to get her to relax, even to cheer up a little, but he couldn't help noting how impossibly sad it was that at his nonverbal, only half-serious suggestion she didn't laugh, or smirk, or brush him off. "Good thinking," she said simply.

This is weird, he thought as he sat in the driver's seat of his car with Kate beside him. In truth, there should've been nothing weird about it. Neither driving his car nor being alone in a car with Beckett was unusual. The weird thing was that these two ordinary occurrences were coming together as one. When he was in the car with Beckett, it was usually her car. It belonged to the city technically, but she'd been using it long enough that it was basically hers. And he'd never, literally never, been in a car with her and driven.

"So where are we going?" he asked her. "Atlantic City? Niagara Falls? Vegas?"

"Yeah, Castle," she said, sounding more wearied than snarky, "you caught me. Forget the cemetery, let's go to Vegas."

The pain evident in her last response, sarcastic though it was, cut straight through him. He'd been trying to lighten the mood, but maybe he'd gone too far. He was compelled to apologize. "I'm sorry. Too much."

She softened. "It's okay."

"No, it's not." Clearly she was already in enough pain without his help. He wanted to alleviate it, not make matters worse. "I'll shut up, I promise." She gave him a look, and he completely understood why she didn't believe him. "I will!" he insisted. "But I'm serious. Where to? We can go anywhere."

"I just need flowers."

"I know just the place."

He watched her face as they walked into the building, and his heart soared as her eyes widened. He'd been hoping that taking her here was the right thing to do, and her reaction helped to affirm this. "What is this place?" she asked him.

"The best flower emporium in New York. Doesn't look like much from the outside, does it?" The large building was blocky and plain, almost warehouse-like, but every inch of the inside was filled with flowers. "For all your floral needs. They make bouquets, wreaths, sculptures, and if it's the kind of deal where you bring flowers to plant yourself I'm sure they can help us out there—"

She stopped him. "There's a vase. I usually just get a bouquet."

"Perfect. What kind of flowers?"

She shrugged. "Oh, I don't know. It depends, I guess."

He raised his eyebrows. "Beckett. Come on. This isn't helping. Look around. You've got no end of options here. What were your mom's favorites?"

She did look around for a bewildered second, apparently thinking. "Lilies," she finally said. "I think lilies. But I don't usually—they're expensive."

He smiled. "Let that be the least of your concerns."

"Castle, I can't—"

"Why not? You let me buy lunch, what's the difference?"

She shrugged. "It's different. First of all, I wasn't exactly thrilled about that. And this is my thing. It doesn't concern you."

"But can't it?" Again he saw her face and amended. "I don't mean to butt in… I just want to help. You should get what you want. Pick anything. I'll cover the cost. It's silly for you to worry about that."

"It's sillier for you to worry about it."

She always picked the least convenient times to be stubborn. "I'm not worried about it. Do I look worried? It's really not a big deal for me. Just let it go. Let me handle it." Before she got a chance to argue any further, he spotted the owner of the shop, a personal friend, and flagged him down. "Lou, hey."

"Ricky, hey! It's been too long." He grinned at Beckett. "Need some flowers for the lady?"

"Not exactly, but I do need a bouquet. The nicest arrangement of lilies you can make up for me in a short period of time."

"How short a period we talking here?"

"Short as you can manage. We need them now."

"I'll see what I can do. If you don't mind me asking, who are these for?"

He looked to Beckett, temporarily unsure of what he should say. She didn't look at him, but cleared her throat and answered Lou directly. "They're for my mom."

"Ah, I see," he said, although he looked confused. "Well, she's a lucky woman. My bouquets are the best in the city. It'll be unlike anything she's ever seen. What's the occasion? Birthday?"

This time Castle responded immediately. "Don't worry about it, Lou." The florist was just being friendly and the tone of his response was a little harsh, but he did want to be clear. The last thing he needed was some kind of "Happy Birthday" sign in the flowers that were going on Johanna's grave. It occurred to him that "Happy Deathday" would be more accurate, but he suppressed that slightly morbid thought. He could tell that even the first question had been hard for Kate to answer, so he jumped in before she had to try to respond to another.

"Okay, let me go get that moving," he said quickly, more than a little taken aback by Castle's sharpness. "I'll have it for you shortly." He disappeared through a doorway into another part of the building, leaving Castle alone with Kate.

Her back was to him as she apparently studied some kind of flower that he imagined at least ninety percent of the population had neither seen nor heard of before. But somehow he got the feeling that she wasn't really all that fascinated by the flower. He crossed over to her and rested his hand on her shoulder, and was pleased, if a little surprised, when she didn't brush him away. It was one thing that she'd allowed this in her apartment with no one else around, but in a fairly public place, albeit still with no one around, he might've thought it would be different. "You okay?" he asked her.

"Yeah," she sighed.

He left his hand there as she continued to study the flower.

"No," she said after a minute, changing her tune. "This is why I don't like to go out today."

"Lou can get a little… chatty." He'd have taken her somewhere else for flowers if he'd have remembered this, but to be honest he'd never found it to be a problem before. "Sorry."

"It's not your fault, and it's not his fault either. They were normal questions. He couldn't have known that I'm so…" She broke off and sighed, disgusted.

"So what?" he coaxed.

"So fragile," she spit out the word like a curse.

"That's okay." He tried to meet her eyes, but she wouldn't look at him. "You more than deserve to be a little fragile."

She shook her head, blinking a little more rapidly than she should've been. "I don't want to be that person. That's not me."

"Like you said before, it's one day."

"I know, and that's fine, but no one's supposed to have to see it."

He shrugged. "It's just me."

"Just you…" she mumbled cryptically. Finally she sighed and did look at him, and he was surprised to find that her eyes were filled not with emotion, but with her standard stubborn resolve. "How long is this gonna take? I hadn't counted on having to wait for the flowers."

"Not long," he answered, relieved at the confirmation that, whatever the circumstances, she was still Beckett. "Lou knows I tend to tip well when I'm satisfied, and he knew I wasn't thrilled with his questions. Ten minutes, fifteen tops?"

She nodded, still looking at him. She was still Beckett, yes, but now there was something in her eyes besides the resolve. He couldn't quite place it. "Thanks."

Gratitude? Was that what it was? And what was she thanking him for? For how he'd handled Lou and the flowers, or for taking her here? For something he'd done earlier? Even if he didn't know exactly what she meant though, he was positive he didn't mind. "Don't mention it."

Just watching Kate's face when she saw the bouquet made up for any regret he'd felt about bringing her here. "Castle, this is amazing," she said once they were in the car again on the way to the cemetery.

"Didn't I tell you? Best florist in New York."

"It seems a shame just to leave them at the cemetery so no one can enjoy them."

"That's why we bought them, isn't it? Like you said, they're for your mom."

She nodded. "I just don't usually leave flowers this… fancy."

He smiled, but didn't say anything more. He was just glad that he could do something for her that she appreciated. "Looks like we've still got some time 'til sunset," he noted as he drove. "You want to go anywhere else?"

"No. Let's just go now."

"Okay." Obediently, he drove to the cemetery she named.

Once they arrived, she gave him more specific directions to the place where her mother was buried. "Park here," she said, indicating a pull-off.

He did. He looked to her and tried to give her a smile of encouragement. He knew this couldn't be easy for her. "I'll just stay here then," he told her. "Take as much time as you need."

"You wouldn't have to wait here," she said quietly.

"What?" From what he could figure, the earth had to be rotating backward on its axis today. He wondered why he hadn't felt the change occur during the night. First Beckett didn't show up for work, then she let him stay at her apartment, then she let him drive her here, and now he was offering to wait in the car and she was telling him he didn't have to? The only logical explanation for all of this was a complete reversal of everything he'd ever known. Following that trend, he kept his sudden insight to himself.

"You can come with me if you want."

"I thought it was something you had to do alone?"

She shrugged. "You've been so sweet today, and so…" she trailed off, and began again. "I understand if it would make you uncomfortable, you can stay here if you want, but I'd like it if you came with me."

He frowned. "You would?"

"I would."

Not another instant of thought was required. "Lead the way."