Jump 7
Please see the M-rated chapter (6.5) of Jump Journal posted last week to fit in right before this one.
The dark cloud loomed in the distance all weekend, but when the day finally came, the sun was shining.
The three of them had managed four Broadway shows in two and a half days, ranging from Gershwin to Judy Garland. They ate out, they walked in the park. Kate had not been simultaneously off but yet so exhaustingly busy for a weekend since she had met Castle and his family.
And at no point did any of them mention Monday.
Rick stayed home that morning, unsure of his mother's plans, but hoping to be there when she got the call from her doctor. Kate had gone to work expecting to suffer for her missed day on Friday, but the boys hadn't even had a case.
Ryan and Esposito knew something was up, but she hadn't told them any details of where she had been on Friday. She had left it at needing a personal day, and without Castle there to pull it out of her, the boys were uneasily allowing her privacy.
Now, it was almost five. All her pens were aligned. She had rearranged her post-it pads. She had even cleaned her keyboard, and still there was nothing.
She had expected to hear from Rick, and she was getting paranoid.
If the news had been bad, maybe Martha had kept it to herself.
When her phone buzzed with a text, she nearly jumped out of her chair.
"Still no word. Mother is home from her class. We're just here waiting."
Something pulled at her—an instinct to circle the wagons, to present a united front.
"Do you guys mind if I take off early?"
Ryan's eyes took on an inquisitive squint, but he didn't act on it when he opened his mouth for a snarky retort.
"Beckett, you're probably the only one here who would consider five o'clock 'early.'"
She lifted an eyebrow in disdain.
"Well, then, fine. I'm leaving on time."
She stood and slid on her jacket, passed their desks with what she hoped was a neutral expression.
"Have a good night, boss."
Esposito knew better than to pry, but his tone conveyed concern. She ignored it for now, hoping there would be no reason for it in the end, but also realizing that if this were something bad, eventually the boys would hear the full story.
# * # * # * #
When Kate walked into the loft twenty minutes later, Martha was standing in the kitchen, one hand braced on the counter, the other holding her cell phone to her ear.
Her expression was cryptic. Concentration, maybe. Certainly not relief, but also not anguish.
Rick was frozen in mid-stir at the stove behind his mother, but he nodded once in Kate's direction.
This was it.
"I see. Yes, tomorrow morning would be fine."
So it couldn't be just an "all clear."
Kate's eyes skirted back to Rick, saw the panic rising behind the blue.
She stopped on the other side of the island.
"No, no. I understand. I appreciate your call, Dr. Leigh. I'll see you then."
Martha clicked off the call, put the phone down, kept her eyes closed for a beat before she spoke.
"So it isn't bad news, really."
Rick turned off the burner and set down the spoon, stepped up beside her to finish the thought.
"But not good news, either."
"Not exactly."
She looked up at him then, lips pressed into a tight smile.
"They found cancer in the biopsy."
Kate saw him fight hard not to flinch. No one had even said that word yet. It sank like a stone in her gut, and this wasn't even her own mother.
It crossed her mind that having Martha was as close as she would ever come to—no, she didn't need to be thinking that way right now.
"But Dr. Leigh says the pathologist believes it's contained—hasn't spread, won't spread. She wants to talk to me tomorrow to decide what to do."
Castle found his voice, as quiet and serious as Kate had ever heard it.
"I'm going with you, Mother. Alexis will want to come, too."
Martha rounded on him with a flash of something like anger. It was reassuring to see the spark after their careful weekend of premeditated levity. Her hand shot up, fingers flared as if to physically stop him.
"Now hold your horses. We are not getting her into this yet. Not until we know more. She doesn't need to worry about this."
Rick found Kate's eyes.
"What do you think, Kate? Does Alexis deserve to know now?"
She was completely floored. Her thoughts lurched to a stop, lips wouldn't move.
He was asking her advice.
He was asking, and the question had no direct connection to her.
And just like that, she understood exactly where all her intrusive, possessive instincts had come from over the past week.
She had been taking care of her family.
She might be marrying Castle next summer, but she was already in so deep with all of them that the vows and the dress and the legalities seemed trite, nearly an afterthought.
She looked at Martha and then back at her fiancé, took a breath, tried not to use her Beckett voice. This wasn't her team at work; she wasn't in charge. But she did get a vote, and that meant more to her than she would ever have imagined.
"We should tell her tomorrow night. After we know more—we can explain it better and tell her the options and she can help decide… whatever needs to be decided… if you want, Martha. But if we tell her now, she'll come over here, and it's just going to take her mind off her molecular biology exam tomorrow. Let her have one more normal night, Rick."
She left off the rest of that thought, the part that involved Alexis never being the same after this. Yes, it was her grandmother, and yes, right now it sounded as though the diagnosis was not as dire as it might have been, but there was no way to know for sure until they had more information.
His eyes were stern, clear-blue. She tried to interpret the firm line of his mouth as he considered her words, but all her Rick tells were failing her. Martha, on the other hand, had blinked hard, nodded, let her lips approach a smile.
Ultimately, Alexis was Rick's daughter. He hadn't shared decision-making with anyone, not even the girl's mother, for most of her life. She knew something hung on his response now, though she couldn't exactly put it into words. This was important. It was one thing to ask her. It was another to listen, even though she disagreed with him.
"Fine. I'll see if she can come have dinner. But I'm going with you, Mother. No arguments."
Everything melted inside her. She tugged her lower lip between her teeth and bit down sharply to keep it from overflowing. She couldn't call it happiness; there was nothing happy about tonight. But maybe relief. Relief, and an overwhelming sense of belonging, of having a place for the soft and tender and fallible parts of her that were only Kate.
"Not a one. I want you there."
Guilt rolled on top of the rest of her internal emotional uproar. She remembered this part of being in a family—letting them down. But she hadn't given anyone any notice, and they were sure to get a case by morning, and if Rick was going, then maybe she shouldn't intrude anyway.
"Martha, I don't know if I can…"
"Darling I wouldn't dream of asking you to miss another day of work for this little appointment. I'll have Richard with me. We'll muddle through somehow, though of course I would want you there."
And this, too, was familiar. The acceptance. The reassurance. Family could take the edge off this darkness.
Martha leaned in, gathered both of them up in a tight embrace.
Kate hoped the older woman was drawing strength from them.
Martha's alto blossomed between them, low and warm and snappy with humor.
"There aren't many things I would change about my life if I had it to do over again. But one would be to make a habit of telling you both how much I love you, at least often enough that it doesn't signal kidnapping or near-death experiences."
Castle let out a laugh as she released them, but Kate could only manage a watery smile.
Rick caught her eye, filled the silence for both.
"We love you, too, Mother. No near-miss required."
# * # * # * #
Short. But I have the next few all ready, so expect another one, maybe even tomorrow.
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