AN: T - Waking up to you every morning is the most treasured gift.
kairos
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He wakes like he's bobbing in a slow current, buoyed into the light, out, back in. Huddled in thick warmth beneath the blanket, he feels heavy, arms and legs limp, the remnants of sleep still lacing his bones, muscles, and ligaments. He stretches languidly, his limbs measuring the length of the bed as he tightens from fingertips to toes, his abdomen taut, head tilted back, two vertebrae popping in his neck.
The day's brightness seeps through his closed eyelids and he gradually blinks open his eyes, prepares for the piercing glare. Hazy brilliance fills his bedroom, and when he turns to look through the window he notices the puffy white heaps that have collected on the sill outside, little cottony mountains that line the glass.
Wow. It actually snowed overnight.
Snowflakes.
His head swivels abruptly, away from the window and to his left - and there's Kate, spread out across the other side of his bed. Kate, with her arms flung up around her head, her face half-smudged into the pillow, her hair a riot of wild chocolate-and-caramel curls that cascade over the edges of the creamy-white pillowcase. Kate, still fast asleep, despite the morning that has long since cracked across the horizon in a spill of luminous grey-white and blurred, pale pinks.
He rolls onto his side, toward her, elbow digging into the mattress as he rests his head in the cradle of his hand, his heart leaping in his throat.
She's so achingly beautiful.
He's never not known this, of course. Has never not been aware of her haunting beauty, from the moment she first flashed her badge at him, attitude as prickly as her hair. The exquisite, timeless eminence of her features, the devastating power of her smiles that buckle his knees and take his breath away. Her perfect profile when she analyzes the murder board, the exotic slant to her cheek bones and that sensual bottom lip; the adorable frown edged between her eyebrows when she's deep in thought, when the facts just won't add up. But the true depth of her beauty lies in her fierce strength, that vibrancy that seems to brim just beneath her skin. The well of compassion and her innate kindness that informs her every choice. Her bright intelligence, that spark that lights up her eyes when they untangle a story, when they spar with verbs and nouns, wield adjectives like swords; when she teases him, challenges him.
But this. This is brand-new. He gets to watch her all the time, in action and in thought, but never like this, quiet and motionless, caught in the suspended vulnerability of sleep. It's a gift, a treasure almost too valuable to comprehend and he lets his eyes roam, drinks in every detail, sipping at the font of her beauty.
Her closed eyelids are pale and naked, reminding him of delicate porcelain and he wants to put his lips to each, paint the fragile skin with tender kisses. Her lashes draw shadows to the rise of her cheekbones, fan darkly where her skin is tinged pink with sleep. He's enamored by the rhythmic rise and fall of her chest with every breath she takes and the hint of cleavage that peeks from beneath the v-neck of her nightshirt. He thinks of the scar that lies nestled there, hidden between her breasts, and his heart stutters, a fragile pulse against his ribs as he flashes back to the indelible moment when she closed her eyes, a dead weight in his arms against a backdrop at too-bright green. To the vulnerable woman propped up by the hospital bed, pale, drawn face and hollow eyes; the brittle woman crouched on the sidewalk, eyes wide with fear at the devastating echo of sniper shots.
She looks so peaceful now, her features relaxed and her limbs flung wide, claiming her space in his bed. Serene in a way he'd always hoped she would find, the weight of the world eased off her shoulders. It calms his heart, the memories dissipating as warmth curls through his blood, sweet and viscous. He yearns for her, feels like he could weep with it, the ache that consumes every part of him. Before he thinks it through, before he thinks better of it he's lifted his hand, thumb stroking at the warm pulse of her temple. He drifts his fingers down the side of her face, marvels at the silk of her skin as he swipes a thick curl off her cheek, combing it back into the mass of hair that haloes her head.
Lingering at the side of her neck, he feels the beat of her heart against the whorls of his fingertips, savors the warmth there, the life-affirming pulse through her vein even as he tells himself he should let her be, make sure not to wake her but then her nose scrunches, a cute little mewl humming in her throat. Before he can pull his hand away she's turning for him, sluggish and unaware as she nudges her cheek more firmly into his palm.
His heart, his fragile, breakable heart skips a beat, then starts thundering, hurtling itself against his ribcage. He cradles her face, fingers bracketing her ear, thumb caressing her cheekbone when her lashes tremble, when she slowly, assuredly opens her eyes.
The grey gleam of daylight floods her pupils, sets off the brilliance of her eyes, light and translucent like sun-kissed amber and he thinks he's quite possibly never seen anything more beautiful than Kate Beckett first thing in the morning, waking up, sleepy-faced and warm and hazy.
He can't seem to stop touching her, curling his fingers behind her ears where her skin is thin and tender. Kate doesn't speak, just smiles gently up at him, a little shy, a little wondrous and he's tongue-tied by it. Overwhelmed with sleepy-morning-Beckett, he says the first innate thing that pops into his head.
"You have cute ears."
Her smile widens, all teeth and raised eyebrows as if to say, 'really, Castle?' but when he strokes his index finger along the ridge of her ear she giggles, actually giggles. Hunches her shoulder up to her ear and hides her face in the pillow.
He bites at the grin that steals across his face, files the information away, hopefully for future reference - Kate Beckett is ticklish at the shell of her ear. He fits his palm to her jaw, watches her eyes close for a moment before she opens them again, looking at him.
"You stayed," he murmurs, hears the wonder in his own voice. She blinks, her laughter melting into a soft smile, the curve of her lips mellow and honeyed. Her fingers tentatively skate across the sheet, bridge the distance between them until she trails them up his sternum, lingers right above his frantic heart.
"You asked me to."
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Thank you for reading and your lovely comments. I treasure them all.