He couldn't have heard, could he? 'Who am I kidding, he's just left the Observation Room, of course he heard…. Shit.' Beckett's breath caught, tight in her chest. The realisation of what she'd just said fully hit home now. How could she have been so stupid? She risked a glance sideways, caught a glimpse of Castle out the corner of her right eye. A rush of cool air and the light scent of cologne flew past her in Castle's wake. 'This is it' she thought, 'He's leaving me'.
It took all of Castle's strength not to breakdown right there, in that moment. Making a break for the elevator, he fixed his gaze to the floor, not wanting anyone to see the hurt in his eyes or the tears building at the brims. He punched the elevator call button once, twice, three times hoping it would speed up the process. To his relief, just a few seconds later the doors slid open to the over familiar sound of that satisfying 'ding' he'd become accustomed to. He stepped inside, hit the button for the exit and leant back against the NYPD emblem, head pointed at the ceiling, eyes shut. He had to get out, had to. The doors of the elevator began to close and Castle breathed a sigh of relief as the elevator activated its descent as a single tear rolled down the side of his face and towards his ear.
His mind was full of all sorts; feelings of foolishness to grief, freedom to confusion, cherries and vanilla…wait. Cherries and vanilla? Ahem. Castle heard a small cough indicative of someone clearing their throat. He could've sworn the elevator was empty when he got in and…the elevator ground to a halt. He raised a solitary eyelid, peering into the space around him. His visual field was filled by none other than Katherine Beckett, finger holding the 'stop' button on the elevator control panel. He should've known. She's clever, too clever it seems in light of recent events. He hadn't heard her climb in the elevator and he'd just assumed the cherries and vanilla were in his mind as they so very often were.
Castle lowered his head, opened both eyes and just glared at the woman that once held his heart so delicately, yet had just closed her fist and squashed it so defiantly, so completely. His wounds so raw, Castle did nothing – not because he didn't want to shout and scream at her for all the hurt she'd caused, but because he was physically incapable of it. No matter what she'd done to him, he could never knowingly cause Beckett any pain. That and the fact all of his remaining energy was fuelling his efforts to dam the waterfall so close to the edge of his brilliant blue eyes. So he just stood there. In the confines of the metal box, suspended between floors five and six of the 12th Precinct, neither spoke a word. Beckett absorbed his hurt, feeling it at the depths of her very core. A look of bewilderment painted all over her face attempted to project the words her mouth could not. Finally, Beckett was the one to break the silence.
"Castle, we need to talk."
"How can we talk when I can barely look at you?"
"Please, Castle. Just hear me out." Kate pleaded with him
"I..bu-..Can't we ju-…" Castle was lost for words, a rare occurrence for a man so adept at finding the right thing to say even in the hardest moments. This caught Kate off guard, so unused to seeing the mighty Castle as a figure of vulnerability – a fortress crumbling into unrecognisable ruins.
The Detective in her reared its head and roared back into action.
"We don't have to talk about this right now," she proclaimed in her best authoritarian-Detective voice. "But we can stay here for as long as it takes. I mean, it's not as if we're going anywhere is it?" She may have sounded stern and in control, but even Beckett took a moment to consider whether she was talking about the elevator or their relationship – she was so caught up in the literary brilliance of Castle and all that he embodied that even she couldn't help but note the potential double meaning in her words and in turn, feel a little misplaced pride. Still, at least this way she didn't have to confront it directly – she could let Castle do the work, find the words and make it right again, just like he always does… 'Snap out of it.' She told herself. 'You messed this up, you fix it for a change. You catch murderers for a living, this is a walk in the park…' she breathed deeply, let out a long sigh as much to steady her nerves as break the painful silence that surrounded her.
Beckett stepped away from Castle – who was still standing at the rear of the elevator – and let herself slide down the wall next to the elevator doors. 'Even the playing field' she thought. By reducing her own domineering presence, she was backing down, allowing Castle to take the power and be the driving force in whatever this was.
"I should've known," he muttered, "once a cop, always a cop."
"What?" disbelief and indignity washed through Kate, her eyes flickered repeatedly across his facial features, the strong line of his jaw, the brilliant blue of his eyes – all searching for clues but to no avail.
"You're treating me like one of your suspects. Think a game of 'Good Cop/Bad Cop' is gonna fix this?"
"I don't…what do you mean, Castle?"
"You come in, all authority and 'don't mess with the Detective', and when that doesn't work you switch tactics – try a round of 'Caring Kate' instead? Back off, let the perp think he's in control, take the heat away from the moment, let them run their mouth a bit, incriminate themselves…Well I'm pleading the fifth." Kate looked up at him from where she sat, fixed her gaze just below the newly developed anger lines on his forehead.
"You might not like it, but it works doesn't it? You're talking, which is a hell of a lot more than you were doing before." Her words sounded cool and collected, carefully chosen and rehearsed like she'd said them a thousand times before.
"Well I have news for you, Detective," the stale bitterness of the word leapt from his mouth and hit her square in the face, the rising tension in his voice painfully apparent, "I'm not a case to be closed or a suspect to lock up or a clue to find. If I was, we'd be done by now. Long finished. So if nothing else, at least do me the courtesy of talking to me like a real human being!" With that, Castle exploded, turned 180 degrees and threw his fist toward the metal wall. He pierced through the wooden NYPD emblem, its remains splintering around him as the bones of his knuckles made crushing contact with the cold steel behind, its resistance futile under his strength as it crumpled and hollowed to make way for his fist. But it wasn't the sting and searing pain in his fist that caused his relief, but rather the surge of heartbreak as it drained from his soul like the blood drops now trickling down his fingertips, away from his heart.
She knew she had tipped him over the edge. The instantaneous change in the man she knew so well, loved so dearly was unexpected and revealed a side of him Kate never knew existed – a side Beckett had trained for years to combat yet for this instance, had no desire to diffuse. The man needed to hurt, to show her his hurt the only way he could think of now that words were abandoning him. Just knowing that she was the cause of his suffering was tearing her up inside, knowing she could have prevented it…well, there are no words to describe her feelings. To give feelings words is to diminish them, depreciate their worthiness. Feelings are words of the heart, a language all of their own – a language that Kate had refused to learn. Many years ago, Kate had barricaded her heart behind unyielding stony walls to keep the echo of this unfamiliar dialect from penetrating her, from making her weak. She hadn't realised it until now, but those same walls came tumbling down the day she met Castle and the rubble she was carrying around was beginning to weigh her down.