Close Encounters 25

The bath had about done her in. Kate could barely move when Castle came back to drain the tub and carry her in to bed. She had suggested him carrying her to bed nearly an hour ago because he had seemed to need it, to need to help, but she had found that she herself needed it, thoroughly wiped out.

He laid her in bed and drew a t-shirt over her head, kissed her jaw when she tried to open her eyes and reach for him.

"Sleep," he murmured.

"Early," she muttered back, but she couldn't seem to stay.

"It's okay, you sleep."

She slept and woke again when the mattress dipped, felt his arms around her. She was in and out of it, pulled sharply awake once with a gasp, not sure why, but then Castle was climbing back into bed with the baby.

"What's wrong?" she mumbled.

"Don't know," he whispered. "Sleep, Kate."

She slept, her face against his shoulder, still half concerned for her son.

When she woke the next morning, sunlight was filling the room and the dog was in bed with her, cozied up. She hummed and curled her arm around Sasha, tugged the wolf closer. Sasha nosed into her armpit and whuffed, lifted to lick her neck and chin.

"Hey, puppy."

"You're awake."

She rolled onto her back and saw Castle in the doorway. "I'm... awake. What time is it?"

"Nine."

"Oh. I missed his bedtime and his getting up this morning."

"He's okay." He turned his head and called back down the hallway. "James."

He had better have the baby gate up on the stairs.

"James, come see mama. She's awake. Come on. No, son, leave that there. You don't need it. Mommy wants to see you."

Kate shifted to sit up in bed, but she had to stay relatively low when the world tilted with some residual dizziness.

James came crawling into the room, scooting more than crawling. When he got to the end of the bed, he reached up and pulled on the bedspread, tried to use it to tug himself upright. But of course, the bedspread was in a clump at the foot and started to slip the moment James grabbed.

"Whoa, baby," she said, jerking up and towards him. She caught the bedspread before it could have him falling on his bottom, and then she leaned over the mattress and gripped him under the arm. "Hey, there. Look at you, standing up."

"He's about to walk. Any day now. Not just using Sasha as a walker."

At seven months old? But she saw it herself, how he could pull up on things and sideways inch his way, how his balance was so steady.

Castle came and picked up the baby, settled James in bed with her. She took the hint and eased back against the headboard, let her quiet but happy boy start crawling over her. He gripped her shirt at one arm and then her hair and stood up on her lap, bobbing his knees in excitement.

"Wow, look at you, Jay. You're so strong." She glanced to Castle, hovering on the edges of things, and she patted the mattress. "Sit with us, Rick."

"Are you - going to do your journal?"

She blinked. "Yeah. I - yeah. Get me some paper and a pen, will you? I'll do it right now."

If that's what he needed, rather than cuddling with their son in bed, then fine. She'd write the daily log and she'd do the work.

"Rick?"

He turned at the doorway, on his way to paper and pen.

She smiled at him. "I love you, you know. No matter what you say, or feel, your regrets or fears, your guilt or responsibility. Everything we've gone through - it makes us strong, so strong, Castle."

His shoulders eased. "If I can carry this guilt and responsibility with half the grace you do, Kate, then I'll consider it a gift." He came back in the room and leaned over them to smooth down James's shirt. And then he kissed her. So softly.

They were going to make it; they had already survived. Now they were going to thrive.

Day One:

(Although really, it's been more than one day since Paris and Cologne but I guess we're counting by journal days. Shit, Castle, it's harder to do this knowing you're going to read it. This feels like a police report.)

9 am - woke up feeling 7 or 8; snuggled with Wolf; writing this journal entry against my thigh while James pulls my hair as he tries to stand up behind me, wedging his little body between me and the headboard. what are you doing back there, you crazy kid?

Goals: five small meals per Carrie's meal plan. Give my son his bottle tonight. Yoga dvd for some conditioning. Um, I don't know what else, but I'm sure there are other things. Oh, I need to call Lanie.

8 pm - well, fuck. fine, about a 5. I slept most of the day. I hate sleeping away the day. Lanie called and we talked but I don't remember the whole conversation and I fell asleep in the middle but she just stayed on the line. James refuses to go to bed; he won't take the bottle. Castle has to do it because Wolf is wriggling around too much. I'm in bed upstairs now, and he's in the baby's room, and it makes me miserable and restless and there's no way I'm falling asleep tonight.

And now I've got to read about that first day in Paris and I'm going to be nasty to you, I can feel it coming. I really don't want to hurt you. I just don't want to keep hurting you.

One.

Seeing Paris with you, the Eiffel Tower and your wonder, how it filled me up with wonder too - that was a beautiful moment. I cherish that morning, standing under the wrought iron structure and staring straight up into the sky, to the top, and how amazing it is to know the work and effort involved - and that it endures.

I want to remember that the most. But what I dream instead is lying on a roof in the rain and feeling the cold down to my bones and knowing how stupid it was to not take the regimen like I'm built to. How stupid and my fingers are cramping with soreness and some numbness and I look through the scope and watch you fall. Into the mud. Crumple.

I took the shot. It was instinct. I don't remember making the decision, I just shot. I'm trained to. I am not, however, trained to leave my equipment lying on a roof and rush down the stairs four steps at a time, slam through an emergency door so that the alarm sounds, and pelt across the gardens at top speed, attracting the attention of every single person in the gardens that day. A man was there, trying to tend to Jolin. I barely looked at her.

You were alive, breathing, but your heart was slow, missing beats. Your face was white and the rain soaked us and the mud was caked all down one side. I panicked. I admit it. I didn't know what to do. I kept searching for a gunshot wound. I thought Jolin had shot you, or someone in the park had done it; I thought it was an ambush - because you'd been fine.

I thought you were fine until that moment, thought it was just fine. That terrifies me still, knowing how wrong I was, how I didn't see it. I remember you telling me that once about the time I got my super flu, how you just didn't think it would get so bad, how you kept apologizing for not paying better attention. I used to think that was so stupid - it's not your job to measure every fever and cough and sniffle. But I get it now.

I understand a lot more. I-

I need to finish this. It's not a novel. Just a damn log.

I carried you to the van. It was not my finest moment. I was weak; it was raining and the gardens were muddy. I had trouble running and the police made chase. Black wanted to stay in the back of the van with you but I wouldn't - he drove until we got to a garage. I had left the sniper rifle on the roof and the gun had fallen out in the park and I had no weapons and I wanted us to go to a hospital, but he wouldn't do that. He wouldn't take you, and it was between driving myself with him doing something to you back there or letting him - letting him have his way.

And then we changed cars because he said he knew of something that would help - the charcoal method - and that he knew you had toxicity and it was the only thing to make sense and it killed me that he - but it made sense. It was terrible but it made sense.

But you had a seizure and you were shaking and it - that was awful. The convulsions. I never want to see that again. I thought - but it did convince me then that it had to be regimen-related.

Your heart stopped while I was driving this Fiat I stole, and I pulled over and crawled into the back and took over chest compressions. I don't know if he really - he looked like he was trying and then he would look like he wasn't trying at all, like it was all a trick, and I couldn't trust anything he said. And then he pulled a fucking needle out of the first aid kit and I lost it. I just - cracked. He stabbed it into your ribs to get at your heart and the atropine worked - it did work. Your eyes flew open for a second and I was holding you and you sucked in a breath and your heart was beating.

We went to a place he knew and I stole some medical supplies but the whole time I had to leave you in the backseat with him. Wondering if he'd do it again, save your life if I wasn't there to force the issue, but if I didn't get the supplies then we couldn't get the charcoal and I couldn't find any of the right ingredients. Oh, that was the pharmacy. There was a pharmacy first. I don't know, Kate, it was - it runs together into that one moment where he stabbed you with the needle. It just, everything I know is right at that moment and I can't get past it.

I carried you up the stairs to this crap place - you remember it. We hid out there until Hunt came with the ambulance, but that's not this first day. I don't know what else. I couldn't carry you like I should have, my arms and legs were shaking. So I knew I needed the pure serum, needed to take it, and he was so pleased. So I got the shot; he had it in the freezer there so it must have been a depot for that for him. I got the shot and I fought - fought it off. I tried to stay awake, Kate, I tried to - because I didn't know if he would try something.

I had to threaten him - he had a knife. I got the knife away but he'd already cut your hair. It was matted with mud and Jolin's blood and it was getting into the IV, but it killed me. I got the knife from him and I was - I was falling apart at every moment and I didn't know what to do that was right. You kept dying and I had serum coursing through my veins, dragging at me, shutting me down.

I don't know what else. I think you fell asleep, but I didn't. I couldn't. And then I passed out for twenty minutes and it was so bad to see his face when I woke and know he'd been there watching me, watching you that whole time.

Joy:

This is better. This is a good idea, ending with joy.

When I gave James cheerios this morning for breakfast, it was just the two of us downstairs in the kitchen and he beamed up at me, arched his back in the high chair in that way he does. He lifted both hands and clapped and I shook some cheerios out of the box and he just kept smiling so big. And then he said daddy and clapped again, like he was congratulating me on a job well done.

And it felt like that. It felt like an accomplishment to be downstairs with him and not panic about whether or not you were still breathing upstairs. I knew you were because you slept all last night and slept hard and when I kissed you as I slipped out of bed, you hummed and said my name.

So that was two people calling me by name, two people I love who love me back, and if I'm not being conceited, who seem to adore me too.

Just the way you both said it.

She was aware of him in a way she didn't think she ever had been before.

When Kate had been shot in the back at her captain's funeral, jumping in front of a bullet for Castle hadn't been of any consequence to her. Of course she would. Of course. At the time, their relationship hadn't been defined, had been rather room-mate-ish, friends with benefits, but her heart had been thoroughly entangled with his despite her best efforts.

No, honestly? She had thought herself so protected, but there was no defense against Rick Castle. Not for her.

Waking up to see him at her bedside, waking up to that intensity of feeling on his face had nearly swamped her. She hadn't been prepared for it, had felt his need and his love drowning her. But he'd been so solid, so strong, that she had let herself lean. Let herself need him back, love him back, even though she hadn't been ready for it.

This was different. This recovery was gutting them out - when it wasn't completely rebuilding them. It was hard to understand how they could be both so bad for each other and yet so good for each other too. When she'd been shot, she'd pushed and battled and fought and he had done the same, and Stone Farm had been misery for her.

Now they were trying so hard not to be each other's misery.

She paced the basement space not taken up by their panic room, measuring out the distance from the washer and dryer to the back wall, nervous.

He was coming down the basement stairs with some equipment. James was napping in his crib; Castle had the baby monitor with him, though they didn't need it. The panic room had CCTV directly above the baby's bed. She could see him asleep from her spot right before the open door.

Castle dumped an exercise band and free weights on top of the front-loader, leaned the yoga mat and exercise ball against the wall.

"You sure you can do this?" she asked, biting her bottom lip.

"Yeah."

"You sure you want to do this?" she said, a little softer now.

He gave her a shake of his head and rubbed his hand through his hair. He looked a little haggard. Their last few journals had been rough, and she knew he didn't like dredging it up.

She didn't particularly like reading it. She supposed it would help them at some point, but she didn't see it yet. She'd had a panicked moment in the bathroom yesterday that had made her yank out her phone and call King, and he'd talked her down while she pushed herself into the tight space between the toilet and the wall, trying not to let Castle hear her hyperventilate.

When it'd been over, she'd come out and he'd been right there, leaning against the closet door, eyes closed, grief-stricken for her.

There'd been some slow sex and his worshipful mouth and her needy fingers, and they'd let it smooth out and roll off of them.

She hoped.

"I need you to - push me when I don't want to be pushed," she said.

He dropped his hand at his side. "I know what to do."

"I'm not questioning your-"

"I can be your trainer, Kate. If it means we stay within these walls, stay safe, then I can do it."

"You hate pushing me," she sighed.

"I pushed you in Russia," he countered, his jaw setting in that little boy stubbornness that James had at times as well. It was cute. He looked cute when he was pushing back against her, when he was digging in his heels and insisting on his way.

"You did."

"I pushed you in Cologne, pushed you on the trip home. I can push you, Kate Beckett, when I have to."

She nodded, suppressed her smile. "I stand corrected."

"Damn straight."

She didn't look at him to avoid showing her hand, but now Castle was bristling and battle-ready, wanting to prove himself, rather than hesitant and dwelling in the past. He was going to push her, yeah, and she was going to hate it a little after this, but she needed it.

She was sick and tired of being too weak to hold her son, too weak to walk down the stairs, too weak to even stay awake through the day.

Time to start physical therapy.

"Yoga mat," Castle barked. "Let's start with stretches. You don't move your body - I move your body. You understand?"

"Yes, sir," she said, suppressing the smirk as much as she possibly could.

"Oh, you won't be smiling, Agent Beckett. Not when I'm through with you."

Oh, but she was already so much more already. More thrilled. More excited. She couldn't help leaning into him as she moved past for the yoga mat, couldn't help kissing his firm, stern mouth with a brush of her lips, an amused thank you in the offering.

He scowled back at her.

Day Six:

7:00 am. I'm a 6 for sure. I'm more accurate now, look at me. I can learn.

I do learn. Right? I think I'm better at this. Something about knowing what I'm trading my day for - for Castle's day, for a day I spent dying - that sobers me.

Let's see, goals: I will actually get to the yoga dvd today, though I'll mostly do the breathing exercises. I don't have that pain behind my sternum any longer, so it must have been a muscle strain like Logan said. I feel good, but I expect I'll be sleeping a lot of today. Snuggles with Wolf boy, though he'd rather crawl all over me. I've been his jungle gym this week. He likes to giggle as he puts his foot in my ribs and tries to get up on my shoulder. Wrestling with him has been a good test of what I can do.

10:00 pm. Okay, not bad. I stayed a 6 today. I slept the same naps as the wolf pack. Got woken up this afternoon by James, giggling. He crawled all over the bed and wrestled the dog with me between. Castle got in bed with us and then we were all giggling. Your face, Castle, looks so much better now. You look like you're going to make it.

Those things make me happy. Even if I slept all day, it's not such a bad day if those are my accomplishments.

Six.

It was mostly the same as the day before; I won't make you - either of us - go through it. I would sit by your cot and hold your hand, trying not to bend the IV line, and your fingers would twitch against my lips from time to time and let me know you were there.

You had a panic attack when Black was trying to help with the meds, and it was really bad - you would stop breathing and your eyes would lock on mine, wild and scared, and all I could do was pet your hair back from your face and try to help you remember how to breathe.

With the windows covered by aluminum foil and newspaper, it was dark in there. We had the hurricane lamp and Black was gone a lot of that day. Now I know why. Late that afternoon, he told me we were moving, we had to go, he said the Collective was going block by block, searching.

I looked, and there were signs. It seemed accurate, but I could never tell with him. He'd bend the truth to make it look like what he wanted, and I told him no, that you couldn't be moved. Your heart was - the chelation seemed to make things worse sometimes. I couldn't be sure of anything.

And then he orchestrated it all on his own. He had Hunt throw a smoke bomb into an unoccupied apartment so that emergency services were called in. I still don't know whether or not there was also an actual fire. Just so much chaos that night. I carried you downstairs, you remember that, right? You were curled up against me, and Kate, you're a tall woman, I love your legs, but you were so small that night. I felt like I was carrying everything precious to me, my own heart outside my body for anyone to bleed.

You had the gun, but I think I did that just to make us both feel better. I'm not sure you could have lifted it, let alone withstood the recoil.

In the stairwell on the way down, all these people were crowding to get down, and I got panicked about it. I could see us getting stuck and the Collective making their move - if it was them with the surveillance car down the street - and here I was carrying you. So I just started shouting for them to move, to clear the way, and the amazing thing was - they did.

I don't even think I was speaking German. I must have been. You know that happens to me, slipping in and out of languages, and they understood, so I guess I was. But it was crawling up my throat, this panic that we'd get trapped in the stairwell, and so I just started pushing forward.

They let us by. It was - that was the first time I really believed that we were going to be okay. That someone was looking out for us, God or Fate or the universe. I had been praying, my lips against your hand, praying please, please, please. But I don't know to who or what. I thought maybe you, or just - putting it out there, needing there to be something else, something more powerful than me because I wasn't cutting it.

And then those people parted before us like water, and we walked through them, and out to the street and there was Hunt coming up to meet us.

It was after midnight in the ambulance when your heart stopped. I'll leave that for tomorrow.

My Joy:

James woke in the night again, but this time, he wasn't sad. He was smiling up at me - you know that one he has where he ducks his head and looks so shy? It was three o'clock in the morning, but he lifted his arms and wanted to be picked up, and so I did. I sat with him in the rocker and he kept saying, "Mama, mama."

So I took him to our bed. He didn't wake you, we were quiet, but he and I talked. I don't know how else to explain it. He babbled to me really quietly, kept patting my chest or looking over at you, and I answered him back. We had a whole conversation about being good for mommy and letting you sleep and how we were buddies in that.

After ten minutes or so, he laid his head down on my chest and he fell asleep, just like that. You were right there, and I reached out my hand and touched your cheek with the backs of my fingers and you sighed a little and nuzzled in.

That was a good night.

"What happened to you don't move your body, I move your body?" she snapped.

Castle flinched and she grunted, losing her balance at the last second. He caught her, arms trapping hers at her sides, and it took him a little time to release her again. She shivered.

"Sorry," he murmured. "Reset."

She shifted away from him, sweat at her collarbones, her temples, at the curl of hair at her nape. He could smell her frustration, and her stupid comment had been mere snark designed to cover her weakness.

He knew her, knew how she operated when she felt threatened, but it didn't make this any easier.

"Reset," he told her.

She didn't grumble at him, which showed just how far past good-natured pessimism she was. But she did reset, moving back into position, a tree-stand with one leg up and her foot braced on her other knee.

She wobbled immediately and pitched towards him.

Castle caught her again, gripped the back of her neck where the sweat was slick and felt erotic under his fingers, a jolt to his system. He was reminded of their son asleep upstairs, of the week's worth of journal entries that always seemed to surprise her (you had to do that? she'd cried). He didn't want to be doing this, another blow, another way to beat her down, but if he stopped, she'd lose it.

She was panting, struggling to right herself, unable to get her balance. A fist in his shirt, the hot breath against his jaw as she pushed off against him.

She collapsed back with a little moan. He knew that moan. He closed his eyes and put that moan into a different context, let his fingers dapple the ridges of her spine at her neck, let his body trick him into believing they were in bed together.

Do that again, she moaned.

"Reset," he growled into her ear.

"Fuck you," she snapped.

He sucked in a breath, tasting her sweat and work, her desperation. "Reset."

She whined but struggled upright; he pressed in close this time, her body electric near his body, skins brushing. She was panting. He could picture last night, and her fingers pleading so eloquently without even voicing it, and this afternoon was the same. Her mewling let him know.

"Reset, Beckett."

"I'm trying," she hissed. Her breath caught and released as she shook.

He kept his eyes closed to not see it, his hands slowly letting go, and he could sense the moment she began dragging her bare foot up the inside of her other leg, trying to move into tree position.

"Palms together," he insisted. Put your hands-

"Shit," she breathed. "Shit. Castle, please."

Please, please, don't stop.

He opened his eyes and saw hers were closed, face contorted, bottom lip trapped in her teeth. She was struggling wildly with her balance, exhausted beyond all ability, but it was the end of their session and he knew she wanted to finish strong.

"You can do it, Kate," he husked. His heart was ragged in his chest, but beating still. "Come on, babe. Give me what we both want."

She gasped and her eyes startled open, hearing his obvious insinuation. Her chest rose and fell, her body straightened up a little more, and she focused. Her concentration pinpointed - he could see it in her eyes, how she shifted into that go mode, Beckett mode - and her foot inched up her calf to her knee.

She stood in position, breathing hard, eyes locked onto his.

"You got it, sweetheart, you got it. Don't stop."

She looked ready to come apart; she'd cry after this. He knew that too. She'd burst into tears as she had two days ago, relief and frustration pouring out of her. He was ready for it this time.

Or so he told himself.

He counted off her time out loud, going slowly over the numbers to torture her, just a little, just enough to make this whole damn PT session worth it - to push her just that much further than last time.

She was shaking so badly that his hands kept flinching towards her. She was shaking so badly she'd clamped her mouth shut and was breathing through flared nostrils, her elbows dipping erratically as her pressed palms before her chest kept falling.

"Three... two... one," he said and she was finally released.

Kate dropped her foot and nose-dived straight into his chest with a choking noise she couldn't seem to suppress. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his mouth in her hair and felt her first shudders, the way she fought it still.

And then she cried.

Messy tears, wracked out of her wrecked body, the body he was tearing down so that she could build it back, the body he adored with everything in him.

He was going to die before they were through with this. It would kill him.

"You're so strong, babe. You did so good," he whispered. "So good, Kate. I'm so proud of you."

She sobbed against his chest until her knees went weak and refused to hold her up, and so he swept his arm under her knees and carried her into the open panic room, laid them both down on the bed.

He held her while she wept through a surfeit of exhaustion and emotion, and he hated himself, he hated her, but he loved her.

She fell asleep clutching his shirt.

Day Nine: 9 am. I slept in a little because we were up late, and we had fun, didn't we? That was definitely my joy last night. Really looking forward to being let off restrictions, babe, and you should be too.

Um, rating, I think, is more 5 or 6 than the 7 or 8 which I was hoping for, but that's probably because I seduced you. Didn't think it would take that much work. I need an emoticon for a smirking little smiley face but this pencil doesn't come with one. Pity.

Goals: Make lunch for my baby. Both of you. (Damn, insert another smirking smiley.) Stay awake on the couch. Convince you to get some work done in the office. Go the full length of the yoga dvd. Talk to the Office about the physical therapist whose supposed to be treating me for my 'GSW.' Maybe they can coordinate with Castle and he can do the training, but ug, no. I don't want that. You'd never let me out of the house. So then it becomes a matter of finding a PT we can trust.

8 pm. Rock on. I am awesome. The whole dvd. Felt so damn good to sweat. Fuck, I miss working out. I really want to run sometime soon. You can push James in the Bob and that way maybe I can keep your pace, maybe. Who am I kidding? I won't be able to keep your pace even if you're handicapped by the jogging stroller. Still. I wanna run, babe. We have got to do that.

I'd say a 7 tonight. I feel really good. And I slept hard during both his naps, and I woke up feeling good both times. That hasn't really happened since we got back. I'm going to try not to push it, even though I feel so damn good. Not going to make you run with me, so that's an improvement, right? I'm figuring this out.

I love you, Castle. I really - a few days ago, I wasn't sure I could get back to this. It's so easy to forget how good the good really is. I'm glad we have to write it down. I think I want to go back and read these again to remind myself.

Nine.

We came home. You were so miserable. I could tell you felt like shit, but all you said was I want to go home. I would've done anything for you, at that point, and I did. Just to get you home. I didn't think about anything else or let my mind wander to long-range plans. I just wanted to do what you wanted because you were alive.

I won't retell events you already know. The point of this is to give you an idea of what it was like for me, so I'll give you that: it was hell. Every minute, I expected your heart to stop with the strain of travel. Every hour in the air felt like the worst betrayal - because if something went wrong, if it went bad, it would be so very bad. We were cut off from all help. There was just me, and I already knew I wasn't enough. We'd kicked Black to the curb and we were alone, and if you died in flight, there was nothing I could do. It was the worst feeling, almost worse than seeing you collapse in Paris, because every second of that flight, I knew exactly what could happen and how bad it could be.

I'm not sure I breathed, the whole flight. And then it was as mundane as driving you home, like it was any other mission, and you were falling asleep in the car. I think I gripped the steering wheel, choking it, until we parked right out front.

All I wanted that day was to get you home because you wanted to be home. You're not the type of person to let anyone know when you're needy, but you were letting me know, and you were just emotionally vulnerable enough to let me know again and again, and that got to me. I shouldn't have let us leave so soon; we probably should have recouped in Florence for a few more days. But we were home.

I think your need and your drive took me over. Because the only thing I could feel when we walked inside the door and you took James from your dad - the only thing I could at all feel was just such fucking relief. God, I can still feel it, once removed, just how damn grateful I was to see you home. To have James in your arms again. Sometimes I think it was all of our feelings together, like a weight, all of us so relieved that it wasn't possible to feel anything else. Any of my own misgivings were crushed beneath the force of that finally.

And then that night, when it had worn off a little, all I could feel was guilty.

I'll stop there to give you our Joy: James was trying out his sea legs this afternoon and I was holding his hands and letting him lurch forward, almost walking. I could feel how he didn't quite always need me, and I was thinking, this is the moment I'll write about, how he's so close, so very close to walking. Almost eight months old and I bet he does it soon.

One of his hands tugged away to reach for Sasha, but the dog had already slipped by him. And I thought, I'll let him go and see what happens. So I worked my finger out from his grasp, just working slowly so I wouldn't set him off balance, and James was stretching his other hand out for the dog and shushing her - that has got to be him calling her name, Shh, Shh.

And I let go.

He wavered for a second. He was so surprised to find himself standing without any help that he turned his whole body back to me to share it - and he fell flat on his face. It was a hard fall, and right in the entry on the tile, and God, I felt awful for it. I thought, this is definitely not my moment of joy right here.

But James lifted his face, his lip was bleeding where he'd busted it, and I had hunched down to pick him up again, and he crawled right into my lap and clung to me. He sobbed a little at first, like his feelings were hurt, but not by me. By the floor for betraying him and being so hard, by his surprise for knocking him off-balance, betrayed even by his own legs. But not by me.

He had fistfuls of my shirt and he slobbered tears and blood all down the front, but he huddled against me. Me. He wanted me. He cried for daddy, and I held him, and it was the first time in a month that I felt like I could actually be everything for my family. Everything they needed, he needed, you needed.

You were doing yoga and I carried him into the living room with me and the two of us sat down on the couch together and watched you and your perfect balance, both of us a little envious.