Nineteen

The week after Valentine's Day Kate unexpectedly found herself eating dinner with Castle and his daughter nearly every night. That week, the detective partners had pulled what Kate referred to as "regular shifts" or the seven a.m. to five p.m. time slot. Somehow, after finishing up for the day, leaving the office together and getting on the subway train going towards southern Manhattan just seemed normal.

Throughout the week, Kate heard about Alexis's history exam and field trip to the art museum. As Alexis was equally as chatty if not more so than her father, Kate felt as though she had been the one touring the art museum with all the detail she received. She was, however, glad to hear the girl enjoyed her trip since the prior weekend she seemed more than a little uncertain about it.

On Friday of that week, Kate made a pit stop at her apartment before going to Castle's. Per his request, she was picking up a bag of her toiletries and a change of clothing so she could spend the night. Initially, Kate was uncomfortable with this idea because Alexis was not staying at a friend's that night; she would be in the apartment. Then she realized in lieu of their conversation at the movie theater the prior weekend the cat was out of the bag, so to speak; Alexis was already aware Kate was spending the night.

Still, Kate did not want to flaunt this fact and confessed so to her partner. Castle brushed off her concerns stating that her spending the night had actually been Alexis's idea. Or, rather, a result of Alexis's suggestion. Evidently, Alexis was in the mood for a huge breakfast with pancakes, eggs, bacon and hash browns. Her father was reluctant to make such a meal unless it was a special occasion, but Alexis talked him in to it as long as there was a third person there to share in the cooking, eating, and cleaning up. Upon hearing this, Kate decided not to turn down the invitation; she hadn't had bacon or hash browns in ages.

Due to the frustrating Friday traffic, it took her almost an hour and a half to make the trek to her apartment, retrieve her belongings, and then get to Castle's. When she entered his apartment, she found him pacing the hall, worry lines creased deeply into his forehead. Naturally, she asked what was going on.

"I have no idea," he told her. "Alexis has apparently been holed up in her room ever since she got home and she won't come out. She won't even talk to me! I have no idea what's going on."

Kate shrugged off her coat and set her shoes against the wall. "Maybe she's sick?" she offered.

He wrung his hands. "I don't know. Maybe. But I haven't heard her go into the bathroom or anything. She's just in her room and won't say anything. Will you try to talk to her?"

Kate's eyes widened. "Me?! Why would she talk to me if she won't talk to you?" she asked. He shot her a desperate look and guilt overtook her. "Alright…alright…"

Smoothing her hands down the front of her sweater, Kate walked up to Alexis's bedroom door and knocked gently. "Alexis? It's Kate. Can…can I come in?" Kate pressed her ear to the door and turned her head towards her partner. He looked as though he was awaiting the tests results of a horrible, incurable disease. Kate resisted the urge to roll her eyes; she doubted the scenario was that dramatic.

"Come in; it's unlocked." Alexis's voice was very soft on the other side of the door.

Slightly surprised that she'd been given the go-ahead, she flashed a thumbs-up to her partner before opening the bedroom door. Kate had never been inside Alexis's room before. She had walked past the door when it was partially open, but she had never stopped and stared. Thus, she was surprised to find the walls painted a very soft pink hue.

The room was fairly small and cramped, which wasn't surprising for a Manhattan apartment. A small closet and the white chest of drawers beside it covered one end of the room. Along the front wall stood a desk crowded with half a dozen books and a laptop computer. Pushed against the far wall was a white bedframe, unmade with quilts and pillows haphazardly strewn about.

Amongst these items sat Alexis. She appeared to be still dressed in her school uniform of a navy blue long sleeved shirt and khaki pants. With her chin pointed to the ground, a curtain of her orange-red hair blocked her face from Kate's view.

Cautiously, Kate stepped into the room and took a seat at the desk chair which was almost directly opposite of the girl. She rested her hands on her knees and said gently, "Your dad said you've been in here ever since he got home and you wouldn't let him inside. Is everything okay?"

"No."

Right. Obviously, Kate chastised herself. If everything was ok, Alexis wouldn't have shut herself into her room and refused to speak to anyone about it. "Do you want to tell me what's wrong?"

Instead of speaking, Alexis very slowly used both hands to tuck chunks of hair behind her ears. Then, at a positively glacial pace, she pushed herself off the bed and stood. Turning only twenty degrees at a time, she ultimately spun herself around giving Kate a view of her back side.

Kate was initially confused until she spotted a few dark splotches on the seat of the girl's khaki pants; blood. Immediately, the cop in her panicked. Her heart rate spiked and she wondered what the hell happened to the girl at school that day. Had she been abused? Attacked?

Twenty seconds later, Kate took a deep breath and remembered that in real life, not every incident involved a violent crime. Most times, the simplest answer was the correct one. "You, ah, you got your period in school and it went through your pants?" Kate asked. Alexis turned back around and nodded as she sat back down on her bed.

Well, that certainly explained things. No wonder Alexis hadn't wanted to tell her father what was wrong when she came home. Kate transported herself back to her early teen years and her sympathy for the girl grew instantly. Fortunately, she had her mother to turn to for any issues of the female kind. The mere concept of taking such problems to her father was laughable; he would have had no idea what to do.

Kate rested her forearms on her thighs and ducked her head to look at the girl. "Did someone laugh at you, Alexis?" Again, the girl nodded.

The detective sucked in a deep breath. "Alexis, I'm sorry. I know this won't make you feel much better but this happens to everyone. Really, it does. Sooner or later it will happen to the girls that laughed at you."

Alexis looked up at her from under her brow line. "Boys laughed at me."

Oh. Well, that wasn't as easy, was it?

"Okay, well, it won't happen to them, but you are not the first girl this has happened to and you won't be the last," Kate promised her. Then, feeling a little female solidarity might help her, she continued, "It happened to me, too. When I was changing for gym class. It's kind of like a rite of passage."

Alexis looked up at her, glum as ever. Right, Kate said to herself, this is why I'm not a parent. Knowing her attempt to make the situation better failed, Kate decided to switch gears. "I know it seems awful right now, but everyone at school will forget about this by next week. You just need to be prepared in the future. Do you keep pads or panty liners in your backpack?"

"No," Alexis mumbled.

Finally a problem she could fix! Alexis wasn't aware of how critical it was to have a female emergency supply pack at the ready (pads/tampons, tissues, and a nail file were an absolute must!). Kate deduced this was because no one had ever showed her. Not that Castle was to blame, of course; how was he to know what women carried around in their purses?

"Well you should. Why don't you put some in there right now before you forget?" Kate suggested with a smile.

Alexis looked up at her still rather terrified and Kate's jaw dropped an inch. She had no idea how, but in that moment everything clicked in her brain. Shit! Oh, holy shit this was definitely not what she signed up for when she arrived that evening! This was definitely a task for a parent but…damn. She was the one sitting in Alexis's room, wasn't she? And she couldn't abandon the girl. For better or worse, she was stuck.

Kate cleared her throat and leaned a bit closer to the girl. "Alexis…do you have pads or panty liners?" Confirming her suspicions, Alexis shook her head. "Is…is this the first time you…oh, right." Kate's voice dropped off when the girl looked even more terrified.

Oh boy. How the hell was she supposed to have this discussion? What was she even supposed to say? Part of her wanted to run and get Castle but good lord he would be a disaster in this situation.

Kate took a deep breath and stood from her seat. Somehow, she figured pacing the tight space in Alexis's room would make her feel better during this uncomfortable discussion. "Okay, Alexis, okay. Well, um, you know what—I mean why this is happening, right?"

"I had health class."

"Right." Of course she had. To that day Kate remembered the video that all the girls watched in fifth grade; she still felt traumatized by it. "Okay—I know this can be kind of scary at first. It was for me and," I had my mom, she finished to herself. As Alexis's mom was…well, Meredith, she knew a comment like that would not help her so instead she just said, "But, you know, it's all totally natural. Do…do you want to ask me anything?"

The younger girl turned her large blue eyes up towards Kate. "Is it always going to be like this?"

"Like what?"

"Bloody."

Kate couldn't help but laugh. "Yes, and I won't lie to you – I imagine it'll get slightly worse from what you had today, but don't worry; you'll get used to it."

Alexis was quiet for a moment before asking, "Will it happen the same day every month?"

"It could, but honestly it'll probably be really sporadic at first. That's what I remember." Kate bit down on her bottom lip and tried to think back to that time. It all kind of blurred together, though she knew it was in the seventh grade. Granted, that was eighteen years earlier. Damn, was she really that old?

"I think I was fourteen before it was regular—maybe even older. Even more reason to have pads in your backpack—and your purse."

"So you have them in yours?"

Kate grimaced. "Ah…generally I just carry tampons—but don't worry you don't have to use those until you're ready," she added quickly, noting Alexis's even more concerned expression. She took a moment to mentally inventory her purse. It was possible she had a panty liner, but she wasn't sure; she couldn't remember if she had replaced it the last time she used the one she carried.

"I might have something. What…what did you do? Did you put toilet paper in your underwear?" She had, of course, had to do that during her teen years when she'd found herself stuck without a pad or a tampon in a public restroom. Those certainly were not her finer moments, but she was sure most women had been through it.

"A paper towel," Alexis confessed with her eyes downcast. "I thought it would be more absorbent."

Kate clapped her hand over her mouth to suppress her laugh. It wasn't funny—not to Alexis—but to her it kind of was. Kate just wanted to hug her; she was adorable. "Ok, just…hold on."

Turning on her heel, Kate quickly exited the room and hurried down the hall to where she'd left her purse next to her shoes. She dropped to her knees on the ground and began rummaging through the item. Just when she was about to give up, she spotted the corner of a pink one inch square packet in the depths of her bag. "Ah-ha!" she muttered to herself proudly and plucked the item from its hiding place. The panty liner wouldn't completely solve Alexis's problem, but it would get her out of the paper towel underpants.

Standing, she turned around and nearly ran smack into her partner, who was staring at her incredulously. Evidently, he'd been pacing a hole in the hallway floor and was positively offended she hadn't explained to him what was going on the moment she exited Alexis's bedroom. "Hello!?" he demanded, arms open wide.

"Hold on." Much to his horror, she stepped around him and hurried back down the hall to Alexis's room. She slipped inside once more and shut the door behind her. Passing the item to the younger girl she said, "Here. Get a clean pair of underwear and stick this inside. It'll be good enough to get you out of this room while I run to the store and get you some pads."

Alexis took the item with great relief and mumbled a thank you.

"Listen, um, I know… I understand why you didn't want to talk to your dad about this-"

"He would have had no idea what to do!" Alexis insisted. "I tried to call Gran, but she didn't answer."

Kate nodded. It was unfortunate the girl's grandmother didn't take her call, though she could not disagree with the comment that her father would have been clueless. "But Alexis you really should have told your father. He loves you very much and while he might not have had all the answers, I'm certain he would have found them for you."

With that, Kate turned to leave the room, but she was stopped by the younger girl calling out her name and adding, "Thank you—so much."

She smiled at the red-head. "No problem."

Back out in the hall, Kate found Castle looking as though he was going to explode. Fighting the urge to laugh at his red-faced expression, she explained simply. "Alexis started her period today."

"Her wha—WHAT?!" he positively boomed. Kate grabbed his shirt sleeve and dragged him down the hall to the kitchen just in case he said anything mildly offensive within earshot of his daughter. He followed her like a very confused puppy dog, stammering the entire way. "But—but—but she's not old enough!"

"She's thirteen."

"Exactly!"

Kate shook her head at him. "That's pretty average. If anything it might be a little late."

Castle skimmed his hands up his jaw and ran them through his hair, reviewing this information in his mind. "Oh…oh my god. No wonder she wouldn't…but you- " He froze mid word and his eyes widened with horror when he looked at his partner. "You had to…"

She waved her hand at him. "It's fine."

"It's not fine," he countered. "You shouldn't have had to…" He turned away from her and leaned his forearms against the kitchen counter. Shaking his head, he lowered his voice. "I just…I…"

"What?" she requested when he didn't continue.

He turned his head and looked at her timidly. "It's times like these—and I imagine there are many more to come—where I feel like I'm failing her. Single father parenting a daughter. I can't answer questions about periods and other lady things." He let out a bitter laugh. "Mother took her bra shopping, but that's more up her alley than the nitty gritty. I just…"

Kate understood his concern, but she wouldn't let him beat himself up over it. "Castle, look at me. You are a wonderful father. Truly. Alexis couldn't ask for better. And, yeah, you won't know what kind of pads or tampons to buy her but…you know, you can always ask me." Kate smiled at him reassuringly before taking a step towards the hall. "Speaking of—I'm going to run to Walgreen's and get her some supplies. I'll be back in a little bit."

"Wait." He followed her, dipping his hand into his back pocket for his wallet. He pulled out two twenty dollar bills and held them out to her. "Is this enough?"

Kate looked at him as though he was insane. "How expensive do you think these things are?"

He shrugged helplessly. "I don't know."

Kate shook her head and plucked one of the twenties from his hand. "I'll bring back the change." She pulled on her coat and was almost at the door before he stopped her again.

"Kate. Thank you."

She smiled at him easily. "What are partner's for?"

Ten minutes later, Castle was still recovering from the discovery of the fact that his little girl was no longer a little girl when her tiny voice interrupted his thoughts.

"Daddy?"

Castle spun to his left and saw her standing just outside the kitchen, arms clasped in front of her. She looked embarrassed and it broke his heart. "Alexis, honey, how are you feeling?"

She shrugged. "Okay. I got blood on my pants."

"That's okay," he assured her. "We'll get it out. Or get you new pants. Are you sure you're okay?"

She nodded and turned towards the sitting room. Before she took a step, she turned back to her father and said, "Kate's really nice, Dad; I like her a lot."

Castle beamed down at his little girl. "Me too."