the night of whole-truths
Rick and Kate almost couldn't believe their ears and in unison react with a resounding, "WHAT!?"
"I'm going upstairs," Ruby announces. "Please don't follow me."
They respect her wishes, hearts breaking as they watch her disappear to the second floor.
This whole time you've been trying to get rid of me.
"Where did she get that idea?" Rick asks in a whisper.
Kate feels tears of sadness and frustration building in her eyes, and sighs as her husband comes over to console her. "I'll give you one guess," she says softly.
"But they were supposed to...Michelle said they would wait," Rick protests. "You really think they told the kids?"
"Yes? No? I don't know," Kate sighs. "I've only ever spoken to Michelle a few times before today, so...but I mean, how would the kids know if she didn't tell them?"
"Do we go talk to her?" Rick asks.
"She asked us not to follow her," Kate responds.
"I know, but we need to set the record straight."
"Sure, we do," Kate says. "But we should respect her wishes first and set the record straight second."
"You're right," Rick sighs. "As usual."
Kate pulls him in for a hug and he reciprocates. As much as they try to relax one another, they still sense each other's rigidity, a culmination of the underlying fear they'd felt since the night they brought Ruby home.
Rick and Kate made it about two hours before they couldn't take it anymore. As much as they wanted to respect Ruby's wishes, they desperately needed to make it clear to Ruby that this is not what they wanted, not at all.
Kate's knuckles rap softly against the closed bedroom door and she follows it up with a soft, "Ruby?" They waited for the girl's response, but it never came, so Kate tried again. "Ruby, can we please talk about what you said earlier?" This time, there's a bit of rustling on the other side of the door, and eventually the door cracks open.
"Fine," Ruby sighs, backing away from the door so that Rick and Kate can enter the bedroom.
"Thank you for letting us in," Kate says as they all take a seat on one of the various furnishings in the newly decorated bedroom.
"Why didn't you guys tell me?" Ruby blurts out, her face still a bit red and puffy from crying.
"We wanted to," Kate admits.
"We so wanted to," Rick reiterates. "But we were supposed to wait until...it was official."
"Can you tell us where you got the idea that we've been trying to get rid of you? Did...did your cousins say something...?" Kate asks.
"Well, at first Dan asked me if I thought you guys were going to adopt me," Ruby says. "And I said that I didn't know but I hoped so. And then Clare said that you weren't adopting me, you were giving me away, and that I was going to live with them in New Jersey."
"Kiddo, that's not really true," Rick says.
"So I'm not going to live with them in New Jersey?" Ruby asks. "You're not getting rid of me?"
"Ruby," Kate chokes out, trying and failing to hold back her tears.
"No!" Ruby exclaims, her tears returning as soon as she saw Kate's. "You can't!"
"Ruby, let me be very clear," Rick says. "We would never in a million years want to "get rid of you" or "give you away", okay?"
Ruby nods unconvincingly.
"When Kate was closing your dad's case, she learned that your dad had specific instructions about who should take care of you if he died, but that it hadn't been updated since before your mother died. So, these instructions stated that you should be cared for by your closest living relative," Rick explains. "Your aunt Michelle is that relative."
"Why didn't you tell me before?" Ruby asks.
"We really wanted to," Kate says through sniffles. "But the social worker for your case had told us that we couldn't say anything about it until next week when custody was officially granted to your aunt. Your cousins were not supposed to say anything about it to you. They weren't really even supposed to know."
"At least they told me the truth," Ruby groans.
"Ruby, the truth, the whole truth, is that we wanted to tell you as soon as we found out," Rick says. "The truth is, we love you, kiddo. We don't want you to leave."
"Then don't make me!" Ruby exclaims. "I don't care about the stupid social worker! They didn't even ask me what I want! You didn't even ask me what I want!"
"We know how unfair this is," Kate says.
"You know what's unfair? I'm a twelve-year-old orphan, who moved in with two nice strangers and I never really knew where I stood in the grand scheme of their lives, but none of that mattered to me so much anymore because I felt like I was part of their family. But clearly I was wrong," Ruby scoffs.
She is too smart for her own good, Rick thinks to himself. He glanced over at Kate and senses a mind-meld.
"Ruby, since the day we brought you home, we've been working with the social worker because we hoped to be able to adopt you someday, if that was what you wanted," Kate tells the girl.
"You wanted to adopt me?" Ruby asks.
"Of course, if that was what you wanted, too," Rick says.
"We still hope that we can, eventually," Kate adds.
"If that's what I want?" Ruby asks.
"Yes," Rick and Kate say in unison.
"Well, it's not. I don't want to live with people who lie to me and don't tell me things about my own life before it's too late," Ruby says, almost coldly. "I'm glad I'll be able to live with my real family."
That hurt, it really did. Kate felt like such a hypocrite, complaining about how the social worker was treating Ruby like she had no autonomy, but Ruby felt like they'd done the same by not being clear about their intentions. The last sentence, she knew, was just teenager talking, but no one knew how to twist the knife like a teenage girl.
That night, no one in the Castle household got much sleep. While Ruby tossed and turned upstairs, Rick and Kate analyzed and over-analyzed, and analyzed again, their lose-lose situation. Then, they agonized over it.
"I knew we should have told her as soon as I found out," Kate kicks herself.
"Kate, we were pinned into an impossible corner here," Rick tries to convince the both of them. "If we told Ruby, and the court found out, that would've jeopardized any chance we had at being able to adopt her."
"Right, and now we don't have to worry about that because she hates us and wouldn't want us to adopt her anyway," Kate states.
"She doesn't hate us," Rick sighs.
"You sure about that?" Kate scoffs.
"Kate, she's just..."
"A teenager who feels betrayed," Kate says. "And I don't blame her."
"Me neither," Rick admits. "God, this really fucking sucks."
That astute analysis was what finally took Kate over the edge, tears starting to fall like a stream down her cheeks and onto her husband's chest.
"I know this isn't about us, about me," Kate sobs. "But I really thought..."
"I know, Kate, I know," Rick comforts her as he rubs circles into her back.
"I really felt...I mean, I know I'm not her mom, but I...I really feel like I could be her mom," Kate says through deep inhales and exhales, working hard not to hyperventilate.
"It's not over, yet, babe," Rick reminds her. "We should make the best of the time we have with her."
With that sentiment in mind, the Castles finally found a bit of sleep as the storm came to pass.
Rick and Kate did their best to navigate the intense awkwardness of the next few days. In some ways, they acted like nothing happened, like nothing was changing. They ate meals with Ruby, helped her with her homework, read a few chapters of Heat Wave, answered her questions about the book (especially chapter 10), and helped her pack up the things she'd be taking to New Jersey.
"Are you nervous about changing schools?" They asked one night. That was one of the arguments Kate had deployed to the court for keeping Ruby with them in the city. The girl minimized it with a shrug, "I don't really have many friends anyway."
"What about your teachers?"
"My new teachers won't treat me like the orphan cancer girl," Ruby insisted.
"Will you miss the city?"
"Yes, but it's not like I can't look at it from across the river anyway," Ruby justified.
They weren't necessarily asking these questions to make Ruby upset or anything, but they did want her to start to process some of the even greater list of changes that were about to take place. With each question, though, Ruby seemed to have some retort, maintaining the hard shell she had formed since the afternoon at the arcade. That shell had taken each glancing blow, leaving Ruby unbothered. At least, until the night before the move.
Every last thing of Ruby's that could be packed had been packed, and in the morning, they'd been putting stuffing those boxes into the car and driving across the bridge to New Jersey. That night, Rick, Kate, and Ruby went though their bedtime routines as if it was just another day, and as it approached 10PM, Ruby closed up her book, got up off the couch, yawned, and then made her way to the staircase.
"Night," she said with a nonchalant wave. Rick and Kate reciprocated, and shortly after, called it a night as well.
They couldn't be sure what time it was when it happened, but a few minutes after turning out the lights came a knock on the bedroom door.
"Come in," Castle says after a quick glance over at Kate, who flipped the night stand lamp back on.
"Ruby, is everything okay?" she asks when the girl opens the door.
"Yeah, um..." Ruby chokes out before crying.
"Hey, hey, come here," Rick says, ushering her toward the bed. "What's up, kiddo?"
"I'm really sorry," Ruby sobs. "For what I said to you guys last weekend."
"Oh, Ruby," Kate says, offering her arms to the girl.
"Hey, it's alright, it's okay," Rick says. "Once when Alexis was seven she told me that she was going to kill me in my sleep because I wouldn't let her get a pony. So, I've heard worse."
That makes Ruby laugh a little as she climbs into bed and slides in between Rick and Kate.
"I'm really gonna miss you guys," Ruby tells them.
"We're going to miss you, too," Rick says.
"So incredibly much," Kate adds.
Ruby reaches for each of their hands and gives them a light squeeze, and they squeeze back. She wipes away her tears and sniffles, before asking, "would it be okay if I sleep in here tonight?"
Without any protest, the three of them re-situate the pillows and blankets to accommodate another person. Then, Kate reaches back to the lamp and hits the switch.
a/n: this was my favorite chapter to write so far! ruby and our fave couple are obviously dealing with lots of complex emotions here, so it took a while to decide where to go with it. thank you for your reviews; they are so greatly appreciated!
