Haha, funny story guys! I thought I had uploaded this yesterday! My bad.
Sorry about the wait, I know I promised you it wouldn't be long but I got sooooo sidetracked!
Thanks to everyone who has reviewed and sent me messages (so I haven't been replying, I'll be better I promise!).
Anyways, I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Kate remained stoic as he walked away. Her eyes were fixed to the wall on the other side of the living room; they stayed that way until she heard the click of the door shutting behind him.
Every part of body wanted to rush after him, to throw herself into his arms and tell him that she wanted - no, needed - him on the inside with her: she wouldn't slam that door in his face, not anymore. She wanted to kiss him in a way that would convince him she wasn't a lost cause.
But her mind wouldn't let her.
And so she stayed, feet planted firmly in place, as the man who had helped her heal so much over the past few months walked away.
"Kate?"
Lanie's soft voice tore Kate's focus from the wall. She slowly turned her head toward the kitchen and found sympathetic eyes - four sets of them - staring back at her.
Shit.
Three hours later they were laughing.
Kind of.
Kate was still totally distracted, too consumed by her thoughts of why am I like this? to be able to give her friends her full attention. But she tried. And, for short bursts of time, she succeeded. Enough to know when to laugh, at least.
Her phone - still on the couch, where she had deserted it in favour of a long, hot shower - chimed. Once, twice, three times in succession. She rose from her spot at the dining table - where they were all still sitting after dinner, talking about anything and everything - and walked toward the latest source of her distraction.
Three messages from Rick.
The first was short, to the point.
Headed to the airport now.
The second message had a file attached. She clicked on the blue link, which opened a shared file: an itinerary. The flight to Vegas, accommodation details, the times he was needed for the appearances his publicist had scheduled for his 60-odd hours in Sin City, and the details for this flight back home.
9pm Friday night he would be back in the city; it seemed like forever away.
The third message was more... hopeful.
Assuming the plan for moving day is the same, I'll be at your apartment first thing Saturday morning. I know it will be a busy weekend for you but if you could somehow find some time for us to talk privately, sooner rather than later, I think that would be for the best. Paula has me booked pretty solid for the next few days so I don't know how available I'll be. I just wanted to make sure you know that, if you don't hear from me, it's not because I'm avoiding you or anything. Just giving you time.
His reassurances were exactly that: reassuring. She needed that, more than she knew.
She typed out her reply.
Will definitely find time for us. I hope your trip isn't all business and you get to have some fun, too-
Not too much fun, though. But she wouldn't say that. No, that was a thought she would keep to herself. She hit send, backed out of the messages app and went to toss her phone back onto the couch.
Her fingers wouldn't release their grip on the device, however.
She hesitated, then opened up her messages again. She typed out another quick message, hit send before she had a chance to reconsider, a chance to change her mind. It didn't exactly align with the notion of taking a break, but she wanted him to know that - despite her actions - she didn't want to run from this.
I'm sorry. Please don't give up on me just yet.
It wasn't the first time she'd asked him not to give up. The last time they were here, he had said he wouldn't.
So much had changed since that night.
The next few days seemed to drag on endlessly.
With everyone else at work, Kate had nothing to do but lounge around Lanie's apartment and wait. The hours felt like days, days felt like a lifetime.
On Wednesday she had met up with her dad for Lunch. He was distracted, shuffling through paperwork at his desk as the nicoise salad Kate had brought for him sat untouched on the corner of his desk. To anyone else it would have looked as though the man had been ignoring his daughter, too busy to give her the attention she deserved after trekking across town with a meal for him but she knew better. She worked in a very similar way to her father, had the same ability to split her focus effectively. He may have kept his eyes glued to his forms, he may have barely touched his lunch, but she didn't feel unwelcome at all. He listened as she spoke, responded verbally as needed but mostly just nodded his head to signify that he was listening and, when she invited him to come to her new place for dinner on Sunday night, he replied with an enthusiastic I'd love to!
She knew that, despite being busy, he appreciated her company. She knew that his lunch would - sooner or later - get eaten, and when he did have five minutes to stop and enjoy it, he would be thankful that she had brought it by. As far as unplanned visits went, this one was nice. After almost an hour, she stood and said her goodbyes. When she rounded her father's desk, placed her hand on his shoulder and told him she loved him, he made sure to tear his eyes away from his work and give her his undivided attention.
"I love you too, Katie," he said with a smile. His eyes darted to his salad. "Thank you for lunch. I'll enjoy it, I'm sure." She dropped a kiss to his head and he continued. "Tell Rick I look forward to seeing him at dinner."
For a second she thought perhaps he hadn't been quite as successful with the split focus as she had given him credit for, but then he looked up at her with a smirk.
"I'm sure you will have come to your senses by then."
Kate rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Don't count on it, Dad."
She laughed, as if she was joking with her old man. But the truth of the matter was, she wasn't entirely confident it would be that easy. Yes, she had come to her senses. But would Rick be able to forgive that easily?
That doubt led her into the early hours of Thursday morning, tossing and turning all night as her insecurities invaded her dreams. She woke as Lanie was leaving for work, feeling as though she hadn't slept a wink.
She pulled herself from the couch, rolled down the blinds to block the sunlight that streamed through the kitchen and dining room windows, then tucked herself back under the blanket.
She slept, on and off, until Lanie returned home that evening.
"Have you even moved today?" Lanie asked as she pulled the blanket from over Kate's head.
Kate groaned, gripped the blanket and tried to pull it back over her face but her friend wouldn't release the vice grip she had on the fluffy fabric.
"Kate," she whined. "This isn't like you. Get up."
"I had a rough night," she complained.
"And you've slept all day, by the look of it!" Lanie walked toward her bedroom, tossed her bag onto her bed before returning her attention back to her friend to administer a large dose of tough love. "Get over yourself, girl. I've had a long day at work. I'm going to shower and when I get out I either want to smell something delicious cooking for dinner, or to see you've got wine, chocolate and a movie ready for me to unwind. Your choice."
Kate groaned, again, and pulled herself off of the couch. As good as wine, chocolate and a movie sounded; she hadn't eaten all day.
And Lanie was right, she needed to pull herself out of this funk.
On Friday morning, she started off on the right foot. She received a text from Ned telling her that the apartment had been emptied, cleaned and that the security system had been completely wiped.
Feel free to pop in at any time to set it up how you want it, he had said. The door man (his name is Theodore but we all call him Teddy) will be able to get you in touch with security. They'll show you everything you need to know, just give him a call before you head over.
Seeing as she had nothing better to do, she called the building's lobby just after 9:15am. Theodore - Teddy - seemed lovely. He told her that she could come in whenever she was ready; she told him she would be there within the hour.
Building security - Bruiser, according to his name badge, but Kate was unsure if that was his actual name or a nickname - had taken her up to the apartment and helped her set up her fingerprint scan and security code for the front door lock. Then, he led her back down to the lobby and into a small room off to the side where she sat patiently as he coded a key fob for her.
"How many do you want?" he asked. "One for yourself, obviously, as you'll need it to access the elevators and the rooftop. If you want, I can also code them to grant access to the apartment. We do, however, advise you give away these fobs sparingly," he droned, as if reciting some script.
He went through this with every tenant, she supposed.
"Right." This was all a little high tech for Kate, but she supposed this was the result of some tech guru owning the place. "Can I get two spares, please? Both with access to the apartment."
One for her father: ever since she moved into her very first apartment, she had always made sure her father had a key for emergencies. She wasn't really sure what emergency would require him to have access to her home and, as far as she was aware, he had never actually used any of the keys he had been given over the years. Still, it seemed almost a tradition at this point, one she wasn't about to end now.
The second... well, that was an impulsive decision but one that felt so right. This fob would be for Rick, should he accept it. She knew that - knowing herself as well as she did - she probably wouldn't be gifting him this key any time soon. Still, the act or acquiring it for him was enough to solidify this in her mind. She wasn't just ready to let him pass through this metaphorical door, she was ready to give him full access to come and go as he pleases, ready to trust that he won't want to go.
She had even managed to shut down that voice in the back of her mind that told her he would never want to stay, that the hope she felt was misguided.
Temporarily, of course. Because this was the real world and, in the real world, Kate wasn't one to romanticise.
She was incredulous by nature, at best. An outright cynic at her worst.
And now - on Saturday morning, as Lanie drove them over to her new apartment - the small, round key fob that rested in her open palm seemed to stare back at her, taunting her. What a stupid symbol of hope. What a foolishly naive idea.
What had felt so right now felt so, so terrifying.
She hadn't heard from him in days; not since her text to not give up on her had gone unacknowledged. He had warned her that he would be busy, that he wouldn't be readily available to talk over the few days he was gone. But, really, how busy could he have been to not be able to send one single, simple reply? And, according to the itinerary he had sent her, his flight had landed earlier than scheduled last night. He had been back in the city, free of any and all obligations, for almost 12 hours now. Still, nothing.
"You're fidgety," Lanie commented as she stared out the windscreen, watching the traffic ahead of her intently. "It's distracting."
"Sorry," Kate muttered.
"You okay?"
"Just... exhausted already," Kate offered the semi-truthful explanation. "I hate moving."
And, even more than she hated moving, she hated the idea that her friends would be the ones doing most of the work for her. She could still barely support the weight of a dinner plate with her wrist, there was no way she could move furniture and boxes without aggravating her injury.
"So, it has nothing to do with Writer Boy?" Lanie asked with a smirk.
Kate shook her head, but Lanie knew. "Maybe a little," she relented.
"Maybe you should have this conversation with him before we're all there, killing the vibe."
Kate shook her head again. "I have two days to get everything sorted before I'm back at work. Once I'm back at work, I'm going to lose all motivation and I'll have boxes scattered everywhere for months. No, the conversation with Rick can wait, if need be."
Lanie rolled her eyes. "Your priorities are always so..."
"Practical?" Kate finished for her.
Lanie shook her head. "No. Boring."
Kate scoffed, but her friend continued before she could argue.
"If I were you, I'd want to be pinned against the wall and absolutely ravished by my man before I even thought about moving in the furniture."
"Yeah, well, not everyone is always thinking about sex," she grumbled back. She ignored the he's not my man comments that swirled in her mind, the fact that she just couldn't bring herself to share Lanie's optimism that their reunion today would be so easy.
Lanie chuckled. "You're your own worst enemy, Kate Beckett."
That, she already knew.
"It's going to be fine," Lanie assured her; her tone much softer, less teasing than it had been just a moment ago. "Have a little faith. The guy is mad about you. Just show him that you're mad about him, too."
Kate looked back down to the key fob in her hand. "Easier said than done."
But, as Lanie had told her just a few days ago, everyone has demons... you're not supposed to let them win. And Kate was determined not to lets hers win. A key was a big gesture, one she might not have been fully ready for just yet but she knew there were smaller steps she could take as she worked her way toward being ready.
Step one sat in a plastic bag at her feet.
They entered the building's lobby and Kate scanned the room for the man who had promised to meet her there, disappointed when she couldn't find him.
"Good morning, Miss Beckett," Teddy greeted as he approached, a bright smile on his face.
Kate swallowed her disappointment and smiled at the man. "Morning, Teddy. And, I told you, you can call me Kate."
"Kate," the man repeated, as if locking the request to use her first name into his mind. "I hope you don't mind, but we moved a delivery into your apartment for you. I just wasn't sure when to expect you today and, given your injury-" He glanced down at her wrist, then back up to her eyes. "I figured you shouldn't be trying to drag that thing inside anyway."
"Delivery?"
"From Mister Castle," he explained.
"Thank you, Teddy."
Kate looked at Lanie and tilted her head toward the elevator.
Lanie was speechless as they stepped inside of the apartment. She looked around the large, open space with wide, awe-filled eyes.
"Kate," she said on a sigh. She moved toward the wall-to-floor windows that looked out over the river. "This place is gorgeous."
"Isn't it?" Kate agreed, distractedly.
Her eyes scanned the empty loft apartment, in search of the delivery Teddy had mentioned, but she found nothing.
She stepped out of the doorway and closed the door - and there it was, hidden behind the now-gone barricade of the front door: the large, faux fiddle-leaf fig she had deemed unnecessary when they spotted it whilst furniture shopping. Rick hadn't known that she had added it to her mental wish list, vowing to come back for it sooner or later. Or, perhaps he had known. At the base of the plant, in the decorative black pot, was a crisp white envelope.
A house without plants isn't a home... or something like that anyway, I don't really know. I saw you looking at this and figured it would look good next to your ugly console table. Consider it a house-warming gift.
She smiled at his words but as she continued to read the rest of the note, disappointment bubbled in her stomach and rose up to her throat, her smile faded.
"What's wrong?" Lanie asked. She must have finally pulled her attention away from the view outside.
Kate tore her eyes away from the note in her hand, looked at her friend. "He's not coming."
It was a case of divide and conquer.
Kate had organised for her furniture to be delivered first thing this morning. Delivery, however, did not include getting said pieces from the loading dock up to her apartment. Cue team alpha: the boys. They had volunteered to be on heavy-lifting duty, bringing the pieces one-by-one up to her new home.
Team Diva - named in jest by Lanie, mocking Esposito's team alpha, but somehow the name just stuck - were on Adam duty. Kate needed someone to meet the removalists at her old place, to make sure all of her belongings were loaded and removed from the house with no issues. Not that she had expected anything to go wrong, but she had always lived by the motto of better safe than sorry. A part of her thought that she should have handled this task herself, but she just couldn't bring herself to see her ex again, to see him and his ex-wife playing happy family in what used to be her home. Lanie volunteered to take her place, promising to be on her best behaviour.
As much as she knew Lanie would love to give the guy a piece of her mind, Kate trusted that she wouldn't stir anything up. Still, she sent Jenny to go with.
Cool, uncaring, disconnected: that was their game-plan. The message they were sending? Kate doesn't care. So what if it were a little white lie?
That left team useless, Kate and her injured self, to stay behind and twiddle her thumbs until she had some lighter duties to do. The waiting wasn't good for her, not with her mind in the current state of chaos that it was in.
I ruined it.
He hates me.
It's all my fault.
The thoughts were pathetic, melodramatic, and she knew it but she couldn't seem to hush the noise in her mind. He had missed his flight, apparently. And couldn't get another one until tomorrow, apparently.
But to that voice in the back of her mind, it sounded like excuses.
There will be a new excuse tomorrow, that voice declared so boldly. And then another, and then another. He doesn't want to see you.
She grabbed the plastic bag - the one she had dumped on the kitchen bench after learning that Rick wouldn't be joining them today, the one that contained step one of showing him that she was committed to this, to them - and marched upstairs to tuck away somewhere where she didn't have to stare at it all day long. Because, if she had to keep looking at it, she was only going to continue to spiral.
As her furniture was brought in, she unwrapped it from it's protective plastic wrapping and - if it was light enough - shift it into place, setting everything up exactly how she wanted it. When team Diva arrived with boxes of her belongings, she got to work unpacking everything. She worked out some of her anger and frustration through the tearing of tape and popping of bubble wrap. It wasn't enough.
Throughout the day her friends had picked up on her morose and tried to lift her spirits in their own special kind of way: with playful jibes and light-hearted teasing about her lack of contribution to the days efforts.
That's right, you just sit there and play with your little knick-knacks, we've got the shelves. Or a, where would you like the couch, your highness?
She knew that they were joking with her, that they knew that she appreciated their help (help that they were happy to give) but it didn't ease her frustrations at how much she was having to rely on other people lately. She just couldn't get out of this negative head space; she had to shake it off.
"Pizza for dinner?" she asked as the day was finally coming to an end.
The sun was low in the sky, preparing to set, and her friends were fighting the fatigue from a long day. After they ordered the pizza, the group settled around the dining table with beers and wine while Kate continued to unpack bits and bobs from the boxes scattered around the place until she received notification that their dinner had arrived.
"I'll get it," Lanie declared, waving her hands dismissively at Kate. "You seem like you're on a roll, keep it up for another five minutes!"
Esposito rose from his seat and walked with his girlfriend toward the door. "Besides, you're probably too exhausted to carry it back up anyway," he said with a smirk. "You know, after all the heavy lifting you did today."
Kate grabbed a decorative pillow from the couch and tossed it at him. Her wrist ached as if to prove his point, but she would never let him know that. She went back to sorting through boxes: stuff to donate, stuff for storage, stuff to unpack. She was so rapidly losing motivation; all of these looked like impossible tasks right now. To the side, she found a smaller box labelled bathroom.
"I'm just gonna-" She held the box to her chest and tilted her head toward the bathroom. Ryan and Jenny nodded, understanding what she was saying before she even said it. "I'll just be a minute, sorry."
She walked into the bathroom and dumped the box on the vanity counter, opened the cupboard doors beneath and began to unpack the items from the box: a hair dryer; straightening iron; half-empty bottles of shampoo, conditioner and other products; combs; brushes; ties, bands and bobby pins. She had survived these last few months without this stuff; she considered the fact that she could probably get rid of at least half of it, saver herself some space. Still, she tucked it all away neatly in the cupboard: she'd deal with what she did and didn't actually need another day.
"In the bathroom," she heard Ryan's voice from the other side of the wall that separated the kitchen from the bathroom. She assumed that Lanie and Espo were back with the pizza.
"Yo, Beckett!" Espo's voice thundered cheerfully. "Got a surprise for you, hurry up!"
"Just unpacking," she called back to him. "I'll be two minutes, just start without me."
"Is this a bad time?"
She stopped pulling items from the box and looked over her shoulder, toward the opened bathroom door, but she couldn't see anything. Surely she was mistaken but... that didn't sound like Esposito's voice. She pulled herself to her feet and slowly moved toward the door.
"Look who we found lurking in the lobby," Lanie said with an enthusiastic smile before promptly removing herself, dragging Esposito and the pizza to the kitchen.
Rick stood by her front door, jacket draped over one arm and a shy smile on his face.
"I thought you might still need my help," he said with a shrug.
Kate walked toward him, drawn to him. She needed to be close to him, closer than she was now, anyway.
"I thought you couldn't get a flight."
"The lady at the kiosk was a fan, I think," he said shyly. "She bumped me up on the standby list and said so long as I'm at the airport and ready to go at a moments notice, she could get me on a flight if someone missed their check-in. So, I camped out. Just landed-" He smiled at her. "Came straight here from the airport."
Suddenly, all of her doubted seemed so foolish. She rushed forward, closed the last few feet of distance between them and wrapped her arms around his waist, burying her face in his chest. His arms closed around her and for the first time in days, she felt a little less lost.
"I've missed you," she whispered into the fabric of his shirt.
His arms tightened around her. "I missed you, too."
"I thought you were mad at me," she confessed. "Thought you were making excuses to avoid me."
Rick pulled back, curled his finger under her chin and tilted her head up so that she could see his perplexed expression.
"I have spent the last few days forcing myself not to bombard you with calls and texts so that I didn't scare you away: why on Earth would I be coming up with excuses to stay away even longer?"
Kate shook her head. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
She lifted herself onto tiptoes and pressed her lips to his. His hands found their way to her hair but she had already begun to pull back.
"Uh-uh." He shook his head. "One more."
With a smile, she leant back in and he kissed her.
Short and sweet; an affirmation that they were okay.