Dealing myself out

The scotch was expensive and deserved to be treated better than simply as 'anaesthesia' but, as he gazed out of the window at the setting sun filtering through the towers of New York he simply couldn't bring himself to care. About anything.

No. That wasn't true.

Mother was still there, a familiar warmth that sustained him; let him hold close when the world proved to be too cold, lonely and harsh. Then there was Alexis. The sun and the moon in his sky. The only brightness he had right now that stopped him being totally enveloped by the dark that was increasingly surrounding him. The two women in his life that he knew loved him unreservedly. Without question. Without doubt. Without fear.

He wished so hard that it could have been three.

Almost an entire year. An entire year of knowing but doing nothing. On those swings, it seemed so simple.

Waiting. For however long it took.

Such a simple thing, to do nothing. Is this how it started for her?

Angrily, he swiped a the traitorous tears falling down his cheeks. Knocking back the last of the whisky in his glass, he leaned forward briefly to refill it and then leaned back in his chair. Instead of returning to the view outside, his eyes fell upon the bookcase and the row of Derek Storm and Nikki Heat novels. A deep, shuddering breath ran through him.

"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" He recited grimly. "Nothing beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare...the lone and level sands stretch far away."

A small, grief filled laugh tore free. "Oz, old buddy...you and me both."

A quick, loud double rap came from the front door.

Blood suddenly pounded in his ears. Only one person would be here, requesting entry.

A brief moment of hesitation, of preparing to ignore it, was easily pushed aside. Events had waited long enough. With a small amount of extra effort, he levered himself out of his chair and staggered slightly out of his office, towards the hallway. In the manner, reminiscent of tearing off a band-aid, he pulled the front door open. She stood there in front of him, a curious mix of strength, hesitancy, sadness and fear.

"Detective Beckett." He greeted her, his tone sad and solemn.

Her eyes widened somewhat at his welcome but she mastered he reaction quite well, he thought.

"Castle...Rick...can we talk?" She asked him softly.

He nodded agreeably and opened the door wider to let her pass. "Absolutely. Please, come in."

More than a little taken aback, having expected resistance or cold aloofness, stepped hesitantly inside the loft. As she walked past and the fragrance of cherries hit his nose, for a long moment, Rick considered playing the game out. There were still moves available and the situation wasn't lost, they could still come back from this.

But as he closed the door, he caught his face in the small mirror by the coat rack and he almost didn't recognise himself. Clearly, from a combination of both their efforts over the past four years, he had turned into some strange puppet version of a real person, a caricature and he was so goddamned tired of it. It was long past time to end this. Nodding to himself, he padded back into the loft, taking a big swig from the glass of whiskey still in his hand, and placed himself on one of the kitchen counter stools.

"Let's talk."

Beckett's face twisted in some mockery of pain and she ran a hand through her long hair in apparent frustration. "Rick... I never meant to hold on to this...thing...for so long. It just...became so big and hard to deal with that in the end, pretending it didn't happen became easier. I was in a bad place and out of all the things I had to deal with, this was the easiest to push aside to deal with later."

God, Rick. Her expression turned bleak. "It was so wrong of me, I know that. I've always known that and believe me, I so much want to go and stop myself from hiding away a year ago...but I can't."

Castle nodded, seemingly sympathetic but inside, he felt himself getting cold. "That's the thing about secrets. They only get bigger and come out at the worse times."

Kate half-laughed, half-sobbed at that. "Don't I know it..."

"This thing we have, this talking without talking? It's gone on for far too long and i'm through. I'm dealing myself out."

Still off-balance, Kate stared at him almost uncomprehendingly. No, no, no...

"Rick...no!" She leaned forward, urgency etched in every feature. "Rick, please...I know you heard me in the box...I know how much that must have hurt but please don't give up on us, not when i'm ready. I lo..."

She couldn't help but stop mid-declaration as he raised his hand forcefully, palm outward, interrupting her. His eyes were immensely sad. "Once I would have given everything I owned to hear those words from you."

"My mother said that love wasn't something you could turn off like a switch and, despite my recent attempts with distractions, she was right." His shoulders slumped and he let his raised hand fall. "What i've learnt is the same applies to resentment. I think it started with Demming. You held off my advances so many times for so long and yet continually dangled the possibility out there, always pulling me back in. I never minded, the chase was fun, i enjoyed it. But then Ellie was there, the first time in quite a while there was a woman who actually wanted me, even if it was for own purposes, a woman who wasn't stepping back."

Castle gave a conflicted sigh. "To this day, I still don't know whether I honestly regret that time or not but what really, REALLY burned was how quickly you turned to him. How you found it so easy to turn down my obvious attraction to you and yet so easy to fall for his. But that was your choice and I had to respect that however much I disliked it. Trying to start things up again with Gina was definitely a mistake; I had divorced her for a reason, but i was tired of being alone."

Kate wanted open her mouth here, to explain the events of that period of time from her perspective but how could she explain it without making things so much worse. She had turned him down again and again and he had no idea that she was going to change her mind. However, execrable his timing, it certainly wasn't his fault. She felt her heart break anew as he stood up from the stool and stared unseeingly out of the tall windows of the loft.

"Then Josh appeared and it seemed I was firmly relegated to the friendzone which, let me tell you, is just as bad as i remember it being back in high school. But we were partners, the job and your friendship was important to me and i wasn't going anywhere. I lived in hope. But you fought...so hard. You fought against the idea of us at every turn and eventually i stopped seeing it as a chase, a challenge but as a simple fact hammered into me again and again. Unworthy. Unliked. Untrusted."

"Castle, no!" She cried out. It wasn't like that. She just wasn't ready.

He spun round, eyes ablaze. "Yes, a thousand times yes! We were partners, Kate, great partners but that's all it ever seemed to be. Even after four years, you still think I consider you a potential notch on my bedpost..."

"You came to me that day on the swing and said a lot of stuff. Left even more unspoken. Except for one thing. We couldn't be together until your mother's case was laid to rest. Your words, Kate. After three months of silence you set a requirement on love. And me, in an astounding moment of bravado, said 'sure, why the hell not...'"

His countenance turned grim. "Well i'm tired of the unspoken and i'm goddamn tired of your wall."

Kate suddenly felt anger surge through her veins. How dare he...

Castle threw back the last of his whiskey ignored her outrage. "I have a secret too. Let me show you." He replied, and almost jauntily, headed towards his office.

Again, knocked off-balance, shocked and a little perplexed, she followed him cautiously. He was being a little mercurial but she had put that down to his drinking. Now she wasn't so sure...

Stepping into his office, she saw him sitting casually on the corner of the table, a remote in his hand and his murder board powering up. Within seconds, the display cleared and her heart skipped a beat. "Castle...what...what is this?" Her trained eyes ran over the details. There wasn't much difference than the last time except for a couple of additional entries. A mystery phonecaller...someone had called Castle...Bob the Mayor and a picture of Castle himself. Nothing about Montgomery though. Someone was trying to keep Castle in the precinct? Keeping her alive but What the hell?

"My own secret, Kate." He replied gently. "I don't think it's quite on the same level as yours but, for obvious reasons, you might feel differently."

She shook her head. She didn't know what she was feeling at the moment...it was too much...coming from too many directions...but she wasn't one of the best detectives on the force for nothing. She cottoned onto Castle's game almost immediately. "Why are you doing this, Castle? Are you trying to get me to hate you?"

Castle shook his head. "No. I'm simply putting everything on the table, clearing the air. There's an envelope full of stuff from Montgomery and a thumb drive with everything i have, to take with you when you leave."

Kate's heart skipped a beat. He really is planning on giving up. "Castle, look, I know I haven't been fair but please...i've been in therapy, i've been making myself better, for us!"

"And how would I know that, Kate?" he replied sadly. "We don't talk, remember? What we have isn't a relationship; i'm just your comfort blanket and funniest-kid-in-school and i'm tired of being set aside until needed."

"Right now Kate, I love you and hate you so much, i don't know which way is up or down. The merest sight of you makes my heart explode with joy and my guts twist till I'm sick. I just don't know how to deal with this any more so I'm stepping back, i'm out."

Tears fell unchecked as his words hit her again and again. "Castle...Rick...please! You promised me always."

Castle stared grimly at her, finding it not as hard as he thought it might be to inure himself to her pain. That right there told him how damaged he felt regarding this whole situation. Before, any sign of distress from her would have elicited a protective stance of epic proportions. Now, it barely made him twitch.

"The guy that made that promise doesn't exist anymore."

Kate's heart didn't break, didn't shatter, it just simply...stopped. She had been so busy healing herself, fixing her own demons, she had thrown away the very thing she had been making herself better for. And then the anger came. It was happening again. Just like that summer.

"No." She spat out. "You don't get to do this."

Castle's eyes had been grim before but now they turned into chips of obsidian, black and hard. "Really."

"No." She replied, heatedly. "You said always and i'm holding you to it. Rick, i'm ready, i'm ready for us and everything that comes with it. Don't throw it all away now."

"Get out." He ordered, eyes ablaze. "I am sick to death of everything being on your timetable. Take your stuff and...just leave."

"No." She knew if she walked out that door now, that was it. They would be done.

"Detective Beckett, I am a private citizen and i am revoking my invitation and asking you to leave my property. Don't make this an official matter." He shook his head wearily. "Just leave."

She couldn't believe it. This was it. After 4 years...

...and right then, she truly began to understand, at least a little bit. She had been happy with the status quo at almost everything point of those four years, never wanting to risk too much but at the same time never seeing just how much it was hurting him; a man that gave and loved so unreservedly being asked to hold back, being denied simple affection and acknowledgement simply because it was more comfortable for her.

Her shoulders slumped and tears fell like rain. "I'm sorry." She whispered brokenly. She hesitated for a brief moment but picked up the thumbdrive and envelope from his desk and then turned around and walked out of the loft, leaving his life completely.

Castle took a deep breath and tried to reign in his wildly fluctuating emotions. Platitudes about closing that chapter of his life scrolled across his writer's mind and he let out an ugly chuckle. What a goddamn mess. Dropping heavily into his chair, he simply sat there in silence, looking out the window as the darkness fell.

Notes: i want to love this show as much as I did in the first two years, i really do but in order for Marlowe to stretch the current plotlines out to four seasons, he has made Castle and Beckett, both in turn, into almost unlikeable caricatures of their first season personas. i know that its a tv show and certain logical/natural responses need to be suppressed or enhanced for the overall themes to maintain the slow tempo but seriously, its almost painful to watch and not in the 'gripping drama' kind of painful either. plus, i think Marlowe has an unhealthy fixation with Stana/Beckett and makes almost every scenario with her coming out smelling like roses and rainbows whilst making Castle look like a jerk. IMO, Castle made his intentions and desires clear from Day 1 and has only gotten more serious about them. its been Beckett that's been turning him down, trying to fob him off on other women and then getting jealous.

no, Season 1 and most of season 2 were amazing entertainment and then the show clearly lost its way.

i hope Season 5 can regain some of that magic.