Sleep Alone

When she finally gets home, Kate opens a can of green beans and dumps them in a pan even as she's unstrapping her holster and yanking off her mother's ring. The watch is next as the veggies heat up, then she sheds the rest of her clothes and pulls on yoga pants and one of Castle's white undershirts.

Smells like him. Smells comforting.

She pops a pre-natal vitamin, drinks a full glass of water, has to pee. When she comes back, the green beans are ready.

Dinner. Folic acid, baby, just for you.

She should have another glass of water - she's short by about sixteen ounces - but she just can't. She feels like she's drowning in water. To make up for it, she pours a glass of milk and eats green beans one by one out of the pan, spearing them with a fork, standing over the stove.

Castle would-

She sighs and closes her eyes, wipes a hand down her face. What does it matter? She's got to figure out how to stand on her own here; she has to be sure and maintain her independence, her identity. This is the fastest way to getting chained down, the quickest route to hitting a major detour in her life that never ends up going back to where she wants it to be.

Not in the plan, baby.

She chokes down the last of the green beans, feels sick until she drinks the rest of her milk. Better. Probably the pre-natal vitamin; it does that to her when she's tired.

She is so tired.

She heads to her bed after switching off the oven, doesn't even bother rinsing out the pan.

Kate curls on her side and finds herself sinking straight down into sleep for the first time in weeks.

She dreams, violently, about an empty boathouse and the smell of fish rotting in the rain. The darkness and the moist, close air, the smell of her blood clotting, the hard flare of her nostrils as she tries to breathe around the stained gag in her mouth.

She sees him, standing in the doorway, morning light spilling in around him but not giving him enough illumination to see, to know, to get out of there.

And then he does see.

He sees it all.

The rest of it in slow motion - the terrible thing, again, again, again - the man behind him, crowbar in candlelight, the blow as it comes, the heavy body of her partner, Castle, hitting the concrete floor.

She sees it all, just as she did then.

Here he is, as he always is, here he is with her, dragged down into the darkness with her, held up to the light with her. Where she is, so he is too.

This man who loves her.

She sees it so clearly.

When the machete comes out, she knows.

She can't go halfway - not when he's all in, not when there is absolutely nothing she can do to keep this man away from her, to make him save himself.

She takes all of him.

Castle grunts and jerks in his sleep, restless, finds himself awake with his heart pounding.

And then he hears the thing that woke him - the vibration of his phone still plugged into the charger; he grabs it, bleary-eyed, and finds a text.

Can you let me in?

Kate. He stumbles up, falls straight down to the floor as his leg gives out, meaty and numb, apparently asleep. He curses under his breath as he rolls to his knees, pushes his body back up.

So weird. He can't feel a thing, and now his right butt cheek is tingling, sharp and angry, his groin half on fire. Shit. This is - ug, was he sleeping on a rock or something?

He has to wait a moment in the doorway of his room before he can feel his foot enough to take correct steps, crippled but manageable. In the living room he finally manages to text her back.

Of course.

He flips the locks and opens the door and she's there, messily dressed, her hair scraped back in a pony tail that reminds him of both how very young she is, really, and how beautiful the line of her throat, the curves of her ears are.

She's rubbing her thumb along the inside of her wrist, over and over, and the movement hypnotizes him.

The scars.

She walks straight into him, her chest tight against his, and he falls down because of his stupid, numb leg, both of them tumbling to the floor because she expected him to be able to take it, the full weight of her body, and she let go, released, trust fell right into him.

But now she's got this smirk on her lips; she's shaking her head as she lies on top of him on his floor, and her fingers come up to his jaw, her nails lightly scrape at the stubble there.

"I'm afraid," she says slowly, looking into his eyes. "But it's not like there would ever be anyone else. It's not like I'd ever not choose you."

He can't understand a word she's saying; she's heavy and soft and warm over him and she looks like she hasn't slept in weeks, but her hair is full and gorgeous as it falls around him. Her pony tail came out. And now she's looking at him with such. . .love.

"Castle?"

"Yeah," he finally says, not even bothering to try and sit up, just watching the way the darkness shifts in her eyes, the light slowly revealed.

Her fingers touch down on his lips, barely there, making his body burn with that delicious awareness. She shifts her hips over his with a smile that's less arousal and power but more like tenderness, gentleness, a kind of surrender.

"Hey," she murmurs, leaning in to brush her mouth at his lips, fingers still there like she needs the touch as guidance. "I know you're going to drive me crazy. I know I'm going to be stubborn and closed off and confusing. But-"

"But?"

"I want it. All."

When he falls asleep beside her, it's an act of willpower for Kate not to slip out again, find her clothes, leave him to the darkness.

All or nothing, Kate.

She lies on her back and breathes, his body warm next to hers, and then she turns her head and looks at him, reaches out to trace the line of his arm until her fingers tangle with his.

She told herself this wasn't forever, but who was she kidding?

This was always forever.

For a moment, the stinging grief of never being alone again hits her with a force like a wave slapping over her body. She can never go back to how easy it was before; she's never again allowed the weightlessness, the simplicity, the isolation of having no one to care, no one to worry, no one to not make it back to.

She has him, now. She's had him for a long time.

And now this too.

She lays her other hand on her belly, wishes for a connection, an understanding, acknowledgement of what she's done, doing, something.

But there's just her own skin, and Castle's, and the weight of insomnia in the darkness.

She knows now that he should've come with her; he should've been there.

At the twelve week appointment, the ultrasound technician couldn't be sure.

But now, today-

Kate trails her fingers over the railing as she mounts the subway stairs, entirely not present in the world around her. She barely registers the sidewalk under her feet, the path of her wandering, the summer heat.

It hits her while she's standing at the corner, waiting for the light. She's downtown near the courthouse where she and Castle gave their testimonies against the Butcher; the sidewalk has the same pattern to it, the people the same forms, as when they walked with their hands tangling, able to breathe cleanly again.

It's the same. And he should be here now, absorbing this with her, sharing. She didn't tell him it was an ultrasound appointment; he had PR stuff for the book tour. It wasn't like she purposefully kept it from him, and he would have been here any other time, but-

She needs to learn how to do this with him.

The crowd blends from rush hour natives to tourists in moments; she's trapped behind a group standing awkwardly in front of a sign, trying to get a photo, so she slips inside a corner drug store in an attempt to cut through to the next block.

She itches to call him now, talk to him, but he deserves it face to face, to see her when she tells him. Her heart is pounding, her mouth dry, but it'll be fine when she sees him.

She cuts through the store with the intent of exiting out the other doors, but she has to sidestep as a couple of people come in. As she waits for the door to clear, she realizes she's standing in front of a display of Yankees gear.

She's looking and not looking at the same time, idly checking out the display because it's Yankees merchandise, idle and not thinking baseball, just this, this, all of it rolling over her, when she sees the Yankees jerseys all in a row. Jeter. Number two.

She's reaching out for one before she knows it's her own hand moving, picking it out. She can't - it's so small. Four or five ranges of jerseys, but this tiny thing, stiff, made for a little body.

Her hand is shaking.

She takes it to the register without stopping to think.

It's stupid, but she can't let go of it.

She's sick with anxiety; it roils in her stomach and makes her mouth dry. No reason; there is absolutely no reason.

Except maybe she's making the biggest - made, she's made - the biggest decision of her life and it's just now hitting her, gripping her tight like a fist, what she's done, doing. What she's doing with him.

And how amazing it feels.

When he opens the door, he's on the phone, but he takes one look at her face and ends the call. She has the bag in her hand, crunched up small, pressed against her chest.

"I found something," she says, stupidly, panic fluttering in her throat and making it hard to breathe.

He smiles at her, a careful, cautious thing that breaks her heart. She's done this to him, made him wary, made him not know how to handle her - she needs handling? - but when she offers the plastic bag, he takes it with a crooked and half-hearted smile.

"This about the Dustin case?" he says, his hands unfurling the bag and reaching in. "Did you find-"

He pulls out the toddler-sized jersey - it is just so very small. How tiny it is in Castle's hands, and yet how huge, massive, the biggest thing ever.

He's staring at the jersey, and then his eyes lift to hers, complete incomprehension on his face.

She can barely stand it; it's roaring in her.

"A Yankees jersey," he says, the material in his hand, his eyes flickering from her to the shirt and then back to her again.

Her lips twitch and his face breaks into something she can't name.

"He'll be a fan," she murmurs, her chest thick with awe. Him. In his tiny-

"A boy?" he says then, dazed. His body rocks back, like a blow. "It's a boy. We're having a boy."

His shock is like a live wire inside her, pulls her right up with him. She smiles, feels herself suddenly shy in front of this man who knows her, knows everything, has-

He wraps both arms around her, so tightly, lifts her off her feet in a hug that breaks apart everything in her chest. It spills out of her, quick and dirty, tears that streak her face even as she curls an arm at his neck and holds him close.

He puts her down, his hands coming up to cradle her face.

She swipes at the tears, opens her mouth to explain, but he must understand, he gets it; he just presses his mouth to hers in a kiss that seals them, binds them up.

His forehead to hers, his fingers stroking her cheeks, he lets out a long breath. "We're having a boy."

She hums, can't trust her own voice to speak when she's wrapped in this fragile web of joy.

She's going to have a little boy. She'll dress him in his Yankees jersey and take his hand and they'll go to the stadium together, sit side by side, and Castle will fall all over himself trying to buy them hot dogs and peanuts and a foam finger and everything a boy should have for his first baseball game.

"It's a boy," he murmurs again, sliding his arm down to circle her waist, bring her even closer. "A son."

Oh God. It's too much.

It's too much.

"Castle," she gets out, pressing her cheek hard into his, her palm curled at his neck.

"Yeah. Yeah." He's bowed into her; she feels his gratefulness like a weight.

She doesn't want him grateful. She just wants him - and their son. Their son.

"Castle, I'm gonna have to be the one to teach him how to throw a baseball, aren't I?"

He laughs then, breaking the spell, and his grip eases.

"Yeah. Yeah, Kate, you are," he says back, and his voice catches on her name.