A Proposal

I feel it in my bones-
I'm stronger now; I'm ready for the house.
Such a modest mouse,
I can't do it alone. I can't do it alone.

-Step, Vampire Weekend

She hopes the horror isn't what shows on her face.

By the grim set to his mouth, it probably is.

Kate slides off the swing and wraps her arms around him, cupping the back of his head, covering his neck, trying to cradle him from the blow of what didn't come. Behind her the swing jumps and shivers without her in it.

"Castle," she murmurs at his ear, a brush of her lips in a kiss. "I thought - thought that was it. That we were breaking up." There's a question in her voice that she can't contain.

He goes very still, that desperate and dark quiet that is never good, but she keeps hold of him, rides the wave of his confusion and hurt until it breaks over him.

"That's not exactly an answer," he says. His is a question too.

"That's not a no," she says quietly.

"It's not a yes, either." His hands are parentheses at her hips, but now for the first time in so long, his grip is certain, his hands unerring; he knows where he wants to be.

It's been a long time since he's staked a claim over her. She's missed it.

She lifts her hands to his cheeks and strokes her thumbs at his face, framing him, smoothing away those lines, wanting to repair her non-answer. "I didn't know that's what you meant by having a talk. It sounded. . .final."

"I should explain it better," he says then, quickly, his words clipped. She realizes that what she mistook for heaviness and finality was actually Rick Castle nervous. Heart-twistingly knotted up over her. His eyes won't meet hers.

His fingers flex on her waist, one of thumbs digging into her hip bone for purchase. "Because I'm not sure I said it right. I don't care what you choose, Kate. Either way, I just want to be part of the choosing. And maybe that hasn't been clear, maybe you don't know about us because I didn't push it. But that's - there it is. This is it for me."

She has to press her lips together to hold it in, how sweet that is, how vulnerable and earnest at the same time. He still hasn't quite exactly met her eyes.

God, he's afraid. He's terrified, and she still hasn't answered.

Because-

Because.

She feels the awkward pierce of the ring at her hip and she reaches her right hand back for his, hooks her fingers around his wrist, a firm grip.

His eyes flare up and she catches his gaze and they hold.

Kate works her finger into that ring, nudging her hand under his, managing to use the force of his grip to slide it on over her knuckle.

It doesn't fit quite perfectly, but it's her right ring finger.

Not her left.

Where it will go. It will.

"It's not a no. It's a hell of a lot more than maybe," she says. Let that be enough for him right now because she needs him to understand. Needs him.

"It's not yes." He blinks and the fall of his lashes cut him off from her, but as desperate and bare and gut-wrenching as his proposal was, it's still his heart writhing on the ground at her knees.

"Castle. It's a promise," she says intently, trying to find his eyes, wanting him to see her. He's studying the ring, saving face, that twisted set to his mouth. "Rick. Listen to what I'm saying. I came here thinking you were ending it."

He tilts his head and looks at her, a line of confusion again, and when he opens his mouth to speak, nothing comes.

"I think a lot of things should come before this," she says carefully. "To go from an ultimatum to-"

"I was - that wasnt my-" He sighs.

"No, I know. Now. I - I don't exactly understand. . ."

He looks away, his face still that heart-stopping blank that gives her no idea at all. She doesn't like not knowing him.

He breathes out. "It occurred to me after we fought that I spent four years chasing you pretty hard. Wearing you down-"

She makes a noise against that, but he keeps going, a flickering glance back at her that keeps her silent.

"And when you came to me. . .I went still. I backed off and let you lead and went at your pace because I. . .thought you needed that. So maybe - God, Kate - maybe it looked like I was running hot and cold, maybe it looked like I was vascillating about us - my mother just said-"

"What?"

"No, nothing. It's just - I was trying to wait. Because you know," he gives her this crooked, half-hearted grin that has a terrible wound behind it. "Rome wasn't built in a day, right? Those walls won't come down overnight and it all still needs time and work, but Kate, somehow all the good I thought I was doing, being for you, instead it's made it unclear." And suddenly his eyes flare sharply back to her, intent and sad. "Being with me - you should never have to wonder. You were never supposed to wonder."

She makes a fist of her hand, the ring squeezed between her fingers and foreign. "Well, now I know. It's clear. This is. . . It's a grand gesture, Castle."

His mouth twists. "No, it's not. You said intimate. Where no one else could overhear."

She laughs a little, a strangled thing. "Sometimes I hate that you remember what I say word for word." She shakes her head at him. "As an answer, then, for where we're going - it's a grand gesture. But as a proposal. . .it's kind of heart-breaking."

"So. . .it's a no."

"That's not a no," she sighs back. "You're right about time. And work. We still need that. So let it be a promise." But it feels flat after all that. Feels less. Like she's cheapening what's happened here.

His hand comes over her fist, his fingers fiddling with the diamond, his chest expanding in what looks like the first deep breath he's taken. She stares at the ring. It's beautiful, and elegant in a way she didn't expect from him, but she sees now she should have.

She sees a lot. He's given her solid ground - no matter her choice. He deserves some in return.

Kate shakes off his grip and snags the ring, yanks it off her right hand and switches it, deftly, impulsively, certainly, to her left finger.

He stops breathing again.

So does she.

They stare down at where it belongs, where it goes, how it fits just right - not too loose like his every half-hearted embrace this year and not too crushing tight like his forceful pursuit of her at the beginning of all of this.

Just right.

"Kate?" he whispers. "What are we doing here?"

"I don't know," she answers.

But she wraps her arms around him again and leaves the ring where it is, closing her eyes against his neck and breathing in time with him.

She presses a soft touch of her lips to his jaw in question, seeking permission, and he lowers his mouth to hers, both tentative. That there's no joy in it - that it's so unknown - breaks her heart. She pulls back from the hesitance to open her eyes; his are direct and raw in front of her, laid bare.

"I don't know what we're doing but it's together," she says, hates how so much of it is still a question.

His palm comes to cup her cheek, a touch she's been aching for, and her eyes slip shut at the feel of his fingers so gentle. His kiss startles her, makes her reach up and catch his wrist, hold him close, and his words rasp out against her jaw.

"You'd be so good in DC."

"I'm good with you," she admits finally. "So good with you."