28. Never gonna give you up

She’s arrested in her movement.

“No. You don’t walk away from anyone who needs you.  Not till it’s the only way to save them.”  He pauses, and takes a breath.  “Nor will I.  You need me, and I’m not walking away from you because that won’t save you.”

“You can’t save someone who doesn’t want to be saved. Don’t you get that?”

“Sure I do.”

“So why are you here?” I don’t want saved hangs loud from the end of her words.  The lie in that clangs louder still.

“Because last night you told me you wanted someone to support you. Someone to save you.  Since you were too wasted to lie, I’m going to listen to the truth. In vino veritas, Beckett.  Or in your case, in vodka.  Your actions don’t lie.  You’ve spent yourself not walking away from anyone who needs you ever since you once – once, Beckett, in your whole life – had to.  And that saved him.”

“Don’t. Don’t make me out to be something I’m not.  You’ll only be disappointed.”

“And when are you going to stop making yourself out to be something you’re not? Huh?  You doth protest too much, Beckett.  Every time you make yourself out to be some ball-breaking bitch who abandoned your father, every time you try to convince me that I should run as fast as I can in the other direction, all I hear is someone trying to convince themselves they don’t deserve any help.  If you were that woman you wouldn’t have tried to hide your discomfort from Alexis so she wasn’t hurt, you just wouldn’t have cared.  If you didn’t care about how I feel, you wouldn’t be trying to push me away so I don’t get hurt more later, you’d have an affair with me and you just wouldn’t care.  If you didn’t care you wouldn’t be trying to save both Berowitzes, but you are.”

He stands up from the couch and paces the five slow steps that’s the distance between them. He doesn’t hurry, but Beckett doesn’t move.  

“You care, Beckett. If you didn’t you’d have never gone back to your father, never been there for him.  If you didn’t care you’d have pretended everything was fine with me and lied about it.  If you didn’t care you wouldn’t have been crying about it last night.”  He reaches her, and stops.  “I thought you were doing what you tried to make me think you were doing.  You almost made me believe it.  But you’re not that woman – and I’m not that stupid.”  He stretches out, and places two hands firmly on her waist to draw her back in and cosset her close against his shoulder.  “Lean on me.  You know you can.  You know you want to.  Come here, Beckett.”

And suddenly she does, dropping the physical resistance, letting herself be brought in and held against the broad chest and wide shoulders, caught in strong arms; letting herself be warmed. So Castle thinks, anyway.  Physically, he’s reached her, which he supposes is a step forward.  Mentally… that might be more of an issue.  She’s been soft in his clasp before, but it hasn’t reached her brain.  He wonders, briefly, if she might have been right: that this will never work because she’ll never be able to get past her own demons and guilt; she’s empty, she’ll never be able to give him anything because she’ll use it all for her father and the victims.

And then he pushes that all away. He can fix this.  All of this.  He can fix her, or bring her to a place where fixing might be possible, given time.  He can.  Because all she needs is someone to lean on when she can’t stand up any longer, someone to hold her up when she’s emptied out, and he can be that.

He brings them back to the couch, and cuddles her in. Affection had been right, way back when.  It’ll still be right now.  Assertive affection, and no questions.  Questions can wait, explanations can wait.  Judgement – can wait forever.  He has no right to judge when he wasn’t there.

Beckett had known that there was no point in refusing to open the door. Castle will simply stand there and keep knocking until he’s let in. Always gets his own way, she thinks bitterly, and if at least three-quarters of the bitterness is because she knows that he’ll leave when he finds out she simply isn’t, now, capable of being who, or what, he wants and he won’t listen when she tries to pre-empt that whole can of worms being opened, well, she can live with that too.  She’ll just have to keep trying.  Maybe this time she can get through to him that she’s a bad deal, and he’ll take the message.  She has to try.  She’s not going to let him carry on with his rose tinted spectacles and happy optimism that everyone has some good in them somewhere.  She can’t afford to be soft and comforted in his arms or leaning on his strength, because it won’t be there for long.

So she lets herself spill out all the anger and bitterness and hatred of the choices – choices? There were no choices: it’s the path her father’s disease forced her down – that she’s made and puts it all out there in the bluntest, nastiest terms she can manage.

It doesn’t work at all.

It doesn’t matter what she says, how she says it or the vitriolic truth in her tone: all he says is that her words now don’t match her actions at any time, don’t match her words last night, holds her close and then comes after her when she’s pulled away and tried again to convince him that this can never work: to hold her close again and tell her that she can lean on him.

And suddenly it’s just easier to give in. Let him have what he thinks he wants.  He’ll find out he was wrong soon enough.  It’ll only end in tears, when she walks away to support her father because that’s the one thing she absolutely, definitely, for ever and ever, cannot put second.  It’ll only end in tears, but he won’t accept that till it happens: he won’t listen when she tells him who she is.  He thinks he can live with that, but truth is, he’ll only put up with it for a short time. He’ll ask questions, and want answers, and then he’ll be bored, and leave, when no answers are given.  He’ll give her a little space of peace, and then he’ll want more.  Not just answers, but he’ll want the story, he’ll want her in his loft, he’ll want her to spend time with his family.  But none of that is going to happen fast enough for Castle.  He wants quick answers, speedy solutions; he’s bored by the slow grind of basic work.

They’ll be over in a month. It won’t even be long enough for him to be upset.  She… well, that’s likely to be a rather different story.  But a month’s peace… priceless, right now, and she’ll take the possibility of peace now in return for the crippling pain later.

She doesn’t realise that she’s weeping until the slow, hot tears crawl down her face; and then she dashes them away and scrubs her cheeks dry on a sleeve; turns her head from view and doesn’t make a sound. Crying has never helped anything, and it’s not going to help matters now.  She made her choices long ago, and she’s been done with weeping over them long, long since.

She hadn’t reckoned on Castle actually paying attention.

“You’re crying,” he says. He doesn’t sound nearly as surprised as he should do. 

“I’m not.” She’s perfected the tone on her father, in those first dreadful months.  He could never tell that she was weeping.  After a while, she’d learned how not to weep at all. 

“You are.” Castle takes hold of her chin and turns her face towards him and up.  “Why are you crying?”  It’s a question she chooses to treat as rhetorical, assisted by his musing intonation.  He cossets her face into the crook of his neck and pets her hair, soothingly.  “Could it be because you’re cold and miserable?  Snuggle in, and get warm.  Or maybe you’re upset about the Berowitzes.  Or could it just possibly be because you don’t think there’s any chance of this lasting?”  She doesn’t answer, though she colours.  “I guess we’ll just have to see.”

Castle is not at all surprised by Beckett’s lack of confidence in the situation, nor by her unhappiness. But she’s cuddled in his arms – where she ought to be – and he’s got enough confidence for both of them, that they can work it out.  She’ll be ready to talk, eventually.  Not now, probably not soon, but eventually.  He continues the undemanding, unquestioning affection that’s the only thing that is likely to work.  She’s not arguing, or pushing for anything else, or switching to the slick sex that was only a distraction from the real story.   Here, for her, he isn’t second best, and he won’t be second best.  He’s the one she needs; the one who can hold her up if she needs it.

He drops a few casual, gentle kisses on her hair, drinks in the scent of her shampoo and nuzzles his nose into the top of her head.   She’s so tired, he thinks, and if she’d only stay curled in and let him take care of her again then she’d feel better.  Or fall asleep, which might be a more desirable option.  He hugs her more closely, and doesn’t try for more, and gradually the air of tense misery and bitterness begins to dissipate.  Still, he couldn’t exactly describe this as leaning on him.  Not yet.

After a further while of undemanding contact and peaceful embrace, Castle thinks that Beckett is calm enough to be reminded of her words of last night. After that, he’ll have to tell her that he’s been to see her father, and after that – if he is still alive – well, he’ll just have to take that as it comes.

“Beckett? Are you awake?”

“Huh? Yeah.”

“We need to talk.” She’s instantly not relaxed, pulling away from him and out his embrace for the furthest corner of the couch, eyes guarded, shoulders rigid.  Braced, he thinks.  “About what happened last night.”

“No, we don’t.” It’s flat.

“You can listen, then, and I’ll talk.” He casts a sidelong glance.  “Nothing happened except that you actually talked about what you felt.”  The relaxation he’d half-expected is non-existent.  He alters tack.  “Do you want to know what you said?”

“No.”

“Really?”

“No. I don’t need to know any of this.  I was” – there’s a hitch in her words – “drunk.  Nothing I said means anything.”

Castle disbelieves that instantly and on principle. He also wishes that getting Beckett drunk again wasn’t wholly unethical.  Or alternatively, that he didn’t care about whether it was ethical or not. 

“I met your dad today,” he says instead, and waits for the explosion. Strangely, there isn’t one.  “I told him that he wouldn’t appear in any book I wrote.”  Still nothing.  She’s completely blank-faced.  “He said you saved him.”

“He always does,” Beckett says bleakly. “Maybe he even believes it.  It’s not true, though.  He saved himself.  I had nothing to do with it.  Everyone has to save themselves.  You can’t do it for them, or make them do it.”

“Doesn’t mean you had nothing to do with it. He says that you walking away was the thing that made him try.”  She shrugs, as if she’s heard it all before, as if it means nothing, but deep in her hazel eyes there’s a green flare, as swiftly gone.  Ah.  Not nothing, then.  “He said that you save him just because you’re there.”  Another flare, and an odd reflection, as if there’s a second surface to her eyes. 

“I abandoned him,” she grits out, and the odd reflection resolves itself into a sheen of moisture that doesn’t gather and doesn’t fall. “I walked away and did my own thing.  Never went near him.”

“That’s not what he says.”

“He was drunk. He doesn’t remember.”  Castle abruptly realises that Beckett is, in fact, talking, and only just manages to conceal his surprise.

“He says that’s what saved him. You walking away.  He says it showed him that he’d never see you again if he didn’t get dry.”

“I watched him drown for three more years,” she cries.  “Three more years when I didn’t go to him, didn’t take the calls, waited for a cop to show up on my doorstep.  Again.”

“Why is that any different from what you told Mrs Berowitz to do?”

“I told her to get help. I didn’t get my dad help, I just walked away and let him drown.”

“Did you? Or did you leave him the pamphlets; the numbers; the adverts?”

“No good, if he wouldn’t read them.”

“Now, how about answering the question I asked,” Castle says. “Did you?”  He’s half-turned towards her, blue eyes focused on her face, pinning her to the truth.

“For a while. Then I stopped.”  The gleam in her eyes ripples and pools.  Castle reaches for her and catches her back into him just as the first drop trickles down, heedless of whether she’d had any intention of moving towards him or not.

“Come here,” he soothes. “It’s okay.  I’ve got you.”  For a second, it works: she’s softer.  Then she pulls away. 

“Don’t. Don’t say that.”

“Come here, then.” He wonders what’s wrong with the rest of it.  Then he realises that, inadvertently, he’s sounded like he’s soothing a child.  Beckett is not a child, though she may need soothed, and memories of childhood are definitely not required.  He kisses the top of her head, being the only accessible point, instead, and runs a hand over her back.  It’s not a gesture he would ever use on a child.  He thinks he’s got this, suddenly. Adult affection, not bonbons for a small child.  She doesn’t need – or want – babied.  She does need to know that she will receive support and comfort appropriate to an adult.  It’s always been (very) adult affection that he’s offered, and to which she’s responded.

Castle considers for a reasonable space of time. Normally, he has two main modes of operation – at least since he divorced Gina.  Childlike enthusiasm (or childishly irritating) and adorably charming; or parental.  The third mode, which hasn’t come out to play much recently, except before Christmas with Beckett, is the one he needs here: smooth, suave and above all adult, whether that’s dinner or drinks or sexuality.  That’s what had worked originally: a certain degree of assertiveness (but always and only with consent); a certain degree of simply sweeping her into the moment. Kat – the Kat who hasn’t reappeared, really, since he questioned her Christmas choices – liked not leading.

So if Beckett doesn’t want anything that might remind her of her childhood, and Kat doesn’t want to have to take the lead… logically that means –

He puts both hands round her face, turns it up, and kisses first both cheeks, where the tears have trailed, and then, slowly and firmly, her lips, tracing the seam. One hand drops back to her hip, to hold her in; the other stays curved around her head, fingers twining into her hair, thumb stroking the edge of her cheek.  He doesn’t press for entry, but sticks with a small tease of tongue along her mouth.  He’s waiting for a response before taking this any further: waiting for her to react as she had done the first times, to curve in and open up and let him taste and explore and take her mouth and turn her soft and purring and close-in.

And she does. Finally, a small re-connection, as her lips part and her hand rises to his shoulder.  Permission granted, he deepens his kiss, explores, and then possesses: leading but not driving, turning her into him, angling her head, sensing her relax against his body: softening.  As she softens, he becomes more forceful, more demanding, invading; more overtly masculine and assertive.  A firm hand holds her against his hardness, and suddenly she wriggles into a better position and her hands come around his neck to hold him tightly and she makes a quiet little noise and is pleasingly pliant and pettable and purring.  Yes, purring.  He’s found his Kat again.  Cuddlesome, kissable Kat.  He strokes over her leg, her hip, her back: long soothing, drugging strokes that keep her soft and eased and his; never stopping kissing her, assertive and forceful and possessive, but never tipping over into roughness, or domination, or hard-edged lust.  Support through strength, which she can draw on if she’ll let herself.

He’s got what he wanted. Well.  Maybe.  He’s found his Kat again, and that’s good.  On the other hand, she’s as like to spook, run and hide, shut him out or turn on him as any untamed wildcat.  So he’d better decide if he can live with that, because if not then this is a truly dreadful idea.  For both of them.  He’s not done so well with dealing with it so far.  Then again, she hadn’t exactly told him enough for him to understand why she behaves as she does.  Now he understands.

He looks down the likely road ahead. If she’s prepared to give it a go – and he’s not too sure about that – then even with goodwill and understanding and…and... it’s going to be rocky.  He’s never needed to worry about that before, and he’s never been bothered enough to fight his way through.  His previous affairs, and relationships, haven’t involved any problems that either party cared enough to work on and surmount. 

And yet. He’s already fought harder for this than for anyone else (except his daughter, but that’s not at all the same) without even knowing why he was fighting.  Even when he told himself he was going to walk away he couldn’t stay away.  Even when she’s told him flatly where she’s at he couldn’t walk away and stay away.  This is not hopeful.  This may be insanity.

This might be love.

Her dad talked to Castle?  So Castle really meant it: that their history won’t be the foundations of his book.  But even so, Beckett can’t bear to be pitied or felt sorry for.  And she still doesn’t, deep down, believe that she didn’t abandon her father.  She still doesn’t, below that from where she hasn’t excavated it, believe that anyone can care enough for her – betrayer, abandoner – to stay with her, when there are so many more attractions out there to take them from her.  She’s spent the last eight years trying to make up for her betrayal by supporting her father and in the work that’s brought her complete professional success, but because her father loved Jack Daniels more than he loved her, when she needed him most, nothing since has truly healed that wound.

No-one’s been there for her: why should this be different? And yet Castle just keeps coming back, in contrast to everything and everyone else.  It doesn’t seem to matter what she says or does or what he says or does – he told her it was over and she told him she couldn’t stand seeing his family, after all, and yet he’s here, and she’s here, tucked up in his arms – they just keep spinning back to each other, gravitationally attracted without intelligence or thought entering into it.  Every time he shows up she eventually lets him in, as unable to deny him as he seems unable to walk away; every time he pulls her in and wraps her up and holds her, every time she’s brought close in to his strength, she falls all over again; she lets herself believe that this time it could all be different; that he might really get it; that he really might be able to be there for her.  It’s insanity.  And yet she’s here in his arms, safe and warm and comforted and eased, and she feels better for the first time since before Christmas.   It might be… something more.

Time to step up, Kate. Time to try.  Because a ghost of a chance that Castle will care enough to stay is better than no chance at all.

“Will you play a game with me, Castle?”