98. Come in, come out of the rain

“Er… I’m totally over-reacting?” he backtracks. This is clearly not sufficient.

“Really? Bit odd that your first reaction is to try to track her. That’s a really big over-reaction. Most people just call a phone.” Ryan scowls, which doesn’t really fit his face. He should leave the scowling to Esposito, who is demonstrating exactly how to do it.

“What do you know that we don’t? Why haven’t you just called her?”

“What have you screwed up this time? Isn’t she taking your calls?”

“Have you upset Beckett?”

“No!” Castle eventually manages to fit an answer into the machine-gun barrage of questions. “Nothing. I was just watching re-runs of the X-files and everyone knows alien abduction is real.”

Both detectives regard him with sceptical cynicism and identically black looks.

“D’you really think we’ll swallow that crap? You only come out with that stuff when you’re trying to hide something.”

“Why haven’t you called her?” Ryan, again.

“Because… Look, calling her now.”

Castle attains the break room without the other men, dials and waits for Beckett to pick up.

She doesn’t.

He waits a couple of minutes, and dials again.

“Beckett.”

Castle is unreasonably relieved that she has taken the call. He is not relieved by her uninflected, dead voice.

“Where are you? I thought we were having lunch?”

“It’s not lunchtime yet. I’m fine. I’ll see you later.”

“It’s twelve-thirty.”

There is a pause. It seems to Castle that Beckett hadn’t known how late it was. This is also not a relief.

“I’m not hungry.” This, now, comes as no surprise at all.

“Then don’t eat. Tell me where you are, and I’ll meet you.”

“I…” Castle thinks that that statement might have ended don’t want to, but somewhat to his surprise it takes a U-turn and finishes up “Okay. I’m in Tompkins Square Park.” He manages not to say why are you outside in the cold and the rain? which is unlikely to help anyone right now. “Near the playground.”

“Okay. See you in a few minutes.”

Castle slides out of the bullpen without attracting Esposito or Ryan’s attention. He’s not very keen on exacerbating his errors. He is very keen on talking to Beckett, whose behaviour has been deeply weird ever since she closed the bathroom door this morning. Yesterday evening she was desperate for him to be with her at Dr Burke’s tomorrow: this morning she’s trying to tell him he shouldn’t go even though she wants him there. And then when he tells her that’s not going to happen she disappears from the one place he’d have thought she always ran to, not from: her work, and no-one had a single solitary clue where she’s gone or why.

He reflects rather ruefully that while Dr Burke had warned him that Beckett might displace irritation or anger on to others, he had entirely failed to warn Castle that he, Castle, might find himself more easily annoyed than usual. Then again, if Beckett weren’t acting so mule-headed, he wouldn’t be so annoyed. How does she think he’d not come to the session tomorrow?

His thoughts wander. If he hadn’t called her, it didn’t sound like she would have called him. It certainly didn’t sound like she was planning to come back to the bullpen, though it also didn’t sound like she’d had the faintest idea of the time. He wonders just how long she’s been out in the rain, currently falling quietly on his umbrella. He has no idea where to start the conversation any more. Earlier, when he’d been vaguely considering Remy’s, it had all been relatively simple. Tell Beckett he was attending, reassure her that it was his choice, and remind her that they’ll be leaving for the Hamptons the minute it’s over and don’t forget to pack that very tactile crimson dress please Beckett? Now, he’s splashing through ever deepening puddles in rain which seems to be getting heavier without a clue what’s going on or indeed whether Beckett has any intention of going to therapy, the Hamptons, or even out of the rain. He sploshes on, depressed.

Finally he spots a dark-headed figure, bedraggledly slumped on a damp bench under a tree. She looks up only when his feet stop in front of her.

“Hey,” she emits. It has as much life as the sodden piece of litter swirling round the park in the March wind.

Castle looks at the damp bench and even damper Beckett and internally concedes that his coat will need dried later. He sits down and aligns the umbrella to cover both of them. Not that it will improve Beckett, who is currently dripping gently from each draggled lock of hair. She doesn’t seem to have noticed that, either.

“Why are you out here?”

She shrugs. “Needed space.”

“You’ve been out here for nearly two hours.”

She shrugs again. “So? It’s not like there’s been a body drop.”

Castle stares at the side of her head. Beckett not caring about closing cases?

“It’s raining. You’re soaked.”

Another shrug. “Hadn’t noticed.”

“We were supposed to have lunch.”

“Didn’t notice the time.”

She hasn’t looked at him since he sat down. Her voice has all the intonation and emotion of a brick. She isn’t even annoyed. She just isn’t there. The lights aren’t on and there’s clearly nobody home.

“I’m coming to your session tomorrow.”

“Okay. Up to you. You don’t have to.”

“You wanted me there,” Castle emits, already frustrated and moving rapidly towards furious. “What’s changed? You know I’m on your side. You asked me to promise I’d be there to get you out.”

“I shouldn’t have. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. You were all right. Burke, O’Leary, you. Drunk or sober it was abuse. So all I have to do is tell him so and walk away for good.   You don’t need to be there for that. You don’t need to be there at all. It’ll all be over in five minutes. It’s been staring me in the face for a week and I’ve been trying to deny it. Well, you were right. Burke was right. I’m sure he’ll be very happy about that.” Her voice is that same dead, defeated tone as she’d had last night. “I’m sure you’re all very happy that I’ve seen the light. Dad abused me and Q.E.D. he didn’t care and won’t care. I can deal with the rest myself. I don’t need you there because there’s no reason for you to be there. Go in, say my piece, and leave. Burke can deal with my dad. I’m done dealing with my dad.”

“Then what?”

Beckett shrugs. “Get on with my life.” There’s a half beat pause. “Get a life.”

“Will you still come to the Hamptons with me?”

She looks at him for the first time. There’s nothing in her eyes. “If you want.”

“What about what you want?”

“It takes two, Castle,” she says wearily. “See whether you still even want to go after tomorrow.”

Castle loses his already frayed control.

“You stop this pig-assed stupid behaviour right now. I don’t give a flying fuck what happens tomorrow and it certainly won’t stop me taking you to the Hamptons, but you have to want to go. You’re the one who suggested it and you’re the one who kept saying you wanted time together and now you’re backtracking? I know what I want but you just keep hiding and now you’re hoping that somehow it’ll all go away if you just sit in the rain till you dissolve?”

“It’ll all go away tomorrow night,” Beckett flashes back, now angry herself. “Come if you want to. Just remember it was all your idea to make it a spectator sport. I’m sure there’s a TV show in there somewhere. Wrangling Relatives, you could call it. Or Feuding Families. Or just The Becketts. You could run it against The Waltons, for the contrast value. Planning to move into script writing, Castle?” Her tone would have riled the Archangel Michael. Castle, who is no angel never mind archangel, is instantly riled.

“That’s ridiculous. I thought you’d got past this. I told you months ago I wouldn’t use your father in” –

“In a book.”

“You really think I’d split hairs like that? You think that? The hell with that. The” – his mouth snaps shut on hell with you. Dr Burke’s words hit his brain just in time. Such anger to be displaced…are you prepared? “You’re doing just what he said would happen,” he says slowly. “I thought it would happen last night, but it’s now. He said you might lose it with me but it would really be the situation. I guess it’s in his damn textbook somewhere.”

“What?”

“Dr Burke said you’d get angry with me but it wouldn’t really be at me. And it’s not me, is it? It’s your dad. It’s the crap your first therapist fed you. It’s the whole thing. You’re yelling at me because I’m here.”

“I’m yelling at you? You’ve been yelling at me since early this morning,” Beckett bites back. “The hell with you. That’s what you were about to say, so why don’t I just say it for you? I’ve seen the error of my ways thanks to you and O’Leary” – the edge on that would cut rock – “so now that you’ve indulged your saviour complex you can fuck off back to your perfect life where you don’t have to deal with any of my issues and ungratefulness and leave me alone just like you were just about to say. I don’t want you there tomorrow and I’m not coming to the Hamptons either. Just leave me alone.”

She stands up and is five steps away and still moving before Castle reacts. A handful of long strides later and he’s caught up and locked a hand over her arm to stop her moving.

“The only way to make you listen is to yell. Didn’t you hear a single word I said? I’m going to be there and then we are going to the Hamptons because this has nothing to do with you and me at all and everything to do with you being scared to tell your father the truth in case” –

“In case he kills himself. Is that what you were going to say? Well, go right ahead. I don’t care what he does any more. He’s not my problem. I can’t change the past but I can damn well not make the same mistake in future. I can’t control him and I’m not going to.” She draws a harried, scarifying breath. “But I can control what happens next.” Her voice locks down to cold and clear. “You are not coming to tomorrow’s session. This is still my therapy, whatever you seem to think, and I have the right to say who is there. You’ve done enough. If you wanted gratitude, you can have it. Thank you.” Bitter, vicious sarcasm inflects each word. “Go find someone who’ll appreciate you like you deserve. Someone else. I wouldn’t be in this mess if you hadn’t shoved your way into my life. Pardon me if I’m not grateful enough for that.”

She pulls her arm away with a sharp movement and begins to walk again, in the opposite direction from where he’d come in, leaving him standing in the rain under his umbrella with absolutely no idea what to do. Dr Burke had predicted this but, now that it’s all exploded in a public park, Castle can’t use the only answer he knows will work, and he doesn’t have a Plan B. He doesn’t, in fact, have a Plan A.

But he does have one, nuclear, option.

Beckett just keeps walking, out of the park, along the streets, under the now-driving rain. She is not going to get into another situation where she feels she has to behave in a certain way, go where she’s told, be grateful or happy or nice just to keep people happy. Just to try to make them love her. She’s not grateful and she’s not happy and she certainly isn’t nice, or kind, or lovable; and she is not going to pretend she is or try to be. It didn’t work last time and it won’t work this time and she is not going to repeat her mistakes.

She walks on. She doesn’t weep. It didn’t help for ten years and it hasn’t helped for the last two months and it won’t help now. Cut her losses. Last time she wasted ten years of her life in an abusive relationship that she didn’t even recognise, till they all forced her into it. This time she’s wasted ten weeks. She supposes that’s an improvement. The shorter time doesn’t make it hurt any less, though. Her feet keep walking. The rain keeps soaking her cheeks.

Shortly, she pulls out her phone and prepares to lie through her teeth to her Captain. She has never, ever, requested personal time when not sick. She is about to tap dance her way through not explaining why she needs it.

“Sir, Beckett.”

“Beckett?” Montgomery sounds dumbfounded. “Why aren’t you in the bullpen? You’re supposed to be at work. Where are you, Detective?”

“Sir… I need to take the rest of the day. Personal reasons. There isn’t anything on my desk that can’t wait.” She pauses. “Sir, please…actually could I take leave tomorrow?”

“Why?”

“Personal reasons,” Beckett says again.

In his office, Montgomery is staring fixedly at the phone, which is making noises that he just does not get. He understands all the words. He completely does not understand the sum total of the sentences.

“That’s not good enough, Beckett. You’re supposed to be on shift and working. I need a better reason.”

There is a very uncomfortable pause, during which Montgomery looks out of his office and observes that Beckett’s desk appears to have been abandoned precipitately. He doesn’t like the conclusions that he’s drawing.

“It’s about my dad,” comes eventually. “I need some time to deal with it.”

Montgomery doesn’t believe that this is anything like the whole truth. On the other hand, Beckett voluntarily requesting leave without being too sick to stand up is an unprecedented occurrence, which behoves him to tread extremely carefully. The stress overtones in Beckett’s voice do not lead him to the conclusion that she is thinking logically or indeed sanely. It is quite possible that if he pushes she will say something irrevocable. There is an edge of desperation to her words which is becoming more obvious by the moment.

“Okay, Detective. You can take this afternoon and tomorrow. But this had better be sorted out soon. Report to me first thing on Monday and if you haven’t got a solution that enables you to do your scheduled shifts then you’ll need to use up your accumulated leave from Monday till you sort it out.”

“Sir.”

Montgomery puts the phone down and thinks hard. He can’t afford to give Beckett obviously preferential treatment – that way lies disaster for the bullpen. He has to treat her like he’d treat any other cop in the same circumstances. But he is absolutely sure that the problems she’s got are related to her father, therapy, that round of so-called stomach flu and her consequent benching. He just hasn’t got any way at all of sorting it out for her. No-one does. Until she is prepared to tell him exactly what is going on, there is nothing he can do to help, and she is quite clearly not prepared to tell him more than the absolute bare minimum. But he is intensely worried that his best detective is wobbling on the edge of a cliff, and he doesn’t want the next call to be I resign effective immediately. To his credit, his first concern is that Beckett is a cop to the core and resigning would break her. His second is that his stats would plummet. Fortunately being human and being the Captain point in the same direction, which isn’t always the case. Also fortunately, he had already been thinking about forcing her to take leave next week.

Montgomery prowls out into the bullpen and lurks menacingly behind Esposito, who appears to be checking the sports results instead of lab results.

“Detective Esposito. Detective Ryan.”

“Sir!” They jump. Montgomery experiences a flash of satisfaction. He’s still got the knack. “Detective Beckett is unwell. She expects to be back Monday.”

“Uh?” his supposedly intelligent detectives blurt.

“Was I not clear? Detective Beckett is unwell. You’ll need to do without her till Monday.” He marches off, leaving two dumbfounded detectives behind him.

“What’s that all about?”

“Dunno. Where’s Castle?”

“Dunno. Musta sneaked out.”

They trade confused faces, and identical shrugs. “Guess I know where he is,” Ryan says. “With Beckett.”

“That’s okay then.”

Ryan nods. Both of them go back to the sports – oops, lab or canvass – results.

Beckett has reached her car and, without entering the precinct for any reason at all, starts it up and turns it towards home. When she gets there, she’ll decide what to do. Except she needn’t go home at all, if she doesn’t want to. Nor does she need to have her phone on. She switches it off. It’s still raining. Instead of homeward, she diverts towards the Holland Tunnel, and out of Manhattan. After that, she aims for the Liberty State Park, in default of any other matter. It’s exactly the opposite direction from home.

She only wants to be alone. Nothing else.   Too many people wanting too much of her; too many people needing her; too many people expecting her to fit their mould; too many people trying to force her to accept their thinking. Simply… too many people, and she’s suddenly drowning in all their needs and wants and attitudes. She only wants to be herself. She can’t find herself and she’s run out.

So now Detective Beckett has disappeared. Gone away. Who cares? Not she.

Castle, still standing in Tompkins Square Park in the pouring rain, pulls out his phone and searches out Dr Burke’s number. Shortly he is speaking to the efficient receptionist.

“I need to speak to Dr Burke urgently, please.” He can hear his own desperation and haste to beat the clock. There is clicking. He imagines the polished nails on the keys.

“He will be free at four.”

“That’s too late. I need to talk to him now.” Before Beckett withdraws consent for Dr Burke to talk to him, Castle.

“He is with a patient, and can’t be interrupted. However, I could ask him to call you immediately afterwards, at two. Would that do?”

Castle checks his watch. It’s one-fifteen.

“It’ll have to do. It’s really important I speak to him as soon as he’s done.”

“Certainly. Who shall I say has called?”

“Rick Castle.” He gives his cell and home numbers. “Tell him… tell him it’s about Detective Beckett. Thank you.”

Having no other place to go, he goes home. The loft is empty. This is very fortunate, as Castle is not in the mood for company and is quite sufficiently angry with himself, Beckett, and the day till now to evict his mother if she should so much as blink sideways, never mind actually speak. He goes straight to his study, shuts the door, makes sure his cell phone is charging, and waits.

At two-oh-two his phone rings. He snatches it up and swipes on.

“Rick Castle.”

“Mr Castle.” Dr Burke’s smooth, soothing tones are, for once, an immense relief. “What is the matter?”

“Beckett won’t let me come tomorrow and she’s bailed on our weekend and I just bet she’s going to ring you to withdraw consent to talk to me but maybe she hasn’t yet?”

“What?” Dr Burke says sharply. “How has this arisen?” Castle would almost say that he sounded flustered.

Dr Burke is more than merely flustered. He is appalled. If there had been one external data point on which he had thought that he could rely, it would have been that Detective Beckett would not engineer another breach with Mr Castle. That she has is profoundly disturbing.

“If I knew that I could fix it,” Castle says forcefully.

“Tell me what happened, in as much, and the most accurate, detail as you can.”

“Last night she got O’Leary and me in a bar and cross-questioned him about her dad’s behaviour back in the day. O’Leary effectively read her the riot act about not seeing what was under her nose. Then she kept insisting she wasn’t abused and we both got angry and then she said she wanted me there and she wanted to go to the Hamptons and made me promise I’d get her out tomorrow’s session if she asked me.”

“You both got angry? What could you say to her that would make her angry?”

“She said that if she’d been abused the first therapist would have picked it up and I said he was wrong about everything and told her that one way or another her dad hurt her and she had to tell him the truth. And she said she might as well have killed him and I said he’s already thinking the worst and whatever happened it wasn’t her fault and she should think about what she wanted.” He gulps in a breath. “And then she made me promise to come tomorrow. But now she’s completely flipped.”