93. Fight the battle, save the girl

Castle is woken by his buzzing alarm at his usual time, which allows him to share breakfast with Alexis and frequently also allows him to watch his mother’s all-too-common walks of shame. Today, thankfully, is not one of those days.  Shortly, however, he wishes it were.

“Dad?”

“Yes?”

“Dad, why doesn’t Detective Beckett come here? You’re spending lots of time with her, but never here.  Why not?”

“She said on Sunday, it’s been very busy at the precinct.”

“I don’t believe you,” Alexis says very firmly. “If it was cases you’d mention it.  You always mention the cases even if you won’t tell me all the gory details, which is totally unfair.”

Castle’s heart sinks. This is not a conversation he wants to have.

“Grams and me” –

“Grams and I, pumpkin.”

“Stop trying to change the subject, Dad. Grams and I think something’s up.  We thought maybe she doesn’t like us, but she doesn’t behave like she doesn’t like us, so why won’t she come here?”

“Alexis, Detective Beckett has other responsibilities. She can’t just do exactly what she likes when she’s off duty.”  He looks very straight at his normally delightful daughter.  “I don’t want you – or Grams – asking about it, or interfering, or trying to investigate.  When it’s dealt with, she’ll be able to come round if we invite her.  Until then, you just have to accept that she can’t come as often as anyone would like.” 

Which last sentence is carefully constructed to give the impression that it’s also Beckett who can’t come as often as she’d like. Alexis looks back, speculation blooming in her face, and then looks at Castle’s serious expression.

“Okay, Dad. But she does know we like her, doesn’t she?  She’s good for you.  You haven’t been half as childish since Christmas.  And I really don’t mind if you spend lots of evenings with her.”  She smirks evilly.  “I like the freedom, you know.”

“You like the quiet, you mean. No helicopter toys buzzing your homework.”

“Yes. So you have my permission to be out as often as you like.  Even sleepovers.”

Castle splutters and Alexis makes a swift escape before he wreaks revenge on her.

After she’s gone, however, Castle recalls that he has to call Dr Burke, and probably O’Leary. Dr Burke is easiest, because that’s simply arranging an appointment time for before Friday lunchtime – he thinks that Burke will need a little time to consider this looming catastrophe.  He’ll call after he’s tidied up breakfast and it’s got to office hours.

Castle manages the tidying up of breakfast, but then he’s distracted by a tendril of inspiration. He’s hauled out of his writing reverie by the ring of his phone, which turns out to be Dr Burke’s receptionist, asking whether he could see Dr Burke this afternoon, at four.  He agrees.  Inspiration having fled, he texts O’Leary, asking what time he’s showing up at Molloy’s, and then asking if they can meet half an hour before that.  Beckett hasn’t actually told him the timings, though he imagines that she’ll say when he shows up at the precinct.  Anyway, it won’t be earlier than six-thirty.

All that done, he collects his coat and leaves for the Twelfth.

The bullpen is full of the depressed and bored air of detectives who are poring over old cases, and that’s just from Beckett, Espo and Ryan. The others all seem to be a little busier, and a lot cheerier.  Castle wonders if Montgomery is still gerrymandering the caseload, and bounces up to Beckett’s desk brandishing coffee and good humour.

“Hey, Beckett,” he says happily.

“Hey, Castle,” she says, and smiles back. Castle notices an underlying unhappiness but is forestalled from asking by the arrival of both boys.

“Where you been, Castle? Haven’t seen you for a week.  Don’tcha love us any more?” Ryan asks, faux-plaintively.

“Got tired of you following him around,” Espo says derisively.

“Neither,” Castle says amiably, before it can get nasty. “Gina threatened me with fire-ants, honey and excision of my liver if I didn’t turn in at least three chapters before the weekend and two more by tonight.  I managed it, so here I am.  Unhoneyed, uneaten” – Beckett hides her expression – “and still in possession of my liver.”

“Does she threaten you like that often?”

“Usually she’s a bit more expansive about it. She must have been in a hurry.”

Castle perches on Beckett’s desk rather than in his chair, and precisely as expected is grumbled and growled at.

“Move, Castle. You’re sitting on my files.”

He doesn’t. Beckett taps him firmly and when he still doesn’t stand up shoves, only moderately gently. 

“Castle, move. Go get coffee and get off my files.”

He stands up, acting as if he’s been put upon. “C’mon, Ryan.  Beckett loves her cold case file more than she loves me” –

“It’s certainly quieter,” Beckett quips, to a snigger from Espo.

“ – so let’s go get some doughnuts.” He pouts at Beckett.  “And you’re not going to steal them all.”

“Sprinkles, please,” is all she says.

Ryan and Castle exit, leaving Beckett and Espo discussing whether it’s worth trying a fingerprint match on a smudge.

“How many doughnuts should we get?”

“Twice as many as you think, and an extra three for Beckett,” Ryan says lightly. “Might sweeten her disposition next time she goes sparring.”

“Yeah?” Castle says. “What’s that about?”

“Beckett was in a bad mood on Thursday an’ took it out on the mats. Glad it wasn’t me.  Even Espo was having some trouble with her.  It got a bit lively, and then it all went full out, an’ then Montgomery turned up and ripped us all a new one.  But Espo took her down an’ she landed badly on her wrist.  Couldn’t even brush her hair.”

“What?” Castle had certainly not realised it was that bad. And yet she’d taken it out the sling to try to console him.

“An’ no make up.”

“Wow. And it’s not broken?”  Castle whistles.

“Yeah. But somehow it was all my fault that they were trying to kill each other.  I was just watching.”

“Sounds like the best place to be. So why was Beckett so mad?”

“Dunno. She was thinking really hard, like when she’s working a difficult case.  We thought she had something that she wasn’t letting us in on, but she wouldn’t talk.  She just snapped at us.  Then she took a breath and eased off and said she’d come sparring at lunchtime.  So we left her to it.”

“Best thing for you. Death’s pretty permanent.”

“Think that’s what Espo was thinking. Beckett doesn’t usually get pissed at us.”  Ryan shrugs.  “Whatever it was, she came out looking for a fight an’ Espo gave her one.”

“Oh,” Castle says, and turns to the vital business of ordering doughnuts in bulk. He’s learned what he needed to from Ryan.  Next up, a chat with Espo.

The doughnuts are appreciated by the bullpen. Castle can tell this by the way that they are all gone in sixty milliseconds.  Beckett receives her separate box first, affords him a dazzling smile and then refuses absolutely to share.  Castle humphs for the sake of appearances and then produces his own doughnuts – chocolate, naturally – with a smug grin.

“You don’t think I expected you to share, do you?”

“You’d have been disappointed. It’s doughnuts.  No cop shares doughnuts.”

“And I didn’t expect to be able to beat the bullpen to the box – anyway, they’ve all got guns and even doughnuts aren’t worth being shot over – so I got my own.” He smiles widely and takes a large bite while watching the flurry of doughnut-fuelled activity around the main box, where Ryan seems to be losing out.  It reminds him of sharks around a bleeding whale.

“You’re everyone’s favourite guy right now,” Beckett says, with a grin. “If there’s any research you want to do that might involve annoying people, now’s your chance.  They’ll all be on a sugar high.”  The grin turns evil.  “Try not to break anything while you’re playing, okay?”

“I’m not a child,” Castle murmurs. “Happy to prove it.  Again.” 

He departs at speed so that he retains the last word, and winds up, wholly not coincidentally, at Espo’s desk, where Espo is just dealing with the last few crumbs of doughnut.

“Hey.”

“Yo, Castle. What d’you want?”

“A chat,” Castle says, with no humour at all.   Espo’s expression darkens.  “I wanna know what you thought you were doing sparring with Beckett till she got hurt.”

“Coffee,” Espo says laconically, not noticeably intimidated, but equally serious.

They attain the break room, Espo’s ferocious scowl and Castle’s air of annoyance preventing anyone else joining them.

“Beckett came out lookin’ for a fight. Dunno why.”

“Thought you could pull your punches?”

“I was doin’. Right up till she kicked me in the gut.  I can’t pull everything when I gotta focus on not bein’ badly hurt myself.  Ask her why she was so mad.  Takes two to keep it clean, an’ Beckett sure wasn’t tryin’.”  Esposito drills Castle with a glare.  “Wasn’t you, was it?”

“No.”

Espo looks very sceptical. “You ain’t been in for a week.”

“Doesn’t mean I didn’t see Beckett,” Castle says, unspecifically. The boys know there’s more going on than they see.  So much was made clear back when he told them he’d got this, a month ago.

“But you know why.” It’s not a question.

“Mm,” Castle hums non-committally, and changes the subject. “How come you couldn’t hold back?  Thought you were better than Beckett.”

“I am. But she’s prob’ly the best woman around right now, an’ like I said, she wasn’t holdin’ back.  Came down to a choice between holdin’ back and bein’ in the ER or not holdin’ back an’ hopin’ both of us weren’t in the ER.  Then Montgomery walked in.”  Espo winces at the memory.  “He wasn’t pleased.  Reamed us all out.  Just as well he di’n’t know about Beckett’s wrist, an’ we weren’t gonna let on.  She fell on it, an’ messed it up.  Went to see Lanie about it, but that’s about all I know.”

“She do this often?” Castle asks, falling into Espo’s laconic style.

“Naw. Once before.  ‘S why we’re careful.  Last time it was my wrist got sprained but Beckett got her shoulder dislocated.  We got used as the floor mops by Montgomery.  After that we watched it.”

“When was that?”

“’Bout – erm – maybe three years ago. She was out for blood.  Funny thing was, I thought she’d been hitting the mats with someone else, ‘cause she had a whole set of bruises already.  Got the feelin’ she’d had a break-up, but she don’t talk an’ I don’t ask.”

“Probably wise,” Castle murmurs sotto voce. Something is nagging at his mind.  It’ll come, if he ignores it.

“Wondered if she’d been sparrin’ with O’Leary. She used to do that a bit,” Espo says, and that’s all it takes for the whole story to fall complete into Castle’s head.

Beckett had last been out for blood when she’d broken up with that Fed. O’Leary had thought – still thinks – that it was because of the Fed, but Castle knows that it’s because she’d wanted a family of her own but her dad’s issues had meant that it hadn’t worked out.  This time… this time it’s still because of her dad’s issues, or more truthfully in both cases it’s because of Beckett’s reactions to her dad’s issues.  Which is the same, really, as saying Beckett’s issues. And on Tuesday last Dr Burke had told Beckett that she was being abused, and she’d not taken it well (understatement is part of his writer’s craft) and on Wednesday she’d been brooding over it all day, and if he puts together Ryan’s comments about how she was behaving and Espo’s comments now he just bets that Beckett was brooding worse on Thursday and then took her entire fury and unhappiness on to the mats.

He’d thought about Beckett’s potential capacity for self-destruction last night. He might have been a day or two – or seven – late.  If he’d known this when he’d spoken to Dr Burke at the weekend, he’d have mentioned it then.  Instead he’ll need to mention it tonight.  It’s the physical version of the emotional suicide – sparring so hard there’s no option but that she’ll get hurt.  This is seriously fucked up.  He supposes, very bitterly, that it could have been worse if it had been self-harming, not sparring, though he’s fairly certain that if Espo is the opposition that’s a distinction without much of a practical difference.

“You okay, bro? You look a bit zoned out there.”

“Yeah, it’s okay,” he says vaguely. “I’ll just make another coffee.  Must be all the sugar in those doughnuts.”

“Yeah.” Espo clearly doesn’t believe him and equally isn’t going to pry.  He wanders out as Castle fiddles with the machine.

Messing with the espresso machine is interrupted by the chirp of a text. It’s O’Leary, who says… what?  Off-shift today. What’s up?  Told Beckett seven, so a bit of time.  Castle texts back straight away how about five thirty? We need to talk.  Barely more of a gap later comes back Sure. Molloys.

The day progresses with a general lack of conversation and surfeit of case files. Beckett isn’t chatty – not that this is ever news – but Castle notices a rather heavier presence of Montgomery than normal.  He seems to have an awful lot of matters to which he needs to attend which require walking past Beckett’s desk.  Shortly after three, Castle makes his excuses and leaves: claiming that he’s bored for the boys’ benefit and that he’ll see her later for Beckett’s.  She raises a cynical eyebrow but doesn’t interrogate him.  A few minutes of a niggling guilty feeling into the cab journey, he texts her: Burke wanted to see me @ 4pm. Later.  C.  It doesn’t really improve the niggle.  Not for the first time, there seem to be no good choices where Beckett is concerned.  He broods all the way to Dr Burke’s office.

“Good afternoon, Mr Castle.”

“Hey.”

“I wished to talk with you, and with Mr Beckett separately, about Friday’s meeting. I have some concerns that, without proper support and planning, that it will be unproductive.”

“Unproductive?” says Castle incredulously. “Unproductive?  Is that how you normally describe an absolute disaster?”

Dr Burke raises his eyebrows. “Would you care to explain?”

“Beckett is planning to interrogate her father to prove you wrong. She doesn’t care how much it hurts – her or him – because she thinks he doesn’t care.  In fact, she’s planning to blow their relationship up so spectacularly that there’s no chance they ever speak to each other again. She thinks that’ll finish things and she’ll be fine afterwards, because she still thinks her father doesn’t care and wants to ensure that she doesn’t either. I think that ten seconds after she does that and discovers her father does care she’ll be sorry but it won’t ever be fixable again, and then she’ll drown in guilt and never come out.”  He draws a breath.  “Did you ask how she hurt her wrist?”

“Of course. She said that she had been sparring harder than usual, because she was frustrated with both her work and my comment that her behaviours were similar to those of an abuse victim.”

“Similar to? Beckett’s convinced you said her father abused her.”

“I have not. I have pointed that out on several occasions.”

“Anyway,” says Castle impatiently, “according to Espo, she was looking for blood from the moment she walked on the mats. And I think it’s the same thing.  She doesn’t care any more how much she gets hurt as long as she gets rid of the thing hurting her.  So sparring in a way that’s going to get her hurt – and it wasn’t the first time – stops her hurting from the other stuff; and blowing everything up with her father is just what we talked about before.”

“Hm,” Dr Burke emits. “An interesting analysis, Mr Castle.  Given that you will be here on Friday, have you had any other thoughts about the likely progress of that meeting?”

“Beckett’s planning out her interrogation. She’s enlisted O’Leary, to go right back to when her father was being picked up drunk in Central Park.  She wants me to add in what I know about what her father’s currently thinking.  She’s not going to like that.  We’re all supposed to be meeting tonight to work it out.”   He pauses.  Letting all of this out is actually very cathartic.  “She isn’t mentioning her feelings at all.  She’s only talking about getting facts.  And” –

“And?”

“And I think actually she hasn’t realised that it’s going to blow up in her face. I just keep thinking that really deep down she’s doing this because he’s hurt her so much, for so long – without meaning to or even knowing that he did – to hurt him right back.  But I’m sure she doesn’t know that.”

“Very astute, Mr Castle. Your analysis marches with mine.”

“You expected this?”

“I am a psychiatrist.  I believe, however, that we can direct events so that catastrophe is avoided.  As a first point, Detective Beckett is not aware that Mr Beckett has now realised that he has never been apprised of the full extent of his words and actions while drunk.  She is also not aware that I will be seeing Mr Beckett tomorrow, and if necessary again prior to Friday’s meeting.  Part of that discussion will cover Detective Beckett’s likely behaviour, so that he is prepared for it.  I trust, too, that she is not aware of your deductions?”

“No.”

“Good.”

Castle bristles. “I don’t like going behind her back.”

“Mr Castle,” reproves Dr Burke, “we do not wish to go behind Detective Beckett’s back. However, I do not wish her to start down another misconceived line of thought.  How do you think she will react if you mention any of your conclusions?”

Castle is brought up short. “Badly,” he has to admit.

“Precisely. Every time that Detective Beckett has been faced with an unpleasant truth about her actions and emotions, she has first denied and then sought to discredit the point.  If you mention these conclusions now, she will undoubtedly refuse to deal with you, and if there is one point that is simple in this highly complex matter, it is that Detective Beckett refusing to maintain contact with you will be very likely to cause catastrophe.”

Dr Burke gazes sympathetically at Castle. “I appreciate that this is a highly unpleasant position for you.  Quite naturally, you would prefer immediate honesty.  I would also prefer that this were unnecessary.  However, it is only two days, and the results will justify the delay.  Honesty will be required, in any event, so you need not worry that you will be deceiving your beloved.”  He smiles, gently, as Castle chokes, splutters, and generally fails to recover his composure.  “Now, could we perhaps discuss your role in Friday’s session, and the potential directions that it might take?”