Frozen Love (A Castle Fanfiction)

Coming Home

I'm baaaaack!!! Did you miss me? ;) Well, I'm all yours from now until August 7th, so... be expecting a lot of chapters, because I'm still kind of in love with writing this. Here you are, and I hope you enjoy!!! :)

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"Mr. Castle, I'd like it if you could remember three words for me, alright?" A doctor asked as he stood in front of Rick who sat at the end of an examination table. I was sitting quietly with Brayden in my arms as I watched the same test I'd witnessed once already. It was only seven in the morning and already our doctor was getting a second opinion about Rick's absolute healing. So far he had shown no signs of relapsing back into the state he'd been in, but they continuously told me that relapsing was a very real possibility. If I was being entirely honest with myself, however, I hadn't even considered believing that to be a possibility.

Just like the other test, Rick sat back and listened as the man asked him about ten medically relevant questions and then repeated the three words back, "Dog, pencil, fire house." Then, just because he was as annoyed with the second go around as I was, Castle said, "And if you're asking about the three words from earlier, they were: panda, library and meatballs."

The doctor cocked an insulted gaze at my mischievous lover and thanked him before asking me to speak with him in the hall. I agreed and handed our son to Rick before following the man out. Once the door was closed, the man said bluntly, "I want to keep your husband here over night for observations, just to be sure that he is alright."

"Why?" I asked, desperately wanting Rick to come home.

He sighed and answered, "When the brain swells as much as his did, it doesn't just go away like this. I'm very concerned that he's suddenly fine. I want to make sure his brain doesn't swell any further."

I looked at him and nodded, telling him, "If you think it's what's best for him, then do it. But you're going to have a tougher time convincing him of that than you are me." Castle was so excited about coming home. We'd talked about it already, he said he was going to take Brayden from room to room and give him a tour of what everything looked like through the man with the RHD's eyes and then he was just going to sit on the couch all night, coddling his son and watching some movie with his girls. That sounded like the perfect plan to me and I so badly wanted it for him, but he was much more set on it than I was.

This is why when the doctor told him about him needing to stay, Rick answered with a plainly, "No."

"Castle, they wouldn't keep you here if it wasn't what was best for you," I told him, watching him lightly sway back and forth as he bounced himself with his one good leg, still sitting on the table with our son.

As though it were an absolute fact, Castle answered, "I'm not staying here to wait for something to not happen." Before a word left my opening mouth in argument, Castle put up his hand and looked at the doctor. "If something goes wrong, if my brain swells again, will you be able to do anything about it?"

The doctor sighed and shifted. "No."

"And if my brain swells again, I will be either a vegetable or back to memory loss, right?"

"Yes."

"Then I'm not staying here." He looked absolutely immovable on the subject. I wanted to ask him why, I wanted to know why he wouldn't be here where someone could help him instead of at home where we couldn't. But I didn't need to ask. It was written in his eyes. In his mind, this could be his last night in earth and he needed to spend it holding his newborn son, being able to cuddle with his daughter on the couch, sleeping next to me and making sure that his mother would be alright if anything went wrong. In his mind, he wanted to spend what might be his last night with the people he loved most. I couldn't argue this. I didn't.