Author's Note: This is the result of my inability to sleep and the very noisy wind that has been gusting outside for the last couple of hours. I've been meaning to write a Castle fic for while now as I've had many ideas, but this is the first one that I've managed to complete.

I took the liberty of interpreting Kate's parents' relationship in my own way. The show has given us no credible reason to believe they were apart, but nothing has really confirmed that they were still together. Yes, they were meant to have dinner together the night Johanna was murdered, and yes, Kate wears her ring, but I tried to explain those facts alternatively. I, personally, think that my interpretation is a possibility. I also decided to make Kate's grandmother an important part of her life, as that could contribute to why she so admires Castle's family dynamic.

This is my first fanfic in many, many years, so I would appreciate any feedback you might have. Thank you, in any case, for reading.

Disclaimer: I do not own Castle, its characters or any of the elements it is composed of.

Kate Beckett closed her eyes as she listened to the wind. She had arrived at her family's brownstone shortly after wrapping up an especially grueling case that afternoon, hoping to find solace in the only remaining relative from her mother's side of her particularly tiny family. She had spent the evening sipping wine with her grandmother, reminiscing the bygone days of her childhood. She smiled, replaying the images the recent conversations had awoken. She saw herself at three years old, sitting on the canapé in the living room of the very same townhouse she lay in now, playing with a favorite doll as her mother and grandmother sat across the coffee table, sipping tea and engaging in carefree conversation. She saw herself, now six years old, strolling down Madison Avenue, hand in hand with her mother, stopping every few feet to admire a window display, on their weekly outing that would end in sharing a treat at her favorite ice cream parlor. Now ten, she stepped through customs at JFK, arriving home from her summer trip to Italy, and rushed into the waiting arms of her father.

A loud thump drew her from her reverie. A snowstorm was beginning to brew, causing the wind to gust alarmingly as it caused the trees outside her window and across the street in the park to swish incessantly, occasionally making the house creak, hinting at its age and the history that lay within its walls. Kate shuddered and turned over on her childhood bed to look at the time, sighing as she realized half the night had gone by and she had yet to doze off.

What would her mother say if she could see her now? Kate knew that had her family never been the victims of a gruesome crime, had her mother still been alive today, she would not be doing the job she was today. She would not be leading the life she was living. She would have followed in her mother's footsteps, determined to make proud. She would have gone to law school and thrived. Kate couldn't help but wonder if her mother would approve of her now. She had an inkling that she would be disappointed to see what she had become.

Despite the fact that her daughter's career wasn't what she would have imagined it to be, Johanna would have been genuinely proud of the work Katherine did everyday. She would be proud of her only child for doing what she believed in at the very best of her ability. She would be honored to see that her daughter had devoted her career and her life to solving her murder, and on the way, bringing justice to countless other families . After all, a homicide detective enforced the law and helped make the world a better place. Yet, Katherine's life resembled nothing the young girl had dreamily described to her mother as her ideal future, and she was right to assume that her mother would have been sorely disappointed in her. Though, as much as Kate liked to pretend her mother's reason for disappointment had to do with her career, she knew it was nothing of the sort.

While Johanna Beckett had been a strongly career driven woman, she had been equally passionate and loving. Her consuming career as a young partner at her family's law firm had cost her her marriage when Kate was still a toddler. This made her realize that though she had lost her husband, she could hardly afford to lose her only child, as well. She had consequently stepped down after she had sufficiently contributed to her daughter's trust and ensured her a comfortable future, and soon after, assumed a position at Columbia as a law professor. While this allowed her to continue to intellectually challenge herself on a daily basis, it also allowed her to spend more time with her young child, as well as with her mother.

Soon after her divorce, Johanna had decided to move back in to her parents' home. Her father had passed away before she had even met Jim Beckett, and her mother was thrilled by her decision to return home. Both women wanted Kate to constantly be around those who loved her, never handed off to a nanny, and never left to feel alone. The three women had lived happily together, close as can be. Johanna was happy to see that Kate always had their support, as well as that of her father whenever she needed him. This recognition allowed her to believe that she had instilled upon her daughter the notion that living a life filled with love and laughter was the only way to truly be happy.

That is why she would have been acutely disappointed in her child, and Kate was well aware of it.

Kate had been only nineteen when Johanna had been murdered. She had chosen to continue living at home, wanting to stay close to her family, and was, hence, studying pre-law at Columbia. Her parents had made an effort to remain civil after their divorce, and they often went to dinner together with their daughter. It was on the night of one of these monthly dinners that tragedy had struck. Kate had spent the weekend with her father, and the two sat joking in the restaurant, waiting for Johanna to join them. They never would have imagined her reason for being late.

Her death had caused all of their lives to spin out of control. Jim, who had never fallen out of love with his wife, drowned himself in alcohol. Kate, whose vision of an untraditional but happy world had shattered, dreamt of vengeance and bringing Johanna's killer to justice. Only her mother, though completely heartbroken, had kept it together, knowing that she had to be Kate's rock and provide her with a shoulder to cry on as well as a safe haven.

Kate finished her undergraduate degree, entered the Police Academy, and threw herself into her unexpected career and spent her every spare moment on solving her mother's murder. She forced herself to toughen up, decided to live on her own and, to her grandmother's horror, moved into a third floor walk-up in lower Manhattan. She refused to see her father, who by then had become a full blown alcoholic, and avoided her grandmother, having convinced herself that nearing her family and allowing herself to be involved in their emotional complications would cause her to soften up and break. She worked day in and day out, emerged as a promising detective, and scoured her mother's case file. Yet, her attempts to stay strong and work through all the hurdles failed.

Two years into her career, she became exhausted and suffered a nervous breakdown. She had been forced to go on leave, had given up her apartment and gone to stay with her grandmother until she convalesced. Six weeks later, she had recovered her strength, and due to the nurturing environment of her childhood, regained her mental composure. In this time, she had salvaged one of the two most important remaining relationships in her life, and her recovery had allowed her to realize that she needed to save the other. So, she had intervened in her father's habits, checked in on him regularly, and eventually forced him into a rehabilitation center that finally allowed Jim Beckett to return to sobriety. In short, she had saved his life.

In the five years since then, Kate had moved into a new apartment, returned to the 12th Precinct, picking up where she left off, and blossomed into one of the best and brightest detectives the city had seen in many years. Yet, she was not happy with the life she lead, and she knew her mother would not be either. This was not the life either of them had envisioned for her.

Despite having opened herself up to her remaining family, Kate had remained closed off to the world. She had few friends, dated rarely, and attempted to avoid forming any relationship that dared to end in even more heartbreak.

Some might say Kate Beckett had become a career driven woman, a woman who would have eerily reminded Johanna of herself at Kate's age. Only, while Johanna had managed to find a love (albeit a love that she did not value enough to hold onto) that had resulted in the one child she cherished more than anything else in her short life, this one child had closed herself off to any such possibility.

Kate had convinced herself that she was letting her mother down every day she failed to find her killer. In this way, she justified her lonely existence. She had convinced herself that she didn't deserve to be truly happy, to allow herself to move on once and for all until she put the person responsible for her death behind bards. For this reasoning, Johanna would have been exceedingly disappointed in her Katherine.

The only thing Johanna wanted from her daughter was not for her to devote her life to chasing the past, but for her to devote herself to fulfilling her dreams. Johanna would have wanted her to fight for the future the eight year old Katherine Beckett had rambled on about during their weekly strolls. She would have wanted her to open her heart and learn to be happy again.

Kate fiddled with her mother's engagement ring as she finally forced herself to realize what exactly would have made her sad to see her now. She wound the delicate chain around her finger as she listened to the wind, contemplating the meaning of the ring. Her mother had put it aside for Kate soon after her divorce. She hadn't wanted to dispose of the symbol of her commitment to Kate's father, because not only did she not resent him, but she was thankful for what had culminated from their relationship. She had wanted Kate to have a symbol of her parents' love to keep throughout her life, to comfort her in her darkest moments, and she felt that her ring was just that. Johanna had given Kate the ring on her eighteenth birthday, telling her that she wanted her to embark on her adult life closed to cynicism and open to love.

Twirling the ring around in the dark, Kate remembered those words. Maybe, she thought, it was time she took her mother's advice. She hadn't caught the person responsible for her death, but she had caught her killer. Maybe, it was time that she allowed herself to move on a little farther in her life. She would continue to try and close Johanna's case, but maybe she would be more successful if she allowed herself to be happy in the meantime. Maybe, she needed to open up her heart and allow someone to join her in this journey.

Kate allowed herself to smile slightly at this thought, because she knew exactly who would allow her to be happy.

For this realization, she knew her mother would have irrefutably proud.

Maybe, now she would be able to fall asleep.

Edit: I found a few distracting typos that I could not leave be. I am, however, working on a follow up that will be uploaded soon.