I just love this. Read and re-read. One of my favorites.

Another wonderful story. I love your writing style. Any chance you will write Castle stories again? (Fingers crossed)

One of my favourite songs :) one of my favourite fics now too!

Beautiful! Best birthday fic!

awesome! Really well written.

Love this! Absolutely beautiful!

Your use of language to evoke this scene is stunningly beautiful! I so appreciate the depth and richness of your writing in this!

beautiful story...looking forward to reading more..keep up the excellent work

I really like your style of writing. It takes some getting used to, but it is very detailed and interesting and definitely one of a kind. Lovely story.

I finally read your profile and found it entirely engaging. I like your review philospohy. ;-)

Regarding Castle and Beckett, it matters not how many time your bring them together, each is rich in imagery and language, emotion and humor. It is always a pleasure to see what you will do next.

Not only are you a master at setting a scene, but you excel at getting inside these characters heads and laying their souls bare.

A lines and fragments that stood out this time are:

“and she realized that he is her tonal opposite but constant equalizer; the one incomprehensible thing in her life that makes the most sense.”

Just nice language...what a way with words.

“no liar's life led.”

Nice allitteration.(sp?) :-)

“and the one thing she's never been able to lie to is her reflection.”

I really liked this one. I see her standing at the mirror and trying to talk herself out of it.

“Castle sits next to her, jabbering a mile a minute to Esposito about the state of the Giants' divisional chances. Martha and Jenny are speaking even faster, the actress's martini threatening to slosh over the sides of her glass. Montgomery is regaling Ryan with stories from his rookie beat days, and the younger man has his head tilted back, laughing uncontrollably.”

In this last quote, I could see the movie running in my head.

Perfect!

Awesome story!

Your line about Martha being a stand in for Kate's mother had me go from fine to bawling in a second. "(Beckett will tell her later that she's not; that the greatest role Martha could ever play is giving her back the opportunity to hear motherly words of wisdom.)" WOW! You got that emotion right!

This is absolutely fantastic-one of the better Castle fics I've read.

I loved this oneshot- especially the vivid imagery :)

Thanks! Looking forward to your next creation.

So sweet and lyrical and utterly fantastic. I loved it.

Absolutely beautiful. You polished each and every sentence till it shined full of meaning and poetry. This was a delight to read. Really. At some points I even made a pause and just enjoyed, re-read the portion, absorbed, and only then proceeded.

Thank you. And nice symbolism on the birthday/anniversary pairing for theme.