A/N: Hello! I decided it's been way too long since I posted anything on here, so I'm uploading a bunch of canon/speculation one shots that I posted on tumblr over onto here. Some of them date from last year and so speculations should be taken with a handful of salt, naturally.
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I needed to stop looking at my thesis, so I wrote a little 4x07 drabble (well, 2000 word drabble). Not really spoilery? But behind the scenes speculationy. This makes it abundantly clear I have no idea what's going to happen, but boy am I looking forward to it!
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So you, my dear, shouldn't fear what lies below
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Emma was trying with all her might to not cry. She was gripping the steering wheel so forcefully that her fingers were beginning to throb in time with the pounding of her heart, and Emma was trying so hard not to cry.
Breathe, damn it, breathe.
The first time it had happened she hadn't really thought much about it. She was more surprised than anything, made a mental note to talk to Regina about it, but hadn't really thought it was any cause for concern. She had been standing in the middle of the street, the chill on her skin a stark contrast between the heat in her cheeks and the warmth emanating from the pirate on her lips. She had been so mad at him – then again, had she really? – so mad at herself and more anxious than anything else.
"Emma, sweetheart –" the endearment was new, and it ripped her resolve (but not her stubbornness) to shreds. That didn't stop her from yelling at him though. She had asked him to be patient and he had graciously, willingly complied. However, this time, as she stood there in the middle of town telling him about that little inch of her that he didn't know from her foster home days, she wondered if she'd said too much.
She couldn't find it in herself to regret it. She trusted him too much.
"You can't do that, you can't – not if this is to work, Killian, I – I need this to work."
One minute they were arguing, the next he was crashing into her with so much need that she, just for a moment, pretended that the feeling wasn't crushing her heart.
The next minute they were standing in the hallway of Granny's seemingly transported, limbs still tautly wrapped around one another. It was only the sudden lack of cool air surrounding them that even alerted her to their new location. They both eased back from each other a little, three hands still firmly lodged around each other. Sitting in the front seat of her car now, breathing still far from controlled, she could remember the sudden feeling of panic that she had felt. How had she forgotten that panic? Then it occurred to her.
It was the look he had given her.
They stood there in the dimly lit, kitschly decorated hallway, and he had smiled at her. It was so open, and amused, and playful that that instant anxiety had just disappeared.
"Well, at least this time, you didn't separate man from hook," lifting his hook from its position on her hip, he paused it beside their faces, lifting his eyebrow in an absurd manner, and Emma burst into a grin.
The first time it had happened, she had been fine.
The second time, less so.
She had felt the panic rising in her throat, and the feeling of frustration burnt through her veins, pricking each of her fingers. Emma was no stranger to the feeling of anxiety, but something was different, something was overwhelming her. Everything just seemed to be this endless series of crises and disasters that she was losing her steadfastness. She tensed her hands into tight balls, shaking them a little in an attempt to not only get a literal grip on herself, but to control the fear that was threatening to cloud her mind.
The reaction had been almost instantaneous. Apparently, the rising boiling feeling hadn't simply been her emotions, but her magic, and shaking her fists had shattered every light bulb and every item made of glass in the Sheriff's station with a burst of bright electricity.
The sound must have been loud, because the next thing she knew was that she was running out of the station to be met by her family, Gold, Belle, Elsa and Killian. She did not want to see any of them. Her blood still bursting with anxiety and searing with magic, she felt like a cornered animal, cornered by herself, stuck within her own damn walls. Seeing these people that she cared about seeing her so vulnerable – Henry seeing her so unstable – was honestly the last thing that she wanted.
The third time it happened it was even worse.
"Emma, are you alright?" Her father called rushing over to her.
She knows she said something in reply. Knows that her mother spoke to her. Knows that Killian had said something reassuringly to her left, but she couldn't recall any of it now. Her magic had been – and was still – pounding in her ears and she had wanted to cry. She was trying desperately not to cry. All she could picture now was the image of her father noticing where a shard of glass had cut her, the image of David and Killian both lunging forward to check her, and the desperate fear that if either of them touched her she would burst and take them all with her.
It hadn't seemed to matter. As Killian had reached her, she had shouted for them to let her go, and that's when it had happened. She pulled her arm back and the movement of her arm had brought the nearest lamp post crashing to the ground in a flicker of sparks.
Then she noticed her father lying on the ground.
She had no idea if he'd leapt out of the way to save himself, or he'd been hit by the light but Emma's heart had stopped, and had risen in her throat as though to choke her. She froze. Mary Margaret, Henry and Killian had all darted to David's side to make sure he was okay.
He was fine. She knew he was fine. Could see it with her own eyes, but suddenly the words were in her head as though the fear and the magic that had threatened to cloud her brain had seeped in without her noticing and planted words of doubt.
What if he hadn't leapt out of the way? It's your magic that has done this.
What if?
What if.
She looked at Killian. She often looked at Killian, that was no secret. The two of them frequently seeking the other out, the two of them looking for answers in each others eyes.
He saw the fear too clearly in her eyes this time. He rose from his crouched position next to her father, carefully attempting to find the right words. However, this time, all Emma could see was caution, wariness – and it frightened her even more. He was looking at her and mirroring her own thoughts, with one subtle difference - she was cautious of herself, and he was cautious of how to deal with the rising panic on her face.
"Emma, love, he's fine. Don't –"
As he spoke, a choked – and damn it teary – sort of 'no' stuttered out of her throat.
She ran.
She couldn't handle this, she had nearly hurt her father, and had given them all reason to be wary of her. To fear her. As she feared herself.
So she ran. Not just emotionally, but physically. As always.
She was mad at herself for it, but stood by the decision all the same.
Sitting in her beat up old beetle she could still hear the sound of her mother pleading with her that it was okay, and the sound of Henry – oh God, Henry - calling after her.
Emma was determined not to cry, and repositioned her grip.
Suddenly, there was the tap of metal on glass. She spun in shock to see Killian standing outside the door of her car. She probably shouldn't have been surprised to see him, but the moment she did she felt the panic in her heart increased ten fold. She turned away from him and focused her eyes back on her steering wheel. Although she was tempted to drive away from him, the short distance she had driven to get away from the whole scene had not been her best idea. Her hands had shook and her nerves too alert and frazzled to really be driving. So she sat there and pretended he wasn't there.
"Emma, get out of the car," his voice a mixture between sadness and concern, and a different sort of tension crept into her heart.
God damn this man.
"Go back, Killian," keeping it clipped and strong, she hoped that being coarse with him would keep him away – keep him safe.
Emma was trying desperately not to cry.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw him open his mouth to say something, but he seemed to decide against it. Instead, he chose to lean against the side of the car, crossing his arms, and sighing at the same time.
Twenty minutes he stood there.
Twenty whole minutes.
She hadn't looked at him, or spoken to him in that whole time, but the man was so determined all of the time, and apparently so determined to reason with her. Not that it would do any good at this stage, and still he stood there without quarrel. She had been paying so much attention to him standing there and wondering when he would give into her stubborn nature, that she had barely registered that her grip on the steering wheel had loosened.
Or that her breathing had regulated. Or that the magic pulsating had eased.
Sadly, while these things had let her be for now, the fear and pain in her heart at the thought of David and Henry – hell, everyone - had not diminished.
Taking a deep breath, Emma gripped onto her anger, and opened the car door, slamming it shut.
"What, the hell, do you think you're doing?"
"Me? What on earth do you think you're doing?"
He lifted off the side of the car, determined to continue meeting her anger with a gentle irritation.
"Removing the problem."
"Emma, you are not a threat- "
"Not a threat?! Did you even see what happened back there? I practically threw a lamp post at my own father, at you, for coming near me."
"It was an accident, Emm-"
"And how does that make it any better?! An accident makes it worse, I have no control over an accident!"
He didn't say anything in response to that and she suddenly felt incredibly uncomfortable with the way he was reading her, understanding her fear. His gaze flickered to her hands, resolutely perched on both of her hips, and suddenly she knew what he was thinking. He was thinking of how he had reached for her, grasped her, and she had responded in shouts and consequently lost control of her magic.
"Elsa requested that if- when you're calm you should speak to her."
His eyes moved back away from her right hand and rose to meet her eyes. She met them with her own, and didn't like what she saw there. She saw pain, and she saw caution – but she also saw loving determination, and belief. Emma wasn't sure which she was afraid of more.
They could have been staring at each other for seconds or minutes for all Emma was concerned. The more they looked at each other, the more breaths she took while doing so, the more she calmed and the more the fear in her heart grew – an annoying contradiction of feelings.
When Emma next spoke, though her words were stubborn and angry, her voice was shaky and unsure.
"Fine."
With a soft exhale of breath, he shook his head, then set his gaze back on her right hand. Timidly yet steadily, he extended his own hand, palm upward in invitation, meeting her gaze once more. She hated that he was suddenly so unsure of himself, so unsure of whether to touch her. She wanted him to touch her - God, did she ever – but she was not going to apologise for wanting distance earlier. This man was becoming far too much to her, and her whole being ached for any part of him that was unsure.
Emma cocked her head to the side a little, settling him with a look that simply said 'of course', before placing her hand in his own (squeezing it lightly at the same time).
The smile he gave her in return was relieved, and as the hand-to-hand contact produced an innocent thrumming in her heart, he lifted the back of her hand to his lips, pressing a gentle but firm kiss there.
Killian cleared his throat.
"Ready, Swan?"