1. Based on a tumblr prompt: "au where you have a tattoo and it tells you how old your soulmate will be when you meet"
2. Title is from the song 'Daylight' by Ron Pope.
3. Diverges from canon in Neverland.
4. the number 232: going off of Killian's comment in S4 about being "more like two hundred" when Emma teased him about his age, plus his physical age.
5. betaed by penandinkprincess and gusenitsaa on tumblr.

Emma was never big on the whole soulmate thing. Mostly because it had never been all that big on her. Growing up with the number 232 on your wrist just really kind of encouraged that lack of faith.

Sure, when she was younger she used to indulge in the fantasy that it was just some cosmic typo, that her soulmate would be either twenty-three or thirty-two – both of which were still far off, and Emma at twelve wouldn't have cared much at all about such a distant soulmark if it wasn't rapidly becoming the only hope she had of finding someone to love her. Someone to belong with her, someone who wouldn't leave. With each new foster home that wasn't, and no family or friends in sight, the thought of a guaranteed soulmate was too precious to let go.

Yeah, Emma at twelve was pretty frantic to believe in soulmates. So frantic, in fact, that she actually did a bunch of research into them, and the various ways they could go wrong (but still turn out okay, please still turn out okay). And what she found was the exact opposite of encouraging.

There were plenty of stories out there about people who met their soulmates in unusual or less than ideal situations. Couples who got married young and then met their soulmates later. People who met their soulmates in daycare and then moved away in first grade and lost them forever. There was that movie based on a true story about the woman who was in love with one twin but it turned out her soulmate was his brother. That other movie based on a true story about the soulmates who lived within an hour of each other their whole lives, finally met in a nursing home, and the guy died two weeks later. That book about the sicko whose actual soulmate died when they were both ten, and he grew up and tried to use the8 on his wrist as a justification for being a pedophile. Closeted people who married someone the right age but the wrong gender. People who just didn't have a number at all, and maybe it meant they weren't interested in romance, or maybe their soulmate died before they were born and they'd never meet, or maybe they just didn't have one at all.

But never, not once in history, had there been report of someone with an impossible number like hers.

Realizing that hurt worse than no soulmark at all would've. Emma was twelve when she realized that there was no such thing as a cosmic glitch that could ever work in her favor – because really, what were the odds that she was the first? What were the chances that little unloved Emma Swan, whose parents had left her on the side of the highway to die and who couldn't keep a foster family for longer than a few months, could have a messed-up soulmark for the first time in history but still find love?

There was no chance. It was that simple. Rather than the universe messing up, it was infinitely more likely that Emma was the one who was wrong somehow, that she just didn't fit even more than people without marks at all. She was so unlovable she had to be one-of-a-kind.

When Emma was thirteen, the age that most people start really showing an interest in them, she stopped believing in her soulmark.

-xxx-

At least soulmarks were pretty easy to cover. Emma's was a little wider than most, with the extra number, but still fit neatly on the underside of her right wrist, easily hidden beneath long sleeves or a watchband. It wasn't exactly polite to ask about someone's soulmark if they didn't bring it up first, so at least if she kept it covered she didn't have to deal with anyone giving her crap about the number. It wasn't bullying she was concerned about so much as someone wanting to take pictures of it, write some stupid human interest story about the freaky dud of a soulmark she had. She didn't want to look at it, didn't want to think about it, definitely didn't want to reveal it to the rest of the world.

She didn't show it to Lily, but she almost wanted to, because Lily had a star where her number should be, and maybe it was just a coincidence but she thought, if Lily could be special, then maybe –

But Lily lied, and Lily lost her the best place she'd ever found, and if Lily was special it wasn't in a good way; Emma was stupid to think her own weird mark could be any better. But still, it seemed like she just couldn't learn her lesson, because she got placed with Ingrid and Ingrid could be stern but also sly and funny and she really cared about Emma, and after six months of living with her Emma was in love, she wanted to never leave. She wanted to show Ingrid her wrist. She had this stupid daydream about Ingrid telling her it didn't matter, she didn't need a soulmate as long as she'd found a family.

Before she ever got the chance, Ingrid turned out to be a psycho. In hindsight, Emma was glad that she hadn't shown her – being completely accepted and then having it turn out to be meaningless would have hurt so much more. Being rejected… would have hurt more, too.

(Sometimes she did think about going to a newspaper, making them write a story about her weird soulmark and spread it nationwide. Her parents had to recognize her by that, it would be a surefire way to find them.

Unless that was the reason they left her on the side of the road in the first place.)

-xxx-

Emma got stupid with her heart one more time, only a few years later. She really could not learn, but she told herself this was different, Neal was different. It was beyond stupid to wait around for a soulmate that she was never going to find, but Neal loved her and she loved him, and maybe most important of all, Neal didn't have a soulmark either.

He showed her his empty wrist the first night they made love, in a cheap motel room paid for with pickpocketed cash. Showed her the blank skin, twisted his mouth up and said, "Hope this doesn't change anything."

Emma stared, heart beating fast. Some people liked to do that, to compare wrists whenever things started to get serious. It could often spell the end of a relationship if the couple cared too much about soulmarks, and she could only imagine that went double for someone with a blank wrist. Back when she'd done all that research in middle school, she'd turned up a lot of stuff about people without soulmarks being treated badly, like they were less important or just fit for a fling because they didn't have anyone they were destined to be with. Maybe that was why Neal was showing her now. Maybe he was afraid that she'd be one of those people who cared too much, who would leave over something like this.

Instead, Emma felt her eyes fill up with tears, and she grabbed his wrist to kiss that empty space where numbers should be. Neal stared at her, obviously confused by her reaction, and Emma let go to tug her shirt off with her heart beating heavy and fast.

"No," she said, forcing up the courage to lift her right arm between them, to show him the ruined mark on her skin. "I hope this doesn't either?"

Neal tugged his eyes away from her bra to look down at her wrist with a little frown, which instantly turned into a look of extreme shock. She could see his body jerk back a little, and held her breath, hoping, hoping.

"Emma – how," he choked, and reached out to touch her skin with trembling fingers. He seemed so confused; well, of course he would be, but she still thought that maybe, just-

"See, we've both got a dud," Emma said, heart aching at the thought, "we both don't have anyone else, but –"

She never got to finish that sentence. Neal looked up from her wrist and just slammed forward into a kiss, tugged her close and melting against him, breathless, lightheaded and lighthearted because that blank wrist and this kiss meant he wouldn't leave her.

"Emma," he whispered, when their lips broke, and it sounded like he was trying not to cry. "I love you."

-xxx-

After Neal, Emma gave up on more than just soulmarks. She gave up on family, on hope, on love of every kind. She knew better. The wholeuniverse knew better, it had stuck that impossible number on her wrist at birth to try to tell her not to bother, but she hadn't listened and she'd paid the price so many times. She gave up her baby, because she couldn't make him pay for her mistakes too, not when she could make sure he'd get something better.

(She couldn't bear to touch him, to look too close, but she glimpsed his wrist as the doctor carried him out of the room. There was a little black 17on his skin, and she started to cry even harder at the sight. At least he would find someone. The same age as she was now, and giving up, but he would find someone to love for the rest of his life.)

She gave up on love completely for a little over ten years, and when it showed up again, barged right into her apartment on her birthday and demanded for her to save a town full of fairy tales from a magic curse – well, she never had been good at learning her lesson.

Still, she kept her soulmark covered.

-xxx-

Graham's wrist said 28.

Emma didn't know until after it was over. He was one of those people who are just good about soulmarks, never tell stories about mistakes or show you theirs or ask to see yours. He was – he was just a good person, completely, in a way that ripped Emma apart again after he was gone.

He wouldn't have cared about her mark. She knew that as simple as fact: he wouldn't have cared, wouldn't have said anything about it, wouldn't have left because of it. He probably wouldn't have mentioned his own mark unless she asked, even if he knew – even though he had known…

She saw the mark on his wrist when he was lying dead in her lap, it didn't matter anymore. And she had her own soulmark to tell her how wrong it was, anyway, how it didn't mean her, couldn't mean her, she knew that so when the hell would she stop hoping otherwise?

But she couldn't stop thinking about it, for months after. He knew how old she was, he'd arrested her after all, and when he started to like her, did he ever think-? Did he ever hope?

Emma told herself it didn't matter, wrapped his shoelace around her wrist to remember him and if it covered up that stupid mark too then good. It was better that way.

-xxx-

Hook's wrist had a 28 too.

Emma noticed it at the top of the beanstalk, when he was bandaging her hand. It wasn't like with Graham though, her thoughts didn't instantly jump to – well, they wouldn't normally. Graham had been a different matter. Emma wasn't one of those girls who got all giddy when a guy she liked had her age on his wrist.

-And besides, she didn't like Hook. What he was just doing with that scarf was… distracting, yeah, but she couldn't trust him.

When Emma saw his soulmark, her first thought was… it didn't really have any words, it wasn't really even a thought so much as a rush of understanding, of empathy despite herself, because just above it he had a tattoo. A curved dagger piercing a fiery heart, the tip coming to rest right before the 28 on his wrist, just visible under the bracer he wore. There was a banner across the heart: Milah.

It was definitely telling, how quick the flirtation dropped from his voice after that, how he stiffened up and quit with the compliments, closed off entirely; Emma knew exactly why.

"For someone who's never been in love you're quite perceptive, aren't you," he cut back, eyes dark, and she couldn't help the words that escaped her, the almost-whisper.

"Maybe I was… once."

Hook nodded slowly, still not looking away, and the moment dragged on too long, way too long to handle. Emma felt shaky, vulnerable and open and she didn't like it, didn't like the way he was looking at her like he understood.

She brushed past him with a curt, "Let's get moving."

And she wondered – how long did he have with Milah? He didn't look that much older than Emma, and even if time had been frozen during the curse, even if Milah had been older than he was when they met, how long could he really have had?

Long enough to turn into this, she thought, long enough to be willing to go this far for revenge, to go who knew how much further.

Whatever he understood or didn't, she definitely couldn't trust him.

-xxx-

In Neverland, they all relied on Hook.

Emma didn't even want to think about what they would have done without him. Even if he'd come back to return the bean, and just not come with them to Neverland itself, they'd have been lost. She didn't know how they would have survived even this long – somehow, for all that it felt too much like they weren't making any progress towards Henry at all, she knew Hook was essential to getting even this far. His knowledge about Pan, about the Lost Boys, and even just simply about the island itself was the only reason they hadn't all been poisoned or captured or just wandered off in the wrong direction. He was confident, helpful – and both incredibly flirty and supportive.

Emma had always felt this connection between them, the edge of something that could be so much deeper, and she'd felt like Hook noticed it too, but they'd both chosen not to go there before. Now that he'd forgone his revenge, now that he'd decided to actually be a part of something and help them find Henry, he wasn't holding back at all. He was so blatantly obvious about his attraction to her – no, more than that, his interest in Emma, something much deeper and more dangerous than simple lust.

"Just who are you, Swan?" he asked, and the rum in her throat burned, the hurt of admitting what she'd always known deep down to her mother still too fresh to touch.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" she deflected, and if he had just been flirting, if Hook had only been interested in her for one thing this would be so easy.

"Perhaps I would," was his reply though, too serious and looking right through her and her heartbeat in her throat wouldn't let her come up with some flippant quip, all she could do was run away. She was a Lost Girl, she had a broken soulmark, Neal had just died, she had a kidnapped son, there was no way she could do this.

So of course it was that night, sitting round the fire, when David asked him how he knew the island so incredibly well.

"Well," Hook said nonchalantly, prodding at a coconut with his hook, "just about two hundred years does lend one a certain familiarity with the lay of the land."

It took a moment.

"That's… longer than I thought," David blinked, sounding awkward; probably sensing the tension just beneath the surface of Hook's words, how closely the conversation was coming to a revenge so recently laid to rest. "Guess that would explain it."

"Aye," Hook said, and pulled his hook out of the coconut, passing it to Mary-Margaret.

"Two hundred years," she said softly as she accepted the fruit, shaking her head slowly.

It got quiet after that.

And Emma realized.

Two hundred years.

She stared at Hook. Her throat felt tight, her palms hot and sweaty. The noises from the jungle were suddenly too loud, the fire seemed to be crackling higher; Hook looked up as if he could feel her staring and it felt like a physical impact when their eyes met. She wasn't sure if she was breathing.

"Swan?" Hook said. He raised an eyebrow and grinned at her, cocking his head slightly to indicate the fruits next to him. "Fancy a coconut?"

He was around her age, maybe a little older. He'd been living in Neverland, not aging at all, for roughly two hundred years.

Her wrist felt like it was burning. She clamped her left hand over it, grabbing onto Graham's shoelace, and thought 232 and felt breathless, on the verge of panic.

"No," she croaked, and tried to look away but she couldn't, couldn't stop looking at Hook, at her soulmate Captain Hook. "I'm good."

-xxx-

It was – she didn't have to acknowledge it. She wouldn't. This wasn't the time or the place or the – she couldn't – but it was the person, finally, there was really a person, she wasn't actually broken.

She had a soulmate. The numbers on her wrist had never been a lie.

Emma wanted to laugh, wanted to take the sword that Hook had given her and find something she could just chop to pieces, because she'd had a soulmate all her life. That was – she'd spent her entire life, feeling broken and wrong and afraid, blamed so much of her bad luck with love onherself, justified it with those stupid little numbers on her wrist, and all along it had been-

This was the worst joke the universe ever told.

Hook sidled closer to her side as they cut their way through the jungle, smiled at her, and she thought about the 28 on his wrist, about the tattoo with Milah right above it, and she wanted to be sick. Wanted to cry. Wanted to have known about this sixteen years sooner.

It wasn't the point right now, she shouldn't even be thinking about it at all.

She couldn't, not coherently. She wouldn't.

-xxx-

"And you think it's the best plan just because your boyfriend came up with it?" Regina sniped.

"My boyfriend?" Emma asked, tried to stifle the hysterical giggle building up in her throat: "Hook?"

She didn't succeed. Both women gave her a funny look.

"What is your problem?" Mary-Margaret asked Regina, sounding genuinely confused, and that was hilarious somehow, Emma had to bite hard on her lip to keep from laughing louder. "She just lost Neal."

That got rid of the giggles quick.

Replaced them with a sick feeling in her stomach, a kind of desperate dreadful longing. Mary-Margaret was wrong. She hadn't just lost Neal. She'd known this feeling for so many years now – it was just worse than ever before, but not at all new.

-xxx-

"I knew, the moment I saw him," Emma blurted, lips trembling, voice wavering out of control, and she was trying, she was trying not to cry but this was a battle she wasn't going to win and she knew it – "I never… I never stopped loving him!"

She spun around and fled, again, it felt like all she was doing these days was running and crying and she hated it, hated everything about this place. It was too much, it was too many goddamn – it was like this place was made out of painful truths and too many plants, it was ridiculous and she just wanted to get Henry and be gone.

She didn't want to think about Neal.

Emma absolutely did not want to think about Neal, knowing what she did now, to think about how she had never stopped loving him, still loved him, would always love him but how she hated him too now. She'd started hating him in Tallahassee and it was impossible to ever stop, maybe all the more now that she knew the truth.

Not just the truth about him leaving. No, looking through his cave, walls covered in drawings she never even knew he'd liked to make, had Emma thinking about time. And she got it, now – because Neal had lived here nearly two hundred years too, he must've…

The numbers didn't line up. Not quite. But – but it was close enough, and she couldn't help but remember the look on his face when she first showed him, the fierce way he kissed her, couldn't help but know what he must've thought.

It wasn't like anyone else should be anything near that old, not in her world. It made sense that he must have thought he'd just miscounted the years a little. And, his empty wrist? Who knew? Maybe he thought it was just because he'd been in a different world when he was born, or really just a random fluke, he must've thought that it couldn't compare to the proof that her soulmark gave him.

But he still left.

And, god, it wasn't like she didn't know he thought he was doing the right thing. He must've thought he was saving her, giving her what she'd always wanted. He must have –

But Emma didn't care, she would never have left him. He could have come back to her in Tallahassee. He could have tried to tell her the truth, he could have done something. And now he'd never know – she'd never get to stop loving him, never get to stop hating him, never get to tell him that he was wrong, of course he was wrong if he would ever leave, because someone who could do that to her could not be Emma's soulmate. His wrist was empty because he never met his soulmate before he died, because he wasn't Emma's soulmate and she could never be his, not after those ten awful years alone.

Emma cried, and kicked a tree, and hurt and hated, and then she scrubbed at her face and walked back to the cave, where the silence was too thick and no one looked at her for long, except Hook. He didn't look away.

Of course he didn't look away.

-xxx-

"I, uh," Hook said, and he was glancing down at the ground almost bashful, it was ridiculous, "I just wanted to let you know that I too know what it feels like. To lose hope."

Emma had to cut him off there. She – she had to, she had no desire to hear what he was going to say next. Whatever words of comfort he had, whatever consolations he wanted to share… None of that would do any good right now. None of it would help Henry. She needed to stay completely focused on that, on Henry, and not let herself get distracted anymore with thoughts of Hook, or Neal, or – or anything else.

(Least of all, did she want to think about Hook talking to her about hope. Hook, her impossible soulmate, his mark on her skin a huge part of the reason why hope had always been so hard for her to hold onto – no. No, she didn't want to hear a single word more.)

"I know what this is," she said, and despite herself her voice came out almost gentle, because she knew so much more than he did, really. "This – you, trying to, you know… bond with me."

The word tasted bitter on her tongue. Having your soulmate offering their support, opening up to you, trying to help you feel better – that was the sort of thing that should make a person happy. This whole situation was fucked, so wrong, and she hated this island.

She felt so… defeated, already. Again.

"So save your breath," Emma told Hook. Sighed, weary. "I'm not in the mood."

-xxx-

Maybe that's why.

Maybe that's why, when David and Hook came back – unsuccessful, sure, but Emma hadn't been, she'd succeeded and she'd seen Henry, spoken to him, he was safe and still hopeful and she was going to save him. She knew it. She felt energized, determined, strong – she could do this. She could save him. As much as seeing her and Mary Margaret and Regina might have given Henry hope, seeing him had helped Emma just as much, breathed new life into her lungs, bravery.

And then David said Hook had saved his life.

Hook had saved him, protected Emma's family for her and now she felt like she was seeing him with brand new eyes as he shifted in place in front of everyone, awkward with the compliment. Hook was more than just a number on her wrist. He was more than just a reminder of her awful past, he was – none of this was his fault, he didn't even know.

He was here, he was helping, he was being honest and dependable and he had saved her father's life and he wanted her, he wanted to know her, wanted to share himself too, he really did want–

And his voice was so raw, he sounded exhausted. He sounded like she'd felt, only a few hours ago.

"Thank you," Emma told him. Serious. Meaning it.

He looked away, sighing, lifted his hand to rub at his ear (nervously, the thought popped into her head, and then she couldn't make it go away, wondered at it, nervously) – and when he lifted his head to look at Emma, his entire demeanor had changed.

"Well, perhaps gratitude is in order now," he said, tapping at his lips, grinning slyly.

Emma felt a smile starting. She couldn't hold it back.

"Yeah," she said, and felt too too conscious of the shoelace around her wrist, "that's what the thank you was for."

"Mm," Hook mocked, hitching a slow step closer. "Is that all your father's life is worth to you?"

Emma felt electric.

"Please," she whispered; shook her head. Thought about the number on her wrist and told him, "You couldn't handle it."

He was grinning, cheeks flushed. His eyes were locked on hers, he rolled a challenge off his tongue: "Perhaps you're the one who couldn't handle it."

Emma stared at him, and thought (sudden, clear) – I want to.

And she kissed him.

It was like lightning – a living thing, out of control, searing down her bones, it was. He was. Words–

His mouth on hers tasted like the word finally. Her hand in his hair felt like more. The leather of his coat in her fist was please, that little grunt he made another please just as desperate, his hand on the back of her head was is this real – their lips separating the question mark, coming back together after a quick, rough breath, pressing together again the answer: yes.

And they kept kissing, kept, further, more – one kiss soulmate, another soulmate, the next Hook, and that was even better, his arms were around her waist, pulling her closer, as close as possible, she was dragging him into her, she wasn't going to let go – another kiss Killian…

That was when they stopped.

Emma clung to him, fingers clenched tight in his lapel, forehead pressed against his. She could feel the curve of his hook and warmth of his hand hovering at her waist, barely touching. She could feel his breath on her lips as she panted, open-mouthed, and thought again Killian with a sort of growing self-disgust.

She felt dizzy. Wrecked. And she felt wanting, like if she had been the one with hundreds of years to prepare for this it still wouldn't have been enough. And she felt so angry at herself, for letting this happen, for giving in to this, for kissing Hook and thinking Killian and somehow, hoping again –

"That was, uh," he didn't finish saying, he sounded breathless and as befuddled as she felt, and he nudged his head forward a little bit, tentative somehow still, and – Emma was weak in the face of this.

She should pull back. She knew she should.

She kissed him again.

He sank into it just as quickly as before, not a surrender but a full and honest reciprocation, nothing held back. And somehow that made Emma feel so wrong, for holding back herself – but kissing him felt so good, and she wanted it and she could have it, that was the most amazing part, Emma couldn't stop thinking she could truly have this.

Couldn't stop thinking right after, every single time (sharp, reflexive, honest like shards of glass): No, I can't.

"That was…" Emma repeated when they broke this kiss, voice too vulnerable. She didn't look at Hook, felt afraid to see his face.

She didn't finish either, just turned and walked away.

-xxx-

The problem was she wanted it.

Hook didn't follow right away. Emma wasn't sure why, but she couldn't help being grateful. She didn't want him around right now, she didn't want to see him or speak to him or think of him but she couldn't help it.

She leaned back cross-legged against a tree, and held her right hand in her lap, out of sight from the rest of the group. Slowly, for the first time in months, she picked at the knot of the shoelace that covered her soulmark. She slid her fingers over the rough material of the laces as they unwound, stared down at her skin as it was revealed.

There it was.

In stark black against her skin, there it was: 232.

She hadn't really been expecting any change, but somehow it was still a shock to see those three numbers again, the same as they had always been. She touched the mark with her finger, slowly, and felt…

There was no special physical reaction to meeting your soulmate, or to speaking to them or even kissing them for the first time. Studies had been done, time and again, by scientists or soulmatch services, and the results had always been consistent. The marks didn't change or feel any different; all reports of heat or itching had proved completely psychosomatic. The only true indication of a soulmate was emotion, and even that wasn't always certain.

Emma knew. People fell in love with people who weren't their soulmates. Sometimes they hated their soulmates at first. Sometimes they met them and didn't even realize – really, soulmarks were very open to misinterpretation most of the time. And sometimes, worst of all, they didn't match.

It was rare. It was something that almost never happened, and even if it did happen it was difficult to prove by any rational method, just like most things about soulmarks. Society could always, did always make the argument that an inconvenient love was just a mistaken soulmark, that the poor person would meet their true soulmate later, or maybe they already had and just didn't realize… People didn't want to believe in unrequited soulmates, it just didn't seem like a thing that should happen. It was too unfair.

But Emma looked down at her wrist, at the numbers on it and at the shoelace still draped loosely over her arm, and she believed. In the worst way, she believed, and it hurt, it hurt so much she couldn't stand it.

She'd wanted to believe. She'd hoped – she'd hated to think about it entirely, but ever since Graham she'd hoped despite herself that she was his. All the more since the curse broke, because – he'd remembered, hadn't he? And he'd really felt for her, he'd really… Emma wanted to be his, wanted him to have had that, to have known when she kissed him, known in his last moments that he had found his soulmate as well as his true self. She wanted him to have been happy, even if just for those few seconds. He deserved that, so much more than most.

So much more than she did.

Because… if soulmarks could be unrequited, then who was to say hers wasn't?

It sounded stupid. It sounded absolutely ridiculous, given everything that Hook had done on this island, the way he'd thrown his whole being into kissing her back just now… The answer should be obvious. His soulmark matched her age when she'd met him. It should make perfect sense, Emma should be happy, finally, should let herself have this, should, should, couldn't.

It wasn't even the wasted years that were the worst part about all this. It wasn't the way she'd learned from the start to feel broken, to be less andwrong and never have anyone to love her. The worst part was that even now, even knowing the truth – none of that was going away.

No one had ever loved Emma, not for long. And deep down, in her little Lost Girl heart, she'd always blamed herself. She'd blamed that mark on her wrist, held it up as proof that she was unlovable. So, fine. Maybe it wasn't. Her soulmark wasn't at fault.

But she'd still lost everyone anyway.

It didn't make any difference in the end, didn't matter if the universe hadn't actually sent her a sign. Everyone Emma had ever loved had left her, one way or another; and if soulmates could be unrequited, then that was all hers really meant: she could love someone. She could truly love someone for the rest of her life, and more than anyone else in history could Emma now knew beyond a doubt who the person destined for her was.

She just didn't know that she could trust him to always love her back.

He had a 28, after all. Once, he must have thought that meant his Milah. Now, maybe (Emma's heart ached) – maybe he could be starting to think it meant her. But twenty-eight was a common number. He could meet someone else. He probably would, Emma couldn't help thinking, couldn't stop thinking for a single second not even when she'd been happy and hopeful kissing him, because her track record had proven the truth to her over and over and over: she just wasn't good enough. Not to stick around for.

And she couldn't – she couldn't go through that again.

Emma wrapped up her wrist again, tighter than before. She knew it was all in her head, but the numbers felt like they were searing even deeper.

Kissing Hook had been a mistake.