A/N: I felt like doing a little CS writing for the holidays , so here ya go. It's a little angsty, sorry, but my family isn't having the best start to the holiday season, and I guess that's just my mood.


Emma stood across the street from Granny's, a spell cast so that no one inside would see her if they looked out as she watched her son smile and laugh, Regina's arm around his shoulder as he loaded his plate high with mashed potatoes. Robin was next to her, staring down at his baby girl (which Emma knew Zelena would be coming for any day now), and Mary Margaret cooed over the infant, Neal bouncing up and down in David's lap as she did. Emma's heart was aching at the sight of her family celebrating Thanksgiving without her, and she couldn't help the tears spilling from her eyes at the thought of how far she had fallen. She had been so close to having all the things she had ever dreamt of - parents who loved her, a brother, a son, Killian - and now it was all gone, and she was once again standing on the outside, watching something she couldn't have but so desperately wanted, just like when she was a kid.

Killian was perched high in a lookout's perch on the Jolly Roger, a telescope glued to his eye as he watched Emma observing her family, his heart seething with anger. He saw her shoulders shake and her hand reach up to wipe a tear from her eye, and for a second, he felt a flicker of the Killian who loved her more than anything, a moment of wanting to comfort her, to take her in his arms and kiss her sadness away. He shoved that other Killian away, down deeper into himself, and his anger burned even more brightly. He pouffed himself to her side in a whirl of smoke the color of hot blue flames, and as Emma turned to face him, he saw a flash of hope in her green eyes, one that he couldn't wait to extinguish.

"Killian…" she sighed, one trembling hand reaching toward him.

"Why hello there, little lost girl," he sneered at her. "Once more on the outside looking in?"

Emma blushed brilliantly, turning to look over her shoulder at her family gathered together in the diner as the tears threatened to fall again.

"You always thought it was your fault as a child - it must hurt now toknow that you've brought this fate upon yourself," he taunted, relishing in the pain he could see written across her face.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, so quietly it wouldn't have been audible if he hadn't been standing so close.

"I'm afraid, love, that sorry just won't do," he answered, somehow lacing his words with magic so that they physically stung her.

The darkness inside Emma wanted to lash out, to send her own magic whipping out at him, striking him hot and sharp, but she was so tired, her emotions weighing like a boulder on her body. She pushed back from him, and it was all she could do to leave, to wave her hand a disappear in a cloud of smoke, unable to fight back, not when everything he said had been so true. Not when he was so justified in hating her. Not when she had lost everything.

As Emma vanished, tears once again rolling down her cheeks, Killian felt the part of himself that loved her rise again, guilt touching his heart.

Happy Thanksgiving indeed.