A/N: Huzzah! Super thanks to phoward, campingwiththecharmings, pandajw, EurekaBeck, Ayyyylmao, jdmusiclover, SolemnlySwearToManageMischief, OnceUponABookworm, florenzu, WapomeoHuntress, LTC522, Lunalove25, Mel, and the guest reviewer, as well as all the people who fav'd and followed. So glad you all like it so far!

Fluffy friendship-building chapter ahoy :)

Killian was twenty minutes late to their appointed library meeting, and Emma spent the time waging a mental war against herself.

Should she bring up what she had seen? Confront him about his interactions with Neal?

But then he might think she was stalking him on Facebook.

Not that she really cared what he thought, but still. It'd be awkward. Not to mention it would make her seem hysterical. Or, even worse – like the jealous, clingy ex-girlfriend who was mad about her former boyfriend being seen out and around with another woman.

Ugh.

Before she had time to come to a solid decision, Killian arrived – suddenly and quietly enough to make her jump when he pulled out the chair next to her.

"Sup. Sorry I'm late, I was-"

"Working," she cut in, taking note of the red polo shirt he was wearing. "I know. What's your job, anyway?"

He was busying himself with taking his books out, but glanced over at her. "I've got two. Video rental place, which is where I was today. And then I normally work as a cashier in the supermarket near here, but since I broke my wrist I've had to switch to shelving and standing around helping people who have been bested by the self-checkout machines."

She couldn't quite help but chuckle at that. "Right. How do you manage two jobs, though? Doesn't that get in the way of school?" Queenhart Grammar was one of the top schools in their area, and in an effort to keep it that way the teachers generally recommended dropping any part-time jobs once you hit your senior years.

"Red Bull," was his answer, deadpan. "A crapload of Red Bull."

She chuckled again. "No, really."

"In all seriousness..." he shrugged. "You know. Needs must. I try to finish my homework in study periods at school."

"Needs must? What's that supposed to mean?" she asked curiously, and he promptly whipped out his copy of Hamlet and slammed it down on the desk.

"Nothing. What? I've confused myself. Let's get to work!"

A blatant attempt to change the topic – and one that unfortunately made it impossible for her to organically redirect the subject back towards Neal. At least that kept her from having to decide whether to bring it up or not.

"Okay," she said. "I picked a new topic, did you?"

"Yeah," he said, extracting his sheet of horrendous scribbling again. "Ladies first."

"Okay. Betrayal." It came out much more darkly than she'd intended, and he stared at her intently for a moment. She quickly added, "Pretty classic for Hamlet, but it does tie into choices. What about you?"

"Revenge," he said, and maybe she was just projecting, but he uttered it with the same tone that she'd used for her theme. Like it was personal somehow. "I went classic too."

"Great. Let's talk about yours first," she said, shaking off the uncomfortable feeling that she was about to get much more deeply involved with Killian Jones than she had ever wanted to.

"Okay." He rested his chin on his hand and leaned across the table towards her, holding her gaze with his. "Like I said when we started this project, the main choice for Hamlet is whether or not to avenge his father. And he procrastinates forever, but he does eventually do it. And all the other choices in the play are the factors affecting that decision, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera."

"Kind of like dominoes falling," Emma mused. "Everyone's choices keep on impacting against everyone else's. And that affects the reasoning and morality behind the choices as well. Most of which are sort of just floating around in a moral grey soup. What?" she added; his eyes were crinkling at the corners now as though he was fighting not to laugh.

"Falling dominoes swimming in a soup of moral greyness," he said with amusement, and she fought not to flush.

"Well, excuse me for getting into the spirit of the metaphor!"

"No, it's good. I like how you think," he added with a grin. "We could use the dominoes thing in the way we present it. Speaking of, how do you want to do this? Power point? Poster board?"

"Maybe some sort of collage. Or a maze. A collage set out like a maze? I don't know."

He was nodding, though, sketching a series of squares idly across the margin of his paper. "That could work. As I said... I like how you think."

"Uh. Thanks." He was staring at her again now, and for a moment she wasn't sure where to look. She settled for eye contact, and was taken aback by just how blue his eyes were. It wasn't something she had particularly noticed before. She wondered what he was thinking.

"...we should look for the turning point," he announced suddenly, and Emma snapped back to attention.

"The turning point?"

"In his decision. When he finally flips and decides,hell yeah I'm gonna kill Claudius. And then boom bam, stuff goes down, everyone's dead. Exeunt."

A genuine laugh escaped her before she could stop herself. She couldn't help it, he just sounded so dramatic.

"Great summary," she said, and he smiled – less of the arrogant or flirtatious smirk that seemed to be his default expression. More a little smile of almost satisfaction, like he was pleased with himself for something.

"Thanks. Anyway, once we've got the turning point we can look at the choices leading up to it and then we can analyse whether it was morally justified or not."

"What do you think?" she asked, trying to gauge in her head which way their project would be leaning.

"What do I think about what?"

"About whether it was justified. The revenge. In general, I mean, your first impression of the play."

His eyes darkened suddenly, like a switch had been flipped. "Completely and utterly justified."

"What, really?" She felt almost nervous suddenly, his face was so intense.

"Yes. Revenge is the only way to achieve any sort of justice in the world. You need to take actions into your own hands."

"You're not a big believer in karma, then?" she murmured, and he shook his head.

"Not really religious. Really, though. People shouldn't be allowed to get away with things. I mean, in this case we're talking about murder-fratricide-regicide, but even other things. If you hurt someone for nothing but selfish reasons – you deserve what you get."

Emma was taken aback. Killian was still looking at her, but at the same time his gaze seemed almost distant and far away, as though he was speaking to himself and his words were just a vehicle for some intense feeling hidden away behind his eyes.

"What about the others?" she asked quietly.

He blinked, as though roused from a dream. "The others?"

"Gertrude. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Polonius. Ophelia. Everyone else who got hurt because of his attempt to get revenge. Is it still justified when other people get hurt in the process?"

"They weren't innocent people," he countered.

"Ophelia was."

His lips pressed tightly together for a moment before he shook his head.

"Still worth it," he said. "I reckon, anyway. Someone had to take Claudius down."

"Right. Okay. Uh... how about we find some critics or philosophers who've written on the subject, get some conflicting views?"

"Hm? Oh. Right. Yeah." He nodded, and the oddness that had descended over him slowly cleared away as they spent some time googling and flicking through their books.

Emma was starting to wonder if she knew anything at all about the boy sitting next to her.

Revenge. Why was he so intense about it all of a sudden?

For a long time she had had Killian written down as an irritating playboy who spent his time prowling the school with Regina looking to do nothing more than cause trouble and get with the ladies. Apart from his odd animosity with Mr Gold – which, again, she hadn't thought much of since it was pretty usual to dislike a teacher – he'd never shown any indication of having anything strange on his plate.

She supposed she'd never really had the chance to look closely.

And if she was noticing this sort of thing about him, God knew what he was noticing about her. Nothing, hopefully. Regina really didn't need any more bait.

"So," he said after a little while. "Betrayal?"

She nodded, capping a highlighter. "Yep. I thought maybe we could put a different spin on it though. People always talk about betrayal in Hamlet in terms of how his friends and family all spied on him, and how Claudius betrayed Old Hamlet by killing him – the really clear cut sort of thing, you know?"

"What are you thinking?"

"I guess," she began, and then paused, hesitant. Wondered if she was projecting too much, if maybe going into this subject would get her in too deep.

Killian was watching her expectantly, and she decided to push through with it, though she kept her gaze firmly trained on the front cover of Hamlet. On the picture of the skull, glistening ghastly white.

"I guess Hamlet was betrayed in another way, too. By being abandoned. Not physically abandoned, but... emotionally? I mean, his father died and his mum and uncle were just telling him to get over it. They weren't supportive at all. I think maybe... well, it could be argued that he felt really alone and that played into the decisions he made. He didn't really have anyone to just listen, or advise him, or snap some sense into him. Ros and Guild were meant to be his friends, but they weren't there. Even the ghost only appeared to him when it wanted something..." she trailed off, feeling awkward all of a sudden, her voice seeming too loud in the silent library.

"What about Horatio?" Killian asked softly.

"Much as I love Horatio, he was not the most helpful friend in the world. If you look at the textual evidence- you never see how he feels about what's going on. Because he never tells Hamlet, at least not onstage. He never tells Hamlet if what he's doing is right, or even tries to, you know, cheer him up a bit."

"That's certainly not a view I've heard of him before," Killian mused, but when Emma looked up he wasn't concentrating on his books. He was looking at her.

She had heard many times that eyes were the window to the soul, but right now, it went both ways. She felt as though his gaze was boring right into her, shining a light into the roiling pit of memories and feelings that, over time, she had squashed down, packed tight and compartmentalised, buried deep where no one could see.

It made her shiver, made her feel almost sick.

"I," she began, but he cut in.

"I agree." His gaze snapped away, looked down at the table. "Abandonment. It... affects you. Probably more than anything else." She fell silent, transfixed by his words. "Hamlet doesn't even trust his own mother. That doesn't come from nowhere. How much different would things have turned out if she had just tried to understand? If she'd looked at his needs over hers. If she'd waited longer to marry Claudius, if at all. If she'd sat him down and asked why he was behaving so strangely instead of just spying on him to find out..."

"If she'd cared," Emma said, almost a whisper.

"Yeah." Killian's voice was soft, almost an echo of hers.

They sat in an odd silence that was not tense nor companionable. Emma felt hyper-aware of his presence beside her. The sound of his breaths in the otherwise silent library. The rough sleeve of his polo a few millimetres from the bare skin of her arm.

The fact that they were both avoiding looking at each other.

How did he know, she thought. How did he put into words exactly what she had been thinking?

Finally Killian cleared his throat a bit awkwardly.

"Miss French won't agree," he declared then, with a nervous sort of laugh. "She's really into the whole Gertrude-as-a-power-woman theory. Marrying Claudius to keep her hand in the power pot, that sorta thing. Also, act 5 kind of redeems her a bit."

"Yeahhh," Emma replied, glad for the switch in topic. "But she's not the sort of teacher who'll take marks away just because she disagrees with an interpretation. Not like Ms Blue."

"Christ, Ms Blue." He ran a hand over his face. "Flashbacks to year 10 final exam."

"God, don't remind me. I lost 3 marks for not mentioning Lady Macbeth's soliloquy even though it had nothing to do with my thesis."

"She did the exact same thing to me!" he cried with excitement.

For a moment Emma felt the bright flare of camaraderie that always came with shared unfair exam results. They stared at each other in united indignation. Killian looked away first, turning back to his book and fidgeting a bit. He looked almost embarrassed for some reason, which confused her.

"Back to work then?" he asked.

Emma nodded. This time, they worked in a companionable quiet, broken now and then by a question or comment. She was surprised by how well they worked together, quickly compromising on any aspects of the play they disagreed on, sharing ideas with a seamless ease.

It was interesting seeing Killian study out of the context of school. In the lessons they shared, when he wasn't talking back to the teacher (in the case of Mr Gold), he was either sitting in his corner not contributing to class discussions, or getting told off for talking too loudly with his friends.

Now, however, he was just getting down to business, occasionally pausing to drum his fingers against the table, stare intently at a quote in the book and chew idly on the eraser at the end of his pencil.

She found she liked him much better this way.

Emma had lost track of time, and when her mobile rang loudly in her bag, she jumped so violently that she knocked over the bottle of water on the table beside her. A few library-goers drifting around the area gave her dirty looks for the noise, and she hurried to answer the call.

"Parents?" Killian asked with a raised eyebrow once she lowered the phone.

"...yeah," Emma replied after a moment's hesitation. It was far easier to just call them her parents than to go into the details of the situation. "She wants me to grab some groceries before I head back. Oh, wow, it's four o'clock already."

Killian startled and checked his watch. "Huh. Lost track of time."

Emma perused the work on the table before them – a quite lengthy document on her laptop and a scattering of sheets of paper. They'd gotten some solid work done today, had written up various essay-style paragraphs, analysed quotes and gotten started on a couple of character studies.

"We got quite a bit done," she said.

Killian nodded, looking rather pleased. "I'll high-five to that," he said, raising a hand expectantly. Emma stared at it, considered, then shrugged and high-fived him with a small smile. So sue her, she liked getting ahead on her assignments.

They packed up in silence and walked out of the library together. There was a shopping centre just across the road, and Emma paused at the crossing.

"Are you catching the bus?" she asked with a glance at the stop.

He shook his head. "I live near here. I'll walk you to the store."

"Uh, okay. Thanks," she replied, a little taken aback.

She realised (halfway through crossing the road, marvellous timing Emma) that she had no idea what Killian thought of her.

She knew that Regina disliked her, and that Sidney disliked her purely out of loyalty to Regina. That Victor messed with her because he was an idiot and found it amusing. That Kathryn and Smee just went along with whatever their friends did.

But Killian... until recently she had assumed that he disliked her as well, enough to behave obnoxiously towards her. Now she wasn't so sure.

"What do you need to get?" he asked conversationally as they entered the store.

"Milk, bread, some spices and stuff." She picked up a basket and Killian instantly held out his hand to take it. She paused. As a general rule she didn't like other people to do stuff for her, especially mundane things she was perfectly capable of doing herself.

At the same time, however, some small part of herself almost wanted to give him the chance to prove himself as a nice guy.

"Don't leave me hanging, Swan," he said with a laugh, and she shrugged and handed the basket over.

"Thanks," she said.

It was almost surreal wandering through the grocery store with Killian at her side.

Oh God, she realised abruptly. Are we becoming friends?

She quashed this pretty quickly, though. It took a long time to earn her friendship. A few shared laughs, forced teamwork and a single act of chivalry wasn't enough to cut it.

She had to grudgingly admit, however, that she was perhaps leaning towards categorising him as an acquaintance rather than an enemy. Maybe. She'd see.

"You doing anything else this weekend?" he asked conversationally, which abruptly brought last night flooding back to her. She still hadn't asked him about Neal.

She shook her head. "Not really. I might meet up with Mary Margaret and study or go shopping or something. No solid plans. Why? You?"

He shrugged. "Not really. Work. Study. Might hang out with some of my group."

"Wow," she couldn't help teasing, "I can't believe it. Killian Jones' social calender isn't full to bursting?"

He huffed out a laugh. "Believe it or not, love, I'm busier with more productive things than partying and hanging around looking brooding and handsome."

"My life is a lie."

"Don't worry, I'm still brooding and handsome – I just do it from behind the counter of Video Rental Plus."

She snorted loudly as she reached for a packet of mixed spices high on the shelf. Okay. Imma do it. I shall ask about Neal. With complete nonchalance.

"I went out last night," she said casually. "Family birthday thing. I don't normally do much on Fridays though."

"Hmmm," was all he said. "A lot of people from our school go clubbing on Fridays. Or to parties, if they're on."

"Do you do that?"

"Sometimes. If I feel like it." He reached up and picked up a packet that was a little out of her reach, dropping it into the basket. "Not really your group's scene?"

"Nah. Well, Ruby, sometimes."

He grinned. "Ah yes, Ruby. I like her!"

She rolled her eyes. "You would. What about last night? No parties?"

His eyebrows rose slowly. She could see the cogs turning in his head as he seemed to wonder about her sudden curiosity. He had to know. He had to be trying to work out what to say.

"I went out to laser tag last night," he said finally, and his gaze darting sporadically between her and the dairy aisle. "With some people from school."

"Your group?" she asked. Neal had hated them, Regina especially. Killian was the only one he hadn't met.

"Nah. I've got some friends at Storybrooke High."

"Oh. Really?"

"Yeah," he said. He glanced at her again, and it took a moment for it to click, but then Emma realised.

He was trying to avoid talking about Neal. But not out of guilt – after all, it wasn't like he'd done anything wrong. What happened between Neal and Emma was between Neal and Emma, no one else.

He was trying to avoid bringing him up for Emma's sake. Presumably because of her... less than sublime reaction that first day in English.

Well, damn.

"Got everything you need?" he asked, and she could only nod, trying to quash down the odd warm feeling that had spread through her stomach.

"Sweet. Let's go then. Self-checkout, it's the way of the future."

They headed over, Emma still frantically trying to puzzle him out. Why? Why was he being so nice? Why was he refusing to stay in the neatly categorised box that she had shoved him into after multiple impressions?

"Everything okay?" he asked, frowning a little, and Emma snapped out of it, realising she'd been oddly silent with thought.

"Yeah. Fine. Just thinking." She commenced with her groceries, proceeded smoothly for about a minute, and was then told off by the machine due to an "unexpected item in bagging area."

"Dude," she said, turning to Killian. "You're leaning on the machine."

"Eh? Oh!" He sprang away, and she couldn't help it, she burst out laughing.

"What?" he demanded with faux indignation. "What?"

"You... get paid... to operate these things..." she gasped. Oh God, it wasn't even that funny. It was just so ridiculous, and perhaps she was a little hysterical, perhaps she was just over things refusing to settle in the way she wanted them to – Neal. Killian. Killian, with his surprises and study habits and that awful uncanny moment where he seemed to have reached into her very soul and just perfectly understood the exact way she identified with the play. Killian and the stupid checkout machine – it really, really wasn't that funny.

Except now he was grinning too, wide and unrestrained and looking more genuine than she had ever seen him.

She straightened up finally, rubbing her stomach.

"I've never seen you laugh that hard at anything," he commented, and there was something almost gentle in his tone.

She shook her head. "You're stupid," she informed him, intelligently, and his grin just got even wider.

A/N: The Hamlet in this chapter - not my personal interpretation of the play by any means, but I'm trying to look at it from the perspective of two damaged teens who project way too much ;P

Thanks for reading! Reviews, comments + con-crit are as always very much appreciated 8D