Two
The second time she wakes in an unfamiliar bed, it hurts a hell of a lot more than it had the first time, which seems like it wouldn't be the case, but it is.
The room is dark with the exception of the warm orange glow of the fire and instead of the screaming child, she hears only the fire crackling timidly. Emma sighs as she tosses her head to the side.
She supposes that she should be grateful that someone was able to help her, that she isn't forced to deal with a broken leg and scarring in her forehead or the residual chills from nearly drowning in a freezing sea in the middle of a storm.
But her rescuer is no Prince Charming. Far from it, actually. The guy is almost as cold as the ocean and he's freakishly dark and terrifying.
Taking a deep breath, Emma pushes herself up into sitting position to examine her knee. He'd set it and the bruising is still there, but the bandage he'd wrapped around it to keep it in place covers most of the damage she'd seen for a few fractions of a second here or there.
Emma whips the blankets off of her and gets out of the bed, her feet slipping as they hit the hardwood floors.
She looks down at the outfit she's been dressed in, musing over how large and baggy they are, and after a glance around the room, she discovers her wet clothes still drying over the fire.
Emma forces herself to go to the fire so she can inspect the articles hanging above the heat.
Crinkling her nose, she decides to keep the sagging clothes on instead, wrapping her arms over her chest protectively. She's a little perturbed that he'd re-dressed her, that he'd seen her bare. Chills run down her spine at the mere idea.
With determination in her step, Emma opens the door, and walks out in time to hear shattering glass and a hiss, followed by, "Bloody hell!"
She walks cautiously, glancing around the room.
It's quaint. Very small, but livable, if you lived alone.
There's a tiny television sitting on a wooden stand across from the sofa. One wall is built with bookshelves installed inside and is full of literature. The fire is beside the television and there is also a lamp that provides low light to the sofa atop of a side table. The floor is covered in a foreign looking rug, one that might have been made by native culture, and she bites her lip as she considers where exactly the boat had thrown her off to.
They'd been on their way home to Maine, back from a trip to England, and the storm had been a mysterious surprise in the middle of nowhere. The ship may have gone down, she isn't sure. All she knows is that she was thrust off and found something to hold onto before she fell unconscious.
On the sofa, she discovers a pile of strategically placed pillows and blankets surrounding a lump that upon closer examination is a child. She frowns at the sight of him.
While he is asleep, he doesn't look very comfortable.
Emma glances over to the open doorway to where she supposes the kitchen must be, for that is where her Savior is cursing himself out in low tones.
The child stirs in his sleep and fusses, pulling at her heartstrings so that she leans in and lifts him to her chest, shushing him softly with a finger to his cheek.
Emma smiles a little, because growing up she'd always wanted a little baby brother or sister to play with, but her parents weren't able to conceive and they didn't want to adopt again, thinking she was more than enough for them.
Emma isn't sure where this little guy came from. She doesn't think there was a baby on the ship, but then again, she'd been kind of absorbed in worry about what she'd say to Neal come her return to Storybrooke.
She hears the clatter of boots on the floor at an ever-loudening pace and glances up from the child when they stop. He is standing at the door frame with a beer bottle in his hand, a tired look on his face that shifts slightly into confusion at the sight of her.
Emma opens her mouth for a moment considering what she should say before he speaks, gesturing to her with the hand holding the bottle, "You shouldn't be up on that leg."
Emma sighs and sinks down onto the couch with a sigh. "Better?"
His jaw clenches and he doesn't look happy with her, staying in the door frame for a moment longer before stepping into the room.
"Here. Milk for the child."
She stares at him with narrowed eyes before yanking the beer bottle from him. "I'm not here to be a nursemaid for some kid that you don't want to take care of. I don't know where he came from just as much as you."
The man gives her a thin smile as he lifts his eyebrows. "Well, I don't see his parents anywhere near here, so you'll do."
Emma gapes at him for a moment. "Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I'm naturally maternal."
"And just because I've brought you into my home, that doesn't mean I'm friendly."
She glares at him and he at her. He pinches up a fake smile and drops it as he storms out of the room again.
Emma rolls her eyes as she fiddles with the beer bottle in her hand, furious that she's even here. She'll have to leave first thing in the morning, get on a boat back to America and figure out whether or not her parents made it back yet.
She struggles to feed the child for a moment, because the hole doesn't work with feeding a baby, but she adapts, pressing her thumb over the hole just enough that he can access the fluid easily. She listens to him as he eats and watches for signs of his being finished, and when he is, she sets the bottle down on the floor and pulls him up to burp him.
The boots come charging back into the room and she shoots her eyes up to meet the dark blues that are the man's.
"I'll be out of your hair in the morning," she tells him.
He stares at her silently for a few long moments and shakes his head.
"Next ship to come through here isn't for four weeks." Emma furrows her brow, about to ask one of the hundred questions on the tip of her tongue, but he interrupts, "Small island in the middle of nowhere, love. I'm afraid we're stuck with each other until Smee comes with supplies."
She wants to scream, because, well, he is the worst person she's ever met, and apparently he has very little respect for her outside of the fact that he wants to help her not die.
Her eyes go wide at his statement and she watches him as he crosses the room to put a bowl of something on the side table under the sickly orange glow of the lamp. The spoon in the bowl clatters upon being set down and she glares when he steps back to look at her.
"I feel some ground rules will be important," he tells her, eyeing her warily.
Emma scoffs. "Ground rules, really? How old do you think I am?"
He gives her that tight, mocking smile again and crouches down in front of her in the most demeaning way.
The baby gurgles out puke onto her and she doesn't care, because it's his shirt and she'll just change in a few minutes. Or maybe she'll wear it and smell up his living room for a while.
She lowers the child into her arms as he speaks.
"Rule number one. You will care for the child for as long as we're stuck together."
She gapes at him for a second and shakes her head. "Woah there, buddy. I told you I don't do kids."
He lifts his eyebrows as if challenging her and she copies him, but he doesn't break.
Emma sighs heavily. She's forced into a corner here. If he won't do it, or can't, then who will?
"Fine. If you're not going to take care of him." She looks down at the bundle in her arms. "I don't think we should call him kid or whatever, though. He needs a name. That's my stipulation if you're going to make me take care of him."
She watches the man as he pulls his teeth over his lower lip for a thoughtful moment.
"Okay. What do you suggest?"
Emma wants to make him name the kid, but she realizes as she opens her mouth to complain that he would probably pick something ridiculous and she would end up naming it anyway. She looks back down at the baby and examines him.
"Henry." She looks back at him. "He looks like one at least."
The man nods. "Alright, Henry it is."
"You need to tell me your name, too." He stares at her with his lips pressed into a thin line. "I told you mine. He has one." Emma narrows her eyes. "Give me yours so I know which name to avoid for the rest of my life."
He chuckles darkly at her.
"Killian Jones," he says. "A pleasure." She rolls her eyes at the tone of his voice. "Rule number two: I have my set of tasks and chores and I will not be interrupted for any reason."
Emma sighs. "Fine by me."
Killian glances down at the floor. "You will sleep here, with Henry. There will be no complaining or whining of any sort, and you will stay here at all times. No venturing out onto the island on your own. Especially with that leg."
He gestures to her with his left hand… er, hook- how absurd is it that she'd managed to find one of the only people in the world with a hook for a hand?- and she sighs again.
"Okay, fine. Anything else you want to enforce, Captain Hook?"
He stares at her, gritting his teeth, and he gives his head a shake. "Keep out of my way and I think we'll be just fine for these four weeks."
She watches him, hand and hook, stand again, and she thinks for a moment that she's won something in the way he's moving out of the room with a vicious sort of walk.
It might be easier to loathe him if he weren't so ruggedly handsome.
She sighs as she looks down at Henry, giving him a tiny smile when he babbles a little bit. He does have a cute face and she kind of likes him, regardless of what she might have thought otherwise before.
Emma doesn't know what to do with Henry, so she just leaves him in his pile of pillows while she tries to figure out what the bowl and spoon Killian had set down for her are.
It's stew, she thinks, stirring the spoon around and taking a sniff of it. She decides that she's too hungry to protest his attempt at potentially poisoning her and inhales her food, listening to him slam things around in the kitchen.
She gets that he has a deal, because everyone always has a deal.
Hell, she has a deal. She doesn't like anyone getting close to her because if they do, she's afraid she'll hurt them, or they'll hurt her, and she cannot let that happen.
After she finishes the stew that tastes more like the can that it came from than anything else, she sets the bowl down on the table and winces as she pulls herself up to go change clothes.
She discovers clothes in the dresser of his room and throws the first thing she can find over her head, disregarding the dirtied shirt on top of the dresser for him to deal with. She takes the blanket and carries it with her to the sofa, where she turns the light off and somehow gets into a comfortable position with Henry at her feet.
She shuts her eyes and takes a deep breath, listening as Killian sits down at what must be a table in the kitchen, the chair making a loud screeching against the floor. He sighs and she hears a click, probably a beer, before the definite sound of him taking a sip.
Obnoxious man.
How she'll ever last four weeks with him is a mystery she isn't sure she's going to be able to live long enough to find out.
/
Killian sighs heavily as he pushes open the door to his lighthouse. It's on, the sweeping light blasting it's beams across the water and cutting through the foggy night, but he's not here to tend to the light that cuts through the darkness.
There is a wooden desk and chair that he sits at with a beer in hand. Perched atop the desk is his radio: his one and only method of communication with the outside world. Thoughtfully, Killian bites on his lower lip as he stares at it.
His supplies are running lower than usual and even with his emergency stashes of food and water, he's not sure he'll be able to keep them all alive for four weeks. Three human beings on one island, in one tiny house, had never been the plan.
Killian likes to think he knows right from wrong and that's why he's staring at his radio now. Within a few minutes, he could have Mister Smee well on his way toward him with blankets, food, and a plan for them to return to whence they came.
Determined, he grabs the radio and flips the on switch, listening as the radio garbles and hisses. If he does this, they'll both be home in no time, leaving him here all alone with his thoughts once more.
It's all he's ever needed, right?
For whatever reason, his chest tightens as he summons the courage to radio out. He can feel his heart begin to race, a throbbing swelling up in his ears while he waits for a reply.
Nothing. Silence.
If they don't leave now, he's stuck with them. He's stuck with taking care of them. Of allowing himself to feel something other than the emptiness he's clung to for these past few years.
Killian sits back in his chair. He takes his fingers through his hair and stares at the device. A wave of desperation washes over him, suddenly feeling as if he's being forced to do something he very much doesn't want to do.
He needs them gone. He can't keep them here.
So he calls again.
And he calls again.
And again.
Absolutely nothing.
In an instant, he is filled with rage. Furious, he grabs the radio from his desk and throws across the room, shattering it completely into pieces on the floor of his lighthouse.
Just as quickly as he'd lashed out, he realizes his fault with tears burning behind his eyes. Killian closes his eyes tight, willing himself to find his calm even if he feels like he's teetering over the edge of an emotional breakdown.
He tugs open the lower drawer of his desk for the rum. He needs something just a little bit stronger if he's going to make it through the night.