Five
Killian comes into the room three times in the night when Henry cries.
His exhaustion is mirrored in Emma's own miserable appearance, sagging eyes and lips pressed together tightly without any need for communication.
He sits in the chair under the window next to the fireplace and she tries not to notice the way his hair sticks up in every direction as he threads a hand through it with his gaze lazy on the flickering fire.
Henry needs to be changed after his third feeding and Emma winces as she lays him down on her legs to do the work.
Emma just fastens the pin on the side with practiced ease and she pulls his little outfit on as snugly as it will fit before taking the boy into her arms and allowing him to play with her finger as she waits for him to drift off.
She nearly falls asleep herself, sitting up in the bed, but Henry doesn't feel like sleeping and she can't just put him down like this, so she drops her shoulders low.
"Can you just go to sleep?" She's begging and Henry just blinks his big brown eyes at her. She sighs.
"Do you know any songs?" Killian asks, voice thick with sleep.
Emma shakes her head, looking over at him. "You don't have to stay here, you know. You can go back to sleep. He's just going to stay up until he's ready."
He shakes his head and stands, pulling the chair to the edge of the bed. He plunks back down and takes a breath.
"I haven't sung in a long while," he tells her, clearing his throat a little. He braces himself with another breath. "So pardon my pitch."
Emma tilts her head to the side in mild curiosity, a swelling of surprise in her belly. "Believe me, I have no judgment. I can't sing for my life."
He smiles the smallest bit, almost shyly, and Emma looks down at Henry before Killian starts in, low and deep.
His voice is beautiful and stunning to say the least. She hasn't heard anything like it, and the song he's singing is equally as such. It's a song about a man calling for his lost love at sea. She thinks it's probably a song that he used to hear at some point in his past.
He sings with passion and she keeps her gaze fixed on Henry's tiny face while he drifts off peacefully. He's asleep before the song is finished, but Killian keeps singing anyway.
They sit in silence for a few moments once he finishes singing.
Turning to him, Emma intentionally meets his eyes. "That was beautiful."
Killian smiles slightly. "My brother Liam used to sing it to me when I was afraid of the storms."
She smiles at that, finding herself genuinely interested in his past. Interested in the fact that he used to be afraid of thunderstorms. Interested in who he used to be, and of what happened to lead him here.
She finds herself suddenly wide awake, wanting to sit up for the rest of the night discussing themselves.
But at the same time, she knows it wouldn't be right. They're still just acquaintances and when she leaves him, she'll never see him again, so it isn't as if there needs to be a relationship here.
Emma hands Henry off to Killian so he can settle the boy into his crib. He stays sitting there in silence for a few moments with her, so she thinks he must want to talk.
She's not good at this, but she manages to find something to say.
"Did you lose him?"
He stares at her and then looks down at his lap, lip going between his teeth. He struggles for a second or two. "Aye."
Emma closes her eyes. "I'm so sorry."
He scoffs, sitting up straight and running his hand over his head. "Don't apologize, love. No one ever sticks around, do they? Death is inevitable. I made my peace with that a long time ago."
He shoves himself up onto his feet and returns the chair to its spot. She watches him, the way his features have darkened with the obvious pent-up anger over this topic.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
He pauses where he's standing by the door and glances over his shoulder. "Not entirely."
"Okay."
He leaves the room after a second at the door and she sees his hand clench up into a fist before falling to his side on his way out.
She wonders if she'll ever figure him out.
There are so many layers, she's beginning to see now, and if she doesn't figure out what he's about now, she probably never will. It's odd that she wants to, because she's had a life of messy relationships and idiots and people who claimed they wanted her but never did.
Wanting to learn about someone else is unsettling. So maybe she shouldn't want that.
Maybe she shouldn't wonder about what Killian Jones' history looks like, about who he lost and who he's hiding from. Maybe she shouldn't want to help him see that living alone on this island is doing more harm than good.
It's evident already that he doesn't care much for himself. She can't say much for his grooming standards, but based on the amount of cleaning she'd done, it's obvious that a part of Killian is careless and hopeless, as if he doesn't want his life to be long-lived.
She can't think of anything sadder, really. Living on this island, in this house, for another fifty years- into his old age? That sounds like it would kill him faster than anything.
People aren't meant to live alone. If there's something she's learned in the past few years of living with David and Mary Margaret, it's that.
It's probably a matter of time before it all comes crumbling down for him and she hopes with bated breath that it isn't while she's still here with him.
/
In the morning, Emma is greeted by the sound of Henry's hungry cry and a groan from the other side of the wall.
After a few moments, Killian enters the room and hands the baby to her. He looks exhausted, as if his sleep had been restless. Hers had been, too.
Henry's cries soften as soon as she holds him, but he still needs comfort, and she hums a little to him, muttering the words under her breath as she strokes over his hair and cheeks.
She bites her lip when Killian comes back into the room with the bottle in his hand.
Emma takes it from him and starts to feed Henry while Killian sits at the foot of the bed. He runs a hand over his face and sighs. "How does your leg feel?"
She shrugs. "A little better, I guess."
He smiles a tiny bit and nods. "Good. I'll get you some ice." Killian pauses and, as if he remembers something important, he tells her, "Snowed this morning."
Emma's eyes widen. "What? Are you serious?"
Killian chuckles and nods. She looks toward the window and finds that it's fogged over in a white sheen and she laughs.
"Can I go outside and see it?"
He shrugs. "Suppose so."
Emma smiles at him excitedly. He seems curious, with the way his eyes shine back at her, and how tentatively stretched his smile is.
She's oddly really happy. The idea of snow brings back memories of real life, where she belongs, and they sit warm in her chest. Clearly, Killian can sense that, though he stares at her like she's being silly.
"Sorry. I just…" Emma shakes her head. "It's just that the first snow of the year, my mom has this tradition that we do."
She pauses, a smile filling her face from ear to ear. She can practically hear her mother's bright voice in her ears.
"She says that the first coat of snow is the most magical and we usually bottle some up and leave it in our freezer until Christmas Eve. Then we'd sprinkle it in our stockings because she says the magic in the snow would bring even more happiness than Santa could ever bring."
He smiles at her explanation, a genuine one, his teeth showing and sparkling in the early morning light.
Her own smile fades as she looks down at Henry, realizing that her parents have no idea where she is and no clue of how to find her. She hasn't even tried to contact them.
Is there even a way to do that?
They might think she's dead and that definitely makes her heart ache, because she knows that they love her more than she thinks is even possible and losing her would absolutely drive them to the brink of insanity.
"Were you with your parents when you fell from the ship?" Killian asks, suddenly pulling her back to reality.
"Yeah," she smiles a little, shaking her head. "We were on the way back home from England. My parents thought it would be fun to take a ship across the Atlantic instead of flying." Emma sighs, laughing a little with bitterness. "It was our Six Year Gotcha Day vacation."
"Gotcha Day?"
Emma lifts her eyebrows. "Yeah. It's silly… I was adopted. We were celebrating my adoption day."
Killian nods in understanding. "Ah."
Henry finishes eating and she tucks the bottle down beside her while she lifts him to burp him, the cloth she'd used all night draped across her shoulder while she gently pats his back.
Killian has an unreadable look on his face, which isn't much of a surprise.
"They celebrate everything," she tells him. "They would celebrate a good day at school if they had the time." A slightly bigger smile fills his lips at the idea. Emma frowns again, longing to see her parents at the forefront of her mind. "Do you have, like, a radio or something? So that we can get word to them that I'm okay?"
He looks hesitant for a moment, squinting one eye in a painful sort of way. "I- I may've smashed it in a drunken stupor."
She opens her mouth and nods slowly. He cringes, pressing a hand to his forehead.
"In about four weeks the supplies will come. Then you'll be free to leave. He should have all of the necessary equipment back on the mainland."
Emma furrows her brow. "How far away are you from the mainland?"
He shakes his head. "About forty-five miles."
She hums, tilting her head curiously. "Why don't you have a boat, then?"
His gaze turns dark and he shifts his eyes away from her, looking down at his lap. She feels a stirring of past emotions bubbling forward, as if it's all too painful for him, and he pushes off of the bed, stalking toward the door before spinning around.
"I don't operate sea craft any longer." It's all he says, but she sees the pain in his eyes and it makes her wonder yet again what exactly happened to him.
Again, she finds herself watching him walk away from her knowing just a little bit more and a whole lot less about him than when their conversation first began.
Emma bites her lip and glances down at Henry as she sets him down in her arms. "Well, Henry, what do you think? What do we do today?"
Henry gurgles and makes adorable noises, a toothless grin filling his face for a moment. She laughs.
"You'd better be glad you're cute, otherwise I don't think I would like being woken up so much at night." She laughs again when he makes a vocalization. "Oh, really?"
Emma pokes his nose and he closes his eyes. His smile widens.
She wonders where he comes from and who his parents are, wonders if they know he's missing, and if they're looking for him.
She sighs as she cradles him tighter to her chest. He certainly would be missed if he was hers.
"Emma, I've got to go check on the lighthouse," Killian comes back into the room. She looks at him with wide eyes. "So if you want to try and move around, I'll come back in about an hour or so and help you."
Emma nods. "Okay."
He walks closer to her, putting a bowl of something down on the nightstand.
"Do you think he'll need another bottle?"
She shakes her head. "No, but if you could grab another one of those diaper cloths, that would be good."
Killian nods and then whisks himself out of the room. Emma looks over at what he's left for her and smiles a tiny bit because he's left her a bowl of oatmeal.
Emma smiles down at Henry. "He might think he's tough, but I think he's a real softie inside, Henry. There's no need to be scared of Killian."
A half second later, the man waltzes back into the room with one of the diaper cloths and a roll of bandages. He holds them out purposefully.
"For your forehead, if you'd like to replace the bandages."
Emma softens. "Oh. Um, yeah. Thank you."
He nods and then leans in close to her, focusing intently on the gash on her forehead. She had only had a quick look at the residue during her cleaning, the blood seeping through the bandage and coloring it a light shade of brown.
She bites her lip as he pulls the tape off. "So you were in the Navy. Were you a doctor?"
He scoffs. "Not by a long shot." He grabs the roll of medical tape and uses his teeth to tear away a square. It's a practiced motion, as if he's done it a lot. "But with time, you learn how to pull off simple fixes."
Emma hums. He applies more tape to her forehead. His fingers brush against her eyebrow, as if he's examining her, and she finds his eyes in an instant that sucks the breath straight from her lungs.
"There we are." Killian says, voice low and gentle.
He doesn't move away from her. She can feel his breath, warm against her cheek, and the longer she stares into his eyes, the more she wants to understand him.
The brush of his fingertips slows to a gentle caress that shouldn't feel as meaningful as it does.
She sees the moment he recognizes the intimacy of the moment, of sensing just how close they are. It hits her all at once, too, and she allows herself to release a soft, shaking breath as soon as he stands upright.
His eyes fall away from her and he straightens his shoulders. "I'd better get going."
She rolls her eyes as he backs away from her. He turns the caretaker switch off and on again so easily that it's a wonder she's still breathing.
"Thanks."
She doesn't say it, but she means to say thank you for everything. For singing Henry to sleep, for saving them when he could've let the water drown them, and for caring when he obviously isn't built for it.
He nods. "Not a problem, Emma."