A/N: This was always meant to be a birthday present for ProtoChan but I am so late because I had some disagreements with the muse about this fic. It's just my second time writing Captain Swan so I hope you'll like it.
A simple motion was usually enough for Emma to get free of her jacket but the red leather was clinging adamantly to her that night and refused to yield to her manipulations, making her huff in tact with yet another useless tug. It felt like she was stuffed in a body tight cage and that had only so much to do with the jacket and much more with the fact that she was actually stuck in a situation that did not at all suit her tastes.
She closed her eyes and focused on her breathing, trying to calm down enough to hunt down the patience she needed to get rid of her jacket. It would surrender and let go of her if she could try to peel it off slowly and gently but then she'd be left with nothing to help her with all the pent-up frustration bubbling inside her and she needed to get rid of that just as badly. Perhaps even more if she wanted to be able to fall asleep and not have anything else go wrong that day. Though, it would take effort for the few minutes left of the day to make it even worse than it already was.
"Feeling tense, are we, love?" Killian asked behind her back, the question playful but still gentle with the care laced in it that she hadn't asked him for. She could take care of herself and her son and didn't need anyone else to do it. "Should I get out while you change?" Killian asked in that same tone that made it impossible to ignore the fact that his attempt at being a gentleman was genuine.
It only annoyed her more, for it would be easier to be angry with him if he were pretending. And she needed to be angry with something so that the feeling wouldn't stay inside her and keep clogging up her system. She'd gathered enough negativity for a whole year that day and she didn't need to keep it. She'd sworn not to take work home with her so that it wouldn't bother Henry but, of course, she hadn't even been able to make it home, the damn case more complicated than they'd thought and leaving them in the middle of nowhere when they should have been home hours ago instead of engaging in a wild goose chase of evidence that seemed to mock them with its elusiveness. She'd gladly lock away Regina Mills once she managed to catch her simply for keeping her away from her son if nothing else.
Emma turned around to speak or snap–whatever came out, really–at Killian but was given a sharp pause when she saw him laying blankets on the ground that she hadn't even heard him fetch from the closet. Not that she could pay much attention to anything besides the mess in her own head.
"What are you doing?" she asked, the clear protest in her tone startling even to her with how acute it was but she couldn't comprehend what she was seeing.
"There's only one bed," Killian said, and of course there was. Of course there was only one room in the one motel they'd managed to find when he'd convinced her it was far too late in the night to drive all the way back to New York and of course there was only one double bed. But the way he said the words as if they explained everything, as if his actions were proportional to the circumstances, didn't sit right with her. He really intended to sleep on the floor and she only felt more pressure enter her system at the conflicting feelings he'd planted in her.
"Don't be ridiculous," she decided to acknowledge the annoyance and let it out to free herself from it and because that was safer than falling into the appreciation she couldn't help but feel at his consideration. Especially when she knew there was nothing fake in it, no hidden motive for personal gain. Just the genuine attempt to help her feel at least somewhat comfortable with the whole situation. "We're both adults," she said, keeping her tone as calm as she could manage as she tried not to work against herself on that one and give proof of the opposite.
It wasn't worry that Killian would get the wrong idea about it that had her doing her best to keep her heart rate from elevating. She wouldn't have needed him to be willing to sleep on the floor to know she could trust him enough to sleep in the same bed with him. It was exactly the knowledge that she couldn't remember when was the last time she'd trusted someone to let them get so close that had enough adrenaline rushing through her to have her running out and keep working until she could catch their criminal and go home to Henry and Mary Margaret and David.
"Are you inviting me in your bed, Swan?" Killian asked, a smug smile on his face that made her want to hit it off as it did nothing to overshadow the care in his eyes that had been there ever since they'd been partnered together.
He'd had her back, risking his life for her, and she'd been grateful that he'd protected Henry from losing the only parent he had left even when she'd wanted to scream at him for exposing her to potentially having to carry his death on her conscience. She'd even done it a couple of times but she'd stopped wasting her time and efforts after he'd given her a look as calm as she would've never managed after he'd almost gotten his heart pierced by a harpoon and had told her he was a survivor but he wouldn't regret giving his life for her and for her son to not be left an orphan. All her strength had poured out in the tears she'd hoped he understood were all his fault and she'd decided to spare herself the exhaustion of trying to talk some sense into him when he'd obviously gone insane. Who talked like that?
Emma rolled her eyes. "Just get in before I change my mind," she said, returning her attention to getting rid of her jacket only to notice her hands were now trembling.
She almost groaned in despair and considered the option of just going to bed with it. It could be what she needed, the one normal thing in the situation to keep her grounded, but she shrugged the thought off as quickly as she wished she could do with the jacket. It would just feel stuffy and get her to sweat underneath the covers, crushing what little hope she had of falling asleep with all that restless energy still inside her.
Scraping what little patience had remained on the walls of her mind, she managed to unpack herself at last with careful and meticulous movements that left her so tired she straight up collapsed in bed feeling the pressure building in her eyes and pushing her to cry with the awareness she wouldn't be able to fall asleep that every passing second kept stuffing in her mind.
"Good night, Swan," Killian said when she managed to gather enough energy to pull the covers over herself without falling apart in the process. His voice was so soft compared to the sharpness filling her that she wished to push him out of bed to stop the temptation of finding a way to get some of that for herself. She wouldn't find any of it inside her, even the thoughts of Henry only making the restlessness inside her more acute rather than helping, and she wouldn't let herself ask him to help her soothe what was supposed to stay quiet in her head.
She didn't answer, hoping he'd decide she'd fallen asleep as that wouldn't be far-fetched after the killer day they'd had even when she knew he wouldn't fall for it. He was extremely observant and would be able to tell her mind was still racing by the reflection of that exertion in her breathing. He had the same superpower of detecting lies as her when it came to her, as if he was stealing it from her to use against her, and she could only hope he'd mind his business and fall far away from her in sleep. She'd made sure to turn her back on him to make it easier for him to ignore her and not feel the need to pull the gentleman act.
She got her wish in the fashion of vicious mockery from the universe, of course, as Killian didn't try to talk to her and she was left to drown in her thoughts instead. She couldn't stop them as they kept flowing, a string of pain stitched together when her memories bled into each other.
The foster homes, the hunger, that cutting starvation for affection that refused to die no matter how many walls you built around it to trap it and make it give up at last, Neal smiling, him stealing a cheap keyring with a swan that she still wore as a necklace because it meant so much, the pain in her hands after she'd made herself bleed by hitting a wall when all she'd wanted had been to hit his father for getting him killed with his illegal business, the pain in her heart when she'd found out she was pregnant with his child that she could never raise on her own because what did she know about being a mother? What did she know of love now that she'd just lost what little of it she'd ever had? And then more of that.
She could still remember the pain tearing through her whole being when she'd thought of giving Henry up for adoption. It had turned even more vicious when she'd changed her mind–or rather, had it changed by Mary Margaret who'd been there for her ever since she'd gotten herself to the hospital to have her hands bandaged after she'd done her best to fuck them up like the hurt and anger had been doing to her heart–as the doubts had started eating at her and her own memories had tried to leap at her baby to suffocate it in the pain of missing a parent. She'd had the hardest time believing she could be enough to fill for Henry that emptiness she'd carried inside her her whole life because she'd never had parents, no one had ever wanted her. But she'd wanted him. She wanted him so much, wanted to take care of him and give him all the love he somehow managed to create in her heart, wanted to give him the love she would've given his father and that Neal would've given him. It was the best way to honor his memory.
Henry had been the one good thing in her life, the one that had taught her to take care of someone else other than herself and to open up her heart. She'd had to bring down the walls around her heart for him, to let him in, to love him, and she'd done it. And for once it hadn't brought pain because Henry was just magic like that. He was her miracle and she wouldn't ask for more. She didn't need more, didn't need anyone else.
She turned around, angry at the tears trying to enter her eyes and determined to leave them behind.
"Can't sleep, love?" Killian's voice startled her before his face being so close to hers that she could see his eyes even in the darkness of the room could.
"Why are you awake?" she hissed, keeping her voice down when there was no need as anything she could've disturbed was already up and running, and kicking, too, to remind it was there, in front of her, and she had nowhere to go even if she jumped out of bed and back into the pickup David had lent them as they were trying to stay unnoticeable and a police cruiser definitely stood out.
"I could ask you the same question," Killian said, his voice not carrying any traces of offense and it made her want to scream at him once again for how calm he always remained even when she was pushing against him. And she couldn't even accuse him of pretending because he was still there after she'd done much more to drive him away than any of the foster families that had taken her in had needed to kick her out again. He was still there, sticking around, even when she'd made it clear that she wasn't looking for a relationship, much less for a fling, and with a colleague no less, and she couldn't understand his motive. What was keeping him at her side when no one else had ever wanted to stay and the one person who had had been taken away?
"I'm thinking about Henry," she said, not trying to lie to him because it would have no effect anyway. He would just keep up the caring attitude until she relented and told him what was truly bothering her and she just had no more energy left for anything.
"He's fine," Killian said, his reassurance effective when she knew that if it'd been someone else, she would've been offended for having her concerns brushed away. But Killian wasn't like that. He'd always listened when she was worrying about her son and had given some surprisingly good advice despite having no experience in parenting except for a pickpocketing, homeless teenager daughter that he'd practically adopted and was helping make her life at least somewhat normal. It was heartwarming. His concern for both kids was. So she didn't find a reason to doubt his words. "I'm sure Mary Margaret and David are taking good care of him." Even less to argue with there.
She'd become fast friends with Mary Margaret and her and her husband had helped her immensely throughout the years. She wasn't certain she would've ever been able to do it without them, without the endless help they provided with Henry and not only. They both had been there for her, listening to her concerns like she wasn't used to anyone doing, offering comfort and a shoulder to cry on, and a hand when she was in need, and that meant so much because she'd always been. They were the friends she hadn't dared hope for.
Killian startled her out of her thoughts again when he threw the blankets aside and got up. She wanted to ask what he was doing but the question refused to get out so she had to resign to the anticipation settling inside her and trying to shake her even more than she already was while he rummaged through the bag with documentation on the case he'd brought along.
It seemed to take forever even when she knew it wasn't. She was used to her mind pulling time apart and creating eternities for her to suffer through while her life remained suspended in its cocoon of pain and she'd learned to recognize when it did so, could almost calculate the ratio between reality and the other reality in her head. She'd learned at least that in twenty-eight years of it happening almost constantly with the happy moments being the only ones that were quick to slip through her fingers leaving her nails sinking in her own skin when she tried to hold the memories in the palms of her hands because her heart was fragile and she was afraid to let them touch it, not to mention that she didn't know if it would be a good enough home for them.
"I always carry this with me," Killian sat back down on the bed and opened his palm to reveal a seashell. "When I can't sleep, the sound of the waves helps me calm down," he said, his voice never wavering like hers did when she had to share something personal, and neither did his devotion to her as became clear when realization hit her.
He hadn't gotten up to get his shell so his sleeplessness had nothing to do with inability to dive into rest and everything to do with him staying awake for her, to make sure she was okay. It was too much to put that knowledge in her head and it started trying to leak out of her eyes once again, and she didn't know how much longer she could hold it back.
"My mother's love is tangled into the sea for me, the shanties she'd sing to me having the rhythm of the ocean and the way she'd rock my hammock–yeah, I did sleep in a hammock, what else to want from a little pirate at heart–made it feel like a ship carried gently by the waves," Killian said, his gaze on her as if he wasn't afraid of letting her see into his soul and the life that was kept there, as if that was exactly his goal, and she couldn't understand that kind of bravery when she knew he'd been abandoned too, by his father, and had lost his brother. His openness made no sense. "It helps soothe me," he said and she could see how that would be the case even if she'd never had a parent's affection. It sounded beyond lovely and she wanted to believe that she'd managed to give that to Henry at least.
"Do you have a lot of nightmares?" she found herself asking, trying to comprehend the kind of person that he was and how he could share so freely with her, how he could trust her when she knew his life hadn't been easy either. Losing his hand couldn't have been anything short of a tragedy, and the woman he'd loved, too.
He'd shared that with her when he'd found her staring at her swan keyring and had gotten her to share her own pain which she tried to hate him for to this day but it always just turned into gratitude instead, for he'd taken a load off her shoulders. Especially when he'd supported her decision not to let Neal's father anywhere near Henry no matter how he tried to frighten her into allowing him in his grandson's life since she was afraid her son would suffer his father's fate. She'd hoped Neal would understand, wherever he was, and for some reason Killian's reassurance that he would had helped put her concerns to rest like she could never hope to do for him.
"Only one," Killian answered, his voice empty this time like she'd never heard it before.
Oh.
Emma moved to take the shell from him, feeling sheepish as she did so but it only lasted until it was in her hand. The effect was instantaneous with everything the shell meant to her when she knew he'd trusted her to share the story of his lucky charm with her and had given up his own means to repel the nastiness of the past to help her. She wasn't used to someone else sacrificing their own comfort for her except for Mary Margaret and David, who she'd come to think of as the exception, and it definitely struck a nerve. That was not such a rare occurrence but this time it was different. Her awareness of her vulnerability in the situation that had prompted him to do so wasn't so acute and threatening when she knew she wasn't alone in it. He was there with her.
"Thanks," Emma said as she looked into his eyes before focusing on the shell as she brought it to her ear. The sound of the sea entered her mind to wash away what had been suffocating her before and she soon drifted off to sleep, carried by the waves.