FOOLS RUSH IN:
Summary: Emma Swan has been married since she was five years old. Under the old oak tree, she wed Killian Jones, her neighbor. Then, he moved away, but made one final promise, that one day he would marry her for real. See what happens when he returns to make good on his promise.
Fools Rush in Chapter Three
A/N: Thanks to CSBB for once again organizing an amazing event. I've been missing Captain Swan for the past year, and having this has helped so much! Thanks to Lana ( high-seas-swan) and Kaitlyn ( Spartanguard) for their beta help. Go check out Lana's story when you get a moment as well – it's amazing! Thanks to Rachel ( Ladyciaramiggles) for the art she has provided. Also, thanks to Kris ( sambethe) for the cover art for the story and for beta help. All of you have made this story what it is!
I can't believe the amazing response I have gotten for the first two chapters! I really loved writing this chapter and I can't wait for you all to see things start to pick up! Reviews make me smile!
Emma was out of her element. She spent the entire day in a tizzy.
She didn't think when she agreed to this dinner that she would be like this. It was just a dinner after all. Just a dinner with a man whom she had dreamt about for years. Just a dinner with someone she held close, even if they had been far apart for decades.
Shit, she thought to herself. Maybe she wasn't ready for this. She initially thought she was. She was ready to see him again after all these years. She was ready to see if their friendship could still be there. She was ready to see if what she had for Killian Jones was more than just some fantasy that helped her pass the time. But now, she wasn't quite sure.
As she got ready that morning, wearing her normal Friday outfit of jeans, a white tee, and her red leather jacket, she could feel the nerves bubble up inside. It was starting to sink in that in less than 12 hours, she would be talking to Killian again. She began to wonder what his voice sounded like. She was pretty sure that Killian's once small but accented voice had disappeared, but what it sounded like now was a mystery. Was his voice deep and full of lust that most men had, or was it still light and airy? Did he still have the same accent, or did it change when he moved?
Henry yelling for her from down the hall pulled her from her thoughts for a while. When she kept busy, images and ideas of Killian disappeared. But when she had a moment to let her thoughts drift, they always drifted back to him.
She found herself in the teacher's lounge, pouring her third cup of coffee for the morning, thinking about the issues with the date. She had finally settled on calling it that on the car ride over.
Were they just going to ruin everything? Emma had spent years dreaming of what might happen if Killian came back into her life. The dreams ranged from them staying friends, to him saying he hated her and never wanted to see her again, to him declaring his undying love for her. What if the reality didn't match up to any of the dreams? What if she was let down by the interaction? What if she made up everything she remembered about him? They were only six, for God sakes, when they parted, and so much could have changed.
The night before, she had a dream about it. Because of that, that she knew it wouldn't be an easy day. She had almost canceled that morning because of that dream. She dreamt she walked into Granny's only to find their old booth empty. The booth that they once shared as children as their moms sat and graded papers was empty, just like her heart had been. She looked down at her watch and saw that she was early, so a bit of hope filled her chest. She sat down and watched the door like a hawk. Her breathing quickened each time the bell above the door jingled, her heart dropped each time it quieted and he hadn't walked through the door. She looked back down at her watch, only a minute had passed, yet it felt like hours. The dream continued like that for eternity. Finally, when she looked down at her watch and it showed 7, she gave up and left. As her dream left the diner, Emma jerked awake in a cold sweat.
Nightmares were supposed to be about what you feared most, what truly scared your conscious, and for Emma, that meant Killian not showing up, throwing away their flicker of a friendship, breaking her heart in two.
Her thoughts were non-stop. She couldn't help it. The fear of the unknown was pretty debilitating. So much so that she overfilled her coffee mug, coffee spilling onto her hand and across the counter. She didn't even hear David come in and come to her rescue.
"Jesus, Emma, be careful!" he exclaimed.
"Oh shit, sorry," she began, not even looking to see the mess she knew she had made.
Instead, she looked right at David, a small smile crossing her face.
In the few short years she had known David Nolan, he had made a drastic impact on her life. David had become the brother Emma never had, but so desperately wanted. He filled the hole Killian left, in his own special way. Yes, Mary Margaret was a great friend, but David was really her best friend; she would never say that to Mary Margaret, though.
While Mary Margaret was a sucker for romance, hope, and beauty, David was stuck in reality. He kept his wife grounded when she tended to float away in fantasy. But his wife also allowed him to dream a bit. Emma's personality matched David's more. She needed someone to tell her the honest truth sometimes. She needed someone who knew when to give her hope and when blunt honesty was needed, and David was just that guy.
"I haven't seen you this tense in a while. The last time was when you were putting in to foster Henry. Did something happen?" He questioned, concern lacing his voice.
"Oh no, Henry is great. I mean, of course the adoption agency didn't want to grant me the petition, but we are trying again. But no, I'm just out of it today," she lied.
She hadn't told the couple about her upcoming date. It wasn't that she didn't trust them. She knew neither one of them would make fun of her for saying yes to meeting him again. Hell, both of them had been encouraging her for years to reach out and truly talk to him. Sure, Mary Margaret's encouragement was littered with questions about Emma's love life, but she was still supportive and just wanted to see Emma happy.
She hadn't told them simply because she was so unsure about what it all meant. She was already scared that she was getting her hopes up by thinking about all that could happen. She didn't want to add in their hope as well. She knew Mary Margaret would be overwhelming with positivity and excitement. She didn't want to have to let her down if things didn't go well.
Emma laughed at herself, finding it funny that in that moment she was more concerned about her friend's feelings about the date than her own. But the laugh wasn't as quiet as she thought it was.
"What?" David questioned.
"I'll tell you later," she replied, hoping that it would end the conversation. She didn't want to tell them anything until there was something to tell, and Emma knew if she told David, Mary Margaret would know within minutes. Plus, she needed to get out of there and wash off before going to class.
"OK, but whatever is going on, Emma, stop worrying. I know that's what you are doing; I've known you for long enough now. Everything will work out in the end," he said, reaching for Emma's slightly burnt hand and giving it a squeeze.
Emma smiled at him as he let go and walked out of the lounge, leaving Emma to quickly clean up her mess and get ready for the first class of the day.
Her Fridays were always pretty chill. Most of her students would agree that Emma was the best teacher in the science department. She never took life too seriously, made the kids laugh, and took the time to really get to know them. She wasn't super strict, but the kids knew not to cross her. They always had the same schedule in her class. Fridays, after they took a test, was a review day, where they went over the test they had just taken. However, it wasn't like a normal review, Emma turned it into a game, so that the kids wouldn't feel so bad about getting some things wrong.
The problem was that she allowed the kids a bit too much freedom with the review game. They ran everything, while she sat back and refereed.
The game was distracting a bit, but little things would bring her back to thinking about the night to come. For example, one of her students, a boy that was friends with Henry named Avery, started talking about his mom and dad having their "date night" when another asked if he could get on and play Call of Duty later. Of course, the word date set her off. Her palms became sweaty, the words her students were saying began to be drowned out by a weird buzzing sound, and her eyesight was too focused. She wasn't paying attention to what anyone was doing. She was so zoned out that she didn't even see one of her students, Gideon, trip another, on his way to the board.
Even after that incident, she still couldn't help but focus on what may happen. During her second period class, she found herself literally in a daydream. She didn't want to let it happen, especially after the previous dream, but her mind was a creature of its own.
All around her, the classroom disappeared, and the inside of Granny's appeared. It was so real, that she thought she could hear the grill in the back. She saw him sitting with his back towards her. She knew it was him because of his hair. That hair that she had memorized from pictures. Sure, most of the pictures she saw of him were from the front, but she was pretty sure she had the correct picture of the back in her mind. She swore she could even smell the shampoo he used - or at least that she thought he would use, the scent was just right for him. As she began to see herself walk forward towards him, she felt a rush of emotions. It was a complete out of body experience. Her heart began to beat faster and she couldn't tell if she was walking slower or faster. She began to turn towards Killian, but before anything could happen, a yell pulled her from her dream.
"Miss Swan, tell him I'm right!" she heard one of her students say.
She quickly regained composure and went back to work.
The rest of the day went about the same, except for her planning period right before lunch. She knew it would be the hardest part of the day. She would be completely alone with her thoughts. She didn't have any real work to do for school. Her year had been planned out, her tests had been graded, and she was caught up on all the assignments that had been submitted. Normally, she loved her planning periods. She would get on Netflix, binge watch The Office or Bob's Burgers, and just relax while eating her lunch, but today, not even Michael Scott's antics could distract her.
Without wanting it to happen, she was back in that daydream from before. Her mind picked right back up where it left off.
She was walking slowly towards the back booth. Everything around her seemed so real. She could hear Granny yelling at a customer. It made her smile. Granny's yelling always came from a place of love. She didn't yell at you if she didn't love you. She saw Ashley behind the counter, wiping it down after her daughter had made a mess of the area with her chocolate cake. Her focus though came back to that booth. As if she didn't have to move at all, the floor pulled her towards him. She reached out to touch him, but decided against it. She didn't want to startle him, and she also didn't think she could handle what he felt like. Would his shoulder be hard? He looked to be in shape, so it would probably feel so good under her palm.
Instead, her daydream decided to just sit down. As she turned, she took in the sight in front of her.
And just like that, what seemed like a lovely version of her nightmare, she was thrust back into her fears.
The man who sat in front of her transformed. All of a sudden he wasn't in shape. He wasn't what his profile picture shown. He was the 6 year old who had left her all those years ago. He had tears in his eyes. His hair unruly and unkept. He was skinnier than he was when he left, which is saying something, since he was a scrawny kid to begin with.
"Killian?" she said.
"Emma? Why didn't you stay my friend?" he questioned, the tears began to run down his face.
"Ummm…" she was so confused about what was going on.
"Why didn't you care?" the ghost asked her.
Emma was stunned. Why was he asking her these things? It didn't stop. After she didn't answer him, he kept asking the same questions, or similar ones. Why didn't she call, why didn't she keep writing, why didn't she follow him, why didn't she reach out more, why didn't she want more, why didn't she do something?
Her heart began to beat faster, she couldn't find the words to tell him the truth. She felt the guilt bubbling up inside. Was she the real reason they were where they were?
The bell for lunch rang, pulling Emma back out of her dream. She didn't realize she had fallen asleep. At least it wasn't the first time she had fallen asleep at her desk after a restless night stemming from bad dreams.
As she headed down to the teacher's lounge, she had to think about the dream. First, what if he didn't look like his pictures showed? What if those were old pictures and he was really different? She knew he wasn't catfishing her; he spoke to her in a way only Killian ever did. But, still, what if he looked completely different? She didn't think she would hate him, she didn't think she would be angry, but she may be disappointed.
But really, she was worried that he was going to question why she stopped their friendship. She was petrified that he was going to blame her for everything that happened. All the questions that she was being asked in the dream, she knew she should be asking him. She did try—she tried so hard to keep him in her life. It killed her how much the discommunication hurt. She tried to write, she tried to call, and she begged her parents time and time again to send her with him. She fought as hard as she could for them.
Did he fight for her? Something in her wanted to spend the dinner tonight grilling him about that. She wanted to demand answers for all those questions that she cried over. But, at the same time, she didn't want to blame him. She knows that life had been hard for him, and that she couldn't blame him for a child's actions. She had gotten over the anger and hurt ages ago.
As she entered the teacher's lounge she was thankful that it was lunch. Lunches on Fridays at the school were always loud and a good distraction. The school had won a prize the year before, so every Friday a nice lunch was purchased for the teachers as a thank you. So, the lounge was packed with almost every teacher lined up to get a plate of tamales.
Her coworkers were pretty talkative, so her mind stayed distracted which was welcomed. She only hoped the rest of the day stayed that way.
She was also thankful that Mary Margaret wasn't at lunch today. She had lunch duty, which meant instead of a catered meal, she would be walking around the cafeteria making sure the students didn't get into too much trouble. Of course, that meant that David had joined her as well. So, she instead sat with Elsa, the Home Ec teacher, and Belle, the librarian.
Emma used to say she didn't have many friends. It used to be just Killian, but when he moved, she was forced to come out of her shell a bit more. Ruby was the first, followed by Lily a few years later. Eventually, she really developed a knack for making friends. People tended to migrate towards her since she knew how to be honest with people without making them feel like shit. They knew Emma would tell them how it is, but in a supportive and loving way.
She was also lucky in that her other friends she developed over the years never abandoned her the way Killian did. Ok, maybe she was still angry at him for that. She had other friends move away, and they never treated her the way Killian did. She still was in pretty good contact with Lily, a friend she made in the third grade who then moved when they were in the eighth grade. Lily understood her in a way no one else did. Both of them were essentially orphans. Yet, Lily wasn't as luck as Emma had been. Emma was adopted, and Lily had bounced around foster homes their entire friendship.
Elsa, who Emma had met last year on the other's first day, understood Emma as well. Emma was pretty sure if she told Elsa about Killian, Elsa would understand Emma's emotions.
Elsa and her younger sister Anna, who worked at the local day care, had been orphaned when their parents died in a car crash when they were younger. And while they were almost immediately adopted by their aunt, they still understood the fear that every orphaned child has: that eventually, everyone would leave them.
That was the root of the reason Killian's absence hurt her so much. She had been actively abandoned by her birth parents. Yes, she had the best adoptive parents a girl could ask for. Yes, she was so thankful for them and the love they gave her. But, in the back of her mind, she always wondered if she was worth it, since she clearly wasn't worth it to her birth parents.
So of course, Emma found herself thinking the same thing sometimes when she thought about Killian. She knew it was far from the truth—that he would never purposefully abandon her. He would never purposefully walk away from their friendship without a good reason. Yet, when she felt depressed, she couldn't help but think that way.
For a brief moment, she did almost ask Elsa to talk. But, the blonde looked so excited to be talking about the upcoming school musical that she was helping to costume that Emma didn't want to interrupt.
She listened intently to the conversation the duo was having. She listened to how Elsa was worried that the kids would mess up the costumes, especially since she had some troublemaking boys in her sixth period home ec class. She listened to how she almost got into a fight with Mr. Gold, the principal, over budget.
Belle blushed a bit when his name was mentioned. Emma had a feeling that Belle had a crush on their boss. A few times during staff meetings, Emma had caught Belle outright ogling him. It was actually kinda cute. Sure, Emma didn't get along well with the guy, and sure most of the school called him "the Beast," but Belle did seem to calm him down when she was in the room. If Emma had to guess, she would say that Gold had a crush on Belle as well. Why else would he insist on staff meetings in the library when the theater or cafeteria would work so much better?
When lunch came to an end, Emma said goodbye to her friends and headed back to her classroom. She was now excited to get back to teaching. It didn't dawn on her till that moment, but she hadn't really thought about Killian when she was listening to Elsa and Belle. Thinking about someone else's love life was actually helping her.
That was the best thing about teaching in middle school, she thought sarcastically, there was always a new love story. So that was her goal. She was gonna find some middle school drama to help distract her mind.
Her next class was Henry's. She was so thankful to see her son. While she may not be his adoptive mother yet, she saw him as her son. No matter what, she wanted him to feel that he belonged.
"Hey kid, how's it going?" she asked as the class settled into their movie. Henry's class was a bit different than the rest of her classes. She saw them every day, but for longer. She had them for two periods, back to back. They were her advanced class. So, they had already reviewed the test. So, as a prize for actually doing well on the test and for finishing the review quickly earlier in the week, she let them watch Jurassic Park.
"Pretty good; it's been a long day though. Steve and Nancy are fighting again, it's all they do recently. Robin and Tilly got back together again, which is nice," he started. Henry knew that Emma didn't always like to hear about the gossip that was happening at Storybrooke middle school, but he also knew that some of the gossip could help her as a teacher.
She listened to him for a few minutes. However, he realized that she wasn't paying full attention, which was weird for her.
"Mom, what's going on?" he asked.
She smiled to herself. First, she loved that he called her mom. He normally didn't do it in class, as he didn't want to keep bringing attention to the fact he was the teacher's kid. Secondly, she loved it cause even though the adoption didn't go through, and even though they have hit roadblock after roadblock, he still say her in the same light she saw him.
"It's a long story," she said.
"Well, I think we have time," he smiled, nodding his head towards the class of students enthralled with the movie.
She giggled a bit before beginning her story.
"Well, when I was really young I had a best friend named Killian. We were neighbors and Grandma was best friends with his mom, too. We did literally everything together. We even got married when we were five. But, abruptly, he had to move to Ireland. We tried to keep in touch for a while, but we lost contact. We've been friends on Facebook for a while and out of the blue, he messaged me and said he was back in town and wanted to meet for dinner. I said yes, and we are meeting tonight," she explained.
"And you're nervous, right?" he asked, already knowing the answer. Henry could read her like a book.
"A little; I haven't seen him in over 20 years. I'm not too sure what to expect," she answered.
"Why did he move away?"
"Well, I didn't know at first, none of us knew. Well, we didn't know. Grandma and the other adults did, they just didn't tell us. Turns out his father had left them and his mother wanted to chase after him," she recalled.
"That sucks. Why didn't he ever come back?" he asked. Emma hated reliving that day and the emotions that surrounded his leaving.
"I found out later that his mom got really sick after they moved. She passed away. I think that is why he stopped writing to me. He didn't have her around to help him write the letters. I'm not really sure what happened to him. I friended him on MySpace and Facebook, but nothing on there answered my questions as to why he stayed in Ireland or what happened to his family," she explained.
"So, are you going to ask him that?" she loved how Henry read her mind.
"Actually, that is what I have been wrestling with all day," she began. "I am not sure if I want to bring it up or not. I think I deserve an explanation, but at the same time, I want to just put the past behind us and be friends again."
She knew most parents didn't talk to their kids like this, but their relationship was different. She didn't want to hide things from Henry. She didn't want to force any type of relationship on him. Instead she thought she would let parenting come out through time and honest interactions. In truth, she was more like a big sister to him than a mother, but still had those mothering instincts with him.
"Sounds confusing," he added.
"It is. The whole thing is," she agreed.
"Well, I would want to know why if it was me. Just ask him. What's there to lose?" he pondered.
The kid was right. There wasn't much to lose by her really laying it all on the line. It's not like she and Killian had a real friendship to begin with. Sure, the foundation was there, the one they had built years earlier, but nothing else had been built. If she asked him and he refused to answer, or if he gave her some bullshit, then she wouldn't be at a loss.
"Well, I think that's enough insight into my strange life," she said. "Tell me about Violet."
She saw Henry blush at the name. She knew bringing up his own schoolboy crush would help her a bit. She knew it would provide her with a distraction.
It was a great distraction and before she knew it, the day was over. She had watched and listened as Henry tried not to go all gooey over his girlfriend who sat a few rows ahead of them, focus on the movie. Emma liked Violet enough—she was pretty, smart, independent, but respectful and kind. She just hoped that Violet wouldn't hold him to Storybrooke.
As it was with most small towns, many who grew up here, got boyfriends or girlfriends in middle school, stayed with them all of high school, and never left town because of them. Emma only left for college, and she was lucky. She didn't want Henry to live that way, though; she wanted him to go out and explore the world.
Now she only had to find a way to make it another three hours.
She wasn't planning on changing. She was already prepared for the date. While she may have decided that it was a date, she didn't want to go all out and look like she had that idea. She wanted to be casual. She didn't want to seem too eager or too excited, even though she was.
When she got home, she thought of something that might calm her down.
She went straight for her bedroom, not stopping for her after school snack, aka a glass of wine.
She bent down to the foot of her bed, felt around, and gave a tug. A large storage box came sliding towards her. Inside was a collection of diaries. She had been journaling since the year Killian stopped writing.
Now, they weren't traditional journals: she didn't start each entry with Dear Diary or finished them xoxo, but they were a collection of her thoughts. She wrote down quotes, and jotted down quick lists of things that happened that were worth her remembering. Some pictures were taped inside, too.
It had been years since she looked at them. She still kept a journal, but she rarely reread them. She was inspired by her mother to keep them, actually.
"Who knows, maybe one day you can pass them along to your daughter and she can get to know you a little better," she heard her mother say in her head.
She started with the very first one, a small little book that had a cover only a six year old girl could love. Inside were a collection of drawings and small notes, written in poor handwriting and even worse spelling.
She smiled at the book as she continued to flip the pages.
There were a couple of drawings of her and Killian, a few of the family dog, even more of princesses and unicorns, but what she settled on for a few moments was one she didn't draw.
It was an actual photo of herself and Alice. She didn't even remember the photo being taken or that she had it. Emma must have only been two or three in the picture. She was sitting on Alice's lap, with the woman's arms wrapped around her small body. She was giving Emma a kiss on the cheek and Emma's smile was so large that it was contagious.
As Emma continued to look at the photo her eyes filled with tears.
She knew that without Alice, none of this would have happened. She would have never met Killian, never became friends with him. She would never have had a second mom, or someone who made her smile when she wasn't getting along with her real mom. She would have never had some of the happiest moments in her life.
For so long, she had been angry with her. She was angry at a woman for following the man she loved, when Emma would have done the same thing given the chance.
In that moment, looking down at the picture, she knew she was no longer angry at Killian. If Emma had known about Alice all those years ago, or if the situation had been reversed, she probably would have done the same thing he did.
She looked at the clock and noticed the time; if she wanted to be on time, she needed to leave within a few minutes. She didn't want to keep Killian waiting, or herself; she had waited too long for this moment.