A/N: Happy Independence Day! To celebrate, it gets a little M.
It occurs to him after sunset that, as much as he loves being able to call it a night and retiring aboard the Jolly Roger again, it leaves him devoid of a shower. Shuffling outside the diner, his eyelids are heavy enough that debating whether to just go back and try to crack open that bloody boy wizard book or begin a potentially fruitless search for a place to bathe feels like a sadistic choice. Mumbling a string of curses, he exhales and heads back into the diner, crossing into the sitting room where Ruby stands in front of the mirror putting on a hat and wrapping a red scarf around her neck.
"Hey! What are you doing back?" she asks, spinning around and smoothing down her hair.
"Could I trouble you for a moment?"
"Well, a quick moment," she says after some hesitation. "I was kind of getting ready for a date."
Polite questions about her evening plans will have to wait, he thinks, peering over her to check Granny isn't knitting on one of the sofas.
"Granny's not here?" he asks, lowering his voice even more and checking behind her again.
"Not right now. What's wrong? Is everything okay?"
He's being a child, frightening her and interrupting her night all out of fear of some old lady.
"I..." Just ask, you bloody fool! "There's not a chance you've rented my old room out already, is there? It's a bit awkward to ask David and Snow for permission to use their bathtub, and I'll pay you for a full night's stay."
Ruby cups her hand to her mouth to quiet the onslaught of laughter he's sure would have started had it been daylight. But at least she's courteous enough to not want to wake the guests. Holding up a finger for him to be patient as she composes herself, she crosses over to the ledger and flips through the pages.
"I think you've lucked out. It's still empty and last I saw Granny, she was back in the kitchen, so if you hurry, she shouldn't notice you're up there." Disappearing behind the little podium that the ledger stands on, she pops back up with his key. "Don't worry about paying for it. It's just a shower."
"That would be bad form, and you know I can afford it," he argues, glancing around her again...since grannies can materialize out of thin air, he thinks, rolling his eyes at himself. He's a Captain, for gods' sake! What reason would he have for fearing an elderly innkeeper? He'll dismiss the whole thing as exhaustion and leave it at that.
"Fine," she says in mock irritation. Or perhaps she's not mocking since she keeps glancing over at the clock.
He pays and pivots to charge up the stairs, feeling the hot water coursing down his chest already, when Granny makes a sharp turn into the sitting room, looking up over her spectacles at him with a knowing smirk.
"Back already, Hook? Not enjoying sleeping out on a boat as much as you thought you would?"
"H-he left something up in his room, Granny!" Ruby interjects. Well, well, the she-wolf can spin a yarn. Bloody hell, why hadn't he thought up that story in the first place?
"Really? After we scrubbed it from top to bottom, huh?" she scoffs, folding her arms, and maybe waiting for him to say something. He's not sure. She purses her lips even when she smiles. Patting his arm, she sidesteps around him for the ledger. "Take your shower, son. I got some numbers to crunch."
And just like that, the ordeal is over.
All in all, he's not certain he'll grow addicted to the adventures of young Harry Potter, not that he's finished with the book yet. In fact, the lad's only just boarded the vessel that will take him to the school that promises to help him harness his magic. He can think of nothing inherently unsatisfying about the story, but perhaps if he'd had the pleasure of reading it as a child he might harbor more passionate feelings.
He lies on his bunk with his ankles crossed, propped up on his pillow with the book's letters and their shadows dancing in the candlelight. He's blinked back the drowsiness for a few minutes now, pausing every once in a while to yawn, but he's not ready to snuff out the light and fall asleep just yet. When his phone rings, he rolls onto his side and lets out an audible exhale at Swan's name and picture on the screen.
"Swan?"
"Killian? Hey." Her breathing is more a series of puffs against the phone, like she's been walking. He hears shuffling sounds and a short hiss from her before she asks, "How are things at home? How's Henry doing?"
"He's fine. We had lunch earlier. Where are you?"
"Still in New York. We'll be heading out soon. Lily..." She lowers her voice. "I found her, Killian. On the way out here."
"What's wrong?" She's terse, but breathless, the events of the day catching up with her. For one second, he swears he hears a splashing sound, but he ignores it.
"She knew. I thought I was going to have to come here and be written off as a crazy person, but she knew! She's known for a long time, and she wants them dead. My parents. She knows all about what they did."
"How?"
"I don't know. We haven't talked much. I-I chased her down earlier today, and I pulled out my gun, and...I almost did it. She went on and on about how she wouldn't stop until she killed them." He doesn't hear crying, but there's a hoarse quality to her voice that's not usually there. "I was telling myself how it would be for the best, too, that I would be doing something good, but then...it felt too easy. And then I thought about everything you've said, about how darkness creeps up on you, and I've already taken a life. I thought about you and Henry and my p—and then Regina, Regina, of all people, was trying so hard to talk me out of it, and she was saying all the same things you've said. I, c-couldn't do it. Protecting Henry is one thing. Coldly shooting someone on the highway's something else, something I didn't want to fall into. It reminded me too much of the nightmare Maleficent's spell gave me. My magic was—it was out control and I was hurting everyone, and no matter how hard I tried, part of me just stopped caring, like it was time for someone else to save them for a change. But then I called out for all of you and no one answered me and, just like that, I was all alone."
Licking his lips, he holds the phone with his cheek so he can run his fingers through his hair and pretend she's doing it, so he can close his eyes and imagine she's with him. She resisted. She will bring Maleficent her daughter, as promised. It's what she does, who she is.
"Where's Lily now?" he asks.
"She's asleep. I gave up on her once. She begged me not to, but I didn't listen." Before he can open his mouth to assure her none of this is her fault, she continues. "She may want my parents dead, but spending this evening with her, it was like we were kids again. Which is a relief since we've got our hands full with Zelena."
He'd almost forgotten the Wicked Witch, how she'd invaded everyone's lives again. His lips spasm at the sound of her name.
"Zelena," he groans into the phone. "Without magic, right?"
"Yeah. Just that little spell thing she used to look like Marian. Regina came prepared, though. The cuff that we climbed the beanstalk with? The one that blocks magic? She brought it and I brought handcuffs, so win-win."
"But no magic that leaves her tantrums falling on deaf ears." He doesn't really ask it, half of him back at the dock that night, locked in a battle of wits with a madwoman with ferocious eyes. He'd lost that battle, thanks to magic, and, looking back, he finds it rather insulting he'd been bested by a woman with the temperament of a screaming brat. Even powerless and restrained, he can hear her rants all too well, grating in his ears.
"I wouldn't know. I knocked her out," she snorts.
"I knew you'd pull through," he says, lifting an eyebrow he knows she can't see.
"It's...more complicated than that. I knocked her out with something in Regina's magic stash. It's going to wear off here in a bit. You wouldn't believe what we've walked into."
If it were with anyone else, he would propose a wager that nothing would exceed her almost killing someone in cold blood, but this is the Savior he's talking to, and she's in close proximity to the Wicked Witch of the West.
"At the risk of sounding gullible, I'm sure I will believe whatever 'it' is," he says. She answers at first with only a deep breath.
"Zelena's pregnant."
"What?" he blurts, shifting so the book falls onto the floor. Grunting, his arm swoops down and retrieves it. Pregnant? He hadn't heard her correctly. One of them must be in one of those, those "dead" zones, where the phones don't work.
"Yeah. Robin thought she was Marian and, well, one thing led to another."
"Bloody hell, Swan."
"That's a variation of what we all said. I can't even wrap my head around it right now. Regina and Robin are across the street hashing it out right now, hopefully coming up with some plan."
"And the boy?" he asks.
"Asleep." There's a sigh, and he hears a change in tone. "Did you forget how late it is? Kids are in bed at this hour, which reminds me—I should have sent a text to Henry to tell him not to stay up too late." She pauses long enough for him to wonder if she's about to end the conversation. "Anyway, we're chilling out until Zelena comes to, and then I think it would be best if we just went ahead and came back. I don't want this kid spending another night under the same roof as Zelena. I've got a few contacts here that still owe me favors, so with any luck we can drive two separate vehicles back to Storybrooke."
She groans, sounding so drained he wishes he had gone with her. He's not sure he would have been able to do anything more than Regina did earlier, but he knows how hard it is—to be faced with your own darkness and choose to turn away from it. It's so much easier to let it engulf you, turn you into a shell of what you once were. How responsive would she be if he told her how proud he is of her now?
"Killian? W-would you...do something for me?"
Something about how her tone trembles sends a shiver down his spine, everything blurring into a haze. The ship seems attuned to it as well, rocking its way into a fast-but-steady rhythm. He should lighten the moment, insert some innuendo into the conversation...or should he be as completely serious as he can be? Promise her he would do anything for her? Reassure her he will never let her down?
"What is it?"
"Would you send me a picture of yourself? You'll probably have to hang up, do it, and then call me back."
"Hold on, love." Hoisting himself up, he hurries over to his desk for a quill and paper. "You'll have to tell me how."
"Okay. On your phone, on the bottom, there should be a symbol of a camera. It'll be a rectangle with a hump on the top and a circle in it. If you select that, your screen will change to where you can take a picture. You'll see another camera with arrows in it. Push that, and the screen will flip so you can see yourself. Push the big button on the side of that, and that's your picture. To send it, all you have to do is send me a text but add an attachment to it. Make sense?"
"I can figure it out from that. Let me try." It doesn't sound too hard.
He pushes the camera symbol with the arrows in it and finds himself staring at his own image, a portable mirror. He keeps angling it since it doesn't quite flatter his devilishly handsome features. Raising the phone to just above his eye level, he gazes into it and remembers she likes for him to smile when they do this sort of thing.
The difficult part over, he manages to send it to her, similar to how he sends her a basic message with words, "texting." For a full minute, there's no response. He releases his clenched muscles when their picture comes up, along with the little melody that heralds her call.
"Not bad," she purrs into the phone, making him yearn for the next time to be directly into his ear.
"It's to your liking then?" he asks, cocking his head and smirking, believing she's doing the same thing.
"You were quick, too. Bath water's still warm and everything."
"Bloody hell, Swan. You've been in the bath all this time?" He shoots up in bed. Everything, and he does mean everything, tenses right back up, including his breathing. Almost gasping, his hand all but clamps onto his groin. Is her hair loose or pinned up to keep from getting wet? Is her leg dangling over the edge? Have the bubbles started fading away, or are there still enough to cover her? Gods, it was ages ago, but one of his very first dreams of her had been when he discovered the shower for the first time: of tasting her slick, soapy skin, watching those gorgeous eyes darken with lust as drops of water tease her eyelashes. She's teasing him. Must be. "H-how are you able to do that?"
"It's easier than you might think. I told you everyone else is conked out and Regina and Robin aren't back yet. I've got to do the long drive all over again. I needed to unwind for a second."
"You're not jesting then?" He can't stop his voice from cracking. Positioning the phone on his shoulder so the side of his head keeps it from falling, his hand unzips his trousers at lightning speed and begins busying itself.
"Nope. Just sitting here talking to you, I...I wanted a visual." Her voice lowers as she finishes speaking, whatever bravado she'd summoned to ask him slipping away. Oh, love, there's no reason to be embarrassed. He'll tell her so.
"Then I hope it's flustered you as much as it sounds like it has," he says, waggling his eyebrows despite knowing she can't see him do it.
"See, I really didn't want to stroke your ego..."
"There are so many nicer things to stroke." Case in point, he thinks with a smirk, glancing downward.
"Okay, I..." She bursts out laughing, and he can hear her bite her lip and lick it afterwards. It's so vivid she might as well be here in front of him, fresh out of the bath, to hell with the towel. "It's a really nice photo." She stifles a gasp, ragged breaths hitting the phone. If she's doing what he thinks she's doing...and judging by the lack of conversation going on, she's doing precisely that, he's not going to last long.
"Oh crap. I have to go. One of them's knocking." A flood of movement and muttered profanities hits him like a gust of freezing wind. "I've got to get dressed and start getting things ready to go. We should be back early tomorrow morning. Thank you, Killian. Thank you. So much."
His hand pauses; bad form to do that when so much sincerity, so much love, is conveyed in so few words. I love you too, Swan. As you said, so much.
"Sweet dreams, love. Hopefully, of me." He grins into the phone.
"I plan to. Night."
