A/N: Holy cow! I totally didn't expect the response I received to this fic! I'm so glad you all loved this little world I created. So, because everyone asked for part 2 of Killian meeting Wendy, here it is. Also, stay tuned, because there will be a part 3!
It's a funny thing how easily one's life can turn on a dime.
Over the course of her near-thirty years of life, it has happened to Emma often. From the Dark Curse robbing her of a life of royalty to Neal framing her to a small, ten-year-old boy showing up at her door – these moments all altered her life in dramatic ways.
Now as she stands in the doorway of her Manhattan apartment, Emma thinks that this is another one of those moments.
Hook stares back at her, and she at him, and none of it seems real. Only it is, or so she believes, because she bites the inside of her cheek and feels a bloom of pain. You can't feel pain in dreams, right?
"Swan," he begins, and before he can say anything further, Emma plants a hand on his chest and pushes him deeper into the hallway, and shuts the door behind them.
If any of her neighbors were to step outside, they would get quite the sight – her in her flannel pajamas and him still in his pirate regalia. Hook looks just as Emma remembers – dark hair an artful mess, blue eyes bright, and chest hair on full display. The ache that's settled in chest for the past three months begins to dissipate, and Emma wants nothing more than to pull him into her arms for a hug. But she puts a clamp on those emotions, because –
"Henry doesn't remember anything, so he really doesn't need to see you right now," she says. She leaves out that part that the daughter he doesn't know exists is also inside.
"You remember?" Hook asks, jaw dropping and brow furrowing in confusion. "But how? Regina –"
"Can you come back in like two hours?" Emma asks, effectively cutting him off. "Henry will be at school then, and we'll have a few uninterrupted hours to talk."
"But, Emma – "
"Killian, I swear I will explain everything," she uses his name for emphasis, an emotional plea that she knows is slightly manipulative, but will work. "Just trust me, okay?"
He opens his mouth as if to argue, but seems to think better of it, because the next thing he says is, "As you wish."
Her heart contracts, and in that brief moment, Emma is taken back to Neverland, to the sweltering heat of the jungle and even hotter kisses. He's staring at her with his too-blue eyes, and it's so intense that she wants to look away. She stands her ground though, and waits him for him walk away. He does, and it surprises her to see him so easily acquiesce to her demands. Leaning against her door, she watches as he ambles down the hallway, any evidence of his usual swagger now gone. She takes a deep breath to summon the courage, and calls out to him.
"It's good to see you again, Killian."
He turns back to her, and Emma can see a ghost of a smile cross his face, "Aye, Swan, you as well."
-/-
The moment she returns into the kitchen, Henry asks her who was at the door. Emma lies by telling him that Hook had been a person she was working with on a new case. Henry takes her answer in stride, and goes on to busy himself with collecting his school things. The lies come easier now, one after another whenever something having to do with her past comes up in conversation. She wonders if Hook's sudden arrival means that her period of lying to Henry might come to an end.
After dropping off Henry at school, she stops by a liquor store and buys a nice looking bottle of rum. She hasn't really drank over the past year, pregnancy and breastfeeding preventing any imbibing of liquor, but she thinks it would be "good form" to have something to offer him. After all, he'll likely need a drink once he discovers the truth.
She stresses over how to dress Wendy, and settles on a onesie printed with tiny ducklings. She places a yellow headband on the baby's head, one adored with an overlarge daisy, and smiles as her daughter coos and kicks.
Emma feels like a teenager again, the young foster kid doing everything possible to impress a potential family. It's desperate and needy, but as she watches her daughter squirming on the bed, Emma tries to tell herself that this is all for Wendy. She lifts the girl and looks her in the eyes, blue meeting green.
"No matter what happens, I just want you to know that you are wanted, you are loved, and no one will make you feel otherwise."
-/-
They're in the middle of tummy time when Emma hears three booming knocks on the door. Wendy coos and stretches – she's so desperately close to rolling over for the first time – and Emma whispers for her to stay put before rushing to the door. Emma pauses at the hallway closet to grab her red leather jacket, and shrugs it on as she approaches the door.
Her heart is pounding in her chest, because this is the moment of the truth.
When she greets him, Hook swaggers in, a defense mechanism if Emma ever saw one. She knows she caught him off guard earlier, and he's doing everything possible to pretend that he still has some semblance of control over the situation. She knows the feeling well. He smiles one of his brilliant smiles, and it strikes Emma how much she's missed him – arrogance and all. He freezes when he sees the baby, though if it is out of surprise or realization, she doesn't know.
It's the former.
"I know it's been a year, but you hardly strike me as nursemaid, Swan," he tells her with a laugh, but there's a hint of confusion in his tone as his eyes lock on Wendy.
"I'm not," she replies. It annoys her that nursemaid had been his first conclusion, and foregoing any careful consideration for his feelings and hasty plans made in the past two hours, Emma announces, "I'm her mother. Killian, meet Wendy, our daughter."
It's then when Wendy chooses to roll over the first time.
Showoff.
-/-
The first thing he says is, "You named her after the bloody Darling girl?"
The second thing is, "By the gods, Swan, if I had known I…"
He doesn't finish his sentence, leaving Emma to fill in the blanks.
Wouldn't have let me leave?
Would have been here sooner?
Would never have come at all?
-/-
Emma wants nothing more than to ask Hook why he is here and not in the Enchanted Forest, but she bites her tongue. Babies are more life altering than realm crossing, and this is one of the many moments she's been longing to happen for months, one she never thought would ever come true. So, she decides to savor it.
"Do you want to hold her?"
He looks flabbergasted at the proposal, but Emma moves to lift Wendy off the floor and into his arms anyway. Her daughter coos and kicks and smiles widely, putting on a show of her very own. Emma wonders if Wendy realizes just how momentous of an occasion this is. Does she sense that she is meeting her father for the first time? Does she want him to love her too?
"She weighs hardly a thing," Hook says as he adjusts the baby in his arms. Wendy gropes for his necklace and tugs, causing him to wince. It doesn't seem to bother him too much, though, because he chuckles and says, "She's strong, though. That's good."
"She just had a checkup last week. According to the doctor, she's right on track with everything. Doesn't weight too much or too little, developing like normal. Actually, she's a little ahead of the curve on a few things, like the rolling over," Emma explains, and she feels a little like she's trying to prove to him that Wendy is good and worth it, and that she, herself, is a capable mother. Emma digs her fists into her jacket and sways. "That's the first time she did that, actually, roll over."
"Smart lass," Hook says, and Emma swears he says the last part with a cooing tone to his voice. "It's obvious she takes after you, love – strong, smart, beautiful."
Emma tries, and fails, to hide her blush. She need not worry, though, because Hook's attention is focused entirely on his daughter in his arms.
-/-
Hook asks questions. Emma answers.
Eventually, he stops inquiring, and simply allows Emma to talk.
She tells him about discovering she was pregnant, and the morning sickness, and how she couldn't even remember his name.
She tells him that when Wendy was born, it was True Love's Kiss that restored her memories.
She tells him about the past four months. That Wendy doesn't like to sleep, and how playing '70's funk music seems to be the most reliable method of calming her down.
She tells him how though Wendy likes to go on walks in Central Park, it is by waterfront where she seems happiest.
"She gets that from you, I think."
-/-
Around noon, Henry texts asking if he can stay the night at Avery's.
She responds 'yes' quickly, thankful that she doesn't have to explain Hook's presence to him.
Might as well give him one more night to be a normal twelve-year-old boy.
-/-
Eventually, he begins to tell her his side of the story. His eyes keep flicking back to Wendy, now asleep her bassinet a few feet away. He takes a generous gulp of the rum Emma offered him, and he tells her of her family's arrival in the Enchanted Forest, and how their lives are now in danger.
It surprises Emma how much it stings that he's here because Storybrooke needs a Savior. Since he arrived at her door, there's been a not-so-small bit of hope in heart that he had magically appeared for her and her alone. Her life is never that easy. But she swallows down that pain, and lets him weave his tale, because she owes him that much.
"—and frankly I was bored. I had a life to get back to. A pirate's life."
And it's then when a coil of fear grips at her heart, and between that and her quashed hopes, she snaps at him. Because she might be able to deal with rejection and pain, but she will do everything possible to prevent her children from feeling the same.
"Here's the thing, you can't do that anymore. You can't just leave because you are bored." The words spill out quickly, and Emma knows she's babbling, but she doesn't care. "You have to decide now if you want to be here for her, okay? Because you just can't just walk away when she's not interesting you, or boring you, or – babies aren't always the most interesting things, you know? They just lay there, or cry, or poop, and you can't hold a conversation with them. You're gonna get bored, and no matter how bored you are, you don't leave them. You just can't."
Emma brushes her fingers against the corner of her eyes, wiping away unshed tears. She looks up at Hook, who is staring back at her with such a hurt expression she feels a wave of guilt at her outburst. In a small voice, he asks, "Do you truly think so little of me that you believe I would abandon my own child because I grew bored?"
"Wha – no – that's not…" Emma scrambles for words, shrinking under the intensity of his stare. She hadn't meant to offend him, but parental instinct and the urge to protect had taken hold. She wishes that he could just get it, read her like the open book he once claimed she was. Then again, Hook's own parental instinct could be coming into play, one that she just thoroughly walked over.
"I left your parents and everyone from that bloody town because there was nothing left there for me anymore," he says, biting out the words. His eyes bore into hers, and Emma knows without a doubt that by 'nothing' he had meant her. "As long as I have a breath in my body, Emma, no level of boredom or threat could ever force or tempt me to abandon my child."
Emma wants nothing more to believe him. After everything she's been through, though, she's not sure she even can.
-/-
Wendy wakes up not long after his confession, her piercing cry startling them both. Emma recognizes her wails as her daughter signaling her hunger, and when she moves to feed her, Hook blushes and looks away. Emma belatedly realizes that this is probably the most he's seen of her breasts. Their first time, they had removed as little clothing as possible in their rush for mutual release.
"Not how you expected to see my boobs, huh?" she asks him, her voice light and teasing. She's not accustomed to seeing Captain Hook blush, and it's amusing to say the least.
"Not as such, no," and then, "though from my vantage, they appear larger."
Emma sighs. Men.
-/-
They play with Wendy on the floor of the living room.
It's easier than talking about missing years, cursed family members, and their own relationship. It's easy to be distracted by their daughter, her sounds, and her many toys. Like Wendy, Hook seems particularly fascinated by the ones that make noise, astounded by the advances in technology for infant paraphernalia.
There's a certain peace in watching Wendy and her father bond, the girl's squeals outmatched only by his laughter. Hook looks at Wendy with nothing short of awe and wonder, and Emma can't help but think fatherhood looks good on him.
-/-
Eventually dinnertime comes, and they realize that neither of them has eaten anything all day. Emma orders Chinese delivery because it's easy, and apparently it's something Hook has never tried.
She laughs when he attempts to eat his Sweet and Sour chicken with chopsticks.
(Key word: attempts)
"Laugh now, Swan, but I seem to recall hearing about your experiences with Enchanted Forest cuisine."
She throws at fortune cookie at his head.
-/-
She takes a shower after Wendy falls back to sleep. When she exits the bathroom, wet hair tied into a braid and wearing flannel pajamas, she finds Hook on the couch, the journal chronicling Wendy's life in his hand. Emma settles next to him on the couch, and pretends not to notice the red of his eyes.
"I missed so much."
"You're here now. That's what counts."
-/-
Unsurprisingly, they end up in bed.
As with their first time, they don't make love. It's raw and desperate, just two people coming together to forget and feel and fuck. In Neverland, she had been frantic to feel something other than fear about Henry's safety and the stress placed upon her by her family, Neal, and the whole goddamn town.
It isn't much too different now, the months of longing and loneliness finally catching up to both of them. It's so incredibly good to just be with someone who remembers, with whom she doesn't have to lie and hide and protect – and it's him. It's Killian moving above and inside her, his fingers tangled with her own, and his skin sliding against her own.
Unlike the last time, she allows him to hold her, and she rests her head against his chest and listens to the steady and constant beat of his heart.
-/-
She awakens to an empty bed and dark room.
Panic momentarily seizes her, the years of abandonment catching up to her. The pounding in her chest doesn't stop until she stumbles out the bedroom, wearing nothing but a t-shirt, and she sees him.
He's standing in front of the window, bare-chested and wearing only his leather pants, Wendy cradled in his arms. She comes to stand next to him, their shoulders not quite touching.
"You can't see the stars here," he says.
"No, you can't."
He looks down at Wendy. "She should see the stars."
"Okay."
-/-
She packs bags for her, Henry, and Wendy in the morning. She's apprehensive about what could be waiting for her when they reach Storybrooke, but Emma cannot help the bubble of excitement she feels when she thinks of seeing her parents again.
"You're gonna meet your grandparents," Emma tells Wendy as she bounces the girl on her hip. Wendy responds by tugging on her hair. "I hope my mom still has her hair cut short. She'll be thankful when she holds this one."
"She'll be thankful no matter what," Hook tells her, and Emma blushes under the tenderness of his gaze. They haven't talked about what happened the night before, and it's not a conversation Emma is looking toward having. She's not sure where she stands on the thing, and with a threat looming, she doesn't know if she has time to figure it out.
Then Henry texts that he is heading home, and the moment between her and Hook is lost.
-/-
Their plan is simple: pour the memory potion into a mug of hot chocolate, and boom – Henry's memory will come back.
They don't count on him clumsily dropping the mug, the ceramic shattering and drink spilling all over the hardwood.
There's a metaphor in there about shattered hopes, but Wendy bursting into tears at that moment illustrates Emma's feelings more clearly.
-/-
Emma knows Henry is confused by the way her hands shake as she cleans up the mess, the strangely dressed man standing in the kitchen holding his sister, and the bags piled into the living. All she can think, however, is that it's now more lies and more maneuvering and how it's going to be so much more difficult when they get to Storybrooke.
Why couldn't she have pretended the vial of memory potion was some sort of candy?
"So what exactly is in Maine?" Henry asks after they all pile into the car, and begin their quest towards Storybrooke.
Hook watches her warily from the passenger seat as Emma ponders her son's question. She ruminates over the possible answers – danger, your family, home – all things she cannot say. Instead she settles on something easy, something excited, and something not a lie.
"You'll see."
