A/N: Oh boy. What do you say to a bunch of people who relentlessly show you kindness, and loveliness and preciousness? I love you all so much for it and you are a bunch of some of the nicest people. At some point I'll get around to replying to you all, but all of your reviews make me absurdly emotional - I actually cried the other day. Honestly. Sadly, this story I feel is winding down, and so this will most likely be the penultimate chapter...
On with the story.

Whatever Floats Your Boat

Part 5: Imagery

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Emma would like to have been able to say that she waited up all night, in part waiting for him, in part thinking of him. She'd like to be able to say that the thought of leaving work early to chase him to the airport was something that had crossed her mind, telling him she'd quit her job and follow him. Nor could she say that she had been overwhelmed with the need to call him up for yet another tearful goodbye. She could not imagine herself in any of those scenarios. It never occurred to her that she could pull out the romantic comedy stops; fight through wind and traffic to beat him to the gate - none of that happened.

Truth is she crashed.

There were seven books in the little brown paper pile Killian had left her, seven books which she had lain out across her bed, observing each of them with varying degrees of recognition. There was a book of Hellenistic philosophy that she didn't remember at all, and the mere fact that there were still so many things she didn't know about him (daft, irrelevant or significant), so many missed opportunities, and so many unsaid things destroyed her.

(Bit by aching bit).

Her fears and her determination to be safer from the world in general had cost them so much time, and she began to hate herself for it. The regret plain and simply made her feel sick, a feeling which only encouraged the tears, torn between believing in the defence of her walls and loathing the distance it put between them, her and everyone.

All of it exacerbated by the simple physical distance between her and him now.

And so she had crashed.

The walk home from work had been accompanied by a particularly petulant wind, her face mildly numbed by the chaos and the sound of it now, roaring outside of her window, was strange in utter contrast to the quiet way she let tear after tear coat her face. So numbed were her cheeks that she could barely feel them as they trickled down her face, but she knew they were there, her vision obscured by the stupid things before they slipped and fell. Eventually she had fallen asleep, head crashing to pillow without recognition, feet buried under the pages of a tattered Aeneid.

When she awoke hours later – half tangled in her quilt, half on top of and underneath the books themselves - she found her head was completely throbbing with the remnants of last night's exhaustion. Her eyes were puffed and aching, but it was easily the pounding of her head that was causing her the biggest grief, and not the spine of the Donna Tartt digging into her thigh. It was as though the gales outside during the night had picked up scattered leaves to assemble them on her sheets, caring very little for precision or delicacy.

Despite the crowded mess of her bed (books strewn, blankets tangled) she felt incredibly empty, her entire body thrown off-balance by the contrasting cumbrous feeling of her heart. She rearranged her feet, folding the edge of her doona around them with the grasp of her toes.

Her legs ached too. "God, Emma, this is pathetic" she told herself - mad about it all, really. Yet louder than her own thoughts was the whisper of the dying winds outside, and the strange way the sound of it seemed to whistle through the empty canyons of her body.

(Even though the windows were tightly shut.)

It was not simply an emptiness created by a good cathartic cry (although she was definitely dehydrated now as a result), but an emptiness in knowing that the only person in her life that truly meant anything was genuinely physically gone.

The longer she lay there, too lazy to even move the cascading hair from her face, she knew that it was more about him being gone and far less about him being the only person.

Emma nestled her head further into her pillow, momentarily determined that the cushioning would obscure her from the outside world. The curtains of her window were wide open, and though the street lights were still glowing, casting barely there tree shadows on the far wall, somewhere outside the sun was beginning to rise, lighting her sparsely decorated room with a soft blue glow.

It was so agonisingly early and now that she'd dragged open her eyes (glued together rather uncomfortably by the tears from last night) she could not stop eyeing her phone. It was just within arm's reach - still it took her several heart thumping minutes to steel the courage to check for any notifications.

There was just one.

Arrived on time with no customs hold ups. Sorry about the books I left outside your house. Liam's place is a mess no news yet about when he'll be brought home. Still mad at me?

Emma had never felt so out of place as she had that night sitting in her bedroom. It had definitely been ages since she had cried quite so much, letting her feelings get the better of her and with nothing to distract her or draw her out from it. She had actually spent a long time trying to figure out if she was mad at him. He'd definitely chosen an incredibly crap way to go about things, but Emma could not feel anything but firm, resolute sadness.

You're going to spend the next few days sending me cleaning jokes aren't you? The books are fine. Don't worry I'm far from the 'mad'ding crowd.

Emma sat up (surprised at the throaty giggle as it left her lips), finding herself relieved that the tone of his text was as though he had never left, and decided to read the very book she had punned. The book was second-hand, the bind well bent, the pages well spent, and though she knew that it couldn't possibly have been all his doing, the only image she could conjure was the one of his ring-clad fingers sliding between the pages, wearing them in (an action she acted out with her own).

She had only really spent half the morning moping in bed looking through the books, unable to fall back to sleep, before she became impatient with her own mood. Though, all it really took was a wander into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee for her to miss the comfort of her own bed. She fell amongst its comfort once more, smiling as she looked back at her phone.

I deserved that for leaving Thomas Hardy on your doorstep.

Two days later he sent her a photo, taken in almost the exact place as the one he'd taken of a sleeping Christmas Liam. In Liam's stead was a bottle of mould remover and the following caption: cleanliness is next to godliness.

Against her better judgement she laughed.

In truth, it was the phone call that did the biggest damage.

Killian hadn't been gone all that long, only thirteen days (not that she was really keeping track), and while he texted her most days, it was enough to wonder how things might have changed between them. She had been walking home with some groceries when he'd rang, the coincidence of passing the scene of his last bar-lit brawl, when the vibrating feeling in her bag sent little quakes down her arm, was not lost on Emma.

She stared at his name on the screen for a fleeting moment, not really sure how to handle it. Not that Emma had a problem with talking on the phone (because she didn't). It was just that it would definitely be the first time she'd heard his voice since he'd whispered his own flowery version of goodbye two weeks earlier.

(Since he'd whispered that she'd shone brighter for him than any others, the whisper of it still echoing in her mind.)

She fumbled a little to squash some of her shopping into her handbag before answering.

"Killian?"

"Hello, love."

And then silence.

Emma wasn't sure why he wasn't saying anything, the agonising joy that had struck her in hearing his voice was equally as powerful as the following silence. She did some quick mental addition, realising it was roughly 2 o'clockish his time while sidestepping a group of girls not watching where they were going. Regardless of the noise and laughter around her, she was still aware that he'd not said anything after his hello. She'd almost have expected the line to have dropped, but it was crystal clear – she could hear each footfall of his boots, a melancholy sort of amusement overcoming her at the thought they were simultaneously doing the same thing, though continents apart.

"What's wrong?"

She was met with a heavy sigh before he stuttered a - "Nothing, well – bloody hell, hang on."

The scuffling of his shoes ceased, slowly replaced by the rustling of what sounded like tall grass, the sound of wooden ground, wind gusts – he was at a wharf. Judging by the scattered consistency of his feet he sounded drunk – though she could barely hear it as a rather obnoxious driver went past.

"Not a day has gone by that I don't wish I were there, or you were here."

She'd heard that clear enough. The words were almost vitriolic to her ears, his voice so quiet and biting that the words caught in her throat. She tried to swallow the choke down but all it did was develop an uneasy tension in her heart, a tension that running her hands through her hair did nothing to abate.

"Killian," she warned him, overwhelmingly worried about the direction of this conversation when she couldn't see or touch him – and vice versa. (There was no point going down this road, there was nothing either of them could do).

"I know, I know, Swan - I'm aware. I'm not trying to complicate things I just wanted to let you know."

More silence. This time she felt like she should say something in response to his confession – but nothing came to mind. She wished Killian were walking beside her (bumping his shoulder into hers) so he could read the forlorn expression on her face that would confirm her own emotions.

Instead there was no one to witness her mildly gaping expression except passersby.

Emma listened to the sound of him dropping what she estimated to be pebbles into whatever water he was at (she was probably right in assuming it was the canal his brother lived on).

(She wondered if he was listening as intently to her end, listening to the sounds of passing cars and the beep of pedestrian crossings, and trying to picture where she was as she was him.)

She waited until she had passed a few loud groups of people before asking him just exactly how drunk he was. She wasn't a moron - from the long extended silences, to the rhythm of his walk, and back to the absurdly late hour he was calling, all suggested a rum-fuelled night. The breathy snort at the other end only confirmed it. ("Is it that obvious?" "Did you forget who you were talking to? This was obviously a drunk dial. Just don't fall into the water, okay - you're no use to anybody as flotsam." "Are you saying I am the tattered debris of a shipwreck, Swan?" "How are you still so wordy when you're this liquored-up?" )

("Just as long as you're not getting into any more stupid bar fights.")

It had only been in jest, and yet his silence spoke volumes.

(She was definitely cursed to think in clichés for the remainder of her life.)

Killian only seemed to mutter a series of apologies, and an 'I know it was a moment of weakness', that he followed with heavy sighing. The annoyance that she felt for his recklessness was hardly because of the violence (Emma herself was often overwhelmed with the need to punch stupid people in the face), but it came from a place of concern for his mental - rather than physical - well-being. So she berated him.

"Can I take your anger to again mean you care?"

"You need to stop asking me that."

Her front door was a little difficult to unlock with the warm - and slowly burning heat of her - phone pressed against her ear. After greeting one of her roommates (absorbed by a movie, one arm around his latest paramour), dumping the groceries on the counter, she stumbled into her room, not even bothering to turn on the lights.

This sporadic back and forth that had taken up most of their conversation may have seemed odd to others – the fact that they hadn't spoken properly in a fortnight should have meant that they both had so much to say. She should have asked him how he was coping with his brother, how he was dealing with all the fall out - but nothing came. In part she knew that it was only something that he would have spoken about unprompted, or with the gentle coaxing of her fingers in his. As pathetic, and soppy, and clichéd as it might be, Emma was honestly just savouring the sound of him puffing little sighs and throwing stones on the other end of the line.

She fell on her bed, the soft comfort of air slowly rushing out of her doona, the quiet of her room allowing the tiny drops of stone to canal to rise in volume – and the quiet between them grew.

"Of course I miss you."

She spoke each syllable deliberately, willing him to understand. The words sounded blaring to Emma (no doubt as a result of the heaviness of their meaning), despite the fact that she'd whispered them in the complete blackness of her bedroom, to someone also in quiet and darkness. The sigh she received in reply only brought a constriction to her throat, a small acknowledgement of her emotions.

"I have to sell either the boat or the flat."

Killian's words were so broken, ringing just as loudly as her previous confession. He explained it, elaborating upon his reluctance to sell the boat, but the apartment was just more practical - and Killian could actually live in it. The clincher was that he could not afford both (didn't even have any income of his own at the moment as it was). Emma felt the tears trickle down her face as warm and as racking as they had been two weeks ago when he'd left. She tried to wipe them away before it became obvious through her breathing and she did not want to turn the conversation away from him.

Not for the first time she was embarrassed by her tears – even though no one could see her, lying still in the obscurity of her own room. She wondered whether other girls in their early twenties spent so much time agonising over boys they had kissed precisely thrice.

His own voice broke and crackled a few times as he slowly (but surely) told her how Liam would be brought home in roughly three weeks. Her hand twitched of its own accord, yearning to reach for his – and when it couldn't it simply wiped the tears from her cheeks instead.

She hated him that night when she collapsed into sleep, hated that whatever this thing that she was feeling was so real, and hated that she did not know how to expel it from her system. With Neal there was only anger, and while it did not detract from how strongly she had loved him, it conveniently created a nice blanket of moss and overgrowth under which she could bury the emotions.

But Killian hadn't done anything but waltz into her place of work, dripping from dark brown head to boot clad toe, and become cruelly afflicted by life.

Emma became increasingly aware of the fact that his absence (and in fact his presence) had become such a focal point in her life. She didn't like it. Not simply because he had left her with such a void, but she realised that outside of expecting him to turn up to the shop, she really hadn't grown attached to anyone else. Regardless of that contrition, she knew that she had outgrown this place with it's endless stream of students or the painfully quaint bizarre outside the shop; outgrown everything about it.

And that flooding need to run; to find home, began to fill her veins.

The books began to lose their appeal. They were no longer something that was just part of the daily grind; something to read and explore, but they became a visual reminder of the scrappy boy who was no longer reclining among them. (Emma had long since started associating them with him). There were times where Emma could have sworn she saw him there (so permanent a fixture was he), pouring over something or other, the strands of his fringe casting shadows over his eyes, and yet never too absorbed that he never knew she was there.

(It was usually just some other student, eyes not quite as drawing, ears never as pointy.)

Everything in the shop seemed foreign to her now somehow, and Emma wondered - eyes transfixed upon the film noir display in the far window, watching as it bent to the invading breeze's will - what it had felt like to be in the shop before she associated it so strongly with Killian.

(The second-hand aisle held no fondness for her anymore.)

(The door never clanged as loudly nor as briskly.)

(And he was no where to be seen.)

She hadn't meant to let it get so far, and found herself increasingly frustrated that it had. How was it possible that the hundreds of customers that came in every week could wander through those doors and not catch her eye? Emma was bumping and helping strangers almost every day of her life, handing over their change and their purchases, constantly grazing the fingers of them without even a second thought.

As she stood there at the counter - swivelling on her stool and watching an old couple bickering about Peter Carey - picturing him everywhere, she yearned for that overtly dumb way he'd purposefully touch his fingers to hers, brushing her skin, sending magical little touches from him to her.

More than anything, there was a war going on inside of Emma. The cynic (that large and overwhelming entity) that lived internally, mocking her own sentimentality, and talking loudly over that still small spark inside of her that yearned (ugh) to just see him.

"Bee in your bonnet?"

The fact that the question was directed at her did not immediately register. Though, in her defence, there was a significant amount of chatter in the restaurant, and enough people at her table to easily facilitate opportunities for Emma's mind to drift.

"Do you mind if I ask you something?"

They were out for her boss' birthday. Emma, a handful of her other co-workers, her boss and his husband were drinking sangria and bursting at the seams from far too much guacamole - and it was nice.

It wasn't exactly characteristic of Emma, the girl who barely knew her own roommates, but Killian's absence had kick-started something in her where she began to regret her own detachment from the people around her. So when her boss had asked her if she was available for a night out ("nothing all that special, champagne on a beer budget kind of get together") she had said yes so quickly she'd surprised herself.

(And it wasn't because she was lonely – although she was certainly that – it was simply that she was sick of the self-imposed isolation. She came to the conclusion that it was entirely possible to be both safe within her walls, and a people person. She may have been somewhat prickly, but she was by no means void of social skills.)

(She'd spent months dealing with a spectrum of difficult customers – Emma had perfect people skills.)

Sure, he talked in a lot of clichés, and really needed to expand his musical horizons, but outside of Killian he was easily the person that she'd spoken to most in the six months she'd been living in town.

(At least the brightly coloured restaurant, with its walls covered in black and white photos of the proprietors family, was playing early 2000s pop ballads – there was not a lute in hearing distance.)

"You can ask me anything, Emma."

Prior to the drifting off of her thoughts, she'd actually enjoyed the night. It was nice to catch up with the people she was never (or rarely) rostered to work with, laughing openly at the bickering between her Christmas time colleague and a boy she'd never met.

Just as it had been strange to consider Killian outside of the bookshop, it was strange now to consider her boss, with his full black curls and his crows feet eyes, in a world where he was simply a man, no books or orders or customers to speak of, smiling in the seat beside her.

"What made you want to open a bookstore?"

He was clearly surprised by her question - pleasantly surprised - and started a long diatribe about moving to the town. None of it was particularly relevant to her question, but Emma waited patiently knowing full well that he would get around to it.

"I think it was a Tuesday when I saw the empty store... or was it a Sunday? It doesn't matter, I only remember that it was sweltering. It was completely run down by that stage and I couldn't help it, something about the tall shelves and aching bones of the place," he paused his little sing-song, noting the expectant look upon Emma's face and sensing that his answer wasn't quite what she was looking for.

He smiled, ever the jolly and strange man, taking a large sip from the glass in front of him, bobbing with pieces of orange. The man beside her was either unaware of the answer she wanted, or was simply biding his time.

"How is that young boy of yours?"

It was Emma's turn to drink from her glass, suddenly finding herself unable to look at him, and only finding herself able to flutter her eyelashes restlessly into her drink.

"So that's what this is about."

Emma really hadn't given her boss enough credit. Somehow she had assumed that the books were the only ones privy to their short lived romance, and it had completely escaped her how very (very) unsubtle they may have been. The look on her face must have told him as much because he chuckled before informing her that he'd have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to notice. She didn't know what was going on between the two of them, if there was anything, but just as she'd told him that he laughed once more at her before glancing round the table fondly at the crew surrounding them.

"Emma, I bought the shop because I wanted to do it," eyes still watching around the table, fingers twisting the glass in his hand by the stem. "I didn't have the foggiest idea how to run a business, only that I liked books and wanted to spread that joy – so I took a leap of faith. When you like something there is always going to be this niggling little feeling in the corner of your ribcage until you do something about it. My leap of faith just happened to involve a lot of polish and an acquired knowledge of literature. No, really, a lot of shellac."

She definitely hadn't given her boss enough credit.

He was right, really. Hit-the-nail-on-the-head kind of right, right down to the niggling feeling that had taken up residence in her ribcage from the moment he'd approached the counter to buy a trashy romance novel.

It wasn't even as though he was telling her anything she didn't know, humming his knowledgeable conclusion by swaying offbeat to the song that had begun playing. In theory she saw others carrying bundles of hope in their strides and watching it come true. It was just that she never saw happy endings ever working out for herself.

(Her life had been too many disappointments, one after the other. It may have sounded bitter and morose, but influenced by such disappointment, the pessimism came naturally to her.)

But as a small vibration from the pocket of her jeans distracted her, she wondered if perhaps Killian's unwavering loyalty - unyielding honesty - was different.

It was a picture of him on the grey-tiled floor of what she supposed was Liam's apartment with a rather deadpan expression on his face (a small bruise under his eye that she'd bring up later). It was the caption more than anything else that broke her.

Wiping the slate clean.

Emma bought a plane ticket.

It just wasn't to London.