Okay, so artielu prompted me this a while ago and I started working on it and then wasn't sure about it. I'm still not, but I found it in my file of unfinished fic so…yeah. I'm not used to writing Emma angst, so let's try this?
clothes make the man
It feels like an invasion of privacy, opening the chest where he stores his clothes, but Killian's given her permission to come and go as she pleases and she does but this is his home, not hers. This is his space, which she only ever occupies when he's there to occupy it with her, and so it is strange for Emma to be here without home, going through his clothes.
(She doesn't know where he is – she assumes that he's with her father, because if he's not with her then he's with David – but she hopes that wherever he is, he's not coming home soon because explaining this might be a bit awkward.)
The chest is kept out of sight in a storage compartment, and Emma feels so strange reaching for it and pulling it out but the thought – of doing something for him, after all that he's done for her – pushes her forward, lets her open the lid.
It is spring in Storybrooke, and the weather has become such that being protected from the elements is not a priority, and so Killian sheds his coat and vest and leather pants for clothes from this ream, which Emma graciously has helped him find. He is still all his swagger and bravado, drawing her attention like a moth to a flame, and even though there have been tentative steps in the direction of a relationship, neither of them has made a leap yet.
Regardless of the fact that he's wearing jeans and t-shirts that in such a way that Emma goes weak in the knees, she can tell that he doesn't feel quite at home in his new clothing (he comments on it on the regular, either while making innuendos about characters on TV shows or bemoaning his lack of coverage during particularly bad storms). He's even shown her his Navy uniform (which is why she knows about the chest) and while he doesn't talk about his time as an officer, she can tell he's wistful for clothing from his home, not hers.
The clothes that Killian has stored away below the uniform are simple shirts that she remembers seeing on others during her time in the Enchanted Forest, made of thin cloth which, as she turns them over in her hands, show careful repair work. Small, neat stiches made to prolong the life of the garment, patches that match exactly – cut from other garments, reused for this purpose. Some of them have slightly different color thread, but all of them are neatly done, stitched by someone who shows great attention to every detail of his life.
Emma can't help but smile as she runs her fingers over the shirts. She's not sure that they're fit for wearing out in public, but maybe he could sleep in them. Maybe they would make him feel better.
(And if she's blushing at the thought of him sleeping in something, she'll blame it on the fact that their relationship hasn't progressed to the point of knowing what the other wears – or doesn't – while sleeping and she actually is not that surprised to realize that this is something she does want to know.)
She bundles the shirts into her oversized bag, and returns to the loft. They smell musty and old, and Emma has decided to wash them because she's not sure how Killian washes anything on his ship and it would be rude to ask – for all she knows, he does laundry at her parent's new house (he probably does, it seems like something David would totally teach him).
She remembers all too well the joys of public Laundromats, hours spent waiting for just one load of clothing to dry all because the dryers were pieces of shit (she didn't have much when she was with Neal, and she's still not someone who hordes things). Sure, it was fun to people-watch, but the process itself was difficult for someone like Emma, who doesn't want the world to know her dirty laundry let alone see her actual, physical dirty laundry.
If she can make things easier for Killian in some way, she'll do it.
The dryer dings, and Emma puts down the magazine she's been reading and goes to unload it. It's only when she holds up the first of the shirts that she realizes that these are probably 100% cotton and she has probably 100% shrunk them.
Fear and panic shoot through her body because these are not her clothes and he doesn't know she has them here and he kept them for a reason, or so she suspects. She paws her way through the other shirts and – yep, completely shrunk down to Henry-sized.
She fists one in her hand and holds it up to her face, sinking to the ground of the small laundry room of the loft, because the emotions flooding through her start with panic and end with regret with sorrow somewhere in between.
She had no right to take his clothes. She had no right to ruin them. And most of all, she's stripped something away from him in the process of trying to do good, and that was whatever nostalgia he associated with these shirts, because unlike Emma, Killian is a man who values memories. She's seen that much in the way he keeps his brother's possessions on him, hidden in a coat pocket. Everything of Milah's is in another box in that room (she knows because she asked about it once, which made for an awkward moment). And these, they could have been Liam's for all she knows.
And she has ruined them.
And that is completely, utterly, absolutely not okay.
This is how he finds her later, clutching a tear-stained shirt that is several sizes too small, slumped against the still-warm dryer.
"What's wrong, Swan?" he asks, and she doesn't have the heart to ask him how he got in here, or why, because she did far worse today trespassing on his territory.
She doesn't respond, and so he looks down at the garment in her lap. Killian's eyes go wide and he looks at her, confused.
"You said that you missed your old clothing," Emma says wearily, leaning her head back against the dryer. "I thought maybe I could wash these?" She laughs bitterly. "Actually, who am I kidding, I didn't think much at all."
"Emma…" Killian crouches down beside her, treating her like she's some fragile thing that he's afraid to touch. He flexes his fingers, reaching toward the shirt, trailing them across the fabric. "What happened?"
"It shrunk."
Killian nods. "And you did this because I kept talking about my leathers?"
"Yeah." Emma refuses to look at him. He takes the shirt from her hands, turns it over in his own.
"And you're upset because…?"
Emma looks up, surprised. "I ruined your clothes!" The admission explodes from her, frightening in its intensity, and she claps her hands over her mouth in shock before the tears threaten to explode out of her. She's such a mess over a stupid piece of fabric but she knows it's because it's his.
He rocks back on his heels, hand up defensively. "Swan, it's fine, really it is."
"Why would it be?"
Killian smiles, reaching forward to brush her hair out of her face. "Because I don't really hate these clothes you want me to wear. I might miss my leathers, and I might miss my other pirate attire, but I don't feel any fierce need to revisit my old wardrobe. Those were the clothes of another man, one whose shadow followed me for far too long." He smiles. "You might have freed me from him in more ways than one."
Emma opens her mouth and then closes it again, unsure of what to say. Instead, Killian speaks.
"It's no matter, love." He holds up the shirt. "Looks like it might fit you. You can keep it, if you'd like."
Emma huffs out a laugh. "Thanks?"
"I think I'm the one that should be thanking you." Killian stands up, and extends his hand. "Anyway, the reason I'm here is because your father has been trying to reach you. Your mother is making a roast for supper and requests your presence."
Emma rolls her eyes and grabs his hand, allowing him to pull her up. "Roast, huh?"
"It smelled delicious," he tells her, face perilously close to her own. "Shall we?"
"Who invited you to dinner?" she asks as she grabs her keys, even though she knows the answer.
"Your father happens to enjoy my company – more so than his daughter," Killian says with a wink as he opens the door, and as he speaks she realizes how wrong he really is.
"Sorry about the shirts," she says as she locks the door. "I was just – I wanted to do something for you, since you do so much for me."
The look on his face is similar, oddly enough, to how he looked when he first saw her in New York all those months ago – there is a softness to it, the way that he smiles at her with that easy smile. He scratches the back of his head with his hand, and shrugs his shoulders. "That is very thoughtful of you, Swan," he tells her. "But like I said, perhaps I should be thanking you."
"Yeah, well, we can argue who is thanking who more on the way to dinner." She brushes by him in the hallway, smacking into his with her hip. He laughs, and all feels right with the world.
(And if, when they eventually do stumble into bed, he is surprised that she wears that shirt, the look on his face when he casually removes it is worth every minute of frustration over her own supposed stupidity).