#cs santa 2018
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Self Promo Sunday: “Beautiful in the Broken Places”
~** MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL MY LOVELY CS SHIPMATES!!! I AM SO GRATEFUL TO SHARE THE LOVE FOR OUR PIRATE AND PRINCESS, AND THE ENDURING FRIENDSHIP IT HAS BROUGHT US, WITH ALL OF YOU!!! **~
Summary: Christmas cookie baking leads to a tender family moment for Emma, Killian, and their rather wise little girl. ;)
Notes: This little Christmas story is full of cookies, cuddles, and CS future family fluff! It was originally a CS Secret Santa gift for @kitsunewingstar in 2018, and it takes place a few years after season six, sometime in the time after Henry leaves to find his own story during season seven, but instead takes place in the peaceful domesticity I hope Emma and Killian were able to enjoy back in Storybrooke as a married couple with a little one.
Also available on AO3 or ff.net if that is your preference...
Snowflakes drifted lightly on the crisp winter breeze outside the Swan-Jones home in Storybrooke, Maine, making the pale, grey day look as wintry and bright as it should a scant few hours before Christmas morning. The downy flecks of feathered white sifted to Earth, gradually covering the spacious yard leading all the way to their dock and stretch of the shore, much to the delight of Hope Swan-Jones, where she stood on the seat of a kitchen chair, braced lightly by her mother’s watchful hands, peering out the window toward the choppy waves with her little palms on the countertop for balance, looking out the window in awe at the bright, almost magical blanket on the ground, turning dry, wintry brown to startlingly beautiful white.
“Okay, Hopey,” Emma finally urged, trying to move on with their task before her husband got home for supper. A light chuckle crept into her voice as it often did at using her daughter’s self-chosen moniker. One that she could only imagine came from the little girl’s having an older brother whom she idolized named Henry, and two little friends - Thomas and Ashley’s second child Toby and Philip and Aurora’s little girl Mary - making her think her name should end in a ‘y’ too. Emma would have never imagined herself, even a mere five or six years ago, using cutesy nicknames with a second child of her own, puttering away in the kitchen so the place would smell of fresh-baked cookies for her husband’s return. After all the loneliness, pain and doubt of her early life, and the danger, trial and loss of her first few years as the Savior and lost princess when she and Killian’s story began, what she had before her seemed almost too happy and idyllic to be real. “Ready to get down now?” she asked again. “We’d better start icing these cookies if you want some ready for Papa when he gets home and to leave out for Santa tonight.”
“M’kay!” Hope chirped enthusiastically, jumping down from her perch to scamper over to the table once more, then crawling back up to sit when her mom moved the chair over into its original place, already bouncing excitedly in her seat as Emma came to sit beside her, patiently showing her how to slather the homemade mix of milk and powdered sugar white icing over cutout baked sleighs and bells, Christmas trees and stars, and gingerbread men and women. Emma iced with her for several minutes, affectionately amused at Hope’s focused concentration on the task until the oven timer went off, signaling that their final batch of the cookies were finished baking.
For several blissful minutes they worked happily together in the warm, cozy kitchen, mother and daughter content with the lights from their lit tree in the next room blinking in multicolored accompaniment from the hall and providing a festive glow, Emma’s iTunes playing an eclectic holiday mix as cheerful background, and the sweet scent of cookies baking indeed beginning to pervade the room and whole first floor. Even as she began to move cookies from the baking sheet to the wax paper on the counter to cool, Emma kept an eye on Hope so she wouldn’t wiggle from her seat in her enthusiasm and end up falling. Once again she bit back a chuckle at the way her daughter hummed “Here Comes Santy Claus” and mumbled along her childish phrasing of the words softly in her cherubic little girl voice as she worked.
All was calm in their little space until Hope let out a dismayed gasp and ‘uh oh’ before the sound of cookie pieces hitting the floor alerted her mother’s ears. “What is it, Baby?” Emma turned fully, ready to comfort and soothe at the sad look on her four-year-old’s toddler face, tears already brimming in little eyes that were an exact blue mirror of her father’s.
“I broke him, Mama,” Hope cried, holding up the gingerbread man she had been painstakingly outlining in white icing and pressing Red Hots to as accents. Clearly, she had pressed one with a bit too much force and snapped the cookie arm off short.
Moving over to gently gather the little girl into a comforting hug, Emma shushed the gathering tears, knowing that between the impatience and bold reactions Hope had inherited from her, the passion of her father, and the full measure she had received of both their stubbornness, if Hope’s tears got started it would be a whole different scene Killian walked into than the homey welcome she had planned. “It’s alright,” she soothed, holding the gingerbread man Hope had decorated up for the child’s inspection. “You did a good job, kiddo. He’ll still taste the same - and he’s looking pretty sharp, if you ask me. One arm being a little shorter won’t change how good the cookie is at all. It just makes him...unique.” She added the last bit as an afterthought, but something about her words seemed to connect with Hope as her youngest appeared deep in thought for several moments. When she did pipe up again, her words hit Emma square in the chest, making her blink back quick tears of stunned surprise.
“He’s like Daddy!” Hope exclaimed, taking back her cookie and seeming to hold onto it with a newly reverent care and pride. She looked to her mom for affirmation, and though Emma found her words clogged tightly in her throat, she nodded vigorously to Hope’s assertion, wanting the child to know how very fitting an idea it was.
“You’re right, Sweetheart,” she finally managed to rasp through her swelling emotions. “Daddy’s just all that much more special, isn’t he? He may be missing a hand, but he can do anything he needs and then some.”
Nodding vigorously, Hope went back to work, finishing off the gingerbread man with a big, white icing and red sugar heart on its chest “to make it like Papa’s too” she’d explained, and then continued on to make cookie versions of Mama and Henry and Hopey as well, clearly once again pleased with her efforts.
By the time Killian blustered in the front door from his job as harbormaster, the snow flecking his dark hair and woolen collar and the chilly wind at his back, calling out to ask where his two ladies were this fine Christmas Eve, Emma and Hope were giggling and singing along to “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and licking icing and sprinkles from their sticky fingers over the sink, the Christmas cookie operation nearly complete.
Her husband’s tall, lean form appeared in the doorway, and for a moment Emma’s breath caught as she sat Hope down and the youngster squealed in delight, running across the room to her papa and launching herself into Killian’s arms. Even after nearly seven years of marriage, multiple battles, curses, separations and reunions, he still looked every bit the dashing rapscallion who had won her heart piece by grudging, gradual piece, and she loved him for it all over again. None of this life they shared would be possible if he hadn’t been willing to stick around and fight for their love, even when she had yet been too guarded and uncertain to believe.
Their eyes met over Hope’s head as Killian hugged his daughter close to his chest, and the knowing light in his gaze, the glow of warmth he sent toward her with an easy smile assured Emma that in this moment, once again, they understood each other.
Pulling back to grin broadly at his little girl, Killian asked jovially, “And just what have my two lovely elves been up to all day? It smells like Mrs. Claus’ kitchen itself in here!”
“We made Christmas cookies!” Hope proclaimed proudly, urging her father forward to the table until she could lean over to reach the particular cookie made in his likeness, and grab it up to offer him. “See Papa? This one is like you. He has an extra big heart, even with his missing hand.”
Emma could see the pronouncement caught her pirate every bit as strongly as it had her, though - to his credit - he barely seemed to miss a beat, grinning as he blinked misty eyes and planted a kiss atop his daughter’s riotously curling hair. “I do see, my little lass. And that is quite the compliment. I love it.”
Giggling, but obviously quite satisfied with his effusive praise, Hope held the cookie out, urging her Papa to have the first bite. As Killian oohed and aahed, smacking his lips and singing his little girl’s praises, asking if she was sure she didn’t have Mama use magic they were so good, Emma could only look on with a heart utterly full at how blessed she was to have a home and a family and a house full of love, more than she once could have ever dreamed.
~~~~*~~~*~~~~
Later that night, when Hope was at last asleep in her room upstairs, after finally being convinced she couldn’t wait up for Santa or he would never come, Emma sat curled up into Killian’s side on the couch in their living room, her sock feet tucked under her, his arm wrapped warmly around her and the pleasing rumble of his laughter vibrating through her from his chest. “Did you tell her that about the cookie?” Killian mused idly, when the nighttime stillness had fallen between them once again. His fingers caressed up and down her arm making Emma shiver with awareness despite the cocoon of blankets and his body heat she had snuggled herself into.
Shaking her head to his question, Emma could only smile at her husband in fond amusement, both at how he still couldn’t seem to see the amazing man he was to everyone who loved him and that he would believe anyone could influence their own little pirate to believe anything other than what she decided to. “The cookie broke while she was icing it, and I was trying to keep her from getting too upset. I only assured her it would taste just as good, and that it would be unique. She came up with the rest on her own.”
Killian’s clear, beguiling eyes were suspiciously bright as he shook his head in disbelief. To think that his daughter found him not only whole, but extraordinary, that a child could look up to him of all people, after all he had suffered and all he had done, was still almost more than the reformed Captain Hook could fathom. “You’re both much more than I deserve,” he whispered against her brow, lips lingering on her skin.
Emma clutched her husband tightly, humming into his kiss. “That goes right back at you, for me,” she replied fervently, praying he believed how deeply she meant every word.
Dipping his head to capture her lips fully with his own, cradling her chin in his hand, Killian swept her up, and Emma gave herself over to his ardent embrace, savoring for just one more moment the star lit on the top of their tree and the echo of the glimmering jewels of the many more in the night sky beyond before closing her eyes in bliss. The gift they had been given in this peaceful night together was a special kind of magic all its own - Christmas magic - and she wouldn’t trade it for anything else in the world.
TAGGING A FEW WHO MIGHT ENJOY: @searchingwardrobes @jennjenn615 @kmomof4 @whimsicallyenchantedrose @jrob64 @apiratewhopines @ineffablecolors @let-it-raines @spartanguard @therooksshiningknight @teamhook @revanmeetra87 @winterbaby89 @anmylica @cosette141 @donteattheappleshook @the-darkdragonfly @elizabeethan @sotangledupinit @wefoundloveunderthelight @zaharadessert @xarandomdreamx @gingerchangeling @gingerpolyglot @xsajx @ilovemesomekillianjones @drowned-dreamer @thislassishooked @tiganasummertree @optomisticgirl @shireness-says
#self promo sunday#cs future family fluff#cs christmas one shot#beautiful in the broken places#ouat future ff
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Well, who doesn't love 80s movies and music? The hairdos, not so much. Wow, more preferences in common: I'm not into whump, and I'm not a big fan of angst. I mean, sometimes it's necessary, but I think it's used as a mere plot device and drawn out too much more often than not. Also, I'm with you about the transformation thing. It should be easy to write a decent fic for you. Now only inspiration needs to hit LOL so, are you in Christmas mood yet? ~csss
I do agree. Hairdos are a bit atrocious and there’s a lot that can be said for 1980′s fashion but legit some of the majority of the highlights of popular culture - the 1980s. Like the 1980s gave us Breakfast Club, Back to the Futue, The Terminator, Die Hard, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Aliens, Caddy Shack, Poltergeist and Risky Business to name a few and not to mention some of the best work by Queen, Bon Jovi, Michael Jackson, the Police, Guns N Roses, U2 and Phil Collins was done then. It’s probably the reason I love Stranger Things so much because of all the references that it makes where I’m like “ah classic!”
Exactly. When it’s necessary it’s fine and serves a purpose but I don’t like suffering for the sake of suffering. I’m so glad we agree on it. I don’t mean to kink shame but it’s just not my bag of chips, you know? And I’m glad that you’re getting more comfortable with the idea of writing something for me. Like I know that I’ve thrown a lot at you and don’t think I’m not conscious of that, I am. And trust me, you have my sympathies. I would just rather you have more than less. My best advice to you on writing is write something you enjoy. If you enjoy it, I’ll more likely enjoy it. I mean generally when I do these things, I try to get a sense of what someone likes and then Easter egg their favorite things in the fic like if they’re a Rangers fan, Emma wears Brady Skjei jersey to bed and if their favorite Christmas movie is Elf, that’s playing in the background. You can get really creative with this is what I’m saying and I’ll probably still love it.
As for the Christmas spirit…Sorta? Like this year just seems like a drunk blur to me a bit. A lot happened and it seems too long and too short at the same time. It’s like way I can describe what I’m feeling right now is that I unwittingly went out on a ginormous and irresponsible bender and I’m somehow scooped myself into the back of a cab and I’m hovering in that moment between still drunk and nearing sobriety where I’m like “Holy fuck did this really all happen and I survived? Christ.” But at the same time, there’s now lights all over London as well as Christmas markers which are lovely and I really enjoy the prettiness of it and the term is winding down and I’m rushing to finish my first round of exam notes and my parents are coming to visit in two weeks and they’re quite excited. So, we’re getting there.
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CS ff: “A Toast to Now” (Part 2) (au)
Summary: His neighbors may be brightening their own holidays, but they’re ruining the constant melancholy of his life. He’s determined to keep to himself until the single mother that lives next door to him drops literally through his door two nights before Christmas. It’s the moment that may be temporary, like everything else, but it may just change everything.
Rating: E (sorry not sorry)
Warnings: Just smut for this part. Not exactly anti-Neal but also not pro-Neal.
A/N: Hoooooly crap it’s finally done! This is way longer than I anticipated it would be, and I thought about splitting it into more sections and posting for a couple days, but the whole thing is just over 13k so why the hell not just post the remaining 11k. This is, of course, the “second part” to @effulgentcolors secret santa gift for 2018. I’m so glad I got you, that I could take a little more time and make it something I’m really proud of writing for you, and using all the things you like to hopefully make one hell of a gift. I hope you enjoy it, dear. And I hope all of you reading enjoy. Now to get back to work on my second CSJJ! Thanks one more time to @cssecretsanta2k18 for rocking this event and staying on top of everything!
Read Part 1 Here!
Posted as one part to FFN & Ao3 if you’d prefer to read it there!
-x-
Emma wakes in the morning to her phone ringing, a headache, and the reminder that she did not get to spend the night in her own apartment. With groggy morning brain, she rolls from the couch, trying to locate her phone and finding it plugged into a charger that’s definitely not hers, nor did she plug it in. Killian Jones, it seems, is one of the most considerate people she’s ever met, and she’s now madder than ever that she was so drunk last night and couldn’t even enjoy their meeting to the fullest extent.
The third ring of her phone has her scrambling for it, and she greets Marco as cheerfully and as quietly as she can. She already interrupted Killian’s night; she doesn’t want to interrupt his sleep, as well. She agrees to meet the landlord at the door and hangs up, quietly gathering her clothes and phone and bag and creeping out the door. She hopes she can get into her apartment and change before her neighbor wakes up, intent on sneaking back in after she’s had a chance to change and make some coffee for the both of them. It’s the least she can do.
As soon as Marco unlocks the door, Emma thanks him and hurries in, throwing items where they need to go while rushing for the coffee maker. While it heats up and brews, she changes into her own clothes, folding Killian’s carefully and putting them off to the side to return to him.
After she’s washed up – teeth brushed, hair untangled and braided, face quickly washed free of any makeup she still had left – she heads back to her kitchen. It takes her a second to realize she’s looking straight at her keys on her counter, not so lost after all, and she groans as she stuffs them in the pocket not occupied by her phone before she pours a couple mugs of coffee and secures lids on each of them.
Maybe she just won’t tell him that they were here all along, or maybe he’ll find the humor in it like she eventually will. But eventually, because it’s certainly not so funny right this moment. Slipping on a pair of flats to walk down the hall, Emma checks her appearance in a small mirror by the entrance and balances the mugs to open and shut the door behind her.
She’s always wondered what her next door neighbor was like. Henry was always going on and on about what a cool guy Mr. Jones was, and he was one of three people in the whole complex she was comfortable with her son talking to, just because of word of mouth. She knew he was quiet and kept to himself, but in the years he has lived here beyond their length of renting, he’s known to everyone as a gentle presence. She doesn’t even know how old he is, but he’s definitely not the old man everyone claimed “Jones” to be.
A puzzle to be put together with more than rumors, if she has anything to say about it.
He seems surprised as hell when she shows up just a half hour later with two travel mugs, fresh clothes, and a smile. The somewhat sour expression he had on his face when he opened the door slowly morphed into pleasant wonder, and he opens the door further when she asks if she can come in.
“I take it you got your extra key?” His voice is rough, and she finds she likes the sound of it more than she should.
“Marco let me in a bit ago. I uh, I don’t cook or else I would’ve made breakfast. Just wanted to do something small to say thanks again for last night.”
“Never a problem, Swan. If you ever need anything, you only need to ask.”
“Well, how about helping me share a pizza tonight for dinner.”
“Pardon?”
“Henry doesn’t come back until late tonight, and I actually hate being alone during the holidays. I spent enough years on my own,” she says before she can stop herself from saying it. The look in Killian’s eyes, however, holds no further question or judgement. He, too, looks like someone who has spent quite a few holidays alone. “Anyway, I thought maybe we could get to actually know each other, seeing as we’ve been neighbors for so long and I just finally learned your name.”
He hesitates in answering, and it’s during his pause that her eyes land on the star on the wall, Henry’s rough penmanship written across the front in marker. She has a matching one on the tree. She didn’t realize she made one for Killian, too. She reaches out to run her finger along the edge, a smile on her face as she does, before she turns back to Killian. His brows are furrowed, the emotion in his eyes one she can’t quite place, but there’s a softness there she didn’t expect.
“I suppose pizza would be a good way to spend the evening,” he says after another moment.
With a brilliant smile, she gives him a time to be at her place, telling him to return the mug when he comes by before she ducks back out of the apartment.
Once back in her own place, she looks around at the chaotic mess she and Henry live in, and she cringes. Now she just needs to make it look like a tornado hasn’t blown through recently and she’ll be ready to have him over.
The day moves so slowly after the tidying takes way less time than she thought it would. Henry has a pile of mess to clean off his bed when he gets back tonight, but maybe he should’ve listened when she told him to clean up his stuff before he left for his dad’s place. She even cleaned the bathroom, just in case. When she calls the pizza place, she makes sure she’s the last one on their delivery list for their early hours, and promises a hefty tip to the kid before she hangs up.
Killian arrives only three minutes after the pizza does, and he holds up a six pack in greeting.
“Wasn’t sure if you liked beer, or what kind?”
“I do, and it’s just my kind,” she says as she takes the offering and ushers him in. When she sets it down on the counter, he also holds up the left hand – today it’s a hook, but she’s seen the artificial hand, as well – and releases the handle of her travel mug when she grabs it. “Thanks,” she says, giving him another smile. She makes a mental note to tell him about his borrowed clothes on the entryway table later on, but for now she rummages through her gadget drawer for a bottle opener before lifting it victoriously.
Over the course of two beers and three pieces each (she’s not ashamed, she works hard at the gym for her abs and deserves her carbs when she wants them), she finds out more about Killian than she anticipated. Some of it, the standard information like his time in Storybrooke and his jobs, she was already partially aware of thanks to Henry and town gossip. The other stuff, it doesn’t look like he even means to tell her. But there’s the story of how he lost his hand, and why he ended up here. She finds out about his brother passing away, and his ultimate heartbreak when his almost-wife died tragically.
She only feels right, then, sharing as much as she can with him in return. Her foster home upbringing gets aired out quickly, along with her relationship with her adopted brother and his sickeningly cute marriage to Snow White (they call her Snow anyway, so technically, it’s not an exaggeration). She talks about her decision to get her GED while she worked bail bonds, and how that led to her going to the police academy and coming back to Storybrooke to take a position as deputy.
“I was here from the moment Ruth adopted me at thirteen until the moment I ran away with Neal my senior year of high school,” she tells him as she’s nursing the end of beer number two. He doesn’t seem in any rush to reach for the third, either, so she sets it off to the side. “Do you want hot chocolate? Coffee? I don’t know if you noticed but our windows are extremely drafty in this apartment and I need something to warm me up.”
He chuckles when she says it, shifting to help gather some of his own trash as Emma’s doing the same. “I offered to weatherproof my own after my first winter here. I can ask Marco if I can do the same for yours, if you’d like. He used to have his son to do the maintenance around here until August went off to be a writer in New York.”
“Hey, I’m certainly not gonna say no to that offer. So? What’ll it be?”
Killian fiddles with the bottle in his hand for a minute before he shrugs and nods. “I’ll have whatever you’re having. When’s your boy due home?”
“Well, according to the custody agreement, he should be home at ten. It was earlier when he was younger, but since he stopped believing in Santa, we’ve been able to play with the times a little.”
“He’s only just turned twelve, hasn’t he?”
“Yep.” She knows he’s doing the math, or at least trying to, and she’s getting ready to cringe as his brows furrow and he looks at her. The kettle whistles, saving her from a conversation she doesn’t want to have just yet, a conversation that she’s only had twice in her life – once with Henry when he asked two years ago and once with David when she showed up back on his doorstep, three months pregnant and crying.
With care, she mixes the hot chocolate in each mug and tops them with her signature whipped cream and cinnamon. “I usually make the good stuff with milk or cream, but I’m out of both and won’t be able to shop until the day after tomorrow,” she explains, not really needing to but wanting to anyways.
“Don’t usually make it, meself. So this is all new to me,” he tells her as he takes the handle of his mug and follows her back to the couch. It’s still early, with two more hours until Henry will be flying through that door.
“Well, come back over when I have all my usual ingredients. I may not cook much but I make a damn good hot chocolate.”
He stops and stares at her, and Emma tilts her head to the side in question. “What is it?”
“You want me to come back for more than just weatherproofing?”
It’s something about the tone of his words that takes her a moment to form her response. “Well, of course I do. I wouldn’t have offered pizza in the first place if I didn’t want you to come over. And I don’t know about you but I’ve been having a great time tonight.”
“I have too, Swan. Thank you. I’m sure it’s obvious, but I don’t spend much time socializing outside my apartment. It’s quite nice to have a… friend?”
“Same here,” Emma says, smiling and resisting reaching out and touching him. Because suddenly, she wants to touch his hand. Worse, she wants to kiss him. It’s going to take some time for her to unpack that thought, though.
He stays almost until the time Henry comes home. And while she told him he was welcome to stay and say hello, he still helped her clean up and said he’d catch Henry again soon. His goodnight and wishes for a happy Christmas were given quietly, their proximity in the doorway closer than she intended to be to him but unable to move away. She manages to keep her hands to herself as she repeats the words back to him, closing the door and leaning against it until she hears his door close further down the hallway.
“Crap,” Emma mutters to herself. She wanted to meet her neighbor, not fall for him.
-x-
Killian figures he’ll wait a few days and then offer to help Emma with the weatherproofing he said he would complete for her. He figures he won’t hear from her, and that he’ll just try his best to see when their schedules line up, and that’ll be that. What he does not expect is the knock on his door just past breakfast time on Christmas morning. Looking out the spy hole on his door reveals not only Emma, but Henry as well. Both of them have their hands behind their backs, and their expressions border on mischief. He runs a hand through his hair once, trying to tame it back, then opens the door for them.
“Merry Christmas!” they say in unison. They sound far too cheery for the early hour, but he can’t help but smile at the both of them and give them greetings as well.
“Why do you both look as if you’re up to something?”
“Because we are,” Henry says immediately, his smile large and toothy and almost childlike in its appearance.
“May we come in?” Emma asks, her smile smaller but no less playful.
He narrows his eyes, sizing them both up, but they stand their ground until he steps back and opens the door wider. What happens next can only be described as a Christmas ambush. They each had multiple bags behind their backs, laden and damn near bursting at the seams with all that was inside them.
“So I let slip that you have your ornament hanging on the wall,” Emma explains as she sets her bag down and Henry starts pulling out item after item, as if the bag was a clown car rather than a reusable shopping bag. “And that you don’t have a tree, or any decorations. I tried to stop him?” She says it with a shrug, and an adorable twist of his lips, and Killian still can’t believe they’re even here, and apparently setting to work giving him a Christmas miracle, by the looks of it.
“Where the blazes did you get all this?” It’s not quite the first thing he was going to say, but neither of them slow even for a heartbeat in their process.
“So when we moved from Boston, we finally had enough space for a bigger tree, and we wanted bigger ornaments with more meaning, so we started collecting them and Henry started making his own. These have been in storage until, well, this morning.”
“Mom told me you don’t have anything up in here. I like my ornament on the wall, but I think it would look much better on this tree,” Henry finally pipes up, and Killian looks over to see that he’s placed a small tree on one of his empty end tables. He’s even managed to find an outlet for it, and it twinkles merrily with its pre-lit multi-color lights. The boy is looking at him, and while he was brazen when he walked in and started unpacking, there’s an edge of uncertainty in his eyes at the moment.
With care, Killian closes his mouth and wanders over to where Henry is starting to fidget by the bag of decorations. Killian stoops to rummage through the bag for a moment and procure a package of tiny baubles that are the perfect size for the miniature tree. He tilts the box back and forth to see the way the glitter catches the lights.
“Tell me, lad. Did you pick these out?”
“Mom and I did together,” Henry responds, his eyes darting over to Emma and the smile coming unbidden to his face before he looks back at Killian. He’s going to start growing like a weed soon, Killian can tell just by looking at him, and he starts to grin with that thought. He pictures Emma and Henry picking out small ornaments for their small tree as a small family, and the image in his mind is sweet and filled with hope and love, and he can feel the life spreading through his body.
“I love them,” he tells Henry plainly. “But I want your ornament to be the first one on this tree.”
If he thought the boy was smiling before, then he’s downright beaming after Killian says that. He runs over to where the star is hanging on the wall and carefully pulls it down, hastening back to Killian’s side to hand the star over. Killian handles it just as gently, affixing the string to one of the upper branches so the star falls in the very middle.
It’s perfect.
“Yeah, it is,” Emma says, suddenly standing much closer than she was before. He wasn’t aware he said it out loud, but he’s glad he did because it’s true. With the first one done, the three of them get to work decorating his new tree, filling it with more ornaments than it should realistically fit. There’s even a tiny strand of garland that they wrap around it, and a red and white skirt which wraps around the base and ties the whole picture together nicely.
But the bags are nowhere near empty.
“Bloody hell, have you brought the whole store with you, then?”
“Yep,” Emma says, the ‘p’ popping at the end as she smirks at him.
With every item that comes out of the bags, she gives the story: It’s something she picked up ages ago but never put out, it’s something she wants to put out but doesn’t have the right space, it’s something she got from a secret Santa when she first moved to Storybrooke, it’s something she bought for David and never gave to him…
By the time they’re done, not only is there a resplendent little tree on one of his end tables, but they’ve strung lights around the window in his living room and placed holiday themed items around the room. There’s a candle that smells like cinnamon burning on his coffee table, and a wreath made of grapevines with sprays of berries and pine trimmings. All fake, of course, but the whole thing looks rustic and fits perfectly in his opinion. There’s also a very light throw with a buffalo check pattern in red and black that comes out last, and Emma carefully drapes it over the back of his couch.
“That’s one of my throws. But once I pictured it in this area, I couldn’t leave it alone.”
He can hardly believe his eyes, or that this transformation has taken place in his own living space. There’s so much more color and vibrancy to the room, and he wonders how he ever did without any of it – which goes far beyond the decorations. Emma and Henry fit here, too. Their laughter fills in all the cracks and warms his heart in ways he didn’t know he was missing. At lunch time, Henry’s stomach growls so loudly that Emma apologizes for him while chuckling.
“Would you like to join us for grilled cheese and soup?” she asks him when she finally controls herself. There’s no possible way he could turn that down.
They include him in their whole day, and Killian can’t say he minds one bit. It’s clear they had their morning together and breakfast, but lunch and dinner and every space between they spend with Killian. They bounce back and forth between apartments, as well, spending lunch at theirs and dinner at his. He only had a few chicken breasts he planned on baking and saving for dinner all week, but with their kitchen contents combined, they make a recipe Emma calls “Chicken Supreme” and they settle along his breakfast bar to eat, with Henry sitting on the counter because he only has two stools.
While Emma and Killian clean up the kitchen, Henry takes command of the remote and finds a marathon of Christmas movies. It gives him time with Emma, not that he doesn’t want Henry there, but just a moment to express his gratitude for the whole day.
“Swan, I wanted to thank you for today,” he says as she finishes packing away the leftovers and hands him the container to put into the fridge.
“It was our pleasure,” she responds, tossing a smile and a look he’s unsure of over her shoulder as she does. She goes right back to cleaning up, setting the pan in the sink to soak a bit before Killian ushers her away to finish loading the dishwasher. With the cycle started on that, they join Henry in the living room.
He’s taken up occupancy of his armchair, which means Killian and Emma are together on the couch. They sit a respectable distance apart, but as the evening draws on and they get more comfortable, he’s shocked to feel her pinky finger touching his on the cushion between them. It could be an accidental touch, so he holds perfectly still, trying to stay as natural as possible while his heart damn well beats out of his chest over the slightest bit of contact. Ah, how the suave have fallen.
It’s no accident, however, when her finger nudges his, and he looks down at their hands and up at Emma’s eyes. There’s a question there, a nervous gesture when she wets her lips and presses them together. And oh, how he wants to kiss her right now. But instead, he extends his pinky and wraps it around hers. Her eyelashes flutter a few times before she smiles, and the space between them naturally thins as the movie rolls onward. Before the credits, their hands are clasped palm to palm with their fingers linked together, and Killian is struggling to remember a time when something so small meant so much to him.
With the late hour and the long day, Henry has long since fallen asleep in the armchair. Really, for him, the extra time was a wonderful excuse for him to hold Emma’s hand a little longer. Even she seems a little reluctant when it becomes obvious that her eyes are growing heavy, as well.
“Thanks for everything today,” she says quietly. The television has been switched off and so they sit in the dim lighting of the tree, Henry’s even breathing the only sound besides their words.
“I could say the same,” he murmurs. Again, he wants nothing more than to kiss her, but it’s been two days; something tells him that they both need more time for this to develop properly. So instead, he kisses the back of Emma’s hand and rises from the couch first. He helps her to her feet, relishing the moment she sways into his space. It’s not really an embrace, but it’s something close to one. He ghosts his lips across her hair and swears to himself that he’ll do everything in his power to do this right.
After they rouse Henry, he sees them off, wishing them one last happy tiding and a good night, as well. Back in his own apartment, he’s surprised it doesn’t feel as empty as he expected it to with the two of them gone. The glow from the tree helps, as does the evidence of their presence in almost every space he’s used to seeing barren.
-x-
Slow progress is good progress, according to Emma. Her heart had stuttered and then beat twice as hard when Killian’s finger linked with her own on Christmas. On New Year’s Eve, right as the ball drops, they kiss. It’s a mutual agreement as they watch the countdown on television. Henry’s not there, so it’s just the two of them on her couch with a bottle of champagne. They’re even both in their pajamas. It would be so easy to invite him to her bed, strip off those flannel pants, but she wants this to stay at the pace it’s going.
So they kiss – a couple sweet and simple touches of their lips that taste like champagne and chocolates from where she was snacking earlier. Shortly after that, he rises from her couch and wishes her goodnight with another kiss, and she walks him to the door as if it’s not been forever since she kissed someone and she doesn’t want to stop.
On Valentine’s Day, a bouquet of flowers shows up at the station with her name on them. They aren’t red, they aren’t roses, and they’re signed simply with “Thinking of You – K. Jones” and she almost cries. She leaves the arrangement in her car as she stops at the bar after her shift, not really caring about the few patrons scattered around the quiet little establishment as she heads straight for the man behind the worn wood. She pulls him over the divider just enough to kiss him hard, his hand barely having time to caress her cheek before she’s pulling away again. She has to go pick up Henry from David and Snow’s house still, and they have dinner being delivered in an hour, but she needed to do this in person today.
“Thanks for the flowers, Jones. See you tomorrow?”
He nods, his eyes still transfixed on her lips as she speaks, and she’s tempted to kiss him again but she won’t leave if she does. Instead, she releases her hold on his shirt and sends him a wink as she gets closer to the door. The whole bar is turned to stare at her, all with the same dumbstruck look on their faces as Killian has as he raises his hand in farewell and a smile blooms across his whole face.
On St. Patrick’s Day, neither of them make any moves at all. In fact, they hadn’t really planned on seeing each other because of the nature of both of their jobs. While Storybrooke isn’t a big party town by any means imaginable, Killian still works at a bar, and Emma still works as a deputy, which means they’ve both been wrangling drunks all night.
Thanks to David and Snow, Henry is spending the night at their house tonight. He got back sometime this evening but knowing the holiday, Neal took him straight out to her brother’s place. He’s a piece of work, but he doesn’t fight the dumb shit anymore – not that he ever should have since he all but ran when she told him she was pregnant – but he pays her a hefty amount of child support and made up monetarily for the years he missed in the beginning. As long as he doesn’t fight her on custody or try to poison Henry’s mind against her, she really doesn’t give a damn about him.
That’s a whole different story, though, and one that’s not important to Emma as she all but crashes into Killian in the stairwell that leads to the apartments. Wordlessly, and looking just as exhausted as she feels, he invites her in to his place since it’s closer.
They barely make it into pajamas before falling into his bed, which is how Emma wakes up after having slept with Killian for the first time. And not even the really fun kind, but the necessary kind. He’s still asleep but stirring awake when she opens her eyes, so she gets to see the way his eyelashes flutter and how he turns and stretches his whole body upon waking.
His hair is an absolute riot on top of his head, the dark brown and hints of gray going in every direction. She has never, in all her life, been attracted to a man so much older than her. Sure, something can be said about how she’s always gone for men older than she is, but this is definitely a different playing field. But Killian doesn’t really act like there’s an age gap between them, so she chooses to see past it as well.
Right now, he looks so much younger than the day they met. His hair is trimmed short now, as it has been since right after the Christmas. He showed up at the station with coffee for her one morning with his hair cut and styled like she imagines he may have worn it once. The unruly beard he’d sported before was suddenly shorter, bordering on the growth from not shaving for a few days, but neater.
She can’t get over the way he looks so similar to before but different, all dark brown hair with gray wings spread along his temples and up over his forehead. The same silver is just starting to pepper into his eyebrows and beard, and she idly wonders how long it’ll take for him to go fully gray. She’s really never entertained the idea of sleeping with a silver fox before, but looking at the way Killian pops his empty wrist beneath his head and rubs his hand over his face before running it through his hair, she has to admit that her thoughts are getting less pure by the minute.
Especially when Killian catches her staring, his eyebrow raising as his lips twitch up knowingly. “Good morning, love,” comes his husky whisper.
“Morning,” she responds, just as quietly and her voice just a bit breathless. “Sleep well?”
“Aye. Like a dream. You?”
She nods, her eyes still trained on him, her body nudging her to move closer, to touch, to kiss, to finally feel. It’s been almost three months since her ridiculous failure of a night before Christmas Eve. They’ve kissed more times than she can count, fallen asleep watching movies – with and without Henry in attendance – at both of their apartments, they’ve spent countless nights getting to know each other, divulging the secrets of their pasts slowly but surely. There’s been some heavy make-out sessions and she’s found that he’s learned exactly how to turn her on already.
But actually venturing into sexual activities? That’s the one place they’ve taken it slow. So really, can anyone blame her for sliding across the unoccupied space in his bed and leaning over him to kiss him senseless? She doesn’t even wait for it to start shifting into something a little deeper before she’s rising up all the way, settling over his thighs as her hands wander up under the hem of the t-shirt he slept in. She feels his muscles twitch, his stomach hollowing out as she hits a particularly ticklish spot, and then resettling when her hands brush over his pecs.
Killian’s hand tangles in her hair, the strands partially wrapped around his fingers as he caresses her neck and pulls her closer. She shimmies up a little, resting right over his hardening cock and rocking experimentally to see how he’ll react. A groan emanates from deep in his chest, and he waits until she’s done it a couple times before flipping them over with ease, settling between her thighs even with his bottoms and her underwear between them. He thrusts against her, in no apparent hurry to shed any of their clothing. Instead, he steals her breath away with his movements, with his deep kisses, with his fingers ghosting along her tank top to tease her nipples into stiffening.
She barely has time to reconcile that they’re actually doing this before she’s tightening her thighs around his hips, his name a silent whisper on repeat as she comes undone. Her nails scrape down his back and he stills, his eyes shut tightly and her name huffed out on a quiet breath. They both pause, both trying to regain their senses as they open their eyes to look at the other. Their matching smiles are almost shy, but Killian leans down to leave a tender kiss on her lips.
He clears his throat, his eyebrows furrowing a little as he holds back a salacious grin. “Would you like some coffee this morning?”
“Isn’t that what we just had?” she inquires, arching up a little and relishing in the way he scrunches one eye closed as he encounters his own release in his pajamas.
“I’ve thought of roughly three things to reply and all of them sound dirty. Out of bed with you, love. Give me a moment to change and I’ll meet you in the kitchen?”
She nods, her nose bumping into his as she does, and she can’t resist kissing him again. This is something she can get used to – all day, every day, please and thank you.
They split ways approximately three minutes and what feels like a thousand more kisses later – Emma rushes to the bathroom to tidy up a little and throw on the same plaid pj bottoms he gave to her months ago under different circumstances, and then she wanders out to the kitchen to set up his coffee maker. She’s familiar with the whole set up now, so she prepares it and hits the button to start the brew cycle at the same time Killian shows up behind her.
With time to wait until the coffee finishes percolating, he wastes no time wrapping his arms around her waist. His hand travels up to palm at her breast while his lips tease along her neck, and suddenly Emma’s thoughts have nothing to do with coffee.
“You sure you don’t need a nap or something before starting up again?”
He doesn’t even pause in his ministrations, and her breath quickens as his hand starts traveling to slip beneath the waistband of her borrowed bottoms. His fingers brush along the spot where thigh meets body and she struggles to keep herself upright on her own – her knees actually go weak for a moment.
“I may be older than you, Swan, but that just means I’ve had longer to hone my experience, and my recovery time,” he tells her, pulling her back until they’re pressed against each other from shoulders to knees. “For the record, I had a very romantic plan for our next date night that involved a lot of candles and my best set of sheets having to be replaced before morning, if you’d been agreeable to it. You and I were very naked when I imagined the course of the evening, and it was probably incredibly old-fashioned, but very worth the wait we’ve spent.”
It does sound perfect, and she’s almost tempted to tell him to wait, that they can hold out a little longer and have that perfect evening he’s imagined, but he chooses that moment to press their hips together a little more and she leans back into his touch.
“Next time,” she utters, reaching back to wrap her arm around his neck and maneuvering so he’s kissing her right as they are. The straps of her tank top get peeled off her shoulders, and Emma shudders with pleasure as he draws the material down over her breasts, leaving it bunched at her waist for the moment so he can touch without barriers for the first time. His left arm remains wrapped around her waist, providing leverage for the shallow thrusts he’s making against her backside. “You need to lose the pants or else we’re having a repeat of when we woke up,” she tells him plainly, abandoning her own needs for a moment as she turns and urges him to remove his shirt.
For all the ways she’s seen Killian at this point, self-conscious never really came to mind, but as soon as that shirt comes off, that’s exactly how he looks. But she has no idea why. The man is built beautifully. His biceps are firm, his chest broad and his shoulders strong. But more than all of that, he’s human. He has scars – more than the obvious ones around his wrist – and other places where his skin is so baby smooth that she can’t help but stroke it peacefully for both their contentment. But now is not time for simply contentment. She leans up on her toes to kiss him again, pressing her chest against his and swallowing his noise of satisfaction.
“Fast, Killian,” she mutters between kisses, and he immediately walks them towards the counter. With her nod of approval he spins them again until she’s facing the counter. Behind her, Killian slides her top and bottoms over her hips and leaves them pooled on the floor by her feet. His hand disappears for a second, but when he comes back she can feel the hard heat of him pressing between her thighs at the same time his hand reaches forward and his fingers drag along her wetness. She doesn’t know which she wants more, to lean back and fall into his embrace or move forward and ask him for more.
He brings her almost to the brink of orgasm like that, his fingers circling her clit between dipping inside of her. He presses his cock against her center, coating himself to lubricate before he silently asks her to lean forward a little, just the right angle for him to enter her slowly on the next thrust. His hand once again moves, but his fingers just cover over her clit as he pushes her against the counter with each thrust, providing the perfect pressure to build her up all over again.
“Shit, shit, shit,” she murmurs with the time of each thrust; it takes next to no time at all before she’s actually coming again, her voice loud in his quiet apartment, and she’s so glad that she’s his immediate neighbor so no one else can hear her. He slips out of her, still hard, but he’s turning her so he can kiss her again, deep and passionate, like the sex he described to her earlier.
Emma pushes them away from the counter, the coffee completely forgotten even as it beeps to signify it’s ready. She’s too busy turning him towards the bedroom and pushing him along, her hands splayed on his shoulders as she finally gets to see the whole deal from behind. Wonderful shoulders and arms, smooth back, great ass.
“I can hear your thoughts, Swan, and thank you for admiring it. I feel like I need to start attending a gym again in order to measure up to yours, though.”
“No way. This is all…” Instead of finishing her thought, she grabs two handfuls of butt and squeezes, laughing as he makes an absolutely undignified noise and spins around. And that view, well, suffice to say she has no complaints at all with his physical appearance, officially speaking. Even half hard as he is, Killian is a shape and size and length that she would consider ideal if she had preferences. But since she really doesn’t, all she takes into account is that he’s growing hard under her stare again and he’s all hers. Just as she’s all his. They haven’t really discussed their status, but one of these days she’s going to introduce him to David and Snow as her boyfriend.
Her face must change in some way because Killian’s moving forward, trailing the backs of his fingers down her arm. “What was that thought you just had, love? Let me into that mind of yours.”
“Do you have objections to me calling you my boyfriend?”
His eyes light up as he smiles, his laughter coming out breathless as he pulls her closer again. “None at all. In fact, I would very much like to call you my girlfriend. Does that meet with your approval?”
She nods, nibbling her lower lip for just a moment before she seals their titles with a kiss. Then, she makes good on her earlier direction, walking him backwards to the bed until he’s sitting on the edge with her in his lap.
-x-
There’s a goddess straddling his lap right now and Killian Jones has not a single complaint in the world. Had you asked him three months ago if he ever imagined what Emma Swan looked like in the throes of passion, he’d have politely walked away from the question and changed topics, even if he secretly had dreamt this moment once or twice.
What makes it even better is that she’s seen him fully bared and didn’t walk away – and that’s more than just a reference to his current state of nudity. He and Emma have slowly coaxed all the scars for the both of them into the light. And maybe that’s why he’s feeling so light-headed as she slides back down onto his cock. It’s either that or the fact that he’s managed to stave off a second climax for this long and there’s no longer any blood left for his brain to function.
She is so much more than goddess – she is siren and ethereal. She is otherworldly in all the best ways, and in all the other best ways she is entirely human. Her flaws are simple and understandable, her emotions guarded for the right reasons to start. Seeing the slow transition to where they are today has been one of the most fulfilling adventures of his life. And now, with her perfectly imperfect body, she is loving him, though there’s not a chance in hell that he’d call it that right now. That’s still down the road a ways.
His focus narrows and broadens with each time she moves, his mind wholly focused and unfocused on the clasp of her body, the grip of her hands, the quickness of her breath as they chase closer to release. He could watch her riding him all day and never tire of it, he’s sure, and he already can’t wait for the next time when he gets to taste and explore every inch of her body at his leisure.
The thought alone has him gripping her hip a little tighter, urging her moves as he finds leverage to thrust up into her. He falls back to the bed, his feet still on the floor but from this position he can meet her movements to benefit both of them.
“Touch yourself, love. Come with me,” he gasps out, and she slides one hand to where they’re joined, hitting just above where he’s hard and aching at this point with each circular movement. As she starts to shudder in his arms, she presses down against him, her hand anchoring in his chest hair and tugging just to the point of pain but causing him to tumble over the edge with her.
If he thought coming in his pajamas earlier was messy, this is a whole different variety of one. They’re both sweaty, and he can feel his release sliding back down his shaft as he softens. He sits up, shifting so he slips out entirely. He shudders at the loss of her warmth, at the aftershocks of the orgasm, but he focuses on drawing her closer so he can kiss her.
“You’re bloody brilliant,” he utters, watching the smile light up her whole face even though she looks like she could use a few more hours of sleep after that. At her eyes fluttering closed a few times, he can’t help the comment from escaping. “Now who’s the one who needs a nap?” He gracefully accepts the pinch she gives to his side, chuckling as she leans forward and places a kiss to the side of his neck.
“Both of us, I’m betting,” she finally says. Still, she moves off his lap, steadying herself with a hand on Killian’s shoulder while the other pushes her hair back from her face.
“Swan, if you kiss me again, we’ll never leave the bed for the rest of the day.”
“Fair point. I’m going to your bathroom, and then I’m going to rummage through your kitchen and find us food.”
He nods, biting his lip and tipping his chin towards the door, resting back on his elbows as she raises her eyebrows at him and breezes out the door.
Okay, so all he desperately wants to do is collapse back onto the bed and sleep for days after two orgasms in such a short amount of time, but he figures they can nap after they’ve had some breakfast. Henry gets home from school right around three and that means the whole day stretches before them with no interruptions but their own.
From that day forward, it’s settled. They are dating, in a committed relationship, more than courting or “talking” – they are boyfriend and girlfriend, which sounds so mislabeled when they are both over 30. Henry is delighted when they share the news, specifically because now he doesn’t have to struggle to explain that Killian is their neighbor who may or may not be dating his mom. Maybe. Sort of. But not really. Now, Henry goes around telling everyone about his mom’s boyfriend, Killian, who lives down the hall from them.
And so they all fumble through it:
It’s two weeks later that Killian meets David and Snow, with Emma tugging on his arm and leading him to the farm house that Henry has already disappeared into.
“Your brother isn’t going to give me some protective dad speech, is he?”
“He better not. First off, you’re older than he is. Second, you’re the first man I’ve dated for longer than two weeks since before I moved here. And third, if he does, I’ll beat him up.”
“Somehow, I don’t doubt that, love.”
She spins on him before they get to the front porch, pushing up on her toes to kiss him, something heady and wonderful, sweet and sensual at the same time.
And so that’s how he first meets David, with Killian’s tongue just ghosting Emma’s lips and his hand just a touch too low on her hip. David clears his throat, causing Emma to spring away and turn to the door.
“Hi! Sorry, we were just…” But she can’t finish the statement, because what would she say? We were just making out like teenagers outside while you were waiting for us to walk in? Not bloody likely.
“Uh huh,” is all David says with a wry grin, his arms crossed across his chest as he leans against the door frame. Then his lips slowly quirk up and he shakes his head, motioning them inside. It’s April, but there’s still a bite in the air and Killian is eager to get out of the chill. He urges her forward and takes her hand again, trailing only a little behind her in trepidation.
Anything he worried about was all for naught. David is a little chilly towards him at first, but over the course of the evening, they find quite a few topics in common and he’s in the middle of a rant about American football versus actual football when he catches Emma staring at them. Snow leans over and whispers something as David is replying his own thoughts, and Emma laughs softly at whatever was said to her. He catches her eye and winks at her before turning back to the conversation.
They dive in even further when Henry asks what the big deal is. He and David both go on the attack with that one, and it takes roughly three minutes before Henry is sorry he asked, but it’s already too late – they’re going to educate him on all the intricacies if they have to.
By the end of the evening, Snow has packed up enough leftovers to last the three of them for days, somehow, and hugged him so hard he may have felt one of his organs shift. David gives him a handshake and promises to drop by the bar sometime, clapping Killian on the shoulder once as they turn to leave.
It’s like another piece falling into place. Over a decade in Storybrooke and Killian could barely string together three words to say to any one person in the whole town. Now, suddenly, he has a girlfriend, and David and Snow could be… friends. And there’s Henry, who – heavens above, let him not jinx it – if this all keeps lasting, could be his step-son.
They’re back in their building, walking down the hallway hand in hand with Henry in front of them when Killian suddenly stops at the very thought, and Emma turns to look at him, her face pinching in concern.
“You okay?”
“Of course, love. Just couldn’t remember something I put on my list for tomorrow.”
There’s a joke on the tip of her tongue about him forgetting anything because she constantly says he’s worse than an elephant as far as memory goes, but instead she just kisses him. “You wanna stay at mine tonight?”
“Are you sure?”
“Killian, do you really need to ask if she’s sure ten times before you finally come inside?”
Henry is still six months away from 13 but that certainly doesn’t stop him from acting like a cheeky teenager whenever he feels like it.
“Besides,” the boy continues, “if you’re asking because of me, I’m pretty sure you don’t have to tiptoe around that anymore. You’re mom’s boyfriend. Even though you live right there, you’re still allowed to come spend the night.”
“Thanks, Henry,” Emma says flatly, an incredulous smile on her face. “What he said.”
Forward they move again, that summer, when the admissions finally happen. Honestly, Killian would’ve told her sooner – he’d known he loved her shortly after Christmas – but there was always that fear and anxiety that it would all go wrong. So he waits, and waits, and waits, all the while hoping she’ll say it first so he can know it’s okay to finally tell her. But then it happens on its own.
During the summer, they plan two mini-vacations. One is for the three of them, where Emma, Henry, and Killian all load up into Emma’s Volkswagen Bug and drive it down to Boston. If they have more time before school starts for Henry, they’ll do it again down to New York City, just a quick weekend with hit-it-and-quit-it tourism, as Emma calls it (though not in front of Henry).
The second mini-vacation, while Henry spends two solid weeks with his dad, is for only a few days of that seemingly long time. So while a majority of the time spent without their third partner in crime consists of cleaning and working, there are four beautiful days and three memorable nights that they spend at a fancy bed and breakfast just a few miles south of Storybrooke. They’ll never admit it to Granny, but they’d stay all the time if they could.
On the second night, after dinner and watching the stars appear above the horizon, they retire to their room. While Killian is in the bathroom, he can hear Emma moving about the room, and he hears her speaking in low tones to someone before the door shuts more audibly than it opened. While he washes his hand and takes his time, he still walks into the main room with a skeptical look on his face. He clears his throat while Emma faces the dresser and fusses with something. She jumps when he calls to her attention, and when she turns she has a hidden guilty smile.
“I know you didn’t want to make a big deal out of it, but…” As she shifts out of the way, there’s a small cake for two sitting there beside plates and forks. She has a lighter in her hand, just about to light the candles, it appears. “Happy birthday, babe.”
He chuckles and shakes his head, wandering over to grasp her hip and kiss her, intent on trying to figure out how to pass over his heart for safe keeping. Which is why he isn’t quite expecting the words that come out of his own mouth. “I love you, Swan.” He’d meant to say thank you, thank you.
They both pause, and he keeps his eyes closed for a moment, praying that when he opens them it’ll all be fine, that he’ll not have royally fucked it all up. He can feel the way she’s stopped breathing for that same moment, her chest pushed against his and not moving for whole heartbeats, and it’s just as his eyes open that the breath whooshes out of her and she swoops back in, dropping the lighter in her haste to get her hands on him.
It’s clear in the way she hesitates, throws herself more into the kiss than into saying anything back, that she’s not ready. He understands, he understands so well that he pulls back for a heartbeat to tell her that she doesn’t have to say it until she’s ready, if and when she feels the same way he does. She nods, a smile cresting over her lips as she kisses him one last time. They both bask in and shake off the moment, something else to be celebrated later on when they climb the tiny steps to their massive four-poster. Emma refocuses them on the cake, struggling for a few seconds to locate the lighter.
“It’s Italian rum, no almonds. Just the way you like it,” she explains as she finally finds the lost item and turns back to it. With a little click, she starts the flames on the candles and lifts it up. “I’d sing happy birthday but you’re too old for that shit.”
At that, Killian throws back his head and laughs. “You’ll pay for that later, love. For now, let me see what I might wish for when I’ve a beautiful woman in my room.” He gives her a teasing look, letting his eyebrows lift and play for a minute before he looks back to the cake.
He thinks hard, and wishes with all his might, that this will continue, that she loves him back, that she’ll consider this an arrangement for the rest of their lives. Because he has officially entered a state where he cannot imagine living without her by his side. He wishes…. he wishes that they’ll consider moving in together in the upcoming years, and he wishes that they’ll talk of marriage and see how the other feels. And maybe, if it’s in the stars for them, Emma will also want to continue their family and consider having her implant out.
All of it he wishes for, but knows that if she only loves him back, there’s nothing else he could ask for beyond her companionship from now until forever. And that’s the thought he has in his mind when he blows out the candles.
The rest of their vacation can only be described as blissful, even as they eat breakfast with strangers and sometimes have to convince the other that they should do more than spend the whole day in bed. They do plenty of that, too, but they manage to wander the little town enough that they feel it wasn’t wasted time someplace new.
It’s not always perfect, by any means. They fight, they argue, they disagree. But they make sure to talk it out as much as possible for two people with communication problems. Henry goes through his teenage rebellion phase, but in how he acts or how he handles chores rather than smoking or stealing porno mags from the corner store. But they take all the imperfections, the sarcasm, the sometimes-unavoidable attitude by talking or laughing or making it up to each other, and that’s what really matters to all three of them.
-x-
She has to admit, when Killian told her he loves her on vacation, her heart actually stuttered in her chest. She hasn’t stopped thinking about the way he said the words that night. He says them occasionally, just to say them to her, without expecting anything in response. And at this point, it’s almost embarrassing that she hasn’t said it back. If they’ve been dancing around each other since Christmas, it’s been ten months since this all began – next week is her birthday – and it’s been four months since her boyfriend declared his love for her.
He is so patient and giving that she almost can’t believe that this whole thing is hers.
For her and Henry’s combined birthdays, they have a party out at David and Snow’s house, with friends she’s made over the years and people Killian has come to know, as well. It’s somewhere among the friendly laughter and warmth that doesn’t leave her limbs for the entirety of it that she decides she’s going to tell Killian as soon as they get a moment alone tonight.
Until then, they mingle and chat, enjoying the antics of the kids and adults alike. She rests her head on his shoulder while his arm slips around her back, his hand playing with the ends of her hair as they chat with their friends.
Despite being a brand-new teenager, Henry isn’t the least bit embarrassed to be ushered inside at the end of the night by both Emma and Killian. He’s barely awake, his eyes struggling to stay open, and Emma gently guides him away from walls and obstacles as they make their way inside. It’s only after he’s tucked away in his room, quiet snores disappearing behind the door that Emma closes, that she moves immediately to her almost equally tired boyfriend in the bedroom.
He’s already changed, his brace off and resting on the nightstand as he settles into the bed. Emma crawls across her empty side in order to kiss him, making sure she has his full attention before she smiles at him. “I love you.” The words are so easy to say after all this time that she wonders why she couldn’t say them sooner, but the look on Killian’s face is worth the wait.
“I love you, Swan.” He pulls her close again to kiss her once more before she shifts away to get ready for bed.
A month and a half later, their lives are in upheaval as they try to decorate for Christmas, but no one can seem to find anything amidst the mess. Of course, that’s what happens when you combine two households into one just before the holidays.
“I can’t find my tree,” Killian says, exasperation showing through as he lifts box after box in their basement. They have a basement. And three bedrooms. They already set up the big tree in the living room, decorations and all because the storage spaces were the last things they emptied and the first things that came into the house. But while Emma thought Killian’s decorations were also in his storage space, they’ve gone through everything twice and can’t seem to find them.
“Don’t worry, we’ll find it,” Emma says soothingly when he almost throws one of the boxes of Henry’s books. She reaches out and actually grabs his arm, moving close to kiss his clothed shoulder. Killian looks so crestfallen, and she takes his hand and leads him back upstairs.
It’s after he goes to work for the evening that she heads back downstairs and starts carefully sorting through the boxes still left over. Old clothes from her, books of Henry’s, kitchen items that they didn’t need doubles of… Each box is put into a pile until Emma finally unearths a box from Killian’s apartment. It’s labeled simply as “MISC” and he may have completely missed it beneath the other boxes, so she opens it to make sure.
When Killian shakes her awake when he gets home, he’s smiling softly, the expression on his face lit only by the small tree she found and set up. Henry’s star is front and center, and he looks so relieved to see it all that she can see as plain as day that he loves her son. Surely, the thought has passed through her mind before, but to see how much he cares about it – not to mention that the star is what started all of this – is something lovely.
“Thank you, love. I don’t know how you found it, but thank you.”
He kisses her gently, resting on the edge of the couch next to her, his hand in her hair and she finds his hook with her hand.
“Something I don’t think I’ve told you before, but when I woke up the morning after we met and you weren’t on my couch, I really thought that was going to be the end of it. I thought we would go back to being awkward neighbors who never spoke again.”
Emma pushes herself into a sitting position, throwing her legs over Killian’s lap as he settles fully on the couch. “But I just ran down the hall to get coffee.”
“Aye, but I didn’t know that at the time. And then you invited me over to have pizza, but I still didn’t think it was going to lead to anything further.”
“And then we barged in the next night with bags of Christmas decorations.”
“That you did, Swan. Fell in love with you a little bit more even then. You were already working on my heart only hours after our formal introductions.”
“That sounds about right,” she murmurs as she strokes along his jaw, watching his eyes flutter closed at the contact. When he opens them again, he’s staring at her with an intensity she can almost feel in her bones. “Henry named our mission, by the way. Operation Killian’s Christmas Miracle. He just couldn’t stand the thought of you down the hall by yourself with only one little star hung up on the wall.”
“You both were my Christmas miracle.”
“I’m sad now that Henry’s out of the age where he makes handmade ornaments, since technically that’s what started everything.” Killian’s eyebrow jumps a little, his lips pressing together to suppress a smile of some kind. He reaches up to scratch behind his ear and that’s the final tell; he’s hiding something from her.
“Aye, I probably would’ve wanted a few more for the collection,” is all he replies. She lets it ride. He doesn’t keep anything from her, so the need for secrecy must have something to do with a Christmas gift or else he would’ve told her already.
When she gets home from work on the eve of Christmas Eve, she gets to see exactly what was going on. There are little ornaments strung throughout the whole downstairs, both with Killian and Henry’s handwriting all over them, and they’re both trying to get something hung up by the fireplace – her weed of a teenager and Killian stretching his arm so high that his shirt has come untucked to show part of his side – so intently that they don’t even hear her come in until she swings the door shut. They both whirl around, and Emma can see the small form still dangling from Killian’s hand.
The wind from the door movement and what followed her inside hits against what she previously thought were just shapes with writing on them, so they flutter back and forth and Emma’s eyes go wide. The writing, it turns out, is dates and locations – landmarks and milestones for the three of them individually and together. The other side has photos filling the shape; they are all handmade ornaments of all the major things that have happened in their lives.
There’s Henry’s birth photo, and one of Killian in the Royal Navy. There’s Emma’s induction into the Storybrooke Sheriff Department, with Henry by her side as she smiles. There’s a picture of Killian and Henry taken on Christmas last year, one she didn’t even know existed, with Killian’s hair still long and his beard fuller. She can’t believe how different he looks, but she does still declare she’d have taken him either way.
Pictures of Emma and Killian, Killian and David, Emma and Snow, Emma and Henry and Killian – they’re all represented. Each holiday, each landmark. A picture from Killian’s birthday when they walked along the beach with the inscription of the date and “I love you, Swan” written below it. Another from her own birthday taken from afar of the moment she tucked into his side as they talked, her own words of love adorning the back. There’s one of the three of them when they decided as a unit that it was time to move house – it was pointless to keep walking back and forth down the hallway to spend time at each apartment when they were all together all the time now.
And the ones along the fireplace… those are the ones she sees last, the most important ones, because as she gets closer she can see Killian’s signs of anxiety heighten. Henry’s smile just grows and grows as he watches all of this take place. There are three along the mantel and one in Killian’s hand, and she doesn’t even have to see what’s written on them to know what she’s going to find. Still, she comes all the way into the living room after removing her boots, reaching for Henry first and pressing a kiss to the side of his head and marveling at the way he’s grown even more.
She moves to stand in front of Killian, taking his hand even as he drops to one knee, and she waits as patiently as she can for him to finish the question before blurting out her answer, but it’s a close thing.
-x-
On Christmas day, earlier than when he and Emma would’ve first held hands, she settles into his arms once more while they sneak in a movie before Henry leaves to spend the rest of the day with his father. It’s something he may have asked for as a growing teenager with a sensitivity to spend holidays with both sides of his family, or it could have something to do with two nights ago. Killian once thought that, on the rare occasion something bright happened in his life, it was only temporary.
But not all things are so temporary. The ring resting on Emma’s finger only proves further that sometimes, if you’re patient enough, it lasts.
#captain swan#cs fanfiction#cs ff au#captain swan ff#captain swan secret santa 2018#cs secret santa 2018#gifts for lovely friends#sarah writes ff
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This is a @cssecretsanta2k18 gift for @edgeofrealms It was such a joy getting to be your CS Secret Santa and I’m so sorry this is so late. Shall we call it a New Year’s gift? This little fic was inspired by our conversations. You said you liked fluff and you said:
“I wish we couldve seen more of their life post- the final battle. like emmas pregnancy and how they adjusted to being married.”
So that’s what this is, I hope you enjoy!
Title: Making More than Pancakes
Summary: Emma’s pregnant and a wee bit cranky, Killian’s bent on reading pregnancy books and feeding her nutritious food and the Charmings have decided it’s time to decorate the nursery. Set post 7x02, a heartwarming look at a day in the life of Captain Swan while they’re expecting.
Fanfiction.net AO3
xxx
Emma looked down at her breakfast and sighed. She loved her husband, she really did, but she did not love pasteurized Greek yogurt with vegan, gluten-free, protein-rich granola for breakfast. At least there were some berries on top. Where did one even get organic, vegan, gluten-free, protein-rich granola in Storybrooke?
She looked over to where he was bustling around the kitchen wearing a ‘Pirates have more fun’ apron that a then 16-year-old Henry had thought a hilarious Christmas gift. “Did you cross the town line to get this?” she pointed to the bowl on the table in front of her.
His eyes lit up, clearly delighted with himself. “Aye.”
“Why?”
“The market in town has insufficient selection. I read-”
“Oh boy,” Emma interrupted and put down her spoon. “I’m going to take the internet away from you.”
His eyes widened in horror at the thought. “The computer contains much useful information on your current state, Swan. You and the baby need calcium and protein and nutrients and-”
“They have granola at the market here in town,” Emma pointed out practically, before adding, “And you don’t have to drive an hour to get it.”
Killian shook his head. “The brand at the local market is full of sugar and very few nutrients comparatively.”
“Why does it need to be vegan if you’re putting it over yogurt anyway?” Emma asked practically.
“It doesn’t, but this brand was rated the most nutritious in a variety of categories.”
She looked at him with the sweetest smile she could muster. “You could make me a pancake instead.”
His smile in return was affectionate, but he shook his head.
“Why?” Emma whined.
“Because they are nutrient free and last time you put chocolate chips and whip cream on them. Empty calories. Pancakes are for special occasions. A treat.”
“It’s Saturday, Saturday should be a special occasion.” Emma replied with a note of irritation in her voice. Then she motioned to her husband, “If you won’t make me pancakes, then why are you wearing that apron? All you did was put yogurt in a bowl.”
Emma had been showing flashes of annoyance as the pregnancy progressed, however he’d read several pregnancy books and they informed him this was normal, having something to do with hormones. With a smile, Killian moved towards her until he could lean around and drop a kiss on her forehead. “I’m wearing it because it reminds me of our lad.”
“Oh.” Emma’s frustration crumbled and she felt her heart squeeze at the mention of her son. Their son. She missed him fiercely. “I miss him, too.”
“I’m sure we’ll see him soon,” Killian said with more conviction than he felt.
“You know what would help with the missing?” Emma asked with a bit of a sniffle.
“What, love?” Killian asked with twin notes of curiosity and eagerness.
“Hot chocolate.” Emma supplied hopefully.
Killian leaned back against the stove and cocked an eyebrow at her, but before he could respond, the front door banged open.
With a start, they instantly found the source of the intrusion. Storybrooke might have been quiet these last few years, but they were still both in a state of constant readiness.
Emma sighed with relief and a bit of exasperation. “Mom, we’ve talked about knocking.”
“Pfft, you’re almost nine months pregnant, what would there be to walk in on?” Snow chuckled, as she made her way into the living room, carrying a large laundry basket filled to the brim.
Emma gave her a pointed look that was supposed to convey that her mother was wrong, but internally she winced. It had been awhile since there’d been anything to interrupt.
“I’m sorry it’s so early, but we dropped Neal at soccer practice and since he has a play date afterwards with one of his teammates, we actually have some free time this morning.”
“What’s all this?” Killian asked as he wandered towards the couch and peered into the basket now sitting on the coffee table.
“Swatches, paint samples,” Snow explained eagerly, before adding, “It’s time to make some decisions on the nursery.”
“Killian and I were thinking we’d wait until the baby comes, since we don’t know if we’re having a boy or a girl.”
“Nonsense,” Snow waved that idea away with her hand. “You don’t want to bring a baby home to an unfinished nursey, trust me you will not have the energy to decorate after the baby is born. There are plenty of wonderful options that are gender neutral. Besides, who ever heard of a color having a gender anyway? Personally, I like this one,” she pulled out a card with bright, sunshine yellow paint on it and brought it over for Emma to inspect.
Emma turned the card over in her hand. “It’s a bit much.”
“Yellow is a happy color,” Snow replied brightly.
“I did read that on the computer,” Killian agreed. “There was a study of children and the color of their living quarters, children in yellow rooms were happiest.”
“Yeah, but our infant will need sunglasses in order to sleep and I don’t know where we’d find ones that tiny,” Emma retorted sardonically.
“Well how about this?” Snow pulled another paint chip from her bag, this time a deep turquois.
“We agreed that we were going to offer to help, not force our taste on them.” A voice from the door sounded.
“Dad,” Emma smiled at the welcome sight of her father and started the arduous process of pushing herself up from the table.
Her father gestured for her to stay put, instead he walked over and dropped a kiss on her head and then looked to Killian, “Nice apron.”
“An old gift from Henry.” Killian replied without a trace of self-consciousness.
David paused for a beat and then nodded, a sign he understood the impetus behind Killian wearing the apron. Then he clapped his hands together. “I hear you have a crib that needs to be built, lead me to it.”
Killian glanced to Emma with a raised eyebrow. “You called your father? I thought you wanted to help me assemble it?”
“I did, but that was before I got so uncomfortable that I can’t even sit on the floor. Dad and I assembled Neal’s, so he knows what to do.”
Killian didn’t show either emotion, but he was both relieved and disappointed. In the last trimester of her pregnancy, Emma had exhibited less patience than usual. With David, he would make quicker work of the crib than he would with Emma, but it had been something he was looking forward to doing with his wife. There was also the fact he was exhausted and had been planning to go back to bed after breakfast. It had been a late night, or rather early morning, of sheriff duty and he’d gotten less than two hours of sleep… but perhaps working without sleep would be good practice for when the baby came. Resigned to his fate, he looked to his father-in-law. “The boxes are in the nursery, as are an assortment of gadgets and tools, do we require anything else to complete the task?”
“A cold beverage?” David suggested with a grin.
“Beer?” Killian asked with surprise. Over the years, the two had spent a lot of leisure time together and Killian knew that when David referred to a cold beverage he meant beer.
“Sounds great.”
“David!” Snow admonished with a scandalized expression. “It’s not even 9am.”
David shrugged, but relented and pointed to the coffee pot. “Then I suppose a bit more caffeine wouldn’t hurt.”
Killian poured them both cups, and then offered to pour one for Snow who declined saying she’d help herself. The expectant father started to follow David, but then turned back to his mother-in-law and said, “See that she eats her breakfast,” before disappearing up the stairs.
“Covering it in chocolate syrup is the only way you’re getting me to eat this.” Emma retorted softly enough that she knew Killian wouldn’t hear.
“Is it so awful?” Snow asked as she surveyed her daughter’s half-eaten bowl of yogurt and granola.
“No, it’s not bad, it’s just not pancakes… or waffles… or French toast… or a bear claw.”
“Ah… has he at least stopped offering fish for breakfast?”
Emma gave a huff of a laugh, “We broke him of that habit years ago, but, yes, now he only eats fish for non-breakfast meals. However, these days he’s being very careful about what fish he serves, you see apparently some fish is recommended as part of a diet for pregnant women, but you have to be careful about mercury. He’s an expert. All I know is once a week we have salmon for dinner… usually served with broccoli and spinach.”
“Well it’s not a bad thing that one of you is worried about nutrition.” Snow said as she walked to the coffee table to retrieve her laundry basket full of items. Once she’d heaved it on the kitchen table, she poured herself a cup of coffee.
Emma felt herself prickle at her mother’s comment, but instead of saying anything about it sighed, “I miss coffee.”
“I’m sure Killian would make you some decaffeinated,” Snow replied perkily.
Emma refrained from rolling her eyes, but she felt like it. “Not the same.”
“Well you’ll be able to have coffee soon enough.”
“Sure, after another six months to a year of breastfeeding.”
Snow looked at her daughter with concern. “Everything okay?”
At that, Emma looked up, “Yeah, sure, why wouldn’t it be?” Wanting to change the subject, she pushed herself up from her chair so she could take her breakfast dishes to the sink and on her way back motioned to her mother’s basket. “Show me what you brought.”
Excitedly, Snow removed paint chips and fabric swatches and starting laying them out on the table.
Emma looked down at the abundance of color in front of her. The paint chips made a vivid rainbow against the wood of the table. Then her eyes traveled to the fabric swatches. There was a swatch with ducks, one with whales, and one with frogs. Other samples had themes ranging from clowns to sail boats to the moon and the stars, some had the same patterns, but in different colors. Overwhelmed Emma plopped back down in her seat.
Snow sat down next to her and started explaining the colors, the differences in tone and hue, which were complimentary, which would work with the fabric. When she finally stopped talking to take a breath, she glanced expectantly to Emma who in turn was looking a little dazed.
“Emma,” Snow nudged her gently, “What do you think?”
“What do I think? I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. Other than… how am I going to be a good mother? I don’t eat right and I can’t even pick a color for the nursery!” Emma replied, startling even herself. Instantly she felt a hot sting behind her eyes. She sat for a moment willing herself not to cry, she did not succeed.
“Oh honey,” Snow said as she searched for a tissue. Finding a napkin, she handed it to Emma before reaching over and rubbing a comforting circle on Emma’s back. “Where is this coming from? You’re already a wonderful mother.”
Emma just looked at her and blew her nose.
Snow knew what she was thinking, and a bit how she felt. Henry had been an adolescent when Emma came into his life, mothering an infant was different. “You’ll be great with an infant; you were great with your brother when he was a baby.”
“Babysitting is not the same… also there was a time when you wouldn’t even let me hold my brother.”
Snow grimaced guiltily at the memory. “Oh Emma, you’re not letting that bother you, are you? Those were very special circumstances for a few days while you were having trouble controlling your powers. You’re perfectly in control of them now; it’s no longer a concern at all.”
Emma shrugged as she let her gaze drift down to her stomach. “Maybe, but this little one is going to depend on me for everything. There’s so much more responsibility with a baby.”
Snow looked at her incredulously before saying, “The Savior, who had the weight of the world, the weight of everyone’s happy endings on her shoulders, and won, isn’t responsible enough to care for a baby? Hogwash.”
Emma snorted at her mother’s colorful language. She hadn’t thought about it like that, she had shouldered a lot of responsibility in the not so distant past. Even if it wasn’t the same. She’d never asked to be the Savior; she’d just done what was necessary when thrust into the role. However, she had asked to be a parent; she’d tried to get pregnant for a very long time, and now that the time was almost here, she was afraid she wouldn’t be up to the task.
“I don’t know. There’s so much to think about… you said it yourself.” Emma sounded a bit defensive as she mimicked her mother’s words from a few minutes earlier. “‘It’s not a bad thing that one of you is worried about nutrition.’ See, I can’t even be trusted with what I eat.”
Snow shook her head, but replied gently, “Are you kidding? Emma, you are eating healthier than 90% of pregnant women I’ve ever seen.”
“But that’s just because Killian has been doing the shopping and the meal prep, if it was left to me; I’d be eating onion rings and pancakes.”
“Then have a pancake. You deserve it. Killian might be going a little bit overboard with the nutritious eating, but it is good that one of you is worrying about it. You balance each other out, and you will continue to balance each other out as parents.”
Emma sat back and thought about that. Maybe that was true, maybe they did balance each other, he shored up her shortcomings and vice versa.
While Emma was pondering that, Snow’s mind went in a very different direction. After a minute, she swallowed roughly and said a truth that none of them confronted very often. “Emma, one thing we know for sure, your baby is going to have a much better mother than you had.”
Emma looked up quickly and met her mother’s eyes. “Mom, don’t say that.”
“No, it’s true; we both know it’s true. I think you know how much I wish things had been different, but I wasn’t there, but you will be. That is the most important thing. Being there.”
Emma bit her lip, and then in a rough voice, said, “I do worry about that, about something going wrong again. I know I won’t have to make a decision like the one I made with Henry, but I do worry about something happening outside our control…”
Snow brought her hand to her daughter’s belly. “You will be there for every moment with this precious gift, and I promise you, your father and I, and Killian, of course, will do everything in our power to make sure nothing separates the two of you. If Henry or Regina happen to stir up more trouble while they are off adventuring, and goodness knows what Rumple is up to, then we’ll deal with it as a family, but there will be no separating of babies from their mothers.” Snow’s eyes were full of unshed tears, but she smiled brightly, “I decree it as Queen. And President of the Storybrooke Town Council.”
“Then it is done,” Emma replied with a laugh and reached over and gave her mother a hug. It was silly, there was no kingdom in Storybrooke, but her mother’s words gave her comfort. Unlike when she was pregnant with Henry, she was surrounded by people who loved her, supported her, and would help her keep this child safe.
“You know what?” Emma asked with a sniff as she turned back to the table. “Maybe I can pick a color. The yellow is growing on me, if kids with yellow walls are happier then why not… but not that bright yellow you showed me before, is there something a bit softer?”
“How about this one?” Snow fingered through the pile until she found the one she was looking for. She handed the card of pale, buttery yellow to Emma.
Emma held out the chip in front of her and tried picturing the room they’d designated as the nursery painted in the warm color. Yes, this could work, cheery, but not overwhelming.
“It’s called duckling yellow.”
Emma smiled, that sealed it. “Perfect.”
Xxx
“You’ve resorted to force-feeding your wife, huh?”
Killian looked up at David from where he sat on the floor looking at the directions that came with the crib. “Force-feeding? I’m doing no such thing. I’m providing plenty of nutritious sustenance for Emma and our unborn child.”
“Right, well, I found when Snow was pregnant that she had cravings and it was best to let her have whatever she wanted.”
“Of course, I want Emma to have her heart’s desire, but if left to her own culinary devices all these years, she and Henry would have subsisted on a diet of pop tarts and items that are breaded and fried.” Killian frowned disdainfully. “It’s even more important now that Emma is with child that she is supplied with an abundance of healthy food.”
“You might slip in a hot dog now and then, is all I’m saying, to keep her happy and sane.”
Killian looked at him in horror. “I will have you know that processed meats are not recommended for pregnant women.”
David looked at him, actually impressed. “You have studied up.”
“The internet has been most enlightening and I’ve read several books.”
David nodded as he organized the assortment of screws that came with the crib, and then cleared his throat before stuttering, “Um… I… have something… but… uh… I don’t want to offend you…”
That stopped Killian and he looked up from the crib directions he’d been reading. “That’s an ominous beginning.”
David shrugged before launching into an explanation. “Recently, I was throwing the ball with Wilby and it sparked an idea. I ordered some things and played around with them in the barn. Long story short, I made you something that might come in handy, but I don’t want you to think I don’t trust you around my grandchild.”
“Ever more ominous,” Killian knit his brows together, but said nothing more. He had his own trepidations about what kind of father he would be, he wasn’t sure he was ready to listen to Emma’s father list his inadequacies, especially if it had to do with him not being fit to be around his own child.
David reached in his pocket and pulled out a small rounded object that appeared to be made of some sort of rubber. He handed it to Killian.
Killian turned it over in his good hand, “What is it?”
“It was a rubber ball, I cut open a bunch of them trying to find one with the right consistency, and then I shaped it and cut it down to size. It’s to blunt the sharp end of your hook while you’re holding the baby. Honestly, I thought it might give you confidence and comfort, especially when you have a newborn. I know I was nervous about holding my kids as infants and I don’t have a sharp appendage.”
Killian studied it and saw that there was a slit on the flat end of the object. He squinted in concentration as he brought it to his hook and slid it on. He turned it one way and then the next surveying the bulbous pink object and then tried it out several times by knocking it on the hard wood floor. His hook bounced off the surface, damaging neither the floor nor the ball.
David pointed to his handwork, “See I put tiny reinforcements in the slit so that the hook wouldn’t slice through the softer material.”
“I don’t know what to say.” Killian said feeling quite gratified. “This is… this is great. I… I, it would be a lie to say that I haven’t been apprehensive about it, I thought I’d switch to the false hand I wear when I need disguise, but I’m more comfortable in the hook, so… I… thank you.”
Pleased that his gift had been taken in the spirit it had been intended, David nodded and said, “You’re welcome. One less thing for you to worry about and now that I’ve figured it out; I can easily make another if you need it. Let me know.”
“I appreciate that.” Killian said before gulping. A moment later he added, “You’re right, these days… a lot of things cause me worry.”
David looked at him quizzically; it wasn’t very often that his son-in-law opened up to him. “Well that’s very natural at this stage of the game. Every expectant father who is only weeks away is worried.”
Killian nodded, but then added, “Not every expectant father has my history. It’s not… well, you know better than anyone, I don’t have a great history with fathers.”
David took a deep breath and then shook his head. “Killian, that’s all behind you and you’re not going to make the mistakes our fathers made and you’re not going to go back to being the person you were. You have experienced more than most people would over several life times and it has brought you to a place where you are not only a changed man, but a wise man.” David them slapped his son-in-law on the back. “Plus I know you are going to be a great father, look you’re sitting there in a silly apron just because Henry gave it to you. You’re already a great father, and you’re a great husband. And if you’ve convinced me that you’re good enough for my baby girl, you know it’s true.”
Killian swallowed roughly, met the other man’s gaze, and gave him a nod of acknowledgement. Then a grin stole over his face as he held up his hook. “This is a fetching pink color; you must think we’re having a girl.”
“Actually, the ball that had the right density just happened to be that color. It’s just a plus that you get to walk around with a pink accessory.”
“As with my apron, I will wear it with pride.” Killian said and he meant it.
Xxx
The crib assembly took longer than anticipated, but eventually was complete. Snow left hours earlier only to return with Neal, so it wasn’t until early afternoon that Killian and Emma finally found themselves alone.
By mutual agreement, they headed to the bedroom… to sleep.
xxx
With a slightly suspicious smile and a mischievous gleam in his eye, Killian moved silently across the kitchen, until he sidled up behind his wife, simultaneously sliding his hook arm around her midsection and pressing a kiss just below her ear.
“Hi.” Emma relaxed back into him, still keeping an eye on the stove.
“Hi, my naughty wife,” Killian murmured into her ear, pressing his nose to her temple and taking in her scent.
“Naughty? I don’t remember doing anything naughty recently; did I miss something during our nap?” Emma sighed and closed her eyes, briefly enjoying his embrace, before getting back to business and flipping a pancake with practiced finesse.
“Love, you know why you’re naughty, you shouldn’t be exerting yourself in this manner. It’s my job to feed you while you’re eating for two. If you were hungry, why didn’t you wake me so I could prepare dinner?” With his free hand he rubbed the shoulder over which he was not leaning.
Emma gave a quick shake of her head. “Because you were resting. You barely slept last night, between me tossing and turning and then you having to go out on that 2am drunk and disorderly – we really need to do something about the dwarfs,” she flipped another pancake with her right hand as her left came to caress the hook that was resting gently on her belly. “You should have slept in this morning, but instead you got up to make me breakfast, which was unnecessary by the way, and then my parents showed up. I wanted to let you sleep, and besides I’m not an invalid, I can make pancakes, and you won’t make me pancakes,” Emma said the last part with a note of defiance. She set the skillet on an unused burner and turned off the stove. “However, if you want to get naughty that can be arranged,” her voice was seductive as she turned in one fluid motion and searched for Killian’s mouth with hers, intending to deliver a searing kiss.
Or at least that had been the plan. However, as soon as she turned, her swollen stomach hit Killian’s midsection knocking him back so forcefully that his feet tangled and he fell back, his behind hitting the tile of the kitchen floor.
Killian chuckled good-naturedly as he reached to steady himself on the floor, but Emma burst into tears.
His laugh died instantly on his lips, and his heart dropped at the sound. He scrambled to his feet and in an instant was wrapping his arms around her from the side, pulling her to him. “Love, please don’t cry, what’s wrong?” he whispered as he pressed a kiss to her cheek.
“I’m huge,” she sniffled after a minute, “And not sexy, and probably couldn’t get naughty even if you wanted me.”
He squeezed her gently, “Love, you are 36 weeks pregnant with our child which is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen, and not a moment has gone by since the day we met that I haven’t wanted you.”
“You’re just saying that,” she sniffed.
Killian let go of her only long enough to reach over to the kitchen counter and grab a tissue. Tenderly he dabbed her wet cheeks. “I promise you I’m not and I’ll happily prove it to you if you doubt my veracity, but for right now why don’t we get you off of your feet and I’ll finish… dinner.” With his chin, he nudged her cheek towards the kitchen table.
Instead of moving to disentangle with him, she relaxed more into his embrace. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me… that’s the second time I teared up today.”
“The second?” Killian asked with concern, “When was the first?”
“With my mom, it was silly… just feeling a little overwhelmed with fabric and paint choices.”
Killian leaned back slightly so he could see her face. “Darling, it’s totally natural. According to the pregnancy book your hormone levels are changing and many women find that they cry more easily during pregnancy.”
“I haven’t finished the pregnancy book.” Emma admitted.
He gave her a gentle squeeze. “That’s all right because, I have.”
That made Emma smile. Her mom was right; they did balance each other out.
“I suppose you’re going to throw those out,” she looked longingly at the pancakes on the stove, “and instead feed me a skinless, organic, free-range chicken breast over a bed of quinoa with steamed carrots and green beans.”
“Of course not, Swan. If you want pancakes, pancakes you shall have.”
“Really?”
“Really.” He kissed her temple. “Emma, I want to take care of you. I want you to have everything you and the baby need. Perhaps I went overboard with the healthy eating. I want you and our baby to be happy and if pancakes make you happy, so be it.”
Instead of moving to sit down, Emma turned her face and pressed her forehead to his. “Thank you, I love…”
With an expectant grin, he leaned back and waited for the end of her declaration.
“…pancakes,” she finished with faux earnestness.
Killian chuckled, guided her to her chair at the kitchen table, and then bustled around getting plates utensils, butter, and syrup. He even sprinkled chocolate chips over the inviting mound of pancakes on her plate. Emma looked ecstatic.
As she dug in to the feast, Killian sat across from her and said, “I had a talk with your father this morning. He encouraged me to relax a bit on the healthy eating.”
Emma swallowed a mouthful of the delicious food and admitted. “And my mom encouraged me to appreciate how you balance out my tendencies towards junk food.” Emma held out her glass full of orange juice to Killian as if to offer a toast. “Here’s to balance.”
“To balance,” Killian clinked his glass against hers. “Speaking of your parents’ wisdom…” He leaned back in order to rummaged around in his pocket, before pulling out his new pink, hook protector. “Your father gifted me with this.”
“What is it?” Emma asked curiously.
Killian placed it on his hook and then brought it to tap against the table, “It’s to protect the cygnet.”
Emma shook her head, “Our baby doesn’t need protecting from you.”
Killian thought about that for a second, he certainly hoped that truer words had never been spoken. “No, never, but your father’s instinct was right, I’ll feel more confident holding our infant, changing diapers, feeding, if I’m wearing it.”
“Okay, whatever makes you more comfortable is good, because you are going to change a lot of diapers. I mean… a lot… mountains upon mountains of very, dirty diapers.”
“As you command, Captain,” Killian replied unfazed.
Emma smiled brightly at him and then remembered what else she talked to her mother about that morning. “Oh, hey, after I stopped crying, I actually did find a color for the nursery.”
“Aye?” he cocked an inquisitive eyebrow at her.
She nodded, “If you agree, of course.” Then she pushed back her chair, grabbed the paint sample from the counter and came around the table. Killian was a little surprised when he realized her intent to sit on his lap, but he dutifully pushed back his chair from the table to give her room. She plopped down, put one arm around his neck, and showed him the swatch by setting it on her pregnant belly. “It’s called Duckling Yellow, it’s not nearly as intense as that first yellow mom showed us, but it’s cheery like you said, and warm, and it would go with a lot of other colors and-”
“It’s perfect.” Killian interrupted.
“Are you sure, I don’t want to make the decision without you.”
“You’re not, I love it.”
She pressed a kiss to the apple of his cheek. “I’m so glad you’re the father of my child.”
He crooked his neck back in order to get a better look at her. “Well, Swan, we’ve been married for five years so I hope there’s no question about that…”
She laughed but shook her head. “No, I mean it. I know I’ve been a bit… cranky lately.”
“My, love, you are growing our human inside of you, you may be as cranky as you wish.”
Emma smiled and kissed him again. “That’s why I’m so grateful.”
“You’re grateful you’re cranky?”
“No,” she nodded as one hand caressed the hair at the nape of his neck. “I’m grateful I have a partner who doesn’t care that I’m cranky and who wants to be there with me every step of the way, and who reads pregnancy books and goes to a lot of effort to feed me healthy foods. The last time I did this, I was terrified, alone and in a cell. Now I have the most wonderful man in the world getting up in the morning after two hours of sleep just so he can make me a healthy breakfast. It’s… it’s wonderful and I appreciate it. I want you to know that.”
He leaned in and stole a kiss. “Well, Swan, I’m glad that you’re the mother of my child. We’re in this together.”
Emma beamed at him, brimming with happiness. They were in it together.
“But…” Killian’s face contorted into an exaggerated wince.
“But what?” Emma asked with concern.
“Darling, you have to get up my left leg is going to sleep.”
Emma pouted as she stood. “See, I’m huge, I knew it.”
“Nah, I just needed you to stand so I could do this.” Killian abruptly stood and then in one fluid movement, he easily picked her up– one arm behind her back the other under her knees– and headed towards the stairs, intent on a bit of naughty time. Emma shrieked and giggled the entire way to their bedroom.
The End.
#captain swan#cs ff#csss 2018#cs secret santa#cssecretsanta2k18#emma swan#killian jones#cs fanfiction#making more than pancakes#my fic
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It Will Not Be Long, Love
As promised, @love-with-you-i-have-everything here is your @cssecretsanta2k18 fic!!
I was requested, and I quote, "I’d definitely say something mostly fluffy/domestic with a little bit of hurt/comfort or discussions of the past, etc. would be ideal! Maybe something with Emma, Killian, sweet little baby Hope, and Henry would be cute? Oooh, or a very normal domestic morning at the Swan-Jones house! Basically anything with CS interacting with Hope would be a DREAM!"
I’m terrible at fluff, and not very good at domestic, but I can deliver on the angst. So....I hope it's what you were looking for!
The lyrics to the lullaby are the ones used by Killian Jones in Season 7 to sing baby Alice to sleep. The poem is called "She Moved Through The Fair" by Padriac Colum.
It was a rough night in the Swan-Jones household. Bath times, scars, and nightmares. It takes coming to the brink of falling back into darkness to realize just how much light you have.
On Ao3 and FF and Tumblr
Killian jerked awake with a harsh breath, the freezing night air instantly chilling his sweat-soaked skin and clearing any vestiges of sleep that might have lingered. His body was still shaking in the aftershocks of his nightmare.
It had been months since he had had one, but he couldn’t find it in himself to be surprised, given what had happened the night before.
“NO I DON’T WANNA TAKE A BATH!”
He could hear the petulant shout as he pushed open the front door and winced. It appeared that his darling girl was going through one of her stubborn streaks, when she refused to cooperate with anything that either he or Emma asked of her.
As he made his way up the stairs towards the master bedroom, where he was sure the shouting was coming from, the lights flickered. He paused a moment, taking a deep breath to steady himself, because the flickering was a clear indication that one of his two lasses was on the brink of losing control, and he honestly couldn’t be sure which one it was going to be.
Since she had been born, Hope had been as gifted as her mother, her cries regularly causing blackouts in the house and there were numerous char marks from where candles and other flames had blazed brightly in one of her sudden fits.
And he had loved every minute of it. The tantrums and the sleepless nights, the horrible spills and even worse diaper messes. Every time he felt his endurance being to run out, he took a moment to sit and remember where he was in life. Married to his True Love, who had willingly carried and born a child with him, in a home that he and his stepson had chosen, in a town that surrounded him with family.
And he would remind himself exactly what he had endured to make it to that point.
And suddenly the trials didn’t seem nearly as arduous. Even when his daughter could throw a tantrum that could fry any electronics in a twenty meter radius.
Emma had been forced to put a spell on their phones after the second time it had happened, and a town wide panic had ensured when Swan didn’t respond quickly enough to her mother.
But even though it could be Hope making the power flicker, it could very well be his Swan.
His heart swelled as he started to ascend the stairs again. His marvelous wife had agreed, after they had discussed it, to consider carrying another child. Hope was almost four and they figured it would be a good time, Hope young enough to not resent the presence of another child but old enough that she wouldn’t require the same level of attention as a newborn or toddler might.
But with that decision came consequences. And at seven months pregnant with their second child, Swan’s moods were as fickle as the winds.
He knew he couldn’t help it. She had come crying to him more than once during Hope’s pregnancy because she was out of control of her own mind, unable to stop her reactions, even if she knew they were unwarranted. Unfortunately, she had been experiencing the same phenomenon during her current pregnancy.
She would scream at him for closing the door too loudly, and right in the middle, it was like she would suddenly register what she was doing, and immediately fall into a spiral of guilt, profusely apologizing to him. And the effects of the pregnancy had only been exacerbated as of late.
There had been several issues that had arisen, jurisdictions clashing between the joined realms as each of the various rulers tried to settle. It had been almost four years since the realms had been united, but things still had not completely settled. The most recent issue being a case of several magically assisted crimes that only she could investigate, as the lone magic wielder on the force. She had begun pulling double and triple shifts at the sheriff’s station to lend as much assistance as she could to have the perpetrator caught.
He knew that today would be particularly bad because he father had forced her to come home, all but ordering her to get some rest. And if there was one thing his Swan hated more than anything, it was being bossed around, especially when it’s done because she is appearing weak.
Her exhaustion, combined with what was probably a stewing irritation with her father, was probably in making it difficult for her to manage her emotions in the face of Hope’s hardheadedness. Which, he would point out in less emotionally fraught a situation, was entirely from her.
“Hope Swan Jones, you will take a bath. I don’t want to hear another word about it.”
Swan’s voice was hard and clipped and Killian braced himself as he walked into the bedroom. Hope was standing just inside the bathroom, her legs apart and her arms crossed with a child’s ferocious frown upon her face.
He may have been the guilty one for that particular trait.
And facing away from him, blocking the bathroom door to prevent Hope from escaping was the disheveled silhouette of his wife, fly away hairs clear from the light pouring out of the bathroom, one hand pressed to her back and the other hidden by her head, but he could easily tell she was pinching the bridge of her nose.
His dalring baby girl caught sight of him behind her mother and her whole demeanor shifted. The pout vanished and a beaming smile took its placed as she threw her hands up in the air.
“Daddy!!!! You’re home!!”
“Aye, my little cygnet,” he murmured, unable to keep the smile off his face as he closed the distance to the pair, stepping up behind Emma to wrap his arms around her and she immediately sank into him. He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to her neck, before he opted to resolve the situation peacefully.
“And I cannot believe that you knew!” he said, lending an air of amazement to his words.
Hope’s brows furrowed as her little nose scrunched up, her head tipping to the side as she puzzled his words. That one she learned from Henry.
“Knew what Daddy?”
“I can’t believe you knew that the first thing that I wanted to do was take a bath, as soon as I got home. And here you are, getting everything all ready for me!”
He felt Emma suck in a deep breath and sag against him further, the tension that drew across her shoulders slowly easing as she understood his ploy. Hope blinked and tilted her head in the other direction as she processed what he was saying. She picked that up after they had puppy-sat Robyn and Alice’s dog while they went on their honeymoon.
He had to stifle his chuckle against Emma’s neck as he watched understanding click into place on his baby girl’s face. Her whole face brightened. “YEAH I WAS GETTING THE BATH READY FOR YOU DADDY!” she screeched, now bouncing enthusiastically on the bathroom tiles.
“Well thank you darling cygnet. I’m just going to put my stuff down and get ready for my bath and I’ll be right in, aye? And you’ll be joining me?”
She nodded enthusiastically, then flopped down on her butt to start struggling with her shoes. He gave her one last affectionate look, before he murmured, “Come on my beautiful Swan.”
She turned in his hold to stand up on her toes to press a quick kiss to his lips before she wearily made her way to the rest of the bedroom. She sat on the bed with a sigh, and started to press her hands into her back, massaging what he knew were twisted up and knotted muscles.
“Thank you for that,” she sighed, removing one hand from her back in favor of scrubbing at her face. He studied her for a moment, still as radiant as the day she first looked upon her from beneath a pile of bodies. But he could see the deep lines of exhaustion around her eyes and the frown lines that seemed to have taken up permanent residence in the corners of her lips.
“I am glad that I was able to help, rather than making things worse. With her, who knows?” he brushed aside her gratitude.
Emma scoffed, but a small smile had taken up its place at the edge of her mouth. She didn’t seem to be up to any other conversation though, as she slowly schooched herself onto the bed, then lowered herself onto the comforter. He turned away, pulling out a pair of water shorts that Emma had gifted him with for their honeymoon, when they had finally managed to go on it. He moved into the walk in closet, shutting the door lightly, and stipping down before pulling on the water shorts.
Elastic was truly one of the most remarkable inventions in Emma’s world, keeping pants tight on his hips without requiring any ties.
Once he had them on, he reached for the buckles on his brace, methodically loosening the leather that criss crossed his upper body. It had taken a long time for him to be comfortable baring his incomplete arm to his daughter, but he was glad he had finally managed to overcome the fear that had held him back.
He opened the door and stepped back out into the room, shivering slightly at the cooling air, padding his way across the room. He paused at the bed, pressing a gentle kiss to Swan’s shoulder, “You just rest easy love.” Then he continued on to the bathroom, where Hope had just pulled off her pants, ready to jump into the warm water of the massive tub.
He closed the door most of the way, in case Hope got loud, before he smiled at his baby girl as she beamed up at him.
“Are you ready, little love?” he asked softly.
She nodded quickly as an excited giggle escaped her, reaching her hand up to him. He put his right hand under her arm, while she lined up her forearm with his left one, making sure that his stump was firmly under her arm, holding on to his upper arm, helping him lift her with his only hand. Then her lifted her up, swinging her over the edge and into the tub, dropping her down slowly among the bubbles and the several rubber duckies he could see floating through the foam.
He quickly stepped in after her, settling down into the shallow water, his back pressing up against the freezing porcelain, facing the bathroom door, just in case Swan needed to get his attention from the room beyond. Hope settled in, delightedly splashing about with her toys for a bit before he decided to get the show on the road, so to speak.
“Hey little cygent, could you help me wash my hair?” he asked, and when she nodded excitedly, he leaned forward, smiling softly as he felt her tiny hands pressing soap bubbles into his hair, while she babbled about the rivetting events of what happened at her daycare that day.
He gasped and agreed at the right points, but was content to just let his little girl carry the conversation. When she had clapped, “Ok, Daddy, all done,” he sat up and smoothed, feeling the foam prickling against his scalp and knew he was going to have to properly wash his hair after he’d put his wee one to bed.
“Alright, little love, turn around for me, it’s your turn.”
He smiled triumphantly as she easily acquiesced, and he worked shampoo into her hair, before picking up the cup they kept on the rim to scoop up water to rinse it out. “Make sure to close your eyes and mouth little one,” he reminded her, before he slowly removed the shampoo. She continued to chatter as he repeated the process with conditioner. She had slowly fallen silent, and he figured that her day must be catching up with her so he was surprised when she spoke up just as he was about to start rinsing the conditioner out.
“Hey Daddy?”
“Yes, little love?”
“You said that the scars on your arm came from a bad man who wanted to make sure you didn’t get your happy ending, right?”
He was completely thrown by the randomness of the question and, unsure of where she was going with the line of questioning, he replied cautiously, “Aye, that’s true.”
“And your other scars are from people like that right? The ones on your back?”
He was completely thrown, but he remembered that conversation, when she had seen him after a shower, his scars clear against his skin. He couldn’t tell his daughter the real story, so he had found the best way he could to convey the origins of the scars, telling her they were from bad men who tried to keep him from being happy when he was younger.
He answered her again, “Yes, cygnet.”
She was quiet for a moment, so he quietly warned her about the water before he methodically rinsed her hair. He was in the process of returning the cup to its usual position on the rim of the tub when she turned to face him, her green eyes holding the same solemnity that her mother’s did when she spoke of something serious.
“Henry said that people who try to stop other people’s happy endings are evil.”
He blinked, brow furrowing as he felt a slight irritation at his stepson. Why on earth would he tell her such a thing?
“Is that right Daddy?” Her voice was earnest, the absolute belief she had in her big brother clear on her face. And he couldn’t find it in his heart to be the first to plant the seed of doubt in her brother’s knowledge of the world.
“Aye, little love, I suppose, in a way, that’s true.”
She nodded at his confirmation, then dropped her eyes down to his abdomen. She schooched forward and he held still, puzzled by his little girl. As she moved, he thought he could hear movement from the room beyond, and was pleased that his Swan might be up to being up and about again.
His attention was forcibly returned to his daughter when her hand pressed against the three inch puckered scar that resided just below his third rib, an ugly mark that refused any attempt at healing.
“You have never told me the story to this one here.”
And the next few moments seemed to happen in slow motion in his mind.
He saw the door open and Emma step through, her mouth opening in a question as she stepped over the threshold, but her eyes taking in Hope’s current point of focus. And as he watched Emma register that Hope was touching that particular scar, he heard his beautiful, innocent, and curious baby girl.
“They must have been really evil to try and stop you from getting your happy ending so hard.”
The effect was immediate and completely expected. Every light in the house flashed brightly before burning out as Emma spun out of the bathroom, a horrible gut wrenching sob reaching his ears as she fled.
“Cygnet, stay here and don’t move.” He could not help his sharp tone as he leapt from the bath, immediately giving chase to his wife, fear blocking out all thoughts except reaching her before she did something else, by accident or intentionally.
He managed to catch her as she tried to escape the house out the laundry room door, grabbing her arm and spinning her to face him. She immediately yielded, spinning directly into his chest as her shoulders heaved with sobs.
It took nearly an hour to get her to calm down, her violent breathes turning into dry heaving over the kitchen sink. As she slowly fell silent he had a feeling it had less to do with her breakdown abating and more the fact that she just had no energy left in her body to sustain it anymore.
His belief was confirmed when he realized she had fallen asleep hunched over the sink. So he carefully maneuvered her into his arms, her protruding stomach making a bit more difficult than it used to be, and carried her up the stairs. He noticed that that act was not as easy as it used to be either, and made the vaguest of mental notes to spend more time on the Jolly.
He carefully lowered her onto the comforter, tear stains glistening in the moonlight pouring through the window, her brows pulled low in her sleep, as if her anguished had followed her into her dreams. He ran his palm across her forehead, hoping to smooth out the furrows or comfort her in some way, but she gave a light whimper, frown deepening.
He sighed, pulling his hand away, reaching for the heated blanket from the bottom of the bed, and pulling it up over her, making sure to turn it on. He was glad to see that the indicator light came on, which meant that Swan hadn’t inadvertently fried the electricity again.
It was as he finally allowed himself a moment to breath that he realized he was still wet from the bath.
Hope.
Cursing quietly, he rushed back to the bathroom to get her. But he was shocked to find that not only was he daughter nowhere to be found, but the water had been drained, her clothes put into the hamper, and her towel missing. Confused, he made his way out of their room and down the dark hall to Hope’s room. Sure enough, he heard rustling coming from her room and the inconsistent light of a flashlight being swung around.
He heard a drawer close, and then the squeaking sound of her mattress springs as the light steadied out and stopped moving. He reached her doorway and quietly poked his head into her room, his heart just about beating out of his chest at the sight.
His little baby girl was sitting up in her bed, using a flashlight to read one of her picture books, her hair neatly brushed and tucked behind her ears, pijamas on, and her window curtains pulled shut.
She had never gotten herself ready for bed by herself before.
He knocked gently, and she looked up at him, but didn’t give him her usual smile.
“Hi Daddy.”
“Hi little one. May I come in?”
She nodded, closing the book and putting the flashlight on the bed, looking at him with a slightly worried expression. He stayed quiet, unsure how to explain the happenings of the last hour. But his daughter, as usual, cut to the heart of the matter.
“Grandma told me a story once, of a princess who had to kill her pirate to save everybody. She didn’t want to hurt him, and he didn’t want to be hurt, but because of the choices they had both made to protect the people they loved, they were the ones who had put everyone in danger in the first place. It was their responsibility to fix it, even if they wanted to choose anything else.”
She went silent as he processed her words. He could not believe that Mary Margaret had told her that story, and was going to have to talk to her about what he deemed appropriate for his four year old.
Hope seemed to read his frown, however.
“Don’t be mad at Grandma, Daddy. I overheard her talking and wanted to know what she was talking about. So its my fault for asking.”
“Oh darling,” he sighed, reaching out to tuck a few wayward strand of her hair behind her ear. “Its not your fault at all.”
She raised a dark eyebrow at him in a so reminiscent of his own expression, he couldn’t help the tiny smile that crept across his face. Hope gave him an tiny answering smile before her face grew serious again. “I’m sorry I didn’t stay in the tub like you told me too. The water got cold. And then mommy wasn’t feeling well, so I decided that I could help by getting myself ready for bed.”
“Oh my cygnet,” he sighed, reaching out and pulling her to his side. “Thank you for being so helpful. Its alright that you didn’t stay in the water. Are you alright?” He could only guess how distressing all this had been for her, having her mother react to a question the way she had.
He felt Hope nod against his chest before her little hand slid across his skin to cover the scar again. “Momma gave this to you, didn’t she? That’s why you don’t talk about it. That’s why she got so sad. Because she had to take away both of your happy endings.”
He felt the hard pressure of tears behind his eyes as he pressed a fierce kiss to her head.
“When did you get so smart, little love?” he whispered, not really sure if he meant to ask it out loud or not.
She shrugged, “It’s like when you yell at me for doing something that might hurt me. I’m sad that you yelled at me, and I know you don’t like doing it, but we are both better because you did.”
He couldn’t fight the tears anymore as he gave a breathless laugh against her hair, the anguish of those memories warring with his absolute devotion for his marvel of a daughter.
“I don’t know what your mother and I did to deserve you, little one.”
She pulled back, her brow furrowing as she studied him. He was almost disconcerted by how clearly her eyes seemed to perceive him.
“Well that’s easy Daddy. You loved me.”
He spent several moments trying to stead out his breathing. Once he wasn’t struggling to draw air into his lungs, he turned to check to see if Emma had woken from the movement. But he was disconcerted to find that she wasn’t in the bed beside him.
Quickly, he threw off the covers and headed out into the hall, grabbing his robe as he went and wrapping it around him to stave off the cold. He tried to figure out where Swan might have gone and noticed that Hope’s door wasn’t open, despite him leaving it so when he’d gone to bed.
Carefully he crept to the door and quietly opened it. To his surprise, it was not his daughter occupying the bed but his wife, tucked in with Hope’s favorite stuffed animal ticked in her grip. He looked more closely and saw that her face was peaceful. He was about to shut the door and go in search of his daughter when he noticed a ceramic mug on her bedside table that hadn’t been there earlier.
He silently crossed the room to pick the mug up, and when he peered inside, he felt tears press at his eyes again.
In the cup was cold milk with clumps of chocolate powder sitting in it and cinnamon sitting on top of that.
He could just picture it. Emma had come to their daughter in the night, maybe to watch her sleep or apologize. But he was sure, when Emma got their, Hope had awoke, and seeing her mother’s distressed state, had taken it upon herself to provide all the necessities to make anyone feel better. A stuffed animal, a nice tuck into bed, and hot chocolate. It was clear that she’d tried to make the drink with cold milk, probably not understanding how to heat it up.
He was certain that Hope had then had a conversation with her mother that brought that easy look of peace to his wife’s face as she slept.
Putting the mug back on the table with a shake of his head, he left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him, before making his way downstairs. With the first look through, he couldn’t locate her, and he was about to head back upstairs to check if he’d missed her in the bed with Swan when his foot his the squeaky stair and a sleepy voice called out, “Mommy?”
He turned back towards the living room to see Hope peering over the side of the couch, and he realized he’d missed her because she’d been lying down on the couch.
“No little love, it’s me. Momma’s upstairs sleeping. But what are you doing down here, cygnet? It freezing.”
Her head disappeared as she, he assumed, layed back down on the couch. “I’m ok, Momma brought her hot blankie into my room. Since she didn’t need it, I filpered it.”
He let out a small chuckle, “It’s pilfered little love.” He made his way around the couch. “Are you alight little one?”
She nodded, and although it was dark in the room, he could see her well enough that he could tell that she wasn’t trying to placate him. She really was undisturbed by the events of the night.
Then she asked, “But why are you up Daddy?”
He sighed, sitting down on the couch next to her curled up form. “I had a bad dream cygnet. That’s all.”
She shifted, sitting up again. ANd her words near about killed him with his love for her.
“Do you need my strength for tonight Daddy?”
It was the question he always posed to her when he heard her crying out in her sleep, usually waking herself up in the process. He’d pull her to him, hold her tight, and whisper to her, “Do you need my strength for tonight, little love?”
He managed to get out a choked up, “Yes little love,” before she reached out and tugged him to lie beside her. He settle up against the back of the couch, laying on his back. Hope squirmed a bit, until she was curled up on his chest, the heated blanket pulled up over both of them, the heat of the fabric paling in comparison to the deep warmth that was seeping into his bones at his daughter’s weight on him.
They both settled, each breathing quietly, and he actually felt his mind start to slow, the shadows of his dreams not gone, but no longer enough to distress him.
Then he heard his daughter’s voice, soft and sweet as a summer’s breeze.
My young love said to me,
"My mother won't mind
And my father won't slight you
For your lack of kind."
He breathed in deeply, letting the lullaby wash over him. Every scar, ever agony, every tear shed, every single struggle he had ever faced was worth it. To have his two truest loves.
He simply breathed as her song reverberated across his skin and drew him down into a peaceful slumber, his daughter’s gentle voice echoing in him mind and settling in his heart.
And she stepped away from me
And this she did say:
"It will not be long, love,
Till our wedding day."
As she stepped away from me
And she moved through the fair
And fondly I watched her
Move here and move there
And then she turned homeward
With one star awake
Like the swan in the evening
Moves over the lake.
The people were saying,
No two e'er were wed
But one had a sorrow
That never was said
And I smiled as she passed
With her goods and her gear,
And that was the last
That I saw of my dear.
Last night she came to me,
My dead love came in
So softly she came
That her feet made no din
As she laid her hand on me
And this she did say
"It will not be long, love,
Till our wedding day.”
#cs secret santa#csss love-with-you-i-have-everything 2018#Captain Swan#csss2018#gingerchangeling does writing
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A Christmas Miracle (1/1)
Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas! @branlovestowrite, this is your Secret Santa gift from me, you Captain Swan Secret Santa for 2018 @cssecretsanta2k18! It was a pleasure chatting with you and I hope that this tickles your fancy for pining and people getting stuck together. (Unbeta’d since I ran out of time)
Summary: After a long wedding, a blackout causes Maid of Honor Emma Swan to become stuck in an elevator with one of the groomsman, who she had unceremoniously rejected after a one-night-stand two years ago, despite her growing feelings for him.
Rating: PG-13 (for language)
AO3
A pair of black, strappy heals dangled from Emma’s tired fingers as she pressed the down button to summon the elevator. With eyes closed, she stretched her neck side-to-side and massaged the tense muscles.
A chuckle came from Emma’s right. “Tired, love?”
Emma cracked open one eye and glared as best she could at the chipper sounding British man. Despite it being nearly 1 am after a day full of wedding chaos, Killian Jones looked just as polished as he had at 3 pm that afternoon, standing next to David at the altar. Wear-as she had a barely concealed wine stain on her dress, her hair was falling out of its intricate up-do, and she knew the smoky-eye eyeshadow she had worn earlier now resembled a raccoon mask. She moved her hand from her neck and pressed lightly on her temple with only her middle finger.
This elicited another laugh from Jones. The sound sent a small shiver down Emma’s spine as she remembered the way his laugh had felt against her neck the one time they had slept together.
It had been two years ago, at the first Christmas party Mary Margaret and David had thrown at their new house in Cambridge. Killian had just moved to Boston from England six months before and was working as a private investigator. He’d met David, a BPD detective, after Killian’s investigation into an embezzling business partner had collided with David’s inquiry into tax fraud.
Killian was handsome, charismatic, and had more than a bit of bad boy charm. Emma had been instantly attracted to him and hadn’t protested his kiss when they’d gotten caught under the mistletoe later in the evening.
After that, one thing had led to another and Emma had woken up the next morning at Killian’s apartment, something Emma never did. What had been more surprising had been the fact that, curled up in Killian’s arms, she felt no need to run. After they managed to drag themselves from his bed, they had a great morning together; Killian made a proper English breakfast in his boxers while Emma drank coffee and enjoyed the show. Everything had been amazing, until his ex-girlfriend had shown up.
The elevator ding startled Emma. She must have jumped, because Killian shot her a concerned look as she carefully stepped through the opulent golden doors. He joined her a moment later.
“What floor?”
“Three.”
Killian pressed the buttons for both three and four, the other floor presumably where his own room was located.
She murmured her thanks as she leaned heavily against the wall. The elevator door closed and blocked out the sounds of the wedding reception that was winding down. The bride and groom had departed fifteen minutes ago, which had been the signal that Emma was finally free from her duties until the next morning.
Emma loved Mary Margaret, her best friends for nearly a decade, and she was thrilled that she had married such an amazing guy as David Nolan, but being her Maid of Honor had been far more exhausting than Emma had anticipated.
While she contemplated whether she had enough energy to take a bath with the aromatherapy bath bomb that been part of the gift Mary Margaret had given to her bridesmaids the elevator lurched to a rough stop. Emma’s eyes shot open just in time to see the lights flicker and go out. Only a small light above the door continued to glow.
Emma pulled her cellphone from her clutch and turned on the flashlight.
She looked at Killian. “Bloody hell,” he muttered as he pressed the call button located at the bottom of the panel.
“Help situation in elevator two,” an automated voice said. “Help needed.”
Static followed.
“Do you think it’s the storm?” Killian whispered.
Emma had forgotten about the raging storm that was traveling down from Canada to blanket New England in snow. Boston was due for over a foot, if Emma recalled correctly, but not for another day or so.
Before Emma could reply, a calm male voice issued from the speaker panel. “Elevator two, is everything alright?”
“Except for the fact that the elevator isn’t moving, yes, everything is perfect,” Emma replied, unable to keep the sarcasm from her voice. Beside her, Killian grinned.
The person on the other end ignored her attitude, likely accustomed to people being upset when stuck in an elevator. “The area you’re in has lost power. Are there any passengers in distress?”
Emma looked over at Killian, who was still grinning, then replied with a simple “no”.
“The staff at the Omni Parker have been alerted to your situation. Remain calm until they are able to get to you.”
More static followed.
With a groan, Emma sank to the wood paneled floor of the elevator, her long golden dress pooling around her.
Killian joined her on the cold floor a moment later, situated directly across from her. He ran his hand through his hair, making it more ruffled than normal. “Seems like we’re going to be stuck for a bit, lass.”
Great. Just great.
Of all the people for her to be stuck in the elevator with, it just had to be Killian Jones.
When Killian’s ex, Milah, had arrived, Emma had beat a hasty retreat from the apartment. But she had been there long enough to see the battle of emotions that had played across Killian’s face when he looked at the gorgeous brunette. They may have been broken up, and he was deeply hurt by whatever had happened, but he still loved her.
Killian had called the next day and had apologized for what happened. Milah, he assured her, was out of the picture, and he wanted to take Emma out on a proper date.
Unsettled by everything that had happened, Emma did what she did best.
She pushed him away.
Told him that the other evening was a one-time thing. That she had no interest in getting to know him any further.
She’d regretted it immediately. And over the next few years, she’d wished so many times she could take it back. But she didn’t know how, so she just avoided Killian as best she could.
The one man she wished she could spend more time with, yet at the same moment, wanted to be as far from as possible.
And now she was stuck in an elevator with him for who knew how long.
Emma’s phone buzzed in her hand. She only had 15% battery.
“Perfect,” she muttered. “Just perfect.”
“You alright there, Swan?”
Emma held up her phone so he could see the power level.
He frowned. “I sent a text to Graham and Ruby, letting them know of our predicament. They are going to try and keep us updated as best they can on the power situation. But I only have around 20% battery myself.”
“Why don’t I turn my phone off for now, so that when yours starts to die we can still use mine?” She suggested.
At Killian’s nod, Emma shut her phone off. But even after the screen went dark, she continued to stare at it.
Eventually, Emma looked up and forced a smile. “Guess we won’t be playing Angry Birds to pass the time,” she said sardonically.
This time, Killian didn’t laugh. Instead, his brows lowered and he studied her with serious eyes.
“Are you claustrophobic?”
Emma blinked in shock. “No, I’m not. Are you?”
“No. But you’re acting rather odd, Swan. Are you sure you’re alright?”
Her “I’m fine” was automatic.
Killian raised one eyebrow, obviously not believing her.
Emma sighed. “I’m just tired.”
Killian nodded but he didn’t look convinced. Thankfully, he didn’t inquire further.
Deciding to get as comfortable as possible, Emma shifted so that the layers of her dress separated her bottom from the cold floor. After, she started pulling out as many of the bobby pins in her hair as she could find.
After pulling out over two dozen, Emma muttered, “How many of these fucking things are there?”
A snort, hastily covered by a cough, came from the man in front of her. Emma shot her best glare at Killian in return as she worked at a particularly stubborn pin.
“Can I be of assistance?”
Emma’s hand froze as she remembered how amazing his hands in her hair felt.
The morning after their night together, Killian had spent nearly an hour combing through her hair with his fingers. He had carefully worked through the tangles caused by their passionate coupling and massaged her scalp. It had almost been enough to lure Emma back to sleep, but her stomach had demanded attention before she could doze off again.
Killian’s face fell as she hesitated.
Emma felt horrible; like she had just kicked a puppy.
Killian had been a godsend the past year. He’d stepped up and helped with any and all wedding planning duties passed to him when David’s Best Man, Graham, traveled back to Ireland due to a visa issue and been gone for six months. Emma and Killian had spent hours traveling around the Boston area visiting florists, bakeries, and caterers with Mary Margaret and David. Despite how standoffish she had been toward him, Killian was kind and cheerful, never once pushing her to talk about what had happened between them.
And here she was, being a bitch in return.
“Killian,” she said softly. “I would appreciate your help.”
The butterflies in her stomach returned at his boyish grin.
Killian scooted across the floor and, with a gentle hand, urged Emma to turn toward the front of the elevator with her back to him. He immediately went to work, handing her the pins as he removed them. A few were quite stuck, probably glued in place by all the product the hairstylist had used on her hair, and Killian whispered apologies each time he had to pull with any force.
After the pin that was jabbing at her scalp was removed, Emma couldn’t keep from moaning. That basted thing had aggravated her all evening. Killian’s hand in her hair paused for a moment at the sound, but quickly went back to work. His fingers slid across her scalp and carefully undid the hairstyle that had taken the stylist over an hour to do.
Emma was quite relaxed by the time Killian announced that he had removed all the pins he could find. When she turned her head to thank him, she found that he was much closer than anticipated, his face hovering just over her left shoulder.
The words stuck in her throat as her gaze traveled up his handsome face. His beard was a little thicker than normal. Grown-out, she knew, to look more professional. The extra length made its reddish color more prominent. His lips were a little chapped and she watched as he licked them with his tongue. His wicked, talented tongue.
Emma felt a blush travel up her face as her eyes reached Killian’s at the memory of the pleasure his tongue brought her just before Christmas a few years ago. She hoped that he didn’t notice.
His furrowed brow told her that she had no such luck. “Are you alright? You feel warm.”
Touched by his concern, and overwhelmed by the emotions it elicited in her, Emma collapsed backward against Killian’s chest, her head resting on his shoulder. His hand immediately shot to her forehead, presumably to check whether she was running a temperature. She gently pulled it away and held it, resting on her lap.
“I’m sorry, Killian. For what happened the other year.” She stared at the dark wood wall of the elevator as she spoke. “I didn’t know how to handle how comfortable I felt with you and I panicked.”
Silence followed her admission.
As it drew on, Emma moved to lift herself off of Killian when suddenly the arm of the hand she was holding drew her back.
“Emma, please open your eyes.”
She didn’t even know she had closed them.
When she opened them again, Killian’s face was just inches from hers.
He was smiling.
She smiled back.
Slowly, his face came closer. His beard tickled when he pressed a soft kiss against her lips.
“Does this mean,” he said when he pulled away, “that I can finally take you out to dinner?”
“I would love that.”
They kissed again, slowly, softly, until Emma’s body reminded her that she had been up for nearly 20 long, stressful hours. Killian insisted she remain propped against him and she dozed off with her head tucked against his neck.
Emma startled awake and grasped tightly to Killian when a grinding noise came from the elevator doors. She blinked rapidly when the doors opened and the beam of a flashlight passed over her face.
“Well, look at that,” an amused Irish-accented voice said, “it’s a bloody Christmas miracle.”
“Very funny Graham,” Killian said dryly as he helped her to her feet. The elevator had stopped just before it finished passing the 10th floor and Graham had to crouch down to talk to them. The gap couldn’t have been more than two feet tall.
“Killian, give Emma a boost up and we’ll get the two of you out.”
After passing her shoes and clutch through the gap to Graham, Killian took off his suit jacket and slipped it over her arms.
“Just in case,” he whispered in her ear as he buttoned it closed.
With Graham holding her arms and Killian’s firm grip on her hips, Emma was able to climb through the gap without a problem. Ruby appeared and helped Emma to her feet, carefully inspecting her for any injuries.
Ruby pulled Emma into a tight hug. “We were so worried! I knew you were heading back to your room when the power went out and I was terrified you were stuck alone until I got Killian’s text!” she exclaimed.
Emma assured her friend that she was okay as she watched Graham help Killian out of the elevator. In the dim emergency lighting, she could see a streak of grease or dirt had smeared along the front of his dress shirt. Once Ruby had moved to wrap Killian in her death grip hug, Emma looked down at herself and saw that Killian’s jacket had protected her dress from getting dirty during her climb out.
Thank you, she mouthed at him. She received a wink in return.
They all thanked the maintenance man who had engineered their release before he headed off to help extract another group of people stuck between the fourth and fifth floor.
Emma looked at Graham. “What caused the power to go out?”
Her friend shrugged. “Not sure. They think some of the city’s preparations for the storm may have disturbed some wiring.”
“Can we still get in our rooms?”
It was Ruby who answered. “The door locks run on batteries, so you shouldn’t have any trouble. But you’ll need to get a few flashlights from front desk. And some extra blankets.”
With Ruby and Graham in the lead, they started toward the closest stairwell. Killian’s arm wrapped around Emma’s waist and he pulled her close to whisper in her ear.
“Would you object to sharing a room tonight, Swan? Keep each other warm?”
Emma giggle caused Ruby and Graham to turn around just in time to see Emma wrap her arms around Killian’s neck and pull him in for a passionate kiss.
Graham shook his head while Ruby grinned.
“You were right, it is a Christmas miracle.”
I hope you enjoyed this little gift!
#captain swan secret santa 2018#CSSS2018#Captain Swan#Lee writes#Captain Swan AU#OUaT#CS ff#CS fanfiction
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Is it still snowboarding if you're using a skateboard?
My secret santa for Maralace in the SymphPond group~ Boo looks like she took advantage of the snow to make some ramps, and is now doing some Sick Stunts!
#pyro draws#symphonie#cs#closed species#secret santa#we're still on 2018 art folks I've yet to draw anything this year#SOON
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Ho ho ho it's Santa here and we're in the final countdown (cue the funky kazoo music). So I was wondering... what are your favourite family dynamics for Emma and Killian? And as a non-Once question, favourite Christmas treats? Love, CS Secret Santa
Well hello there Santa! Yes, it feels like the home stretch! Love the kazoo music! Favorite family dynamics? I LOVE totally besotted with Emma papa Killian. Little ones running around that he loves to pieces, but still totally in love with Emma and shows it.
And favorite Christmas treat is pretty much anything chocolate.
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Come cringe with me - ɟ
Guys… The cringe… The cringe 😖😖 I’ve been gone for less than 24 hours and I’m bombarded with news. One that made me very happy (who knows what I mean, gets me 😏 and heartfelt thanks to everyone who helped 🥰😍🤗), and others, most of which are honestly making me cringe to the core.
Point number 1.
Have you learned nothing all these years?
All the people who believe in all those accounts like T, my question is: why? No, seriously, why? Mari sent me screenshots of the list they posted that ‘should belong’ to Scooter, and where are the proofs of what they say? And I don’t mean something that can be easily faked like a Word document, or phone notes. I mean actual proofs.
So why do you fall for it? Because you’re kind-hearted? Because you still believe in Santa Claus? So if I were to write a list based on what people want to hear, would you believe it? Okay, let’s give it a try:
1° Shawmila will break up before Cinderella’s release.
2° Camila will come out as queer after the movie reviews.
3° Lauren’s album will be released in March 2021 around Camila’s birthday.
4° Camren will tell the world about their epic love story in late 2022.
🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄
Guys, come on. What else do you still need to open your eyes? Did you forget all the accounts that turned out to be impostors? I wasn’t here at the time when it happened, but Mari told me about a Lola, Lota? I don’t remember her name. But take her as an example. Or take the story about Lauren’s journal. Remember that one?
For those who don’t know, on September 16, 2016, Lauren tweeted: “So just found out my journal was thrown away in Nevada..there’s no feeling in the world to describe the desolation I feel inside my soul”. And coincidentally, a fan, who along with three of their friends found it after eight hours of searching in the dumpsters, posted a video the next day with this so-called journal belonging to LMJM. The journal was obviously a fake.
It’s easy to fake something nowadays and pass it off as proof. So please don’t be so gullible.
Point number 2.
For all those who still don’t understand how things work behind the scenes.
The music industry, even if it doesn’t seem like it, is as small as a butthole, literally. Everyone knows everyone. Everyone uses everyone. Things are planned months and even years before. Everything has a purpose. Why am I saying this? Because Roger is in touch and has connections with as many people as possible. Even more horrible people than Scotti bRice. Whether you like it or not, he needs to have these connections FOR Camila. Think about this. Camila has always been his priority since 2015. If C is where she is now, if she has and has had this success, it’s also thanks to him.
Point number 3.
As for the Shitshowmila situation and the CS who are leaving because they can no longer bear the weight of their monkey business, guys, okay, go if you really can do it no more. But I want you to think about one thing. Picture the sharks pat you on the back and walk you out the door with a huge smirk plastered on their faces. Because that’s what happens when you play their game, and my friends, although I understand that everyone is free to do and believe what they want, you make them win by leaving.
The days of Shout’s releases are approaching, it’s obvious that everything will be thrown in our face and that everything will be heavier. Because THAT’S HOW IT WORKS. You have to resist. You have to be patient. Do you think that I myself don’t get annoyed to see all that falsehood? It’s more the time that I roll my eyes than the rest.
“It’s all about her”. Yeah, sure, Chin Chin. And what about the relationship you had for two years (2014-2016) with that girl, Lauren Arendese? Didn’t you confirm that in that Q&A in 2017? Didn’t you say you had a girlfriend for two years and write songs about her that day, therefore loooong before this whole made-up comical little story? Ah, no? My bad. *And then I’m sorry but when have you ever write your songs?* And what about the example of the song you used, Treat You Better? Weren’t you together with Lauren at the time? And above all, 🎵 “The second you say you’d like me to” 🎵, didn’t you say you never had the balls to tell her you liked her and that you were going to do it when her PR with Matteush started? 2016 song, 2018 when you were supposed to confess your oh so great love. The math, the math…
There will always be holes in their narratives, guys. There will always be bullshit that they will try to inculcate in us to make us fall into their traps. With any PR. You need to resist. You must not give them any importance. You must not fall into the traps. You need to keep your eyes open. Don’t give up. And above all, don’t give up on hope.
I love you guys. Always with love, F. ❤️
P.S. I’m not 100% back yet, but I couldn’t resist after talking to Mari.
___
Thank you for the necessary wake-up call, because it was something that was not really taken into consideration. But what you're saying is true, although I really don't like the part about Scooby tied to Camila. Disgusting. I think the most basic problem here is that the anons, the fans who leave have been too bombarded by all the circus they see on social networks, because all that shit comes from there. I know, because I do my best to ignore all that mess and nothing happens to me when I ignore everything. I am aware that it is there, that the clowns behind the PR are desperate to sell showmila and do whatever it takes to win that goal, that we can disrupt. It can. Most of us don't believe that circus because we know that they started creating it in 2015 and had to stop because Camila needed to launch her solo career and they took up the circus in 2018. Since that year, there has been talk of a showmila circus on steroids and that. is what we are seeing. Nothing they do or what they say will make us change and believe that Showmila is real because the Diva was never there with Camila. Not in the sense that they want to sell because it wasn't even that way from the beginning.
So at least, for those of us who believe that Showmila has been a boosted circus since 2018, nothing they do will make us believe otherwise. Lauren didn't make it with her podcast, no one will.
And for the anons who want evidence, I am sorry to say that direct evidence from Camren will never have unless Lauren or Camila want to show us something. Keep in mind, folks. Artists have two lives for a reason. It's to keep your private life private and not transform it into a PR circus like Showmila. And I think we have to respect their decision. At least that's what I've decided. I love both girls too much to risk something as important to them as their privacy.
And F, was Loca. That insider was called Loca.
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Dark beer in Prague, OMG! Yes, distances are short here in Europe, it's easier to see different places and also slightly different cultures, and honestly, before I go to far away places, I prefer to go to a place in Europe I haven't been yet. So, law school? Have you ever regretted the decision? I'm sure it's hard (and sometimes boring?), I hope you can relax a bit over the holidays! Is it going to be a big family event? ~csss
Living in Europe has honestly been an adventure and I wouldn’t give it up for the universe. I’ve hit big chunk of it and see there’s more to see. Hopefully I’ll get to see more of it and Asia and Africa. I’m just hungry for travel and exploring and learning new things.
As for law school, I wouldn’t say I regretted it. If anything, being in law school has made me a stronger person. It’s kinda of a forge really; a baptism by fire. It’s more breaking into the professional side of things that’s hard but I’m a tough cookie and I’m going to break in, one way or another whether it be in the United Kingdom or in the United States. I’m not afraid to work my ass off to get what I want. And that’s really what law school is a lot of work. The material isn’t hard, it’s just a lot and once you rewire your thinking it gets a lot easier. I don’t regret it. I’m just stressed the hell out but once I get through it, I know it’s worth it.
Law is not boring. Not in the slightest. If anything, it’s more like a puzzle and some pieces a bit more jagged and hard to place than others. It’s just finding where the pieces fit. There are some cases that stay with me. I don’t forget the cases I learned for criminal law easy. It’s hard to. Knowing what people can and will do to each other, it makes you cynical. It’s easy to see what a lot of solicitors like to stay to the financial side of things. It’s easier to be detached and it makes more money. I’m more of the international side of things. International law is seen as a bit of a joke right now but it’s only going to get more and more relevant.
As for the holidays, unfortunately I don’t get much reprieve about I have four exams come January so I’m going to be studying my ass off for the next month. However, it will be nice for have my parents here for a week and half for the holidays. And yeah, it’s going to be a nice family event for the four days we’re in Italy together. That’s the only vacation I’m really giving myself then I’m just going to be hitting the books and doing the best I can to kill those exams so maybe someone will hire me.
Sorry for the ramble.
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I loved Bohemian Rhapsody! I left the cinema in such a good mood. I’ll never quite understand why people wanted it to be darker and grittier, when it was such an enjoyable illustration of the transformative, unifying nature of music. - Santa
My sister sent me this and I knew I had to share it with you. I think a lot of people wanted... I don’t know... the last of his days? How he would’ve looked dying and wasted away? How the band coped immediately after? I think it’s something to do with the voyeurism of death where some fans think it’s owed to them to see how it all played out in the end. I think the way they ended it, instead, was a much better way. Much better for the heart.
Hope you’re having an excellent day, santa. I’m going to nip my potential internet fucking about at the start and go grade essays before I get sucked into the tumblr vortex.
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Ho-ho-ho! It's your secret santa again! If you like bed sharing then you'll really like your gift (at least I hope so anyway). I don't blame you about not wanting to read lengthy CS break ups I'm not a fan of them either. My holidays are going really well. I'm on break from nursing school, so I'm trying to write/read as much as possible. How are your holidays going?
Woo Hoo! Love bedsharing. How exciting, it’s so nice of you to put so much thought into it. I appreciate it!
Nursing school? That’s amazing! Congrats. I think the world of nurses. Glad you’re getting a holiday break and getting to read some fic, I’m hoping to do a bit of that next week after Christmas since I’ll be off work and have time.
My holidays have been fabulous so far. Very busy, but I’ve done all the things I wanted to do. Today, I head to see my family. It’s not too far a drive, but far enough that I can’t pop back home if I forget anything so I need to pack up everything I’ll need including presents and food this morning. Busy!
Happy Holidays to you!
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MASTERLISTs from 2018 & 2019
hey dear participants!
I thought why not thinking about the good old days and the last two CS Secret Santa events?
Here you find the lists of 2018 and 2019. Enjoy!
PS: This year we will also have a masterlist of all your gifts. I will post it around New Year after all gifts have been posted by you.
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Fic Year in Review 2020 edition
I was tagged by my wonderful friend @kmomof4. Thank you for being one of my biggest encouragers, along with @xsajx, to write as much as I did last year!
Total number of completed stories: 4 complete stories, plus 6 outtakes for Devastation and Healing, and credit for High Confessions and What Came Next, which Krystal wrote for my birthday, but was kind enough to allow me to add to an already perfect story.
Total word count: 118,481 which includes the 1403 words I added to Krystal’s story.
Looking back, did you write more, less, or about what you expected this year? Well, considering that I swore I would never write another story after an OS that I wrote in 2018 to add to a story by @kymbersmith-90, I guess I’d have to say about 118,481 MORE words than I expected to write!
What’s your own favorite story of the year? That’s like asking me to choose my favorite child! (Don’t tell my kids, but my favorite is my dog Zeke!) I guess I’ll have to go with Devastation and Healing, just because it ended up being 24 chapters and 6 outtakes long, which is far more than I ever thought I was capable of writing. The Prologue for it is my favorite thing that I’ve ever written, and I still don’t know how I came up with it! Plus, it was my first angsty story and required a lot of support from several of my friends (and one friend’s husband!), as well as excellent beta services from @hookedmom, who has been my loyal beta for nearly every one of my stories. I really love the version of Emma and Killian that I created for this story.
Do you have any fanfic goals for the next year? I’m currently 5 chapters into a new story, for which I’ll be posting a sneak peek on January 30 for Captain Swan January Joy. The tentative title is Sowing Seeds of Trust and will focus on homeless Emma. After the sneak peek goes up, I’ll start a regular posting schedule, hopefully.
Most popular story of the year? This is like comparing apples to oranges, because Devastation and Healing (along with its outtakes) got the most hits by far, but it was also 24 + 6 chapters long, whereas the others were all one-shots. Out of those (and I’m not counting Krystal’s story because I only added a short section so I shouldn’t get the credit), Time Alone got the most hits, and The Mystery Carver of Storybrooke got the most kudos. Of course, Snowstorm Confessions hasn’t been up for very long, so it might go surging ahead.
Story of mine most underrated by the universe, in my opinion? I’m going to cheat on this one, because it’s from 2019, and go with Reception Redos and Jellymoons. This was my first MC and it’s all fluff and sweetness, but it never drew the readers that I was hoping it would.
Most fun story to write? I’ll have to say it was The Mystery Carver of Storybrooke because I wrote it, with @kymbersmith-90‘s help, as a gift for our good friend @kmomof4‘s birthday. Snowstorm Confessions was also a lot of fun because it was for CS Secret Santa and gave me a chance to get to know @girl-in-a-tiny-box.
Biggest surprise: That ANYBODY took the time to read my stories when there are so many excellent authors and CS fics out there!
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Tagging: all wonderful authors who want to reflect on their writing from 2020.
#tag games#fic year in review#2020 edition#jrob64#devastation and healing#the mystery carver of storybrooke#snowstorm confessions#time alone#high confessions and what came next#reception redos and jellymoons
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So I guess this is a thing people do, yeah?
Holiday Collections/Series:
Mistletoeing & Hearts Glowing -- a collection of Christmas/winter based prompts. 10 one-shots. December 2017.
Love is All You Need -- a collection of Valentine’s Day based prompts. 8 one-shots. February 2018.
Challenge/Gifted One-Shots:
Come in From the Cold -- Emma has had a crush on superstitious Killian Jones for years now, but he still sees her as the same little girl the Nolans adopted so many years ago. Where's the mistletoe when you need it? (A Secret Santa Gift for a since deactivated blog from Christmas 2017)
It’s Like Rain on Your Wedding Day -- Emma Swan looks back on the many years she's known Killian Jones as she prepares to meet him at the altar. (Contribution to the 2018 @csjanuaryjoy)
Galentine’s Day -- Emma Swan has zero girl friends, so why was she the one assigned to write about a day celebrating them? (Secret Valentine gift for @yasmin-khan from February 2018).
The Fox and the Hound -- Years ago, Killian Jones left his youthful days of illicit romance and causing trouble behind him in favor of walking dogs for a living in Storybrooke. He’s been working for the same families for years, so discovering David Nolan’s beautiful yet closed off sister behind their apartment door is a surprise. It's not long before Killian finds himself coming down with a case of puppy love, but Emma might just send him home with his tail between his legs. (Contribution to the 2018 @captainswanbigbang CSLB).
Plain White T’s Song Project:
Natural Disaster -- Killian Jones, lead singer of the up-and-coming rock band Deaf Horses, does NOT date fans. So it's a good thing Emma Swan isn't one.
Meet Me in California -- Killian Jones has a dream that's taking him to the west coast, but the love of his life, one Emma Swan, wants to stay back east. A little angsty one-shot.
No Imitations -- Emma Swan is terrified of heights. Can her boyfriend help her out?
I Really Want You -- One universe, three ficlets. Some Modern AU Swan-Jones family fluff to get you going.
MC(s):
A Fan of Every Part of You -- Killian Jones has a really loud, destructive upstairs neighbor, and he's about to lose his patience with them. But when he discovers that it's a beautiful witch with a soft spot for his dangerous familiar, Captain, that complicates things just a bit. (Contribution to 2019 @csrolereversal).
Matchmakers -- Salesman Killian Jones has been in love with receptionist Emma Swan for as long as he can remember. While he's left pining away for her, a ring on her finger from another man, he's setting up half the office on dates. (In other words, OUAT in an Office 'verse). (Currently being rewritten for @captainswanbigbang CS Rewrite-A-Thon).
I’d Pick You (and Your Little Dog, Too) -- According to everyone in the known universe, Emma Nolan's dog is supposed to lead her to her soulmate. But she's not even sure if she wants that. Soulmates are pretty idealistic, don't you think? (Currently being posted as a part of the 2019 @cspupstravaganza).
#captain swan#captain swan fanfic#i don't know if anyone cares but i really just wanted to link all my stuff in one spot#yanno?
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Sunday reading recap (9-Dec-2018)
still alive
totally used instacart to buy cold supplies from the grocery store
spent a lot of time catching up on season 6 of Elementary + a few other shows so less reading this week!
Omega Defiant (Wolves in the World #2) (Dessa Lux, 399 pgs) - loved the 1st book in this series and this second one does not disappoint either. I love a story where two people learn that their broken edges fit together perfectly. And even when you can see the big bad conflict/danger coming, the character is built so well that you totally understand why they have to make the decision that they did -- anything else would have been so OOC. Cannot fucking wait for the next installment.
Omega Wintertide (Wolves in the World # 2.5) (Dessa Lux, 79 pgs) - gorgeous little holiday novella that basically gives codas to the two couples from the 1st 2 books and an episode from another character we met in Book 2, who I suspect will get his own book eventually.
Santa Daddy (Kiera Andrews) full of tropey goodness (virgin hero, age gap, snowbound, a little daddy kink), I enjoyed it well enough.
The Working Elf Blues (Piper Vaughn, 46 pgs) also satisfactory
That Turtle Story (CS Poe) short story. Quick but funny & charming & heartfelt, I just really love this author. I really love the stories she sets in her hometown of Key West.
The Christmas Angel series - I like this concept - a series of (mostly) novellas set in different historical periods, all related only by the angel ornament. a lot of authors I like are contributing; all can be read as standalones. I enjoyed most of them a LOT.
Christmas Angel (The Christmas Angel #1, Eli Easton, 121 pgs) - Georgian era (1750ish) -- the sculptor of the angel + a Bow Street Runner. ❤❤❤❤
Summerfield's Angel (The Christmas Angel #2, Kim Fielding, 113 pgs) 1888 - department store heir + displaced cowboy. ❤❤❤❤❤
The Magician's Angel (The Christmas Angel #3, Jordan L Hawk, 108 pgs) 1910 - a vaudeville magician + small town accountant. Of course this one’s a murder mystery as well. ❤❤❤❤
Christmas Homecoming (The Christmas Angel #4, LA Witt, 79 pgs) - WWII - two BFF’s realize they are more than that, just as one leaves for college, and then the war happens so they are very different when they meet again. So far this one was my least fav mainly bc I don’t love the whole ‘oh noes we are gay! how will we ever live!’ angsty thing. Luckily bc it’s so short there’s not too much time to spend on it.
#sunday reading recap#bookgeekgrrl's reading habits#christmas#time for the holiday reading!!!#dessa lux#wolves in the world series#omega defiant#omega wintertide#cs poe#the christmas angel series
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