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It’s three years later and a handful of months after the death of Peter Pan, and extraordinary things have happened since. The merciful death of Captain Killian Jones is one, but Killian came back to the living and was wounded tight in the arms of a Swan that tried so hard to embrace his torso in warm feathers. He accepted the hug in it's futile attempt, buried his nose in blonde locks wishing for a different scent that wasn't there, that never would be; and all because that hug was something, just nothing he wanted or desired deeper than the surface. Still, he continued on with intertwining his fingers in the Swan Lady’s, telling her how glad he is to be back on cold, hard ground.
He smokes now. Well, Killian’s smoked before but not like this. In the Enchanted Forest it was tobacco pipes and cigars; here in Storybrooke it's tiny white and orange sticks called cigarettes. (The medicine man gave him a little glass pen first, said it smelled as sweet as molasses and tasted even better, but he was a liar.) They remind Killian of coffee cooked over a fire pit in the heart of Neverland, quickly burnt from paying attention to the settling of trees and rustle of nocturnal life, ashy. He smokes them when he can, usually at three in the morning with the fan on high as he blows dark, billowing clouds out the window then he flushes the evidence in the washroom, cleaning his mouth with a green alcohol Swan said not to drink. She doesn't like his smoking, said it's disgusting and only going to kill him again faster, so he hides the sticks in an empty flask (matches in his coat pocket) and finds solace in chewing gum and some mist called Febreeze.
He still drinks. Always drinks. Always has. The longest Killian's ever been sober was a year, when he and Liam cleaned up for the Navy, then that went to shit and here he is. The consumption is always consistent, follows a pattern most days. If stressed, he might black out. If calm, he'll be living in the realm of tipsy and functional. If happy, he might forget a shot until he's depressed and he throws up in the bushes (even after hundreds of years of tolerance). Three years and some months ago was the worst, Killian felt lost without the demon who terrorized him, who built him up to be a cutthroat pirate in all his glory of looting and slaughtering the likes of men and fiends. He drowned his sorrows heavily after, until his gut was filled with so much alcohol someone could get drunk off his piss.
The relationship between boy and pirate wasn't all bad. He remembers touches in the Dark Wood beside the glow of a crackling fire pit, hands roaming and mouths touching; he saw the warm embrace of Peter Pan as a carnal urge to satisfy human desires, as meaningless. Now? He misses it, craves it as much as his other addictions.
When Killian died- When he went to the underworld? Pan was there. Killian saw him through Gold’s pawn shop window before he evaporated in a cloud of green like he always used to. He heard the other residents talk about him (Liam had plenty to say until he didn’t), but Pan never sought him out and whenever Killian searched instead he found nothing. It was obvious after the hero's departure, leaving him behind to a world of wandering souls, that Pan didn't want to see him. Killian yelled his name and asked around but Pan was nowhere, gone, then Zeus hauled his ass away before it really soaked in, told him he was returning to the world of the living, leaving the isle of the lost. He was on the brink of screaming no, he wanted to see Pan first, but it was too late. There was a flash of white light that dissipated into a graveyard and the lover he gave up, the second one he supposes. That's when the hug came and it killed him more internally than the cigarettes would accomplish in a lifetime.
Now and then Killian runs into some of the old lost boys, eyes them as they pass, coward the only word running through his mind as they cling to their new mothers at the sight of him. He’s not scared of the feral children turned tame, part of him even trusts them, because they know the past. They know of the filthy trysts of one Captain Hook and one Peter Pan, and they may be cowards but they are not incompetent. The lost boys spilled Pan’s secrets on Neverland to escape it’s clutches, but in Storybrooke they want to be as quiet as possible with bloody tongues and grit teeth, nothing to spoil the second chance they won and be met with the sharp end of a hook. So they mind their own and pretend like they've forgotten all about Peter Pan when approached with the subject, shrugging it off like they never went to Neverland and danced with wolves at night or hunted wild Neverbeast for a meal. Killian pretends too when David or Emma inquire. He told them every second away is a moment forgotten, a price every visitor pays for growing up. Killian’s a liar though, or he’s waded in the frozen realm’s beaches so long the seconds away will never fully catch up to three hundred years worth of moments spent. To his knowledge, he remembers everything from his first steps on rocky shores to the bitter last to the bloody hellish, lusty thrill inbetween.
It’s sobering the way Killian remembers everything, looking back and longing for things he once revelled with awe. Like the smell of evergreen and saltwater in the morning; or watching from the top deck of the Jolly Roger as the island underwent metamorphosis to fit a new game; or how vines and flowers would tangle in Pan’s hair every time he laughed; or how bright the stars glittered with souls of the damned. He hates how he misses it. He hates how Maine smells like fish, how his ship is missing, how the flowers never bloom, and how the stars in Storybrooke dull under the town's harsh lights. He detests that because of his melancholy his polished boots are now muddy, and after three years and a handful of months he's staring at an unmarked grave hidden in the woods, one he dug after the Wicked Witch’s curse in a hazy afternoon of booze and more booze.
There’s no physical body underneath the makeshift stone, just a forgotten shoe from Killian's cabin that probably didn't even belong to Pan, but it was small and the best he could do. He hates himself some nights for building a symbol of what was lost that was never his to begin with. But he needed it. It eased an itch and gave him an escape from this real world of heroes to revert to his darkest memories. He confesses bitterly to the buried shoe how he's changed and what's happening or some days Killian’s screaming his feelings as he drinks and smokes too much for a good day. He tells the grave he misses Pan and that he loathes him so fucking much because all he wants is to be embraced by the familiar arms of a stagnant island’s prince, encompassing his torso with warmth and a nip to his neck. He loathes that he misses Pan, that the life brought after death doesn’t provide the satisfaction and deliverance it should. It's borderline. Of what? He's not sure, maybe everything.
In a vulnerable moment Killian pondered if he'd change upon a return of Peter Pan, an idea that flourishes now and then with midnight smokes and afternoon rum tastings. Would he give up being a hero? Would he give up Swan? Would he be brave enough to follow along, or be a coward like the boys still alive and hiding in nurseries? Would he spit on Pan’s matching shoes and marry the savior like he's supposed to, like he tells everyone he wants to? He supposes sometimes he'd revolt, push Pan away and pretend he's been completely changed for the better. Other times Killian knows he'll never be away from the boy's grasp. Killian will see him and step forward, spellbound and filled with the same feral hunger, lust, and desire from times past, parched for anything Pan is willing to offer. The immortal boy just another addiction he hasn't been able to squash in the past 3 years, 7 months, 22 days, and 15 hours that Pan has been gone. Killian never loses count of how time progresses in the world without magic, but the cigarettes and rum help make the clock fuzzy enough he can’t keep accurate count until they too fade away and he can read the hands again, clasping his pocket watch shut and swigging deep from a glass flask.
Grass has grown over the shoe in the years past, the grave almost blending in with the rest of the foliage. An eerie sound of wedding bells chime behind Killian telling him it's time to truly change like he’s supposed to, so he swigs the last shot in his flask and smokes his last cigarette, lit with his last match. Staring at the grave with a haunting pang in his chest, part of him wishes and hopes, or maybe he's forcing himself, to believe that one day there will be a reunion between the one-handed pirate and the demon of Neverland, odd ends never settled. It triggers the numbness to burn and rectify his metamorphosis into a good man, proving one day he will again be more than Killian Jones, possibly effectuating his more colorful moniker of Captain Hook, the most feared pirate of all the realms. He will be fulfilled in Storybrooke and come full circle into the hero he's meant to be, yet that day is not today.
Today Killian spits smoke and breathes deep even as the back of his throat burns. Adjusting his tux, he takes mental notes to buy more booze and cigarettes before walking in muddy boots toward the church where Swan is waiting in a dress as white as her feathers.