Archive of Our Own

“...it’s such a muddled line between the things you want, and the things you have to do.”
-- Sheryl Crow --

Robin could fucking hang.

There is a line all the way to the door, and the woman in front of him is tapping her ridiculously long nails hard against the counter (are there palm trees on her nails ?), and the fact that Killian is stuck behind said counter, trying to deal with all of the above is all Robin’s fault, so Robin could fucking hang.

“ Nonfat soy milk,” says the woman with the palm tree nails and Killian puts the carton he just picked up back in its place and grabs the one next to it instead.

Seriously.

Hang .

Two months ago this had sounded like a good idea.

Well, not a good idea exactly.

More like an ultimatum and a bribe to get his act together or else, but still. Right now this moment he would take the worst hangover in the history of alcohol withdrawal over the nail-tapper and the six people behind her.

It is at the precise moment when he hands over the nonfat soy latte with a double shot of espresso that his wrist seizes and his useless left hand curls in on itself at a right angle. The pain is so sharp his vision goes grey for a moment and his right hand, the one with the coffee cup in it, starts to shake, and the woman practically rips it out of his grip. She shoves a twenty at him and he can hardly see the register as he tries to ring her up and give her change, and the sounds around him amplify, become a cacophony of voices and laughter and one whining 5-year-old and he nearly screams.

All he can see are blurry colors.

All he can hear is a wall of noise.

He can’t do this.

He looks up at the line of expectant, impatient faces, and then down at his dysfunctional hand, and he’s a second away from telling everyone to get the fuck out when a voice to his left says, “uh, excuse me?”

No, he will fucking not excuse anyone not even waiting in line, probably wanting something extra special, but he does turn.

In front of him is a blonde woman with a baby on her hip. He vaguely recalls her coming in at least two hours ago and getting a cup of tea. He thinks.

“What?” He snaps at her, and she flinches a bit, but stands her ground.

“Sorry,” she says, bouncing the infant a bit. “I just--- do you need some help?”

Oh god yes.

He needs so much help.

But she’s holding a baby. That’s two hands occupied right there.

He’s about to point this out to her when she pulls up one of the high chairs stacked across from the counter and simply deposits the infant in it and then smiles at him.

Smiles like this is no big deal at all.

Her eyes come down to rest on his left hand for a moment and then she looks up.

“You could take the orders? And I could make the coffee?”

He can’t answer for a second.

All he can hear is the bell above the entrance, signaling yet another customer.

So much noise.

The woman before him has green eyes, eyes which are steady and calm, and they settle him a bit.

He shrugs.  “Do you know how to work the espresso machine?”

She nods, serious. “I do.”

He waves her back behind the counter and then turns to the next customer, a brassy red-head whose 5-year-old is hanging off her arm and wants “a brownie, pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease!”

An hour later things are back to calm, everyone has been served, and he turns to the woman behind him who has been cranking out perfect coffee and is now cleaning down the machine.

“Thank you.”  He tries to massage his left wrist, get the muscles to loosen up a bit.  They don’t.

She nods.  “Yeah, well---”  

He waits, but she doesn’t finish.

“Why don’t you make yourself a cup of coffee?”  he says.  “On the house, obviously.  You could sit back down and relax until I figure out how to compensate you for helping me out?”

She looks like she’s about to say something, but then she just shrugs and fills a mug with hot water.

“For tea,” she says.  “I’m breastfeeding.”

Of course.

Then she walks over to the baby and picks it up.

“You’re being such a good kid,” she says.  “Are you getting hungry?”

She turns around and looks at him with large eyes.  “I can--- can I feed him here?”

Is she asking him whether she’s allowed to feed her--- Oh.

But that’s ridiculous.

“Go ahead,” he says.  “Go and sit down.  I’ll bring your cup.”  Then he sees the backpack at the bottom of the high chair.  “Is this yours?”

She nods, and he loops it around his left arm.  It’s heavy.

He follows them to a booth and carefully puts down her tea and her backpack and then goes back behind the counter.  As she unbuttons her shirt she gets several disgusted looks and he glares at each misgiving patron until they look away.

The boy is fast asleep in her arms when he finally makes his way back to her.  The coffee shop is empty at last.

“Here,” he says, holding out a cushion and a blanket.  “They’re from my office.  I figure you must be tired holding him all this time.”

“Thank you,” she says with an unmistakable sigh of relief.  She gets the baby settled on the bench next to her and shakes out her arms.  “He is getting a little heavy.”

He grabs a plate full of baked goods from the counter and puts it in front of her.  

“You must be hungry, too,” he says quietly.  “I haven’t seen you eat a thing all day.”

She looks up, and it’s suspicious.

He holds up his hands.  The left one is curled up like a claw.  

“I’m not trying to----”  He exhales slowly.  “You earned it.  And also, my name is Killian.  Killian Jones.  I should have said that hours ago.”

She smiles.  “Emma,” she says.  “Emma Swan.”  She points at the infant.  “And this is Henry.”

“He’s a good boy,” Killian grins.  “Didn’t cry once while you saved my life.”

She laughs.  “Now I believe you are exaggerating.  You would have been fine.”

He’s not telling her about his near meltdown.  He is not.

“We’ll agree to disagree on that,” he says instead.  “How can I make it up to you, Emma Swan?”  He pushes the plate towards her.  “Apart from baked goods?”

She studies the tabletop as if formica was the most fascinating thing in the world and shakes her head.  When she finally looks up, she’s chewing her lip.

“I was going to ask you for a job when I came in this morning.”  She vaguely points towards the HELP WANTED sign in his window.  “I just-- I was trying to work up the nerve to ask.”

“Why on earth would you need to work up---- you’re hired.”  He laughs.  “First of all, you are incredibly hired.  And second of all, why would you---”

“I don’t have a sitter for Henry.”  Her voice is a whisper.  “I don’t have an address.”

“Wait.”  She can’t be serious.  “Are you telling me you’re---”

“We’ve been staying down on Rosemont,” she says, and he swallows hard.  There is a homeless shelter on Rosemont.  

“I can’t----”  She’s fidgeting.   “I can’t leave Henry there, but if I can’t work, I can’t get out of there either.”

Her eyes are glued back to the tabletop.  

“That’s OK,” he says.  “We can figure something out.  Henry can just become the coffee shop’s official mascot.  We’ll put him in a playpen in the center---” he points to the middle of the floor--- “make everyone leave their tips with him.”

She laughs.  It sounds wobbly.

“He’ll just eat your profits,” she says, her voice not quite steady either.  “Literally.”

Her hand comes down on Henry’s belly and she rubs his side.

They sit in silence for long minutes, while her fingers keep rubbing across cheap cotton.  When she looks up again, her eyes are shiny.

“Why?”  She says.  “Why would you do that for us?”

He smiles.  “You make a mean latte,” he says.  “And you already know your way around.”

She’s silent again while she looks at him, studies him until he nearly squirms.

Then she takes a deep breath and nods.  “OK.”

“OK?”

She nods again.  “OK.”

She shows up the next day at 7 AM on the dot.  She has Henry tied to her front in what looks like a large scarf, and the straps of her backpack are digging grooves into her shoulders.  He remembers how heavy it was and nearly makes a joke about her carrying her whole life around when it hits him.
That’s what she’s doing.
Carrying her whole life around in her backpack.

It probably contains everything she owns.

And then he thinks of what else is on Rosemont and he shivers.  That is no place for an infant as tiny as Henry is.

No place for his mother, either.

Fuck.

He chews on how to say it, how to bring it up, almost the whole day.  It’s never the right time.  Not when he makes her eat a breakfast croissant ( shifts include meals ), or when he hands her a bagel with cream cheese and hot chocolate for lunch ( she likes hot chocolate, with cinnamon ), or when she plays with Henry during their slow times ( there’s nowhere to put the boy, not really, so they have essentially made him a pillow fort with the couch cushions from his office) .

But when he locks up after the last customer and she picks up a broom to help him clean up like she hasn’t just worked 12 hours, he just blurts out, “There’s a room upstairs.”

She looks up, and her eyes narrow.

“It’s an old stockroom.”  He can’t get the words out fast enough, now that he’s started.  “It’s basically a shoebox with a window, but it has a small bathroom, and I can clear out the boxes, and anyway, you could stay there, you and Henry.  If you like.”

She just keeps looking at him with those narrowed eyes, hard as flint. When she finally answers, her voice is low. And just as hard.

“What do I have to do in return?”

Is she angry?

Why is she angry?

He has a room to spare and she needs a place to stay.

“Nothing?” He’s not sure how to answer. “Pay for your own utilities? Once we get your wages sorted?”

Her look is figuring now. But no softer.

“We’d have to get a bed for you and one for Henry somehow, but---” He’s squirms. He can feel her stare down to his bones.

“Are you saying you’re offering me a place to stay?”  Her voice is as steely as her look.  “For free ? No strings attached?”  She makes it sound like it was the most indecent--- oh. OH.

He almost smiles, but then, there’s really nothing funny about the situation she’s in at all. And who knows what kinds of propositions she’s had to fend off.

So he meets her gaze and nods.

“Yes,” he says, and doesn’t blink. “I’m offering you a room. No strings attached.”

Her eyes very slowly fill with tears.

“People don’t do that.”  It’s a whisper.  “People don’t just offer to save your life without wanting something in return. I mean, who does that? Who?”

She looks over at Henry, chewing on a corner of a couch cushion and gurgling happily, and then back at Killian.

“I don’t know what to do.” Her brow furrows, like she’s trying very hard not to cry. “But I can’t take the chance that I’m wrong about you. Henry can’t take the chance that I’m wrong about you.”

He nods, slowly, and doesn’t look away. “You’re not wrong about me, Emma Swan. I’m a guy with a broken hand and a floundering coffee shop and not much else, but I really am just offering you a place to stay. That’s all.”

“Where do you live?”

He knows what she’s asking.

“Not in this building,” he says. “I have an apartment a few blocks from here. You’ll have the place to yourself at night.”

She’s chewing her lip hard. Looks from Killian to Henry and back again several times, and Killian remains silent and simply waits.

In the end she shakes her head with a laugh that sounds like a sob, and she goes and picks up Henry.

“Show us the room,” she says. “We’ll take a look.”

It feels like relief.

-/-

The storeroom is a shoebox. A shoebox full of crates and boxes and a frazzled mop in a broken bucket. It has a window on one side, and a small bathroom with the tiniest shower stall Emma’s ever seen, and it’s perfect.

Oh, she wants this.

She wants this for herself and Henry.

But her insides are at war . This will leave her indebted to her employer. It will give him so much power over her. What if eventually he asks her for something in return?  Something she’s not willing to give?

What if she gets used to having a place to stay and a steady source of income and then he threatens to take it all away?

He hasn’t said a word since he unlocked the door for her. The door has a lock. It makes her feel marginally better.

He’s just standing there, silent, rubbing his left wrist and trying to straighten out his hand, his curled-up fingers. It looks like he’s in pain; he flinches occasionally, but doesn’t make a sound. She takes a step forward, ostensibly to get a better look at the room, but really, it’s so he won’t see her eyes fill up with tears again.

She wants this so badly.

Henry gurgles into her shoulder and grabs her shirt collar, making small, happy noises.

“You like it here, don’t you,” she whispers in his ear, and swears that Henry nods. Which is ridiculous. He’s six months old and can just about hold his head up on his own. She kisses his nose and Henry laughs. It’s Emma’s favorite sound.

She turns and looks at Killian standing in the doorway, rubbing his hand and waiting.

“I can clear all this stuff out tomorrow,” he says quietly. “You can stay on the couch in my office tonight if you want.  It has a lock, too.”

It would be great if he didn’t read her quite so well. Then again, hers is not a complicated story. Just a difficult one.

“We can maybe get you some furniture at Goodwill,” he goes on. More uncertain now. “I don’t---” He huffs. “We can figure out how to pay for everything.”

It occurs to her that it’s quite possible he cannot afford any of this. That he can barely afford to pay her wages. He did say ‘floundering’ coffee shop, and it might be true. They’re a far cry from the Strip here, on the dirty, bleak side of Vegas, a long way from neon and choreographed waterworks.  She doesn’t know anything about his business, doesn’t know anything about him. Except that he needs help.

Just like she does.

Maybe----

And then Henry turns his head and stretches his hand out towards Killian. He looks at the boy, and then at Emma, like he’s asking for permission, and when she gives him a slight nod he smiles and lifts his good hand.

Henry clutches Killian’s index finger and Killian shakes it a bit and Henry squeals with joy and beams , and Emma makes up her mind.

Her son is a great judge of character.

“We’ll take it,” she says, and Killian’s smile widens. “But you don’t have to clear it out by yourself, I’ll help.”

He nods.

“And you’ll take the rent and the furniture and everything else out of my paycheck. You’re paying me too much as it is.”

She is prepared to fight him on this point, but he just smiles and nods again.

“Why do you think I pay you too much?”  He asks instead.

“It’s more than minimum wage,” Emma says. “Way more.”  Who pays the help eighteen bucks an hour?  It’s ridiculous.

“I believe in paying people what they’re worth, even if the law doesn’t agree with me,” he huffs.  “I’d pay you more if I could afford it. People should be able to live on what they earn.”

“Yeah, well – you’re helping with that, too.” She shakes her head. “Why are you doing this?”

He shrugs. “Because I can?”

There is weight underneath that sentence.

The weight of penance.

This is an act of attrition.

“Do you want to stay in my office tonight?” His voice is quiet again. “Or do you need to go back to Rosemont and get your things?”

She points at the backpack at her feet. “I have everything.”

“OK then,” he says, quietly. “Let’s get you sorted.”

The office is basically a desk and a couch and a sink in the corner, but she stops him before he can apologize.

“We’ve been sleeping on a military surplus cot, fifty people to a room.”  She puts Henry down on the sofa.  “Trust me when I tell you this is better than anything we’ve had in months.”  

Henry smiles and stretches out his arms.  Killian kneels and tickles the boy’s belly, and Henry beams again.

“I can’t imagine how hard it’s been for you,” he says without turning around, his voice low.  “But you have a lovely son.  He’s happy and well-fed and loved, and for what it’s worth, I think you’re doing a phenomenal job. You’ve certainly done better with a hell of a lot more odds stacked against you than I ever did with a free ride.”

He sounds quiet and defeated and his hand stills.

Henry tries to grab his fingers again, and Killian chuckles. “Sorry, lad. Didn’t mean to stop.”

“He likes you.” It’s as big a concession as Emma can think to make.  She doesn’t fraternize.  She certainly doesn’t like people being overly familiar, not with her, not with her kid.

But – Henry did make the first move.

Killian turns to look at her. His eyes are ridiculously hopeful.  “Do you really think so?”

He asks as if this – whether a six-month-old likes him – is important to him. And not as a way to get closer to her, the mother.

As if her kid’s inclination mattered . 

God, he’s an odd duck, but none of Emma’s spidey senses are tingling, and so far he has not lied to her once, so she nods.

“Yeah. I really think he does.”

Killian turns back and pats Henry’s belly one more time. “You’re a very good boy,” he says, and then gets up.  “I better leave you to it then.  Please help yourself to any food in the kitchen fridge. I’m sorry - this blanket is all I have here.  I’ll bring you another one tomorrow.”  His brow furrows.  “Will you be cold?”

“It’s Nevada ,” she says.  “We’ll be fine.”

“Good.  Here are the keys.”  And he simply hands her his whole key ring.  To the store.  The whole store.

“Here.”  He picks up the cash deposit bag and stops in the doorway to hand her a post-it note.  “This is my number, just in case you need anything. Please don’t hesitate to call.”  And then he smiles and nods at her.  ”The place is yours. I’ll be back in the morning.”

She watches him walk all the way across the parking lot and out onto the street.

He doesn’t seem to have a car.

-/-

“Did you two sleep all right in my office?”

“I have an idea.”

They’re setting up for the morning rush, stoneware cups lined up next to the espresso machine and paper ones stacked next to the register.  Henry is in his pillow fort corner and Emma is filling the display case with pastries when she turns to him.

He raises both eyebrows.

“Sleep all-- yes, yes, we did.”  She smiles.  He’s happy to see it.  “Thank you again.”

“Not at all,” he says, and pushes his thumb hard into the inside of his left wrist.  It hurts a lot today.

“Are you all right?”

Emma’s eyes are on his hands and she has stopped laying out muffins, her brow furrowed.  She is going to ask him what’s wrong next, and he cannot have that.

He might tell her.

“Fine,” he grinds out.  “What was your idea?”

She throws him a look that says she knows exactly what he’s doing, but she’s letting it go for now.

“You have a full kitchen back there,” she says.  “You could make your own pastries.  Not all of them, I know that bagels are a whole thing, but--- it can’t be that hard to make muffins.  Or scones.”  She bites her lip and cringes a bit, like she’s overstepping.  “I’m sorry,” she says.  “I don’t mean to tell you your business.  Just--- it would be cheaper if you made your own, you know?  Especially since you have a commercial oven?  And--- stuff?”

Dejection surges and immediately turns into anger and takes him completely by surprise.  He shoves his thumb into his wrist until he nearly blacks out from the pain, just to stop himself from yelling at her, but he cannot block them out, the fear and the faces, no matter how hard he tries.  

Instead he sneers at her.  

“And what could I do with a kitchen?”  His voice is a hiss.  “What do you think?”

She looks down at his hand and then up again.  “You could learn,” she whispers, uncertain.  

What does she know?  What can she possibly know about the things he can and cannot do, about the hundreds of ways he can find to fuck up?  About the mess he makes of everything, always, everything he touches?  He is so barely keeping his head above water here, just waiting for the next breaker to come and bury him.  He wants to scream it out loud, how he can’t, how he can’t , how he’ll never---

he’ll never---

“You could learn,” she repeats, her voice still a whisper.  “And--- you have help now?  I---” she looks even more uncertain--- “I think I remember some baking things?”

You have help now.

He blinks, slowly.  

Takes a deep breath, and another.  And another.  Then he looks at her, determined and calm even in the face of his----

How strange.

He’s no longer angry.

Instead he feels like he was punched in the gut.

He leans against the counter, tries for nonchalance even though it’s all for support, and sighs.

“I’m sorry,” he says.  “I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

She nods, her eyes wide.

“Let’s finish setting up, OK?”  He tries to make his voice gentle, nonthreatening. 

She nods again, and turns back to her tray of muffins and they work in silence for a few minutes, before he says, “It’s a good idea, Emma.  Let me think about it.”

From out of the corner of his eye he can see her smile.

That night they clear out the storeroom.  He wants to tell her not to help, because a lot of the boxes are heavy, but he can’t lift them by himself either, not with one hand useless and aching.  When Henry gets tired of sitting in the high chair they’ve brought up from the shop, Emma wipes down an empty laundry basket and puts a sofa cushion in it.  By the time she covers Henry with the blanket, it looks like a crib, and he can’t help but smile.

She’s definitely resourceful.

The next night he borrows a pickup truck from his neighbor and they go to Goodwill and leave with a bed for Emma and a small table and two chairs.  There are no cribs, but she says Henry is fine in the laundry basket for now, and they can figure out something else later.  There are lots of baby clothes though, and he insists on buying Henry at least ten onesies.  After some prodding she grudgingly buys a few t-shirts and another pair of jeans for herself.  She keeps the receipt, because she wants to pay him back every penny.

He doesn’t argue.

He knows she needs this.

The next day she says she has to run an errand during her afternoon break, and for one, long, irrational moment he’s afraid she’ll leave and never come back.  They’re gone for almost an hour, and he’s close to panic by the end of it.  When they return he is so relieved he almost hugs her.  Especially after she walks right up to him, eyes sparkling, and hands him a brown paper bag.

“This is for you,” she says, smiling.

It’s a cookbook.

A baking book, to be precise.

A basic, simple-recipe baking book for people on a budget.

How he manages not to hug her then, he’ll never know.

-/-

Two days later Emma is woken by a loud crash downstairs, and nearly panics. 
Her first thought is burglars.

Her second thought is that the only working phone to which she has access is also downstairs.  In the office.  She makes a mental note to get herself a burner as soon as possible.

Henry is fast asleep in his makeshift laundry basket crib and she stands arrested in the middle of the room, breathing hard, trying not to be afraid, and for a long moment she doesn’t know what to do.

And then she hears it.

Cursing.

Loud, continuous, very vocal cursing.  A blue streak in full progress.  It’s Killian.

Killian in the kitchen.

She sinks to her knees and laughs out loud in relief.

“What on earth are you doing?”

Emma has put on clothes and made her way downstairs.  She sets down the laundry basket with a still quietly sleeping Henry and looks around.  The kitchen looks like a war zone.

There are several baking sheets on the floor, as well as a large mixing bowl, the contents of which are splattered across every surface.  Including Killian’s hair.

Including Killian’s face.

He wipes his forehead and quirks a self-deprecating brow.  “I seem to have dropped some things.  Did I wake you up?”

Emma grins.  “I thought we were being robbed.”

“Oh.”  His smile falls.  “I’m so sorry.  Were you scared?”  He looks at her from under egg-caked eyelashes.  “I should have told you.  I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I was scared,” she admits.  “I need to get a phone.”

“You don’t have a---”  His eyes widen.  “Yes.  Today .  I didn’t realize---  you have to have a phone.  You need to be able to call for help.”

She knows he doesn’t just mean 911.

He’s saying she can call him .

She looks at him and bites her lip and then she smiles.  “So, what happened here?”

He shrugs and mumbles, “I happened.  Obviously.”

Oh, the baggage that man can pack into one sentence.  But that’s a different story, for a different day.

Emma walks over and starts to pick up the baking sheets and the mixing bowl and says, “What were you making?”

He points to the open book on the counter, wipes his face, and says, “English scones.  They look good and simple and I thought I could get them done by the time we open.  Those and maybe some muffins?  I found a pan for those.”

She doesn’t say, I’m happy you’ve come around .

She doesn’t say, you should have told me, I could have helped .

She doesn’t ask how the mess happened, or whether his hand hurts, or anything else.

She simply plunks the bowl into the sink and starts to wash up while he cleans down the steel table and then she looks at the recipe book.

“They look yummy,” she says.  “And not too complicated.  We can definitely get those done before we open.”

And from out of the corner of her eye she can see him smile.

Henry sleeps through all of it.

What follows is a week of long hours.  A cheap-ish convention of insurance agents descends on the hotel down the block and they get very, very busy.  It’s a lot of revenue, but also a constant stream of customers, and they can hardly keep up.

It’s getting harder to get up early to bake, and Killian begs her to sleep in and let him be, but she’s seen how he fights with his broken hand, and it’s impossible to load the trays and fill the tins and pull hot baking sheets from the oven with just one.

She sees how slow he is during the day, when she has to step away to feed Henry, and it hurts her to hear the snide comments and huffed asides of the patrons.  She wishes the nasty ones to hell, the lot of them, never mind the money.

He hears them, she knows he does.

It’s in his face every time she returns to behind the counter, shame and relief, and it makes her so angry, because he should be feeling neither.

They should be ashamed.  Like their lives can’t afford one extra minute for their coffee to get made.  It’s ridiculous.

Friday afternoon is the worst.  The insurance agents are nearly done with their conference and crowding the shop to caffeinate one last time before gearing up for a night on the town.  They’re all frat boy energy and hormones on a rampage, not a good color on beer-gutted men circling the shady side of forty, and Henry won’t stop crying.

Emma has fed him twice so he’s not hungry, and she doesn’t know what to do.  He usually only cries when he wants food.  She’s running ragged pulling espresso shots and trying to run over intermittently to calm Henry down, but he just won’t , and it’s getting harder to ignore the sneers and scoffs about the “lungs on that one”, and suddenly she hears Killian behind her say, “Excuse me, sir, but I think you can get your coffee elsewhere today.”

The shop falls almost completely silent as the burly, balding man in the cheap suit in front of Killian gasps.  Killian turns to Emma and says gently, “Don’t worry, love, I got this.  Just keep going.”

And then he walks over to her son and picks him up and bounces him a few times and the crying stops .  Several people laugh and clap, but Killian doesn’t pay any attention to them, just looks at Henry and talks to him in a low voice, holding him perfectly in his left arm, despite his crooked hand.

Emma nearly starts to cry.

She bites her tongue instead to stem the tears and finishes her orders and Killian walks back behind the counter, still holding Henry, and calmly hands out the cups to everyone but the balding man in the cheap suit.  He stares at him instead, silent and unrelenting, until the man turns and leaves along with his colleagues and the shop is once again quiet and empty.

“Emma.”  Killian turns to her, patting Henry’s back, his eyes narrow and worried like he can see her exhaustion.  “Please, go to my office.  Or to your room.  Just--- please go lie down.  You look ready to collapse.”

And she is.  She is ready to collapse, but they’re not done yet and she can’t afford to; but before she can open her mouth, he says, “I’m closing early today.  And you’ve done enough.”

He walks over to the front door and locks it and flips the sign closed, all of it with Henry on his arm, his small head on his shoulder, tiny fingers playing with his collar.

She can no longer fight the tears.

“Go,” he says.  “Go upstairs and take a shower and lie down for a bit.  Henry and I will order some food and talk about manly things.  Have a boys’ chat.  When the food gets here you can come down and then we’ll have dinner and you’re taking tomorrow off.”

“I can---”

“No, Emma.”  His voice is soft.  “Whatever it is.  You get a day off.  And you get some time to yourself.  You get to have that.”

The tears are flowing in earnest now, and he hands her a towel and she capitulates.

“OK,” she sniffs, wiping her eyes.  “OK.”

He smiles at her, and then looks at Henry.  “What do you say, my boy?  Want to talk about shaving and baseball?  Not that I know anything about baseball.”

She laughs out loud, wobbly as it is.

And she realizes that she doesn’t mind him holding Henry.  Not when Henry’s so quiet and content.  He really is a good judge of character, her son.

“Go,” he repeats.

“Fine,” she huffs.  “But I’m still going to help you bake in the morning.”

He rolls his eyes, but his smile widens.  “Is that your final offer?”

She nods.

“Sold,” he says.  “You can help me bake, but then you’re taking the day off.  No matter how long the line is.”

“Deal,” she says, and turns towards the stairs.

She can hear him talking softly to Henry the entire time she’s upstairs.  Can hear Henry laugh and squeal happily in return.  Not that she’s listening.

A few weeks later they’re in the café kitchen, up to their elbows in flour and butter.

It’s quiet, early in the mornings, just the two of them.  Emma likes it.  And there are worse things than starting your day surrounded by the smell of freshly baked muffins and scones. 

She’s breaking eggs into a mixing bowl when Henry starts to cry.  Killian looks up, always ready to jump into action, and Emma smiles.

“He’s just hungry,” she says, wiping her hands on her apron.  “Aren’t you, kid?”

She walks over to the playpen they’ve constructed from milk crates and boxes and zip ties, picks Henry up and settles herself on the couch in the office, just like she always does.

He walks in after her and hands her a clean towel, just like he always does.

They have a routine now.

She thinks of the day she first came into the coffee shop, when he glared at everyone who looked at her sideways for nursing in a public place, and she smiles again.

“What’s so funny?”

He sits down across from her.  His voice is soft, like he doesn’t want to disturb them.

Emma watches Henry latch on and then looks up.  “I was just thinking of my first day here.  You were very nice to me.  Brought me tea and let me breastfeed in the middle of your café.”

“Yeah, well, you had just saved me from the lunch rush.”  

His voice is still soft, fond, and his eyes shine, and it just slips out.  

“What happened to your hand?”

Killian’s entire bearing changes all at once.

His body tenses and his face becomes mask-like, his eyes shuttered, his mouth a thin line, and Emma thinks she could bounce quarters off his shoulders for how rigid they are.  His jaw muscles contract and he pushes his thumb hard into his left wrist and then his breathing becomes erratic and Emma says, “Stop!  Stop, please, I’m sorry.”

There are tears in his eyes.  For anger or sorrow she doesn’t know.

“Please Killian.  I’m so sorry.”  She’d give anything to take it back now.  “You don’t have to tell me.  It’s none of my business.  I’m so sorry I asked.”

And then he looks at her and laughs.

It’s helpless .

He shakes his head.

Takes a deep breath, starts, stops, starts again, stops again.  His mouth opens and closes and doesn’t make a sound.

He looks up and chuckles and it sounds like a sob and then he takes another deep breath and meets her eyes.  The look he gives her is dejected.

“Oh, Emma,” he says.  “It is your business.  You should know who you work with.  It’s just----”  His shoulders slump, the tension leaves his body.  He looks small, sad.  His eyes wander to Henry, feeding happily, and then back to hers.  They’re wet now.  “It’s just--- you won’t want to stay once I tell you.”

She looks at him sitting there, guilty, tortured, despondent, and shakes her head.  “Why don’t you let me decide?”  Henry coughs and she shifts position.  “I have seen only good things so far.  I’m not sure what you could have done that would make me leave.”

He laughs again and it is bleak and forlorn and she never wants to hear it again, ever.

Not when his normal laugh is so lovely to hear.

She realizes in that moment that his laugh is her second favorite sound.

“You’ll want to leave after this, I am sure of it,” he says and takes another deep breath.  “But you deserve to know, so here goes.”

His thumb presses down on his wrist again, the hand curled up tightly at a right angle.  

He holds it up for a brief moment.  “I wasn’t born with this, you see.”

She nods and murmurs, “I figured.”  

He hears it, low as it is.  His eyebrows rise.  “You figured?  How so?”

Emma cringes, but she knows, knows , that she has to be honest with him now.  That this is one of these moments where nothing but the truth will do, no matter how painful it may be.  

“The way you move,” she says softly.  “Like you’re used to having two hands.  The way it stresses you out when you can’t--- do things just with one.  The way you hide it behind your back when you don’t want people to see.  It’s---- it seems recent.  Not at all like something you had time to get used to.”

He whistles in awe.  “You are a very smart woman, Emma Swan.  Has anyone ever told you that?”

“I’m not so smart,” she says.  “I managed to end up homeless with a newborn.  I never even graduated high school.  I’m not fast-tracking that Nobel prize just yet.”

He laughs, and this time it’s genuine and Emma was right.

It is her second favorite sound.

And then his laugh fades and his eyes turn serious and he says, “I’m a gambler.”

Emma doesn’t flinch.  Just waits.

Killian sighs.  “I’m a gambler, and not in a cool, Hollywood movie kind of way.”  He looks down, rubs his hand.  “I’m an addict.  I’ll wager the deed to my house and the change in my pocket and the shirt off my back.  As a matter of fact, I have.  Wagered all of those, and more.  And lost.  Everything.”  

Henry gurgles and stops drinking and Emma props him up to burp him.  Killian doesn’t move at all the entire time, just sits there, his eyes downcast, and it’s heartbreaking.

She gets up and puts Henry in his makeshift crib and then walks over to Killian and kneels before him.

“Tell me,” she says.  “You can tell me.”

He blinks and tears start to roll down his cheeks.  He makes no move to wipe them away.  His eyes are oddly blank.  He’s looking somewhere over her left shoulder.

“I went the way all gamblers go.“  He shrugs.  “Down.”

He clears his throat.  

“Lost my job, my house, my car, all of it.  Borrowed money from every one of my friends and lost every last cent of it until I didn’t have any friends left.  And then I borrowed money from the wrong people.”  He chuckles.  If Emma never hears a sound that hopeless again, it’ll be too soon.  “Lost that, too, of course.  Couldn’t pay them back.  Got in deeper and deeper until they decided to teach me a lesson.”

He lifts his left hand briefly.

“They smashed my hand with----  well, it doesn’t matter.  Broke it beyond repair.”

He takes another deep breath and shakes his head.  “It’s not like I had money for a doctor, anyway.  Had  to go to a vet.  He tried his best, but he couldn’t save it.  Not that any part of me deserved saving.”

He falls silent, and Emma can hardly breathe.  His guilt and his shame are palpable.  He is haunted by these ghosts, tormented by them.

“I don’t believe that,” she finally whispers.  “I don’t believe you weren’t worth saving.”

“Oh, but it’s true.”  That empty chuckle again.  “I wasn’t worth the fucking air I was breathing.”  

“What happened then?”  Her voice is not working, but again, he hears her.

“I was broke and in pain so I climbed inside a bottle.”  He sighs.  “Climbed inside a lot of bottles.  For weeks.  For months.  I don’t remember most of it, to be honest.  I was couch surfing where I could, spent a lot of days just sitting on bus benches.  I overstayed every welcome, until I knocked on Robin’s door.”

“Who’s Robin?”  Her voice is a whisper.

Killian smiles the ghost of a smile, still not looking at her.  “Robin was--- a last resort.  We were mates once.  Best mates, really.  He was one of the people from whom I borrowed a sizable sum of money, which I neglected to pay back.  I swore to myself I was never ever going to see him again, but I was completely out of options.  I’d slept on benches for two nights and hadn’t eaten in days.  And I was out of rum.  So I came here.”

“Here?”

He nods.  “This is his coffee shop.  Was his coffee shop.”  He rubs his wrist again.  “Robin took me in and forced me to sober up and made me join Gamblers Anonymous.  He gave me a job here at the café, but he wouldn’t give me my wages at first.  Just put them into a bank account for me.  He let me stay on his couch, didn’t let me out of his sight.  Saved my life.”  He smiles again, small and wistful.  “And then one day a few months ago he just hands me the deed to the store and the lease to his apartment and an ATM card with my name on it and says, ‘I’m going back to England.  The place is yours.  Fuck this up, and no one will ever help you again.’  And then he left.”

Killian looks up and meets Emma’s gaze and tears spring to her eyes from the look in his.  

“So there you go.  This is the whole ugly truth of it, and I’ve been trying to not fuck it up ever since, but there are days when I wish I’d gone down with the ship.”

And Emma puts her hand on his.

He looks down, and then up at her, and then back down at her hand, covering his, and then he starts to sob.

And Emma puts her arms around him and lets him cry.

-/-

“I’m sorry.”

“Please don’t.  You have nothing to be sorry for.”

But the thing is, he does .  He has everything to be sorry for, every goddamn thing in this miserable semblance of a life, and especially dumping his fucking problems onto the woman before him, because she has enough to worry about.

And she shouldn’t have to carry his baggage as well.

So he’s stuck in a loop of “I’m sorry” and she’s being so nice about it he can hardly get a hold on himself.

And her hand is so soft on his.  It’s so fucking lovely.

And then he says “I’m sorry” again, and she says, “I was in jail when I gave birth to Henry.”

And it stops him cold.

“What?”

She quirks a laconic eyebrow at him and shrugs.  “I was in jail.  For possession of stolen property.”

She takes his left hand and slowly starts to rub his wrist and he doesn’t think she’s aware of it at all.  Her eyes are unfocused, far away, and her fingers feel so good on his aching joints .   He can’t speak.

“I liked a boy,” she says.  “He was charming and he said wonderful things to me until I was in love.  I followed him here.”  She rolls her eyes.  “I was young and stupid and in love and I didn’t know he was a criminal.  But he was, and he let me take the fall for him when things got dicey, and I ended up pregnant and in jail, so----”

“I’m so sorry.”  He means it.  Really means it.  “And he’s a fucking scumbag, whoever he is.”  He really means that, too.

“He’s gone now, that’s all I care about.”  Her voice is low.  “And he’s never getting his hands on Henry.”

He shudders at the mere thought.  

“Definitely not,” he says with vehemence.  “Over my dead body.”

She looks at him and smiles.  “I do believe you mean that.”

If only she knew.

“I do.”  It comes out as a whisper, but he has never meant anything this much in his entire life.  

“So you see,” she says, still smiling, “we’ve all made some very bad decisions.”  Her fingers are still massaging his wrist, warm and sure and completely unconsciously.  “But those don’t matter.  It’s what we do afterwards that matters.”

Her eyes narrow.  “When did you knock on Robin’s door?”

He has to think for a minute.  “Ten months ago?”

“Right when Henry was born,” she says, her voice soft.  “Right when my life got a new meaning, you decided to save yours.”

“I didn’t---”

“You did.”  She sounds sure.  Very, very sure.  “You say you were out of options, but that’s not true.  You could have fallen further.  Gone begging on street corners.  Slept in shelters.  Drowned.”  She squeezes his fingers.  “But you didn’t.  You started to, and then instead of ‘going down with the ship’ you went to the one person who was never going to let you get away with it.”  Her eyes are so clear, unblinking.  “And you’re here now.”  Her smile is brilliant.  “Look at you.  Look how far you’ve come.”

He can’t speak.  Can’t blink.  He doesn’t want to squander this gift she is giving him.  Redemption and contrition and hope.  Hope.

He doesn’t want this moment to end.  

She meets his gaze, steady, unwavering, and it feels like everything inside of him shifts .  Into the right places.  The places they were meant to be.

Then her eyes suddenly widen in surprise and she looks down at their hands.

At what she’s doing.

She starts to pull back and he blurts out, “Please don’t stop.”

She stills.

“Please,” he says again.  “It’s--- it feels good.”

And he leans forward to kiss her.

It’s slow, and careful, and tentative, and it takes one, two, three heartbeats - but then she kisses him back.

-/-

She can hear seagulls when she wakes up.  It’s now her third favorite sound.

Next to her Killian is breathing evenly and she quietly rolls out of bed, pulls a blanket from the chair, and steps out of the front door to sit on the porch steps.

She can hear the ocean in the distance.

The sky is hazy, the sun slow to rise. 

A cup of coffee is put down next to her and he sits down on her other side, sleepy and rumpled and smiling as his hand slowly strokes down her back.

“All right, love?”  He says, pulling her against him.

“Good,” she says, kissing the underside of his jaw.

And she is good.  The small cottage behind her is the result of thousands of hours of work between them, of nearly four years of all three of them living in the storeroom, of not spending a single penny that could be saved.  It’s run down and in desperate need of lots of repairs and even more love, but it’s theirs .

On the other side of the country, far, far away from Las Vegas.

It is a testament to his dedication and her tenacity and the end of a very, very long road.

Or rather, the beginning of a new one.

“I’m sorry you had to wake up without me,” she says quietly.  She knows he hates waking alone, but sometimes she needs to think.  

“It’s all right,” he says, slides his hand up her neck and gives her a very long kiss.  She’s nearly breathless by the time he’s done and he whispers, “You can make it up to me later.”

She smiles.  “Keep this up and I’ll make it up to you right here right now.”

He laughs and kisses her again until they’re both breathless.

“When do you have to be at work?”

“In an hour,” he says, frowning.  “Two freighters coming in today.  I may have to do overtime.”

She nods.  “Don’t work too hard.”  He always does.  Like he wants to prove himself, constantly.  Like he needs to show everyone that he is not as broken as his past, as his limb.

She starts to rub his wrist and he sighs.  

“Try not to be home too late,” she says.  “Henry’s class trip is today, and you know how he loves to tell you about the Big Fish.”

He chuckles.  “And maybe one day he’ll hear me when I tell him dolphins aren’t fish.”

She laughs.  “He’s only five.  Give him a minute.”

He stills.  Takes several deep breaths, like he’s gearing up to say something, but nothing comes.  She waits.  He’s been doing that often throughout the past few months, more often now that they’ve settled into their own home, but she can’t bring herself to push.  He’ll tell her in his own time.

She can feel him breathing, feel his chest rising and falling, and then suddenly he says, “Do you think it’s hard for him?”

She sits up and turns to look at him.  “Hard for whom?”

Killian fidgets and looks down, but she’ll have none of that.  She gently lifts his chin and says, “What do you mean?”

He gives her a small smile and god, it’s so vulnerable.  “Henry,” he says.  “Do you think it’s hard for him, not knowing his father?”

To think that he thinks that.  That he believes that.  Tears spring to her eyes.

“You’re his father,” she says, with all the conviction she can possibly muster.  “ You are.  Never doubt that.”  She grabs the front of his shirt in both fists.  “Never ever doubt that.”

His eyes grow large and very shiny and she leans over to kiss him, hard .

When they pull apart she leans her forehead against his and they stay like that for long moments.

She kisses him again before she pulls back and then studies his face, his open expression and his soft eyes and the fact that he couldn’t hide what he’s feeling if he tried, and she says, “I think it’s time.”

His eyes grow even larger and she feels his good hand wander down to her belly.

“Are you sure?”  It’s a whisper.

She closes her eyes for a moment.

Listens to the seagulls.

“Yes,” she says.  And means it.

He looks at her, eyes shining, and smiles, wide and carefree and happy.  And then he kisses her again.