CS FF Flashback: Fireworks (that went off too soon)

It’s Independence Day here in America, but considering there’s a uncontained deadly virus, I have three incurable autoimmune diseases, and I could give birth to a fairly large baby at any moment, I’m not exactly out enjoying myself. But I was reminded that one of my favorite CS stories I’ve written is appropriate for today, so I derived a little joy from rereading that. Maybe it might bring you some smiles, too.

This one is M rated but not explicit, and has two chapters, one of Emma’s POV & one of Killian’s. He’s basically Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy, and she was his best friend in college. Years later she hears one of his songs and it changes her perception of the past by a lot - and alters her future, too.

Read on AO3.

I Could Use a Love Song (2/22): where the whiskey drowns and the beer chases

Pairing: Emma Swan/Killian Jones (AU) Words: 3k(ish) Rating: T for this chapter, I’d say. (M overall) Chapter Summary: The band’s first day with their new roadie gets off to a shaky start.

Read on AO3.

---

Having grown used to shitty sleeping situations through foster homes, homelessness, couch surfing, and now touring, Emma awoke the next morning refreshed and ready to fight.

Yep, fight. Because the prior evening she’d been exhausted and hovering in that weird stage of drunk where you’re basically pre-hungover, and life had thrown a hot roadie at her. Except it wasn’t life that had done that. It was David. David who in the year of our lord 2019 most fucking certainly had a cell phone and could have shot her a text that a stranger was going to crash her quiet night alone.

Not that Killian crashed in any sense beyond sleep. They were seemingly both out before even the first song had finished playing through her speakers and he was still eyes-closed and breathing steady now that Emma was crawling over the seat and out the door, dead set on properly raging about the ridiculousness of this decision in addition to the lack of communication that shouldn’t exist among people who literally write words for a fucking living.

Seriously. How hard is it to send a text? Don’t wanna do your dirty work yourself, you can just tell Siri to piss of your bandmate on your behalf.

I Could Use a Love Song - Ch 1: givin’ up on love, hey love’s given up on me

Summary: Emma Swan, small town orphan and up-and-coming country singer, is known for her voice, her penchant for leather, and her overall (earned) anger toward the world. She’s had a rough go of it – rough enough that every single song of hers is angry or sad – but on the road something (or someone) happens that might change her tune.

(Spoiler Alert: it’s Killian. Cue the gasps of shock.)

Also on AO3.

---

The upside to a truly shitty adolescence? Lyrical inspiration.

Emma Swan grew up a little bit all over the place, but primarily in a small town that was most definitely above the Mason-Dixon line and yet half its population spoke with some kind of southern-esque drawl. Confederate flags were common on Chevy trucks. Friday nights in the Fall were dedicated to high school football and absolutely nothing else. Their town’s only radio station was country, though it played seven different church services on Sunday mornings. To say that the whole town’s dynamic read like a cliché country song… it was more obvious than Emma’s bright red leather jacket in a crowd of cotton camo.

So no one was particularly surprised when the beautiful, damaged orphan with the voice of a (really pissed off) angel hit the road with a country band.

They might not have been surprised, but oh did they talk. After her falling out with the pastor’s son and her quick escape to Pittsburgh, she was every negative stereotype of famous in a small town you could conjure. Lily, the closest thing she’d had to a friend outside of Neal, son of Pastor Gold, would keep her updated on the rumors and the hearsay. Not that she wanted to know, necessarily. She’d rather imagine that her name had simply fallen out of the collective memory of that god forsaken town. But it hadn’t. Her story was on the tongues of every bar patron, Baptist, and boy scout leader north of I-80.

It wasn’t her story, though. Not really. The tales they told of Emma Swan always somehow ended up with her as the villain and not the fairy tale princess, the lost girl with no choice but to suffer at the hands of assholes.

Her parents had been shit. Drug addicts, apparently, and she’d been taken from them. She’d been passed through the foster system from ages 3-12, the best foster parents mostly ignoring her and the worst… well, she couldn’t afford the therapy to even attempt to go there.

She’d wound up with an OK but definitely half-crazy woman by the name of Sarah just before she turned 13 and that’s where she’d stayed, that hick town that just couldn’t get enough of her little sob story. That’s where she’d met Neal, the charismatic son of one of the town’s pastors. His dad had seemed nice enough, did a lot of community work and even owned several businesses, boasting of his commitment to boosting the local economy. For once she’d thought she’d found some people who didn’t suck who might make her life at least somewhat normal.

She, as usual, was wrong. Pastor Gold was… well, off. Way too angry for a dude preaching the New Testament each week. But at least he’d never hurt her. No, that privilege was reserved for Neal, who would beat her to a bloody pulp and then tell his daddy’s flock all about saving his sweet girl from a drug deal gone wrong (poor thing ended up like her parents despite the best efforts of the system, you see).

It was pathetic. And after she went to jail for having the gall to defend her own life from that sociopath, well, that was it. She dropped out of high school during the homecoming pep rally and hopped a bus to the city.

fireworks (that went off too soon)

Hey there! This is a CS one shot. An AU in which Killian is the lead singer and songwriter in a band that sounds suspiciously like Fall Out Boy...

Summary: Emma and Killian were friends in college, but haven’t spoken in 9 years. Killian’s band’s new single changes everything.

Words: 4400ish

Rating: Teen? (Swearing, References to Sex)

Also on AO3

Big thanks to @awkwardnessandbaseball​ for reading this over, correcting all my dumbass mistakes, and helping me polish this up pretty :) (The title comes from my favorite Fall Out Boy song, Fourth of July. It’s heavily featured in the story sung by Killian’s band.)

---

It was 3pm on Friday the 13th – also a Full Moon – when Emma Swan finally had the meltdown she’d pressed “pause” on about nine years earlier.

(Nine years, three months, more accurately, but who was counting?)

The work week was winding down. The get this done today or be fired tasks had been completed and all the emails had been answered and it was about time to start doing the bare minimum to run down the clock to 5:01 when she could, without regret, run screaming from the building and put her god forsaken job out of her mind for two days of rest, relaxation, and rum.

(Definitely the rum. Or maybe it had been upgraded to a tequila weekend.)

It was Pandora’s fault, really. (A fitting name for opening up an emotional box inside her soul that had been sealed for quite a long time and with very good fucking reason.)

Usually Emma listened to wordless music – movie scores, Vitamin String Quartet and the like – so as to keep the creative juices flowing without breaking her train of concentration. But having reached the procrastination part of the afternoon, she thought, what harm could there be in listening to a little regular music?

Emma had always had a soft spot for pop/punk/emo music. It brought her joy even when it wasn’t joyful, which is either a sentiment only shared by lonely foster girls or perhaps all emo kids, but did it matter? It was her kind of music. Long before she met Killian Jones.

But then she met him. He was an insufferable ass at least 2/3 of the time, but for the other third of his life, he was sweet, funny, and musically a goddamn genius. His voice was smooth and warm, he could play guitar like it was in his DNA, and his lyrics were both relatable and completely original. She was half in love from the start, so of course she pushed him as far away as possible.

(Love is patient; love is kind. Love is slowly losing my mind)

He was aloof. At best. They were college kids who shared a dorm building and not much else, not until their roommates fell in love with each other. That’s around the time they started spending an inordinate amount of time together. He was fucking anything with brown eyes and tits and she absolutely did not care and everything was fine. They were friends, kind of. She was a fan of his band, but not in the groupie way. She had no intention of being just a notch in his bedpost or a line in his song.

(As it turned out, she ended up becoming both. Eventually.)

Lost by Choice

Welp, this is the Naked and Afraid AU that absolutely no one in the world asked for. I’m trying to get back into writing, and last weekend I watched a lot of Naked & Afraid (I usually watch Investigation Discovery, but was exhausted with murder), and I just couldn’t stop seeing an AU opportunity. I don’t know. Maybe someone out there will appreciate? 

Part 1 of 2 Rating: Teen (swearing) Word Count: 2200ish

AO3

In retrospect, a televised challenge with a little less dehydration and mosquito bites would have been a smarter choice. Maybe one that didn't involve literal hunting for food and water. But Killian Jones was always one for a challenge. He was a survivor. He had already lived through a thousand different hells (hyperbole); he could live through this one, too. Except he hadn't slept in 3 days, hadn't had clean water (aside from opening his mouth in the rain) in the same amount of time. Oh, and he was slightly in love with his very naked partner who very much despised him.

Yeah, Killian being a survivor and all, he should have chosen to audition for that show. Not Naked and fucking Afraid. 

But noooo he'd been determined to prove himself. And to whom? He didn't have anyone around anymore to impress. Liam was dead. Milah was dead. Bae made it perfectly clear Killian should consider him dead. He'd lost everyone and everything and apparently the long-lost emo kid inside him decided he needed to take that metaphor and make it literal and audition for a show where he was cold and he was ashamed, lying broken on the floor.

Wait, no, that wasn't it.

(The delirium had set in.)

Surviving in the worst of conditions had drawn him to this particular (idiotic) challenge, but there was something, too, in the partnership aspect. Being paired with only one other person, just as stranded as you, to finish out the task... maybe it was his complete loneliness or, again, the part of him who couldn't resist a challenge, but it intrigued him. How do you put all of your individual experiences together to form a bond, a team, that would keep them alive for 21 days without another soul?

Then he was paired with Emma fucking Swan.

COMPLETE! Knock, Knock Ch. 27/27

The epilogue is here! I’ve loved writing this story more than I can even explain and I hope that you all enjoy where it’s ended up. It makes me inordinately happy and I hope you can feel at least a little of that. Let me know what you think? Maybe? 

Thank you for reading!

Read on AO3.

Start from the beginning on tumblr.

So many things get easier the older you get, the more life experience you have.

Moving is not one of those things.

Despite having more money, more help, more space, and more time… moving still fucking sucked.

In fact, if it weren’t for the bitter memories of filling up the last house from scratch, Emma would just burn all this shit and start over. But that was an overreaction. She was just stressed. Moving did that to you.

And kids did that to you, too.

The business had been great. In the last year, she and Killian had invested in another whole ship and small crew. They’d been on the water nearly every good-weather day with some kind of touring group, and spent the entire off-season taking classes and attending conventions and getting all kinds of educational certificates and accolades.

Schools from towns a hundred miles away were booking trips with them. The summer camps had waiting lists a mile long. And finally – finally – Emma had been able to work out a grant deal that allowed the kids who couldn’t afford the camp to actually attend.

To say she’d been riding a high for the last 365 days would sound like an overstatement, but it still felt deeply true.

Knock, Knock Ch. 26/27: (Im)perfect

Second to last chapter! Last chapter is going to be posted in about five minutes, so there won’t be much wait on this one. 

Read on AO3.

Start from beginning on tumblr (links to next chapter at the end of each)

“I swear to God, Mary Margaret, if you make me go into one more store, I’m going to set you on fire.”

The mall was crowded – it was a gloomy Saturday and there wasn’t much else to do but window shop and people watch – so Emma’s shouting (unfortunately) garnered quite a bit of attention.

And guess what? She couldn’t care less.

“First of all, Emma, the fire references are no longer funny. OK, they never were funny, but I’m officially calling Time of Death on tolerating them. Second – and more importantly – you have to completely start over here. You’re building a home! And you have very little to fill it with. You need to explore, to look around and see what you want. It’s more important than you’re realizing.”

Eye roll. “It’s just stuff, Mary Margaret. You know me well enough to know that I don’t give a shit about the things that I own. I’ve lived on next to nothing, so why the hell should I care if my pot holders match my tea kettle?!” She was still shouting. It would be easy to pretend she was merely enjoying the full use of her lungs now that she’d mostly recovered from the smoke inhalation damage, but the fact was she just snapped a little and lost all volume control in the process.

Knock, Knock Ch. 25: New Beginnings

Full disclosure: I literally just got off an actual real life pirate ship excursion and I might be a little drunk. But I wrote this sober, promise! I hope you enjoy this chapter - things are definitely wrapping up for our pirating lovebirds.

Read on AO3.

Read from the beginning on Tumblr.

Recovery wasn’t like it was in the movies and TV shows. Well, not in the happy ones at least.

Emma was miserable a lot of the time. Her voice was mostly back to normal, but the aching in her chest was still pretty severe. The burns she and Belle had suffered were admittedly minor by comparison to what they could have been, but they still hurt like a bitch (and didn’t look very aesthetically pleasing either).

And the pain. Ugh. The pain was nearly constant. She’d stopped taking the pills the doctor had given her – the addiction videos did their proper job of scaring the living daylights out of her – but now she was left at a constant 6-7/10 pain scale (definitely the level of one of the miserable looking emojis) and it was negatively impacting just about every part of her life.

“For God’s sake, Emma, is there any meal you will eat?!” David snapped at her, deeply frustrated by her current distaste for all food that wasn’t ice cream, frozen yogurt, or milkshakes.

“Sorry, dad, I’m just not feeling lasagna today. Especially not since you most definitely just bought this from Granny.”

“Well my pregnant wife and I got sick of putting in so much effort to try to cook you delicious, homemade meals just to have you turn your nose up at them! I know you’re going through a lot, Emma, but, quite honestly, you’re acting like a toddler. Mary Margaret and I are happy to have you here and we love you but I swear to God if you don’t eat this lasagna I’m going to throw it at you.”

Yeah, most people were at their breaking point with her.

Killian was the most patient, of course, but he’d finally broken just the day before. And what a delightful break that was (sarcasm).

Knock, Knock Ch.24/27: The Aftermath

We’re getting closer to the end, friends! This chapter had more angst than I’ve planned, but I still love it. And I hope you do, too! Question: does everyone know the game Hangman? As I was taking the photo above I realized that might be a regional thing (and also realized how gross the concept is; like seriously why the fuck was I playing this as a child?!). But when I was in the hospital my mom and I played it a lot, hence it making its way into this story. 

If you read, let me know what you think? And thanks to @emmaswanchoosesyou for unintentionally(?) providing a line of dialogue. :)

Read on AO3.

Start from the beginning on Tumblr.

It’s funny how sometimes you just want to reach through your rib cage and rip out your own lungs.

OK, so funny probably wasn’t the word. But Emma was trying to see some form of lightness in her current situation. And, yes, she was failing horribly.

She couldn’t talk, not really. It came out all scratchy and wasn’t really worth the pain, so she’d taken to writing notes. Except her hands had suffered minor burns from coming in contact with hot objects, so that hurt, too.

Just wonderful.

Miraculously she hadn’t broken her legs – Killian did well to remind her exactly how lucky she was to have escaped that particular injury (“why are you calling me the lucky one? I’d say it’s you, considering if my legs were broken you’d have been the person in charge of helping me use the restroom,” she’d scratched out, her voice somehow Julia Child and Morgan Freeman at the same time).

He’d been distant. He was taking care of her, of course – in addition to David, Mary Margaret, and Regina, the three of whom were also tending to poor Belle (alongside a massively apologetic Will).

Belle was doing about the same as Emma, though with fewer bruises, cuts, and sprains (Emma was ever the Princess of Stupid Ideas with Painful Consequences, it seemed).

Knock, Knock Ch. 23: F is for Fire

Didn’t leave you hanging too long, I hope. Please keep in mind I have zero firefighting experience. And, hey, let me know what you think? Hope you enjoy!

Read on AO3.

Start from the beginning on Tumblr.

When they smelled the smoke they should have just run. They should have put on something other than their pajamas, maybe, but beyond that they should have done nothing but snatch up their phones and wallets and head for the fucking hills. They should have just reacted like any normal, scared human would.

But no. They weren’t normal. They didn’t just run away from bad stuff. They ran toward it; they tried to stop it. They were helpers.

Emma loved that about herself, and about Belle. It’s why they became friends in the first place. They were the ride or die kind.

And it appeared they were choosing die today.

Leave it to her to be cracking jokes in her head before she burns to death.

(Hey, she gets bitter when her attempts at helping don’t do a damn thing.)

“Belle! Belle, are you here?”

To be fair, when Emma and Belle had run toward the source of the smoke rather than away, they really weren’t thinking it was going to be life-threatening decision. Kind of like how she figured closet sex in an airport wouldn’t get her on the terror watch list or how she thought becoming friends with her loud next door neighbor couldn’t possibly irrevocably change her life. Oh, how the universe loved to prove her wrong.

The smoke was now so heavy that Emma couldn’t see her fingertips as they slid along the soon-to-melt retro-ass commercial carpet, her attempts to crawl down the hallway not seeming to get her anywhere close to fresh air.  

“Emma!” Belle choked out, somewhere to her left. “Stay low!”

No, Belle, I was planning on going up there where all the heavy smoke and death was.

Fuck, she needed to chill with the snark and focus on surviving.

Knock, Knock Ch. 22: The Long Way Home

Forgive the transit fantasies (USA doesn’t have as many trains as I’m suggesting), but I hope you like this chapter! Stuff is on the horizon.

Read on AO3.

Read from the beginning on Tumblr (links to next chapter at the end of each).

“I think you two are the only non-terrorists I’ve ever known to wind up on the no-fly list.”

Ugh. Leave it to Ruby to find this very terrible predicament they were in just so damn funny.

After security had escorted them out of the airport and Ruby had found them sulking on the curb of long-term parking, Killian had just assumed that he and Emma would laugh it off and enjoy the rest of their vacation (well, the start of it, really). But Emma’s cheeks were still burning red, even an hour after the incident, and the weight of the logistical nightmare they were now dealing with – you know, how the hell do you get the whole way across the country without a plane? – well, he wasn’t exactly laughing it all off himself.

The plus side: Emma wasn’t mad at him. Nor was he mad at her. They knew they were doing something stupid and they were clearly both willing participants. If anything was to blame it was their hormones. Or something. But the downside: not being mad at each other doesn’t make the other glaring problems go away.

“And, what, you’ve got a lot of terrorist buds out there?” Emma snarked back, the first words she’d actually spoken since Killian regaled the Washingtonians with their tale of love, lust, and losing their right to take domestic and international flights for an undetermined amount of time.

“Hey, I’m proud! Wasn’t too long ago you didn’t care enough about anyone to risk that kind of nightmare. It’s a good thing when baby’s in love.”

“Baby is in a fucking mess, thank you very much, Ruby.” Emma was tapping at her phone furiously, whether it be taking out her frustration on Angry Birds or researching alternative forms of travel - Killian couldn’t be sure.

Knock, Knock Ch. 21: Vacation

Thank you, Pennsylvania, for being gloomy enough today to pass for Seattle. (I’m not happy about it shielding my view of the meteor shower, but whatever.)

This chapter has a fair bit of humor, a guest star, and some slow development. Please let me know what you think if you’re so inclined. :)

Read on AO3.

Read on Tumblr (links to the next chapter at the end of each).

Ruby hadn’t been gone that long, and yet somehow Emma entirely forgot how ridiculously persuasive (manipulative) the girl could be when she was really and truly motivated.

Which is the short story of how in a Skype call meant to serve as a planning meeting for Mary Margaret’s upcoming baby shower, Emma Swan somehow ended up agreeing to visit Ruby. In Seattle. In two weeks.

(Killian was going to kill her, since she’d kind of offered him up as her copilot – after hacking into his iPad to ensure that he didn’t have any scheduled excursions, that is.)

Ruby had acted almost surprised that Emma had been so easily swayed, but that probably was part of the persuasion process – start with guilt and end with innocent surprise… Ruby might have said that to Emma once.

Manipulative wolf girl. Oh well. Maybe it would be fun?

(If Killian didn’t kill her.)

(She’d definitely been watching too much iZombie.)

In an effort to butter up her recently labeled boyfriend, Emma made some hot cocoa (Goldschlagger in hers; Kahlua in his), lit a few candles, and slipped on a little lacy number she’d ordered from Amazon in preparation for whatever romantic milestone/holiday she’d inevitably not realize had arrived until the day of (or, in this case, the preemptive groveling for forgiveness she was about to embark on).

Killian quietly opened her front door only about 5 minutes later (thank god or the hot chocolate would have been more like lukewarm chocolate) and the way his eyes so very cartoonishly bugged out of his skull was both a major boost to her self-esteem and proof that maybe, just maybe, she might be able to make him not hate her after all.

“Swan! My god, are you trying to kill me, love?” Killian’s eyes were still fairly buggy, roving over the royal blue lace in shock and obvious appreciation.

Knock, Knock Ch. 20: Teach You a Thing or Two

OK, so yes it’s been far too long since I updated, but I’m going to try to get this done in the next month or so! It’s 27 chapters total, so we’re nearing the end... with a few twists and turns still to come. If you’ve forgotten where we left off, there’s a summary under the cut to refresh your memory! Or if you’re reading for the first time, you can use the links below to start from the beginning.

Read on AO3.

Read on Tumblr (links to next chapter at the end of each).

Previously on Knock, Knock...

Invented

Well I guess I was still a little obsessed with a ‘verse I wrote over a year ago, so I decided to give the whole thing a conclusion. A follow up to “Cut” and “Always Be,” this story shows Emma and Killian navigating their rekindled relationship and trying to find ways to put the past behind them to build a brighter future.

(Like the other two, the title and subtitles within are courtesy of Jimmy Eat World.)

Words: 9K

Rating: T 

[Read the whole collection on AO3 if you’d rather.]

I’m one more here, some old-time pioneer / who believes with shaken faith I still have some cool

It was a funny thing, being in a new relationship that wasn’t really new at all. 

Parts of it were new, of course. They had almost nine years of life to catch up on with each other so they had no shortage of conversation topics, for sure. It was almost overwhelming how much she needed share with him – every milestone of Henry’s, of her own police service, of her parents and her friends and the renovations she did to her house by the water (always thinking of her Captain, even when he wasn’t hers) – and he had things to share as well. The good he’d been able to do in the Navy after all the bullshit died down. The friends he found in the men whom he’d saved. But his life had been – well, far more empty than hers. 

It hadn’t been her fault. Nor was it his, not really. Like she’d always said, it had felt like the whole universe had conspired against them, had fucked up their perfect storybook life. Reality had been the reason she’d walked away, after all, not Killian. And she’d made a life in her (lonely) years. Mostly filled with Henry, but he wasn’t it. Even without him, if – god forbid – drunk Emma had had enough sense to ask that man from the bar to wear a condom, her life would still have gone on. Killian – he hadn’t seized the moments the way she had. In a lot of ways he’d crumbled in on himself after she’d made that hardest decision of her life to bolt. And some days it ate at her.

This day being one of them.

Knock, Knock Ch. 19: Definitions

Ahhhhh only a few minutes until Once Upon a Time! I know this is probably the worst time to post a new chapter but I have to work at ass in the morning, so I’m just doing it now before I forget. Hopefully people still get a chance to read after the episode is over!

This is a transitional chapter - Emma and Killian’s relationship is changing and growing - hopefully for the good. Let me know what you think!

Read on Ao3.

Ruby left her on a Tuesday.

(Seriously, fuck Tuesdays.)

Emma hugged Ruby practically to death at the door to their no-longer-shared apartment building. Killian gave them some space but Ruby had screamed at him to join the group hug and of all the situations she never thought she’d be in, this one probably topped the list.

Not one but two accidental neighbors had come into her life and proved to her that she’d been nothing but flat out fucking wrong the majority of her life she spent feeling like she’d always be alone. Through a thin wall or across a whole damn country, she was loved and loving and she’d berate herself for being so closed off all her life and for all the things she’d probably missed out on because of it, but you know what? If she’d opened up sooner maybe she’d have entrusted her heart (and sanity) to complete dicks and then where would she be?

Definitely not in this ridiculously weird neighbor sandwich.

Mary Margaret and David had apparently arrived mid-hug and joined in, too, and even though none of them really knew Whale all that well, he also got out of the car and dove in. Emma might have started crying a little for the happy and a lot for the sad that was her day-to-day life without Ruby Lucas, the biggest pain in the ass, beautiful, supportive, (platonic) best friend she never thought to ask for (but was given anyway).

There was awkward shuffling as the group hug disassembled, plenty of mumbled goodbyes – even a few laughs – but in less than the span of one sitcom commercial break, Ruby was on her way to becoming a Seattle girl.

(Ugh, Seattle. Home of zombies and horny doctors and whiny music and rain.)

Knock, Knock Ch. 18: It’s My Party and I’ll Cry if I Want To

This took forever to write and I’m so sorry about that! But I’m back and I’m finishing this fic that I love deep down in my heart. I hope you love it also. Last we left our favorite couple, they’d finally taken the leap and gone on a date... and enjoyed the fun that came after. Now we see what happens next! 

(Please let me know what you think. I’m very nervous about this.)

Read on AO3.

Why exactly couldn't life just work like a fucking rom-com, Emma thought, Killian's fourth phone call that morning dashing all her hopes of a morning-after shag (the British slang was rubbing off on her, apparently, or maybe it was helping her cope. Who knows). That's not how this should work. They went on the date. They had the sex. Depending on the rating of the film, this would either be the cute-series-of-dates montage or the mashup of various sexual positions in fun and exciting new locales (oh, soooo many surfaces in their apartment remained woefully unchristened). But no. Emma didn't wake up to sunshine and orgasms. She awoke to sleep deprivation and an aching back (stupid uncomfortable boat) and the real world where Killian still owned a one-man booming business (and she still needed to figure out what the hell to do with her life). He kept stealing glances at her as he talked with clients and partners and travel agents (those still existed?), begging her to stay in bed just a little longer so he could come back and snuggle the morning away. But that never happened. She got a call from David and Killian had to check back with his insurance agent, and their glorious first day of we're actually doing this turned into nothing more being done than a kiss on the forehead and a sad smile goodbye. - A man should be happy when he's making money, but Killian was decidedly not. OK he was. But it was complicated. Because all that money making was taking an awful lot of time and energy and he was left with about nothing left at the end of the day. Nothing for his Swan. (They didn't have labels yet but she knew damn well he was hers, so what was the harm in thinking maybe possibly she could be his in return?)