Chapter Text
“Stupid, stupid, stupid, stu-”
“I’m gonna go ahead and guess the next word was stupid?”
“Goddammit, Ruby! Shit!”
Emma jumped back in surprise. She didn’t think her roommate would be home yet. Ruby was supposed to be with her boyfriend - well, fiancé if everything went according to Graham’s plan.
“Nice to see you too, Emma. Missed you these last few weeks. How was your trip home?”
Emma slammed the door, dropped her bags on the ground, and plopped onto the couch rather dramatically, even by her standards. Ruby hummed in acknowledgment of her friend’s dramatics. Unfortunately for Emma, Ruby had a sixth sense when her friend needed help and had no qualms about offering it. Even pushing Emma to take it when necessary.
“Emma? What happened? I thought Killian was going home with you-”
“Exactly! You thought it was a great idea! I didn’t! I knew it was stupid!”
Ruby walked out of the kitchen and shoved Emma’s feet out of the way before taking a seat at the opposite end of the couch.
“Did he not feel the same?” Emma looked away from Ruby, refusing to make eye contact. Ruby thought for a moment she had crossed a line, but then she saw her friend blushing. “Emma? Emma Marie Swan! Did you not tell Killian the truth?”
Emma sat up abruptly. “When would I have done that, Rubes? Between the family dinners and David watching us like we were some goddamn teenagers needing to be supervised, we had no time alone! And the time we did have alone, it was awkward as shit! We’d spent the entire day acting like we were in love-”
“You do love him, so there’s not much acting involved.”
“Ruby, I swear to god.”
Ruby held her hands up in defense. “Sorry. Please continue.”
“It was awkward at night, but nothing was worse than the mornings.” Emma held her head in her hands as she tried to forget what it felt like to wake up in his arms.
Ruby stood up quickly. “Wait! Are you saying you shared a bed?” Her face lit up like their Christmas tree, much to Emma’s chagrin. Ruby moved quickly out of the room to grab their whiteboard, which was often used when trying to pin down the location of their latest skip.
Emma rolled her eyes as she saw the whiteboard enter the living room and flopped back down into the cushions when she saw the title Ruby had written across the top of the board.
“ Trope-A-Thon ”
“Really, Ruby?”
Her friend simply smiled in reply as she picked up the marker and began to write. Finally, when Emma heard the marker’s cap click back on, she sat up to read Ruby’s work, her jaw-dropping in surprise.
“What the hell is this list, Ruby?”
“This, my dear Emma, is what I call a trope chart. I’ve listed some of the most overused, cliched, cute, and dare I say fluffiest tropes there are.”
The list was full of concepts Emma had heard of before. She’d read a piece of fan fiction or two, and a few cheesy novels. Enough to know this list was only going to add fuel to Ruby’s fire.
“Okay, number one: bed-sharing. Now, a big moment here, Emma. Was it forced?”
Emma thought about lying; however, she figured that it would be best to tell Ruby the truth for the sake of her sanity. “Ruth assumed we share a bed now and-”
“Perfect so that we can check that off. Oh! Actually, and I’m assuming the answer to this question is yes, but I need confirmation. Did you actually sleep in the same bed, or did one of you “try” to sleep on the floor but ended up in the bed anyway?”
“We both offered to sleep on the floor but eventually decided we were mature enough to share the bed. Ruby! Please don’t give me that look. We knew there was a chance someone would barge in.”
“Yeah, right! I’m sure it was a real sacrifice for him to spoon you all night.” Emma’s face went bright red – again. “Wait - were you the one doing the spooning?”
“No! He was...it was, ugh - I hate you! It was nice, okay?”
Ruby continued to laugh as she wrote more nonsense on the board under bullet point one. Emma saw that she already had seven listed, and there was still space for more.
“My next question was going to be ‘was there cuddling’, but I guess we can skip that. Now, what about outside of the bedroom?”
“Why does that matter?” Ruby didn’t answer, she merely gave Emma a pointed look. “Yes, we cuddled on the couch some nights.” Emma sighed, before reading the subpoint listed on the board. “ And yes, sometimes it was when others were around, and sometimes it was when we were alone," she continued, hoping to bring an end to the conversation sooner rather than later. But Ruby wasn't anywhere near close to being done.
Eventually, Emma grabbed them both snacks and drinks. She hated herself for giving into whatever this nonsense was. Still, she couldn’t help but feel curious about where this was all going.
They made their way down the list, checking off every single trope Ruby had listed and added a few more as they went along. It wasn’t until they got to the last bullet point that Emma realized just how screwed she was.
“Ruby, I am not sharing-”
“Ems, you keep saying that, and it’s cute you still believe it. But you’ve already shared every other detail about this trip with me. I’m not letting you skip over the most important one.”
- Kiss?
That’s all the board said. Emma had hoped that they wouldn’t get this far. She had been relying on the fact that Ruby had a shiny new ring on her finger and hadn’t yet mentioned it once. Emma had tried to distract her at point number twelve, breaking the no gift rule . Of course, it hadn’t worked, and with that, Emma was forced to relive one of the most thoughtful and awkward moments of her life.
Killian had given her a star. Not just any star. He’d given her the one that was located right by the Cygnus constellation. Even the tips of his ears had gone bright red when she’d opened the letter. Killian felt terrible that he couldn’t get her the constellation but figured this was a close second.
One summer three years ago, not too long after they had met, Killian took her stargazing and showed Emma her namesake. Since then, whenever possible, they would always try to find the Cygnus, and that damn star he got for her was the star that usually led to the discovery.
Emma realized she had been caught up in the moment when Ruby’s fake cough brought her back to the reality of her situation.
“Okay. Yes, there were kisses.”
Ruby’s eyes went wide, and she sat back down on the couch. “Wait, Emma... Kisses? Plural? As in, more than once? How much of that was for real?”
Emma was exhausted. Reliving these past two weeks was both great and miserable. The moments in front of her family were real. Emma knew she’d loved Killian for two years now. Being by his side, showing affection was nothing new for her; in fact, she reveled in those opportunities. But then there was the reality of the situation, Killian was faking. He’d always been a flirt, even if she knew he was different with her, always charismatic and doting, and yet open to her affection, knowing how rarely she showed her softer side. Emma and Killian had shared a kiss or two before- usually when someone turned their head the wrong way. All harmless little moments.
Until this trip home.
“I mean, my family hung a lot of mistletoe this year, so there were a few harmless quick ones. But there were two, um, not so innocent ones?” Emma tried to shrink away from Ruby’s squeals. It took a moment for her friend to calm down, and when she did, she turned intense eyes Emma’s way as she waited for more details.
“When he got me the star, I kissed him. And I mean like grab-him-by-the-lapels-of-his-jacket-and-haul-his-lips-down-to-mine kiss him. It just felt like - ”
“Like your life depended on it? Like one of the cheesy romance clichés? ”
“You know, I still hate you right now,” Emma sighed, once more deflated that Ruby’s clichés seemed to perfectly sum up that kiss.
“Wait, you said there were two. When was the second one?”
That was the one Emma was most bothered because Killian had initiated the kiss that time. “It was the last night. We...uh...everyone else had been drinking except for us. Everyone was so lovey-dovey and all over their significant other. I kinda used it as an excuse to be more...touchy than normal.” Ruby grinned wolfishly. “PG-13, I swear! But we were alone in the kitchen at one point. And that goddamn mistletoe was hanging from the fan. I...fuck...I made a joke about how I knew Mary Margaret had planted it there and he said something about not wanting her efforts to go to waste.” Emma was starting to squirm as she recalled the encounter. “Then I said he couldn’t handle it, and then he said that I couldn’t handle it. He was right. I definitely couldn’t handle it.”
Ruby nearly fell off the couch from how hard she was laughing. Emma took a pillow and threw it at her friend to try and make her stop. Finally, after a few minutes, Ruby regained her composure and sat back up.
“Emma, you do realize how ridiculous that sounds, right? Like, how the hell did you guys not finally get together? Seriously!”
“I don’t know, Rubes! I thought after the kisses he would say something. I thought...I thought he was going to after the last one. He looked at me...ugh...he looked at me like he loved me or something. It was so incredible, but then…I just ...”
Ruby moved closer to Emma and pulled her into a hug as her friend started to become emotional.
“Emma, I know I tease you all the time about telling Killian how you feel. But look at yourself, sweetie. I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it. The two of you have something special. It’s rare and I need you guys to stop being idiots and get over-”
Ruby stood abruptly and walked back to the board. Emma wiped the tears from her eyes, as she turned her head to try and figure out what Ruby was doing.
Ruby mumbled something to herself that Emma couldn’t decipher. “Rubes? What are you saying?”
“There was no angst.”
Emma pushed away from the couch and moved to her friend’s side. “What did you just say?”
“Emma! That’s it! There were no angsty moments!! How did I miss this the first time?”
Ruby turned back to the board as if it all made sense now, and Emma couldn’t have been more confused.
“What do you mean there was no angst?”
Ruby sighed, almost as if she was annoyed that Emma wasn’t keeping up with her. “Come on, Emma, you like cheesy romance novels. You know how this works! There’s the mutual pining, the insane idea that fake dating will ever work, forced bed-sharing, kisses that weren’t necessary for the ruse! You checked every trope box we could think of - all except one. What eventually pushes the couples together?”
Emma gawked at Ruby’s accusation. “I think I’ve let this go on long enough. We aren’t some cheesy Hallmark movie!”
“The board of tropes and I disagree with you, my friend. Look, you know it’s true. I know it’s a lot to take in, but maybe this is your angsty moment. How did you guys even end the trip? He dropped you off, right? What did you say to each other?”
Emma walked back to the couch and dropped down onto it with a huff of annoyance. As much as she hated to admit it, it felt like Ruby was on to something.
“Fine! Nothing happened! Okay? He helped me grab my stuff and we just stood there while he held my bags. I went to grab them, and he thought I was going in for a hug.”
“Oh, Emma. No.”
Emma reluctantly nodded her head. “After that, he thanked me for letting him come home and asked if he would see me Friday for poker.”
Ruby quickly cut Emma off. “You will be seeing him on Friday, right?”
Emma ignored the outburst. “I said maybe, as long as I didn’t have any cases. And then I just came upstairs.”
“Oh, Emma. Thanks for proving my point. Go see your man. Tell him you love him. Have hot sex. I’m done here!” Ruby walked out of the living room and back to her bedroom, leaving Emma to think about what she’d said.
Maybe she should go and see Killian. But it was late, and she should really sleep on everything before she did something reckless. Besides, nothing good ever happens after two am.