Emma could hear it, clear as day. A voice warbling on the brink of exhaustion, wafting through the windows of Granny's diner, followed by the smell of freshly baked bread and the fried fat of bacon. The bell tinkled as she pushed the door open, frowning momentarily with confusion as she saw Ruby rolling around in her skimpy waitress uniform, serving Leroy and the other dwarves tall mugs of beer. Shooting a quick look to her left, she saw Mary Margaret and David grinning like idiots at one another, glancing to the bar every couple of seconds. Granny was busy cleaning a few glasses free of beer that club to the bottoms of the glass. Sighing, Emma strode over to Mary Margaret and David, sliding into the booth next to Mary Margaret, David sitting across from them.
"Hey Emma," Mary Margaret slid an arm around her, squeezing her with a one-armed hug. Emma returned the favor, the voice still hanging on her ears.
"Hey guys," she said quickly, adding, "hey, did you hear someone singing outside?" Mary Margaret and David shared knowing looks before the black haired woman shifted Emma so she stared at the bar, pointing to Granny as she began talking with someone. By now the voice had stopped singing, ringing through the airwaves.
"He was, but he stopped now," Mary Margaret said, then to David, "wasn't it beautiful?" David nodded in agreement, shoulders shrugging as he chuckled.
"If you consider covers of Queen songs to be beautiful," he retorted. Emma smiled awkwardly, craning her neck to get a good look at who it was Granny was talking to, who was singing.
A teenager, looking to be about eighteen, possibly older, was hunched over the countertop, arms stretched backwards so he was tangling his hair up in his fingers, hands resting behind his neck. Granny was sliding glasses around him carefully, the friction against the counter loud amongst the bumbling and talkative customers. Biting her lip, Emma studied him some more:
He was wearing what looked like a long sleeved shirt, gray and a little worn out. Black skinny jeans bunched up around his ankles, stretching across his legs as he kicked them idly like a child, sitting atop a black peacoat he had placed on the stool. A woolen scarf was wrapped lazily around his neck. His black loafers needed a good shining, the heels worn away until they looked like they might fall off. After a few minutes, Granny tapped him on the shoulder, and the great mess that was his hair swayed in his face, golden brown or some sort of gold and in desperate need of a brushing.
"He was singing?" Emma said, almost breathlessly. She had to admit: the kid was extremely good-looking. His cheekbones looked like they could be higher than skyscrapers, his lips pouted to near perfection as he licked them. All the while he seemed to retain some sort of childish innocence about him, as if he was unaware of what effect his looks might have on girls. Mary Margaret nodded.
"It was truly magical," she said, not bothering to address the fact that it did, in fact, sound cheesy. Emma shrugged. Ruby had rolled up the counter, leaning against it in what the girl probably hope was seductive. Emma and David snorted in unison, watching the teenager try flirting.
"Leave it to Ruby to snatch up the goods before anyone else," David joked, receiving a playful glare from his wife. Shaking her head, the trio watched as Granny tried shooing Ruby back to work, Ruby throwing a mini tantrum, yelling that "You never let me do anything fun!"
"Annoying the young man is not an idea of fun, missy!" was Granny's rebuttal, and Ruby sent the boy a pretty lipsticked smile before rolling off to collect mugs from the dwarves, who looked like they were just about finished and drunk out of their minds. The boy shook his head, smiling sheepishly in reply before resting his chin on the counter. Emma took this opportunity to slide out of her seat and amble over to the bar, hopping up on the seat next to him. Granny turned her attention to her, smiling softly.
"Anything I can get you, Emma?" she asked. Emma cleared her throat nervously, casting a sideways glance at the boy before answering.
"A Coke, if you don't mind?" Emma asked, clasping her hands on the counter in front of her. Clinking and clanking could be heard throughout the diner as people finished or started meals. While Granny wen under the bar to fix the soda, Emma stole another look at the boy.
Up close, his cheekbones were sharper than she realized, looking like possible weapons of mass destruction. With his golden brown hair framing his face, it looked fluffy, like the soft downy feathers of a pillow. A thing ring of gold decorated the boy's left nostril. Fancy, Emma thought, noticing it shined brightly under the fluorescent lights. Eyes trailing along his arms, Emma saw how thin the shirt really was- like it had been washed one too many times.
"Here you are, dear," Granny broke through her staring, placing a tall glass of bubbly soda in front of her, a bendy straw sticking out jauntily from the top. Nodding, Emma leaned forward, grabbing he straw between her fingers carefully. One too many times she had shaped the straws in half with her nails, and she was determined not to do so again.
"Thanks, Granny," Emma said, her eyes darting momentarily to the kid as she sipped the drink. It was cool on her tongue, the bubbles fizzing up to her sinuses, making her scrunch her face and shake her head as they popped in her nose.
"You okay there, Miss?"
Emma raised an eyebrow at the boy, taken aback by his accent. It shouldn't have been surprising, the British thing, but for some reason it was. She had met a lot of British people while doing her job as a bounty hunter in New York.
In Storybrooke, Maine, however, no one was that exotic. Unless you counted Belle and Mr. Gold, with their fancy Australian and Scottish accents. Shrugging, Emma smiled politely, her lips a thin line on her face.
"Yeah, thanks," she said, then, "if you don't mind me asking, do you know who was singing earlier?" A brief look of what Emma could only discern as worry flash across his face before he answered her.
"Sorry, that was um…." he trailed, licking his lips, "that was me…." He seemed to be trying to press himself into the counter, like he wanted to disappear on the spot.
"Dude, you look terrified," Emma commented with a laugh, "just because I'm the sheriff doesn't mean there's a need to be wary." At the mention of her job, the boy widened his eyes, jumping up suddenly. In a flurry of gray cloth and wild limbs, the boy rushed to get off his stool, but only succeeded in twisting around awkwardly before crashing to the floor. Emma jumped as he slammed his hands on the floor to keep himself from crashing, taking a moment to draw a breath.
"Hey, kid-" Emma began, reaching down to help him up. Before she could grab his arm, he suddenly wrenched himself away from her, scrambling as he got up, running from the diner as if he was being chased by a murderer, the door nearly coming off its hinges as he slammed it behind him.
Silence hung in the air before everyone returned to what it was they were doing, Emma staring at the door minutes after the kid had run out.
The bell was swinging wildly above the white doorframe, ringing obnoxiously his departure.
