"Unless we don't want the same things."
It hung in the air so thickly Snow swore she was having trouble breathing. Every challenge they'd had in their relationship before had been a problem from without - never within. It brought back all the awfulness between them as David and Marry Margaret under the curse. Ruby was quick, but the check couldn't come soon enough. The moment they stepped outside into the crisp New England air, and away from prying ears, David launched back in. "You do want to go back home, don't you?"
"I am home," replied Snow, not breaking her stride as they walked back to the apartment.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Exactly what I said."
"For now, sure, but in the long term -"
"Long term? Regina wasn't wrong when she said that land is gone. Aside from the small patch of land that was somehow spared - which, by the way, stinks of some other nefarious magic - it's been ravaged. Torn asunder! Just like our home. Emma's nursery..."
"You - you went there?" asked David, his voice suddenly thick with emotion.
Snow broke her stride to nod. "It was... well, like walking into a mausoleum. It was a hollow shadow of our home, David! It broke my heart and... all of our land is like that now. Not to mention that Cora slaughtered almost all the remaining survivors." She started walking again, even as David's feet felt bonded to the pavement.
"So we rebuild," he answered, forcing himself back into motion. "It's our duty as rulers, isn't it?"
"Ha!" Snow erupted in a sarcastic laugh.
"What's so funny?"
"It's gone. You grew up on a farm, you connect the dots. Fields left fallow for 28 years? Tell me where we get the seed to sew to feed an entire realm. While engaging in another ogre war. And rebuilding everything?"
"And what about those left there?" he asked, huffing behind Snow as she stormed up the stairs to the apartment.
"All... I don't know? Four of them?" she shot back.
This stopped David I his tracks for a second again. "Four?!"
The shock and horror in his voice stopped Snow too, even as she rested her hand on their home's doorknob. "There could be more." She sighed, closing her eyes. "But 28 years of ogres, and the tiny patch of the realm that was spared... most were at the haven." She turned her head back to meet her husband's eyes. "Cora slaughtered them. It's ..." Her eyes glistened with unspent tears. "It's gone. And not worth the trouble." She turned away and opened the door, retreating inside. "Hell.. it's not even ethical! How much blood would be spilt in the rescue of so few?!"
David sighed heavily as he followed her in. "Okay. So what about another world? One more like our own?"
"So, you'd like to wander, portal to portal, searching for someplace that may not exist, and will probably never have a big enough yard for you, missing the growth of our grandson, just as we did our daughter, in search of a land that could rid you of homesickness?" She glided into the kitchen, a controlled missile of energy, seeking to find a way to keep her hands busy. For once she was glad to see Emma and Henry's dirty dishes and set at them.
"Well, when you put it that way..." He huffed out a frustrated lungful of air and Snow's eyes alit with some kind of epiphany. He hoped he was wrong and he stared down, pretending to examine a drawing Henry had left on the table.
"You're afraid," she said in wonder. It wasn't something she'd seen often in her soulmate.
He eyed her. "No," he replied defensively.
"You are! What happened to honesty of the heart, Charming?"
"I'm not afraid of living in Storybrooke."
"No. You're not afraid of Storybrooke. You're afraid of having to be reminded of how you acted under the curse!" She watched him squirm uncomfortably. "That's it, isn't it? You don't like being reminded of Nolan!"
His eyes shot back up to meet her's. "Would you?! That guy will always be inside me now. The man who cheated on one wife and didn't even have the balls to let her go when he'd found the one who was truly in his heart! So he lied to you too!"
"A guy I fell in love with. Again. Against all odds," she pushed. "I walked away because it hurt too much. Look, the curse forced us to look at the parts of ourselves we like least. I was meek, and let myself get pushed around, and didn't believe I even deserved a happy ending - let alone than I'd get one. And when I did try to take it, I became the town tramp! I even hurt Emma out of frustration when she was doing her best to prove me innocent. You don't think that eats me up inside?"
"And I bet you apologized. Certainly, it didn't seem to hurt things for long. Mary Margaret was still loyal and brave enough to do the right thing. And then, after she'd stood by him, he leaves you to stand alone in a jail cell!"
Snow's stance behind the kitchen counter softened, her hands dripping with suds. "I wasn't alone. I had Emma."
"A roomate."
"Family. She said so long before I did."
This stilled David for a moment. "You never told me that," he said quietly.
Snow raised a single eyebrow. "When, between the curse breaking, fighting a wraith, getting sucked into a portal, fighting to find our way home, and our... reunion... would you have liked me to drop a short anecdote about my jailbreak and Emma rescuing me? In the burning room perhaps?" she bit back.
"Jailbreak?!" He exclaimed, then shook his head. "Never mind." David looked almost sheepish. "Still... I'd like to hear it."
"Another time. You're not changing the subject."
"Will we ever have the time?"
"And that's my point! There's never any time! What happened to that toast about not having to find each other again for a while? I'm tired of fighting, and that's the only thing we can be sure that land can offer us anymore. The castles are all rubble. This world- is our best chance to have what we always wanted: peace and comfort into which to raise our family. Do you expect to take Henry onto the battlefield as we take back our home? Because that whole world is one now! And to take back what? Fallow land with no established civilization at all. It isn't the Dark Ages back there, David, it's prehistory." She sighed.
"It's home," he replied, and the threads of longing in his voice pained her heart.
"It's gone," she said gently. David shook his head, eyes back on Henry's drawing. He knew he was being irrational, but such a fate didn't seem possible. He shook his head to himself. "But this is home too," she added.
"Maybe it could be..." He was trying to find some common ground but couldn't help the scoffing undertone to his words.
Snow's eyes widened as she spied a quickly scrawled note on the kitchen counter, and David who missed her look, was surprised she seemed to let the bitterness in his tone slide when she finally spoke again.
"Charming," replied Snow, wiping her rinsed hands on a dish towel. "Think about 've lived here just as long as there. 28 years of a life here,that's two lifetimes, one in feels just as much like home to me... and I have to say I'd miss things like electricity and instant cocoa," she said with a smile, hoping to bring a little levity to the situation."Or a good glass of scotch... "
"You lived here 28 years. I've been awake, for what? A year? This isn't home."
"But you have a lifetime of memories, still..." tried Snow.
"I don't know how they are for you? But those don't feel real. They're like I watched them on tv or something. You have 28 years of real memories - cursed or not, they're real. Mine aren't. This doesn't feel like home."
"Home is where the heart is, David, and our family is here. With Emma and Henry... and possibly Regina," she added the last under her breath.
David blanched. "She's a murderer! A sociopath! Besides, Henry doesn't want to have anything more to do with him than us, now!"
"Yeah... apparently, we were wrong." She held up a piece of paper with a small note and handed it to David.
Archie alive. Cora is here. Went to tell Regina with Henry. Will be back soon, don't worry.
-Emma
PS: If you see any pitchforks or torches headed in
the Mayoral Mansion's direction, put 'em out for
me, Deputy? THX.
"I... guess we owe her an apology? Her and Emma..." was all he could say.
"David... you didn't see Emma in the Enchanted Forest. I couldn't be more proud of how she grew to handle herself, and a sword, and if she'd have grown up there? Probably could've put the best of us to shame in combat. But, especially at first, she was lost. It wasn't her home... it never will be, and I don't blame her."
He didn't want her to be right, though he knew she was telling the truth as she saw it. He held up Henry's drawing. "I think it could be for Henry. He's fascinated by our homeland - look at this drawing of the loft. He's got an armory, and added a carrier pigeon coop to the upper level..."
There was a certain twinkle of pride in his eyes that Snow had always expected to see with their first son. Which was why crushing it was going to hurt her heart so much. She took the sketchpad from him and sighed. "He was doing this before they found out Regina was innocent. Look, with the idea of you and I moving out, he's turned the apartment into a citadel... my teaching degree may have come from a curse, but I still spent 28 years teaching kids. He's scared. This is just his way of dealing with it..." she said sadly.
"But, that doesn't change the fact that he loves fairy tales. He wants to be a knight!" he protested.
"Every kid does. I remember loving them. Every kid in my class had their favorite hero."
"But they're from our land."
"And this land makes billions of dollars every year selling those stories to children across the world. It's normal. You don't send a kid to a Shoalin Monastery because he likes Kung Fu movies when he's ten!"
"But if we all lived there-"
"Are we bringing Regina along too?" asked Snow hotly."Because if she's truly changed, he'll never be happy leaving her behind. He loves her, but she'll never be able to live in peace in the Enchanted Forest. And I know Emma won't be truly happy there either. She'd go for Henry, but that is so beyond fair if we were to talk him into coming. This her world - the way she handled Regina's accusation, and a hundred other things, proves that. I'm not taking her away from her home again."
David sighed, the painful frustration clear in his tone. "You're right. But... I don't know if I know how to live with him."
"If I can love Mr. Nolan, perhaps you'll learn to like him. Even if just a little bit." She took his hands in her's and gazed up into his eyes. "Besides... you know we'll figure out a way across the line eventually. And then, maybe, we can all move to some other town. Like Boston." David's nose scrunched at the idea of living in such a big city. "Or... some farm in upstate New York or something..." she offered and he looked pleased for the first time that afternoon. "Don't get your heart set just yet, Charming."
"Yeah, I'm allergic to too much fresh air," interrupted Emma as she swung the front door open. At their surprise, she shrugged. "Thin door."
Henry darted in behind her, looking happier than he had in days."But what about my riding lessons and the horses, Mom?"
Emma began to open her mouth, but it was Regina's voice that was heard as the woman followed the pair inside. "I will always make sure you have a place to ride, Henry." She cocked her head to one side. "And if that means we're all stuck with each other, then so be it," she deadpanned.
"That's what parents do for each other, Grandma," intoned Emma, a devilish smirk appearing on her lips when Regina gave her the stinkeye. "They put their kids first."
Snow wrapped her arm around David, and he returned the gesture as they exchanged a look of silent communication and smiled. "Always," they replied in unison.
"Just try and limit my son's candy intake, if you will. There's enough sweetness in this home to turn him into a diabetic without the morning poptart," Regina sneered, though it lacked any real venom.
"Finally, we agree on something," replied Emma, eyebrow raised, and to her surprise,she caught an amused glint in the former Mayor's eye as her parent's groaned.
"That and that my mother needs to be stopped," replied Regina seriously. "That is why I'm in your happy home, is it not?"
Emma nodded. Maybe... just maybe, this insanity would work.
A/N: This will probably be AU by the next episode or so, but I hope you enjoyed. Let me know using one of the little boxes, or even the big one, if you are so bold. ;)