Title: Coney Island Baby
Disclaimer: I don't own Once Upon A Time. If I did, Adam & Eddy would be fired and picking up litter by the side of the highway.
Summary: A short follow-up to Heroes Are Stupid, Villains Are Attractive. (Swanfire.)
Author's Note: It helps to read HASVAA and its prequel Tinder: True Love For Fairy Tales. Rated M for a few F-bombs. What can I say? Emma's a potty mouth!
CHAPTER ONE: CONEY ISLAND BABY
(In which nine months have passed since the last story!)
"Stop the car stop the car STOP THE FUCKING CAR!"
The yellow Volkswagen Beetle swerved on the darkened highway, lights flashing crazily, wiper blades swishing back and forth even though there was no rain.
In the driver's seat, Neal exclaimed, "But we're not at the hospital yet!"
In the passenger seat, one hand wrapped around her extremely swollen abdomen, the other clammed onto the dashboard in a white-knuckled grip, Emma gave the father of her soon-to-be-born child a look that said Neal might as well have had 'stupid' tattooed to his forehead for making such an asinine comment. She snarled out, "I don't think this kid caAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRES!"
At which point the interior lights, headlights, turn signals, and emergency flashers all stared flickering like old-school flash bulbs.
Neal tried very hard not to swear at how quickly this day had taken a turn for the overly dramatic. Up until a few hours ago, the mustard stain on his coat from Emma's corndog-related accident was the biggest hiccup of the day that began with an early morning elopement to Portland and turned into a day trip to Coney Island. He hadn't even been planning on the wedding part until a couple of days ago when Emma had proposed with a casual "We should get married. And soon." while putting the finishing touches on the nursery in the fixer-upper cottage they'd bought about, well, nine months ago, and turned into a family renovation project (both the house and the family in certain respects!). Neal hadn't asked what had changed her mind, if it was just time to get over the psychological blow of her previous marriage or some hormonal thing she'd come to regret; he'd just agreed that however and wherever she wanted to get hitched, it was fine by him. Emma hadn't been particular either, her only proviso that they elope to avoid the magical bad karma that seemed to follow any full extended family gathering and her mother's obsession with planning big fancy events like weddings. He'd certainly had no objection to that! He had objected to Emma's postnuptial demand to drive six hours to Coney Island just for the few hours that the park would be open before closing for the season, but Henry had never been, even living in Manhattan for eight months, so he'd been outvoted.
From Henry's pallor and panicked expression that Neal was pretty sure looked very much like his own, he'd guess his son was regretting that childish enthusiasm now.
"Neal!" Emma screeched, "I have to push! Oh God! AARRRRGHHHHHHH!"
"Dad! Pull over there!" Henry exclaimed from the backseat as a turnout appeared up ahead and his mother made an animalistic sound that resembled one of Graham's wolf calls.
Neal swerved to the shoulder, nearly clipping the guard rail before slamming on the brakes with such force that gravel went flying and Henry tumbled forward, bashing his nose into the back of the headrest with a muffled, "Owe, that hurt!"
"That hurt!?" bellowed Emma. "Try pushing an eight pound human being out of your vagina! Oh, wait, you don't have one! I do! And I pushed you out of it!"
Throwing the car into park, Neal fumbled with his seatbelt as Emma began doing what he really had hoped she wouldn't... preferably until they were in a hospital with doctors who had more experience with this than an old birthing video that Emma had refused to watch. "Awwww, hell no, don't you start pushing yet!"
"I can't NOT push, NeaAHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
The lights flickered and crackled again.
Henry gasped, "I think Mom fried my phone!"
"I told you to turn it oOAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHFFFFF!"
"I told you we should have stopped in Portland!" he shot back.
"Henry, if you don't shut the hell-AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
"I'm getting the first aid kit," Neal declared as Emma started making those weird hee-hee-hoo-hoo breathing sounds. "Keep her from pushing!" he ordered Henry before dashing out into the cold winter night, leaving the teen alone with his laboring mother.
Emma let out another painful sound then began uttering a mantra of, "This is not happening by the side of a fucking freeway" over and over.
Wincing in sympathy and as his stuck-in-the-back-of-a-tiny-car-for-seven-hours limbs protested climbing into the driver's seat, Henry tried to remember anything from that one childbirth class he went to with Emma when Neal had the flu. Unfortunately - or not for his sanity - he'd tried very hard to block out extremely graphic poster-board sized pictures of dilation and effacement.
"It's going to be okay, Mom," Henry tried while he could hear Neal banging around under the hood for supplies. "Just... ah... take short breaths and try not to push yet.."
"Why did I actually want to do this without drugs!? Shit shit!" Emma cursed as she felt the pressure building and knew there was no way this wasn't going to resolve itself right here, on the side of the fucking freeway, probably not very far from where Pinocchio had wandered out with her baby self on his eventual way to that seafood shack where she'd stopped to pee and her water had broken and then things had progressed must faster than she'd anticipated after six hours of tolerable pain. She'd even managed to conceal that she was having contractions until they'd gotten to Boston, and she was now really regretting not just going to the hospital there or Portland. Mostly, she was really regretting sneaking onto the Italian Trapeze, but was it her fault that the pimply kid in charge of the ride didn't notice she was extremely pregnant? Okay, so it was dark out, almost closing time, and she had on a poofy coat and arms full of a giant stuffed duck - Emma threw a glare at Mr. Quakington in the rearview - but if her son and husband had pussied out of trying to stop her...
Speaking of pussies and out... Emma could definitely feel something progressing down there as her abdomen clenched painfully again and she tried really really hard not to push.
The shock of cold air from Neal opening the passenger door was a brief but welcome distraction, until he started tugging at her leggings.
"Noooooooo!" Emma childishly protested, suddenly beset with irrational panic. "You're not supposed to see this!"
Neal smiled despite the fear coursing through him at everything that could potentially go wrong in the next few minutes. "The birth of our child?"
"You know what I mean, Neal!" she cried, literally starting to cry now from the pain that was going to ruin her vagina for a good while - if not permanently. "This other inmate with kids said not to look for six weeks, but I did and it was horrif-ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
"Well, unless you want to traumatize our first kid, I'm your only option, Em. Pretty sure we're past the point of no return here," Neal told her, trying to keep his voice light even as he was a complete wreck inside. "So, let's do this, okay? I'm gonna look. You know I have to."
Emma did and the pain was almost at the point that she didn't care what he saw, so she nodded and gripped onto the seatback and doorframe so Neal could finish removing her sodden leggings and underwear... the lacy red ones she'd picked out for the wedding night that wasn't going to happen now, though she couldn't exactly regret riding the swings, she just hoped her baby was okay and she hadn't screwed up as a mom already. Henry had come a couple of weeks early, and he'd been fine. At least, she thought he had, because the doctor hadn't said anything was wrong, but she hadn't asked, hadn't even looked at him...
Suddenly, Emma found herself sobbing. She'd been trying her best as her due date approached to not think about the last time. This time the whole nine months had been so very different; the physical symptoms aside, it was almost like being pregnant for the first time. But as Emma could feel her second child fighting its way out of her, all of the guilt and regret that she'd been trying to work through, trying to not let weigh heavy on this second chance and second child, all boiled up and spilled over with hot tears and hiccuping sobs.
"Henry, I'm sorry," she gasped through the pain, oblivious to whatever Neal was now doing. "I didn't mean-"
"Hey, Mom, it's okay," Henry assured, giving her arm a squeeze. "I know you didn't mean it."
"No," she wept, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry!" Emma wasn't even really sure which part of it she was sorry for after everything, if it was just not looking at him and holding him when he was born or giving him up or that he was born to a prison inmate. Any of it, all of it. The kid had no idea what she was babbling about, though, his usual perceptiveness apparently eluding him, or maybe she was just that incoherent in a haze of pain. "I just couldn't do it," she gasped out. "I'm so sorry, Henry."
"Henry," Neal gave the bewildered a teen a look as he pulled off his scarf, "just give your mom a hug, buddy."
Bafflement switched to understanding, and Henry felt a bit dumb that he hadn't even thought about his own birth under the circumstances and that it was a painful topic for his mom. Whenever his birthday rolled around, at least since she'd come into his life, he was just happy to have Emma be there to celebrate. And having the fake memories of her raising him, even though he knew it wasn't real... well... he'd never really considered that his mom felt guilty about giving him up. Of course, he'd often wondered how much like those fake memories it really might have been, and there was a lot from his childhood with Regina that he'd repressed and was only now starting to talk about with Archie, but he didn't hold any of it against Emma. He couldn't exactly tell her now, though, so Henry gave his mom a hug as she cried some more and clung to him.
Not for very long, though, as the next contraction overtook her, and then she was trying to break his hand and the lights were flashing and popping again.
Crouching down like a baseball catcher, Neal gave Emma an anxious look. "The baby's crowing, sweetheart." He didn't think he'd ever called her 'sweetheart', aside from maybe in jest when they were kids, but she didn't object to the endearment as her hazel eyes flashed with a mix of agony and determination. "Big push!"
"You can do it, Mom!" Henry cheered.
Her body was already baring down as he spoke and Emma went with it, shouting through the ring of fire, trying to focus on Henry's encouraging words and Neal's intense brown eyes in the flickering light. She pushed and she screamed. The radio came on with a roar of static at full blast and the lamp posts along the side of the highway rained down sparks like feinting fireflies.
"One more, Em."
One more was all it took
Emma yelled and pushed again, bending forward until her forehead pressed against Neal's and then she felt the pressure break. There was a splash of liquid and then cool air against her sweaty brow - and other previously scorching areas. She slumped back against her son in the sudden silence and Neal lifted up a baby girl, pulsing umbilical cord wrapped around one small leg.
Wet, bloody, and steamy in the cold air, the brief silence was broken with a wail, harshly beautiful, and then tiny arms and legs began flailing as if in some newborn interpretive dance to convey displeasure with the whole situation of being evicted from her warm and watery home into this dry and chilly new world.
"It's a girl! I have a sister!" Henry exclaimed, then amended with scrunched expression, "Gross! I saw my sister's vagina!"
"Better hers than mine, Kid. Believe me," Emma gasped out, while tears of relief and joy and lingering pain wet her cheeks.
His own face streaked with tears, Neal quickly bundled the newborn in his scarf. Then beaming so wide he was sure his face would break, he carefully placed the baby in Emma's arms, the moment he knew she'd been waiting for, and placed a kiss on her sweaty brow, declaring, "My two favorite ladies. I think she has your nose, thank God."
Their daughter continued to fuss and Emma continued to cry as she cuddled the baby against her chest. It was everything she had hoped it would be and so much more! This wasn't a fake memory, this wasn't a dream, this was her holding her baby for the first time. She found herself laughing then, completely undone and overjoyed and relieved. It was over, her child was here, and she had ten perfect fingers and ten perfect toes! Oh, she had to admit that a baby covered in blood, still slightly blue, eyes screwed up in the first few minutes after birth, was not an object of beauty, but this kid was still the most wonderful and precious thing that she'd ever held, tiny and fragile and made from love - a love that had endured so much tragedy, that she'd thought for so long would only ever be 'what could have beens' and a pain in her heart. It was still painful, but it was the good kind of painful now, like her heart was too big for her chest and might burst out of it.
"Hey there," Emma cooed, a grin splitting her chapped lips as her daughter's eyes opened, grayish blue, not yet settled on their final color it seemed. That unfocused gaze and those slightly furrowed little brows made for the most amazing moment, mother and daughter regarding one another at last. Even if, Emma knew, she was probably just a blurry shape, her blurry shape was the first thing her child saw, and she knew she would do her best to always be there, to be the parent she hadn't with her son. She could tell that Neal felt the same, that he was just as in love with this person they'd just met and would do anything for her, even if it meant giving his life - but she sincerely hoped he wouldn't have to pull that shit again.
"Look what we did," she managed to speak through all the emotion as he draped his mustard-stained coat over her legs.
"You did most of the work," Neal reasoned, still smiling.
"Maybe," Emma conceded, "but thank you for not freaking out. Both of you," she included Henry.
"Oh, I was freaking out on the inside," admitted Neal with a laugh.
"I wasn't," lied Henry.
"I think your nose is growing, Kid," Emma chuffed, and then winced at another contraction.
"I think we're not quite finished yet," reminded Neal.
Emma wrinkled her nose at that. Oh, she hadn't forgotten that, the pain that had followed giving up her son - though it had paled in comparison to the emotional pain. That bloody mess had seemed to sum up her life in that moment, to remind that her choice had transformed her into nothing more than a surrogate giving nourishment to someone else's child. She shook off that thought and joked, "Just as long you don't pass out."
"You didn't actually think I would?" Neal responded, mildly offended.
"Of course not. But I also wasn't betting on you being on that end of the birth process. I don't want to lose fifty bucks to my father because you fainted at the sight of my placenta."
Neal rolled his eyes, deciding not to comment on the fact that his now father-in-law thought he would pass out in the delivery room. They still had issues and he supposed they always would, whether it was something to do with his and Emma's past or that he saw the Land Without Magic as the better option rather than just a world of amusing novelties, leading her parents to some irrational fear that he was keeping Emma from wholly embracing the Enchanted Forest way of life and thus stifling her potential for happiness. They probably wouldn't be thrilled that Emma had given birth by the side of the road outside of Storybrooke or married him in a civil ceremony outside of Storybrooke, but nothing ever seemed to go according to plan with them - something they were learning (or at least trying) to take in stride.
As Emma tensed again, Neal requested Henry empty out his Big Gulp cup and grab the roll of paper towels from the trunk, so after grabbing his own coat and scarf, Henry jumped out, heading for the weedy ditch his dad had just managed to avoid driving into. As he was dumping the ice and rootbeer slurry into a ditch, something caught his eye...
"Hey, look!"
Neal turned from tying off his daughter's umbilical cord to find Henry holding the cassette tape that he'd tossed out the window nine months ago, still in its plastic case - though the paper had faded and warped somewhat, and in the harsh glow of the street light it look a bit like Lou Reed was wearing a Clockwork Orange cosplay outfit.
"Must be fate," Emma laughed and Neal grinned, leaning in to rub his nose against hers, which seemed appropriate in the chilly weather as much as for the old sentiment of his jokingly dubbed "swan kisses". Now they had a second cygnet, and he was officially a 'Swan'... when the paperwork went through, anyway. Not changing her name had been Emma's one completely nonnegotiable demand, and he was perfectly fine with that. Swans mated for life, after all.
Emma followed up the affectionate rub with a real kiss, sighing happily against Neal's lips - then wincing as the pain returned.
A few minutes later, the ordeal was done, concluded with Henry's exclaiming, "I'm never ever getting another Big Gulp!"
Back in The Bug and heading onwards toward home, Neal put the cassette in the tape deck. Some of the iron oxide had fallen off the ribbon, fading the notes, but it still played, picking up a few bars into "Charley's Girl", just where Emma had stopped it before trying to put it back in the glove box - and Neal had snatched it away, chucking it out the window in the middle of their childish argument on the way to Tallahassee.
"Well, it's not New Year's Eve," said Emma, "but close enough."
AN: Wouldn't it be cool if it was New Year's Eve? Sadly, Luna Park is not open in January. Considering conception around Mother's Day, Charley had to arrive early just for them to get a day at Coney Island's theme park. This is what happens when you don't check things like the age of consent laws in the state before you write about an underage teenager getting knocked up! The line about newborns being less than attractive is from Call the Midwife. And, of course, they named her "Charley"!
TO SEQUEL OR NOT TO SEQUEL: I am leaving this story a WIP for now. If a sequel arises, there will be an additional segue chapter tacked onto this one. In the interim, as I decide on that, I will be posting a super angsty story that I wrote last Saturday, based on a rather depressing Swanfire dream I was cursed with which to begin my weekend. The muse hasn't gone into hibernation quite yet!