Hello. This is a very short one-shot I wrote after watching Interstellar. INTERSTELLAR SPOILER: There is one scene where Cooper watches these video messages from his children after he has been gone from Earth for what seems only minutes for him. It has been over twenty years back on Earth though and so the videos show his children growing up without him. It is utterly heartbreaking to watch as he sobs over the fact that he missed his children's lives and is, in my opinion, the best scene of the movie.
When I was thinking about it, I realized that this was probably what Snow would have felt and so I decided to write a short one-shot where Snow seems Emma for the first time and realizes what exactly putting Emma in the wardrobe meant.
Enjoy! And go watch Interstellar.
She was Snow White, the Queen of the Enchanted Forest and she was alive. The curse had been broken, and there was David, Charming, her husband and her lover. She hadn't felt such joy as she did upon seeing his face in so long.
And then, just as she had never been happier, she had never been sadder. Because there stood Emma, her baby daughter. She dropped to the ground and tears spilled out of her eyes. She sobbed as she looked at Emma.
She had just been born, only minutes ago and now she was twenty-eight years old. 28 years! 28 years she had lost. Even losing her parents hadn't hurt as this did because she had had time to love them, to live with them, to be with them.
Looking at Emma she realized she had lost everything.
Every birthday, every first step, every laugh, smile, hug, first word, first day of school, first date, first kiss.
She had missed every graduation, every job interview, every royal ball, every family dinner.
She had missed tears, fights, reunions, and heartbreak.
Her minutes old baby daughter was a full-grown woman and she had had no part in it.
She wished she could go back desperately and never put Emma in that wardrobe. She would have rather watched the whole word die than miss her daughter's entire life. She had failed her.
When she stood up from the ground she had thrown herself unto she saw the Evil Queen. Snow picked up a metal pole lying on the ground near her and without thinking ran it through Regina, killing her. Immediately hands were on her, arresting her. She didn't say a word, just let them take her to wherever they liked. Eventually she was pardoned. She remembered nothing about the trial other than Emma's face.
As the years went on and her and Emma built up a better relationship, it slowly hurt less. Charming and her had more children eventually and seeing them grow helped as well. There are things, though, that no one ever forgets. And seeing her newborn daughter already 28 years old was an image that would haunt her until the day she died.