the prompt: a post 3x11 fic where emma keeps a notebook that she never shows to henry because it's filled with nothing but regina's name, but it kind of got away from me and now there's more to it than that.
special thanks to BladedDarkness for going over it and for keeping me sane what with all these swan queen feelings.
if you were here beside me, instead of in new york
of the arms you said you'd never leave;
i'd tell you that it's simple, and it was only ever thus
there is nowhere else that i belong
It all starts in a dream.
It's the dusk of February First when Emma wakes up to jagged breaths, her baby blue silk pajama top completely drenched in sweat despite the snowfall that has been blanketing Manhattan the whole night.
She doesn't remember a lot; and though she struggles to hold onto the edges, the sound of Henry's soft snores drifting from the next room is quickly chasing the remnants of the dream away.
It's a pointless attempt when the last of the vestiges slip away so easily, so she just strains her ears and listens, willing to calm the racing breaths that seem to fill her chest.
Whatever it was, it's just a dream. She's not running away from anyone, and certainly not from a curse, of all things.
It's just a dream. She didn't leave her heart in someone else's hands.
She repeats the thought in her head over and over as she slides back down and settles comfortably under the still warm sheets; though unconsciously, her hand crawls to where her heart is supposed to be.
She feels it beating underneath her palm, and the shaky breath of relief she lets out takes her by surprise.
When she takes one huge breath and closes her eyes to drift back to sleep, she sees nothing but a haze of green smoke mixing with purple, and a lone figure that seems to be watching her from afar.
Her heart aches incredibly, she almost can't breathe.
She tosses and turns for the next hours.
Her sleep is fleeting, but even then, she still wakes up to her pillow wet with tears, with an odd sense of loss and longing that just seems to press a nameless weight down on her chest.
But what has caused it, she forgets entirely.
It's ten past six when she chances a glance at the alarm clock on her night stand. Emma groans as she stares at the glowing red digits, because sleep is precious and she values each minute.
Just fifteen minutes more before her alarm will ring, but Emma is already wide awake. It's pontless to wait so she jumps out of her bed, heading straight to the bathroom.
She feels like shit—like she's gone ten rounds in the emotional ring with that therapist she once was forced to see when she was fifteen—inexplicably drained by a dream she can't even remember. But she shakes the feeling off with a splash of cold water, rubbing the tear tracks all over her cheeks off.
Her pajama top is wet too, so she throws it in the hamper by the bathroom door and dons on a new shirt. It signals the start of her day, one that she's more than just glad to push through for obvious reasons, beginning with dragging Henry out of bed.
It takes her ten more minutes than usual to rouse him up, and when he finally does, he still looks like he needs sleep.
He's grumpy for some reason, grumbling to himself for the most part. Though, they're both not morning persons, Emma totally gets that. But, still, he's being extra surly, and that hasn't really happened in quite a while, so she asks. "Hey, what's up?"
"I'm tired," says Henry. It sounds a little too snippy, and Emma has to remind herself about pre-teens and their mood swings.
"How come?" She presses on, though a little unsure. "You went to bed early."
Henry lifts a fist, rubbing off the last bits of sleep from his eyes. "I couldn't sleep."
Emma grabs the covers Henry has thrown off of him and shoves it to the other side of the bed, making some space for her to sit. She flops down in front of him, trying hard to reign in the worry she knows is seeping into her voice. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah." He nods feebly. "I guess."
"You know you can tell me, right? If something isn't."
"I know, Ma," Henry affirms. His lips twist to a small smile, an attempt to apologize for his mood and to reassure his mother at the same time. But it turns lopsided just as quickly, though he doesn't really understand why.
He doesn't understand why he woke up feeling like he's forgetting something, missing something, like there's a space in his heart that he needs badly to be filled but can never quite know how to.
"I just feel like I'm forgetting something," he tells Emma, "but I don't know what."
For a moment, Emma thinks it's weird that they woke up feeling the same, but she chalks it up to maternal instinct. Maybe, maybe, she's finally getting a hang of motherhood after twelve years.
"Oh, like, school stuff?" Emma narrows her eyes at him. "Did you forget to do your homework?"
Henry's initial response is a disgruntled eye roll. As if he'd ever. "I didn't. It's probably something Timmy asked me to bring."
Emma almost blurts out it better not be porn, but thankfully, she catches herself before her mouth can run. It's six thirty in the morning, there's no need for yelling and certainly no need for the kind of talk they've never ever even had.
God, Emma can't even begin to imagine giving Henry that—duck taping his hands to his sides till he's thirty is honestly proving to be the better option for her at this point—and she doesn't really trust herself to do a good job if the time comes.
She feels like there's someone better suited than her; a grandfather, perhaps.
Emma startles, completely surprised at the sudden thought that has wiggled itself from that closed vault at the back of her brain to the forefront of her mind. She'd stopped thinking of her parents and her issues when she had Henry, hasn't thought about them since.
"You okay, Ma?" She hears Henry ask. His voice is rough with sleep and it cracks near the end, but it still manages to break through the confusing stupor she has unknowingly fallen into. "Ma?"
"Huh, what?"
Henry waves a hand in front of her face. "Are you okay? You got all quiet and stuff."
Emma clears the confusion off with a quick shake of the head that Henry, thankfully, doesn't notice.
"Uh, yeah." She blinks once, twice, thrice. The frown on her face slowly smoothens as she remembers where she is. "Yeah."
"You sure?"
"It's nothing," she says. She doesn't bother to fight the huge smile tugging at her lips, at the reminder that this is her life now. She doesn't need parents. All she needs is Henry, her son.
She runs a hand through his hair fondly, still smiling, then, "Go take a shower. Then maybe we can make breakfast together."
"'Kay," Henry yawns but easily agrees.
It's breaking their daily routine, Emma knows that, but the smile that grows on Henry's face makes coming late to work and school completely worth it.
(Somewhere at the back of her mind, there's another niggling thought about someone disapproving, an I expect you to write a note to his teacher explaining why he is late, Miss Swan. I will not be a part of this said with a ghost of the smile that takes away the bite of the berating tone.
Somewhere at the back of her mind, she swears she can hear whispers of how routines keep things and schedules intact, but occasionally breaking one does not make her a bad mother at all.)
Two days after, she dreams of a ship.
She's on a ship docked at the shore of some weird island, and she's hugging Henry in a way she's never hugged him before, as if she'd just spent countless of days looking for him so that she could save him and bring him home. Even when she pulls back from his embrace, she keeps her hand gripping his shoulder in place just to keep him close.
Her eyes are filling with tears at the mere sight of him, smiling and talking, alive.
Around her, she can hear voices. Voices that belong to people that are familiar, but Emma's too busy telling herself to breathe to care about figuring who's who out, because Henry is here. Henry is okay. He's okay.
Emma can hear voices calling her name; a gruff Em that makes her bristle because it reminds her too much of Neal, an Emma, you did it that sounds so proud and so fatherly it makes her want to cry. A motherly tone that follows, soft yet stern, telling her that they'd have more time to attend to Henry later but first they should leave.
Emma wants to yell no. She can't bear to take her eyes off of her son, let alone move, not after everything. But she bites back the urge because she'd rather stare at him, stay where she is.
But then there's another voice, a soft Henry, oh Henry that lilts low and breaks halfway through into a stifled sob of relief.
At this, Emma does snap her head up, turning to look. That voice, she would recognize anywhere. She knows whose it is.
She's met with brown eyes glossed by unshed tears, and Emma feels a brand new wave of concern wash all over her, almost as huge as the concern she feels for Henry, and just as deep.
She wants to say, no, no, don't cry please. She wants to say, he's here now and he's okay. We'll be okay. But her words get stuck in her throat just as how she's stuck looking into those eyes.
Emma wants to look away, wants to look at the rest of this… this person, whose name is at the tip of her tongue.
But the ship lurches without a goddamn warning, and Emma finds herself falling overboard at the sudden motion. Her body sinks fast into the deep, dark sea as if there's an anchor tied to her feet pulling her down, the water drowning the panicked screams echoing from above.
The cold breaks into what feels like a thousand needles piercing her skin. It's that feeling that jerks her awake, but all Emma remembers is eyes looking back at her, warm like sunshine and glistening with tears like dew on the first day of spring.
She falls back into sleep with a little less trouble this time, but Henry wakes her up not even two hours later, whining about missing breakfast completely.
Emma blinks one eye open, the other squinting at the light filtering through the lilac curtains on her bedroom window. "What time is it?"
"It's almost ten!"
Her eyes almost pop out of her head as she shouts a frantic, "What?!" She throws the covers off of her, kicking them to the side, and then jumps out of the bed in haste. "Henry! Why didn't you wake me sooner?"
She doesn't even remember hearing her alarm ring, she thinks as she grabs a clean shirt from the dresser, her jeans resting by the lone chair in her room and a pair of socks from the third drawer. She throws them all on the bed. At this hour, she'll have to forgo a shower.
Emma is about to run towards their shared bathroom for a quick brush when she finally notices her son. He's still standing by the side of her bed, watching her spiral down into frenzy with nothing but pure amusement.
"Kid, come on, we gotta get moving," she says, hands flailing helplessly. She's never been late to work since they moved to the city and she got the job. "You're still on your pjs!"
"Coz it's Sunday," answers Henry cheekily.
"Sunday? Wha—"
At the look on his mother's face, he can't resist tipping his head back to cackle—a deep laugh that shouldn't sound familiar but it does—and then high tails out of the room when he sees her stretching a hand out to get him.
Emma shakes her head, laughing, too, and then scrambles to follow him out of the room, shouting, "Henry you little sh—come back here!"
They spend their Sunday afternoon at Central Park, with Henry cooing at most of the dogs they pass by and Emma dismissing his pleas of adopting one with an I'll think about it.
She decides to forgo cooking dinner, so they grab a booth at Emma's favorite bistro instead, about two blocks away from her office.
Henry has no problems showing how much he appreciates her not cooking for once. "You know I love your cooking, Ma. But I could use a change."
Emma rolls her eyes, flicking the peanut resting on her palm. It soars past his head. "You're just never one for subtlety, are you?"
Henry laughs and throws a peanut back at his mother. Emma's not one to lose so she throws another peanut in retaliation, which Henry returns with practically a fistful of.
It goes back and forth, and it only stops when a really snippy waitress finally approaches them, asking for their orders while glaring at Emma with clear disapproval.
"Uh, yeah, I'll have the club house sandwich," Emma says, pretending not to notice the scowl on the waitress' face. She's had a good day with her son; she won't let anyone ruin it.
She turns to look at Henry, jutting her chin out in gesture. "Kid?"
Henry, in turn, straightens his back, laces his fingers together on top of the table. And then—in a perfectly polite manner that Emma just knows Henry didn't pick up from her—says, "I'll have lasagna, please."
That seems to appease the waitress at the least. But she still huffs. "I'll be back with your orders. If you could just both behave yourselves, the management will greatly appreciate it."
Emma presses her lips together, barely holding in the laugh that's bubbling in her throat. But when Henry responds with a sweet thank you and a toothy grin, she completely loses it.
The waitress comes back with their orders, but she sure as hell has taken her sweet time. Emma decides to just focus on Henry to stop herself before she ends up either saying something stupid or doing something that could get her banned from the place forever.
So she asks, "How's your art thing coming along?"
Henry looks up from his plate of lasagna, but swallows his food first before answering. "My project?"
Emma tears a bite off the sandwich and nods her head.
"It's coming along nicely, I guess. I finished working on the storyboard earlier than planned, so I'm going to start the proper drawings right away."
Emma hums, chugs her food down with a huge swig of iced tea. "That's good. I'd offer my help but you know how I am when it comes to, well, art."
"Yeah," Henry snickers. "I do."
Emma picks up the peanut closest to her plate and throws it straight to his face. She raises a fist in the air when it hits him on the forehead.
"Ma!"
"Score!"
They go home right after dinner, practically dead on their feet. Still, Emma doesn't mind. She's had a fun day, and those kinds of days tend to come few and far in between the past months.
She tucks Henry in and plants a kiss on his forehead as she bids him good night. By the time she shuts off his lights, he's already snoring.
Emma changes to her sleep clothes as quick as she can and cuts through half of her nightly routine. Her limbs feel heavy, her whole body as heavy as lead, so she drops face first on her bed without a fuss.
She's expecting a dreamless night, but she spends the whole of it dreaming instead.
Everything is huge and green. There's grass all around, as tall as her, some even as tall as trees. But the trees—the trees are as tall as fucking giants.
Yet none of it matters, because she's running, dodging rocks and grass altogether as she races through endless greenery, the sound of her shoes crushing against the ground in tune with the pounding in her ears. Her lungs burn from the lack of air, but she's not going to stop. She's never going to stop until she finds—
"Who the hell are you?"
Emma feels her mouth open but doesn't hear the first few words. But she does hear herself shout, "Where is she?!"
"I'm fine. I'm fine," comes from somewhere inside a cave. A cave that Emma only notices because her eyes, her ears, her everything follows the sound. The voice, that voice.
She finally steps into the light, and Emma feels her hand shake along with the sword that is clasped in her fingers. She feels her knees turn to jelly as she exhales relief, because she's okay, because she's not harmed (and because she's still as beautiful as ever).
"I'm fine," Emma hears her say. There's such grace in the way she hurries out of the cave, all queenly and regal even in haste. "Stand down."
Emma wants to ask, are you sure; wants to go to her, to stand in front of her and shield her from all the dangers this world possesses, be her knight. But she stays in her spot and holds her sword upright, because there's still the matter of Henry—her other weakness—still missing, and the crippling feeling that comes with that fact.
One day, maybe, she will be brave enough to be the knight to this queen.
Monday comes and her alarm rings promptly at six thirty. Surprisingly, she finds it easier to get out of bed this time than the past few mornings.
She dives into her practiced routine with ease and heads to the kitchen after waking Henry up.
Emma's on her second cup of coffee when Henry walks into the kitchen freshly showered and neatly dressed. "So, breakfast," she says, by way of greeting. "What's it gonna be?"
Henry leans against the counter closest to the fridge, his mouth pursed as his thumb and index finger playfully pinch his chin in thought. "We had French toast yesterday."
Emma hums, then, "Yeah. Any requests for today?"
He tilts his head, pondering the question. Emma stares at him in amusement, letting him drag the act through. There's a part of her that wishes that he never outgrows his playful antics.
But he ends up staring blankly at the window right across the kitchen, and his eyes glaze over in a way that Emma can't possibly miss, as if he's digging through buried memories just to find what he really wants.
"Henry?" Emma asks, hand hovering unsurely, ready to snap him out of his daze before he can even slip into a coma or something, no matter how ridiculous it sounds.
(And it's really how Henry looks, as if his mind isn't in the same world that she is in now and that scares the ever living crap out of her.)
"I think," Henry murmurs. A frown etches deep on his forehead, the same frown Emma had seen on herself when she stood in front of her bathroom mirror not even a week ago. "I think I want apple pancakes."
"Oh?" Emma says, trying not to sound surprised (and relieved, now that he's finally talked, and the familiar glimmer in his eyes is back.) They've never really had it before; Henry's favorite is bananas and she has always been partial to blueberries. "I'm not sure we have apples right now, kid," she adds as she makes her way to the refrigerator for a quick check.
She rummages through the half-empty fruit compartment, and doesn't find apples just as she's suspected. "We might have to make that tomorrow. No apples."
Henry shrugs nonchalantly, trying not to let his disappointment show. He's really looking forward to apple pancakes now that he's thought about it. "Tomorrow then, I guess."
But Emma can see the beginnings of a pout, so she flicks him on the nose to get him out of his mood, and then quickly assures, "I'll drop by the store on my way to work. Or after."
"Ma," Henry grumbles, batting her hand away from his face.
She laughs at the glare he throws at her. And just like that, the momentary panic she had earlier is forgotten.
"Can I come with?" He then asks. "I need to get a sketch pad and some color pencils."
"Yeah, sure." Emma proceeds to grab the cheese from the fridge, together with two eggs, and bumps the door close with her hip. "You ready to draw?"
"Yup," Henry answers, pushing himself off the counter to give his mother the space. He fishes a bowl from the dish rack, placing it right next to the block of cheese and then proceeds to crack the eggs. "Though I still have to add a few things on my original storyboard, thanks to the awesome dream I had last night." He hands the bowl to Emma's waiting hands. "But I think I'm ready to start working on the drawings."
Emma stills from beating the eggs at the mention of her son dreaming, too. It doesn't take long before the wisps of her own dream teases her over the edges, never quite fully resurfacing.
There was forest. She remembers a forest, and a scene of grass and greenery that seems to stretch on for miles and miles.
After a good long second of reaching out and falling flat, she gives up; instead asks, "What's it about anyway? You never really told me."
Henry shrugs. "Just an Evil Queen and a cursed town."
It sounds incredibly familiar, as if the story is her favorite, the kind she cherishes close to her heart. But Emma supposes it's because it is how every story she's ever read goes so she thinks nothing of it.
"And a savior, I guess?" She says, looking over her shoulder as her hand feels for the pan and takes it out of the cupboard.
"That was my idea originally," answers Henry. He moves towards the stove, fiddling with the dial until the burner lights. He puts on the pan Emma hands him, and then scoots to the side again once he's done.
"But you changed your mind," she supplies, matter-of-factly.
Henry nods. "Yeah." He leans forward to unhook the turner from the hanging rack, passing it to his mother.
Emma accepts it with a murmured thanks, then, "What are you planning to do, then?"
"Something different," he says as he pulls one of the dining chairs out and drops his whole weight on it, his part on making breakfast clearly over.
Without taking her eyes off the pan, Emma flips the omelette with practiced ease, then asks, "How?"
Henry grins wide, even though his mother can't see. He's been stewing over what to do for his art project for weeks, debating whether or not to push through with his original idea of a savior bringing back happy endings.
But something inside of him wants this, wants to be able to tell the story in the eyes of a supposed villain instead; the story of redemption, of a woman giving up what she loved most just to keep them safe.
With a firm conviction that he has undeniably inherited from Emma, he says, "The Evil Queen? She's going to be the hero of my story."
Breakfast is anything but silent, not with Henry's loud chatter ringing all over the kitchen. Emma can practically feel the excitement emanating from him and she can only smile at that.
He's bouncing ideas with her, from what brand of colored pencils to get to conceptualizing scenes, and though art is not really Emma's thing, she answers earnestly.
"Maybe I should buy the pricey ones. I've got some money saved up anyway."
"I'll pitch in, kid. Don't worry," Emma assures, smiling. The pad of her left thumb runs on her right wrist, scratching at the coin-sized drawing inked there, out of habit. Her smile only grows as she feels the curves of that raised part of her skin.
"Thanks Ma." Henry beams at her. "Can I use your laptop later, by the way? I think I'd have to do some research for medieval clothes and scenery, I guess."
"Yeah, sure, just—" Emma pauses, almost tempted to say jut no porn but that's almost as good as giving him ideas, she thinks, so she diverts quickly. "Don't stay up too late, uhm, researching."
Henry rolls his eyes, as if sensing what she really means. "It's just Google images, Ma. I won't even erase the browsing history if that'll make you sleep at night."
"When did you start being a smart ass?"
He laughs and then takes a quick bite of the piece of omelette that's been speared on his fork before carrying on with listing the things he has to do.
But he's telling her absolutely nothing about the story itself. The most he's mentioned is the town being cursed and the Evil Queen doing the saving.
Emma wants to know more, because his son has a brilliant brain and a wealthy imagination, and judging by the inspired look on his face, this project is going to be a masterpiece. Perhaps one of his probable many.
"So, how did the town get cursed?"
Henry giggles first, a soft sound that reminds Emma of the way he always did in his younger days, and then purses his lips haughtily. "Sorry Ma, I'm not saying a word until it's finished."
Suddenly, there's something flashing inside her head. Red lips that quirked the same way Henry's did, but it's gone before Emma can even figure out what the fuck it is.
It leaves her completely confused and dazed in her seat because it came from out of fucking nowhere. The next thing she knows, Henry's telling her to go shower as the clock at the living room chimes at seven.
She doesn't dream for the next five nights.
Emma falls into a weird in between, where she's thankful that it has finally stopped but also wary, because she absolutely has no clue when will the dreams be back. And God, she hates that most, when things spring on her and she ends up feeling helpless.
Even Henry notices a change, how she seems like she's walking on eggshells wherever she goes. Paranoid is what everyone else would've called it, but she knows she's raised a good kid when Henry doesn't say anything but, "It'll be okay, Ma. Whatever it is."
And if Emma looks wistful, he says nothing too, and she doesn't either because, really, it's not that she misses her. Not at all.
Just when she's starting to get a hold of things and of her control, it comes back with a goddamn vengeance.
It brings an earthquake with it, chunks of rocks falling all around her. Emma feels the ground beneath her feet shake with unpredictable tremors, the stillness lulling her into a false sense of security until it jolts again.
But it's that voice that rocks her very core; a raspy tell him, that in the end, it wasn't too late for me to do the right thing, that's devoid of all hope in its tone.
Emma finds herself swallowing visibly, pushing the knot that's tightening in her throat. But the plea is clear when she says, "Regina, please."
Regina just smiles sadly, and even then, she still looks tragically beautiful. "Everyone looks at me as the Evil Queen, including my son. Let me die as Regina."
Emma opens her mouth, wanting to ask her to think things through, but then there's a purple shimmer coming out of Regina's hands that brings a black diamond floating in between them.
Emma's too busy holding back her tears and a scream to say anything at all.
She gets a headache upon waking; the painful, throbbing kind that she only ever gets when she's spent a whole night crying. It has her running to the nearest drugstore for the first time since she last remembers.
It's ten in the evening, but Henry is still up working on his art project, so she makes a quick run to his room to let him know, before stepping out of the apartment.
Her pace matches the throbbing in her head, and so she gets to the store in record time. She buys a whole mat of Ibuprofen, grabbing a bottled water to match, one she downs in a few huge gulps.
Emma knows that it will take quite a while for the medicine to kick in, so she decides to get coffee too because it has always eased her headaches like magic. She heads to the opposite direction of where her way home is, and stands at the side of the lane directly across the small café she frequents whenever she's in the area.
The lights are still red. She waits for it to change, drumming her fingers on her thighs.
Her eyes are reading through the huge signs of the various establishments lined across the street when the motion of the café's glass door opening catches the corner of her eye.
A woman is coming out of the dainty place, clad in a black winter coat that goes past the knees and melds with well-pressed black slacks. Her black hair is short, the locks falling in waves but barely hiding the white scarf wrapped around her neck. She gracefully squeezes through the other customers trickling in, but she just seems to stand out from the rest, the material of her clothes screaming of the dollars it must have cost.
She looks incredibly familiar, Emma thinks, as if she has seen her before even though she probably never even has.
The woman begins to walk away from the café; Emma feels her heart start hammering in her chest. She grits her teeth, bouncing at the balls of her feet because the timer still has five more seconds to go and that's just way too long.
When it finally flashes zero, Emma rockets past through the throng of people, her steps hasty and lithe, spurred by the need to get to her quickly. She's barely able to stop herself from just plowing her way through, everyone else be damned.
She miscalculates her speed in her last few steps, changing angles quickly to avoid crashing against the tall guy walking briskly at her direction. Emma ends up stumbling over the pavement, but thankfully her knees don't completely buckle. She can hear hisses and grumbles of how rude and careless she's being, but the woman is about to turn into the corner and perhaps disappear from her life completely—exaggeration, yes, but fuck it—so she scrambles on her feet and just runs.
Emma doesn't really understand why, but when she finally catches up to her and grabs her by the elbow to spin her around, it's the first name that falls on her lips.
"Regina."
The woman's hair swishes along with the motion; Emma catches a whiff of her shampoo. Coconut with a hint of vanilla.
It should have clued her in, Emma will think later on, but her heart is stubborn and stupidly hopeful that she insists to wait until she sees the woman's face.
There are creases etched on the woman's forehead; she looks clearly confused. Emma shifts between tracing each line with her own eyes and taking in the arch of the woman's perfectly kept brows. And then, slowly, with her heart pounding in her ears, Emma trains her gaze lower, until she meets the woman's puzzled stare.
Her eyes are blue.
A noise escapes from the back of her throat; the sound of strangled disappointment—disappointment that's painful enough it almost feels like a punch in the gut.
The woman tilts her head a little. "Sorry," she says, and even her voice is incredibly different. "But I think you got the wrong person."
"Yeah, I—" Emma starts, dropping the hand that's been clutching on the woman's elbow, as if the contact suddenly burns. "I—" She swallows thickly, pushing down the lump forming in her throat. "I'm really sorry. I just thought—"
The woman gently shakes her head, smiles at Emma kindly. "It's fine," she says, and then gives Emma a final polite nod before turning around the corner.
Emma doesn't watch her go, because even though her upper lip doesn't have a scar and her eyes are a sparkling blue, the sight of her back turned as she walks away still makes Emma's heart ache.
Henry's already asleep by the time she gets back home.
Emma doesn't bother flipping the lights on. She feels her way through and flops down the living room couch when she finds it.
The apartment is quiet, but her head is far from such. And there's that feeling of utter disheartenment that settles heavily on her chest every time she closes her eyes and sees nothing but shades of blue.
She switches the TV on, turning the volume up a little so it doesn't wake Henry, but just loud enough to drown her restless thoughts.
She doesn't sleep for the rest of the night.
That sense of loss is back, and it clings to her even when she leaves the apartment to go to work. And it only grows and grows, festering inside her head.
Emma stops in front of her office door, staring at the bolded letters printed on the glass that spells Emma Swan and Field Investigator just right under her name. She doesn't really know what makes her pause, only that there's this weird feeling creeping up on her again, the kind that accompanies the threads of her dream, teasing whispers of you were something else once, in another lifetime.
Ruby, her timid secretary whose hair is always immaculately whirled into a bun, thankfully takes notice. "Miss Swan?"
Miss Swan. Miss Swan. She's heard it before, but it feels like it's from a different life. A life where she was Miss Swan, and then she's Emma, and there's a lot of I'm sorry and a lot of please, and of small smiles she can count in one hand but they mean more to her than anything else.
It feels strange for some reason, as if it's wrong that her secretary is calling her that even though Ruby has always had, so she says, not unkindly, "Emma. It's Emma, remember?"
"Yes, sorry," Ruby apologizes sheepishly. A blush taints her cheeks as she adds, "Emma."
Emma smiles at her in response, then, "Got anything for me today?"
"I do have a few papers for you to review," Ruby answers, her hands already busy shuffling through the folders stacked on her desk. She picks three folders out of the pile and hands them to Emma. "Here."
"Thanks." She gives her secretary a playful salute before pushing the door of her office open.
The clutter she left last night is no longer there. Ruby had probably cleaned it first thing in the morning. She really needs to give the woman a raise.
She heads for her desk, ignoring the mess of papers sprawled all over, and tosses the three folders she's carrying on top. She shrugs off her red coat next, lets it rest on the back of her office chair.
The chair squeaks in protest as she drops her entire weight in it. But Emma's used to the sound. (Her trusty chair had withstood every single time she threw her weight around.) She just rolls it closer to her desk.
She snatches the topmost folder, eager to start working and to just put all the weirdness of the morning—the past few weeks frankly—behind her.
Five minutes in and all she's ever read was the notes written in one of the few post-its that her secretary has tacked inside the report.
Her eyes are glued at the your signature is required in Ruby's neat scrawl, but her mind is floating elsewhere, jumping from place to place, really—flashes of a ship, an island, a small, cozy diner, and a white door numbered 108.
It drives Emma crazy, being unable to pinpoint the source of the thoughts that is, and failing to know what exactly is that feeling that's threatening to smother her completely since she first started dreaming. She hates how it's all she can think about these days.
Emma slams the folder close in frustration, because she's nowhere near close to figuring anything out. All she has are disjointed thoughts and nameless feelings she can't even begin to describe.
She kicks her feet, pushing her chair away from the desk. She goes to the supplies drawer and riffles through the boxes until she finds a new clean notebook.
She sinks back to her chair, flips the notebook open and grabs her pen, intent on writing down everything she can remember. It's not much, but it's a start, at least one step closer to getting to the bottom of whatever the fuck is happening to her.
Taking a deep breath, she writes.
She fills a whole page.
She runs her fingers through the letters and the dried ink, feeling the dents of the dotted Is and the curves of the Rs, the flicks of the As as she proceeds to write the next.
She fills a whole page, but it's not as freeing as she's thought. The weight in her chest doesn't lessen, but instead fills here with even more longing than ever.
It has got to mean something. Regina has got to mean something.
After all, it's all she could write.
Another week passes and she's nowhere close to figuring out what the hell is happening.
That is until a knock on their door comes, just as Henry is about to show her his final work. And she's so startled that she completely forgets her strict rule about always using peepholes.
They don't get visitors, ever, save for delivery guys, and Emma surely hasn't ordered anything this morning. That alone is suspicious enough.
Her heart is hammering in her chest when she moves to open the door, because this week has been incredibly weird; she wouldn't put anything past it.
It's a man standing on the other side, looking scruffy and tired. Probably because he's fucking wearing nothing but what looks like tight and heavy leather, of all things, Emma thinks.
"Uh," She starts, then, "Can I help you?"
His face lights up upon seeing her. He's beaming, brimming with joy that he's almost shaking all over.
"I found you," the man says, in an accent that Emma can't quite place.
It's a little disconcerting, really. Emma has never met anyone who's this happy to see her that it catches her off guard completely.
So off guard that she doesn't see him stepping closer, his hand darting out to grab her face, and kissing her.
The fucking nerve.
Her right leg moves instantly, the minute his lips touched hers, her knee bending to deliver a good, solid blow to what's in between his legs, right where she knows it will hurt most.
He lets go of her then, doubling over in pain. And, God, Emma wants to do more. She wants to unleash the frustration that has been building inside of her since this weirdness started.
The frustration building over the fact—that's now goddamn undeniable—that her heart has been aching to see a woman with dark hair and brown eyes in every corner she turns to, and the painful disappointment that had shot through her system when she opened the door minutes ago and it's him waiting on the other side.
She slams the door right on his face.
"Who was that, Ma?" Henry asks as she comes back.
"Wrong address," she says, grumbling.
For a moment, Henry studies his mother, noting the tightness of her shoulders. He wants to ask more, but he catches the look Emma gives him, wordlessly telling him to leave it.
He does, though grudgingly. Instead, he pulls out the chair on their table that his mother has left earlier, gesturing for her to come sit back. He still has his art project to show her anyway.
Emma flops down, hands already reaching out for the sketch pad. Henry excitedly offers it to her, his grin growing wide as he says, "Ma, meet the Evil Queen, Regina."
She sags against the chair, completely stunned, because there, looking right back at her is the woman who has been haunting her dreams.
She manages to praise Henry on his incredibly beautiful art work despite the complete surprise, and her son is too excited to notice that she's been rocked to her very core.
She flips to another page, her finger absentmindedly tracing along the lines that Henry has drawn, Regina's smiling face. Henry has managed to color Regina's eyes with the right shade of brown, and detail the scar on her upper lip.
Surreptitiously, Emma wishes she has magic just so that she could bring Regina to life.
She goes to work with some kind of reluctance. She doesn't really want to leave until she finishes reading Henry's story, but the clock has chimed, reminding them both that they have to.
Her office is oddly empty when she gets there. Ruby beats her to work most of the time. Though there's a niggling feeling in her gut that tells her something is up, which only amplifies as she sees the lock of her office door broken.
She hears movements from the inside. Quietly, she changes her stance, careful of her boots to not make a sound. She lifts a foot, ready to kick her door, hoping to catch the fucker off guard.
A loud thud echoes, bouncing through the four corners as her foot makes contact with the wooden door. There, by her desk, is the intruder.
"You," Emma hisses. Her hand instinctively flies to her hip, fingers reaching for a gun on a holster that she doesn't remember ever wearing at her side; her current job has never required one.
She frowns, but the man leaning on her desk moves to stand, and his voice breaks through the confusion before she could get lost in it. "Ah, yes," he says, spreads his arms wide, and then fucking bows, "Killian Jones, at your service."
"What the hell?" She puts one foot forward, already poised to charge. "Are you stalking me?"
"No."
Her usually long patience is cut short as she watches the weirdo—well, Killian but whatever—hold his gloved hand up, and then say, "I simply followed you not long ago, and now I'm here."
"That's the same fucking thing!" Emma practically growls. Her day has yet to start and she already has this creep to deal with. God, this is so not her morning. "What do you want? And you better start talking fast or I'm throwing your ass in jail for harassment. And I'll make sure that you'll never get out."
"Calm yourself down, Princess. No need to be violent."
Emma bristles visibly at the term. "Talk. Now."
He raises his hands, seemingly holding them up in surrender. "I will, if you stop shouting."
That's when she sees it. Her notebook—the notebook—rolled and clutched in his bare hand.
Emma feels herself grow furious, feels the white hot rage shoot down her spine. She's so mad that she feels like her head is going to explode.
Killian realizes his mistake a little too late. The next thing he knows, he's being shoved against the wall and a pale arm is pressing against his throat.
"How fucking dare you," Emma hisses through gritted teeth.
Killian swallows visibly. He's seen Emma furious over Pan before, and even more at Tinkerbelle when she kidnapped Regina, but he admits that this is a whole new level of fury. He has never seen her this angry, her eyes blazing wild that he actually fears for his life.
"Give. It. Back."
"I—" he tries to speak, but Emma's arm just presses harder that he ends up sputtering. "I d-don't mean any harm."
"Do I look like I care? I said give it back!"
Killian starts to heave for breaths as Emma threatens to press even more. His hands flail, intent on handing the notebook back, but his eyes catch onto something that is probably even more significant.
"Y-you…" He coughs. "Have a tattoo."
"What's it to you?"
He knows about it, the tattoo. He remembers Tinkerbelle telling him about it once, back in a cave after a particularly grueling fight with Pan's shadow—the real evil, not him; never him—and he and Tink were talking about loses. He'd told her about how he lost his hand; she'd told him about how she lost her wings in exchange.
So yes, it means something to him, at the least.
"Tell you what. Tell me about the tattoo and I'll give you your notebook back."
"You seriously have the nerve to bargain with me," Emma hisses.
"Please just—just tell me something about it."
Emma's almost snarling when she says, "No!"
The tattoo, it's no one else's business but hers, and Henry's because he drew it with a sharpie one night they fell asleep on the couch.
She'd had it inked permanently then, because… because….
Because she got hit by a multitude of emotions when she woke up that morning, and felt the huge love she has for her son that's making her throat close up, even now.
But the creep doesn't need to know that so she says, "Never mind. Just give me the goddamn thing!"
Though difficult, Killian manages to move his good hand, offering Emma the notebook.
Emma grits her teeth, jaws clenching as she snarls at him one more time before snatching the notebook with her free hand.
"W-while I think this is very risqué and all," Killian stutters, but he still smirks. Of course. "I'd like to be let go of now, if you please."
Emma presses her hand on his throat one last time; a warning. Then, she steps back, freeing Killian to cradle the notebook in her hands.
He sags against the wall, massaging his neck. "In another life, I would've loved being roughed up like that."
"Yeah, well, keep dreaming," Emma snaps.
He stoops down, propping his good hand on his knee to catch his breath. "From the looks of things, I will."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing," he says, shaking his head. "Just that I now know why the kiss didn't work."
"It's because I'm not into perverts," Emma lobs back. But, upon realizing what he's possibly implying, she blanches. "Did you look?"
"Forgive me, but I got curious."
Her face twists into anger next, feeling the rage course through her again. She holds onto the back of one of the chairs lined in front of her desk, trying to reign in some of her control back. Her knuckles are starting to turn white from the tight grip. She knows—she knows that if she doesn't control her anger, she'd end up inflicting more damage. (Perhaps throwing the chair at him, which is honestly very tempting.)
"You had no right," Emma says, in an icy tone of voice that clearly means you fucking better fear for your life. "It's my fucking notebook. It's private!"
"I never had a chance, didn't I?" Killian asks, completely ignoring her outburst. "And here I was thinking I got you completely charmed." He gives her a smile, but it doesn't reach his eyes.
"If you call kissing someone who clearly doesn't know you charming," Emma snaps back.
"It's her, isn't it? All this time?"
"I—" Emma starts to say, the anger in her taken over by surprise. It's the only time she has ever seen him take something seriously since he showed up on her front door. And though he has tried to joke about it, the glimmer of mischief that usually matches his attitude quickly fades, like a fire suddenly put out. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"I suppose I should've seen it coming. It does explain a lot of things," he prattles on, as if he didn't hear anything.
"Okay," Emma points a finger at him, "You seriously need to stop talking in riddles."
He doesn't. He even starts pacing behind the desk, causing Emma's scowl to etch deeper as he continues to talk to himself.
"You've been saving her from the start. And when it called for it, she gave up the thing she loved most."
Just like how Milah gave Baelfire up to be with him. And though the two situations are not the same, it stems from one truth: the greatest act of love is sacrifice.
He laughs, but it's self-deprecating, then mumbles to himself with a gentle shake of the head. "Neal and I, we never stood a chance."
Having enough of his antics, Emma throws her hands up. She's almost tempted to pull her hair out. "I don't have time for this."
Killian turns his head, looking at her with an almost triumphant grin. As if he's finally figured out how to make her listen.
Almost, because the truth still hurts, and to know, now, that she kissed him back in Neverland out of nothing but pure gratitude is as painful as it is bittersweet.
"You would," he says as he props a hand against his hip. "You'd make time if you want to hear this."
"Yeah, well guess what? I can also throw you—"
"Short black hair," he starts to say, cutting Emma off quickly. "Brown eyes that, if I'm going to be completely honest, can be cold and terrifying if you're at the receiving end of her ire. But if not, is just the right shade of warm."
"How did you—" Emma's mouth falls open in shock, but there's a spark of hope that spreads on her chest at the way he just described the woman who's been haunting her dreams and plaguing her mind.
As if he knows her. As if he's seen her. Touched her, even.
"She has a scar on the upper lip, your Regina. Doesn't she, love?"
Emma shoves the chair she's been leaning for support out of her way, charging towards Killian, armed with the shaking need to find out everything he knows about her. Her hands dart out, fingers latching on the lapels of Killian's leather coat. Her left foot kicks her trusty chair to get it rolling until it hits the wall.
With all the strength that she has—and didn't even know she had—she drags Killian towards the chair, dropping him on his ass.
Killian is laughing and shaking his head when he says, "It would seem like I finally got your attention."
Emma lifts her left foot then, hovers it threateningly over his manhood, as if making sure that he doesn't make a break for it.
"Now, now, there's no need to result into such drastic measures."
"You wanted to talk?" Emma says, her foot twitching. "Let's talk."
Killian, in turn, squirms on his seat, wriggling away from Emma's foot as subtly as he could—just in case she's serious; with her, he can never tell—and lets his back fall against the chair rest. It's going to be a long morning, might as well get comfortable.
"So there is a town in Maine…"