She woke up, screaming. Her Mommy and Daddy ran into her room, with the big pink canopy bed and the pictures of unicorns.
"It's okay, Emma, it was just a nightmare."
"You promise?"
"Yes, Emma, we promise."
"So it couldn't happen in real life?"
"No, Emma, it was just a bad dream."
Emma smiled. "Ok."
It happened again, every night, and every night the same thing - her mommy and daddy told her it was okay, it was nothing more than a dream.
For years it was that way. Eventually they stopped telling her, she just knew. But she still had them. Until she was 13. Then the dreams just stopped.
"Emma?", her mother asked in the morning. "No nightmare?"
"No, mom, no nightmare."
Snow frowned. "What did you dream about?"
"Nothing", Emma replied. "It was just... darkness."
"Really?", Snow asked, perplexed.
"Really", Emma answered. "Guess I finally grew up."
Now it was Emma's 15th birthday. The nightmares had been over for two years, and nobody even talked about them anymore. But she still thought about them. Her brother Neal hadn't had the nightmares. Neither had her parents as kids. It was all Emma's thing. So was the darkness. She was celebrating her birthday dinner with her parents and Neal when the air around them seemed to grow colder. Suddenly, they all froze - literally froze. They were ice-cold, and not moving one bit. A chilling voice rang through the castle. "What do you do, little Emma? What can you do? Go on, you shouldn't be alone on your birthday. Freeze with them. You're a special girl, Emma. You get to chose. So choose wisely. Better to freeze than see what's next." The voice went away like a gust of wind, and it was silent. And suddenly, somehow, Emma knew exactly what to do. She found a relatively soft part of the floor and lay down.
"Take me to the darkness", she said, and closed her eyes.