If I tried hard enough I could feel him. Almost as if he was just lingering in the air. I would get a whiff of his scent, or hear his voice in an empty room. But when I was under my fort made of sheets, and it was dark enough or quiet enough, it was like he was lying beside me. His dirty face and fingers, his messy hair, and those big beautiful brown eyes were so close I could touch them. Sometimes I would. I would reach out and touch him. And for those few seconds my heart didn't ache with longing.
I spent most of my time hiding under my fort, trying to remember the wrinkles in his cheeks and the freckles on his nose. It was easier to imagine a world with him in it than live in a world where he didn't exist. No one remembered him, or even knows of him. There won't be anyone mourning his death. That in itself is tragic.
There were days I slept through, and days I pretended to sleep through if it meant peace. Mary Margaret and David tried to give me space, but sometimes they couldn't help themselves and would break my walls of depression. Thankfully, I could blame my health or wounds on the reason I slept all day. Soon that excuse wasn't going to work.
It looked like this morning was going to be the last I was allowed to wallow. Mary Margaret and David had been huddled outside of the bedroom arguing over who was going to step over into enemy territory.
"She's heartbroken, David."
"I understand that. But we can't let her fall into… whatever this is."
"We can't force her to feel happy when she doesn't."
Eventually, Mary Margaret lost the battle and David broke down my walls. Not only did he allow the heat out, but he brought in a ton of light that was not welcome.
"Hey, how's it going in here?"
"As well as to be expected." I turned over to face him.
"How about you come out for some breakfast?"
The counter had three plates set. Mary Margaret was finishing cleaning the pancake pan when we sat down. She poured three glasses of orange juice and handed me a handful of pills. The abundance of medicine in my hand seemed threatening.
"Make sure to take all of these with that whole glass of juice." She sat down beside me.
"How about this…I'll take 3 of these with a sip of orange juice." I bartered.
"How about you take all of those and the whole glass of juice?" She countered.
"You clearly don't see where I'm trying to go with this…" I swallowed the handful of pills and chugged the glass of juice while pinching my nose.
The three of us sat at the counter, chewing pancakes, choking down a fruit salad and drinking juice. There were very few words exchanged. It felt comfortable. No one was forcing anything. It was happening as naturally as it could. Of course, there were common breakfast conversation exchanged like, "pass the syrup" or "what's the weather going to be like today?" I managed to get by yet another parental interaction with minimal syllables. They dismissed me as soon as I had cleared my plate.
I returned to my fortress of solitude for another day of wallowing. Just as I slipped under my comforter and pulled my blanket up to my nose I heard David kissing Mary Margaret goodbye. He was off to the station for the day. It was his second day back to work. Apparently we were trying to bring back some normalcy. Nothing about this life was normal. I was living in a new house, with new parents and meeting all of these people for the second time. This was all so bizarre.
"Knock knock…" Mary Margaret peeked through the sheet.
"Come in." I moved over so she had some place to sit. Our shoulders touched as we laid on our backs, staring at the sheet above. It was just sheer enough to see the day happening on the other side, but thick enough to keep this side of the day in ultimate darkness. Mary Margaret had been walking the line of stranger and mother. She was my biological mother, the person I've spent the most time with so far, but also someone I'm meeting for the first time. It was a transition I, normally, would have gone through willingly. This whole thing was just too much.
"How are you feeling?" She asked quietly.
"Better. It doesn't hurt to breathe anymore." I was referring to my bruised ribs.
A moment passed. She collected breath and momentum and asked the question that has been on her lips since the moment I woke up: What was his name?
My instinct was to defend his memory and protect what we had. For some reason I was on the defensive a hundred percent of the time. But her eyes grounded me. Her eyes were like my own. Somewhere in there, in her eyes, I saw the mother that courageously gave up time with me so I would have a good life. In that moment I trusted her completely, like a daughter would with her mother.
"Aladdin." I managed to say it without crying.
"What was he like?" She asked, as a smile appeared on her face.
"Wonderful." With very little hesitation I managed to tell a segment of 'our' story. "Adventurous, crazy, funny…"
"Did you love him?" She asked a very bold question.
"I don't know…I mean, I've never felt like this before." Truth is, I don't know what love is. I've never seen it up close. The closest relationship I've seen true love is in the storybook. Actually, it was my parents' love story that I read over and over to try and understand what love meant.
"Did you tell him that?"
"I wanted to. But it was too late. He was already gone."
She took my fingers in her hand and squeezed so tightly it almost strangled the pain that was running in my blood. I moved my head closer to her shoulder and told her more about him. There are many stories in this world that didn't need to be told, but Aladdin's did. He was brave, strong, spontaneous and kind. His legacy shouldn't burn in vain. People should know about the kind man who saved my life.
She cringed when I told her about our run-ins with the Queen's men. She chuckled when I explained the feeling of the wind hitting my face as I jumped off the cliff. It was when I told her about our first kiss did it seem like she could understand my loss. Reliving the moment he told me he loved me was beautiful and horrible in one twisted motion. We are young, naïve and immature. But what we had wasn't. The connection I felt with him was the realest thing I've felt. No friends or suto-parents made me feel the way Aladdin did.
We must have talked for hours. Time had no presence in my memories. We spent the day laughing, crying, rejoicing and napping. By the time either of us bothered to look at the clock David was coming home from work. He climbed into the cave with us. The two of them cuddled together and soon I was pulled back to reality. I watched them kiss, catch up on each other's days and hold hands. Now this, this is love, I thought.
When they moved to the kitchen to prepare dinner I made the bold move of following them. It took me a few minutes to prepare myself. After spending all day talking to Mary Margaret I was reminded that I didn't need to be alone. I didn't have to surrender. Unfortunately, I walked in on a conversation that wasn't intended for my ears.
"So, what does everyone want you to do?"
"They want to talk to Emma. They think she may have some insight to how to get back to the Forest."
"That's out of the question. She's still recovering, and she's not ready to talk." Mary Margaret spat out.
"I know! Trust me, I told them all of that. But they're relentless. Leroy has the whole town riled up. I'm getting phone calls every second. I don't know how much longer I can hold them off." He finished basting the chicken and put it back in the oven.
"What do they hope to get from talking to Emma?" Mary Margaret licked the butter off her thumb as she continued smoothing it on the baked potatoes.
"I mean, there are questions that need to be answered. Like where is Regina? Do we need to be concerned she's going to come back and throw us all into another curse?"
"What are you saying? Do you think we should make her tell us about what happened?" They stopped what they were doing and put their utensils down.
When I tried to back out of the room and pretend like I never heard this conversation, the squeaky floorboards gave me away. Suddenly the attention had shifted to me. Their faces went ghost white and I could see them regretting every word that came out of their mouths. I think David tried to swallow them with little success. They begged for me to sit down and talk with them. I did, but I knew this moment was going to be the sole reason why I'll never leave my fort ever again.
"I'm sorry, Emma. I didn't know you were listening."
"It's okay. I figured people would want answers eventually." I said, twiddling my thumbs and avoiding their stares.
"We're not going to pressure you into doing anything you're not ready to do. " Mary Margaret reassured me.
We sat at the dinner table, pretending like it wasn't awkward. The weirdest part of the meal was eating real food. For the past few days I've been restricted to liquids and light food. Having chicken, potatoes and green beans felt like a luxury after the past two weeks of bread an apple diet. It made me miss the Enchanted Forest. Everything tasted sweeter, juicier. David excused himself from the table and grabbed a bag he had left by the front door. As I pushed my vegetables around my plate he handed me a rather large rectangular shaped present. It was wrapped in glossy red paper with a gold bow taped on the top. I took it cautiously, looking from her to him.
"What's this for?" I asked, holding it out at arms length.
"It's just a gift. Consider it a Welcome-Home and We Love You gift." David said.
Mary Margaret piled our plates together and put them in the sink for later. They seemed unusually happy. I slowly ripped the paper. Sitting in my hands was a gift they thought they were giving me. The portrait I had carried with me from one land to another was now nicely placed between four golden walls. My fingers traced over the golden crusted frame. It looked more beautiful than it already had. David grabbed the paper and balled it up.
"We found it in your bag and thought you might like to hang it up." Mary Margaret said. "It's beautiful." She added.
"Where did you get this?" David asked.
"Uh…" I tried to form a sentence. "I got it in your- uh, I mean, our house." My eyes were fixed on the innocent little girl with curly blonde hair sitting in front of two very proud parents. She was nearly perfect. She looked young, brave, and full of life. It didn't look like she had one sleepless night.
They knew that wasn't right. Their eyes sent unspoken messages back and forth. And while I recognized this Morse code being exchanged, I was wrapped in an emotion I had yet to experience. I wanted so badly to be that little girl. A strange feeling staring at a younger version of yourself, and wishing you could be her. As soon as I could excuse myself, I headed back to bed. This time I didn't hide in my fort. This time I sat on the bed staring at the picture I had seen a hundred times before. I've just never looked at it through these eyes. When dinner was cleaned up and they had turned off all the lights in the kitchen they came in to say goodnight.
"Are you feeling alright?" Mary Margaret placed her hand on my forehead.
"Fine." I said.
"Okay, well, we'll be right upstairs if you need anything." David placed a glass of water on my nightstand.
I nodded in response. For some reason my mouth couldn't form words. They each kissed me goodnight and headed up the staircase. All of this time I've been struggling with how I left Aladdin, and never once did I give a thought to the other part of my life I left behind. There was so much that happened back there. There weren't even words for it. I had experienced a whole other life, literally. This was one part of my time there that they needed to know. They would want to know about it. But no matter how many times I tried to go upstairs and tell them, I couldn't find the words. I couldn't wrap my head around the whole thing, so I wasn't sure how to put it into a sentence that could make sense. Finally, I figured out a way I could tell them without having to actually say it.
They looked so happy. Even in their sleep they looked like they were in complete bliss. I almost felt guilty waking them up. I gently touched Mary Margaret's shoulder and turned on the lamp by the bed. They had turned the upstairs loft into a second bedroom. Their eyes fought off the abrupt light and when they made out who was sitting on their bed they lunged into emergency mode.
"What's wrong?! Are you okay?" Mary Margaret panted.
"I need to show you something." I said.
Carefully I stood up and walked close to the full-length mirror hanging on the wall. Looking back to make sure they were watching, I drew in a deep breath, closed my eyes and concentrated. I could feel it working its way through my arm and into the tips of my fingers. Finally, with a flick of my wrist, I transformed the glass in the mirror from a reflection to a show. They both gasped.
"Emma, you can - " David couldn't even really finish his sentence. They both stood behind me watching the mirror as I showed them what I couldn't say.
"That's us!" Mary Margaret exclaimed as she saw a memory playing out in her mirror.
This was the first time I saw this happening myself. Regina pushed them into the portal and slamming the doors. Mary Margaret slipped her arm around my shoulders as she relived a painful moment. But what they never got to see was what happened after that. Regina was left standing alone in my nursery. But it wasn't actually Regina. A cloud of purple smoke erased Regina and replaced her with Cora.
"It wasn't Regina." David muttered.
"It was Cora the whole time?" Mary Margaret asked.
"Yeah…" I felt a huge weight being lifted off my shoulders. "But there's more."
Willfully I held out my hands and forced a power from deep inside me to show them a very key part of my time in the Enchanted Forest. It may be my favorite and most coveted part of my time there. The time we got to be a family from the very beginning.