Not much changed in Storybrooke unless Aleera made changes happen. To keep a grip on her sanity she played around with things. When she'd spend her nights with Geoffrey she'd change things up with what kind of sex they had. Jessica had memories of acting in a musical with Geoffrey, so they often roleplayed scenes from movies. She befriended people she had no connections with. She often palled around with Ruby when she came into the diner for dinner. And her friendship with Jefferson did not go unnoticed.
In fact, it helped distract people from her relationship with Alastair. No one figured that one out. Ruby often teased Jessica about her man friend. But she was under the impression it was Jefferson that Jessica was having the relations with. Jefferson was not a fan of that. But he was grateful enough for their friendship that he played the beard to protect Aleera and Alastair from being found out. Or rather, Jessica and Geoffrey. Besides, Jefferson and Geoffrey's names were so similar, Aleera could refer to both of them as, "Jeff," when talking to Ruby, and she had no idea they were two different people.
"Jess, hurry up!" Tina called back to Jessica when she was following after Tina and Audrey to get to class on time. Jessica didn't have Aleera's speed, which greatly frustrated her. She hoped that even though she was frozen in age she could build up Jessica's muscles and become faster. But that wouldn't happen until time started moving forward.
Jessica did as she usually did when they were close to the corner they needed to turn to get to the school; she picked up speed and was nearly flanking Audrey. But that day, something different occurred. Regina had parked her car on the side of the street where they were running. Regina always did what she could to make her day go differently too. This would be the closest Aleera and Regina would have at crossing paths.
When Jessica ran by, some force threw Regina back and made her spin around and fall forward into her car. Jessica didn't notice her but she found herself veering off course away from Regina at that particular moment. She didn't even notice, but Audrey did.
"Jeeze, Jess!" Audrey called back to her as Jessica started to fall back again when they'd turned the corner. "You nearly took out the mayor!"
"I what?" Jessica asked confused. That wasn't what normally happened. "Who was it?"
"The May-orr!" Audrey sounded out through her labored breathing. "Regina Mills!" That made Jessica falter and Aleera take over. She had been in Regina's vicinity and she hadn't known? Then she remembered the deal her father made with her. That made her slow down and turn around to look for Regina. But she couldn't see her now.
"You're on your own slow poke!" Audrey called to her, and then she and Tina got too far away for Aleera to catch up and headed into the school. Jessica was later to school that day than she'd ever been. It changed her day up ever so slightly so that was a bonus. But she was too distracted by what had happened to her that morning.
With this deal she would be kept from her sister for 28 years. It would be nearly 40 years when adding the time she spent in her father's prison. Aleera couldn't stand that. Although there was nothing she could do to change her sister back now, she wanted at least to be in her life. She missed her. So she decided to enlist Jefferson's help in making contact with her sister. She knew that her father had planned for everything direct. But there must be some loophole she could find.
"You want to break in to the Queen's house?" Jefferson asked when she showed him the layout of the house she'd taken from the historical museum.
"I can't directly go to her." She told him. "But I can leave hints. Things that would link to me."
"You think that will be enough?" Jefferson asked.
"I thought about letting the Sherriff catch me in her house," Aleera told him. "The deal would make him more likely to catch me than for her, but if he told her my name and gave a description, she would have an even bigger hint. In the meanwhile I will do other things. Like leaving my name in the suggestion box at the courthouse, maybe mail her a picture of me. I don't know what else."
"Sounds like some plausible ideas," he said. "How does this involve me?"
"Don't you want to mess with Regina?" she asked him.
"I want her dead," he seethed.
"Well…" Aleera paused. She couldn't give him that. She wanted Regina alive. But Aleera didn't want to do this alone. Two heads were better than one. So she chose to lie. "I guess that's one way to break the curse." Jefferson looked like a kid at Christmas at that.
"You'll kill her for me?" he asked excitedly. Jefferson had done many terrible things in his past, but he wasn't a killer. Aleera wasn't either. And she had no intention to kill Regina, but she didn't want Jefferson to try. So she made a stipulation.
"We will get her to kill herself," she said. "We'll drive her mad." Jefferson really liked that. It was quite an ample punishment for her to have the same fate as his.
All Aleera had to do was keep up the façade, possibly for the next 27 and a half years. Who knew how long it would take to get a message through to Regina. Time seemed to move so quickly there. 6 months felt like nothing to Jessica. The curse numbed her down to believe that was how time was moving. But Aleera could feel how much time had gone by if she let herself think about it. She often tried to look at time progression through Jessica's eyes.
Before undergoing their big mission of a break in, Aleera and Jefferson tried her other ideas first. She wrote suggestions in the courthouse suggestion box with her name signed onto it. But the person who handled the suggestions before giving them to Regina scratched her name out to protect the girl's identity, thinking this girl didn't know it was supposed to be anonymous. Aleera mailed her photo to Regina's address. But the postman rerouted it to her office mail, where the mail clerk threw it away because he thought it was junk mail for an amateur escort service. Her note she'd sent with it had been rewritten by magic to be suggestive.
"This is ridiculous!" Aleera exclaimed frustrated. She was burning letters she'd gotten in the mail from perverted lonely men in Storybrooke who wanted a good time. Jefferson was looking through his telescope looking for Regina. "I hate my dad!"
"Maybe it's time to haul out the big guns," Jefferson suggested, looking up. "Let's do our biggest plan."
In the cover of night when Jefferson saw Regina was working late, he and Aleera broke into the house. They made quite a show of the break in. They broke a door window to unlock the back door. They ran in and vandalized everything they could quickly disassemble. Jefferson had fun breaking her furniture and smashing things. While he did that, Aleera removed a painting from a white wall of the living room and started spray painting.
She drew a large X on the wall. On one line she sprayed an R on one point and a D on the other. On the other line she sprayed an A and another A on the points. She then sprayed a heart in the center point of the X. R and D for Regina and Daniel, A and A for Aleera and Alastair. That was as direct a hint as she thought the deal would let her do. It was a bit messy because Aleera only had moonlight to see from. But she hoped it would be readable enough.
When she did that she heard sirens coming toward the house. And when that happened, Jessica took over. She made Aleera pick up her feet and start running. She raced toward the back door and was out of it before Jefferson could ask her what she was doing.
"What are you doing!" he called after her. Just then the front door to Regina's house was kicked in, and Sherriff Graham came bounding in with his flashlight and gun poised.
"Put your hands where I can see them!" He bellowed.
"What?" Jefferson asked confused.
The lights in Regina's house came on, and she entered. She wasn't supposed to get here this quickly. Jefferson raised his arms and looked around for Aleera. But she was long gone. She was headed straight for her home, running in the back allies, hiding in shadows. Aleera screamed in her head to Jessica to stop doing that. But Jessica was trying to save her ass. Since Regina hadn't been far behind the sirens, the deal had sent Aleera running for cover.
When Jefferson was hand cuffed and being led out of the house by the Sherriff, he turned to look at the wall where Aleera had been spray-painting her clue. It was completely illegible. The X had been made too big so the two letters at the top points of the X were faint because Aleera couldn't reach very high and it didn't get direct contact. The lower letters were all bloated from being painted with the spray can so close to the wall. All that one could tell was the X. Even the heart was pretty lumpy. The deal made everything impossible.
Jefferson sat in the interrogation room with his hands cuffed in front of him. Regina and Graham stood in the viewing room watching him through a one-way mirror. Graham was prattling on about possible teen groups who would tag Regina's living room like that, but was coming up with no for sure suspects. Regina was ignoring him, just glaring at Jefferson. She knew that he still had his memories. He vandalized her house because he wanted revenge, but he was too weak to do anything really serious.
"I'd like to talk to him alone," Regina said, interrupting Graham.
"I'm not sure that's best," Graham told her. Regina turned to him and glared. So he tried to save the conversation. "It just wouldn't be safe."
"He's harmless," she said, turning back to look at Jefferson.
"Just let me check him out first," Graham begged her. But she ignored him. She stormed out of the observation room and barged into the interrogation room.
"Hello, Regina," Jefferson said to her while she stared at him.
"Hello, Mr…?" she feigned to not know him.
"Oh knock it off!" he growled, banging his cuffed fists on the table.
"What were you doing in my house, Jefferson?" Regina asked. Jefferson didn't respond. He wanted to tell Regina about Aleera, but some force in him compelled him to remain silent. He found it odd that he didn't say anything.
"Well?" Regina asked. Jefferson tried to speak up, but then he nearly swallowed his tongue. "Cat got your tongue?" she asked, mocking him. That phrase couldn't be truer at that moment. The deal had his tongue. Regina turned back to the mirror and waved at Graham to come in. It took a minute but then Graham came swiftly into the interrogation room.
"Release him," Regina told Graham.
"What?" Jefferson said, finally finding his voice.
"Are you sure about that Madame Mayor?" Graham asked her. "You really should let me handle him. He committed a crime he should have a trial."
"Alright," Regina agreed. "Let him have his trial. I think a perfect sentence would be for him to pay for the damages. I know he's lousy with money." She looked back down at Jefferson and sneered. Jefferson scowled back at her. "Don't bother processing him," Regina said to Graham. "He can certainly make bail."
Aleera left Jefferson alone for a couple of days. She had one more plan to attempt. This one was the least direct plan she'd had. It in fact did not go against the deal. She was doing something her father would want her to do. She was making the breaking of the curse more possible.
"Good morning, Miss Duncan," said Mary Margaret Blanchard when Aleera came to see her in between morning classes. Jessica was on the bench for this plan. Aleera was in control. In her arms she held the storybook that she had made with the Blue Fairy. She had gone to Mr. Gold's shop the day before and bought the book from him. She had to spend 50 dollars to get a book that she made. Apparently just the binding and gold inlay made it that expensive.
"Hey Miss. B," Aleera said. It sounded like something Jessica would call her. "I have something for you."
"For me?" Mary Margaret asked completely stunned. As far back as she could remember the only gifts she received were from her students.
"Well, for your class," Aleera clarified. She lifted up the book and put it in front of Mary Margaret on her desk.
"Once Upon a Time?" Mary Margaret read off the cover of the book. "Is this a book of Fairy Tales?" she flipped through the pages.
"I thought your students might like it," Aleera told her. "During reading time or something?"
"Well that's so sweet," Mary Margaret told her. She was very flattered by the gift.
"You're welcome," Aleera told her, half bowing to her. She caught herself and sprung back up. This was Mary Margaret Blanchard, not Princess Snow White. Then the bell rang and Aleera excused herself. When she left Mary Margaret's students filed in. Mary Margaret got up from her desk to lead the class, and forgot all about the book. At the end of the day when it was time for the students to clean up the classroom, one of the students put it on the bookshelf.
"What happened to you!" Jefferson yelled at Aleera when she came to his house a couple nights later like she normally did after her evening spent with Alastair.
"It was my father's deal," she explained. "I was wrong, there is nothing I can do to get around it. I was just kidding myself."
"Is that why I couldn't tell her anything when she asked me?" he asked her.
"You would be acting as another party, so yes," she told him. "The expenses for the clean up aren't too terrible are they?"
"It's not like I'm going to use my money for anything else," he told her.
"I'm really sorry," she told him.
"Sorry I paid for your crimes or sorry I can't get my revenge?" he asked her to clarify.
"You're not a killer, Jefferson," she told him.
"I could probably stomach beating the crap out of her at least," he countered. He imagined scarring that gorgeous face of hers and making her as ugly on the outside as she was on the inside.
"Well, let's put that on hold too," she said. "We don't need her throwing you in jail for good if she thinks you are too much trouble to remain free."
"Yeah, I guess," Jefferson pouted. Aleera assuringly put her hand on his shoulder and they walked into his living room to hang out. While they walked together she told him about giving the book to Mary Margaret. He agreed with her that it was a good idea.
"Mind if I sleep here tonight?" Aleera asked through a yawn.
"Trying to sell your story more?" he asked. They sat down on opposite couches and Aleera picked her feet up and lounged.
"Since the curse makes me wake up every day on the floor of the studio even though I go to sleep in my actual bed," she told him. "I doubt it matters really where I fall asleep."
"I see you walking from your house to the dance studio in the mornings through my telescope," he told her. "You are all dressed for yoga and look very tired."
"The curse is probably taking over me completely at that moment to make sure I'm in the right spot," she said. "I certainly have no memory of that." She was starting to fall asleep.
"Then you can sleep here," he said. She lightly acknowledged the permission he granted, but then she was asleep. Jefferson took a blanket that was lying on the back of his couch and draped it over Aleera. He then left her there so he could sleep in his bed. The next morning he was awoken by her clumsy sleepwalking, leaving his house. He got up and watched her file out of the house like the undead. It gave him a reason to laugh.
What do you all think of Storybrooke so far? After taking a two week break from writing I wanted to get a couple chapters in very quickly. But I will probably go back to only one chapter a week. Who knows. Please let me know what you think of my story. I appreciate the people who say they like my story. But I'd love to know what you really think. Is there any certain part you really liked? Are you looking forward to something. Just so you know, the next chapter is going to take place 28 years later when Emma comes to town. Thank you for reading!