A/N: Plot twist - I came back. I feel resoundingly rusty, but let me know what you think, or if you'd like me to reread and update anything else, in the reviews.
Also, I thought staying up all night writing and related irresponsibility was a thing of the past, but it turns out you can grow up, graduate college, get an apartment, get a 'proper' job, and still be a total fangirl at heart. I'm kind of glad this is true.
BREAK
Emma wanders around her house, thinking. She dislikes thinking. She's a woman of action, she likes to do things. She does 20 push ups, swatting Ana off her back, and decidedly not thinking about Regina and Henry, who must be at the Science Museum by now, looking at all the smart people things, being intelligent and witty.
Emma tells herself she doesn't mind that she isn't smart. She's never found academics easy, and changing school often several times a year didn't exactly help with her test scores. So it's fine, she tells herself, that she never graduated high school, never went to college. It's not as if she's not successful. She's loaded, she doesn't need to work another day in her life if she doesn't want to, and prestigious acting colleges are all too keen to offer her honorary degrees in return for sponsorship, so she could even have a degree if she wanted one. She wonders if a high school would give her the same kind of deal for a diploma.
She lies on the floor, relenting and allowing Ana to clamber all over her.
"You don't care that I'm dumb, do ya?" she asks fondly.
She grunts, gets up, and digs out the pages she needs to know for Monday. They're going to the country club location, the forecast is clear, and Emma's looking forward to creating the build up for the bathroom scene they've already filmed.
She likes this scene. It's fairly early in the movie, and it's one of the moments which drew her to Marie. While Emma can't relate to being a fancy socialite, she can definitely relate to feeling out of place. Marie's trying to suss out Maria, so she gets herself invited to a fancypants DAR meeting in an upscale country club, all white tablecloths and triangle sandwiches. It's the first time they meet, and Maria makes her because she uses the wrong fork for her salad.
They're both superheroes underneath it all, Maria's faking it just as much as Marie, but Maria's furious that Marie has the audacity to fake it on her turf. Then there's the fight in the bathroom, where, in Emma's mind, Marie and Maria start to realise they're the same.
Marie's backstory is far simpler than Emma's own. She's supposed to come from an upper class family who haven't quite accepted her 'difference' (and the movie keeps this open to interpretation, it could be her superpowers or her sexuality). Emma wonders what that would have been like. She realises, as she wonders, that while she couldn't be happier for Henry, she's also violently jealous. He's still a kid. He still has a chance to have a family, to grow up knowing how it feels to be loved.
Emma accepted, long ago, that she'd never know that feeling. So now, all she has left is jealousy, beer, and Bonnie Tyler.
Two in the afternoon be damned, she pops open a beer and croons along with her guilty pleasure heroine - IT'S A HEARTACHE, NOTHING BUT A HEARTACHE - swig of beer - NOTHING BUT A HEARTACHE - pictures Regina - HITS YOU WHEN IT'S TOO LATE - lights a cigarette, ignoring Ana's disapproving look - HITS YOU WHEN YOU'RE DOWN. Emma lets Bonnie take the next verse, wondering if the fool's game Bonnie's talking about is anything like the fool's game she's currently playing with Regina.
She doesn't really think it's fair to assume Regina will let her down, but she justifies, it's not about Regina. It's just about people. She knows people, and if there's one thing you can always rely on, it's that people will let you down.
She thinks back to one of her conversations with Regina. The one time I really got close to a foster parent, it was still six months before I shared anything significant with her. I liked her from the start, I was just really used to being let down.
The end of that story hadn't been relevant. But as she pictures Regina and Henry having family fun day at the Science museum, Emma can't help feeling resentful, and thinking about what happened after those six months.
At eight years old, Emma Swan was small, skinny, and suspicious. She hid behind a curtain of blonde princess curls, and spat venom at anyone who came too close. She'd spent the last three months in a group home, and despite the manager's insistence that no one would want her unless she wore dresses and braids, a couple had decided to foster her.
Mrs. Gardner had wavy auburn hair and wore patterned cardigans that she knitted herself. She baked cookies and had a frilly apron, and she always spoke gently, no matter what you'd done. In spite of herself, as time passed, Emma began to like her.
She was kind about school, kind about bedwetting, kind about the tears that seemed to appear in the knees of Emma's jeans of their own accord.
Mr Gardner was quieter, but he was good at Math and helped with homework, and when he found out Emma liked sports he started taking her to a kids softball game in the park every Saturday, cheering just as loud as any of the biological parents.
After six months with them, little Emma was starting to wonder if she'd been wrong about the world. Her real parents had given her up, sure, and other people had too, but maybe the Gardners were different. They really seemed to like her. She had her ninth birthday with them and Mrs. Gardner gave her a hand knitted sweater, bright red, with a textured pattern that must have taken hours. Emma wore it every day for the next two weeks.
Another week or so after that, Emma had been sitting on the swing set in back of the house. Mr. Gardner had put it up for her just after she moved in, and Emma loved sitting there, swinging back and forth, looking at the clouds, imagining she was flying. Mrs. Gardner came out to her and Emma gave her a wide smile, which, to Emma's surprise, wasn't returned.
Mrs. Gardner perched awkwardly on the swing next to Emma.
"How are you?" she asked gently.
Emma shrugged, closing up, sensing something was wrong.
"Listen, Emma, Mr. Gardner and I… We need to talk to you about something."
Emma waited.
"When we took you in, the doctors had told us the chance of us having a child of our own were so small, they might as well be impossible. But… Well, perhaps you being here is what's done it, but we've had our very own miracle! In six months, I'm going to have a baby. My very own baby. But the thing is, Emma, we only have the one bedroom, it's just a small house, and a baby's a lot of work… Emma, we hate to have to do this, but… We're going to ask your social worker to start looking for somewhere else for you to stay."
Biting back tears, Emma tried to glare at Mrs. Gardner. "Why don't you give the baby to the social worker?" she demanded. "I was here first!"
She knew it was stupid. People wanted their own children.
Well, most people. Her parents were an exception. Which meant no one wanted her at all.
Emma charged upstairs, ignoring Mrs. Gardner's calls for her to wait. She pulled the garbage bag out from under her bed and threw all her things into it. Everything except the sweater. It was a lying sweater.
Then she stormed back downstairs, bag over her shoulder.
"Emma, don't be ridiculous, honey, you don't have to leave now. The baby won't come for months, we're more than happy for you to stay with us until you find somewhere else."
Emma had cried herself out upstairs. She pulled herself up to her full height and looked Mrs. Gardner dead in the eye.
"I'd rather sleep in the gutter than spend another night with you, bitch," she spat.
"Emma, I know you're angry, but you can't just-"
Emma slammed the door and marched out of the house, not waiting to hear the rest. Mrs. Gardner ran after her, but Emma was faster.
"And I never really stopped running after that," Emma murmurs to herself, swigging the remnants of her beer. She wonders, fleetingly, what became of the Gardners. Did they have their kid? Was it as much better than her as they'd hoped?
Her phone pings and she glances at it. It's a picture, a selfie of Regina and Henry, in front of some planets.
We miss you! follows close behind.
Emma picks up her script and takes a selfie with her glasses peeking over the top.
I miss you both too.
It's less than a minute before the reply.
Henry says to tell you you're a workaholic.
Tell Henry I say he's a cheeky little brat.
I will do no such thing.
Tell him I said it's good to work hard, then.
I did. He said you should've memorised the lines sooner, so you could come out with us today. I have to admit, I agree with him.
I can't help being stupid.
Emma looks in confusion at the laughing emoji which Regina sends in response. She's even more bewildered by the kissing one, then the devil one, which follow it.
?
Henry is trying to teach me about the little yellow faces. I want to send the one which is rolling its eyes.
Emojis, Regina. They're called emojis.
I refuse to accept that 'emojis' is a word. Anyway. You are not stupid.
I kind of am. I didn't know what a supernova was until Henry explained it yesterday.
That's a narrow example. I'm sure you know many things we don't.
Pfft. Only about stupid stuff like beer.
Pfft?
It's an onomatopoeia.
I see. That's a decidedly intelligent word, spelled entirely correctly.
Fluke. And autocorrect.
You are being stubborn. I need to put my phone away, we're going to the earthquake room now.
Emma sets her phone down, interpreting the message as an end to the conversation. She's about to open another beer when her phone pings again.
We can't wait to see you tomorrow!
And there's another kissing emoji.
"That was probably an accident," Emma tells herself, but she can't quite stop the smile that spreads across her lips. She sends one back, just in case.