Drumming blunt nails nervously on the cracked varnish of the booth's tabletop, Neal waits impatiently as his dark gaze flickers repeatedly back to the glass door of the bar. It is only ten past twelve, but he has been sitting at the table since half eleven due to nerves, and now turns to offer another dirty look at the man behind the counter that sneers down at the half-drunk beer he clasps in his free hand.
He supposes the fact that he sits alone with what could well be another drink in reserve does little to help his image.
Finally, the door swings open, and he raises a hand awkwardly to Emma who makes no move to return the gesture. Watching as she offers a brief nod towards the barman, he sighs, noting the fact she doesn't bother to address the man nor grant him a smile. He understands that this is New York, and that such niceties are not always expected, but the simple fact of the matter is that until yesterday, he has never witnessed Emma Swan opting not to grin disarmingly at anyone.
He tries offering her his own smile as she takes a seat opposite him, but is again granted no response. She simply nods her thanks as he gives up and slides her beer towards her and speaks quietly.
"Hi."
"...Hi..."
He struggles to find something more to say, before taking a suspiciously long drink from his glass and signalling towards the barman- who now seems a little less judgemental following the blonde's entrance- to bring over another. He tells himself that they are not, in fact, suffering in silence, but simply waiting for this small task to be accomplished before getting down to... Whatever this is going to be.
Emma seems happy enough to go along with this act and stares pensively into the amber suds before her.
Neal takes advantage of her lowered gaze to finally grant himself a chance to observe her properly; without getting hit in the face or trying not to let his eyes fall to her chest with his father in the room.
He concludes that she still looks disarmingly pretty beneath her hard glamour; has always been disarmingly pretty... But this had had little to do with why he had liked her in the first place.
No, that had all come down to the fact that when they had met, she had been everything he had wanted to be as a child; cheerful, untroubled, brave...
Carefree.
Of course, over time, he had slowly come to learn of the darker things in her life that had left her quite so bold and careless of consequence; the two of them once upon a time having spent many an evening talking long into the night, watching the moon go through its phases from the curious comfort of that old, stolen car... Now though, the memory leaves his throat suddenly dry, and, just as he imagines- despite her agreement to talk- that she will never be able to tell him all of the the things she might be thinking beneath that carefully cold exterior, he too will probably now never get an opportunity to confide in her the simple fact that he still thinks back on those long, wine-soaked nights in the bug with a terrible longing. To explain to her that, when out on a date- hell, even during the brief period a few years ago when he had been engaged to a young dancer from Brooklyn- there has forever seemed to be something missing. He imagines- as with he himself- that she has little time for stories these days, but he sighs as he is struck by that old realisation of long ago, that no matter how svelte and promising her body had been, he would have given it up- if ever such a choice were forced- to simply listen to her wild and fanciful tales of a magical world in which the knights were brave, the stallions fast, and the wizards were good.
She had always had the best stories... Mostly because 'stories' were all that they ever were.
Idiot princes, and sharp-mouthed damsels, and gender-confused dragons, and- his favourite- a deliciously kink-led colony of fairies... And not a dagger in sight.
He wonders if she remembers the way they had made that old car shudder with nothing more but the sheer force of their laughter.
He doesn't imagine this is the time to ask.
"You look... Good."
He offers gently; careful to make it abundantly clear in his tone that he in no way means to piss her off with such words. He breathes a sigh of relief when rather than snapping at him venomously, she just shrugs and places her hands down into her lap.
Thus, he is unaware of the way she plucks at the tight wool of her sweater nervously.
She sighs, scolding herself silently for fidgeting with her clothes- the plain, black cashmere lent to her by Regina after her stated wish to hide the purple graze the darker woman had left at her collarbone, and looking altogether suitably forbidding having paired it with her own black jeans and boots- and replies with just a hint of cattiness that instantly serves to lift just a little of the heavy cloud beneath which they fester
"I guess you look alright too, for a guy whose nose got broken..."
"It was a pretty decent punch, I'll give you that."
"Pretty decent...?"
She raises a brow, and he rolls his eyes and sits back in his chair as the barman comes over with a fresh beer.
"Ok, it hurt like a son of a bitch, happy?"
"No, but that knowledge does help a little..."
She replies silkily, but he doesn't miss the slight tick to the side of her jaw, and he relaxes just a little.
"Emma, I... I don't know where to start... But, I guess the first thing I should tell you- and I know you don't want to hear it, but I'm going to say it anyway- is... I'm sorry..."
Cool green flickers up to offer him a sharp look, but then she sighs; crossing her arms over her chest, and regarding him solemnly.
"Okay... What for?"
"What do you mean?... I mean... I-"
"Oh, I know what you should be sorry for... But I'm curious... I want you to tell me what you think you should be sorry for..."
"I..."
"Tell me why you did it, Neal... Then I'll tell you what you did..."