Tailing a man like Scooter Polarsky was an easy task, one Emma Swan indeed felt like she was being overpaid for. It was not like Rita would miss that money, but to be fair, it was not like Emma needed it either. However, after following him for a few blocks and seeing how he flashed his smile and flirted with literally every woman crossing his path. Emma was sure of one thing, if Rita really cared about this young man as she had claimed, this love affair she had with him was only going to hurt her, and that was something the blonde knew Rita could spare herself for once in her life.
Hadn't Regina suffered enough already? Emma was completely positive she had.
Scooter Polarsky made a stop after sundown in some diner downtown, and the detective was a little surprised that it was no other but the diner where Alma Fillcot's daughter worked as a waitress. She took a seat near the counter where Dee Fillcot stood, ready to take her order, and placed her fedora down on the nearest stool. Her eyes were stuck to the young actor who was now flirting with the waitress attending him in the far corner booth.
"Evening Madam. Welcome to the Orange Grove Diner. Our special tonight is meatloaf, but between you and me, it's not that special." Dee greeted her, noticing her eyes were stuck to the couple in the back of the diner.
"Yeah, I'll just, uh, I'll just have some coffee.", Emma replied, lifting her gaze from Scooter and the waitress long enough to glance at the girl behind the counter to see if she got her order.
"Wise choice. How do you like it?"
"Blonde and sweet", Emma replied distractedly, trying to determine if the waitress back there might be Mr. Polarsky's lover. The detective saw Dee Fillcot opening her mouth to say something out of the corner of her eyes and then closing it again. This spiked Emma's interest, so she flashed a look at the girl again and saw the exact moment the spark of jealousy dissipated from her eyes.
Could this be professional jealousy? Her being sick of her friend getting all of the customers' attention? Emma was now curious enough to try and find out while she was around.
"We're talking about coffee. Right?" The waitress asked.
"Yeah, that's just, uh, it's my fancy way of saying cream and sugar", Emma smiled.
"Cute," Dee replied, "You know, that paper you're pretending to read is two days old," the girl leaned a little forward saying these words.
"So it is," Emma looked down at the paper in her hands. She didn't need to read any of the words on the front page to know exactly what was popping on the news that particular day. She had studied all of the current events and the news long enough to know what happened two days ago. "Well, you got something newer?" She replied just to make the other blonde let the subject go.
"Well, I just finished this. Give it a try". Came as a response to her question and the girl pulled a magazine from under the counter.
"Masters of Crime. Huh. You read this stuff?" Emma asked surprised, she didn't want to sound judgemental or anything, but for what she had seen of the girls these days, crime and mystery were the last things she thought Dee would be interested in.
"Oh, I love a good murder. The bloodier, the better," blonde eyebrows darted up. Emma was now actively listening to Dee Fillcot, who had both her palms over the counter and leaned in to look her in the eyes, "See, violence doesn't bother me." The young girl stated.
"Is that so?"
"Yeah," the girl smirked, "keep that in mind when you tip me", she let out as her final sentence, picking up Emma's old newspaper from the counter and taking it with her when she headed for the kitchen.
Emma smiled, watching her go. Dee's personality was refreshing, something she appreciated considering the amount of stress she had been through the last month, or maybe she should say most of the current year.
Dee Fillcot was the kind of person the detective would quickly become friends with if she could let slip the fact that she was the daughter of a pair of serial killers. Nevertheless, if anyone was living proof that the apple can occasionally fall very far from the tree, that was indeed Emma Swan. During her research with Henry, Emma found out it was no other than Dee and Vern Loomis, her future husband, who uncovered all of the Fillcots' murders. Except, of course, for the one, Emma was most desperately trying to stop because it was practically committed at plain sight. However, the fact that Dee was the kind of person who would put justice before her own parent's sake somehow made Emma feel the prick of guilt building up in her chest. Now that she had met the girl, the notion that she had robbed her of meeting Vern for the first time felt suddenly wrong and so very present in the back of her head. This was probably the night they had met, and here she was tailing Scooter instead of him.
Despite the guilt building up inside of Emma as the waitress placed her coffee in front of her on the counter, she knew she could not change any of the decisions she had taken during the last month. She had taken them for a reason, and that reason was Regina's well-being and healthy return home. Dee would have to wait to meet Vern another day. That was a reunion Emma could easily plan once Regina was safe in her arms.
Mr. Polarsky went straight to bed that night, unaccompanied. The detective made sure of this before she called it a night and headed home.
"Hey kid," She saluted Henry, who was lying on the couch with a book over his face, "any news on Rita?"
"Nothing new, she reunited with the club, then went to meet you at the office which you obviously know, and went back home. They are planning that party on Saturday, so I had to survellance her her house all afternoon while doing nothing. God this year was so dull. Remind me why did I agree to come the past in the first place?".
"Because we are saving your mother from being brutally stabbed and murdered?"
"Yeah yeah, that," Emma's eyes fixed on the young boy, he stared back daringly.
"Teenagers, you take their phones away and they become monsters!" Emma laughed.
"I'm not a teenager anymore," he deadpanned.
"Then you can survive without a phone for some months.
"Anyways—, did Mom recognize you?"
Henry Mills was hoping that once his Moms met again, all this would be over, it clearly didn't go that way, but Emma couldn't deny that she was hoping for the same result until the last minute of her conversation with Rita in her office.
"For a moment I thought so, but she has not a clue who I am," the blonde shrugged, surrounding the couch to sit beside her son. Henry swung his legs off the couch to give her space.
"How will we make true love kiss work if she cannot remember you?"
"Well, I suppose I have to make her fall in love with me again if triggering her memory is not an option."
"What about Scooter Polarsky? Do you think she loves him?" Concern was written all over his young features when Henry asked this.
"Well, I think she cares deeply about him, but I also think he doesn't deserve that from her. So we will have to rule him out of the equation for her sake," Emma winked, feeling how a little bit of jealousy found its way easily into her chest at the mere mention of the young actor and the possibility of Rita loving him.
"That's good, I love my mom but that guy looks like he is the same age as my older version back home or even younger, it would be awkward at dinners," Henry let out a relieved sigh. The blonde had to fake a smile because the thought of Scooter in their family dinners hugging Regina in her tight black jeans was undoubtedly something she didn't want to imagine but now couldn't take out of her mind.
...
October 2nd, 1949
Rita Castillo had always thought of herself as a very patient woman. However, the truth was that she often lost her temper fast, which made her act impulsively. Carlo, her drunk husband, never failed to irritate her, almost as if that was the primary purpose of his annoyingly long life. Only the fact that he was still breathing every time she looked at him when he should have passed away many years ago was enough to enervate her generally. Despite that, what was on Rita's mind when she called her lover that night, had nothing to do with Carlo's ability to keep breathing while being drunk dead on his bed.
No, while the phone ringing tone went off in her ear, there was something else in her mind, reverberating in an endless loop, Carlo's words earlier that night.
I'll bet he's young and pretty and, uh, for sale. Just like you were—. It must be tough getting old. Having to pay for what you used to sell.
Inviting Scooter to her house that night as she watched Carlo lying drunk in his bed was the easiest reckless decision Rita had taken in her life, and this was saying much since Rita could be called many things by the people who knew her, but prudent was not one of those.
Emma Swan was about to call it a night on her quest to find who Mr. Polarsky's lover was because the young boy had been in his apartment for hours without any visitors. She would occasionally see glimpses of him through his window and was sure he was alone. Deflated and a little mad that this day she also was out of luck to catch him in flagrant, the detective started her car and readied herself to go home. That was when she saw him leaving the building and stopping a taxi. Emma checked Scooter up and down when he opened the door to get in his cab. His smile was bright, his expensive suit that the blonde had not a single doubt that had been bought with Rita's money was pristinely ironed, and his hair was perfectly slicked back. Noticing all these little details made the blonde's stomach revolt and her heart crumble because it was apparent that all of it was for a woman. As much as Emma wanted to think that the woman Scooter was visiting at this hour was no other than his lover, as she watched Chinatown disappear in the rearview mirror of her car while tailing the taxi, she also could not help but notice that they were driving towards Rita's Mansion instead.
After parking her car on the usual spot, Henry used for his stakeouts in front of Rita's house and trying to convince herself that she was only sneaking into the mansion because that is what the brunette paid her to do, to follow Scooter. Emma found a great window to watch the couple's interaction.
As shame and guilt seeped into the detective's heart, realizing how low and sickening was what she was doing, spying on them. She tried to convince herself that she was only doing it because she needed to see if Rita was really head over heels for the young actor. Emma repeated to herself that if what she saw in there was really love, she would do the right thing and walk away, let Rita have her happy ending, even if it was not in her arms, after making sure she wasn't killed by Alma Fillcot of course.
When the detective first saw Rita kissing him with absolute devotion, she even believed her own words. She would walk away, yet as the night went on and the kisses became something far more intimate between the two of them. Guilt transformed into excruciating pain, the kind of pain she wouldn't even wish upon her enemies and sadly the same sort of pain she knew she had caused the brunette for years because now the blonde could see it. She could see in her memories the pain behind Regina's smiles, when she told her she was engaged to Hook, during her wedding, even during the day of her coronation as the Queen of the reunited kingdoms when Emma assumed that was her happy ending, she literally told the blonde it was not, and Emma just did not acknowledge it, like a dumbass. Regina had always smiled through this kind of pain. The pain of losing her loved one to another man, and Emma had always been so blind.
It was just in that moment, as she watched Rita make love to Scooter as if that was her punishment for all the pain she had caused to Regina, that she understood that even Scooter Porlarsky was more worthy of Regina's love than herself. She understood that the honorable thing to do was to indeed walk away, let her find her happiness in his or anybody else's arms. The problem was that Emma was also sure that she had never been the kind of person who takes the high road. She was never the princess that she was born to be. She had been a thief, and she was now a knight, if anything, one that would fight to the death for her Queen, hoping that along the way, she could find redemption for her sins.