Worthless

A guest asked for a oneshot of Emma constantly making negative remarks about herself. She belittles herself because she feels worthless. Snow notices and confronts her.

Whenever Snow heard Emma talking about herself, it always seemed to be something bad. She was always too stupid to understand, or too slow to get the joke. She was never strong enough. Never fast enough. Never good enough. Snow hated hearing Emma talk about herself so negatively. Snow knew neither of her children were perfect, but to her, they were. So Snow couldn't hear Emma talk about herself like that any longer. So one evening, Snow sat her daughter down to talk about it.

"Sweetheart, I just wanted to talk about the way you talk about yourself." Snow began. She wasn't sure how to approach this. "You just never seem to point out all the things that are simply amazing about you, and all the nasty things you claim to be your flaws just aren't true." Snow pointed out. Emma gave a humourless laugh.

"You're my mom. It's your job to say that." Emma pointed out. Snow reached her hand out. She placed some stray hairs behind Emma's ear before cupping her cheek.

"That may be true, but have I ever lied to you?" Emma stayed silent. "Exactly. You're beautiful. You're smart. To me, Emma, you are basically pretty damn near perfect." Emma scoffed, unable to look her mom in the eye.

"Over-egging the pudding a bit, aren't you?" Emma said quietly. "I'm not that great, really. There's not much special about me." It broke Snow's heart to hear Emma say things like that about herself. She placed her other hand on Emma's face and made Emma look at her. Snow shook her head.

"No, Emma. That's just not true. There is plenty special about you." Snow smiled. "I'd be here forever if I tried to list everything." Emma smiled weakly. She still didn't feel she was particularly worthy of such praise. "Ok, we'll start small. Let's just start by you trying not to put yourself down so much. Think you can try that?" Snow asked. Emma shrugged.

"I guess." She mumbled. Snow smiled, kissing her forehead. It was a start.