Know that finding her there was a pure coincidence.

Maybe it's fate, who knows?

She wasn't that far from my house. I remember, her gaze was blank, the gaze of the lost child I knew all too well. She must have been around ten years old, she was blonde and adorable but she lived on the streets. I recognized her even though the last time it was just a baby. Her face was so familiar to me.

She was burning book pages and it was the ugly duckling. Too many happy coincidences ...

I approached her and grabbed the pages in extremis ... I know she couldn't recognize me ...

« Look, the ugly duckling! I loved this one when I was a kid.

« You're still a child », she told me annoyed.

« You've got spunk, I laughed. The best fairy tales are about the same thing. Transformation, I annotated while reciting what my surrogate father told me, You know... See, a duck it becomes a swan. It's beatiful »

« That's not what it's about. The duck has always a swan, just didn't know it ... »

I felt like I was starting a debate but I wanted her to understand something crucial, I wanted her to have the right to the life that I had at that time: a family and a home.

« Maybe that's how you see it. But I see it as about belief. About a duckling believing so hard believing so hard that she'd become a swan. One day, it actually happened. If we believe in strongly enough, we all have the power to change our fate. Speaking of which, is this really the fate you want ? Maybe your last home was bad. Doesn't mean you won't find a good one, someday. »

I think she understood.

She offered to accompany her to the police station so that she could ask for a new family. I didn't want to get Ezra and Olivia involved in this, it would have been too complicated to explain to them who this little girl really was. But I watched her for a little while to make sure she was really happy and fulfilled. And her life seemed to have changed.

Now I tell myself that maybe I had given up on her a second time, seeing as I didn't look after her long enough but she told me that this lesson had changed her life and maybe it is what is most important. Maybe for once I did a good deed because now she has become a swan.

The new Emma: Emma Swan.

It may have helped her, but it served me even more. I had understood one thing, the stories inspired me and I wanted to inspire people, to give them good lessons through my stories and the reviews, the analyzes that Ezra gave me helped me to understand life, to understand the thought of human. I wanted to start writing, create my own stories. Mr. Iarding found this idea very attractive.

During my high school year, I won a few news awards, some of which were published in the school newspaper. It was a first step towards recognition.

For my seventeen-year birthday, Ezra and Olivia contributed with Gordie's help to give me a typewriter, the one I'm using now. It was heavy but very practical.

Then Gordie had managed to find us a job as a waiter in the restaurant of a large classical dance theater. It allowed me to earn a lot of money.

I could even find accommodation for myself but I didn't want to leave the Iardings, I really liked them very much and I secretly still needed them so that I wouldn't make bad choices. It was still too difficult to lead my life alone.

In order for him to keep me as long as possible, I wanted to work hard, make them proud and at the same time, make my dear daddy who was very far from me proud.

I obtained my diplomas with honors, then I wanted to do major studies of letters, familiarize myself with my passion for words. My surrogate parents were very proud of me and I was happy.

But it was only short-lived. Gordie, having withdrawn from our old comrades wanted us to go see the world. Gordie was a really good friend, he hadn't let go of me for thirteen years. Even if sometimes he annoyed me to want to flirt with all the dancers and high school girls, I admired him, he was my guide in this new world.

Ezra and Olivia wanted me to be happy, and Ezra told me that "the best writers always start to see the world before they write masterpieces."

But, I was so sad to say goodbye to them especially that I never saw them again: these seven years have been synonymous with peace.

To celebrate my departure as it should be, they gave me what will become my best friend: an absolutely beautiful Harley Davidson motorcycle. (Ezra's brother had taught me how to ride the motorbike, for a few months and I was pretty good).

Since that day, I don't never left it again.