TITLE: Awakenings (2/?)
NOTES: So, this chapter is something of a rock bottom. Hopefully you won't hate me (or Emma) too much. My next updates may not be as quick since I go back to work after this weekend, but I'll try my best.
Chapter Two
"I don't want to talk about it."
It is half past eleven at night, and Emma has been hoping that Mary Margaret might have already gone to bed. For the past three days she has managed to avoid speaking to just about everyone, except about strict business. In a way it has been a welcome distraction, doing her best to take over both shifts, though the jail feels too quiet by day, and haunted by memories of Graham in the short time that she has known him. Weeks which now seem to stretch into an eternity. Now she is headed out again for the night after only a few hours of sleep, but the escape seems a relief.
Except for the fact that Mary Margaret has perched herself at the bottom of the stairs, mug of cinnamon-laced hot chocolate in hand and clearly intended as a therapeutic device.
"I'm serious," Emma insists, when she makes no move to clear the way to the door. "I have work to do."
"Emma." Mary Margaret's tone is laced with equal parts compassion and exasperation, and Emma cannot help feeling an instinctive twinge of guilt for causing her worry. "Storybrooke isn't going to fall apart if you take one night off. And besides, everyone knows where to find you if they're in desperate need of—I don't know, someone to pull a lost kitten out of a tree or something."
"I'm fine," says Emma shortly. "But I need to go to work."
Mary Margaret gets to her feet, though it makes little difference since she remains at the bottom of the stairs. "You're avoiding me. You've been avoiding me ever since Graham died. Which was fine at first. I mean, you need your space and I want to respect that. But you can't just deal with this by trying to ignore it."
"Ignore what?" Emma insists. A week ago she might have welcomed the opportunity to confide in Mary Margaret, but now even that simple act seems risky; the betrayal of overly optimistic advice has landed her here in the first place. "I'm not dealing with anything, except for the fact that I suddenly have way more work than I can possibly do by myself. So seriously, please just let me get on with it."
"Graham died," says Mary Margaret, very gently. "You started to open yourself up to him and he died. It was a shock to all of us, but especially to you. Please don't shut us all out now that you're trying to protect yourself again."
"I don't need to protect myself from anything," Emma snaps, suddenly infuriated by the attempt at sympathy. It feels like an invasion of her grief. "I barely knew him. It was sad. I'm over it."
"Emma," Mary Margaret repeats, and this time her disapproval is palpable.
"Come to think of it, I barely know you either." Emma brushes past her, a few feet from the door now. "So if I did have a problem, I'm not sure why you'd expect to be the one playing my therapist."
"And sniping at the people who care about you is really going a long way toward convincing us that you don't need help," Mary Margaret answers, an uncharacteristic note of sarcasm in her voice.
The hurt in her face is obvious, and Emma feels another momentary pang of regret at the way she is acting. Yet it seems the only way to keep anyone else from being harmed. The only way to protect herself. She is no stranger to tragedy, though her usual response is to simply vanish from the circumstances, to pack up as quickly as possible and start again someplace where the stakes are lower. But she finds herself unable to run this time, when it seems that Henry's wellbeing has been so precariously placed in her hands. When she is more than partially responsible for his misery. Now the only option seems self-imposed restraint, her body here where it must be, but her heart locked tightly away.
Instead of answering, Emma pulls open the door and steps out into the night. The air holds an odd chill, and for an instant she wishes she had thought to wear a thicker jacket. But the thought of going back inside now is absolutely unacceptable, and she reminds herself that the patrol car has perfectly decent heat if she needs it.
She has left the car parked out front of Mary Margaret's place, practically daring anyone to question her authority in driving it now. The key is chilly in her fingers when she digs it out of the pocket of her jeans, as though the metal might be impervious to her body heat. Emma holds her breath momentarily as she opens the driver's side door, instinctively bracing herself for the way that the scent of Graham's leather jacket seems to cling to the old upholstery, another fresh reminder of his sudden absence here. Slipping into the car, she closes the door quickly on the night, turning the key in the ignition and feeling the engine sputter to life, as though unaccustomed to her obeying her commands.
Mary Margaret is right; it is highly unlikely that she will have anything to do on her patrol tonight, or that there would be any consequences if she simply opted to stay inside and sleep. Yet Emma feels driven to the streets, unable to sit still in the aftermath of Graham's death, desperate for any action that feels remotely productive. Cruising slowly, she turns the car onto Main Street, where most of the store fronts are long closed down for the night, lights out. Granny's is the only place still showing some activity, Sidney Glass nursing something in a mug at the front table as Emma slows the car to look inside, and Ruby wiping down tables. The sheer normalcy of it all tugs at the emptiness which has been lurking in the pit of her stomach, threatening to expand once more into full-fledged grief. Stepping on the gas, Emma pulls away quickly, moving this time toward the hospital and the woods.
It is darker and quieter still out here, and she is nearly ready to turn around for a second circuit when the odd movement of a shadow catches her eye. It is just outside the soft light stretching from the hospital's doors, on the treeline of the forest. Shifting the car into park, Emma waits, watching, finding herself hoping irrationally that this will prove to be something, a distraction to show the town that she is needed here, to shift attention away from her personal failures.
She has nearly given up when the movement comes again, more quickly this time. It is too dark to make out from the car, and Emma switches it off, quietly climbing out but leaving the door ajar. A little thrill of adrenaline runs through her core as the shadows shift again, and she wonders momentarily what she will do if there is real danger here. She has left the gun in the desk at the jail, repulsed by it since her encounter with Regina and Henry. But she has never been one to plan ahead, and so Emma steps into the darkness with nothing but her instincts. The movement is coming from behind a tall bush, she realizes, and it is low to the ground. Slowing, she waits for her eyes to adjust, half expecting to find some sort of large animal.
"Hi Emma," comes a tentative voice out of the darkness, and she nearly jumps out of her skin as she suddenly places it.
"Henry! What the hell are you doing out here?" Her skin prickles with an overwhelming combination of relief and anger. She has not seen him since the night of Graham's death, allowing herself to think that the best course of action. "It's the middle of the night!"
"I was waiting for you!" he answers excitedly, emerging from behind the bush now. His clothes are covered in dirt, Emma realizes, and one knee of his pants is ripped.
"Out here?" Emma kneels to get a better look at him, suddenly more concerned than angry. "What happened to you?"
"I had to make sure she wasn't following me," Henry continues, barely missing a beat. "We're going to have to be even more careful now. She absolutely can't find out!"
"Henry. Find out what? You have to slow down."
"You mean you don't know yet? You broke the curse! At least—part of it. I'm pretty sure that's what happened." The words tumble out in an excited whisper, still practically nonsensical.
"What are you talking about?" Emma insists, becoming afraid that the trauma of the past few days has affected him worse than she'd guessed.
"The Sheriff is back!" he answers, voice rising despite his attempts to keep the volume down. "He's been hiding in the woods. The wolf came to show me! You did it!"
"Shut up!" Emma explodes, catching herself a moment too late. His claim seems utterly cruel, designed to cut in the worst possible way, and she finds herself wondering whether this is some sort of revenge for her perceived failure.
"What?" Henry recoils, looking shocked.
"Graham is dead," Emma hisses, suddenly wanting to see her own hurt mirrored in his face, though the very realization of her intentions sickens her. "This is not a game."
"I'm not kidding!" Henry insists, voice rising petulantly. "He's not dead! He just can't come back to town because of the mayor. It's too dangerous. But you can help! Just go into the woods, and the wolves will show you."
"I'm taking you home right now," Emma says coldly, stepping back and waiting for him to follow.
"No!" he protests, predictably. "You have to believe me. Whatever you did, it's starting to break the curse! We can't just quit now!"
It feels as if something cracks in this moment; Emma finds herself completely and utterly exhausted, this conversation more painful than if he'd remained angry with her. Everything about the town seems a further torment tonight, and suddenly running doesn't seem so impossible. Especially when Henry seems incapable of seeing her as anything beyond a player in his fairytale fantasy, as anything real.
"I am done with Operation Cobra," Emma answers. "I am done playing fairytale games and humoring your theories. Get in the car and let me take you home right now, or I will be gone by the time you wake up in the morning."
For a moment Henry does not move, the harshness of her words sinking in slowly. Emma regrets them instantly, knowing without question that she has now damaged any sort of relationship she might have had with him beyond repair. Yet she feels incapable of further grief, already having reached her limit, and now beginning to become miserably numb.
Henry says nothing this time, simply walks toward the car and climbs into it without meeting her eyes. He is silent as she drives back toward the mayor's house, and Emma feels as though she ought to say something, but there is nothing that will fix what she has done. It is almost a relief when he slides out the door again and runs up to the big house. She waits to see him go in the door before pulling away, not caring whether Regina catches sight of her car.
Afterward, she drives in circles through the town, trying not to see anything now, hoping simply to slip more completely into a numbness that will let her forget the pain of her mistakes. She ought never to have come here, Emma thinks, never let herself hope that she might ever be anything other than a terrible risk in Henry's life. She wishes now that she could deny being his mother, deny her own flesh and blood and instinct to keep him safe from herself.
She has nearly succeeded at losing herself in these thoughts when the shadows move again, this time darting in front of her car. Emma slams on the brakes reflexively, her heart suddenly pounding in her temples. Cutting the engine, she stumbles out of the car once more, fully expecting to find Henry here again, this time playing a game with his own life.
Instead she finds herself confronted by the silver wolf, its head cocked majestically to the side, single blood-red eye regarding her with an air of disapproval.
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