By the time the sun began to set in Storybrooke, Henry had managed to profile another dozen of its residents. Helena, meanwhile, had spent some time at the library and was now enjoying dinner at Granny's. It was 8:30 when Henry finally ambled through the restaurant's door and right past Helena without so much as glancing at her. The reason why was sitting at the counter nibbling on the remains of a slice of pecan pie. Helena raised her eyebrows and tried in vain to catch Henry's eye.

"Hi," said Henry with a smooth smile as he sat down in the empty seat next to the young woman. She turned her head to face him. "Nice shoes," he meaningfully glanced at her black boots. "Want to make your parents proud?"

Her response was a laugh, but not the kind of laugh he'd hope for. "We can start with me buying you a drink," Henry continued hopefully.

The woman stood up and narrowed her dark almond-shaped eyes. "Hell. No." As she sauntered out of the restaurant, Granny happened to catch Helena's eye, and the two exchanged an amused smirk. A few seconds later, Ruby noticed Henry at the counter and took his order.

"You all done, girl?" Granny asked Helena as she walked over and took the younger woman's dishes. "I'm wondering, does he save this kind of behavior for vacations, or is he always like this?"

Helena grimaced. "He's been like this since he was twelve."

Granny leaned in closer to Helena. "Can you do me a favor and let him know that if he's looking for a good time, The Rabbit Hole is a few blocks away? I need him to stop alienating my customers."

Helena forced a smile. "Will do."

After she and Henry both finished eating, Henry emerged from the restaurant with Helena following close behind. "Hey!" she called, causing him to barely glance behind him. "What's your problem? Why the hell didn't you come sit with me?"

"Figured you still didn't want to talk to me."

"Are you sure it wasn't because you were too busy trying to get laid?" snapped Helena.

"No, it wasn't," mumbled Henry, barely looking where he was going as they made their way down the cold dark sidewalk. "But I was sure that I had a shot with that chick at the bar. Did you see that had the Chinese symbol for fun tattooed on her wrist?"

"Actually, it was the symbol for war." Helena jumped a couple of steps ahead to catch up with her brother. "You know the way you act around women is disgusting, right? How would you feel if some guy treated me that way?"

"Oh, I'd kill him."

"And you somehow have it in your head that I have more value as a person than every other woman?"

Henry sighed. "Haven't we already had this conversation…oh…twice a year since you stopped believing that babies come from an iron claw machine hidden at the hospital?"

"Yeah. Because it never sinks in." Helena grabbed the door and pushed her way into the hotel ahead of her brother. "I don't understand it, Henry. You've never been a bad person. How the hell did you end up being such a big slut?" She turned and marched upstairs without giving him a chance to respond. Henry just sighed. He knew his lifestyle wasn't always smart. But right now, he had to do something to try and keep the memory of a certain someone from playing with his mind. Which was a lot easier before he had a living reminder of her.

October 1993

The chilly Boston night air was thick with rush hour smog as Henry jogged around the track owned by the police academy. "Mr. Stable! Faster! Run like your best friend's life depends on it!" bellowed the coach. Henry sucked in his breath and managed to pass a couple of his classmates. "Run like if you can't keep up with the fastest person in this class, an innocent person who you care about is going to lose everything. Because THAT'S what it's like out in the real world!"

"Yeah, right," muttered the guy next to Henry. "Watch us all become cops and do nothing but paperwork and giving fat chicks speeding tickets."

"NO TALKING! THAT'S AN ORDER!"

This was Henry's life now. Helena had signed herself out of the system and moved in with him the day she turned sixteen. A month later, he'd been accepted into the police academy. He'd set aside enough money to sustain them during his fourteen weeks of training combined with the benefits they were still receiving from the state. He and Helena couldn't often afford to spend money on anything that wasn't an absolute necessity, but they made do. A lot of people had asked Henry what had made him decide to go to the police academy. Obviously, a big part of it was better paychecks than he'd ever gotten as a cashier. He knew that the downside was that he'd be putting himself at risk on a regular basis. But for him, this had always been a harsh world.

After the workout and a quick shower, Henry got in his car and drove home. When he got there he and Helena would have TV dinners, do homework, and then he'd probably go to bed early while she called her friends on the phone. Just like every other day. That was what he was thinking about five miles down the road from his apartment, when he saw a swirling mass of neon green shoot up out of a nearby field. He pulled over without stopping to think about it.

Henry jumped out of the car and instantly felt the wind slap his face. He ran in the direction of the bright whirlpool and froze five feet away from it. After a moment, a screaming woman shot out of the whirlpool and landed on the grass. Then the whirlpool shrank and vanished. Henry stayed still for a second, starring into the pit of dirt left behind by the magic. The woman on the ground stirred and weakly pulled herself into a sitting position, clumps of grass sticking to her white blouse and dark hair.

"Hey?" yelled Henry. "Are you okay?"

"No," she mumbled. He stepped closer to her. "What realm am I in?"

"Did you hit your head?" he asked.

"I think so," she mumbled. "Everything went dark for a moment."

Henry knelt down next to her and helped her sit up all the way. She looked about his age, give or take a year.

"Are you from The Enchanted Forest?" he asked.

"No. That's where I was trying to go. I have a pouch of gold I can trade for a magic bean and a compass."

Henry took a deep breath. "I'm sure we can figure something out," he lied. "For now, just come with me."

"No way," she mumbled, even as she let him put his arm around her back to keep her from falling over. "Why would I trust you? I don't know anything about you or this realm."

"This realm is called Earth," said Henry. "And you should trust me because I'm the only other human in this world who's ever been to The Enchanted Forest and wants to go back as badly as you. And because you have a concussion and have nowhere else to go."

She hesitated, then held out her hand for him to shake. "I'm Aerona of the White Kingdom and the High Seas."

"I'm Henry Stable."

"What kind of a name is that?"

"Henry!" scolded Helena as soon as he walked in the door with Aerona leaning against him for support. "I thought we agreed, no girls over on school nights."

"Thanks, sis," replied Henry dryly. "She's just a friend who needs to stay over because she's hurt."

"Huh? Nope. She's too pretty to just be a friend."

"Don't worry," said Aerona as Henry helped her lower herself onto the couch. "I'm married." Helena paused to check for the wedding band and then walked away.

"Sounds like you bring a lot of girls over," slurred Aerona as Henry adjusted the pillows on the sofa so she could lie down.

"My sister knows there are only two types of women in my life. The kind I'm friends with and talk to and the other kind."

"And when you find both of those in the same person, that's called love," muttered Aerona wistfully as she starred at her ring.

Aerona spent the next three days lying on the couch and mostly sleeping. Henry called in sick to take care of her on Friday and stayed home to do it on Saturday and Sunday.

"Is there something I should know about your friend?" asked Helena, who was sitting in their old armchair flipping through a magazine. "She keeps calling the TV an 'enchanted box'."

"Don't worry about it," said Henry. "She hit her head."

"And I'm right here," mumbled Aerona, who was still lying on the couch.

"I'm going to the movies in a few minutes."

"Be back by ten."

"Okay." Soon after, Helena tossed her magazine on the coffee table and left. Curious, Aerona picked it up.

"What's this?"

"It's like a book, only once a week you throw it away and get a new one."

"How barbaric."

"So," Henry sat down in the armchair. "Are you feeling any better?"

"Not really. My head still feels like someone is pounding on it with a mallet."

"We should probably try to get you to a clinic later today," Henry admitted. "Really, you should have seen a doctor the day I found you. But you have to promise me that you won't talk to anyone about magic, or portals, or wherever the hell you came from."

"What happens if I do?"

Henry hesitated. "It's…um…it's illegal to discuss magic openly in this realm."

Aerona's strange expression told him that she still didn't entirely trust him. "Okay."

The following Saturday, Henry and Aerona were taking a walk along a busy street. "The noisy bikes on the road are motorcycles. And those things above us that look like they have candles in them at night are lampposts."

"What about the things with cords that people hold up to their ears while they talk?"

"Telephones. We use them to communicate."

"How does that work?"

"Basically, the sound of your voice travels to the other person through a series of wires. That's why we have those." He pointed up at the telephone wires strung right above their heads.

"Fascinating," Aerona remarked.

"Yeah. Electricity is this world's magic."

"Speaking of magic…" Aerona subtly slipped her left arm around Henry's. "What's the easiest method of realm jumping to locate in this realm? Preferably something cheap but reliable."

Henry sighed. "Yeah, about that…"

Aerona dropped both arms so they hung at her sides and starred up at him with determined emerald eyes.

"You're not going to help me get to The Enchanted Forest, are you?"

"I would if I could, but…this world doesn't have any magic. None. No one even believes it exists." Aerona looked away and starred at the ground with an unreadable expression. "I'm sorry. Neither one of us has a way to get there."

Aerona shook her head. "People have come here from magical realms and gone back before." Henry raised his eyebrows. "I've known quite a few men of travels in my life. There are so many ways to travel between realms-magic beans, magic mirrors, magic hats, magic slippers. There's no way that Earth doesn't have any of them."

Henry froze. This was a possibility he hadn't even considered before. All his mother had told him was that a monster would cast a curse that only he could break. He'd assumed the curse was something that was going to happen in this land. Maybe it was something that he had to go back to fix.

"But how are we going to find that?" asked Henry. "You can't even talk about magic in this realm without people treating you like there's something wrong with you."

"I'll figure it out. I've spent half my adult life looking for a way back to my husband. I'm not about to let a world full of imbeciles stand in my way." Henry and Aerona both smiled. "Are you with me?" She held out her hand.

"I'm with you." Henry took her hand and shook it lightly, unintentionally keeping her hand in his grasp a few moments longer than necessary.

When he had started attending the police academy, Henry had expected the hardest part to be something physical. As it turned out, forcing himself to stay awake through the lecture portion of the day and actually pay attention to them was proving much harder. He discreetly snapped a rubber band against his wrist as the instructor wrapped up his elaborate speech about DUI's.

"Let's say you are driving a patrol car and pull a man over who you suspect has been driving drunk. When you ask him to get out of the car, he does. What do you do?"

Just then, Aerona stepped into the doorway of the classroom. She smiled and waved. He discreetly smiled back while a man next to him answered the question.

"That's right. And what if he refuses to take the test? What do you do next, Mr. Stable?"

"Um...arrest him."

"Yes! What do you say to him?"

Henry forced himself to look away from Aerona as she kept her eyes locked on him and placed her left hand on the inside of the door frame. "Mr. Smith, you are under arrest for driving under the influence," recited Henry. "I'm going to need you to turn around, put your hands behind your back, and spread your legs. You have the…"

"WRONG! It's FEET! Spread your FEET!" Henry's face turned red as about twelve of his classmates burst out laughing around him. "That's an extra four laps at the end of the day for all of you because Mr. Stable is letting his girlfriend distract him! You are all dismissed for lunch!"

"Yes, sir!"

Henry discreetly slipped off to a corner of the room where Aerona was waiting. "I brought you a sandwich. Helena told me you're always complaining about the food here."

Henry smiled. "Thanks. How did you get here?"

"I took a taxi cab and paid the driver in gold coins. Is that allowed?"

"I'm sure he didn't mind." Henry took a bite out of the sandwich.

"I've been at the library researching magic all day," said Aerona. "Unfortunately, most books about it are in the fiction section."

"Don't get discouraged. You did just start looking. And this weekend I'll help you out for a few hours."

"By a few you'd better mean all you can. You don't get to make me do all the work and then reap the same benefits."

"Fine. Twenty then."

"Thank you." Henry smiled. Both were trying to squash the way the idea of spending so much time together in just a few days was making them feel.

"Okay, that does it." Henry picked up the book he was holding and threw it onto the empty chair opposite him at the library. "I'm done. I'm fried."

Aerona ran her hand over her face wearily. "What does that mean?"

"My brain can't work anymore today," said Henry. "I know it's only four in the afternoon, but I spend all week trying to memorize stupid facts that I wish I'd cared more about in high school government class. I can't spend the whole weekend studying too."

Aerona frowned. "So you're not going to help me again tomorrow?"

"I will, but only if you let me show you how we have a good time in this realm tonight."

"Sounds tempting." After a moment of Henry teasing her with his playful smile, Aerona tossed her book aside, too, gathered her collection of notes she'd been making, and left the library with him. Three hours, two new outfits, and a fake ID later found them at the grand opening of the hottest nightclub in town.

"These drinks are so good," remarked Aerona "I've only ever had straight up rum before. Bartender, we'll have another round of pink ladies over here!"

"Beer for me," Henry interjected quickly.

"Gods, the music in this realm is awesome."

"Oh, what, they don't have The Rolling Stones in The Enchanted Forest and wherever else you've been?" Henry quipped.

"Of course not!" shouted Aerona as the music grew louder. She was about to ask him something else about The Enchanted Forest, then thought better of it because there were so many people around. "Come on, I want to dance." She grabbed his hand and led him to the dance floor.

"That was the most fun I've had in years," mumbled Aerona as she took Henry's hand in hers and let him help her out of the cab.

"Maybe we let ourselves have a little too much fun," Henry admitted as he paid the driver and let Aerona take his arm.

"Not really. We only had a total of three drinks each in four hours. You should have just driven us home."

"Not if I want to be a cop." Henry wrapped his arm around Aerona, letting the full weight of her body rest against his even though they both knew she was only slightly tipsy. On the inside of the front door, they found a note from Helena.

"Sleeping over at Carly's house, back before noon. You and your girlfriend can have the rest of the coffee cake."

"Why is everyone around us assuming I'm your girlfriend?" asked Aerona as she wandered over to the couch and turned on the radio.

Henry fidgeted. "I don't usually keep a girl around this long."

Aerona snorted. "Woman, Henry." Henry smiled. "You know, I don't get it. You've devoted half your life to taking care of your sister, you were willing to do everything you could to help me before you even knew anything about me, and you want a job that involves upholding the law. You're not one of the bad guys."

"Yeah?"

"So what exactly do you have against falling in love?"

"The fact that I would never do it doesn't mean I have anything against it." Henry sat down on the couch next to Aerona. "Frankly, I don't see what's wrong with the way I live my life. Yes, my relationships rarely last more than a couple of hours. But it's not like the women don't know what they're getting going in."

"But still…" Aerona moved slightly closer to Henry on the sofa. "Why would you say you'll never do it?"

There was dead silence for a full thirty seconds. Henry starred at a smudge on the blank TV screen across from them as the beginning notes of Alone by Heart came from the radio.

"I came to this realm with Helena when I was four. She was a baby, and my parents didn't follow us. They couldn't." Henry fidgeted. "I had so many people in my life that I loved. My parents, my grandfather, some close friends. Even a few horses. And all of that disappeared in an instant." A moment of silence passed. "For the next thirteen years, we just bounced from home to home, living with groups of strangers who we knew would never give a damn about us." Henry paused. "I've always looked after Helena, because I love her and because I know my parents expected me to, but that's it. Like, don't you think that we'd all be better off if we didn't get close to anyone we didn't absolutely have to? The more you care about, the more you have to lose."

Unexpectedly, Aerona reached over and squeezed his hand.

"I grew up alone, too. My mother was supposedly killed by a monster, and my father couldn't stand the sight of me because I looked like her. When I was six, he let some people take me away with them to another realm. There was always someone looking after me who cared for me when I was young, but I could never really get close to them. I hated my father so much. And I loved him. And I hated myself for being stupid enough to love someone who was never going to love me back."

Henry let out a deep breath he hadn't known he was holding in. He turned and looked at Aerona and squeezed her hand.

"I've actually never told anyone that before," Aerona admitted.

"Neither have I."

Both of them leaned forward in the same moment. His lips met hers. After that, the only words spoken in that room were coming from the radio.

Till now, I always got by on my own
I never really cared until I met you
And now it chills me to the bone
How do I get you alone?

Henry woke up the next morning in his own bed. His eyes scanned the room and landed on a pile of clothes on the floor, which was enough to make the previous night's events flash before his eyes. Seconds later, Aerona appeared in the doorway fully clothed. "Sorry. I was just going to leave you a note."

Henry warily brushed his hair out of his eyes as he processed what she'd said. "What?"

"Last night was a mistake. I don't know what the hell I was thinking. I've been loyal to my husband for eighteen years."

"Eighteen years? How the hell young were you when you got engaged to him?"

"It's complicated, okay? Bottom line…this…whatever there is between us…it can't happen. Ever."

Henry sat up in his bed. "This doesn't mean you have to go. You can still stay here, we can still look for a way back home together…."

Aerona stepped as close to Henry as she possibly could. "Can you honestly tell me that if we continue living and working together that you will never want to sleep with me again?" A minute passed. Henry said nothing. "I didn't think so."

"Aerona, wait."

"Because of everything you've done for me so far, I'll contact you when I find a way back to The Enchanted Forest. But until then, just stay away from me."

By the time Helena had gotten home, there was no trace of Aerona left in the apartment.

A Few Weeks Later

He didn't even have a picture of her. He was putting up a photograph of himself in his new official police officer's uniform when he realized it. Why it occurred to him even then he had no idea. It wasn't like he made a habit of asking girls he was with for a picture, no matter how hot they were. He wasn't even sure that he really wanted a picture of Aerona. After all, he had two categories of women in his life. And Aerona didn't fall into either one. Not really.

"You okay, Henry?"

Henry glanced up and saw Helena sitting at the table with some papers spread out in front of her.

"Yeah, I'm fine. What are you up to?"

"Looking at some college brochures."

"That's great," said Henry. "Leave those out when you're done with them, will you?"

"Um…okay," said Helena. "Why?"

"I might need to take a few classes before I take the detective exam," Henry explained.

"Ooh, you're gonna be a spy?" teased Helena.

"Yeah, something like that. It's time I started learning how to find people."

A/N: facecasting

Helena = Lea Michele

Henry = Misha Collins

Aerona = Sophia Bush