He'd been sat in another dive, chasing shaddows in some crazy spur of hope he'd known would die the moment he found concreet evidence, when he meets Baelfire for the first time.
Plain, almost deliberartly so, as though he is wearing mediocracy like a mask and it draws his eye, has him pushing aside social convetions and ordering the other a whisky.
A cursory acknowlidgement the expense and the other had gone back to his apparently highly involved game of sollitare.
It's then that he notices the incongrauaties, the age on the cards and the odd, almost retro, style of his clothes.
It's a look he recognises from his reflection, a look that shows an innate discomfot with this world and a repressed want to cling to another.
He might, of course, still have been wrong, seeing little more than someone stuck in their way and yet...
He buys another drink, writes a note and, no matter how he knows its going to look now, sends it in the other mans direction.
Surprisingly he does actually read the note, his brow furrowing in what looks like confusion before he's collecting his cards, his coat and walking out the bar, pausing a moment to state, "I'm not interested," before he's gone.
He'd been certain that'd be it, that the mystery would never truly solve itself and then...
...then Bae and Emma had found one another, begun the love affair that'd produced Henry and that'd ended when Bae had clicked that Emma had also come from their 'neck of the woods' and allowed his paranioa to get the better of him.
Quite what he has to be paranoid about is something Bae has ever quite put to words, but it'd had him twisted up enough to somehow think him a part of 'it' and come yelling for a stop to everything.
To be left the hell alone.
It'd actually worked out for the best because he'd been able to let the other know how far off track he was. To tell him that he'd broken both Emma's and his own heart for no good reason.
Of course instantly the other had been all desperate plan to find her again, to make ammends somehow and yet, by that point, Emma had gone again to ground.
They'd kept in contact after that, though given that they'd both developed the love of their own company it'd been little more than a phonecall here or a letter there.
And then Emma has decided to stay in Storybrooke.
Leg in agony and very, very, aware of the duty he'd been chirking for so very long he'd made the choice to at last make good his promise to his father.
Emma had been but a baby the last he'd seen her, however, and he was as likely to make things worse as he was better.
So he'd phoned Bae and inlisted the other's help.
Henry, or rather that Emma had hidden him away so very compleetly and made utterly certain the boy wouldn't go chasing after Bae the way he'd chased after her, had allmost undone everything.
Had had his friend retreeting back into himself and threatening to cut contact entirely.
So he'd gotten desperate, confronted Rumplestilskin and been rewarded for the risk with the knowledge that the Imp truly regretted his actions.
Wished, more than anything, to have his son back at his side.
That he'd used magic to do as such, pulled so many innocent lives in for what seemed little more than whim, had done little to impress Bae and yet it'd been enough to keep the other on side.
To work at the other's mentality until he was doing this as much for the hope of somehow winning Emma back as at last reuniting with his father.
Of course he understood how heady the thought of at last getting abck all you'd wished for was, he'd spent the last few hours moving about with the express intent of avoiding the inevitablity of his own 'happy ending' after all and yet this had never really been about Bae.
No, this had been about somehow undoing the harm his choice to leave Emma had caused, of healing as much of the woman's scars as he was able and thus somehow asuaging his guilt.
Make himself, at last, worthy to see his father's face once more.
So he'd pushed as much as Bae would let him, left the poentially risky news of magic's return to the last possible moment and allowed himself a moment of smug pride when he'd gained a result.
It's fading the moment he sees how tired his friend looks, as though he's some ellaborte water colour that's been smudged a little about the edges.
"You look like hell."
A sharp laugh and a habitual mussing of hair before he repplies, "Mmm, someone'd think I'd just sat on a train for more hours than was likely sain." A beat then, "You guys have a tornado or something?"
"Not quite, no."
Which is more than enough for Bae to catch the general jist of where the rest of this is heading and enquire,
"So what did he use the magic for then?"
"To conjour a wraith."
He can see the moment the penny drops, can see the self same confusion he'd felt when he'd first heard the news and smiling, he states, "The word on the street is that there's a girl involved."