Drumming blunt nails on the cracked varnish of the booth's tabletop, Neal waits impatiently as his dark gaze returns repeatedly to the glass door of the bar. It's only ten past twelve, but he's been sitting at the table since half-eleven on account of his nerves, and he turns to offer another dirty look at the man behind the counter that sneers at the half-drunk beer he clasps in his hand.
He supposes the fact that he sits alone with what could well be another drink in reserve does little to help his image.
Finally, the door swings open, and he raises a hand awkwardly to Emma who makes no move to return the gesture. Watching as she offers a brief nod towards the barman, he sighs, noting the fact she doesn't bother to address the man, nor grant him a smile. He understands that this is New York and that such niceties are not always expected, but the simple fact of the matter is that, until yesterday, he has never known Emma to refuse to grin at anyone.
He tries offering her his own small smile as she takes a seat opposite him but is again granted no response. She simply nods her thanks as he gives up and slides her beer towards her and speaks quietly.
"Hi."
"...Hi."
Neal struggles to find something more to say, before taking a suspiciously long drink from his glass and signalling towards the barman - who now seems a little less judgemental following the blonde's entrance - to bring over another. He tells himself that they are not, in fact, suffering in silence, but simply waiting for this small task to be accomplished before getting down to whatever this is going to be.
Emma seems happy enough to go along with the act and stares pensively down at the amber suds in front of her.
Neal takes advantage of her lowered gaze to grant himself a chance to finally study her properly without getting hit in the face, or trying to keep his eyes from wandering to her chest with his father in the room.
He concludes that she still looks disarmingly attractive beneath her hard glamour; has always been disarmingly attractive... But this had had very little to do with why he'd liked her.
No, that had come down to the fact that when they'd met, she had been everything he'd wanted to be as a child: cheerful, untroubled, brave...
Carefree.
Of course, over time, he'd come to learn of the darker things in her life that had left her quite so bold and careless of consequence; the two of them once upon a time spending many an evening talking long into the night, watching the moon go through its phases from the curious comfort of that old, stolen car... Now though, the memory leaves his throat suddenly dry, and, just as he imagines, in spite of her agreement to talk, that she will never be able to tell him all of the things she might be thinking beneath her carefully cold exterior, he too will probably never get an opportunity to confide in her the simple fact that he still thinks back on those long, wine-soaked nights in the bug with a terrible sense of longing. To explain to her that, when out on a date - hell, even during the brief period a few years ago when he had been engaged to a young dancer from Brooklyn - there has forever seemed to be something missing. He imagines, as with he himself, that she has little time for stories these days, but he sighs as he's struck by that old realisation from long ago, that no matter how promising her body and advances had been, he would have given it up if ever such a choice were forced to simply listen to her wild and fanciful tales of a magical world in which the knights were brave, the stallions fast, and the wizards were good.
She had always had the best stories... Mostly because stories were all that they ever were.
Idiot princes, sharp-mouthed damsels, gender-confused dragons, and - his favourite - a deliciously kink-led colony of fairies, and not a dagger in sight.
He wonders if she remembers the way they had made that old car shudder with nothing more but the sheer force of their laughter.
He doesn't imagine this is the time to ask.
"You look... Good."
He offers gently; careful to make it clear with his tone that he in no way means to piss her off with his words. He breathes a sigh of relief when rather than snapping at him venomously, she simply shrugs and places her hands down on her lap.
Thus, he is unaware of the way she plucks at the tight wool of her sweater nervously.
She sighs, scolding herself for fidgeting with her clothes - the plain black sweater lent to her by Regina after her stated wish to hide the purple graze the darker woman had left at her collarbone, and looking altogether suitably forbidding having paired it with her own black jeans and boots - and replies with just a hint of cattiness that serves to lift a little of the heavy cloud of discomfort they share.
"I guess you look alright too, for a guy whose nose got broken."
"It was a pretty decent punch, I'll give you that."
Neal nods, dark, raccoon-bruises acting as a memento of their scrap in the alley.
"Pretty decent?"
Emma raises a brow, and he rolls his eyes and sits back in his chair as the barman comes over with a fresh beer.
"Okay, it hurt like a son of a bitch, happy?"
"No, but that knowledge does help a little..."
She replies silkily, but he doesn't miss the slight tic to the side of her jaw, and he relaxes a little.
"Emma, I-... I don't know where to start with all of this... But, I guess the first thing I should tell you - and I know you don't want to hear it, but I'm going to say it anyway - is I'm sorry..."
Cool green flickers up to offer him a sharp look, and the blonde sighs; crossing her arms over her chest as she regards him solemnly.
"Okay. What for?"
"... What do you mean?"
"Well, I know what you should be sorry for. But, I'm curious... I want you to tell me what you think you should be sorry for."
"I..."
"Tell me why you did it, Neal. Then I'll tell you what you did."