Prologue
It also snowed on January 1, twenty-four years ago, when Storybrooke's lake froze over, trapping a dilapidated boat in the middle of the icy water. They found the little girl by accident. Perhaps the hardy and somewhat daring anglers of the small town would not have risked a fishing trip on the first day of the year if it had started snowing at dawn.
They later told anyone who would listen that the girl resembled an angel frozen in ice. They all said her skin was icy, and her hair, which almost completely covered her frail, naked, and tiny body, was blonde and as light as snow. Her lashes were covered in shimmering hoarfrost, but her lips remained red, like ripe cherries.
The snow began to fall as the small girl opened her eyes and blinked sleepily. The men who had found her claimed, one by one, that her eyes resembled evergreens deep in the forest at night. They claimed that it wasn't real, that they were dreaming.
What is true and what is just a legend? Despite the fact that the increasingly colorful story had accompanied her throughout her life, the girl who had grown up since then had never investigated the truth of the narrative. In the temporary homes and foster families where she lived over the years, her reputation always preceded her. It didn't matter how the other kids discovered it; they simply did. She was the girl without a past, the girl with sun-bleached hair and emerald green eyes.
They called her Miss Moonlight or White Duckling, and the meaner kids just called her Dopey, which had more to do with the fact that she didn't start talking until a year after they found her. The names themselves were never the worst part; it was the contempt, disgust, and ridicule with which they were spoken. The little girl quickly discovered that a person can have multiple names, and she also discovered that if she does not protect herself, no one will defend her.
All of this tormented her, and her story has followed her for the past twenty-four years. She can't get away from it even now as she walks to the lake on shaky legs. Snow crackles beneath her knee-high boots and small flakes curl in the folds of her crimson woolen coat. She's wearing a knitted scarf but she didn't put on her beanie, the cold has never really bothered her. She only wrapped the scarf around her neck because she likes it; no one can see her in this terrible weather anyway; clearly, no one is insane enough - save her - to step foot on the streets.
She hadn't returned since they found her, but she had moved to a larger town nearby on purpose. She turned thirty today (though not officially, because she doesn't know her exact birth date), and as a child, she vowed that this day would be the deadline. Like so many other things in her life, she procrastinated and put it off until she couldn't anymore, but she's here now, and that's all that matters.
She has no idea what she is hoping for. That she'll suddenly remember the first six years of her life? That she'll discover why and who abandoned her in the dead of winter on a creaking, rusty old boat? That she'll figure out how she didn't freeze to death when all human calculations pointed to it? That she'll finally understand why she was not wanted?
She clamps her lips together defiantly and raises her head involuntarily. No, that's not why she's doing it. She hasn't cared about any of that in a long time. She's an adult now, independent, and knows what she wants out of life. She has no expectations from anyone. She simply fulfills a childhood promise she made to herself for the sake of the young girl she once was.
Even so, as she steps onto the ice, her heartbeat quickens. The wind whips through her hair as if to warn or restrain her, but she refuses to back down. She didn't take a cab this far on the first day of the year just to run away.
She comes to a brief halt to inspect the ice beneath her feet. She'd been reading the news and noticed that a local journalist had written that the lake had been covered in a thick sheet of ice since Christmas, and the piece even included photographs of children skating and sledding.
She dashes off as soon as she is certain that the ice is not protesting her weight. The wind hisses violently, causing her cheeks to flush and tears to well up in her eyes. Snowflakes, rather than soft fluff, cut into her skin like tiny shards of ice.
She moves slowly and carefully, leaning forward slightly and briefly stumbling, but she perseveres. She was told she was discovered in the middle of the lake, so she intends to travel so far that the shore is equally distant no matter where she looks. She can then go home and relax as the new year begins without feeling tense or guilty. Perhaps she'll watch a movie or read the book she got for Christmas. One thing is certain: no matter which path she chooses, she will no longer ruminate on her perplexing past; it will end today, as soon as she reaches the middle of the lake.
The first crackle enters the air, making a terrible noise. She's not sure she heard anything because the wind howls so loudly, but she pauses the moment she hears a sharp and abrasive sound again, resembling another crack. She takes a deep breath and proceeds. She hears it again as if the lake is roaring angrily and harshly because her footfall disturbed its peace.
Her knees buckle as she turns to where she came from. She attempts to balance herself in fear, but she can feel the ice disappearing from beneath her feet and the corrosive cold pulling her down. The panic coursing through her body sweeps away her sanity, and she no longer has significant thoughts, only a frantic instinct that drives her to cling to whatever she can.
The lake would engulf her exactly where she was found twenty-four years ago in a rickety boat with frosty skin, almost white hair and a barely beating heart, a mocking thought passes through her mind as she submerges helplessly in the endlessly cold water.