A/N: Thank you to everyone who's read, commented, favorited, and followed! It's such an encouragement for me, coming back to fanfiction and still loving this flawed show!
A few things about this last chapter: 1) I did use a quote (paraphrased) from Neal that I believe he probably said in one of the later seasons (I heard it on a Swanfire music video over on Youtube, but don't remember seeing it in any of the episodes I watched), so I just wanted to let you know that even though I only write canon-compliant-ish for seasons 1-3a, that quote was taken from someone else; no copyright infringement is intended. 2) I wrote this story at the same time as I wrote chapter 2 of my other story, 'If Only...' which also details the events of 'Manhattan' and subsequent episodes, and that made things complicated in my own head, trying to keep which changes I made where straight for each story. I sincerely hope I kept each story cohesive, but I do apologize if any of it bled from one to the other.
Anyway, that's a super long author's note you probably didn't read, but I do hope you all enjoy this last chapter! This has been one of the funnest stories to write on my end, and I hope it brightens up at least a few other people's day!
Neal can hardly breathe. He's afraid to look to the side and see Emma. Afraid she'll have changed her mind.
Good things don't happen to him. Not like this. Not good like her.
"I've always wanted to take a cross-country trip," she says. She's eating Junior Mints they swiped from a gas station a few dozen miles back. One by one, she plucks them from the box, sets them in her mouth, and lets the mint dissolve on her tongue. Neal doesn't know exactly why the repetitive process is so mesmerizing, but he's nearly drifted the car off the road more than a few times just watching her. "If we're going to find a home, I guess this might be our last trip for a while, huh?"
"Oh, we're keeping the car," he says. He shoots her a smile and pretends he isn't bowled over by relief all over again when her return grin is still just as excited as in that hotel room, when she pointed at a map, and he let himself think she could be his dreamcatcher. "We're never getting rid of this thing."
She laughs at him. "What if it breaks down?"
"We'll fix it," he says. "Just because we're settling down doesn't mean we forget everything we've learned. We both know home is what you carry with you. It's what you can't let go of without missing it with every fiber of your being."
"I wouldn't know," she says. A flash of that bitterness he hasn't seen in her for a while ghosts across her face.
Neal reaches across the seat and takes her hand. There's a bit of chocolate sticky on her fingertips and the sun blazing in through her window has left her palm hot and sweaty. Neal doesn't care. He'll never let go of her. Not even a curse could make him choose anything over her.
"Yes, you do," he says gently. "We're just a little different than normal people. We carry our homes with us. Means we can never lose them."
"Yeah." She stares at him as if he's wondrous, which just steals Neal's breath all over again.
He's never been the wondrous thing in someone's life. Not really. Not for long. His mother abandoned him. His father let him go. The Darlings were better off without him. Hook sold him off the instant he became inconvenient. And Pan…well, Pan, who never lets anyone escape, has never even bothered to come after him.
But Emma…Emma chooses him. Emma wants him. He's even daring to start believing that Emma loves him.
And that's more miraculous than he can ever be.
"So," she says, pulling her hand free to eat another mint. "What have you always wanted to do on a road trip?"
"Hmm, good question." Neal blinks when she holds a Junior Mint to his lips. The instant he opens his mouth, she pops the candy inside, and then giggles as he teasingly bites at her fingers. His heart feels too big for his chest, like it might just balloon up and carry him off into the sky. Is this normal? Is this something everyone experiences in this world? It's better than magic, without a doubt. "What are your ideas?"
"I think…we need to listen to music. And eat tons of junk food. And stop to explore wherever looks interesting. And…"
"Yeah?" he prompts her when she falls silent. "And what?"
Only when he glances over does she smile at him and finish, "And we need to take frequent breaks."
The gleam in her eyes, behind her glasses, sets his veins on fire.
"Breaks," he says, low and dark.
"Yeah." She's lost the box of Junior Mints somewhere, and her hand is blazingly hot on his face, in his hair, at the nape of his neck. "Lots and lots of breaks."
The tires squeal as Neal pulls them to the side of the highway and nudges the hazard lights on. It's a pretty quiet road, out here in the middle of nowhere, and he hasn't seen a car in a while, but…well, he recognizes that look in Emma's eyes, and he doesn't think this 'break' is going to be too short.
"I like your ideas," he says as he leans over into her space. The steering wheel digs into his hip, the sun is blinding him, and it's all so real that he wouldn't even mind if time stopped in this moment. "I think we need to make a checklist. You know, mark off all of our goals. Make sure we really get in everything you want."
Her hand curves just so along the side of his face. "I just want you," she says softly. "You're my home, Neal."
In the back of his mind, he wonders what it would be like to hear her call him Baelfire. More importantly, he's trying to remember just how much room the backseat offers. It should be easy to remember—he's slept there multiple times just in the last couple weeks—but he can't think past Emma's eyes, green and wide and beautiful, and her mouth, so close to his he can smell the candy on her breath.
"Emma," he says. He's not a coward. Whatever he's afraid of, he faces it full on, no matter what it costs. But it takes everything he has, every bit of hope she's roused inside him, to say, "Do you think…you think this could be forever?"
"I hope so," she says in a rush, and Neal crashes his mouth against hers.
She tastes of mint. She smells of sunshine. She holds onto him as tightly as he holds onto her, and this is nothing he ever thought to wish for and everything he wants for the rest of his life.
Just her. Her and him and this car and whatever home they can build between the two of them, all the nightmares trapped outside, caught in a net of her making. In her arms, he's safe, and it's been an eternity since he last felt that.
I love you, he thinks, but he can't rip his mouth from hers long enough to say it.
They don't make it to the backseat, but that's okay. They have all the time in the world.
"What are you doing here?" Regina asks, and Henry can only gape at her. What is he doing here? She said she was going to be good! She promised she would try!
She lied. Again.
And he fell for it. Again.
Sure, he knew she was mad about the Archie thing, and okay, so maybe he should have believed her, or at least waited to get scared of her all over again, but it hasn't even been that long.
"Why are you doing this?" he asks. "How could you ever think this would be okay?"
"Henry, you don't understand. I'm doing this for us."
"No, you're not!" he cries. "You're doing this for you! Because it's harder to be good than it is to be evil! You barely even tried!"
"I did try," Regina says in a tight voice. "But no one's ever going to believe in me. I'll always be stuck on the outside. But it doesn't have to be that way. You loved me before, Henry. You'll love me again."
"Henry," Emma says from the other side of the tower. "Come here."
She and Neal stand side by side, both of them with a hand stretched toward him. Between them and Regina—and that must be Cora, another grandparent he didn't know about—stands Mr. Gold, Belle just behind him. Cora's attention is wholly fixed on the dagger in Mr. Gold's hand, but Regina is stepping closer and closer to Henry.
Her hand is wide open, her fingers outstretched. With one wave, she can imprison him in overgrown foliage. She can send him back to his room in the house he doesn't want to admit he misses. She can erase his memories and turn him into a victim and a puppet, the exact opposite of the hero he longs to be.
"Mom," he says in a voice as steady as he can make it. "This isn't the way. Do you really want to trick me into loving you? Why? Why, when if you just tried, if you gave me some time, I could love you on my own? Willingly. Purposely."
"Henry, you just don't understand. They're poisoning you against me. Rumplestiltskin doesn't have our best interests at heart. And Snow White—"
"Stop!" he yells. His voice echoes strangely in the clock tower. "Just stop, please. I'm sorry I thought you killed Archie, okay? But I don't want any more lies or secrets or magic. I just…I just want to be happy."
Regina stares at him. He's never seen her look so shattered.
"Regina, darling," Cora says. "A little help over here, if you please. Remember exactly what will get you everything you've ever wanted."
"All I wanted was to be happy," she says in a small, crushed voice. "That's why I cast this curse. But it didn't work. It only made me lonely."
"Regina!" her mother snaps.
Henry's afraid to blink or do anything to break Regina's stare. He's afraid if he does, she'll listen to Cora and he'll lose her all over again. And this time, he doesn't think he can forgive her again.
"Until you, Henry," Regina says with a watery smile. "You made me happy."
"Enough of this," Cora says. It's her who waves a hand, imprisoning Neal and Emma against the curve of the tower with invisible bonds while Cora reaches for Belle.
She doesn't make it.
Mr. Gold slides in between them, and the slicing motion he makes with the dagger seems to cut through whatever threads of magic Cora was using.
"I don't think so, dearie," he says in a voice Henry's never heard before.
"Mom, please," Henry says. "We can be happy again. But not like this."
Regina's eyes slide closed, and when she opens them, she's already turning to her mother. At some gesture of her hand, Henry's mom and dad fall back to the floor, sagging freely. Henry makes a dash for Emma, but the hand snatching his arm pulls him up short.
A burst of terror surges through him, and Henry struggles as Cora pulls him back against her. He kicks backward but hits nothing. And then Neal blazes past him, his hands closing around Henry's shoulders as he twists to put himself between Cora and Henry. Henry tries to reach back, to cling just as tightly, but Neal shoves him backward—into Emma's arms.
"Neal!" Emma screams. She's holding onto Henry for all she's worth, but he's able to turn enough to see his dad caught in a net that glows red and purple.
"Don't move," Cora commands Mr. Gold, who's halfway to her. "Or your son dies."
"Ms. Swan," Mr. Gold says. "I believe you're due for your first lesson."
"What?" she snaps. "Save Neal!"
"Magic," Mr. Gold says, "is all about intent. Isn't that right, Regina? You remember this lesson."
"Papa!" Neal blurts before he winces, choking. It looks like that net is strangling him and Henry wishes he could reach out and snap it.
"Emma," Mr. Gold says. "Think of an emotion. Use it as a weapon. Direct it where you please."
Everything seems to happen at once.
Regina puts herself between Henry and the others in the room.
Emma goes wide-eyed as a pulse of something bursts outward from her—and Neal falls, coughing, to the floor.
Henry dives for him, wrapping his arms around him, holding on with all his might, while Regina comes up behind him and sets her hand on his shoulder.
And at the same instant as Cora lifts her arms, Mr. Gold steps up behind her, lifts the dagger, and—
Regina buries Henry's face in her coat. There's a liquid sound, like water sprayed over the metal landing, and then a thud that echoes through the soles of Henry's feet as something drops heavily to the grated surface. Any other time, any other day, maybe Henry's curiosity would have been strong enough to have him pulling back, looking, craning his neck.
Today, right now, he squeezes his eyes shut, crushes his face further into Regina's chest, and tries to think only of the apple-and-hay smell that makes him think, in some young part of himself, of home.
There will be time enough to be a hero. Later. For now, he thinks that maybe it's okay to just be a kid.
"You're okay. You're okay." Emma hears her own voice repeating this truth until the words blur together, but still she can't make herself let go of Henry. He's crowded close between her and Neal, a solid form in their midst, his arms wrapped around her waist, his head leaned back against Neal's chest, and all Emma can think is that she nearly lost this.
She nearly lost everything.
It will take her a long while more—and maybe a couple bottles of something stronger than wine—to come to terms with the fact that, once again, she used magic. And this time she doesn't even have the excuse that she was in a fairytale world.
She's magical. She's Harry freaking Potter.
"You're okay," she says again, mainly to distract herself, and this time, when she draws Henry tighter against herself, she also lets her head lean, ever so slightly, against Neal's shoulder. He smells of sweat and blood and Junior Mints, and Emma has never felt more nostalgic for something in her life.
Of course, usually whenever nostalgia hits, she ignores it. Impossible to go back to something that doesn't exist anymore—foster homes, places she's spent the night, people she's lost touch with.
But Neal…Neal's here. Again. Reminding her that there's only one home she's really, truly missed after leaving it.
From across the clock tower, Regina watches them. She looks small. Alone. Hunched over with her dead mom's head in her lap, there's nothing left of the Evil Queen in her. But then, Emma may not know much about parents, but she does know that you should never have to watch someone slit your mother's throat in front of you.
"Regina," she tries to say.
Regina flinches, looks down to her mother, and says, "I'm coming back for Henry."
"I know," Emma says.
For Henry. He'll always link them. Always bring them together. And for the first time, Emma thinks maybe that's not a bad thing. Maybe Regina needs that connection just as much as Storybrooke needs her to have it.
A flurry of smoke whirls around Regina and Cora's body, and they're gone.
Neal shudders, and when one of his hands slips from Henry's shoulder to her waist, Emma doesn't shrug him off.
She should call David or Mary Margaret. Let them know Cora's been dealt with and Regina's…in retreat? Good again? Trying again? Whatever. She should let them know.
Only, if she reaches for her phone, she thinks Neal will step back. Henry might let go of her. And then Emma will have to let the whole world back in—including the Dark One, standing in a corner, his eyes anywhere but on Neal, Belle still pressed up against his side as if she didn't just watch him brutally murder someone five minutes ago.
But then…Neal didn't let go of her even after Tamara stopped breathing.
"You're okay," Emma says one more time. And then she reaches for her phone.
Henry does let go. Neal does step back, though not far, his arm slung around Henry's shoulders to keep him close. And when Emma calls Mary Margaret, she answers immediately.
For the first time, Emma wants to see her. And David. Wants to see them together, and more than just during the latest crisis or over whatever breakfast David whips up for them. She wants to sit down with them and maybe try talking to them about real things. About the way she grew up alone. About the parents she dreamed up for herself and how she thinks maybe Prince Charming and Snow White are even better than those fantasies and that scares her because she doesn't get to keep anything good. Maybe she can even work on finally forgiving them and coming to terms with the fact that along with magic, she also has a real family who loves her and won't ever give up on her.
She wants to introduce Neal to them. She wants them all to sit down around a table and try out one of those family dinners she always sees in shows.
She wants so many things, and so many of them are brand new, so revelatory for her, that it terrifies her.
"You okay?" Neal asks when she gets off the phone after promising Mary Margaret to meet her and David at the sheriff's station. They still have the outsider to deal with, not to mention whoever he's working for, and the pirate, and…
Well, she still has work to do. She is nominally the Savior after all.
"Let's get out of here," she says abruptly. She very pointedly doesn't look at the bloodstains on the platform. Or Gold. Is she supposed to arrest him? Technically, this was self-defense—self-defense in a way she doesn't think she really wants to understand considering all the things Neal and Gold and Belle keep saying about the dagger—and Cora was a threat and…and Emma doesn't really care that she's dead. She still shivers every time she thinks about Cora's hand inside her chest, trying to yank her heart free, and the thought of her maybe doing that to Henry always made cold sweat break out all over her body.
No, she doesn't mind at all that Cora's gone.
She just doesn't want Henry to have to see the stains left over from where his…grandmother?...died.
She doesn't want him to know that his grandfather's not the only one who killed someone today.
"Okay," Neal says.
Emma's so busy pulling Henry back into her side and hustling him down the steps that she doesn't look back to see how hard—or how easy—it is for Neal to walk away from his father. She does know that Henry keeps his steps reluctant until Neal joins them, which just goes to prove how difficult it would be to separate him from his father.
Not that Emma wants to. Not anymore. Her kid deserves as many people loving him as humanly possible. And in this town, he needs all the protectors he can get.
And in a fight, Emma wouldn't bet against Neal.
That's what she remembers the most about that short scuffle in the clock tower, after all. When Cora tried to snatch Henry, Neal was the one who got there. Who threw himself into that lethal hold instead. Who nearly died just to protect the son he hasn't even known about for a full day.
"You know what?" Emma comes to a stop in the middle of the road. Dawn is cresting pink and gold over the horizon, turning the far ocean into a cascade of shimmers that gleam over Neal's tired face. "You want to stop at Granny's Diner? Mary Margaret and David can meet us there. I could use some coffee."
Neal stares at her. It's the same look he wore when she told him she loved him. The look she locked away in the depths of her memories and never allowed herself to miss—because if she had, it'd have broken her all over again.
Kind of like it's breaking all her walls down right now.
"Yeah," he says with that crooked smile he always has when he's bashful and hopeful and unsure all at once. "Maybe a bagel?"
"For the road?" she asks with an arched eyebrow. That's what he always used to grab for breakfast. When she teased him about possibly wanting something else, he just said that it was the perfect breakfast for being on the move constantly. You can eat and run at the same time, he said.
His smile goes small. Still sincere, but more serious now. "You're right," he says. "Not bagels. Let's get some eggs. Maybe some toast. Definitely some bacon."
"Yes!" Henry cheers. He runs ahead toward Granny's, and Emma's not sure what hours the diner has exactly, but the interior is lit up and there's movement inside so she's fairly certain Granny or Ruby will get them some food.
"Can't eat and run with eggs," Emma says quietly. They walk side by side, and every other step or so, their hands brush against each other.
"I'm done with running," he replies. "Think it's time I found a place to call home."
She gives him a sidelong glance. "I thought we carried home with us."
"The problem with that is sometimes we do lose it, and then it's kind of like losing yourself." His shoulders are rounded and stooped, but he's stealing just as many looks at her as she is at him. "You think once you lose something, you can ever find it again?"
Despite herself, Emma laughs out loud. "You're going to have to read Henry's book," she says. "That's kind of our whole family's thing."
"What is?"
This time, their eyes meet, and Emma's slow to look away. "Finding each other," she says. "No matter what comes between."
"That's a good deal." His voice sounds hoarse, like there's a lump in his throat. Neal never cried in front of her, but there were times when he'd sound like this, like he felt too much to let it safely out.
"Deals are kind of your family's thing," she observes, softly. She wasn't so far gone in the car on the ride here that she missed everything in his and Gold's conversation. She heard enough, at least, to know that Pan is Gold's father, and that Neal has a lot more family trauma to deal with than she does.
He's going to need someone to choose to stand by him.
"Yeah." Neal looks away. They're standing just outside the diner. Inside, Henry's chattering away to Ruby, who pours him an orange juice and smiles back at him. With the lights of the diner on his right and the growing dawn on his left, Neal looks like what he is: caught between two worlds.
"You can share my family instead," Emma offers.
She meant it to sound teasing. It doesn't. It sounds entirely too serious. Too sincere. Too much.
Neal's smile goes crooked again. "Yeah, well, maybe we can both share."
It's a lot for someone who just lost his fiancée, found his father, learned he has a son, and come face to face with a woman he once loved. Because he did love her. Emma can see that now. She can't even try to convince herself otherwise.
Maybe…maybe he stopped loving her just about as well as she stopped loving him.
"Let's start with breakfast," she offers.
"Yeah." Neal chuckles. It's a smile, but there's a suspicious brightness to his eyes too. "Breakfast sounds good. You'll tell me Henry's favorite foods?"
"You know," she says as she pulls open the door for him, "I think he can tell you himself. You have a lot to catch up on."
"I can't wait."
And when he walks past her, she twines her fingers through his and doesn't let go. Because some homes, you carry with you, and she's tired of missing hers.
"We should hide the dagger," Belle says.
He doesn't blame her. Everyone else has left, and without people, with the blood stained over the grated floor, the clock tower is an eerie place. Still, he's afraid to move. If he moves, he's not sure her hand won't fall away from his elbow. Her steps won't fall out of sync with his. The distance between them won't yawn ever wider until she never touches him again.
After all, she's never seen him kill in front of her. She's seen him inflict pain, seen him threaten torments, seen him aim and consider, but he's so far managed to avoid the actual act of murder in her presence. And considering this all started when she gave him her hand and implored him to walk away without killing the pirate, when he thought that choice was the making or breaking of their future, he doesn't think he's overreacting to imagine that she wants distance between them now.
"Yes," he makes himself say. "Yes, we should…"
"Let's go," she says, and her hand slides down from his elbow—his heart clenches—and down to his hand, where she slides her fingers through his and tugs.
As she leads him down the stairs, he cannot tear his eyes from her. "Belle," he tries to say, but either he can't get the word out or she pretends not to hear it. She pauses, at the landing to her apartment, before she tugs him on, down to the ground floor, out of the library, and across the street and down one block to his shop. They've walked this path a dozen or more times, the most recent of which was when she wore his coat—the only comfort he could give her—and he tried to steer her away from all mention of the pirate.
Now, they walk in silence, the morning waking up around them, lit storefronts beginning to flicker out in favor of the sunlight. Rumplestiltskin fixes his eyes on the sign bearing his cursed name, and tries to memorize every nuance of her hand in his. If this is the last time she chooses to hold onto him, he wants to remember it forever.
He's already come far too close to forgetting her.
Some noise emerges from his throat, and Belle looks back at him. "We're almost there," she says, soothingly, as if it's the dagger hidden in his coat that bothers him rather than the shawl draped over his shoulders.
Squeezing her hand tightly, he only nods. And follows. And lets her unlock and open the door of his shop. He can see the signs of her presence within, the books pulled out and littering the counter, and in the backroom, the beginning stages of a potion in progress.
She was going to try to save him.
She didn't want to forget him.
He hopes she still doesn't.
"Belle," he finally says, "I'm sorry."
"You're all right, aren't you?" she asks instead of acknowledging the apology.
He isn't. Of course he isn't. How will he be all right if both his son and his True Love walk away from him?
But how can he ask them to stay?
Simply him being who he is has already endangered their lives more than he's comfortable with in just the last several hours.
And Bae… Well, Bae has brought him home and delivered him, even if only temporarily, into Belle's hands, and now he has his own family. A new one. A family that won't kill someone right in front of him. A family without blood staining their souls and darkening their hearts. A family that isn't composed of too many monsters for any good person to have to face.
He's lost him, as he's always known he would, and Rumplestiltskin wishes he could be sorry, but he'll never regret protecting his family. Never be sorry that he's able to.
"Belle," he tries again, and then the power of speech deserts him as Belle steps up close enough to reach up and begin unbuttoning his shirt.
"I should have asked earlier," she mutters, almost to herself. "I should have made sure, but… There's magic here, so you're fine, right? You're okay?"
And it's only then, when she splays her hands over his unscarred chest, that Rumplestiltskin realizes she's talking about the stab wound he healed so perfunctorily before rushing to embrace her.
Before asking her to marry him.
She's probably regretting that now.
"I'm fine, sweetheart," he says. "Really, it's all better. Nothing to concern yourself with."
"Rumple," she sobs, and then she throws her arms around his neck and buries her face in his shoulder.
"Belle, darling," he murmurs. Tentatively, waiting for her to recall what his hands just did, he gathers her close, holds her tight, presses the feel of her tiny form against his own tainted body, and whispers soft reassurances into her ear. "It's all right, sweetheart, you're safe. No one's going to hurt you. I'm here."
She sobs and clings tighter, so tight that Rumplestiltskin nearly keels over. Catching himself with his cane, he maneuvers them to the small cot he keeps here, and settles himself down. Belle doesn't even lift her head before she rearranges herself on his lap, her legs draped over his, her face still hidden against the hollow of his throat. Her tears are hot against the underside of his jaw, his bared chest, and he strokes her hair as carefully as he knows how.
"Shh, beautiful Belle, it's okay."
"I was so scared," she whispers.
Rumplestiltskin, in that instant, is taken back to another moment, centuries ago but so immediate and sharp in his mind: to a hut, and a bed, and a little boy staring shamefully into his eyes. I'm afraid, Papa.
Both Bae and Belle, so courageous, so bold…until he loves them. Then they are made weak and broken, left shivering in all their poisoned pieces.
"It's okay, Belle," he says, and closes his eyes. Turning his face into her ear, he breathes in deep of roses and ink, paper and blood. "I'm here."
She shudders, once, then curls tighter against him. "I thought you were going to forget me. And then the dagger, and she…"
The rest of her words devolve into sobs that pick apart her coherence, leaving him struggling to keep up.
His memories. Being stabbed. Forgetting her, piece by piece. Cora. And the dagger.
He offered the dagger to Bae. Not to her.
And didn't she say something, earlier, over the phone, about how she thinks he loves Bae more than her?
Rumplestiltskin feels cold. There's a leaden lump in the pit of his stomach that makes him feel nearly nauseous.
"Belle, I love you," he whispers. It's perhaps not the wisest admission to make with his hands still marked with the blood of the last woman he loved—that's two he's murdered now, and only one left; when she's recovered herself, she'll be terrified of him and he cannot blame her for that—but he never wants Belle to feel unloved or unwanted. She deserves better than that. Better than him, but right now, he is all she has.
"Rumple." It's the only part of her muffled sentence he can understand.
"I remember you," he says. "You helped me keep hold of myself. You convinced Bae to help find the shawl. You kept the dagger safe. You're so strong, Belle, so brave."
"I don't feel strong," she whispers.
"But you are. You're the strongest person I've ever known. And I'm sorry that I didn't offer you my dagger like I did Bae. It's not because I don't love you, sweetheart, you must know that, it's just—"
"Rumple." Finally, Belle lifts her head long enough to regard him steadily. The tracks of tears have ravaged her face, and her breaths are staggered with tiny hiccups, but there is something in her eyes that makes him think she's never been more serious in her life. "Do not ever try to give me that dagger. I mean it. I don't want it. I want you to keep it. It's yours, and I would never, never take that from you. I'm not upset that you offered it to Baelfire. In fact, I'm glad you did because now he knows, he has to know, how much you love him. And I love him so much for not taking it, for giving it back to you, for realizing what it means."
"But, Belle, you—"
"You could have died!" she cried. "I couldn't go to you, I couldn't even hold your hand or kiss you, and you could have died without even ever remembering how much I love you. And I know that your son has to be your priority now, and that I can't be selfish with you, but I just…I just…I was so afraid I was going to lose you."
And she picks up his hand, the one he used to draw his dagger across Cora's throat, and she kisses his knuckles, the ring sitting there on his third finger, the groove between his thumb and the rest of his hand. Tiny, reverent kisses that should never be sullied against his skin, but she offers them only to him, rains them down on him with her curse-breaking lips while her other hand curls around his neck, beneath the fall of his hair, keeping him close.
The weight of her atop him, the fall of her hair against the side of his face, the press of her lips on his palm, is so astounding that Rumplestiltskin cannot help but cast a tiny spell just to make sure he isn't dreaming.
But he's not. He's awake. This is real.
She really does love him. Given every chance, every opportunity, every reason to cast him from her heart…Belle only holds him tighter, clings closer, kisses deeper.
With a touch so light he barely feels the softness of her skin, Rumplestiltskin tilts her face up toward him. Usually, he lets her take the lead. He likes to know that she chooses every step of her life with him, free of manipulation or deal, coercion or force. But now, at such obvious proof that she is his, Rumplestiltskin cups her cheek in the palm of his hand and brings his lips to hers.
A sigh, soft like the sound of a heart opening, drifts from her mouth before she twists in his lap to wind her arms around his neck, her knees falling on either side of him. The new angle sets her above him, and he lets his head fall back to keep their lips joined, his neck exposed. One of her hands drops from his throat to rake down his bare chest, and Rumplestiltskin shivers and twines his tongue with hers. He wants all of her. Forever with her. He wants…well, he almost thinks…he does think…that he'd even give up magic for her.
"Belle," he breathes before catching her mouth up in another kiss. "Belle, you promised me forever, remember?"
She whines, low in her throat, when he stops kissing long enough to ask the question, and begins dragging her lips along his cheekbones, his jaw, his throat, instead. "I did promise," she murmurs. "It's too late to take it back now. No one breaks deals with you, remember?"
"You could." Rumplestiltskin clasps the back of her head long enough to ensure she meets his eyes. "If you wanted to, you could."
Her smile is sweet and pure and so beautiful he kisses her, open-mouthed and sloppy, trying to impress the feel of that smile into his very soul.
"I don't want to," she pants, and her hands are clutching handfuls of Bae's shawl, holding him to her, binding them together. "I want this deal, Rumplestiltskin."
"I want you," he offers in return. With one hand keeping her balanced atop him, Rumplestiltskin is finally brave enough to drag the shawl off his own neck, all so he can wind it around hers. It catches in her hair, sets off the sheen of her skin in the burgeoning light, and casts tears to glint in her eyes. "I love you, Belle. I choose you."
This time, when she lunges in to kiss him, Rumplestiltskin doesn't stop them to say anything else. Or to ask if she's sure. Or to do anything but help remind them both of what she looks like with only the shawl—his past, their future—draped over her.
This time, he takes everything he's offered and he promises himself that he will not let go.
"It must be scary," Henry says into his ice cream sundae. Neal knows kids aren't probably supposed to have ice cream for breakfast, but the Lost Boys never get any treats and Neal can afford to buy his son this and anyway, the kid deserves a bit of spoiling after everything he's gone through.
Tamara never ate ice cream. Hated the taste of mint. Loved concerts.
Maybe. Or maybe that was all lies.
Either way, Henry likes ice cream, and that's enough to make Neal smile again.
"What's scary?" he asks, almost dreading the answer. Henry has nearly as many reasons for nightmares as Neal himself does. And though Neal wishes he could have been there to protect him from all of it, he also admires the hell out of the young hero sitting across from him.
"Thinking that love is something you can lose with one mistake." Henry shrugs before eating the cherry he's fished out of the bottom of his bowl.
Neal stares at him. And then, almost against his will, he feels his gaze drifting over his shoulder, to the counter, where Emma stands with her parents, filling them in on everything that's happened.
They ate breakfast together. And then sat there long enough for quite a few other people to filter in and also eat their breakfasts. And then sat there some more. In fact, Emma only dragged herself away when her parents came into the diner and headed her way. Neal could choose to believe she dived out to meet them because she's ashamed of him, or because she doesn't want him involved in her life. He could…but he doesn't.
He knows what it's like to want to keep a parent all to himself for just a little while more.
Besides, she left him with Henry. She trusts him with Henry. That says more about her feelings for him than anything else could.
"Henry," Neal says. He's not sure this is a conversation he should be handling with less than a day of fatherhood under his belt. "You don't… That's not something you believe, is it?"
Henry looks up at him, surprised. "What? No, of course not. I know that Emma loves me no matter what. And Regina does too, even though she doesn't know how to show it as well. And, well," the kid looks up at him from under his eyelashes, a bashful little smile curving his lips, "I think you probably like me too."
Neal laughs and can't resist leaning forward to tap the kid's nose in a way he remembers his papa doing to him, once upon a time. "I think we both know I more than just like you, kid."
"Already?" Henry's eyes shine as brightly as Emma's used to whenever she looked at him. As brightly as they almost looked to be this morning over bacon and eggs.
"Didn't take more than a minute," Neal promises.
Henry sits with that while he finishes his ice cream, and Neal would think he's successfully ended that conversation if he weren't already acquainted with how tenacious his son can be.
"Anyway," Henry finally says as he pushes his bowl away. "I think love is more powerful than a single mistake."
He's spent enough years in the real world now that Neal's not sure Henry's right about that. Sometimes, a mistake is all it takes to ruin whole lives and change everyone's paths.
But then he thinks of the woman who's apparently Snow White's Evil Queen, choosing Henry over her psychotic mother and still crying over her body afterward, looking so scared. He thinks of Emma, asking him to breakfast and taking his hand and choosing to forget the way he left her—the way he should have lost her forever if she didn't choose to forgive him.
And he thinks of Rumplestiltskin, the way that cold look on his face faded away as Cora's body fell at his feet. The way his eyes went wide and terrified when he met Neal's stare, blood once more spilled between them. The way his papa didn't say a word as Neal left him behind to follow Emma and Henry away from that clock tower.
Neal doesn't regret that. How could he? Emma's smiling at him again. She told him about Henry coming to find her, and Operation Cobra, and a poisoned apple and a magical kiss. She didn't let go of his hand for over an hour. She's still smiling when she looks past her parents and catches his eye.
No, he would never take back his decision to stick with his family.
But…this isn't all his family.
"Have I mentioned how smart you are, kid?" he asks his son, and revels in Henry's pleased smile. "I hope you don't lose that optimism of yours."
"Well…" Henry's smile turns sly. "That may depend on how much longer we have in this world."
"Oh, right. That."
"You really don't want to go back?" Henry asks. "What's so great about this world?"
There are a lot of possible answers to that. Neal goes with only one. "You're here," he says. "And so's your mom. That makes it the only world I want to live in."
He can tell that Henry won't be satisfied with that answer for long, but he likes it well enough for now that Neal comes to a sudden decision.
"Look," he says, "I promised you that I'd find out if it's even possible, right?"
"Right."
"If you…?" Neal looks at him expectantly.
Henry rolls his eyes, so much the picture of Emma that Neal feels his heart twist in his chest. "If I think about the things I'd miss in this world."
"Yeah, well, you work on that list. I'll go find out what our options are."
"You're going to go talk to Mr. Gold?"
Though he hesitates, Neal nods. "I think I need to."
Before Neal quite knows what's happening, Henry spills out of his side of the booth and crashes into Neal. He squeezes him tight around the shoulders and says, "I'm so glad you're my dad." And then he's gone, off to Emma's side where he answers some question Prince Charming asks him with a detailed reenactment of what Neal sincerely hopes is not their time in the clock tower.
When he recovers from that hug, Neal comes to his feet and catches Emma's eye. He makes a gesture to the door and she nods back after the slightest pause. It's enough to make him second-guess himself until she rolls her eyes—seriously, just like Henry—and motions him out.
This isn't the end. He'll see her again. Hopefully later today. Or tonight. Or tomorrow. Or all of the above. He's not picky. He can be patient, but for once, he's not sure he'll need to be. His hand still burns with the imprint of hers wrapped around it.
It's not hard to find his father's place. Neal just follows the trail of magic that permeates this town, turns away from wherever there are people, hurries his steps past the clock tower, and finds the name Emma and Henry use for Rumplestiltskin emblazoned on the side of a shop at the end of a street.
It's strange. For so long, he's been afraid of his father finding him. Any mention of Rumplestiltskin—even the most innocent here in this world without magic—had him skittish and searching for every possible exit. Just…yesterday?...when Emma tackled him to the ground and mentioned his father, he nearly leaped onto a passing car just to put distance between them.
But now, staring at the single door that's all that keeps him away from Rumplestiltskin, Neal doesn't feel scared. Cautious, sure, and maybe a bit guarded, reluctant to get his hopes up—sick when he thinks of the sound Cora's throat made when his papa ran his dagger across it; almost as sick as when he remembers the sight of Tamara's limp body—but he's not scared.
Somehow, he's more afraid of not doing this. Of turning around and fleeing back to the shelter of Emma and Henry, and letting his papa go on thinking that his own son has turned his back on him.
When Neal pushes the door open, a bell tinkles overhead. He steps inside the dimly lit interior to find the detritus of a world he long since abandoned surrounding him on all sides.
"Wow," he breathes, his eyes skipping from object to object before finally, forcibly, landing on one.
An old, tattered ball, handsewn with thread his papa made himself, stuffed with wool from their own sheep, granted as a birthday present on Bae's eighth year. It used to be one of his most prized possessions. Now, it's one of his father's.
Neal reaches for it, lets his hand drift over the nearly forgotten feel of it, and realizes—for the first time, really, truly realizes—just how long Papa has been searching for him. Missing him. Loving him.
Choosing him.
"Bae."
It still takes him aback, when he looks up and finds his papa standing near a curtain that leads from the back of the shop. Not the Dark One with scales and reptilian eyes. His papa.
"Hey," he says back. Letting his hand fall from the ball, he moves to the center of the shop. Rumplestiltskin mirrors him, but stops a good few feet away. Behind him, the curtain twitches and Belle peeks out. Neal tries to nod in greeting, but she smiles too quickly and backs away.
"I'll make tea," she announces, and leaves father and son alone.
"She's very subtle," Neal says with forced humor.
Rumplestiltskin's lip twitches, but his eyes are too wide for the smile to be anything more than a passing thought. "She's very optimistic," he says quietly.
"Well, she has that in common with Henry." Neal can't bear the weight of that stare, locked so beseechingly on him, so he wanders around the shop, fiddling with items he can't name a second later.
"Is…is Henry all right?" Rumplestiltskin asks.
"Yeah, he's fine." Neal swallows and meets his papa's eyes. "Thanks to you."
"You protected him, Bae," Papa says. "Like a father should."
"Well, I learned from my father." Neal holds up a hand before Rumplestiltskin's eyes can more than fill with tears. "I'm…I'm still mad, Papa. I never thought you would break our deal. And the things that happened to me…"
"I understand," Rumplestiltskin whispers, averting his eyes.
"No, but…the thing is…" Neal wishes he were better at words. He wishes Papa hadn't stopped so far away from him.
He wishes he could be as forgiving and as wise as his own son.
"Papa," he says, helplessly.
Rumplestiltskin stumbles forward a step. Another. Another. The hand not on his cane is half-raised between them. Yearning, but tentative.
For an instant that might be an eternity in Neverland, Neal pauses. Caught between, indecisive.
He remembers Henry's hug.
He remembers that when he first realized Pan's after him again—still—his immediate instinct was to look to his papa to save him.
And he remembers that once, before he became what Bae was afraid of, Rumplestiltskin was the one Bae trusted to protect him.
Neal steps forward and takes his papa's hand in both of his.
"Papa," he says again. "Do you think love is something that can be erased with a mistake?"
The answer is clear in Rumplestiltskin's eyes: he does think that. He's believed it for centuries, maybe all his life, since his own father sold him out for immortality.
But Neal doesn't believe it. He can't. He's been forgiven for too much himself.
"I love you, Papa," he says, and Rumplestiltskin breaks. Tears stream from his eyes, his cane falls away, and the whole weight of him sags into Neal's arms.
"Oh, Bae," he sobs. "Oh, my son, I love you too. I've always loved you. I'll love you forever. And I'm so sorry."
"I want to forgive you," Bae whispers. "I think I can. I've missed you, Papa."
"Oh, my boy. My boy."
There's no dagger between them, and if there were, Bae knows that Papa would hand it over immediately. There's still a curse, but Neal can smell roses and ink on his papa's skin where once he only smelled wool and thread and magic, and in another world, True Love is more powerful than anything, so that curse might not be as permanent as he's always dreaded. There's a past, of course, but Neal has his own past, his own mistakes, his own regret, and he thinks that maybe, in a place where time moves forward, they can overcome it. Most past it. Become something more than their mistakes have made of them.
Let Pan come, Bae him try to pull Bae's family apart again.
This time, he won't succeed. This time, he'll lose. Because now, for the first time, Baelfire has learned how to win what matters most.
Belle smiles as she sets the tray of tea things. It's muscle memory to prepare a cup to Rumplestiltskin's specifications, and she feels a bright burst of joy when she is able to set a cup for Baelfire too. After today, she thinks, she'll know exactly how he likes his tea. If he's anything like his papa, she'd better add a few sugar cubes and perhaps some honey to the tray. She imagines that a sweet tooth is something that runs in the family.
Despite the time she takes, when she emerges into the front of the shop with the tray, her true love and his son are still locked in an embrace, murmuring soft things to each other. Belle stays quiet and tries not to stare, though she can't help but watch them from the corner of her eye.
She was so afraid to let Rumplestiltskin go, so leery of how much of him there might be left when he returned to her, but there is a smile under all those tears, and though his hand shakes as he cups his son's cheek, he doesn't look as if he expects to be rebuffed for the touch.
Quietly, Belle sets out their cups. Three, where for so long there have only been two.
This feels, she can't help but think, like a happy ending. She knows that life isn't like her books. Here, there are still more threats to face. The outside world has come to Storybrooke, this Pan is apparently hunting Baelfire, and Regina might find it as hard to break old habits as Rumplestiltskin does. But Belle has never asked for perfection, just happiness.
And she's never been so happy as she is now.
Only when Baelfire starts backing to the door does Belle break her silence.
"Oh," she says. "You won't stay for tea?"
"Uh, no. Not this time," he adds hurriedly when Belle's face falls. "I just had breakfast. But…maybe…maybe tomorrow? We could do lunch?"
Belle beams, and nearly bounces on her toes when Rumplestiltskin nods and says, "I'd like that, son. Belle and I have news to share with you anyway."
Baelfire's brows arch high before he smiles. "Okay. Guess I should have seen that coming. All right. Lunch, tomorrow. At Granny's?"
"If you'd like." At the note of fear in his voice, Belle slides her hand into Rumplestiltskin's, and he straightens, bolstered by her touch. "Actually, I could make us lunch. At my house? It's better suited for telling stories."
There's a long silence. Belle can feel Rumplestiltskin's hand shaking in hers.
"Yeah, I guess we both have stories to tell, huh?" Baelfire nods again. "Okay. I have some questions, too, about how possible it is to go back to our old world."
"You…you want to go back?"
Neal shrugs awkwardly. "Henry wants to. And…well, maybe I don't have to be afraid of the same things I used to be. Not anymore." And with a last smile, he backs out of the shop.
Rumplestiltskin takes a single, lurching step after his son when the bell rings over the closing door, and Belle braces herself to hold him up if he falls apart again.
But he doesn't.
Instead, he swivels on his foot and smiles at her. "Tea, sweetheart?"
For all she likes to think of herself as patient, Belle nearly bites through her lip as she holds in her questions long enough for them both to pick up their cups. She contemplates the third cup for only a moment before setting it aside. There will be other days.
"Well?" she finally blurts. Her teacup clatters as she sets it down and latches her hands over Rumplestiltskin's wrist, just above his cane.
The smooth, slow sip he takes of his tea is given away only by the smirk that's revealed when he lowers his own cup. "Don't tell me you weren't listening through the curtain this time?"
"I was," she admits. "But…" Studying him, looking past the proof that he's shed tears recently, she can't find anything but contentment. Maybe even peace. "Are you happy, Rumple?" she asks.
He takes her hand in both of his, his cane slung over the counter, and draws her near. "I never knew I could be this happy," he says. "Villains aren't supposed to get happy endings."
"You're not a villain," she says through her smile. "And this isn't an ending."
"Yes, I suppose you're right." Rumplestiltskin tugs her closer until he can wrap his arms around her waist, and despite the fact that they'd only just managed to put themselves back together moments before Baelfire's arrival, Belle feels the sudden urge to undo the knot she put in her True Love's tie, coax him to the back of the shop, and try to make him smile exactly like that—so happy and pleased and wondering—the rest of the day. The rest of their lives. "It's a beginning."
"You found your son," she reminds him, and nearly laughs to see his smile widen. He's so beautiful. So dear. So hers. "And he loves you."
"He may yet forgive me," Rumplestiltskin says, as if speaking a foreign language, sounding out each word carefully. "I never…I never dared hope for that."
Belle laughs at him. "Yes, you did."
"No, my darling Belle," he says, and the endearment makes her as happy now as it did back beside a well in the woods, "I let you hope for the both of us."
"And now?" she dares to ask.
"Now," he says, "I'm holding onto you as tightly as you've been holding on for us both."
Her breath catches in her throat. Belle blinks back her tears.
Rumplestiltskin kisses her cheek, a tender press of his lips that has her gasping. "Now," he says lowly, "I don't think we have any plans until lunch tomorrow."
"Oh?" she asks. Her eyes flutter closed at the feel of his smile pressed against the corner of her mouth.
"Yes," he murmurs. "Which gives me time to show you exactly how much I love you."
"Only a day?" she asks, because she thinks forever is just barely time enough to show him how much she loves him too, and he laughs.
"It's a start."
Belle smiles, and kisses him back, and for the very first time, she doesn't have to let him go. For the very first time, she gets to keep him.
The End