Authoress Note: Welcome to Chapter 4 of Jar of Hearts. I want to thank those who have left reviews for this story. It truly does mean a lot to me that you guys are enjoying this story. I hope that you guys will continue to enjoy this story more as the story goes on. I hope that you all will enjoy this next part. Without further ado Chapter 4. ENJOY!

Chapter 4

Ruby poured another cup of coffee for Mac. "Leroy on another binge again?" She asked, looking at Mac sadly. She knew that Leroy always did cause a bit of trouble for Mac. He would always go out and cause some sort of trouble by going out and drinking. He always did when something bothered him. He would never come home and talk to her and Ruby never understood why he would just sit down and talk it over with Mac about the night time job at the hospital that he worked at.

Mac rubbed her face. "You have no idea. He always seems to get pissed off at work lately anymore. Instead of taking it out on me he decides to take it out on the bottle." She said, tangling her small hand in her platinum blonde hair. "I don't know what I'm going to do any more with him. I can't keep bailing him out of jail."

Ruby smiled at Mac with a cheeky smile of her own. "You get to see Graham again." She knew that Mac was kind of a thing for Graham even though Mac wouldn't admit it to her. She knew that the soft stares from Mac would go unnoticed from Graham, but she knew that her friend's stares weren't unnoticed by her. She knew that Mac was smitten with Graham.

Mac's cheeks began to flush. She didn't like the act that Ruby had noticed the fact that she had been giving longing looks at Graham all this time.

"You like him don't you?"

"He's the mayor's man."

Ruby rolled her eyes. "So what if he is the mayor's man. He's been sweet on you for a while now Mac."

"Ruby, nothing will become of it."

"Are you sure of that?" Ruby asked, raising an eyebrow.

Mac looked down. She was lying to her friend. She knew that. But she didn't know if Graham had feelings for her or not. Of course he had been sweet on her. He had been for a while now, behind Regina's back and Regina had not known. It had been between the two of them. Of course Ruby would know, she always caught signs of things like that. It was always like her sixth sense or something.

"Now if you excuse me while you think about what I said… I have to get back to work." She said patting Mac on the shoulder getting right back to work like she was supposed to do.

Mac rubbed her forehead. Ruby always did like to overthink things. She listened around her and heard Mary Margaret who happened to be on a date as well.

"Um, where were we? Something about you wanting fifteen kids?"Dr. Whale asked looking at Mary Margaret.

"No! Good lord, no. I meant in my class where I teach. You'll meet them tomorrow. They're coming to the hospital as part of the volunteer Outreach Program." Mary Margaret said, shaking her head. It was outrageous that Dr. Whale thought that she wanted that many kids.

"Oh, yeah. That's a great program." Dr. Whale said, nodding his head. He should have known that she didn't want that many kids. That was his sex crazed mind that made him think like that.

"I mean, obviously I don't want fifteen kids of my own. Um, I mean, not that I don't want kids. I do. I want kids, marriage, true love… I want it all. That that of course is…."

Dr. Whale was ignoring her and was too busy looking at Ruby who was cleaning off a table. He was taken by her, she hardly wore anything that covered her legs often. She always had shown her legs like this and it was something that always distracted him and he approved of it. He truly did.

She turned her head and saw this. "Wildly inappropriate for me to discuss on a first date."

"Hm?"

"Ruby!" She shouted for her friend. She couldn't deal with this, not on a first date. This date sucked and she needed to end it quickly. She needed to get out of this bad date, so she was just going to end it while she was still ahead of the game.

"Yes, Mary Margaret?" Ruby asked, looking up from the table that she was cleaning off.

Mary Margaret sighed. "Check, please."

Ruby nodded her head and went to go and get the check for Mary Margaret.

"A bad date for Mary Margaret?" Mac asked softly.

Ruby nodded her head. She hated to see a date go down the drain, she really did. Mary Margaret deserved better than this.

"Dr. Whale is a pervert." Mac said, shaking her head. "She would have been better off with someone else. Anyone else that doesn't stare at women like they are a piece of meat."

Ruby patted Mac's hand. "I know what you mean. Stick around. I'll walk you home."

Mac nodded her head. "Yeah sure."

"Maybe a girl's night tonight?" Ruby grinned at the idea being a good one in her mind.

"You know what happens." Mac shook her head, knowing that the idea was a bad one.

Ruby gave her a cheeky smile. "Oh don't deny it. You didn't hate it."

"Last time you gave me bright red streaks and Leroy had a fit." Mac reminded Ruby about what had happened the last time that Ruby had stayed over.

"Oh come on… Please?" She said, pouting a bit. "I want to try something."

Mac let out a sigh. "Okay. Okay."

"Okay." Ruby said with a smile before heading over to Mary Margaret with the check.

OUAT

"Yeah…" Emma said softly as she watched Mary Margaret walk down the street. She was surprised that Mary Margaret offered her a room to stay in. She heard laughing and turned her head. She saw Ruby walking with Mac heading towards where she supposed Mac lived in town.

Mac saw Emma. "Don't you have a place to stay Emma?" She asked softly in concern. She always cared about people's well being even though she was timid and shy.

"I'm fine. I've been in worse spots."

"Sleeping in a car… that can't be too comfortable. Are you sure that you wouldn't want to crash on my couch for the night?"

"Thanks for the offer MacKenzie, but you hardly know me." Emma said looking at the platinum blonde haired woman.

"I feel like I can trust you. It's not like you're going to hurt me. Besides, you're Henry's real mother and he trusts you…"

"It's nice for the offer, but I'll be fine."

"Okay." Mac said with a small smile.

Ruby linked her arm with Mac's. "Now no more yammering I got work to do on you."

Mac looked at Ruby shyly. "You aren't going to go overboard are you?"

"Oh Missy you will die for."

"No red in my hair. Leroy was pretty upset about it."

"I won't do it again. I promise."

Mac let out a sigh. "Okay."

OUAT

Mac was busy doing her rounds putting new paintings in patients' bedrooms. She saw Mary Margret coming into the hospital. "Mary Margaret, I thought you weren't coming in tonight?"

Mary Margaret smiled shyly. "I was coming to visit the coma patient."

"Oh?"

"To read."

"They can hear." Mac said with a smile. "And that is awfully nice of you Mary Margaret. I will be stopping by there shortly with a new painting."

"What did you paint for the room?"

"Oh you know me Mary Margaret I never show the paintings. You see them on your rounds."

"And they are glorious every-time that I see them." Mary Margaret nodded her head smiling at Mac. It was true, she really did love Mac's art work.

Mac chuckled lightly.

"You are an amazing painter."

"I'm glad that you think that." Mac said shyly ducking her head.

OUAT

Henry, Emma, and Mary Margaret returned to the hospital seeing Graham with MacKenzie.

"You're right... he's waking up." Henry said with a smile.

Graham looked at Henry. "Henry, you should stay back."

"What's going on? Is it John Doe? Is he okay?" Mary Margaret asked in concern, worried about John Doe, after all she had touched him.

"He's missing." Graham explained to them. "He had knocked MacKenzie out of the way." He pointed out the young woman who was busy getting her stitches checked by one of the nurses. He winced when he saw her wincing at the touch of the nurse touching her stitches.

Mary Margaret, Henry, and Emma saw Regina in John Doe's room and she saw them.

She walked over to them. "What the hell are you doing here? And you..." She said looking at Henry. "I thought you were at the arcade. Now you're lying to me?" She didn't like the fact that Henry was lying to her.

"What happened to John Doe? Did someone take him?" Mary Margaret asked, looking at Graham concerned about the man that she had read the story to.

"We don't know yet. His IV's were ripped out, but there's no sign of for sure there's a struggle. But MacKenzie was hit in the head with something, but she doesn't remember what happened." Graham explained to them putting his hands in his jacket.

"What did you do?" Henry asked, looking at Regina with narrowed eyes.

"You think I had something to do with this?"

"It is curious that the Mayor is here."

"I'm here because I'm his emergency contact."

"You know him?"

"I found him. On the side of the road years ago with no ID. I brought him here." Regina explained to them.

"Mayor Mills saved his life." Dr. Whale explained to them with a nod of his head.

"Will he be okay?" Mary Margaret asked, hoping that he would be okay out there.

"Okay? The man's been on feeding tubes for years on constant supervision. He needs to get back here right away or, quite honestly, 'okay' might be a pipe dream."

"Well then, let's quit yapping and start looking." Emma said, putting her hands in her pockets.

"That's what we're doing? Just stay out of this, dear. And since I clearly can't keep you away from my son, I guess I'm just going to have to keep my son away from you. Enjoy my shirt, because that's all you're getting. Sheriff, find John Doe. You heard Dr. Whale. Time is precious." She grabbed Henry's arm, taking him away from Emma.

Graham looked at the doctor. "Doctor, how long between your rounds since you last saw him?"

"Twelve hours or so." Dr. Whale explained to him. "That was when Miss Stone was here." He pointed at MacKenzie. "She was hanging up paintings that she had left. I left her here because she is putting paintings up like she normally does."

"Then that's what we need to account for..." He said with a nod of his head.

"Leroy and Walter would have the tape of what happened." MacKenzie explained to them. She knew that Leroy and Walter would have the tapes because they worked the night shift. That was something that they were supposed to keep an eye on at night time. Well mainly Walter due to the fact that Leroy had a tendency to drink during the night shifts because of well issues that she only knew.

The four of them walked into the security room.

Walter and Leroy were in there waiting for them inside of the room.

"You two were the only employees on the floor last night. And you saw nothing?" Graham questioned them wanting to know if they were the only ones and if they had seen nothing on the tapes.

Walter shook his head. "Not a thing other than Leroy's sister, putting up painting's up like she normally does." He pointed out to them. It was true, he only had seen Mac putting up her paintings in the rooms like she normally did and that was it, nothing else.

"Did anyone walk by?" Emma asked.

"I didn't see anything." Leroy said, shaking his head.

"Well that's helpful." Mac said letting out a soft sigh feeling a slight headache coming on.

"Miss Blanchard, was there anything unusual you saw during your trip with your class?" Graham asked, looking at Mary Margaret.

"I don't think so." She said, looking at him.

"We're looking at the wrong tape." Emma stated looking at the tape more closely. "This is the ward where Henry's class put up decorations. If this really was the tape from last night, we'd see the banners the kids hung."

"Tch." Leroy looked over at Walter. "You fell asleep again." He was fed up with the fact that Walter kept falling asleep on the job.

Walter looked at him with wide eyes. "You selling me out?" He was surprised that his best friend was selling him out on the job. Granted yes he fell , but it wasn't his fault that he had fallen asleep. It just happened because he hadn't gotten much sleep the night before.

"I ain't getting fired for this." Leroy said, crossing his arms looking at Walter.

"Oh for the love of god." MacKenzie said, shaking her head. "Leroy you aren't going to get fired for this. This happens from time to time."

"At least I don't drink on the job." Walter pointed out, rolling his eyes.

"Gentlemen, enough. Where's the real tape?" Graham asked, looking at the two of them.

The real tape was put into the player.

They saw the real John Doe get up and shove MacKenzie knocking her into the table, knocking her out and walking out the door.

"He walked out alone. He's okay." Mary Margaret said softly.

"Four hours ago." Emma said looking at the time stamp. "Where does this door lead?"

"The woods." Leroy said with a nod of his head. He looked at his sister. "Are you alright Kenzie?" He was concerned about her. After all she was his little sister and he was always looking out for her.

Mac nodded head. "I'm fine. Just a little banged up." She said softly. She didn't mind the fact that she got smacked around.

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This is the end of Chapter 4. I hope that you guys enjoyed this chapter. I had to split this chapter in half to make it worthwhile. I hope that you guys enjoyed this chapter. I tried my best with this chapter to make it worth reading. Hope you like MacKenzie and what she brings to the story. Please leave a review and let me know what you think. I'm going to try to update soon with the next chapter. Until next time.