by Odette Beane
She was convincing herself that she wasn’t hoping it would be him when she opened the door and saw Emma looking back.
The two women looked at each other. Mary Margaret found herself smiling then, just a bit.
“Hello, Emma,” she said.
“Hey.”
“What can I—Is everything all right?”
“Everything’s fine,” Emma said. “The mystery man is awake and the Evil Queen is asleep in her tower. We’re good.”
Mary Margaret laughed a little and opened the door a bit more. “Do you want to come in?” she said. “I have some dinner I could share.”
“I was actually wondering if that offer still stood,” Emma said. “About the room.”
“Oh,” Mary Margaret said, legitimately surprised. She’d managed to forget all about it in the excitement of the day, but she was glad Emma had not. “Absolutely. Come in.”
Emma nodded and walked into the room. She took a look around, obviously pleased. Mary Margaret felt better. She didn’t want to think much about why.
“Nice place you got here,” Emma said. She rested her hand on the counter. “Much nicer than the back seat of a car.”
“That is true,” Mary Margaret said, and the two women laughed. “But I’m glad that you’re here,” she said. “Really, Emma. Welcome.”
CHAPTER 4
THE PRICE OF GOLD
The next morning, Emma walked with Henry from his house to the bus stop, unconcerned whether Regina would see.
He was happy to see her, abuzz about John Doe and Operation Cobra, and Emma listened to his patter happily. Regina was not going to push her around. Not anymore.
After Henry waved good-bye and the bus pulled away, Emma had to stop short when the town’s sole police cruiser pulled into a driveway and blocked her way on the sidewalk.
Graham popped out and nodded good morning.
“You almost ran me over,” said Emma. “Hi.”
“Had to get your attention,” he said.
“Are you going to arrest me again?” Emma said. “Lemme guess. Trumped up jaywalking charges.”
He smiled and hung his head, which Emma took to be his way of acknowledging how unfair she’d been treated here so far. She knew Graham was sympathetic to her, even though he and Regina seemed to have a complicated relationship. There was something between the sheriff and the mayor, maybe something romantic. She couldn’t tell, but she felt it. And it made sense. Late hours, working together, neither of them attached… She didn’t yet know how it fit into the equation of Storybrooke, but it certainly mattered.
“I want to offer you a job, actually,” Graham said. “I need a deputy. I know that you’re good. I think we’d work well together.”
“Something tells me your boss wouldn’t like that,” Emma said. She was surprised by the offer. Flattered as well. She wouldn’t mind working a few late hours with Graham, either, now that she thought about it.
She said no. He asked her to think about it. She said she would, and he drove off, apparently pleased that he’d gotten that out of her.
The next surprise came at the diner twenty minutes later, when Regina slipped into her booth, smiled her devious smile, and said, “Good morning, Ms. Swan. Have a nice walk with my son?”
“Of course you already know about that.”
“It’s really not what I’m here to talk about. I don’t mind. I understand the urge; he’s a lovely child.”
“What is it,” said Emma flatly, “that you’d like to discuss?”
“Roots, Ms. Swan. The problem of roots.”
“Roots?”
“That’s right,” Regina said. “You don’t have any. You drift, you don’t stay in the same place for long. Phoenix, Nashville, Tallahassee, Boston… and here you are now. With no lease, staying with Miss Blanchard. How long will it be before you leave again? Do you see what I mean? I’m happy that Henry is happy, but I’m making this appeal to you. If you’re being honest, don’t you think this will all eventually hurt Henry more than help him?”
Emma stared, feeling the cold recognition of a fear she’d had herself.
Regina saw it and drove in the knife: “You will leave eventually. People don’t change. Why not spare your son’s feelings and rip the Band-Aid off clean?”
The mayor stood and walked away. Emma was so flustered by the comment that she stood as well, trying to think of something to say in response. But no words came. All she managed to do was knock over her hot cocoa and spill it all over her sweater.
Ruby saw this happen, took pity, and sent her back to the diner’s laundry room to clean up. “My friend’s back there,” she said, passing by with an order. “She’s nice. Talk to her, will you? She’s going through something.” Ruby zipped away.
Sure thing, Emma thought. Happy to help. She shrugged and headed to the back room.
Ruby’s friend was indeed back there, trying (and failing) to wash a set of white sheets, crying as she did it. Emma gave her some advice based on her very limited knowledge of laundry: Try some bleach, lady. But at the hint of a connection, the girl—Ashley was her name—glommed on to her like a lost puppy dog and soon was telling Emma her whole sad story. Ruby had sure been right: She was going through something. Nineteen years old, very pregnant, all alone in the world, no plan, no way to make money. Where have I heard this story before? Emma thought, listening to the young woman’s worries.
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” Ashley said. “I just—I just feel like giving up sometimes.”
“You’re nineteen now,” Emma said. “I was eighteen.”
Ashley looked up, realizing what Emma was saying.
“It gets easier,” Emma lied. “But listen. This is the important thing. You are the one who decides. You get to choose. And if you choose that you can do it, you’re gonna make it.”
Ashley wiped her face, let this sink in.
Emma added: “Life is there to be taken. You have to take it. It doesn’t seem like it could be that simple, but it is.”
This seemed to strike a chord with Ashley. Some of the clouds that had been darkening her face lifted. Emma had surprised herself a little with the speech, but it was how she’d made it this far. Be bold, be strong—there’s no other way.
It would be a few hours before she found out just how literally Ashley took her advice.
• • •
It was Saturday, and Mary Margaret and Emma were together in the apartment. Emma’s few possessions had been delivered from her apartment in Boston. She was going through her clothes as Mary Margaret made scrambled eggs. Life was starting to feel a little more normal.
“That’s it? That’s everything you’ve got?” Mary Margaret asked, sizing up the box.
“I’m not a hoarder. I don’t keep things.”
“Makes it easy to move, right?” Mary Margaret said.
Before she could get too upset at Mary Margaret’s innocent comment, the doorbell rang.
Mary Margaret answered, and gasped a bit when she saw who it was.
Mr. Gold, a bandage on his head, darkened their doorway.
“Hello there, Miss Blanchard,” he said politely. “I’m looking for Ms. Swan.”
Emma walked up behind Mary Margaret. She remembered him from Granny’s on her first night in town. Creepy dude.
“Yeah?” was all Emma said.
“Ah, Ms. Swan, hello,” he said. “Perhaps you recall meeting? I am Mr. Gold, a local… businessman.”
“I remember.”
He nodded curtly and continued: “I’ve heard through the grapevine that you’re quite good at tracking people down. And as I have a need to track somebody down, I thought to stop over and offer you some work.”
Both she and Mary Margaret looked at him for a long while. Mary Margaret then made an excuse and retreated into the apartment. Emma, cautious but intrigued, shrugged and invited him in.
“Her name is Ashley Boyd,” he said as they both sat in the living room, “and she’s stolen from me.�
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“Why not use the police?”
“Because this is a delicate matter. I don’t want her to get into any trouble. I just need what she stole to be returned.”
“What did she steal?”
“I don’t think it’s important for you to know that,” he said. “Find her, you’ll find it.”
Emma didn’t know what to think, but it wouldn’t hurt to earn a little money. She hadn’t made a dime since she’d been there.
“She broke into my shop last night, muttering something about taking control, choosing to take control of one’s life, some such nonsense.” He shrugged, touched the bandage on his head, and as he did so Emma tried to conceal the glimmer of surprise in her eye. Good grief, she thought, it’s Ashley from the diner.
“Okay,” Emma found herself saying. “Okay. I’ll find her.”
Mr. Gold, apparently delighted, stood and thanked her. At the door, he was nearly run over by Henry, who came bounding in, a big smile on his face. “I have until—” Henry was exclaiming, but he stopped in his tracks when he saw Mr. Gold looking down at him.
“Hello, young man,” said Mr. Gold. “Ms. Swan and I were just discussing a business matter. I was just leaving.”
Henry looked terrified. And Emma knew why; she remembered from the book: Henry thought Gold was Rumplestiltskin.
“Hello, sir,” Henry said quietly, then entered the apartment, head down.
Once Gold was gone, Emma sat down with Henry and told him that he couldn’t keep showing up in secret, even though she did want to see him. She explained that Regina would find a way to use it against them. Henry assured her it was okay—that he had until five o’clock and that his mother would never know. Emma didn’t like it one bit. Before she could insist that he leave, though, Henry started asking questions about why Mr. Gold had been there.
“He asked me to find someone,” she said. “A girl. It’s just a job.”
“What girl?”
“I doubt you’d know her, kid,” she said, regretting saying anything at all.
Henry sat down on the couch, removing his backpack. He dug around and took out his book, started flipping through the pages. “Is she pregnant?”
Emma turned, eyes wide. “How did you know that?”
• • •
Emma’s plan was simple. She never made a complicated plan unless she needed a complicated plan, and in her experience, whenever she was trying to find somebody, it was simplest to start with friends. Emma didn’t know much about Ashley, but she knew she had one friend in Storybrooke. Ruby.
She and Henry went right to the diner. When she saw that Ruby had a moment free, Emma pulled her over to the back entrance and asked her if she had any guesses about where Ashley might have gone.
“I don’t. No,” Ruby said, shaking her head. “Excuse me.” She pushed on the back door and propped it open. “I’m waiting for them to drop off my car, sorry.”
“You don’t think the boyfriend could be involved?”
“He would have to be involved to be involved,” Ruby said. “He hasn’t talked to her in at least six months. He’s such an ass.”
“She mentioned he hadn’t… done the right thing,” Emma said. “When he found out she was pregnant.”
“He dumped her,” Ruby said disdainfully, chewing her gum loudly. She looked like she was about to say something else, but just then a tow truck trundled into the back parking lot, pulling a cherry-red Camaro. The truck stopped, and the driver got out, waved to Ruby (who waved back quite flirtatiously, Emma noticed, and added a hip-twisting curtsy for good measure), and started lowering the vehicle. Nice car for a waitress, Emma thought.
“And where’s Ashley’s family?”
“She doesn’t really have one,” Ruby said. “Horrible stepmother somewhere. I think stepsisters. I don’t know. She doesn’t talk to them.”
Henry tugged conspiratorially on Emma’s jacket, and nodded up at her when she looked down. She shook her head and gave him a “not now, kid” look.
“You know, maybe you should go ask Sean,” Ruby said. “Maybe he knows something. He lives with his dad.” She took Emma’s hand, pulled it up, then took the pen from behind her ear. “I’ll write down the address.”
• • •
A burly man in his fifties opened the door when Emma rang the bell of the two-story midcentury on Randolph. The father, she assumed. She asked for Sean, and the man introduced himself as Mitchell Herman, asked her what she wanted. The way he said his own name, the way he shook her hand, the way he crossed his arms afterward—Emma could feel it when she wasn’t going to like somebody. Pushy fat rich men were not exactly her type.
Emma was glad she’d left Henry in the car as she explained that Ashley was missing and that she’d been hired to find her. She told him few other details, but Mitchell took what she gave him and ran: “Of course she disappeared, of course she bailed on the agreement. Can’t trust her to be a good mother, can’t trust her to do the right thing. She let herself get pregnant in the first place, didn’t she?”
Oh, Emma thought. I really don’t like you.
“Who’s at the door, Dad?” Emma heard, and behind Mitchell, she saw Sean emerge from a back room and come down the hall. He was so young—just a baby, not even twenty. Just like Ashley. Emma couldn’t believe that her own son would one day turn into a similarly gangly, bright-eyed creature. She couldn’t believe that she used to be like Ashley….
“Is everything all right?” Sean asked.
“No, Sean, everything isn’t all right,” Emma said, her voice suddenly stern. “Ashley is missing. If you know anything, you need to tell me where she is or go to the police. Right now. And I mean anything.”
Sean became extremely agitated when he heard this information, and he tried to push past his father, who held him back and blocked the doorway. “What do you mean, disappeared?” Sean said. “Where is she? What about the baby?”
“No,” Mitchell said. He turned to his son. “Get inside, we’ll talk in a minute.”
“I get it,” Emma said. “You’re the reason. Right? The reason he broke it off in the first place?”
Mitchell looked at her like an idiot. “I had everything set up for that girl. She was set. She agreed. It was all very civil. All she had to do was follow through.”
“What do you mean you ‘had everything set up’ for Ashley?”
“I mean exactly that,” he said. “I made an arrangement.”
“For the baby. You sold the baby. And who’s the buyer?”
Mitchell Herman looked honestly confused now, and Emma backtracked through the conversation, wondering what she’d missed.
And then she realized.
“Gold,” she said. “Of course.”
“Yes, of course, Gold,” he said. “Isn’t that who hired you? To bring him the baby? I thought you worked for him.”
Emma closed her eyes; she should have guessed it all the way back at the diner, when she was talking to Ruby… Ruby, who had known as well. Known everything, and had sent her here to buy Ashley time. The possession of Gold’s that Ashley had taken was… herself. Damn it, Emma thought, turning and running back to the VW.
Inside, she cranked the engine. “We gotta find this girl, Henry,” Emma said, reversing out of the driveway. “She panicked and she needs our help. She’s running.”
“There’s only one road that leads out of town,” Henry said, “but—”
“Don’t talk to me about a curse right now, kid,” Emma said. “This is real. She’s running and she’s too far along to run.”
Ten minutes later, feeling like she was playing the lead in a bad nightmare, Emma rounded a bend on the road outside of town and saw the bright red of the Camaro’s backside sticking up out of the ditch. She crashed, Emma thought, as she hit the brakes then got out to run to Ruby’s car. Ashley wasn’t behind the wheel, which was a relief, actually. Emma looked up, scanned the woods. She heard the moaning almost right away.
She and H
enry found her ten feet past the tree line, sitting on the ground, holding her belly. When she saw them, she looked up, eyes filled with terror. “The baby!” she cried. “The baby is coming right now!”
• • •
Emma and Henry sat together in the ER’s waiting room as Ashley delivered down the hall. Emma, nervously staring at her shoes, didn’t notice when Henry looked up from his book and studied her. She wrung her hands and fidgeted, busy imagining what Ashley was going through. Imagining and remembering. She couldn’t believe how close Ashley had come to disaster. A girl like that alone in the woods…
“You’re the only one,” Henry said.
Emma looked up.
“What did you say?”
“You’re the only one who can leave Storybrooke,” he said. “All of us are stuck here. You can go if you want. You know that, right?”
“What do you mean?”
“The rules of the magic. That’s how the curse works. People who are already here can never leave because bad things happen whenever they try to get out of town. You’re not stuck, though. You’re special. You don’t come from here. So you can go. It’s fine, I get it.”
She felt the urge to reach out, pull him to her, cradle his head against her chest. To protect him from the things that didn’t make sense. She steadied herself by reaching down and taking hold of the arm of her chair.
“Anyone can go, kid,” she said. “There’s no curse.” She saw the doctor coming toward them down the hall. “And besides,” she added, standing, “I’m not going anywhere. There’s too many lost people around here.”
The smile on the doctor’s face told Emma everything she needed to know, even before she heard the details: six pounds even, baby girl and mother healthy and happy both.
“Thank you,” Emma said, the tension easing out of her shoulders. She took the doctor’s hand and shook it. “Thank you so much,” she said. Henry had to be home by five o’clock if she was going to avoid another plumage-puffing session with Regina, and so she told him to gather his things, then crossed the room toward the bathroom. Out of the corner of her eye, through the front window, she saw Mr. Gold approaching the hospital, cane swinging happily. He came in, looked around.