Chapter 1

'Yeah, I was in the dark, I was falling hard, with an open heart...'

Wide awake, Emma Swan stared at the ceiling. She was back. She could hardly believe it. The days spent trekking through the Enchanted Forest, and her return home seemed like a bizarre dream. It was going to take her time to sort everything out. And right now she couldn't sleep a wink. The house was far too quiet. Every creak and groan of the old stone building was amplified, and the tap of the ancient heating pipes irritated her. Ever since Mary Margaret (her newfound mother) had left to move in with David Nolan (her newfound father) she had been lonely.

Or maybe guilty?

No, it was definitely lonely.

Nighttime was the worst. During the day, she found escape in her work as the town Sheriff of Storybrooke, Maine. At night, with the paperwork done and her badge laid to rest beside her gun on the dresser top, the heavy silence settled in on her. Evenings spent home alone, were like a hangman's noose slowly choking the life out of her.

And why are you alone, Emma?

She rolled over under the fluffy white comforter. Had she said alone? Emma realized she overlooked the annoying inner voice that plagued her constantly. Another reason she hated going home to an empty house. No one to distract her from herself. The whole situation felt eerily familiar. She once spent eleven months, just her and her accusing thoughts, and it almost wrecked her life.

But you weren't alone then, you had Henry.

Could she count a fetus growing in her belly as a companion? Emma pondered this. She remembered the cell. Four walls, a barred window, a cot, and a toilet –her entire world as days turned to weeks and weeks to months. The food sucked, the inmates were bitches, and prison guards looked like souped-up schoolmarms with the personalities of dead fish. And she? She was the worst of them; a seventeen year old, pregnant mother, languishing in self-doubt. What an environment to nurture a child in the womb.

No, she hadn't been alone. Emma disliked agreeing, but it was true.

After Neal's betrayal punched a hole in her heart, she was free falling in the dark. How could she have been so wrong about him? At first, the tiny plus symbol on the pregnancy test seemed immaterial. When her abdomen began to swell against the elastic waistband of her prison-uniform pants, the immaterial became real. She called it Kid, and found comfort talking to it late at night. Kid was her safety net. Without the baby, Emma dreaded to think what she might have become. Orphaned by her parents, and now abandoned by her true love, she convinced herself the fault was her. She was drowning in sea of inferiority and hate. Kid saved her. The day she felt him kick inside her was the moment she found direction. She was a victim of selfish people, but her baby deserved the best chance she could give it! Self pity was out.

Is that why you gave him up?

"Yes," Emma said inwardly. She told that lie so many times the answer came out smooth as butter. It was a lie. Was it not? If not, then why else had she wormed her way into Henry's life again?

You need someone, more than you want to admit.

Emma squeezed her eyes shut. She put herself back together during those months in the correctional facility. The personal promise of never trusting anyone but herself aided in cementing the pieces of her heart into place. Kid (Henry) was the only chink in that stone wall. She gave him away then because otherwise her newly constructed shell would have crumbled.

But that's selfish.

"No." She said. "Selfish would have been keeping him when I had no means to support him. I couldn't take care of him. I wasn't a mother!"

Maybe he could have cared for you?

"I don't need anyone to take care of me."

You'll never know at this rate. You keep slamming the doors on anyone who could.

"Not true, not on Mary Margaret—Snow—Mom!"

Is that why you told Mulan to cut down the beanstalk?

"Hey, I was giving her the best chance to get home!"

Is that why you left Killian?

Emma's eyes flew open, more wide awake than ever. Her hand shot out to grasp a set of car keys on the nightstand beside her bed. Sleep? Screw it.

TBC, Thanks for reading! I own nothing but the writing, by a fan for fans :)