Disclaimer: OUAT is not mine, not making any money. #still dirt-poor. Inspired by and borrowing from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. A few lines are taken ipsis literis from Tallahassee for obvious reasons. Emma's speech on her "numbers" based on Erin Brockovich.

Summary: Tired of being trapped in a broken heart, Emma Swan decides to erase Neal Cassidy from her memory. When he decides to do the same, he realizes he is not ready to let her go, and tries desperately to hold on to his memories. Oneshot.

Warnings: Angst ahead. Very long, very sad. Rated T/M for a minor sex scene – nothing too graphic, though.

Erased

When he woke up on that Friday morning, he knew he was not where he was supposed to be. He let out a sigh, pulling up the blanket to cover his head, trying to go back to sleep.

He couldn't. That feeling just wouldn't let go.

He pushed the blanket away, and brought himself to a sitting position to look at the window. It was raining, again.

The sound of the water splashing against glass somehow numbed his already numb heart. He felt empty. But then, that was nothing new. He had been feeling empty for a very long time. Not sad, not angry, even though he would always be sad and angry after his father abandoned him. Still, he felt there was a hole in his heart, one that he could not explain. There were pieces of him missing, he knew it. He just wondered what they were.

I'm just a shadow of the man I used to be. A man I just can't remember.

He reached out for his cell phone.

"Hi, Neal Cassidy here," he told the receptionist at the insurance company. "Can you let Mr. Rogers know that I'm sick? No… I won't be turning in. Thanks."

He had somewhere else to be.

"What time does the next bus to Tallahassee leave?" he asked the Greyhound clerk, less than an hour later.

"Eleven."

"And what time does it get there?"

"Twelve-thirty."

"Wh-"

"Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" he winced. "Jesus."

If only I could rent a car. Don't think they would let me, though, not with my track record…

"Roundtrip?"

For a second, he only stared at his hands holding the wallet.

"Yeah," he replied. "Last bus on Saturday."

It had been a stupid idea. Just like it had been raining in Manhattan, it was raining in the capital of Florida, and he had spent hours wandering around, expecting something or someone to show up. There was nothing much for him to do, but wait.

Why am I here?

It was useless. He had waited for five hours. Maybe there had been a reason for him to be there, and he was simply too late. It was gone. If he hurried, he would still catch the Greyhound office open, and maybe change his ticket.

When he turned on his heels, he collided with something.

"Oh, shit!"

Someone.

Someone who now had coffee spilled all over her clothes.

She's the most beautiful woman I have seen in my entire life.

"I'm sorry!" he muttered. "I am so, so sorry!"

"It's fine, it's… fine," she replied, shaking her head as she looked at her top. "I was distracted, didn't see you standing there."

"Here," he said, taking out his scarf. "I guess you can at least hide it."

Her blue eyes lingered on his for a long minute.

"Do I… do I know you?"

I wish you did. I don't think you do, though. I know I don't know you. I would remember.

"I don't think so," he answered, although his heart was racing as if claiming otherwise. "Neal Cassidy."

She frowned, wrapping his scarf around her neck before shaking his hand.

"Emma Swan."

"Please let me buy you another coffee."

"Oh, no, seriously, we're fine. I was…"

"Please," he insisted. "I've been having a very strange day, I really could do with some coffee. And some company."

He stared into her eyes, wrinkling his forehead and hoping, from the bottom of his heart, that she wouldn't turn him down.

"Look, thanks. I appreciate it," she said, breaking eye contact and looking at her own boots. "But I think I'll just head back to my hotel and-"

"You don't live here?"

She smiled and raised an eyebrow at his question.

"No, I don't. And no, I'm not hitting on you, and or inviting you to join me in my hotel."

"Where do you live?

"I'm sorry, I-"

"I live in New York."

"Oh," she said, looking into his eyes again. "And what… what brings you to Tallahassee?"

"I honestly have no idea," he answered with a shrug. "I just woke up last morning and felt that I should… you know… be here."

He watched her mouth hang open for a moment.

"And you?" he asked.

"I… I… I'm here on business," she replied, without looking at his eyes.

She doesn't know why she's here either.

"Now how about that coffee?" he asked, giving her his most charming smile.

So she was a bail bondsperson. How fitting that he, a former thief himself, would be sitting in a café with the kind of person who could very easily land his sorry ass in jail.

"But my life wasn't always that virtuous," she said. "I used to be an outlaw myself."

"I find that hard to believe," he answered, smiling at her from the top of his half-empty cup.

"Well… I think that's enough about me," she smiled back, but quickly made sure not to when she continued. "What about you? What do you do?"

"I used to be an outlaw as well," he said, putting down his cup as he spoke. "But now I work for an insurance company."

"Oh, wow…"

"Yeah, right? And house insurance, of all things…" he let out a chuckle. "I guess they found that my… knowledge in burglary and stuff would be a differential."

"And is it?"

"Sort of," he replied, looking at her smiling face again. "Sometimes the old habits kick in and I end up giving the customers the wrong kind of advice."

And then, she laughed. And when she did, she seemed sorely disappointed at herself. He kept watching as she cleared her throat and looked away.

Such high walls around her… Someone must have hurt her really badly.

"Well, talk is good, but I gotta go," she said, picking a crumbled 5-dollar bill from her pocket.

"Please, this one is on me."

"Thank you, then."

She was about to stand up when he spoke again.

"Emma…" he swallowed a lump in his throat. It was not rocket science. All he had to do was ask. It was not as if he would die if she said no, anyway. Or maybe he would. His heart was about to burst from his chest.

I don't know why I'm feeling like this.

"C-can I… Can I have your number?"

"You want my number?" she asked with a smile. But this time, there was no joy in it. Only disdain. Heavy, copious amounts of it. "And what number do you want, Mr. Cassidy?"

"Do you have more than one?"

"Hell yeah I do," she said, glancing at him with a painfully skeptical look in her eyes. "I have lots of numbers. Here, what about this one," she looked down at her watch before speaking. "Thirty-five. That is the number of minutes we've known each other. One is the number of nights my relationships usually last, though you might find that one convenient, huh?" she snorted. "Eleven is the number of months I've spent in prison, five is the number of dollars in my bank account, and two hundred eighteen is the number of miles from Boston to New York," she reached out for a napkin and the pen in her pocket, and started writing something down. "617-435-7865 is my phone number, but you know what?" she gave him the napkin as she stood up and put the pen back in her pocket. "After all the other numbers I gave you, I'm guessing zero is the number of times you'll call it."

She took a final look at him, and he couldn't help but notice that despite all the resentment in her voice, her eyes were strangely vacant as she walked towards the door.

"Have a good day," she said.

Two days later, he was back at his office in Manhattan, holding the napkin in front of him.

"Hello?"

"Emma?"

"Who's this?"

"Neal. We met in Tallahassee."

"Oh."

"Can you talk?"

"Actually, I'm… kind of busy now. Can I call you back?"

If you hang up now, she will not call you back.

"It's super quick. Gimme a minute?"

There was silence on the other side of the line, and then a sharp intake of breath.

"Fine."

"Remember my scarf?"

"What about it?"

"Can I drop by your place to get it back?"

He heard her snort.

"That has to be the lamest pick-up line ever."

"Come on!" he rubbed his eyes, trying not to smile. "I'm willing to travel more than two hundred miles just to see you again… It can't be the lamest thing you've ever heard."

"Well…"

"I can take donuts, if you want."

"Donuts?"

"No?"

"I like bagels better."

"Bagels it is."

"When are you planning to come here?"

"I guess that if I leave now, you can meet me at 6."

"Are you… are you kidding me?"

"I know right? People don't usually have bagels for dinner."

She laughed.

"But maybe we could have a picnic on Spectacle Island," he said, wishing he could see her face as they talked. "I did some research and I really think it makes a nice dating spot."

"A picnic, on Spectacle Island, today, at 6 pm," she said, and her voice was amused as she did so. "I don't know what part of your plan is the most ridiculous."

"Ridiculous?" he whispered. "My feelings are officially hurt."

"Sorry!" she said, laughing again. "But you had it coming, you know that."

"What if I take a basket? A checked blanket?"

"Oh, God, please no… You're sinking deeper, you know that?"

"I do. And I can keep going, if I need to."

"You won't give up until I say yes, will you?"

"Pretty much," he lowered his voice and his head to hide his face from the scolding look of a bald man behind a glass door. "Despite my boss giving me the look, I do not intend to hang up until you tell me when and where I'll see you again."

Another moment of silence.

"I'm sorry, but the last ferry boat to Spectacle Island leaves at 4:30," she said. "Meet me at the Public Garden. I'll be waiting for you by the Swan Boats."

She laughed again.

"Fitting, don't you think?"

I wonder why her voice makes me feel at home.

"It certainly is…" he replied, feeling his chest swell as he remembered the first time he saw her in Tallahassee. "But then, I shouldn't expect anything less than that, coming from you."

"Flattery will get you nowhere, Mr. Cassidy," she replied, trying to keep her most serious tone of voice. "Don't be late."

And then, she hung up.

He closed his eyes for a moment, and saw her smile again… For some reason, he felt he had just found the pieces of him that had been missing for so long.

"I'm telling you," he said, as his fingers dangled above his glass of beer. "She walked right past me. And when I went after her, and talked to her, she said she didn't know who I was."

By his side, August W. Booth remained silent.

"I mean… How? How can she…?"

"You were not supposed to see her again, Neal."

"It was… It was an accident," he muttered. "I had… I thought…"

"It doesn't matter now," August said, finally turning his head to look at him. "She had you erased from her mind."

He couldn't have heard that right.

"She what?"

"There is a place…" August explained. "Lacuna Incorporated… They offer this procedure in which they-"

"Wait, hold on. No. No way. She wouldn't. I know she wouldn't-"

"She did. That is why she didn't recognize you."

"You mean… she erased… all of our memories?" he was staring into his beer, hoping he would drown in it as reality slowly sank in. "All of them?"

His question was met with silence. Instead, August just fumbled on his pockets for a moment.

"Here."

Neal picked the yellowish card from his hand and as he read its contents, he felt he could no longer breathe.

'Dear Mr. Booth,

Emma Swan has had Neal Cassidy erased from her memory. Please never mention their relationship to her again.

Thank you.

Lacuna Inc.'

He blinked several times, trying to ignore the burning pain in his chest. That couldn't be true. It had to be some kind of joke, a very cruel one at that. He turned the card over, and saw the date on it: November 15, 2005. That had been two months ago. It explained why she hadn't recognized him when they came across each other in Vancouver's Amtrak station the week before.

"You should keep their card," August said, giving him another piece of paper with the Lacuna Inc. logo.

"Why?"

"Perhaps now that she doesn't remember you anymore… You will consider-"

"Erasing her? Hell no!"

"Neal, you're saying that now-"

"No! I don't want to forget her!"

"If the pain becomes too much to bear, at least-"

"August, she's the best thing that has ever, ever happened to me."

I told her that once. More than once. And now, she will never remember.

His eyes burnt. His heart burnt. He felt like he had been hit by a train, then died, then brought back to life, and then hit by a train again. His whole body was sore. His soul ached.

The woman he loved had erased him from her memory, but there was no way he would do the same.

"I love her," he whispered.

"And I'm sure she loved you too."

Just go ahead and rub salt in my wounds. I hate you, August.

"But maybe being trapped in a broken heart was too much for her to handle. And maybe, just maybe, one day you will understand exactly what she felt like."

He didn't care.

He wasn't even listening anymore.

"May I help you?" asked a lady, as soon as he approached the reception desk.

"I have an appointment with Dr. Mierzwiak at ten."

"Oh, of course! Mr. Cassidy, right? Please have a seat. He will be right with you."

As he sat near another old lady near the entrance door, his eyes caught his own reflection on the mirror on the other side of the room. He looked like a carcass. Pale, with dark bags under his bloodshot eyes, unshaved, scarily thin. He had hit rock bottom.

He just couldn't do it anymore.

It had taken him two years since that day he met August at the bar in Vancouver, for him to admit the man was right.

Eventually, the pain had become too much to bear.

Maybe I'm making a mistake. Maybe I just need to learn to live with this.

He wondered how he had even managed to rob another jewelry store to get the money to pay for that procedure, when he could barely make sure to remember where he had slept the night before. Then again, sometimes a man in despair can do the unimaginable…

I have to follow through with this. I have no choice.

"Mr. Cassidy?"

Dr. Mierzwiak was finally showing him to his office.

"How are you today, Mr. Cassidy?"

Stupid question.

"Never been better."

"I see… Well, let's get down to business, then."

A pill. A single pink pill, with some illegible initials stamped on it. That is all it takes. I'll just swallow it… and then… it will begin.

He was now lying on a bed in some cheap motel near the LaGuardia airport, with electrodes on his scalp as Dr. Mierzwiak explained the procedure.

"We are now creating a map of Emma Swan in your brain, using the items you have provided and the recordings of our previous appointments…"

My dreamcatcher. One of her dresses. A birthday card.

"As you sleep, we'll trace the map and eradicate the emotional core of each memory. By the time you wake up in the morning, they will all be gone… Like a dream upon waking."

Although his eyes were open, he couldn't see anything anymore. He was already inside his own mind.

He could hear footsteps around him.

Maybe if we met again… and I just explained what happened… I wouldn't have to go through this and it would be like you knew and we could rebuild and we could be happy again and…

"Once we are done, we will dispose of all these objects so that you will not be confused later by their unexplainable presence…"

It is too late.

It is already happening.

"August?"

He had just parked his yellow bug somewhere in Vancouver, and was now walking towards the other man.

"What did I tell you?" he asked.

You knew I would end up erasing her from my mind.

"Why are you here?"

"Simple. My only connection with you is through Emma Swan. Erase her, and you erase me as well."

He rubbed his eyes, seeing the road under his feet grow diffuse, as well as everything around them.

"If I can't be there for her, man, you got to promise me that you will be."

"I promise," replied a faceless August, as he disappeared into the mist of his first erased memory.

"I've been looking for her for the past two years. Now I finally find her, and she's robbing convenience stores with some deadbeat. Tell me again who's doing the crap job."

It was August, again, in a dimly-lit alley.

"God, I don't want to go through this again…"

"It's almost finished, believe me," the other man replied, as the wall behind them fell apart and bricks and dust stormed around them.

"It better be. I hate this memory."

"Soon enough it will be gone," August said, his voice becoming distant with every word.

Just like everything else.

He saw Emma rushing towards his car.

"Oh, thank God…"

As she entered the bug, she threw him the bag with the watches, and only stared at him. No kissing, no whispered loving words, no high hopes of a better future.

"You look so pretty…"

"Yeah," she replied, and her voice was unusually cold. "You should see how pretty I was in jail."

Please don't say that.

"So… you're erasing me too?"

"Yeah. I guess…"

He wished he could rant at her for erasing him first, but he couldn't. There was something deeply disturbing in how things had turned out to be for both of them, and all he did was look at her for a very long time… until she faded away.

Then she was hiding behind a tree, waiting for him with a paper bag in her hands.

"Donuts?" she asked, without her original amusement.

"No, thanks."

"I wonder why I had that stupid idea."

"It was not stupid. I was."

"I know."

"So you… You want to steal the watches, to help me with get away with stealing the watches?"

"Yes. That is exactly what I want to do."

"Who would have thought it would go that wrong…"

"Well, maybe if you hadn't called the cops to tip me in…"

I wish I could tell you the truth. I wish I had the time.

All the trees around them had already disappeared, all the people, the grass, the paper bag in her hands.

"I… Emma, I was… I was trying to help."

"Yeah… Right."

"I wonder what you would have done… it you were in my place."

"I…" he watched as her face went pale, and then paler, until only the blue of her eyes could be seen. "It doesn't matter now."

And then, they were leaning against the bug, in front of a motel. He had his arm wrapped around her shoulders.

"I really love, love this memory," she said.

"Me too," he replied.

"This was the happiest day of my life."

Every single day with you was the happiest of my life.

"Wanna shower first?"

"Look! Our dreamcatcher!"

They will take that away from me.

"Are you sure? Is this… what you really want?"

"What I really want is you."

And then they were kissing, and it was sweet and gentle and it started to fade.

"Oh no, please, no!" he whispered. "Stop! I've changed my mind!" he screamed, letting go of Emma to scream at the top of his lungs. "I want to call it off! Do you hear me? Stop the procedure! I don't want to do this anymore!"

Please let me keep this memory.

The whole room was dissolving into mist, just like she was.

"No. No, no, no, no…"

He grabbed her hand and flung the door open, just to find out that what expected them outside the room was a big white canvas of nothingness.

"Oh God."

"Neal?"

"Don't let go of my hand, Emma."

"What are you doing?"

"I'm gonna take you somewhere else."

"Where?"

To a memory you don't belong to, where they cannot trace you.

And then they were in an old shack. An older man with reptilian skin was pouring some soup into a bowl and handing it to him.

"Holy Moses, who the hell is this guy?"

He looked at Emma and had to stifle a chuckle. She was dressed just like their maid.

She looked funny, and so did he, with that brownish cloak.

"My father."

"Your father?"

"Well, you look for other ways, Bae…" said the man. "But don't get your hopes up."

He scares me so much.

"Who's Bae?"

"I am Bae."

"What?"

"It is a very long story, but I`ll tell you everything."

"I don't like the way your father is looking at me."

He wants to kill the maid.

"Let's get out of here."

Again, he grabbed her hand, and then they were running towards the forest, feeling branches hit their face in the process, trying not to trip and fall as their feet got tangled in the huge roots sprawling across the ground.

When he felt they were finally sheltered from his father's insanity and the impending threat of erasure, he hugged her, trying to catch his breath as he pressed his head against hers.

"Where are we?"

"This is where I come from."

"You Mowgli or something? The child of the jungle?"

He laughed at her words. Would there be any point explaining it now?

"Let's just hide here until morning. They can't find us here."

"Why has it stopped erasing?" asked Howard Mierzwiak, as he stared at the computer screen.

"I don't know," answered one of his associates. "He's not on the map."

The doctor then pulled out another laptop computer from his equipment bag and plugged it into the system.

"I'm running a Spectrum search throughout his memory… Let's see what happens."

"I missed you," Emma whispered, as he still hugged her.

"I missed you too."

And then, they kissed. Softly, slowly, just like they had done in that motel room, before they…

"Make love to me?" she whispered.

Oh God, Emma. You loved me. Why did you erase me?

He laid her on the ground, carefully lodging his body between her legs as he breathed into her mouth.

I never thought I'd be inside you again.

She opened her legs wider and lifted her hips to increase the contact between them, and he bit her lip when she arched her back as he entered her.

They were making love in a memory that never even existed, their bodies were nothing but images behind his eyes and yet, his heart was racing. His whole body felt tingly. His hand closed into a fist and he squeezed a bunch of dried leaves in his fingers as pleasure swept across him, and he moaned against her shoulder, feeling her nails dig into his back.

And then she was crying.

"Oh God, Neal, what have I done?"

He felt her sobbing against his chest, and tears fell from her eyes onto his bare shoulder as she buried her head in his neck.

"I erased you from my mind! I… we… everything… it's gone!"

He rolled off her and onto his back, pulling her head close to his chest and caressing her hair as she cried, her shoulders shaking with every word.

"I won't remember you… ever again."

He felt his heart was breaking. It was the truth. She wouldn't. Even if he did manage to keep whatever it was that had been left of his memories, even if he found her and told everything, even if she believed him… She would never remember him again. She would learn who he was and what they had been together, but in the form of a story.

An existence of which you will have no recollection.

"Don't cry, baby."

"What are we gonna do?" she sobbed.

"I don't know… But we… we'll find a way."

Dr. Mierzwiak had finally spotted a small distant light in his patient's brain.

"Okay, here it is," he said, as he zeroed in on it. "I wonder why it is off the map like this, but…"

He closed his eyes when her tears finally subsided. He could stay like that forever, just holding her against his chest.

I'm exactly where I want to be.

"I love you," she whispered.

When he opened his eyes to respond, she was no longer there.

And he panicked.

"Emma, no! This can't be happening. Please!" he screamed. "I don't want this! Wake me up! Stop the procedure! Plea —"

The two of them had just entered a convenience store, and he was touching her fake pregnant belly.

"You're not gonna believe it…" she said.

"What?"

"But we have a son. For real."

His heart literally stopped.

"What?"

"I was pregnant when I went to jail," she answered, swiping food as she moved along the aisles.

"Oh, no, God, no…"

I always wondered what our kids would look like.

"It's okay."

Despite the cool in her voice, she was avoiding his eyes. It was obviously not okay.

"What is his name?"

"I don't know… I… I had to give him up," her lips trembled as she spoke, and all around them shelves started cracking and falling and dragging them into a whirlwind of destruction.

"Oh, Emma…" he muttered. Of course she had erased him from her mind. She was expecting their baby and he had let her go to jail and…

I should have been there.

"But I didn't let them erase him. I…I lied. I said my kid's father was someone else."

"So you'll remember him?"

"Yes," she smiled dreamily. "Maybe… even you. I don't know."

"Honey?"

"I think… I think it's time."

"He's ready?"

"Oh, yeah. Oh, it hurts really bad!"

"Breathe, baby."

"Oh God."

"Breathe! Let's go! Come on."

As the convenience store disappeared in a mix of debris and shadows, he rushed her into the bug with his eyes full of tears, one of his hands holding hers as the other touched her belly, even though it was actually just her bag with a few stolen goods.

If only it was really our son on his way.

And then, there she was, driving the yellow bug in Portland. Their first memory together.

"Impressive," he said, watching her clutch the steering wheel as she gasped. "But really, you could've just asked me for the keys. Just drive. It's fine."

"You always scare me when you do that."

"I'm sorry."

"Why did you leave me, Neal?"

Around them, the bug was turning into sand. He needed time… he needed to explain everything.

Time, however, was the one thing they didn't have as they sped away in their fading yellow bug.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Why didn't you stay?"

"I wish I had stayed. Now I wish I had stayed. I really do. I wish… I wish I had done a lot of things."

Her eyes caught his in the rear-view mirror.

"What if you stay this time?"

"I…I can't," he whispered. "There's no memory left."

She pulled over and turned to look at him, and by that time tears were already running down his face.

I don't want to forget you.

"Well, let's at least make up a goodbye," she said, smiling as he moved over to take the passenger's seat. "Pretend we had one."

He was halfway buried in sand when her hands touched his face.

"Goodbye, Neal."

"I love you," he whispered.

And then she faded, leaving only a trace of her voice behind.

Meet me… in Tallahassee.

When Neal Cassidy woke up the next morning, he had no recollection of Emma Swan having ever been a part of his life.

The pain, the sorrow, the regret for leaving her behind, everything that had hurt for so long was finally gone. So were all the happy memories of their life together, his hope he would one day meet her again, their dreams of having a family, their plans.

He felt strangely empty, as if there were parts of him missing.

Still, he was able to climb out of bed, have his breakfast at the cheap motel, then go back to his room to get ready for the first day of the rest of his life.

He shaved. He put on his least shabby clothes. He set out to find a job. Any job.

And he did. He started scrubbing toilets at an insurance company. Then he became a janitor. Then some kind of office boy. Then, he applied for the job of insurance broker. He did poorly at the written test, but the interview was spot on.

He got back on his feet.

Three years later, he was living in a rented apartment in Manhattan, and as he opened his eyes on that rainy Friday morning, not for the first time in all those years, he felt there was something out of place.

This time, however, he had the very clear impression he knew what he had to do to find some meaning in life.

As a matter of fact, he didn't know what to do.

He did know, however, where he was supposed to be.

"What time does the next bus to Tallahassee leave?" he asked the Greyhound clerk, less than an hour later.