"Bent"

Author's Foreword –

I was really bitterly disappointed in 322 – in all of 3B, really – so this story is, first of all, an attempt to fix it. I don't know where the character of Emma has run off to, but I'd really like her back (pretty sure she disappeared at the same time Neal did.) More than that, though, this story stems from a NEED that I have to see certain conversations between the two of them – ones that they should have had on the show, but they never did.

This story picks up right around the end of 322. The only real changes I've made are to eliminate the introductions of Elsa and Marian to the canvas – just pretend those items didn't happen. Needless to say, this is a SF story, so other characters only float through to serve their tale, but I don't use kid gloves on the two of them, either – the whole point is to work through their junk. It's not always pretty, but I hope the payoff makes it worthwhile in the end.

Last but absolutely not least, a huge (HUGE) thank you to textbookone for serving as my beta reader and consultant. She challenged me to fix certain parts of the tale and write things that I would have rather let be "because plot" to actually make them fit the characters, story, and mythology of Once (or at least Once as it was before it lost its head here in the last 11.) It's a better story for it.

T rating is purely for occasional language.

I hope you enjoy :)

-DSB

We're not broken
Just bent
And we can learn to love again

CHAPTER 1

Emma approached the door to the diner, briefly glancing back over her shoulder and finding herself relieved that the only person in sight was the leather-clad pirate seated on the patio. At least nobody else had seen what just happened, she thought. Whatever insanity had come over her a few minutes prior had dissipated, and she realized she had been distracted from the important things at hand - her family - for far too long.

As she stood on the front stoop, she was thankful to see her family and the rest of the townsfolk enjoying the baby's coronation party. Her mother caught her eye as she came in the door and she wandered to her booth with a smile.

"How's Henry?" Snow asked, as Emma approached.

"Henry?" Emma asked, confused.

"Yeah, he seemed upset earlier, after we announced the baby's name. I didn't mean for it to upset him…" she trailed off. "I thought you were going after him when you walked out?"

Shit. Shit, shit, shit, Emma thought, realizing she'd been completely oblivious to Henry's needs, caught up in her own thoughts, when she ended up outside on the patio.

Blushing slightly, she replied, "No, I, uh… got distracted." She ignored the questions written on Snow's face and turned to go. "Maybe he went back to the room. I'll go see if I can find him there."

"Henry?" she asked softly, as she opened the door to their room.

She was met with silence as she looked around the darkened room. Walking between the beds, she glanced under the covers and then wandered to the bathroom. No Henry.

She'd just seen Regina at the diner, so he wasn't at her house. After pondering for a minute, it dawned on her where it was he used to go when he was upset: his castle. The structure was no longer there, of course, but perhaps it would be a place to start searching.

A few minutes later she pulled her car into a spot near the space where Henry's beloved playground used to stand. A lone bench was all that remained of the park, illuminated by a single streetlight that stood some distance away, and over the back of the bench she saw the unmistakable mop of brown hair that belonged to her son. He sat facing the beach, his castle no longer blocking the view, as the area where it once had stood was now a barren stretch of sand. He leaned forward and gazed into the ocean, his weight resting on his hands as they grasped the front edge of the bench. The scene was utterly heartbreaking, speaking volumes about the little boy - not so little anymore - whose childhood dreams had been shattered.

Wordlessly, Emma took a seat next to him and mimicked his sightline. Her hand covered his and she gave it a little squeeze as she broke the silence. "Hey."

The corner of his mouth curled up into a false smile, then fell as quickly as it had risen. He didn't even greet her before he begun baring his heart. "It wasn't supposed to be like this, you know. Just this void of nothing… It was supposed to be you, me, Dad in a castle by the beach…" He shook his head. "It's all my fault. I should never have gone to get you. My life wasn't that awful, I know I thought it was but it was really pretty okay… if I had never gone, or if I hadn't given Pan my heart, or – or – if you hadn't had to stay behind with me last year… my Dad would still be alive," he trailed off into a whisper.

"Oh, Henry," she breathed, unaccustomed to seeing her eternally optimistic son so heartbroken. "It's not your fault. You made the decisions that seemed best at the time. Your Dad did the same thing, and saved us all - that's the kind of guy he was, he thought nothing of it, he just did what he needed to do."

Henry's brow furrowed. "What happened to him, anyways - what is it that he did? You just told me he was a hero. I know you think I'm just a kid, but I think I deserve to know what happened to my Dad."

Emma scooted closer to him and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. "To be honest, I don't know, exactly. From what I can gather, he thought bringing back his father was the best way to get back to us, to get us back to our family. Only, when he did so, to bring him back… the price was his life. He made it back here but then…" she closed her eyes and sighed, memories of that day in the woods washing over her. "He promised he'd watch over us, from somewhere. And he wanted you to know he was a good father. And he was, Henry. He was an amazing father to you. He loved you more than anything."

They sat quietly on the park bench, staring into the dark ocean, for more minutes than they could possibly count. Finally, Henry broke the silence. "I just wish you could have brought him back with you… or done… done something. Something while you were changing the past, to make it turn out differently this time. In all of the time travel movies, the hero always finds a way to make it turn out okay." He looked up at Emma, expecting to get a "life isn't always like the movies" speech - only to see her expression change and her eyes dart to the ground. Surprised, he asked, "Mom?"

She dropped her head, her blonde hair cascading on either side of her face, finally realizing the gravity of her earlier request. In that moment, in the vault, her self-protective habits had kicked in – the same habit that had led her to hope Pan had been lying about Neal the prior year in Neverland. Only this time, she realized - unlike at the caves - that habit had actually held the power to make a difference, it wasn't a simple inconsequential hope. And in convincing Rumplestiltskin to drink the forgetting potion, she had robbed her son of a chance to truly get to know his father.

"Mom?" Henry asked again.

Emma looked at him briefly, before dropping her eyes back downward. She withdrew her arm from his shoulder and wrapped it around herself, her own shoulders slumping now, unwilling to lie to her son again, but unable to tell Henry what she had done. She inhaled, then tried a different tack, hoping perhaps he would let the conversation drop. "Henry, it's getting late – we should get you back to Granny's so you can get to bed."

Henry, being Henry, would not be deterred and asked again. "What happened back there… what aren't you telling me, Mom?"

Emma closed her eyes briefly, and began to try to explain. "I – I-" she faltered, unable to come up with anything to say that would explain the situation to Henry. She inhaled, then let out a shaky breath, and inhaled again, trying to find the courage and the words to explain to Henry what occurred in the last moments before she stepped back through the time portal. Finally, hesitantly, she spoke. "I – I told Rumplestiltskin not to," she mumbled, her gaze still firmly fixed on the ground.

"Not to what?"

"Not to change what happened."

The silence in the moments that followed was deafening. It could not have been but a few seconds before Henry twisted out of her embrace and jumped off of the bench, walking towards the beach – and away from his mother. "Henry-" she began, pleading with her voice for him to hear her out.

It was rare – in either Emma's cursed memories or her real ones - that Henry got angry with her, but when he did, he did not mince words. True to form, he spun on his heel and lit into Emma from several paces away. "You were supposed to bring back the happy endings," he started, his voice breaking with emotion. "You're the savior, you're supposed to make everything okay again. And you're supposed to love me most of all – but you took away my Dad! You could have given him back to me, but you were so mad at him that you made him stay dead."

"I'm sorry," she whispered, standing and closing the gap between the two of them. "I'm so sorry, Henry. I didn't mean to, I didn't think it through, I just – it just happened. I just reacted, I didn't think… I'm so sorry," she repeated again, reaching to pull him into her embrace.

"I don't think this is a thing you can fix by saying sorry," he replied, shrugging out of her grasp and wheeling on her again. "You were mad at Dad for leaving you back then – but this is worse. This is way, way worse."

He stormed towards the car, tugging at the handle on the passenger side. "Can you take me to Regina's? I think I'd like to stay there tonight."

Emma nodded numbly, knowing there was nothing she could say to combat Henry's words. He was hurting, this time at her own hand, and she was completely defenseless against his anger. They drove the few blocks to the mayor's house in silence, Emma running their discussion back over in her mind. As she pulled up to the curb and stopped, she softly asked the only question she could seem to formulate. "How did you know it would be by the beach?"

Henry looked at her, puzzled, "What would be by the beach?"

"The castle," she replied, her voice nearly a whisper.

Henry shrugged. "I dunno, it just seemed right."

She sent him a sad smile, seeing for the millionth time how much of his father he had in him. "You know I love you more than anything, right Henry?"

He weighed his options for a moment before answering, finally opting for a simple, "Yeah, I know," as he got out of the car. The lack of reciprocation was not lost on his mother, who watched him climb the front walk to the only home he'd known for his first decade. Once she'd seen him ushered safely inside, accompanied by a confused wave from Regina, she folded her arms over the steering wheel and allowed a few tears to escape, knowing she had failed her son in an irreparable way. The child had an enormous capacity for forgiveness, but this would take a lot – even from him.