Authors Notes: This story might take a few chapters until it focuses entirely on SQ, I hope you'll stick around to read it! I'll most likely be doing weekly updates on Friday evenings but that could possibly change. I don't own anything Once Upon a Time related. Enjoy!

Soundtrack: Lupercalia by Valentines Day

Chapter One: What If's and If Only's

It had been three days since she returned from her time traveling adventures in the Enchanted Forest. Three days since she recreated the moment her own parents fell in love. Three days since seeing Rumplestiltskin in all the glory of golden alligator flesh. Three days since witnessing the terror the Evil Queen wrought upon that land. Her homeland. Three days since attending her first proper ball. Three days since she climbed through yet another portal and back into the arms of her family.

Three days since she irrevocably ruined Regina's life.

Again.

And in those three days, Emma had done little besides laze about in bed with a bottle of vodka at her side trying to drown out the words Regina had spoken to her with the potent liquid. Yet it seemed her efforts to inundate those hateful words only weighed her down more. A suffocating pressure imploded on her, ensconcing her in a tomb of her own unjustified guilt. And so she lay there in bed as the guilt washed over and around her, gently coaxing her further from the shore until it disappeared entirely.

But her intentions had been good. She didn't want to see an innocent woman suffer at the hands of tyrannical queen. She wanted to be the Savior that everyone tried so hard to convince her she was. And rescuing that woman with whom she'd developed a spark of comradery had made her feel like the Savior. It was an entirely different feeling that what she'd experienced before. She supposes now that this is due in part to this action being her own. For once, her decision had not been predetermined by some fate or storybook. Saving Marian had not been foreseen, written, or forced. She made the decision, finally knowing what it felt like to do the right thing. Finally knowing what it was like to be the hero…the Savior.

Yet despite her intentions and heroine complex, she succeeded in only causing more pain. More suffering. Perhaps the innocent woman should have been left to the hands of the Evil Queen. Maybe then she wouldn't have this feeling saturating her every thoughts like a wet blanket. Maybe then, this guilt wouldn't be eating away at the very fiber of her being until only a carcass of the person she wanted to be remained; nothing but a picked over meal for the buzzards.

Emma awoke on the fourth morning in much the same fashion as the previous three – with a mouth sour and dry from drink and a throbbing headache a la carte. The incessant wailing of an infant permeated through the floorboard of her bedroom. Emma groaned as she rolled over in bed and tried using her pillow to muffle Neal's crying. Given the intensity of his screaming, Emma knew she wouldn't be falling back to sleep anytime soon; little baby Neal was quite the screamer and Snow and David were still trying to get a firm grasp on this whole parenting thing.

Emma lay there for a moment longer feeling Neal's cries pierce through her skull and bore into her throbbing brain. And when the child's cries became too unbearable, Emma reached over to the nightstand, groping blindly until her fingers found the cooled surface of a glass bottle. Her spine cracked in protest as she pushed herself up into a seated position on the small twin-sized bed. Blonde hair hung lifelessly limp over her shoulders as slender legs crossed themselves into a pretzel. Emma gave the bottle a good shake in an effort to discern the ratio of vodka left undrunk. Muscled thighs held the slender bottle as one pale hand worked to unscrew the cap and the other wiped midnight sediment from her eyes.

The crystalline liquid burned against Emma's dry mouth as it trickled into her empty stomach. She took a few small sips from the bottle before replacing it on the nightstand, next to her open laptop. Emma tapped the mouse to resume the music that had been playing before she fell asleep just a handful of hours ago.

Soft, delicate notes of an acoustic guitar floated from the speakers, filling the air inside the four walls of her old room. Back when it was just her and Mary Margaret. Back when Henry was the crazy kid with an over active imagination. Back when Regina Mills was just the town's bitchy Mayor. Before the curse was broken. Before the wraith and that whole fucked up journey. Before Hook and Operation Save Henry. Before Zelena the envious witch. Before Marian.

There it was again. That thought. That person who was to blame for her current misery. For lack of a better way to cope with her anger and guilt over the entire situation, Emma grabbed for the bottle once more. Only this time she took a drink much heartier than her previous sips. Her thoughts drifted about in a drunken stupor, her feelings faded into a conglomeration of anguish. And soon she couldn't even tell the difference between her anger and her sorrow. She simply felt…heavy. Heavy with a relentless despair which held her captive in this constant state of drunken wallowing.

A fair hand gently shook Emma's shoulder, nudging her from the merciful nap that she had just recently fallen into. Malachite eyes opened slightly to see the rounded face of her concerned mother looking down at her. Her eyes gleamed of sadness, her thin pressed lips expressed disapproval coexisting with understanding.

"Sweetie it's nearly four in the afternoon, it's about time to get up," Snow said with a forced smile.

Emma groaned and pulled the blankets over her head while rolling away from the raven-haired woman.

"Go away," she mumbled from beneath the sheets.

"Henry will be coming over for dinner this evening," she said as cheerfully as possible. "He'd really like to see you. He's been asking about you, you know?"

"Tell him I'm sick," Emma grumbled.

"He's a smart kid…"

"I know."

"So…he'll know something's up. He saw you…the night you got back. You were anything but sick."

"Well now I am," Emma huffed, throwing the sheets back from her face in irritation to meet her mother's gaze. Who would've thought that having parents would be so annoying?

"With what, Emma!?" Snow asked as she threw her hands in the air.

"I dunno…bird flu, swine flu…fucking chimera flu…what does it matter. Just tell him I'm sick and leave me alone." Emma said, burying her head in the pillow hoping that Snow would take the hint.

After a long moment, Emma felt the bed rise slightly and the springs creak in appreciation from the reprieve of Snow's added weight.

"This can't go on forever, Emma," Snow sighed as she walked towards the bedroom door. When Emma didn't respond, Snow continued. "I know how you're feeling. The guilt; it's a heavy burden to bear when you've hurt someone. But…you can't keep going on like this. You have to find a way to overcome it. If not for me or for yourself, then do it for your son. He needs you."

Emma heard the door handle turn and seconds later the latch click back into place. She knew Snow's words were supposed to be encouraging, to help her find strength but they only made her feel worse. Worse about not seeing her son. Worse about wallowing about for days in a drunken haze. Worse about not having showered for two full days. Worse about the accumulating collection of vodka bottles beneath her bed. Worse about everything.

The afternoon hours slowly bled into the evening and then into darkness once again as the moon rose to her stygian throne. It was nearing midnight by the time Emma had finally gotten herself out of the bed. And with her current bottle of vodka completely empty, she looked for ways to keep herself from thinking…from feeling.

It started with pacing. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth until soon the floorboards began to groan from the repetition of her constant motions. Then came the nail biting and leg bouncing as she sat by the window staring out at the lifeless town of Storybrooke.

It was so different from New York. New York was lively and entertaining. A place where you could walk down the same street everyday but discover something new each time. It was busy and crowded. People shuffled about in their daily lives too consumed with their phone calls or meetings to even pay attention to anyone else. But that's not to say it wasn't a nice place. She had a well-paying job and colleagues who she genuinely liked. And Henry had friends. So many friends in fact that she found it difficult to keep their names straight.

She was happy.

Henry was happy.

And this was only supposed to be a business trip. A quick little break of a curse and then she'd be gone. But as it turns out, leaving Storybrooke was harder than she'd imagined. While the other residents seemed hell bent on getting out, Emma found that – magical town line or not – leaving was ten times harder than coming.

Everything that she had ever wanted was here. She found the family that was once lost to her. She found her son after 11 years of wondering who he was. She found friends and as eclectic as they are, she cared deeply for them.

That's what made all of this so damn hard. It was the fact that she cared. She'd developed relationships and of all things – roots. So when her own mother looked at her like she was a failure, it hurt. And when her father came home in the evenings too exhausted to even change Neal's diaper because he was doing the work of two people, she felt like shit. And when the texts from Henry came through asking her what she thought of various apartments, she felt like a failure.

Because while she lay in bed trying to drink away her misery, the people she cared about – her family – they still needed her. And she couldn't even put her feelings aside for one fucking minute to be there for them. If she didn't care so much for her friends and family, none of this would be so hard. She would have already packed her bags and would be on the interstate back to New York.

She used to think that love was strength.

But maybe Regina was right all along.

Love is weakness.

Because that's what all of this came down to. Love. The amicable relationships she'd built with everyone in town were rooted in one common emotion; love. It always came back to love.

It is not entirely lost on her either that she harbors some feeling towards the town's soon-to-be ex-mayor. How could she not after the ordeals they went through? Perhaps she will not go so far as to say she loves the woman. But she also knows that at minimum she cares about her. And that's precisely why all of this is so hard.

After months of being at one another's throats they had finally developed some sort of unspoken yet civil understanding. Though this is a fact that neither woman commented on, they both knew to be true. She tried so hard build their relationship into what it is, rather, what it was before she made the decision to bring Marian to Storybrooke.

If only she could despise the woman like she used too…

Now, they're back to square one. Perhaps even worse this time.

If only there was a switch she could throw that would turn off the part of her that cared. To return her to her former self before she'd developed these attachments to the people in Storybrooke. To let the guilt from her veins.

If only she could not care.

If only…

Emma sighed and pulled out her cellphone, the LED screen casting a ghostly aura onto her already pale skin. She tapped through her contact list until highlighting Regina's name and clicking the message button. The cursor flashed like metronome. Each flash mocking her indecision to type a message, the blank screen a testament to her own uncertainty.

Emma chewed on the inside of her lip as she thought of exactly what she was about to do, of what she was about to ask. It would be irreversible. But it seemed like the only way to make things better. She didn't see any other options. She needed to do this, needed to let go, needed to be let go. Seconds ticked by but still the blonde had yet to type a single word. She sighed and gently set her phone on the windowsill, opting out of such a high-stakes decision while drunk and craving even more drink. Being just past midnight, Emma would have to wait until morning to restock. In the meantime, she'd try to sleep. And this time she hoped for more than just a few hours of tossing and turning.