Once Upon A Happy Beginning

Chapter Thirty-Four: Parents and Curses and Crocodiles, Oh My!

Emma

Mom says my name. Softly. A whisper. Emma. My name. Just my name. 

I rush towards her and Dad and wrap my arms around them and sob. Dangerously. 

I feel like a small child, a little girl running to her Mommy and Daddy because someone's being a meanie at school. I choke out those childish names and feel Dad tense up. Realistically, he's actually a year and a half younger than me so it's always been odd picturing them as people who'd genuinely have to baby over me. The Killians collapse behind my head. I smell my husband's scent around the desk chair behind. I don't know where Hook is. Dad's hand presses me to the joint of his and Mom's shoulders and Mom pulls Henry into our hug. Killian sobs behind us. Our daughter is gone. Really gone. Truly gone. 

"Mommy... Daddy..." I cry, arm curling around my boy. If I've lost one kid, I need to keep this one as close as possible. 

"We're here Ems. We're all here." Dad tells me, his thumb still stroking my hair. 

"Gold stole her. Elizabeth. He took her." I whisper softly, and Mom rattles a small cry. I know it's Belle who's taken to the corner to sit by herself. Belle. I didn't notice her before I heard her sniffle. Belle, whose husband has ran off with my baby. "He should pay... He has my baby girl... my Elizabeth."

I let my parents hold me close as Regina battles to get a story out of my husband. He's afraid to talk. Afraid to answer. Hook mumbles phrases like: 'The Crocodile'; 'More than a hand, more than a girl'; 'The Crocodile deserves to die'. 

"I thought he'd changed..." Killian whimpers. Whimpers. Everyone pauses, my love's never been this vulnerable. He screams now, narrowly missing Granny with a flying bottle of rum. "I THOUGHT HE CHANGED! STILL." He takes a heaving breath and punctuates each word in his next sentence with one. "THE. SAME. BLOODY. CROCODILE!"

"That bastard's never going to change, brother." Hook tells him seriously, pain stretching through his voice. I don't even think to question the 'brother', and I know no one else does. No one else questions Killian's double.

"What... What happened?" Belle asks gently. "I need– Please tell– What did he do?" 

"Talk to us Mom, Dad." Henry encourages. "Please."

Eventually through rattled breaths and soothing words from each other and our family and friends the three of us piece together what happened in the Enchanted Forest. Killian's hand strays to mine when I find myself on his lap, my tears christening his shirt rather than my father's. As Hook finishes the tale of how he found out about us, he pauses. 

"What happened next?"

I pause, I don't know. We got to the Dark Castle, just us, we left the crew behind, and then... "I don't remember."

"Me neither." Killian says.

"There was smoke. Green smoke." I say, picturing clouds of bustling smog. 

"It sounds, Emma," Zelena tells me. "Like you've been cursed."

"Cursed?" Jack Sparrow's eyes bug out of his head. "You were only telling us that stuff, lassie. Only telling us."

"No, no Mr. Sparrow–"

"Captain Jack Sparrow, if you will."

"Very well," 'Gina continues, "My sister and I have had a fair involvement with cursing members of this town, especially if it requires you to forget certain things."

"Cursed?" I ask, looking at my best friend. "Do you think that's true?"

"Almost definitely." Zelena says, without even blinking. 

Cursed?

Do you agree with Killian? Was there potential for Gold to have changed? Or do you agree with Hook?

Happy 2022, wishing you all a healthy New Year.

Not that I started out right... Caught Covid on Boxing Day... Merry bloody Christmas! I'm okay though, but my thoughts are with all those who don't have as easy a time as I did.