"How hard are you trying to bribe him?" I asked Emma. We were in Granny's, after Emma had called Neal and told him the situation. We were hoping Neal could get through to Henry. And if that didn't work, Emma also got Ruby to take a sundae with "extra everything" on it to Henry.
"Hard enough to make him actually talk to me," she replied. "But since that won't work, maybe he'll talk to his dad."
"And you really want him to go to New York?"
"I just want what's best for Henry," she replied. "And if New York is the safest place for him right now while Regina is casting her curse, than so be it."
"I wasn't talking about Henry," I said, walking over to their table. Henry had gotten up.
"How'd it go?" Emma asked Neal.
"Went good," Neal replied. "He said yes."
"Seriously?" I said.
"Yeah! He's in the bathroom right now, just... Than we're gonna go home and pack. Not bad for day three as a dad, if I do say so myself."
"Wait," I said. "Where's his backpack?"
"Well, I don't know," Neal replied. "He took it with him."
"To the bathroom?! Did you really fall for that?" I exclaimed. "He's your son."
"He's running," Neal muttered, and we left Granny's.
"Henry?!" Emma called out. "Henry?!"
We were searching for him in the mines. Ruby had come along, and she was following his scent. The whole Big Bad Wolf thing.
"He was down here," Ruby said.
"Why would an 11 year old kid run away to the mines?" Neal asked.
"Wouldn't be the first time," I muttered.
"I think I know what he was looking for," David said, running over to a red box. "The dynamite the dwarfs use for blasting."
"What the hell would he want dynamite for?" Emma asked.
"To get rid of magic," Neal said.
"What?" I asked.
"At the diner, he said someone should get rid of magic."
"What," Ruby said. "So he's gonna blow it up?"
"But where would he even go to do that?" Neal asked.
"The well!" Emma said. "That we came thought from the Enchanted Forest."
"That you came through," I said, crossing my arms.
"Whatever," Emma said. "We need to get there. Fast."
When we got to the well, Henry
was there. So was Regina.
"Regina!" Emma yelled. "Get away from my son!"
"He's not yours, he's mine. And after I cast this, you'll never see him again."
"That's never gonna happen," David said.
"If you wanna kill Mary Margaret, you're gonna have to go through us," Emma stated.
"Okay," Regina smirked, and formed a fireball in her hand. David ran in front of all of us and cocked his gun at Regina. Before either could harm each other, Henry ran between us.
"Stop!" He yelled.
"Henry," Neal said. "Get out of the way!"
"Not until someone helps me destroy magic!" Henry yelled back.
"There's no way to get rid of it," Regina laughed. "You can't just blow it up!"
"Magic isn't the problem kid," Emma said. "It's her." She held out her hand for Henry to take.
"It's not just her!" Henry protested. "It's everyone! Look what magic did to Mary Margaret!" He turned towards Regina. "Look at what it did to you! It's ruining everything! It makes good people do terrible things."
"And bad people," Emma tried again, reaching out her hand. Henry ignored her and walked closer to Regina.
"Please," he begged. "It's gonna destroy my family. Help me get rid of it."
"I can't do that, Henry," she said softly. "But there is something I can do."
She held up the piece of parchment that had the curse written on it and dropped it into her fireball.
"Thank you," Henry smiled at her, and walked over to Emma, taking her hand and hugging her.
••••••••••
Henry kept me updated on the whole Mary Margaret situation. It wasn't going very well. In fact, it wasn't going at all. Emma decided to go with her theory. Mary Margaret needed to "haul her ass out of bed and get on with it." Apparently Mary Margaret finally decided she was hungry enough to get up.
"Glad to hear it," I told Henry. We were in Granny's, buying donuts for all of us (Neal and Emma included) who were up in Neal's rented room from Granny's.
"Maybe we can get a move on with all this," Henry said. "I just want to forget about all of it."
"I know," I said. "But sometimes we have memories just to remind us not to do something again."
Henry smiled at me. "Yeah. Let's go eat these!"
•••
Back upstairs in Neal's room, it was super awkward. For everyone except Henry and me at least. Neal's fiancée, a pretty and skinny girl names Tamara, had arrived, and she was sitting with us.
"So," Henry said, breaking the silence. "How'd you two meet?"
Neal laughed.
"Um, well," Tamara said, smiling. "I was super late to work, rushing like crazy, guzzling my giant coffee, when this guy crashed into me!" She laughed. "Hot coffee soaked my blouse. There was no time to change, so Neal gave me his scarf to hide the stains. And he said I could keep it or call him if I wanted to return it. I decided to call and, we've been together ever since."
"Sounds like fate," Emma said, smiling such a fake smile. Neal looked up at her but she turned away.
"I've gotta drop Henry off with his grandpa," she said. "Thanks for the bagel."
Emma, Henry, and I all stood up.
"It was nice meeting you, Tamara," I said.
"You, too," she replied.
Neal picked up Henry's book and tried to hand it to him.
"Why don't you keep that," Henry smiled, looking at him and than Tamara.
"Okay, bye man," Neal said, and we left his room.
Haha, back to the two updates a day, yeah? Unfortunately, it won't be like this for long because the weekend is almost over and I have a test about every day this week. I wish it was summer so I could update every day. Sorry for the delay before last chapter! Hope you babes are still enjoying this story.
And I really liked the idea someone said about having Aladdin as a love interest. I've actually thought about that before right when I began this book so it might happen in the future.
Liz xx