#ansbwt001

Regina watched the inhabitants of Storybrooke (her town) walk about to start their Wednesday. For eighteen years, she had bored herself with the same smiles, good-mornings, and day-to-day interactions with the Cursed until she’d had enough – running to the only man she knew who could help. Mr. Gold, the last person she wanted to go to for assistance, found her a child. And that child, her little prince, just-so-happened to have a mother descended from the line of two idiots. (Fate’s a bitch, isn’t it?) Regina wasn’t stupid; her talk with Ingrid – the only person she found solace in – had more than opened her eyes. While her only true friend wanted, needed Emma to stay, Regina was doing everything in her power to get the blonde and her bug to hit the hay.

Until now.

Regina mulled over the occurrences of yesterdays, her eyes fixed on the eyes of the townspeople that her passed by. Still glazed over (much like staggering sleep-walkers) unless spoken to, all eyes indicated only one thing: her success. Yet, Regina couldn’t bring herself to rejoice. Sure, everyone did seem to be walking in the same daze they had done for nearly three decades. Clearly, the curse full of vengeance hadn’t suffered too much damage – but the queen felt a change in the air. Wicked winds in the west, a bitter substance stinging the oxygen that filled her lungs – something was happening to her curse.

Emma Swan was staying.

Henry needed her, Ingrid needed her, and Regina was going to do absolutely nothing to get her to try to leave. When the time came, she knew Emma would pack her bags and ditch her town. Perhaps time was all she needed. Time and patience.

Sunny always liked change because she never got much of it at home. She had always been living in slight fear of her mother, afraid of doing something wrong and being punished for it. It was true, her mother was extremely protective but she was a big girl now who should be free to make her own decisions.

She had always waned to travel, to see other places besides this small town but her mother never allowed her to. Sunny was tired of it and when Emma Swan came to town, she finally stood up to her mother and though all it did was cause her trouble, she was happy that she had finally done it. 

Eight fifteen. 

                      Eight sixteen.

                                             Eight seventeen.

Time was moving again, and you didn’t have to be a genius to notice that the clock reigning over Storybooke had begun ticking because of it. After all, what idiot wouldn’t notice that the hands weren’t stuck at 8:15, anymore? Jefferson had seen it, no, he had felt it; and it had given him something he hadn’t had in a long time – hope. 

Hope that the Saviour would play her part, do what she was always destined to do; break the curse. Because if she succeeded? It meant everyone would remember. Grace would remember. He’d be one step closer to having his daughter back in his arms, and he was going to do whatever it took to make sure that Regina and her pathetic excuse for friends, stayed out of the way. 

But for any of it to work, he needed Emma to believe. Believe that this was all real, that she was the only one that could save them all from the torment that that evil bitch had cursed them with. She would believe. She had to, and he would make her, because if he didn’t then...He didn’t know, and it scared him. Not knowing where the future lies, that this future was in the hands of some woman who, from what Jefferson had heard, was more trouble than was worth.

     James was used to things being the same. Used to the way nothing in life seemed to change--except for the worse. It could always change for the worse, and he had learned that rather quickly. He had no longer held any hope things might get better, that things in his sad life would improve. He drowned away his sorrows almost daily in rum and whiskey, holding an almost permanent seat at the end of the bar in the Rabbit Hole. He walked home drunkenly afterwards, eventually passing out in his bed--or even on the couch, if he couldn’t even make it that far. 

     Until someone new came to town. 

     He didn’t even realize the old clock tower had started moving again; he generally didn’t pay much attention to the happenings of the town; James had no reason to. The town didn’t really like him (or so he felt) and so he didn’t care for them. Not more than he had to. So when things began to change--little things, things he paid no mind towards--James really didn’t notice. 

     But he did notice her. 

     Emma was new, and different than the rest. She hadn’t looked at him like he was nothing, and instead, he’d felt almost connected to her. A strange sense of calming peace that he didn’t know he was missing. That James didn’t know he even needed. He’d drowned himself in alcohol (and even Lacey) for so long in the effort to silence his demons; he’d thought there was nothing else around. No other way to live, than to drown himself away until he died. And yet...