Ten Years- Once Upon A Time- ON HOLD

That Was Regina

Emma woke up the next morning to see the town full of people. Neal was still asleep, so Emma decided to wait until he woke up to get out. She watched everyone in town getting along with their day.

The diner was opening, and an old woman was arguing with a girl in a short skirt and tied up shirt while putting up a sign outside. A woman with chin length, dark hair walked past, looking bored, and bumped right into a woman wearing a hat over short, black hair. The second woman kept apologising to the first, as if she was scared of her. The first woman almost didn't care about it, and just carried on walking.

Emma decided to get out of the car and talk to the second woman, to find out what just happened.

"Hello? Excuse me?" She ran over to the raven haired woman.

"Oh, hello!" She said, "Can I help you?"

"I was wondering if you knew anywhere for me and my boyfriend to stay? Like a hotel or something?"

"You could always try Granny's." The woman said, "This is her diner, you could ask her now. Where did you stay last night?"

"Crashed in the car." Emma said.

"You slept in your car?"

"Yeah. Hey, who was that woman you bumped into?"

"Oh, that was Regina. She's the mayor." The woman said, not too happy with the change of subject.

That might explain why she was scared of her, Emma thought.

"I'm Mary Margaret, by the way, Mary Margaret Blanchard." The woman introduced herself.

Emma paused. Should she tell her her real name? The whole point of coming to Storybrooke was to keep their identities, but if they wanted to move somewhere else everyone here would know who she was.

She decided to go for it. "Emma Swan."

"Nice to meet you, Emma. Now listen, I've got to get to work, but if you need anything I work at the school up the road."

"Okay, thanks." Emma said, and with that Mary Margaret was gone.

"Who was that?" Neal's voice asked from behind her.

Emma turned to him, "Mary Margaret. She said that the woman who owns the diner also has somewhere we could stay. Come on, I'm starving!"

She dragged him into the diner. It was quite empty in there, just a few people. They took seats at the counter. Standing on the other side was the girl who had been arguing with the woman Emma guessed was Granny. Close up, she could see that the girl had red streaks in her hair.

"Hi, I'm Ruby. What can I get you?" She asked.

Neal didn't say anything, he just stared at Ruby.

"Neal!" Emma punched him on the shoulder, "We'll just have two lots of pancakes."

Ruby nodded and walked over to the kitchen.

"I don't want pancakes!" Neal said.

"Well maybe next time you should order instesd of gawping at the waitress!" Emma retorted.

"Fair point." Neal said.

A few minutes later, Ruby brought over their breakfast. Neal payed her with some of the money from the watches he'd sold, an she turned to walk away.

"Hey, Ruby!" Emma called, "Before you go, I've heard that Granny has an inn as well or something. Could we get a room?

"Really?" She seemed shocked as she got out a notebook and pen, "Can I have your names please?"

"Emma Swan." Emma said. 

"Ok, and you?" Ruby pointed to Neal.

"Neal Cassidy." Neal added.

"Great. Let me just get your key. how long will you be staying?"

"We're not sure. As long as it takes for us to find a place." Neal said.

"That's fine. Stay as long as you need." Ruby said, going to get their key.

They finished their pancakes quickly, got their key from Ruby and decided to explore Storybrooke.

But the whole time, while they were looking around, Emma kept on thinking about how she didn't want to be there. She wanted to be living with Neal in Tallahasse, or somewhere in Canada. But something felt odd about this town. Maybe it was the fact that the clock hasn't moved from 8:15 since they got there. Maybe it was the fact that everyone seemed overly friendly, except for Regina of course. Maybe she just didn't like that Neal had been so happy to abandon their dream.

Whatever it was, she didn't really like Storybrooke.