Dream Catcher Dream Breaker

Chapter 5

August and Neal were up very late. By the time he got up, it was already 2:00pm. Neal missed his brand new job. Neal would have been upset, but this was another job as a janitor, a job he could find anywhere. Neal was job searching anyway to find something with better pay and was a bit more entertaining. He took his phone out, one missed message from a number and area code he had never seen before. Hopefully, it wasn't a spam call; he despised those. It was a lousy con, would barely work, so why even bother when there was a store across the street?

Neal sat himself down with a cup of black coffee and played the message.

"Neal Cassidy, I found a notebook of yours at Granny's Diner. You have some interesting content which I would love to talk to you about. Visit Storybrooke as soon as you can; I'm surprised we never bumped into each other while you stayed. This is Mayor Mills."

Neal dropped his mug on the floor. Crap. Forget about the coffee or shards, the Evil Queen knew. Neal knew that notebook would get him in trouble; he kept mostly records of who he wanted to help each day with little notes about who he thought they might be in the Enchanted Forest. It would have been a bit much to memorize, and Neal figured it would be helpful for him to have in the future as he left there as a kid. Kind of hard to convince Emma of something Neal didn't know the details about.

Neal took a broom out of the closet and began to sweep up the broken pieces. He would be having his weekly call with Emma very soon. Did Neal mention Emma in the notebook? He hoped not, that would make the Queen go after her.  August would know what to do.

But August was out. So he took out his phone and called the prison.

~~~

Emma was brought to the phone room again; she noticed a few other prisoners on the phone in intense conversations. Some looked ready to cry, and others looked ready to punch a wall. Emma went over to the phone assigned to her and picked up the phone, "Neal?"

"Emma, how are you feeling? What's wrong?" Neal queried, he sounded both worried and suspicious. Emma realized Neal wouldn't believe the food allergy issue after the fact; she wished she was as good at Neal when it came to improv.

"Just a stomach bug. No need to fret. Just your average puking and bathroom breaks. Along with some...period cramps. I wasn't going to give August the real details. It's a bit personal." Emma wished she planned this out in advance. One thing she learned, when you add in uncomfortable details, for example, being on your period, people are more likely to believe lies.

She heard Neal let out a sigh of relief, "Thank goodness, I thought you had some sort of serious medical thing you were hiding."

"Nope. Nothing so serious. I'm being taken care of," Emma insisted. Nothing serious like growing your freaking fetus, she thought. "The doctors haven't called you or August, right? HIPAA and all that?"

"They haven't called me, not sure about August. I can ask if you want." Neal suggested.

"Please do." Emma decided to change the topic; this was the only time they had this week to speak after all. "How's your day going?"

"Well, last night August and I were up pretty late talking. It felt like a sleepover mixed with high school games. Like instead of  who kissed who gossip, he was asking me if I've ever given you alcohol." Neal felt exhilarated just thinking of the night before.

Emma laughed, "alcohol? I'm scared to know what else he asked about. Was I the focus of all of this?

"He did hint at knowing we've slept together. I told him nothing, I promise." Neal sounded apologetic

"Wish I could have been there spilling your secrets. Like how you loathe drinking songs." Emma threatened, "Or how you love to window shop unique looking knives." She loved when Neal acted soft like a marshmallow, Emma felt butterflies. It was so rare but wonderful.