Chapter Text
Chapter 11
In the early morning mists of Storybrooke exists a problem.
"It's me!" Says a voice through the fog. A voice that sounds suspiciously like David Nolan's.
But…
That can't be…
He's dead.
Everyone is presently at a funeral — HIS funeral. "Everyone" being almost the entire town.
About one week earlier, a drunk driver in a truck had T-boned right into the driver's side of David's police cruiser. It was really only seconds after that Death opened the car door and blew the life right out of him with a briskness not too unlike the wind and torrential downpour that snuffed out the resulting fire.
As is custom in this world, the funeral was arranged for as soon as possible. One week later, and here we all are.
This could be their family portrait. All blacks and greys and navy blues. The four of them, standing together. Stitched by proximity but fraying at the seams. Two mothers, separated by a chasm that neither will cross. One holds their three-year-old daughter on her hip with one arm. An arm that is stiff and protective like a shield of flesh and bone. Her other hand rests gently in between the shoulder blades of the other mother. Who's jaw is clenched like it might hold her together. As she stares at the coffin, one hand in her freshly ironed black slacks. The other gripping tightly to their son's shoulder. He is between them. An ungainly figure in a borrowed suit. He hasn't been able to find the courage to look at the coffin — or what's inside — since they first encountered it at the funeral home. And now he's staring down at the wet earth instead. The toes of his scuffed shoes sinking into the mud. His hands balled into fists inside his jacket pocket. He doesn't want to cry. Not here. Not in front of them. He knows from what he's seen so far in his short life that it's not something men do. But no matter how old he thinks he is — or how much he thinks he knows about what it means to be a real man — he's still too young to stop the tears completely as they fall.
They are a shattered triptych. The shards of a life that could have been if events had unraveled in a completely different way. Posed awkwardly in their shared tragedy. A family broken — however inescapably bound — and framed forever by the weight of the loss they share.
There's something fragile in the air. Like the hum from an outlet before a power surge. And it buzzes with the static of that loss. Not just that of the person they are burying. But the version of themselves that could have been unbreakable. And yet, in this moment — amid the rain-soaked soil and the smell of flowers wilting in the cold — they are here. Together. Not healed, not whole, but gathered closely. Though it's not by love nor forgiveness but something heavier, older — an obligation to the dead. And though they barely touch, their shared silence carries the frail, electric tension of a family that was once broken who is momentarily restored by the raw edges of mourning.
Because you see, reader, in order to become unbreakable, you have to allow yourself a moment to break.
Which is exactly what Snow White does the second she hears the voice of her dead husband. The wail she releases is primal, guttural — a sound pulled from the blackest well of human despair. Her voice cracks, falters, then surges again. Louder and more agonized as if trying to drown out the embodiment of his voice to preserve her own sanity, "David!"
He is not dead.
He is also not alive.
He is in a state of quantum decay. Everyone here has spent the better part of the morning talking about him as if he is long gone. And yet here he is — at his own funeral. Talking as if he's made of flesh and bone — like he's part of the living world. But with something off about him. You could feel it in the air. It's thinner, where reality bends ever-so-slightly. He now exists in a permanent maybe. Where he can be alive in one breath and dead in the next. Caught in the kind of loop that is only ever talked about theoretically inside a physics textbook.
"Yes! Snow, it's me!"
Everyone can hear him. But no one can see him.
She collapses to her knees. Arms wrapped around herself as if to keep from splitting open entirely. This is not quiet, dignified mourning. This is something else. Something elemental and untamable. The kind of grief that could burn an entire city to the ground if it had the hands to strike a match. The kind of grief that the former Evil Queen herself knows more intimately than most.
She hands her daughter to the blonde beside her and with a grace befitting royalty drops to her knees next to Snow White. Her hands gripping tightly to the younger woman's arms. Grounding her in this moment. Holding her in her pain in a way that no one had ever done for her. Because she recognizes this. And she knows the loneliness there in it like an unwanted friend. And for some reason — completely unknown to her — she doesn't like coming face to face with it again. Even if she's seeing it in someone else. Even if it's in the face of her worst enemy.
"Where are you? Show yourself. Is this some kind of joke?" She asks, voice practically shaking with all the different emotions eating their way through her in this moment.
"It's me, you guys. I'm right here! Can't you see me?" He answers. But still, no one sees any sign of David. At least, not as they knew him.
But he is there. A paradox wrapped in flesh — or whatever it is that's holding him together. He died one week ago. And yet, he is here. Lingering in the first flush of morning. Alive in a way that doesn't make sense. Like a Schrödinger's Cat that crawled out of the box and refused to pick a side. The living dead or the dying alive — it doesn't matter. He's both and neither.
He is Schrödinger's Man. Stuck between life and death as if both could be true. Maybe they are. Maybe that's the problem.
And you? Well…in your eagerness to prove that you have any kind of say over the fate of these characters and no one can tell you what to do, you leapt from your pedestal and plunged head-first into one of the greatest plot holes ever written.
Good job, reader. You are definitely the one in control of the story now.
I bet the fall even physically feels like motion — a drop, a descent into something that should have an end. Like madness. But then you realize: there's no ground beneath you. No narrative to land on. The plot slips away, unraveling like an old cassette tape, spooling out into the void. You try to remember why you're here. What was the story again? Something about fairy tales? A mystery? Saving people? Killing people? No, that's all wrong — it was never about any of that. Was it?
Your mind scrambles for purchase but the details keep changing, shifting. You fall through a door and end up in the same room. You're stuck. Trapped in this spiraling non-sequitur of a story that is folding in on itself. No beginning, no end. Just the hollow echo of questions you can't remember asking.
What is this?
Well…It's the anomaly in the story. That missing link just out of your mind's grip. A plot hole. No, the plot hole. The infinite plot hole.
And don't you dare think that you can come in and patch any of this up with some sort of sound reasoning or explanation; this devours reason. It's the black pit between intentions. Where characters forget their purpose. Where the timeline unravels and folds like a broken accordion.
And you jumped — head first. Right into the center of it. From here on out, each step forward will be just another step back. Every question will begin to double itself. You can try to grasp the narrative but it will continue to slip through your fingers. Evasive like the tail end of a bad trip; where meaning is an illusion and you're just a ghost haunting the wrong scene.
Here. Where the air is thick with the damp lachrymosity of those who are corporeal cleaving to a ritualistic mourning for those who are not. A fog of candlelight vigil and tear-streaked makeup. And the man whose death they all came to mourn. A man whose death is not even true.
"Come on, guys. I'm right here," David says again, his voice even closer now. And the moment he lays an invisible hand on the shoulder of his wife, she can feel it there. She sobs even harder.
"Regina, what's happening here?" Emma asks, stepping closer to where they sit on the cold wet ground.
"I — I don't know. He's dead. There's nothing strong enough to bring the dead back. Nothing. No amount of science. No magic. I just don't know." She responds. And it's the most scared she's ever sounded. The most unsure.
"Geez. Who's dead now?" Another voice says. Though it comes from a real physical form this time. A person no one knew the status of until this very moment.
And there she stands. Leaning against a birch tree as if she'd been there the entire time. "I really hope this isn't all for little ol' me. Granny knows I'd prefer more of a party than this and I really hope she'd honor that," she rasps. Her voice full of gravel and smirking regret. Her breath rising in sharp clouds that vanish into the grey sky. The golden light of the rising sun framing the scene like some half-forgotten painting.
Then she sees her. Across the street, lit by the flickering fire of a single candle. A silhouette she had memorized by now. The modest black dress. The defiant tilt of her chin. The way her hands are always fidgeting, even when she's holding something, like they don't quite know how to be still.
Belle French. It's been weeks since they've seen each other. Even longer for one of them (given the intricacies of time dilation). You'd expect her to be smiling. But she doesn't. Neither of them do. Smiles are too unreliable for everything they've been through — for this moment.
Instead, the half-forgotten woman crosses the street, slow but deliberate. Her boots splashing through puddles. In seconds that feel more like hours, they are face to face and the world seems to shrink, pulling tight around them. Only a single word escapes — her name, "Ruby," Spoken softly like a prayer, like an accusation, like salvation.
And then they are falling into each other's arms, clutching so tightly that you couldn't say where one of them ends and the other begins. The embrace lingers. Too long. As warmth spreads between them. Something unspoken and delicate and impossibly real. And as they pull apart, their eyes linger too. Belle opens her mouth to speak, the words catching in her throat so that she isn't even able to choke out what it is that she desperately wants to say: I missed you. But that isn't even really it. It's more than that. It always has been with them.
When the words finally do bubble up, it's a dulcet and small, "You're here."
And still not enough.
"I'm here."
And then silence. Heavy and stretching thin over the weeks (yet also months) they hadn't been able to talk. Ruby's hand lifts, unthinking. And brushes against the other woman's cheek so tenderly as if it had always belonged there. And then her lips. Soft. Chapped. Wavering. It isn't romantic. It isn't practiced. It's messy and full of longing. A kiss that speaks louder than their words ever could. A kiss that lasts less than they both feel they deserve. That when they break apart, eyes searching, breaths mingling…it hits them both like a revelation. Oh. It's always been you.
Their surrounding audience doesn't have but a few seconds to process all this new information before a rather large man comes staggering through the darkness of the trees behind them.
"Now jaanu, I told you not to run. You need time to adjust to walking on two legs. It's not something that is natural," he's in the middle of saying as he comes into view.
And gods is he is tall — maybe 6 ft 4. With hair dark and thick and streaked with that hint of grey that whispers of untold stories. His skin a deep, earthy brown that catches in the array of sunlight filtering through the trees. Around his neck is the arm of another — much smaller — man. With hair a bit thinner and skin just as dark. A pair of modern day rounded spectacles over his eyes and a scruffy beard that clings to his jaw, unevenly. As if he had forgotten the concept of grooming but never quite fully abandoned the thought. They're both wearing faded kurtas. With the embroidery at the edges barely visible, like an undertone of something lost to time. Paired with dark trousers that end in scuffed leather boots. A strange combination that speaks of a type of people who are perpetually stuck halfway between two very different worlds.
"Papa!" A younger voice screams as the small girl kicks and squirms for freedom against Emma's grasp.
"Did she just —" Regina asks in disbelief, looking back at them from her place next to a still weeping Snow White. For she had never before heard the child's voice. And wasn't entirely convinced that she had just now.
"Daddy! Papa!" Noemi cries out again with an indomitable clarity as she breaks free of her caretaker's arms.
But as her feet meet the solidity of the earth, she just stands there — small and shuddering in the half-light of the dying morning. The world seeming all too big for her then. With her feet bare — because she refused to wear shoes — and her precious clock clutched in her arms as if it might be the only thing anchoring her to the ground. Across the way the two men freeze.
"Little cub," One whispers. Spoken in a single syllable quavering with disbelief. The other stumbles forward, arms outstretched but unsure. She doesn't run to them immediately. There is a hesitation there. An uncertainty unspoken but heavy between them: Are you really here? Are you still mine? And then, with the suddenness of a ruptured dam, she breaks off into their arms. Her small frame swallowed immediately by the embrace of two fathers that would have never stopped searching for her if that's what it would take to hold her safely in their arms again. And now that she is found, the world around them finally releases its breath.
So does Regina when she pieces together who exactly these strange men are. It's the bear and panther from the other world. Baloo and Bagheera. Noemi's fathers. When they crossed over, whatever magic that binds this place must have transformed them physically into something that the people of this world could more easily digest. As it had with most of the creatures who were transported here by her curse.
She knew this was coming. She has spent countless hours since she'd first arrived home researching and trying to find a way to make this very thing possible. And yet…
There is so much reunion around them. Everyone gaining back a person they'd lost. And at a funeral, no less. For a man who both is and isn't dead. And she just feels…
This overpowering sense of loss all the same. Like yet another piece of her has died. Like that time a certain blonde entered her cursed fairytale town and damn near ruined everything.
A hand grabs at hers and tugs her up from the ground. It belongs to that very same blonde. And deep in her eyes is a knowing look. One that says this is not how it ends. You are not alone in this. And for probably the first time in her entire life, Regina Mills discovers what it means to hope.
She stands in the doorway of the living room, her hands trembling around a coffee cup. Not from the cold. But from something infinitely more profound.
He's here.
After all this time. After all the sharp words and quiet nights. The space between them that grew like a wound left to fester. He's here. The same boy who once filled every room with noise and then, just as easily, drained it all away with his silence. He's home.
It feels like a dream — unsettling, foreign, like something you don't dare touch for fear it'll disappear. Even now she questions it. Because the house is still too quiet — save for the sound of his footsteps upstairs. The creak of the floorboards that once knew the rhythm of his laughter. It's been months — no, a year — since he was last here. Since they lived in the same space as one another without the thick uncomfortable silence choking the life out of them. The months after he left passed after that like a wound that never quite healed. And now, this: his bags, dumped in the hallway next to his shoes, his other mother sitting so casually on Regina's Roche Bobois designer sofa, an unspoken question hanging in the air. Why are they here?
It's a question that burns — that claws — at her throat but never escapes. Is it pity? Is it a quiet surrender? Or are they just tired of running? Either way, she doesn't know how to let him back in, doesn't know how to unfreeze all that space between them.
Emma's loft was always his real home. Where he would always end up. No matter how tightly she clung to him. And she saw how much he came to resent her for that. In the end, he made that choice months ago for the both of them. Chose to walk out. Chose to walk away and never look back. So why is he here now, up in his room reading comic books and waiting for dinner to be served, like a phantom that wandered back into a life he left behind?
She wouldn't ever find enough courage inside herself to ask him directly. So she stands there. In the doorway of her living room. With two cups of coffee. Caught in the quiet. Watching his other mother. Waiting for her to speak. To say something. Anything really.
"Thanks," Emma says tiredly as she takes one cup from the other woman's hand and encourages her to sit on the sofa beside her, "I really mean it, Regina. Thank you for everything."
And she does really mean it. So much so that the words break a little as she says them. It has Regina so taken aback that when the other woman guides her to the sofa by the sleeve of her dress shirt, she follows with an ease that would normally leave her discomfited. Emma continues anyways, "I don't know what happened with the kid. Well, I mean, I do I guess. To some extent. I know he's — David — er, my dad, I mean — He's not dead or whatever. But when we entered the loft after the funeral it just felt — I don't know. Wrong somehow. Think it freaked the kid out. It more than freaked me out. It was his idea to come here though. I just don't want you to think I pushed him into it or anything. I think he just wants to feel something safe and familiar? I really don't know. This is such a fucked up situation. And I don't have the first idea how to help him through this nightmare."
"And you?"
"Me?"
"Yes. Why are you here?"
"I think on some level I get how he feels. I mean yeah, sure. Dad's still technically with us. But there's this emptiness there — at the loft — that I can't — I don't know how to explain. And I'm just kind of…I don't know…bone-tired of feeling empty? Does that make any kind of sense?"
Regina hums her response. But only because she does know. Too well maybe.
"And you? How are you doing with all of this? How are you doing without the little sparrow fluttering around?"
She's talking about Noemi. Who refused to be separated from her freshly found fathers after being away from them for so long. And is presently staying with them at Granny's Inn for the night.
"Ah. I see. That's why you're here," Regina says, heart sinking in her chest, "The Savior. Doing her job. Making sure the big bad Evil Queen doesn't go on a rampage because her daughter was taken from her."
"What? Regina no," Emma replies fervently, grabbing at the other woman's chin to try to get her to look her in the eye and understand the truth, "That's not it at all. I genuinely care about how you feel. I didn't mean to imply anything other than that. Honest. I guess…well…one reason I asked is because I know you are hurting…because…well…a part of me is feeling it too. That loss. I miss her too is all."
"And you want to share that," Regina says, their faces close, "with me?"
"I do share that with you," Emma says just as softly but with a fierce confidence that Regina couldn't break even if she wanted to anymore.
They fall into it slowly. Like the first notes in a song neither one of them knew they needed to hear. Lips meet lips. Warm and soft and hesitant at first — a question more than an answer. But the question unravels quickly. Replaced with something deeper. Something hungrier. The world around them blurs at the edges. Every sound, every thought dissolving into the deep deliberate rhythm of this kiss. That shared gravity between them that always seems to pull them both into an orbit where only the other exists.
Somewhere a distant radio hums a sad forgotten tune. A hymn for lost things and people. But they don't hear it. All that matters is this — the taste of lipstick, and coffee, and longing. And the unspoken truth that Storybrooke — with all its disappointment and misery — cannot touch them here. Not in this moment. Not like this.
Regina clutches at the neckline of Emma's shirt with trembling fingers, pulling her closer. Their kiss becomes wild then. A silent scream of hunger as they push and pull at each other with a force that makes the whole room feel smaller. Like the air is heavier. Like the walls are closing in.
Emma's fingers trace the curve of the other woman's jaw. Her other hand squeezing at the back of Regina's thigh. A silent ask for this. For more. A request that the older woman is all too eager to ameliorate as she kicks that leg out and over the blonde's lap to straddle her. Hands sliding down her neck, pulling her ever closer. As if she could climb into her skin and erase any and all space between them.
They kiss like there is no tomorrow. Like the world might end if they stopped. Their lips desperate and bruising and real. It's not love — not exactly. But something darker, more urgent — that need to be seen. To be felt. To burn together in that hollow place where nothing else matters but this.
You know I'm solid gold
Worship me at the alter what you got to offer
The sound of Stela Cole's Love Like Mine is loud and invasive. Vibrating the room around them with rhythm and bass. And already Regina can feel Emma is about to pull away.
"Don't! Just ignore it," she says breathlessly against Emma's mouth before diving back into their kiss.
It's hard not to obey. With the heat of her skin. The press of their bodies against each other. The way her lips part against Emma's as if opening a door to something far greater than either of them. It's not just passion. It's that very same gravity that has always existed between them. That inescapable pull towards something that is raw and real and infinite.
I'll let you take control
Put your hands on my hips and we'll go baby go
One of them moans softly into the other's mouth. A sound that vibrates down both their spines, pooling low in their stomachs.
Az's small little gay crime hands rest on Regina's shoulder with the intent to help her along. But Emma beats them to it. Her fingers curling around the older woman's waist and pulling down until she is grinding into her lap. It throws Regina off balance, not only because of how unexpected it was, but because of how good it feels to connect with someone else in that way. Even if only for a split second.
She breaks the kiss but can't bring herself to pull away fully. Her arms secure around the other woman's neck, holding her firmly in place. As her forehead comes to rest gently against Emma's. Az's ridiculous music loud as ever in the backdrop.
Brrrr, ra-pa-pa
Baby you'll never find a love like mine
Brrrr, ra-pa-pa
Baby you'll never find a love like mine
I'll make you scream
And I'll make you want it
You can be my ride or die
Brrrr, ra-pa-pa
Baby you'll never find a love like mine
"We've really gotta do something about your fairy-god-demon. Or at the very least set clearer boundaries," Emma breathes out into what little space exists between them.
Regina pulls back. Just enough to really look at the other woman. A smile curls the corner of her mouth — soft, vulnerable, devastating. Her eyes dark and shimmering with emotion as they lock onto Emma's.
"I'm already in so deep with you," she whispers. Her voice trembling. Her forehead, once again, falling to rest against the blonde's.
She responds with a kiss. An answer written in fire and devotion.
"Mom? Ma," Henry's voice echoes down the stairwell, "What's with the music? And why is it so loud?"
The moment they hear their son's voice coming down the stairs they spring apart. Quickly readjusting their messed up clothes and hair. Music still playing in the background, albeit with slightly less volume than before.
"Mom? Ma?" He continues as he rounds the corner into the living room.
Regina turns sharply. A large overemphasized grin on her face. "Yes, my little prince. We can lower the volume," she says as she flicks the little demon in the ear — they don't understand the hint and they won't respond to it, "how about you go set the table. Dinner should be ready soon and we can talk more about it then?"
It doesn't come to her in a single clear epiphany — no grand, cinematic swell of recognition. It arrives jagged, like walking across a bridge of broken glass. Someone shouting in the kitchen, her lasagna just on the cusp of starting to burn sits steaming on the counter, and an old argument — the same old argument — rising up like clockwork the moment she starts to explain Az and Noemi and the magic that is back in Storybrooke.
He's hesitant about magic. And her motivations. She's hurt. And doesn't know how to explain herself in a way he can understand. He's confused and conflicted. She's tired and desperate for…well anything he's willing to give her.
And yet, in the middle of it all, Henry is setting a glass of water in front of her. A sort of unspoken care somewhere in the gesture. And then someone — Emma, always Emma — starts laughing a little too loud. Her crooked smile too familiar now to be anything other than comforting.
The dysfunction is palpable. A living, breathing thing that should repulse her, but instead, it pulls her in. They're messy, sure — imperfect in a way that sometimes aches to watch. But the mess has a shape, a rhythm, and somehow, impossibly, it's made room for her.
The realization is quiet at first, a small flicker in the back of her mind: This is what it feels like, isn't it?
A seat at the table. A place carved out just for her. Not because of blood, but because someone looked at her and decided she was worth loving. She looks around, sees herself mirrored in their eyes, their gestures, their way of folding her into their chaos without a second thought. And for the first time, the hollow ache she's carried for so long feels… distant — muted. She's not an outsider peering in through frosted glass. She's here, inside the warmth. A part of something whole. She's in the crossfire of their squabbles. The center of their careless affection. Not a guest, not a spectator — she's a piece of the chaos now, frayed edges and all. And as she sits there, caught in the noise, she realizes: This is what family feels like.
Broken, but hers.
And here at the end of the infinite plot hole there's still no impact, no crash. Just an endless drop through non-existence. A freefall through scenes that never were. The world above becomes a distant smear, fading into nothing as you spiral deeper. You hear fragments — half-formed dialogue, music from a scene you never witnessed. Familiar faces flicker in and out, like an impression of forgotten moments. But it's all wrong. It's all wrong, and the further you fall, the less you care. You're outside of the plot now. Beyond its reach. A place where time fractures. Bends back on itself. A Möbius strip of meaninglessness. You jumped — and the story forgot you.