#bookbeliever

[nothingeverlost]

Fic: Nature and Nurture (4/?)

Summary: When Emma put her son up for adoption it was to give him his best chance at a family. When Henry comes looking for her ten years later it might be that he’s giving Emma her best chance at family too.

From the prompt: Emma had done precisely two good things: she’d given birth to a beautiful amazing son and she’d given him of before she could ruin him.  Or the one where Belle adopts Henry and we get adoptive mom/bio mom love story that’s healthy.

A/N: This is the one where the shit gets real. I’m really really happy with this chapter.  

____________

The apartment was too quiet.  She turned on the tv, but after a minute of flipping channels she turned it off in disgust, tossing the remote onto the coffee table.  She was restless, the job she’d come home for being over too easily.  She just needed another job to burn some energy and feel more settled, but it was late and nothing would happen until morning, and only then if she was lucky.  Weekends were slow usually if she didn’t have a case already going.

Emma turned on the radio but that annoyed her too, and she turned it off again when the song faded and a commercial began.  It wasn’t the sound she was hoping for.

“Crap.”  She had only been in Maine for a couple of days.  It barely counted as a vacation even, and a forced vacation at that, after being pseudo-kidnapped by her own kid.  It didn’t change anything.  Sure, she knew Henry’s address now. His name.  His favorite food and the type of books he liked to read.  She knew what his mom looked like and how she smiled.  And how her eyes got darker when she didn’t think anyone was looking and she was trying to hide things.

Nothing had changed, though.  

What she needed was something to distract herself.  She changed her top and pulled on her jacket.  At least she could head for the bar down the street and have a drink or three.  Maybe it would help her sleep.  Her phone started ringing just as she was about to turn out the lights.  Emma almost decided to ignore it, but she hoped that maybe it was an after-hours job.  

“Emma Swan,” she answered tersely.  

“My mom’s crying.”

“Henry?”  There was no reason to question who it was; she would have known his voice anywhere.

“She doesn’t know I can hear her, I’m supposed to be asleep, but I know she’s crying.  Something’s wrong.”  He sounded like he was crying too, or at least fighting off tears.  Emma could almost feel and echo of his arms around her waist and his face buried against her when he worried that his mom was sick.

“Maybe it’s just been a long day.”  Everyone had a bad day sometimes, it didn’t have to mean anything.  After all, she was raising a kid and working a job, and things had to get overwhelming sometimes.  

“Ariel picked me up from school because mom had a doctor’s appointment.  She hardly said anything at dinner, not even when I left all my vegetables on my plate.  And she said she was too tired to read to me.  She always reads to me at bedtime.”

Shit.  Emma covered her mouth, taking a deep breath through her nose to try and quell the acid rising in the back of her throat.  

“I’m scared,” Henry whispered.  Emma wondered if it was her imagination or if she really could hear sobbing in the background.  She looked at the time on her cell; it was almost ten o’clock.

“I can’t make it there until almost morning, kid.”

“But you’ll come?”  His voice trembled, but under the sadness she could hear the hope.

“I’ll come,” she promised.

It took her almost five hours, thanks to a never-ending construction project in the middle of town.  Last time she’d only had the bag she kept in the trunk of the car.  This time she’d stopped and packed a duffle with enough for a few days, just in case.  It was three-thirty when she pulled up in front of the salmon-colored house she’d only left a few days before.  All of the lights were off.  After a moment’s consideration, Emma shrugged and leaned back her seat as far as it would go, turned over onto her side and pulled her jacket over herself as a blanket.  It wouldn’t be the first time she’d slept in her car.  Hell, it wouldn’t be the hundredth time.

II

“Emma?”  She woke to the gentle tapping on her car window and Belle standing over her, wrapped in a robe that had seen better days.  She took a moment to stretch before opening up her car door, waiting for Belle to take a step back.  “I thought you went back to Boston.”

“I did.  I was in Boston, and then New York for a night and back to Boston.”  She closed the car door behind her, not worried about making sure it was locked.  After all, this was a tiny town in Maine, not the city.  She leaned against the car and took a better look at Belle.  Her eyes were puffy, her skin so pale it was almost translucent just below her eyes.  “You’re upset.”

“I’m fine.”  Belle wiped a hand over her face as if that would magically change anything.  Even as she tried to square her shoulders and smile a little Emma could see how tired she was.  She suspected the woman hadn’t slept much the night before.

“For a librarian your definition of fine seems to be pretty off-kilter.”  Emma crossed her arms in front of her, avoiding the temptation to reach out and use her cold fingers to try and soothe the skin that looked so sore from crying.  “You could talk to me, you know. It’s not like I have anyone to tell.”

“Let’s go inside before someone calls Graham to report the stranger sleeping in her car.”  It wasn’t a promise to talk, but at least Belle was inviting her in rather than being mad she’d shown up.  It wasn’t yet eight, and a Saturday morning.  Henry, it seemed, was still asleep.  Belle led them to the kitchen.  “Would you like something to drink?”

“I can make it.”  She knew enough about the kitchen to know that there was a jar of instant coffee in the cabinet.  Not her favorite but since Belle apparently was a committed tea drinker she was glad to find that much. The important thing was that it contained caffeine.  “You want some tea?”

“I already have some.”  She refilled the kettle with water, though, and turned on the stove even though microwaved water would have been fine.  Once that was done there was a pile of mail on the corner of the counter that she straightened by a fraction of an inch and a drawing hanging on the fridge that she moved to the side a little.  Her teacup was on the table and she raised it to her mouth and then put it down again without drinking.

“Did you sleep at all last night?”  When the teakettle started whistling Emma turned off the burner so it stopped making noise.

Belle pulled her robe tighter around her.  She looked down, and for a moment Emma thought maybe she’d forgotten the question or wasn’t going to answer.  Finally, she shook her head.  “I don’t know how to stop moving.”

“Yeah, I know.”  She’d been there before, pacing rooms, afraid that stopping meant she’d never be able to start again.  She took one of Belle’s hands in her own.  “Come on, it’s still early.”

Belle followed her up the stairs, though they paused halfway through so she could take a few breaths.  Emma wished she could put it down to exhaustion.  Henry’s bedroom door was closed and silent within.  Belle’s door was open.  The bed was still made, as if she hadn’t even tried to sleep properly.  Two photo albums were open on the bed, a handful of loose photos scattered on top of the quilt.  There were books too, all looking well worn; Emma was amused to see one was a romance entitled Her Handsome Hero.  There were some papers too, with small typewritten font in a start black against the white.  Emma didn’t try to read them.  She did notice the logo of the Storybrooke hospital.

“So the first secret of sleeping in a bed is having enough room to sleep.”  She moved everything while Belle shifted her weight from foot to foot but didn’t leave.  The photo albums from her quick look before closing them seemed to show a younger Henry and a Belle that looked very much the same.  The man she’d seen in one picture downstairs already; Finn Gold.

“Why are you here?”  Belle asked, not meeting her eyes.

“Because I am.”  She turned down the covers, at the same time kicking off her shoes.  She couldn’t remember if her jacket was still in the car or in the kitchen, but the quilt on the bed seemed like a far better blanket and the four hours of sleep she’d gotten didn’t feel like enough.  She contemplated taking the robe off Belle but decided it wasn’t that important, and steered her into the bed.  She went easily enough; the question was if she’d stay.

“Emma…”

“It can wait, okay?”  She didn’t know if Belle wanted to tell her what was wrong, or ask her to leave, or thank her or staying.  She wasn’t ready for any of them.  Emma pulled the blankets over them.  “Just close your eyes for a couple of minutes.  I’ll be right here.”

Belle bit her lower lip but she nodded.  “Just for a minute.”

It was noon before they woke up.

II

Belle woke up slowly, her limbs feeling heavy and her eyes not wanting to focus.  It felt as if she’d rubbed her eyelids with sandpaper and used cotton balls to absorb any last bit of moisture.  When she moved even enough to try and look at the clock her head pounded.  It was almost 12:30 and from the light streaming into the windows that didn’t mean midnight.

“Henry.”  She tried to sit up but her thudding head had her back on her pillow.

“He said something about a sandwich and cake.”  Emma’s voice was scratchy and dry.  The bed moved a little as she shifted.

Wait, Emma was in her bed?  Emma was in Storybrooke?  Belle pressed the flat of one palm to her forehead and tried to focus.  She knew Emma was here, had looked out the window while making her tea and seen the yellow bug that only meant one thing.  Emma had been asleep in the front seat despite the fact that she’d left for Boston days ago.  Emma had helped her into her bed and stayed.  

No one had shared her bed for five years.

“I don’t understand.”  She took a breath and rolled over, giving herself just a moment before daring to open her eyes.  Emma was looking back at her.

“That makes two of us.  Three, if you count the kid downstairs.”  Emma frowned, but she didn’t sound angry.  She didn’t even sound frustrated.  She looked worried, but not in the clinical way her doctor had looked at her.  Like a friend.  “You might find it easier to talk to me first.  Henry’s going to need to ask questions and I don’t know if that’s the first time you want to say things.”

“I wish I didn’t have to say anything.”  Saying things out loud made them more real.  You couldn’t ignore them, once they were spoken.   She remembered her father shaking as he told her that her mother had died.  She’d been the one shaking when she’d held Henry and told him that Finn was never coming home.  Words had power; something that usually meant good but now felt more like a dagger.

“But there’s something to say.”

“Yeah.”  Belle sat up, wincing at the throbbing in her head.  She needed to take an aspirin.  Could she?  She couldn’t remember if they were on the list of things to take or the one to never take.  There were papers somewhere, but she would find them later.  For now she’d just drink some water.  Slipping out of the bed she went into the bathroom and filled a glass with water, then drained it.  She filled it again and drank half of it in a single gulp.  Leaning against the counter she stared at herself in the mirror.  She looked like crap.

“You okay?”  Emma leaned against the door frame.  In the reflection, Belle could see her watching.

“Okay?”  Belle burst out laughing.  She almost couldn’t catch her breath, a laugh that had nothing to do with humor swelling and getting caught in her throat.  “I don’t remember what okay means.”

“Henry called me.  You were crying.”

“I thought I held it in until he went to bed.”  Damn it, she hadn’t wanted to scare him, and he’d been so worried he’d called Emma.  He couldn’t even ask his mom for help; what kind of parent was she?

“You went to the doctor yesterday.”  Gently Emma gave her an opening.

“It’s called cardiomyopathy.  Restrictive cardiomyopathy, if you want to be specific.”  She would never be able to say it all if she didn’t start with the hardest part.  “It’s my heart.  It’s not working very well.”

There was something poetic about the fact that her heart was, quite literally, hardening.  When had it started?  Whale hadn’t had an answer to give to her.  Last night she had looked at pictures of Finn and had remembered how numb she’d been in the months after he’d died.  Logically she knew the heart was a muscle that didn’t actually have anything to do with the ability to love, but at three o’clock in the morning it seemed more reasonable than anything else she’d learned.

“So how do they fix it?”  Emma took a step closer, her eyes not leaving Belle’s in the mirror.  She sounded so certain that there was an answer.  Belle shook her head.

“They might be able to keep it from getting worse.  Diet, exercise, medications.  They might need to do surgery.”  Without noticing what she was doing Belle’s right hand moved to cover her heart.  It felt fine this morning.  

“What happens if it gets worse?”  Emma mimicked her gesture, perhaps just as unconsciously.  Her hand rested on her chest, shielding her heart.

“I might be a candidate for a heart transplant.”  Belle looked down, breaking eye contact with Emma.  A new heart meant someone else dying.  If things got that far it meant her life depending on someone else.  It meant a piece of her being cut out and discarded.  Failure to get a new heart, if it came to that, meant her son growing up without her.

She could feel Emma’s hand on her shoulder before she looked up to see it.  Tears might have threatened to form if she hadn’t been so dehydrated.  “I don’t know if I can do this.”

“I know you can.”  Emma’s hand tightened on her shoulder.  Belle closed her eyes but leaned back a little, into the touch and the warmth.  She was so cold.  “Henry needs you.”

“I have to tell him.”  He’d been so worried that he’d run away to Boston, and she was going to have to confirm his fears.   After months of dismissing everything as ‘fine’ she was going to have to admit that things were a long way from fine.  She was going to hurt him.

“I can stay, if you want me,” Emma offered.

Belle took three deep breaths before she nodded.  “Please.”

[lamagainsensata]

Retomando #leoautorasoct con esta señora que hoy debería haber cumplido años: URSULA K. LE GUIN ✨ . "Si el bosque perece, la fauna puede extinguirse junto con él. La palabra que para los athshianos designa el mundo designa también el bosque." ...✨💥✨... -El nombre del mundo es bosque, Ursula K. Le Guin✨ . . . . . #readgram #autoras #booklover #librosgram #bookstagram #book #libros #booklovers #reading #leoautoras #bookbeliever #cifi #syfy #cienciaficción #inbookwetrust #book #bookquotes #reading #readingtime📖 #inreaderswetrust #scifibooks #scifireads #igreads https://www.instagram.com/lamagainsensata/p/BpNBO4vHxKI/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=g1b8p50jkn20

[innersanity]

I just HAD to repost this beautiful quote and image from @book_believer #bookbeliever It spoke to me in ways that inspire the mind!! LOL gush much??? #Repost @book_believer with @repostapp. ・・・ Hello fellow book lovers! I found this lovely quote from Winter and absolutely LOVE it! 😍 Feel free to repost the quote, and make sure to tag me and use the hashtag #bookbeliever so that I can see your beautiful feeds! It's always fun to make some new bookish friends 😉

[nothingeverlost]

Fic: Nature and Nurture (3/?)

Summary: When Emma put her son up for adoption it was to give him his best chance at a family. When Henry comes looking for her ten years later it might be that he’s giving Emma her best chance at family too.

From the prompt: Emma had done precisely two good things: she’d given birth to a beautiful amazing son and she’d given him of before she could ruin him.  Or the one where Belle adopts Henry and we get adoptive mom/bio mom love story that’s healthy.

_____________________________

She’d never seen a library with its own apartment, but she’d bever seen a place like Storybrooke either.  The town, when she saw it in daylight, looked like a tv set from one of those family shows were everything bad was always resolved in forty-five minutes.  The apartment was above the library, the living room/kitchen looking out over Main Street and the bedroom looking over the street behind.  Apparently the pawn shop she could see from the window was Belle’s too, but she’d hired a manager after her husband had died.  Henry had pointed it out when he’d given her a tour of the apartment.  It was more private than the B&B room, which she appreciated.

It was a pretty busy place, though.  The first time she’d come down the stairs Henry had been waiting for her.  The second time it was the sheriff.

“You’re still here.”  

“Just for a couple of days.  Figured as long as I drove all the way up here I might as well check out the place.”  She didn’t need to mention that Henry had asked her to stay.  “I’m not here to cause any trouble.”

“Didn’t figure you were.”  Graham nodded his head farther down the street.  “I was heading back to the station, any interest in fairly decent coffee and slightly stale donuts?”

“How can I turn down an offer like that?  Sounds like a good breakfast.”  She was meeting Henry at two; she’d promised him time while his mom was in the parent-teacher conference so she could see his ‘castle’ but she didn’t have any plans earlier than that.  It was early enough that Belle hadn’t opened the library yet.  She followed him down the block and helped herself to an apple fritter.  “Is this where you warn me not to get too mixed up in Henry’s life?”

“Why would I do that?”  Graham seemed honestly confused.  “Belle and Henry want you here, clearly.  Belle’s never offered the apartment to anybody else, so that’s saying something.  The only thing I’m guilty of is giving you day-old donuts.”

“I just figured you might worry.”  Emma shrugged.  “Birth parents causing problems, you know.”

“Didn’t even cross my mind.  Besides, I can’t imagine anyone coming between those two.”  Graham poured two cups of coffee, pointing out the sugar and little cups of creamer.  “It’s pretty cool to watch them together; reminds you that there are really good parents in the world.”

“You probably see some pretty crappy ones in your line of work.”  She was glad her job only dealt with adults; she’d seen enough bad parents in her lifetime..

“Occasionally.”  His expression was hard to read; Emma had to wonder if it was the job or his own life he was thinking about.

“What about Henry’s dad?”  She’d seen him in a couple of photos but didn’t even know his name.

“I didn’t know him that well; he wasn’t a very social person.  He doted on his wife and kid, though.  If Gold was laughing you knew that one or both of them were with him.  People were pretty shocked when the librarian married the pawnbroker until they saw them together.”  Graham looked down at his cup.  “I don’t know how Belle would have handled the loss if she didn’t have Henry.  It gave her something to focus on besides grieving.”

“I can’t imagine what that’s like.”  She’d never loved someone so much that their loss would cripple her.  She didn’t allow herself to get that close, not even to Neal.  People didn’t stay around.  She took a bite of her donut.  “You know these aren’t half bad.”

II

“That was delicious.”  When Belle had asked her over for dinner on Saturday she hadn’t been able to find a reason to say no, and was glad.  The fried chicken was amazing, way better than KFC.  Even better than the chicken was the homemade cake.  The food at the diner hadn’t been bad, but it wasn’t anything like Belle’s home cooking.

“Thanks.  I owe it all to my dad.”

“Learned it from him?”  Belle had shown Henry how to mash the potatoes earlier, and then let him do the rest himself.  She’d never thought much before about parents teaching their kids.  Her own cooking skills were pretty well limited to the microwave and maybe scrambling eggs or cooking a steak.

“He burned just about everything, even if you think it’s not possible to burn it, like soup.  I learned from cookbooks I checked out from the library.  It was self-defense, but I found that I liked cooking.”  

“Mom’s the best cook ever.  She could have her own cooking show.”  Henry’s plate was completely cleared, even the broccoli.  Emma had been under the impression that kids didn’t usually eat green vegetables.

“Well since you cooked will you let me at least do the dishes?” Emma offered.

“You’re our guest.  Henry and I can do the cleaning up.”  Belle stood up, but a moment later was back in her chair, landing awkwardly and clutching the arm with both of her hands.  Her eyes were closed.

“Mom!”  Henry’s own chair came precariously close to falling when he stood up as fast as Belle had sat down.  

“I just moved too fast.”  Belle took a few deep breaths before opening her eyes and looking at her son. 

“How about you and I do the dishes tonight, kid?  You can start clearing the table.”  Emma tried to act as casually as she could.  Henry frowned and looked at his mom again before finally nodding.

“Okay.”  He took his plate and cup into the kitchen first.

“Is this the ‘nothing’ you were talking about?  The reason for those tests?”  It wasn’t her place to pry; she’d only known the woman for a couple of days.  Emma certainly wouldn’t have appreciated anyone questioning her on her health even if they were a hell of a lot closer.  Belle was lying, though, and their weird bond of Henry made her more pushy than usual.

“I don’t want Henry to worry.”  She took a sip of her water when Henry came in to collect Emma’s dishes.

“Are you worried?”  She watched as Belle released her hold on the chair slowly, as if testing out her ability to support herself.  It seemed like an answer.

“I’m frustrated.  Sometimes I get out of breath when I climb the stairs.  Sometimes I get dizzy when I stand up fast or stand for too long.  It’s an annoyance more than anything.  Hopefully after the tests on Monday they’ll have a pill or something and I can just move on.”  Belle made sure to sit up straighter when Henry came for her own dishes, taking a last sip of her water before handing it to him.  “Thank you, sweetheart.”

“Are you okay now?” he asked, eyebrows drawing together.

“I am.  I’m going to start a fire in the library, and after you and Emma wash the dishes we’ll have some hot chocolate before Emma has to go, alright?”  A piece of Henry’s hair was sticking up and Belle smoothed it down with her hand.  

“I’ll get out the cinnamon.”  Henry carried the last of the dishes to the kitchen.  Emma lingered in the doorway until Belle stood up and walked out of the dining room without stumbling.  When she entered the kitchen she found that Henry had already filled the sink with water and probably more soap than was strictly necessary, judging by the bubbles.  He was standing in front of the sink without moving.

“Waiting to see if they’ll wash themselves?” she asked.  To her surprise Henry pivoted and threw his arms around her, burying his face in her chest.  He was holding on hard, a grip that might have made her uncomfortable if he was an adult.  She was uncomfortable, but more because she had no idea what to do.  Awkwardly she patted his back with one hand and let her other hand rest on his shoulder.  “It’s okay, kid.”

“What if something’s really wrong?  What if she dies too?”  She could barely hear him, his voice muffled.  She wished she could pretend she didn’t hear at all; she had no answers for him.

“Maybe nothing’s wrong, or it’s something easy to fix.”  It was what Belle believed, or at least what she said.  Emma was usually pretty good at knowing when people were lying, but she couldn’t tell if Belle believed what she said or not.  “Your mom will know more after her tests.”

“I don’t want her to be sick.”  Henry dropped his arms, taking half a step back.

“Pretty sure your mom doesn’t want that either,” Emma tried to tease, but it fell flat.  “Let’s get these dishes done, okay?  We don’t want your mom to think we’re slacking.”

“Yeah, okay.”  He was quiet while she handed him clean dishes to dry and put away until they were down to the last few.  “My mom’s mom died when she was little.”

“That must have been hard for her.”  Emma saved the pots for last.  The one the gravy had been in took the most scrubbing.

“Do you still have your mom?”  Emma winced at the question, and wondered if she should have expected it sooner.  She was glad that she was leaning over the sink and he couldn’t see her.

“I don’t know if she’s alive or not.”  She’d thought about looking, once, especially when she first started working at finding people.  She’d never tried, though.  She wasn’t sure she wanted the answers to the questions she had for the woman that had abandoned her.  “I never met her.”

“Never?”  She felt Henry’s weight shifting and assumed he was looking at her, but she didn’t look.

“She left me in a parking lot.”  Maybe she hadn’t done much better, but she’d asked for him to be with a family and she’d signed the papers to make sure people would be able to adopt him.  

“Alone?”  

“Just me in a box with a blanket.”  The blanket and her name were all she had; she didn’t even know for sure that it was her mother that had abandoned her.  It could have been her father or her mother’s parents.  She’d gone through a phase when she was ten where she’d been convinced that someone had kidnapped her from her parents and had abandoned her.  “Sorry, kid, but if you’re asking about grandparents you don’t have any from me.”

“I just wanted to know about you.”  

Emma spent more time on the pot than was necessary, and didn’t look at Henry until Belle came into the kitchen to make the cocoa.

II

She had to be at the hospital at nine-thirty on Monday morning.  Ariel would be free to spend a good part of the day with her, but she had classes until eleven.  When Belle suggested she drive herself Emma pointed out that she wasn’t going to drive herself home, so that meant leaving her car overnight.  It made more sense if Emma took her.  Belle had to admit that it made more sense. 

“You don’t have to come in,” Belle said when Emma started circling the parking lot looking for a space.  She hadn’t expected more than a drop-off.

“I don’t have anything else to do until this afternoon.”  She’d agreed to pick Henry up from school and watch him until evening.  By then Belle would have a better idea when she’d get home; if it was too late Ariel could spend the night with Henry, like she’d originally planned.  She couldn’t keep asking Emma to do things; she was already being overly generous with her time.  “Unless you don’t want me to come in.”

“I wouldn’t mind the company, actually.  Hospitals aren’t my favorite places.”  When Emma found a place they both got out of the car.  Belle looked at the building looming over them ant steeled herself to walk inside.

“Does anyone actually like hospitals?”  

“This is where Finn died.”  Five years ago she’d gotten the call that he was here.  He’d lived long enough to say goodbye, but she’d left the hospital alone.  It was the first time she’d had to return, something that she hadn’t thought of before.  It made it that much harder to make herself go inside.

“Damn.  I’m sorry.”  Emma slouched a little more than usual. Looking down at the ground.

“I am too.”  They’d had eight years together.  It wasn’t enough.  Belle looked at the building before her and took a deep breath.  She didn’t have a choice, she needed to go in.  She squared her shoulders and pressed her lips together.  “Let’s go.”

II

It was after six when Ariel drove her home.  She was exhausted, though other than a stress test she hadn’t done much physical.  She felt like a pin cushion too.

“You’ll call me if you need anything, right?” Ariel asked as she pulled up in front of the house.  It looked as if every light on the first floor and a good many of the ones on the second floor were on; Henry had a habit of forgetting to turn off lights when leaving rooms.

“I appreciate you being there today.  It was certainly a lot more entertaining than it would have been by myself.”  Ariel’s cheerful patter had distracted her during and between tests, except for the few times she hadn’t been allowed in the room. 

“You know I’m always a phone call away, sweetie.  Plus that doctor of yours is cute and who better to catch a Whale than a swimming coach?”  Ariel flirted and teased almost as much as Belle’s doctor; she had no way of guessing if her friend was serious or not, but it made her laugh.  Belle suspected that was the point.

“Goodnight, Captain Ahab.”  Belle climbed the stairs to the front porch, pausing to wave to Ariel once the door was open.

“Mom.”  Henry came out of the kitchen moments after she closed the door behind her.  She was lucky that he was still fond of hugs, and wrapped his arms around her.  She rested her chin on his head for a moment and wished she could hit a pause button for just a little while.  

“Hey sweetheart.  How was your day?”  

“I showed Emma the arcade and dad’s shop and the ice cream parlor and the library but she said she’d been there already.  We picked up some pizza on our way home.  We were just eating.”  

“I’m sure that’s not your usual but cooking isn’t exactly a talent of mine.  It was that or burgers.  There’s plenty still.”  Emma leaned in the kitchen doorway.  She didn’t ask how the day went but Belle could see the question clearly in her eyes. 

“It sounds like a good afternoon.  I hope you remembered to say thank you, Henry.”  He was a sweet boy, but like all kids sometimes needed a reminder about manners.  

“Uh huh.”  Henry leaned his head against her shoulder.  “I can microwave some pizza.”

“Thank you, sweetheart, but I think I’ll just have some tea right now.  I had something at the hospital.”  The something had been a very unsatisfying sandwich a couple of hours ago but her stomach rolled at the idea of pizza.  “It’s a school night and you need to take a shower before bed.  Say goodnight to Emma, okay?”  

“I have to head back to Boston tomorrow.  I have a job.”  Emma looked down the same way Henry did when he didn’t want to say something.  “I could do breakfast at the diner first, though.”

“But…”

“We’d like that, wouldn’t we Henry?”  She knew he wanted to argue, to find some way to convince Emma to stay longer.  It was her fault for not talking to him about the fact that Emma had only promised Monday, but she’d been so preoccupied with her appointment at the hospital.  It was over now, though, and other than waiting impatiently for the results she could focus completely on what was most important.

“What if…” 

“Shower, kiddo.”  Belle gently nudged him towards the stairs.  “You can say goodbye properly tomorrow.”

“I should have told you before I told him, shouldn’t I?”  Emma asked once they heard the bathroom door slam upstairs.

“I don’t think it would have gone over well no matter who told him.  He likes you, and he tends to latch on hard to people he likes.”  There had been a point when she’d worried she might have to have him repeat kindergarten because he was having a really hard time leaving Mrs. Goose behind.  He still stopped by to see her sometimes.  When he’d been seven it had been his swimming teacher Ariel; at the end of summer they’d invited her for dinner and had been friends ever since. Belle figured it was part of losing his dad so young, though his connection to Emma was of course something a little different.   “I know this was all dumped on you suddenly this week but if you’re open to it I know Henry would like to stay in contact with you.  It doesn’t have to be much, maybe e-mails once in a while, unless you want more.  And you don’t have to make a decision now if you want to think about it.  I know it wasn’t part of the deal originally.”

“I’ll think about it.”  Emma’s answer sounded more like a no than a yes; Belle hoped she was really going to think about it, as much for herself as for Henry.  She seemed lonely.

“Thank you for everything you did for is this week.  I’m glad we got to meet you.”  She’d wondered before, about the woman that had given birth to her son.  It was good to have a few answers.

“It helps, you know.  Seeing you two together, I know I did the right thing.  This is what I wanted for him.”  Emma’s hands were in the pockets of her jacket.  It seemed almost defensive armor, the jacket protecting her from more than just the cold.

“I love him more than anything in the world.”   She glanced but the stairs where she could hear water running. After Henry got out of the show she’d read him a story and soothe his sadness as well as she could.  She’d watch him sleep a little because it made her feel better.  “Thank you.”