CS AU Week // Monday July 18th // Complete AU // Pregnancy AU
this idea was inspired by @alchemistc and i promised i would finish it before my own kid was born – and i did!
“Granny has a habit of picking up strays,” Ruby whispers to Emma on her first day working at the diner, blood red lips parting in a kind smile before scooping three plates from the counter and expertly carrying them to a booth. Emma blinks in confusion, wondering if the head waitress’s comment was an insult, a compliment, or a fact, but the entrance of another family forces her to shake the moment off and return to the frantic duties of learning how to be a waitress.
But it takes her only a few days to recognize that Ruby, the granddaughter of the diner’s owner, was just stating fact. It seems that most of the regulars are outcasts, weirdos, and people who don’t quite fit the picture-perfect mold of this little picture-perfect town Emma stumbled into. Emma doesn’t quite fit the mold herself, being an 18-year-old high school dropout with a record for running away from foster homes. Storybrooke is just the latest in a series of places to lay her head, a sleepy hideaway from the ex boyfriend who tried to frame her for some watches he stole, leaving it up to her to sweet talk her way out of the compromising position. Getting the hell out of town was the best way Emma knew to never see the scum bag again, and a “Help Needed” sign in the window of a picturesque diner was just the miracle she was looking for.
But waitressing is shaping up to be harder work than Emma had figured, and she finds herself exhaustedly crawling into the bed in the room Granny’s offered at a reduced rate. Her whole body is sore from the constant movement – her legs, her arms, even, strangely enough, her breasts. Emma shares a bathroom with all the occupants on her floor, but she learns their schedules and takes it upon herself to soak late at night in the tub, hair pinned haphazardly on top of her head as she sighs in pleasure.
A month into Emma’s new job, as she starts to understand the mechanics of Granny’s and the intricacies of small-town living, she pulls open the calendar app on her phone, counts backward, and stops three weeks further than she should have. Her thumb scrolls back to today’s date, she counts again, and swears violently.
Never before has Emma Swan wanted a cigarette so badly.
this family we build
Published
It All Starts With a Dance 