Summary: She wishes he could say her name forever. Woodenswan.

Disclaimer: I don't own OUAT, obviously.

Sway

I'll wait for you to find me again. So don't take too long. [Nalini Singh]

She sees him first.

It's from a distance, and he doesn't look quite right, the wooden man whose marble eyes she'd watched fade and die in his bed at Granny's so many months ago. The memory pushes her forward, and his name tears from her lips as she forces her body to run faster.

She's not losing him.

Not today.

She's entranced by this man, this stranger who rode into town with his odd box and his disarming smile and gorgeous blue eyes.

She'd rather drink poison than admit it, but she is.

She watches as he slips his helmet off, across the road. Watches as he dismounts his bike, swaggers up to her and her son with an easy grin and glinting eyes. And she knows she should probably feel suspicious (he practically radiates mystery, this one, and she's not a stranger to these kinds of guys) but she doesn't. She's not sure what she's feeling.

"Hey," he says, so easy. His blue eyes shift up her body, almost intimately, definitely not even close to the realm of appropriate, not with the ten year old standing next to her. They latch onto hers after a languorous up-and-down that has heat pooling in the pit of her stomach, his twin pools of clear, cool blue boring into her own dark green eyes. She feels something inside her chest begin to warm up and respond to this stranger's gaze, her heart thumping faster and faster.

Her head spins with the déjà vu Mary Margaret bumbles about whenever she's with David. She pushes that comparison away almost as soon as it makes itself known, but she can't shake the feeling that's suddenly embedded itself in the back of her head. She knows this guy.

But from where?

Her head spins and tries to latch onto the plethora of logical possibilities—maybe he was in Boston or maybe he's a convict or hell, maybe he's a stalker—she doesn't know, but none of those hurried, unlikely excuses feel right. She struggles for answers in her own head, blinking owlishly at him and realizing a bit belatedly that he probably wants a reply to his hello.

"Hi," she says.

She drops to her knees beside him before even Marco can, her hand subconsciously finding his.

Marble blue eyes stare up at hers, conveying all the things he never got a chance to say, everything he's ever wanted to say and always will. All the unspoken declarations and apologies and sleepy, incoherent mumblings on Sunday mornings and the fights they never got to get into. All the days that never were.

I love you, he wants to say.

I know, she mouths, her lips moving just enough for him and only him to see.

She squeezes his hand and doesn't think he can feel it.

He's only been in town two weeks and he's driving her insane.

She trusts him, a little bit, right now. She doesn't give it out easily, her trust, but he has it, and they barely know each other. She'd handed it over like extra change the day she'd learned his name, the day he showed her that stupid box. It's not like she thinks he's a serial killer or anything—or, at least not anymore. He was an arrogant flirt but he wasn't too bad of a guy. A bit enigmatic, probably.

And that was exactly what drove her up the wall. She thought all the mysteries would stop with the stupid box and his need to get a drink with her.

Well, she'd thought wrong.

Typewriter wrapped in an enigma wrapped in stubble, she thinks, watching from across the street as he exits Granny's, stopping when he sees her, a slow smirk stretching his lips. Damn that smirk. Damn those lips. Damn everything about him.

"Hey, Princess," he calls cheerfully, taking a cursory glance around the street to make sure there are no cars coming before jogging up to her.

"Don't call me that," she snaps, because she hates it and he knows it. His smirk fades into a shocked o shape, his eyebrows arching in amusement. That rush of déjà vu is back again, stronger this time than before.

She feels like she's known him all her life, maybe longer. But that's ridiculous, isn't it?

Of course it is, she thinks as she shrugs him away, walking to back to the station and leaving him alone and still whining for another date.

She resists the urge to tell him yes.

She feels tears pricking her eyes, but she bites them away because she doesn't cry. Not her—

but maybe she will for him, just this once.

She feels lost and alone and so afraid, that same little girl the man in front of her had left behind in the system. And that should make her angry, right? She should hate him for that. But she doesn't, because she knows that if the roles were reversed she probably would've done the same.

But she still feels helpless and childlike, and looks up for guidance, from anyone.

But no one helps. Her parents look lost, Henry looks sad, and Marco just looks… devastated. Her fingernails dig into the fabric of her jeans and she bites the inside of her cheek to keep from screaming.

Their story can't end now. It hasn't even begun yet.

She kisses him, once.

They're outside Granny's, fighting a fight the whole town is used to by now. Everyone knows not to take it seriously, have even taken to rolling their eyes when they see the pair of them bickering. It's a quarter past eleven PM on a Wednesday and one one's really out, except Ruby who's closing up for the night.

She snorts and rolls her eyes at them like she always does, and mumbles, "Oh, just kiss already."

Surprisingly, he hears her over the din over their argument. Even more surprisingly, he takes her advice and grabs the blonde before him by the arms, pressing his lips to hers clumsily.

She thinks she hears Ruby wolf-whistle in the distance, but she's too far gone to really care. Her battered heart bleeds a little, remembering a similar situation where another man's stubble scratched against her chin in front of this very diner, but his lips chase away the unwanted memory and burn a new one in her head. She loops her arms around her neck and pulls him close, and when they finally stop to gulp in some air, Ruby's clapping.

Two pairs of eyes lock onto the beaming waitress.

"Ruby," she says, in a very serious voice and surprisingly steady voice, "If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I might have to make you sorry."

Ruby squeaks, but continues to beam because she knows the threat isn't real. She puts up her hands. "I won't breathe a word," she vows. She mimes zipping her mouth, shooting the pair of them a wink before sashaying back inside, her grin a mile wide.

Green eyes roll heavenward and their owner smiles at the man in her arms. They stay that way for a while, in the empty street in front of the diner.

Tomorrow, they'll probably act like this never happened.

Tonight, they're the only two people in the world.

Well, except for Ruby, who starts singing Elton John's Can You Feel the Love Tonight at the top of her lungs.

He whispers her name, and it's like coming home.

She wishes he could say her name forever. She'd say his back, if he wanted to. She'd do anything he wanted. If he just stayed.

She murmurs his name back to him, a plea for forever and his own absolution, for not believing him, for throwing him under the bus with Neal, for not being quick enough in finding him today. She bends down as he surges up, weakly, his glass eyes holding too much emotion.

Oh, August.

She'd say his name every day, if he only just stayed.

Contrary to what he might think, she's not nearly crying because he's spouting nonsense about trees and fairytale creatures.

No, she's nearly crying because she believes him. Not about the magic part—that's stupid, of course.

But everything else?

She believes he found her. She believes he was that seven-year-old boy those twenty-eight years ago.

And that kills her.

Because she loves him. God, she loves him so much it should be a crime. They've only kissed once, and he's been nothing but a typewriter wrapped in an enigma wrapped in stubble the entire time she's known him, but he's crawled his way into her heart and she thinks she finally understands why he seems so familiar.

And he thinks he's a fairytale character.

Well. She always did like the eccentric ones, didn't she? First Clyde, then the plethora of idiots, married men, dealers and stealers, and now Pinocchio.

She turns when she can't take it anymore. She can't take having him yell at her, tell her she's this savior.

Who the hell is he kidding, anyway? She can't even save herself. She's no one's savior.

She certainly can't be his.

His whisper is hoarse in her ear.

"She—she's—"

Her blood turns to ice in her veins when his voice drops, and even though he was never quite breathing, she can tell the exact moment his heart stops—because that always stayed, didn't it? His heart. His heart of tarnished gold.

She wants to curl up in a ball and cry, and maybe she'll do it later, when there's no one else around. When she's alone at Mary Margaret's apartment or maybe later, at the station and she can't be interrupted. She doesn't want to be anyone's savior.

Not today, she thinks as Marco starts to cry, as her mother starts talking about second chances, as Neal walks up, looking lost.

Just… not today.

He'd called her a savior.

But how can she be a savior, she thinks, sitting by his bedside at Granny's, clenching her eyes tight and trying to ignore the cool, varnished oak under her fingers, how can she be a savior, when she can't even save the two boys who mean the most to her, in any world?

She doesn't want to be anyone's savior today.

That doesn't mean she can't try.

She thinks she hears Henry talking, something about being brave, truthful, and selfless, but she's not going to dwell on that. Her heart is broken and her eyes are stinging from the tears she's been biting back, and she refuses to listen to theories and possibilities that are now spouting from the mouth of the Blue Fairy.

She walks up to them, then, brandishing her wand, but Emma folds in on herself, shielding August's body with her own. No, she thinks fiercely, no no no no no. Either it works or it doesn't.

And God, she hopes it works.

"Emma?" her mother whispers, and the blonde in question shakes her head and bends further down.

She presses her lips against his perfectly-carved cupid's bow, and feels the magic come alive under her skin.

She sighs.

His waking thought is always "Emma".

It was the first thing he thought of after he came through the tree, and the first name he thought of when he woke up after the curse was broken.

It only makes sense she'd be the first one he thinks of, sees, smells, kisses when he wakes up the third time.

She gasps when she breaks away, her eyes glistening as she sees the wood melt away to reveal smooth, pale skin, blue eyes—real eyes, not glass—flutter open and meet hers.

She's not sure what to say, and she's not sure what she expects him to say. But when he smiles and quips, "I bet you enjoyed taking advantage of me like that," she laughs and swats him playfully on the chest.

Maybe it's not what her father would have said to her mother. But it's just so August and Emma and it's perfect.

"You bet I did," she snipes right back. She looks very serious for a moment, her dark green eyes cutting into his ice blue ones. And then a real, true grin splits her face, and he matches it with one of his own.

It's not your average fairytale. It's not true-love's-kiss-and-a-happily-ever-after. It's blood and sweat and tears and hard work. It's consoling Neal after they lock up Tamara and, later, Greg. It's getting to know Henry better, taking him out for ice cream and comic books after David and Neal finish up with his sword-fighting lessons. It's sidestepping Gepetto's overenthusiastic attempts to learn about their upcoming wedding (there is no wedding, not a real one, anyway) and hiding behind Snow when David's overprotective father streak comes to life.

It's fighting at two AM because someone forgot to close a window in the apartment they share. It's her burning the spaghetti on a Friday evening and him forbidding her from ever using the stove again. It's kissing in the pouring rain like a couple of teenagers and dancing in the woods at midnight like a couple of lunatics. It's laughter and anguish and all the bits in between.

It's wild and raw and new, and they wouldn't have it any other way.

Okay… so. This is my first foray into the Woodenswan section of the OUAT fandom. I've always loved these two, though, and I hope this lives up to the standards of this ship's amazing writers.

Reviews are love, and thank you for reading!