I know it's been a long time since I've updated and I'm sorry for that. But! I think this is the longest and feels-y chapter yet, so I hope that makes up for it.

Disclaimer: The Blue Fairy hasn't heard my wish, yet. I don't own Once Upon A Time. But when I do, I'll be sure to bring Graham back and make Gremma canon as hell.

"Don't say that it's not fair that you're not the person you wanna be,

'cause oh, you'll be the end of me." - A Day to Remember

Emma kneeled in the sand beside Henry, holding her breath and hoping, praying, that he'd be okay. He couldn't be dead, she knew that. More so, she believed it.

She watched Regina wave her hands over their son's unconscious form, ripples of golden magic spreading out over his body as she did. "This preservation spell can keep him in this state for a while longer, buy us time to get to Pan."

Emma nodded and stood up, turning to Neal. "You were a lost boy." And I was a lost girl, she thought but didn't say. "Any idea where he went?"

"Well, I mean..." He shrugged his shoulders. "I know where he lived, where his compound-"

Regina cut him off, a hard edge in her voice. "Well that's idiotic, we all know that." Her eyebrows furrowed as she looked up at the two. "You think he's stupid enough to go back?"

"Please, let's..." She trailed off as she turned back to Henry and Emma had to bite her lip to hold back from asking what the hell had gotten into her. Was this really the same woman who'd just helped them minutes before?

"Okay, enough."

"No, don't tell me what's enough!" Regina all but snarled as she gestured to Henry, laying too still in the sand before her. "My son is dying."

"Our son." Emma says, emphasizing the "our" before she continued. "So yes, I know how you feel."

"I know how you feel, how you hurt, how your heart feels like it's going to come out of your chest because you know his isn't inside of him. I know, Regina." Her voice broke on a sob as Neal walked away to pace the floor of the cave. He was never very good at comforting others and she was glad he didn't try to comfort her. Because if he wrapped his arms around her, now, she knew that she'd break.

"You have no idea what I feel." There was venom in the other woman's words. "You have your parents, you have this..." She waved an arm at Neal as her dark eyes met Emma's light ones. "Person."

That person? Her gaze wandered to Neal's, heart beating painfully hard against her chest as she watched him gaze out to the dark sea below the cave. She could only wonder what he was really seeing, what he was really thinking. He was more than just "that person" to Emma. But she supposed now wasn't the time to tell Regina that; it'd only add insult to injury.

"And you have a pirate who pines for you, too, as if he wasn't enough." The queen's eyes flicker to Neal once more before they move back to the savior.

Who pines for her? Emma would hardly call it that, but she still felt it insensitive to point out.

"You have everything, and yet you claim to know what I feel? All I have is Henry, and I'm not about to lose him because he is everything to me."

She knelt to the ground beside Regina once more, murmuring, "You're right. I don't know how you feel. You wanna run the show? Run it. But how do we save Henry?"

"I don't know." The brunette's eyes glimmered with tears unshed and she thought, so this is what the Evil Queen had been reduced to.

Neal walked back over to them, then, his eyes moved to both of theirs before his gaze settled on Emma, standing once more. "Pan was powerful enough before, but now with Henry's heart...I don't know if we can hurt him."

"Yes we can. Look. When you swiped at him before, you nipped him." Regina said as she gestured to Emma's sword, the tip red with the dark trickster's blood.

"If he can bleed, we can hurt him. And if we can hurt him, we can kill him."

While the blonde wasn't sure that that was the best option, she'd said she'd let Regina run the show - and she'd honor that promise, whether she wanted to or not.

As they made their way out of the cave and back to the main island, Emma had to wonder if she was making the right choice. What if Regina turned on them again? What if she couldn't save their son, even with help from her parents? What if Hook found a way to leave the island without them, what if Gold were to stay as Dark as he was now? And what if...what if when they woke up Graham, he didn't feel the same about her anymore?

Emotions flickered over her face like the dappled light of the setting sun. She thought Neal must've known, must've seen, because she felt the familiar weight of his arm around her shoulders as they walked soon enough.

"You wanna tell me what's goin' on in that head a yours, Savior?" He asked around a grin that gave without taking, his voice low and rough and somehow warm through it all.

"I was just thinking, you know." She said as their eyes met, her sea blue to his chocolate brown. Or were they blue, too? She could never be sure.

His grin only widened at her words and damn it all to hell, she could remember why she'd fallen in love with him in the first place. "I know. You get this little look on your face when you're thinkin' hard about something."

"I do?" She raised an eyebrow at that, finding it hard not to smile at him when he was being so open with her. "I didn't know I had a thinking face."

"Oh, ya do. And I always loved it, really. Always loved you." He moved to step in front of her as they near Pan's camp. Regina was far away enough that Emma knew she wouldn't hear a word they said, but she still felt a little uneasy. Wary.

"Neal, I..." She trailed off, biting her lip once more. Because here they were, again.

"I know, Em. I know." He murmured as he brushed a stray lock of hair back behind her ear. "And I'm not blamin' you for it. Y'know, if the only good that came out of us bein' together was Henry, then I think we did pretty damn good."

"I think we did good, too." Damn it all to hell, her voice broke on the word "good" and his facial expression softened even as his voice got a touch rougher, lower.

"I'm not gonna make you choose between me and Henry. Or me and Graham. 'Cause I know what you'll choose. Who you'll choose." He leaned even closer, pressing a tender kiss to her forehead as the tears she'd been holding back all this time were finally set free.

And she wanted so badly to hate him for lingering, there, for looking into her eyes and murmuring, "I'd always choose Henry. And if it came down to it, I'd always choose you over Tamara, too."

But she couldn't hate him. So she hated herself.

"Seven hundred and thirty-two days, Neal."

"What?" He asked as his face contorted into a mask of confusion.

"How long I waited for you, telling myself I hated you everyday I did it." She whispered as she tilted her head up to look him full in the face. "And then once I found you in New York, I thought that maybe things could be different. That we could have another chance. But then I saw her and I realized you'd already found Tallahassee with someone else."

"Em, I..." She held up her hand to stop him. He fell quiet like she'd asked in a way that didn't require her voice; she felt like this was one of the first times someone had listened to her so intently in years.

"Back when we rescued you, and I told you I'd always love you. I meant it. But I meant it when I said that about Graham, too." She heaved out a heavy sigh as her voice threatened to break once more. "So I understand, and I'm not going to fault you for loving someone else, either."

She wanted to hate him. Oh, she wanted to.

But as she cupped the back of his head and brought him into her arms for the hug she so desperately needed, she knew she could never do it. She'd spent years trying, and years failing. Because she loved Neal Cassidy, through and through. And she loved Graham Humbert, true and true.

And Neal knew both of those things, knew it like the backseat of her car and the smooth metal of her keychain. The keychain she'd made into a necklace, the keychain she hadn't stopped wearing all seven hundred and thirty-two days she'd waited for him. The seven-hundred and thirty-two days he didn't show.

"I'm sorry." He whispered into the shadows of her hair as they clung to each other. "I'm sorry I couldn't be strong enough to come back for you. I wasn't strong enough, then. Brave enough."

His voice was as rough as the gravel driveway they'd never had as he leaned forward to whisper, "But I'm brave enough, now. And I'm gonna let go. I'm gonna let you go, Emma" in the shell of her ear.

And he did, stepping away from her and bounding down the dirt path to catch up to Regina and rally the others. She knew he meant more than just physically let her go, but she didn't allow herself to linger on that thought; her gaze wandered from her first love to that of the horizon; the sky was still blue. Something about that calmed her, though why, she didn't know. She wiped her tears with the back of her hand, not sure whether she wanted to laugh or cry. But there wasn't any more time for tears, not now. She could cry again once they'd brought Graham back. But now? Now it was time to find Pan.

chapter three end