A Once Upon a Time Tale: Reawakened

“What do you think stories are for?”

“Burning up some time?” Emma offered. She thought it was a strange question to ask.

“I think they’re a way for us to understand our own world,” Mary Margaret said. “In a new way.”

Love makes us sick. It haunts our dreams and destroys our days. It starts wars and ends lives. Love has killed more than any disease.

“Why not free yourself?”

“Because that wouldn’t be real,” he said. “Because it would always be deep down in you somewhere, eating at you. You can’t pretend that what is true is not true. Regardless of what you remember. Give me the pain, and what’s honest. I’ll take that any day.”

Love is too powerful to eradicate, unfortunately. What I can do, however, is create a spell that makes you forget your beloved. Perhaps not quite the same, I know. But it can do the job.

She was stuck in a fantasy, some silly story that did not resemble reality.

“It would be terrible to have no one at all.”

Emma looked at her, and didn’t want to say it once she realized what it implied about their relationship. Emma was surprised at how eagerly some part of her imagination entertained the idea, tried to dock with it, albeit for just a few seconds. It was just the kind of thing she used to do when she was a kid, a game she played by herself. Making Up Mom was what she called it, even though she never told anybody what it was she was doing for all those hours, hiding in closets or tucked in a ball beneath a tree. She spent that time envisioning what her mother was like—who she was, where she was, why she’d been forced to give Emma up for adoption.

with great violence, striking the walls on either side of the entrance.

There, in the doorway, stood a figure all in black.

The Evil Queen.

Again.

Wonderful, thought Snow. More of this.

Guards rushed her as she began to stride toward Snow and Charming, who stood in the center of the room, clutching each other. The Queen sent a half-dozen guards flying through the air with a flick of her wrist—her magic was still powerful, there was no doubt.

his kid, really? He was certainly not her son. Here she was getting bent out of shape, and for all she knew he was rifling through her things in the other room, or he was the front end of some con that in

IN ANOTHER WORLD, in another time, Snow White stood hand in hand with Prince Charming in the Royal Castle’s ballroom.
All the kingdom’s subjects surrounded the couple. The two looked into each other’s eyes as the bishop asked Snow if she would have Charming forever.
There was no hesitation. She said that she would, and the two smiled at each other nervously and lovingly as the bishop pronounced them man and wife. The court’s musicians began to play, and Charming and Snow leaned together to kiss once again.
It had been something of a miracle. Charming had awoken Snow from a cursed sleep brought on by her stepmother, the Evil Queen. And they were not, it turned out, free of her yet.
This time, just as their lips touched, a tremendous clap of thunder overwhelmed the music, and many in the room cried out. The assembled guests all turned at once to the ballroom’s great doors, where the sound had originated, which flew open with great violence, striking the walls on either side of the entrance.
There, in the doorway, stood a figure all in black.
The Evil Queen.
Again.
Wonderful, thought Snow. More of this.
Guards rushed her as she began to stride toward Snow and Charming, who stood in the center of the room, clutching each other. The Queen sent a half-dozen guards flying through the air with a flick of her wrist—her magic was still powerful, there was no doubt.
When she was near, Snow pushed Charming back, grabbed the