Title: Second Thoughts
Fandom: Once Upon a Time
Rating: PG-13 for some swearing
Length: 718 words
Content notes: spoilers for OUaT 2x06 & 2x14, takes place during flashback events of 2x06
Author notes: written for fan_flashworks challenge #73: Telephone
Summary: Neal Cassidy has second thoughts about getting rid of his phone and going through with a plan.



Neal had parked the yellow Volkswagen Beetle in a little back alley not far from where he had left his meeting with August. Neal had stolen the car first and then Emma had come along and had taken it while he was sleeping inside, that was how they had met. At the time he thought it was fate. That car had been home and transportation for both of them.
Now Neal leaned against the car, his phone in his hand. Thoughts of fate and destiny heavy on his mind. He knew what he had to do. He just dreaded doing it.

He knew what the plan was. He had agreed to it as soon after August had shown him that dreadful piece of paper with his true name type on it. Baelfire. That’s who he was. The son of The Dark One. August knew. He was from that world too. The world with magic. As was Emma. His Emma was from the fairytale world. Neal shook his head. It was so hard to believe but he knew it had to be true. It was too crazy to be a lie. And he had already had more than a lifetime of magic fucking him over. It didn’t surprise him that it was happening again now.

Neal had tried so hard to run from that world and anything to do with magic and here fate was biting him in the ass, again. Emma had no idea of course. She was raised in the world without magic; what most people thought of as the real world. She knew nothing of magic. She didn’t even know who he really was. Emma had even joked about going to Neverland when he suggested they make a life for themselves somewhere. If she only knew the truth. Neverland was a place of nightmares, nothing at all like the stories they told in this world. Neal had spent too many years in Neverland and he was never going back. Not willingly.

Neal kept playing with the phone in his hand as he paced the sidewalk. He hated the plan. He wanted to call her. He wanted to warn her not to go to the meeting place. August was going to tip off the police and Neal was supposed to dump his phone and disappear. The plan sucked. He hated it. Emma was going to jail in his place. It should be him. August assured him that Emma wouldn't spend much time behind bars. He said that once she got out that she would straighten up her life. Without him. August promised that he would be there for her when she got out. She wouldn’t be alone. She would just be without him. It was the right thing to do.

This would get her back on her path. In about a decade she would break the curse and find her parents. She would save her family and she wouldn’t be alone anymore. He knew that he needed to let her fulfill her destiny. Even if it meant that she would hate him. And she would hate him. He knew. He hated himself already. But it was the right thing to do. It had to be.

Neal checked his watch. It was time. He had to dump the phone. Shaking his head, he took it apart and tossed it in the dumpster. Temptation gone, he got back into the car and started the engine. Maybe when it was time he could find her again.

Maybe after Emma learned about the fairy tale world and the curse and had finally been reunited with her family, she would forgive him. He could wait and find her when it was time. Ten or eleven years. That wasn’t so long. Not to him. But Neal knew that once the curse was broken his father would come for him and if he went to find Emma he would end up back in his father’s clutches and he didn’t want that. He wanted to be with Emma, but maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Maybe fate had something else in mind for them both.
Neal pulled away from the curb and drove off into the night. The sound of a police siren in the distance haunted him as he got on the highway.