Evergreen │Once Upon A Time Fanfic

I get an apple to my stomach (what is with people throwing food at me?)

I entered Granny's to get a quick coffee before school. Mary Margaret left early today because she had to prepare for her class activity or something.

I spotted Emma reading a newspaper on one of the stools. The headlines highlighted Emma's "crime" of drinking and driving. Ruby saw me and called out, "Hey Piper!"

I walked over to them and wished good morning to the pair, sitting down. "Missed you at work last night", Ruby said, eyeing me suspiciously.

"Field trip", I mumbled under my breath and ordered my usual coffee.

Emma chuckled. Ruby set a cup of hot cocoa with cinnamon in front of Emma. She looked at Ruby weirdly before saying, "I didn't order that"

"I know. You have an admirer", Ruby replied, nodding towards a man sitting in one of the booths. It was Sherriff Graham, the local crush of all teenage girls in Storybrooke. Except for me, of course. The dude is the age of my mother.

Emma rolled her eyes and walked over to him. I followed. This is going to be fun.

"Ah, so you decided to stay.", he says.

"Observant. Important for a cop.", she replies.

"That's good news for our tourist business, bad for our local signage. ", he said. I and Emma gave him a look. The poor guy was trying to joke. Or flirt?

"It's--it's a joke... because you ran over our sign..."

"Look, the cocoa was a nice gesture, and I am impressed that you guessed that I like cinnamon in my chocolate, 'cause most people don't, but I am not here to flirt, so, thank you, but no thank you. ", Emma said, setting the mug down.

"Are you sure?", I whispered to Emma, smirking. She just rolled her eyes and asked me, "you trying to hook me up?"

"me?", I said innocently, "I would never do such a thing. I am just a kid."

We had completely forgotten that Graham existed. "I didn't send it.", he said, ignoring the conversation I and Emma just had.

" I did.", came the voice of none other than Henry Mills. He added, " I like cinnamon, too."

" Don't you have school?", Emma asked him.

"Duh, I'm ten. Walk me."

Emma sighed and started for the door, Henry at her heels. I grabbed the coffee Ruby handed to me and paid her. I waved goodbye to Sherriff Graham and followed the pair.

So, what's the deal with you and your mom?", Emma asked Henry as I walked behind them.

"It's not about us, it's about her curse. We have to break it. Luckily, I have a plan. Step one: identification. I call it, "Operation Cobra"."

"Cobra? That has nothing to do with fairytales."

" Exactly, it's a codename. It'll throw the Queen off the trail."

"Yeah, he's good at that kind of stuff. Once, I forgot to do my history homework and he helped me steal an old one from the school storage. He called it "Operation T-rex", I said, trying to keep up with them.

Emma gave me a weird look and said, " So, everyone here is a fairytale character, they just don't know it."

"That's the cure. Time's been frozen... Until you got here.", Henry said