“Never thought it would be as an officer of the law,” she mused a bit to herself, bringing the edge of her mug to her lips and sipped at the cooler contents. The hot chocolate was no longer scalding hot to the tongue, which made enjoying it a little more easier. When she lowered her cup once more, her rimmed lips were curved up into a small smirk.
It was kind of ironic, really. How does a thief on the run become a sheriff of a police station? It was most certainly a strange twist of fate; a funny thing indeed. Fate and destiny probably played a part in it, even though she never really believed in such things, until now. But her hands were forced, taking into consideration the life she had now.
Taking his question into consideration, she traced the rim of her cup with a finger. Shoulders rose and fell in a simple shrug, giving a small incline of her head. “There are the occasional drunkard stragglers in the middle of the night, but doesn’t all towns have that?” Her eyes glanced toward Ruby for a moment, who had changed since the curse had been lifted. When she met her gaze, the waitress gave her a confused look before going back to work, which elicited another small laugh from Emma.
Neal nodded knowingly in response to Emma’s remark about drunkards going out for a noisy midnight stroll, because really, it was just what he’d expected. Small crime, especially insignificant compared to all the things he and Emma had done in the past—but he wasn’t willing to bring that up at that point. He was well aware that she kept past events that had come to pass between the two of them in the back of her mind at all times, but there was no need to bring them to the front.
There was an outstretched silence before Neal finally leaned forward to speak again, his expression much more serious than it had been just moments ago. Only a hint of a smile tugged at one corner of his lips, but he did not quite let it break through.
“What’d you do?”
He paused, then realized his question sounded a little too vague and sought to define it a little better.
“I mean, if you could have any job in the world, what’d you be doing right now?”
It was a question he had often asked himself, but more often than not, he found that he had no valid answer to show for it. Had he grown up in the Enchanted Forest and had something resembling a normal youth there, perhaps he would have become a farmer, or a spinner—maybe even a warrior or a knight. But since his hopes of having a normal childhood had been crushed early on, his dreams had never been anything more but a seed, never to grow into full bloom. Even now that his life had settled a bit, he still caught himself living from day to day, sometimes. It was a habit he feared he wouldn’t be able to get rid of all that easily.