Deputy Swan

Chapter Seven

"Dammit!" She hears her mother scream as she enters the front door.

She slowly drops her backpack onto the side table and sighs, kicking off her shoes with frantic flare. It's been two weeks now that she has noticed her mother's odd behavior.

First, she chalked up the sudden outburst to just having a bad day but things started to progress from there with extreme mood swings. She has been practically walking on eggshells, unsure if her mother is in a good mood or sour and not wanting to agitate her further.

Then came the tears, every time she turned around, it seemed her mother was crying over something completely pointless which is so out of the ordinary for her. And now, she's forgetting things, something her mother has never come close to doing before. She is always on top of everything.

Today, she missed her school play.

She thought for sure she was mistaken and she just couldn't see her mom out there in the massive crowd with the blinding bright lights blasting down upon her. However, after the show, she waited and waited but she never showed up. She knew her father wasn't going to be there tonight because he is on duty but he switched days with his coworker, just so he could see her in tomorrow night's show.

"Mom?" She tentatively calls through their home, quietly walking through their house. When she receives nothing but silence in return, she headed straight for the kitchen, knowing that is her mom's domain. "Mom?"

"What?" Mary Margret furiously snaps, forcing Emma to take a nervous step back. She never once feared her mother but right now she is downright terrified. "What, Emma?" She seethes and all Emma can do is flinch.

Her mom is standing there over a homemade cake, leaning over the counter with a knife gripped painfully tight between her fist. She swallows, her eyes flicking to the knife before jumping back up to her mother's face.

"Are you okay?" She nervously inquires, her voice distorted from the large lump swelling in the back of her throat.

"No, Emma. I'm not okay. This damn cake keeps falling apart every time I try to spread the icing."

Subconsciously, she furrows her eyebrows, baffled by the situation she is finding herself in. Is she really this upset about icing on a cake? Her mother never gets mad or ever raises her voice and here she is losing her mind over frosting and not even mentioning missing Emma's play.

"Mom? Do you realize you missed my play today?" She cautiously investigates, anxiously fiddling with her fingers and hoping her mom will snap out of this.

"What play?" She barks, cold eyes darting to Emma but she swears her mother is looking right through her.

"My school play...well, musical really. I was Sandy...in Grease," she gently explains, feeling completely lost and utter defeat.

She just can't wrap her head around what is happening. This isn't her mother, this isn't them.

Emma was so proud when she landed the part of Sandy. That's all she remembers singing with her mom when she was little and she couldn't wait to run home and tell her the good news. Her mom was more than ecstatic when she told her. They spent that whole night baking cookies and blaring the Grease soundtrack as they sang and danced all around the kitchen. And now, her mom is unrecognizable. Sure, she's standing right in front of her but she really doesn't think her mom is actually here at the moment.

Mary Margret doesn't say a word. The silence growing louder as she just stares blankly at Emma. She notices her mom's warm green eyes are now lifeless, dull. They no longer hold any life like they once did and her heart clenches viciously in her chest. Now she realizes something is radically wrong with her mother.