Chapter Text
Jefferson woke in his bed with a blinding headache, a dry mouth, and a noose wrapped loosely around his neck.
Wait. That wasn’t right. This wasn’t the closet-sized bedroom in the cottage where he’d raised his Grace. Nor was it the cot tucked in the corner of the workshop where he’d tirelessly - obsessively - created tens of thousands of hats, begging each one to please, just once, just one fucking time, please... work .
No, this bedroom was opulent. Gaudy, even. His entire cottage could have fit in this bedroom. Hell, the bed alone would comfortably sleep a family of five, and the silk bedding would keep them all fed for well over a year. So where…?
A sharp pain throbbed behind his eyes, and he remembered. He was Jefferson Carroll, renowned fashion designer. This mansion in the woods on the outskirts of Storybrooke had been his home for… how long? Everything was blurry, running together like swirls of wet paint. He was Jefferson, loving father and widower. No, he was Jefferson, lifelong bachelor, on the run from a life of drug-fuelled parties that had left him so strung out that he’d lost track of reality and tried to hang himself.
He shook his head in the vain hope of dislodging one of the two sets of memories that ravaged his brain. Both held fast, gripping him somewhere behind his eyes. Pushing himself out of bed, he staggered to the water closet - bathroom, one half of his mind supplied - and purged the contents of his stomach into the toilet. Every heave and retch put pressure on his overburdened head, threatening to burst it like an overripe melon. The end of the rope tied around his neck trailed in the filthy water. He pulled the noose up over his head with a disgusted sound, chucking it across the room.
He had to figure out what was going on, and that sure as hell wasn’t going to happen if he stayed cooped up in this bedroom all day. He quickly threw on a dove gray button-down shirt, not bothering to button it all the way up or change out of his pajama pants. Outside his house there was a horseless carriage - car - and with a start he realized that he’d instinctively grabbed the keys on the way out. Getting in, buckling up, and starting the ignition was as natural as breathing, and driving into town was second nature to him. Part of him marveled at the speed at which he was moving, and the strange smooth black cobbling of the roads, but the other half of him was unimpressed.
When he pulled into Storybrooke proper, both Jeffersons found a foreign landscape. Bachelor Jefferson was accustomed to sprawling metropolises with impossibly tall buildings, housing tens of thousands of people from all walks of life. Jefferson the father recalled dense forests broken up by quaint little hamlets filled with thatch-roofed cottages, where the most bustling bazaar might boast a hundred shoppers with coin to spend. Storybrooke, with its small family-owned shops and modern conveniences, was somewhere in the middle.
Parking the car on the street, Jefferson wandered aimlessly, turning in endless circles to take everything in. People everywhere were walking about as if nothing was wrong. A scantily-clad girl with streaks of scarlet in her straight black hair flipped a sign at the local diner to Open while a familiar looking blond man surreptitiously ogled her legs. A woman with a black pixie cut read a large, brown, leather-bound book as she walked, straightening her cardigan absently. A group of seven short yet stoutly-built men bickered loudly on the sidewalk before splitting off in different directions.
Everyone looked absolutely miserable.
Jefferson made an about-face without looking, abruptly colliding with a red-haired man in a tweed jacket. The man’s umbrella clattered to the sidewalk.
“Oh! Pardon me,” the shorter man said, bending down to pick up his umbrella.
Jefferson waved off the apology. “My fault. I should’ve looked where I was going.”
“No harm done; that’s the important thing.” Straightening his back, he extended his hand to Jefferson with a smile. A smile that faltered when he saw the - decapitation? Hanging? - scar on his neck. His own voice echoed in his head: I’m alive! Shit. He should have covered that up. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure. My name’s Archie Hopper. I’m the town therapist.”
He reached out and shook the proffered hand. “Jefferson. Uh, Jefferson Carroll.”
“Oh, you’re the one who lives in the mansion just outside town, right?”
“Uh, right.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Jefferson.” In a quieter voice, Archie continued. “Listen, if you ever need to talk about something, or get anything off my chest, my door is always open.”
“Right. Sure. You too, I guess.” It wasn’t until Archie rounded a corner that Jefferson put two and two together. His first five minutes in down, and the town therapist already thought he was a suicide risk. Wonderful.
Even more unsettling - in his current mental state, he couldn’t be sure he wasn’t.
He continued taking in the town - strange faces inside foreign shops in an alien landscape - for the next few hours. This whole town had the feel of a dog that had been kicked too many times - weary and downtrodden, but with a thrumming tension under the surface, just waiting to burst.
It wasn’t until nearly 3PM that Jefferson saw another soul that seemed to be aware of her surroundings. A woman with tanned skin, dark eyes and pitch black hair cut to her shoulders was meandering the streets, turning her head this way and that just as he’d done a few hours ago. Only where his expression had been shocked confusion, this woman wore the delighted smile of a child in a confectioner’s shop. Both halves of his mind supplied a name at the same time.
Mayor Mills.
Queen Regina.
As if his thoughts summoned her, Regina’s eyes landed on Jefferson, and her smile grew. She strode toward him with purpose, her heeled pumps clacking on the sidewalk with each step.
“Regina,” Jefferson greeted.
“Why Jefferson, I’m flattered that you remember me.” Her eyes flickered up and down his form. “But my oh my, you seem a bit under the weather. Did you wake up with a splitting headache this morning?”
“As a matter of fact, I did.” Was that emphasis deliberate, or was he just imagining things.
“Such a pity. I’ve heard a cup of tea can work wonders for such things.” Her smile turned more predatory - eyes narrowing and teeth bared. “But a headache is no excuse for bad manners. Everyone else in this town calls me by my title, and I must insist that you do the same.”
Did she know what was happening in his head? Was she aware that there were two realities, each fighting for dominance? Or was this woman just so arrogant that she needed everyone in town to remind her of her position? His common sense told him it was the latter. Stories of evil witches and magic hats certainly couldn’t be trusted.
His instincts, however…
“My apologies… Your Majesty.” Were he in a better mood, he might have flourished a mocking bow.
“So you do remember. Good.” What he wouldn’t give to wipe that smug smirk off her face.
“What did you do to me?” he demanded. “There are all these memories in my head that aren’t mine. Did you curse me?”
“I only did to you what I did to all of the Enchanted Forest.” Regina made a show of checking her perfectly polished nails for flaws. “In fact, you’re the only one - other than myself, that is - whose memories are still intact. You should be thanking me.”
“ Thanking you? For making me live with two men in my head?” His hands shot out and grabbed her shoulders, shaking her a little. “For ripping me from the one hope I ever had of getting back to Grace? For separating me from Grace in the first place? Tell me, Your Majesty , exactly what should I be grateful for?”
“Why, for bringing the two of you together, of course.” She looked significantly over his shoulder. “I thought a year in Wonderland might make the heart grow fonder. Was I wrong?”
Releasing his grip on the queen, Jefferson turned. An enormous, elongated yellow car - a school bus - had stopped across the street, and kids in school uniforms were piling out. One girl in particular stood out. He’d know that head of hair anywhere.
“Grace?” His feet pulled him, step by step, across the street, until he was running toward her with all his speed. He caught his daughter in a bear hug, spinning her around. Her happy shrieks pierced his eardrums, making his head throb even worse, and it was the best pain he’d experienced in his life. “Oh my gods, Grace! I finally found you!”
Gradually he realized that she was struggling, shoving against his shoulders frantically. “Let me go!” she screamed, beating her little fists against him. “Help! Someone help me!”
“Grace, what’s wrong?” He put her down, kneeling in front of her and gripping her gently yet firmly by the shoulders. She still struggled, terrified tears streaming down her face. “Gracie, it’s me. It’s your Papa.”
“No, no, let me go! You’re not my dad! Please, someone help!”
Before he could say anything to reassure her, another man’s voice interrupted. “Freeze!” A strange clicking sound - that of a gun being cocked - warned Jefferson to act carefully. Looking up over his daughter’s head, he saw a man with curly, sandy-brown hair wearing a leather jacket and a sheriff’s badge. And pointing a pistol at him. “Let the girl go,” the man’s lightly accented voice continued.
“This is just a misunderstanding, Sheriff,” Jefferson said. “I’m just picking up my daughter, Grace.”
“I don’t think so,” the sheriff disagreed. “That’s Paige Milliner, and I know for a fact that she isn’t your daughter. If you let her go now and agree to stay away from her, I’ll let you off with a warning just this once.”
Jefferson set his jaw. “And if I refuse?” he asked.
“Then I’ll be forced to subdue you through any means necessary. Including lethal force, if I need to. Is that something you want to put Paige through?”
“Her name isn’t Paige, it’s Grace !” He slowly started backing away from the sheriff, holding his arms protectively over his daughter. He had to believe that the man wouldn’t open fire. Surely he could see that Jefferson meant no harm.
Before he got far, pain exploded through him. He crumpled to the ground, hands gently grasping his groin where Grace had kneed him. His daughter bolted down the street, fleeing around a corner. Before he could gather himself enough to rise to his feet, he felt his arms being yanked behind his back.
“Right,” the curly-haired man said. “Looks like we’re doing this the hard way. A night in the holding cell should cool you off.”
"No,” he breathed. He elbowed the sheriff in the face, feeling his nose break with a sickening crunch . “No! I need to get to Grace! She needs me! I left her once, I can’t leave her again! I--”
Something prodded his side, and his entire body seized up as though struck by lightning. As he fell he tried to catch himself, but his hands were still cuffed behind his back. His head struck the sidewalk, and everything went black.
******
Jefferson woke in his bed with a blinding headache, a dry mouth, and a noose wrapped loosely around his neck.
He groaned into his silk pillowcase, gingerly cupping his aching balls and vaguely wishing for death. A sharp pain throbbed behind his eyes, and he remembered. He was Jefferson Carroll, renowned fashion designer. This mansion in the woods on the outskirts of Storybrooke had been his home for… how long? Everything was blurry, running together like swirls of wet paint. He was Jefferson, lifelong bachelor, on the run from a life of drug-fuelled parties that had left him so strung out that he’d lost track of reality and tried to hang himself. No - that wasn’t right at all. He was Jefferson, loving father and widower. He was sure of it. But the way Grace had looked at him yesterday…
Yesterday. The town. The queen. Grace. His arrest. The miserable night spent sharing a holding cell with a bearded drunk whose snores sounded like logs being sawed. He didn’t want to face that reality today. Maybe if he went back to sleep, he’d find out that this was all a dream. He’d wake up in a cottage with his Grace. Or in his hat-filled workshop. Or in his suite in Milan, blood pumping with the drug of the day, balls deep in some hot young thing who had always dreamed of being a model.
But the light streaming through his damask curtains wouldn’t be denied. He rolled over, luxuriating in the smooth slide of silk over his skin.
Wait a minute. Silk? He should be in a holding cell, nose wrinkling at the smell of his cellmate’s sour whiskey sweat. His eyes cracked open, wincing as the light shone through… his bedroom window.
What the hell was going on?
His mind was warring with itself again. Part of him - the half that took pleasure in fine silks, and drugs, and burying himself in the body of young twenty-somethings just waiting to be discovered - told him that he’d spent the night in his mansion. He’d had a glass of scotch, made some sketches for next season’s vogue, put the noose around his neck as a reminder that all of this - the luxury, the fame, life itself - was transient. He took comfort in it.
The other part of him remembered a small town in Maine. It remembered the heartbreak of frightening his daughter, the agony of a taser in his side, the blinding flash of the camera making his head throb worse than it already had, and the lumpy mattress in his cell. That part of him told tales of strange lands, of magic spells and fantastic creatures and mirrors that can’t be trusted. Of a scaled wizard paying him a king’s ransom of spun gold for his services, all while directing his attention away from the pretty maid who served their tea.
Rumpelstiltskin. He had to find Rumpelstiltskin. It was impossible to believe that the Evil Queen had bested the Dark One, but she had said that the entire Enchanted Forest had been cursed. If anyone could find a way to break it, it was the Dark One.
He dressed with more care today - putting on tight pants that gave his leather trousers in the Enchanted Forest a run for their money, a pale purple shirt, and a charcoal waistcoat. A silk scarf covered the ugly scar at his neck.
The drive to town was just as uneventful as yesterday’s (if that had happened at all). The people on the street reassured him somewhat. The girl in the hotpants being gawked at by the blond man sipping his coffee. The meek, fair woman with her nose buried in a leatherbound book. The seven men arguing loudly outdoors for all to hear. He didn’t make it up. Yesterday had happened. He watched with quiet relief as the town’s sheriff came to break up the argument.
Jefferson winced. Graham Humbert, his mind supplied from last night. With his scruffy stubble and wild curls, the man managed to pull off that “just rolled out of bed” look that had always eluded Jefferson. In one of his lives, anyway. The sheriff caught his eye and gave a friendly wave.
Jefferson waved back hesitantly, a feeling of dread rising in the pit of his stomach. Sheriff Humbert didn’t seem to recognize him. Even more alarming - where he’d been sporting a crooked nose and two black eyes last night, the policeman’s face was now straight and unblemished.
That should be cause for relief. It meant that he hadn’t been arrested, hadn’t somehow managed to escape a holding cell and become a fugitive, and best of all, he hadn’t terrified his daughter yesterday. But it also meant that he couldn’t trust his mind. He couldn’t trust the part that told him he’d never left the house; clearly he had, because he’d seen these people, these streets, these shops before. But he couldn’t trust the part that had been here, because it made up things that hadn’t happened.
Panic churned in his belly, gripped his chest, thickened his throat to choke him. He spun on one heel, and promptly slammed into a red-haired man. An umbrella clattered to the sidewalk.
“Oh! Pardon me,” Archie Hopper said, bending down to pick up his umbrella.
“S-sorry,” Jefferson stammered. Keep it together. You’ve got to keep it together. “Seems like I keep bumping into you like this.”
“Oh?” The shorter man straightened, dusting off his umbrella. “How so?”
“I… I bumped into you yesterday,” he said. “Just like this. Knocked over your umbrella and everything.”
Archie frowned. “No, I don’t believe so,” he disagreed gently. “I don’t believe you and I have had the pleasure. My name’s--”
“Archie Hopper. The town therapist.”
“Yyyyes.” Archie looked at him uncertainly. “So we have met. Maybe I just forgot.”
“Doctor Hopper,” a woman’s voice interrupted. The therapist flinched at Regina’s voice, shoulders hunching as he retreated into himself. “Don’t you have a practice you should be running? Telling everyone how they should live their lives?”
“Y-yes. Of course, Madam Mayor. Good day.” Archie scuttled off like a cockroach exposed to the light.
That smile had returned to Regina’s face - the one with the cruel gleam. “So, Jefferson, I heard you had a brush with the local law enforcement yesterday.” She turned and strolled slowly down the sidewalk, beckoning him to follow. “Something about an attempted kidnapping?”
“You know exactly what happened. You were there,” he snarled. “What did you do to her, Regina? Why can’t my Grace remember me?”
Regina made a show of shrugging, palms up at her sides. “Why doesn’t the insect remember his vaunted calling? Why does the wolf act like it belongs in a cathouse? Why do the sanctimonious little gnats still insist on preaching when they now call to a power that doesn’t answer?”
“Spare me the riddles. Cut the crap and tell me what you did,” Jefferson growled. “Whatever it is, it works differently for me. Nobody else remembers anything that happened yesterday, but I do.”
“And you’re so sure that your memories are reliable?” Regina chuckled. “You seem so sure that you’re the only rational one in a town that can’t remember. But are you certain that you’re not a lone madman in a town of ordinary people?”
He wasn’t, damn her, but he couldn’t let her know that. “I’m going to get to the bottom of this. And when I find out how this curse, or illusion, or whatever it is can be broken, I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure you get what’s coming to you.”
The queen’s grin didn’t so much as flicker. “We shall see. In the meantime, I have other things to be doing. A mayor’s work never ends, you know.”
Jefferson watched her go, his heart sinking in his chest. Shit. He’d talked a big game to Regina, hoping that maybe she’d reveal some sort of… of weakness, or something, that he could look into. But she’d been utterly confident that he would fail.
He was just one man. One man with a head full of false memories, unable to tell which - if any - were real. He needed help. He needed Rumpelstiltskin.
If he existed.