Pongo's tail thumped the bed contentedly. Dalmatian fur tended to be rather coarse save when they were puppies, but most people didn't seem to mind it with Pongo.

"That doesn't surprise me. Until he went to meet Emma, he'd never left Storybrooke," Archie pointed out. "Of course he'd want to try every little thing. A whole world beyond the town line. All of us had Cursed memories, but Henry had to grow up in a small town where time had essentially stopped for everyone but him."

Which explained why he'd believed so deeply in the Curse when everyone else didn't: He could clearly see the effects in classmates becoming more and more distant former classmates as they repeated the same year of schooling and summer vacation endlessly while he alone moved on. Ashley Boyd -- Cinderella -- had been pregnant for twenty-eight years, and no other pregnancies had occurred, not even accidentally due to miserable people trying to find some solace wherever they thought they could. Henry was a smart kid. Once he was old enough to start noticing things, the evidence of the Curse had been everywhere but he hadn't been able to make sense of it until Mary Margaret had given him the book.