A/N Hello, this story it's dedicated to LilithiumGirl since it was her who recommended me the song (Break in by Halestorm) in the first place. I hope that you like the whole story and thank you for letting me write this.
Since Fanfiction has a very strong rules about writing songfics (As I discovered recently) the parts in which the lyrics are show has been cut in this version, but if anyone wants to read the story with the lyrics with it you can go to the link that I will write at the end of the story.
That's all, on with the one-shot!
Disclaimer: The characters depicted in this story aren't mine.
1.-
Fat drops of rain poured before the brunette's figure, her arms tightened up against her frame as she smiled sadly at the gray sky, the stony entrance of her vault open at her back as she wondered when she was going to be able to go home.
Home, a word that she had decided long ago it was a word without a fair answer or a correct description.
As the fair gray of the sky started turning black with the fast approach of the night the rain grew on strength. The droplets of cold water now splashing against her boots as her vault remained open, the porch of the crypt her only shelter for the storm.
She knew that she could enter in her vault and wait there, even sleep there, but the regrets and lost words weight to much for her to bear them.
After talking with Emma inside the mysterious manor she had tried to keep smiling but after weeks of trying to find a clue without result the memories were starting to become thin and painful and even the cheerfulness of the blonde and Henry couldn't erase the wondering thoughts of Regina that maybe the Author didn't want to change her story.
Sighing, Regina exhaled and looked at her breath that floated for a second before her before disappearing in the woods. She knew that she needed to close the vault as well as she had decided to change her future by accepting that her past was well in the past, the now probably torn pieces of paper that had been once another page of her story were the proof that she was tired of expecting some kind of magic love.
But, she thought as her lips parted in a grim smile, she had been raised in a world in which True Love was whispered between royals and peasants; the possibility of having a true love was considered both luck and destiny. Even if Daniel was long gone the possibility of having that with Robin had been intoxicating and now that it was over the memories of her acts were another burden that she needed to carry.
She had stopped feigning that she could sleep after the first week and as she tried to explain to the ever-concerned Henry she had also tried to explain herself that her sadness wasn't because Robin's disappearance but because she now needed to conceal the idea that she didn't want to be another chapter in a book. Maybe that kind of self-revelation wasn't one that a pre-teen needed to hear from her mother but after talking with Henry the brunette had figured out that her sadness was born because her insecurity and not because some kind of broken heart.
But even after realizing that she couldn't sleep and so she had started to pass her time inside her vault, her memories haunting her as she tried to find something in the books that she had there, the words turning into gibberish after the first weeks.
And so after the few days in which Henry had called her, agitated that she didn't make it to dinner she had decided that even if they couldn't understand her it was better to tell both Emma and Henry were she was going.
Telling Emma her whereabouts was something that she had done without thinking but when the younger woman had showed up and had managed to make her go home Regina had figured out that she had done that because she had knew that the blonde was going to accept her instead of fighting her because of her will to change her fate.
As yellow lights approached the vault the brunette exhaled once again and turned her head slightly, looking at the inside of the vault with fondness as well as rage and sadness but as the soft voice of Emma Swan echoed inside her head she nodded to herself and stepped into the rain, the first drops of water managing to wet her hair before the half smiling blonde managed to put her own umbrella over Regina's head.
2.-
Emma smiled at the brunette as Regina motioned at the yellow bug, the body of the vehicle barely visible through the pouring rain.
They hadn't talked about the fact that Regina could make herself appear inside of her home whenever she wanted to return to the manor but even if they both knew that Emma's decision of being there for Regina was somehow illogical both women were happy with the simple act of sitting next to each other as the blonde carried the brunette to her home once the older woman was finished with her research.
And Emma knew that after her decision Regina had finally been able to sleep for more than two hours, that information courtesy of Henry, so even if the dark haired woman's eyes were still full of sadness the determination of Regina's face was starting to win the war between the brunettes' beliefs and upbringing.
The blonde hadn't hesitated when Henry had first called her in the middle of the night, worried that his mother hadn't come back from what was going to be, supposedly, a short walk, she was going to help Regina. And show her that she was there for her, even if that meant to be there, going with her to the older woman's mansion and back every single night.
It had been a little scandal once Emma had finally decided to start talking with the brunette in a social basis, her caring and protecting nature in obvious display for anyone to see it. But after the dust has settled down Regina had smiled at Emma with that secretive smile that the blonde was proud to bring to the brunette's lips every once in a while.
They hadn't talked about that either or how Regina hadn't not only brightened up but also open up both to Henry and to the blonde after the few and most dark days.
3.-
As the wheels spinned around Regina looked through the window, her eyes vacant but her smile more bright with each passing second as the droplets of rain started to thin little by little, the storm already losing its battle.
She once had loved the rain, happy to see it from her balcony from her castle as it poured over the village at her feet. But now she loved the afterwards smell of it, the pureness that invaded the woods as the rain became only a memory, the last drops being absorbed by the ever-thirsty ground.
She knew, as she glanced at the blonde at her side that kept looking at the steering wheel with firm resolution, that she was recovering for something much more difficult that only the realization that she had really been written by someone. She knew that Robin's departure hadn't been the last straw, she knew that she needed to rest after everything that had happened to her, that she had experienced, that she had changed in the lapse of three years.
She knew that but as Emma smiled at her and she returned her smile she knew that she was getting better.
Home was a strange word, her mind reminded her and she nodded because it was true and the dark ideas that had been lurking inside of her disappeared as she saw with clarity that "home" was, indeed, a very strange word full of different premises and meanings, each one correct to the person that enunciated them.
Home had been the word that she had used when she had been young to referring to her parents manor, home had been the word that she had used to mention Leopold's castle albeit she had said that against her own free will, home had been the word that she had used once she had arrived to Storybrooke and after Henry's arrival home had been the designated word to describe the mansion in which she lived with him.
But home was also Emma's car as they both went to her mansion and even if it was short-lived home Regina was thankful for those slow moments with the blonde in which the future and the past didn't matter because they didn't even exist.
She had grew up in a world in which home was something that someone needed to survive and she had been happy with that explanation until she had finally realized that that description wasn't the correct one for her. And she didn't even know if that lesson was one from Henry's or Emma's.
4.-
Both women looked ahead of them, the night running along with them as the yellow car carried them through the middle of the city, the occasional night sounds filling the space as Emma's window is perpetually open due to a problem with a Lost Boy and a rock. (Or a brick or something that Emma hadn't quite explained to Regina but it was alright because even if it was cold it was relaxing to listen to the night)
Both, brunette and blonde, were already thinking in the words that they had repeated to each other for the last weeks, the soft smiles growing each night as Emma's frankness made Regina look ahead of her with a brighter disposition that the previous day.
They knew the words by heart now but even if that was true they liked those last moments between the two of them, the remainder that even if they were both Queen and Savior they were also something else, something entirely different that had escaped the Author's decision.
And the young woman was the only one apart from their shared son that saw Regina how she truly was, how she truly wanted to be and what she truly had tried to accomplish.
And the brunette woman was the only one that even if she should dread the blonde's company actually relished it because she could see the woman that the blonde had truly could have been if she wouldn't have been a mere character into another story.
So they believed in each other, tired of petty arguments and half-assed morals and as Emma finally stopped the car both of them looked at each other and smiled, knowing that it was going to be the brunette the first one to open her door and Emma was going to rush, trying to close it behind the older woman as she made a stupid joke about being a gentleman with a Queen.
And Regina was probably going to roll her eyes and walk with the blonde to her door as she listed carefully the books that she had read that day, listening to the blonde's quickly and informative notes about her own research inside Gold's shop.
And so they were going to talk and listen because they knew, deep down, that even if Regina was starting to feel better and Emma was starting to accept what she was and what she wasn't, they only could trust in the other. Even if they still tried to appear nonchalant about it.
5.-
But this night the rain had left the world more pure than normal and as she breathed the air filled with the sweet aroma of trees and nature Regina felt her head drowning with words that Emma knew as well as her even if they hadn't uttered them to their partner.
So breaking her rules she stopped, making Emma looked at he with concerned eyes as the darkness of the night created shadows and creases where Regina knew were smooth and pale skin.
"Thank you" It's the first words outside their normal routine that made Emma nod with uncertainty, her hands playing with the hem of her jacket as Regina repeated them with the wonder of a child that has started to talk.
And as more seconds passed and Regina's eyes locked with Emma's both women knew that whatever was happening was something different this time. They didn't have any script or words prepared, they are them, only them, and the ink that had written her story is long dry.
So as Emma nodded and raised her right hand (that tingles slightly with the pressure of magic and nervousness) Regina only kept looking at the blonde with her dark orbs, the knowledge and tiredness that had been perpetually inside of them changing to wonder and curiosity with each passing second, the ties that tied her acts thinning and disappearing.
6.-
The awkward pat in the brunette's forearm as Emma smiles and nods, still slightly lost, was the final straw that made Regina wondered if they could once fool themselves into thinking that they were only going to be mere titles in a child's novel.
The blonde looked at the manor and interlaced her own fingers as she watched nervously the changes inside Regina's gaze, her own eyes shining slightly with the twinkling of the stars that are starting to appear over the city now that the clouds are leaving the place.
Feeling light-headed the young woman coughed and bit her lip, making Regina's eyes look there as both of them shared a nervous smile, the silence pregnant with the multiple answers that Emma could say to the brunette who now looked more at ease as she realized that she had, in fact, spoke her mind.
7.-
Emma closed her eyes and laughed to herself, realizing that they were breaking every kind of silent truce that they could have created, truce that she had been comfort with because it meant everything as well as nothing. But now, that Regina is standing in front of her with her manor shaping her figure and a thin brow rising already in the older's woman forehead she knows that even if they had managed to keep they strange truce they had been always playing that game, a game that didn't have rules, only the ones that they decided to play.
For a fleeting moment she wondered if that didn't mean that it was the Author's plan all along but she grew up in a world in which reality beat down fairy tales universes so she decided to simply follow the brunette's smile instead of those old words that even didn't matter anymore, the book closed and read it, it's lessons long learnt it.
And as she approached Regina she felt herself crumbling into pieces, her savior persona disappearing as her simpler shelf emerged between the ruins of what she had left of that mighty "chosen one".
8.-
Regina exhaled and this time she didn't have time to actually see her breathing before it disappeared because Emma was looking at her with a question in her eyes and a smile trying to touch her lips as her own mouth was determined to spell the silent answer to that question, the question that both of them knew as they had toyed with it
And the brunette knewthat she wasn't what she was, or even what they wrote about her to be, and maybe her her older self would be disappointed but she had spent so many years being and living the title that it was given to her than even if it's easier she wanted to know, to feel, to taste being only a name, a name which she was ready to die with.
So even if it could be easier to just turn and march through that door she stayed as Emma approached her, their eyes locking as her walls crumbled and shivered, cracks that were already there growing bigger as Emma finally stood there, her breath ragged as well as hers.
9.-
They didn't know who hugged the other, or who simply kissed the other's cheek as they sighed, feeling the last pieces of them mingling together, creating something that they only could describe as freedom.
And Regina's couldn't really explain if it washer legs who started to tremble or it was Emma's body who shook until the blonde finally let go the older woman's body but the truth was that when they finally looked into each other's eye something inside of them had changed.
It that moment, as Regina smiled and laughed, feeling the coldness seeping away as Emma answered with a soft laugh of her own, in that quiet, and short moment, the city disappeared as well as the muffled promise that something new was going to happen, something in which they were going to wear their written personas as if they were real to the shake of that place that both of them had grew to love.
But in that moment that didn't matter because they weren't names, or ink. They had rebuilt each other with the same pieces that hundreds of people had stated that were broken in the first place.
10.-
And as the both looked at each other, letting the oftness of he leather and the crispy touch of the silk already tingling in their fingertips a sudden light appears behind Regina, making her body light up with the sudden brightness, bringing back the reality of a world written by others and ruled by long forgotten feuds.
But Emma knew what were inside the brunette's panicked eyes, the older woman knew what was inside of herself as sky started to cover up again behind a thick layer of fresh clouds. And as the first droplets of water started to touch their heated cheeks and then sometimes high sometimes deep voice of their son resonated through the mansion as the front door was opened just an inch the blonde knew that she was going to keep going to Regina's vault as well as she was going to keep inviting her at the dinner. As well as Regina was probably going to keep trying to fed her with green food as they both recovered and grew.
"I know" Said Regina as she eyed the sky, her eyes hidden behind her bangs for just a second.
"I'm going to be there" Replied Emma and she sighed because they are almost the same exact words that they say to each other each night bt even if that words are overused Regina nodded, as if knowing exactly what Emma had truly meant with that.
And she probably knew.
"As I am going to be next to you" Finished the blonde as Regina already started to turn towards the door, a soft smile touching her lips fleetingly.
And the older woman tilted her head and wonder, not for the first time, if she only Emma's voice and promises to fully heal. Promises that she knew were going to be fullfilled.
Because both of them were real and not some kind of written story about redemption and broken hope. They were something else.
Something even special.
(Original version: : / / archiveofourown works / 3119111 )