This is something that was kinda requested to me on Both of Us but not really. It's just a short multi-chapter version of The Things We Have series. I wouldn't expect it to get too long but it certainly might if I keep postponing the ending.
Emma pulls into the place that August told her to go to meet them. The second her eyes land on him, she tears up but ends up wiping them away. She gets out of her car, slamming the door and walking over to them. The first thing she does is wrap her arms around Neal. Then, she turns to August and socks him in the jaw.
Neal's eyes widen as he tries to pull her off of him, knowing that the last thing Emma needs is prison charges for assault. She continues to struggle against his hold until Neal goes in front of her and wraps his arms around her. "Hey, it's okay. It's okay," he whispers, placing his hand on the back of her head and cradling it.
August had explained everything related to Neal's disappearance to her prior to them meeting, saying that he didn't want Neal to have to explain something that wasn't his fault to her. After a few minutes of just enjoying being together, they decide to go inside of the coffee shop instead of just standing outside. "We have a kid," she tells him as they sit down, figuring that it'd be a great conversation starter and she would have to tell him eventually.
Neal just stares at her with a blank look in his eyes, a grim expression on his face. "His name is Henry. He lives in Maine with his adoptive mother," she says and sees tears beginning to form in Neal's eyes. She reaches across the table and takes his hands, moving her drink out of the way so she doesn't knock it over.
She squeezes his hands, leaning over the table so that she can see his face. "Please don't cry, it's okay," she cooes, sending a glare in August's direction. She wants to tell him that she hates him and use many swear words to make sure he understands just how much but she doesn't want Neal to think that she's actually talking to him, so she doesn't.
He looks up at her, wiping the tears from his eyes and putting his face in his hand. "I see him sometimes. I go up there once a month for a few days. You could come with me next time. I have to ask Regina, but I'm sure she'll say yes. She loves him, Neal. She takes care of him and she's great to me. She says I can take him back anytime, so it's kinda like she's just watching him for me for a little while," Emma explains, trying to make him feel better.
He nods, looking over at the wall and shaking his head in disbelief. "You didn't tell me," he says, looking over at August and the other man shakes his head, shrugging.
"I didn't know."
Neal sighs and puts his head down on the table, his forehead resting on his arm. Emma looks over to August and glares at him. "Get out of here," she says and the man gets up, walking out of the shop and leaving Emma and Neal alone. She stands up, going to sit beside Neal in August's place. She wraps her arms around him and rests her cheek on his back, waiting for him to stop shaking.
She looks over at the clock, sighing and sitting up. She takes his hand, having him sit up as well. "I was gonna go to Regina's like, literally right after this. Is it okay if I go and call her and then if she's okay with you coming we can stop by whenever you're living and get your stuff before we go?" she asks and Neal nods. Emma smiles, kissing his cheek before getting up and going to go and call her.
She's gone for a few minutes before she comes back to the table and looks over at him, smiling and reaching across the table to get her coffee. "She said yes. She's really excited to meet you, so come on," she says, taking his hand and they walk out of the building together. "Are you coming with me, or do you have a car someplace around here?" she asks.
Neal chuckles and looks up at her, smiling as he walks over to the bug with her. "No, August picked me up at my apartment to save gas," he says and Emma smiles, handing him the keys to the car. "Wha-?" he asks before she cuts him off, looking over at the building.
"I don't know where your apartment is. You're driving there, we can take turns on the way to Maine," she says, talking as they get into the car and Neal starts the engine, taking off and driving to his apartment.
They get there and Emma laughs a little bit and for a second Neal thought she was laughing about the building but quickly realizes it's the sign that says not to chain bikes to the gate with a bike on the other side, which is, of course, chained to the gate.
Neal lets out a breathy chuckle as he opens the gate and holds it open for her. They walk up to his apartment and Emma takes note of the fact that his room number is 407, just so that she doesn't have to ask the next time she needs to know it. "I'll try to be quick," he says and Emma nods, going immediately over to the window where their dream catcher hangs in the window.
Neal grins as he looks at her while he takes out his suitcase. "Do you want that? You can take it," he says but she shakes her head, hanging it back up on the window. His smile fades a bit as he puts clothes neatly into his suitcase.
She walks into the other room, going to sit on the bed while he packs his suitcase. "I already have the pictures," she says, handing him a pair of socks that he missed while trying to throw them into the suitcase.
Neal nods, smiling a bit as he remembers all of the old photos that they took with a Polaroid camera- one that he still had sitting in his desk drawer, along with half a package of unused film. He walks over to the desk and picks it up out of the drawer, bringing it and the film over to the bed to put in his backpack. "Oh my god, I can't believe you still have that," she says and he smiles, nodding.
She watches as he zips up his backpack, then goes and grabs down a backpack from the closet and puts his sweat-shirt into it along with his sketchbook, the camera and its film, and a few other things that he wasn't paying enough attention to to recognize. "You're bringing it?" she asks as she watches him put it into his backpack.
He nods, looking over at her and smiling brightly before answering. "Of course! Maybe we could get some more good memories in pictures out of this trip," he says, putting it in the back wrapped up in his sweater so that it won't break if he drops the bag. "I'm ready to go if you wanna," he says and she nods, standing up and they walk downstairs to her car. He puts his suitcase in the trunk next to hers and his backpack on the seat behind him in the car so he'll be able to reach it if he needs to.
They start driving and after many hours of driving and many breaks along the way, they finally get to Storybrooke. Emma parks outside a nice little house and rubs Neal's arm as he begins to shake with nerves. "What if he doesn't like me?" he asks, resting his cheek on his hand.
Emma gives him a look, staring at him funny. "He's 6 months old, Neal," she says and he sighs, putting his head in his hands. Emma opens her door, grabbing her backpack out of the trunk and handing Neal's to him before they start going to the door. "Just calm down, okay," she mumbles after ringing the doorbell. They hear a cry, one of a child, approaching the door as they see the blurry outline of Regina through the door's glass.
She answers the door and gives Emma a hug as best she can. "Hi," she says breathlessly and shakes Neal's hand. "Regina Mills, nice to meet you," she says, offering him as best of a smile as she can while holding their screaming child.
Emma looks at her, tilting her head to the side as she watches her and then sees her sigh as the microwave starts to go off. "I can take him, Gina," she says, putting her backpack down on the ground and taking Henry from Regina so she could go and get what was probably a bottle for the wailing baby from the microwave.
Regina smiles at her gratefully, taking her hand in both of her own before rushing into the kitchen, Emma following slowly behind her. Henry calms down almost instantly when Emma takes him and grabs onto her finger with all of his, playing with it with both of his hands. Emma smiles at him, bouncing him up and down as they make their way into the kitchen.
Emma sits down on one of the bar stools at the small breakfast bar and Neal sits down beside her, looking at their son in awe. "Do you wanna hold him?" Emma asks, seeing that Neal's watching Henry and the baby is reaching for him while sitting on her lap. Neal nods and Emma passes Henry to him. Neal sits the baby on his thigh, holding onto him with both hands until he feels comfortable with just one like Emma does.
Regina looks over at him after the bottle is all done, smiling at the father and son meeting each other for the first time, Henry already seeming to have taken a liking to Neal and is holding onto his shirt with both hands and leaning against his chest. Neal's holding onto his son, looking down at him with such compassion and affection for the little boy.
Neal notices that Regina's watching him and looks up at her, seeing that she's holding an already made bottle in her hands. "Do you wanna feed him?" she asks and Neal nods once, a small smile spreading across his face and she hands it to him before coming around the other side of the counter and showing him how to hold Henry while feeding him.
Emma smiles as she watches Neal with the kid. She never really knew how good he was with kids until now. Sure, there was maybe once or twice when they found kids on the road that they felt the need to take care of and watched overnight, and then the few that lost their parent's in the grocery store or had fallen off something at the park, but that was really it and they were all for short periods of time and none of them was his own child. Now, she was beginning to see that side of him.
He makes sure to hold onto Henry tight while feeding him, afraid to drop him or hurt him in some way. Emma smiles as he looks up at her and smiles, chuckling a little bit as Henry let's go of the bottle and starts using his little fists to try to push the bottle away. "I can take that, here's this," Regina says, handing him a cloth in exchange for the half-full bottle.
He looks at it with a confused expression until Henry starts crying a minute later and Emma helps him. She puts the cloth on his shoulder and helps him pick Henry up. "You have to pat his back. He'll throw it up a little bit because that's what babies do but it's completely normal," she says watching as Neal pats Henry's back and he throws up. Neal makes a face and Regina comes around to take the cloth from Henry.
She looks over at Emma when she comes back into the kitchen from the laundry room. "Hey, have you guys had dinner yet? I could fix something up, or we could go out somewhere if you wanna go someplace," she offers and Emma looks to Neal, who is too fixated on the giggling baby sitting on his lap.
Emma looks back to Regina and smiles, looking over at her. "It depends. Has Henry left the house today?" Emma asks and Regina shakes her head and Emma remembers that she was getting her cable fixed. "Let's go out, then. It might be good to get him out of the house," Emma says and Regina nods, walking over to the door and slipping a pair of converse on before grabbing Henry's car seat and walking over to Neal.
Regina watches as he reluctantly places his child in the seat and Emma can see that he's beginning to get nervous as his hands start shaking, something that happens very rarely. "You can sit next to him in the backseat if you'd like," Regina says and Neal nods. She straps the baby's car seat into the car and Neal goes around to get in the middle row of the backseat.
He learns on that car trip that Henry doesn't like his car seat. He knows that he can't take Henry out of the car seat but he does reach over so that Henry can see him and tickles his stomach lightly, which makes the baby laugh and stop crying. When they get out of the car, Neal just carries him, figuring that it would be easier than carrying his car seat into the restaurant while the child screams the whole time.
They sit Henry in a high chair at first, but when he starts crying Neal takes him out and holds him on his lap while they eat. "Neal, if you rip the fries into little pieces he can eat them," Regina says, watching as Neal tries to convince Henry to eat a little piece of chicken that he ripped up. "Chicken is still too stringy for him so he could choke on it, though," she says and Neal nods, taking out a fry from the basket and ripping it up into tiny pieces before putting it into Henry's mouth gently.
The baby smiles and giggles a little bit as Neal continues ripping off pieces of fries and feeding them to Henry. After about two of them, Neal stops it, figuring that it's not healthy to give him too many of them. They leave after everyone's eaten already and Neal has to put Henry back in his car seat, something that he really doesn't want to do because he knows that Henry hates it, but he knows that it's not safe to not put him in the car seat.
After they get back to Regina's house, they hang out for a little bit before it's bedtime, when Henry went to his nursery, Emma and Neal went into the guest room- which was pretty much just Emma's room seeing as she was the only one who stays in it- and Regina goes to her room. One thing that Neal knows is that he's very, very excited for the next day when they would have even more fun with their son and maybe even get to take some pictures with the Polaroid camera to take home with them.