"By the time you read this, I'll be gone. I'd always hoped that it wouldn't come to this. I love you so much, but we could never work out. There's too much between us. There's too many complications in my life. You always thought you could make me stay, but I'm a runner. So here I am, running."
Regina sat at her desk, poring over the town's financial reports. Something wasn't adding up. There were two thousand dollars missing from the budget, and it was her job as Mayor to track them down. 'Where could they have gone?' She sighed angrily, finally slamming the papers down and cupping her head in her hands. Two thousand dollars wasn't much in the grand scheme of things, but Regina didn't like not knowing what was happening in her own town. Tomorrow she'd have to call in an accountant and hire him to find the money. She looked at the clock. It was two-forty five. In fifteen minutes she would call it a day. She shuffled the reports together, putting them back in a folder, filing it away with the previous month's financial reports. The intercom beeped, and Aurora's voice came through.
"Mayor Mills?" She sounded unsure.
"Yes Aurora?"
"You have a call on line one. The only information I have is that it's urgent."
"Thank you Aurora." Regina almost picked up the phone, and then she pressed the intercom button again. "I'm done for the day Aurora. You can go home."
"Thank you Madame Mayor." The intercom clicked again, and Regina picked up the phone.
"Mayors Mills." She answered the phone curtly.
"Madame Mayor." The voice on the other line was a man's. He sounded sure, confident of himself. It sounded like he was smiling. "I've found her. She was a wily one, but I found her."
Regina inhaled sharply. "Where is she?" She breathed the words out. They were almost a whisper.
"She's in Tallahassee. I've sent you an email containing all the information I could get, including where she's been the past two years, jobs she'd had, and her current address." Regina had so many questions that she couldn't even pick one. The PI on the line offered her one more piece of information. "She had a daughter. She's one and a half now."
"Thank you, Mr. Templar. A bonus will be wired to you by tonight."
"It was a pleasure doing business with you Madame Mayor. I appreciate the challenge. Good luck." Regina hung up the phone and sat back, in her chair, her hands over her face. Emma. She'd found Emma. Regina left a note on her desk for Aurora, telling her she was taking a vacation for the first time since taking the Mayoral position, and leaving directions for her. She knew where Emma was, and she needed to find her.
It's hard to lose someone you love to an accident. That was how Regina lost her first love, Daniel. He'd died in a car accident on his way to the hospital. Regina remembered that day in painful detail. The day Daniel died was the day Henry was born. Henry's birthday always brought on a tidal wave of emotion. She remembered sobbing through the delivery and demanding to wait for Daniel, until a doctor pulled her mother from the room, giving her some grave news. "What is it!?" Regina had screamed, partially from emotional distress and partially from pain.
"Regina, we need you to push."
"I have to wait for Daniel!" She screamed, sweat pouring into her eyes as tears leaked out.
"He's not coming. There's been…there's been an accident." Regina had given birth to Henry through a flood of tears. She'd spent years recovering from losing Daniel. She hadn't healed from that loss, and probably never would.
It might be hard to lose someone to death, but it's even harder to lose them to their own fear. Emma ran out on Regina, left her in the middle of the night. Actually, as Regina had read and reread Emma's letter, it became clear to her that Emma had left her in the early hours of the morning. Regina had dropped her guard for just a little while, long enough to let Emma in. She'd spent nights with her, holding her, being held by her. Things were hectic. There was a man stalking Emma. He'd killed Graham, and then simply disappeared. Emma had let the guilt overwhelm her, and then she'd run. She'd vowed to find the murderer herself. And she'd told Regina she was pregnant.
Regina had spent a year unsure of how to handle Emma's abandonment. She'd written a letter responding to Emma's. She'd reread Emma's. She'd reread her own. She'd considered sending her letter to Emma, and then she'd realized that she wouldn't know where to send it, even if she wanted to. So she'd stashed it and hired a private investigator to find Emma. And two years later, finally, she knew exactly where she was. Regina sat in her home office, staring at the address on her computer screen. 'Tallahassee. Tallahassee. What now?' The answer struck her. She knew exactly what to do. She was going to Tallahassee.
"Henry?" She called his name. He came to the office door. "Pack your bags. We're going to Florida."
"Yes!" Henry celebrated, his voice shooting down an octave. He'd hit his growth spurt, adding six inches to his height in the last three years. "What're we doing in Florida?"
"Whatever you want. We'll spend some time down there, maybe go to a beach. Do something educational."
"Awww mom. Come on."
"Don't 'come on, mom' me. Go pack. We're leaving tomorrow." Henry left the room, and Regina opened her web browser, purchasing two one way tickets to Tallahassee. She tried to avoid forming any expectations over what would happen, but nothing she told herself could stop a pit from forming in her stomach. She went upstairs to pack a bag, her palms sweating slightly.
The next morning Emma and Henry woke up at three am to drive to the airport. They boarded quickly and without incident, Henry excited to fly for the first time.
Regina sat on the plane, apparently at ease. To the casual observer she looked like the average businesswoman, traveling first class with her son while working on her laptop. On the inside however, she was nervous. The longer the plane ride dragged on, the bigger the pit in her stomach. The only thing she'd asked Templar to do was find Emma, and that was the only thing he'd done. Regina scanned through the email he sent her. Emma had left Storybrooke and gone off the map for a bit. Emma's daughter had been born a little over two years ago, in a hospital in California. After that she had disappeared. She'd cancelled her credit cards, closed her bank accounts, and left her job. He couldn't even find the name of Emma's daughter. He'd said that Emma must have paid the doctors quite a lot of money to keep quiet. From there he'd scoured Boston trying to find any trace of her. Her old employer had been forced to let her go. He'd said Emma was the best bail bondsperson he'd ever had, and letting her go was the hardest thing he'd ever had to do. Emma hadn't said why she was leaving or how to find her.
Regina scrolled down further through the email, reading on. Templar explained how he'd had an automatic internet search going for Emma Swan. If her name came up anywhere, he'd know it. Lucky for Templar (and Regina) there were only 21 Emma Swan's in the country, so finding her name when it finally showed up on the internet wasn't too hard. There'd been a fire in a nursery in Emma's neighborhood, and Emma had rushed in. There was an article in the local paper on her, including a small interview with Emma. It turned out her daughter hadn't been inside, but Emma had gone inside anyways. Regina opened the link to the article, reading it for a fourth or fifth time. She wasn't surprised that Emma had been a hero. She looked at Henry, who was sleeping through the long plane ride, and remembered how Emma had saved Henry from a mine years ago. The fact that Emma had saved children didn't surprise Regina. She wondered how motherhood had changed Emma. In fact, she wondered how time had changed Emma.
After five long hours, the flight finally ended. The plane descended slowly and the passengers disembarked. Emma and Henry hurried, gathering their bags and checking into a hotel near the airport. They stood in their room for a few moments. "What are we gonna do?" Henry asked curiously.
"We're gonna go visit an old friend."
"Who!?"
"You'll see. Just wait." Regina brought up the address she had, which was only a few blocks from the hotel. She wrote it down and gestured to Henry. "Let's see if we can find our old friend."
Regina and Henry walked through the streets, taken in by the humid summer heat. Regina looked at the paper in her hand, trying to find the address written on it. It was in the middle of the street, a yellow paneled two story house, with blue shutters and an immaculate white door. The perfectly manicured lawn was a lively green. There was a red wagon in the middle of the grass, lonely and abandoned. The white wrap around porch had a gate to it with the hinge wide open. The entire thing looked incredibly domestic and inviting. Regina wasn't sure what she'd expected, but this certainly wasn't it.
"Who's house is this?" Henry asked, always curious.
"Just wait a few moments more." Together they walked up the steps onto the front porch. Regina knocked. After a moment she could hear footsteps coming from the other side of the door. It opened, revealing a man she didn't recognize. He had brown hair and brown eyes. He was an average looking guy. "Hello?" He said.
Regina was taken back. She looked at the number on the house again, making sure she had the right address one more time. She did. "Hi, I'm looking for Emma?"
"Who are you?" He asked, not rudely.
"I'm an old friend."
"Emma!" He called, then waited. Henry gave Regina a curious look. No one answered. "She's in her office. Come on back." He led the way to the back of the house. "Emma, there's someone here for you."
"Who is it?" She asked as they turned the corner and walked through the door that led into Emma's office. Emma looked up from the desk she was working at, which faced the door they walked through. Regina and Emma locked eyes. Emma dropped the pen she'd been working with onto the desk and stood straight up, sending her chair into the table behind her.
"Emma!" Henry called. He ran past Regina and around the desk, throwing his arms around Emma.
"Henry!" She smiled as she disappeared into his bear hug. "How have you been?"
"Good! Look at this! I'm taller than you!"
Emma laughed. "Yeah kid, you are. How'd you get so big?"
"I eat my vegetables." He finally let go of Emma. Regina looked at the two of them standing side by side, catching up. Regina thought about how Henry had been after Emma had left. Every day for a long time Henry had asked about Emma. At first he'd asked where she was. After a while he stopped asking where she was and had started asking when she was coming back. Then he started to ask if she was coming back. Then he stopped asking altogether. It broke Regina's heart a little bit every day to watch him lose faith in someone they'd both let in.
Emma turned to Regina. They both just looked at each other. The man cleared his throat. Regina had forgotten he was even standing behind her in the doorway. "I'll go make some coffee." He said, leaving.
"Regina." Emma's face seemed unsure.
"Emma." At the sound of Regina's voice Emma's face changed, a smile slowly forming. The sound of a baby came out of a baby monitor on the desk. "Um…would you like to meet my daughter?" Regina nodded. "You wanna come too, Henry?" He shrugged, so Emma led the way from the room. "Come on, her room's upstairs."
They followed Emma upstairs to the nursery, where a little baby girl was standing in a crib. She was the spitting image of her mother, with short curly blonde hair and striking blue eyes. She gurgled, reaching out with one hand for her mom. Emma plucked her baby up, propping the girl on her hip. "You want to hold her?" She asked. Regina nodded, and Emma offered her the baby. The little girl reached for Regina, wrapping her short arms around Regina's neck.
"Well hello to you too!" The baby let go, leaning back and smiling at Regina. "What's her name?" Regina asked Emma.
Emma paused, then cleared her throat. "Regina."
"Yeah?" Regina asked, not understanding. "What is it?"
"Regina. That's her name." There was an awkward silence. Henry looked at Regina, Regina looked at Emma, and Emma very pointedly looked at the ground. Baby Regina swiveled her head around the room, perplexed by the silence. She looked back at Regina and said "Mama." She giggled and buried her hands in Regina's hair.
"I know you've suffered. I don't want you to suffer over me. I don't want you to feel the pain that this will probably bring you. The problem here is me. It is my fault."