Rated T

Prompt: rumple and regina we're in love aren't we?

Enchanted Forest (where Regina went to help Henry and Rumple went to find the Guardian). Before HH curse.

He watched as she sat by the lake, the moon casting a glow along the water and her skin. The amount in which her stunning image sent warmth throughout his limbs could almost have floored him. Brought him to his knees right where he stood. But, he moved forward to where she sat and leaned against the same log she was currently. They didn't speak at first. Both content with drinking in the silence and calm water moving along the stream beneath that swollen pale orb in the sky.

A sigh escaped her lips, bringing Rumple's eyes with it. He watched as she regained that same determined look he had learned to admire over the years. Clearly a battle had begun waging behind those eyes of hers, a clash against the tide. Where it was leading? He hadn't the slightest of clues. Adjusting his posture, he searched for something to his right that he could have sworn caught his eye before she had. There. Plucking it from it's tendrils of grass, he brought it around to rest in front of those fighting eyes of hers. "For your thoughts?"

Regina hadn't seen it at first, having been caught up in a whirlwind of thoughts that seemed determined to try and shatter her resolve. But as soon as the white rose came into view, her mouth fell open. It was beautiful. The gesture as well as the flower. "Thank you." A second passed as she took the blooming rose into her grasp, running her thumb along the soft petals. But Rumple sat patiently. Which had to have been one of things she admired about the man. In his own way, he always had shown her that. "I came here to help. Wasn't needed." The words felt like bricks as she tried to get them up and out of her. "Then I somehow just made things worse."

He nodded, tongue snaking out to wet his dry lips as he tried to decide the best way to say what he needed to. "As a mentor.." Feeling confident in how he had begun it, he continued as he leaned forward his elbows coming to rest on his knees whilst he tilted his head in her direction. "…we do what we know. As well as what we've learned."

Shaking her head, she brought the rose to her chest. "Don't put this on you, Rumple. It's not your fault she's set on doing all of this."

"Neither is it yours, Regina." Only then did he sick back up and bring his arm around to grasp her shoulder. Giving it a reassuring squeeze. It surprised him when she leaned in, resting her head against his shoulder, eyes set on that white rose and it's velvet petals.

It seemed to have soothed her, his words and how he had put them in such a way that might have helped her realize that the creations that are sometimes made aren't always the fault of their creator but instead the person that lives on before and after they are made. Just in case it hadn't set in, he opened his mouth to make more of a point – but the words faltered as soon as he heard her speak.

"This connection. This understanding." She began, heart thudding a normal pace now. Having calmed from the few words he had wanted to use to soothe her. In one way, they had. But her consistent grief at possibly making things worse for those she loves would stay with her regardless of consolation. She would not stop until she saved the ones she loved from someone like Drizella. "Finding a way to always be…us. And there for each other regardless of the situation at hand…"

He titled his head so that he could let her know he was listening. The hand on her shoulder slipping down to her back, sliding in slow strokes along the fabric adorning her frame.

"We're in love, aren't we?" In some ways, throughout their partnership or whatever this had been - she had always thought love wouldn't be the right term for what they had. Always having been at each others throats or helping one another when the moment called for it. But now, after all they had gone through, everything life had thrown at them. Change had occurred. Life threw things in their way, things meant to do their worst but only served to now soften their edges. Make them so that they fit perfectly, like this, on silent nights under that swollen bright moon in the sky.

He pushed a sigh out from his lips, the organ in his chest sending a pang to his brain. One that told him she might be right. Indeed she was. Of course. He had known their connection for years was that of love. In one way or another. She had been his star pupil. The one flower he watched bloom into a brilliant and true Queen. And that wasn't in the way of the monster he had created. No. That was for the woman she had become, the one who was currently nuzzled against him in a display of vulnerability. "Let's just say there's a reason we always find our way back to each other." He shifted slightly then,taking her chin in between his fingertips and guiding it up as he dipped closer, lips grazing hers in such a way it could scarcely be called a kiss.

Her left hand wrapped around his wrist, holding his hand where it was as her right rested against the nape of his neck - white rose trapped between his and her skin. Their bodies stayed like that for what seemed like hours but were merely seconds. Eyes searching each other for the answer neither could bring to spill from hesitant lips. Both inhaling the air that the other allowed out between them, humid and delicious. Light and yet heavy with the realization that had all but been admitted in a land they both felt strangers in.

Before anyone could ruin their moment, giving them more reason to feel weighed down by the fight of the good and true – Both at the same time, as if on cue, leaned in. Lips pressing chaste at first in a timid embrace that soon turned into a desperate admittance, the space between them closing.