Swan Queen
The Morning After
It must have been barely dawn, Emma surmised, from the way her eyes opened with a relative easiness in the dimly lit room – unfamiliar, but not entirely unwelcoming. From the crook in her neck, she guessed she'd been out way longer than the 'few hours' she had originally planned for, and her body felt stiff and heavy as she tried to roll her limbs back into feeling.
Her foot brushed against something warm and, perhaps out of instinct, her leg further twitched towards the source of heat as she craned her neck up – ignoring its pained protest – to catch sight of the woman she knew to be lay by her side.
Regina had been watching her, clearly, for a small, almost teasing smile already held her lips, and Emma made a show of stretching to help diffuse the blush that was dead-set on climbing to her cheeks.
"How long was I asleep?" She asked after clearing her throat.
Regina gave a soft, one-shouldered shrug, as though the concept of time had completely left her, or perhaps just did not apply to the room they were currently harboured up in.
"They're not happy you're here," she said softly, her eyes crinkling with amusement. Emma rolled her own, catching sight of gleaming pink, and Regina continued, "A nurse came in ten minutes ago… just to check on things."
At that, the Emma's relaxed posture stiffened a little and she teetered closer to the other woman with a soft, yet urgent, "Everything okay?"
Together, they peered down at the wrapped bundle – impossibly small and perfect – that dozed against Regina's chest. Pink lips parted with the baby's breath and, unable to help herself, Emma brushed the tip of a finger over the infant's chubby cheek, making only the slightest contact with the new flesh.
When she sat back again, smile wobbling, she caught sight of the look of dainty wonder over Regina's face. Her hair was mussed, and only further messed up with the hand that Emma reached up to brush through her thick locks, and her make-up had been previously washed off her after the events of the night before, but that pregnancy-glow remained intact and her cheeks bloomed with rose-tinted warmth.
In the softest of breaths, as though even the slight increase in volume might startle their daughter from her slumber, Regina answered, "Everything's perfect."