BRUISED HEARTS

CHAPTER 1

Regina was in the kitchen, her hands under the hot running water. With quick movements she washed away the last drops of cider and the mark of her lipstick from the glass that had stayed with her during the last few hours.

Regina had spent her evening on the couch with Henry, watching two episodes of his latest favorite show and, during commercial breaks, listening to his excited recount of his sword lesson with David.

Six months after the curse was broken, mother and son were rebuilding their relationship on stronger and more honest foundations. Since Regina had expressed and showed her desire to change, to redeem herself, to not use magic to hurt others, to not treat him as a possession, Henry had been standing proudly on her side. In the spoken words of regrets and in his strong and frequent hugs, he was showing to his mother his desire to forgive her and to stop seeing her as the cruel Evil Queen of his stories.

Regina was working hard to leave her Enchanted Forest's persona behind, to not let the wary and unforgiving looks of some of the residents of Storybrooke get to her, to not succumb to the dark magic that was running again in her veins and to the power that came with it. She was focusing on Henry, on her love for him and on her desire to be the mother he deserved.

And so the quiet evenings spent with her son became Regina's primary source of serenity. Having Henry talking to her, smiling at her and enjoying their time together, after months of accusations and hateful looks, was giving Regina happiness again. Those evenings warmed her heart, like the glass of cider she allowed herself each time after Henry went to bed warmed her body.

Glass cleaned, Regina closed the faucet, dried her hands, and looked at the clock on the kitchen wall. It was already eleven thirty and Regina was ready to end her day.

She was making her way upstairs when someone knocked loudly on the front door. At that time of the night she knew it could only be Emma Swan.

Regina turned around, climbed down the stairs and slowly walked to the door as another series of knocks echoed in the foyer.

In the past few months opening her door for Emma had become a habit. Picking up Henry and dropping him off, their biweekly magic lessons, the casual dinners all together: almost every day there was something that brought Emma to stand on her porch. And so Regina had become familiar with the way Emma rang her doorbell – always two rapid rings – and the way her own lips curled into a small smile every time she made her way to welcome Emma into her home.

This time was no exception. But along with the spontaneous curl of her lips there were also a strange thrill going through her body and a heartbeat becoming quicker every step she took. They were the result of the last time Emma had knocked on her door past Henry's bedtime.

"Miss Swan, it's late. What do you want?"

"You're so fucking impossible…"

Those were the words that Emma had replied to her three weeks before. Emma had been drunk and angry, and before Regina could ask her to leave and call it a night, the sheriff had taken her face in her hands and kissed her hard.

The kiss had been rough, imperfect, whisky-flavored. But if it hadn't been for the shock which stunned her into stillness, or for Emma who quickly – too quickly – stepped back breaking the kiss, Regina would have tangled her hand in the woman's hair, pressed her more firmly against her body and kissed her back until her lips hurt.

The kiss had been long coming, Regina thought. Desire had always sparked between them; a weird sexual energy had always tinted their interactions. In the past few months – as they worked together as Henry's moms, as magic users and protectors of the town – trust, understanding, gratitude and playfulness had also become elements of their tentative friendship, strengthening their draw for each other and building genuine affection between them.

In the rapid touch of their lips, Regina had realized that Emma – with all her goodness and compassion – was the person for whom she might dare to love again. In the way her heart had exploded in her chest, Regina had realized that Emma – the daughter of her enemy, the breaker of her curse, the mother of her son – might be her chance at a happy ending.

But Emma hadn't shared her epiphany. Without any words, without another look, she had stumbled away, and Regina had been too stunned to try to stop her.

Later that night, her lips still tingling, Regina had vowed to herself and to her bruised heart that she would be cautious: Emma Swan had now the power to either be what she needed the most or be the final crack set to fully shatter her.

Preventing Emma from knowing she had that power felt like a necessity and buying time to come to terms with the new realizations was imperative. And so, without thinking it twice, Regina had used her magic to erase Emma's visit to her house from the woman's memories, sparing herself a morning-after conversation undoubtedly destined to be an awkward and false denial of feelings or a terrifying admission of them.

But if Emma couldn't remember the kiss, Regina did. In fact, she relived it at least once a day. Before falling asleep, the memory of their kiss mixed with fantasies of a happy life together; during the time spent with Emma, it prompted her teasing and her flirty remarks, made to test if Emma would kiss her even without alcohol in her body; but mostly it fueled her desire to become a better person, someone who could give Emma all she needed, someone who was worthy of the Savior's love.

At times, the memory of their kiss also inflamed her body. And in that moment, with Emma showing up so late like three weeks before, Regina was burning. More than ever, her lips longed for Emma's. More than ever, her hands craved to touch Emma's body. More than ever, her heart asked for Emma's to beat with hers.

Regina tried to swallow her desire, took a deep calming breath and opened the door. As expected, Storybrooke's sheriff was standing in front of her. Emma's posture suggested sobriety and tension, fatigue and purpose. The porch light illuminated her face, revealing a grim expression that made Regina's smile and desire quickly vanish.

"Miss Swan, is everything alright?" Regina asked in a worried whisper.

Emma didn't offer any answer, she simply pushed past her and entered the mansion.

Regina quickly closed the door and followed with her eyes as Emma moved to the staircase, looked briefly upstairs and turned expectantly towards her. The fast and edgy movements alarmed Regina even more.

Slowly she approached her guest and asked again, "Emma, what's wrong?"

Once again, Emma stayed silent; she only moved closer to Regina and took the woman's right hand in hers.

Regina shivered as cold fingers touched her skin and looked with confusion as Emma brought their hands on her chest. Under the cheap fabric of Emma's shirt, under her own palm, Emma's heart was beating fast and strong. Regina could feel the pure and rich magic – the magic she had come to know in the last months as she taught Emma how to connect with it, the magic she wondered at for the way it connected with her own – flowing inside it.

Emma's heartbeat, Emma's magic, Emma's perfume made Regina feel warm and lightheaded. Unconsciously, she moved closer to Emma, until their thighs were touching and their breaths caressed the other's skin. Regina let herself be lost and anchored in the intimacy of the moment.

When she lifted her gaze from their hands and met Emma's eyes, the sheriff finally spoke, "Take my heart, Regina."

Ice.

Regina felt like ice was suddenly coursing through her veins.

And then lava.

Regina felt like hot scorching lava was running through her whole body.

Fresh in her blood, her rage burnt like desire had moments ago.

Regina's magic reacted immediately and in a blink of an eye Emma was flying across the foyer, while a ball of fire appeared in Regina's hand. Facing the door, she was ready to defend herself; she was ready for Snow, David and the Blue Fairy to burst into her home and reveal themselves as the masterminds behind the farce.

Regina couldn't believe it. She had thought that Emma really trusted her. Emma knew she had no intention of ever using her magic for that purpose again, Emma knew that she was trying to be a different person than the Evil Queen who rips hearts out; and yet, Emma dared to make such an outrageous request to test her real ability to change.

Regina could imagine the townspeople forming the plan, "Let's see if The Evil Queen is truly on the way of redemption by offering her the Savior's heart!", and worst, she could imagine Emma agreeing to that.

Regina felt angry, but mostly betrayed.

When after a few long minutes the Charmings didn't announce themselves, Regina assumed that Emma had at least had the decency to face her alone. Quite certainly an enchantment would have kept her from taking the sheriff's heart.

When Emma walked towards her, holding her shoulder and grimacing with pain, Regina ordered in an emotionless voice, "I want you out of my house. Now."

But Emma didn't move, instead she looked at Regina with defeat in her eyes, and spoke again, "Take my heart, Regina, and I'll go…please."

That final word and the way Emma's voice broke around it stopped Regina from attacking the woman again. With horror, she realized that Emma's request was not part of a scheme to prove her unchanged; it was genuine.

"Emma…"

The sheriff's name escaped her lips in a soft murmur, and all of Regina's confusion, shock and disbelief found expression in the two syllables.

"Please…"

Emma's desperate plea sounded like the cry for help of a drowning woman. And looking into Emma's tearful eyes Regina could see the overwhelming emotions in which Emma was sinking.

Regina had always been aware of Emma's palpable uneasiness with the reality of fairytales, with the strangeness that the life in Storybrooke entailed, and with the burdens that came with her role as Savior; she was conscious of Emma's reluctance to let herself be loved even by the people she'd always dreamt to meet; but Regina had not realized how oppressed Emma felt by the novelties of her life.

Was it so painfully noticeable now because something had happened and brought it out in the open, cut Emma so deeply that she decided to stop feeling?

One thing was certain: Regina had no intention of taking Emma's heart. She wasn't going to leave Henry's other mother without a heart to love him, and she wasn't going to turn the only person who really understood her into an emotionless being.

Emma was a drowning woman, but she was asking for the ocean to evaporate and not for a life jacket to keep herself afloat. Emma needed to be strong, to cope with her emotions and make the needed changes to find her peace, no shortcut allowed.

"This is not the solution to your problems, Emma. And even if it were, I wouldn't take your heart. It's not right."

Her refusal prompted an instant change in Emma: the sheriff straightened her stand, moved her hand from her injured shoulder and looked at Regina with anger and resentment.

"Since when do you have a problem taking a heart?" She spat out. "Has The Evil Queen suddenly acquired a conscience? Only…what? a year? after you crushed Graham's heart without any mercy?"

Regina could empathize with a desperate soul; she could understand better than anyone else how the inner turmoil of the soul could bring a person to lash out at the others, but she had no intention of allowing Emma to be disrespectful and deliberately hurtful. They were past angry accusations.

Regina gritted her teeth in displeasure when Emma stopped her hand just before it made contact with Emma's cheek. She then grimaced in pain when Emma tightened her grip around her wrist and brought her hand back to her own chest. Minutes before, feeling Emma's heart beating strong under her fingers had felt intimate and heavy, now it felt hollow and wrong.

"I'm asking you to do it, just fucking do it," Emma ordered, her voice loud enough to possibly wake Henry.

The sheriff was clearly getting angrier and more frustrated by the minute and Regina – unsure to be able to handle her – decided to put an end to Emma's visit.

"I hope you'll see reason in the morning," she said and with a subdued flick of her free hand, teleported Emma at the end of her street, where she knew Emma's Bug was parked.

When she finally heard the car leave, Regina allowed herself to breathe. She then climbed the stairs and quietly entered Henry's room.

Relieved that her son was still sleeping, ignorant of his mothers' confrontation, Regina went back downstairs and into the kitchen. She took the glass she had rinsed before Emma had knocked, and filled it with whisky. The bottle of hard liquor – always kept hidden behind two big cans of tomatoes – was now almost empty, and Regina made a mental note to buy another one next time she went shopping.

Leaning against the counter, she gulped down her drink, hoping for an immediate effect on her body.

She felt exhausted, consumed by the many different emotions lived in the last minutes. She also felt the forming of that same headache that had been her companion for such a long time when Emma had first came to town with her challenging and annoying attitude. Mostly, she felt concern and sorrow for Emma.

Even in her darkest times Regina had never thought about ripping her heart off. When Daniel died, she had needed her anger and desperation, her hope in dark magic and her thirst for revenge to wanting to live; when she married the King, she'd needed her longing for freedom to finally achieve it; when Snow got her happy ending, she'd needed her desire to destroy it to find her own through the curse. Her heart – her quickly darkening heart – had provided all that; taking it off her chest would have meant resigning herself to the circumstances, forgetting what happiness could be like, preventing herself to feel the warmth that remembering Daniel brought to her chest.

Her emotions had guided (and misguided) her through life, they had been anchors to hang on to. But Regina knew that for Emma it was the exact opposite: a cool detachment from people and a self-imposed numbness to emotions were her allies, and evidently they were very much missed.

Being in Storybrooke surrounded by people she loved and who loved her had clearly destroyed the walls around Emma's heart with no possibility to rebuild them, and had opened the gate to so many feelings and fears that Emma had always worked hard to keep away. Now, Emma felt like she couldn't breathe.

Should she consider giving Emma what she wanted if it meant giving her peace?

She couldn't and even the fact the she found herself wondering that made Regina feel ashamed of herself. It was time to go to sleep and stop thinking about Emma's outrageous request.

After drinking another glass of whisky, Regina left the kitchen and went up to her bedroom.

That night Regina fell asleep looking at the jewelry box on her nightstand. It was one of the many wooden boxes which had contained pulsating hearts until the curse was broken and she had used her magic to find their right owners to give them back to. It was a reminder that the Evil Queen was gone and that now she was a different person. It was a reassuring testament that people could change and learn to embrace new things.

Emma could too.

A/N: The idea for this fic has tormented me for so long. Now I'm finally writing and sharing it. I really hope you enjoyed this first part.

Chapter 2 may take a while, please be patient!

I apologize for any mistakes. Blame my Italian blood for them.