A/N: This is a pretty quick story that I wrote in about 4 hours because I couldn't get the idea out of my head. Basically, this is how I wish things would go down with The Author, just condensed to a single story lol.
At the time of publishing the show is only at 2.15, so nothing beyond that is canon in this fic, even though it's imagining the end of season four... ANYWAY, Dakota says it's not shit lol, so I hope you like! And yes, more OFM is on the way too.
"I should probably get going," Emma muttered, the lack of enthusiasm behind her sentiment mirrored in her sluggish descent from Regina's kitchen bar stool. "Killian is probably wondering what's taking so long."
Regina scoffed at the mention. What a woman like Emma saw in that scoundrel she'd never understand.
"How are things with the pirate, anyway?" she politely inquired, because she was pretty sure that's what friends were supposed to do.
"Fine," Emma shrugged, as if that's really all the more one should expect. She hesitated a moment. "He's been calling me his happy ending."
That shouldn't have made Regina's stomach churn, nor cause hot pin pricks to dance achingly across her skin. She wanted Emma to be happy, just as the woman wished the same for her. That's how friendship worked.
"So, you've found your 'ever after,' then." Regina smiled tightly, hoping she sounded genuine. She wanted it to be genuine. She couldn't quite explain why it wasn't. "I'm glad for you."
"I'm glad for you, too," Emma replied, and Regina thought she must be imagining that she heard the same tightness in the woman's voice when she did.
"Robin Hood," she affirmed, saying his name aloud as if to remind herself. "Right, of course."
"I guess we both found our happy endings." Emma smiled, but it didn't touch her eyes. As she turned to leave, Regina wondered why it sounded like a lie. Perhaps Emma felt it too, because at the doorway she stopped, placing one hand against the frame for support as she turned back halfway. "You are happy," she asked cautiously, "aren't you, Regina?"
"Are you?" Regina asked in return, caught off guard by the question, and the way it made her heart drop into her gut.
"Honestly," Emma sighed, turning to face Regina fully again. She sounded so lost as she softly admitted, "I don't know."
The relief Regina felt at those words was for nothing more than a sense of being less alone. Nothing more. She wanted Emma to be happy, after all. Even with the pirate.
"Me either," Regina confessed in turn, chuckling hollowly as she stared down at the counter top. "I guess I thought it would feel..." she shook her head, grasping for the word, "different, somehow. Like spending time with you or Henry."
When she finally looked up at Emma, there was suddenly a light in her eyes that hadn't been there since this conversation began, and Regina thought maybe she shouldn't have said so much.
"I make you happy?" Emma asked wondrously, with a grin that looked equal parts hopeful and frightened.
"I mean," Regina cleared her throat, realizing she had given entirely too much away, that she had to find a way to take it back. "How should I know? What even defines true happiness?" Her questions became desperate as Emma prowled ever closer. "Who even–"
But the words were swallowed up by Emma's mouth as she daringly pressed it over Regina's own, kissing her like she'd waited her whole life just for this.
"You make me happy, too," Emma pulled back only briefly, gasping the words against Regina's lips and then reclaiming them instantly.
For a moment, everything made sense. Everything she hadn't understood in these last few minutes of talking, in the years since Emma first showed up on her doorstep. For a moment, Emma was all that existed, and Regina thought she could spend eternity just floating through time wrapped up securely inside this feeling. For a moment, there were no pirates or merry men, no curses or fairytales, no authors and no destiny.
Until suddenly there was. It sucked the air from Regina's lungs like a fist to the gut, and she had no choice but to pull away.
"Emma, we can't," she said, her voice shaking in the small space between them.
"We have a choice, Regina," Emma insisted firmly, though her voice was just as unsteady. "The author, he said that we can choose."
"The endings he wrote for us are guaranteed," Regina whispered, swallowing hard. "I've waited so long... I just want to be happy."
She heard Emma's breath catch, and her heart broke. She didn't want to hurt Emma. She didn't want this to hurt.
"There's more than one path to happiness," Emma tried, pleading for Regina to just be brave.
"I... I can't, Emma." The words were thick and stuck to her tongue, but still Regina forced them out. "I'm sorry, but I just can't."
And if the author's plan really was meant to be her happy ending, Regina couldn't understand why it should hurt so much to watch Emma walk away.
She didn't understand how so many tears could be a part of the bigger picture. She cried crouched next to the kitchen sink after Emma left. She cried so many nights, even as she smiled dutifully in the face of the town and her family.
She could hardly face the man who was supposed to be her lover. Regina couldn't let him touch her, couldn't let him occupy the empty space in her bed.
She was no happier than she'd ever been, though now she was without even vengeance to fill that painful void. This was not what she'd been promised, not by a long shot. She had worked too hard and come too far to fail now.
Storming into the author's house, she found him sitting in a chair by the fire, as if he'd been waiting for her to arrive.
"You said my happy ending was guaranteed," she snapped with no time for pleasantries. "As long as I followed the story you wrote me, you said I would be happy."
The author nodded, hands folded pensively beneath his chin.
"That is the truth."
"Well, is there any certain point when that's supposed to kick in?" Regina continued with no less vigor than when she'd arrived. "Because I have been absolutely miserable."
"If that is so," the author replied, irritatingly subdued, "then you have not adhered to my story."
Such an accusation was intolerable. She'd stayed with Robin, through every painstaking moment of heartbreak, every moment of wanting to run. She had stayed with him, just waiting for the storm inside to clear.
"Like hell I didn't!"
"Are you certain?" the author inquired, finally turning to face her with a frighteningly penetrating stare. "Or did the Swan girl perhaps manage to steal your affections?"
"This is because Emma kissed me?" Regina felt like the world was crashing down around her. She tried. She tried so hard, but she couldn't resist.
"Dear me, no," the author chuckled. "It's not because Emma kissed you. It's because you wanted her to."
That finally stunned Regina silent.
"You made your choice long before she ever took action," the man continued to explain slowly, "and when you did, the story I wrote for you ended."
"Then write me a new one!" Regina spat hysterically, unwilling to concede that this was it, that everything they'd worked so hard for in Operation Mongoose was just over.
"I'm afraid that's impossible," the author shook his head. "You made your choice. It is your story now."
"You're telling me that after everything I did to get here," Regina wailed angrily, feeling as though the final nail of defeat was about to be struck, "I still somehow chose a lifetime of uncertainty over guaranteed happiness?"
"No, Regina," the author gently corrected with a reassuring grin. "I'm telling you that you chose hope for something so much greater."
Her heart seemed to still in her chest. That there could be more for her than creature comforts and the simple pleasure of a family to come home to. That, maybe, she really could have it all.
"I could still be happy?" she asked, trembling with an aching desire to say what those words really meant to her, to hear the answer she'd longed for since that day in the kitchen, or even longer would seem. "I could be happy with Emma?"
"You are your own author now," the man finally stood, placing his hands on either of Regina's shoulders, ensuring she heard what she was told. "Perhaps your 'Operation Mongoose' was not where your story ends, but where it begins in earnest."
It was only then that she noticed the hot tears rolling down her cheeks. Somehow, Regina thought this might have been the man's true plan all along, to help them break free of their fates, though she knew he'd never admit it.
"Thank you," was all she could manage to say.
There was no time to spare. Regina knew Emma and Henry would be dining with the Charmings at Granny's tonight, as per the weekly tradition that she was most often a part of.
She burst through the door, the little bell chiming overhead, and this suddenly all felt very dramatic.
"Regina," Emma smiled, and although it was genuine the pain around the edges was still clear. "You made it."
"Can I talk to you for a moment?" Regina beseeched the woman breathlessly.
"Yeah, of course," Emma replied, concern written across her face as she stood and followed Regina to the back hallway.
This was it, Regina thought, this was the moment. Now, staring at this woman she dreamed of spending a lifetime of happiness with, words suddenly seem foreign and unmalleable, and not a single one would rise from her throat as Regina simply gaped.
"Is everything alright?" Emma inquired, eyes darting back and forth all over Regina's body, seeking out any signs of distress.
Somehow, just that – just Emma's simple, unfettered concern for her wellbeing – was enough to give Regina the courage she needed.
"Everything's fine," Regina said softly, reaching a hand up to cup Emma's cheek, letting her fingers tangle into soft blonde locks. She smiled, hearing Emma's breath hitch just before Regina close the space between them and kissed her, feeling the way the girl trembled beneath her lips.
"I choose you, Emma," Regina sighed, still holding the porcelain face in her hands. "And I'm terrified, because everything is so uncertain now. But there is one thing I know for sure, and that is that you are worth the fight." She paused, kissing away the tracks of tears that rolled down smiling cheeks. "I choose us. I choose our story, in all its uncertainty. The only thing I need to know is that you'll choose me too."
"Of course I'll choose you, Regina," Emma replied, wrapping her arms tightly around the woman's waist and resting their foreheads together. "I already have."