A/N To the ones that haven't seen the episode yet: I recommend you to not do it. But apart from the horrible writing, enormous plotholes, stupid Hook and Ursula's leaving we have had a at least one moment between Emma and Regina and even after Hook's "incredible" admission we have yet to reach the TLK state so I'm confident that Hook is going to have his arse dumped.
Anyway, sorry for the long author's note, I needed to write somewhere about the fuckery of last episode but anyway, here we are, hope you enjoy this one shot and let me know your opinions about it!
The things that we don't say (but we know)
Disclaimer: I don't own them.
"What do you feel when you have true love?"
The question was said softly, as if the words were precious glass that was going to smash against the floor seconds before being released in the air of the empty room. And for a second Regina thought that she had merely projected her own doubts into the air instead of being questioned by Emma.
The rest of the house was asleep and somewhere Regina could sense August's snores and David's breathing and even if she couldn't see Henry she could imagine the gentle smile that the boy always had when he was in the middle of a good dream.
Everyone was sleeping except them and a hour before Regina had actually been surprised when Emma had brought two mugs full of chamomile tea and has seated next to her in font of one of the upper floor's windows, her profile illuminated gently by the moonlight that filtered through a few clouds.
"I can't sleep" The blonde had said as her only explanation and she had drank her tea calmly without looking at her. And even if Regina had known that something wasn't right she had let it pass, drinking the hot beverage instead and thanking silently the blonde's thoughtfulness.
And for an hour they had shared the silence without feeling uncomfortable, Regina actually relaxing in her skin once again after being exposed to dark magic for far too long in the past 24 hours.
Until Emma had asked that question of course.
"What do you mean?" Regina replied, trying to win some more seconds before answering the question. She looked at the window once again, the flickering lights of the city blurring until the only thing she could see was herself and Emma's tired look reflected back at her.
"How do you know when you are with your true love? It's something that both people feel at the same time?"
The blonde's voice was forced, strange, metallic to Regina's ears and she frowned thinking in the pirate and if he was the reason behind Emma's questions.
"It's not exactly a feeling" Regina said, repeating the words that she had been taught when she had first asked about what being a someone's true love meant. She doubted that anyone in Storybrooke could actually give a different answer since all of them had been born in the same land. "You simply know"
Emma nodded but her reflected eyes remained the same, unmoving, sad, full of something that made Regina bit her lower lip as she still refused to look at the blonde directly. Even if she didn't know why she was scared or why she didn't want to look at Emma's open face.
"That's what mom… Snow had said to me" The blonde muttered and Regina thanked her good hearing because otherwise she couldn't have listened to those last words. "But I don't understand how something so… important for the people that live here can be described as that"
Regina wanted to answer to that but she didn't and the silence reigned again between them as an imperceptible ticking from the brunette's wrist registered the pass of time.
"Sometimes I also wonder about what it means" Regina admitted while wanting to make herself stop. She wasn't supposed to say that, she was supposed to believe in what true love meant but after those last months she was starting to think differently about that powerful force and what actually could do.
"That's why you had asked me to search for Robin?" Emma replied and her tone had changed, bitter and full of something that the brunette didn't exactly knew but suspected what it was.
Regina, however, did know that she wasn't supposed to search for Hood, or for wanting to know where he was. She had made the right decision sending him away and she doubted that confirming that he was happy was going to make her any good. But she wanted desperately to believe that something in her life had been different that merely being destined to be the Evil Queen, even if that was just a soulmate that should have never existed.
"What do you think?" Regina asked and she cursed herself for standing a little too straight and talking a little too loud and clenching her fists a little too forcefully as if she was feeling challenged for just the answer of a stupid question that didn't exactly hold the importance for all of that.
"I promised you that I was going to find your happy ending" Emma said mechanically while removing at the leaves of her already cold tea as she looked at somewhere that Regina doubted was really at the other side of the window.
"That's not an answer" Regina said and sighed, asking herself why she was still trying to talk about something that neither of them knew exactly what it was.
"I suppose it isn't"
And this time Regina actually turned to look at Emma's face while the other woman moved her neck until their eyes met, Emma's still cold.
"Hook told me that I'm his happy ending" Emma finally admitted moving her right hand and touching the window, her index finger tracing a figure that only her could see. "And I kissed him"
"Congratulations" Regina croaked out and she coughed, trying to discern what Emma wanted her to say.
"I didn't answer him" Emma replied, her lips barely moving as she kept drawing against the glass. "I don't think I understand how that works"
"Which part?" The brunette asked and she found herself raising her hand and touching with it the cold glass of the window, Emma's finger stilling for a moment before continuing with the invisible picture.
"I don't understand how anyone can be someone's ending and that be seen as good" Emma continued "What happens after being named that? What are you supposed to feel? Trapped?"
"Is that what you feel?" Regina asked and for a second she could felt Emma's burning gaze even if she was not looking at the blonde once again.
Emma didn't answer for so long that Regina started to think that maybe she had asked too much for only a simple question but after what appeared to be hours the blonde let her hand drop at her side and answered a quick affirmation, her voice still sounding strange to Regina's ears.
"I miss feeling that I can do anything without being seeing as someone's someone" Emma continued "It's because of that that sometimes it's easier just to kiss Hook and say to myself that I'm his happy ending because he is mine but nothing is so simple and he certainly isn't my true love"
"We are in a different realm, maybe the feeling here is something entirely different" Regina whispered and she suddenly felt defeated; Emma's last words were the ones that she had been asking to herself since Robin's departure, what had meant for her, what it had meant for both of them, how much everything had been fate and what it could have been good in another time, in another realm.
"And what if it's not?" The blonde asked moving herself closer to the brunette until Regina didn't have the choice but look at her.
Emma's eyes were full with questions and wonder, the same eyes that Regina had seen the first time she had met the younger woman. Eyes that could easily turn into deep emerald eyes fueled with anger and desire for protection, protection that Emma could easily give and was now starting to learn how to accept.
"Emma…" Regina found herself saying, her voice wavering as Emma took a step closer to her, still far enough to not actually being touching the older woman but close enough to make everything more complicated than it actually was.
"I was worried you know?" Emma said, her voice wavering and this time it wasn't confusion but hurt what filled her eyes. "Worried sick in fact because as powerful as you are, you were one against three different queens. And after you told us that Gold was also there… Regina, you are in danger, as much as August was"
Regina opened her mouth and tried to explain herself but she knew that she couldn't, she had promised Snow to keep the secret to herself so she stood there, silent, looking at everything but Emma's eyes. And it was then when she saw how Emma's mug was still in one of the blonde's hands, the fingers white because of the pressure that the younger woman was putting in it.
Touching the mug Regina caressed softly Emma's skin until the blonde exhaled and tilted her head, her blonde hair obscuring half of her face as Regina stilled her hand, suddenly realizing what she was doing. But Emma didn't move and so neither did her.
"I won't lie to you, I think we already established that" Regina said and that made Emma look at the brunette once again, silently nodding before moving her body, Regina's hand falling at her side as both of them returned to look at the night's darkness.
"He doesn't deserve you" Emma said after a few more seconds of silence and it was Regina's turn to feel tired and filled with rage, rage because neither of what was happening was something that she had asked for.
"I know" She replied as softly as possible and when she saw Emma's curt nod in the window's reflection she talked again "Neither does the pirate"
And this time, when Emma moved closer, Regina didn't think about moving away. She stood there as the blonde kissed her cheek and when Emma stilled for a second, afraid of moving and unsure of what she had done Regina moved her neck and kissed the blonde's lips.