This is a WWTS flashforward I wrote for Mother's Day. It's set a year or so into the future and I hope it'll calm some nerves.
It is a truth universally accepted among all parents that small children often do strange things. Things that hold to no reason or rhyme that a mature, fully-adult brain could ever hope to understand. Robin had long since accepted this with Roland. Over the years had son had gone through countless phases of inexplicable behavior – jumping off furniture, pretending to be different animals at odd times, there'd even been a whole month where he refused to eat anything yellow – but each phase was just that, a phase. And Robin had always been able to approach them with a sense of humor but this time he didn't find things so easy to shrug off.
For the past year or so Roland had begun to pray. Every few days or so before bed Robin would come to tuck him in a night and find his son on his knees, his hands folded atop of his bed, whispering his hopes to someone above. While Robin himself wasn't particularly religious – and he certainly hadn't taught his son to be – it wasn't so much the praying that worried him as much as who he prayed to.
For the fourth night that week Robin had looked in on his son only to hear him praying to his mother, Marian. He couldn't help it. Every time he heard his son whisper "Dear Mama" he felt his heart clench. yet he never spoke to Roland about it. He wasn't even sure what he'd say.
Instead he tucked his son into bed, put him to sleep and went to his own room. He walks in to find Regina already in bed reading glasses on, book in hand, comfortably tucked into the blankets. It'd been weeks since she and Henry moved back in but his heart still leapt every time he remember that he can fall asleep as well as wake up next to her every day. As soon as he walks in she takes one look at his face and sympathetically sighs.
"Was he praying again?" she asked.
Robin nodded his head. "He wants her to help keep the baby ducks at the park safe."
She couldn't help the small smile that appeared on her face. They'd been feeding baby ducks at the park earlier that morning. He'd been so protective of the little ducklings and their mama. "That's sweet."
"Maybe… until the ducks get run over," mumbled Robin as he climbed into bed next to her.
Regina sighed as she set down her book and slipped off her reading glasses. She turned to Robin with serious eyes. "Why does this bother you so much Robin?" she asked. "Why do his prayers make you so...uneasy?"
Robin sunk down into the sheets with a groan but offered no tangible response so she pressed on.
"Is it about the god thing?"
"No," he immediately refutes. He is not concerned about Roland believing in God. Robin had been an atheist for decades now but he'd never once tried to sway Roland in any direction regarding his faith. He figured his son would come to his own conclusions when it came to his faith. He just didn't expect for him to come to one so soon. Or to latch on to something so complex.
"It's just that he started doing this when we were all in such a bad place," he softly points out.
His tone goes heavy and he can see Regina biting her lip as they both think back to that hard time so many months ago, when Cora had been meddling in their lives. She'd put them through so much, but they'd come out stronger in the end. At least that's what he thought.
"Roland was so upset during all of it and I was alright with him praying that one night because I thought it would help give him hope and maybe take away some of his stress," he explained, "but now… I don't know. It's making me worry that maybe he's not feeling secure anymore. Like he's not over everything that happened."
He still remembers how stunned he was the first night when his son had asked if he would pray with him. And how that shock had doubled when he'd started praying to his own mother. He'd prayed for his mother to help make things happy again. Things went back to normal and he'd hoped it would be a one-time thing but Roland had never stopped. He still prayed to Marian and a part of him feared it was because he no longer trusted his father to hold things together anymore.
Regina grabs his hand and lets out a deep breath. She understood Robin's fears. She carried similar ones about Henry and how that time had affected him. It'd been months since everything with Cora but she still worried about how those days had affected their boys. If there were truly as healed as they appeared to be.
"I get why you're worried," she said, comfortingly running her hand up his arm. "But I don't think that's the reason he prays to her."
"Why then?" asked Robin, desperately.
"Honestly?" She nervously presses her lips together before answering him. "I think he's just trying to know her, in his own way."
She softly squeezes his hand, trying to comfort him before broaching a topic that she knew still saddened them both.
"Robin, he was only three months old when Marian died," she gently pointed out. "He can't remember her voice, or her touch. He has no memories. And I think… with all the changes this past year, it's starting to bother him a little."
Her gaze drops down to her left hand where her engagement ring sits on her ring finger, sparkling with every slight movement.
"I love Roland with all my heart," she says, "but maybe realizing that I'm going to be his stepmother… makes him want to know his real mother instead."
"Hey," drawled Robin, straightening up in bed. "You're not just a stepmother, you know that."
"I do," she agrees, "but I'm still not Marian, I'm not his mama, I can't replace her and he knows it. I practically told him as much."
"What?" said Robin, narrowing his eyes at her.
She lets out a deep breath and runs her fingers through her hair before sitting up next to him. "Okay… I've never told you this but do you remember that night when I was moving out and the storm hit?"
Robin nods his head. Of course, he remembered that night. It was the night he'd decided to tell her how he felt. The night he'd realized how much he'd wanted their family. He'd never forget that night.
"Well, after we all went to sleep Roland woke up afraid because of the storm and he climbed into my sleeping bag with me ," she continued. "And as I comforted him we talked about Marian and how you'd explained that she was in heaven and he asked if she would ever come back for him."
She still remembered the look in his brown eyes when he'd asked her. So wide and confused, searching for answers. They'd sent her heart racing.
Robin eyes widened at her confession and he stutters in surprise. "Well… what did you say?"
"I told him that… once you go to heaven you can't come back." She pauses. "I didn't want to leave him with false hope."
"I know," said Robin, his tone gentle. "I wouldn't have done any differently."
Regina nods, swallowing hard before continuing.
"But then he asked me if since his Mama wasn't here anymore did that mean that I was his mama now," she said, tears welling up in her eyes. "And I said… no."
"Oh my god," breathes Robin. Shock ran over his blue eyes. He couldn't believe she'd kept this to herself for so long.
"I said that no matter what his mama was his mama, no one else," she said. "I said that a piece of her still lives in him and because of that she'd always be with him."
"Regina…"
She continues to speak over him.
"It was before we were together," she explains. "I was still struggling with my feelings for you and when he asked… I felt like a thief[14] , like I was stealing both of you from her and I just… my heart cracked. I never thought..."
The words dripped from her mouth as she confessed her feelings to him. Ever since she'd heard about Roland's prayers she hadn't been able to get that moment out of her head. She wondered if the reason he prayed to Marian was because of that night. Perhaps he was reaching out to the mother he lost because he thought it was his only way to have a maternal relationship.
"Oh, Regina," whispered Robin, bringing a hand to her cheek. "You said… exactly the right thing to him."
"Really?" she asks, her eyes still shining with tears.
"Yes," he assures her nodding his head. He pulls her closer into his side. "I love you. And I love our family. It's more than I could've dreamed of and I can't wait to make it official to the world. But as beautiful as our family is I don't think we can erase the fact that in order to get here we've had to lose people that we loved and so did our boys."
Daniel and Marian.
Their names run through her head and sadness trickles into her heart. As happy as she was with Robin she'd never want to erase either of them from her past.
"You didn't want Roland to forget Marian any more than I want Henry to forget Daniel," he said. "The fact that you want to honor that makes me love you all the more for it."
Relief runs through her at his words and she sinks into his side. "Thank you," she mumbles. "And despite my tears on the matter I think Roland's prayers are a good thing."
"You do?"
She nods, wrapping her arms around his waist. "Robin, I used to think that he'd never have a relationship with her because she was gone but maybe this is his way of having one. A way for him to keep her close and form a bond. Something of her that's all his and no one else's."
It was nice thought but it wasn't enough to quell his concerns.
"But what if…"
"What if what?"
"What if something doesn't work out?" he says. "What if those baby ducks actually do get run over? Or something else he prays for doesn't work out for him? What if… what if he stops believing in her?"
"He won't," she says, her voice solid with certainty. "We won't let him. And neither would she."
She looks up at him. "Robin for most of my life I never had faith in anything. No one ever taught me how to. But I do have faith in Marian. I believe that she is watching over him. I know it in my soul. Don't you?"
Robin sighs. Honestly speaking he'd never considered himself a man of faith. At a young age he'd discovered that his own prayers tended to go unheeded and if you asked him what he believed in he couldn't give you a straight answer but still he hadn't forgotten that stormy night. The dream he'd had and how she'd come to him, letting him know that it was time to let go. It hadn't been his mind or his imagination. He knew it. He couldn't explain it but he knew it. It'd been Marian. That much he was sure of.
"I do," he answers.
"Then how could you ever think that she'd let him down," says Regina.
Robin remains silent.
"If it turns out to be a problem, then we'll worry," she promises. "But for right now, I think it's best we let him have this."
"Okay," agrees Robin with a nod of his head. "For now."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Alone in his room Roland couldn't sleep. He tossed and turned in bed with too much on his mind. Finally when he could stand it anymore he ripped off his covers and kneeled on the floor in his SpongeBob pajamas, folding his hands over his mattress for the second time that night.
"Dear Mama," he whispered into his hands, "I can't sleep because I need to talk to you."
He pauses before continuing. "I want to talk because I kept a secret and I'm afraid you won't like it."
He takes a deep breath, trying to gather his courage. "My secret is… that sometimes I really wish that Regina could be my mama. I know she told me that you're still my mama even when you're in heaven but… sometimes I want a mama that's down here."
He pauses for a moment, afraid that he's hurt his mama's feelings.
"Regina said that you're the only mama that I can have but I have a friend at school. His name is Andrew and he has two mamas. He says that he calls one of them Mama and the one them Mom. So… would it be alright if I kept you as my mama but asked Regina to be my mom? If I asked her... would you be mad at me?"
He waits, listening to the silence in his room for some sign of her but there's nothing. So he tries again.
"If I asked her… would you be happy?"
He goes silent, listening for her but he doesn't hear anything. Instead he feels something spread through his heart. Warm and happy, it almost feels like a hug. He smiles into the darkness, knowing that it's her.
"Thank you, Mama," he whispers.
NEXT CHAPTER: Roland proposes to Regina.