Author's Note: I'm not sure what the length of this story is going to be. Recently I found a bunch of stories I had started but lost interest in writing. This one seemed really interesting and I realized I wanted to read it more than I wanted to write it.

So a few warnings, this story is pretty much anti-Rumple and anti-Rumbelle and I won't go into why I don't like him or the idea of him. If you like him or Rumbelle, then maybe this fic isn't for you. It's also a fic in which Regina gets pregnant (by Emma and I realized after reading this that I wrote it with a lot of heteronormativity, like the idea lesbians can't pro-create unless they both have magic and are each other's true love. I've decided to change that but for now, the characters believe that's the only way women can get each other pregnant). I'm also going to apply some after-Neverland canons to this like Regina being Henry's true love just as much as Emma.

The timeline of this is after Neverland but Pan didn't switch bodies with Henry subsequently sending them back to the Enchanted Forest and there was no Zelena. None of that happened. They sailed home and celebrated and Regina and Rumple were left to atone for their actions.

I don't think there's anything left to say. I hope you enjoy the chapter. I'll likely be writing my AN's at the end of the chapters from now on unless I'm writing trigger warnings.

She doesn't actually suspect she's pregnant. Not really. Not at all. It wouldn't make sense for at least three reasons.

She's barren.

She hasn't had sex with a man.

She hasn't made love with her true love, who would also need magic to heal her barren womb. And she knows for a fact that he's not in Storybrooke.

So she doesn't suspect she's pregnant even when she's overwhelmed with nausea right as she's being escorted into the courtroom. Even when she deters away from the double-doors and the officer at her side jumps out of the way to avoid the contents of her stomach spewing from her mouth.

Even during the meeting when King George and King Midas both inform her that she and Rumplestiltskin will be required to atone for their crimes but all she can think about is eating those atrocious Twinkies Henry loves so much dipped in Habanero sauce.

She doesn't even suspect she's pregnant when she drives all the way to the nearest neighboring town, which is almost fifty miles away, just to see a doctor because she's afraid she won't be treated with the same confidentiality as the other residents of Storybrooke.

So when her doctor, a woman with dark olive skin, returns to her room vaguely congratulating her on her pregnancy, Regina sincerely believes either the woman is an idiot.

"That can't be." Regina states firmly.

"Miss Mills, I assure you our tests were correct. Your urine contains amounts of hCG which is human chorionic gonadotropin hormone. It's only there when a woman is pregnant. Miss Mills, the hormone is in your urine."

"You must have mixed my file with another woman."

The Doctor looks at her iPad, scrolling through her information. "You are Regina Isabella Mills, are you not?"

"Yes I am."

"And your bloodtype is B Positive, is it not?"

"It...it is."

"Our analysts are very assiduous, Miss Mills, I assure you this is your information and you are pregnant but if you'd like us to take the taste again, we can."

"I...I would be comfortable with that." Regina eyes the iPad curiously. Emma had gotten a new iPhone and no doubt, everyone had started purchasing the damned things. The breaking of the curse had allotted them access to updating their electronics.

"We can do that. Also, I would like to speak with you on other concerns. Your blood pressure is extremely high, and if you are pregnant, it's something we'd have to work on alleviating. Have you been stressed recently?" The woman asks as she puts the small tablet into her white coat's pocket.

Regina wants to laugh. Being kidnapped and tortured did put a tremendous amount of stress on a person. She still couldn't sleep. Also having to save your kidnapped son from a deranged never-aging group of pre-teens and teenagers stressed someone too. In truth, she's lucky she's functioning as well as she was.

"I...I have been under a bit of stress at work." She answers though that was the farthest from the truth because of all the things going wrong in her life, work wasn't one of them. She'd have to have a job in order to work. The only work she does is in her garden and while it's arduous on her back, it isn't stressful. In fact, it's therapeutic if anything.

"Well I suggest delegating your workload. Try taking a few days to yourself if you can. Partake in activities you enjoy. The symptoms you were describing were all clear indicators of stress and hypertension. I've written a much-needed prescription to balance your blood pressure but I'll need you to work on your stress. Can you do that?"

Regina nods.

"Great. I've asked a nurse to print out several tips to help relieve stress. I see you're a very fit woman so I don't have to tell you the benefits of exercise but things such as yoga or hiking are beneficial in more ways than health. Do you have any questions for me?"

Regina shakes her head.

"Okay, a nurse will be in soon with discharge papers. She'll draw blood if you're unable to urinate in a cup again and I'll call you personally with the results. If you'd like, I can wait and we can schedule an appointment for you to come in?"

"No, a call is good enough." She knows that the call will only tell her they got their information wrong and she's not pregnant. There's no reason to waste time driving all there way there to be told something she already knows. The doctor nods affirmatively before patting Regina awkwardly on the shoulder then leaving.

She sits for a moment, trying to gather herself. She knows there's something wrong with her but...unlike the Enchanted Forest, illnesses aren't almost certain to kill you. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't been afraid for her life. With the curse, she, and everyone else included in the curse, had been guaranteed good health. Or at least, the health they'd had when they were cursed. No one could die unless it was by her hand.

So when she'd started showing signs of being sick, she worried maybe it'd been something she'd contracted from Neverland but everyone else from that little adventure seemed to be in perfectly good health so she worried it'd been something she'd already had but hadn't shown clear indicators of it when she'd cursed the Enchanted Forest.

The nurse returns quickly with the information as promised. She draws blood and quickly marks it. While the nurse is fetching her discharge papers, Regina changes out of her gown and back into her black slacks and white chiffon blouse.

She'd stopped at the hospital's pharmacy on her way out for her prescription but the drive home, despite being quiet and dark, was filled with swirling rapid thoughts. So many things scared her. Snow had promised because she'd volunteered her life for the safety of the town to deactivate the trigger, though Regina had rolled her eyes at that because it had been more about saving Henry than the town, execution was out of the question.

That left several ways to atone like: imprisonment, banishment, separation from her son. All of which were likely for the rest of her life. She would be imprisoned for the rest of her life, likely in the asylum. She would be banished for the rest of her life. She would be separated from her son for the rest of her life. Each possible punishment felt like a stack of bricks weighing down on her heart.

There's four people that can leave and return to Storybrooke.

Regina, Henry, Emma, and Neal.

While the town is cloaked from anyone outside of Storybrooke, since Regina was cursed with it, there's fortunately (for her) no amount of cloaking that could hide it from her.

Though Regina is the only one cursed out of those four people, she's able to leave due to the curse not directly affecting her in the way it did others. She could enter and leave as freely as she wanted and she figured it had to be Gold having a back-up plan had Regina not adopted Henry.

Regina's so wrapped up in her thoughts that she doesn't realize there's a hooded figure on her porch until after she's cut the ignition. The pouring rain only makes it harder to pinpoint who the figure belongs to.

Taking her chances, Regina exits the car carefully. The figure moves, grows as it stands.

"Mom?" It's Henry. His voice cracks and he moves forward.

It's hard to see his face through the bleary rain but she can make out his shivering so she reaches for him, hoping she can extend any warmth to him. "Henry?"

"I...I thought...Leroy said…" A sob erupts from Henry's throat and he latches on to her, enveloping her in a strangling hug. "You left!" He laments.

She's confused...she's so very confused. Hadn't he received her message? She'd told Emma that she was leaving but she'd stressed to the Sheriff that she was going to return. She had to return.

Henry's completely drenched clothes are starting to seep through her own. She has questions but she saves them for later, right now she just needs to get her son inside.

##

Henry's sitting in front of the fireplace wrapped in a quilt Regina had taken with her with the curse. Her grandmother Isabella Mills had made it for her father then darned her name into it once she'd been born. She hadn't known her grandparents well and she suspected her grandfather wasn't a very great man by how little her father spoke of him. But she'd heard stories and had fond memories of her grandmother.

Henry's staring mindlessly at the flames. Even when Regina returns with two steaming cups of hot chocolate, one with cinnamon, he doesn't look away. He simply puts his cup aside and continues staring at the fire.

"Why didn't you use your key?" She finally asks. Henry had never in his life had to use his house key but he'd had one. Even after he'd moved out, she'd duplicated her own and left it for him in an envelope at Snow's loft.

Henry doesn't respond.

"Sweetheart," Regina cups the back of his neck, her thumb stroking the warm skin. "Please talk to me."

"You left…" He says quietly.

Regina nods. "I did, I'm sorry, but I came back. See? I'm here."

"Why did you leave?"

Regina considers how much of the truth he needs to know but she'd promised him she would never lie to him again. She would never withhold information from him no matter who she thought she was protecting. Whatever he wanted to know, he would ask.

"I wasn't feeling well." She thinks about Snow and how their meeting had been postponed for thirty minutes so she could gather her bearings. The officer that had been escorting her to the courtroom had explained, vouched for Regina even, that she'd suddenly gotten ill. "I needed to see a doctor."

"Then why didn't you go to Whale or Doc?" Regina's nose wrinkles in revulsion at the mention of Dr. Whale. While he'd been cursed with a degree, the man knows nothing of saving the living. His only focus was resurrecting the dead and failing. And Doc was a miner for too long to be considered a doctor to her. There aren't many options.

"I couldn't trust them to be confidential and have my best interest at heart." She had cursed them. Despite her recent efforts to redeem herself, she will never truly atone for what she's done to the people of Storybrooke.

Henry nods in understanding. "Leroy just said you left." He starts to explain. "I went to the station to ask Emma to bring me here but Leroy said he heard her telling Ruby you left town. I thought...I thought you left…"

"You thought I left you." It wasn't a question because she knows exactly what he thought. "Henry, if I ever left Storybrooke, if I ever made the decision to leave, you would be the first to know. You would...I would never just leave you."

"Then why didn't you tell me you were leaving? Why'd you tell Emma and not me?"

"I suppose...because I didn't want to have to explain why. I promised to never lie to you so I hoped if I avoided telling you directly, I wouldn't have to explain why I needed to leave."

Henry responds with silence. His eyes bore into hers and she swears she'd bare her entire soul if it meant the abandoned look on his face would disappear.

She kisses his forehead. "I love you, my prince." She promises him.

A/N: Fixed the past/present tenses. I normally write in present tense.

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