Authoress' Note: I'm not exactly sure what Regina will choose in this story, but I do intend to finish it. This takes place after 'Queen of Hearts' and assumes Emma will get her job as sheriff back in the upcoming episodes. I'm working through the second part and would REALLY appreciate detailed feedback and suggestions in reader's reviews!
Without Direction
By Arianwen P.F. Everett
"So, house arrest? I don't know what to say, Regina," Dr. Archie Hopper stated simply, honest as always. He would remain a conscience till the day he died, human or cricket form mattered little. What had started as a quest for redemption had turned into an avocation he was grateful for.
"I'm sure you've heard the story. Despite the fact that dozens of fairies have been all over the prostrate man in the hospital and have concluded that there was no magic beyond the lingering memories of the curse and Rumplestiltskin's magical cloud, I somehow used my power to push him in front of a minivan for no other reason than he was arguing with me and I'm evil," Regina quipped, but Archie could tell that her venom at being falsely accused hurt her more than she was letting on.
"I know that's not true, and as to the next question I know you're about to ask, Henry does as well. Emma set him straight on that. He's been trying get people to understand, but it's a slow process, especially when nobody knows what really happened," Archie delved, letting his patient absorb the fact that her son was on her side and giving Regina an opening to tell him her side of the story. If there was one thing Archie had gleaned from learning about the incident yesterday afternoon, it was that rumor and speculation, not fact, were ruling the day here.
A look of sheer bliss washed over Regina's features. "My little knight, my hero, defending his Queen like he used to, before that book, before her."
"Regina, Emma didn't…"
"Don't bother. I know you're her friend, so I won't tax you on the point. Anyway, you asked what happened with Mr. Drake. Well, I was in his shop, picking up my weekly order and sharing my cheese bread recipe with him. I think I told you we'd started swapping recipes a few weeks ago. Anyway, he offers to help me with my bags as the bakery was my last stop before going home and I was pretty laden down already; then, out of the blue, he asks me out to dinner at Tony's. I thanked him, trying to let him down easily, but he kept insisting I give him a reason for my refusal. I explained to him that I wasn't interested in him that way and that he should find someone who was. All the while he's backpedaling towards the curb. I tried to warn him that he was about to walk into oncoming traffic, but he ignored my warning. He was too busy going on about how few options I had in this town and how his business was thriving while I was currently unemployed. I didn't even get to respond when the minivan made a hard turn on Elm and well… I dialed 911 and tried to check his pulse, but before I could reach for his neck, those busybody wolves restrained me," Regina finished, amazement still written over her face at the memory of the solidly built man going over the vehicle's hood like a rag doll.
"Ruby and Granny thought you were trying to harm him," Archie defended, deciding to put aside her portrayal of his two friends as the creatures they were both cursed to become.
"I don't care about their motivations; they had no right to lay their dirty paws on me!" Regina railed, desperately trying to control the anger welling inside of her. The Evil Queen wanted out, wanted to exact revenge on those that had humiliated her, but Henry cared about them so Regina, his mother, locked her away once more.
"Okay, granted, they rushed to judgment where they shouldn't have, but let's forget about Ruby and Granny for the moment. What happened after that?" Archie questions, not wanting his prickly patient to clam up just yet.
"Nothing happened after that. The ambulance came just as Sheriff Swan arrived on the scene. I told her what happened and she asked me to sit in the patrol car. I did so while she took some statements. Once everything was squared away and I'd gathered what was left of my groceries, we decided that for my own safety I wouldn't leave the house for a few days; Sheriff Swan called it a defacto house arrest, even though she assured me she understood it was all just an accident. Thankfully the other witnesses and the fairies' magic confirmed I didn't touch the oaf, so I'm still planning on attending that bake sale Henry's class is having Thursday afternoon and buying a cupcake or two to show him my support," Regina explained, her previous anger having slipped away at the mere mention of her son's upcoming event.
Archie thought about Regina's description and while he understood her frustration at being unjustly confined, as she'd talked a question had arisen in him that he wasn't sure how to phrase. Collecting his thoughts and girding his loins against any possible backlash due to the personal nature of the coming line of inquiry, Archie pushed forward. "Regina, I'm sorry this happened to you, and I'm sorry that people can't see the good person you're becoming. I know you've been trying to change these past few months and you've been doing a great job, really excellent work. However, I'm curious as to why you weren't interested in having dinner with Mr. Drake. I mean, his reaction aside, you've previously mentioned that you both enjoy gardening and sharing recipes."
"Not enough to bed him, I don't," Regina abruptly inserted. The man was a wall, equal parts muscle and fat. It wasn't his fault, really. He was the last of the human/giant hybrids, but neither his form in their realm or his current, fully human one, held any appeal to her.
"Who said anything about…"
"He asked me out on a date at Tony's, not a friendly lunch at Granny's. I know when a man's interested in me and I didn't want to lead him on," Regina explained as if to a dullard. She'd been around the block enough times to know that there would be no going back to the free and easy comradery of cooking aficionados trading tips now that Drake had crossed that line.
"Your attention to his feelings is commendable, but how do you know you wouldn't have had a good time if you'd accepted? You didn't even give him a chance," Archie continued. He knew the woman before him was lonely and yet she had rejected a simple offer of dinner from a man whom she'd made a positive connection with.
"If he were the last man in this realm, I'd still be well above his pay grade. Drake was completely accurate in his assessment of my dating options, but I'm not that desperate," Regina rebutted forcefully, rolling her eyes at the cricket-turned-therapist's lack of understanding. Although she supposed it wasn't his fault. He'd not been human long enough to fall in love before the Blue Fairy had turned him into a conscience to escape his cruel parents.
Not for the first time since starting her therapy and learning of his background, Regina wondered what her life would have been like if even one of her own youthful wishes had brought a fairy to save her from her mother. Quickly she put such thoughts to bed. If she'd been rescued back then, turned into a form so different that Cora couldn't have recognized her, she never would have met Daniel. Even after all the horrific pain and miserable longing his loss had engendered in her, to never have known him would have been far worse.
"You place a lot of importance on appearance, don't you?" Archie surmised gently. Despite Regina's protests that her mother had failed to turn her daughter into herself, the evil witch that had murdered her child's true love had succeeded in installing a value system based on image, power, and selfish determination. Regina might love more freely, but Cora's mark was still there. Archie had to modulate that if he were to bring out the best in Regina's spirit.
"We all do; it's human nature. If appearance is so arbitrary, why didn't Drake ask Sophie from the seafood shop out instead of me? They have a lot more in common, people don't fear her, and she looks like the type of young woman who'd appreciate being asked. However, despite all this, he asked me because I'm far more attractive and my smell is less offensive," Regina countered. She was no more obsessed with appearance than anyone else. Daniel had been attractive but she'd fallen in love with him for his gentleness, intelligence, and perseverance. Even Graham, whom she'd primarily taken on as a bedmate, had possessed the skills of a hunter and a ruthlessness that had turned her on. She didn't see anything special in Martin Drake and had no desire to look beyond his appearance.
Archie sighed. She had a point. As her therapist, Archie knew Sophie had feelings for Martin Drake, but that despite knowing her for years in the Enchanted Forest as well as here, he barely said hello to her when they passed on the street. Regina was a very attractive woman and Martin had asked her out after only a brief acquaintance. However, this session wasn't about Martin or Sophie, and Regina was the one he had to focus on. "Granted, but Martin obviously saw something in you that made him want to spend more time getting to know you. As you said, people fear you, so asking you out came with the risk of being ridiculed, a risk he was willing to take."
"And that's what makes the whole situation so galling. I was as delicate as I could be. Same thing with Sydney. After he killed the king, I offered him an escape from the palace, but instead he chose to curse himself into a mirror rather than run away and live a full life! What is with these guys that they can't take 'I'm not interested' for an answer?" Regina gripped, throwing her hands up in exasperation.
Since Daniel's death, the men who sought her attention were generally weak nobodies. As with the genie, this could be useful, but it could also be extremely annoying at times. She remembered her father had claimed he first fell in love with her mother because of her fiery temperament and unwillingness to concede her ground, even in the face of a more powerful opponent. Perhaps some men were just like that. They sought strength, even dangerous strength, to balance their timidity.
Archie was taken aback at his patient's mention of her late husband. She'd barely even acknowledged her marriage before today, and Archie felt like a dwarf who'd finally discovered a deep vein of diamonds. "I thought you killed the king."
"I arranged his death, but technically Sydney was the one who killed him. I needed to appear sympathetic to the people to prevent rebellion, and Sydney was a foreigner, a genie whom Leopold had befriended. Politically, he made the perfect assassin. I convinced Sydney that I had fallen for him the way he'd fallen for me but that the king stood in the way of our happy ending, and I let him believe that if he didn't kill Leopold, I'd commit suicide rather than live without him. Once Sydney had done the deed, I tried to convince him to flee for his own safety. When he refused, I revealed my ruse and informed him that I'd never had any intention of being with him, thinking that would motivate him to save his own hide. Instead he used the final wish in his lamp to give himself the opportunity to 'look upon my face, always'. That's how he ended up in my mirror," Regina related matter-of-factly. Where Sydney was concerned, she felt nothing, neither victorious nor defeated, which was probably why she had grown to appreciate his company. She liked the numbness his presence provided. For so long it had been a welcome respite from the chaos of her life.
"Sounds like you miss him," Archie commented, having heard wistfulness in her voice he could only hope was for the man and not the murder the two had committed.
"In a way, I suppose I do. Despite his cloying affections, he was loyal, efficient, reliable, and uncomplicated. However, I'm not exactly comfortable with how our association began and I didn't want to repeat that history with Mr. Drake. Back then, in that miserable world, I had no choice, no hope of a happy ending if I remained tethered to that weak old man who sought to control me merely because he was born a king and had married me against my will. I did what I had to, used whom I had to, to survive and gain my freedom. For that part, I have no qualms. However, here, even without using magic, I have more options and I didn't want to go down the same road if I could help it. Considering what happened yesterday, maybe it's my destiny irregardless of my intent or actions," Regina surmised in defeat.
Long ago, when the man known in Storybrooke as Dr. Whale had failed to resurrect Daniel, she'd accepted the unpleasantness of her destiny, the lines she'd have to cross in order to gain enough power to do it herself and give them a chance at their happy ending. Now, at his pained request, she'd let him go, and with him any hope for their mutual rebirth that she'd held onto over the years of darkness. Yet she still had to play the role destiny had set before her knowing there would be no ultimate reward for her effort. She might one day win back Henry's love, but the years of him being her son were gone. Emma was never leaving now that the curse was broken and she'd found her family and Regina had to accept that any victory would be partial and flimsy at best. Any victory would cause her more pain than joy and yet she would soldier on because it was what Henry needed and Daniel had wanted. She would endure any hardship in her quest for Henry's love, just as she'd once done in the name of Daniel's return to her arms. Through Henry, she would indeed 'love again', no matter what that love cost her, even if it left her as heartbroken and miserable as she'd been all those years she'd searched for a way to bring Daniel back .
"No, Regina. That was an accident, not a sign. You did what you thought was right. That was all you could do," Archie jumped in. He could see a spiral into depression beginning and it was his job to stop it before it buried the hurt woman sitting across from him.
Regina tried to believe the ginger-haired man, but the part of her that always assumed the worst reared its head. "Perhaps, but.. Maleficent warned me. She claimed that casting the dark curse would leave a void inside of me that would never be filled. What if she was right? What if I can't make friends without dire consequence to them? What if Henry finds a way to forgive me and as a result he gets hurt or kill…"
"Regina, stop it! Stop it right now! You'll drive yourself crazy if you don't stop this and then where will Henry be?!" Archie shouted before kneeling in front of his patient, grabbing her shoulders, and forcing her to meet his eyes. This was not where things were supposed to go.
He'd known Regina had deep pain, but until this moment he hadn't understood that Daniel and her hope for their future together had acted as a dam against all the anger, fear, and fatalism that had built up for nearly two decades inside the Evil Queen. Now that she accepted his loss as unalterable, all of it was rushing over her and twisting her thoughts towards self destruction. If he couldn't get this under control, he'd be forced to call Sheriff Swan have Regina taken to the hospital and put on a suicide watch, in Whale's care. The man was unfit to wear the title of doctor, and yet Storybrooke needed him. With the curse broken, they couldn't just hire or create new medical personnel. The curse had left him with knowledge of this world's medicine and thus made him a necessary evil, but in Archie's eyes, an evil just the same.
"Henry would be with his birthmother and her parents. He'd be fine irregardless of whether I went mad or not. In time, and with the help of his newfound family I'm sure, he'd forget that he'd ever loved me at all or chalk his good memories with me up to a side effect of the curse," Regina stated bitterly.
Sadly, Archie knew she was probably right. Henry would miss her at first, maybe even feel some guilt, but it wasn't in his nature to harbor loss or regret for long. He was already thriving in Emma, Snow, and Charming's care and would likely continue to do so with or without Regina. Still, Archie could tell Regina was not so strong at the moment and he needed to use Henry's place in her heart if she were to pull herself out of a pit of despair. As one of his favorite expressions from this world advised 'sometimes you've got to fake it till you make it', so Archie put on his most serious expression and stared the former Evil Queen in the eye. "Physically, he'd be fine, true, but he loves you, Regina. Can you imagine the guilt he'd feel if he thought his moving in with Emma and their family had driven you insane? Surely you can't want that for him."
"Of course I don't want that for him, but I also don't want him pinned under a minivan for trying to have lunch with me either!" Regina blurted out, her mind filling with horrific images of her baby boy dismembered and in pain as his biological family fought to free him without killing him.
"Regina, Henry's safe. Look, I don't understand much about magic, but I can speak with the Blue Fairy, see if there's any merit to your concerns. If anyone would know, it's her." Archie offered, hoping he got the answer they both wanted to hear. If Regina was right, if the curse had turned on her and anyone who cared about her, he didn't have much hope of keeping her sane or even alive. Then again, what was the purpose of life if you couldn't even swap a few recipes with a bakery owner without having that person end up in a body cast for merely being civil to you?
Regina thought about the offer a moment before conceding. Truth was that the only person who could tell for sure was Rumplestiltskin and he had incentive to see her loose everything, even her son, so his help was out of the question. The Blue Fairy was ancient. If anyone else had a prayer of deciphering the curse's long term implications, it would be her. "That would be helpful. Rumplestiltskin wrote the dark curse, so he might have put in an angle even she can't see, but I'd feel better knowing there's nothing intrinsically threatening to Henry."
"I'm happy to help. I know how much Henry means to you, and…"
"He's my whole world. In the stables, before I had to… Daniel told me to love again, but the truth is that Henry is the only person worth loving. Before Emma and that book, all Henry ever wanted was my love and attention, and I tried, I tried the best I could, but it wasn't good enough. If I can't win his love, if I can't get him to come home, to stop calling those people 'mom', and 'grandma', and 'gramps', I don't know what I'll do," Regina seethed with frustration, suddenly finding her emotions too explosive to contain.
Another finer point about Sydney Glass was that, like her father, he listened. He may not have been able to do anything, but he always paid attention and took her side. As much as she now respected Archie, she knew Snow and her family were his old friends and he was loyal to them; he'd put their needs ahead of hers.
"Regina, they are his mother and grandparents; you have to accept that fact, learn to work with them," Archie replied, realizing he had to deal with this conflict here and now if they were to proceed in their work together.
"You mean obey them, submit to their every whim on how to raise Henry, and of course, pay the bills when what they've unilaterally decided is best for Henry costs more than their combined public servants' salaries will permit. That's not parenting, Dr. Hopper; that's not being Henry's mother, and that's certainly not reciprocal love!" Regina raged, making Archie jump at the raw rage in her voice. Yet, as he watched the woman before him standing her ground, he could see the true Regina, not the Evil Queen, making her voice and her needs heard. While few in Storybrooke would agree, this outburst was a good thing.
"No, Regina, I mean work with them. Compromise with them," Archie explained, sitting his patient back down, only to have her move to the edge of her seat, ready to jump up again.
"They're royal. They have the loyalty and support of the people, and Henry believes they can do no wrong. They don't have to compromise, so they won't. They will keep feeding my impressionable child their self serving spin and pretty soon I'll have Snow's pet dwarves breaking down my door with pick axes to collect Henry's remaining possessions. Make no mistake; they intend to cut me out of Henry's life permanently. My only hope is that Henry can find a way to see past their manipulation, the way he saw past the curse. My boy's smart. Someday he'll see. The only question is whether he'll already have given up on me completely before he sees," Regina explained, going from clenched-teeth fury to soft admission as her thoughts progressed to her lips.
"How do you believe he'll come to this realization?" Archie asked, curiously. He wasn't about to question Regina's assumption directly. That would merely force her to defend her position when his goal for her was to deal with her anger productively and without magic.
"Emma. She's the least skilled emotionally, so she's the most likely to slip up, to admit that she lied about something to him, most likely the lie she told about who his biological father was. Then Henry will come to understand that all adults lie for the protection and comfort of the children they love. Once he sees Emma and her family aren't perfectly moral, he'll feel betrayed and come home to me, and I promise you, I'm not going to waste the opportunity. I'll help him to see that while Emma lied to make herself look better, my lie was only meant to give him his best chance in this world. I mean seriously, what ivy league school is going to admit a young man who writes his admissions essay on how the struggles of his grandparents, Snow White and Prince Charming, have shaped his life? What teenaged girl is going to accept a date from a boy who carries a book of fairytales everywhere? Heck, the art teacher at the middle school level used to be a gnome that turned children into sculpture. How could Henry have made it through his class once he'd read his story and figured out who he'd been in our world? The curse and our world aside, I had to raise Henry to be able to succeed in the realm he would grow up in, didn't I?" Regina asked, knowing that had Emma not come to town, life and age would have done to Henry what the curse had done to everyone else, convince him that nothing was out of the ordinary in Storybrooke and that any feelings to the contrary were all in his mind.
"Whoa, whoa, wait! There's a gnome that kills children to make art working in the town middle school?" Archie asked, his senses heightened. He had to get more information and warn the town, lest the creature take up his old vocation.
"Yes, Mr. Epstein, but he's no longer a threat. He can't entrance the children with a lute when they have video games and internet porn at home, so even if he wanted to pick up where he left off in our realm, he has no way to get them back to his workshop. When I was first learning magic, Rumplestiltskin sent me to obtain a sculpting knife he'd dealt for but had yet to receive. Unfortunately, the guy wouldn't hand it over until I'd toured his gallery and gave him my honest assessment of his work. I did, and let's just say peaceful negotiations for the knife kind of broke down from there," Regina detailed to a dumbfounded Archie. He'd always known things like this happened back in the Enchanted Forest, but the fact that Regina had felt so comfortable running with this crowd still put him back a step every now and then.
"Regina, it's only fair that I let you know, I'm obligated to inform Sheriff Swan about this. This man needs to be removed from his position with children," Archie informed his patient.
"Well, I guess now that the curse is broken, it's for the best," Regina commented, shrugging her shoulders noncommittally. Archie wished she felt more strongly about the rightness of protecting the middle school students in Storybrooke, but he understood why she didn't. She'd been separated from her conscience a large part of her life; they needed time to become reacquainted. He would be there to facilitate the reunion, for that was who he was and who he wanted to be.
"Are you sure disparaging Emma and her family is the best course of action; I mean, when she first arrived, you tried to convince Henry that she was a con woman…"
"According to the private investigators I've hired from outside Storybrooke, she was a con woman, as well as a car thief, at the time Henry was born. When she finally got caught, it was for a jewelry store heist that one of her associates committed. I've seen multiple sources of surveillance footage and considering how the two carried on, the timing, and the eerily familiar way this man walked and stood, I suspect he might have been Henry's biological father as well," Regina crowed, knowing that she finally had something on the blonde. It wasn't fair that all her sins should be on public display, but the car thief sheriff should have her privacy respected. Regina knew she would never win Henry's forgiveness for her own past until he saw the remorseless criminal his birth mother had been as a young woman. She didn't need to lie to Henry and she didn't need magic. In this one instance, the truth could set Regina free. How to package that truth so that he wasn't permanently damaged by the disappointment or turned his anger on her to protect Emma was the issue.
"Regina, revealing the hurtful truth about his origins won't make Henry love you," Archie offered, feeling the heat of this woman's desperation and knowing he had to bring her back to her better nature, even if it required shocking her.
"Is the conscience advocating I lie to my son?" Regina shot back, the former cricket's verbal arrow having hit its mark.
"Of course not. Emma was the one who lied, and she shouldn't have, but if you tell Henry the truth, all he'll see is that you're willing to ruin his relationship with his biological mother to get what you want," Archie pleaded. He understood Regina's frustration at watching another prosper from deception while she was pilloried for things she didn't even do.
"Then how am I going to get him to see that Emma Swan has feet of clay, that she's just the imperfect woman who gave birth to him and not some mythical hero? How do I do that? Because I can't see any other way of getting him to stand still long enough for me to show him I love him! He's growing up. He's growing up and I'm not there! She's there! How can I win his love when he perpetually runs towards her and away from me?!" Regina fumed, shooting out of her seat and pacing back and forth across her living room.
"You stop chasing him and give him a chance to come to you, and you have to find other people to spend your life with, because, while I truly do hope that you and he can build a new relationship together, the case may be that Henry won't come back to you," Archie offered, knowing whatever came from that statement wouldn't be easy for either of them. He just lit a match near a powder keg, but he had to be honest.
Hearing this was like a punch to the gut, but Regina wouldn't allow it to sidetrack her. She'd learned long ago to hide her disappointment. "I have thought about leaving Storybrooke, but doing so almost certainly means I'll never have Henry's love. I might not even remember he exists. I certainly won't remember my Daniel, and..."
And then it happened, a gushing of sorrow suddenly swallowed Regina, and Archie sat silently dumb founded. He had expected a fight or a painful emotional upheaval, but this was beyond anything he could have imagined. In all his years, both in the Enchanted Forest and this world, he had never witnessed pain so consuming. He thought about the child Gepetto and the years of tearful nights, but in time the young boy, kind hearted by nature, found friendship and true love. Many years later, he carved Pinocchio, and now the man named August had returned to help his elderly father in his repair shop. His old friend finally had his happy ending. Regina was one, big open wound, and for several moments Archie was doubtful that he'd ever be able to bind her, much less help her heal. All he could do was watch as she toppled over onto her side, curled up into a ball on her sofa, and lay there sobbing.
It took nearly half an hour, but her tears finally stopped. Seeing the signs of dehydration, Archie quickly filled a glass of water from the carafe on Regina's coffee table and handed it to her. He barely knew where to begin. The only thing he could think of was the gnawing question of why she had to leave Storybrooke to build friendships. He knew she faced an uphill battle, having been the one to cast the curse that had brought them all here, but he also knew that many of the residents of Storybrooke were far happier in this world then they'd ever been in the Enchanted Forest. Surely some of those people could become her friends if she gave them the chance. Still, Archie believed that whether or not she should surrender her memories for a new life was a choice Regina had the right to make for herself. He just needed to ensure she saw all the possibilities before her and made her decision for the right reasons.
So preoccupied in his planning was Archie that he completely missed Regina's attempt to straighten herself out and put on her mask of control. "You don't have to stay. I know our session ended some time ago. I'm grateful, but I understand if you have other patients or things you need to do."
"I cleared my afternoon. I'd guessed the house arrest would be difficult on you," Archie admitted. Nobody liked to be caged, but due to the demons of her past that perpetually threatened to catch up with her, Regina especially detested standing still.
"Thank you," Regina replied, not knowing what more to say. She wasn't used to her feelings being considered in other people's plans.
"Would you like to stop? I mean, if this is getting too painful, I'll understand," Archie offered. He knew his patient well enough to know that being out of control was terrifying for her, so he wanted her to choose whether or not to continue.
"If I was the type of person who let pain stop me, I'd never get anything done. Perhaps I really should cross the border and leave Storybrooke. I mean, after I cast the dark curse, when there was no magic, the pain was always so much less. I think that's why it took me so long to adopt Henry; for eighteen years, having to endure so little pain on a day to day basis left me content, needing nothing more in my life than my job as mayor and the solitude of my apple tree at home. Maybe without memories or magic, I'd have a chance to truly be free of the pain," Regina contemplated as she adjusted her scarf under her shirt collar.
"Perhaps, but don't you think your leaving will be hard on Henry?" Archie asked, worried that Regina was attempting to talk herself into something she wasn't thinking through. As much as Regina thought the boy indifferent, Archie knew better. Regina had been Henry's entire world for years. His disgust at her was a reflection of his pain at being told his perceptions of the curse were mental illness. If he'd truly felt so little regard for her, he would never have pushed her away as forcefully as he had. He understood Regina's exhaustion at trying to connect and failing, but he also had to think of Henry's wellbeing. Regina was his mother and her leaving Storybrooke would be abandonment to him.
Regina organized her thoughts before making her case. She knew it sounded like she was giving up on her life with Henry, but just as the Enchanted Forest had nearly eaten her alive, so she felt the newly delivered magic of Storybrooke threatening to do the same. This was an issue of survival. Perhaps the best thing to do was to let go of her hope for a happy ending and move to a place where nobody truly expected to get one. "Like I said, Henry would be fine with Emma and her family. Besides, I'd never just get in my car and drive. I'd have to talk with Emma, sign over custody, set up a college fund, transfer my house and several bank accounts into a trust for Henry once he reaches adulthood; we're looking at weeks or months of work before I could leave. There would be plenty of time for the two of us to make peace."
"Make peace? You talk as though you'd be dying," Archie questioned, his previous concern that she might attempt to take her own life resurfacing.
"In a sense, I will be. While I have no way of knowing for sure what would happen to me if I crossed the border, I have no 'cursed self' to draw my life memories from. From the moment I arrived in this realm, I remembered everything that I'd lived through in the Enchanted Forest, although I was given a lot of additional knowledge like how to use a microwave and what the American Revolution was. I'm assuming that 'education' would stay with me, but the rest would be lost. If Henry really had been just a baby from this world and not Snow and Charming's grandchild, I'd probably have a chance of remembering him. However, he wasn't. He's part of them and they are part of our realm." Regina explained, the disappointment she'd felt at realizing Henry's true origins seeping into her voice.
She'd once entertained the notion that Henry's adoption papers were like her green card, a way to make her truly a part of this wondrous realm the way the naturalization process turned a refugee into a citizen. Now she knew the truth; by adopting her son she'd bound herself even tighter to that horror show of a world she'd been born to. She just wished she could make her son understand what the Enchanted Forest was really like and how the stories in his book were whimsical fantasies of a way of life that had never existed except for a tiny, tiny minority. Then again, with Snow and Charming as his grandparents and his mother, the savior, had Henry been born in their realm he would likely have been in that tiny minority, a happy ending requiring no exceptional effort his birthright.
"So even though Henry was never part of the Enchanted Forest himself, there's a good chance you still won't remember him," Archie concluded.
Nodding, Regina considered the situation. "Him or anything else about my past, which might be for the best. I mean, imagine if you were a mother of a brilliant ten year old boy one day, blacked out for a few minutes, then came to and everyone told you that your previous life, including your child, was just a figment of your imagination. I can't see how I'd ever find even a small degree of happiness under those circumstances. Heck, I'm pretty sure there was a horror movie about just that scenario a few years back, it involved a plane crash I think… maybe a train derailment, something like that…."
"I'm surprised you can speak so casually about it all," Archie stated, partially intrigued and partially concerned, although not about the movie. Having a psychotherapist's license, his curse-provided training, and his bank account information, his hasty decision to attempt to leave Storybrooke when the curse first broke had carried little practical risk. Thankfully their prince had stopped everyone, including himself, from giving up who they'd been. Even armed with all her legal paperwork, Regina was risking far, far more but showed none of the anxiety each of Storybrooke's residents had shown as they drove towards the boundary that fateful day.
"Other than my Daniel and Henry, and also maybe a few with my father, I don't really have any memories I'd be sorry to loose. Hopefully those I make once outside this town will be better, happier. I know I will never be… have... I know happy endings don't exist out there, but I won't remember that there was ever a place where they did, and as they say in this world 'You can't miss what you never knew," Regina explained, trying to put her hopes into words.
"But if you won't be happy there, then why…"
Regina cut Archie off from drawing the wrong conclusion. "I didn't say I wouldn't be happy. I might be. But the kind of happiness that lasts, the kind that walks beside you the whole of your life and sustains you in tough times, my chance for that died when I let my Daniel go. I know they say that magic can't raise the dead and that I and Whale were on a fool's errand from the beginning, but I still believe there's a force out there, be it magic or medicine or something else entirely, that will one day succeed where the not-so-good Doctor failed. For Daniel and I, however, whatever it is, it comes too late. From what I've gleaned, people native to this world take small victories, small joys, so that on their deathbeds they can claim those successes greater than the sum of their parts. I can't help thinking that maybe, if I truly become a part of this realm, if I leave the Enchanted Forest behind forever, that way of living might work for me, might bring me some happiness… but to do so, I'll have to give up Henry. All magic comes with a price. I just don't know which price is greater, staying or leaving. Once I figure that out, I'll know what I have to do."
"I'd like to help you with that," Archie offered, holding Regina's gaze across the coffee table. He knew Regina wasn't used to people making offers to help her, at least offers that didn't come with a painful price, and he silently cursed her parents for isolating her as a child. Despite her devotion to her father's memory and the positive stories she'd shared in the course of her therapy, Archie could see the myriad of ways the elder Henry had failed his daughter. Some of his choices, though distasteful, had been necessary. Had the man stood up to Cora when their child was young, Archie had no doubt the witch who fit the textbook definition of sociopath would have killed her husband and young Regina would have been truly alone and defenseless. However, once Regina was older and less physically dependant on her parents, Henry could have run away with his daughter, but he hadn't. Instead, he'd comforted her after the fact and coaxed her out of depressions with jokes and stories, but offered no real protection when she was abused daily at the hands of a monster. That above all else Archie had trouble forgiving, though as a conscience, he would always try. Holding anger accomplished nothing.
"I'd appreciate that; thank you," Regina replied as she took another sip of water. She didn't know where to go from there. She knew the trappings of false generosity well enough but the rules of the real kind, beyond thanking the bearer, still left her feeling awkward.
Archie beamed a smile before growing serious again. "You're welcome. It's a big decision, and I'm honored that you trust me enough to let me help you make it. I want you to know I don't take that lightly."
Regina nodded her head in gratitude once more. She was overloading on kindness and she couldn't take any more. She had to get back to business. That was where she could be strong and effective without risking someone being hurt. "So, how do we do this? Should we make a list, pros and cons of why I should or shouldn't leave?"
"Exactly, although it doesn't have to be a written list. In a way we've already started. You mentioned that leaving would give you a chance at happiness without the burden of your past. You've also expressed your hope to rebuild your relationship with Henry as your primary reason to stay. If you want, we can write this down, but we don't have to; it's really your choice," Archie offered, taking up a notepad should Regina choose that option.
"Considering you take notes on our sessions anyway, we don't need to draw up any formal documents," Regina conceded, not wanting to make extra work for her therapist. She knew herself. When the right answer arrived, she'd know it.