3

Sticky Fingers

"Regina!" Gold cried, staring at the growing puddle in dismay. "What did you flush down the toilet, young lady?"

Regina looked up at him guiltily. "Umm . . ."

Rumple could tell she was preparing to tell a fib to him and he put his hands on his hips and said sternly, "Now don't you lie to me, little girl. Tell the truth—what did you flush?"

"Umm . . . well . . ." the child began, looking even guiltier. "It was two things."

"Two things!" Gold growled, and then noticed the water was creeping down near his slippers. "Okay, you stay right there and don't move and I'm going to fix this flood you just made. Right there, Miss Nolan, clear?" He pointed to a spot against the wall opposite the spreading water.

"'Kay, Unca Rumple," she said and went and pressed herself against the wall, careful to keep her toes from touching the soaking wet carpet.

Rumple rolled up his sleeves, thinking he should have known this might happen sooner or later, since toddlers seemed to have a penchant for flushing anything and everything down the toilet. Alina had flushed an expensive pen of his once, and he'd had an unholy mess to clean up then, because he'd had no magic to help him.

He gestured and the water stopped flowing all over. Another quick flick of his wrists and the soaking wet floor and carpet were dried. Now that the flood was stopped, he could go and fix the toilet itself. As he walked over to it, he called to Regina, "What did you flush down there, you little scamp?"

"Uh . . . well . . . after I went potty I was bored, so I 'cided to play with Ariel an' Ursula an' Cap'n Hook an' Ariel's mermaid sisters. I was playin' kidnap, an' Hook n' Ursula kidnapped Ariel an' her sisters an' was takin' them away across the ocean. But then . . . I had a big ole storm come with a whirlpool an' I flushed Ursula an' bad Cap'n Hook down the potty!" Regina recited.

"Great!" Rumple muttered. "She flushes the sea witch and that bloody pirate down my toilet."

Now he could see Ariel and her mermaid sisters all over the floor beside the toilet, they were about the size of his hand and still sopping wet. Grimacing, he gestured and they were cleaned and dried. Then he muttered a charm and Hook and Ursula were yanked out of the pipe and he cleaned and dried them as well, fixing the toilet.

Gathering up the toys, he stuck them in the pocket of his Christian Dior bathrobe and stomped back out to where Regina was waiting. Wearing a rather stern Look, he beckoned to her. "Come with me."

Regina, sensing she was in trouble, followed reluctantly at his heels.

Rumple brought her back into her room and sat on the chair where he'd dreamwalked her last night. "Over here, you naughty little imp."

Regina walked over to him, her lower lip sticking out in a classic pout. "Unca Rumple . . . it was an accident."

He raised an eyebrow. "An accident? Oh no, that won't work with me this time. You know better than to play around with the potty. Your papa's told me he already went through that with you at home . . . more than once. Right, dearie?"

Regina bit her lip. "Uh . . . yeah . . ."

"Then what happened wasn't an accident, little imp. Now was it?"

She shook her head, knowing better than to try and lie to him. That would only earn her a spanking and time out, the same as it would if she lied to her parents or Emma and Bae. "No . . . but I was playing," she said, hoping somehow to get out of being punished.

"And are you supposed to be playing in the bathroom?" he queried sharply.

"Umm . . . no . . . but Unca Rumple . . ." she whined.

"Don't you Uncle Rumple me," he scolded. "Where should you be playing, Regina?"

"Uh . . . in here or . . . or downstairs," she said. Then she added, "I sorry."

"Good. You should be," he said.

She breathed a soft sigh, thinking maybe she wasn't in trouble.

Until he said, "However, you're still in trouble." He pointed to the corner across from him. "Five minutes, young lady, and I want you to think about what you did and never do this again."

Her lower lip trembled and she sniveled, "Aww, but Unca Rumple . . .!"

"Now, Regina. Or shall I count to three?"

"No!" she yelped and scurried over to the corner. "No counting!" Putting her nose to the wall she stood there.

Rumple timed her with his watch, and leaned back in his chair.

Regina fidgeted and squirmed after about two minutes, shifting from one foot to the other and whining, "Can I come out now, Unca Rumple?"

"No. Now quit jumping about like you've got ants in your pants and stand still," he replied, checking his watch.

The little imp tried . . for about fifteen seconds, he'd give her that. But soon she was shuffling her feet and sniffling.

Rumple ignored her, calmly counting down the minutes.

Then she started crying, hoping to get him to take pity on her.

Familiar with that tactic, Rumple crossed his arms over his chest and said, "Quit the waterworks, dearie. Two more minutes."

"No-o-o!" she wailed. "Unca Rumple!"

"If you don't like it, dearie, don'tget in trouble," he told her.

Finally it was over and he called her over to him. "Next time behave, okay?"

"Uh huh," she sniffled. "You mad at me?"

"No, dearie. Not now," he said and picked her up and hugged her. Then he dried her tears with his handkerchief and said, "Let's go and eat some breakfast."

"Okay. I want panny cakes. With smiley faces on 'em," she told him.

"All right. I think I can manage that. And how about some scrambled eggs too?"

"Yup. With ketchup."

Rumple made cinnamon pancakes with light syrup and scrambled two eggs for them. Ten minutes later they were sitting at the table eating, Regina had milk in her sippy cup and Rumple had coffee.

Regina ate happily, informing her uncle whenever she ate part of the pancake face. "I's done, Unca Rumple!" she sang out.

"Good job. Now eat your eggs, dearie."

Regina dipped her eggs in the ketchup on her plate and put some in her mouth, growling, "Rrowrr! I'm a vampire! I vant to suck your blood!" Ketchup coated her little mouth as she bared her "fangs" at Rumple.

"Little vampires who don't eat breakfast get tickle tortured," he threatened.

"No!" she cried. "No ticklin'!" She ate some more eggs.

When she had eaten almost everything, he washed her face with a wet cloth and told her to go play in the den with her Leap Frog while he cleaned up and fed Nala.

Afterwards he made some tea and toast for Belle and brought it up to her, knowing that was all she could eat until later on in the day, after the morning sickness passed.

Page~*~*~*~*~Break

Later on, Rumple went to work at his shop for half a day, since he didn't like leaving Belle alone with Regina for too long, since Regina was a handful and a half for anyone to watch, never mind someone who was pregnant with twins.

Belle spent the rest of the morning and part of the afternoon with Regina getting out some decorations and putting them around the house. One of Regina's favorite "scary" decorations was a "talking" magic mirror, which was a shiny small mirror about the size of her head that Belle hung at eye level on the wall, it looked almost like an ordinary mirror until you walked in front of it.

Being motion activated, once you peered into it, it "came alive" and a ghostly face appeared in it and screamed, "Help! Let me out! Help! It's dark in here! Let me out!" and realistic knocking sounds came from it. "I'm stuck in here! Get me out!" in a totally creepy voice.

The first time Regina encountered it, she was scared to death, but after the third time it started screaming about being locked up, she started laughing hysterically. "Lemme out!" she would scream along with the mirror, and shout, "Auntie Belle, the magic mirror man has a serious problem!"

"Yes, he sure does," Belle agreed, and then would ask the child where to put something, like the Halloween clings of various things all over the front foyer and the kitchen and in the downstairs bathroom.

Soon they had bloody footprints stalking them from the door to the kitchen, handprints along the wall, some zombies emerging from the wall of the foyer, a creepy guy coming out of the bathroom mirror and bugs crawling along the wall of the bathroom, as well as a skeleton reading the paper on the inside of the door.

"Eew! Roaches!" Regina shrieked every time she ran into the bathroom, and pretended to stomp them, then she would run out of the bathroom giggling.

Belle put cartoons on for her to watch, and when it came time for lunch, made Regina her standard peanut butter and jelly with crusts cut off. As a Halloween treat, Belle gave her some gummy worms, and when she saw them, Regina started singing a funny song they'd had on the TV. "Worms! Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, guess I'll go eat worms! Short ones, tall ones, long ones, skinny ones, icky, gushy, wriggly worms!" Then she picked up one and ate it. "Mmm! Yummy!"

Belle smiled at her. "Oh, Regina! You're so cute, you make me want to . . . eat you all up," she cried, and then she grabbed her niece and began to tickler her, making her giggle uncontrollably as she pretended to "eat" her.

After lunch Belle asked Regina if she wanted to help make cupcakes for Halloween.

"Will they have worms in them?" she asked.

"Well, not literally," Belle chuckled. "But we can put candy bones and fake skeleton hands on top of them, see?" and she showed Regina the cupcake toppers she had to decorate them with.

"Cool! I wanna eat somebody's finger!" the toddler crowed.

She helped stir the batter, and Belle taught her to count to twenty-five as she did so, and let her lick the bowl and the spoon afterwards.

While the cupcakes were baking and later on cooling before they frosted them, Belle read to her from a book of scary children's Halloween stories, making the little girl squeal in pretend fear. Then Belle played some creepy Halloween music on the TV while they frosted and decorated the cupcakes to the sounds of ghosts shrieking and chains rattling and doors slamming.

Belle allowed her to eat a cupcake, though afterwards the toddler was so wired that she ran around the house howling like a "werewoof" and jumping on all the bloody footprints and singing, "Step on a crack and you'll break your mama's back!" for fifteen minutes.

Poor Nala was so frazzled she went and ran upstairs and hid under Gold's desk, with only the tips of her whiskers peeking out.

Belle put a hand to her tummy and muttered, "Maybe that was a mistake," to her babies.

She continued unpacking more Halloween decorations, and was putting a gargoyle statue on a table in the den when she heard the front door open and Rumple call, "Belle, I'm home. Hey, Regina, what's— "

"Surprise, Unca Rumple!" Regina yelled, spraying him with a can of silly string.

Belle came to see what was going on and started snickering at the sight of her husband festooned with green silly string, all over his suit and his face, there was even some in his hair, and he looked like a victim of a seaweed attack. "Rumple!"

"Belle!" he gasped, wiping some of the string off his face.

"Gotcha!" Regina giggled, still holding the can. Then she ran across the foyer, screaming, "They're coming to take me away, hee hee haa haa!"

"Rumple, I didn't know she found that," Belle said, smirking.

"She'll find anything that causes a mess," he remarked, then he mock-growled, "C'mere, you wretched minx! I'm coming to take you away, all right!"

"No!" Regina screamed, still running away with the silly string can in her hand. She squirted more silly string at Rumple as she fled. "Ahh! The beast's after me!"

Rumple chased her all over the foyer, snarling and stomping, and threatening to crunch her bones and eat all her brains.

"Help! Help! Auntie Belle!" Regina screamed and ran to hide behind her. "He's going to get me!"

"I'll save you, Regina!" Belle cried. "This is how you tame a beast."

Then she grabbed Rumple and kissed him.

Her startled husband promptly kissed her back.

Just then, Henry and Alina came in from school.

Henry stared at the silly string all over, some of it covering his grandfather, and then at his grandparents smooching and cried, "Grandpa, get a room!"

"Henry! Auntie Belle tamed the Beast for me!" Regina shouted, then she sprayed him and Alina with silly string, laughing like an inmate from an insane asylum. "Happy Halloween!"

Page~*~*~*~*~Break

After cleaning up the silly string, the older kids sat down at the kitchen table to eat a cupcake and do their homework, while Regina prattled to Rumple about helping Belle make cupcakes and "dekrate" the house. "Looks like you two had an exciting day," Rumple said to his wife.

Belle stirred her tea and said, "We did, but she's like a firefly, here, there, and everywhere. I almost couldn't keep up with her."

"That's one reason I came home early," Rumple said. "You can rest now, and I'll watch her."

While the adults were talking, Regina poked Henry and asked, "Henry, when can I wear my princess costume?"

Henry looked up from writing about five things you could do with a pumpkin, and replied, "Not yet, Regina. You have to wait till Halloween."

"When's that?"

"In another two days," Alina answered.

"Aww! But I wanna wear it now!" Regina whined.

"But you don't even have it here," Alina said. "It's at your house."

Regina considered. That was true. Her costume was at home, hanging in her mom's closet. Bored, she decided to go upstairs and get Sofia and play with her, since her cousins were doing boring homework and Auntie Belle was having "grown-up" conversations with Unca Rumple.

Since they were busy, none of the older Golds noticed Regina slip off, and soon the toddler had climbed the stairs and spotted Nala walking.

"Here, kitty!" Regina called, and went to pet the cat.

But Nala fled, knowing better than to put herself within reach of the child's hands, running into Rumple's bedroom and under the bed, since the door was partially open, as he had come up there to get changed after the silly string game.

Regina raced inside, and not seeing the cat anywhere, spotted Rumple's good Ferragamo tie folded on the bed. She picked it up and slung it around her neck, calling softly, "Nala! Here, baby!" the way she had heard her uncle address the cat, figuring she could fool the kitten into thinking he was there so she would come out.

However, Nala remained safely under the bed, knowing quite well Rumple was not there.

Sighing, Regina went over and peered into Belle's vanity mirror. It was then she spied the makeup sitting all over it. "Pretty!" she cried, and climbed up on Belle's padded bench.

Page~*~*~*~*~Break

"I think we should have hamburgers for dinner tonight," Belle said. "We can put out all the fixing and let everyone create their own burger. I think Regina will like that."

"Sure she will, dearie. And Bae's coming over, so he can grill them, since he likes doing that," Rumple agreed. He glanced over at the table and saw that Regina suddenly wasn't in the room. "Now where did that imp go?"

Just then they heard an odd sound—triptrap triptrap—and Rumple and Belle exchanged glances. "What on earth's that?" Belle asked.

Regina clomped into the room, the odd sound was made by her walking in a pair of Belle's Louie Vutton blue heels. She still had Rumple's Ferragamo about her neck, it was dusted with glitter, as was her entire face. In fact her face was . . .covered in various hues of different products.

Henry took one look at her and almost busted a gut laughing.

Alina goggled, then cried, "Regina! You look like a clown gone insane!" Then she cracked up too.

"I is not a clown!" the little girl declared indignantly. "I is goin' to work! Like Mommy an' Unca Rumple!"

"Me?" Rumple gasped. "I'm not a cross dresser, dearie," he objected . . . until he caught sight of his tie. "Regina! My Ferragamo! Good Lord!"

Belle should have been horrified at the wreck the child appeared, but instead she just found it hilariously funny.

Regina had painted her face with her body glitter, making it shimmer and sparkle. On top of it she had added some blush, blue and gold eyeshadow ringed her eyes, making her look like a psychedelic raccoon . . . or an Egyptian mummy with a bad eyeliner day. She had taken some lavender lipstick and rubbed it all over her lips and put a heart on one cheek. Some of the lipstick had drifted south and so it looked as if she was sort of frowning.

"Look, Auntie Belle!"

"I see it, Regina! Oh good God!" Belle said, burying her face in a dishtowel as she laughed uncontrollably.

"Unca Rumple, aren't I pretty?" she asked innocently.

"Uh . . . you look . . . very interesting, dearie," he managed to say.

"I gotta take a picture!" Henry gasped, and pulled out his iPhone and snapped one, still laughing.

"Now who told you, you could touch Auntie Belle's makeup?" Rumple asked, trying to keep from laughing.

Regina shrugged. "I was lookin' for Nala and I 'cided to play like I was goin' to work."

"I guess you can't blame her for that one, Rumple," Belle said, wiping the tears from her eyes. "I'd better go see what she did upstairs. And . . . umm . . . she needs a bath too, only I can't kneel down to give her one. Well, I could, but then you'd need a crane to get me off the floor . . ."

"Don't worry, I'll do it," Rumple said. "Come here, Regina."

She bounded over to him, and he picked her up . . . right out of Belle's shoes. "Do y'like my face all shiny an' sparkly?"

"You look very . . . glowing," he allowed. "But now we're going to take a bath and play with Ariel," he told her.

It took fifteen minutes for him to get off all the glitter and makeup, and after he had washed her hair for the third time, he scolded her softly. "Now, you owe Auntie Belle an apology for touching her things. You know you're not supposed to do that, young lady."

"Sorry, Unca Rumple," she replied, looking upset.

After getting her into a new outfit, he said, "I think a certain sticky-fingered girl needs a nap."

"No! I'm not tired!" she howled. She made as if to run out of the room, but Rumple waved a hand and the door closed before she could get to it. "NO!" she bawled, trying to open the door. "I don't wanna nap!" She threw herself at the door, punching and kicking it, and when that didn't bring results, threw herself down on the carpet, sobbing and having a total meltdown.

"Rumple! What's going on in there?" Belle called through the door.

"Nothing, dearie. Regina's having a fit because I want her to take a nap," Gold answered calmly.

"She sounds like you're torturing her," Belle said.

"No, dearie. If anything I'm being tortured, listening to her," Rumple replied, wincing. "Don't worry. I'm not beating her. But she needs a nap, she's cranky."

Belle winced at the banshee shrieks coming from behind the door, then said, "I'll see you downstairs . . . if you can get her to sleep."

Rumple sighed and tapped a foot on the carpet, waiting for the little terror to take a breath and quit flipping out.

Finally, Regina realized her tantrum wasn't getting the results she'd wanted and she stopped pounding the carpet and screaming. Her face now all red and blotchy from screaming, she lifted her head and looked at Rumple.

"You about done?" he asked, frowning. "Or do you want to beat up the carpet some more, dearie? Maybe you think they didn't hear you over in China, hmm?"

Hiccupping slightly, Regina sat up. "Unca Rumple . . . I don't wanna nap!"

"All right . . . then how about you sit here with me for awhile?" he suggested, knowing her histrionics had exhausted her. He went and sat down on the bed.

Regina came and crawled into his lap then, and allowed him to wipe her face with a hastily summoned wet cloth. "M' not tired!" she repeated stubbornly.

Rumple smirked, and gently tucked her against his shoulder. He began to pat her back, rocking gently to and fro, whispering, "Hush, little imp. Now lie still and relax. We're going to pretend you're a silk worm, all snuggled up in your cocoon. . ."

Regina yawned, despite her protests she did feel rather sleepy and his hand rubbing her back was very nice . . . so nice that she laid her head down and closed her eyes, pretending to be a silkworm, and between one blink and the next fell fast asleep.

Rumple held her for a few more minutes before placing her gently on the bed and tucking her in. He thought about dreamwalking her then, but his cell rang. Answering it, he found it was David, calling to check up on his little princess, and the pawnbroker quietly went into the hall and left Regina slumbering, while he told Charming everything that had gone on since yesterday.