It hits him sometimes, a feeling he recognizes even in its oddity, like a new leather boot that fits but has been crafted by a different cobbler. It strikes him when she touches his arm as she's prone to do-odd how he never noticed just how physical a being she has always been, how she reassures herself through touch far more than through conversation. It washes over him when his son snuggles into her lap for a story or gives her a kiss on the cheek, or when her daughter burrows her dark head into his neck. It rushes over him like the most delicious magic when his name tumbles from her lips as he moves inside her, as her nails scrape the surface of his skin, as she flutters and clenches around him until he empties himself inside of her and they both fall panting into a sweaty, sated heap.
But there's something about watching her nurse Nadia that freezes him in time.
He'd stumbled upon them and watches quietly from the still dark shadows of the hall, feeling a bit like an intruder as the baby sucks at her mother's breast. Something primal aches as the image of Regina morphs into one of Snow, as memories of Neal feeding from his late wife's breast crash into what is happening in front of him now.
"You can come in if you like."
The present draws him back, and he smiles and shakes his head, wondering how in God's name he could even think he'd been hiding from her. One doesn't hide from Regina, he thinks. She's the expert, one who has spent much of her life hiding from everyone else. She's adept at reading the shadows.
"You don't mind?"
Her eyes find his from across the room.
"It's not as though you haven't seen everything," she whispers with a wry grin.
He moves into the nursery, into its ivories, lavenders and sage greens, comforted somehow by the muted squeak of the rocking chair, the chair in which she'd rocked Henry when he was this small, a chair that linked them by blood in a manner that spans decades. Nadia is nearly asleep now, her lips occasionally sucking before going slack.
"This is different," he breathes. She gazes up at him, her brow creasing in an unspoken question. "Nursing your baby...Robin should be here with you for this."
The chair stops in mid rock.
"But he's not," she states. "He's in New York with his family."
He kneels beside her, reaching out to cup her cheek.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought that up."
A soft noise pushes up her throat.
"Don't apologize," she murmurs as she removes her breast from Nadia's mouth and shifts the sleeping infant just so. "We're the ones who were left behind. Not them."
Their eyes lock then, and his close as he nods, as time flies before his vision, as memories assail him from every direction at once. Nadia stirs slightly, and his hand cups her dark head automatically, a surge of protectiveness wafting over him as she settles into his touch.
"I won't be able to do this much longer," Regina whispers, staring wistfully at her daughter. "She's cutting two more teeth." She pauses, and he notes a tinge of regret in her voice. "I never got to do this with Henry."
There is a softness to her that reveals itself only with children, and he thinks for not the first time that she and his son have claimed each other, just as Nadia has laid claim to his own heart.
"Cherish every second," he mutters. "We both know how fleeting time can be."
Her eyes lock with his again, and he spies something hovering in them, something painful, something she'd rather not entertain.
"I'm sorry...that you never had this with Emma."
The sting of loss has never completely left him, but he stares at her and cups her face, his thumb tracing a soft line over bone and skin.
"That's the past," he says. "We've talked about this, Regina."
She swallows and nods, feeling emotions he knows she struggles to process. The depths of her self-doubt and self-loathing had astonished him at first, even though he was aware of their existence, even though Snow had told him of their extent several times. But he reads them now and wonders how he'd missed them before, how anyone misses them when they play out like a fractured symphony across her features.
"We both know the past never truly leaves us," she returns.
"No," he utters. "But it doesn't control us, either."
She blinks repeatedly, her eyes damp and luminous as night's fleeting shadows hover in the promise of pre-dawn.
"Why are you with me?"
Her question hangs between them, and he strokes her cheek again, watching as she leans into his touch.
"Why are you with me?" he questions. She smiles then, and he's struck by how beautiful she is just like this, bare-faced, hair uncombed, looking far younger than her years will ever let on.
"It beats the hell out of being alone."
His chuckle makes her smile broadens, and he leans in to kiss her temple, struck by the slight waft of apples and honeysuckle. She smells like spring, like newness, like the first blossoms after a long winter, and his mouth seeks hers, tasting morning as he kisses away the staleness of sleep. She hums and kisses him back, noses nudging, careful not to wake the baby sleeping between them.
Footsteps pad down the hallway and stop just short of the nursery, and he looks up to see his son standing in his pirate pajamas, rubbing one eye with a drowsy fist as his other hand clasps the arm of his stuffed dog. Regina slides the robe over her breast as David silently beckons Neal forward, and the boy moves into his father's arms, laying his head in the crook of his neck as blonde waves that need trimming stick straight up on one side. He breathes him in and hugs him close, kissing a head still warm from blankets and smelling of baby shampoo.
Neal's body goes slack against him, his breathing steadying within a couple of minutes.
"He's out," he mouths, watching her eyes soften at his words. He stands then, knees popping in the process, and looks down at her, motioning towards her bedroom with his head. Her lips tug upwards as she catches his meaning and carefully rises from the rocking chair, Nadia nestled securely to her chest. They creep down the hall towards their destination, both of them lying down gingerly, careful with the precious cargo they carry.
Neal snuggles into his chest as he pulls the comforter over all four of them, smiling broadly as the boy's nose scrunches. Regina tucks Nadia into the crook of her elbow and strokes her straight black hair as a small thumb ventures into the girl's mouth.
He watches her in the grayish haze that precedes the sun, feels it when her eyes lock onto his, senses something in the flutter of her lashes and way she licks her lips. This, what they have now, what they've created, it's good. Not perfect, not what they'd dreamed, not a relationship without its difficulties, but good all the same.
Family, he thinks, unable to swallow as the word swirls through his mind. They're becoming an odd, misshapen sort of family, one many might judge or not understand but one that works for them all the same. Two lovers left broken, a boy who'd lost his mother, a little girl whose father didn't know she even existed. Yet they were loved, these children, cherished to the point of pain, snug in this aftershock of a relationship their parents had forged from the charred remnants of their souls.
"You're right," he breathes, watching her eyelids begin to close at sleep's quiet beckoning. "This does beat the hell out of being alone."
He hears her sniff as she nods and feels her sigh of acknowledgement, one that carries a promise of things they're both still piecing together but clasp onto with everything they have. Soft fingers reach out to find his arm, and he moves onto his side so he can hold her and Nadia as well as Neal. She shivers, and he pulls the blankets up over her shoulder, losing yet another piece of himself to a woman he'd once despised.
One day soon, they'll let the rest of Storybrooke in on their secret. They'll hold hands openly, they'll kiss at Granny's, he'll park his truck in front of her house overnight without caring who may or may not see. He'll speak openly about Regina to Emma, and she won't live in fear of Henry figuring things out. But for now, this is good for both of them-for all four of them, actually.
It's better than good. It's living.
Family, he thinks yet again as he gazes at the three sleeping under the protection of his arm. It's the last coherent thought he's able to form as he finally surrenders to sleep's lull with more peace than he's felt since the woman he'd held had been wife.