Author's Note: This chapter, you guys. I don't know. It's been giving me trouble for weeks, and I finally decided to just split it in two and give you the first part now. Apologies for the wait.


Regina is hot. She is hot, and she has to pee, and in her sleep her arm had gone limp over Robin's torso, landing just so, and now there's pins and needles tingling through her fingers, her palm. She is sweating, with a full bladder and a tingling hand, but she cannot bring herself to move. The scent of him is all around her, and he no longer smells vaguely of woodsmoke and open air, but he is somehow still familiar, and his fingers are loose against her shoulder blade, and she is perfectly content - aside from the heat, and the need to pee, and the tingling.

She's not sure how long they've slept, but the room is nearly dark, she's probably due for another antibiotic, and more cough suppressant. She should really get up.

She should.

She doesn't.

Instead, she stays where she is, and resolutely ignores her bladder. She does pull that tingling hand back, though, and the pins and needles get worse, grow sharper, and she winces, spreads her fingers, flexes, fists, flexes, fists, then tucks her hand against his chest.

Robin stirs, somehow manages to draw her even closer, his palm flattening against her back, then falling loose again, his chin rubbing against her hair, stubble tickling her scalp.

She should get up, use the bathroom, take more medicine, but for a little while, she has him to herself again, and she has a selfish desire to keep him that way. If not for the tickle in her throat, the awareness of how every breath works into her lungs (she's on borrowed time with that cough suppressant, she can tell), she could almost imagine that their time apart has never happened, that they've just been making love in front of her fire, and now they are here, asleep, wrapped up in each other. It's a selfish thought to have while his wife is not yet even in the ground (and while she was responsible for putting her there in the first place all those years ago), but Regina has never been all that selfless, not really, and there's still a part of her that feels as if Marian stole him away from her anyway. As if the other woman had never had any right to him in the first place. She wonders, for the billionth time, how their lives might have been different if she'd had the courage to abandon her rage and approach him in that tavern.

She doesn't know what they are right now, what this curious middle ground is between strangers and lovers, but they are something. He's right about that. Something intimate, if not romantic, and Regina is not sure what to do with that. Intimate relationships have always been in short supply for her. She tries to recall another, between Daniel and Robin, and it is a struggle. She and Graham had been physical, maybe even familiar (thirty years with someone will do that - even if your partner is a bit muddy about the passage of time), but never intimate. Maybe Sidney, by the sheer bad fortune of him being forced into her eternal companionship, but even then, she'd never felt an iota of the connection she feels with Robin.

There have been precious few who could see through her the way Robin does. Parents aside, the only ones she can think of are Snow and Rumplestiltskin. The former, far too intuitive for Regina's liking, despite all the bad blood, and dead loved ones, and years of animosity. The latter, far too involved in creating the monster she became. Of course Rumple knows her better than most, he helped mold her, helped grow every dark part of her. And Snow, Snow has known her longer than anyone else alive. Has known her since she was that hopeful young lover in the stables all those years ago.

Robin was the first in a long, long time to crack her open and root around inside, to settle into all her dark parts without paying them much mind - and to do so without motive or ill will or self-importance. The first one she's allowed in willingly. She wonders if it's because she knew, because the very first day she happened upon him here in Storybrooke he unwittingly bared his arm to her and she knew that he was hers for the taking, if only she was willing. He'd terrified her, the very idea of him, but she had known in her gut that he was trustworthy, that he wouldn't betray her. But then, she'd known that for months - since their time in the forest.

Things had never been easy between them during the missing year, but there had been moments. One or two, here and there, when he'd been his gratingly open and honest self and worn her down with charm and insistence and her own vulnerable heart. When she'd been raw and aching, and he'd gotten her to open up just a sliver or lighten up just a shade, and never held it against her or made mention of it ever again. He'd kept her confidences - she knows he had, because Snow had never given her the knowing looks she was sure would have followed any word of her softening or sharing or any of the other mushy emotional things the princess excelled at.

She hadn't exactly repaid his kindness with kindness of her own - often the opposite, in fact. She'd been too raw, and too unused to someone taking an interest in her that was genuine and unselfish. Every step he managed closer to her usually sent her reeling two or three back. But she'd trusted him, despite herself.

And if she doesn't pee soon, she will wet the bed like a child.

She cannot wait any longer to extricate herself, it must be done, so Regina shifts back carefully, tries to work her way out of Robin's embrace without waking him. But he's been too long sleeping under the canopy of a dangerous forest, alert to any threats to his men, his child, and he is awake immediately, sucking in a quick breath as his head leaves the pillow and he squints sleepily at her.

"I'll be right back," she whispers reassuringly. And then, "Go back to sleep."

He grunts, scowling in a way she finds utterly adorable, but his head falls back to the pillow, eyes already closed. Regina slips off the bed, feels a bit weak-kneed from spending the whole day in it, but she still scuttles as quickly and quietly as she can for the bathroom. The urge to go is desperate now.

She relieves herself, clears her throat again and again while she does it, because that tickle is still there, that hitch in her chest that has her breathing shallowly to avoid coughing. She should've brought her medicine with her, could have taken it without disturbing him again - it's all the way back in the bedroom now.

She washes her hands and then studies herself in the mirror for a few moments, frowning at her reflection. She still looks wrecked - hair mussed, dark circles on her pale skin, her eyes watery. Not a drop of makeup, and she's slick with sweat in places (her belly, the spot on her back where his warm arm had cradled her), and sticky with heat everywhere else. She feels filmy and grimy, and she needs to shower and brush her teeth. She'll start the taps in the shower, she thinks, let the water warm up as she fetches new pajamas, ones that don't smell like a day gone unwashed, and maybe she'll even be clean and presentable before he wakes from his nap.

That's her plan, and she runs her fingers through her hair, smooths it down and turns toward the shower with a deep sigh.

Her lungs protest immediately, seizing up and propelling her into a cough that shakes her violently, then repeats, and repeats, persistent, unforgiving and unending.

It's not the first time she's been seized like this in the last few days, but it's still horribly unpleasant, this feeling like she can't catch her breath, like every drop of air she manages to force down her throat just makes the coughing worse. Her palms slap down to the sink's edge, gripping there, supporting her, and she cannot breathe for coughing.

She doesn't get better, only worse, and it's one of the few times this illness has actually frightened her. She coughs so hard her knees buckle, elbows thudding onto the porcelain in place of hands, and she thinks she might vomit, thankfully doesn't, but it rattles something loose in her lungs, forces it up, and suddenly she has a mouth full of mucus and Robin is there behind her, saying her name almost frantically, his hands on her back.

She is bent over the sink, hands scrabbling for the tap and yanking it on and she spits out her disgusting mouthful, straight into the stream so it washes down and away, out of sight. Not that she can see clearly through the tears in her eyes.

Robin is half supporting her now asking, "What can I do? What do you need? Regina, talk to me, please."

But she can't answer him, doesn't have the air for it. Her breath is coming in ragged gasps, which is horrible, terrible, because it triggers her into more coughing, and her head is pounding now, tears running down her cheeks, and she cannot even turn to look at Robin because this is mortifying, he should not be seeing her like this.

Finally, she manages to gasp, "nightstand," and "bottle," her voice a rough scratch in between coughs, and he says alright and I'll be right back, and then his hands are gone from her and she sinks down to her knees, presses her forehead against the cabinet and tries futilely to rein this all in. She coughs up more junk and gropes for the toilet paper blindly, spins a wad off the roll and yanks it free, spits into it before Robin has to bear witness to that ugly sight. He returns in no time, must have run there and back, and he is behind her again, on his knees, urging her back against his chest and dropping bottles into her lap, every one he could find by the looks of it. Antibiotics and Advil PM, Imitrex and Midol, and the one she needs, the only one not packed with pills - the cough suppressant.

She fumbles for it, and her hands are shaking, so Robin takes it from her and turns the cap. It spins uselessly - childproof, something he's unfamiliar with - and Regina yanks it back from him, presses her palm down hard against the cap and twists it free, doesn't even bother to measure out the dosage, just brings it to her lips and chugs. It is thick and heavy, coats her throat, and slides down to her belly with a warm spread of medicinal cherry flavoring. When she tips it away from her lips and he reaches for the bottle again, she lets him take it, dropping her head heavily onto his shoulder and trying to keep her panting breaths shallow and bearable.

God, that was awful.

It takes a moment for her to become aware of the quickness of Robin's breath against her back, of the hand he has laid steady on her chest, just below her collar, a gentle, soothing pressure over where her lungs are still trying to find a normal rhythm. When she finally, finally looks at him, all she sees is fear.

She has scared him, and she is not surprised, that was a beastly hell of a fit, and she has been unable to offer him any sort of reassurance that she's not about to choke to death on her own spit. He looks her square in the eyes and asks, "Do you need the doctor?" and she shakes her head, swallows, lets out another cough, this one shallow and weak.

"I'm okay," she tells him, and her voice is an octave too low, and gravelly again. "Just overdue for the cough medicine."

He shakes his head and clutches her against him, and Regina sinks deeper against his shoulder, turning her aching head into his neck. "You scared me," he murmurs, rubbing his palm back and forth under her collarbone and she lets out a soft, dry chuckle.

"Me, too," she admits. "That was... unpleasant."

"Henry's right; you should have had someone here with you," he insists, and Regina rolls her eyes at him.

"I can take care of myself," she insists, and Robin just grips her tighter.

"You cannot be serious," he growls into her hair, and Regina pushes away and turns to scowl up at him, about to tell him off when he cups her cheek and denies her the chance by saying, "I get to be worried for you when you can't draw a full breath, or speak, or even look at me. You couldn't even stay upright."

And she has to give him that, she supposes, so she relents, nods, and relaxes back against him. He cradles her to him again, one arm around her belly, the other now wrapped across her front from bicep to bicep, his mouth pressed to the crook between her neck and shoulder, not kissing, just resting, his every exhale tickling across her skin. "Is there anything else you need to take?" he asks after a few moments of silence, and she nods, murmurs something about antibiotics, but she's comfortable now, and doesn't want to move quite yet, so when he reaches for the two prescription bottles in her lap, she lifts a hand weakly toward his shoulder to still him, telling him, "In a minute. I need a minute."

He nods, and then that press of lips becomes a kiss, distinct, definite, dropping onto the warm skin at the base of her neck. And then another, more, a garden of them planted lightly onto her shoulder, over the flannel there and he is muttering in between each one, desperately, "Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you..." It takes her a second to realize what he means - Roland - and she cups his knee with her hand and rubs there soothingly. "Thank you for doing this, I'd never have asked you to do this," and she shushes him gently and squeezes her hand against him.

"Robin, it's done," she tells him. "You don't have to keep thanking me."

He shakes his head, ignores her, and says, "We should get you back to bed."

"Mm-mm," Regina protests. "I need a shower. I'm sticky."

He tilts her until he can see her face, his own incredulous. "You think I'm letting you step into a slippery tub right now? After all that?"

"I don't think you'll let me do anything," Regina counters as sternly as she can manage. "I'm a grown adult, this is my home, and I'll shower if I wish to."

"Not alone," he insists, and she arches one eyebrow slowly at the implication of that. "I won't have you hurt under my care," he says to her, and then compromises with, "If you insist on bathing, at least allow me to stay here, in the room, in case you need me. I swear to you that I won't peek."

There's nothing left he hasn't seen, she thinks, but Marian is still lying in the morgue, so a tandem shower is out if the question. And now that he's up and not likely to get any more sleep no matter what he does, she can't find much fault in his idea. If he wants to stand there and sweat and keep her company, that's his prerogative. So she agrees, and has him help her to her feet, teaches him the ways of the childproof pill cap before she takes her antibiotic with a palmful of tap water.

"Can you get my robe from the bedroom?" Figuring it will buy her time to get out of her clothes and into the shower.

She cranks the heat up high, as high as she can stand, hoping to steam her battered lungs, then strips quickly, balling up her pajamas and shoving them into the hamper of dirty towels before stepping into the tub and drawing the curtain. She hisses at the first contact of water on skin - it's hot enough that she has to ease in, grimacing until she adjusts to the intensity of the heat.

But once she does, it's exactly what she needs. She tips her head back into the spray, lets it beat down on her, and closes her eyes. The air around her grows warm and heavy, thick with steam and she wants to breathe it in deeply, but she waits, too afraid of her own fragile lungs to risk sending herself into another fit.

And then she hears the door open and close softly, knows he's back, and breathes in.

This time, her lungs don't protest.