Note: I hate to do this to you again, lovely readers, but I only have half a chapter today. Merry Christmas tomorrow to those celebrating!

December 23rd, 2014

Emma groaned as her brother's wails ripped through the air. It was barely 6am and this was the third time he'd woken her. She hadn't even been able to get to sleep until nearly 2.

With a sigh, she gave up and rolled out of bed. To her surprise, Neal was still in his crib when she got downstairs, Snow and David half asleep with pillows pressed over their heads, apparently hoping their son would eventually calm down on his own.

Gently, Emma reached in and picked up the baby, cradling him to her chest. His wails quieted to a dull roar as she bounced him in her arms. All she wanted was to lay down in her bed and sleep. An idea struck, and she knew it was a long shot, but what did she have to lose?

Grabbing up her brother's blanket and draping it over her shoulder, she made her way up the stairs back to her room. She laid Neal near the wall, his cries piercing the air once more as soon as he was put down, and lay beside him. Placing one hand on his belly and stroking his forehead with the other, Emma began to quietly sing. Her mind floating back to a peaceful moment a few days before, she sang Silent Night; she only knew the first verse, but Neal calmed so she continued to hum the tune long after the words ran out. Slowly, Neal relaxed, and in the quiet Emma's eyes drifted closed.

Half asleep and still crooning, Emma remembered Regina's contentment as she had hummed, moving around the house hanging lights, her gaze drifting to Henry and Emma with a warm smile. The images slipped seamlessly into a dream of other Christmases, Christmases where Regina's smiles grew even wider, where Henry lifted up a little girl with golden-brown skin and black hair so she could decorate the top of the tree, where four stockings hung on the mantel, where her arms wrapped around Regina and never wanted to let go.

~*~*~*~
Emma's day already felt so so long, and it was barely two o'clock. She was starting to forget how it felt not to be exhausted. She contemplated going by Granny's for a fourth cup of coffee when her phone rang.

"Sheriff Swan." A pause. A smile spread across her face. "I'll head over right away. Thanks!"

As soon as she was off the phone, her mood faltered. Regina's present was ready. Regina's special, intimate, meaningful present that tomorrow she would know was from Emma. They were friends now; it wasn't a weird gift for a friend to give another friend. But… Emma thought back to her dream from this morning and wondered, was friend exactly the right word for what they were—for all that Emma wanted them to be?

~*~*~*~
It was still early after Emma retrieved the present, but she couldn't bring herself to go back to work. She ambled home in a daze and was surprised by how relieved she was to find her mother sitting at the table, filling out paperwork and nursing a cup of tea.

"Hey mom," she greeted as she hung up her coat before sinking into a chair with a sigh. Snow put her pen down and looked at her daughter with a discerning gaze.

"What's wrong honey?" she asked with concern.

"Noth—I… I don't know," Emma trailed off. She groaned, sinking her head into her hands. "Things aren't… the way they're supposed to be."

"What do you mean? Is something wrong?" Emma could see her mother's alarm bells going off and felt guilt rise up inside her; the last thing she needed was to panic Snow.

"It's just my thing, nothing for you to worry about," Emma attempted to reassure her.

"Emma, I'm your mother," Snow said fondly, reaching a hand across the table to rest against Emma's wrist. "I'm always going to worry and want to help. I know I've been distracted lately, but you are still my daughter, and you can always talk to me. Your father and I want to be here for you, Emma."

Emma sighed. Someone to talk to, a parent who loved her, sounded pretty damn good right now, but she couldn't bring herself to burden her overwhelmed mother with her problems.

"It's fine, really. Just, worrying about Regina's last gift. It wasn't supposed to be this hard."

"Oh, well!" Snow exclaimed in surprise. "If that's all it is, I'm sure I can help you come up with a few ideas."

~*~*~*~
Half an hour passed before Emma was able to escape. Her mother's ideas actually hadn't been bad—candles, bath salts, wine; none of them had jumped out at her as exactly right, but with one day left she'd be willing to settle for not bad. The conversation had been mildly agonizing nonetheless, and Emma was grateful for the baby's screams when he finally woke from his nap.

She left quickly after that, deciding even another hour or two of work would be better than sitting around the apartment feeling trapped, forced to talk about Regina without talking about… whatever it was that was going on with her when she thought about the brunette.

"Emma? I thought you left for the day," David greeted her curiously.

"Yeah, I thought so too. But I'm not due at Regina's for movie night for a couple hours yet, and keeping myself occupied sounded appealing right about now."

David looked at her with concern. He'd always been a little harder than Snow to convince that everything was alright; his wife was naturally trusting and optimistic, easy to persuade to believe things were better than the reality, but he was a bit more cautious. Combined with his protective instincts where his daughter was concerned, Charming almost always knew when Emma wasn't really okay. Sometimes he'd let it slide, trusting her to handle things and understanding that she needed to work certain things out on her own, but he never hesitated to push when he thought she needed it.

Looking at the bags under her eyes that matched his own and the defeated slump of her shoulders, he decided this was a time to push.

He pulled a chair up to her desk and sat down in silence, giving her a moment to see if she would talk on her own. With a sigh, Emma sat in her own chair facing him and his gaze with a tired smile. "You're not buying that, are you?"

"Emma, I've known you the entire time you've been sheriff, and you have never once wanted to do paperwork. You can talk to me, if you want. Your mother and I will always be here for you."

It was the same message her mother had given, but her father's sturdiness gave her the reassurance she needed to give in.

"I'm not sure where to start," Emma admitted. "I don't know when I started to feel this way, or how, or why, but I'm just so fucking confused and I don't know what to do." She paused, looking away, and when she spoke again her voice was small. "I don't know what to do Dad."

"Emma… Is this about Regina?"

Her face flushed lightly. Was whatever she was going through that obvious? Because it sure as hell hadn't been obvious to her.

She nodded slowly. "I don't know what's going on with me. I wanted to get along with her for Henry's sake, and then I wanted to be her friend, and now I don't know what I want. I had a dream this morning, and I think we were… together."

Emma had expected surprise, even outrage. What she hadn't expected was a small, understanding smile.

"Emma, you and Regina have been through a lot. You believed in her before any of the rest of us did; you saw what we couldn't, the woman she was trying to be instead of the woman she'd been. She's also Henry's mother, and growing up without your mom and I, it's natural you would want to give your child a home with two parents. But you have to figure out what you want for yourself, not for Henry or your mother or anybody else."

"I just wanted to help her find her happy ending. But now I… I think I want to be her happy ending."