So the chapter alludes to rape, because, well Regina was barely an adult when she was forced to marry a King who was at best twice her age if not more.

It had been a few weeks since Emma and Regina had been told that Regina was pregnant with what Emma affectionately referred to as the magic baby. They had decided to tell Henry before they told everyone else and so a few days after their trip to the hospital they sat the teenager down and asked him how he felt about becoming a big brother. A huge grin spread across the boy's face and he questioned if his mothers were joking with him. Regina assured him that they were 100% serious and showed him the blood test results that proved it. With the conformation in his hand Henry was even more excited at the prospect of being a big brother and even when his mothers begged him to keep the news to himself for a few weeks you still couldn't have slapped the grin off his face. In the weeks that followed Emma was woken up every morning to the sounds of Regina suffering through morning sickness and while there was precious little she could do, she still tried to help where she could. That morning in particular however, Emma woke up on her own and Regina was still sound asleep next to her. Deciding to let Regina sleep in, Emma quietly left the room and went into the kitchen to make breakfast and set up Henry's lunch. Henry eventually stumbled down the stairs and ate his breakfast in silence, as he wasn't fully awake yet. Once he was done he headed back upstairs to shower and get ready for school. Emma was about to go check on Regina and bring her some tea, when the doorbell rang. Emma was shocked to say the least when she saw her mother standing on the other side of the door.

"You driving the school bus now as well?" Emma quipped and her mother smiled as she stepped inside.

"Very funny. I thought I'd swing by and double check that we are still on for dinner tonight." Emma and Regina had decided to tell her parents about the baby after Regina reached her three month mark and that had passed the week prior.

"Yes, Regina has been planning this dinner for weeks."

"All that fuss for a family dinner?"

"You know Regina, it's go big or go home with her." Snow was about to say something when Henry came downstairs with his backpack in hand and worried look on his face.

"Not to alarm you, but mom is upstairs crying." Emma frowned slightly. Regina's emotions were all over the place with her pregnancy, but she hardly ever cried loud enough to be heard through a closed door.

"Crying like she just watched the end of Steal Magnolias crying or end of Fried Green Tomatoes crying?" Henry opened his mouth to answer, but at that moment Emma could hear her wife crying from all the way downstairs. Something was most definitely wrong.

"More like the end of Les Miserables crying." Emma handed her son his lunch and pointed to the door. "Go to school, I'll go check on her."

"But mom..."

"Henry...go to school, I'll handle this." Henry sighed, but walked out the front door and started his walk into town. Emma reached to grab the tea she had been making for Regina anyway and as she did, she caught sight of the calendar Regina kept on the fridge. The date that was circled made her pause; it was today's date, but Emma couldn't think of anything she was missing. As she thought about it longer, Emma remembered that after the first year she and Regina had spent together she and Emma had created a system for what Emma termed Regina's dark days. While calendars worked a bit differently in the Enchanted Forrest, Regina had figured out that certain days would drag her into a depression that she couldn't shrug off and those days repeated on a yearly cycle. Over the years she figured out what "dark day" synched up with her past life experiences and once she and Emma started dating, Regina felt obligated to at least warn Emma that some days Regina needed to be left alone. Their system was that Regina would circle the days on their family calendar so that everyone had ample warning. This year however, Emma got distracted. The wedding, followed so closely by Regina becoming pregnant made Emma blank and miss seeing that the worst of Regina's days was coming and now it was here.

Emma abandoned the tea on the counter and ran past her mother and straight up the stairs to her and Regina's room. She opened the bedroom door and she almost started crying herself at the sight before her. Usually, Regina just slept through her bad days, but not this one. Today she was lying in bed, clutching Emma's pillow and sobbing uncontrollably with her body tucked under the comforter that covered the bed. Emma rushed to her side of the bed and climbed back into bed, careful to let Regina know she was there.

"Regina. Honey, talk to me, what happened?" Regina kept crying, but she tried taking deep breaths in an effort to answer her wife's questions.

"Gina….Gina look at me." Regina finally locked eyes with Emma and all the blonde saw was her wife's lower lip quiver like a baby about to scream and that was enough for Emma to instinctively wrap her arms around Regina. The crying continued and Emma was certain she never heard anything so heartbreaking in her life and she had seen plenty of sad things to compare it too. After a few minutes Emma wasn't surprised to see her mother standing in the hallway outside her bedroom door, but Emma didn't have the chance to address her because Regina finally said something.

"Emma?"

"Yeah Gina."

"He was here." Emma shook her head and pulled Regina closer to her.

"No honey, he wasn't here. He isn't coming back ever. He's dead Regina."

"I saw him, I could feel him….touching me, kissing me. It happened all over again." Emma's eyes shut tight and when she opened them again, her mother saw anger flash in the normally soft eyes of her daughter.

"It's over Regina, he is long dead." It was the only thing Emma could say. To promise over and over again that the nightmare Regina was reliving was literally from another life. Regina held onto Emma with a vice grip and pleaded with her wife to make it go away.

"Don't let him come back." Emma kissed Regina's forehead, gently, but with a firm purpose. It forced Regina back into reality and replaced the fear she felt with the gentle reminder that Emma wasn't going to let anything hurt Regina, Henry or the baby.

"Never. He's never coming back. I won't let him." Regina's crying had softened and when she could finally breathe again all she wanted to do was shower. Emma told her she'd be downstairs and as she closed the door she ushered her mother downstairs as well, knowing that if Regina ever knew that Snow had seen her life that…well it wouldn't be pretty. Once they were back in the kitchen and Emma was sure the shower water was running she turned to her mother and pleaded.

"Look, I need you to forget you saw anything upstairs just now. Regina would never forgive herself if she knew you saw her like that."

"What is there to forgive, she clearly had a nightmare."

"That wasn't a nightmare, that was a flashback. Besides, you know Regina doesn't like to cry in front of people."

"I won't say anything, but I would love an explanation as to what brought that on." Emma shook her head no. "No, this one is between me and Regina.

"Emma, she was in hysterics. She thought someone was going to hurt her, or she thought that already had; now tell me. Please, I just want to be able to help if I can."

"You can't. No one can. The damage was done a long time ago and no matter how hard I try, I cannot erase what he did to her." Emma didn't mean to snap at her mother, but Regina had never acted this traumatized before. She knew that sometimes pregnancy made dreams and nightmares seem more real, but Emma questioned why this nightmare, this memory, had to seem the most realistic.

"Emma." Snow wasn't trying to be nosey, she honestly was just concerned and wanted to support both Emma and Regina if she could.

"Today…it's her wedding anniversary."

"What are you talking about, you two got married a few months ago."

"Didn't say it was our wedding anniversary." Emma waited for her mother to connect the dots and when she did Snow looked distraught.

"Emma…I had no idea."

"I know. And for what it's worth, this is the worst I've ever seen it. Usually, it's just her having a bad dream, she wakes up and I hold her in bed until she feels safe again and then she wants me to leave so she can sleep it away. That…I don't know what that was. That was her reliving it. She thought he was actually back." Emma ran her hands over her face, trying to make sense of this situation, but she got nothing.

"The dream, or the nightmare rather that she has…what's it of?" Snow hated to ask, but she hated not knowing more.

"A man in his late 50's marries a child that just turned 18. What usually follows weddings?"

Snow's face turned a color that did her name justice as she chocked out an answer. "Wedding nights."

"He broke her…absolutely destroyed her. Even Cora couldn't do that, but he fucking did. And now I have to spend the rest of my life trying to convince her that he isn't coming back, that her monster is dead, that he isn't going to get a second chance to hurt her again."

"Emma, I'm…so sorry."

"I know you are. It's not your fault he did what he did, but on some level you were bound to find out and I'd rather you hear it from me."

"Does Henry know?"

"No and you will not tell him. It's Regina's story to tell or not. I already hate that I told you. Just keep it to yourself otherwise?"

"Of course."

"Thank you. Look you should go before Regina gets out of the shower. Assuming she's still ok with it, we'll see you alter tonight ok?"

"Call me later and let me know about dinner. We can always reschedule if she'd prefer."

"I'll check with her and let you know by the time school lets out." Snow smiled and said goodbye to Emma before leaving the house and heading to the school. Once the house was empty, Emma headed back upstairs knowing full well that Regina was likely done in the shower. When Emma got back into the bedroom Regina was back in bed, dressed in one of Emma's baggy tshirts. Emma kicked her shoes and her jeans off and climbed back into bed with her wife and Regina instinctively rolled over and curled into Emma's embrace.

"Tell your mother dinner is at 6:30." Emma was stunned, how did Regina know Snow had been there at all?

"How did you…?"

"My sense of smell is in over drive and I can smell her perfume on you."

"Regina I'm sorry."

"Don't be, not your fault the dream was worse this time. Just tell your mother to be at 6:30 and hold me like you are now." Emma texted her mother the new time for dinner before tossing her phone aside and wrapping herself and Regina up in the bed sheets. Emma couldn't take back what happened to Regina and maybe she would have these nightmares for the rest of her life, but for that moment, Emma taking the day off from work and snuggling with Regina was the best idea either of them could come up with for making the past stay buried.