Regina loved the trees in this particular part of Storybrook. They were tall weeping willows only a short distance from the lake near her home. Despite how close it was to where she lived she knew no one at her house, save the help, knew where it was. Proven by the fact that Zelena had never once found her here and by the fact her mother hadn't already chopped down the trees. Lately it seemed that she was determined to destroy any small piece of happiness either of her daughters had.

So Regina was grateful, for this one small blessing. Her own private sanctuary.

"Who the hell are you and why are you in my spot?" a high pitched voice asked from behind her. Regina turned from her book and looked at the new arrival. She recognized her from school but couldn't quite put a name on the blond. All she knew was that she took her fair share of teasing, mostly from Zelena and her crew.

"Who are you?" Regina asked back defiantely. Whoever she was, she wasn't going to get Regina to move. This was her sanctuary.

"I asked first," the other girl said, her hands placed on her narrow hips, like she was uttering a challenge.

"Yeah, and I asked second," Regina responded with a roll of her eyes. She marked her page and placed her book at her feet before standing up, hoping along the way that she wouldn't have to physically fight the girl. She had only ever had a few scraps with her sister and Zelena always bested her unless the fight was stopped by one of their parents.

"Wait, wait. I know you. You're in my social studies class. You talk to that weird boy all the time," the other girl said thoughtfully. Regina nodded.

"His name is Jefferson."

"Yeah, whatever… your sister is that red head bitch who always messes with me," she said with a glare.

"She gets it from our mom," Regina said quickly, wanting to distance herself from her sister. They weren't any thing alike, anyway, and only half related.

The other girl looked at her with wide eyes before laughing loudly, almost obnoxiously so. She doubled over and fell to the forest floor with the strength of it. Regina watched her with worried eyes as she backed up; maybe this girl was crazy like all the girls said. Regina certainly didn't see how she could be so amused by the truth.

By the time the other girl sobered Regina was already halfway to the path that led back to her home.

"I thought I was the only one," the girl said with a slight grin. Regina stopped then and regarded her carefully, wondering what she meant.

"Only one?" she repeated. The other girl nodded and chuckled slightly to herself.

"With a bitch mom," she clarified. Regina's eyes widen as she took a step back towards the girl. She had thought only she was the only one as well. TV moms never did the things her mother did. And it never seemed like anyone else's did either.

"Does your mom drink too?" the blond girl asked, looking at her from the corner of her eye. Regina shook her head as she stepped closer, stopping to pick up her discarded book along the way.

"Only sometimes. My dad says she's sad so she's mean but I don't really believe him," Regina murmured, stopping to sit a little ways from the blond. The other girl chuckled spitefully.

"My dad said the same thing when he left," she muttered darkly, her bright eyes darting to look into up at the sky.

"I'm sorry," Regina said quickly. The other girl shrugged and looked back down at her.

"Don't be. It was for the best, anyway. He used to watch me," the other girl admitted. They sat in silence for a while after that, Regina twiddling with the pages of her book and the other girl just staring blankly ahead, as if caught in a particularly vivid memory.

"Why don't you believe your dad when he says your mom is sad?" the blond asked suddenly.

"Because sad people don't hit so hard, I think," Regina responded without pause. The other girl nodded her head and sighed softly.

"Yeah… I think so too. I'm Mallory by the way," the girl said, wrapping her arms around her long legs.

"Regina."


"Why in the world are you pretending as if you don't already know where he went?" Mallory's voice called over the car speakers. Regina rolled her eyes and continued pulling out from her drive way. Robin and Chri-Marian stood watching her with Roland who was waving his arms frantically with a smile. Regina tried not to think about how this would probably be the last time she would see the little boy.

She wasn't too hopeful about her relationship with Robin lasting when his ex-wife was finally back. And there was the fact that she really and truly believed that Marian deserved a second chance with her family. She'd thought it when she thought Marian was Christie and she couldn't stop the feeling now that she knew the truth.

It didn't stop her though, from feeling used and violated. Had the girl always known about her relationship with Robin? Had she chosen her organization for that specific reason?

"Hello, earth to Reggie! Are you listening?" Tink's voice squeaked through the sound system. Regina cursed Mallory for demanding to make this a threeway call.

"Listen, just because I think he might have gone there doesn't mean he did. I'm not leaving my son's life up to chance and there's no way I'm going to Maine on a 'maybe'," Regina gritted out, the hopeful part of her self screaming that it just 'couldn't be'.

"I can't believe that Henry would just up and leave to go backpacking across Canada, okay? Regina… he'd got to be searching for answers. You said that Emma said he'd been asking about his grandparents. He may want to see what they're like on his own," Mallory stated.

"Yeah, maybe if you just got there first you could persuade him to come home with you," Tink added. Regina shook her head and turned onto the I-395.

"Even… even if he is there, me showing up would more than likely be the opposite of helpful. He left to get away from me and if he's going to my mother than I can't believe he'd want to see me. Going there may only push him further away," Regina said, her voice displaying a calmness that she didn't actually feel. In reality she was feeling jittery and scared.

Scared she'd lose her son to her mother but at the same time scared that she wouldn't and he'd have to face the hard truth about her life. That he'd finally see Cora for the monster she was.

"Regina… are you saying that just because you don't want to see your mother?" Tink questioned shyly.

"Oh shut it, you pixie wannabe. Regina's right. Going to face her wicked mother in some final showdown isn't going to help things. It'll only exacerbate the problem, which is Henry thinking his mother, his real mother, is some kind of evil witch sent from the damn fifth dimension or something like that. Let him face Cora on his own and he'll come to his senses sooner or later," Mallory said before Regina even had a chance to tear into her spirited friend. She didn't want to see her mother, no, but she wasn't at all afraid of Cora. Not anymore.

Not really… well, maybe just a little.

"Hey! I'm not a pixie wannabe, you butt! Tinkerbelle is a fairy!" Tink hollered into her phone.

"Yeah, whatever. She had pixie dust so she's a pixie," Mallory responded, no doubt rolling her eyes at Tink's outcry.

"You're only saying this because you don't like Henry," Tink said quickly. Regina raised a brow and waited for her friend's response.

"It's not that I don't like him… he's my g-dson and I love him. I just love my best friend more," Mallory finally said after a short pause.

"But enough about that, I have to get back to work. I'll call in a few favors for you and see if I can get Henry tracked down. In the meantime make your way to New York and rip that stupid vapid blond apart. How dare she neglect to tell you your own son was missing for a whole week? If you want I could draw up some papers and take her for all she's got," Mallory heatedly stated.

"She probably doesn't have too much to give," Tink added smartly.

"There's no need. Just start making calls," Regina said with a sigh.

"And what about me?" Tink asked.

"You can keep… being a pixie. Got to go," Regina chuckled as Tink screeched into the speakers before she hung up on her. She felt a little lighter after having talked to her friends but she was still worried. Worried that somehow or another she'd lose her son. Worried she'd already lost Robin and Roland. Worried that Marian might even relapse under the stress.

So she did something she hadn't done in a long time, not since she was a young girl.

She prayed.


"And that's Mack and that's Colby and that's Jefferson," Regina said, pointing out various kids in the bustling cafeteria and ending with her grinning friend who was making his way through the lunch line while talking to a few boys from their shared Math class. No doubt trying to score the answers to the homework.

"That weird looking one is the one you always talk to in Social Studies, right?" Mallory asked with her head cocked to the side. She sat next to Regina at a table close to the exit, munching on Regina's juicy red apple happily. It was the first thing she'd eaten in about two days and it was probably the best thing she'd ever eaten in her whole life.

"Jefferson? Yeah… I think he's kind of cute," Regina muttered shyly as said boy began making his way to their table.

"Cute? I don't see it. You gonna marry him or something?" Mallory asked teasingly.

"What?! No way! My mom would kill me. She says Jefferson's parents are too common. She doesn't even like me being friends with him," Regina said just as Jefferson slid into the seat opposite her on the table, the boy Colby sitting beside him.

"Hey, 'Gina. Guess who just scored all the answers to tonight's math homework?" Jefferson gushed.

"If you're getting them from Mack you might as well do it yourself. You'll get it all wrong either way," Regina said smartly while rolling her eyes. Jefferson chuckled before turning to look at a now blushing Mallory.

"Who's this? You're the girl in our Social Studies class, right?" he asked, taking a bite of his hot pizza.

"Yeah. Mallory," she said, introducing herself.

"Nish to mish youss," he said around his mouthful of food. Regina grunted in disgust before pulling out her sandwich from her tin lunch box. She frowned and opened it up to see what was inside. Avocado, cream cheese, a slice of tomato, and thinly sliced smoked salmon stared back up at her.

"What the hell is that stuff?" Mallory asked with a frown. She'd never seen such a weird looking sandwich in real life. It looked like the type of stuff the chefs made on those cooking shows she sometimes watched.

"Our chef made it. Mom said that Zelena and I need to go on a diet so we're only allowed to eat really healthy stuff now," Regina responded before pulling the tomato from her sandwich and taking a bite. Mallory looked down at the discarded tomato and licked her lips.

"Do you want it?" Regina asked after noticing her staring. Mallory shyly nodded her head before Regina shrugged and handed it over. Mallory moved threw the already finished apple into the trashcan at the head of the table before taking the tomato slice to munch on. Jefferson eyed her wearily for a moment before turning to talk with Colby.

"Do you want to split my sandwich?" Regina asked with a frown, finally noticing the empty spot in front of her friend.

"Nope. I'm um… a vegetarian. And not the kind that eats fish," Mallory said before standing from the table.

"Where're you going?" Regina asked quickly, about to put her lunch away and follow after her new friend.

"I gotta go to the library. I forgot I have to return a book! Just stay here and I'll see you in class!" Mallory called over her shoulder as she rushed from the cafeteria, Regina and Jefferson watching after her.

"She's weird. What the heck are you talking to her for?" he quickly asked. Regina just shrugged her shoulders and fiddled with her sandwich bag.

"She's like me," Regina said before standing to follow.

"I'll see you in class," she muttered.


"Regina, I swear," Emma started as soon as she'd opened her apartment door. Regina promptly ignored her and instead focused on finding her son's room. She'd been in the city for two days before contacting Emma. In that time she'd hired a private investigator and had Mallory call in a few favors for her. She spent most of the time talking with officers about what they were doing to find her son, then she'd gone to the school which had given her more grief than help.

Since she wasn't listed as his guardian in their files they'd refused to give her any information that could be helpful. Luckily one of Henry's friends had been in the office while she was busy cursing the clerks for being so useless; Arthur or something like that. He'd agreed to meet with her later the next day with a few of Henry's other new friends.

And now, instead of being too early for said meeting, she'd decided that perhaps his room would have some type of clues as to where he could have gone.

She had her suspicions but she was determined to ignore them.

"You must be Regina, nice to meet you," a man with dark brown hair and a sparse beard said, stepping from the living room and towards her. Regina lifted a finely manicured brow as she looked him up and down.

"You are?" she asked as she looked around the small flat. She was surprised by how neat it seemed to be. Whenever Emma visited she always left her guest room in a general state of disorder.

"I'm Neal, Henry's dad," he stated with a subdued smile," Sorry we had to meet under such circumstances."

"I'll be honest with you; I don't care anything about you. As far as I'm concerned you're just as much of an irresponsible parent as Ms. Swan. Now, which room belonged to my son?" she asked with a glare. He stepped back and narrowed his eyes, no doubt ready to jump to his precious Emma's defense.

"Save your excuses for someone who cares," she said, stopping him before he could even start. Emma stepped from behind her, tears gathering in the corners of her light eyes. Looking at her now, Regina could tell she'd been crying. Her eyes were red rimmed, the tip of her nose looked like it was scabbing over probably from her use of too rough tissues. She looked and smelled as if she hadn't taken a single shower since Henry's disappearance.

"Regina...," she whimpered pathetically.

"Get yourself together, you pathetic little girl. I don't have the time or patience to deal with you falling apart and looking for my son on my own. So wipe away your useless tears, go take a shower, and get dressed. We have work to do," Regina ordered before turning from the two of them and stalking further down the short hall and peering into both rooms before walking into the one decorated with superhero posters. There was no doubt that this was where Henry had slept in his time in New York.

She sat on his bed and looked out the window facing the back of the building. A small courtyard filled with passing strangers and a small play area for children. There weren't many people milling around with the temperature dropping like it was but she wondered if Henry had ever spent time down there. Or up here people watching.

Looking around his room filled her with longing and just the tiniest bit of anguish. When she was younger she had talked about visiting New York with Daniel. He wanted to be close to his family in Boston but she'd always felt a pull to this particular city where her parents had met. She remembered that her mother only ever seemed to be happy when talking about her socialite lifestyle in the big city. Consequently she blamed having children as the reason why she had become so miserable.

What Regina never understood was why, between the two of them, so much of her fury directed at her youngest child? From what she knew Zelena was a drunken mistake while she'd been planned.

"She's having a hard time right now too," a new voice said from the door way. Standing there was man decked in a startling amount of leather.

"And you are?"

"Killian at your service," he said with a slight smirk.

"One of Ms. Swan's men, I presume. Seems she's quite popular in this city. I only wish she'd spent more time looking after my son than throwing her legs open for the two of you. Maybe he'd still be here and not goodness only knows where," Regina bit out, standing from Henry's lumpy bed. Killian looked at her with a slightly amused smirk before shrugging off her words.

"I wish you'd spent a little more time being honest with your son instead of doing goodness only knows what. Maybe he'd still be here," he responded with a wave of his hand, as if dismissing her previous statement. Regina narrowed her eyes, her lips twisted in a silent snarl. She wanted to rip him limb from limb. How dare he act as if he knew anything at all about her relationship with her son?

"I see you've already made up your mind about who you think I am. Let me correct that. I have never lied to my son, not once in all my life. I may have neglected to share some things with him but as a parent that is my right. And I don't need you or Ms. Swan or Neal to be walking around thinking that I have ever wronged that boy. Whatever Ms. Swan or Henry have told you is only half the story. The other half being my business to share and not yours to know, you cheap pleather wearing buffoon," Regina hissed, stepping within an inch of his smug little face. She smiled widely as his smirk fell from his face. She stepped back from him and folded her arms around herself before sighing out to release a bit of anger. It wouldn't do her any good, berating this idiot. She needed to stay in control and composed if she wanted her coming 'meeting' to be at all productive.

"And for the record, I could care less how hard of a time she's having. I raised that boy since he was a baby, one that she gave up and never looked for. I did everything I could to protect him and keep him happy, even going as far as tracking that woman down because I knew he wanted to meet her; even though it hurt me to my core to hear him call another woman 'Mom'. I did it for him. And now… she's lost my son and didn't even think to tell me until a week had past. So excuse me if I don't give a damn about her feelings. She didn't care about mine," Regina rushed out, feeling more exhausted with each word. Killian gave her a strange look before shaking his head slightly in disbelief.

"She called Sunday. She tried to tell you then but you hung up on her. I was there," he said quickly. Regina shook her head in disbelief.

"She didn't call me. I would have answered because I was pissed that she'd neglected to contact be for two weeks. I wanted an update on my son, I would have answered," Regina stressed, pulling out her phone as she spoke. She pulled up her call history and began scrolling down. There were no missed or received calls from Emma until Wednesday.

"She called Sunday, I was there," he grumbled moving to look down at her screen. At the end of the list was a missed call from Tink she'd received Sunday evening around ten.

"I don't have anything from her," Regina grunted.

"Or anything from Sunday morning to Afternoon. Do you delete your call history? She called and it was around seven. I was with her here because she needed the company after work. I know she called. I watched her do it," Killian said just as Emma stepped into the room, looking a thousand times cleaner than she had earlier. Her eyes were still puffy and her nose was a bit redder than before but all in all she looked much better than before.

"What's going on?" Emma asked with a shaky voice.

"She said she never got your call on Sunday," Killian stated. Emma looked between them and frowned slightly.

"I called Sunday after I got off of work. I couldn't keep not telling you but you ignored the call. I thought you were angry and then I was too scared to call back," Emma explained.

"That doesn't make sense. I was home all day Sunday with Roland and Robin," Regina said, glaring at the two of them. Liars.

"I swear, Regina. I called. I couldn't take not being honest with you anymore. The only reason I didn't call back until Wednesday, other than my fear, was because I threw my phone out the window after you ignored my call. I was so angry," Emma said, lips trembling as she tried to hold a new batch of tears at bay.

"That isn't possible. I'd just told Robin about how frustrated I was with you for not calling. And that I was planning to call you and give you a piece of my mind," Regina said with a sneer.

"Who the hell is Robin?" Killian asked.

"None of your business," Regina responded hotly. Killian held up his hands in surrender before shrugging it off and moving to Emma's side.

"All I'm saying is that maybe you need to ask him if maybe… he ignored the call. Because, regardless you whether believe Emma or me, the truth is that she did call you," he said before stepping from the room and leaving the two women in the room. Regina thought back to Sunday and tried to figure out if there was any time she'd left her phone unattended. The only time she could think of, outside of breakfast, was when she'd went to go read a story to Roland. She made it a habit to keep her phone on hold. She didn't have a separate business line for her workers or her charges to call. They usually either called her cell or her house phone.

"Regina I'm just… I should have told you the moment I realized he wasn't coming back. I thought if I just give him a day or two he'd come back but that was stupid and irresponsible of me. I'm sorry," Emma explained, shivering under Regina's narrowed eyes.

"Can you give me a moment? I need to make a call," Regina said before turning her back to the other woman. Emma nodded and left the room after a second, closing the door behind her.


"I slept with Jefferson," Mallory said with a sneer as she sat beside her friend's bed. Regina lay on it with her eyes closed, arm thrown across her face to block the light from the bare window.

"Okay," Regina muttered softly.

"I slept with him before we graduated. Before you two broke up. And I slept with him again yesterday. I always liked him," Mallory admitted softly, fat tears gathering in the corners of her eyes.

"Okay," Regina repeated with a slight shrug.

"Aren't you angry at me? I thought I was in love with him back when we went to school together. But he only had eyes for you… so I slept with him at your birthday party, after Cora came and got you. We were left cleaning everything up and I… just did it," Mallory explained, her hands shaking in her lap as she watched her friend for a reaction.

"I don't care. I never loved him. I loved Daniel," Regina mumbled softly, her lips trembling as tears rushed down the sides of her face. Sweet Daniel, lovely wonderful Daniel who made her feel worth something. But Daniel was gone and Mallory was slipping away and… so was she. Slipping away, like a boat out to sea. So poetic. Daniel would have liked to hear her being so poetic. He liked fancy word play. Daniel liked her. Loved her. Like Mallory had always loved Jefferson. And she'd known. She'd always known.

"Aren't you going to get angry at me? Damnit, Regina! Aren't you going to do anything?! Are you even still alive?!" Mallory screamed, standing so abruptly that she knockjed her chair to the floor. She crawled onto the bed and took Regina's shoulders into her hands before shaking the girl feircly.

"Say something! Do something! Don't just lie here and die! Daniel isn't worth that. I don't care how much you loved him; he was never worth you anyway! Neither was Jefferson. No one, Regina, no one is worth this. I refuse to let you lay here every day wallowing in your grief. I will not bury you, you hear me? You aren't allowed to fucking waste away like this!" Mallory screamed, spit flying from her lipstick smeared lips. Regina coughed then, taking in the smell of cheap perfume and sex wafting from her friend.

"You… smell atrocious," she grumbled, pushing the other woman away. Mallory laughed at her gruffness as she sat back on her knees.

"I didn't take a shower before leaving. I just came here. Regina… I…," she began only to be stopped by Zelena sticking her head into the room. Her bright blue eyes staring at them with amusement.

"When you two are done being lesbians together, mother has called everyone down for dinner," she said with a smirk, shutting the door behind her.

Mallory rolled her eyes before looking back at her best friend. Regina looked out the window and then back at Mallory with a slight smile. "I don't want to be alone," she whispered softly.

"We should… get you a puppy so that when I'm not here you'll have someone. They say animals help with these sorts of things. Remember Perdita?" Mallory says, thinking of her old dalmatian. She'd loved that dog before her mother had sold it. She'd never felt alone with Perdita and Regina at her side.

"Yeah. I loved Dita," Regina mumbled.

"So let's get you your own Perdita. And then you'll feel better, I just know it," Mallory said with a bright smile, happy that her friend was finally coming around.

"And I am… a little mad that you slept with Jefferson. But only because you… never told me before how you felt even though I knew you liked him when I saw you dance with him at my party. I broke up with him more because of that than because of my mother 'forcing' me to," Regina said as she stood to get dressed. Her mother hated her being in her pajamas at the dinner table.

Mallory grinned and rubbed Regina's outstretched hand, grimacing only at the sight of the bandages covering her forearm.

"I'm sorry about that," she murmured, gesturing to the slightly red coloring at the side of it.

"It just grazed me. Not like he shot my arm off, no worries," Regina said.


"Regina?" Robin asked into the phone, his voice filled with equals parts concern and surprise.

"Did you ignore a call from Emma on my phone?" she asked without pause. She heard his quick intake of breath and frowned.

"Regina… I didn't mean to," he started.

"Didn't mean to? You deleted my call history," she said in disbelief.

"It just happened. I swear it. One moment she's calling and the next moment the screen was blank. I didn't even realize I'd done it until afterwards. If I had known why she was calling I wouldn't have done it," he explained.

"What would it matter, 'why'? I told you that I thought she was avoiding calling me. I told you that I was worried and you… didn't even tell me that she'd called. Why?" she asked, pacing around Henry's small room.

"I… I don't know. I just thought about how good things were going and I guess, maybe, that I was scared that you'd go back to avoiding us if you heard something about Henry. It was stupid of me and I'm truly sorry," Robin said.

"I'm so sick of apologies. Everyone is always sorry," Regina muttered before taking a deep breath.

"Re…."

"I'll deal with you when I get back. Until then… don't call me. Focus on fixing your family," Regina stated with a side shake of her head before hanging up the phone. She took a moment to compose herself before opening Henry's room door. She didn't have time to worry about what Robin had or hadn't done. She had a son to find.


Hey guys! Sorry for nothing yesterday but I promised not to write when I wasn't feeling too well and I spent most of yesterday throwing up, I think my nephew gave me something.

Anyway, woah! Drama and this is a pretty long chapter too, maybe longer than that other one I did before that seemed extra long.

Drop me a line and let me know what you think. Also the part two to Henry's companion piece should be out sometime this week. I wrote part of it and then realized I'd forgotten to add some very important plot points into it so I have to rework it.

AND (Gosh this is turning into a really long note) I hope no one's bothered by the flashbacks breaking up the story. I thought it would good to put them in to give you guys a better feel for why the present is the way it is. I promise you guys there will be a happy ending but you know, if you're going through hell you've got to keep going.

And um… to the person who commented about me writing G-d like I write it, yes it is a religious thing for me that I'd rather not explain (It's a long and terribly droll story.) I hope it doesn't bother you too much.

I think… that's it for this note. Sorry it's so long but I had a lot to say to you guys. Plus I like how interactive this feels.