She prefers to be called Kelly mostly because that was what Chad knew her best as, but she still responds to Zelena whenever Regina would use it during their traded phone calls after she moves back to San Francisco.
Kelly still felt horrible about leaving her younger sister and her daughter in the middle of a curse, but she had to get away. She didn't want that life anymore. The curses, the magic, the looming shadow of a past she just wanted to leave in the past.
She wanted a fresh start.
A start she now had once she and Chad had finally unpacked the last box after the move from their apartment to the cozy feeling house they'd picked out when Zelena was still walking around under the fog of Kelly 'I teach peddling' West.
"It doesn't matter what name you use sweetheart; they are both yours." Chad reminds his arms slide reassuring around her waist.
"But you didn't fall in love with Zel-" the former wicked witch would attempt to counter but Chad would rest a finger to her lips and take a deep zin-like calming breath that Zelena would always find herself mimicking as her arms wind around his shoulders in return.
"I fell in love with you," he murmurs letting his hand slide from her lips to gently cupping her chin to get her to meet his eyes. "I don't care what you call yourself. Zelena, Kelly they are both who you are and it's that mix of the woman that I love." Chad tells her pressing his lips to her forehead.
Kelly feels tears sting her eyes, but she hides them against Chad's broad chest letting them soak the front of his shirt. "You don't understand." She chokes out her hands fisting in the back of his shirt while his arms tighten like a warm anchoring blanket around her.
"Then help me to understand." He coaxes pressing his lips against the crown of her head when she keeps her head bowed against his front. "Tell me everything. The good the bad. I want to know it all."
Another broken sob slips from her throat as she shakes her head against his chest. She wants to so badly to give in to his request, but she also knows that when he learns the wicked truth about her he will leave. She thought having to give up Hades was difficult. That was nothing compared to the pain she just knew would come from losing this new honest and unwavering love the latest horrible curse had brought into her life.
She can't lose Chad. She just can't.
"Zelena, please."
Kelly stills at the sound of her birth name on Chad's lips while he once again cups her chin in his warm hand to draw her eyes to meet his own. "I want to know you." He whispers leaning in to brush his lips to hers. "All sides of you. So, whatever you want to tell me—just tell me." Her head was spinning as his lips once again press against her own when he finishes his plea.
Not even Hade's kisses had made her feel like this.
Accepted, Loved, Wanted, Safe.
Some small part of her mind wondered if this was how Regina when she would kiss her outlaw or Snow when her shepherd prince would kiss her whilst Chad's hand slides down to rest against the small of her back as the kiss deepened just a little more when she allows herself to relax into it.
"Let me know you, sweetheart," Her real-world Prince Charming pleads when they finally separate.
It takes a few more beats of searching his gaze before she gives an answer. "Okay." She agrees taking a deep breath to steady the last of her nerves "Alright." She says a little louder when he didn't seem to catch the first.
Chad's smile could be city powering as he drops his arms allowing her to move away. "Let's go downstairs to the sitting room first." She suggests just in case he tells her to get out once she'd finished telling her tale.
"How about I go make you a drink first and then meet you in the living room." Chad counter offers as he brushes her hair back behind her ear for her. "And no, no matter what you tell me I'm not going to ask you to leave." He adds as if he'd been able to hear her lingering doubts buzzing around in her head.
"I love you." Zelena smiles blinking away a fresh batch of tears.
"I love you too." Chad smiles pausing at the door to their bedroom to look back at her over his shoulder. "and I always will." He promises before heading out the door toward the stairs leading to the second level of their new house.
As promised Chad was waiting for her when she'd gathered enough courage to head down the stairs after digging out a few things to aid in unpacking of her more wicked times.
Mainly her copy of Henry's newest storybook the white cover glaring at her as she handles it, but also a few 'souvenirs' that had surprisingly came with her in this newest casting of the dark curse.
The green leather gloves from her very public main street brawl with her sister, the powerless crystal the Black Fairy once tried use to attack Regina, the needle holder from the vinyl record player that had put Dorothy Gale into a sleeping curse. (needle not included). The drained remains of the necklace she'd once used to trick her sister's true love into having a child with her.
Then she added a few much more personal things.
The bell from that first bike ride she'd taken with Hades that laid the groundwork for the ill-fated romance that would follow their time together. The preserved burnt flower he'd gifted her during her visit to 'Underbrooke'. The only picture she had of Robin and their daughter taken just after her birth in the Storybrooke hospital.
"Green apple martini for the lady." Chad smiles holding out the glass as soon as she rounds the curve into the living room. "As promised." He adds with a playful wink that makes Kelly blush as she sets down the little box, she'd been carrying on the coffee table.
"Thank you." Zelena hums taking the offering with a grateful smile as she sinks into the sofa cushions beside him.
"I did have something else from Zelena's-from my past, but I left it with Margot instead."
"Let me guess." Chad muses setting down his own half-tumbler of some amber liquid Kelly guesses was scotch. "That weird green necklace you had on when you fought off that Nick guy-"
"Hansel." Kelly corrects "In my world, he went by Hansel."
"Then if his sister's name was Gretel-" Chad started to say while Kelly nodes "The same from what those in this realm think of as just characters from a fairy tale." she summarizes over a first sip of the drink in her hand. "I blinded the witch that hurt them when they were young, but they still turned on me. Everyone ends up turning on me."
Chad's hand finds her on top of the sofa cushion. "I'm still here." He reminds then blinks in surprise "wait, wait you blinded the witch how'd you—"
"Magic." Zelena answers "That's what my pendant was for. To harness my magic."
"Aahh so there is magic in the world." Chad sighs and for a second Zelena couldn't tell if he was just messing with her or honestly impressed by the thought.
"Of course." Kelly nodes. "but this was different not like the mumbojumbo Harry Potter, Marry Poppins stuff I'm talking really honest to Merlin raw magic."
"So more like the fairy tale, Disney, true loves kiss, fairy godmothers-I'll huff and puff and blow your house down kind of magic?" Chad clarifies again Kelly nodes. "Exactly."
Chad smiles resting his head against his arm while Kelly takes another nerve-calming sip of her drink. "So, would that make me Prince Charming?"
"Well considering I didn't hit you in the face when we met, I'd have to say by Storybrooke standards no." Kelly chuckles setting her glass down on the coffee table. "See." She says opening the glossy white leather-bound book to the part she needed then passed it over.
"Oh yeah, the princess pretending to be a bandit attacked the shepherd pretending to be a prince." Chad nodes scanning over the first page. "What? I may have skimmed a few chapters after you picked it up."
"I also used to be a midwife for them for a time. Back in my darker days." Kelly muses running a hand in her hair.
"What was that like?" Chad prodded closing the book and setting it aside.
Kelly chuckles "Sickeningly sweet." She pretends to gag. "but we're getting ahead of ourselves."
"Yes, considering it's kind of a big leap for the Wicked Witch of the West to be the long-lost sister of the Evil Queen."
"Seems Hans had been spilling the beans."
Chad shrugs laying an arm across the back of the sofa. "Not really he just rambled a lot when he thought I was unconscious in the back seat during the drive to the bar."
"Well, I bet he didn't tell you that my mother aside from being the Miller's daughter was also the Red Queen."
"As in the 'Off with her head' Red Queen from Wonderland?" Chad pressed an eyebrow raised intrigued.
"Mother always did have a flair for the dramatic." Kelly nodes swirling her drink around its glass just to have something to do with her hands. "Although it's just now occurring to me that in all my time with her, I never did think to ask Alice if she ever—"
"Hang on you've met Alice too?"
Kelly chuckles over the rim of her glass as she takes another measured sip. "So, have you darling." She informs him. "A few times actually." She adds remembering when she's spotted that unmistakable main of wild blonde locks trailing them from the rooftops if not the more obvious times Tilly had been sitting as plain as day at the end of the bar making heart eyes at her daughter while Margot worked.
True those memories were hazy considering most were curse created but it did give Chad something of a touchstone.
"Oh, so it's Margot? Makes since considering how much she knows about the book." He nodes along with another swallow of scotch.
Oh, how she wished she had a camera to catch the bemused look at her buzzer like exclamation and her teasing prod of "Guess again," as she gets to her feet at the reminding rumbling of Chad's stomach that they hadn't thought about what to make for dinner yet.
"Your joking? With how often she'd go away traveling?" her fiancée scoffs following her into the kitchen.
"Margot isn't Alice." Kelly confirms finding it difficult to hold her tongue on the additional 'she's just hopelessly in love with her' she wanted to say as she starts hunting in the cabinets for something suitable.
"But she is your daughter, right?"
"Of course, she's mine." Zelena smiles but it soon turns pained when she also remembers the horrible, wicked lie she'd used to bring her adventurous spark of sunlight into the world.
Chad's hand returns to cup her jaw his thumb flicking away tears Kelly hadn't noticed were spilling from her eyes as she thought about that particular moment of her past. "Did you love him?" he asks obviously misunderstanding the reason for her tears.
"No," Zelena answered honestly. "I mean I did grow to kind of care about him in my own way after I'd lessened my more wickedness, but it was never love." She clarifies picking up the picture of Robin and their daughter. "He was Regina's, true love."
"Regina, your sister?"
Kelly nodes "Roni was her cursed name just like mine was Kelly."
"So, Margot's father was like her soulmate?"
Kelly nodes again passing over the torn picture from the box Chad had carried in. "That's 'Gina's hand there actually." She points out tapping the floating looking hand belonging to the jagged edge of the ripped image.
A nurse had taken it just after her daughter's birth. Her Robin then just rather annoyed code-named 'Baby Hood' swindled in a soft pink blanket cradled so tenderly in her father's arms for the first time while Regina leans in with a kind smile as she looks at her niece. Zelena remembers the moment well and still feeling a twinge of jealousy over it as she looks upside down at the frozen image in her fiancé's hand regardless of the image being a complete one.
"Wow." Was all Chad says scrutinizing the captured father-daughter moment. "So, who is—"
"Robin Hood." Zelena hadn't thought his eyes could go any wider in surprise yet he proves her wrong again as his eyes find hers. "You're kidding." He gaped disbelieving She laughs aloud at that so much so that her ribs begin to hurt. "Says the man standing here talking with the Wicked Witch of the West." She clarifies nudging the utensil drawer closed with her hip.
"Former Wicked Witch." Chad corrects retrieving the cutting board from under the sink noticing that Kelly was finished rinsing the vegetables she'd rummaged from the refrigerator.
"and before you ask, I'm nothing like that cheesy movie version everyone knows."
Chad can't resist the dig a little if his chuckled "darn so you never once told Dorothy 'I'll get you and your little dog too' what a letdown."
Kelly rolls her eyes flicking him in the arm with the end of a carrot "Last I heard she has two dogs now. That bratty pet and the taller one that looks quiet fetching in red."
"Okay, now I know your fibbing. You're saying that Red Riding Hood is a werewolf?"
Zelena only smiles at him. "You catch on quick." She praises "that famous Hood of hers was meant to keep her from turning. Not that I blame them really." She shudders. "I've never gotten to see Red's more animal form, but I was foolish enough to cross her badly once and I caught a glimpse of the beast inside the woman." She explains catching sight of Chad's questioning gaze. Even now she can hear the threatening growl of "You need to wake her up." Ringing inside her head.
"What'd you do?" Chad questions biting into a raw slice of a carrot whilst Kelly finishes off cutting off the fattier bits from the chicken portions they'd picked for supper.
"I put her true love under a sleeping curse."
"As in?" Chad clarifies miming biting into an apple he'd picked up from the fruit bowl at his elbow.
"As in." Kelly nodes twisting the bit of fruit out of his hand and returning it to the bowl. "But in my defense, I was trying to get back to my baby daughter and they wouldn't give me the slippers so I could go back to Storybrooke," Kelly adds sliding the chicken portions into the oven to bake.
"I have to admit Margot was one cute kid." Chad agrees glancing again at the ripped image of baby Robin in her father's arms.
"Yeah, even Hades loved her, or he at least tolerated her a lot to appease me." Kelly agrees with a pained smile at the memories of her little girl in the God's arms.
"Hades? As in the ruler of the Underworld?" Chad clarifies moving the now sizzling veggies from the burner to cool down while the chicken continued baking in the oven.
Kelly nodes picking up the blackened flower with a fond smile as she lifts it to her nose inhaling a flavor the dead thing no longer carried. "He and I dated on and off as it were." She confessed with a shy blush to her cheeks. "He was my first love." She admits setting the flower down as her fingers drift over the bicycle bell.
Chad didn't speak but Zelena could see the jealous tick in his jaw out of the corner of her eye whilst he attempted to hide it by focusing on what was left of the cooking. Rather than let him stew Kelly winds her arms around his middle from behind pressing her face between his shoulder blades enjoying the hard plans of his stomach under her hands over his shirt.
"But all that was before I wised up and realized he wasn't the man I thought he was." She finishes in a broken whisper.
The next second Chad's pivoted around to face her his arms wrap around her in a grounding warmth Zelena clings to as the memories of her last moments with her ex true and first love replay behind her closed eyes. "I've got you." He vows one hand at her back the other smoothing out her hair as she cried into his front once he was sure the stove had been turned off.
"He threatened my daughter, threatened R-Regina- he—he k—killed Robin." She defends in a broken tone and still, he holds her as her hands fist tighter against the back of his shirt. "I had to."
"you did the right thing, Zelena." Chad whispered into her hair. "they are safe because of you."
"Nothing was good enough. I wasn't good enough."
"I beg to differ," Chad argues so sure of himself, and the statement startles her for a few long seconds. "You're perfect just as you are, Zelena and if Hades wasn't man enough to see that and appreciate what he had then I'll just have to work that much harder to prove it to you."
His lips still taste like whiskey when they connect with her own when she pulls him with her more toward the kitchen island rather than press him back into the cooling stove. Soon after the scent of burnt chicken taints the air but their mouths don't separate.
"Hang on." Chad insists rather reluctantly breaking their kiss to look toward the door what could have been hours later when really it was only several short minutes.
Kelly had heard it as well.
"You try to salvage dinner; I'll handle our guest." Chad instructs as another round of knocking these much harder more instant than the last comes from the other side of the front door.
Kelly nodes "Just a second." She insists when Chad starts to lean away whilst she sits up from her half reclined place on the kitchen island. "I'm the only one who gets to see you." She reminds hastily rebuttoning his shirt while Chad chuckles under his breath "Who am I to argue with the Wicked Witch." Kelly rolls her eyes at the lighthearted tease "Former Wicked Witch." She corrects as he gently set her back onto the floor.
"Better go let whoever that is in darling." Zelena sighs when the sounds of knocking fists came again. "Seems like a storm is about to come rolling in."