A/N: A quick update. Have a great weekend!
25. Emma: Day 117
As the door to the study slams behind Regina, Emma looks to Neal for help, but he averts his eyes. The room is tense and uncomfortably silent, but soon Sidney and Cora start chattering loudly about strategy and shouting at Gold to fix the situation. Emma ignores them and continues to stare at the closed door.
"Go talk to her," Henry suggests quietly from his chair next to the sofa where Emma remains seated.
"And say what?" Emma asks.
"Don't worry about the PR or the campaign or the contract. Decide what you want to do as Emma and Regina. Don't let all this shit get in the way. I know how she feels about you," he replies. "…And I've seen how you look at her. You should find her."
"Henry," Cora scolds. "I don't know what your conspiring about over there, but focus. Go talk some sense into your daughter and get her back here."
"No, Cora. I let you convince me that this was a good idea once. I'm not playing along anymore. Emma and Regina are adults and can make their own decisions," he says, sending another look of support to Emma.
She nods and slips out of the room, much to the chagrin of Cora, Sidney, and Gold, who are continuing to yell at one another about the best course of action.
"Emma, wait," Neal calls after her, closing the door behind him to block out the shouting match inside the study.
"What, Neal?" she sighs. "What could you possibly have to say right now?"
"I'm sorry," he says sincerely. "I thought you knew. It was all in the contract. We went over it."
"I'm sure we did. I was probably too anxious about it to really understand and digest it."
"Well, still. I am sorry."
"Is that all?" she asks impatiently, desperately wanting to go find Regina.
"Umm," he starts, catching her arm as she starts to turn away from him. "I haven't heard from you since you left the convention in Chicago. I assume you and Regina made up, then? Did you guys get to talk?"
"Yes," she answers. "Everything was fine until this morning. Better than fine, actually."
"As in…" he starts.
"As in we decided to actually pursue this. But now I'm not so sure. This drama kind of fucks everything up, you know?"
"Oh," he says, and to his credit he does genuinely look apologetic.
"Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go try to salvage my relationship."
*.*.*
She knocks quietly on the bedroom door, which isn't quite latched and begins to open on its own. "Regina?" she asks tentatively, peeking through the now-cracked door.
"Hey," Regina answers from her spot on the bed, acknowledging Emma's presence. She's laying on top of the bedspread with her arms folded, propped up against the pillows and staring at the ceiling.
Emma isn't quite sure what to do. "Are you okay?"
She chuckles wryly, finally looking at Emma. "Not really."
"Right," Emma agrees, closing the door behind her and leaning against it. "God, this is all so fucked up."
"Yeah, no kidding," Regina sighs, forcing a laugh and shaking her head. "First my mom is a giant bigot and gets herself into an epic mess she can't get out of, and then she drags us into it so I can pretend to be gay to save her ass, but then we end up falling for each other for real, only to then be told we have to either break up or get married to save this bullshit story we've created and not destroy our careers in the process. What the actual fuck? How did we get here?"
"I don't know," Emma replies. It really does sound ridiculous when she hears their situation summarized out loud. "But obviously, both of Gold's suggestions are stupid options," Emma says, hesitating. "Right?"
Regina finally looks at her. "Of course they're both stupid options," Regina answers. She shifts over on the bed, making room for Emma to join her in a silent invitation.
Emma immediately accepts and crosses the small distance from the doorway to the bed, leaning back onto the vacant spot. She smiles when Regina rolls onto her side to face her, wrapping an arm across her abdomen in a light embrace.
"What should we do?" Regina asks after a moment of silence. Her grip on Emma's waist tightens slightly.
"We're only obligated to what's in the contract. There's nothing in there that says we have to do exactly what they tell us to. We do have some free will, Regina," Emma says. "So, I say we go with your original idea. We deny it and then carry on with our lives. Let your mother deal with whatever fall out may occur, and we focus on ourselves."
"I'm just worried that Gold may be right and this may screw over our careers."
"Well, it could. But the risk of that is the same no matter what we do, so we may as well try to let this blow over and do what's best for us. In the meantime we can just keep playing up our relationship and selling people on it. At this point it's not like it'll be hard to do, now that we're actually together," Emma points out. "Unless, that's not what you want? Have you changed your mind about this?"
"Emma," Regina says, pushing herself up so she can look the blonde in the eye. "I meant what I said when we first got here today. This stupid scandal doesn't have to change anything with us. I'm still very much in this, in terms of our relationship. The only thing I'm done with is catering to my mother's every demand. I'm sorry if I freaked you out when I walked out downstairs."
Emma smiles and can't help but lean in and kiss her, her relief evident as she does so. "Okay, then," she breathes when they pull apart. "And you're willing to fight Gold on this?"
She nods. "Absolutely. You're too important to me now to risk screwing this up just to please my mother and whatever moronic notion Gold has."
"Then I'm in. I'm with you, whatever you want to do," Emma confirms, lacing her fingers through Regina's.
"Good," Regina smiles, and this time she's the one to initiate a quick kiss. "But can we stay up here a little longer? I'm not quite ready to go back and argue with all of them again."
"God yes," Emma agrees. "I'm exhausted. I could so take a nap right now. I didn't exactly get a lot of sleep last night," she smirks.
"Don't let me stop you," Regina says, laying back down on the bed and tugging Emma's arm to join her. "But before you do, what do you think of this?" Regina asks, reaching for her phone and handing it to Emma.
"Oh wow. It's gorgeous," Emma says, looking at the picture on the screen. Regina must have taken it sometime in the early hours of the morning. In it, Emma was asleep on her side, and Regina was partially visible in the edge of the frame next to her. The photo was in black and white, and the shadows created from the full moon outside the window and the glow from the fireplace made Emma almost look ethereal in the photograph.
"I didn't mean to be a creeper, but you were sleeping so peacefully and looked so content and serene. And beautiful."
"I love it," Emma smiles, handing Regina her phone.
"I wasn't planning on every showing it to anyone, other than you, obviously," Regina started. "But, given everything that happened this morning, I was wondering if I should post it. I don't love the idea of sharing something so personal as a strategic move, but it would probably help."
"It makes sense," Emma nods. "I'm fine with you posting it, if you're comfortable sharing it. I mean, it's pretty obvious that we're both not wearing any clothing, but nothing is visible. And it's clearly taken in the middle of the night so it would have been taken before any of the stories were leaked in the press, so no one could accuse us of staging it as a reactionary move."
"Yeah, that's what I was thinking," Regina says, hesitantly.
"So…why don't you?"
"It's just…it's intimate, you know? I didn't take it for anyone else. I just genuinely thought you looked beautiful and I wanted a memory of last night, since it was such a big step for us. And for me in terms of admitting how I feel. I don't know if I want to share that with the world. It was supposed to just be for us. "
Emma reaches out and threads her fingers through Regina's. "Then don't post it. We can always post something else. We probably have some photos we haven't posted yet that were clearly taken before this news came out that may help dispel the allegations."
"I don't. I went back through my photo albums already," Regina sighs.
"Then we can figure something else out. But, Regina, maybe sharing this one will help guarantee that we'll have many more moments to come. We can have a lot more that can be for just us."
"True," Regina nods. "And, I really like the idea of taking control of the narrative and not having Gold involved. Posting this will piss him off, if only because it's a brilliant move and it wasn't his idea."
Emma laughs. "That's definitely a perk."
"Alright, I'm going to do it," she says, quickly typing up a caption and letting Emma see it to give her approval: 'Escaping the noise of the city for the peace and serenity of a night away from holiday chaos. The calm before the storm.'
"That's perfect," Emma confirms.
"Okay," Regina sighs. "It's posted. Now we wait to see how this goes."
"Can we nap now?" Emma smirks.
"Yes, dear," Regina says, closing her eyes and wrapping herself around Emma.
Emma smiles as she feels Regina's arms around her, and she just hopes they can get some rest before whatever fresh hell will come next.