Chapter Seven
"Regina, is Emma with you?" Snow's voice came through the phone, panicked.
"No! Why on earth would she be with me?" Regina demanded, standing up from her desk in her Mayoral office. "I'm at work."
"She was with me at the diner, and she just poofed away. I assumed she went to you. If she didn't then…"
"Alright, don't panic," Regina said, trying to keep herself calm as well, "she's new at poofing. She probably doesn't know how to get to me when she doesn't know where I am. She's probably at my house. Hold on."
Regina kept Snow on the line as she poofed herself back home. Sure enough Emma's shoes were strewn on the floor in the hallway.
"Oh, she's here, alright," Regina sighed.
"Oh, thank God," Snow replied, the relief evident in her voice.
"Why don't I keep her for a bit," Regina suggested. "She needs another magic lesson… clearly one on poofing appropriately.
"Ok," Snow agreed, reluctantly. "Just… call when you're finished."
Once she was off the line, Regina set about looking for her little intruder.
"Emma! I'm not in the mood for hide and seek! Come out here this instant!" Regina called, as she walked through the seemingly empty house. As she passed by the patio door, she noted that it was minus one stray cat, which she had shooed away twice that morning. She wondered if it finally got the hint.
As she came back out into the foyer, she was met by Emma bounding down the stairs.
"I wasn't hiding!" she insisted, as she ran up and wrapped her little arms around Regina's legs.
Regina forced herself to keep a serious look on her face, as she crouched down in front of Emma, meeting her at eye level. Emma seemed to pick up on the fact that Regina was upset with her, and tried to look away, but Regina caught her little chin in her hand.
"Look at me, please, Emma," she said, firmly.
Emma blinked up at her.
"You made a promise, last night, that you wouldn't do this again, remember?"
Emma nodded, sticking her lip out into a pout.
"Then why did you break your promise?"
Emma's lip began to quiver. "I just… I can't help it! I think about you and I miss you and then I'm here!" As soon as the words were out, the tears followed.
Regina sighed. As frustrating as this all was, she knew she couldn't be upset with Emma over something that she really probably couldn't control. She reached around her and wrapped her in a tight hug. "It's alright, Emma, I'm not mad. But your mother was very worried about you, and we're going to have to work on your control, alright?"
Emma sniffled and nodded against Regina's neck.
"So you're going to stay here with me this afternoon and we're going to do just that."
Emma backed away a bit and grinned. "Really?"
"Yes, really," Regina nodded. "But for a magic lesson, no funny business. Got it?"
Emma nodded, and then reached into the pocket of her little jeans. "I bringed you a present," she said.
Regina raised an eyebrow, wondering what in the world this child could be bringing her. She just hoped, whatever it was, it wasn't alive.
Emma pulled a silver chain from her pocket, with a familiar swan pendant hanging from it.
"Emma," Regina said, looking at the pendant swinging gently in front of her, "that's your necklace."
"I know! I found it in a box of things that Mommy said are mine. All the things are grown up clothes, mostly, but I found this and I want to give it to you."
Regina smiled. "That's very sweet, Emma, but I think you might miss it if you give it to me. You might not remember it now, but you love this necklace."
Emma shrugged. "You gave me a necklace so I could remember you. I want to give you this so you remember me!"
Regina could feel tears burning in the corners of her eyes as she hugged Emma again. "I couldn't forget you if I tried."
Emma insisted on trying to push the necklace into Regina's hand, and Regina knew she wasn't going to stop until she accepted it. "Tell you what, Baby Girl. I'll wear this for now, and when you want it back, you tell me, alright?"
Emma grinned and nodded as Regina put the necklace around her neck. She placed her hand over the pendant and closed her eyes for a moment, as images of Emma's self-sacrifice nearly five months ago flooded back to her. She felt a few of those tears start to fall.
"Why are you sad, Gina?" Emma asked, suddenly very concerned.
Regina smiled. "I'm not sad. These are happy tears, I promise."
Emma grabbed on to Regina's hand as they headed to the backyard to practice magic. Regina tried to teach Emma about aiming for a specific destination when she was poofing, and how to not use magic, even when she couldn't stop thinking about something. She wasn't sure how much of the lesson she was actually retaining, since it was advanced material, but Regina was mostly just grateful that the damn cat never showed up, and that Emma seemed to have forgotten all about it.
Or so she thought.
Once Emma had had enough and they headed back inside, Regina could hear the mewling again. This time, it was coming from inside the house.
The paused and closed her eyes, counting to ten silently in her head.
"Emma," she said, once she had cooled down a bit, "is there a reason that I hear a cat in here?"
Emma shrugged a little and mumbled something inaudible.
"Pardon?" Regina asked.
"I said," Emma started, in a whiny voice, "Kitty Soft Paws was sad and she asked me to let her in."
"Kitty Soft Paws?"
Regina heard the distinct sound of Henry's laugh as he entered the room, having just come home from school. "She couldn't stop talking about cats last night," Henry shrugged, "so we watched Puss In Boots."
"Kitty Soft Paws is his girlfriend!" Emma exclaimed, grinning.
"Kitty Soft Paws is a stray," Regina corrected, "and it's going back outside."
"She!" Emma insisted.
"It," Regina said again. "Henry, you played into this cat fixation, you get to help me find it."
Henry laughed again, and Emma gave him an impish grin as Regina took off in the direction of the cat's meowing.
"Don't help her," Emma whispered, "if she can't find it then she has to let it stay."
"Emma!" Henry laughed, "you might think you're sneaky, but you're not going to get away with keeping a cat in this house. Trust me!"
It didn't take long for Regina to find the cat, backed away under her dresser, inside her bedroom where the door had been strategically shut, in a clear attempt to keep the cat in. She knelt down on the floor and peered at the cat, wondering for a moment – just a fleeting moment – if she should just let Emma keep it. She reached underneath to grab it, only to have it scratch her mercilessly.
She sighed and looked at it directly in the eye. "Just know that I hate you," she hissed at it, as she waved her hands and placed it under a temporary enchantment, to assure that it was docile enough for her to pick up and carry back downstairs.
"She likes you!" Emma squealed, when she saw Regina carrying the cat.
"The skin on my arms would beg to differ," Regina said, putting the cat back outside.
Emma sighed and pouted, heading over to the glass door and dropping to the ground in front of it, sitting cross legged and tracing her finger on the glass, for the cat to chase.
"That cat's paws are anything but soft," Regina said, holding her wrist up to reveal the deep red scratches.
Henry laughed, in spite of himself. "Come on, Mom. You can heal those away."
"That's not the point. And I'm not healing them to remind myself why having a cat is a ridiculous idea."
"If you need the scratches to remind you, does that mean you're considering it?"
"In a brief moment of insanity the thought may have crossed my mind. Then this happened," she said, referring to the cuts, once again.
"I think you're being a little dramatic, don't you? And look how happy she is," Henry said, gesturing to Emma, still playing with the cat through the glass door.
"Perhaps your grandparents would be interested in acquiring a pet, then."
"But, Mom, if you have it, you know she's just gonna want to come here more, and I somehow doubt you would mind."
"No, Henry. It's not fair to toy with her affections like that. Besides, she already wants to be here anyway. She's poofed herself here, twice, already."
Before they could continue, there was a knock at the door.
"Emma, come on, that's your parents," Regina said, ushering the girl away from the cat.
Emma pouted. "By Kitty Soft Paws. Come back tomorrow!" she called through the door, before looking up at Regina. "If she's hungry tonight, can you feed her? Please?"
Regina sighed. "I'll think about it."
Emma beamed as she bounded down the hall to the front door, nearly toppling down the stairs in the entryway, to let her parents in.
"Mommy! Daddy! Kitty Soft Paws came back again!" she exclaimed, jumping up and down with excitement.
Snow smiled as David scooped their daughter up, patting her on the head and kissing her cheek, before coming over to Regina.
"Thanks, for watching her today," she said. "Please tell me you got her poofing under control."
"I'm trying," Regina insisted, "it's rare for magic to be this strong when she's so young. But she'll be alright."
"Is that… Emma's necklace?" Snow asked, noting the pendant sitting on Regina's chest.
"She wants me to wear it to remember her," Regina explained, putting her hand over the pendant again. Snow opened her mouth to say something, but Regina continued. "I'll give it back to her when she remembers it's hers. For now, I'm not going to deny a four year old a gift she wants to give me."
Snow nodded, reluctantly. "I'll bring her back tomorrow afternoon for another lesson, then?"
Regina nodded, and stepped over to say goodbye to Emma, kissing her on the forehead.
Even though she still missed Emma when she wasn't around, Regina enjoyed a chance to have a nice dinner and a movie night with her son. One on one time had become so rare with Emma around, and she was cherishing every moment.
Once he was off to bed, Regina headed to the kitchen to finish up the dishes before she went to bed herself. When she was done, to her dismay, Regina heard the mewling, yet again, as she was about to ascend the stairs for bed. She sighed, and tried to ignore it, but it was so loud and pathetic, that before she knew what she was doing, she was back at the patio door, crouched down, looking at the cat.
"You like the girl, don't you?" she asked the cat, through the glass door.
The cat meowed again, and scratched at the glass.
"I like her too," Regina sighed, as she opened the door and the cat stepped inside. "And she likes you, apparently."
The cat rubbed up against her ankle as she slid the door shut again, and bend down to pick it up, holding it up to look it in the eye.
"I'm warning you, Kitty Razor Claws, you scratch me again, and I will scratch back. Understood?"
The cat purred, and Regina sighed, putting it down again and watching it stalk off into the living room. "That goes for the furniture, too, you little demon!" she called after it.
She shook her head as she headed up the stairs. "Emma Swan, the second you are back to adulthood, you are taking that damn cat back."
The next morning, Regina woke up before the sun, to the feeling of pressure on her chest. She blinked a couple times, expecting to see Emma's large green eyes, but instead, was met with the cold, yellow eyes of a cat she momentarily forgot she had let in side.
"Ugh," she groaned, closing her eyes for a moment, as the cat mewled at her, and pawed at her cheek – thankfully, without claws, this time.
"No! No, absolutely not," she said, pushing the cat off of her and onto the floor. Kitty Soft Paws just stared up at her for a moment, and jumped right back up, purring loudly.
"I see you listen about as well as Emma," Regina sighed, pushing the cat off again, and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. She pulled on her robe, and headed downstairs, the cat close in tow.
"What? You want to go outside now?" Regina asked, as the cat pawed at the door. She slid the door open a little, allowing the cat to run out, but left it open, in case it decided to come back in. She glanced at the clock as she started the coffee maker: 5:56am.
She realized, for the first time since waking, that Emma had managed not to poof herself back in the night. She knew she should be happy about this, since she had asked her to promise to stop, but for some reason she found herself a little sad about it. She sighed as she took her coffee over to the table and sat down, mentally preparing herself for a long day of being tired.
Regina sipped at her coffee and pored over her magic books, trying to decide on some sort of structured lesson plan for Emma that day. She got wrapped up in that, making notes and refilling her coffee cup – twice – until Kitty Soft Paws made her next appearance, nearly an hour later. On Regina's table.
"Off," Regina said, looking at the cat pointedly. The cat responded by sitting down.
"Off!" Regina repeated, with more force this time, pointing at the floor.
The cat stared.
"Get down," she said, finally standing and lifting the cat from the table, and putting it down on the floor. She pointed at finger at it. "This, is where you belong. We have manners in this house, understood?"
"Oh my God!" Henry laughed from the kitchen. Regina's eyes shot up, and her face flushed with embarrassment at her son seeing her speaking to a cat. "You just went from zero to full-blown crazy cat lady over night!"
"I did not-" Regina was cut short as the cat decided to hop onto her lap, and make herself at home there. "This is not down," she said, pushing the cat off again.
"Emma's right," Henry grinned, "she likes you."
"Emma is going to be minus one cat if this one doesn't start listening," Regina insisted.
"I think you like her," Henry teased, as he sat down with his cereal and milk. When he was half way through eating, the cat jumped back up on the table again, and started lapping the milk up from the bowl.
"Henry! Don't let her do that!" Regina cried, shooing the cat away with her hands.
"Oh, she's a 'her' now? Not an 'it'?"
"That means nothing," Regina insisted.
Moments later, an all-too-familiar voice rang through from the foyer. "Kitty Soft Paws!"
Regina closed her eyes and sighed. Apparently Emma had just been a little late in breaking her promise today.
Regina stood and walked out into the foyer, where Emma sat, hugging the cat.
"Emma," Regina said, causing Emma to jump a little. "What did I say about poofing to me without permission?"
Emma looked up, still grinning, hugging the cat. "I didn't! I poofed to Kitty Soft Paws! And she's here!"
"You're not supposed to be poofing, anywhere, period," Regina reminded her, crouching down to meet her as close to eye level as possible.
"But Mommy and Daddy went to work and I don't wanna stay with a babysitter!" Emma wailed, sticking her lip out in a big pout, for emphasis.
Regina sighed. The kid had a point. What good was it for her to be with a babysitter when Regina was here, and willing to watch her. She didn't even want them to take her away in the first place.
"Be that as it may," Regina said, trying to keep her voice firm. "You can't leave without permission."
Regina stood up and went to grab her phone, and made a call to Granny at the Charmings' loft, to let her know where the wayward little girl had gotten off to. Granny seemed relieved, having thought that Emma had hidden herself in some cupboard somewhere. Regina told her not to worry, she'd be keeping the girl for the day. She then texted Snow.
'I have your child.'
'Which one?'
Regina closed her eyes and sighed.'
'The one who is able to move about Storybrooke of her own volition. I'm keeping her until you're done work.'
'I was kidding… She's fine with Granny.'
'Evidently not.'
Snow didn't text again, and Regina took that as her acceptance that Regina would not be returning Emma to Granny that day.
"Come along, child," Regina said, holding her hand out to Emma.
"Where are we going?" Emma asked, hesitating to reach for Regina, in case she wanted to send her back to her babysitter.
"We are going to drop Henry off at school, and then we are going to buy some supplies for this little pest of yours," Regina said, wiggling her fingers a little to coax Emma to get up and take her hand.
"She's not a pest! She's beautiful!" Emma insisted, jumping up to grab Regina's hand.
"Her appearance has no bearing on her behaviour. And if she destroys one thing in this house while we're gone, she will find herself as Kitty Homeless Paws once again."
Emma turned back to the cat, who looked at her, expectantly. "Kitty, be good!" she instructed, as Regina led her out the door.
Emma stared longingly out the window at the school as Regina was dropping Henry off.
"What's the matter, Little One?" she asked, as she started driving towards the pet store.
"When can I go to school?"
Regina sighed and looked at Emma in the rearview mirror. She was getting bigger – Regina had had to used magic to stretch the clothes she appeared in today, and she was going to have to do the same with the rest she had at the Charmings' loft.
"I supposed you must be nearly five now?" Regina hazarded a guess. Emma nodded. "Well, I supposed kindergarten is something I'll have to speak with your mother about tonight," Regina sighed, wondering how on earth they would put Emma in school, when she would outgrow her grade every month.
Emma was beyond excited when they pulled up to the Storybrooke Pet Store.
"You listen to me," Regina said, as she unstrapped Emma from her carseat. "We are here to get food and a collar for your cat. No other animals will be coming home with us, so don't even ask, understood?"
Emma nodded, though she clearly didn't understand.
"Gina! Look! Can we get a hamster?" Emma squealed, the second they were inside.
"God, no!" Regina said, rolling her eyes. "Come on, we're here for cat food."
"Gina! Fishies! Please?" Emma trailed her hands over the various aquariums with brightly coloured tropical fish on display.
"Absolutely not," Regina replied, as she grabbed a bag of cat food from the other aisle. "Come over here and find your cat a bowl, please."
Emma hurried over and studied the array of cat food dishes. After several minutes, Regina found herself wishing she had just picked one herself. Finally, Emma picked up a shiny black bowl with tiny rhinestones.
"Seriously?" Regina asked.
Emma grinned and nodded. "It matches your house," she explained.
"I see. How very thoughtful of you. Now let's go found a collar."
"A snake!" Emma cried, pressing her face up against the glass of a ball python's terrarium as they headed to the collar section. "Pul-eeeease Regina!"
"If there's one thing I hate more than cats, it's snakes. Did you forget that I told you not to ask for any other animals?" Regina reminded her.
"I don't want Kitty Soft Paws to be lonely," Emma shrugged, as she followed Regina to the collars.
"I assure you, she'll be anything but," Regina said, pointing at the collars. "Which one?"
Emma was quicker with this decisions, picking out a pink faux-suede collar with a little bell and more rhinestones.
"Charming," Regina said, as Emma tossed the collar on top of the bag of food and took off further down the aisle.
"Look, Gina!" she cried pointing at something on the shelf. "Kitty Soft Paws needs a bed!"
Regina sighed and rolled her eyes. Yesterday, she had sworn that cat was never coming inside. Today, she was buying food and bowl, a collar, a bed, several toys and bags of cat treats.
"This cat is spoiled," Regina remarked, as she loaded the cat's new things into the car before strapping Emma back into her seat.
"She was lost like me," Emma said, smiling as she leaned back into her carseat. "You saved us both."
Regina felt a pang in her heart at those words. She had never looked at it that way. She never expected Emma to relate herself to a stray cat, but in a way, her childlike analogy made perfect sense. Regina sighed as she got back into her seat, knowing that even if that cat had torn her entire house apart by the time she got home, there was no way she would be sending it away. Not after that.
Fortunately, that wasn't the case.
To Regina's surprise – and delight – the cat appeared not to have moved since Emma had told it to be good.
"Look, Gina, she was a good girl!" Emma cried out, delighted, as she bounded in the door and scooped up the cat.
Regina knelt down and pulled the collar out of the bag, fastening it around the cat's neck. "Now I can hear you coming," she said, narrowing her eyes on the cat, "no more sneaking up on me."
Emma giggled and hugged the cat, sitting on floor. Regina just watched her for a moment, her face filled with pure bliss.
"Are you happy, Little One?" she asked, even though the answer was obvious.
Emma nodded. "I never stayed in a place long enough to have a pet," she said, smiling at Regina over the top of the cat's head.
"Well, like I said, Storybooke is your forever home," Regina reminded her. "Kitty Soft Paws can stay with me, but you can see her every day."
"As long as I get permission?" Emma asked.
"Precisely. Now, we have to have a magic lesson today," Regina said, as she started to stand. She stopped when she noticed the pout forming on Emma's lips. "What's wrong?"
"All we ever do is have magic lessons now," Emma said. "I want to just hang out with you."
"You want me to be your friend and not your teacher?" Regina guessed. Emma nodded. "Alright, what would you like to do then?"
Emma crouched down and pretended that Kitty Soft Paws was whispering in her ear. She nodded, looking serious, and then looked back at Regina. "Kitty Soft Paws wants you to watch Puss In Boots with me."
"Oh, does she now?" Regina asked, raising an eyebrow.
Emma nodded, looking serious as ever. "She thinks if you see her story, you'll like her better."
"I see," Regina said, taking Emma buy the hand and leading her into the living room, the cat following like Emma's little shadow. Regina sat down, Emma on her lap, and covered them both in a blanket and she pulled up Netflix and found the movie. The cat sat on the floor, and watched them.
"Diablo Gato," Regina commented, part way into the movie, "that would have been an appropriate name."
Emma didn't respond – not that she likely new what diablo gato meant, anyway – and Regina looked down to see that she was fast asleep. She went to turn off the movie, but Kitty Soft Paws chose that moment to jump on the couch, and curl up against her leg.
"Oh, I see how it is," Regina said, stroking the cat's fur, in spite of herself. "Fine, I'll watch your movie, but don't think it's going to make me like you."
Regina sighed and leaned back into the couch, one arm holding Little Emma securely against her, and the other resting on the cat's admittedly soft fur.
"When did I become such a pushover?" she wondered out loud, marvelling at the fact that this was what her life had become.
Regina opened her eyes and glanced at the TV screen. Netflix was asking if she was still there, and she realized she must have fallen asleep before she got to see the end of Kitty Soft Paws' riveting story. How unfortunate.
She sighed and lifted her hand to stroke Emma's hair, when she realized her lap was notably short one three foot blonde. Panic shot through her, momentarily, as she wondered if Emma had gone outside, or worse, poofed herself somewhere, but with her rational mind she was vaguely aware that she could sense Emma's magic in the house, and she hadn't gone far.
As she set off to find the child, Regina realized just how often she had to go looking for this Emma. With the old Emma, she had quite the opposite problem – the woman was always around, even when she didn't want her. Never in her life would Regina had believed that she would spend this much time looking for her.
She supposed it was alright so long as she never attached an annoying catch phrase to it, like the Charmings had.
From the foyer, Regina could hear Emma's little voice upstairs, presumably talking to the cat, and she was relieved. Emma hadn't taken off and hidden, she was just playing. Before long, Regina discovered her in the guest room she had originally tried to get her to sleep in, sitting on the floor, the entire bag of new cat toys dumped out. Regina was suddenly aware that the cat had an abundance of toys, and Emma had none. This would have to be rectified, sooner rather than later.
"Hi, there, Little One," Regina said, as she entered the room. She noted that the cat's new bed was also in the room, as well as an open bag of cat treats.
"Hi Gina!" Emma beamed up at her.
"You look very happy," Regina commented, as she sat down on the guest bed.
"Um… Kitty Soft Paws and I were talking…." Emma said, biting her bottom lip and looking at Regina out of the corner of her eyes.
"And….?" Regina prompted, having no idea where this might be going. She hoped it wasn't another attempt to lobby for a new friend for the cat.
"Yeah, and… we think that you should give us this room," Emma said, nodding at the cat, as if the cat had an actual opinion on the matter.
"Oh, I see…" Regina nodded. "You and the cat would like to have your own room?"
"I have a room and Mommy and Daddy's," Emma pointed out.
"Yes, but you live there," Regina reminded her.
"But…. I kind of live here, too," Emma pointed out. "And you have lots of rooms. I only want one."
Regina couldn't help but smile. "I see… well, I suppose that might be alright." Regina didn't want to admit that before the Charmings had taken Emma back, she had already been planning on converting one of the guest rooms for the child. She was sure Snow would have a comment to make, on the subject of giving Emma her own room was 'not trying not to be her mother', but she didn't particularly care.
"Well, I guess we'll have to get you some new things for your room, won't we? And paint the walls… what colour would you like?"
"Pink!" Emma squealed, jumping up and climbing onto Regina's lap. She wrapped her arms around Regina's neck and hugged her tight. "Thank you, Gina."
Regina hugged her back. "Apparently, there's nothing I wouldn't do for you, Little One," Regina said, shaking her head at the thought.
Regina heard Emma's little tummy grumbling, and glanced at the clock. "How about lunch at Granny's, then we'll go get paint?"
"Can't we just use magic to make the walls pink?" Emma asked, leaning back to look at Regina, and scrunching her nose in confusion.
"We could… but where's the fun in that?"
After a quiet – and surprisingly uneventful - lunch at Granny's, Regina took Emma over to the hardware store for paint. She picked out a shade of pink that Regina thought was horrendous, but Emma thought would match Kitty Soft Paws' collar perfectly, and Regina told herself silently that she could just keep the door to that room shut, and it would be fine.
She purchased the paint, along with brushes and rollers and painter's tape and drop sheets. She had never actually painted a room – she always hired someone when the mansion needed updating – but she was pretty sure she could handle this. Plus, she figured it would be a good memory to give little Emma.
Back at the mansion, Regina put Kitty Soft Paws outside, much to Emma's objection.
"I do not need her getting into the paint and tracking pink footprints all over my carpets," Regina insisted as Emma pouted at looked at the cat through the glass door. "Emma, she'll come back in when we're done."
Regina flicked her hand at the cat, putting a small enchantment on it, ensuring it would not run away.
Upstairs, Regina pulled Emma's hair into a ponytail and put one of her plain, white t-shirts on her, effectively covering all of Emma's clothing and protecting it from the paint. She changed herself into a plain t-shirt and yoga paints – ones that she specifically reserved for heavy duty cleaning and never let anyone see her wear, until now – and threw her own hair in a ponytail, before leading Emma back across the hall.
In the guest room – soon to be Emma's room – Regina waved her hands and temporarily vanished all the furniture, as that was easier than trying to move and cover it. Emma helped her roll out the plastic drop cloth, and then crawled and rolled around all over it while Regina set about lining every edge with the painter's tape.
She then stirred up the paint and poured it onto the roller tray. She handed Emma a small roller, and showed her how to apply paint, and then how to put that paint on the wall. Regina had watched enough home design shows during the twenty eight years of the curse to have a general idea of how painting worked, and she surprised herself by how good she actually was at it.
By the time they finished everything they could reach without a ladder, Emma had pink paint in her hair, on her face, on her hands and somehow all over her feet, and she stepped around leaving pink footprints on the plastic. It gave Regina and idea.
She waved her hands and produced a large piece of white cardstock, and put it on the floor. Emma regarded her, quizzically, as she motioned for her to come over.
"We're going to make a special art project," Regina said, taking one of Emma's little hands and applying pink paint to it with a paintbrush. "Press your hand right here," she said, pointing at the paper.
Emma giggled and did what she was asked, leaving a perfect handprint. They did the same with one of Emma's feet, and then Regina picked up the paper. "We'll leave this to dry, then you can write your name and your age, and we'll always remember how little your hands and feet were."
Emma started to stand up, but Regina held up her palm, to stop her. "Don't move until I come back," she said, as she stepped into the guest room's en suite bathroom and started filling the tub. She placed the paper on the counter to dry, and stepped back into the bedroom. With a wave of her hands, the pink paint covered all the spots that were too high to reach, and also evened out some of Emma's handiwork.
She peeled off Emma's paint stained clothing and carried her into the bathroom, depositing her straight into the tub. Emma had gotten so much paint on her, that it seeped through the white t-shirt and through the shirt underneath, and her little body was specked with pink all over.
"I guess it's a good thing we kept some clothes here, just in case," Regina remarked, as she started scrubbing the paint off of Emma's skin.
Emma giggled. "It's a good thing I'm so smart!"
"Yes, I believe you are correct," Regina winked, and Emma grinned wider. Regina wondered if anyone in Emma's real past had ever taken the time to tell Emma she was intelligent, or anything, really, that would have boosted her self-esteem. She guessed not, and it explained a lot.
"Tomorrow, Baby Girl," Regina said, as she began to wash the paint out of Emma's hair, "we'll get you some new things for your room, alright? A new bedspread, and curtains, and maybe some toys. How does that sound?"
Emma's face lit up. "My own toys?"
"Yes, of course."
"I never had my own toys before!" Emma squealed, bouncing in the tub in her excitement, and splashing bubbly water in Regina's face.
Regina sighed and wiped the bubbles from her cheek as Emma burst out laughing. "Oh, you think that's funny, do you?" Regina asked, picking up a handful of bubbles and dropping them on Emma's cheek. Emma laughed louder and splashed Regina.
"Ok, let's not go overboard," Regina said, wiping her face again. Emma's smile faded and she stared at Regina intently. "What is it, Emma?"
"I love you, Gina," she said, with an intense seriousness.
Regina smiled and stroked her cheek. "I love you too, Emma."
Emma stood up in the tub before Regina could stop her, and hugged her wet little body against Regina's, soaking her clothing. Regina didn't protest, just simply stood, lifting Emma up, and wrapped her in a towel.
"I wish you would keep me forever," Emma said, nuzzling her face into Regina's neck.
Regina cupped Emma's face, and moved and moved her back so she could look at her. "I promise to keep you right here," she said, pointing at her heart. "Forever."
Emma smiled again, and nuzzled Regina's neck again.
And Regina wished she could keep her forever.