A/N: I had this ready to post yesterday but then I started changing things because I'm indecisive. My apologies for any errors. Thank you to those who've reviewed, it means a lot. Question: would you like to read from David's perspective? I've debated alternating POVs but my sister told me no. Hopefully, your Monday was better than mine. Happy reading!
2.
Before
She is sitting at her desk chewing the last bite of the apple she packed with lunch when she feels…him. Not him moving, not yet, but that pull of magic (albeit stronger now). And she knows that the baby growing inside of her is a boy. Regina gasps and her eyes blur with unshed tears as she brings both hands to her stomach. The apple drops to her desk, forgotten. She feels more emotions now than she had five weeks ago when she saw the small outline of her baby in black and white on the sonogram screen. When a young nurse named Beth (thankfully not Whale) confirmed that she was nine weeks pregnant. One week after the wolf's intuition proved true.
"Hello, mister," she whispers.
"Are you okay, mom?"
Regina startles and looks up to find Henry standing in the doorway to her office. She's not sure how long she'd sat with her hands on her stomach, eyes closed. But she smiles at her son. The last time she saw him was a week ago, but she swears he was about three inches shorter then. She lets her hands fall from her stomach, though the action is hidden by her desk. "Yes, Henry. I'm okay."
She's going to have another son.
"Good," he gives her a close-lipped smile. "Because I need you to use your magic."
One minute later, she's following her son outside of townhall. Regina gives his shoulder a squeeze. Henry is more resigned now that the Jefferson's hat idea failed. But he still has hope for Snow and Emma's return, even though it's closing in on three months since they fell through the portal.
She frowns when she steps outside in the sunlight and sees the shepherd ducked under the popped hood of his truck, fanning smoke. It reminds her of the time he aided her in her own car troubles all those weeks ago. The only difference now is that Grumpy is there with him and they are arguing over some type of valve. And back then she had been intentionally trying to seduce the shepherd.
"Mom's here to help," Henry tells the bickering men. Then breaks into a fit of coughs.
Grumpy mumbles something under his breath that she pretends not to hear and rolls his eyes at her. He makes no move to leave, though, and she suspects it has something to do with him wanting to have David's back should something arise. David gives her a sheepish smile before turning back to the smoking truck. It takes her a moment to decide which spell to use but she makes quick work of it because she's not so sure the fumes are good for the baby. For any of them.
With the flick of her wrist the truck is like new. Well, the engine is at least. It's going to take a lot more than magic to get that old thing looking new again. The action takes a bite out of her, more than she expects it to. It leaves her lightheaded and the world spinning. Before she can stop herself, she leans forward, gripping the edge of the truck, where the hood would meet it once it's closed again. Her knuckles turn white.
The shepherd notices.
"Thank you, Regina," he says.
She nods her response.
She sees the shepherd again for dinner. Tuesdays at Granny's has become a tradition of sorts since the Tuesday Henry invited her to breakfast. She's only missed one Tuesday so far because she'd been sick in bed. Your secret's safe with me, Ruby had told her and while it may be true now, she expects nothing more than the young waitress to run her mouth to her intolerable best friend whenever she returns.
You are the company you keep; her father's voice echoes inside of her head.
David is staring at her. He does it often enough from the opposite side of the booth or table (they never sit at the same spot multiple times in a row, haven't settled into that type of routine) that she has learned to ignore it. But today, the shepherd is staring at her. A quizzical look in his blue eyes, an accusation on his tongue. She does not like it. But she holds his stare anyway. He falters, looks away first. Regina smirks, triumphant, around the rim of her drink.
"Can I stay by mom's tonight?" Henry asks, oblivious to the staring contest between the two adults.
"We've talked about this Henry," David says.
He provides no further explanation, and she finds herself curious. She wants to know what conversation this man—a shepherd turned prince with no experience being a father except in title—had with her son to explain why he couldn't sleep in his own home, in his own bed. Other than: she's the Evil Queen, you can't. She knows that Henry will run back to Emma and Snow with open arms once they return. But he wants her now.
"I think we should let Henry decide," she says.
"I said no," David says. But he doesn't even convince himself. She sees the flash of insecurity in his eyes.
Henry doesn't say anything else.
Three hours later, when she's in her kitchen filling a glass of water to quinch her thirst, her doorbell rings. She is not surprised to see the shepherd standing there, Henry asleep in his arms.
"He fell asleep on the ride here," David says.
She nods and allows him entrance into her home. She doesn't follow him upstairs; trusts he can find Henry's room without her assistance. Regina returns to the kitchen to put away her glass and that's where he finds her, standing over her sink, drying the glass with a dish towel. She does not look up at him.
"Go ahead and say what you want to say, shepherd," she says. "You've been holding your tongue all evening. Henry's asleep now. Let it out."
"Were you going to tell me?"
She snaps her head up to look at him then, glad she tied her robe closed when she walked downstairs to answer the door. Her stomach isn't showing yet, but she likes the security it gives her. She narrows her eyes at him. He's about to make a bold assumption and she will give him show. "Tell you what?"
"Don't bullshit me, Regina," he snaps. "Were you going to tell me that you're pregnant?"
"No, shepherd," she grits out. "I was not."
The look that flashes across his face—he hides it well—is not anger. She has seen him angry before and this is not it.
"Why?"
"How do you know?"
He tells her that he noticed the small things. Similar to his time in the Enchanted Forest, nearly thirty years ago, with Snow White when she was pregnant with Emma. The way her shirts and dresses, like the one she wore today, have pulled taut in the middle the past few weeks. Not like her Evil Queen attire that was made to fit her curves. You're a small woman, Regina, he tells her. He points out the way she has started eating things she normally wouldn't. He's specifically talking about pancakes at Granny's, a sudden craving of hers. I thought you didn't like Granny's pancakes, Henry noted two weeks ago. I don't she had responded.
"That Tuesday, when you missed lunch at Granny's, Henry told me that he heard you throwing up. That you had an appointment," he says. "And since when does Regina Mills nearly collapse after using magic?"
She did not nearly collapse but it seems the shepherd is more observant than she gave him credit for. So, she nods, slowly.
"Why?" he asks again.
"You have already taken one…child away from me," she snaps, doesn't give him the satisfaction of telling him it's a boy when one son almost slips from her lips.
"This is different."
"How is it different? Hm? Tell me!"
"Shh! You're going to wake Henry."
"This is my house dammit!"
David lets out an exasperated sigh and throws his hands up in surrender. And she takes a moment to calm her own nerves. She is still not sure what to feel. She is still so angry with herself for fucking the shepherd. Angry with him for taking her son. She wants to scream, and she wants to cry. And she is so, so tired. She doesn't want to argue with the shepherd right now. She just wants to sleep. "So, what are we going to do?"
We? She snorts. Of course, he'll do the right thing. He's Prince fucking Charming.
David runs a hand over his face. "It's mine, too." And when she doesn't respond, adds, "What do you want to do?"
"I want you to get out of my house, shepherd."
She is relieved when he turns to go without putting up a fight. But he does leave her with a warning. "This isn't over, Regina."
Of course, it isn't fucking over.
After
She wakes from a nightmare, a scream tearing from her throat. "Mother, no!" She screams into the dark, forgetting her surroundings for a moment before falling back on her pillows. Her arms instinctively wrap around her thirty week pregnant stomach. It takes her several attempts to steady her breathing and when that doesn't help, she is out of her bed and headed for Henry's bedroom.
The room is empty save for his things. Henry has been staying with his birth family since his mother and grandmother's return. So, she sits on his bed and hugs his pillow, breathes in the scent of him. It would give her far more comfort if she could physically reach out and touch him.
Her feet carry her to the nursery across the hall next. Henry's pillow hugged against her still. She doesn't usually visit the nursery unless she's come to put something away. The rocking horse two weeks ago when Henry carried it upstairs for her and she followed. A blanket knitted by Widow Lucas (who has volunteered to babysit when the baby's born). The ridiculous one piece fashioned to look like a bear that Ruby picked out and she'd rolled her eyes at but secretly loves. She smiles as she runs her fingers over the tiny suit hanging in the closet.
It's been two weeks since Emma and Snow's return and there has been no sign of her mother. Not that she trusts her mother to grant them any kind of warning before her arrival. Cora can be quite unpredictable. A lot of the town suspects that since she hasn't showed herself yet, that Cora isn't in Storybrooke. But she cannot be easily convinced. She can only hope that she is granted the mercy—not that she deserves it—of not panicking herself into an early labor when her mother returns.
She feels useless but will use her magic if she needs to. She has tried to save it for when she just can't find an alternative to whatever it is she is doing. Afraid that once she depletes herself of energy—when she is at her weakest—is when her baby will need her most. When Henry will need her most. And as much as the others hate to admit it, she is their best defense (other than Rumple who doesn't give a shit about any of them) against her mother.
"I won't let her hurt you or your brother," she says, rubbing the left side of her stomach where her baby rests. It is a promise she intends to keep, no matter the consequences. It is a promise that David intends to keep. He has told her as much. I will kill your mother if I have to, he'd told her just three days ago. She knows it's only because she's pregnant. Once their son is born, that's a different story.
Their son.
The last time she saw her baby boy was the morning after David gifted her the rocking horse. The baby had not settled since she absorbed Rumple's spell, the night Emma and Snow returned. Not even after David's visit, which always seems to calm him. Not even after a night's rest. The next morning, she'd called David and told him she was going to the hospital. According to Henry, he'd driven on two wheels to get there.
David had been awestruck seeing his son on the screen for the first time. Since being in a coma for nearly thirty years, the technology of this realm is still quite new to him. There's your baby Dr. Whale pointed out. That's his head and there are his fists, his feet. He'd pointed out each visible part of him to the expectant father.
They shared a moment, she and David, as mother and father. A subtle stare, blue eyes locked on brown. His lips turned up in a smile, but it was over in a blink, his attention turned back to Whale, asking who all would be in the delivery room the day the baby is born.
She had seen his protective side on many occasions back in the Enchanted Forest. When he put his life on the line to protect his beloved Snow White. But more vehemently when he sent his only daughter to another realm just to protect her from the Evil Queen's curse. He'd held his daughter in one hand, a sword in the other. If he could have, she's sure the shepherd would have killed her that night. She didn't care then and was absolutely not sure why the shepherd's reaction to seeing their son for the first time had her damn near tears.
Hormones.
Her youngest son is due on a Friday. Today is Tuesday and there are ten of them left, including today, until she meets her baby boy. She has most of what she needs to be holed up in her house for the first few weeks of his life. A few boxes of diapers (she will go through plenty), ample onesies and socks and blankets. Though, if he's anything like Henry was his socks will disappear daily. Bottles and formula; she doesn't know if she wants to breastfeed yet. And since she's using Henry's old crib and changing table, there are only a few big ticket items she needs to buy. A new stroller and carrier. And a new mattress for the crib, not that it matters so soon. The baby will sleep beside her bed in his bassinet for the first few months of his life, anyway.
She has everything but a name.
She parks her car outside of the diner and sits behind the wheel for a solid fifteen minutes before killing the engine and going inside. There's not a large crowd for breakfast, it never is on Tuesdays. Ruby greets her with a massive grin, which is surprising given the fact that most inhabitants of their town now know who the father of her unborn child is. Her grandmother appears by her side and asks Regina if she wants something hot to eat or drink but she declines and continues upstairs.
"He needs a name, David," she tells him when he opens the door.
Truthfully, the reason she's come is because she can't sleep and David, apart from Henry, is the only person in town willing to keep her company. And for the better part of the last three hours, since she woke from her nightmare, she's been sat on the carpeted floor of the nursery clutching Henry's pillow, wondering if her mother was lurking in the shadows.
She can tell by the look on his face, the three day old stubble and his tousled hair that she's interrupted his own sleep. "I can come back."
"No, no," he says when she turns to go and steps aside to let her enter. He gathers his strewn clothes—something she used to chastise Henry for but misses terribly now picking up after him—and disappears into the bathroom. David's been renting a room at Granny's for obvious reasons since his conversation with Snow White. She dreads her own confrontation with her former stepdaughter that is bound to happen sooner rather than later. Regina is surprised the girl hasn't come knocking on her door yet.
"You're right," David says when he steps out of the bathroom a minute later, pulling a shirt over his head and down his chiseled torso. "He does need a name."
The have talked about, mostly argued, about everything except names. In fact, the only conversation she's had about a name was with Henry after she picked him up from school one afternoon. We should call him, Ollie, Henry had exclaimed and she'd scrunched her nose and ruffled his hair.
She knows that she wants something short and simple for his name. Something with meaning. Henry's name checks all three boxes. She doesn't think she considered any other names for him. For this son, she has no clue where to even begin. Also, with Henry it had solely been her decision. She knows David would not oppose of her naming their baby on her own. But she owes him as much, for Emma, to at least let him have some input. She will try and let him be more involved.
David walks over to the table beside the unmade bed and produces a small notepad, his barely legible scrawl all over it. A list. She should have known that the valiant shepherd would have a list. She stops reading after the first name.
Charles
"Absolutely not," she says.
"You don't like Charles?"
"Charlie, yes. Charles, no."
"Now, we're getting somewhere."
David laughs when she draws her eyebrows together in confusion, tells her that he's only kidding. That he thought she would get a kick out of it. He taps the side of his head, tells her that's he's got two good names right here. But he doesn't want to debate names over an empty stomach.
While she waits for him to brush his teeth and change into none pajama bottoms in the bathroom, she sits at the small desk and starts a list of her own.
to be continued
A/N: I will try and update this soon. Let me know what you think. Also, the baby has been born and named and I cannot wait to share the chapter when the time comes :)