Chapter 2: A Land Without Magic Season 1 Episode 22
"You did this!" Emma was passed any reasonable gauge of logic. She's livid that Regina has stooped so low to allow the ire between them to harm Henry. "He's shown me that stupid fucking apple, I know you did this!"
"What?"
If Emma was feeling sane she would've recognized the genuine disbelief in Regina's tone, but all she was now was righteous fury. She was an idiot for thinking that Regina had any good in her.
She felt even stupider for thinking their night time meetings were anything more than a trade in flesh.
Their time together, a momentary truce for the shameful indulgence of sex.
The bottles of medicine tumbled over their shoulders as Emma rammed Regina into the metal cabinets. The pain was sharp and unforgiving against Regina's back but she doesn't have the drive to return the damage she'll likely sustain.
She had never meant for Henry to consume the poison apple.
She hadn't even begun to bake it into an end for Emma.
She had taken the apple from her past to stop the cursed Saviour from ruining everything. Her tutelage under Rumple had driven that instinct into her.
The enchanted apple was charmed with a stasis spell, never rusting or decaying, only displaying Snow's first bite. It was supposed to sit in wait until Emma became more of a hindrance than a pleasure.
Until then it should've been her safety net, just an assurance.
That plan was permanently stalled when an angry verbal bout with Emma had resulted with them fucking on the desk.
It had been a few weeks after Graham's death, so who could blame her for needing release whilst dealing with the unwaveringly stupidity of her citizens? That had been their first tryst together and Regina had promised herself to never allow them within the sanctum of her office again.
She had been heading to the mausoleum with the apple when Emma had stormed into her bedroom. More like clambered up her trellis and fallen through her window than stormed, but it had resulted in a peeved but concerned Regina all the same.
Emma had let out an irritated grunt and discarded her jacket as she stalked towards Regina.
The 'how dare you' was cut off by Emma's lips. Their front teeth had painfully clacked as the apple fell from her hands. She had to meet Emma's forceful touch with equal vigor.
It felt like a lifetime ago, when all she had to contend with was the idea that Emma might trespass with little more than lingerie and a confession of despising motel rooms.
It hadn't exactly been a threat to her reign.
…
Regina had foolishly made concessions, allowed changes to her ways set in stone; her chiselled rules had become malleable under Emma's pigheaded insistence.
Her bedsheets warmed by a lithe body that willingly stayed the nights. The pillows lost their scent of cologne, replaced by cheap lotions that made Regina sniffle in distaste.
Then during the hours when the room was basked in dusky greys Regina could almost decipher the letters drawn by Emma's fingertips.
She had claimed ignorance to the words scrawled onto her skin. To the way Emma's eyes shone with affection too fragile to keep out in the daylight.
They had been so new.
Surely their relationship would never transcend anywhere near functional.
Emma's clothes shouldn't have made their way sneakily into a drawer she herself had left open. That a rigid routine of life, work, and Henry shouldn't have had an allotment of space made just for Emma.
It was surreal how Emma, groggy with sleep and cheek holding red indentations from their sheets had become absurdly endearing in Regina's eyes.
…
"You did this!" Emma was repeating herself in her rage, crying out of abject misery and anxiety over Henry. Her indignant tears made her lips shine and caused Regina to meet her frustration halfway.
To make everything else feel so much worse, she's humiliated for thinking Regina capable of returning her affections.
…
Regina had loitered outside the gathering family, having been ousted from her son's room. It didn't matter that the Charmings had burst into a private hospital room; their fussing was wanted and welcomed.
She can recall in vivid detail how her trembling hand had fogged the glass barrier between her and Henry. Can feel her heart squeeze at her boy glowing under his grandparent's attention and Emma's open affection.
She had felt dismayed as her normally strong partner memory pains her every time she dwells on it, but she was a glutton for punishment.
…
Regina doesn't expect to see Emma once the curse breaks, but she has yet to resign completely from her son's life.
Henry is carelessly cruel after the validation of his claims. She expects more from him and wonders if that was how Cora felt during her own betrayal.
Perhaps it was a Mills' family trait to expect too much and give too little.
…
The fairy tale characters had stampeded onto Regina's lawn, but it wasn't until Emma had rushed onto the scene did she open her door. She told herself it's because she's had quite enough of seeing her precious flora getting crushed under peasant shoes and nothing with how her heart ached at the very sight of Emma.
Her heart had felt like it was going to explode when Henry had hurried to her defence and then crumpled when Emma refused to exchange a single glance.
Emma dragged Henry into the beetle, speaking to the empty driveway. "I'll keep him this week."
Regina should've known better, sooner or later, they always left.