"Henry, I'll be good! I promise. I'll be good for you!" Regina calls out to her son.
"That's not good enough!" he screams. "If the only reason you're doing good things is so that I'll like you that's not being good, that's acting good. It's not lasting! What if the reason you are acting good is taken away? What if I die? You'll just go back to the Evil Queen again!" Tears well up in his eyes as he pleads, "I can't do this! That's too much pressure. I'm just a kid. You can't depend on me like that. You have to be good because it's the right thing to do, not just so I'll like you."
Regina stands blindsided by Henry's stinging words she finds herself unable to move feeling crushed under the weight of his emotions as the boy takes his leave. Leaving Regina standing once again in the street.
"Can I tell you what Henry said? 'If the only reason you're doing good things is so that I'll like you that's not being good,'" Regina recalled. "Do you think he's right?" she asks earnestly.
"Listen, Sister- er - Mayor, if all you've got to talk to is me, you're fucked either way," Leroy reckoned, as he swiveled his bar stool to face her. Her expression clouded by the low light of Granny's at midnight and multiple drinks Leroy had already had.
"Can I come in?" Regina asks timidly standing in the open door frame faced with Mary Margret.
"What or should I say who are here for?" Mary Margaret asks unsure how to feel about Regina's presence, after her performance at the dinner.
"That's fine, Mom, I'll deal with her," Emma says as she pushes past Mary Margaret to be with Regina in the hall, shutting the door behind her.
"Emma - I - um... you're right. I'm sorry, too," Regina stumbles on her words, as she plays with her necklace, but quickly regains her demeanor . "I — shouldn't have thrown a fire ball at you. And maybe I may have overreacted, slightly."
"Wow," is all Emma can formulate as a reaction to the so out of character apology. After Emma regains her bearings she raises an eyebrow and repeats "slightly?"
Regina brushes right past Emma's bemusement to her confession.
"I've suffered a great loss in this life from the hands of someone who was supposed to love me and well it's given me a complicated perspective on love. Between possessively protective and revulsion. I push people away because if at my own hand, I can't be blindsided by their absence," Regina confesses this story with her usual superior and icy tone. A moment passes and Emma just stares at her, feeling too privy as if it was a conversation she wasn't supposed to hear.
"But I want to be the mother Henry deserves." Regina pleads, finding herself on the verge of crying, her shoulders collapsing in on themselves, heaving with convulsions as her quiet huffing become more pronounced.
Emma stands there uncomfortably, unsure if she should or how to comfort the Queen coming undone in her hallway. Emma tentatively reaches out a hand to touch the other woman's back, pulling Regina into an awkward half hug.
Regina didn't expect to have such emotions seeping out her when she came over to make peace with Henry's birth mother, but the sight of those caring eyes directed at her after all she had done to the younger woman was just too much for her to remain her composure. Regina wanted to pull away from the blonde to keep her upper hand, to keep her distance, to keep that semblance of her heart guarded. Regina wanted to not need her. Regina wanted to not want her taught arms around her shoulders. But in trying to push the blonde away she inadvertently pushed Henry away, leaving herself more alone than ever with only her guarded heart and brooding thoughts for company.
The two stayed there like that a few moments until Regina broke away, wiping her eyes self consciously.
"Old habits die hard," Emma shrugged and offered as a consolation, a half smile forming on her lips as if looking upon the broken woman with pity. "I get it."
Henry wasn't home Emma had told her as much in the hallway. He was out with grandpa David at the arcade. The memories making Regina shutter. Emma also told her that Henry didn't want to see her. This crushed Regina but was not unexpected. Emma told her to give it some time, to which Regina nodded ruefully and turned to leave.
"You know, you mother thinks I could love again," as Regina speaks the words feel strange leaving her tongue, so she follows them with a bitter laugh. "I think she's just trying to assuage her own guilt..."
"Oh, who with?" Emma asks innocent with mild interest, having a hard time imagining the mayor having a good relationship with anyone.
"That's not important," Regina replies flippantly as she takes her leave.
"Love is weakness," the words sound hallow coming from her own throat, as she collapses down onto Henry's bed clutching his pillow to her chest in pain. Breathing hard into the night air, until sleep overcomes her.