Flu Love's Kiss 8
Chapter 8 - Safe with you
Mary Margaret and David turned up under the cover of evening darkness. Regina and Emma led them to the formal sitting room while Henry was upstairs playing in his room.
"How are you coping under house arrest?" David asked the two sick women. He started spreading out the files and paperwork on the coffee table that stood between the two lounges.
"Do you need me to pick up some groceries from the store?" offered Mary Margaret.
Regina took up a sheet and started writing a list. When she went to hand it to Mary Margaret Emma intercepted it, saying "I need to add some things". Emma scanned the list Regina had written and crossed out some of the items (what the hell is quinoa?) and replaced them with her own choices in her barely legible left-handwriting. She gave the edited list over to her mother.
"This is what we know so far..." started David. "Five couples are confirmed infected. Four of them - obviously excluding you two - have been examined at the hospital by Dr Whale. They've been discharged but told to stay at home quarantined until he can question them further."
"Who are the infected? Any connection between them, any similarities?" asked Emma.
"There doesn't seem to be," said David, shaking his head. "That's what I'm hoping you can help me with, Emma."
Emma flipped through the patient files one at a time and started summarising the information to herself.
"Okay. Some are married and some aren't... Different ages... Three couples were already together before becoming infected and two weren't, including me and Regina... Four opposite-sex pairings, one same-sex... All the addresses are in different parts of Storybrooke... No common workplaces..."
Emma sighed and looked up at the others who seemed to be waiting hopefully for the answer. "These people have nothing in common. Do any of them know each other?"
Mary Margaret exchanged a look with David before asking Emma, "Do you know any of them, Emma?"
"No, why would I?" Emma shrugged.
David gave her an apologetic face at what he was about to say. "You were the first person that we know was infected."
"You think I started this?" realised Emma and she was slightly offended but not sure why.
"Emma, I'm sorry, but it makes sense," said Mary Margaret gently. "You two were the first to get stuck together and you were sick before Regina. It has to be someone out of these five couples that started it."
"No it doesn't," said Regina, finally joining the discussion. "If a person becomes infected they infect their lover, yes. But Love Flu mustn't be passed between people by air like a regular cold or flu. Otherwise you two idiots would've caught it from us already by always coming over here."
"So how is it transmitted then?" wondered Emma. "More people are becoming infected so it has to be spreading somehow."
David agreed. "Dr Whale is convinced it was originally spread by someone he's calling Patient Zero. Whether it's deliberate or accidental we need to find this person."
"Patient Zero may not even be infected," Regina told them.
"Are you kidding me?" said Emma, letting her chin drop at how complicated this was getting. "How is that possible?"
Mary Margaret nodded at what Regina was getting at. "Typhoid Mary had Typhoid but she wasn't sick. Patient Zero may only be a carrier for Love Flu."
"So the quarantining is useless," concluded Emma.
David's phone started to ring and he stepped outside in the hall to take the call.
"Belle, come away from the window."
The pretty auburn-haired girl turned away with a sly smile. "Why?"
Gold went over to shut the curtains after taking a peek at the darkened street below his stately manor. "No-one can know about you."
Belle let out a confused giggle at his manner. "Why, Rumpel? Why are we hiding away locked up in your house?"
"The town is under threat."
Belle frowned and smiled at the same time, the dimples in her cheeks showing. "I don't understand. I thought things were better now that the curse was broken. Everyone has their memories back and they've been reunited with the ones they love."
"Love isn't safe anymore," said Gold ironically, flicking his wrist in a 'there you have it' gesture.
"I know you will protect me. I'm safe with you," said Belle sweetly. She left to go prepare tea.
"You're not safe, Belle," murmured Gold to himself, remembering everything he'd ever learned about Love Flu back in the other land. Paradoxically the disease preferred not to go after the weak and cowardly like him. Only strong hearts were at risk.
The three women sat in silence, mulling over the information they had so far. Emma in particular, stared into space out of concentration, trying to piece together what she knew about this tangled mess. The threads of Storybrooke were coming undone and as the Sheriff, she was feeling rather useless since being forced into hiding. Sitting around waiting was not her style, she was more of an action kind of girl and it frustrated the hell out of her to not be able to do anything.
Emma didn't realise she was holding on so tightly, but Regina did and smoothed her thumb across the back of Emma's hand.
David came back in, shoving his phone back into his jeans pocket. "More bad news I'm afraid."
"What now?" moaned Emma.
David scrubbed his face tiredly. "Reports of domestic disturbances, more looting, and the adult shop was rolled by some teenagers caught on CCTV."
A disturbing thought occurred to Emma at the mention of the teenagers. "Can children get Love Flu?"
"It's exceedingly rare," said Regina, tensing up at having to explain. "The child normally doesn't realise … back in our land adults have been known to be killed over it. Lives have been ruined."
The door to the subject was slammed shut when Henry wandered in, which was lucky because Mary Margaret looked physically sick. Apparently the boy had come down to see the visitors and he took a seat on the lounge next to Regina.
"What's going on?" said Henry, looking around at the adults since they'd immediately stopped talking.
"Nothing, kid. Whatcha been up to?" said Emma, trying to change the subject.
"Eavesdropping."
You could've heard a pin drop in the room.
The adults simultaneously shared their commiseration without words over the boy's precocity, realising that he'd heard the entire conversation and knew everything that was going on.
"Why didn't you just tell me the truth," asked Henry. The question could've been for either of his mothers but he was looking at Regina.
"I didn't think you would want to hear anything from me." Regina brushed his cheek lightly with her right hand.
"You should've told me," insisted Henry, looking down at his feet.
"Henry," said Emma seriously, leaning over to get his attention. "Dr Whale is looking for us but we don't know why so you can't tell anyone about your Mom and me ok?"
"Yeah, I get it," said Henry sadly. "More secrets."
"I promise we'll figure this out, buddy," said David. "It's going to be ok."
Henry bit his lips as though he wanted to disagree and looked at the joined hands of his mothers for a long while before speaking up. "There's a boy in my class. His parents are getting divorced."
"Who's the boy?" asked Mary Margaret. She didn't know of any kids in her class having trouble at home.
"Timothy Montague."
None of them thought the surname was a coincidence.
Emma awoke in the middle of the night to hear Regina crying in her sleep again. This time was much worse however and it scared her. Desperate sobs wracked the brunette's form as she lay on her side facing away from her. Emma spooned herself behind the other woman's back and straight away Regina pulled their joined hands to her heart and held them close.
"Regina. Regina. Wake up." Emma called softly.
"Emma," gasped Regina.
"I'm here," Emma whispered into Regina's hair and pressed a kiss to her shoulder.
Regina was still half-asleep and unable to stop her panicky breathing. "They're gone."
"Shh it's okay. It's going to be okay," soothed Emma, but she didn't quite believe it herself.
Holding her close, she wondered what would make Regina cry like that. Emma had heard sketchy details of her tortured past and knew there were plenty of demons there to haunt her... but was this really the Evil Queen - malicious and cruel? The Mayor - inaccessible and unyielding? The woman in her arms was neither of those former selves right now. That kind of pain could only come from deep regret and loss. But what had Regina thought she'd lost, Emma wondered. Was the pain old - or new?
Emma half expected that she would push her away and try to pretend nothing was wrong. But for once Regina allowed herself to be held, either unwilling or unable to bear giving up the comfort of it. They stayed like that for a long time until the sounds died away and both drifted back to sleep.
At 6am the next morning, Henry rose and quickly got dressed. Before sneaking out of the house he dropped a note to his mothers on the table saying he was going to school early that day.
Everyone at school was talking about Love Flu. Some of the older kids knew what it was and were spreading wild stories around. As soon as Henry heard about it he knew that was what happened to his Mom and Emma, that it was how they'd gotten their hands stuck together. He didn't understand it though, how could they be in love? They didn't even like each other and they fought all the time.
He remembered back to last night after David and Mary Margaret left, when his Moms had sat him down to explain it.
"So if you're in love you get Love Flu?" he asked them, still confused.
Emma shifted awkwardly. This was bordering on The Talk and she was way out of her depth explaining the difference between love and sexual desire to a ten-year-old.
"Ah kid, it's a different kinda love. I mean, it's kinda hard to explain..."
"What's hard about it. Either you're in love or you're not."
"Henry, we're not in love with each other," said Regina.
"But you're together."
"No," said Regina.
"Well, we are stuck together but we're not together together," said Emma.
"Can you be in love and not know it?" asked Henry.
"I guess so, kid."
"Then how do you know you're not?"
At the end of Mifflin St, Henry turned in the direction away from his school. He made his way across town to the outskirts heading for a place he knew his Mom used to go every Wednesday. She always went without him and would never tell him why.
Upon reaching the Mills family crypt Henry froze and ducked behind some trees seeing that somebody else was already there. The man looked around checking first to make sure no-one was watching and then disappeared through the vault's doors. Henry waited till the coast was clear and then ran back to town as fast as he could.
Dr Whale had beaten him to it.