Chapter Nine
Friday morning started off as normal as any other morning that week. Emma got up and dressed herself in a pair of beige cargo pants and a burgundy long sleeved shirt. Regina brushed and braided her hair, making sure she didn't forget to add her tiara. They joined Henry downstairs where Regina made breakfast. Sitting at the table, looking and Henry and Emma, Regina couldn't help but think how perfect they looked, like a little family.
She tried not to let herself think like that, because she knew it would only cause her heartbreak down the road if she got too attached to Emma in this state. She feared, though, that it was too late and she was already too attached.
Mary Margaret picked up Henry in the morning, like always, and to Regina's relief, had no news for her this morning. Between babies on the way, and little girls soon to be grown up, Regina wasn't ready for any more changes at the moment.
After Henry had left, Emma headed off to play while Regina cleaned up from breakfast. She was just wiping off the counter when she heard Emma crying from the other room.
"What's wrong, honey?" Regina asked as she hurried into the room.
Emma held up her hands, half a broken tiara in each one, and looked up and Regina, whimpering.
"Oh, Princess, I'm so sorry," Regina said, kneeling down on the floor in front of her.
"I'm not a princess anymore. I can't be a princess without a crown," Emma said, sniffling, trying to hold back more tears.
"A crown isn't what makes someone a princess," Regina said, lifting Emma up and sitting down on the couch with her. She wished she could tell this child that she was actually of royal descent in another realm.
"What does?" Emma asked.
"Being a princess comes from inside, and you will always be my princess," Regina replied.
"I'm still sad about my crown," Emma pouted, dropping the broken pieces into Regina's lap.
"I know, sweetheart, and it's ok to be sad when you lose something special."
"I don't feel like playing anymore. Can we watch a movie?"
"Of course, baby." Regina put the broken tiara on the end table as Emma climbed off her lap, letting her get up to put a movie on.
When she sat back down, Emma curled up beside Regina on the couch, laying her head on Regina's leg, staring at the movie on TV. Regina stroked Emma's hair with one hand, while she went about trying to answer work emails from her phone with the other. She was surprised at how natural this had whole situation had begun to feel to her, after such a short time.
"Regina?" Emma's little voice spoke up, about half an hour into the movie.
"Yes, baby?" Regina asked, putting her phone down.
"Can I stay with you?"
Regina smiled. "I thought you already were staying with me."
"No, I mean forever."
Regina sighed and pulled Emma up onto her lap, so she could look at her face. "Is that what you want?"
Emma nodded.
Regina kissed Emma on the forehead, and pulled her in close for a hug. "Baby, you know I would love nothing more than to keep you forever, but I'm not your mother. Your mommy and daddy love you very much, and I can't steal you away from them, but I will always be here for you, Emma."
"It's not fair!" Emma pouted, pulling herself out of Regina's hug, but remaining on her lap.
"What's not fair?"
"I had to stay with bad people and I wasn't allowed to leave. But you're nice to me and I'm not allowed to stay," Emma huffed, tears welling up in her eyes.
Regina felt sick. Emma was right. Nothing about her life had been fair to this point.
"Sweetheart, just because you can't stay at my house forever, doesn't mean I can't stay in your life forever. I'm not going to make you leave until you're ready, but your parents love you and want you, too."
Emma continued to pout, and Regina started to wonder if there was more to this than Emma simply wanting to stay with her. "Emma, is something else bothering you?" she asked.
"I never get to keep anything good," Emma replied.
"You mean your crown?"
"Everything good goes away. Only the bad things stay."
"What bad things, Emma?" Regina asked.
"I'm worried about the bad man," Emma said, staring at the wall.
"The bad man can't get you here, baby. You know I will never let him hurt you."
"But what about when I'm at home and you're not there?" Emma asked.
"Then your parents will protect you," Regina replied.
"But my daddy is a man."
Regina took a deep breath. "Your daddy loves you Emma, he would never hurt you."
"The bad man said he loved me, and he hurt me. Boys do bad things."
"What did the bad man do, Emma?"
"It's a secret."
"Do you want it to be a secret?"
Emma shook her head, no.
"Then it's not a secret. You can tell me, if you want to," Regina said.
Emma turned to look at her again with wide eyes for a few moments, as if she were weighing the pros and cons in of telling her secret in her mind. She turned away and lifted her hand, holding up her pointer finger. She stared at her own finger for a long time. Regina couldn't figure out what Emma was doing, but the child looked so lost in thought that she didn't want to say anything, and risk Emma shutting down.
"He put his finger," Emma said finally. She turned to look at Regina again, and then moved her own finger to point at the apex of her thighs. "He put his finger here, and it hurted."
Regina inhaled sharply and pulled Emma close to her again, holding her head against her chest. "In the bathtub?" she whispered.
"Sometimes," Emma replied. "Sometimes in my bed when I was sleeping, and it waked me up."
Regina felt hot tears rolling down her cheeks, as Emma was confirming all the things she had feared. "I'm so, so sorry Emma. And I promise you, nothing like that will ever happen to you again."
"Something else happened there."
"What else happened?" Regina asked. She held her breath waiting for Emma to respond.
"I almost drowned," Emma replied.
"How?"
"In the bath, after the man hurted me, I was crying. He got mad and he called the mommy. The mommy said, 'why are you crying?'" Emma paused, and started playing with the hem of her shirt.
"What did you say?" Regina asked, prompting her to continue.
"I said I was scared. And she said, 'you don't know what scared is.'" Emma paused again, and Regina looked down at her face. Emma was staring blankly at the wall, and Regina realized she was dissociating herself from the events. She figured that must be another coping mechanism, to help her deal with it.
"Emma, what did she do?" Regina asked, even though she feared she already knew the answer.
"She pushed me under the water," Emma replied, "and she put her hand on me so I couldn't get up. Water got in my mouth and I couldn't breathe. Then she let me get up and she said never tell anyone what she did, or I would be in worse trouble. But I kept coughing and I couldn't stop and I threw up in the bath. I had to go to the hospital."
"What happened after that?"
"I don't know. The next day I was lost and the police found me."
Regina cringed. Emma had been in the group home one week before the Charmings found her. She had been in Storybrooke now for two weeks. In Little Emma's timeline, this near-drowning only happened three weeks ago.
Another, more terrifying realization followed that one: Little Emma thought her stay with the bad man was ended when she got lost and the police found her, but, in reality, Emma had been in that man's house twenty-five years ago, and never gotten lost. Regina wondered how long she was there after the near-drowning. If she had really done what they told her to all those years ago, and kept what happened a secret, there was a chance that Emma had actually gone back to that house after her trip to the hospital.
Regina held her tighter. "You're safe now, Emma, I promise," she said, as she rocked her, "no one will ever hurt you like that again." Because if they do, I'll incinerate them myself.
"Can I stay here again tonight?" Emma asked.
"Of course you can," Regina replied. She knew the Charmings had intended to take Emma home tonight, but Regina figured after all of this, she would just have to inform them that that wasn't happening.
Regina sat and held Emma for some time after that, playing over everything she had said in her mind. She debated if she should tell the Charmings. On one hand, they were her parents, and in the off-chance that the fairies were wrong, and they weren't on the verge of reversing the spell, Emma could still be stuck as a child permanently. They would need to know so they could handle her appropriately moving forward. On the other hand, it was more likely that the fairies would actually come up with a reversal spell any day now, and Regina didn't know if Emma remembered the bad man, as an adult. If she did, she clearly hadn't told her parents, and perhaps that was because she didn't want them to know. If she didn't, then telling them now might open a whole can of worms that Adult Emma wouldn't want to deal with.
Regina sighed, audibly, causing Emma to look up at her.
"Will you not tell anyone what I told you?" Emma asked, as if she were reading Regina's thoughts "'Cause it's a secret."
"Okay," Regina whispered.
Regina didn't let go of Emma until lunch time, when she finally had to get up and make her something to eat. For her part, Emma seemed fine after the revelation, and after lunch resumed playing as if no tragedy had struck her beloved tiara earlier that day.
In the afternoon, Regina tried to call Mary Margaret, but reached her voicemail instead. She left a brief message telling her that she thought Emma should stay another night, and asking her to call back, which she never did. Regina was in the kitchen, prepping for dinner, when the Charmings arrived with Henry. Henry, of course, had a key and let them in, which Regina didn't hear. She wasn't aware of their presence until she heard Emma start to wail from the other room.
Regina ran back into the living room, just in time for Emma to fling herself against Regina's legs. Regina scooped Emma up, and held her tight, as Emma buried her face into Regina's shoulder, and held on to Regina's neck as if her life depended on it.
"What is going on?" Regina asked. Henry took the opportunity to silently leave the room, for which Regina was grateful. She didn't want him in the middle of this.
"We came to pick up our daughter," David said, taking a step towards Regina. Regina instinctively took a step back.
"They said I hafta go home!" Emma wailed. "Please don't make me go!"
"I'm not going to," Regina said, rubbing Emma's back.
"No offense, Regina, but that's not your call," David retorted.
Regina looked over at Mary Margaret, who was remaining silent, and wondered which side she was taking. She assumed that David's presence must have meant that Mary Margaret did hear her message, and had informed her husband.
"It's what Emma wants," Regina replied flatly.
"She's five. And we're her parents. We decide what's best for her, not you," David countered.
"You don't have a clue what's best for her," Regina snapped back, putting her hand protectively on the back of Emma's head.
"You're not her mother. You don't get a say. We let you play house with Emma long enough, but it's time for her to be home, with her family, where she belongs." David took another step towards Emma, and Regina turned her body to block his attempt to reach her. Emma still had a death grip around her neck, and her tiny body was shaking. Regina tried to keep herself calm, but deep down she knew she'd rather incinerate David than hand over this child right now.
"David, stop," Mary Margaret finally spoke up, no doubt recognizing that look in Regina's eyes. "Look at Emma, she's terrified. This needs to stop."
David sighed, but he didn't look like he was ready to concede just yet. Regina knew she needed to take a different approach.
"David, I know how hard this situation is, because I've been in your place. It killed me when Henry went to live with you after…" Regina stopped herself before adding the curse broke, remembering that little ears were always listening. "You know I tried everything to get him back, but hindsight, you were right. It was the best thing for him at the time. And now you need to start thinking about what's best for Emma, at this time."
"And you think you're the best thing for her?" David asked, his tone much softer now.
"At this point? Yes, I do," Regina replied.
David closed his eyes and sighed, before looking back at Regina. "Okay," he nodded. Emma turned her head to look back at David. "You can stay here with Regina, Emma. We won't make you leave."
Emma didn't respond, just continued staring.
"Just know that we love you," David continued.
"She knows," Regina assured him. At this point, she knew Emma was too emotionally drained to actually respond to David herself.
Mary Margaret stepped up and gave Emma a kiss on the forehead. "I love you, sweetheart," she said, before turning her eyes to meet Regina's. "Thank you, for everything. I don't know what we would have done without you, in all of this."
Regina offered her a small smile, before they said their half-hearted goodbyes and the Charmings finally left. She would never admit it to Snow, but she did feel like she owed her a lot, considering everything she put her through. But she was starting to feel like she owed Emma even more, when she considered that this little girl would have never ended up in the bad man's house at all, if it weren't for the Dark Curse. While she knew she couldn't go back and take it all back, she was at least grateful for the second best thing: a chance to make life a little better for the little girl whose life she had unknowingly destroyed.
"Come on, Princess, let's get you changed, then we can have dinner," Regina said, softly. Emma's clothes were soaked with sweat from crying and shaking.
"Can I have a bath first?" Emma asked.
"You want a bath?" Regina was shocked; that was the last thing she ever expected to come out of Emma's mouth, especially today.
"Mm-hm," Emma nodded. "You made me not scared of the bath anymore. And I want bubbles."
"Anything you want, Princess," Regina said, smiling as she took Emma upstairs.