Chapter 15.

"So where do we go from here?" Charming asked practically, breaking the silence that hung between the four.

"Well, I suppose that depends on what you're referring to," Regina crossed her arms, "Magic is back and I suppose the town will be looking to you for answers. What now, where now? Do you go back to the Enchanted Forest – "

"Is that even possible?" Snow narrowed her eyes at Regina.

Regina shrugged, "Not immediately, but I may be able to figure something out. I don't know," it was rare for the evil queen to sound so unsure of herself.

Emma felt like a child listening to the adults talk and it frustrated her, "What if I don't want to go back to this Enchanted Forest? I mean, I get it for you guys – it's your home. But I've never even been there, well not since I was a baby, I have no memories there, I don't know… And now I just find you and you're going to leave me?" she didn't mean to sound as petulant as she did but she couldn't help it; it was how she felt.

"Emma," Snow replied gently, stepping closer to her daughter and resting a hand on her arm, "We will never leave you. I just need to know…for everyone else if it's possible. But if you choose to stay here, in this world, then we," she looked at Charming who nodded, "will stay here with you. We're a family."

Emma nodded unsurely, "Right. But I mean, someone has to be their ruler… and if you three stay here…," she looked at Regina and faltered, "I mean, I assume…Regina, I didn't…"

Regina smiled, "I will go wherever you go, darling," she said, running a finger over Emma's cheek, "Besides nobody wants the return of the evil queen," she shrugged.

Emma smiled back, "So if we don't… I don't want to force anyone to stay in a world they're not comfortable in."

Snow sighed, "Honey, why don't we talk to the rest of the town before we start worrying about this stuff?"

Charming nodded, "Anyway, I know there's a lot going on right now, but we would love the chance to sit down with you and have a somewhat normal conversation?"

Regina looked at the ground uncomfortably; she knew she couldn't stop Emma getting to know her parents and it wasn't even that but she couldn't help the worry that they would somehow turn Emma on her.

"I'd like that too," Emma nodded, ignoring the stir of nervousness in her stomach.

"Granny's?" Snow asked.

Emma nodded and looked at Regina, "Sure," she agreed, looking back at her mother, "I'll be back in a while," she said to Regina, laying a hand on her face and kissing her quickly on the lips.

"Take your time," Regina forced herself to plaster on a smile, "I suppose…" she hesitated, turning back to Snow and Charming, "We may have to find a way to at least tolerate one or another…for Emma's sake."

Both Snow and Charming couldn't hide the shock in their expressions, "Well, it may take some time. There has been a lot of bad blood, Regina," Snow started, "We can't just…trust you. I still don't understand how this relationship," she looked at her daughter and back to Regina, "even happened, but I'm sure we could…work something out."

"Just know that Emma will always be our top priority, no matter who she is with," Charming added, a hint of warning in his voice.

"So, tell us everything," Snow requested excitingly as they took a booth in Grannys.

"Everything?" Emma asked apprehensively.

"Of course," Snow beamed.

And so Emma begun what felt like a tedious tale; through many foster homes (though she tried to make it sound less horrible than it was with the guilty faces of the Charming's looking back at her), schooling, the petty thieving and eventually the last few years as a bail bondsman.

"We are so sorry we weren't here for you… You have to understand Emma we were trying to give you the best chance," Snow seemed to do most of the talking.

Emma clucked her tongue, "You never thought my best chance might be with you…even cursed?"

Charming stepped in, "We didn't know what this curse would do. Regina is a very powerful woman, we really thought it was safest to put you in that wardrobe, to get you away…. Which I suppose is somewhat ironic now…" he shrugged.

Snow bit her lip a moment before looking at her daughter, "Emma, how on earth did you end up in Storybrooke? And with Regina?"

Emma was apprehensive. Should she tell these people, her parents the whole truth? I mean, it kind of started out a bit haphazardly and would surely give them more reasons to dislike Regina. For now, she thought it was best to keep things simple.

"I don't know," she replied, "I was just driving through, on a road trip I guess, I skip towns a lot, and I kinda crashed on the icy roads. Regina found me, she saved me actually and we just…connected. She told me about magic and this place, the curse, everything."

"She told you all that?" Snow frowned.

Emma nodded, "Yeah, she did. She wanted me to know the real her and still love her and well, I do. I know you guys have history with her, but I don't know that her, okay? The Regina I know is amazing. I love her and she loves me."

Snow pursed her lips a moment and Charming had a hand on his wife's shoulder, "Emma, it's just…we've known Regina for a really, really long time. She can be extremely manipulative. We just worry," she put a hand up as Emma started to protest, "Please, let me finish. We're worried that this whole thing, you getting to town and ending up with Regina, she must have orchestrated it. It makes the most sense. Regina hates me and her last threat to us, in the Enchanted Forest, was that she would destroy our happiness if it was the last thing she ever did. What better way to do that than through you, our daughter? It's just another way for her to get her revenge on us," she finally finished.

Emma was practically seething but forced herself to keep her temper, "If she wanted to make you so miserable, why wouldn't she just keep you under the curse?"

Charming sighed in exasperation, "Don't you see? She undoes the curse and we think we get you back, but she – "

"I'm here, aren't I?" Emma snapped, throwing her hands up in annoyance.

"Emma, we're just worried. We're your parents,that's what we do."

"Yeah, when you're not sending me through a magical wardrobe to some foreign world you know nothing about to keep me safe," Emma laced that last word with sarcasm as she stood up, "You might be my parents, but you don't have any right to tell me how to live my life," she shook her head, "I was so stupid, I was actually looking forward to getting to know you guys, but no, right now, I'm done. I mean, you think just because you guys couldn't love me, nobody can? Well, Regina does."

Charming and Snow watched their daughter storm out of the diner, angry and disappointed, not only at Regina but at themselves.

"We should have been more sensitive," Snow berated herself, "Of course she has issues with love and trust and we basically just told her…"

"No, we didn't," Charming comforted his wife, "It's just how she interpreted it because she wants to be loved."

"And we're the cause of that, we abandoned her," Snow shook her head slowly.

Emma hadn't exactly walked off her anger and slammed the door behind her as she entered the mansion.

"Everything okay?" Regina popped out of the kitchen, frowning at the obviously worked up blonde standing in her foyer.

Emma shrugged, "They're idiots," she said shortly.

Regina couldn't help but to smile but quickly wiped it off her face, "What happened? You weren't out for long."

Emma closed the space between the two and rested her head on the brunette's shoulder, smiling when she felt a hand in her hair, "They think you're using me," she mumbled.

Regina's eye twitched, not that the blonde could see; it wasn't that she was using Emma, even when she had kind of manipulated her and used her, Regina hadn't even known that who Emma was in relation to Snow. And yeah, maybe when she had learnt Emma's connection to her land, she had thought of how ironic it was that was now sleeping with her biggest enemy's daughter.

Anyway, if it hadn't been true love then the curse wouldn't have broken at all, so her feelings weren't fake… She just didn't mind the benefit of them. She sighed; it wasn't that easy to kill of the evil queen, she could see that now.

"That's ridiculous," Regina whispered into blonde hair, "I love you, Emma Swan."

"I love you too," Emma mumbled back as she sunk onto a chair in the dining room, "I just thought I might have a chance to actually love my parents too. Stupid, huh?"

Regina pulled back and placed a gentle hand under Emma's chin, tilting it so their eyes locked, "It's not stupid, dear, just give it time."

Emma shrugged, "I guess so," she put her head in her hands, "Ugh, I was so cruel to them, I said… the meanest thing."

Regina's forehead crinkled, "What did you say?" she asked curiously.

Emma pulled her head out her heads, "Um. They were saying you didn't really love me," she put a hand on Regina's as she saw the anger flare in the other woman's eyes, "And I maybe said something like just because you couldn't love me doesn't mean nobody else will," she finished meekly, looking at the table.

Regina's eyes misted over, "Is that…really what you grew up thinking?" she asked.

Emma looked up at her and shrugged, "I s'pose," she tried to sound casual, "All I knew was my parents gave me up and never tried to find me."

Regina broke eye contact with the woman, stepping back a little, "I'm so sorry, Emma," she said.

Emma frowned and stood up, approaching Regina, "No, Regina, that's not what I meant at all," she put a hand on Regina's arm.

Regina pulled it away automatically, "It should be though. It's my fault you grew up that way. I mean, you get that, right?"

Emma shrugged, "Yeah, I get it."

"Then why are you with me? Why don't you hate me?" Regina asked incredulously.

The blonde took a step back, "I…I prefer not to think about it, I guess. I love the person you are today, Regina, not the evil queen. I mean, it's not my favourite thing, but you're flawed… That's part of what I love about you."

Regina frowned, "But if you don't…think about it, then if we stay together, eventually you will think about it and it will bother you."

"God, you people," Emma growled, "I just can't get it right, can I? I try to go out with my stupid parents and they ambush me, I try to love you and you just push me away. I don't understand what you want from me."

"Emma, I'm not…," Regina hesitated, "Maybe I was, I don't know. Honey – "

"Don't," Emma shook her head, "I just need to be alone a while," she finished quietly, picking the keys up she had placed on the table.

"Don't leave again, Emma, please," Regina didn't' even care that she was begging now.

"I'm sorry," was the last thing Emma said before she closed the door.