Chapter Fourteen~

Emma's POV

The word is like life. Strong, beautiful, agonizing, chaotic, powerful.

"Emma," she says.

She's far away, but her words carry the emotion of a thousand voices crying together and I could hear her from the ends of the earth.

I stop when I hear my name being called from down the street. I close my eyes, letting every last drop of emotion be drained out of my weak and feeble body. I cried myself to sleep last night. When Regina said that she didn't love me, I could feel myself falling apart. The fragile seams by which I was held together had been devoured by my very worst fears.

I had been running my whole life. Running from life, running from home, running from love. I had been terrified of staying in one place, because when you stay in one place you let people love you, and when you let people love you they are going to break you.

There was one woman who changed my mind. She seduced me into believing that perhaps someone could love me after all. And when I finally decided to stay, when I finally decided to stop running from her, she began to run from me.

I feel empty inside. She had been the only thing keeping my fragile heart beating. And now it's a dead lump of coal deep in my chest.

But as I walk along the street towards Granny's for a bite to eat and I hear her calling my name behind me, I feel a large lurch in my chest as the coal becomes a faintly glowing ember.

I stop dead in the street. No one else is around. It's just me and her. It would be anyway—in my thoughts, there is only ever her.

My entire body is screaming, writhing, aching. My heart is begging to feel something again, my mind is screaming for me to run to her, my breaking soul is crying for me to let her repair it.

But I don't move. I can't move. She destroyed me. She doesn't love me. She can't love me.

"Emma," she says again, and she's closer now.

My mind is spinning. I might fall over or black out or run or scream or cry or something, anything, to release the chaos happening inside of me.

I only have a few seconds. I can keep going. I can run away. I won't have to face her. I can pretend that this never happened—any of this—and go on running for the rest of my life.

But my frail body gives up. It's done running.

"Emma," she says again, one last time as she stops beside me. I can feel her almost reach out to grab my hand, but she changes her mind.

I close my eyes and suck in an aching breath before I turn around.

I turn slowly. I open my eyes. And the world starts spinning again.

Green eyes meet brown eyes.

Two souls melt out of their bodies, swimming in the air around them, forging into the soul of one body, of one person, of the bond between two women that love each other desperately.

Tears burn in the back of my throat and my head throbs with new tears.

Oh god. I'd give everything I have to have her love me again. If she could just remember…

"Emma," she begins to speak, but I cut her off.

"I thought you were leaving," I say sharply. My mind is shot from three hours of sleep and several more hours of crying, so the words don't even process before I say them.

"I changed my mind," she states simply.

"Why? There's no reason for you to stay here." My words are as cold and bitter as ice, and I can see the pain they cause beneath her eyes.

"I came back," she says slowly, quietly. "I came back for you."

She reaches for my hand, but I pull away.

"No, no," I say, almost shouting at her. The tears spill down my cheeks and clog up my throat as I choke on my own words. "No. I don't want you here. You don't understand. You don't know what it's like to cry yourself to sleep at night because of the fact that they only person you've ever let yourself love doesn't love you anymore. You don't know what it's like to have them tell you that they don't love you, to have every dream-like memory that you created together be burned down by their own venomous words. You have no idea what it's like to love someone with your whole mind and body and soul until every mere thought of them aches because of how much you miss and love and admire them."

I try to continue, but I can't speak over the tears raining down my face. I grab my chest, desperately reminding my lungs to breathe as they surge into hyperventilation.

"You don't know what it's like," I say weakly, "to love someone with the same intensity that I love you. No one can fathom what it's like to love you. They can't fathom the light or the peace or the joy, and they can't fathom the ache or the hurt of the pain. I love you with everything that I have and everything that I am. And I'm broken without you."

Regina is crying now, too. I look into her eyes, and they break me, because I can see that my words are breaking her. Tears are clumping onto her pretty lashes and spilling onto her smooth white cheeks, and god it takes everything I have left in me to stop myself from gently cupping her face in my hands and wiping her tears away.

So instead, I manage out one last sentence. "Do you have any idea what that's like?"

There's something swimming beneath her eyes. It's a feeling that you only see a few times in a lifetime. It's love. Pure, true, irrevocable, desperate love.

"I do," she says gently. "I do know what that's like." She steps closer to me, taking my hand and forcing my hunched figure to stand up straight. Her eyes bore into mine, and I can almost feel every emotion in her body circulating into mine.

"And I know what it's like to think that your love in unreciprocated," she continues. "I know what it's like when you think you've lost the love of your life, the only person who understands you, gets you, on a level that no one else can. When you came back to Storybrooke over a year ago and I was getting married to Robin, you made my entire world shift. I remember looking into your eyes that very first moment that you entered Granny's and my world fell apart. Everything stopped. And after a long moment it started up again. It was like I was breathing for the very first time. The world was brighter, better, brand-new… had I ever really lived before that moment? I realized then that I was in love with you. Of course I was. How could I not have fallen for a woman as soul-achingly good as you are? You cleansed my darkened heart. And in that week, when you went to Hook and I thought I was losing you forever, I felt like my soul had left my body. I have never felt pain like that before. Loving you is so beautifully aching."

She takes my face in her hand, gently pressing a piece of hair behind my ear and caressing my cheek softly. "Oh Emma. Even when I couldn't remember a single thing, I never forgot what it was like to love you. I don't believe that there's ever been a single moment in my life that I haven't been in love with you."

We stare at each other, and the world is silent. There are no words to describe what is happening between us right now. I can feel our love emanating out of our souls and it is one love, one soul. Sometimes there are moments where I just… understand her. Nothing needs to be said or done or stated. I can look into her eyes and know exactly what she means.

And as I stare into her eyes, I realize that she can remember. I can see the memories flooding beneath the tears that glisten in her eyes.

"Regina?" I ask gently.

She nods, smiling, that simple act sending life through my body all over again. "Yes," she says, answering the question I didn't directly ask but that she understands.

I've been reborn. My lungs take in a grand, shaking breath as the realization pours through my veins.

"Yes," she says again. "I remember. Emma, I remember everything."

And the world is yet again bright and full of joy and wonder.

I can't help the smile that creeps up onto my face. It's a smile of pure joy, the kind that devours my entire face and only grows bigger with the big wet tears that rain onto it. It's obviously contagious, and soon Regina is smiling too.

With a choking sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob, I grab Regina, pushing her body into mine, wrapping my arms around her warm body, holding her so close to me that no force in this realm or any could ever take her away from me.

"Regina," I cry gently, pulling her closer. We hold each other as the heavens pour light down from the sky.

After a long moment, we pull apart, staring into the other one's bright, tear-stained face.

Words can't describe the moment before our kiss. Our eyes bore into each other's, and there had never been a moment shared by two people that was quite as special, quite as loving, quite as perfect.

We had been lost lovers reunited again.

I took her cheek in my hands, both our eyes roving over the other one's face, trying to drink every perfect detail in. As she wrapped her arms around my waist, I leaned in, our lips crashing together like lightning, beautifully and longingly moving together in perfect harmony. My aching soul lit on fire at the taste of her lips, the touch of her skin, the feeling of her warmth.

We pulled apart after a long moment, breathing heavily, our foreheads pressed together and our noses touching. "Emma?" she said gently, and my heart jumped at how breathless she sounded.

"Yes?" I responded, sounding equally as winded.

"I have something to ask you." She pulled apart from me, reaching her hand into one of the deep pockets of her expensive coat.

Pulling out a small object concealed in her fist, she looked at me with a small smile.

My giddy heart began to beat faster. "What is it?" I asked nervously.

She smiled. "It's something you asked me a long time ago, and something you'll agree to again if I'm somehow lucky enough to still have you love me."

"Of course I love you, Regina, what is it?"

My heart was pounding through my chest now, sending my body into hyper drive.

After another sly smile, Regina dropped down onto one knee.

"I've loved you my whole life," she said. "There's always been a part of me that's loved you. There's been a part of me that's scared of love too, of course. But you taught me that our fears don't make us. Love does. Our love can make us better people, because it shows us the pure beauty of the human spirit and drives us towards becoming even a thousandth as good of a person as the people we love. Love can heal our wounds, conquer our demons, piece us back together when we're broken. And sometimes love can help us remember the parts of ourselves that we're missing. You've done all of these things for me, some obviously more than others," Regina smiles before moving on. "Of all the things I have seen and done in done in my life, there was only one that made me truly happy. If I could do anything, anything at all, there's only one thing that it would be." She pauses, dragging on for exaggeration. "I would marry you."

She opens the small velvet box in her hands, revealing a silver engagement band. "Emma will you marry me?"

For the thousandth time that day, the world stops spinning again. I had just reminded my lungs how to work, and now they won't breathe again. It's a long moment before I can get enough air in my lungs to say something.

The tears keep swimming down my face, and Regina looks worried.

"Emma?" she asks. "What's wrong?"

I look into her eyes. "I missed you so much," I say, smiling through my tears. "When you were in the hospital, I kept imagining what it would feel like if you were able to remember again and we could still get married. But none of those dreams ever felt as good as this one."

I extend my left hand, and she smiles broadly, placing the ring on my finger. I exhale, relieved to once again be engaged to the love of my life.

I wrap my arms around her, kissing her again, my hands lingering on her waist, her fingers roaming my hair. Never was there a kiss so passionate, a love so strong, nor a moment so precious.

And as the sun began to set beneath the horizon, I thought to myself, "I just can't believe I'm lucky enough to marry you."