"Are you running away from me?" Emma asked, walking slowly alongside Regina, who was just turning into a park.
"I'm going to have a hard time doing that," she returned bitterly, without stopping. She was breathing heavily, walking was anything but easy for her, but the exercise was still good.
"You know that's not what I meant. Talk to me," Emma asked, standing in front of her with her hands on her hips.
Regina stopped and calmly returned her gaze. "Get out of my way."
"Not until you tell me what's going on!"
"I'm serious, Emma. Get out of my way!" she repeated more clearly as her gaze flickered over Emma's shoulder to a bench she was aiming for.
"You're not suddenly running outside after you've had such a headache. Did the conversation with Henry and Killian upset you? Did they say something I don't understand that condemns us to stay apart forever?" she guessed, getting more and more worked up.
"Damn it, Emma! Get out of my way, I need to sit down!" Regina was almost shouting at her now and tears of despair welled up in her eyes as Emma made way for her with an apologetic look, but she was unable to take another step as numbness invaded her legs.
It was only thanks to Emma's quick reaction that she didn't fall to the ground as her knees simply gave way beneath her. Instead, the blonde slowly eased her down onto the grass and sat behind her, allowing her to lean back into her arm while the other was wrapped around her stomach.
Regina gritted her teeth and averted her eyes from her. She would not allow tears now. Absolutely not. "Have you got what you wanted now? Now we're sitting here in the wet grass and we'll both have bladder infections tomorrow."
"Regina, what's wrong with you? I'm already trying everything to please you."
Regina snorted. "To please me? Don't try any harder, you don't have to please me. We're two grown women who have been forgotten here. My excuse is that I was dead. What's yours?"
Emma hesitated before saying quietly, "I don't know. I don't know why I'm not in the Enchanted Forest."
"Well, I think I already know. You're the Savior. And since it's your job to save, and I needed saving, I snatched you away from your family. Again." Although the instability in her pelvis made it difficult for her to sit without leaning against something, she moved away from Emma.
"And even if that would be the case. You don't think I'd ever blame you for that, do you? It's not your fault and you hardly asked for a crazy witch to beat you to a pulp. Is that why you're acting like this all of a sudden? Because you feel guilty?"
Regina looked at her and the sudden pain in her eyes startled Emma. "You really don't understand anything."
"Then just explain it to me!" Emma glared at a couple of joggers, who almost craned their necks to give them curious looks and listen to the conversation.
But Regina just shook her head and struggled to kneel down in the hope that she would get back on her feet better from this position. Her plait had come loose when she landed on the floor and her dark hair now hung in front of her face like a curtain.
Emma stood up, also less flexible than usual due to her pregnancy, and slipped her hands under Regina's armpits to help her up.
"Hands off! And don't you dare pull on my right arm again!" Regina immediately growled at her in pain, holding her broken ribs on that side.
"Then forget your pride for a moment and at least give me your other hand. You'll only hurt yourself more this way!"
Regina, stubborn as she sometimes was, tried to push herself up from the floor two more times before she more than reluctantly smashed her hand into Emma's outstretched one and allowed herself to be pulled to her feet.
As soon as she stood, Emma put a crutch in her hand and slid her arm around her from the other side. "We'll walk slowly to that bench over there and you wait there until I get your wheelchair from the hotel."
"I don't remember that I asked you to do that."
"You didn't, but I don't care. Regina, even if you think this is a completely new situation for me, you're wrong. You may not have been physically dependent on my help before, but I've saved your ass often enough and, in the end, you were grateful for it."
"Emma Swan, just shut up for once!" She sat down heavily on the bench and stared up at her. "I can't stand being around you, don't you realize that? You're like a drug. I try to stay away from you and as soon as I get close to you, I'm in physical pain when you're gone again!"
Emma opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She didn't know what to say in response.
"You've made your choice; you chose Hook and the baby. And that's fine. But leave me out of it and stop forcing your closeness on me all the time, because it's exhausting fighting the desire to hold you forever."
Emma still didn't say anything, which is why Regina broke eye contact after a while and stared in the opposite direction.
"I'll... be right back," the blonde finally said quietly, but this elicited no further response from Regina.
When Emma entered the hotel room, she closed the door behind herself and expelled her breath in a heavy gush. She had realized that after the physical separation and the interruption in contact, there had been a chance that the first few days with Regina could be strange again. But she had never dreamed that Regina was still not over what they had had, whatever that was. On the other hand, she asked herself if she herself was and came to the conclusion that she couldn't say 'yes' unequivocally.
The first days had been particularly hard. She had struggled a lot with herself, wondering whether she had made the wrong decision, whether she should have stayed with Regina in the Enchanted Forest, whether she really loved Killian more than her. Of course, he had sensed it and had often asked her if she was unwell, as she had hardly eaten and was very monosyllabic. She had always reassured him that everything was fine and that she probably had to get used to the feeling of expecting a child again. How could she have let him in on her true thoughts? Not only were Regina and he not on particularly good terms, but he would have questioned his masculinity if she had suddenly shown an interest in the opposite sex.
Emma slowly crossed the room and grabbed the wheelchair.
This was the next problem. She could only help Regina if she let her get close to her and at the moment, she could barely manage on her own. On top of that, Emma could hardly bear to watch Regina suffer and not be able to do anything about it. Her injuries would heal, but Emma knew from her own experience how painful broken ribs were and her back was certainly hurting as well, now that she was still suffering from temporary paralysis. Considering all of this, Regina bore it with such stoic calm that Emma realized that the pain must really be almost unbearable in the moments when it was visible.
Emma ran a hand over her face and then left the hotel, pushing the wheelchair in front of her. She would have to talk to Regina, at least she owed her that much. She very much hoped that it would be possible to have a conversation in which they both remained calm and neither of them lost their nerve, as had just happened to Regina. But it was already clear to Emma that it would be anything but easy.
Regina covered her face with one hand once Emma was finally out of sight and she was able to relax her tense body a little. She shouldn't have blurted it out like that, not in this way and certainly not here. She was annoyed with herself, as she had always been a master of control and had now lost it so quickly.
She needed a few minutes to herself after she had allowed Emma to touch her in this intimate way in the hotel. She realized that she had only done the massage for medical reasons, wanting to help her and get rid of her headache, possibly even due to guilt, as it had not been her who had supplied the crystal with the necessary aura energy.
But in Regina's overstimulated state, every touch, however kindly meant, felt like an invitation for more and she found that even harder to bear than the pain that had been her constant companion since that fateful night.
What made her so angry about the whole situation, however, was Emma's behavior. She seemed to have forgotten all too quickly what feelings they had once shared for each other, and Regina knew that they had not been one-sided and had come from her. Emma had literally begged her with her gaze to take the decision of who to live with off her hands. Letting her go had been one of the hardest things she had ever had to do in her life, but she had done it for her. Who was she to decide who Emma should spend the rest of her life with, knowing that she was carrying Hook's baby?
But now Emma acted as if they were the closest of friends, as if there had never been any deeper feelings involved, and that hurt Regina more than she could ever have imagined. She felt forgotten and pushed away and even though she had left this decision to Emma herself, she would never have thought it possible that she could have easily cut her out of her life immediately, as if she had never existed, as if there had only ever been one person for her.
Regina wiped the tears that were glistening under her eyelids with her sleeve and smoothed her face into a blank mask. She wouldn't let Emma throw her off track like that again, and she didn't need to see her crying because of her. Then it would just go back to the way it was at the beginning, when they could barely be in the same room without going for each other's throats. She didn't like it, but if it was the only way, then they probably had no other choice.