Her Happily Ever After
Mar. 30th, 2014 12:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katleeptTitle: Her Happily Ever After
Author: Kat Lee
Characters/Pairing: Regina, Henry, also mentions Daniel/Regina
Rating: PG/K+
Challenge/Prompt: Once Upon A Land: Write Me A Story challenge
Word Count: 2,488
Warnings: Mild SPOILERS! for the last three episodes
Summary:
Disclaimer: All characters belong to their rightful owners, not the author.
She looks into the eyes she has loved since she first saw them and remembers how tiny, fragile, and innocent he was when they first met. He thinks he just met her, but nothing could be further from the truth. She's loved him since almost the moment he was born; indeed, his arrival in her life was almost like a rebirth for herself. For the first time, when she held him, she felt whole. She felt as though there was nothing missing at all from her world and that she finally stand a chance at having her happy ending even though she told Tinker Bell all those years ago that she couldn't possibly have one without her beloved Daniel.
True love does exist after a soul mate's death. He taught her that. She'd thought she could never love or care truly again for another human being after her mother killed the man she loved before her very eyes. She thought she could never love or give herself to any one, but she gave herself wholly to him with very little second thoughts.
She can't say she had none. She almost caved when she first had. She came quite close to returning him to the agency from whence she'd gotten him, but in the end, she chose to keep him. There has never been another decision that has been more right, and from that moment on, she never regretted taking him again.
She still doesn't regret what she's done for him now as he's looking up at her as though she is a stranger. She is a stranger to him, although they can never be strangers. She thought losing him was the hardest thing she ever had to do, even though it had been the only way to keep him safe. She couldn't be more wrong.
Part of her thinks she should have buried her heart there in the forest. Listening to Snow White had surely never gotten her anything but heartache. Yet now, as much as she hurts because he doesn't remember her, a pain far worse than simply losing him, she is glad she held on to her heart for if she didn't have a heart, she would have no way to feel. She wouldn't feel the remorse and hurt she's feeling now, but she also wouldn't remember how much she loves this wonderful child before her.
"Henry." She's spoken his name a billion times over the years through which she has raised him, and yet never has she spoken it with more emotion than now. Oh, how she just longs to reach out, pull him tightly to her, and never let him go again! But she knows even a simple hug would be out of place right now.
He doesn't know her or, at least, he doesn't remember that he knows her. All the things they've shared -- all the toys she bought him, the kisses she's placed on his sweet, little held, the times she's held him as he's been sick or scared -- all of it is gone from his mind, and it is because of her that he's forgotten her. She had no choice, she reminds herself yet again. She had no choice but to take him from her and his memories from him. It was the only way he could have lived.
She sacrificed everything so that her child can have a future. Does that not make her good? She gave everything she held dear up without a second thought, because she knew it was the only way. There was nothing evil in her decision this time. She saved him and nearly lost herself in the process. She has, she thinks, lost the Evil Queen she once was.
He always wanted her to be good. Regina wishes with all her might that Henry -- the Henry she knew and loved, the Henry who was a hero for her despite being just a boy, the Henry who did and gave everything he could to make her and his other mother and his whole family happy, the Henry she'll always miss if she doesn't find a way to get him back, the Henry for whom she fought so hard to change her ways to make him happy and proud of her and want to love her again . . . She wishes that Henry could see the woman she has become, could know what she has sacrificed to save him and his birth mother. She knows he would be proud of her, and that would be one of the best feelings in the world. The only thing that tops it is his love.
But this Henry . . . This Henry who is her Henry but yet who is not for his mind is completely changed is looking at her with utter distrust in his eyes. His emotions flicker in his brown pupils. He's always been wise beyond his years, and she knows he knows something is up. His mother didn't simply come to Storybrooke for a case, but he can't figure out exactly what is going on.
She wishes she could tell him. She wishes she could show him his book and the pictures and stories therein would bring everything flooding back to him. But it's not going to happen. The spell she cast upon him can not simply be expelled by looking at a few pictures and reading some old stories. It's going to take much, much more than that.
She would do anything in a heartbeat if it would bring her Henry back to her. She would kill his grandparents, his other mother, the whole world if that could return him to her, but she knows none of that is going to help. The only way they're going to get through this, the only way she's going to get her son back, is by working with them to solve the mystery of their stolen memories and find a way back to the Enchanted Forest. This time, she swears, she's going to take him with her.
Emma can come if she wants. She well imagines she does want to. After all, being separated from her parents, now that she finally has them, can not be easy, although Regina imagines it to be far less painful than losing her child. But regardless, she's taking Henry. They can have the whole kingdom -- the whole world, if they want it -- except for her son. She is going to get her son back, and he will love her and be proud of the woman she has become, the woman she's become for him.
But for now . . . For now, she can't stand this very much more, and yet, also, she can not stand to be away from Henry. It feels worse than a thousand knives stabbing her in her black heart every time he walks away from her. She's still tempted to bury her heart to end this torture, but doing so would mean losing him forever, so she'll never do it.
"Come on," she says at last, feeling as rejected as the play castle in which he no longer has any interest. "We need to head back." They have to get back to town so that she can get back to her books. There must be something in this world today she can use to restore her son's memory, something, anything that will return her precious child to her.
"Madam Mayor?"
"Yes, Henry?" It feels so natural to say his name, and yet, there is nothing natural about this situation. Maybe her son is right. Maybe no good can come of magic, but yet if she hadn't placed him under this spell, he would not have lived -- or he would have lived but hurt as greatly as she has, something she never would have wished for him. It is all she can do to endure this torture; she'll never let her son hurt like she is.
She looks back down into his beautiful, wonderful eyes and notes that he's still watching her with that same, flickering expression. He's trying, she realizes with mixed emotions, to read her! He's trying to figure out just who she is and what she wants from him. He can never know or even guess the truth until the spell is lifted, but she can't help her lips turning up into a smile as she realizes that he knows there is something more between them, some greater reason why he should know her than simply as his mother's friend and the Mayor of Storybrooke.
He knows there's something more, something special about her, something he can't quite figure out. She knows he feels as though he should know her for some other reason, as though they've met before which, of course, they have. She beams, but then her heart throbs with pain again as he quickly lowers his eyes. But yet, almost as soon as he looks away, he's looking back again.
She's been read before with such an expression. Rumpelstiltskin was quite adept at it. Her child -- her wonderful, awesome, amazing child is trying to look through her and is almost seeing her soul! Her smile grows. She does have a soul now, a soul that is much, much more than just a bottomless, black pit because she is filled with love for her child.
He looks away again and then back once more, and she knows he feels uncomfortable. She dulls down her smile, not wanting to make him think too much about what he's sensing and also not wanting, never wanting to scare him away. "Thank you," he says.
"For what?"
"For bringing me out here. For acting like . . . Well, like I belong." He's been to many new places with his mother, but never once has he felt as though he was truly welcomed as she and Mary Margaret and even Ruby and Granny at the diner have made him feel. They haven't hesitated to welcome him or try to become his friend. He doesn't know how long his moms plans on staying here, but he knows he'll have people with whom to hang while they're here. He won't be alone. For the first time, he won't feel lonely while his mother's working.
"Every one belongs in Storybrooke, Henry." Her smile is sincere, and yet they both know it hides a deeper meaning. Every one in this town does belong, Regina thinks. Every one of them, even their memory thief. They all came from one world; they all belong in this world in a world, in Storybrooke. Yet, none belong here more than herself, Henry, Emma, and perhaps, just perhaps, the rest of their family, a family she's never asked for, outside of Henry, but has been given nonetheless, a family that includes her three greatest enemies.
She hasn't forgotten that it is because of Snow that her mother killed Daniel. She hasn't forgotten that her life would never have turned out this way if not for her betrayal as a child. She hasn't forgotten or forgiven all that has happened to her because of what she did. But then, she realizes suddenly with a twisted expression and mixed emotions fluttering in her dark heart, if it wasn't for what had happened, this also wouldn't have happened.
If it hadn't been for Snow causing her cherished Daniel to be killed, she would never have cast the curse in the first place. If she hadn't cast the curse, they would not have been brought to this time. Emma would not have had Henry, and she would never have found him. He wouldn't have been alive to be found, to give her a child and a second chance at life, to finally complete that missing part of her. True, she and Daniel probably would have had kids, but none of them would have been like Henry.
For a moment, Regina feels as though she can barely breathe. There is something to thank the little, goody two shoes bitch for after all. There is a reason Daniel was killed. There is a reason that everything that has happened has happened and Tinker Bell was right. Her happily ever after was not cast away because of Daniel's murder. In fact, it hasn't happened yet, but it will with this wonderful child beside her.
She struggles to breathe, struggles to think, and it wasn't for Henry suddenly looking concerned, there's no telling what the great Queen would have done next. She doesn't even know, but as he looks at her in concern, she knows she has to soothe his worries. She has to act like everything is all right. She can not give him a reason to fret or doubt, to be afraid or to be sad. "Tell me, Henry," she asks, ignoring the waver of her tone. "Do you like it here?"
"I think I will," he says in a hurry and without a second doubt. Then he sprints ahead of her to her waiting car. She watches him go and smiles at his back. He is going to do more than simply like it here. He is going to love it. Soon but not too soon (it could never be too soon), she will find a way to break the spell she put on her child. She will free him of the spell and restore his memories, and he will be hers again.
He will love her once more, and then at last, when all the other problems are conquered together, when she takes him and his grandparents take Emma back to the Enchanted Forest . . . When they are home again and together once more, maybe then she'll finally get her happily ever after ending. She will have her happily ever after -- not with Daniel or with her father or with any of the other men who have come before him or might try to come still but with her son. Her son is all she needs to truly be happy, and soon, very soon, they will be together and happy for the rest of her life.
She nearly jumps into her car. "Buckle up," she commands and begins speeding back to town. It will all happen soon, but it can never happen too soon. She waits till he's no longer watching her, and then Regina looks back over at her son, at her child, at the boy who's already made her more and happier than she ever thought she could be. She looks at him with all the love she holds in the heart she thought could never love again but is now overflowing with love for him alone and promises herself once more. It won't be long now before she's holding him in her arms again. Her son has come home, and soon, he will be hers again forever.
The End
Author: Kat Lee
Characters/Pairing: Regina, Henry, also mentions Daniel/Regina
Rating: PG/K+
Challenge/Prompt: Once Upon A Land: Write Me A Story challenge
Word Count: 2,488
Warnings: Mild SPOILERS! for the last three episodes
Summary:
Disclaimer: All characters belong to their rightful owners, not the author.
She looks into the eyes she has loved since she first saw them and remembers how tiny, fragile, and innocent he was when they first met. He thinks he just met her, but nothing could be further from the truth. She's loved him since almost the moment he was born; indeed, his arrival in her life was almost like a rebirth for herself. For the first time, when she held him, she felt whole. She felt as though there was nothing missing at all from her world and that she finally stand a chance at having her happy ending even though she told Tinker Bell all those years ago that she couldn't possibly have one without her beloved Daniel.
True love does exist after a soul mate's death. He taught her that. She'd thought she could never love or care truly again for another human being after her mother killed the man she loved before her very eyes. She thought she could never love or give herself to any one, but she gave herself wholly to him with very little second thoughts.
She can't say she had none. She almost caved when she first had. She came quite close to returning him to the agency from whence she'd gotten him, but in the end, she chose to keep him. There has never been another decision that has been more right, and from that moment on, she never regretted taking him again.
She still doesn't regret what she's done for him now as he's looking up at her as though she is a stranger. She is a stranger to him, although they can never be strangers. She thought losing him was the hardest thing she ever had to do, even though it had been the only way to keep him safe. She couldn't be more wrong.
Part of her thinks she should have buried her heart there in the forest. Listening to Snow White had surely never gotten her anything but heartache. Yet now, as much as she hurts because he doesn't remember her, a pain far worse than simply losing him, she is glad she held on to her heart for if she didn't have a heart, she would have no way to feel. She wouldn't feel the remorse and hurt she's feeling now, but she also wouldn't remember how much she loves this wonderful child before her.
"Henry." She's spoken his name a billion times over the years through which she has raised him, and yet never has she spoken it with more emotion than now. Oh, how she just longs to reach out, pull him tightly to her, and never let him go again! But she knows even a simple hug would be out of place right now.
He doesn't know her or, at least, he doesn't remember that he knows her. All the things they've shared -- all the toys she bought him, the kisses she's placed on his sweet, little held, the times she's held him as he's been sick or scared -- all of it is gone from his mind, and it is because of her that he's forgotten her. She had no choice, she reminds herself yet again. She had no choice but to take him from her and his memories from him. It was the only way he could have lived.
She sacrificed everything so that her child can have a future. Does that not make her good? She gave everything she held dear up without a second thought, because she knew it was the only way. There was nothing evil in her decision this time. She saved him and nearly lost herself in the process. She has, she thinks, lost the Evil Queen she once was.
He always wanted her to be good. Regina wishes with all her might that Henry -- the Henry she knew and loved, the Henry who was a hero for her despite being just a boy, the Henry who did and gave everything he could to make her and his other mother and his whole family happy, the Henry she'll always miss if she doesn't find a way to get him back, the Henry for whom she fought so hard to change her ways to make him happy and proud of her and want to love her again . . . She wishes that Henry could see the woman she has become, could know what she has sacrificed to save him and his birth mother. She knows he would be proud of her, and that would be one of the best feelings in the world. The only thing that tops it is his love.
But this Henry . . . This Henry who is her Henry but yet who is not for his mind is completely changed is looking at her with utter distrust in his eyes. His emotions flicker in his brown pupils. He's always been wise beyond his years, and she knows he knows something is up. His mother didn't simply come to Storybrooke for a case, but he can't figure out exactly what is going on.
She wishes she could tell him. She wishes she could show him his book and the pictures and stories therein would bring everything flooding back to him. But it's not going to happen. The spell she cast upon him can not simply be expelled by looking at a few pictures and reading some old stories. It's going to take much, much more than that.
She would do anything in a heartbeat if it would bring her Henry back to her. She would kill his grandparents, his other mother, the whole world if that could return him to her, but she knows none of that is going to help. The only way they're going to get through this, the only way she's going to get her son back, is by working with them to solve the mystery of their stolen memories and find a way back to the Enchanted Forest. This time, she swears, she's going to take him with her.
Emma can come if she wants. She well imagines she does want to. After all, being separated from her parents, now that she finally has them, can not be easy, although Regina imagines it to be far less painful than losing her child. But regardless, she's taking Henry. They can have the whole kingdom -- the whole world, if they want it -- except for her son. She is going to get her son back, and he will love her and be proud of the woman she has become, the woman she's become for him.
But for now . . . For now, she can't stand this very much more, and yet, also, she can not stand to be away from Henry. It feels worse than a thousand knives stabbing her in her black heart every time he walks away from her. She's still tempted to bury her heart to end this torture, but doing so would mean losing him forever, so she'll never do it.
"Come on," she says at last, feeling as rejected as the play castle in which he no longer has any interest. "We need to head back." They have to get back to town so that she can get back to her books. There must be something in this world today she can use to restore her son's memory, something, anything that will return her precious child to her.
"Madam Mayor?"
"Yes, Henry?" It feels so natural to say his name, and yet, there is nothing natural about this situation. Maybe her son is right. Maybe no good can come of magic, but yet if she hadn't placed him under this spell, he would not have lived -- or he would have lived but hurt as greatly as she has, something she never would have wished for him. It is all she can do to endure this torture; she'll never let her son hurt like she is.
She looks back down into his beautiful, wonderful eyes and notes that he's still watching her with that same, flickering expression. He's trying, she realizes with mixed emotions, to read her! He's trying to figure out just who she is and what she wants from him. He can never know or even guess the truth until the spell is lifted, but she can't help her lips turning up into a smile as she realizes that he knows there is something more between them, some greater reason why he should know her than simply as his mother's friend and the Mayor of Storybrooke.
He knows there's something more, something special about her, something he can't quite figure out. She knows he feels as though he should know her for some other reason, as though they've met before which, of course, they have. She beams, but then her heart throbs with pain again as he quickly lowers his eyes. But yet, almost as soon as he looks away, he's looking back again.
She's been read before with such an expression. Rumpelstiltskin was quite adept at it. Her child -- her wonderful, awesome, amazing child is trying to look through her and is almost seeing her soul! Her smile grows. She does have a soul now, a soul that is much, much more than just a bottomless, black pit because she is filled with love for her child.
He looks away again and then back once more, and she knows he feels uncomfortable. She dulls down her smile, not wanting to make him think too much about what he's sensing and also not wanting, never wanting to scare him away. "Thank you," he says.
"For what?"
"For bringing me out here. For acting like . . . Well, like I belong." He's been to many new places with his mother, but never once has he felt as though he was truly welcomed as she and Mary Margaret and even Ruby and Granny at the diner have made him feel. They haven't hesitated to welcome him or try to become his friend. He doesn't know how long his moms plans on staying here, but he knows he'll have people with whom to hang while they're here. He won't be alone. For the first time, he won't feel lonely while his mother's working.
"Every one belongs in Storybrooke, Henry." Her smile is sincere, and yet they both know it hides a deeper meaning. Every one in this town does belong, Regina thinks. Every one of them, even their memory thief. They all came from one world; they all belong in this world in a world, in Storybrooke. Yet, none belong here more than herself, Henry, Emma, and perhaps, just perhaps, the rest of their family, a family she's never asked for, outside of Henry, but has been given nonetheless, a family that includes her three greatest enemies.
She hasn't forgotten that it is because of Snow that her mother killed Daniel. She hasn't forgotten that her life would never have turned out this way if not for her betrayal as a child. She hasn't forgotten or forgiven all that has happened to her because of what she did. But then, she realizes suddenly with a twisted expression and mixed emotions fluttering in her dark heart, if it wasn't for what had happened, this also wouldn't have happened.
If it hadn't been for Snow causing her cherished Daniel to be killed, she would never have cast the curse in the first place. If she hadn't cast the curse, they would not have been brought to this time. Emma would not have had Henry, and she would never have found him. He wouldn't have been alive to be found, to give her a child and a second chance at life, to finally complete that missing part of her. True, she and Daniel probably would have had kids, but none of them would have been like Henry.
For a moment, Regina feels as though she can barely breathe. There is something to thank the little, goody two shoes bitch for after all. There is a reason Daniel was killed. There is a reason that everything that has happened has happened and Tinker Bell was right. Her happily ever after was not cast away because of Daniel's murder. In fact, it hasn't happened yet, but it will with this wonderful child beside her.
She struggles to breathe, struggles to think, and it wasn't for Henry suddenly looking concerned, there's no telling what the great Queen would have done next. She doesn't even know, but as he looks at her in concern, she knows she has to soothe his worries. She has to act like everything is all right. She can not give him a reason to fret or doubt, to be afraid or to be sad. "Tell me, Henry," she asks, ignoring the waver of her tone. "Do you like it here?"
"I think I will," he says in a hurry and without a second doubt. Then he sprints ahead of her to her waiting car. She watches him go and smiles at his back. He is going to do more than simply like it here. He is going to love it. Soon but not too soon (it could never be too soon), she will find a way to break the spell she put on her child. She will free him of the spell and restore his memories, and he will be hers again.
He will love her once more, and then at last, when all the other problems are conquered together, when she takes him and his grandparents take Emma back to the Enchanted Forest . . . When they are home again and together once more, maybe then she'll finally get her happily ever after ending. She will have her happily ever after -- not with Daniel or with her father or with any of the other men who have come before him or might try to come still but with her son. Her son is all she needs to truly be happy, and soon, very soon, they will be together and happy for the rest of her life.
She nearly jumps into her car. "Buckle up," she commands and begins speeding back to town. It will all happen soon, but it can never happen too soon. She waits till he's no longer watching her, and then Regina looks back over at her son, at her child, at the boy who's already made her more and happier than she ever thought she could be. She looks at him with all the love she holds in the heart she thought could never love again but is now overflowing with love for him alone and promises herself once more. It won't be long now before she's holding him in her arms again. Her son has come home, and soon, he will be hers again forever.
The End
