Time Will Tell

Chapter Twelve

Storybrooke; The Past

"Graham you have to find him," Regina orders, frantically pacing Henry's bedroom and worrying her bottom lip. Graham encloses the gap between them, pulling her toward his chest for a hug and persuading those insistent hot tears to well up in her eyes, threatening to spill down her face. "He's all that I have," she chokes out against his shoulder.

Graham pulls back from the embrace to meet red red-rimmed eyes with a pout upon his face. "You have me, Regina," he claims and plasters on his best smile, but she knows it isn't heartfelt. It's just the curse working its magic, so she abruptly jerks away from his touch and stomps out of Henry's room. "Regina, wait!" The sheriff calls out behind her, rushing to follow in her shadow.

"Don't be so foolish to compare your love to my son's!" She snaps, not once glancing back to observe his reaction.

"That's not-"

Her hand flings up, silencing the sheriff shuffling behind her and it's not because she isn't in the mood for his lies, but intrigued by the headlights shining through her front windows. She listens intently, hearing the distinct sound of a car rolling in front of her house. She stands perfectly still, waiting patiently for whatever comes next and that's when she hears two car doors slamming.

Her heart hammers brutally, persuading her feet to charge down the stairs, the sound of her heels echoing throughout the mansion. Her body is determined, moving all on its own as she flings open her front door and calls desperately for her son.

"Henry?...Henry!"

Relief washes over her body like a thick wool blanket when her blurry vision lands upon her son. She dashes down the front steps, her heart threatening to leap straight out of her chest to find her son once again. It's a tunnel vision, her eyes zoning in on him and ignoring the rest of the world around her as she hysterically tugs him into a tight hug. However, his arms remain at his sides, never even attempting to hug her back and her heart breaks a little more.

"Are you okay?" She investigates, pulling back slightly to check his physical appearance, making sure there is no harm. "Where have you been?" She proceeds when she doesn't receive an answer right away, glancing at the woman behind her, but only for a split second before she directs her attentions toward her son again, trying to piece together what could possibly be going on. "What happened?"

"I found my real mom!" Henry shouts with that look of disdain that always seems to make her physically nauseous, before he bolts up the pathway toward the house, leaving her in utter shock.

For a brief moment, her body tenses, her senses completely failing her; she can't breathe, can't talk, she couldn't even shed a tear even though she feels that liquid clinging to her eyes. Very slowly, her body starts to cooperate and she pivots the slightest to meet this woman who has torn her and her son apart. All the blood swimming through her body runs cold, her heart colliding painfully against her chest and she really doesn't think her body can take anymore trauma.

Those innocent, green doe eyes are blinking back at her and her heart just melts. It. Is. Her. Surely, she must be seeing things, because it's impossible that her princess is standing before her once again. She blinks slowly, but Emma is still standing there, fearfully gazing back at her. So, she shakes her head, trying to formulate words to say to her, after all these years.

"You're Henry's birth mother?" She finds herself asking in pure shock.

Emma shrugs so nervously, so adorably shy while flashing her most innocent smile. "Hi," is all she mutters.

Graham mumbles something behind them, but Regina's mind is too focused on the gorgeous blonde standing before her after all those torturing years. Her heart quickens it's pace, her eyes shamelessly scanning the body up and down that she's been so cruelly deprived from. It has been well over thirty years since she last saw this stunning woman and Emma is even more beautiful than she remembers.