Andante, Andante

Chapter Twelve

"Keep mixing dear," Cora instructs as she places the crunchy looking mini taco shells onto a cookie sheet.

"Don't you think we need more chocolate chips?" Emma innocently questions, her finger dipping into the white cream to scoop up a piece of chocolate.

The older woman playfully smacks her bicep and glares at her. "Stop eating the mix, I'll have nothing left to fill the shells."

Emma hums around her finger and smiles from ear to ear while her hand begins stirring with the rubber spatula. "But it's so good! You should open your own restaurant with all your fancy dinners and then these delicious cannoli for dessert," she hums again and steals another lick.

"I'm retired, dear," Cora softly replies and shoves a spoon into her hand. "Now, scoop the mix and fill the shells. Be very careful not to squeeze the shells in the process and make sure you fill the center well."

"Oh, don't you worry, I'm gonna stuff these things until it's oozing out the ends."

"Not too much, we need to dip the ends in the crushed pistachios and then we freeze them."

"Alright," she agrees, examining carefully how the older woman assembles the cannoli before she copies her work.

They both stand in silence, filling the shells for a few minutes before Cora decides to express what's truly on her mind.

"So, eight weeks down and only four left..." she trails off and waits as if Emma's supposed to know how that sentence was supposed to end.

"Yes," she drawls while maintaining a laser focus on the stuffing process.

"Are you ready to go home?"

"Umm, I don't know." She shrugs because her heart is torn between her home and Regina. "Sometimes I miss Boston, but I feel so comfortable here that sometimes I forget about my life back home."

"And your life back home..." Emma's hand stops forcing the filling into the shell as her heart begins to race, having an inkling where this woman is headed with their conversation. "What does your future look like there?"

Emma purses her thin little lips before gently setting down the half-made cannoli. "Are you asking if my future includes your daughter?"

"Just know this doesn't have to do with Regina because she is my daughter. I have already spoken to her about you and warned her not to hurt you as well," she proudly states while Emma's sure her face has morphed into sheer mortification.

"What? Why? When?" She screeches uncontrollably, absolutely flabbergasted by the admission.

The woman chuckles softly, picks up the cannoli she had set down and places it back in her hand, silently demanding that she continues her task.

"Emma, dear, I care for you a lot. You're like a second daughter to me now and I would never want to see you hurt, especially in the hands of my daughter."

"But I...she's just..."

"Besides," she waves her hand to desist the stuttering thoughts. "By the looks of the continuous love bites, that you two think you are hiding so well..." her eyes flick to Emma's pointedly, completely draining all the blood from her face. "I think you two are in deeper than you care to admit."

She attempts to swallow her humiliation, but her tongue seems to be made of sandpaper all of a sudden. "I-uh..." she cannot come up with one logical thought, so her mind resorts to her childhood behavior when she was so obviously caught with her hand in the cookie jar. "Sorry."

Cora laughs lightly and brushes the long golden hair away from her shoulder like a loving mother does. "Don't be. You're good for her. Regina is very goal oriented and strives for perfection, always has. She needs you to show her that there is a world outside her career. She's going to blink and one day her whole life will have passed her by, and for what?"