Regal Believer, 7x01, FF.net

I blame myself for this. After seeing some set pictures from the new season and some talks with my dear puppies, this came to mind. Big thanks to @reginasevilpanda for looking this over for me :-*

“Mom? You okay?”

His mother sits on his bed in the mansion, her back turned to him, when Henry steps into his soon-to-be old room.

He can hear her sniffle, subtle but still there. She probably doesn’t want him to see her like this.

“I’m fine,” Regina replies while straightening up and moving a hand over her face.

Henry smiles. His mom is always fine, even when she’s not. Right now she is clearly not, not that she would ever admit that. He’s leaving his childhood home, leaving his mother to go to college.

He moves to sit next to her on the bed. The room is practically empty. Most of his stuff is already packed in boxes and on its way to his new room in college. The furniture is still there but the room lacks his personal touch. It feels weird, even to him. It must be even harder for his mom.

“Of course you are,” he answers with a knowing smile and takes one of her hands into his. Regina looks at him and tries to smile as well. But it doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

“You know, it’s okay to cry.”

She laughs wetly at this, holds his hand tighter and leans slightly into him.

“I always told you that when you were sad or mad. You were convinced that boys don’t cry, that it’s weak to cry,” she tells him softly, her head leaning on his shoulder.

“But it’s not.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

Regina lifts her head from his shoulder and looks him into his eyes. “I’m going to miss you terribly, Henry.”

Again, he smiles. “I know. I’m going to miss you too,” he says and draws her into a tight hug. They stay like this for a while longer, nobody saying a word, just enjoying the moment and the closeness.

Regina is the first to break the silence. “You probably need to get going. I don’t want you to drive in the dark on this death trap on two wheels.” She breaks the hug gently, moving to stand up from the bed, while purposely ignoring his sigh and growled ‘Mom’ on her comment about his motorcycle.

Henry only chuckles. “Okay.”

They both move to leave the room to go downstairs when Regina stops in front of his chair, his striped scarf in her hands. “Are you not taking this with you?” She sounds sad.

“Mom, it’s summer. I won’t need it now.”

“Oh,” she simply says and drapes the scarf back over the back of the chair. “I can send it to you when it’s getting colder.” She still stares at the woolen scarf, which accompanied him for so long, softly running her fingers over the material. It clearly holds a lot of memories to her.

“Keep it.”

“What?” Regina utters distracted, lost in a memory.

“Keep it,” he repeats, “you need it more than I do.”

She looks at him in confusion but quickly realizes that he isn’t talking about proper clothing for cold weather. He isn’t talking about the weather at all.

“Thank you.” She smiles genuinely now, already tearing up again. “I love you, my little prince.”

Tagged by @spiral-nebula :) I finally decided to do this as I’m really close to give you that one prompt for beta (whenever that will be though). I haven’t posted anything on ao3, so can’t answer these questions, but I’ll try the other ones. This is just to show: hey I wrote a thing (actually three things ;))

1. Your 3 fanfics with the most comments:

as I only wrote three...this is easy ^^ - Smile - Wish - Something’s Not Right

2. Your 3 fanfics with the most kudos:

/

3. Your Oldest Fanfic:

Something’s Not Right, my very first one. I gave that prompt to Anastasia and she was like “Why don’’t you write it?”, and suddenly I wrote, for the very first time (not exactly but anyway). And it felt really good :) And I have to thank Anastasia for that a thousand times over :)

4. Your Latest Fanfic:

Wish, apparently I like to write Regal Believer ^^

5. Your Proudest Fanfic:

all of them! but if I had to pick one, I would go with Wish, because that was the first time the words were just flowing out of me.

6. Your Longest Fanfic:

Smile, my only OQ attempt so far :)

7. Your 3 fanfics with the most Bookmarks:

this is ao3, right?

8. Your top 3 crossover fanfics:

/

9. Your favourite character to write in fanfic:

Regina, and Henry.

10. Tag some fanfic writers:

a little drabble between 3x11 and 3x12, Regina waking up from the dark curse

FF.net

Thanks again to @spiral-nebula for helping me out. What would I do without you? :)

It feels like the first time she arrived in Storybrooke. She can feel the soft silk against her skin. She can sense the warm light that falls through the window. But this time she keeps her eyes closed.

She tries to listen, to hear something. Anything that would indicate to the surroundings of the Enchanted Forest. Because that’s where she should be right now. But everything seems to point to another direction. She’s very certain that she’s in her own bedroom, back in the town she created all those years ago.

She remembers the sparkling purple magic that surrounded them all. She remembers looking up at the vanishing sky, not daring to take another glimpse at the yellow bug that had just rolled over the town line.

Henry.

Her eyes shoot open. Without another thought she pushes her blankets away, scrambles out of bed and hurries out of her room. Everything is quiet when she reaches the hallway, standing right in front of her son’s door. It’s closed.

You’re not a villain.

Her hand hesitantly reaches out for the knob, grabbing it and holding it for several moments. She just saw him leave. She saw him leave with Emma into a better life, a happy life. However, she’s supposed to be in the Enchanted Forest according to her plan. Maybe it backfired, maybe it didn’t work.

With a deep breath she turns the door knob and slowly pushes the door open. She peaks into the room, at the bed that should be occupied by her little prince.

It isn’t. No one is there. The bed is empty; it’s been made, like it was when they hurriedly left the house after Emma’s emergency call. Henry was sitting on his bed then, his back to her, his nose in the storybook. The previous night she had tucked him in, reassuring him that he was safe from Pan. But it was all a lie.

You’re my mom.

She’s the one who sits on the bed now, facing the window. Nothing seems to have changed. The sky is painted a bright blue, the sun is shining and leaves are being scattered around by the wind. Just as it was before the magic took them, like it was yesterday. Even though everything feels like it wasn’t.

She sneaks a hand to his pillow, lifting it up to her face, taking a deep breath. It smells like him, her little prince. She notices that the house is very quiet. No sign of another life in it. Like before, like always.

A lone tear makes its way down her cheek, landing on the pillow. She hastily wipes the trace away with her sleeve. Whatever is going on here, she has to find out what it is. She stands up, placing the pillow where it belongs and starts to leave the room. This is all wrong; this is not according to plan.

She reaches the door, her hand on the knob again, and with one last glance back at the room, she wishes that at least one more thing would’ve gone wrong.