"Good morning, darling," Regina greeted and bent at her knees to scoop him into her arms. He was getting bigger now, taller and more solid. Her mother would have scolded her for coddling him, but that only made her hug him tighter and press a wet kiss to his cheek which he wiped off promptly with a wrinkle of his nose and the back of his hand. "What are we going to do today?"
Tucking Rexy and Mrs. under the crook of his arm securely, he brought a finger to his chin in deep thought. "Play?"
"Of course, we can play." She made their way down the stairs, adjusting him on her hip to hold onto the railing.
"Eat food," he determined. "Aaaaand watch."
"Treasure Planet?" She guessed, settling him on his feet and ignoring the churning of her gut at the prospect of watching the movie and only hearing the laughter of Emma and Henry as they made farting noises on their arms.
"Yeah!" He raced off to his playroom in a gallop, leaving his mother at the entrance of the kitchen.
The routine of making his apple cinnamon oatmeal helped clear Regina's mind. Too much apple bits, Henry would find it too fruity. Too much cinnamon, he'd refuse to eat it.
It'll give it more of a kick.
Regina shut her eyes, forcing the image of Emma tampering with a perfectly good apple turnover recipe from her mind. If she walked through that door right now, Regina would let her alter the recipe entirely if it meant she was safe. Her ears perked only slightly, hoping to hear a knock or a doorbell or a rattle of keys but nothing.
Keep it together, Regina told herself as she stirred Henry's breakfast. It's fine. She exhaled through clenched teeth before spooning out the pot into a bowl for Henry. She carried a cup of coffee for herself since she didn't have the appetite to put away anything more than a piece of toast or the leftover chicken strips Henry couldn't finish.
She entered his playroom, deposited the bowl on his table where he eagerly sat and began chomping on the dish, pretending to feed the Rex family while his mother crawled into the rocking chair in the corner. Regina hadn't crawled anywhere since she was a baby, but she tucked her foot under her thigh and brought her left leg up to wrap her arms around. Making herself small in that rocking chair wasn't the typical stance of the Mayor who made every chair she sat in look like a throne, but burrowing in the corner was all she had the energy to do.
Her chin rested on her knee, and she only moved to take the daintiest sip of her coffee, letting Henry's chatter soothe her mind.
She had the laundry to do today and wash all the bedding. Even the guest room. That needed to be changed. Henry needed a haircut again, but that would take some convincing so that would be pushed to the bottom of the list. The developers want to create traffic through the town by creating a mega mall. Crush them. Let Felix's younger brothers know that she'll pay them to shovel the driveway and sidewalk. Have her meetings rescheduled again. She could phone conference the more important ones from her home office. Remember to sign off on her secretary's Christmas bonus. Henry's class was having a party for. . .Valentine's Day.
Regina pinched the bridge of her nose. Don't think about it. Don't. But how was she not supposed to? Emma said she would be home for Valentine's Day, some fool's prank—No. She wasn't a fool—some prank to surprise her during the holidays. Emma was mischievous like that, but so kind-hearted. Regina paused. Is. Is like that. She's not dead. There wasn't a body. She's just, just not here at the moment.
She scoffed bitterly. A female soldier captured. On the nights when sleep absolutely refused to come to Regina she had sat up and researched testimonies from prisoners of war. Torture. Humiliation. Beheading. And that was just from the men.
She swallowed the bile rising in her throat and squeezed her eyes shut tight. Emma was fine. She was fine. She'd be fine.
"Mommy?"
Regina picked her forehead off her knee and smiled weakly at her son. His eyebrows knit in concentration and just the tiniest hint of oatmeal saved on the corner of his lip. She placed her coffee, now cold, on the floor beside them and used her free hand to wipe away his breakfast. "Yes, darling?"
He held up Rexy and Mrs. up to her face and stuffed them under her neck in a big hug before climbing into her lap. "Are you sad, Mommy?"
Guilt flooded through her as her eyes slowly shut in a silent scolding. She opened them, pressing a kiss to his cheeks and hugging him tightly. Four-years old and he was already so perceptive. He was practically five. Five years since this little tiny baby was placed in her arms and now here he was staring worriedly up at her as she struggled not to cry. Her little prince was getting so big.
Stop growing up, Emma had once said. She couldn't have agreed more.
Regina snuggled against him again and carried him and his friends up the stairs. It was time.
"Mommy?" He asked again as they entered her bedroom.
"I have something for you," she said quietly, gently placing him on the corner of the bed and retreating to her closet where the bag of Emma's belongings lay hidden.
She hadn't been able to look through it thirty-two days ago, and even still it lay untouched at the bottom of her closet. But Rex stuck out of the bag, a habit of Regina's since Henry had enforced in her that his toys needed to be able to breathe. Thankfully she didn't have to dig through much to get the dinosaur, actively turning her head away when the gloss of a photograph skimmed her pinky. Fingers clutched around the plush, she held it behind her back and turned to face Henry.
"Whatcha got there?" Henry asked excitedly, craning his head for a peak behind her back.
She smiled softly and sat beside him, all the while keeping the toy out of sight. She produced it, and the way Henry's eyes widened and his mouth parted in stunned happiness made her heart stop aching for just a little bit. He grabbed at Rex and held him so tight to his chest that stuffing surely could have come out him. "Rex is home!" Henry announced, hopping up onto his feet and jumping up and down. "Rex is home!"
He giggled, holding the t-rex by its tiny arms and jumping in a circle, the plush toys at his feet bouncing forgotten. Suddenly remembering the other two members of the Rex family, Henry abruptly sat on his bottom and scooped Rexy and Mrs. into his arms and hugged them all, a content smile on his face, his eyes blissfully closed as he cuddled in absolute ignorance.
"Look, this is Mrs. Rex," he introduced the female dinosaur to the newly returned male one. "She missed you!"
He made the dinosaurs hug before sneaking the baby toy into the middle and put on a high pitched voice. "My turn! My turn!"
A chorus of kissing noises came the reunited dinosaur family as Henry puppeteered happily. Regina stretched out on her side, holding up Mrs. Rex since Henry's tiny hands could only hold so many toys and made kissing noises to both the baby and her husband.
Continuing in his Rexy voice, Henry used the smaller dinosaur to talk with the bigger one in both hands. "Daddy, did you have fun with Emma?"
Henry deepened his voice. "We had so much fun, little baby."
Then Henry looked up at his mother with a tilt to his head. "Can Emma play?"
And the other shoe dropped as her clever little boy pieced together the fact that Rex was here but Emma was not. Regina averted her eyes briefly, placing the toy in her hand down as she pushed herself up. "Sweetheart, I have to tell you something."
"'Kay." He continued playing, half his attention on bouncing his toys up and down as they moved across the bed while he glanced up every so often at his mother to show he was listening.
Regina took a deep breath and sat cross-legged, extending her hand to Henry who stopped his playing and crawled into his mother's lap so that he straddled her. He cupped her cheeks and locked their eyes in an adorable gesture saying she had his full attention.