This honestly couldn't have come as a surprise. Who wasn't inspired by that scene with them on the opposite ends of the couch like a couple in counseling? I was immediately so here we are: another fic. I promise to update everything else I just have to get this out there and it's all my beta/coauthor's fault.

Speaking of...this brilliant idea of a story will be coauthored by the infamous Withgirl.

Happy reading and let me know what you think.

The brunette studied her phone screen as she expertly poured Emma and herself glasses of wine. She frowned at the screen for a moment and then turned it off with a sigh. She sat the phone down on the counter and glanced over her shoulder to check that no one was coming. Just for all the stress work had given her she downed her glass before refilling it again and made her way back to the dining room.

Right before she made it to the door, she heard the distinct sound of giggling and clapping. At first she frowned slightly but then grinned watching the spoon float around Tamsin's head.

She looked to the happy child and then over to her wife who was concentrating on her task. Her eyes were squinted and her tongue poke out from between her lips. Regina chuckled silently before setting the wine down on the table and grabbing the blonde's glasses. She walked over behind Emma's chair and placed them on her face. The blonde only pushed them up her nose as Regina kissed her hair.

"I don't get it," Henry frowned watching his brunette mother sit down.

"Get what, dear?" Regina asked continuing her food from the pause she took in the kitchen.

"Why is that so funny?" he questioned gesturing over to Emma and Tamsin.

"Sweetheart you know they're both silly children," Regina replied and Emma immediately snapped to her with a grimace.

"I am not," she frowned causing the spoon to drop and the five-year-old shoulders slumped in disappointment.

"No magic, mommy," Tamsin whimpered, grabbing the spoon and pushing it in her blonde mother's direction.

"One second baby," Emma said looking at Regina's smirk, "Did you just call me a child?"

"I believe that's exactly what I said, dear."

"You don't say that when the lights go off."

"Ew," Henry said scrunching up his nose. Because Tamsin either mimicked everything Emma or Henry did more often than Regina, the girl scrunched up her nose as well, sticking her tongue to add to the look. She had no clue what was going on really and she didn't really care so as long as it had nothing to do with the lack of magic in her spoon. She had very little concept of magic at her age since Emma frequently showed her the trick but never quite understood how it worked. Regina lightheartedly rolled her eyes at the pair.

"Mommy, 'poon," Tamsin said tugging Emma's shirtsleeve persistently.

The blonde to her carbon copy and took the spoon from her hand made it float again. The little blonde clapped happily at the resuming of the trick. Emma kept a close eye on it before turning back to her seemingly impressed wife and gave her a shit eating grin.

"Emma as cute as your little trick is, there's a certain little blonde who needs to eat her dinner before it gets cold," Regina said purposely looking over to Tamsin who grabbed her floating utensil and pouted at she grumpily shoveled peas into her mouth. Henry chuckled at the scowl.

"She looks like Ma when she does that," he said.

"I know," Regina grinned before schooling her feature and shooting the little blonde a look. "Don't give me that look young lady."

"Sorry, mama," she replied looking shamefaced.

"Oh come on Regina," Emma said leaning over and pulling the girl out of her seat and onto her lap. "It's Friday and you've already got us eating meatloaf and vegetables instead of…" she put her hands over the little girl's ear's and said in a whisper, "Pizza."

"I'd like us to not have greasy foods so often because I have three children who I wouldn't want to get their arteries clogged with French fries and bearclaws."
Emma just rolled her eyes as Tamsin pushed her hands away from her ears and started to stick her finger in her mother's food. Emma deflated watching the little finger scoop up mash potatoes but it was worth it to see her wife cringe.

"Well, she's done anyway…everyone is done. Let's get going," the blonde said standing up from her seat and putting her daughter on her hip. "Henry go pick a movie, I'll go get Tamsin in the bath, and we'll have movie time."

"Emma. Dishes?" Regina asked raising an eyebrow as she sipped the last of her wine.

"Yeah, I know…after the movie," she said looking away from her wife. The brunette got up from the table and grabbed Tamsin from the blonde.

"I'll take Tamsin, while you get the dishes now." Emma started to protest but was silenced by Regina kissing her softly before retreating up the stairs. Henry walked passed her chuckling as he went to go find a movie.

"Yeah, yeah laugh it up," the blonde grumbled beginning to collect the plates, attempting to avoid the sticky mess that was Tamsin's spot at the table. As she filled the left side of the sink with water, however, she heard a splash above her head. Soon after an adorable giggle sounded through the house. Emma bit the inside of her cheek trying not to laugh at the obvious fact that the sound indicated that their daughter was giving her brunette mother a hard time.

"Tamsin!" Regina yelled as the sound of little feet skittered around the floorboards above her.

"'I'll take Tamsin'," Emma said copying her wife's previous words and outwardly laughing to herself.

Six months later...

Regina stood in the kitchen and rolled her eyes once again, clutching the phone closer to her ear out of frustration.

"This is not important enough to take me away from my family dear," she finally said, interrupting her assistant's incessant babble. "I will deal with this in the morning."

Without waiting for a reply, she hung up and made her way back to the dining room. As soon as she got close, she heard someone clapping in glee and furrowed her brow instantly and walked quicker into the room. She clenched her jaw as soon as she saw a fork hovering around her daughter's head. Looking over at her wife, she narrowed her eyes at her and the fork fell back to the table, causing Tamsin to frown and whimper in disappointment.

"Why no magic?" the five year old cried as she grabbed the fork and inspected it.

Henry looked from his sister to each of his mothers, before he nudged her and whispered, "Just eat, Tammy."

The girl looked thoroughly confused and looked over to her blonde mother, she hadn't seen her in so long and she seemed perfectly normal, even if her hair was different and she was generally paler. But at the same time, she could see a difference in the way that other people treated her, almost as if they were afraid of her.

"What are you doing?" Regina asked lowly. The newest Dark One sighed and leaned her head on her hand, she had hoped that this dinner would actually go well.

"Tamsin asked me to show her a spell, I used to do it all of the time," the blonde shot back.

"That was very different," Regina breathed.

Henry bit his lip and looked at his little sister again, he was sure that this was not something that she should see, but before he could attempt to move, his mother was already far too focused on her tirade.

"How is it any different? It was just a floating fork, Regina," Emma replied, slowly raising from her seat to stare down her wife.

"Do you not understand your…situation?"

"Situation?" the blonde laughed incredulously, "Situation, Regina? Just say it...I'm the Dark One!"

Tamsin tugged Henry's sleeve, clearly frightened by her mother's title. Though she didn't fully understand the implications, she knew that it meant something bad. She had asked Henry what it meant while she was waiting for the former savior to come home, but he had just said that she couldn't understand.

"So that means you understand my point," Regina replied, her voice gradually coming up in volume.

"It. Was. A. Fork!" Emma shouted, no longer able to control her anger in the way that she once had been able to. "I was showing Tamsin a simple magic trick."

"With dark magic!"

"You don't think that I can control myself?!"

"I know you can't!" Regina finally shouted back.

Emma's mouth fell open and after a moment, she disappeared in a cloud of black smoke. Silence fell over the room and Regina sighed heavily, looking at the floor. Her head soon snapped up, however, to the sound on crying and she saw her clearly distressed daughter letting out heaving sobs. As quickly as possible, she made her way around the table and made to pick up the little blonde, but instead, Tamsin threw herself into Henry's arms.

"Tamsin…" Regina tried, somewhat desperately.

"No!" the girl snapped through her tears, "You made mommy go away again."

The brunette looked up at Henry, who offered her a sympathetic, understanding look. Though she would have craved that expression years ago, it didn't help the current situation, or the sorry state that her marriage was currently in.

"I know, baby," she sighed, "She'll come back…I promise."

Tamsin refused to turn to look at her and Henry brought his arms around her and stood from his chair.

"How about an extra-long bed-time story?" the teen whispered as he ran his fingers softly through her long locks. Brown eyes looked back at him, she seemed to have calmed down marginally and finally nodded.

Henry was about to walk away, before he thought better of it and turned back to Regina, "You know, I think that both of you have to try harder to make this work."

Regina was about to protest, before she just looked down and nodded whispered, "I know."

With that, she felt a soft kiss to her cheek from Henry, during which, Tamsin briefly leaned against her brunette mother. But a moment later, she found herself alone, surrounded by yet another unfinished family dinner.

Regina felt a particular heavy breeze run across her face and she rolled her eyes as she continued to trek through the forest. This was not how she had wanted to spend the night.

She was sure that this would finally be the night that she and Emma could be civil to each other, but the sight of Emma using such dark magic, not matter how innocent the intention, had just struck a chord. In that moment, all she could think about was the numerous spells that her own mother had cast during her youth and the number of times that she wished her father would have the courage to do something about it.

She now realized that she was being irrational, but still had no intention of apologizing to the blonde, as petulant as it was, she didn't see why the woman deserved it after the rift she had caused in their once perfect family.

Finally, she entered a clearing where Emma had taken her camping. Not that she would ever admit it, but it wasn't the worst honeymoon in the world, and in the sheriff's defense, leaving town was not exactly an option.

Her heels crunched over the leaves and she zeroed in on the blonde sitting cross legged exactly where their tent had been pitched that night.

"This is not what I wanted to be doing tonight, Emma," she sighed. The Dark One looked up and rolled her eyes at her wife, pushing herself off the ground, she turned away from her so that she couldn't see just how close to tears she was.

"You could have just commanded me to come home," she snapped while running her hand across her face and then turning back to face the former Evil Queen.

"I would rather have not had yet another argument in the same house as our children."

"So you would rather argue in the forest?" the blonde shot back.

"No," Regina replied with an exasperated sigh, "I don't want to argue, I want everything to go back to how it was. I want my wife back!"

"I am your fucking wife, Regina, I just have a little more power than I did before."

"I wonder if Rumple ever said something similar to Belle," the mayor said mockingly.

"Are you seriously comparing me to him?! All I did was take some time alone, he sent his son through a portal because he couldn't take the idea of being without magic!"

"Are you telling me that there was a choice between Tamsin and your magic that the choice would be easy?"

There was a silence and Regina's eyes widened, she had been half joking. Emma looked at her facial expression and held up her hands, "Of course I would choose Tamsin."

"Assuming that the moment of hesitation hadn't already sealed her fate!"

The blonde looked down at the ground in shame and Regina felt anger flood her system, "You claim to be the same old Emma, but the savior we all knew would have given her life for even her worst enemy. Now you have to think about whether or not you would give anything for your own child!"

The blonde swallowed hard, she wished she could explain exactly what was going on inside her head, but she just didn't feel like it would help. She didn't feel like Regina would be willing to listen.

"I am Emma, I'm fucking sick and tired of being defined as 'the saviour' or 'the Dark One', why can't I be both?!"

"Because you just can't," Regina shouted.

"You get to be a hero and the Evil Queen, you complained about everything be so black and white in this town, but you're being a hypocrite right now, Regina."

As she spoke, Emma came towards to her wife, but before she could invade her personal space as she had planned, her steps faltered and she scowled as she watched Regina pull the dagger out from the inside of her coat.

"I gave you that as a precaution, not so you could control me whenever you wanted," the blonde said in a low voice. Regina sighed and allowed her arm to drop, freeing the former savior, though she made no attempt to step any closer.

"We need to stop this," she sighed.

Emma nodded her agreement but continued to stare at the ground.

"I called Archie…" Regina continued.

The blonde's eyebrows shot up and she held up her hands, "No fucking way, Regina."

The brunette winced at her reaction, she had expected it but she had hoped that she might be an adult for once in her life.

"We cannot continue to act this way in front of Tamsin and Henry."

"You know that I don't like…"

Regina held up her hand to cut her off and said, "Nobody likes therapy, Emma, but the fact remains that we need it."

"You can't force me there against my will," Emma said petulantly while crossing her arms.

The mayor huffed and raised the dagger, "Actually I can. I command you to be at Archie's office at precisely midday tomorrow."

Emma rolled her eyes and sat back on the floor, "Well when you put it like that, I'm pretty convinced," she mumbled.

Regina stood awkwardly for a moment, she could hardly deny that she felt bad for what she had just done, but it was necessary if she wanted to get her happy ending back. She opened her mouth to say something else, but Emma cut her off as she said, "I'll be there, now can you please leave me alone?"

The brunette sighed and nodded, purple smoke bellowed around her and she found herself in her bedroom. For a second, she looked at the bed, staring intently at Emma's side. With a huff, she grabbed a pillow and proceeded to go downstairs to place it on the couch.

Archie eyed the two women on the couch across from him. He wasn't exactly sure why but everyone in town recommended they come to him. He wasn't sure how this was supposed to work but he tried anyway. He didn't actually know what the problem was other than the obvious.

"So, can you tell me why you think you're here?" He asked, slowly observing the way they chose to seat themselves.
Regina was on one end. Emma was on the other.

Regina had one leg over the other with her hands in her lap pushing herself against the arm of the couch to keep her distance from the other woman. Emma had one leg over the other as well but had one arm across the back of the couch with the other, bent at the elbow and her chin resting on her knuckles. He tilted his head at the observation. It seemed Emma was the one trying to fill the space between them.

"Is it not obvious?" Regina frowned.

"It's better to get things out even if we all know what the problem is. Although in this case I don't actually know what the main problem is," Archie said.

"We're here because she's the Dark One."

"I haven't done anything wrong," Emma replied looking over to the brunette.

"Other than being the Dark One?"

"I was trying to save you, Regina."

"Does that make you angry?" Archie asked Regina. The brunette tightened her jaw and adjusted herself on the couch. Emma turned to her to hear the answer as well. Regina had never actually said that she was angry but after the past few days it was evident that she had to be upset.

"Yes, no one asked you to take in the darkness."

"What did you want me to do? Stand by and just watch it take you?"

"I…I don't know but there could've been another way."

"Not a way that could be accomplished in the three seconds we had. So technically you can't blame me for thinking about saving my wife in the moment, it's not like I have some malicious intention from doing what I did."

"At least being the Dark One gave you a bigger vocabulary," Regina chuckled mockingly.

Emma glared at the woman and then turned to Archie, "I'm not the reason we're here. She is."

"Why do you think so?" Archie asked as he finished writing down his conclusions from their back and forth. They didn't have their usual tension.

"Why? Do you not see her? She's been doing this ever since it happened."

"How dare you?" Regina snapped.

"It's true."

"So what are you saying?" Archie questioned hoping fireballs weren't about to be thrown.

"No…it's not-" Emma sighed. "I don't know…"

"You don't know?" The brunette turned to her wife with an arched eyebrow and an unamused look on her face.

"Well, maybe I think you don't trust me. You commanded me to be here for Christ's sake!"

"Well considering you disappeared with the intention of pushing everyone away instead of asking for help when this first happened, I'd say it was the other way around. I'm your wife, Emma. There is a job that comes with marriage and I had every intention to stick to my word when I promised to help you through anything," Regina said looking at her wife intently.

"I thought it was what was best for our family. I thought that if I didn't put you in danger, if I wasn't tempted to do anything wrong that I could better control it."

"But…?" Archie urged her to continue.

"I didn't have my parents or the kids there to give me hope or you to tell me I was…being stupid."

"Fine. You are and were being stupid and irrational. Is that better?"

Emma narrowed her eyes at her wife, "That's not what I meant, Regina. Are you honestly still mad about that?"

"Oh, is that something I'm just supposed to get over Emma? You abandoned your children."

"I-"

"I sense there's a lot of miscommunication going on here. How long has this been happening?" Archie asked writing on his notepad.

"About two days after she decided to comeback home," Regina answered quickly. She exchanged a look with Emma before turning back Archie.

"Anything significant happen in that time?"

"Family dinner."

"Does that not happen often?"

"It happens every evening. This dinner in particular involved a shouting match between myself and Emma in front of the children."

"And this moment has created the rift we have now?"

"Partly."

"What was it about?"

"She decided to practice dark magic while sitting next to Tamsin…"

"It. Was. A. Fork!"

Archie held up his hand before Regina could retort and tried to move the conversation along, "and what happened after the argument?"

"She abandoned our children once again. "

Emma narrowed her eyes at the brunette and said, "I needed time to think, you know full well that I was coming back."

"Tamsin didn't!"

Emma just rolled her eyes and Regina crossed her arms and huffed.

Archie watched as they each looked away and blinked a couple of times, he didn't know that much about the way they acted in private, but considering that the mansion had yet to be set up in flames of anger, he guessed that they were at least able to communicate better than they were in this moment. After the moment of silence stretched on for thirty seconds, he finally decided to break it with a plan of action:

"Might I suggest gathering a small list of problems you each think needs to be handled and we can discuss during next Thursday's session."

"We will. Right, Emma?"

"Yes, I suppose," the blonde said uncertainly.

"Thank you for seeing us Dr. Hopper," Regina nodded standing up from the couch and grabbing her purse. Emma watched her stride to the door. "Come along, dear. We have errands to run."

"As you wish, your majesty," the blonde said grabbing her coat and following her wife and Archie to the door. Regina left down the hallway and the man stopped Emma just outside the door.

"Emma, if you ever need to see me, just yourself, that'd also be beneficial to working through your problems…as the Dark One."

"Thank you, Archie. I'll consider it," she mustered her best Emma Swan smile before leaving down the hall. She made it down to the first floor in silence and met Regina outside.

"Well that was pointless…I don't need therapy, Madame Mayor."

"At least I'm admitting that we need help. Now are you going to magic yourself away or are you going to endure the silence of sitting in the car?"

"Despite what you may think I still love you. I want to ask you for your help but it's difficult. I just don't want to hurt anybody, you know that."

"I never said I doubted your love for me. As you said yourself, Emma, you need me to tell you when you're being stupid. You're not going to hurt me."

"I think I'll bear the silence with you…If you're making lasagna for dinner."

"Really, Emma? You getting in the car is based upon what I'm cooking for dinner?"

"Is that a problem?"

Regina rolled her eyes affectionately and got in the driver's seat. Emma followed her lead, "You don't have to."

"I know I don't. Even as the Dark One, you still have Emma Swan's appetite."

"That's what you shouldn't have expected to change."

"Trust me, dear, I didn't expect that at all."

Let me know if you want more.