It was funny. All that time as Tilly and Alice's phone message was still the one, she'd recorded before the curse. How she had managed to keep it would have to wait to be asked until the woman in question would actually answer when Robin would try and call her.

"Sorry whoever this is, but either I can't pick up for work-related reasons, I'm on a date night with my amazing girlfriend or I've just let my magic calling box lose power again."

Robin's heart breaks into even smaller pieces regardless of how many times she'd listened to this message while she was treated to the recorded music that was her true love's laughter at her own raspy mew of "Cell phone…called a cell phone….Just have them leave a message and you'll call them later"

"You hear her, thanks Nobin." Alice's cheery voice giggles when she'd manages to contain herself enough to finish her message.

"Don't call me that."

Then it clicks over for the requested recording or that was what Robin was hoping for except this time it was a recording telling her the box was already full.

Robin almost hurls her phone away as hard and as far as she could at the mechanical voice in her ear, but for some reason, she doesn't instead she shoves her phone back into her jacket pocket as she yanks the dinner door out of her way just in time to hear Ruby's cheery tones announce the latest order.

"One super banana split hold the banana with extra everything else, one double burger combo side of rings and a large hot chocolate, one kid mac 'n cheese side of apple slices and small chocolate milk all to go."

Her head immediately jerks up hopeful even as her body drops into the booth as far from everyone else as she could get.

Granny's ice cream Sundays had quickly become a staple for whenever Alice was having one of her bad days as soon as they decided to simi settle in her old hometown of Storybrooke.

Maybe?

"Thanks again Rubs." Emma's soft tones answered as Robin drops her eyes to the tabletop defeated only to glance up through her lashes seconds later when the sound of the sheriff's footsteps drew closer.

Robin knew her window to get in a word with Alice's stepmother was rapidly closing but she couldn't make herself move once Emma's eyes land on her on her way to the door. The archer recoils at the ice she finds in the gaze.

Seven long torturous days had passed since that disastrous night Robin had rejected the woman Emma had come to think of as a kind of second daughter. Each one finding the Savior making it her personal mission in making sure Robin stayed well away.

If only Robin could make her understand the only reason, she said no to Alice was because she also wanted to propose.

"Rogers asked me to meet him." Was all she could think of to say under the Savior's chilling gaze her voice a cracked squeak. Emma's answer, however, was drowned by the shrieking cries currently coming thought the door.

Robin's heart hammered against her ribs as her eyes locked on that unmistakable mess of blonde locks storming into the dinner with an apologetic little smile. "I'm sorry Ems but she won't stop." Alice was saying trying to contain the wriggling screaming toddler in her arms currently reaching out as far as she could from the safety of Alice's arms toward her mother.

It should be counted as a record how quickly Emma swopped out the food and drinks she was carrying for her daughter. Hope calming the second she was in her mother's arms. Her little head nestled against Emma's leather jacket clade shoulder her hands fisted in a few of Emma's long locks, yet her eyes are on Robin.

Curious and warry.

The watching archer warms whilst Alice exchanges a few giggled words with Red then a few more with Dorothy when her mother's ex enemy comes out of the back balancing two trays of food on each arm.

Later she would facepalm at the textbook lovestruck feeling blinding her to the danger of the scene but right now Robin was so hypnotized by the beauty in front of her that she didn't think to warn Alice when Dorothy's fur ball of energy was darts out of the back at Dorothy's heels.

Robin's name a whisper on her lips as an avalanche of emotions flicker across her face the second Alice's eyes find her own. The dazed archer whispering Alice's back to her just as softly finding it difficult to keep from simply dropping to her knees and begging the woman she loved to give her another chance.

Lucky for her fate seemed to give Alice a little push in her direction.

As the more danger predictive side of Robin's mind predicted Alice ended up tripping over Dorothy's ever-present dog when Toto suddenly swerved for a new direction whilst under the distracted blonde's feet the second Alice had chosen to make her feet move in Robin's direction.

Alice doesn't know how she keeps her tears away at the feel of those familiar arms once again pulling her away from disaster. The fact that doing so also spins her into the chest of the woman that had so completely broken her heart was a matter for when she could think properly again. They are even harder to hold back when Robin's trembling arms fall away almost as quickly as they'd closed around her once she'd regained enough balance to stand unaided.

Surprise flashes across her archer's face when Alice's hands fist in the front of her shirt holding her closer than Robin thought she would be allowed. Breath mingling and nether able to speak from hurt or nerves the two stayed like that far longer than they should just rememorizing how beautiful the other eyes were up close as they stand in the middle of what everyone in town jokingly called 'the heart of Storybrooke.'

An impatient whine of "Issy." Seems to break the spell and has Alice's eyes turning to the grumpy faced toddler reaching out to the pair.

"Yeah, she talks now." Alice murmurs in answer to Robin's surprised expression as Alice moves away to take her 'little sister' back into her arms.

"Issy." Hope coos nuzzling her face against Alice's shoulder only for her eyes to harden the instant they land on Robin. "G way." The toddler ordered with as much authority as her little voice could muster up.

'Is everyone against me?' Robin sighed and going by the guilty look Alice was giving her the blonde at her side knew what she was thinking. 'Please please please marry me.' She tried just in case the girl she loved really could read her thoughts in just a glance. Too bad Alice wasn't looking her way anymore so she couldn't properly test her theory.

"Hope. You don't mean that." Alice sighs resting a hand on the toddlers back. "You know you don't really want her to go away." She translated. A translation that had the first embers of possible hope blooming in the listening archer's chest.

Was that just Alice repeating the little one's words into a more understandable sentence or did she really mean them herself?

The toddler shakes her head meeting Alice's pained look with a determined one of her own. If Robin wasn't so broken up about yet another person in Storybrooke turning against her she would have cooed at how adorable the scene was.

"Her hurted issy." Hope snapped redirecting Robin's gaze toward her instead of the golden-haired angel who was currently holding her once more while Emma takes a phone call. "G way."

"I didn't mean to hurt your sister Hope."

"Di Hu." The toddler throws back her hands fisting as tightly as she could hold in the shoulders of Alice's shirt.

How had it come to this?

That she Robin Mills daughter of one of the most wackily feared sorceresses in all of the UR and the namesake of the most legendary of archers and thieves know to anyone in the whole of the United Realms arguing with a toddler in the middle of a diner for permission to talk with her true love.

The woman who's heart she'd so unintentionally shattered when she'd turned down her proposal.

"No, I didn't. God why can't anyone see that." The exhausted woman snarls raking her hands in her hair as her eyes cast around looking at everything and nothing all at once. "Look the only reason I said no that night was because I wanted to be the one to ask her to marry me, but she beat me to the punch and asked first." She hadn't meant to just announce her intention so publicly, but she didn't know what else to do. Everyone was against her and Alice wouldn't even look her in the eye for longer than a few precious seconds.

Angry tears sting Robin's eyes while the diner lets out a collective gasp at the news. She doesn't move to wipe them away when they do start to fall only dropping her head to hide behind her hair instead as she drops back into the booth, she'd clamed in the corner.

"Issy Dow, Peas."

Alice doesn't move some in the vicinity doubt she's even breathing anymore from the shock as Emma steps up to gently pry her daughter from the other woman's grip and set her on her own feet.

Mother guiding Alice into a nearby chair before she collapses while the rest of the diner watches as her youngest daughter walks on shaking but determined steps toward Robin.

"Up." She asks as only a toddler could while she pats the open space beside the woman huddled up beside the wall with her head on her arms. It takes three more tries for Hope's request to be answered. It would have been only two, but the little girl had snapped at the closest offer of hands with a huffed "No want her." as she pointed toward a yet to move Robin Mills trying to hide in the corner of the booth.

Given her rather hostile welcome Robin was surprised when Hope chooses to crawl into her lap once she had been set onto the seat. "Hi." Robin cracks a pained hint of a smile at the shy greeting once she was sure the toddler was secure. "Hi." She parrots How she wasn't cracking up in laughter at the serious expression on the younger girl's face once the pleasantries were out of the way was a complete surprise given how adorable it was.

"You love issy?"

Robin doesn't hesitate in her answer, but it doesn't take everything in her to keep her eyes on Hope's and not the soft ocean colored ones she was talking about sitting just a few tables away from them. "I wouldn't be trying to ask her to marry me if I didn't."

Apparently, that wasn't a clear enough answer for the toddler in her lap because Hope repeats her question with an even more disbelieving expression. "You loves issy?"

"Yes."

The answer comes with an echo.

One from Robin and another from Alice.

It's the second confirmation that has Robin's eyes casting upwards to hold the soft ocean blue she'd loves and had missed so much in her separation. Seems the week apart has also dulled the archer's abilities to catch her girlfriend when she was being sneaky.

"Yes," Alice repeats while Emma slides in long enough to tug her now grumpy daughter out of Robin's arms. "My answer." She clarifies when Robin can only blink in soft confusion "It's yes."