Disclaimer: I own no part of Once Upon a Time.

A Year and a Day

- By MegannRosemary

The First Year

She had enough.

She had enough to leave.

Enough to not be alone.

Enough to share the bright light in her life with someone.

Someone from here, or rather from there.

A new page, a clean slate.

She shuffled through the items, calculated the amount of magic that resided in them.

She'd brought more than enough with her.

This would work.

In the room beneath her father's casket, she raised her face to the sky miles above her and smiled freely.

Planning carefully, she removed the bare minimum with enough magic to keep her safe outside the town line and to change a woman's memories.

Once her signal returned above ground she dialed Graham at the station. "I need you to watch over Henry this weekend."

"Of course."

Of course he said yes, he had no choice.

It was late evening when she stepped off the plane.

The first thing she did was call Graham to ensure her newly one year old son was safe.

Then she was caught with a decision, to seek out the woman named Emma Swan that very evening or wait until morning.

She hated to waste a single second of the precious time she'd bought for herself outside of the town lines, her magical resources were limited

A split second decision and she decided that morning would do.

She needed a good night's sleep and a shower to make a good impression.

This woman could be a twenty dollar hooker for all she knew and a shower would hardly make a difference. However, her pride demanded it.

The young woman at least had a roof over her head, she knew that much, so that was something.

She called out for a taxi that whisked her away to her comfortable and clean upscale hotel room.

She smoothed her skirt and fluffed her hair one last time before raising her hand to knock at the door, balancing the tray of coffees in the other hand.

It was several minutes before the door opened.

Attraction.

Raw attraction.

Connection.

Body and soul connection.

The first few seconds she stared.

The young woman was dressed in a simple white tank and tiny black panties.

Her hair fell in messy blonde curls to her waist.

She was breathtakingly beautiful.

She was incredibly sexy.

"I hope you have a better reason to wake me up at nine AM on a Saturday than to stare at me."

She forced her mind to string words together. "I brought you coffee."

Words yes, but not the right ones.

Emma reached for one, taking a big gulp before pertly sticking out a pink tongue when the hot liquid scalded it. "Thanks, but uh, who are you?"

"Regina. Regina Mills."

Emma took her hand in her own, shaking it loosely and studying the brunette. "Nice to meet you Regina Mills, what can I do for you?"

Regina took a deep breath before she began, "You're my son's birth mother."

Emma turned away, prepared to slam the door in her face.

Regina stopped the door from swinging shut, "Wait please."

"It was a closed adoption, I don't want to talk to you."

Regina pulled a picture from her purse, "Here he is, I... I just wanted you to have it. If it was my son I know I'd be curious. My phone number is on the back if you want to call me. I'm here until tomorrow."

Emma glared at the photo with a combination of longing and fear. "What makes you think I care, I gave him away for a reason."

"You care, otherwise you wouldn't be so angry. You gave him away because you care." Regina surprised herself, coming just now to understand the woman she had often cursed so late at night for giving up her son, for being so heartless.

With that, Emma snatched the photo from her hand and closed the door firmly.

Regina made her way down the steps, taking a sip of her coffee.

It was a step.

A big step.

She'd been able to share her son, though she longed for more, this would do.

The call came later that afternoon.

A small voice speaking over a crashing, babbling background noise.

"I'm working at the dinner on Seagull. There's a pie on the sign. You can't miss it."

Then silence.

She'd hung up.

Regina found the place without difficulty, the blonde was right, you couldn't miss it.

A hostess dressed in a putrid yellow uniform greeted her cheerily at the front door.

"I'm looking for Emma Swan."

"She's there at the counter, feel free to have a seat."

Regina sank down on the cracked pleather barstool, resisting the urge to wipe it off before she sat down.

"Hello Emma," Regina spoke carefully as if not to scare the young woman away.

"Can I get you anything?"

The blonde looked perky and cute in a white tennis skit and white t-shirt that hosted the diner's logo and with her hair pulled into a tight ponytail.

"What do you recommend?" Regina studied the slightly sticky menu.

"Hot chocolate and French toast," Emma spoke surely, confidently.

"It's the middle of the afternoon."

The blonde shrugged, "You asked."

Regina nodded, "Alright then. Hot chocolate and French toast."

Emma left her alone until she brought the food. French toast sprinkled with raspberries and powered white sugar accompanied by a steaming mug of hot chocolate with whipped cream.

"Here," She waited patiently, her eyes urging Regina to dig in.

The brunette took a small bite and an equally small sip of her hot chocolate. "Cinnamon?"She asked, nodding at the coco coloured powder sprinkled over top of the cream.

"Yeah, it's a little quirk of mine. The customers like it," Emma's flashing emerald eyes challenged her to disagree.

Regina smiled softly, enjoying the strong willed passion in the woman before her, even for something like cinnamon covered hot chocolate. "It's interesting, thank you."

She ate quietly and slowly, letting the blonde come to her.

Halfway through her second piece of sourdough French toast the girl blurted, "Can he talk yet?"

The iron fist around her heart melted away into molten happiness, "He doesn't have any words just yet, but he is fond of animal sounds. He loves to say 'woof woof' and will make that sound for just about any animal you ask."

"You have a dog?"

"No, we don't, but a family friend has one. A Dalmatian named Pongo."

"Saaaay," Emma grinned, "Like 101 Dalmatians."

"It would seem," The brunette's smile didn't quite reach her eyes.

It broke the ice for the girl and she was back and forth between customers to ask question after question, "Does he walk?"

"Again not quite, he holds onto things and can make his way around."

"Does he get into trouble?"

"He's a very active boy, but he's very well behaved."

"Wow." Emma smiled tightly, "Guess he doesn't get that from me...or his father."

Regina saw a great depth of pain behind the young woman's eyes and wished she knew her better so that she might ask.

The blonde hurried away, making a round through the diner to fill coffee mugs. When she returned she asked, "Does Henry have a father? Now I mean?"

"No, he doesn't it's just me."

"But the man with the dog, they're close?"

"Yes, they get along quite well. The town sheriff is also a close family friend."

Emma hummed thoughtfully, "Alright."

As the dinner crowd came and went Emma disappeared, rushing and barking orders behind the counter.

Regina enjoyed a cup of coffee this time, and studied the strong young woman. She'd been all wrong about her, her less than stellar reputation on paper meant nothing now. She'd made mistakes in her life , but from the looks of it she was trying to make right by some of them.

In the late evening, a single table remained, an older man sipping a beer and eating a piece of pie.

In the quiet of the dinner, Emma hopped up on a stool beside her and asked softly, "Tell me about him?"

"You've been asking questions all afternoon."

"But those are just facts, I want you to tell me about him," She pleaded.

Regina began, her voice softening to the lilting tone she took when she read bedtime stories to Henry and had Emma leaning in closer with her chin propped in her hand. The words flowed out of her, "He always knows when I'm upset, every since he was about three months old he's been able to tell or at least show me. If I pick him up, he knows, and he puts his little hand to my cheek. Now sometimes, he'll come to me so I'll pick him up. He puts his little hand to my cheek and buries his head in my shoulder."

Tears sprang to pale green eyes, "His superpower," she murmured.

"What?"

"I guess I have something similar, I call it my super power.

Regina smiled softly, "I suppose it's rather like a superpower." The words were foreign on her tongue, very much something from this world. Coming from the boy's biological mother, they seemed right.

"Cool," Emma pulled the tie from her hair, letting it cascade over her shoulders. "Does he slobber?" She asked, moving on.

"Sometimes, yes he does."

"Is it gross?" She wrinkled her nose.

"Sometimes, but I don't mind." The brunette smiled at the memory of the sloppy kiss he'd pressed to her cheek before she left.

"I guess that makes you a mother." Emma fiddled shyly with the pen hooked on her pocket.

"I guess so Miss Swan."

"Tell me more," She looked up with confidence now, eagerly awaiting more stories with eyes shining with longing and delight.

"Please."

"Please what?"

"You should say please when you ask something."

"Oh wow ok cool, Tell me more please." She fluttered her eyelashes with playful exaggeration.

"When he first came to me he was three weeks old. He smiled up at me with the brightest blue eyes you've ever seen..."

They continued chatting long into the night, long after Emma had closed the dinner and the traffic had quieted.

At last, she stretched and yawned, exposing a smooth flat stomach. "Thanks for coming Regina."

"Thank you," Regina stressed, "I so longed to share him with someone, with you."

"I hope you don't expect me to come you know visit him or anything, this hasn't changed anything." Emma's words were firm.

"Of course not dear, I only wanted you to know." It was better this way, she told herself.

"I appreciate it." She hopped of the car stool, her legs stiff from sitting for so long. "I guess this is it."

"This is it," Regina agreed sadly. She'd felt warm and whole for the first time since, well the first time ever. Talking with this young woman, sharing their son, this is what she needed to fill her life and make it whole. She'd though by bringing Henry into her life she'd fill the gaping cavern of pain she felt every second of every day, through all her waking moments and even in her dreams.

"I don't know if I want to see you again." Emma admitted, "But if you show up one day to tell me about him again, I don't think I would slam the door in your face."

"Perhaps, Miss Swan, I will."

They shook hands and Regina stepped to the curb to wave down a taxi. Before she slid into the back seat, she turned slowly, hating what she'd have to do now.

She focused the magic stored in the items she'd brought with her and waved her hand, wiping the slate clean.

Emma wouldn't remember the past few days.

She'd remember that she slept in late Saturday, barely making it to a busy but otherwise normal shift.

She'd remember nothing of her son.

Of Regina.

Emma was waving back, as if saying good bye.

Then the spell took over and her hand fell to her side.

Reset.

A/N: I'm really excited about this story so I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I'm enjoying writing it. Let me know if you have any comments/criticism or stories you'd like to hear about Henry's first ten years before me meet him in the show. Thank you!