Chapter Text
Dr. Whale's usual greasy smile was replaced by something far more disconcerting. The good doctor was uncomfortable, that was clear. But it was pity Regina saw in his eyes.
"Just tell me, Doctor. I don't have time to wait. I have very important business to attend to."
The doctor swallowed, "It's - You should sit down, Ms. Mills."
"I will do no such thing. Out with it." The impatient patient insisted.
With a sigh, the blond man started, "Madam Mayor, you have cancer."
"Oh." Regina's expressive brown eyes widened, but she collected herself and asked what she would need to do. Surgery? Chemotherapy?
Dr. Whale interrupted her with a sad shake of his head. "If you had come in sooner, chemo might have slowed its progress. As it is, Madam Mayor, the tumour is inoperable. And it is highly advanced. We could do more tests to be sure, but from what we know, I'd say you have maybe three months left."
"Three months? To live?" The Queen stumbled out in shock.
"I'm so sorry, Ms. Mills. I know I wanted you dead when the curse was broken, but… I don't now. We at the hospital will do everything we can to make your last months bearable. I am prescribing some heavy pain medication. It should keep the worst of it at bay. And some anti-nausea medication…"
By now the ex-Evil Queen had stopped paying attention. She'd never anticipated death coming for her in this form. Murder, execution, magic, even poison, sure. But not this.
"Thank you, Doctor. I would appreciate it if you would keep this to yourself for the time being, please." The Queen rose from the seat she didn't remember taking, and exited the room holding her new prescriptions in shaky hands.
---
Rumplestiltskin was gone. He'd gone after his son straight from Neverland, much to Belle's chagrin. Of course, Regina had originally been thrilled at this development. She certainly didn't hate being the most powerful magic-user in Storybrooke. Of course, that was before she had been diagnosed with cancer. This wasn't something she'd had to deal with in the Enchanted Forest. There was no magic she knew to cure it. Without Rumplestiltskin to turn to, Regina was forced to go to the Blue Fairy.
"What do you want?" The fairy snapped, already certain she would refuse anything the Evil Queen asked for. Unless it would help Henry. She quite liked that little boy.
"I have cancer."
Mother Superior flinched. She didn't mean to show surprise, but this was truly unexpected.
"I would think that would be something to bring to the doctors, not me."
"They can't do anything. I have three months." The Queen stood regally, and kept a veil of composed calm over her eyes, masking any fear she might be feeling.
"I cannot cure you."
"Do you know how?"
The fairy shook her head. "It's impossible. Cancer is not a sickness of our world. There was never any need to find a magical cure for it."
Regina nodded, unsurprised. "Can you tell if it is magically caused? I took in a death curse a while ago, and I was wondering if it was related."
Mother Superior nodded. "Perhaps you could sign the nunnery's request to hold a Christmas celebration at the Town Hall?"
It was Regina's turn to nod. "Of course. I will look over the paperwork this afternoon."
The Blue Fairy smiled, and waved a hand over Regina's body. A light blue glow emanated from her skin. A spark of green wove its way around the shield the light made, looking like a crackling lightning bolt crossed with a slithering snake.The fairy frowned and waved her hand again. The light disappeared.
"The curse is still there, but it is not causing this. It seems to be trapped inside of you, but it is still searching for purchase. I suspect if you did not have such powerful magic, it would have already killed you. As it is… the cancer is not magical. There is no magical cure."
A crack in Regina's armour allowed a single tear to escape down her cheek. The fairy refused to notice it.
"Thank you, Blue. I trust you will keep this to yourself? I want to tell Henry on my own terms. I imagine the Charmings would fail to respect that if they were to hear of my… circumstance."
"Of course, Regina."
The fairy watched sadly as the Queen strut out of the building, shoulders straight, but somehow smaller in the woman's eye.
---
Regina returned to her office and asked her secretary to please bring her the paperwork from Mother Superior, and then offered her the rest of the day off. The younger woman complied with a surprised smile. When she was gone, the Mayor signed the document in front of her without so much as reading the heading. Then she poured herself a large dollop of her best scotch, and drank heartily, finally allowing the sobs she had been fighting all day to come out into the empty air.
Only silence met her cries.
---
Henry and Emma were called to the table mid-Mario Kart session. The distraction allowed Henry to throw a banana right under Emma's wheels, sealing her fate. As they dove into their seats, Emma grumbled as her son laughed and bragged about his "mad skills", a term he had picked up from his biological mother.
Mary Margaret and David sat across from their daughter and grandson, and shared a smile. The family munched away on Mary Margaret's excellent lamb stew. Emma and Henry picked around their vegetables, but one raised eyebrow from the head of the household, and they bit into her well-prepared carrots with exaggerated enthusiasm.
Henry chatted happily away about something-or-other David had been telling him about sword fighting. It went over Emma's head, but the others at the table were pleased to supply more details and ask questions back about what he thought of each move he'd been taught. The group was the picture of happiness, so it took them all by surprise when a knock sounded at the door.
All the adults in the room stood to get it, but Mary Margaret shooed the others away and walked purposefully to the door. A jolt of fear ran through her when the door swung open to reveal her once stepmother.
"Regina!"
Both women heard the scrape of chairs as the other occupants of the table stood, preparing for a fight, perhaps.
"I need to speak to Ms. Swan." Regina offered in an uncharacteristically quiet voice.
Snow responded firmly, "She's eating right now. Maybe you should have called first."
"I will only be a moment, please."
The use of "please" threw Snow enough that she stepped back as Emma came up to the door.
"What is it, Madam Mayor? And why couldn't it wait until morning?"
"Sheriff, I… I would like to request your presence with Henry at my home tomorrow. Perhaps for dinner?"
"What, so you can poison us again?" Emma snapped, unthinking. Regina flinched, and the blonde woman saw tears gather in her eyes. She blinked them away as quickly as they came.
"I have something very important to discuss with my son, and… and with you, Ms. Swan. It is a delicate… family situation." The Queen choked out, and this time Emma could smell the alcohol she'd been drinking on her breath. She also heard the desperation in her voice.
"If you promise that you will be sober tomorrow, we will come by after school. Mary Margaret is making us dinner here."
Regina nodded silently, and almost whispered, "I promise. Thank you."
The Queen turned to leave the building, but Emma stopped her at the end of the hall with a hand on her shoulder. She had dipped inside the apartment to grab her keys and jacket, and looked Regina in the eyes. "You're drunk. I'm gonna drive you home. You can tell me what this is all about on the way."
Regina shrugged Emma's hand off her shoulder. "I can walk. I would rather risk my life with the alcohol than in that deathtrap you call a car." Her voice broke on the word "death", and Emma noticed a shiver run through the brunette's body as she spoke.
"I will not have you drunkenly stumbling around a town that still half wants to kill you. Henry doesn't deserve to hear that you were killed that way."
Another shiver, Emma noticed. This one bigger than the last.
"Thank you, Ms. Swan." Regina responded, surprising Emma again with her conceit.
The drive was silent. Emma wanted to ask, but as soon as the engine had started, Regina had started to cry silently in the passenger seat, and Emma didn't know what to do about that, so she simply pretended not to notice.
When they arrived at the mansion, Regina was moving up the steps before Emma could even get her seatbelt unstuck from her belt buckle. She quietly cursed her clumsy hands for spilling the cola in the buckle just last week. Staring at the ever-poised form of the Mayor of Storybrooke, Emma sighed. She would know what was happening tomorrow afternoon. She supposed that would have to be good enough.
---
Emma picked Henry up from school the next day, and half-listened to him babble about his day as she drove to the mansion for the second time in less than 24 hours. She couldn't help but think about what the boy's adoptive mother might have to say. She'd called it a "family situation", but she'd included Emma in that category. Was that a step in the right direction, or was she up to something malicious? Emma had a hard time picturing the woman she'd driven home last night plotting anything, but she knew better than to underestimate Regina.
"Mom? Are you even listening to me?" Henry asked, waving his hand in front of his mother's face. She blinked, only just realizing they had made it to the mansion. She turned the car off, and turned to her son, inhaling deeply.
"Your mom seemed very distressed last night. I don't know what that means, but I think this could be bad news. We need to be on our guard. We can leave anytime you want. Okay?"
Henry nodded. "Do you think she's okay?" He asked, suddenly worried for his adoptive mother.
Emma started to answer that of course she was, but she shut her mouth, remembering the look of desperation on the woman's face the night before. Instead she said, "I don't know."
Henry climbed slowly out of the Bug, and Emma followed once her buckle gave up its hold on her seat belt.
The walk up the path and the stairs to the Mayor's door was done in anxious silence. Before they could knock, the door opened, revealing the Mayor dressed in a pair of loose sweatpants and a t-shirt that insisted she was "#1 Mom". The shirt was a little tight, but had clearly been a gift from Henry, probably many years ago. There were holes in the fabric, and her knees were completely on display. Her feet were bare. Her hair was set perfectly, as though she'd intended to get ready for work, but given up part way through. She wore no make-up.
"Mom?" Henry asked, confused by her appearance. Emma simply gaped openly.
"Henry," Regina knelt, opening her arms, "I am so glad you came."
Nervously, Henry stepped into her embrace. Emma saw the tears starting to creep into Regina's eyes again. She stood and opened the door wider, gesturing her guests into her house. "Please, won't you come sit in the den?"
Emma followed Henry to the room, and sat close to him on the overstuffed couch. Both of them looked nervous. Regina entered the room behind them, and stayed standing.
"Can I get either of you anything? A drink, a snack? Anything?"
Ever the perfect hostess, Emma thought. Out loud, she simply declined for both of them. "We're fine, Regina. Can you just tell us why we're here?"
Regina sat, sighing on the arm of the chair that matched the couch her guests were sitting on.
"I… I need to tell you both something, and it is… hard to say…"
"It's okay, Mom. You can tell us." Henry supplied, helpfully.
Regina's eyes shone as she looked at her son lovingly.
"Emma will recall I was quite sick on our trip to Neverland."
Emma snorted. "Puking hourly off the side of the boat. I never would have pegged the Evil Queen for one to get seasick. But what does that have to do with us now?"
Regina finally glared at the blonde, "Because I wasn't seasick, Ms. Swan. I… I have cancer."
Silence followed her admission. Shock and disbelief crossed Emma's face. Fear dominated Henry's.
"Are you sure?" He asked.
Regina's look softened as she looked at her son. "I am sure, Henry. Dr. Whale diagnosed me yesterday morning, and the Blue Fairy confirmed it later that day."
"So, what does that mean?" Emma questioned, "Are you wanting rides to chemo, or something?"
"I will not be going on chemotherapy. The tumour has… it is too advanced for that now."
"Do you have to have surgery?" Henry asked, afraid of the big word.
"No…" Regina responded quietly. She took three long steps across the room and knelt at Henry's knee, taking his hand in her two quivering ones. "Henry… the tumour is inoperable. It's too big and too advanced… Dr. Whale is giving me three months."
Henry swallowed, but no matter how tough he had become since his kidnapping to Neverland, he could not fight the tears that threatened to fall.
"No… you have to fight it!" he shouted.
Emma reached for his free hand, but found that hers were clammy and shaking. It took a few tries to catch his hand in hers.
Regina looked sadly up at her son, and for the first time, Emma understood that this was the look of a mother telling her son something she didn't want him to have to hear. She fought to control the lump forming in her own throat watching the exchange.
"I have been to the Blue Fairy. This is not a magical disease. There is no magic to fix it. And Dr. Whale is running more tests, but he is not hopeful for any change in the diagnosis."
"But you're the Evil Queen! You have to fight it!"
Regina smiled sadly and shook her head. "I would if I could, Henry. For you, I would do everything in my power to fix this. But this is out of my hands."
Henry leapt from the couch into his mother's arms, and this time Emma didn't tense or doubt for a moment the love going either way. This was a family, brought together again in the face of tragedy. Emma felt she was intruding. She stood to give the couple their space, but as she did, Regina stood as well, looking into Emma's blue eyes, brimming with unshed tears.
"Regina, I…"
"Emma, we still need to speak. I have two requests for you. I would like to be allowed to spend more time with my son in the next few months, if you would be okay with that, Henry?"
"Of course, Mom! I've missed you!" Henry admitted, making Regina beam through her tears.
"Thank you, Henry. I've missed you too. Very much." Regina looked seriously at Emma, then back to her son. "Now, Henry, would you mind terribly running into the kitchen and boiling some water for tea? I would like a moment alone with Ms. Swan, please."
Henry nodded, and ran off.
"He's listening at the door, you realize?" Emma said.
Regina nodded and then stepped very close to Emma, her lips almost brushing the shell of Emma's ear. "I have called a lawyer from outside of town. He will be coming here next week to help me draw up my will. You understand, I will leave everything I have here to Henry, but Henry will need you. You will have to adopt him to become his legal guardian. I would appreciate very much if you would do this for me, and for him."
Emma found her cheeks had become wet now too. She could not force any sound from her throat, but managed a tearful nod. Regina returned the gesture, then held out a firm hand to shake. Emma's less stable one met hers and over their hands, their eyes met in understanding.
Henry ran back into the room, his eyes darting between his two mothers. He then ran into the gap between them, pulling them both down into a big group hug. The women were a little surprised, but did not resist the closeness. Regina mouthed the words, "Thank you" over their son's head. Emma simply nodded, fresh tears streaking her face.
When the family finally broke apart, Emma suggested that maybe the two of them could stay for dinner if Regina would still have them. Regina smiled, and then suggested the two of them help her with the cooking. Emma was forced to wash and cut vegetables, where she could do the least damage. Henry helped his brunette mother with the more complicated lasagna and apple pie. It was clear they had done this a hundred times before, as they moved around one another in the kitchen with practiced ease. Emma couldn't help but smile at this.
The phone call to Mary Margaret was vague, but it got the point across: Henry and Emma would have dinner with Regina, and then Emma would return home to discuss with them the meeting she'd had with Regina. Henry would stay at the mansion overnight, at his own insistence. He didn't want to let his ailing mother out of his sight. Emma thought it had a lot to do with making up for lost time.
The meal was possibly the best Emma had ever had, and the smile on Regina's face as she looked at her son nearly broke her heart. Three months just wasn't long enough… Emma decided then and there that she would do everything in her power to make sure Regina smiled like that as often as she possibly could before… well, they would come to that when it happened. For now, Regina was smiling at them both like the family she'd found again after years of separation, which, Emma supposed, they were. Henry grinned back at her, and Emma was surprised to notice that she was as well.