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Chapter Text

Regina swirled her tongue around the rim of her glass, searching for any grains of salt that she’d missed. Realizing the endeavor was futile, she let out a long, melodramatic sigh and downed the watery remains of her margarita in one go. Setting her empty glass down, she impatiently scanned the crowded Rabbit Hole for Zelena. She was supposed to be bringing refill margaritas and shots so that Regina could drown her sorrows while she spun her tale of woe. She couldn’t damn well do that sober now, could she?  

Thankfully, it wasn’t long before her sister returned with a tray of alcoholic beverages and greasy french fries, and she immediately picked where she’d been. To be honest, her tale of woe, being the fight that she’d had hours earlier with her very pissed off girlfriend Emma, was entirely her fault. 

The argument had been a long time coming, no doubt. Frankly, if the roles were reversed, if she were Emma in the situation, she would have picked this fight MONTHS ago. But Emma had not. Because that wasn’t the kind of person Emma was. 

Emma, who wanted so, so much to be loved and cherished, would sooner drive nails through her own feet and hands than start an argument with someone she loved and cherished. She was too afraid to lose them. And Regina had known that fact, and she had taken advantage of it because she was terrified of what could happen when they finally took their secret relationship public. She could admit that to herself now. She also admitted it to Zelena, who rightfully booed her and called her a jackass. 

Regina had been a jackass. She had stalled Emma for the last three months, coming up with every single excuse under the sun. Her longest-running, biggest, somewhat legitimate excuse had been the fact that they were installing a brand new, state-of-the-art water tower in town. Between dealing with the construction crews and the state inspectors, Regina’s nerves had nearly fried down to nothing. 

It wasn’t just all of the regular red tape; she also had to ensure that none of the various “out-of-towners” traipsing through town caught wind of the fact that half of the town could wield magic in some way, shape, or form. And that’s not to mention that only Emma and a handful of children had actually been born in the U.S. Nightmares on nightmares. 

But that excuse had officially run its course. Like literally. The official “unveiling” of the one-hundred-thirty-foot-tall water tower was scheduled for tomorrow morning at nine a.m. 

Emma had called her bluff, suggesting they have lunch after the unveiling with her parents, Zelena, and a few select others, and tell them all the happy news. And then, after Regina stuttered nonsense for a few seconds before saying they ought to wait until January, as not to disturb the holiday season, Emma screamed some choice expletives at her, and told her she was staying at her own house before storming out of Regina’s. 

A completely fair reaction in retrospect. 

“I just didn’t think she would want to do it so quickly after the unveiling,” Regina grumbled pathetically, reaching for the last tequila shot left on the tray. She was already drunk, but she was going for at least VERY drunk. 

“She just hit her bullshit limit. You had to know it was coming eventually. And really, Regina, don’t want to disrupt the holidays? It’s fucking September 26th,” Zelena said with zero sympathy in her voice, shaking her head at her. 

“I know the date! Ugh, you’re no good at this,” Regina moaned, flopping her head down on the table. “I knew I should have tried to get Maleficent on the crystal ball,” she mumbled against the sticky vinyl tablecloth. 

“Oh, please, she’d literally be roasting you, and I wouldn’t blame her,” Zelena chuckled as she forced Regina to sit upright. “And you can’t blame me for being a little put off,” she continued, narrowing her eyes at Regina as she pushed her hair off her face. “You show up unannounced, drag me out of my comfortable house to this dump, and then drop this massive fuck up you’ve done on me like a brick house? Excuse me for being a little bit disgruntled by the facts as you’ve presented them.” 

Regina just sighed forlornly down into her empty shot glass in response. She also pouted a little because that too, was fair.

Zelena sighed at that and picked up the last fry in the basket. After slowly eating it, she took a deep breath before putting on a game face. “Okay, first question, do you love Emma?” She asked, studying Regina closely. 

Regina didn’t need even a second to think. Here in the relative privacy of their dark booth, with loud music playing and a LOT of tequila in her system, she could be painfully honest. “I love Emma Swan more than I have ever loved another person romantically,” she said immediately, her brows furrowing together in her intensity. “I did not believe I could love another person as much as I love her. I did not even believe this kind of love was possible for anyone, let alone me. If I were to lose her now, I would rip out my heart, throw it off of the pier at the highest of tides, and jump in next to it with a heavy weight tied around my ankles.” 

She was being dramatic, of course. She would not do all of that. Probably not. She still had Henry to consider after all. 

Speaking of Henry, Zelena let out a long whistle. “All right, let’s ah- avoid that then, shall we?” She said, grimacing slightly. She also took a big drink of her margarita before continuing. “Right, so you love her…a lot. Clearly. And Henry already knows, which you said was your biggest concern, so that’s squared away.” 

Regina just nodded down at her empty shot glass with a pitiful expression. How Henry would react had been her first excuse when Emma started asking if they could go public. That excuse had gone out the window very shortly though, when one day, not long after, the seventeen-year-old had just casually told them over lunch at Granny’s that he’d seen them kissing in the hot tub one night several weeks prior and knew they were together. He said he was tired of them waiting to tell him because he was, in his own words, “a mature adult now and totally on board for our family to take its natural form finally”. He then wished them more than well and changed the subject to the car he’d been asking for four months straight. 

Regina had been gagged. Emma had almost died laughing. Henry still didn’t know it, but he had actually witnessed their very first kiss. And thank every God in every realm that after a moment of watching them he’d quickly continued on to his friend’s house, where he was supposed to be spending the night anyway, because shortly thereafter they’d moved on from their first kiss to their first time having sex. Very shortly. Like Emma dragged Regina out of the hot tub as if she’d weighed nothing before going down on her on the closest deck chair to the hot tub, shortly. 

Zelena pulled her back to the moment by not so gently jabbing her in the side with an elbow. “So what is the hold up then?” She asked, looking at Regina like she was insane. She didn’t wait for a response. “Are you really afraid of what the Charming Idiots and their large, merry band of devout followers think of you?”

Regina had to admit, “Well, when you put it that way,” she said, rolling her head on her shoulder. She really had not looked at her fear from that perspective. Who was she trying to ingratiate herself too here? Henry’s opinion was the only one that had ever truly mattered to her, and he was already planning Christmas photos and a family vacation to Alaska next summer before he went off for college. 

Sudden drunken resolve raced through Regina like fire. She couldn’t lose Emma. She just couldn’t. It would wound her down to her very soul and leave her lifeless in a way no past hurt could compare to. Especially because this time, there would undeniably be no one to blame but herself. 

Clearly seeing that she was quickly making some major progress, Zelena gave a little cheer. “Exactly,” she said, gripping Regina by the arm. 

Flashes of the argument she’d just had with Emma raced through Regina’s mind. Emma had thrown around the phrases “last straw” and “I’ve had it” a lot. Regina blanched at the memory of the tears streaming down her girlfriend’s reddened face. “Oh Gods, Zelena, what if I’ve screwed it all up beyond repair?” She asked, grabbing both of her sister’s hands and squeezing them. “She said I make her feel like a dirty secret. I NEVER wanted to do that,” she said, on the edge of a full-blown panic.

Zelena squeezed her hands back, obviously just as caught up in the emotion of the moment, and also just as drunk as Regina. “You know what you have to do now?” She asked, beginning to slur her words just a little bit. 

“What?” Regina asked, eyes wide and hopeful. 

“Well, I don’t know yet,” Zelena said, reaching up to tuck Regina’s hair behind her ears. “But I’m going to get us more drinks and we’re going to figure it out,” she said with a big smile. 

And that is the point in the story where Regina’s memories of the night started to get extremely fuzzy. Clearly, though, they did eventually come up with a plan of sorts. 

Emma didn’t have to be at the station until nine the next morning, but she flopped down into her office chair before the sun had even risen over the harbor. Granny’s wasn’t even open yet, so she had resigned herself to a cup of lukewarm station coffee. By the taste of it, she guessed her father, who had pulled graveyard duty for the month, had brewed it well before he left for the last patrol at five. 

To say that Emma had gotten some truly shitty sleep would actually be an insult to truly shitty sleep everywhere. What she had gotten was a fucking joke masquerading as sleep. A farce. A fallacy. A few other words in Henry’s SAT prep books. What she was trying to express in her internal monologue was that she’d slept really badly, alright?

Her house sucked. Every single thing about it sucked. From the way she had never gotten around to hanging anything but a few pictures on the wall when she’d shared the place with Hook, to the way Henry didn’t keep anything in his bedroom but a couple of duplicate comics he had and some spare pjs. 

What sucked the most was her bed for sure.

It was cold as hell for one thing. Regina ran like a furnace twenty-four seven. Her mattress was lumpier than the Grand Canyon for another. Regina’s mattress cost four grand, and she was pretty sure it was made for the Gods. And her bedding felt like it was made of Brillo pads and fire ants. She had no clue how expensive Regina’s sheets and duvet were, but she was sure the threat count was off the charts. 

After the epic fight that was really more her yelling at Regina for twenty minutes straight, Emma had returned to her house for the first time in weeks, walked up the stairs to her bedroom, and just burst into tears at the sight of the damned thing. Thinking ‘any port in a storm,’ she’d flopped down on it face first regardless, and she had cried into her cold, scratchy pillow for so long she ran out of tears and just kind of whimpered for a solid hour there at the end. 

Emma just felt so damn heartbroken and confused. Saying she was just in love with Regina would be a massive understatement. She’d always had pretty intense feelings about the woman, to say the least, but fuck, they had grown into something big that Emma could barely even put them into words. They came from somewhere so deep inside of her that it felt like they’d breached the very core of who she was as a person. She honestly felt like she and Regina had been metaphorically woven together at their very frayed edges. 

To be short, she felt insane about Regina. 

And she knew that Regina loved and felt insane about her back. She knew it. What she couldn’t figure out was why it was so easy for the woman to seemingly turn those feelings off at the drop of a hat. When they were hidden away from everyone, Regina treated her like she was some precious, delicate treasure that she’d been gifted by fate. In sharp fucking contrast, the second they stepped out into the world, they became work buddies to everyone who saw them; close colleagues; co-parents at best. 

In the midst of all of the crying, Emma thumbed through her mental list of proposed reasons why Regina was so against making their relationship public. The top reason was that the woman was afraid of how everyone would react to the “Evil Queen” shacking up with their “Savior”. 

Emma knew that Regina was still very fearful that her past was going to cycle back around. It was obvious in the way she practically broke her back running the town. The new water tower was just the latest in a string of public works projects she’d undertaken for the betterment of the town. Emma was sure she had an idea for something to follow.  

Emma knew all of that, and knew it was the most logical explanation for Regina acting the way she was, but Emma was in no state of mind to hold on to that logic. Her thoughts really wandered, getting progressively darker by the minute. By the time she’d finally exhausted herself to the point she could try to sleep, she was pretty convinced that Regina was just plain too embarrassed to be seen with her. Regina was gorgeous and smart and successful, no matter what realm she was in or role she’d been cast in. And Emma was just Emma, barely housebroken and still flying by the seat of her pants most days. 

Emma spent four whole hours “sleeping”— drifting in and out of consciousness, interspersed with at least two crying jags she could remember. When she dragged herself out of bed and put on her uniform, it was mostly because she was starting to get a headache from the effort. She’d hoped when she got up that she’d seen a text message from Regina, ideally starting with an apology, but she would have taken anything to tell the truth. 

Sitting in her office, zoned out at her desk, she now began to wonder if she should back down. She knew now for sure that Regina was never going to come around to them going public, the fucking holidays comment had made that crystal clear, but maybe she could just learn to accept keeping their relationship a secret indefinitely. Just the thought made her feel sick to the stomach, though. It wasn’t fair to herself, and she knew that. 

Emma could just feel the beginning of a new crying jag approaching, and she would have fully given into it too, but the moment was saved by her cell going off.  Quickly she fished it out of her pocket. Her father calling. She took a breath to calm herself before picking up the call and saying hello to him. 

“Hey, Pumpkin,” David said, amusement VERY evident in his tone. “You outta come on down to the new water tower now,” he said, chuckling as he spoke. 

Emma frowned and looked around her office. “What’s going on?” She asked warily. She’d been stewing so long in her chair that the sun had done its thing, but it was still only just seven-thirty. They had another hour and a half until the unveiling ceremony was scheduled. 

Emma heard a shuffle, and then suddenly her mother was on the line, sounding even more amused than her father did. “Emma, Sweetie, just come on down here quickly,” Snow said before abruptly ending the call. She’d been quite obviously just barely holding back full-on laughter. 

So, feeling very much like a prey animal in unfamiliar woods, Emma got up from her desk and headed out of the station. She couldn’t help but notice on the short drive to the water tower that everyone in town seemed to be awake and heading in the same direction that she was. Nerves really starting to race then, the sheriff rightfully turned on her siren to clear the street ahead of her and laid on the gas. 

Emma entered the large clearing that had been carved out for the water tower from the East side entrance. The direction is important because she completely missed the very obvious cause for the commotion. 

When Emma pulled up next to the temporary stage that had been set up for the ceremony at the foot of the tower, she was gob-smacked by how many people were there. Regina herself had said barely a quarter of the town were likely to show up for the ceremony, if that. But more than half the town was already on the field now, and she could see people walking in from the road. Hell, half of them were still in their pajamas, having obviously been roused out of bed by their families or neighbors. They all seemed to be in pretty good moods at least.

Emma was so confused and semi-frightened that she failed to notice that almost all of them were looking up at the water tower. Thus, again, she completely missed the very obvious cause for the commotion. She also didn’t look up onto the stage, which was probably for the best because she definitely would have freaked out. 

Quickly, she pushed her way through the crowd, heading to where she could see her mother and father chatting with Belle and Rumple. On her way, she heard a few snippets of the conversations going on around her, but she had no clue what they were talking about. She also couldn’t help but notice that every person who saw her broke out into the biggest grin and started laughing. 

Case in point. 

“The fool should have used red. Red would have been more romantic,” Granny said to Ruby as Emma ducked past them. 

“I think it’s romantic enough regardless of what color she used,” Ruby said, grinning widely at Emma and batting her eyelashes. 

Emma went from rushing to hauling ass then. 

Emma got to her parents out of breath and on the verge of a heart attack. “I’m here! I got here as fast as I could! Jesus! What is going on with everyone?” She asked breathlessly. 

David apparently thought that was hilarious because he let out a bark of laughter. Snow, who was badly holding back her own laughter, swatted David in the stomach, and the man snorted and then cleared his throat. “Is there, ah, something you want to tell us, Emma?” He asked, trying a failing to put on a serious face. 

Emma stared at him like a confused puppy for a few seconds before her mother thankfully took pity on her. “Oh, Sweetheart, just look up,” she said, smile radiant and eyes actually shining a little bit as she pointed up at the water tower. 

Brows furrowing together, Emma stepped away from them and then did as told, tipping her head back to look up at the tower. It took her a few moments to process what she was seeing, and then, once she did, her jaw dropped so fast and hard it actually hurt a little. 

There, dead center on the brand new water tower that Regina had spent countless waking minutes agonizing over the details of, inside of a large heart that was TEN FEET FUCKING TALL, were the words “Regina Loves Emma” in letters three feet high. Emma figured there wasn’t a spot on Main Street you wouldn’t be able to see the painted-on declaration of love from one’s car.

She was stunned. Beyond stunned. And touched. Vaguely, she could remember screaming at Regina that she needed to make a big move now, or it was the last straw. Apparently, she had taken it to heart. 

Emma was a tad bit confused about the color choice for the paint. At least the conversations she’d passed made sense now. If she had to label the shade of green standing out in vivid contrast to the tan water tower, she’d slap a John Deere Green sticker on it. 

Finally, after a LONG moment of taking it in, Emma regained her senses enough to look back at her parents. Both of them looked like cats that had just feasted on a flock of canaries. Snow nodded up to the stage, and Emma followed her eyes. Her heart nearly jumped into her throat when she saw Regina lying motionless on the stage next to Zelena. “They’re just passed out,” Snow said quickly, pointing to the empty cider bottle next to Zelena’s head. 

“Yeah, I picked them up from the Rabbit Hole last night around three after they drank the place out of margarita mix and tried to start a riot,” David said with a grin. “I swear I dropped them off at the manor, but I guess they didn’t stay put.”

“I guess not,” Emma said, shaking her head. A thought hit her then that sucked all of the air out of her lungs for a second, and she had to fight to get it back. When she felt like her voice would squeak, she looked back at her parents. “So, uh, you’re okay with this then?” She asked, nodding up to the water tower. 

Both David's and Snow’s smiles turned sincere then. “We just want you to be happy, Emma. That’s all we care about,” David said, reaching out to grip her shoulder for a moment. 

“I think this makes sense,” Snow said, reaching out as well to grip Emma’s other shoulder. “Like things were always supposed to happen exactly this way.”

“Thank you,” Emma said, fighting back some powerful emotions as she looked between her parents. She reached up and grabbed their hands and squeezed them, just basking in the moment.

David, of course, chose that moment to drop a bomb on her. “Your mom and I have also known about it for over a month. We saw you kissing through one of those massive windows at the mansion when we arrived for Friday dinner. You two are really bad at carrying on a secret love affair,” he said, wrinkling his nose. 

“You really are, Honey,” Snow said, nodding her head. "When I dropped off that winter coat last week that I told you about, there was dust on your front door handle.” 

Emma sputtered for a few seconds at that. All of this time wasted was her immediate thought, but she quickly shook it away. No use being bitter about it now. She had a girlfriend to peel off a stage. “Alright,” she said then, taking a deep breath and looking up at said girlfriend and her sister. “I’m going to go wake them up then,” she said, grimacing a bit. 

“Good luck with that. Watch out for fireballs,” David said with a snort, earning him another swat from Snow. 

Emma chuckled and shook her head as she walked away. Climbing the stairs up to the stage, she was more than aware that everyone’s attention was turning from the painting to her, and she did her best to ignore them. Stopping next to Regina and Zelena, she put her hands on her hips and assessed the damage. They must have been so drunk she thought, shaking her head with a sympathetic grimace. They were both in loose t-shirts and leggings. Regina’s shoes were nowhere in sight. She was glad for their sake that the nights were still warm. 

They were also both streaked with the green paint. Regina had a massive splotch on her neck, and Zelena looked like she’d just straight-up dipped her right hand into the bucket. Speaking of, Emma looked around for a stack of paint buckets and frowned when she saw none. A mystery. Oh boy. It looked like a job for a sheriff.

Sighing softly, she crouched down next to the pair of sisters. She couldn’t help but smile very fondly. If they weren't sleeping out in the public next to the water tower, they'd obviously spent the early morning hours defacing; it would have been an adorable scene. Zelena was spread out on her back, and Regina was sleeping on her side with her head on her older sister’s stomach. Zelena’s hand that wasn’t covered in green paint was resting on Regina’s head as well, suggesting she’d fallen asleep playing with her hair. Emma just barely resisted the urge to snap a photo. 

Tilting her head to the side, she reached out to gently push Regina’s messy hair off of her face. “Regina, Babe, you need to wake up,” she said softly, before gingerly giving her shoulder a little shake. 

Regina’s eyes slowly fluttered open, and then she squeezed them shut against the early morning sun. A soft groan escaped her, and then she was silent for several long seconds before she took a deep breath and opened her eyes fully. 

“Hi,” Emma said, giving her a little wave. 

“Hello,” Regina said, her voice a bit hoarse. 

Regina opened her mouth then, to say what Emma never learned, but then her lips slammed shut along with her eyes, and there were several seconds of silence again. Finally she slowly craned her head around and opened her eyes, looking up at the water tower, and gave a small nod, seemingly to herself. 

Chuckling softly, Emma reached out and turned her face back to look at her. “I really would have been fine with a simple lunch this afternoon,” she said, her eyes twinkling with amusement but also love. 

Regina managed to muster up a weak smile at that. “I know– I think the night got away from me,” she said, her smile turning into a grimace. 

“I can tell,” Emma said, resting her elbows on her knees so she could rest her chin on her fists. “Can I ask why you went with green?” She asked, genuinely curious. 

Instead of an answer from Regina, she got one from Zelena, who sounded extremely displeased to have been woken up. “I conjure the paint, I get to pick the color. That was the deal,” the redhead grumbled, throwing the arm with the green hand over her eyes to block the sunlight. 

Emma only barely managed to fight back a bark of laughter at that, and her eyes immediately flashed to Regina’s. Her girlfriend had been on a campaign for the last six months to pass a town law prohibiting drinking while using magic. Both Rumple and the Fairy Brigade were staunchly opposed to it. Not to mention Zelena was as well. “I know,” Regina sighed, covering her face. “I didn’t know where we could get enough paint that late at night,” she mumbled. 

Gently, Emma reached out to pull her hand away. “I won’t tell if you won’t,” she said with a wink. 

“Thank you,” Regina said softly. After a moment, she swallowed, and her brows furrowed together. “I’m sorry I made you feel like anything but treasured Emma. I was just afraid,” she said.

“I know,” Emma said, stroking her cheek with her thumb. She couldn’t help but glance up at the water tower then and smile for a second before looking back at Regina. “All is forgiven,” she said softly. 

“Really?” Regina asked, eyes shiny with tears. 

“Really,” Emma said, with a nod. “Now, how about we get up off the stage?” She asked with a grin. 

“Please,” Regina said quickly. 

Emma helped her girlfriend to sit up and then looked down at Zelena. “Do you need help getting up and or a ride home?” She asked, nudging the woman in the arm. Zelena’s response was just disappearing into a cloud of green smoke. Very on brand at least. 

Chuckling, Emma started to help Regina to her feet, but then froze. She had just nearly walked into getting herself into trouble. Quickly, she gripped Regina’s arms and met her eyes. “You should know what practically the entire town is standing behind me,” she rushed out. 

Regina sucked in a sharp breath at that, and for a moment, Emma was sure she was about to disappear into her own cloud of smoke, but instead, the brunette nodded her head with a jerk and motioned for Emma to help her up. Emma chuckled softly. She knew the look in her girlfriend’s eyes. She’d slipped into mayor mode. 

Once on her feet, Regina took a moment to collect herself with Emma standing in front of her. Then, she took a deep breath, pressed a firm kiss against Emma’s lips, and power walked over to the already set-up microphone like she wasn’t barefoot in pajamas with bedhead and an obvious hangover. Emma turned to watch her go with the widest smile of her life. She also noted that the rest of the town had seemingly arrived while they were talking. Apparently word had traveled fast that the mayor was passed out on the stage by the new water tower, not to mention what she'd done.

Emma had to slam a hand over her mouth and look up at the sky to keep from bursting out laughing when her girlfriend conjured up a small stack of note cards, realizing right away what was about to happen. With a flick of Regina’s wrist, the clearing was briefly filled with the sound of the sound system coming on and a low static hum. Regina flicked her wrist again to get rid of the hum before clearing her throat and looking out at the crowd with the cheeriest smile she could seemingly muster under the circumstances.  

“Right,” she said, voice still a little hoarse. She cleared her throat again before continuing. “I’d like to thank everyone for showing up to the unveiling ceremony for our new state-of-the-art water tower. This marks the biggest move yet in our goal of becoming a wholly self-sufficient town. I would also like to thank everyone in town for working with me to keep our community safe while we had visitors in town. I could not do my job without each and every one of you.” 

Regina paused then. Emma knew that the pause was written on the note card. She’d heard this speech about fifty million times over the last few weeks. After her pause for emphasis, Regina continued. 

“In addition to saving an estimated one hundred and eighty thousand dollars out of our annual budget, the quality of the water we drink, cook our meals with, and clean our homes with has also been greatly improved, filtering out five times the heavy metals as well as common pollutants. In partnership with the sheriff’s department, the hospital will be conducting random testing for the next year to ensure the quality, and then the test will move to quarterlies. The reports will be published in the Daily Mirror as they become available.”

Regina turned and gestured to Emma then, as she’d also written on her note card. She was supposed to be gesturing to Sydney Glass and Doctor Whale as well, but they were both out in the middle of the crowd in their pajamas still. 

Regina looked back down at her note cards and straightened them out for a moment on the podium. Emma had been watching Regina like she was a work of art, but she spared a glance out at the crowd. Every single one of them looked undeniably fond of Regina at the moment. Very amused by the situation for sure, but very fond of their mayor all the more for it, it seemed. 

Regina took a deep breath, then looked back out at the crowd. “Once again, I would like to thank everyone for coming out this morning. A few notes to wrap up on, Snow White and Ruby Lucas will be in charge of this year’s Fall Festival, and they are looking for volunteers to help construct the booths at the moment. Snow has also asked me to remind all of the parents in the crowd that school pictures are scheduled for September 30th. And next month's town hall meeting has been moved to the second Saturday of the month to account for the blood moon’s powers. Thank you all and have a great weekend,” she said, finishing with a curt nod. 

A ripple of polite applause ran through the crowd, and Regina turned to Emma, who was positively beaming with pride for her girlfriend. She expected Regina to walk over to her, but the woman stayed where she was, seemingly mulling something over in her mind, and then she took a deep breath, and her expression turned determined. 

Looking back out at the crowd, Regina cleared her throat and gripped the podium with both hands. When she spoke, it was very deliberate. She spoke clearly, enunciating every word to a T. “On a final note, in case it has not been made clear, Sheriff Swan and I are in a romantic relationship.  I would just like to take this moment as your duly elected mayor to assure you all that this town’s well-being and safety is, and always will be, our number one priority above all else. Our professional relationship will never be compromised by our personal lives.”

Regina stopped short then and cleared her throat, seemingly at a momentary loss for words. Emma, who was looking at her with absolute fucking heart-eyes by that point, stifled a chuckle. She loved Regina so much. She even loved watching her struggle without a notecard to read off of. 

Regina settled for thanking them all once again for attending the “Unveiling Ceremony” and then finally stepped away from the podium. This time, the applause was much more genuine and louder. 

As soon as she was within arm’s length of Emma, Regina pulled her in with both hands. “Please take me home now, I think my brain is trying to escape from my skull.”

Emma just loved her all the more for it and rushed her home with a smile. 

About six months after Regina famously crawled up onto the water tower to write her declaration of love for all to see, Emma was out on the front lawn on the manor mowing the lawn when a sight caught her eye that made her freeze in place. It was the water tower, juuuuust managing to peek through the tree line, and she could just make out the giant green heart with their names inside of it. If she walked even a foot to the left or right, she wouldn’t be able to see it for sure. She smiled, softly, feeling oh so in love with Regina and that was the moment she decided she was going to buy a ring worthy of a queen and propose very soon.

They got married and went on to have an extremely long and happy life together. Of course, like any relationship, they had their ups and downs, little fights here and there that never amounted to much at the end of the day. They had a strict not going to bed angry rule. But, before the making up, Emma would usually head out to the front lawn for a bit to think, and to look at the water tower, of course.   

You see, whatever ultra-charged magic black-out drunk Zelena had imbued that paint with was no joke. Even Zelena could not remove it. And Regina did make her try VERY HARD. But only after, with Emma’s blessing, she’d hired three different contractors to paint over it. It didn’t matter what they did, though. The best they got was a few weeks, and then the green paint would start to show through. A ten-foot-tall heart with three-foot-tall words of love written inside of it. 

After Zelena tried and failed to tap into that wild, drunken magic she used to cover it up, Regina accepted defeat. That heart was there to stay. 

And then, a couple of months after Regina accepted that fact, an extremely drunk Leroy crawled up on the watch tower and painted “Leroy Loves Astrid” inside of his own heart. Pink this time.

And then things kind of snowballed. 

Regina knew she couldn’t cover up Leroy’s declaration, even if he’d just used regular paint, because she’d already set a precedent herself. She literally started it. She also knew she couldn’t cover up any of the other dozens of hearts that followed. She did have several more safety railings installed though, and the standing rule was if the sheriff’s department saw you, then you had to abandon your effort and come down. No arrest, but you could be waiting weeks or even months for another opportunity to finish your artwork. 

Soon, it became a town tradition. Any love-sick fool who was worth their salt practically had to crawl up the water tower or face doubt in the relationship. After ten years, it was no longer called the water tower; it was the love tower, covered from top to bottom in hearts of every different shape and size. BUT, out of respect for their beloved Mayor, no one ever made their heart and words as big as she had.

Chapter Text

RIIIIIIGHT So! How about this crazy world we're all getting to live in right? Almost enough to make someone feel extremely insane right???

Lol In all honesty had a pretty bad year, but things are cautiously looking up. At least I'm all around happier than I was this time last year by far.

Has for my fics, one, I'm very, extremely sorry if you have commented on one of them and I have not responded. My unfinished fics give me guilty anxiety so I haven't logged into my account for a long time. And two, I don't know when I'll be able to get back to writing regularly. I have managed to VERY slowly get the next installment of Bringing Down the Houses up to 7k but, it's going very slowly. BUT I did bang out this one-shot out in three days of feverish after-work writing, so maybe it's a sign of things to come. Either way thank you very much if you enjoy my fics and thank you very much for reading my rambly explanation as to why I've been in ghost mode forever. I hope you at least enjoyed this silly little song fic. :D