NEW YORK CITY, 2013.

Emma Swan is a perfect balance of a strict and responsible mother. She does not spoil. Okay, so she's probably less strict than she should be. But she doesn't spoil.

It's perfectly normal to wake up at the crack of ass to make your kid pancakes before school right? That isn't spoiling, is it? She's responsible. But damn, if it doesn't feel good to make him happy, even if her cooking skills seem to vary every day. Some days she burns the eggs, other times they're perfectly fluffy; but she seems to have the most success whenever the recipe involves apples, though her son is not overly fond of the particular fruit. But today, on her son's birthday, she tackles chocolate chip pancakes, (resisting the urge to make them apple) and has just finished the first successful batch, when Henry comes padding into the small kitchen apartment.

His sleepy eyes and messy, too-long hair does nothing to mask his face that is quickly slimming down and lengthening, and, Emma notes with dismay, his still-new pajama pants are already too short for him. It's not that it's a bother to run out and buy him new pants--her job as a bail-bonds woman provides plenty of money for the two of them--but too much of his ankle showing beneath the hem reminds her, again, that Henry is growing up much faster than she's comfortable with. She absolutely dreads the day when he surpasses her in height, but, she notes as she stares down to see he still stands at her shoulders, that day hasn't yet dawned.

"Morning, Kid! Happy birthday!!" She almost squeals (Emma Swan does not squeal.) and gives him a much too sunny smile for the early time of day. She flips a pancake with what she hopes is with an air of expertise, and licks the raw batter off of her finger, cringing instantly at the taste of uncooked eggs.

Henry cocks a brow, (Emma's never known where he'd inherited that particular trait, as she'd never mastered the expression) and takes the plate she'd just handed him. "Is it safe to eat?" He asks somewhat sarcastically, referring to the face she'd pulled at the batter.

Emma rolls her eyes as she turns off the burner. "Sure it is. Come on, I tried." She throws over her shoulder at him as he moves past her to sit down at their small table. She picks up her own plate, grabs the whipped cream from the fridge, and sits across from him.

He caves at that, and gives her a closed-mouth smile through a chew. "Yeah, it's good. Seriously, thanks for doing this, Ma," he acknowledges, seizing another large section with his fork.

She smirks at her latest cooking accomplishment, and downs her glass of milk before crossing her arms and eyeing Henry across the table with a grin. "So, anything special you wanna do today?"

He lifts his gaze with a hopeful smile and a touch of his famous puppy-dog eyes. "Not go to school?"

"Ha, ha. Nice try, Kid," she chuckles dryly with another eye roll. "No, seriously--what are you in the mood for? An after-school activity," she stresses pointedly, "You only turn thirteen once." Her heart pangs for only a second after admitting that last part; her son's a teenager now? What the hell.

He thinks for a moment, then brightens. "Could we go see that new Marvel movie at the theatre?"

"You got it."

"Oh, and afterwards could we get ice cream from that little place nearby with all the different flavors?" He asks with a dorky grin that makes him look a couple years younger.

She slaps her palms down on the wooden table and gives him an adoring smile. "It's a plan. After that we can come back here and get to opening all these damn presents." She glances towards the monstrous pile of gifts littering the sitting room floor across from them. "Remind me next year not to spoil you so much."

"Of course." He declares with mock sincerity as he brings both of their dishes to the sink.

About a half hour later, he reappears showered, dressed, and with his backpack slung carelessly across one shoulder. She waves goodbye to him, and he's halfway to the door when he stops suddenly and turns around.

After a pause, he opens his mouth slowly, like he'd just ended the mental battle of whether he should say anything. "Hey, Ma?" He calls to Emma carefully, the lift of the question ending in a voice crack, signaling the voice drop that's sure to come sooner rather than later.

"Hmm?" She acknowledges distractedly as she leafs through the receipts from the last few months, adding up the amount of money she'd spent on those presents. Well, damn. She sighs as the sticks them back in the envelope. It's fine. It's his thirteenth birthday, for god's sake. She takes a long sip of water from the glass sitting next to her.

"Were you ever with a girl?"

Emma chokes on the water, mouth opening to spill half of its contents across the table.

Shocked by his mother's reaction, he immediately backpedals. "If you were, it's okay--I mean if you weren't either--"

Having recovered herself, she lifts a hand to stop his nervous stammering. "It's fine, Henry. Why do you ask in the first place? Were there kids at school talking about same sex relationships or something?" Maybe it's time to have that talk, she muses. She won't have him thinking there's anything wrong with being gay, though her heart is beating slightly faster than it should from his previous question. Sure, in her younger years she'd experienced with a few girls, but why is he asking her now?

He pulls a face at her choice of words, then shakes her head. "No. I don't know--this is gonna sound really weird, but I actually have this reoccurring dream of this lady, and you're usually with her. But she just seems familiar, and I guess I was just wondering if you had a girlfriend when I was really little or something and if she was around a lot?" He asks, his mind's eye showing a flickering image of a dark-haired woman whose face never seems to stick with him.

Emma thinks hard; she hadn't had a serious relationship with either a boy or a girl since she'd given birth to Henry--not after what Neal did to her, and she'd wanted to direct her full attention to parenting her son anyways. So, she shakes her head slowly. "No, I don't think so. Maybe she just feels familiar since you keep having the dream?" She offers up somewhat lamely, but he seems to latch onto it.

"Yeah, yeah, that's probably it. Sorry," he mumbles, somewhat embarrassed; then moves towards the door again.

"Hey, Kid, it's fine. Have a good day at school okay?" She says warmly, rising and closing the small distance between them to give him a squeeze.

Sometimes he shies away from her when she gets too embarrassing and affectionate, (and she has to remind herself then that it's just his age and not that he loves her any less) but this time he hugs her back just as tightly as she does. Her hand cups the back of his head, and she closes her eyes with a smile. She's loved every second of their lives together, just the two of them.

THE ENCHANTED FOREST, 2013.

One year.

One year of absolute hell had passed, and though it had passed agonizingly slow for the dark haired beauty standing on the balcony overlooking her former kingdom, on this very day it seems as though it had gone by much too fast.

This unendurable day.

Regina finds that if she labors over the fact of today she starts to feel sick; starting in her head then traveling down to the pit of her stomach in one fluid motion-- but there's no way to stop herself from continuing with these thoughts. For not one moment did her mind wander from the subject it is set in stone upon.

This very day, this very moment, is Henry Daniel Mills' birthday. Not his first birthday by any means, but it is, in fact, his very first birthday he's spending without her.

She'd known what she was getting herself into when she'd gifted Emma and Henry with those memories; known exactly what she was about while transporting herself and the others back to the Enchanted Forest. She'd been brutally reminded every single day spent here that her little boy had been ripped from her far too soon. But what she hadn't fully anticipated was the unbearable, vast ocean of pain she's drowning in at this very moment, at the thought, the idea, the very prospect that her baby boy became a teenager without her.

That's not to say that she hadn't built herself up for today, that she hadn't been counting the months and days and minutes and seconds up until the day dawned; but she'd previously thought that maybe she could get through it easier than this. She stares at the crystal glass clutched in her hand filled with dark red wine, the pigment reminding her of the countless hearts she'd crushed while parading around this very castle.

Thirteen.

She can hardly believe it; the years with her little prince had practically rushed past without her--and suddenly, she feels as though she'd taken the twelve birthdays she'd had for granted. Though, she supposes, it'd been more accurately ten birthdays she'd been there for. Truthfully, years ten and eleven of Henry's life had been more than rocky between them, and she knows to take much more than a little blame for that, but their last year together had been good--no, wonderful.

She downs the rest of the glass and sets the goblet on the railing in front of her. If she lets go of the stem, the glass will fall off the edge and smash. If she lets go, she will fall off the edge and her life will extinguish like a flame, becoming only a distant memory.

No. While she feels as though her life from now on holds little to no value to her--in other words, it's unbearable and meaningless--she still wants to be here for the dreams of her son that flicker past and warm her at night, and every memory of him that soothes her throughout the dreary day. She wants to stay while each memory--good or bad--is still fresh in her mind. She doesn't want to let go. She doesn't want to forget.

She leaves the balcony and moves into her cold, dark room, and sits on the edge of her bed, cradling the goblet between her shaking fingers. As she looks up, she can catch a glance of her reflection in her vanity mirror. She feels quite ridiculous really; the black, corseted gown that pushes her ample cleavage up to her collarbones feeling more like a Halloween costume than not, something she no longer feels any part of comfortable in.

She averts her eyes, the image of herself staring back causing her more discomfort than she'd like to admit. It reminds her all too well of the woman she had been long ago, but sitting here again, it doesn't feel as though too much time had passed. Looking at herself like this, and with the overbearing grief in her heart and the numbing depression hanging over her head, it feels as though she could turn back to her old ways at any given moment. Be the Evil Queen once more.

She won't, though; and she sincerely knows not whether she could if she'd even wanted to. She is by no means the woman she was thirty years before her greatest sacrifice and twenty-eight years of stopped time. She knows this deep down--knows she's gone exceedingly soft and that she feels things now, and knows that if she'd even begun to squeeze anyone's heart she held in her hand now, she would never be able to crush it.

It sickens her to see herself this way--before now she'd been able to turn her grief into power and make something great out of herself--something her mother would have been much too proud of. Now, grief is all she is. She feels as though she has absolutely nothing left.

She stares at the goblet again, then watches as she slowly releases her coiled fingers from around the stem. The glass crashes onto the marble floor, smashing into a thousand shards of various sizes, completely littering the ground at her feet. She enjoys the sound, and the suddenness of it all seems to bring her out of her stupor. Once more, her mind flickers back to Henry.

She wonders what he looks like now. One year doesn't immediately seem like altogether that long, but she of all people knows how such a short time can change her little boy in the biggest of ways. Surely he'd be taller by now; and she notes with a pang that he wouldn't be able to fit under her chin for much longer, though she acknowledges that that little factor doesn't amount to much importance--she's perfectly, rudely aware that she will never be able to tuck him into her arms again.

Would his voice still emit the ray of sunshine it always had, still be high-pitched, boyish, glorious, and everything that Regina had loved and more? Would it have become richer already, along with the unavoidable growth spurt Regina had been dreading for ages, but had never been given the chance to witness? She doesn't want to know almost as much as she does; the idea of him growing up at all, let alone without her, pulling at her heart as well as expanding it.

Either way, she will never know, will never even be given a picture. Nothing matters. Nothing at all except for the fact that she knows that he is happy, and that's all she needs. She lifts her legs from the ground and curls them behind her as she reclines on her bed. She slowly relaxes her tense muscles as she rests her head on a pillow made of thorns, as she begins the rest of her life without the one thing that had made it worth living.

AN: Another chapter so soon!! I'm on a roll with writing. Please vote and comment, it makes all the late nights of writing and brainstorming worth it!:)

If anyone was confused with Emma's varying cooking skills, it's because Regina gave Emma her memories, so mixing Regina's skills with Emma's --that's what you get. In my mind, at least. Also, if it was unclear, the "lady" reappearing I'm Henry's dreams is, in fact, Regina. :)