four
The next morning was spent looking at schools within the neighborhood. Emma and Henry walked hand in hand through each one and got a sense of each school. By noon, the two had made a decision and enrolled Henry. The one they had chosen was only about a ten minute walk from the house, a three minute drive, and it had a city bus route that stopped right near the school. It also didn’t require uniforms, Henry quite liked that. The paperwork was minimalist, and although Emma almost forgot she was “Regina Mills”, the signing process went fairly smoothly. Emma went ahead and snuck a text message over to Regina telling her that henry started school tomorrow, and told her not to worry because she had it covered.
The next thing they did was head to the mall to pick up some new clothes that were more suitable for school, as well as basic school supplies off the list the secretary had given “Regina”, such as a twelve pack of pencils and a pack of personal pencil crayons or a three pack of erasers, and of course you couldn't forget the green, not purple, but green Elmers glitter glue.
After all the shopping was done, the duo decided to pick up some lunch. They both got a hotdog and a cup of fries each from a local stand and sat down at one of the smaller picnic benches to eat. At this point, Emma was getting a little worried-or was it nerves? About the fact that regina hadn’t responded to her text messages from this morning, as it was fairly odd to not receive a message back hours later. But, Emma played it off for the kid.
“So, school tomorrow. Maybe you could join the.. Basketball team?”
Henry shook his head, his freckled nose scrunched up. “No? Well what about.. Swimming?” the blonde asked before taking a bite of her own hotdog. That earned the blonde another shake of the head.
“Baseball? Softball? Soccer? Tenn-” Emma started listing off the different sports she had read through on the brochure
“They have a soccer team??”
Emma chuckled and nodded, wiping at her mouth before opening it again, “yup. The season starts soon, I presume. Do you like soccer?”
Henry immediately nodded his answer, giving Emma a clear response, to which she chuckled. “I actually have a soccer ball kicking around here somewhere..hmm..” Emma pretended to think about it real hard. She told Henry to wait a moment as she left the dining room and headed to her room. She went through her closet and found a brand new, still in package soccer ball. Emma had bought it for the last time her “nephew” had shown up, her friend Ashely’s son, who had come for the weekend a couple months ago but didn’t end up needing the ball. So, Emma had been stuck with a new soccer ball, because Emma being Emma, she didn’t keep the receipt so she was unable to return it to get her twenty bucks back. It wasn’t a big deal, so she didn’t stress about it, but she was hoping Henry could get some use out of it rather than it collecting more dust tucked away in her closet. After a couple minutes of Henry waiting anticipatedly, Emma had walked out of her room and back into the dining room, and carefully rolled the packaged ball across the table to the ten year old.
Said ten year old gasped and grabbed the ball, darting his eyes up at Emma, “it's mine? Really?” At a quick and simple nod of affirmation from the blonde, the preteen made quick work of tearing off the protective clear film before examining the ball. “Woah! Where do you get a pink soccer ball? I love it!” The boy dropped the ball and carefully caught it with his one ankle, before he began dribbling the ball with his knees and ankles, alternating them in an orderly fashion. After nearly ten hits the ball fell out of reach.
“Wow, kid. You’re actually pretty good!” Emma exclaimed, but was met with a more sarcastic tone.
“I have a name, woman, use it,” the boy rolled his eyes before making his way around the dining room table towards Emma and hugged her the best he could, his head resting against her lower stomach. “Thank you, Emma. F-for the soccer ball and the.. You know. Not sending me away. I wish you were my mom. I-I don’t know Regina. But I know you. And you’re a good person Emma. You take care of me. Why can’t you adopt me?” the next thing Emma knew, she felt a small patch of wetness on her abdomen.
“Oh kid..” the blonde frowned, pulled away slightly and bent down to Henry’s level. “That’s not the way the world works, unfortunately. Legally..and biologically, you are Regina’s son. I.. I can’t change that. I’m sure you’ll love Regina, alright? Regina, your mom, is one of the kindest people I've ever met. And I've met a lot of people. She always takes care of me when i'm sick. And she loves to watch disney movies, so whenever you're feeling upset or sick she will watch disney movies with you. Um… she can sing, way better than me. And she knows a lot of languages, so that’s cool. She could teach you spanish, or french, or one of the others like.. Four languages she knows,” Emma giggled and looked the young boy in the eyes. “Regina is an amazing person, and I bet she’ll be an amazing mother. I love her, and I'm sure you’ll love her too.”
“So if you love her.. Why can't you both be my moms? Y-you can get married and do all that gross grown up stuff like.. Kiss! And we can be a family.'' Henry looked up at her with teary eyes and a red nose, almost desperate.
“Oh Henry.. I wish that was how the world worked, I really do,” she mumbled and pulled him in for another hug without another word.