A (Deaf) Christmas to Remember

Chapter 9: December 19th

The next time Emma and Henry were able to see Ruby and Regina was the following Monday. On Friday and Saturday the two women were in New York to scout a couple art galleries that had reached out to Regina about displaying some of her works there and while Emma was incredibly proud of Regina that didn't stop her from wishing that the brunette was home with her and Henry. Then on Sunday Regina was with her sister, and while Emma would have loved to go, Regina assured her that it was a bad idea given her sister's prying nature and crude remarks. She wanted to spare Emma as long as possible.

To make up for the distance the two women texted frequently. There were numerous times during school on Friday that Emma had snuck out texts to Regina and on the weekend there was barely a moment where she set her phone down. Regina and Ruby facetimed them as often as they could which eased Henry's discomfort at the situation. He missed the brunette duo even more then Emma probably did.

Even though they were out of the state, the sign language lessons didn't stop. Ruby sent Emma countless links to different lessons for her and Henry to practice which kept them occupied for the most part alongside school and everything that came along with it. The homework, the grading, the lesson plans were all contributing factors to keeping Emma's sanity intact until her friends returned home. Snow even stopped by a few times and hung out with them, providing further distraction for mother and son.

But now it was Monday and Regina and Ruby were due to be over soon. Emma and Henry were in the middle of playing Smash Bros upstairs on Henry's Switch when her phone rang, the buzz echoing throughout the entire apartment.

"I gotta see who that is. Play by yourself while I answer that."

She trotted blissfully down the steps and walked into her room where her phone sat on the bed. When she got closer to the phone she saw a picture of her mother pop up.

"Mom?"

"Hi, sweetie! How are you guys liking it out there?"

"It's been pretty great actually. Sorry we haven't called you sooner." Emma took a seat at the edge of her bed as she continued to talk to her mother. "Henry's doing really great which is nice. Even made a friend in class."

"That's so nice to hear Em. Look at you, all grown up. Making it out there in the big scary world. I'm so proud of my baby."

"Mom. I'm twenty three."

"Okay, answer me this then. When is Henry going to stop being your baby?"

Emma took a short pause trying to find some way around her mother's question but she couldn't think of anything. Now she had to tell her mother she was right, which was something no daughter ever wants to do.

"Touché mother."

"That's what I thought. So what are you guys doing today?"

She hadn't told her mother about Ruby and Regina, let alone her and Regina's budding relationship, and she had originally planned on waiting until things got more serious to tell her mother. But Emma figured that now was as good of a time as any to start.