Here you come a-knockin', knockin' on my door
The first Regina met Emma was a windy day with grey light that filtered the colors of her living room as she tried to read. The blonde knocked on her door and smiled at her sheepishly as Regina rose an eyebrow, glasses atop of her nose and the that-morning-applied-lipstick curving as she waited for the newcomer to speak.
"I'm Emma Swan." She said, offering her hand and motioning to the door at the other side of the landing currently open and showing a hall and the beginning of what seemed to be a sparse selection of cardboard boxes. "I just wanted to apologize for any noise I could have done with the moving."
Regina had heard a couple of muffled expletives once she had arrived from the law firm but, tired as she had been, had decided not to skin alive whoever that could be the culprit until, at least, finishing the wine glass that was resting now on her wooden table, half-finished and sporting lipstick stains. However, the blonde's behavior erased that idea from her mind and so she found herself nodding while promising this stranger -Had it been Emma? - That it hadn't been that bad.
The blonde's looks, she would later admit to Kathryn while they both finished with their meal the day after that, had certainly helped.
Emma had smiled happily, nodded forcefully and pointed again towards her new home with her right thumb before running that very same hand over her long blonde locks, taking them away from the light and making her green eyes shine.
"I will… go now." She finished, her chin tilting towards Regina's own home. "I don't want to bother you. I will finish unpacking tomorrow morning but if I do any noise just tell me, yeah?"
And, with that final statement Emma had smiled and left, leaving Regina to close her own door slowly while thinking what in hell had happened.
The second time Regina saw Emma wasn't due to Kathryn's prompting even though the blonde would have killed for Regina to try some of her plans to meet with her "hot-neighbor" again. It had been a week after that first talk and the weather had certainly improved but not enough for the wind to not be playing between the slowly browning leaves of the trees that rose at the other side of Regina's window. The orange light of mid-afternoon had caught on her as she finished yet another deal for a client and she had been on the verge of pouring some coffee on her white mug when Emma had knocked on her door again.
This time Regina had recognized the quick knocking, the almost scraping on her door as the blonde withdrawn her hand and waited. She, however, didn't look as sheepish this time, nor as tired, and the white tank top she wore painted a contrast on the darkened wooden landing and the orange filled room that framed Regina on her own. Yellow and ivory, Regina belatedly thought. On the woman's hands was a letter in where Regina could distinguish her own name.
"I think this is yours." Emma had said, handing the letter to Regina, the movement showing a bruising on her knuckles, the way she quickly moved her hand away and drummed her fingers over the waist of her neatly tucked top on equally perfectly pressed jeans. Regina had let her gaze linger -just a second, only a second- before focusing on those green eyes once again, noticing the quick movements of Emma's pupils, imperceptible almost and yet obvious as the woman smiled, muttering a "right" that got almost lost on the lonely landing.
"Thank you." Regina spoke, much more softly than she had intended, a whisper that had made Emma's hand to halt before she moved her head once, then twice, her pink lips parting before Emma exhaled.
"Anytime."
With that she was gone, a swirl of motion that closed her own slightly ajar door and left Regina slightly amused and smiling. A smile Kathryn would later point out as being telling enough on its own.
(Regina didn't listen to it of course)
The third time Regina had the opportunity to speak to the blonde instead of briefly seeing her back whenever she either arrived or left home, was just before dinner, the purple and black of the settling sun tinting her walls as she opened the door just to see Emma raise it, halting the movement and catching the woman just as she bit her bottom lip, her white teeth casting longer shadows than normal on her pale, pale skin.
"I need your help." Emma whispered, only after a brief doubt, her hands falling lax at her sides before she started playing with her fingers, grazing, caressing, interlacing them as she spoke.
Regina didn't even doubt before she, too surprised to speak, let the woman talk, her voice a whisper that felt as if carrying something else, something more, than just a mere petition.
"If a guy," Emma started, coming closer to Regina, never truly entering but letting the other woman smell her perfume -simple, clean, fresh- The gold of her hair and the green of her eyes darker into this new light and Regina eyed those before focusing again on the voice that came from those lips. "Comes and ask you if you know when I will be back could you say him that you truly don't know?"
Regina narrowed her eyes, her mind already filling the blanks.
"I met him at work." Emma paused, winced, pulled on her shirt -plaid, Regina noticed- "Which that should have already told me something. But it didn't. I smiled at him, perhaps too long, perhaps more than what he thinks it's normal. It doesn't matter."
Regina wanted to tell her that it did, that she knew some very good lawyers that could help her, but said nothing as Emma kept on talking, her lips trembling as she did.
"I'm trying to disappear from his radar. I doubt he will really come and ask you and if you don't feel like opening the door if he finally comes I won't hold it against you." Emma smiled at her before resuming her tirade. "I just… wanted to ask you that, I guess. I'm sorry to keep coming like this. I will repay you, believe me."
That time Regina almost called after her but didn't. Dumbfounded as she was like every other time Emma Swan had knocked on her door.
The mysterious man never came but a month after that Regina saw Emma turning her back away from a police car, the shadow of a dark-haired man racing past her, and she imagined what may have happened.
The fourth time Emma knocked on her door it was a stormy Sunday morning; too cold to really do anything else but enjoy the white and bluish light that came from the pouring sky. Emma's jumper had a similar shade and Regina briefly glanced at it before muttering a quick Hello, one that Emma replied with a quick tremble of her fingers.
"I didn't forget." She started. "I know today it's not the best day but I'll be swamped with work next week and I've the feeling you will as well."
-Regina didn't interrupt her. She was right after all. -
"So…" Emm trailed off. "I thought that I could invite you to have brunch? As a way of repaying you. If you want, obviously. I…"
"I would love to."
Emma smiled, all but halting for a moment before nodding several times, her long fingers writing words in the air Regina didn't really pay any attention. She didn't know why she said yes, wasn't really her modus operandi and hadn't been since… Daniel. She, however, followed the blonde to the other side of the landing and stared, for the first time, at the almost minimalistic flat in where warm golds and caramels reflected the same stormy light in a very different way than it did on her flat.
That was the first time she thought about Kathryn's words only to shove them away as soon as she discovered herself thinking about them. She didn't pay any attention to them, to Emma's never stopping hands or the way the blonde kept on eyeing her from the corner of her eyes with something close to a blush dusting her cheeks. She truly didn't think about it as that first brunch turned into many more. Some on her flat, some others on Emma's.
She didn't think on Kathryn's words as Emma let her met her friends; the lanky Ruby and the silent Mulan. She didn't think, either, on Emma's hands as they began to reach for Regina in the very same way they tended to do the first times they met whenever something bothered her. She didn't think about them when another month passed and Emma's presence on her life was as normal as that reddish glow of the morning sun on her comforter's surface every time the clock woke her up.
She didn't think on them as Kathryn turned from teasing to happy to annoyed for not having had the opportunity of having met Emma to delighted for having finally met her.
She, however, thought about them a night full of silver and onyx in where Emma asked her if she wanted to go out with her and they returned slightly tipsy, smiling at each other and holding hands while singing a song Regina didn't know all the lyrics of it but Emma kept on muttering them, eyes full of stars and green and blue.
She stopped thinking though when Emma glanced at her lips one too many times before asking her if she could kiss her. She merely muttered a yes, her mind chanting along the last verses of the song, the ones she did remember as Emma's fingers grasped her dress, her right knee coming between her legs, her own back hitting her door, her own hands tangling on those golden tresses, her lips caressing and touching skin before they finally met.
"Yeah, it's all right."