The Last Draw

Regina was a master of games, no matter the rules she knew exactly how to play. In her career, family life, friendships and love life her strategies, as she would put it were flawless. The world was her casino, one in which she was constantly winning Jackpots, and that's where she was now.

Regina was dreaming that her metaphor had become tangible she was swimming through piles of coins, still trickling out of the machines around her. The dream began to fade as she was pulled out of her sleep by the familiar tone of her cell phone ringing. She freed herself from the golden strands fanned out on her face coming from the woman next to her. She rolled closer to the small table that held her phone and answered it only to hear a voice on the other end scream at her.

"Regina Angela Mills!" Regina held the phone at a safe distance from her ears as the yelling continued.

"Where the hell are you?"

"Hey, Kat! What's u-" Regina began. Her casual tone did nothing but feed Kathryn's anger.

"Hey, Kat? HEY KAT? Regina, do you know how long I've been trying to reach you?" She asked but answered before Regina had a chance to.

"Two days Regina, I've been worried sick. Two days! Where the hell are you so I can drive over there and kill you."

Regina knew Katheryn was foaming at the mouth at this point but she wanted to push her a bit further.

"Well good luck driving to London." she answered with a smirk.

"London?", Kathryn's voice had climbed an octave.

"Regina, what the hell are you doing in London?"

Regina smirked again "Well right now, I'm doing this hot blonde."

"Regina! Oh my god." Kathryn paused for a moment in an attempt to compose herself. Regina swore she could hear her pinching the bridge of her nose.

"You scared the shit out of me just so you can bed girls in London?"

Regina sat up and scratched her head as the woman beside her stirred.

"Well no Kat, I like to think of it as me traveling to find inspiration."

Kathryn had become exhausted of the situation and with how Regina wasn't taking any of this seriously. She was exhausted of how often Regina did things like this. Kathryn drew a deep sigh before she responded, her voice much lower than earlier.

"Regina. Do you have any idea how terrified I was of what might have happened to you? You really need to stop doing shit like this."

Regina noticed the way her best friend's voice had dropped and how near she sounded to tears. She immediately stopped messing around with Kathryn.

"Okay yes, I understand Kat. I'm sorry for scaring the shit out of you like that. I really did need the inspiration though."

Kat raised her voice once more but this time tears were evident in her throat. "Regina I don't give a shit you should have told me or someone that you were leaving the country. I was about to report you as a missing person."

Regina felt extremely guilty now for putting the other woman in such a state of panic. Driving her to tears made it worse.

"I'm sorry Kat, I really am. It was impulsive of me."

"Incredibly impulsive, inconsiderate, irrational, irresponsible," Kathryn grunted as silence fell on them. They both sat with their phones pressed to their ears in silence for a few minutes. Then Regina decided to break the silence. She whispered into the phone in a very childish voice,

"I'm sorry Kitty Kat."

"Nope." Kat's tone was a bit more playful now but it was clear that she was still agitated.

"I'm not falling for that one this time. This was an ass move, Regina. A real ass move." Things went quiet again until Kathryn asked Regina when she was coming back home.

"Well, I should be back after the weekend."

"Okay well call me when you get back."

"I will. I promise."

"Good."

"Bye Ka-" the phone hung up before Regina could finish.

The blonde had now gotten up and threw her arms around Regina's neck

"Who was that?" she asked

Regina smiled in her embrace "Just my friend. I didn't tell her I was leaving the country so she's really pissed."

The blonde hummed and crawled into Regina's lap, "Breakfast will take your mind off of it. Maybe room service?" Regina chuckled as she laced her fingers through the woman's hair.

"I think I'll just have this English muffin right here." Regina dove face-first into the woman's neck throwing them back into the bed.


Emma didn't like games much. They rarely ended in her favor no matter how well she played by the rules. She'd done her best to remain a good sport but life had seemed to have been a vindictive dealer. One that felt that she was fair game. It had been that way from her very first round.

Emma had been in foster care since she was a baby, right up until she was fifteen. She had been tossed from home to home. Had been separated from her brother several times and although they had been reunited when they were adopted by the same family, she still felt separated from him in many ways.

Emma however, didn't want to be a sore loser, so she had decided to focus on the points she had been able to score. Emma had an amazing best friend who was like a sister to her. Ruby had crawled into her heart and refused to leave. She gave Emma more love and support than she could have ever expected. It was so overwhelming Emma couldn't bare to reject it. When Ruby had started to date her now Fiancé, Belle the love in Emma's life only grew.

Emma had also considered herself lucky to be a social worker for foster kids. Sure the job could be rather grueling. It often drained her physically and sometimes emotionally, if she got too close to a case, but she loved it. She loved the thought of helping kids play the cards they were handed. Offering more help than she had received in the system. Even if that meant giving up some of her own cards. In fact, that's what she was doing at that moment.

Emma had brought another large stack of paperwork home with her. She sat at her small desk reading and sorting through them as the sound of a knock echoed through her heavy door.

"Come in." she yelled as she turned to see her visitor.

Ruby cracked open the door, stuck her head through and sweetly called out.

"Emilia!"

Emma balled up a piece of scrap paper and threw it at her friend's head.

"You know I hate it when you say my full name, Ruby Ann" she stretched out the name and rolled her eyes for emphasis.

"Hey," Ruby whined as she entered the room. "That's my granny's name, not mine." Emma chuckled at her childish tone.

"What's up Rubz?"

Ruby shrugged as she steadily made her way towards Emma, who's back faced the door again.

"Just seeing what you're up to on this fine Friday night, Emz." silence fell on them for a moment before Ruby spoke again.

"What's all this?" she gestured towards the desk. "Brought work home with you again."

"Yup," she replied then bit her lip. Emma knew exactly where this was going. Ever since college, whenever Emma's workload had seemed to be getting too stressful, Ruby would try to ease her away from it. She'd try to get her to relax a bit and clear her mind. Her methods of relaxation had become more subdued since then. The trio often had game nights or mini dance parties which were nice, but she couldn't be bothered to be dragged from her work tonight.

"You're so tense." Ruby rubbed Emma's shoulders as she continued. "You know what you need?"

Emma raised the mug of water she had on her desk to her lips. She paused to answer before she took a long sip. "A movie night with the family?"

Ruby shook her head. "No, you need to go out and get laid."

Emma completely regretted that drink of water as she spat every last drop of it across her bedroom. Her mouth hung open for a moment before she explained.

"What?"


Author's Notes

This is the first fanfic I've publish in a very long time and It's a fic I've been working on for over a year. A lot of material has been stored for this universe following a pretty long time line of Regina's life. With that being said do expect more chapters and fics published for these characters in the future.

Thank you for reading this fic I hope you've enjoyed it thus far. I do not have a beta reader and I do struggle with dyslexia so please forgive any errors that may have slipped through all of my online checks. Please don't be afraid to send feedback or suggestions, writers need as much help and support as we can get. Feel free to contact me on Tumblr (link in my profile) I'll respond much quicker there. The next chapter should be up in maybe a week (maybe sooner depending on how editing the third chapter goes).

Standard disclaimer: I do not own Once Upon a Time or any of it's characters.

Thank you once again for reading !