Characters aren't mine. They belong to ABC, Disney, and other assorted entities of importance. I gain nothing from writing these stories but the fun of doing it. Please don't sue me.
"Alright, dog, it's Wednesday." Regina stepped over Pongo and made her way to her closet. Her morning shower had been quicker than normal. There was no reason to wash her hair or primp. It was cleaning day, which meant she was going to be filthy before the day was over.
She pulled out a pair of well-worn shorts and a t-shirt that had once belonged to Graham. "I don't suppose I could train you to sweep the floors?"
Pongo looked up at her, gave a violent shake of his head, stood, and turned to face away from her, dropping back down to the floor and resettling.
"No, of course not," she muttered, tossing her towel over the back of the chaise. She pulled on her clothes with a sigh. "I wish there was someone in this town brave enough, dumb enough, or disinterested enough I could pay to at least assist me in this chore. This house is really too big to be cleaned by one person."
She stood, grabbing the towel on the way to her laundry basket. "Shall we start with Henry's room or your play area?"
Pongo slowly pushed up, walked into the hallway, and sat down in front of Henry's bedroom door.
Regina chuckled. "Yes, somehow I thought that's what you would say."
Since the arrangement between Regina and the Charmings had taken full effect, Henry had been spending more time in his room. Though the visits were still supervised by Emma Swan, the sheriff had less and less issue with Henry moving about the house as he pleased.
In an odd turn of events, the more time the sheriff spent in Regina's home, the more Regina found she wasn't bothered by the blonde's company. Of course, that could have been because the sheriff was one of the few humans that came to her home and would voluntarily speak to her, though she doubted that was even most of it. Regina was fully accustomed to being more-or-less completely alone.
Whatever the case was, the mellowing out of her relationship with the sheriff had allowed Henry to feel more comfortable in the house, and he'd started asking to come over more often. His visits had grown from once a week to a few times a week, and, though the agreement was for once a week visits, Emma had been very adamant that Henry should be able to come to the mansion whenever he wanted.
Regina couldn't decide if she was happy for the increase in visits from her son or irritated that someone had to fight on her behalf to allow him to come home to see her. What's worse, it was the Savior doing the fighting.
She sighed, opening Henry's door to find the room in complete disarray. "This is how Miss Swan is allowing my son to live?" She glanced around at the clothes on the floor, papers scattered around the room, and a half eaten sandwich on the bedside table next to an empty glass. "This room is a pigsty."
Pongo carefully crept in behind her. He looked around for a safe spot to take up residence and whined.
"The bed," she motioned for him to hop up on it. "It's the safest place in here." As she moved around the room, picking up clothes and throwing them in the hamper she carried, she muttered to herself about the state of affairs in which she now found herself living.
"When Henry lived here on a full time basis," she grunted, dropping down to her knees to reach beneath the bed to fish out whatever was under there. "He was never this messy." She pulled out one sneaker, which was badly beaten up and smelled like something had died in it. Slowly closing her eyes, she held the shoe away from her. "Oh god," she swallowed a few times, trying to rid herself of the bile that had risen up, "I've been near ogres that smelled better."
Pongo buried his nose beneath the rumpled covers of the bed.
"Dog, you're no help, are you?" She set the shoe aside and dropped down onto her stomach to see what else was under the bed. "Naturally, the other shoe is missing. What…" She trailed off as she tried to figure out what was tucked between the box springs and the bedframe. After maneuvering herself under the bed, cursing a few times, and managing to smack her had on the frame twice, she finally retrieved the item.
Sitting up again, she looked down at a badly crumpled magazine. "I knew this day would eventually come," the disapproving tone in her voice made Pongo whine again and burry himself further under the covers. "Of course, I had hoped he'd have better taste than this." She sighed, flipping through the magazine to see full color pictures of women in various poses and various stages of undress. "I suppose Miss Swan and I will need to discuss this new development. I'm sure it hasn't occurred to her to discuss any of this with Henry." She looked up to see Pongo watching her from beneath the blankets. "What do you think?"
He pulled himself back a bit, allowing the blanket to cover his eyes.
"I agree. She's clueless." Regina looked down to the magazine again and flipped to the centerfold, who was a chesty redhead with a picture perfect tan, no lines naturally, and stunning green eyes. "This is so unrealistic. No woman ever truly looks like this." She frowned, scowling at the picture. "He's going to develop unrealistic expectations of what a woman should look like and beauty on the whole if we let him keep looking at just this kind of tripe."
Sighing heavily, she tossed the magazine on the bed next to the hidden dog and continued on her journey to find any more dirty clothes or dishes. "I suppose I should be upset that he's got a publication full of nude women hidden under his bed," she remarked as she finished pushing the last of the clothes into the hamper, "but I really see no reason to pretend that sex doesn't exist, do you dog?"
Pongo shimmied from the covers and jumped down onto the now exposed floor, careful to avoid the magazine still sitting on the bed.
"I somehow suspect you and Miss Swan share the same attitude about this." She picked the magazine up again, laid it on the nightstand beside the dishes she'd collected, and stripped the bed. "I also suspect it's time to buy Henry some new sheets. Somehow, I feel the Buzz Lightyear theme is now well past him."
She pushed the sheets into the hamper, picked it up, and headed down stairs. "Mark that on the list of things to buy, dog. We need…," she dumped the pile of clothes in front of the washer and dry and began to sort. Pongo happily jumped into the middle of pile and made himself comfortable.
Regina rolled her eyes. "Do I put you in with the whites or the darks?"
He tilted his head and quirked an ear.
She narrowed her eyes at him. "Move, dog. Go sit in the pile of sheets."
Begrudgingly, he stood and moved to the pile of sheets as instructed, but he was far less enthused about being in Henry's sheets than he was sitting in a pile of Regina's dirty clothes.
"As I saying," she began again as she sat in the floor and began to sort clothes out for the wash, "we need new sheets for Henry's bed, dog food, meals for the week, toiletry items for me and," she threw a pillow case in the general direction of Pongo and the sheets, "toiletry items for the guest bathroom as well. Miss Swan has finally used up what was in there. It only took her two and half months." She sighed. The weeks had passed by quickly, and the three of them had found an odd routine. Henry had joined the track team at school, and he was constantly on them to go running with him. After a few weeks, they had acquiesced. It had been a healthy habit to pick up, but it created a routine in which the sheriff would arrive with Henry in tow, they would change into running clothes, all three would go for a run, come back, shower, and have dinner. It was bizarrely domestic.
"She makes an adequate running partner, and Henry is getting stronger with his sprints, but the mess they leave in the guest bathroom after we finish our runs creates a marathon cleaning moment for me after they leave. I would feel bad for Mary Margaret if I cared."
She smirked. "She deals with that mess on a daily basis." She nodded. "Good." Standing up, she began filling the machine with delicates. "What do you think, dog? Is Miss Swan more of an Axe bodywash kind of woman or an Oil of Ole person?"
She picked the basket up and trudged back up the stairs to pull the sheets from her own bed. Pongo dutifully followed her up the stairs. "Ivory soap," she declared as she finished stripping her bed. "I feel she's the type that is rather neutral in her soap options." She pulled a pen and pad from her bedside table and wrote down the list of things she needed from the store. "But I've never been the type for neutrality. Henry's on an Irish Spring kick," she added that to the list, "and I think I'll find something that smells a little of cinnamon for Miss Swan."
Pongo grunted, looking up from his place in the floor with what would pass as confusion in his eyes.
"She spends enough time here that I'd… oh, shut up." She rolled her eyes at the dog. "I can be a gracious hostess if I want to be." He grunted at her. She ignored him. "I also need to buy Coke for Henry, Sam Adams for Emma," she was talking to herself as she worked out her list, "I'm out of juice, apples, greens for salads, and I promised them I'd make lasagna this weekend. I'll need the ingredients for that."
Pongo barked at her, pulling her from her thoughts. "What?" She raised an eyebrow at him, and he barked again. "Oh, yes, your treats." He resettled as she wrote the note down.
She set the pen and pad back on the table and stood to pick the basket up again. "Shall we continue with our cleaning, dog? If we're lucky, we may finish in time to have a late lunch at Granny's."
With a happy bounce, he stood and rushed down the stairs. She could hear his toys squeaking in the study and could only assume he was putting them away.
"Dog, it is times like these that I wish I'd learn a few cleaning spells." Regina grunted as she pushed her mop around the kitchen the floor. "Or, at the very least, I wish I had my servants back." She stood, leaning backwards to stretch out her back. She had started on the hardwood floors downstairs. As they dried, she had vacuumed the second floor, and she was now back down in the kitchen. "Are you sure you can't learn to do this?"
Pongo stood on the other side of the kitchen's entrance. He watched her intently, staring between her and the back door. It took a few moments for his silent request to be heard. With a huff, she leaned the mop against the cabinets and opened the back door.
"Don't get muddy. I'll hose you down on the back porch before I let you come inside again if you do."
He darted out of the door and disappeared into the large backyard.
"He'd going to get muddy," she muttered as she closed the door. "I suppose I'll add 'clean the dog' to my list of chores today, right after 'clean the bathrooms' and 'fold the laundry."
Laundry folded, bathrooms cleaned, and all the beds made except for Henry's, Regina finally stepped into the backyard to look for Pongo. She found him sitting under her tree with mud caked around his paws and along his belly.
She sighed.
The moment he saw her, he stood and started to make a run for the shed, where he knew he could wiggle beneath the door and hide, but he was stopped by a wave of her hand. "No, not today, dog." With a flick of her wrist, she held him in the air with magic, watching with a cocked eyebrow as he tried to run in place. When he finally stopped, she moved to the shed and pulled out cleaning supplies and his wash bucket. "I'm going to put you down now. If you run again, I'm going to puff you into this tub."
She had learned early on that the dog didn't appreciate having magic used on him. He always seemed off put by it when she did. Because of that, she'd come to use it as a form of non-violent punishment. She was always careful to never hurt him, to never retrain him in a violent manner, or to never scare him, but he was a large dog and at times unmanageable. She needed the help, and magic gave her the helping hand she needed.
After being released, he slowly made his way to the large wash bin and hopped inside. Regina watched him sit, and her mind flashed back to the day a few months past when Henry had helped her wash Pongo. She frowned. It had been such a normal thing to do, and it hurt her that it was something she couldn't do with her son on a regular basis.
She wondered if she would ever have the chance to live a normal life with him, but she brushed the thought aside as she began washing Pongo. Some things were best not to think too hard on.
They settled at a table on the patio outside of Granny's. Regina took the seat facing the street, and Pongo settled beside her on the ground. She ordered something for herself and a bowl of chicken and rice for Pongo.
It was a peaceful moment that was well earned. It had taken her nearly 5 hours to clean her house from top to bottom, the dog, and herself. Now she was taking a break for food before going off to buy groceries.
She was tired. She was stressed, and she was hoping everyone would leave her alone.
"A little late for lunch, isn't it?"
Naturally, being left alone wasn't going to happen. She looked up to see the sheriff taking the seat across from her. "Sheriff, aren't you supposed to be patrolling or doing paperwork or saving a damsel in distress right now?"
"I have deputies to patrol, my paperwork is up to date because you make me do it when Henry does his homework while you're cooking dinner, and 99.9% of the damsels in this town don't need saving. They tend to save the asses of the men around here, so why do they need my help?"
Regina chuckled. She had to hand it to the sheriff. She had a point. "Are you here for lunch as well?"
"Yup," Emma flagged Ruby down and ordered before continuing, "I had to go take care of an issue between Terry Gosling and Brenda Merriweather this morning. It lasted until about twenty minutes ago."
"Land dispute," Regina commented dryly.
"Yeah!" The blonde furrowed her brow in thought. "How'd you know?"
"Those two always had constant land disputes between them. It would make sense that, now that they have their memories back, they'd return to that same old, tired fight." Regina shrugged.
The blonde's eyes light up with a thought. "So, how did you fix it whenever they had this problem back in the Enchanted Forest?"
"You really don't want to know," the older woman answered, glancing down to check on the dog.
"No, I really do," the sheriff countered. "What did you do? Threaten to burn their places to the ground? Tell them to stop it or you'd tear out their hearts? Demand they leave you alone because you didn't have time to deal with their petty crap?"
Regina narrowed her eyes at the woman across from her. "Despite what you may think, Miss Swan, I was not as bad of a matriarch as some may have you believe. Sometimes, my guards took things too far, and, for that I…" Her eyes widened as she realized what she was saying. She stopped and regrouped. "I told them that I would redistrict their lands and make certain each had exactly 50% of the total land between the two of them. I had a local fence maker build a fence along the redrawn property line, and I told them stop attempting to pick fights over things they weren't truly having issues with." She huffed at the memory. It still irritated her that she'd had to deal with them in the midst of trying to find a good way to take out Snow White. "Their real issue was they were fighting over the same love interest, but neither had the wherewithal to step up and take full claim."
"The same love interest?" The blonde blinked a few times as she processed. "Who?"
"Amanda Smythe." Regina stated with disinterest as Ruby brought their food down and set it on the table, followed by setting a full bowl of chicken and rice down next to the water bowl for Pongo.
"You're kidding me!" The sheriff's eyes bulged. "She's married to Thomas!"
"But she's having an affair with both women." Regina began to carefully cut the chicken up in her salad. "The love quadrilateral caused all sort of issues between the four of them."
Emma leaned back in her chair and ran a hand through her hair. "That's insane."
"Humans tend to lean toward insanity over logic in matters of the heart or sex or both." Regina started to take a bite of her salad but stopped. "Speaking of, I cleaned my house today and found an interesting magazine beneath Henry's bed."
She was pleased to see the blonde pale. "Let me guess," Emma said in weary voice, "a nudie magazine?"
"It would seem it's time to have a talk with him." Regina raised an eyebrow in question as she took the bite of salad.
"Yeah, about that," the sheriff shifted uncomfortably in her chair, "I may have given that magazine to him."
Regina calmly finished her bite and swallowed, all the while staring the still anxious blonde down. "I come from a world that doesn't have the same hang-ups regarding sex and nudity that this one seems to have. I have no issue with him looking at pictures, but I do have issue with him being uneducated about realistic expectations of feminine beauty and how to be safe regarding any sexual ventures he chooses to take."
"Wow, that's… that's really," the sheriff pulled her jaw up and tried again. "That's way more open minded than I expected from you, Regina."
"I cannot stop him from growing up or doing things he shouldn't. At some point, he's going to do whatever he likes. The only thing I can do is educate him, and, since he's not at home where I can do so on a regular basis, I'm forced to make sure that you, at least, are making certain he understands the way of things." Regina leaned forward a little in her chair. "Are you?"
"I'm trying to," Emma answered with a heavy sigh. "I use myself a lot as an example of what not to do, but I'm honestly having a hard time with how to get everything across to him about all that stuff. I just… I don't know. I need help, and I don't want to ask Mary Margaret and David. God… just no." She winced at the thought.
Regina nodded. "The next time he comes home, we'll sit down and talk to him. I'm off to buy him new sheets, and that would be a good setup for this discussion."
"New sheets?" The sheriff puzzled over that one for a moment. "Oh, I guess Buzz is a little young for him now, huh?"
"Sadly," Regina answered with a frown. "I actually have a rather long list of items I need to pick up from the store."
"Groceries?"
"Yes, among other things. Why do you ask?"
Emma popped a fry into her mouth and quickly swallowed it down. "Let me help. Henry and I are there enough that I should pitch in. Besides, the guest bath is out of stuff, and I want to buy whatever you want in there since I use it."
"Guests are not expected to buy things for their visits, Miss Swan," Regina rolled her eyes at the very notion. "However, I could use the help carrying things in once I've bought them. Pongo is a terrible pack mule."
The dog couldn't be bothered to respond. He was only halfway through his meal, and there was something yummy at the bottom of the bowl for him.
"So, how about you drop the dog off after we eat, and I'll follow you? We can take the cruiser. It's got a trunk big enough to carry everything."
Regina nodded. "You'll do for a pack mule, I suppose."
The sheriff smirked, pointing down to her badge and commented with mock pride, "Hey, to protect and serve."
Thank you for reading. As always, reviews are appreciated.