It Wasn't the Spell
Anyone may have thought that a quaint little town in Maine would be quite a come down for the Evil Queen. However, considering Storybrooke was entirely of her own design – right from the cosy, family-run diner down to the charming, well-stocked library – others might say it was obvious what Regina Mills really wanted all along. A community, a family. She just didn't quite go the right way about getting it.
Yet, against all odds, that is exactly what she got. It seems that these things can be found in the most unlikely of places. Her old tale was rewritten – the villains became heroes and her legacy became one of respect instead of terror. She was the rightful Mayor of townspeople who had once feared to speak her name, the step-daughter she once vowed to kill was now one of her closest confidantes and the woman who tried to 'steal' her son showed her the true meaning of a best friend. She didn't just get a second chance to start with a blank page; she got a brand new book.
However there was one chapter in her story that Regina was still missing – love. Her heart was fuller than she ever dared believe possible in her years as the Evil Queen – the hole that Daniel left was more of a gaping chasm that she never thought could be filled, and the forgiveness she had been proffered proved her wrong in the most poetic of ways. Yet the dust had settled and she was surrounded by kindness, affection and care but she was still alone. The Stable Boy was gone. The Man with the Lion Tattoo was gone. Both would still hold a piece of her heart for the rest of her life, and she held on to that now without the resentment and anger that they were taken from her too soon. But she was still alone.
It wasn't that she didn't know how to be alone. She'd been alone for the best part of her whole life, and fully relished in her freedom to do as she pleased. Sex had never been a problem either, she'd always found that in one way or the other (though now, thoughts of how made her feel extremely nauseous). It was more that she'd finally started to forgive herself for her past sins and believe that maybe, just maybe, she'd become a person deserved to be loved. With Henry off realm-hopping, pursuing his life's purpose (which could only lead to a beautiful love story for a handsome boy like him, Regina was sure of it), the space in her life to accept someone new was ever present. The dozens of empty rooms in the mayoral mansion reminded her of that every day.
Storybrooke had barely changed in the 10 years since the Saviour's wedding. It was almost like the town never aged... funny that. Neal was no longer an adorable toddler – he'd passed the terrible twos and was almost into the even-terribler teens, but was growing up to be just as handsome as his father. Snow and Charming were coping remarkably well, and Emma was clearly enjoying being the very cool big sister, making up for the years she'd lost with Henry. Aunt Regina played a very active role in his life too – he'd only met his nephew a handful of times since he left, when the older boy returned to Storybrooke for a few of both his mothers' birthdays, but he certainly appreciated all the cool stuff left behind to play with. The Charmings even often came to her for parenting advice, considering she was the only one of them who had the first clue how to raise a teenage boy. It really was as if the world had turned upside down.
The only thing that had really changed was that Hook was gone.
It seemed that life on the shore wasn't for him, and even Emma hadn't been enough to keep him moored. By their first anniversary, he was spending increasing amounts of time by the docks and she with others closest to her. They seemed to have reached an impasse – he wanted them to pick up and go on adventures, battling the high seas and never staying in one place for too long. He couldn't understand her frustration and insistence that she didn't want to leave her family. Her childhood had consisted of moving from one family to another and never having a place to call home and she wouldn't choose that for her adult life too. So one day, in the midst of a big fight, he left. No one had known he still had a magic bean, but the portal opened and into it he sailed. He never came back.
Regina learned an important lesson in empathy that day – the last thing your best friend wants to hear when her husband skips out on her is probably "I knew he wasn't worth your time". However true it may be, apparently it's polite to at least wait a couple of days to voice that thought out loud, as Emma swiftly informed her in a blaze of rage and heartbreak. They'd had fights before – they'd had more fights than anyone in Storybrooke could count, as friends as well as enemies – but that one hurt the most. Never before had she seen the Sheriff so abandoned, not only by Hook but by her. It was the first fight in which Emma had clearly expected better from her, the first in which she'd been shocked by Regina's questionable behaviour. That cut deep, along with the onslaught of yelling that followed, fuelled mainly by anger at her husband but expertly and lethally directed only at her best friend. The brunette let the words wash over her, knowing full well she probably deserved most of them, and taking comfort only in that Emma clearly had the capacity to be disappointed in her, which meant that at least there was a level from which she could fall. That showed she'd been doing something right before. Regina vowed to do better, and when the screaming subsided, she took the sobbing wreck of the Saviour into her arms, guided her to the hard concrete floor and held her until long after the sun set.
That was almost 8 years ago. Since then, neither Emma nor herself had entertained the notion of romantic involvement, with anyone. Not because they didn't want to, but exactly because Storybrooke had barely changed at all. It was filled with all the same people – no one ever left (aside from Hook, apparently) and no one new ever came – so there were a distinct lack of available prospects in the town. This was a road they travelled, and then revisited, almost every time they got drunk together.
The past 8 years were punctuated by many an evening of the two women sitting together in Storybrooke's only bar – or on Regina's plush mayoral sofa – usually one with a dirty martini and the other a neat whiskey, wistfully wondering about the abundance of men outside the town lines, in this realm or the next. In the early days there was a melancholy that hung over their conversations, but that soon dissipated as they became a balm to one another's loneliness. Emma's companionship in fact filled some of the space in her life – they both missed their son, they'd both experienced terrible heartbreak, and now they were both here. Their friendship was something the Mayor had never experienced before – she'd never before known anyone who would have taken the Dark curse for her, stayed with her through the dark nights when she lost Robin, or rushed to the hospital at 3am when her appendix ruptured. It was the closest to true, lasting love Regina wondered if she'd ever feel. But it was no substitute for the earth-shattering, core-shaking, beating-heart love that she still held out hope one day they'd both find.
It was one of those evenings in particular on which Regina was pondering as she held a glass of cider in one hand and twirled her phone in the other. Not two days ago she'd been sat in much the same spot – her side of the couch – with her stocking-ed feet up on the glass coffee table and Emma's in her lap. The blonde was laying full-length over the remainder of the sofa and was getting her feet absent-mindedly, albeit affectionately, massaged as they made their way through a second bottle of red wine. They'd been in comfortable, warm silence for only a few minutes when it was broken.
"You know, maybe it's time to make our hopes and dreams a little more attainable. You know what they say, when you run out of men there's always women... and there are plenty of women in this town."
Caught off-guard by the comment, Regina almost snorted into her glass as she tried to stifle a less-than-elegant laughing fit. It was only by way of a miracle that she didn't spill wine all over the cream fabric on which they were sitting.
"What?" Emma had an innocent grin on her face that almost warranted a halo hovering above her head, as if her suggestion was of completely legitimate merit.
Shaking her head with amusement as she regained some of her composure, the brunette glanced over at her best friend. "Well, I hadn't thought of that one, so top marks for creativity." For a second she caught herself. Why hadn't she thought of it? It was a part of herself she'd barely even thought about since they left the Enchanted Forest, though she didn't know why, but it definitely wasn't a part of herself that didn't exist.
That only widened the Saviour's grin as she could see an interesting conversation on the horizon. She wasn't quite sure how, in maybe 12 years of friendship, this had never once come up but she realised it was something she didn't actually know. "Told ya – I'm a genius. I never have, but there are definitely a few times I wish I had, so why are we limiting our options?" The reaction was completely unreadable, but as far as she was aware they had no secrets so she had no hesitation in asking. "What about you? Are you telling me the Evil Queen never had her wicked way with a wench in her time?"
Trying not to shudder at the thought of how some (albeit, not most) of those trysts happened, Regina tried to push that out of her mind, knowing that wasn't at all what Emma was getting at. Instead she smirked, feeling something like pleasant butterflies in her stomach as if she was rediscovering an old passion. "Guilty as charged, though not for many, many years... Although, what made you so sure?" She swilled the remaining dregs of her wine round the bottom of the glass as she turned an interested gaze down the couch.
"I can imagine the Queen was quite adventurous and, well, kinky – she did manage to sleep with Rumpelstiltskin in the short time I had her acquaintance – so it's not really that much of a leap. And if she's indiscriminate about what she does, she's probably going to be open to who she does it with, too. Though you did confirm my suspicions, I did think now-good Mayor Regina Mills might be a bit too vanilla for that..." Oh it was too easy. The former queen had played right into her hands. Just because they were friends now, didn't mean the Sheriff didn't get a kick out of pushing her buttons.
With each passing word, a full range of emotions were displayed on the Regina's face in all their glory. Interest turned to horror and disgust as she remembered the exploits of her evil self (all in the name of chaos, of course, but no less revolting), and then landed firmly on outrage, just as Emma had intended.
The jibe earned her a painful swat on the thigh but it was undoubtedly worth it to see the fire rising behind the brunette's eyes as she struggled to voice her irritation, considering she was relatively tipsy and had not been expecting the slight.
"I... what... For a start I don't see what anything between that elf and my worse half has to do with anything at all other than making me feel quite ill, and secondly, you might know a lot about me but you certainly do not have any idea how 'vanilla' or not I am Miss Swan." That was as eloquent and measured as she could muster with the annoyance bubbling just under the surface and the alcohol impairing her judgement. Though she couldn't quite keep the disdain from her voice when she spat out the word 'vanilla', so there was no doubt which image of herself she found more offensive. They might have turned her good but she hadn't gone soft – she was still more fearsome and powerful than the rest of them put together.
The blonde hadn't heard that name in a while. Now they no longer hated one another, she actually took great pleasure in knowing she could rile Regina up so quickly and so effectively, so she couldn't resist poking the bear. "Miss Swan? Is that your way of asserting your dominance to prove you've not gone all gooey and innocent inside? You know that doesn't fool me anymore, right?" She pushed herself into the sitting position and stretched her arms down her own legs, invading her best friend's personal space. Although she continued to grin innocently, she bit her lip slightly, knowing she was straying into dangerous territory – even redeemed, the former Queen's temper was legendary.
She was flustered. Sometimes she really despised Emma Swan. She didn't, but of course sometimes she did. She hated that this woman had the ability to get under her skin, but also this was her best friend and that was her job. They both knew this had nothing to do the brunette's sexual preferences and everything to do with her pride and reputation, yet this was a way only the Saviour could get to her since no one else would dare poke fun at her sex life. She took a slow breath in an attempt to quell the urge to banish her in a puff of purple smoke. "I'm not sure what you're trying to get out of this or what you're trying to goad me into – if you want to see my collection of sex toys you only need to ask, but trust me when I say you do not want me to assert my dominance." The confident smirk that accompanied the declaration contained just enough of a warning flash to say 'I'm not mad, but I might just kill you'.
Now the bear was just asking to be poked. "Maybe that's exactly what I want. I mean, it's been a while for both of us..."
Poof. The urge was not quelled. Regina was now alone, empty glass of wine in hand, but missing the warm weight on her lap and surrounded by a slowly dissolving purple haze. Damn, that woman tested her patience.
And here she was, two days later, thinking about that exchange. In fact, she'd struggled to stop thinking about it ever since. It was like a light switch was flicked on in her brain, illuminating options that she forgot were even possible. Illuminating feelings she'd forgotten she'd ever had, or even had the capacity to feel. She did wonder if it was amongst her obsession with Snow White and her perfect husband that she lost that part of herself – her all-consuming jealousy of their family gave her one ideal, one image of happiness, which she was determined to replicate at any and all cost. Either that or the solution was markedly more straight-forward. There simply weren't many women in Storybrooke with an interest in other women – to lead by example or to potentially date. Except apparently there was one possibility that Regina hadn't even know existed.
There came the real reason she couldn't stop thinking about the other night. That option in particular that was suddenly illuminated in a very, very bright spotlight. She cursed herself for even letting the thought cross her mind, but suddenly she was noticing how exquisitely beautiful and intriguing Emma Swan was. She thought of the smell – red wine mingled with that sweet, smoky perfume – when the pale skin had drawn near. She even began to wonder if that prickle she'd felt over her thighs as the blonde disappeared really was a reaction to the lack of heat, or instead to the lack of Emma.