A/N: Very short for me, a oneshot for now based on a random idea I got from Lana being adorable, but if you're interested enough I might be persuaded to continue...
BREAK
September 1st, and she was already late. Emma Swan slammed the door of her bright yellow mustang and wondered if she could sneak into the back of assembly without being noticed. Since it was her first day at her new job and her gym teacher outfit always made her stand out, she kind of thought not. She raced into the building, trying to remember the layout from the brief tour she'd gotten before her interview.
At least she managed to enter the hall without slamming the door. The kids were sitting neatly in rows in their cute blue uniforms, bright eager eyes staring up at their goddess of a principal, Regina Mills. Emma had developed a huge crush on her at the interview, and seeing her now, all power suit and speech mode, had her practically shuddering with delight.
"Miss Swan! How good of you to join us. Please, come up to the stage."
Emma blushed a little as the focus of the entire room turned to her, but did as she was instructed.
"Welcome to Storybrooke Elementary School, Miss Swan. Now, children, Miss Swan was late this morning. What happens to young women who are late?"
"Spank her! Spank her!" the children chorused. Principal Mills grinned wickedly.
"Bend over, Miss Swan-"
Emma rolled over in bed, gasping with relief as her alarm clock beeped at her. Seriously? Spanking? Mills wasn't that hot. Okay, she kind of was. She really was. But this new job anxiety was ridiculous. The interview had been fine, very professional, and look, here was her alarm, it was 5.45 a.m., she would go for her run, and there was no way she would be late, even if every pensioner living in this tiny town suddenly decided to buy a car and somehow cause a traffic jam.
Somewhat to her relief, that didn't happen. She arrived at the school just after 7; the kids wouldn't arrive until 8.15. There was a staff meeting scheduled for 7.30, so Emma set about carrying in her one cardboard box of classroom supplies, and arranging them in her room. While she was a gym teacher, she would also be doing some pastoral work, teaching social studies and citizenship. She liked the system, she was looking forward to getting to know the kids better. At her last job, the school had been huge. Most teachers didn't even know the names of most of their students.
She put up her three posters - a map of the U.S., a map of the world, and a map of space which depicted the major constellations. She hung her trusty dreamcatcher at the back of the room (she had a theory bad thoughts didn't just need to be stopped when you were asleep) and slid her childhood favourite book, The Ugly Duckling, into her desk drawer.
Then she set about arranging the kids' desks. They were all in rows, but she didn't believe in that. She didn't really believe in desks, not for her way of teaching. She pushed them all to one side of the room and into one large table, putting some chairs around them so they could be used if necessary. Then she looked at the grey carpeted floor. She'd have to get some gym mats or bean bags or something.
She was so absorbed in her rearranging that she didn't notice she was no longer alone. In fact, she continued to give her visitor an excellent view of her ass in her neat tracksuit bottoms until the visitor loudly cleared her throat, and Emma somehow banged her head on the wall in her efforts to right herself.
"Principal Mills," she stammered, trying to get a hold of herself. She managed a smile. "Good morning, it's great to see you again."
The austere brunette principal quirked an eyebrow. "Likewise, Miss Swan. I see you are making yourself at home."
"Oh, uh, yeah, I mean, that's okay, right? You said in your email that this would be my room so I thought-"
"It is quite alright," Regina said, seemingly rather amused. "As long as you educate the children, it does not matter where you sit them."
Emma grinned. "I'm so glad you think that way. The meeting's in like five minutes, right? Or are you already waiting?"
Regina smiled more warmly. "No one is waiting yet. I came to make sure you were settling in okay, to give you this," she held out a piece of paper with Emma's login details to the school network, "and to ask if you needed anything. You are the only new staff member this term."
"Ah, the new girl, yay," Emma said sarcastically. "But thanks, it's nice of you… I don't think I need anything. Well, I was wondering about something for the kids to sit on, like, cushions or bean bags or something, but I can sort that out myself."
Regina looked around the room more carefully. "I see what you mean. Bean bags would be nice. Leave it with me, if you like. I can certainly arrange something by the end of the week."
"Seriously? That would be awesome. I was kind of worried you'd be mad that I moved everything."
Regina chuckled. "Oh, I am sure I'll find plenty of reasons to be angry with you, but your destruction of my approved classroom set up is actually rather pleasing. I always wanted to run a friendly school; I'm interested to see how you teach in this environment. When everything is settled, I plan to supervise some of your classes."
Shit. She had enough trouble keeping it together when it was just the two of them. How was she going to manage it in front of a class of rowdy kids? Especially when she couldn't quite get the image of spanking out of her head…
"Uh, cool, I mean, sure, sounds good."
Regina did the exact wicked grin Emma had imagined in her dream. "You needn't look quite so terrified, Miss Swan," she said, but her tone said the opposite. Her tone said Emma was absolutely right to be run for the hills, shit in her pants, scream like a banshee terrified.
