Title: (Just Like) Starting Over
Rating: T for language, might be bumped later for language and/or sexiness
Disclaimer: I have no rights to any persons real or imagined, no television shows, no books, basically nothing. You want to sue me the best thing I have is a bed, but try to take that and I'll cut a bitch, it's super comfy.
Summary: AU Remma, Regina/Emma, Swan Queen, whatever you want to call it. Regina is a high society HBIC, Emma is a street-smart cop. This is what happens when I watch Once Upon a Time then go to sleep listening to Uptown Girl.
Word Count: This chapter: 1027; Total: 4897
Notes: I can't get the idea of Remma out of my head; you will all be subjected to more of it. And frequently.
Also, I'm trying to build my own AU canon here so bear with me. Mary is Emma's pseudo-mother but James (yes he will be James, not David or John) did NOT come part and parcel with Mary. There will be Henry, but certainly not when Emma's 18. I think that's it.
If Regina was going to be honest with herself, which was something she only did when it was convenient for her, she would admit that she spent far too long sitting around in her apartment and wearing nothing but a robe. But nobody can complain about the boss being late when the boss worked later than her employees, built the company up from next to nothing on her own, and kept the profits rising during an economic slump.
And she did come in late, strutting in like she owned the place (which she did) with the face of the cat who'd gotten into the cream (which, again, she had). And what started out as a very good day got even better after threatening five people, making a few important phone calls, and threatening a few more people. All before lunch.
Just before Regina was going to bully her way to reservations at some upscale restaurant or another, her assistant's voice came through the intercom, "Miss Mills? There is a caller who insists on speaking with you."
"Name?" she asked, absently scrolling through a marketing spreadsheet. She was the boss after all, she had her hands in everything.
"A Miss Blanchard," the tinny, speaker distorted voice informed her.
"Put her through, and make a reservation at that place I like." Picking up the phone, Regina reclined in her plush, leather chair. "Miss Blanchard, what can I do for you?"
A timid voice responded, "Regina Mills?"
"Yes, that is whose office you called and therefor the person you intended to speak with, or am I wrong?" Regina asked in a low, cutting voice.
"Oh – I…yes." The woman was already flustered, Regina wasn't even trying. "You're Emma's friend?" The stressing on the word friend would normally have been met with a biting retort. Instead that all too familiar weight of worry settled onto the brunette. This had been uncommon before Emma Swan had stomped into Regina's life wearing those manly shoes, but now was distressingly familiar.
"I am," Regina assented, dropping the cool and barbed tone almost immediately.
The tonal shift obviously reassured and emboldened the other woman. "She had a bit of an accident – she's fine," was a quickly added disclaimer, "but I thought you would want to know. County only called me because I'm her emergency contact - "
Regina hung up the phone and probably left the other woman still chattering away. She sailed out of her office, barking at her assistant, "Call for a town car, cancel my lunch plans, and push my afternoon, I'm leaving early."
The elevator had already whisked Regina away before her stunned assistant hesitated to look into the office, certain that something must be chasing her boss to inspire such urgency.
Ten minutes later Regina tapped her nails impatiently, causing her driver to glance back in the rearview mirror. "Almost there, Miss. Traffic is outrageous with the new construction they're doing on - "
But she was in no mood for small talk when the car had gone two feet in as many minutes. "I will be at County Hospital, I will call you when your services are required." And with that declarative, Regina exited the town car to walk the next block and a half to the hospital.
When she arrived, miraculously without a hair out of place, she think that Emma Swan had better be very grateful because the Christian Louboutin shoes on her feet would never be the same now. "Officer Swan?" she asked impatiently at the desk, and her father's portrait on the wall ensure quick directions to a small room in the ER with the blinds drawn but the door open.
"Jesus, I'm fine. Did you have to call everyone, Mary?" Hearing Emma speak was enough of a relief to calm the waves of panic Regina had been swamped with.
In her relief, Regina had missed the rest of her blonde's tirade. Now a doctor was floating out of the room as Regina approached. "She's fine, we would like to keep her for observation for a few hours but Miss Swan is fine. But one of the residents noticed some scratches which were inconsistent with the rest of your injuries. On your shoulders and across your back. Can you tell me what caused those?"
"Yes dear, do tell the good doctor exactly how you got those other scratches," Regina suggested with a wicked tone to her voice. She was quickly the only one in the room not blushing. The doctor fled with a flustered shuffling of papers while 'Mary' quickly excused herself and a tall man who was vainly fighting to hide a smile.
"Could there possibly be a reason we have brains in our heads instead of rocks? Or were you just not thinking? Hmm?" Regina asked, tapping one dusty Louboutin very dangerously.
"I was thinking that I couldn't let the guy get away. I didn't go flying through a plate glass window for shits and giggles," the bandaged blonde shot back.
The normalcy of it all, at least for them, rocked Regina's calm. "You idiot!" she growled, smacking the other woman with the purse clutched in one fist.
"Ouch! Hey, injured person over here," Emma yelped, fending off the halfhearted blows.
"Which is it, injured or fine? Make up your mind," Regina growled, feeling emotionally unstable.
Emma looked up at her, confused before asking, "Regina, are you crying?"
That brought the sternness back full force. "You either have brain damage or you think of me as an emotionless robot, so which is it?"
"I - " But Regina cut that off at the knees.
"After last night what possessed you to think I wouldn't care that you got hurt? It's something dramatic and tragic on the level Nicholas Sparks would be ashamed of," berated the angry brunette, her hold on her emotions nearly nonexistent.
"Last night? I didn't think - " again Regina cut her off.
"Which is painfully obvious." That made the blonde duck her head, rightfully shamed. It was that gesture of submission and apology which made Regina put off her disapproval. "You are obviously an idiot, but you are my idiot."
