A.N.—Hey y'all! Sorry for the lack of updates, but this week and next week are CRAZYPANTS for me. I will try to keep updating, even if the updates are shorter than normal. I already know how I want this installment to end, so it's just a matter of having typing time to get us there! Thanks for your patience, and as always, your views, follows, and reviews!
Snow and Tinkerbell had been going at it well into the night.
"Fine, you give me back Cupid, and I'll throw in my Madonna Greatest Hits box set." Tinkerbell was really getting the grill here.
"Try again, Tink. You committed treason." Snow said, still stuffing the pizza into her own face. Truth be told, by slice five, she was starting to feel a little sick, but she was also attempting to starve them out.
"For good reason! And I'll also throw in my signed copy of Like a Virgin." Tink whined. She had on an official uniform, but the professionalism ended there.
"She was helping me. I'm the one you wanted all along; just take me. None of this is her fault." Cupid added from his chair.
"Oh you're in plenty of trouble, mister. But right now, this is about Tinkerbell." Snow was upset, and clearly not at just the Cupid situation. Tinkerbell just took off. It was a betrayal of friendship. After she just left them after everything they'd been through, Snow wasn't keen to just pick up where they left off. They had all ended up on drugs, for Savior's sake. Then she just upped and left with the first guy to send her some jewelry.
"Snow, I'm trying to help here. You know that. You have to know that on some level."
Snow refused to look Tink in the eye, instead working on her next piece of pizza. Tink sighed. This was personal indeed.
"Snow, he doesn't have his heart. Or his—nevermind. Focusing on the heart. If you knew someone didn't have a heart, wouldn't you try to help them?" Tink asked.
Snow looked down. She knew that Tink was right. She would've left to help someone, with or without support. But it didn't make Tink's disappearance hurt any less.
Henry was back in his fetal position, now his signature break-up pose, on the couch. The crew had left Snow to negotiate on her own, seeing as how Cupid and Tink didn't seem to pose an immediate threat, even after hours of Snow attempting to psychoanalyze their relationship.
Bandit was growling and pointing at the kitchen. Henry sighed. He still had no appetite. Or any desire to move. And nobody had said anything about his lack of showering since the break-up.
"Bandit, help yourself. Whatever you're not tall enough to reach, just stand on a stool or something."
Don't mind if I do! The dragon thought, scampering off to the kitchen.
"I have to do something." Henry said to himself in the now empty room. He looked around while still on his side. All he could think about was how this morning he had not woken up to a "good morning" text. The television didn't seem appealing; neither did his video games. What is a Prince supposed to do when he's nursing a broken heart?
He saw Emma's laptop. He thought about how he'd never actually talked to another prince or princess, at least not his age if he counted royals he was related to. There had to be a princess out there.
Henry knew enough to know what a rebound was. He just didn't know yet why they're such a bad idea.
Meanwhile, at Granny's…
"Okay, Belle, Mulan, what's your song?" Emma asked, full well knowing there wouldn't be an answer. Emma had developed a way of throwing fries into her mouth one at a time that the Warrior across from her knew was meant to be casually mocking.
"What do you mean? I've never sung a song before…or written one." Belle and Mulan had no idea what Emma was talking about.
The Savior and the Queen had decided they were going to show Belle and Mulan how little they actually knew about each other when they decided to jump head-first into a marriage.
Regina and Emma smugly nodded at each other.
"Every couple has a song. It's like 'awwww honey, they're playing our song'!" Emma said, trying to explain the concept.
"What are you talking about?" Mulan asked.
"Point proven. Moving on," Regina took over, "Mulan, what chore around the house does Belle dislike doing the most?"
"Wait a minute. You're telling me that you have a couple song? An 'our song' song?" Belle asked. Mulan caught on quickly.
"Right. You two are moving just as quickly as we are. You're moving in together. You're making a marriage without actually doing the paperwork." Mulan said knowingly.
"Which is the sloppy way of doing it, if you ask me." Belle couldn't help adding.
"We do have a song, actually." Emma said crossing her arms as Regina jabbed her with her elbow.
Mulan and Belle leaned in, waiting for the information.
"We have a song because I wrote us one." Emma said proudly, while Regina looked away in embarrassment.
"Yes, Emma, well that's a personal song, not for-"
"I love yooooooou! When I am bluuuuuuueee! Not one, we're twooooooo!" Emma started to howl out until another jab to the side came.
"Yes, thank you dear. Did that song start in your head?" The Queen asked.
Emma nodded.
"Let's keep it there. No demonstrations."
"See? Legit moving-in. And it's not the sloppy way of doing things." Emma answered, assuming they still had the upper hand.
"Mulan, what chore does Belle hate to do around the house?" Regina pressed further. They clearly didn't know the tiniest details about each other. They'd only been together long enough to learn how to fight fair and fuck, there was no way Mulan knew any more.
"If we answer questions, you have to answer too. Whether or not you want to admit it, you're doing the same thing by moving in together." Belle said with a passionate emphasis.
Ruby came over to the table.
"Ooo! I have notecards! Let me get a marker. If you're going to do this, do it right. They're just going to cheat and agree to whatever the other one said if you don't write it down!" Ruby shuffled off to the back, an amazing feat considering the size of the heels she was wearing.
Tinkerbell handed a fresh piece of paper over to Snow.
"My new demands." She said, now with Cupid back on her side in exchange for promising to apologize to the entire town for her antics, and her official resignation as Mayor for David to keep the office.
"Tink—A football helmet filled with cottage cheese? Naked pictures of Bea Arthur?" Snow furrowed her brow. "Is this a game to you?"
"Far from it. This man had his heart ripped out of his chest against his will by Cora-" Tink said, now pretending to be his attorney.
"Actually, I gave it to her. Willingly." Cupid chimed in at exactly the wrong time.
"Wait—you GAVE the Queen of Hearts your own heart, and then want help?" Snow said with her eyes bulging out of her head at the man.
"I was…upset at the time. I couldn't handle having it in my chest with my full emotions." Cupid added.
What Cupid wasn't telling Snow is that was before he became Cupid, the King of Valentine Land. The crushing unrequited love he had experienced as a young man of barely twenty-one years of age was unbearable.
When he sought help to stop his love from marrying another man, Core had taken him under her wing. Her evil, heartless, crusty wing of darkness, when she encouraged his obsession with all things love related: falling in love, tokens of love, showing love, and eventually, convincing him to hand over his heart and learn to use magic to take love away. She no longer controlled him, but he had gotten so used to acting cruelly with a part of him feeling empty inside that he started a quest to get his heart back—regardless of the method or consequences.
Henry Googled, and Yahoo'd, and clicked, and searched, and after an hour of dodging more porn pop-ups than he would ever admit, he had just about given up.
Until he found the "Royal Roundtable" internet forum. He continued to click around and found a board for princes and princesses.
"Okay…I need to make a user name…Majestic Mobster…Password…Bandit."
Hey, where is Bandit? Henry suddenly jumped up to find out why he hadn't heard a peep out of the normally animated dragon in over an hour.
Henry found Bandit groaning on his very inflated belly on the kitchen counter, surrounded by the evidence of why he had such a balloon.
"Bandit! You ate a pound of raw bacon?" The dragon groaned again and nodded. "And a box of chocolate donuts? Emma's going to be pissed about that one, by the way. And…did you make nachos?"
The dragon moaned and nodded. Henry started cleaning up after his pet friend. He made a mental note to add "baby wipes" to his pet shopping list. With the way Bandit was looking, Henry was half expecting the creature to add, "And the schnoze-berries taste like schnoze-berries!"
"Well, I guess they say pets are like their owners." Henry thought back to his first Snickers binge. Good times. Painful, good times.
Emma and Regina were now fully and publicly teamed against Mulan and Snow, sitting on the Granny's countertop while Granny and Ruby fed them questions.
Once they had accidentally turned Granny's diner into an all out competition, and with a round of free beers on the line Regina had decided it was time to be ruthless. They were indeed going to win, and show everyone that not only were they ready to move in together, but Mulan and Belle were not prepared to do anything beyond kiss goodnight on the porch and make it back home in time for curfew.
"This question is for Emma and Mulan!" Ruby read off of the notecard. Twenty minutes ago they had started taking questions from the "audience", also known as "everyone who thought they were going out for burgers at six o'clock".
"What's the thing that your partner does that embarrasses you the most?" Emma and Mulan both started scribbling right away, much to their girlfriends' dismay. Considering how much the Savior appeared to be writing, Regina lost hope that the answer was "absolutely nothing", which of course would be the appropriate answer if Emma intended to return home to any sort of sex life.
"Pens down!" Ruby called, thoroughly enjoying not spending the evening providing coke refills. "Before we flip the cards, Regina, what would Emma say is something embarrassing that you do?"
Regina shot Emma a threatening look. She had a few things circling through her head, knowing that ONE would absolutely be the worst thing she could possibly announce at Granny's. Clearly, that would be most likely what Emma would say. Better to beat her to the punch rather than have to act surprised. She would handle the situation politically, diplomatically, and with her best royalty speech skills she could muster up.
"Fine! Sometimes, as we all know, the female body sprouts stray hairs in various places that have been socially constructed by an unwaveringly patriarchal culture as unconventional. It is not uncommon for one of royal stature to require some assistance with such hair removal, by razor or by plucking, particularly if the area of this sensitive nature is the equipment ostensibly in existence for nurturing a new born babe, while other activities for the area may be approved but not publically discussed, and Emma detests when I recruit her for such cosmetic, albeit paramount grooming activity."
The room sat silent trying to figure out what the fuck the Queen had just said. Something about hair removal? Methods? Places?
"Emma tweezes the Queen's nipples!" Grumpy yelled out once he figured it out. Emma put her hands in her face. Regina stayed stoic, sticking to her politician face for this round, even while most of the audience was laughing while trying to hide it. That was indeed the most embarrassing thing they had ever done, although in all fairness, Emma had offered the first time.
"Emma! Flip your card!" Ruby called out.
The card read, "When she licks her finger and cleans my face like I'm five."
"Oh. I would've thought the nipple thing was way more embarrassing." Regina said.
"It is…which is why I wasn't going to announce it in the middle of Granny's!" Emma answered, noticing that the newest customers didn't even bother pretending to come in to order, instead joining the "audience".
"No points for team Swan-Mills! Belle, what would Mulan say is the most embarrassing thing you do?"
Belle mumbled something, then pretending to cough. Mulan giggled.
"What was that, Belle?" Ruby asked.
"Alright! I've offered to do her laundry before, and she doesn't like when I fold her underwear into little shapes. She said it makes her feel like I'm questioning her womanhood or whatever. So of course, that makes me want to do it more." Belle said, now also embarrassed by the action.
"Little shapes?"
"You know, like balloon animals, but with clothes. Emma, you'll be happy to know you can make an origami sports bra swan. It really is a nice break from the mundane roll or fold routine." The Scholar continued.
"Okaaaaaay…Mulan? Your card?" Ruby asked, now embarrassed for Belle.
Mulan flipped the card over to reveal, "underpants animal shapes".
"Another point for team French Warrior!" Ruby said excitedly.
"Really, Regina? You just volunteered the nipple thing? Now we're losing." Emma crossed her arms.
"Well if we were playing HONESTLY, Emma, you would have the same answer as me." Regina also now had her arms crossed.
"I was doing the girlfriend-ly thing to do!"
Emma and Regina continued to bicker as the audience "oooo'd" and "aaaahhh'd" along, their arguments fully part of the show.
"Next question! This is for Regina and Belle, and it's fill in the blank! My partner is the world's best blank. Fill it in!"
The teams started scribbling furiously, although for Belle the motive was finishing the question, while Regina was simply furious.
"Time! Emma, what do you think you are the best at?"
Emma paused. What would Regina think she was the best at? Annoying everyone? Emma, the world's best…pouty orphan? Emma was starting to get very depressed very quickly.
"Nothing." Emma said. She looked at Regina with giant, sad eyes. "I'm the world's best at nothing."
"Emma, you have to try! Answer the fill in the blank." Ruby said.
"That is my answer."
Regina went from blindly embarrassed to feeling a heaviness in her heart that only went from deep to deeper. She flipped over her card.
It said one word: Everything.
"Emma, you're the best everything." The Queen looked deep into Emma's panicky eyes, not understanding how Emma had saved the world many, many times, and still didn't believe that. Regina put her hand on Emma's, noticing that the Savior didn't pull away.
Regina just kept staring at Emma, the eye contact starting to break the Savior down. She wanted to believe what Regina was saying, but years of having nobody appear to want you or even care if you existed weren't going to be undone by a few months. Sometimes she still woke up in bed with Regina, relishing in the feeling, but still having the nagging thought tugging at the back of her mind expecting it to be taken away.
"I love you." Was all Emma could mouth over, with the crowd matching with a collective "Awwwwww."
Snow burst into the diner, with Tinkerbell and Cupid, who had been untied and allowed to walk around under their supervision.
"Everyone! We've come to an agreement." Snow announced more for the women on the countertop, since the general restaurant population neither knew what the hell Snow was talking about, nor did they care if it didn't involved, "Tonight's specials are…"
"Great! I mean, good! What are we doing?" Emma said, hopping up off of the counter while wiping away the evidence of the last three minutes from the corners of her eyes.
"You two are staying here. Mulan! Belle! You two are going on a honeymoon." Snow said, nodding at Tink and Cupid.
Bandit was lying on his back on the couch, having an antacid cocktail of epic proportions, while Henry was back on the laptop.
"Ohh! I think this one's a girl. Her name is 'Pretty Pretty Princess'. That's gotta be a girl, right?" Henry said excitedly. Bandit simply groaned again, rubbing his purple underbelly.
Henry started typing: how old r u?
PrettyPrettyPrincess00: 14. M or f?
"Male! Male male male!" Henry yelled excitedly while typing on the screen.
Are you really a princess?
Bandit looked over, seeing Henry type back and forth, getting overly excited. He really wanted to keep an eye on Henry, but he was just so sleepy after that binge that he couldn't keep his little scale-y lids open any longer.
I know! So short! I'm sorry!
