Chapter 12
"Emma dear, the dinner table is set", I hear Regina knocking softly on the bathroom door.
"I'm coming", I yell over my shoulder, giving myself the last check in the mirror, a blonde girl that I don't fully recognize smiles back at me.
As I open the door and step out of the bathroom to grab the extended hand that Regina is offering me, I can't help but notice that there is no table set anywhere in the room.
"I asked for a change of room. I don't like the view in this one", Regina explains when she notices my eyes wandering around the bedroom, "want to see the new one? Dinner is waiting there—", she continues when I give her no reply, and I shrug but nod my head at the mention of food, I'm starving. I try to recall if I saw Regina go near the window at any time, but I notice the blinds are still down from when we went to bed earlier that day, and before I can say anything about it, I feel the brunette dragging me out of the room.
Outside we find a new bellhop boy waiting with the luggage cart and all of Regina's bags already in it. The brunette takes the tank top and the joggers that I didn't remember carrying from my hand and places them over one of her bags in the cart.
"Follow me, ladies", the young boy tells us when we step outside of the room and starts pushing the cart towards the elevator. I give Regina a side look. She is smirking while her eyes are stuck on the back of the bellhop's head.
"You are enjoying this", I complain, and her smirk widens a little.
"Relax, your suffering will only last for a few floors—", she leans in closer to me so that only I can hear her, "his will last a lot longer, certainly all of the night and probably most of the month", she almost whispers in my ear.
"How humble of you bragging about your appeal like you were some unforgettable goddess", I remark as we wait for the elevator to arrive.
"I have no doubt I am that", she starts, still whispering in my ear, and we step into the elevator that has just arrived. The cart once again separates us from the bellhop boy, "but it is not my appeal what he will find difficult to forget", she finishes. Before I can register what's happening, I feel my back slamming against the hard surface of the elevator wall, "I'm so glad you wore that dress again. Now I get to rip it off your body as I promised I would", Regina says, this time loud enough for the boy to hear, and her lips clash against mine in a hungry kiss. One of her hands crawls under my dress, making it slide slightly up my legs as she digs her nails in the skin of my thigh. I can feel all color draining from my face as I remember I am wearing no underwear underneath my dress because I wasn't wearing any under the joggers when I rushed to the bathroom to take my shower. I forgot to pick it up from whatever place over the floor it had been discarded earlier that afternoon.
Regina's hand slides further up my thigh, and I press my legs together, ashamed but willing to see just how far Regina is prepared to go.
"Here we are", the bellhop says with a trembling voice when the elevator reaches its destination, and I almost let a laugh escape my lips if it wasn't because Regina's lips were there to catch it.
"Go ahead, this will only take us one sec", Regina doesn't even turn around to look at the boy. She just says this against my lips.
"Oh, don't sweat it, ma'am, take your time", the boy answers her cheekily, and I have to admit that I kinda like this boy.
"You are a naughty girl Miss Swan", Regina whispers in my ear when the boy leaves, "you forgot something in our old room. I thought you might want it back", she adds, pulling something from the little purse that she has on her shoulder. She drops the tiny piece of lace in my hand and walks away, following the boy.
...
The new room is bigger than the other one. However, I can't help but notice that it is on the hotel's south side and the old one was too, which means the view is exactly the same. I don't mention this, but I look at Regina suspiciously while we eat our dinner in complete silence. She looks back at me.
When I finish my food, which was heavenly, I must add, or so I thought because I was starving, I take a minute to look around the room. This one looks even more elegant and, quite honestly, more expensive than the old one. We are sitting in a living room completely separated from the bedroom that I haven't seen yet because it is situated behind a set of sliding doors at Regina's back.
I look at her through my eyelashes, my chin leaning on my tangled hands and both my elbows resting over the table. She stares back at me for a few seconds.
"What?" She asks after a while of receiving my intense suspicious look. I can't help but feel a kind of déjà-vu from the first time we met when she took me to that strange restaurant with the old people and the beds.
"So, how do you like the view here?" I ask her, and she keeps staring at me for a moment without answering.
"The view is stunningly beautiful", she says without taking her eyes off me, "the room's view too if you really want to know", she adds after.
I squint my eyes and look at the nearest window. Regina hasn't walked there since we arrived.
"It is the same view", I let out in a whisper, looking back at her, and she shrugs.
"So it is", Regina simply responds.
"Then why did you ask for a room change?", Regina keeps staring at me with that smile on her lips, "I want the truth".
Regina nods her head and gets up from her seat at the dinner table, she walks towards me, and I observe her. Navy blue fitted dress, hugging her curves perfectly as she approaches my side. She offers me a hand to help me stand up, and I take it.
"I adore this red dress on you", she whispers in my ear.
"I adore this dress on you too, Regina, but I will like it better when I take it off of you", Regina's smile widens.
"Follow me then, and let's make that fantasy a reality", she replies, and before I know it, she is dragging me to the sliding doors that separate us from the bedroom.
"Don't think I didn't notice your lack of response to my question", I warn her as I see her slide the doors open enough for us to go through them.
"Oh, but I am answering just now", she says, and I don't understand what she means, "Look at the bed", Regina says when she sees that I'm completely lost to what she is trying to say. I do what she asks me, and I see a king-sized bed completely covered in the same gel material that my bed at home has.
"It is a bed", I say out loud, still not understanding her point.
"Yes, but it is a W-o-n-d-e-r-l-a-n-d bed", she says slowly like she was explaining something to a little kid.
I look again. Yes, the mattress seems like the one in my Wonderland bed, but I can't see any cables or anything else that indicates this is a functional dreamland bed.
"Believe me, Emma, it works", she says then, as if she could read my thoughts, "I asked for a change of room because I know now why you don't like to sleep unplugged. You can't control your dreams unplugged, and you get nightmares. I don't want you to have those because of me", she explains, and now I understand, "also I don't want to expend time apart from you when I don't have to", she finally says and my heart aches a little hearing her words.
"You did all this for me?" I ask surprised, and she laughs.
"That's what I just said, idiot, now come on, this dress is not getting off of me by itself", she says, and she drags me nearer the bed.
She pushes me until I'm sitting on the mattress, then turns around so that the zip of her dress is in front of me. I pull the zip all the way down, and she turns to face me again. She leans in to kiss me while she shrugs off her dress. All I see in front of me when I pull apart from the kiss is lingerie.
"Damn Regina, it is unfair you are this beautiful, you know?"
"So I've heard", Regina smirks, "your turn", she says right after, and she offers a hand for me to stand up, "come on, I think it's time for me to unwrap my present".
"You are wearing lingerie".
"Yes dear, and?"
"I'm wearing nothing underneath", I whisper.
"I know, that's why I said you are a present, this feels a little bit like Christmas, and I always love when my presents come in a pretty red wrap", Regina looks at me with shiny eyes as I stand in front of her. She turns me around and unzips my dress with extreme care. I get goosebumps when her hands slide between my shoulders and the fabric of my dress, and she lets it slide all the way to the floor.
For a moment, she takes her hands away from my skin, but then I feel hands brushing against my sides, and she pulls me close to her body by my hips, being extremely careful not to touch the scars in my back with her body.
I don't know how she is managing not to touch my scars in this embrace, but I feel her kissing the back of my neck softly.
"You are unfairly beautiful too, Emma", she whispers against my nape, and before I understand what I'm doing, I take her hands that are resting on my hips, and I pull her closer, wrapping her arms around my stomach. She gasps for air. "Emma, your scars!"
"I want to feel your body against mine", I simply say. The brunette rests her chin on my shoulder once she internalizes what I'm trying to say.
"I will eat you up alive in Wonderland", she says in my ear, tightening her embrace around me.
"I'm all yours Gina, you can do with me as you please".
We lay on the soft gel surface of the bed after a while of just standing there in silence. Regina went out of the room to find her pajama and my tank top, and I went to find my underwear somewhere on the floor near the dinner table. I remember her laughing when I threw it there when the man in charge of setting out dinner finally left after serving us both some wine because I was holding it tight in my hand the entire time. We also made a stop in the bathroom to brush our teeth and whatnot. Now we are ready to go to sleep. It feels bizarre seeing Regina do all these humanly tasks. I don't know what I expected, but brushing my teeth beside her was certainly not on the list. It felt almost mundane, like we had been doing this for years. Is this what married people feel when they are with their partners doing standard routine stuff? Moving on now, maybe we should skip the part where I entertain the idea that I will ever be married to Regina Mills.
The Wonderland bed should keep us warm by itself, but we still lie there with our clothes on, dressing precisely the same clothes we did some hours ago when we went to bed. I pull a comforter over our bodies, and we snuggle anyway, I wrap my arm across Regina's stomach, and she wraps her arm around my shoulders, my head rests over her chest.
"Now, Emma, this is how we connect to the grid". She says, and she takes a box lying on top of the bed headboard in her hand. She pulls from there a kind of transparent sticker with the Wonderland logo printed on it. I observe the little thing and decide rich people are privileged jackasses because we ordinary folks have to hook ourselves to several cables to enter the dreamland, but here is Regina holding a sticker in front of my face, claiming it will do the same without the discomfort of actually being hooked to a machine. "Now, and this is important, once you enter the grid today, you will be able to take out any information you want from the dreamland, remember it comes free of charge with the room, for hotel guests".
"But technically, I never checked in the hotel", I say.
"Yes, you have. I checked you in when I asked for a change of room", she states.
"How? you don't know my ID number or anything".
"I have my ways".
"So you just asked pretty please, and because you are who you are, they let that detail slide", I deadpan.
"Pretty much that's what happened", she shrugs, "but that doesn't matter Emma, what matters now is that you will be able to bring important information out, I don't know, your friend's names, for example, you can look for them out here if you want to".
"I can meet my friends in real life?" I ask, and for a moment, I dare to think of planning a reunion with all the gang in the outside world, maybe going skating for real. My smile grows wide without my permission.
"If that is what you want and their names there are real, unlike yours, yes you can, and I will help you", Regina promises.
"That would be nice, thank you, Gina!" I say excitedly.
"Okay, ready?" She asks, and when I nod my head, she moves my hair out of the way and sticks the sticker thing to the back of my neck, where my skull meets my spine, "good night, love, see you in my dreams", she says, and she places a kiss on my temple before I lose consciousness.
Welcome to Wonderland. Alice's voice resonates in my head as I fall down the rabbit hole that is Wonderland's threshold. The first thing I notice is that the hole isn't dark for the first time in forever. As I fall down the rabbit hole, I can see images of Regina and me in the hotel room. Of her kiss in my temple right before I fell asleep. The ride in the elevator. The ride in Zelena's car, and even the exact moment I first saw her stepping out of the airport gate. The second thing I notice is that I'm not alone. I feel someone holding my hand tight, I look to my side, and I see Regina, looking at me with her big smile. We land on the front porch of her manor, still holding hands and remembering what we were talking about when we crossed the threshold. The feeling of knowing exactly what I was doing before I entered the dreamland is strange and entirely new for me. It takes me a while to clear my head enough to actually listen to Regina, who is saying something to me.
"Your phone is ringing, Emma", she repeats, and I pull it from the pocket of my hoodie when I realize what she means, "answer, it must be important if they are calling you a second after you entered Wonderland", she tells me when she sees me staring at the screen. It is Killian who is calling.
"Hello?" I answer the phone while Regina lets us in the house. Killian sounds worried as he tells me that I've been impossible to reach since last week and that I missed a race that I had told him I would assist to this afternoon. "I'm sorry, Killian, I had a lot on my plate today, I totally forgot about the race, and this week has been bonkers, to be honest," Regina's eyebrow quirks up when I mention the part of having a lot in my plate today. Still, she just waits patiently for my call to end. Killian is glad that I was just busy and that I hadn't disappeared for real. He proceeds to invite me to the celebration they are having because of their placements in the race. Apparently, Robin ended up in first place today, "Oh, I think I won't be able to make it there today to celebrate, but tell Robin I say congratulations on his victory", I wait to hear his disappointment, but it never comes because Regina snatches my phone from my hand.
"Hello Killian, forget what Emma said. We are coming, just tell me, where is this celebration taking place?" Regina asks, holding my phone against her ear, "Okay, we will be there in twenty, see you!"
"We are not going, Regina", I say with crossed arms.
"Yes, we are", she replies, "I'm not going to be the lot on your plate that keeps you from celebrating with your friends", I know from her stern look that she didn't like a bit the way I expressed to Killian why I hadn't been able to make it to the race. I also know there is no way for me to convince her to stay in the manor now.
"But you were going to eat me alive in Wonderland", I pout, and she shrugs.
"Later maybe".