Change Graham to Daniel and NYC to Boston
"What are you doing tonight?" Mal asked as Regina slung her bag over her shoulder, ready to leave for the day.
Regina shrugged. "Oh, you know, the usual. Knowing Daniel, he won't have started making dinner, so I'll have to do that, and we'll probably watch something. What about you?" She knew her friend usually led a much more exciting life than she did, and to an extent, she was perfectly fine with that. She loved her life, wouldn't give it up for anything. She was perfectly content to watch from the sidelines as her coworkers went out and enjoyed a more social life than she did.
"A bunch of us are going out to the Rabbit Hole for drinks, and we might grab dinner at Granny's afterwards," Ruby told her, her head popping up over Mal's shoulder. "You should join us!"
"You absolutely should, darling," Ella, who everyone, including her clients, called Cruella, chimed in. "Ursula is joining us too. It'll just be a girls' night. You haven't joined us for one of those in so long, and it just hasn't been the same."
"It hasn't," Mal groaned, joining the group that appeared to have decided to congregate around Regina's desk. Apparently, her coworkers had decided to gang up on her, and Regina wasn't quite sure how she felt about it. "Who else will side with me when Ursula and Cru gang up on me? Besides, you cook better than Daniel, so you end up doing it all the time. It's about time you get a night off from Daniel's cooking. You deserve it."
"I get nights off from cooking," Regina protested. "Daniel and I go out to eat all the time." Too much, in fact. She loved cooking, and her busy life didn't give her time to discover new recipes like she always wanted to.
Ruby laughed. "Only so you can have takeout or fine dining with food that the rest of us haven't even tried- and you never give us a ringing endorsement of them, either. Come out with us and get something you'll actually like for once. Not every meal out has to have three courses for it to be good. Besides, you need company that isn't Daniel at some point in your life."
Regina shook her head. "I'm good, but you guys should go. You can tell me all about all the fun I missed on Monday." She was sure they would take her up on that offer, too. They may work together at a place where every day was spent in meetings round the clock, but her colleagues still managed to turn the workplace into more of a social environment than one would expect when they heard about a publishing company as reputable as the Mills Publishing Group. Regina didn't stop it, though. Granted, people weren't always as productive as she wished they would be, but they did still manage to get their work done by the deadlines that were set, which honestly, was all Regina cared about at the end of the day.
Honestly, that was part of the reason she had rejected Mal's invitation. She didn't think it was appropriate for her as editor in chief of the publishing company (well, co-editor in chief, to be specific) to go out with her subordinates after hours. That was a tradition she had allowed Zelena to set up long ago to keep her employees happy, but she had no desire to fraternize them. Did that mean she had a social life outside of the office? Besides Daniel, not exactly. However, she was okay with that, and always had been. Daniel was enough for her. She didn't need to be Miss Popular in the office or outside of it to be happy. Somehow, that was a difficult concept to grasp for everyone else.
"Oh, don't worry, we will," Ruby assured her. Seeing the glares the others gave her (from what she had gathered over the years, Ruby was always the one who was inclined to have a little too much fun at these outings, Cruella following her lead), she shrugged. "What? We do, don't we?"
Ursula, who had now joined their little impromptu gathering, quickly added. "But we'll probably be at both places for a while, so you can always change your mind. Just text one of us and we'll let you know where we are. I'd say we'll be at the Rabbit Hole for at least an hour though, right guys?" she asked, looking at the others for confirmation.
Cruella nodded at her wife's words. "Of course. We'll have enough time for an app, some drinks, and then we'll head on to dinner, maybe go to a club afterwards…"
"Or just come to my house and play games. I have a bunch," Mal interrupted quickly, seeing Regina's eyes widen at the seemingly never-ending list of activities that were far more suited to people who were more social, more of a party animal than she was. "Honestly, if you actually did something with us, I'd be willing to do just about anything to make it happen."
Regina snorted. She highly doubted that. No one wanted to spend time with her that desperately other than Graham, and she was perfectly fine with keeping it that way. "I highly doubt that. No, I think I'll just head home." Not wanting to seem impolite, she added, "Thanks for the invitation, though."
"Anytime," Ruby assured her. "Seriously though, if you change your mind, don't hesitate to text one of us. I always keep the volume on my phone up, and the others will do the same, right guys?" she asked, looking around at the others.
They all nodded, and after telling them good night, Regina left.
Time for another relaxing evening with the man she loved.
"I'm home!"
Regina stepped into her apartment and took a minute to inhale. She could smell the food Daniel had likely gotten from their favorite Indian place and couldn't wait to dig in. She took a minute to lean against the door of the coat closet in the long hallway that served as her entrance. She knew she had her job to thank for the luxurious apartment she had owned for years. Not many people who lived in New York City could say they had such a spacious apartment (in fact, most would likely say the opposite), but she did and she was thankful for it. She could have anyone over to visit anytime she wanted- not that she had any friends to invite. In the midst of her busy life as editor in chief, she hadn't been able to keep in touch with any of her college friends, and they hadn't bothered to keep in touch with her either, which ultimately had shown her who was the real person making an effort to maintain the friendships she had had. It was okay though. She had Daniel and her job and her very nice apartment and that was all she had ever wanted.
"In the kitchen," Daniel called out.
Regina walked down the hall, which opened out into her large kitchen and living room space. Daniel was standing at the counter washing his hands, a bag from the takeout he had ordered for them on the table beside him.
"Kuthrapali's?" she asked, a hopeful look in her eyes.
He nodded, and she gushed, "That's perfect, thank you! I've been wanting Indian all day." She had often thought about ordering lunches in for her staff if not daily, than at least on a weekly basis, but she had never gotten around to it. Truthfully, she hadn't wanted to deal with finding out everyone's food preferences, knowing that there were likely several people who had some kind of allergy. It would make getting lunch for everyone difficult and only encourage the social atmosphere, which would go against every single one of her goals for her company. The last thing she needed was for people to have another reason to socialize and not see the company as a workplace.
"You're welcome," he smirked, clearly pleased with himself for a job well done.
After getting herself a plate, Regina settled on the couch, setting the plate down on the coffee table in front of her. They had a nice table in the kitchen as well, but Daniel always wanted a little something to add atmosphere to the meal, and when she had caught him constantly turning around to watch the TV screen, she had finally given in and said it was all right for them to eat in the living room. They had every streaming service available to them, after all, so it did make sense for them to use it as often as they could.
"How was your day at work?" she asked as Daniel set his plate down beside her.
"Oh, you know, the usual," he said after swallowing his mouthful of food. "Lots of meetings, not enough time to get everything done, the usual."
She nodded and waited for him to reciprocate, bounce the conversation back to her. Instead, his eyes lit up as he said, "Oh, and I forgot to tell you! Kris Arendelle wants to have a business dinner, and wives are invited. So we have that to look forward to this weekend. You like Anna, right?"
She shrugged. "She's fine." She was actually a little too perky for Regina's tastes, but she wasn't going to tell Graham that. She wanted this meeting to go well for him, and wouldn't dream of doing anything to jeopardize that goal.
"Great! Then we'll have something to look forward to on Friday."
Regina nodded, her heart sinking. They usually had a tradition where they made plans at a restaurant on Friday nights, a date for just the two of them. The fact that Daniel was foregoing that in favor of plans that he hadn't even confirmed with her was a little annoying. At the same time though, there had been a part of her that wanted to go out with Mal and the others tonight. It was kind of a relief to have plans now to do something social, even if it was with people who weren't her favorite acquaintances.
She was quiet for the rest of the night, and she expected Daniel to notice, but he was completely oblivious. To be fair, though, they spent the entire evening doing some very enjoyable activities with the TV on in the background. Not much talking was required, even if she had wanted to.
She went to bed that night with the latter part of the day's events on her mind. She tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep for the longest time.
"You look beautiful, love."
Regina looked down at herself, pretty sure what she was wearing didn't even come close to earning the compliment. To her amazement, she was wearing a knee length bright red dress with a keyhole neckline that had a skirt that flared out around her. It definitely wasn't her typical attire for what she knew instinctively to be a night out. Pantsuits, Daniel had often teased her, were practically her uniform.
What that night out entailed, however, she didn't know. She looked around her, and her eyes lit up. At first glance, this was a dance club just like any other, but she saw maracas on the wall and in the hands of one of the band members who stood on the stage, and the beat pulsating through the club making her heart hammer inside her chest was definitely not an American one- not North America, at least. Instead, it was that of her ancestors on her father's side, and excitement filled her, everything her father had ever taught her about the dances of his homeland coming to the forefront of her mind. She might not like this type of thing normally, but Latin clubs were the exception to the rule. Not that she had ever gotten to go to one with Daniel.
She looked up, expecting to find her boyfriend of five years staring back at her, but to her surprise, a different man was standing in the spot meant for her dance partner. His eyes… they were a blue so deep they seemed to pierce her very soul. Combined with the salsa beat and the way his hips moved, she would have never believed he didn't have a single drop of Hispanic heritage in his blood.
His hands fell to her waist, and they fell into the steps of the dance and swayed to the rhythm, his moves as sensual as her own. There was a charged atmosphere in the air, a vortex of tension that she found she couldn't resist. Their lips suddenly were a mere inch apart and she waited with bated breath, wondering if he was going to close that final bit of distance between them. Then, unable to resist any longer, she surged forward, melding her lips to his.
Electrifying. That was the only adjective that was sufficiently adequate to describe the feeling of his lips on hers. She had never felt so alive in her entire life, not even when she was kissing Daniel. It was a good thing so many changes had happened in her life. Images flashed in her mind's eye of the myriad of good times she had had with the man in front of her too fast to get a good look at them, but she did know one thing without a doubt: he was her everything.
Her fiancee broke the kiss first, only to kiss the top of her head affectionately. "What do you say we get out of here, love?"
Regina had no complaints, to say the least. As she followed him out of the club, she knew times like these were what dreams were made of- and she couldn't be more thankful it was her reality.
Regina woke, still wrapped in the blissful atmosphere of the dream. She clung to it, not willing to let it to. It was the happiest she had been in longer than she cared to think about. Not to mention the stranger's eyes, his smile, those dimples… the details of most of her dreams were usually gone in the blink of an eye, but in this case, she knew would never forget them.
She touched her phone's home screen, curious to see what time it was. Much to her dismay, it was only 3:30. She had another two hours to sleep before her alarm went off.
Lying back in bed once more, she tried to recapture what she had had in the dream. She didn't know if she had ever been that happy. Yes, she loved Daniel, but he had never made her feel so… alive.
Guiltily, she looked over her shoulder at Daniel, making sure she didn't wake him. What did her dream say about how she felt about the current state of the most important relationship in her life? She had everything she wanted: a long-term boyfriend who she was sure would propose to her any day now, the best apartment Boston had to offer, and a killer job that she loved. Anything else was secondary- right?
She closed her eyes and tried to go back to sleep. Hopefully, things looked different in the morning.
The only thing she saw in her mind's eye as she finally drifted off to sleep, though, were the stranger's fathomless blue eyes and that irresistible smile of his. Sure, she had only seen them in a dream, but she still somehow knew that she would never forget them.
