Emma wasn't much of a cook. She didn't even watch cooking shows. She didn't even reblog cooking gifs on Tumblr. But how hard could cooking Christmas dinner be? You just followed instructions, right?

She went into Mary-Margaret's apartment—on Emma's strenuous objection, Mary-Margaret had been convinced to relocate the blood orgy to the jail, where there was more room as well as "Nightsticks and handcuffs!" As she'd hoped, all the ingredients were waiting for her in the kitchen. She put on a Muppet Christmas Carol for Henry and rolled up her sleeves.

Half an hour later, Regina showed up. Emma was just glad it wasn't the fire department.

"Is that a baking soda volcano?" Regina asked.

"No, it's a turkey."

"Once upon a time, perhaps. Now, it's a baking soda volcano."

"It's not a—" Emma pursed her lips, feeling a bit like a Muppet herself. "Are you going to help or what?"

Regina pursed her lips in turn and picked up one of Mary-Margaret's aprons (she gave Emma a look upon noting its blue and yellow colors, as if to say "See what I do for you?"). She put it on over her festively red and white minidress, which Emma could imagine putting in an appearance—or disappearing act—at the orgy. Properly dressed, Regina began salvaging a mixing bowl of cookie dough. It had gone from a supermarket tin into the bowl, so Emma didn't think she had messed it up too bad.

"So you're not headed to, uh, Saturnalia?" Emma said, feeling an inexplicable relief.

"I have time for a quick bite before a few quickies."

"So you are attending. Hunh. Wouldn't think you'd want to attend an orgy with a whole town that hates you."

"Have you ever had sex with someone who feels an intense rivalry towards you?" Regina eyed her. "It can be very demanding… heated. A contest of wills, Ms. Swan… and coming second is not without its charms."

"Ever had sex with someone who didn't hate you, highness?" Emma eyed her right back. "Everything soft… caring… gentle. Just luxuriating in the warmth of your love for each other."

Regina took a step closer to her. "Lick my rod."

"What?"

"My rod." Regina held up the wooden spoon she'd been using to mix the cookie dough. "I'm done with it, and I doubt you're too mature to lick the dough off it."

"Hell no." Emma took a long lick.

Regina seemed to stare at her tongue. "None for Henry?"

"He wants some, he can help cook."

"You have an enterprisingly ruthless spirit, Ms. Swan. Help me find the rainbow sprinkles."

"Hey," Emma said, oddly pressed on the conversation continuing. "Have you noticed anyone… bursting into song lately?"

"I thought I saw Mary-Margaret and David singing Let It Snow, but I was too busy trying not to kill myself to be sure."

"I saw Granny Lucas singing Good King Wenceslas. Hunh."

"Ah, with the famed deductive reasoning of Sheriff Swan on the case, the mystery of the people singing on Christmas will be solved in no time."

In record time, Regina had a holiday feast for three done. Emma thought she used magic, but she was pretty sure Martha Stewart did too, so fuck it. Regina ate sparingly, Emma less so, and Henry ended up in a food coma on the couch while Emma and Regina watched Rise of the Guardians on either side of him.

"I don't see why every children's movie needs a legion of speechless little creatures running around making sight gags," Regina complained.

"What, the elves? They're cute. Kids like cute things. As do the non-homicidal in general."

Regina gave Emma that look of hers. "When you have to watch every children's movie the Saturday it comes out, then tell me how cute these minion wannabes are. No, no, even the minions were Ewok wannabes."

"Don't talk shit about the minions, Mills. They make me wanna be a better woman."

"Well, something has to." Regina checked her watch. "Orgy's getting started. I'd better be on my way or I won't even be in time for sloppy seconds."

Emma made a face. "You could stay with us, you know. Magic up some presents for Henry—give me five minutes, I'll run to the store and find you something."

"Much as I might want an air freshener or beer cozy, I really can't stay." Regina stood, looked slightly perturbed at her momentary musicality, then marched for the door.

Emma followed close on her heels. "But baby it's cold outside."

Regina swiftly grabbed up her coat from the hall tree. "I got to go away."

And Emma, just as swiftly, stuck her arm down one sleeve as Regina took the other, ending up in a sort of getalong straitjacket. "But baby it's cold outside."

The former mayor resolutely shook her arm out of her coat and grabbed Emma's jacket instead. "This evening has been—"

Emma shirked off the coat and flung it around Regina's shoulders to pull her close. "-been hoping that you'd drop in."

"So very nice," Regina corrected sarcastically, prying Emma's hands off her coat.

Emma clamped down on Regina's. "I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice."

"My mama will start to worry." Regina's voice faltered, remembering the last person she'd stayed out late with. The pain was so fresh it was hard to remember her mother was gone.

But Emma snapped her out of it, bopping her forehead against hers with a grin as infectious as a kid in a candy shop. "Beautiful, what's your hurry?"

Regina refused to let Emma's high spirits rouse her; turning away, remembering one more sacrifice she'd made in her campaign for nothing. "My daddy will be pacing the floor."

Still with a deathgrip on her hands, Emma tugged back, pulling Regina back into the living room. "Listen to the fireplace roar."

Regina dug her heels in. "Really I better scurry."

Emma separated her hands and pulled them behind her back, causing Regina to embrace her. "Beautiful, please don't hurry."

Regina bit her lip in thought, suddenly liking the nearness of Emma—whilst also being quite annoyed with it. "Maybe just half a drink more."

Emma practically skipped to what Mary-Margaret had the audacity to call a liquor cabinet. "Put some records on while I pour."

And just as suddenly, Regina was cured of her insanity. "The neighbors might think," that she actually regretted her actions and wanted some sort of redemption and, oh, that she was brooding over her dark, evil past. Come now…

"Baby it's bad out there," Emma argued, shoving a glass into her hands.

"Say, what's in this drink?" Regina gave the glass a shake. It was a plastic ice cube with a rubber fly. Very mature, Ms. Swan. She drank anyway.

"No cabs to be had out there," Emma crooned directly into Regina's face as she lowered the glass.

I wish I knew how

Your eyes are like starlight

To break this spell

I'll take your hat, your hair looks swell

The sight of Emma absconding with her fur hat, one of many clothing items Regina had been happy to reintroduce to her wardrobe once her true identity was known, broke her 'spell' quicker than true love's kiss. She snatched it away from Emma.

"I ought to say: 'No, no, no, sir.'"

"Mind if I move in a bit closer?" Emma asked, poking Regina's hat so it tilted at a rakish angle and slipped down over one eye like a Veronica Lake hairdo.

Regina wondered if anyone could expect her not to flambe the princess. "At least I'm going to say I tried."

"What's the sense of hurting my pride?" Emma returned, having no idea that her eyeballs, heart, and spleen were more opportune targets.

"I really can't stay," Regina insisted at the same time Emma said "Baby, don't hold out." Then they both sang "Baby, it's cold outside."

"Wait, why am I agreeing with you? …Emma?"

"Yes, Regina?"

"I think we're in a musical number."

Emma looked around. "That does explain the background music. I think there's a second verse. You sing about your maiden aunt, which doesn't really fit—"

"No, let's not bring the Wicked Witch of the West into this."

"Wait, what?"

"Ms. Swan," Regina said carefully. "If there's one thing I regret about teleporting myself and all my hated enemies to 1983, it's having to put up with the baby boomers and their insipid nostalgia fetish. Just because you heard a song when you were a child does not make it a holiday classic!"

"I don't know, I kinda liked N'Sync's Home For Christmas."

"And as long as you don't try to have that played every hour, on the hour, for every Christmas for the next forty years, I will tolerate it. But no, no, I simply refuse to do a second verse."

"Suck it up, Reggie, I had to sing choir in Catholic school. I still have nightmares in Latin…"

"Very well. But would you have any objections to me changing the tune? No, wait, I don't care." Regina closed her eyes and began to gesture. "Though this would be a lot easier if I had my magic wand."

"I could go get mine from my bed… oh. Not what you're talking about, is it?"

"Actually, that could come in useful." With a hand motion much like she was scratching an invisible record, the background music changed to something a bit more—urban.

Regina stalked toward as if she were about to wring her neck, stopping at the last instant to turn on her heel and—grind her ass against Emma's crotch. "All you ladies pop your pussy like this/Shake your body: don't stop, don't miss/All you ladies pop your pussy like this/Shake your body: don't stop, don't miss."

"Uh, Regina?"

Regina casually ushered Emma to her knees. "Just do it, do it, do it, do it, do it now/Lick it good, suck this pussy just like you should/Right now, lick it good/Suck this pussy just like you should."

Then she started thrusting her crotch in Emma's face, just in case Emma had gone deaf.

"Regina, c'mon, I know it's Saturnalia and all, but I'm not going to sleep with you. This is a fairy tale town, not a weird fanfic town."

Regina just turned around and started rolling her ass. Okay, clearly Mama Mills had gotten the hook-up, because that was a Kardashian-level booty (in Emma's humble opinion). "My neck, my back/Lick my pussy and my crack."

Emma just shook her head. No. No, no, no. Just because Regina was doing an admirable job of singing an excellent rap song did not mean Emma would be having oral sex with her. No way. It wasn't going to happen. She wasn't doing it.

Okay, maybe a little.