OUAT: Niggles in Paris (Patreon)

Emma Swan had asked out a lot of people in her life. More than she cared to admit. So asking out Regina should’ve been easy. They were friends. Sisters, almost—no, not sisters, that was gross. They’d talked about everything from their shared son’s graders to the finer points of the Orc digestive system; Emma wasn’t sure how that conversation had gotten there.

She should be able to tell Regina that her body was banging and she wanted to get with that. In, like, language that would be used by an adult that hadn’t had a traumatic head injury.

Still, walking into Regina’s weird, cozy, intimidating, somewhat kinky super-office, she found herself asking Regina “Can I have a bottle of water? My mouth is really dry.”

“Minifridge,” Regina said, with a slight accoutrement of reproach, because of course the bottled water would be in the minifridge, but also there was an amount of endearment there, because she knew how tough Emma’s job was and so of course a minor, unimportant detail like where the bottled water was might get lost in all her important labors and so Regina forgave her the small slip, even while being a bit of a brat over how she would never forget about the minifridge no matter how dire the situation became.

God, Emma really needed to date her.

First, she went to the minifridge… literally a vintage Frigidaire ‘from before planned obsolescence was invented—and they call me evil’ according to Regina, that had been shrunken down by magic so Regina didn’t have a big icebox cluttering up her office. Or an actual minifridge, because that was too ‘dorm room’ for her.

It had bottled water and cold cuts in it, as well as some juice boxes for Henry and a bottle of champagne. Emma had to admit, she was more tempted by the juice boxes.

After a long draught of ice-cold water, Emma took her eyes off Regina… difficult as that was… and faced herself. You have basically never been able to stop yourself from barreling into anything in your life. You’ve spent multiple decades learning just to slightly smarten up your barreling. All you have to do is unsmart your barreling for once.

“Regina, I think we should go out.” The words were through Emma’s larynx before she could even think about them; it was a stroke of luck they formed a grammatical sentence. She just wished she could’ve phrased it better. Hey, Regina, how about you march those stiletto heels of yours next to me for a night on the town? Then again, maybe there wasn’t much phrasing it better than that.

Regina crashed a stapler down on a sheaf of papers. “Of course, Emma. Does Henry have a new play coming out?”

She was, of course, condescending with the idea that she wasn’t intimately aware of the details of Henry’s life and afterschool activities, but that was how nice Regina had gotten.

Emma barreled: “No, Regina. I don’t mean us taking our kid to a minigolf course. And I don’t mean us watching some foreign film that can only be appreciated in this whole town by us… well, you. I mean a romantic, sexual, lesbian date.”

Goddamn, Regina had a good poker face. Or, not exactly a poker face. Emma had a better poker face. She could be absolutely unemotional. Regina had a more composed mask, with her dark eyes swimming with pride and amusement and it was very hard to sort out whether she was lording her supremacy over you or simply pleased you had halfway managed to figure out that foreign movie’s themes even without being from Albania and knowing the last thirty years of Albanian history.

“Do you want to be romantic with me, Emma? Sexual? Lesbian?” Okay, she was amused. And lording her supremacy, but that was second nature to Regina.

“Don’t act so surprised,” Emma snapped at her. “You’ve been sending plenty of… those three signals.”

Regina grinned. Emma was kinda used to the bright, cheery, ‘isn’t our kid cute’ grin. The twisted, naughty grin—like someone who’d bitten into a chocolate even though they were on a diet but it didn’t count because the chocolate came from a realm without calories (which was a very poor use of a beanstalk seed, but they had like twenty of them)—well, it reminded Emma of how evil Regina had been. And how far they’d come that a literally wicked smile that should’ve frightened her instead…

Well, that was why she’d asked Regina out.

“You’ve taken your time receiving them,” Regina said. “When would you like to go?”

Emma waved a hand in the air. She literally hadn’t thought she’d got this far. Not that she’d thought Regina would turn her down. She’d just been more comfortable barreling ahead and dealing with this stuff as it came up.

It wasn’t like dating a thirty-something who was actually a century old that was proficient in the dark arts and recovering from being a tyrant in a parallel universe was something that would go according to plan.

“Whenever’s good.”

“I’ve finished my current project,” Regina announced, closing a ledger. She examined the digital wristwatch she wore. “And it is seven o’clock in Paris. You don’t mind teleporting?”

“Now?”

“You said whenever’s good.”

“I need time to get ready.” Emma gestured down at her clothes. Barreling through may have gotten her a date with Regina, but it had also led to her making her proposal in jeans with no knees and, of course, a jacket that had acquired a distinct musk after years spent in the company of dragons, ogres, and minotaurs.

Emma actually kinda liked it, but she knew Regina was more of a perfume girl.

“Jacket off,” Regina told her.

Emma had taken her jacket off before she realized that Regina’s alternative plan was probably not for them to have sex in her office, even if she’d spent a lot of time thinking about the possibility, especially when she’d foolishly asked how hard it could be to budget in a new stoplight and Regina had ‘let’ her help out.

Regina pointed at her. Pink smoke came out of nowhere, circling Emma, blotting out her vision, and when it was gone, she was wearing a torsolette bustier and matching (for once) panties underneath a black shift dress, a smoky sheer black shift dress.

Emma looked at herself in one of the mirrors Regina surrounded herself with—not that she would do any differently if she looked like that. Or like this. It was a good look. Even if, vexingly, the panties were thong-cut, the hem of her dress almost knee-length, but not opaque enough to keep from showing a lot of Emma. They’d better be going to a sit-down restaurant.

“I thought you’d like something a little slutty,” Regina needled.

“It’s literally your dress,” Emma retorted. “And I’m still all sweaty and…”

Regina gestured again. Pink smoke swirled around her, Emma felt a fleeting moment of nudity and a rush of cleansing water. When the smoke was gone, she looked down to see her dress was still there. Her skin gleamed pinkly, freshly washed; she felt shiny as a new penny.

“Now you’re just showing off,” she groused.

“Forgot to do your hair,” Regina grinned. More pink smoke.

Emma looked in the mirror after to see Regina had given her a chic updo, chopsticks sticking out of her chignon, opals dangling from her ears, fresh make-up flattering her features…

“You can do make-up like this?” Emma asked. “Then what’s with all the… lipstick and rouge and… Regina, I’ve seen you putting on your face.”

Regina shrugged eloquently. “I enjoy it.”

“You would.”

“I have a necklace to put on you,” Regina threatened, gliding on those six-inch heels—in her home office, the woman was deranged—to get it.

“It’d better not be the Hope Diamond. That thing’s cursed, you know.” Emma patted her groin. “Regina? Did you give me… a trim?”

Regina poked her head back into the room. “Of course not, Emma, your hair’s just in a bun.” She rolled her eyes as she went back to the search.

That wasn’t what Emma meant, of course, but it probably wasn’t something she should bring up on a first date.