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The camera pans across to Emma (28, Bail Bondsperson, Boston) sitting on a bench by the harbour, staring wistfully out to sea. Her blonde curls sweep artfully across her face with the wind.
“My old roommate entered me,” she says. “Seemed like a laugh. I’m looking for love. Who isn’t? And who knows?”
There is a shot of Emma, walking with another woman, hair cut short and quite an obvious baby bump protruding from beneath a voluminous tunic. We cut to Mary Margaret (30, Elementary School Teacher, Emma’s Best Friend), who says, “Emma needs to find true love. She’s not going to find it beating up bad guys. I don’t know. I guess I’m a romantic for thinking this could work?”
Cut to Emma who laughs. “I’m not fussy. Good looking, makes me laugh, challenges me. Oh, and a good cook!”
*
Regina Mills vibrates with anger, staring across at her mother, and the only reason she’s not screaming and throwing things is that her ten-year-old son is in the room, slouched in one of Cora Mills’ office chairs and head moving from mother to grandmother like he’s watching a tennis match. “I won’t do it,” she says.
“Yes, you will,” Cora replies. “We need a last minute replacement for one of the girls–”
“–women,” Regina mutters.
“–and you fit with one of our target markets,” Cora continues as though Regina has never even spoken. “Women watching at home want to know that they can find love, even as a single mother with a son, even with a career, even with emotional baggage that could fill an entire storage facility.”
Regina wants to make a comment about who exactly saddled her with this emotional baggage, but she suspects Cora will not take this well and Henry shouldn’t have to watch his grandmother verbally berate his mother. “I can’t leave Henry,” she says, her trump card.
“Marian’s offered to housesit,” Cora says and she’s smiling, the witch.
“You contacted my best friend before you even told me?”
“She thinks it’s a great idea.”
“Of course she does,” Regina mutters. Marian’s motives are unlikely to be as altruistic as Cora makes them out to be; a best friend on the worst television show in history is going to be prime mockery material for years to come. “Do I get a say in all this?”
“No,” Cora says. “Henry needs a father.”
“Henry had a father,” Regina replies, and twists the engagement ring that she still wears even after all these years around on her finger.
Cora’s lip curls. “I think you’ll like the gentleman we’ve chosen,” she says. “He’s very good with children.”
Henry looks up from his book. “I don’t like people who are ‘good with children’,” he says and Regina has never been prouder of him.
Cora ignores him. “Just sign the damn consent form,” she says, brandishing a fountain pen as though it’s a dagger and she’s going to stab her. Regina signs.
And that’s how she finds herself, one week later, in a limousine, dressed in red velvet, arriving at the mansion in California as one of the twenty women on the latest season of ‘The Bachelor’. She steps out of the car, holding up the long skirts of her dress. The costume department chose it and she’s pretty certain they’re trying to turn her into the ‘bitch’ already because who wears slinky, red velvet?
At any rate, this all works in with her and Henry’s plans. Operation Praying Mantis, he told her. “Because praying mantises eat their mates,” he’d said, matter-of-fact, when they’d had dinner together the evening of the blow up in Cora’s office. “And you’ll chew up this guy and spit him out.”
“You don’t mind me going?” she’d asked. “We could always move to Venezuela - somewhere without extradition, where Grandma can’t find us.”
Henry had shrugged. “Like, it’s embarrassing but I’ll survive.”
Regina had laughed, running her fingers through his hair. He’d squirmed away. “I’ll miss you so much, sweetheart.”
“I’ve been doing some research,” he’d said. “I reckon, what you do, is make yourself the one everyone loves to hate. You’ll get to stay on the show long enough to make Grandma happy.” Regina had raised an eyebrow at that. “Well, not happy. Slightly less disgruntled, I guess. But the bachelor never chooses the ‘bitch’.”
The bachelor stands at the door to the mansion and she steels herself, shifting her jaw and pursing her lips, putting on her mask. There are cameras everywhere. He’s attractive, she supposes, in a bland, stubbled, ‘white guy with lots of money and a good orthodontist’ sort of way.
Their introduction is all rather a blur rather too reminiscent of the networking parties her mother used to drag her to (one cheesy joke, a brief discussion about how challenging it must be to work as an advisor to the mayor of Storybrooke but wasn’t she lucky to get the time off work to go on the show) but eventually she’s had a cheek kiss and a rather clammy handshake and she’s in the garden, where a crowd of women are gathered.
She grabs a glass of champagne and stands to the side, watching the women mill around, being positioned by the crew into groups. She’s not sure what she was expecting really but it’s an absolute sea of white blondes.
She looks over as one of the blondes in a short black leather dress is being pushed in her direction (and Regina’s certainly not jealous that the blonde with princess curls gets to wear the short, edgy, easy-to-walk-in dress and she’s in the ageing red velvet). “Hi,” the woman says, lashes absurdly, falsely long and the beginnings of a smile playing across her lips. “I’m Emma.”
“Regina,” Regina says, gritting her teeth into a smile. “We should probably look like we’re making polite small talk until this man turns up.”
“Oh, so you’re in it to win it,” Emma says, raising her eyebrows. “All ‘I’m not here to make friends’?”
“Well, I’m not,” Regina says because she has plenty of friends, thank you very much, and she doesn’t need more of them – especially not the sorts of people who would go on a show like this without being essentially blackmailed by their powerful mother.
Emma actually laughs. “I thought that was, like, a scripted thing people said not an actual belief.”
Another blonde woman approaches, dressed in a spangled blue gown that, frankly, looks cheap and introduces herself as Elsa. She tells them that she’s a yoga instructor, which, Regina’s not trying to be judgemental but it’s just too easy. “So,” she says, turning to Regina after exhausting her brief repertoire of chit-chat with Emma. “Where are you from?”
“Maine,” Regina says, still smiling, always smiling, though she imagines if one of the millions of cameras went in for a close up about now, the entire nation would see the horror lurking in her eyes.
“No,” Elsa says, “but, like, originally.”
For a moment, Regina is frozen. “You’re an idiot,” she says, and the smile is being forced to breaking point. Emma snorts into her drink and Elsa huffs, moving away from them and letting another woman take her place.
(“I was trying to be polite,” Elsa says, fiddling with the end of her long braid. “She didn’t have to be such a bitch about it.”)
It’s all very staged. She doesn’t know why she was expecting otherwise but then her ten-year-old son has watched more of the show than she has.
She gets pulled aside for conversation with the bland bachelor (she’s having trouble remembering his name, to be honest, and that’s never a good sign, is it?). “So, Regina,” he says. “Tell me about yourself.”
“I have a son,” she says. “He’s ten and he is everything.” She knows the camera will be in a tight close-up of her face and she will not cry even though she misses Henry already and it’s only been a day.
Does she spot fear behind his eyes? “I love kids,” he says though. He tells her about his paleo foods business, about his family (he loves his mother, which is a point in his favour). Eventually though, he smiles – white teeth gleaming – and says, “I should probably talk to someone else.”
He leans forward and kisses her cheek, stubble scratchy against her skin, before walking her back to the girls and asking Emma to talk with him and Regina can’t help the brief second of a scowl that crosses her face.
I was picked first though, she thinks and then actually wants to shoot herself because she is not getting invested in this awful competition.
At some point in the evening, the bachelor disappears and they’re positioned in the foyer of the house, lined up. Regina ends up near Emma. The combined scents of perfume are nearly overwhelming and she fights an urge to sneeze. Emma meets her eye and grins and Regina rolls her eyes back.
“Ladies,” the host says, and explains the process. Four of the twenty will be eliminated, those who don’t receive roses will leave immediately.
The bachelor steps forward, his face a perfect balance of melancholic and charming. He picks up a long stemmed red rose from the platter, playing with it between his fingers. “Emma,” he says.
Regina feels her lips twist, pursing, and her nose wrinkle.
(“Her? Really? I mean, she’s pretty enough, I suppose.” Regina purses plum-shaded lips and flips dark hair over her shoulder. “But first rose?” Music reminiscent of the wicked witch theme from ‘The Wizard of Oz’ plays before transitioning back to the rose ceremony.)
Of course they don’t get rooms to themselves. Regina supposes she should be grateful that she has scored a room with just two beds but her roommate ends up being Emma.
“So,” Emma says, claiming the bed by the window by pushing past Regina and leaping onto it full tilt. Regina feels a muscle in her eye twitch. She will not let this girl irritate her, even though she always sleeps beside a window, even though it’s the larger of the two beds. “What’s your real story? You so don’t seem the type to be on this sort of show.” She turns, struggling with the zip of her dress, hands grasping and failing to get the zip. Regina moves over, huffing, and unzips the dress, baring the smooth skin of Emma’s back.
“Coercion,” Regina says, unzipping her own dress and trying not to stare at Emma’s frankly impressive abdominals, clad only in a bra and underpants. “My mother…”
Emma smiles and pulls on a tank top and pair of leggings. “Say no more. I have an old roommate who’s basically my mother.”
“No real mother?” Regina asks, stepping out of the red velvet dress and draping it over the end of the bed. She bends over her suitcase, grabbing her pyjamas, and when she stands she sees Emma staring, a faint flush staining her cheeks.
“What?” she asks, shaking her head. “No, no mother. Foster kid.”
“Oh,” Regina says. She thinks she knows why Emma might have been selected. Her sob story. “I have a son,” she adds, volunteering the information because a) Emma’s told her something personal and b) it isn’t like her roommate won’t find out eventually since she’s promised to call Henry every night.
(“You don’t have to,” he’d said, though it had been rather undercut by the fact that he was sniffing and holding her tight to him. “I’ll be fine with Marian.”)
“Huh,” Emma says. “How old?”
“Ten,” she replies, pulling on pyjama pants and pulling off her slip. She notices Emma’s eyes drift to the ample cleavage created by a well-designed bra and files this away for later. If you’re going to go on a hideously heteronormative dating show that pits you against twenty other women, perhaps it’d be worth being less obviously into women.
“Teen Mom?” Emma asks. “Are you, like, some reality TV child star?”
“I’m thirty-one,” she says, rolling her eyes.
“I take it his dad’s not in the picture anymore,” Emma says. “Because that would be an amazing scandal otherwise.”
Regina twists the engagement ring on her finger, finding comfort in the worn gold sliding against her skin. “No,” she says. “He’s not.” She retires to the bathroom to wash off her makeup and brush her teeth, passing Emma on her return to the room, where she sends Henry a text (I love you, darling. Be good for Marian.), and burrows under the covers of her bed.
She falls asleep to Emma’s quiet footsteps as she unpacks and gets into bed, and then to her deep, soft breathing.
The next day, Regina receives the news after breakfast that she has the first single date.
Obviously enough research has been done to tell the bachelor that Regina has not – and nor will she ever be – an outdoorsy person. Instead he takes her to a vineyard, maybe an hour’s drive away, and they have lunch before a private wine tasting. “I thought this would be up your alley,” he says, holding the door of the car open for her.
“It’s beautiful,” she replies, brushing off her jacket.
The food is good, the wine excellent. It’s disappointing that everything seems to be falling flat. “How’s the house?” he asks.
“Good,” she says, spearing calamari onto her fork. “Very luxurious.”
“Are you comfortable?” he asks.
She knows this is code for ‘are you actually into me at all’ – or so Henry has told her, saying very earnestly, “he’ll send you home if you show that you’re not comfortable with the whole situation.”
“I miss my son,” she says and is surprised and not a little embarrassed to find that her throat closes tight.
“Tell me about him,” the bachelor says.
So she does. “Henry’s smart,” she says. “Not just academically, but he’s a quick thinker and he’s good at planning and logic. Sometimes he’s too smart for his own good.” She laughs.
“Did he put your application in for the show?”
It’s as good a reason as any to explain why she’s here. “Yes,” she says, wishing she was wearing Daniel’s engagement ring on her finger instead of hidden around her neck because apparently it’s gauche to go on a date with someone else’s engagement ring on your finger. “He wants me to find my happy ending.” She can just imagine the way this will be edited, swelling music, close ups of Regina’s face as she looks down at her hands, smiles, looks up at the bachelor through long lashes.
“How sweet,” the bachelor says. “And his father, is he still in Henry’s life?”
“He died,” she says. “Before Henry was born.”
The bachelor clasps her arm. “I’m sorry,” he says and she thinks he might actually be sorry. “My father died when I was a kid and it’s hard but if you have a great mom you turn out all right.”
Someone who goes on a reality show to ‘find love’ is not precisely Regina’s definition of ‘all right’, but she lets it go. “That’s good to know,” she says instead and puts her knife and fork on her plate.
“If you excuse me for just a moment,” he says and she nods, staring out the window at the view, which is, frankly, spectacular.
So immersed is she in the sun gleaming hot and golden against the green of the vines, she doesn’t notice him return. He coughs and she starts. “I’m sorry,” she says. “It’s beautiful here.”
“Regina,” he says, and he pulls a rose from behind his back. “Will you accept this rose?”
She smiles. “Of course.” However, her heart feels wooden and this is never going to work, even if she could be with someone who would go on this show, even if she could love that easily and quickly, even if she will carry on trying her hardest on this stupid show until he finally sees sense and eliminates her.
She wonders what Emma – what all the women – are doing today.
(“I definitely wasn’t expecting this,” Regina says, one finger stroking the petals of the rose she holds. “But we connected on our date. He’s special.”)
On her return to the mansion, she recounts the date to the room full of women, faces lit with envy, anger and greed alternately. “Did he kiss you?” one asks.
She shakes her head. “What do you take me for?” she replies. “Not on a first date.” She catches Emma’s eye and sees her snort.
After dinner Emma’s watching television in the living room and Regina takes the advantage of a quiet space to call Henry. She dials and Marian answers. “Fallen in love yet?” she asks, in lieu of a greeting.
Regina laughs. “You know that even if I had, I couldn’t tell you. Confidentiality clauses. Mother draws up a good contract.”
Marian nods. “We’ve been watching old seasons on Youtube,” she says. “Henry’s weirdly obsessed.”
“Of course he is.” Henry’s always been prone to these obsessions and Operations (as he calls them), including a horrific several months when he was nine where he became convinced that Regina was the Evil Queen from ‘Snow White’. There had been a lot of tearful phone calls with Marian then. It was only when he got really sick with food poisoning – to the point of hospitalisation – that he let that one go. “Is he home?” She knows he is. She can hear him in the background, pestering Marian for the phone.
“I’ll pass you over,” Marian says. “Love you, linda.” Regina’s always been envious of Marian’s ease with her culture, with the language that is so much a part of her bones and her blood, while Regina struggles with even the most basic Spanish. She’d been ‘encouraged’ to take French at high school at around the same time her mother introduced her to hair straighteners and sun screen and WASP-y pursuits, like horse riding and student government.
“Mom!” Henry says and her throat chokes up for the second time that day.
“Hello, my darling,” she says. “How are you?”
She can practically hear him grin. “Really good. I got an A for my diorama.”
“Well done,” she says. “I’m so proud.”
“How’s Operation Praying Mantis?” he asks.
“So far, so good,” she says. “You know I can’t talk specifics though.”
Henry heaves a deep sigh down the phone. “It’s not like I’d tell anyone…”
“Liar,” Regina says, smiling naturally for the first time since she arrived at the mansion. “You’ll tell Paige or Ava or one of those girls who you insist aren’t your girlfriend.”
“Do you want to talk about people who aren’t girlfriends?” Henry asks. “My art teacher still asks how you are sometimes.”
Regina frowns. Ruby Lucas had been a mistake. A very attractive, giving, sensual mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. “Henry…”
“I know, I know,” he says. “Don’t talk about Mom’s love life.”
“I don’t have…” It is at this point that Emma enters the room, kicking off her shoes and flopping down on her bed, sighing deeply.
“Ugh, so tired,” she groans.
“Who’s that?” Henry asks.
“My roommate,” Regina says and she is unsurprised to hear Henry laugh, high and delighted, down the phone line.
“You have a roommate?” he asks when he’s calmed down enough to talk. “What’s her name? What’s she like?”
“Her name is Emma,” Regina says and looks over at Emma, who grins, waggling her eyebrows, and then pulls her sweater over her head. This leaves her in a thin camisole and no bra. It’s not like Regina can help but notice, her breasts clearly outlined beneath the thin fabric and nipples pressing against the fabric. “She’s obnoxious.” Emma pokes out her tongue.
“You like her,” Henry says.
“She’s not as terrible as some of the others here,” Regina admits, though even saying this makes her feel exposed. At that, Emma sits up on her elbows and beams, her whole face brightening with the force of her smile and there’s something so charming about it. “I should let you get to bed. Sleep well, darling. I love you.”
“Love you too, Momma,” Henry says and her heart jolts at the childish nickname. Henry only calls her ‘Momma’ these days when he’s feeling especially vulnerable.
She slides her phone onto her bedside cabinet and lies back. “That your kid?” Emma asks. She sits up on the bed, drawing her knees up to her chest.
She nods. “I was just saying goodnight.”
“Sorry I interrupted,” Emma says, studying her knees. “I can’t even imagine how weird it must be to be away from him.”
“Thank you,” Regina says. “I’m going to go to sleep.” Emma keeps her bedside lamp on for some time. The warm glow of light is comforting but she finds herself all too aware of the other woman, of her quiet breathing and her infrequent huffs when something in whatever it is she’s reading doesn’t meet her liking, to relax entirely.
The next day, Emma is one of six women chosen for a group date and Regina finds herself strangely disappointed. She’s left behind with a couple of women, gossiping on the sun loungers. They’ve been instructed to stay as a group.
(“I wonder what they’re doing,” one says, slathering sun screen on long, tanned legs.
“I wish I was on the group date,” another adds, sighing. “You’re so lucky, Regina, to know that you’re safe.”
“I can’t get complacent though,” Regina says, looking up from a copy of ‘The Goldfinch’ and adjusting the long shirt she’s wearing to cover herself from the sun.)
She has her phone out and is tapping out an email to Henry – a muddled combination of reminders and endearments – when the women return. Apart from a couple of filmed segments, they’ve been essentially left to their own devices at the mansion and the return of the cameras feels intrusive and unwelcome. “So,” one of the women says. “What did you do?”
Motor-biking, apparently. One of the women won some alone time with the bachelor – not Emma – and got a rose out of the deal too.
(“That’s two roses already taken,” Emma says to the camera, biting her lip anxiously. “It’s all a bit nerve-wracking.”)
There’s no time to talk to Emma before the cocktail party that evening and then Emma is busy vying for time with the bachelor. Regina stands with the other rose-winning woman – Tamara – trying to pace herself on the champagne. “So,” Tamara says. “We’re the ‘let’s prove the bachelor’s not a racist’ candidates, right?” She’s thin and dark and sharp-tongued and Regina thinks she might like her.
She raises an eyebrow. “What did you do to impress him?” she asks.
“You think I’m going to give away my secrets, Maine?” Tamara asks. She thinks she recognises the accent as a New York one, recalls her talking about her job in PR the other evening over dinner. At least it seems like a suitable career for one going on to a show such as this. One of the women is a high school English teacher and Regina can’t help but call her ‘Career Suicide’ in her head.
“Curses, you found me out,” Regina says. She feels eyes watching her and realises that it’s Emma. She’s sitting with the bachelor in the ‘private’ bower (that is so not private because, quite apart from the cameras, every single woman glares across at it the moment they’re not in it). She should be staring dreamily into the bachelor’s eyes but she’s not. Her eyebrows are knitted, lips in a tight downward turn. Perhaps the bachelor is saying something that isn’t to her liking but Regina’s not convinced.
She raises an eyebrow and Emma looks away. “He seems to like Emma,” Tamara says, staring critically over at her. “Blonde. It figures.”
“Emma’s all right,” Regina says.
“Oh, nothing against the girl,” Tamara says. “She’s just so typical.”
She doesn’t get a chance to talk with Emma, swept away in a bevy of blondes for the evening, while Regina remains aloof. She exchanges a few brief words with the bachelor, laughs at his joke and makes an excuse to touch his arm. Henry’s been texting her dating tips all day and this is one he suggested. She’ll be having words with Marian that night about what her son is being allowed to google.
At the rose ceremony she finds herself inexplicably anxious, hands sweaty and the fingers of her left hand tapping against her thigh. “Calm down,” Tamara whispers into her ear. “You’re already safe this week.”
She doesn’t realise quite why she’s so anxious until the third girl’s name called is Emma and her heart rate eases. “Emma, will you accept this rose?”
Emma grins and walks forward, the tail of her long green dress trailing behind her. She leans forward, kissing the bachelor’s cheek as she accepts the rose. “I’d love to,” she says.
Later, they’re getting ready for bed, Emma’s curls are pulled back into a tight ponytail and Regina rubs moisturiser into her skin; every time she considers skipping a night her mother’s voice echoes through her head, “you aren’t getting any younger, dear.”
“Another day safe,” Emma says. Regina just nods. “I mean, I don’t know if I even like the guy. Mary Margaret would tell me that love is instant…” She laughs, but it’s kind of shuddery, wet and as if she’s close to tears.
“It’s not,” Regina feels compelled to say. “I mean, love is whatever it is for you.” It wasn’t instant with Daniel; she’d hated him when he’d first turned up in her sophomore biology class and was assigned to be her lab partner. He’d been so diffident, so gentle, and he’d fainted when they’d dissected a frog. He’d grown on her. “Like mould,” he used to joke.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been in love.”
“I have,” Regina says. “Once upon a time.”
“The kid’s father?”
She nods and rubs the band of her engagement ring, now firmly back on her finger where it belongs. “Yes.”
Emma’s silent for a moment, as though waiting for Regina to continue, and when she doesn’t she shrugs. “I should get some sleep.”
The next single date goes to Emma and Regina is crotchety all day, sitting around outside with the other women and texting Henry.
I miss you, darling boy.
Miss you too, Mom, Henry replies. She looks at the time and realises he should be in Math.
I really hope I have your schedule wrong and you’re messaging me at lunchtime rather than in Math class.
She doesn’t hear back from him until after school hours. Of course not! Attached is a selfie of Henry pulling his best puppy dog eyes and she laughs.
“That from your son?” one of the women asks. She’s one of the blondes – Ashley, Regina thinks her name is. She’s sweet, seems a little too good to be true really, but she’s young and naïve and kind. She would be a good match for the bachelor – the all American girl with her buff, Ken doll of a partner.
“God,” one of the other women says sitting up on her lounger to apply more sunscreen. “It’s so weird that you’re on this show when you have a kid.”
“It’s so weird that you’re on this show when you don’t have two brain cells to rub together,” Regina snaps and she can just imagine the sound effects that’ll be laid over that tasty little snippet of bitchiness.
When she goes to bed, Emma still hasn’t returned from her date. She sleeps fitfully, though doesn’t hear Emma return. She simply wakes at six – habitual after all these years of early starts for work and Henry – to find Emma face-down on her bed, still dressed and, if she could hazard a guess, still with a full face of make-up. She tuts (because how hard is it to change into pyjamas?) and goes through her morning routine, dressing casually in slacks and a sheer blouse before heading down for coffee.
“Emma return?” Tamara asks her, passing a plate of pastries over. She takes one eagerly, and gulps down half a mug of coffee before responding.
“After I’d fallen asleep,” she says.
(“I’m not implying anything,” Regina says to camera. “But I was awake until midnight and she wasn’t home then. Someone’s had a good night…”)
It’s at that point that Emma enters the dining room. She’s made up, though Regina suspects that beneath the concealer, she’s sporting some seriously dark circles under her eyes. She’s smiling though, hands behind her back, and then she reveals the rose. The women squeal in unison. “So,” one of the women says. “Tell us everything!”
Emma sits, white teeth bared, golden hair gleaming in the sunlight. Regina crosses her legs, clutching the coffee in her hands, suddenly not so interested in the pastry flaking on the plate before her. “It was really romantic,” she says. “We went out on this boat in the harbour and when we anchored, we went swimming and then had a meal, a few drinks…”
“Did you kiss him?” Tamara asks, looking over at Regina as she does so.
Regina watches colour blotch and flush across Emma’s neck and she frowns. “I’m not one to kiss and tell,” she says and Regina knows.
(“I know some of the girls are going to judge me,” Emma says, the tilt of her head defiant, “but I don’t regret kissing him.”)
A bunch of the women are chosen for a group date but Emma and Regina are amongst those left behind and Regina finds herself following Emma to the sun loungers in the garden, where she lies on her stomach with her book open but her mind elsewhere. Emma’s face is covered by sunglasses and a giant floppy hat and she’s wearing shorts that may as well be underwear for all the coverage they offer her long, pale legs.
“You’re pretty quiet today,” Emma says and Regina turns onto her back.
“And you’re looking pretty exhausted,” she fires back. “Are you sure kissing is all you did on your date?”
“I knew someone would make a crack about it,” Emma says and she sounds hurt almost. “Didn’t think it’d be you though.”
“I didn’t think you’d kiss someone you don’t really know so early on,” Regina says. “We learn new and delightful things about people all the time.”
“That’s pretty judgemental,” Emma says. “You’re on this show just like everyone else.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Cut the ‘holier-than-thou’ attitude,” Emma says. “If he’d wanted to make out with you, you’d have gone for it.”
“I’m not a slut,” Regina says and then claps a hand over her mouth, horrified. Her words seem to echo in the quiet space and she’s almost certain it has been caught on camera and what will Henry say if her comment makes it to air?
Emma stands, fists clenched. “No,” she hisses. “But then you’re so frigid I’m surprised your ex even got far enough to impregnate you. No wonder you’re not together anymore.”
Now Regina’s standing. She can feel her whole face flare up with warmth. “Fuck you,” she says and stalks off to their shared room, wedging a chair under the door in case Emma has the bright idea to follow her.
In there she cries. Not because of what Emma said, not really, but because of this whole stupid mess. She cries because she hates that her mother has bullied her into this and because she misses Henry and because Daniel is dead and has been these past ten years and because she’s so tired.
She could put in more of an effort at the cocktail party prior to elimination. She snatches a few words with the bachelor, being forceful enough with her flirting so as to distract him from the droop of her lips and the redness of her eyes. He kisses her cheek when they’re finished talking and she tries to enjoy it, tries not to critique his papery lips or to consider how much she hates the feel of stubble against her skin.
Otherwise, she sits with a group of women, letting conversation lap against her like waves, breaking against her walls. She does not look across at Emma. She does not feel bad. Not when Emma said so much worse.
She is called second, the sound of her name breaking through her reverie, startling her. At least her reaction will be good on camera. “Regina, will you accept this rose?”
“Thank you,” she says, letting him kiss her cheek again, feeling large hands grasp her shoulders as she does so to pull her forward.
She calls Henry on her return to the room, desperate to hear the sound of his voice. When he answers, she can hear ‘The Sound of Music’ in the background. “What’s wrong, darling?” she asks because ‘The Sound of Music’ is the movie they have always watched together when they’re sad or lonely or ill.
“Nothing,” he says. “Just missing you.”
“What bit are you up to?” she asks.
“The Ländler,” he says. A memory flits across her mind, of her and a four-year-old Henry watching that scene over and over again, attempting to perfect their own dancing of the Ländler. She remembers the leaping and skipping in three-quarter time, Henry in footie pyjamas and Regina with her dressing gown wrapped tight around her waist, billowing as she twirled because Henry was a dictatorial toddler and wanted it to look right. She remembers ending up in a twisted mess like Kurt and Maria do, remembers laughing until tears streamed down her face, the blush in her cheeks nothing to do with romance and everything to do with the hysterical laughter that welled up inside of her.
Henry seems to understand the lengthy pause. “When you get home we’ll have a movie night,” he says. “I reckon I could do that twist thing with you now, if you had bare feet.”
“Don’t say that,” she says. “That means you’re growing up.”
He laughs. “I’m ten, Mom, not fifty.”
She sighs and then hears the door creak open. “I’ll let you get back to Fraulein Maria,” she says, not turning around. “I love you very much.”
“Love you too, Momma,” Henry says and she can hear the smile on his lips.
“That the kid?” Emma asks.
“My implausible child?” Regina snaps, turning around. Emma’s sitting on the edge of her bed, hands balled into the fabric of the bedspread and every line of her body taut with tension.
“Yeah, him,” Emma says. “Look, it was a ‘heat of the moment’ comment…”
“It hurt,” Regina says.
“Well, so did being called a slut,” Emma fires back.
She’s silent for a moment. Emma’s knuckles are white and she’s worrying at her lip with her teeth so hard Regina’s genuinely afraid she’s going to break the skin. “Stop biting your lip,” Regina says, standing and moving to sit beside her. Her hand touches Emma’s when she sits and Emma flinches at the touch but doesn’t move away. “You’re right,” she says. “I was out of line.”
“Is that an apology?” Emma asks.
“I don’t hear you apologising either,” Regina snaps.
Emma turns to her. “Would it help?”
She shrugs. “I didn’t expect this show to get to me,” she says when Emma’s still staring at her, expecting her to say something. “I didn’t expect to get sucked into this stupid, hideous competition.”
“Neither did I,” Emma says. “God, I’m glad there’s no cameras in our rooms. The kiss was fucking awkward.”
Regina laughs. “Dry lips?”
“So dry and he tried to slip me the tongue,” she says. “I mean, I don’t blame him. He’s stuck in this environment where twenty women are vying for his affection but he can’t sleep with any of them…”
“Would you?” She knows that when (if) they reach the final three there’s the camera-less night in a romantic hotel room with the bachelor. But, just, no.
Emma bumps her shoulder with hers. “Enough with the insinuations,” she says but her tone sounds lighter somehow.
“I didn’t mean–”
“I know.” Emma’s silent for a while before she says, “it’s just, you’re not the first person to call me a slut. I like sex. I don’t do relationships.”
“Daniel was the first person I slept with,” Regina admits. “I was twenty.”
“And then you had the kid?”
“Henry,” Regina says. “His name is Henry. I’d just finished my degree. Daniel was working at a stable. He was so happy when I told him and I wanted to be a mom so much – maybe not then exactly but one day.”
“So are you guys divorced?” Emma asks.
“He died,” she says. “Before Henry was born, before we could get married. Accident at the stables where he worked. A horse kicked.”
Emma shifts, her hand finding Regina’s and normally she’d balk at the idea of clutching someone’s hand like this but somehow it anchors her, keeps her grief – still permeable after all these years – from overwhelming her. “That sucks,” she says.
Regina laughs wetly. “I mean, I can talk about it now without having a complete mental breakdown,” she says. “That’s something, at least.”
“And you have Henry,” Emma says and there’s something faintly wistful in her tone.
“Yes,” Regina says. “I have Henry.” Somehow this talk has eased so much of the horror and distrust and pain coiled in her belly like a snake, and she wants to say thank you, but the words stick in her throat. Instead, tentatively, she wraps her arms around Emma’s shoulders, pulling her into a hug.
Emma stiffens before sinking into the embrace, her chin resting sharply on Regina’s shoulder and her fingers skirting across her shoulder blades and something about it feels so right.
She pulls back and Emma loosens her grip and smiles so broadly. “I’m glad I met you,” she says. “Even if nothing else comes out of this shit show, I’m glad we’re friends.”
“Yes,” Regina says though her heart sings out for more, always more, impossibly more. “Friends.”
And so time goes on. The pool of women is slowly whittled away. Regina continues to go on dates, go through the motions, and alienate the bulk of the women there by her refusal to play nice or ingratiate herself with others. She says just enough to get through each week. It’s easy really. Growing up with Cora as a mother, one grew accustomed to anticipating moods and needs.
One afternoon, they sit outside, sharing a lounger when a few girls are off on a group date, Emma braiding her hair. Tamara’s on the next lounger and Ashley – who already got a rose from her single date the previous day – is lying on the grass, reading a magazine. “I just don’t know,” Regina says. “Sometimes I wonder if I’ve spent enough time with him. Maybe he’s losing interest.”
Emma’s fingers are soft, careful in her hair. “I think you’re safe. I’d date you.” It takes all of Regina’s willpower not to spin around, to see if Emma’s being serious or if it’s just another joke.
Tamara raises an eyebrow over her sunglasses.
Emma’s words seem to be prophetic in some way because she gets a huge slab of time alone with the bachelor that very next day. He asks, “can I kiss you?” and Regina plasters a smile on her face, leans in and tilts her head to avoid a collision of noses.
His lips meet hers, and it’s pleasant, if not exactly setting off fireworks. She brings up a hand to cup his face, to stroke the rough skin of his jaw with her thumb, to draw him closer, closing her eyes, in the hopes that deepening the kiss might set off something within her.
And then Emma’s face flashes into her mind and she reels back.
“Did I do something wrong?”
“No,” Regina says, and smiles, leaning forward again, and whispers an inch from his mouth, “kissing you is lovely.”
That’s going to be on camera, she reflects later, and is mortified because a) Emma will see that she said that and will never stop mocking her and b) she thought about Emma seeing it before she thought about Henry.
(“She’s beautiful,” the bachelor says. “I find her fascinating and I want to know more about her every time we talk.”
The screen cuts to Regina. “It was a great kiss,” she says, pushing a lock of hair back behind her ear and looking down at her lap, a smile playing across her red lips. “Fireworks.”)
He keeps giving her and Emma roses and she feels that quickening of heart rate every time she finds out they’re both going to be staying. It’s the proximity, she tells herself. It’s having someone in the house – a friend – that she can trust and rely on when she’s so far from home.
They’re both still in the game when they reach the final four – along with Tamara and Ashley (and, honestly, Regina has her money on Emma or Ashley at this point because Tamara’s too sharp and she’s too uninterested and they’re both too not-white). It is at this point that the bachelor visits their homes, gets to know their families, and so Regina gets to go home. Her knee jiggles the entire plane ride back to Maine, irritating her seatmate. She’ll be seeing Henry in just a few short hours and she cannot wait.
After weeks of constant intrusive cameras, she doesn’t quite know how to behave when back in normal society. She keeps smiling when there’s no need and when her stomach rumbles on the plane, she looks around anxiously before realising there’s no one to hear it – or care. Emma would have laughed.
Henry’s at the airport, holding up a banner that reads ‘Welcome home, Mom’, and she runs toward him, throwing her arms around him and pulling him tight to her, peppering his face with kisses. “Mom!” he says, squirming out of her grip. “We’re in public.” But he hands his banner to Marian and wraps an arm around her waist.
“I don’t care,” she says, running her fingers through his hair – in dire need of a trim – and taking his hand to walk to the car. She smiles over at Marian. “Thank you.”
“I expect gossip,” Marian says, bumping Regina with her hip. “Confidentiality clauses or no.”
She doesn’t get it, not until later, once Henry’s in bed. Regina sits by his bedside longer than usual, wishing he hadn’t proclaimed himself too old to be read to two years ago. Eventually though he rolls his eyes. “I’ll still be here in the morning, Mom.” And so she returns downstairs where Marian has poured her a glass of wine and settled onto the couch in the den.
“So,” she says. “Tell me everything.”
“He’s very nice,” Regina says automatically.
“Such enthusiasm!” Marian says. “He must be a real catch.”
Regina’s phone beeps. She opens the message to find a selfie of Emma, pulling a face like she’s about to throw up, and then a second picture of a table laden with food. Mary Margaret’s trying to fatten me up, she writes.
Regina smiles. Don’t lie. You’re going to go back for fourths. Please eat some vegetables.
“Who’s sending you messages that have you looking like a lovesick puppy?” Marian asks.
“No one,” Regina says. “I mean, it was Emma. My friend from the show.”
“Oh, yes. The friend,” Marian says. Regina can practically hear the speech marks around the word ‘friend’. “She was literally all you talked about.”
“Well, confidentiality clauses didn’t allow me to talk about much else,” Regina says.
“Bullshit,” Marian says. “You couldn’t give less of a crap about confidentiality and you know I don’t have anyone to tell anything.” It’s true. Marian’s a social worker and all of her friends seem to be these do-gooder types, the sorts of people who think reality television is appalling. Regina’s sure she’ll be lectured about setting back feminism fifty years the next time she goes to lunch with Marian’s crowd. They already think she’s selling out because she works for the mayor.
“I just have to be careful,” Regina says. “Besides, Emma’s kept me sane in that mansion. She’s been a good friend.”
“A gal pal?” Marian asks, lips stretching into a grin.
“Shut up,” Regina says and throws a cushion at her, heedless of the possibility that she might tip pinot noir on her couch.
It’s later that night when she can’t sleep – time zones, the restless horrible feeling that she’s dragged Henry and Marian and whoever else in Storybrooke into this ridiculous farce of a television show by making it this far – that she texts Emma. You awake?
Her phone immediately starts ringing. She puts it on speakerphone. “Hi,” Emma says, voice drowsy with sleep.
She feels guilty immediately. “Did I wake you?”
“No,” Emma says. “Just tossing and turning. I miss my roomie.”
Regina is flooded with unexpected warmth at her words. “You too, dear.”
“So, how was the big reunion with the kid?”
Regina sighs. “Wonderful,” she says. “I didn’t realise quite how much I’d missed him until I saw him at the arrivals gate. I don’t want to let him out of my sight again and it’s going to hurt to go back to California.”
Emma’s silent for a moment and then says, laughter in every syllable, “hey, you might get eliminated!”
“Screw you,” Regina says but she’s laughing and Emma’s laughing and why can it not be this easy with someone she can actually have.
“I’d like to meet the kid one day,” Emma says. “Perhaps when this is all over?” She sounds hesitant and Regina can’t quite understand why.
“You’ll probably be too busy in your new life with him,” she says, endeavouring to keep her tone light, to hide her jealousy (and she’s not even sure who she’s jealous of, which alarms her).
Emma yawns. “You’re ridiculous,” she says. “Keep talking.”
So Regina talks, telling her everything that Henry has said and done since her return, telling her about Marian, about the crew coming tomorrow to set up her home for the bachelor visiting and how this means that, of course, she must spend all morning compulsively cleaning her already tidy home…
And Emma’s breath evens out and she stops interjecting into Regina’s talk and Regina realises she’s asleep. She should hang up, but Emma’s breathing centres her so she places her phone on the pillow next to her and curls up, listening to the steady, in-and-out, in-and-out.
In the morning perhaps she’ll think about what this means.
But her morning is taken up with cleaning and directing camera crew and make-up artists and spending as many stolen moments with Henry as possible (making him grilled cheese for lunch, watching him eat his grilled cheese, not thinking about how much Emma would like her grilled cheese). She goes to bed that night, exhausted, but her phone beeps just as she’s drifting off.
Good luck. Attached is a picture of Emma giving her the thumbs up.
She falls asleep with a smile on her lips. When she wakes up, she is hustled into the makeshift hair and make-up room (her guest bedroom really) because the bachelor will be arriving soon. Henry has been given a new plaid shirt, in the same blue tones to complement her dress, and he’s having his hair cut by someone. At least he’s getting something useful out of this whole hideous experience.
Her phone rings and, without looking, she answers. “Emma?”
“Regina, it’s your mother.”
“Oh.” She whole body tenses and the woman doing her hair moves away, sensing her unease.
“Keep up the good work,” Cora says. “He likes you – and you’re good television. The ratings will be excellent this season, I can feel it.”
Regina sighs. “Of course that’s the important thing.”
“Of course.” Cora laughs, as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Good luck, darling.”
“Thanks,” Regina says and wishes, not for the first time, that she could slam the phone down into a handset. That used to be so satisfying when she was a teenager, spending the weekend with Papi after her parents divorced, where her mother would call at least twice a day to ‘check up’ on her (by which she meant, ensure that Papi wasn’t letting her eat carbohydrates or shirk her studies or see that dreadful Daniel whose father was only a mechanic).
When the bachelor arrives, she notices he’s had a spray tan and she wonders at this need to make himself browner when all her life, her mother has told her how lucky it is that her skin is light and to warn her to stay out of the sun. His teeth shine too bright against the almost-orange of his face and he holds out a hand to shake Henry’s.
Henry smiles at him and says, “are you going to be my new daddy?” and they have to start the entrance again because Regina’s laughing so hard that her side aches and she can hardly breathe and Henry’s grinning proudly at her and the bachelor just looks confused.
She files this away to tell Emma later.
Later, she sits on the porch swing in the back garden, curled up in the bachelor’s arms. There’s something comforting about the embrace, in spite of the artificiality of the moment. She has missed being held, instead of being the one doing the holding. “You seem more real when you’re around your boy,” he says. “You’re a wonderful mother.”
Regina smiles into the dying light. “Thank you,” she says. “I’m sure you’ll make a great father one day.” Despite the occasional narcissism and his bland machismo, she does believe this. But he needs someone younger than her and someone more willing to stroke his ego and play the placid little housewife. Still, she’ll see how far she can take this. For her mother.
“You must be glad to be at home,” he says, his fingertips stroking down her bare arm.
“Yes,” she says automatically. “I do miss some people from the show.”
“Emma?” he asks and at her surprised glance, adds, “you seemed to be good pals.”
“Yes,” Regina says slowly because it’s that word ‘pal’ again, which Marian had imbued with some sort of meaning Regina has missed somewhere along the way. “We connected.”
“Well, that’s great,” he says. “I worried that the mansion was just full of bitching and backstabbing and that’s not exactly attractive.”
Regina lets the fake laugh out. “Oh, there was a fair share of that as well,” she says.
He presses a kiss into her hair. “Still, it’s great that you made a friend.”
It really was, she thinks, but instead twists so she’s facing him and presses forward, kissing him, hoping that maybe, just maybe, dominance and control might spark something within herself and make her forget pale, freckled skin and strong arms and eyes with flecks of green in them.
How’d it go? Emma texts her later.
Fine, Regina writes.
Just fine? :(
Good night, Emma, and good luck for tomorrow.
She turns her phone off and when she checks it in the morning she sees that Emma has sent her an emoji back. She has to squint to work out what it is, her eyes not adjusted to being awake yet, but when she looks closely, it’s a rose.
She keeps her phone at arm’s length for the rest of her time in Storybrooke, spending time with Henry and Marian and the occasional other friend. On her final day, she takes Henry out of school and they have a day together. Over pancakes at Granny’s diner, Henry asks, “I hope you don’t win.”
“Really?” she asks.
“That guy’s a blowhard,” Henry says and takes a large bite of chocolate chip pancake. Before she can question him further about the ‘blowhard’ comment, he changes the subject. “Hey, we should skype your roommate friend. I want to meet her.”
“I don’t know, Henry…”
“C’mon, Mom,” Henry says. “Text her.” So she texts Emma: Henry wants to ‘meet’ you. Skype?
Emma responds in the affirmative and several hours later, she has set her laptop up in the living room and is holding a cup of coffee clenched between her hands. Her stomach bubbles with nerves and she hates that she’s feeling this way. The skype call comes through and Henry answers. “Hey, Emma!” he says when Emma’s face, grainy and washed out, appears on her computer screen.
“You must be Henry,” Emma says and she grins. “Managed to score a day off school, huh?”
Henry smirks. “Mom decided,” he says. “I didn’t even have to beg or pretend to be sick or anything. How was your romantic day with the bachelor?” He pulls a face and Emma laughs and even though it echoes and crackles because Regina’s skype connection is terrible, the sound is a balm to her soul.
She sits back and watches them interact. Emma seems to be genuinely interested in everything Henry has to say, asking apt questions that speak of someone who has listened to everything Regina has told her about him, and making him laugh. “When we’re out of this, I’ll come and visit you guys in Maine,” Emma says, “and we can play video games.”
Henry grins. “You’re on my team,” he says. “Maybe we’ll be able to beat Mom together.”
Emma starts at this, before a smile curls at the corners of her lips. “You’ve been holding out on me, Mills. I can’t believe you’re secretly a video game aficionado.”
“You never asked,” Regina says but she’s grinning, tongue poking between her teeth.
Henry looks over at her. “I’m gonna make a snack,” he says. “Give you guys a chance to talk privately.” And before Regina can protest, he’s gone.
For a moment, she’s silent, staring at Emma who is looking down at what Regina assumes is her keyboard. “I’ve missed you,” Emma says.
Regina’s lips twitch. She will not smile. She will not look down coyly like a teenage girl with her first crush. “You look tired,” she says.
“A few bad nights,” Emma says, shrugging. “It’s nothing. Just insomnia.”
Her hand stretches to touch Emma, before she remembers that she’s talking to a computer screen. “You need to take better care of yourself,” she says.
“You could take care of me tomorrow,” Emma says and she actually waggles her eyebrows like she’s actually Millhouse from ‘The Simpsons’ trying to flirt.
“You’re arriving the night before as well?” She lets out a shuddering breath and feels her heart beat just that little bit quicker.
Emma shrugs. “It was that or the butt crack of dawn. I’ll see you at the hotel.”
Regina turns. Henry’s standing behind her, a bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream with chocolate sauce liberally applied in his hand and a teaspoon in his mouth. She feels heat rise to her cheeks, grateful that she doesn’t visibly blush. “I should go,” she says.
“Until tomorrow,” Emma says. “Nice to meet you, kid,” she adds and Henry waves his spoon at her.
“I like her,” he says, settling in beside Regina on the couch again and nuzzling his head against her shoulder for a moment.
“Good,” Regina says. She can feel Henry staring at her from the corner of his eye, lips twisting and eyebrows furrowing.
“You like her too,” he says and there’s realisation dawning.
“Of course I do,” Regina says, her voice just a little bit too light and high. “She’s been a good friend. Now, did you want Harry Potter or Captain America?”
Before she goes to sleep that night, she checks her phone one final time and is met with a message from Emma: Until tomorrow.
She drops Henry at school the next morning before Marian drives her to Bangor for her flight. “Good luck,” she says, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
“Cross your fingers for my elimination,” Regina says.
Marian just looks at her for a moment. “I didn’t say who I was wishing you luck with.”
When she gets to LA, she’s driven to her hotel. Upon checking in, she enquires after Emma. “She just got here. I can patch a call through but you’re in adjoining rooms,” the clerk says and she smiles.
She checks her reflection before knocking on the door between the two rooms. There’s a muffled curse word and padding footsteps and then she’s face to face with Emma. “Regina!”
“Hi,” she says, inexplicably shy. Emma’s hair is damp from a shower and she’s barefoot, wearing one of the hotel robes, and Regina’s definitely not thinking about what, if anything, she’s wearing anything underneath the robe. The next thing she knows, Emma has her hand clenched around Regina’s wrist and is dragging her into her room, pulling her onto the bed and bouncing.
“It’s so good to see you!” she says and there’s something puppy-like in her behaviour.
Regina pulls off her boots and blazer and lies back on the bed, just for a moment. “You too,” she says.
“It doesn’t sound like it,” Emma says. “Missing Henry?”
“No,” Regina says. “No more than usual. I just…” She sits up, leaning against the headboard. “I can’t help but think that after this is all over, we’ll never see each other again.”
“Hey,” Emma says. She pulls herself so that she’s sitting cross-legged by Regina and her hand touches her thigh and it sends a tingle through her body. “You’re stuck with me, sister, whether you like it or not.”
She smiles tremulously. “I hope so,” she says. “You’re important to me.”
Emma’s hand is still on her thigh as she shifts onto her knees, moving so that their faces are only inches apart. “Honey,” she says and she lets out a gasping laugh, “you’re pretty much the most important person on the planet to me.”
Regina surges forward and kisses her. For a few horrible, mortifying seconds Emma is frozen beneath her lips and Regina wonders if she’s misread everything leading up to this point but then Emma returns the kiss, snaking her body forward, pressing against Regina, and her lips draw Regina in, tightening the coil of heat in her belly, and it’s right.
She has her arms around Emma’s neck and there’s barely an inch between them and she says, “do you have anywhere to be this evening?” In response, Emma’s fingers go to the belt of her robe and Regina discovers the answer to her question, that she is indeed not wearing anything under her robe.
“Darling,” Regina breathes and then all talk disappears in the tangle of limbs and the lick and kiss of tongues and the sharp arching of bodies. At some point, Emma orders room service and they eat burgers naked and Regina has never laughed so hard than she does at the moment when Emma drops ketchup on her boob and tries to lick it off herself and it’s really not that funny but she’s caught up in a wave of happiness.
Of course, it all comes crashing down.
Emma sleeps like the dead. Regina watches her, early morning light kissing her skin and her hair a tangle of gold against the pillow. She murmurs under her breath as she sleeps, smacking her lips together and then turns, flinging herself away from Regina, pulling all the covers with her.
This is a mess. Her mother will be furious. “If you’d only made an effort,” she can just about hear her say, “you could have had everything.”
She doesn’t want the ‘everything’ her mother is so insistent on but she’s stuck in this whirlwind and she’s not quite sure how to get herself out. She gets up, pulling on her shirt and walking over to the desk where she finds a notepad and pen. The words won’t come. Instead she draws something – a rose – and leaves it on the pillow before slipping back to her own room to shower and dress.
She locks the adjoining door and ignores it when Emma knocks even though the rapping continues for at least a minute. Her hands shake when she dials Henry's number. "Mom!" he says. "How's it going?"
She starts crying. "I love her," she says when she can get words out. "I love her and your grandmother is going to be furious."
She can picture Henry, sitting cross-legged on the couch, jaw clenched stubbornly and thinking. "Okay," he says. "I have a plan."
When she stands with the three other women in the navy dress that isn’t her own and the heavy make-up that feels tight and sticky on her skin, she thinks she might throw up. The host talks about the difficult decision the bachelor has had to make but she thinks no decision has been more difficult than the one she’s made that morning. She tries to catch Emma’s eye but she’s staring at the tray of roses and refuses to look her way. She’s dressed in pale pink, like she’s a teenage girl going to prom, not a grown adult with a predilection for leather and tight pants. It’s all too fancy dress.
The bachelor twists the first rose between his fingers. “Ashley,” he says and the blonde student lets out the smallest gasp, before moving forward. “Will you accept this rose?”
“Regina,” the bachelor says and her legs feel as though they’re made of lead. She steps forward, looking back once at Emma whose eyes are wide and hurt. She reaches him. “Will you accept this rose?”
She smiles at him. “No.”
There are gasps, a whisper from someone to keep the cameras rolling. The bachelor’s eyebrows knit together. “Um.”
“I fell in love on this show,” Regina says, “but it wasn’t with you. I’m sorry.” She places her hand over his momentarily before turning to the women. To Emma. “Emma…” she says. “I’m sorry.”
Emma’s crying, her chest heaving with an effort to keep sobs contained. She smiles through her tears, kicks off her shoes and runs forward, wrapping her arms around Regina’s neck. “I hate you,” she whispers, sniffing. “I thought yesterday was all a game, a way for you to win.”
“I’m sorry,” Regina whispers back, kissing her cheek. She tastes salt on her lips. She pulls back, wipes the tears away with her thumb. “It needed your reaction. My mother can’t fault the potential ratings for this stunt.”
Emma kisses her fiercely, heedless of the cameras, of their audience, of the poor, hapless bachelor standing behind them.
*
The two women sit on the couch, hands clasped together. They are dressed casually in matching black skinny jeans, though Emma wears a plaid shirt and Regina sports a vest and tee-shirt combination.
“I hear we created quite a scandal,” Regina (31, Mayoral Advisor, Storybrooke) says. “My mother couldn’t be too furious if the ratings were good.”
“Her mother,” Emma (28, Deputy Sheriff, Storybrooke) says, shaking her head. “When I thought she’d decided to choose the show over me, I wanted to die and she blames her mother!”
Regina laughs, throwing her head back. Light from the windows of her picture-perfect home hits her dark hair, making it shine and glisten. “I made it up to you,” she says.
“Yes,” Emma says and she grins, tongue poking out between her teeth. “Yes, she did. Multiple times.”