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A loud thud, followed immediately by a series of half-muttered curses and the jiggling of the door knob, pulls Regina's attention towards the hall and away from her book. “Did you forget your key, dear?”
The jiggling stops and, for a moment, the house is quiet. “...yes.”
Chuckling softly, Regina waves her hand to unlock the door and is quickly rewarded with the sight of Red trudging into view and collapsing onto the couch beside her. If she didn't look so thoroughly exhausted, Regina would have words to say about the strain that sort of thing puts on the furniture.
“Hi,” Red says as she inchworms her way into her lap. “Sorry I'm late.”
“Long day?” she asks, absently moving her book to the side as her hand sinks into Red's hair.
“The longest . First Ariel called out – again – then the cappuccino machine broke and Mark said he couldn't fix it until next week even though I know he has literally nothing else to do. And then, to top it all off, Emma decided she just had to have my statement about the whole Leroy thing just as I was flipping the closing sign.”
“Didn't that happen on Tuesday?” Regina asks.
“Monday.”
Regina sighs. “I suppose it's time to remind Miss Swan how procedure works. Again. For someone who proudly claims to have watched every episode of Law & Order , you think she'd be better about following the rules.”
Red laughs even as she turns, nestling her face into Regina's stomach. “How was your day?”
Regina considers the many ways she could answer that question, the series of minor annoyances and tidbits of admittedly boring minutiae she could offer about her day, and says, “Better now.”
Red twists in her lap, peering up at her through a curtain of tangled dark hair, with big green eyes Regina knows mean nothing but trouble “Can we watch a couple episodes of The Amazing Race before bed? I know it's not your favorite but I really wanna get caught up before Wednesday.”
She chuckles, gently smoothing the hair from her face, hand lingering on her cheek. Frankly, she considers herself lucky; she's had to do far worse things for those eyes in the past. The two months Red was obsessed with HGTV springs to mind and Regina barely resists the urge to shudder. “Sure, Red.”
She makes a small sound of victory in the back of her throat as she turns, wriggling around until she's facing the tv with remote in hand. How she managed to find it that fast, especially without moving, Regina will never know. “Do you think they'll go to India this season?” she asks as she expertly navigates through the various menus. “‘Cos it never goes well and is always hilarious.”
“I suppose we'll just have to wait and see,” she says, tugging Red closer as Phil appears and launches into the recap for the previous episode.
And if Regina wakes up an unspecified amount of time later to find their positions reversed, her head nestled on Red's thighs as the were mutters to herself about a team not reading their clue correctly for the nth time, she can't find so much as a single reason to mind.