Chapter Text
"So, uh. If you want to just sit and I’ll-I’ll order something for you. Here, there’s a table over there.”
Regina’s date places a clammy hand on her elbow and attempts to guide her through the throngs of tables and college students. She rolls her eyes as her bag hits the corner of a table and offers an apology as her date continues to charmingly help her. Her date couldn’t possibly believe she hadn’t know how to order Starbucks or simply walk through a crowded table before she met him.
She may be blind but she could easily spot an asshole.
After her walking stick hits a few too many chair legs, she decrees her date a mistake, but still, she lets him guide her to a far off table where the noise lessens. He stumbles an apology after he tries taking her bag from her and excuses himself rather awkwardly to order drinks, never once asking Regina what she prefers. Ten minutes pass and the brunette grows impatient of listening to the bustle of the cafe.
Before she can contemplate leaving, she hears him set a drink in front of her. “I uh- I didn’t really know what you liked but you seem like a tea person. It’s this pink fruity tea, or something.”
“Or something,” Regina mumbles, sniffing the tea with displeasure. “And what did you order?”
“Oh, black coffee.”
Regina takes a sip of the drink in front of her to hide her scowl and immediately regrets it, the sweet treat making the back of her teeth ache. Who was he to assume what she liked and order for her?
“Right, so tell me about yourself. Mal said you weren’t born blind, so how did that happen?”
Her hands clutch around her stifling drink but before she can respond that the meddling ass should just listen to the rumors if all he wanted to talk about was her disability, he stands up abruptly and jostles the table.
“Hey, I know that girl! Do you mind if I say hi real quick?” And he was gone.
After waiting twenty minutes, and nursing what was clearly the worst drink at Starbucks, she gathers her bag and, making sure to leave her drink behind, she heads to the door with purpose.
She feels a hand at her elbow again and sighs as her now failure of a date says, “Hey hey, I was just coming over. Where are you going?”
“I have to be at my dorm soon. So sorry to cut this short.” Her words drip with sarcasm that go over her date’s head. Robin, was it?
“Oh. Well, I can walk you. I wouldn’t want you getting lost. Maybe we can do this again?”
“I certainly know how to get to my dorm. And, no the first time was hardly enjoyable, why would I ever out myself through a second time?”
She turns on her heel and throws a short “Sorry,” over her shoulder.
She really did know how to get to her dorm.
It was the simplest things, even an idiot like her date could do it. Three blocks down from Starbucks, go in through the back door, give it a hard push while jimmying the knob, climb the stairs and walk to the third door on the left.
She’s folding her walking stick and wrapping a hand over the doorknob when she feels something collide with her stomach and make her stumble backwards. A muffled oomph and some vague curses are heard before Regina blinks back her surprise and finds her voice.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Shit. Shit, listen it’s really not what it looks like,” a female voice carries through the hallway, high pitched and nervous. “I’m just really don’t want to see my roommate naked again, okay?”
She hears feet shuffling and catches a whiff of something sharp, like coffee or food. Her mind catches up with what the girl is saying and instantly, her back stiffens and she raises an eyebrow.
“‘It’s not what it looks like?’ Is that a joke?” The girl stops shuffling and stays quiet for a beat, probably taking in her walking stick and her unfocused eyes, before she starts moving again.
“Shit, no. It isn’t. Look- I mean, I’m sorry.” The girl stops there, all awkward mumbling finally coming to a halt and Regina cringes at the look again. Still, the girl stops her apology there, where as most would simply keep excusing themselves and start leaving awkwardly.
She stays still for a second, considering how to handle this, and after she takes a steadying breath, her anger almost making her incapable of speaking, she opens her mouth.
“Were you trying to break into my room?”
“Okay, yes, but hey, no-,” Regina makes an indignant sound at the back of her throat and the girl’s voice grows anxious, “hear me out. I heard some clacking and I thought it was the RA and I freaked out because I’m supposed to ‘stop crowding the halls with your filthy pillows, Swan.’”
The girls’s voice rises in pitch and Regina has to admit that she captures the nasally, obnoxious voice of their hall’s RA perfectly. She takes a deep breath to interject, because there’s no point to this story, when the girl interrupts in one long frenzied explanation.
“I’ve been outside too many nights and if she caught me again I’d be fucked. I freaked out, tried the front door and- you’re apparently the only one with locks in this building? So I freaked out some fucking more and tried picking the lock, which worked,” Regina huffs in annoyance again, “sorry! And then I sort of made out with your stomach when you bumped into me.”
The girl is a little breathless as she finishes what is probably one of the weirdest retelling of events.
“That doesn’t explain why you’re out here. If you knew there’d be consequences, why would you do it?”
“Okay, you asked.” The girl takes a deep breath, “My roommate is having some seriously rough sex right now and I’ve already seen too much. I was asked to join and while I was tempted, it just seemed like too much work starting from the middle.”
Regina can feel her face coloring and she tries turning her head towards the door to mask it but judging by the girl’s tone at the end of her rant, she’s annoyingly aware she got a rise out of Regina.
“Well. Yes, that seems like a reasonable excuse. I would be out here as well if I were in your situation. Or better yet, I’d kick your roommate out.”
“Nah,” Regina hears the stranger plop herself down on the floor and directs her face towards her, “she’s not that bad when she’s not showing me her bare ass. Anyways, thanks for not calling security or something.”
“Yes, well.” Regina opens her dorm room and stops before going in, her mouth suddenly betraying her. “Would you like to wait for your roommate to be done somewhere less… pitiful?”
She doesn’t know what exactly prompted her to invite this perfect stranger inside her room, but she felt supposes it has to do with pity and nothing else.
“Are you serious? Let me get my pillows.” The girl exclaims with excitement and Regina hears more shuffling before she feels some hair tickle her bare arms, closer to her elbow as the girl passes through the door; she makes note that this girl’s hair is by far longer than her own.
“I’m Emma, by the way. Emma Swan, front door roomie at your disposal.”
“Charming. Regina Mills, apparent savior.” Regina sets her bag down on the little chair beside the door, and points towards what she hopes Emma’s feet are.
“Shoes, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, yeah, sure.” Emma seems to struggle out of her shoes for a second before a loud thump is heard at the corner of her little room.
“This is a really nice place. Cleaner than mine. I don’t have that either. Man, can I come in here in the mornings for toast?”
Regina assumes she’s pointing to the toaster perched on her kitchen table and she tampers down a smile.
“Well, I assume all the sex you’re having can lead to an unsanitary room,” she says, ignoring Emma’s question.
“Not everybody can remember to change the sheets after sex. I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast, honestly.” She hears Emma moving around, inspecting her tiny dorm room before she speaks up again. “No, that’s a lie, I had a poptart.”
Emma seems to keep relying fascinating information as quickly as it wasn’t asked for.
“Poptarts can’t be considered a healthy breakfast. There’s a lot more you can eat that is just as fa-” Regina’s winding up to a speech she’s shared multiple times when Emma interrupts yet again.
“Hey, you don’t have a roommate? Does it get a little lonely, or is that just what you wanted?”
Regina’s annoyance at being rudely interrupted is quickly replaced by her surprise of Emma’s interest. Mal never questioned her housing arrangements, thinking it was Regina’s choice to live alone.
She doesn’t mind it, but she thinks it’d be nice to have a regular experience for once.
“I- well, no. I enjoy it, yes- well, sometimes.” She stutters out, her cheeks tinting slightly again. She sends Emma what she hopes is a fierce glare, not enjoying the way the girl easily makes her react to the simplest of things.
“I’m just asking. It doesn’t look like there was somebody else living here.” There’s pause and Regina doesn’t know she’s heading with this. “I’m pretty bored most of the time I’m at the dorm anyways. Maybe I’ll come here” Emma’s words, although meant to be kind with her apprehensive mumbling, reached Regina’s ears as condescending.
“You really don’t need to take pity on me. If I invited you here, it was simply as a one time offer, nothing more.”
“Oh. Well, honestly, I was just offering for the bo-” a rapper’s voice interrupted what Emma was saying and she quickly started searching for her phone. The ridiculous song blared on until she finally found it.
Regina stood tall as she regretted inviting this stranger inside her room.
“Where the fu- Hey, Rubes.” After some arguing and a quick goodbye, Regina heard Emma’s phone snap shut. She opened her mouth say anything, kick her out or demand an explanation, but the girl interrupted once more.
“Well, thanks for saving my ass just this once. Didn’t mean to insult. See ya around, Regina.”
And she was gone.