Who: Regina Mills & Caroline Forbes What: Catching up over wine When: Last week Where: Casa de Mills Rating/Warnings: Low Status: Complete!
Caroline honestly couldn’t remember the last time she had seen Regina. It was before everyone turned into complete assholes at least that much she knew. Life or OC craziness just kept getting in the way. Even though there were many differences between herself and Regina, Caroline had become attached to the witch.
When Regina came to the door, Caroline had her usual bright smile on her face. “No treats this time,” she had come straight from campus after all. Not work. And last time Regina had complained about the pastries causing her to get fat. Though if you asked Caroline the woman was gorgeous and didn’t have anything to worry about.
Ever since Henry’s arrival, home seemed more like home. Things had always been pristine, placed precisely where she wanted it to be, every corner and crevice free from dust and there wasn’t anything scattered - everything had a home and it stayed there. Nowadays she had the presence of a boy edging towards adolescence run through; comic books lying around, a stray sock here and there (no matter how many times she’s told him to clean up after himself). The kitchen, lately, was stuffed with more cooked meals and the frequent appearance of popsicles and things like poptarts, root beer, juices.
Some of those things were for Neal and Emma too, when they stopped by and actually had a semblance of a family meal together. It was an odd dynamic between them, but it seemed to work, and Regina felt a serene sense of contentment from it. Even if her dreamhalf was constantly shat on by rotten luck, she’d find comfort in knowing that her son was here, and they were becoming an integral part of each other’s lives.
“The treat’s wine,” she explained with a chuckle, leading the blonde immortal through the house and into the kitchen. It smelled seasonal; cinnamon and nutmeg, maybe a hint of peppermint bark. Stools aligned the kitchen bar and from her extensive collection of vino, she selected an unopened bottle of merlot. “Though I’ve got other things if you’d like. Not of the blood variety, of course, but if you like tequila, there’s a bottle of Jose Cuervo that needs attending to.”
Caroline had actually met Emma and Henry, at Baxter’s. But she would fill Regina in on that later. There was a lot to catch up on and she wanted to hear about this exploding crypt business first. “I already ate,” Caroline informed her referring to the blood comment. She was good at keeping herself well fed and under control. She wasn’t going to get too hungry around the people she cared about. Or humans in general. The last thing Caroline Forbes ever wanted to do was hurt anyone. She was a good vampire.
Being your typical college aged girl Caroline drank her fair share of tequila. She often left that for when she was out though, at a club or something. Or if the conversation required some hard liquor. She also drank wine or beer when the situation called for it and depending who it was with. Regina was more of a wine drinker. “Wine’s fine,” she smiled to herself at the rhyme. “Unless you think this conversation calls for something stronger?” she questioned with a raised brow as she took a seat on one of the kitchen bar stools. “How much catching up am I in for?” she was only half teasing with that comment. Knowing this place anything was possible.
“I’ve already had my fair share of tequila after it all went down,” she snorted, rummaging through the drawer for her trusty wine opener. Red foil cut around the neck, the cork stabbed, a couple of pressured turns, and then - pop! Two glasses were pulled from the cabinets by the stem, and then she gave them each a generous pour. The color was a deep, rich burgundy, and this particular brand had a heavy taste of blackberries.
Regina got comfortable on one of her designer stools and pulled all that thick, raven hair behind her neck. “Basically, there was some sort of ‘epic confrontation’ in my crypt with a certain entity of my world parading around with my face,” she explained, sourly. “There needs to be a billboard that says ‘Do Not Practice Offensive Magic in Close Spaces,’ but it needed to be done. Many things were salvaged, so it wasn’t a total loss.”
“Someone was walking around pretending to be you? Gross,” she wrinkled her nose. That had happened in Caroline’s dreams a few times. The Original vampires were able to take over other bodies and travelers as well. Luckily no one had ever taken over her body but she had encountered someone else in her boyfriend’s body and her best friend’s. “And rude,” she added taking a sip of the freshly poured wine.
“What happened to my blood?” Of course that was Caroline’s main concern. She was pretty sure Regina had been keeping it in her crypt and she wanted to know if it was one of the salvaged items or not. “And you know the entity?” because that seemed important too.
Yes, gross was a word to describe it. Regina hadn’t seen Rumplegina for herself, but all she could imagine were his little hand flourishes and impish chuckles while he wore her face and whatever he thought would be appropriate fashion. “Your blood’s safe,” she promised, and it was the truth. They’d been in an enchanted box that would keep it from being crushed. “I try and keep most of my fragile things under enchantments to keep them from breaking - seems silly otherwise. As for the entity, he’s gone. Blown up with my crypt.”
The entity seemed like a proper term for him, anyway. Neal’s father was a sensitive subject and she’d rather not air that particular family complication to the entire world. Best to gloss it over with something vague but still informative to the situation. Regina raised her wine glass and gave the fermented liquid in it a swirl to air the aroma. “Gives me a chance to redecorate anyway, I suppose. It very much screamed evil fairytale queen, didn’t it?”
Well at least her blood was safe. That was the important thing. “Sorry about your crypt, but at least the entity is gone and can’t go around pretending to be you anymore. Because seriously that’s just rude.” And still gross. “Just a little. All the hearts didn’t help matters much,” she wondered what was going to happen to all of those. “How are you thinking of redecorating?” Look at that, Regina looking on the bright side. She didn’t even need Caroline to point it out for her. Maybe her optimism was starting to rub off.
“So I met your son. Henry.” Obviously. His name didn’t really need to be stated since Regina didn’t have any other sons. At least not that Caroline knew of. “And Emma.”
Regina would figure the decor part out - after all, it was her trade, to make all things interior look tasteful. Maybe with a bit less ‘darkness and gloom’ and something with a bit more light, who knew. It was a sanctuary that originally belonged to the Evil Queen and sometimes is still oozed mad vengeance and a broken heart. It’d be good to revamp it into something less sinister, and more…her.
Then she brought up Henry and Emma in mid-wine sip, but she had the grace to swallow and not sputter. “Did you,” she coughed politely into her fist, then glanced at her puzzled. “When was this?”
Even though Regina covered her reaction fairly well Caroline still caught on to it, especially with the cough. She had sort of expected some sort of reaction to that statement. “Last week. Not long after my humanity came back.” Had she told Regina she lost her humanity for a week? She couldn’t remember. There was so much apologizing and explaining she had to do. At least she hadn’t attacked the evil queen when her humanity was off. That wouldn’t have ended well for her.
“They came into Baxter’s. I recognized the names and asked if they knew you,” Caroline could be a little nosey sometimes. “He’s a cute kid. Very curious. He had a lot of questions about vampires.”
“Wait,” she abruptly announced, hand up to stop the conversation from continuing onto the Emma-Henry territory - which they’d touch on, eventually - but Caroline’s previous comment had raised red flags, and Regina thought it rather appropriate to discuss the topic of her humanity (or former lack thereof, apparently). “Can we please rewind this entire discussion to the part where your humanity apparently had to return, because you’ve hinted that it was...gone?”
Vampires weren’t her specialty. None of that existed in the Enchanted Forest, but she’d learn a couple things from being on decent terms with Barbie over here. They’d kept each other up to date on dream nonsense, and the topic of some ‘humanity switch’ had been touched on here and there in passing - was that what she was talking about?
Okay so maybe she hadn’t told Regina about her week without humanity. She was sure she had mentioned it. It wasn’t the type of thing she would keep from Regina. She trusted her with these type of things. Hell she probably trusted Regina the most outside of the people from her dreamworld.
“Yeah that happened,” Caroline sighed taking a sip of wine. “I turned it off in the dreams and sort of woke up with it off here. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. I didn’t kill anyone. Just did a lot of making an idiot out of myself,” and fed on some random guys but she compelled them to forget it so at least they wouldn’t remember. Her guilt was still there though.
No, Caroline hadn’t told her at all. Mostly about her changing majors and some college nonsense, but she very much neglected to inform her about her most recent dream mishap. It wasn’t anything to take personally - obviously she’d been going through some things - but the announcement was still, nonetheless, alarming.
“Any of those idiocies you care to vent about, or…?” Regina raised the rim of the glass to her mahogany colored lips, and her consumption of the drink could be considered more of a gulp than an actual sip. “Though having the body count be zero is impressive. You lucked out there, Miss Forbes.”
It wasn’t like Caroline had purposely kept it from Regina. There was just so much going on, for the both of them. And luckily Regina hadn’t been directly affected by the whole thing so an explanation to her could wait. “I don’t think you want to hear me vent about all the guys she made out with.” From her best friend to an ex hook up to random guys. Caroline was all about it and then she got bored and left making a fool of herself with all of them. She didn’t care so much about the randoms but the people she knew? She it was a tad embarrassing.
“It was weird. Like even though I didn’t really have a conscience I still knew killing people would get me in trouble and I didn’t want that so I was careful not to severely hurt anyone,” another clue for Regina. “But anyway that’s all over with now. I’m back to the Caroline you know and love,” she teased.
“You have an episode where you’re steer clear of humanity, and the worst you do is make out with strange men,” Regina stated, a laugh huffed. Well, wasn’t that adorable? “Barely a bad bone in your body despite the bitch switch being flipped. Congratulations. You really do ooze rainbows and unicorns, Caroline.”
A second serving of wine was poured into her glass. Though she - and everyone - should really be thankful there wasn’t any bloodshed while she wasn’t ‘herself.’ Something like that would result into something particularly messy, and the last thing Regina would have wanted to do was tear her heart out and keep her as a slave until it all passed.
“That pretty much sums it up, yup,” Caroline replied her cheeks reddening a bit because even if it could have been so much worse she was still embarrassed by the whole thing. She finished off her wine and sighed. “I sort of fed on people too,” she admitted. Regina was the one person that she didn’t think would judge her for it though. At least not too much. Lexi had seen her do it, but other than that no one knew about the feeding thing. “Not enough to hurt them though“ she added quickly feeling the need to defend herself as she refilled her own glass.
“Pardon me for bursting your bubble, but feeding on a human means you have to hurt them, doesn’t it? I can’t imagine a vampire bite feeling like a pleasant tickle.” Not that she indulged in the harming of innocents here, but Regina carried the emotional baggage of the Enchanted Forest’s Evil Queen - every murder, every scheme, every curse. So, yes, there were definitely worse things than making out with skeevy strangers or taking a ‘harmless bite’ out of someone for sustenance. “Not like it matters, but again, the important thing is that no one died and you’re fine. Some things you couldn’t help, even if you had done worse.”
Regina had a point. But there was a difference between a little nibble and drinking enough blood to leave them injured. At least that’s what Caroline was telling herself to feel better about the whole situation. “I don’t know how it feels. I’ve never been bitten,” she just did the biting. “I just didn’t take enough blood to do any damage?” she was beginning to doubt herself and the guilt was increasing a bit. Just because her humanity was off didn’t make it excusable. “I’m so over these dreams fucking with us.” She sighed, taking another sip of wine. She needed it, not that it would really do anything but whatever.
Did nibbles truly exist for the vampiric kind? “I’ve never been bitten either, but to have teeth pierce flesh is still a painful experience for a human, I’d imagine,” she went on, brow quirked. Anything that drew blood tend to hurt, really. “I know you didn’t mean to hurt anyone, your humanity was off, you weren’t in your right mind, but if you’re going to deal with this properly then you need to accept the fact that you weren’t the controlled, good version of yourself, and you very much likely did hurt people.”
It wouldn’t be the easiest thing for Caroline to face. Vampire Barbie oozed sunshine and good intentions and was the ‘golden child’ of the nocturnal monster race - but reality needed to be faced. If she fed off people then she did some kind of damage, no way around it. Regina sighed. “I’m not lecturing. I’m telling it as I see it. No one’s perfect.”
Caroline knew that Regina was right. She just didn’t like thinking about that whole week. Part of her wished she could forget it like she had done to Anna and Stefan. But it didn’t work like that for her. It was probably better that she remembered anyway. It would keep her from choosing to flip the switch. Hopefully it wouldn’t get flipped due to the dreams again.
“I know,” Caroline finally said eyes locked on on her wine glass, not a hint of cheerfulness in her voice. But just like that the moment passed and she was back to her usual optimistic self. Caroline always brushed things off with a smile. Looked on the bright side. Put on a happy front for the world around her. It was how she handled things. “Anyway. Your son is cute.” Yeah, time for a subject change.
The switch of moods was abrupt but, alright, she wouldn’t poke the beast further. Everything was still fresh, and likely Caroline had a couple things she still needed to sort out for herself. Regina was always just the sort to dust off the sparkly bullshit and get down to the bone of things - problems needed to be dealt with head on, not caked with with sugar. It was a lot, for someone like her to go through. Even if she preferred to smile on about it.
So, yes. Subject changed. “Thank you, though I did nothing to contribute to that pool of genes,” she chuckled, fingertip lining the rim of her glass thoughtfully. Regina hadn’t even raised him here, yet Emma and Neal had been more than open to let her help them with him. They were in, all sense of the word, a family. An odd one, but family nonetheless. “He’s adjusted to this area fairly well. Not that I would think otherwise. But he’s going to be sticking around, permanently.”
“So things went well with the custody? I don’t need to compel any judges?” It was cheating in a way. She knew that, but almost a year of being a vampire had taught her to accept her talents. Besides she couldn’t think of anyone more deserving of a child than Regina. Emma seemed pretty great too. Caroline knew Regina a lot better than the blonde though. The evil queen was guarded, could even seem cold sometimes, but Caroline knew there was more to her than just that. She had seen a more caring side to Regina whenever Caroline had been going through a hard time, Regina was there.
“Does he dream?” she had wanted to ask when she first met him, but refrained. He seemed to know a lot about magic and sure had a lot of questions about her kind, but it was difficult to live in the OC and not know these things. Particularly when your family members had powers of some kind. Her own mother didn’t dream, but Liz knew what Caroline was.
“No compelling necessary, but the offer’s appreciated,” smirked the queen, a glint in her eyes - that would have been a fantastic idea, but lucky them, the system had worked in their favor. Neal and Emma were able to prove their biological relation to the boy, the adopted aunt seemed to be willing to let them take him. It wasn’t a difficult battle. For once. “But, god, no. I mean, he might, but…”
Fucking christ, that’d be their luck - but that was the risk of raising him here. Regina looked more than bothered by the thought and breathed in deep. “Look, he’s aware of what’s going on here. He showed up during the apocalypse, and it’s a little hard to sugarcoat that with a boy who gets all his logic from comic books - and even harder when his logic’s even on the money. He knows what I am to him there, but doesn’t...know all the details.”
Like what she’d done in the dreams early on, every sin and crime committed as the Evil Queen. She wasn’t proud of those moments, wasn’t proud how Henry got caught under the crossfire and was cursed because of her. His kidnapping to Neverland, Pan ripping his heart out. Pandora’s Box. Neal’s death. He was as resilient as she was, but she hoped if the dreams did come, it wouldn’t be this soon. Not while he was this young. “He might, one day, and we’ll...handle that when we get there.”
“He seemed aware,” Caroline agreed. “But don’t worry I didn’t spill anything about the dreams,” that wasn’t her place. She had also been careful not to refer to Regina as the Evil Queen. She knew better than that. “I’m really glad things worked out for you guys though. You deserve it.” Again she was mostly referring to Regina since she barely knew Emma and she didn’t know Neal at all so she couldn’t speak much for them.
Odd to have someone think so, but events here played out to her favor much more than they did in Storybrooke - where she struggled to find her happy ending, and shit rolled down hill on a constant basis. “Thank you,” she smiled - a small, genuine one, something soft in contrast to the usually sharp features. “Henry’s my happy ending. Whatever hole I had in life was filled, the moment he decided to venture across the states and come to my front step during the apocalypse.”
The daring boy they all knew and loved. She couldn’t imagine him crashing into their lives any other way.