AN: Okay, here is the first installment of the prequel to "If They Can't Have Each Other They Will Never Be Happy." Aside from this first chapter, it will strictly deal with the seventeen dates that happened before Henry took their lives over. Also, since the kid is so prominent in the original and this one is strictly dates (for the most part), Henry will make sparse appearances, but will mainly only be mentioned, so for the sake of everyone's mind, let's just assume he's with Grams and Gramps or at home doing homework. And I know I mention Nealfire once in this first chapter; I don't really know where he went beyond that, but I like to think that he only comes for vacations (which is why he wasn't in the original… sort of)… And just one more thing for this story. It's actually pretty fluffy, so the two of them are not going to be as true to their characters as I tried to make them for the original story. Regina is as fluffy as can be, and Emma is her fluffed up savior…

*For the sequel I am writing, I am actually dealing with the big family, but I will warn you that it will turn into an Ellie-centric piece… and this eleven years after the epilogue. I will be happy to write another installment that will go before that time and will deal with the kids when they are kids… Just let me know via review or PM or my ask over on Tumblr!

Thanks, and hope you enjoy!

Ruby had been watching Emma the last few weeks. She'd been acting strange. Like she had a secret and she was just barely keeping it in. She wanted to know what that secret was. So, she walked over to the station with an extra large cup of hot cocoa and set it down in front of the already suspicious blonde.

"What's this?" Emma took the cup despite knowing it was some sort of bribe or ruse, and took a large gulp from it.

Ruby smirked as she took off her gloves and coat before, "Everything alright sheriff?"

"Fine, thanks…" The blonde eyed the brunette, "Why do you ask?"

"Just checking in… I'd hate for the good sheriff of Storybrooke and the savior of us fairytale beings to be anything but happy…"

"Well." Emma looked down at the paper travel mug, "I'm not unhappy…"

"I believe that. But, what would make you happy?"

Emma bit her lip, still staring at the hole in the lid, "I don't know…"

"Are you sure you don't know, or you just don't want to tell me?" Ruby had a smirk when she saw the reaction of her best friend. "I'm going to tell you what I think you need—"

Emma laughed as she interrupted, "I'm sure you will."

"I think you need sex. Not just regular sex. I think you need love. I think you need to make love to a hot and sexy and fiery newly reinstated mayor because she is the only person in this town—including your ex and baby daddy—that has ever ruffled your feathers so to speak… and lesbi-honest… She ruffles them way more than he ever did."

"Okay." Emma put her hand out and closed her eyes like there was so many things wrong with what Ruby just said, but she could only focus on one, "Ruffles my feathers?"

"Well Emma you are a swan, are you not?"

The blonde rolled her eyes at the now punny statement, "I guess so…"

"Well, did you know that swans mate for life?"

"I did not…"

"And I think that you were not really in love with Nealfire."

"I wasn't…"

"But I do think… the way I see you staring at her and the way you've always stared at her that you are falling or possibly have fallen completely in love."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Maybe now you'll go get what you need to be happy…" Ruby smiled and stood. She walked to the door of the main office then called over her shoulder, "Think about it. That's all I ask."

Emma knit her brows as the brunette left. She always told herself that she would hide her feelings for Regina as long as possible, but the moment someone called her on it, she would do something about it. She stood, moved to the window and gulped down her cocoa as she watched the waitress cross the street back to the diner. After Ruby was back inside, she waited precisely five more minutes before walking out of the station and getting into the cruiser to 'make her rounds'.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Emma saw Regina's car at Town Hall and swerved into the lot. She stalked into the office to find the woman listening to music. "Regina!"

Regina turned with barely wet eyes and held her hand up to stop Emma from talking, "Please. Not now."

The words of the song began flooding the silent room, "When you came to me with your bad dreams and your fears it was easy to see you'd been crying. It seems like everywhere you turn, catastrophe it reigns, but who really profits from the dying."

They held their stare through the rest of the song, and when the next song, Adele's "Someone Like You," came on, Emma dared moving into the room more after Regina took a seat in her office chair and turned around. When the third song, "I Won't Give Up" by Jason Mraz came on, Emma didn't have the heart to interrupt. She only came in a little more and observed the brunette at this awesome vulnerable state she was in, and she was completely awed.

Emma sat down and listened to songs 4 through 10 unbeknownst to the mayor: "You're My Favorite" Jason Jones, "Wanted" Hunter Hayes, "So Close" Jon McLaughlin, "Longing For" Ballas Hough Band, "Man Who Can't Be Moved" The Script, "Just Let Go" Mae, and "Collide" Howie Day.

Once the playlist ended, Regina turned around surprised that the blonde was still there, "Sheriff Swan, what are you still doing here?"

Emma cautiously stood from her seat, walked around the desk and knelt before the woman. She didn't touch her yet, "Those songs seem to talk of one thing…"

"Yes. Why are you here?"

"Do you want that one thing?"

Regina turned from the blonde.

"Regina, please. Do you want that one thing?"

"Why are you asking?"

"Because I want to know." Regina didn't respond for a moment, "I want it. Love. Sometimes I get so caught up in my own thoughts that I think I can have it."

"Yes, well, I'm sure Neal is as upstanding as his father."

"Now, now. He gave us Henry."

"Yes, and he didn't tell you who he was and he took advantage of you when you were seventeen and he was technically over 200 years old."

Emma smirked and nodded as she looked at the brunette, "Alright. I'll give you that one… But, I wasn't talking about Neal."

"I thought you loved him."

"I think, maybe I did. Love him. But there's a difference between loving someone and being in love with someone."

"And who are you in love with? Someone just as gooey and family oriented and charming as you, I'm sure."

"Actually, she's pedantic and preachy and a bit of a narcissist…" Emma smiled when she saw Regina's surprised look. "Are we really playing this game? You're really asking me who I'm in love with? Regina, come on… You're a lot of things, but stupid ain't one."

"Why me?"

"Because you ruffle my feathers."

Regina looked at her confused.

"You're everything that I want in a partner, Regina. You challenge me. And you don't show it, but I can see how deeply you feel everything... And I don't see how you do it. How you live life feeling the weight of everything. You are so beautifully strong… You take my breath away."

Emma took the brunette's hand and stroked her fingers, "I want to take you on a date, Madam Mayor."

Regina raised a brow, "Are you asking or telling?"

"Does it matter? Once I really set my eyes for something, I get what I want." Emma's voice was nothing if not arrogant.

"Well, if you expect me to show up or actually go with you on a date with you, then you're going to have to ask me."

"Okay." The blonde nodded and adjusted her knees so she was kneeling a little more comfortably, "Will you go out on a date with me?"

"No." Regina stood with a hint of a smirk and a wide smile behind her eyes.

Emma could tell it just became a game. She didn't lose her smile as she followed the newly reinstated mayor from her office to the hallway, down the stairs and to the parking lot.

Emma waited for Regina to click the unlock button on her key ring before running a few steps ahead and opening her door for her.

Regina raised a brow as she moved around the blonde to get in her car. She opened her mouth as if about to ask something, but Emma leaned in and kissed her cheek.

"I will get that date, Madam Mayor." Emma's grin was triumphant and wide, "You know I will." She didn't look back to see the happily shocked face of one Regina Mills Mayor of Storybrooke, she simply sauntered to the cruiser, got in and sped off.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Emma's many shenanigans became a game between the two women. Chocolates here, notes there, an apple-shaped cookie/candy jar and even an apple-shaped decanter were all gifts the blonde woman used in hopes that the brunette woman would say yes. Finally, she decided to quit with all the shenanigans seeing as they weren't working, She needed to do something that would be noticed. Something so grand and so corny that Regina would have to track her down and have it out with her. And she knew just what to do.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Emma was crossing the street to go to the diner for lunch when she saw the front of the Mercedes. She sprinted into the diner just getting in before the car could turn onto the street. She watched it pass by the diner and turn into the station parking lot.

Emma grinned then walked like she was creeping down a hallway, thinking any subtle movement of hers would get her caught. With her entrance, her tongue narrowed against the middle of her upper lip and the glint in her eyes, Ruby definitely knew something was going on. She sniffed the air and looked to the station lot where Emma's eyes had been trained as she got the girl some water and set it before her.

"What did you do?"

Emma only grinned wide.

"Obviously whatever it was, her parents were not allowed to know about it." Snow said as she and Charming picked up their plates from their two-person table to sit at the diner, "Where's Henry?"

"He's at a friend's tonight. He wanted to go over right after school." Emma provided easily whilst looking back to see if Regina was making her way over yet.

She was.

She grinned and turned back around.

"Seriously." Ruby gave her a grin, "What did you do?"

Emma kept the grin on her face and pointed behind her to the door as it opened and the bell chimed.

"Sheriff Swan. A word outside please?" Regina's voice was calm and collected as she stood halfway between inside and out.

"Sure, Madam Mayor." Emma's voice was cheery as she started to follow the brunette outside, but Snow's hand stopped her.

"Emma, is there something we need to be worrying about?"

"What? No! I'm just playing nice like you told me." Emma tried to leave once more, but her mother's grip stopped her.

"I never told you to play nice." Before Emma could go off on a sarcastic tangent, she continued, "I don't dispute that it's what you should do, but I never told you to play nice…" She gave her daughter a look telling her she was watching the blonde like a hawk and she would find out what was going on then released her.

Emma finally made it outside where the brunette was waiting, "Yes, Regina?"

Regina took a fake rose out of her coat. It was as crimson as one of her apples, and made of silk. "I found this."

"For me?" Emma feigned excitement, "That's so sweet, but I don't think our relationship is there yet." She held herself together with a smirk.

"And many, many more real red roses scattered throughout my home in many vases. Care to explain yourself?" Regina's tone wasn't harsh so to speak, it was stern and almost scolding. Almost.

"Did you find the vase with the note?" Emma's lips pursed in question.

Regina pulled out the small envelope to show the blonde instead of tell her.

Emma shrugged, "Then I don't need to explain myself."

"'I'll love you until the last one dies'?"

Emma looked down and smirked, "Regina that is so sweet, but so cliché… especially since the only flower you're giving me is fake." She pretended to reach for the rose, but Regina pulled it back quickly and huffed in frustration.

"Sheriff Swan!"

"Regina!"

"When are you going to give this up?" The brunette's voice was desperate.

"When that flower dies by natural and non-magical means—That means you can't set it on fire." Emma grinned and bobbed her head back and forth.

"Why are you doing this?" Regina's voice became suddenly serious.

"Because I like you! Is that so hard to comprehend?" Emma's voice now held the desperate tone.

Regina looked down at the envelope and rose in her hand. She knit her brows and looked back up, "The note says love."

"Same diff!"

"No, it's not, it's completely different. Liking someone and loving them are not the same. Just like loving them and being in love with them is not the same."

"REGINA!"

"What? It's true, and I got that last one from you." Regina kept herself composed, knowing she was riling the woman up, with an inquisitive look.

"Will you just go out on a date with me, damn it!?" The blonde pushed her fists down her sides in frustration.

"Why?" She knew that she was frustrating the blonde, but she just didn't understand why, after everything that has happened between them the blonde wanted her. She needed to know it wasn't a ploy of some kind.

Emma sighed and rolled her eyes. She stamped her foot like a child, "Just do it!"

"Not until you give me a reason." The brunette bit her lip.

Emma huffed and puffed and finally, "Because you're infuriating!"

The blonde then walked away. Not inside, just the opposite direction of the infuriating, brunette woman she loved. It took a total of five steps before Regina realized Emma wasn't going to turn back around.

The mayor followed the sheriff, "Sheriff Swan!" she called after her. Emma just kept walking. "Sheriff!" She tried again to no avail. "I will keep following you. If you can chase me down and ask me out every damn day then I can and have the right, might I add, to ask you why."

Emma stopped suddenly and turned around, "If you can catch me!" she started running. It was like a horror movie, Regina was gaining on the blonde running away when she was only walking after, granted she was power walking, but still. She walked after the blonde all the way to the woods.

She might be in love with the other woman and she might want that other woman to know it even if she was asking why instead of saying yes, but she was not going to keep chasing after her like some sort of fool. So, Regina after getting to the trail herself, out of sight from the public eye, decided to poof. She poofed only a few feet in front of the blonde causing said blonde to run smack into her and them both to topple to the ground, Emma landing on top of Regina.

They stared at each other for a moment before Emma finally broke the silence, "Go out with me."

"But I'm infuriating."

"Damn it, Regina! Go out with me!"

"Why?" The brunette breathed the word out as she stared up into Emma's green eyes.

Emma saw Regina's insecurity, "Oh… You think I'm playing you…" She took the brunette's hand and put it over her heart, "Take it."

"No." Regina tried to wriggle from under the blonde.

"Put your hand in my chest and feel it." The look in Emma's eyes made the brunette do what was asked of her. Emma took a steady breath knowing no harm could come of her heart, "You should go out with me because you feel it as much as I do. You want me as much as I want you. You trust me as much as I trust you. And because when you're not around, that's when my heart is truly in danger… Not here. Not with your hand in my chest. Here. Now. I'm safer than I've ever been."

Regina pulled her hand from Emma's chest and placed it against the blonde's cheek, "But you're going to be the death of me. You're the savior."

Emma gave the woman a happily wicked grin, "That doesn't have to be a bad thing, R'gina." She hiccupped. After a small staring contest, she leaned down and kissed her cheek before whispering, "Please go out on a date with me." She pulled back and held onto Regina's hair tight and whispered again, "Please."

"Okay." Regina whispered back.

"Yeah?" Emma, still whispering, was grinning ear to ear.

"Yes." Regina barely got the word out and nodded once more.