Some context:
This story is incorporating the canon of the graphic novel Shadow of the Queen. For those who have not read it this is basically the plot:
Regina sends Graham to do her dirty work, which he does reluctantly because she has his heart and he must do her bidding. Regina uses a pack of werewolves, Graham's and Red's old pack, to hunt for Snow. Red manages to get Graham's heart away from Regina and realising that he is not her enemy she gives his heart back: cue feelings.
They work together to find Snow and once they're all reunited Snow notices how close Red and Graham are, bonding over wolfish things, and calls it true love. However Graham hands himself back to Regina so that Snow and Red will be safe and the two are parted. However it ends with Snow and Red promising that they will defeat Regina and make sure that Red's Huntsman "knows who his heart truly belongs to."
/end context. Now my story is set after this but I kick things off in Storybrooke…
The apartment has a view of the sea and forest. She will wake to the sounds and smells of the woods and eat breakfast with a beautiful vantage point of the Atlantic. It's a bittersweet feeling knowing that Graham would have been greeted with the same sights. Though he has been dead for months the apartment still smells of him, something a human would not notice but as soon as she unlocks the door and walks in she is overwhelmed for a moment. He is fading from the diner and the station but here he lingers.
Red steps quietly into the apartment, noting with surprise the number of items that still occupy the place. She had been told that some of his possessions may still be in the apartment but had believed that Mr Gold had removed the bulk of Graham's things. Cardboard boxes rest on the floor and a few are open on a desk, as if someone had started to pack his things away but then lost heart. She wonders who it could have been.
Wherever she looks there is something that brings a painful recollection of him. On a mantelpiece are sports trophies, mostly for soccer and running, awards for his work in law enforcement and other trinkets that were probably there the moment he and everyone else appeared in Storybrooke. She moves slowly towards the desk, inspecting books and vinyl records in a bookcase before moving behind the chair before the desk. In the open boxes are framed pictures and loose photographs. She picks up a picture that depicts a slightly winching Graham standing in front of the Animal Shelter. He is shaking hands with Regina.
Red remembers that occasion, the fund raising event that raised money for belligerent animals. He had saved a dog from being put down, showing a passion that the usually laid back sheriff hardly let slip. She had danced with him, or tried to. Smiling softly she puts the picture down and reaches for the bundle of photos. Most are of Graham in the station or with Regina but there are a few that depict other scenes and people. When she comes to one that shows him standing in front of the B&B she stills and takes a seat. In all the pictures of Graham he had either been stony faced or grimacing a smile but in this one he is doing neither. She has her hand on his arm and she's staring up into his face with a large grin while he laughs down at her. She can barely remember what she said, something salacious no doubt, and Granny had captured the moment.
We spent almost three decades together but there are only these small moments that we shared. Every day was the same, until Emma came, and in all that time we barely had a moment together…
She traces her fingers over the picture, a swell of grief rising high and wishes that he was still here. Sighing she takes the picture and slots it into her bag before standing but as she does she notices something beside her foot and bends. A screwed up piece of paper is under the desk and she unravels it carefully, starting to feel circumspect.
"Hope you don't think I'm being nosy," she says to the air, casting a swift glance around before looking down at the crinkled page. Handwriting is scrawled over the page and at first glance is appears to be nonsense, the work of a mad man, but as she flattens the paper against the desk and focuses she realises the importance of what she is reading.
Woods. Wolf. A white wolf. Hunting. Huntsman! Another life? Is Storybrooke real?
This question is underlined and Red blinks. Emma had told her, hesitantly, that Graham had remembered his true self before he died. Is this his last testimony? Feeling a strange fragile sense of awe she carries on reading, noting that the abrupt start of his writing finishes into scrawling sentences.
My heart…how do you live without a heart? I know that it's missing and I should be able to feel so much more. I have these dreams, these visions…I must be mad but it feels real. I think they're not dreams, they're memories. My heart is missing and there is my friend, the wolf. I saw him tonight and I have to find him too. Wolves are important; they mean the truth and…family? Other things come to me, sounds and smells, strange places and names, things I can't stop thinking about. If I just get my heart back all this madness will make sense.
Rose. Who is Rose?
Red lifts her head in surprise, blinking down at the page.
"…I'm Rose."
a.n:
So I plan for this to be multi chapter story, about 9 or 10 chapters, but I probably won't be able to post regularly but I will try. The rest of the story will take place in FTL.