Someday Her Huntsman Will Return
Once Upon A Time
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Emma/Graham
Summary: There is one man that can make Emma believe. He is the same one that gave Emma hope. He is the man she sees in her dreams.
Author's Note: Okay, I have to admit that there are two reasons why I wrote this. The first is that I am still bitter about Graham's death. The second is that I am pissed off that people have seemed to forget the electric chemistry that Emma and Graham had. Every guy character that Emma shares scenes with is suddenly a new pairing for her. Um, am I the only one that still remembers that the only person she has ever shown any romantic interest in on this show was Graham?
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
It is not every night. But it is certainly more often than not. It started shortly after his death. He would return to her in her dreams and it was only then that they could be together.
It's just the way they should have always been.
Together.
It always starts the same even if the dreams are different.
He calls out her name.
Emma.
It seems from across life and death.
Emma.
From across this life and the next.
Emma.
From across this world and another she has only read about in fairytales.
Emma.
Her eyes open and she sees his face before her with a breathtaking smile and warmth shining in his gaze.
Graham.
She touches his face.
The stubble from his beard tickles her fingers and he leans into her touch.
Emma sits up from the floor of the forest. They are always in the forest in these dreams. She has never understood why.
It hardly matters to her where they are as long as she gets to see him.
Her face breaks out into the smile she only reserves for him and leaps forward into his arms as he kneels in front of her. The force of her enthusiasm knocks him over and she is straddling his waist, looking down at him, and her blonde hair creates a curtain around their faces as she leans down to touch her lips to his.
Graham's kiss is like the sweetest torture. It's everything a kiss should be and the only thing that breaks her heart is that it never lasts long enough.
His kisses did not last long enough in the real world and they do not last long enough in the world she created for them in her dreams.
Graham matches her enthusiasm with some of his own. He is grabbing at her waist and pulling her in suddenly just as greedy and impatient as she is. Emma is caught off guard by his sudden movement and before she knows what hit her, he has rolled on top of her and is kissing a trail of hot, wet kisses down her neck.
Nothing has ever felt as right to her in her whole life as he does.
She never means to break their moments.
But she always does. The torment of their illusion crashes into her like a freight train off its track and before she can stop them the tears pour out of her eyes.
It's the same ugly sobbing she could not hold in as she held his dead body in her arms.
Graham is never anything but comforting and gracious in these moments. He is always there to hold her as she mourns him and mourns what they could have been.
Emma.
He whispers softly in her ear.
She clings to him like she never wants to let go but knows she will eventually.
Emma knows she will wake up.
But tonight is different.
He usually holds her in his arms until she drifts away from him into consciousness. She usually drifts back into the real world.
"It's not where we belong, Emma." He says.
His accent his thick and heavy.
She pulls back to look into his face and his brown eyes are shining with unshed tears.
"What?" Emma asks so truly confused.
"I know you are not ready to handle it. I know you don't believe that you can save all of them."
Emma is pulling back even further. Never has her real life interfered with her dreams of him and to hear August's words coming out of Graham's mouth is shattering everything she was trying so hard to hold onto.
She shakes her head and brings her hands to his face.
Graham continues and he speaks only words of encouragement and his unshaking faith in her ability.
"I know you can save them. I know you can because you saved me."
Emma shook her head again. "I did not save you. You died. I held you in my arms as your heart stopped beating…"
The tears continued to spill down her face again but quietly this time as she saw that magnificent look grace his face. It was the same look he had on his face as he had been leaning into kiss her for a second time… right before he died.
"No, I was dying every day without you in my life because I never felt anything before I met you. I am the huntsman, Emma. The Evil Queen literally ripped out my heart. I couldn't feel anything until you broke the curse… and brought love into my life. I love you, Emma. I believe you can do it."
Emma was sobbing again as she listened to him. The odd and unbelievable truth he was speaking was bearing down on her.
So she did the only thing she could… she spoke the words that had been holding her back all of this time.
"What if I fail them? There is a whole town of people, fairytale people you are telling, that are counting on me to restore their happy endings! How can I do that? I don't know where to even start? I can't do it—"
She was becoming hysterical just like she had with August earlier that day.
Unlike August, Graham knew how to handle Emma and all of her myriad of emotions and simply put his hand to his mouth in a signal for her to calm and quiet down.
She did. His presence merely enough to get her through her doubts and fears.
Graham shook his head. "You are thinking way too grand, Emma."
"But—"
She tries to start again but he silences her this time with his lips by placing the most romantically chaste kiss she has ever known in her life upon her lips.
Emma sighed. Only Graham.
But then he let her go and stood up. "You don't have to save a whole town of people, Emma. You are not responsible for people you don't know, that you have never met. Just believe in yourself like I believe in you and that will guide you through. Not to saving a whole town but to saving your family."
And as he walked back toward a fallen tree he was suddenly joined by two other people that she had met in Story Brooke.
Mary Margaret and David.
But as Emma looks up from her seated position on the forest floor, she does not see a school teacher and a man that works at the animal shelter.
She smiles in spite of herself because there before her eyes…
Emma sees a princess and a prince. Not just any princess or any prince…
"Snow White? Prince Charming?" She questions and the words fall off her tongue like a brick because she can hardly believe it.
They smile at her and laugh.
"Emma, please." Snow says but Charming finishes for her. "It's Mom and Dad."
She's speechless and stunned. Too stunned to move.
They look toward Graham.
She follows suit.
And there he is...
He is no longer dressed in his trademark leather jacket and there is no sheriff's badge to be found.
Graham… is cloaked in fur with that wolf he had been chasing through town on his last day sitting patiently beside him.
Graham is the Huntsman.
The Huntsman of her dreams and the man that she loved.
He is looking at her with a smile. "I told you that you saved me. I am waiting for you Emma. All you have to do is believe in yourself, remember the people you love, and come back to me whenever you are ready."
Emma wanted to say something. Anything. But she felt herself drifting away from them. Back into consciousness. Back into the real world…
No, not the real world.
Regina's world.
The Evil Queen.
She wanted to laugh because she should not have been so hesitant to ever believe that Regina was actually an Evil Queen.
Emma stared into Graham's eyes as she drifted away from him. She always stared him as she left and nothing could ever change that.
There was only one thing that could change… they would not always be apart and her dreams would not always be the only place where she could see him. Emma just had to get back to him, somehow.
Emma sat up in her bed. The apartment of Mary Margaret looking so familiar but suddenly feeling so foreign was all around her.
The darkness and the silence were the only things that were witness to the smile of wonderment that flitted across her face as she whispered out two words.
"I believe."
End.
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