Alright so I'm a huge Once fan and I decided to try my hand at writing a story for it. It's an non-magic AU where all our friends start out at the end of sixth grade. So they're like twelve. I started out with characters from the beginning of the series and then advanced to characters who appear later on. So I will try to fit in everyone at times. There are no specific pairings in this story but there are lots of chances for some to happen. Anyway, I hope you enjoy?

Chapter 1

Being in an orphanage was not great. It wasn't fun. It just sucked. That's what Emma thought anyway. Some people liked it there but most wanted out. She knew that not many foster families would take in older kids. She just couldn't wait to be out of school. But she was only eleven, heading into sixth grade in a completely new school. She sighed as she lifted her backpack over her shoulder and headed towards the bus stop with a few other girls and boys from the orphanage. When the bus came to pick them up, she saw it was already full. She climbed on and looked around for a seat. There weren't many open seats and she ended up sitting next to a boy with chestnut hair that hung down in his eyes messily. He didn't talk or even look up at her. He sat there quietly, reading some kind of book. Someone tapped on her shoulder and she turned around to see a slightly nerdy looking boy smiling.

"Hey there! Name's Jiminy," the boy said with a grin, "And I wouldn't sit there with him. That seat is reserved for someone else."

"It's a bus," Emma said, "The seats aren't reserved for anyone. And he didn't say I couldn't sit here."

"Just trust me. You don't want to sit there," Jiminy said sadly, "You can sit with me. Or November."

"It's August!" a boy protested from behind him. Emma watched as the boy climbed up on his seat. He had dark brown hair and blue-grey eyes. Jiminy smiled and then motioned for her to get out her seat.

"Hurry! Before she gets on!"

Emma decided that it was probably best to do what the boy said so she moved over and sat down next to Jiminy who smiled and then nodded towards the front.

"See, that's her," a voice whispered in her ear and she turned to see the other boy who had said his name was August, leaning over, "That's whose seat you sat in."

Emma watched as a girl got on with dark black hair and walked quickly to the seat in front of them. She sat down in the seat that Emma had most recently vacated. She put her hand on the boy's shoulder and the boy glanced up in surprise. He must have been really absorbed in the book.

"That's Regina," Jiminy said softly, "And that's her…adopted brother who lives with her dad on the other side of town. They don't see each other much except for at school where he doesn't ever talk and she takes charge of the whole place."

"Yea she's a b-word," August said happily to her. Emma kind of liked these two boys. They were actually nice. They'd accepted her easily.

"Who is this?"

They looked up to see Regina looking over the back of her seat with the boy at her side with the same scowl on his face.

"This is…"

"Emma. I'm new," Emma said quickly and Jiminy nodded.

"Oh….well then…..welcome. I'm Regina."

"Hi," Emma said and then the girl turned around. But the boy continued to stare at her and his gaze was filled with such intensity that it was slightly scary. Before she could say anything, the boy turned around and sat back down. He was alarming in her opinion. Was he really incapable of talking?

"So who is your teacher?" August asked, leaning over the back of the seat again.

"Umm….I have Mrs. Nolan."

"Awesome! Me too! And Jiminy! And David and Snow. And Ruby. And Regina. And her brother."

"Does he get excited about a lot of things?" Emma asked Jiminy who smiled slightly and nodded.

"It's odd that he enjoys hanging out with me. I'm not anything like him."

The bus pulled up to the school and they all filed out of the bus. She watched Regina walk with her brother towards the school. For some reason, it didn't seem like they got along very well. They walked into the school and another boy ran up to her. He had sparkling blue eyes and short dirty blonde hair.

"Wow! Hi, I'm David," the boy smiled, "And this is Snow."

Emma smiled at them both. The girl had black hair and brown eyes. She smiled back at her. They all seemed so excited to be friends with her. She saw August walking up and noticed that he limped quite obviously.

"Come on. We need to get into our classroom. You know Mrs. Nolan doesn't like when we're late."

"That's right!" David smiled as they walked into the classroom. It was a comfortable room. There were desks everywhere with nametags. She smiled as she read each of them. David's had knights and swords all over it. Snow's had flowers and apples. August had drawings of what looked suspiciously like puppets. Jiminy had drawn bugs on his. Regina had spiders and a lot of black. She looked for the boy that she still didn't know his name.

"You must be Emma! Welcome to our sixth grade class. I am Mrs. Nolan," the teacher said with a smile. Emma smiled back.

"Thanks. Um…Where do you want me to sit?"

"Well, we have an empty desk right for you next to….Graham. Graham, where are you?"

A boy raised his hand hesitantly off the desk. He sat alone with no one next to him. It was the same boy from the bus. His nametag had a drawing of a bow and arrow on it. Emma walked over and sat down at the desk next to him. The boy still wouldn't talk to her.

"I'm Emma, it's nice to meet you," she said holding out her hand, hoping the boy would take it.

He glanced at her and just nodded before going back to reading his book. She felt a tap on her shoulder and sighed when she saw who was sitting behind her.

"What do you want July?"

"August!" the boy complained, "And, he's not going to talk to you. Mrs. Nolan has even given up trying to make him talk."

"Ok, I get it," Emma said nodding. August gave her a smile and then leaned back in his chair. Mrs. Nolan started teaching them all about history but Graham didn't seem to care less. He was still absorbed in whatever book he was reading. Emma glanced at it and tried to see what it said. She couldn't really tell.

"So today, we're going to get into groups of four or five and I will give you a fairy tale to read. You will then have work together to reenact the story by Friday," Mrs. Nolan smiled, "And I will divide the groups."

"Awesome!" August hissed from behind her, "Please let me get in a good group."

"For Group 1. Regina, Ruby, Sidney, Jiminy and Phillip."

The students started to move around a little bit to get into the groups.

"Group 2: David, Snow, August, Emma, and let's have Graham join you guys."

August rolled his eyes but smiled at Emma. They all got into their group and started talking about what fairy tale they should do.

"Pinocchio," August said immediately with a grin on his face.

"No man that's stupid," David said rolling his eyes, "We should do Snow White. Since Snow is already named Snow."

"I love Snow White!" Snow said excitedly, "It's like my favorite story ever."

"Aw come on!" August complained, "We obviously know that you two will want to be the main characters! Who are Emma and I going to be?"

"And Graham," Emma put in and August rolled his eyes.

"Yea him too."

"Well, there's the evil queen! The seven dwarves! You could be all of them August!"

"I don't want to be any darn dwarves!"

A paper slid over in front of Emma and she glanced down. She frowned but picked it up and read the five words printed on the note. She glanced over at Graham who was looking up at her again.

'Can I be The Huntsman?'

Maybe he really couldn't talk. Emma smiled slightly and then nodded her head at him. He smiled slightly and went back to reading his book.

"I got it!" August said with a triumphant grin, "I'll be the Huntsman."

"Sorry August," Emma said, "Someone already took that spot."

"What?!"

"Graham said he wanted to be him."

"But…..fine. Whatever. I'll be the darn dwarves," August grumbled but sat down on the desk. Snow laughed.

"It's fine August. You'll be my best friends."

"This will be so much fun," David said excitedly as he pretended to wave a sword, "Snow! I shall find you! I will always find you!"

"Kids, go out for recess! I'll call you back in a little while."

Everyone ran outside and Emma smiled slightly. She liked this school for once. Her old school hadn't been nearly as inviting as this one. All the kids here were so friendly apart from Regina.

"Let's play Snow White and practice!" August said as Jiminy joined them.

"You guys are doing Snow White? That's so cool!"

"Yea it will be great," David said, "Now come on let's play."

Emma laughed and then frowned. She saw Graham playing alone but he seemed to be enjoying himself. He had a stick that had been sharpened to a point and taped at the bottom to look like a sword. He was swiping at the air and throwing it from one side of the playground to the other. While David, August, and Snow were planning on how they would play Snow White, she walked slowly over towards Graham.

"Ha! Hwa!"

Emma watched him again as he swung the stick around and then froze when their eyes met. He smiled at her for once and then tossed the stick aside. He cocked his head slightly before taking off and running off towards the playground. All Emma could do was follow him. She found him sitting at the top waiting expectantly for her.

"What are you doing?" she asked quietly, "Why don't you talk."

"Because whenever I talk, no one believes what I say," Graham said quietly. His voice was soft and gentle. Nothing like Regina.

"What do you mean?"

"Have you ever read Snow White?"

"No."

"Here," Graham gave her his book, "Read it. It's a great story. I'm in it."

"What?"

"The Huntsman. He's in that story."

"Oh. Do you want this back?"

"Yes eventually. But you read it first."

Emma stared at Graham as he smiled again before jumping and taking off down the slide. He gave her a shy wave before hurrying off back towards the field to play with his sharpened stick. She watched him and realized he must have an amazing imagination to still be able to play like that. Nowadays, it was all technology.

"Emma!"

She turned to see her group of friends waiting for her. They waved her over and she walked over to them. They all looked shocked.

"What is it?"

"You got Graham to talk," David said with his mouth hanging open, "How did you do that?"

"I…..I don't know," Emma said truthfully. Why had Graham chosen to talk to her of all people? She had only been here for a day. She glanced down at the book in her hands and wondered why he'd given it to her.

"Let's read it!" David said with an excited smile.

"Yes Emma! We must!" Snow agreed. Even August seemed slightly excited by the book. They sat on the playground and read the story and it was a really great story. It was full of information on the characters as well as the plotline. And then she got to the part that Graham was so excited about. The Huntsman. It was awful what the guy had gone through. His heart had been ripped from him by the evil queen and he was forced to do her bidding for the rest of his life. If he didn't, she'd cause him pain.

"Can we do this in the play?" August asked with a smile, "That would be so cool."

"No, it's too gruesome. And how would we even pull it off?"

"I think it's a good idea."

They all turned and Emma was surprised to see the fifth member of their group standing there, hands clenched together. He was extremely nervous. Graham looked away and then glanced back at them with a timid smile.

"That's why I gave you the book. So you could read about me."

"See? Graham-Cracker wants it so let's do it," August said putting his arm around the other boy, "Glad you're not mute buddy."

Graham smiled again and Emma noticed that he didn't seem as nervous. It seemed as if this was the first time anything like this was ever happening to him. The kid must have never had any friends because his sister was so scary.

"So…..we're friends right?" Graham asked and August grinned.

"Sure. The more the merrier."

"Of course we're friends Graham," Snow said with a smile and David nodded his approval. It was time to go in and they didn't stop talking the whole way there. Emma realized how much of a personality Graham actually had. He was a bit like August only less sarcastic and more afraid of what people would say about him.

On the bus ride home, it was sort of quiet between the group. Jiminy was talking quietly with August. Snow and David were sitting up front and Graham was back in the clutches of his sister. Emma glanced over the seat to see Regina with her hand held tightly on Graham's back. When the bus got to the first stop, Regina almost pushed the boy out of his seat and into the aisle. Graham turned back and Emma gave him a little wave before he left. At her stop, she got off and headed into the home. She wandered into her room and shut the door. It had been a tiring day but now at least she had some nice friends. She wasn't there for long by herself because the door opened soon after. The owner of the place, Mr. Gold walked in, followed by a very familiar face.

"I believe you know this boy?"

"I do…."

"He'll be staying here then."

"August? What happened?" she asked as soon as Mr. Gold left the room.

"I don't know. I got home and there was no one there and a note that said I was to come here. I….I think my parents left."

"I'm so sorry August."

"It's alright. I guess. I get to spend time with you all the time now right?"

"Great. I can hardly wait."

Thanks for reading! I hope you all enjoyed and I'd love some reviews! So if you liked, review, favorite, and follow! And I'll try to get the next chapter out soon.