Chapter Text
Winter Wonderland
Rumplestiltskin always won. It was a fact of life; people didn't argue with him, or get the better of him. They might try; in fact, he expected it. But they didn't win. So why was it that right now he couldn't seem to win at all? Probably a great deal of it had to do with who was getting the better of him. It seemed a simple enough thing, all he wanted was his beautiful Belle to marry him immediately if not sooner. She had agreed at the Midsummer Ball, accepted his proposal in front of everyone. At the time they thought they would have plenty of time to plan. They had more or less agreed to some time in spring, the traditional time for marriages back home. She had started to look at dresses; decided a few things, it was early days yet. They weren't planning a big wedding, but his Belle was so popular and he was so...well, he wasn't hated, which was more than he had been before.
Then everything changed. Belle was pregnant, having his child. He was excited, frightened and overwhelmed, and he wanted her to be his wife now. This wasn't the old world; a woman had freedoms here. It was acceptable for couples to date, to live together and to make love without being married, without even being betrothed. Otherwise they wouldn't be in this situation in the first place. He'd never been able to deny her. Not after all they had gone through to get here, and when she had drawn him to her, well, he hadn't had it in him to resist. It happened in the old world, of course. Any number of betrothals had gone from contract to cleric more suddenly than planned, but it was not as common. He was not that man. Already there were so many things against them, and he didn't want this to be one of them. Belle should have a perfect wedding, not one where she walked down the aisle heavily pregnant with their child.
But while he wanted it tomorrow, Belle wanted to wait until after the winter holidays. He couldn't argue with her, not that there was any point. She reminded him that this was their first winter holiday properly together, something to be celebrated with friends and family, and of course, despite her condition, Belle was right in the middle of it all. It didn't help that, while he knew what to do with an infant, he had been away at war throughout Milah's pregnancy, so this was the first time he had ever lived with a pregnant woman.
Only a week after Thanksgiving he had accompanied her to the hospital where she had been subjected to
an ultrasound. They had seen a rather blurry and odd looking image that was their baby, while the nurses, doctors and technicians walked very carefully around them. Nervous fathers they could handle, but no one had ever written how to handle this in any manual. He'd been good though, and everyone had come out of it in one piece without violence or accidental transformation. He didn't know exactly what to make of it, but it was nice to be able to see their child. Of course, he knew that she (and it was a she, his magic had told him that) was perfect. How could she not be with Belle for a mother? That he was the father couldn't be too much of a draw back; after all, Bae had turned out better than he could have ever expected. Still she was tired, and the morning sickness arrived at all times of day, but she was so happy. She exuded happiness and amazed him. Then there was the other side of it. His lovely Belle was having some...interesting reactions to the hormones. Not that they had ever had a less than intense physical relationship, they had too many years to make up for. But recently he only had to look at her for her to turn amorous and he was only to happy to comply (or even to encourage). The Doctor had warned them about that particular effect, causing him to blush for what must be the first time in...well, longer than he cared to count.
He dragged himself away from those thought forcefully before he went down to the library and did something that he was pretty certain would result in him losing his library card at the least, and being banned from his lovely wife's place of work all together, those thoughts could wait til tonight. Still, he spent more time that was probably healthy worrying, about her, about the baby, about...actually about everything. But top priority right at the moment was getting their wedding planned, while trying to put up with all this...holiday stuff. Mostly he was leaving that stuff up to Belle, helping her with the heavy lifting so she didn't hurt herself, but letting her make all the planning decisions. At least planning didn't require climbing any ladders. Instead he tried to look at the list of things for the wedding he wanted to accomplish. It should be easy enough to get flowers taken care of when his prospective father in law was the only florist in town, but the relationship there was...unpredictable.
Maurice French had just settled down to accept that his beloved only daughter was marrying the last person in the world he would have chosen for her when she told him about their current situation. To say he had been under excited would be putting it politely. Belle had invited him over the day after Thanksgiving for a little sit down leftover dinner to tell him the good news (well, they both thought it was good news, though Rumplestilskin was still in a state of shock). They had been treading very carefully since the engagement, and to give the man credit, he was trying to act like he didn't think his daughter was making the biggest mistake of her life. Still, finding out that they were having a child had put him in a state.
"You can't," he had stuttered. "It's not possible."
"I assure you it is," Belle told him. "The doctor confirmed it. A spring birth," Belle had told him, smiling at Rumplestiltskin with such warmth that he had been afraid her father would have a heart attack right in front of them.
"You, you've done this," he shouted at Rumplestiltskin. "You took my daughter and now you've ruined her. Probably part of some evil plan to keep her chained to you. You're not even human; how is it possible?"
"Father," Belle said sharply. That was enough to get him to quiet for a moment; she never called him Father unless she was upset. "He didn't do anything," she started. He thought about saying something for a moment, but there was really nothing he could say that would make the moment less than awkward.
"You mean he isn't the father? Because otherwise..."
"Yes, no, I mean, of course he's the father, but he didn't..." She trailed off as she realised that there was no way of saying anything that wasn't going to make it worse.
"Do you even know if this...if it's going to be human?" he said. His tone only made Belle angrier, and Runmplestiltskin had stepped in to calm her down. Not that he hadn't been angry; it had taken a hefty loan on his three hundred years back log of self control not to throw the man bodily from his home just for upsetting her. But either Rumplestiltskin's tone had shown him how close he was to ending up something slimy in the back garden or he realised how close he came to shutting his daughter out of his life for good. He calmed down, and while he wasn't happy, and probably never would be (though Belle was certain once he saw his grandchild he would change his mind), he had at least accepted that nothing he did would change things. Grudgingly, he had accepted her wishes to be a mother, and Rumplestiltskin's reassurance that while he might not be as completely human as he once was, the fact that this child existed was proof that he was close enough.
If anything had come out of the conversation, at least Moe was on his side when it came to the wedding. He was all for his daughter marrying as soon as possible, preferably before the entire town knew what happened. Having a daughter pregnant out of wedlock was probably more of a shame than having her wed to the most feared sorcerer in all the kingdoms at home. But it didn't make a good basis for a working relationship. Before the old florist left, he had taken Rumplestiltskin aside for a few words about what had and had not been in the contract that his daughter had agreed to when they made their deal. His reassurance that nothing had happened between them before they came to this world nor until after the curse had broken only seemed to mollify him somewhat. Still, he had forced himself to tell Maurice that he loved Belle, and had done since before the curse had fallen. That seemed to, if not reassure him, at least lessen the man's anger.
"I'm not happy; you are old enough to be her father," he told him as Rumplestiltskin was showing him out.
"Dearie, I'm old enough to be YOUR great grandfather at least, but unfortunately true love is a magic even I can do nothing about." For some reason, the revelation about his age actually seemed to calm the man even more, or perhaps he was just accepting that there was little to be done about them at last. Still, it didn't make calling him to talk about wedding flowers any easier.
Maybe he should start with finding someone to marry them? There were any number of people who could officiate at their wedding in a way that would make it binding in both worlds. The Blue Fairy was the obvious choice for a lot of people. He had settled some of his differences with her. She had actually sought him out to apologise after Bae came back; telling them both that she knew he would never go through the portal; it was something about fairy magic and destiny that he took to mean a little bit of seer power that was probably as useful as his own. However he still wasn't comfortable with the bloody fairies, even while he was forced to work with her trying to find a way to get them home. Prince Charming was also a valid choice and more likely to agree than any of the others he could think of right off the bat. Adding in family ties that were only chaffing a little, and he was willing to ask the man to do it. He was looking at his phone, trying to decide whether a call to Charming or a trip to the florist shop was the best use of his time, when the doorbell rang.