Chapter Text
January
She was back. So was magic. Rumpelstiltskin should have been happy. He had his true love, she was skinny, not-quite-whole but she was there. So why didn't she feel like his?
February
Power. He chose the power again. Those hallucinations...the memories that had haunted her for 28 years were true and there he was, standing in front of her. She told him she loved him. And he had said it back and held her tight. Held her like he would never let her go. But then he had. He stepped back and said he had things to do. He walked away from her and towards power. Had nothing changed? Rumpelstiltskin had even forbidden her to leave the house. For her own protection, he said. To her, all it meant was that her cell had gotten a little bigger.
March
She started to look more like herself, like the old Belle. Her hair was healthy, her eyes were shining and her reading obsession had come back in full force. But...still there was something missing. Something in her wasn't quite the same as it was in Fairy Tale Land. Her spark was gone. Jefferson (he preffered that name to Mad Hatter) visited her often with his little girl, Grace. Belle really came alive when playing with the young girl and Rumpelstiltskin found himself staring at her, losing himself in the image of what a fine mother she would've been to Bae. He held her sometimes, kissed her lovingly but his affections went unreturned. Not rebuffed, but not returned. They slept in seperate rooms.
April
Claustrophobia was a new word she'd come across in a book. Belle was starting to think she was developing it. She knew Rumpelstiltskin was hiding her away so that the Evil Queen wouldn't be able to hurt her again but she couldn't stand it. Staring at the same things, never feeling the grass under her toes, her father...her father was out there somewhere. Rumpelstiltskin said it would be better for her to wait, that the curse had taken a bigger toll on Maurice than she could imagine. But there was something in the way he avoided her eyes when he said it. He was lying to her. He was keeping her here, no better than what the Evil Queen had done to her and now he was lying to her too. She closed her eyes as the tears that she thought she had cried out ran down her cheeks.