Disclaimer: As per usual, I only wish I owned the material. I don't. I can only dream.
I wrote this fic a while back - back when we were just hearing rumors about Will and Belle in the second half of the season. I'm very behind on the show right now, so I haven't actually seen what happened, but this was my way of trying to reconcile what exactly went on with Will pre-season 4 and what happened with him and Belle during the hiatus. It's probably slightly AU at this point. The title is from Part That's Holding On by Red.
It is less than a week until their wedding when she calls it off.
Will cannot quite believe what he is hearing when she says that she cannot go through with it. They have already done everything – her dress is ready, the guests are arranged, he is already king consort – and it's just gone.
It seems she never quite forgave him for falling asleep and muttering Alice's name in his dreams. In his defense, he had been having a nightmare that kept replaying the time he and Alice were stuck in Boro Grove and those bloody flowers were turning her into a tree. Not that that apparently mattered to Anastasia.
His pleas fall on deaf ears. She locks him out of her room and the moment he picks the lock and breaks in he finds himself teleported back outside. If it were part of a game, he might have found it amusing. He does not. All he gets is "My word is law, Will" when he tries to convince her to change her mind, or that she cannot banish him because he is legally the king of Wonderland. So much for that.
It is his misfortune that he is the one who plants the idea in her head. She sends him away on pain of death again.
Will cannot breathe. He feels like his heart has been ripped from his chest all over again, but he is not so fortunate this time. There is no Cora to actually take it from him and dull the pain.
He cannot go back. He cannot find Alice. (If he is honest with himself, he prays that she never goes to Wonderland again just so that she never has to see that all she wanted for him is undone.) He has nothing left.
So he goes to Storybrooke and finds himself in mess after mess after bloody mess. He hates it. He is flippant with the sheriff, somehow gets himself pardoned by the mayor, and by the time the snow queen is done he just wants to go home.
He wants to go home, but he has no home to go back to. Anastasia will not see him and Alice is happily married to her genie. The women he loves are unreachable, untouchable, and he is in Storybrooke with no White Rabbit to take him back to Wonderland or Alice's London. He would not go to either even if he could.
(He loves Ana, but he cannot face her again. He loves Alice and he will never ruin her happiness. If he could go back and do things over, he would pray that Alice would change her mind and fall in love with him because she made him feel something even without his heart.)
It is a strange day when he runs into the librarian that got him sent to jail in the first place. Belle.
They meet at the Rabbit Hole, where he is drowning his sorrows (again) and she is trying to pick up the pieces.
"You lost someone, didn't you?"
Her voice makes him look up. Their eyes meet and he drops his back to the beer in front of him. "'S not important."
She raises one elegant brow at him. "You're a terrible liar." She takes the seat next to him without even bothering to ask if he minds.
"I'm no liar." It is a weak defense.
She turns to look at him, both brows raised this time. She does not say a word, but her gaze seems to go right through him. They sit in silence for a few moments. "Tell me about her," Belle prompts.
Will sighs. He fights with himself for a moment before he gives in and starts telling her about Ana, then about Alice. She does not interrupt. He is grateful. He is not even sure why he is opening up to Belle at all, but he knows his crimes – in love and in all other aspects of his existence – are nothing compared to others she has faced of late.
She keeps him talking until the Rabbit Hole closes. He is surprised when the bartender finally asks them to leave and he sees that the bar closed an hour ago. Belle is easy to talk to.
He offers to walk her home and she lets him. Part of him is thrilled and he cannot put his finger on why. They stroll back to the little apartment she moved into after she banished the Dark One from Storybrooke and he escorts her safely to her door.
He wonders if she thinks he is harmless after being married to the Dark One. Probably so.
For once he does not drink himself silly before he goes back to his apartment. (Thankfully his name is still on the lease and he has not been kicked out. That seems to be one of the benefits of living in Storybrooke.)
Somehow he finds himself at the library the next day and he does not even know what he is thinking.
He does not know what he is thinking when he keeps going back either.
They fall into an easy friendship – perhaps the first truly open and the easiest friendship he has ever had.
He curses himself for it. If the Dark One could see him now he would be a dead man. But making Belle smile lights up the darkness in his heart. Hearing her laughter as they sort through books and put them away makes him smile.
When he is with Belle, he can forget how much it hurts to think of Ana or Alice. In fact, he does not even think of them. He does not dream of them anymore. Instead, his dreams are filled with her bright eyes and shining light.
He curses himself for that, too. He is falling for her smile and her laughter and her ever-hopeful view of the world. He wonders how anyone could not love Belle.
He thinks he should know better, but Belle makes him believe again.