AN: A little Ella Enchanted drabble to check whether I can still write. Enjoy! It's Ella x Char, of course. Just after their wedding.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
I sighed and sat on the edge of the bed, running a hand through my hair absently. "Remind me never to get married again," I muttered. "Weddings are so tiring."
An amused chuckle sounded from behind me, and I turned to meet Char's gentle brown eyes. His forehead was furrowed with false worry. "I should hope you will never marry again," he stated, trying to hide his smile. "Why would you even think of such a thing?"
I laughed tiredly. "Oh, Char," I murmured, bringing my hand to rest on his. "I was joking, you know that. I love you."
The crease between his eyebrows flattened out and his eyes flashed with tenderness. "And you know that I love you, too." He pulled me closer, and I could hear his heartbeat clearly as my head rested on his chest.
"Of course." My mind was filled with memories of the wedding. "Today was exhausting though, you have to admit. I was afraid Apple would knock the priest over, he was so full of energy."
Char stifled a snort of amusement, and I pulled away and glared at him accusingly. "Do you happen to know who fed him an apple?" I continued, raising an eyebrow knowingly. He lifted his hands in defeat.
"All right, it was me. But you should have seen his face, Ella! I couldn't begrudge him an apple on my wedding day. I wanted everyone to be as happy as I was."
"Was?" I was quick to latch onto his use of the past tense.
"And still am." He laughed gently and placed a kiss on my forehead.
"I don't deserve you," I whispered to him. "After everything I did… oh Char, you will never know how hard it was for me to write that letter…"
His eyes darkened. "And you will never know how hard it was for me to read it," he replied quietly.
I shrank away from the haunted look in his gaze. "It was cowardly of me to do that," I confessed. "I… maybe Mandy could have told me to tell you about it. But what would you have done?"
"I would have done something, Ella! Didn't you trust me enough to tell me something so important?" His voice rose.
"That's not it, Char, and you know that. I…" I swallowed. "I didn't want to be used against you. I thought about it so often, but I couldn't see any way out of it. You know that I went to see Lucinda, and later she saw the error of her ways, but she still didn't reverse the curse. And I just lost hope."
His eyes softened slightly. "Do you know," he said slowly, "what I thought when I received 'Hattie's' letter? I was scornful of the truth in 'her' words. I knew you wouldn't do something like that to me. But then there was your letter. And despite the fact that it went against everything I saw in you, I believed it."
"I believed it, and it broke my heart, Ella. You've told me why you did it, and why you had no other choice, but I still think you should have trusted me. I would have protected you. I love you so much."
My fingers curled around the edge of the bed frame. "I know you do," I protested weakly, "and I know you would have done anything to help me. But I didn't want to be a burden… and so many things could have gone wrong. I couldn't sacrifice you for my own happiness. I thought I was being unselfish." I lowered my eyes. "But later, I realized that it was just a different type of selfishness. I didn't… I didn't think of how fiercely you would react. I'm sorry."
He regarded me with a strange light in his eyes, one I had not seen before. It gave him the look of one much older, yet much younger at the same time.
"In the end, we're still here, together," he murmured. "And I don't suppose anything else matters."
At that moment, I named the light in his eyes. It was the light of wisdom, and it was the light of love, yet it was also something intangible that I couldn't quite put my finger on, no matter how hard I tried.
"Yes, we are." My voice was softer than I would have liked it. I tried to change to subject and lightly remarked on Sir Stephen's hounds, which looked far smaller than I had imagined them after his incessant talk about them.
"Ella?" Char's voice stopped me mid-sentence. I looked at him quizzically. He drew me closer and brushed his lips against mine.
"I love you." Though I had heard him say it so many times before that day, somehow they seemed different this time. I gazed steadily into his eyes, pressing my lips against his in a short, sweet kiss.
"I love you, too."
Happily ever after never seemed so perfect.
AN: Meh. I thought that was gibberish. But I was in a nice romantic mood so I wrote it quickly, and well, it's up to you to judge…