A/N: This is a fic to the Disney version of the story. I realize that the actual play/story is a lot darker and would be a lot more fun to write, but at least this way Esmeralda is alive and Quasimodo isn't just a skeleton in a tomb. This also takes place before the second movie, considering I haven't seen that one.
The glow of our triumph is starting to become faint to my eyes. It has been only a few months, a few fleeting moments of living with them, eating with them, and being one of them, one of the normal people who walk the streets of Paris. Yet, despite it being what I dreamed of for twenty years, I can't help but return to my bell tower. I have forgotten who it is I am.
The people of Paris accept me as a hero because Esmerelda wishes it. That is the only reason they tolerate me. There are some that still set gaze upon my deformed face and wince, a smoldering fear deep in their eyes. I have given up trying to change that which cannot be changed. Even though Frollo is gone, burning in the flames of his own beloved Hell, I still find myself an outcast. A stranger to the world in which everyone else lives. Even Esmeralda could not change that for me. It's a hard stock in life to be ugly.
Esmerelda and Phoebus have been wed in my beloved sanctuary. I was there in a place of honor, and I watched as they smiled at each other, both decked in white. Pure.
Esmerelda's raven hair glowed with light from the stained-glass windows, and her turquoise eyes smiled like the moonlight. Phoebus was like the sun itself, his blonde hair radiating with all the flare of the heavens. They were so beautiful, moon and sun. Heaven's light winked around them in such force that I felt myself shrink from it. It pained me to be there, to watch the woman who I had given everything to fall in another man's arms. Even if that man was Phoebus, my only other true friend next to her- the woman who tore apart my world.
I couldn't watch them kiss. It was just too painful to my misshapen eyes. I waited for them in the shadows of the stone, smiling when they came to me, offering them my congratulations. I watched Phoebus look at me with his blue eyes, pity deep within them. I hated that pity more then I loathed my ugliness. I want no ones prayers.
So, shunned once more by the world, I find myself climbing up the cold stone stairs of Notre Dame. Notre Dame. How I adore its dark halls, and its shimmering bronze bells. Gently I pass my hand over one of my gargoyles, my only companions through my times of being locked in solitude.
They have stopped talking to me, those three. It pains my heart to watch them immobile, staring down at the world that had been my only dream. I have lost them, too. Irrational, I know, to cry over stone, but I feel tears enter my eyes anyway, unbidden. They were my imagination and they had been me when I was trying to find some other sort of companion in my life… but they had always been there, and I miss them. I miss myself.
Slowly I climb up the ladder, like I had so many times, to where my bells stood. I had missed them so. Softly I run my hand along Big Marie's bronze metal, feeling the warmth leave my hand at her cool touch. She is lovelier then any real woman I have ever met or known. Even more beautiful then Esmerelda.
Softly I laugh. This is my home. This is where I belong. I walk down the strip of wood to the rope I had pulled daily, my gruff hands taking it once more within my fingers. And I ring the bells again.
The beautiful sound that surrounds me is more angelic then any love I have ever witnessed from my tower. It contains more feeling and purity then any mortal could ever know. With the sound of God surrounding me, I sob. I weep for a world that will never understand me or accept me for who I am. I cry for the world who will never experience beauty or love as I have experienced it.
Notre Dame has been everything to me. A friend, sanctuary, and lover. It is to her that I give my heart, it is to her that I give everything I am. I am hers. I am the bell ringer of Notre Dame.