Title: The Gift of Love

Timeline: AU Season 2 Christmas

Prompt by: hollymac - First Christmas Together

Word Count: 1,098

Belle was adjusting, little by little, to living in Storybrooke. Many things were new and different, but many also remained the same. Christmas was still a time for celebration, for decorating homes and giving gifts, for feasting and merriment. Belle had loved Christmastime as a child and into her young adulthood. She saw no reason why that should change now, just because she had been sent to a new and modern land that she did not yet fully understand.

Rumpelstiltskin seemed disenchanted by the occasion, and Belle didn't wonder at it. The Dark One was hardly likely to be of a religious bent and believe in the true meaning of Christmas. It was why she did not ask to buy a tree nor plan a celebratory meal, at least not until Christmas Eve rolled around.

There had been carol singing in the town square as they walked home from the shop, arm in arm. It was such a pretty scene, Belle was quite taken, and Rumpel knew how she longed to be a part of the Christmas spirit. A bright smile from her, her hands gripping his arm as she bounced like an excited child, he could deny her nothing. She spoke vaguely of decorating houses, feasting on goose, all the things she so enjoyed about Christmasses past as they arrived home. Before he knew it, Rumpelstiltskin was offering her every chance to do as she chose.

'If it makes you happy, love,' he had told her kindly, with a rarely seen smile, the type of which he seemed to reserve solely for her.

Belle had wasted no time. A chaste kiss on his cheek and she was back in her jacket and away, hurrying to the store. When she returned, laden with tinsel and fairy lights, she found her house-mate gone, and a note left in his place. Rumpel was gone back to his shop to work some more whilst she made his house into her own personal grotto. He promised to be home by midnight and that she should not worry about him. Belle smiled as she read his words and then dropped the note into her pocket. She surveyed the house and her collection of newly bought decorations. She had much to do!

Rumpelstiltskin was surprised when he returned home shortly before midnight to a dark house. He had expected it to be festooned with lights and all manner of other decorations. Instead it looked quite the same as when he left it. Letting himself in the front door, Rumpel was even more confused to realise the inside of the house was as gloomy as the outside, and yet in a moment he realised his mistake.

"Surprise!" Belle exclaimed as she flipped on the lights in the living room.

Rumpelstiltskin felt he might go blind as he looked around at sparkling tinsel, glittered ornaments, and twinkling fairy lights in all colours. Still nothing was so stunning as the smile on Belle's face as she stood in the centre of the room, joyfully grinning.

"Surprise is indeed the word, dearie," Rumpel told her. "You've worked hard."

"And this is just the beginning," she told him, rushing into his arms. "I managed to get supplies together for a real feast tomorrow... or should that be today," she checked, looking toward the clock on the mantle that proclaimed it was now three minutes past midnight - Christmas Day.

"Merry Christmas, Belle," Rumpel told her when he realised the time himself.

"Merry Christmas," she echoed, leaning in to softly kiss his lips.

When she pulled away a moment later it was with a frown he wasn't expecting.

"Is there a box in your trouser pocket?" she asked, too naive to realise there were other words to follow that if you were a modern girl of a certain type.

"Well, since it is Christmas Day now, I suppose I can show you," he told her, trying to keep the smirk off his lips. "Your Christmas gift, my love," he told her, presenting her with a small box.

Belle's hands were shaking as she took it from him and prised open the lid. Inside lay an exquisite gold chain, a bracelet she realised, with tiny charms hanging from it. A heart for love, a horseshoe for luck, a book for her love of reading, and most precious of all a miniature tea cup. Though so small and in odd lighting it was hard to tell, Belle was almost certain there was the tiniest chip missing from the rim.

"Rumpelstiltskin, thank you so much! It is the most thoughtful and beautiful gift I have ever known," she told him, throwing herself back into his arms with such force he was sat down in the armchair with her in his lap a second later.

"You're more than welcome, Belle," he promised her, thrilled beyond anything to have made her so happy, and ever more so to have her as close as she was now.

"But I have no gift for you," she said then, pulling back enough to meet his eyes. "I should've thought, I..."

"Your being here is gift enough for me, dearie," he promised her, a hand at her cheek. "You will never know what a gift it is to have you back in my life, still caring for me inspite of everything."

"I could never love anyone as much I love you," she swore, knowing then there was but one gift she could give him without any sacrifice made at all, since it would be as much a gift to herself as to him.

"It's late... or early. Anyway, we should go to bed," she told him as she hopped back onto her feet and held out a hand to help him up.

"Belle..." there was a warning in his voice somehow, perhaps telling her she should think carefully about what she might be doing.

"Christmas is about life and love as much as it's about anything," she said as he stood up beside her now. "You are both life and love to me, now and forever."

Those were the only words he could ever wish to hear from her lips as he gripped her fingers tighter and they headed for the stairs. With a flick of his free hand, the main lights of the living room went out, leaving only the fairy lights twinkling their pretty colours. At last it seemed that love had truly entered Rumpelstiltskin's life with intent to stay, and if that wasn't a Christmas miracle then nothing ever would be!