7. Silence Is Killing Me
After that, I did my work in complete silence, and Rumplestilzkin let me be. I refused to touch the two puppets in the cabinet, scared that he would do something to me if I broke them or somehow managed to change them in some way. I stopped reading to him, what had once become a daily habit ceased entirely. I grew scared of him, and only took baths and changed my clothes when he was had left the castle for one of his outings.
He did not speak to me, not even to make a command. He couldn't look at me, and I could barely look at him. I would gaze at the floor or the wall, never making eye contact. After a few weeks had passed of this, he threw a glass snow globe against the wall.
"SPEAK!" he commanded, and I slowly walked towards the mess and began to clean it up. "No, just leave it!"
I exclaimed in shock as I pulled away from the shards of broken glass to find a sliver stuck in the fleshy palm of my right hand. Blood dripped down my arm, and Rumplestilzkin grabbed my wrists roughly. I winced with pain as he dragged me away from the mess.
"Look what you have done," he said as pulled the shard out of my palm.
"Look what I've done?" I asked, trying to remain calm as more blood started to pool in my hand. "I'm not the one who smashed that snow globe."
"I ordered you not to clean it up dearie," snarled Rumplestilzkin as he roughly began to bandage my hand. "This is your fault."
I winced as his rough hands finished bandaging, and got up to leave the room. "Where are your manners dearie?" he asked with a slight snarl in his voice. "Don't you want to thank the Beast?"
I turned around, and walked right up to him. "Just because you want to put up this front that you are somehow a creature whose nature is that of a Beast does not make you one. You may think you are a Beast, but deep down you know you are not. I know that deep down inside, you are a man, trapped and doomed to live this kind of life. But I will be damned if you are going to force me to pity you. You are not worthy of anyone's pity, you are worthy of trying to find a solution."
There was a heavy silence in the air, and all of a sudden, I felt like I had said too much. "Do you know," said Rumplestilzkin. "That you are, in fact, the only person in this world who has ever talked to me the way you do?"
I braced for the consequences: a beating, torture, whipping, sent back to my cell with nothing to eat for days. "You are the most intriguing woman I have ever met…"
I was utterly speechless. "No one has ever stood up to me," said Rumplestilzkin. "But you, you are something else Belle."
I smiled slightly, and began to walk towards the drapes. "Are there any windows in the castle?" I asked.
"Thousands," he replied. "But I cover them up. Daylight burns my eyes."
"But it would be so much better to have some natural light in here, and possibly fresh air!" I shifted the drapes, and saw a flash of green hills, and I realized that the drapes his the enormous window. "Goodness, what is wrong with the drapes? It's like they are stuck!"
"I nailed them down," replied Rumplestilzkin. "Sometimes the windows blow a draft in, and the drapes expose the sunlight…"
I laughed. "You silly, one needs daylight in order to live! How do you think flowers grow? Every creature needs some sunlight."
"I've managed well so far," smirked Rumplestilzkin.
"You think you are so clever," I smirked back as I tugged on the drapes. "Ouch!"
"I think you'd better leave off that little adventure for a while," said Rumplestilzkin as he took my injured right hand in his. "You'll want to have time for it to heal… This means no chores for a day or so… Can't risk infection now can we?"
I nodded, and eyed the drapes longingly. One day, those drapes were going to come down, like it or not.
