Part 6
Sitting closely next to the man who has become the center of her life in such a short time, it's tempting to just stay like that, comfortable and content. Especially when he moves a careful arm around her, only resting it ever so lightly on her waist as she smiles and nods, she wishes that she could just enjoy this nearness.
But there are things she wants to ask him, a great many of them. He has told her a lot, but there's so much more she needs to know in order to find more than a fleeting peace of mind, to understand. The list with questions in her head grows only longer the more she thinks of it.
There is a single question that stands out though, the one that has been bothering her the most ever since she found herself at the town line, having no idea whatsoever who she actually is.
This never seemed to matter all that much when she was still locked up in the basement, if only because she was convinced that there would never be any need for her to have an identity.
It didn't matter back then that she was confused and blank, not even knowing her own name. But now she is here, with him, hearing of a woman who has enchanted him so completely.
She isn't sure whether she can be that woman, apparently the very woman who she is supposed to be, whatever that means exactly. Either way, she really wants to try, more than she ever wanted anything throughout the years. But in order to do that, she'll have to learn more of the person of whom he speaks with such longing and affection.
"Can you tell me about her?" she asks, awfully aware that she's asking about herself, as if she is a different person altogether. "About what she's like?"
"It's probably better if I don't tell you about her... about you. I'd like you to be who you are, right now, not trying to be who you think you should be."
"Do you?" she urges quietly, very much aware of his reluctant tone. Besides, the memory of him doing just about anything to make her remember is one that hasn't escaped her.
"Yes," he replies after a few seconds, sounding entirely sincere. "You lost your memories and there's nothing we can do about that now. Those memories are part of what make you you. They can't be replaced; they have to be regained."
His speech falters for a moment, but he continues after taking an audible breath of air.
"Besides, you should be who you are, not who I want you to be. I have to admit that those aren't necessarily the same."
"I... I appreciate that," she says, thoughtful of both his actual words and the fact that they differ so much from what he did before this evening. "But isn't there anything you can tell me? Some facts? I know nothing, Rumple, and..."
She shakes her head in frustration, struggling to find the words, anything, which might explain to him what it does to her, not knowing even the most basic of things about herself.
"I think it's better if you don't hear about yourself from me."
"Why is that?" she asks, noting that his earlier reluctance has returned.
"Our relationship is... controversial. Many don't believe that you truly want to be with me... they say that I'm forcing or manipulating you, one way or another. I can't truly blame them for that. I don't understand why you kept coming back to me. Given my own involvement, I should be the last person to influence your perception of our relationship now that you can't remember whatever it was that persuaded you not to leave me like everyone thought you should."
She nods slowly in partial agreement. She understands his reasoning and appreciates his caution. Then again, he is the one who has been supporting her, much unlike the 'many' who apparently condemn their relationship.
"I'd really like to hear it from you. Not everything, just... just some things, the same that anyone else might tell me. You're the only one I trust. Not because of what you told me about us being together, but because you were the only one who helped me or even came to see me in the past few days."
"Oh, Belle..."
He's reaching for her again, eyes full of hope and awe and wonder, and she can imagine that it's hardly the first time that he looks at her like this, as if he can't believe that this is real. Her eyes flutter closed in enjoyment when he brushes his knuckles against her cheek, a gesture that too is almost familiar.
"We met in a different land... a different world."
She forces herself to open her eyes when he begins to talk, not wanting to miss anything now that he has started to tell her about their past after all. New questions are already erupting in her mind, both about the characteristics of this 'different world' and how something like that can exist in the first place. But she remains quiet, for now, and just listens now that he is talking after all.
"There was a war. Your father was losing. He requested me to defeat the ogres that his army was fighting. I accepted, but I demanded a price. I always did... and I still do. There was very little he had to offer. But there was a young woman with him that night, as part of his war council... a courageous and intelligent woman, and beautiful too."
He doesn't cease to touch her during his tale, which is lovely despite making it slightly difficult to actually focus on what he is saying.
"You were the only one who wasn't afraid of me. Not just there, but anywhere in the realm. I would never have admit it back then, but I was a lonely man, living at a large castle without any company. No one would voluntarily stay there with me... or so I thought before meeting you. I demanded you to come live with me, as caretaker of my estate, in return for the safety of your village. Your father and fiancé forbade it... but you came with me anyway."
She is hardly aware that she's on the edge of her seat in her eagerness not to miss a word of what he says. From the moment he started talking, it's clear to her that the 'woman' he is referring to is her, whether he is aware that he changes from describing her in third to second person or not.
"On your very first day, you dropped the cup in which you were going to serve me my tea," he continues, her eyes widening in realization. He hesitates, doubtlessly knowing as well as she does that he tried to tell her this before, to very unpleasant results. Only after another small smile from her, he goes on. "It didn't break when it fell, but it was chipped. You thoroughly apologized, but it was as if you were more concerned because of the cup itself than for my reaction. And that's when I was beginning to find out..."
He shakes his head, his gaze distant, lost in a memory only he can cherish, for now at least. She looks at the shards next to her, her guilt for destroying the cup increasing much more rapidly than it already had.
"We didn't spend all that much time together at first. We were both mostly at work, in different parts of the castle. I wasn't sure how to... well, how to talk to you. You never reacted the way I thought you would. You confused me, I suppose. But after a while you insisted on having tea with me, saying I was going to have to talk to you if I didn't want to end up with a housekeeper who forgot how to talk in the first place. It became a lot easier after that. It turned out that talking to you wasn't difficult at all. It was like you... understood."
His narration doesn't trigger any memories, but it makes it easy for her to imagine these events of her past – their past – in her mind's eye.
"I was falling in love with you," he adds, taking a deep breath and looking almost apologetic. "But I was certain that you could never feel the same way about me. You were kind and lovely, but... I am a monster, and I never forget that."
She opens her mouth to object. She may barely know him at this point and he might have done horrible things, but there is a side of him that couldn't be further from what he is currently describing. But she doesn't interrupt him this time either, wanting him to continue talking now that he has opened up like this.
"I let you go. I expected I would never see you again... but you returned. And you... you kissed me."
Everything about him betrays that he can't believe this even now. Her heart aches at seeing him like this, so completely incapable of believing that she would willingly kiss him... and she was the one who was repulsed by the very notion until only a short while ago.
"It was perfect. And I ruined it," he whispers, his regret almost tangible. "Your kiss began to break my curse. I thought that you had done it on purpose, to take my powers away from me. I was convinced that you were working with Regina."
He spits out the woman's name with such hatred that she momentarily forgets about the curse he is referring to.
"Who is Regina?" she asks, not wanting to interrupt him but beginning to understand less and less of what he's saying.
"The Evil Queen," he replies. "It's a long story."
A single quirked eyebrow tells him that this isn't an acceptable answer for her.
"My role in it is something I'm not proud of," he says slowly, resigned. "but I saw it as a necessary measure at the time. These days... I prefer not to think of it. Regina and I have a long history. She was my apprentice before she..."
He sighs deeply, his shoulders sagging, but continues talking.
"I... I used her. I manipulated her to cast the curse that brought us here. It worked, but I lost control over her long before that. She tried to defeat me, to become more powerful than me. The only way she could do so was by taking my powers from me."
His explanation adds yet more questions she wants answered. She attempts to memorize each and every single one that pops into her head, not deterred by the apparent impossibility of it.
"True Love's kiss was a way to make an end to my powers. Regina must have known that. I thought you were cooperating with her and that you used our feelings for her purposes. I was... upset."
Judging from the way the volume of his voice lowers yet more, the last word barely audible, 'upset' is an understatement. It doesn't help that he can no longer look at her, focusing on the floor at her feet instead.
"I threw you out. You pleaded for me to let you stay and to open up to you. But I couldn't, not when thinking that it was all a trick. Despite the evidence of our feelings, I was convinced that you didn't really love me. You left, eventually."
His voice is hoarse, shaking, the memory of these events still visibly hurting him.
"No news of you reached me for a few weeks and I didn't go looking for it. I had no reason to presume that you had done anything other than returning either to your father or to Regina. But then she came by one afternoon and she told me..."
It's as if telling her this is physically hurting him. He is trembling and she doesn't dare imagining how horrible those events must have been for him.
She makes gratefully use of the experience she has developed in consoling him. She shifts closer to him and gently guides him towards her as well, until his head is resting on her shoulder again and her arms are on his back, rubbing him gently.
"She told me you died," he says, struggling to keep his words intelligible as he whispers them against the side of her neck. "She told me that you had gone home and that your father shunned you, that he locked you up and attempted to have you... cleansed because you had lived with me. You were treated violently and cruelly... or at least, that's what Regina said, and that you... leapt from the tower... she said that you died."
She pulls him closer to her, muttering words that'll hopefully bring him some solace. Just hearing this makes her shiver, both the story he tells her and the way he reacts to it so very painful. She can't imagine what it must be like for him, to remember it directly.
"I don't know what truly happened to you. I never made sure that she hadn't lied. I should have, but I... Thinking that you were gone, it hurt so much. And it was all my fault. If I hadn't thrown you out, if I would have treated you properly and not let get my anger and suspicion the better of me... I never forgot about you. There was no hour that went by in which I didn't wish at least once that you were still with me."
She rocks him gently, relieved when he relaxes a little. She doesn't know what to say to him so she doesn't say anything, by now quite certain that there are very few more calming things to him than the way she is holding him now.
"Regina cast the curse eventually. We ended up here. And one day, many years later, you walked into my shop. A former... associate of Regina freed you from here, but your memories were gone. At first, you didn't remember anything of your life in our home world."
"I lost my memories before?" she asks, interrupting him despite her eagerness to hear as much of her own history as she can, his retelling of her past much more detailed than she thought it would be.
He says so many things that she doesn't fully understand, places and people she can't imagine let alone remember, but this part of his tale resembles her current life so closely that she can't help but interrupt him immediately.
"You did," he says, sighing deeply. "Regina took them from you. They were restored eventually."
"By True Love's kiss?" she asks, eyes lighting up because she knows this now. "Or the teacup?"
"It wasn't like that," he replies, sounding so very, very old. "It's... it's complicated. And a long story. Very long. I'd love to tell you one day, but this isn't the right moment. It had nothing to do with that. Regina's curse was broken, that's how you got your memories back."
"What happened then?" she asks, her mind spinning more than it has done at any moment in the past few days, but in a way that's for once not entirely unpleasant.
"You moved in with me," he replies, still clinging to her. "That's when we were together, for a few weeks. But we argued, we quarreled. You were right about everything, about my dependence on magic... dark magic. But I couldn't give it up. That's why you left."
There are so many things she wants to say to that and there are yet more questions that his narration raises. But she remains quiet this time, aware of how difficult it is for him to tell her this, and that she might have only a single chance to hear this from him.
If there's something she has learned in the past years, it's patience. Besides, she can do something now that's so much better than simply waiting for anything to happen, for her apparent life story to be told to her.
Already having found more than she could have dreamed of, she simply tightens her hold on the man in her arms, quietly awaiting the moment he'll be ready to continue their tale.