Summary: Belle has a craving and bakes. At three o'clock in the morning.

Butterfly Cake

Belle could not sleep. This was becoming an increasingly regular occurrence and she was not at all surprised by it. She had long since accepted the fact that her unborn child was, in fact, nocturnal. She was also not at all surprised by the fact that she was craving golden syrup, since this was also becoming an increasingly regular occurrence. As well as being nocturnal, her baby apparently had a sweet tooth to rival the best of them.

When she had first become pregnant, Ruby had advised Belle to make the most of being able to eat as much cake as she wanted, whenever she wanted. Belle had not yet taken advantage of this, knowing that despite pregnancy being an excuse for a lot of things, it still would be best to maintain a relatively normal diet throughout.

But the odd binge could not hurt, Belle reasoned. Especially when it was three o'clock in the morning and she knew that baby was not going to let her sleep again until the craving for syrup had been satisfied. Very carefully, she got into a sitting position and got out of bed, not wanting to wake Gold as she padded softly across the room for her dressing gown and inched the bedroom door open.

She tiptoed into the kitchen and put the lights on before rummaging in the back of the cupboard for the tin of golden syrup. Once it was open, she paused. As tempting as it was to simply dig in to the delicious confection with a spoon, the sheer decadence of the action was still a little too much for Belle, and she resisted with a sigh. Baby still wanted syrup, though. She looked over at the oven. Since she was completely awake, she might as well bake. She would have to be quiet so as not to wake Gold, but she could do it. And treacle tart sounded like such a very delicious proposition at that point in time.

Belle crept around the kitchen, gathering the ingredients she needed to make the tart. Normally she would blitz the pastry in the food processor, but that would almost certainly wake Gold. Never mind. There was something therapeutic in the art of cooking. Belle classed herself as an average cook, enthusiastic but not always successful. Gold was the chef of the household, but Belle was the baker. She did not actually bake all that often; having become so used to always having access to exquisitely baked goods whilst working at Granny's she'd got out of the habit and was somewhat out of practice. Still, no time like the present, especially since Granny's wares were unavailable in the small hours of the morning.

She set the pastry to chill and sat down at the kitchen table, one hand on her bump. There was still a lot more growing to be done, but she was already feeling the weight, and whilst she was very awake, she was still tired.

"How are you doing in there?" she whispered down the front of her dressing gown. Her mid-pregnancy scan had shown that everything was still progressing completely normally, but Belle could not help feeling a certain unease in these quiet moments, when it was just her and her baby. Old fears and misgivings came back to bite, and there were times when her confidence caved.

"Just give me a sign," she said. "Anything. Just let me know you can hear me in there."

The only response was her stomach gurgling, and Belle gave a wan smile. "I guess that's my answer. You're hungry, and only treacle tart will do. You're going to have such a sweet tooth when you grow up. Daddy's going to spoil you rotten, little one. You've already got him wrapped around your little finger. But then again, you've got me hook, line and sinker as well. Why else would I be down here baking at three o'clock in the morning?"

There was no response from her tummy, and Belle sighed. Time to roll the pastry and get cooking whilst she waited for a sign.

X

Gold woke suddenly and completely to a rather loud crashing sound from the kitchen. He sat bolt upright and turned to see if Belle had been disturbed by the noise, only to find her side of the bed empty. It then occurred to him that if Belle was not beside him, she had likely been the cause of the noise. Given that it had been a rather loud and alarming crash, he shot out of bed as fast as his stiff leg would take him, grabbed his cane and his dressing gown (it was not a good idea for one to confront possible burglars and other potentially dangerous situations when one had no clothes on), and rushed down the stairs.

"Belle!" he called. "Are you all right?"

Naturally, in his sleep muddled state, he was assuming that the very worst had happened, and several scenarios vied for dominance in his mind, each one as terrifying as the last - from intruders holding his wife at knifepoint to the baby deciding it was time to come fourteen weeks early.

There was no answer, and Gold called out again. "Belle!"

"I'm fine," she replied at last, and Gold entered the kitchen to a sight that was not at all one that he was expecting.

Belle was standing in the middle of the kitchen, what looked to have once been a treacle tart splattered on the floor in front of her, one hand pressed over her belly and an expression of utter wonder on her face.

"She kicked, Gold," Belle murmured. "I've never felt a kick before. My last appointment with the midwife, I said I was worried because I hadn't felt a kick."

At last convinced that all was, in fact, well in the world, Gold came over to Belle and offered her a hand to step over the sticky mess that had at one point been her midnight snack, and he guided her over to the nearest kitchen chair, pulling up one next to her.

"There it is again!" Belle smiled and took Gold's hand, placing it gently on her bump and closing her own over it. "It was right…there."

On cue, Gold felt the fluttering movement under his palm, delicate as a butterfly's wings.

"I don't think that's a kick," he said, "I think that's a wave. He's waving hello."

"She," Belle corrected automatically. They had decided in the end to keep the baby's gender a surprise, but Belle was certain that she was having a girl. "Hello in there, little one," she said softly, undoing her dressing gown and letting it fall open so that she could stroke her tummy, uncaring of being nearly naked in the kitchen in the small hours of the morning. "I love you so much, even if you did make me drop your treacle tart. You gave me a bit of a shock, but I'm very happy that you're saying hello. You don't know it's night time in there, do you? It's always nice and dark and warm and snug. They say you can recognise voices even before you're born," she continued. "You can recognise me, can't you? I'm Mummy, and the one with the lovely rich Glasgow brogue is Daddy. Say something," she hissed to Gold. "She needs to know who's who!"

Gold laughed and bent to kiss Belle's tummy, just above where a little hand or foot was still making its presence known.

"Hello darling. Very pleased to meet you."

He felt something wet drip onto his head and looked up. Belle was crying.

"Belle? Sweetheart?"

"I'm just so happy," Belle said, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. "I was getting so worried, but now everything's going to be all right."

Gold smiled. Everything was more than all right.