Author's Note: "Why didn't he fix the cup?" everyone asks. Sat down at my computer and wrote this out in less than ten minutes after watching 'Straight on Till Morning'...I was inspired by that finale. And sobbing my tiny fangirl heart out. Please forgive the poor quality below...its a product of the emotions. :)

Never Fixed It

He never fixed the cup.

He stayed just outside her room, standing with his head pressed hard against the wall, focusing on the pain, relying on it to keep his brown eyes dark and fierce as he glared at anyone who dared to stop and notice him, lingering there like someone lost.

Frightened, they moved on too quicky to see how white his knuckles were, how they shook as he clenched the hard, golden handle of his cane.

The metald was cold, but his fingers were sweating. He couldn't let go to wipe them on his hankerchief or even just on his trousers, because he knew that the minute he let go he'd start shaking uncontrollably. And control was one thing, just one thing in this blessed world that he must never lose.

So he waited.

Until a nurse with red hair pulled back tightly under her cap and a severe face that could curdle milk pushed Belle's door open with her foot, carrying a broom and a dustpan.

Without so much as a word to her, he moved forward and roughly tore the dustpan from her hand. Not recognizing him, she yelped in outrage. Her flapping hand smacked his elbow, but he only held on tighter, mouth in a thin line as he whipped a velvet blue bag out of his pocket.

He couldn't remember when he'd conjured it into being. Maybe his heart had done it for him. Or whatever served him as a heart…Guilt? Longing? Grief? Pain? Yes, one of those had commanded his magic to prepare something to hold what he now took from the nurse.

He shifted a corner of the dustpan into the mouth of the bag. The nurse had gone quiet, realizing who he was. She watched with wide, curious, slightly greedy eyes as the most powerful man in Storybrooke took posession of every single grain of the porcelain shards that had once been a cup. A chipped cup, at that.

With a merry tinkle, the broken pieces tumbled into the bag. And every merry sound added a fragment to the pain burning behind his eyes, the pain that was so terrifyingly strong as it urged him to cry.

When the dustpan was empty, he pushed it back and let her grab it. Then he pulled the golden cord tightly. He held it in the palm of his hand a moment, soft with velvet and sharp with the pieces poking into his skin. He knew the nurse was still there, breathing at his shoulder. He didn't clutch it. He forced himself not to.

Instead, he deposited it safely into his pocket, picked up the cane from where it leaned against his hip, and began limping away down the smooth, slippery white corridor.

The nurse was a smart woman; she didn't say anything.

He took the pieces home, and he never fixed them. She didn't remember him anymore…didn't remember anything. The only real thing in his entire world…the only person who didn't belong to him, who saw him for what he was and yet still cared for him…she was gone.

And it was all his fault.

Why do you think anyone who's ever gotten close to him…

"You're a coward, Rumplestiltskin."

Has either run away….

"You're still a man who makes wrong choices."

Or been killed?

"I'll be here waiting for you."

He didn't deserve his cup. He didn't deserve her. He only deserved fragmented reminders of what he'd once had. What gives a demon the right to have an angel? What gives him the right to look at her, cherish her, protect her…speak to her? Soil her lips with his? Overshadow her soul with his lack of one?

He'd been stupid. The angel had touched him, and he'd fancied himself a man. Fancied that God would forget all he'd done, that maybe, just maybe, he could have one person to share his life with, after he'd destroyed so many others.

But that was so, so stupid. And wrong. He'd never deserved her, and now he could never have her.

He never fixed the cup.

Even when another little devil…not even a devil, really, no one could be compared to him, but just a wild, pretty little barfly…had sauntered in with his angel's face on. Even then, he hadn't fixed the cup.

Because that was Belle's cup, not Lacey's.

But he was still so stupid. He thought someone who didn't act like his angel, like his Belle, could wear her face and be just as good, because she let him lead her wherever he wanted to.

And then he realized he couldn't lead anyone down his dark and condemned path, especially not someone who looked like, spoke like, and, deep inside, was Belle. He couldn't make them share his darkness.

No one deserved that.

Then he lost Baelfire. Just when he was about to destroy Bae's son, his son's son. They came with the news. As if since Belle was gone, the world was taking her place by telling him, "Look what you've done."

And he knew he'd done it all. All his fault. He failed. Everything. Everyone's pain and suffering had been for nothing…all of his pain and suffering…all nothing. Worthless. As empty a sacrifice as his lame leg. As big a failure.

He'd lost his baby and he'd lost his angel and he was so, so surprised even though he knew he'd never deserved them in the first place. He knew that and he was still so surprised (gods, he was stupid) and he'd lost them and he was in so much pain (so stupid).

He needed Belle.

He needed her.

He needed her to look at him with open blue eyes, without judging him for what he'd done and how badly he'd failed (so selfish), he wanted her to forgive him for what he'd put her through and maybe understand how much he'd wanted to keep her (stupid) and just maybe find it in her big, beautiful heart to hold him because he'd failed and his baby was dead (it hurts) and everything, everything was going to end.

So he fixed the cup.

And she held him.

She forgave him.

And as the vines began breaking through the window and the trees rose up through the floor he clutched the baby blanket in one tight, white, shaking fist, cane forgotten on the ground, leaning into her and sobbing into her shoulder as she stroked his hair and cried into his suit. Her hand clutched the fixed cup.

She was beautiful and bright and so, so Belle in his arms.

And, she whispered to his stupid, selfish heart, crying for Bae as much as he was, she still loved him.

FINIS