The ringing of the bell was so quiet that Belle almost missed it.

She had been sobbing uncontrollably in one of the back rooms of his shop, hugging her chipped teacup and the dagger. She'd wanted to be alone, but now she was regretting her choice of location. Yes, it had been her home, but it had been her home with him. The entire shop was stuffed from the bottom to the top with his belongings: magical items, personal items, stolen items, random things that Belle could research for years and never understand what they were. However, the one thing that she did know was what made the shop most unbearable; every item in this shop was something that he would choose over her.

The bell reverberated faintly throughout the shop and Belle paused mid-sob, a feeling of dread sinking through her stomach. She prayed it wasn't Mary Margaret again. She knew that the woman meant well, but at the moment there was only so much smothering comfort that Belle could take. Alternatively, it could be someone here to see if he really was gone. It was hardly surprising that people would want to check, really.

Hesitantly, Belle stood and peaked out through the gap in the curtain into the main area of the store. Standing there was the last person that she expected to see, bright blue eyes scanning the shop as though looking for something.

"What are you doing here?" She said sharply, stepping out from her hiding place to confront the unwelcome former pirate captain.

Hook studied her impassively for a moment, his handsome features unreadable.

"If you've come to gloat-" Belle began angrily, blinking back fresh tears.

"Regardless of what you may think, I'm not that much of a monster," Hook replied simply. "Why don't you sit down?" He added, as an afterthought, gesturing with his hook to the bed that Belle had woken up in that morning.

When Belle hesitated, Hook sighed and moved towards her, gently extracting the cup and dagger from her grip. Belle opened her mouth to yell at him, ready to fight before she let him take the dagger that easily, but, to her surprise, he simply dropped it on the counter and guided her over to her cot.

"What do you want?" Belle asked again, resigned now.

Hook sat down next to her, suddenly fiddling with his namesake as though reluctant to meet her eyes.

"I wanted to thank you, first of all, for saving my life. I owe you a great debt," he told her quietly.

"I didn't do it for you," Belle blurted out before she could stop herself. "I did it because what he was doing was wrong."

Hook half-grimaced. "Aye. I know, but I appreciate it all the same."

Belle glanced at him sideways, but couldn't detect anything mocking on his face. If anything he looked a bit sad and bitter, consumed with a certain self-loathing that Belle recognized from her own dealings with Anna. Letting Anna fall had haunted her for her entire life, and then the whole incident with Ingrid's mirror had only made things worse. Belle shuddered at the memory, suddenly feeling herself slip into another scene in this shop, one in which she had begged her husband for forgiveness and told him that she didn't deserve him...

A tear slipped down Belle's cheek, and she wiped it away quickly. She glanced over at Hook to see if he had noticed, and suddenly found herself face to face with a flask.

"Rum, love?" Hook offered.

"Rum?!" Belle exclaimed in disgust.

Hook shrugged, his face twisting into a half smile. "Sometimes the best medicine for times like these is to drink them away."

Belle meant to refuse, but before she knew what she was doing, she had gathered two clean - if slightly dusty - cups and was holding them out to her unexpected guest.

"We might as well do this properly," she commented.

Hook grinned and filled up the cups to much higher than may have been socially acceptable, before holding his cup out to hers. "Cheers."

The glasses clinked and Belle took a sip of her drink, grimacing slightly. If Hook noticed, he didn't comment.

"I still don't understand why you're here," Belle said after a few minutes of silence, both pirate and princess focusing wholly on their drinks. "Surely it wasn't just for an apology or to make me drunk."

Hook turned to her, drinking the remnants of his glass in one large swallow before pouring himself some more.

"Emma went to check on Regina, who is perhaps the only person in this town who had a bad day that comes close to yours, and it seemed to me that someone should come see how you were faring as well," he told her matter-of-factly.

"And you decided you were the man for the job?" Belle asked incredulously.

Hook looked down at his glass again, running his thumb absently across its side.

"I know what it means to know loss, particularly the loss of a loved one. You forget that I spent well on 200 years mourning the loss of my love. So, yes, lass, I thought that I may be the man for the job. No one should be alone while they're grieving. The least I could do was provide you with a drink and some company. Besides, you did save my life after I tried to kill you twice in the past. If empathy isn't justifiable to you as a motivator, than take this as partially fulfilling my debt to you, milady." Hook raised his glass again in a toast to his companion, never taking his eyes off of hers. To her surprise, Belle read only sincerity in them.

"It's not the same thing, though," she replied finally, holding her drink with both hands in a gesture of almost childlike vulnerability. "Rumple was my true love. When we first kissed, in the Enchanted Forest, he began to transform back into a man. Only true love's kiss could break his curse. And I sent him away," Belle sobbed.

Hook looked at her sadly, before gently rubbing circles into her back with the curve of his hook.

"You had good reason to do so, love. Not because of his actions against myself or others, but solely for what he did to you. You deserve much more than lies, lass. And as for him being your true love... I used to imagine that a person only got one true love in his or her lifetime, but I don't anymore. I loved Milah with all of my heart, and now I feel the same about Emma. You know that what you had with the croc- with Rumplestiltskin was real, but a lovely lass like you is bound to find that again. You did what was best for you, lass, and that takes more courage than your husband ever had," the pirate captain replied earnestly.

"I never thought I'd hear a 'hope speech' coming from you," Belle commented, studying her companion as though she had never seen him before.

Hook raised an eyebrow. "I don't know if I'd call it that. Hope speeches are a little bit too good to be true. I'm just telling you what I observe and what little bit of wisdom I've gathered in my life. But I suppose it could be an overdose of the Charming family," he added with a crooked grin.

Belle took another sip of her rum, mulling over Hook's words.

"If I am bothering you, though, lass, just let me know and I'll be off," he added, sincerity filling his words.

"No, I actually don't think I'd mind a 'drinking buddy', as they say here," Belle said with a small smile.

Hook grinned back, mischief dancing in his eyes. "Well, perhaps we should move onto lighter subject matter. Rum is the best remedy for grief, but it may be tied with humour..."

Hook launched into an animated story about a prank he and his brother had played on their mother when she still was alive, and soon Belle was laughing for the first time since she'd discovered her husband's betrayal.

As he moved onto a new anecdote, eyebrows wiggling in his enthusiastic storytelling, Belle realized something. She had once told this man that his heart was rotten and her husband's was true. As much as she hated to admit it, perhaps the opposite had occurred. Maybe it had happened slowly, or maybe it had always been that way, but, somehow, underneath everything, Captain Hook was a good man.

And, more importantly, a hell of a drinking buddy.