From the Dark Side: Stories as told by Disney Villains

Belle: Gaston

"Belle was a beautiful girl who I fell in love with when we first met as kids. I used to tease her because I liked her, but she never understood. When we were teenagers I tried asking her out, but she rejected me. She rejected—this." I motioned to my good-looking self before realizing my audience wasn't a room full of Belles. It was a group of women way too out of my league, two sorcerers, a lion, and a sea witch. Not exactly what I had intended.

Ursula snorted before whispering something to Jafar. He laughed, but immediately sobered and once again stroked his beard to show his innocence when Maleficent shot the two of them a threatening look.

"So, I found someone who would date me, just to make Belle jealous. Well, it didn't work. She got married to someone of her own liking and I kicked her out, who I'd asked to marry me, because she wasn't doing a good job of winning my Belle back for me," I said.

Ursula seemed extremely interested in what I was saying, but perhaps a little too much.

By the time we were adults, she still hated me and I was falling apart, desperately in love. Then that—thing—came along and she fell in love with it. That—that hideously terrible beast who was worse to her than I ever was. And then she defended him when I formed my army of beast-haters! "Why wouldn't she want me? What is so wrong with me that I couldn't get her?" I asked, exasperated.

"It don't make sense to me," said Ursula. "You and me brotha, we got to stick together! You've got to show her how much you care because if you don't keep doing that she'll just leave you for someone else."

Everyone in the room seemed to agree.

"Even when I tried to tell her how much she meant to me, I was just thrown to the curb. Did I deserve that?" said Gaston.

"No, no of course not!" answered Maleficent. "This goes to show how much we cannot trust those good-for-nothing humans like Belle who just don't understand that we're trying to protect them."

I snapped my fingers. "Exactly! The beast was a dangerous being, but Belle still went after him. I wanted to keep her safe, so therefore I should've won her!" I said.