It's Always Sunny in Storybrooke!

Chapter Part 6

"Morning!" Tink said loudly, bursting through the door.

Belle covered her ears, wincing at the sudden flood of light and noise. She had purposefully kept the library dark, closing all the curtains and turning the lights on low. She and Hook had truly outdone themselves at the White Rabbit yesterday.

"What are you doing here?" she grumbled, lowering her hands. Tink tossed a box on a table and swung herself up to sit on the counter. She leaned on her elbow, watching Belle put barcode stickers on new books.

"Blue—excuse me, Mother Superior—" she rolled her eyes—"needs that box of crap—sorry, books—rebound."

"Can you talk a little lower?" Belle said through gritted teeth. "I'm kind of dealing with an epic hangover here."

Tink grinned. "Yeah, I know."

Belle frowned at her. "You're not a very nice girl."

"No, I'm not," she agreed. "That's what makes me such a shitty nun."

Belle had a sudden mental picture of Tink in a nun's habit, with her hair covered by a heavy cloth veil."It just weirds me out, thinking of you as a nun," she said, shaking her head.

"Meh," she shrugged. "I'm not, really. All the other fairies are, and I'm stuck living with them 'til I find my own place, but 'nun' is really only a technical title. Well, at least... that's how I'm choosing to think of it." She blew out a breath. "So. Epic hangover, huh?"

"Yeah," Belle yawned, taking another book from her pile. "Hook's got girl trouble, so I took him out drinking—"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Tink said suddenly, holding up her hand. She looked at Belle scoldingly. "Why would you let him drink in that state?"

Belle's eyebrows rose. "Because," she said, rather defensively. "It's our thing. That's how he gets over stuff."

"No. That's how he holds onto stuff, so he can keep bitching about it, and have an excuse to get drunk off his ass," Tink said matter-of factly, flipping through a book on trains. "God, this is dull."

"What do you know about it?" Belle said, stung by Tink's dismissive criticism. "You're not on the other side of the phone every day, you're not sitting with him at Granny's every day—I am. I know how to deal with Hook, okay?"

Tink looked up, unfazed. "Well, I spent two hundred years with the guy in Neverland," she said flatly. "So, yeah, I think I know what I'm talking about. And I say, drinking is not how you deal with him." She went back to her book. "The man's an alcoholic."

Belle shifted on her heels, feeling much less certain than she had before. Something about the way Tink talked about him made her feel... distant. As if there was a lot about Hook she didn't know about, and she was suddenly painfully aware. Yesterday, he had been her best friend; at the present moment, he seemed more of a stranger than anything.

"You knew him pretty well, huh?" she said finally.

Tink looked up at the dejected tone in her voice, and offered her a sympathetic smile. "Hey, come on," she said lightly. "Don't take it personally."

"I'm not," Belle insisted, sounding like a petulant child.

"Look—" Tink hopped off the counter and started unpacking the box of books. "I know Hook is the last person you'd expect to have a type. I mean, the man'll sleep with literally whoever—whatever— will let him. " She dropped a stack of worn books on the counter, making Belle wince again. "But when it comes to... you know—" she raised her fingers in air-quotes—"besties ..." She smiled apologetically.