The day he got the letter was the day he started talking to a woman who wasn't there.
One day in Storybrooke was much the same as its predecessor and its successor would likewise be much the same, so on this day Gold (no first name, though no one, not even himself, ever asked why) did pretty much what he always did. He walked from his big pink house (no one, not even himself, asked why his house was pink, or why he, a lame man, had bought a house with a steep set of stairs leading to the front door) to his shop. He entered through the back door, flipped on the florescent lights and the heater, plugged in his electric teakettle, walked to the front and picked up the mail that had been dropped into the door slot. As he waited for his kettle to whistle, he sorted the mail: antiques catalogues and estate sale notices in a stack on the left, bills in a stack on the right, accounts receivables in the center. No pile necessary for personal mail: he never got any.
Except for today.
The envelope was of the size used for greeting cards, except the card had been left out. The return address just said "Annie." The recipient's address, in smudged pencil, said "Mr. Gold, Storie book, Mane."
Gold slid his letter opener (nineteenth-century, solid brass with a dragon's head handle) into the seal and sliced the envelope open. Inside was a tightly folded sheet of Big Chief lined rule. He read the penciled, misspelled message, and that's when he started talking to himself, and eventually, to his long-deceased beloved Belle.
"Deer Mr. God,
I been sayin my preyers at nite every nite like the nuns say too but I gess your too far away too here me cos you never anser. So my sister says rite a letter so I am. Riting a letter. I dont no your adres but I hope the maill lady will.
How are you? I am fine.
But not rally cos my sister says thats wat you got to rite in a letter. I hope you are fine but I am not rally.
My sister her name is Sara she has to go to a job but she shuld be in school. She supose to be in 11 grade. She wants to go to school go to collej to be a docter but she cant cos we need money cos mom is sick and cant get a job cos nobuddy gives you a job if your sick. She got sick head akes and somtimes she throw up. So Sara goes to work to get money for us and I coock the food and clene house after school. I like to coock but not clene. Do you like to coock? Sara says you prolly got people for that.
Any way I am riting this letter to aks you to help. The nuns say you can do any thing. I want you to make mom not sick any more and get her a good job so we have food and things and Sara can go to school. Shes a good mom always nice to us and work hard when shes not sick and dont deserf to be sick. Is what Sara says. I aks the nuns how come she is sick and they say its the will of God so I say woold you please have a diferent will cos we need mom.
If I clene my room every day and do my home work before Sara tells me to. Woold you make mom well then?
Love from your friend Annie
XXO"
Gold tried to make a bemused sound but it came out sounding like a weak question mark. He examined the envelope more closely in search of the answers to three questions: who was this child and whatever possessed her to think he could "do any thing," to include curing the sick? And considering their centuries-old feud, what were the nuns thinking that they encouraged a child to write an appeal to the Dark One?
Now that he was looking at the envelope more closely, he realized the mistake was the post office's. The addressee wasn't "Mr. Gold"; it was "Mr. God."
No matter, then. He would simply take it to the post office during his lunch break. As he began opening the bills and sorting them for payment, he put the matter out of his mind.
Except it resurfaced as he was writing out checks. And again when he was writing deposit slips. And again when he was recording the rent payments in his ledger.
That's when he started talking to Belle, for the letter had awakened something in him. "Well, what would you have me do?" he snapped.
He could see her in his mind's eye, her fists on her hips, her sapphire eyes flashing. Help them.
"I don't know this family. There must be a dozen Annies in town."
How many with a teenager sister named Sara and a sick mother?
"Three thousand people live in this town, Belle."
And you rent to two thousand of them. In your records, the names of every soul living in your houses and apartments, right down to the pet hamsters. All you have to do is look.
"Whatever for, dearie? I run a business, not a charity."
Because the letter was sent to you.
"The letter was missent to me. Besides, I have no magic here and I'm no doctor. It's out of my hands." Yet on the word "magic" he caught himself flourishing those hands as he did when he did have power.
Money is magic here. You're the richest man in town.
"I can't heal the sick! I'm not. . . the one the letter was addressed to."
But you're the one it was meant for.
"Have you forgotten who you're talking to? I'm the Dark One, the one they call the devil in this world."
You're a father.
"To a child I haven't seen in three hundred years."
All the more reason to help the child that's here, needing your protection.
"Not my responsibility, dear."
Then whose?
He turned on the radio to some raucous noise this world called music. It gave him a headache and made his ears ring, but at least he couldn't hear her any more. Or himself. Then he shuddered, because talking to the deceased was a sure sign of mental illness, when the deceased talked back.
At noon he closed the shop and took the letter to the post office. "Clearly, a case of mistaken identity," he said as he pushed the envelope through the trough beneath the clerk's window.
The clerk glanced at the mailing address and agreed–a bit too promptly. "Clearly. Sorry, Mr. Gold."
As he walked away, he heard the clerk snigger and call over another employee. Quite the joke, that the Devil in Armani, as they called him here, had received a letter addressed to God.
He stormed back to the service window. "What's going to happen to that letter?"
The clerk stepped back as though afraid the plexiglass partition might not be enough to hold the devil back. "Same as the letters to Santa and the Tooth Fairy."
"Which is?"
"Recycling bin."
"Give it back to me."
"What? No, it's against policy–"
Gold slid a fifty dollar bill into the trough. He walked out with Annie's letter. The only reason he could come up with for his own strange behavior was that Belle would've wanted him to. Certainly, he had no intention of actually doing anything with the letter. After all, he had a reputation to uphold.
He almost forgot about the letter propped up on the dresser in his bedroom. He was a busy man with much to juggle in this world: he hadn't time to think about letters or little girls named Annie. Almost forgot, until one morning he found another handwritten envelope lying on his shop floor amid the bills and the checks and the catalogues. He threw it in the trash.
An hour later, he fished it out again because he could swear he felt Belle staring a hole into his back.
"Dere Mr. God,
In school today we lerned theres seven bilion people in the wurld. Im not sure how many of them rite you letters but I gess its alot and may be you dont get them all like some times mom says that the child suport gets lost in the mail so may be my letter got lost I'm riting agin.
Please help us Mr. God. Make my mom better but if you cant but I no you can cos your God you can do any thing. But if you cant may be you coold find the child suport checks that got lost so Sara wont have to work at the resrunt and she can go back to school. The nuns say you are father witch are in hevan and fathers are supose to take care of children rite? So I no you will help us if you get this letter.
Love from your freind Annie
XXOO"
Rumple. . . .
"Belle, I'm a busy man."
How long does it take you to write a check?
"If I help her, then I'll have to help the others: the Avas and the Nicolases and the Henrys. There'll be no end to it."
And the Baelfires?
He had no comeback for that.
Wouldn't you like to think someone out there is helping your child, since you can't? In his honor and for your own sake, Rumple.
"And if I do this, Belle? If I find this child and help her?"
Yes?
"What if it changes me?"
It already has, Rumple. Look who you're talking to.
Groaning, Gold opened his ledger.