The worst was the nightmares.

The feeling of waking up and realizing that the tightness in your chest wouldn't go away.

Gold hated that feeling.

"Rumple?"

He was halfway dressed, in the midst of buttoning up a dark shirt, "I'm going to go for a walk."

"Did you have another nightmare?" she asked quietly.

He didn't feel like talking, and didn't reply verbally. He just nodded and he shrugged on a suit jacket for warmth. He went for the door.

"When will you be back?" she asked.

"Don't wait up for me," he said finally and left.

The cool night air filled his nose and his chest, making the tightness seem worse than it actually was. As he walked down the steps without his cane, he didn't really have a specific destiny in mind. He just needed to move. That was his new thing; moving. Using his freedom to the full extent, he started walking towards the main street. There was lighting, no cars, or people, and no one to ask him about why the hell he wasn't home sleeping with his beautiful wife.

He heard the ocean in the distance and paused. There were benches by the dock.

There were a few lampposts still shining when he arrived. One of them blinked ominously, and he steered clear of that one. The bench was cold and the sensation made his shoulders tense. He leaned back and tried to relax, feeling the backrest of the bench against his spine. A sparse amount of gulls rested a few feet away on the edge of a boat.

He folded his hands in his lap and breathed. His breath turned white when he exhaled, but by now he hardly felt it. Instead it had become something of a persistent tingle in his limbs, leaving his hands and feet pretty senseless. But just being aware of the sensations was enough for now. It proved that this was real. It wasn't a dream, or a nightmare. And reality could be controlled.

Why did Charming have to talk without thinking?

The prince had apologized afterwards, and the sorcerer hated to admit it, but it had taken more than a few hours to calm down. He hated it, he really did. Belle had tried to help, but he still wasn't comfortable with her touch. And he wanted to make Zelena suffer a most painful death for making him behave this way. He used to love having Belle put her fingers through his hair; now it made bile rise up his throat and he always slapped the hand away in minor panic.

He heard footsteps and was up from his seat in an instant.

David's face was half obscured by the dark, "Gold?"