The alarm rang at 6:30 AM; Gold blindly reached out with one hand to hit the button to turn the ringer off. For a moment he tried to recapture the memory of a nightmare. He had been held in some sort of medieval prison, but a cave instead of a dungeon, with what looked to be bones for bars. Strange the things the mind came up with.
He had worked late at the pawn shop the night before polishing a silver tea service. For a moment, he thought about rolling over and going back to sleep. As sole proprietor and employee of the shop, he could set his own hours. And it wasn't as if the shop was ever busy; most people avoided him unless it was rent day. And even then, they would have loved to avoid him.
But Gold was a creature of habit, and 6:30 meant it was time to get up. He forced himself to sit up, left hand automatically grasping the gold top of his cane that rested next to his bed. As he switched it to his right hand, he wondered again why he didn't just sleep on the other side of the bed. He shuffled his feet into the slippers on the floor and stood up on his left leg, favoring the right one even more than usual. The welcome coolness of late September following the short, hot Maine summer was turning quite rapidly into the coldness of a November winter, and his leg throbbed from the change. He thought fleetingly of becoming a snow bird, one of those Mainers who wintered in Florida or Arizona, someplace warm. But he was born and raised in Glasgow, and a bit of arctic cold could never be allowed to bother a Scotsman.
He peered into the mirror as he shaved and brushed his teeth. His long, mousy brown hair was shot through with gray. His golden brown eyes were framed by wrinkles that, on a sunnier personality, would be described as 'laugh lines'; but Gold rarely laughed, at least not at the silly things most people found humorous. I'm getting old. A hot shower revived his leg enough that he felt he didn't need to take any prescription pain killers, but it didn't improve his mood much.
He pulled out a black three-piece suit from a dry cleaning bag in his closet. He grabbed a light purple dress shirt with a darker tie and handkerchief to match from the closet. The crueler sort of children would talk about how only girls wore purple. And the town gossips, of both the male and the female persuasion, would start wondering again about possible skeletons in his closet (he especially liked the one about an insane wife locked up in his basement) given that he was rapidly approaching middle age and the complete absence of overt interest in women since his arrival in Storybrooke. He put the purple items back, exchanging them for their black counterparts; today he would be in unrelieved black. It seemed fitting what with Samhain (or as the Americans celebrated it, Halloween) only eight days away.
It wasn't that he didn't like women; he did. He had sown his wild oats, so to speak, first in college and then at law school, had even flirted with the idea of marrying one of his girlfriends when he practiced at that firm down in Boston. But he was not a romantic, and when they inevitably parted ways, he didn't miss them. Oh, he did miss having a regular dinner partner and someone to argue over the morning newspaper with, but not enough to marry just to keep the silence at bay. And now that he was older, the women he had met at the theater or charity events (otherwise known as tax breaks) in Portland or Bangor described him as debonair and sophisticated. A few of the more mature had indicated that they were quite willing to trade their last names for his bank account and a brownstone in the Back Bay or facing Central Park. And the younger women with their midriff baring shirts and minuscule skirts were willing to spend a year or two of their youth on him as long as he kept them in style, jetting them to Europe, introducing them to Hollywood moguls (not that he knew any), and/or keeping them supplied with their drug of choice. Any women he talked to of the less mercenary type were either already happily involved with someone or scared that his reputation for ruthless business and law practices also applied to his personal life. So he remained single and not completely unhappy about it.
Gold hobbled down the stairs to the kitchen. He filled the kettle with cold water and put it on the stove to boil. He remembered the one time he had tried the convenience of microwaving water instead, and shuddered at the unwelcome recollection of its nasty metallic aftertaste. A proper pot was made with loose tea leaves (which were not readily available here in Storybrooke); he had had to learn to live with bagged tea when his supply of loose leaf tea ran out. Boiled water was also good for making a quick oatmeal breakfast; he stirred maple syrup and chopped pecans into the oats. As he ate, he skimmed the Sunday newspaper: a prison riot in Illinois, a march for Nuclear Disarmament in London, Regina Mills' editorial on why Storybrooke should institute an annual town forest clean-up day. He poured a second cup of tea, and drank that slowly while he completed the newspaper's daily crossword and crostics puzzles. He carefully washed, rinsed, dried, and put away the few dishes; there was no reason to use the dishwasher when he was the only one eating.
It wasn't quite 8 AM when he shrugged himself into his overcoat, grabbed his wallet, keys, and sunglasses, and locked up the house for the day. As he walked towards the driveway, he wondered, as he did almost every morning, whether he should hire someone to paint over the salmon colored exterior. Perhaps a neutral brown or tan. Or a soothing blue. But as always, he decided to leave it alone as yet another topic for the gossips: the eccentric Mr. Gold and his pink house.
The outside temperature was only a bit above freezing. He carefully wedged his cane in the passenger seat side, and eased into the driver's seat of his Cadillac. The leather seat was cold at first, but soon warmed and molded to his frame. The engine purred smoothly as he made the short drive into the business part of town. He stopped for a school bus filling up with children; no other town in Maine had school on Sundays.
Gold parked his car, deciding to walk the last few blocks, hoping that it would stretch out his cramping leg muscles. And maybe a bit of fresh air would improve his mood. Archie Hopper, the town psychologist, was walking his Dalmatian and carrying an umbrella against the threat of rain. Tom Clark was unlocking the pharmacy in between sneezes. Across the street, Ruby was arguing with her grandmother; he couldn't hear the words, but he suspected it was either about Granny's cooking or where the rest of Ruby's clothing were hiding. There was Marco fixing the Five and Dime store sign again; he fixed it yesterday, too. Odd… he was usually a better carpenter than that. And Regina, the mayor, looking a bit too smug for this early in the morning; Sheriff Graham must have shown her a really good time last night. Gold gave them credit for trying to be discrete, but anyone who was awake and out late at night would find his patrol car parked down the street from her house a few nights every week, and they both conveniently had 'town council meetings', to which none of the rest of the town council was invited, for hours at a time on the occasional Saturday afternoons.
Gold unlocked the pawn shop door, not locking it behind him, but leaving the sign to Closed. He wouldn't open the shop for business until 11 which gave him just under three hours to work in peace and quiet. Not that flipping the sign to Open would ensure his loss of peace and quiet; there were many, many days where no one would enter his shop at all. Most of the people of Storybrooke couldn't afford his antiques and while he did have a side business of providing monetary loans to people the bank rejected, those that did come to him, broken and begging, usually came in through the back door so as to avoid the shame and humiliation of being seen doing business with the devil incarnate.
Just because this business wasn't busy with customers didn't mean he didn't have work to do. He had an 1845 pocket watch to restore, a 1941 compass that needed its clasp repaired, and a book on glass blowers to read. He was hoping to find out who made the unicorn crib mobile; he had purchased it for its beauty and originality, but it came without any provenance. Knowing who had commissioned the piece and/or who created it would increase its value. And if he ever became bored with his pawn shop duties, there was always bookkeeping for his various rental properties and loans to do, and legal reviews to read to keep his law practice up to date.
He hung up his coat and suit jacket and turned on the radio to a soft rock station for some background noise; Elton John was crooning about an empty garden in New York City, a memorial to the late, great, John Lennon. He hung an apron strap around his neck and tied the belt; the apron would keep the watch's dirt and grease from ruining his clothes while allowing him to maintain a professional look should any customers wander in. The watch lay on a cheese cloth on his work table; Gold hung his cane within easy reach, and proceeded to carefully take the watch apart.
Gold became aware that hours had passed only because his stomach growled and gurgled loud enough to interrupt his concentration. He looked out the shop windows to see that the street lights were lit; not only had he missed lunch and the first dinner rush at Granny's, but the door sign was still turned to Closed. He limped to a cabinet to put away the now mended pocket watch and compass; he'd find a spot on the shop floor for them tomorrow. As he put them away, he espied a broken porcelain tea cup and saucer sitting on a shelf. And he thought, for perhaps the hundredth time this month alone, that he really should just throw the thing away. It was a cheaply made, mass produced item to begin with, was not part of any set he sold in the shop, and with that chip in the rim, no one was going to buy it. Resolved at last to throw the piece of junk out, he picked up the cup.