His name was Mr. Gold.
Mr. Gold was all he'd ever gone by, all he could ever remember being called with perhaps the one exception of Master Gold when he was a boy. Looking back, he couldn't remember a single person who had ever called him by his first name; no teachers, no friends, not even colleagues. No one ever asked him for his first name, and he'd never met anyone who needed it. He was only Mr. Gold. And he liked it that way.
He preferred to be Mr. Gold. Nameless, mysterious, and formal as it was, his lack of a friendly name afforded him a level of respect and fear with those he lived among. Some people worked years to develop that kind of reputation; it came simply by giving a name for him.
"Hi, I'm Gary," they might say, extending a hand.
He had only to stare at that hand, tighten his grip on his cane, and inform them, "you can call me Mr. Gold," and then sit back and take satisfaction in their immediate discomfort.
As a boy, he supposed it was possible his mother might have called him by his first name. His father had always told him that it was she who gave him his first name, after an uncle or a cousin or some relative he'd never met. It didn't particularly matter to him; giving him his name hadn't exactly made his mother want to stay with him. Or his father. Though after she'd left him to grow up with his father, he couldn't say that he blamed her.
His father was a cold man, clever and conniving. He'd often traveled while he'd been alive, leaving him home with the servants who called him Master Gold and entertained him to the best of their abilities. They never particularly cared for him, but to be fair, he never cared for them either. Young as he was, he'd always been aware that they were paid to look after him in his father's stead. Until one day, his father came home, packed a bag, and never came back.
The servants had explained that his father had found work elsewhere that was no place for a boy his age. So he was informed he would be moving across the sea from Scotland to America. His father had a sister there, who lived with her partner, and they'd agreed to keep him with them. All on his own, a boy of only eight, he'd made the journey by plane, then train, then car to his aunt's home in a dreary little place called Storybrooke, Maine.
Somehow he had hoped for more when he'd arrived, that he might have friends or find someone who was happy to spend time with him, but what he found in America was heartbreakingly similar to Scotland. It was another house, filled with servants that helped him dress and tutors to help him learn. At least, his aunts were around, and unlike his father, they did care for him, show him love and consideration, but they isolated themselves from the town they lived. So much so that all of them, himself included, were treated as outcasts.
His aunts were the talk of the town. He didn't go out often, but on occasion, one of the servants who was fond of him took him somewhere as a treat. Everywhere they went, whispers followed.
"That's the young Master Gold," they whispered.
"Gold…as in-"
"The very same!"
"It's scandalous! Imagine, a woman living with another woman as if they were married."
"And now they're raising a child together?!"
"Just goes to show you that when you have money, you can do as you please, no morals!"
As a small child, he never understood what they found so scandalous. As a teenager, he grew to understand their conversations but still didn't understand why they were so flustered by his aunts. It wasn't as if his aunts interjected into the business of others or flaunted themselves about town. For the most part, they stayed hidden and out of sight, sending servants to do their tasks, content to love one another behind closed doors. His aunts never bothered with them, and he couldn't understand why they had to bother with his aunts. As far as he was concerned, they were the best people he'd ever known.
The women doted on him as his father never had, calling him "darling" and "sweetheart" and "dear boy," but they never brought themselves to call him by the name his mother, "that pitiful woman" they called her, gave to him. They played games with him and taught him to knit and cook. His aunts bought him everything he needed or wanted. A dog for a companion, a playground for exercise, a car when he came of age to drive, and a top-notch education at the local catholic school that kept him out of the public schools. He hated the nuns who taught him, he thought they were cruel and judgmental of his family just like the rest of town, but it was because of his education that he earned him a spot at the best law school the country had to offer.
He was sad when he had to leave them for school; away for months on end, he missed his aunts. Storybrooke and the rest of her citizens he couldn't care less for. But his aunts…he missed them terribly. He missed them so much that he returned to Storybrooke and opened his own law firm when he graduated. His aunts were primary investors, of course, but he worked hard and found he was successful. A little of this, a little of that, it was enough to keep him busy, enough to buy him his own home in town where he could stay on the weekdays and go back to his aunts during the weekends. It was an embarrassing rosy pink color, but aside from that, it was perfect. It was one of the biggest houses in town and grand beyond measure. As soon as he had it repainted, it would be nearly as intimidating and mysterious as he prided himself on being. However, that wasn't what his aunts saw when he bought it.
"It's big enough to put a family in, darling!" his aunts smiled when they saw it.
He'd smiled and blushed at their insinuation, but all the while, his stomach turned over. A wife and children…he knew that was the natural order of things, and yet…he couldn't see it for himself, and it wasn't something he wanted enough to pursue. He couldn't see himself ever meeting someone that would make him want to give them his first name. He couldn't imagine having a child and potentially screwing them up as his father and mother had with him. He couldn't see how any woman would ever want to deal with his leg.
It was a burden. And the cane was a pain. Truthfully, he couldn't remember the injury. It felt like he'd had it all his life, but he was cane free in his memories as a boy and at law school. He assumed it was a car accident, perhaps something that crushed his ankle and took his memory away because when he tried to remember, tried to pull a memory from his mind to relate to it, he found a blinding pain in the back of his skull that demanded he stop thinking about it. There were times he tried to remember to ask his aunts what had happened, but he always seemed to forget. Probably because his aunts thought nothing of the affliction, they treated him no differently, no better or worse than they ever had with it. But he was certain a woman wouldn't want someone as broken as he was. True, his family had enough money he could shower any woman in jewels all the rest of her life, take her around the world on grand, expensive trips, meet all the most powerful people in the world. But he didn't want a woman who only wanted him for his wealth. He wanted something real; like his aunts had. After years of watching them together, years of battling back the stigma, and just being happy to be with one another, that was the life he dreamed of having. But he had so little experience with the opposite sex he had no idea how he'd ever discern what was real from fake. So there was no need to take the risk. Besides, why did he need to? Things were good. He had his reputation, had a home that he loved, and had his aunts…why did he need more?
It was September when his world fell apart.
His aunts died barely a month apart. Cancer had claimed his aunt's partner quickly, so quickly he hadn't been prepared for it, and nor had she. A few weeks later, his father's sister had died. The doctors gave him a laundry list of reasons why it had happened; old age, failing heart, high blood pressure...but he knew why it had really happened. She'd died of a broken heart. He was a stern and serious man, unrelenting and unforgiving; it was what made him a good lawyer. He believed in material things, in money and power, in black and white, and things he could see. But he believed, truly, with his whole heart, that it was heartbreak that took her. His love hadn't been enough to keep her on this earth. And so they'd left him alone in it.
In the months that followed, he wished he wasn't a lawyer. He knew, from experience, that it should have been easy. He should have made funeral arrangements, liquidated their property and their assets dismissed the staff, and gone on with his life. But nothing was simple, and he soon learned the truth about his aunts that led to complications.
Why had the townspeople always bothered with them when his aunts had never bothered with the town? Because they had bothered with the town. It was theirs.
He hadn't known it until after their death when documentation they'd had since before he'd even moved to America arrived, explaining to him that the land Storybrooke rested on belonged to his father and his aunt. Because his father couldn't be located, he was next of kin, and now it was his and his alone. The land, rental agreements, business contracts...legally, it was all his. The town existed and had a government of its own that demanded taxes, but everything outside the scope of politics fell to him. He loved his aunts, but he'd never been angrier in all his life. They'd never explained any of it to him, never told him why they owned the land or the contract they had with the city, they never taught him how to collect the rents or deal with the mayor.
He didn't want to do it. In fact, he was tempted to turn it over to the Mayor and let her handle it, but he could hear the voice of his father in the back of his head preaching to him about money and power. Whether he'd planned on it or not, he was the most powerful citizen of the town. It wasn't something he took lightly, and he wasn't about to give it up easily. So he didn't. He crafted a persona for himself; he created a new mask, one that he wore for the Mayor, for the police, for the tenants he had to collect rent from, and the family he'd hired to help him. Mr. Gold was a name everyone knew. They didn't dare whisper about him or his aunts, not in his presence, lest he raise their rent. They didn't cross him. They didn't approach him. They didn't bother him. For the most part, they let him be. It was good, but it also meant that his firm suffered the consequences.
It was fine. He didn't need the money; he didn't need to work. His aunts had set him up so that he could sit at home for the rest of his life and never leave the house if he so pleased, just as they had. But he wasn't them. They'd had each other, and they'd had him. He had no one, and he found himself longing for structure, for something to invest his time in, for something to occupy his days when he wasn't collecting rent or arguing with Regina Mills.
The answer came to him when one of his tenants on Main Street informed him they wouldn't be renewing their lease. Oak's Pawn Shop and Antiques was closing. Mister Oak, his wife, and his dog were moving to Florida for retirement. They planned to sell the merchandise and move out, but when he stepped inside to talk about their contractual obligations, his heart had stopped.
He loved old things. He loved their delicacy, the story behind each one, the mystery that their history presented him with. He loved the feel of the dust beneath his fingers and the coziness of the little shop. The bell on the door was darling, but it suited the place, the squeaky antique spinning wheel was familiar in a strange way, and every little thing he saw or touched seemed inviting. It felt like coming home. He hadn't had that since his aunts had died.
Foolish as it was, he'd made a deal with the Oaks on the spot, leave the shop to him, and he'd let them out of their contract and pay them a handsome sum of money. They'd taken the deal right then and there. Two weeks later, they moved to Florida. Three weeks later, a new sign was installed over the door that said, "Mr. Gold Pawnbroker and Antiques Dealer." He taught himself the business, read every book the Oaks gave to him, let his new work consume him, and soon fell into a happy routine.
Each morning he woke up, stretched, and got into the shower. He dressed in a suit, adding layer after layer to make any who felt the need to deal with him feel underdressed. That was a trick he'd learned as a lawyer. In the morning, he read the newspaper, cooked himself some breakfast, eggs usually, with spinach if he had it. He drove to town and parked his car in the lot or on the street. He didn't live far from work, but he wasn't about to walk there. With his leg, he'd never manage, and besides, walking might give the impression he cared about something. He walked down the street every morning. Sometimes people lifted their eyes to him in acknowledgment. He never returned the favor. As he unlocked the door to his shop, he glanced at the abandoned library on the corner across from him. It always made him feel uneasy, probably because it was becoming an eyesore. One of these days, he was going to file a complaint with Regina about that, but today there was too much to do.
Inside the shop, he opened the blinds and took a deep breath of the musty smell that came with age. It still felt like home, probably more like home than his pink house, which he still needed to get painted. He turned the sign behind him to "open" in case someone felt like coming in to make a deal but then escaped to the back room just like always. It was his favorite place in his shop. The spinning wheel he'd first seen when he bought the place was back here, along with a fold-away cot for nights he got carried away and just decided to sleep there. There were two tables crowded into the back that he could use to polish or repair or clean or whatever he needed to do. On the table was an old clock he'd bought that no longer worked. That was his task for today.
It was just another day in Storybrooke.
Hi! For those of you that are just checking out this fiction, welcome! For those of you who are a fan of the Chronicles of the Dark One, welcome back! I hope you'll enjoy this fiction. It's the 4th in the Chronicles, a series that is an attempt at an accurate portrayal of Rumple's perspective during the Once Upon a Time series. This fiction features everything that happened in Storybrooke from the moment that everyone arrives in the Land Without Magic up to the moment that Emma arrives in Storybrooke.
The Dark One Chronicles is meant to be a companion series with The Moments Series, which explores Once Upon a Time from Belle's perspective. This means that everything you read in the Chronicles where Belle is concerned will show up in Moments as well. It is just told from a different point of view. If you'd like to see Belle's chapters from her perspective, The Chronicles of the Dark One: Storybrooke, Maine is the companion story to Moments Seen and Unseen! You can find The Moments Series by checking out my profile.
If you enjoy this fiction, please review! I always enjoy those wonderful gems waiting for me in my inbox, and I love writing back to thank you personally for reading! It helps me know that I'm doing a decent job! Peace and Happy Reading!