It's been three weeks since he woke up. Three weeks of avoiding the hands and lips and I don't know what I did wrong wheedling of Charles. His husband. He watches Regina and he sees the smirk on her face when she sees them fighting by the docks, angry words and annoyance and I should leave you.
The latter makes her stop.
And it takes everything in him to not turn and grin at her and give himself away.
If she knew…
Well, if she knew, Belle would be in danger. He didn't worry about himself. He knew that Regina couldn't touch him in any tangible way. He certainly didn't worry about Charles. But Belle? He worries about her. And with good reason. He doesn't know what Regina did to her back in their world, but he suspects she had been holding onto her all that time.
How could he have been so stupid? So blind?
And the dealmaker has been beaten at his own game. He asked for comfort, a good life. And she gave him that. In spades. Expensive house and a doting, if completely inebriated, husband who adores him. Or did. The curse is breaking down. He knows this like he knows which way is north or the directions to his house or that the "closed" sign on his pawn shop really means nothing to the residents of the town.
So he stays away from Lacey French and watches her from afar. She traipses through town in outfits far too small and he wants to cover her up, wants to bring her back to his house and protect her and keep her safe, keep her away from the rest of the town and Regina and that big oaf Keith who once tried to buy her from him. As if she were so much chattel.
But he doesn't.
And the world turns around him and the curse weakens a little more each day.
The day Emma Swan decides to stay is the same day the mine collapses. Things are progressing and Gold knows he has to progress along with them. He wants to stop the madness. Every day Charles slams into the house, cocky grin in place. He tries to touch him and Gold moves away, not wanting the brush of his fingers against his face.
He shudders at the thought.
And it's not even that it's a man that is touching him. Gold has never much cared about genders and sexual attraction. The fact that his lovers have always been women has been more by chance than design. He has far more love for the beauty of the female form, but men do not repulse him.
It is Hook repulses him. Hook and his clammy hands that reach up and try to run his fingers through his hair. Hook and his I'm sorry I'll stop drinking, last time I swear. Those slurred words and his stumbling and Gold's having to put him to bed every single night. And all he wants to do is escape.
But Regina is watching. And there are times her eyes narrow at him as he blows off Charles and lets him sleep the night on the bench by the sea. Charles hasn't forgotten, somewhere deep down, that he's still just a pirate and the longing for the sea is strong in that one. He spends most of his days on the docks and Gold would prefer to leave him there forever. But Regina can't know that he knows who he is. So he smiles and begs and cajoles and brings his errant husband home almost every night.
But then Emma Swan decides to stay. And he sees the way she looks at Henry and he knows. She's going to break the curse and then it will no longer matter. Nothing will matter.
Nothing but Belle.
She's Lacey here. A tiny little thing in too much make-up and skirts so short that it would make him blush if he allowed this face to show such emotion. He knows she spends too much time at The Rabbit Hole, the dive bar on the outskirts of town. He's seen her there when he goes to find Charles, picking up his husband off the floor and dragging him home. Lacey has always watched him with a smirk on her face, holding up her glass of wine or beer or occasionally the shot she has as he sneers at her.
But this time he seeks her out.
He doesn't intend to.
Not really at least. He's kissed her and he's indicated his interest and damn if she didn't kiss him back. He should stay away. But he can't. Belle has always been a drug to him and it's no different now. He wants her. Needs her. And so when he wanders into the bar, watching people scatter in his wake, she is not the least bit surprised.
"Mr. Gold," she murmurs as he takes the seat next to her. Tonight she's dressed almost primly, the skirt that flares about her going halfway down her thighs, the shirt not quite as low cut as usual, though he can clearly see the outline of her bra beneath it. Black. And expensive. He's not sure how she affords it though he's heard the whispers.
Everyone has.
"Lacey," he mutters, mouth barely moving.
"What brings you to this part of the world?" she asks and cocks her head slightly to the side. He remembers that expression well. Belle is still there in the middle of it all.
He takes a deep breath. Swallows hard. "I…"
"Charles isn't here," she adds before he can get anything else out.
"I don't care about Charles," he says and leans just slightly toward her. The words are harsh, almost guttural. He more than doesn't care about Charles. He hates him. Hates him like he's never hated anyone before. And that includes Captain Hook, who has been an enemy for more years than most people have been alive.
"Really then?" Lacey says and she scoots her stool just a little bit closer to him. "So then the other day…"
She trails off and he feels himself grow a little hotter, a little harder at the way her eyes look at him from beneath her lashes. He doesn't remember Belle ever being quite so…seductive. She was sweet, beautiful, and while he remembers the flirtatious bent to the way she followed him around, he doesn't ever remember that look. He'd remember that look. He knows that much at least. He could never forget that look. Even now it will worm its way into his brain and haunt his dreams.
"Yes," he whispers and his hand comes to rest on her knee, sliding just a little bit underneath the edge of her skirt, fingers moving subtly across the edge of the expensive stockings she's wearing. Garters. He didn't expect that. Lacey was not what one would call a "classy" lady. Belle was. Belle is, but Lacey is tawdry. She hangs out at the Rabbit Hole, shoots pool with men she doesn't know are really dwarves and, from all accounts, sleeps her way through the town.
He knows it's not true.
It's simply a product of the curse. They've been living the same day over and over again for over twenty years. Storybrooke may think she's been out with a different man every night but the reality has been a whole different story. Every night she walks past Granny's Diner on her way home to her ratty little apartment where she no doubt curses her miserable luck. And every night he goes to Granny's Diner to collect the rent before returning home to his pathetic little life with Hook.
Except this night.
The world is moving forward again. He can feel the pull of time on his bones. And he can see Lacey watching him with that calculating look that Belle once watched him with. The look that said she knew there was more to him than others might think. The look that says she sees right through him.
Tonight she slaps his hand away after he inches it up under her skirt just a hair more. "Mr. Gold," she says and her voice has that sort of breathiness that Belle's did whenever they got too close. "You're a married man."
He just stares at her for a moment and then laughs. What else can he do? She's still Lacey and he's still married to Charles.
"Not for long," he mutters.
Her eyebrows raise. "Still." She offers a little shrug at that. "I may be a lot of things Mr. Gold. This town may think me nothing but a common whore. But I am not that kind of woman."
"Of course you're not." He's not sure what else to say and when Lacey slides off the stool, throws back the last of her whisky, and turns to walk away, he reaches out a hand to stop her. Just a gentle touch. He's the villain of their story, but he regrets ever laying a hand on her in anger, regrets accusing her of betrayal, of shouting at her. The curse drove him, his pain and anger and hatred for all that he had become, for the loss of his son, drove him to it. And she had been caught up in the mess in a most unfortunate way.
So he's careful with her now, as if she were made of spun glass and not flesh and bones.
"Did you need something, Mr. Gold?" Her voice is a purr and he wants to pull her tight up against him. She's seductive here. Belle was intelligent, kind, but Lacey is shrewd and sexy. It's a heady combination. Who she is underneath, who she is now.
"I'm throwing him out." The words come out before he even intended them to. But he knows it's what he must do. Time is marching forward and it's time for him to march with it. Hook has to be out of his house, locks changed, before the curse breaks, before he realizes who he has been involved with for the entirety of the curse.
"Of course you are…"
"Tomorrow morning," Gold interrupts her with. "Come to my house. Around eight." He doesn't intend to make a public spectacle of it. And yet he knows he's going to. He knows that Charles will make a big deal out of it and that will bring out all the nosy people of the tiny town they call home.
Lacey watches him for a moment, head cocked slightly to the side. "Make it ten and I'll be there."
He nods and she slips away.
Ten tomorrow. He has approximately twelve more hours before he can finally be rid of the blighter.
It can't come soon enough.
The time is quick approaching and Charles is still sound asleep.
Of course he is.
It's not like Gold expected anything else out of the man. He's either completely pissed, passed out from being completely pissed, or sitting on the docks staring out to sea. Generally while in the process of getting pissed.
It's odd, really, how their former lives intruded on their current lives. Hook was a man who sailed the sea, letting the winds take him wherever he wished to go. Here in Storybrooke he's an unemployed bum who lives off Gold's money and spends most of his days soaked in alcohol, longing for a ship that never comes.
Gold is wealthy. He lives in a mansion instead of a castle. He's powerful and reviled, just as he was in their world. He tinkers with antiques the way he once tinkered with people's lives and he's spent a lifetime walking by a spinning wheel that always made him pause, touch it, wish he could use it.
He can now.
He remembers.
Though he can't spin straw into gold even if it is his namesake here. Regina never has been all that creative, now that he thinks on it.
He isn't careful with the packing up of Hook's things. Not that he has much. Gold is the one with the suits carefully pressed and hung in the closets. Hook's stuff is strewn about the bedroom floor, the bathroom. Most of it is useless junk and ratty clothes. What the town must have thought about Gold's being with such a layabout!
He shoves everything that does not belong to him in a suitcase, a ratty old thing with a few holes on one side and a wheel that sticks. "Get up," he growls at Charles as he shoves a few dirty socks in the bag and closes it.
Charles mumbles something from the bed and rolls over, drooling on the other side of the pillow. Gold rolls his eyes and drags the suitcase out of the room, down the stairs, and tosses it rather unceremoniously onto the lawn. As he turns to go back inside, to take more stuff to the curb, he sees Lacey standing there.
She's dressed more demurely in the light of day, her makeup toned down and for a moment he can almost believe she's Belle. But the hand on her hip and the smirk on her face tells him otherwise. "Lacey," he murmurs.
"You're really doing it then." It's a statement, not a question.
"I am." He turns away from her and heads back inside. She doesn't follow and he's thankful for that. He's shoved all of Hook's toiletries, and for some reason the man has a lot of those, into a plastic grocery bag and is heading out when he hears a commotion behind him.
"What are you doing?" The other man's voice is slurred and he reeks of stale alcohol. Even if he weren't Hook, that alone would be enough for the man known as Mr. Gold to kick him out. There is perhaps no less pleasant smell than stale beer. He would rather the man reek of sheep manure.
"We're through." His voice is terse.
It takes Charles a moment for the words to even sink in and by then Gold is already outside, tossing the second bag with the first.
"What do you mean we're through?"
Ah yes, here it goes. Charles has come barreling out of the house behind him. He supposes at the very least he's more alert now than he has been in days. Gold turns on his heel and watches him for a moment.
"I thought that was rather clear."
Charles rushes him, grabs him by the shoulders. "It's not," he hisses. "I've always..."
Gold shoves him away and he hears Lacey let out a small bark of laughter somewhere behind him. "Always what? Always been drunk? Always had to be dragged home?" Always stolen away with my wife and let me believe you'd killed her? Always made me tell my son his mother was dead? Always found a way to keep me separated from my boy?
"I've always been there for you," he says and there's a sullen note to his voice.
"Right." The word is clipped. "We're through," he reiterates and walks back into the house. Charles follows behind him for only a few steps before he hears him stop, screaming expletives after him at the top of his lungs. He rushes through the rest, gathering up the cheap beer from his fridge, the ratty slippers left under the kitchen table. He'll burn the sheets later, air out the place, get all traces of Hook out of his home.
When he steps back outside, Charles takes a deep breath and shouts something else at him. He's almost incoherent now and Gold just turns away from him, tossing the last bag with the rest. There's not much there. A few bags, a suitcase, only a handful of things that spoke to supposed years of being a couple.
He shudders at the thought.
"My, my my…what do we have here?" Gold shuts his eyes for a moment, takes a deep breath, and turns to face Regina. The Evil Queen in their world, the mayor here. He's not wanted her to know that he knows who he is, that he knows who Charles is. Or worse. That he knows who Lacey is.
"Mayor Mills," Gold says, his voice tight. "What can I do for you?" He doesn't look at Lacey, who he can see watching the proceedings out of the corner of his eye. She's leaning up against one of the trees, casual as can be, but the smirk on her face tells another story.
"People are reporting a domestic disturbance at your place of residence," she begins and there's a dangerous glint to her eyes as she watches Gold.
"The disturbance is over," he mutters.
"The hell it is!" Charles roars and comes rushing over. He's grabbed Gold by the shoulder and whipped him around before he can even dodge out of the way.
"It seems that's it not quite over after all," Regina says and crosses her arms. "And as mayor of this town…"
"Doesn't the mayor have better things to do?" Gold shoots back with and pulls his shoulder away from Charles, who stumbles a bit before regaining his balance.
"As the mayor of this town, I take particular interest in such disturbances. Storybrooke prides itself on…"
"Stuff it," Gold mutters and Regina's speech grinds to a halt.
"Excuse me?" Regina's voice is brittle.
Gold doesn't even look at her. "You heard me."
Lacey laughs and he can well imagine the look on Regina's face. She doesn't take kindly to being told to sod off. It's not in her nature, after all. She expects to be obeyed. But it seems she's forgotten one thing. This curse is his. He created it. He gave it to her. And he altered it to suit his needs.
To some degree at least.
The curse had to leave his hands sometime and clearly Regina played with it far more than he expected when he handed it over. Comfort. He asked for comfort, nothing more, and Regina had given that to him in spades, hadn't she now?
"Mr. Gold." Regina's voice comes from close behind him and he turns to face her, hands gripping his cane hard. "I think we need to talk…"
Oh yes…she would want to…talk…wouldn't she? His lips pull into a feral grin.
"You need to talk!" shouts Charles, barreling over to the pair of them, one of the plastic grocery bags Gold had tossed out on the lawn clutched in his hand. "You need to!" he reiterates, the handless arm flailing. "You throw me out without any warning? You can't even talk about this?" His voice goes higher in pitch and louder with each word.
"I thought I've been rather clear." Gold's voice is cold. He hears Lacey let out a snort from her position by the tree.
"Mr. Gold, if this disturbance continues, I'm going to have to…"
"Yes, yes," he says dismissively. "By all means, call in the good Sheriff. He can arrest Charles here for public drunkenness. It should have been done a long time ago."
"How dare you?" Charles says and rushes forward. Gold sees him just seconds before his hand collides heavily with the side of his face. He somehow stays his feet…barely. He sways but manages to dig his cane in and catch himself before he stumbles more than a foot back. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Lacey step away from the tree. She looks alarmed and he's thankful for that much at least.
Gold smirks.
He has the perfect out now.
"I want this man arrested for assault." The words fall into the absolute silence around them.
And then Lacey laughs.
And Charles attempts to go after him again. Gold is ready this time and neatly sidesteps him. As Charles lands heavily on the ground just behind him, Gold turns and hits him rather hard on the buttocks with his cane. "Oops." He looks at Regina who is eying him warily. "Accident you see. Sometimes I just can't control this thing."
"Mr. Gold," she says and there's more than just ire there. A bit of surprise. And perhaps more than a bit of worry. He can well understand her thought process. But he's not going to reveal his cards just yet. Let her wonder if he knows who he is. He's planted the seeds of doubt, of worry, of hatred and fear. It's up to Regina to pick them up and run with them.
"I'm going back inside," he says, flicking an imaginary piece of lint off the lapel of his suit.
"You can't just leave!" Charles starts to shout, still crouched on the ground where he fell. Gold imagines he can't quite get up. The stench of alcohol is still on him, strong and pungent, and he's unsteady on his feet at best.
"Charles is quite right," Regina says.
Gold ignores them both, turning toward Lacey. "You coming, dear?"
She makes her way over slowly, that kind of walk that says she knows she's the center of everyone's attention and is enjoying it. But he can see behind the bravado, can see the confusion and concern in the wide blue eyes. He's angering the mayor, of course. And everyone here fears her.
They fear him more.
As they should.
But still, the fear is there. Lacey has never feared him. But she has always feared the mayor and so while she moves with confidence, her eyes meet his and he sees it, hidden just below the surface.
He smiles as she links her arm with his, head held high.
He finally turns back to Regina after she makes another noise of irritation, after Charles screams his name. "I can leave. And I will. I expect the good Sheriff will take care of this…rubbish." Charles shouts something again and starts toward him before Regina puts her hand on his shoulder to restrain him.
As he leads Lacey into his home, he hears Regina mutter something about already in trouble enough to Hook. He almost turns back then, to throw a parting shot about divorce papers. But he knows those won't be necessary. Soon the curse will break and the last thing Hook will want to do is be anywhere near Rumplestiltskin. In fact, he expects there will be more drinking, a feeble attempt to forget the memories he himself has been trying so very hard to forget.
He won't ever forgive Regina for placing those memories in his head. He can't imagine what Hook will do once he comes back to himself. It might almost be amusing to be there for the transition, though he's happy enough to be well away from him at last.
With one last smirk at Regina and Charles, whose eyes are red from either drink or tears, Gold pulls Lacey inside and shuts the door. They do, after all, have much to discuss.