CHAPTER 11
Mr. Gold, blissfully unaware of the mayor's latest move to destroy his life, had passed an uneventful but pleasant day in the pawnshop. He had few customers, but that didn't bother him; the pawnshop was nowhere near being his main business interest, more like a hobby. He spent the day puttering around, rearranging a few displays, restoring a few antiques. But mostly, he spent the day thinking.
He had finally come to the conclusion that maybe, just maybe, he and Amy could have a life together. He had finally accepted that she truly cared for him, although he was still a bit unsure as to why. Her gratitude for everything he'd done for her, as she'd said, was only a small part of it. He had finally come to realize this. There was a world of difference between being grateful to someone and being their friend, and Amy, he realized with no small amazement, was his friend. What was even more astonishing was that she was willing to be more, had even come out and said so. If their encounter the week before was any indication, she even wanted to be more. It had occurred to him that if she had only accepted his advances out of a desire to "repay" him somehow, she would not have responded physically as she had. He remembered the flush of her cheeks, her ragged breathing, and the dampness between her legs. She couldn't have faked that kind of desire; for some reason he couldn't fathom, she was really attracted to him.
So perhaps there was a chance for them, he concluded. Now that he was finally open to the idea, he had to make some plans. He couldn't imagine going home tonight and blurting out, "I love you. I want you to stay with me. I want to raise your child as my own". No, that wasn't his style. He would do things much more gradually. But he would start tonight.
He decided he would start by telling her a partial truth: that during his search for a good home for her baby, he had realized that the baby already had the best home imaginable, with Amy herself. He would tell her that he wanted to help her keep the child. As soon as the baby was born and Amy was recovered, she could resume her position as his housekeeper; and she and the baby could live in the small apartment where she had spent her first three months in his home. He would begin giving her a regular paycheck so she would be able to cover the baby's expenses. He knew her pride would make her balk at the prospect of him supporting the child himself, but if she were earning the money to do so it would be a different matter. Gold didn't anticipate any problems with the first phase of his new plan. He knew Amy desperately wanted to keep her daughter. Maybe she had even hoped he would help her find a way to do so. By granting her unspoken wish, he would prove to her once and for all that he really did care for her.
The second phase of his plan would be easy. He would simply continue his friendship with Amy. And he would dote on the baby. He knew that would be no problem. It would have shocked everyone in Storybrooke to know that, in his own way, Mr. Gold loved children just as much as Marco the handyman. But where Marco was a natural child magnet, friendly and approachable, Gold was more…well, reserved. Babies liked him, that much was true; on the rare occasion when he had come face-to-face with an infant, the child would invariably smile and coo, often reaching for him. At these times Gold would be surprised at the sudden ache in his heart. He had never understood it before, but now he knew it for the longing that it was. He had thought for years that he had no wish to be a father, when in fact it was the thing he'd wanted most.
On most occasions when a baby reached for him, the horrified mother or father would immediately jerk the little one away, perhaps in fear that he would snatch the child and run for the hills. One or two had consented to let him hold the child briefly, however. And on these occasions the ache in his heart would almost overpower him. Looking back, Gold almost wondered if he had been a father at some point, some time in that distant past which he couldn't quite recall. For he had handled the few babies he'd held with ease, not jostling them as so many did, but holding them still and close. He would smile into their faces and speak to them, softly but not in the ridiculous gibberish so many people used. The infant would smile back at him and nestle close, letting out a wail of protest when the apprehensive parent reclaimed them.
Sadly, even the infants who smiled and reached out to him soon came to fear him. As the children grew older, they picked up on their parents' fear and became afraid themselves. It probably didn't help matters that some parents in town used him as a threat: "If you're bad, Mr. Gold is going to come and get you!"
But with Amy's child it could be different, would be different. The little girl would grow up knowing him. She wouldn't take on her mother's fear, because Amy had no fear of him. She wouldn't think of him as a threat, a boogeyman who would spirit her away if she didn't behave; she would see him as nothing more than kindly Mr. Gold, who lived with her and her mother. With her he would be able to indulge the affectionate, paternal side he had only recently discovered he possessed. She would grow up knowing that he cared for her, loved her even. And he knew he would love her, because she was flesh and blood of the woman he loved.
Eventually, Amy would come to realize that he cared for her child as much as he did for her. And that was when the final part of his plan would go into effect. Then, then, he would tell her that he loved her. He would tell her he wanted to be her child's father. He would tell her that he wanted them to be a family, the family she'd never had, that he'd never had (or had he?). At last, at long lat they would have their happy ending.
It wouldn't take long, he was certain. Perhaps a year. Maybe even less than that. No matter how long it took, the end result would be the same: he and Amy would be married. He would formally adopt her daughter. Eventually there could be more children, if Amy wished it and Nature complied. Either way, Amy would have what she'd wanted all along for her baby: loving parents who could give her everything she could ever want. And he, he would have his happy ending at last.
Eager to put the first part of his new plan into action, Gold left the shop in an unusually ebullient mood that night. As he made his slow way to the parking lot on the next block where his Bentley waited, he ran into a few townspeople: Dr. Hopper walking Pongo. Flora Fae, one of the proprietresses of the Storybrooke Family Shoppe. Mr. Clark, who ran the pharmacy-slash-convenience store around the corner. The Nolans, out for an evening stroll. To each he offered a smile and a friendly greeting. He took a certain perverse amusement in their reactions. To a one, they all paled and looked as if they dearly wished to run off screaming. However, they all composed themselves enough to return his greeting (though Archie Hopper's knees were practically knocking as he did so). As he passed them by, each of them breathed a quiet sigh of relief and inwardly marveled at the fact that the sinister Mr. Gold had seemed downright cheerful. None of them cared to speculate on the reason for this.
Mr. Gold's good mood lasted throughout the drive home. It lasted as he entered the house, hanging his winter coat up in the foyer before continuing onto her room—the room that he hoped would eventually be their room. It lasted as he tapped on the door before entering, the now-familiar greeting of "Good evening, dear," on his lips.
As soon as he entered, though, the words and the good mood died. For Amy, rather than being sprawled on the bed in her lounging clothes, was sitting in one of the armchairs fully clothed in a sweater and jeans. In her usual place on the bed lay an open suitcase.
He knew immediately that something was wrong. "Amy?" he said, struggling to keep his voice calm. "Is everything all right, dear?"
She smiled, but it wasn't her usual open smile. Rather, it was a small, formal smile that came nowhere near her eyes. He had seen the smile before, he realized. But where? The answer came to him with a jolt: it was the same smile he gave to everyone in town save her.
For a moment he simply stared at her, unable to speak. Yes, something was definitely wrong. Though the fireplace was lit, there was an unmistakable chill in the room. It took him only a moment to understand that the chill was emanating from her direction.
"I was going to pack my things and leave before you came home," she said clearly, in a frighteningly matter-of-fact tone. "But then I decided I owed it to you to give you a chance to explain yourself."
"Explain myself?" he repeated dumbly. "Amy, what are you talking about?"
The false smile widened but still didn't reach her eyes. "I had a visit from Emma today," she said, as if this explained everything.
He was still confused. "What?" Suddenly feeling weak in the knees, he sank into the armchair opposite hers.
"I want you to tell me the truth, Mr. Gold," she stated, still smiling, her tone still deceptively pleasant. But her eyes…oh, her eyes…
"The whole truth," she continued, "not one of your famous half-truths. I want you to tell me who arranged for Mayor Mills to adopt Henry."
The revelation hit him like a punch to the stomach. Oh, God, how stupid could he have been? He had forced a promise out of Regina that she wouldn't tell Amy he had brokered Henry's adoption. It had never occurred to him to forbid her to tell anyone else. With sickening clarity he realized what must have transpired: Regina had let it slip to Emma just how Henry had come to Storybrooke. Emma, knowing he was supposed to be helping Amy find a home for her own child, had guessed his original motivations for doing so. Of course, she had felt it her duty to warn Amy.
"I did," he said simply. No one could have lied to that stone face.
She closed her eyes briefly, as if in great pain. When they opened, they were every bit as flat and cold as his own usually were—and as Regina's always were. "And you were going to do the same thing with my baby, weren't you." It wasn't a question.
"That was my intention in the beginning, yes," he began carefully. "But Amy, dear—"
Her icy control faltered. "Don't," she said, unable to keep her voice from trembling. "I used to think you meant it when you called me that. But you never did, any more than you meant it with anyone else. Did you?"
Knowing it was futile, he nevertheless tried once more. "Amy, darling…"
She cut him off. "Darling," she mused aloud. "That's a new one. I never heard you call anyone else that. I thought it meant I was different to you, somehow. I thought it meant I was special."
"You were," he said quickly. "You are. Amy, please…"
"'Stop it!" she shouted. He flinched; he hadn't been expecting that. Had he ever heard her raise her voice in anger? No, he didn't think so. Though she wasn't quick to anger in any event, on the few occasions he had witnessed her so she had never shouted. Her eyes would narrow, her lips would thin, but her voice always remained calm and sweet, even if the words she spoke were anything but.
But this was not merely anger; this was rage. Amy in a fury was a completely different animal from Amy in a mild fit of temper. The eyes were wide, blazing, the electric-blue of coal fire. She wasn't flushed as he would have expected, but a small red spot burned on each cheek. He thought crazily that if he reached out to touch her, she would be throwing heat like a furnace. He didn't want to think what her blood pressure must be right now. For a moment he considered reminding her of the baby, but realized that was probably the worst possible thing he could do right now. For the moment, perhaps it was best to let her vent.
She jumped up; Gold couldn't refrain from taking a small step backward. Instead of coming towards him, however, she began to pace to and fro, a lioness in a cage. "All this time…" she said, her voice once again at a normal level. "All these months, you've known how I felt about Mayor Mills. You even agreed with me that it was a shame Henry had to be raised by her. And all the time you were the one who gave him to her…no, no, you didn't just give him to her. You sold him to her!"
"Yes, I did," he said, his calm voice belying the anxiousness and outright fear that was coursing through him. "But it's not like you think, Amy. I didn't…it was never my intention for Henry to go to a home where he wouldn't be loved. At the time, I believed Regina when she told me how desperate she was for a child. If I had known…" Here he stopped. If he had known what sort of mother Regina would turn out to be, would it have changed anything? With a twinge of self-loathing he realized that no, it wouldn't have mattered to him…not ten years ago, at any rate.
Amy stopped pacing to stare at him, uncertain hope beginning to dawn in her eyes. "You regret it, then?" she asked. "You wish you hadn't done it?"
"With all my heart," he said. He meant it. The man he was now truly regretted that Henry Mills had led a miserable existence with a mother who was incapable of loving him. No child should have to go through that. But mostly he regretted it because the knowledge had upset Amy so.
"And you learned from the error of your ways, right?" she continued, the hope in her eyes now almost unbearable for him to see. "You never sold another baby, right? You weren't going to sell my baby…you really were going to help me find a good home for her, out of the kindness of your heart, right?"
He wanted more than anything to confirm this new story she had woven, wanted with everything in him to say, "Yes. Finding a good home for your child was the only thing I cared about." But it would have been a lie. He couldn't lie to her, even though, in her desperation, she might have believed him.
"Amy," he began carefully, "I've never lied to you."
That spark of hope in her eyes vanished as quickly as if it had never been. "So you were going to sell her," she stated in a dull tone.
"I was going to accept a broker's fee," he admitted. The words hit her like a slap to the face; with a gasp, she sank back into the chair, covering her face with her hands.
"Amy, listen to me," he said, the desperation now clear in his voice. "I really was looking for parents who would love the baby and treat her well. I knew you didn't want your child to grow up in a loveless home, so I promised myself I would find a couple who genuinely wanted a child, who would cherish her as well as provide for her." Even as he spoke the words he realized how hollow his defense of his actions was. He could try to pretty it up as much as he wanted, but the fact remained: he had been planning to sell her baby. Only now did he clearly understand what he'd intended to do—what he had done before—and it was monstrous.
"So you were going to find a couple who was desperate, and offer them what they wanted more than anything else in the world…for a price," she said, her face still in her hands. The words were muffled but he had no trouble understanding them. "You were going to use them, just like you were going to use me. Some childless couple gets a baby, Amy gets a good home for her baby, and Gold gets a nice fat wad of cash for his trouble. Happy endings all around, right?"
"I was only going to keep part of the money," he said despairingly, knowing it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference at this point. "A small part of it. I was going to give the rest to you, so you would be able to start your life over."
He was wrong. The words did make a difference. They served to send her back into a state of rage.
"You what!" she screamed as she leapt up. "How dare you! That would have made me a party to your…disgusting plan! Do you honestly think I would have agreed to such a thing?"
"No, I knew you wouldn't," he said miserably. "That's why I was going to tell you the money was what the adoptive parents would have paid for your medical care."
"You bastard!" she roared at the top of her lungs. "As if any amount of money would have made up for losing my baby! You knew…you know I want this baby more than anything! You know the thought of giving her away tears me up inside! If you really cared about me, like I was dumb enough to think you did, you would have helped me to do that! But, wait, stupid me…there wouldn't have been any payoff for you then, would there?" She laughed bitterly; Gold wanted to put his hands over his ears at the sound.
She strode toward him, and he braced himself for the blow he was sure would come. But instead, she went to the suitcase on the bed and began zipping it shut.
"Amy…what are you doing?" he croaked out of a throat suddenly gone dry.
"What does it look like?" she snapped. "You think I would stay here now?"
He wanted to reason with her; he wanted to fling himself at her feet and beg her forgiveness; he wanted to tell her everything. He opened his moth to say, Stop, wait, I changed my mind. I do want to help you keep your baby! That's what I was coming home to tell you tonight! What popped out instead was ludicrous: "You shouldn't be doing any heavy lifting in your condition."
She gave him a scornful glance. "What, you're afraid I'll damage the merchandise?" she quipped. The disgust in her tone cut him like a knife. "Don't worry, I only packed a few things. I'll have the Sheriff come by for the rest of my stuff tomorrow." At this she gave an ugly laugh. "Ironic, isn't it? The sheriff brought my things here, and the sheriff will be taking my things out. I felt so lucky that night, you know. I thought I had finally caught a break. I thought, everyone says he's a monster, but deep down he's really a kind man. Why else would he be doing all this for me? I should've known." She lifted the suitcase. "You even tried to warn me, in your own way. You told me yourself you were a monster with a crippled soul. If only I'd listened…thank God Emma set me straight before it was too late."
Emma. She was the reason for all of this. But no, that wasn't right. Much as he wanted to, Gold couldn't lay the blame for this at the new sheriff's door. She'd only done what she thought was right. She couldn't know that she was a pawn in an unspeakable game; she couldn't realize that she'd reacted to the news of Gold's role in Henry's "adoption" exactly as she was meant to…exactly as Regina had meant her to.
"How did Emma find out?" he asked, more as a way to keep Amy with him just a little longer than out of any real desire to know. He already knew the answer, anyway.
"Regina, of course," Amy said, lowering the suitcase back to the bed momentarily. "Turns out the woman does have some kind of conscience. She got all sloppy drunk this morning and called Emma…demanded that Emma come over to her house. Emma said she was completely shitfaced. She cried about Graham for a while, and her father. She said her father was the only one who had ever loved her. She said that ever since he died, all she's wanted is to be loved again. She even tried with Graham, she told Emma…apparently she and Graham had been carrying on an affair for years, but I'm sure you already know that…and when that didn't work she decided to adopt a baby. That was when she let it slip about you selling Henry to her." She decided not to mention that Emma believed Regina had let that tidbit slip on purpose, believed, in fact, that she might well have staged the whole thing just for that reason. She hadn't really had a chance to wrap her head around that theory, and anyway she didn't intend to stay in this house a second longer than she had to.
Regina, Gold thought. I knew it. I knew after that conversation in the shop she would be out for revenge…and after the fire…Too late, he realized he'd spoken the words aloud.
Amy froze. She hadn't been able to make out all Gold's mumbling, but she'd caught "Regina" and "revenge" and "fire". "Wait a second," she said slowly. "Why would Regina want to get revenge on you for the fire…unless…unless…oh my God!" he could only watch helplessly as the horror dawned in her eyes. "You set the fire at City Hall!"
It was all over, he realized as he saw the expression of shock and disbelief on her face. In his agitation, he had let slip the one thing he most didn't want her to know. Even Emma had kept the secret, though why he couldn't guess. But now it was out, and he was the one who had let the cat out of the bag.
"Amy," he said as the color drained from her face. "Amy, I can explain." In mortal terror that the shock would cause her to deliver on the spot, he moved to rise, to go to her.
"Don't come near me," she spat. She backed a few steps away, though he was still seated. "Don't even think about coming near me. You…you're insane. Don't you realize you could have killed them both? Or was that your intention?"
The exclamation tore from him involuntarily. "Christ, no!" The words gushed out like a river; he couldn't control them and didn't want to. He had to make her see. "Amy, you have to believe me. I never intended to hurt them. I was trying to help Emma. I knew no one would vote for her without something…dramatic to prove her bravery."
"So you torched City Hall?" she said incredulously. "That was your way of trying to help?" a new thought occurred to her. "Emma doesn't know, does she? She'd have you under the jail if she even thought—"
"She knows," he interrupted.
Amy's legs gave way at the revelation. She sank onto the bed. "I can't believe it," she whispered. "Emma would never go along with such a thing."
"She didn't," he told her. "At first she believed it was an accident. But when she was looking over the ruins she found something…something that led her to believe I was responsible. She confronted me right away, of course. But she couldn't prove it."
"So she confronted you," Amy said numbly. "Yet she still went through with the election. Why?"
"Oh, she still went through with the election," Gold said. "But during the debate, she came clean with the townspeople. She told them I was the one who set the fire, though she couldn't prove it. She told them she couldn't run under such circumstances, and she left the debate. But she still won the election. Her honesty, not her bravery, got her the votes she needed to win."
She stared at him. "And that was what you intended all along, wasn't it?" she asked.
"It was," he confessed.
Amy began to shake. Her teeth actually chattered with the force of her trembling. This time he did rise. "Amy, my darling, I want you to understand," he pleaded. He took a step towards her, hoping she would allow him to come to her and take her in his arms, all the while knowing she would do no such thing.
She jumped up. "Oh, I understand," she hissed. "I understand perfectly. I understand that you're absolutely diabolical…I understand you'll stop at nothing, nothing, to get what you want. Setting fires…selling babies…leading idiots like me to believe you're in love with them. Even what happened that night…that was part of your plan, too, wasn't it?"
"Amy, don't," he begged. He took another step towards her.
She squeezed her eyes shut as shudders racked her body. When she finally opened them, they were full of a flat and terrible calm. Her voice, when she spoke, was the same.
"Mr. Gold," she said evenly, "if you take one more step towards me, so help me God, I will take that cane and bash your fucking skull in."
Looking into her eyes, he knew she meant it. He knew it was over. He sank back into the chair, only able to watch helplessly as she picked up the suitcase yet again and moved to the door.
"I'm leaving now," she said in that terrible matter-of-fact tone. "I'm taking the SL. I'll leave the keys in it when I get where I'm going. You can pick it up tomorrow. I suggest you don't try to follow me. No doubt you know exactly where I'm headed, but don't try to contact me in any way. I'll get a restraining order if I have to. I'm sure Sheriff Swan will be happy to help me with that. And you can tell your lawyers, if there really are any, that the adoption is off. There is no way in hell you are getting your hands on my baby."
If only she would let him explain…but he had tried, and she still didn't understand. He hadn't been able to make her understand; he saw now that she was incapable of it. Virtue couldn't understand corruption, deviousness, even if it was done with the best of intentions. He had been right all along: he was a monster, and monsters didn't deserve kindness, or goodness, or love.
He didn't deserve her.
Hopelessly, he told her one last thing as she prepared to walk out of his home and his life: "Amy…what happened that night…it wasn't part of any plan."
Hand on the doorknob, she turned to look at him one last time. He wished with all his heart she would realize, would understand what he was trying to tell her. But he knew it wouldn't happen.
She wasn't angry now, or emotionless, but the look on her face shattered what was left of his heart nonetheless. She gazed at him with a terrible pity.
"You were right when you called yourself a cripple, Mr. Gold," she told him, and her voice was soft, almost kind. "But it's not your leg that makes you that way…'it's in your soul that the true distortion lies'".
Then she was gone, closing the door softly behind her.
…
Later, Amy realized it was a miracle that she made it to town without wrecking. As soon as she slid behind the wheel of the Mercedes the tears she had managed to hold at bay during their confrontation gushed forth; they continued to flow the whole way into Storybrooke. A couple of times she actually had to pull over, stop the car, rest her head on the steering wheel, and cry until the leather was wet and the knobbed wheel left indents on her forehead.
Consequently, it was full dark by the time she finally pulled onto Storybrooke's main street. Once there, she didn't have far to go. Granny's Bed and Breakfast overlooked the town square.
By the time she stepped onto the front porch of the B&B, suitcase in hand, she had regained most of her control. Swiping at her eyes one last time, she knocked.
It took a few minutes for Granny to answer the door; she must have already been in bed. It occurred to Amy that she probably should have called ahead. It really was terribly rude to just barge in like this, even if Granny and Ruby were the closest thing to family she had, and would undoubtedly welcome her with open arms.
When Granny Woods finally answered the door, she was in her housecoat but her hair was still up. So she hadn't been in bed quite yet, only getting ready for it. For some inane reason this made Amy feel a little better.
"Amy!" the older woman exclaimed. "This is a surprise." Her sharp eyes immediately took in the tearstains on the girl's face and the suitcase in her hand. "Darlin', what's wrong?"
At the familiar loving tone, Amy's eyes began to water again. She swallowed hard. "Granny, I…I hate to barge in on you like this, but…I don't have anywhere else to go," she managed before the sobs started yet again.
To her credit, Granny didn't ask any questions. Time enough for that later, she thought. She put her arms around the girl and led her into the house. "There, there, honey," she soothed. "You've always had a place here, you know that. I'll be happy for you to stay as long as you need to." She gave the crying girl a brief squeeze before letting go. "Give me that suitcase, now. You don't need to be carryin' that in your condition. You don't need to be climbin' no stairs, neither. Luckily I cleaned the downstairs rooms today. We'll get you all settled in, and I'll make us some tea and somethin' to eat if you're hungry, and you can tell old Granny what's wrong."
As she followed the old woman down the hall, Amy had to smile a little. Myriad emotions swirled through her: rage, sadness, fear, desolation. But, for the moment at least, she felt cosseted and cherished. For the first time in her life, she felt as if she had finally come home.
…
Several hours later, a black late-model Bentley ghosted down Main Street. The lights and the motor were off; the driver would have undoubtedly received a ticket if the sheriff were about. But Sheriff Swan was in bed, sleeping the sleep of the just. No one saw the Bentley as it paused in front of Granny's Bed and Breakfast.
The SL was parked in the side parking lot. She had made it safely, then. Good. She would be safe at Granny's for the time being; the old woman and her granddaughter would take good care of her.
He'd pick up the SL in the morning. Or no, maybe he wouldn't. She would still need transportation. Perhaps if he simply left it there, she would give in and drive it. It was the least he could do for her now. He wasn't worried that anyone would steal it; everyone in town knew full well who the car belonged to. They'd no sooner steal from Mr. Gold than cut off their own hand.
Now that he knew she was safe, likely sleeping since no lights shone behind the curtains, he could go home and try to get some rest himself. When he reached the turnoff that led to the edge of town, however, he kept going straight instead. He knew already there was no question of sleep this night. Might as well get some work done.
After all, one never knew when someone would need to strike a deal.
Aaannnddd it's finally finished. I had so many false starts and stops with this chapter it wasn't funny. I was worried it would go into indefinite hiatus like my Dark Knight fic (which I do still intend to finish…one of these days). Finally, my muse was good enough to evacuate its magical bowels on my head (disgusting, I know, but that's the only way to describe it). I think we're getting into the home stretch here; another 4 or 5 chapters should do it. But when you're working with characters like these, it's hard to say.
I'm not 100% thrilled with this chapter, but I wanted to get it up before too much time passed. Some parts I'm quite pleased with, however. If I figure out a way to improve one of the parts I'm less impressed with I'll edit it. BTW, I'm sure most of you know this but the quote "It's in your soul that the true distortion lies" is from Phantom of the Opera. Me and my morally ambiguous sexy anti-heroes.
ABC etc owns everything but the OCs, yada yada yada. If I owned Rumple/Mr. Gold, I wouldn't have time to write fan fiction. I suspect my life would resemble a PWP fic.
Je t'aime, mon readers and reviewers! (I have no clue if that's the correct grammar and frankly, I'm too tired to look it up. I have to b at work in a few hours.) It looks as if Regina's plot has succeeded, but we all know how the EQ tends to overplay her hand. Will that happen in hr plan to tear apart Amy and Mr. Gold? Stay tuned!