Chapter Six

Rumford Gold sighed, not yet getting out of his car, while Jefferson sat in the passagner seat whistling cheerfully until he noticed Gold's hesitation.

"You Alright Rum? You've been acting weird for a couple days now, what happened?" Jefferson tilted his head to the side, curious and clearly worried.

"Yeah, just had a strange parting with Belle, you know after you and Ruby ditched us at Grannies on Monday," Gold said a little bitterly; he would never admit it out loud, but he was a little jealous about how easily the two seemed to hit it off. Gold wondered if they would start dating soon; he just wished that he and Belle could be like that. Not that she would ever like him that way.

Jefferson smiled, "You didn't seem to have a problem with my leaving you alone with Belle. Normally when I do that, you scowl. With Belle, you didn't".

"So? I've been working with her on your nightclub," Gold said, glaring at the steering wheel in front of him, while Jefferson chuckled; unfortunately for Gold, his friend could almost always catch on to what he was feeling.

"You looked like you were about to start blushing when she smiled at you like that," Jefferson teased him.

Gold's head snapped up, "Was not!"

His best friend raised an eyebrow, "Come on Rum, I know you better than that; you like her. Like really like her".

"So," Gold decided to give in. Outside, the door to Jeff's future nightclub opened to reveal Belle and Ruby. Belle had phoned all four of them, and had insisted that she needed all of their help with the main floor of the building to get it ready for opening day, which happened to be on saterday night. That meant Gold would spend another saterday night in Jeff's company, not that he was complaining. Jeff was one of the few people who put up with him.

"You boys going to sit in there all day?" Ruby called, winking at them, with a mischievious gleam in her eyes that mirrored he look in Jeff's eyes.

"We're coming, give us a moment," Gold yelled back.

"Don't worry about it Rum," Jefferson said, resting his hand on Gold's shoulder reassuringly, "You're more charming than you admit".

With that said, they both slipped out of the car and joined the girls inside.

Belle had them split into two teams, which Ruby automaticly picked; Jefferson would be with her, and Belle would be with Gold. One team, Ruby and Jeff would be working on cleaning the main floor of the building, and would begin to install some of the basic appliances, and furniture, like the bar, and the fridge and freezer in the kitchen.

Belle and Gold would do the rest, which mainly included painting the walls, installing the more complicated appliances, like the DJ equipment, and would put up the light fixtures.

"Dark forest pattered, and a castle" Gold shook his head at his friend's messy scrawl on the paper that said how they would go about painting, "Typical Jefferson".

"Come on, let's get started," Belle said, smiling at him. Gold's stomach did a back flip, and butterflies fluttered their way into it.

Within minutes, they had figured out a basic pattern for painting and had a smooth enough rhythm that they could talk to one another without worrying about messing up the paint job.

"Did I do something to upset you on Monday?" Belle asked quietly, looking over at him. Gold paused in his painting and looked at her, forcing himself to meet her gaze.

"No, why would you think that?" he asked. Is it because I ran away like a coward? He wondered.

"You just seemed really skittish, and we were going to talk, and you, well, you kind of just took off. I didn't know if I said something that upset you," Belle said, putting her paint brush down.

Gold glanced around the room, and realized that they had finished painting, so he put his paint brush down as well.

"So," Belle licked her lips, "Look, I really, really need to talk to you about something sometime, you know outside of work," she said with a quick glance towards where their friends were setting up the last of the chairs near the bar and surrounding booths.

"Ok," Gold agreed, a nervousness flooding through his veins once again. He swallowed the need to take off again, and decided to keep talking with her. If he didn't, well, then either Gold himself, or Jefferson would beat him up over it.

"Great," Belle said, brightening at the thought, "When do you have time?"

"How about saterday, at the grand opening?" Gold said, if other people were around, he would be less likely to run off. No, this time he would have to have that conversation with her. Gold swallowed hard, knowing that his careful actions around her, hadn't been careful enough. That she would tell him to back off, and reject him.

"That sounds great, I'll be there at seven sharp," she said smiling at him brightly.

"Agreed," Gold replied with a small smile.

They walked over to where the DJ would be stationed and began to set up the equipment. For a while they worked in companionable silence, then Belle spoke.

"Did you ever take an Art class in school? You really great at painting the walls. Better than me anyway, my trees look like broccoli," Belle said, nudging his shoulder to make sure he heard her.

"A few," Gold admitted, "But they didn't have many art classes when I was in school. Just basic things, like Drawings, general art and sculpting. What about you? What electives did you take in school?"

"I mainly took band and workshop." Belle said, she mimicked a percussionist playing the snare drums. "The teacher used to complain I was drowning out the vase drum with my snare".

Gold laughed.

Belle smiled at this, and continued her story, "Then, right after he had us play again, I would play really quiet, like I was a mouse, then I would bang on the snare as loud as I could; freaked my teacher out so much that have the time I'd end up in the principles' office."

"You sound like quite the trouble maker," he smirked, "But I'm afraid that I beat you in that category dearie."

"Oh yeah," Belle asked, her eyes narrowing with mischief, "I also annoyed my history teacher. See he had a British accent, so I would put in as many references to England and the American revoluntary war as I possible could. The only time I was actually good, was when I was in the library".

Gold snorted and laughed again, making Belle's smile widen considerable.

"I'm afraid but I still beat you ," he said, clasping his hands together in glee, "In high school, my senior year, my friends and I made it our personal mission to cause as much trouble for the school staff as possible."

Belle grinned, and motioned with her hand for him to continue.

"Every classroom had a strict set of rules, well, one day, Vinnie, Russel and I came to school early, and switched all of them, so when the teacher went to reprimand somebody, they got mad because they thought another teacher had done it. Another time, during home ec, we were baking cookies, and we always burnt them every time so we could eat them."

"Ooh," Belle's eyes widened, "What was the worst thing you ever did?"

"Got in trouble for, or didn't get in trouble for?" Gold asked.

"Both," Belle's eyes gleamed.

"Probably the time Russel and I got a classmate's cow on the roof of the school and with some of the other students help got all of the chairs from every classroom and put them in the lunch room. Vinnie and a few others distracted the teachers for us," Gold said, smiling at the memory.

"OK, I guess you do win," Belle said, placing her hand over his accidently, "Oh, I'm sorry I didn't see your hand there," she added, rearranging her hand so that it rested on his arm instead.

"It's fine," Rumple said, smiling shyly, and unable to fully meet her gaze, his cheeks reddening in a slight blush.

They joked around a little longer than when they were finished headed out with Ruby and Jefferson.

Sorry it's been a while since I updated, anyway hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.