Morning Grind

I made sure to load my pack up with the usual reclaimed junk I brought on these runs. Some of these shops were not in the best of neighborhoods but I'd learned as long as you didn't look rich and didn't act nervous people generally wouldn't mess with you. The few times someone had insisted on looking in my bag they'd just laughed at the junk and sent me on my way.

I didn't need any of that attention today so the bag was good camouflage, made it look like this was just another of my normal runs. I even had some stuff I'd fixed up to sell while I was at it. And I'd need the bag if I found anything good to take home as well.

My first stop was at a place simply called The Pawn Shop, not a very imaginative guy. The kind that left the place looking dirty just so people would expect him to not have much money. "Morning Ed!" I called to the bald guy in question sitting behind the counter. He just grunted back at me as I started to look around. He was used to my hunting for treasures after all these years. Thrift shops were better hunting grounds, they got most of their stuff from donations that was often as not just a way for people to clear out their old trash, while people came to pawn shops to get money so mostly brought stuff they thought would sell well. Still I found some good bargains at times so it didn't hurt to look.

Nothing jumped out at me today though so I eventually made my way to the counter. "You think you can restring a guitar kid?" Ed asked without preamble and nodded at a pretty nice looking guitar though it was indeed stringless.

"You including the strings?" He snorted at me, that's what I thought. "Pass, we both know a set of strings would cost me more than I'd make back."

He laughed and shook his head. "Can't get one over on you kid, what you got for me today?"

Setting my bag down I opened the first pouch and pulled out three watches. I found a lot of broken watches at the thrift stores and usually they came cheap, and sometimes they were surprisingly easy to fix. Occasionally all it took was a new battery.

I set them down on the counter while slipping the two coins I'd also grabbed into a pocket. "These are all in good shape and run perfectly."

Ed whistled appreciatively as he picked up the Rolex. "Is this a real Thunderbird?" I nodded. All I knew was when I grabbed this is I saw the Rolex name on the watch. It had been tossed in with a dozen other broken watches and I'd bought the bundle dirt cheap, doubtless someone hadn't a clue what they'd sold and the people at the thrift shop hadn't been any wiser. He glanced at the fancy pocket watch that had just needed some dirt cleaned out of it and the Mickey Mouse watch that I had hoped was a rarity and shrugged, but didn't let go of the Rolex. "Tell you what kid, I'll give you a thousand for the lot." His left eye twitched, a thousand dollars and he was trying to rip me off. Still that was the most anything I'd brought in had gotten me, and I no longer felt bad about passing him copies of the doubloon.

"I don't know much about watch prices Ed, so I'm going to trust you on this." He grinned seeing a score. "But I got something else I do know the value of." I pulled the heavy gold coins out of my pocket on set them down on the counter. His eyebrows looked like they were trying to climb up and replace his lack of hair.

He very carefully set down the Rolex before picking up a coin to look over. "Is this real solid gold? Where the hell did you get your hands on these kid?"

"I just got my some of my inheritance. Real doubloons recovered from the ocean. Worth ten grand a pop but I know you can't give me full value."

He set the coin down and stood up. "You suddenly in the need for some real cash? No don't tell me, I don't want to know." He turned and pulled a small box from a cabinet behind him and set it on the counter. Inside was a small stone bowl and what looked like a couple stone bottles as well. "You sure this is pure? You've built up plenty of trust over the years kid but if this is fake it's gonna melt and I ain't paying you shit."

"It's the real deal, test away." I really fucking hoped this was going to work. If the copies just melted to a acid test like the copper or nickel they had been before I was back to square one on my plan. Worse, I'd have to scratch this shop off my list.

I tried to look confident as I held my breath. Ed let out a laugh as I blinked in confusion. "That's not how you do a acid test kid, I'm just messing with you." He pulled a small black cloth out of the box. "If you're gonna set up your own shop you need to learn these things. Watch this." For some reason he was convinced I wanted my own pawn shop. He rubbed the cloth on the side of the coin for a bit, which left a gold mark on it. Then he put that in the bowl and let a drop fall on the mark where it did nothing I could tell. "Yeah that's real gold kid, but how pure?" He stoppered that bottle and pulled out the second one. "Once you know you have gold this will tell you the purity by how long it lasts. If these are the real deal that's ten grand each to a collector, but you know you won't get that price here."

I nodded. "Yeah I know, but I don't have the time or patience to try to track one down. You have connections and I expect you to make a good profit on this, just don't try to screw me like you did on the watch."

He laughed again as we watched the new acid on the mark. "You're sharp kid, tell you what, cards on the table you're looking at a value of twenty five grand all told." The mark finally faded and his grin just got wider as he shook his head. "I'll give you eighteen grand right here and now, and you get anymore of this 'inheritance' you let me know and we can work something else out."

"Deal." I held out my hand, Ed was old fashioned like that, always wanted to shake on a deal. More than three times what the watch was worth for it and what had been two pennies this morning. And this was just my first stop. Knowing the Alterscope turned copper into real gold was worth a whole damn lot too.

.

After a long busy morning I had more money on me now than I'd ever seen in my life. I'd gone to every pawn shop I knew and no one had turned down a sale. Some places I'd gotten better deals, and a few worse but I wasn't complaining. The best had about turned my hair grey when he insisted on calling in a expert, and served him right when his expert offered to buy the doubloon from me directly right there and didn't hesitate to put ten grand in my hand for it. I'd deposited five thousand of it in the bank, I didn't think I could do much more without raising flags. The rest was hidden away best I could in various places in my pack.

I sat eating lunch at a nice cafe trying to decide what to do next. If I was smart I'd head home and hide the money before doing anything else but it was literally pocket change. If I lost it I could do this all over again tomorrow. But could I really? How many coins could I pawn realistically? I doubted the shops I knew had that much liquid cash, which is why I only sold a few at a time. Maybe now that I had enough cash in hand for anything I might plan short term I should contact a collector? Make a big official above board sale with another pile of doubloons and actually pay taxes on it so my account wouldn't get flagged. Once I had a pile of 'legal' money the occasional larger deposit hopefully wouldn't be suspect.

Worries for another day I ultimately decided. I got up and tossed my waste in the trash while looking across the street. The sign above the store said Leather and Lace in a dark purple. The advertising over the windows made it very clear what they sold. I'd never been in a sex shop before, but there was no way I could buy a sex doll online so in person it was.

Making my way across the street I smiled. I'm sure I'd find the perfect fit for Amber.