Shards of Sunset

by fmriver

The Do-Over CH02

The next day arrived soon enough. Sunset had woken up at sunrise, moving to camp in an alley just across from her first planned stop for the day. The Trading Post wouldn't open for another half-hour, but she'd seen the old man park in the back a few minutes ago, so she hoped he'd open the door if she knocked. After another night of barely any decent sleep, she simply wanted to go through her goals for the day and hopefully get into an actual bed by this evening.

It seemed like he heard her banging in the door, as she could see him coming through the dark store from a door that lead to what seemed like the back-office.

He looked as gruff as ever as he wrinkled up his eyebrows at her before unlocking the door.

"Storefront opens at 8 kid." He said with his gravelly voice.

"Mister Trade, look. I'm clearly not here to buy anything ok? I've actually got a couple gold collectors coins, and I heard you can help getting identify them?" Sunset blurted out, turning in the charm. For some reason the old man didn't seem very impressed.

He grunted out. Sunset could tell he was about to close the door on her, but she pushed ahead.

"No-not asking you to buy them! Look, I... I got some stuff from my Gran's estate and I really want to know if any of it might be worth anything ok? I'm pretty sure these are made of gold so if you don't look at them I'm going to sell them to the gold for cash guys down the road, but they'll just melt them down. Don't you want to know if they're more important than that? I can't figure out what they are or where they're from." Sunset grabbed her elbow, trying to sell the downtrodden look.

Fair Trade squinted at her, frowning for a while. Finally though, he grunted and walked back, leaving the door open in silent invitation for Sunset to follow.

She carefully made her way through the unlit store after closing the glass storefront door behind her. Soon enough they entered the well lit back office. There was a placard with the name "Fair Trade' inscribed on it. It figured thought Sunset.

"Well, show me what you got" Fair Trade said as he sat down at his desk. Sunset pulled out two of her bits she had previously taken and folded in one of the leftover paper donut bags and stashed in her front pocket, and set them in the rubber mat he had in the table.

"I have a couple more, but I brought two for you to look at. think they're commemorative? " Sunset stated, forcing herself to sound credulous, as if she didn't know quite well when they were close to mint condition in spite of their age. Her effort at guile were wasted, as Fair Trade's eyes were pinned to the Equestrian coins, slack jawed for a moment.

He pulled out a cleaning kit, some cloth gloves a jewelers eyeglass and two transparent coin cases, looking almost affronted at the shoddy care she had shown for them. He was hooked.

===========

The cash she had gotten wasn't as much as she had hoped, being just a bit more than the fair value for the gold content of the coins, but Fair Trade wanted to get a second opinion and have appraised before giving her the rest. He still gave her enough for the next step in her plan, and she'd be heading back there in the next couple days. He also said if they were what he thought they were, he'd be more than happy including a couple free appraisals by his jeweler cousin Fair Cut on the raw gemstones.

Afterwards Sunset had been able to open an account online for the local Canterlot Credit Union from the local public library and then fund it using a prepaid visa card she had bought from the nearby grocery store. She had then gone in person to the branch to deposit most of the remaining cash she got from Fair Trade, and then rented a storage locker at the Self-Storage place, for her remaining coins and gems. Sunset made sure it was paid for a couple months and also linked it to her new bank account for autopay.

By that afternoon, Sunset was sitting on a park bench eating one of the last of the stale donuts she'd hoarded, along with some carrots and water from her new drink bottle she had picked up from the grocery store and filled with tap from a fountain. While she'd gotten a lot done that morning, she still didn't have a place to stay, nor any change of clothes. That was fine, she would be able to deal with it.

She found herself staring out at the families and kids taking advantage of the last week of summer vacation to enjoy the park and the Canterlot shopping district. Sunset sniffled and blinked her watery eyes.

Sunset had kept herself so busy since she woke up that she hadn't had a moment to continue her emotional spiral. Sitting here at the park, eating carrots, seeing people that may have almost been familiar walk by once in a while, it was almost too much. Sunset breathed in, then did so again, then one last time.

There was a lady that had stared a little bit too long as she walked by. It was probably time to keep moving. Sunset forced herself to focus as she crumpled the paper bag and wiped her face. Her next stop would be the trendy thrift store nearby.

She'd be able to get at least a couple tops and maybe some jeans for under twenty dollars. After that, it would be back on the bus to get closer to the part of town with the motels. She'd need to go back to Quills and Things for school and drawing supplies once she had a more permanent spot to sleep.

All this walking and busing around really made her appreciate her old scooter.

=======

Radiant Hope couldn't shake the image of that girl silently crying at the park. She could have sworn she had seen that same girl all across town all day, and had been thinking about approaching her to see what was wrong before the kid got up and left.

Comments

[xyberblood]

you write interesting bits and i hope to see more of them the sunset doover is something i would probably love if you wrote it even if just up to stealing the crown, if she actually steals it or just goes back to equestria, if she make friends and family before this canon starts

[Velvet-Fresh]

write 'do over' as a full story. I love the peggy sue concept