Wow guys, long time no see.
Thanks so much for the encouraging and heartfelt messages you sent during my long absence. Winter hit hard, and I'm trying to make enough money to pay my bills, etc, etc, life. I never forgot about you, or the Pirates. This story is my sanctuary, my practiced escapism. I could never just walk away and leave it go, not forever.
I hope this winter has treated you better than it has me. Remember, sunshine is only ever hours away. And in the meantime we have the moon, and the stars, and all the ways in which those things are infinite and reflections of our own desires and mythologies and still maintain their own truths. Remember all the things that are the moon; a myth, a story, a physical body that controls the seas. Distant, yet so close you can nearly reach out and touch it, so present that it affects our very day to day life. Warm enough to speak to on nights you are lonely. So cold that to visit it without protection would mean death. And yet we went anyway, we put on suits and rocketed through space and past death just because we wanted to go and visit our friend.
May you find someone who treats you like we treat the moon.
Peace, love, peace again. Rate and comment, feedback if you'd like, I love you and love to hear from you. Each and every one of your voices is special and powerful.
***
The Captain woke me that night with the force of his dreams.
It was not something that he meant to do. It was not something that he could have helped. If he could have, I believe that he would have kept his fear from disturbing me and taken it all for his own.
But he could not. And it was not his own, or at least it did not have to be for he was with me. And the universe understands these things and perhaps his body did as well, held the truth of our connection closer than his mind would allow and so when the nightmare came he reached out and grasped onto me, his hand landing on my forearm with a grip so tight it startled me from my slumber.
It had been a long time since I had been grabbed out of sleep. Still, my body had not forgotten what usually came from such touches and my eyes flew open, my hand coming up ready to defend or strike. The Captain, already half-awake and now faced with the sudden movement of my body, reacted accordingly and pulled away with a startled noise. I, recognizing the noise he made and, more importantly, recognizing the anxiety held within it, froze.
And that was where we finally came to rest; I, frozen in my moment of defense and the Captain, his moment of fear.
We laid there in the darkness, our pants swirling in the air above us and catching raggedly against each other. I could barely see him, could only hear him in his breathing, feel him in the way he didn't move, could see the faintest outline of the wild curls that sprung up whenever he tossed at night.
My heart beat. I anchored myself in the space we created and bade it continue.
The Captain was the first to speak. "Shit," he said. His outline slowly began degrading as he slipped toward the bed, his face dripping towards the covers. "Shit, shit, shit, my love, I didn't-"
This outline, those small sounds. They were not enough for me. I reached out and wrapped an arm around him, felt my skin slide across the smoothness of his chest until my fingers held his shoulder and I could pull him towards me. He fell into my arms, a gravity created as much by the negative we had been as the positive we were.
"My love," I whispered into his hair. His breath left his frame to crawl shakily through my ribs. I waited until I felt his chest again inflate in my grasp before I spoke again. "I'm right here."
I did not say it in full, but I knew he understood. Nothing can hurt you so long as I am with you. How many times had I told him that? How many ways had I promised those words? I said it and so it was true. Or it was true, and then I said it, but in the end all that mattered was that truth. And of that, I was certain.
He wrapped an arm around my shoulder, pulling me tighter still. I still could not see him but now I could feel him, could smell him, could touch him and was that not better than sight? A mirage you can see. An illusion you can witness. But this, this truth, it was all the senses I trusted and it sat so close to my being that I no longer could tell the difference between it and my name.
He said not a word, and I said nothing more. We simply held each other in the darkness, surrounded by the knowledge of our love, the protection of our sincerity, and we allowed these simple realities to cocoon us as we drifted back to sleep.
***
"How long until we reach the border?"
I glanced across the table as I put down the Captain's breakfast. He had the maps spread out across the surface, his annotated map of the border on the top. I saw he had marked out an approximate position for us that was nearly perfect.
Nearly. But still, it was close enough. I placed my finger just north of the spot, a few centimeters above the line he'd marked out. The border was curling North in these currents. "We should be there by tonight."
He took a deep breath as he looked at where my finger lie. I let him stare, not knowing what might be going through his mind but knowing that he would tell me when he felt it was time for me to know.
When his eyes left the map, the place they moved was me. I watched him trace his gaze up my booted feet, my worn breeches. The shirt he had chosen for me, half tucked in and splashed with flour. When they reached my face I felt his gaze tickle against the stubble I hadn't shaved yet that day, the scars I wore more easily than my clothing. The ones he never asked about, the ones that had stories he knew and ones that had stories I tried my best to forget. And when his eyes reached mine?
What else could we do? We both smiled.
"Eat your breakfast," I told him. He reached across the table to trace his hand down my arm. I caught his hand at the end of its path and squeezed it lightly before letting go.
I paused in the door and looked back, as much to see him again as to make sure that he was eating.
He was not eating. He was standing at the table, braced lightly against the solid wood. His chin was in his hand, a smile was on his face and a half-dreamy, half sharpened look in his eyes as he stared distractedly at my ass.
I shook my head, laughing softly to myself, and headed up to the deck.
I found Natch leaning on the deck railing, looking green and winded. I clapped him on the back and he groaned, collapsing down so that his face was in his arms.
"Good night?" I asked him.
"I'm never drinking again." I patted his shoulder and left him to deal with his hangover in peace.
Hamms welcomed me with a glint in his eye and a smile. "The ropes were missing you, lad." I got to work coiling and cataloging. I wanted everything in perfect shape for when we crossed the border.
"Should be smooth sailing," Hamms told me. "Weather just right for sailing."
I nodded my agreement. It would be just right, at least until we crossed into the North. After that there might be storms as Dreyfus pushed against my control.
