"Reminiscing His Love"
(A/N: I guess you could call this the sequel to "Hopeless Dreams, Hopeless Jack", takes place sometime after the third movie, so yeah spoilers are bound to come out from DMC. Read, review and by all means flame. Another one-shot: The Blacksmith's Daughter is not forgotten, i'll update as soon as my muse tells me to)
Disclaimer: I own nothing Pirates of the Carribbean related. Except for my OC(s).
"Reminiscing His Love"
Rum slopped, messily, down the front of her as she bustled toward a table filled with laughing, greasy men. The tavern was buzzing, and the moon had yet to fully show itself. Inwardly, she groaned, but her face glowed a secretive, small smile. She dropped the tray of glasses into the center of the table. The motion of over filled flasks of rum, clanging like bells together, sent roars of approval from the men to the barmaid. One man being bold enough to slap her on the rump as she walked on by, heading to her spot behind the bar.
Bess, as she was called, smirked over her shoulder, her brassy eyes flickering over the grotesque, dirty, smelling man, that was currently waggling his brow in her direction. Sucking in a deep breath of bar air, she winked at him ever so slightly and continued her pace to behind the counter. Once, there she rolled her shoulders back, and massaged her temples with her index fingers before dabbing the beads of sweat, currently taking up residence on her forehead, with the back of her hand. Bess ran her hands over her flushed, rosy cheeks, and before she gingerly rubbed the exposed skin of her neck and chest. Closing her eyes for a second, she only half attempted to wish the voices of the brawny men that filled the tavern, would hush their voices, only for but a second or two.
She shrugged her bare shoulders before adjusting her dress back to its proper place, which wasn't very proper at all. Bess, was after all, a bar wench. She wasn't a prude trying to make a better life for herself, or an unfortunate girl dreaming of running away. Bess was a simplistic bar maid, with no other aspirations to become a fairy tale. Plainly, a bar girl, just like her mother was before her.
Alas, she wasn't a strumpet of any sense, that sold her body to various forms of lonely men. Bess didn't mind a man becoming fresh with her, or going to bed with her, if he was clean and good looking enough. The latter didn't happen that often, though.
Ladies of a respectable status would have snubbed their noses at the sight of disgruntled Bess, allowing men to slap her ass as she served them more of that just plain vile, drink. Calling and assuming Bess to be a common whore. That was why no respectable woman lived in Tortuga.
Bess snorted a laugh, resting her head in her propped up hand. She blew air that tasted of rum from the corner of her lips, watching the sudden movement of air blow a stray piece of her sun-kissed brown hair up into the area around her face before it faltered and landed into her eyes.
"Aye, Bess, glance over yonder, see that man in the corner, all by his onesies?"
One of the heavier set maids motioned a chubby feature, sloshing more rum onto Bess as she thrust the glass into Bess' chest. Bess sat the glass on the counter eyeing the man carefully.
The maid turned to Bess, fidgeting with the bodice of her dress, causing Bess to turn a darker shade of red and annoyingly bat the helpful hands away.
"I see 'em, and what of it?"
The maid twinkled her eyes at Bess, hushing under her breath,
"Give 'em 'is rum, darlin' and let him put you to bed, if yer dare."
Bess sent the maid a sly glance, but went on her way, to the back corner of the tavern, where the mysterious man sat, his feet, clad in heavy leather boots, propped up on the table and his tricorne casting a shadow of his dark rimmed eyes.
She padded toward him, careful not to spill or slosh the rum she held so diligently from her chest. Bess could feel her stray pieces of hair coming free from their pins, and that caused a high degree of annoyance. Cautiously, she placed the glass somewhere near his feet.
He lifted his hat, so it was out of his eyes, and cocked his head to the side studying Bess for a moment, before taking a sip of the red liquid.
"Thank you . . . " He drawled from his lips, eyeing Bess up and down.
Bess shifted her weight between her feet and cast a gaze over her shoulder, and saw no one watching her or egging her on. She was on her own.
She wasn't used to striking up conversations, most the times the quiet men in the tavern didn't want to talk, simply they wanted to wallow in self pity, coat themselves in their own thick blanket of silence, wishing their mind would clear or things would be different.
Wishing was for the hopeful, but Bess didn't wish for things. Did that make her hopeless? In away, yes, never praying or thinking life could change for the better, did make her, in a certain light, hopeless. But, then again, her thoughts were logical, wishing and believing something good would come from it, was close to being a mad loon.
Crossing her arms over her chest, she stared at the man, who had since replaced his tricorne over his eyes. Her lips quivered slightly at the anticipation of words vibrating off her tongue and into the stale bar air. It was notably quieter in this corner of the tavern, making it seem easier to breathe.
"What 'tis a yer story, sir?"
He didn't even blink an eye in her direction, the only movement he made was subtle, as he reached for the glass of rum and downed half of it in one long, continuous gulp. Bess pulled a chair next to him, breathing in the aroma of his clothing and body, he smelt of sea salt, and sweat.
"I don't have one, a sorry lass."
Bess tilted her head to the side knowingly, her eyes smirking at him/
"Every man that walks in here has ay story . . . " She boldly removed his hat, and placed it in her lap, "Some just tell the tale too much . . . " She gestured to a table were a greasy man, with frizzy, grey hair, was flamboyantly moving his arms. He chuckled softly to himself, for a second, shaking his head.
"And yet some, like yourself, don't say anything and those are the most brilliant tales of them all."
The man snapped his hat out of her lap, setting it atop his head. He leaned in close to Bess, his breath tingling the skin of her neck.
"And why do you say that, love?"
She breathed in a deep breath to compose herself before speaking, "Because those are the tales that'd nevered be spoken on the lips of men."
He rubbed his chin, as if he was thinking, tugging at one of the braids that adorned it. He leaned back, resting his hands behind his head. She starred tentatively at him, waiting for him to speak.
"The name's Captain Jack Sparrow, and your's?"
Bess cracked a smile, maybe she wasn't as bad at talking to people like she thought she was. She noticed he wasn't smiling, and still looked sullen.
"Bess of Tortuga, nice to meet you captain."
"Bess . . . " He mused out loud, looking hazy for a moment.
"Captain?"
"Ah, yes? Story? It's quite long, I shall warn ye."
She smiled at Jack and he began his story and even though he was sad, and depressed looking, the man sure did get a kick of talking about himself.
Bess sat eagerly on the edge of her seat, her eyes growing wide as Jack continued to weave his story tightly around her body, hooking her instantly. She had to have been sitting there for at least twenty minutes, the only noises she made were her shallow, anticipating breaths.
"Then she kissed me, and it was like everything stopped. The waves of the ocean simmered, all my fear evaporated, and then it clicked . . . "
"You realized you loved her?" Bess asked in a hopeful tone.
Jack laughed in spite, "No, she shackled me to the mast of my ship."
Her mouth made the shape of an 'o' as Jack wrapped up the last of his tales, "They of course rescued me later on, but that's another night's story."
"What happened to her, did she stay with that other man?"
Jack shook his head yes and small, watery tears, fronting in the corners of his deep brown eyes.
"I'm sorry. Do you wish things could have happened differently?" Bess whispered, running a hand along his cheek. Jack gave her a hard look, grasping his fingers around her chin and lifting it up so she was staring directly into his eyes.
"Love is a free bird, one cannot capture her, she goes where she please. Someday she might comeback but never for long."
Jack finished the last of his rum, allowing it to swish in his mouth before he swallowed.
"Your out of rum, I shall need to get yer more."
Her words seemed to get lost in the noisy room, and Jack ignored them all together.
"Bess, is that short for . . . Elizabeth?"
She nodded her head, not bothering to speak. " Elizabeth, don't let me take yer to bed tonight, promise?"
Bess, nodded mumbling something about not liking to be called Elizabeth. He shifted, uncomfortably, under her questioning gaze.
"Yer better then a sad man's doll."
"I'll order some more rum for you, Captain."
Bess scooted away, but he caught her wrist, and ever so quietly in, an overly noisy tavern, to a fickle bar wench, Jack purred the words that had been eating at his insides since that fateful kiss.
"I do wish, I wish for her to have picked me instead. They're just silly wishes though, right?"
She stared at her feet for a moment, her shoes were dirty and the bottom of her dress was stained with liquor of all sorts.
"Indeed . . . " She murmured, unsure of herself walking toward the bar.
"Thank you, Elizabeth."
And Bess wasn't sure if Captain Jack Sparrow was talking to her or musing to himself, so she didn't answer him. Jack was a torn man, torn between love and heartache, image and the truth and most of all, himself.
The wishes he cursed under his breath when he couldn't fall to sleep at night were proof of one thing: Jack wasn't hopeless anymore.
Fin read & review, sweetums.