Once a man steals his first piece of gold, he can't go back. No question. That was always my problem.
I stole my first piece of gold as a child to raise some money to get out to the Caribbean, to find my father. Once I'd stolen that first bit of gold, it always haunted me. Those few coins glittered like the rarest of jewels in my dreams. I tried my hardest to stay on the "right" side of the law. But I always remembered that thrill. I shoved it to the back of my mind, and got an honest job. And when I wasn't very good at that, I got an apprenticeship under the blacksmith. The Governor Swann, under Elizabeth's pleading, vouched well for me, so, despite my unknown heritage I was given good standing. I turned out to be very good at that, much to my master's approval. Mr Brown could drink himself into a stupor and I'd do the work. I even trained myself to use the swords. It made it so much easier to get the swords to work to my advantage.
I pushed the memory to the back of my mind, barely remembering it had even occurred. I was always good at deluding myself. I managed to persuade myself for years that my lack of interest in the female gender was entirely due to my fairy-tale obsession with Elizabeth. And from that strength to get away from the craving to steal one more piece of gold, bred my hating of pirates and thieves, for being so much weaker than I. Until I met Jack Sparrow.
I travelled with him, out on the open water. It reminded me of the few times I had gone to sea with my father. I had never met his crew mates, but I had always loved that moment when we'd be on the water, just us, father and son. The water underneath us mirroring the billowing sails, following a wind that would lead us to treasures that could not be measured in silver and gold, just as Jack later reminded me. I believe that to have been an inherited enjoyment, for my father, after all, was a pirate.
I saved Elizabeth, travelled back to Port Royal and married her. But it still haunted me. The sea, the gold … And when Jack Sparrow came back into my life, I realised something else had been haunting me. The thing that symbolised everything I shouldn't want, but did. Jack Sparrow.
He offered me the chance to get back to the sea, to join his crew. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't leave Elizabeth, but I wanted more than anything to be back there. On the Black Pearl. Then Elizabeth came in and everything was explained to her by the silver-tongued captain. She told me that I could go. I was allowed to quench my thirst for the sea and "everything with it". She signalled at Jack with the back of her head when she said that. I knew what she was telling me. She always knew me better than I knew myself.
I heard that she had our marriage annulled, after I left, and remarried, but I knew not who. I barely touched ground again after that, as I found that if I let Jack off the ship, the company he took was the kind of company that left me jealous and alone. The only way to keep him on board was to make sure he never left his bed during shore leave. Not that he complained too much.
I suppose my life is not what one would call the perfect life. I am a pirate, a wanted felon. I l also know that many in my position would regret the stealing of the coins that condemned me to my current profession. However, I cannot bring myself to regret it, for to regret it would to say I am not happy and I have never been happy. Maybe the coins were not my problem, but my solution, my salvation. I could never imagine being this alive without the Black Pearl, without piracy, without the sea … without Jack.