Catherine didn't know why she let Jack Sparrow walk her home. Maybe it was because she had never been this drunk, and the remaining logical part of her brain had decided that he, drunk, would do a much better job of getting her home than she, drunk.

Or maybe she was not yet ready to say goodbye to this strange, charming man.

She wasn't entirely able to walk straight, so she leaned into him every few steps, both of them stumbling each time it happened. Sometimes she'd veer off course and have to grab his arm to keep from walking into something. She didn't mind, though — she kind of liked walking with him, and the moon was so beautiful, sitting giant and round among its bed of stars, turning the muddy road into liquid silver and making her skin glow like it never could in candlelight. She felt lovely. The evening was lovely. The captain was lovely. Everything was lovely, lovely, lovely.

They didn't talk; Catherine wasn't sure if she could string two words together at that point, and Jack seemed to be enjoying walking around in silence. But after a while the delight began to wear off. "So," he said, "where am I to drop you off?"

Catherine saw a building several houses away from hers. It wasn't abandoned, so to speak. The family who'd lived there had just moved out, and no one had bought it yet. Her mind, sluggish and a little crazy from drinking, made the decision for her, one that her sober brain would never have considered. "Here's fine," she said, gesturing vaguely toward the house.

He looked over at it. There were boards on the windows. "You sure this is where you live?"

"It's a fine place to spend the night, is it not?" She took his hand — needing him to keep her from losing her balance — and staggered up to the door. It was unlocked, to her relief, and with a glance around to make sure no one was watching, she pulled him inside.

It took a few minutes for their eyes to adjust. When they did, Jack looked around. "Love," he said, "have you been plundered?"

Catherine could see his point — it was completely empty of everything except dust. "No," she replied, lifting her chin. "I think it's rather nice." She stepped closer, audacity having spawned from drunkenness. "You're not supposed to wear hats indoors," she reminded him. "S'not proper." He took it off, about to set it carefully on the ground (he always treated his hat like it was an expensive white dress, instead of the old leather rag it was), but she plucked it out of his hand and placed it on her own head.

His eyebrows almost disappeared into his hair, they rose so high. "I believe you're contradicting your own rule."

"You cannot," she replied. "But women are allowed to." They were both speaking in very low voices; there was something a little creepy about the building, and perhaps they both felt the precariousness of their situation, and were afraid of speaking too loudly or they'd break the spell.

"Oh?" he asked. "Why?"

"I . . . do not know." Her forehead wrinkled as she tried to think of a plausible explanation. "Because I enjoy wearing this hat," she eventually declared, triumphant and a little dizzy.

He laughed, shaking his head and nearly falling over at the movement. Snatching his arm to steady him, she was surprised at how it felt: warm and lanky and firm under her fingers. "S'all right," he said, regaining his balance. "I got it." She opened her mouth to speak, but suddenly realized that she had no idea what she would say, and after a few seconds of her brain drunkenly computing — calculating her inhibitions divided by desire, with risk utterly subtracted from the equation — she lunged forward and threw her arms around his neck. Though she nearly pulled them both to the ground with the embrace, she was undaunted as she pressed her lips against his earlobe, leaving a messy lipstick smear on his skin and earring (which might have looked like gold, but tasted more like copper or nickel).

When Catherine pulled back, she saw that Jack's mouth was hanging open in mute surprise, and his wide eyes met her own dark ones. Then his lips spread into a wide grin and he snickered. Bright red, Catherine tried to pull her arms away as his amusement turned into full-blown laughter. "Well, excuse me, I was simply —"

"Enough, Miss Catherine." His laughter dying down, he took her by the upper arms, leaning forward and studying her intently. "Do you wish to kiss me?" he asked, as serious as though he hadn't had a drop of ale. She swallowed, then nodded. "Even though I am a fearsome pirate?" Another nod, and he shrugged, one side of his mouth quirking up into a smile. "Then I suppose I ought to comply, hmm?" Despite his drunkenness, he managed to catch her lips on the first try, holding them for a moment — he seemed to know that she'd never done this before, though perhaps that was obvious — before his tongue trailed along her lower lip. She gasped and started to pull away, but he murmured, "You're all right, darling," and she allowed him to enter her mouth, shocked that she, the ugly daughter of the Blackwells, was doing something she'd only ever read about in penny romances. Pulling back, he rested his forehead against hers, his breathing slightly ragged. "You know, I have a rule of etiquette too."

She blinked. "Really? You?"

Jack continued as though she hadn't spoken. "If men are not allowed to wear hats indoors, then women are allowed to wear only them."

"Beg pardon?" Either she was too drunk or that hadn't made sense.

"If you would like to wear the hat, you cannot wear anything else," he clarified, and stepped away, crossing his arms and watching her with that near-constant amused expression.

She ran a thumb along her lower lip, inspecting with some interest the dark red film it left on her thumb and either ignoring or unaware that her mouth was a mess. "So, hypothetically, I could take the hat off and still be proper?"

He nodded, trying to hide his disappointment. "I suppose."

She sighed, glancing at the entrance to the house and running the fingers of one hand along the hat's brim. "That is a very crude remark," she said, unbuttoning her dress.

He raised one eyebrow, watching as she let the dress fall to her feet and tugged her hair out of its tight bun. "And yet, it seems to have worked."

"That is because I am exceptionally drunk." Catherine dropped her hands to her sides, pushing the rest of her underclothes down with them. "But that does not mean that you cannot act like a gentleman."

"My sincerest apologies," he replied, tilting her chin up so that he could kiss her again, his other hand pressing against the warm skin of her back. "I'll make up for it, I promise."

Catherine woke up lying on the floor of the empty house, her dress thrown over her like a blanket. Sitting up, she sneezed at the dust and pulled the dress around her, the evening returning to her in a series of images that blurred at the edges. "Jack?" she whispered, feeling her head throb at both the sound and the sunlight streaming in razor-thin lines through the boards on the windows.

"Here, love." The voice made her start, which only increased her discomfort. Pressing one hand to her skull, she turned slowly, trying to keep her keep the pounding in her skull to a minimum. The captain was sitting behind her, fully clothed, pulling on a boot.

"Where are you going?" she mumbled, gingerly climbing to her feet and stepping into her clothes.

"Tortuga," he replied, grinning at her. "I will soon be captaining my own boat. Ship."

"Oh. Right." Suddenly aware of how she must appear, she looked down, running a hand along her mouth and trying to flatten the rat's nest that was her hair. "O-of course."

His smile became tinged with pity, and he stood to meet her. "It's okay," he said, reaching forward and stroking Catherine's cheek with the back of his fingers.

She shook her head, trying to focus her scrambled, hungover thoughts. "Is it truly?" she asked. "I mean, is there any way I could . . . or you could . . . ?"

He didn't answer either her finished question or the ones left hanging; he just knelt down and picked up his tatty old coat, pulling it over his shoulders like a cape. "I have to go," he said, glancing out at the sky glimpsed through a hole in one of the boards. "It is getting late. Now, have you seen my hat?" When she discovered it hanging on a nail, he placed it on his head with the utmost care.

"Good luck, Captain," she said, not knowing what a more suitable farewell would be.

He smiled at her, the tan skin at the corners of his eyes crinkling in a way she hadn't noticed in the dim light of the previous evening. "You too . . . I don't think you gave me your name."

She had, but the amount of liquor consumed had been quite remarkable, and she felt no qualms about repeating it for him. "Blackwell," she added hastily, realizing he might want to look her up again next time he was in the area.

"Goodbye, Catherine. I shall never forget you." He kissed her again. "I'll see you again, someday." With that, he turned and disappeared into the bright morning, and the last thing she saw before the door swung shut on him was his silhouette, his hand raised against the sunlight.

The comparative darkness returned with the closing of the door, and she sat down on the floor, resting her head on her knees. She couldn't leave so soon after a man, anyway, and her head was too clouded with thoughts and emotions and the hangover to do much of anything. When she felt like the room had stopped spinning, she climbed to her feet, stepping into her shoes and out the door.

Catherine was going to have hell to pay when she got home. The only question was: Had it been worth it?

She thought of Jack, his strangely knowing smile, his stupid hat.

Yes. It had.