Sorry this update took so long! Are ye still with me? Characters owned by SM but the story is owned by someone else. Not Me.

Buccaneers

Part 5

Imperceptibly, a change took place in the way I regarded Jasper. I was protective of him, certainly, and angry at the continuous abuse he suffered from Eleazar. I admired his fortitude. I enjoyed his intelligence and wit. In a purely objective way, I could see that he was - how shall I say this? - unspoiled of feature. As a thoroughbred racehorse is clean of limb and elegant in its conformation, so was he. Around anyone but me he was reserved, but when it was just the two of us he was insouciant and charming.

Friends we were.

More time passed and I found myself thinking of him all the day long as I climbed the lines, endlessly checking ropes and sails. What was he doing now? Was he sewing? Was he in the galley, waiting as the cook put together a plate of the best of whatever was left in the depleted stores, to be hand-delivered to the Captain? Was he standing by as Eleazar and Garrett examined charts, wielding compasses and consulting almanacs?

I day-dreamed about pending whole evenings with him, wishing Eleazar would be too drunk to make his vile demands. Reveries also abounded where Jasper and I found ourselves in the exotic world of the Indies, eating strange new foods and discovering new music, both of us carefree and drunk on liberty. These idylls of mine didn't include any touching other than brotherly arms-about-shoulders as we made our way from one bar to the next, debating philosophy and politics, setting the world to rights over fortified wines, or unimaginable new liquors made from fermented fruits unknown outside the Carribbean. Before long, I never envisaged myself without him.

Then one night we were discussing what manner of employment we should take once ensconced in our new habitat.

"Perhaps a clerical position - or something of a mathematical nature?" I suggested. "Book-keeping? Ledger work?"

Jasper snorted emphatically. "You would confine yourself in a stuffy office all day, in formal wear, scratching numbers with the quill, endlessly counting, and deaf and dumb to the wonders around you?"

As ever, he could introduce a point of view I hadn't considered.

"You are right, Jasper. The prospect lacks appeal. But what, pray, did you have in mind?"

"I'll work on a plantation. I'll labor in the sun all the long day, harvesting sugar. Brown as a conker I'll be, slicing the cane and tying it in bundles, strapping them to my back and hefting them, a hundred at a time. Or have you heard of the coconut? A curious food item - its shell is fibrous and tough, but inside the flesh is white and sweet, and in the centre is a nectar such as those that the Gods themselves must imbibe. The coconuts grow in clusters at the top of tall straight trees which you have to climb without shoes, so you can grip with your bare feet while using your hands to collect the fruit. I'll hack them down, then collect them in sacks to take back to the foreman. A hard, and honest day's work is what I want, Edward, and many of them."

"That certainly sounds better than my poorly-thought plan," I nodded. "I would like to be there at your side, cutting and gathering and lifting." But I am of a competitive nature, and vain to boot. I saw myself as being more powerful than my lithe friend.

"I wager I'd carry more than you, though," I added, pride to the fore.

"Why is that?"

"Well, just look at the pair of us! I outweigh you easily. And your muscles are puny, while mine are well-developed and large," I boasted.

"Indeed?" he responded, with a glint in his eye. "A wager you say? Let's have an arm wrestle then, to determine who is the mightier. What will the loser owe the victor?"

"The Caribbean's finest coconut."

"Agreed. Prepare yourself for defeat."

We had a makeshift table which was the top part of a barrel that had been sawn in half, and we sat down opposite one another and rolled up our sleeves. I was grinning and confident, because I am of stouter physique than Jasper, and I must admit, I expected that he would be a little delicate. Perhaps it was hasty of me to pre-judge him, considering I had no valid grounds, but I was sure a lad so youthful of appearance, smooth of skin and slight of build could not be manly.

I was proven wrong within moments when not only was he able to resist the pressure I exerted, he slowly began to overpower me. Climbing all day up ropes as I do, holding my bodyweight suspended dangerously, swinging on one arm while grabbing for frayed ends with the other - how could he be stronger than I am? But I had led a layabout's life, which had only become physically demanding the past few weeks. It appeared that Jasper's slender frame had power I never suspected.

I am not a man to concede easily, though.

"You have somehow enfeebled me, through mysterious and unfair means," I grumble. "This contest was not honestly won."

"A round of throwdown then, to verify who is the champion?" he offered, and I quickly assented. Throwdown was wrestling, where two opponents grapple, and each strives to knock the other to the floor. The victor is the one left standing.

We were of the same height, Jasper and I, but I must have been the heftier by thirty pounds. I would simply be too heavy for him to have an effect on my balance.

Bracing our legs, we reached for one another and each locked our hands around the other's shoulders. Again, he surprised me. I had underestimated him. I assumed myself to have the superior chance, but we were quite evenly matched. As we sought to tip each other over, we brought our legs and feet into play as well. It is permitted to hook a foot behind your adversary's ankle to topple him. This adds a dance-like dimension, and means that participants must be crafty and agile. Starting off as cocky as I had, I soon saw that Jasper had a distinct advantage. I hadn't been challenged to a Throwdown since school, and I have already detailed my activities over the last few years. Girls, women, cards, drinking and opium. Jasper was quicker and more supple than me, and apparently his brain worked somewhat faster. He had me on the boards, flat on my back and grunting, within minutes.

Because we were grasping each other, he crashed down too. He was on top of me, kneeling across my groin and holding my hands pinned above my head for a few moments, grinning in triumph as we both panted. I became aware of something at the same time he did, and my eyes widened as his closed. My member had become erect, and was straining upwards into him.

With a groan, he flung himself off me, and he was gone.

There are few places to go on a ship, and I knew he would avoid the crew's sleeping quarters. He would be above decks, well away from the bridge. It took no time to locate him.

His head was sunk down between his shoulders, and his shock of pale hair was as unruly as always, yet seemed to shine with the moonlight. When I laid my hand on his shoulder he flinched.

"Don't say anything," he said, dully.

"Jasper - " I began.

"No. I already know you don't have tender or loving feelings towards me; I don't need you to tell me that you're embarrassed and ashamed, and you were just having some sort of reaction, or whatever - "

"Jasper - "

"Go away."

Everything had changed - I'm not sure how, and I don't know when, and I certainly didn't know why, but to see the beautiful boy in front of me hurting and upset over me was unbearable. And I wasn't embarrassed and ashamed. Oh my Lord, no. I remembered his hand on me that other night and the way he'd looked - jade eyes dark with desire and tongue between those full lips as his breath came fast and irregular. I thought of how he'd been just now, so solid across and above me, and I wondered if that was how women felt when a man was over them.

I took his chin in my hand and forcibly turned his head towards me. There had never been a parity of strength between me and a woman, and suddenly I was excited that Jasper could push me away easily if he chose to. Seized by caprice and a startling yearning, I brought my mouth to his.

He fought me. I hadn't thought about this at all. I kissed him out of an impulse brought about by discovering that this man, slender and almost feminine in his fineness and sensitivity and gentleness was as physically strong as me, and he was honest and caring and open. He had characteristics I'd looked for in women, but he didn't simper, wasn't coy, wasn't devious. He had told me directly that he wanted me, and he didn't care for money, or position. He was brave. All these things would make for a good friend, and I had thought I could be friends with him. Then he had touched my private parts and I thought I would be sick. But later, barely acknowledging it to myself, I'd longed for the feeling and the contact again, and I'd even longed just to feel his eyes on me.

My kiss was imploring, I knew it. Not sophisticated and arousing, not sure and skilled. I'd kissed many women, but I'd never been in this agitated state with them. I'd only ever had one outcome in mind. Now, I didn't know what outcome I sought. It mattered not a whit. Jasper shoved me away.

"Please," I whispered urgently. There shouldn't be anyone else up and about this hour except for whoever was on watch on the bridge, and we should be well out of earshot. But I still felt the need for discretion.

"Please what?" he whispered back. "I don't know what you're doing, and I don't know what you want. It was clear to me that I disgusted you the other day, even though you didn't stop me when you could have - and now what? Have you gone too long without a woman and grown bored with your own hand? You're prepared to slake your desire with me, though ordinarily you would find such an idea repugnant..."

I reached for his shoulder, and he was shaking with distress.

"It's not like that, Jasper," I murmured.

"I won't let you use me, as that brutish Eleazar uses me," he asserted, and his words hit me like a blow. I could have reeled away in pain.

"I would never, never..."

Such was my despair at his statement I couldn't even complete the sentence, yet I knew I had to. "I would never do anything to you against your will, I know I've already hurt you and I'm so deeply sorry for that. You have made me realize something about myself, and it's not a realization I was ready for. I'm not quite happy about it, to be honest, and I'm still adjusting to the shock. But let's go back below for this discussion. We can't talk up here, Jasper."

He nodded wordlessly and followed me, back down to our little hell hole outside Eleazar's door. The sounds of the captain's snoring and grunting and farting assured us he was deep in a stupor, and was unlikely to wake. With him in this state, this was the most secluded place on board, dank and airless as it was. No breeze could gather up our words on its way past, and whisper them to ears that would wish us ill.

And hesitantly, I attempted to explain myself to Jasper. It wasn't a fine speech - eloquent and assured, but a series of mumbling utterances, punctuated with long gaps. The jist of it was that I didn't believe myself to be a man who loved men. I wasn't about to abjure the delights and pleasures of women. Truthfully, I had been faintly repelled by what Jasper had done to me, but as he so rightly pointed out, I hadn't stopped him - I hadn't wanted to. And since then, I'd thought of him constantly and -

This was where I ran out of things to say.

"What are you actually telling me?" Jasper asked, from his hammock.

"I don't know," I admitted. "I only know that I want to see you every day, and I love your smile, and I hate your misery, I want to be with you, and when you get off this accursed tub, in the Windward Isles, I want to come with you."

He considered, and so did I. My awkward and ill-conceived monologue hadn't actually admitted anything - I'd neither said that I wanted him, or needed him, or loved him. Really, I was no more than a fool.

"You have already said that you consider me a friend. This is surely a reiteration of that sentiment," he said finally.

"It's more," I insisted. "I want to kiss you. I wish you would let me."

We hadn't blown out the lantern yet, and his shadowed eyes were fathomless as he heard this last remark. An eternity passed - him expressionless and me breathless.

"So kiss me," he invited finally, and I was out of my hammock in a flash. He sat on the edge of his, and our lips met, for the second time that night. His were plump as a girl's, but I felt harsh bristles around them - a situation at the same time anomalous and wrong, but exciting. He parted his thighs and pulled me between them, wobbling on the swinging hammock and holding my hips to steady himself. Our mouths were wide open and hot straightaway, and as our tongues delved with no shyness and no restraint, we were both soon out of breath.

Jasper was the first to pull away. "Is this just a matter of curiosity for you?" he asked.

Maybe it was. I was thrilled and confused - a toy tossed carelessly between Eros and Tyche, while Aphrodite watched and reserved judgement. I swallowed dumbly and made no response.

"Don't play with me," he said. "Promise me nothing, Edward. I couldn't bear it."

But I was ready to promise him everything. By this point, I couldn't bear not to.

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I'll proofread this later. I just wanted to put it out there so you'd know I haven't given up on this tale!

If you spot any glaring errors in continuity, grammar, spelling etc, let me know.

If you know any good pirate jokes, let me know.

Or go on, leave a review.