Chapter Twenty One

Oh no! So you lot think I'm mean huh? Come on it was only a little cliffie! I had to keep you in a little bit of suspense! Anyway thank you very much for your reviews, and I apologise for being mean! Wow we have reached a hundred reviews! How great is that??? Please keep them coming! Also don't forget to check out my 'From Hell' fic 'Personal Hell' and my PotC drabble 'I'm Gonna Smile'

Chapter Twenty One

The silence seemed to hang in the air for an age, and Jack didn't seem inclined to answer her question, just as Anamaria was about to prompt him into a response, he cleared his throat and turned towards her. She was shocked to see tears welled up in his chocolate eyes as he looked at her.

"Aye lass, I know exactly where his daughter is" he responded, and then turned and walked away from her. She stared after him open mother. He knew? Well had he taken her? Where the hell was she? Had he given Harry Birch the information that he needed? So many questions raced through her mind, yet she knew he would not permit her to verbalise any of them, at least not yet.

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Jack finally managed a whole day stood at the helm, after his cosy little chat with Anamaria, the pirate was having trouble banishing his memories from his mind, so he took his comfort in the only way he knew. He drank rum and lots of it. He drank so much that he could barely stand yet he still refused to relinquish his hold on the wheel. Anamaria had headed straight off to tell Will and Elizabeth the latest twists in the saga, just as Jack had known she would, yet he couldn't bring himself to care overly much. To care only meant to hurt, and that was precisely why he was currently drinking his eighth bottle of rum, it was the only thing that numbed the pain. The pain of his wounds, the pain of his memories and the pain in his heart.

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"Are you just going to stand there and watch him drink himself to death?" Elizabeth asked Gibbs angrily, the former navy man shrugged his shoulders.

"Jack be best just left alone. He is lost in his thoughts, and at the end of the day he is my captain, I do as he says" Gibbs responded, and Elizabeth fumed in exasperation.

"Bloody pirates!" she retorted and marched up to the helm herself. Jack whirled abruptly around on hearing her approach, despite his drunken state first and foremost he was a pirate, and a pirate was always on his guard. Elizabeth halted immediately upon his reaction, and eyed him nervously until he removed his hand from the hilt of his sword.

"Haven't you learnt by now not to go sneaking up on pirates?" Jack asked her, slurring his words as the rum took effect.

"If you heard me then I obviously didn't sneak up did I?" she asked him triumphantly. Jack rolled his eyes in response, but couldn't bring himself to directly respond to her comment.

"What can Id o for you Miss Swan?" he asked instead.

"Well I was hoping that you would join me for some supper. Will has already eaten, and it is terribly tiresome to eat on my own" she told him, hoping that the sly pirate would fall for her weak attempts at firstly getting some food into his much too thin form and secondly hoping that the table conversation would extend to his recent troubles.  Jack sighed, he knew what she was up to, yet he felt so tired that leaving the helm for a few moments may not be such a bad idea, with s light nod he reluctantly gestured to Gibbs to take over the wheel, and followed slowly behind Elizabeth as she headed to get some food. Elizabeth piled up a large plate of bread and cheese and whatever she could lay her hands on, then she grabbed two smaller plates and went to sit down besides the ship's Captain. As soon as she sat she pushed more than half of the food onto one of the smaller plates, and placed it in front of her friend. He looked at her with his eyebrow raised in question, yet she refused to rise to the bait and she simply ignored him, until eventually with a huge dramatic sigh he picked up a chunk of bread and began to chew it disinterestedly.

"So Miss Swan, why did you really want me to come down here?" he asked her, when he could bear the awkward silence no more. She looked at him, and her gaze was so piercing that he could have sworn that she saw right down beyond his soul, and saw every emotion he had ever felt and every thought he had ever had. He looked away when he could stand the intensity no more, yet his movement was halted by a firm yet feminine hand n his jaw.

"Jack, please don't shut us out. Anamaria told us what had happened, and I don't want to force you to talk, yet it looks to me like whatever it is, is eating you up from the inside out, and that's no good for any man" she told him, her voice barely a whisper, yet it echoed through Jack's overcrowded mind. He sighed deeply once more, and lowered his head to rest against his arms that were down on the table, his plate now discarded and forgotten though its contents were barely touched.

"It's just so hard" he told her, not looking up and his voice barely carrying the distance between them. "Everything that happened, was over and done with so long ago, then Harry pops up again, and the memories just won't leave me be" he told her, hating himself for admitting his weakness, and the desperate pitch that his low voice carried. "When Emma died I fell apart, I went crazy for quite a while, call it grief, call it guilt it don't really matter. I just couldn't handle that she was gone, I didn't want to accept that I would never get to marry her. All the plans that we had made had gone out of the window, and I knew I would never ever find anybody that I loved as I had loved her. I also knew that no one would ever love me as unconditionally as she had. Eventually I got through it, with more than a little help from old Bootstrap I guess, but it sort of changed my outlook somewhat. See now I can't see meself ever settling down with someone, cos I don't think I could handle losing them in that way again. I can't take it again" Jack told her his voice still a whisper, and Elizabeth was shocked into silence by Jack's admission, this was certainly a side of Jack Sparrow that she had never seen before, nor expected to. She knew that his lovers death would have had a marked effect on the man, but he was talking about never trusting the World with his heart again, for fear of it being broken as it had all those years ago Suddenly another thing about Jack Sparrow made perfect sense, and she looked at him with new found clarity. He really was a good man, he had deliberately left he majority of his life without a woman by his side to love him and hold him, because he was afraid that she would get hurt because of him. Get hurt because of who and what he was. Elizabeth smiled lightly and gently squeezed her friend's solid forearm.

"Jack you truly are a puzzle" she told him. He looked up confused at her words. "I am terribly sorry for the hurt that you have had to endure time and time again, but please remember one thing. You have the four of us and we each love you in our own way. It doesn't make you any less of a man, or any less of a pirate if you come to us when you feel the need to talk" she told him softly. He returned the smile weakly, and then he got to his feet and planted a soft kiss on the top of her head.

"Thank ye lass, but you really shouldn't care for Captain Jack too much" he told her, then headed back to the helm of his ship, for he knew he would get no rest that night.

End Chapter Twenty One

Check back tomorrow for the answers to some questions, and what happens when the Pearl returns to where she last saw the 'White Knight'?

If you really want to find out, and you really want to see another chapter posted tomorrow you know what you have got to do!