This week's prompt: Solitude
Birthday Boots
Deep in the hull of the Black Pearl a figure moved silently past the crates and barrels. The darkness of the ship's bowels provided a kind of filthy solitude on the crowded galleon, and it was here that this particular pirate spent his sleepless wanderings. They did not come often, but on the occasion that he felt the pangs of guilt and homesickness, when the faces of his son and the boy's mother crowded his mind so he could not sleep, he found his refuge here.
He sat atop a crate, the foul bilge water lapping at his trademark boots as the ship rode the quiet waves. One calloused hand plunged into an inner pocket, extracting a single letter. It was worn with repeated readings, and its words were run into inky streams by its author; whether the tears were of sorrow or rage he did not know. Inside its browning folds was tucked a small lock of sandy brown hair, not unlike his own had been before it had matured into the nutty brown that it was now.
Holding the strand between his fingers, the seaman examined it in the dim light, and tried again to imagine what his son was like. Three years it had been since he had slipped from his warm bed and left her sleeping, his ambitions set on adventure and fortune, his blood pulsing with an anticipation that her soft and supple form could not inspire. He enjoyed the life of a seadog, it was everything he had hoped it would be and more. It was only on nights like this that he ever regretted his decision to become a pirate.
"Happy birthday, William." He muttered into the darkness, "May ya turn out to be a much better man than your old dad."
Then, drawing out the bottle he had brought along for this very purpose, he toasted his bastard son, repeating the motion again and again until finally the affects of the drink overcame his insomnia and he slumped backwards into a deep and snoring sleep.
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A/N: Am I the only one whose free association jumps from "solitude" to "…lead me take me from my solitude…" ? ALW love.