AN: Chapter's shorter than usual; I've been having a little trouble with writer's block…

How My Perfect Life Was Inverted

Chapter Thirty-Five: Flavio's Favourite Frock

Cate was adamant that I never set eyes on her precious brother—and all because, although I'm not actually certain, of the fact she was ashamed of being related to an effeminate cross-dresser. I couldn't help but to question her logic on this point; I mean, if Flavio was going to join us on the Black Pearl, I'd have to run into him sooner or later, wouldn't I? And his questionable dress sense wasn't exactly going to remain a secret, so the pirate was just wasting her time and energy.

On the plus side, it might keep her away from Jack for a somewhat lengthy period of time. I was beginning to appreciate small blessings.

In any case, Cate really shouldn't have bothered attempting to preserve Flavio's modesty, or whatever virtuous characteristic her brother possessed she was trying to salvage, as Flavio soon came to us.

…Well, technically, Jean-François was making a mad dash for freedom which (ultimately ended with him almost running into me) with Flavio following close behind, whining about neglect and how he felt unloved in French, whilst Cate buried her face in her hands in a gesture of despair.

It wasn't hard to see why she was so mortified.

Now, I'm not certain of the exact details of what horrendous, torturous events occur during a mutiny; if I was to think of the word mutiny, my mind immediately conjures up images of a poor captain who shall remain nameless balancing precariously on a clichéd plank, hands lashed together in front of him as he peered uncertainly into the turbulent waves of the ocean whilst scores of faceless sailors jeered. The feeling of the scene was one of fear, of panic, one of mindless, unadulterated haste.

In any case, it was certainly a situation in which the soon-to-be-marooned would not have had sufficient time to have gathered several dresses before being thrown overboard. And yet there stood Flavio in all his golden-haired glory, clad in what looked suspiciously like a pearly wedding dress of unsullied ivory.

And as if that wasn't humiliating enough, what else should Flavio be clutching to his chest but a lacy veil?

Flavio froze as his eyes fell upon me; his jaw dropped, and he very rudely stood staring at me for the longest of moments whilst I took in every intricate detail of his pretty frock.

Then, for absolutely no reason that I was aware of, he opened his mouth and screamed in a manner so high I was certain that several of the bottles of rum in the cache so close by had cracked. As soon as he was done, Flavio lifted his skirts, spun on his silk stocking-encased heel, and immediately bounded back in the direction that he came.

The three of us stood staring at the still-rustling leaves; from somewhere in front of me there came the sounds of rustling silks and other materials, some hyperventilated breathing, muttered curses in several languages, and finally, the unmistakable sound of something heavy and dare I say wooden being lifted. Then there came what I believed was the sound of feet climbing down what was very likely a ladder of a kind, and the final sound of the trapdoor snapping back into place.

I glanced at Cate, who was clearly in the middle of mentally severing all connections she had with the over-reacting pirate, and then at Jean-François, who I must admit looked more than relieved. He caught my gaze and allowed an embarrassed smile to steal across his features.

I've not yet described Jean-François, have I? The Frenchman was tall, taller than Jack, though that wasn't really much of an achievement, considering that the captain was of average height. Now that I thought about it, almost everything about his physical appearance was superior to Jack's, cruel though it may be for me to say it; his shoulders were broader than Jack's were, and his muscles more defined, from what I could see through his shirt, and the faint stubble on his face told me that usually he was a clean-shaven man. His general colouring was lighter though; his hair was an unremarkable medium brown, the same shade as mine, with a small gathering of silver strands at his left temple and faint lines at the edges of his startling grey eyes quietly denoting his supremacy in years. I also noticed that there was a scar running horizontally across his throat, the beginnings of several others peeking out from beneath the hem of his linen shirt, and couldn't help but shiver as I looked at him; there was something in the way that he carried himself that made his appearance all the more intimidating, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it…

A faint chuckle snapped me out of my thoughts, and I dragged my eyes from the stranger to look curiously at Cate, who was obviously smirking at a private joke. "And here I was, thinking you only had eyes for ole Sparrow back there," she goaded in English, so that her acquaintance would not understand.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked her suspiciously, and her smile widened ever so slightly in response as she shrugged.

"I'm just wondering…" she began, deliberately trailing off as she picked at an imaginary bit of lint on her blouse. "Just curious as to what your dear old Jack would make of this… recent development…"

I stared at her in suspicion, knowing what she was implying, but uncertain of how she had reached this conclusion; exactly how she planned to use this to her advantage, as I'm sure she was capable of and more than ready to do so, was also another mystery that I found unfathomable.

"…Are you alright?" I politely enquired of her mental health.

She raised her eyebrow in a gesture that was between arrogant and condescending, but before she even had a chance to reply Flavio had reappeared, blond hair in disarray, wedding dress completely unbuttoned and unlaced to reveal an ivory corset and lacy chemise.

There was a silence as we all stared at one another, clearly at a loss of how to interpret this worryingly repetitive behaviour. However, before any one of us could even begin to voice our concern, Flavio had unexpectedly dived at his sister, eliciting a shriek of surprise as she was forced backward by the assailant, both siblings landing on the earth with a thump.

"What the hell's the matter with you!" Cate shrieked as Flavio, ignoring her not entirely unjustified exclamation, scrambled to his feet, unceremoniously tugging her up along with him and unknowingly displaying the miracle of his still stainless white gown.

His head whipped around so that he was looking directly at me, his shaking hand slowly rising to point accusingly in my direction.

This small, emotional gesture was apparently one of great significance to the female pirate: Cate's jaw dropped open in horror; she stared at me in fury for a moment before rounding on Flavio, violently ripping her wrist out of her brother's grip and striking him so aggressively that not only did his head snap to the side, but he also stumbled, his legs tangling with his skirts.

"Her?" the irate sister shrieked. "Oh, Flavio!"

The brother had the courtesy to blush, his pale cheeks reddening so suddenly it caused me to wonder whether what I was witnessing was actually humanly possible or if it was just a trick of the light. He lunged at her wrist once more, immediately succeeding in grasping the appendage, and, with one last fearful glance at me standing innocently to the side, calmly observing this little scene unfold, darted once more back to the rum cache, his reluctant sister accompanying him.

Jean-François and I merely stared at one another before simultaneously rushing towards the point where the two blonds had not-so-mysteriously vanished, rudely and shamelessly vying for the better view as we spied on the siblings.

Flavio was in the middle of the perilous task of diving through the trapdoor—a highly dangerous rendered doubly so by the voluminous skirts of the entirely inappropriate wedding attire—whilst Cate stood to the side, shaking her pretty head and staring at her brother in disbelief as he disappeared into the murky, alcoholic recesses of the rum cache.

Flavio's head popped back out within moments, his eyes widening as they once again met my own curious gaze once more, and he visibly gulped.

"Kitten!" he shrieked, gesticulating wildly at his sister to join him. "Gattina mia!"

"For Christ's sake!" she cursed, stalking towards him regardless of her obvious reluctance, and aiming a kick at her brother's head as she approached. A jolt went through me at this action; was it just me, or did it seem as though she seriously intended to dent his skull…?

Flavio, on the other hand, released a highly feminine squeal whilst ducking well out of the way of mortal peril, a gesture which Cate ignored as she stomped moodily down to join him on what I presumed were a hidden set of steps. Her hand reached out for the edge of the trapdoor as she descended, effectively swinging the trapdoor shut above her.

There was a silence for all of two seconds before Flavio's voice, timid yet loud, proclaimed, "…Kitten? I'm scared of the dark…"

"Shut up, Flavio!" Cate bellowed, causing both Jean-François and I to start.

Silence once again fell upon us, in which Jean-François and I once more met each other awkward gaze. He grinned nervously at me in embarrassment, his hand reaching up to unconsciously rub the back of his neck.

"Je…" he began, and stopped, looking uncertainly at me.

I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring smile. "Don't worry," I told him in his mother tongue, "I understand French."

He nodded at this, but still hesitated, clearly still uncertain and uncomfortable of my presence. At length, he finally said:

"Je ne sais cet homme pas…"

I merely smiled and nodded in response.

-x!x-

AN: Apologies, for both the delay in update and the shortness of the chapter. It got the basic point across though…