Author's Note - Here's a clever trick: whisper to someone that you have a secret, and when they bend their unsuspecting ear towards you, shriek into it! Hilarity ensues.
Eighteen
Jack was sunbathing and Melanie was pretending that she didn't notice. It's very easy to say simply that, but in truth, there was much more to it. In fact, there can be made several assumptions.
Firstly, a tan line is a thing unseemly on a pirate, and Jack was a very proper pirate. This being said, Jack Sparrow - my friend and yours - was completely in the buff. Nude. Nekkid.
Kinda gets the ol' oars churning, don't it?
It should probably (regretfully) be mentioned that by the time this chapter was taken up, Jack had already finished his front and was dozing quite serenely on his stomach. Oh well, can't win them all.
Another assumption that can be made is that Jack - being Jack - knew completely well that Melanie was within spitting distance from him. And he did: in fact, it had been Melanie who was perched on the sunny little rock plateau first. She had been meticulously sharpening her boot dagger (which lends itself to dullness very quickly, I've been told) and humming to herself as the branches rustled over her head and she dangled her bare feet over the water that rippled a short drop below. Then there had come Jack, sans his skivvies - though he still wore his hat - and stretched out beside her.
She had stopped her merry tune, because the third and last assumption is that because it was the lean, browned body of Jack Sparrow languidly unrolled beside her in the corner of her eye, and not some other, it was very difficult not to pay attention.
Melanie continued to sharpen her little blade without pause, but soon discovered that due to the very mystical and undoubtedly useful properties of its shiny surface, she did not need to look directly at Jack in order to see him. This, she thought, is full of possibility. She angled it a little further, then -
"There's no need to be so discreet, love. 'Snothin' you 'aven't seen before."
"Despite being a scallywag and captain of their ilk," Melanie replied without turning, "I am still something of a lady."
Jack snorted.
Melanie continued to turn her knife this way and that to catch the image of the sunbathing pirate. "In any case, I can see you perfectly well whilst retaining my dignity and poise." She stopped her movement suddenly. "Ah, see? There we are. Pirate bum on my knife and no one is the wiser."
Jack chuckled and wiggled his rear, but the other captain did not join in. She was staring fixedly into the reflection on the blade with her mouth partway open. Jack noticed this. "Wot's wrong, Melanie?" he asked slyly. "See somethin' t'make you blush?"
The corners of Melanie's mouth twitched and she turned to look directly at him. "Not exactly. It's just that only now have I noticed that very large and long-legged spider that has made its way onto your backside."
With a bellow, Jack leapt to his feet. Well, leapt to one foot, because the other had placed itself a little too close to the edge of the embankment and slipped off. The rest of Jack went with it over the edge, and both he and his errant foot went tumbling into the pool below.
After Melanie had wiped away the tears of laughter, she popped her head over the edge to peer at Jack who had stopped floundering. "Then again," she called, "I could have been mistaken."
"That's a chance I'll be willing to take," returned the wet pirate. He shuddered in the water. Spiders.
~
Gibbs and the doctor Matthew were sitting at the beach and watching the little lass Carly and her monkey, who were up in a tree. "I still don't see how ye sail wi' em lad," Gibbs was saying. "Womenfolk, every one o' them."
Matthew laughed. "Captain Melanie and I are ... very special friends. We've known each other for a long time; we know each other's 'ins and outs', so to speak." The young man shrugged. "Sailing on the Yellow Dart had been very lucrative for me. If I ever decided to find a permanent port, I would be able to live very comfortably."
Gibbs winked. "Very comfortable and un-pirate-like. But that's not why we keep doin' it, is it. It ain't about the comforts o' the luxuries - it's about the salt in our veins."
"You were born in the wrong generation, Gibbs," said Matthew with a smile. "We could have been fantastic shipmates, you and I."
"On a ship full to th' brim o' th' fairer sex? I don't know about that, me boy. Methinks a superstitious ol' chap like me needs odds more in 'is favor than that." Both men laughed suddenly, and Milton was startled out of the tree.
"Times like these call fer pints o' somethin'," said Gibbs wistfully. "What I wouldn't give." Matthew clapped him on the back.
"How bad can it be? You've only been here and away from the taverns for barely a fortnight! Do the aged always become thirsty for drink as quickly as this?"
Gibbs waggled a finger at him. "You'd be surprised, lad. Mother's milk it is. 'Tis harder fer some t' go without than others."
"Is that so?"
Gibbs was about to reply when Jack emerged from the trees with his arms full of coconuts. Matthew raised his eyebrows as the pirate deposited them at their feet. "Look!" Jack cried. "There's plenty for everyone. Bottom's up!" Matthew and Gibbs glanced down at the mound, then at one another.
"Others like Jack," Gibbs finished as his captain wedged a hole in his coconut with his knife.
"You know, I thought that having nothing to drink for days on end would bother me," Jack said as he did so. "But it certainly doesn't. Not at all." Jack downed the entirety of the milk inside with a single swallow and tossed the fruit aside. "Not at all. I've hardly even noticed."
"Hardly indeed," Gibbs agreed. Matthew nodded amiably when the pirate's slightly crazed eyes flicked in his direction.
"I think we've all done a decent job of it," Matthew said and Jack sat himself in the sand beside him.
"But I miss holding a bottle," sighed Jack, and the other two could not help but agree. They reclined there, bare toes in the fine beach sand for quite a long while. The ocean stretched out before them farther than their eyes could reach: pulsating, empty and blue.
"Green," murmured Jack after a time. "I dreamed that the water was green." Gibbs and Matthew both thought it would have been wiser to politely ignore his mutterings, but Gibbs couldn't help but say:
"Green, Jack?" Matthew wondered idly how much coconut milk Jack had put away.
"Aye." Jack's eyes were far away. "I had a dream ... and the ocean was green. And Will was in it."
Both Gibbs and the young doctor looked startled. "Our lad Will?"
Jack nodded slowly. His gaze never strayed from the distant horizon. "I can barely remember it," he said carefully, as if a too-sudden movement or motion would cause the returning dream fragments to turn and flee. "But I remember the green, and I remember Will. I remember that it made me feel icky * when I woke up. Unhappy."
Gibbs leaned closer. "Why, Jack? How could that 'ave bothered ye?" Jack shook his head and was about to express his own frustration when the lookout's - Monica's - voice startled everyone:
"Ahoy! Ship! Ship on the water!" they heard her cry, though she was not in sight.
Jack looked wildly around. "Wot? Where - "
Matthew was the only one who did not seem surprised. "That's our girl - can spot a ship half an ocean away."
"But where is she?"
Matthew shrugged. "Other side of the island? Doesn't matter though. Monica's never been wrong. And that means," he rose and swiped the sand from the seat of his pants, "that we are rescued."
Jack and Gibbs stood and squinted. Neither could distinguish between sky and water at such a distance, never mind make out any shape that they could guarantee was not a sea-bird. Matthew watched them and chuckled.
"Don't worry yourselves. I'll bet there's nothing there to find."
Jack raised an eyebrow. "Then how - "
Matthew shook his head and smiled. "It's a lookout's job," was all he said.
And he was right. There was nothing to see on the horizon until late afternoon, and even then, the approaching ship's colors were a mystery to all but the lookout herself. She seemed happy. "It doesn't seem possible," Monica said brightly, blinking one large green eye before the other. "But that's our ship out there. That's our Yellow Dart."
It was evening when the Yellow Dart halted before the island and dropped a single jollyboat. Captain Melanie set off around the island to rouse and round up the remainder of her crew while Jack, Matthew and Gibbs stood on the beach to await the little boat's arrival. It was difficult to identify the figures that rowed it through the deepening dark, and it was only when its hull touched sand that the three men allowed themselves to break into happy grins. **
"Will!" Gibbs roared and pounded the young man good-naturedly on the back. "We knew ye'd come, boy. We knew."
Jack was equally pleased. He embraced the beaming William then held him at arms length. "You've lost that fancy hat." Will laughed, mentioned something about still having it somewhere at home, and shook Matthew's hand. Matthew smiled at him, then his eyes strayed to Will's companion who had been standing just behind him in her long coat and hat.
Jack noticed this companion as well and extended his hand. "I don't believe I've had the pleasure, mister ... ?"
"Miss, actually," Dana replied and removed her hat. "Though to be perfectly honest, that's probably not entirely accurate either. Dana Flint." Jack watched her with a sly smile as she shook the hand of Matthew and Gibbs. She paused when she reached the pirate captain and looked him up and down.
"Captain Jack Sparrow," he offered.
"I figured that. You don't look quite like how I imagined you."
Jack raised his eyebrows. "You've been imagining me? William, I think I like this lady." All chuckled and Dana was about to replace her hat when a small group returned from their final expedition of the island. As they stepped onto the beach, Dana and Will turned -
And so it was that Captain Melanie Cash and Dana Flint regarded one another for the first time.
* Ah, Mort Rainey - how I wish I owned your hair. And the opportunity to nap with you after eating Doritos.
** But come on - had there ever been any doubt?
Eighteen
Jack was sunbathing and Melanie was pretending that she didn't notice. It's very easy to say simply that, but in truth, there was much more to it. In fact, there can be made several assumptions.
Firstly, a tan line is a thing unseemly on a pirate, and Jack was a very proper pirate. This being said, Jack Sparrow - my friend and yours - was completely in the buff. Nude. Nekkid.
Kinda gets the ol' oars churning, don't it?
It should probably (regretfully) be mentioned that by the time this chapter was taken up, Jack had already finished his front and was dozing quite serenely on his stomach. Oh well, can't win them all.
Another assumption that can be made is that Jack - being Jack - knew completely well that Melanie was within spitting distance from him. And he did: in fact, it had been Melanie who was perched on the sunny little rock plateau first. She had been meticulously sharpening her boot dagger (which lends itself to dullness very quickly, I've been told) and humming to herself as the branches rustled over her head and she dangled her bare feet over the water that rippled a short drop below. Then there had come Jack, sans his skivvies - though he still wore his hat - and stretched out beside her.
She had stopped her merry tune, because the third and last assumption is that because it was the lean, browned body of Jack Sparrow languidly unrolled beside her in the corner of her eye, and not some other, it was very difficult not to pay attention.
Melanie continued to sharpen her little blade without pause, but soon discovered that due to the very mystical and undoubtedly useful properties of its shiny surface, she did not need to look directly at Jack in order to see him. This, she thought, is full of possibility. She angled it a little further, then -
"There's no need to be so discreet, love. 'Snothin' you 'aven't seen before."
"Despite being a scallywag and captain of their ilk," Melanie replied without turning, "I am still something of a lady."
Jack snorted.
Melanie continued to turn her knife this way and that to catch the image of the sunbathing pirate. "In any case, I can see you perfectly well whilst retaining my dignity and poise." She stopped her movement suddenly. "Ah, see? There we are. Pirate bum on my knife and no one is the wiser."
Jack chuckled and wiggled his rear, but the other captain did not join in. She was staring fixedly into the reflection on the blade with her mouth partway open. Jack noticed this. "Wot's wrong, Melanie?" he asked slyly. "See somethin' t'make you blush?"
The corners of Melanie's mouth twitched and she turned to look directly at him. "Not exactly. It's just that only now have I noticed that very large and long-legged spider that has made its way onto your backside."
With a bellow, Jack leapt to his feet. Well, leapt to one foot, because the other had placed itself a little too close to the edge of the embankment and slipped off. The rest of Jack went with it over the edge, and both he and his errant foot went tumbling into the pool below.
After Melanie had wiped away the tears of laughter, she popped her head over the edge to peer at Jack who had stopped floundering. "Then again," she called, "I could have been mistaken."
"That's a chance I'll be willing to take," returned the wet pirate. He shuddered in the water. Spiders.
~
Gibbs and the doctor Matthew were sitting at the beach and watching the little lass Carly and her monkey, who were up in a tree. "I still don't see how ye sail wi' em lad," Gibbs was saying. "Womenfolk, every one o' them."
Matthew laughed. "Captain Melanie and I are ... very special friends. We've known each other for a long time; we know each other's 'ins and outs', so to speak." The young man shrugged. "Sailing on the Yellow Dart had been very lucrative for me. If I ever decided to find a permanent port, I would be able to live very comfortably."
Gibbs winked. "Very comfortable and un-pirate-like. But that's not why we keep doin' it, is it. It ain't about the comforts o' the luxuries - it's about the salt in our veins."
"You were born in the wrong generation, Gibbs," said Matthew with a smile. "We could have been fantastic shipmates, you and I."
"On a ship full to th' brim o' th' fairer sex? I don't know about that, me boy. Methinks a superstitious ol' chap like me needs odds more in 'is favor than that." Both men laughed suddenly, and Milton was startled out of the tree.
"Times like these call fer pints o' somethin'," said Gibbs wistfully. "What I wouldn't give." Matthew clapped him on the back.
"How bad can it be? You've only been here and away from the taverns for barely a fortnight! Do the aged always become thirsty for drink as quickly as this?"
Gibbs waggled a finger at him. "You'd be surprised, lad. Mother's milk it is. 'Tis harder fer some t' go without than others."
"Is that so?"
Gibbs was about to reply when Jack emerged from the trees with his arms full of coconuts. Matthew raised his eyebrows as the pirate deposited them at their feet. "Look!" Jack cried. "There's plenty for everyone. Bottom's up!" Matthew and Gibbs glanced down at the mound, then at one another.
"Others like Jack," Gibbs finished as his captain wedged a hole in his coconut with his knife.
"You know, I thought that having nothing to drink for days on end would bother me," Jack said as he did so. "But it certainly doesn't. Not at all." Jack downed the entirety of the milk inside with a single swallow and tossed the fruit aside. "Not at all. I've hardly even noticed."
"Hardly indeed," Gibbs agreed. Matthew nodded amiably when the pirate's slightly crazed eyes flicked in his direction.
"I think we've all done a decent job of it," Matthew said and Jack sat himself in the sand beside him.
"But I miss holding a bottle," sighed Jack, and the other two could not help but agree. They reclined there, bare toes in the fine beach sand for quite a long while. The ocean stretched out before them farther than their eyes could reach: pulsating, empty and blue.
"Green," murmured Jack after a time. "I dreamed that the water was green." Gibbs and Matthew both thought it would have been wiser to politely ignore his mutterings, but Gibbs couldn't help but say:
"Green, Jack?" Matthew wondered idly how much coconut milk Jack had put away.
"Aye." Jack's eyes were far away. "I had a dream ... and the ocean was green. And Will was in it."
Both Gibbs and the young doctor looked startled. "Our lad Will?"
Jack nodded slowly. His gaze never strayed from the distant horizon. "I can barely remember it," he said carefully, as if a too-sudden movement or motion would cause the returning dream fragments to turn and flee. "But I remember the green, and I remember Will. I remember that it made me feel icky * when I woke up. Unhappy."
Gibbs leaned closer. "Why, Jack? How could that 'ave bothered ye?" Jack shook his head and was about to express his own frustration when the lookout's - Monica's - voice startled everyone:
"Ahoy! Ship! Ship on the water!" they heard her cry, though she was not in sight.
Jack looked wildly around. "Wot? Where - "
Matthew was the only one who did not seem surprised. "That's our girl - can spot a ship half an ocean away."
"But where is she?"
Matthew shrugged. "Other side of the island? Doesn't matter though. Monica's never been wrong. And that means," he rose and swiped the sand from the seat of his pants, "that we are rescued."
Jack and Gibbs stood and squinted. Neither could distinguish between sky and water at such a distance, never mind make out any shape that they could guarantee was not a sea-bird. Matthew watched them and chuckled.
"Don't worry yourselves. I'll bet there's nothing there to find."
Jack raised an eyebrow. "Then how - "
Matthew shook his head and smiled. "It's a lookout's job," was all he said.
And he was right. There was nothing to see on the horizon until late afternoon, and even then, the approaching ship's colors were a mystery to all but the lookout herself. She seemed happy. "It doesn't seem possible," Monica said brightly, blinking one large green eye before the other. "But that's our ship out there. That's our Yellow Dart."
It was evening when the Yellow Dart halted before the island and dropped a single jollyboat. Captain Melanie set off around the island to rouse and round up the remainder of her crew while Jack, Matthew and Gibbs stood on the beach to await the little boat's arrival. It was difficult to identify the figures that rowed it through the deepening dark, and it was only when its hull touched sand that the three men allowed themselves to break into happy grins. **
"Will!" Gibbs roared and pounded the young man good-naturedly on the back. "We knew ye'd come, boy. We knew."
Jack was equally pleased. He embraced the beaming William then held him at arms length. "You've lost that fancy hat." Will laughed, mentioned something about still having it somewhere at home, and shook Matthew's hand. Matthew smiled at him, then his eyes strayed to Will's companion who had been standing just behind him in her long coat and hat.
Jack noticed this companion as well and extended his hand. "I don't believe I've had the pleasure, mister ... ?"
"Miss, actually," Dana replied and removed her hat. "Though to be perfectly honest, that's probably not entirely accurate either. Dana Flint." Jack watched her with a sly smile as she shook the hand of Matthew and Gibbs. She paused when she reached the pirate captain and looked him up and down.
"Captain Jack Sparrow," he offered.
"I figured that. You don't look quite like how I imagined you."
Jack raised his eyebrows. "You've been imagining me? William, I think I like this lady." All chuckled and Dana was about to replace her hat when a small group returned from their final expedition of the island. As they stepped onto the beach, Dana and Will turned -
And so it was that Captain Melanie Cash and Dana Flint regarded one another for the first time.
* Ah, Mort Rainey - how I wish I owned your hair. And the opportunity to nap with you after eating Doritos.
** But come on - had there ever been any doubt?