I just got this idea in my head last night while lying in bed that I should write a PotC fanfiction. So the next morning I started writing and lo and behold a Will/OC story was born! This is my first attempt at writing a story in 1st person so you're gonna have to cut me a little slack here. Anyhoo, enjoy and please review! ^^

Chapter 1: The Blacksmith

I clutched the paper to my chest as I carefully plodded down the muddy road. My shoes made a squelching sound with each step and mud splattered on the front of my dress. I scowled as I saw that the whole bottom five inches of my dress was a dark brown ring. That would be hell to try to get out later. Ducking and weaving between people and the odd carriage or two, I made my way through the crowded streets of Port Royale toward the blacksmith's shop. Why was I going to the blacksmith, you ask? It's quite simple. My father wants a sword.

Let me repeat myself as you have obviously not fallen onto the floor, rolling about between tucks of disbelieving laughter. My father--the fattest, ugliest, laziest man in the world--wants a sword. You know, that sharp pointy thing that requires more action than simply moving ones hand continuously from his plate to his ugly fat face. Curious as to the reason behind my venomous attitude toward ol' Lard-For-Brains? Let me start from the beginning.

My father was a cooper, a barrel maker. Because of his trade our family name is Cooper. Creative, no? He was a stinky ugly stupid man back then but he was muscular and strong, attributes that come with the job of a cooper. My mother, on the other hand, was pretty and had a sweet disposition, or so I'm told. You see she died when I was a baby. Anyway, supposedly she had a sweet disposition when she was sober. The rest of the time, which was most of the time, she was stupid and cruel.

She was a good girl, though, and didn't drink for a whole nine months while she was pregnant with my sister, Dawn. After my sister was born, Mother drank the whole day straight and was sick for two weeks because of it. Six years later she became pregnant with me and once again she didn't drink for nine months. After I was born, however, she drank for three days straight, went into a coma, and died the next day. Honestly.

For the next ten years Dawn was sister to me and also the mother I had never had. She was the one who named me. Mother was dead, Father didn't care, she was six years old, and I was christened Samantha. Not much of a name, not like Dawn anyway, but I love it because it's from her.

Four years later some rich old relative of ours, I forget her name, died and left everything she owned to our father. Instead of buying a nicer home, some servants, and becoming a respectable business man, my father did what he does best: was stupid. He sold the business and bought a couch. And to this day he only gets up if he has to use the bathroom. He has to be at least three hundred pounds of pure fat, it's revolting. Dawn and I had to do everything around the house and field with not a soul to help us. Six years later disaster struck. Dawn was taken from us, a fancy way of saying that she died. I don't like to talk about it.

And here I am, seven years later. Walking through the mud in a dress so patched that the fabric doesn't even have a pattern anymore, going to the blacksmith to order a sword for my father. Figures. A sword. I snorted.

A much louder and longer snort jerked me into reality and I found myself nose to nose with a horse. Eww. I wrinkled my nose at the dirty beast and checked my bearings. Let's see now...three doors down...ah! There it is! It was pretty obvious with a picture of an anvil over the door. I opened the door slowly and peaked inside. There were swords, hammers, and every other tool you could possibly think of lining the walls. At the end of the room was a forge and a man was working on something with his back to me.

I quietly walked over to him and cleared my throat. No answer. I cleared my throat a bit louder. Still no answer. Becoming slightly irritated, I threw the idea of subtlety out the window. "AHEM!!!

He whirled about, startled and I had to work hard to keep my jaw from dropping open. He was gorgeous! Why hadn't I ever thought of visiting the blacksmith before?! Swiftly regaining my composure, I tentatively took a step forward.

"Mr. Turner?"

"Yes." He answered, wiping his brow on his sleeve.

"My father would like a sword. He wrote down the requirements on this." I handed him the slip of paper, quite proud at my businesslike tone. "He says that price doesn't matter." I added.

Actually he hadn't said that but it was always fun to waste his money. And what better way then on a fancy sword that he would never use?

He looked it over and nodded. "Is there a date he would like it ready by?"

I had no idea, the old goat obviously hadn't thought of that. "No, whenever you get around to completing it is fine. There is no rush. It's not like he'll ever use it anyway." I muttered that last bit under my breath but judging by his expression he must have heard it anyway.

"Well, I shall start on it first thing tomorrow. Good day, Miss..."-he checked the paper again-"Miss Cooper." He said politely, and turned back to his forge.

Taking out the hammer that he had been working on out of the forge, he put it in a bucket of cold water and I watched fascinated as it hissed loudly. Taking off his apron, he proceeded to go over to the other side of the room and stopped a donkey that was walking around a pole, obviously working the forge. My eyes swept over it absentmindedly and I looked at a fancy sword next to me. I did a double take. A donkey?! Awwww! It was so wittle!

Sword forgotten, I dashed over to the donkey screeching as I went. "It's so cuuuuuute!"

Mr. Turner turned to me in astonishment as if he had assumed I had already left. Rushing past him, I hugged the little donkey and placed a kiss on its forehead. I then started to babble insanely to the cute adorable likkle animal.

"Oh you're so cute, yes you are! Aren't you? Yes you are! What's yo-" I cut off mid sentence and took a whiff. Hoooee! This little donkey was stinky! I turned resolutely to the still shocked blacksmith.

"Mr. Turner, do you-"

"Will." He said automatically.

I started over. "Will, do you have any soap." At his raised eyebrow I clarified. "For the donkey. He's filthy, poor little thing."

He gaped at me. Obviously strange girls visiting and asking to wash his donkey was not a usual occurrence for him. After a few minutes he seemed to have found his tongue.

"B-but, Miss Cooper, y-you can't wash it! That's...what..." he spluttered.

I looked at him pityingly. He seemed to think that I was a lady. Silly lad. I interrupted his babbling. "One, if I call you Will then you have to call me Samantha. Two, you seem to think that I'm a lady and I'm not. I washed our horse just this morning. And three, this poor beast needs a wash and you're obviously not going to do it and I have nothing else to do. Now, do you have any soap?" I put my hands on my hips and gave him my best 'irritated woman' look.

He instantly scurried off in search of soap. I grinned. Score one for Sam! He returned a few minutes later with a small bar of low grade soap. I took it from him with as much dignity as I could muster and tugged at the donkey's lead.

 "Come on now..." I turned to Will. "What's his name?"

He raised an eyebrow. "It doesn't have one."

I glared at him and turned to the donkey and pondered for a moment. "Phil." I announced triumphantly. "Come on, Phil."

I coaxed and shouted and pleaded and threatened and begged and finally Phil and I reached the small river behind the shop. I managed to get him up to his knees in the water and started to scrub him down with the small bar of soap. Soon it was an all out war. I'd splash him and he'd kick water at me and I'd splash him again and he'd knock me over and sit on me. I wasn't very happy about that last antic as his bum smelled like crap. I soon remedied the situation, however, by using what was left of the soap to take a little bath myself, I was already soaked so why not? 

An hour later, we were both sparkling clean and I led Phil back up the path to the shop. I tied him back up to the pole and looked around for Will. Where was that boy? As if on cue, he came out of a back room, what I guessed to be his living quarters. He gaped at me, yet again.

"You're still here?!"

I frowned and pointed my nose in the air. "Fine. I can take a hint." Sniffing regally and spinning about with a flourish of skirts that almost knocked me over, I stomped off to the front door to let myself out.

"Wait!" his voice called out. I stopped with my hand on the door and looked back. He looked decidedly embarrassed.

"I didn't mean it like that. I didn't mean to be rude. I was just surprised that you hadn't left already, that's all."

 "Do you want me to leave?"

"I'm just going to be sword practicing. You can stay if you want." He mumbled.

I turned fully around and broke out into a face splitting grin. "Sword practicing?! Of course I'll stay!"

That said I ran to the corner and tugged an old chair out to the side and plopped into it, prepared for quite a show. He got an old sword out and just stood there, mumbling something under his breath about how he couldn't concentrate when he was being watched. Rolling my eyes, I turned around until I heard movement. Moving quietly, I turned back around and watched with shining eyes. When he got going, Will obviously forgot about everything else because he didn't acknowledge my presence at all.

He was fantastic! I'd never seen anyone fight before but I could tell that he was very skillful. After he finished an extremely difficult looking routine, I started clapping and cheering, very impressed. He whirled around, looking very self conscious and mumbled a, "Thanks." under his breath.

I was suddenly hit with an idea. "Could you teach me to sword fight?"

He blinked owlishly. "What?"

I stood up and hopped from foot to foot eagerly. Once I came up with an idea it was impossible for me to let it go and I was completely captivated by the idea of learning how to use a sword. "Could you teach me to fight? Hm?"

"Weeell-"

"If I became good at it, it would help you because it has to be better practice with another person, right?" I was practically jumping up and down with excitement.

He looked thoughtful. "I suppose it would...I guess...alright. But only when I have free time!"

I gave an excited yelp and started scampering about the shop looking at all the different swords. Suddenly, I was hit with a thought and I deflated, all of my earlier excitement gone.

"Oh, but Father would never let me buy a sword...I know! Can you just add it to the bill of his sword?"

"That would be fine."

"Yay! Happyyyy! Happyyyy! Iiiiii'm soo happyyyyyyyy! Tra la la lolly! Dum dum dee DUM!"

In my hyper joy, I started twirling clumsily around the room, singing away. Now I think I should warn you about something. My singing sounds like a dying rabbit, not a pleasant sound at all, and when I was younger I would never sing. As I grew older, however, I found it extremely amusing to see the reactions I would get. I peaked over my shoulder in the midst of a rather earsplitting note that was a bit out of my range and saw Will wince and chuckle.

He didn't yell at me! He didn't cry out in pain and anguish! He laughed! I beamed. Now I knew we'd get along juuust fine. I saw Will take a smaller, lighter looking sword off of the rack and test its balance. I stopped my singing and pranced over to him, humming all the way.  He held the sword out to me.

"Will this one do?"

I reached out, my eyes wide. It was beautiful and the handle fit snugly in the palm of my hand. I looked from his sword to mine.

"Hey, Will. How come your sword is so much longer than mine?"

"Your sword is a cutlass. This sword,"-he swung his about-"is more of a fencing sword. It's a bit fancier and not quite as practical in battle." (A/N: For the record, I have no idea if the cutlass is better or worse but I have to make Will sound sword-smart, don't I? ^^)

"Oh." I looked at my sword again. A cutlass. Neat! "Well...let's get started!"

"Now?"

"Of course now!"

"Well, er, alright. Hold it in your hand like this." He held his sword and motioned for me to copy him. I tried to but it didn't look quite right.

"Like this?"

"No, no. Like this. See? Look how I'm doing it."

I looked at his grip and then mine. I adjusted my thumb and held it closer to the hilt. "Like this?"

"No, move your thumb this way."

"Oh, I get it. Like this."

"Yes like—no, no this way."

"I did!"

"No, you moved it that way."

"Same difference."

"What? Here now, let's forget the grip. That's good for now."

"No! I want to get it right." I looked at my sword and tried again. "Like this?"

"Yes! Like that! No...wait, you moved it. Blast."

And on and on it went. It took me about an hour to get the grip right. It's the sword's fault! I'm not sure how but I'll think of somethin. After that we worked on blocks and footwork and other equally tiresome things. Two hours later I was about to drop from exhaustion.

"Wiiill!" I whined, interrupting a boring explanation on footwork.

"Then move to the le—what?"

"I'm tiiiired! I'm ready to die! Do you want the death of a poor wittle innocent girl on your hands? Hm? I think not!"

"Just a bit more and then we'll be done for today."

"You said that a half hour ago!"

"So? What's your point?"

"A bit means like a few minutes."

"To you maybe."

"Well, what's it mean to you then?"

He grinned evilly. Uh oh. I'd learned that that meant nothing good. "Oh just two hours."

I moaned and tried another tactic. "If you don't stop right now I will be forced to use drastic measures."

He crossed his arms and smirked. "Oh?"

I drew myself up to my full height, which wasn't very impressive at 5'4, and tried my best to look intimidating. "Yes. Drastic  measures."

"Like what, for instance?" he asked, smirk still firmly in place.

"I'll...I'll..." I looked about me desperately. I had put up my sword when we started on footwork as it kept tripping me up. Looking about, I searched for anything within reaching distance. Aha! Reaching down, I took off my boot and hefted it in my hand. "I'll throw this boot at your head!"

He quirked an eyebrow and looked at me as if to say, 'Uh huh, yeah. Sure you will.'

How dare he, the little pansy! Scowling, I launched my little boot at his head. It flew straight and true, bouncing off his head in the process.

I clenched my fist and shook it in the air. "Success! Haha!"

He mock glowered at me and lunged at me with his sword. I screeched and darted out of the way. I ran to the door and unbarred it, breaking through with a triumphant, "HA! FREEDOM!!"

I heard chuckling behind me as I dashed off down the road. I smiled to myself. I'd have to go back sometime soon.