A/N PED-Sarah (me) denies owing any of the characters in this piece of writing except Danielle, Tawny, Marissa, Sam, Daniel, and Marc.
You're welcome, reviewers. Here is your update, which was actually slightly hard to write… I hope you enjoy it (You'd better…)
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"Anne! Wake up!" The voice that woke Anne up was Tawny's; her voice was soft, but not sweet, and it did not wake her nicely.
"Tawny? What are you doing here so early? How did you get in?" Anne mumbled, opening her eyes.
"It's not that early… come on, help me get Jack up. Sam is getting impatient." Tawny said, ignoring the other question. Anne realized how important it was the Sam not get impatient, and she got up, out of the hammock.
"Jack!" She called down the small hall. She went inside the Captains cabin and saw him lying there on the bed, asleep, but he looked different, because there was no kohl, no beads, just… his black dreds over the pillow, his dirty tanned skin contrasting nicely with the sheets.
"Jack… Tawny's here." Anne said, not bothering to speak softly. She wanted him to wake up, so where's the point in that?
"Mmm… tell her to go away." Jack said, not opening an eye.
"Jack!" Anne said, and furiously pulled the pillow out from under his head. Jack bumped his head on the bedpost when she did this, and sat up quickly, holding a hand to his head.
"Ow! That hurt!" He cried, jumping out of bed and grabbing Anne's arm. Then, as if he realized that there was no point in this movement, he let her go. He pulled the pillow out of her hands and lay back down on the bed, after which Anne kicked him.
"FINE!" He yelled, rubbing his backside after the kick. "I'm getting up!"
There was a short silence and Anne and Jack realized that Tawny was giggling. This just made her giggle harder.
"Let's go." Anne said, turning around to the door.
"Sam's in the galley, already looking at Anamaria." Tawny said, her giggles immediately disappearing.
"Why'd we have to be bloody woken up, then?" Jack asked irritably, still rubbing his backside. Tawny shrugged.
"Sam wanted you to help make decisions and such…"
"What decisions are there to make about pulling a f***ing bullet out?" Jack muttered, mostly to himself.
"Jack!" Anne exclaimed, glancing at Tawny, who just grinned.
"Quit it, Anne, that's bothering me. Jack's just being Jack. And it's not like I don't hear curse words all the time."
"Yes, exactly my point, love," Jack said, nodding to Tawny. "Anne's got it in her head that she's yer mother."
Anne pretended that she didn't hear this, and Tawny just smiled.
The three headed to the galley, where Jack observed a man leaning over Anamaria, frowning and poking her side lightly. Anamaria was up and conscious, and suddenly the man looked up and said something to her, and she laughed at it. He smiled also.
"Sam?" Tawny called to the man. He looked up and then stood up properly so that Jack got a better look at him. Light brown hair; Tawny, like Tawny's, only no black streaks. His eyes were gray and it looked like he hadn't slept in months. He was tall and broad shouldered, but he was also quite skinny; and pale, very pale, slim face. He brightened a little when he saw his sister and her companions step into the room.
He held out his hand to Jack first, shaking his hand firmly in greeting, and then embraced his sister softly. He turned back to Jack and said "She'll be fine, but keep her off her feet for the next few days to build up her strength, feed her well, and I shall have to tend to it a bit longer, and I'm not sure if you want to watch." Jack nodded like he understood.
Then Sam turned to Anne. "Anne… you're back." He said softly, his expression unreadable.
"Yes.' Anne said to him, also in a very soft voice. Their eyes were locked together for a brief moment of understanding, and everyone was feeling slightly uncomfortable, with the exception of Tawny, who wasn't paying any attention; instead, she was standing by Anamaria, blabbing away.
Jack cleared his throat, and Anne glanced at him, But Sam continued to stare at Anne. "Get a room please." Jack said, grinning cheekily.
Anne sighed. "Leave it, Jack. Don't talk of things you don't understand. Actually, I'd like to talk to you privately for a moment… Sam, if you'll excuse us, Tawny…" she looked at Tawny. "Tawny won't mind if we go somewhere. She's busy." Jack turned and followed Anne out the door, glancing back briefly to see Sam's confusion and hurt.
Anne dragged him into his cabin and made him sit down. Then she looked straight at him and started talking.
"Sam and I go way back, Jack, further than you might think. Originally, we lived in North Carolina together, where Sam was staying as a young cabin boy. But he always talked of going back to see his family in the Caribbean.
"Well, one day, he got a message that his mother had died, and he knew that he had to go back to Port Royal to check on his family. I helped him leave.
"Some time later, I eloped with James Bonny and then he took me to Nassau. It turned out that Sam was there also, and we got the chance to reconnect. Sam took me to meet Tawny, who instantly clung to me like I was her role model. But then, my husband began to get jealous, and I feared for Sam's life. I forced him to stay away from me, and we haven't spoken since."
Jack thought about this for a moment.
"Ok, can I go now, Satan? I understand fully that these are your friends that we're dealing with, and I'd like you to get off my back. I'm not going to mess with anybody that don't want to be messed with."
"Doesn't." Anne said, turning to go.
"What?" Jack said, standing up and grabbing her arm before she could disappear.
"Doesn't want to be messed with." Anne corrected him. Jack groaned.
"Did you even listen to what I said?"
"Apparently not." She told him, grinning evilly, and then she turned around and marched to the galley.
"Anne!" Jack called after her.
"Nope!" She called behind her back. "I don't really think I'll listen to you anymore!"
Jack cursed and sat down.
When Anne reached the door to the galley, leaned against the door, obviously furious about something, was Tawny, her eyes closed. Anne stepped back, surprised to find Tawny standing here like this, and then Tawny turned to face her, also surprised.
"Anne!"
Anne smiled. "Yes, Tawny? Something wrong?"
Tawny sighed. "Well, Sam just wanted me to leave, so I told him that I wanted to stay and talk to Anamaria, but then he looked at me and he had this awful, mean look on his face, and it scared me!"
Anne just smiled. "Well, I'll go in and talk to him. Why don't you go talk to Jack? I'm sure you would like to hear about his adventures!" Tawny smiled, and left, but Anne couldn't help but feel that she was still troubled.
Anne opened the door, still with her mind on Tawny, and gasped, just slightly at what she saw.
Sam and Anamaria were talking. Both had unreadable expressions. But Anamaria was lying down, and Sam was bent over her… and they were only about two inches apart. Anne stepped out and shut the door as quietly as she could, feeling a bit put out… she was thinking of Calico again. Remembering the way he used to look at her, talk to her… it gave her Goosebumps.
She didn't want to go face Tawny right away, admit that she hadn't talked to Sam, so she went out and stood on the deck, the sky still a cloudy gray from the storm that had happened the following night. Anne felt that it would probably storm again soon; the air was still thick and heavy. But familiar…
It still had that cool, salty taste to it that made her skin tingle, and when it blew her hair around, the wind was claming and forgiving; it didn't care if she came up with a plan or not, whether she was Anne Bonny, or Anne Cormac, or Red… whatever she was, it still accepted her, it didn't separate her from everyone else, blow her hair in a different way than some other girl, standing on the balcony in her fathers mansion close by… The wind was fair and charming, and it always loved Anne, no matter what she did.
Anne wondered… if everyone could see inside her mind, what would they think of her? Sometimes, she felt that if everyone would just understand her a little better, they would all love her. But then again… there were times when she was definitely glad that nobody could read her mind. Sometimes she was just plain cruel, and sometimes she had terrible thoughts about good, kind people, just because they were aggravating her. Did that make her a bad person?
Anne took a deep breath and decided that it was time to face the real world again, turn away from the wind, her one true love. She put a smile back on her face and turned to go back into the cabin that Jack and Tawny were in.
When she opened the door, she felt her heart sink a little. Jack and Tawny were in the room; gambling with cards.
Anne knew for a fact that Tawny had never learned to gamble, and she was a little miffed that Jack had taught it to Tawny. Jack said something to make Tawny laugh, a pure laugh, not a fake one, and then he leaned over the table and whispered something in her ear, at which she grinned. He winked as he sat back down.
Anne felt a little pang of anger inside of her… she did not want Tawny to be hurt by Jack, and whatever it was he was saying was most definitely not something one would say in civilized conversation. Otherwise, Tawny would not have thought it was funny.
She turned abruptly and closed the door behind her, not caring who heard.
Maybe she did want to leave the Pearl after all.
In fact, she did want to leave. Desperately. She had to leave soon, before she grew attached to this ship, and before it started to drive her nuts. She couldn't stay for too long; that wasn't in her nature. This wasn't her home.
She made a decision pretty quickly, and walked off the ship, with no companion but the wind.