Chapter Two: Meeting a Pirate

The last thing I remember before I fell asleep that night was the sensation of my eyebrows being plucked out. My lovely pet cat, Amigo, always had this personal goal to try and remove any and all hair on my face. I opened my eyes, only to see two big, green pupils staring back into mine. I sleepily moved Amigo's face away, attempting to preserve whatever eyebrow hair I still had left. As soon as he was pushed away, I became lost in a world of dreams as I returned to sleep.

Next thing I knew, I was waking up to the sound of seagulls. Ugh. Time to get up already.

I had one of those special clocks that made nature sounds as alarms, and I always had mine on the "seagull and ocean" setting. It was weird, though… The alarm noise sounded strangely distant. Being so quiet, the clock definitely wasn't enough to immediately wake me up from my heavy sleeping.

I tossed and turned, trying to ignore that stinkin' clock. I wasn't imagining it, though; the seagull sounds really did seem as if they were far away. The batteries of my clock were probably going dead. Oh well. I didn't even open my eyes.

Low batteries meant good karma allowing me some extra winks! However, the extra sleep wasn't turning out so great. As I tossed and turned, searching for a more comfortable position, I couldn't help but grumble about how terrible my bed was. It didn't seem there was any cushioning left! My bed was rock hard.

Quite suddenly, I was splashed by a heaping amount of water. I shot straight up, sputtering and coughing, trying to wipe my eyes. But wiping the water off my face made my eyes sting, and then there was a salty taste in my mouth. Eyes clenched shut, I leaned around, hands reaching and grasping for anything I could use to dry my face.

Before I even knew what was happening, I was completely submersed in water! Instincts clicked in and I kicked my legs until I reached the surface.

When my eyes had adjusted to the salt and the bright blue sky above me, I began dog-paddling toward a small wooden boat-looking thing drifting only a few yards away.

Fear. Total Shock. Completely Overwhelming! I was in the middle of an ocean!

Seagulls were dipping their heads into the waves, snatching their meals from the water. Schools of fish were darting around haphazardly underneath the boat.

I don't believe what I'm seeing! I thought. This is crazy!

I slid to the bottom of the tiny boat. I had no idea what to do, or even what to think, so I just curled into a fetal position and stayed there.

A half hour, or perhaps an entire hour, passed. Nothing changed, except now my stomach was gurgling and rumbling. I felt moments away from a panic attack. What would I do for food? How long until the sun burned all my skin off? Where would I get drinking water?

I looked down at myself. Then I almost passed out. My clothes… they were… different. When I had first woken up, I'd still been in my pj's. Now I was wearing strange clothes! A leather hat with a feather, baggy pants, a small heavy pouch attached to a belt, a bandanna… And sooooo much jewelry around my neck, wrists, and fingers.

I groaned. "What else is going to happen?!" I yelled out. "How could this get any worse?!"

I almost jumped out of my skin when a deep, gravelly voice answered. "Aah . . . It could be much worse. You could be stranded on a remote island, trying to rope a pair of sea turtles."

Lying on the bottom of the small boat, I could just barely seed over the sides. Too frightened to get up, I strained my neck to see if anyone was out there. I found a tanned face with black stubble surrounded by long, unkempt black hair. I whimpered.

"Now," this man said. "That's not how you say hello to a captain is it?" His voice was heavy, his words slurred. I sat when the man teetered for a moment. He took a few steps to steady himself. He seemed so off balance that perhaps he really was trying to rope some sort of wild bronco sea turtles!

"Are you drunk?" I couldn't help but blurt out my first thought.

He looked taken aback. "No." There was a long pause as he took a hip flask in his hand and enjoyed a hearty swig of the mystery liquid inside it. "I am celebrating an escape on my life." He made a gesture as if he were making a toast.

I adjusted myself so that I was in a kneeling position. I didn't trust myself standing in my little rocking boat. I nodded my head, pretending to understand. "Um . . . Who are you, exactly? What are you doing out here?"

The man put his right hand to his chest, as if preparing to recite a pledge or tell a speech. "Why, I'm Captain Jack Sparrow!" He saluted the seagulls and then proceeded to collapse over and into my lifeboat.

I shifted away from him. He stunk. Then I peered over the edge of my boat. All that was there was a wooden board drifting alongside my boat. How the heck had this "Captain Jack Sparrow" stayed on that thing? Better question: how had he stood on it?

I tried to imagine him actually balancing himself on it. All I could come up with was that his own drunken swooning made a balance between himself and the waves of the ocean. How's that for physics?

I waved my hand over the guy's face. He was out like an old, burned light bulb. Grumbling, I shoved him to the end of the boat, and then leaned over the side, letting one of my hands dangle in the salty water.

This is not the company I would have preferred, I thought. I sighed as I watched Sparrow's plank of wood drift away on the waves.

UPDATE: I started this story back in 2006 (years ago!). I have commitment issues with my writing and, unfortunately, I doubt the adventure will ever go further than this chapter. I'm sorry! I hope you enjoyed what you've read though. ^_^

Grammar and Spelling Mistakes Corrected: 10/10/12