Title: Question Always
Author: Kathryn Sparrow
Rating: PG13, maybe light R for mention of sex
Pairings: Jack/Elizabeth
Warnings: No real spoilers, could be anywhere in the series.
Disclaimer: I wish I could say I own it, but I don't. The only thing I own is the plot.
Summary: Elizabeth questions what is truly going on. Written for Challenge 4!
Elizabeth reached up to catch Jack's lips in a kiss, but just as her lips brushed his, he pulled away. She sighed as he left the cabin that they shared.
She sat down on their bed… their bed… Could she really call it that? She guessed she could, she just couldn't think of it in a relationship sense of the word. Had things changed? No, they were exactly how they started, with Jacking coming to Elizabeth by night and the sea by day.
After Jack had come back to Port Royal, and Elizabeth had left with him, she had finally given herself into the temptation of sleeping with him. The next morning Elizabeth had woken to find herself alone. Not knowing what to think of it, she stood up and dressed herself. She walked up on the deck. She saw Jack at the helm. His honey eyes were focused on the crystal blue water stretched out in front of him. She tried to make eye contact, but he seemed to not notice her.
The rest of that first day, Jack had either expertly avoided her; assigning her to tasks and places that he didn't supervise or inhabit, or had honestly been busy.
The next night, before Elizabeth could ask questions, he was kissing her, pushing her back onto the bed, and making love to her again.
The morning and day were the same, as were the ones that followed. When she would try to ask what was going on in his head, he would either leave, or change the subject. She had then tried a different approach.
"It should be a dress or nothing."
On the third night, she wore a dress for him. She had brought one with her. She didn't bother with a corset, and had only laced the bodice two thirds of the way, leaving the rest open. She had seen the way his eyes had lit up and his breath had caught, and soon she was relieved of the uncomfortable clothing.
The next morning was the same.
Could it be? It couldn't… Yes… It just might be the problem…
The sea…
Could one be jealous of the sea? It's not a person, it's just a body of water, right? Jack called it his freedom, and one of two of his great loves, the Pearl being his other. Why couldn't Elizabeth be his third love? She had left her life, her family, her fiancé in Port Royal, all for him.
She mentally kicked herself, not understanding how she could have been so thick. She couldn't believe that she had been so silly to think that Jack and her could have actually made a life for themselves. They were both pirates. And now that she thought about it, did she really want a life with him? Wasn't it natural for a woman to want to wake up the next morning with the man she had slept with the night before, beside her? Wasn't that just natural?
Elizabeth had always thought of herself as a girl who didn't necessarily care about the same things other girls did, as she didn't care about dresses, or corsets, or who she would marry, but she did want the sexual and physical intimacy that a man should be able to provide.
Didn't she?
She decided she didn't. She decided she was okay with the lack of emotions behind their purely physical relationship. She would have to put her emotions aside, were there ever emotions? Were there ever feelings?
There weren't…
There wasn't ever anything. She was his mistress by night, and the sea… The sea was his mistress by day.