Chapter four

Luna scowled. She'd searched her entire room for her damned diary but it wasn't anywhere to be found.

"Unde dracu este?!"

"Pardon?"

Luna turned from the chest at the foot of her bed to look at her maid in the door way. "Sorry, Henrietta. Sometimes it just slips. I'm looking for my cum se spune... jurnal. Oh, duh. Journal. Have you seen it?"

Henrietta just chuckled. "You mean the one with the moon?" At Luna's nod she pointed over to the mantle. "I was cleaning yesterday and found it beneath the bed."

Luna stared at the diary from afar. That had been the first place she looked.

"Bogdaproste, err, thanks. I'm sorry. I'm stressed and I tend to slip into my native tounge."

"You're welcome." She left Luna alone then, taking the hamper with her.

Luna snagged the book and walked out to the garden. It always did this. The book. Disappearing at the most random times and only reappearing when she needed comfort. It was as if it had a mind of its own.

She opened the cover to reveal a little passage written in Jack's handwriting.

Dearest Luna,

If you have come to these pages for laughter, may you find it.
If you are here to be offended, may your ire rise and your blood boil.
If you seek an adventure, may this sing you away to blissful escape.
If you need to test or confirm your beliefs, may you reach comfortable conclusions
All books reveal perfection, by what they are or what they are not.
May you find what you seek, in these pages or outside them.
May you find perfection, and know it by name

Jack

Luna really didn't care as much as she did at first. It was sweet really. She wondered if it had always done this. She hadn't written much in it when she lived on the Black Pearl with Jack and her father. There wasn't really a need to write down how she felt, she simply tell Jack.

He always kept what she said to himself. It was one of the reasons he was her best friends. When he'd be too busy to talk to her she'd retreat to her cabin and find the journal and write. It wasn't as relieving, mainly because it never retorted wittily like Jack would've when he heard something he didn't like.

As she flipped to the newest entry, something written just a few months ago a small breeze blew off the sea and turned the page. Pressed in between the pages was a slightly familiar torn piece of parchment.

She opened it up to find it to be Jack's writing. As she began to read, against her better judgment, she realized at once it was for her to read. In fact, she was sure that it wasn't supposed to be read it at all. It was almost like I diary entry.

Luna Dawn Barbossa is unconstitutionally and irrevocably my best friend has been since the day that I met her as a small child curled up in the corner of the hold sopping wet as she cried for her mum. And I doubt that fact will ever change. As much as I'd like it to. Not that I want her to stop being my best friend, because I don't. Quite the contrary actually. I want us to be more than that. But unfortunately she doesn't. She always comes up with some trifling, annoying reason to not agree. She uses my promiscuousness often.

I'm fine with that. Really I am. But lately I can't seem to get her out of my head. Could you, mate? With the way her silver and blue eyes are always hinting at the mischief she's planning and how the glint just perfectly in the candlelight. And her hair, no matter how she has it, it always seems to get in her face. She gets so frustrated but she never pulls it up. Not to mention she's beautiful. Ungodly. No, what was it the poem said?

A beauty untouched by any mortals…

The other main reason she uses is that damned curse. I constantly tell her that I don't believe in it. And even if it was true, I'd help her in every possible way I could to break it. But she doesn't believe me. Serves me right to try to lie to the only person that truly knows me. Damn Gypsy Lu.

She's caught on to everything her father's taught her lately. Especially sword fighting. Of course she talked me into teaching her how to sword fight a long time ago, but Hector didn't know that. Er, rather doesn't know that. He's much better at it than me, so I'm glad he's finally teaching her. She catches on quick.

Her birthday's coming up quick, as well. She'll be fifteen this year, I wonder what I should get her. What do you think, mate? Hmmm. I saw this beautiful ring in a shop in Tortuga with little pears and a light blue stone that was almost the color of her eyes. It reminded me so much of her. Strange yet beautiful. I saw her eying it as well.

Luna's stirring now. I have to go.

Luna stared out to the cream rose-filled garden, her fingers twisting the ring that rested on her hand involuntarily. She didn't think it was quite possible for him to feel the way he did. Obviously he's admitted it on more than one occasion and for Luna to hear. And, yes, they did a lot of couple-ly things together, but that was forever ago. They were kids.

That was it. He was a kid then. A mere whelp with no idea what love is. Yeah, that was it. But he actually bought her the ring. It wasn't just some trinket he pilfered from somewhere. He actually bought it. But this, this diary entry was written nearly fourteen years ago, his feelings have bound to have changed… right?

Right.

Hers certainly had. She was no longer that naive little girl that used to speak of finding her knight in shining armor and having him break the curse. No, she was fully grown woman wise beyond her years who knew of love and what it felt like. And what she felt towards her best friend wasn't love… right?

Well, let us examine the evidence, shall we?

If she had to describe what love felt like in one word it'd be…. Hard. As in too hard to put a single word to. It's crazy and wild and weird and strange and mystifying. And it's screwing up and getting scared but knowing that everything's going to be alright because they're there for no matter what. It's saying you're sorry even though it wasn't your fault and forgiving them even though you want to hate them with every thread of your being. It a horrible feeling but the greatest high. It was- it is the purest most innocent of all emotions.

And it was exactly how she felt about Jack Sparrow.

And James Norrington, she reminded herself.

There was no denying it anymore. And he was just as bad with claiming he loved her more than he admitted. As possible as that sounded. She couldn't flip-flop between loving him and just being his best friend forever. But Jack was dead and if she didn't hurry up and marry Beckett then he was going to stay that way.

As for James, well, that one was much more simple. He was far to moral to care for her the way she cared for him...

But if what was said at the ball were true, well...

Luna huffed and closed her eyes, feeling the last few rays of sunlight filter through the trees and onto her olive face. She had a feeling that things were about to get really complicated...

A/n: So Unde dracu este means Where the hell is it and cum se spune... jurnal means how do you say... diary. It's all Romanian.

The enscription in the journal from Jack is actually the Author's Blessing in Chrisopher Moore's 2002 novel Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal. I found it online and loved it. It didn't really sound like Jack, but this was before Jack was, well, Jack.

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Love you guys!
Lyra Raine Sparrow