(no subject)
Title: Undecided
Rating: PG.
Words: 1362
Pairing: Norribeth
Summary: Picks up at the end of two loooooong fics of mine from a long time ago
Disclaimer: POTC belongs to Disney, however poor the scripts may be
5 years post Daydreams, The Commodore’s Pleasure
Jack POV:
Of all the sodden, flea-bitten places around the world I’ve been, this is the one place I will remember til my death bed.
“It surprises me somethin awful you want to keep goin back to the place you was almost hung”, says Gibbs. He’s getting too old to keep traveling the world with me, but shows no signs of slowing down.
“If I didn’t go back to places I was almost hung, I’d never get off me ship, and I owe my favorite niece and nephew a visit.”
He helps me lower the longboat and I row into shore. Not Port Royal’s big harbor, but a smaller cove. A big house stands in the distance on a hill top looking down on the beach and the ocean wide.
I’m not entirely rowed to shore when he appears. No one catches the Admiral unawares. He looks exactly the same. Too stubborn I suppose. He refuses to age. As I row closer and closer, he walks down the hill and onto the beach.
I suppose I’m lucky I caught him ashore. He had happily taken a desk job for the first time in his life when…well that topic is as off limits as it always was. He wears brown breeches and a simple white linen shirt flapping in the breeze.
To his credit, he steps into the surf and helps me drag my boat onto shore. Lazy is something he never was.
He raises an eyebrow and looks down on me from his 6’2 perch. I always hated that about him. “To what do we owe the pleasure, Sparrow?” The man’s voice is also, unfortunately, burned into my brain.
“I owed me favorite niece and nephew a visit. How are the tykes?”
“Growing like weeds”, he says, “Come up to the house.”
There was a time I never, and I mean never in my entire life, thought I would be walking up to Norrington’s house. Not without irons anyway.
“Looks who’s come to visit?” he says, as we come through the back door that borders the beach.
“Uncle Jack?” A little girl flies across the room and launches herself into my arms.
“Pearl!” She looks like a little lady, and a miniature version of her mother. Blonde hair, brown eyes, mischievous grin….it’s painful to even look at her.
“Where is she?” Pearl asks, lighting up.
“Now I promised you could have your namesake after I died, I’ll leave the Pearl to you in me will as it were. She ain’t yours yet.”
“I think not”, the Admiral corrects, but he has a smile on his face.
“Father…he said I could have her.”
“Pearl…you will be happily married to a gentleman by the time this old bird passes into his grave.”
“Father…”
“Not another word, young lady, go back to your studies….”
Pearl looks back and forth between both of us. “You can’t stop me from being like her, you know.”
The Admiral slaps his hand over his heart, and I can feel the reverberation of pain, like a little earthquake.
“She’s just like her”, he says.
“I can see that”, I add quietly.
In the corner of the room stands a solemn looking boy nearly impossible to recognize. I remember a little boy who worshipped his father, looked just like him, and followed him around everywhere. He still looks just like him, but the rest is gone.
“Jamie, come give me a hug”, I say.
“J.W.” he says, “Jamie is a baby’s name.”
James rolls his eyes like this is a continuing discussion. “You can call yourself whatever you like when you’re a grown a man, but you’re a child, and your name is Jamie. Or James. That’s it.”
“When I’m a midshipman you won’t be able to stop me”, he hisses.
“How old are you now, son?” I ask.
“Ten.” He stands prouder.
“Well you’ve got a few years yet before you could be a midshipman, best to listen to your father….”
“He will never be”, James cuts me off. “He will be a man of letters like his grandfather. A lawyer. He could be a politician, maybe even governor, if he so chooses. And will be educated in England when the time comes.”
“I will not! You joined the Navy when you were 13!”
“I didn’t have a choice, son. The people who raised me were not parents, were not people you would have ever liked to meet”, James insists.
“And my father is always gone, and my mother couldn’t wait to leave. I don’t blame her.”
He turns on his heel and storms out.
These people are in crisis. It seems I’ve arrived in the nick of time.
My best friend, Elizabeth Norrington, nee: Swann, disappeared five years ago and has not been seen since. The Admiral tore the Caribbean apart looking for her. He spent the first two years at sea himself searching everywhere, every port, every outpost, every ship…but she was gone. And none had seen her. The loss of their mother and the time he spent at sea or obsessed with finding her…the children had learned how to be alone. It cost them all more dearly than I’d dreamed.
“Still no word?” I whisper. I figure if I don’t hear the words, they don’t count.
He turns away quickly. “We both know what happened, Sparrow. You know how many times she left. This time she made it permanent. That’s all.”
“She wouldn’t leave her children…”
He puts up a hand. We’d had this discussion a million times when she disappeared, turning into raging arguments that left us both with black eyes.
“She left Jamie before. She sent him to England alone as a baby, and she left again after that.”
“You know why…”
“I’m not having this discussion”, he says with that booming finality only he can pull off. “It’s over and done with and I’ve accepted it.” He clears his throat. “Cook was going to prepare some fresh red snapper for lunch, you have to stay, and dine with us.”
I put my hands together and give him a little smile and bow of thanks. Lizzie, Lizzie….where did you go?
Martinique
With my toes sunk into the surf, I feel myself sink slowly in the sand as the tide rushes in and pulls out, dragging me forward. Tiny red crabs scuttle around and hide under rocks.
“I’ve seen her work a ship, she knows what she’s doing”, I hear in the distance.
“Bad luck to have a woman aboard.” This was another man, then I hear him hack and spit.
“She’s a better sailor than the rest and will work for half as much. Bad business not to have her aboard. ‘Ay, woman!”
I turn my head. He must be talking to me.
“What be your name?”
I have no idea. “Sally Smith”, I tell him. I decided I was the daughter of a blacksmith whose mother died when I was a baby. For some reason, I can never get “blacksmith” out of my head. Maybe I knew one. But that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
“How did you get to be such a good sailor, Sally Smith?”
“When my father died, my uncle took me to sea with him. He died of influenza just a year ago, God rest his soul.” It was a good story. When I’d woken up alone and confused on a beach on some island years ago, I had to think fast. Since then, I tried every moment to remember who I am, my past, but I never get anywhere.
“All right, Sally Smith, welcome to the crew.” Good. I could stop worrying about who I am again, and work.
“What ship is this?” I ask. Not that it matters. They all blend together.
“You have the distinct honor of serving aboard the Queen Anne’s Revenge. Maybe you ‘eard of the captain, Hector Barbosa, famous among pirates he is.”
“Never heard of him.”
In the distance, a woman calls out, holding out her hand for a little girl. I wish I had gotten the opportunity to have children. “Elizabeth…come here!”
My head snaps around and I stare. But I’m an urchin, and this is a lady. She glares at me, and walks on.
“Coming?”
“Yes, sorry, Sir.”
“That’s better”, he man mumbles and I follow him up the plank and onto the ship.
Rating: PG.
Words: 1362
Pairing: Norribeth
Summary: Picks up at the end of two loooooong fics of mine from a long time ago
Disclaimer: POTC belongs to Disney, however poor the scripts may be
5 years post Daydreams, The Commodore’s Pleasure
Jack POV:
Of all the sodden, flea-bitten places around the world I’ve been, this is the one place I will remember til my death bed.
“It surprises me somethin awful you want to keep goin back to the place you was almost hung”, says Gibbs. He’s getting too old to keep traveling the world with me, but shows no signs of slowing down.
“If I didn’t go back to places I was almost hung, I’d never get off me ship, and I owe my favorite niece and nephew a visit.”
He helps me lower the longboat and I row into shore. Not Port Royal’s big harbor, but a smaller cove. A big house stands in the distance on a hill top looking down on the beach and the ocean wide.
I’m not entirely rowed to shore when he appears. No one catches the Admiral unawares. He looks exactly the same. Too stubborn I suppose. He refuses to age. As I row closer and closer, he walks down the hill and onto the beach.
I suppose I’m lucky I caught him ashore. He had happily taken a desk job for the first time in his life when…well that topic is as off limits as it always was. He wears brown breeches and a simple white linen shirt flapping in the breeze.
To his credit, he steps into the surf and helps me drag my boat onto shore. Lazy is something he never was.
He raises an eyebrow and looks down on me from his 6’2 perch. I always hated that about him. “To what do we owe the pleasure, Sparrow?” The man’s voice is also, unfortunately, burned into my brain.
“I owed me favorite niece and nephew a visit. How are the tykes?”
“Growing like weeds”, he says, “Come up to the house.”
There was a time I never, and I mean never in my entire life, thought I would be walking up to Norrington’s house. Not without irons anyway.
“Looks who’s come to visit?” he says, as we come through the back door that borders the beach.
“Uncle Jack?” A little girl flies across the room and launches herself into my arms.
“Pearl!” She looks like a little lady, and a miniature version of her mother. Blonde hair, brown eyes, mischievous grin….it’s painful to even look at her.
“Where is she?” Pearl asks, lighting up.
“Now I promised you could have your namesake after I died, I’ll leave the Pearl to you in me will as it were. She ain’t yours yet.”
“I think not”, the Admiral corrects, but he has a smile on his face.
“Father…he said I could have her.”
“Pearl…you will be happily married to a gentleman by the time this old bird passes into his grave.”
“Father…”
“Not another word, young lady, go back to your studies….”
Pearl looks back and forth between both of us. “You can’t stop me from being like her, you know.”
The Admiral slaps his hand over his heart, and I can feel the reverberation of pain, like a little earthquake.
“She’s just like her”, he says.
“I can see that”, I add quietly.
In the corner of the room stands a solemn looking boy nearly impossible to recognize. I remember a little boy who worshipped his father, looked just like him, and followed him around everywhere. He still looks just like him, but the rest is gone.
“Jamie, come give me a hug”, I say.
“J.W.” he says, “Jamie is a baby’s name.”
James rolls his eyes like this is a continuing discussion. “You can call yourself whatever you like when you’re a grown a man, but you’re a child, and your name is Jamie. Or James. That’s it.”
“When I’m a midshipman you won’t be able to stop me”, he hisses.
“How old are you now, son?” I ask.
“Ten.” He stands prouder.
“Well you’ve got a few years yet before you could be a midshipman, best to listen to your father….”
“He will never be”, James cuts me off. “He will be a man of letters like his grandfather. A lawyer. He could be a politician, maybe even governor, if he so chooses. And will be educated in England when the time comes.”
“I will not! You joined the Navy when you were 13!”
“I didn’t have a choice, son. The people who raised me were not parents, were not people you would have ever liked to meet”, James insists.
“And my father is always gone, and my mother couldn’t wait to leave. I don’t blame her.”
He turns on his heel and storms out.
These people are in crisis. It seems I’ve arrived in the nick of time.
My best friend, Elizabeth Norrington, nee: Swann, disappeared five years ago and has not been seen since. The Admiral tore the Caribbean apart looking for her. He spent the first two years at sea himself searching everywhere, every port, every outpost, every ship…but she was gone. And none had seen her. The loss of their mother and the time he spent at sea or obsessed with finding her…the children had learned how to be alone. It cost them all more dearly than I’d dreamed.
“Still no word?” I whisper. I figure if I don’t hear the words, they don’t count.
He turns away quickly. “We both know what happened, Sparrow. You know how many times she left. This time she made it permanent. That’s all.”
“She wouldn’t leave her children…”
He puts up a hand. We’d had this discussion a million times when she disappeared, turning into raging arguments that left us both with black eyes.
“She left Jamie before. She sent him to England alone as a baby, and she left again after that.”
“You know why…”
“I’m not having this discussion”, he says with that booming finality only he can pull off. “It’s over and done with and I’ve accepted it.” He clears his throat. “Cook was going to prepare some fresh red snapper for lunch, you have to stay, and dine with us.”
I put my hands together and give him a little smile and bow of thanks. Lizzie, Lizzie….where did you go?
Martinique
With my toes sunk into the surf, I feel myself sink slowly in the sand as the tide rushes in and pulls out, dragging me forward. Tiny red crabs scuttle around and hide under rocks.
“I’ve seen her work a ship, she knows what she’s doing”, I hear in the distance.
“Bad luck to have a woman aboard.” This was another man, then I hear him hack and spit.
“She’s a better sailor than the rest and will work for half as much. Bad business not to have her aboard. ‘Ay, woman!”
I turn my head. He must be talking to me.
“What be your name?”
I have no idea. “Sally Smith”, I tell him. I decided I was the daughter of a blacksmith whose mother died when I was a baby. For some reason, I can never get “blacksmith” out of my head. Maybe I knew one. But that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
“How did you get to be such a good sailor, Sally Smith?”
“When my father died, my uncle took me to sea with him. He died of influenza just a year ago, God rest his soul.” It was a good story. When I’d woken up alone and confused on a beach on some island years ago, I had to think fast. Since then, I tried every moment to remember who I am, my past, but I never get anywhere.
“All right, Sally Smith, welcome to the crew.” Good. I could stop worrying about who I am again, and work.
“What ship is this?” I ask. Not that it matters. They all blend together.
“You have the distinct honor of serving aboard the Queen Anne’s Revenge. Maybe you ‘eard of the captain, Hector Barbosa, famous among pirates he is.”
“Never heard of him.”
In the distance, a woman calls out, holding out her hand for a little girl. I wish I had gotten the opportunity to have children. “Elizabeth…come here!”
My head snaps around and I stare. But I’m an urchin, and this is a lady. She glares at me, and walks on.
“Coming?”
“Yes, sorry, Sir.”
“That’s better”, he man mumbles and I follow him up the plank and onto the ship.