Disclaimer – Ultimately, Disney owns them. Terry Rossio and Ted Elliot got the screen credit for creating them although Jay Wolpert and Stuart Beattie also had a hand in, Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom gave them life, and Jerry Bruckheimer had the brains to sit back and let talented people do what they do best. I appreciate that in a man, I truly do.
Rating: PG-13
Otherstuff: Sure and they'll be getting down to it soon enough, mate. This is what we in the trade calls layin' the groundwork. And "helm's a lee", that be a nautical phrase – it's what ye yells out when the captain changes the heading and the boom swings fast and hard across the deck. Them that as don't duck, well, let's just say that their lives are invariably changed…
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HELM'S A LEE! By Teand------------------------------
The rum was a given. The Interceptor was a naval vessel, after all. Had been a naval vessel… Will supposed that technically it was now a pirate ship.
That Jack would drink the rum was also a given. More than a given, actually, given Jack. Even on short acquaintance, it was easy to see that Jack and rum were, well, close. Friendly. Though it was more of an equal relationship than his master had with the liquor that was for sure.
The rum gave Jack a soft burnish, like copper rubbed rough so that it gleamed rather than glistened. And Jack did much the same for the rum. Watching the effect it had on Jack, it was impossible not to think that maybe a little rum would be just the thing to wind a bit of excitement, of mystery, around the grind of day to day.
It was a lie, of course. Few knew better than Will what rum really did for a man but Jack made the lie tempting in a way it hadn't been for years.
"Drink?"
Jack dropped down beside him on the top aft-castle step and Will shuffled over to give them both room. He wasn't getting up. This had been his place first! "What makes you think I have any interest in sharing anything with you?"
They were sitting so close he could feel Jack shrug. "Might have been the way you were staring. I just assumed you were staring at the bottle." The pause was… interesting but then all of Jack's pauses were. When they weren't entirely perplexing. "Besides, I have no intention of sharing my rum; I brought you a bottle of your own. Equal shares on a pirate ship." The bottle in question, clasped in a strong, brown hand, was shoved into Will's line of sight. "So… drink?"
Will stared at it for a long moment. Why not?
The rum was smoother than he expected. Sweeter. Stronger. "You've stolen this from the captain's cabin then."
"I have not." High indignation in Jack's response.
A second swallow, even smoother than the first. "So this isn't from the captain's private supply?"
"Now I didn't say that, did I? Since I am the current captain of this vessel, the captain's cabin is mine and you can not steal what is yours. Nor as it happens…"
Will could hear the smile in Jack's voice; found himself turning toward it without ever intending too.
"…can I steal what is mine."
Strangely mesmerized by the long line of Jack's throat, Will watched him swallow, watched muscles move, watched a drop of rum run from the corner of his mouth over his jaw and down under the edge of his collar, thought of twisted hemp and heels kicking in the early morning light and had to turn away, locking his eyes on the rum instead.
"Something floating in it?"
"No."
"Something sank?"
Impossible not to grin. "No."
"Then drink up, lad. Don't sit there and let it vanish into the sun for pity's sake!"
The third swallow was… warming. In fact, his insides were rapidly becoming as warm as his outsides. And his outsides were pretty damned warm. They were sitting in the shadow of the big square sail – the reason Will had chosen to sit on this step – but not even the steady wind blowing them from Port Royale could lift the late afternoon heat. Hottest where Jack's shoulder pressed against his.
"Shouldn't you be, oh I don't know, sailing the ship or something?" The note of desperation in his voice rather surprised him. What did he have to be desperate about? Granted, there had been a certain desperation to the whole day but here and now…
"I am sailing the ship." Heat now on his leg. Will looked down to see Jack's hand patting him absently, long fingers almost cupping the inside of his thigh. "Wind is in our favour, sails are full, the wheel's locked, and at this speed we've a good six hours of open sea before us. The sea is all about knowing, lad. Knowing where you are. Knowing…" Fingers tightened momentarily. "…where you're going."
Mouth suddenly inexplicably dry, Will gulped down a mouthful of rum, choked, coughed, and succeeded in moving Jack's hand from his leg to his back where it threatened to burn through waistcoat and shirt both. How could any man be so… hot? "Are you feverish?" he gasped.
"Am I what?"
"Nothing." It was the rum. It had to be the rum settling hot and heavy, low in his gut. Stealing his breath. Wrapping his head in fog.
Jack's hand rubbed heated circles over his back. "Rum's mother's milk to a pirate, Will. You'll get used to it."
"I'm not a pirate." And there was that note of desperation again.
"So you say. I say I know more about pirates than you do."
"Murdering thieves!"
"On occasion."
"Stop doing that!" The note had become several notes. Well on it's way to becoming a song.
"Doing what then?"
"With your hand!" A long song. Several verses. And a chorus.
"My hand?"
Squirming away, Will turned until his back was hard against the post that secured the railing at the top of the stairs, left leg where it had been, right leg bent, foot planted firmly on the aft-castle. Just changing position. That was all. A man could change position without being accused of running. He hadn't actually gone anywhere, had he? He wouldn't give Jack the satisfaction. He didn't know what game the pirate was playing but Will Turner did not like to lose. Did not intend to lose.
Teeth flashing gold in the depths of his smile, Jack mirrored his position on the other post. Except that Jack's left leg ran along the edge of the top step, inside Will's right, bent just enough that it stopped short of…
Jack's toes were very long. And brown. And when had he taken his boots off?
Will set the bottle down carefully between his legs, incidentally between Jack's toes and his… and him. "My hands are sweating," he explained at the enquiring lift of a dark brow. "It seems the safest place for it."
"Save the rum." Jack nodded as he lifted his own bottle in salute. "Don't have to explain that to me, lad. I'm all about saving the rum."
"You're all about drinking the rum."
"I am indeed."
Watching Jack swallow from this angle had its own fascination. Shading down into the vee of his chest, framed by the two beaded braids of his beard, his throat seemed even longer. And it gleamed.
Pressure at his crotch dropped his gaze to see tanned toes caressing the bottle between them. Rubbing it. Pushing it rhythmically up against him, the rum sloshing gently back and forth with the motion. Unable to stop himself, he followed the movement of the rum to Jack's foot to his calf -- also bare and brown – to a long line of thigh -- cotton breeches pulled tight against lean muscle -- to the place where the trailing end of a grimy sash dropped between Jack's legs. A sudden increase in temperature snapped his head up so quickly he slammed the back of his skull against the ship.
"You're not drinking."
Gold gleaming, eyes gleaming, Jack gleaming. Way too much gleaming going on here. "I think I've had enough."
"Suit yourself." Back arched, chest pressed momentarily against unbleached muslin, Jack reached behind him on the deck for his hat. Settling against the post, he cradled his rum against his body in one hand and drew his tricorn down over his eyes with the other. "You and I, as stellar a pair of pirates as we may be and, I assure you, we are – or I am at least -- aren't enough to bring the sails down and then up again in the morning so we'll be running through the night. As I'll be manning the wheel into the wee smalls, I'll be having a bit of a kip now."
"You're going to sleep?"
"I am."
"Now?"
"As you say, now."
"Right." With Jack's eyes safely closed, Will somehow managed to stand without knocking his bottle over. "I'll just be over here then." He backed across the deck until he was nearly caught up in one of the ratlines. "Keeping watch."
"Good man."
He had no idea what he should be keeping watch for although Royal Navy dreadnoughts were probably high on the list.
"Mr. Turner. Three days to Tortugas."
Jack's eyes were still shut but his lips had curled back into what could only be called a predatory smile.
Will looked down at the bottle in his hand, thought about dropping it overboard, decided that just because he was holding it didn't mean he had to drink it. Took another swallow anyway before he set it to one side. He'd seen sharks in the harbor wearing much the same expression Jack wore. Only without the gold.
Gleaming.
No. Burnished.
And he was becoming very much afraid that the rum had nothing to do with it.
--end--