(no subject)
Title: Spiced Rum: Aged Five - Family
Type: Gen at present, with very slight het
Genre: Character study/Humor
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean
Characters/Pairings: Jack Smith (eventually Sparrow); his parents, a harlot and a pirate; Lizzie, a harlot; Johnny, a pimp; Johnson, a preacher; and very slight wee Jack/Lizzie.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Minor language, talk of whorin' and drinkin', but it's with a five-year-old's limited understanding of it.
Word Count: ~1,600
Summary: Jack is five and loves his family.
Disclaimer: PoTC belongs to Disney, Bruckheimer, Elliot & Rossio, and Verbinski. Copyright, I respect. Infringe upon it, I intend to do not.
A/N: Written for everyfiveyears; I'll be going up to 40, with a conclusion fic at 41 that will basically spoil DMC rotten. The other claim, for the record, is Norrington, who gets to go up to 31. It's likely that, at some point, their paths will meet and slash will ensue. Slash will ensue with Jack anyway, particularly of the Jack/Bootstrap and Jack/Barbossa varieties because I am a sick, sick puppy. And... most of their histories will be made up by me, aided with various things I found on Wikipedia links. Yay Wikipedia!
The docks are always bustling, filling over with all forms of interesting sorts that come and go as they please. Everyone’s there - British, black, Chinese, Indian, pirates, merchant sailors, French, law officers who can take a hint and a few shillings for their silence. Fascinating and full of life, every one of them. Not that the tavern, The Empty Wineskin, where he lives, isn’t interesting, far from it, but there’s just something about the sea and the crashing waves, and the sounds of bartering, and the smell of rum and spices. It’s magical. Not even mama and all the pretty girls can best it. That’s what Jack Smith, aged five years, going on six, and with two loose teeth to show for it, knows above all things, save maybe that his papa’s the best sailor in the Seven Seas and that his mama has the fairest face.
Mama’s name is really Mary, but everyone calls her mama, simply on account of her being the only one of Johnny’s girls who has a son, and that “mama” is what Jack and Johnny call her. Papa calls her “Mary” or “darlin’ Mary,” but no one else does. She is always, always, always “mama” to everyone else, and it’s mostly because that’s what Jack calls her. She and papa aren’t married like all the other sailors and their wives, but they don’t need to be. Besides, Jack heard the captain of papa’s ship, The Endeavor, fighting with his wife once - he hasn’t told anyone because he was out sneaking around when he shouldn’t have been, but the captain hit her, and papa and Johnny say you’re not supposed to hit a lady - and papa and mama never, ever fight. They sometimes close the door and leave Jack with Lizzie, mama’s best friend of all the girls, who also closes her door sometimes, but mostly she tells him brilliant stories about pirates and adventurers and lost loves. Jack loves these stories.
Jack doesn’t understand why they all close their doors. They always say it’s because they want to be alone, and Johnny says the same when Jack has to sit with him, but that’s just stupid. Jack doesn’t have to close a door when he wants to be alone. All he has to do is go down to the docks, find the strange old man who feeds stray cats and plays the violin for sixpences, and just watch as all the ships come sailing in and the smell of rum and spices warms his little heart. The old man plays really well, Jack thinks; all his songs sound like the sea, and it’s all beautiful. Everything he knows is beautiful, he thinks.
Johnny said one time that mama, papa, Lizzie, and all the other girls close the doors for something that Jack will understand when he’s older and girls look prettier; Jack told him that he thinks girls are perfectly pretty right now, thanks. That was one of the times when Lizzie closed her door too, so Jack sat with Johnny and all the other girls and smiled a lot because he likes smiling. The girls like having him around because, they say, he’s a handsome young man who’ll grow up into a fine sailor just like papa, and they can make him watch their shiny baubles, which he doesn’t mind at all; sometimes, they let him keep small things, never necklaces, but a broken bracelet or earring, or, one time, Azura let him keep a choker. Shiny things are pretty.
And Johnny likes having him around because all the drunk sailors like seeing the girls with a little boy - he says it makes them look sweeter and it reminds the sailors of their own sons, and true loves, and things of that nature, so they’re more inclined to give Johnny and the girls their money, which is always good. And he likes being around them all because they’re all his big, warm family. Jack has his mama, his papa, his Lizzie, his Johnny, and all the girls, and they all have their Jack. And some people, like the preacher, Johnson or whatever his name is, who comes down to The Wineskin some Sundays to call mama and Lizzie and the girls whores, and papa a pirate, and Johnny a pimp, and Jack a bastard. He says they’re all going to Hell, and that they should for corrupting an innocent like Jack. He’s against their family, but they don’t care. They have each other, which is all that matters.
Jack stuck his tongue out at Johnson one time. It really made him angry and it was fun to watch his face turn red. Even Tom behind the bar had a laugh about that.
That night was the only time that Jack has ever seen papa get mad at Johnny. Sometimes they make fun of each other and jostle around a bit, but that was the only time, the night that Johnny gave Jack some of his rum - just a little bit, only a couple of sips. It tasted funny, and it made him cough a little… okay, a lot, but it was fun until papa got home from sea - he was two weeks early, which Johnny didn’t expect. If he had, he never would’ve let Jack have the rum. Jack was staggering around, which was fun because the girls were laughing and kept picking him up, but papa’s face got red like Johnson’s and he yelled at Johnny for sharing his rum with a five-year-old boy. He said his boy was going to have a better life than this, and then Johnny said back that no amount of pirating was going to help any of them if they never saw the booty, and then papa called Johnny something Jack didn’t hear because Azura covered his ears. Then mama and Lizzie took Jack upstairs and put him to bed. They left the door open. He was ill the next morning, and his head hurt, but mama and papa took care of him, and Lizzie told him some of her stories.
Sometimes, Jack thinks papa might be mad, going on about having a better life than this. Jack can’t think of having a better life, unless it’d be like the pirates in Lizzie’s stories, sailing around and finding treasure and meeting pretty girls.
Lizzie’s pretty. Not as pretty as mama, though Jack sometimes thinks so. She has hair like sunshine, but it’s stringy like a horse’s mane and has waves like the sea. She has skin like the moon, except when she blushes, and then it’s like roses. Her eyes are a little lighter blue than the sea, but she always wears this black stuff around them that makes her eyes look darker, just perfect images of the ocean that Jack loves. And she wears a lot of blue - Johnny says his girls have to have colors, and every time he finds a blue dress, Lizzie gets it; mama’s color is a sort of silver red. Jack loves it when she wears blue. With her hair as the sun, and her skin as the moon, and the sea in her dress and in her eyes… she is everything he thinks is perfect.
But the thing he likes best of all in this world, even before the sea and the thought that, someday, not someday soon because he’s still a boy and his mama and his Lizzie still need him, but that someday, he’ll be out on those waters, making his living by being free from people like Johnson and the holier-than-thou officers who arrest people like his papa (papa’s too sneaky for them; they can’t catch him, ever). Before that thought and the sea, there are the Moments.
The docks are no busier than usual, and the folk are no more or no less interesting, but there’s something else in the air with the smell of rum and spices. Mama calls it anticipation; Jack calls it the longest wait in the whole, wide world. These are the moments when, after he’s been at sea for several months, papa’s supposed to come back. On these days, Jack doesn’t sit in the tavern with mama, Lizzie, Johnny, and the girls. Instead, he gets out and runs for the docks, even though he always winds up sitting with the old man, his cats, and his violins, watching the waves and the horizon, tugging at his sleeve and gnawing on his lower lip like the meat he eats when Johnny can get it. But no matter what, Jack always waits, loyal to the end. Even the time papa was delayed a week - every day, Jack went to sit and watch the horizon. He’s waited in the rain before, and he’ll wait in any weather at all. He keeps his spirits up, though. The old man tells brilliant stories too, when he isn’t playing, and any sail looks like papa’s sail, which always makes him grin, but always lets him down.
And then, the real one appears, The Endeavor returning from another successful run, and Jack’s spirits spring up like drunken dancers to their favorite song.
And then they dock and anchor, and Jack runs down to meet them. Papa’s always the last one off, but Jack always has his strong, sun burnt arms to run into. They lift him up like the sight of sails lifts his spirits and papa’s sea salty laugh means everything in the world is that much brighter, and then, together, they go to see mama, Lizzie, Johnny, and the girls. And, like a proper family should, they welcome papa home.
Type: Gen at present, with very slight het
Genre: Character study/Humor
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean
Characters/Pairings: Jack Smith (eventually Sparrow); his parents, a harlot and a pirate; Lizzie, a harlot; Johnny, a pimp; Johnson, a preacher; and very slight wee Jack/Lizzie.
Rating: PG
Warnings: Minor language, talk of whorin' and drinkin', but it's with a five-year-old's limited understanding of it.
Word Count: ~1,600
Summary: Jack is five and loves his family.
Disclaimer: PoTC belongs to Disney, Bruckheimer, Elliot & Rossio, and Verbinski. Copyright, I respect. Infringe upon it, I intend to do not.
A/N: Written for everyfiveyears; I'll be going up to 40, with a conclusion fic at 41 that will basically spoil DMC rotten. The other claim, for the record, is Norrington, who gets to go up to 31. It's likely that, at some point, their paths will meet and slash will ensue. Slash will ensue with Jack anyway, particularly of the Jack/Bootstrap and Jack/Barbossa varieties because I am a sick, sick puppy. And... most of their histories will be made up by me, aided with various things I found on Wikipedia links. Yay Wikipedia!
The docks are always bustling, filling over with all forms of interesting sorts that come and go as they please. Everyone’s there - British, black, Chinese, Indian, pirates, merchant sailors, French, law officers who can take a hint and a few shillings for their silence. Fascinating and full of life, every one of them. Not that the tavern, The Empty Wineskin, where he lives, isn’t interesting, far from it, but there’s just something about the sea and the crashing waves, and the sounds of bartering, and the smell of rum and spices. It’s magical. Not even mama and all the pretty girls can best it. That’s what Jack Smith, aged five years, going on six, and with two loose teeth to show for it, knows above all things, save maybe that his papa’s the best sailor in the Seven Seas and that his mama has the fairest face.
Mama’s name is really Mary, but everyone calls her mama, simply on account of her being the only one of Johnny’s girls who has a son, and that “mama” is what Jack and Johnny call her. Papa calls her “Mary” or “darlin’ Mary,” but no one else does. She is always, always, always “mama” to everyone else, and it’s mostly because that’s what Jack calls her. She and papa aren’t married like all the other sailors and their wives, but they don’t need to be. Besides, Jack heard the captain of papa’s ship, The Endeavor, fighting with his wife once - he hasn’t told anyone because he was out sneaking around when he shouldn’t have been, but the captain hit her, and papa and Johnny say you’re not supposed to hit a lady - and papa and mama never, ever fight. They sometimes close the door and leave Jack with Lizzie, mama’s best friend of all the girls, who also closes her door sometimes, but mostly she tells him brilliant stories about pirates and adventurers and lost loves. Jack loves these stories.
Jack doesn’t understand why they all close their doors. They always say it’s because they want to be alone, and Johnny says the same when Jack has to sit with him, but that’s just stupid. Jack doesn’t have to close a door when he wants to be alone. All he has to do is go down to the docks, find the strange old man who feeds stray cats and plays the violin for sixpences, and just watch as all the ships come sailing in and the smell of rum and spices warms his little heart. The old man plays really well, Jack thinks; all his songs sound like the sea, and it’s all beautiful. Everything he knows is beautiful, he thinks.
Johnny said one time that mama, papa, Lizzie, and all the other girls close the doors for something that Jack will understand when he’s older and girls look prettier; Jack told him that he thinks girls are perfectly pretty right now, thanks. That was one of the times when Lizzie closed her door too, so Jack sat with Johnny and all the other girls and smiled a lot because he likes smiling. The girls like having him around because, they say, he’s a handsome young man who’ll grow up into a fine sailor just like papa, and they can make him watch their shiny baubles, which he doesn’t mind at all; sometimes, they let him keep small things, never necklaces, but a broken bracelet or earring, or, one time, Azura let him keep a choker. Shiny things are pretty.
And Johnny likes having him around because all the drunk sailors like seeing the girls with a little boy - he says it makes them look sweeter and it reminds the sailors of their own sons, and true loves, and things of that nature, so they’re more inclined to give Johnny and the girls their money, which is always good. And he likes being around them all because they’re all his big, warm family. Jack has his mama, his papa, his Lizzie, his Johnny, and all the girls, and they all have their Jack. And some people, like the preacher, Johnson or whatever his name is, who comes down to The Wineskin some Sundays to call mama and Lizzie and the girls whores, and papa a pirate, and Johnny a pimp, and Jack a bastard. He says they’re all going to Hell, and that they should for corrupting an innocent like Jack. He’s against their family, but they don’t care. They have each other, which is all that matters.
Jack stuck his tongue out at Johnson one time. It really made him angry and it was fun to watch his face turn red. Even Tom behind the bar had a laugh about that.
That night was the only time that Jack has ever seen papa get mad at Johnny. Sometimes they make fun of each other and jostle around a bit, but that was the only time, the night that Johnny gave Jack some of his rum - just a little bit, only a couple of sips. It tasted funny, and it made him cough a little… okay, a lot, but it was fun until papa got home from sea - he was two weeks early, which Johnny didn’t expect. If he had, he never would’ve let Jack have the rum. Jack was staggering around, which was fun because the girls were laughing and kept picking him up, but papa’s face got red like Johnson’s and he yelled at Johnny for sharing his rum with a five-year-old boy. He said his boy was going to have a better life than this, and then Johnny said back that no amount of pirating was going to help any of them if they never saw the booty, and then papa called Johnny something Jack didn’t hear because Azura covered his ears. Then mama and Lizzie took Jack upstairs and put him to bed. They left the door open. He was ill the next morning, and his head hurt, but mama and papa took care of him, and Lizzie told him some of her stories.
Sometimes, Jack thinks papa might be mad, going on about having a better life than this. Jack can’t think of having a better life, unless it’d be like the pirates in Lizzie’s stories, sailing around and finding treasure and meeting pretty girls.
Lizzie’s pretty. Not as pretty as mama, though Jack sometimes thinks so. She has hair like sunshine, but it’s stringy like a horse’s mane and has waves like the sea. She has skin like the moon, except when she blushes, and then it’s like roses. Her eyes are a little lighter blue than the sea, but she always wears this black stuff around them that makes her eyes look darker, just perfect images of the ocean that Jack loves. And she wears a lot of blue - Johnny says his girls have to have colors, and every time he finds a blue dress, Lizzie gets it; mama’s color is a sort of silver red. Jack loves it when she wears blue. With her hair as the sun, and her skin as the moon, and the sea in her dress and in her eyes… she is everything he thinks is perfect.
But the thing he likes best of all in this world, even before the sea and the thought that, someday, not someday soon because he’s still a boy and his mama and his Lizzie still need him, but that someday, he’ll be out on those waters, making his living by being free from people like Johnson and the holier-than-thou officers who arrest people like his papa (papa’s too sneaky for them; they can’t catch him, ever). Before that thought and the sea, there are the Moments.
The docks are no busier than usual, and the folk are no more or no less interesting, but there’s something else in the air with the smell of rum and spices. Mama calls it anticipation; Jack calls it the longest wait in the whole, wide world. These are the moments when, after he’s been at sea for several months, papa’s supposed to come back. On these days, Jack doesn’t sit in the tavern with mama, Lizzie, Johnny, and the girls. Instead, he gets out and runs for the docks, even though he always winds up sitting with the old man, his cats, and his violins, watching the waves and the horizon, tugging at his sleeve and gnawing on his lower lip like the meat he eats when Johnny can get it. But no matter what, Jack always waits, loyal to the end. Even the time papa was delayed a week - every day, Jack went to sit and watch the horizon. He’s waited in the rain before, and he’ll wait in any weather at all. He keeps his spirits up, though. The old man tells brilliant stories too, when he isn’t playing, and any sail looks like papa’s sail, which always makes him grin, but always lets him down.
And then, the real one appears, The Endeavor returning from another successful run, and Jack’s spirits spring up like drunken dancers to their favorite song.
And then they dock and anchor, and Jack runs down to meet them. Papa’s always the last one off, but Jack always has his strong, sun burnt arms to run into. They lift him up like the sight of sails lifts his spirits and papa’s sea salty laugh means everything in the world is that much brighter, and then, together, they go to see mama, Lizzie, Johnny, and the girls. And, like a proper family should, they welcome papa home.