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dwgmI have my new computer mostly set up now. The screen is nice, one of those skinny, flat ones with great resolution. I was able to load my old version of PrintArtist, the one with the nice graphics, but the old WordPerfect (6.1) doesn't work so I'll have to rebuild my templates in the later version I have (9.0), unless I can figure out how to load the old ones. 6.1 had some great clipart too. Maybe I can still use that. Bob is trying to find me a newer version of Frontpage, but I can use GoLive in the meantime, although there is a bit of a learning curve involved there.
Getting things done for Christmas. Only two days, and then I'm off. We had our Holiday Pot Luck Luncheon today. Great food, as usual, but we sure missed Sheila. :(
Mom & I went to the Mall, briefly, and to Marmelade Cafe for mushroom soup. Had bread pudding too, but it wasn't as good as mine. Bought stocking stuffers at Cost Plus, also.
Tomorrow is the annual staff breakfast. Yum!
Was writing a Christmas fic for the Secret Santa exchange on Black Pearl Sails, but found out we can't post 'em anywhere else 'til January 1st, by which time Christmas fics will be past their prime. So I've decided to post it as a sort of Christmas prezzie to everyone, over the next four days. Nothing like a little Christmas fluff to get one in the spirit!
The Christmas Guest
Chapter One: Remembering
A long while later,
they lay twined together, sated, the covers pulled up close around them against
the chill, and, completing her contentment, he made no move to go.
“’s all right,” he
murmured, eyes closed. “Gibbs’ll come if I’m needed. Wore me out, you did.”
Elizabeth studied
the face next to hers on the pillow, golden in the waning light of afternoon.
The fey, Sparrovian animation was absent, replaced by a quiescent beauty that
made him look both more mature and more youthful at once. She reached up and
ran a finger along the edge of his jaw, the curling facial hair soft-rough to
the touch. His eyes opened, and focused on hers, warm and penetrating, as
always. She subdued the little thrill, and frowned a question.
An answering frown.
“What? Have I something on my face?”
A bubble of
laughter rose, and her voice shook as she said, “No! It’s just… what do you
look like? Without all the hair and ornaments?” She smoothed one ruffled
eyebrow, and ran the backs of her fingers against his cheek, just because she
could.
He reached up and
caught the hand, and kissed her fingers, tenderly. “Don’t look like a pirate,
that’s certain,” he smiled. “Fella called me ‘fetching’ once.”
She chuckled. “Oh,
dear!”
“Mmm,” he agreed.
The eyelids drooped. “Couldn’t look ‘fetching’ an’ still be the best pirate in
the Caribbean, could I?”
Elizabeth smiled,
thinking yes, he could, and did, and he certainly was. But she said, instead,
“How glad I am that Father asked you to come to me.”
“Aye. Though Will
asked first.” He opened his eyes again at her sudden stillness.
“How was this?”
“ ‘Twas that first
Christmas. Remember?”
She did, and her
expression lightened. “Oh. Yes. I remember. How could I forget?”
“How indeed?” he
chuckled, and let his thoughts wander back...
Captain Jack
Sparrow of the Black Pearl, grandest pirate ship in the Caribbean (and,
quite probably, the World!), should have been filled with the joy of the
season, or so he thought. The trouble was, he wasn’t.
Jack hadn’t
bothered much about Christmas during the last ten years, when he’d been adrift
and taking whatever inferior ship and chance of employment came his way, but
this year should have been different. This year, they should have been docked
here in Tortuga and hosted a monstrous party, celebrating the death of his old
enemy, his fabulous escape from hanging, and his return to the captaincy of the
Black Pearl. Not to mention other happy events and circumstances: his
attendance (in disguise and without mishap) at the wedding of Elizabeth Swann
and William Turner; the expansion of Commodore Norrington’s “one day’s head
start” to include most of the previous year (possibly due to Jack’s policy of
completely avoiding English ships and settlements); and his continued and most
convenient access to the vast treasure of the Isla de Muerta.
The latter was what
had him at loose ends now, for, as his beloved ship needed careening, he’d elected
to hire workers to accomplish this, and gave the whole crew fat bonuses and
leave for the holidays. Jack almost thought it would have been better if they’d
had to do the work themselves, or at least that he should have stayed to
supervise, but Gibbs had offered and Jack had taken him up on it readily
enough, thinking that two weeks of carousing in Tortuga would be the next best
thing to celebrating on the Pearl. How wrong he’d been.
Maybe he was
getting old, he thought morosely, as he wandered along through the town, his
tricorn pulled down and his coat collar pulled up against the rain that had
been drizzling for days. Somehow the raw and raucous life of the place
wasn’t making him happy like it usually did. He remembered how enthusiastically
he’d extolled the town’s virtues to Will when he’d brought the boy here that
first time: ‘twas always entertaining to see a place through new eyes. But,
ultimately, Will hadn’t liked Tortuga much, and, though that hadn’t bothered
Jack then, it was bothering him now, considerable. His usual haunts, close to
the waterfront, seemed seedier than usual, the women coarser, the liquor
execrable. He knew the better parts of town, and had made his way there,
through the rain, but even these more attractive streets with their
well-stocked stores and neat houses failed to cheer him. P’rhaps if he’d had
company… but Gibbs was back with the ship, AnaMaria had gone into the interior
to visit an aunt and uncle, and the rest of his crew had either found lodgings
with friends, or were content to reside in the brothels back near the harbor
for the holidays.
Crossing a muddy
street, he saw a prettily dressed woman emerging from a store called Finnegan’s
Mercantile, carrying a number of parcels: Christmas gifts! Admiring the
view as the lady retreated up the boardwalk, he crossed to the storefront and
peered in. Finnegan’s looked as though it catered to the well-to-do.
There was a little of everything on display in the window, from dry goods to
fine jewelry, and, as Jack looked the items over, a piece of the latter caught his eye. It was a stickpin, for a
gentleman’s cravat, elegant but not too ‘barock’, and surmounted by a black
pearl! The thought came, unbidden but immediate: Will would like that.
Now where had that
come from? And what was he going to do about it? Go to Port Royal, on the sly,
just for a few days, playing Father Christmas to those children? He imagined
their surprise, and the decorations Elizabeth would have arranged so carefully
(their first holiday together, after all!), and the hot rum punch they’d press
into his hand, after seating him close to their little fire. And perhaps they’d
have him to dinner, as well…roast goose? With all the trimmings? How long had
it been since he’d spent a Christmas like that? Lord, they might even try to
drag him off to church at midnight—if he stood at the back he wouldn’t be too
noticeable, and he supposed they’d sing carols and such, just like they’d done
in England when he was a lad.
He looked up and
around, shaking off this warm vision, and seeing the reality of his current
situation: the muddy street, drizzling rain, palm trees scraggly and dripping.
He could stay in one of the better establishments here in Tortuga, but most of
his crew would be at the Faithful Bride, or the Blue Boar, down
by the docks, and somehow he wasn’t in the mood to be alone. He frowned up at
the unrelenting gray of the sky, and suddenly made up his mind.
“Right, then,” he
said aloud, decisively. He’d take the chance. At the very worst he’d have a
different set of inns and taverns to choose from. And at the very best…well,
he’d just have to wait and see.
On to Chapter Two...
~.~
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no subject
Date: 2004-12-16 11:25 am (UTC)