Truly, Madly
Driving wind and rain brings with it the memory of the open sea. The sky opens with a roar and Elizabeth breathes deep, eyes shining. Elizabeth wishes to stand with her palms open, face turned towards the heavens and tongue curling towards raindrops--but Will catches hold of her wrist and leads Elizabeth, stumbling and laughing, back inside their home. Instead, Elizabeth casts open the balcony doors and sits now with Will's head pillowed on her lap, her eyes trained on the horizon.
If fierce winds and rain call forth the memory of the open sea, such memories are closely followed by thoughts of Captain Jack Sparrow. Elizabeth's fingers take to a familiar patterns as she weaves a braid into her husband's fine hair. She keeps to the silence for Will's memories of Jack are of riddles and rum and loose women and Elizabeth's--Elizabeth's are not.
It is not that Elizabeth disbelieves Will's Jack, for she does not, but Will is. . . sensible more often than not, solid in heart and mind and manners and has never once looked towards the wide, wide blue and yearned with all his heart.
Elizabeth imagines Jack: hands and feet steady against the Black Pearl as everything but--knees and hips, shoulders and head--sway and twist and fold in time with the sea itself. Elizabeth envisions sun-dark skin turned slick with water; droplets clinging to eye-lashes and rain sinking into Jack's thick mat of braids. Elizabeth sees kohl-lined eyes narrowed against the spray from sky and sea, and Jack is smiling--truly, freely in the here and now--and Elizabeth thinks--Elizabeth knows--that the wilder the waves, the wider Jack will grin until he is laughing into the face of the storm itself, unafraid.
There is enough of the romantic child in her for Elizabeth to wish herself at Jack's side.
Elizabeth loops the tail-end of Will's braid into a loose knot. She drags the edge of her thumb down the length of it and frowns. Will is no pirate, Elizabeth reminds herself and tugs harder than she ought as she releases the knot and unravels Will's hair.
Elizabeth is sensible enough to know that a pirate's life--Jack's life is not hers.
There is sea-madness enough within her that Elizabeth's acceptance of that truth will never bring her peace. Will sighs and settles more firmly into the curve of Elizabeth's body and she knows that the sound of wind and rain and waves against the shore will always call forth memories of the open sea and Captain Jack Sparrow.