The Pirate and the Poem Lover

Chapter 13

*****

Eliza felt her heart thundering in her chest as Captain Charles sat so close to her. He had been looking at her so strangely since the day she'd been thrown overboard and Tom had saved her. She felt nervous and shaky under his dark gaze and she had been thinking up ways to interrogate him as to why he acting that way. But she was not longer a guest aboard the ship and he was her captain, to speak out of turn to one's captain could be a death sentence if worded the wrong way or if the incorrect tone was used.

She took a deep breath and sighed it back out, doing her best to ignore the raging storm outside of Captain Charles' quarters that reminded her of that horrifying storm where the captain was injured. Eliza shook her head, feeling her jaw lock as she took another breath and lowered her head.

She began to think of the conversation that she'd had with Michael a few days before and thought about all the things he'd told her. To be strong when faced with fear, to trust even when your heart is anxious and to never forget that the most important thing in all the world is to love and let yourself be loved by another in return.

His words were so strange to Eliza but something told her that Michael wasn't oblivious to her secret and while he seemed senile and fragile, he was quite observant and wise. But observant of what? Eliza hadn't fallen for anyone in all her nearly nineteen years and she certainly hadn't fallen for a pirate, though her affections were growing for Tom.

He had saved her after all and they were quite close but.... But she didn't love him, at least not romantically. Not like how Romeo loved Juliet or how Viola loved Duke Orsino nor Katherina and Petruchio or any other of Shakespeare's lovers.

She didn't know if she would ever love someone the way that Shakespeare described love and if his stories were anything true to the desperate, achy, fantastical, dire, mental infuriating love that he seemed to describe then.... Then perhaps she didn't want to feel that love at all.

Romeo and Juliet, though fictional, were several years younger than Eliza herself and if even young men and women like them could feel something so strong that they desired death when they realized they could no longer feel such a thing, then why? Why would they choose to love so strongly or perhaps it wasn't a choice after all and when one feels such things, they simply cannot contain it?

Eliza sighed in defeat, wishing for privacy so that she could slam her head over and over into a wall until she realized what she wanted. She glanced at Captain Charles and did a double-take when she realized that his face was bright red and beads of sweat were rolling down his face. He looked as though he was going to be sick and with the ship rocking so violently, she felt a bit queasy herself.

"Capt'n Charles.... Are you alright?" She asked in a low, concerned voice.

"I saved you from drowning, not Tom Lee! I jumped in after you and gave you the kiss of live, not him!!" Captain Charles blurted out all of the sudden.

Eliza felt terror fill her as he eyes widened and she watched Captain Charles take a deep breath and sigh it back out. The redness in his face only seemed to grow and she wondered if he knew her secret. If he had known it since then, why did he keep it? Why did he never breath a word of it to her before?

The room fell silent and Eliza felt her limbs shaking from the joints attached to her torso to the tips of her fingers and toes. Her heart pounded in her chest like she had raced across a meadow in mere seconds and her mouth became cottony and dry. If the captain had saved her..... If he truly had.... There wasn't a chance that he didn't know her secret and she felt her heart sink into her gut.