Chéri

Ch.2: Boy on the Seas

The Golden Age of Piracy was over. It had been many years since the likes of Blackbeard, l'Olonnais, Billy the Kid, Henry Morgan, and Calico Jack had sailed the warm Caribbean seas. Pirates were something Jackson had only heard of in hushed whispers and tall tales, relics of a bygone era. Yet here he was, standing aboard a real Pirate ship, salt on his lips and wind at his hair. All around him, colorful characters with fanciful jewelry and an excess of weapons were getting the ship ready to sail.

"Oi, get a look on, mate," said Amelia next to Jackson.

"What?"

"We don't bring tourists aboard," she said, "You either work or you don't sail with us."

"What should I be doing then?" asked Jackson.

Amelia rolled her eyes and pointed over to the starboard. There was a tall man there, with a nice face and a well-groomed beard.

"Go help Mani pass the cable through the chock."

Jackson was still confused but the look on Amelia's face told him not to ask any more questions. He jogged over to the man and started helping him pull up the rope. It was a huge rope, almost wider than Jackson himself. It was heavy, too.

"మీరు ఏమి చేస్తున్నారు?1" asked the man.

"Sorry?"

"నా దారి నుండి అడ్డు తొలగు.2"

The man was waving his hands and speaking in a language Jackson had never heard before.

"Sorry!" said Jackson, backing away from the rope.

The man went back to heaving the rope up onto the ship, shooting a nasty look the boy's way. Jackson then ran over to Kingsley, who was busy inspecting a set of burlap sacks, full of oats.

"What is it?" asked Kingsley, not looking up.

"It's just that, um, I was trying to help someone out and well- I couldn't understand him you see."

Kingsley leaned back and looked at Jackson quizzically.

"You best get used to that sort of thing," he said, "We're a multi-ethnic crew here, mon. We've got people speaking Telugu, Tagalog, Tzeltal, Wolof, Kwa, Igbo, Cantonese, Mandarin, various Creoles, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and of course, English."

Jackson hadn't heard of half those languages. He figured that Kingsley probably made up a few just to mess with him.

"What am I supposed to do if I can't understand someone and they can't understand me?"

"Improvise," said Kingsley, "You have your orders and they have theirs. Work based on what you know and infer what you don't."

"Alright then... I'll try my best!"

"Yes yes, now get out of here," said Kingsley.

Jackson ran about the ship, helping with odd jobs. He'd slept aboard last night and was very much energized to get sailing today.

He eventually found his way into a circle of crewmates seated just below the upper deck who were busy tying together spools of rope for some purpose or another. Still, he sat down on a crate and started helping them. The men and women there were all caught up in their own conversations, with a half dozen or so different languages being spoken among them. Jackson wanted to see how many languages he could name just by hearing them. Two women nearby were speaking something he definitely couldn't name. A gentleman across the circle was speaking Spanish, or maybe Portuguese? There was also definitely some Dutch Creole being thrown around. Jackson struggled to think back to all the languages Kingsley had named.