Falling For The First Mate

Chapter 20

“Bloody, infernal weather!”

Pearl raised a middle finger towards the darkening sky through a porthole window.

“They say storms be the worst aboard a ship, and they be right. Yer lucky if ye’ be survivin’ one without losin’ ye’ mind- especially with this poxy crew.”

Upon awakening, Evanora had rushed from the little room straight down to the galley to find Pearl. It was already late evening, meaning that she had slept all the way through a night and a day without so much as stirring, and now all she wanted was the openness of female company.

The hole in the wall of the galley had been barricaded with waterproof cloths and planks of rotting wood; very makeshift, but enough to make entering the kitchen safe at last.

Seeing Evanora lurking in the doorway, Pearl had wasted no time in issuing orders, swearing about the room as if the world was hell-bent on wasting her time.

“There’s going to be a storm?” Evanora asked, dreading that her wobbly sea-legs would reappear if the boat was shaken like a ragdoll. “How do you know?”

“The wind be howlin’ already, Miss, and the skies be heraldin’ rougher tides to come. I’m tellin’ ye’, there’s a storm on the brew or me name ain’t Pearl Gubbins.”

“Oh.” Evanora sighed. “And how bad are the crew going to be?”

Pearl placed a portly hand on her hip and raised her eyebrows. “You don’t even wanna know. Imagin’ a ragin’ claustrophobic beast in a bloody small room, times it by about twenty, and add rum.”

Evanora laughed at Pearl’s tendency to exaggerate and embellish; the woman was genuinely quite hilarious. The ship’s cook had decided to heat up almost every beverage that the Maelstrom possessed in an attempt to subdue the cabin fever of the crew with the offer of chow.

“So we just have to sit inside and ride it out?”

“Aye,” Pearl replied, tutting, “that be what the sane ones o’ us will be doin’. But ye’ know, First Mate Skyler’ll be out on deck in the rain, maybe even up in that crow’s nest.”

Evanora let out a gasp.

“That’s crazy!”

“That’s Kade Skyler.” Pearl chuckled affectionately. “But ye’ already be knowin’ all about him, don’t ye’ now?” She tilted her head and pulled a knowing face.

The suggestion behind her words was not lost on Evanora, and she felt her cheeks light up like fireworks. Pearl chortled to herself, returning to her multitasking.

“Wish I’d be havin’ a man like that.” she mused as she stirred a bubbling pot of sickly green liquid. “Just think- he should be movin’ about just fine today. Perhaps he’ll come and see ye’.”

Evanora remembered the last time she had properly seen Kade, leaving him alone and in pain in his cabin, refusing to stay. She thought for the thousandth time about how falling for a pirate was difficult, perhaps too difficult for a ‘land-girl’ like herself. After minimal deliberation, she concluded that there was no way under the burning sun that Kade would come to see her.

“What makes you think that there is…something going on between the First Mate and I?” she wondered aloud, trying hard to lessen her obvious blushing.

Pearl dropped her spatula, allowing it to clatter across the dirty wooden floor and hoping that Evanora would understand her surprise.

“Ain’t it painfully obvious, miss? He’s got it bad for ye’, the whole crew’s been noticin’ fer ages. And that’s a big deal, considerin’ that he always swore he’d wait fer his Siren.”