A Pirate's Life For Me

The End.

It's the kind of dark where nothing should be visible but by some strange stroke of unlucky fortune, it's possible to see, so I don't have that excuse to stay in the pillows. I try my hardest to slip out of the bed silently, to throw some of the random shirts on the side into the duffel. My shoulder throbs, so I use it as little as possible. I may or may not snag one of Jackson's shirts on purpose. I may or may not care.

I zip it quick, one loud tear in the silence, and turn my head, watching him breathe.

The birds aren't awake yet. Why should I expect him to be?

Instead of booking it up the ladder before emotions tie me down, I find myself sitting on the edge of the mattress, resting my throbbing ankle. I don't have the willpower to tear myself away.

Deep down, I know why I'm not leaving just yet. I'm waiting for something. For him to wake up, for my courage to drop, for me to lose my cool, for the world to explode and silence everything for a while. But courage doesn't just fail because of fear. Not when something more valuable is on the line.

I turn my eyes to his sleeping form, but I find that I can't quite look away. I watch him sleep. Watch his chest rise and fall, watch his lips part with each exhale, watch the patterns his eyes make under his eyelids. Watch the tear stains dry on his cheeks, watch his hair lie against the curve of his nose, watch his fingers routinely tighten and relax in little fists on the sheets. Watch his shoulders shiver every once and a while from the cold. Watch his head sink further into the space between the two pillows. Watch everything completely and utterly Jackson become the reason I have to push myself away.

I stand softly, quietly, limping to the side, moving instead to stand over him. A small voice at the back of my head tells me I'm being creepy, staring at him while he sleeps, so I make it quick. Out of my pocket I pull a braided leather bracelet, placing it on the mattress beside his open hand. I'd taken the opportunity to take the little strings he'd always been playing with, and turn them into something else, something worthwhile. It's not stealing, not really. Something to remember me by, if he wants to. If he doesn't, well, I didn't tie the knots too tight.

In a last ditch effort to give Jackson the opportunity to wake up and stop me, I pull the blankets up around his shoulders to stop his shivers, tuck the edge under his chin. His nose wrinkles at me before he settles back into the blankets and lets out one long sigh. Before I can stop myself, I've already reached out, pushing that strand of hair back from his nose, smoothing it down across his forehead. I hesitate, but only for a moment.

The dam breaks the instant my lips leave his skin.

I'm halfway up the ladder when I hear the blankets shift, halfway up when Jackson yawns, halfway up when I hear "Oliver...?"

I turn and slam the trapdoor down before I can tell myself otherwise, move to the couch, grip it by the seams and drag it lurchingly across the floor, settling it down when the leg is on top of the latch. My ankle wobbles, shoulders seizing, and I collapse with a thud on the floor, back against the couch.

Jackson reaches the door a moment later.

"Oliver!" He cries, voice tight and confused. "Oliver! Oliver!"

"I'm so sorry it has to be this way," I mumble, the words gaining strength the longer I speak them. "I'm sorry you had to save me."

"Don't be sorry for doing the right thing!" He shouts. I can hear him pounding on the wood, hear him straining to lift it. "Remember? You told me that! You told me to never regret doing the right thing!"