Stars and Cigarettes

Summary: A short tale of Jimmy's first days as a member of the crew on The Venture, during which he does some exploring around the ship, makes some mistakes, and bonds with Mr. Hayes.

I wrote this literal years ago and never uploaded it. It's gonna be three chapters, but if anyone actually reads this, it'll probably be after I've already uploaded them all, so you probably won't have to wait between chapters. Stories for King Kong are not in very high demand, I don't think. I'm mostly only interested in things no one else cares about, it seems and happened to get very attached to these secondary characters in a film the rest of the world didn't really have that strong of a reaction to... I don't believe anyone else on the planet saw this movie and therefore no one reads King Kong stories, but here it is anyway:

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Chapter 1

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Jimmy sat cross-legged and silent on the floor in the corner of his favorite cage below deck. Ever since he sneaked aboard The Venture a few weeks ago and was sort of accepted by the ship's crew, Jimmy had taken to hanging out in the cages any time he could. It wasn't that he disliked any of the other men on the ship. He just didn't really know them all that well yet, and always felt the safest when he was alone.

A lot of the ship's crew just ignored Jimmy. They let him do whatever he wanted (which consisted widely of staying hidden from their sight.) They hardly ever requested that he come up on deck or help with anything. Of course, his arm was still broken, he was eleven years old, and he wasn't at all experienced in any of the different jobs that needed to be done around the ship... He was in fact very grateful that none of them seemed too worried about him. The only one who really consistently checked up on him was the man who'd first found him in the cages, Mr. Hayes, the ship's first mate.

While sometimes Jimmy was annoyed by the guy constantly seeking him out and making sure he was doing alright, he supposed it was sort of nice to know someone would notice and maybe even worry if he disappeared. Considering Jimmy was a new-comer and none of the sailors knew him or had any reason to trust him, he sure was left alone a fair amount of the time. Even Mr. Hayes didn't follow him around constantly.

This left him a lot of time to explore the ship, mostly the portion below deck, where he was almost guaranteed to not run into anyone else. The men seemed to find the cages far less appealing than Jimmy did. Jimmy saw them as a sort of sanctuary. From what he heard from the sailors, they considered them dirty, cramped, uncomfortable, or even creepy.

After two weeks of living on this ship, Jimmy had pretty much memorized the layout of the cages. He knew which were his favorites, which ones were too dirty even for him, which ones were filled with crates, and what was inside those crates. He had explored the lower portion of the ship pretty much all he could. He supposed now that he'd seen all there was to see down here, he could take a closer look around the rest of the ship.

Grabbing onto one of the bars of the cage he was sitting in, Jimmy pulled himself to his feet. He stretched his left arm, the one that wasn't broken, and let out a yawn. He'd been sitting still quite a while.

Breathing in and out slowly, Jimmy stepped out of the cage and walked as carefully and quietly as he could toward the stairs that led up to the deck. Even though the sailors claimed he was perfectly welcome to be seen around the ship, Jimmy still tried to stay hidden. He didn't want to risk doing something wrong and having any of them get angry with him. He didn't want them looking at him, asking him questions, or even wondering about him. He could see in their expressions when their eyes fell on him that they had questions about where he came from and how his arm had been broken. They didn't ask, but they wondered. He could tell, and he didn't like seeing those questions in their eyes. Simply staying out of their sight entirely was preferable.

As he reached the top of the stairs and peeked out over the deck, he could see no one in sight. They must have all been busy elsewhere. Lumpy was likely cooking, Englehorn and Hayes were probably at the ship's wheel or somewhere looking at a map, planning the ship's course or something... Jimmy didn't know that much about sailing. At any rate, he seemed to be in the clear for now... but where should he explore? Which places on the ship might be worth seeing? Where would he be least likely to run into anyone else?

The cabins.

Jimmy probably wasn't supposed to go into the sailors' cabins. He had been assigned his own, and Mr. Hayes was constantly making sure he slept there instead of below deck, but he hadn't seen the others. Was his cabin a nice one? Did he just get whatever was left over, which would be one no one else wanted? He didn't much mind if his cabin had been a reject leftover. It was better than nothing. He had a warm, dry bed and a door that he could push a chair in front of to make sure he'd wake up if anyone walked in. It was a nice room. He just wondered what the other rooms were like... Did the other sailors have belongings? Did they keep any personal things in their rooms? He wondered if he'd be able to tell whose room was whose based on what was kept inside... Or maybe they just used the rooms to sleep in and to store their clothing. Maybe they didn't care much about possessions.

Quietly, the boy tip-toed across the deck and into the hall the cabins branched off of. He doubted anyone would be in their cabins this early in the evening. He hoped not at least...

Pushing gently on one of the cabins' doors, Jimmy peered inside. Sure enough, no one was in the room. He let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and slipped quickly into the room, pushing the door shut behind him.

He looked around the space of the cabin. It was pretty similar to his own, and seemed just about as empty as his room as well. There was a bed, a small dresser, a desk, and a chair.

He walked over to the desk and peered down at it. On its surface was a map. Jimmy ran his fingers over the worn paper. There were creases on it where it had been folded, probably hundreds of times. Jimmy wondered if the sailors even needed the maps anymore. How long had they worked on this ship? Did they have their courses memorized by now? Or did it depend on other things, like wind and waves? Could they judge that kind of thing simply by having a lot of experience doing so already too? Maybe he'd ask Mr. Hayes sometime, if he could muster up the courage to do so. As it were, he tried to keep his conversations with any of the sailors as short as possible.

Jimmy glanced over the desk's surface again. On top of the map was a strange metal instrument. There were lines and numbers written on it, and it had a piece of it that looked like it was made for someone to look through. He picked it up and put the eye-piece up to his left eye as he closed his right one. He couldn't really see anything. Just a blur of the color of the room's wall.

Turning the instrument in his hands, Jimmy continued looking it over. He wondered what it was for. Whose room was this? Maybe that could help him figure out the use of the instrument. He doubted it was Lumpy's room. Lumpy would have no use for something you look through... All that man seemed to care about was cooking. A captain or first mate might use it. But so might a lot of the sailors. It looked like just a looking glass or telescope of some sort... but why did it have the numbers?

Perhaps he could just take the strange thing with him and try to figure it out on his own... He could wait until the other sailors were mostly asleep and then take it out on deck and see how far he could see with it... But he might not be able to see much at night...

Fortunately, Jimmy's pants had pockets that were rather deep. He was in fact wearing pants that had previously belonged to one of the crew, Choy. They were too long for him, but not by too much. Choy was a small man, barely taller than Jimmy. He stuffed the metal device into one of the pockets and crossed the room to the other side where the dresser was.

Opening up the drawer, he looked inside. What he found there was a pad of paper, a pen, a small lighter, and cigarettes. This didn't give him much of a clue as to whose room this was either. Almost all the sailors smoked. He wondered if he'd like to smoke... Jimmy picked up the box of cigarettes and opened it. There were eight left in the container.

Staring at the cabin's door, Jimmy pulled one of the cigarettes out of the box, placed it between his teeth, and put the rest of the cigarettes back in the drawer, replacing the box in his hand with the lighter. He stared at the door again. He could feel his heart racing. But he wanted to try the cigarette. Lumpy seemed to be unable to function without cigarettes. The captain seemed to like them too. So did most of the sailors. There had to be some reason they were all so fond of the things.

Still staring at the room's entrance, Jimmy fiddled with the lighter. How did Lumpy make this look so easy? Every time the boy saw the ship's cook, it seemed he was lighting up a cigarette, and he never had any trouble getting the lighter to work properly.

Jimmy tried the lighter again, again, and a fourth time before a flame finally sprouted up. As he raised it toward the end of the cigarette hanging out of his mouth, leaving the flame there just as long as Lumpy usually did. Making sure the flame was really out, Jimmy moved to put the lighter back in the dresser. He paused as his hand was inches from the drawer and decided to put the small lighter in his second pants pocket instead.

Now he had to deal with the smoking cigarette between his lips. Putting his fingers around it, he inhaled through his mouth, ignoring the stinging, burning sensation in his throat and lungs. What was so great about this? Why would someone chose to smoke these all the time, every day? It actually hurt.

As his eyes began to water, Jimmy tried to exhale calmly, watching as smoke filled the space in front of his face. It didn't take long at all before his attempt at breathing calmly was completely destroyed as the smoke tickled his throat, or lungs, or something the wrong way. He erupted into a fit of painful coughs as he tried to force clean air back into his lungs. He hoped no one was anywhere near the room... What if they heard him?

He coughed and gasped for a minute longer before finally deciding he was in the clear, that he was in fact not going to suffocate, even though he still felt a little sick and his throat still felt scratchy. He blew on the end of the cigarette, trying to extinguish the invisible embers that were causing it to continue emitting smoke, but that only made more smoke come out of it. Coughing again, he held his breath and opened the door slowly. No one was in the hall.

Jimmy tip-toed as fast as he could while still being quiet until he reached the ship's railing. He looked over it at the water below, tossing the cigarette into the water and then looking around himself some more. He could see Mr. Hayes walking in the distance. The first mate seemed like he hadn't noticed Jimmy tossing the cigarette into the ocean, and for that Jimmy was grateful. Mr. Hayes simply smiled and nodded toward Jimmy, waving slightly. Jimmy nervously waved back, waiting until Mr. Hayes turned away before dashing back down to the cages.

As soon as he was back in his cage, in his comfort zone, he resumed coughing. He would have really liked a glass of water at this point, but he didn't want it badly enough to go seek it out and risk running into someone who might ask him questions. So he stayed below deck, clearing his throat and coughing every few minutes, hoping no one would come looking for him, hoping whoever owned the cigarettes and lighter and strange metal tool didn't notice them missing and suspect him of thievery.

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