A long one-shot, post AWE but before my other fic, Winter. Jack's not been the same since returning from the locker and Jade's having a hard time dealing with the differences in her father's behavior and adjusting to being the adult of the two of them when his madness is overbearing. She keeps telling herself he'll get better with time, but can she face the truth?
I don't own Jack (wish I did though)
"Miss Jade, do you know why the Captain's talkin' to 'imself?" I looked up to where Dad was standing at the helm and having a very animated conversation with no one. I shrugged. I'd noticed this many times but just like every other time, I just smiled.
"Oh he's probably arguing with his compass again." Ragetti squinted as he shaded his eye against the setting sun.
"He ain't holdin' it." I shrugged again.
"Then maybe he's talking to the Pearl. He does that a lot, you know." Ragetti went back to scrubbing the deck next to me and I heard him mutter, "The Pearl's too big to fit on his shoulders, Miss Jade." Frustrated, I threw my brush into the bucket of water hard enough to splash him with the dirty water as I stormed off to the helm. Sure enough, as I got closer, I saw my father doing the same thing he did when we were sailing in the Locker. His eyes shifted to the left, then the right as he talked to both shoulders. I didn't know what he saw there, but remembering that he said something about "Mini-Jacks" when I jokingly referred to myself as that right before the battle against the EIC, I sighed. He was hallucinating again.
I'd hoped that would just go away when we rescued him from the locker but he still had moments where he'd stand still, slightly swaying with the breeze and rolling movements of the ship as he stared out at nothing with his eyes glazed over, or talking to no one, or just looking sadly out at nothing. I hated seeing him like this and I hated Davy Jones for sending him to the locker, knowing that being alone with no one but his ship would cause his already fragile sanity crack for good. I shook my head fiercely, hating the thought that entered my mind. Dad wasn't insane; he was just…still recovering. It hadn't been that long since we rescued him and maybe it would just take him longer to get better than I thought.
He'd also been drinking even more than usual. Many times I'd seen him slumped over his maps in our cabin with an empty bottle of rum in his hand and when I managed to wake him enough to get him to go to bed, he'd have ink on his face from where he'd lain on his newly charted routes. From the mumblings he emitted, I soon came to understand that he'd deliberately drunk himself to this state to escape the demons in his head. I'd help him get to bed, tuck him in and then get in my own bed and cry myself to sleep because I was scared and had no idea how to handle his problem and had no idea when it would go away and I could have my pre-locker Daddy back.
Looking up at him now as he started talking to something standing on the binnacle, I tilted my head in thought. Maybe he just needed help getting past it. I'd been avoiding addressing the problems he'd been having, hoping that if I pretended they didn't exist that they'd go away. Apparently I was mistaken. Walking slowly up to him, I tapped him on the shoulder and he jerked away.
"Careful love, you'll squish him." My hand still poised at the height of his shoulder, I forced a smile on my face.
"Who?" His brows knitted as he gave me a look of confusion that quickly settled into one of sadness as lucidity seemed to come back to him.
"No one," he answered quietly as he tried to smile at me. "Just pulling your leg, darlin'." I almost believed him, I suppose because I wanted to. "What's the matter, love?" I wanted to say nothing and walk away but something compelled me to stay and even seemed to be pushing to confront this but I really didn't want to. I wanted to ignore that little voice in my mind reminding me that my father was, in fact, fallible.
No, I mentally told that little voice, Daddy's going to be alright, it's just a rough patch and if we work through it together, he'll be himself again!
"Love?" I realized I hadn't answered him.
"Oh, uh, well nothing's wrong…with me." He raised one eyebrow.
"Something wrong amidst the crew?" I shook my head. "Love, ye better tell me or it won't be fixed." No kidding, I thought. Oh, fine, the more I put this off, the longer it will take him to get better. "Jade…"
"Dad, I'm worried about you." Well it was out there now. Can't take it back.
"Why?" I looked up at him, surprised that he didn't sound surprised that I was worried about him. His eyes were focused on the multicolored sky ahead of us.
"You're…" I paused, unsure of how to continue. "You haven't been the same since you, I mean, since we rescued you from the locker." I saw out of the corner of my eyes that he was looking at me out of the corner of his.
"I know." I breathed a sigh of relief; I'd been expecting him to deny it. Turning my body to face his, I smiled.
"But it will go away, won't it? I mean, the spells you have, they have to ease up and stop bothering you eventually, right?" Dad turned his head quickly towards me, causing the beads to click together as he slightly tilted his head back and then to the side as he seemed to study me. A myriad of expressions passed over his face, first something akin so surprise, then some sort of understanding, then sadness. He didn't say anything for a while, then it was so soft I could barely hear it.
"Not likely. Might get a little better, but it won't go away, as much as I wish it would." I felt tears sting my eyes and stepped closer to him, my hand resting on his forearm.
"It has to, Dad. You're not dead anymore so how long could the Locker's effects bother you?" He took his other hand off the wheel and covered mine with it with a gentle squeeze.
"Well, you know what they say, darlin', you can take the man out of the locker, but you can't take the locker out of the man." I yanked my hand away.
"No, Dad! You can get better, unless you don't want to get better. I'll help you, just tell me what I need to do to get better cause I'll help you, I will, even if it takes forever." Dad closed his eyes for a few moments, moving his head a little as though stretching out his neck slightly before tying off the wheel and turning to face me, his hands lifted as they usually are to make a point, but seemed to give up as he vaguely waved them around and dropped them to rest on my shoulders.
"If I knew I could get better, love, I would do everything I could to find out how, but I know the changes the locker caused in me are permanent and I've accepted it. I don't like it, but I've accepted it."
He lifted his hands from my shoulders and I missed the warmth as he backed up sadly with his hands up, palms towards me as though creating a visible wall to protect himself against disappointment. I wanted to cry. My father really thought I'd reject him for his cracked mental state? Then I winced, realizing that my ardent denial of his mental status would lend itself to that impression.
Looking out to the darkening sky ahead of us, I sighed. "So, you're completely sure it can't be helped?" He sighed.
"Maybe it can be helped, but it can't be cured." I nodded, understanding his meaning. Taking the wheel again, he cast off the line that had been holding it. I bit my lip as I blinked back the stinging tears and suddenly wrapped my arms around his slender torso and pressed my forehead into his chest. "Whoah, I am still trying to steer, love." I didn't answer, just kept hugging him. I felt one arm wrap around my shoulders and his goatee tickle my brow as he kissed my hairline. The simple show of affection undid me and I started to cry into his coat.
"I'm sorry, Daddy." I felt his hand rubbing circles on my back.
"Hush, love. 'S not your fault for wanting a papa that's sane." I shook my head, feeling it rub against the cloth of his coat. "No need in denying it love; you were just insisting only a few moments ago that I'm not really mad and could get better." I felt his chest deflate somewhat at the same time a heavy sigh was forced through his mouth. "Can't blame you, really, if ye wished for another, more sane old man."
"Dad! No! I don't want another father, I love you! I-I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, I just...you look so lost and scared sometimes when you have one of your spells. I don't know what's going on when you have them and I wish I make it go away because I can tell from the look on your face that you want them to go away too!" Dad moved his arm from my shoulders and cupped my cheek in his palm, his eyes full of fondness and sadness.
"You shouldn't feel like you have to fix my problems, sweetheart. I haven't lost all my faculties," his smile was small as his thumb stroked my cheek. "I'm still the parent here and last time I checked, parents take care of their children, not vice versa." I shrugged.
"Sometimes they do. I used to help Mama when she didn't feel very well. She got headaches often and I knew enough to take care of myself while she rested and I was only ten then. I don't mean that you need to be taken care of, like an invalid, Dad." He pouted like a kicked puppy.
"Sure sounded like it." I winced.
"Well, I didn't mean for it to come out that way, Dad. I just…well…I just want you to know that if you ever need someone to turn to when you need help with a spell or if you just want to talk about what happened in the locker, or because of it, well I'm always here." He smirked.
"I know that, darlin'. There ain't anywhere else for you to go." I rolled my eyes.
"Dad, I meant-" He cut me off with his hand cupped over my mouth.
"I know, lass. I was just trying to make a joke." He gestured to the forced grin on his face. "Hah hah, you know? You do remember how to smile, don't you?" I sighed.
"Dad, I'm trying to be serious here!" He shook my shoulder and smiled.
"Aye, too serious." I shook my head, too annoyed that he was refusing to talk about this to smile. "Smile, Jadie smile!" He grinned as he sang off-key to make me laugh. To my greater irritation, the corners of my mouth turned traitor and started to turn up.
"Stop trying to make me laugh, Dad! I'm trying to have a heart to heart with you and you don't want to talk about whatever was just bothering you before I came up!" He sighed, looking up at the sails with his head tilted to the side as his fingers lightly tapped the spokes of the helm. "Dad?"
"I'll try, love. It ain't going to fix me; nothing can, but maybe wif me girls at me side I can keep from getting worse." I hugged him again.
"You can count on me, Dad. I'll be here for you, just like you've always been there for me." He smirked with a tinge of sadness.
"Always, love?" I looked him square in the eye.
"Yes, Dad, always." He looked down at the boards at his feet before looking back at me with his head tilted back and to the right a bit, a smile growing on his face.
"Alright, then. Now, enough of this topic for now, Cap'n's orders, Savvy?" I nodded. "Now, what's for dinner? I'm starved!" I shook my head and smiled.
"I'll go check, Dad." Right before I walked away, I felt his hand wrap around my arm and jerk me back and turning me round to hug me tightly to him. I gasped as the action nearly knocked the wind out of me. I heard him say something, though he said it so softly that I'm sure he had no intention of me hearing it, but I did. I didn't understand it, as it was in a different language, but I heard it.
"What did you say?" He kissed my head and said it again.
"Go raibh maith agut."
"What does that mean and what language is it?"
"You mean to tell me your Irish mum never taught ye any of her country's language?" I shook my head.
"I heard her mutter things in another language, especially when she was furious with people but she refused to tell me what they meant." Dad laughed. "What's so funny?"
"Chances are she was probably cursing and didn't want you to know what it meant so you wouldn't know your dear saintly mother was swearing at someone. Can you remember anything she said?" I thought hard, trying to remember.
"Well, I remember her saying something about a cat and jowels." Dad laughed out loud, something he doesn't do often, which is a pity cause he has a nice laugh. "What's so funny?"
"The phrase, my dear, is 'go n-ithe an cat thú is go n-ithe an diabhal an cat' and means, may the cat eat you and the devil eat the cat." My jaw dropped in shock that my mother, who had tried so hard to be so good to redeem herself for having me out of wedlock with a pirate, had actually cursed someone! Suddenly I couldn't stop laughing.
"Good to hear you laughing love, now go and get our dinner and bring it back up here so we can eat together." He pushed me towards the steps but before I started down, I turned toward him.
"Dad, how do you say you're welcome?"
"Ta failte romhat." I nodded and smiled.
"Ta failte romhat, Dad." With that, I turned and ran down to the galley with a big smile. I felt like a big burden had lifted off my shoulders when I just accepted the truth instead of hoping for something that would never be. Suddenly life just seemed a lot easier, and even though I knew there would be hard times ahead of us, I knew it would be easier to deal with than when I tried to deny he had a problem.
What I told him was true. I will be by his side, no matter what because I love my rum-soaked, locker-addled pirate Dad.