Hello all =]. This is my first story I kind of wrote it while practicing for NaNoWriMo and I wanted to get some feedback of what people thought of it. So please enjoy and review.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the names you recognize from the movies
XOXOXOXOXO
Our story began on Saturday July 16th, 2007. I had been going through town running a few errands when I stopped inside a local coffee shop to get a coffee and a pastry for breakfast when my eyes spotted him for the first time. He had walked in just after I did and was on the line behind me. He was wearing a simple pair of denim jeans, a vintage tee that had the logo for the Who printed on the front and a pair of Nike sneakers. He had paint stains on his pants and shirt. His brown hair was pushed back by a light gray bandanna and pulled into a low ponytail at the back of his neck. This man, despite the paint stains on two thirds of his outfit, was truly a work of art. He had olive skin, the deepest eyes I had ever seen, and his facial hair (a thin goatee and moustache) pulled his look together. "NEXT!" was what finally brought me out of reverie.
"Hello, what can I get you ma'am?" The teenager behind the counter said to me with a slight wink. Disgusting, I though as I smiled politely and placed my order. "Hi, I'll have a large hazelnut coffee with a slice of your marble loaf cake to go." As he put my order into the computer, I looked through my purse for my wallet and pulled out my credit card. "Anything else ma'am, like my number and a good time?" I just looked at the boy with a look of disbelief until I heard a voice sound behind me.
"Listen kid: I'm not sure who raised you, but that is no way to speak to a lady." I turned around as the voice began. It was the man that was in line behind me. Never in my entire life have I met a person that had the courtesy to stand up for a woman when someone was being disrespectful. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself for trying to score with a woman just trying to order a coffee and a simple piece of cake. Etiquette has certainly changed from when I was your age."
This small situation has escalated into a large situation, and I was beginning to feel very embarrassed! By now the entire shop had gone completely silent and all you could hear was the soft music that commonly went unnoticed as people were usually talking or just listening to their own music. All heads turned toward where the cashier, the stranger, and myself were currently standing.
The boy was silent for a good minute before he responded to the man behind me. "Chill dude, it was just a joke. She looks like she needs to unwind a little bit, and I'm just the person to help her do that," 'Joey' (that was the name on his tag) replied with another wink in my direction. This entire situation is getting out of hand, all I came in for was a simple coffee and a pastry! Unknowingly my thoughts slipped out of my mouth and I was yelling at the cashier. I think he got the message because he picked up a cup silently, wrote my order on it, and then passed it to the barrista behind him. I turned around to give the stranger a piece of my mind then noticed that he was placing his order at another register that had just opened up. When that man was done placing his order, he was going to get a piece of my mind. I was standing at the condiment station when the stranger came up next to me and began to put milk in his tea. This was my chance to give him a piece of Elizabeth Michelle Rosalyn Swann!
"I'd thank you for doing what you did back there with the cashier, but I was perfectly capable of handling that situation by myself," I snapped at him as I put two lumps of sugar into the steaming pool of coffee that resided in my cup. The cup of coffee slightly resembled my emotion at the moment. The steam rising out of the top was me cooling down through a natural process and the milk I was adding were the exercises that my therapist had taught me in my first year of high school after my mother had died in a car accident. I waited patiently for the man's response.
"I'm sorry, but as an older brother to 3 girls and the oldest child to my mother, I feel the need to protect women when people like that cashier treat women the way that he did." Wow, it really made sense now that he had explained himself to me. Now I feel bad for getting cross with him for that short moment.
He seemed truly sorry for his actions and had a hurt expression to match, I felt terrible. "No, don't be sorry. I just didn't know your entire story. I shouldn't have snapped at you like that," I sincerely apologized to the stranger. "I'm Elizabeth by the way," I said to him as I replaced the lid on top of the cup to hot coffee. He turned to me and smiled after what seemed like an eternity and replied with a smile, "I'm Will, nice to meet you Elizabeth." And with that 'Will' made his way out of the coffee shop and on to the busy streets of Liverpool. I'm determined to see that man again, I thought to myself as I walked out and turned in the opposite direction of Will.
XOXOXOXOXO
It's been two weeks since I encountered Will at the coffee shop, and he is literally all that has been on my mind. At work I seldom find myself paying attention to the tasks at had, but I spend most of the free time in my office thinking about William. I've been going back to the coffee shop for breakfast every morning at the same time since then in the hopes that William would just so happen to be there at the same time as myself. "Get a hold of yourself Liz, you've only seen this man once before. Think about someone like Jack." I said to myself.
I took a moment to think about what I said, Jack Sparrow has been my best friend since we were in kindergarten. When we were younger he had dreams of becoming the best sailor in the world until his dad shot down his dream in the seventh grade when he told Jack that being a sailor was a dying profession. Although Jack was sad for months after receiving that news. He still wanted to do something relating to water, so he decided to become a marine biologist. And today, Jack is one of the top marine biologists at Cambridge University. I hadn't spoken to Jack in what seemed to be an eternity, so I decided to give him a quick call.
"...Sparrow," was the first thing I heard after the phone rang three times. I smiled at the greeting as Jack was the only person I knew that answered the phone with only his last name. "Hey Jackie, it's Liz. What's going on, I haven't seen you in months," I said as I uncharacteristically rotated in my desk chair. "Lizzie, how are you love? Still working more than you date I presume? I've been meaning to call you all week! I have a favor to ask of you actually."
I sat silently for a minute or so taking in my best friends voice. It really has been too long since I've had a proper chat with Jack. Every time I speak with Jack he feels the need to bring up my love life, or lack there of. I rolled my eyes as though he could see me through the phone and began to respond. "Yes Jackie it has been far too long since we've last spoken. And yes again, I am working more. But in my defense, I'm so close to that promotion I was telling you about last month when you came up. What's the favor you need? Hopefully not to chase off a hooker you met last time you went to Blackpool right," I asked him with a slight chuckle.
"Look at you Liz, you're just the regular comedian! Congratulations on being so close, but promise me that when you get that promotion you're going to take it easy," he told me with what seemed to be deep concern in his voice. It took him about a minute or so before he began speaking again, "the favor I must ask of you is to pick up a friend of mine from Lime Street Railway Station today at 3. I was going to surprise you with a visit, but something happened with one of the workers down at the lab and I need to stay an extra day. My friend who you'll be picking up is Will, he was going to meet me there as he was down in Brighton meeting with some people from the University and he needed some time away from the idiots." My heart began to beat faster when Jack mentioned his friend Will, maybe this was the man that had been consuming all my time as of late. It couldn't be, but then again there was that six degrees of separation theory.
"Alright Jack, just tell him that I'll be there at 3. Do you know what track he's coming off of? Just so I have an idea on where to park," I responded after getting over my slight shock. "Thank you so much Lizzie! You are truly a life saver, I'm going to text him in a couple minutes and then I'll forward you all the information. I'll see you tomorrow afternoon love, don't do anything I wouldn't do! Ciao," he said just before he hung up the phone. "Bye Jack," I muttered to the dial tone as I hung up the phone and turned back to my computer screen.
Just after I got off the phone with Jack my secretary, Carrie, walked in and told me there was a meeting I needed to attend in 15 minutes. I was a bit perplexed by this news because I usually didn't go to the 11:00 meetings. "He said he wants you to go to his office as soon as possible it sounded pretty important Lizzie," Carrie said just as she walked out of my office.
I work in the publications department for Liverpool FC and James Norrington was the perverted head of the department. He had been hitting on me since I first got a job as a paid intern just after I graduated from college. My current job was to manage the people that look for places around the city that commonly have visitors to put signs and ads up for the upcoming games and player adverts. The promotion I was after would bump me up to the head of the graphic design department which mean larger office and larger pay check. I had been working my ass off for 9 months in the hopes that I would be promoted by the end of May, just before my youngest brother, Ethan, graduated from high school and went off the study Pre-Med in the states.
Ethan is the only child my step mother, Emily, had from her previous marriage. When his mother met my father I was 13 years old and Ethan was 8. My older brother, Adam, was in his junior year of high school and he had a lot of work to do in order to prepare for college. When my father and Emily went out together I was either dropped off at her house or Ethan would be dropped off at our house and there would be a baby-sitter hired to watch over us. Usually their dates lasted for 3 to 4 hours, so Ethan and I had an immense amount of time to get to know each other. While my father and his mother got closer so did Ethan and I. Of course we didn't have the same bond that our parents had, but we were developing the kind of bond that only siblings share.
I got out of my chair and organized my clothing before making my way out of my cramped office. I waved to some of the workers that waved to me as I passed by their cubicles. My walk to James's office only took two short minutes and I was there by 10:50. I knocked on the door and waited for a response. His secretary, Amelia, was talking on the phone with one of the players telling him that James couldn't speak with him at that moment as he was about to go into a meeting. I smiled at her in greeting just before James opened the door to his office and welcomed me in.
"Elizabeth, I've been watching your work ethics and I've decided that you deserve the promotion you'll be officially be receiving at this mornings meeting." My heart literally stopped as soon as he said I was getting the promotion I had been after. I was now the official head of graphic design! Promotions like that weren't usually announced in the 11:00 meetings. "You really deserve this, I want you to be my apprentice. Broughton told me over the weekend that I was going to be promoted to another section of the team, and that I needed to find someone to replace me. I thought to myself long and hard 'who better to replace me as the head of this department than Miss, Elizabeth Swann,'" James continued winking at me.
So this was an incredibly major movement. This meant direct contact with the players which entailed taking care of their public relations and keeping their image as clean as possible. I stood there slightly dumbfounded for a moment or so until I finally found the words to say, "James, I honestly am flattered at being given this position, but I don't think that I'm quite ready for the responsibility. Making press conferences, maintaining the club's public image, it's a lot of work."
"Elizabeth," he began as he placed his arm on my shoulder. "If I though that you couldn't do this, then I would have chosen someone like George or even Errin." I politely moved his arm off of my shoulder just as Amelia walked into the office telling us that it was time to start heading to the meeting. We walked into the conference room and waited in silence for the other directors to arrive. "Just sit right here Elizabeth," James said as he pointed to the seat across from where he was sitting.
XOXOXOXOXO
I walked out of the conference room just in time to catch Carrie before she ordered lunch, "Where are you ordering from today CC?" She looked up from her computer screen and smiled. "Well I was debating between ordering from Piccolino and Panoramic." All three of the restaurants were fantastic, so it was a tough choice to make. "Well we haven't ordered from Piccolino in a long time and I could really go for one of their burgers right about now," I replied while looking over her shoulder at the Piccolino menu she had up. "But then again, Panoramic has some salads that are to die for. Oh my goodness, there are way too many choices! Get Ashley to pick she usually picks good food," I told Carrie as I walked into my office.
I opened my laptop and checked the time, 13:00 was in the top right corner of my screen. I had time to work on cleaning my office, eat lunch, and still have time to pick up Jack's friend from the station. Bring on the work.
XOXOXOXOXO
Well this is the end of chapter one =] Please review and tell me what you think