I soon hear the sound of stomping feet and stuff scraping along the deck and I know that the dinner is ready. I see a roast pig, chicken, apples, bread, fine wine, cheeses, and so much more enter the captain’s cabin; carried by various crewmembers. Koehler lights candles. I watch Elizabeth’s reaction to the food and those who are carrying it. I look at her to see if she wonders about why all this fine, fresh food is on a pirate ship, and why the carriers aren’t drooling over it. She should have seen on her crossing from England that the crews didn’t get very good food. All this should be suspicious to her if she is paying any attention. I see the way she stares intently at the food and remember she’s never been hungry a day in her life. She’s never really experienced so much as a rumbling belly before, not to mention actual hunger.
Barbossa enters and tells her to sit. I sit in the shadows, watching for the fireworks that are bound to come sooner or later. Ragetti comes and sits with me. I whisper “Why aren’t you out scrubbing and tarring the deck?”
“I came to sit with you.” he replies.
“Why? Why would you do that? Am I fascinating or something? You never did finish telling me about what happened the night before you left.”
“Well, we… I don’t know what really happened.” He put his head back and bumped it against the wall. Out his eye popped, and Ragetti was instantly on his hands and knees looking for it, but I quietly picked it up and put it in my pocket. “Me eye!” he said over and over, his hands scrabbling the floor looking for it while I sat and watched and laughed quietly to myself. Eventually he saw me stifle a giggle and knew something was up. He pulled out a knife and said, “Hand it over.”
“I’ll give it back, on one condition.” I said; the eye clutched in my outstretched hand. “Do you think that you could get Pintel to talk about that night?”
“I think so.”
“Then go! Bring him here!”
He gets up and runs toward the door. I watch as he opens the door and steps out, his flesh vanishing as the moonlight hits it, leaving his true form. ‘Pintel deserves to be cursed.’ I think. ‘But about Ragetti… I’m still not sure.’ I tune back in to Barbossa and Elizabeth. She’s cutting her pork into very tiny pieces; her hands shaking with hunger as she tries to fight the urge to start filling her belly as fast as she can. Barbossa watches, and then says, “There’s no need to stand on ceremony, nor call to impress.” She stares at him for a moment, and then starts stuffing her face with as much food as she can. Barbossa watches with a wistful longing and hands her the bread bowl. After she greedily takes a piece and eats that, he says, “Try the wine.” He continues to stare at her as he expertly pours it into a fancy glass. The glass slides back and forth on the table as the ship rocks with each wave.
His eyes are so full of want and desire; I feel something that just might be a spark of pity. It’s quickly stifled by the thoughts of the fact that they brought it upon themselves. I glance over at Ragetti, who is standing in the doorway and see the line of drool coming out of his mouth. I suppress a small smile that almost escapes my lips. I suddenly realize that I’ve been downright nice to him! My face hardens into the stony mask it was before Gov. Swann took me in. This man, one I had laughed with and almost flirted with, was one who used me, an innocent girl, to fulfill his own desires. I was prepared to give him the cold shoulder, when a small little voice in my head said something about his actions towards me that night, the night of the rape.
I see his form in the distance, doing nothing as I am put at the mercy of Pintel. Then he’s on me, giving me something that I didn’t want. As the flashback goes on, he’s carrying me to safety, trying to erase my pain, giving me my first true kiss.
