Day 17

Day 17

“I do not know any other couples who married purely for love.” 

Izzy was sitting in my chair eating a burrito. A burrito! In my chair. She was going to spill it. There was going to be burrito in my chair. 

“Like something out of a fairy tale.” 

The girls were fawning over Izzy’s meet cute with the young lieutenant as she ate a burrito in my chair.

“Will you tell us of how he asked you to be his wife?” 

“The very idea! To have such a choice! California must be quite the kingdom for young ladies.”

I mean, did she have to gesture so much? It was a burrito…that she was eating…in my chair. I took a big gulp from my medicine. Izzy moved the cup from my reach when I put it down. I was supposed to sip. 

“Well, it was a big surprise. Ian had been taking me around, showing me his favorite places, and this day he said he wanted to show me a beach on one of the neighboring islands.” 

We were on a ship in the 1600s with limited supplies and limited options and what does this bish do? She bops out of her cabin and decides to recreate some gringo ass tex mex burritos. I mean, it was breakfast. Couldn’t she at least have made them breakfast burritos?

“How romantic!”

“Yes. It was very romantic. I splashed him in the face with water, and he asked me to marry him.”

How hard was it to make a breakfast burrito? She’d been making eggs and all kinds of salsas for days, just wrap it all together. 

“What about the ring?” 

What about the ring? What about the rice?

Izzy looked at her ring and almost spilled the contents of her non breakfast burrito all over my chair. How long did it take her to eat? I supposed I should be thankful the tortilla appeared to be containing all the rice and nothing was dripping. 

“There was quite a bit of gossip exchanged over the diamond in Lady Isabelle’s ring.” 

“Makes sense he’d choose that diamond,” I laughed. That diamond had been a curse to me since the day I picked it up. Should have chucked that bauble into the Dead Sea long ago. 

“It is a beautiful stone,” Catherine admired Izzy’s ring. I shrugged. I guess it’s easy to see only the beauty when you don’t know the history. 

“What do you mean, Anne?” Izzy asked. 

I looked up to find them all staring at me. None of them had finished their burritos. I’d be sweeping up rice for days. It was going to dry into the teak and then I’d need to sand and varnish – they were still staring at me. 

“Nothing. Catherine’s right. It’s a nice diamond. He’s got good taste.” I didn’t care to be reminded of this story. Graham had kicked me out of the house for a time after I obtained that gem.

“Bullshit. I technically kind of stole it from her because I needed to buy the Sea Wind and repair it and run it and stuff. It’s a long story. Anyway, I sold it for cash, and Ian bought it and here we are. So?” She turned back to me expectantly. The other two mirrored her. 

“Yeah, I recognized it the morning of your wedding. Hard to forget that one. Sat in a prison in the Canary Islands for three months because of it.” It was after one of my most successful operations, one where I united a whole fleet of my comrades to take down a jewel laden armada. It was the biggest payday any of us had scored in seasons. To this day I don't know if I was ratted out by one of those pirates or if the armada sent word out to the neighboring ports and I was unlucky enough to get caught. I was imprisoned for months. I was hung. I was buried. It wasn't pleasant. Worst of all, Graham was so terrified at the sight of my injuries he ordered me to go away and rest. Angelica and Yvonne had wanted me to continue but he put his foot down and Helene had backed him up. So I’d left. I'd saved the jewels though. “No – but, it was cool. It’s fine.”

“Your life is so exciting, Captain!” Bessie exclaimed.

“That is certainly one word for it,” Catherine disagreed with her sister.

Izzy twisted the ring, unsure of how to feel about the price I’d paid for the ring. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. If this is not okay--”

“I didn’t tell you. You couldn’t know.” I’d shot that rat bastard thief in the foot when I saw him next in St. Kitts. It had to have been him who ratted me out.

“You’re not mad? There were just all of these expenses for the Sea Wind. There was the matter of fixing your wall modification, and inventory and payroll, and-- I didn’t know Ian was planning to buy it. I definitely didn’t know he was thinking of proposing with a custom made ring.”

“I’m not mad, I’ll replenish everything once we are in Greenland. I’m glad you like it.” I worked on my own burrito. It would have been better with eggs and salsa, maybe some pork sausage or chorizo, side of home fries…

“Really?” she asked, still twisting that ring.

“It’s not a big deal.” I said around the beans and rice. I’d rather forget all of it. 

“Captain? Was it much the same for you with Mr. Andrews?” Bessie asked. She had finished her plate already. I was once again surprised to see I had all of their focus. I swallowed. I’d been avoiding talking or even thinking about Graham...I wanted to think about him. I missed him. 

“No. We had a…different sort of courtship.” Those early days were magical. It had been just him and me scraping a life together out of weeds and sail canvas. These girls hadn’t even been born yet when he and I laid the foundation for that manor. “A few less walks and stolen moments away from expensive chaperones. But still nice.” 

“Gerta was totally cramping my style,” Izzy scoffed. 

“That is the point of a chaperone, dummy.” I took a turn rolling my eyes.

“I hardly needed one with Lieutenant Commander ‘not before the wedding, my lady’ Coventry.”

“Unless you wanted to be counted as a whore in the eyes of society, yes, you needed one.” I finished off my burrito to show her that it could be done and done neatly without spilling it all over my chair. 

She laughed, tried to stop herself from laughing, then continued talking and not eating. “Anyway, tell us more. About your courtship. I’m dying to hear about you two whirling away on the dance floors of the nobility in the most scandalous manner.”

I liked these memories too. Instead of hurting like I thought they would, they felt like the medicine made me feel, calm. I took another sip to brace myself anyway. “It helped that we were never counted as nobility. Andrews was there because he was rich and they couldn’t afford to keep him out of their circle. I was there because I made them all richer. I was a novelty and I made them laugh. It was easier for them to condone our –” flagrant disobedience to their social constructs “ – dancing because we never truly belonged among them.”

“The Commander never thought you belonged. He was furious after Kings Bay when he had to release you back to Mr. Andrews.” I laughed at that. He would have been furious. He and Andrews always clashed at the dinner parties too. “He insisted you weren’t married, that you would have had a grand ceremony and festivities to flaunt all your money to the struggling nobility.” 

“He was always an ass,” I laughed. Graham and I would soundly abuse his name the whole way home from the Wallington's. “I never liked him. Thank god you are away from the shit head.” Those nights we took our time meandering the dark road back to the Hundred Acres. Sitting next to him as the horses clopped us down the road, we'd share the information we’d garnered from the nobility that we could use to increase our business. He would kiss me and hold me tight to his side as he drove the team home.

“Were you married? It was always much debated among us. The husbands insisted you were not. The ladies insisted you would not be so depraved as to let him in your bed otherwise.” I knew they all wondered. Speculation abounded on that island about the classification of our relationship. “All called you his wife, regardless.” Catherine tried to pad the directness of her question.

“I want you, Nanette.  I’ve been wed to you since the start even if we never said any vows.  You know that.” He shook with emotion. 

“I know that.” I really did know that.  We’d been committed to each other from the start.

“I’m your husband whether you want me or not.” 

“I want you.”  

“You’re my wife.” His words were reverent and true.

“Yes, I’m your wife.” I agreed.

“In all the ways that counted I was his wife. Though we never stood before God and declared it, we were married, yes.” I was ready for sleep now. I took a big sip of the medicine. They asked me a few more questions but I was far away, in the back of a wagon, with the man I should have said yes to over and over and over again…but never did until it was too late.