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Blackbeard is untouchable.
Not impervious to harm, nah he’s got the scars to prove that. He’s been stabbed and cut and burned and whipped and hit, less so these days, but it happens.
No, what it is, is that no one wants to touch Blackbeard.
He’s god and he’s a ghost, for all that he’s reachable to the average person, for all that he can reach out to the average person. Not that he spends much time around anyone average; there’s his crew, and he keeps the best, but they work for him, there’s the people on the ships they raid, but if Ed even bothers to step foot on board before it’s all over, they cower from him, and then every once in while when they make port, he tries to have a regular day, just a bit of shopping, get a bit of lunch, but inevitably he’s recognized, and depending on the location, it’s awe or terror or some twisty mix of both.
Nah, nobody wants to touch him, cause they’re terrified of him, or they respect him so much that it circles back around to terrified.
Used to be, when he was younger, just coming up, before he’d gone and made a name for himself and he was just another crew member on another pirate ship, touch came easy. Pirating was rough work, tough work, and you let it out where you could. Wasn’t even just sex. It was friendly claps on the back, it was sleeping way too close together cause the hold was cold and you didn’t rank high enough for a hammock, let alone a bed, it was wrestling matches, it was boisterous hugs after a raid gone well, and—
Yeah, it was sex, also.
And Ed won’t get fuckin poetic about mutual handies in a store room, but there was something about you and a guy who ranked just as low in the shit as you did fucking it out in the five minutes you could scrape together between chores and raiding and eating and sleeping. Wouldn’t dare to call it a real fuckin connection unless he was hankering for a split lip, but there was camaraderie in it, in a weird fuckin way. You were crew, together, and you did what crew did, together.
Couldn’t do that anymore, when he made captain for the first time.
(Made captain, he says, like he didn’t see an opportunity and steal it right out from underneath the old man with a rallying cry for any crew who’d rather serve anyone else than sail another league under Hornigold.)
Becoming a captain suddenly meant that everyone in fucking distance worked for him, and that really did not fuckin work for him. He knew captains that would, knew the twisted politics that came out of it, the back stabbings and the mutinies and the complaints. The haunted looks on the favored crew member, sometimes. But that couldn’t be him, could never be him, and anyways, naively, he figured, it was fine. Was just sex, and what was sex compared to all the money and power and thrill and adventure of being an up and coming pirate captain who could literally do anything, anything else he wanted?
But then it wasn’t just sex.
Everything else that came with just being one of the guys faded away, some of it slowly, some of it all at once. He had his own cabin, suddenly he slept alone. But other things, friendly touches for celebration, for companionship, for just fuckin for the fact that pirating’s a brutal business and sometimes you gotta remember you’re a human person, all that stuff started to trickle out of his reach, because he was a fuckin captain, and you could be the best captain to ever sail, your men could love you, truly love you, and they still wouldn’t touch you.
Didn’t take long before the want of it started to itch under his skin, a physical feeling of need that crawled all over him and left him restless, and what was he supposed to fuckin do?
Yeah, he knew, he wasn’t stupid, he knew making port there were places he could go and people he could pay, get the quick fuck that couldn’t be garnered anywhere else, get the tension in his bones, crawling on his skin eased out and washed away.
That was never his bag before, he didn’t like women so particularly that what he got with his mates didn’t scratch the itch, and women did like him enough that if he was in the mood, it wasn’t something he ended up paying for.
Before, anyhow.
But then he became a captain, and he grew out his beard, and he hit the caribbean fast and hard, and by the time they made port longer than it took to offload what they’d stolen, his reputation had already spread like wildfire.
First time in months that he was on land for longer than a few hours, and apparently Ed was left behind in his cabin, because the feet that hit the dirt and walked him over to the nearest tavern already belonged to Blackbeard.
That first time he actually made landfall, tried to have a pint and talk to anyone, anyone but the crew he sailed in with or the harbormaster, and no one wanted to look him in the eye, let alone touch him, not for money nor anything sweeter.
Eventually, eventually Blackbeard became infamous enough to draw the sort of deranged fans so crazy they did want to sleep with him, tried seductive eyes across pubs and oozing lines of flattery and hands on thighs, but Ed didn’t want any of that, didn’t want the sick anti-hero worship, the attentions of people who only wanted Blackbeard to fuck them so they could bandy about town that he’d done it and they’d lived to tell the tale.
And then there were other pirate captains, bitter competition, except when they weren’t, and when they weren’t, at least, fuck, there was someone in the room that was almost on his level— almost, never quite, because, reputation what it was and not for no reason, everyone knew who the king of the caribbean was— but that was even worse. Greedy, backstabbing, desperate shits, neck deep in a lifelong game of use or be used that Ed didn’t want to play, regardless of how often he actually did play it. Ed didn’t have airs, knew better than that, knew himself better than that, he was almost as cutthroat as the rest of them and clever enough to edge out the top spot even with that “almost”, but, if he was gonna fuck someone who reminded him of his worst self and also might kill him for the pleasure, he might as well just try autoerotic asphyxiation in front of a mirror and save himself the trouble.
And then that was his life.
And then that was his life for years, and for years, and for years, until he didn’t remember what it was like to be touched enough, only knew the crazy, weird, insane shit that lived in him with the lack of it. The oddest little things would leave him wanting for someone, anyone safe enough to touch, to be allowed to touch him, and rarely were those odd things actually people, since the people around him were walking warnings, morning red skies brushed in bold strokes across the sneer of their gaze, the twist of their knife. Nah, it was little things, pathetic things. His hair brush catching in his curls and leaving him aching for nails scratching delicately at his scalp. One perfect raindrop landing on his lower lip and leaving him hungry for a kiss. Peeling an orange and feeling the press and give of it and finding himself desperate to run his fingers over a warmer flesh, a softer skin.
A pirate’s lifetime of wanting and wanting and wanting nothing to do with anyone available for him to want.
Which is why Stede— Stede fucking Bonnet— slammed into his life like a cannon to the hull and left him just as dead in the water, cause Stede—
Stede was so easy to want to touch.
To want— and wanting never felt like this, never felt like an animal come to life inside his chest, running in circles and begging on its heels and panting and needing and needing and wanting— so easy to want to touch, to hold, to press into until it wasn’t just hands to hands, mouth to mouth, skin to skin, until it was something closer, something warmer, something far more intimate than the word touch was even worthy of describing.
No, Ed was used to want as a dull ache, something unspecific and ambling, something that could be put to bed with a bright enough distraction, a big enough meal, a brutal enough raid. Something he could train out of the motion of his hands, the sway of his limbs, something he could hold back from making him overfamiliar with the crew, over eager with any poor dock hand or tavern girl removed enough from the news cycle to mistake him for just some guy, something he could keep tight in his chest, safe from the danger it would wreak if let free and untethered.
Wanting Stede, wanting to touch Stede, just wanting Stede was nothing like that, no, it was sharp, and it was feral, and it shattered his defenses, cut through his restraint like the fresh edge of a razor through colonial flesh— easy as hell and soundtracked by a pathetic whimper.
So Ed gave in. Gave easy touches like he would if Ed and Stede were just crew together, just two sea dogs hauling rope and swabbing decks, loose and responsibility free. Well— easy— easy in that they looked easy, looked casual, looked like, oh yeah, Ed does this every day, hugs a beautiful blond brick of a man after a successful fuckery, claps him on the shoulder in encouragement before a raid, fiddles with the cuff of his coat in interest during a sartorial lesson every single day.
Actually giving the touches—
Far from fucking easy.
Part of it was, Ed had no idea what the line was. He was out of practice, hadn’t had anything this casual or comfortable in— god, twenty years, and listed out like that, doesn’t he feel his fuckin age, the rot of loneliness under his skin, the itch of the absence of touch— and he didn’t see it in his crew, didn’t know if it was unique to his fearsome reputation or just a symptom of being a captain that your crew hid evidence of their humanity from you like a coin pilfered out of the ship share, but no. Ed had no god damn clue what the line was. How much touch was too much, too familiar, too far to be excused as friendly.
The other thing was, touching Stede was Ed’s hands versus, at minimum, three layers of fabric— two if Ed took off his stupid fucking gloves, but even then, Stede went around wrapped and draped in shirts and waistcoats and jackets by day and nightshirts and dressings gowns by night (and really morning/mid morning/early afternoon if they weren’t busy that day). With the exception of the rare brush of fingers against fingers, there was just no reason, casual excuses or not, for Ed to touch his skin, want or not, welcome or no.
Fuckin run me through was one part educational exercise, four parts stupidity, and fifteen parts raw desperation, and what do you know, Ed got skin to skin! Ed got Stede’s— soft, criminally soft— hand braced against the small of his back, tucked right up under the hem of his stupid— genius— crop top. Ed got both hands braced against him as Stede pressed into the bleeding, both hands gentle around his waist as they wrapped the bandages, both hands fluttering nervously against his stomach like Stede was worried the rest of him was about to come to pieces from the one wound he’d wrought. Both hands, soft, soft, so soft, so gentle, so warm against his skin that Ed couldn’t even feel the pain of his literal stab wound because there was something so much sharper trying to burn him up.
Because that was the last thing, the worst thing, the best thing, the biggest thing.
The actual touch, the actuality of the thing that he’d wanted for so fucking long, with such pathetic desperation, the thing he was so hungry for, fucking starving for—
The barest brush of it made him dizzy.
The full press of it made him nauseous.
Two palms, warm against his belly, undemanding and kind, made sick crawl up his throat, acid and evil and ready to eject, ready to take his heart with it.
It was like wine on an empty stomach, it was like cake for breakfast, it was like sugar, sweet and syrupy and straight into his veins.
He wanted it, he wanted it, he wanted it, and his body couldn’t stand to have it.
No amount of shoulder to shoulder through layers of leather and silk, no amount of hand to arm, fingertip to fingertip, no amount of it could prepare him for the reality of Stede’s skin against his, and for every inch of him that begged, frothy and fierce, for more, more, more, there was another that screamed back too much, get away, too much.
But he had a taste of it now, the sick twist of pleasure amongst pain, the fight for flight when Ed only just got the rest of a landing, and not for anything would he let it go.
So he kept stealing, touches and glances and contact, kept snatching up littles pieces wherever he could get them, a magpie or history’s greatest grifter, taking hands against his throat when he couldn’t “figure out how to tie this damn thing, mate” and handfuls of hips to “correct his stance” and brushes of cheek against fingertips cause “you’ve got something, just there, no, there, no, let me get it.”
And then everything fell to shit, faster than he knew what to do with, fast enough that escape tore itself out of his throat as “act of grace”, because that was what it would take, an act of god, or the closest thing the English had to one, to save Stede from the tangle of shit it really was to be tossed up with someone like Blackbeard.
And then.
And then quiet.
And then calm.
And then the answer to “what now” teased out of the most vulnerable parts of him, softer and more fragile than even the thin skin of Stede’s inner wrist (stolen when Ed had raided a bracelet and insisted it was perfect for Stede and never mind his clumsy fingers, Ed would put it on for him)— the answer teased out and teasing out the last dregs of Ed’s courage, the only part of him that ever really knew the meaning of the word brave—
Ed kissed him.
Ed kissed him, and if he thought he knew sick, if he thought he knew want, if he thought he knew hunger, he relearned it all in the span of one chaste kiss, one small sigh, one tiny, fragile little declaration.
One small moment blown so big Ed thought his stomach would burst with it.
So big Ed couldn’t hold it in, the terror and the ache and under it all, tentative and hopeful, but very much there—
The relief.
It was over.
Twenty years he’d gone unkissed, and it was over, safe in the hands of the only man who would ever deserve it.
And suddenly he could do anything, could be anything, could offer Stede anything. An escape to China, a new life, a fresh start, with that weight off his shoulders, that hunger free from his gut, sure, Stede could name it, anything.
It wasn’t so hard as all that, one little kiss, one small set of words that barely nudged the true shape of everything Stede had been to him, and there it was.
A future full of anything.
After. After Ed knew better, after reality crashed back around his shoulders, after the sick settled back in his gut, after the itching sparked up underneath his skin. After, Ed would wonder if that’s where he got it wrong. That maybe he played it too casual, that maybe he should have said it better, louder, more eloquent, maybe he should have thrown up his guts right there on the rock the way his nerves were begging him to so that Stede could see— here it is, this is everything, please don’t leave it behind, please, please, please, please, please.
Or maybe that was it, already, whatever was sparking between them dead in the cradle, because Stede could taste it. On the lips of that little kiss, could taste the desperate hunger, the bitter bile of want that choked up his throat and twisted up his hands. Maybe Stede felt it and knew it was too much, too deep a cavern, too hungry a hole to ever fill, and for the returns it offered, why even bother?
Whatever it was, the results were the same.
Once again, Blackbeard was untouchable.
Once again, he shrugged on those leathers, painted on that mask, and pulled up from inside of himself that wall against the world, the armor that came between him and want, the shade that came between him and anything that could possibly light the way out.
It was clear to him now, he got the message loud and clear, wouldn’t be making that mistake again.
He knew who he was, and for him?
For him, there was no way out.
No way except death.
Except then even death didn’t want to touch Blackbeard, no, couldn’t be that fucking easy. Death got close, close enough to smell him, close enough to feel the last lingering dregs of heat in his body, and death curled up its nose at him and said “no thanks, actually.”
Death didn’t mind knocking him around, didn’t mind making him feel like death, didn’t mind pushing him back into the land of the living at the very worst possible moment, right into the beams of Stede’s sad wet puppy eyes, right into the clasp of his hand, burning straight into Ed’s nerves, branding him with his grip, sending spiraling waves of waves of nausea to his gut, a throb of sharp pain to his brain.
Because Stede came back, of course he fucking did. Like death, Stede wasn’t interested in granting Ed any mercy at all, no, instead Stede had to show up looking wide eyed and pleading and disheveled but still that golden god damned ray of light he always was, except it was worse this time, right? It was worse, because Ed didn’t have to wonder if he could ever have it, if he could ever touch, ever feel that ray of light on his skin without it burning him up. No, he knew for a fact he couldn’t. Tried it. Worst thing that ever happened to him. Best thing he ever felt. Makes him sick even now remembering it. Wouldn’t trade the memory for anything. And then Stede left, so what did it matter how he felt about it anyways, because Stede’s thoughts on the matter were as clear as any feeling of Stede’s ever was, which is to say clear as fucking mud, but Ed got the general vibe. No thanks on the soulmates/lovers/happily ever after thing, we’re better as friends.
And then Ed was banished, head still swimming with the ache of Stede’s hand in his, gut still twisting with the nausea, brain still completely scrambled— hell of a drug, Stede Bonnet, if the government had the right to regulate anything, it should be him. But Ed was on his own, nothing to keep his company but his addled brain, and actually that might’ve had more to do with the almost dying than one little touch from Stede, but what did Ed know for how fucked up it made him feel when it happened? Being beat to death versus holding Stede’s hand, Ed has no sense of self preservation so he would still rather hold Stede’s hand but at least he knows he can survive being beat to death.
And then Stede pops up like a gopher and Ed has the second worst dinner of his life and the first best desert and thinks. Maybe I got it a bit wrong. Maybe Stede got it a lot wrong. Maybe they don’t have to keep getting it wrong. Maybe Ed gets a second, third, fourth chance, maybe he can give Stede the same.
Maybe things can change.
Maybe he can change.
Some things don’t change.
When Ed looks at Stede in the light of the waxing moon and turns back the most romantic line he’s ever heard on the most romance hero man he’s ever kissed, it’s not because it’s easy. It’s not because there’s no lump in his throat, it’s not because there’s no sick in his gut, it’s not because his palms aren’t sweating with fear. No, no, he’s so scared he’d shake with it but he doesn’t want to set that damned bell ringing, so he’s clutching himself tighter than that fuckin fish on a string.
It is because Stede wears fine things well, looks perfectly at home in them because he’s the finest thing of them all, it is because if Ed has the opportunity to hold something so fine in his hands, has the opportunity to— be near it, breathe the same air, let it make him feel good, he’ll be damned if he squanders it. He’ll be damned if he looks at that soft smile, that curve of that one perfect dimple, those creases around the eyes, the scrunch of that nose, he’ll be damned if he sees that face and knows he can kiss it and still leaves it unkissed.
So he doesn’t.
He shuffles in, telegraphing intent, and it’s not so much that Ed kisses Stede as it is them falling together, meeting in the middle.
And Ed would love to say the second kiss was easier, would love to say that the gnawing thing in his chest had finally settled, that he could have and hold it and feel it without it making him sick.
But he can’t.
Because if it was one thing to kiss Stede Bonnet after 20 years unkissed, it’s a whole other beast entirely to kiss Stede Bonnet after 20 years and several months unkissed by anyone except Stede Bonnet.
If their first kiss was a wave, roiling in his gut, their second kiss is a storm, the whole ocean, twisting in his insides, salty and sick making, so much more than he can handle. Everything he wants, yeah, the warm, and the press, and the sweet lavender scent of it, but he cannot fuckin handle it for how flimsy his hands are, for how his hungry body shakes. He’s gone weeks without rations and he’s being offered a whole iron pot of stew, and he’s not even strong enough to tip it towards his mouth and sip. If he pulls it towards himself, he’ll fall in, he’ll drown in it, he’ll swallow it down until he's sick, until his stomach bursts with it.
So he goes against it, every cell in his body screaming, begging, pleading for more and desperate to push it away in equal measure, and he asks for slow. Asks for time. Asks for a chance to adjust, to come back to a life where he is held, and touched, and— loved, yeah, a life where he’s loved, one little bit at a time.
And Stede gives it to him.
And gives him his hand to hold.
And what do you know?
Ed does survive it.
What Ed asks for, what Stede so sweetly gives him, he gets to keep.
For one day. For one perfect day, yeah, he gets to keep it.
Glancing touches, gentle and undemanding, a nibble, a small morsel, one perfect mouthful at a time for Ed to taste and savor and chew and swallow, to feel it slowly expand his stomach until it’s not a tight little pit, but maybe something with room to grow, with room to hold. Stede’s hand on his elbow. Ed’s hand in his. Shoulders pressed against each other, forearms touching forearms, rolled up sleeves touching sleeves. Little bits that he can handle, they don’t stick in his teeth and they don’t lodge in his throat because they’re just right, they’re perfect, they’re exactly what he needs.
And so yeah, for an entire day he gets to keep it.
But whatever he has, whatever bit of good grace he’s stolen out from under the nose of a capricious god, it’s yanked back that very night, snatched up in grubby hands like a selfish toddler who hasn’t yet learned to play with others, and yeah, that’s exactly what Ned Lowe is, petulant and whiny and just so embarrassingly uncool, and it’s funny, it’s fuckin hilarious, right until it’s not.
Right until it’s Stede with a burn mark on his chest, right until it’s Stede, sword drawn and deadly calm, though Ed knows him well enough to catch that clutch in his free hand that means he’s clenched it tight only to keep it from shaking. Right until it’s Stede, stepping past that point of no return, stepping from one side of “killing with kindness” to the other. Right until it’s Stede, swallowing his feelings and disappearing to the cabin, and Ed swallowing his own to disappear right after him.
And those feelings, what a hell of a pill they are to swallow, and Ed’s only just been testing the limits of what he can hold in the hollow of his gut without straining, without kicking them right back up on the deck, spoiled and messy.
Those feelings, brand new in their terror, brand new in their fear. Hasn’t had anything he could lose in a long time and tonight he could have lost Stede. Could have lost each other. Could still lose Stede, could still lose him to the thing that crawls up inside of you when your heart loves and your hands kill and there’s no one there to hold both after, to tell you they’re still good, you’re still good.
But Stede doesn’t have no one, Stede has Ed.
And maybe that’s what it is, that does it in the end.
Because he’s not ready.
When Ed goes to the cabin and Stede hauls him in by his jacket and holds him against the wall and looks at him with eyes that beg and plead in place of a mouth that can’t summon the words to say for what, Ed’s not ready.
But Stede doesn’t have no one, Stede has Ed, and Ed has Stede right back, and since the first time Ed even heard of the Gentleman Pirate, moments where those two truths were guaranteed were few and far between, and this, right now, is one of those moments, promised, signed, sealed and delivered. Right fucking now they have each other, and if Ed has to keep living a life where what he has and what he gets to hold and when he gets to be held are up for grabs to any lowlife idiot like Ned Lowe to spoil, then Ed will fucking take those moments as they come, will grab them up in sticky fingers and press them into his tongue, rub them into his gums, swallow them down until they’re a part of him that no trial or torture can tear from him.
So he nods.
He nods, and Stede falls into him, and Ed falls right back, melting, sugar in hot tea, butter into fresh bread, the warmth of Stede, the scent pressing into every bit of Ed as his body presses into every bit of Stede.
And it’s like something inside of Ed wakes up, casts off the covers and flings wide the shutters. It’s like the part of him that was starving realizes it had only ever really known peckish, it’s like the part of him that was thirsty realizes it’s only ever been a bit dry, because this, this in the now, with Stede so close, and finally, truly within reach, this is what it means to want, this is what it means to need, body and soul, to need to be touched.
It means clawing, desperate for every bit of skin he can reach, until Stede’s shirt is gone, until Ed has shucked his jacket. It means letting Stede guide him to the bed, letting Stede be gentle and slow with it, because they both know what comes next, and this is the very last bit of slow they will ever get. It means, once they’re both bare, once it’s nothing but skin to skin, devouring any bit of it he can reach, desperate gnashing of lips and tongue and teeth snagging the curve of his neck, the lobe of his ear, the slash of his collar bone.
It means greedily snatching up a kiss, a caress, a clinging hold, it means swallowing them down, no time to even chew, only time to lodge them in his gut, to sew them into his heart. It means heat and heat and heat, rapidly building, burning him up, a fever pitch, sweaty and sticky and delirious. It means being full up on it, swelling and stretching and thinking he’ll burst, that he can’t hold any single bit more. It means taking more anyways, it means taking Stede inside him, it means taking it exactly how he wants it, so so badly he wants it, and when he finally gets it, it means realizing he could gorge himself on these touches for the rest of his life and without this he still wouldn’t know what it meant to be full.
It means Stede holding him so close, it means Ed holding him just as closely back, it means breath mingled with breath, sweat mingled with sweat, the lines of their bodies running in perfect parallel so close they defy the logic of it and the perfect lines of them touch and kiss and meet.
It means when it ends, it doesn’t end.
Stede holds him just as close, just as tight. The heat cools, the sweat dries, and it doesn’t end.
Stede holds him, and touches him, and feeds him little bites of sweet all night long, little drops of sugar to dissolve on his tongue lest he forget how decadent the taste: a kiss to his neck, a squeeze to his waist, a caress to his chest.
Stede holds him, and Ed holds himself, and he promises himself that now that this is it, the everything, it will be enough.
Ed gets sick of telling the story like this.
It’s epic highs, a hunger sated, a thirst quenched, the veil pierced, and then the lows of it all coming back up, partially digested and no longer recognizable as pleasure, as joy, the lows of the loss and the shame of ever thinking it could be had in the first place.
He gets sick, woozy, wobbly boned and weak from telling the story like this.
Life doesn’t care, keeps telling the story all the same, but Ed is tired.
He knows how it goes at this point.
He has it, and then he doesn’t, and then he has it again, and in the having of it he is clueless and stupid and clumsy, and then he doesn’t have it again.
Except that this time, he is as broken as he knows how to be, sobbing and blood stained on the deck and kneeling over the greatest loss and the greatest relief of his life, sobbing and blood stained in the cabin shaking with he doesn’t know what to even call it when he has never been allowed the grace of grief, sobbing and blood stained and sobbing and blood stained is all he ever, at the core of it, has been, and now it’s there in the big bold font and no one can say they don’t know, and certainly not Stede, and Stede holds him anyways.
And when the sobbing stops, and the blood stains are washed away, and Ed finally finds the words, Stede just holds him, just says okay.
Ed says “I can’t do this anymore.”
“Okay,” says Stede.
Ed says “I can’t do it without you.”
“Okay,” says Stede.
Ed says “I need some fucking quiet, some peace, some time.”
“Okay,” says Stede.
And then Ed finds an inn— a shack that Ed can picture as an inn— and he steps off the Revenge to give it a walkthrough, and when he does he knows he won’t ever stop foot back aboard, not for as long as the two legs he walks on are his, because he is so, so fucking tired. And he tells Stede, he tells him all about it, the terror and the anger and the hurt and the loneliness and how no matter how differently they do things, no matter how different they are, that world will keep trying to come for them and he has to step away, he can’t play the game any more, he needs space to breathe, he desperately just needs space to breathe.
And Stede looks at him, stood close enough to touch, far enough to breathe, and he says “Okay.”
And then they’re innkeepers.
And it’s so soft and it’s so simple and there’s no great peak for him to fall off of, there’s no great gorging meal leaving him sick, it’s just that.
They’re innkeepers, and it’s okay.
And Stede touches him at his elbow, and kisses him at his cheek, and squeezes him at his shoulder, and they’re sturdy touches, freely given, freely taken, they’re thick and wheaty bread, they’re long simmered stew, they’re solid pieces that Ed can sink his teeth into and chew and chew and chew, and by the time he can swallow, they don’t drop into his gut like a rock, they settle easy and even.
It’s too soon to call it a happy ending, Ed knows that. Knows better, and knows better than to call it an ending at any rate, because in the grand scheme of happy Ed plans on being with Stede, they’ve really only barely scratched the surface. This is cheese and crackers while the table’s being set for seven courses.
And it’s wild, how Ed knows it, knows it in his gut and in the way Stede’s eyes crinkle around the corners when he says I love you and in the way that Stede touches him so deliberately and so carefully and in the way that even when things are not perfect, they are so fucking perfect. Because Ed has been up and he has been down and he has been desperately pulling Stede in and just as desperately pushing him away and has only recently figured out that he can just go and say the things he needs to say and that Stede will hear him, and Stede has seen all of that and known, just, soul deep and unwaveringly known that Ed still loves him, that Stede loves Ed right on back.
So yeah, he knows, happiness on the horizon, happiness in the here and now, he knows it’s gonna be there despite.
Despite.
Despite the fact that there’s still something wrong with him, still something crawling underneath his skin, something that feels Stede’s touch and braces for panic, braces for sick, braces for too much, too fast, too soon.
The touches themselves, the touches are good, are great, are something that simple words don’t do justice to, and the thing inside of him that gets sick with it has healed, has stilled its vertigo, has soothed its nausea. Stede’s palm against his cheek is all oven-warm and soft, his lips the right touch of sweet against a sturdy brew of tea, and it’s just right. It’s exactly what he can handle.
And that, that is what he’s scared of.
It’s been a couple weeks now shoreside, and it’s been touches, perfect fucking touches, not even necessarily nor strictly chaste, but it’s nothing close to—
Ed doesn’t know how to explain it, how it feels like there’s a line, how everything up to the line is safe, is something he can stomach, and if he crosses it— How he might crumble under the weight of it, how it might terrify him, how it might make him sick, how it might unravel the tenuous peace that he’s made with himself.
And he doesn’t even know what the line is.
If it was just anything past what he could shuffle under the protective umbrella of “take it slow”, then Ed has no idea what to make of that heavy necking session on the couch where Ed would’ve come right there in his pants if his knee hadn’t taken the opportunity to make known a solid six month’s worth of complaints. But nah, that was fine, and so were any others on the list of filthy and frantic makeouts they’ve had since coming to shore. Ed has no fucking clue, but the thing is, Stede seems to?
Seems to always know the exact right moment to slowly cool things down, to gently pull back, to have a wander off to the kitchen or to pop into the garden, always seems to sense the exact moment before the panic starts to set in, and honestly it makes Ed a little crazy, a little obsessed, that Stede just gets him so damn good.
But also he wants to know, wants to know why he can’t cross the line and why Stede seems to know where it is when he doesn’t and they’re elbows deep in a soft and syrupy lie in one morning when Stede starts doing that petting, placating thing where he’s gentling the grind of Ed’s hips against his slower, slowing, to a stop, and Ed thinks, fuck it, he may as well just ask.
“What’s up with that?”
Stede blinks his eyes back open, slow, once, twice, before furrowing his brow.
“What’s up with what?”
“That thing, that thing you do.”
Stede purses his lips.
“I’m not doing a thing. And if I was, you’d have to be more specific.”
Ed rolls his eyes, because yeah, things are good, but Stede is still stubborn and a bit of a bastard when it comes to taking his own advice, to talk it through. “Okay, specific, specifically we haven’t had sex yet, and you’re always the one putting on the brakes.”
“We haven’t had sex again.”
“Are you seriously splitting semantics with me right now?”
Stede gives a little grin, the right shades of sheepish, a touch of apology. “No, no, of course not. Though, to be fair, I’m not the only one putting on brakes.”
Ed has not been putting on brakes—
“I have not.”
“Ed, darling—” and, ugh, that tone from anyone else, kid gloves and coaxing, but from Stede it just makes him want to roll over and bare his belly— “If you go stiff any time I get my hands under your clothes, you don’t have to be putting on brakes. Message received.”
Ed doesn’t—
He may have been doing that.
Fuck. Definitely thought he had tamped down on that impulse, definitely thought he had been playing it very cool, very fucking casual, but he should’ve known better than to try to get one over on Stede, the guy who has made Understanding Ed less his personal business and more like his life’s sole mission.
But talking it through goes both ways, so—
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Well, I thought we were taking it slow!”
Ed huffs. “Again?”
“Well—” and then Stede looks away, which is less and less like him as the days go by, but this time his gaze nearly shutters. “You said it was a mistake. And, I know you were panicking, but that in particular did not feel untruthful—”
“Whoa, mate, it—” He tries to tease it out, because he did say that, but it was more like— “It wasn’t a mistake that we had sex. I just— fuck, I wish that it hadn’t happened like that. I’m glad it happened. I just think. I think we deserved it different.”
“Oh.”
“Not, like, after almost getting tortured to death. Not so desperate.”
“I felt, almost, like I had to, like we had to.”
“Yeah. Exactly. Didn’t want it to feel like that.”
Stede murmurs a no, an agreement, brings his hand up to cup Ed’s cheek and he instinctively tilts into it, the warm and the soft.
“So why then, the freezing up?”
Oh, yeah, that.
“Dunno,” Ed says, and buys himself a bit of time nuzzling a kiss into Stede’s palm, though it does fuck all for his concentration. “It feels like— gahh, do you have any idea how intense it is to touch you?”
“Hmm, maybe, if it’s anything like touching you.” Stede follows through with the touch, tucks his hand into Ed’s hair, weaves his fingers into the roots, and that’s the good fuckin shit.
“It’s good, right, it feels good.” Feels good as Stede gives a gentle scratch at his scalp. Ed lets his eyes fall closed. “But also it feels bad.”
Stede’s hand stills. “It feels…. Bad?”
“Ah, fuck, not bad, no, just, like everything you’ve ever felt, all of it at once, so it’s the good and the bad and the really really fuckin good so that you don’t even know what to do with it.”
Stede hums, continues with his fingers in Ed’s hair. “I suppose I know what you’re getting at, but I’ve never felt so good touching you that it felt bad.”
Ed pops one eye open, checks on Stede’s expression. He’s just doing his thinking face, not bothered, just considering.
“Are you worried about it feeling bad? Is that why the freezing up?”
“Yeah,” Ed figures. Because it is so much, but also he survived the so much so many times and— “It’s like, I know what I’m used to now, what kinda touch just feels good. What’s safe.”
“You know what to expect.”
“But if it’s more than that—”
“Where’s the line? When does it start feeling bad again?”
“Exactly. And even fuckin harder if I don’t know what’s coming.”
It’s one of those things that solidifies as soon as he says it, that it’s not even the touch anymore that’s got him hiding scared in his own skin. It’s knowing what to expect, knowing when, being able to brace for it proactively, instead of flinching in reaction.
“What if you—” Stede starts, just as Ed goes “I think maybe if I—”
“No, you go,” Ed tries, as Stede says, “Sorry, you first.”
(This happens at least once a day. Ed does not get tired of it.)
Stede clamps his lips closed, turning thin lines thinner, and raises his eyebrows at Ed, who just rolls his eyes.
“Okay,” he starts, and it crawls heat across his shoulders to think about actually saying it. Just saying in plain english what he wants from his boyfriend, who literally would do anything for him. “I want us to have sex again.” That’s not the full sentence, but hell if this isn’t harder than he thought it would be.
“But?” Stede asks, tossing him a line.
“But I’m still. I’m still.” Fuck.
“It’s okay if you’re still scared.”
Ed scoffs, immediately ready to deny it, except. Yeah. Actually that’s exactly it.
“What if— and stop me if you think it would be weird—” Like Ed doesn’t love weird, doesn’t love that specifically about Stede. “What if you knew exactly when it was going to happen? How it was going to happen? If we planned it?”
“Wouldn’t that, I dunno, take the magic out of it for you?”
“On the contrary! It would be fun, we could make a night of it, a really nice dinner, break out the madeira, oh and candles for the table, flowers from the garden—”
Ed’s cheeks heat, but this time it feels good, it feels pleased, because that actually sounds really nice—
Stede’s eyes are soft, all gooey and warm. “If I could’ve done it like that the first time, really romanced you the way you deserved, I would have, darling, I hope you know that.”
Romanced. No one has ever romanced Ed before, at least not before Stede, and Ed has seen what romance looks like when Stede does it on accident, so the thought of getting the full force of it, all on purpose, leaves him feeling giddy.
“Okay, yeah, that’s— that, let’s do that. Please.”
Stede smiles at him, an indulgent beam, all soft and affectionate.
“How about Friday night?”
“That’s perfect.”
The whole way to Friday night, Ed is a mess. And Stede was smart, Friday was only the very next day, but still, Ed has to get through the whole of Thursday, and most of the day Friday, and he’s a mess.
But a good mess? If there is such a thing. Stede would know, would be the one to make Ed into one. But yeah, good messy, it feels good. Every lingering bit of eye contact feels like a promise, every brush of a touch feels like a preview, and Ed can’t stop thinking, with butterflies of anticipation fluttering from his stomach, up his throat, bubbling up smiles into the corners of his cheeks, they’re going to have sex tomorrow night. They’re going to have sex, and Ed is going to know it’s coming, and it’s going to be only exactly what he asked for and nothing more than that and he knows it for sure because they talked about it, talked it out in detail, just for Ed’s squirmy little nerves, and far from dulling the shine, it leaves a bit of heat, a bit of anticipation stirring up in his gut every time he sees Stede, which is all the time, because they share a not entirely huge seaside shack.
A bit of heat.
Or maybe a really lot of it, a furnace, a raging fire, something that needs to be fed, that’s been stoked carefully with a kiss here, a touch to his nape there, Stede coming up behind him while he fussed over tea in the kitchen and wrapping his hands around his waist, tucking his nose into the curve of Ed’s neck. God, that one, Ed had almost dropped the jar of sugar, almost doomed them both to a weekend of sugarless tea until they could make it to the market again for more, not for shock or shiver but for how entirely weak in the knees it left him.
And that’s the thing, the thing that’s so nice.
None of the touching has changed, it’s still all the things Ed wants and likes and feels safe with, there’s no feeling like Stede is holding back, saving up for something special. There’s just this, and. This, and Ed knows what’s coming tomorrow— now tonight. This, and there will be more. This, and the rest. This, and.
This, and then it’s almost time for dinner. And Stede asks Ed to keep himself busy while he prepares. And Ed does, decides to keep himself busy dressing for the occasion. Not that they have an expansive wardrobe collection, Ed has the cash for it, but the island lacks the supply. So dressing up is more like his favorite shirt, the one that “sets off his eyes”, and his softest pants, and mostly, mostly doing his hair.
He doesn’t have a reason to wear it up up, not very often, but he likes it, the meditation, of twisting and pinning, fixing long, waving tresses into a neat knot that adorns the back of his head like a crown. And likes how Stede looks at him, like he’s something beautiful, something delicate. And for a night like tonight, he needs a little of both sides of things, of the repetition in the doing of it, of that look in Stede’s eyes after it’s done. Not like Stede doesn’t know what he looks like, doesn’t see him every day, doesn’t get that look in his eyes most of those same days, but. But Stede wants to romance him, and Ed wants to be romanced, wants to feel soft and romantic and romanceable.
So he does his hair, does it up in braids and curls and knots and waves until it’s a miracle of pearl tipped pins defying gravity, liable to soar all the way up to the heavens, and he sends his spirits with it, knocks nervousness loose from them like stubborn dirt and sets them free.
And then there’s a knocking at the bedroom door jamb, Stede peeking his head through the empty doorway, darling—? Oh darling.
The way Stede looks at him, he knows he got it just right.
Dinner is also just right, which doesn’t make any sense, because Ed knows for a very hard won fact after several experiments gone wrong that Stede cannot cook, but Ed had trusted him when he’d winked and said to leave dinner to him while they giggled and planned, and apparently it was not for no reason, because, over candlelight and fresh picked flowers, between teasing conversation and smitten glances, they make their way through rich roasted veggies for appetizers, succulent seafood and pasta for mains, and then Stede presents him with an entire Swedish princess cake for dessert.
And Ed wants a slice of cake (maybe two), he does, but he hesitates when Stede goes to pass him a plate. Because they’ve had dinner, and now that only leaves dessert, one tiny slice of cake (or two) between him and—
“Alright, darling?”
“Yeah, course, yeah, let’s have cake.”
Stede quirks his eyebrow, but lets it lie, gets cake served up for both of them and settles back into his seat, and Ed takes a couple bites, feels the sweet cream against his tongue, chews through soft sponge, chews through his thoughts.
He says it before he even thinks not to.
“I don’t know why I’m so fuckin nervous.”
Stede raises his brow, go on, chewing his own bite of cake.
“I mean, it’s not like I’ve never had sex before. I’ve even had sex with you, and my palms are sweating like it’s gonna be the first time ever. Silly.”
“I like silly.” Ed smiles, yeah, we both like silly. “And, really, I feel like this is going to be our first time. How’s that for silly?”
Ed flushes, pokes at his cake, ferries himself up a bit of custard, a bit of raspberry. “Yeah?”
“I mean, you hardly got the proper Stede Bonnet first time experience, doesn’t seem fair to you if I’m honest.”
“No?” Ed cracks a smile.
“No, not at all, firstly, way too much eye contact. And I should have been much more awkward. Should have fumbled getting you out of your clothes a lot more, or even been too nervous to undress you myself and just left you to your own devices. There should have been at least a few times I had to apologize for faulty equipment, and altogether we had just far too much fun. But tonight, nervous as I am, I’m sure I can promise you the full experience.” And Stede’s smiling, but there’s nerves in it too, and Ed knows he’s not joking, that Stede’s right there with him.
“Why’s this different?” Ed has to ask.
“Maybe because we’ve had time to think about it, maybe because of how it went last time, I don’t know exactly. But it’s okay that it’s different, isn’t it? You wanted different. Gotta start somewhere.”
Ed’s smile starts warm in his belly, worms up into his chest, curls at the corners of his mouth.
“Yeah. Yeah, it’s okay.”
They finish their cake, and then they have tea, and it doesn’t feel like stalling, it feels natural, dinner, dessert, tea in the living room, and then Ed cracks some joke about sea gulls, and Stede leans in to kiss him with smiling lips, and it feels natural, feels so fucking easy. And then Stede goes to pull back, to yes-and him, and Ed catches him, pulls him back in, kisses him again, and it’s so natural.
Tastes like just a tease of sweet, tastes like how Stede takes his tea, stiff brew, two sugars, hint of lemon. Ed sips up a bit of tongue, a nip of lip, and it goes down easy, settles in with his dinner, soft cushioned landing. And Stede leans in, leans into him and tangles his hand up in Ed’s hair, that patented Stede move that always takes his breath away, the way Stede can’t stand to not have every bit of himself twined up in every bit of Ed, and the warmth of it, the teasing pull tingles at the base of his scalp, sends shivers down his spine, but they’re not running, rapid, out of reach, they’re apace as Ed walks slowly into it, slips easily into Stede, deeper into Stede. He does some reaching of his own, rests one hand against the slope of Stede’s chest, curves the other across his shoulder, and feels it, solid skin, warm and dense under slippery silk, feels it seeping into his hands, the comfort, the ease, the heat.
He’s not swimming in it, not yet, it’s a slow build. Stede gives him another taste of tongue here. Ed gives it right back there. Stede reaches with his other hand. Ed leans in with his whole body. Stede gives the smallest tug at his hair, Ed gives the tiniest whine. Slow build, but it does, it does build, until Ed’s mouth is watering, until he’s ready for more, until he’s ready to pluck it up in his hands and bite.
He pulls back, waits for Stede to slow blink his eyes back open the way he always does, and cups his hands around two perfect cheeks.
“Are we doing this?”
“If you still want to.”
Ed wants to scoff, as if he wouldn’t, but Stede’s earnest, perfectly earnest, and Ed feels it too.
“Yeah, I want to.”
“Okay. Um, in the bedroom, yes? That’s what you said—”
“Yeah, yes, please.”
They both go to stand at the same time, and Ed’s knees knock into Stede’s and they both fall back into the couch, Stede flushing red, nervous smile. “I’ll go first, and I can—?” and then he stands, offers out his hand to Ed to pull him to stand. Ed is a little bit gratified that Stede’s palm is sweaty, that he’s not the only one blushing, because—
Because he can taste it, the sharp spice of how fucking close they are nipping at his nose, and yeah, it is different, the anticipation of the thing. It’s so wildly different than the last time, when deciding it was happening and it actually happening stumbled up so close to each other they were nearly the same event. No, this time, Stede is taking his hand, is walking right by his side to their bedroom— theirs— casting sneaking little glances at him every second step like there’s something precious he might miss if he looks away for even long enough to walk down the hall without stubbing his toe. This time, Ed is looking right back, and it’s not a heady whirlpool of confidence and desperation in Stede’s eyes he’s seeing, a storm that he was willing to fling himself into headfirst and damn the consequences. This time it’s gentle, it’s adoration, it’s nervousness, it’s eager, so fucking eager to just get this right.
This time they settle into their bed together and Stede clasps Ed’s hand in both of his and just looks at him, kneading his thumbs into the dough of Ed’s palms, loosening tension, leavening the air.
He’s waiting. Waiting for Ed. Because Ed had asked. Had asked if he could— he didn’t want to be in charge, he’d said, he just wanted to steer. And Stede had looked at him like he’d understood, and clearly he’d been listening, and now here he is, just giving it to Ed. Everything he’d asked. All night, everything that he’d asked, every little thing, and Ed feels.
He feels spoilt with it, but not in a way that leaves him feeling slimy and wrong, no, he feels indulged. He feels like he is Stede’s favorite— favorite— Just his favorite. Favored. Like Stede would do him any favor.
He works his jaw, tongue sticky from the sweet of it, heavy with the fat of it, until it’s loose enough to ask “Take off my shirt? Yours too?”
Stede nods, leans in, and Ed lifts his arms, expecting Stede to go for his waist, to pull at the hem, but he starts at Ed’s throat, delicate fingers fumbling at the laces of his collar. They’re already loose, hanging wide, because Ed dressed for seduction, and that meant a glint of his chest, wings of his hawk spread wide.
Stede answers his unasked question. “I don’t want to catch your hair. It’s so lovely.”
And Stede is true to his word, his fingers do stumble over the laces, do tug and pull in their nervousness, but every touch is spun-sugar delicate, gentle, always gentle. And then his hands shift to Ed’s wrists, soft rasp of fingertips against the sensitive skin of his wrists as Stede works buttons free. And then hands to his waist, little tug, tiniest of tugs to slip the linen from his waistband, to bring it up, past scars and tattoos, soft and careful past skin that bears the marks of anything but.
Ed’s breath catches in his throat like it’s someone else he’s seeing bare, because soft, soft handling like this, gentle and slow, he feels like anyone but himself. He feels in his body, grounded in the flesh and the give and the skin of it in a way he can’t ever remember feeling, because Stede’s eyes have gone liquid, have gone warm, have gone big and heavy with adoration, and Ed knows, knows with perfect clarity that it’s him, that it’s Ed who has him looking like that.
Ed leans in to kiss him, just quick, just a nibble, before he breathes out “you next, please.”
Stede goes for his own cuffs, his laces, and his hands are still shaking, just a bit, but what his movements lack in surety they contain in droves determination. His hands slip, and find their target, and slip, and find their target again, until Stede is bare chested and beautiful before him.
And to Ed, Stede is always picture perfect, untouched, something precious kept up in his mind not to be soiled by his touch, and last time, last time it was dark, and it was fast, and Ed imagined it all to be the same. But this isn’t last time, and Ed has the light and the time to drink him in, to see him for who he really is. And Stede matches him better, more closely than Ed had thought. The burn mark on his chest, the twin to Ed’s own scar. The two angry stabs to his gut. Dozens of other smaller marks and scars earned, surely, in their months apart. Hundreds of freckles cast amongst them, the stars mapping the expansive sky of him.
The reality is much better.
Feels so much better under his hands as he reaches out, one hand and then the other, to touch, to feel. Ed feels Stede’s breath catch with one palm flat to his sternum, feels the rabbit thump of his heart picking up in his chest, matching Ed’s own, beat for beat. He leans in, pressing as he goes, eyes locked with Stede’s as he tips him slowly back into the pillows of their bed. Stede nods up at him, breathes out Ed, eyes wide, wide enough to swallow him whole.
“Pants?” Ed asks, and it’s barely a word, barely above a breath, but Stede hears, hands heading straight for his buttons, shimmying his hips as he reaches around back for his laces, until the waist is loose enough, and together, hands tangling and touching, they work his pants, his smalls, down his body, cast them to the floor.
Stede is still mostly soft, and it’s a comfort, actually, like, they’re going to have sex tonight, but only because they decided to, because they said together that they wanted to, but not because they have to, not because anyone has to. There’s no desperation in it. There’s still all the room in the world to work up to it.
“Yours too?” Stede asks, and Ed knows he could say no, knows that it wouldn’t mean the end of the world, or even the end of their night. Doesn’t want to say no, but it feels good, settles something in his stomach just to know, bone deep, that he can.
He goes for the drawstring on his pants— he wears simple, loose things around the house, can’t for the life of him understand Stede’s propensity for full on proper breeches and stockings when they’re bloody well retired, except that his calves look amazing in them, so he certainly won’t complain— and then he’s shimmying his own pants free and then. Then they’re both bare together, completely and wholly and.
And it’s a big deal, because it’s done, they’re naked together, they’re naked together so that they can have sex, and holy shit they’ve just gone and done it. But also it isn’t. Because it’s just Stede, just Stede looking at him that way that he does more than anything else, like Ed has invented the printing press just to fill his library, like Ed has strung up the stars just to give him light to read.
And then looking isn’t enough, no, he wants to touch, wants to taste, wants to feel the grain of him under his fingertips, the salt of him under his tongue. And he can. And he does.
Slowly at first. A touch, lips to lips, something familiar, something grounding. And then lips to cheek, cheek brushing cheek, lips to the rasp of stubble along his jaw, along the taut line of his throat, little seeking tastes, salt and sweet and solid settling on his tongue, washing down his throat, landing light in his stomach. And then Stede, touching back, grounding, warm and solid, solid and meaty, something he can sink his teeth into, something he can grip tight so that he doesn’t spin off with the dizziness of it.
Or the dizziness he expects, only he doesn’t get it, no. He sinks into Stede, hands roaming, mouth seeking, and it’s only solid. Only sure. Only settled. Mind and body are working together this time, taking it all in, big pieces of everything he wants, but not so big that he can’t break it down, digest it, absorb it into him as something that he just knows in his very bones: that he can touch and be touched, that he can hold and be held, that he simply can.
And he can and he does and he does until it does start to build, an epicurean itch driving lips and teeth and tongue across every inch of Stede, until he’s tasted hip bone and heel, until he’s sipped from Stede’s lips every moan and whimper, until Stede is hard, and he can feel it, feel it press against him where he’s just as needy, but it’s still not desperate, not some starving thing that begs and begs and begs. No, this is dessert after dinner, this is afternoon tea after a full lunch, this is the extra, the sweet, that he wants, yes, he wants, and gets to have just for the wanting of it, but he doesn’t shake, he doesn’t tremble with the lack, because there is no lack in his life anymore.
He just gets to have.
He just gets to hold.
Gets to hold Stede close and closer until it’s hands wrapped around each other, the right amount of tight, the right bit of slick, until it’s driving, hot and tense and quick, but still so easy, so god damned easy to take each other up and up and up right to that edge, so god damned easy for them to fall right over, feeding kisses, feeding breath right into each other’s mouths.
And then he gets to be held.
Gets to be held through it, through the shuddering after, not trembling, no, just full, full to the brim and spilling over with pleasure, with joy, until it’s shaking shoulders, shaking them into a giggle, a big fuck off bright smile, gets to be held through it all, Stede’s arms a steady weight, a grounding thing, solid and secure. And, held so tight, he can feel, can feel Stede shaking too, but it’s giggles, it’s his own laughter, his own ease, this was so fucking easy.
There’s so many fucking things that have been grit your teeth difficult between the two of them, so many that Ed doesn’t even want to tally up cause a fair few of them land shame on his shoulders, but this?
Asking Stede to touch him the way he needs to be touched?
Finally, finally getting it?
It’s easy.
Easy as breathing.