Johnny the Sea and Me by Melba Escobar

Author:Melba Escobar
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Abrams
Published: 2024-05-10T00:00:00+00:00

“And you?” asked Pedro.

“What about me?” said Victoria.

“Were you a friend of White’s?” Pedro asked.

“Yes, very much so,” said Victoria. “I was afraid of him, so I always spoke pleasantly to him and brought him slices of ham from the kitchen whenever he snapped his fingers.”

“You’re a coward!” said Pedro.

“Could be. After all, I’m just a simple, old parrot who’s lived a long time—but now, to get back to the story I was telling about old Taylor. He was as good a chef as the Taylor of this generation, and exceptional at rationing water, too. When everyone on the ship thought they had run out, he would always bring out another little jug. Every night, he’d invent a new dessert: vanilla cake topped with shrimp, mango sponge cake with sardines, coconut cake with crab sauce …”

“Ewww, gross,” mumbled Pedro.

“True, but they were the most delicious kind of ‘ewww!’” said Victoria. “White always ate more than his fair share of the desserts. He was a rude man. He’d sit near the kitchen door and grab the food with both hands before it got to the table. He had a giant paunch and a thick beard that was always smeared with cream and fish scales.”

“Just like a pirate.”

“Well, not really,” said Victoria. “The only corpulent pirate I met in my three centuries of life was White. Anyway, the point is that old Taylor was easy going. He didn’t lose sleep thinking about pearls piled up in treasure chests. He loved the sea and his two friends, Perkins and Rick.”

“The guy who lost an ear?” asked Pedro.

“Perkins, yes, poor guy. But he was also lucky, since Taylor excelled at making bandages from old canvas sails, which guaranteed a speedy recovery. Taylor was always ready with a pailful of water to clean up the blood after every fight. He knew how to make tourniquets and stitch up and dress any kind of wound. When he wasn’t cooking, he was tending to people.”

“What do you mean?” said Pedro. “It wasn’t like there was a war going on.”

“True,” said Victoria. “Pirates have a pretty bad reputation overall, but you’d be surprised at how romantic they are when they’re in love. Tay cooked, he tended to wounds, and at night he liked to tell stories about princes and princesses that made even the most macho pirates tear up. Every self-respecting pirate believes in love. Did you know that? It made me laugh to see such hardened men in tears over the story of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ or ‘Snow White.’ These were bald, disheveled, tattooed, wounded, legless, armless, eyeless men, but they always believed that one day they would find true love and leave the high seas.”

“That’s boring,” said Pedro, letting out a yawn.

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