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lisenberry · 4 months ago

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I’ll be sailing on your deep blue eyes

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E/MDNI/18+

Cw: Mention of dirt and filth, rodents (rats/mice), smut, he’s older (it's up to you by how much). Fish/Fishing. Meet cute. Summer love.

John takes you on a first date aboard his fishing boat. It isn’t at all what you’d expected.

Ao3

It had taken John three days to say one word to you, but once he finally had, you found it hard to get rid of him. Not that you wanted to.

For your first date, he invited you for a ride on his boat for some fishing and a sunset cruise along the Mersey Estuary. Although he'd say it was actually your second. You didn't think snogging and necking for what seemed like hours, like a couple of teenagers, in the alley behind the pub you worked at all summer qualified, but he could be very convincing.

You were a teacher who supplemented your income cooking in your family's seaside inn during school holidays, and John really liked your great-granddad's fish batter recipe, enough to eat lunch there every day. He must've known the havoc a steady diet of fryer oil and potatoes could inflict on one's health, but you were too happy for his company to remind him.

And he probably didn’t care anyway.

He was massive. Wide shoulders and a thick chest. He must've worked in construction or something active. He was cut not by fancy weight machines, but by hard labor.

And he must've seen something in you, too, because the food really wasn't anything special. Especially when your cousin forgot to set the timer and disappeared to text his girlfriend, over-cooking the whole batch of fried cod and serving it anyway.

You wondered how the place stayed open or had any customers at all when you weren't there.

John told you to dress comfortably and to meet him at the docks at 6:00pm. You weren't prepared for what awaited you when you walked up at 5:45, in a pair of cutoff shorts and a light jacket in case it got cold. A bottle of good wine poking out of your bag.

“This is your boat?” you asked, as he exited the wheelhouse to greet you at the railing.

It was an ancient prawn trawler, probably from the early 80s, named the William John and about ten meters long. Made for hauling in loads of fish and crustaceans, not pleasure cruising. Rusted nearly through and decaying before your eyes. It creaked and groaned above the lazy waves of the River Mersey like a contrary, lumbering goose.

You’d lived along the river your whole life. You'd thought you’d gone nose blind to the smells of low tide and petrol exhaust, but you couldn’t place the stench that radiated from the relic. Notes of wet tobacco, mildew, and dead animals, perhaps?

“What’s the matter? She’s not pretty enough for you?” He wiped his grease covered hands on an equally greasy rag, defeating the purpose you thought, and reached up to help you board.

His grip was warm and firm as he helped the bag from your shoulder and caught you against his chest. His meaty palms on the backs of your thighs and his hot tongue down your throat was enough to momentarily distract you from your doubts.

You hooked your own arms around his neck, and the dampness of his sweat seeped through his layers. It left you to wonder if he’d showered in anticipation of your visit, or if it would’ve even mattered in the end. He was filthy either way, and must’ve been dying of heat in his layers.

Undershirt, overshirt, coveralls. Topped off with the boonie hat he only ever took off while he was sitting at his favorite booth while he ate.

When he finally set you down, you nearly stumbled backwards from the absence of his steadying mouth. Instead, you let yourself fall forward, further into him as you used his immovable form for balance.

“You look nice.” His eyes sparked with appreciation as he dragged his gaze from your bare legs back up to your face. “But are you ready to get a little dirty?”

“What do you mean?” Suddenly apprehensive that you really did have wildly differing ideas of what constituted a date.

“You’re going to be my first mate for this trip. How good are you at following orders?” His hands had traveled to your hip bones, resting as if they were handles molded just for him.

“I’m not so sure I trust this thing in the open water.” Your eyes fell upon a hose pumping some kind of slurry off the side of the boat.

Best case scenario, it was some sort of waste. Worst case, it had a leak, and that pump was the only thing keeping it afloat.

“Oh, she’s fine. You don’t have to worry about her.” He rocked your hips with his hands, as if gauging your pliancy. Your soft edges fit perfectly in the crook of his thumbs.

“Then what do I have to worry about?” You inquired with mock suspicion, as you blew away an annoying whisp of hair from catching to the beading perspiration along your eyebrow.

The humid air, and your closeness to him, already had your pulse up and your pores working overtime to cool you off. You’d have done anything for a stiff breeze to ease the stickiness between your breasts and thighs. But there was no respite, not from the sun or the intensity of his hungry stare.

“The tides. We don’t have much time to waste if we’re going to make it back tonight.” He slipped a hand behind you to unhook the line from the dock’s cleat, in a smooth motion that brought you closer together.

Trapped between him and the railing behind you.

Being stranded out to sea with him overnight didn’t seem so terrible. Until you remembered the vessel upon which you were standing. You did a quick mental check for the last time you’d gotten a tetanus shot. Primary school, maybe?

“I’ve never worked on a boat before.” You confessed as you moved out of his way helpfully. “I just cook the fish, not catch it.”

"Try and relax, yeah? There's no such thing as a bad crew. As the Captain, it's my job to take good care of you."

“Is there somewhere I can sit?” You looked around for a chair, only to find a few grimy plastic buckets and rusted out storage hatches.

“Plenty of time for that later, princess,” he said with a smirking shift to his lips that brought your attention to his thick mustache. “You’re up here with me.”

An innocent enough reply, as he gestured you to follow him to the wheelhouse, but it brought lewd thoughts to your mind. The kind of thoughts you’d been having for him since he first walked into your pub a few weeks before.

There was no going back now, you thought, as he fired up the engine with a start that had you clutching his forearm with a white knuckled grip. Only to have the nerve to laugh as you tried to compose yourself.

“You don’t trust me?”

“No, I do,” but you didn’t sound very convincing. So, you tried again, locking your eyes with his. They were a deep blue that matched the sea and held a certainty that made your stomach flutter a bit too fast. “I do.”

He only nodded, content with your declaration, and motored effortlessly up the river. Your nervous belly eased as bit as you passed by the Liver buildings and underneath the Queensway and the Kingsway, until you reached the mouth of the open Irish Sea. The familiar stagnant smell of rotting seaweed and burning fossil fuels gave way to a fresh and crisp ocean breeze.

The sun dipped lower towards the horizon line as you continued north past the statues along Crosby Beach, and the still visible vestiges of shipwrecks that dotted the coast between Fornby and Southport.

Your captain dropped anchor near each of them, and you shared knowledge and debated the history of the wrecks as he casted a few poles into the water, with hopes of hooking into the schools of mackerel that liked to feed in the cavernous ruins. You'd read about them, and even taught the local lore to your students, but it was a treat to see them in person.

To witness how the sea had claimed them and used them for its own purposes. Deformed by the tides, and reshaped with mussels, vegetation and barnacles.

And he was right about the fish. You took turns reeling in over a dozen of the mackerel he was hunting for, and with each catch, you'd gotten bolder. The smile on your face grew bigger as each of your conquests stacked up into the ice chest. There was a certain power to it. In the team effort, between you and him. A connection to the wild that sent your endorphins rushing and ignited your sense of competition.

He oversaw and advised, with a half-burnt cigar in his mouth and a growling affection for your quick study as he showed you how to measure them and gauge their weight.

"Good fish," he muttered approvingly, after each inspection.

“Good captain,” you flirted back as he caught the bottom of your ass with a firm clap.

An unrest had begun to brew deep between your thighs, an uprising of desire and sensation with every heated glance and flex of jaw beneath his beard. He was having as much fun as you were, judging by the flick of his tongue along his teeth, and the crinkle of his eyes as he took in your laughter.

A twinge of hope perhaps, and the promise of more excitement to come.

"This one feels bigger than the others," you noted with a warning at the last fishing spot before it was time to head back. The tip of your rod was bent nearly in half and the force of it pulled you tight against the railing.

"Fuck my old boots, you got a big one there," he grated, urgently, as his arms wrapped around yours and his foot propped against the side to give you more leverage. “Could be a shark or a tope.” He coached you through it patiently as you reeled in the line as hard as you could.

By the time you wrestled it aboard, you were both soaked, in both the salty sea spray and each other’s perspiration. Your blouse drenched through, and your denim shorts smeared with fishy slime.

Your prey gaped at you from the chipped and iron-stained deck as John worked the hook free from its lip. It was a cod fish, bigger than you’d ever seen. It must’ve gone after the mackerel that had taken your bait and gotten snagged along with it.

"Now that's a beautiful thing, darling." He held it up easily by the mouth and tail, and it spanned almost as long as his arms. "About twelve or thirteen kilos, I think."

The sun had just about set around you and it painted the sky a dazzling pink. The excitement of your catch buzzed in your chest as you stopped to appreciate the colors of it for the first time.

Your Gran had often spoken of her love for pink skies at night. A good omen, she’d always said.

Was that the root of your building delight as you watched him pack the giant cod into the cold storage with the rest of the night's catch? Or was it something else that had you gawking at his waist and hips, appreciating the efficient and powerful way he moved?

"I hope you don't expect me to cook any of that," you chanced a quip as he pulled two of the bigger mackerels out of the ice.

You were wet and getting chilled, as the evening breeze picked up. Your jacket long forgotten in the wheelhouse. A shiver crept from your feet to your neck and rubbed at your arms to brush the goosebumps away.

"You can take a seat now, love.” He dropped his worn and smelly hat on your head and stripped off his thick flannel shirt to wrap around your shoulders as he disappeared into the wheelhouse. "I'll take it from here."

His overshirt fell nearly to your knees as you retrieved your bottle of wine from your bag and hopped up atop the whaleback storage hatch. Thankful that you thought to bring a few plastic cups and an opener, just in case. This boat didn't have wine glasses, of that much you were certain. And at that point, it didn't matter.

He hadn't capsized you yet. You could cut him a break for the shabby state of his fishing boat.

"Need any help?" You offered, as he came back out with a small grill, a cutting board, and a sharp knife.

He turned over two buckets and grunted in a purely masculine way as he sank on top of one and set the board on the other like a makeshift table. He held the knife with purpose, like an extension of his own hand, as he skillfully gutted, scaled and deboned the fish he’d set aside.

“Thought we’d have a deck-side barbeque. Enjoy our spoils.”

When he’d finished prepping dinner and set the whole fillets to cook on the grill, he accepted a cup of the offered wine and reclined back against the wall behind him. You were already ahead by a few glasses, and it made you soften a bit.

You felt closer to him now that he’d wrapped you in his warmth and his scent. His shirt didn’t smell bad, necessarily, but it was ripe. Like musk and spice, and the salt of the earth. You decided then that you were keeping this one.

The shirt. And maybe him, too.

Curious to learn more about him than the brief bits he’d let slip so far, you prodded him with conversation, and learned that he’d been in the army, serving for several years before retiring and returning home. He’d only been back a few months before he’d stumbled into your pub for a pint one afternoon and saw you hustling back and forth between the bar and the kitchen.

“I didn’t realize you could cook. Thought you only ate my fish and chips,” you asked.

The simply prepared, oily filets sizzled over the fiery coals as he checked and flipped them over with his bare hands.

“You think I was there because I like the food?” A raised eyebrow giving him a rather dashing edge.

“You don’t like my food?” You feigned a mild outrage, but you didn’t blame him. You didn’t even like it most of the time.

“I like you.” He pulled a fresh cigar from his pocket and took his time lighting the end. A distraction perhaps, so he didn’t have to follow it up with another declaration.

You felt a girlish heat rise to your cheeks as you sipped more wine. The culprit surely, not the giddiness of his attention. There wasn’t much you could say to something like that.

Thank you? I like you, too? How were you so bad at this?

“I meant to ask earlier. Who’s William John? The name of your boat, I mean.”

“That’s me. My father was a bit of a ne’r do well. So, when I was born, my grandfather commissioned this boat for him in hopes it would give him some purpose in his life. A livelihood to provide for his family. Aside from draining the family trust dry.”

“And he named it after you? What a lovely gift.” As rough around the edges as he was, the picture of him as a boy, working alongside his father brought a pang of longing to your heart.

“You can see, by the condition of it, exactly what my father thought of it.” He filled his mouth with a hot bite of food to test its doneness, and to save himself from revealing more of his secrets.

But he’d said enough, and the weight of what he’d shared made everything about him a bit clearer. His pride, and his quiet authority. He ran hot with something to prove, but was more shy when it came to the personal things. Was he insecure in his ability to be loved?

The pang in your heart deepened, at the thought of him seeing the physical manifestation of the neglect he may have felt all his life. That it wasn’t his father who taught him to fish, or drive the boat and chart the tides. That he’d most likely taught himself, out of spite.

You thought of your own family legacy at the pub. Still reaping the benefits of its name, generations after its greatness had faded. Desperately in need of repair. A little love and care.

“She’s not so bad. Just needs a good cleaning and a coat of paint,” you offered gently, smiling your thanks as he handed you a plate of fish and a few slices of crusty bread.

“You see the vision, do you?” An inquisitive light of humor in his eyes, surprised maybe that he hadn’t scared you away yet.

“Maybe I spoke too soon. I haven’t used the bathroom yet.” There was a brief moment of panic as he looked at you with confusion. “You do have a toilet, don’t you? Running water?”

“The head’s down the stairs on the left, but I warn you, it’s a tight fit.”

After dinner, you retreated down below to find that he was right. The wheelhouse above held the controls and comms equipment, as well as a small galley with a padded bench, a dinette table, and a small cooktop and oven.

Down a set of steps was the bathroom on one side and a sleeping area on the other. A lumpy mouse-eaten mattress and a closet full of shelves holding everything from extra rope, bottles of motor oil, and dog-eared books.

A rucksack full of clothes and a few pairs of boots were stuffed haphazardly under the bed.

Somehow, the bathroom was smaller than the closet. The door was broken and didn’t close, and there was a toilet and a sink, with a detachable shower head hanging above to wash over the drain on the floor. It was wet and a bit slippery, with a newish bar of soap in the corner, solving the mystery that he had showered at least sometime over the last few days or so.

You settled for just washing your hands, but the faucet levers were stuck with layers of corrosion and scum. Abandoning the effort entirely, you chanced a look at yourself in the cloudy mirror as the light bulb buzzed like a dying insect above your head.

Before you could take in your appearance, you heard him move behind you. Felt his shadow take up mass, displacing the air and affecting the atmosphere like a weather system.

“Are you living here?” You asked, turning around to find him propped against the narrow doorway with his shoulder. He must have to pivot sideways just to make it through.

“I’ve gotten used to worse, if you can believe it. This is downright cozy compared to the places I’ve been.”

It didn’t seem like an exaggeration, and you believed him. You understood then why he’d been such an effective captain. Why men followed him into hell. Because he’d probably already seen the worst—and survived. He could take it, whatever it was.

He could take care of you.

Nothing about this date could be considered romantic. You’d spent the first few weeks that you’d known him talking about yourself and your family. Chatting his ears off while he ate and drank, patiently listening to your life story.

This date was to show you his. To show you him. To test whether you could follow him. Trust him. No frills. No putting on airs.

You could either hide from it, or embrace it. It’d been too long since you’d kissed him, you came to the conclusion in that dank, stuffy space. Hours at least, so you made the first move. And it was if he’d been waiting for it. Your acceptance. Acquiescence.

Because once his hands met your waist, he made a sound of possession, feral and slightly unnerving. One that bridged no argument between what is and what could be.

What was.

Hands and mouths, hips against his cock. You stripped each other bare and collapsed into the bed with the squeaking of coils and the scurrying of something you hoped was smaller than a rat.

You took off his undershirt and chanced a look at his bare chest. The tan lines between light and dark were stark around his arms and neck. They brought a contentedness to your breath as you buried your face into his collarbone.

“What you laughing at, love?” He pulled your face up to meet his, towards his eyes once more. You struggled to find your focus in their depths.

“I like you, too.” You hoped he would understand. A simple thing, and yet you both had something to loose.

He only smirked, knowingly, and tipped a finger against the brim of the hat you’d forgotten you were still wearing.

“You’re in charge, sugar. And I’m going to fuck you to until you beg me to stop.”

“Please. Yes!” You were right, he was a weather system. And you were at his whim. Do your worst, you wanted to scream. To throw a bottle of empty spirits into his core and watch it be sucked away.

But he wasn’t wild like a storm. He was steady, like the shore. He caught the bottle and gave it back to you, quietly. Gently.

You felt a breath of fresh air along your bottom as he pulled you pants away. And the humidity found you quickly while you writhed sticky and needy along his scratchy, hairy dick.

“You’re just one surprise after another, aren’t you?” You murmured, as he slipped his thick cock past your entrance.

Tighter than you thought he’d be. A fit with no margin for error. Snug and tight and welcome.

It stretched, reached places uncharted within. You could whimper and shy away, but not with him. You held steady and open, talking all of it. As much as he could give.

“I could say the same for you, sweetheart.” He wadded up your discarded shirt. His shirt, and placed it under your head. Its scent masking the moth balls and the dust as he buried your nose into the mattress.

And the remaining hours passed in a dream. You beneath him, and then atop his face. Aligned with his hips as you shuttered and rode his length in that tiny cot. Kicking and screaming and begging for your own release. Again and again.

“Do you want the good news or the bad news?” You felt the thin mattress creak and dip as he slipped back down behind you, finally, when it was all over.

“Hmm?” Your brain was too fucked out to form anything resembling a coherent thought, even if your voice hadn’t been broken. You were sure they’d heard your screaming in Wales. Maybe even Ireland.

“We missed the tide window. About five more hours before we can attempt to go back.”

You whimpered, feeling the crush between your legs and the scratchy fabric at your back as he turned you over and pushed your knees up around your ears.

“The good news is I’ve got plenty of fuel in the tank. A good captain prepares for all possibilities.”

“You did this on purpose, didn’t you?” You couldn’t bring yourself to put any real accusation behind it.

“Yes and no. I had my hopes.” At least he was honest.

A relieved gasp escaped you as a warm towel greeted your sore cunt, and not the blunt tip of his cock or the prodding of his thick fingers. Instead, he cleaned you up in soothing strokes that lulled you into security as you buried your face in the shirt that had become your pillow.

You awoke alone in the tiny bed sometime later, nearly hitting your head as you sat up too quickly. With the size of his frame, he must not have spent much time in such a cramped space. Eager to find him, and not be left alone with the chittering sound you could only imagine were mice, you slipped on his shirt and creaked your way up the stairs.

You found him at the helm, sipping a hot tea as he looked out at the lights of the city off in the distance. Back to civilization. You curled up on the padded bench beside him and watched in a comfortable silence as the light slowly returned to the sky.

By the time you returned to the dock in the early hours of the morning, you felt rancid. Your skin itched, hopefully not from bedbugs, and your muscles burned and ached. But you were smiling, floating with the kind of hopeful feeling that only came after something so new, so different, so crazy, it turned your whole world upside down.

“What’d you think? Come back again tonight, princess?” He helped you disembark the boat and folded his arms across his chest expectantly.

“I’ll have to think about it,” you replied sweetly, knowing you’d see him again at lunch in a few hours. Already looking forward to it.

And of course you showed up that night at the same time, and the same place. Bringing with you more wine, an armful of industrial grade cleaning products, air freshener, mouse traps, a few preemptive cranberry pills, pest spray, and a rubber mattress pad cover meant for bedwetting toddlers.

You slipped into an easy routine together, until the end of summer. Some days you’d leave the dock and sail overnight a little further down the coast. Others, you’d stay in the port and work on the boat. He’d do the hard job of making repairs and buffing off the rust with a belt sander, while you’d carefully apply coats of thick, maritime-grade paint.

Below deck, you helped scrub off the nearly forty years of mold and crud from the head and the galley until the true surfaces shined like new. You finished it off with clean bedding and a decluttered storage area to hold the few things he’d owned.

He lent you his hat to shield your nose from the sun while you worked, and wrapped you in his layers at night when the chilly air crept in.

You brought a bit of life back into your family’s restaurant with fresh and simple grilled mackerel and curried cod recipes that your customers had raved about, and the William John got a makeover worthy of its name.

And it had been the most fun you’d had in your whole life. Your favorite summer holiday yet.

On the last official day before the school year started again, with your classroom set up and your lesson plan laid out, you ended your final shift in the kitchen and found him waiting for you in the alley out back.

A bouquet of flowers in one hand and an enigmatic expression on his face. His eyes danced with promise and his mouth seemed to twitch excitedly with words unsaid.

“What’s all this, John? I thought I was meeting you later.”

“I wanted to pick you up,” he said, as if it wasn’t a short walk to the pier. But his hands found your waist as soon as he’d handed over the blooms, and he set your legs around his hips. A shocked yelp escaped your lips before being silenced by his. You could kiss him for days and it wouldn’t be enough, you mused as he pulled away first. “I have something to show you.”

For a moment, you thought he intended to carry you the entire way, but he set you down gently and instead took your hand. A silly, romantic thing on the surface, when more accurately he was just too reluctant to let you go.

His instinct to guide and lead, to pull you along in step beside him. For your part, your curiosity had you skipping quickly to match his long stride, eager to see what had him so worked up. Bustling with a nervous energy that contradicted his usually stoic demeanor.

By the time you reached the boat, he’d slowed down, walking forward more deliberately. Waiting to see if you’d notice his gesture on your own.

He’d finished painting the hull since you’d seen it last. It no longer read William John in tarnished, fading letters. In its place was your name. Elegant and bold. As if he’d tattooed it on his own chest.

“Oh, love, you shouldn’t have!” Your hands covered your mouth, and your eyes brimmed with shocked, happy tears.

“She’s as much yours as she is mine now. Seemed fitting. For a fresh start.” He draped a lazy arm around your shoulders and kissed the top of your head. “A new beginning.”

“You’d better take good care of her.” You smiled up at him, your forehead barely grazing the bottom of his chin.

“Do you think she’s ready for her maiden voyage? One of the lads I used to serve with is up in Glasgow. Wants to meet for some creel fishing for langoustines next week.”

“For how long?” You’d be busy soon with the new term in full swing, and you’d quietly begun to mourn not seeing him in the restaurant every day, or sharing space in his wheelhouse each night.

Change was inevitable, and it often came swiftly all at once.

“A month or so. I wish you could come with me. Never had a better first mate.”

“Bring me back a few crates of those prawns, will you? I’ll put them on the specials menu.”

Saying goodbye to the haze of summer, and to him, was hard but you knew he’d be back. Especially when he dropped his cherished boonie hat on your head and told you to keep it warm for him. And sailed off in a boat he’d named after you.

All the love to @the-sweet-hibiscus for your early support for this.

#call of duty #john price #captain price #captain john price #price x reader #cod smut

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