Chapter twenty eight - disgrace (this grace)

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"Gerard, it's me," Lisa said earnestly. "It's Michael."

Gerard looked furious and a tiny bit distraught. "How do you know Michael's name?" he snarled.

"It's me," she said quietly. "I'm your brother. Well, not anymore, I suppose, but–"

"My brother is fucking dead," Gerard said.

"I thought you were dead," Lisa said, even quieter than before. The fighting around us had slowed, and only the silent shrill roaring of the sea pierced the air. Everything was beginning to still. "I thought father had killed you."

"Father is dead," Gerard said, voice shaking. "Father is dead, and Michael is dead, and this is sickly."

"It's not sickly," Lisa said sharply. "Father never liked that I was a woman inside. But nobody on the Aurora cared." She tugged at the frayed edge of the red sash around her waist. Her words were suddenly softer. "I never tried to find you because– because I hadn't even known you were still alive."

Gerard's face looked plastered white. His features looked as if they had been painted on with a fine brush, like a porcelain doll, positioned in an expression of slight terror. He reached up to his collar and touched his red tie. It took me a few moments to realise that it matched Lisa's sash. "Michael?" Gerard said, almost inaudible.

"Gerard," Lisa (Michael?) said softly in response.

I must admit, I was so startled by the revelation that Lisa was in fact Gerard's brother that I couldn't help myself from simply gaping. Gerard's face was in a similarly hopeless state, eyes wide and mouth hanging despairingly open with no words coming out. "You're–" he managed. "Fuck."

Lisa (Michael?) anxiously smoothed down her dress. "I'm–"

"A woman?" Gerard spluttered.

"I was going to say alive, but yes," Lisa said. "Inside. I just. I have the wrong body."

"So you fucking faked your death to go and live as a woman?"

"No!" Lisa cried, looking desperate, desperate for Gerard to understand. "The Aurora found me in the market in the middle of the night– I had tried to run away. I told them what was happening with Father– he hated me, Gerard. God, you have no idea."

"He was beating her every day," Captain Wentz insisted, stepping closer to Lisa. "We couldn't leave her."

"I never wanted to abandon you, Gerard," Lisa croaked, tearing up. "He was just–"

"It's okay," Gerard said, stepping forward carefully. "Mikey, it's okay. I mean, Lisa?"

Lisa nodded, and edged into Wentz's arms. She was taller than him, especially with her heeled boots, but she clung to him like a child– like the way Gerard clung to me. Hm.

"So do you believe me?" Lisa asked, after moments of silence. She stood tall again, no longer crowded into Wentz's chest. He looked smaller somehow without her.

Gerard looked incredibly fragile as he took another step towards Lisa, but I took it to mean that he did believe her despite the uncertainty he was projecting. He took Lisa in his arms and hugged her.

"Shit!" Dewees said loudly, after a few moments. Everybody turned to him, Lisa and Gerard looking slightly bewildered from being interrupted. "Sorry," Dewees continued, "It's just– Gerard, you found your brother. That means that whatever happened at Parade Island worked. Frank was the scorpion kid. The whole deal." He shook his head in disbelief. "Shit."

Gerard didn't look nearly as conceited as I was expecting when I glanced at him to gauge his reaction. He just looked happy. He squeezed Lisa tighter with a laugh, and she smiled and buried her face in his shoulder, grabbing at the lapels of his jacket.

"I knew I was right to trust your judgement, Way," Captain Bryar said, eyeing Dewees. Bryar had never explicitly commented on Dewees' doubts in Gerard, although he had been very clear of his irritation with Patrick for second guessing him. I supposed it was because he held more respect for Dewees, but then I realised how preposterous that sounded ('Dewees' and 'respect' did not go together) and decided that it was probably because Dewees would have been more annoying when being reprimanded, while Patrick would just sigh and shuffle away.

Dewees widened his eyes innocently in response to the look the captain had shot him. "It was only logic to think Frank's mark was a coincidence, especially after all the other coincidences that didn't work out."

Captain Bryar's chin fell a little (Dewees did make a fair point), and Gerard huffed, but shook his head fondly all the same, then released Lisa and put his hand on my waist. The gesture was strikingly intimate, and in that moment a thought highly inappropriate for the situation came to me: were Gerard and I courting? I didn't know what sort of a name we could give the relationship that we shared. I wondered what father would think; what Lady Emily would think. Although, given some thought, both father and Miss Emily would probably be far more concerned about me cavorting with pirates than loving a man.

Or something to that effect, at least. I wondered for a moment whether I was actually in love with Gerard. Probably not, but I knew that that was how father would see it. As some sickly obsession with something I had never even been allowed to think about as a child. I had not even learned the word for such relationships until Dewees told me.

There was a reason I was sheltered from these things as a boy. They were terrible things. They were terrible people. And now I was one of them. I was a disgrace to my family's good name, a disgrace to my town. Father would be so horribly ashamed of me.

I couldn't imagine how furious Lisa's father must have been with her. I could, however, imagine how far he would have gone when he lashed out at her, but I certainly didn't want to think about that. I was glad Lisa was safe now, happy, and with her brother. I was glad I was here, in this disgraceful life, with my disgraceful friends. And my disgraceful Gerard.