#never left

I’d make a rubbish screenwriter.

If I’d written this scene, I’d have had Ed call out to Stede first to alert him to the fact he’d returned. ‘I’m back! And I’m over here’ sort of thing.

But it’s Stede that spots Ed and calls out to him. And it’s these bits of detail that make this show so precious to me.

The last time Stede saw Ed he was walking away having said their intimacy was a mistake, that ‘fishermen and pirates’ are nothing alike. And Stede lets him go because he knows Ed better than he knows himself. Knows he’s panicking, yet respects his agency.

And then Stede spots Ed across the battlefield. Blinks in slight disbelief. Possibly notices Ed’s back in his leathers. And he shouts to him. Shouts to his friend. Shouts to his lover. Shouts because he wants him desperately. Shouts to show Stede’s a constant in his life. All wrapped up in a single cry - ‘Ed!’

Ed has his back turned in combat when he hears his name in Stede’s voice. Until that moment, he doesn’t know whether Stede is alive. And Ed turns and just roars Stede’s name in return. And I always think the second, deeper ‘Stede!’ is like the bellow of a bull stud. It’s so visceral. So full of love and yearning and heat and wanting and promise. It comes from Ed’s core, from his bloody boots. There’s something of ‘Act of Grace!’ about it. A primal scream.

Stede tells Ed twice there’s nothing to forgive as they kiss; but he also does so by calling to Ed across that beach first. Stede doesn’t hesitate. He trusts Ed has returned for him, and Ed is fighting in the name of his love for Stede. And there is nothing Ed could do that would mean Stede didn’t want him to return.