#soldrigo

Solo couldn’t get enough of that white hot sting crackling over his skin like electric currents. 

“You stopped counting,” Rodrigo noted, taking a moment to stroke the reddened splotch of otherwise brown skin.

“That’s because I was enjoying myself,” Solo said slowly as he rolled his eyes.

“You can save the sass,” Drigo said, itching to use his hand on Solo again.

“Baby, I’m dying for you to make me.”

Solo felt the whip-like sting before he heard it. He maintained eye contact with Drigo through the mirror, challenging him with a look few outside of that dressing room had seen.

By the time Solo had asked Rodrigo to stop, his own lip was swollen from biting down on it. Not to mention his lipstick was smeared everywhere. 

He had a nice erection too. When Rodrigo offered to take care of it, Solo tried to conceal his blush behind his delicate fan. Soon Solo was standing before Rodrigo, watching the pirate suck him off while he jerked away at his own cock.

The flaring sting in Solo’s ass cheek paired well with what he was watching Rodrigo do and what he was feeling in his gut.

“Very good, Captain,” Solo whispered when Drigo gagged on fresh cum, careful to not let it spill.

“Okay. Now go change,” Drigo said once he swallowed and wiped the corners of his mouth.

Solo pointed out that Drigo had not come yet. The pirate growled something to the effect of worry about yourself and strip.

Solo hummed coolly to himself as he seesawed off his original white teddy. Then he stood comfortably naked, waiting with his hip cocked to the side and his arms folded while Rodrigo pointed at the next piece that he had laid out on the divan.

Solo picked up the gift – something black and flashy that he would not be caught dead wearing in a million–

“Quit sticking your nose up at it and put it on,” Drigo snapped from where he waited with a still very hard cock. And then softer, “Come on, baby. Hurry up.”

Solo looked over his shoulder and sighed, “Drigo, hon, your taste… I worry about you sometimes.”

Drigo barked at Solo again before he got up and hurried the process along. He begged Solo to wear the thing so he could see the look on his face when Drigo finally made him come in it.

Finally, the seamstress gave in with a sigh. “Fine, Drigo. But be sure to fuck me good enough that I forget I’m wearing this little hideous delight.”

The mirror didn’t lie. For as much shit as Solo gave Drigo for his selections, it was clear how much he fucking lived for it. 

Because who at home was going to put Solo in something as dark and daring as this? Who would be there to wear his sweet little ass out while he got to watch it all unfold? Who?

“N-no one.” Solo wheezed. “Oh, gods. I’m about to fucking come now.”

He broke eye contact with the mirror and dug down on his elbows, so very aware of his glowing prostate.

Drigo smirked. “That’s right, baby.” His hand caught the reddened swell of Solo’s ass and gave a tender squeeze.

Solo listened to his pearls as they sang. The voices were louder than usual. They had the potential to become deafening whenever the seamster couldn’t activate his charms. It was supposed to be a song, but to Solo, it sounded like a jumble of notes at the moment.

He locked them away in a chest. The pearls were loud enough to drive anyone else crazy were they to wander too close.

After the mad song of the congested pearls was silenced, Solo swayed over to the divan by the window and flopped down on it. He stretched his arms out on the paneless frame and rested his cheek on the cool marble.

It was the hottest day of the summer. No one was having a wedding. Not in this heat.

Solo wore a thin, loose silk thing that had a tendency to slide off his shoulder whenever he was too relaxed. He adjusted the strap without much thought, looking out at the stretch of Zephyr Bay not too far in the distance.

“I wonder if anyone has seen my fan,” Solo wondered aloud, though there was nobody around.

In the chest where his pearls lay, underneath his gowns and silk slips, Solo had many fans. For every occasion. But there was one in particular that he let live on his vanity.

Lifting his head to look felt like he was moving a mountain. Solo sighed. The fan wasn’t there.

He slumped back across the window’s edge, resigned to melt in this cruel, coastal heat. Solo found it was somewhat easier to pretend that his discomfort didn’t exist when he chose to think of where he had last left the fan.

If he remembered correctly, he had left it in the care of a certain pirate in hopes that he would, on a whim perhaps, bring it back to Solo. Perhaps the pirate didn’t need a reason to return to Vesuvia. He came often enough. Perhaps Solo was reason enough. Still, the fan was insurance. It was a reminder whenever the Captain Rodrigo became too lost in the universe of oceans and adventure.

Swan feathers, pearls and lace all went into the construction of the fan. That and a soft spritz from Solo’s perfume bottle. The pearls carried microscopic traces of his charms. Combined with those downy soft feathers, Solo imagined it brushing over the captain’s scars. Whether his wounds were old or new, the fan would erase any pain. If only temporarily.

And if the fan was in Solo’s hands, he could show Rodrigo how much further he could take those charms.

Briefly, Solo wondered if Rodrigo would continue to entertain whatever it was they had if he knew…

The extent of my… infirmness.

Most of the time, Solo’s condition didn’t really hold him back. It was more of an inconvenience. But days like this made it seem impossible for Solo to have a life anywhere outside of Casa Vega.

It was a stain on his otherwise peaceful daydream. An ugly, stray needle caught in the delicate tapestry of his beautiful fans.

Solo ignored the needle just as he ignored the discordant song of his pearls. He dragged the tips of his fingers over the window’s marble edge, imagining the end of his fan grazing a back shifting under a different delicate tapestry. This one made of scars and sweat and shine.

His dyed hair curled slightly and caught onto his eyelashes as his bangs became heavy with perspiration. Solo leaned his cheek into the crook of his arm and continued to dust the marble with his right, mimicking the path of his favorite fan until the sun went down.

.

.

.

.

Jacqui thought that by the time he was done organizing the bottles and scrolls in Rodrigo’s office, the latter would be done staring at the pretty fan folded in his fist.

The quartermaster cleared his throat, but Rodrigo was still slouched in his chair, his dark eyes intently fixed on the fan. Though his body was relaxed, his eyebrows were tense, making his expression mostly unreadable to those who didn’t know him that well.

But Jacqui knew him better than anyone.

“Can I expect you to meet us above deck in ten minutes?” Jacqui closed the glass door to the shelf and turned the key. “Or do you need more time alone with your friend?”

Rodrigo’s focused stare cracked. He blinked suddenly. “What?” As soon as he saw the lack of seriousness in Jacqui’s expression, he cursed under his breath.

“Shut up.”

Jacqui had expected Rodrigo’s next move to be shoving the fan in his drawer or in the private compartment under his cushion. Instead, the captain filed it away inside his coat. He got to his feet and strode to the door like he was in a rush and Jacqui had been the one dragging his feet this whole time.

“Come on.”

Jacqui rolled his eyes as he stashed the key in his pocket and followed the captain.

“By the way,” he said on their way out, “happy birthday.”

He dreamed of white lace and feathers and felt soft hands running over his skin—soft, scarred hands that knew just how to touch him. He could never touch them back, and when he woke up, alone in his bed on his ship, he was always left feeling cold, which in turn changed to annoyance. What was worse was that the dreams were starting to leak into his daydreams, and he would find himself zoning out in the middle of things randomly throughout the day, only to think about the dream and the person he was dreaming of.

Jacqui was even starting to notice, which only pissed Rodrigo off. His quartermaster watched Rodrigo one morning as he was getting dressed, arms crossed over his chest. He had just woken Rodrigo up from one of his nice dreams, one where he had even been able to see the face of the person he dreamed of, and he had been tucking blue hair behind their ear when Jacqui woke him up.

Rodrigo grumbled under his breath as he got ready, swearing as he hopped around to pull on his pants when he heard Jacqui speak. “Were you… dreaming about a bird?”

Rodrigo paused, one leg still out of his pants. “What kind of question is that?”

“You said something about a swan.”

Heat flushed Rodrigo’s cheeks, and he angrily finished pulling his pants on. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, or why you’re listening to me talk in my sleep, fucking creep.”

Jacqui rolled his eyes so hard Rodrigo thought they would fall out of his head. “Whatever. Just, hurry up.”

Rodrigo struggled for the rest of the day between trying to bury the dream so he could go about his business and trying to hold onto it as tightly as possible because it had felt nice and he had felt safe and he never got to feel that way. Then, he felt almost guilty for it. He never got to feel that way for a reason, he wasn’t safe. And fuck his dreams for trying to convince him he was, when that was only ever going to end in disappointment.

He couldn’t stop his mind, however, and as he sat at his desk towards the evening, he kept getting distracted by the feather in his quill. It took Jacqui almost three tries of calling him for Rodrigo to even acknowledge that he was there, and even then, it wasn’t until the quartermaster slammed his hands down on the desk that Rodrigo looked up at him with a glare.

“What? I’m busy.”

Jacqui sighed. “Paulina is asking for you.”

That got Rodrigo’s attention; she almost never asked to see him. He stood from his desk, not even bothering to grab his coat as he walked past Jacqui. Ignoring the rest of his crew, he crossed the deck and made his way into the galley, looking around for the cook.

“Abuela?”

Her warm voice came from the back of the kitchen. “Here, mijo, here.”

Rodrigo found her sitting around a barrel of oysters, cleaning them out with a knife. Her long, silver hair was pulled back into a loose bun on top of her head, and her eyebrows were drawn together in focus, making the old scars across her face look even harsher in the dim light. When she saw him, her face softened, and she waved him over, pointing with her chin to a stool next to her.

“Jacqui said you wanted to see me.”

“Mhm.” She waited for him to sit down before holding out another knife to him. “Help me with these for dinner.”

He wrinkled his nose but took the knife from her anyway. “Why do you need me to help? Isn’t that Keean’s job? Has that brat been leaving you to do everything by yourself?”

Paulina clicked her tongue at him. “Keean is a darling and you know that.”

“Not the word I would use.”

She ignored him. “I just wanted to see you. You haven’t been coming to see me lately, what, you forgot all about me?”

“What?” Rodrigo frowned, watching as she continued cleaning out oysters. “I… of course not. How could I forget you when you make such delicious food, Abuelita?”

Shrugging, she tossed a shell over her shoulder. “Jacqui says you’ve been distracted, your head in the clouds with the birds.”

“What does he know,” Rodrigo grumbled, annoyed that Jacqui had even brought it up to her.

“Ah, I don’t see you helping me, mijo.”

Biting his tongue, Rodrigo started to clean the oysters with her, secretly thankful for the opportunity to move his hands. He knew that she had picked up on that over the past decade or so of her traveling with him, and that he couldn’t completely blame Jacqui for her perceptiveness. They sat in silence for a few minutes until Paulina started to hum some old Nopali lullaby that Rodrigo vaguely remembered from his childhood. Back then, it was his Mami who sang to him, though he barely remembered what her voice sounded like anymore. When he hummed along, she smiled, and reached out to pat his knee.

“There he is, mi querida.”

He rolled his eyes, but she wasn’t offended by it, only patting him again before returning to her task. They kept working, both of them humming to each other, until Rodrigo’s knife caught on something. He looked in the oyster and saw a pearl, brilliantly white and surprisingly big. Setting the shell in his lap, he pulled the pearl out and studied it, his thumb tracing over the gemstone slowly.

Even now, when he was so far away, he could still feel the ghost of pearls dragging over his skin, of scarred hands touching him, soft lips pressed against his. He didn’t realize he had been staring at the pearl, lost in thought, until Paulina waved at him, pulling his gaze up to meet hers.

“Ay, Rodrigo.” She smiled at him again, but it was softer, and she looked at him like she could read his thoughts. “You are hopeless. And endlessly stubborn. What is on your mind?”

“It’s… who.”

“Alright.” She nodded, setting down her knife. “Yes, who is on your mind?”

He didn’t elaborate, instead looking down at his hands, his knife in one and the pearl in the other. He saw himself reflected in the blade, and in the pearl… it seemed too pretty for him to hold, and he was almost surprised the knife hadn’t scarred it.

Paulina sighed. “Is it the person you met at that party you and Jacqui went to? The, uhm…” she waved her hand around her face.

“The masquerade,” Rodrigo finished for her. “And… yes.”

“Ah! I had a feeling.”

He frowned, tilting his head. “What does that mean?”

“You’ve gone back to see them a number of times since—what, you think I would not notice how often this ship travels the Queen’s Sea just so you can see someone you like? I am not that old and stupid.”

“I never said you were!” Rolling his eyes, he muttered under his breath, “nosey bruja.”

Paulina hit his leg with the back of her hand, and he yelped, but she was still smiling at him. “You enjoy being with them. You are happier when you come back to the ship, you know.” She laughed through her nose. “And that is good. You deserve someone to make you happy after everything the world has taken from you.”

“I don’t…” he looked down at the pearl again. “They deserve better. They deserve something, or someone, who’s perfect and who can make them happy and I can’t—can’t give them that. I can’t make anyone happy.”

“How dare you say that?” Paulina shook her head, holding his face in her hands. “Mijito, you are not perfect, but nobody is. And in my experience, nobody wants perfect anyways. It would be too boring. You are not boring, are you?” Before he could even answer her, she shook her head again. “No, you are not. And saying you can’t make anyone happy—Madre de Dios, it is like you have never looked around you. I am not unhappy here. Keean is not unhappy here. You and Jacqui argue and argue and drive everyone on this ship crazy, but he is not truly unhappy either. If you made no one happy, don’t you think you would be alone?”

“But this—this is different, I—”

“It is not. Have they ever chased you away?”

“…No.”

“Have they ever told you that you make them unhappy?”

Rodrigo swallowed, feeling like the pearl was caught in his throat. “No.”

“Mi cielo, not everyone is as quiet or as needlessly, infuriatingly stubborn with their feelings as you are. Sometimes, when someone says something, they mean it. Or, if it’s something they haven’t said, that doesn’t mean that they are secretly thinking it. Do you trust this person, your pearl, or your swan, whoever they are?”

He hesitated. Not because he didn’t know his answer, but because he did, and it scared him.

Paulina’s eyes searched his face for a moment. “Do you trust that they mean what they say, that if they didn’t want you around, you would know it?”

That he could answer. No one had an issue telling him when he wasn’t wanted somewhere. “Yes.”

“Then why are you worrying? If I was this person, I would be offended that you thought so little of me to be all tied up like this.” She let go of his face, turning back to her work. “You know, normal people talk about these things with each other.”

Rodrigo huffed, tucking the pearl into his pocket. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I am not normal people.”

She laughed at them. “No, no you certainly are not, mijo. But, if I know right, and I do—” she pointed at him with her knife, “don’t you forget that—your swan likes that about you. Why wouldn’t they?”

He could think of at least half a dozen reasons why someone wouldn’t like him the way he was, but he knew Paulina would not agree—and considering the things he had seen her do with a simple knife he didn’t feel like arguing with her when one was still pointed at him.

Taking his silence as agreement, she continued cutting oysters. “You should bring them by, I want to know what kind of person has captured the heart of the fearsome pirate captain Aguilar.”

Rodrigo just laughed through his nose. He couldn’t see that as an option, at least, not anytime soon, but the idea settled into his mind like a particle, or an irritant, something that would keep prodding at him for a long time.

When they finished with the barrel of oysters, Paulina let him go, kissing both his cheeks, and promised to set aside some extra of the dinner she was making just for his help. It was delicious, of course, and that night he laid in his bed, staring at the pearl between his fingers, the moonlight making it glisten iridescently.

Solo’s fingers went numb the moment Captain Rodrigo appeared from behind the ice sculpture.

“I don’t remember seeing your name on the guest list,” Solo mused coolly, doing her best to hide her surprise.

“You wouldn’t have because they put me in charge of the decorations,” Rodrigo replied as he scooped Solo’s wrist in his hands and stroked warmth back into her chilled skin.

Solo arched a brow. “Interesting. I thought that was my job–”

Rodrigo abruptly pulled Solo’s hand to his face and brushed his lips over her scarred knuckles. For a moment, his dark lashes fanned over his band of freckles as he dropped his gaze and whispered, “You look beautiful.”

Caught off guard by the pirate’s compliment, Solo fell silent. Her free hand came to rest where the silver fabric made a deep cut down her chest.

“More than anyone else here anyway,” Rodrigo grunted before Solo could summon a proper thank you. Then he pulled her away from the sculpture.

The seamstress wanted to return the compliment in some way. She almost told Rodrigo that he looked better too now that he wasn’t wearing that poor spotted creature on his back. But instead, she asked, “Taking me to see your decorations, Captain?”

“Something like that,” Drigo mumbled.

Solo didn’t press him any further. She was content admiring the way his tunic shifted across his broad shoulders with each of his long strides. She couldn’t help but wonder if Rodrigo was just in the neighborhood or if he caught wind of the wedding and came seeking Solo out.

However it was that Rodrigo came to find Solo, she was glad that he did.

The pirate eventually pulled Solo under a knot of mistletoe tucked away from the crowds. Then he asked her if she knew what it was they were standing under. When Solo said that yes, she did know, Rodrigo’s hands came to secure her waist and bring her in until their hips connected.

Then Drigo asked, “Do you know how this works?”

“Rodrigo — Baby. Do you think I was born under a rock?” Solo kissed him impatiently. “Of course I know how mistletoe works.”

Rodrigo muttered something about not being too sure since Solo was so damn sheltered. The seamstress indignantly nipped at Drigo’s lower lip.

“I may be sheltered, but I know how to break loose when I feel like it.” She held Rodrigo’s face steady in her hands. Her voice dipped lower. “Or when I’ve found someone worth leaving this sheltered life for.”