quigonejinn

Part I.

In this world, Hornblower never comes back from France: no, it's not that he stays in France after the Hundred Days, nor is it that he dies on the execution ground in Paris.

Instead, he escapes. He goes into the icy river with Bush and Brown, and spends the winter at Gracay with the Comte and Marie. He goes down the Loire, is there to take command of the Witch of Endor, but he is also there when one of the pursuing ships gets close eough to send one-pounder through his chest.

One moment, he's living. The next he's not. Maria is, months before, with the birth of her last child, dead.

...

The world we are not talking about is not the one, closely related, where Bush walks away from from the Bond Street house with a five month old baby in his arms, gets into a stage coach, and raises Richard Arthur as at Sheerness. In that world, Hornblower made provisions in case of his death, had it put in writing that if he were to die at sea and if something should happen to Maria, too, Bush would be guardian of his children -- he never had a thought that Bush would die before him. It seemed impossible that anything hould ever happen to a man who had survived the deck of the Renown, the fight against the Natvidad.

In the world we are talking about, Hornblower never commits those words to paper. He says the words to Maria. Maria lives long enough to gasp out a few delirious words to Barbara Wellesley, who is there in the blood and stink and terror of a woman who is dying from the inside out of complications from childbirth, and she pants out, rotting so badly that even her breath smells of it, "If he had lived, Bush would have had the child."

Bush is dead. Hornblower is dead. After Maria is in the ground, Barbara brings a nurse to the house and takes him back with her to the house, and when Bush comes back from France with the Witch, takes a look at the boy in his cradle trimmed with lace, wet nurse rocking it with her foot, he decides not to press whatever claim he might have had.

Even with his new captaincy, Bush feels, obscurely, in his heart, that the Wellesleys can give Hornblower's son a better life than a one-legged captain pensioned off at a backwater yard ever could.

He does make Barbara promise -- is grief-stricken enough about Hornblower to push her on this, to make her come close to swearing on her name -- to let him see the boy whenever he comes to London, and starting the year that Richard Arthur is old enough to walk, Bush comes to London for a week.

...

When Richard Arthur is young, he has to learn not to be frightened of Bush anew every year: he cries the first year, whimpers the second. Bush is like nothing else he sees in his life. He is as far from the comforting, soft nurse as could possibly be imagined by a terrified child, makes such a strange noise when he walks, so there is a tense half-hour in the nursery where Bush has to win him over anew, but in the end, he always does.

The gold on his uniform helps. So, too, does the fact that Bush has gentle hands, and quite definitely, it helps that he brings a little present -- the other men that come viiting to the house and to whom Richard Arthur has to be presented bring sweets or books, but the first present that Richard Arthur ever receives from Bush is a twist of rope, as large as a man's hand, made out of finest hemp, so cleverly and richly knotted that it seems as though there is only one end.

Bush explains that he had a toy like this when he was young -- Richard Arthur is too young to understand the words, but Bush explains that he is from a town where they made rope for the Navy, that he played with one much like this when he was small, and as it turns out, Richard Arthur has what Bush attributes as his father's mind. Instead of just chewing on the knot of rope with breaks for banging it against any available hard surface, as Bush did, Richard Arthur is immediately fascinated by the twists and turns. There is banging and chewing, too, but also Richard turning it over and over in his hands, then looking up at Bush, who is seated close by, in a chair, leaning forward so that his elbows are on his knees.

The next morning, when Bush comes to see him again, Richard Arthur goes to him willingly, with outstretched arms and a very sodden knot of hemp.

...

The sight of the grizzled one-legged Navy captain going down the street, hand in hand with a tiny boy still in dresses, is something.

So is the sight, a few hours later, of the captain gently carrying an exhausted and very muddy boy back the street to the Wellesley house -- that happens when Richard Arthur is four. Bush has mud in the buttons of his coat for days, and after that week, for a solid month, Richard Arthur squeals every time he sees a Navy uniform because he expects it to be his friend, come back early to play with him again.

...

They never go anywhere particularly important. There are days that they spend entirely in the nursery together, eating at the low table by the fire, with Bush even putting Richard Arthur to bed by telling him stories about the sea and singing, as a lullaby, that he swears the method by which proper sailors learn their letters -- A is the Anchor, and that you all know, B is the bowspirit over the bow. Most of the time, the nurse is there; some of the times, she is not. One time, Bush takes Richard Arthur with him to the Admiralty. He must go in and see someone for a moment, and he can bring Richard Arthur with him into the building, but he must leave the boy outside with the secretary.

A lieutenant comes by to leave some papers to leave for the Second Sea Lord, and he looks at Richard Arthur sitting on the gilded chair with his feet two feet off the groud. The secretary makes a non-commital gesture.

"Hornblower's boy," he says in a low voice. "You remember that business from a few years back -- the Witch of Endor? Hornblower was the one who got blown to bits just as the Triumph was coming into view and chased them off. So it's Hornblower's old lieutenant in town and brought the boy around."

The lieutenant looks over at Richard Arthur, expensively dressed in a trimmed suit with real silver shoe buckles and buttons, a hat made out of beaver felt, trimmed, too, a splendid model of a frigate on the seat next to him.

"He must be doing doing well enough for himself."

"Barbara Leighton, actually. He's her ward. You remember who her brothers are."

The lieutenant whistles, shakes his head in appreciation, and Richard Arthur continues to study the moldings of ships decorating the ceiling and swing his feet.

...

"Mother, if you must marry again, why can't you marry Captain Bush? He's splendid. You would like him."

...

Richard Arthur has only been close enough to three people to know them by their smell: first, there is his nurse, who smells like bread and fresh linen. Then, there is his mother, whose cheek smells like flowers and dry powder. He usually visits her in the morning, while she has her coffee and fruit, and thus, he associates her with the smell of coffee, as well as a vague dread that he is about to be examined for how well he knows his lessons.

The third person is Bush. He smells nothing like the other two, and now that he is old enough to sleep in a bed of his own, in a room of his own, too, wear a proper jacket, Richard is never held so much as the week every year when Bush come to visit.

Bush smells like nobody else that Richard knows, and when Richard asks, Bush laughs, sniffs his sleeve and says that he doesn't think that he smells like anything.

When Richard learns to write, the first letter that he writes is to his mother. It is copied out of the book; it is about the duties of a son, and he writes it in the nursery with his tutor looking over his shoulder and correcting his letter formation.

The second that he writes, the firts that he ever really puts together for himself, is to Bush. There are ink blots over half the page, and Bush laughs for half a day when he gets it and finds that it is signed Richard Arthur Hornblower, Esq. with the tail on the q attached to the wrong side of the letter.

...

When Richard Arthur is seven, Bush brings him a model of a ship -- he explains that it is a model of the Sutherland, as close like to what it actually was as he could make it, and Richard Arthur is fascinated. Bush shows him the tiny, delicate lines of catgut that can be used to raise and lower the main sails. Also points out the quarterdeck as where his father would stand during a ship to ship action, and later that afternoon, they re-enact Trafalgar on the floor of the nursery with the Sutherland on her stand playing the part of the Victory and Bush's hat playing the part of the Temeraire.

They execute all the maneuvers. Bush supplies, from memory, the signals that make up the first part of the famous message, and has Richard Arthur work out the flags for "D U T Y" himself. Bush plays the part of Villeneuve, complete with terrible Frog accent, ordering the French fleet out to meet the British, and when it come time for the Redoubtable to lock masts with the Victory, Richard Arthur snatches up Bush's hat from the floor, puts it on his head, curls his arm up inside his sleeve so that he has a fin, and then plays out the whole of being shot.

He staggers, falls backward, goes onto his knees, and then lies very still on the floor.

There is a pool of sunshine on the nursery floor, and after a moment or so of lying there, Richard Arthur decides it is to bright to lie there comfortably, so he props himelf up to ask if Bush will then carry him down belowdecks so that they can do the death scene -- and he is surprised to see his friend staring at him, tears in his eyes, unable to speak.

It is not just that Nelson died at Trafalgar, that Bush was a junior lietuenant on the Temeraire, and that every good officer who was at Trafalgar ad may who were not still mourn Nelson: it is also that Hornblower died on the deck of the Witch and that Bush was standing four feet away.

...

When Richard Arthur is nine, almost ten, his step-father decides that it is appropriate for him to go to away to school. His marriage to Barbara is not going well -- she remains cool to him despite having taken his name, and they have been trying to conceive for years without success. During fights, she drops hints, too, about what the boy or, rather, the boy's father meant to her, and Pemberwick thinks that perhaps if they send this reminder of the past away, perhaps the future could be better.

Bush comes for his annual visit, and three hours into their first afternoon, Richard Arthur mortifies himself by bursting into tears in public at Bush's inquiry into how his studies are going. They are at the park with a scale model of the Hotspur between them, and Richard crushes the mizzenmast and most of the waist when he tries to hide his face after he blurts out that they've dismissed his tutor and given his nurse notice because they are sending him away to school in two months, and won't Bush please let him go away with him this year?

Richard makes the most extravagant promises. He will be Bush's secretary. He knows a little Latin, a little French, can write with a fine hand. Bush always praises his head for numbers, so he could keep accounts if Bush needed that, and he could sleep at the office if he would be in the way for Bush at home -- Richard promises to behave himself as long as Bush won't send him away, and then, there is a long, awkward moment where Bush canot speak, where Richard is bawling partially in terror of school, partially in shame at crying in the first place, but mostly from relief of finally admitting that he does not want to go away, even if it is not all that far from London, from his nurse and nursery and the woman he has called his mother all his life.

Bush's arm is around him, and the Hotspur is all smashed to bits between the two of them.

...

A pool of sunlight. Supper eaten and done with on the table, and Bush and Richard Arthur on their stomachs, on the floor, looking at one of the model ships. Richard points to each part of the ship as they get to that part in the song. THe has known this song for years, so he does not stumble much, but if he ever does, Bush prompts him.

A is the Anchor, and that you all know.

B is the bowspirit over the bow.

Somewhat later, when they've started singing together.

Q is the quarterdeck where our captain oft stood.

...

Bush does not see Richard Arthur again for more than six years. There are letters, more frequent in the beginning, fewer later on, none for months towards the end, and no visits.

Part II.

The house is at the edge of Sheerness.

It is low, built fairly close to the ground. There is less space in the yard given over to vegetables than might be expected. After all these years, it is still a small household, and it is close enough to the sea, too, that efforts to grow the standard assortment are not successful. The captain follows, for the most part, a sea diet with substitutions, and with the right wind, the air smells like the sea, not the marsh or town. The healthy air is why the house was built on the site it was, and inside, the house is dark and still. There is a clock on the mantle above the fireplace; there is nothing in this area that is grown all that well, but the house is in the style of a prosperous farmhouse, though there is a second floor.

Night is coming, and the owner of the house is on the doorstep, watching for signs of the carriage. Due to years of training at sea, he does not put his hands in his pockets. Instead, he has them clasped behind him, and now, he walks in the dust beyond the doorstep. There is a sunset to the west; dinner is laid on the table, and by the guest's plate, there is a model of a ship that has been carefully repaired and mended. All the rigging had to be replaced; the mizzenmast was re-set.

The lettering on the stern gives the name. It has been repainted, and underneath, just barely visible are the remnants of the first. Under examination, it becomes apparent that it, too, reads Hotspur -- it creates a strange, doubled effect.

It is almost ghostlike.

...

Bush might never have seen Richard Arthur again if Richard hadn't irritated his stepfather as much as he did: he was almost expelled for poor marks in the first term of the year, and then, for a short period, he was expelled for poor behavior. Barbara refused to punish him beyond reducing his allowance, and his stepfather refused to have him home for the summer holiday. The punishment was to send him to his uncle's, to learn a little sea discipline and be separated from trouble and troublesome friends.

The carriage does not arrive until well into the twilight. It is completely dark except for the lantern by the door and the lanterns on the carriage; Richard Arthur is the only passenger on the carriage, which will be going back to London after this. Bush and the driver are discussing the unloading of the carriage. In mid-word, Bush breaks off and looks over, and even in the light from the lantern by the door and the carriage, it is not easy for him and Richard Arthur to see each other.

Bush's house is low and small. There is only one light inside it, one boy, a little younger than Richard, wrestling with the boxes at the back of the carriage. Richard and Bush look at each other for a long moment; Bush opens his mouth as if to say something. He even has his hand extended.

And then, Richard walks into the house and goes directly to bed.

...

The first days are not entirely bad. Like all experiences, it is a mix. It is a busy period at the Dockyard, so Bush works late and occaisionally stays in Sheerness. He has a letter from Lady Barbara's husband, telling him a little of Richard Arthur's troubles, so that Bush was not entirely unprepared. He had expected it, to a certain extent. The Hotspur goes up on the mantle, and two days later, when the carriage had been long gone and Richard Arthur had been continuously penned in the house with only the housekeeper and her sullen daughter of a maid for company. He has gone through the four books in the house, and one afternoon, Bush takes him out onto the sea.

...

[RA fucking a tavern girl. RA talking up his social status, the estate his stepfather has]

...

[RA getting into trouble with sons local good families that he thinks are beneath him.]

...

[stupid vandalism, Bush being furious, snarling, "If you'd been mine to raise -- "]

stalked away. The next time he went down to the [name of brothel], he heard, with a laugh, this uncle had been there, paid up RA's debt, and had some on the side for himelf, too.

...

[RA's crazy, Hotspur-style jealousy. Shift this section to his POV -- how does he know to make the moves on Bush?]

...

This part of the story should be told by Bush: two nights after Bush paid the tab, Richard Arthur went to bed early, stayed there for a long time, and then, when Bush had gone to sleep, came into the bed and woke Bush. A few footsteps, the creak of the door when he closed it behind him. There was a lock, but it was not turned, and Bush woke when the footsteps came close. Moonlight came iinto the room brightly enough so that even with the curtains mostly, Bush could turn and see Richard's face. He thought for a moment that perhaps, Richard wanted to lay against him in the way that a child might curl up against a parent, but Richard began to kiss his throat and chest. He ran his lips over Bush's collarbone, used his tongue on the line of Bush's jaw, and something like a noise started to come out of Bush's throat.

Still no words.

Then, Richard stripped his nightshirt off so that he was naked. Richard had not closed the curtains entirely when he came to the bed, and the moonlight made his skin look blue and silver. Shadows over his chest. More between his legs, in the hollows of his elbows, and also where his hair fell over his houlders.

Bush was not looking at him, though. He was staring up at the canopy on the bed instead, and slowly, deliberately, Richard slid down on the bed, licked his lips twice, then wrapped his mouth around the tip of Bush's cock. Pushed the hem of Bush's shirt up, slid his mouth down, and it went until Bush could stand it no more, pulled Richard up and off of him. Put his arms arund him, kissed him until he couldn't taste any more of himself in Richard's mouth -- when Richard tried to speak, Bush pressed his fingers to the back of Richard's jaw to make him mouth open wider so that he could be kissed more deeply.

One hand was at the back of Richard's head like that. The other pressed down on Richard's back so that he would lie more closely against Bush; it was hard for Bush not to wrap his arms around Richard and simply squeeze until they were both breathless.

A moment more, and then Bush came, gasping, against the skin of a boy he'd carried in his arms and sung to sleep.

Richard curled up against him afterwards. He wrapped his arms around Bush, put his head on Bush's shoulder, took a deep, held it, then let out with happiness after reassuring himself that Bush smelled the same as he had all those years ago, and for a man who was as unused the sentiment as Bush was, guilt like this was terrifying.

...

breakfast the next morning. Bush staying away from Richard.

...

second time: boating. [RA giving Bush the silent treatment, Bush looking at him]

clumsy, with more teeth than Richard Arthur wuld have normally tolerated, but so hard and good nonetheless that he arched his head back against the rocks, arched his back, and moaned, a little, originally for the form of the thing, then with sincerity, until his throat ached for the whole of the aternoon.

At first, it was more in the order of gasps, but he loudened, gained a vocabulary. Bush put his hands on Richard's hips, held him fast to the rock so that he was working his mouth over Richard and not the other way around.

Whenever Richard looked down at the sight, words went from his mind. When he closed his eyes and listened, he heard the waves breaking on sh ore in the distance and the wet sounds of Bush sucking his cock close up, close and obscenely loud, and he didn't even have the presence of mind to grab onto Bush's head and give him some kind of warning. If he thought about what it felt like, too, on top of that -- Richard had a vague notion that he was using his fingers to claw at the rock, that Bush had let go of his hips and that he'd started shoving himself down Bush's mouth and throat, as far as he could go. Bush had figured out the knack of tilting his head back and dropping his shoulders; Bush had figured out how to breathe through his nose, was letting him do it, and it was amazing, too, to open his eyes afterwards and see his old friend wiping his mouth off on a bit of handkerchief.

The sea was behind Bush. The boat was still half-dragged up on shore, and Bush was looking at the boat. He had seen something that needed fixing with it, so he went off towards it, picking his way over the gravel and wobbling more than once.

When the moon was up that night, Bush came to Richard's room, kissed Richard, put his hands through Richard's hair, kissed him some more, then spread Richard's legs so wide that Richard had to hold onto the headboard to keep himself off the bed, and Bush fucked him from behind until neither of them could, despite the start of dawn coming into the room, see anymore.

...

[dialogue piece: in bed after sex. Bush holding RA's hands, looking dwn at them. your father, collecting the prize crews on the Renown. "Your father saved my life so many times."]

...

[trip to see Maria's grave, them sharing a bed because the inn is booked up, and Richard Arthur listening to Bush snore. Bush's explanation that there had been two children. He did not know where they were buried]

...

[another boating trip, no sex this time -- talking about wretched tseamships. Bush eventually alpsing silent. RA looking at Bush looking out at the horizon, realizing just how much Bush still loves Hornblower. ]

...

[Finding a bit of knot lying n the mantle, next to the model of the Temeraire. Rememberig how he had once been to hardy's house in London, how a picture of Nelson hung i the entryway of the houe -- it went with Hardy when he went to sea, came back to shore with him, too.]

...

[dialogue bit: the revamp of FC so that HH is not the one who meets Hardy -- it's Bush and Hardy, two men who have lost their leaders. Bush touching himself to show where the cannonball hit Hornblower]

...

Rich remembered one afternoon with Bush -- there was no wo, him on top of Bush, RA naked. Bush sitting on the edge of the bed, RA kneeling with his legs on either side of Bush's, alterately kissing Bush and getting finger-fucked until he was hard. face with Bush's hand in the small of his back, light as a breath. RA hving his eyes cloesd, and he knows that tbush is watching him]

...

[RA at his window, packing, watching Bush at work in the back, building a larger boat. hirt off, working in the heat, and RA looks out. Goes back to packing, thinks abuit later going out to the whorehouse.

Sheerness as a burying ground for ships now that the war is over. The only whole ships are the model ones in Bush's office.]

...

[RA leaving at the end of the summer. Bush asking him if he's sure that he doesn't want to take the Hotspur. RA being sure -- he thinks, instead, that he's gt that knot he took from the mantle]

...

[memory of a boating trip]

...

[Ending; RA's marriage, the banquet afterwards, outside because it's good weather. Rosebushes. Bush in the back, gray-haired, sitting in sunshine to ease his rheumatism. Contrast with RA's new wife, pretty and young and wildly happy]

"To Captain Bush and the summer he loved me as much almost as he loved my father, who had been his captain on so many ships and in so many parts of the world."

Bush seemed surprised by the applause that he got, stood rather awkward and, blushing, bobbed a bow to the assembled. There were a few calls for a return toast, but Bush looked embarrassed. He waved them off and sat down again, heavily, still smiling at pleasure at having been recognized, so handsome even with his wooden leg and age and old-fashioned black suit that, in the end, Richard Arthur had to tell himelf it was the sunlight, remembered from so many years ago, while lying on the floor in his nursery and acting out the battle at Trafalgar, that made his throat ache and tears come to his eyes.

slipped into bed and woke Bush -- the moon was coming into the room enough so that even with the curtains mostly, Bush could turn and see Richard's face. He thought for a moment that perhaps, Richard wanted to lay against him in the way that a child might curl up against a parent, but Richard began to kiss his throat and chest. He ran his lips over Bush's collarbone, used his tongue on the line of Bush's jaw, and something like a noise started to come out of Bush's throat

There was a moment where Richard stripped his nightshirt off so that he was naked. Richard had not closed the curtains entirely when he came to the bed, so the moonlight made his skin look blue and silver. Shadows over his chest. More between his legs, in the hollows of his elbows, and also where his hair fell over his houlders.

Bush was not looking at him, though. He was staring up at the canopy on the bed instead, and slowly, deliberately, Richard slid down on the bed, licked his lips twice, then wrapped his mouth around the tip of Bush's cock. Pushed the hem of Bush's shirt up, slid his mouth down, and it went until Bush could stand it no more, pulled Richard up and off of him. Put his arms arund him, kissed him until he couldn't taste any more of himself in Richard's mouth -- when Richard tried to speak, Bush pressed his fingers to the back of Richard's jaw to make him mouth open wider so that he could be kissed more deeply.

One hand was at the back of Richard's head like that. The other pressed down on Richard's back so that he would lie more closely against Bush; it was hard for Bush not to wrap his arms around Richard and simply squeeze until they were both breathless.

A moment more, and then Bush came, gasping, against the skin of a boy he'd carried in his arms and sung to sleep.

Richard curled up against him afterwards. He wrapped his arms around Bush, put his head on Bush's shoulder, took a deep, held it, then let out with happiness after reassuring himself that Bush smelled the same as he had all those years ago, and for a man who was as unused the sentiment as Bush was, guilt like this was terrifying.