Ocean's Justice

Part 12

Twelve

William slammed the door behind us and threw his shirt on his bunk. "What were you thinking? Why didn't you stay here like I told you to?" he demanded, lifting the bucket of water onto the locker. He cupped some water in his hands and splashed it on his face before he dumped the remainder over his head, sending water everywhere – even on me, on the other side of the tiny cabin. A puddle started to form on the deck by his feet. "A fight is no place for a woman. You could have been…ungh!" His words faded into agonised sounds as he gingerly fingered his ribs. Bruises were already forming beneath the skin and I feared the bones were broken.

He dropped to his knees and rummaged through the locker. Pulling out a roll of cloth, he held it out to me. "Here. All women know how to bandage, don't they? Natural-born nurses and all."

I took the roll and examined it. It was barely bigger than my fist – a rolled strip perhaps as wide as my wrist. I stared at the man who now stood before me. He looked expectant, but I lifted my shoulders in a shrug. I had no idea what he wanted me to do.

He made an exasperated sound and snatched the cloth back. William proceeded to unroll the fabric, wrapping it around his chest repeatedly, grimacing in pain as the poorly-applied bandage slipped down his torso.

Realisation dawned. He wanted me to bind his broken ribs. "William," I said, reaching out to touch him. The bandage slipped from his fingers and slid down to his waist. I smiled as I unwound it. First, I needed to check where he was injured – if I put too much pressure on a different injury to support his ribs, I could do further damage.

I touched my fingers to the darkest bruising.

"Hey! That hurts!" he complained, shrinking away from my touch.

Holding my hand over his injury, I repeated, "Hurts?" I shifted my hand to his stomach, which appeared undamaged. "No hurts?" For what felt like the hundredth time, I wished I knew the words to ask him for what I needed. I wanted to be able to say, "Tell me what hurts, you great big baby, so I know what to tend first."

William sighed and pointed to his bruise. "This hurts." He gestured at his cheek, where his angry scrubbing had reopened the cut on his lip. "This." He held up his hands, so that I could see where the skin had split across his reddened knuckles. "These, too."

I nodded, but it was his ribs that I focussed on. Broken or just bruised? Kaito had kicked him hard, but surely not hard enough to break bone, nor had William crashed into anything afterwards. Avoiding the dark discolouration, I probed the hard muscle around it. His skin was hot and moist beneath my fingers, but he didn't flinch the way he had before. Trying to be as light as possible, I touched the bruising again, following the line of his ribs to ascertain if there really was a fracture. No – they seemed intact.

"No broke. Hurt, no broke," I announced, biting the unravelled cloth to tear it into two pieces. I took his hand in mine and bound his fingers in the length of cloth, tying it at the end to secure it. I did the same with his other hand. "No hurt," I assured him, smiling.

His lips lifted a little and blood trickled from the cut. I had no cloth left, but I knew where he kept his handkerchief. I slipped my fingers into his pants pocket, feeling for the folded square of fabric. Through the thin pocket lining, I could feel more hot, hard muscle beneath, but I'd also found the bunched-up handkerchief, so I withdrew my hand and dabbed at his lip. William took the handkerchief from me and did his own dabbing, looking conflicted.

"You shouldn't go rifling through a man's pockets like that. You might find things a lady like yourself shouldn't…oughtn't…" He stopped as if searching for the words to continue while his face grew red with embarrassment. This seemed to fuel some fire within him. "What were you thinking? Jumping from the mast into a ring of fighting men. You could have been killed. You could have been hurt. One of them might have attacked you – I might have attacked you. Kaito did. Did he hit you – hurt you?" Anger turned to panic. "Are you hurt?" He framed my face in his hands, his eyes boring into mine.