4. The top three people who touch Stede, or who Stede touches, are Ed, Mary... and IZZY.
Which is pretty impressive, considering these are three people who don't appear in every episode with Stede.
Figure 1. Dreadful enemy is totally cool with staring at hero's mouth.
With regard to Mary:
We know from context that they've had sex at least twice, and likely more often than that due to the age difference between the kids. (They had a daughter first; for the purposes of inheritance, I suspect they had to keep on trying until they had a son.) We could theoretically call the character of Alma between 10 and 13 years old -- meaning that Stede's had at least a decade to get body-comfortable with Mary.
Stede will undress in the same room as her, but that's not particularly special for him (he also dressed/undressed at least twice with Ed, and spent a not-insignificant amount of time bare-chested after Izzy cut his shirt up. For the early 1700s, Stede is remarkably free and easy with showing his body).
They share a bed. His memories show him curled away from Mary in the past, not touching at all, but from Mary's viewpoint he tends to starfish extravagantly. Either Stede's memory is wonky (and it might be), or his sleep behavior could be considered a reflection of his innate wish to touch and be touched, without the fears he carries while awake. (Or maybe he's just a bed-hogging jerk. He can contain multitudes.)
Mary's method of dealing with Stede is clearly one of withdrawal. While she tries to initiate touch with him at the wedding by taking his hand, and she'll gesture into his personal space when she's more in charity with him (when she gives her anniversary gift; on the porch of Evelyn's house), she otherwise tends to leave his presence when she's angry or upset. It's interestingly passive compared to her very direct murder attempt, and also plays into, or was even instrumental in building, Stede's own maladaptive touch behavior.
Figure 2. Standard intimacy in heterosexual marriage.
In a fascinating inversion of the moonlight scene with Ed, when Stede says "May I?" to Mary's heart (the advertisement for her gallery opening), he waits with his hand out for her to give it to him, rather than taking it from her.
I do think Stede is fond of Mary, though, and tried to show it -- specifically, he knelt and got into her personal space when presenting his gift to her (a mirror of his kneeling and suggesting co-captaining to Ed). And I do think they were used to being in one another's personal space when they weren't upset or arguing -- he lets her close enough to cover his eyes for his gift, and when she hugs him, she purposefully does so at an angle and in such a way that he could choose not to touch her directly in return-- which is the kind of compromise one learns to make after a decade, I think. What's sweet, though, is that while he doesn't hug her back, he does lean his head against hers -- accepting the opening she gave him.
Figure 3. The positive results of carefully developed intricate heterosexual rituals.
Welp. Fuck it, yup, we gotta talk about Izzy Hands.
In their first meeting, Izzy uses his sword to undress Stede -- and Stede doesn't retreat. Stede then pushes the point of his knife into Izzy's cheek. This is in contrast to how Stede threatens the French captain in episode 5, where the knife does not touch the captain's skin at all.
And actually, with that introduction, let's also bring in Stede's Thing about angles... Stede starts the scene facing Izzy directly; he turns so he's right-angled to Izzy after Izzy has stripped him. Later, in Spanish Jackie's, they're almost entirely at right angles even as they argue. On the Revenge, they're back to face-to-face when Stede calls him a raging asshole, and the whole duel... well. These two go back and forth between Stede's version of intimacy and everybody else's version of intimacy like someone's flicking a lightswitch.
Speaking of Spanish Jackie's: While Izzy purposefully gets into Stede's personal space to menace him, Stede also gets into Izzy's space (and uses his own taller height to invade further); they notably spend this interaction intentionally getting closer to one another, which is unusual for Stede.
Figure 4. Eighteenth-century Spy vs Spy get into one another's space and very heterosexually do weird things with their faces.
There's a fascinating parallel in episode 6: the only two skin-on-skin touches are when Ed leans his forehead against Stede's hand in the bathtub... and when Izzy punches Stede in the face with his bare fist.
The majority of Stede's acts of violence happen against Izzy, and the majority are either symbolically or explicitly (within the context of the show) intimate/sexual.
And we finally get to Ed. I'm not even going to try and categorize this shit. If you go to the raw data you can see the whole shebang, so I'm just gonna give the highlights now that I've gone over Stede's multifaceted Touch Stuff. Particularly notable moments will be in red:
Dreaming and waking up: Stede gasps/flinches simultaneous to Ed's hand lifting as he wakes; Stede sinks down away from Ed's hand when Ed stops him from rising; it's possible that Ed helps Stede as Stede dresses into his breeches and then again into Ed's clothes
The leap year mistake: Stede is touching the capstan when Ed leaps onto it; Stede does not move away; Stede slides an elbow onto the capstan while Ed is sitting on it; when Ed realizes his mistake and gets down, Stede lifts a hand as if to comfort and/or stop him but puts it down again; Ed touches the capstan while Stede is still doing so and slides his hand on it while circling to leave
Figure 5. The start of the complex capstan flirtation.
The lighthouse: Stede sets down his lighthouse painting such that it touches Ed's leg; Stede gets mouthfuls of alcohol from same bottle Ed was drinking from; Ed hugs Stede from the side, hands on Stede's bare upper arm (Stede is happy but does not reciprocate)
Looting the French ship: Stede doesn't flinch in surprise from Ed entering his personal space from behind; Ed gets further into Stede's space to knock books from Lucius and grazes against him
Teaching dining: Stede withdraws and moves away in face of Ed's anger, then steps forward to "fix" the situation; Stede rights Ed's chair but releases it before Ed touches it
Moonlight scene: Stede pulls silk from Ed; Stede gets into Ed's personal space; Stede tucks silk into Ed's waistcoat pocket; Ed approaches but Stede stiffens; Ed claps Stede's arm instead of falling onto his mouth
Ship life: When Stede sits on deck next to Ed, one leg is extended toward Ed while the other is folded under, and Ed leans toward Stede while laughing (it's also possible that he puts his hand on Stede's knee, but off-camera) -- Stede also leans in as he laughs
Practice fight: Stede and Ed practice with swords; Ed threatens Stede with gun; Stede stabs Ed; Stede unexpectedly embraces Ed in an effort to hold him up (but notably his hand flutters uncertainly before actually committing); Ed and Stede talk closely while Stede holds him up
Figure 6. Ridiculous man leaves handsome pirate hanging unsupported on his sword for several moments because he somehow doubts that handsome pirate really wants to be embraced by ridiculous man.
Tub Scene: Stede knocks down the washroom door to get into Ed's space; Stede kneels next to tub and touches edge; Stede moves hand closer along the edge; Stede puts his hand on Ed's shoulder; Ed rests his forehead against Stede's bare hand
Morning routine: Stede hands Ed a cup of tea; Stede and Ed speak closely in each other's personal space; Stede lets the lace of his cuffs brush Ed's arm several times (unusual for Stede)
Figure 7. Gentleman drags lace of sleeve over arm of local heartthrob like a debutante brushing her skirts against the handsomest man at the ball, the flirt
Snake eating: Stede and Ed's pant legs graze slightly while sitting on log; Stede asks Ed to come closer and cleans his beard
Co-captains: Stede kneels behind couch where Ed sits sideways (right angles); Stede rests his bare arm against Ed's; Stede resettles his bare arm again against Ed's
General Ed behavior with Jack around: Spends a lot of time touching Stede to placate or show his affection, which Stede permits and sometimes provides opportunities for (such as leaning on the stair baluster in front of Ed, giving Ed the chance to lean on it too)
Cove plans: Stede leans in to offer Ed a nature walk, but then leans away when Ed demurs
Yardies: Ed and Stede start by grazing clothing and hair to look at Roach in the water but when the camera cuts back there is significant space between them and Pete has his hands on both their shoulders
Bathroom break: Stede technically permits who he thought was Ed to be in his personal peeing space (which is apparently a Sacred Space, or so I've heard from cis dudes?)
The British: when Ed's boot touches his shoe, Stede purposefully lifts his own foot to rest his stockinged ankle on top of Ed's boot-tip (very direct compared to Stede's usual plausibly deniable physical overtures)
Camp: Stede sits on Ed's bunkbed; unclear if Ed taps Stede's knee when offers to fold his clothing (if it does, it's off-camera)
The kiss: Scene starts with Stede curled up tightly on the beach, knees up and elbows tucked tightly in; Ed sits closely to Stede, at which point Stede lets his elbows wing out into Ed's personal space; Stede leans in to whisper; Ed kisses Stede (at a right angle again) with his hand on his face, shoulder, sinking down Stede's back; Ed shifts to get closer to Stede and make the angle between them more acute; Stede shifts to lower and open his knees; unclear if Stede touches Ed's knee (off-camera, could be part of his own shifting position); 💖Stede kisses back💖; after the kiss they settle back, widening the angle again slightly but remain curled in toward each other; Ed is holding Stede's hands (Stede is not grasping back, his hands appear to be folded into Ed's); very subtle leaning back from both of them for remainder of scene (indicative of concerns after the fact, or just necessity of filming? unclear)
Figure 8. Deeply surprised middle-aged man suddenly discovers that kissing someone back is actually an amazing goddamn idea, holy shit. Was this always possible? Could he have been doing this this whole time?
...And that's it. That's the whole thing.
✨~Stede is fucking weird about touch.~✨
Please write more things that address this issue, I beg of you.
-----
-> Review the raw data and notes
-> Go to part 1: Stede wants to be touched, but is afraid of it.
-> Go to part 2: Stede will avoid touch to protect himself.
-> Go to part 3: Stede has found/developed "safe" ways to physically interact with people.
看得我半夜大喊大叫脚趾蜷缩你们怎么这么可爱啊啊啊啊啊
