BACK TO THE PAST
Chapter Eighteen
They were gone. A noise in the distance, a
little flash of light, and the adventure was over. Jack and Rose went back
home. Gary couldn't help but worry if they'd made it back all right, but he was
living proof of that.
Christine put her arm around her twin brother
and gave him a little squeeze. "Come on," she said with sisterly
affection. "Let's go home."
"Let's go home," Gary echoed.
The Dawson twins walked back to their car in
peaceful silence, swinging the arms back and forth--oblivious to the fact that
they walked in perfect unison. They were more alike than they thought. The
police had left Doc alone. They thought they had the time machine cornered when
they saw the flash at the end of the road. Doc was just getting in the house.
They waved to him as they got in and headed for home.
As they crept into the house, careful not to
wake their parents, they stopped in front of a few pictures of their
grandparents. Christine smiled.
"Look at those two kids," she said,
pointing at the picture of their wedding.
"Yeah." Gary looked at the adjacent
photo of their fiftieth anniversary. "A couple of kids."
April 17, 1912
Jack and Rose were back to familiar
surroundings. Well, almost familiar surroundings. They were in a field in upstate
New York so as to hide the time machine.
"Glad to be back?" Doc asked. He
was the only one who had been there through their whole ordeal with them.
Jack sighed. "Ya know, it was one of
those adventures every little boy dreams of. Now it's over, and I--we--have to
return to normal life. Whatever that is."
"It's whatever you make it!" Doc
patted him on the shoulder. He smiled sadly. It might be the last time he ever
saw them. When he returned to 1996, there would be no more Jack and Rose
Dawson. But it was good to know, that somewhere in some time, they would always
be there.
He climbed into the DeLorean, the last of his
team to leave. He saluted the young couple and pulled out and up. As the time
machine lifted off, Jack and Rose headed toward the train station to go back to
the city.
April 18, 1912
9:00 PM
Rose and Jack arrived at Pier 54 in clean
clothes and well-rested as the Titanic survivors stepped off the Carpathia. It
didn't seem fair. But they been through the sinking, too, although, admittedly,
they had a little bit of a break.
It was a strange feeling. Being thrown back
into the world they had left after all that. Now it was time to get down to
business, pick up the pieces, and carry on.
"See anybody?" Rose struggled
through the crowd amidst the dark and the rain.
"I see lots of people..." Jack
answered.
"Familiar people, I mean."
"I see lots of those, too." All of
their blank, pallid faces. Jack had seen them around those few days on Titanic.
Some he had talked to about the weather, or his drawings, or how about that
Mary Pickford, isn't she adorable? Now they were like ghosts--those who were
still alive, that is.
"Jack!" a voice called from the
crowd. Jack turned around, working his way through the confusion.
"Jack!" the voice called.
"Fabrizio!" he cheered, pushing
through the mass of people and dragging Rose with him. "Fabrizio!"
"Jack!"
"Fabrizio!"
"Jack!"
"Fabrizio!"
"Okay!" Rose shouted over them,
cutting them off with her hands. "Sorry." She shrugged. "Had to
be done." Helga came up alongside Fabri.
"Fabri," Jack said, too excited for
words, "you look so...so...young!"
"I don't know what you mean, but I take
it as hello." Fabri slapped him on the back.
"Glad to see you're both fine,"
Rose said. Helga smiled weakly. She didn't speak much English, and she was at
loss for words in her native tongue after all that happened. Not even Fabri
knew just what a little pip she could be.
"Hey, Fabri..." Jack began.
"Yes?" His friend waited.
"What happened to Tommy?"
Fabrizio hung his head low, and gave him a
little head shake for no. They automatically bowed their heads. Jack smiled
sadly, remembering the boisterous, lovable Irishman. He had only known him for
a few days, but he and Fabrizio were best friends by the end of the very day they
met. Jack sighed. He had lost another friend. He didn't ask how. For now, at
least, he didn't want to know.
Fabrizio forced a reassuring smile. For the
first time, he realized they weren't invincible anymore. Even the young and
strong can die. Tommy Ryan was dead.
A hand fell on Rose's shoulder. She whipped
around. It was her mother. Rose stared. Everyone else held their breaths.
"I thought your friend might be wanting
this, Rose." Ruth looked at Jack and pulled out something from under her
coat. His portfolio. Jack took it nervously from her outstretched hand.
"Mother...how did you...?" Rose was
puzzled.
Ruth stared into her daughter's face. For
now, she couldn't tell her how much Titanic had changed her in just a few short
hours. She could see how Rose had changed. She looked older and wiser, but
calmer...sadder. But nothing in her eyes was broken anymore. Her face was
tanner, though she wasn't sure how, but there was no look of frustration or
despair. Rose was a new breed of woman. She was harder, but she always looked
ready for anything.
"Don't ask, darling," said her
mother. "Just accept. I know I have." She pulled her daughter in for
an embrace, but didn't stay long. "We'll be staying here and you know
where home is. The door will be open." She nodded. "I'll be on my
way."
Jack looked in shock as Ruth walked through
the crowd, still a little wary of the hoards of other people, trying not to
come into physical contact with the unwashed masses. Some things would never
change.
"What was...that?" Jack turned to
Rose.
"I never needed her approval, but now I
have her acceptance...it's a start and she knows it." She nodded
knowingly.
"Jack?" yelled another voice,
cutting through the silence. A little girl of about twelve looked at him,
trying to discern him. After a moment, she decided it was him.
She ran into Jack's arms. It was the girl in
the picture of di Rossi's Ristorante. It was Jack little cousin, Emily. They
had both grown and aged, but they could tell each other from any double.
"Emily!" He hugged her, lifting her
off the ground. "Look at you!"
Behind the girl came her parents. Jack's aunt
and uncle, Rose presumed.
"Kiddo!" shouted the man.
"Jackie!" shouted the woman. She
smiled at the image of the four of them. The Dawson family was back together
again.
"There's someone--" Jack cut
himself off. "There's a few someones I'd like you to meet."
*****
Like the lost boys being packed into the
Darling household, Jack's aunt and uncle had four extra people sleeping under
their roof. It was a madhouse and the young couple needed to get out, if only
for a few hours. It was only two days since they had returned to 1912, but
there would always be a little bit of the sixties in them.
"We should get home. This is a dangerous
neighborhood to be out so late," Rose suggested to her man, and she
affectionately held his hand.
"We're dangerous people," Jack
said. "None of the miscreants around here have ever floored a car at
eighty-eight miles per hour at another human being."
"Hey, you had that fiasco with the board
in the center of town...that was mine."
Just then, he whirled her around and pulled
her right in front of him. "What are you doing?" she asked. He said
nothing. He pulled her to his face and kissed her deeply. He broke away after a
few minutes. He wrapped his arms around the small of her back and started
swinging her gently.
"I just realized," he said, "I
haven't done that in a while."
"Crazy week. We had other
distractions...you know what else we haven't done in a while..."
"Oh, don't you go destroying my virtue,
Miss DeWitt Bukater. We're not married." He scratched his chin, pretending
to think. "Hey, I got it! Marry me!" He lit up.
"No," said Rose bluntly.
"What?" Jack asked. He was taken
off guard.
"You cheated. You already know we're
getting married. Knowing the future--where's the romance in that?" She
grinned evilly. Jack breathed. She was kidding. She had really scared him for a
second.
"Good thing, then. Gary and Christine
would be really upset."
"No, they wouldn't," Rose argued.
"There would be no one to be upset...fine, but I keep my name."
"The press will be all over you,"
he warned. "Why, how many women do you know that stick with their maiden
name after they're married?"
"One, at least. I don't care about the
press. If they know I'm alive, the press will get bored eventually and
Cal...I've got no money, nothing. There's nothing for which he can touch me.
And I've always been Rose DeWitt Bukater. It's my identity. That, my darling
man, is me. I don't have anything to hide. I don't want anything to
hide. If I can't face the world as myself, I won't face it at all. And that's
not Women's Lib talking, that's me." She ended her speech.
"That all?" He smiled and kissed
her hand. He really didn't care about the name.
"No," she said. She put her finger
on his nose as she inched closer. "My name is much cooler than
yours." She was barely containing laughter. Jack didn't contain his. She
latched onto the lapels of his jacket. "Let's go home, buster." She pulled
him forward as she walked.
"No, wait! I gotta get you a ring
first!" He pulled her in the other direction.
"There's nothing open!" She laughed
and pulled him the other way.
They ran home hand in hand, laughing like
children. When they reached the door, Rose searched in her coat pocket for the
key. "What's this?" she wondered, pulling something unfamiliar out. A
necklace.
"Isn't that Christine's?" Jack
lifted the little peace sign from her hand.
"Yeah, it is," she mused.
April 10, 1968
4:43 AM
Doc closed the front door with a sigh of
relief. Another out of time adventure--or near disaster, depending on his mood,
was laid to rest. In another seventeen years, he knew he was in for one with
Marty McFly. As for the rest, well, he couldn't predict the future...