AFTER TITANIC
Chapter One
She stared up into the night sky, singing the
song he sang to her while they were at the bow of the ship just hours ago.
"…up she goes, up she goes..." she sang, running the lyrics over and over,
trying to ignore the horror of her situation. "Come Josephine in my flying
machine…"
Suddenly, a beam of light flashed across her
face and a distant voice broke into her reverie. "Hello! Is there anyone
out there?"
Coming to attention, she forced herself to
turn around, to see where the voice was coming from, and for the first time, a
ray of hope broke into the bleak darkness of her heart.
A boat! Could it really be a boat, come back
to save them?
"Jack." Rose lightly, but urgently,
shook the cold hand tightly grasping hers. "There’s a boat."
Poor thing. He’s fallen asleep. She hated to wake him, but she had no choice. They had
to get to the boat.
"Jack." A little more loudly and a
little more roughly. "There’s a boat, Jack."
No response.
"Jack! Wake up! Please! There’s a
boat!" Her voice was by now hoarse from the cold, but the fear in it was
unmistakable. Why didn't he wake up? Why didn't he open his eyes and say
something? He couldn't be…no. She wouldn't even harbor the thought that he
might be dead. He had to be alive. He just had to be, or what else was her
reason for living? "Jack…?"
Suddenly, his hand squeezed hers, and his
eyes popped open. "Can't I get any sleep around here?" he weakly
replied, lightly smiling at his attempt at a joke.
"Oh, Jack." Instant relief washed
through her. She knew he was alive. Like he said earlier, he was a survivor.
"A boat! There’s a boat right over there, and if we don't hurry, we'll
miss it." She pointed to the silhouette of the lifeboat and the officer,
still yelling for a response as he got further and further away. Perhaps it was
already too late. The boat was obviously too far away for a human voice.
"Come back!" Jack yelled as loudly
as he could, which in his weakening condition wasn't very loud. "We're
over here! Come back!"
But the boat got further away. It was obvious
that they weren't going to be heard. Rose felt her eyes fill with tears of
hopelessness, until she spotted the whistle stuck in the mouth of a dead
officer. It was a disgusting thought to have to use a whistle that was in the
mouth of a corpse, but she had no choice. Their case was getting hopeless. She
could feel the life going out of Jack’s hands as he remained in the freezing
water. She had to get him out of there fast…before he was really gone from her
for good.
Still holding tightly to Jack’s hand, she
slipped off the board and pulled Jack over to where the dead officer floated on
a piece of debris.
Here goes everything, she thought, as she pulled the whistle out of the
officer’s mouth and blew on it as hard as she could.
"Come about!" a voice hollered,
shining a light right on Jack and Rose. Smiling with satisfaction, Rose fell
into unconsciousness.