The third class general room was the social center of steerage life. It was stark by comparison to the opulence of first class, but it was a loud, boisterous place. There were mothers with babies, kids running between the benches yelling in several languages and being scolded in several more. There were old women yelling, men playing chess, girls doing needlepoint and reading dime novels. There was even an upright piano and Tommy Ryan was messing around with it. Three boys, shrieking and shouting, scrambled around, chasing a rat under the benches, trying to squash it with a shoe and causing general havoc. Jack sat on the large bench in the middle of the room, playing with Cora, drawing funny faces together in his sketchbook. Rose watched him with the child. She was totally under his spell. It was as though she was his daughter. She giggled, grinning up at him before leaning towards his arm.
“Draw him?” Cora pointed to Bjorn Gunderson sitting directly in front of them at a table with friends. He was a bearded man with dark hair. Jack glanced at where Cora was pointing and pulled out another piece of charcoal.
“All right. We’ll draw him.” Jack took his charcoal in his right hand and began to sketch the man before him. All the while, Cora looked on, stunned.
Rose brushed the few crumbs from her dress and stood. She saw Sharon stood beside the piano Tommy was playing. It was obviously out of tune, but it entertained the room. Rose wore a lemon dress with a beige shawl and her hair was pinned up neatly, a far cry from the clothes she had worn in first class, but she felt more comfortable around the sort of people she had met here. She gazed out at the whole general room. The people were from all walks of life, from all different cultures and countries.
Tommy stopped playing and stood. Rose sat on the seat, pulling Sharon to sit beside her. Tommy removed his gray hat and perched beside Jack on the bench.
“What are we doing, Jackie?” He saw his friend’s face looking towards Bjorn and realized he was drawing him. Jack smudged the final touches of the drawing before showing it to Cora, whose face lit up.
“Wow.” She touched the drawing with her tiny hand before smiling up at Jack. She handed it to Tommy, who held it up in the air, looking at it from every angle and comparing it to Bjorn, who was sitting a few tables away.
“It’s very good, Jack.” He handed it back to Jack, who put the sketch in his portfolio. Cora’s parents, Bert and Irene, waved to her, signaling for her to come to them.
“I have to go. Bye, Uncle Jack.” She waved shyly, walking off towards her parents. Tommy lit a cigarette, offering one to Jack, who took it.
“She’s quite under your spell.” Tommy grinned, taking a first puff and handing the matches to Jack.
“She’s a beautiful little girl.” He was fond of her.
The piano started again, but this time a soft melody was played. Craning his neck, he saw Rose playing. He had never heard his wife play the piano before, but was stunned by her talent. She turned her head to him and their eyes met for a moment across the room full of people. She smiled once before continuing to play.
*****
Walking along the stern deck, Rose pulled her black coat further around her body. Though her arm was linked through Jack’s, she felt the evening chill. It was almost eleven PM, she guessed.
They had left the party below decks to come on deck for some air. The stars blazed overhead, and they had walked all the way around the boat deck until they had come to the stern. The sound of the gushing water below could be heard, and the deck was lit very little in this area of the ship.
A small bench loomed and Jack led her to it. They both took a seat, Jack wrapping his arms around Rose in an attempt to keep them both warm. He himself wearing just a thin jacket. He looked up, squinting as he saw the sky.
“Stars like these—they remind me of the night I proposed to you back in England,” Jack spoke quietly. “So clear and endless.”
Rose looked up, too. She leaned back on the bench. “I remember. Also, the night we met back in Paris. The stars were so clear overhead.”
Looking around, Rose stood and began to walk to the rail on the stern of the ship hesitantly. Slowly, with shaking hands, she reached for the rail and looked over the end of the ship, seeing the black water below. If anyone fell into the ocean, they were bound to never be recovered. She felt sick looking downwards, not that she was seasick, but just thinking back to when she was ready to kill herself by jumping from the bridge onto the railway line in Paris.
Carefully, Jack came up behind her and put his arms around her waist. He, too, looked over the edge.
“Water like that, right down there, it’s so cold it would hit you like a thousand knives stabbing you all over your body. You wouldn’t be able to breathe or think,” Jack told her, remembering when he fell in the lake while ice fishing when he was a child.
“It looks so cruel and dark.” Rose rested back against Jack’s body, feeling his warmth. “Like when we first met and I looked down on the tracks. There was nothing but darkness.”
“If I hadn’t found you, would you have jumped?”
Rose thought for a moment. The reason she had run away was because she had such a restricted life and she had thought that death would be the best option for her to find peace and to be with her father. “I didn’t want to die. I wanted to be free of the confines that my mother and Cal had kept me in. But then I found you.”
Jack tightened his grip on her hand and ran his fingers over it gently, stroking it. “I think it was destiny,” Jack told her. He was a big believer in what was meant to be. He believed everything leading up to him and Rose getting together was destiny.
Rose turned to Jack. His face was red from the cold and his hair was hanging casually in his face. She still couldn’t believe they were married.
“Maybe it was destiny.” She leaned against him and he stroked her curls softly. “I’m just so glad you found me there when you did. I couldn’t imagine my life without you now. Maybe it would have ended.” She felt tears welling in her eyes. She hadn’t cried in such a long time, but in this moment, just the thought of life without Jack was unbearable.
“You’re never going to be without me. I’m a survivor and I’m not ever going to leave you. You make me so happy, Rose.” He touched her face gently, and she felt how numb her skin had become from the chill.
She closed her eyes against his hand on her face, feeling a few tears fall freely. He brushed them away. “We’re going to be in New York together in just a few short days.”
“I can’t wait until the ship docks. I can’t wait to see New York and begin a new life with you.”
“Don’t wish away our time together. We have a few days left on board yet. We have to enjoy this before we reach New York. Tomorrow, we should go and explore.” A boyish grin appeared on Jack’s face. “Maybe find somewhere more private to…um…” His grin grew wider and Rose hit him playfully, remembering what he had said in bed the previous morning about finding somewhere else on the ship.
“You’re shameless.” She grinned at him, her tears subsiding. “But I wouldn’t mind it.”
Their eyes interlocked for a few seconds. Jack leaned forward to kiss his wife. They both felt their stomachs twist. Jack pulled Rose further towards him to keep her warm. It was silent except for the gush of water below them as they steamed further into the North Atlantic.