WHAT HURTS THE MOST
Chapter One
Caledon Hockley looked around St.
Katherine’s Orphanage. He saw all the children running around, dressed in ratty
clothes. A child with blonde, curly hair ran past his feet, squealing as
another child chased her.
The orphanage was obviously too
cramped for all of these small children. The wooden floors were rundown and not
the dark brown that they could have been. The stairs looked even worse. He
imagined that they were musty and probably starting to mold.
A painting of a boy fishing in a
boat hung by the stairs. A boy hunched over at the foot of the stairs, about
fourteen years old, looked up at Cal. Cal realized that this boy bore a strong
resemblance to Jack Dawson.
God, no, not back to the
Titanic again, Cal
thought. He wanted to forget everything that happened on that voyage. How his
beautiful fiancée, who he loved, Rose DeWitt Bukater, left him for Jack Dawson.
He thought about her every day, her fine, porcelain doll-like features. Her
fiery red hair, green eyes, fair skin, and full lips. She was as beautiful as
they came, in his mind. No one could be more beautiful than Rose. But what if
they had waited just one day later to go onto the Titanic? Would she have been
Rose Hockley?
Yes, he thought. She would. We’d be here in
New York together. We’d have been married. She would have been mine.
But no, that little bastard named
Jack Dawson had to ruin everything for them. Well, more precisely, he had to
ruin everything for Cal. All Cal got out of the deal was a naked drawing of
Rose and an empty heart.
Were they still alive? Cal could
have sworn that he saw Rose get off of the ship when they arrived that night in
New York a few months ago. He half thought he was delusional, but he thought he
really did see her.
Cal had to remind himself why he
was here. That was right. He was here to adopt a child. Preferably a little
girl. Since Rose was no longer with him--and he knew he was never going to find
another woman--he thought he could at least adopt a child and help it. Maybe,
if he was lucky, she would bloom into another Rose.
Cal walked down the hallway and
knocked on the door that said Sister Amy. He waited for a few moments until a
nun with slightly wrinkled skin opened the door. She seemed to be about forty
years old. Red hair poked subtly out of her black veil. Clear blue eyes scanned
him over.
"Can I help you?" the
woman asked.
"I’m Caledon Hockley. Are
you Sister Amy?" Cal asked.
"Yes, I am. Oh, wait, we’ve
been exchanging letters, haven’t we?"
"Yes, we have," he said
smoothly.
Sister Amy smiled and stepped
aside. "Come in! It’s so nice to finally meet you in person!"
Cal walked into her office. It
was a little stuffy. The walls were a dirty yellow. Papers were scattered on
Sister Amy’s desk as if they were blown there by the wind. He sat down in a
wooden chair on one side of her desk.
"I’m so glad you’ve
considered adoption, Mr. Hockley," Sister Amy said. She sat across from
him and crossed her legs.
Cal smiled. "Oh...I just
think it’s good to help someone. You know, give them a head start in
life."
Sister Amy smiled.
"Well...that’s very generous of you."
I know, Cal thought.
"Can I get you anything to
drink? Tea?" she asked.
"No, no, that’s all right.
I’d just like to get started on the adoption as soon as we can."
Sister Amy got up from her chair,
walked over to a cabinet, and looked for a folder with Cal’s name on it. She
sat back down and opened it, scanning the letters that Cal had sent her over
the past few months.
"It says here that you want
a little girl, Mr. Hockley," she said.
"Yes, if at all possible.
Daddy’s little girl, you know."
Sister Amy smiled, almost as if
she was remembering that she was Daddy’s little girl. "Do you have a
specific age group that you’d like to look into?"
Cal paused, then said, "The
younger the better. Maybe under one year, if possible?"
She nodded, then stood up.
"If you could follow me upstairs, I’ll show you our little ones."
He left the office, following
Sister Amy. The boy that looked like Jack Dawson was still hunched by the
stairs. Cal felt like hitting him, even though he knew that wasn’t the real
Jack.
Still serves him right,
though, he thought. Jack
steals Rose...my Rose...I hope he died when the Titanic sank. He deserved it.
They went up the stairs, then
down a long hallway. Cal saw more younger children playing with wooden toys in
the dormitories. He saw the older children reading and talking to each other.
At the end of the hallway was a
room of cribs. Babies were laying there. He walked into the room. It was
painted light green. A relaxing color for babies, he guessed.
"Well, here we are. These
are our youngest," Sister Amy whispered. "Go ahead and have a look."
Cal looked at the first one. It
couldn’t have been older than four months. A tuft of blonde hair came out of
its pale head. He smiled softly and looked at the others. He was starting to go
soft and actually care for something. He actually thought they were...cute.
He peered over at a baby who was
about five months old. Brown hair spouted from its head. It was sleeping on its
back, hands curled up into little fists. It had a glowing, cherubic face that
he thought only it could possess.
He must have been looking at the
baby for a long time, because Sister Amy came up and started telling him about
it.
"This is Sarah," she
whispered.
He grinned. "She’s
adorable." He looked at her longer. "What else do you know about
Sarah?"
She walked to the foot of Sarah’s
crib and pulled out a few sheets of paper hanging from it. Cal realized that
all the cribs had information attached to them.
She handed the folder to Cal. He
opened it and looked at the information on the baby in front of him.
He found out that her parents
were originally from England, but had to give her up because they couldn’t
afford her to take care of her when they came to America. Both parents lived in
Brooklyn. He found out that her mother was a seamstress and her father made
machine parts for miscellaneous things.
He skimmed through most of it
until Cal found her birthday--April 15, 1912. That was the same day that the
Titanic sank, that his only chance of surviving was taking some random child
with him and pretending that she was his.
Ironic, he thought.
"You wouldn’t happen to know
when Sarah was born, would you?" Cal asked Sister Amy.
She looked at the papers, then
flipped to the other page with her birth certificate. "2:20 AM."
2:20. The same exact time that
the ship went down. A chill went down his spine. This was obviously an omen to
get Sarah.
"This is the one," Cal
said decisively.
Sister Amy raised her thin, red
eyebrows. "Really? So quick?"
"Yes. Sarah is the little
girl for me, I believe."
She smiled, then walked out of
the room, passing another nun. "Sister Mary, could you please get Sarah
ready to be taken away? Mr. Hockley is ready to adopt her."
The woman known as Sister Mary
nodded, then went into the room with Sarah. Sister Amy and Cal walked back
downstairs to sign the adoption papers.
"Would you like to get your
wife, sir? I’ll be glad to just wait. She does have sign the papers after
all," Sister Amy said.
"Actually...my wife couldn’t
be here today," Cal said.
"We can wait for another
day. You are married, right?" she asked.
"Well...I was. My wife
passed away a few years ago," he said softly, eyes diverted to the floor.
Cal was a good liar, and he damned well knew it. He could get anything with the
way he lied. And that now included Sarah.
"I’m sorry to hear that, Mr.
Hockley," Sister Amy said.
Cal shook his head nonchalantly.
"Don’t worry. She’s in a better place."
Like the arms of Jack Dawson
are better than the arms of me, he thought bitterly.
She was quiet after Cal had
spoken. She pulled out the adoption papers and handed him a pen. "You can
sign that. Just skip your wife’s part."
Cal skimmed through the papers
and started signing. The silence between them grew more and more loud.
"If you don’t mind me
asking...what was your wife’s name?" Sister Amy asked.
"Rose," he said softly.
"Died of a fever. God rest her soul."
He could see it in her eyes that
she felt sorry for him and to ever have brought anything up. He knew he was a
great actor. He inwardly have himself a pat on the back.
"Well, sir, here she is. Little
Sarah Hockley," Sister Amy said, after the papers were all signed.
Cal took Sarah into his arms.
Those big brown eyes held all of the potential in the world. He knew she would
look just like him. She’d grow up to be the most beautiful girl in all of Philadelphia,
maybe in all of Pennsylvania.
Sarah’s eyes met his. Even though
there was no blood relation, their eyes were the exact same color. Her glowing
skin made her look like an angel.
She's my angel.