HEARTS WILL GO ON
Chapter Eight
"Jo, could you come in here
for a minute?" my mother called from the bedroom we were sharing in the
suite back at the hotel after the dinner. I had actively avoided Jonathan
Hockley for the rest of the night and had later found out that he was engaged
to the blonde, Gloria Edwards. I set down my journal, which I kept for writing
ideas.
"Yes?" I asked, coming
in to find her sitting at the vanity, clutching something in her hands. Turning
to look at me, I could see that this was something serious.
"You were wonderful tonight,
Jo...you pulled it off," she said with half a smile. I made a face,
sitting on the bed to face her.
"Are you kidding me? I was a
wreck!" I exclaimed.
She laughed lightly and shook her
head.
"No...you were the picture
of modesty and poise. You will be a great addition to the Dawsons." I
smiled uncomfortably. Something was troubling her. I could always sense it.
"Ma, something is bothering
you...why don’t you tell me what it is and quit beating around the bush?"
A nervous chuckle came from her throat.
"I was going to wait until
your birthday to give you this, but I thought tonight would be better...but
before I do, there’s something I want you to know," she warned. I nodded,
curious.
"Well?" I asked
impatiently.
"Caledon Hockley gave this
to me when he and I were on that ship." She could never bring herself to
say Titanic. It was always that ship.
"What is it?" I asked,
and she held it out, a large twinkling thing that made my eyes widen. It was
the biggest jewel I had ever seen in my life, and yet I was afraid to touch it.
"It is a very rare diamond,
Jo...it was once called the Heart of the Ocean. It was worn by Louis XVI before
he was killed. The night of the sinking, your father drew me wearing nothing
but this necklace, and I’ve always said that I was going to give it to you to
do with what you will. I couldn’t bring myself to pawn it, not even when we
were at our lowest, Jo."
I was caught by sudden tears
threatening my calm, because it was the first time she’d referred to Jack Dawson
as my father and not Jack. It was easier just to believe I didn’t have a
father. Jim Calvert had died, and though I loved him dearly, there was
something missing, something I could never find in him that I longed for. I
couldn’t picture Jack. I just couldn’t. I imagined him as a somewhat tall man,
though from what I’d understood, he’d barely been a man when Ma had met him.
He’d been...my age. Twenty. Well, I was almost twenty, and I’d never even
thought about boys. My mother said he’d had light hair and a winning smile.
Then again, how many men in America had light hair and winning smiles? If that
was the case, then Tom could have been my father, which was laughable. It
wasn’t enough. But I didn’t want to see a photo. Secretly, I was glad Olivia’s
pictures of Jack were in Chippewa Falls. That way, I didn’t know what I was
missing.
"Jo? You haven’t said
anything..." Ma’s voice brought me out of my thoughts as the damned
diamond was dangling in front of me. Trembling, I took it from her and gently
cradled it in the palms of my hands.
"It’s...something," I
said, afraid to move, or breathe, or even think. It was incredible and
terrifying all at once, and I had to set it back in the makeshift case she’d
taken it from. "I...don’t know what to say," I said, still facing the
vanity.
"Oh, Jo...you don’t have to
say anything...I just thought you should have it." She put her arm on my
shoulder and I whirled to face her, sudden courage coursing through me.
"What did he look like?
Really?" I asked, and she frowned.
"Who? Cal?" she asked
in confusion. I shook my head.
"My father. Jack...my
dad," I said, knowing damned well I sounded like a fool. She smiled at me
then and I could relax, for the last thing I’d wanted was to make her cry.
"To me? Like a guardian
angel...he had this...gold...I mean shining gold hair, like yours sometimes
shows in the summers. And your eyes...they’re the same. But you have my
mouth...his mouth was thinner, but wider...it’s been twenty years...but he’s
still as vividly real to me as you are to me right now."
By this time, I was fighting to
hide the array of emotions passing over my face.
"D-did you love him?" I
asked, and she turned her head to look at me, because I, being ever the
skeptic, did not believe that love could happen in a matter of two days. She
looked at me for a long time.
"I did, Jo. I do...and it’s
truer to me than ever, every time I look at you. Just like I know how much I
loved James when I look at your brothers."
"It isn’t fair..." I
said, shaking my head in disgust. She chuckled.
"You say that far too much,
Josephine." I sighed.
"I know," I replied.
"Didn’t you ever think life wasn’t fair?" I asked her.
"Yes, Jo, I did. Life isn’t
fair...when I was seventeen and alone, with nowhere to go...nothing, not a cent
to my name and nothing to bring you up with, do you think I didn’t curse fate?
Do you think I wanted to wake up on that plank only to realize that your father
was dead? But I remembered what your father believed in, what he stood for. He
stood for life. He made his life count, and when I found out that I was having
you, I vowed to make yours count, too, because you made mine."
I threw myself into her arms like
a kid and began to sob, something I hadn’t done since I was very young.
"Oh, Mama...I love
you..." I gasped, allowing her to rock me gently.
"Um...Mrs. Calvert?"
The night maid’s voice came from the doorway. We sat up as the woman looked at
us nervously.
"What is it, Jane?" Ma
asked as I walked toward the door. The maid whispered something I couldn’t hear
to her, and Ma’s face went white. Instinctively, I walked out of the room and
found an older woman standing in the sitting area of the suite.
"Can I help you?" I
asked in confusion. She turned around, eyeing me somewhat critically from head
to toe.
"Who are you?" she
asked, but before I could answer, Ma’s arm wrapped around my shoulders.
"My daughter...how can I
help you, Mrs. DeWitt Bukater?" she asked coldly. I realized instantly who
this woman was. Her mother. My grandmother.
"Deirdre Hockley called
me..." the woman explained.
"Damn her!" Ma spat,
her grip tightening on me.
"How could you? How could
you let me think you were dead?" the woman whispered. My mother maintained
her poise.
"I suppose the same way you
could pawn me off to the heir of a steel tycoon," she bit back. My mouth
dropped. I’d never heard her speak with such contempt to anyone.
"I was desperate, damn it! I
know I was wrong...every day since I lost you, I knew I was wrong...and all
I’ve been able to think was God, take me...take me instead...but here you are,
alive and well and with a daughter, and other children, no doubt..."
The desperation in the woman’s
voice made me sympathize with her, but I knew my mother, and I knew she only
showed contempt for those who had caused her pain.
"Yes, I have two boys
also...thankfully, they are asleep." The woman nodded.
"Then you know...how hard it
is...how old is this one? Fifteen? Sixteen?" she asked. I cringed as
Mother replied sharply.
"Twenty next month." A
gasp left the old woman’s mouth as she stared me down.
"You slept...with that
boy?" she asked incredulously. My mother glared at her.
"No. She was immaculately
conceived. What do you think?" I swallowed.
"Can we please stop
referring to me as she like I am not here?" I asked, irritated, longing to
be anywhere but in front of this woman who was eyeing me like the vermin of the
earth.
"Are you married to the
boy?" the woman asked, and Ma let go of me.
"The boy’s name is Jack, and
no, I am not. He’s dead. He died twenty years ago, nearly twenty-one
years." Finally, some compassion shone in the woman’s eyes.
"He died that night?"
she asked, and my mother nodded, both of them obviously reliving that night.
"Oh...God, Rose...I...I’m sorry," she began, but my mother held her
hand up to silence her.
"No. You are not allowed to
do that...you are not allowed to show me sympathy for Jack...not after the way
you treated me...and the way you treated him. Goddamn you for saying you’re
sorry!" Her voice cracked as she pointed toward the room where my brothers
were sleeping.
"Josephine, go check on
Jamie...he wasn’t feeling well..."
"But Mama..." I began
to protest, but desperation entered her voice.
"Now." I didn’t waste
another second and fled the horribly awkward scene taking place in the room.
"Jo?" Jamie asked as I
came into the boys’ room.
"What is it, James?" I
asked, sitting on his bed.
"Is Mama crying?" he
asked, and I shook my head.
"She’s got company and I was
coming to see how you were feeling," I said, touching his forehead. No
fever.
"Jus’ tired, Jo...I’m
tired..." he said. I lay beside him and sank into the pillow.
"Then sleep," I
replied. "Just sleep..."