My Clarity

Chapter twenty - five

Taking Jack's hand within her own to walk the corridors of the Titanic, where prying eyes were all over her to see felt rather exhilarating. Despite the current state of the ship. Despite the uncertainty of the future of everything else, the only thing which seemed to matter was Jack Dawson. Not just because what had transpired between them both but because of the goodness which she had discovered laid purely within his heart. Despite his pain; he was still coming with her to face her mother.

Reaching the stateroom at B-52, the walls around Rose seemed to have closed in, slowly suffocating her as soon as she had stepped foot inside her own quarters. She felt as though she was a different woman. Damn, she was a different woman. She was a woman. Jack had taken her senses and divided them a million different ways yet they all seemed to come back together to create the one feeling which was all encompassing. The stateroom felt different, like a cage to her now, more than ever. It was as though she had once been kept there as a pet of some kind, now she had tasted the wild, it was hard to come back to the shelter. She craved Jack's open space of a life, the very one which he had described to her before leaving his own stateroom.

The sitting room was empty. Just hours earlier, Jack had drawn her, there, naked. Her cheeks flushed as the thoughts came to her and Jack seemed to take note, squeezing her hands to break her reverie and causing Rose to question that perhaps returning here wasn't a good idea. Her mother could have gone to the lifeboats already, although something told Rose that wouldn't be the case.

''How is it such a circus below decks, outside people are about to evacuate the ship and yet, here, in the centre of the universe it is almost quite the norm.''

"Isn't that what society is, how they pretend to welcome change and despise it, too."

"Will you, despite the change with us?"

Jack was about to respond until Ruth DeWitt Bukater emerged, her skirts swishing at her feet until she stopped abruptly at the sight of her daughter, entwining her fingers ever so tightly about the man who she quite clearly loathed. Rose's heart calmed as she met her gaze.

''Hello, mother.''

Ruth tilted her chin upwards, not removing her eyes from Jack.

''I came to see you.''

Ruth nodded. ''I see.''

Silence fell between them almost as though they were strangers and not mother and daughter. ''I hear that we are in the middle of some sort of emergency and was about to attend the commotion.''

Rose stiffened.

''I shall wait in the corridor.'' Jack quietly smiled, sensing that the two needed time to speak alone. As soon as her hand was not within his, there was a frightful cold which overcame her but the steely determination remained. Once Jack had clicked the door closed, Rose turned to her mother, feeling every single scrutinising second and she was suddenly back beneath the microscope of her mothers eyes.

''I see that you are in a race to the very bottom.'' Ruth started, ''entangling yourself with a man like Mr. Dawson is foolish.''

''For you, not me, mother.''

''Mr. Hockley has already informed me that you have ended your engagement, without a single care in the world for me, perhaps the one who would suffer the most in your endeavours of seeking a love match with a man who barely has any credibility."

Ruth never said anything further of the drawing and so Rose remained quiet of the matter. Perhaps Cal would keep that little secret for himself.

''Yes, perhaps, but with me engaged to any person but Mr. Dawson, I should be the one who suffered the most, but I assume that was never thought of during my engagement to Mr. Hockley.''