My Heart Must Go On

Waking Up

Rose struggled to sit up. She looked around her, not recognizing any surroundings. She was on a ship, in an infirmary bed. She tried to remember what happened. She was on the Titanic, engaged to Cal, met Jack...Rose stopped. Jack. Everything rushed back to her. 

"Jack!!" Rose cried hoarsely. A nurse came over and checked Rose's forehead. 

"Shhh..." said the nurse, trying to ease her back down. "You'll be okay. You're safe now!" 

Rose fought against the nurse. "Jack!! Jack!!!" She yelled. She stumbled out of the nurse's grip and slipped out of bed. Rose ran away from the nurse, shouting out Jack's name. She remembered, she remembered, but she did not want to remember, not at all. 

"Jack!" She whispered, coming to a stop on the deck of the ship. It wasn't Titanic, it couldn't be. She noticed an officer standing nearby. 

"Excuse m-me," she called out, inching towards him. He immediately stood at attention and replied, "Yes, ma'am?" 

"Can you tell me what ship I am on currently?" She whispered. 

"The Carpathia, ma'am." He informed her, then hesitated. "Don't  mind me saying this, but you seem a bit too proper for a third class survivor of the Titanic."

Rose stared at her feet. Of course she would be classified as third class. She had kind of assumed that she would still hold her position as a first class, but then again, she hadn't been in a first class lifeboat. 

"I'm sorry," the officer amended quickly. "I wasn't trying to...I mean, you've been through a lot..." For Rose had begun crying. 

And she couldn't stop. She let loose, huge, wracking done that filled her entire body with tremors, for Jack, her Jack, lay at the bottom of the sea. 

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Rose calmed down enough for the officer to finally get through to her. 

"I'm so terribly sorry," he repeated. "It was none of my business."

Rose wiped her nose with her sleeve. "No, no, it wasn't your fault, I just lost...I lost someone I loved to the sinking, and I feel like I could have prevented it..."

The officer looked shocked. "Of course it wasn't your fault! This tragedy has brought upon the death of many people, you can't blame yourself! It was the iceberg!" 

Rose nodded mutely, still not over her thoughts about Jack. She doubted she ever will be. 

"So, uh, what was this fellow?" The officer wondered.Rose 

Rose buried her face in her hands. "Jack Dawson. He was-" Rose suddenly looked up. "Do you have a list of survivors?" 

The officer shook his head. "Not yet. We will gather names when we get to America. But you may find who you are looking for over there-" he pointed to the third class area on the ship-"and you can check the other decks as well."

Rose felt her hopes rise. Could Jack have survived? She quickly dashed those dreams. No, she had seen him sink into the freezing ocean. He couldn't be alive. But she had to check. 

"Yes, I will, thank you, Officer, uh..."

"Grembly. Maxwell Grembly. But you can call me Max." 

"Well, thank you Max." Then Rose hurried towards the third class bridge. When she arrived, she quickly scanned faces, looking for anyone familiar. Her heart sank. Jack wasn't there. Tears fell down her face. She sank to the ground, finally acknowledging that Jack really was...dead.

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Someone put a hand on her shoulder. She did not know how much later it was, but she didn't care about time anymore. Everything important was gone. She glanced up. It was one of Jack's third class buddies. 

"Jack?" He asked, searching her face. 

She shook her head, tears still silently streaming down her face. She took a shaky breath. 

"No...J-jack froze and n-now he's d-dead..."

His face fell, but he knew the pain she was in. He left her to her grieving. 

Rose stood up after a few moments, dizzy. Then she decided to check on the first class. Just to see if someone in her family had made it. 

With some help from officers along the way, she found the fist class dining room. She ducked in and kept her head down, slowly making her way around the room. Finally, Rose spotted her mother, Ruth, standing next to Cal. Rose gritted her teeth. If not for him Jack might still be alive. 

Ruth Dewitt-Bukator was crying and telling Cal something. Rose inched closer, but kept out of sight.

"-My only daughter, Cal. I fear she may be d-dead. She was too caught up in saving that...Dawson fellow, and I fear she lost her life because of it."

Cal looked extremely sympathetic, but still, Rose noticed, there was an air of insincerity in his look. "Well, if that gutter rat is still alive, and my darling isn't, by the good Lord above that man's hide will be mine," Cal glowered. 

Rose shrunk back. This was absurd!! Jack was dead and Cal still thought he was a gutter rat! He had tried to shoot them, but yet she was his darling? Rose had heard enough. She never wanted to see her family again. She sure as heck was not getting off with them.

Back at third class, everyone stared at her, wondering why she was third class now. They had seen her around Jack, but never really seen more of her. Rose shied away from most of them until a small six-year-old girl came up to her and said, "Jack coming back, right?" 

Everyone turned out look at Rose. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't tell them what had happened. She couldn't bear it. But she had to tell someone. Taking a deep breath, she began:

"The night the ship sank, Jack was locked up in a room. He had been team to stealing a precious diamond...."

Rose was sobbing uncontrollably by the time she finished with: "...and he j-just froze...r-r-right in my a-arms. I couldn't save h-him..."