Titanic Alternate Ending
The icy grip of rolling waves wrapped my body, pushing into ivory skin and dusk blue lips. With frozen eyelashes, I gazed up at the familiar black sky, unable to feel anything but the numb throughout my body, the quiet muffle of silence in my head. The only inch of skin that had any feeling left was Jack's palm to my palm finger locked tightly around one another. Our blood was surely colder than the midnight sea itself, and yet it felt like we held a burning emblem inside our grip, pulling our fingers together in a lacing of skin against skin. Around me, most was uncertain, but of his grip I was sure. I promised, and I would never let go.
Time seemed to pass in something un-measurable. Eons became seconds, seconds became infinities. I became unsure of whether I gazed at a night sky, or the own dark caverns of my head. A cold so deep had flooded through every vein, every nerve taken by the freezing ocean water. Just as I began to imagine winter itself had sunk into me, I heard it. It was muffled, a soft sound that registered somewhere in the back of my mind, unreal. Reality came flooding back into my head in a painful shatter not unlike that of ice against a deck, and I forced my eyes to open, revealing a hazed starlit sky. The sound came again, echoing into something that resembled words. "Is there any one out there?" came the cry again, this time forming into a sentence in my own thoughts. The voice bounced across the water, soft on the blackened waves.
A boat…safety, warmth…a boat. Every thought that passed through my mind collected into large pile, taking a moment to sort them selves out. In a heavy movement that took every thought, and every piece of life I had left in me, I moved to grip the whistle Jack had placed in my empty fist, pressing it to my numb lips. Air refused to move from my lungs, stuck in an icy fog. With a desperate attempt, I breathed again, feeling the energy deplete by the second. This time, a small pitiful sound whispered into the air, barely audible. I felt Jacks grip around my fingers, and forced what frigid air I had left into a last try. A piercing sound came, shrill in night air, followed by shouting of some sorts that was growing closer.
With frozen movements, I moved to face Jack. A blue sheen had crossed his lips, skin pale as the crescent moon that hung overhead. "Jack" I managed to breath, the words frail on my quivering lips. I squeezed his hand, feeling every frozen vein in my wrist cringe in an agony. I could feel only a bare beat in my chest, but it tightened as there was no response but the approaching cries of safety. "Jack" I whispered again, winter words across my tongue. I had held on, I had held on for him. The chill of death couldn't take him, we had a promise. I knew though that death honored no such a thing. "Jack" I began to weep, but it came out as a shuddering of stiff shoulders, a single tear rolling across ivory skin.
A sky blue eye peeked out from under his ice-encrusted lashes. In that single eye, and the aqua rivulets of ocean within it, I saw my world. "There's a boat" was all I could manage, but a symphony of words sunk into my head that warmed through my veins. Relief buried itself within my chest, and yet another single tear caressed my cheek as I felt his fingers squeeze mine, ever so slightly. I couldn't fight, for safety was close, and all I had fought for was right in front of me, alive. I closed my eyes, and let the warmth from his palm consume my thoughts.
Where ice once lurked beneath the surface of my skin, the warmth of country fireplace had burned itself in. A grey sunlight overwhelmed my view as I opened my eyes, listening to the steady brushing of ocean waves against the steel of a ship. Objects focused in front of me, dark shadows carefully forming into people, all moving about. I opened my palm, looking down to see it empty, void of his hand. Jack. My legs were weakened as I stood abruptly; a sudden desperation to see is face. I steadied myself against the wooden beam, the heavy weight of a winter jacket wrapped around my arms. I staggered under it, but found my way to a man holding a clipboard, a panic already setting in. He turned expectantly to look at me, a kind smile painted on his lips. "Jack Dawson. I need to find Jack Dawson" I exclaimed, begging in my head with the grey skies sulking above that he was here. The mans eyes flickered across his list, flipping a page with a heavy thud of my heart.
"It appears he is in the ICU". His words took a moment to resonate, but immediately I felt the violent crash in my heart subside, only by a little. "Downstairs and to the left" he instructed, pointing with his pencil to a pair of large wooden doors. I couldn't bother to thank him, taking off with bare feet across the deck and rushing down the stairs with legs that felt they would collapse. I hurried left, noticing the surprised faces of staff as I whisked by. A long row of doors were lining the hall, and I turned to the nearest nurse, breath too heavy in my throat. " I need to find Jack Dawson. Where is he?". The words poured urgently across my tongue, and her eyes widened in surprise, quickly looking to her list. Once more I begged in my head. "He seems to have quite a serious case of hypothermia" she said grimly, finger out stretching to point to a room marked 2a. I was already pushing through the door by the time she had finished her sentence.
I burst into the room, eyes falling to the pale figure beneath the sheets. My knees collapsed in a weakened relief at his bed side, pulling his hand into mine and pressing my lips to it. He was chilled, the skin cold against my lips. But he was here, and feeling his touch in mine reminded me that he world was here, that he was here. His bare chest slowly rose and fell, eyes closed and breath soft. Even sleeping, his face seemed to be drawn by the hand of beauty. Tears of salt carefully dripped across my cheeks, and I pushed my forehead to his hand, still wrapping it in my own cold fingers. He was alive.
My breath paused as I felt his thumb move slightly from my grip and run across my cheeks, the wet trail of tears wiped off with his touch. I looked up, time freezing as his pale blue eyes watched me, full of a compassion that seemed to draw me in, making us the only 2 people in the planet. Vast miles of ocean surrounded us, and yet, it seemed it was only Jack and I, together in infinite measures of time. His fingers moved to softly hold the side of my face, cold skin against my cheeks and touch so gentle. In his eyes I saw life itself, a deepened love painted into the blue. " I told you we would make it to the stars" Came his low whisper, voice tender and only for me. I took a breath, reminding myself that I truly was alive, it simply wasn't a dream. "To the stars" I echoed, lacing my fingers around his. With his promise holding our fingers together in a quiet warmth, I knew I would never let go.