"Shit!"
Rose hears the sound of shattered glass, and a curse from Jack all the way out in the kitchen where she's attempting to make herself a cup of tea on a stove she still hasn't mastered. Quickly, she abandons the task, and makes her way up the staircase, and into her bedroom, where she finds Jack. She would have liked to think of it as their bedroom, but ever since she had told Jack about the baby she had lost, he had been distant, only coming up here to comfort her when she cries out in her sleep, rather than falling asleep next to her as he had been doing before. As the days begin to wear on into weeks, Rose finds herself increasingly lonely, despite the presence of the man she still feels infinite amounts of love and adoration for. That love now seems somehow tainted, and she fears through Jack's stoicism that she has indeed ruined everything.
"Jack! Are you alright?"
He looks up from the large mirror, which has shattered into hundreds of pieces upon the wooden floor, startled, and runs a hand through his hair, in frustration.
"I'm alright, Rose. Nothing to worry yourself about."
"Here, let me help you." She takes a few steps forward, crouching down to brush the glass into a pile with her skirt. Jack is quickly down as well.
"No, Rose, I've got it." He reaches over her arms, cutting off her access to the pile.
"Really, Jack. It's alright, I can manage," Rose begins, but he cuts her off again, pushing her hands away.
"No, it's my mess. I'll clean it up. Go back to whatever it was you were doing, Rose."
He doesn't mean for his words to be hurtful, but the tone of his voice is clipped, and strikes Rose hard. Without thinking, she responds rather childishly.
"Fine. Its obvious that you have no care what it is that I do, so I'll leave you to yourself from now on."
Jack sighs heavily, throwing down the shard of mirror. "Rose, you know that's not what I meant."
She bites her lip stubbornly, and stands up straighter. "No, Jack, I don't. I have no way of knowing what you mean as you've barely looked at me or said two words to me in weeks, and you promised me you wouldn't stop loving me! At this point I'm pretty sure I could down your entire liquor cabinet, and you wouldn't even notice, as its already half gone, and since I know I haven't been drinking, my only guess is that you have been."
Jack looks back down, mollified, and angry with himself. He never meant to hurt Rose. That's the last thing he'd ever want to do, and he had gone and done it again, but how could he ever explain all of the emotions going through him— all of the thoughts running constantly through his mind?
"You're right, Rose." Jack stands, and runs a hand through his hair again, brushing it back from his face, expression serious. "I haven't been paying much attention, and I apologize. And I feel like a damned hypocrite. It's wrong of me to criticize you for your vices when I've turned around and done the exact same thing. I just don't know what to think anymore. I don't know what to do."
"Let me help you, Jack. Please. Why can't you ever just accept help? I can understand you wanting to do simple tasks on your own, but you're completely shutting me out at this point."
"I'm so used to fixing everything with my own two hands," he reveals, trying to explain how he's been feeling. "Its stupid, really, and I don't think I can explain it." He sits down on the edge of the bed, looking at his hands, defeated.
Rose sits as well. "Try me," she says, and reaches for one of his aforementioned hands, eyebrow raised in defiance.
"I guess—I guess it was something I was taught when I was young. My Pops always told me that while there will always be a certain amount of luck, a real man had to do everything and fix everything with the two hands he was given. If something went wrong, Pops would find a way to fix it; broken toys, broken bones, broken hearts. Thing is, Rose, I don't know how to fix this, no matter how much I want to be able to. I don't know how to fix what he did to you— what he took from you, or what I did to you, and I don't know how to fix us. Not this time."
"What do you mean, what you did to me, Jack?"
Jack looks at her with sadness in his eyes. "All of this is my fault, Rose. It's my fault you got pregnant. I shouldn't have been so careless with you. And it's my fault that Cal was angry enough to hurt you. If you hadn't met me he wouldn't have been such a mad man. You would never have had a daughter to lose. You wouldn't know the terror I see in your eyes at night."
Rose turns to face Jack, taking both of his hands now. "Jack, you're right. You are being stupid. Its not your fault that I became pregnant; it takes two after all, and if anything I was the one who seduced you that night. You were a perfect gentleman. And Cal has always been a bastard. His anger, while you didn't help it, has always been a problem. While I was able to avoid sleeping with him, he started beating on me long before you and I met, so perhaps some of my fears are more deep rooted than all that. I'm not afraid of what he did to me, Jack. I've accepted it. I accept that it wasn't my fault. And I'm glad that our daughter wasn't born into such a cruel place. What haunts me most at night is the thought that I could end up back there; trapped again, suffocating in a world of unhappiness, and loneliness—the world that lead me to the back of that ship and to you. You save me time and time again, Jack. You're there when things get dark. All I ask is that you're there when things are light as well. I so want some happy days."
"Rose, I love you. I want to spend all of my days with you, but things are so messed up. I don't know what to do with everything. Its like we're living here pretending to be in this life, but neither of us are actually here."
"Jack, we're not going to fix everything overnight. I know that. But avoiding each other will never help. "
"I know, Rosebud," he says, using a nickname for the first time in weeks. "I'm just so terrified of losing you again— of you deciding you don't want to be with me. I guess I kind of froze up. I'm sorry."
"Jack, I know I was resistant to come here with you, but that's because I was afraid you would change your mind, and decide you didn't want me after all. Now that I'm here with you, I'd never leave, but I can't just sit by hoping that one day we'll have a life together. You told me we'd really live, and I'm still waiting for that to happen. I'll keep waiting, for you, but I can't wait forever, Jack. I can't stand back and do nothing any longer. You have to let me in. Let me in to that beautiful mind of yours."
Jack's hand reaches up to cup Rose's face. "I'll try, Rose. We need to live. We need to get out of here, and go somewhere."
"Okay, Jack." Rose nods, with a hint of a smile, and Jack suddenly gets an excited glint in his eye.
"Fuck, Rose! What are we even doing here, huh? Why are we here in this big empty house, acting like an old bitter married couple who want nothing to do with each other? Its horse shit. I'm 22, and you're nearly 20. We're young. We're in love. Why aren't we out on some wild adventure soaking up the youth we have left?" He's standing now, gesturing grandly towards the picture window.
Rose laughs at his sudden antics, and foul language. This is the Jack that she love, snot the somber man she had found hunched over shattered glass. Perhaps he had shattered his dull reflection along with the mirror and come to his senses?
"Alright, Jack. We'll go, then. We'll head out for the horizon, and see where we end up."
From where Jack is standing, his eyes fall upon Rose, her hair lit by the afternoon sun in such a way that it's set into a golden red fire like a halo, and Jack can't help but smile. She credits him with saving her life, but she would never fully understand the ways in which she is able to save him as well. Overwhelmed with emotion, he takes two strides forward, lifting Rose to him and capturing her lips for the first time in a month.
"Jack?"
"Yes, my angel?" he grins down at her, enjoying the feeling of having her in his arms again.
"You said you're used to fixing things with your hands?"
Jack looks into her eyes, confused. "Yeah, Rose, what are you talking about?"
"Well, I've got something that maybe you could fix for me." Rose smiles coyly, and Jack catches on, playing along.
"And what would that be, Miss?" He leans forward, kissing her neck hungrily, making Rose smile.
"I couldn't tell you, Mr. Dawson, but I could show you. Give me your hand."