My eyes flick past Tommy for just a second and then my gaze catches on an angel. She walks out onto the deck and rests her arms on the railing. She doesn't look as posh and pompous as the other people in first-class I've seen. In her eyes I can see a deep sadness as she stares out at the ocean. She looks almost … trapped. A few curls frame her beautiful face. Beautiful seems like almost an insult, she's far more than that. There aren't words in the English language to do her justice.
"Ah, forget it boyo. You're more likely to have angels fly out your arse than get next to the likes of her." Tommy chuckles. She looks over in my direction for a moment and then away again, and I don't think she's seen me at all until she looks back, slightly confused at the man staring at her, I guess. Something waves in my line of sight for a second, but I barely notice it, looking only at her.
A dark-haired man walks over and taps her on the shoulder, clearly trying to persuade the angel to go inside. She resists for a minute, before giving in and walking inside. I blink and I hear Fabrizio and Tommy laughing. "A first-class girl, eh?" Tommy teases and Fabri says "It is amour." Amour. Love. "Maybe." I reply but I know it is more than maybe. I love her and I don't even know her. This is crazy.
I puff down the cigarette and stare up into the night sky, watching the stars. It still feels surreal, that I'm on Titanic, the ship of dreams. And the angel I saw earlier. I can't take my mind off her and I don't want to. She's an angel but she's a trapped angel. I've always been able to tell these things about people, ever since I can remember. Suddenly, someone rushes past me, sobbing. I sit up quickly and look after them. It's a woman, with red hair tumbling down their back, wearing a red dress and they're running towards the back of the ship. I follow her and I watch as she hangs onto a … for a moment before walking towards the rail. Theres something about her but I can't put my finger on it. She climbs up onto the rail and as she grabs the pole for balance, she looks back for a minute and my breath catches in my throat. It's her, the angel. She climbs over the rail and leans away from the ship.
"Don't do it." I walk up behind her slowly, so not to startle her.
She half turns around. "Stay back! Don't come any closer!"
"Come on, just give me your hand and I'll pull you back over." I try to convince her, holding out my hand.
"No! Stay where you are. I mean it. I'll let go!" I stop where I am, not wanting to scare her by coming any closer. I can't help here from here though. I take my cigarette, blow through it, hold it up so she can see what it is and step close enough to the railing to throw it into the ocean.
"No, you won't". I can tell she won't let go, this isn't really what she wants, but she doesn't think she has any other way out. What has happened to her to make her feel like this?
"What do you mean, no I won't? Don't presume to tell me what I will and will not do! You don't know me." She retorts angrily.
"Well, you would have done it already. Now come on, take my hand."
"You're distracting me. Go away!"
"I can't. I'm involved now. You let go, I'm going to have to jump in there after you". She stares at me like I'm crazy, but I know that I'll do it if I have to.
"Don't be absurd. You'll be killed." I take off my coat to show her how serious I am about jumping in the water after her. "I'm a good swimmer." I say as I start to unlace my shoes.
"The fall alone would kill you." Yes, and it would kill you too, so if that's your way of trying to talk me out of it, that's not gonna work.
"It would hurt. I'm not saying it wouldn't. To be honest, I'm a lot more concerned about that water being so cold." If scaring her is the only way to get her to take my hand and come back over the rail, then I'll do it. I flick my eyes between my shoes and her. She's looking less and less sure of what she's doing.
"How cold?" she asks warily.
"Freezing. Maybe a couple degrees over." I can see she doesn't want to do this. I want to find whoever made her feel like this and punch them. "Ever, uh, ever been to Wisconsin?". For a moment I don't think she's heard me.
She looks at me like I'm crazy. "What?"
"Well they have some of the coldest winters around. I grew up there, near Chippewa Falls. And I remember, when I was a kid, me and my father we went ice-fishing out on Lake Wissota." If she doesn't know what ice-fishing is, this story won't make much sense. "Ice-fishing is you know where you- "
"I know what ice fishing is!" She interrupts angrily. I hold my hands up.
"Sorry. You just, you know, seem like kinda an indoor girl." I try to explain and then pause for a second. "Anyway, I, uh, I fell through some thin ice and I'm tellin'you, water that cold, like right down there, it hits you like a thousand knives stabbing you all over your body. You can't breathe, you can't think, least not about anything but the pain." I remember that cold, all these years later. I never want anyone else to feel that pain, ever.
"Which is why I'm not looking forward to jumping in there after you." As I say this, I pull off my jacket. "But like I said, I don't have a choice". I lock eyes with her, pleading for her to come back over the rail, for both our sakes. I could never leave her here to jump. "I guess I'm kinda hoping you'll come back over the rail and get me off the hook here." She stares at me as if I've lost my mind. "You're crazy!"
"That's what everybody says. But with all due respect, miss, I'm not the one hanging off the back of a ship here." I say as gently as I can. "Come on. Come on, give me your hand. You don't wanna do this. I try to convince her, holding out my hand" She stays frozen for a long moment. Then she takes my hand and I grasp her hand firmly as she turns to climb back over the rail.
"Phew. I'm Jack Dawson." Seems appropriate to introduce myself now.
"Rose Dewitt Bukater." Rose. It's a beautiful name and it suits her perfectly. "I'm gonna have to getcha to write that one down.". Rose laughs tentatively and puts one foot on the first bar of the railing. Suddenly, she slips and falls towards the ocean. Her scream rings out. I grunt as I get pulled forward and I grab her hand with my other hand as well.
"I've got you. Come on! Come on!" I try to pull her back to safety and for a moment it works but then she loses her handhold on the rail and drops again. "No!" I haul her back up again. "Help, please! Help, please! Please, help me!"
"Listen to me. I've got you, I won't let go. Now pull yourself up. Come on!" I shout. Slowly, she comes further and further away from the ice-cold water. "Come on, that's right. You can do it!". Finally, I've got her in my arms, pulling her over the rail. "I've got you." We both fall to the deck and as much as I try to fight it, trying to turn around so that I take the impact not her, I lose my grip on her waist and she falls to the deck and I fall on top of her. We stay there for a moment, breathing heavily. Just as I'm about to stand up, give her a hand up and walk her back away from the rail, I hear footsteps running towards us.
"What's all this?" It suddenly hits me what this looks like. I quickly move away from Rose so that I'm kneeling beside her but it's too late. They couldn't have come one minute later could they?