"It's kind of a tragic love story," Emily tried again to explain it to James, as they stood there on the sidewalk together.

Gazing up at the movie poster outside the cinema, with Kate Winslet looking down over Titanic's portside, and Leonardo Dicaprio leaning onto her shoulder.

"Supposedly, the movie is based on a true story, from a diary written by Rose Calvert, who sailed on the Titanic when she was 17. Kate Winslet plays her as this rich girl, who is engaged to a man she doesn't love, and feels trapped as a woman in upper class society. Until she meets Leo, a guy with literally just '10 bucks in his pocket', and falls in love with him onboard the ship. Mind you, in just 3 days, but you're supposed to overlook that detail, because it's obviously very practical. Anyway, she leaves her life behind as a rich girl and heads out for the horizon because she damn well feels like it. Oh, and at some point in the movie, Titanic sinks...Sorry, on second thought, maybe we shouldn't. I can't exactly promise you a documentary here."

"You don't reckon it could happen?" James asked her. "A love story like theirs?"

Emily gave a little shrug.

"It's just a movie," she said. "Of course, I want to believe in a story like that, but I can't speak for any woman of 1912. I can only guess that choosing to love him in the end was probably way more complicated for her than that."

"Perhaps you're right. Quite complicated indeed," James agreed quietly. "How does it end for her then, in this moving picture?"

"She makes it to New York on the Carpathia," Emily answered. "And the rest is history."

"Oh?" James's voice perked optimistically. "Suppose then that the end is still the beginning for her?"

Emily passed him a smile, but left the answering of his question to chance, as she turned to lead their way to the ticket booth.

It was April 17th.

A season, James realized, for "fanatics".

Never would he have imagined that simply being a crew member of the Titanic made him a celebrity in some worldwide fan club of 2022, or suchlike.

Why did it seem that everyone of the future was so infatuated with his ship, that might've easily become grandly mediocre fast in his day, and which ultimately became a ship that didn't very well 'ship' in the end, as it should have?

Weren't there other wonders one could make a fuss about? Like the opus debut of the Wright Flyer, or that bloke he'd been reading about in the papers, Mr. Lawrence Oates, who died on his South Pole Expedition by bidding his gents a last farewell, "I am just going outside and may be some time."

And if it had to be any old ship, why not-oh well, the Belgic (for all the gnarly rumors he'd heard secondhand from Officer Lowe about her, one could easily pull a whole epic out of that one), or the Adriatic, or even the Olympic?

Why Titanic?

If being the star attraction of its own private museum was a little overmuch, an entire 3 and a quarter hours of a whole ruddy moving picture was certainly butter on bacon.

Though James would soon enough get his answer.

As being the season of the 110th anniversary of Titanic's sinking, it so happened that there was lots of hype about the release of James Cameron's 1997 film at Regal Battery Park.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Emily asked James again. "We can always watch something else, you know?"

"Don't fret over me, Miss Millie," James told her lightheartedly. "It's only a moving picture. Not like Titanic can kill me a second time, can she?"

James insisted on paying their way in, on the grounds that it was the one thing a gentleman should do.

And this time, he'd remembered to bring a billfold out of his cat-sitting wages, instead of pennies, which made the transaction of ticket and popcorn buying much smoother.

However, the time-well-spent he'd saved at the register was only time-well-spent up until the point when James held the door open for Emily to walk through. Glancing back over his shoulder at another lady also waiting to come through the door behind them, with no gentleman accompanying her.

"Good day to you, miss. Not to worry, I will hold the door for ye," he offered her, stepping aside so she could walk through.

"Oh, thanks," she passed a bashful smile to him as she walked on.

"It's no trouble," he nodded.

But just as James was about to rejoin Emily, another woman came hurrying to the door from outside, also unaccompanied by any gentleman.

James hurried over to open it for her as well.

"Now then, I've got the door for ye, love."

Then nodded to an elderly lady shuffling slowly forward with her walker a few steps behind.

"Alright, come through, madam," he beckoned her. "There's no hurry at all."

And by the time James had safely held the door for 13 ladies, and tipped his hat to a few gentlemen in between, Emily had found herself a bench by the arcade to wait on her polite-to-a-fault Edwardian officer, watching James as she passed the time snacking on their popcorn.

"This is a great movie," she mumbled to herself, as she observed James going back and forth to the door. "Why pay to see Titanic when it's living in my apartment?"

"Sorry to have kept you waiting, miss," James said, when he got enough of a break catching ladies at the door to finally make his way back to her. "I daresay, I've never seen so many ladies all alone in one singular place. It's a wonder they haven't taken on a concierge here yet. Did we miss our picture?""

"Only by about a half an hour," Emily said, glancing at the clock on her phone. "It's my bad, though. I just didn't have the heart to stop watching you. There's another Titanic showing in 3 hours."

"I'm terribly sorry, I had no idea there were so many—"

But before he could make his apologies, James stood suddenly from his seat again, nodding politely to a group of ladies walking from the snack bar into the Titanic auditorium, as could be expected of a well-mannered fellow. "Good day, ladies. Enjoy our moving picture, eh?"

And in an attempt to save him frim himself, Emily quickly caught James's sleeve, dropping him back in his seat, as the pack of girls giggled at him and walked on by.

"You don't have to do that every single time," Emily informed the Edwardian man.

"Is that not how it's done here, when a lady leaves a room?" James asked her. "How should a man speak well of himself and his manners, if he cannot show plain courtesy and pledge himself to the service of another?"

But just as Emily attempted to explain the devolution of manners in 2022, someone blurted out.

"Damn, her boyfriend be fiiiiinnne!"

"I told you, girl, guys from the UK are my weakness. They be cute as fuck."

"I'd smash, if I didn't already have a man."

"I'm a hoe though, it don't matter to me no way."

"God, I can't take you anywhere with me," Emily remarked to James, passing over their half-gone buttery popcorn bucket, so that he might focus on something other than being 'a proper gentleman' for a while. "Your accent is way too distracting here."

"I'm the diversion?" James challenged her assumption. "It's I who will never get myself acquainted with the way folks talk here...Exactly what do you think she'd be smashing anyhow?"

"It means," Emily clued him in dryly. "That she wants to go to bed with you."

"Oh?" James muttered, surprised, his eyes squinting as he tried to reimagine the whole theory of the word in his head.

Then his lips dipped into a smug grin.

"What a brick of a lass she is, the poor duck. Wait until she sees me in the moving picture," he told Emily. "You don't suppose he's handsome, do you? The jammy bloke they picked to be my actor?"

But James was cut off when Emily turned on him suddenly, feeding him a mouthful of popcorn.

"Mm-mmm!"

"Much better. Can't talk if your mouth's full now, can you?" she side-grinned at him.

"'Is 'sat 'a 'hallenge?" James's words were mumble-jumble against cheeks full of popcorn. " I say, 'ere 'es 'o 'un 'hoo 'an out 'est me 'at 'at?"

"Oh, god, you're right," Emily answered him. "You sound so much worse that way."

"Though, what did that lass mean, I wonder," James asked, when he finally had his chance to ask it. "When she called me your boyfriend, that is? Did she take us for sweethearts?"

"Well, in the strictest context of the word-in a very literal sense, I mean- it means you are of the male genre, and that you are my friend," Millie informed him. "Boy-friend."

"Ah, so mates, you say?"

"Roommates, generally speaking."

"But we are sharing popcorn together, Miss Millie," James pointed it out, as if it were the most intimate thing one could do with another. "Surely, there must be a fonder word that I might call you better by?"

"Well, while you're coming up with one," Emily told him. "Would you mind passing me back the popcorn? I'm so starved."

"Oh?"

James's brows perked at her, a sign that he had heard, but it didn't stop him from carrying on eating it.

"James?" Emily reiterated her statement. "The popcorn."

"Eh? Oh, I'm sorry, did you say you wanted this back?"

Emily's eyes narrowed at him.

"If you don't give me back the-"

–She grasped for the bucket and pulled it her way.

And James tugged it back his way.

Until torn by the competitive force between them, the popcorn bucket ripped a little from the top, just as Emily snatched it back.

Splashing dozens of showering popcorn kernels all over her.

And there the Miss sat jaw-dropped and stunned as James snorted into a laugh behind the shield of the war-torn bucket. Hardly able to keep himself from cackling fully aloud.

Hard work for him, it was...with the way Emily looked at him then.

So endearingly cross and daffy with a crown of popcorn tangled in her hair like his own Lady Liberty.

And being the gentleman he was, James couldn't help it but to reach up and gently comb his broad sailor's fingers through each of her delicate twirling tressess, carefully picking each of the popcorn pieces out.

Giving Emily chills for that tootsie-roll-like sensation of a slight pinch, followed by ticklishness that hurt so good, each time James slowly dragged one of the kernels away from a strand of her hair.

"On second thought," he told the Miss fondly. "Perhaps, I should call you butter, because you taste a great deal better than it."

.

And so, after losing an entire bucket in their popcorn fight against each other–James and Emily went on a hunt for something equally delicious and snackable to sneak back into the movie theater with them.

Knowing it would be some time before the next showing started, they took their time in a slow stroll through Battery Park.

Emily opening up her umbrella for James as the two held onto the handle together, against the sea breezes blowing in from the Upper New York Bay.

James, in fine fettle, taking comfortable long strides over deep rain puddles, and Millie nimbly leaping over this one and that one in her dainty wedges.

And as they walked through the memorial gardens of Battery Park, Emily had come up with a little delightful game to pass the time.

"Truth or dare?" she asked James.

"Dare, of course," the officer answered.

"Hmm...I dare you to...talk in your best American accent until it's your turn again."

"Alright, well that's money for old rope," James pulled it off nearly flawlessly, giving Leo DiCaprio a run for his money. "Nothin' to it, ma'am."

"I beg to differ," Emily challenged his overconfident assumption. "How are you so good at that?"

"It's all in the tongue placement," he explained. "Dragging your vowels and adding just a pinch of inflection around the nose. Americans love their R's. Darken the L, and deaden the t. Easy as American apple pie."

"Why do I get the feeling you're oversimplifying the story behind this?"

"Reckon it's because you'll be grateful I spared you a longer one," James replied. "Let's just say, I spent my fair share in America, after I turned 20."

"Mhm?" Emily urged him on. "And then?"

"Now don't get ahead of yourself, Miss Millie," his lips dipped into a smile at her. "It's not my turn anymore, is it? I believe it's your turn to answer the question."

"Such a tease," she shook her head. "Ok, so ask me."

"Truth or dare, Miss Millie?"

"Truth."

"Ah, come now, you ruddy chicken," James heckled her playfully. "Alright then. Tell me the truth. What's one secret you've not told anyone?"

"Hmm," Emily thought it over for a moment. "I've never actually been on a date."

"Now you're pulling one over me."

"I swear, I haven't."

"How's that then? A darling as fit as you?

"You're gonna think I'm crazy, after what I told you earlier. But I have this idea in my head that if it's not like "movie love", it's not enough for me. I know that's not practical but it's hard to explain."

"You mean like the moving picture with Kate and Leo?" James asked her.

"I mean...like the story in my quilt, Emily answered. "It feels a little bit like being trapped, like I never really fit in here. It's like I'm waiting for something I've lost. Like being under a spell or something. Waiting for some place, or fairy tale...or person, I don't know. And the longer I wait for it to happen, the more I wonder if I'll ever find what I feel is missing," she said. "I know that sounds overly sentimental."

"I should say, it sounds like an opportunity, it does," James said to her. "Whoever that lucky fella might be, anyone could still be him, right? I wouldn't count yourself out yet, Miss Millie. Not by a far chance."

He nudged her playfully with his shoulder, and Emily smiled, nudging him back.

"Suppose it's my go now?" James smoothly shifted back to his natural Yorkshire accent.

"Truth or dare?"

"The truth, I reckon."

"Why are you so good at American accents?" Emily fired off the question she'd been waiting since last turn to ask him.

"Because it was loads more fun being American on the Oceanic, and joshing the passengers into taking me for one," he confessed. "And a handful of times, I stayed in New York for private reasons."

"Oh? Sounds scandalous."

"To some, it was," he said quietly. "The truth being that I loved a girl in my adolescence. She was the daughter of a lord, and her family was heir to a grand estate in Yorkshire...But I was a sailor...Though I suppose, it wasn't because I was a sailor that I didn't deserve her in the end."

"She's the one that got away then?"

"My very first sweetheart, she was," James said. "Though...you can say things got complicated, and I was forced into an ultimatum that, I regret to say, broke her heart terribly in the end. Before I had a chance to explain everything, she was gone."

"And didn't you go after her?"

"I tried, God knows I did," he said. "We made a promise to each other, that when the time was right, and I'd made my career at sea, we'd find each other again here in America. Though, on the day I turned 20, I asked for my leave from the S.S. Caprera. Suppose I'd gotten cocksure, as I'd been promoted to first mate. Needless to say, it was denied twice. I insisted. Then I was promptly demoted to second mate. I got the leave eventually in winter of 1910, but by that time, the storms were merciless. I didn't get to America until February, 6 months after my 20th birthday. I lodged in New York for as long as my wages could hold me over. It was every day that I waited for her...at the very spot she said she'd meet me. Though I never found her there."

"Did you ever try writing to her?"

"I wanted to, but I didn't want to risk her family getting the letter and letting them on to what she'd been up to," James said. "I knew she'd gone to sea to see the world, as she'd always wanted, but I knew nothing of what shipping line had taken her on. What's more, I suspected she had a new name anyway, leaving her old life behind...Even so, I never gave up looking for her.

"I went back the following year on my 21st birthday to try and meet her again. Though, that same year, my brother Christopher had offered to share a tiny house with me in Grimsby. He had such a dislike for lodgings and I wanted some little place to come home to from sea. So, I left America to set it up with him, and went back the following year. By that time, I had lost hope that I would ever meet her again.

"Still, my heart wouldn't let her go...If her feelings for me had changed, I would have understood and let her be...I suppose I just wanted to know at least that she was safe. And that she was happy, after it all...Wherever she was."

"But you found her again, didn't you? On Titanic?" Emily asked him. "What are the odds, really? Maybe it was a sign that you were always meant to be together, despite everything keeping you two apart."

"I reckon I wanted to believe the same, that day in Belfast. It must be written in our stars, I couldn't stop hoping when I saw her," James said to Millie. "If we'd gone around the whole world by sea, and still found our way back to each other, how could it not be so?"