The Explorer's Apprentice

93:An Ocean of Memories

Marley Faulkner

The great Carpathia greets Marley in her sleep, like a still dream. And when the passengers around her shake her shoulders, Marley half expects to open her eyes and gaze onto the familiar face of her miracle once more--just one last time. She can hear him whisper her name. It feels so real.

“It is here, Miss! The rescue ship has arrived!”

But the voice that greets her is feminine and unfamiliar. Marley’s chest feels hollow. They have her wrapped in a thick green blanket, but she still feels so cold. 

“Would you like me to help you up, miss?”

Marley shakes her head. The entire time she’s been on the lifeboat, she hasn’t said one thing. The words just haven’t come. She wonders if they ever will.

Fifteen hundred people went into the sea when Titanic sank from under them. There were twenty boats floating nearby, and only one came back.

One.

Twenty minutes later, the solid, healthy Carpathian decks are littered with people. The sounds of mourn pierce through the air. Everyone has lost something. Every soul on the Carpathia misses a piece of his or her heart. Some of them wish to have been left behind.

Marley isn’t sure of what she wishes for. Her mind doesn’t seem to be working right. It can’t seem to stay focus one on thing for too long. One minute, it’s in Florida, riding on the back of an elegant stallion beside her love—a vision of what would never be. And then the next, it’s underwater, and it’s sinking. Endlessly sinking. Down…down, with dead arms reaching up towards the surface. Just like Jack’s body.

Marley moves toward a bench and sits there, thinking about everything and nothing all at once, her entire head bundled up in thick blankets. Her lips are pink again, and her breath no longer comes out in smoke. Slowly, she’s regaining feeling in her toes. But still her soul is freezing.  Everything hurts. It’s painful to breathe.

Nearby her, perhaps somewhere to her left, she can hear steady footsteps—dark footsteps that stand out among the rest. Pat…pat…pat…Sniveling footsteps, unearthly, broken footsteps.

Marley holds her breath and counts to ten, bringing the blanket further over her eyes. By the time she reaches seven, though, the footsteps are gone. Forever. Because she’s got promises to keep.

It’s the last time Marley will ever see Caledon Hockley.

………………………………………………………………………………………

It starts to rain when Marley passes the statue of liberty, and she’s the only one without an umbrella. It’s amazing and terrible to see. The tall, mighty lady standing strong and undefeated. She carries a light—a beacon, in her hand.

It’s just as amazing as you said it would be, Jack. I know why you wanted to see it so badly. It’s beautiful. It’s free. It, in a way, reminds me of you.

She remembers. Tiny kisses, hard but fierce, licking away her tears--igniting an irreplaceable surge of joy within her.

“Can I take your name, please, love?” The ship guard beside her seems fake, and she tears her gaze from the statue slowly to take him in. He’s young and his face is gentle. She likes the way he doesn’t push and lets her take her time to answer.

Has there ever been a boy, a human being like Jack? A boy who could bring a person from the deepest depths of a cloudy despair, and inspire them to do crazy things, make beautiful things— make miracles spark from their very fingertips? Has there ever been a boy whose eyes held the universe the way his did, whose smile touched even the darkest of hearts, like his did? Has there ever been a human being with a spirit as free and as joyful and as beautiful as his, with an overflowing, powerful love erupting from the very core?