Archive of Our Own

All of New York is moving beneath her feet.

“You’ll need a day or two to get your sea legs,” Cal had told her when they first boarded, as though she’d never been on a ship before. “Until then, it’ll be staggering around like a drunk. Do be careful when you’re near the rail, sweet pea. Wouldn’t want you to stumble right off the edge of the ship, would we?”

She stands on the dock now, remembering the casual dismissal of his words. Watching Titanic’s other survivors disembark, wobbly knees and hollow gazes, nerveless hands clutching at the kindly-eyed Carpathia stewards. The world sways around them all, like a child’s toy carelessly upended.

It’ll take more than a day or two to adjust to this new equilibrium, this new reality.

“Miss?” Another sympathetic face appears at her side. “If you’re ready, we have accommodations prepared for you. You can meet the rest of your people there, out of this rain.”

Is it raining? She blinks, barely feeling it. “No other people,” she says softly. “Just me.”

His face creases into the already-familiar expression of horror-tinged pity. “I’m so sorry, miss.”

Rose accepts the condolences with a wordless nod, turning to follow his lead.

What more is there to say?

She settles into a tiny room with several other solo female survivors. Each of them shuffles about like they’re walking to the gallows, too drained for anything besides brief glances and briefer introductions. Rose falls into her assigned bunk, little more than a pallet topped with a scratchy blanket, and stares at the ceiling. They’ve been given clean, warm clothes, but the room still smells of salt and sodden fabric. She wonders if it’s inside them all now, this icy dampness, creeping like a disease sensed but unseen. The North Atlantic forever stamped on their bones.

Creaking bunks give way to the sounds of even breaths and gentle snores as the others drop one by one into sleep. After a while, there’s a wet sniff, a hitching breath interrupting the stillness. Rose stretches out her hand in the dark, brushing against the crying woman’s sleeve. Fingers meet and clasp in the gloom, holding on for dear life, until her bunkmate’s sobs eventually subside.

(In the morning they won’t speak of it, won’t even be sure whose hand held whose, but none of that matters.)

Rose stares into the blackness, her hand going numb, and wishes she could cry. Maybe the tears will come later. For now, there’s only a dull ache, deeper than anything she’s ever felt. Even deeper than the ocean’s chill.

The minutes tick by into hours, and eventually she slides into sleep.

When she wakes, she thinks of Jack, then Trudy, then her mother. She thinks of Jack’s hands, gentle artist fingers tracing patterns on her skin, as natural as though he was born to touch her. She thinks of Trudy’s ready smile, of how she saw Rose at her worst but never complained or judged. She thinks of her mother back before her father died, back when her eyes were soft instead of brittle, her voice soothing instead of laced with stress and sneers.

She thinks of how she’ll never see any of them again.

The whole country is her oyster—a notion as terrifying as it is exhilarating. Part of her wants to head straight for California, her battered psyche craving the sun-drenched days and easy adventure Jack spoke into existence for her.

Money, however, is another story.

She sells Cal’s coat to a man on the street who doesn’t seem to mind the lingering stench of seawater and sweat, his eyes bulging out at the quality of the construction. The sum isn’t enough to take her all the way to the opposite coast, but it’s a start. She buys a small satchel and fills it with hard bread and salted pork, and roughspun clothes that would make her mother faint dead away if she could see them. She shoves Cal’s diamond to the very bottom of the sack, its blue gleam snuffed out by the clothing, and does not think of it again.

With the little money remaining, she makes her most important purchase: a train ticket heading west, someplace far from New York and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Someplace small and unassuming, where Cal will never think to look for her.

When she steps off the train on the outskirts of Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, she breathes in deep, savoring the cold, clean air filled with the heady scent of pine and the first fresh hints of spring.

It feels right, at least for now.

Rose closes her eyes and tilts her head toward the sun. She remembers Jack’s face, his blue eyes turned green in the golden light of her sitting room, and the way he looked as he drew her—almost reverent, drinking her in in a way no one else ever had. She imagines him starting out here, only feet from where she stands, a sandy-haired boy of ten or twelve sketching figures in a crowd.

It’s enough to chase away the butterflies lingering in her stomach. She shakes back her hair, straightens her spine, and walks into town, eyes skimming the buildings’ signs until she reaches the shoe factory’s door.

She knocks three times, firmly, and waits as the door swings open with a groan. An older woman stands on the threshold, peering at Rose with sharp brown eyes. Gray hair sits piled atop her head in a bun that was likely once neat, but now leaks wispy strands like a broken faucet. A grease smudge lines one cheek.

“Can I help ya?” she asks.

“Yes.” Rose lifts her chin, summoning confidence. “I’m looking for work, if you’re in need of any help. I can sew.”

The woman stares at her, a skeptical tilt to her head. Rose wonders just how obvious it is, despite her travel-worn frame and humble clothing, that she’s never worked a day in her life.

“Please,” she adds, trying to sound calm instead of desperate. “I’m new to town and I need to work. If you’ll let me show you my sewing—”

A second face appears over the woman’s shoulder—a girl Rose’s age, perhaps a year younger.

“Who’s this?” she asks, not waiting for an answer before her eyes fall to Rose’s hands. She lets out a cry, darting forward to grasp one of Rose’s hands in her own, staring as though she’s never seen anything like it. Her grip is firm but not overpowering, her skin rough and callused. Tiny needle-prick scars dot her fingers in an endless array, constellations stretching between her knuckles. Next to her hands, Rose’s look like a doll’s.

“Look at how smooth her hands are!” she marvels. She meets Rose’s eyes, still clutching her fingers. “Where did you come from?”

There’s no derision in her voice, more a sense of disbelief, even awe. For the first time, Rose questions coming here, the carelessness of being led by her grieving heart instead of her mind. Maybe she should have chosen a bigger city, someplace she could have blended in with a thousand others just like her. Maybe she should have become a lady’s maid to the matriarch of a middle-class household, a family not rich enough to catch Cal’s notice, but not poor enough to immediately call out the smoothness of her hands—

“Hush now, Eliza.” The older woman’s voice breaks into Rose’s spiraling thoughts, gruff but not unkind. “Don’t scare her off with your endless questions. Back to work, now.”

The younger woman—Eliza—steps back from the door, but Rose can still see her lingering, naked curiosity in her eyes.

“What’s your name, love?” the older woman asks. She reaches up to push back her loose strands of hair, further smudging the grease along her cheekbone.

“Rose.”

The woman raises an eyebrow, clearly waiting on a surname, and Rose hesitates. Dawson sits on the tip of her tongue, but she bites it back. Better not to use his name, not here in his hometown. Too great a risk, especially when she already apparently stands out like a sore thumb.

“Just Rose,” she says. She holds the woman’s eyes with her own, a silent request for understanding.

And, to her relief, she sees it granted. Suddenly she wonders how many women have come through this town and others like it, their eyes haunted, their minds and bodies scarred, their hands reaching for any fresh start they can find.

“I’m Alice,” says the older woman. “Come inside. Let’s see these stitches of yours.”

By the end of her first day at the shoe factory, she’s never been so tired. Yet beneath the exhaustion lies a glimmering pride.

She can do this. She doesn’t need to rely on Cal, on her mother, on her father’s good name. She doesn’t even need to rely on Jack. She can do good work, hard work.

“Never seen stitches as small and neat as yours,” Eliza says as the day draws to its end. “It’ll be good to have you here, Rose.”

“Thank you.” Rose smiles at her. “You’re a good teacher.”

Eliza ducks her head, her long brown braid swinging over her shoulder. “Have you got a place to stay?” she asks. “Alice said you were new to town.”

“Not just yet,” Rose admits. The question of where she’ll sleep tonight has been a thorn at the back of her mind all day. The money left at the bottom of her satchel isn’t enough to afford a hotel room. “There’s always sleeping under a bridge, I suppose?”

When she speaks it aloud, it sounds much less romantic than when Jack said it back in Titanic’s opulent dining room, surrounded by gleaming chandeliers and candied oranges, rustling silks and cheery violin music.

Eliza is already shaking her head, dark eyes flashing bright in her thin face. “That won’t do!” she says. “You can come and stay with me, if—if you like. My house is small, but it’s a far sight better than sleeping on the ground. I promise I won’t bombard you with questions,” she adds, pink spots spreading on her pale cheekbones. “Alice says I’m far too curious for my own good. She made me promise today that I wouldn’t talk your ear off about where you’re from, what brought you here, and I swear I’ll make good on that—”

“Eliza.” Rose lays a hand on the other woman’s arm. It takes her a moment to realize that, for the first time since Titanic went down, she’s laughing. It feels wonderful and horribly wrong, all at once.

“I would be honored to stay with you,” she says, pushing away her conflicting feelings. “Thank you.”

Eliza beams and leads the way from the factory, heading down streets still dotted with late-winter snow. Dusk has fallen, leaving the sky dark and the air thick with cold, and Rose finds herself all the more grateful for Eliza’s offer of shelter. The other woman’s home is indeed tiny, but clean and well-kept, even cozy despite the chilly draft the walls can’t quite keep out.

“You live here by yourself?” Rose asks, setting her satchel down in a corner.

Eliza nods. “My father left it to me when he…well.” She shrugs one shoulder. “It’s mine for now, anyway.” She bustles over to a small room, almost an alcove, painted the color of paprika.

“This was my room growing up,” she says. “It can be yours now, if you like.”

The bed is a far cry from the plush, pillow-heaped affair Rose slept on in Philadelphia, but she hardly notices.

“It’s perfect,” she says. “Thank you, Eliza, truly. You’ve been so kind to me when you didn’t have to be.”

Eliza smiles at her again, but this time it’s touched with sadness.

“It’s the least I can do,” she says. “A woman like you doesn’t come to a factory town like this without a good reason. I can tell. You can stay here for as long as you like.”

And Rose does.

Days turn to weeks, then to months before the time feels right to ask the question that’s been on her mind since she set foot in Chippewa Falls.

She sits at a table in the factory with Alice and Eliza, sewing neat rows of stitches in pieces of leather like she does every dawn to every dusk. Hours upon hours of labor for paltry wages, turning her hands pockmarked like Eliza’s, but the little pile of money at the bottom of her satchel is growing by the day.

“Alice, you’ve lived here your whole life, haven’t you?” she asks. At the older woman’s nod, she continues. “Do you know of a family called Dawson?”

“Dawson?” Alice echoes, something pensive but vague flitting over her features. “No, my dear, I’m afraid I don’t know of anyone by that name.”

“Oh!” Eliza pipes up. The word bursts from her with enough force to nearly make Rose jump. “What about that family’s home that burned up over on 12th Street? It must have been five, six years ago now. Wasn’t their name Dawson?”

Alice’s face clears. “Oh, yes, it’s coming back to me now that you mention it. Heavens! My memory isn’t what it used to be, that’s for certain.”

Eliza leans over to Rose, her eyes wide and alight. “I was walking home from school when I saw the smoke. I wasn’t allowed to go near, of course—I was only ten or eleven—but I remember that smoke reached all the way to the clouds, thick and black as the devil. The whole town smelled of it for days after!”

“A tragedy, it was.” Alice clucks her tongue, reaching for another piece of leather. “The mister and missus both perished, as I recall.”

“Were there any survivors?” Rose asks, her tone as even as though she’s discussing the menu at tea.

“No. Actually, wait.” Alice frowns. “They had a son who made it out. Lord, what was his name? I remember I’d see him at the sweet shop downtown when I would pass by to get my milk. Gangly thing he was, always laughing. Popping penny candies in his mouth. But after the fire…” She trails off, shaking her head. Wisps of silver hair flutter against her cheeks. “I wonder what became of the poor boy?”

Rose places both hands in her lap, sits perfectly still. Her knuckles are white against the tanned leather hide, her needle still sticking from its edges.

He died in the middle of the ocean, she thinks. He died holding my hand and I didn’t even know the moment it happened. He died so that I could live.

And now here I am. And for what?

“Excuse me,” she murmurs, rising on unsteady feet. “I—I need a smoke, if that’s all right.”

Alice looks bemused but waves her off. Rose weaves through the factory, bypassing countless machines and sewing tables, breathing in the scents of leather and toil.

When she bursts through the back door, it’s like being shot from a cannon. Her legs carry her away from the factory, not stopping until she finds herself beneath a massive oak tree, her calves burning, the cigarette trembling in her hand. She doesn’t even remember lighting it.

She takes a drag, then another, the tobacco calming her. Grounding her, here in the present. Rough bark between her shoulder blades. Dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves. She’s here, not trapped in the impossibly black ocean, so cold she can’t feel her own body, nothing but a damaged soul hovering above the depths. Waiting to die.

Screams overlapping screams—

Come, Josephine—

Jack’s bloodless skin, frozen to hers—

“Rose?”

She looks up, managing a wan smile for Eliza.

“I’m all right,” she says, pre-empting the question. “I just needed some air.”

“Oh, Rose.” Eliza stops next to her, gathers her up in her bony arms. “I know you’re not all right. And I won’t ask, not unless you want me to. But I’m here if you need company.”

Rose returns the hug, fiercely, then slides down against the tree trunk. She’s probably leaving sap on her work dress, but she doesn’t care at all. “Is it that obvious?” she asks with a watery laugh as Eliza slips down beside her.

“Actually, no,” Eliza says with a chuckle. “You’re a very good actress, Rose—I mean that as a compliment,” she adds with a small blush. “But—well, I didn’t want to say anything, but…I hear you dreaming at night. And they don’t sound like very good dreams.”

Rose releases a long, slow breath.

She only remembers the dreams occasionally. And they’re not always nightmares. Sometimes she dreams of Jack, alive and well, smiling and beckoning to her from the other side of a wide-open door. But other times, she’s braced once more against Titanic’s final plunge, unable to break free as the ship pulls her under. She wakes up gasping for air, shivering uncontrollably, swearing she can still feel the icy droplets streaming down her skin.

It's no wonder Eliza is worried about her.

“I…escaped a bad situation,” she says carefully. She wants so badly to tell Eliza everything, but it’s only been a few months. Cal could still be looking for her, and though she doesn’t believe for a second that Eliza would willingly give her up, word can always spread. “And it’s not something I’ll ever be able to forget. But I’m doing better now. I truly am, and I know I’ll be all right. Living with you has helped, more than you know,” she adds, squeezing Eliza’s arm.

Eliza pulls out a cigarette, and Rose lights it with her own. They sit in silence for a few moments, smoking together.

“Like I said, I won’t ask what happened to you,” Eliza eventually says. “But my mother…she died a year ago. Fever. Before she passed, she had that same look in her eye that you sometimes do. Like she was always on her guard. Always watching out for something—or someone. And I know it’s because my father—”

Her expression tightens, eyes glittering with a momentary rage.

“He up and left after she died,” she says. “Just vanished one day without so much as a goodbye. As though, without her to beat up on, there was nothing left holding him to this town. And good riddance to him; I hope he never comes back,” she adds. “But what I mean to say, Rose, is that if someone hurt you, and if he ever comes looking for you? Well, I still have my daddy’s shotgun hidden back at the house.”

A startled laugh bursts out of Rose. She watches Eliza with new eyes, seeing, for the first time, the extent of the strength in those wiry arms, the piercing determination in Eliza’s dark eyes.

“You’re a wonder, Eliza,” she says, pulling her into another hug. “Thank you.”

Eventually, they head back toward the factory, the trip back much slower than the flight out.

“If you could go anywhere,” Rose asks at length, “or do anything, anything in the world, what would it be?”

Eliza pauses, her steps faltering, as though the question has never occurred to her.

“I suppose I don’t know,” she says. “My whole life has been here in Wisconsin. It’s hard to imagine leaving.”

“But the world is so vast,” Rose says. “Don’t you want to see what else is out there? Climb mountains? Eat strange foods? Dip your toes in the surf on the beach?”

Eliza is quiet a moment, her eyes distant.

“I would like to dance,” she finally says. “Somewhere outside the little ballroom here in town. One of the great dancing halls, maybe, in a grand city like New York or Chicago.”

Her answer doesn’t surprise Rose at all. She smiles, remembering Eliza swaying, humming tunes only she can hear while cooking food or washing dishes.

“Come with me to California,” she says. “We’ll dance until we drop.”

The factory door comes into view. Eliza slows her steps, turning to look at Rose.

“I see you putting money away into your satchel every night,” she says. “Is that what you’re saving it for? California?”

Rose nods.

“And what’s there for you?” Eliza asks.

Rose exhales, one last cloud of smoke, and stubs out her cigarette.

“The horizon,” she says simply. “A promise I need to keep, and new memories I want to make.”

“That sounds lovely,” Eliza says softly. “We’ll go, then. As soon as we have enough money, we’ll leave here, and we’ll go.”

Rose looks at her, hardly daring to hope. “You mean that?” she asks.

Eliza pauses, her brow furrowed, and Rose can tell she’s seriously thinking it over.

“I never thought I would say this,” Eliza begins, measuring her words. “But…yes. If you can escape whatever brought you here, start a new life, why can’t I? With both my parents gone, there’s nothing left for me here, not truly. Except the house,” she adds after a moment. “I do love that house.”

Rose grins at her. “You don’t have to give up the house,” she says. “Just…let it rest, for a time. You can always come back to it when you’ve had enough of exploring.”

Eliza matches her smile, her face aglow. “Then it’s settled,” she says. “Just say the word, and we’ll go.”

“We’ll go,” Rose echoes. “But first…” Her smile widens. “I need to buy a camera.”

At the end of their shift, Rose and Eliza leave the factory with steps a little lighter than normal. The work remains dull and wearying, and both are nursing new accidental needle-stabs on their hands, but now there’s an endpoint. A faint, flickering glow at the end of a long, long tunnel.

When they reach the street, Rose comes to a slow stop. Eliza turns, several steps ahead, and raises a brow at her.

“Are you coming?” she asks.

“You go ahead,” Rose says, waving her on. “I’ll be there in a little while. I just want to take a walk, clear my head.”

“I can come with you, if you like?”

“No, thank you,” Rose says. “I won’t be long. I just need some time to myself.”

“Of course,” Eliza answers, and Rose releases a breath, grateful for the understanding. Her mother always seemed perplexed and annoyed whenever Rose requested a few moments of solitude.

On a seeming impulse, Eliza darts forward, wrapping Rose up in a brief but firm hug. “You enjoy your walk,” she says next to Rose’s ear. “I’ll see you at home.”

Home. It’s still a little strange, thinking of this place as home. And yet, is it not? She’s learned the layout of the small town by now, could probably walk from Eliza’s house to the shoe factory or the general store with her eyes closed.

And she knows exactly where she needs to go tonight.

Her pace quickens once Eliza is out of sight, only slowing when she reaches 12th Street. A quiet road, almost on the outskirts of town, tucked away from the bustle of the factories.

Her body tenses from head to toe, knotted up in memory and grief. She takes a breath, deep as her lungs will hold, and forces herself to relax as she walks the length of the road, pausing in front of each house. Dusk is falling quickly, but there’s still enough light for her eyes to trace the contours of each structure. They look sturdy, well lived in, well loved. Try as she might, she sees no trace of fire damage. Wherever Jack’s childhood home stood, it’s been wiped away, remade into something new.

When she reaches the end of the road, she stops, just stands, breathing in the crisp evening air.

“Which of these was yours?” she whispers, tilting her head up to the indigo sky.

She receives no answer, of course, yet his voice is still so fresh in Rose’s memory that she can imagine what he might say, his tone teetering on the edge of a laugh as it so often did.

“That one was mine. Or wait, maybe it was that one. Actually, maybe my folks owned the whole street. Turns out the Chippewa Falls Dawsons had as much money as your family before it all burned up in the fire. A real riches to rags story. Betcha didn’t see that one coming, did you, Rose?”

And Rose finds herself laughing through a sudden burst of tears. She wipes them away with the back of her hand, yet they keep coming.

How is it possible to miss him this much, to hold such a fierce, deep yearning for someone she barely knew?

He barely knew you, too, a tiny voice whispers in her mind. But he still thought you were worth dying for. Remember that.

She takes a last look at the houses of 12th Street, watching as lights turn on through the windows, one by one, burnished gleams in the gathering dark.

And in the morning, as the sun spreads over the horizon, she walks to the general store and buys her first Kodak Brownie. She strolls down the street almost leisurely, the camera clutched in both hands, and stops in front of the sweet shop Alice mentioned. She thinks of Jack sitting outside, fingers dusted in charcoal and sugar, and she lifts the camera to capture it, framing the store’s cheery bunting in the lens.

Rose turns away, a faint smile on her face, and promises herself it will be just the first picture of many.

Months pass, until one evening Rose adds up the money at the bottom of the satchel and finds herself surprised at the sum.

She looks over her shoulder at Eliza, who lies on her stomach by the fireplace, legs sprawled behind her, a book propped open in one hand.

“I think it’s time,” Rose says.

It’s almost comical how fast Eliza sits up, the book tumbling away, forgotten.

“Truly?” Eliza says. Her voice is hushed, her eyes round as saucers.

“We don’t have to go far, not at first,” Rose says. “What’s the biggest city you’ve ever been to?”

Eliza draws her knees up to her chest. “Rose, I’ve never left Chippewa Falls.”

“Then you’ll love Chicago.” Rose closes her eyes, remembering city lights and sounds and bustle. “It might be overwhelming at first, but there’s so much to see and do. You wanted to dance in a true ballroom, didn’t you? You’ll find plenty there.”

Eliza gives a little shiver—of excitement or nerves, it’s hard to tell. Rose scoots closer, leaning down to see Eliza’s eyes.

“Do you still want to go?” she asks softly. “If not, it’s all right. It’s a lot to think about, leaving the only place you’ve ever known.”

“No, I do. I do want to go.” Eliza nods, stubborn and firm. She looks at Rose out the corner of her eye. “Is…is that where you’re from? Chicago?”

“No,” Rose says. “But…someplace like it. Philadelphia.”

It’s the first time she’s told anyone here where she’s from, and it feels like a weight tumbling from her shoulders. It’s now been nearly a year since Titanic sank, and the headlines have long since moved on. Surely Cal has, too. She hopes.

Even if he hasn’t—let him come, she thinks. She’s not the trapped, silently screaming girl she used to be. He has no hold over her, not anymore.

“I knew it,” Eliza grins. “I knew you were from some huge, fancy city, all sophisticated. Thank you for telling me that.”

“You’re welcome.” Rose squeezes her arm. “Shall we begin packing?”

Eliza’s face when the Chicago skyline comes into view is a sight to behold.

“It’s massive,” she breathes. “What if we get lost?”

“We won’t.” Rose grins. “And if we do, it’ll just be part of the adventure.”

They spend their days sightseeing and their evenings dancing until they’re cloaked in sweat, returning to their hotel flushed and exhausted and happy.

“You really are a natural dancer,” Rose says one night as they stumble into the hotel room, stomachs filled with cheap stew and cheaper beer.

“Thank you,” Eliza says, pink-cheeked, then adds, almost as an afterthought, “You…aren’t.”

Rose throws her head back and laughs, Eliza joining in.

“What do you want to do, Rose?” Eliza asks, when their mirth has finally subsided. “Surely you don’t plan to sew shoes for the rest of your life.”

Rose sits on the edge of her bed, taking down her hair. “No,” she says with a small smile. “I want to be an actress.”

“Like Lillian Gish!” Eliza sits bolt upright, her eyes huge. “Oh, Rose, you’ll be amazing at it, I know you will. You have this air of mystery about you, like you’re a well brimming full of stories just waiting to be told.”

Maybe it’s the beer, or maybe it’s that enough time has finally passed, or maybe it’s that Eliza’s words have loosened the knot that’s been lodged in Rose’s chest since that frigid April night.

Whatever the reason, she hears herself saying, “I was on the Titanic.”

The silence that falls is as absolute as silence can be in a metropolis the size of Chicago. Beyond the thin hotel walls, the city continues its clamor, a mess of car horns and raised voices and machinery, but it all seems muted, distant.

“Oh, Rose,” Eliza finally whispers. She comes to sit next to Rose on the edge of the mattress. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine.”

“Well, there it is.” Rose manages a laugh, though her voice feels thick with tears. “Now you know my secret.”

Eliza slips her arms around her, and Rose leans into the embrace, resting her head on Eliza’s shoulder.

“Your family,” Eliza says. “Were they…lost?”

After a moment, Rose nods. It’s true, after all. In a manner of speaking.

“I’m so sorry,” Eliza murmurs again. “No wonder you have nightmares. How did you survive?”

Rose closes her eyes, and immediately, Jack is there.

She thinks of him less often now, the passage of time easing grief’s stranglehold on her heart. But her memory of him is as sharp as ever. His eyes, his arms, his voice, his hands—none of it has faded from her mind’s eye. Not even a little.

She opens her mouth to say his name, but it catches in her throat, and she knows that she’s not ready. Maybe she won’t be, not for a very long time.

Maybe that’s all right.

“I’d rather not talk about it,” she says instead. “But I’m glad, now, that I did survive. Some days…I haven’t been. But those days are fewer than they used to be.”

Eliza’s arms tighten around her.

“I’m glad, too,” she says.

They stay in Chicago until the money is almost gone, and then they head west, and west again. They watch stage performances in Missouri, chase dust storms in Kansas, climb mountains in Colorado, and catch fish—the biggest Rose has ever seen—in Montana. With each new stop, her collection of photographs grows and grows.

They’ve settled in Oregon for a time, just one state away from California, when Eliza returns home from work one evening with a strange look on her face.

“What is it?” Rose asks, and then she catches sight of the sheet of paper in Eliza’s hands.

“A letter from Alice,” Eliza says. She turns the page over in her hands, then back again, and Rose can see it’s already fraying at the seams, as though it’s been read over and over again.

“It’s my father,” Eliza says, her voice strained. “Alice says he’s back in town. She says he’s…he’s not well. He only has a little time left, it seems.”

“Oh, Eliza. I’m sorry.” Rose goes to her, pulling her into her arms. “What do you want to do?”

Eliza looks at her, uncertainty written across her face. “I—I should go see him, shouldn’t I? He is my father, after all.”

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.” Rose grasps Eliza by both shoulders, looking her dead in the eyes. “You don’t. With what you’ve told me about him? He isn’t entitled to any of your time. Family or not.”

“You’re right,” Eliza says after a moment. She folds the letter, sharpening the crease, then opens it again. “But…the house. It still belongs to him, technically. And if I’m not there…” She worries the paper in her hands. “I think I have to go.”

“I understand,” Rose says, and she does. The past is impossible to escape, sometimes. She knows that better than anyone.

“Do you want me to go with you?” she asks.

Gratefulness touches Eliza’s eyes even as she shakes her head.

“You shouldn’t abandon your plans on my account,” she says. “Go to California. Be the best actress they’ve ever seen. I’ll see your moving pictures and I’ll tell people, ‘I traveled with her, for a while.’ I’ll tell them, ‘she was—she’s my best friend.’”

“We’ll see them together,” Rose says, and now they’re both crying, tears soaking into the coarse fabric of their collars and sleeves.

In the morning, Rose sees Eliza off to the train station, watches her long brown braid disappear into the crowd, and wonders if she’ll ever see her again.

She stays in Oregon for months, taking work where she can find it, rebuilding the pile of money at the bottom of her satchel. It’s slow going, agonizingly slow, and she spends more time than she cares to admit watching the ceaseless raindrops rolling down the windowpanes. She writes letters to Eliza when she can, receiving responses every now and again. She cherishes those letters, tucks them in the pages of her photo albums.

It may be only one state away, but the final push to California feels more distant than ever.

And for the first time in a long, long while, she reaches into the satchel, pushes past the slim band of dollar bills, past the neatly folded clothes, and pulls Cal’s diamond free. Turns it from side to side in her fingers, watching the brilliant blue gem catch the light. Even in her dim, shoddy apartment, its immense worth is obvious.

Fifty-six carats. One sale, and all her troubles would disappear in an instant.

And yet…

She closes her eyes, and this time it’s not Jack’s face she sees, but Cal’s. That curl of his lip. The contempt in his eyes. The blur of his hand before it impacted her cheek. The way he’d tried to buy her love with money and jewels.

Bile rises in her throat, and she shoves the diamond back down to the depths of her satchel.

Maybe it’s foolishness, nothing but stubborn pride. But it matters.

She’ll live her life without his help, no matter what form it takes.

Finally, she makes her way to California.

The sheer size of the state takes her breath away, and she laughs a little at herself, remembering Eliza’s stunned expression when she first saw Chicago. So long ago now, and yet not that long at all, in the scheme of things.

She works her way down the coast, north to south, but now her time is spent in theaters more than factories. It’s hard work in an entirely different way: countless people to impress, countless auditions to attend, all for the chance to secure one role or another. But on those nights when she’s able to take the stage, pouring herself into her performance, it’s worth every moment spent, every tear shed.

It's mid-summer when she arrives in Los Angeles, landing a theater role that allows her to rent a much nicer apartment, and she knows she’ll stay here a while. She writes Eliza, sending her pictures of the theater, the palm trees, the sunlit skyscrapers. And she sees the advertisements for the Santa Monica pier as she walks around the city, and they bring a bittersweet pang in her chest—mingled memory and longing, grief and anticipation.

Say we’ll go there sometime, to that pier. Even if we only ever just talk about it.

She will go, she tells herself, when she’s ready. Just not yet.

Not quite yet.

She’s exiting the theater one night after a performance, stepping into a balmy moonlit evening, when she hears her name rise above the city’s sounds.

“You were magnificent, Rose!”

It’s not an uncommon compliment—she’s built herself a small but growing reputation on the stage—but something about the voice is different. Familiar.

She spins around and sees Eliza standing there, grinning ear to ear.

Actress or not, Rose can’t hide her shock.

“Eliza?” she murmurs, taking a step forward, then another, faster and faster until they’re standing face to face. “How are you here? You—were you in the audience tonight?”

“I was.” Somehow Eliza’s smile grows even wider. “I wanted to surprise you. Did I?”

“You certainly did!” And Rose pulls her into a hug, laughing and laughing, and suddenly it feels as though no time has passed at all.

In the morning, they go together to the Santa Monica pier, Rose’s beloved camera in hand.

“No, not the sidesaddle,” Rose says to the perplexed employee at the beach stables. “The regular saddle. One leg on each side.”

He blinks at her, eyes flitting down to her legs—clad in trousers, not a dress—then quickly back up, as though he’s just seen something scandalous.

“But, miss—” he tries.

“One leg,” Rose says, “on each side.”

Next to her, Eliza hides her giggles behind her hand as the employee relents, bringing out two horses tacked up with standard saddles. Rose takes her horse’s reins and leads it further onto the beach before swinging up and over its back, settling into the saddle with ease.

“Take my picture,” she calls to Eliza, grinning.

It’s a pitch-perfect southern California day, warm and clear and just breezy enough, the abundant sunlight glinting in Rose’s hair. She smiles as Eliza lifts the Kodak Brownie, freezing the moment in time.

“Oh, that will be a good one when it develops!” Eliza says, putting the camera away and mounting her own horse. “I think I got you just right, with the roller coaster in the background and all. You look like you were born in the saddle.”

“A better rider than a dancer?” Rose teases, and Eliza laughs.

They point their horses toward the surf, first at a trot, then breaking into an easy canter. Rose tips her head back and briefly closes her eyes, breathing in the scents of sand and salt. The sun warms her even as the ocean mist touches her face, like a cool hand on her brow. She’s making new memories of the sea. Better ones, this time.

She isn’t sure if she believes in heaven, but if it exists, she knows Jack is looking down on her now. And she knows he’s proud.

Opening her eyes, she slants a mischievous glance at Eliza, urging her horse to pick up the pace.

“Come on!” she calls. “I’ll race you to the edge of that dock!”

The wind steals Eliza’s reply as she breaks into a gallop, but Rose hears the thunder of hoofbeats and knows her friend is right there beside her. She leans down over her horse’s neck and rides faster, losing herself to the wind against her face, the sun on her back, the ocean’s roar filling her ears.

And just for a moment, everything else disappears.

And she's flying.