The Girl Who Came Home - a Titanic Novel (36 page)

Marconigram message sent from the Captain of The Carpathia to George E Foster, acting Premier, Ottawa, Ontario, 18 April 1912

CHAPTER
36 - Chicago, 1982

They’d arranged to meet by the shores of the Lake. It had always been a favourite hang-out of theirs during spring break or whenever he’d come to visit her at home and seemed like the perfect location – not too public and not too isolated either as there were always plenty of people playing Frisbee, fathers pitching baseballs to their sons or keen water sports enthusiasts falling off their jet-skis. There would be enough distraction to mask their discomfort if the meeting didn’t work out as Grace was hoping it would, and enough space for her to wipe away the tears in private.

Their conversation over the phone had been brief and awkward; punctuated with uncomfortable pauses and hesitant exchanges, talking over each other inadvertently, causing the conversation to stop and start as they each apologised and insisted the other one carry on. It was nothing like the easy, relaxed chats they’d had for hours over the phone when they’d first got together and were at their respective homes for Thanksgiving or during the summer break. The use of the phone to call Jimmy had been the only real source of arguments between Grace and her father who frequently insisted she’d spoken for long enough and when she argued with him, he insisted that she would be paying the bill if she didn’t hang up right away.

Grace played their brief conversation through in her mind all over again as she pulled into the parking bay. He’d told her he’d been keeping well and had been amazed when he’d read her article in the paper. His voice had been receptive and not at all hostile – which had been her worst fear – and he hadn’t allowed her to apologise, insisting that it would be better to meet in person and talk face-to-face. She hadn’t been able to ask him outright if he had a girlfriend but she guessed that if he was happy to meet up with her, he probably didn’t. She hoped he didn’t, but had prepared herself for the possibility.

Checking her appearance in the rear-view mirror she was happy enough with how she looked, but could already feel the nervous rash breaking out across her chest. She wrapped a silk scarf loosely around her neck, fluffed her hair, re-applied her lip gloss and pushed her shades up onto her head. ‘Right,’ she said to herself as she locked the car, ‘Let’s do this.’

They’d arranged to meet outside
The Java Bean
– a coffee shop they used to hang out at. Whoever got there first was to order two flat whites to go and they would sit on the grass and talk. ‘Nothing else – no other expectations. Just talk and enjoy great coffee, huh? How ‘bout it?’ His words buzzed around her head as she walked towards the rendezvous point. As she rounded the last curve in the sandy path, she saw him standing there. Her heart pounding in her chest, she stood for a moment and stared, barely unable to believe it was really him. After all this time, after all the pain and belief that she would never see him again, there he was with a Styrofoam coffee cup in each hand, waiting for her.

She took in every detail of him. He looked taller than she remembered him and had let his hair grow longer. It suited him. He was casually dressed in a sweatshirt, pale denim jeans and trademark Converse sneakers. She watched as he shifted his weight restlessly from one foot to the other. He looked as nervous as she felt.

And then he turned.

Their eyes met.

Grace felt as though her heart would burst from her chest it hammered so hard.

They stared silently for a few moments and a steady smile grew across his lips as she walked towards him. It felt good. It felt OK.

‘
Grace Butler,’ he said, standing tall in front of her. ‘Well, wow, would you look at you!’

‘
Look at
you
,’ she replied, smiling. ‘You look great!’

They laughed nervously, the spark of attraction they’d sensed during that first college lecture instantly there again, hanging in the air between them.

‘
I would hug you,’ he said, gesturing to the coffee cups in his hands ‘but I’m kinda stuck here! Flat white with an extra shot?’

‘
You remembered!’

Laughing, Grace took one of the cups from him and they shared a long embrace, not saying anything, just remembering the touch of each other and inhaling the familiar scent of perfumes and aftershave.

‘
Shall we walk?’ she suggested, keen to escape from the prying eyes of the coffee shop customers and the continual flash of cyclists rushing past them.

‘
Yeah. Let’s take a stroll. So, that was some amazing story you pulled out of the bag. I bet O’Shea nearly crapped himself when that manuscript landed on his desk. You did an awesome job, really, I loved it – and what about your great-gran? Who would have known that quiet old lady had such a massive secret hidden away. How come she decided to tell you after all those years?’

As they walked, Grace told Jimmy all about Maggie’s confession at her twenty-first birthday party and how she’d found the small suitcase with some of Maggie’s Titanic possessions in the attic.

‘
She seems to have just reached a point in her life when she wanted people to know,’ she explained, enjoying the light breeze against her cheeks. ‘She told me she had missed being able to talk about it with great granddad, who was the only person in the family who knew about her Titanic trip. I think she just wanted to make sure that the story was left within the family before she…you know….dies.’

‘
Well, if she’s anything like I remember her, she’ll not be doing that anytime soon!’ Jimmy laughed. ‘She’s an amazing woman. I reckon she’ll live to be at least a hundred.’

‘
Oh, I dunno Jimmy. There’s something different about her these days. She looks older somehow. More fragile. She looks her age, I guess.’

They sat on a grassy bank and talked easily about how Grace had contacted Professor Andrews and about the amazing reactions she’d had to the article. She told him about Edward Lockey and Maggie’s coat and letters and how Maggie had been able to piece together some of the missing pieces from that night and put to rest some of the things she had worried about and carried with her since that awful night.

‘
I don’t think she’s ever gotten over it y’know. After all these years, I really think she has never really been able to come to terms with what happened – or that she survived when she watched so many others die. It must have been so terrible. I just can’t imagine. She once told me that she sometimes feels like she has never really gotten off that ship. That she walks those stairwells and decks every day, looking for her lost friends and family.’

For a while, they avoided talking about their own relationship, neither one sure of how to broach the subject, anxious to avoid causing upset and argument when they seemed to be getting on so well.

‘
Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you,’ Grace ventured when there was a pause in the conversation. ‘Thank you so much.’

‘
For what?’

‘
For giving me a chance. For coming to see me. I really didn’t think that after…..’

He placed a finger delicately across her lips. ‘Don’t,’ he said. ‘Let’s not do that. Let’s not do the whole post-mortem thing. I don’t want to go back there, back then. It’s too painful for both of us. We both know what happened. We both have our whys and what-ifs and a need to explain ourselves, but I don’t think it would help. We’re here now, so let’s talk about now. You seem so happy Grace and that was all I ever wanted, was for you to find happiness in your life again – whether with me, or without me. I could never fully understand what it felt like to be you - to lose your father like that – and I eventually figured that I had no right to judge how a person should or shouldn’t react to such a shocking event in their life. I just hoped you and your mom and brother would find happiness again someday. I really hope you have Grace. That’s all.’

Allowing the tears to fall then, tears of relief, tears for her father, tears for herself, Grace sank into Jimmy’s arms and they sat together, talking and laughing until the sun started to set on the horizon and she wrapped her jacket around her for warmth.

‘
So, will you come with me then?’ Jimmy asked, as they strolled back to the parking lot, arm in arm.

Grace continued walking, trying to keep her voice as casual as possible. ‘Come where? Where are you going?’

‘
Ireland. Well, Ireland and the rest of Europe. I’m travelling this summer after graduation. You always said you wanted to go and see where your Irish roots came from – remember we’d sort of planned it?’

Grace laughed, remembering the naïve, romantic, carefree conversations they’d had about travelling the world together. She also remembered how impulsive Jimmy could be. ‘Seriously? You’d want me to come with you?’

He stopped and turned her to face him. ‘Well, only if you want to. I figured it might be a good way for us to spend some time together again, y’know, get to know each other again. What d’you think? Unless you’ve other plans for the summer?’

She smiled, a beaming smile which seemed to spread through her entire body. ‘It sounds like a great idea! Of course I want to go with you. I want to more than anything in the world!’

While her mother fussed over the dinner in the kitchen later that evening, Grace sat in the swing chair on the back porch, enjoying the relaxing, rhythmic sensation; thoughts of Jimmy and the wonderful words he had said skipping and dancing around her mind. Maggie sat on the bench opposite, smiling at her.

‘
So, what’s got you all excited then?’

Grace sat up. ‘Excuse me?’

‘
What’s got you so excited,’ she repeated. ‘Because something certainly has. You’re practically fizzing with excitement.’

Grace laughed at her great-grandmother’s perceptiveness. ‘Good Lord Maggie, nothing gets past you does it? Are you sure you’re nearly ninety years old?!’

Maggie chuckled. ‘Sadly yes, although I don’t feel a day over seventeen y’know. Up here,’ she added, tapping her head. ‘So, are you gonna tell me or am I gonna have to beg?’

Stepping down from the swing chair, Grace sidled over to sit beside Maggie and clasped her hands in hers. ‘Oh Maggie, it’s just amazing. I just can’t believe it. I met Jimmy today.’

‘
Jimmy?
Your
Jimmy?’

‘
Yeah,’ Grace laughed. ‘
My
Jimmy!’

‘
Well, go on then. Tell me all about it. I can tell by the twinkle in your eye that you were definitely pleased to see him.’

Grace had barely been able to believe everything that had happened since she’d spoken to Jimmy on the phone, but she was desperate to tell somebody and she knew that Maggie would listen without judging her. So, she told her all about the note she had written to Professor Andrews along with the newspaper article, and how Jimmy had called her and how they’d arranged to meet for coffee earlier that day and how it had been amazing and was as if they’d never been apart. She hardly stopped for breath as she relayed all her exciting news. Maggie listened patiently as she sipped her cup of tea.

‘
And, you’ll never guess what Maggie.’

‘
What?’

‘
He’s going travelling around Europe this summer and he wants me to go with him. To Ireland! I’ve always wanted to go to Ireland.’

‘
And are you going?’ she asked, when Grace eventually stopped talking.

‘
Yeah. I think so. What do you think?’

Maggie put her cup and saucer down purposefully and stared Grace straight in the eyes. It was a look she gave people when she wanted their full attention; wanted them to sit up and take notice and not be distracted by anything else going on around them at that moment. ‘You don’t need to know what
I
think Grace. It’s what’s in here that counts,’ she said, tapping her chest. ‘There are probably a hundred and one reasons for you not to go rushing off around Europe with a young man whose heart you’ve already broken once, but if there is just
one
reason why you should, then perhaps that’s the one reason you should listen to. You’ve been cooped up here in this sleepy town for two years longer than you’d ever planned to be. I think only you can truly know if now is the right time to leave home and get on with your life.’

She nodded after making this speech, as if to reinforce the solemnity of her words.

Grace sat and thought for a moment. ‘You’re right,’ she sighed. ‘It may look crazy and rushed and foolish to people on the outside, but I’ve got a good feeling about this. I don’t think I can go for the whole summer though – I’ve got a lot of catching up and prep to do before I go back to college in the Fall, but he’s planning on visiting Ireland first, so I thought maybe I’d just go there with him and come back.’

‘
Ireland huh?’ Maggie smiled. ‘D’you know, I never went back. I’ve never stepped foot on Irish soil since the day I stepped onto the tender which took us out to the Titanic moored offshore in Queenstown. I was too afraid, you see. I made a promise to myself you know while I sat in that lifeboat bobbing around on the great blackness of the Atlantic ocean – I promised myself that I would never sail again until my dying day. And it’s a shame because I often think that it would be nice to know what happened to that little cottage I used to live in with my aunt Kathleen; would be nice to know whether anyone living in Ballysheen now would know about the fourteen of us who left that spring day.’ She sighed and laughed a little. ‘I wouldn’t think the people living there now would have any notion of what happened to us all. They’ll be too busy watching that awful MTV nonsense and doing that silly Rubik’s Cube thing.’