【Titanic】True Love Lasts Forever

April 10, 1912, Southampton, England. The clock ticks away, marking precisely ten forty-two, and there I stand on the dock where the Titanic embarks on its journey. In the early spring of England, April holds the lingering chill of winter in its sunlight, enough to send shivers down my spine. I gather my golden waves, a trademark of my fair complexion, into a bun, concealed beneath a gentleman's black felt hat. This hat, a trophy from a wager won in a bar by an American immigrant, whose family sought opportunities in the New World. The 19th-century European migration saw two-thirds of its population head to America, and they would often return to England, perhaps to reminisce about their homeland or to bring back relatives and friends. Up until the outbreak of war, immigrants flooded out of the decaying ruling-class countries in Europe, swarming into the lower decks of ships bound for the American continent. Their sole purpose was to catch a glimpse of the majestic Statue of Liberty. What the Statue truly symbolized, I cannot say, but I do know that no one will be sending me money for a third-class ticket from America. Yet here I am in Southampton Harbor in the year 1912, standing in anticipation, searching for a man I may never find. Or rather, a man not quite yet at the age to be called a man — a boy of twenty, exuding innocence and youthful exuberance. The deep brown coat draped over my shoulders, a tad too large and clearly of cheap quality, was scavenged from a homeless man found lifeless beneath a bridge. As I washed the coat by the unfamiliar seaside, gazing into the distant mist, I couldn't help but wonder if this was nothing more than an exceedingly prolonged dream across the dimensions of time. One day, or perhaps in the next moment, you might open your eyes and wake up, and I would still be living in the time where I belong. This haphazard journey through the dimensions has lasted for nearly five months. In a country that spans only 240,000 square kilometers but once boasted the phrase "the sun never sets," I wandered aimlessly, assuming the identity of a vagabond. Before my plane crashed, I had just finished touring London, England, and was about to return home. My knowledge of the UK was confined to the many roads in London, the numerous pubs along the way, and the abundance of water. Not to forget the lengthy and challenging full name of the United Kingdom that tests the memory of the average person. When consciousness returned, and I pried open my exhausted eyelids, a myriad of snowflakes froze my scattered pupils. I initially thought it was an illusion, assuming the blanket of snow was just the overly bright moonlight at night. Reaching out to touch it, I discovered that my fingers seemed to blend seamlessly with this plump and glistening white. Then, I heard someone humming, a delicate voice on the verge of breaking in the air, intermittent and haunting. Turning my head, I found a woman, weathered and frail, holding me with a tattered blanket wrapped around me. We nestled together, intimately yet unfamiliarly close, in a surreal and inexplicable scenario. I wasn't in a hospital but lying in the arms of a strange foreign woman. Who knows how I returned to the streets of England in late 1901, transformed into a wandering pauper. Saved by a woman on the brink of death from tuberculosis, she wrapped me in her only old blanket. The woman asked me, "What's your name?" I was momentarily speechless, unsure if she would accept a Chinese name. "I'm Mary Robert, hello." She looked worn and aged, dirty hair clinging to her pale, wrinkled face. The final days of her life resembled a withering grapevine, fragile and curled. My lips moved, and finally, a sentence emerged, "Hello." "Have you seen a man? No... a boy, perhaps." She breathed slowly, white breath escaping like the deathly chill of a British winter, gradually robbing your body of all its warm hues. "He's named Jack Dawson, with beautiful eyes. If you see him, please tell him I'm looking for him... No, maybe it's enough if he just lives well." The woman's voice slowed down, as light as the morning mist. "He's talented... he'll live happily." By the time I could move, it was too late to return the blanket to her. No one knew where she came from, just as no one knew where the body of this blonde girl I inhabited came from. So many wanderers in this day and age, I sighed in boredom. Jack Dawson? It seemed like a common name, just like Tom John, a name you could find everywhere. The male protagonist of the Titanic was also named Jack Dawson. It wasn't until I saw news of the Titanic, the luxurious cruise ship launching for its trial run in Belfast, that I suddenly realized this might not be a coincidence. The sketch portrait the woman held in her hand, which looked more and more like a young Leonardo DiCaprio as I stared at it, confirmed my suspicion. It took me a month to adapt to this world that had regressed a hundred years. When I discovered that, apart from occasional dizziness due to malnutrition, this body was still functional, I started exercising my muscles and bones. Maybe I couldn't be as formidable as I once was at my peak, but being able to dance again made me feel that this world was full of hope. I stepped out of the last bar I could find, and the stale odor of the homeless man's worn-out coat mingled with the chilling air of the harbor, creating an atmosphere called loneliness. A green passenger ship's car passed in front of me, dragging my vacant gaze away at an even pace. The midday sun stubbornly pushed aside the haze in the air, a hue that lingered from before ten o'clock. I don't know why I had been ignoring this backdrop without Jack, but now, I see it. You can't notice it at first glance because your eyes start straight ahead. Your gaze unconsciously catches the light that just crushed the mist, and the sky is a rich milky white. Halfway, there's a floating layer of bluish-gray mist, making the sunlight appear feeble in this weather. My gaze slowly pierced through the green mail cars carrying passengers, the gentlemen with round black hats or the elderly women wearing burlap on their heads, the brown-haired girls, and the middle-aged men with cheap cigarettes dangling from their lips. Then I saw the towering gangway, connecting the ship's body to the port, complex cables below where crew members urgently shouted, "Queue up here, come over here." The car's horn echoed through the dock, the fog of people coming and going permeating everywhere, giving me a completely surreal sense of daze. Suddenly, a loud and colossal horn sounded like the explosion of sea tides, and I took a slow step forward. Countless people pressed against me, all seemingly drawn by this sound. My gaze finally made contact with that enormous black shadow, a black hull as long as the night, and golden letters soaring on the pristine black ship — TITANIC. The first chimney finally spewed out a thick black smog, and I could almost hear the internal workings of this colossal 40,000-ton ship as the engines in the engine room started. Hundreds of coal furnaces delivered tons of coal into them amid the shouts of workers, finally burning and igniting, preparing to set sail. And now, it's here, not as the icy remains at the bottom of the sea, but as the truly, in every sense of the word, the largest mode of transportation in this era, in this world. Then the remaining three months were spent on training my body, getting by with whatever food I could find, and wandering through various vicissitudes. I hesitated about whether to go in search of Jack Dawson, to warn him not to board the Titanic. But how could I convince him? How could I tell him that the destination, the luxurious cruise ship bound for the Statue of Liberty, the supposedly unsinkable dream vessel, would eventually meet its demise in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, over three thousand meters below? Maybe I should just forget it. I should consider how to move forward with my life. As someone who suddenly found themselves in the early 20th century, a so-called lower-class person, or even an undocumented individual without any background, I thought I could earn enough through some effort to buy a ticket to the United States. At least there, opportunities would be given to those willing to work hard, and survival wouldn't be a problem. Of course, the ship I'd board would definitely not be named Titanic. I had no ability to save the Titanic. Should I run to London and drag out Harland Wolff or go to the White Star Line to find Bruce Ismay, shaking them by their capitalist aristocratic collars, yelling, "I'm from the 21st century. The Titanic is destined to collide with an iceberg and sink to the bottom of the Atlantic, with less than a third of the passengers coming back?" Well, if I really dared to do that, you would see me at the bottom of the Atlantic the next day. These rational people would undoubtedly throw me, a lunatic too poor to afford even a ticket, onto an iceberg in the Atlantic to dance with seagulls. So, I shouldn't have gone crazy at the last moment, rushing to the port of Southampton. In this place, 600 kilometers from the port of Belfast, in the desolate place facing the cold wind of the English Channel, God knows that when I finally arrived here, less than two hours before the Titanic set sail, I had to squeeze into the busy dock, searching for a guy who might not even exist in the bars along the way. Blacksmiths, carpenters, musicians, merchants, aristocrats' luxury cars, beggars mingled with the rich, forming the only cheerful melody here. I swear I've never run so fast, holding that crumpled, palm-sized sketch portrait in my hand, shouting loudly in every bar near the harbor, "Jack Dawson, Jack, Jack Dawson!" Pushing open one early 20th-century British pub after another, almost using violent methods to kick open the door, in English, Chinese, broken Swedish, or Italian, mixed with some unfamiliar German, I've never shouted a person's name in so many languages. I was afraid that some people who knew Jack wouldn't understand my American English. God knows I learned English later, using the KK phonetic alphabet. I definitely didn't have the so-called authentic British London accent. I almost hate myself for contributing to the Titanic's box office back then, and not just one ticket—I could almost recite the entire plot of the movie, and I went through a dozen tissue boxes. So, when I saw the news of the Titanic setting sail, my first reaction was to question who Jack Dawson was. Of course, the crumpled painting in my hand, deserving to be thrown into the icy sea, was also an essential presence. This guy was once my idol for a period of time. Before I fell in love with Pirates of the Caribbean, his poster in a suit on the Titanic was glued to the wall next to my bed. If I could go back, I would tear all his posters into pieces and stomp them into the trash bin. Jack Dawson. Jack Dawson— Jack! Dawson... Where the hell are you hiding? I remember in the movie, Jack rushed out of the bar just as the ship was about to leave and ran straight onto the ship. But I had to find him before he left the bar. Otherwise, it would be too late. The speed of a man's and a woman's legs is simply not the same thing. By that time, the Titanic was about to depart. Even if he heard someone desperately calling him, he wouldn't bother. America, my homeland, the Statue of Liberty, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, new opportunities, the starting point of dreams—a third-class ticket that costs a whopping $30. If I were Jack Dawson, and a crazy stranger tried to stop me, I'd definitely slap you to death. Do you think you get a chance every day to win a ticket to the Titanic? Even if it's a damn sinking ship, you'd still want to rush up. Even if the ship sinks, you might grab a piece of a door panel and swim to America like a polar bear. Humans are always so presumptuous and blindly optimistic before regrets set in. "I am the king of the world. I can't help but recall Jack's famous line, but unfortunately, this 'king of the world' existed at sea for only five days and then met its demise."