April 15, 1986

Jack and Rose sat on the back porch, watching the sunset. It had been a long and exhausting day for the elderly couple. It was yet another anniversary of the sinking, and this time Claire had her kids gathered around while Nana and Pawpaw told the story of how they had met on the ship of dreams. It was a story that their grand kids had been especially interested in since the discovery of the grand ship. They listened with rapt attention as Jack and Rose described the ship in her former glory, before she had spent over seventy years beneath the sea. When she had been brand new and beautiful. It was a romantic and tragic tale that always took a lot out of Jack and Rose by time it was all over.

Now they sat on the porch, enjoying the last remnants of the day while their daughter and grandchildren went about the rest of their evening.

"You know, talking about Titanic...it wasn't as hard as it used to be. Before they found the wreck, I could barely mention the sinking without falling into a major depression for a few hours," Jack sighed, wrapping an arm around Rose's frail shoulders.

"It's like finding the wreck freed us somehow," Rose nodded in agreement. "Now I think of Titanic and I remember our first meeting."

"And your dream of living in a garrett, poor but free," Jack grinned. "I still say that you wouldn't last a day."

Rose scoffed and playfully punched his side. "Buster."

"It was a special time back then. A time before all the wars and unrest. I mean, grant you, not all of it was great. Alice never did get to enjoy having her civil rights. That Loving case...it would have done both her and Micheal good to see their marriage recognized in all the US."

"And her being able to eat in any restaurant she wanted. That stupid director be damned!"

"I wish that I had been there to see you punch that bad apple. The children still don't believe that you had done such a thing."

"Oh it doesn't matter. It was ages ago and it's still a fun tale to tell."

"I should tell them about being flirted with by Lillian Gish! Now that would have been a tale."

Rose just rolled her eyes. "Hussy."

Jack just laughed and sighed, feeling incredibly sleepy all of a sudden. "It's been a good life, Rosie. A happy life. I am glad that we spent it together. I loved you with all that I had."

"I love you too, Jack. I gave you all of me."

"I gave you all of me, too. I still do. No matter what, I always be with you. To the end of the world and beyond."

Rose smiled. She liked the thought of that. To the end of the world and beyond. It described perfectly just how much she loved this dear man. This man that had given her a life that once upon a time, she had never dreamed of having. She was forever grateful for him.

A comfortable silence fell between them. Rose loved times like this, when they were so comfortable with each other, so in-tuned, words simply weren't needed. She kissed his cheek before resting her head against his chest. She smiled as she watched the moon and stars replace the sitting sun and her mind drifted as she heard his voice singing to her, soft and low, just on the verge of sleep it seemed.

"Come Josephine in my flying machine and it's up she goes, up she goes. High in the air like a bird on a beam. In the air she goes, there she goes. Up, up a little bit higher, oh my the moon is on fire. Come Josephine in my flying machine and it's up and up, goodbye..."

Just as the song ended, Rose looked up just in time to see a star shoot across the sky. She smiled as she remembered what he had once told her about shooting stars being souls going to heaven. "Look Jack, a shooting star. We should make a wish."

She frowned as she was only met with silence. That was unusual. Jack never remained silent when she spoke to him. He always had something to say. She shook him a little, trying to get his attention. His hearing wasn't what it used to be. Maybe he didn't hear her.

"Jack! There's a shooting star! Let's make a wish!" She spoke a little louder, just to be met with more silence. Her frown deepened as she sat up and looked at him. His eyes were closed, as if he was asleep. But just by how still he was, she knew that he wasn't sleeping. No, this was not something that Jack was going to wake up from. Not this time.

She covered her mouth with a trembling hand and sobbed, letting the realization wash over her. "Oh Jack...why?"

They had been married for over seventy years and Rose had always assumed that they would pass together. That there was no way that he would go on without her. She had thought that they would pass in their sleep, their hands intertwined, ready to meet the next life together. Not one going on without the other, leaving the live one alone to face the world without his or her soul mate.

Sobbing, she touched his cooling cheek and placed a small kiss on his lips for the last time.

"Why Jack? Why did you leave me alone?"

There was no answer. Only a somber silence that would stay with her far beyond his funeral.

Three days later, when they laid Jack Dawson to rest, Rose had to lean on her daughter, her grief almost unbearable. She felt as if she couldn't go on any longer, not without Jack. But she knew that she had to. It wasn't her time yet, obviously. She had to wait. For how long she didn't know. But she did know that wherever Jack was now, he was waiting for her. But for now, she had to live. Keep making it count until it was indeed time for them to meet again.

…..

April 13, 1997

Rose was a little over 100 years old now. Despite the death of her Jack, her heart still kept beating, refusing to let her go meet her beloved. After two years of grieving her husband, Rose had pulled herself together and decided to start keeping that promise to make it count. It was what Jack would have wanted. So she took up writing again. This time, it was a memoir, depicting her life before and after Titanic.

She didn't plan to have it published. No, this was private. Something to leave her family, especially the girls. She wanted to inspire them. Show them that they didn't have to be what society told them to be. That they came from a woman that had broken out of a gilded cage and lived life on her own terms. It had been a hard life, full of sadness and heartbreak at times, but also filled with love and triumph as well. She wanted them to recognize the fire inside themselves that she had passed on down the line and use it to make their dreams come true. If a trapped Edwardian princess could break free and become her own person in a time when such a thing was unheard of, so could they.

Writing wasn't the only thing she did. She also took up ceramics. She would often be found in the ceramic's studio that her granddaughter Lizzie had set up for her at the potter's wheel, throwing together a pot or a vase or some other object. It was messy work, but she loved the feel of the liquid clay as it coated her now gnarled and age-spotted hands.

It was a clear April morning when Titanic again intruded on her quiet life, this time for the first time since Jack's death. She had just been finishing off throwing a vase as she listened to CNN news when the mention of Titanic drew her attention. She turned her face to the screen and watched.

"Treasure hunter Brock Lovett is best known for finding Spanish gold in sunken galleons in the Caribbean. Now he is using deep submergence technology to work two and a half miles down at another famous wreck...the Titanic. He is with us live via satellite from a Russian research ship in the middle of the Atlantic. Hello Brock?" The newscaster spoke into her microphone, looking straight into the camera.

"Yes, hi Tracy. You know, Titanic is not just a shipwreck. Titanic is the shipwreck. It's the Mount Everest of shipwrecks," The man known as Brock Lovett spoke.

Rose rolled her eyes at this. This man was being overly dramatic. But that was okay, she liked drama. She was curious though. So much has come out about Titanic over the years, she wondered what new discovery could have been made to warrant a CNN news report.

"I've planned this expedition for three years, and we're out here recovering some amazing things...things that will have enormous historical and educational value," Lovett continued.

The reporter was not impressed. She could probably smell bullshit from a mile away. "But it's no secret that education is not your main purpose. You're a treasure hunter. So what is the treasure you're hunting?"

Rose was impressed. The reporter was not going to be distracted. She was going to make this man tell the real reason why he was at the Titanic site. Good for her.

"I'd rather show you than tell you, and we're close to doing just that."

Curious, Rose got up and walked into the living room, picking up a rag to wipe the pottery clay from her hands. Seeing her grandmother on the move, Lizzie Dawson rushed to help her grandmother across the room.

"Turn that up please, dear," Rose directed, wanting to hear more of what this Lovett man had to say.

"Your expedition is at the center of a storm of controversy over salvage rights and even ethics. Many are calling you a grave robber."

Lovett scoffed at the accusation, as if such a thing was absurd. "Nobody called the recovery of the artifacts from King Tut's tomb grave robbing. I have museum-trained experts here, making sure this stuff is preserved and cataloged properly. Look at this drawing, which was found today..."

Rose's mouth dropped open in amazement as the camera panned off of Brock and to the nude drawing of herself that Jack had drawn all those years ago. She still remembered that night so clearly.

"A piece of paper that's been underwater for 84 years...and my team are able to preserve it intact Should this have remained unseen at the bottom of the ocean for eternity, when we can see it and enjoy it now…?"

Rose couldn't believe it! After all these years, that picture had survived! Jack would have been flabbergasted if he had been there!

"I'll be goddamned," Rose gasped, stunned. The past had just reached out and grabbed her, taking her back to a time when she had been young and beautiful and had met the love of her life. It was like Jack was giving her a sign. She didn't know what it meant, but...maybe she could find out somehow. She had to go speak to Mr. Lovett. She had to let him know the story behind that drawing. Titanic had been more than a famous shipwreck. It was the place where her life had truly began.

….

April 15,1997

Rose returned to her cabin, feeling exhausted from the long couple of days. She had just spent hours recounting her time on Titanic. From the moment she boarded to the moment when she and Jack had been rescued and had embarked on their life together. It had been so long ago. The people she had known back then, they were all gone now. Her mother. Molly. Janie and Cal. Alice and Micheal. Fabrizio, Cecily, Richie, and Jolene. Most important of all, her Jack. They were all gone now. She was the only one left.

She walked over to where the pictures she always took with her on her travels sat. They were her pictures depicting her life with Jack. Their renewal of vows, the birth of their children. Jack in his army uniform. Rose in a play. Their honeymoon in Santa Monica, their time in Hawaii and Europe...it was all there on display.

It had been a life well lived. She had no regrets. None at all.

Yawning, her exhaustion growing, Rose Dawson made her way to the bed and slipped under the covers. It took only a few minutes for her eyes to close for the last time, leaving the world with the legacy of her and Jack, freshly told and newly discovered by those outside of the family. It would be a story told to the world and never forgotten. A story of Love, bravery, and devotion. A love that lasted a lifetime.

Rose found herself swimming. She was going deeper and deeper into the abyss until the wreck of Titanic appeared. Strangely, it was lit by some kind of light. She swam over the endless forecastle deck to the superstructure. She was swimming faster and faster, as if she was flying.

Suddenly, her feet were on the deck and she went inside, following the sound of distant waltz music. She watched as the rust faded away from the walls of the corridor and it became transformed into the way it was before the sinking. She looked down at herself and gasped. She was no longer an ancient old lady. She was a girl of seventeen again, wearing the same style of dress as she had at the first class dinner, except it was white. She pulled a strand of hair into her line of sight, and sure enough, it was soft and as red as It had ever been.

Swallowing down her awe, she continued on and emerged into the grand salon, which was lit by the glowing chandelier above. The music became vibrant and Rose noticed that the room was full of men and ladies in evening wear. It was so beautiful, Rose couldn't believe her eyes. What was this? A dream?

At the bottom of the staircase were familiar faces. Tommy. Fabrizio. Mr. Andrews. Janie and Cal. Alice and Micheal. Including many other faces she had known from Titanic and throughout her life with Jack. But what really caught her eye was the man standing on the landing at top of the steps in front of the clock.

Jack.

He was a twenty year old man again. His blond hair fell into his eyes and his blue eyes twinkled with love and devotion as she approached. He held a hand out to her, which she eagerly accepted as she walked into his arms.

"Welcome home, Rose," He smiled before claiming her lips in the best kiss she had ever received. It was a kiss that truly promised forever. A promise that could never be broken.

Finis

(A/N: This is the end of All of Me. It's amazing that when I started this story, I hadn't thought it would be this many chapters, almost the same size of A Life That's Good. I hope that you all have enjoyed reading it as I had writing it. Thank you again for all the reviews, favs, and follows:) I am going to truly miss this version of Jack and Rose, but there are more stories to come:))