Dear Fate

Olivia stepped on to the deck of the Carpathia with the help of the steward standing next to the ladder. She immediately looked around the survivors already on the ship but realized she was among some of the first to be rescued from her lifeboat. Another steward immediately came over and took her name, handing her a blanket and asked her to follow him. He led her up some stairs and she realized that all of the survivors of Titanic were still be separated by class. She stopped in her tracks and turned back around, going back down to where the other survivors were, not even bothering to tell the steward. She sat down on a bench beside an older woman with her two children. She tuned them out and watched as slowly but surely, the other people were rescued from the lifeboats.

Before she knew it, she was being shaken gently awake. She opened her eyes and blearily peered around, trying to focus on the person waking her up. She finally focused on a young stewards face, looking at her curiously.

"Excuse me miss, but perhaps you would be more comfortable laying down on one of these cots?" he gestured to the make shift beds behind him.

She shook her head and stood up. Or tried to, anyway. She swayed on the spot and the steward reached out his hands to steady her, making sure she didn't fall flat on her face. She thanked him quietly and looked around the deck.

"Has everyone from the lifeboats been collected?" she asked him.

He nodded his head and held out his clipboard wordlessly. She scanned through the names, from Jane Moore all the way down through Hayes Mooney. But she didn't see Holly's name anywhere. But she also didn't see Harry's name anywhere either, and she knew he was alive, so it gave her some hope. She scanned through the list again, double checking and looking for Tommy's name as well, which she also didn't find. She was disheartened, but kept a little bit of hope alive.

She handed the clipboard back to the steward without a word and strolled through all the people currently on the deck. She peered at everyone's face, looking for anyone that was even slightly familiar. But since she was in the steerage area, she didn't recognize anyone. So she made her way over to the nearest bench and sat back down, trying to plan her next course of action.

She could go up to the first class area where she was supposed to be, and look around up there. But that required moving, and Olivia was having a hard time with that thought. She was starting to feel incredibly tired again, and honestly thought about taking that steward up on his offer of the cot, if only for a few minutes.

"There you are! I've been looking everywhere for you, you know!"

Olivia snapped her head up to see Harry Lowe standing in front of her, peering down at her with a small smile on his face.

"Where is she?" Olivia asked at once, taking the smile on his face to be good news.

"In the hospital wing. But I have to inform you," he said, grabbing her arm to make her stop as she'd immediately began to walk away, "she's not in the best of shape and should probably not be overwhelmed right now."

Olivia opened her mouth to argue with him, telling him that she knew all of this, but decided against it. She knew that he was worried about Holly as well, and lashing out at everyone would not make her better.

So she followed Harry up some steps and through some corridors as her led her to the hospital. When they reached a pair of double doors, he stopped outside them.

"She's just inside there. In the third bed from the back. She tired, worn out, upset, and sick. Please, just be gentle," Harry said.

Olivia nodded and pushed open the doors. The nurse at the front stopped her, asking what she was there for. Olivia explained and the nurse nodded, gesturing her head towards the back of the room. Olivia walked past her and walked towards the bed she knew her friend was in. When she reached it, she gasped.

Holly couldn't have been more pale, her face hardly standing out against the white of the pillowcase behind her head. Her lips still had a bluish tint to them, making the split in the bottom one stand out even more. She had harsh red rings around her eyes, making them an even more startling blue than they normally were. Olivia stepped closer to the bed.

"Hey," she said quietly, not knowing what else to say.

"Hey," Olivia was shocked at how raspy Holly's voice was.

"How, how are you?" Olivia asked stupidly.

Holly smiled at her, but it didn't reach her eyes. She gestured to the chair beside her bed and Olivia immediately went and occupied it. She stared at her friends face, wondering what on earth had happened to her. She started to look around the room, her heart aching for Holly. She then spotted the life jacket on the floor beside the bed.

"What happened?" she asked frantically, picking it up and gesturing to the bright red stain on the front of it that looked suspiciously like blood.

She looked back to Holly, whose bottom lip was quivering dangerously. Before Olivia knew what was happening, Holly burst into tears and was doing her best to explain everything that had happened that night, starting with her storming out of the room and finishing with being brought onto the lifeboat at the end of the night. Olivia missed a lot of it, as it was hard to discern the words through Holly's sobs, but she got the gist of it. She also got that the blood wasn't Holly's but Tommy's.

"So, Tommy- he-" Olivia broke off, not able to finish the sentence.

"I'm-I'm so sorry, Olivia," Holly hiccupped.

Olivia blinked her eyes rapidly and forced a fake smile on her face, "It's not your fault dear. No need to worry about it any longer."

"What about you?" Holly asked, "What are you going to do now?"

Olivia kept the forced smile on her face, "Let's just concentrate on getting you better, and then we'll worry about me, alright?"

Holly looked unsure, but nodded anyway. Olivia stood up, telling Holly that she was going to find someplace for them to stay after Holly was released and headed towards the exit. She knew that Holly wouldn't be released from the hospital before they docked in New York, but she needed a few minutes to herself.

She walked out of the room and brushed right past Harry Lowe, ignoring his attempts to try and talk to her. She hurried up the corridor and around a corner, making sure she wasn't followed in the process. When she was sure no one else was around, she clutched her hand to her chest and tried to calm her rapid breathing. She slowly slid to the ground, her sobs coming full force as she buried her face into her knees.