“What? Really?” I ask, amused. I glance over at Jack and Rose shivering in the water. There’s only one door, and only one of them can survive.

I put down the plate of palitaw on the coffee table. “And of course it’s gotta be Rose who survives. God forbid we let the smart, scrappy, poor guy live and kill off the rich, beautiful idiot.”

I think of Heather as I’m saying this, but Zach turns to me, all offended. “Rose is not an idiot,” he balks.

I chuckle. Didn’t figure him to be such a diehard fan. “She is,” I insist.

“How so?” he asks. He stops watching and turns his attention to me.

I point to the door in the movie. “First of all, she could have totally scooted over,” I say. “Look at that door! You can easily fit two people on that door!”

Zach glances at the door and considers this.

“Second of all, she tries to kill herself by trying to jump off a ship. Why? Because she’s tired of fancy cocktail parties?” I ask. Please, it’s not like she’s a full-scholarship student at American Prep.

“Whoa!” Zach says, throwing his hands up.

I giggle. I like riling him up, it’s fun. I move closer toward him.

“Let’s consider what would happen if they actually did both make it off the ship together, shall we?” I gaze over at Zach as I talk. It almost feels like we’re a real couple. Like we’re dating. And we’re having one of those couple’s debates that is going to become like our song.

“And Jack would probably have had to go off and fight in World War I. Maybe Rose would hook up with Cal again—”

“But she didn’t hook up with him,” Zach points out. “We know because Old Rose is in the movie.”

Dang it. I forgot about Old Rose.

“Well whatever. We don’t know what Old Rose did or did not do. She looks like she’s had a bunch of boyfriends.”

Zach bursts out laughing. “What?”

“Seriously, she’s got that look.” Now I’m just spewing nonsense. Zach is on the floor, laughing his ass off. And I’m starting to laugh too.

It feels good to laugh, to forget about Mr. Connelly and what he did and what’s going to happen to Snider. Zach puts a hand over his stomach, and pleads, “Stop, stop . . . you’re too much!” But I don’t stop. Instead, I move onto the floor with him. Our arms brush lightly against each other.

“And what’s with her throwing diamonds in the ocean?” I continue. I smile at Zach, rolling around on the carpet, shrieking with laughter. “Seriously, she could have donated that diamond to some free-women-from-boring-cocktail-parties charity.”

“You are a piece of work, Dani, you know that?” he asks.