Saving Ruby King

by Catherine Adel West

  “What do you mean ‘kinda fine’?”

  “Has everybody lost their damn mind!” a voice calls out from behind. Auntie Violet. She’s all of five feet, but about as big and bad as any man I’d met in prison. She’s the only woman I know that seems to carry no fear.

  She marches up to Jackson and me. “Jackson Blaisdell Potter, let him go right now!”

  His hands release me. I forgot how strong he is. Most of the time that strength is cloaked in some turn-the-other-cheek-type bullshit he can preach to other people who don’t know what I know about him.

  “Hey, Auntie Vi. Me and Jackson was just messing around is all.”

  She crosses her arms. Much like she did when me and Jackson were kids, before she was gonna let us have it for whatever rule we broke. “Lebanon, do you take me for a fool?”

  “No, ma’am, I don’t. Tensions are running high is all. It was just a misunderstanding.”

  “About what? I heard you talking about Layla when I got out the car. The whole neighborhood could probably hear the both of you.” She expects an honest answer, and that, though I love her, I can’t give her.

  “Auntie, me and Jackson is gonna get it squared away. We’ll figure it out like we always do, right?”

  I turn and look at Jackson, and hope he understands my look, that all I need him to do is agree and shut the hell up about what’s going on...about the girls and about us.

  “Momma, really, things got heated. We weren’t going to do any harm. Not really. Can you go back in the house and wait for me? I’ll come back in a few minutes and we’ll go visit Sara.”

  Auntie Violet uncrosses her arms and looks at me. I already know the question forming in her mind.

  “Lebanon, baby, you want to come? See Sara, talk to her?”

  “I already did.”

  “Well, why don’t you come up with us again. I’m sure Sara still wants to see you no matter what time of day or night. Maybe she—”

  “Just...just don’t. Please. She ain’t you, Auntie Vi. She’s always gonna be the way she is, so stop hoping for different. I did a long time ago.”

  Auntie Violet comes up to me, takes my face in her hands. For a moment, I bask in that warmth, the same kind when I was a kid, it was like she could reach this deep part of me I didn’t even know existed. Her touch and those eyes were what I always expected love to feel and look like. And the only reason I don’t try to start back up with Jackson is because of this woman here. If there’s anything good in me, anything at all, it was Auntie Violet who planted that seed. It might have fallen on hard ground, but at least she saw something in me enough to try and nurture whatever it was.

  Behind me Jackson pleads, “Momma, go inside. I’ll be there soon to take you to see Sara. Lebanon and I have to finish talking.”

  “Y’all weren’t talking. Y’all were fighting.”

  “Mom, we got that out of our system.”

  “We’re good, Auntie Vi. I promise.”

  She lets go of my face and steps back and proceeds into the house. She turns around one last time, and I see her face search mine and I plaster on the most peaceful look I can muster. “I love you, Auntie.”

  “Love you, too,” she replies. “Love you both.” And she disappears into the house.

  Turning to face Jackson, I resume the line of questioning before our fight. “Why the hell was your daughter at my house?”

  “I don’t know. She didn’t tell me what she was doing after church. She was probably looking for Ruby,” he mutters.

  “You need to learn to keep her in check.”

  “Yeah, I see how well that’s worked out for you.”

  “Watch it before you find yourself having to explain for past sins. I could go right into that house and tell Auntie Violet everything. Remember, none of us ever gets away from what we do. We might get by, but we never get away.”

  “Believe me. I don’t want Layla doing what she’s doing, but Ruby is like her sister. She’s concerned for her like I was for you. Like when you’d come to my house after Sara had a go at you.”

  “I remember that, but I remember other things, too.” I think about Jackson and how he was my brother, how the girl thinks of his daughter as her sister. These thoughts and this night, it’s too much. Alice is gone and my girl has run away. I just need it all to stop. I need his daughter to mind her own business. I need the girl to come back and she won’t do that unless it’s me and her, and only me and her.

  “Just tell your girl to stay away from mine.”

  “You know she won’t do that.”

  “Make her, Jackson! Find a way to get Layla to listen to you.”

  “You can’t even get Ruby to listen to you!”

  “My family. My business.”

  “It’s your business when it’s convenient, but it’s my problem when you come to me with your hand out, asking for another check.”

  Jackson has this air about him when he feels justified. Standing tall, chest all puffed out, arrogant as hell and it makes me want to take the wrench in his hand and smash in that self-righteous face. Just hit him over and over and—

  “This is done, Lebanon, this protecting you. The money, the lies, the gun. All of it! It’s been too long, and I’m done.”

  All I do is laugh. It hurts like hell to do it, but I laugh.

  “You protecting me? How soon we forget.”

  “That was a long time ago.” His voice is softer.

  That grip on the wrench is still tight, but Jackson won’t do anything. He’s probably mad he doesn’t have the courage to follow through on what he really wants to do. Not like I do.

  “A long time ago, huh? That was fucking yesterday for me! I protect you, Jackson. Remember that. Those years I spent in that damn cell. That was to protect you. As far as what’s on paper, I’m the one who killed Syrus Myllstone. I’m the one who spent five years in a fucking cell! I’m the one who cops beat on over and over, and I never said your name. I remember the smell of my flesh burning with their cigarettes. I remember you not being able to look at me in that courtroom. Auntie Violet crying. Sara not coming at all. I protected you from all of that. So for the fucking love of Almighty God, do what I ask and keep your girl away from mine. I got plans too. May not be as big as the pastor of a church who people think pisses ginger ale, but I can carve out my own little stretch of the world. And you or Layla or anyone better not get in my way again.”

  His fingers loosen on that wrench and his dark face is all screwed up, wrinkled in the wrong places.

  “That’s right. I’m your savior. You never were tough. Not like me, so I saved you. Remember that and we won’t have to have any more of these conversations.”

  I straighten my suit and my tie. “I’m gonna go home and get some sleep, then get the girl. She thinks she’s gonna make some kinda life for herself in Tennessee, get her happily-ever-after.”

  “You can leave her be. Give her a chance to—”

  Holding up my hand to stop any more of this spouting off of nonsense, I continue, “Now you know I hate repeating myself, but, because we’re friends, I’ll do it for you. Tell Layla to stop minding business that ain’t hers. Stay away from my house. Stay away from Ruby.”

  I turn around and stroll away. I hear nothing from him. All I hear is the wind, just the wind.

  LAYLA

  I’m still in that house with Lebanon standing in front of me, a warped grin and green eyes. I’m still on the sidewalk standing in front of two white detectives with guns, badges and veiled threats. Physically, my body has just arrived back at home in the kitchen with Timothy, but my mind hasn’t caught up. Tim still holds this belief Dad will do the right thing. I’m not so sure. I know whatever this connection is between him and Lebanon, it will cause Dad to do the exact opposite of the right thing. Tim believes in the good of people. I’m more of the James Bal
dwin school: “I can’t believe what you say, because I see what you do.”

  Grandma Violet sits at the small table off to the side of the kitchen in her coat, a rare grimace creasing the edges of her soft face. When I asked her what’s wrong, all that came out of her mouth was “Grown folks’ business.” Code for: Mind your business, Layla.

  But now this is something I can’t do. Minding our business got us in the mess we’re in, and I plan to clean it up: the secrets, lies, shame. It’s got to end if anyone in Ruby’s family or mine has a chance at some semblance of being free from whatever’s haunted our families generation after generation.

  The back door of the house slams shut and within seconds my father’s hulking frame storms through the kitchen with a wrench in his hand. He stops short when he sees me. I’m expecting a lecture, some scripture, a why couldn’t you be a better daughter look in his eye, but instead his arms scoop me up and hold me. He just says “Layla” over and over again. My arms encircle his massive waist and I hug my dad back. The world melts away and we’re like we once were, when I was small and I’d run up to him after church and he’d pick me up and put me on his shoulders. I’d laugh and he’d laugh. I believed I could see the whole world when he did that and I knew, I knew my father loved me.

  Dad lets me go and I want to hold him tighter, but I don’t.

  “Where were you?”

  I look at Tim and he nods. “I went to meet Ruby after church. I think something bad is gonna happen. I think Lebanon really killed Auntie Alice. I think Ruby is next. I don’t think she can take much more of him now that Auntie Alice isn’t here. I think she’d rather hurt herself than live with Lebanon.”

  Dad’s light brown eyes darken and narrow. He shakes his head. “You don’t know that.”

  “I know I found a bullet in his bedroom. I know there are two detectives who think he did it, too! Why are you still protecting him? He’s a monster, and if you keep taking up for him, you’re no better than he is!”

  “Leave it alone, Layla.”

  I turn to Tim and say the four words I knew I’d say when we left his apartment: “I told you so.”

  The small patter of footsteps I hear behind me and Grandma Violet stands between me and Dad for the second time today.

  “I told you both this fighting nonsense has got to stop.”

  “We’re going to find Ruby, Grandma. I’ll let you know when we do.”

  Dad grabs for my arm, but I snatch it away just before he manages to get me. “You will do no such thing, Layla.”

  “Yes, because forbidding me to do things always works out so well for you.”

  Mom opens her bedroom door and comes out to see, and possibly to play peacekeeper between me and my father. Tim touches my arm, a signal to calm down.

  Grandma Violet takes my hands in hers. “Baby, there’s some more to this than you know, you and your dad. You can’t keep trying to fix what’s broken.”

  “You do it all the time.” I look from Grandma Violet to my father.

  “Child, be better than me! Be better than your daddy.”

  “I’m trying to be, which is why I’m going to find Ruby.”

  “I’ve had about enough of your insolent attitude, Layla. You will obey me!” I can’t remember a time he looked more angry.

  “You can’t control me,” I shoot back. “You order me to obey, talk about God and love. You don’t do any of it. You’re a fraud! You’re not a pastor. You’re a fake.”

  Grandma’s and Mom’s eyes sharply turn in my direction. I poured tons of gasoline on this situation and just lit the match. My father’s eyes grow wide.

  “Reverend Potter, we just want to make sure—”

  “I’m not asking for your permission,” I say cutting off Tim’s predictably diplomatic response. “I’m telling you we’re going so no one is wondering where I am.”

  “Honey, let her go do this. Ruby needs help. Let Layla help her,” Momma pleads.

  “I’m not debating this, Joanna. I’ve made my decision.”

  “She doesn’t need your approval to make a decision, Jackson. She’s already made it. She just needs you to respect it. That’s all.”

  “I’m not a child,” I add echoing my Mom’s sentiment. “I’m not under your thumb. I’m not going to let you hold me back from saving Ruby.”

  His meaty hand curls into a fist. He might hit me. I might push him just that far. Yet while it’s all hot under my skin and I know I should be calm, I’m not because it feels good to let go of this anger, and to hurt my father while doing it.

  “I’m trying to protect you.”

  “You don’t want to protect me. You couldn’t give a damn about anyone but yourself—just like always.”

  “I care about—”

  “About your reputation, Pastor, but not about me or Ruby or what I’m trying to do!”

  “So you’re just going to go off in the middle of the night with him?” He gestures at Tim. “You know people talk about the two of you already. Do you know how that looks to others in the congregation?”

  “I don’t give a good damn how it looks to anybody!”

  “You don’t care about how your actions affect this family,” he accuses.

  “That’s all I care about. Everything I do, I wonder how it looks. What you’d do. What you’d think. I’m so mixed-up because I barely have time for my own thoughts. I’m done with it! I’m done with you!”

  We are less than two feet apart and my eyes match his—our color, our stubbornness, our pride; all of it crackles and pops like cooking oil over a high fire.

  Tim wedges himself between the two of us and says, “Reverend, Ruby and Layla grew up together. Layla just wants to be a good friend, a good person, like you raised her to be. Haven’t you needed to be a good friend before?”

  Something snaps across those light brown eyes, but my father quickly regains his anger.

  I haven’t lost mine.

  “If you leave, Layla, you’re not welcome back in this house. The church. You’re not welcome with me. You’re a disgrace and no better than a whore if you leave.”

  Momma yells, “Jackson!”

  “He doesn’t mean that, baby. He’s just angry,” Grandma Violet consoles.

  I laugh. I am mad as hell and I laugh. It is a weird and slightly unhinged sound. Tim looks at me with a measure of what I assume is concern as I cock my head and spout, “Better his whore than your daughter!”

  I turn and stalk out of the kitchen. I don’t look at Grandma Violet’s face or Momma’s. I know they’re sad and hurt, for my father and me.

  Timothy’s hard footsteps follow mine out the door, and into the night. The rotting pile of aluminum, metal and rubber that is the Black Stallion slumbers in front of the house.

  “He’s not as bad as you make him out to be...Reverend Potter. There’s something to be said for protection,” Tim offered.

  “He protected me by calling me a whore. That’s what passes for protection with you?” I fume.

  “You said your words, too.”

  Frigid gusts of wind chafe my lips and I believe it some appropriate penance by nature.

  “My dad said a lot of messed-up stuff when he was drunk,” Tim confesses, “but none of it was to keep me from anything.” He doesn’t meet my eyes as he speaks, but peers through threadbare tree branches to a somber black sky. “His drinking never served a purpose, never covered up how broken he was.”

  “Your dad used liquor. Mine uses God and self-righteousness.”

  “I’m not thinking about whiskey or Bibles or God, Layla. I’m thinking about actions,” Tim says and, though his tone is sharper than I’ve heard, an earnest plea belies his frustration.

  I grab Tim’s hand. He stops looking at the sky and his eyes bore into mine. “There’s something going on, and whatever it is, your dad’s afraid for
you, for himself,” he cautions.

  The rumbling of J.P.’s blue-and-white Mustang pulling up to the curb interrupts our conversation. I let go of Tim’s hand. Stepping out of his car, J.P. plants his legs on the grass and he stands, but he keeps going up and up and up.

  “Lala!”

  Holding a paper bag with light streaks of grease and the aroma of something deliciously grilled, he gives Tim a quick punch on the shoulder. J.P. goes to hug me, but stops short when he sees my face. “What’s wrong?”

  “Dad.” All this word implies, all prior fights, history, the general knowledge of who Jackson Blaisdell Potter Sr. is and how who he is affects us, is wrapped up in our sibling understanding when I just say “Dad” to J.P.

  “Alright then,” J.P. says. “So where you off to?”

  “Going to find Ruby before Lebanon finds her.”

  “You need my help?”

  “The less people involved, J.P., the better.”

  “You sure you got this, sis?”

  “Honestly, I don’t know. I don’t know if I can do this. I want to, but so much can go wrong. So much has gone wrong already.”

  “All this shit, with you, with Ruby, with Dad, you looking at your problems like they bigger than you. You looking at your situation like it’s a wall. It’s not. It’s a hurdle. Jump the hell over it.”

  I hug J.P. I squeeze him for all it’s worth and he lets out this big whoosh of air when I let go.

  “Thanks for the kick in the ass.”

  He laughs, it’s more like a yuck-howl, then smiles.

  “He’s in a bad mood so if you can, try and steer clear,” my last and only parting words of wisdom to my baby brother.

  “Unlike you, sis, the old man can’t get to me. All that melancholy, spiritual bullshit he puts himself through, hell, that’s on him.”

  I want to be like him in that moment. To give not one good damn.

  I suddenly feel Tim’s hand grip mine. “We have to go to the church,” I say.

  “The church? You wanna pray for Ruby?”

  “No. Buy plane tickets.”