[Rulebook 01.0] The Rules of Love

by Cara Malone

  Now that Megan was standing in her bedroom doorway, though, she wasn’t ready to shove aside all their history or the pain. She wasn’t ready to confront her about their breakup, either, though, and she was grateful to Megan for offering up this tour idea instead.

  “Show me your academic building,” Megan said as she squeezed past the narrow space between Ruby and the door frame into the hall, their bodies pressing together momentarily. “I want to see where you’re sitting while you send me all those texts.”

  They spent the afternoon wandering around GSU, and when their stomachs began to rumble and Megan suggested pizza and a movie in her apartment, Ruby balked. Instead, she took Megan into the city for dinner. She was careful to choose a casual restaurant – nothing romantic or candlelit – and they ended up at the Italian place that Ruby ordered takeout from so often. It was close enough to walk to, and the atmosphere was chaotic.

  Ruby thought that dinner would be just as good a time as any to start unpacking the events leading up to their breakup, but every time she opened her mouth to ask Megan a question – Why wasn’t I worth fighting for? Do you regret it? Why are you here? – the waiter came by, or a screaming kid a few tables over interrupted her, or Megan asked her another question about library school.

  “Do you want to order a bottle of wine?” She asked at one point, and Ruby found this suggestion to be more than welcome. Alcohol would help lubricate her tongue to ask the questions that needed to be asked, and Megan flagged down the waiter with a coy smile at Ruby. “It’s impossible to eat pasta without a glass of red.”

  Ruby downed her first glass faster than she probably should have, and Megan kept refilling them until the bottle was empty. By the end of the meal the alcohol was swimming through her veins, and as they walked back to Founders Hall she felt pleasantly light-headed. Megan linked her arm in Ruby’s and it felt almost right again.

  They walked slowly and Ruby enjoyed the breeze on the quad, unable to feel the cold despite the fact that she had goosebumps on her arms. She looked over at Megan, who was just tipsy enough herself to start telling the truth about this visit, and Ruby asked, “How’s med school going, really?”

  Ruby had asked this question earlier in the day, and in text messages during the week, but she’d always gotten the impression that the answer Megan gave was short of the truth.

  “It’s fine,” Megan said as they approached Founders Hall. Ruby reached into her pocket and realized that her fingers had turned to jelly at some point during their walk – from the cold or from the wine – and she was having a hard time grasping her keycard. Megan kept her hand wrapped around Ruby’s arm while she waited, and added, “It’s a lot harder than I thought it was going to be.”

  Ruby was finding this whole keycard issue irritating. She succeeded in pulling it out of her pocket, but now she couldn’t get it to swipe correctly. She kept running it over the magnetic card reader on the door handle, and it just kept flashing red.

  “I was in the top of my class in undergrad,” Megan was saying, putting her head on Ruby’s shoulder. “Now I’m in the middle of the pack if I’m lucky. And everyone’s so cutthroat they don’t even want to study together, or hang out after class, as if it would be sleeping with the enemy. It’s weird, and all the undergrads are so young. I don’t even recognize most of the Zetas this year. I went to one party and realized that I had become the loser alum still hanging around the house.”

  Ruby could hear the pain in Megan’s voice, but she was also starting to get really frustrated with her fingers and her keycard for not being able to make this damn door open. She was drunker than she thought.

  “I’m so lonely,” Megan said, and her free hand traced over Ruby’s cheek, then down her neck and lightly over her chest. “I wish you were there.”

  “I can’t get this fucking door open,” Ruby muttered, and that’s when the door popped open from the inside. Ruby’s heart dropped into her stomach as she stepped aside to let it open and Max was standing in front of her.

  She looked from Ruby to Megan, whose hand was still lingering on Ruby’s chest – completely oblivious to the look they exchanged. Ruby thought she saw revulsion in Max’s face, and there was definitely anger in her eyes, but then Megan grabbed Ruby around the waist and pulled her past Max, muttering a thanks to her for opening the door.

  Megan yanked her toward the stairwell, her fingers lacing through Ruby’s, and the last thing she saw before they rounded the corner was Max standing frozen in the hall, her eyes following them up the stairs.

  A wave of nausea rolled over Ruby, and then Megan was pulling her down the hall to her apartment. She was obviously less drunk than Ruby – she took the keycard out of her hand and swiped it correctly on the first try, then pulled her into the living room. The door swung shut behind them and the stunned look on Max’s face flashed in front of Ruby’s eyes again as Megan grabbed her by her shirt and pulled her close.

  “I need you, Ru,” she whispered, pressing their bodies together. Her lips brushed against Ruby’s as she spoke, and Ruby could hear the desperation in her voice. Megan’s hands were all over her, trying to pull her shirt over her head.

  “Stop,” Ruby said. “I can’t.”

  “Why not?” Megan breathed, leaning in to kiss her.

  Just then, Ruby’s stomach lurched.

  “Oh no,” she said, tearing herself out of Megan’s grasp as she darted into the bathroom and slammed the door.

  When Ruby came out of the bathroom ten minutes later, it felt like she’d purged the last vestiges of her desire to rebuild her relationship with Megan along with her dinner. She felt sick and exhausted but calm, and Megan was sitting patiently on the couch when she emerged.

  “You okay, Ru?”

  “Yeah,” she said, sitting down beside her with a full cushion between them. “Megs, I love you.”

  “Ru-”

  “I love you but I’m not in love with you anymore,” she said, cutting Megan off. “I’m going to sleep on the couch tonight. You can take the bed. Tomorrow, I think you should go back to Northwestern.”

  Without a word, Megan got up and went into the bedroom, shutting the door a little too hard. Ruby laid down on the uncomfortable couch, her stomach still slightly queasy, and tried not to think about Megan, or Max, or anything as she fell asleep.

  Twenty-Seven

  Max

  Max just stood in the hall after Ruby and the girl – the one who couldn’t be anyone but Megan – pushed their way past her. She’d been going to the dining hall for a late dinner, but suddenly she wasn’t hungry anymore. She nearly turned around and went back to her apartment, but the only things waiting for her inside the dark, tiny apartment were the memories that she and Ruby made there.

  She listened as Ruby and Megan made their way clumsily up the stairwell – they sounded drunk and stupid, tripping over each other. Then she walked out of Founders Hall, letting the door slam shut behind her.

  She couldn’t stomach the idea of getting a meal, so instead she wandered lethargically across campus, aiming at nothing in particular but knowing that she didn’t want to be in her apartment while Ruby and Megan were doing what she knew they would be doing on the second floor.

  After a few minutes, Max fixed on the little café that she and Mira went to a few times a week. The library would be closed by now, and that was the only other place she could think of to go. But when she got there, it had shut down for the evening, too – not many people wanted coffee on a Saturday night when there was harder stuff to be found.

  Max went over to one of the café’s small iron tables on the sidewalk and sat down, prepared to wait it out there. She watched undergrads crossing over from GSU to the bars that dotted the street across from campus, coming in small groups like herds of animals looking for alcohol and entertainment. There were groups of giggling girls, and couples that reminded her of Caitlin and Brad, clinging to each other as they walked.

  She thought about Flint’s response when
she asked him how people get over each other – they drink. Max had never been much of a partier, and she probably still would not have been tempted if all she saw flocking to the bars were Brad and Caitlin types.

  But then her eyes caught on a pair of guys with their fingers intertwined. One yanked the other closer as they crossed the street so he could whisper something in his boyfriend’s ear that elicited a smile and a wry look, and Max watched them round the corner at the end of the block. She got up and followed them at a distance, and they disappeared into an inconspicuous door at the end of the street.

  Max came closer and saw a bland wood sign above the door identifying The Rainbow Room. She knew the name – Mira tried to bribe or drag her here a dozen times in undergrad, and Max always told her the bar scene wasn’t her thing. She’d never been in one before, but every bar she’d ever seen on television was small and frantic and loud. She always had the distinct impression that as soon as she entered a bar like this, the crowd would swallow her up in a flash of neon lights and she’d be lost for the rest of the night.

  Tonight, though, getting lost sounded nice.

  The Rainbow Room was just as hectic, loud, and sensory overloading as Max imagined it. As soon as she walked through the door, the electronic racket of dance music blasted through the room and the heat of a few dozen gyrating bodies on the tiny dance floor swelled around her. This was almost enough to make Max turn around right then and there and admit defeat.

  But then there was a surge of people and they pushed her further into the bar. To avoid being jostled and shoved, she gave in to the motion of the crowd and it carried her over to the bar.

  She ordered a beer, and when the bartender gave her a puzzled look and pointed to a long row of taps, all of which were completely beyond Max’s wheelhouse, she asked for a soda instead then left a five-dollar bill on the bar.

  There was no place to sit and the dance floor filled with sweaty, gyrating bodies wasn’t exactly appealing to her, so after a few minutes of consideration, Max found her way around the periphery of the room to a wall that was mostly away from the action. There was a ledge for her glass, and the music didn’t sound quite so loud there. Max leaned against the wall and nursed her soda as she looked around.

  The two guys she followed into the bar were nowhere to be seen, most likely swallowed up on the dance floor, but Max saw couples all around her. In fact, the more she watched the people of The Rainbow Room, the more she realized that they all had partners, or at least groups of friends surrounding them. She was the only one who was here all alone, and suddenly the bar didn’t feel any less isolated than her apartment.

  She picked her drink up off the ledge with the intention of downing it and then going home – she’d paid five dollars for a soft drink, after all – but before she got to the bottom of the glass, a pretty girl in a tight spandex dress slid up the wall and stopped beside Max.

  “Am I in your way?” Max shouted over the music. “Need me to move?”

  “No,” the girl said with a flirtatious laugh that betrayed her drunkenness. “I just came over to say hi. I’m Jessica.”

  “Oh,” Max said, then put the glass to her mouth again. There was about an inch of soda left and it was giving her a cold headache to chug it like this.

  “Umm,” Jessica paused, not sure what to make of Max’s disinterest. “Can I buy you a drink?”

  “I have one,” Max said.

  “Well in that case,” Jessica said, batting her lashes at Max as she spoke, “would you buy me one?”

  “I was about to leave,” Max said, and as the music changed and the crowd swelled, Jessica let it push them closer together.

  She was close enough now that they didn’t have to shout, and her body brushed against Max’s as she asked, “Alone?”

  This was about the time when Max finally realized that Jessica was coming onto her – another reason why she hated the concept of bars. As hard as it was to read people in a normal setting, the noise and the crowds and the inability to have a real conversation made everything ten times worse for Max. Jessica was pretty, with long blonde hair and soft skin, but she didn’t hold a candle to Ruby.

  Everything about The Rainbow Room suddenly seemed so fake, so superficial. What was Max supposed to do, hook up with Jessica tonight and then never see her again? Do the whole thing over again next weekend with another girl? Max looked into the crowd of gyrating, sweating bodies, and wondered if any of them would notice or care if their partners suddenly changed.

  “Yeah,” Max called to Jessica as the music ramped up again, “Alone.”

  She set her empty glass back on the ledge and Jessica rolled her eyes and muttered, just loud enough to be heard, “Suit yourself,” before threading her way back into the crowd. There was nothing for Max here, so she made her way out of the bar and went home.

  Twenty-Eight

  Ruby

  Ruby woke up with a stiff neck and a headache to find the sun streaming through the window and splashing across her face. The couch was too short, the cushions stiff and the upholstery scratchy, but she’d still managed to sleep like a stone.

  She sat up slowly, her stomach gurgling unhappily as she did so, and put her hands up to block the sun. The bedroom door was still shut, and she wondered what kind of night Megan had. After a minute or two, when she was sure her stomach would remain settled, Ruby stumbled into the kitchenette and filled a glass with water from the tap, chugging it down in the hopes that hydration could fix at least a few of her problems. While she was drinking the last of the water, she heard Megan pad softly into the room, leaning against the door frame and mumbling a good morning.

  Ruby set her glass down and regarded Megan. She looked about as flattened as Ruby felt, her hair standing out at even more wild angles and her curls turned frizzy with bedhead.

  “How are you feeling?” Megan asked.

  “Not the greatest,” Ruby answered. “How about you?”

  “Same,” Megan said, her hand going to her head as if it was aching.

  “Drink some water,” Ruby said, filling another glass and passing it to her.

  “Thanks,” Megan said, and while she slowly drank it down, Ruby studied her.

  She was wearing nothing but a long tee shirt and her panties, a look that Ruby used to live for, and even the way her hair was standing up used to charm the hell out of her. Now, though, Ruby couldn’t muster any romantic feelings for Megan at all. It was more of a curiosity than a heartache now – a simple fact presenting itself to her rather than the torrent of emotion that she’d felt last night. Ruby wondered just how long she might have kept pining for Megan, or the idea of her, if she hadn’t come to visit.

  “What?” Megan asked when she noticed Ruby staring at her. She looked down at her skimpy clothing, then bashfully back up at Ruby.

  “Why did you come here?”

  “Because I missed you,” Megan said, taken aback at the apparent obviousness of this statement.

  “I don’t think that’s right,” Ruby said. “I think you missed being part of an ‘us’ and you thought you could get that back, just for a weekend.”

  “I-” Megan started to object, closing her mouth and opening it again several times as she tried to come up with the words to rebut. Ruby didn’t let her gather her thoughts, though.

  “A month ago, or two, I would have done anything to get us back, even if it was only temporary, and only because you were lonely,” she said.

  “And now?”

  “I’m glad you came,” Ruby said, “But I don’t think you should visit again.”

  “Okay,” Megan said, her voice small and meek, and Ruby had to fight the instinct to cross the tiny kitchenette and pull her into a comforting hug. “What now?”

  “Hmm,” Ruby said, thinking. After a moment of consideration, she said, “I’m going to drink another glass of water, and then I think I’m going to a yoga class to sweat all this alcohol out of my system. I’ll be gone for a few hours, and that should give you
plenty of time to get showered, eat something, whatever you need before you get back on the road. Text me when you get back to Evanston so I know you’re safe, okay?”

  “Okay,” Megan agreed. She put her glass in the tiny sink, then walked over and wrapped her arms around Ruby. “Goodbye.”

  “Goodbye, Megs,” Ruby said.

  Then she broke the hug and turned back to the sink to refill her glass. Megan walked out of the kitchenette and went into the bedroom to get dressed, and Ruby didn’t say goodbye to her a second time when she picked up her yoga mat and headed out a few minutes later.

  Get Bent was mostly empty when Ruby arrived. It was still early for a Sunday morning in a college town, and with the exception of a couple hardcore yogis, she had the class to herself. The water in her stomach and the heat of the room both did their job, sweat dripping down her face and drenching her clothes and sobering her up, and by the time the class was over she felt hydrated and tired in the best way.

  She walked out of the studio thinking that hot yoga sessions might just be the answer to all of her problems after all. They had originally been her respite, before she got caught up in the whirlwind that was Max. Ruby knew she’d have to confront her eventually, especially after that ridiculous display Megan had put on in the hall last night, but if she just kept sweating it out, working out all of her sexual frustration and anger and disappointment on the yoga mat, then she could keep ignoring what transpired between her and Max for a while.

  After class, she thought about going straight back to her dorm like she usually did, but an hour wasn’t a lot of time to deal with a hangover, take a shower, find something to eat, and then get on the road. She and Megan had parted with remarkable amiability this morning, but Ruby wasn’t sure she had the energy to do it all over again if Megan was still there when she got back. So she walked down the sidewalk to the little café that Mira introduce her to after her first yoga session.