by Liv Bennett
I shoot Austin a text. Is it okay to call you now?
My phone rings in an instant in my hand with the caller ID, MKISA. I can’t help but grin. “Hi.”
“Hey, did you miss me already?”
“Well, maybe just a little. But, I’m calling you for something else. About Fran.”
“Fran?”
“She told me why she did what she did and introduced me to her daughter. She’s only two. Fran was behind on her rent and facing eviction. She had to pay for her daughter’s medical expenses from her hospital stay for pneumonia two months ago. She was just desperate and scared that I’d call the police. She made a mistake and came to apologize. I forgave her. I wanted to ask you if you could hire her back. She really needs the job. She’s already living paycheck to paycheck as it is.”
He exhales loudly into the phone and takes his time to consider. “Are you sure she’s not lying?”
“She showed me the communication between her and the landlord and the hospital bill. They looked legitimate. And, I met her little girl. How many eighteen-year-olds do you know with a kid? She’s afraid they’ll take her child away if she ends up losing her apartment. Max was equally guilty for not checking the surveillance records, but he got to keep his job. Don’t do it as a favor to me. Hire her back because it’s the right thing to do.”
“If another incident like this happens—”
I cut him off. “It won’t. I’m taking full responsibility for her. If someone else’s money gets stolen, you can cut it out of my paycheck,” I promise.
“Is the daughter cute?”
“Ahh, she’s adorable. You should see her teddy bear. It’s bigger than her.”
“All right, I’ll hire her back for her daughter’s sake. Tell her she can come back tomorrow.”
He really is my knight in shining armor. Tears rush down my cheeks. All I can muster is “Thank you,” so I won’t let out a loud sob.
“What are you doing now?”
“I have a dinner date,” I say with a serious tone.
He waits a moment, perhaps for an explanation. “Is it my turn to throw a cup full of hot coffee on you? Honestly, I wouldn’t mind seeing your dress all wet and clinging to your body.”
Dirty mind! “I’m kidding. Fran invited me to her place for dinner. I should go.”
“All right, I’ll talk to you later.” The line disconnects, leaving me with an ear-to-ear grin.
The phone's battery is ninety percent full, despite having been on all day. My old phone would have had to be charged for a second time to last until night. The comparison reminds me of Tara. She’s probably waiting for a call from me, checking the screen of her phone every other minute. It’s not going to happen unless I have something solid and beneficial to report on my search.
For now, I don’t have much, other than a harassing boss and a fake police officer. My father and Tara are already aware of the situation about the officer. I’m still too ashamed to open up about what happened with Max to my dad, and I’d never discuss it with Tara.
Grabbing my coat, I leave the room and drive to the nearest grocery store on my way to pick up some fresh fruit, vegetables (I almost return the red bell peppers that are two dollars apiece), European cheese, and a chocolate bar—the stuff I’d normally never spend money on with my limited budget—for Fran and her daughter. Then I buy a bottle of wine and a stuffed giraffe from the liquor store next door. Fran has been through a rough patch. A night of luxury will hopefully help lift her spirits.
Her home is on the Hill in an old apartment building hiding among luxurious fraternity and sorority houses. It’s definitely not the cheap part of the already expensive town where home prices average around a million dollars. With her limited income, I wonder why Fran didn’t choose a more affordable area. She must have her reasons, and I’m afraid I won’t be able to keep myself from inquiring about them.
After I find a parking space in the parking lot of Starbucks, I walk to her apartment building. My stomach feels heavy with my guilt for having never paid a visit to my sister in the two months she lived here. There’re so many things I’d have done differently, knowing now how terrible and empty it feels not having her in my life anymore.
Many customers are on their computers or phones inside the Starbucks or chatting with their friends. I picture Ruby coming down here for her morning coffee and maybe ordering a banana-nut bread to go as well. Perhaps, she’d work on a project or study at a corner table at the back. I’ll never know.
Ch 14
Interrogation On The Hill
With my shopping bags, I walk past a tattoo parlor, then a soup kitchen with loud music banging. The street doesn’t look suitable for raising a little kid. The apartment is on the third floor, which makes it a challenge to carry the bags. How much worse would it be if I had to carry a two-year-old and her stroller too?
I knock on her door, and Fran opens it with Emma on her hip. “Hey, come in!”
“I brought a little something.” I glance at the open floor design of the living room combined with the kitchen area and at the doors of the two bedrooms, one open, the other closed. For two bedrooms in this neighborhood, she must easily be paying fifteen hundred a month if she’s renting the entire apartment by herself.
“You didn’t have to.” She gives me a welcoming hug and locks the two locks on the door and then puts the chain on. She clearly understands the need for safety precautions in her neighborhood. After hanging my coat on a chair in the living room, she carries the shopping bags to the small kitchen area, with Emma running beside her.
“By the way, I talked to Austin. He agreed to hire you back,” I say.
As soon as she drops the bags, she advances on me with open arms and wraps them around me in a long hug. “Thank you. I can’t tell you how big of a burden you’ve lifted off my shoulders.”
“You’re welcome.”
She goes back to the kitchen to prepare dinner, while I stand in the middle of the living room with Emma. She gives me a shy smile, looking hesitant to talk to me, but when I find the stuffed giraffe from the shopping bag, all her hesitancy evaporates. She brings in her collection of stuffies and lays them on the floor to introduce them to me, while Fran sets the table. She has a name for each and every toy.
“How do you manage it all?” I ask, craning my head back to look up at Fran, who’s piling spaghetti with tomato sauce on the plates. “I mean with Emma, school, and work.”
“I’m part of a group of single moms. We help each other out a lot. I couldn’t have done it without them. And, there’s Ruth, another single mom who’s a nurse and lives a block away from here. I got to know her while Emma was hospitalized. She works three nights a week, and I stay with her kids while she’s at work, and she cares for Emma when I have to work or study.”
That explains why she’s in this part of town. “Is your roommate home?” I ask in a whisper, hopefully not intimidating her with my nosiness, but I need an introduction to ask about my sister.
“I don’t really know the deal with the room. The landlord told me the room is being rented, but I’ve never seen my new roommate. The door is always locked. This one is mine.” She points to the room with the open door. I can see a full-size bed and a crib next to it, distinctly remembering her telling me she already had a roommate when I mentioned my search for a room to her.
“Erin told me about your previous roommate.” I really have no censorship in my questions. “It’s horrible what happened.”
She exhales loudly, giving me a look of discomfort about the new subject. “Yeah.” She’s not going to throw me a bone.
“Were you close friends?”
I feel she’s holding herself back from rolling her eyes at me. She’s clearly not enjoying our conversation and volunteering information only out of courtesy. “Not really. She only lived here for two weeks.”
That’s news to me. Just when I open my mouth to ask where she lived before moving here, Fran turns to the sink to wash so
me vegetables while saying, “She worked mostly on the days I didn’t. We only had one shift together, and it was at our busiest time, Saturday nights. She probably didn’t need the job. She had a scholarship and wealthy parents as far as I understood. We had Econ together, but she hung out with another group of girls. I don’t have time to go out anyway. She looked normal in the beginning, but when she moved here, she got weird.”
My ears perk up. We’re getting somewhere. If only she doesn’t stop talking…
“She’d just come home and sleep, like I don’t know, for several hours. I wondered if she was sick or something.”
I don’t remember reading about tiredness or sickness in Tara’s journal, but their last phone calls were few and far between.
“Once I asked her if she was okay. She said she was fine, and that was it. She didn’t look fine at all. She looked like a crack addict. She wouldn’t shower for days, wouldn’t eat. Then, it just happened. I felt guilty for not insisting that she get help.” Fran shrugs and brings a bowl of salad and a cheese platter to the table. “Dinner is ready!”
Not now!
Emma leaves the pile of toys on the floor, except for the giraffe, as her mom carries her to her high chair. “Spaghetti!” she cheers loudly.
“Did you see her taking drugs?” I won’t let it go, obviously, and Fran, thankfully, seems fine with it.
“No. She didn’t even smoke weed. We used the same bathroom and threw our trash in the same can. I admit it wasn’t my best moment, but I checked her trash regularly. I was worried that if she used needles, Emma might accidentally find one of them and hurt herself. I found nothing.”
She wraps a plastic bib around Emma’s neck and places her plate of spaghetti and some of the things I brought in front of her. “Oh, and one morning when I came back from babysitting Ruth’s kids at night, I found used condoms. But, that was just that one time. Maybe she was going through a breakup. I really don’t know.”
My mind is going to blow. Condoms! As in plural. Ruby had someone in her life, an option I’d never considered, as I always pictured her as a virginal teenager. Tara didn’t write anything about a boy in her journal either. Ruby had a boyfriend or two in high school but never mentioned sleeping with them to me. Still, that sounds more plausible than her being on drugs.
If only I knew where to begin with my search for the man who slept with my sister. Used condoms? The thought makes my stomach twist.
Fran carries the bottle of wine I brought to the table. “I don’t drink alcohol, but I can open it just for you if you want some wine with your dinner.”
The wine was to loosen her tongue. Fortunately, she’s been cooperative without the effect of alcohol in her blood. “Oh, no, that’s fine. I shouldn’t drink either. I drove here.”
“I don’t have a car,” she admits with a sheepish look. “I take the bus everywhere, to work, to my classes, and to Emma’s daycare. Doing the groceries is a bit hard, but Ruth helps a lot.” She keeps going on and on about her bus riding habit and her plans to get a bike if she can save enough money while I’m busy eating and contemplating a way to bring the subject back to Ruby. I need more information about the man in Ruby’s life, and Fran seems to be my only source at the moment.
In the midst of her talk about the busy schedule she has between school and work, I jump in, risking annoying her. “Do you have a boyfriend?”
“No! I’m busy as it is.” And irritated. “Besides, the landlord has an absolutely no visitors rule for the condo.”
“Your past roommate had a man overnight. Didn’t you say you found condoms in the trash?” I sound like the biggest jerk. Maybe I should come clean about my relationship to Ruby, so she won’t think she has a lunatic for a guest and is endangering her daughter’s life.
For some reason, her expression turns serious with a hint of sadness. “I know. If it had been any other roommate, I’d have gone directly to the landlord. But, I worried about her. I didn’t want to cause her more trouble.”
My heart melts at her compassion for my sister. I give her a bittersweet smile, wishing I could have been there for my sister in her darkest hour. I wasn’t even aware of her problems. Some sister I was!
Ignoring the kiddie fork, Emma has been feeding herself the spaghetti with her bare hands. Each time I turn toward her, her face gets a bit more smeared with tomato sauce. By the end of her dinner, she has sauce all over her face, hands, and arms and even has pieces of spaghetti hanging on her golden locks.
“Bath time!” Fran announces and carries Emma to the tub with her clothes and bib still on to avoid spreading the mess around. While she washes her, I clear the dishes and load them into the dishwasher, wiping the table at the end.
Fran comes out with Emma in a bathrobe in her arms, glancing at the table in surprise. “You didn’t have to do that!”
“It’s nothing. Is she going to bed?”
Her shoulders sagging in exhaustion, Fran gives me a nod. “Yeah. Finally. I’m exhausted. It’s been a tough day.”
That’s probably my cue to leave. “I know. I should go. Thanks for dinner.”
“All right. This was really nice, and thank you again for talking to Austin.”
“Sure.” I grab my coat off the chair, glancing at the room my sister lived in during the last two weeks of her life. “I know I’ve been running the Spanish Inquisition on you all evening long, but I’ve got one last question about your ex-roommate.”
“You’re really interested in her, aren’t you?”
“I’m just baffled as to why a successful young girl would kill herself. Do you know if she had any close friends…from school or work?”
“I don’t really know, but she always sat in Econ class with these three New Yorkers. One is the daughter of a politician. Kelly Somerville, I think, is—” Emma shrieks with a cry right then, clearly cranky from sleepiness.
“All right. Thanks again for dinner.”
Fran passes Emma from one arm to another, looking more tired with each passing minute. “Hey, why don’t you take the groceries and the wine?”
“Oh, no, keep them.”
“I don’t drink alcohol.”
“Okay, I’ll take the wine then.” I grab the bottle of wine, find its paper bag on the counter, and slip it in before leaving.
As soon as I climb into my car, I fire up Facebook on my phone to investigate Ruby’s classmate, Kelly Somerville. From her profile and photo albums, she doesn’t give off the image of a wealthy daughter leading a wild life. I click on one photo after another, maybe going through hundreds of them before stumbling upon a picture of Ruby sitting with a group of students around a table.
Tears fill my eyes in an instant as I see her sunshine face staring back at me. I zoom in on the photo to get a closer look at her face. As bright as her smile looks, traces of exhaustion are palpable on her face. I’d never seen her with dark bags beneath her eyes. Her hair is a messy bun on top of her head as if she couldn’t be bothered to brush it, and she has a t-shirt haphazardly thrown on. The date of the photo shows September 15th, around the time she moved in with Fran.
Just then, I realize I forgot to ask her about Ruby’s previous roommates. I dial her number, knowing too well she’ll label me as a creep after hearing my new question about Ruby’s previous roommates before she moved in with Fran. All I get is her voicemail. She looked tired enough to collapse on her bed. I end the call and drive back to my hotel.
It’s only eight thirty when I walk into my room. Thoughts of Austin flood my mind. I throw my coat and bag into the closet and sprawl out on my bed, my phone in my hand, fingers looking for Austin’s number on my contact list. I hesitate about whether I should call him or not. It’s nighttime, and phone calls after dark usually move into dangerous territory. He may get himself invited to my room where there’s only a bed and a TV. He can intoxicate me faster than Jack Daniels, and I’ll forget about self-control or anything resembling it if he sits with me on my bed.
My thumb lingers
on the call option, my body saying yes, my brain protesting. Out of the blue, the phone vibrates in my hand, and I jolt up to a sitting position. It’s an unknown number.
“Hello?” I say, suddenly breathless.
“Hi, Ashley? This is Erin. I asked for your number from Max, saying it’s for something urgent. I hope you don’t mind.”
I can’t help my hopes being crushed because it’s not Austin on the other end of the line. “Hi, Erin! Not at all. Nice to hear from you. Everything okay?”
“Yes, I just wondered how you were doing. You looked pretty upset when you left.”
“I’m better. It’s all good. Aren’t you at work?”
“We closed early tonight. I guess Max got tired of handling the front desk.” She laughs. “What are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing really. I just got back from Fran’s. She invited me over for dinner.”
“Oh.” She pauses, sounding curious and upset at the same time. “Does that mean you sorted things out with her?”
“Yeah, but it’s a long story.” And phone calls aren’t exactly among my favorite activities.
“Are you busy now? Why don’t we get together for drinks?”
“I’m kind of tired to go out.” My eyes fly to the bottle of wine lying on the floor. “But I have an unopened bottle of red wine if you don’t mind drinking with me in my hotel room.”
“That sounds great. I’ll bring snacks. What hotel are you staying in?”
I give her the address and my room number before disconnecting. As disappointed as I felt about the phone call not being from Austin, it’s better if I stay away from him at least one more night to rid myself of the trauma I had with Max.
Ch 15
Who Is The Connection?
Erin brings popcorn and crackers, and I bring my problems.
Whoever claimed alcohol isn’t a solution to problems is clearly unaware of its unmatched ability to loosen any sort of inhibition. It takes one glass for me to recount the stealing in the bathroom, another glass to give the juicy details about Fran’s accusations and Max siding with her. By the third glass, I lay it all out about what happened with Max after Fran left, no detail too embarrassing to mention.