Winning Ruby Heart

by Jennifer Lohmann

  She recoiled as if he’d hit her. “Let me help you.”

  Her offer was the last straw. “Get out.”

  “I have to be able to do something for you.”

  Micah scrambled out of his recliner, willing to drag her out if she didn’t leave on her own. In his anger and exhaustion, he’d forgotten to set the brakes on his chair, and the chair slipped out from under him, leaving him grasping on to the arms of the recliner, his legs uselessly dragging on the ground and his chair out of reach unless he let go and crawled to it. Not in front of Ruby. He wouldn’t be vulnerable in front of Ruby.

  “Get out,” he said again.

  “Let me...”

  “Ruby, what do you think your parents will say when the gossip sites report that I locked you out of my apartment? Or that the doorman had to call the cops? King couldn’t redeem you after a story like that hits the papers, even if he wanted to.”

  She backed away from him, her tears running down her face in torrents that matched the gush of blood in his ears. “I would’ve asked how you were. I would have.”

  Micah had managed to set the brake on his chair and do the difficult transition of getting himself off the floor. He looked her in the eye, no longer the man begging at her feet. “You cost me my job, Ruby. Asking how I am doesn’t matter anymore.”

  Clenching his jaw so hard his teeth hurt, Micah stared Ruby down until she backed up to the door and left. Running. Like the coward that she was.

  * * *

  ONLY WHEN RUBY got down to the parking garage did she realize that she’d played right into Micah’s expectations of her. You have to stop escaping your problems by running away. Instead of getting out of the elevator, she pressed the button for Micah’s floor. Her courage and stomach sank as she rose higher and higher into the air. And when the doors opened with a ding, she stepped onto the carpet in the hallway and dragged her feet to Micah’s door.

  He didn’t answer her first knock. Or her second. She leaned her forehead against the wood, determined to say her piece, even if she spoke into emptiness.

  “Micah, I’m sorry.” The metal of the eyehole—at a useless height for Micah—dug into her skin, but she didn’t move from her position. “You’re right. I’m selfish. Narcissistic, even. I opened the door and I knew something was wrong with you. Knew, and I didn’t ask what was wrong because I had stuff I wanted to talk about with you.”

  Still no answer, though she thought she felt him behind the door. Smelled him, even. Gym soap...and castor oil for his chair.

  “I’m trying not to run away. I’m trying to learn.” She tapped on the wood with her fingers. “Selfishness is who I am, but I love you. And I’m slowly learning not to see the world as my own little bubble because I want to. For you.” The door tore into her fingernail as she scratched at it. “But for me, too.”

  She’d battered her heart and soul against the door. Now there was nothing to do but wait and hope he was on the other side. That he could hear her.

  “Do you hear me, Micah? I was wrong. And I’m sorry.”

  The words hadn’t worked when she’d said them to the American public on national TV, either. And still Ruby waited, her head pressed against the door until she either had to curl up and sleep in his hallway or go home.

  * * *

  MICAH SAT ON the other side of the door, listening to Ruby apologize. When she stopped talking, he could hear her breathing on the other side of the wood. And he still didn’t open the door. He had his own anger to deal with. He didn’t need Ruby’s easy apologies.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  MICAH’S FATHER WAS walking toward him when his phone rang. Again.

  “Someone important?” his father asked.

  “No.” Yes.

  “Aren’t you going to answer it? What if it’s about a new job?”

  “It’s not.” He’d halfheartedly applied for sportscaster positions around the country and the studios had wholeheartedly turned him down. Except for one, who’d asked him to cover an adaptive skiing event in Colorado as a freelancer. When Micah had asked if there would be other events—not just the disable beat—the network had responded, “Not at this time.” Micah had turned that offer down in a flat second.

  “Ruby?” his father asked, though it wasn’t really a question. Ruby called several times a day, but all her calls went to voice mail. Micah deleted them without listening.

  “Probably.”

  Micah rolled easily across the hard marble floor of the lobby, his father having to keep pace with long strides, until they got out onto the sidewalk and there was a crowd to deal with. They were headed to the lakeshore. Again. Once Ruby was out of his mind, Micah was never going to come to the lakeshore with his father again. Let the memories be ridden over by a million different bicyclists, all with no respect for sharing the path.

  His father had been on an afternoon flight. Night was falling. Maybe the fresh, cold winter air would freeze her out of his mind.

  “Have you talked with her since you were fired?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Busy.”

  “All you ever did was work. What has been keeping you busy now?”

  Taking stock of his life. Thinking about work. Missing his desk and the camaraderie of his office. Wondering where he had gone wrong. Thinking about buying a fish because he’d no longer have to worry about being sent off to cover the national championship in New Orleans at the last minute.

  All he told his father was, “I’ve been looking for jobs.”

  “Are you still upset with her?”

  “Yes.” Micah paused. “And no.”

  He was more upset with himself. As tempting as it was to continue blaming Ruby, he just couldn’t. For one thing, she had nothing to do with the fact that he’d let his work and his desire to stay in sports eliminate everything else in his life. And second, she literally hadn’t done anything to compromise his integrity. She had been tired and sore and he had been the one to offer a better solution than a massage.

  A bicyclist buzzed by them, cursing. Micah returned the curse with a gesture. Coming out on the lakeshore and cursing out bicyclists who thought they owned the path helped with some of his anger, but it hadn’t answered any of his questions.

  “Any good jobs out there?” His father asked, jump-starting the conversation again and probably hoping Micah would give more than a one-word answer.

  “I don’t want to be a sportscaster for some Podunk network. I wanted to be a SportsDaily anchor. I’ve worked toward that goal for ten years.”

  “No. First you wanted to survive graduate school. Then you wanted a beat job. Only when you realized it was possible did you want the anchor position. And there’s nothing wrong with wanting something big, but what if, along the way, you’ve lost sight of the smaller pleasures of life? A wife. Kids.”

  “You didn’t marry again after Mom left.”

  “No. If I married again I’d have to be home more. Or abandon another wife. Just because I didn’t like either of those options doesn’t mean I made the right decisions. Or that they’re the right decisions for you.” His father stepped off the path to allow a group of women to run past. None of the women was Ruby. “Maybe if I’d let myself be open to it, I would have found a different woman. One I wanted to be home with or one who ignored my mother. Or maybe I would have taken you and moved to another city. But I only had one goal, and so I didn’t see the other possibilities.”

  “So what am I supposed to do?” Micah asked when they started forward again.

  “Well, do you love her, or did you lose your job over a relationship that would have failed anyway?”

  “It might have failed anyway, Dad. She can’t see past her own nose.”

  “Neither could you, when you were the quarterback e
veryone wanted in the draft. You were always a fighter, but your accident taught you to see the battle in a new way. A way that included the whole battlefield. Don’t retreat into headquarters now.”

  “Am I supposed to arrange a broken back for Ruby so she’ll think of someone other than herself?”

  “Obtuse is an ugly look on you.” His father stopped short and Micah had to back up to continue the conversation. “Talk to her. If you can’t make something happen, at least you’ll have talked to her.”

  “She’s lived her whole life on the other side of the camera. What advice can she offer me about what to do next?”

  “She’s been in the spotlight since she was, what, twenty years old? And her job crashed around her—also through her own fault—when she was twenty-four. She can probably understand your predicament better than your dear old dad, who’s been a boring sales manager for the same company for his whole life.”

  Remarried or not, in a job rut or not, his father had pinpointed one of the sources of Micah’s unease. Reassessing his life with someone wasn’t enough. He wanted to talk with Ruby. And not just about his life but hers, as well. Even if both of them were little more than bodies to the rest of the world, they also had strong minds and could figure something out. And they would be better together.

  * * *

  THE NEXT EVENING, Ruby opened the door to her house with a nervous smile and stuck a hand out for the Chinese takeout Micah handed over. Then she and Dotty backed up to let him in.

  Micah hadn’t been in her house since he and his father had come over for the game night, which meant he hadn’t seen the new furniture arrangement that made it easier for him to get from the living room to the dining room. During the month of Micah’s silence, Haley had told her to move the furniture back. Advice Ruby had ignored.

  “The house looks nice.”

  “Thanks. I was hoping you’d be back to see it. I’ll have to move all the furniture back when the owners return, but for now...” A shrug didn’t cover up her nervousness.

  Ruby waited for him to tell her again how she’d cost him his job. A job he loved. He’d been so angry the night they’d fought, and as he’d hung off the recliner, she’d been frightened. For her. For their relationship. But mostly for him. She’d been slow to catch up to what was happening, but she knew what it meant to lose a job you loved. Knew that hopelessness as well as she knew the back of her eyelids.

  “I missed you.” The bag of takeout thumped as it hit the table and she almost didn’t hear him.

  “I missed you, too. I’m sorry.... I’m trying.”

  “I know.”

  They stared at each other for several long seconds, steam and the sweet smell of orange chicken filling the air between them.

  “I have some ideas for you on how to beat King at the game I’m sure he’s going to want to play.”

  “Oh. Is that all you came over for?”

  “I brought dinner, too.” His smile was halfhearted.

  “Why?” She wrapped her arms around her body, tucking her cold hands under her pits.

  “I’m bored. I need something to do.”

  “Am I supposed to offer you something in return? Another bargain?”

  “No. I’m not offering to help as part of a bargain.”

  “Am I to become your lifeline, then? My redemption will become your purpose?” She couldn’t say the words quietly enough to hide her horror.

  “No.” He shook his head. “I’m looking for another job. Thinking of another life. Of reinventing myself again. But if I’m going to reinvent myself, I guess I’d rather do it with you in it. And if we’re together, I might as well help you with King.”

  “Okay.” When she untied the plastic bag, more steam and spicy smells escaped in a puff. She laid out the chopsticks and napkins.

  Micah returned from the kitchen with plates. “All you can say is okay?”

  “I’ve not run away, have I?”

  This smile wasn’t halfhearted. “No, Ruby. You’ve not run away.”

  “So serve yourself dinner and explain.”

  He folded his arms on the table, leaned toward her and started talking. And Micah Blackwell was back in her life. His eyes were hot with determination. His face warmed with affection, and her body was set to boiling by the same lust she’d felt as far back as when she’d seen him in that first marathon.

  Their plans made, Dotty fed and the leftovers stored in the fridge, Ruby stood facing Micah, shifting from one foot to another. The tenor of their relationship was completely different. Not only was the business deal out the window, but what was emerging in its place was a team. She’d never played team sports—not even relays—and she wasn’t sure how to stop acting as one person cooperating for her own benefit and become two people cooperating for mutual benefit.

  “Why did you really call me?” She waved her hand when he opened his mouth. “And don’t say because you’re bored or you missed me. Why else?”

  “You and me, Ruby, we’re the same. We want and we want and we push and we push and we keep aiming for number one. When I get back to number one, it will be better with you there. And I’d like to think, maybe, when you win your hundred-mile race, the victory will be sweeter because I’m waiting for you at the finish.”

  “Oh.”

  “I love you, Ruby.”

  He loved her.

  She was afraid to breathe too strongly and push the feeling away. Then she said, “I love you, too,” and her breath grew, filling the room before sneaking out through the drafty windows and into the sky. Suddenly her world was much bigger than she’d ever thought possible.

  She’d never really been a fan of the unexpected before, but she could learn to look forward to conversations like this.

  “Can I ask a question?”

  “You look as if you might burst if you don’t.”

  “When I talked with my parents, about us, they asked me all kinds of intrusive questions about you that I didn’t know the answers to, even if I didn’t think it was any of their business.”

  “Like?”

  “Like if you could provide for me—which is hilarious since I’ve never had a job in my life and still haven’t registered for the personal trainer classes. If anyone’s worried about their kid being provided for, it should be your dad.” She treaded carefully, not fully trusting that there wouldn’t be another big fight. Micah had been fired from a job he loved. He was likely still grieving. “They also asked if you have the ability to father children.”

  “Does that matter to you?”

  “If you can father children? I don’t think so. I mean, I think I’d like kids. They sound like a challenge and I like challenges. But I don’t know if I care so much about their genes. It seems as if I could mess up my children no matter whose blood they carried.”

  “Then...”

  She waved him off. “I don’t want to know the answer now, not unless you want to tell me. But I would like to have the conversation with you—when we’re ready.”

  He laughed. “You want to schedule a conversation about children down the road, already assuming we’ll be ready for it someday. Why not do it now?”

  “We can, but I figured we should take things one step at a time.”

  “My sperm have forgotten how to swim, but they still function as sperm. It will take doctors, but I can father children.”

  “Oh.” That was better news than she’d expected. “Thank you for the answer. But didn’t we skip a step?”

  “I don’t know, Ruby. What did you think the next step was?”

  “You can sleep over with me and Dotty. If you brought catheters, of course.”

  The corners of his mouth lifted in a smile that was so full of pleasure and anticipation that Ruby was almost tempted to figure out the mechanics of sex with
a paraplegic on a kitchen counter. “Plenty. And disinfectant. I came prepared.”

  “Then that’s what I’ve got next in the Micah-Ruby calendar.”

  He gestured wide with one arm. “Lead the way.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  MICAH FOLLOWED RUBY through her living room and back into her bedroom, which wasn’t entirely what he’d expected. The rest of the house wasn’t reflective of Ruby—she was house-sitting, of course—but she’d placed her stamp on this room. There was nothing of Ruby in the sleigh bed, the tan coloring of the walls or the antique dresser with an ornate mirror, but she was still in the room, under all the furnishings and beyond.

  He looked at the line of running shoes under the window. In the dim light of the lamp, he could barely make out the markings on the heel of each shoe, designating pairs of the same styles and probably helping Ruby keep track of how many miles of running she’d put on each shoe.

  She had walked farther into her room and must have sensed his halt, because she turned back to look at him and then followed the line of his gaze to her parade of shoes. “Would you believe I still don’t have to buy running shoes?”

  “But...” Confusion cocked his head to the side so his ear almost touched his shoulder. “I can’t imagine any running company would still send you samples.”

  “They don’t. This is evidence of how many samples they sent me. All of these styles are at least five years old, and I’m sure a sales person at a running store would tell me that the plastic has gone stale, but I couldn’t very well ask my parents for new shoes. And, I’m still a twenty-nine-year-old without a real job, so I have to watch my pennies.” She let out a breath, and he thought it was a laugh because the corners of her mouth had gone up. “The shoes are okay, I mean, I have to wear shoes, but I had to give all the branded running clothes away. One of the conditions of the many lawsuits against me is that I can’t go out in a branded shirt. The company won’t want to risk being associated with me.”