Goodbye Ruby Tuesday

by A. L. Michael

  ‘No, nothing. How would he even know I was here?’

  ‘A spy in our midst, perhaps?’ Chelsea’s voice was tight. ‘There’s no way he’s doing this without wanting something from us. I doubt it’s access to the gallery.’

  Evie held her head in one hand, the phone still pushed against her ear.

  ‘Argh,’ she growled, pushing herself out of the chair. ‘Wait. Wait a minute. It’s got to be this.’

  She grabbed the letter from the table, analysing the handwriting. It was all capitals. Distinctly old school. The bastard.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘There was a letter on the floor this morning, perfectly timed, right?’ Evie held the phone between her cheek and shoulder, and ripped the end off the envelope, fraying the note inside in the process.

  She looked at the piece of lined notepaper – cheap, bobbly paper from a yellowing notebook. The pen had started to bleed through the page, blue ink expanding messily.

  ‘Checked the paper? There’s more where that came from.’

  ‘That’s all it says?’ Chelsea’s voice was pinched, and whilst Evie was about to lose it, she really needed Chelsea to be the strong, calm one.

  Evie laughed, outraged, ‘I just want what’s mine. Love Daddy.’

  ‘That prick.’

  ‘The man’s got balls,’ Evie said, feeling the anger start to swallow her up. ‘Bill Davis, always convinces himself something belongs to him.’

  She heard Chelsea exhale, ‘I love you, I’m glad I’m involved with this, but if this shit threatens my life…’

  ‘It won’t,’ she said certainly, ‘I’ll deal with Bill.’

  ‘He didn’t leave a number?’

  Evie rolled her eyes, ‘Never does. Likes to let you know he’s in charge and he knows where you are.’

  They were silent for a moment, and all Evie wanted was for her friend to be the one to say it, but she waited, and waited, and nothing came.

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ Chelsea sighed.

  ‘Everything’s going to be fine,’ Evie said resolutely, and hung up before Chelsea could tell her otherwise.

  ***

  Evie lined her eyes heavily, covering up the redness around the corners.

  ‘All right Drusilla?’ Ruby nudged her, sending the liner flying.

  ‘Oi! Fuck off!’ Evie elbowed her sharply, watching her stumble a little and frown. She watched as Ruby straightened and shook away the frown, replacing it with a pout as she placed her face next to Evie’s in the mirror, and grabbed a lipstick from the make-up bag.

  ‘When did he get back?’ She filled in her lips in a dusky rose, not meeting Evie’s eyes in the mirror. Her voice was soft and light, as if she was asking about the weather, but Evie still looked over at Chelsea and Mollie getting changed on the other side of the room, arguing over who got to wear the one decent skirt she had.

  ‘Last night. Turned up, put his muddy feet up on the coffee table and asked my mum what was for dinner.’ Evie felt a red hue glowing within her, pulsing and beating as if it was just waiting for the briefest spark to set it off. ‘Like he’d never left. And of course, she did what she was told.’

  An hour or so later, necking the bottle of vodka Ruby had procured, they tumbled down the stairs to head off into town. There was some event on, a lame school disco or a youth club event, something that the do-gooder PTA hadn’t even considered might be destroyed by the Bad Girls off the Badgeley Estate.

  ‘Hey,’ a low, rusty voice called from the living room, ‘you goin’ out? Say goodbye to your old man.’

  ‘Yeah, who knows when you’ll be back again, right Bill?’ Evie said slowly, feeling the words slither out of her as she watched him. He was tall, her father, with a wide white smile and thick dark hair. He could win over the most stoic of hearts. Just not hers.

  ‘You know, Evelyn, I can’t tell if that’s you wanting me to fuck off, or saying that you miss me,’ he grinned and winked at her, before his eyes scanned the girls hovering behind her, roving across them in their skirts and heels, his eyes settling on Ruby.

  ‘Well, Ruby, Ruby Tuesday. Aren’t you looking grown-up?’ His voice took on a leer, and Evie felt her skin crawl, watching as he watched her friend. Ruby raised one perfectly drawn eyebrow and smirked.

  ‘If looking grown-up was all that mattered, life would be a lot more fun.’

  Why? Why did Ruby have to play along? Why, for once, couldn’t she just tell the old pervert to go fuck himself? The minute someone showered her with attention, no matter what kind it was, she had to go along with it. Being wanted was her own personal addiction.

  ‘Come on girls, we’ll be late,’ Ruby said smoothly, turning on her heel, throwing a ‘see you later, Bill’ over her shoulder haphazardly.

  Evie didn’t say anything, there was no point. She sat stiffly in the car, zoning out as Mollie made polite conversation to fill the awkward silence, her voice getting higher and more silly as each minute passed. When they got to the party, Evie downed drink after drink, in the hope that it would wash away that slimy feeling that seemed to infect her skin, as she thought about that look on her father’s face.

  ***

  ‘I’m just dropping off Ez!’ Evie yelled up as she thundered down the stairs the next morning, Esme waiting impatiently at the bottom for her.

  ‘Could we hurry up? Evelyn said eleven a.m.!’ Esme’s arms were crossed, and she tapped her toes in her pineapple-printed trainers pointedly.

  ‘Time is relative.’ Evie shrugged, kissing her cheek just to annoy her, ‘Coat?’

  ‘It’s a hundred degrees out!’ The child rolled her eyes and marched across the room.

  ‘Bag?’

  Esme turned to show her empty backpack, ready to be filled with the books from their landlady’s library.

  The door to the workshop creaked open, and Killian beamed out at her, running a hand through his hair.

  ‘Hey beautiful,’ He reached for her, but she stepped back, smiling apologetically.

  ‘Hi, sorry, have to take Esme to Evelyn’s…’ She pointed, already backing away towards the front door.

  His face dropped, the smile settling into something more wary, ‘Well, wait one second, I’ll come with you–’

  ‘Sorry, Ez is in a ridiculous rush, aren’t you Ez?’

  The little girl looked up at her, frowning. Something was going on, but she nodded anyway, ‘Yes, I was meant to be there five minutes ago but the adults are always late.’

  Killian paused, tilting his head to look first at Esme, and then Evie, as if she was some peculiar puzzle, or rather, a piece that didn’t fit at all. ‘Okay… I’ll see you when you get back then?’

  Evie looked around him, seeming to be looking at his cheekbones instead of making eye contact, ‘Yeah, sure.’

  They charged to the front door, Evie noticing the torn letter on the side and stuffing it into her pocket, as Killian was left to stand and wonder what had suddenly changed.

  ***

  ‘Are you all right?’ Evelyn frowned at Evie, standing at the front door, hovering. Esme had already charged on through to the library, after accepting a hug from the older lady.

  ‘I… I don’t know,’ Evie shrugged, staring past her. She had a hundred things to do, and now her dad was back to make trouble. She couldn’t even predict what was going to happen. Sure, she could recognise his plays once he’d started, but Bill was adaptable. If a better con came along, he’d jump on that. She was surprised he hadn’t tried to make money from Ruby before. Although rock stars who’d died in mysterious circumstances were worth much more to the tabloids than when they were alive, she supposed.

  ‘Come in and have some tea,’ Evelyn held the door open, her eyes soft and kind, underneath a furrowed brow.

  Evie shook her head, ‘Did Ruby ever mention a man named Bill Davis?’

  Evelyn thought about it, but shook her head, ‘Never to me. But we both know there were a lot of men in her life. Who was he?’

  ‘A man sayin
g he used to be her manager,’ Evie said shortly.

  ‘Well, what does he want?’

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ Evie sighed deeply, ‘and I’m worried about finding out.’

  She shook her head, as if to awaken herself, and pulled down her sunglasses from atop her head, ‘I’m gonna go.’

  ‘Don’t. Stay here, talk to me.’ Evelyn reached out a hand, squeezing Evie’s briefly.

  Evie tried for a smile, ‘Thanks, but I need to walk. I’ll pick her up in a couple of hours.’

  The older lady nodded sadly, but paused as she was closing the door, ‘Darling, don’t try to do everything alone, okay?’

  Evie shrugged, and just kept walking, a hand up in acceptance as she headed off down the street, her head lowered. She paused a few streets over, sat on a wall in front of a random house and took the letter out again. She read it a few times, feeling her hands start to shake until she screwed it up, then flattened it out in order to rip it into tiny pieces.

  Bill fucking Davis. Daring to show up now, at the moment when she might finally get her life together. Days until the opening, and here he was again, turning up as and when he felt like it, just like her childhood. She remembered standing by her locker at the end of the day, when everyone else had long since disappeared at the sound of the bell. She’d just punched the locker, over and over again, the dull thud as her knuckles bounced off the thin sheet metal, denting it, a little more each time she hit, until eventually, she stopped, leaving a small but deep crater.

  ‘Why don’t you get angry at him?’ Ruby had said, shaking her head at her, ‘You’re angry at everything in the world except the one thing that makes you that way.’

  She was right then, and she was still right. Bill Davis had waltzed into her life whenever he wanted, destroying things that got in his way, taking advantage of her mother, using her whenever he wanted a warm bed and someone to look at him with loving eyes. Her mum. Of course, that had to be how he knew where she was, who she was with. What she was doing.

  Part of her wanted to call up her mother. Scream and shout and ask why, just this once, couldn’t she put her daughter above her love for Bill? Why she couldn’t realise that her Evie needed to be protected from him, that he could take it all away from her? Somehow, in Maria Rodriguez’s mind, they would all be a happy family if she just closed her eyes tightly enough. And Evie had never been strong enough to prise open her eyelids and make her watch the massacre of her reality.

  This had to stop. Evie stood up, clenching her fist around the tiny bits of paper, noting the twitching of the net curtains in the windows behind her. Another bad girl, sitting on someone else’s front garden wall, Evie smirked to herself at the irony of it all. Here she was, the good one for once, walking off to avoid confrontation. Sitting quietly to reflect. And some poor old bastard in his house probably thought she was casing the place.

  She started to walk into Camden Market, taking slow steps that felt more solid with every movement, weaving in and out of the people with purpose, feeling the heartbeat of the city with the stamping and twisting bodies that moved around. Everyone had somewhere to be, somewhere to go. She took part in the dance, side-stepping, sliding, avoiding contact with every other human, as if they were contagious, the bumping of shoulders in the afternoon sunlight met with apologetic mumbles.

  Evie traced the route Killian had taken her on, following the snaking road around to Primrose Hill. She walked into the park purposefully, digging her heels in as her stride lengthened, leaning into the hill. Every available space seemed to be full of bodies. Lying out on blankets, snoozing in the shade. Girls in bikinis, women with their tops rolled up. Men using their t-shirts as pillows, peering about beneath sunglasses, as if they won’t be seen leering.

  Evie didn’t care, walking up, and up, and up until she could see the skyline of London littered with cranes – odd, spindly metal structures against a blue, cloudless sky. She waited for a breeze, eyes closed as it picked up, and flung the bits of the note into the air.

  Something was released with the motion, and she breathed out, relieved for a few seconds… until the angry splutterings of Londoners surrounded her.

  ‘Oi! What you doing!’

  ‘She just threw paper on me!’

  ‘That better not be somebody’s fucking ashes, or I am gonna lose my shit!’

  Evie shrugged, grinning to herself, and disappeared down the hill again.

  ***

  ‘What’s he doing here?’

  Evie’s eyes flicked to the living room, where Bill was sitting in ‘his’ chair, feet up on the coffee table, getting mud over the floor her mother scrubbed on her hands and knees most days.

  ‘He’s here to see us! I’m making paella!’ Her mother clapped her hands, her black hair falling out of its tie and springing out, giving further movement to her action.

  ‘No, Maria, I don’t want that,’ Bill shouted from the chair, the TV blaring, ‘none of that Spanish shit, I want fish and chips.’

  ‘Uh… I don’t have anything to make that–’

  ‘Well send Evie to the shop then,’ Bill looked up slowly, meeting his daughter’s eyes squarely. ‘You wouldn’t want to disappoint me, would you?’

  The silence seemed to suffocate them, like a heavy blanket falling over the situation.

  Evie stared at him with pure hatred, and then looked back to her mother, whose eyes were pleading with her.

  ‘Go on, my darling,’ She rustled a five-pound note from her pocket.

  ‘Why can’t he pay for it?’ Evie said loudly, daring him to answer, but her mother pinched her arm, frowning.

  ‘Stop it! Do you want him to go away again?’ her mother hissed.

  ‘Yes. Of course I do. And you should too!’ Evie screeched, horrified as her exasperation turned to tears. ‘I’ll go get the food.’

  She turned, looking at her mother sternly. The little Spanish woman had always seemed so tough, the minute her dad was gone. She went to marches to save the NHS, put the men in their place at the care home she worked in, stood up for her colleagues when the manager took his frustrations about targets out on them. But not once had she stood up to Bill.

  ‘Hey, Evie,’ Bill called from the living room, actually standing up to walk over to her, fixing her with his dark eyes and grinning. Her mother always said that smile was playful, but to Evie it felt menacing as hell. ‘Make sure you knock when you come back in, all right? You never know, me and your mum might be feeling a bit… amorous, right babe?’

  Evie didn’t even need to see her mother’s tight smile, she just turned on her heel and slammed the door behind her, not coming back that night at all.

  ***

  She’d taken the opportunity to hand out some extra flyers to the local businesses, inviting them along to the opening. Dev – the young boy at the corner shop who usually made frantic, excitable conversation about Ruby Tuesday and rock stars when she was buying milk or ice lollies – was keen to come along. His mother rang up the items every day, eyeing Evie like she was a siren, a bad influence on teenage boys in love with rock’n’roll. But they put the flyer up anyway.

  By the time she walked back to pick up Esme, the afternoon had cooled off a little and she arrived holding onto three lemonade lollies, smiling as Evelyn opened the door.

  ‘You seem a lot happier.’ Evelyn revealed dimples in her soft cheeks as she took the ice lolly, ‘Why thank you. Come in?’

  ‘Nope, me and Miss Ez have got some cooking to help with. An old friend is visiting tonight for dinner. If she doesn’t cancel on us. We promised Mollie we’d help, didn’t we Ez?’

  Esme frowned from the top step, holding five books piled up, balancing them under her chin to support them.

  ‘Hmm,’ Esme said, ‘I guess.’

  ‘You guess?’ Evie laughed, ‘Come on, I’ve got an ice lolly melting into my hand with your name on it. We’ve got big important things to do, missy! The opening is in two days!’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I know,’ E
sme sighed, kneeling on the bottom step of the staircase to slide the books into her blue, spotted backpack. She slid it over her shoulders, looking suddenly smaller, and reached up on tiptoes to hug Evelyn, closing her eyes. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You are very welcome, I’ll see you at the opening!’ She tapped the bottom of the little girl’s chin, smiling widely, ‘Now I’d grab that lolly before you have to drink it with a straw!’

  Esme shrugged as she reached out her hand for the ice lolly, and Evie followed her down the road, wondering why the little girl seemed so bereft.

  ‘Sorry you had to leave Evelyn’s,’ Evie offered, catching up with her as they walked in the direction of home.

  ‘It’s fine,’ Esme said lightly, looking straight ahead.

  ‘What’s up Ez?’

  The little girl stopped, sighing, and turned to her godmother. ‘I’ve got to tell you something, but I think you’re going to get mad.’

  ‘Mad at you?’ Evie frowned, ‘Did you break something at Evelyn’s, because I’m sure we can just–’

  ‘No. Not mad at me. Just mad.’

  Esme’s words hung in the air, seeming to take on a heaviness.

  ‘I can’t promise anything Ez, but you know I love you. If you need to tell me something, just tell me.’

  ‘A man came to Evelyn’s house,’ Esme started, biting her lip. ‘He asked for me.’

  ‘For you?’ Evie felt her brow crease. What man would be looking for Esme? Had Jamie suddenly reappeared? Even that didn’t make sense.

  ‘He said he needed to speak to me, and Evelyn brought me to the door, and he said he had a message for you.’

  ‘Did Evelyn ask who this man was?’ Evie suddenly regretted letting her stay with the older lady, how much did they know about her really?

  ‘He said he was your daddy. And he told me to tell you that he was really looking forward to seeing you at the opening, and that you should buy a newspaper tomorrow morning, because there was going to be a feature on the gallery.’ Esme’s lips were trembling, watching for Evie’s reaction.

  ‘Why didn’t Evelyn send him away?’ She could feel her heart racing, feel her breathing start to become sharp and tight. He’d gotten to Esme. He knew where they were, he was watching where they went, he knew that they’d dropped off Esme. This was awful.