Saving Ruth

by Zoe Fishman

  “I have the day off.” I rubbed the cold glass against my forehead.

  “Want to go to the mall with your mama?”

  “Oh, Mom, shopping? Now?”

  “C’mon, I’ll buy you a treat and we can grab a girls’ lunch.”

  Saying no would have just been cruel. And to be honest, a new something for my date with Chris sounded pretty appealing. But lunch? What would I eat? Shut up, Ruth. Just do this, please. “Okay, sure. Why not?”

  “Great. You ready?” She was practically behind the wheel already.

  “Slow down there. I have to shower and, you know, get ready.”

  “Oh, okay. I’m going to be in my room. Just call me when you’re ready.” She got up. “But don’t take forever, okay? It’s the mall, not prom.”

  “What would I know about prom?”

  “What exactly do you do that takes you so long?” my mom asked at a red light.

  “You’re already annoying me. I thought this was going to be fun.” I stared out the window morosely.

  “Honey, don’t be so sensitive. I really am legitimately curious. You prepare yourself for a good half-hour, and when you finally emerge you look exactly the same.”

  “Thanks a lot.”

  “No, I don’t mean it in a bad way! You look great. I just—I know you’re putting on makeup because I see it in your room, but I don’t see it on your face.”

  “Hello, that’s the key to good makeup. It’s subtle. The key to looking good is appearing as though you’ve spent no time doing so.”

  “But, honey, you’re nineteen. You don’t even need the makeup.” She glanced at me. “Well, maybe you do now. You never used to.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Ruth, a steady diet of sugar and air doesn’t exactly provide a glowing complexion.”

  “Very nice, Mom. I’m glad you’re perfect.”

  “C’mon, Ruth, it’s not like you aren’t aware of these things yourself, right? You’re a smart girl.”

  “Mom, Dad already read me the riot act this morning. Can we please move on?”

  “Oh yes. I heard about the grass.”

  “The grass? Is this 1969?” She pursed her lips.

  “Okay, well, I apologized to him for acting so irresponsibly, and I’ll apologize to you too.”

  “Thanks for the apology, but it doesn’t change the fact that you did something really stupid.”

  “God! I know! This is like, some déjà vu shit. I had the talk with Dad, okay? I get it.” Arguing with my parents took me from nineteen to thirteen at time warp speed.

  “All right. We’ll move on. For the moment at least.” She sighed. “Are we looking for anything in particular today?”

  “Not really. Maybe a cute top or a miniskirt. I’m not really sure.”

  “Are you going somewhere?” She pulled into a mall parking space.

  “I have a date,” I explained coyly. My mom had had a crush on Chris as long as I had, really, but not in a creepy Mrs. Robinson way. More in an appreciation of male charm kind of way.

  “Oh, that’s nice. With whom?”

  “Mom, you’re acting pretty nonchalant. I was hoping for more of a dramatic reaction. I think I went on a total of three dates during my entire high school career.”

  We began walking toward the entrance. “Sure, you didn’t date much in high school, but that’s because you had no confidence in yourself. It’s different now. I’m not surprised at all.” She put her arm around me.

  “Mom, give me a break. The reason I didn’t go on dates was not because of a lack of confidence. I was fat.”

  “Ruth Wasserman, you absolutely were not fat,” she hissed. “I can’t believe you’re saying that.”

  “Mom, c’mon.” We stared at each other. “You yourself told me I needed to lose some weight.”

  “Sure, a few pounds, but not anything extreme.” She opened the door to the mall. “Oy, this air conditioning! And anyway, the only reason I said that was because you seemed so miserable about your weight. I wanted you to be happy.”

  I thought about Laney. Did she think that was all she wanted for Khaki as well? Was she blind to her own intentions? “Hey, Mom, it’s okay to say that you wanted me to lose some weight for your own well-being. It’s not a crime to want your daughter to be thin.”

  “Ruth, what are you talking about? Sure, I could have used one less shopping trip with you that didn’t go on for hours on end with you in tears, but I honestly just wanted you to be happy. I suppose maybe I knew that your life would be easier if you were thinner . . . oh, who knows. I mean, God knows I’d like to lose a little weight.” We made our way past an array of stores displaying bedazzled T-shirts, leather bomber jackets, and Crimson Tide paraphernalia in their windows.

  “I just like food too much these days to be good. It’s like I opened Pandora’s box, except the box in question has Entenmann’s written across its top.”

  “You never used to eat like that. Remember when you only ate grilled chicken for six months?”

  “Grilled chicken and hard-boiled eggs. I looked wonderful.” She sighed.

  “And what about that cabbage soup kick you were on for David’s bar mitzvah?”

  “I had forgotten about that.” She smiled wistfully. “I was practically down to my birth weight.”

  “God, you were such a bitch that year. You banned everything. The kitchen was like the Sahara.”

  “But did I look gorgeous or what? That photo of the four of us is a masterpiece.” I rolled my eyes.

  “Am I responsible for this?” She stopped midstride and faced me.

  “Responsible for what?”

  “This.” She waved her hand in front of my waist.

  “Mom.” I reached out and put my hand on her goose-pimpled forearm. “No.” The truth was that maybe she was partly responsible. She had always battled her body’s inclinations with focused ferocity and tsk-tsked my own inability to do the same. I think she knew that, at least on a very basic level. Looking at her panic-stricken face now, however, I couldn’t say as much. Besides, what would placing blame do? In the end, it was my choice what I ate, or didn’t eat, every day.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. Relax.”

  “Good.” We continued walking in awkward silence. “So, who is it?”

  “Who’s what?”

  “The guy you’re going on a date with?”

  “It’s Chris, actually.”

  “Our Chris?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “David’s Chris?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She nodded slowly. “Well, I’ll be damned.” She smiled broadly. “He is really good-looking. And such a nice guy.” She paused for a moment. “I’m trying to keep my cool here, you know that, right?”

  “I know.”

  “Well, you know what this means. A new outfit, top to toe. This is serious business. What about these?” She held up a pair of shapeless pants. My mom had a soft spot for linen.

  “Am I sixty-five?”

  “Very funny.”

  “What about this?” I held up a purple T-shirt.

  “Are you twelve?” I smirked. To say that we didn’t have the same taste was a severe understatement.

  In the dressing room, I surveyed myself in a black minidress. Who the hell is this? I wondered. I actually laughed—whether out of nerves or fright or happiness, I wasn’t sure. The rational me saw the emaciated girl staring back and thought, Yikes, you really are a nut job. The crazy me saw a girl who could probably still stand to lose a few pounds around her midsection. The rational me knew that there was no way in hell I’d be able to keep this up forever, and the crazy me said, You’d better, because skinny is all you have. It was a constant game of psychotic ping-pong.

  My
mom opened the dressing room door. “I’m so bored out there! Show me.”

  “So—”

  “Oh, Ruth.” She put her hands over her mouth, and her eyes widened behind her glasses.

  “What, Mom?” I squirmed in front of her. “Mom! Come on!”

  “Ruth, I—I just don’t know what to say.” She sat down on the stool beside me, and our eyes met in the mirror. “You’re so thin.”

  I was trapped. I couldn’t take the dress off and put on my baggier clothes, but I also couldn’t just stand there and watch her fight back tears.

  “You know what’s really screwed up?”

  “What?”

  “Part of me actually thinks you look good!” She took her glasses off and rubbed her eyes. “How sick is that? Here’s my daughter, looking like someone right out of Dachau, and there’s part of me that’s happy for her! It is my fault—all of this. I’m a terrible mother.” I slid down the wall to the ground and sat with my back against it.

  “You’re not a terrible mother.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Mom, this is not your issue. Cut the ‘we’ stuff. I’ve gone a little overboard with the eating thing, and I know that, okay? I’m trying to be more sane, I really am.” “Trying” as in I think about it but never actually act on it.

  “Do you promise?”

  I nodded.

  “Because if this gets worse. . . .”

  “Mom, everything is going to be okay.” I stood back up.

  “Ruth, when you look in the mirror, do you see that you need to gain some weight? Five pounds would work wonders, you know. And this is coming from a woman who used to believe that a person could never be too thin. No longer. You’re too thin, honey. Too, too thin.”

  What I wanted to do was scream, But, Mom, five pounds leads to ten pounds, leads to thirty! What I said was, “Yes, Mom, I see that.”

  “Okay.” She exhaled deeply.

  “Ruthala, remember when you were little and I found you stark naked in my bedroom, standing in front of the mirror and kissing your own shoulders?”

  I laughed. “Yeah.”

  “What happened to that confidence? Where did it go?”

  “Mom, I was three.”

  “I know, but oh—I wish I could have bottled that feeling for you.”

  “Mom, you have mascara all over your face.” I licked my fingertips and rubbed it away as she waited patiently.

  “Ruthie, you really promise that you’re okay?” she asked when I was finished.

  “Yes! Now scram so I can try on something that doesn’t make you burst into tears.”

  “Okay, I’ll wait outside for the next one.”

  She left, and I stared at myself in the mirror for another moment. I didn’t want to live like this, but I also didn’t know how to not live like this and look the way I wanted to look.

  In the end we settled on a blue-and-white-striped tank top and some white shorts.

  “Thanks, Mom,” I said as the cashier handed her her credit card.

  “You are very welcome.” She looked at her watch. “Shall we go to lunch? You’re going to eat something, right?”

  “Yes, I’ll eat something.” Get a freaking sandwich, eat half, and move on, Ruth!

  As we settled into our booth, my mom beamed like a beauty contestant. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you look so excited,” I told her. “Wow.”

  “I love lunch out,” she confessed. “Your father will never indulge me, and it’s impossible during the school year. There’s something so wonderfully decadent about it.” As I gave my order to a giant pair of braces attached to a fifteen-year-old boy, she nodded happily.

  “No comments, please.”

  “Okay, I won’t.” She pursed her lips. “But I’m glad that you ordered a sandwich. Good girl.”

  “Mom, c’mon.”

  “Okay, okay. Let’s change the subject.” She took a long sip of her diet soda. “Where are you two going to go on your date? And when is it?”

  “I’m not sure where we’ll go. And Thursday is date night.”

  “I used to love going on dates.”

  “With Dad?”

  “Well, sure, but with other people too. The whole idea of getting dressed up and being taken somewhere.” She grinned.

  “Where did you and Dad go on your first date?”

  “Where did we go? I think it was to a dance or something. Or maybe we met at a dance and then our first date was to a party?”

  “Mom! You really don’t remember?”

  “Honey, it was a long time ago. We were freshmen in college, for goodness’ sake.”

  “Just like me now.”

  “Yep, just like you now.” I took a sip of my drink and tried to imagine marrying Tony. Or Chris. It was impossible.

  “Was Dad your first boyfriend?”

  “Oh no. I dated a few boys in high school for a stretch. But he was the first man I fell in love with.”

  “And when you fell in love, did you know you were in love? Or was it just something you figured out later?”

  “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “I wonder if when you fall in love you’re too busy experiencing it to fully realize that that’s what’s happening.”

  “I guess there’s some of that. But mostly it just feels so different from ‘like.’ The thought of life without him seems unbearable. And then of course, at least for me, there was the whole sex part of the equation.”

  “Mom!” I blushed.

  “What? We can’t talk about these things?”

  “Not if we’re talking about it in relation to Dad.” I thought about him asleep in his office.

  Our waiter deposited our plates in front of us. My stomach dropped as I examined my BLT. As my mom futzed with the ketchup bottle, I discreetly removed the bacon and folded it into my napkin.

  “Ruth, have you talked to David at all since you’ve been home?” she asked as she poured a pool of ketchup onto her plate.

  “What do you mean? Like, really talked to him?”

  “Yes, Ruth. Like a conversation.”

  “No. He hates me.”

  “He doesn’t hate you!” She slapped her palm on the table, and her lemon wedge parachuted from the rim of her glass.

  I rolled my eyes. “Whatever you say.”

  “Anyway, I’m worried about him. Something is off, but I don’t know what it is exactly.”

  “Do you have actual proof, or is this just a mother’s intuition thing?”

  She chewed her burger and held her finger up. “Mother’s intuition,” she finally replied. “He’s just acting differently. More secretive or something.”

  I chewed my own bite and tried my hardest to enjoy it, despite the mayonnaise that I detected. “He’s the same as he’s always been at swim practice.”

  “Is he? That’s good to hear. It’s just that he’s always been so open with me and your father. These past couple of months, not so much.”

  “He’s open because he’s the favorite.”

  “Ruth, please.” Her eyes widened above her burger bun.

  “It’s true. He’s the soccer star on scholarship, and I’m the endearing screwup.”

  “I would hardly call getting into U of M being a screwup. You’re being ridiculous.”

  “Geographic distribution saved my ass.” I fingered the bread on my plate.

  “Honey, that’s just not true. And besides, whether or not he’s the favorite is not what this conversation is about. Can we focus, please? If he says anything to you that’s cause for concern, will you let me know?”

  “I’ll keep my ears open, okay?” Here I was, starving right in front of them, and they were sweating David’s PMS. Typical.

  My phone rang. It was Chris.

  “Hell
o?” My mom stared at me like a frightened deer, her hands balled into fists on top of the table. To her, cell phones were for emergencies only. Every time one rang she was convinced that someone had died.

  “It’s Chris,” I mouthed. “Relax.” I slid out of the booth.

  “How’s it going?”

  “Good. And you?”

  “Decent. I have the day off.”

  “Nice! Uh, were you still into hanging out Thursday?”

  “Yeah, definitely.” I was loitering by the bar next to a woman who looked like a human cigarette. Gray and wrinkled, she appeared to be created out of ash. Her smoke languished in her ashtray as she drank a mudslide and gave me the stink-eye.

  “Well, there’s this bluegrass band that I like playing downtown. They start around nine. Would you be into that? Maybe supper first or something?”

  “You know, I should probably eat with my parents, but I’m definitely into the music part.” Eat with my parents. Yeah, right.

  “Okay, cool. How ’bout I pick you up around eight-thirty then?”

  “Sounds good.” I looked back at our table. My mom was paying the bill. She cocked her head and stared into the distance as she calculated the tip. “Well, see ya later, Chris.”

  “Yep, take it easy.” I considered asking human cigarette if I could bum a smoke, but thought again when I saw she was smoking menthols. I could wait it out. I made eye contact with my mom, and she began walking toward me. At the door I pocketed seven peppermints.

  “Soooo?” she asked as we battled the heat on our way to the car.

  “We’re going to listen to some bluegrass on Thursday.”

  She clapped her hands. “That really sounds like fun, Ruthie.” She beamed at me.

  I smiled back. I was excited to go out with him, especially since we weren’t headed to Chili’s and miniature golf, the typical first date in our town. “Do you think David is going to care?”

  “You know, it might make him uncomfortable for a minute or two, but it shouldn’t be a huge issue. Think of all your friends he’s flirted with.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I figured.”

  “I would think that Chris had already told him about it,” she said. “Although, with boys you never know.”