I narrow my eyes at him, feeling hope slip away. “What?”
“I won’t call the police. I’ll let you and your friend go on your merry way. But you will be going, yes? Out of Lisbon. Out of Portugal. You won’t tell Luciano a thing. Believe me, I’ll know if you do. And if you tell him what really happened, I’ll make sure there’s hell to pay with him. No, you’re going to leave, tonight, right now, and never look back. Or else…you’re gone.”
No. This can’t be it. My choices are either stay in Europe and lose Luciano, or keep Luciano and go home?
But I can’t go home. I just can’t. Maybe that’s the selfish choice, but I know I won’t survive it. The shadows are deeper there.
They’ll swallow me whole.
“It’s a pretty simple choice, Ruby,” he says, slipping his phone in his pocket. “And I know the one you’ve already made. The lesson I hope you learn from this is, don’t fuck with me. Don’t fuck with people when you have no idea what they’re capable of. You think this is a lot for me? It’s not. This is just taking care of business. I do this every day. This is just me flicking you away like the flea that you are. If anyone else had done what you did, they would be begging me to have gotten the bargain you got.” He steps close, leaning in. “Do you understand me?”
I can’t even swallow. I barely nod. My whole body feels like it’s sinking.
“Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday,” Tomás says to me, whistling a few notes of the song. “I hope, for your sake, I’ll never see you again.”
I stare at him while he strides off, trying to think, trying not to cry.
I never cry.
But I’m not sure how much longer I can hold out.
I’m not sure how much longer I can even keep breathing.
I feel Elena tugging at my arm, and I follow her like my eyes have failed me too. She leads me out of the stadium, past the guard who lets us pass, and toward the metros.
It’s starting to rain, cold droplets hitting the slice of bare skin between my leather jacket.
The jersey.
No.
“I left his jersey on the seat,” I cry out, trying to turn around and go back, but Elena holds me in place.
“No,” she says. “You can’t. Ruby, I heard what he said. You can’t go back.”
“But it’s all I’ll have of him,” I say through a gasp, my throat feeling choked, heat building behind my nose. The tears want to fall, want to bury me.
“You have to leave the jersey. You have to leave him.”
“I need to tell him what happened!” My words shake. “I owe that to him.”
“And let him know how awful his father really is? Do you really think that’s the right choice? He’s already on the outs with him, you’ve said so yourself, this will destroy that relationship for good, it will destroy the relationship he has with his brother. It might hurt the game, his life, everything he has worked for. You want that for him?”
She’s right. I hate it. I hate it so fucking much but she’s right.
“And he said there would be hell to pay. Whatever that means. But, fuck, Ruby, that guy is like the fucking mob or something. He’s not right in the head. Vittu perkele, I would have thrown a beer in his face too.”
“But if I don’t tell Luciano, then he’s going to think I just…left.”
“Then that’s what he has to think. Believe me, it sucks all around but you don’t have much choice here. You could make things bad for him for a bit, but he’ll get over you and move on.”
Fucking hell, why is she telling me this?
I don’t want him to move on.
I feel like my heart isn’t breaking into pieces, it’s shattering into smithereens, so small and sharp I’ll inhale them and they will kill me slowly.
I can’t think.
It hurts.
Everything hurts so fucking much that my lungs and my heart are squeezing, shrinking in on themselves, threatening to turn me into a black hole.
I stop walking and collapse to the ground in the stadium parking lot, bent over in pain, my head resting against a tire. The tears that I’ve held back for years are coming and I know there’s a chance I’ll drown.
“Ruby,” Elena whispers, crouching down beside me, putting her arms around me as the rain pours, mixing with my tears. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll drive to my aunt’s tomorrow. We’ll be out of Lisbon, you’ll have time to think. You will get over this, I promise you will. You’ll get over it and move on. It’s going to take time, but it will happen.”
But I don’t want to get over him.
I don’t want him to get over me.
I want to rewind time and bring everything back to the way it was before I got those beers, before I made the biggest mistake of my life by acting on my fucking impulse, that shit that always gets me in trouble. I dug my own grave this time.
“I’m in love with him,” I say to her, sobs wracking my throat. “Doesn’t that mean something?”
She gives me a sad smile. “It just means that everything is going to hurt more. That’s what love is. You open up, you let it in, you take the risk of getting hurt. Then your heart is either hardened or softened by your suffering.”
Hardened, I think.
How could my heart not turn to steel after this?
Why would anyone let it grow soft, just so it can hurt again?
“Come on, we’re getting wet,” she says to me. She stands up and helps me to my feet. “I have a bottle of vodka back at the hotel with your name on it.”
She puts her arm around my shoulder and leads me off through the parking lot to the train.
I’m leaving Luciano Ribeiro behind.
Seventeen
Luciano
This game is garbage.
No matter what I fucking do, I can’t get the ball in the goal. None of us can. I’d like to say that Nacional’s goalie is just being exceptional today, and perhaps that’s how some of the media and fans will spin it, if they don’t feel like hating on us. But the truth is, we’re lacking the focus today. There’s no skill in our passes, no confidence in our kicks. If we rose up to be the better team then we’d have a chance. But we didn’t rise.
On the other hand, they didn’t rise either. They never got past our goalie and I did manage to intercept a few of the balls. So there’s that.
But to have five minutes left in the game with both of us tied at zero, well, that doesn’t instill a lot of hope in me. At least the fans still have hope. No one has left early, they’re all just waiting to see if we can work some magic and get a goal at the last second. One goal is all it will take.
I glance up at the stands where I know Ruby is, but to my surprise, the seats are empty.
What the fuck?
Concentrate on the game, I tell myself. That’s all that matters right now.
Even so, that stings. Did she leave because she was bored? Because she knew we weren’t going to win? She had seemed so enthusiastic, was even wearing my jersey, which honestly was the sweetest thing anyone had ever done for me, and yet now she left?
It makes no sense.
I try to forget it for now, to concentrate on the game, but time flies and even though I’m trying to do my job, scrambling to score a goal, the game comes to an end with a tie being called.
No one is happy. A tie isn’t much better than losing, and a zero tie does nothing to help with the points. The silver lining is that the other team has nothing to gloat about. You both suck.
I exhale, running my hands over my face. Fucking hell, I wish I had given Ruby a good game, not one that was so bad she left.
Maybe she went to get a beer. Maybe she went to the washroom.
With Elena too?
“That was a bag of dicks,” Benedito says to me, as we walk off the pitch.
“Tell me about it.”
I make the mistake of looking at my father when we passed by his seats. I tried to ignore him the whole game, but I’m not sure it worked as well as it did last time.
And now, well of course my father is happy.
He’s grinning at me, rather maliciously, and giving me two thumbs up.
That asshole. Always happy when I lose.
We do the usual song and dance of giving soundbites to the media, and I have to paste on my happy face, the one that lets people know we’ll try harder next time and I’m not too worried, even though the next time is in the next year. Who knows what 2014 will bring us.
But after I’ve given my talk to the team, I text Ruby to find out where she is. I don’t know if she wants me to pick her up from the hotel or if I should meet her somewhere.
I text her: Where did you go?
I stare at it as I make my way with the team to the bus that will take us back to the training center. I wait, watching everyone get back on the bus, trying to decide if I should go back with them, shower there and get my car, or just take a cab to my apartment and get my car tomorrow. It all depends on Ruby.
Deciding that the text might have been a bit demanding I then text: Sorry the game was shit. Where are you? Do you want me to come get you or meet me somewhere?
I send it and wait.
No response.
Maybe her phone died.
She doesn’t expect to see me for a while, even though it’s nearly eleven at night, so I decide to get on the bus.
But during the whole ride over to the training centre, I keep checking my phone. Nothing. The texts are getting delivered too, so I know her phone isn’t dead. It’s like she’s looking at them and choosing not to respond.
A sour feeling spreads in my chest.
“Cheer up,” Benedito says. I look up to see him twisted around in the seat in front of me. “There’s always next year.”
I give him a stiff smile, my eyes going outside the bus at the headlights passing us on the highway. “We had five wins in a row. Perhaps six was asking for too much.”
He doesn’t say anything to that, and I glance at him, brow raised. “What?”
“Are you okay?”
I try to swallow. “Yeah. I’m fine.”
“Girl trouble?”
“I hope not.”
Benedito grins at me. “It’s such a nice change to see you like this.”
“Fuck you.”
He laughs and turns around.
I hope I can laugh about this soon.
I hope that creeping sense of doom is just an instinctive response due to being abandoned when I was younger, and that the basis of it isn’t valid for this situation.
I try and live with that feeling the whole ride, then when I get to the centre and I shower, and then on my drive back into Lisbon. I check my phone so many times I nearly drive off the road. Finally I call her.
It goes straight to voice mail.
“Hey this is Ruby. Leave your words at the beep.”
I leave my words. “Ruby, it’s Luciano. Obviously. I was just wondering what happened to you tonight. I don’t want to get on your nerves or anything and if you changed your mind about seeing me tonight, that’s fine. I guess I’m just worried. Call me when you can.”
I hang up and drive.
Get back to my apartment.
Go into my liquor cabinet and pull out that same bottle of scotch I once drank with Ruby. Pour myself a shot and down it. Then I have another.
Finally I pour three fingers into a highball glass and go outside on the balcony, leaning on the railing and staring at the street below. It’s late but there are people out and about, because this is Lisbon after all.
Ruby where are you?
Why are you doing this?
I have to remind myself to calm down, that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.
That she lost her phone.
That has to be it.
It’s not the thing that’s been crouching in the dark corner of my mind, waiting to pounce.
The fact that I scared her.
That when I invited her to live with me, it made her realize how bold and forward that was, that we were moving fast. I don’t even know why I said it, other than the fact that it made perfect sense at the time.
It still does. I know it’s fast. But she’s not someone I just met.
She’s my Ruby girl.
And we have a lot of history, as complicated as it is.
Plus, I’m in love with her.
That’s the biggest thing of all.
I love her and I want her to come live with me.
I held back on one of those things. I’m thinking now I should have held back on both.
She lost her phone. She didn’t get scared and run away.
Even though it’s what she always does.
I finish my drink, feeling drunk and bitter, and go straight to bed.
I check my phone one last time, then pass out.
* * *
The next morning I wake up with a bit of a hangover. That’s what I get for fueling myself with scotch after a game instead of food.
I roll over slowly, my head feeling fuzzy, and grab my phone.
All my dreams were interspersed with thoughts about Ruby, my worries, my fears, so my mind already slips into the same state I was in last night.
I check it. No texts.
No calls.
My heart sinks.
I pull up my emails. No emails from her.
I quickly send her one, just in case, and then lie back in bed, trying to figure it out.
She doesn’t use Facebook and I don’t even have Instagram.
I get up and make a cup of coffee, then pull out my laptop to see if I can find her somewhere. But her last Instagram post was from six months ago, her smirking smile at a lake surrounded by pines, Finland probably. Her blog is still up but hasn’t been updated in years.
I decide to Google the hotel she’s staring at.
I call the number.
The woman at the front desk answers.
“Hello,” I tell her. “I’m looking to get in touch with one of your guests, Ruby Turner. Could you put me through?”
“Ruby Turner? Let me see.”
I hear the clack of the keyboard. “I don’t have anyone under that name.”
“Right. Uh, she’s with a friend. Same room. Elena something. She’s Finnish.”
“Elena Hamstrom?” she asks.
“I think so?” I say, feeling so helpless.
“Oh, yes I see Ruby’s name down as her guest. I’m sorry but it appears they checked out this morning.”
My breath stills, throat closing up.
“What?” I manage to eke out.
“They’ve checked out,” she says matter-of-factly.
“What…what time?”
“Seven thirty,” she says. “Quite early.”
“But…” I trail off. Silence.
My mind spins.
This can’t be right.
“Sir?”
“Sorry.” I try to breathe. “Do you know where they went or if they said anything?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t have any notes here. Is there something else I can help you with?”
I can’t even respond. I hang up the phone and it slides out of my hand, clattering onto the laptop.
What the fuck?
She left?
She just left without saying goodbye?
“What the fuck?!” I yell, my voice booming across the apartment, my hands making fists in my hair. “What the fuck?”
Who does that?
I mean, Ruby. Ruby does that but I never in a million years thought she would do that to me.
I can’t even think. I’m so fucking livid and hurt and FUCK.
I start pacing, trying to come to terms with what’s happening, not understanding any of it.
Ruby is gone. She and her friend left this morning. Early. So early. She hasn’t texted, hasn’t emailed, hasn’t called. She left the game early.
What the fuck happened?
You fucked up. You did this. You brought this on yourself.
&
nbsp; I don’t want to listen to that voice, I want to blame it on something else, someone else.
But I know that voice is right.
Because I did fuck up, didn’t I?
I moved too fast with her and scared her off and now she’s going back to fucking Finland and leaving me behind.
But why didn’t she tell me? Why not at least say goodbye?
Why leave me in this hell?
In a flurry of rage, I pick up my laptop from the table and launch it across the room. It smashes against the wall, bits of it flying off, and then they scatter on the floor.
“FUCK!” I roar, wanting to rip my fucking arms off.
Why did I have to fall in love with her?
Why did I let my motherfucking guard down and let her in?
I knew this was going to be doomed from the start, I knew it, and I ignored it because I believed it would be different this time, that we would find a way.
But there was no way, not with her.
I was just her latest impulsive thing.
I was that cliff she went to the edge with, just to see what it would feel like if she fell.
She turned around so fast.
She had no intentions of ever going over.
But what if you’re wrong?
What if what you had was real?
I decide to call back the hotel. Maybe I can get them to give me Elena’s phone number. I can be pretty convincing. Maybe if I tell them who I am, and cross my fingers that they aren’t Benfica fans…
I call back.
The same woman at the front desk answers.
“Oh it’s you,” she says brightly.
“Yes, sorry, I was wondering—”
“You hung up before I had a chance to tell you,” she interrupts. “There was a message for you,”
“What?”
“Or it’s for someone, anyway. Are you Luciano?”
“Yes,” I whisper, feeling hope slide through me.
“It’s from Ruby. She gave it to my colleague. It’s written on the stationary, so I missed it.” She pauses. “Do you want to hear it?”
I did before. But from the way the tone of her voice just changed, I’m now scared to death, gripping my phone like I’ll break it in two. “Y-yes.”
The One That Got Away: A Novel Page 22
