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“What gave me away?”
“Oh, you know…all the…levelheadedness,” she says, wiggling her spoon at me.
I shake my head and bite back another grin, eyeing the whiskey in my glass. “Tell me about Ken,” I say, realizing I’m not just willing to endure Ruby’s chatter—I’m eager for it.
She sighs and leans back, grinning at the flight attendant as he takes our first-course plates away.
“He’s just the typical dad who leaves his family behind. Left when I was a kid and I haven’t seen him since I was six, so it feels like I’m going to meet him for the first time. He lives outside of Sacramento, and…” She shakes her head, her smile slipping slightly. “I’m not even sure I want to see him, but a few months ago I decided it was time to figure out who he is and either get some closure or try to bridge things between us. When I contacted him and he offered me the ticket, I thought, Why not?”
I’ve always known I was lucky to have the parents that I do—two people who love each other immensely, always put our family first, and would never think of leaving one of us high and dry.
The idea that a dad could just leave? Mark Mitchell would never do something like that, let alone disappear. I’m pretty sure my dad would show up and beat my door down if I ever went longer than a few weeks without talking to him. I can’t imagine having nearly twenty years without him.
“Either I meet him, realize he is exactly who I think he is, and I get some closure, or he pleasantly surprises me and I get a dad. It’s a win-win, I guess, even though I’m crazy nervous and totally regretting this trip altogether.” Ruby pauses then looks at me with a pinched expression. “Sorry to dump this on you,” she says. “I tend to ramble when I’m nervous, and talking is helping me not think about the fact that we’re flying thirty thousand feet in the air. My mom calls me Ruby Rambles for a very legitimate reason.”
“It seems like a fitting nickname.”
She blushes and shakes her head but doesn’t say anything in response as the attendant brings out our next course.
“You’re close with your mom?” I ask, picking up my utensils and cutting into the egg white and spinach dish that is probably going to taste nowhere near as good as it looks.
“Careful, Boyd. If you ask me questions, you’ll make it seem like you actually want to have a conversation.”
I can tell her tone is teasing, but I’m still a little embarrassed. Normally, I can’t be blatant enough about the fact that I don’t want to talk to someone. Now that I actually want to talk to Ruby, I feel a little bad about how standoffish I was earlier.
Thankfully, she doesn’t keep the spotlight focused on me for long, instead launching into sharing about her mom and what it was like growing up as just the two of them.
She talks about the struggles—like moving around a lot, having a hard time making rent, and watching other kids with dads have fun doing things together—but also the good things, like getting all of the attention, having slumber parties together in the living room, and getting a lot more freedom and independence than her peers.
“She’s my best friend,” Ruby says, finally pausing to take a bite of her own eggs.
“How does she feel about you going to visit your dad?” I ask.
I can tell almost instantly that I’ve struck a nerve. She sets down her knife and fork and takes a sip from her drink.
“I didn’t tell her,” she says, her voice quiet and, if I’m reading her right, a little ashamed. “I just…didn’t think she’d approve, so I told her I was going to hang out with friends for a few weeks.”
Her nose scrunches up, and I can tell even talking about this is making her emotional.
“Part of me thinks she knows what’s going on, though. She didn’t ask who the friends were, and it’s not like I’ve got tons of friends from all walks of life, you know? Why would I suddenly have a group of friends from California that my mom has never met or heard me talk about before?”
She takes a bite of her eggs and follows it up with a bite from her toast.
“You don’t have friends from college she hasn’t met?” I ask, trying to think about how well my own mom knows my friends. She’s heard me talk about them, sure, but if I were to bring up someone new, she wouldn’t bat an eye.
Ruby snorts and lets out a laugh. “I definitely didn’t go to college,” she says. “A few classes at the community college when I was fresh out of high school, but nothing that stuck. Besides, you don’t need a college degree to be a massage therapist, and I’ve always known I wanted a nontraditional job. Formal education doesn’t really help when all you want is a certificate you can earn in less than a year.”
I bob my head but allow myself a moment to think about her perspective.
College was never an option for the Mitchell kids. It was an expectation, a given. Junior high, then high school, then college. After that, it’s up to you. Sure, grad school was optional, and my guess is I’ll be the only one of my siblings who actually has a need for postgraduate education.
Ruby’s perspective is…different than I’m used to.
I had it hammered into me for so long that college is the only way to go, and I didn’t even consider what it would be like to have a different mindset, didn’t consider that anything else would even be a realistic option.
I can’t help but wonder what kind of stability comes with giving massages. Is it set hours? Do you have to find your own clients? Does she work at like…a spa or something? In general, it seems a little flighty.
But I guess when you’ve grown up the way Ruby has, bouncing between apartments and couch-surfing with a mother who has to work several jobs to make ends meet, maybe this is a step up for her.
