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But now he was here, back in the theatre, doing a punch list of all the repairs and decorating needed to bring his uncle’s movie house back to its former glory – or at least back to a place where it could be sold quickly – the answer he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge, hadn’t even consciously admitted to himself until now was staring him right in the face.
Ruby Graham – and the weird jolt, not to mention the desire to see her again and check up on her – had also been a factor in his decision to do the community service.
The thought would be funny, if it weren’t so fricking annoying. But it was hard to deny she had snagged his attention.
‘How do you think I should list this area?’ she asked from behind him. ‘West of the stage?’ She gave a nervous chuckle. ‘That sounds like something John Wayne would say.’
‘Nah, it’s better to draw a grid.’ He straightened, walked the two steps towards her, took the clipboard out of her hands – and got a lung full of her fierce, floral scent for his troubles.
He let his gaze glide over the notes she’d been jotting down for two hours as they assessed the work needed together.
‘Ruby? What the heck is this?’
The notes and diagrams she’d drawn on the work sheet – with a smattering of doodles and movie quotes thrown in for good measure – were totally unintelligible.
Her cheeks pinkened and she made a grab for the board. ‘It makes sense to me.’
He whipped the board away. ‘Uh-huh …’ Lifting the list above her grabbing hands, he read one of the barely decipherable squiggles aloud placed next to the list of supplies he’d asked for and what looked like a cartoon robot. ‘Smell. The. Glove?’
‘It’s to remind me to order the eleven litres of primer you asked for.’
She reached to grab the board back. The pulse of awareness became a shudder.
Sweet Jesus, ignore it.
‘What has smelling gloves got to do with primer?’
‘It’s a perfectly obvious reference to This Is Spinal Tap,’ she said. Her face had gotten even pinker. Had she felt that shudder, too?
So not good.
‘Spinal Tap? You mean the movie about a rock band?’ He vaguely remembered watching the old mockumentary in college and laughing his ass off, but he’d been wasted at the time so he wasn’t sure it counted.
‘The numbers all go to eleven,’ she said in a dead-on imitation of one of the British guys in the band. ‘Get it?’
‘Yeah, weirdly.’ The laugh rumbled up his torso but he held it at bay. ‘What’s with the robot guy?’ he asked, pointing at the scribbled drawing next to the quote. This he needed to hear.
‘That’s Optimus Primer, to you,’ she announced. ‘From Transformers. The first film with Shia LaBeouf, not the sequels, obviously.’
The laugh burst out before he could stop it.
It was like breaking a seal, because suddenly his chuckles matched hers. Their spontaneous laughter echoed round the empty auditorium and felt good in a way he hadn’t felt in a while. Not since a couple of years back in Rome, when he’d shared a brew with his kid brother while they both coughed up a lung over the latest random bullshit to befall Jack on his travels.
‘That’s nuts, but yeah, I get it,’ he said as the laughter faded.
She smiled and took the clipboard from him. ‘Precisely,’ she said. ‘Do not mock the method in my madness,’ she added primly as she tucked the board back under her arm.
Her cheeks were still that pretty shade of pink, highlighting the freckles.
‘Do you have a movie reference for everything?’ he asked, genuinely intrigued.
‘Pretty much,’ she said, without an ounce of embarrassment. ‘Movies are like life, if you look hard enough. A good movie can allow you to walk around in someone else’s shoes and also help you escape your problems, at least for a little while. That’s why I love them.’
It was the sort of naïve woo-woo crap his mom had used to justify the bad decisions she’d made throughout his childhood. But coming from Ruby, her expression bright with sincerity – and not fake sincerity either – it sounded kind of profound.
It was still bullshit, of course. He’d seen the damage that kind of crap could do, especially to those poor suckers left to pick up the pieces when others doggedly invested in the dream and refused to face the reality. He’d seen the man behind the curtain – to borrow a quote from Ruby’s favourite movie – and he knew the guy was a faker, a charlatan, a cheat.
