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“I know,” I say, taking my seat. I’m glad to see that we aren’t seated with Jake’s friends from earlier. “I just always saw the bar as something temporary, you know—like it was a great job to pay the bills until I evolve into this serious journalist or best-selling author or something. Taking this job makes it seem like I’ve resigned my fate.”
If I’m honest with myself, maybe I should. But that's just another one of those things that I wouldn't dare speak aloud.
“I’ll support you no matter what you do, and you know that. It would be nice to have my girlfriend maybe not working until two in the morning all the time, though. We could spend a lot more time together.”
I hear him, but I don’t entirely process it. I’m reading through the texts on my phone and trying to piece them together. There’s a couple from Evie, saying something like why does fucking Alex keep calling her and texting her and asking me if I’m okay. There are about 5 missed calls from Alex, and one from the Seattle PD. There’s a voicemail. There are more texts.
“Um, I think I have to leave,” I tell him, panicked.
“What? Why? What’s going on? Is everything okay?” he asks.
“Apparently…my apartment was broken into. The police are there. I have to go. I’m so sorry, Jake. I don’t want to embarrass you.”
“I’m going with you.”
“You don’t have to,” I tell him.
“Ruby, why wouldn’t I go with you?”
“Okay,” I tell him, “let’s go then.” We quickly head for the doors, hand in hand, as they start to bring out plates and Jake’s mom takes the stage. I can feel at least 100 sets of eyes on our backs.
When we get to the building, sure enough, there are two police cars parked outside, and once we make it down the stairs, we see an officer that appears to be taking a report…from Alex. He’s in my apartment and they’re looking around, and I’m wondering for a minute why the hell they even let him in there, but I don’t really have time to dwell on it. My door looks like it was kicked in; the frame is cracked, and the latch is no longer functional. The officer explains that another neighbor on my floor walked by and had seen my door this way and called 911. Some chaos ensued with panicked residents as they checked for signs that other apartments had been broken into and looked for people in the building that maybe did not belong there. They found no one, and apparently, it was only mine. They spoke to Alex, who then explained that he knew me and that we were friends, and he could get ahold of me. When I didn’t answer, they asked him to come in and see if he noticed anything that was missing.
My TV was missing. And mylaptopwas missing. My heart fucking plummets in my chest. My life’s work was missing.
I could get it back. Some of it, I could get back. But not all of it—definitely not all of it. I stand there, frozen for what feels like an eternity, processing what I’d lost and realizing that I’d been violated. I can’t breathe. I’m burning. It was gone, and my safe space was gone.
How the fuck did this happen?
“From what we can tell at this time, yours was the only apartment that was targeted. More than likely, it was a crime of opportunity. It is the only unit in this hallway. It’s quiet down here. Someone just wondered if they could get away with it. We see stuff like this in this area, sometimes. People just looking for things they can sell for drugs. I don’t believe that you were ever in any kind of danger nor do I think you need to worry about them coming back.”
The officer finishes his report and leaves the three of us, together again, standing in my apartment. I sink down on the couch. I don’t have time for this awkward shit. Not now, when I’m sitting here, once again, figuratively covered in shit.
“I’m sorry, Ruby,” Alex says from behind me. “I’m really, really sorry. If you need anything…at all…you know where to find me.” He squeezes my shoulder and leaves. Jake leaves it be. Thank goodness I don’t have to deal with any of their macho crap right now.
“Thanks,” I answer faintly. I hear his footsteps as he makes his way toward the door and attempts to close it behind him, only for it to loudly creak as it slowly opens back up into the apartment. Fucking awesome.
“You okay?” he asks.
“No,” I say through tears. “I’m not okay. I feel fucking violated. I don’t even have a door. How long am I going to have to deal with not having a door?”
“Ruby, I’ll get someone to come and replace the door for you first thing tomorrow, okay? I’ll send your landlord the bill,” he says simply and reassuringly.
“You can do that?” I ask. The funny thing is I’ve kind of thought of myself as the one in this relationship with the street smarts and the survival skills, and Jake as kind of helpless in that area. Now I realize I have no idea how to navigate things like replacing a door. Yet again, I’m wrong about him.
“Of course, I can,” he says with a shrug. “I know this is terrible, and you lost your laptop and I can’t imagine how awful you must feel about that. But that stuff—is just stuff. I’m just glad you weren’t here when it happened.”
“Are you mad because your trash girlfriend ruined your fancy fucking fundraiser with drug crimes?” I ask resentfully. I realize my anger is misdirected before it comes out, but it comes out anyway.
“Ruby, what the fuck? No.” That’s all he says. I wouldn’t really call it taking the bait, so I’m forced to reel it in. He sits down next to me on the sofa and joins me in staring at the ceiling, saying nothing. We stay like that for a while.
“Well, let’s go to your place, I guess,” I say, after a while. He tells me to pack a bag, and that I can stay for as long as I want to. I change out of my ridiculous dress and into some sweats and a hoodie. Ultimately, I just grab a change of clothes, my toothbrush, and my charger. I try to do something to close my door as we leave, but it won’t even allow me create the illusion of closed. I kick it wide open in frustration. I guess if someone wants to come back for the rest of my shit, there’s nothing stopping them.
He says nothing—not when I’m kicking the door, and not when I stop to repeatedly scream ‘FUCK’ into the night when I’m too stupid not to pull on the passenger door handle of the car at the exact same moment he pushes the unlock button, not once, but twice. It isn’t because he doesn’t know what to say, but because he knows me better than I’d expected him to at this point. He knows that I’m angry and I have a good reason to be. He knows that I like to pick fights when I’m mad, and that I’d rather light everything on fire and then lament the ashes I deserve than listen to someone else tell me to calm down.
We continue that way, in silence, and when we get back to the apartment, there’s a large paper bag at the door. He picks it up and holds the door open for me, and I step inside.
“What’s in the bag?” I ask as I enter the apartment.
