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Cap cuts the engine as they drift into the calmer waters around Shipwreck Key, steering them towards the dock.
"I'm going to drop you here, have a quick bite to eat at The Frog's Grog, and then be on my way. You'll call if and when you need a lift back?" Cap asks him as they pull into a slip. The sun is high overhead as the clock inches toward noon, and Dexter is eager to get to Ruby.
"Absolutely--and thank you, Cap. I owe you one." Dexter steps off the boat and onto the wooden dock with a simple duffel bag slung over one shoulder. He offers Cap a hand to shake.
"Ah," Cap says, shaking his hand and then waving away the notion of owing him anything. "Not a problem. Just promise to make me a likable character when you put me in one of your books."
This makes Dexter laugh; people are forever hoping to end up in one of his books somehow--the desire to be permanently etched onto the page is a universal and enduring one.
"I'll make you the salty old Kraut you are," Dexter says, alluding to the fact that Cap is German.
This makes the older man howl with laughter. "Fair enough, my boy. Have a wonderful time here with your lady." Cap lifts a hand in farewell as he ambles across the street to Seadog Lane, headed for the dark wood bar of The Frog's Grog. "And don't do anything I wouldn't do," he calls back over one shoulder, not bothering to give Dexter a backwards glance.
Ruby
Dinner that night is linguine with clam sauce, a Caesar salad, and a bottle of crisp, cold Pinot Grigio. Ruby and Dexter have been reading Jack’s diaries since lunch (with a brief trip upstairs to climb beneath her sheets and spend the midafternoon lolling about in bed), and they can’t stop talking about what they’ve discovered, finishing each other's sentences excitedly in the way that lovers who are in tune with each other's minds and bodies often do.
“It’s like he’s writing with some sort of advanced knowledge about becoming president,” Dexter says, sounding awed. He uncorks the wine and pours two glasses as Ruby uses a pair of tongs to toss the linguine in its sauce. “How could a seventeen-year-old have known he would someday be important enough that people would want to read his innermost thoughts?”
Ruby shakes her head, not making eye contact with Dexter. “I honestly do not know. I spent many years with Jack Hudson, and all I can tell you is that the man planned everything. He knew from the minute I met him that being a senator was just a stepping stone on the way to the White House, and I have to tell you, he had me immediately convinced. Within a month ofdating Jack, I’d gotten a tasteful hair cut, given up my talent agent, stopped doing commercials, and tossed out my thigh-high socks and Mary Janes—“
“Oh, damn,” Dexter says, setting the glass of wine in front of her. “You tossed those out? I’d kind of like to see them…”
“Very 90s,” Ruby says with a shake of her head. “I’m not sure that particular fashion statement would have stood the test of time, and I don't know that fifty-year-old Ruby could pull off Mary Janes quite as well as twenty-five-year-old Ruby did.”
“I’d like to be the judge of that.” Dexter makes a low growling sound and she laughs.
“Anyway.” Ruby shakes her head as she walks over to the sink to wash her hands. “I traded in the cute L.A. fashion for a look that was decidedly more Washington D.C., and overnight I looked less like a commercial actress who spent her weekends at the beach, and more like a senator’s wife who took lunches with other senator’s wives.”
“Do you regret that now?”
Ruby turns off the faucet and dries her hands on a towel as she leans her back against the sink and looks at Dexter. “You mean do I regret changing who I was externally in order to fit into Jack’s life?”
“Sure,” Dexter says. He folds his arms across his chest as he watches her. "That works. Do you regret undergoing a makeover in order to please a man?"
Ruby’s kitchen is gorgeous: all white marble countertops, dove gray cabinetry, and stainless steel appliances. There’s a giant island in the center of the kitchen, and all of the windows look out onto the house’s wraparound porch. The sun has not yet set for the day, but its pastel light is spread out across the sky over the ocean in the distance. Ruby looks around at everything, admiring for a moment the home and the life that she’s built for herself here on Shipwreck Key. This is the first part of her lifein more than thirty years that’s truly been hers. No part of it was created by Jack Hudson; no portion of this life has anything to do with being anyone’s wife, or with needing to hold up any particular image for the public. This is all hers, and she loves it.
“I don’t think that I do,” Ruby finally says, letting her roaming eyes land on Dexter. “You might think, given all that’s happened since, that I wished I’d let myself just be me, that maybe that would have been enough for Jack, but I was ready to commit to a cause at that point in my life. I wouldn't make the same choices now, but I don't regret making them then.”
“A cause?”
“Yes. A cause. Whether that was being Jack’s helpmeet, a mother to his children, a future First Lady, or just becoming a footnote in the history of American politics, I think I was ready to do something bigger with my life than rollerblading up and down Venice Beach on Saturday mornings. I wanted to find love, and I did. I wanted to have a career, and in a way, I did.”
“I know you always wanted to teach English and it’s a regret in your life that you didn’t,” Dexter says as he walks the wooden bowl of salad over to the table and sets it down. “But if you had to describe your work life to someone who didn’t know you, what would you say?”
“Oh, jeez.” Ruby blows out a long breath and then carries the ceramic pasta dish to the table along with her glass of wine. “Well, I would start by saying that I’m a proud bookstore owner.”
Dexter smiles and pulls out his chair as he sits. “I love that.”
“It’s the first thing I’ve done that’s all mine, not steam-powered by Jack or his position. And,” Ruby says, squinting as she thinks, “I’d highlight the work I did for the various literacy programs that I partnered with over the years. I’m very proud of that. I would talk about raising two successful, well-adjusteddaughters, and I would add that I’m only fifty, so I’m not nearly done making my mark just yet.”
Dexter lifts his wine glass as Ruby sits down. “A perfect answer,” he says, clinking his glass against hers.
Ruby shakes out the floral linen napkin next to her plate and sets it in her lap. “I know it’s not much,” she says. “Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama were lawyers. Laura Bush was a librarian. Betty Ford was a dancer and a model. Nancy Reagan was an actress. And little old Ruby Hudson got her start hawking Levi’s on television, never used her degree from UCLA, and ended up widowed by a man who had a second family on the side.”
Dexter blinks a few times and sets down his wine glass. “Okay, that took a turn.” He shakes his head. “I know you’re mostly being facetious, Ruby, but surely you can see that you’re more than that.”
Ruby swats his words away and reaches for the serving spoon to dish up her pasta. “Of course. I was just indulging in a sarcastic moment there.” She goes quiet for a minute as they serve themselves. “But I think that journal entry we read right before we took a break to cook dinner kind of threw me.” She hands him the salad bowl and licks a bit of the creamy anchovy dressing from her thumb. “I had no idea he felt that way about me. I mean,” she adds hurriedly, “it doesn’t matter much now, but to think that Jack thought of me as a housewife with a three-hundred dollar haircut…it stings a little.”
