Part 27 (1/2)

Dorothy is staring at her. ”Dear, I'm concerned about what you said downstairs. About last night.”

”I couldn't stay a virgin forever.”

Dorothy rubs her face wearily, and Ruby almost feels bad about the sarcasm.

”I don't want to be lectured, Mom.”

”Yes, you've made it clear. You're not taking advice from divorcees-” She offers a tight smile. ”But if you'd tell me even a little something about Chris-”

”Why should I?”

”-I'll listen.”

”You never do-”

”Give me a chance! For G.o.d's sake, give me a G.o.dd.a.m.n chance.” Dorothy shouts these words, and the surprise of this-because she never raises her voice, she relies on measured condescension to do the job-has its effect. Ruby takes a deep breath. Feels herself retreat from the argument. She's aware all over again of her ongoing physical discomfort-her stomach, her sunburn, a new, bloated feeling that she imagines for a wild moment to be some early warning of pregnancy-and then she does what she can to banish all this irritation, to concentrate.

”I don't know,” she mumbles.

”Please,” Dorothy says. ”I don't want your life to be a mystery to me.”

”I met him a long time ago,” Ruby begins. ”Do you remember Crossroads?” She talks, haltingly at first, about the retreat weekend, about the phone calls that followed and then ended without warning. ”I kind of made myself forget him,” she says. ”But I never really did, you know?” She says it was a surprise that he was there at the party, that he recognized her first. She tells her that she thinks he's good looking, that she likes his style, that she already feels things for him she never felt for Calvin. Dorothy seems to be holding up her part of this-staying quiet, receptive-so Ruby says something she's never said aloud before-that Chris is the first person to understand all the confusion in her head about G.o.d. She doesn't mention cocaine or suicide or condoms slipping off-this is obviously not what you tell your mother, no matter how much she wants to be close to you-and anyway, these things don't seem important compared to the overwhelming sense of fate and certainty that her feelings for Chris are wrapped in.

”Was he respectful?” Dorothy asks. ”Of your s.e.xuality?”

”Yeah.”

”And you did actually have s.e.xual intercourse with him?”

”Yeah.”

”And?”

”It was major.”

”Major?”

Even though Dorothy keeps pressing on, Ruby senses that she's nearing the limit of what she can tell her mother, what her mother can hear. She says, ”I think it's what people mean when they say 'making love,' instead of 'having s.e.x.'”

Dorothy brushes her hand lightly along Ruby's hair. ”Well, dear, that sounds like pa.s.sion. That's the word for what you're describing.”

Ruby wrinkles her nose. ”That's something out of a romance novel. I mean-he gave me an o.r.g.a.s.m.”

”I see.”

So that was the point where she went over the edge-she can see it in Dorothy's face, in her body language, the way she's rubbing her hands together now, as if smoothing in lotion. ”Sorry, Mom.”

”No. Don't be. Pa.s.sion is physical. Romance is all the trappings, which you can whip up without real pa.s.sion. You know, Clark was very romantic when we were first together, a million years ago. But when I look back on it, I don't think that we ever felt pa.s.sionate about each other.”

”But you married him.”

”I didn't have much of a choice, dear. You know that.”

”You could have gotten an abortion.”

Dorothy blinks, an almost bewildered look on her face. ”You can't imagine how frightening an idea that was.”

”Right,” Ruby says. ”The coat-hanger days. But if you really wanted to-we learned all about these women's collectives in the sixties that were doing almost like an Underground Railroad for pregnant women.”

”Just because you learned it in school,” Dorothy says, and then swallows hard. Something pa.s.ses over her face. Dorothy rubs her hands on her thighs and then stands. Ruby senses that the limit has been reached. Of course. There's always a limit.

Dorothy says, ”I'd like to get on the road before it's too late. Perhaps we can continue this conversation in the car?'

”I'm not coming with you.”

”Why not?” Dorothy blurts.

”I told you, I gave him this number. I need to wait for this phone call now.”

”If that's what you want,” she says, her voice cool-the same old Dorothy again.

”I can get back to the city by bus.”

As they hug good-bye-wrapping stiff arms around each other, their cheeks brus.h.i.+ng-the familiar smell of her mother's powdery-spicy perfume is suddenly everywhere, and Ruby almost changes her mind. It would be easy to get in the car and go back to Manhattan and sleep in her real bedroom tonight. It would be nice to imagine that the drive home would allow them to keep talking things through, and that this would be a watershed moment. They'd end the night huddled over the New York Times New York Times crossword puzzle, something that had once been part of their Sunday ritual. They'd eat the food Dorothy had cooked, and even sip a little wine, something Dorothy only does in moderation now. It would feel like a special occasion, and tomorrow she'd wake up refreshed, ready to start her life over again, free of Calvin, and move ahead with Chris. crossword puzzle, something that had once been part of their Sunday ritual. They'd eat the food Dorothy had cooked, and even sip a little wine, something Dorothy only does in moderation now. It would feel like a special occasion, and tomorrow she'd wake up refreshed, ready to start her life over again, free of Calvin, and move ahead with Chris.

But Dorothy's embrace is brief, and the awkwardness magnifies as they pull apart with nothing more to say.

The door shuts behind Dorothy and Ruby is left staring at its blank back side-wood painted white, gone dingy, full of tiny pushpin holes and sc.r.a.ps of Scotch tape, remnants from the teen-magazine posters that used to hang there. She's newly aware of the bloated feeling in her gut, the way her abdominal muscles ache, and above all her desire to sleep.

Lying in bed, she runs through everything she just told her mother and sees the conversation for what it is-a surprising level of honesty wrapped in a lot of avoidance. Selective details. A lack of trust in her mother's ability to respond. Dorothy isn't going to warm up to Chris, a.s.suming she ever meets him, which is something Ruby would actually like to put off for as long as possible. And Chris might be in danger, and she couldn't tell her mother about it. So what does that say about fantasies of being close close?

She hears Dorothy across the hall, saying good-bye to Robin, their voices m.u.f.fled and conspiratorial, intimate in tone. There's a bit of light laughter between them. That's just the way it is. It's always seemed unfair that Robin has always been, will always be, the favorite. Now it strikes Ruby as a relief. A kind of freedom. She can do what she wants, and if her mother doesn't like it, well, too bad, because her influence can only go so far. If there's anything that's been made perfectly clear this weekend, it is this: no one is ready for her to grow up, to be a woman, and make her own choices. No one except Ruby herself. She is done waiting for their permission.

After a while she knocks on Robin's door. He calls her in, and there, amid all that loud wallpaper, he lies on his bed. He's flipping through a notebook-one of those speckled composition books, black-and-white, like something from middle school-but as she comes into the room, he closes it quickly and turns it facedown. She says, ”I'm not going back to the city with Dorothy.”

”So I heard.”

”Was she p.i.s.sed?”

”You know Mom. She takes everything personally.”

She points to his notebook. ”What's that?”

”An old diary. From high school. I used to get myself quite worked up.”

”Used to?”