The Day I Spoke Out Loud- excerpt from "The Meanderings of Ruby Stewart"
I felt lighter as I walked home, like I didn't need to breathe as deeply because my atmosphere had changed.
Approaching the brownstone, I could make out an old green truck just across the street. Behind the wheel was a nightmare that had taken me years to forget. My pace quickened as did my heart beat. Maybe he wouldn't see me…
“Hey there, Ms. Lady! You sure are looking good. Slow down…”
I kept going as I heard the old truck door creek open.
“I went by your mom’s house. She was working in the garden and spared me a few minutes of her time. …Said you was doing real good at some fancy new job.”
Still, I kept going, furious with my mother, yet focused on reaching the front door before he crossed the street. I lost the race but managed to make it up the stairs and scrounge the depths of my purse for an elusive key. He was behind me, so near I could feel his rum-laced breath on my neck.
"Come on Ruby, don't do me like this. Don't you remember our times together? The special things I did to you… and the way your belly quivered afterward? Let's start over again…
“Yes, I remember Gregory. I remember falling in love with a man who brought me a ninety nine cent wilted, rose the day after Valentine’s Day, and how it played on my emotions because you were a man with very little means… I would continuously excuse your behavior, labeling it, ‘an effort…’ I brought the whole song and dance about your antics being acts of courage, when we both know that it was nothin’ more than liquid courage, straight from a cheap rum bottle. Once the booze wore off, so did you, usually with some other woman who paid your bills. But I don't blame you for all of the wrongs because I knew a man like you would never hold me accountable for any of the sexually, deviant acts that we performed on one another. You would never make any demands besides gas money, which keeps you inebriated and rolling from one misguided chic to the next. But the problem is, my expectations have increased. And, I'm not that detached from my needs anymore. … Therefore, every-time I see you it makes me feel sick and awful about myself and I don't want to feel that way anymore. Please don't go by my parents’ house and please don't come to my home again.”
It wasn't until I heard him say, “Damn baby! Can I at least get gas money” that I realized I'd said these things out loud. I didn't answer, just watched him run back to his truck and pry the door open.
“I came all the way from the North side, “he screamed!
Then I watched as he slammed the ancient door, loosening the side mirror from its lasso of electrical tape. Even sadder is when he got out to retrieve the broken remnant from the ground, and labored to re-secure its mount. I turned, having found my key and went inside.
excerpt from the book "The Meanderings of Ruby Stewart" by Monica Handy
cootw.com
Available @ Amazon.com in Kindle and Paperback and Payloadz.com for Digital Downloads.
Photo Credits: Loretta Devine Promotional Photography from the film "Waiting To Exhale," Common Usage and Re-usage License Photos (Green Blazer Truck, Key Opening Door)-Google Search & COOTW Literary Works promotional/cover photo.
