Chapter 20 Ruby

20

Ruby

At seven the next morning, Ruby stood in front of the Jacksons' front door.

She had never been given a key to their house. Some residents didn't mind Ruby having a key. She could clean, shop for groceries, keep the place secure and in shape for their return from vacations or long weekends in the Hamptons.

Not the Jacksons.

Ruby's finger hovered in front of the doorbell.

When she pressed it, things would be set in motion.

She had to be quick.

Accurate.

Silent.

She dropped her hand away from the bell. Stared at the door. Yawned.

Took a moment to think.

Alison would answer the door. She always answered the door. These last few weeks, it had seemed as though every morning that Alison opened the door, a month had passed instead of twenty-four hours. The weight of her troubles was squashing her spine and drying her skin. The woman was aging at incredible speed. Crows' feet clawed deeper into the skin around her eyes with every passing day. And that skin grew more pallid. Gray now, instead of her usual pink glow. It had occurred to Ruby that Alison now looked almost the same age as her mother – Esther.

She suddenly remembered that Alison rarely left the house.

She might not see it.

Ruby had to make her notice. And, for that to happen, Alison had to see something in Ruby. Some reaction. Ruby could not risk Alison failing to notice.

She pulled up the sleeve of her shirt, exposing her right wrist. Before Ruby did anything else, she took a second to scan the street. No one around. A quiet moment.

She had to be quick. Accurate. Silent.

Ruby bit into her right arm. Just above her wrist. Her teeth took hold of the flesh, pulled. She whimpered. The pain was intense. Ruby didn't want to break the skin. That wouldn't do. She just wanted the pain.

She bit down, harder.

Her eyes squeezed shut. Her fingers began to tremble. She pulled her wrist away, stretching the skin, and just when she thought she couldn't hold on any longer, she jerked her head up.

That did it.

Tears squirmed from her tightly shut eyes.

Ruby opened her mouth, wiped the saliva from her wrist and folded her shirt over the teeth marks, deep and already turning purple. There would be bruising for a few days at least. She had to remember to keep that arm covered.

Her cheeks were flushed and she felt her breath ragged.

Ruby hit the doorbell. Within thirty seconds, Alison opened the door. Her head bowed, eyes on the floor. Another day in hell for the woman married to the man accused of murder. Another day to suck the life right out of her.

Ruby didn't move.

She stood on the top step. Her left arm cradling her wrist.

When Ruby didn't step into the house right away, Alison glanced up.

‘Oh, Ruby, what's wrong? You're crying,' said Alison with genuine concern in her voice.

Ruby said nothing.

She just stared at the front door.

Alison opened the door another few feet, and followed Ruby's eyeline.

The door was painted a pale lilac. A brass knocker in the center of the door.

And scrawled across the door, in bright red spray paint – a single word.

MURDERER

Alison's fingers flew to her lips as she staggered back a step. As if the word had wounded her. She let out her breath all at once, and sank to her knees. The strength had left her shaking legs.

Ruby had to act swiftly.

She wiped the tears from her face, and gently lifted Alison back to her feet.

‘Is Tomas out of bed yet?' asked Ruby.

Alison shook her head.

‘Okay, let me go get some cleaning products. There's some strong bleach in the bathroom cabinet upstairs. You'd better take a picture of this for your attorney. They should know you're being targeted.'

‘Ruby, thank you,' said Alison through the tears, her phone in her trembling hands.

Moving past her, Ruby heard soft, sibilant laughter from the red priest as she took the stairs to the upper floor. She moved quickly past the bathroom into the main bedroom. John was downstairs in his study, the door closed, already hard at work. She opened the jewelry drawer, grabbed a diamond bracelet and stuffed it into the front pocket of her jeans. She took the bleach from the bathroom on the way back down to the kitchen.

At the sink, she filled a dish tub with hot water and found some scouring cloths. Taking the tub, cloths and bleach to the front door, Ruby set them down on the top step.

‘Did you get a picture?' asked Ruby.

‘I took a couple. Oh my God, I can't believe this. Why are they doing this to us? Don't they know us? Don't they know we're not bad people?'

Alison was in a mix of panic, deep frustration and sadness. The message scrawled across their door was an attack.

John must've heard the commotion. He came out of his study, his noise-canceling headphones round his neck.

‘What's happ—'

His question became redundant before he spat it out. His eyes locked on the graffiti sprayed across the front door.

Doctors have strength. Ruby had always thought so. To deal with life and death on a daily basis builds an internal fortitude. Of course, it's different when something terrible is happening to them. That professional distance that allows a cool head cannot be reached. The hurt hits the heart before the head.

His face flushed red. Eyes glistened. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came, only a groan, his throat strangling his voice.

‘I'll take care of it,' said Ruby. ‘It'll be okay. Go back inside.'

John's lips trembled as he held Ruby in his gaze. In that moment, Ruby was hope. Someone helping them in another dark moment in what was becoming a perpetual night.

Somehow, Alison found strength – for John. She took his shoulders, turned him away from the door and spoke softly as she guided him to the lounge. Ruby closed the door, poured a small amount of bleach into the tub of water and soaked the cloth. She set to work, gently probing at the edges of the M . She didn't want to remove the paint too quickly.

She checked her watch.

Althea would be arriving any moment.

Glancing behind her, Ruby made sure no one was on the street, no faces at the windows of the houses opposite. She reached over the stone porch and discreetly emptied the bottle of bleach into the storm drain.

While she worked, Ruby kept one eye on the east side of the street, waiting for Althea. Just a few minutes later, she saw her marching toward the house, her old, worn-out Converse sneakers flapping on the sidewalk. As Althea ascended the stoop to the front door, Ruby squeezed the last drops of bleach into her tub of water.

‘Hi, Althea. Isn't it terrible?' she asked, gesturing to the door.

Althea didn't react to the graffiti, nor to Ruby. She had an uncanny ability to keep her expressions neutral.

Ruby did notice Althea shifting her eyes to Ruby's right wrist. Following her line of sight, Ruby noticed small dots of red on her wrist. The exact type of mist that would blow back onto someone who is using a can of spray paint.

Rubbing at the paint on her wrist, Ruby said, ‘It's starting to come off. Mostly onto me. But I'm out of bleach. Could you be a dear and get me a second bottle from the bathroom cupboard?'

Althea looked at Ruby's hands again. There was some red tinging to the cloth, and Ruby's fingers. It was clear she was making the calculation that the flecks of paint on Ruby's wrist could have come from cleaning. Althea nodded, and Ruby stepped aside to let her get through the door.

Once Althea stepped into the hall, Ruby used the cloth to remove the last of the paint from her wrist. She thought she had washed her hands thoroughly last night. She must've missed these spots.

One mistake would be catastrophic. Ruby could not afford any more mishaps. Now, she was relying on Althea doing what she normally does. Every day she comes to the Jacksons' she dumps her backpack in the hall. Same spot.

Listening, Ruby heard Althea's footsteps on the stairs.

This was her opportunity.

Ruby quietly stepped into the hallway, making sure not to go too far, so that Alison or John wouldn't be able to see her from the lounge. She bent low, unzipped Althea's backpack, took the diamond bracelet from her jeans pocket and placed it inside the pack. She didn't zip it back up, just left it where she had found it.

Returning to the door, Ruby worked harder now on the letters. In a few strokes the M and U were almost gone.

Footsteps coming down the stairs. Althea's rubber soles flapping on the tiles.

The door opened further and she gave Ruby the bottle of bleach. Pausing, taking a breath, Ruby wiped at her brow before taking the bleach. Althea returned to the house and moved to the kitchen. She was heading for the utility cupboard to fetch her sweat-stained apron.

Any plan requires elements of luck. People not paying too much attention to what is going on around them.

Althea hadn't noticed her bag was open. Everything was set.

Ruby picked up the tub of water, pushed open the front door and dropped the tub onto the tiles. She let out a cry, nothing too dramatic, but enough to summon Alison to the hallway. Two seconds later, Alison and John came bounding out of the living room, wondering what fresh hell was waiting for them. They saw the spillage. Ruby's hands on her head, swearing at her incompetence.

‘Jesus, I'm so clumsy. I'm sorry. Alison! The water – grab Althea's bag before it's soaked.'

As the puddle of water spread across the tiles, Alison stepped forward and took hold of Althea's backpack, not wanting it to be ruined. She didn't realize the bag was open. As she snatched it upright, the bag tilted. A purse fell onto the floor. A granary roll wrapped in a plastic baggie, a set of keys . . . they all clattered onto the mosaic tiles.

And then a bracelet hit the floor.

Alison swore, at her own clumsiness this time. But then she paused as soon as she saw the diamond bracelet. Slowly, she bent low, picked it up and examined it.

‘I'll get a mop,' said Ruby.

‘No!' said Alison forcefully.

Ruby stood still. Waiting. Watching.

Althea came out of the kitchen to see what had happened. She hadn't even gotten to the cupboard yet to put on her apron. She stared in confusion at Alison, at both the expression on her employer's face, and puzzlement as to why she was holding her backpack.

‘This was in your bag,' said Alison, holding up the bracelet. ‘This is mine . John gave it to me for our tenth wedding anniversary.'

‘I don't know what you're talking about,' said Althea.

‘It fell out of your bag,' said Alison.

Fear crept into Althea's voice, ‘I swear to God I didn't put it there. I've never seen it before.'

‘John, call the police . . .' Even as Alison said it, her face crumbled. The police had put her husband on trial for a murder he didn't commit. Their happy, elitist beliefs had been shattered. Now, they didn't trust the police.

‘You took my grandmother's necklace too,' said Alison. The shock of Althea's betrayal was subsiding, replaced by anger.

‘Get out!' said John. ‘Just get out of our house.'

Althea began to speak, but John shouted her down. He took hold of Alison, steadying her. And Althea gathered her own belongings, wet from the water on the floor, and stormed out of the house, muttering in Spanish.

Ruby found the mop and the bucket and soaked up the water, then quickly removed the spray paint from the door.

As she washed her hands in the kitchen, she heard Alison behind her.

‘Thank you so much, Ruby. I honestly don't know what we would do without you.'

The rest of the day passed without incident. Esther called in, as she did more regularly, to check on Alison. She heard Alison telling Esther about what had happened that morning. The graffiti on the door, and Althea's betrayal.

Ruby listened from the hallway and Alison and her mother spoke in the kitchen over herbal tea.

‘I just can't believe it,' said Esther. ‘Not Althea. The other one, Ruby, I could believe.'

‘No,' said Alison. ‘Ruby has been amazing. She's so kind. And she's stood by us.'

Even though the conversation fell quiet, and Ruby could not see the two women from the hallway, she knew Esther was giving her daughter one of her looks. One of her skeptical, motherly looks.

Esther was beginning to become a major problem for Ruby.