Toxic

Ruby

My bedroom door bursts open, startling me awake. I stare, blurry eyed into the dark night and make out the silhouette of my mother.

“Happy fucking birthday!” She slurs, still drunk from the night before.

I grab my phone off my nightstand and see that it’s 2:03 in the morning.

“You’re eighteen now Ruby, I can finally get rid of you. You’ve ruined my life ever since I found out I was pregnant with you. Now, get out of my fucking house.”

“What?” I gasp. I always knew my mother had no love for me, but is she serious? She’s really going to kick me out in the middle of the night. I only have a couple hundred of dollars from my waitressing job and I have nowhere to go.

“You heard me you little bitch!” She angrily spits. She staggers over to me and roughly grabs me by my upper arm, hauling me out of bed.

“You’re hurting me.” I complain.

“Pack your shit and get out of my house.”

“I have nowhere to go though.” I quietly remind her.

“Not my problem. Why don’t you call your father?” She smiles bitterly. “Oh that’s right, he doesn’t care about you either. He doesn’t even know what you look like. Hell, he dropped me so fast when I told him I was pregnant that he doesn’t even know if I had a boy or a girl. No one cares about you, no one loves you, Ruby.”

“Mom, please.” I cry, begging her to keep me. It’s pathetic, I’m pathetic.

“Don’t fucking call me that!” Her hand moves so fast that I don’t even register she slapped me until my cheek stings. “You have fifteen minutes to grab your things and leave. If you’re not gone by the time, I come back in here then I’ll throw you out myself with only the clothes on your back to keep you safe and warm.”

She wobbles out of my room and I’m left standing there, my heart stuck in my throat and tears staining my cheeks.

I shake my head and wipe my tears. “Get it together Ruby.” I tell myself.

I grab my backpack and stuff some clothes into it. I pull on a pair of jeans and put on a thick sweater. I stuff my feet into a pair of sneakers then I grab my hidden stash of cash, get my phone then book it out of the house that I’ve been living in for the last eighteen years of my life. I walk down the dimly lit road, leaves crunching under my feet and shiver as the cold breeze rakes over my body. I pull out my phone from my back pocket and dial the only person that I know can help me.

“Ruby, are you okay?” My best friend Jill asks, her voice heavy with sleep and worry.

“No.” I admit, my voice comes out shaky and I hate how lost and vulnerable I sound.

“What’s wrong?”

“I need your help, Jill.” I confess. “Ronda kicked me out.” I tell her, calling my mother by her first name.

“Oh no.” Jill gasps.

“I have no one else to call, I don’t have anywhere to go.” I cry.

“You have me honey. Where are you? I’m coming to pick you up; you can stay with me and Samuel.”

“Are you sure he won’t mind?” I ask.

“He’s my big brother, he’ll do this for me. I know he will, and if Samuel has a problem with it, then I’ll just have to kick his ass like I used to do when we were younger.”

I laugh at that and wipe some snot away from my nose with the sleeve of my sweater.

“Thank you, Jill.”

“It’s really no problem, Ruby, this is what friends do. Now please tell me where you are so I can come and get you.”

“I’m a couple streets down from my house. I’m on mahogany road.”

“Okay. Stay right there, I’ll be there in twenty minutes, maybe fifteen.”