Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Ruby
I park in my space behind the condo and pause before turning my car off to let Bad Bunny finish singing about getting drunk—but only because he misses the people he’s lost, that sweet man. When he’s done, I turn off the car and step into the early evening post-rain humidity.
The parking lot at the Grove is behind our condo, which means I enter through our back sliding-glass door.
“You’re here,” Madison says, perking up as she rinses a glass in the kitchen sink. “Ruby’s here!” she calls to the rest of the house.
That stops me short. “Why are you announcing that?”
Madison gives me a fully evil grin. “Can’t I be happy you’re home?”
“What are you up to?”
“You’ll see,” Ava says, walking in.
“Whatever you’re up to, I already hate it.” I may not know what they’re plotting specifically, but they have definitely seen the engagement post.
“That’s only because you’re not running the show,” Ava says.
“It’s a valid reason,” I say.
“Only one of us can run the show at a time,” Madison says. “It’s me today. Now enjoy some libations until we call you into the living room.” Ava pulls out a chair from the small dining table and waves me into it. Madison puts a glass of iced tea in my hand as soon as I sit.
They disappear into the living room with loud whispers, and I don’t bother trying to decode the rustling I hear, instead using the time to text Charlie.
The girls are conspiring against me
Please send video
Not the support I was looking for
It’s always something good
Unless it’s bonkers and exhausting
Same thing
I scowl at his replies. I hope karma finds him in the form of Mrs. Davenport tomorrow.
She’s an elderly regular we have to watch like we’re Secret Service agents or she’ll clip pictures from the magazines, leading to complaints from patrons who find holes where they’re expecting their article to continue.
Sometimes you can even tell what she cut out from the shape left behind. There was a confusing period where patrons kept bringing us vandalized magazines and sending us into giggles until we figured out Mrs. Davenport was clipping photos of the first rocket launched by the nearby aerospace company.
“You can come out now!” Sami calls.
I sigh and obey, leave my untouched drink behind, and walk into the living room to discover each of my roommates holding a hand-lettered sign made with crayon and printer paper.
Sami’s says, “Happy Ruby Liberation Day.” Ava’s says, “Celebrating Six Months Chump-Free!” And Madison’s reads, “IT’S OUR TURN.
” She wrote it in pink and decorated it with hearts and flowers, but it means trouble. I can feel it.
I sigh. “You saw the engagement post.”
“Not that you care, right?” Madison asks.
“I absolutely care,” I say, and Madison’s face falls. “I care that I wasted five years on that drool stain.”
Ava grins and Sami and Madison high five. I smirk at them and plop on the sofa. “You don’t need to cheer me up. I’m mad but mostly at myself for not dumping him sooner.”
“That’s excellent news,” Madison says.
I note three closed shoeboxes on the coffee table. Hmm. That’s a Madison antidote, not a Ruby one. “If I pretend I’m upset about the engagement, will there be comfort chocolate involved?”
“We have a whole ceremony ready to go,” Sami says. She picks up a Doc Martens box and opens it, tilting it toward me to reveal several bags and boxes of chocolate. “Chocolate is only the beginning.”
Ava scoops up the Nike box and flips up the lid to reveal some leafy plants. “Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme.” She names them as she sets their temporary plastic pots on the coffee table. “Know why?”
“Because it’s a song and we’re going to make Sami sing it?”
Sami grins. “Kinda slow for my wheelhouse.”
Ava shakes her head. “These are all natural slug repellents, so I figured we could add them to our window garden.”
“Because Niles is a slug,” Madison adds.
“I got it, Madi.” I make heart hands at Ava. “I accept, co-plant mom.”
“My turn,” Madison says. Her shoebox is an Italian brand I don’t recognize. With a flourish, she whips off the lid and tilts the box to display . . . nothing.
“Oh, Madi, you shouldn’t have,” I say.
She grins. “Nothing but the best for my bestie. It’s full of things you can’t see. Hopes, dreams, and love.”
“That’s nice.” My mind is buzzing between the empty box and her IT’S OUR TURN sign, trying to figure out the connection.
“I’m glad you’re taking this so well,” she says.
I groan. “Lay it on me. What are you up to?”
“It’s been a few hundred years since you broke up with Niles—”
“Six months,” I say.
“—a few hundred years,” she continues as Ava and Sami give the Hunger Games salute behind her. “And it’s time for you to get back out there. And we’re going to help. In fact, we’re flipping the script on you.”
Not good. Not at all. “Are you saying . . .”
Ava adjusts her glasses, so maybe that’s why it looks like her eyes glint when she says, “Ruby Ramos, are you ready to bet on love?”
“Nope.” Last New Year’s Eve, I’d bet them that I could find them true love by the end of the year. Sure enough, they’d each rung in this New Year with their perfect match.
Sami snorts and pushes her pink-streaked hair out of her face. “Yes. And I’m going to win.”
“Didn’t you already win when I set you up with Josh?” I ask.
“That’s an old bet. This is a new one,” Ava says. “And I’m going to win.”
“Wasn’t it enough that I gave you my brother?” I demand. Theirs had been the hardest match to pull off.
“We all owe you,” Madison says, “and that’s exactly why we’re going to find you your soulmate.”
I stand and collect the Nike and Doc Marten boxes. “I’ll take these two.” I nod at Madison’s empty box. “No thanks on that one.”
“Niles doesn’t deserve to have kept you off the market for six months,” Sami says.
“He hasn’t,” I say. “I’m so offended you believe he has that I need to go eat this chocolate in my room by myself. Byeeeeee.”
“Then why haven’t you dated?” Madison asks.
“I haven’t been single for longer than six months since . . . sophomore year of high school? But five years is a long time without any downtime, even for me. I’m not in a hurry to do that again.”
They exchange looks with each other. Ava’s expression is thoughtful, like this makes sense to her. Sami’s is uncertain, like she doesn’t know if I have a good point, but she thinks I might. Madison’s turns stubborn.
“We’re not suggesting you find another five-year dead end. We’re saying find a real prince.”
“Or at least some good-looking frogs,” Sami says.
“You’re saying pull a Madi?” Madison is a flirt. Not even a reformed one. It’s her nature to flirt with men, women, babies, senior citizens. She can’t help it. Until Oliver came along, that had meant lots of first and second dates and casual makeouts, hoping for The Kiss.
“Absolutely,” Madison says. “I say put the best-looking frogs in Austin on notice that Ruby is coming.”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. That’s not me.”
“We know. Ergo, we have placed a bet among the three of us,” Madison says. “The winner is whoever finds your true love.”
“What do you win?”
“We’re not telling you,” Ava says. “That way you won’t try to skew the results for or against any of us. Any other objections?”
“Honestly?” I try to picture living Madison’s pre-Oliver dating life, or even the dating regimen I put Ava on last summer.
I shake my head. “I can’t imagine casually dating, but I can imagine wasting time on another long-term dead-end relationship.
Easily imagine it. I’m worried that’s how I’m built. ”
“Nothing will seem like wasted time after Niles,” Madison says. “You dated Niles for so long, and he was so wrong.”
Sami—lead singer and lyricist for her band—perks up. “So wrong for so long. Oh, hey, that’s got a nice—”
“Alison Krauss already wrote that song,” Madison cuts Sami off. “Anyway, Ruby, you will be dating different guys and gathering information about what you like. It’s research.”
“You love research,” Ava says, her voice encouraging. “I’ll help you organize the data. We can break it down however you want. Pie charts, bar graphs, aggregate scale ratings. You’ll figure out exactly what kind of guy you like.”
My besties watch me with steady, understanding gazes, and I sigh. “I don’t see the point. I haven’t missed being in a relationship.”
Sami and Ava exchange a look I don’t understand. It’s knowing, but what do they think they know?
“Your problem is that you have too many friends,” Madison says.
“People tell me that all the time.” In a fake sugary voice, I add, “Ruby Ramos, you have so many people who love you. It’s holding you back.”
“I mean that you always have us around, and Charlie too, keeping you busy and distracted, so you don’t have to think about if you’re lonely,” she says.
“You’re right. Because I’m not lonely.”
Madison must sense that I’m talking myself out of this, because she looks to Sami and Ava for help.
Ava leans forward. “If you won’t do it for love, do it for revenge. Think about all your mutuals who saw the engagement post. He’s getting his revenge for you dumping him by showing everyone how fast he’s moved on.”
Sami jumps in. “Yeah, and they are not seeing you with a man. Are you going to let Niles get away with letting everyone believe you’ve been pining while he finds himself a wifey?”
I glance from her to Ava, then back to Madison.
“He doesn’t think that. No one else is thinking that.
” But my voice rises almost to a question at the end, because I checked that post all afternoon, and I saw plenty of our mutuals commenting everything from a basic congratulations to his freaking mom chiming in with, “It’s always so clear when it’s finally right. ”
I choked on my own spit when I read that one, and Charlie had steered me away from the reference desk to the children’s playroom. He’d said, “Why don’t you straighten up in here?” But he meant, “Strangle the plushies until you’re safe for patrons.”
My roommates look at me with pity. I’m not pitiful. “I even congratulated him, and it got a bunch of likes.”
“You didn’t!” Madison gasps. She whips out her phone and checks. “‘That restaurant is perfect.’ Nice try, but it only has twelve likes. You didn’t exactly ratio him.” She frowns and drags her eyes up to meet mine. “When’s the last time you checked this post?”
“Before I left work. Don’t worry, I already saw his mom’s comment.”
She bites her lip. “But did you see his?”
The rest of us pull out our phones. It’s my turn to gasp. “‘It felt good to take someone who appreciated it.’” I look up at Sami and Ava. “If you didn’t know he’d proposed to me there and you saw that comment, how would you take it?”
Ava grimaces. “It definitely sounds like he’d taken you there before and you didn’t appreciate it.”
"Whyyyy?" I almost whine. “My comment was low-key loaded. Why did he have to make his so obvious?”
“Dude has never been subtle,” Sami says.
“Now you really have to let us do this. We’re giving you a win-win,” Madison says.
“We get to have our bet with each other, and if none of us win, you’ve at least made us happy by letting us try to find someone who deserves you.
But also, we send you out with hot men, you get to put pictures out there living your best life with a string of cute guys. ”
“If you won’t do it for love, do it for the ’gram,” Sami says.
I scowl. “I have never lived my life for Instagram.”
Ava leans back, her face understanding. “That’s true. You’re right. It’s no big deal if all of Niles’s friends start swiping through your photos and realize you haven’t moved on.”
“I’ve moved on,” I protest. “I wouldn’t have dumped him if I wanted to be with him." But even to my own ears, I sound like someone trying to recast a sinking boat as a submarine. Our mutuals will absolutely pity me.
“You’ve definitely moved on,” Ava says. “Who cares if it doesn’t look like it to anyone else? We know the truth and that’s what matters.”
It’s what should matter. I know this. But the problem with a lifelong bestie is that she knows exactly which buttons to push.
“Besides,” Madison says, “you know we all love having you as a permanent third wheel. Forget about Niles. It doesn’t matter if the talking Dockers thinks he wins.”
What am I thinking? Of course I’m not letting that speed bump win. “You’re going to need to give back the Ruby Woo lipstick you borrowed, Sami.”
They burst into cheers. It’s my “going out” lipstick.
I grin. Or maybe it’s a grim smile. But I lean forward. “Tell me how this love bet will work.”