Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Her name was Carrie.
She was Milo’s girlfriend.
“How—I mean—what?” Ruby shook her head after Milo introduced Carrie as such. He had still yet to give his mother any real context. “What is going on?”
“Miss Wever,” Carrie said, getting up and sticking a hand out for a shake.
“It’s nice to finally meet you, but I’m sorry it was under these circumstances.
I’m also really sorry if I scared you outside just now.
Milo dared me to go out in the dark. It's childish, I know, but I thought it would be kind of fun. Of course, on my way back to the house, I fell, and that’s why I look so dirty.
I swear, I’m usually more put together than this. ”
“It’s not the state you’re in that’s concerning me, dear,” Ruby said dryly. Her confusion, though still quite strong, was no match for her irritation at the moment. “What’s concerning me is why you are here in the first place.”
“Right.” Carrie winced. “I would be too if I were you.”
“It’s not her fault,” Milo began.
“What’s not her fault?”
Carrie sighed. “I thought I was invited here.”
“Huh?”
“I was under the impression, up until the moment I actually arrived here, that you had actually invited me to join you and Milo here in Florida. That’s what Milo told me; otherwise I never would’ve done something like this.”
“Is that so?” Ruby raised a brow in her son’s direction. “Milo?”
He sighed. “Okay, so… I lied. But you wouldn’t have said yes if I told you that I wanted to bring Carrie with us this summer.”
Ruby folded her arms. “That’s not true!”
“Yes, it is,” he insisted. “You were so mad at me for dropping out of school; you wouldn’t have said yes to something like this. But I really wanted Carrie to come and see the property…”
“So you just went ahead and invited her? Without telling me?”
“You would’ve said no!”
“That’s not an excuse!” Ruby shook her head at the kid.
“You can’t just go over my head and lie because you don’t think I would agree to do something you wanted to do.
That’s very immature, Milo. When are you going to stop lying to me?
This is ridiculous! And now you’ve made your girlfriend lie for you too. ”
“Again,” Carrie chimed in. “I had no idea that you were in the dark until a few days ago. I never would’ve agreed to come if I knew we were going to be hiding and lying to you. I also told Milo that when you inevitably caught me sneaking around, I wouldn’t be willing to lie to your face.”
“That makes one of you.”
“Mom, it wasn’t supposed to happen like this,” Milo said. “I was going to talk to you about Carrie coming when we were on the plane ride here, and that first night as well, but I just kept chickening out.”
“How long have you been here?” Ruby asked the girl.
“Three nights.”
“In here?” Ruby gawked. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“It’s actually not so bad…” She looked around at the small room. “But I guess you’re right. It’s not my idea of a vacation.”
“Yeah, I can’t imagine it would be.” She clicked her tongue. “Milo, not only did you lie to me, but you stuck your girlfriend in this tiny, spider-infested room in the basement for days! How could you think this was a good idea?”
“She hasn’t been in here for days,” Milo said. “She’s been out and about the town for most of the time, actually, and she sleeps outside in her own hammock with me most nights. I wouldn’t lock her up in here like a maniac!”
“Well, can you blame me for assuming as much? That’s what happens when you don’t tell people the truth. They come up with their own explanations that may or may not be worse than the truth.” Ruby laughed. “This is all so crazy, Milo! What were you thinking?”
“I’m really sorry, Miss Wever,” Carrie said. “I hate that this is how you found out.”
“Don’t blame Carrie for any of it,” Milo said. “She’s been asking me to talk to you about all of this since the second she arrived in town and found out that you didn’t know the truth.”
“I wasn’t blaming Carrie,” she told them.
“Not at all. I appreciate that she wanted to be truthful even when my own son didn’t seem to care enough about me to do the same.
” She inhaled deeply, trying to let the extra oxygen relax her a little.
“I just—I don’t know what to do about any of this, but I know that we’re not going to solve anything tonight.
I’m exhausted, and I think Carrie has earned a night in a real bed. ”
Milo grinned. “You mean she can sleep with me in the guest bedroom?”
“Ha! Yeah right.” Ruby snorted. “Not a chance. She’s in the guestroom. You’re taking the futon.”
He deflated, but was still smiling. Ruby got the sense that he thought he wasn’t in trouble, but really, she just needed to get some sleep before she could come up with an adequate parental response to something she was so wholly unprepared for.
“Come on,” she said, turning her back on them. “Let’s go upstairs. I’m still worried about the family of raccoons.”
“Oh, Carrie saw them last night,” Milo said.
“The babies are sooo cute,” Carrie said.
“But I can tell the mom didn’t like me even looking at them.
” She pointed to the far corner of the open room as they walked towards the staircase.
“I think they have mostly been hiding out over there, so just avoid that area if you don’t want to get hissed at. ”
“Good to know.” Ruby headed up the stairs, her son and Carrie following close behind.
On the main level, she made sure that Carrie was comfortable in the guest room and that Milo knew that he would be in a lot more trouble if he tried to sneak into that room while Ruby was asleep.
He promised that wouldn’t happen, and she chose to believe him—mostly because she needed to go back to sleep.
She carried a bit of frustration and sadness with her when she returned to bed, but thankfully neither feeling was strong enough to keep her awake for long.
* * *
The next morning, Ruby woke up to the smell of fresh coffee and donuts. She knew right away what was going on.
He’s sucking up.
As much as she wanted to hold her ground and not let Milo’s attempts to get back on her good side work, Ruby’s stomach growled.
She wondered if there was a way to sneak a donut and some coffee without her son finding out.
She left the bedroom, and after double-checking that Carrie was still sleeping alone in the guest room, she went down the hall and into the kitchen.
Milo was seated at the fold-out card table they’d been using as a kitchen table for the time being, flipping through a faded paperback.
“What’s that?” Ruby pointed to the book. There were two to-go coffee cups on the table and an open box of assorted donuts. She grabbed one of each and sat down to enjoy. The food and drink weren’t going to make her any less mad, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to have her fill.
“It’s a book I found in the basement,” he said.
“I don’t know if it belonged to Edith or what, but it’s pretty good.
” She squinted at the cover. The glossy letters on the front spelled out Cheaters Never Prosper.
There was a painting of a woman in a trench coat and oversized sunglasses on the front.
She was holding a finger up to her dark red lips, asking the reader to keep her secret.
“Is it a romance?” She laughed. “Or maybe a pulpy mystery?”
“Both,” Milo said. “It’s absolutely ridiculous, but also really entertaining.
No wonder these books are so popular. I have to find out what happened next, so I haven’t put the darn thing down for, like, two hours.
” As he said this, however, he promptly closed the book and seemed to give his mother his full attention. Another peace offering.
She frowned. “Did you say you’ve been awake for two hours already?”
Milo nodded. “Yeah. I tossed and turned almost all night, and when the sun came up this morning, I decided to stop the struggle and just get up. I went into town to get us some refreshments, but don’t worry, I used my own money.”
“What money?”
“I had a hundred-dollar bill Dad gave me on my last birthday,” he explained. “I thought this might be a good time to break it.”
“You broke your birthday money for some coffee and donuts?”
“It’s also an apology,” he said. “Not that I thought you were going to forgive me just because I got you snacks, but I wanted to start somewhere. I desperately needed the caffeine myself anyway.”
She explored his face a bit more. “You really didn’t sleep at all?” That wasn’t like Milo. He usually fell asleep fast and slept like the dead until he was forced to wake up either by his blaring alarm or his mom pounding on the door to his bedroom, yelling that he was going to be late for school.
“Maybe an hour or two in total.” He shrugged. “But that’s it.”
Ruby sipped her coffee, incredulous. “If you’re about to try to convince me that the futon is too uncomfortable for you to sleep on, I don’t want to hear it. You’re not sharing a room with your girlfriend. I’m sorry, but I have to draw a line somewhere and after the lies you’ve already told me?—”
“Oh, no. No.” He waved his hands in the air.
“It’s not that the futon isn’t comfortable.
You and I both know it’s more comfortable than the cheap mattresses we got at Walmart.
In fact, I might ask to see if Carrie wants to swap with me, because I can usually sleep anywhere. She is a much lighter sleeper.”
“Ah. Okay. That would be a nice gesture.”
“I couldn’t sleep last night because I just felt so awful for lying to you.”
“Hm.” Ruby didn’t say anything but that for a few seconds.
She wanted to try to gauge how serious she thought her son was being.
She hadn’t always been this suspicious of Milo.
Of course not. But he’d made a lot of questionable, rash decisions as of late, and she didn’t want to be caught off guard again.
She wasn’t sure how many more surprises she could handle at this point.