This is a short I wrote back in 2013. It’s about a girl trying to hold tight her grasp on self-identity. This one appears in my first short story collection Slivers of Life.
Remaining Ruth
I heard my mother say, “It could be she’s just that kind of girl.”
I knew she meant me because my father responded, “No daughter of mine will be that kind of girl.”
I’m an only child, so forget any misunderstandings. Besides, just what kind of girl were they debating me to be?
I slipped through the back door, just inside the kitchen, crouched low near the refrigerator, and listened to their talk in the next room. I’m either a lesbian or a drug addict, depending on their deciphering of my mood on any given day.
Okay. True. I do keep my hair cut short and dyed black. I also prefer jeans and T-shirts to dresses and skirts. But that doesn’t make me a lesbian. Of course, there is that other thing…
My father said, “Maybe we should send her to one of those Catholic schools.”
“We’re not Catholic, Fred,” my mother reminded him.
“But they know how to deal with these sorts of things, Miriam.”
What sorts of things? I wondered, angling for a closer peek into the living room. I didn’t need to see, though. My father would be parked in his recliner, newspaper open and held in front of him. My mother, she’d be seated on the sofa, watching the television with the sound turned all the way down.
I’d never get past them. At least not without a hundred questions tossed in my face.
“Maybe we should just leave her be,” my mother offered. “I had my own moody moments at that age.”
A low harrumph, is all my father managed.
As much as I hated the idea of confrontation, I despised even more the notion of hiding out in the kitchen all night.
He’s the one who caught me, came right up out of his recliner as soon as I entered the room. “Let’s see what’s in your pockets, young lady.”
I knew the drill. They’d been doing this since the end of the school year, when I’d been stupid enough to leave a joint in my jacket, where my nosy mother happened upon it.
“I’m not carrying,” I told my father. “I smoked it before I came in.”
“So disrespectful,” my mother lamented. “I never sassed my parents when I was fourteen.”
“Gonna let them nuns straighten you out,” my father threatened, searching the pockets of my jean jacket.
He found nothing incriminating. I’d learned to never carry anything on me—at least not where they’d bother to look.
“Can I go to my room now?” I asked, not really looking for that argument my parents seemed to enjoy so much.
My father gave up a subtle nod I’d have missed if I hadn’t been looking for it.
They took my phone—and my bedroom door.
But I still had the bathroom.
I closed myself inside, pressed the lock. They’d come knocking in a while, demanding to know what all goes on when they can’t see.
They’ll never see what they don’t really want to see, though.
Muffled voices trickled through the floorboards, putting them still in the living room.
My mother’s the one who caught me kissing Megan Vennerhull. That’s where the whole lesbian thing came from. But we were just practicing. Megan pretended I was David Skillsky and I, well, I too imagined Megan was really David Skillsky—I just told her I’d been dreaming of Michael Kranshaw to keep her from freaking out. Megan has been in love with David since the third grade. But so have I.
Can’t tell that to Megan, though.
My fingers worked at the buttons on my jeans; I tugged them off my hips.
My father never used those multi-bladed razors. “One blade is all it takes,” he’d tell the television, whenever one of those commercials touting three blades came on.
I agree. One blade is all it takes.
I twisted the razor’s handle, retrieved the shiny blade from its open mouth.
It’s not a suicide attempt. I’ve never wanted to die. It’s just something I need, something I dream about when moments of stress find in me an easy target.
And I never cut too deep, either; just enough for bleeding.
Just enough for a taste of pain.
They never look at my hips—or my inner thighs. Nobody looks there. Nobody sees or knows.
My mother’s voice disrupted my moment of pleasure. “Are you going to be long in there, honey?”
“Be out in a minute,” I assured her, knowing full-well my father would be beside her in short order, threatening to remove even the bathroom door.
A quick cut just beneath my stomach let go that crimson release.
Better than an orgasm, this.
My father intruded; his meaty fists banged against the door. “I’ll break this son of a bitch down, Ruthie, you don’t open this door!”
“Can I wash my hands first?” I asked, rinsing the blade before returning it to its proper place of honor.
They weren’t quick enough—not this time, at least. I still owned one secret belonging only to me.
One more day I could still be the Ruth I wanted to be.
© 2013 Beem Weeks
This story, along with 19 others, is available in Slivers of Life: A Collection of Short Stories. Find it at all online booksellers.
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