i feel i'm fading

Joseph: ok

Joseph: tomorrow? what time.

Ruby: three tomorrow afternoon?

Ruby: good time between the lunch and dinner rush

Joseph: fuck what did i leave

Joseph: wait was it a notebook. fuck.

Joseph: im at tommy's apartment

Joseph: sure. wherever your dad wont go.

Ruby: meet me at the diner

Ruby: the little one that ingrid showed me

Joseph: [read 9:15 pm]

Joseph: didn't want my absence to come off as a surprise

Joseph: did i leave anything at the house?

Ruby: hold on

Ruby: yea

Ruby: i'll bring it to you

Ruby: where are you?

Ruby: can we meet somewhere?

Joseph: im kicked out the house

Joseph: staying at thomas' apartment

Joseph: why did you let russell back in??

Ruby: i missed him and i just

Ruby: he's still my daddy

Ruby: i can't push him away

Ruby: but i don't wanna lose you either

Joseph: its true. im fired.

Joseph: russell bragged to my face about "getting your trust"

Joseph: do you really think he'd keep me around?

Ruby: what the fuck

Ruby: i don't even like. know what to say

Joseph: hey

Joseph: got your earlier text. sorry didn't have my phone on

Joseph: but the reason im not staying the night is bc your dad fired me

Ruby: what???

Ruby: ??????

Ruby: what do you mean, he fired you?

He never trusted doctors. It was fitting for a man that didn’t put much faith in science in general. Russell had been young once, a boy with a deranged mother that was flying off the rails more often than she was ever on them to begin with. It happens when you’re born to that and a father you understood later on in life was one of her clients that she had intentionally trapped herself with his baby. What good was a shrink if you couldn’t unpack all of that garbage? A waste of time and money.

Ruby was listened to as she explained herself, but what was filtered through that brain of his was a cold distrust, built upon a foundation from the rubble of a burnt bridge that could never be reconstructed in his mind. On the outside, though, she took his hands and he didn’t move away from them, only letting his eyes level with hers. “I disapprove of my little girl threatening me, too,” he amended. It was good for her to sense his displeasure. It made her work harder to overcome it. She deserved that. She deserved to feel as though his trust was the only thing she needed to gain. “It’s going to take a lot more than a bunch of worthless sorries to make up for what you did to me.”

Growing up with a father like Russell, Ruby didn’t much believe in doctors either. That was, however, until she’d sought out treatment on her own. She’d been skeptical, not really believing any of it would work or benefit her, but she’d turned out to be very, very wrong. Truthfully, she’d love to have Russell join her for a therapy session, something they could do to work through their shit together, but she didn’t dare ask. She already knew that the answer would be no, and that it would most likely just piss him off anyway. 

She shrunk into her seat a little bit when he spoke, gaze dropping to the table rather than holding steady with Russell’s. “I know.” Ruby murmured, nodding her head. She remained silent for a moment, staring down at the milkshake in front of her, before biting her lip and looking back up to meet her father’s gaze. “All of that stuff I said to you, everything I did... I didn’t mean any of it, daddy. I really didn’t, I was just - I was having a hard time, y’know, after everything that happened with mom.” It had been a long, long time since she’d called Catherine anything other than her first name, but she’d worked through that in therapy too. “I want things to go back to the way they were before, y’know? I miss it - I miss us. We’re a team.” 

“Shut up. You don’t know shit, alright? Our family is none of your business. So shut it.”

“Good to know. Hope he’s okay with being a single parent, I guess. I don’t want no baby.”

“They don’t have to worry about him. I’m grown and I can do what I want, okay? He doesn’t have a say in who I see.” Bullshit. Ruby was still wanting to get on his good side, and if either of them stood in the way of that, well… They’d have to be cut off, at least for a while.

Was there ever going to be a world where Russell could forgive his daughter? Of course. Somewhere out there there was a parallel universe that had a nicer, kinder, gentler Russell, but was that in this world? Of course not. He looked at her, and then looked at the hand that rested atop of his, feeling the warmth of it sink through his own hand. She was always going to be his daughter, but what did the word truly hold for him?

A smile was hinted against his face, placing it on at her calling him that term that would always seem to come so naturally to her. He took on the offer, sitting down across from her before both of his arms rested over the tabletop, listening to the rest of her bullcrap.

“Sounds like they did a number on you. Are they making you into a pill-popper?” he asked with a tilt of his head before sighing, slowly nodding his head with subtle movement. “I wanted to come see you,” he went on, “but that didn’t feel like something you wanted, too.”

It had taken a lot of work, but Ruby was at a point where she could forgive her father. Before it had seemed like nothing in the world could make her forgive the man, but now things were different. Letting go of a grudge had been the worst thing she’d had to work through. She had been taught from a young age to bottle things up, to hold onto the past and remain unforgiving and cold, but that wasn’t healthy. Russell was the first person she had to forgive, and then her mother, and then herself. Forgiving and moving on felt like the world being lifted off her shoulders.

She shifted a bit, taking a sip from her milkshake before folding her hands one on top of the other on the table. A part of her deep, deep down told her not to let Russell back in. She’d had a good month or two of seeing him for what he really was, but that was over now. He just had a way of drawing her in, and she could never truly hate her beloved daddy.

“Oh - no, of course not.” She shook her head. Ruby wasn’t about to tell him that she’d been put on medication, even if it was just one pill, because she knew how adamantly he was against it. “I would have loved for you to come see me but... I know how you disapprove of that kind of treatment,” She reached out again, placing both hands over either of his this time. “I think some time apart was better for both of us.” It felt good to be open and honest with her father for once, like she didn’t have to hide anything. The worst was already behind them, what else could go wrong? Nothing she couldn’t handle. “I’ve missed you so much, daddy. And I’m sorry, really sorry, for everything I did. I wasn’t in a good place and I should have asked for help instead of acting out, especially against you. Can you ever forgive me?”

Joseph didn’t expect those words to hit him like a freight train, but they did. He hadn’t gone to visit her in inpatient once. He had been busy, true. He had been trying to piece together his life. He had been talking back and forth with Derek, thinking over and over in his mind that it couldn’t be real. He had been wondering how much he should tell Derek or Luda about all of his problems, among them being Ruby kissed me the night her mom died.

How long ago had that been? Whatever feelings she had that night, Joseph hoped they were sorted out in inpatient. If anyone had known, and bothered to ask, he would have said he didn’t want to interfere with it. And to an extent, he didn’t. But if he were honest with himself, that wasn’t the entire truth.

“Good, good!” He let out a sigh, drumming his hands on the table. Where did he start? “I’ve been, uh…” he folded his hands together, “keeping the house clean. Finding work. I… I’m working on a script, actually.” He neglected to mention that while she was in inpatient, he slowly started basing one of the key characters on her. Lucy Sponde, young vampiress who wants nothing more than to be human again, if only for the sake of being able to grow up.

Ruby hadn’t neglected to notice that no one visited her while she was inpatient. As much as she would have liked to ignore that fact, she couldn’t. What friends did she have? Who liked her? Not even her own father liked her right now, let alone any of her peers. It came as no surprise that she hadn’t had any visitors, though it did suck and it made her feel bad. 

That didn’t matter now, though. She’d learned to let go of her grudges, and therapy at a designated time every day helped with that. Truthfully, she just wondered how that would continue now that she was back to work - would she have to make time every day to go to therapy? Would it be twice a week? Once a week? Every other week? That part had been discussed, sure, but how would it actually work out? She didn’t know, and she really didn’t want to think about it. All she wanted to do was revel in being happy. 

“A script?” She asked, raising her brows. Ruby had always been nosy, so of course she wanted to know what, exactly it was all about. “What’s it about? You saving me a part when you get it finished?” She asked, partially joking, as a grin spread across her lips. During her free time in the hospital she’d had a lot of time to do things herself, and a part of that had been writing. Ruby had enough material to publish a book at this point, and she truly did consider it, but how would that coincide with her acting? She didn’t want to fuck this up. “I’ve been doing some writing myself. Not a script or anything like that, of course, but it’s been nice.”

Maybe eighteen wasn’t the lucky number he thought it was. Maybe it was nineteen. Because Joseph was now nineteen years old, and his life had changed.

What happened was this: Ruby went into inpatient, giving Joseph free reign over the house. Joseph had picked up another gig at Prometheus as a sponsor for an event, on his birthday. He celebrated by scamming Russell out of a shit ton of money during a prank call in which he pretended to be the financial services part of a phone sex line (Russell had good reason to believe he needed to update his credit card - Ruby had cancelled it). A text Derek had sent him about giving his birthday present early had been leaked on TV, causing Twitter to lose its collective mind. And now, a box of chocolates had long met Eloise’ doorstep, a paycheck went straight to Joseph’s bank account, and he was walking outside a little diner with a spring in his step.

The sight of Ruby from behind the glass window made him stop short. Was she out of inpatient already? How long had she been out? Joseph had been distracted lately, what with preparing for this event (and brushing up on an amateurish script he dug out of his old notebooks) that he hadn’t thought about Ruby. A familiar pang of guilt hit him, and he forced himself to smile at her back before he went inside. 

“Ruby!” He called out and waved. He briskly walked to the seat opposite hers. It was weird seeing her back. And, weirder, she was happy. A part of him still wondered if she was simply up before she would soon come down. But he pushed the thought aside for the sake of being pleasant. He had to.

“How are you?”

For once in her life, Ruby was truly happy. Not only that, but she was medicated. That helped a whole lot. Lamotrigine was a hell of a drug and it had brought her to a stable medium between too high and too low in mood. Happy. It was a strange feeling, and it no longer felt forced, but it was taking some getting used to. 

Her eyes gleamed when she saw Joseph and she grinned when he entered the diner. “Joey!” She exclaimed, genuinely excited to see him. Weird. “I’m good!” Ruby chirped, reaching up to brush a strand of hair back from her face, tucking it behind her ear. She hadn’t thought much about anyone else while she’d been in the treatment facility, mostly because she’d been made to focus on herself. Most of her trauma stemmed from family, and that was what she had to reflect on, not her friends who she’d shunned and lashed out at in the past. She’d been able to find ways to better herself, to stop lashing out at others and to start behaving like a normal person should. “I feel so much better,” She sipped her milkshake. “How have you been? I’ve missed seeing your face.” 

Of course Russell had heard about his own daughter being hospitalized, but between prepping Liana for the dare event and still holding a grudge against Ruby, he couldn’t make the time to go visit her. Besides, what good was it going to do her? A bunch of whackjob shrinks sinking their claws into her was going to change her? It was in her blood. Catherine’s blood. She was always going to be cracked in the head.

Though, by simple chance, he saw her in the diner’s window. It was a surprise to him that she wanted him to join her, but a maggot never forgets a good meal. The bell rang with a rattle as he stepped inside before finding himself standing by her booth, staring back down ater as his hand rested on the tabletop.

“You look better.” She did, but she’d never be cured. “What’d they do? Find a way to put all the blame on me?”

Ruby didn’t expect herself to be so kind to her father, but she just felt so... Happy. Hospitalizing herself was the best thing she could have done to better herself, and she could truly tell a difference in how she felt. Everything felt good, she felt like a normal person, like she was different. She wanted to be better. Everything she’d done and said to Russell during her little-big meltdown, all the petty things she’d done, god, she felt so guilty about it. She didn’t know if their relationship could ever be the same, or if they could even have one, but she wanted to try - it would be good for her, she thought, to have a real relationship with her father.

Looking up at him, that smile remained on her lips and she placed her hand on top of the one he’d put on the table. “Sit with me. Please, daddy?” Those words coming out of her mouth felt so strange, so different now, but it was the only way she knew how to address him. Calling him Russell seemed odd to her, and father was much too formal. Dad would have been okay, she supposed, but the word didn’t feel right on the tip of her tongue. “I feel better,” She took a sip from her milkshake before continuing. “No, of course not. I just... Worked through a lot of things that I needed to get off my chest and off my conscience.” Some of the blame was on Russell, of course, but she wasn’t going to say that. It was inappropriate when she was trying to make the best of this and salvage their relationship. “I just, uh... I was hoping you’d come to see me, but I understand why you didn’t. I was a real bitch when I lost my cool. I’m sorry.”

She’d re-signed her contract with Prometheus, something she had to do for herself, to prove that she could be better, different, no longer some bitch who everyone behind the scenes hated. After that, she’d asked her driver to take her to that little restaurant Ingrid had introduced her to a few months ago so she could have a milkshake. As she sat in the little diner, sipping away on her strawberry milkshake, she felt someone staring at her. Chancing a glance out the window next to her, the blonde saw a familiar face and cracked a smile. “Come in,” She said, exaggerating so they could read her lips, motioning for them to come in and join her. “Sit with me.”