“It’s when your testicles twist, cutting off circulation,” Ruby continued, twisting her heel slightly. "And if it doesn’t untwist in a few hours, they’ll have to be cut off.”
She lifted her foot, and the man gasped in relief, curling into himself. "Now apologize to the lady," she said coldly.
He turned to Kavya, blinking back tears “I-I’m sorry.”
Ruby loomed over him once more, raising an eyebrow. "For...?"
“For saying shit to you, for touching you, for— I don’t know—being born? Whatever else you want me to apologize for. Can I go now? Please?”
Ruby glanced at Kavya, giving her a silent question. Kavya picked up her lemonade and, with a smirk, dumped it over his head.
Jonah’s shoulders shook beside her. Ruby thought, for a second, that he was trembling in anger, but when she turned, he was doubled over laughing.
“Testicular torsion? Where did you learn that?” he asked, still catching his breath.
“TikTok," Ruby said with a straight face.
“What happened to your cleaning videos?”
Ruby sighed, genuinely exasperated. "I still get them about 50% of the time. The other 50% are Grey’s Anatomy clips.”
Jonah chuckled. “You watch Grey’s?”
“Not a single episode.” Ruby shook her head. “Watched a video about two people who were impaled together and only one got to live. Sobbed. It played like four times while I cried into a pillow. Now it’s all hospital drama clips.”
As they stepped out of the mall, the late afternoon sun painted the parking lot in soft golden hues. Ruby ducked into a quiet alleyway beside the mall, slipping one of her herbal rolls from her designer bag.
With the cigarette between her lips, she flicked the lighter, once, twice. Nothing. She frowned, shaking it, feeling the emptiness of the fluid inside.
“Damn it,” she muttered under her breath, frustration bubbling up.
A soft shuffle behind her made her turn. Jonah had followed, standing a few feet away, his expression unreadable but calm.
“Need a light?” he asked.
Ruby raised an eyebrow, surprised. “You don’t smoke.”
“I don’t. But I know you do.” He stepped closer, pulling a lighter from his pocket, offering it to her without another word. Ruby stared at the lighter for a moment, then took it, her cheeks heating. She lit her cigarette, taking a long drag of the resulting phlogiston before handing the lighter back.
“Thanks,” she said, quieter now, the edge of her earlier irritation fading as the green substance curled into the air.
Jonah slipped the lighter back into his pocket but stayed close, leaning against the brick wall beside her. They stood in silence for a few moments, the sound of distant cars and the faint hum of the mall fading into the background.
“You okay?” Jonah asked after a beat, his eyes not on her but on the sky, where the clouds were beginning to take on a soft pink hue.
She looked away for a second. “Sometimes it feels like no matter what I do, I’ll always be... apart. Separate. It’s like I’m stuck in this endless in-between.”
Jonah straightened up, shifting a little closer. “You’re not as separate as you think. And you don’t have to go through it alone.That’s what friends are for, right? To help shoulder some of that.”
Ruby took a long pull from her cigarette, her thoughts running in tandem with the quiet rhythm of their conversation. She didn’t look at him, but the corner of her mouth twitched in the ghost of a smile. “Didn’t know you were such a philosopher.”
He chuckled softly, the sound rich and comforting. “I’ve got layers, Ruby. You’d be surprised.”
She shot him a sidelong glance, exhaling a soft stream of smoke. “Maybe I would be.”
The silence that followed wasn’t heavy or awkward. It was easy, comfortable in a way that Ruby didn’t often allow herself to feel. She flicked the ash from her cigarette, watching it fall to the ground, and for the first time in a while, she didn’t feel like she had to rush away from the moment.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
