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Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Acknowledgments
  6. Cast of Characters
  7. Part One
  8. One
  9. Two
  10. Three
  11. Four
  12. Five
  13. Six
  14. Seven
  15. Eight
  16. Nine
  17. Ten
  18. Eleven
  19. Twelve
  20. Thirteen
  21. Fourteen
  22. Fifteen
  23. Sixteen
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Part Two
  28. Twenty
  29. Twenty-one
  30. Twenty-two
  31. Twenty-three
  32. Twenty-four
  33. Twenty-five
  34. Twenty-six
  35. Twenty-seven
  36. Twenty-eight
  37. Twenty-nine
  38. Thirty
  39. Thirty-one
  40. Thirty-two
  41. Thirty-three
  42. Thirty-four
  43. Thirty-five
  44. Thirty-six
  45. Thirty-seven
  46. Thirty-eight
  47. Thirty-nine
  48. Forty
  49. Forty-one
  50. Forty-two
  51. Forty-three
  52. Forty-four
  53. Forty-five
  54. Forty-six
  55. A note on the Author

That’s when Security removed me, dragging me down the escalator adjacent to the one I had just glided up.

Thirty-one

image
Get me out of here

Someone had recognized me and called the Enquirer, who had a photographer waiting to snap a photo as Security threw me out on the sidewalk. I couldn’t help but stop crying as they then turned around and began roughing up the photographer too. Swallowing the desire to kick the photographer in the ribs, Sebastian, thinking fast for once, grabbed the camera. “I’ll press charges,” shrieked the paparazzo.

The taxi pulled jerkily away from the cineplex, Sebastian holding my head on his shoulder, the statue stranded streets behind us.

“Holy shit!” screamed Sebastian, stuffing the film in his blazer pocket.

I was laughing hysterically. “That was brilliant! That was fucking brilliant. That guy will press charges. You’re going down, Sebastian Chase. Lawsuit!” My panic ignited again by the word “lawsuit,” I switched back from laughter to tears, realizing, in seven-second time delay, that I was no longer laughing but sobbing.

“Ruby. Calm down. Chill the fuck out. What is it? What are you really upset about?”

I saw the driver glance in his rear view mirror, not as if he were worried about having a psycho in his car, but as if he really wanted to know what I was really upset about, too.

“I’m upset about Russell Crowe being successful. I mean, okay, he’s allowed to be successful. He’s allowed to be an in-demand character actor. But he wasn’t supposed to be a leading man. I never said he could be a romantic lead. I NEVER SAID THAT WAS ACCEPTABLE. Nobody asks me anything.”

The driver and Sebastian rolled their eyes. “I’m going to ask you again. What are you really upset about?”

“I’m upset,” I choked, “because there is a cockroach in my bathroom.”

“Really?” demanded Sebastian.

“Really,” I answered, my voice as sloppy as my own melted-caramel eyes. I often think my whole life, my whole world, would be completely different if only I had blue eyes. It would be completely better, which is what we mean when we use the phrase “completely different.”

“I’m sorry, Ruby, but I don’t understand what’s so awful about a dead cockroach.”

My voice was now flat with disgust. “I hate ugly things. That’s why I hate myself.”

“Ruby, for the last time, you’re fucking beautiful.”

“That’s very sweet of you to say.” Ricky Martin was on the radio. He was segueing between two languages, making no sense in either of them. “That cockroach looks how I feel. I think my worst fear is of it crawling on me, crawling on my feet or on my face. Because then how I feel on the inside would be on the outside too.”