Ruby Fox (love_ruby) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2019-03-14 09:55:00 |
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Entry tags: | #december 2017, jasper, jasper x ruby, ruby |
Who: Ruby and Jasper
Where: School
When: After school, Thursday, Dec 7th
Status: Complete
Ruby texted Jasper just as soon as Jules left, her concern for him winning out over the awkwardness she’d created between them. She supposed it had to happen at some point, that things could never get better if she avoided him forever, but she didn’t know how to create a new normal. None of that mattered in the face of tragedy. I just heard about Aaron. What happened? Want to talk? Of course, she was concerned herself, but if Jasper wanted to be alone, then she’d give him space.
Jasper had missed school the day before, since his uncle had gotten stabbed and everything. He’d spent most of the day at the hospital, trying to support his dad and Amelia, who was much more upset than he felt about it. Aaron had survived it and it seemed like he would be okay, so Jasper hadn’t been broken up about it, really, just concerned and tired of all this bad, weird shit happening to their family. He didn’t know Mila super well, she’d just been around sometimes and he never had much to do with his uncles’ girlfriends. If she’d turned Crazy Evil Bitch though, Jasper was kind of glad she’d disappeared.
Thursday it was back to school though, and he went even though he was worn out and tried to stay awake. He had hung back after the last bell to talk to one of his science teachers about making up some work, and he was just walking out when his phone buzzed in his pocket. Jasper was surprised to see it was a text from Ruby. Damn, news traveled fast in a small town. girlfriend stabbed him. he’ll live. you left yet?
His text didn’t tell Ruby any more than Jules had said, but that Jasper didn’t seem worried about it said a lot. It was still a big deal, but maybe not a crisis. That being said, she was still trying to wrap her head around Aaron’s girlfriend stabbing him. From the little bit they’d talked, it had sounded like a good relationship, not… well, not the kind that resulted in a stabbing. But maybe no one saw that shit coming. Nope. Just about to head to my car. You? It would be way easier to talk in person, so she tried to ignore the nervousness that cropped up. She hadn’t spoken to him since that bizarre confession she’d made and she didn’t want things to be awkward. It felt like a guarantee no matter what she did.
Jasper knew that Ruby and Aaron were friendly at least, since his uncle had worked at her dad’s shop for so long. It made sense that she was concerned about him. But it was also kind of convenient, since Jasper had been meaning to talk to her. He’d just been putting it off, and that wasn’t really fair or a good friend-thing to do. This was as good a time as any, he supposed. As he walked toward the exit doors, Jasper thumbed in a response. meet u out there. Ruby hadn’t invited him to, but Jasper was sure she also knew they needed to talk. He pushed through the school door and fished his cigarettes out as he strode toward the parking lot.
Ruby spotted Jasper as soon as she exited the building and turned to head his direction instead of to her own car. His or hers, it didn’t matter, so long as they got out of the cold, and hers was old and slow to heat up. She tried not to overthink things on the way there, hoping that maybe if her mind was clear then she’d be able to act normal. “Hey,” she said as she got close enough to call out. “So, what actually happened? Why’d she stab him? Was it an accident?” There had to be a story there or some kind of explanation. Things like that didn’t normally just happen, though considering this was Point Pleasant Ruby was willing to listen with an open mind.
Jasper spotted Ruby and headed her way. They ended up closer to his car, so he aimed his steps that way. It was too cold to be standing around for a long-ass time, and this conversation might not be quick. He wasn’t surprised that she started by asking questions about Aaron. “Uh ... hey,” he said, then shook his head as he pulled his keys out of his jeans pocket. “Not an accident, no. We’re kinda thinking she had a mental breakdown because of the, uh, baby thing. You wanna get in with the heater?” he asked, nodding at his car as they got close enough.
Ruby knew they needed to talk about what happened with them, that it was the so-called elephant in the room, but it was so much easier to start off with the subject she didn’t dread discussing. “God, yes,” she nodded as she rubbed her hands together. Even in his car, she might consider putting her gloves on just to get warm. “So you don’t know for sure? What’s Aaron say? What happened to his girlfriend?” Even though she didn’t know the details, specifics didn’t really matter when it came to losing a baby. It could shake any woman’s sanity, regardless of the reason, however most didn’t end up stabbing their partner.
Jasper got into the car and started it up, rubbing his hands together before he took another drag on his cigarette and cracked the window just enough for the smoke. His brow furrowed, he tried to line up the jumbled things he’d been told about the stabbing into some kind of order he could give to Ruby. “Well like ... Aaron thinks she was possessed. I think my dad kinda thinks so too. When they were helping us look for Amelia, they heard some crazy shit in the Cooperdale tunnel? And then Mila started acting weird after that. And then like ... the other night she got up in the middle of the night, she was like, coughing up blood, and Aaron was gonna take her to the hospital ... only she stabbed him twice with a big kitchen knife instead and disappeared.” He gave a helpless little shrug. “She just walked out in her PJs and nobody’s seen her since.”
“Oh my god,” Ruby muttered. That was so much more than a mental breakdown, in her opinion. And far worse because how did you help someone that was possessed? Do you call an exorcist? Was that really a thing? “Bad things happen down at those tunnels. Like, the hangings? And then that kid went missing? People say they hear voices in there.” She’d never explored them herself and she didn’t plan to. They were creepy and, if the stories had any merit to them, dangerous. “Has anyone tried looking for her?” The nights were getting cold, too cold for someone to survive in their pajamas without shelter. If Aaron’s girlfriend wasn’t in her right mind, she might freeze to death.
Jasper nodded a bit about the tunnel -- he’d been up there a few times with friends when he’d been younger. It was a place to smoke a joint and drink beer without any chance of adults showing up. It had always given him the creeps, but machismo was a strong motivation to keep that under wraps. He’d never personally heard anything unnatural, but given the vibe of the place and what he knew now about the nature of reality, it didn’t surprise him that other people had. Or that there was something bad lurking in there. “Yeah, of course, the cops are,” Jasper told Ruby. “Like, her parents sure as hell don’t think she was possessed, so everybody’s looking for her. I think the cops even took an ATV into the tunnel a ways, but as far as I know they haven’t found anything yet.” He paused, his thoughts similar to Ruby’s. “She mighta had somebody pick her up or something, who even really knows.”
Ruby knew most people wouldn’t buy into the theory that she was possessed. It was just too outrageous, even when the alternative was a perfectly normal person snapping and trying to kill their boyfriend. As someone who also had reason to blame external forces rather than her own emotional state, she wished people were a little more accepting of the bizarre, but she supposed that normal people just saw it as an excuse. “Hopefully they find her soon. Even if she’s not possessed, something’s obviously wrong with her. How’s Aaron holding up? Other than being stabbed, I mean.” Physically, it sounded like he was recovering, but mentally he had to be a mess.
Jasper wasn’t sure if he hoped they found Mila or not. The whole thing felt a little muted to him, like it wasn’t his problem. Maybe that was cold -- he did love Aaron, even though he’d always felt closer to Caden -- or maybe he was just getting too saturated with weird bad shit. It wasn’t directly affecting him, Aaron hadn’t died, so it was easier to shrug off. If the crazy bitch who stabbed him froze to death out there, well ... that sucked, but it wouldn’t the worst thing in the universe. “I dunno, he’s not talking much,” Jasper told Ruby with a half-shrug. “At least not to us. Me and Amelia have been to see him a couple times. I’m sure he’s not doing great. I wouldn’t be, either. You should go see him if you want. Dad thinks he’ll be out this weekend.”
Ruby just remembered how happy Aaron had been the last time they’d really talked. Losing the baby had to hurt, but losing his girlfriend on top of that? It was a whole lot to take on in a short period of time. If she was possessed, then Ruby hoped someone could help her. If she was batshit crazy, well… maybe she should stay missing. But she wasn’t going to say that part out loud. “I might do that,” she nodded. If it wasn’t too weird, maybe he could use the company. Ruby put her hands in front of the warm air of the heater even though they’d already warmed up, an attempt to distract herself from the sudden quiet. She knew they needed to talk, but she kind of hated to bring it up. “So… how’ve you been?”
Jasper just nodded about going to see Aaron. If it hadn’t been entwined with his childhood so much, he might have thought it was weird that a grown man was friends with a high school girl ... but he didn’t. He’d worked for Ruby’s dad, and Aaron was kind of simple in the head anyway, so it made sense. He could use all the friends he could get right now. Jasper took another drag off of his cigarette, then let out a smoky chuckle at Ruby’s words. He kind of hated that things were awkward now, but he hoped they could get past it. “I’ve been okay,” he answered. “Just tryin’ to like, buckle down and focus on school. Look after Amelia. That kinda stuff. How about you?”
Ruby knew that school wasn’t exactly Jasper’s thing, but she thought it was good that he was doing his best to graduate. They were almost there, only a few months to go, and it would be a shame to see him throw in the towel when he was so close. But it also felt a little like a throw away answer, since they both knew full well that Elodie had been stirring things up. She couldn’t blame him. She didn’t really want to talk about it either. “I’m okay,” she said. “Just doing my thing. School, work, you know. I told Amelia I’d start tutoring her, so we need to start that up.” She’d meant to do it already, but they both had a lot going on. Maybe this week would be a good time to start. Ruby scraped at some flaking nail polish for a second, then looked up at Jasper. “What do you know about Clint Parker?”
It was probably the most stilted conversation they’d ever had, and Jasper thought that really sucked. He knew they probably needed to talk about the elephant in the room -- elephant in the car? Even worse -- but he didn’t know how to start. ‘So you’re definitely not really in love with me, right?’ didn’t sound great. Neither did ‘so about that spying bitch next door ...’ Luckily Ruby had a couple of different subjects to offer. Jasper had been about to comment on Ruby tutoring Amelia, which he thought was a great idea, but then she asked about Clint Parker and Jasper gave a puzzled little frown. “Uh ... not much, I guess. He’s a dumbass rich jock? Why?”
“Just curious,” Ruby said. “I went to a party at his house last weekend.” And that was as far as she wanted to take that now that she had Jasper’s feedback. Fucking around with Clint was probably a huge mistake, but she’d had fun and… At least their fun wasn’t cycling its way through the gossip mill, at least not yet. Which meant that either Clint was keeping it to himself or he was embarrassed about it. Ruby really hoped it was the former, that he wanted to keep it a bit private, even if they hadn’t exactly been discreet at the party. “I couldn’t throw a party like that without worrying people would destroy the house. I don’t know how they do it.” Clint, Victoria, Jules, whomever. The Overlook kids. They all threw these epic parties and lived to tell about it.
Besides Jules, Jasper was incredibly uncomfortable with rich people. They were the types who had kept his family down for so long, who just saw them as worthless trailer trash. He’d never really made friends with any of the Overlook kids for a reason. So he didn’t know much of anything about Clint Parker, nor did he want to. Just another silver-spoon dickhead. Jasper snorted a little and shook his head. “They’ve got like, maids and shit,” he said. “Maintenance people to call. Those types never do anything for themselves.” He knew that was probably overly cynical, since he’d personally helped Jules clean up after a party, but still. It felt true for the rest of them. Jules was just special. He eyed Ruby a bit sideways. “So what, are you like, into him?” he asked. Why else would she ask about Clint Parker?
Ruby could totally picture some kind of clean-up crew coming in to help clean up the mess that they made at the party. It was easier to believe that than Clint going through the house picking everything up himself. Wiping down counters and mopping up floors didn’t seem to be his thing. Ruby shrugged in response, unwilling to commit to what she was feeling when it came to Clint. He was definitely hot, but Jasper was one of the few people whose opinion she actually cared about and she didn’t want to admit possibly liking a dickhead to him. “I dunno,” she finally said. “He seemed cool, but… but everyone seems cool when you’re drunk.” A good party tended to bring people together, regardless of their differences, but it was hard to say if it would be the same if they were sober.
Wasn’t that the damn truth? That was kind of what had happened with him and Jules -- he’d always avoided and judged her until they ended up together at a party and she’d seemed at least cool enough to make out with. Then fuck the brains out of for months until they finally acknowledged they had bigger feelings than that. And now here they were. Jasper realized he was probably being uncharitable to Clint, and if Ruby did like him, then ... well, whatever, it was her life. He just didn’t want to see her with an asshole ... which was the exact stance she’d taken about Jules. “Maybe he is, I dunno,” he conceded. “Like I said, I don’t know him.” Jasper fell quiet for a few heartbeats, then cleared his throat a little. “Speaking of cool, uh ... are we? Cool, I mean?”
“Yeah, of course. If you’re cool with me,” Ruby said with more hesitation than she would have liked. It was the situation with Jasper that had her going out and partying in the first place, maybe even trying to prove herself that she didn’t have feelings for him. But it wasn’t like she had anything with Clint, other than a good time. They weren’t even friends, so that didn’t prove anything, except that she’d sleep with anyone if she drank enough. Ugh. She didn’t want that to be the case, Clint had seemed cool enough, but she also wasn’t up for trying to convince Jasper when she wasn’t all that sure of herself. It felt rather complicated when piled on top of the awkwardness between them. “I don’t know or understand what happened to me, but I really, seriously didn’t mean what I said. I just want things to be normal again… and for Elodie to get what’s coming to her.” Because that needed to be said. The girl deserved some comeuppance.
Hearing that brought Jasper a relief so keen it almost made him ashamed of himself. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t ever date Ruby, but she was so much like a part of the family and he had Jules ... it just wasn’t the right timing or anything. If she wasn’t actually in love with him, then that made things a lot easier. He’d suspected it had been the drugs, and she’d apologized via text already, but hearing it out loud was different. It was reassuring. “I just want things to be normal again too,” he said, trying not to sound as relieved as he felt. “I’m definitely cool with you ... weird shit happens, y’know? I just didn’t wanna like ... hurt your feelings or make you miserable or anything.” Jasper sounded a bit hesitant about that possibility, but she’d come on pretty intense that day. “I agree though, that bitch needs something bad to happen to her,” he muttered darkly.
Even though she’d been under the influence of something else, Ruby remembered how crazed she’d felt, like she had to talk to Jasper, how the feelings that she’d had were too strong to be ignored. On that day alone, it had been devastating to hear he didn’t love her… and then the feelings were gone. What remained wasn’t heartache over his lack of feelings for her, but the angst of having to deal with the repercussions of her actions. “I’m good, I swear. I wish I could explain it, but it was like… like something else took control of me and the next day it was gone.” Like Jasper said, ‘weird shit’. That was the best explanation there was, from Ruby’s perspective. “I ran into Jules. She seemed… not as pissed as I expected.” She’d been cold, but Ruby could take that. In this instance, she knew she deserved it.
Jasper was more than happy to just file it under that ‘weird shit’ label and leave it alone for forever. Or at least the foreseeable future. He’d been right that Ruby didn’t really mean it, like he’d tried to tell Jules, so there was really no reason to keep talking about it. It all made him feel awkward, and he had enough of that in his life. “Yeah,” he said slowly, sighing a bit as he fiddled with the heater vent. “She was more pissed at me, that I didn’t tell her. And then when she showed me the fucking video Elodie sent her.” Jasper’s jaw clenched and he shook his head, the anger about all that getting riled up again. “Let’s just say I didn’t react the best. So that just made her more pissed. We talked it out, though. ... but like, sorry my shitty neighbor stuck her nose into it.”
Ruby cringed, pretty sure that Jasper could have avoided that particular fight if it wasn’t for her request not to tell Jules. She’d hoped that they could just brush the whole event under the rug and move on without ever speaking of it again, which might’ve actually worked if it weren’t for Elodie. Now she and Jules were back to ground zero and Jasper had had to deal with a mess he didn’t deserve. “I should’ve told you she knew,” Ruby said, shaking her head. “She caught up with me a few days after it happened, called me a liar when I tried to explain. I thought if she said anything it would be my word against hers, but I didn’t know she’d recorded it. She knew exactly what she was doing when she went to Jules.” Like Jasper, it was hard not to get riled up about it. She felt like revenge was necessary, but she also felt like Elodie had the upper hand. “I wish there was a way to make her pay for it. Which I know makes me sound super bitchy, but I don’t give a fuck.”
Even if Ruby hadn’t asked him to keep it a secret, Jasper didn’t think he would’ve run to tell Jules anyway. He hadn’t wanted to make trouble between them, but he’d probably caused more damage than he’d avoided. It was all too late to second-guess now anyway, Elodie had seen to that. He raised his brows, then furrowed them, to hear that Ruby had known that Elodie knew before him ... but the recording had apparently been a surprise to everyone, so he couldn’t exactly fault her for not telling him. It wasn’t like they’d been hanging out or even really talking anyway. “Don’t worry about it,” he told Ruby first, to brush off her ‘should’ve.’ It was just kind of a clusterfuck from start to finish, everybody’d been wrong in some way. “But yeah, no, that bitch deserves whatever’s coming to her. And it’ll be something. We’ll spot it. Because a girl who does fucked up shit like that? Is gonna do some more fucked up shit. There’ll be an opportunity.”
“I’d love to see her dig her own grave,” Ruby said with a little laugh. Jasper was right. It was just a matter of time before Elodie fucked up and karma bit her in the ass. She’d just have to be patient— Ruby could be patient when it was worth it. Timing was everything. She sighed, leaning back in the seat, a smile curling on her lips. “Amelia said she’d go with me if I wanted to beat her up. I kinda like her all grown-up.” Sure, it sucked that she’d been in some horrible other-world for ten years, but Ruby liked having a new friend and she’d clicked with Amelia like they’d been friends their whole lives. She didn’t trust any of her other girlfriends nearly as much.
Jasper gave a soft snort-huff. Amelia had said as much to him too, more or less. “Yeah, she turned all tough on me,” he murmured, a mixture of fondness and regret in his tone. Amelia hadn’t had the easiest life -- that was impossible when Olivia was your mother -- but she’d still had a sweet innocence about her before she’d gone missing. Jasper was still adjusting to who she was now. He’d missed so much in the blink of an eye. “Please don’t take her up on that,” he added, shooting Ruby an amused glance. “Much as I’d like to see it, Amelia needs to keep a low profile. The cops know about her, but if she starts getting into trouble, shit might get more janky. I’m glad you guys are like, friends now though. She needs that.”
“I won’t,” Ruby smiled. “I definitely wanted to, but I don’t think I would have taken it that far unless the bitch was standing right in front of me when I found out.” Now she felt like Elodie deserved something more than a punch to the face, even if she couldn’t be the one to deliver it. That damn video. Ruby needed leverage of her own, otherwise it would always be hanging over her, just waiting on Elodie’s phone for her to send out or post. “I just appreciated the support. And the fact that she believed me. I was worried you wouldn’t.” But he had, thank God, because Ruby didn’t know what she could have done to convince him otherwise. Ruby gave him a little nudge. “We cool?”
Jasper understood that all to well. If Elodie had been in the car when Jules showed him that video, he probably would’ve strangled her. He couldn’t think about it too much or he’d get all full of rage again, so he tried to push it out of his head. They would exact some sort of revenge, it would just take some time to figure out the best way to go about it. And maybe it would lull Elodie into a false sense of security, like she just got away with fucking with their lives. “I got no reason not to believe you,” he told Ruby with some warmth back in his tone. Jasper gave her a little smile and nudged her back. “We’re cool.” He paused, then cocked a brow at her. “You drive today? You need a ride home?”
Relief washed over Ruby, along the feeling that they could finally move past this. Things might be a little weird, but they’d get better so long as they kept talking. “No, I drove today. I’ve got work soon, so I should probably get going. You can drive me to my car though,” she grinned. She might be a few minutes late at this point, but it was worth it to get this mess ironed out. There were still a few loose ends to tie up, but they’d be dealt with in their own time.
He couldn’t help but grin back, and it felt good. They’d needed to talk and get this settled for a while now, and he was glad they’d finally done it. “I guess I can,” Jasper teased with a put-upon sigh. He put his foot on the brake and put the car into reverse to back out of his spot, then glanced over at Ruby. “Whereabouts did you park?” The lot wasn’t huge, but there were still a lot of cars there, and he admittedly didn’t really remember what Ruby drove when she wasn’t on her bike.
“Very back corner,” Ruby said, pointing in the direction of her truck. “I overslept and barely made it to first period.” Some days she wished she cared a little bit less about her education. Then she could’ve slept in and rolled into school whenever she wished. She had hopes of being more than a waitress at Moxie’s, or a mechanic, which meant she had to take school seriously. Plus, if she made enough money, she could afford something better than the junk heap she drove when she wasn’t on her bike.
If that had been Jasper -- and many times, it had been -- he would’ve just skipped school and kept on sleeping. He knew he couldn’t keep doing that as much as he wanted, or he would never graduate, but his natural inclination was almost never to rush to school. He gave Ruby the short lift to her truck, looking over at her again when he stopped in front of it. “I’ll let Aaron know you asked about him,” he said with a small smile. “Take it easy, Fox.”
“Thanks,” Ruby smiled, giving Jasper a wave as she hopped out of his car. “You too, J.” She felt lighter now than she had all week, confident that at least she and Jasper were okay, even if everything else might still be in limbo. Jules might hate her and Elodie still had blackmail material on her, but she could only deal with one thing at a time, one day at a time.