“Can’t make that promise.” She sees the alarmed look on her friend’s face and rolls her eyes. “Drew, I’m kidding.”
“With you two, it’s not funny.”
She shuts the car door and stares at the house for a few seconds more. Slowly, she walks toward it, passing the pond, which for now is silent. She heads up the porch steps, but before she can lift her hand to knock, the door opens.
After twenty-five years, she is now standing face-to-face with her mother.
They stare at each other from two feet apart on opposite sides of the doorway. Neither woman offers to shake hands or hug.
The first thing she notices is that Ruby’s signature long, lustrous black hair has been chopped to her shoulders, its natural shine dulled due to age and cheap hair dye. There’s a slight papery texture to her skin, highlighting angles in her cheekbones that never used to be there. Though her mother is still a couple of inches taller than Paris, she seems to have shrunk. She’s wearing loose jeans and a yellow T-shirt, and there are new slippers on her feet.
“You look like me when I was your age,” Ruby finally says. There’s a tinge of jealousy in her voice. It’s as good a compliment as she can offer.
“And you look like Lola Celia now,” Paris says.
There’s a long pause. Paris makes no attempt to enter the house. For all she cares, they can do this on the porch.
Ruby opens the door wider. “Come on in.”
Paris steps inside, and as if on cue, the frogs by the pond begin to croak.
* * *
The house is cleaner and quieter than it ever used to be.
“Where is everyone?” Paris asks, even though she already knows the answer.
“Your lola is in Cebu,” Ruby says. “She left right before I arrived, but she’ll be back in a month. And your Tita Flora went to Toronto for the weekend.”
“And you didn’t want to go with her to the city?”
“She’s staying with friends. I wasn’t invited.” Ruby takes a seat at the kitchen table and gestures for her to do the same. “Is that Drew I saw in the car outside? When he asked if I was available today, I assumed he was coming to interview me for his podcast, which is going to be all about me. He didn’t mention he’d be bringing you.”
“There is no podcast about you,” Paris says. “I asked him to kill it.”
“And he agreed?” Ruby raises an eyebrow. “Just like that?”
“Amazing, isn’t it?” Paris allows a small smile. “And to think, I didn’t even have to sleep with him.”
“So you’re sarcastic now.” Her mother’s lips flatten. “Nice way to talk to your mother.”
“Would you rather I hit you?” Paris asks. “Smack you? Put cigarettes out on your neck? Would that be more polite?”
“Oh my God.” Ruby’s chair scrapes as she pushes back from the table. She goes to a cabinet and pulls out two mugs, and pours them both a cup of coffee from the pot on the counter. She dumps powdered Coffee-Mate into them, which is no different from how she used to drink it back in the nineties. “Are you still upset about all that? That was so long ago. It’s time to move on. You’re an adult now, Paris.”
“I was a child then, Ruby.”
Her mother sighs, placing both mugs down on the table. “Are you here to talk about the past, or are you hear to pay me so I don’t talk about the past?”
“Both,” Paris answers. “You’re getting your money.”
“Good,” Ruby says, her shoulders relaxing. “You owe me. I deserve that money. I did twenty-five years in prison for you.”
“For me?” Paris forces herself to stay calm. “Is that what you tell yourself?”
“You know I did.” Her mother sips her coffee and leans back in her chair. “I never told anybody what you did to Charles.”
“Because you know they wouldn’t have believed you,” Paris says. “His blood was all over your dress, and your prints were on his knife. You stabbed him sixteen times.”
Ruby cocks her head. “Was it that many?”
“Sixteen times,” Paris repeats. “And I was only thirteen. You would have made yourself look even worse if you accused me of anything.”
“You fucked me over in court, testifying that Charles never touched you. All you had to say was that one thing. That one true thing.” Ruby’s lips flatten into a hard line. “No jury would have convicted a mother for protecting her daughter.”