The Ruin

The light coming through her Samsung Galaxy photo app wasn’t nearly as bright as real life. She kept looking up over her phone at the dilapidated old building and back down to her phone. It wasn’t the same. Why bother taking a picture if it wouldn’t capture exactly what she saw? Putting her phone in her back pocket she sighed heavily and turned around to her best friend. He was busy making duck lips. God damned selfie queen.

“Aren’t you tired of the same picture over and over again, Colin?”

Without looking away from his phone and managing to stay in his pose he replied in a caustic manner, “Shut it, you!”

Smiling as she carefully made her way over to him on the rocks that jutted out of the cliff she yelled across to him, “Hey, don’t make another train video!”

He let out one of his famous sounds that was a cross between a laugh and a gasp, “Lord have mercy that was a day!”

She looked around at the mountains across from them filled with dark evergreens. The shadows of the clouds seemed to race each other across the tops of the trees. Far below them was where the two rivers joined; the Potomac and the Shenandoah. She couldn’t believe she’d actually gone tubing on them the summer before. What was she thinking? From up here they were much smaller but when she had stood on the bridge, desperately hoping a train would not come, they were terrifyingly wide and she didn’t even want to think about the depth.

“Mark invented a new dance that day...train twerking.” Colin laughed bringing her out of her daze.

“Yeah, that’s still one of my favorite videos of you!”

“Oh, almost falling off the side of the hill and getting killed by a passing train?”

Lily couldn’t help but laugh, “No, the...the sounds you made!”

Her best friend joined in her laughter while thumbing through his Facebook trying to find the video in question. “What were you doing that day anyway? You should’ve been with us, why weren’t you with us?”

“I was probably…” she trailed off looking past him.

“Working?”

She stood frozen. He saw the look on her face and put his phone away. “It’ll get better babe. You just need time. You’ll get over it.”

Lily shook her head slightly as she looked back to him, tears obscuring her vision. “I wish I could fast forward to that point. I don’t like this part, never have.”

Colin gave her a sympathetic look, something she didn’t need. She shook her head and put her hands in the pockets of her hoodie, “You hungry?”

His eyes widened.

*

After they finished up at a hole in the wall deli, which actually turned out to be really good, they settled in for the long drive home. It wasn’t really that long, just seemed like it to her. This had been a nice distraction but he had to work tomorrow and he always went on about beating the traffic, since he was the one who always drove during their adventures. Japanese and Korean pop music played in the background as she gazed out the window listlessly.

“It’s okay if you wanna sleep.”

She looked at him and sighed, “No. I don’t need to. I’ll probably sleep all day tomorrow anyway.” She gave him a lopsided smile.

He returned it before she continued to look out the window and drift into thought.

*

The boss ruined her weekend when he told her this was the last day they’d be working together. As she sat in the comfy leather chair, swaying from side to side with a smile of disbelief, she realized she’d been in shock.

“You son of a bitch,” she accused him flatly, “why couldn’t you have told me this earlier? Even Tim told me months ahead so that I could get used to the idea of him not being here.”

Ed looked apologetic, “I thought I’d be giving you a few extra days with me without dwelling on it. Besides, you loved Tim, it won’t be the same with me.”

Lily scoffed, “Love. LOVE. I LOVE Tim, that shit doesn’t just go away, especially not after ten years of working together. And how the fuck do you know? You know how I feel about you. We’ve had at least five years and we’re closer than Tim and I ever were. It’ll probably be worse.”

Ed looked at her incredulously, “I doubt it.”

She was too mad at him right now, that and the shock kept her from crying outright.

It started while she sat in her tiny Toyota in the parking lot. It wasn’t a rejection, he wasn’t leaving her, he was leaving the company. Not her. Lily let out a choked sob and coughed when she realized that was the last time she’d see him. That was all that was needed for the dam behind her eyes to rupture. The entire ride home she bawled, she couldn’t believe she’d actually made it home through that torrential downpour. When she arrived home everything went downhill. She tried to concentrate on her school work for a couple hours but cried so much that she got a headache and gave up. She couldn’t stand the noise in her house and needed to get out. She’d shoved her bare feet in the nearest pair of shoes, grabbed her keys, cell, and Ipod.

Taking the back roads thinking they’d be less busy, she walked sullenly from her big yard to the next street over. Listening to softer music, she tried to let her emotions go. She looked up at the clear blue sky which had begun to go dull as dusk set in. There were houses on both sides of the road, she no longer knew who lived in them though.

As she reached the end of the road she noticed a new housing development. About eight houses had been squished into the tiny field where she used to explore as a kid. Sighing, she turned to make sure the road was clear before crossing and making her way to the brook. By this time her heels had started to hurt. Finally making it to the brook, she sat on the silver aging guardrail as an SUV raced by her. It was close enough to hit her. Usually, she’d flip off a car that came that close to hitting her but she couldn’t find the will to care. She felt the wind rush past her getting hair in her face. She left it there. Looking down at her feet, she took off her shoes and noticed her heels bleeding. Not a lot, but enough. After a few moments of sitting there listening to mood music and almost getting hit by cars that didn’t know how to give way, she got up and decided to walk back barefoot. There was too much traffic on this back road now that they’d built that damned school back there. Lily needed somewhere peaceful.

When she got home she flopped face first onto her bed. Her headache was in full force by then. She crawled up under her covers. As she settled in she rubbed her blisters with her big toe, I tried to walk away from my problems and got blisters on my feet instead.

*

“Did he say why he left?”

Colin’s question knocked Lily out of her recollection, “He said there were changes coming in the company and he wouldn’t be able to run the store like he wanted.”

“That’s it? What a pussy.”

Lily chuckled, “Well, he did say he was emotionally drained.”

“From what?” Colin’s tone was starting to get on her nerves.

“I never knew this but he said that employees would come in his office begging for hours because they needed the money. Some people actually cried.”

“Whaaa, really?”

Lily prickled, “He’s not a liar, Colin.”

“Ok, ok,” he glanced at her and his expression softened, “you’ll get over him, just like the others. You always do.”

Lily sighed, “I know. I know I can but knowing that doesn’t make what I’m going through right now any easier.”

*

The next day Lily didn’t wake up until noon. Her calves hurt from all the climbing the day before. Well, at least she had gotten some exercise. She’d been trying to get back into the gym for weeks but chickened out, or was too busy, or her period came. Today her legs hurt. Her back hurt. Her heart hurt, everything hurt. She turned over on her side so that she faced her T.V. She turned it on. Channel surfing quickly bored her and she went across the hall to the bathroom. When she came out she heard her father in the kitchen. Instantly, she became annoyed.

Her family was famous for not leaving her alone. Her brother always asked to borrow her car after he’d crashed his third. After having an almost scathing talk with her mother, he never asked again. So now her mother asked for rides into work. Work. If she didn’t find enough distractions, her mind would slip and it would start all over again.

Loud banging from the kitchen made her groan loudly and turn the volume on her T.V. up. Please don’t be making food for me, please. Her father was in the habit, since he was retired, to ‘help’ everyone in the house. Except, the kind of help he offered was not the kind anyone needed. They were all adults in this house capable of taking care of themselves but for some reason her father had forgotten this. Not that she and her family weren’t grateful for the thought but when it happens every single day, in combination to other repetitive actions, it can get on anyone’s nerves. Both her and her mother agreed he needed a hobby or part time job because he was driving everyone crazy.

Lily heard him sit back down in his chair in the living room, it was too early for dinner anyway, besides her mom wasn’t home yet either.

She laid spread eagle on her bed, propping herself up with her extra pillows and numerous stuffed animals. That was an obsession that needed to stop, she had way too many things in her tiny room but she couldn’t say no to another cute little alpaca or llama stuffed animal. As she lay there absently stroking the alpacas head she became a channel surfing zombie. How many channels did she have to go through before she found some-

She gasped. “I can’t believe this is on! It’s been forever.”

Hugging the neck of the alpaca tightly and squirming she looked to her poster. It was one of her crushes, “And it’s just beginning too!”

The opening scene was pretty brutal but she was used to it by now. She watched as Gary Oldman’s character gunned down the family in the ratty apartment. He was so young in this one, it was the first movie she’d ever seen him in and she’d fallen in love. Lily had always had a thing for older men and bad guys. He ticked both boxes and boy was he bad in this, utterly despicable.

It was also the first time she’d seen Jean Reno and Natalie Portman. Jean was pretty good looking too she’d thought. She knew she would cry at the end of this movie, always did. It was nostalgia. This was a pretty old one. She didn’t remember when she’d first seen it but knew she was young. As she watched Natalie Portman’s character ringing Jean Reno’s character’s door bell she remembered that she’d watched it with her parents. Her parents had not only let her watch this at a young age but they had watched it with her.

When it ended that damned song came on. She loved it but always cried when she heard it, especially if she had been watching the movie. Lily watched as Natalie Portman’s character sat looking at her love’s potted plant that she had just planted after he’d been killed. Her vision blurred and she hurriedly switched off the T.V., tossing the remote across her bed. She brought her hand to her mouth trying to cover her choking sobs. I’ll never see him again. I shouldn’t have watched this movie, it was bound to upset me.

Lily let her hand drop as she leaned across her bed and snatched a tissue, or tried to. The damned box was new and the tissue got stuck resulting in her bringing the box with her. After wrestling a minute with it she threw it across her room in rage.

“FUCK! God DAMN it!”

The tissue box landed with a dull thud. She shoved the surviving tissue into her eyes and let loose. She felt like a child; hiccuping and choking, while blubbering with snot running out of her nose.

Lily would have to face it tomorrow, he wouldn’t be there. No matter how many times she looked down the hallway where his office was, she wouldn’t see him emerging or trying to get in by jamming his key in the lock. She wouldn’t hear his voice on the walkie and he wouldn’t come by, give her that knowing smile and say ‘hey kiddo’. He would never do those things again and she would have to face it.

Looking at her miserable reflection in the T.V. she realized she’d have to face the whispers too. Everyone at work knew how she felt about him, he knew, and she didn't hide it. Lily didn’t believe in hiding affections any longer. She was too old and life too short. Also, she wasn’t very good at it anyway. Lily had always been a very blunt girl, so now she was a very blunt woman who refused to conform to anyone’s expectations. He’d told her once that was one of the qualities that endeared her to him.

She knew she wouldn’t be able to keep her emotions in check if she didn’t have distractions or if someone asked her how she was doing. Even if someone mentioned his name, or if she knew they were talking about the meeting where he told everyone. God forbid if she was doing something that reminded her of him.

Of course, she knew all this was coming because she’d gone through it before, twice. She knew what to expect but that didn’t mean she wanted to have to go through it again. It was like she told Colin yesterday, she wanted to skip ahead to the time when she knew she’d be okay.

That night she cried herself to sleep thinking about all the things he did for her and how he made her feel knowing full well that it would never be the same again.

*

Lily had been on autopilot that morning. She didn’t listen to her Ipod while she got ready in the bathroom like she usually did. She stared straight ahead in the mirror while brushing her teeth instead of facing away like she usually did so that toothpaste debris wouldn’t land on the mirror. She didn’t even straighten her short blonde hair though she’d slept on it wrong and it was sticking out at odd angles. She just didn’t care this morning.

She sat in her little Toyota wiping her eyes as she remembered how he would have driven past her car by now waving at her and smiling that boyish smile.

Her face started to flush, her eyes began to water, then she remembered.

Tim. She had gotten over Tim after three straight weeks of spontaneous crying. She would still love him, always love him. Both of them. All of them. But she knew the pain would lessen with time plus Ed did tell her to text him whenever she missed him. She would do that.

Smiling to herself, Lily got out of her car and headed to work knowing that she could bother the hell out of him just like before, even if he wasn’t there.