Joseph

 

 

 

I check the time once we’re done eating our food, and I‘m relieved to see that I still have a few minutes before I have to get on my way to Boston.

Time has flown by while we were sitting here eating together. We have been downstairs for more than an hour, but it didn’t feel like any time had passed at all. Talking to her comes so easily to me, it feels natural, right. I shouldn’t be surprised to learn what I did about her family‘s past. No girl ends up as an escort if she grew up in a healthy family environment. There’s always something wrong with them, and just like in her case, it’s most often the father to blame.

I guess the same could be said about me, but I refrain from blaming my father for anything that I’ve done or who I’ve become. He doesn’t deserve the attention. He hasn’t even earned the right to be blamed for my misdeeds.

I pour us another coffee, not ready to return Ruby to her room upstairs. This will be an exception. I won’t bring her downstairs again because it would be a stupid thing for me to do. But since it’s just this one time, I might as well make the most of it.

She’s holding on to her coffee mug, looking so innocent, almost too prim and proper in the outfit I gave her to wear, and it’s hard to believe she’s a prostitute. She strikes me as too smart and timid for that profession. I wonder what was really behind it.

Maybe she’s in trouble? A good girl who made a bad decision, or somehow got caught up in some kind of shady business and now owes a bunch of money to some bad people, perhaps?

Or maybe she simply enjoys it, though knowing her as I do, I can’t believe that.

I would love to ask her, but that would be such a big breach. We can talk about our families, but not about her real job, and definitely not about the reason why she’s here.

“There’s something else I’m curious about,” she says, casting me a cautious look.

“I’m not surprised to hear that,” I say, leaning back in my chair, as I beckon her to continue speaking. “What is it?”

“Your tattoos,” she says. “They are quite… peculiar.”

I smile to myself. “That’s an interesting word for it.”

“What do they mean?” she adds. “I mean, why did you get those particular ones?”

I hesitate, looking at her as I contemplate my answer. The truth may scare her, and it would tell her a lot more about me, and I’m not sure that I want to share. I’d rather say nothing than to lie to her.

“They remind me of something,” I say, deliberately being vague in my answer. “Or rather of someone.”

“Your father?” she guesses.

I snort.

“Fuck no,” I say. “He doesn’t deserve to be remembered.”

“Well, who then?” Ruby presses, leaning forward with interest.

“Myself,” I tell her. “They remind me of the person I used to be but no longer want to be.”

Her eyes flicker with anxious fascination. “What kind of person?”

“An angry person, very angry,” I reply. “I was an angry child, and I wasn’t very good at handling my emotions. I let it out on other people.”

“So you beat up other kids?”

“Yes, a lot,” I confirm. “I constantly was getting into trouble, and I wasn’t shy about using my fists. I’ve always been tall and strong, and I used it to my advantage. I did some real damage.”

That’s the understatement of the year, but she doesn’t need to hear the entire truth. She doesn’t need to know that I almost killed another boy when I was sixteen. She doesn’t need to know that I robbed him of his ability to walk for the rest of his life, and she doesn’t need to know that I took out an eye from another kid shortly before that. Those two were only the tip of the iceberg, but they were also the last ones.

I will never get those images out of my head, no matter how hard I try. They will haunt me forever. The boy, lying on the floor before me in a puddle of his own blood, motionless, so badly ravaged that I wasn’t the only one who thought he was dead. He survived, his life was changed forever, while I continue to walk the Earth being able to use both of my legs. No amount of money that my family paid out to him will ever make up for the fact that he will never walk again. He can’t forget about that day, and when I - with the help of my grandfather - decided to make a change in my life, I wanted to make sure that I could never forget about it either.

The marks on my skin resemble the scars left on my victims. They aren’t pretty, and they don’t look anything like the kinds of tattoo men usually get, but they serve a purpose. They aren’t designed to be vain decorations, but rather to help me never to forget.

“So you really hurt people?” she asks, her voice tight and concerned.

I nod. “Yes, I really hurt people.”

Ruby’s eyes are locked on me, observing me. I can see her mind working, processing what I just explained. She doesn’t look scared, but only because she’s working so hard at hiding it.

“I don’t anymore,” I tell her. “And I would never hurt you.”

She takes a deep breath, relaxing her shoulders a little.

“I want to believe that,” she says, sounding anything but convinced.

Seeing her like this drives me insane. That real and raw fear pervading her entire being. She’s too good of an actress - or too tricked into thinking that all of this is real. I don’t want her to feel this way, not like this. It fucking bothers me.

“You can trust me on that,” I tell her, reaching for her hand on the table. She doesn’t flinch, but welcomes my touch as a reassurance, intertwining her fingers with mine as she smiles at me.

“I have no choice, do I?” she says.

The smile on her face is lined with sadness. I wish she wouldn’t look at me like that.

“Will you let me clear the table?” she asks, nodding toward the dishes in front of us.

I raise an eyebrow at her. “Why?”

“I would like to,” she says, shrugging. “I haven’t done anything since I… got here. I’d like to be useful.”

“You are useful to me,” I tell her. “Very much so.”

The blush that rises on her cheeks is so much more appealing than her frightened sorrow from before.

“Alright, if it makes you happy, clear the table,” I say.

Ruby smiles as she gets up from her seat, gathering our plates and carrying them over to the kitchen as my eyes follow her. She knows that I’m watching her, and she makes sure to move her hips in a way that emphasizes her round ass in those tight jeans I bought for her. I knew she’d look delicious in them.

She deliberately bends over, taunting me by poking her ass out as she places the dishes on the counter top. The effect it has on me is clearly visible in my crotch. I rub across the hardness between my legs, checking my watch one more time.

“You said you wanted to be useful,” I say, as I get up from my chair to follow her to where she’s standing in the kitchen.

She turns around to face me, a mischievous smirk brightening her pretty face when she sees me unbuckling my belt.