Ruby Gloom: Fashion Without Passion
Author's Note and Summary: This is my first story ever. Please review and tell me how I can improve! :D
I do not own Ruby Gloom. There, simple and neat, no more words to describe the terrible fact I have no control over the aforementioned awesome show.
In order to help Misery, Ruby has to model for an upcoming fashion show and win it but is the happiest girl in the world comfortable to be the happiest girl on the runway?
The transformation from scattered, old, abandoned items on Ruby's table into something that people could actually hold and exclaim the beauty of it all was something she loved to do. One of the basic things about being human— even if you were the only human in Gloomsville— was to use hands. The first thing she learnt was to grasp and tug onto her father's long beard. The perky redhead later discovered that she loved the acute sense of satisfaction that came with creating simple things out of scrap objects and forgotten things lying about. Out of the tissue paper that wrapped cut flowers, she could make paper flowers bound in floral wire— a small echo of the living things it once nestled in its arms for Misery so she could admire the beauty of the flora without her allergies kicking in (though the unlucky girl often got a paper cut just by touching them). Out of armfuls of tulle and leftover Yam Ween lights, she could make a night lamp for Scaredy Bat to greet the Boogeyman at night. In a way, she was rewriting— or rewiring— the stories and histories of the unique items she made. However, the perky goth knew that you should go changing only when you want to change. She learnt that particular lesson after a particular incident.
In the centre of Weeper's Gulch, the largest vale in Gloomsville, quite some distance away, was a wizened oak tree. Its gnarled and hoary girth laid under a tangled old man's beard of leaf and bough while the serrated Morose Mountains loomed in the -legged sheep gamboled and frolicked with each other in feigned merry innocence as the happiest girl in the world worked on her latest project. One of her favorite things to do was to bind books, to make notebooks out of sheaves of loose paper, some recycled cardboard, a little thread, a little glue. The texture of the fresh paper in her hands, the repetitive, consuming movement of the thread weaving in and out of the pierced holes; the choice of color and pattern for the cover and the binding; the way she could customize each book she made by deciding what kind and weight of paper she used. Currently, she was conjuring up a zebra-print fabric notebook for a certain adrenaline junkie of a cyclops who wanted a special place to keep the photos she took in Africa, particularly taming the vicious beast dubbed as 'laundry'.
"Ah what a perfect day." She sighed to herself, marveling the autumn landscape.
Suddenly, the sky was as dark as the devil's soul, the clouds were onyx-black and glared down balefully at Gloomsville. Like a tightening noose, the sky seemed to be coiling in on itself, purring with a suppressed rage. A distant rumbling, much like the sound of an avalanche, echoed in the air. The world became cellar-dark and the buckling, heaving sky looked fit to collapse down on top of Ruby though she doubted it would do so. Then there was an explosion like a sonic boom and the rain came. It was not the nectar-of-the-gods type rain beloved of all those wandering adventurers lost in the desert. It was icy, stinging nails of rain that seemed to strip the skin and shrink the soul. Then the hailstones came. They were bone-white and as big as baseballs, bombarding everything with their spite and Ruby quickly whistled with two fingers and herded the sheep back to their farmhouse.
"What do you know? Thunder and rain! This is such a great day!" Ruby giggled to herself, briefly assisting a spider to its web.
A clanking sound was then heard from the sky. It was if a huge anvil was being dragged across the vault of heaven against its will. Branched lightning lit up the Stygian sky. They were like liquid, golden ore streaks that were being moulded and forged into forks above the redhead. Buzzing and hissing, they trembled with the anger of being shackled to the sky since time began. A single vein of lightning, large and fearsome, blazed out in the sky. Writhing and wriggling with the pain of its existence, it flashed once, glossy and polished, like a cold, gold prong of the Apocalypse.
Then it hit something or more like someone. There was nothing friendly about the terrawatts of violence it unleashed but she and a particular banshee considered it to be Nature's megawatt smile. Apparently, Mother Nature flashed the aforementioned smile at Misery as lightning struck her square on the head. As if to make things worse, while Ruby rushed towards her in a vain attempt to minimize the damage, Misery was startled by the perky goth's sudden appearance and tripped over the most diminutive rock in the world, which was clearly labeled, rolled down north to Blue Fond Canyon, the lowest point in Gloomsville with a lot of scorpions who were not fond of Misery's blue dress.
"Er Ruby, can you order the lasagna at the hospital whlie Dr Dredrick performs his hundredth operation on me? You know, to mark the special occasion."
Needless to say, Misery had a lot of needles pieced through her once Ruby brought her to the hospital. The nurses simply gawked as Misery told them another one of her unfortunate tale (then again, the fact aloe vera was good enough to heal her wounds naturally and at inhumane speed to point she could be discharged within an hour for an unlucky girl could have also thrown them off).
By the time they savored the lasagna and Ruby had filled out Misery's particulars for her, she found Misery's shoes and pants were soaking wet with soda. Apparently, the vending machine didn't drop a paper cup into the slot. Yet, getting a drink was the furthest thing away from Misery's mind apparently as she murmured into the phone speaker from a nearby phone booth.
"Yes. You still don't need to worry about the bills again, I won a free toaster that was worth a thousand pounds... yes, I have not gained weight.."
Misery apparently reassured a relative while her shoulder bag got tangled in the phone cord, pulling the phone down with a clunk.
"What was that?"
Ruby strained her ears and brain but failed to link a face with the high-pitched, rather nasal voice asking the question from the other line.
"It was just the phone falling."
What Misery did not explain was that when she stooped to pick up the phone, her veil fell off and when she reached for it, she tripped over the cord and was now sitting in a tangled heap on a cushion Ruby had quickly produced to soften the fall.
"Er, well, bye now... Mum.." Misery sighed as she tossed away the phone that just unluckily bounced off the glass panes of the booth and landed on her head. With that last sentence, Ruby was instantly taken aback. Images of her departed loved one began to flow throughout her mind, even as she gently massaged Misery's skull and helped the unfortunate lady get up.
After a minute of awkward silence, Ruby shuffled her feet on the floor, teetering with the temptation to ask hee friend about her conversation. All of a sudden, Ruby's will sunk deep down into her stomach, prompting her to question Misery.
"So…didn't mean to eavesdrop," The plucky teen lied. "But I heard things getting loud even from way over here. Everything cool with you?"
Misery sighed in disgust, "Oh, that. It's nothing to worry about, Ruby. It's just my mom being a royal pain. As usual…"
Unbeknownst to Misery, her words had accidentally touched a sensitive nerve within the redhead. "Really?" Ruby pressed on. "How so?"
"By automatically linking me with disaster."
At that, Ruby felt sympathetic and her earlier discomfort with the topic lessened. She knew every single member in Misery's family tree had terrible luck, Misery being no exception to that trait. Fortunately, her friends were all kindhearted enough to take that in stride as she spent most of the time in a state of detached apathy and with ever-present trails of tears running from her eyes but they all knew her frown was smile upside down.
Lately however, she seemed to be annoyed with the fact she was constantly associated with misfortune. Not only was Misfortune her least favorite aunt, but almost everyone in Gloomsville just dubbed her as the unlucky one. They always turned to her whenever some disaster occurred. She had always loved her bad luck as it was a part of who she was but it was not her only aspect either. Sometimes, it felt as though someone had tied a rubber band around her scarred chest and an anchor to her broken heart. She stumbled through life with a weight on her shoulders, dreading the day she would be forgotten. Once, Ruby had witnessed her weeping uncontrollably in the kitchen after merely spilling a glass of milk, no doubt the result of her recently frazzled nerves. As Misery bent over to pick up the pieces of shattered glass, Ruby placed her hands on her shoulders and steered Misery to her bed of nails. "Don't cry over spilt milk. Have a friend to clean it up."
When Misery crept back to the kitchen, she saw Ruby on her hands and knees, clearing up her mess. Finally, after multiple cuts to her delicate hands, Ruby gripped the counter and groaned as she hauled herself up. It was a good thing Skull Boy had decided he was related to a long line of doctors that day and forsook an early medical scholarship from Havard just to attend to her but when he enquired about the cause of her injuries, Ruby actually successfully fibbed to her crush and best male friend that she just stumbled into a patch of broken glass. While Skull Boy did raise an eyebrow, the only form of hair he had, he did not prod further and she never mentioned that day again. Such uncomplaining love could only come from a friend and Misery knew for a fact that living away from them would make her feel hollow and incomplete. That was the thing however.
What else could she be other than a symbol of pure, rotten bad luck?
She found herself pondering on that huge question as they boarded the trolley home.
Ruby was still comforting and handing tissue paper to a sniffling Misery once they arrived at the manor when further down the hallway they were in, there was a yell, although it was something more of a muffled squeak, followed by a light thump.
And a bang.
And a crash.
Rolling from the closet door that had a now-missing handle was a ball of fur, decorated with a pair of wings and a scarf. Two twitchy eyes could barely be seen from under the quaking wing membranes. Those eyes grew larger when they saw that Misery was about to sneeze, while the rest of the body simultaneously tried to become as small as possible. "Oh dear, oh dear, of dear!" Scaredy Bat shivered.
There was a bracing for impact, but thankfully, it never came. What came instead was a distinct whoosh of air from Ruby quickly covering Misery's mouth with a handkerchief and a shadow that passed over the head of the poor creature on the floor. The ball of fur and fear dared to take a peek in the girls' direction, and relaxed only slightly upon seeing the optimist and the melancholiac. "Ruby and ...Misery? Oh thank goodness. Are you two, ah, alright?"
"I'm fine but Misery just came back from the hospital."
"Oh, that means you must have had your hundredth surgery with Dr Dredrick. Congratulations Misery!"
Instead of gazing upon the young child who was singing her 'praises', the blue Misery saw red. Literarily and figuratively considering she had a very bad case of Nightis Fever. At least it was better than much worse Nightis Fever.
"Is that what everyone thinks of me to be? Just another walking disaster? At least you are known for not being scared of everything but also being sweet and cute!"
As Scaredy dived under the carpets at the fearful sight of an angry Misery, Iris just had to walk in with fuel to fire.. literarily.
"Hey Misery, are you on fire because I need a huge fire pit to jump over!" She whooped, waving the huge bundle of logs that finally came apart and stubbed all of Misery's toes, while catching fire at the same time. While Misery was singing a monotonous chorus of 'Ow's, Skull Boy then entered the room, with cameras and microphones everywhere to the point they might be able to capture anyone's nose hairs and in his best news reporter voice that actually nearly made Ruby swoon, looked directly at an imaginary audience.
"And here live, we have the great Misery whose relatives caused the great Ice Age!"
"NO THEY DID NOT! YOU HAVE NO EVIDENCE!" Misery shrieked before flatly declaring, "besides, sculpted glaciers look pretty."
"Er.. guys... now is not a good time to...!" Ruby attempted to explain the entire flummoxing mess until Poe flapped his feathers into the scene.
"Misery, my feathers are in an absolute mess. Why, I do not suppose you would be willing to drink this entire bottle filled with the Elixir of Hiccuping to hiccup a tornado to get them just right?" Poe requested, aiming his favorite hand-mirror to capture the right amount of candlelight and get his best angle.
As Misery scrunched up her face, Ruby winced,
"Brace yourselves...!"
Then, the dams broke as the banshee wailed her lungs out. Ruby was so caught by surprise that the champion swimmer found herself floundering in a sea of divine-blue quicklime and there was no escape. She screamed, but a burst of bubbles was the only result. Finally, she gave up, sinking. The last thing she felt before she passed out was a strong pair of bony arms, lifting her to the light.
The next thing she remembered was her eyes snapping open, as she coughed the tears out of her lungs. She barely had enough time to take a few wheezing breaths before she was enveloped in a warm, relieved hug from her silent rescuer. He had somehow managed to swim despite his bones pulling him to the depths and losing a couple in the process of hauling her and himself on the floating cameras he had cobbled together which coming loose.
"Oh thank goodness you're ok, Ruby."
Ruby could feel herself turning as red as her hair before quietly thanking him with a small, affectionate smile and holding his hand in appreciation.
"Hang on, what are we? Chopped liver?" Poe rolled his eyes as he, Iris and Scaredy managed to board the 'Skull Cruise' while Scaredy's eyes became dilated with horror,
"CHOPPED?!"
"Poor choice of words, Poe." Iris sighed.
Ruby scanned the area, before noticing Iris still had her foldable spring shoes.
"Great!" She cheered before instructing the cyclops quickly, "Iris, I need you to bounce up and down as fast as you can to create a hole in the hallway!"
"Gee, that sounds dangerous..." Iris hesitated before proceeding to follow the instructions (for once) with a spring in her step and loud exclamations of joy coming from her mouth even as gravity was defied or defied her until a huge hole was created, draining all of the tears. By then, Misery had also stopped bawling her eyes out until a flyer landed on her face and despite the weird proximity, Misery somehow managed to read it;
Miss Gloomsville Contest!
Do you think you have what it takes to WIN the title? Girls, sign up now!
The Prize: A good reason to feel good about yourself and a cruise to the Scaribean Sea for models and for the mentors of model, a chance to show you can do something right and a free toaster!
(Only FIVE will be able to compete)
And suddenly, a tiny lamp appeared above her head, burning a small portion of the paper.
"Let me get this straight... you're going to model?" Frank cocked an eyebrow. Even when the rockers were busy tuning their guitars, their music was strangely not loud enough to drown out the wailing and after some time, they finally got a coherent retelling from Poe but admittedly dull compared to Iris' exaggerated tale.
"Oh hex, no! I'm allergic to make-up and certain fabrics. Besides, I want to be the fearless mentor who will not tolerate anything and I strive for the best as I helps the most beautiful girl in Gloomsville be known as the most beautiful MODEL in Gloomsville!"
By then, with Misery's megawatt smile, all of the lamps had shattered but one— a huge white spotlight and she aimed directly at Ruby who was snapping one of Skull Boy's metatarsals back into place in one of his windows while he fixed Iris' springs. It took the aforementioned metatarsal poking her to make Ruby realize Misery's idea.
Within two years, Ruby had grown from an awkward prepubescent child into a graceful and mature young woman, with a twine-thin sculpted figure and a tapered waist. A pair of arched eyebrows looked down on sweeping eyelashes while her delicate seashell ears framed a button nose. Her hair was as emollient as eiderdown and was like a loom of molten-lava. It swooped past her ethereal neck, framing her flawless face, save for the few freckles that were splashed across but somehow made her two jet stones slumbering in milky pools alive. They were a-smolder with joy and had a hypnotic quality to them, gleaming with an unearthly quality above her concave cheekbones and they shone with the faraway look of a star gazer. Her smile glowed with not only her fluorescent, archangel-white teeth but also the pure happiness she often radiated. All the boys went crazy to be with her and all the girls went crazy to be her. It was no surprise that Misery wanted her but Ruby had always been oblivious to the attention she attracted evident when she said,
"Misery, I'm super flattered that you actually think of me as a model but the thing is, I'm not a model. I don't really have lot of admirers of my looks." Ruby, not even batting an eye at the werewolf who wolf-whistled at the gorgeous girl until Skull Boy threw an axe at him, narrowly missing the target by a fur strand.
"Huh, guess I'm not related to a long line of Vikings after all." The skeleton murmured, disappointed that he had failed once again in finding his genealogy. The animal yelped and gave a pitiful whine before Iris barked at him,
"For the love of... look Luke and other boys behind him...," The cyclops paused to gawk at the sheer number of males lined up just to witness the sight of Ruby, "she is NOT interested!"
"Yeah, let it go!" Frank huffed before realization dawned upon him as his brother's eyes suddenly became dilated with giddiness and a renewed vigor only one song in the world could have triggered. And the blue lead guitarist had just said the name in front of the green lead guitarist.
"LET IT GO, LET IT GO!" While it was difficult sharing the same body, especially with Len's cluelessness to major details, two heads were better than one and Frank and LEN made a perfect team so Frank eventually couldn't resist joining in after a chuckle at LEN pretending to be shooting snowflakes,
"I'm one with the wind and sky!"
"Exactly, I won't be the girl just known to have just stubbed her toe in the kitchen, or rescued from an ice-flow or the one sleeping in a bed of nails anymore."
"Misery, while I'm glad you're trying out something new... but nobody has ever thought of you that way. You are a true friend and an important part of our world, I've never anyone so loyal."
As Ruby was adding her two cents' worth however, Misery pulled up the site on her eekPhone, went to the Special Events page, clicked on Miss Gloomsville, and signed her up. After a few seconds, it beeped. The screen read:
Sign-up successful. Contestant #1: RUBY GLOOM