You know that chick you see going into the convenience store when you stop off in that little town on the way to Grandma's house? Sort of shifty lookin' fella who buys a pack of smokes, a couple lotto scratchers and a tallboy at 10:00 in the mornin'? The kind of chick you wait to come out before you and your family go in? Well, that chick's me. My name is Ruby. And if you took the time to really get to know me find out what kind of person I truly am instead of just stereotyping me because of the way I look, well, you'd be wasting your time. Because I'm exactly who you think I am. Hell, I'll pretty much steal anything that isn't nailed down. I wasn't always like that, when I was fifteen I was a good person. What happened? I won't go into details, but my sister, Yang and I had a disagreement that ended up with me knocking her out, stealing everything she owned and selling it all for a plane ticket to Mystral
That was ten years ago, I haven't been in contact with my team, my friends, or Yang the entire time.
I had been stealing everything that wasn't nailed down, up until three weeks ago, when I won the lottery. $100,000. But, in my excitement, I forgot to look both ways when I ran into the street and got hit by a car, losing my ticket.
When I came to, my best friend, Randy went searching for the ticket, but I knew he wouldn't find it. I probably would have been more upset, if I wasn't so doped up. On top of that, my roommate kicked me out. Of my own trailer! Just so her boyfriend and two kids could stay with her. Also, my husband, Earl, divorced me, turns out he had been cheating on me and finally decided that she was better than me.
My roommate, Joy walked into my hospital room. "Ruby, you got a week to get your crap the hell out." She said, speaking with a southern accent.
"Okay!" I said, still doped up.
Now, I've never been much of a complainer, but lyin'in traction that night knowing that I no longer had a home and no longer had a $100,000 lottery ticket well, I think I might have cried if I wasn't afraid of Randy waking up and seeing me.
Then it happened. I was just flipping channels and he came on.
"Forget about me." The man on the screen said. "I wanna know about you. I wanna know about Carson Daily. Every time I see you, you got a beautiful woman on your arm. You got a talk show, you got your own record company. What's your secret?"
"If you must know, uh, I'm Satan." The other man said, earning a laugh from the first. "Seriously," he said. "I've been very blessed. I also believe that what goes around comes around. And that's how I try and live my life.
You do good things and good things happen to you. You do bad things, and it'll come back to haunt you. It's karma."
Karma. There it was. The secret of life coming straight from Carson Daily's lips to my morphine-laced ears.
When they finally released me from the hospital, we checked into a motel. It didn't take Randy long to make friends with the help. It never does.
"How long is your break, Catalina?" He asked.
"I'm on my own schedule for the afternoon." The maid answered.
"Do good things and good things happen to you. Do bad things and it'll come back to haunt you." I said out loud.
"That's deep, Ruby." Randy said.
"I'm talking about Karma."
"Who's Karma? I don't know."
"Something Carson Daily came up with. He says he does good things in life and that's why his life is so great. Got me thinkin'. My life sucks and I ain't ever done anything good in a while."
"Who is this Carson Daly? Is he some sort of spiritual leader? - A holy man?" Catalina asked.
"If I want a better life, I need to be a better person." I said, pulling out my List, and going outside to pick up trash.
"What's this?" Randy asked.
"I made a list of everything bad I've ever done."
"Why?"
"Why? Randy, I just won $100,000 in the lottery, and was immediately hit by a car.
I almost died because somethin' good happened to me that I didn't deserve.
That karma stuff is gonna kill me unless I make up for everything on that list. Number 23- peed in the back of a cop car. I'm no longer proud of that. Number 41 - snatched a kid's Halloween candy when he came to my trailer to trick or treat. That was wrong, and I know that now. Number 102- harmed and possibly killed innocent people with secondhand smoke."
"How are you going to fix these things?"
"Start with the easy ones. Like, um, number 64-Picked on Kenny James. I used to torment the hell out of that poor boy back in school."
"What do you think you're gonna do about it now?"
"Do something nice for him, and then cross him off the list."
"Excuse me." Catalina said. "But if my boss comes back and sees there's no garbage in the parking lot he's gonna get used to it like that. So can you please put it back?"
"No, I can't. Number 136- I've been a litterbug."
"Cross that one off your stupid list." Randy said.
"I can't cross it off the list. Not until I've picked up as much as I littered. And my list isn't stupid either. It's my road map to a better life."
"Well, I hope that road has free gas and free food and a van big enough for us to sleep in 'cause we've just spent our last $45 on this room. And I'm not cuttin' into my beer money for some stupid-ass crusade."
As he said this, my winning lottery ticket floated to my feet. "Son of a bitch." I said. "It's working."
When I went over to the lottery office, they sure made a big fuss. Randy had an idea to get an extra 100,000 out of the deal. But I knew it wasn't gonna work. When they took my picture with the giant check, I was worried that my old friends might see it and track me down? So my eyes were closed.
I wanted to get started on my list as soon as possible, so my life would start gettin' better.
Hell, it was already better. Our new friend Catalina had the day off and nothin'to do so Randy had somethin' pretty to look at.
"Which house belongs to this boy you tortured? That's his parents' house right over there." She said.
"We don't know where Kenny lives now, but Randy'll find out." I said. "Whoa, whoa, whoa.
That's four."
"But I'm still thirsty." Randy said.
"Look, you had four. You can have another one when you come out."
Randy's a pro, so long as he's got the right number of beers in seems to be the magic number. Any more and he starts to get unpredictable. Randy hadn't been inside Kenny's parents' house since we robbed it in high school and all we got was a backpack full of birds.
I could hear the sound of sirens approaching. In case you're wondering how many beers it takes for Randy to get himself into trouble nine seems to be the magic number. Luckily, he got Kenny's address before he pissed off Mr. James.
At first we had a little trouble finding Kenny's house. You see, Randy wrote the address on his hand, and sweated off the last digit during his getaway.
I wasn't proud of the way I treated Kenny. I watched him for a few days and tried to figure out how to make up for all the abuse I put him through. Kenny had a good job as an assistant manager at the Copy Hut a powder blue car he took pride in and the nicest house on the block. But he didn't have anyone to share it with. He was lonely. There was something special missin'in his life that every man needs to feel whole.
"I gotta get him laid." I told the other two.
"What?"
"I made him feel bad his whole childhood.
If I wanna cross him off my list, I gotta make him feel good. A little pleasure to make up for all that pain."
"What kind of woman are you gonna get to have sex with a scrawny little man like that?" Catalina asked.
"Yeah," Randy said. "Don't you need muscles to get laid?"
"Not with Patty, you don't." I said.
Patty wasn't your run-of-the-mill prostitute. She was a daytime hooker. It takes a special kind of woman to sell sexual favors in the light of day. And I was right. Patty doesn't care if a man has muscles. Muscles can't buy Mad Dog.
"Hey, Patty." I said.
"Hey, guys." She said. "Is it Randy's birthday already?"
"No, we got another job for you."
When Patty came out of Kenny's house, not five minutes after we sent her in, I knew something was up. "How'd it go?" I asked.
"He gave me $10 to help baby monkeys."
I knocked on Kenny's door. "You think he'll remember you?" Randy asked.
"Oh God!" Kenny yelled when he saw me.
"Kenny, calm down."
"I have a restraining order against you, Ruby Rose!"
"But that was written on a brown paper bag by the school nurse 20 years ago. Besides, I made you eat it, remember?"
"Yeah, just take whatever you want!"
"All I wanna do is talk!"
"If you're giving stuff away, can I have this?" Randy asked, picking up a CD player.
"Put it down!" I told him.
"But it's a CD player!"
"Put it down! Listen, Kenny. I'm here to help you."
"I don't need your help!"
"Buddy, you just gave up a chance to have free sex with a daytime hooker. You need my help."
"Ruby?" Randy asked.
"Not now! Shut that drawer! Kenny, I'm here to help you find a woman so that you can be happy."
"Ruby, I think you're trying' to sell a cat to a man who fancies dogs." Randy said, holding out a gay porn magazine.
I know this might sound crazy in this day and age but we live in a small town, and I've never been face-to-face with a gay before.
I understand now the runnin' probably wasn't necessary.
"That's it." I said. "Kenny's off the list."
"Isn't that against the rules?" Randy asked.
"The guy was gay. Gay. That's special circumstances. I don't have to help if there's special circumstances. Here. Get us a couple of cheeseburgers from the machine."
I walked into the motel room, to find it trashed, and then I got smacked in the back of the head with a phone by Earl, my ex-husband. "What the hell?!" I asked, as Catalina walked in. "Who's the whore?" Earl asked.
"What did you call me?" Catalina asked.
"She's the maid." I said.
"Did you think I wasn't gonna find out? Damn." He said.
"Look at that. My eyes are closed."
"I want half that lotto money, Ruby."
"And I wanted a husband who didn't cheat on me! But I guess life's full of disappointments, ain't it!"
"I want half that lotto money!" He said as he walked out.
"That's your ex?" Catalina asked.
"Yep. I'd be lying if I said I was gonna miss him."
"What happened?" Randy asked
"Karma."
And I believed it too. Think about it. As soon as I decided not to help Kenny Earl broke into my room and beat me up with a phone. That's when I realized I have to stick to the plan. There are no special circumstances.
I may have made the list, but I do not make the rules. Karma makes the rules. The one-legged girl would have to wait! Kenny had to be first.
When I went back to Kenny's I had to shove the door open. "Stay back!" He told me. "I bought mace!"
"I just wanna talk!"
He went to spray me, but was holding it backwards and sprayed himself.
"How's it feeling now?" I asked.
"Better. Thanks for pinning me down on the ground prying my eyes open and pouring the milk in."
"You steal enough purses you learn a thing or two about mace. Why don't you have a man, Kenny? What? If you like men why don't you, uh, have a man?"
"That's none of your business."
"No it's not."
"Trust me, I don't really wanna know.
It's just you seem lonely.
And I gotta figure out how I'm gonna help you so I can cross you off my list."
"What list?"
"You're number 64. But don't let that fool you.
I'm doin' you first.
You see, Kenny, my life sucks.
And it's because I've been a bad person.
I'm hopin' if I can do some good things then maybe some good things might finally happen to me."
"You're talking about Karma."
"You're a Carson Daily fan too, eh?"
"You're really trying to change? If I don't, I think life's gonna kill me.
I don't have a man because nobody knows I'm gay. You know what this town is like, Ruby. Besides, even if people knew, where am I gonna meet anyone? What about the city?"
"Don't they have special bars for the queers? I'm sorry. Homosexual Mystralians."
"I tried that once, drove an hour and a half just to sit in my car, too scared to go in."
"I'll go with you. Also, if you wanna know my biggest secret, look up my name in the missing persons database."
"You're a missing person?"
"For ten years. I used to go to Beacon."
"Beacon Academy?"
"Yeah, skipped two years to get in after I stopped the White Fang from robbing a dust shop, anyway, let's go."
I didn't wanna be the only non-gay there so luckily, Randy agreed to go as soon as he heard there were gonna be bubbles.
After I hooked Kenny up with a guy, I crossed him off the list. And never underestimate 15 beers a little enlightenment and the power of Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock. Well, one down, 258 to go.