Save Me
Chapter 4 – Family Ties
Ruth felt distinctly uncomfortable as she settled herself in the booth with the rest of the gang. This was so not her idea of fun. She looked around nervously as Adam announced it was his round causing a chorus of cheers from her work mates. As he took their orders she asked she wanted a coke ignoring the comment from Jeff about letting her hair down and lent back in her seat observing the conversation of her colleagues.
Jeff and Dixie were bickering like a married couple, Tess, Big Mac and Jess were chatting amicably with Charlie whilst Kelsey and Zoe was laughing at something that Jay had just said. Her bright blue eyes met the chocolate brown eyes of the curly haired nurse for a second and she immediately looked over at the bar and focused on Adam who was picking up a tray containing all their drinks.
As he returned everyone's attention fell on the friendly doctor handing out drinks. Ruth accepted her coke and sipped on it watching as he squeezed into his seat between Jess and Tess.
How did this all come so naturally to them all? She felt totally uncomfortable sat here amongst her colleagues in a non-professional setting, more so as that setting was the pub, a place she had never enjoyed visiting.
As a child her father would often spend his evenings down the pub near the estate, the majority of the time he would stagger in the house waking everyone inside at one or two in the morning. Ruth would often wake to his heavy footsteps or loud yells or sometimes a bang as he threw her mother across the small apartment. She had always believed the pub to be a bad place from as long as she could remember because her father always came back in such a state. Her early visits to the pub her dad practically lived in did nothing to dispel her opinion of pubs. Depending on how her mother was feeling Ruth would sometimes find herself and her brother being dragged by her mother down to the pub, either to yell at her father because he hadn't been home in days or for a family night out. Even those so called family nights out did nothing to make the place better in her eyes because she couldn't remember a single night in the pub that hadn't ended in an argument.
Ruth's eyes darted around the pub eyeing up its occupants. This particular pub did seem to attract a different cliental than the one on the edge of the estate but there were still a few shady looking old men leaning over their pints in much the same way as her father used too.
Her attention turned back to the group as Charlie asked her opinion on something obviously trying to draw her in to the group conversation. She shrugged a little and politely agreed her eyes now flicking around the group once more as the conversation continued. She focused on Jay once more, how did someone who had barely been working in the department a week already fit in with the group when she had been working there for over a year?
Ruth sighed slightly and took a long gulp of her drink. This was going to be a long night.
An hour and a half later Ruth decided that she had been polite long enough. To be fair she had begun to relax a little as the night went on and had even been able to join in the conversation a little, it didn't make the whole situation feel less awkward though.
"I'm going to head off." She announced quietly
"So soon?" Adam smiled
"There's a few journals I want to check out before bed…" She lied
"If we only had the inclination to study as much as you!" Adam joked slightly "It was nice of you to join us." He added with a small sincere smile
Ruth blushed at the compliment as a couple of the others agreed with Adam's statement whilst she stood up.
She left the pub to a chorus of 'see you tomorrow' from her colleagues. She felt a little smile creep across her face .It had been uncomfortable but Nick had been right coming out for a drink hadn't hurt and she had learnt more about her colleagues than she did over a patient, she actually felt like she might be part of a team not just a junior doctor trying her hardest to get into the career she had chosen.
She wandered away from the pub. Although this wasn't the pub her father had always drunk at she still had to walk past the edge of the old estate in order to get back to Maggie's as she walked past the imposing buildings she couldn't help but look up transfixed counting the windows to work out which was the flat from her childhood that still sometimes haunted her nightmares. It made her feel even more uncomfortable as she passed the pub from her memories. The whole place gave her the creeps she decided as the haunting memories of her childhood flashed before her eyes.
Quickening her pace slightly Ruth decided to just get out of their as fast as she could but as she neared the edge of the estate and began to catch her breath she froze as she spotted a figure directly ahead of her stumbling down the pathway towards the pub a few feet back. An awfully familiar figure. She tried to convince her feet to move but they seem to have become glued to the spot as the grey hair became clearer and clearer. She held her breath hoping he wouldn't recognise her, that he'd just walk past her without a second glance but her luck wasn't in. He paused, swaying slightly on the spot. Ruth could smell the stench of stale beer a mile off.
"Ruthie?" She shuddered at the old nickname
"Dad." She greeted him coldly trying to not show her fear as he stepped closer despite the fact her heart was pounding in her chest.
"Right I'm going to love you all and leave you." Jay announced as he watched Tess and Big Mac leaving, after Ruth had gone a few of the others had begun to call it a night as he watched the door close behind Tess and Big Mac Jay made the snap decision to head on to a club.
"Better offer?" Zoe laughed as Jay pulled on his coat and checked his phone.
"Time for a bit more excitement, there's a pint in a club with my name on it!" He winked
"And some poor girl's bed…" Kelsey laughed and Jay felt his cheeks flush slightly. Did his new colleagues already have him pegged as such a womaniser?
"Sorry Kelsey got no plans of sharing your bed tonight!" He retorted cheekily waving off her previous remark "Later guys."
There was a chorus of goodbyes as he made his way towards the exit of the pub. He loved hanging out with the gang already, they were such a good bunch but he was craving a pint in somewhere a bit louder and possibly a dance or two with some decent looking ladies.
He paused as his path split two ways, the short cut to town towards the edge of the estate or the long way to town through the suburbs, he usually avoided the estate areas after dark, his Nan had always said they were unsafe and full of unsavoury characters. He didn't; fancy getting mugged just for walking past a few buildings. He looked up at the darkening sky, the sun had only just begun to set and the long route was not feeling at all enticing. He made the snap decision and turned towards the estate deciding to take his chances.
"What you doing round 'ere?" he said in a semi threatening tone "Thought the estate wasn't good enough for you these days!"
"I'm just walking home." Ruth said truthfully "I don't want any trouble… I'm just going to…"
"Going to what?" He stepped closer, Ruth could smell the beer on his breath and she instantly shut her eyes expecting him to grab her or strike her. When he didn't she opened one eye warily to see him sneering unpleasantly.
"Go home…" Ruth tried to suggest
"Not even got five minutes for a conversation with your dad?" He responded instantly "Always were a cold fish weren't you! Can't even look me in the eyes can you?" He grabbed her face and pushed her chin up to try and force her to look in his eyes grey met blue and Ruth flinched. "Stuck up brat. Don't know where you got it from, Jon might be in prison but at least he doesn't pretend is family doesn't exist!"
He let go and Ruth could see the drunken anger in his eyes. She knew what was coming next before the fist even met with her stomach, before a familiar dull pain spread through her body.
Jay glanced around himself wearily as he wandered, hands in pockets, towards the estate. He looked up at the towering flats, glad he had never had to spend much time around this area of Holby. He felt sorry for a moment the paramedics who seemed to always be being dragged over here for emergency calls, real or fake.
He quickened his pace and kept his head down as he passed a grubby looking pub. Suddenly his head flew up as he spotted movement ahead. Two people fighting. He stepped closer warily neither seem to have noticed his presence, at first he could only see shadows and figured it was two men but as he drew closer he realised it was an older man towering over the figure of a girl.
Jay didn't want to get caught up in something but he couldn't just stand by and watch some girl get attacked by an older man. He took a deep breath.
"Leave her alone." He stepped up grabbing the man's arm firmly with his hand he looked into the cold grey eyes of the girl's attacker
"And you are?" he immediately challenged Jay
"I'll call the police." Jay said bravely
"She's not worth it anyway." He hissed his breath stank of beer and his eyes were blood shot. Jay fixed him with a glare. "Later Ruthie." As the man staggered off towards the pub Jay looked down his heart leaping slightly as he heard the name 'Ruthie', Ruth? He looked down to see the familiar face of Ruth staring up at him a little blood trickling from the edge of her mouth.
"Ruth?"
She stood up ignoring his questioning tone as he said her name
"You ok?"
"Just fine." She managed to spit out shooting him one of her familiar glares
"What on earth was that?" Jay asked as he looked between the retreating back of the older gentleman and his colleague
"That?" Ruth said straightening her coat slightly and looking up into his eyes. "That was my family." She replied bluntly before hurrying off as fast as she could towards her flat fighting back tears leaving Jay stood watching her go rooted to the spot unsure what he should do.
