Chapter Twenty One

Ruby observed Charlie and Joey with caution. Both women looked very serious and the thirteen year old dared not hope that they were about to tell her they were back together. When neither of them spoke, she couldn't keep silent.

"What's wrong?" she asked. "Why are you both looking so serious?"

"There's um... there's some stuff we need to tell you," Joey began.

She glanced at Charlie, who looked rather unwell. Silently she pleaded with Joey to change her mind but knew it was fruitless. Taking a deep breath, Charlie attempted to explain.

"Ruby, the thing is that... that, um... that I didn't tell you everything about myself when I first arrived here," she ventured.

"Well, of course you didn't," Ruby said. "You can't possibly tell anyone every single thing about yourself as soon as you meet them. That's why you spend more time with them..."

Joey and Charlie exchanged glances.

"I kept something pretty big from you," Charlie admitted.

She glanced at Joey again, who tried to look encouraging.

"What?" Ruby asked. "Because you guys are starting to freak me out here."

Charlie swallowed and took another deep breath.

"I'm your mother," she blurted out.

Ruby just stared at her.

"Excuse me?" she finally said.

"I'm your mother," Charlie repeated.

"Yeah, I heard what you said, it just doesn't make any sense," Ruby snapped.

Joey chewed her lip, wondering if this had been a good idea after all. Maybe she'd got all of this wrong from the start.

"Charlie, she needs more of an explanation than that," she said gently.

Charlie nodded.

"I um... I didn't have all that much choice about giving you away," she ventured. "I loved you so much but it wasn't... well, the circumstances..."

She sighed, starting to panic. Ruby's eyes narrowed as she hung onto her every word.

"I um... I moved here because I was looking for you."

"Why?" Ruby asked. "You obviously didn't want to know me when I was a baby."

"I did," Charlie said, trying not to sound too desperate. "I loved you but..."

"But what?"

"I was still a child myself," Charlie explained. "I wasn't old enough to give you a proper start in life. I was trying to do right by you."

"How could abandoning me be doing the right thing?" Ruby asked incredulously. "I mean, I know I ended up with a good family but it took quite a while to get there, Charlie. You dumped me and sent me off into a scary world. I was in hell before I came here."

"I was assured that you'd be looked after by a loving family," Charlie said. "I didn't know you'd get passed around first. I didn't know what was going to happen."

"Well, you know what?" Ruby said, her eyes dark. "The way to keep control of what happens to your child is to keep her, grow up and be her mother!"

Charlie chewed her lip, willing herself not to cry. She jumped when Ruby leapt to her feet. The teenager turned to Joey.

"How long have you known about this?" she demanded.

"A few weeks," Joey admitted. "That's why... that's why Charlie and I broke up."

"Then you've betrayed me too," Ruby accused.

Joey stood and attempted to reach out to her sister but she was rudely rejected. With tears in her eyes, Ruby stormed up to her room and slammed the door. Joey stood, motionless in the lounge. Charlie sank back in her seat and closed her eyes. Tears began to flow.

"I told you this was a bad idea," she said bitterly.

"None of this is my fault," Joey snapped, storming into the back garden.

It had been a couple of days and life in the Collins household had been muted to say the least. Joey had tried several times to talk things through with Ruby but for the first time in her life, the teenager had no interest in anything she had to say. Similarly, Joey hadn't spoken to Charlie. She'd seen her a few times, floating round town like a ghost but far from the happy ending Joey had dared to hope for, it felt like their world was ending.

Over dinner that evening, Joey attempted to talk her sister round.

"Ruby, I know you're upset," she ventured.

"Upset doesn't cover it," Ruby told her, focussing on her food.

"But you must have a lot of questions," Joey said, ploughing on regardless. "If you want, I can call Charlie and we could all sit down together. We could try to work through this."

"I don't want to work through it," Ruby told her. "Charlie is a lying bitch. And you're just as bad as her."

Joey struggled not to feel desperately wounded. They continued eating in silence.

"Why did you break up with her?" Ruby finally asked.

"Because I felt the same way you did," Joey admitted. "I thought that she'd used me to get to you. I thought all of the things that are probably running through your mind right now. But then I sat down with her and she told me the whole truth. And I started to understand why she did the things that she did."

Ruby chewed her lip.

"What's the whole truth?" she asked cautiously.

"Charlie needs to be the one to tell you that," Joey replied.

"Can you just tell me if she gave me up because she hated me?" Ruby asked, tears brimming in the corners of her eyes.

Joey reached across the table and held her hand.

"No," she said honestly. "She loved you. She always has."

"One of the reasons I've been afraid of finding out who my parents are, is that maybe they saw something bad in me," Ruby admitted.

Joey was surprised. She thought Ruby had told her everything about her anxieties on this particular subject. Obviously, she hadn't.

"That's definitely not true," Joey said. "There is nothing bad in you, Ruby. You're amazing. I genuinely believe that Charlie was trying to do right by you."

Ruby sighed heavily. She squeezed Joey's hand and then wiped her eyes.

"Call her," she finally said. "If all of this is real, if she actually is my Mum then I need answers. But please don't think that I'm going to welcome her into my life. If you choose her over me, Joey, you've lost me for good."

Next time… Charlie, Joey and Ruby talk things through…