A/N: A great big thankyou to everyone who reviewed - really. It's nice to know that some of the people reading are actually enjoying this story.

Leon stood in the doorway, watching Ruby throw clothes all over the room as she muttered to herself.

"Ruby, come on.."

She scoffed, holding up a silver bikini. Seemingly satisfied that was what she was looking for, she shrugged out of her robe. She knew Leon was still standing there watching her, but she couldn't bring herself to care. He knew her inside and out in the most literal sense anyway so what was the point of hiding herself from him.

"Go home, Leon." She mumbled, stepping into the bikini bottoms. Her hair hung around her face in messy waves, tousled from her running her fingers through it out of frustration. "I don't want to talk to you."

"Ruby come on – don't act like a child."

She laughed humourlessly. "Leon I am a child – Or I may as well be the way you treat me." Out of the corner of her eye she saw him flinch and felt a flicker of pride. She'd hit a nerve.

"You're not a child, Ruby."

She smirked, angrily tying the straps on her bikini top. "Of course not!" She spat. "You wouldn't fuck a kid, otherwise you'd be sniffing around that stupid little whore, Marissa by now."

He was growing frustrated, she could see it in his posture as she moved about the room, gathering some things to change into after she'd been swimming.

"Goddamn it Ruby! Will you just stop!" He made a grab for her arm.

She jerked away. "Go home, Leon!" she shouted. "I don't want to talk to a person who thinks I'm good enough to fuck but too low to be friends with!"

Leon's eyes flickered with rage. "Now that's a lie and you fucking know it!"

Ruby stopped, her shirt clutched tightly in her hand. She fought the tears that were pushing to the surface.

"No it's not, Le… All I'm good for is a roll in the sack to you. I thought we could be friends – I've tried being your friend, but you want none of it!"

"That's not true, Ruby! Will you goddamn listen to yourself?"

She shook her head, stuffing her clothes into the small tote bag she took to the ocean baths with her when they were teaching Cade to swim.

"What the hell am I supposed to think, Leon?" she wouldn't even look at him, "All I know is what happens – you don't tell me anything! Would you have ever told me that you had family somewhere in the country if I hadn't found out by accident?"

He stammered slightly and Ruby cut him off.

"At least you have a family! I spent my entire life in those groups homes, Leon! Every time a family would come to see us kids I would think 'maybe it's my turn today – maybe they'll want to take me home with them' but every single time I was left sitting in the corner while one of the prettier kids were chosen." She threw her hands up in the air. "God knows nobody wanted the weird little red headed kid in the corner! No – she talked too much, was too opinionated – nobody wanted her!"

She tugged on a pair of old sneakers and picked up her bag. "At least you have people who love you, Leon." She muttered as she pushed past him. "Wake up to yourself before you find out how lonely life can really be."

Leon rushed after her down the hall.

"Ruby, please! Come on, girl – I'm sorry!"

She shoved the front door open and walked out into the warm sunlight. "I don't want your pity or apologies, Leon," she called back at him, "I want you out of my house!" She strode toward the cab that was waiting, the one she'd called while Leon was still hunting for his cigarettes and beating up her fridge.

"If you're here when I get back, so help me god, Leon.."

Leon's thick fingers pressed the numbers on his phone slowly, lifting it to his ear once he was sure he'd entered the right amount of numbers. He blinked, the movement exaggerated and slow thanks to the alcohol muddling his brain.

After Ruby had left he had gone back inside, fully intending to leave until he found the bottle of Absinthe on the counter behind the cookie jar. It was there and then that he'd decided to throw caution to the wind and had taken his first sip of the potent alcohol. With every mouthful things became clearer, wounds were made more raw – the guilt got heavier.

As soon as the other end answered Leon sighed. "Hold on a minute," he said to the person on the other end, setting the phone down in his lap so he could pick up the bottle of Absinthe and take a swig. He would have been able to multi-task if it hadn't been for that impulsive fridge beating. Even drunk as he was Leon knew that his wrist was broken. It had ballooned up something horrible.

"Ok – I'm back." He told his sister in law, gazing out at the ocean. Ruby had told him to get out of her house – she never mentioned the nearby beach.

"Leon?"

He nodded, forgetting she couldn't see him in his drunken state. "I'm so sorry.."

He heard her pull up a chair and tell Vince to shush. "What for, baby?"

"I'm a bastard. Why didn't you tell me I was such a jerk?" he demanded. "She hit me and yelled at me and she got upset – and I'm a prick."

Tala sounded more than confused. "Leon have you been drinking?"

"I love him so much, Tala" he sniffled, tears welling in his eyes, "- I love him so much and I'm such a bad father. I try so hard for him."

The burn that spread across the bridge of his nose threatened to smother him and his throat closed up. He coughed, the tears forcing their way out.

"Why did she have to leave me?" he kicked at the sand, crying. "It was all my fault that she died, Tala!"

Tala's voice was shaky. "Leon it wasn't your fault – you never knew this would happen."

He snorted. "That's what she said – I took that from her you know. It wasn't mine to take but she let me anyway." He choked slightly, "So much blood – I never meant to…"

There was a silence on the other end and then Leon heard Tala telling Vince to leave the room so she could talk to him in private.

"Ok, Le – are we talking about Letty or your other friend?"

He blinked rapidly to clear his eyes of the salty moisture. "Nobody knows – I was stuck for almost an hour and he kicked me. Couldn't tell anyone Tala, not without showing them. Two hundred and thirty four stitches."

Her voice had an edge to it now. "You had how many stitches?"

Leon chuckled, eyeing the rapidly decreasing amount of the green alcohol in the bottle. "Ruby said I looked like a puzzle. Puzzle with zippers."

Tala covered her mouth with her hand, leaning on the kitchen table. Her eyes were swimming with tears. So far Leon had claimed he was a bad father, he'd hurt someone accidentally, it was his fault that Letty died and at some point he'd had over two hundred stitches.

"Sweetie, what are you-" she stopped, hearing his sobs. "Oh, Le.."

"She cried! I – I hurt her and she cried… never meant to make her bleed like that. My best friend.."

Tala struggled to make sense of his disjointed speech. She had the vaguest feeling that he was talking about the girl Vince had spoken to that morning. She frowned. Vince had said they were just friends.

"Do you have yourself a girlfriend, Le?"

"She's not my girlfriend," he spat, "-we just fuck. You ask her and she'll tell you." He sounded angry now, a total three sixty from the sobbing mess he'd been minutes ago. "Why didn't you tell me I was such a prick?"

"Would you have honestly believed me?" Tala asked, rubbing her eyes.

He snapped. "Yes!" there was a muted mumbling and she heard a sharp intake of air.

"I broke my wrist."

Tala sat up. "Just now?"

"No, not just now you fucking idiot – this morning when I assaulted the fridge."

"Leon Michael Orello don't you ever speak to me like that again!" She didn't mean to shout at him but his words had shocked her.

"So wrong," he muttered, seemingly ignoring her, " – should be with Let. She's not Let."

Tala got up and walked into the living room, sitting beside Vince. She picked up a pen. "Leon what's Ruby's cell number?"

He spat it out almost automatically in between garbled rambling about stars and chocolate. Tala pushed the paper at Vince and held her hand over the mouthpiece.

"Call her and tell her Leon's broken his wrist and he's completely loaded."

Vince blinked dumbly, then nodded. "Where is he?" He was already reaching for his cell phone.

She listened to him talking to himself for a moment. "Sounds like he's at a beach."