Chapter 2 has arrived! Now we begin Ruby's climb back. I won't spend eons making Ruby suffer just to hammer it home to you guys. Ruby's trek back will not be quick, but it won't be agonizingly slow. Anyways, let's get on with it!
Ruby was not present for Blake's farewell to the rest of their friends. She could not look at Blake. Not out of anger, or sadness, but shame. Shame that Ruby wanted Blake to ignore such a noble calling. One that anybody with a heart of gold would answer in a heartbeat. Ruby thought she would be one of these people. She soundly realized that after saying goodbye to Blake that she was a terrible person. She wanted everything to stay the way it had since she met Blake. She wanted a happy, loving life with Blake. She should've known better. She was a smart woman, but it seemed that having great grades in school did not prepare her for everything she would have to face in adulthood. Her outlook on life had gone from vibrant, to shades of gray.
Soon after coming to this realization, change would come into Ruby's life as if it were a sneaky thief invading her home in the dead of night. It took everything from her and left her with almost nothing. Now she now had to deal with the burden of having less. It started with Weiss. Her best friend. Weiss's father owned a giant tech company in Atlas, responsible for supplying the world with swift and reliable internet, as well as extensive catalogs of data, and information allowing anyone to research anything, and even make a living supplying even more information, and entertainment through the evolving age of the internet. Weiss herself was not a technical girl, but she knew enough, and decided that she would take on the task of learning the company's history as well as its business practices. She would leave only a month after Blake, becoming the ambassador for her father's company.
Juane and Pyrrha had finally gotten together in the final year of high school much to everyone's delight. The two lovebirds were inseparable. Pyrrha was a talented fighter. She spent years training in the gym owned by Ruby's uncle, Qrow, in Patch. She ventured out with the school's fighting team, winning a multitude of notable events and tournaments, gaining fame, and bringing some notoriety to Patch's Beacon Academy. She decided to take her talents to the city of Vale. Along with Juane, the two opened a gym to teach young ones about discipline not just in fighting, but in life. Another noble venture within her friend group. Training the next generation to handle themselves physically, and mentally. Ruby was happy for the two, even if that feeling of selfishness ate away at her. Juane and Pyrrha left 2 months after Weiss.
Ren, and Nora did not travel far. The town was beginning to expand. two new apartment complexes were being built near the center of the city, which housed most of the fun places to go in town. The local public library was seeing an expansion as did Beacon, and Signal academy. A new school was being built near the poorer area of the city, and the community there would see infrastructure improvements that raised their standard of living. Not too far from where Ruby lived was an old, abandoned church. Plans called to have the building dismantled. What replaced it was yet to be determined. Ren, and Nora bravely defended the building from meeting its demise against the local government. They eventually met with Mayor Ozpin to talk about turning the building into an orphanage, and the old man happily agreed. So, Ren, and Nora wouldn't leave her. That did little to lift Ruby's spirits, but she was glad for it. They began repairing the building with some assistance since before Blake left. Finishing the same week Juane and Pyrrha left.
Ruby's own sister, Yang Xiao Long, followed in the footsteps of their parents. Branching out to the rest of the world with money she had saved from doing odds jobs for a decade to do the same thing that made her and Ruby the proud kids of Summer Rose, and Taiyang Xiao Long. She had decided to stay in Remnant, so even if she was miles from Ruby, all she would have to do was hop on her trusted steed, a yellow motorcycle she named 'BumbleBee', and take the long trek back to Patch just to be there for her baby sister if she ever needed it. Not that Ruby would bother her though. By the time Yang's plans to leave had finalized, Ruby had slipped into a horrible state of depression from being unable to combat her own horrible feelings, on top of watching everybody she cared for move along as if life was supposed, and they were right to do so. She just couldn't bring herself to do the same. Yang would leave 5 months after Blake did.
Ruby herself did not do much. She could only watch, and offer little support as the beckoning call of purpose called out to everybody she knew except for herself. Her days were spent lazing around the house, failing to clean up after herself. Early on, after Blake left, she thought she would be able to bury herself in her work. She inherited a tech shop that sold computer parts close to the heart of town after high school. After two months, it felt like she wasn't getting much done. People visited her store less, and less. Whatever maintenance she ran on the shop such as keeping up on inventory, organization, overall clean presentation that she had envisioned for so long felt like there was no longer a point to any of it. She just couldn't bring herself to care about her job. Not when the one person that would give her life purpose wasn't there to support her. The thought made Ruby's headache, and her heart hurt. She closed the shop down after those two months as the world around her began to lose its color. It had been 7 months since then. She had not left the house since. Ren, Nora, and her uncle had all made sure to visit Ruby weekly. Ren, and Nora looked after her, but the three did not speak much when inside Ruby's house. Things quickly became tense between Ruby and Ren. The young man did not like how Ruby had left herself fall to the wayside. It started out with Ren taking to the brick wall that Ruby had become outside of a few, but all it took was one comment about Blake, and Ruby and Ren would get into heated arguments that went nowhere. Nora often had to break them up. Ren would eventually stop coming to Ruby's house. Nora never stopped. She would often tell Ruby that Ren couldn't handle seeing someone who brought so much life to other people lose her own and didn't know how to help. Nora herself didn't know how to help Ruby either, but she refused to let her connection to the woman be severed, even if it was mentally taxing on her alongside running the orphanage.
Uncle Qrow's visits were brief. Ruby remembers yelling at Qrow, telling him to leave her like everyone else did. She remembers breaking down and being held in strong arms for what felt like mere seconds compared to what felt like eons of lonely days and nights. She was positive Nora and Qrow gave up on her. She hadn't heard their voices in long enough to realize it had been a good while since they came.
Ruby found herself awake one night. It was the first day of her birth month, October. She lazily got out of bed, almost crumbling to the floor, but pushed herself up and began a wobbly trek downstairs to her kitchen. The first thing she noticed that a lot of her house was caked in dust, and in disarray. The stories of the very few times her gray sight turned red, signifying that she was mad at the world. Books, and couch cushions not in their rightful places. She could see certain spots of mildew and mold beginning to form on the walls from lack of cleaning and clean air flow. Ruby herself hadn't been close to a mirror in a very long time. She walked into the kitchen to a mess of appliances strung about. Broken fragments of glass, and dishes littered the floor. A drawer almost completely removed from its place, bacteria from what she could only guess was spilled from whatever the hell she was eating, a dirty fridge that she knew better than to open lest her nose be burned by an even worse smell than the one coming from the garbage can that she never threw away. Dishes also piled the sink. Ruby, for the first time in months took a look around. Her eyesight still shades of gray, but even she could see that her situation was absolutely fucked. What the hell happened to her? A sudden burst of sobs left her mouth, and she failed to control herself. She backed up against a wall, letting the tears and sobs go as she bent over slightly, letting her greasy hair drape over her face like curtains. She was not crying because she felt hopeless, she was crying because she had allowed herself to feel that way. As her sobs slowly stopped, she looked up again, a small tinge of red mixing with the grays of her vision. She was mad. She hated the way purpose failed to find its way to her. If it never did, then fuck it. She remembered the pleas from Ren to dig herself out of the hole before it was too late. She remembered Nora crying after telling her that she was still loved, and not to do anything to harm herself. She remembered the words Qrow spoke to her the night she told him to get out of her life.
"I'm not giving up on you, kiddo." She spoke through the hoarseness present in her voice. Right as she finished speaking those words another round of sobs escaped her and she let them. She silently repeated the words to herself. The impact of hearing them at this moment made Ruby feel thankful for the first time in months. Thankful that despite her ways, a few people still cared about her. As her cries came to a stop, she lifted herself up from her hunched over position, standing flat against the wall, her fists balled at her sides. It was going to be extremely hard for her, but she knew she had to do something, and it started with cleaning this place she used to call home. After all, it never gave up on her.
Over the course of the next week, Ruby slowly gathered cleaning supplies, and cleaned one part of the house a day at a time. She started with the downstairs areas. She mopped the floors and swept them free of various debris. Soon the kitchen countertops were clean, the sink spotless, dishes neatly put away, the fridge, and freezer cleaned. Ruby had emptied it out completely and cleaned the walls free from festering bacteria. She even briefly ventured outside, but it was to the back to take out the trash. She was not ready to face the outside world. As Ruby pulled down her face mask she looked around, the spotless area made her feel lighter, but barely. She moved to the living and dining rooms, cleaning dust, and reorganizing everything to their rightful places. As she moved a chair into place at the dinner table, that lighter feeling returned with a small flash. The upstairs area was not at all harder to clean compared to downstairs. Ruby slowly worked her way through every room. Leaving no stone unturned as she cleaned every inch of every room. By week's end, she arrived in her own room. She felt dirty as the air hit her nostrils. She almost gagged on how bad the air flow was, so she left the door open, as well as a window, as she began to methodically clean her room and put her clothes to wash. She finally finished that Friday night, refusing to sit on her bed until after she showered. In her hands was a portrait of all her friends, she was in the middle of the picture, holding up the peace sign next to Blake who simply smiled at the camera. Ruby wished she could see the golden eyes shining through the picture, but her world still lacked the vibrance it once did. She moved the picture away from her face, not daring to ruin this perfect memory with the tears of bad times. She set it down on the drawer across from her bed, then made her way to the bathroom she cleaned the day before. She took a lukewarm shower, allowing the stench of her depression to permeate and still feel the sting of cold water to bring herself to life. After a while she switched to a full cold shower. The sting of cold water hitting her back sent much needed chills up her spine as she felt her body shiver. She hadn't felt this way in a very long time and welcomed it with open arms.
A deep scrubbing along with a fresh pair of clothes later, Ruby sat on her bed, towel still over her head as she looked around. Her room was clean for the first time in a long time, and that lighter feeling hit her in waves. The strong emotion of accomplishment coursed through her. She didn't know how many times she was going to cry this week, but she felt the release of emotional build up to be good for her. She held her hands close to her heart, grabbing at the fabric of her shirt as she let the tears and sobs flow like a dam. Ruby felt a little better, and she was going to do whatever she needed to do to hold onto this feeling for dear life. She drifted off into a dreamless sleep. A day later, Ruby woke up. She opened her eyes to the faintest hint of colors just begging to burst through the barrier of gray holding them back.
Chapter 2 is in the books. Writing a chapter little to no dialogue feels weird. Gotta set up the motif for what is the first arc of this story. As I said at the start, I'm not going to go write waves of angst and sadness to get the point across that Ruby is suffering. You just need enough to see how much she has been. Let me know what you liked and didn't like. Please remember that Ruby is not over her depression. I do not subscribe to the whole "Clean your room and you'll no longer be depressed" advice I see people give. It takes so much more than that, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't help even a little.
Thanks to Kharaki Takan for the first review as well as everyone who has followed and liked the story. Glad y'all like it!
See you's for Chapter 3.