Ruthie Camden fought back her tears as she boarded her plane. She was leaving Scotland and returning to Glen Oak where she had family to get her back on her feet after she ran out of options.
When Ruthie was nineteen, she decided to move back to Scotland permanently. Her relationship with T-Bone had grown stale, and after some self-reflecting she realized that being in Scotland was the happiest point in her life. She enrolled herself into college and was enjoying finding her place again after being away for a while. That all started to go downward when she was twenty and she got the call from her mother that her father had passed away. T-Bone later revealed that every sibling was by his side that day but her, and that was the bitterest pill to swallow.
Peer pressure to drink from her friends suddenly turned into a willingness to drink to numb the pain she was feeling. Partying with her friends turned into three or four nights a week, and her studying took a huge hit. After passing out from drinking too much and forgetting to set an alarm, she missed a final exam and flunked out of school. She was in an emergency financially, and with Matt's help she was able to find a cheap place to live if she got a job. Failing school added to her depression, and the drinking worsened.
Her family was picking up on the problem more and more, as she was trying to hide obvious intoxication when she communicated with them most of the time. Three jobs had let her go for attendance issues, and Annie finally put her foot down for all the siblings to stop supporting her financially. Annie bought her one last plane ticket to come home, and with that she had no other choice but to return to her family.
Annie sat on her sofa, lost in thought, staring blankly at a wall. She was no stranger to her children going through struggles, with Mary and Simon having some angst filled late teen/early adult years. It was now Ruthie's turn, and her heart was shattered as this was the absolute last place that she ever envisioned her daughter being in. Mary and her family were in town because the kids wanted to spend time with their grandmother during their spring break. Mary also knew Ruthie was returning and had plans to help intervene.
Mary took a seat next to her mother, trying to offer some support. "We're all worried about Ruthie."
Annie sighed. "I just want my sweet little girl back. I don't know who this person is. We gave her too much independence too soon and this is what happened."
"Don't blame yourself mom. We all are dealing with dad's death in different ways. She's just picking the worst way. She's about to be with her family now and we will get her through this," Mary assured her.
Annie wiped a tear from her eye. "I'm just glad your father didn't have to see this. This would've been what killed him."
Mary put her arm around her. "Her plane is going to be landing in about an hour."
"I'm about to ask you for a favor. The biggest favor I will ever ask of you. I want you to go pick her up," Annie pleaded. "As much as I just want to give her the biggest hug, I don't know if I can see her and not start screaming in the airport right now. Losing your dad broke me, but this is just killing me inside."
"Gladly," Mary accepted. "I have plenty I want to say to her. Matt and Lucy had already tried to talk to her and her attitude towards them was horrible, and they've both done the most for her, so I'm pretty upset. Now it's my turn."
Annie flashed a smile at her oldest daughter. "I'm so proud of the woman you became, Mary. Thank you. Bring her home and I'll try to talk to her calmly. Emphasis on try."
Mary sat in a chair in the airport texting Lucy on her cell phone. Lucy was begging to stop by and help Mary intervene, but she told her not yet. She stood up as she realized Ruthie's plane had arrived and was letting people off. She recognized her sister's long curls immediately and smiled and waved as she locked eyes with her. Ruthie's face grew excited as she was only expecting her mother to pick her up and she hadn't seen Mary in ages. She walked over to her older sister and embraced her.
"What are you doing here?" Ruthie asked as Mary held her tightly. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but I don't see mom. Where's mom?"
"At home," Mary answered. "I've got Carlos and the kids over for a visit. The boys really missed their grandma, so we decided to come spend a few days with mom."
"Oh ok," Ruthie seemed disappointed. "I guess it's fine. I don't really need another lecture from her anyway."
"Maybe you do," Mary replied with irritation in her voice. "You're hurting everybody around you, and you don't see it. That's why mom's not here. She's tired and breaking."
"Are you kidding me right now?" Ruthie snapped back. "You are not the Camden to be lecturing someone about hurting people."
"Actually, I'm the perfect one, because I've been in that dark place and I overcame it," Mary argued. "I'm not doing this with you in the middle of the airport though so let's just go okay?"
Ruthie rolled her eyes at her sister. Mary waited as she got her luggage situated and then the two went to Mary's car. Ruthie struggled to get her luggage to fit in the backseat full of her children's stuff, but managed to cram it in. "With a family of five, why do you have a car this small?"
"It seats my family perfectly. You just have a lot of stuff," Mary explained.
"No, most of my stuff is still in Scotland. I just need to figure out how the hell I'm going to afford to get it sent back here with the family cutting me off financially and all," Ruthie whined.
Mary bit her tongue and took a seat in the driver's seat. She was planning on pulling over into the first empty parking lot she saw, and they were going to hash things out there before she brought Ruthie back to see Annie. She just hoped she could make it that long because her little sister was tempting her to lose her temper. They drove for a bit while Mary talked to her about some cute things her kids have been doing lately. Eventually Mary located an empty parking lot of a closed business and pulled her way into it.
"What are you doing?" Ruthie looked at her like she thought she was weird. "There's literally nothing here to stop for. If you can't see that place is boarded up with wood!"
"Look we're going to chat before I take you to mom and you don't have the option to hang up on me this time," Mary said sternly.
"I'm so sick of this family trying to brand me as an addict!" Ruthie exploded. "There isn't one member of this family that is perfect! Drinking alcohol sometimes doesn't make me terrible!"
Mary looked at her and spoke with seriousness. "Ruthie, I'm not going to sugar coat anything with you, you have a real problem with alcohol. You know it, I know it, the rest of the family knows it. You were where you thought was the perfect place for you, you had everything you wanted, and then you blew every opportunity that came your way because you couldn't stay sober. When you text us, the words are always jumbled, when you call, we can tell by the way you speak that you have been drinking. Lucy and Matt have both helped fund you to try to make you happy to get you to Scotland and that didn't work for you. Something much deeper is going on with you that you need to face. We all want you to get help with this, but a big thank you to the ones who have helped you as much as they have would be to work on getting better because that's all they want from you right now. They don't care about the money; you don't have to pay them back a dime. Please, just get better."
Ruthie, who was always quick with a witty reply, looked down and couldn't instantly reply to that. It wasn't lost on her that she really blew it. She just didn't want her family to acknowledge how badly she had screwed up. "Please don't hate me. I couldn't handle dad's death the same way that you guys could, okay? Not everybody is strong, and clearly, I'm not."
Mary was stunned. "Ruthie, we don't hate you. We love you. It's okay to fall sometimes, you just need to pick yourself back up again. All of us want to help you with that, we just need to know what you need."
"Things were bad for a while," Ruthie paused and took a second to collect her thoughts. "I broke T-Bone's heart, and it didn't even bother me. All I knew was I wanted to be in Scotland again, and he was standing in my way, so I threw him away like he was nothing. Then dad died, and all I could think about was the first time when I was sixteen, he really wanted me home and they practically dragged me home kicking and screaming. When I think about it now, I should have jumped to pack the second I got news that he could possibly die soon. Then he had another heart attack, this time it was fatal, and here I was as far away from him as I could be again, and now he's gone. I never got to tell my dad 'I love you' one last time. My friends knew I was grieving the loss of my father and threw everything they could at me to make the pain go away and make me fun again. I was smart enough not to touch the drugs, but I found comfort in the alcohol. Too much comfort clearly, but I didn't care. One professor cared enough to pull me aside and tell me I was on my way out if I didn't start getting my grades up. He even offered me an opportunity to make up an assignment I missed, but I spent that night partying with one of my friends because I didn't care anymore. Once they kicked me out, I found jobs here and there, but I was too hungover some days to show up. I told myself it was okay because Matt would send me more money, and if he didn't then Lucy and Kevin would. Believe me, not having a choice but to leave Scotland has broken me. It's all I've thought about on the plane."
"I appreciate you opening up to me," Mary thanked her. "Dad knew you loved him, Ruthie. He was so proud of you, and I know it because he told me countless times. He bragged to me when you and T-Bone took that trip to Florida together how happy he was that you were living your life to the fullest. That was what he wanted you to do, and you were doing it. This family made me feel like I was the biggest failure when I was struggling, but I promise you that you're not a failure. School and jobs are all things you can get back to once you deal with the bigger stuff, but you have to face the bigger stuff."
"I'm sorry that we made you feel like that," Ruthie apologized. "I didn't realize until I became the troubled Camden how much it sucks."
"It's okay," Mary smiled. "I don't know where I would be today if everybody didn't give me such a swift kick in the behind. Now life couldn't be more beautiful."
Out of nowhere Ruthie found herself breaking down in tears in her sister's passenger seat. Mary pulled her in and let her cry on her chest for a few minutes without saying a word. "I'm willing to get some help, but I just want it to be between me and mom, okay? I love all my siblings and I appreciate the support, but I don't want it to be a thing where every Camden and honorary Camden feels like they need to put their two cents in. I feel embarrassed enough."
"As long as you promise me that you will get better, then I'll honor whatever you want to do," Mary promised.
"Thank you," Ruthie wiped her eyes, and she stopped crying so hard.
"Just know that I love you and you can call me if you need to talk. I'll drop whatever I'm doing to talk to you. I'm here for you, whatever you need," Mary offered.
Ruthie nodded. "I love you too."