Southern Ruby Read Free Page A

to her moving about in the kitchen, clinking plates and glasses as she stacked the dishwasher then locked the back door as she got ready to go to work. The sound of her pumps clomping down the hall sent me rolling onto my stomach and feigning sleep. She strode into the bedroom and put a list of chores on my bedside table, as she’d done each morning since last Friday when I’d been suspended from school. Nan had always been my greatest ally, my guide and my confidante, and I could talk to her about anything — except my parents, of course. Now she was mad at me.
    â€˜It’s time to get up,’ she chided. ‘You can’t lie in bed all day.’
    â€˜Okay,’ I replied, rubbing my eyes. ‘I’ll get up in a minute.’
    She kissed me on the cheek, giving me a whiff of Youth Dew. ‘I don’t know what possessed you and Tamara to do what you did, but I know you’re good girls at heart.’
    â€˜Thanks,’ I said, watching her hands as she patted down the sheets. I was fascinated by Nan’s hands. They were thin and bony and translucently pale with freckles on the knuckles — not anything like my hands, which were long with tapering fingers that gave me an advantage on the keyboard but weren’t very feminine. I had muscular hands that looked like I could crush an apple between my palms.
    â€˜Your grandad left me an insurance policy and this house, Amanda. I don’t need to keep working,’ Nan said, looking at me with her piercing green eyes. ‘I’m doing it so you can get the best education possible. So don’t pull any more stunts like that, all right?’
    Ouch! Did I need to feel more guilty than I already did? The fees at the ladies college were hefty and Nan was putting aside money for my university studies as well. Dyeing my hair candy pink for the school sports carnival put me only two strikes away from getting expelled.
    â€˜I wouldn’t mind going to the local school, Nan,’ I said, sensing I was pushing my luck with the topic. ‘They have a good music department. The master entered the school’s rock band into the Kool Skools project and now they’re getting assistance to record and package their own first album.’
    I’d sung in Nan’s church and even had some paid gigs at weddings and birthday parties but I longed to perform jazz like Ella Fitzgerald. What I wouldn’t give to be making an album! But the only performing available at my school was in the corny school musical — where girls had to play the male parts as well — or in the choir.
    Nan grimaced and hoisted her handbag onto her shoulder. ‘Singing for the pleasure of your friends is one thing but the life of a musician is nothing but drugs, debauchery, divorce and . . . death. A woman needs a profession these days and to get that you need a good education.’ She kissed me on the forehead and headed out into the hall. Before she opened the front door she called back to me: ‘Your art teacher faxed your assignment description. I’ve left it on the kitchen counter. I think Miss Ellis is rather fond of you. She said you’d make a first-class architect.’
    I heard her 1984 Volvo warming up in the drive and went to the window to watch her leave. I’d normally be going with her, to be dropped off at school before she continued on to work. I glanced at my reflection in my dresser mirror and ran my handthrough my thick hair, which had been dyed back to its natural dark brown by Nan’s hairdresser.
    â€˜Life’s a bitch,’ I said. There was a stack of Cosmopolitan magazines on my desk. I picked up the top one and flicked through it. The girls were so pretty with their voluptuous Victoria’s Secret bodies and sculpted features. I hadn’t told Nan that I’d dyed my hair because I was sick of being bullied about my appearance by the other girls.
    â€˜Amanda came first in the freestyle