Before You Knew My Name, Jacqueline Bublitz [best book club books for discussion txt] 📗

a seat next to Lennie now, Ruby watches as Sue silently adjusts Lennie’s grip on the knife handle before returning to her own chopping and dicing. The casual intimacy of this gesture is maternal, beautiful, though neither of her friends seem to give it a second thought. Ruby stares into the wine glass Sue had ready and waiting for her when she walked into the room. Thinking that perhaps the best friendships are like this. Quiet and certain. She wonders at how long it’s taken for her to contemplate this notion. That being seen and known is better for you than being someone’s enduring mystery.

I don’t understand you sometimes! Ruby would need more fingers and toes to count the many times Ash has directed this sentiment at her.

She opens her mouth, wonders where to start with her story about Tom, when Lennie turns to face her.

‘So. Josh. You talked to him yet?’

It is almost a relief to push Tom to the back of her mind, even for a minute, and focus on something she might actually have the words for.

‘There is something I never told you about why I came to New York,’ Ruby says nervously, as Sue stops her chopping and dicing. Lennie is already demonstrably holding her breath.

‘I left because I was having an affair. With a guy—Ash—who’s getting married later this year. I’ve been the other woman for so long, and it’s horrible to wait for a person to choose you, and when Josh said he was still married, I saw all of that starting over again …’

The rest comes out in a rush, the heartache and embarrassment and loneliness that followed her from Melbourne to New York, and before she can stop herself, Ruby is crying, causing Lennie to jump up from her chair, wrap her in a fierce hug.

‘It all makes sense now,’ Lennie says, her own voice cracking. ‘I knew something was up with you! I just wish you’d told us sooner.’ ‘Agreed,’ Sue adds, massaging her fingers through her cropped hair, a gesture Ruby now recognises as an attempt to gather her thoughts before speaking.

‘I’m very glad you told us, Ruby. And you’ll get no judgement from me on how or who you choose to love.

‘As for Josh,’ she continues, ‘you should know it’s not the same situation. He’s been separated for a while now. I tell him all the time to hurry up with the divorce papers, but he’s such a procrastinator when it comes to his personal life. We had hoped’—Sue looks at Lennie, who nods emphatically—‘that you might be a catalyst for him to finally get moving in a new direction. You’re basically all he talks about.’

Ruby blinks at this information, tries to absorb it. There have been so many revelations coming at her these past two days, she can hardly keep up. It hasn’t even been that long since she found out my name and now—

Alice Lee pops into her head with a startling clarity and Ruby stops, remembers why she came here tonight. She takes a long swig of wine, shakes Josh off for the time being.

‘Thank you for that. I think. But … there was something else I wanted to talk to you both about, actually. Something happened yesterday.’

Taking it slow, Ruby tells Lennie and Sue about meeting Tom. About how he showed up at the exact place she found my body, and how charming he was at first, before he kept trying to turn the conversation back to the murder, even when she made it clear she didn’t want to talk about it.

As Ruby goes over their encounters, she thinks of Detective O’Byrne, and the last time she had tried to explain what happened down by the river. How he’d said it can take time to remember details ‘better’, especially the important ones. She is conscious of getting the details she does remember about Tom in the right order, wants to give her friends the clearest account she can. Still, she pauses over Tom’s comment about ‘pictures’. Struggles to describe that particular detail, and all that came after it. The unwanted kiss, and Josh’s message. Meeting Noah. The gift of his stories about Alice. She knows that each beat of the story is bursting with significance, but what if she’s reading the signs all wrong? When was the last time she knew something to be completely true?

Ruby suddenly sees Josh holding out his phone like a bunch of flowers, my smiling face filling the screen.

Taking a deep breath, she carries on, finally able to admit just how uncomfortable Tom made her feel, the way he kept pushing himself on her, and onto me, too.

‘There’s something this guy seems to know that he shouldn’t,’ she adds, arriving now at the place she started, coming up the stairs to Sue’s apartment tonight, her confusion held out in front of her, and her fear, too, that her friends might shut the door in her face. She feels exhausted to have come this far, and from the looks on Lennie and Sue’s faces as she finishes her story, they are right there with her.

‘Oh my God, Ruby. Do you really think …’

But for once, Lennie is lost for words and she trails off, looking to Sue for help. The older woman is silent, thoughtful, as she refills each of their wine glasses almost to the rim. If Ruby didn’t know better, she’d swear Sue’s hand is shaking.

‘That man, whoever he was, had no right to make you feel that way, Ruby.’

Sue is indeed trembling, though not from fear. From rage.

‘And Alice, that poor, poor girl. She was basically the same age as my Lisa. What happened to her makes me so mad. The entitlement of these fucking men who destroy lives, just because they can.’

‘I’ve never, ever heard you swear—’ Lennie starts, then stops. ‘You’re right. It makes me fucking mad, too. And scared.’

Wine slops over Lennie’s glass, she watches it spill onto the table, before she turns back to