Ruth's Love Story Pt. 01

"Don't ever, call me again. Just out of curiosity are you going to cuckold daddy in beautiful Missoula?

"What did he ever do to deserve this?"

"Nothing."

"I hung up.

Then I texted again. "Update, I spoke with Mommy dearest, slutbag from hell and she informed me that Daddy is not my biological father. Attached are the pictures of the cunt fucking the black guys. I will probably sleep here tonight, after that who knows.

I'm going dark now and maybe for quite a while, By the way the cunt has moved out and I'm leaving my keys on the counter in the morning. It's been real folks. There's not much more for me to say and I've not heard from daddy, so he must be heaving a sigh of relief that that's one less obligation. Peace out."

I turned my phone off and gathered my stuff up and staged it in the living room. Then loaded up my stuff in the Trooper. Locked it and went and slept on my bed for one last time.

I woke up and showered and went to early mass. My teacher Ms. Mary Ellen was standing inside the main door and I rushed up to her and hugged her. I pulled back and said, "Can we talk please? Things are worse than I could ever guess."

She turned and walked towards a small chapel. I followed her in and closed the door. I told her about having sex with Annie and then told her that Annie confessed to sleeping with my mom for two years and that my mom had left and told me my dad was not my real dad and she refused to tell me who my dad was. I talked to Naomi my sister, but I had not heard from my dad yet."

She said, "Child I can't begin to imagine your pain. What are you going to do?"

"Here's my thinking so far, I need to find a place to sleep full time, so I can focus on school and tennis. If Annie is still in the program with the kids, I can't do that."

"Well the good news is that I received a note from Anne on Friday that she was leaving school and moving. So that's still open to you. My roommate just left, you could stay there.

"She's with my mom isn't she?"

She nodded yes.

"It seems like everyone in my family is happy that I'm not in their life now. I told myself last night that I am not going to be anyone's victim and that I will live a good life no matter what."

"Ma'am I love Annie with all my soul and I feel so betrayed. Did I do anything to hurt her that she would do this to me? She led me on and seduced me and I was not able to resist her, because I so love her. I can't turn that off. Please tell me what I did to deserve this. She knew she was leaving with my mom and led me on to trample on my heart. I always wanted to be a wife and mother and now she has sullied me and I will never trust anyone. Plus if I ever get to be a mother, I'll probably turn into a slut bag whore like my mom."

"Child you take your life, one day at a time and hold onto your rule of prayer and college will come and you will meet new people. It will good for you to be away from here and your parents both. I cannot say anything, but if he has not reached out to you don't expect him to. Annie is not for you, anyway she's gone."

We hugged. I said, "Can I bring my stuff to your apartment today? I've nowhere to go."

She nodded and got a key ring out of her purse and fiddled with it then handed me a key to her apartment.

She nodded. I opened the door and there was Mrs. Villeneuve. She opened her arms to me and I stepped back and crossed myself.

She said, "Ruth!"

I looked at her and said, "You knew, all along. "Et tu Brutus!"

She looked down and I was away.

I drove to the apartment and parked out front. I unloaded the Trooper and realized that I was hungry. I drove back to my parent's house and slowly passed in front of the house and it looked empty. I drove down the alley behind the house and parked. I had left my keys on the counter, I thought there was a loose window that would let me in the basement, I was able to nudge it open and slid through it. There was a freezer down here and I opened it and it was stuffed full of pork and beef roasts, ground beef and pork, no steaks or chicken. I pulled on an overhead light string hanging in front of face. There were ten Costco freezer bags. I filled them all up. The labels had indicated that it had all been purchased in the last week or so based on the sell by dates.

I opened the basement door and carried them out to the Trooper. It took six trips and I filled up the trunk. I quietly went up the basement steps into the kitchen.

There were boxes on the kitchen table and floor. I opened up cabinet doors on the bottom underneath the counters. Cans of Tuna (my favorite) filled up one. The next had peanut butter (Adams), the last had her Tupperware cannisters. I pulled the flour out and opened it and there was five thousand dollars in the way of one hundred fifty dollar bills. I kept pulling them out, a bunch of stamps in one, In the last one there was a note.

"Ruth, saying I'm sorry to you is the wrong thing to say, it seems trite. But it was either kill myself or do what I did. Annie just took you as she took me. It was a cruelty.

That was it.

There were more foods. Cans of chicken noodle soup, tomato soup, bags of rice, hominy, pickled jalapenos. I took all of it and filled up the back seat. I went back and took pans and big kettles and cast iron fry pans and an old percolator. Spatulas and big spoons, eating utensils, plates and bowls, salt and pepper shakers and aluminum foil. I had got it all in, jumped into my seat and fired up the Trooper.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement and it was my dad on the back porch. I opened the glove box and found my phone and turned it on. Bunch of messages from Names. None from my dad. He had not moved.

I released the hand brake and drove off. There was no smile, just staring at me. It was like I somehow fucked my slutbag mom through time travel to make me. Oh and I grew a dick and balls as I sped through time. So Mary Ellen's advice was right.

He was better left behind.

I got back to her apartment and I unloaded everything into the kitchen. There were two freezers. I put pork in one and beef in the other.

There were tons of shelves. I noticed that there was no butter or oil, so I got one of the kettles out and added two cans of hominy and two of the pickled jalapenos, which included carrots too. I opened up two packages of ground pork and put it in as well. I carried it over to this huge sink and filled it up with water to just cover everything. I put some salt and pepper in too.

Carried it back to the electric stove onto the big burner and put it on low. I grabbed my keys and went out front and moved the Trooper over behind the nun's apartment house. Locked it up and brought my phone charger back and locked the front door of the nunnery. I stirred the soup and got some aluminum foil and covered the pot and put it in the oven at three hundred degrees. I could hear the electric burners ticking so I knew it was working.

I was ravenous and opened two cans of tuna and put them into a bowl. There were sweet pickles and I chopped some them up and added a little mustard and stirred it up with a fork. I got some saltine cracker out and opened one of the packets and carried it over to the couch. I plugged my phone charger into a long cable. I unblocked Annie from all my social media and my phone too.

I started playing some music from YouTube. Camilla Cabella. She was so evocative and beautiful, she was hooking up with one of the Mendez brothers. I went to my facebook account and really my only friends were my sisters and Annie and my tennis teammates. I posted a note that went like this.

"We won our first tennis tournament Saturday morning. I went to the dance with my soulmate Annie Villeneuve who broke my heart and left with my mother to find love in the sunset. My wonderful mom explained to me that the man I've known as my dad, is not my dad from a biological perspective. Somewhere my dad was coaching for some small college football team and she fucked a coach with red hair that worked with my dad. Might have been a grocery clerk or some guy at a bar. When I pressed her on that wanting to know, if maybe he could love another daughter he didn't know about, but she didn't want to ruin his family. The only person that loves me is my big sis, Names. My other two sisters having taken the news in have gone dark I did see my dad and that did not go well either. I've met some wonderful people here in Missoula and I do love you and thank you for your kindness. I'm on an eight month and a wake up and I will be leaving for college and I will not be back. I'm not leaving facebook or Instagram, it's just that I'm on a sabbatical for the next year. I have to focus on my tennis and school. So I'm deleting the apps from my phone. Ruth

I pulled the kettle from the oven to the top of the stove and took the foil off. I stirred up the broth and broke up the pork which was not done cooking but it was unfrozen. I added three cups of rice, some more salt and water and carefully covered it with the foil and put it back in the oven. I set an alarm for five thirty. I finished the tuna and put the bowl on the floor and stretched out on the couch.

Sleep came and I woke up with the alarm and I could smell the rice. I ran to the oven and pulled it out and saved the foil again. It was perfect!!

I ran and got my bowl and rinsed it out in the sink. I got a clean one down and filled it up with rice and covered the kettle up and back into the oven and lowered the temp to the lowest setting.

The rice was so good, meaty and spicy but not really too much and I loved the carrots and hominy. Am I a chef?

I looked at my phone and there had been a text from Annie. It said, "hey bitch get over it i will be back for you", all lower case.

I was not emotional now, or at least not on fire. It was sent two hours ago.

Here is my response, "you might want to think on that annie, if I see you coming I will bend that nose a bit, your whole face too...oops there goes that modeling career, obviously I'm from white trash and the more I think about it, I might make it a thing to find you and fuck you up, prolly not, cause the deal is i rented the space in my heart to somebody else.

I blocked her again. I had some more rice and watched Emily in Paris on Netflix on my phone. Hilarious little movie about this so very hot girl from Chicago who seemingly fucks anyone she bumps into. I worked myself into a frenzy as she fucked her neighbor and then this black guy with an English accent and I really wanted to fuck her and I came hard and felt stupid. I need to focus and not do that shit. If I met the right girl sure, but no fantasy.

Monday morning I was at the grade school at seven forty five.. Mrs. Villeneuve was already there and came up and said, "We need to talk."

I said, "I agree."

We stepped outside the classroom and I let her go first, "Your mother is to blame here Ruth, she couldn't stay away from Annie," she glared at me.

"Whatever you think you know you don't. Your loyalty is understandable. Annie seduced my mom and then me. I was borderline between straight or bi-sexual and she destroyed me. Did things to me that I had no control of my body. She's been fucking women for a long time. My mom said Annie seduced her and me and last night Annie texted me and told me, "hey bitch get over it i will be back for you.

I showed her the text and she was blown away.

"Mrs. Villeneuve I told her to stay away and that I would hurt her face if she came near me again."

"But you knew. If we can't work together then I will stop coming immediately. Annie is not your fault."

She said, "It is the least of what I can do, so please stay.

Things settled down for me and my tennis just got better and better. In October I approached Mary Ellen and said I needed some help. I hugged her when I saw her.

"Hi Mary Ellen, thank you for the time. The University of San Diego is a Catholic college and they want to give me a full ride scholarship, but a parent needs to sign on the form too. My dad, quit as a coach and I have not seen him, or mom for that matter in two months. I need a lawyer that can emancipate me and get that filed so I can go there. Can you help?"

She said she'd look into it and within two weeks it was done. I signed the letter of intent and my tennis coach had the Missoulian reporter and we zoomed with the USD coach who was the person that changed my grip at tennis camp. The USD coach asked, "What was the deal with the emancipation certificate?"

"Just after labor day, they, my parents actually well they broke up. My mom ran off, my dad quit his job with the Grizzlies and left. Umm we both discovered that he is not my biological dad. Technically it's abandonment but I'm eighteen."

"Well, who's taking care of you?"

"I'm renting a room in an apartment from a teacher Mary Ellen and she found me a place to stay and I am warm and safe. I love her with all my heart, I'm in this program where I'm working with K through two kids at our parish school and they make me feel so loved. It's really in so many ways the best time of my life."

"Do you want for food and money?"

"Oh no I've got enough and I'm a pretty good cook now too."

"Honey, I have three kids. We have a nice parish on campus and we will help you grow and get your start on life and being the best woman you can be," she smiled at me and said, do you have Mary Ellen's phone number?"

I pulled out my phone and expanded the contact page and held it up to the zoom.

"Coach, I can't thank you enough for this opportunity, what you did for my serve has really taken my game up to the next level. Coach I graduate on June sixth. Can I come down then and get set up."

"Short answer is yes. But how would you do that?"

I have a good reliable four by four and I can get my stuff in that. I take care of it, I change the oil and stuff."

"You change the oil?"

"It's easy coach, you'd just have to watch me do it, my dad taught me. What kind of a car do you have? I'll do it for you if you want."

"We'll show you when you get here. When do you think you'll get here?:

If I left on Thursday, it would probably be Sunday midafternoon. I would drive straight down through Idaho, Utah and across through Palm Springs and across to San Diego.

I ran two miles and went through some soft intervals to clean my legs up for lactic acid buildup. When I got home I took a shower and then boiled some water to cook some macaroni and then drained it through a colander. I heated up some tomato soup with some milk and tuna. I added some cheddar cheese. I poured it on into a casserole dish and put it into the oven at two fifty.

I forgot about the letter of intent signing except I was awfully excited to have that in place. It had been a few days and I came into high school for my AP English class and the whole class stood and came to me and they were hugging me and telling me they loved me. My face felt flush and I looked up at Mr. Peters and shrugged.

"Ok class, please sit down, " he said looking at me, "Ruth do you have a television?"

I shook my head no.

"What do you at when you get, umm home?"

"I shower, and wash my clothes in the shower and hang them up to dry, then I warm up some soup or stew I made Sunday afternoon. I put some music on through my phone and I study and make notes and I write any papers for class.

"What do you write your papers on?"

"Oh, my iPhone."

"Are you lonely Ruth?"

I blushed and tears came and my lip trembled and I took a deep breath and I said,

"Ms. Mary Ellen told me I should read about St. Katherine of Alexandria who is also know as St. Katherine of the wheel."

"Ruth have you ever fallen in love with someone?"

I looked at the floor and all my prayers and resolve evaporated. I wept bitter tears and then I was being hugged so hard and it was Sarah. I laid my cheek against her head.

"None of you know, how good she is. I'm good and she destroys me, I will be the number one with the Grizzlies, my freshman year, Ruth will be number one at the University of San Diego and an All American and I love her. She's the best example for me."

I started crying again and she squeezed me.

"Thanks Sarah," Mr. Peters said,

"Ruth sit down please I want you to see something."

He had plugged his laptop into a big flat screen on the wall behind his desk and YouTube, opened up and he clicked on a clip from Jimmy Fallon and he started, "I don't know if everyone has seen the story in the New York Times that was picked up from the Missoulian the local paper in Missoula, Montana. Here she is last summer at tennis camp practicing her serve. They are saying she is the new Anna Kournikova (the shot jumped to me, fifteen inches off the ground blasting this serve and the crowd let out this oooh). She was abandoned by her family due to infidelities and she lives in a room in one of her teacher's apartments. And get this she wants to be a schoolteacher.

She works with kindergarteners through second graders, five days a week. She's undefeated and has not lost a set. She is going to the University of San Diego and get this, she offered to change the oil on her coach's car. Said it was easy and she was grateful for the opportunity. The New York Times is calling her the Angel from Missoula.

Mr. Peters loaded up the article from the New York Times and said, "Ruth, I will email you this and the one from the Missoulian. Do you have an Instagram account and Facebook too?"

"I have accounts, but I deleted the app from my phone."

"You might want to load them up. There were over twenty million hits at seven this morning."

I looked at him and started shaking my head no.

"Mr. Peters, I take no pride or glory in this, I'm kind of embarrassed about the attention. I don't know why my life has changed so much. Three months ago, I had a mom and dad and three sisters and now I have three half-sisters, one of whom talks to me, the other's being embarrassed by me, I guess. I do find joy with tennis and with all my little kids. I think I need to go see the nurse though, I thinks Sarah broke my ribs."

Everybody cracked up.

I said, "Thank you all for the support and love this morning, I really am blessed. I'm no Angel, I'm just Ruth and so lucky to have so many friends. Please don't change I'm in the perfect spot. I think I got more hugs and love this morning really in my whole life. I could get to enjoy that."

After class, I ran down to the gym and knocked on Coach Julie's door. She looked up and waved me in.

"Coach, I'm sorry about all of the hullabaloo. I didn't know about any of it. I don't want to be a disruption. I need a favor to ask. Mary Ellen is caring for me and I really need to talk with her. Could you tell Mr. Peters? I will try to get back for at least part of practice."

She nodded and said, "Go."

I ran to the Trooper and got her started. I tried to stay at the speed limit and got to our apartment. I went inside and knocked on her bedroom door.

She said, "Come in."

I said, "Good afternoon Mary Ellen. Can we talk, please?"

She nodded and said, "Close the door and sit down."

I told her, "In Mr. Peter's class, he had me watch the stuff about me being the Angel of Missoula. I was mortified, I am not an angel."

"You're fine.

"Do you know Sarah Ferguson?"

She nodded.

"She hugged me really hard and in front of the whole class and said she loved me and praised me. I'm queer and my heart started pounding so hard. What happens if meet somebody in San Diego and fall for her. Could I go to church if we were married?"

"The Pope has said that he blesses queer love, but not queer marriages."

"What if we adopted a baby?"

"That's between you and the state of California."

"Mary Ellen are you queer?"

"I am not. I was married to a U.S. Marine who died in Mogadishu about twenty years ago. I could never see marrying again."