Are we out of the woods

 

It felt like Ruby might be on the mend, but Rafe wasn't sure of anything. Possibly, he'd fallen down a dark rabbit hole and didn't know it. 

Oh,  how he'd listened. There wasn't much else he could do. First he got her to go to the cafeteria and eat something that might make her mood better. But then one could only go so far on brownies and ice cream. 

Later, they did a lot of walking around the empty campus. It wasn't exactly in full mode. So they spent a lot time eating sandwiches at the local SUBWAY. They were hiring and for a moment of positive thinking, Rafe wanted to fill out an application. Naturally, Ruby forbid it.

"I'm not staying," she was still full of anguish.

"Well, where will you go?" He told her her dad had been calling her, but she wouldn't answer. "I bet he wants you to come home."

"I can't." She hugged herself as if he had no idea what she was going through. After all, they were no more than maybe friends. Sure he'd slept in her room. It was like the longest slumber party he'd ever been to. There wasn't any fun. Yes, sometimes, he slept through most of her rants. Still, he couldn't say he felt bad about a lot of things, but not bad enough to call home.

Still, the roaming around of being in a different place left him eager yet so lost. And then out of nowhere was someone very familiar that he thought he might be having an illusionation. Maybe it was just the heat.

"DAD!" Rafe was baffled. "What are you doing here?" He was certain no one could find him.

"I've come to take you home," he was even-lipped as if he was too tired to fight.

"How? How did you know?" Rafe's eyes stared at his dad as if he bet it was all Cade's doing.

"Your friend Boone told me," he looked over at Ruby whose bright red hair was blowing in the hot wind. "Who's she?"

"It's..it's Ruby."

"Ruby Reynolds," she told him she was twenty-one which Rafe didn't even know. He squinted, unsure she was telling the truth.

His dad looked her in the eye. "Do  you know he has a term paper to do before he can graduate?" 

"Dad?" Rafe wailed. How could he bring up something like that? 

"You're coming home," his dad told him. 

"I can't." It was all so frustrating. "I won't leave Ruby."

"Is this true?" He looked at Ruby who gave him a shrug.

She said she quit. Her father and his new family moved to where Rafe lived at the nearby airbase. Her dad was an officer in the Navy.

"But it's Nebraska?" Did Rafe have to remind her how landlocked they were?

That was when his dad mentioned he'd been in the Navy too and the Air Force. Rafe was certain his dad would tell him he'd be in the military soon enough, but instead, his dad mentioned her dad's name. They knew each other from a long time ago.

All the while, Rafe kept holding Ruby's hand as if she might fly off somewhere. 

"I guess you can come home with us," his dad told her. He turned to Rafe. "You're going to graduate."

Rafe winced as if his dad was just too much, but there wasn't much he could do about it.