Saving Ruth Read Online Free PDF Page B

of bread in this house has to be frozen?”
    â€œNo carbohydrate is safe.”
    â€œWell, I hate it. If you nuke one of these, it shrivels up into a weird little sponge. Shit.” He pulled one out and tossed it into the microwave, where it landed with a thud.
    â€œI’m out,” I said, sliding my chair back from the table. “Are you going to the meeting straight from home, or no?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œOh, you’ll be coming from Hillary’s?”
    â€œHillary and I broke up.”
    â€œReally?” David and Hillary had been together on and off since their freshman year of high school. She was the kind of pretty that always put her in the running for Miss Teen Something.
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œDamn, Ruth, you are so nosy. Who cares why?” He took his bagel out of the microwave and pried it open before throwing it in the toaster. Toss, throw, slam, shut. All of his movements were so forcefully deliberate. You’re too rough, my parents would say to us when we were toddlers—biting, kicking, and pinching at whim.
    â€œAnd how would you understand, anyway? You’ve never even had a boyfriend.” His insult stung. Technically, Tony had been my boyfriend. We had spent two months and seventeen days together. We had sex regularly, he told me I was pretty, and sometimes he bought me a drink when we were out. That had fulfilled my boyfriend requirements. I’d found out later (on day eighteen) that he’d been flirting and sometimes sleeping with various other girls the whole time, but still.
    â€œSorry, you’re wrong. Maybe if you had called me once this year, you’d know that.” I got up from the table, slammed my bowl in the sink, and headed toward my room. David said nothing. Of course.
    My dad’s frame filled my doorway. “You know, this is going to be a long summer if you two don’t get along.” I could feel the tears coming. My lip trembled like a five-year-old.
    â€œHey, whatsa matter?”
    â€œDavid is an asshole.”
    â€œLanguage, Ruth,” he warned. “And go easy on him. Can you imagine playing soccer in this heat? My nerves would be shot.”
    â€œOh God, give me a break.” I flung myself on my bed dramatically. “He gets a personality pass because he kicks a ball around?”
    It had always been like this. Whenever David and I had gotten into fights growing up, my parents always figured that I was the one who had started it. Moody Ruth. Even the time when they had left us alone to go to the movies and returned to find me pinned underneath him with his knee in my throat and choking me, I had taken most of the blame.
    â€œI’m heading to the office, but what are you doing tonight?”
    â€œI’m going to hang out with the girls.”
    â€œI wish you would come to synagogue with me instead.”
    â€œYeah, not so much,” I replied. He pursed his lips in disapproval.
    â€œI know, Dad. I’m sorry. Maybe later in the summer.” He went to Friday night services every week—usually alone. My mom wasn’t exactly a fan of synagogue either. It wasn’t the Jewish part—that was okay with me on a cultural level—but the whole synagogue experience was just not my bag. If I wanted to leave the entire time I was there, how did that make me a better Jew? Because I endured it?
    â€œWell, David’s coming with me.” Naturally. David: the golden Jew.
    â€œCool,” I replied. “I promise I’ll go another time, okay?” He nodded. I put my pillow over my face. Not even twenty-four hours in and the summer stretched ahead of me like I–95.
    I closed the door behind me and crossed the garage to the workroom to find my bike. I dug the keys out of my backpack and unlocked it, immediately fighting the urge to lie down on the cool, concrete floor. Just for a little while.
    When we were little, David had been obsessed with