Excerpt
Chapter 1
Rat-a-tat
Pow! Pow! Pow!
Rat-a-tat
FADE IN:
The Vanishing Point, it's called. "The Little Café with the Big Screen Flavor." It might seem familiar. There's a fake Hollywood restaurant for every mini-mall in the San Fernando Valley.
This one's right next door to Pagliacci's Rent-a-Clown, all but hidden behind their Bozo banner. A person could pass by and never even know it.
That's what has Ruby worried.
Her mother gives her a look. "You okay, honey?"
Ruby stares at her chopsticks. "Sure."
She sinks back in the bamboo seat.
Closes her eyes.
THE SCREEN GOES BLACK.
At first you can hardly hear the tapping. It's only the ghost of a sound. Away off in the dark somewhere, a distant drumming, gradually growing louder:
Rat-a-tat
POW! POW! POW!
FADE IN...slowly...
Now you can see it, too. A single hand, sending out Morse code on an old-time telegraph machine:
POW! POW! POW!
Rat-a-tat
Rat-a-tat
Now the camera PULLS BACK, showing more of the picture. The hand belongs to a girl. A beautiful girl. A beautiful, blue-eyed, golden-haired girl. No freckles. Quite tall for twelve. (You can tell this right away, even though she's hunched over the machine, tapping with all her might.)
TALL GIRL
SOS! SOS! Come in! Come in!
Don't you hear me? SOS! SOS!
Somebody, anybody, please!
CUT TO a long shot of a ship in distress. Lights flickering, people shrieking, icy water pouring through the portholes.
MOVE IN CLOSER: On the deck (tilted now at a sickening angle) the lifeboats are being lowered. But not enough. Not nearly enough. Any fool can see that. As frantic passengers claw their way toward them, and crew members struggle to keep order, a band of brave musicians plays a lilting melody:
Yankee Doodle went to town,
Just to ride a pony,
Stuck a feather in his cap
And called it maca -
"Ruby!"
Still the tireless TALL GIRL in the telegraph office pounds out her tortured message:
SOS! SOS!
Come in, please!
Rat-a-tat -
"Ruby!"
The ship disappears. The band stops playing. The chopsticks rap out a sharp staccato on the edge of the café table.
POW!
Rat-a-tat
Rat-a -
Pearl Miller reaches across a plate of egg rolls and touches her daughter's wrist. The chopsticks freeze in midair.
"Thank you," says Pearl. "Have an egg roll."
"No, thanks."
"Come on. Just one. They're delicious."
Ruby shakes her head. It's a very red head. She squints behind her glasses, trying to change the picture again....
No use. She's still wedged in a half-size corner booth by the window with her mother and her little brother, Pete, still sitting there staring at the pair of them across the soy sauce.
"Not much longer," Mama says. "Another five minutes, maybe. We'll give him another five minutes."
Mama and Pete are both redheaded too, but otherwise normal-looking. Even somewhat better than normal, in Mama's case. She was almost a beauty queen once. In her younger days back in Texas, she was fourth runner-up for Miss Wichita Falls. Of course she would tell you that's all ancient history; it kind of embarrasses her now. But sometimes Ruby gets chills just thinking how a simple twist of fate might have altered their entire lives. What if the actual winner had been unexpectedly visited by some hideous disfigurement? Attacked by marauding bears, say, during a fun-filled but ultimately tragic vacation in Yellowstone? Would they be sitting here right now if, for any reason, the first, second, and third runners-up had been unable to fulfill their duties?
Ice cubes clink. A fat man laughs. A guy with a beard drops his napkin.
As for Pete - well, Pete is Pete, that's all. Freckles are fine when you're six.
Ruby, on the other hand, has been twelve and a half all year.
"You're sure you're not hungry? You're both bound to be tired. Maybe we ought to - "
"I'm okay, Mom." Ruby's fists (square-shaped, freckles on the otherwise white knuckles) clench around the chopsticks. "We're okay, right, Pete?"
"Pete's gone," says Pete. He holds up a ragged woolly mammoth puppet. "I am authorized to take all messages."
"Give me a break."
"My name is Mammook."
"Just another five minutes," says Mama.
Ruby looks out the window. Not much there, really. Just a pigeon pecking at a bug on the ledge and the traffic crawling by on Ventura Boulevard and the summer sun setting in a smoggy haze behind the Sizzler across the street. Still, from where Ruby sits, she has a clear view of the sidewalk, so she'll be the first to see him, if he comes.
Frankie Miller, that is.
Her father.
When he comes, that is.
Rat-a-tat
POW! POW! POW!
Rat-a-tat
The ship is sinking fast now. Salt water floods the telegraph office. Still, the TALL GIRL refuses to relinquish her post, though she's up to her waist in the stinking brine:
SOS! SOS!
Rat-a-tat
POW! POW! PO -
Pete gives Ruby a nudge in the ribs. "You're doing it again," he whispers.
"Shut up, Mammook." She pokes him with a chopstick.
Their mother signals the waitress. "Check, please."
"No! He's coming. He promised."
"It's almost eight o'clock, Ruby. We've been here an hour and a half."
"Well, maybe he got lost."
"Oh, honey - "
"Maybe he got tied up in traffic or there was an accident or - "
"Are you finished, miss?" asks the waitress, leaning in to take away the egg rolls.
"Yes...I mean, no!" Ruby grabs the plate, playing tug of war until she wins, spilling half a bowl of fried rice in Pete's lap. "I'm still eating, okay, Mom? I'm hungry now. See? You're right, these are really good."
Mama sighs. She nods at the waitress, who walks away with a shrug.
"Five minutes. Tops." Mama shows her watch to Ruby. "Then we're leaving. Got it?"
"Got it," says Ruby, her mouth full of stone-cold shrimp, her eyes on the little black second hand, ticking away.
Rat-a-tat
POW! POW! POW!
Rat-a-tat
CUT TO a second ship, far from the first. Below deck, a YOUNG NAVAL OFFICER is receiving a telegraph signal.
YOUNG OFFICER
SOS. SOS? Dear God, not the "Titanic"!
He rips the printed page from his telegraph machine and tears out of the office.
CUT TO the ship's bow. The CAPTAIN stands at the rail. Square-jawed. Intrepid. A glint of granite in his keen blue eyes. Clearly a man among men. As he gazes out on the moonlit waves, the YOUNG
OFFICER comes running.
YOUNG OFFICER
SOS, sir. From the "Titanic." It's just come in.
CAPTAIN
Well, what are we waiting for, Lieutenant? Turn the ship around!
YOUNG OFFICER
Yes, sir. Right away, sir. But -
CAPTAIN
But what? Speak up, Lieutenant! We've no time to waste!
YOUNG OFFICER
But...well, sir...the radar doesn't seem to be working properly, and unless we can re-wire the throckmorton and decode the coleanthus, I'm afraid that -
CAPTAIN
Confound it, man, speak plainly!
YOUNG OFFICER
I'm not sure we can find them, sir.
A blue minivan pulls into the Sizzler parking lot. An enormous family climbs out. Six or seven kids and a worn out-looking mother. Last of all comes the father, talking on his cell phone. Trailing after the others, taking his time. He's still deep in conversation when the littlest kid (a tiny girl in a ridiculous pink tutu) turns around and comes skipping back to him. She pulls on his shirt sleeve. He doesn't notice her. She pulls again. Now he looks down and sees her looking up at him, waiting. Ruby figures he'll get mad, but he doesn't seem mad. He smiles and touches the kid's wild curls and signs off on his call. Then he hoists her up on his shoulder and carries her inside.
POW! POW! POW!
On the doomed ship, the last dim light begins to die. The end is near, but the TALL GIRL isn't crying. You might think she is, but you're wrong, okay? She grits her teeth. She's no crybaby.
SOS! SOS!
Why didn't we go to the Sizzler? All you can eat and a sign as big as Dallas.
"Ruby? It's time."
SOS! SOS!
Anybody can find the Sizzler....
"We're waiting, Ruby. Don't you hear me?"
Don't you hear me?
SOS
Rat-a-tat
Pow.
Copyright © 2003 by Theresa Nelson
Continues...
Excerpted from Ruby Electric by Theresa Nelson Copyright © 2004 by Theresa Nelson. Excerpted by permission.
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