Chapter 11.2: 1994, Ruiz
"MAMA!" I shrieked, my eyes flying open. My body rocketed up in the bed, my eyes darting around in the dark.
"SHIT!" Came a familiar voice beside me. "Oh my god, Ruiz, are you okay?!"
Elegant hands were touching me in the darkness, trying to find me. I shrank away from them, afraid from my dream. My body began to heave, and I couldn't breathe. The hands found me, recognized me, and I felt the warmth of my best friend around me, hugging me close to his body.
"Ruiz, Ruiz, its okay," Ambrose whispered to me, rocking me back and forth as I began to cry, the images from my dream flying around in my mind. "He's not here, its just me. Its just me. Don't cry. I'm here. He'll never hurt you again."
"Ambrose...Ambrose, my Daddy... He burst through my door with a knife...my Mama...he stabbed my Mama, Ambrose..." I sobbed, shaking in his arms.
"He'll never do that, Ruiz. He's in prison! He'll never get out. Don't worry. I know its scary, but nothing like that will ever happen to you. Ruiz, its okay," he whispered quickly, kissing my hair.
I started to hiccup, and he rubbed my back deeply, trying to relax them away.
"I want to see my...Mama, Ambrose," I hiccuped, wrapping my arms around him tightly.
"She's at the hospital right now, working. You can see her in the morning, I promise," he said to me, making little comforting clicking sounds with his mouth. He hadn't done that since we were kids when someone knocked me down on the playground. The sound touched me deep, and made my heart start to beat a little bit slower.
He heard the change in my breathing and kissed my hair again. "Do you want something to drink? You're hiccuping," he said quietly to me.
"Yeah...some chocolate milk," I whispered to him.
We jumped as a knock landed on the door, then another. Ambrose rubbed my back to comfort me against the sudden sounds in my fear.
"You two okay? I heard a scream," Miss Cha Cha's voice said behind the door.
"Its okay, Miss Cha Cha, Ruiz had a nightmare," Ambrose called to her, not stopping in massaging me.
Miss Cha Cha gasped. The door opened a little and the light from the hallway flooded in, easing the dark and letting me see Ambrose's worried face. "Are you okay, Ruiz? Do you two need anything? I'm up anyway, was just reading in the living room. I can get you something if you want it?" She asked kindly, a look of concern on her face, too.
"Yeah, some chocolate milk," Ambrose said, wiping a stray part of my long bangs from my face and giving me a small smile to show me things were really alright.
"Okay, I'll be back," Miss Cha Cha assured, closing the door again.
"Oh, Ruiz, I'm so sorry," Ambrose breathed, wrapping his loving arms around me and holding me, his chin on my shoulder. "I wish these nightmares would end. I don't know how to end them. I wish I could end them for you."
"Mm," I whimpered, "they haven't happened in a long time. It might be stress...from...from what happened tonight..." The memory that I had lost my Mama's pearls struck me like a hit to the gut and my eyes closed tightly. I didn't want to start crying again, worrying Ambrose even more. I wanted him to feel like he had comforted me, not stress him out more.
He kissed me on the cheek. "We'll find them," he told me, squeezing me tighter. "I don't know how, but we will. I'm sure your Mama will understand. That clasp was always funny, you know? We never know, too, so many people saw you in that neighborhood. Only a drag queen would wear those pearls." He gave a little giggle at this, trying to make me feel better. "Maybe someone dropped them off at Charlie's store? A lot of people saw you in there, too. We don't know yet. Things will be okay."
I wanted to believe him so much. I rubbed my face into his chest as I felt him breathe in. So I breathed him in, too, and the fresh smell of carnations flooded my nose. His familiar, comforting smell.
The door opened, and I parted from him, looking up. His arms draped at my waist as he looked up, too. Miss Cha Cha stood in the doorway, smiling at us in her way. She turned on the light and brought in two tall glasses of chocolate milk. Setting them on the nightstand, she winked at us and then walked out of the door again, closing it.
Ambrose reached over and took a glass of milk from the nightstand and gave it to me. Still feeling his lower body pressed to mine, I drank the milk in a long swallow. I sighed as I held the glass, half empty now, between my legs.
"I wish it was strawberry," I said sadly, thinking about the strawberry milk from my childhood.
"Like your grandma used to make us when we were little, right?" Ambrose asked, taking his own glass and sipping a little then looking at me again.
"Yeah, when we watched Miss Audrey Hepburn on those tapes she recorded from TV. Remember?" I asked, remembering myself.
"On that monster VCR? Yeah," Ambrose chuckled. He looked at me with a small smile. He touched my cheek, his fingers cold from his glass. "You're smiling," he said gladly.
A weird feeling enveloped me as I realized that indeed I was. "Oh," I whispered, surprised.
"Things will be okay, Ruiz," he told me, looking at me with love.
"I hope so, Ambrose," I said quietly.
We talked together for a little while more, reminiscing about my grandma and when we were kids. Thinking about my grandma, hearing about Ambrose's happy memories about her, comforted my heart enough so I could settle to sleep again. In the darkness with Ambrose, as Ambrose wrapped his body around mine to make sure I could dream no nightmare, I felt such joy in my heart. And as I fell asleep, I only had one thought: Ambrose. I loved Ambrose so much.