A Girl Like Her - Talia Hibbert Page 0,1

the peace of her shitty little flat, Ruth’s easily-shattered focus was, for once, razor-sharp.

Until the phone rang.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she muttered. The sweet spot became sour. Ruth was thrust out of her own head and back into the real world, into herself. The image, the story, was left behind.

For a moment, Ruth looked down at the scene she’d just outlined. Lieutenant Lita Ara’wa glared at her captain, an 8-foot-tall, golden alien, from over a huge, living desk. The desk smelled and felt like Derbyshire peat, but that was a detail only Ruth would ever know. In a moment, Lita and her captain would commence rage-fuelled hate-sex on top of the Derbyshire peat desk.

Which, come to think of it, didn’t sound very hygienic. Maybe one of them should catch something…

Aaaaaand the goddamn phone was still ringing.

Its shrill chime threatened to snip the golden thread of Ruth’s idea—which could not be allowed to happen.

Chewing at her lower lip, Ruth thrust out a hand in the direction of her phone’s repeated chime. After a few unseeing, experimental gropes at the bed’s rumpled sheets, she came up empty-handed.

But the phone kept ringing, loud and clear. It had to be there somewhere.

Eyes still trained on the tablet, Ruth shuffled across her bed. Lita and the captain should definitely catch something, she decided. An unfamiliar Earth disease. What could one catch from Derbyshire peat? Frowning slightly at the image before her, Ruth reached out toward the space where—if muscle-memory and instinct served—a bedside table sat.

Muscle-memory and instinct did not serve.

In fact, not for the first time, they failed her completely. Ruth shuffled a bit too far, leaned a bit too hard, and fell right off the bed.

Again.

“Ah, fuck.” The cool, wooden floor of her bedroom was a familiar location, but that didn’t ease the sting in her hip and elbow.

Ruth stayed still for a breath, because serious pain usually waited a second to make itself known. Just as she decided that nothing was damaged, the blasted phone stopped ringing.

And, of course, in that precise moment, she spotted the bugger. It was on the floor, next to a nearby stack of Avengers comics. Exactly how it had gotten there, Ruth had no idea. Perhaps she’d thrown it.

With a sigh, she scrambled over and grabbed the phone.

1 MISSED CALL: HANNAH

Oh. Any hopes of ignoring the call and returning to work evaporated. Rising to her feet, Ruth called her elder sister back.

“Hey,” Hannah answered. “You’re up.”

“Unfortunately.” Ruth pressed a hand to her belly as she stood. Sometime in the last few minutes, she’d become aware of a concerning, nauseous feeling low in her gut. She headed out into the hall, weaving expertly through her stacks of comics, and explained, “Inspiration struck.”

“Well, it’s good that you’re awake. I wish you’d get your sleep schedule on track.”

Sigh. Ruth had been gifted with a mother who did not nag. As part of the bargain, she’d been given an elder sister who did nothing but. “My sleep schedule is fine,” Ruth muttered, stepping into the bathroom. “I’m not one of your—” Of your toddlers, she’d been going to say. Because she was an insensitive, ungrateful cow. She swallowed the words and hoped they’d gone unnoticed.

“What time did you get up?” Hannah demanded. Thank God for dogged determination.

“About four.”

“In the afternoon?”

Ruth ignored the question, because the answer was obvious. She yanked down her pyjama bottoms and enormous granny knickers to find the expected splotches of blood staining their crotch. “Oh, dear,” she mumbled.

“Are you talking to yourself again?”

“Nope.” Ruth grabbed a box of tampons from the bathroom cabinet and found it quite tragically empty. “Shit.”

“You are talking to yourself,” Hannah insisted. “Oh, Ruthie. You really should get a cat.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Ruth tucked the phone between her shoulder and chin, tearing off a length of toilet paper. “Cats despise conversation.”

“Perhaps a goldfish, then.”

“You’d rather I talk to a goldfish?” Ruth wadded up the tissue and shoved it down her knickers. Emergency manoeuvres were called for.

“I’d rather you talked to people,” Hannah corrected. “Real, live people. Why don’t you come out with me tonight?”

Ruth paused in the act of pulling up her pyjama bottoms. She couldn’t help it. At the prospect of spending a Friday night out—like, out out—her body froze.

There was a pause. Then her stiff joints released, her muscles relaxed, and her breath calmed just enough for her to say, “No.”

Hannah sighed. Perhaps unsurprised, probably disappointed. “Not in Ravenswood. We could go to the city.”

As much as Ruth hated to deny her