Dancing on the Razor's Edge: Drabbles

I. Origins

(Alright, so this first chapter is gonna be angsty. Trigger warnings for injury detail, cutting and mentions of suicide. Keep this in mind, and read ahead at your own discretion.) ~Shay

                                                                                              ~

(Ruby has a nightmare about the night she killed her friends, before herself. Shay tries to calm her down and bring her back.)

8:00pm, the Lane residence, 11th February 1965.

Ruby Lane never wanted to be the social outcast of her group. And tonight, she was determined to make it happen. She'd invited a few of her friends over from high school earlier that day. With her mom working a later shift that particular night, she'd allowed her to have her friends around, so long as they didn't make a mess of the house. So far, it was actually going pretty well. They'd been watching old movies on her TV, with the record player playing faint music in the background, as they talked and chatted about their days. Sure, she was social in choir. But this felt... different. At some point, she'd come upstairs to check on her makeup, when she thought she heard a whisper behind her.

"Ruby..."  The teenager turned around on her heel, thinking it was one of her friends talking from behind her. 

"Hmm? Did you say something, Cassie?"

"Huh? No. I was just going back downstairs. You must be hearing things." Her friend gave a light chuckle before going off back to the rest of Ruby's friends. As the footsteps faded further and further away, Ruby's head began to pound lightly. It wasn't a migraine, but it was definitely sudden; she'd been basically fine up until this moment in time. Going back into the bathroom, she decided a splash of cold water wouldn't hurt, even if it did potentially mess up her make-up. Looking back in the mirror, she saw the black eyeshadow lightly smudged, which caused her to frown lightly. Worse of all, her headache only seemed to worsen. The voice that she thought she'd heard earlier on now seemed to become clearer. 

"Ruby..."

With that, Ruby's senses all faded at once. Her hands were still on the bathroom counter, just before the mirror, but she herself couldn't feel it anymore. It was like she'd been pulled out of control of her own body, and could now only watch. Rummaging through the drawer beneath the sink, she found an old antique razor, of which the blade was very much still sharp. So much so, that she sliced her finger lightly upon inspecting it. Hearing the door open behind her, she heard Cassie's voice.

"Ruby, are you okay? You've been up here an awful long time."

Turning around, Ruby held the razor in her hand, which was now open, as more droplets of her own blood stained the blade.

"What the... Ruby, what are you doing with that? And... what's that look in your eye?" 

Ruby slowly approached her friend, pinning her up against the door, before slashing her forearm open with the razor, which produced a screech of pain from her, muffled slightly by Ruby's other hand. Trying to move the blade to her face, her friend thrashed around under her grip, and as she slashed her friend's throat, it soaked her printed flower shirt with blood, some staining her cheeks. She looked like a bloodied angel, and as her friend choked on the last of her own blood, her eyes looked up to Ruby's in pure frozen horror. The audible thud of the body hitting the bathroom floor got the attention of the rest of her friends from downstairs. At least one, anyway.

"You girls alright up there? Watch my drink, I'm gonna have a look." 

Laying in wait behind the bathroom door, she recognised the whistling of her friend Trevor, and as soon as he walked in, that was when she sprung her trap. Admittedly, overpowering his taller frame was much more of a challenge than Cassie, and as she fought with him, she was momentarily stunned as her cheek was slashed open crudely, thanks to some fighting back from the boy. This only seemed to anger her more, however, and so she kicked the back of his knee, before roughly grabbing him by the scruff of the neck, before condemning him to the same fate as Cassie. With two of her friends now dead, she hummed a distant tune that the record player downstairs was playing; she recognised it as the Mills Brothers, with the song You Always Hurt the One You Love. 

As she emerged from the bottom of the stairs, all of her friends looked to her as soon as they heard her voice. Their faces all dropped, when they saw the new colour covering her shirt, cheeks and arms.

"You always hurt, the one you love..."

"What the... R-Ruby?"

Ruby's head tilted to the left slightly and as she sang her sick, demented lullaby, all that her friends could do was look at her in horror. One by one, each of them would fall to her blade, and whilst some did struggle, others could only freeze in horror as they met the same grisly end. Even her boyfriend, who at one point would've been the very last person she would ever thought of hurting even remotely. After what felt like an eternity, everyone barring Ruby was dead on the floor, blood soaking into the carpet at this point, as the TV and record player were the only sources of noise in the living room now. Looking around silently, she ventured through the kitchen, before going out the back door.

Sitting outside in the backyard, Ruby sat down on the garden swing, sitting down in time to see the sun begin to set over the horizon. Hearing the laughter of children, the faint honking of car horns, her senses began to return, as she looked down to her hands and lap; there was no spot on her body that wasn't bloodied. Feeling tears immediately beginning to spill down her cheeks, she gently placed the razor over her wrist, gritting her teeth. Slicing horizontally up and along her forearm, she repeated the process for her other arm. Dropping the razor to the stone floor, she laid back into the swing. 

The ambience of the evening kept her in the moment, as the noises kept her anchored in reality, her breath hitching frequently with the rapid loss of her blood. Eventually, one of her neighbours who was already in their own back garden, noticed her from where she was stood. As she approached, her eyes widened, hopping the fence to check on the girl. By this point, her pulse was slowing down, her eyes rolling back slowly, as the sunset and rapid shouting of her neighbour echoed through her mind.

                                                                        ~Back in the present day~

"Ruby! Ruby! Wake up! You're dreaming!" Shay gave Ruby a light shake, hearing her partner sobbing and feeling her thrashing about next to her, until she saw her eyes open, which caused her to calm down, albeit slowly. Ruby clung to Shay, wrapping her arms around her as she sobbed uncontrollably into her shoulder.

"Shay... It never stops... They don't stop...! Why won't it just leave me alone?" She squeaked, her voice sore from her harsh sobbing. Shay kept rubbing her back gently, holding her tightly before giving her a reassuring kiss to her forehead.

"Sometimes, memories like this don't just leave. Maybe not right away. Maybe not ever, y'know? Sometimes, we need to learn to live with them. And I know how hard, and how horrible that night was for you. I can't even begin to put myself in your shoes. But it wasn't your fault. Okay? With the Goodes dead, this kinda thing won't happen again. Not with me around." She gently pulled away, cupping her cheeks with her hands. Feeling them moistened with tears, she wiped them away gently with her thumbs. 

"You're not planning on going anywhere, r-right? You're not scared of me?" She shivered, before Shay shook her head at her girlfriend, kissing her lips gently, giving her a gentle smile.

"You could never scare me away, Ruby. You never will, either. I'm always gonna be here. I promise." With another kiss, Shay slowly coaxed her partner to lay back down with her. As they began to fall back asleep, Shay made sure that her partner was asleep before she felt alright to do so herself.

(A/N: And that's my first little drabble completed! It feels good to write again after a few days. A slightly different version of what happened in the original story. This'll probably be the running theme for my drabbles in this series. It'll be both angsty, fluffy, or both! It'll be everyday scenarios, to other canon events within the Netflix trilogy. It honestly depends on what I'm feeling. Stay tuned!) ~Shay