Love, Ruby Lavender

Evelyn tells Ruby that she and Melba need to sort things out, but Ruby won’t go. Dove arrives to watch the chicks hatch, and Ruby promises that what happened with Melba was an accident. Dove believes her but says Melba had to have all her hair cut off. Dove feels bad for Melba. Ruby hates that Dove likes Melba, and Dove asks why Ruby dislikes Melba so much. Ruby says it’s because Melba hates her, though there’s no good reason for it. When Ruby calls Melba a bully, Dove says that Melba’s been nice to her. She asks why Melba is “so mad” at Ruby for last summer’s accident.

Ruby changes the subject, asking why Dove always wears the same clothes. Dove says she has a bunch of the same shirts and pants because she likes them and they’re good for her anthropological work. Dove tells Ruby there was even a reporter at Melba’s house and that Melba’s scalp is stained bright blue. Ruby thinks Melba got what she deserved after making fun of Ruby, and she claims she doesn’t care about Melba at all. Dove does, though, and she keeps going on about Melba being blue and bald now. They can hear Ivy’s chicks pecking at their shells. When Bemmie and Bess start screeching, Ruby knows something is very wrong.

Ruby tries to catch Bess and Bemmie as a rock hits the ground next to her. The chickens scream when another rock smashes the greenhouse window, showering the girls with glass. Ruby finds Ivy’s nest on the ground, and two of the three eggs are broken. The chicks inside are dead. Ruby and Dove are scratched and bleeding from the glass. Ivy is sitting on her third egg, which is still peeping. One of the rocks has a note tied to it, professing the writer’s “hate” for Ruby and her chickens. Ruby knows it’s from Melba.

Evelyn and Mattie arrive to find Ruby enraged and Dove in tears. Ruby accuses Melba of throwing the rocks and shows the adults the note. Mattie says she saw Melba running away from the scene. Mattie takes the girls inside to clean their cuts.

Mattie washes the girls’ hair to get the glass out, and Ruby misses her grandparents more than ever; she is surprised to learn that Mattie also misses Eula. Ruby wants to have a funeral for the chicks, and she cries. Mattie is gentle with Ruby and agrees that it hurts to lose someone you love. She tells Ruby there is no shame in crying, but Ruby explains that Melba laughed at her for crying at Garnet’s funeral. Ruby apologizes for ruining the operetta, and Mattie assures her she hasn’t, pointing out that “There’s always another day” (132). Mattie gives Ruby a big smile that surprises Ruby, who smiles back. Mattie assures her that the family is “full of strong women who know how to laugh” (133). Suddenly, Dove bursts into the room with the news that the remaining chick is hatching.

Dove and Ruby are dressed in two of Eula’s floral muumuus, and each notes the other’s different appearance; Dove only ever wears her anthropologist “uniform,” and Ruby always wears overalls. Ruby tells Dove about Eula’s saying, that life does go on, but she says it won’t for the chicks who died. Dove thinks that perhaps the expression means something else. After the girls watch the chick hatch, they go inside Eula’s house to rest. Evelyn tucks the girls into Eula’s bed before she leaves. Dove tells Ruby she’s glad that Ruby is her friend, and Ruby asks Dove what she should do about Melba. Dove doesn’t know, and she is already asleep when Ruby asks what Dove would do. Ruby sleeps, dreaming of her Grandpa Garnet.

In the June 27, Twilight Edition of the Aurora County News, Phoebe Tolbert reports on the incident with the blue paint and the one at the Pink Palace. She suggests that both events were unfortunate “accidents” though two chicks are dead, as is Melba’s acting career now that she has no hair.

Ruby writes to Eula about the chicks’ funeral. Melba told Evelyn that she didn’t mean to break the window and another neighbor gave her a job so she could pay for it. Ruby named the new chick Rosebud, and Rosebud sleeps near her bed. Ruby writes that she’d like to picnic in the cemetery with Eula when she gets back. She thanks Eula for pictures of Leilani, who she finds sort of cute.

Eula writes of her sadness about Ivy’s chicks. Ruby reports that Melba sent her an “I’m sorry” note, but she tore it up. She also told Mattie that Mattie isn’t such a crab. Eula wonders how Ruby will avoid Melba once school starts. She asks Ruby to go to the operetta so she gives Eula a report. Ruby excitedly writes that Bemmie laid an egg, and Ruby anticipates the new chick around August 1. Eula writes that Dove is welcome to her muumuus and can interview her when she returns. Ruby writes about watching the Ishees together and says, “You must miss Grandpa Garnet worse than anybody” (150). Eula expresses her happiness for Bemmie, and Ruby rejects the idea of seeing Melba or going to the operetta.