CHAPTER 8
The look on Ruby’s face broadcast her dismay in high definition. She knew bad news was coming and refused to take one more step into the apartment. She stood in the entranceway, arms folded, expression stern and disapproving. She couldn’t imagine what I was going to say. She heard only the words, “I did something . . . something I probably shouldn’t have done.” If you’re a fan of Lifetime movies, like Ruby is, those words, spoken by a nervous spouse, tend to be followed by revelations of infidelity, a hidden drug problem perhaps, or an admission of a felony crime. No wonder she didn’t want to sit down.
“What have you done, John? If you’re leaving me for another woman, I swear I’m going to kill you.”
There was no jest to her threat. A heavy mood seemed to thicken the air. I took hold of her hand.
“No, baby,” I said, my eyes locked firmly on hers. “There’s no other woman. There can never be another woman. You’re the love of my life. That’s why I can’t let anything happen to you.”
My voice broke. A choking sob got caught somewhere in my throat, while gathering tears blurred my vision. I watched Ruby’s angry expression transform into one of pure sympathy for me. How could someone vacillate between emotions that quickly? Love, that’s how. But I didn’t need another reminder of Ruby’s genuine goodness. All I needed was for her to get better.
Ruby tugged on my hand, leading me into the living room. She sat down on the futon beside me, hand resting on my knee.
“Sweetie, talk to me. What’s going on?” Ruby asked.
I swallowed hard and took several deep breaths until I felt composed enough to speak. That’s when I told her everything. I explained how Atrium would cover only the cost of the generic drug, even though the generic was unavailable. And how Wilhelm Genetics could give us twelve thousand dollars toward the cost of her medication—a sliver of what we needed. I explained again how the other prescription assistance programs didn’t provide coverage for Verbilifide and how some health insurance companies, such as UniSol Health, offered a generic drug exception.
“We can’t just get this drug on a promise to pay the pharmaceutical company back one day,” I said more than once. We needed insurance or cash, and had neither. That’s when I told her about my phone-spoofing effort and how I’d found a suitable identity to steal. The Uretskys, Elliot and Tanya, had what we needed: UniSol Health.
Ruby got real quiet, as I had when I first found the cancer on the bottom of her foot. It was that kind of silence. She got up from the futon and walked around the room, inspecting every corner of the tight space like it was a crime scene—which I guess, in a way, it was. I watched her enter the bedroom and come out moments later, holding a framed picture of the two of us, taken on the top of Mount Greylock in the Berkshires. She held the picture up for me to see. She had one hand rested on her hip, body slightly tilted, as though readying to accuse me of something.
“John, what’s this apartment for? Why did you fill it with our things? Explain this to me.”
I expelled a heavy breath.
“Elliot Uretsky had fallen behind on his health insurance payments,” I said.
“How is that helpful? Won’t UniSol come after him for payment and hold his future claims?”
“It’s good because he won’t be wondering why he’s not getting any bills from UniSol. We only need to do this for six months, and I’m counting on Uretsky being too scattered to notice his missing UniSol Health bills. Meanwhile, the bills and statements are now coming to a P.O. box I got in his name. I also made him current on his account, so there’s no receivable issue, either. Still, we have to be careful. Insurance fraud is a very big problem.”
“One that we’re apparently contributing to,” Ruby said, her arms folded across her chest.
“I figured the sudden and sustainable claims might rouse some suspicion. UniSol Health has an eight hundred number for a Special Investigations Department. The apartment is a precaution in case they sent somebody out to investigate us. If they did, they wouldn’t find cause to dig very deep.”
“Meaning?”
Ruby tossed the picture onto the futon like she was throwing a Frisbee.
“Meaning we have an apartment rented as Elliot and Tanya Uretsky. I made us identification cards, too.”
“Made?”
“Forged.”
“Goodness, John. So we don’t drive?”
“Too hard to make driver’s licenses. But a Mass ID is way easier to duplicate.”
“Let me guess. You made it off the Internet.”
I looked honestly surprised, because I was.
Now it was Ruby who looked surprised. “I was joking. You really did?”
“DocumentID.com,” I said. “They sell kits. Synthetic paper. Butterfly pouches. ID laminators.”
Ruby looked away.
“I think I’m going to be sick,” she said.
I jumped up to grab a bucket that was tucked under the kitchen sink.
Ruby held up her hands to stop me. “I’m not really going to be sick,” she said with a huff. “It’s just how I feel.”
At least now I was standing beside her. I reached out to touch her, but Ruby jerked away.
“We can’t do this, John,” she said.
“We have to.”
“No. We don’t.”
“We don’t have the money. Where are we going to get the money?”
Ruby let go an exasperated sigh. “We’ll go on TV,” she said. “The Today Show.”
“You just want to go on The Today Show because you have a crush on Matt Lauer.”
“No, John. I just don’t want to be a criminal.”
“And then what? What do you think they’re going to talk about? Your cancer? Or the fact that I cut the rope of my climbing companion and sent him falling to his death?”
“That’s not enough of a reason not to try.”
I nodded my agreement. If I had to relive what I did to Brooks Hall on national television for Ruby, I’d do it in a heartbeat.
Then I said, “Even if they did pick up our story, there’s no guarantee we’ll raise enough money in donations. What then? We can’t fall back on my plan. Not after we’ve exposed ourselves to the world.”
“Can’t you have faith in other people . . . that they’ll come through for us in our time of need?”
“Climbing taught me how to rely on myself, Ruby. That’s what I have faith in. Solve my own problem. I can’t trust anybody more than myself.”
“Oh, ye of little faith, what if we get caught?” Ruby asked.
“Who?” I said. “Who’s going to catch us? Elliot Uretsky hasn’t even paid his bills. He’s not going to see a single statement. And we’ll make our co-payments on time, every time. Like I said, this isn’t permanent. In a few months’ time, you’ll be cured and this will all be put behind us.”
“Where did you get the money for the apartment?”
“And cable,” I said, making a weak attempt to lighten an increasingly tense mood. Ruby’s expression conveyed a blend of disbelief and disgust. Smartly, I decided to shelve any further mood-lightening attempts. “I sold some equipment,” I confessed. “But I didn’t buy the furniture. I just rented a furnished apartment.”
“But you need that hardware to expand your business!” Ruby exclaimed. “That’s what you’ve been telling me.”
That’s Ruby for you, thinking of me when it’s her life on the line.
“I don’t need anything but you,” I said.
“This is just like you, headstrong and impulsive.”
“And it’s just like you to balance me out, which is why I knew I had to ease you into this plan.”
“This is how you ease?”
Time to switch tactics.
“When I was depressed, you never once gave up on me.”
“Because I love you. I’d do anything for you.”
“Don’t you think I feel the same?”
This gave Ruby a moment’s pause. “Of course.”
“There’s something else you should know.”
“I don’t think I want to,” Ruby said.
“We can’t leave this place for six months.”
“Six months? What are you talking about?”
“Well . . . I sort of rented our apartment.”
“Rented our apartment?”
“To a couple of professors from Barcelona.”
“What? Why?”
“Because I couldn’t sell enough equipment to afford both places.”
“So what? We move here starting now? We just start living our lives as Elliot and Tanya Uretsky?”
I nodded and then said, “Hey, at least it’s a short walk to the movies.” Ruby shrugged that benefit off. “There’s more,” I said.
“More?”
“You’ve got to get rediagnosed. And, of course, we’re going to have to find another dermatological oncologist to see.”
“What do you mean? Start this whole process all over again? The MRI? PET scans? Needles? Oh God, John. You can’t be serious.”
“It’s the only way. We’ll tell them that we just moved to town. We don’t have any primary care doctor, because we haven’t needed one. We’re young. Young people don’t always go to the doctor. They’ll believe us. There’s no primary doctor for anybody to contact. Dr. Lisa Adams essentially no longer exists. They’ll run the tests over again. They’ll come to the same conclusion. Think of it as a very thorough second opinion.”
Ruby scoffed and threw up her hands. “Yeah, maybe the results this time will show I’m cancer free.”
“Let’s hope they do.”
Ruby put her hands on her hips and gazed absently out the windows directly behind the futon. Her fifty-thousand-yard stare reminded me that I needed to buy curtains for those windows. I wanted to rent a first-floor apartment because of my acrophobia but couldn’t find one furnished in our price range. Light spilling inside through those very windows lit her hair, giving the appearance of an angelic glow. Ruby stood still for a long, tense moment. When she looked back at me, there were tears in her eyes.
“I don’t want to do it, John,” Ruby said, taking steps toward me. “I don’t want to.”
I opened my arms, and Ruby fell hard into me. I held on to her, rocking back and forth on my heels as Ruby wept onto my chest. Eventually, I started to cry as well. I tried to speak, but I’m sure it was hard for Ruby to understand me, as I was struggling to catch my breath.
“I can’t risk it, Ruby,” I said, my voice cracking and quavering. The tears were flowing freely now. I don’t often cry, and I could sense my tears were bringing Ruby closer to me. “I don’t want to trust our lives to the kindness of strangers. I don’t want to wait for the cheaper drug to miraculously become available. I don’t want to waste time chasing grants and assistance programs. I want you to take the medicine you need without having to worry about how we’re going to pay for it. You have a right to live. This isn’t your fault. This is just how it is. And I’ve got a way to fix it. Please, baby. Please let me fix this—this one thing, the only thing about your cancer that I can control. Please, don’t say no. Please.”
Ruby pulled away, her eyes ringed black with running mascara. She sniffled and forced a half smile. “I’m not okay with it,” she said. “But if you think it’s the only way, I’ll do it.”