Chapter Text
In all of her life, there was never a time when Ruby Rose truly felt alone.
There were a great deal of people in her life justifying that statement, and Ruby considered herself a fortunate person to have those people. Her immediate family— consisting of her sister, her father, and uncle— were her precious ring of support, of people who cared about her, and Ruby could say the same about her small but loyal ring of friends at school as well.
Her father, Taiyang Xiao Long, treated her like she was the most precious thing in his world. He was a wonderful father who spoiled his daughters rotten, and held a respectable job as a martial arts instructor. Ruby and her half-sister Yang Xiao Long couldn't have been closer, and despite the occasional sibling rivalry, they were fiercely loyal to one another, and couldn't imagine life without the other. Uncle Qrow was their backbone— despite his somewhat removed presence from the family, as he was the brother of Taiyang's first wife, he was as much a member of the household as a blood relative, and his visits were always laced with fun times and amusing stories of some of his various clients he consulted with as a detective for the police force.
"Hello again, Ruby."
So it would come as a shock to anyone outside the family to hear a voice long thought to be gone from the household. This voice was not among the usual family members— at least the ones who had a physical presence.
Standing two metres away from Ruby was a woman dressed in black. Her attire was most unusual; consisting of a jet-black kimono, with a lining of white serving as an under-layer, also with matching black hakama. A sword hung at her hip, adding to her general mystique and other-worldliness. She stood out against the modernity of her surroundings; embodying the image of a traditional swordswoman.
She was also Ruby's mother, Summer Rose.
Ruby couldn't look at her— not out of fear or shyness, but of a desire not to acknowledge her mother's existence. Summer appeared not to be bothered by the apparent stonewalling, and simply continued with the task she made her duty to perform every visit: talking about her day. She had always appeared at the household at least twice a month simply to share her feelings with any errant family member, and this time was no exception.
This wasn't to say that Ruby disliked her mother. In fact, she was always jubilant to hear her mother's words, and would have replied in earnest. There was only one problem, however, a problem which Ruby tried her hardest to ignore the metaphorical elephant in the room— and that was the fact that Summer Rose had died over ten years ago.
Summer had passed on a Sunday afternoon when Ruby was only four years old. Ruby had been told her mother had died in an accident, far away from home one day while Ruby spent the day at home with her father and sister. She had never known much of her mother, to her dismay, but the gap Summer had left behind was a constant ache in the family's mood.
But somehow, Summer was here, standing neatly in the corner of the living room looking pristine and none the worse for wear.
So there was only one explanation: ghosts.
Upon finding out their household was being haunted by a deceased relative, an ordinary person would either freak out, seek a psychologist for grief consoling, or call an exorcist— possibly all at once. Ruby certainly would have run to her father for help the first time she heard her mother's voice, if it weren't for her child-like curiosity that ultimately turned the tides.
Ruby was no stranger to ghosts— she had been able to see them around the time of her mother's death, which was in retrospect a rather unwelcome experience at the time. Being around four years old and seeing ghosts was a little scary because the ghosts would notice her staring at them, and inevitably try to interact with her— leaving a young Ruby panicky and flustered because she was alone; adults would assume she was playing make-believe, and other children would tease her.
It was worse with her family. Like a great deal of things after her mother's death, her newfound ability to see ghosts became one of the things that became taboo to talk about. Her father, undergoing a terrible depression that rendered him all but deaf to the world, would not stand for any of Ruby's purported ghost sightings. Ghosts inevitably brought up the topic of Summer, and Taiyang would gently— but firmly— tell Ruby to stop. Yang would become angry— being unable to see the ghosts herself, she would assume Ruby was making things up, and accuse her of 'defiling Mom's memory'.
As she got older, Ruby eventually recognized it as their way of coping with the loss of a person— one she had never truly gotten to know, and so she stopped talking about ghosts— with her family, or any of her peers for that matter.
Still, Ruby had been surprised at how, well, human— the ghosts were. They didn't look like any of the scary ghosts found in horror movies like Sadako or others, to a young Ruby's immense relief. For a while, she even played with them, much to her father's consternation.
Back to the topic of her mother: apparently, her mother was some kind of super-ghost; one charged with the duty to protect mankind from evil, corrupted ghosts--and did so by slaying them with nothing but a katana. The image cemented itself in Ruby's mind that even dead, her mom was a badass super-mom. It also reinforced the notion that there was an afterlife— it seemed even as a soul, you couldn't become a super-soul without someone granting that power.
From the corner of the room, Summer would watch Ruby's family go about their day, while also talking about her own day to anyone who could listen. There was no malicious intent behind her mother visits; they were simply to check in once in a while on her still-living family. Ruby surmised that this was her mother's way of coping with her own death, but Ruby couldn't actually do anything to help. The truth to Ruby's inability to reply lay in the other spirit standing outside the house.
Summer was still talking about her day involving a particularly unruly Plus--the term for a recently deceased soul, and how she calmed him down enough to release his soul into the afterlife. Ruby listened avidly, mentally replying to the conversation whenever she could.
The bright sunny day outside was the antithesis to what Ruby felt like when she carefully stole a glance outside. Another man stood outside the window, a few metres outside the property line. He was also dressed in the same uniform as her mother, signifying his affiliation as her mother's teammate— but from his impersonal air, Ruby knew he was watching over her mother. Surveilling her, ensuring she didn't step out of line and interfere with living matters.
Ruby realized some time ago her mother was not supposed to be here; with her still-living family. It only made sense, with the way she purposely avoided touching or disturbing anything physical, including their very bodies whenever Yang or Taiyang or Ruby herself got too close to her. While it was possible that the family would just pass through her like any other ghost, Summer appeared to be unwilling to take her chances. And the other shinigami watching her from outside was to ensure she never did.
It was unfair, Ruby thought, for Summer to be so close yet unable to interact with her loved ones. Even though she worked hard to protect her family from harm, there would never be a reward for her in this lifetime.
"...and that's how I calmed that Plus down, without a konso." Summer finished, unconsciously gesturing with her sheathed sword. Ruby recogized that term— a human who had died with regret in their hearts, and thus their souls would remain in the World of the Living, shackled by a chain that represented their unfinished desires. Her mother would ramble on about the mundane to the interesting, like the rules of the society she was a part of, assuming no one living could ever hear her.
"Sometimes, you just have to be a good listener." Summer concluded her tale, chuckling quietly to herself. If only Summer could realize the extreme irony of her sentence, as Ruby had in fact listened to every single thing her mother ever said since she stepped foot in this house.
Summer stopped laughing, her expression becoming more forlorn. "Hmm, it seems my time today is coming to a close." Summer stole a glance outside the window, where the other shinigami gave her a polite but firm gesture— an indication it was time for her to leave. "Say hello to your father and sister, will you?"
For Ruby, that was without a doubt the hardest part of every goodbye. She knew she couldn't let anyone know of her mother's visits—not that her family would believe her. Or anyone else for that matter—it was her sole burden to carry the hearts of the deceased, and Ruby would make sure of it.
Why did she have to see ghosts? It was torture to see her and be unable to interact with her, and the worst part was that her mother wasn't even trying to give Ruby a hard time—for all that she knew, she was simply rambling to her family like they were the deceased; unable to speak back, only intended for the speaker to relieve their own sense of loss. Despite that, Ruby couldn't fault her mother for the angst—if she were in Summer's shoes, freshly deceased and separated from all that remained of her old life, she could imagine herself doing such a thing—but only if she knew with certainty that her listeners were, indeed, unable to listen.
Summer got up from her half-slouch, and began to walk towards the door. Ruby desperately wanted to say something, to tell her to stay longer, but she knew she couldn't so much as turn vaguely towards her direction, lest the other shinigami notice her. They'd question her, then potentially wipe her memories—as overheard from her mother's topics, —then Ruby would never see her mother again.
So, like every goodbye with her mother, Ruby lowered her head and pretended to be immersed in whatever task she happened to be doing; washing dishes in this case. And only when she was certain Summer and the other shinigami were gone, did she permit herself to speak.
"Bye, mom."
This was Ruby Rose's life, and she imagined it would go on like this until her mother finally moved on, or she herself ultimately passed. Not once did she imagine she would interact with her mother again in this lifetime, as it would only bring pain unto herself and her family. She knew she couldn't tell the other family members; she had pretended her 'ghost-seeing' phase was just that: a phase, and she knew it would just simply be too much for them to handle. Taiyang was completely catatonic for the first few years after Summer's death, leaving Ruby and Yang to grow up themselves—he had recovered enough to snap out of it eventually, but sometimes Ruby would still catch him staring blankly into space when he thought no one was looking.
If only her ability to see ghosts didn't include her very mother, then Ruby could have an easier life. Heck, Ruby would be happy if she couldn't see ghosts anymore—though that would bring its own pain, not knowing what had happened to her mother's soul. But she had said it herself: her mother was gone, and that was their reality.
That all changed when Ruby encountered a Hollow for the first time in her life.