My extra-long, extra-soft weekend is just about over. I think I'm all favored-out, I'm peopled-out and I'm not thinking very hard today, I'm trying to close the holes in my own armor before today's first visit with Joel at the helm. Dr. Important Joel, who is probably the kind of man who writes PhD. after his name when he signs the guestbook at a wedding, and I'm guessing he practices shooting his cuffs in mirrors as some men do because it appears to be a studied talent. No less devastating to Bridget, who likes that sort of thing, but far too practiced to be natural.
Sometime this morning while I talk with Joel and Jacob exhausts the nearby bookstore, Loch will make his exit. I told him it was time to go, that he didn't come out for me, he came out for him. I lost him yesterday and by nine o'clock I assumed he was visiting friends or checking out old haunts until I went out to get the lights and there he was, sitting in a chair with an empty case of beer at his feet.
Loch is hardcore, whereas a case of beer would have buried Jacob somewhere in the hundred acre wood, wiping every last trace of Flogging Molly lyrics from his brain forever, Loch simply gets sweeter and a little slower and usually a lot more open. He isn't an open kind of guy otherwise. I was about to be treated to his slurred confession, the likes of which he rarely ventures into.
He smiled at me in the dark.
Oh Loch, you're fuckered, aren't you?
Not anymore. I've just about come out the other side.
What in the hell is going on?
Come and sit with me, Bridgie. Just for a while.
Okay. Tell me what's going on.
Are things okay?
No, but they will be.
What about Jake?
What about him?
You love him.
So much.
Then what was the rush for?
We were tired of waiting. You know this story. Come on, it's time for bed.
You should have had more time to play around, more time to have fun.
Please don't, Loch.
Maybe we should have had another go-round, princess.
Loch. Enough.
Like we did just before you got engaged to Cole. My God, it was better than high school.
Stop it. That was sixteen years ago.
It should be a prerequisite when you get engaged.
No it shouldn't.
What's this?
There was Jacob, poking his head out the door.
Loch's had too much and he's nostalgic.
No, Jake, I've had too much and I'm wistful.
About?
Sleeping with your lovely wife. I was hoping for a crack at every year or more.
Loch, you'll get a crack alright. Across the head. Maybe you need to get some sleep.
And maybe you should stay out of this, preacher man.
Yeah, I think I will.
Jacob actually went back inside. I was stunned. He trusts us both.
Bridgie, I wanted a life like this. With you. I was the first one to love you. I taught you things.
A million years ago. What the hell happened to everyone just being my friends?
I never fell out of love with you.
No, don't.
You make it impossible not to. The little blonde, so pretty and bubbly and fragile, who has worked her way into everyone's heart. Everyone cares about you.
Then why can't it stay caring?
I don't know. How do you steal everyone's hearts?
I don't. I wanted one and I took it.
Bridgie, he's rebound guy. You two are too intense, everyone's simply waiting and holding their breath.
They can stop. I love Jake. There's no rebound here.
If things don't work out, do you have a plan?
Yeah, I die alone. There won't ever be another man like Jacob for me. He's extraordinary.
He must be.
He is, Loch.
But if it doesn't work?
Hey, Loch, did you know I had this conversation with Ben already?
Ben's a fucking pervert. He just wants inside you.
And you?
I want the whole package. You and me, we have always belonged together.
And here I thought we had platonic down to a science now.
You did. I just kept quiet.
This is the last thing I need right now, Loch. I need your friendship, I'm running out of friends.
With all due respect, Bridge, you don't have any friends.
Stop it.
We all want the same thing. You wonder why Chris and PJ are well into their thirties and single? Oh and in the summer when you dress so sparingly spending time with you is like winning the lottery. You don't think they whack off to your face at night in their dreams? You have no friends. Just a line up.
Just then the screen door banged open again.
That's enough, Loch.
Jake, you see it.
We'll talk tomorrow. Jesus, Loch.
Jacob waited for Loch to go inside and stagger slightly down the hall to the guest room and then he locked up behind us. We went to bed in silence upstairs and I lay in Jacob's arms and cried.
Friendless.
An inevitable truth, because not once did Jacob deny it. He knows. Hell, I imagine I knew too and just refused to let the idea bloom in my head because my boys have been such huge helps to me and such comfort and fun over the years. I was hoping that hidden agendas weren't so rampant. I was convinced men and women can be friends. Loch was the last person I would have expected this from, the very last and I don't want to lose him but after an admission like that things are never going to be the same. Things have never been the same anyway. This is not my life anymore.
Now I just have to get everyone else shitfaced and throttle the truth out of them too.
