Thank you for the kind thoughts, but really, it's a small remembrance, one of many I've made so that the kids will always remember they've got two dads, and both love them unconditionally and forever, in spite of any circumstances that have ever been in place.
I'm going to make less than the usual sense today. I was up all night with the thunderstorms raging in my ears, sweat dripping off my chin, blowing off steam and heartache in Jacob's arms, Jacob who didn't drive to Mexico like I feared he might, instead returning after dinner to hear all about 'Daddy's bench' and see the pictures and hear about the slightly creepy black butterfly that wouldn't leave us alone the whole time we were there.
Christ. Cole is going to reincarnate himself as different giant scary insects. It figures. Oh my God I am so afraid of bugs.
Jacob's issue wasn't with a fixture-type memorial, it was more with the sad notion that this is the first Father's Day that Cole wasn't here, and now that Jacob is all officially a dad now he feels the pain of that. He's sad for Cole. Sometimes he realizes the gravity of what has happened so much more deeply than it is usually felt around here and he can step outside of his own feelings and..
And oh my God, be objective about something.
Otherwise, he made sure all the butterflies in the neighborhood, along with the bees and the spiders and any other creepy-crawlies were left outside in the rain on the other side of the locked doors of his house and that his children and his guest were long asleep and then he made love to his wife all night, an athletic, belligerent, half-angry rail because sometimes he's not objective when it comes to Bridget and he won and stuck it to Cole worse than any two friends could ever hurt each other and he did it on purpose because he wanted me and not because Cole was hurting me, oh no, and he took all of the dark hours to confirm that, in my eyes and in his own I am his so that there would be no mistake.
There is no mistake.
And I'm sure the rain poured down on that bench last night and somewhere Cole was screaming at Jacob to give him back his family. Jacob would have smiled in his dreams and said no, that I was safe now and I would be safe forever because he always liked to hide his selfishness, wrapping it in a disguise of rescue, so that he would always be my hero, saving me from bugs and from dead husbands. Saving me from everything dark and scary.
Everything except for Jacob and his intense need for me. For that, I am on my own.
