Neither Caleb nor Batman ever sleep. I truly think that while the rest of us are naked and drooling, facedown in the sheets, these two are on the phone setting up deals overseas, with those for whom the times zones vary wildly. I daresay I can count on two hands the times I have encountered one or the other actually released from a wakeful state and yes, it was as disconcerting as you would imagine. I would tell you a horrifying story about the first thought that entered my mind upon finding Caleb with his guard down. I believe it may have involved a weapon of some kind but no, I'm not going to put it on the Internet and besides, thought crimes are not crimes per se so just nevermind. You can't indict me for wishing.
But real events are real, sadly and this morning I am overseeing the replacement of an entire wall of glass in Caleb's office because in case you missed the earthquake this morning, there wasn't one, it was Satan THROWING a table at Batman, who ducked and the table went crashing into the windows which aren't actually windows but walls made of glass that aren't supposed to be breakable. The table was sticking out of the glass when I arrived, a web of cracks stretching twenty feet on either side. No worries, I am not alone and the momentary lack of control has been replaced with Satan's usual droning hum of malevolence in an undercurrent just below the surface.
He shot his cuffs and morphed back into James Bond. It's a practiced talent. Under the dress shirt is his other form. A psychopathic nightmare. As long as he's wearing a suit we're safe. This morning? Armani, I think. When Batman arrived I am guessing Caleb was still in a black t-shirt and his shorts from a cloudy early run. The operative reminder here today would be to note that you wait until he's in the suit to be confrontational. That much I have learned anew over the past five years.
Batman isn't going to wait for Caleb to be less dangerous, for Batman trumps everything, including the devil. This hierarchy, clearly it comes from comic books and my curses come in waves at high tide, the dangerous time of day when I can't read the letters under the sea and I don't take care or exercise caution, leaving caution to morph into risk on my behalf. No work for Bridget, no, Bridget's going to be difficult.
And so the allegiance shifts once more and the power moves with it and Batman becomes the one we answer to because I was sold out. SOLD OUT.
They stopped working for Caleb in order to work for Batman.
Why didn't you tell me?
I could ask you the same thing. Do you remember our conversation from December?
Sure. You told me to fish or cut bait.
Batman smiled tightly but didn't flinch. He isn't unsophisticated enough to be rattled by my bluntness. Or by my beauty, sadly. I have no aces up my sleeves. I don't even have sleeves in this dress, for crying out loud. I have nothing, not my flesh, not my soul, not my heart, I am a doll. My eyes are sewn on and my dress is stitched to my plastic frame. I will sit in the corner and stare until played with, you can call me any name you want and I will never look back at you with accusatory eyes, just my customary I-didn't-hear-you blank expressionless pretty face.
I said I would give you weeks and I gave you months and you haven't made a move to put him in his place.
Why didn't you tell me you talked the boys into working for you?
They're not working for me. What are you talking about?
You own everything they're starting in.
I catch him off guard but then his face breaks into a huge grin.
You're not easily fooled.
I must look so incredibly stupid to all of you, you don't give me credit for a damned thing.
We give you credit for your strength.
It isn't strength, you idiot, it's endurance. It's patience. It's a pain threshold beyond anything you have ever even imagined.
The grin is gone. Away to be burned off by the sun. I hit the mark. Batman's been a safe haven of a different sort. His offers of help were so final and frightening, his power a little too great. I've never really believed that he was a man, he seemed to be more of a superhero, someone who held great power, someone who would only help you when you had nowhere else left to turn and as bad as things were, I still lined the boys up in order and Batman was always last. I put space between us on purpose and so he was last.
Last. This race is a joke, I'd rather come up slow through the populated portions of this race to watch the people in the park play chess on those giant human-sized boards, schlepping their rooks about the squares on a bright sunny day, not caring for the outcome of the game, just for the sake of play.
Running without watching where I'm going never ends well, now, does it? When I don't look where I'm going I have a tendency to trip and fall and hurt myself and this time, it goes as well as expected.
You've changed the subject. The point is, I gave you a time limit, and your time is up, Bridget.
Like hell it is, I say, and I step back into the elevator, letting the doors close in his face. Caleb didn't throw the table because he was angry, he threw it because he was scared. That's when you lose control the most. When you are unequivocally afraid.
