I've reached that stage of exhaustion where it takes a supreme effort not to sit slack-jawed and vacant-eyed at the dinner table or in conversation or when I'm sitting by myself.
Nolan is gone. Claus went too. The old Russian doctor came by this morning and gave me some probably-not-a-good-idea pills for my headaches and thus it seems this week will be shrouded in fog. Even the ghosts are disappointed as the Devil is elated at how things turned out. How well I stood my ground. How well I balanced on the edge of life, good and bad, between the past and the future, between the buried and me.
Between Ben, Loch and Caleb.
I'm not sure Caleb is going anywhere. This wasn't supposed to be a magic fix, it was a beginning, a shift in the wind that might lead to a smoother existence down the road or maybe nothing will change. I don't know. Half the time I couldn't hear what anyone was saying because it rained so hard it drowned everything else out. And now both Nolan and Claus are gone again and yet Sam, Joel and August remain. I'm trying to figure out how to keep everyone happy while living within Lochlan's limits, protecting myself from the Devil and still being permitted access to my ghosts. Then they get all mixed up and I wind up living within the Devil's limits while protecting myself from the ghosts and being permitted access to Lochlan.
I do it to myself. I know that. I never said I had it all. I never said I had it all together. I never said I understood why the forbidden is so attractive or why it's so easy to ignore the danger Caleb brings but some things are just meant to be figured out over time. Even if time sometimes skips, drags and runs flat-fucking-out.
