A laundry list.

Oh, great. Blogger's made changes and I don't have time to fuck with this today as I have to take Henry to work and I want to make a drugstore run. PJ offered to do it but I like to be the one to take the kids to their jobs, though only Henry works outside the home at this point and I hate it. I want to keep him home and safe but he's six-two and handsome and fine with going, fine with danger pay, fine with the pandemic as he said he hardly notices except for not being able to spend time with his friends.

Soon, I tell him.

I know, he replies.

When I get home the dryer will be finished so there will be clothes to fold and while I do that PJ will probably make us strange noodles for lunch and clean the kitchen. I'm plotting a second do-nothing day save for picking Henry up again and then cooking dinner tonight, since my headache won't budge even though I've had coffee and another five-kilometre run (this time in the wind and rain SO MUCH BETTER) and a decent sleep.

Today they're going to make the opening announcement for our province but I'm already scared we're going to get left behind, stuck like this forever. I need my eyes checked, my teeth cleaned. I want to go to the shops without getting dirty looks and I want a doctor's appointment without having to resort to the Russians and I want to go to Golden Ears instead of Cypress. Cypress is a joke played on the rich people. It's not a park, it's a gravel pit on the side of a mountain.

I want OUT.

But I can wait.

And I won't even complain.

PJ nods and says it wouldn't do any good anyway and I know he's right.

Who needs a post title? I have a magician.

When you reach the part where the heartaches come
The hero would be me
Heroes often fail
And you won't read that book again
Because the ending's just too hard to take

I walk away like a movie star
Who gets burned in a three way script
Enter number two, a movie queen
To play the scene of bringing all the good things out in me
But for now love lets be real

Two years in a row, two birthdays running, I point out to him gently in the early morning light as he struggles to wake up. Lochlan is out like a light, zonked on my other side but Caleb is half-alert, tense as he fights his dreams on the way back to the surface.

Happy Birthday, Neamhchiontach. Thank you for letting me be here for the first early hours of it. 

I nod, as if we get along, as the only time he's the absolute best is under strict supervision. As if it wasn't a little bit overwhelming last night though they didn't need to fight over me at all. As if he has ownership now. I need to make sure he's aware that he doesn't, even as I gleefully followed every instruction he gave me not to doubt him as he pinned me to the dark last night and kept me there for hours while Lochlan burned us alive and then when Caleb finally handed me back he blew out all of the flames on us until the dark roared back with a vengeance and I. need. sleep.

It may not be every year-

I'd prefer not to think about that right now and just enjoy this. He puts his arm out, pulling me back down. I can still smell a hint of his Tom Ford cologne and soap even and I close my eyes for another minute.When I wake up again he's gone and Lochan is awake.

Come here, my birthday girl. His toothy grin, wild hair and sleepy eyes make me burst out laughing.

You look crazy. 

I am. For you. He lights his fingers and puts them out against my lips, meeting my eyes steadily. Getting telepathic confirmation that even though the Devil was here and gone in the night he left my heart, left my soul intact and Lochlan doesn't have to fear a kidnapping or a defection. And confirmation that even though my ghosts shroud me in protection, in the past, the earliest memory of love still shines in the sunlight.

What would you like for your birthday? He says suddenly, a question I don't think he's ever asked me before but somehow I have the answer ready. Easily.

You. 

He doesn't break his gaze, even as his eyes fill up and spill over. 

But I won't let this build up inside of me

Caleb used his good graces last night to pick the lock on my bedroom door, squeezing himself through the opening left by Ben when he went back down to his studio to work, busier than ever thanks to everyone's need to create their magnum opus while in quarantine and then be able to burst out of the gates with a tour the minute they can. He may as well be with them, as with few exceptions Ben rarely shows his face, even as every single time he does come to bed with me or appear suddenly for a meal or a gardening afternoon he promises to spend more time and then promptly forgets. He makes it too easy for me to be angry at him but I can't be. Working keeps him busy and busy Ben is sober Ben and that's more important than anything, ever.

Caleb wedged himself inside the door and then inside the light, blooming just a hint of darkness within reach for me until I could step in and pull it right up over my head. I have demons of my own but instead of being bottled they are skinned in forms I recognize, comforting ones from my childhood, shapes that fit into a wagon you can pull along behind you, click-clack-click down the quiet hallway into the night.

Estamos emocionados!

Caleb made eggs benedict late this morning, with Ben's help and then set the table for four. I wasn't paying attention, as I was banned from the kitchen for the duration, forced to go to the library where I needed lights as it's rainy, damp and dark. I was called to the table a little after ten-thirty, starving, a condition announced loudly as my stomach growled when I sat down, surprised to find Ben and Lochlan at attendance, Caleb not even attempting to do a morning at-home date. He likes the late night ones anyway and I sneak hashbrown chunks, golden-crisp all through his remarks about fresh-starts marked by important days, and how working together will keep us together. Lochlan deflects every last word back onto the devil and surprise, this morning the devil is magnetic, the magician enigmatic, and the princess quiet, just watching them figure out this new endless present in the shadow of a hopeful future. The rock star is also starving and matches my bites, one for one. Trying to make me laugh. Winning the fight.

Maybe this future will be different, as they have been fighting over me since I was nine.

My god, it's been forty years. That's four decades of history now living in this house at last and we are still trying to rewrite the book. We can't change anything but we can control how we go forward from here.

Caleb says my name as I manage to finish the hashbrowns while he's talking.

Would you like some more, since you couldn't wait?

While you're talking the food is getting cold. I kick the leg of my chair, and Lochlan tips his plate towards mine, spooning a third of his hasbrowns onto my plate.

Make them last, he says.

There are five bags of them in the freeze- I start to point out and Caleb laughs.

We're just trying to have a leisurely Sunday brunch, he says. This is nice. 

It is, actually. Especially with a third-more hash browns. The boys eat a lot more than I do so they usually put mountains of starch on their own plates and a traditionally-appropriate amount on mine. Though Lochlan always shared growing up, and looks like that isn't going to change. Hell, if there are more hash browns going forward then yes, I'm all in.

I think the rest of the day will involve teasing Sam about this week's podcast, as he got a little dramatic, and possibly birthday cake. Maybe Mexican food for dinner as I failed to choose a birthday meal but am also craving burritos.

You're still hungry? Lochlan listens to my stomach growl again as I excitedly discuss toppings and size requirements. A burrito must be as heavy as a newborn. Green salsa, not red. No sour cream but cheese, please. Yes, chips on the side, please. Gracias. Te agradecemos mucho.

The story of your life with mine.

No matter where you are tonight a part of you is here with me
Here with me, I don't know where you are, all I know is I need you to be
Here with me, I know it's not to late, to turn around and get it straight
It's not fate to have you here with me

The king of eighties power ballads demolished my broken heart again this morning, beating me to the piano where I had huge plans to bang out a rather difficult Sorabji (Opus Clavicembalisticum, bitches, but not the whole thing because I have things to do but one of my original goals was to be one of the few artists to be permitted to perform it. Oh, the pipe dreams of youth.) and played a very old REO Speedwagon tune that he used to sing to me when I would come and visit with him when Cole was being a monster and Caleb was unreachable.

He would sing it into my hair, a breakup song about missing someone so much but they've left you and it broke my heart then but now as he sings it the meaning has shifted into one of a Lochlan brokenhearted because he's aware that the one he loves is not emotionally present and he knows he can't fix anything but if she just stays it will be the Greatest Love Of All Time.

He tells me this story every day now, though. I'm beginning to suspect it might be true.

Here with me.

Kind of better, still rotten.

Thank you for the very kind early birthday wishes. It isn't until Tuesday proper but since life is weird we sometimes try to celebrate on a weekend instead. Not sure if we're doing it this year. I let go of my early annoyance with life after dinner last evening as I caught up on chores and then on vodka. Then I didn't care anymore. Then I wasn't so annoyed. It's going to be a rainy cozy weekend and I'm looking forward it it. I have a plan and it's grand. Some wine, movies and catching up on Outlander. Catching up on sleep after a week of not much. Preparing to get kind of excited but not excited because things are opening up and I'm really wanting normal life again though every single person I have encountered as I try to get things done that need to be done has been patient and cheerful and encouraging.

I really hope that is the legacy of this Life Event we're all sharing. That people find patience. Though from my ivory tower I can see some people are falling apart and some are lashing out and it's tense, too. I'm not a pollyanna (I swear). I know it's rough. We've looked after many people (entire crews) who otherwise would have lost everything, and we'll continue to do so, as it's going to be a long road back.

We'll get there as one big giant family.

(Except for Mark. He refused the Ha, oops, did I tip you back in the late winter for that tattoo? I forget attempts to fill his bank account and is too fucking proud to pretends it's anything less than what is is so we have instead filled his days with commission work so at least he can say he earned it. We also can still tip fairly huge on those without him getting too annoyed at least.)

And I want the hairdresser to open. Henry has refused all attempts to have Daniel or Ben or anyone cut his hair. He's been going to this lovely Korean lady since he was eight years old and he won't let anyone else cut his hair. They have a bond, it's kind of awesome. I wonder if she misses him too. I'm saving a huge tip for her because it's going to take her two hours to cut his crazy mop at this rate.

But really I just want to go to Trolls for breakfast. I complain about the crowds and the tourists but damn I want their hashbrowns and coffee like you wouldn't believe.

Cake.

Sliding into a muted birthday weekend here, muted, dulled by the shadow of a pandemic blocking out the light, making it hard to make plans, making it hard to be me, unless defined by Lochlan's explanation in which I dance in a circle made by their hands, from a young age til now, in an ever-widening space in which the grass is soft and green and tangled with flowers. I can spin and spin and spin in the rain and I can't get hurt, even if I fall. They won't catch me, as they don't break the perimeter, they won't break the bond, they won't let go but I can get up and keep going, forever, as they watch me, watch over me.

That's beautiful, I tell him as I smack my black rye toast, fucking hideously annoyed and spoiled rotten and anxious to do everything from have breakfast at Trolls to ride the rides inside my brain to not have to spend the day shovelling soil, delivered from a place out of town but in huge quantities for my gardens.

Peanut. That's all he has to say sometimes and I understand I'm being unreasonable. I just want a birthday like the others have been. Magical. Without equal. We can defer-

No! It has to be the right day! I continue to smack my toast, wallowing in my annoyance. It's the only thing I have left to do.

Five kilometres to couch.

And I'll wait for that woman
Until then I will wait alone

The new routine is to crawl out of bed reluctantly, throw on my technical gear for rain, save for shoes. I wear the lightest most breathable running shoes I own since my feet are going to get wet anyway and Caleb and I meet to run to the top of the hill to the playground in Cypress and back home. We average five kilometers or more each morning (which sounds like nothing until you realize the intensity of the incline), a half hour to begin the routine of day from the time we set our watches in the driveway to when we collapse on the front porch and hit End.

My heart rate remains that of a hummingbird. His is an easy measured lope. We'll never match up in workout stats. Bigger, taller people burn more and go harder, small people go further, as I add a third more steps just to keep up with him.

I don't miss running but God do I love that high at the end.

And the focus for the rest of the day as I don't flutter quite so hard all the time. I wear out my body and it's as if my mind gives in.

Caleb on the other hand, uses it as foreplay. He wants the time, wants the visual. He considers exercise a necessary precursor to performing well in bed and I don't know if he's right or not, as PJ has incredible moves and a bit of a beer gut. PJ only runs if you hold a loaded weapon to his head and even then he'll be like come ON, man.

(Whoops. Shhh.)

We don't talk when we run. At all. It's considered 'public' or something (he doesn't talk when he fucks, either as a data point though) and other than seeing a bunny today up on the trail we barely spoke to one another. He is busy watching me, busy planning out the rest of his day, hoping to include me in it, all the way through the end to the next and I am busy yelling BUNNY inside my brain and then looking for the next bunny, hoping it's not a bear because I'm getting tired.

(I carry bear spray when I run. Well, it's tiny so it's actually dog/mugger spray but I could at least surprise a bear enough with it to get away or at least get a headstart.

Caleb could probably just control the bear with a hefty payout. It worked for New Jake, right? Except that he's still a wildcard at the end of the day and I just try to avoid him.)

Lochlan does not want to run. Lochlan wants to sleep and then Lochlan can't understand why I can't stay awake past eight at night. I am tired. I don't know why I get up at so early anymore except that's when you catch the bunnies and the sun and the Devil on a good day, that's for certain.

Win stupid prizes, too, they say.

OOoohhhh. Did I tell you I discovered Apollo Under Fire? I went looking for Submersed, after listening to Flicker from the new City Burials album by Katatonia and wondered briefly if it was a cover. Then I went to make a fire playlist and realized Submersed was missing from iTunes.

(iTunes eats things. Did you know? One day you just wake up and stuff is missing. It SUCKS.)

But then I followed the trail of musical breadcrumbs left by Donald Carpenter and found this band. Apollo Under Fire, and they have one whole self-titled album out but it's solid and beautiful and really freaking GOOD and I love days like this.

Also returned Submersed to my revolving favorites list and can't believe I didn't notice for so long.

But it's fixed.

Also fixed is the shower drain in our ensuite. It's sealed so it's a bit of a pain and I figured between Lochlan, Ben and at the worst, New Jake's ingenuity as a handyman or an actual professional called in, we could fix it. Lochlan said it was my fault. I blamed him, handily. His hair's been longer longer, right?

Then I got to work and fixed it! Alone! Ha!

It was all blonde. I have enough to make a whole extra person here with this hair. Or at least some highly efficient voodoo dolls. Either way, it's fixed and I have one of those confidence-bursts from not freaking out and calling someone, and now I'm off to the bank to finish signing the paperwork for my deal which is all approved and ready for me to deploy.

The Devil watches me from the shadows and smiles, proud of his little contextual prodigy, with dollar signs in her eyes, sleeves rolled up, ready to do all of his dirty work because the cut is too much to turn down.

When Lochlan finds out the amount it will be enough at least to offset his sudden desire to wash me down the drain and into the sea. His eyes will go wide and he'll have that moment of doubt but then resignation as it's not all that different from the way things are now. We just raised the stakes a little in order to raise the reward.

Okay, a lot. We raised them a lot.

If you want to be a big player you have to play the big games, Neamhchiontach.

Vikings.

Just for fun they all ('all' meaning PJ, Duncan, Dalton, Gage, Lochlan and John) let me shave the sides of their heads and put braids in their hair. Just a few here and there with silver rings for decoration.

Just...well, DAMN.

No one is ever allowed to revert back.

Skol.