Rose petal vodka.

Indeed I am going to begin working as Caleb's assistant again this fall, starting mid-next week. We've narrowed my role to a scant fifteen hours a week to keep him organized, three days a week and no more. He is not allowed to lock me in his suite either. Seems simple. I am to keep track of my hours worked and prepare to work hard during the times when I am working as he agreed that it's not a lot of hours but it's a fair lot of work, as he points out and he wouldn't have anyone else do it.

(WTF! Oh, he means, he wouldn't trust anyone to do as good a job. OH, well, thanks for clarifying after I threw my phone at his head. WOW. Also, may I have my phone back, please, for the second time this week? What do you mean, no? I only threw it at you onc-

Thanks.)

I already dug out a beautiful brand new pink silk-covered notebook and same-coloured pen to carry when I follow him around. If I don't write it down it's gone forever. My brain is a like a beach towel that's lost it's absorbency due to the weight of sunscreen. Eventually I should probably soak my brain in vinegar too to strip off the coating and then maybe I can absorb more info but for now my mind is hard-coated in sunblock 60, so I write it all down. He likes that though. He says it feels official. 

He helped me hang the dozen cowboy hats on long racks above each side table in the foyer this morning and I have set out a few dozen pumpkins on the front steps, both sets so it looks super 'weeny around here now. There is a round table in the middle of the front hall with a big arrangement of fresh lilies. I think it might last until Sunday, and then I can choose something more hardy for the remainder of the month. Probably dyed zinnias and dark roses and a lot of heavy greenery. 

I put the good vodka in the flower water and they last a very long time with it, which is good because I don't like wasting money on things but who doesn't love fresh flowers and besides, the few months we tried to go without on that table, weird things started to appear on it and the weirdness multiplied the longer it went empty. It started with a nickel, then a cookie and then a sweater no one claimed to own, followed by a single cross-country ski, and then a full easel with charcoal on the lip so people could add to a communal drawing (it got hilariously ugly fast, as you would imagine), followed by a stuffed snail wearing sunglasses that remained for WEEKS until I ordered flowers again starting in September. 

I suppose it could have been worse. 

But I do like the hats. Also this frees up half a closet shelf. Which is nicer than anything else in a house full of people. I try to stay organized in the common areas of the house to a military degree, so I think I get how Caleb feels.

It's also Friday so I am pre-weekending/gaming, and though I thought about drinking the water from the big round vase before I changed it out, I didn't because the vase is too heavy for me to lift, and also because people judge. Judge me for my giant foyer instead. Biggest necessary waste of space ever, and I wish I had it when I used to try and wrestle both kids in their snowsuits when they were so little. God, that feels like a million years ago now, and now they are both older than me.

Lies (and fries).

 Caleb won't dare go up against Lochlan. He'll take what he needs, if I give it to him, and then he'll fade back into the shadows on the sidelines before he riles the lion, unwilling to cross my allegiance, since he knows it isn't to him ever and never will be. 

Didn't stop him from taking my phone away and locking the door, keeping me with him for too long to be overlooked.

And when Lochlan got me back the very first thing he did was undress me and check me all over. He found two brief imprints. One on my shoulder, one on my hand where I fought back briefly before I was told to give in and when I did it got better, and neither one broke the skin and I said I was fine and Lochlan believed me. He's trying to trust me and trust that I know Caleb well enough in that way that I know I won't be hurt again even though the self-control Caleb swore he had was hanging by thread there, at the end. And that's when I asked that he open the door and he did, if only to protect me from that. 

Because he knows. 

They all know. 

But I am fine and I figured out how to put myself back together (in Lochlan's arms) and now things are mostly ironed out, and I don't have to worry about another shoving match (not allowed, and every single person here will throw themselves in between two who start, because we're not about to ever risk any more surprise punches, head injuries, or long recoveries on a moment when things got too heated to use our words) because they've already spoken, if only to agree on the day on which we will celebrate Thanksgiving, Sunday or Monday (they chose Monday). 

We're having turkey, gravy, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet carrots and cranberry sauce, along with butter rolls and pumpkin pie for dessert. I am excited. We have no plans at all, except for the meal. Last year at this same time I told Caleb that if I were planted I wondered what would grow, a tall flower or a stumpy turnip. He laughed and laughed and still calls me his little turnip every now and then but last night we finished the last of our homegrown potatoes from the garden, an irony considering I keep finding them in the dirt, gathering them up in the hem of my dress to bring back inside by the dirty dozen. 

A rotten potato, kicked around the garden but enjoying the very last moments of sun before winter sets in and the soil grows cold. 

 That makes me sad, Neamhchiontach. 

Me too, Diabhal.

You know where I've been.

I stood outside when the roof gave in
You crawled from the wreckage you were lying in
You're out of reach and we're out of time
But I took it all and toed that line
You held my hand and pulled me down with you

I told you what would happen. I give him a moment and he tries to take a lifetime. He sets the world on fire and I'm reduced to this in the early dark hours, finally free, sitting at the piano slackjawed and trembling, wrapped in a blanket, picking out notes with a blank mind and a ruined heart. He finds things stuck in that heart. Dark things, bad things and he tastes them, he takes them out and plays with them and he breaks them, leaving the pieces strewn all over the room and then I'm forced to picked them up and stuff them back in but they're sticking out all over and it hurts. 

It hurts. 

He hurts. And he's a biter. He's the kind of man that always promises you he'll be better this time and then he isn't. He bites and he forces and his eyes burn right through me and he bends my limbs far past what they can manage and breathing is a privilege not a right. My eyes are bloodshot, my head hurts and her little brain doesn't even understand why I let him get to her. 

Do I though? Or do I put up a defence and he can destroy me instead but she will be okay?

She won't talk to me right now so I can't answer that. 

When I was ten he looked me in the eye and told me that if I was his, he would eat me up. I thought he was scary and a chill ran down my spine but I was at the same time thoroughly fascinated, flattered even, by his intensity. 

Still am.

Jesus Admin. Asst.

 Ben wanted to go to church so off we went. We stopped at a drive-thru and got hot pumpkin-y fall drinks. I wore a dress + tights + sweater + scarf and my docs and felt pulled together but also look like I might take a running jump into the nearest leaf pile if you let go of my hand. I sat between Ben and Lochlan and held my cup in two hands. We don't sing in church anymore but it was nice to sit and listen to Sam and then we left without waiting in the line, distanced on lovely peel-and-stick stained glass floor tiles, because it looks nicer. We wore our masks when we weren't sitting down. We took them off in Lochlan's truck and drove home through the leaves, listening to some rainy jazz and being quiet. 

(Normally we would have found a diner and had breakfast out but that didn't happen because takeout is difficult with some cravings and honestly I want a monte cristo and nothing else these days but I don't like to make them at home.) 

The dog is lying at my feet beans-out and my cup is long empty now. The woodstove is burning out but the lights are on. Boys in sweaters. I love this. I have to tailor a pair of Ruth's pants, take out the garbage and make dinner tonight-probably monte cristos- and I have to talk to Caleb about his latest offer. October fifth is back to routine for him and falls are reasonably busy with his various business dabblings and he does indeed need an assistant. I would be mostly filing, cleaning and answering his phone, screening emails and entering figures on spreadsheets. That's not that any one of those is hard, per se, it's just a lot to juggle and I don't know if I'm up for it this time around. He pays very well and we do work well together but then we settle into bad habits and that's the part that I'd like to avoid. To his credit it's busywork, a distraction from the upcoming unlucky anniversary but it's also a way to spend hours with me almost every day, a side benefit being that he will be impeccably organized once again. That's a good thing. 

Right?

Broken lies I still believe.

Below the willow tree

I get hung up on my insecurities
Rose-coloured dopamine
My soul feels like it could be make believe

 

Below the willow tree
I search to find some sense of identity
This weeping willow tree
Sits in silence, sheds no tears for me

 

Last night on a walk I saw the moon with Mars and I knew they wanted privacy, a rare coupling that I haven't seen for a while and I'm not cuckold and so I turned back in the cold, crunching through the brown leaves all the way back to the house where the warm lights beckoned me home. 

 

We did go LED to save energy, money and effort in changing bulbs all the time. It was an ice-cold light and so everything was changed to warm. It took a while and I am still finding fixtures that were missed. 

You're looking up cuckold because you haven't seen that word in a while, aren't you? You don't care about my lights or the planets or my crunchy-leaves walk. 

Ah, she admitted it. 

It's holdover teenage curiosity, that's all. You see someone and you stop and watch and rarely will you move until it ends, someone catches you, or you risk being seen by them. 

That was me and Mars. I turned away first.

Ghosts and...and..pirates.

My heart is pierced by Cupid

I disdain all glittering gold

There is nothing can console me

But my jolly sailor bold

 

His hair it hangs in ringlets

His eyes as black as coal

My happiness attend him

Wherever he may go

https://lyricstranslate.com

My heart is pierced by Cupid

I disdain all glittering gold

There is nothing can console me

But my jolly sailor bold

 

His hair it hangs in ringlets

His eyes as black as coal

My happiness attend him

Wherever he may go

https://lyricstranslate.com

My heart is pierced by Cupid

I disdain all glittering gold

There is nothing can console me

But my jolly sailor bold

 

His hair it hangs in ringlets

His eyes as black as coal

My happiness attend him

Wherever he may go

https://lyricstranslate.comMy heart is pierced by Cupid

His hair it hangs in ringlets
His eyes as black as coal
My happiness attend him
Wherever he may go.

I am startled out of a sound sleep. It's almost light out and Ben is gone. He gets up very early now to go and have coffee with August. Maybe that's what woke me. Him closing the door.

Who is your allegiance to, Princess?

I survey the empty room. It was Lochlan's hand on my cheek and Jake's voice in my head. I knew it wasn't Lochlan's words because he reached out in his deep slumber to make sure I was still there and besides, he doesn't call me that and rarely says the word out of a reluctance to put the focus on a spectral memory when a real one is taking place as we speak. 

I wouldn't leave you, you know. If Jake was alive and came right through that door after lunch I wouldn't leave you. Never again would I stray out of your reach because this is where I belong.

Hmmmm? Lochlan heard my answer and woke up. You okay?

I stare at him. I can't focus. He is not awake. Yeah, go back to sleep. 

Just for a half hour. 

Okay. 

By the way? I wouldn't leave you either so tell Jake piss off.

Can't even bum a bite of bacon off these jerks.

October one. The first day of the rest of my life, to be sure. I'd like to make some time for hot chocolate and drawing. I'm going to do a little sewing and a little gardening. I'm going to be thrilled at the fall leaves and cozy in warm sweaters and I'm going to cook and bake right through. I've already started sewing Halloween costumes and shopping for  Christmas presents and I wouldn't even dream of being sad that the sun goes down now before we have the curtains drawn or supper cleaned up each night now because that would be ironic and pointless.

It's going to choose it's time and I don't get a say and suddenly I find myself mourning summer all the while I hug myself in these oversize sweaters and hold my mug close. 

Dumb, is what it is but completely normal, Joel tells me. He, August and Sam are going to take Ben out for breakfast, which will consist of takeout that they bring back and eat in the gazebo or probably the patio, heaters on, hours spent while they sort out exactly who Ben can rage at and why he needs to get a handle on this because we're all understanding but Jesus Christ. 

This is why he got punched in the first place. 

And I'm about to punch him again, if not for the fact that we're giving him patience he might not even deserve but does at the same time.

I don't get to sit in on the meetings because I am distracting and too emotional.

Too...emotional. 

Huh. 

I'd rather be that than not emotional enough.  

It's okay though, like I said I have things to do and if you can even believe it this week I am the glue and they are the cracks. Go figure. I just hope they get it together before the first week of November because that's when I might need help. 

But then again, I might not.

We're going to call it the birdcage, I know it.

I watched Caleb and Dalton walk Ben through his physio in the pool. It's warm and relaxing and his muscles will get stronger and he will regain some of the coordination he lost. He does this every single day, rain or shine and I've got a couple of people coming to give me quotes on glassing the whole pool in so it will truly be year round. I'd like drop lights and maybe those super huge circumference ceiling fans in it too. And a lock on the door, of course. It isn't a lap pool, however and so in order to maintain the aesthetic around the pool with space for chairs and such this could wind up costing as much as the boathouse did. 

Not like I care, exactly. Ben's rehabilitation comes first and Caleb can pay whatever I tell him it costs. 

(His soul is on the bill, trust me. That shit's mine, so I can kick it like a soccer ball. Right into the sea where it will bloat up, blackened, rotted and unrecognizable. Kind of like it is now.)

After he showers and gets dressed Ben has promised me a trip up the road to the coffee shop for a fall drink and maybe a drive to see the leaves as they begin to change. Then fifteen minutes later he snapped at me for being selfish when he's too tired and can't drive anyway (it was his...idea...and PJ had offered to drive?) and once again I'm struggling with not taking any of this personally, as I was struggling before with this exact issue when it came to him using. 

Probably why it's the same. Because it's the same. He's been clean for five days and not without struggle. He was told to take the pills if he had headaches. The headaches continue, and he's trying to weather them with ice packs and biofeedback. A lot of naps. Coffee. Slow walks in the cold air. Whatever works, we're doing it but it feels like nothing when he yells at me.

Creepin' it real.

 I zoned out hard at the table. The Scientist was on the sound system and I was staring off into space letting the refrain stroke my soul gently, almost falling asleep. I know the words to every single Coldplay song by heart but it's Caleb's band so I don't usually put them on, since he will. 

(By his band I mean his favourite.)

He picked up my hand and kissed the palm of it. Everyone's left. The candles have burned mostly out and the light is dim. Come for a nightcap.

It's an order so I nod and follow him. He pours us each a whiskey and then holds his arms out, his drink in one hand. Dance?

I nod again, dumbstruck and exhausted. Sure. Why not? He does a gentle circle around the kitchen with me being wooden and then I get so tired I just reach up and cling to him. He stiffens slightly, surprised at the sudden expression of affection and holds me close with one arm, saying wait while he searches for a place to set down his glass. Once it's out of his hand he holds me so tight I can't breathe. 

There, there. It's a soothe. Not sure he was ever any better at this than I was but I'll take it. A moment of tenderness that will end up costing me dearly always as it gives him reassurance that wasn't mine to give. 

I gotta go, Diabhal. 

Stay with me. 

I have plans. Plans are upstairs in bed and I've had a long drunken day that has started far too early and will end far too late. Schuyler's upstairs waiting for a nightcap of his own and we'll most likely end up next door. I will, anyway, whether or not anyone comes with me. Schuyler doesn't drink but he does play fast and loose with his convictions and I am but always a test and I'm pretty sure he's in love with me but also pretty sure he would never ever be the kind of threat I have to worry about. The only threat from Schuyler is the one where I may be spoiled and touched to pieces and never want to rejoin reality, as if I did anyway, no thank you. 

What if you invite me along?

What if I did?

What if I just did?

***

I make a plan to go and fetch him and go in to tell Schuyler and Lochlan that I'm making it a crowd. Schuyler is always up for anything and everyone and Lochlan is drunk and resigned and will see himself out if he can't manage his emotions. A far cry from the rest of them, to be sure.

Then I head back out, ostensibly to go and get Caleb but instead I go all the way down to PJ's quarters. I knock but he doesn't answer. I try the door after a minute. If it's locked I know he's asleep but it isn't so I let myself in. He is in his den reading and listening to music, pulling off his headphones and putting his book down when he sees me. 

Everything okay?

I think I've made a big mistake. I mean Caleb and Schuyler in the same evening laid out ahead of me like a buffet when I'm already full but PJ thinks I mean showing up at his door, because he doesn't know the buffet is even there.

I don't think you have. He laughs, self-conscious in that way you are when you're not self-conscious at all. But I also think you need some sleep and so I'm going to put you to bed and sleep in the den. It's not an idea or a suggestion, it's the plan now after he sees my hands fluttering and so the plan is already cast in cement and I don't get a say. I think I've said enough and everything unsaid is written across my face.

Yeah, okay. Thank you, PJ. 

I hate being the good guy, Bridge. 

Who says you are? I give him a drunken kiss, salute him and go in his room, closing the door. 

***

I wake up this morning alone. Still in my dress and earrings. Still in PJ's big comfy bed. I come out and PJ isn't in the den. He's in the kitchen with everyone else.

Caleb glares at me across his coffee. I love being stood u-

Oh, shut UP, Cale, PJ said and I see Lochlan's face flicker with amusement. He gets up and comes to hug me. PJ said you stole his apartment for the night. 

I did.

Can you let me know next time? Schuyler was a little disappointed. 

I'll talk to him. 

 Another night. You good?

Yes. 

Am I fine with it? Caleb asks no one in particular.

Do I care? I ask him. Don't fuck with me today, Diabhal. Trying to figure out life here and you pressured me. 

Because usually I'm right and it's what you wanted. 

Well it wasn't last night. 

You can stand up to me, you know, Neamhchiontach. You're the strongest person here. 

That's what Edward said to Bella after he turned her. I point out the obvious.

Who? 

Nevermind.

And love will steer the stars.

Exciting things are happening here as we are having a breakfast party to celebrate Schuyler's retirement (and by extension, Lochlan's! third! job!), which I'm not sure I believe for a second, having been made to wait eight minutes outside his office door last evening while Schuy considered heading out to help put out a professional fire of some sort with a RAS far from home. He can be there in four hours if he can grab a plane. He can send someone faster who is local. He can check in with the office here. Maybe Lochlan can do something from here? I stood there and shook with laughter. This isn't going to work, though Daniel is so excited to have Schuyler join him as a fellow lady of leisure, he's practically vibrating with glee. 

But Schuyler hasn't noticed and obviously never changed the contact info of who people are supposed to call in these emergencies. When he's finished his call he swears to me that the email is going out tonight, bc'd all the way to infinity and beyond as his final fuck you to an overreaching industry that has eaten up everyone in its path, a mortal engine we've come to despise.

Okay, Buzz. 

Buzzkill?

Buzz Lightyear. You said 'to infinity and bey-

Oh, right.

But he isn't focused on me, just work difficulties and this will be a transition for the record books. It will be like Ben's retirement, though I think Ben's rethinking that as we speak and maybe will actually retire once he gets through this new season of challenges.

But first, a party to celebrate Schuyler and all of his successes, all of his hats in different areas of the same industry going wildly from art to technical and back again but skewing tech because it was easier, he said, to keep the machine well-oiled than to feed things into it. It's a descriptor that usually horrifies me, that's for sure and I wonder what the fuck he's going to do with all of his free time when his phone stops buzzing and Daniel becomes a tangible event instead of a hazy mirage. 

We made savory (rosemary and brown butter) waffles with our own syrup, end of season blackberries and clotted cream, poached eggs with cheese and big thick slices of smoked ham, with coffee and sparkling champagne-free champagne, as Schuyler has been in recovery longer than anyone and does not drink but suffers all of us fools so gladly he's a gift from God. 

Maybe he'll have more time for me or Ben now too but I don't think I'll let my brain go there.

Even Lochlan, who made the first speech outside as the sun rose over the hills to illuminate the sea, noting Schuyler's inability to stop calling him every time something went wrong, wondered aloud if anything is actually going to change here.

(The newish tradition for retirement parties is to get up at the normal work-time but instead of work we have a huge formal breakfast and make speeches building up the future leisure all the while verbally burning the bridges of employment that isn't truly self-employment ever, but by others, as always.)

A good laugh and we raised our glasses, sparkling in the morning light. To Schuy. May he figure out how to sleep late or go to bed early! He is the fourth one to retire, but none of them stayed that way for long so we'll see. 

Also, I'm hoping this isn't just a ruse to get some of the waffles I never make because of the effort involved. Trying to work my ancient cast iron waffle pan for twenty people at five-thirty in the morning is a fucking joke. I'm retiring.

(People want me to do a food blog. Yeah, no.)