Monsters, miracles.

It's not the wind that cracked your shoulder
And threw you to the ground
Who's there that makes you so afraid?
You're shaken to the bone
And no, I don't understand
You deserve so much more than this

 

I'm trying not to take the words. I push them away as they as are pushed against my breastbone. It isn't personal. It's an injury. He's going to be like this and it's not his fault but it's not mine either and I don't know how much of this I can take. 

 

A hand rests against my back, keeping me up against the onslaught. I take a deep breath out, relaxing all of my muscles, digging down deep into the stubbornness. 

 

Good luck with that, I say suddenly. 

 

With what? He's not following my mental conversation. Good. 

 

With trying to drive me away because you don't want me to see you weakened?

 

You call this 'weakened'? Bee, I'm ruined. I can't fucking tie my fucking shoes. 

 

We'll get you some pull-on ones. I'm dead serious. He thinks I'm trying to dismiss his middle-of-the-night cry-out-for-anyone deeply-seated fears. He knows damn well I'm the last person who would ever do that, seeing as how he and I have always shared this and we don't ever take it lightly. He's offended and I'm offended at his assumption that I've somehow changed and I can feel myself wading in to the deep dark waters where he waits for me, a monster I'm not supposed to argue with, blithely, strongly, somehow ignoring his outbursts and his words. 

You don't want to fight with Ben. He's fierce and cutting and frightening and that was exactly what led Caleb to throw a punch when he ran out of reasonable. When he became afraid and needed to fall back on his size and strength just to make a point.

 

Right.

It'll come back. 

Or it won't. You don't know. I don't know. They don't know if it will.

Hey, Ben? There's Lochlan. Ready to take over. Jacob moves his hand from my back. The reinforcements are here and now the ghosts can run and hide again. She doesn't have the answers you're looking for.

Doesn't she? Isn't she supposed to be the patron saint of the Collective? Isn't she my Jesus? If she doesn't read my future are you going to do it? Come on. Grab your fucking crystal balls and tell us all how this ends. The only thing I had going for me I've lost. Now what, Lochlan? I fade into obscurity. She turns away. What the fuck is left here, you want to tell me?

Everything, Benny. Everything is right here for you and for all of us.

I don't have any leverage. 

You don't need any. 

Don't fucking patronize me, Locket. (Oh, he called him Locket. My heart.)

I'M NOT. Oh, Loch's getting mad now. He doesn't suffer self-pity any more than anything else. Well, unless he's drunk but it's seven on a Friday morning. Also he doesn't do that the way I do. Someone has to bring the acumen. It's always on Lochlan, an easy choice for alpha-everything, something Ben suddenly can't stand. 

I try and play the peacemaker. It's not you, Ben. It's just the pills talking, remember how they make you irritabl-

Great. My little shadow is my enabler.

What would you have me do?

Tell me to fuck off, Bridge. To go away until I have my shit together and come back to you whole.

You're not going anywhere, and I always liked you more when I was stronger.

Well, that's good to know isn't it? Guess you got your wish.

The sort of thoughts in my head, at any given moment (cut the cord and kill the lights).

This is not about Ben. He's doing well and no I don't want to talk about the pills. No one does but there they are. Goddammit.

***

When is 10 Years' song Unknown going to be the theme for the most epic adventure movie ever made? How long? Minutes? Is it already licensed? I'll be waiting for it. But then the next track is Waiting and it's so catchy and also Without You is really good too and wow, this new album (Violent Allies) has surprised me. It's one of those ones where I almost regret buying it on first listen and by the fourth listen it's my favourite and I draw my sword, ready to die defending it. They're so underrated. Like, criminally.

Right, that good.

I don't have a sword though. The closest one is uh, I think it's Bilbo's sword that the Elves gave him. Right. It's hanging at the bottom of the steps to the theatre. We are not nerds, what gave you that idea? 

(I've been corrected, it's a dagger. But it's HUGE.

To you it is. 

Right.)

***

I should go out and get a few groceries. Eh. No. Maybe PJ will drive. PJ is still in pajama pants. The storm is supposed to get worse. We had thunder on the water this morning and it was incredible to listen to, something I indulged in from the front of Lochlan's flannel shirt, the top button between my eyes as always. The cool crunchy clean flannel coupled with the rumbling, the warmth and the swift breeze. It was wonderful. I wish I could bottle that. I'd call it Storm From The Safety Of A Hug or something.

***

I am four hours and forty-five minutes into the Twilight saga on Netflix and it's SO GOOD. I watched it twelve years ago when Ruth was nine and I'm pretty sure I spent the whole thing wondering if it was too scary for her and definitely too scary for Henry, who was seven when it began and I probably dismissed it out of hand though the books were amazing but since Midnight Sun is so good we're watching the movies too and they have aged exceeding well and I'm really enjoying them to bits. At the beginning I think it was Gage who made some comment about how Bella could possibly be so sure she found her soulmate so immediately and surely and I threw a glance at Lochlan, who glanced back as if he is a vampire and I am a hapless high school student. 

It does happen like that, only he isn't a vampire but emotionally I am definitely and forever will be a hapless high school student. 

(OMGOSH. Can you imagine if Edward was a carny? I mean the risks wouldn't transfer but the hotness would TRIPLE.)

I also got called out for snorting every time they mention Jasper, as that was the name of Batman's former assistant and he and I did NOT get along and eventually I won though now Batman is five times lonelier and I can't help that but Jasper tried to blackmail me thinking I would go away and he was the one who was sent, instead. I don't know why people fuck with me so much. It's not a good idea.

***

I had a great laugh this morning about a thing in the foreign papers detailing a Russian Jesus presiding over a commune in the woods of Siberia. Except they called it a cult and they swooped in with helicopters and armed swat teams to break it up, calling it an illegal religious organization. They said he was brainwashing the members and taking money from them. 

That can't be the whole story but it's not like we'll get any followup information. Russia's a weird world, to be honest. Trust me. I know this.

If the helicopters landed here on the point to take away me, a tiny blonde Jesus, to whom everyone here has pledged their lives, all that they have, all that they are, worshipping at my knees I would be surprised because colour me wrong, I don't think any of this is illeg-

PJ is laughing*.

Am I wrong?

Oh, I have no idea. I wasn't laughing about that.

What are you laughing about?

How into Twilight you are suddenly. 

It's really good, PJ. Stop resisting.

Oh, I haven't even started yet.

 *(The inevitable footnote here is that he is damn near thrilled that the relentless haunting of Bridget isn't currently dragging the whole point into the sea, clutched up in her white-knuckle grip, pulling with all her might to get the ghost to step off the fabric of her life. He won't, of course and so the Twilight distraction is the stalemate while I wait for something to change. The day is young though, right?)

***

It's not about fair, it's about love.

A rare invitation to breakfast saw me splash my way over to Schuyler's in the rain, as Christian and Andrew have also decided I am burning the candle at both ends again, losing my own shit as we slide into winter here since the seasons are racing by like horses in the sand on Sable Island, and wanted me to have a treat. 

A very fancy breakfast with the good silver and champagne in very tall flutes and at one point I almost asked for a phone book to sit on before realizing they don't make them anymore so I went and got a throw pillow out of their tv room and then I can sit at the table, an equal instead of a child with the table hitting me in the collarbone when I lean forward. 

They wanted to show me the trailer for Supernova. Yes, of course I cried. This will now be the baseline for deciding if one is human or monster.

(Except later that theory was blown to smithereens because Caleb cried when I showed him.) 

They wanted to apologize for shutting me out in the cold since nearly December, as they had settled in to a long hibernation over the winter that turned into quarantine spring and lockdown summer. They've been over for quiet dinners but otherwise I have hardly seen them in 2020 and it's not for a lack of trying on my part. 

Unlike you, I told Andrew, I don't get so caught up in my relationships that I forget about my friends. 

Christian leans into view, blocking Andrew's face. Your relationships are with your friends, though, honey. He bursts out laughing and I take the gentle roast. I know what they're avoiding.

Where does that leave you two then? 

To our own devices, Andrew says, sending a look to Christian that made my knees waver just a little. Their second wedding anniversary is coming up and they're throwing a Christmas eve dinner on the beach to celebrate and again I feel like that's the greatest Christmas present ever, having them be so blissfully content and wanting to share that with us so sparingly as they spend all of their time together mostly alone. It makes us all feel special in a weird way, as if we are permitted glimpses into their fairytale romance as a favour or as a gift. Either way I'll take whatever I can get because it's so lovely.

***

I came back intending to tell Lochlan all about it but he pulled me up into his lap and then pushed me back so my head and shoulders were on the bed and my legs were on either side of his hips, knees in the middle for both of us. He stripped me down and pulled me in hard and then abruptly he pulls me up by the shoulders against him, lifting me up, letting me drop, over and over again. It would have been so nice except that I can't forget the vision of Andrew and Christian doing the same, laughing gently about getting Bridget nice and early-morning-toasted and then sending her away. It's a move few would bother with, that's for sure but as they reminded me they are only into each other and that's the way it is (and will be) for the foreseeable future.

But the vision. In my half-drunk, rain-soaked condition it's the best thing I've seen in a while and it'll have to do as I won't be seeing it in person any time soon. Lochlan drops me back against the quilts with a grin and then I realize I don't need to see them in person. I'm just happy they're happy.

How about a hot bath? He asks out of the blue. That's how I know it's fall. All I want is to soak in the bubbles and turn into a prune, muscles turning to liquid, brain turning to mashed potatoes.

Yeah, I nod and he smiles. Did you have fun at breakfast?

I did. 

They coming up for air anytime ever?

Nope, I laugh. Not any time soon.

Fixed.

 Headphones keep my legs from stumbling this morning, keeping me strung up, a puppet controlled by the lyrics being fed into my brain to keep it from imploding like my heart only yesterday and still recent enough that the misery-blood hasn't even dried on the hard floor. I walked through it, tracks going to the end of the line and back, from heaven to hell, from the bottom of the hole in the concrete room to the roof of the treehouse behind Schuyler's house, a place I keep ending up, even though I'm not supposed to go. 

That and whatever else they gave me is keeping me from falling on my face even though I deserve to be nowhere else right now. God, this is one glorious high. I can feel all of this, I just don't care.

I learned yesterday I might be too small to balance this. Ben on one hand, struggling mightily but doing great. Every time he conquers something stupid, something ridiculously benign I have to fight not to crow, not to clap, not to exclaim lest I pander to him, something he can't stand suddenly. 

And he's not even as stubborn as me. 

Caleb on the edge of my shoulder, weighing me down, asking all the time for me, for my attention, for my absolution, for my soul back in his hands. Wanting to know his place, his station, where he fits, what I need, reminding me what he needs and I swat him away without touching on it. I only have two hands. Pleaca de langa mine!

Jacob in that other hand, only too big/too heavy/too profound and so instead of balancing him on my straightened fingers I have the back of his shirt in my fist, balled-up fabric straining against my attempts to not cling to him like a raft in a storm. 

Not with Lochlan right behind me, anyway. 

A wave crashes over my head and I am left gasping and choking. 

Huh. I still don't care though. Amazing.

Lochlan rolls his eyes and wades in, pulling me off the raft, into his arms. We're on dry land suddenly and I can't focus on his face, just his curls. Just the emergency-red, the built-in security blanket I've clung to for the better part of my life, since the water is always over my head.

Christ, Peanut. Stay put. 

What if he drowns?

Who?

I look around. Not sure which answer to give him. They all need me, this is an emergency and he doesn't even notice, can't see it, doesn't care. 

Sure I care. That's why I'm here.The physical barrier between you and fire and you and water. You and the Devil, you and your ghosts, you and the things you don't have to carry alone.

Boring.

Right? It is and it's exactly what you need right now and I may not be as thrilling as...as chasing ghosts or devils or hoping Ben will be who Ben was last summer but AT LEAST YOU'RE BETTER WHEN YOU'RE WITH ME!

Oh it's a deafening roar and I cover my ears but he wrenches my fingers away from my head in order to replace them with his own, pulling my face right up into his until I cry out, squeezing my eyes shut against his sudden outburst. He finally stands back, letting go of me, picking up the headphone cord which is miles long all of the sudden and he wraps it around me until my limbs are pinned and then he ties the end around his wrist in a neat bow.

You're better and better off, he says, and he gives a sharp tug on the line. I stumble and follow him as quickly as I can keep up, like I always did before. 

After is now, he turns and says quietly and I know he's right.

The very last day of the summer that wasn't (without you).

I am brand new now without you
Everything I can do now without you
I was right all along now the pain feels like it's gone
I am brand new now without you
Everything I can do now without you
Now without you
Now without you 

(13/50. That's this year, the number of trips around the sun without you, and the age you would have been had you stepped back down instead of off.

13 fucking fifty, Pooh.)

That's what fall means, swirling in and around the velvet and crunchy leaves, the rattle of acorns kicked across the front-porch boards as the ghost stares expressionless through the glass. I didn't give him an emotion today. Today he is a placeholder, a large obstacle, a statute out there in the lush green grass, something I'm going to run into at full speed any minute now, bouncing off his cold marble skin and falling into the wet leaves, stunned to silence, again. 

My brain's been bumping up against him all week already. I tried to distract myself with Cole but let's face it, Trey was never any match for the mighty Preacher, not even close. I keep making contact with him, my hands outstretched in pitch black and I recoil in surprise and try a different way but there he is again, the soft worn cotton of his best pale blue Denver Hayes button-down so familiar against my fingers.

As long he doesn't say anything I'll be fi-

Hullo, Princess. 

And I freeze in place, ice crystals on my eyelashes, blood turned to slush in my veins. My heart thuds painfully against its alabaster cage once or twice before shattering in the cold again, flooding the inside of my body with still-warm viscous misery as I go crashing to the ground.

Jesus witness.

May I see it?

No. 

But why, Neamhchiontach?

Because then it will smell like you and I need it to smell like him. 

You miss him. 

I don't miss him. I still love him though. Part of me always will.

Which part is that?

I'm sorry?

It's a question you would ask. Which part of you misses him?

My stupid brain. 

Ah. But it drives the bus. 

The bus went off a cliff years ago. You know this.

And now?

I run on heart and soul. 

The song?

If required. 

He smiles now, amused to have one of my odd conversations, and be on the inside, as it were. 

I can show you the sweater, since you don't believe me, but I don't want you to touch it.

What if I want to smell it?

Then you should have kept the things of his that I gave you.

What makes you think I haven't?

You're a minimalist. 

Am I?

Definitely. 

Even though I have a small case full of his things on the top shelf of my closet? Two of his shirts, his leather bracelet and his daybook? 

Should I believe you, Diabhal?

You show me the sweater, I will show you the case.

Fine. I pick up my mug. Didn't think I was going to spend Sunday testifying but in a way it fulfills Sam's request too as we still have not returned to church and may not for a while yet.

Cold rain, warm hands.

Finally, the part of summer I like. 

The end. 

That doesn't make much sense, seeing as how I crave the super late-night sunsets and ridiculously early sunrises, how much I hate doing my morning chores in the pitch-black and how going out at four in the afternoon and needing headlights makes me cry. I'm famous for my daily announcements of the days getting longer at the end of each winter and I wish that part didn't exist, but this. 

This. 

Hot endless coffee, ochre-colored velvet dresses and red leaves that swirl down the storm drains in the driveway from the relentless rain. The sound of the rain on the windows while we are warm and cozy inside. Baking potatoes and roasts for hours in the oven. Piles of boys on the big couch by the woodstove or the fireplace or in front of the movie screen. Flannel shirts, back after a four-month absence and the end of worry as the motorcycles are heavily seasoned (inside joke for winterizing) and put away until the spring again, much to the ire of both John and (new) Jake. 

Batman emerges from his air-conditioned cave to herald the cool slow slide right into Halloween. Caleb stops being angry all the time (he also hates the heat. I think very wealthy people are just allergic or something), and all the tempers seemingly disappear. Everyone is up for endless cuddles and pumpkin pie from the market up the highway and we're painting watercolour bridges and lighting candles and plugging in the fairy lights all day every day.

I can decorate for Christmas and no one even complains. 

I can take down the fair bunting flags that I had strung from the gazebo to the poolhouse. They bleached white in the sun and now I can dye them teal blue and put them down on the docks for the winter. 

I can bake cinnamon rolls without getting heatstroke in the process. 

I can wear Cole's big grey sweater which inexplicably still smells like him and has never ever been washed since he died, which was fourteen and a half years ago now but seems like yesterday. Will I wash it? Never. I only put it on in the closet, give myself a long hug and then take it off, shoving it back under the pile of sweaters so no one can see it. Then I go give my devil a long hug and he'll tell me I remind him of his brother and then I feel awful, as if I am a living reminder of Cole's temper, as he took Caleb's pet project and all but finished her off, only to return her to the original sinner to continue on. 

Then I'll borrow one of Lochlan's sweaters instead, for this one is tan and looks nice with my dress, and when I come out of the closet he says There you are and I get a long hug of a different sort, a living one, a loving one that claims no ownership even though he has it all, his name stamped across my fingers just so there's no mistake because I always touch first.

Half tempo.

A knock on the door of the library where I sit waiting for the rain, sketchbook in hand. I haven't been drawing, I can't get out of my own way long enough, but I had been planning to do a little. 

The knock startles me and I cry out. SHIT! 

Sorry, Bee. I'm wondering if I can borrow you.

I jump up. Right. Ben doesn't have to ask. Where's Caleb?

I set him free for a bit. He doesn't need to hover.

He's just trying to make things up to y-

I know he is. I do like the fact that this gives you and Loch a chance to rest so let's leave it as it is for now. 

Okay. 

Come with me. Ben takes my hand and we leave the library and head downstairs and then turn right and go straight down another hall and then he turns and winks at me and opens his studio door. 

Can you stick around while I tune my guitar?

Are you going back to work?

No, I'm going to play a song for the love of my life, if she'll have it. 

I might have jumped up and down and done a little happy dance. He thought it was funny anyway but I got a song and it's the best Friday afternoon I've seen in a while. I texted Loch at the end and he came down and got a song too and this is now the best day we've had since Before.

For the love of God, please show me your heart.

 This morning when I came down the steps, I managed to arrive just in time to catch Caleb turning Ben's mug around so that he could easily pick it up by the handle, after setting down the cup in front of him at the table. We don't sit at the island anymore for coffee. Ben doesn't trust the tall heavy stools to hold his weight. They will and then some, but he doesn't trust them and that's okay, the table works perfectly too. 

(I trust them because I once climbed up Ben's back and right over him to dance on the island. PJ thought it looked like fun and followed me up, climbing over Ben and we laughed and laughed. So they hold at least four hundred pounds.)

It was a tender gesture and things are evolving again and suddenly Ben and Caleb are new best friends and I swear to God Caleb was put on this earth to torture (his former best friend) Lochlan and nothing more sometimes. 

Caleb has pledged that he will take Ben on, be his primary caregiver, look after whatever he needs help with and completely facilitate Ben's physical and emotional therapy until he is one hundred percent Ben or as close to it as he can get. Financially and time-committed. His very own version of restitution for what he has done. I'll maybe forgive him someday, like I have for everything else but for now I watch Ben lift the cup to take a sip, the barest of shakes making him slow his movements ever so slightly and I know I won't forget, like I haven't forgotten anything else he's done, permanently altering who we are with his own actions, thinking he can fix it all with money and attention to detail. 

Ben and I and Lochlan are just closer than ever now, further cemented together as Caleb's favourite triad of targets. He's left jagged, hideous scars on all of us now and we'll never be the same. 

He sees me (he knew I was there) and smiles.

Good morning, Neamhchiontach. 

Morning, Diabhal.

Be right back. Playing with iOS 14. Was serious underwhelmed until Lochlan showed me how to put the widgets on any screen, not just the home screen. Jesus. No one's talking about THAT. 

(Update: we cannot make this happen with the iPad OS. WTF Apple?!)

Update: You can change YOUR ICONS NOW.

Push.

Caleb met me on the steps last night just as I was heading up. The new routine is Ben says his goodnights and now usually Lochlan will go up with him and settle in to read by the fireplace. Lochlan is a huge reader and can finish a book in a day or two while it takes me weeks. I usually come up by ten or so and we cuddle down into the quilts and eventually go to sleep but sometimes I get up again and go read until my head starts to nod forward or Ben wakes up and wants big snuggles and sometimes we're all awake, sometimes no one is and we actually get sleep. Right now the routine is kind of blown up, a little bit rosy around the edges and positively brimming with light. 

But then the Devil comes along and smacks the illusion with a closed fist and it changes everything.

He pulls me in, kissing my forehead, wrapping his arms around my shoulders as he rests his chin on my head for a long minute. Too long. I finally make a move to go but he doesn't set me free. 

Neamhchiontach. Come up with me. 

I'm going to Ben and Loch.

Just a quick drink and then I'll walk you home. 

I laugh in spite of myself. He's funny like that. A desperate charm but it works, like squeezing a worry doll really hard hoping your worries will fill it up and leave you the hell alone.

A laugh is a good sign, he rocks me back and forth gently. 

I'm taking my cues from Ben. 

Ben has made no moves to acknowledge my role in what happened. 

Then once he does, I'll be back to visit and we'll go from there.

What do you mean, 'go from there'?

I don't know what more I can say right now. I'm sorry. 

Bridget, you go on how you feel. Ben goes on how he feels. This is carved in stone. Even Loch-

Is it? Right now I'm going on how I feel and I'm not putting his feelings aside right now either. He is my priority. Not you right now. When you needed me I didn't leave your side and right now it's his turn. He needs me. Can you understand that?

I feel his chin sharp against my head as he nods once and I pull back to look at him. 

Goodnight, Diabhal. 

Goodnight, Neamhchiontach. I miss you. 

Me too. Still going on how I feel. Damaged and brainwashed as always. Soon, I promise but it feels empty. 

***

This morning Caleb wants to take Ben out for a drive, maybe for an ice cream for lunch if they can hit a drive thru at Dairy Queen or something. Ben is surprisingly game for this. 

Lochlan? Not as sure. 

Caleb promises that he will look after Ben and they are off. 

Lochlan turns to me. Thoughts?

I don't know yet. 

He nods. Me neither.

Sam wants a barometer but this is all I got.

The phone is dead and one of today's gift baskets featured a shirt with a handwritten note that said:

For Bridget- Saw this and burst out laughing thinking of you. Look after him for us. XO

It's a white t-shirt, girl cut even and in big pink letters it says:

WORLD'S MOST AVERAGE ASTRONAUT

And I love it. 

It's from a super famous guy that was super arrogant until sitting with me in the kitchen for half an hour realizing I wasn't about to be charmed by him and that it was okay, and yet he remembered how much I like outer space and how unimpressed I was by him (and his friends) because music is a fluke. You produce a thing and if it hits at the right time in the right way you're a mega star. Then you have a formula and you milk it like a cow until it dies. Then you have to find a new cash cow to milk again and hope it's a heavy producer too.

Or at least, that's how it was back in the day. There is no plane of existence that suddenly places you above other humans, the only difference is we heard your name because of the thing. So get off your high horse.

I guess he didn't forget our talk. Huh. And I love it and Ben gave me his number, getting it from one of his producers and I called and left a voice mail thanking him for thinking of me. He also sent Nintendo Switches (I think? The long ones..these are yellow and turquoise!) for the kids, in case they didn't have one. He sent three. So he's not perfect, unless Ben counts as a kid, if I recall I made that joke too while he was here. 

Better than flowers, in any case. 

Today is a sleepy Monday. I went out early, watered all the plants outside, chucked some grass seed around, as is tradition each fall and we have some worn spots where it disappears sometimes and watered that too. It's supposed to rain by the end of the week and I cannot wait for that. I'll do a little more gardening to get rid of some of the things that are done for the season but I find it backbreaking these days and I don't know why. 

I don't sleep again. That's probably why. I had a really great week there during the summer and now the wakefulness is back, fear creeps back in, LIFE creeps back in and my brain is in space and I don't know how to handle earth at all anymore. 

He texts me back and I roll my eyes. Great. Now he has my number. Whoops.

The last place you saw it.

Ben is angry about Dalton.

I'm home now, why didn't you come up to me? 

I- I didn't even know how to respond to that. He's the encourager. He's a bigger freak than anyone. Always happy to see any of us let loose but most especially me. He knows what I need even when I'm not sure of that and suddenly I'm questioning my very being.

Well?

What do you want me to say? That's how it goes? Maybe 'sorry'? Fuck you? Are you even serious right now? 

My swiftly-returned fury is enough and he backs way off. Which is good because I'm about to dissolve and can't stand up to Benjamin the way I could probably stand up to anyone else. I'll fight with Lochlan or even Caleb to the fucking death but it scares me when Ben is angry, it leaves me feeling like I'll never be good enough or smart enough or trusted to do whatever it is that he wants. That's how it feels right now. I am suffocating, choking on the smoke and on his moods. I don't know what to do so I just freeze, standing there while he tries to control his expressions and not look too scary all the while to angry to worry about what he looks like at all. And now concern pushes into his features because now, well, now he's pissed me off.

He laughs. Now I get Caleb. I need you and you're gone off somewhere and I feel left out and alone. 

That's never been a 'funny' feeling in my book. 

Your book might be out of date, Bee.

And your accident might have triggered your jealousy bone. 

Oh, it triggered a bone alright. 

Jesus, Ben. I was banned from caring for you because I needed a rest and I was on my way up and Dalton asked me to stay. You know how rare that is and I figured you were already long asleep. Next time call me and I'll come right up. 

I haven't seen my phone in weeks, Bridget. 

Oh. Uh...It's probably in the studio. You could check?

I see what you're doing. 

Helping you find your pho-

I'll check after dinner. 

I'll help?

That would be great. He says it jovially, formally and I cringe.

Don't do that thing, Ben-

What thing? He looks so wholesome and honest suddenly. It's my favorite Ben, back for a brief glimpse.

That thing where you act cheerful and hope I'm not scared of you. I'm not. I just- 

I know, Bee. It felt weird to wake up and be absolutely enraged that you weren't there when I needed you. 

I'm sorry. It's a whisper but he hears it. 

No, I'm sorry, he returns with his own whisper and I hear that too. 

***

The phone was in the dirt underneath the lilacs on the far side of the pool almost in Batman's backyard. The well-watered lilacs over the past month and a bit. I think the phone is toast but it's in a bag of rice anyway. Time will tell. Not like Ben's ever really kept track of his phones so honestly this is the least-surprising thing to happen this summer.

Uh, I'll take you over to Apple this week. 

Okay. He's back to being childlike and agreeable. This is exhausting but we fix what we can and the rest will come.

Short. Not sweet.

All in all I don't know what to believe
But I told my friends I'm not sure if they're real
And I'm peering in mirrors for proof that I'm here

Half in, half out of this broken machine
Sick to the bone with some spectral disease
Came back from the void with the void still in me

Oh, how I wish I was here 

He's so quiet, almost like he's talking to himself and not to me. I came down to get out of the smoke and away from the construction noise. I think he likes the company but my panic never went away and I'm spooling up like a tornado again. He's attempting to help.

Right here. Shhhh. Shhhhhhhh. He looks kindly into my eyes before pushing his hand up around the back of my head, pulling me in, pulling me down into his arms, a place I don't know all that well even though I have been here before. I can't send you back like this. 

I shake my head. No, he definitely can't. I root for a kiss in the sudden smoky heat and he responds easily. This one is so easy to read. So easy to love and leave. So easy to crush on hard enough to draw blood in the palms of my hands, between my teeth, behind my eyes, leaving me bloodshot and heartsick and then in the next breath it's gone. The difference is that he isn't looking to be in charge, isn't looking to be powerful or overpower. He just makes the offer and this is only the third or seventh time I've taken it, my Teflon Jesus who never sticks around long enough in my heart that it hurts and he does that on purpose to not be a burden.  

He likes to pin me flat on my back, kiss a lot and he's usually either barking at me to sleep or asking me to go within a couple of hours. He's quiet about it and far more gentle with his words when he wants to sleep alone than August is, that's for sure. I don't leave feeling that I did something wrong, it's more like he gets full-up on Bridget and then he's good for a long while. 

Dalton's never been as predictable as some of the other boys and the last time I was here I brought Loch with me but someone has to look after Ben and yesterday I wasn't allowed and neither was Loch. We are exhausted and stressed and needed a break, which again I'll argue because Ben doesn't get one. 

Close your eyes, Poem. Ah, conjuring up his brother's charms will surely help. 

I think I have to go. But thank you for having me. I land a final kiss on his cheek and he laughs.

Thanks for letting me have you.

Friday's cancelled.

It's too smoky outside for me to breathe so I'm inside with the windows all closed and the fans on in bed with Dalton eating s'mores made in the microwave and watching season one of The Promised Neverland. It's so good it almost makes me forget we're surrounded by fire again. 

This is not the fresh clean snap-flame of a well-built campfire, this is filthy black smoke, debris floating through orange air, breath choked back in our lungs. Henry and I both have reactive asthma and so we are laying low. Ben is spending today with Daniel. Lochlan goes in between all of us. I have a blistering headache and am sleeping more than watching but it's a fast-moving series so Dalt is always happy to rewatch parts that I miss for dozing off.

None of the boys are outside today. Work is even stopped. I sent Emmett's crew home. They'll still be paid but no one should be exerting themselves and trying to breathe through this air quality nightmare. 2020 just keeps on coming, doesn't it? It's almost as bad as 2007 at this rate. Time will tell.

I wouldn't want to be any closer to the fires, that's for sure. 

 OMGOSH. 

Switchfoot's cover of Bowie's Space Oddity is freaking UNREAL.

Same difference.

 Oh my gosh. What was a trickle at the end of last week has grown to a waterfall overnight seemingly. Seven deliveries this morning alone and it's nine-fifteen. Four were huge bouquets of flowers, the kind of bouquets you don't have space for but we're doing our best. Three were care packages of chocolate and fruit and candy as Ben's sweet tooth is as legendary as mine and one of the reasons we get along so well. 

Once he sees them I will take them apart and find space for everything (because the candy basket in the butler's pantry is not nearly big enough suddenly even though it's technically a basket designed to hold ten pounds of potatoes but for now I'm just trying not to fangirl over the names on the cards. Pretty sure the local delivery shops were like yeah, right, but also maybe not, once they got to the front gates and had to be buzzed in after a little scrutiny. 

John has fetched each and every one and I am mentally choosing the next places for flowers if more come and can spill over to next door if necessary. Ben can see them all when he is ready, as this morning he and Lochlan took their coffees and their ipads and stretched out in the library in the big chairs to read quietly for a bit, with the doors closed against the noise of the morning, a habit they like to indulge in a few times a week, a rare couple of hours to be left alone.

(More likely a respite from my boundless nervous energy and fretting which I would also like a respite from but as Ben told me earlier it's a far sight better than the despair I usually exude but by saying that he was also admitting that my suspicions are correct.)

That's why when we walk on the beach I like to be alone. They can be at the other end. I just sometimes need space. Doesn't everyone? This is not a bad thing, it's necessary. 

Do I sound defensive? 

Huh. 

I'm having a really hard time not monopolizing Ben since he's been home. Apparently that's normal. Maybe it's even good as we have to watch him still for any backsliding or new issues that come up but I also want to protect him. Lochlan told me I can't watch him twenty-four hours a day or who would look after me? 

You, I blurted out, as if there's any question. 

He smiled sweetly. God, he's sick of my shit too I bet.

***

I have something that might work for you, Duncan says later (WAGON WHAT WAGON I think in alarm as I watch the wheel squelch him facefirst into the mud.)

Schuyler said I'm not allowed to day drink anymore, I point it out properly and completely ignore the Best Mom Ever coffee mug sitting at my right hand. It's full of champagne and a splash of orange juice (for colour). I haven't touched it yet. I'm oddly jittery and even though Sam says it's normal and I know all this it's also incredible to me how quickly the fluttering fingers and crushing panic returns and how it feels completely standard now, as if it's my default and everything else is fake.

Geez, Bridge. It's not booze.

I can't smoke, Duncan. It's a reminder. Instant headaches. Also just gross. 

It's not smokeable. It's a capsule. 

Filled with what?

Less panic? He laughs. Look. It's here if you want it. Might take the edge off. 

I don't think it's for me, whatever it is, but thank you. 

Here's the label. Look it up. I'm not trying to fuck you up. I mean...I could if you...want? But this is like microdosing just to control the worst of the moment. 

Like when they give me the needles and I sleep for a day?

No, not like that at all, Bridget. Holy fuck. 

***

Caleb keeps trying and I won't let him. He tries to corner me. Tries to call me. Tries to 'surprise' find me wherever I end up but by my request no one's giving him an inch and I've got privacy but I'm not alone for him to approach and he absolutely will not entertain an audience. 

Well, that's the difference between me and you, I guess. Having an audience is in my blood. I see John's eyebrows go up and he is a master at looking amused without changing his expression one iota. Maybe he can teach me how to do that. 

Can I request a nightcap tonight? 

Sorry, I think I'm doing drugs with Duncan tonight. 

What the fuck, Neamhchiontach. 

It's a joke..I think! 

He looks so hurt. Good.

We're in the burning building now.

Ben still has not ventured into his studio downstairs, a place he rarely left before the accident (life is now before and after again but newer tragedies require newer delineations). He is mildly fearful and visibly hesitant sometimes, especially near the end of the day. In the mornings he wakes up almost-Ben. He has near-constant headaches, cannot walk at his usual pace for unsteadiness and dizziness, and he is easily overwhelmed. 

He is slow to answer a direct question, needing more time to process. He briefly forgot my name the first day he spent fully awake but not who I was to him. He stumbled over trying to call me Beatrice, eventually when he was looking for the word Bumblebee, then he snapped when corrected to remind him my name is Bridget. 

I know that, I was looking for what I call you.

He couldn't remember stupid shit like skiing in the rockies or dancing on tables but he knew how much was in his chequing account and when the kids' birthdays are. It's coming back in pieces, by degree. He can't parse the steps necessary to make his famous ice cream and can no longer swim (doesn't want to, I mean, and doesn't like the pool suddenly anyways. Which sucks because he's going to be doing some of his physical rehab in it.)

 He can brush his teeth, type out emails (albeit slower than before) and make love (very much slower than before and not looking forward to that changing back if it does. HA). He knows what clothes are in his closet and what he wants to wear and it's appropriate for the forecast but he needs a little help with buttons. He is not going to be driving anytime soon. He can't write down a dictated phone number because it's too fast, say it again and he still gets sidetracked and frustrated so quickly. 

He shakes when he's tired, which is virtually all of the time. He is getting up at ten or eleven and going to bed at seven. 

 Days are long but short but long. 

It's going to take a long time. Most of his days are spent resting and the rest will just take time. We are learning how to help him with his physical rehabilitation and with his emotional fallouts where he is angry far too fast and inappropriately or when he is despondent and feels dark and hopeless. We're working with him on managing pain medication in order to wean him off it without seeing him suffer. He doesn't want to take it. His headaches remind him he has to. 

So yes, we were lucky. He is lucky. He got hurt in just the right way that he isn't permanently destroyed but it will be weeks or months or maybe never that he is Ben 1.0 again. Ben 2.0 is a little more of a handful but like I said they let us bring him home because we have the resources and the manpower to care for Ben more impressively (around the clock) even than the wonderful staff at the hospital who put up with all of our shit for weeks and never once acted surprised at any of it. 

We are caring for him every moment of every day and night. He cares for us right back. I wanted to be back in his arms and I am and there isn't any other favour I will ever ask for again from God. I got a very big one granted and I wouldn't dare try my luck again. I daresay neither will anyone else.

Mars.

 Today's much better, or at least this morning certainly is. Got fucked. Twice. Okay three times if you count that Ben came back for more because he gets super hot watching me and Lochlan and then can't help himself ever and I should know better than to indulge him a second time. So, moving slowly now. 

Caleb handed me a breakfast mimosa because he a) didn't know how much fun we were having sleeping in so doesn't hate me yet and 2) despises stale champagne so this was the end of the party champagne from Saturday night and now I'm half-drunk and reading Interview magazine out on the patio in the sun. It's still summer by a technicality but not by tradition and so we balance here on the cusp of Autumn and by four this afternoon every last one of us will be melting by the pool. I managed to get a tan in spite of myself this year and am loathe to even think about my corduroy overalls and oversized sweaters when it's still thirty-five in the shade every day. Ice cream for dinner? Okay, whatever. 

I read about Lana Del Rey first and now I've moved on to Jamie Dornan. Interview has dredged up a thirst trap (they admit it) photoshoot of Dornan from six years ago when Fifty Shades came out and wrote a few lines that I snorted painfully quick about how summer 2020 doesn't exist and didn't happen for any of us but hey, look at these pretty pictures and feel better, huh? 

They aren't wrong. That's how everyone lives now. Gloss along on something beautiful and find a few ways to dull the pain here and there and what more can you ask for? This summer saw me make some decorating changes in the house, I learned to navigate the feelings of someone getting badly hurt but coming home again in their own body instead of a box, I kayaked, I drank too much, I fought with virtually everyone and I went to the first half of summer camp but it wasn't great and now we have yet another freshly minted start on our threshold and I don't know if I should let it in now or wait for it to become frustrated and impatient in tinges of orange and gold. 

I don't know. I don't know. Jamie would know. Or maybe Caleb. He looks good in a bathtub in his underwear. I've seen that picture before. I don't care today though. I've got Ben's fingerprints embedded in my heart and Lochlan's arms wrapped around my soul, holding it tight so the devil can swoop in with his cold breezes and hot sins and he can drag my defenses down from the top of my head right off the ends of my toes and he still can't break today. Because it's new, it's strong and it's mine to make good. He can't have it. Well, okay if the mimosas keep coming to me seventy-thirty then he'll probably get it but that remains to be seen.

They don't know my heart

FUCK. Having a stressful day and can't get a hold of it and it's only ten in the morning. Wish me luck.

Lazy Sunday.

 No church today as Ben still tires easily and we won't leave him alone. We're shift-napping, shower-sharing and eating when he is hungry and it's honestly been the nicest schedule as I even slept until eight-thirty this morning, his arms tight around me, one hand holding Lochlan's head because Lochlan's arms were also around me but he had a hand tucked in Ben's elbow. Thank heavens it's not twenty-five degrees overnight anymore. On the contrary, actually and it's wonderful and cozy and I feel safe again, at last.

This morning Sam blessed us all on the way out the door. I am in respectable pajamas, enjoying a coffee mug full of ice and grapefruit juice, mildly hungover but also worn and tired today. I popped a multivitamin, lit an Indian temple incense stick and brought Midnight Sun (it's that good) outside to read on the patio under the pergola. It's vaguely overcast and scheduled to be very windy tomorrow and then really hot for the rest of the week so I have an eye towards chores and what will really need to be done this week versus what can wait one more. We're trying to wring the last of summer out here, trying to keep ahead of the headaches and ennui, trying to indulge in group self care and comfort, trying to just feel better about everything and heal up from the stress of August (the month, not the person).

We'll get there. Always do. Finding the little rituals, the tried and trues, the poetry of being flawed humans. The endless second chances, always called second because we can't keep track. 

Ben is working his way through emails. A line or two saying he's home recovering from a brain injury after a fall and if there's anything pressing between now and December to reach out and otherwise he'll reconnect after Christmas. None of it was due before that that hasn't already been finished and he is content again, closing his laptop lid, putting his head back to catch the sun, eyes closed. 

Schuyler's taking over as point sponsor from Ben too, though people still confide in Ben in a way they don't with even Schuy. We're good. So good. Still just happy he's here.

Fifty-five.

It's a pirate ship ride. A trip through the fog, gold pouring out of our pockets as we get pelted by saltwater rain. It's a darkened journey through a moonless sky, an endless black ribbon like a highway that slips through my fingers and twists away on the wind. It's a siren's song from the deep and I implore them to go faster, lest she catch me, drowning me in her mirror image, taking me to the end. 

Did I win? I wake up with a start, thick sleep muffling my words, spoken into the side of Lochlan's head. 

What were you fighting for? 

Life. 

He nods sagely. Then you won. 

I grab his hand as another wave washes over us. There's no rest for the wicked here on the high seas, no respite from the danger, and he straightens my hat on my head before resuming his perpetual lookout. Lochlan is a professional pirate, and I am his parrot. Always at his side, echoing his every word. Lifelong companions here on the Salish sea.

Happy birthday, I whisper over the roar of the waves. 

Indeed it is! He agrees. Best birthday ever. An annual proclamation, no matter what adventure we end up on.

I trace his Jolly Roger flag tattoo. It's one of my favorites. He kisses the top of my head and for good measure leans forward, kissing Ben's cheek on the other side of me. 

Me hearties, he says and he falls back asleep. Huh. Guess we're not getting up just yet.

Icing, lies and unbroken yolks.

So I finished Heidi and I'm telling you, calling it my most beloved book of my entire childhood now means my childhood was basically a lie, covered in goat cheese. 

The ending was a nice comfy discourse between not-disabled-child anymore Clara and miracle holy child Heidi, who has fixed everyone's miserable lives and then points out you don't have to wish for specific shit from God, he will simply gaze down upon you and figure out how to give you exactly what you need! 

And they lived happily ever-

WTF. *throws book at wall* *Lochlan comes bounding up the steps a moment later*

You oka...ah. I see you finished the book. 

Boy, DID I! 

He laughs and heads back downstairs. 

When I next saw the book it was neatly on the shelf again. Sure, I'll keep it for the cheese-toast and milk breakfast descriptions but otherwise fuck that. Worst book ever. Can't believe I didn't remember anything else. Maybe I blocked it out to self-preserve.

Next up is Midnight Sun. I'm the biggest secret Twilight franchise fan that ever was. Looking forward to this. Wish I had bought it a few weeks ago so I could have remained in the dark forever about Heidi's true purpose as the Son of God disguised as an unwanted orphan girl clinging to a steep Swiss mountainside. 

Vampires are always better.

***

Tomorrow is Lochlan's birthday, yesterday was Ruth's. It's a whole week of celebrating here and I am enjoying it. Even the work part of throwing big special dinners and baking multiple cakes is fun. No pressure these days. I'm in awe of how beautifully both my kids have grown up and as always like to remain fairly private about them because this blog isn't about parenting or a peek inside my life, it's simply a place for my brain to throw words at a blank page and see what sticks. 

 But you know this. So stop asking for more about them.

***

Caleb landed a gentle kiss on my cheek as I made eggs for breakfast this morning and asked if there was enough for him, or could I leave the pan on the range and he could make some as well. 

There's tons. Grab your plate, I assure him that I'm not giving him the silent treatment or anything, I'm  just waiting to take my cues from Ben, who is hungry and all he wants to do is eat and sleep and sleep some more. Collective politics can wait. 

We extended that courtesy to Caleb the last time he had to have a hospital visit, you'd think he would return the favour.

Instead I get a text later. Nightcap?

Maybe, I write back if for no other reason than to make him hope. Maybe God will just see what he needs and drop me down the mountain. Surprise, Diabhal! 

Fuck my life.

(I know I can do it, but that doesn't make it any less frightening.)

I mistakenly called it clairbuoyant when I was little and he never said it the correct way again.

***

Everyone keeps asking me (no I haven't finished Heidi yet. Working on it, rage-reading) how I'm doing and I just widen my eyes slightly and point. Guess they have the wrong person. Guess everything I've been though is but a drop in the proverbial bucket in comparison to Ben, and Daniel, who have seen more hardship in their lives than I, but also Ben took a double-blast as he tried to shield Daniel from the worst of it, charring his skin to a thick shell, keeping it turned toward the rest of the world thereafter. 

Ben has dealt with some terrible things, and he ended up in recovery finally (AA not the room outside surgery) only to have Caleb come for him and fuck him up just enough that the hospital pumped him full of drugs (!) (!!) (!!!) to make him comfortable for the fight to go home. 

And here he is. 

He's been through his shit, and you've been through yours. August is holding a glass of ice water against his t-shirt and it's soaking through. But he is intent and focused on my face, waiting for the tell-tale expression that will give my hiding place away. 

My shit is not relevant this week. 

It is. Too you and the people who care about you and you don't need to backburner your own struggles to achieve martyrdom for looking after Ben. 

Was I? Can you cite any concrete examples?

You've been a machine this week?

I try and change the subject. How is virtual burning man? (It's trash. Don't look) I smirk for good measure. August is not an internet boy. He gets the news when someone tells him. He phones the bank to do transfers. He is practically Amish and I love him for it though he also sends me naked, headless selfies so the potential is there and it's not even...untapped. 

(Snort.) 

Burning building, Augie. I told you it was important to save Ben first. Now it's really important. It's like I knew already and have just been doing drills.

Maybe you foretold the future-

My eyes grow wide again and I turn and hurry back to the house, back to Ben, back to the safety of the coloured lights illuminating the late summer birthday sky, away from what was supposed to be a guess, that got it right so readily I knew then for sure that I really was dealing with the Devil himself.

Still can't get him to go into his studio. Didn't expect that but he says he just wants to be close. :)

 Birthday cake baking is well underway. I keep giving Ben tiny chores like fetching the flour or washing the measuring cups and turning on the oven light and after looking at him sideways one too many times thinking he would revolt he finally asked if I was okay. 

Yes. Are you?

I'm fine. Bee, I'm just happy to be standing here right now. You know how long it's been since I could properly hold you?

(By properly he means nakedly, of course.)

I nod. Not going to cry. Dammit. No no no no no don't. Daniel needed-

Daniel has Schuy. You needed the reassurance. I would have kicked him out but he was asleep too fast. 

He's your brother. 

You're both my family-

Blood is thicker-

Thicker than us, Bridge? No, it's the same. We're family, same as Dan and I are brothers, you and I are forever together.

I wish this hadn't happened to you, Benny. 

Sometimes bad things are just a reset button for a new direction.

What direction are we going in now? 

Forward. We've been sideways for too long. He grins his big goofy nerd grin at me and I burst into tears.

Make us who we are.

I had a moment of panic yesterday late afternoon when I suddenly wondered if we were capable of bringing Ben home after all, even though I wanted to so badly. If we could manage. What would happen if something went wrong, as we're close to an hour from the nearest hospital. 

(It's just like that feeling when they let you leave the hospital after giving birth and you just take your baby with you and you're thinking, what? You're just going to let me leave with this fragile human? I don't even know how to take care of them. Are you sure? Do I have to sign something? Do I need to pay for them? Aren't you coming with me? Is there an instruction manual? Oh my God, they're crying again, maybe we should stay a little longer?)

Ben just wanted his own bed, though when he went to have a shower Daniel came up with him and sat on the bench outside the bathroom with the door cracked open just a little in case Ben got dizzy or anything went wrong because I could happily watch him shower but if he slips or keels over I can't physically catch him. Too small. 

Lochlan could do it but not full weight without any warning. That's a lot to ask.

But nothing bad happened and now Ben smells like our soap instead of institution and Daniel has finally exhaled as it is the two of them in this world and goddammit they've been through enough. Once he was judged to be fine Ben said he was going to go to bed early and Daniel went and curled up beside him. I cried because Daniel was so afraid during this but he was so brave and this seems right. He needs this, needs his big brother and as much as I wanted it I can wait another day.

Even in sleep Benjamin still looks like a raging maniac. He'll have permanent scarring underneath his hair (when it grows back in). He has headaches and moments of vertigo and confusion if people talk too fast all at once (God help us in this house) and he reaches for the handrail and considers stairs and inclines for a beat, leaving me profoundly grateful for Emmett's railings. He loses focus easily and gets angry easily. He's afraid to go into his studio but we're going to tackle that this morning maybe, if he wants. He's tired. So tired. But he's intact and his brain is working and they say everything will either come back in time, or not and just to wait and see.

Thank you for your prayers that I stole a couple of weeks ago. They worked and I will repay you when the time comes that you need them returned, though I hope that doesn't happen.

Microaggressions.

Edgar, holy FUCK. How did you go from the Point Break remake to The Last Days of American Crime? Did you read the script or...TL;DR.

 How is it even possible for a film to be this badly written?

A whole fifteen seconds here or there had the potential for greatness but really this treatment was written by someone who watched a couple of seventies crime movies and figured it looked easy.

Gosh. Not even one star. 

***

It's fucking FREEZING out. I turned the heat on. I think I'll bring the tomatoes in to ripen. Fuck it. Though it is supposed to swing back to hot at the end of the week. I think whenever I bake birthday cakes I summon intense heat waves and have to fret about condensation and melting icing constantly as we have a disproportionate amount of summer birthdays here on the point. I suppose I could buy cakes that are a little more hardy but no one likes the taste of those unless they're ice cream cakes but we are all old now and those are too rich and stupidly expensive and again, not as good as homemade.

Then again, I've never made an ice cream cake, specifically. 

I actually saw a cookbook online the other day that was all about 'reinventing' cake.

I was so offended.

***

I'm about to spend an hour with a youtube video featuring a little old man and an oil can and service my own sewing machine. Lochlan figures I can do it. Gosh. He's brave. I might be brave too, as it doesn't look overly complicated. 

Kind of like writing an action script.

HA. 

I know, shut up cranky Bridget.

A princess perched in her electric chair

It's four o'clock in the morning
Damn it listen to me good
I'm sleeping with myself tonight
Saved in time, thank God my music's still alive

Ben couldn't hit the notes, citing a headache coming on and I refused to help him. 

Just do it, Bee. Please.

Not that song. That song is a catalyst for misery and I can't, Ben.

Misery is your blood.

We're not going to do this right now. 

This is a pointed, sharp conversation because Ben lost some time during/after his accident and he's angry because I didn't save him, Caleb did. He would have died had Caleb not been there. The irony is that he wouldn't have landed on his head on concrete had Caleb not been there.

(AND BUTTERFLIES ARE FREE TO FLY-)

We'll do it later. I cut him off even as the notes are now swirling in my head but I'm just trying to outrun/hurry through the notes in Tiny Dancer, the song that comes next on my Elton John smart playlist because I organized it to tell a story and Elton knows how to bring the feels. 

My life is a fucking musical, and it's two weeks today since Caleb hurt Ben so badly it's permanently changed not only Ben's life but all of our lives as we try to 'navigate our new normal' as Ben's doctors keep telling us, causing me to swear out loud and yell something about nothing ever being normal in our lives, that where I come from 'normal' is a dirty word but hurting each other is absolutely not allowed and that resulted in a dramatic moment where Lochlan physically carried me out of the conference room in a bear hug while I pointed out Ben could hurt every last one of the boys but the difference is he WOULDN'T and he's absolutely untouchable and the 'new normal' is that maybe Caleb should leave. 

Sorry, I have moments like that. Moments where I hate everyone, moments where everything is scary and wrong and a lump comes up in my throat and it hurts so fucking bad. 

They wanted me to talk to one of their crisis counsellors thinking this was all reactionary for what's happened but over the course of Ben's stay the nurses have gotten our whole life story but not the doctors and they get the high-level emotional wave we ride in and out on, they somehow understand that nothing about any of this is normal, nor will it ever be.

But today I can't see Jesus, just vengeance. Today I'm a superhero with no power, I'm a livewire and they've already cut the breaker, I'm a mess and no one has a mop.

Jesus Christ, Sam says as I unload all of this on the table when Caleb arrives at the hospital to help Ben sing and I leave so fast I break a nail on the door going out.

I told you! He's not even here today! I yell it at Sam. I don't mean to but like they said, it's probably reactionary. 

Right.

Virgo season.

Another beautiful day and I'm getting the house ready for Ben's return, though the boys didn't leave a lot for me to do. They took over the chore chart, picked up the slack and then went above and beyond, pulling it until it sang, stretched tight over our little point like a line, ready for a funambulist (meeeeeee) to show off on. I'll have help doing the formal dinners this week, and in baking the cakes.

Life is a tightrope. If ever there was a metaphor, it would be this.

They've scrubbed every trace of construction away. Emmett also went above and beyond. I gave him a blank slate and zero plans, told him what I need and asked that it all blend in so it was virtually unnoticeable. He did exactly that and I requested that Caleb tip him handsomely and then doubled that. That's how you keep someone good. You make it rain. 

Didn't work for Caleb though. He thought money would make me come running. I did, but I ran away from him instead of towards him.

He's going to spend the fall working on figuring out how to blow off steam, how to keep his explosive temper in check and how to coexist peacefully with the rest of us. They were working so hard to incorporate him into the house but it seems as if he still falls back on his old flaws, still pretends he is above us, still separates himself from the group. Sam has some names and I get to pick one for Caleb and he can go and lay his heart bare a couple of times a week to someone with threadbare cuffs in a worn scrubbed office and not complain even once because I have asked for that and that would mean more to me than another stupid payout. No settlement can save him from this. I forgave him quickly but as always I won't forget.

In the meantime, I acquiesced and sent Ben's new/favourite guitar in with Sam and Matt this morning so he could serenade his nurses and reassure himself that he can still play. It's a Gretsch baritone and it's cherry. He found it practically for free and only had to replace the coils and strings and it became number one pretty quickly. They'll probably bring it back tonight but he'll have that peace of mind. We keep finding strange things that he can't do that his team says will return in time. Nothing major, just little things like concentration if several people are talking at once or really super quick reactions to something falling, for example (mostly things some people struggle with in life anyway). It's hard to watch Ben get so frustrated so I think this will help and since it's actually electric, it makes less noise unplugged than his favourite Martin acoustic.

I may just take the guitar out of the case and hide myself in it so I can curl up in Ben's arms, come to think of it. I think his touch is what I miss most about the past few weeks. There's not nearly enough of it.

Ben is hopefully coming home early next week!

Lochlan was sad this morning so I sang to him. Specifically I sang Hard For Me (which is a fucking BEAUTIFUL song from 365 Days, sung by the actor himself in real life, Michele Morrone.) but I did it with Michele's heavy Italian accent and by the end Lochlan was doubled over, shoulders shaking, face beet red from laughing but I hit every note, fuckers and cheering him up was well worth it.

Because he returned the favour and now I keep breaking into fits and giggles even thinking about it. Lochlan has a great and terrible habit of taking on accents that don't belong to him and he sounds very strange without his clipped staccato consonants. And he mimicked the great shuddering breath before the final line and I think I'm done for the day. 

Also, the playlist this is on (on my phone) rolls right into Lana Del Rey's The Greatest and it's just gorgeous. 

So he's not sad anymore but he was only sad in that way you're sad when you momentarily realize that summer is almost over and it's dark earlier in the evenings, or that your children are both going to graduate in the next year's time frame (365 days, again) and that life keeps going. But at least he isn't sad anymore.

Happy Friday. At last. Next week is birthday week and I have a lot of things to do.

This is nothing and everything and weirdly full of spoilers but if you haven't read this book that's been out for a hundred and forty years then I'm not really worried.

Okay so many times here I have extolled the virtues of Heidi, one of my favourite books as a child purely because the description of mealtime with the fresh goat milk and crusty bread with toasted cheese sent me over a carbohydrate edge that is sharp as fuck. It's stuck with me my whole life and I love to have cheese bread for breakfast, despite being ridiculously lactose intolerant.

I threw the book in my bag on one of my quick visits home to grab stuff. I've had so much time to sit in a hard chair and do nothing. Play games on my phone. Draw on my ipad. I watched two whole really good series on Netflix (Outer Banks and Unsolved Mysteries) and I prayed. I facetimed with Daniel so many times I have PTSD just looking at his face and I texted with Lock and with PJ by the minute. 

But sometimes I would make tea and read. They let me use this little kitchenette and tea was the only thing that kept me from cracking like a brittle ice shelf from how cold they keep the floors. 

And I picked up Heidi, thinking it might be comfort-reading. An old favourite book I haven't read since childhood. I look at the author's name and wonder if she wrote anything else. Johanna Spyri. I didn't realize the book was so old (1880) or that she wrote so much, but that's neither here nor there.

This book is fucking insane. Not only is Heidi passed around like an unwanted puppy but no one actually cares for her safety and she's five years old. There's a long human-trafficking segment where she is taken from the mountain and sent to Frankfort to be held prisoner in a city home as a companion for a disabled girl before the girl's father takes pity on her and has her sent back to the Alm Uncle on the side of the mountain, in care of his butler, who abandons her halfway there to a random guy with a cart who promises to take her the rest of the way.

She is taught about God while in the city too and decides that God is her personal wish-genie. No one ever questions this simplified, bizarre new life-plan of hers. 

Oh, and dinner rolls are worth more than gold in this story. 

Magically she learned to read in the year and a half she was there because Heidi is all about self-preservation. 

I have one chapter left and I'm gobsmacked by how bad this is in comparison to how vivid and delicious the descriptions are of her first few days on the mountain. I'm so embarrassed now. And stunned at how poorly this has aged compared books of fifty years later, like the Little House on the Prairie series but wow, now I know.

Pride, prejudice and zomb-Ben.

I brought Ben his phone today, let him make a couple of quick calls and send a couple emails off and then he passed it back. It hurts his eyes, he said. 

You're probably just allergic to work now, I pointed out and he laughed. 

He asked for his favourite guitar but we vetoed that, as not only is it not appropriate in a quiet hospital wing, private room or not, but he can look forward to playing when he gets home. 

He agreed. He's been very agreeable. He goes with whatever we say, whatever is decided and he just motors through milestones and progress markers and keeps stable and steady and he sleeps a fair bit and while he's not high now from pain meds he was a few days ago and I worry about what that means for his recovery but he said we'll take it one step at a time and I laughed because the irony and he didn't but he smiled.

We're all just thrilled that his brain is no longer leaking out of his nose. 

***

Masks are now my new all-time favourite accessory (don't worry, I've been wearing them for months), as I have one of those faces that not only can't make a poker face but I perpetually look as if I'm about to burst into tears when I'm not actively smiling. I always said my superpowers, if I could have them would be hiding my true feelings instead of broadcasting them with my eyes, and writing my name with pee in the snow, but that's not really relevant right here, it's just something I would like to be able to do. If I can refrain from raising my eyebrows I look completely normal and like I believe what you're telling me.

***

 Caleb has sought redemption quietly. He's hung back. He's facilitated the contractors coming in and doing a general sizing up and adding all sorts of accessibility to the house that brings a physical ease where before the house was accessible only in terms of hearing. The lights flicker when the doorbell rings or the gate intercom buzzes, plus there is a small light attached to the inside of each door which lights up really bright if you knock on the outside. Our smoke alarms are these super piercing rave/strobe lights and I have a flashing-light alarm clock that wakes me up. They lowered the ceiling heights on the main floor to nine feet from vaulted to help with the echoing and there are lots of other tiny touches like water alarms in case water is left on from a tap and I don't hear it and we have hard wood on all floors downstairs so that I can hear you coming.

They're putting in an elevator from the studio to the main level. As I said the other day we're adding railings and grab bars wherever we can. They've opted to put in higher toilets because it's easier to sit on them when you're tall and the tall people in this house outnumber the short (uh, me. Even Ruth is tall and willowy). They're adding non-slip tiles in the kitchen, foyer, garage and bathrooms, the front steps are being retrofitted to be nonslip. We're just going to bubblewrap everything we never did before, ironic again because when we moved in with a nine year old and an eleven year old we didn't have this much safety in mind, choosing instead to teach the kids to watch out for hazards than to assume they would be safe. 

Ben will not need most of these additions but they're never a bad thing, and with Emmett doing the work I know it will blend in seamlessly with the design of the house. And I made sure it's going to cost Caleb a blooming fortune. He may not even be living here once Ben comes home, though he has played advocate to himself and has pointed out that if Lochlan had hauled off and punched someone who then suffered a TBI I would not make him leave. 

He's not wrong but they really have to stop using their fists to try and fix their bruised egos (and brains).

Love is the most selfish of all the passions.

 It's a beautiful day. I took a deep breath and it didn't hurt. The sun is shining, but it didn't burn. Our tomatoes are ripening but not splitting. I brought one in for Ben, salt shaker wrapped in a napkin in my purse because he likes them with a little salt and he said it was the best thing he's ever eaten. Then he winked at me and laughed gently. He can't laugh too hard or his head hurts. 

He's in a private room and let me tell you being able to have a good long conversation with him and not being told that he needs to sleep or I need to leave so they can change tubes and bags and test him and feed him and listen to the noises of the machines while I wonder exactly how hard his brain hit the inside of his skull and what the fallout from this might mean for the future of the biggest, strongest man I know.

The doctors have gone from cautious to practically packing his bags for him.

(Just kidding. He has no bags. Only the clothes he came in wearing. No phone. No watch. No nothing. Not even his reading glasses.)

And Lochlan is with me today so we can spend time with Ben together. Three musketeers.

Futures.

 I slept for nine hours straight and then the phone rang but it was Schuyler and his soothing voice telling me Ben is doing great and everything is fine, so don't rush, take some time to be at home and rest a little more. I'm more glad that I was at the hospital for the first more frightening days so that I didn't have to wait for the boys to tell me news in their roundabout, slowed-down way. That's too hard. This works better. Either way, our cautious but hopeful approach is working and today instead of church Sam is going to go in with Matt to pray with Ben. Ben has been asking for Sam.

I called Ben's old manager to put him in the loop and ask him to try to reach out to some of the people Ben was working with. Not like I know how to get a hold of them. He said not to worry about a thing. Ben's projects will be heavily delayed or delivered in fragments and they'll have to make do though he is not a procrastinator when it comes to work and is probably ready to send everything out if he hadn't already. 

I saw Caleb and I would not stop long enough to see him dissolve into his own sorrow nor listen to his lament, I only asked him to contact Emmett (NOT RANSOM) and see about arranging to put in some better accessibility points on the property, especially around the main house. We need stair railings indoors, rails in the bathroom, a second ladder and rails at the other end of the pool and I'm putting a auxiliary driveway that comes around and isn't such a bottleneck way on the other side where our property hooks around (surprise, the waterfront is all mine), about forty feet past where Batman's property ends, in order to facilitate both deliveries and emergencies. 

Caleb nodded, absolutely hobbled by my refusal to hear his confession. 

He's not a stupid man, though.

Maybe we won't need any of that stuff but if we do, it will be there. 

When can I see him?

When he asks for you.

 Ben's improvements are coming by the hour now and they say if it continues he'll be out of ICU perhaps early next week. They're so cautious but optimistic, it makes me crazy but at the same time I crave more and more, hanging off every word. 

I'm home for the night. Daniel and Schuyler are trading off tonight. I need to not be there right this second. I got physically sick this morning and Lochlan came back to collect me, sending me out to the truck while he took a few minutes to talk to Ben. Ben is mostly drifting between commands, playing trained seal, hitting his tests with an ease he didn't have even two days ago so I'm excited. 

Still sick though, not too sure why but I've also been sitting in a hard chair in the cold wearing a mask for a week in a terrible environment for getting sick, eating like crap, sleeping five minutes every three or four hours and I need a break, though my argument this week is that Ben doesn't get a break. 

But I am more at ease now with being able to leave him for a little bit, and a little more heartened that he might be okay, or at least better in short order and when I go back I'll be slept and fresh and ready to take on next week.

I'm home for a moment to have a hot shower and wolf down some dinner and then I'm going back to the hospital. Ben has stabilized finally. The nurses said he is full of surprises and doing really well. He's had three surgeries, two frightening setbacks and a lot of really really good care over the past six days (it happened Sunday morning) and God bless the staff, they've been looking after me too.They're already talking about all the things he's going to do when he comes home but I can see on their faces that they say that as a thing to keep our spirits up. Half the time Ben is sleeping and not listening anyway. The other half I am too despondent to pretend that I am cheered from their effort but I get it. It's part of the job. 

May not be posting a lot but people wanted to know that he's alive. It's kind of all I want to know too. They said it's too soon to tell the future but I just need to know he's in it. That's all I care about right now.

Not going to ask for prayers, I'm just going to take them. Thank you in advance.

Sitting in an ice cold waiting room right now. Caleb and Ben had a shoving match by the pool, Ben was off-balance and when Caleb suckerpunched him Ben fell and cracked his head on the concrete and didn't respond didn't get up for so long I went completely numb and didn't even scream. I froze. I probably wasted so much time but Caleb did not and called 911 the second he could get to his phone.

Ben has not woken up yet. 

Update: he's awake.

I'll find a way home.

Watching my life on a detuned TV,

The pictures I see are just shapes on a screen,

Come shake me out of my slow motion dream

https://lyricstranslate.com

Watching my life on a detuned TV,

The pictures I see are just shapes on a screen,

Come shake me out of my slow motion dream

https://lyricstranslate.com

Watching my life on a detuned TV,

The pictures I see are just shapes on a screen,

Come shake me out of my slow motion dream

Ha. I broke my heart learning the opening notes for Wish I Was Here. Falling for a song so hard I break bones and my own heart on the way down is truly the way I want to die. 

Fuck off, Bridge. Sam isn't playing this morning and I am stubborn, a pile of dust and ragged pieces of myself on the floor. The curtains are thrown wide to highlight the dust motes floating in the morning sun. We're supposed to have thunderstorms later today, first for God to smite me with and second for my bones to fuse back together in the light. Then and only then will I be able to move again. 

Sam reaches down into the dust, picks up a pinch between his fingers and draws the sign of the cross on my forehead.

He doesn't have room for me, Sam. That's why I live here in the dark. 

It isn't dark right now, is it?

Sure it is. You just need to look behind my eyes. 

What will it take, Bridget?

If I knew I would buy it. 

Faith doesn't come for sale. 

None of the virtues do, Sam. Or we would have some. 

You're too hard on yourself. He whispers it. He makes me sad. He came over to see if I wanted to tag along to exceedingly-hot church (NO) and then he said I didn't actually have a choice. He's concerned because yesterday I had Saturday kayak with Matt and maybe made some casual statements that scared the fuck out of Matt because he knows me very well but apparently not enough.

I'm fine. As always. Some days are harder than others. Most of them follow tough nights.

Came back from the void (with the void still in me).

 You can't just hand me a new album and a good pair of headphones and leave me to drift, floating on a bed suspended by heavy ropes for fifty four minutes (which stretched into a hundred and eight so I could listen to it again) and blow me away with an easy breath for the profundity some men can reach with a piano and a pen. 

I am so readily in love with those men. Sort of like men who speak Gaelic fluently. This is my kryptonite, it's my biggest flaw because those are the men who navigate their own charms, wielding a power immeasurable, a stunning display of emotional peacock feathers by which we are levelled flat. 

Hello, Mick Moss. Welcome to the inside of my brain.

He's what I wished Pearl Jam would have been but isn't. Like a hotter, deeper version. Tighter instruments, but he's just...let the fuck go with his words, something I wish more people would do. That's something I require, it's a dealbreaker, in fact. If you want to talk to me you have to drop your walls. You have to tell me of your deepest darkest thoughts, fears and wants. You have to go one step further, opening yourself, being vulnerable, being unabashed, shameless and pure. I don't care if it makes you look bad. I don't care if you're embarrassed, just give me what I crave. 

 Like this. This is fucking awesome. Antimatter's Black Market Enlightenment is now safely ensconced in my top ten Most Perfect Albums of all time. 

(If you want to check him out listen to Wish I was Here. GodDAMN.)

(Happy Saturday. Our virus cases here in the southern half of the province have tripled every day over the past week and I'm never leaving the house again but as long as I have some amazing music and my deepest boys around I'm good for the rest of my life, thanks. Deliver Vietnamese food and I'll not complain with a single word. August laughs when I tell him this. I was so drunk when I explained exactly how I work, to his amused face as he nodded. I know all this, he reminded me, but I told him again anyway.)

Judas summer.

Henry and Lochlan were outside until around midnight last night, as Henry continues to learn to handle fire. It looks cool, he says. He's enjoying the process of learning and trying and getting it, finally after dozens of attempts. Then it's on to the next level, as practice is everything. Henry's not a perfectionist and doesn't worry if he can't do something, but he is also exceedingly quiet and contemplative. He feels things twice as deep as your average human, which is a hindrance and a help. Henry is exactly like Jake but with my stubbornness and pragmatism, and so Lochlan has no trouble at all crafting a plan to teach him in a way that will work both for Lochlan's capacity for risk and patience and for Henry's confidence in himself and desire to expand his decidedly too-safe horizons.

As this week wraps up we've really settled into a new sort of dynamic here on the point. It's all good, all positive, all healthy which is the most you can ask for, right Joel? Joel came by last evening but we were busy hanging out with the kids and didn't want to break away to go and talk. I don't want to talk to him right now anyway. He is not for the good times. He is for the hard times (or as I call them, the heart times). He is for emergencies. He is just a textbook we can flip open if we need a reference but otherwise he can wait. 

Sometimes I just stand and watch and I can't believe the way things turned out. Jacob, you baptized your own son and you didn't know he was yours. And now he's learning to throw fireballs into the night because of Lochlan's encouragement, and because mom was so disappointed in the lack of meteor showers, so let's make one for her and she can enjoy a personalized experience and God bless them both it was the greatest round of shooting stars I think I've ever seen and not only does Lochlan not see Jake in Henry (he lies but he insists: Only you, Peanut. Only you) he doesn't even hesitate to be his father. Never has, never will and I love him for that, even when Jake was still alive and had no idea, Lochlan would talk about his kids which drove them all batshit. This is the life we wanted, only the camper's a tad bigger than we expected but the kids are too. Pinch me, I'm dreaming. 

No, you know the rules. Get away from me and just leave me like this. Please.

We're not talking about the invisible meteors today.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Overcast achillean paradises and stars that won't light up the whole way.

 PJ took the entire beer cooler to his wing, Duncan and Dalton helped bring the food back to the house and we left the blankets in the pool house to bring back out tonight, as last night the only thing I saw was muddied shooting clouds, I guess and after a fifteen-minute insistence on me adjusting my eyes properly to the dark after pulling the switch on all of the exterior lights, Lochlan very gently suggested we try tomorrow. 

But wouldn't you know, I'm stubborn and I made him wait a further thirty minutes just in case, you know, it cleared up or something.

I double-checked this morning and yes, it's supposed to be clear tonight and yes, PJ is punch-drunk this morning, having worked his way through a bunch of beers (there weren't that many in there, I just call it a cooler full of beers because it's easier to describe than saying 'an assorted galvanized tub full of ice and assorted beverages' or something. Most of the point doesn't drink or is in recovery. We're technically happier dry but then I like to get shitfaced and...be cute and PJ likes to drown his loneliness and Caleb measures his worth by how much his whiskey costs but THAT isn't even in the bucket and Lochlan isn't even picky if you hand him whatever and then there is ginger-ale for Benjamin and canned pellegrino with orange for Dalton who is a lot snootier than one might suspect. I don't even aspire to the sparkling water and I'm the queen of your very best dry champagne) and you should probably too now, after reading that huge parentheses section, I bet.

What was I going to say? Oh yeah! The meteor shower that never was. I planned my whole week around being gobsmacked by it and I've yet to lay eyes on a single star. 

Lochlan thinks I am funny and yet it's also his fault. 

(The legendary story of how he made me fall in love with him (he didn't, I already had) by showing me a path straight from the sky to his heart, stopping at all of the constellations along the way. GOSH. Such a romantic to my little elementary-school heart, I never had a chance, I don't think and this is why today my glaring lack of maturity causes so many problems. He promised me a fairytale but he didn't know there would be such a price to pay to get it and we're just now debt-free and realizing this gift after years of hard work, years of adversity and miles between us, both literally and figuratively.)

He is the north star, and anyone who says different can fuck off.

How many beers have you had today, Bumblebutt?

Two. No, three. I don't know. Maybe three. I have to pee, did you need something?

And the moon brought her the stars and she gave one to each of them.

Lochlan laughed at me when I struggled past him dragging a lawn chair. Where you going, Peanut?

I'm setting up for the Perseids, I remind him. 

Duncan jogs past. Hey Bee, what's for dinner?

Pop-tarts, I call back and he stops in his tracks.

Seriously?

The meteor shower is tonight!

So why didn't you trade nights? (my turn to cook)

I tried and no one would trade. Can one of you help me with these?

Sure, why didn't you ask?

I've been asking for a week now. 

They look suitably chagrined. Guilty. But it's true. And now I'm left with five hours to spare having to do it all myself. 

Here, Bee. Give it over.

Got it. 

Grab that end? 

I watch them whip into action to set up a viewing station that will see us through a twelve-degree night with wind but clear as a bell and the telescope is ready, the pile of blankets is folded and sitting on the rock wall and my plan is to bring the firepit down but put it back behind us so those who want to can have have hot dogs and s'smores but those who want to watch for shooting stars won't be bothered by the light. There's a cooler full of beer and one of the heaters down there too. I'm kind of ready. Surprise. 

It works and they get excited. 

Got the good buns? 

I'll go bring out the mustard and chips. 

 Is this enough blankets?

We can be pirates.

It's Monday. Always a fresh start. August went back across the drive early this morning, after waking up and pulling me in against him for the slowest, hottest fuck I've had so far this week. He kissed Lochlan's cheek and got up, getting dressed in the dark, telling us he'll see us later, and then he closed the door so quietly on the way out I fell asleep waiting for the sound. 

When I woke again it was late, Lochlan had scooped me in against his chest and I woke up in a cage of his arms, his breath on my eyebrows, his curls in my mouth as I tried to hold him right back, only he's bigger than me and his arms were blocking mine.

The fresh start is reacquainting ourselves with each other as individuals. It's learning to live in the fire again. It's getting so wound up with each other that we forget to breathe at all, forget that others have feelings or needs, forget that we need things like vitamins, vegetables or virtue. 

I'm trying to do all this while still embracing summer's offerings, while learning boundaries with Caleb, while learning how to navigate my crippling grief and crushing immaturity, my wild fear, while learning how to let my children go and at the same time being there for them, while going through early menopause and trying to lose myself in the dirt of the garden or the sand of the beach every chance I get. My two favorite non-human places are in the sun, which is ironic, as I can't be. 

 I'm trying to heal my skin from Caleb's teeth marks after covering almost every square inch with tattoos to protect myself from the outside world after he taught me singlehandedly how dangerous it was. How I keep the devil close to my heart, how I opened my door to him, learning that my own needs were far more dangerous than living on the road with the shows, than strangers all around me, than my own thoughts in the dark, discounted for how they were formed. I get credibility for nothing in life because of this man and yet I love him so and some nights it feels as if all of Lochlan's work is for nothing. All of his efforts to shape me into a good person destroyed in that first night and for the rest of my life. 

But it's Monday and like I said, it's a fresh start.