Saturday 28 March 2015

'Behold, I know not anything' is how it goes.

Care to...lick some gravestones? He says it with a smile. He gives in to my lack of sophistication. The Lagavulin has an amazingly specific smell and taste in that all I could ever imagine is that someone took the bottle and poured the liquid out across the head of the angel lying on Mary Nichol''s grave at Highgate and then caught it in another bottle and that's what I now hold in my hands.

I know what gravestone tastes like. I grew up with boys. I can still remember it clear as day.

It was nighttime. I was ten. We stood under the trees at the center of the cemetery and Lochlan passed me up as they took turns having a swig of bravery from Caleb's flask. Caleb is eighteen, Loch is sixteen and I am not going to get any bravery in a jar, which makes me braver than all of them by default. I ran after them all all night while they played Do or Dare, and when it got late and I got desperate I finally yelled PICK ME!!

Caleb turned and laughed. If I have to lie on this one then you have to lick the death date, trace it with your tongue. 

Oh, that's EASY, I boasted.

He lay flat on his back on the grave, arms crossed on his chest, feet together, pointing to the moon. Okay, go for it, Bridget. He sounded so uneasy.

I sat by his head and leaned over him slightly and stuck my tongue in 1938.

It tasted like the Lagavulin of my future. It tasted like moss and death and iodine and it wasn't nearly as awful as last week's game where Christian told me if I really wanted respect and entry to the Dare Club I would eat the dead ladybug he found.

I did that too except that I swallowed it whole so it only tasted a little bit bitter and then I threw up because he told me if I left it there it would come back to life and hatch and grow ladybug babies inside me then when I opened my mouth and eyes they would come flying out of my face.

At least I don't have to eat anything dead this time.

Also? Boys suck.

When I sat back and spit out the moss from my tongue, Lochlan put his hands out to pull me up. I think you just won the game, he tells me. He's plastered.

Caleb closes his eyes and pretends to stop breathing so we leave him there and start to run flat out across the cemetery. Cole is vaulting over headstones, Chris does slaloms. Loch throws out his hand for mine and we stay between the rows so we don't run over anyone. When we get back to the cars everyone is laughing and out of breath and I look back into the dark. Where is he? Maybe we should go back and get him. 

He'll be along. Loch lights a cigarette and blows smoke over my head so I don't breath it in. He hands off the smoke to Cole and then Caleb comes staggering out of the darkness and I scream.

He puts his arms out and drops the flask. What? What is it?

I didn't think you were that close. 

I like that Bridget is the only one who wanted to go back there and get me. You got my back, Bridgie. For that, you can have a drink. He goes hunting in a circle in the grass and finds the flask. There's a little left, he says as he shakes it. This is good. You're only little. He brings it to me and Loch shoves him backwards.

Naw, brother. She's too young. 

She's as old as we were when we tried it. 

And half our size. 

She's tougher than any of us. 

But I just keep staring at Caleb because he's alive, he's okay. I was worried that maybe he died for real and we were just going to leave him there in the dark. It's still a relief when I see him every time because he's still here. I didn't know at the time how final death is but maybe I did all along. That night stayed with me and we were just kidding around. Amazing how it feels when it's not for fun but for real and they don't get up. They don't come back into the light. They don't talk anymore. They're not there.

I finish my gravestone-drink and he pours me another. That's what this is for. Numbing everything. Maybe he knew all along what it would be like and this is just good practice, except it's not practice anymore. The dark is all around us, and the quiet and the weirdly-cold grass.

Friday 27 March 2015

Lunch was extra special.


Lochlan now calls the company PepperBridge Farms.

They have my back, apparently.

(And my front. I ate the whole bag.)

Thursday 26 March 2015

Over a billion.

Well, based on the endlessness of Caleb's laughter when I inquired sweetly just how much sugar was in the bowl, I'm not bidding on Cirque du Soleil.

I can't afford it.

I knew that but if there was a shot it wasn't like I wouldn't have taken it, you know? Life is about taking chances and I'd give anything to go back to that life, but on my own terms. I'd also have to bring everyone with me whether they like it or not and for that sort of influence you need to own your own show, as clumily as that reads.

I'll settle for ruling the roost, or at least pretending to. PJ won't let me give orders, Lochlan makes sure no one listens to me and really I'm here for decoration, I think. Like the colored Easter eggs, of which we had two dozen but then Ben saw them and now there are five.

He said sorry and that he would make more.

They now have plans to put on aprons and pin their beards back and decorate some more eggs for the upcoming Easter weekend. This time we'll blow the contents out so that they aren't awesome, colorful hard boiled eggs to eat but little fragile works of art instead.

(Like me.)

I usually make an angelfood cake around when we wind up with a lot of eggs without shells. Ben will eat that too. He'll growl and pick it up with both hands and pretend he is celebrating a great victory. We won't actually get any of the cake. And it's fine. He does more to try and make me laugh than anyone I have ever met before. He doesn't take things so seriously. I could learn a thing or two from him but I'm too busy being stubborn and trying to run away again and trying to exist as a square peg in a round hole. Trying to be a norm when it's so glaringly plain that I'm not.

He will pretend not to notice all of these flaws of mine.

I like that too.

Wednesday 25 March 2015

Dreamcatchers.

I asked Caleb and Batman to pool every resource they have between them and bid on Cirque du Soleil.  Batman waited for a heartbeat or six and then sighed heavily and said it wasn't the type of thing he financed.

Caleb stared at me for the longest time and then he said he would see what he could do. I'm pretty sure that was a very gentle way of letting me down without having to say no without concrete reasoning. That's sort of what you do with a willful child.

Somehow I don't think they would buy a whole circus or I probably would have had one by now.

Loch will inevitably point out that it's not quite the traditional circus I am used to. I know that. I'd like it anyway. We'll make changes when the dust settles. Just like we always do on a show.

Ladies, the time has come.



August and Lochlan have a new favorite song to lipsync to. They've got the dance down and everything. They recruited Duncan and Sam for this one. They called themselves...Little Dicks (But not really, said Lochlan).

(I knew we all missed August something fierce. He brings out the virtual insanity, and by that I mean the very best in Lochlan like no one else can.)

Ruth nearly died of embarrassment. She's a complete stranger to watching her father make an ass of himself and would prefer he be cool and mysterious instead. Fatherly. Together.

Henry thought it was a goddamned riot.

I think maybe someone mixed up their test results and Ruth is Caleb's child, while Henry maybe should belong to Loch. If she didn't have flames in her hair just like Lochlan I would seriously consider another round of tests but really their looks preclude any other possible outcomes.

Their personalities though.

Makes you wonder.

Tuesday 24 March 2015

Five by five.

Ben showed his face long enough today to seek out the huge bag of Cadbury mini-eggs I bought while grocery shopping. He ripped the top off, opened one side and poured the whole thing into his face.

That was thirty-six ounces of chocolate, for the record. Which is two and half pounds. I wonder if he'll want dinner tonight.

Oh, wait. Of course he will. This is Ben we're taking about here. If there isn't food on the table for him, he'll just eat the table itself.

***

I finally got to see Interstellar last night. Maybe it was a little Contact-y. Maybe a little 2001-y too. A tiny bit of Gravity-y too. And then a whole lot of scientific crap about space, time and 'Gargantua' (which is a ridiculous name for a black hole anyway) and I fought hard to absorb the pseudo-science and then gave up completely. I was like arghhhhhhh gravity! Time bending! Relativity means the time is local to where you are in space and moves at different speeds! And ahhhhghghhh this is where we cry! Right? Right? Okay, yup, now I'm crying. 

So it wasn't life changing except in a sense to remind me that I'm too curious to accept scripted explanations for complicated forces of nature and also hype kills movies dead for me. It was okay. I wouldn't watch it again but wouldn't you know now I own it on iTunes. I wish they would take trades. I'd rather have Contact. I think my copy is VHS.

***

Sam and Matt aren't getting along presently. Matt has moved up to Batman's house and is providing space because he thinks that will win Sam over. I've been instructed to stay out of it or I would point out that Sam isn't going to be won over by leaving. Sam is too much like me. Leave me? I'll write you off. When I'm done being sad I'd be so angry. I never got a chance to be angry at Jacob. Granted, Matt isn't done-done, he's just being stubborn.

Sam is being more stubborn but I'll side with him always because he's one of our own.

***
I went up to Batman's to drop off some papers for Jasper, as per Caleb's request, because Batman is away but Jasper was in his home office doing some odd bits of work and New Jake ambushed me on the way in. He loves company. The more the merrier. He is freakishly social and intense and I'm always surprised at how perfect the storm of tension is between us.

Hey, Beautiful. 

Hey, yourself. Where is Jasper?

Under a rock, probably. Naw, he's in Batman's office. 

I laugh and New Jake stands there grinning at me. (So cute. Don't touch him. He's perfect. Don't ruin him.)

Hey, Bridget?

Yes?

I was wondering if you would stop calling me New-Jake and just call me Jake. I'm not really new anymore. 

I hear what sounds like glass shattering but it's on the inside so he doesn't react at all.

I'll think about it. 

No, you won't. 

I smile so I don't cry. I can't. Not yet. I'm so sorry.

Maybe someday then. And don't be sorry. 

Someday. He kisses my cheek and he's gone again and I'm left to face Jasper. There's no tension there except for pure hate for each other. Jasper has had a thing for Batman for years and resents the very air that I breathe.

I don't actually care.

***

This morning marked my first stab for the season at gardening which consisted of me getting a start on weeding the lawn. Caleb came out twice and told me to stop, that he'll call someone but I insist. If I'm not going to run anymore and we're going to ingest chocolate by the pound, then I need a physical outlet and sex isn't enough, contrary to popular belief. Why? Because I get held up or held down and am restrained so I don't get to move at all. With anyone.

That's not a complaint.

Not even in the least.

(I swear.)

(Snort.)

Monday 23 March 2015

We bury the sunlight.

Breaking Benjamin superfans will appreciate this. We're all alike. That's right. I got up at five this morning to preorder an album because I was so excited. It didn't come out until seven.

Har.

East coast bands. Right.

I got up again at seven and it wasn't for sale in Canada.

NO.

After freaking out and digging around I found a different link that said it was. Be patient. They'll fix it. I got it in spite of the technical issues. The album comes in June but the first single is here now and everyone's going to hear Failure on repeat because WOW.

The last thirty-five seconds go from cookie monster growling (that's what I call it now, stop laughing) to power ballad and are like someone stroking my brain and saying Shhhhhhhhhhhh. I don't know why that is but I love it.

Sunday 22 March 2015

This is your Chase on drunk (with random comments by Dalton).

Bridgie, yu're like...Hufflepuff or something. 

Wrong fandom, Dude. She's probably Factionless.

Screw you both. I'm the last Word Bender. 

Did they even bend words? 

I 'm sure they had to bend more than just air. That would be such a waste if they didn't. 

Wind at least. Windmelons. Water? Elemelons.

Well, didn't you see the movie?

I slept through it. 

Did you sleep through Harry Potter?

Some of them, yes.

You're a stain on popular culture, Bridget. You know this, don't you?

Oh, probably.

Saturday 21 March 2015

Waiting for requitement.

I'm fine in the fire
I feed on the friction
I'm right where I should be
Don't try and fix me
Back into the fire, pinned between his hands, face to face so that this time I couldn't pin my ignorance on a scrap of a miserable hearing skill. Face up staring into hell. Hell looks a little like a cross between Richard Armitage and Clive Owen. Hell is a god-dammed handsome motherfucker and hell now seems to want to tell me he loves me every chance he gets.

If only he could control my mind the way he controls everything else, Christmas would come in March, heralded in on a matte-flat equinox just like spring, muted by the chill of the nights, decorated with snowdrops and crocuses and soot.

Instead of responding in kind, I warn him.

You shouldn't. 

Don't tell me what I can do. He lobs it back gently, threateningly.

I'm pointing out the obvious. That's all. I bite my lip to stop it from trembling and he puts his head down against mine. Somehow in the past ten days he's figured out what he missed in the first three decades. How I am driven by affection, swayed and bribed, fuelled by it. He pulls me up into his arms and says he wouldn't be able to help himself even if he could. That maybe if he just leaves it there it will become accepted. Even by Loch.

And I laugh because I don't have time to check myself. No, it won't. It never has so it never will. 

Never say never, Princess. 

I wait until he is in close against me and I repeat myself in case we both missed it. Never, Diabhal. Not in thirty years so not in a million, either.

Friday 20 March 2015

B is for butter and better and bye.

Breakfast with Joel this morning. I made butternauts and they explored the Grand Croissant Mesa, a desert of the flakiest, greasiest pastry landscape they've ever seen. I think they prefer the cold surface of the porcelain plate-moon, for in the desert they just melted and withered from despair. You know what they say, you can take a butternaut from the moon, but you can't take the moon from the butternaut. 

Well, they say that in MY mind. Haters.

Twice the servers tried to take my plate. I hate to be a snob but if you hover, you're getting a smaller tip. I get that on Fridays you just want to turn your tables over as fast as possible but when I'm being psychoanalyzed I want to take my time. Get it all. Miss nothing. Jesus, what if this only paints a partial picture, after all and in butter, no less?

Can't have that. Hey look, I'm going to order more food that I don't plan to eat, just to get you off my back.

Oven-browned pretentious fingerling potatoes. Organic, locally sourced. Hand-cut. Fried in extra virgins (which is even more virgins than ever before).

Not vegan though, because butter. Mmmmmmmmm.

(Butter is better than Joel, if we're keeping score.)

He said this first breakfast would be strange and probably difficult, reminiscent of some of our earlier meals together, after flight. Or maybe I should say after the front hall. He is right. He's always right about everything except for the things he is wrong about. I have no desire to correct or elaborate today. I'm busy making butternauts because they keep disappearing into the ground. This Mesa is clearly a trap made of emotional quicksand, just like this breakfast date. Who knew?

Thursday 19 March 2015

Cold and charm.

Caleb swept in early yesterday. A little work. Some food. Some easy meetings and decisions without emotion. Some more work in the form of planning. Some followup. A lot of cuddles in between. It's got to be some sort of tremendously sad and thoroughly ironic day when one suddenly finds themselves welcoming a metric ton of sexual harassment on the job.

A failed venture. One of my emotional trigger pulls that he warned me not to get involved in but trusted my emphatic pleas and wrote the cheque anyway (figuratively speaking).

A really delicious-looking lunch that I hardly touched in spite of his efforts to bite his own tongue for once, instead of mine, sitting quietly while I ordered for myself. It was a first, almost.

A mischievous round of hooky played when we opted to stop working and go for a walk on the beach because it didn't rain after all. He put his hand out for mine and I took it. He squeezed my fingers and I squeezed back.

He told me he loved me and I pretended I couldn't hear him. On the way back up to the house when his time was up I thanked him for being so sweet but he had already hardened back over.

Wednesday 18 March 2015

Navy blue.

When the phone rings at six in the morning it's never good news, is it?

I thought my grandfather was going to live forever but he stuck around long enough to celebrate Saint Patrick's Day and then he slipped away when no one was looking. He's to be reunited with my beautiful grandmother and they can be in heaven together now where nothing ever hurts and it never snows or rains. There's never a bad crop, a rough sea or a long day.

It's a bit of a surprise when you expect people to be immortal and you find out they're not. It's not a nice surprise but it makes more sense, I suppose and while I was prepared for this, I was never fully prepared and therefore a little dismayed to discover I wasn't prepared at all.

He gets credit for giving me:

All the Irish I have.
My obsession with the sea.
The two decades of vegetarianism.
A love of bonfires and exploring the woods.
The fascination with creepy glass eyes on taxidermied critters.
Plaid flannel as a comfort object.
Confidence in building things myself.
This debilitating wanderlust, which turns out to be the best inherited, genetic gift and not a flaw in the least.

Monday 16 March 2015

Cards for humanity.

It's a cold foggy morning and the first thing I did when I woke up was to pull on pajama pants and Cole's big grey sweater. It's a habit. Comfort objects. You know, routine.

Don't wear that. Loch's voice comes out of nowhere. I didn't even think he was awake and yet honestly? We both wake up when the other even so much as changes from REM sleep to stage one. 

Why not? I ask. It's emotionless. I don't know. I'm tired but curious, always. 

You don't need to be wrapped in him today. Come see me. 

I debate. I'm warm. It's already on. He's breaking promises, asking me to do things he said he'd never ask me to do again.

(Bridget, we're going to skip dinner tonight. Okay? Just tonight. We'll have a big breakfast tomorrow.)

(Cole will keep you safe.)

(It's always going to be just you and me, against the world.)

But he's trying hard, and this isn't the hill I want to die on, arguing over a big worn-out scratchy hand knit sweater with a hole in one elbow and singed cuffs and paint streaks on the back of the hem.

I pull it back off slowly, up over my head and when I put my arms back down, letting the sweater drop to the floor, he tells me I can wear his hoodie from yesterday. 

It smells like rain and sugar and pine needles and dryer sheets and adventure and hope. Like Lochlan. 

I zip it all the way up to my neck and stick my hands in the pockets. I pull out a playing card (three of hearts, always the magician) and his reading glasses. Both go on the nightstand. He throws his arms around my legs and drags me back into bed with him, whipping the covers down over us, smiling in the dark as he shoves my pyjama pants all the way down to my knees and then off. 

Sleep, Peanut. 

How long?

Just until the fog lifts. Then we work. (He's half asleep now, words come out via muscle memory.)

What if we didn't work today? 

Then we can sleep till the sun hits the bed. Deal?

Deal. 

When I woke up next (when Lochlan stopped dreaming), sunshine had flooded the room and the three of hearts was in my hand.

Sunday 15 March 2015

Assholes and angels.

"A cold-water surf trip to a remote and frozen Canadian frontier."
That's the description of Nova Scotia in this month's feature article in SURFER magazine (the large photo is a slide show). I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry. I guess when you grow up on a tiny peninsula surround by the harsh Atlantic you forget that the rest of the world has hardly any idea what that's like and will probably never see it with their own eyes.

And for that you have my deepest sympathies.

Actually, I'm kidding. If you never see it, that's fine. There is a lot of this world I'm never going to see either and I've made my peace with that but if you are as proud of where you come from as I am, then please write and tell me about it. I love to hear other people's depictions of their own home bases too.

***
Standing on the floor of the ocean. That's where it all makes sense. It all seems easier. It all turns out to be smaller, somehow. Less catastrophic. There is this big beautiful tumbling entity in shades of blue, green, black and white and it shapes solid rock, tosses huge vessels, drowns secrets and steals souls. Her highs and lows are noted, recorded and observed. She demands respect and commands attention. She steals and she gives back the most amazing treasures and she will continue to do all this relentlessly until the end of time. Long before me, long after me.

And I love her so.

I'm fine. Thank you for your concern. The pressure of how long is appropriate to grieve sometimes gets to me, when usually I can deflect it with a few well-placed invitations to fuck off. Sometimes I can't find the strength to do that and then I feel awful twice over. Once for missing them. Him, both. And once for putting everyone else through that. Especially Ben, who has dealt with far worse grief but had professional handling over months and months of his voluntary stay to get sober and actually learned something.

Unlike me. Tie me down and tell me you're going to teach me how to feel properly and I will buck and strain against it right to the bitter end, arching my back and flopping back down in frustration. I will hold out and pretend everything is fine right up until the moment that I fall apart.

Dismay is expressed all around. They wish I wouldn't cry. They tell me to get mad. I told them I don't want to be an asshole when I'm hurting but they figure it's probably safer than falling apart. I'm not so sure. There are of few of them who express sorrow through rage and it isn't any prettier from where I'm standing.

Saturday 14 March 2015

Trigger pulling.

Backwards
Into a wall of fire
It still works. I can crawl into bed and pull up a blanket made of memories and sadness and it's safe. It's warm. I pull it all the way up over my head and underneath it the music is loud and a familiar face is right there, stealing my fort. Taking my comfort. Leaving hardly enough room for me to stay warm, suffocating my sanity or what might be left of it now.

Matthew Good is singing so loudly I can't hear what Jake says to me until he reaches out and turns down the song.

Are you going to stay in here forever?

Until the weather is better, yes. It's called Hunkering Down. Don't they do this in Newfoundland?

They do indeed. But the weather is fine here.

Not inside my head it isn't.

We can fix this.

I don't think I'm fixable, Pooh.

What if you are? What would you do then, Piglet?

Oh, I would be so happy. I would never ever stop smiling.

Then that's what we should do.

I woke up because I couldn't breathe anymore and I threw off the covers to find total dark, complete quiet staring me back in the face, a waiting adversary and yet no match for my dreams. I get up, naked, gasping for air, borderline/hysterical, and I go and get a glass of cold water and bring it back to bed with me. When I get back into bed I smell sandalwood and it smells like Jake and I start sobbing because I miss him so bad and at the same time I feel so horribly ashamed for still feeling this way.

Friday 13 March 2015

Hold me, thrill me, kiss me, we're going to kill you.

They want you to be Jesus
They'll go down on one knee
But they'll want their money back
If you're alive at thirty-three
And you're turning tricks
With your crucifix
You're a star
I woke up this way. Lochlan picked a song and twisted the knob on the stereo until it couldn't go any further. Then he went out back to the patio, leaving the music blasting through the house. It seems like a bit of a mean way to wake everyone up but in his defence it was after eight when he did it and today is one of those rare and wonderful days that every. single. one. of. us. have. off. Even the ones with actual jobs. Even the children, who are on March break. Even Sam who has weddings tomorrow and church Sunday managed to get everything done ahead of time so that he didn't break our stride here.

Even the Devil and the Batman too. Best behaviour all around.

I'm going to get my day (see yesterday's post), is what this means. It begins at lunch. Just have to pick a movie and nix the whiskey because I don't really want any today, and have a baseball bat handy so that someone can knock me out when I decide it's a perfect nap time but not be able to fall asleep (but then drop like a stone in the dark the minute the movie spools up).

But first! Ben is going to throw Loch off the cliff into the sea because it's sunny and twenty degrees and we've decided it really was a mean way for him to wake us all up after all. You can't make love to U2 music. It just isn't something that can be done.

Not by me, anyway. I start singing along. It's a mood-killer.
Babe, it must be art
You're a headache
In a suitcase
You're a star

Thursday 12 March 2015

Easy to please, difficult to comprehend.

A perfect day right this second would involve some ramen. Maybe a couple hours of shopping and a stroll through the gallery. Then a nap. Then maybe a sleepy movie before some potato skins and whiskey. Maybe a blisteringly hot bubble bath and then sex and sleep and more sex and some eggs benedict the next morning. 

I said to only pick one day, Bridget.

Right and there's twenty-four hours in a day. I started at lunch on the first day. Yeesh!


Wednesday 11 March 2015

Throwing hope.

Step right up, boys and girls, olds and bolds, mids and kids! No matter what age you are, we got something you're gonna like! Prepare to be astounded, amazed and impressed. Prepare to scrape your wits up off the ground after you see what we have to show you! There's room down front, though please don't put any part of your body past the chalk line here and you'll go home intact! And now, if everyone is ready-

Peanut! 

I memorized it exactly like it was written! 

No, you need to be louder. Too soft. Too sweet. I didn't fall in love with a mouse. I swore you were a girl last I looked. 

I need a microphone. 

We have no power. Just project. Like I do when I'm relaying the poems. You can hear me down the street. 

That's because you have a big booming Scotch voice. 

No, it's because I'm loud. Act like I walked too far ahead of you on the path and you're mad because you can't keep up. 

I roar his name and he grins. Yes. Just like that. Start over, okay? 

STEP RIGHT UP, BOYS AND GIRLS! 

I look back at him and he looks like he owns the world. Maybe today, right now, here on this filthy street corner in the middle of nowhere, he does. There are no boys or girls here. No olds or bolds. No mids or kids. There's just us and the fire and the unrelenting sun and the nub of almost-gone chalk and a dream so big it'll probably crush us before lunchtime.

Tuesday 10 March 2015

August found me late this evening and said,

Don't do that, Bridge. Don't build me up like that. Don't ever think I didn't come back because I'm running from things you know nothing about. It's easier to find a soft landing then to try to make it from scratch. You know that better than anyone. 

Well, ow

Got it. 

Burning man.

We will save your precious skin
Let the healing light come in
I'll cover you when the sky comes crashing in
Seventeen minutes after August hung up the last flannel shirt in his closet, he had a job. Sometimes his perfection astounds me. He's easy to hang out with, he wants for nothing. He owns six outfits (one is fancy, one is festival, four are for every day and I think it's time to buy him some clothes), one worn-smooth watch, a big backpack, an iPhone and a smile.

He owns one pair of shoes at any given time. He would be a hipster and you would be aghast at his stereotypical persona until you talked to him for eight whole seconds and then you'd be aware that you were just in the presence of greatness absolute. You would salivate with the coolness he emanates that you only wish you had and you'd be left wanting more time with him in the hopes that you could absorb some of his fucking awesome for your very own via simple proximity.

He's a God among men. You just don't realize it until he's left your vicinity and then you just want him back.

But he doesn't compete for the adoration. It's all implied. He doesn't have the charm of the resident lizard king, Duncan. Duncan's all unfounded ego. August has no ego. He's humble, he works hard, he listens so incredible well if listening were an Olympic event he would have all the gold and his only issue with being here, back home on the point is Caleb.

August doesn't like Caleb. Doesn't like his double entendres, his double crosses or his double-talk. Doesn't trust him, doesn't understand why he does the things he does and generally would imagine his life as complete if only there wasn't a real-life devil standing just behind each of their shoulders, and towering over me.

On the other hand, Caleb is the one who single-handedly facilitated this entire commune so we are all mostly polite to a fault and loathe to start shit because shit could see the whole mess scattered to the four points of the compass and we've been there. We don't want that.

We're a family now and as long as everyone treats everyone else with respect, it's okay.

Besides, Caleb is the one who hired August.

And gave him a really stupidly fucking large salary.

To look after me.

With one caveat. If August does anything to make me fall in love with him again, Caleb will throw him off the wrong side of the cliff, because he is done with that foolishness.

Yes, that's in the contract. Caleb's going to force emotions via paperwork. This is why he is the Devil and I'm merely an apprentice, I guess. So much to learn and no means to wield my future talents, which means I have to resort to magic instead.

You can apprentice in two different things at once, you know, and someone else got here first.

Monday 9 March 2015

So sleepy. I just spent a good five minutes trying to wipe sunshine off my chair.

(It looked like a white mark.)

PJ won't stop laughing at me.


All the way home.

Guide my life into destiny
Climb outside
Reach up and paint the sky with me
Finding you has changed everything

We both break free if we make it on top
If one should fall we both will drop
We move together from here on out
What you need is what I’m about
Breakfast yesterday outside in the sun on the patio. Cool enough in the mornings for a sweater and jeans but I have forgone putting anything on my feet. Jake was right. Barefoot is best at home. He hated shoes. HATED them. To the point where there was a line of marks on the back wall of the hall closet, about knee high, where you could see where he kicked off his shoes and they'd land against the wall.

My toes. My toes are so happy to be in the sun.

I've gone back to coffee too. Only two or three cups a week. Coffee and toes. So happy. The narcolepsy reached a breaking point when I sat down to do some banking at my laptop and fell asleep mid-bill paying.

It tastes like shit. But I can pay the gas bill without blacking out and hitting a bunch of extra buttons. Now I understand the value of all of the steps required to complete the payment. I used to find it a pain. Last week those steps kept me from paying a $400 bill as $40023853.

(Not that it would have gone through, mind you.)

Why is our gas bill so high? Some of the fireplaces come on with the push of a button.

AND IT IS GLORIOUS.

Fire then no fire.

Fire then no fire.

Fire then no fire.

I could do that all day.

It costs $10 to run a gas fireplace for 15 minutes however. Your romantic moments are gilded and shine like diamonds here on the modern, easy-living West Coast.

Where was I?

Oh yes. Out under the cherry blossoms. Some of the trees bloom now. Some in July. And my toes will witness the whole thing.

But then the Devil comes and ruins the whole thing. It's okay though. Loch is in a great mood. Loch is also five inches away from me and all words will get filtered through his emotions like rainwater though a screen.

Caleb says he isn't the bad guy. That I'm an adult and he should not have to clear it with ten separate handlers to take a few days to get some work done.

Loch picks it apart. She's not an adult. He does have to clear it. The work isn't work. She didn't have to go. Shut the fuck up.

I snort. I actually love watching them bicker. It's like 1980 all over again. As long as they're not throwing punches or pulling me apart for a share it's very teenage and amazing to see their very different personalities go to war.

Loch then points out Caleb's new plan of feigning innocence and being accommodating isn't going unnoticed.

Caleb points out that Bridget's plan on trips now of either fighting and crying the whole time or showing up drunk to every event isn't going to fly. That the past two trips were disasters and that isn't acceptable.

Then stop taking her. She's not an adult, she's a child. This is your fault. Loch sits up and stares at Caleb. Caleb actually takes a full step backward.

(I would have too.)

Ben comes out and rolls his eyes. Ben actually fought for and won sleeping-Bridget-real-estate last night and Loch didn't fight him. But right now Loch is fighting everybody and it's my fault.

I kick Loch in the leg and he stops talking and asks me what I need. I tell him I need to apologize but then he cuts me off and says it isn't my fault and I shouldn't be coming to the defence of the Devil because he doesn't need any help.

And so I tune them out and look at my toes in the sun. Ben comes to sit behind me and I lean back against him, putting my feet up. Now my toes are in the air. It feels amazing. He gives my arms a squeeze and when I tune in again Caleb is gone and Loch is quiet and leaning against Ben too.

They both have bare feet. I didn't notice before.

Sunday 8 March 2015

Rules of engagement.

Come surrender your hidden scars
Leave your weapons where they are
You’ve been hiding
But I know your wounded heart
And you don’t know how beautiful you are
I'm still alive and possibly my liver is so wrecked and battered I'll never ever have to worry about waking up in a hotel room in pain and covered with mysterious, bloodied bandages because the organ traffickers will now forever pass me by.

Also my husband gave me the death stare upon my return because I was still drunk and slid quite ungracefully into his arms. He asked if I was done and told me to go up to bed. That he was going to talk to Caleb and that he'd be up in a minute. I performed one of my most glorious and well-known princess-maneuvers (passing out face down and yet still fully clothed) and Ben never came up.

Legend has it he and the Devil spent the night sitting on the front porch talking about all the things that are never going to happen again, like surprise work trips to do stupid things like plan decorating for a house when it could be done from home, or taking Bridget away from her safety nets when she's just about to leap off the platform to perform her act.

AKA it wasn't a good time.

(She's fragile)

Caleb bristled at this. He knows me as well as anyone. He's perfectly capable of looking after me. How dare they insinuate that he's in over his head or clueless?

Come out here, Bridget.

(Because I woke up at 4 and no one was there. I found them all out front on the porch, lights blazing. Loch is sitting on the steps facing away but listening. Ben and Caleb are each in a chair.) Loch just got in as well from his trip (see how Caleb operates? He stole my soul once and left a big pink cone of cotton candy in its place) and when I stepped outside Loch moved so fast to jump up and cross the porch to put his arms around me you would have thought he had built a time machine after all.) Caleb ignores this and keeps talking.

Did I harm you while we were away, Neamhchiontach?

No, Diabhal.

Did I get two separate rooms at the hotel? 

Yes. 

What did we do while we were at the lake?

Planned the decorating for the house with the design teams. 

Which part did you enjoy the most?

Choosing paint colors and appliances. 

Why?

I like it. I'm good at it. 

So you feel confident in your abilities?

Yes. I nod from Lochlan's shoulder. He is shaking almost imperceptibly.

Tell me what you didn't like about the trip, Bee. Ben's voice is soft. It's okay.

You and Loch weren't there. I don't sleep when I'm alone. That's why I'm up right now. 

Ben looks so relieved I almost cry on the spot but the hangover has dried me up and made me wince with every breath.

We're here now, baby, and you're not going anywhere without us for a good long time. He keeps glaring at Caleb. It takes an awful lot to piss Ben off. I think Caleb has finally discovered the line he can't cross and he is surprised, taken aback.

Can we go to bed then? I'm still drunk. I laugh. I can't help it. Shame makes me petulant and boastful.

Calebs' voice cuts through the darkness like piano wire. I'm sorry, Bridget. I was heavy-handed in getting you away. I'm sorry to both of you as well, Ben and Loch for taking her without permission. 

Like I am a car he jacked.

(Drive it like you stole it.)

Snort.

Loch doesn't say a word, he wraps his hand around the back of my neck and steers me into the house, up the stairs and down the hall to bed where I fall into bed again, dreaming of trying to swim in a sea of paint chip cards back to shore, where Ben and Lochlan wait for me in the dunes but Caleb has his hands around my ankles and he won't let go so I can't get anywhere.

Friday 6 March 2015

Oh and if anyone is up for it, I would love to trade my 1986 Original London cast stage recording of Les Miserables for the 2012 Les Miserables film soundtrack.

It's up next. You've been warmed. I know all this words!
I was waiting for someone, something to happen
Something ridiculous climbing the walls
And falling in what I now would call your bluff
Please don't call it love
I figured out fairly quickly why Caleb was so easygoing and jovial over the beginning of the week and on his birthday. I figured it out from my seat in the tiny plane as I stared into the bottom of my champagne bubbles because I've decided that if he's going to pull this shit all the time then I'm just going to get rip-roaring drunk and be so obnoxious he'll never want to bring me anywhere again.

And at a glistening dandelion-fluff weight of ninety-seven pounds, this is going well. It's far easier than I thought and I'm pulling a buzz nice enough to remember my punctuation but forget I can't yell fuck off across a crowded restaurant.

(Sorry if you were there. That was me and I really didn't need him pulling out my chair like some sort of gentleman, because he isn't.)

No more restaurants. Only take-out but that's okay, the hotel delivers alcohol and he's BUSY which means I can get shitfaced on a Friday morning, a Thursday evening and hopefully a Saturday too. Which is funner than I remember. Must be the different between good liquor and the cheap stuff we buy because half of us are unemployed and undereducated and the other half who know their booze don't drink anymore. They are sophisticated. I am clearly not.

That's fucking fine by me.

Lake Tahoe, I love you but I don't want to be here right now so I'll just apologize in advance because the only way to deal with him trying to talk to me is to put my headphones on and sing Fiction Family songs at him at the top of my lungs.

I only know two-thirds of the words! Go me!

Wednesday 4 March 2015

Snapping elastic under my chin.

Slightly defective
Not what I had planned
This is my Saturday today and I'm working my little butt off cleaning up.

I waited until everyone was up and out of my hair this morning and then I finished my tea with a new book (the Trudeau one I got for Christmas) and then had a hot bath with some of my Lush goodies. PJ cut all of the bath bombs in half for me (then they last twice as long) and impulsively I threw in two different halves. An eight-dollar bath but I would have paid eight hundred because it felt so good.

I didn't drop my book in the tub but I made the pages all wavy with my wet hands.

When I was beet-red it was time to get out. Then I had to spend twenty minutes scrubbing glitter and seaweed out of the tub.

That isn't anything new actually. Lochlan said that's what I'm made of. Glitter and seaweed. He laughed and asked if maybe he could join me for the next decadent bath. That we could make his skin as red as his hair. I find that amusing. Loch hates baths. He thinks it takes too long. He lives on the run.

Then I had to have three people help divide up the food left from last night. It seems when you put out a potluck request without parameters from all men you'll get red meat and Mexican food and very little else. We ate until we couldn't move and it looks like there's enough left that no one will have to cook until Easter. And we're still cleaning up this afternoon.

But it was fun. I kept my streak of making Caleb cry when he listened to his birthday speech from me and by the end of the night everyone had put their party hats on John, who looked like a big papery hedgehog.

Caleb's own speech made me tear up too. I didn't expect that. Instead of his usual assurance that he'll do what he wants he said he was humbled by the outpouring of love and generosity and time. That we're not his friends, we're his family and that he couldn't have chosen a better group within which to see his son raised. That the only thing missing from the night was Cole's presence but that Cole lives within him now so he is here after all, in spirit.

I sniffed really loud and at least eight sets of eyes looked at me. But it's okay. I'm the sap of the family so I do this often.

(Cry, I mean.)

Caleb loved the cake that I made, and liked the numbers for his age instead of an equal number of candles and he was touched by the photograph I gave him. He stared at it and commented on every detail he could spot. His size. His youth. He said the only thing different about me was my hair. He said Cole had such an eye for candid photos. He asked how it was that he hadn't seen this one before and I just shrugged and said I was full of surprises.

You are, he smiled. Thank you for this. 

I nodded.

John put all of the party hats on the chandelier in the dining room. It's twelve feet up in the air so there they will stay and most likely burn the house down.

The dog fell asleep under the table and we forgot about him. The kids were sent up to their rooms at ten-thirty. It was a school night.

The record player scratched along the edge long after we forgot it was on, too.

Sam and Matt danced close. By themselves, far removed from the table where the rest of us sat and drank our faces off on a Tuesday.

And the unintentional, nefarious king surveyed his kingdom, pleased with what he has done.

Tuesday 3 March 2015

Same age as Tom Cruise.

There's a big beat
You're sleeping in my memory
Like Satan
Lonely
So I'm with him
Floating, loaded
Enough to be released

It's more than the less you say you do
It's more than the shot that gets you though
Born to buy into something
Born to kill
It's a birthday-day. Caleb is fifty-two today. Which seems old, and everyone tells me he's too old for me but just remember this: he's a year younger than Jon Bon Jovi and a year older than Brad Pitt.

I KNOW!

Besides, sugar daddies are supposed to be older, and more distinguished and in-charge. They tell you where and when and then off you go.

I usually get a dress code too.

(And a bunch of other instructions that are none of anyone's business.)

Starting with a breakfast-date. Birthday breakfast with candles in the waffles because he's still a little silly in spite of his distinguishment. He's still a little overjoyed that no one made a fuss about his plans with me today, least of all August. They all knew August was coming out here to stay. He talked to them over Christmas when he was here and they all managed to keep the secret even as I wondered out loud if cutting Joel loose was the best idea. If I would be okay without someone here who is trained in people like me.

I guess I don't have to wonder if I'm getting better. I'm not or August wouldn't be here. Even though I'm glad he's here it pretty much confirms that I'm crazy. I don't know if I'm okay with that but I don't have a choice.

Like in what to wear. Caleb requested a pretty pale pink dress that he likes but it's cold and I couldn't find the little matching jacket so he gave me his suit jacket and now we match like a couple which is probably what he wanted and he stole my jacket.

Which must mean he's crazy too but I knew that the moment he saw me walk in (slowly) and his whole face fell. He asked if I was okay and I shrugged and reminded him Ben came home last night.

(Snort.)

I'm beautifully fucking wrecked is what I am.

He did not find that amusing in the least. I told him to lighten up and by gosh, he did. He totally did and he clapped when I sang Happy Birthday along with the waitstaff at breakfast this morning. Because birthdays should be amazing, even when you've had a whole lot of them.

Like fifty-two of them. Jesus Christ. When did this happen? I remember his sixteenth birthday. He got his drivers license on the first try. Later he had five beers and he and Lochlan got in a fight.

Another tradition if you're keeping score.

The rest of the day is filled up too. But this year without the big group outing that saw a table flipped in what was a very lovely restaurant we're no longer allowed to enter. Instead we're having a sort of pot-luck here at home and everyone is cooking. We'll eat on the patio at the big table that they brought up from the vineyard already. I blew up a thousand balloons this morning. We'll put the heaters on and the tiny lights. And party hats too.

Because you can't have a party without tiny paper hats on grown men.

You just can't.

Besides, it'll look ridiculous when they start swinging at each other. I figured at the very least I could assist in making them look even more foolish than ever.

(In the meantime, I've very nervous about that and the present I got for Caleb. It's a photograph he's never seen of the two of us, taken by Cole when I was sixteen and Caleb was twenty-four. I had it blown up, printed in black and white and framed for him. It's really amazing in itself. I just hope he feels the same way.)

Monday 2 March 2015

In a girl called catastrophe.

Remember how we started
Because since then I'm a waste
Caleb is more than a little angry that he paid a lot for a show but we're still going to move forward with our plans, Ben is ecstatic and Joel, well, Joel is gone.

But.

But.

Ben brought August back. A five-day detour to go and get him and ship his stuff and bring him home.

Jacob's parents have moved to a cute little condo in town. The homestead was too much for them now. Death ages people. Especially when you're in your seventies when you lose someone. They haven't coped all that well but at the same time they're doing great. They live in a semi-assisted building now and August's reason for being there has been removed, essentially. And August is a prophet and a saviour and a nomad too and he needs to be helping to be alive and so he came back.

He's the first one to ever do this and I don't even know if I can look him in the eye for how humbled and honoured I feel right now.

He came back.

No one's ever come back for good. Usually they just vanish and die. Sometimes they die but don't leave. Sometimes they set me up to fall so hard I think every time will be the last and I will break to bits.

But when Ben got out of the truck I was already running down the steps and then when the other door opened I stopped and stared and then burst into tears. I thought it was a surprise visit. I thought August was temporary but then he grabbed me up off the ground in a hug so hard I think my ribs are liquid now but he told me he was home and the rest of me dissolved too.

Don't worry, I did say hi to Ben and maybe forgave him for the extra time away, under the circumstances.

And I haven't let go of him since.

Sunday 1 March 2015

Hard-crack stage.

You break around me
You say that I should give my heart a rest
Let me wash away the painful words I wrote

We can smother out the flames within my soul
No more standing by the way that I believe
We can smother out the flames with gasoline
There I was, riding high on a cloud over the mere hours left in...life with Joel here and Caleb had to pop my balloon with the demand that we join him in private to discuss the impending plans that I've discussed with precisely no one here. Not Loch. Not Caleb. Just Ben and the lawyers.

The plan was to shift all of the legal right onto the carny and give him a goddamn safety net.

Yes, him. The one who never needed a net for himself but if I was up there he wanted two. One standard, one secondary in case the first one failed because for all of the talk about carnies and circus folk trusting each other with their lives, well, that's a myth, folks, just like Happily Ever After.

We had a couple of drinks. Strong ones. I could feel my ears buzzing louder as the level in my glass went down. Loch got friendlier and less tense. Caleb didn't drink at all, and just watched and finally Loch pulled me out of the big chair and said we were going.

And Caleb asked for a private show. He promised he wouldn't leave his seat. But if we maybe melted some sugar he would finance the tax issues himself as payment and we could skip all of the hassle. A forever offer. A humiliating admission that floored both of us.

It was a lot to ask for and at the same time it was nothing at all. This is muscle memory, rehearsed warmth, maximized returns for all. We know how to do this. I measure my breaths as practiced while Lochlan threads a tiny flame from between his fingers, chasing it across my skin, using it to trace the night, connecting us to the stars. The only thing I hear is the crackle of our heartbeats synchronizing, wrapped in an occasional whispered reminder from Loch, single words at a time. Wait. Go. Stop. Sometimes a warning in the form of half my name. Finally a conclusion. Okay, as he lifts the palm of my hand up to his lips and blows out the flame. It's an incredible show and yet I've never seen it.

Without argument Caleb says it's late. His voice is quietly strangled as he tells me to take Loch to the spare bedroom and we sleep drunkenly, solidly. Loch's hands fall away as he turns to get comfortable and I dream of Ben behind a wall of airplanes with no way to break through.

At three-forty-five a hand slides over my mouth and I am picked up right out of my dream, carried down the hall in the arms of the Devil to his room, where there are candles lit everywhere, flames to make me feel safe, to make him feel familiar.

He does, but not in the way he always hopes he will.

I am not returned to the guest room, instead falling asleep in Satan's arms because my eyes and arms are so heavy and I'm so grateful just to stop moving for a moment and I'm wildly narcoleptic, unapologetic, frenetic and drugged again to the point that the words aren't coming when I need them anymore. And Satan is the last person on earth who is going to correct this for me without my express input.

So we sleep. At least for twenty of the heavenliest moments of Caleb's life before Loch barges right in and takes me back but by now we are awake, it's almost six in the morning, the sun is coming up, I am bathed in sweat and surprise and exhaustion and it's time to go home.

Caleb sees us out without speaking. No one speaks. It's a little bit amazing. We're all in shock, I think.

Outside his front door Loch turns back and takes my hand, pulling it up to his mouth, kissing the back of it firmly, with a squeeze. I squeeze back harder than I ever have and he kisses the top of my head.

He doesn't own us.

No, he doesn't.

Then what was that?

Something in the drinks, that's what it was.

We're going ahead with the lawyers then?

Yes.

We stare at each other. Just a show. Nothing more. It isn't us. It's us in character. Our carefully cultivated performance. It isn't who we are. He can't have us. He gets a show, that's all. He gets a taste of the life and then we pack up in the middle of the night and run for the next town over, where no one knows us and we hide in plain sight, freaks of the night, beggars of the dawn.

Loch whispers that he loves me and we head home. I never say anything in return. My head is reeling. Every time this happens I have a harder time separating that girl on stage in the flames from the girl who puts the fires out with her tears offstage. I have a harder time breathing. I have a harder time just coming down. I feel high and sick and out of my league and I just want to go home, if only I could remember where I felt the most like what that is.

He doesn't move though. He waits while I pitch and reel and then when I stop and focus finally I blurt it out. I love you too. I don't love that. I don't know what that is but I don't love it and I don't want to do it ever again. 

I know, Bridget. I wouldn't either.

Saturday 28 February 2015

When you know they know, and you know they know you know.

When I came out of the boathouse this morning with Lochlan, the brothers D and PJ were coming up the path, wetsuits half down, grins crossing their faces like highways through fields.

Then they saw me and told me how PJ screamed like a woman on his first waverunner experience. He hit the throttle and just keened, apparently. They all got the hang of it quickly and loved it. They can be so much more relaxed than they were on the bikes.

Which makes it even more funny because PJ is the most hardcore of the bikers. His bike is still in the garage under a cover. He takes it out every chance he gets. He's big and strong and his beard has a mind of its own and if he was screaming like a little girl on a watercraft then I want to see it, dammit.

Then they point out how early we must have been up to eat and be over at Caleb's before they got organized. And boy, did they get up early for a Saturday. They wanted to be done their introductory runs before Joel needs help finishing his move.

Yeah, how about that? I ask. Lochlan looks away.

We didn't go home last night after being invited back for a nightcap, that's why.

Friday 27 February 2015

Oiche mhaith agus codladh samh.

Loch is singing radio ballads while we begin dinner prep. It's Joel's last night on the point. We invited him and everyone to a big farewell dinner. We're going all-out with steak and lobster and cake, just so he'll know what he's going to miss. I'm sure he already knows but instead of being forced back into my life he should have just waited, eventually I might have found some sort of peace there but for today I'm relieved that he's going. He's got a really nice place a forty-minute drive from here, closer to everything relevant and I'm hoping he starts dating or maybe finds more secure work or even just stops trying to exist on his (plentiful) young charm.

Charm is great, but integrity is better.

I have a small, gracious speech prepared and we bought him some housewarming presents too. He wanted to be a monster but he didn't quite have the chops. He wanted to take over the world but he couldn't find enough purchase to hold on to it. He wanted to live a dream but unfortunately from all dreams we must wake up.

He's working at being a good human again and he's doing okay, I just can't have him here. We have our updates planned out for the next several months, however and I'm looking forward to my monthly ten-thousand-calorie breakfast lecture, actually. At the end of the day he's a familiar face and that's of more value to me than most people realize.

Caleb is subbing for Ben at dinner tonight, because now Ben is talking about coming home next Thursday. We'll eat outside because we still haven't gotten the dining table bolted to the floor and it's nice enough if the patio heaters are turned on. And tomorrow we clear out the rest of the things from the garage and lock it up for the next drama.

I mean tenant.

Or whatever.

So done with this.

I like lobster though.

:)

Thursday 26 February 2015

PJ called them 'Yamahahahas' because he thinks they're a bit over the top. Like everything the Devil does, they are.

I can't find the secret to survive
To grow old safe and sound
Life is sifting through like the sands in the hourglass
There's not a moment to relive my time and space
There's not a moment to undo anything
I think Ben is forcing my hand here. He keeps delaying his return to prove to me that I don't need him.

He would be wrong but he would have to be here to see how wrong he is, and since he isn't here that means he's in the dark. Though here is the dark sometimes and I need him more than he realizes. He's my anchor. He's my living human.

He's not a ghost, he's not a memory, he's not an obstacle either.

My secrets are being opened all around me while I stomp my feet and yell that they're private, that it's not fair, that I didn't ask for this. That I have a right to keep things to myself. And even as I fight to hold onto that right, Joel carries his belongings to the truck. He's been moving the past few days and will finish on Saturday. Every day he asks me if I need an out, if I want to say the word and keep him here. Let him stay and sort out the tangles my mind gets itself into, if I need an objective eye kept on the Devil while he steamrolls over those secrets, flattened, embedded in the road I didn't plan to walk down but found myself on after every other way was blocked.

I snort. Joel is not objective. Joel is in love with someone he thought he could save.

I've seen it before. In Jacob. In Caleb.

Loch doesn't look at me like that. Neither does Ben. Do you get it now? I mean, do you? Does it make any sense? I don't want to be saved (because no one can do that but me) but neither do I want to drown, or sit here in the road forever, chipping away at the secrets I wanted to take with me while the other ones can stay where they are.

Ben comes back Saturday. Maybe Sunday. He didn't think one set of hands would be missed with getting Joel moved (because we're not monsters. I even packed dishes) and can get some extra things done in New York and this might eliminate a trip later in the spring.

Which would be good not to dread-forward to, as I call it. Who looks forward? Not I. Too busy keeping the present sorted, thank you.

In happier news, Duncan and Dalton went to bat for me in the big Waverunner Access vs. Padraig case. They have promised to teach me how to use them properly. I will never be out by myself or outside of the cove and if I stunt drive, I lose my privileges. And yes I will always have on a lifejacket. No string bikini either, this will be a wetsuit activity.  (That has nothing to do with safety for me, but for everyone else because a wet bikini is distracting, apparently. Even though it's February and maybe a little too early for that.)

Fine by me. Not sure how the lessons will go. Neither brother admitted they've never been on one before until PJ had left, satisfied that I will be in good hands.

Snort.

(If you never hear from me again, I drowned. But not on purpose this time.)


Wednesday 25 February 2015

Oh, and Ben won't be home until Friday.

Fuck.

Emergency brightside.

Never want my hand cut off
Never want a hacking cough
Never need a cliffside push
Never turn my brain to mush

Always give me what I lack
Always take the best parts back
Always recognize your fate
Always just a moment late

Left is where I always turn
Left is how I'm forced to learn
Left the route my walking takes
Left alone with my mistakes

Up against a person who
Up 'til now I never knew
Up from hell the answer blew
Up and down it's up to you
My brain is swimming through the Phish catalogue today, drowning, resurrecting, doing the backstroke when it feels tired. I'm forcing contentment at all costs. I'm counting my blessings. I'm practicing gratitude. I swear I'm not rolling my eyes at Sam's orders. Nope, not at all.

Sam is spoiled these days. Matt's an easy lover. Up for anything. Leaves at eight, home at five. Loves Sam to within an inch of his life or perhaps beyond. He's incredibly open, level-headed and seemingly baggage-free.

I point this out and ask Sam if he really knows this guy, that everyone has magnificent heavy baggage, especially at our ages and how the hell did Matt emerge unscathed?

He had the broken engagement, remember?

Child's play. I've had ten of those. 

And as many husbands. Some people don't leap, they wait for safe passage. 

What if he's a spy? Or in the Witness Protection Program?

How do you think I should go about finding out?

Check his shoes for mileage! 

Anything else?

Check his skin to see if he's sanded off any old tattoos. So he can't be identified, right?

Okay. Is that it?

Ask him? Maybe hiding in plain sight is how it's done now and you win a prize if you connect the dots. 

What would the prize be?

A husband! Gosh, you're not very good at this game, Sam! 

Tuesday 24 February 2015

Powersaver mode (Call me Budget, for lawyers are expensive.)

Rain will fall
Wash all the pain
It shields the soul
You turn the page
To face another day
Let me know that you will wait
And I will pay for my mistakes
To feel the sun again

Can you hold on?
Meetings since seven this morning. Lawyers are vampires.

I ate in the car, a croissant wedged between my teeth while I steered through rush hour traffic downtown. Then I saw the mediator. Then the counselor that I don't actually talk to at all (he works with the mediator. He's cold.) and then the bank. Now I'm home and the sugar in my blood has dissolved, leaving me with a decided lack of resolve or energy, for that matter.

I faceplant into the big chair by the fireplace and Ben calls. He's away and I hate it.

So?

I have a ton of information to go over.

You don't sound thrilled.

I don't know if I am.

Nothing will change.

Everything will change. I can pull the plug right up until the end of March if I need to though.

You won't need to. Merry Christmas, Happy Saint Patrick's Day and Happy Birthday to you both.

This could be a curse and you act like it's a present. You've seen what happens when you give someone absolute power, haven't you?

Yes, she puts on a business suit and gets all sexy-professional. It's a huge turn-on.

I didn't mean me.

He'll be fine. Actually, I think it will make things a lot better for him.

I know, that's the problem.

Since it doesn't involve me, it's ultimately your decision but I think it's one you should make. 

Ben, this is a can of worms so big I don't think you want to open it. And it involves you so stop saying it doesn't.

Nothing will change, Bumblebee. I have to go. Home tonight. Wait up for me?

You're asking a narcoleptic to wait up? Hahahahah. 

Okay don't. I'll wake you the traditional way, Bee.

Okay, that I'm looking forward to. 

Good to know. See you soon. I love you. 

I love you too. So much that I might not go any further with this. 

Bridget, everything is going to be fine. 

I've come to believe that means precisely the opposite of what it should. Oh! And the jetski thingies were delivered today. 

Are they neat? 

No, they're HUGE! And PJ already said I can't drive on one by myself. 

He's such a grandma. 

I'm going to tell him you said that. 

Do it. Then let me know what he says, okay? 

PJ has come to the rescue anyway and takes the phone from me. He says you listen hear, Sonny Boy! Those things are dangerous! But he says it in a high falsetto-waver that makes me laugh and I have no idea how Ben responds and then he's gone again and the connection is broken but the smile remains on my face. It's a guarded one, though. I think in Ben's quest to be as generous as humanly possible he's going to discover that no one's rushing in to match his gesture, and he's going to be left surprised and deeply disappointed.

Monday 23 February 2015

Teenage daydream.

He was bluffing. I knew when I walked away. I counted around eight steps and he jumped in front of me.

Let's go get you some new things. 

What's the point? You'll just burn those too. 

Not if you stay put. But if his hands are on things, they're going up in smoke. I don't want him putting things on you. I don't want him touching you. I'd burn you if I could, just to reduce you to ash and start you over again without him ever having touched you. 

Baptism by fire. 

If that's what it takes. 

When are you just going to accept that this is the way things are?

NEVER. 

Well, okay then. I really loved those jeans. 

They weren't like French or something designer, were they?

No. They were from Walmart. 

Oh okay then. Maybe I can buy you a couple pairs. 

Great idea. So I'll have a backup pair when you burn the next outfit I wear. 

I have a better idea, how about you just stay the fuck away from danger, like I told you when you were ten, Bridget! 

Do I look like I'm still ten, Lochlan? 

YES! YES YOU FUCKING DO! SO JUST LISTEN ALREADY!

Sunday 22 February 2015

Samwise, patron saint of unintentional junkies.

I should have a medal with his likeness stamped into it, and wear it around my neck, the noose of my conscience as I am reminded again and again that the devil doesn't change. And neither does the carny though the carny keeps trying to pin me up by my word and I didn't have my word to go on, I was incapacitated and now I only hang by my flesh and it's burned. It's burned so badly and I went to church this morning flanked by Matt and Daniel, both angrier than they have the right to be, and when my hands started shaking Daniel held them in his and it felt like Ben and I stopped trembling but continued to only nod or shake my head in conversation because when I open my mouth the words come out slurred, wrapped in cotton, confusion and regret.

People keep trying to talk to me and after a while Daniel would step out and cut them off politely and finally Sam was done preaching his sermon to me, channeled straight from God and we could go home again where Lochlan waited still, only this time staring out over the backyard to the sea standing in front of the fire pit where my pretty cardigan chars into a tiny black rag, unrecognizable and my favourite jeans meet a similar fate. Everything I wore gone because it makes Lochlan feel better to conjure his flames, setting his problems alight and finding the answers he needs in the sparks that write on the sky.

You straight yet? He asks me without looking.

I stare back without answering. He held me in the spray of an ice cold shower last night until I stopped screaming. I'm straight but for my words. They're always the last to come back. My stomach hurts and my head aches and underneath the burns I have hives but I'm straight and he knows this. This isn't what he's asking. I know what he's asking.

He looks at me, breeze blowing his curls straight back off his face and I shake my head.

You need to get straight. Then come see me. Until then you can stay with him. You're both too fucked up for words anyway. 

Saturday 21 February 2015

Less friction.

He took all of my secrets and looked them over, turning them inside out and back again. He polished some to a shine and let me keep them and others he crushed in his hands, declaring them to be not secrets but known markers in history, shameful ties that bind, just like the velvet ones still looped around the posts of his big bed, stretched to nearly double their length at some point during the darkness, just like the lies that my history has told and the secrets that line the path toward the future.

Sleep, he orders. And I did. Hard, drugged, dreamless sleep, facedown in the cool french sheets until precisely four, when I woke up with a start to find the Devil removing my sage woolen underthings once more. I asked him what he's been giving me since Thursday, since the bottled water, that I can't feel my skin but he just said that he could feel it and so that's all that matters. I asked him what he wanted and and he said he has it now, and that matters too. That I should close my eyes.

I asked if I could go home and he said not yet. And then he tied me back up again, not as hard, he has a heart after all, and he was sweet but tough and I asked for my secrets back and I asked for Lochlan to come here if I couldn't go home and he finally covered my mouth too and sang into my ear. I don't know what it was, but I told him not to give me any more of the drugs because it isn't fair and I don't like the way they make me feel. He said I would be glad for them later, as he bent my arms back and burned my skin with his face. I couldn't feel any of it now and so he was right.

I called him Cole and he didn't react like he usually does. I think he possesses. I think he's possessed.

Just before his time ran out he asked if it was better this way, if it's nicer not to feel so profoundly all the time, if it's easier to navigate the night in a friendly stupor, if it makes a difference at all. I pushed his hands away and said no. It's not better, or easier or nicer. It's not me and I have to be me so I'm not his.

And then I slept some more. When I woke up the velvet was gone, the Devil was gone and I was fully dressed in my jeans and a pretty cardigan over a tiny baseball shirt. He took my underpants. I called it a loss and left, head still fuzzy, brain clouded with all the things he said that didn't make any sense. I gathered up all of the secrets I could find, stuffing them into my pockets and carrying the rest and I got the hell out of there while I could. I stumbled into the house and ran up to my room, dropping secrets on the floor, secrets rolling down the stairs and I slammed the door and turned around, letting go of all of it and Lochlan was there sitting on the bed, not doing anything, just waiting and he pointed out it wasn't sanctioned time and it isn't right and what are we going to do with you and I was angry by then and coming down so fast it was like being on a elevator with the cables cut and I snapped at him that he could do whatever he wanted with me, just like everyone else.

Friday 20 February 2015

Benzobabied again.

I'll tell you about the movie but not today. This afternoon I spent a good twenty minutes watching the waves and realized I wasn't fluttering much if at all. Wasn't hungry in the least, Ben sent me a message about a trip he has to take and I didn't panic or anything, I just thought oh, at least he has enough clean shirts because I am caught up on the laundry and then I realized...

That this means they're probably putting drugs in my food again. They try this two or three times a year when I spin off my axis a little too far and I'm usually aware by the half or second day when they kick in hard and I realize I care about nothing.

Which is why I don't take them in the first place.

Thursday 19 February 2015

Stockholm cinema.

Caleb told me we had a thing today, but not a meeting, that I was to wear a pretty dress and heels and plan to spend the afternoon with him. He met me at the door, dressed in one of his nicest sport jackets, shirt unbuttoned at the neck. No tie.

Where are we going? To eat?

It's a surprise. 

So off we went in his car. To the movies. In the middle of the afternoon on a Thursday because I'm not sure I've ever been to a movie theatre with Caleb so the timing wasn't the surprising part.

Oh my Jesus. Fifty Shades of Grey.

It was us and then a small group of breathy, giggly women in the back, who stared at Caleb like he was meat and they were starving and he gave them exactly what they wanted by smiling tightly-politely and gripping my upper arm with his fist as he pulled me toward a seat many rows below them.

He got me settled, went out for popcorn and bottled water and just as he came back it was starting.

During the whole thing he kept leaning over, comparing things.

I should get a helicopter. Should I get a helicopter?

No, Diabhal. Shhh. Watch the movie. 

A glider, maybe?

No. Shhhhh. 

I need a playroom. That's what I need. 

I just glared at him and finally he elbowed me and said, Neamhchiontach. Watch the movie. 

Fifteen minutes later he says, Who the heck cuts her bangs?

Then he says to himself, Probably Lochlan.

Then he laughed.

And I glared some more.

Neamhchiontach. 

WHAT?

This is what I'm going to do to you later. 

Like hell you are. 

Grey's a lightweight. I don't need contracts.

He's a billionaire. Oh, and I don't know if you noticed, he's also FICTIONAL. 

Shhhh. Watch the movie.

When we returned home he pulled the car right around to the side door to let me out (it was raining) and I turned and said Don't even think about saying it-

What?

Laters, Baby. 

Naw, see, I was hoping you'd say it to me. As usual, you played right into my hands. And as usual, that's exactly where you'll be soon enough. 

Wednesday 18 February 2015

Pro et Contra.

So What about you?
Yeah? What about me?
Quit playing on my insecurities
It's not about you, it's not about me
Reasoning with you is impossibility

I'll put up with this, for love
One more turn and twist, for love
Gimme one more kiss, for love
We're not through with this
I'm a sentimentalist

I'm feeling sentimental
I'm feeling sentimental
Cause you made me kind of mental
Yeah our love was monumental
So I'm feeling sentimental
Okay, so everyone's taxes are done and now I need a vacation. Even Caleb's are done and I swear to God if I had had to call one more place tracking down forms for him I might have given up again. He looked it over (because he had already done it and this was a test and also an attempt at transparency on his part) so I will be doubly rewarded. I prove my worth as his financial partner (bonus confidence boost) and I get to see how much money he made in the year (bonus confidence boost). He makes more than he relinquished. It's a bit hilarious. And I don't think that's all of it, frankly because as a good financier, he's hidden all of it (of course) and the taxman will never ever cometh because this is a great system for the nouveau rich. Write it all off, hide it away and then turn your pockets inside out and lie through your fucking teeth, every time.

I swear, you know everything, he says. The taxman nods and moves along and I stand there suspiciously, waiting for untenable proof. I'll wait forever.

Just like the Devil.

On a happier note, Lochlan introduced me to a record today. New Trews music from last spring. I must be like a tiger in a cage to which raw meat is introduced when a new album by a band I love comes out. Bring in the record and drop it twenty feet away and then back slowly out of the enclosure as I circle around slowly. Then run out and slam the door and watch from the relative safety of the other side of the fence as I approach cautiously, sniffing. Then wait as I play through the album once, noting my standout favourites. Then a second time. Then on the third go round I only play the ones I really love and then it's safe to come back in and be closer.

He described it this way to me and my despair was evident even as I tried not to laugh. If I'm this horrible why bother at all?

Because I love you, and I have my own bullshit that you have to put up with, he told me.

Maybe yours is even worse but it's sort of like trying to hold on to a fast moving spark of electricity as it arcs all over the damn place.

He smiled really wide and said I like that. That's a perfect description. And we're okay. For today.

(For today. He always used to say that when he made promises he couldn't keep and I hate it. It's an escape clause and it isn't fair.

We're safe, Peanut. You can sleep now. 

You promise?

Yeah, I promise. We're safe and everything's okay. For today.)

For the record his taxes were the easiest and most straightforward and therefore finished first. And for tax purposes in the future we may be changing things up a little because it would help exponentially. I'll explain more later. It wasn't my idea and I'm still working out the pros and cons here.

The protections and conversations, I mean.

Tuesday 17 February 2015

Raising cane.

Yesterday just didn't really go my way and I handled it poorly besides. I made two huge, like multi-thousand dollar mistakes on income taxes and practically had to resort to reverse-engineering my calculations to figure out where I want wrong. I bought three different tax softwares and then finally hacked one of them to find out how they filled the forms in for the .tax files. Then I found the mistakes and they were really dumb ones. I missed entire lines. I screwed up instructions. I love financial math and am inept at standard math so it was daunting but had I just taken a deep breath or a walk or something it would have been okay.

Can I do that? Of course I can't.

I went full-Bridget and panicked and freaked the fuck out all over everyone and my Fairy Blood Mother arrived in the middle of the whole thing (which explains at least the random tears, if not the on-purpose ones) and then Duncan told me to go fuck myself and opened a beer and went out to the front porch where he sat sipping it for the next half hour while I stood in the doorway with my head pressed against the screen door watching him but not being able to do anything about it.

When Sam got home, he came in the kitchen door and I just pointed and cried some more.

Had I looked I would have seen it was not beer. It was Jones soda. So there's that.

Duncan came up and apologized last night. He rubbed my back and reminded me I'm like a little frenzied maniac when I panic and he wished I would have just said I was spooling up and he would have done something sooner and not just retaliated. He joked that we need a DoomsBridget clock to show when she's getting closer to imminent disaster.

It sort of wrecked my whole argument about why Joel could happily leave because I'm fine and Ben can manage. Ben wasn't here. Loch wasn't either and really Duncan has rightfully shifted from pouring all of his energy into helping to look after me to taking care of himself. Sam had figured it would be safe for him to go and do some work so he wound up in trouble from PJ too, who was at the dentist all day and thought he had planned for just about every outside contingency but forgot I can dismantle myself from the inside too.

He didn't forget. I was in a great place when he left. Sitting by the fire at the coffee table with forms spread everywhere and my laptop playing music and spitting out answers from the CRA.

If you need four different fail-safes then really they're all in over their heads with me and I should be somewhere with medication and soft walls. Well, I mean I know I should but I keep charming them all the while I insist I'm fully functional.

But.

I fixed the taxes. Doubled the refunds! Filed the paperwork. Forgave Duncan and apologized in kind. Reassured Joel he is still leaving. Took Sam off the hook from where PJ put him. Promised PJ I would give out warnings like favours for a party that will never end. Plotted designing that clock to show my moods so no one would have to ask nor will they be surprised when it starts to chime the hour of my imminent destruction.

I changed my clothes. Because I wasn't expecting the Fairy until tomorrow.

I had a soda. It was good. Root beer. I got hives anyway (food coloring) and Duncan just smiled as I began to itch so I can't have another ever but it was good.

Monday 16 February 2015

Really overwhelmed by life right this second so if you don't mind I'm just going to put my head down and cry.

Sunday 15 February 2015

The more they stay the same (Updated*)

Loch said he would indeed burn down the big Lake house or rather, he would have if only he was young and dumb instead of old and juggling responsibilities now instead of batons.

God love him, he's maturing.

Naw, I'm probably mistaken but he also said I'll never go there, he'll just burn my passport instead. I believe that, wholeheartedly I do, because he told me while I was pinned underneath him, his hands holding my hips, his breath making my legs tickle. His tongue making me scream.

I told you he talks the whole damn time. It's unbelievable.

*(For the record, Caleb already placated him easily, telling him the house will be rented out for long-term corporate stays. Caleb's just an absentee landlord, he says. Loch believed him.)


Saturday 14 February 2015

Community property.

The rain resumed midway through my little mini backyard afternoon vacation, so heavily I had to snap my laptop shut and run for the steps but the door was locked (everyone has this bad habit, we're constantly locking one another out of the house) and so I left my computer by the door (covered) and ran for the boathouse instead.

By the time I get there it's almost too late and I'm soaked again. My Docs will be full of water too. My stockings are probably ruined. Caleb laughs and asks me if we're doing scenes from The Notebook today and I say no because we have neither swans nor a rowboat and he says he'll make notes for next time. He gets me a clean towel from the linen closet and pours me a shot of whiskey and I drink it before I wind up shivering too much to hold on to the glass. I wrap the towel around my back and hold it together in the front. Warmer now.

Could you let Duncan know I'm here and ask him to get my laptop from the back deck? He nods and calls. I yell that I'll be home in a few and Caleb glares at me. When he hangs up he says I should stay. I point out that I have things to do and that was a little break and I had no intentions of being out very long when the weather made sure of it.

He asks if I would like to hear his news. I told him I already heard that the boat sold and I hope we can get a little zippy outboard or something or maybe jet skis to play with in our teeny-tiny cove and he nodded and said yes we can but that isn't his news. He gave up the expensive, depreciating asset for an appreciating one instead.

Another house.

Number three, if you're being absolutely technical (considering the boathouse is part of the main property, and Schuyler and Daniel's house is next door but counts as house number two). Which is sort of astounding considering everyone I love is so minimalistic, nomadic, indecisive and unwilling to put down roots anywhere it seems but inside me, wrapped around the little charred pieces of my formerly robust heart.

He went on to describe it as not really a house, more like a cabin. A five-bedroom, three-bathroom cabin with a lot of waterfrontage in Tahoe and a very private road.

You bought a house in Lake Tahoe?

Yes, Neamhchiontach. It's a familiar place to you, close enough that it isn't impossible to get to on short notice and yet far enough that it's a decided break from here. 

Here?

The commune. Your beloved collective. It's a place where I can breathe and you can have a little privacy. A place you can call your own. 

But it isn't mine. 

No, it's ours. But when we are not using it the others are free to enjoy it. 

Just not together with us.

No, not with us.

Then why five bedrooms?

He laughed. Because I don't think you can get a house any smaller there. And if I could, I wouldn't want it. I told you, I'm going to show you a life that will keep you in awe, and it doesn't involve magic or elaborate shows. 

So this is not an elaborate show? 

No, Bridget, this is a wise business decision and a promise that you're going to have a good life no matter how many times Pyro tries to burn down my efforts. 

Better not show him the new house then, because that's exactly what he'll want to do to it. 

Friday 13 February 2015

Night and day.

I'm listening to Billie Holiday while I sit in the sun, dress hiked up to my knees, Adirondack chair finally dry, laptop in place. Boots off. Stockings off. Brain off.

If I had a cup of coffee this would be perfect. 

But I don't. Not saying if someone handed me one I wouldn't drink it because I would right this second. Hell, yes, I would. 

I think I like Billie's Gloomy Sunday better than Pallbearer's. Wait until I tell that to Teflon Jesus. He will laugh and then probably agree with me. Everyone loves Billie. We play her records on the porch in the evenings when it's not too chilly but when it's just chill. When it's almost dark but not quite dark and everyone is home, quiet and thoughtful, listening to the needle scratch the vinyl into our brains where it will rest until awakened by a feeling or a memory or a dream. Isn't that how music is suppose to work? 

Thursday 12 February 2015

Excommunicating myself.

And one day we will die
And our ashes will fly from the aeroplane over the sea
But for now we are young
Let us lay in the sun
And count every beautiful thing we can see
Love to be
In the arms of all I'm keeping here with me
Between taxes and removing all trace of Firefox from my computer so far today, it's been too busy to write.

The last straw for said browser was broken way early this morning when it failed to give me half of the information I needed to book flights because just...large voids of white space seem to be located where I want to see actual useful information. In any case, I got the job done finally and then blew away the program.

Because no. Because I'm not going through that mess again.

Now I'm using Safari which took all sorts of wrangling and beatings to make it function the way I need it too. I even managed to export and import my bookmarks and...and...something something keychain. I don't remember. Password things.

All by myself!

But you know something? I could be Amish. So, so easily. Except for the curiosity part. Then I'm doomed.

Do the Amish file taxes? I'd look it up but the tabs in Safari. I can't find 'em. Give me a minute (I mean an hour. Give me an hour.)

Wednesday 11 February 2015

In the twinkle of an aye (all apologies, I cannot resist).

This morning I let Caleb inspect his purchases, because as he pointed out, before he settled the bill he wanted to be sure everything was perfect. He's a perfectionist. His standards are high. I finally relented, first in the cashmere, then in the velvet, telling him he could look but not touch. He found that supremely amusing as we have sort of-almost made up here over the whole Joel-eviction thing.

While I did a slow turn, freezing to pieces in the Boathouse in my underthings he revealed something too. The news that he's going to sell the boat. That he has something else in mind but he'll tell me once it's official. He's simply not using it, though the private covered slip and extensive docks he built will be terrific for the resale value of this house someday.

(This is the part where I will perish from curiosity and he knows it. See how he plays? I'll find out what I need to but the cost will be huge.)

And in Joel-news:

Joel is going but we've come a mutual agreement to meet for brunch once a month. That way he gets a check-in (UNQUALIFIED) and I get a...free butternaut adventure since he always chooses a very fancy place when we go out, which is so interesting for that imaginary trust fund kid. The butter arrives on a little plate in pretty curls and instead of spreading it on bread I make it into little people with my knife. I call them butternauts and it's a welcome distraction from his endless counseling. I've mentioned them before (here and here, for example).

Caleb is somewhat satisfied that we came up with this ourselves. Then Joel and I promptly hunkered down and watched Annabelle, because Joel is only really good for horror, hockey and humility, as I always tell him.

He wishes I was as good with my emotions as I am with my observations, my words. I point out that for every gift there is a deficit somewhere and oh boy did I ever lose hard. Thank heavens I can express myself in the feelings I can't seem to control, or everyone would be left foundering in the darkness along with me.

That would not be good.

So now we have that space over the garage. Someone suggested we call Asher back. When I was done laughing I asked if we just hold it for Ruth. By the time she's 17 or 18 she'll want her own space I imagine. In the meantime I think I'll call August and ask if he'll come back or maybe come out for Spring Break/Easter/Summer/The Rest of my Life.

Though he'll probably gently refuse. Run, Augie. Run while you can.

Tuesday 10 February 2015

Acting like a lady.

Hang on to your hopes, my friend
That's an easy thing to say
But if your hopes should pass away
Simply pretend that you can build them again
Look around
The grass is high
The fields are ripe
It's the springtime of my life
I'm ready to punch Joel in the face, I think. Though I wouldn't. Nothing is worth getting into it physically. Especially since we're in this up to our necks emotionally at this point and I just want him gone.

He campaigned for and won a whole day with me to change my mind and even Lochan went to the wrong side to allow it.

Which stung so badly I still feel burned. Their reasoning being, if something goes really wrong as it tends to do every now and then, he should be here, because August isn't anymore.

I point out helpfully that between PJ, Ben and Sam I've been called back from the edge easily. That did not help and only served to riddle my promises with holes and now I can stack them all up and put them on a post because they're done and he's so close to staying I want to scream.

He sits too close. He waits too long. Every single thing I say is evaluated, loaded and shot to see how far it goes, how badly it wounds, how I could change it, rethink it, get better.

(I am better, Fucktard. You're just stringing this out so that you have a job, aren't you? Tell them she's nucking futs and they'll make sure you have a roof over your head for decades.)

I don't have that kind of time. I want him gone NOW and the Devil asked me for a report proving I don't need Joel. He wants me to outline a plan for the future and a plan for emergencies and he will be vetting them personally. If I can argue successfully, Joel can go.

But I'm not a lawyer! Besides, I thought it was 'innocent until proven guilty'!

If that's the case, Bridget, then he should stay and maybe you should go.

Gladly! I turn on my heel and slam out and go back to Joel, because I do what I'm told. Even if I hate it. Even if it hurts. Even if I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, even though he's staring me right in the face right now. That's what kind of good girl I am.