Burning Van.

She's naked on the phone
Watching them back
No eyes just their stupid grins
They long to be liberal mannequins
And in their tiny room
They eat Chinese food
And they don't call their wives
Cause the girl in the window is
Pressing her breasts
Up against the window pane
The guy they're after
On the floor below her
Is cutting cocaine
Higher than the building

I really really hate it when reality comes in, tripping all over my daydreams that I leave all over the floor (in spite of being asked repeatedly to pick them up and put them away so no one will get hurt) and then starts to bitch and moan about having stubbed toes on the sharp corners of my thoughts and hopes. What the fuck is that? Did you not see the Do Not Disturb sign? Next time at least knock before you interrupt the life I want in favor of the life I have.

Guess who isn't going to Burning Man?

I mean, unless there's a bunch of people here who want to have a burner party with me because I glued LEDS on fucking EVERYTHING and really this wardrobe isn't fit for anywhere else that falls under the heading of reality. Maybe I will wear some of it to the celebrity grocery store. The creepy butcher will like it. I actually stopped going to that store and drive to the Superstore instead these days. They have Japanese candy.

On the upside, the boys owe me BIG TIME because I spent five days straight cooking and stocking the RV only to stand aside as it pulled away from the driveway this morning without me.

Without Loch too, who turned and smiled so goofily at me with a big mix of half-relief and full-regret going on I had to laugh. I've seen that look every time the show run ended. He didn't want to go home but he was sick of it all. It's the definition of bittersweet, his face is. 

 We switched our tickets over to Gage and Andrew who are both fucking crazy and will love it, having gone way back in the day. They promised to take a billion pictures and not touch each other in the touchy camps.

August and Sam had this great eleventh hour epiphany about me. That was great. Sam will do fine. They do great independently of one another when it comes to care and feeding of my feeble brain and outward nightmaring, I don't know why they butt heads when they have to do it together but they sort of made up this morning and it was nice to see.

Duncan said it won't be the same without me there. Especially in the touchy camps.

Sigh. I should have gone. 

Look, I'm trying to spin this best I can here. The stars did no align this week, nothing fell into place, it's all jammed into various unsuitable, opposite-shaped positions that do this life no justice at all today.

I didn't even get to see Lamb of God and Slipknot this week. I was supposed to.

I need to start organizing the new plan, which is a joint birthday party for Ruth and Lochlan. A Sweet Sixteen/Grifty Fifty bash. He remains touched but not disappointed by my efforts overall to make fifty something amazingly special.

(Please don't find it weird that I don't gush about Ruth turning sixteen. I'm still following the original plan to not trot out much info about my kids for higher viewcounts.)

Truthfully a whole host of factors kept us off the RV, the most important of which was how hard a time Lochlan has been having breathing in the smoke from the air quality/forest fires all around us (a new feature bug in him since his accident inhaling a shitload of fuel into his lungs while eating flames on his birthday last year ) and how bad the dust would be for him at Burning Man if he's this bad now.

The second factor was the severity with which Caleb came down on my poor little head with just about every ace up his sleeve that he had. I'm not sure exactly why he didn't want me to go, I mean other than the possibility I might touch Duncan, though, NEWSFLASH, I touch Duncan all the time.

Gosh.

I hope Caleb's picturing that. right. now.

I have to say I love Ativans for breakfast though. I'm so level you could hang a picture with me. I'm fine. I'll be asleep in about three minutes. Prime time deliverance indeed.

Thanks, Matthew.

I feel like I'm losing for money
I feel like I'm losing for free
I feel older than the dead angel on my shoulder claims to be

I feel like we're drinking and driving
I feel like we're running into walls
I feel like swimming in your apathy as a kind of parody
For miles and miles, miles

I feel like somebody's missing
I feel like somebody's missing
I think somebody's missing

Matthew Good lives near Lochlan's mother. I ran into him once. We were both walking our dogs. We're the same age. I wanted to grab his sleeve as he passed and he stared at me waiting to see whether I recognized him or not. His gaze was so intense I was staring back nonetheless and since this was almost five years ago I wanted to tell him that I spent the winter previous sitting in the car in the garage with the motor running listening to his songs while tears ran down my face but I don't suppose that's the sort of thing anyone who writes music wants to hear. Even though it wouldn't have gone like you think. It would have gone more like this:

Matthew, could I have a moment of your time?

Of course. Of course. Cute dog.

Thanks! Yours is too. She a Burmese mountain dog?

No, just a mutt (we laugh and the stranger-ice breaks, plunging us into sudden tepid familiarity).

I wanted to thank you for your songwriting. Honestly there were days when your music was the only thing I could feel.

Tell me about it.

I'm a widow twice over. Sometimes it's hard to feel at all anymore and sometimes I feel everything and you have many songs that just seem to reach inside and squeeze my heart in a hug, but a crushing hug that makes my heart bleed at the same time. Like it feels better even as it hurts.

Maybe you should be the one writing songs. I'm sorry for your sadness but I'm glad if I could help somehow. Is it getting better? Are you alright?

Sometimes. I won't keep you from your walk but I've awfully glad I got a chance to meet you and thank you in person.

I'm glad I got to meet you too.

He gives me a mega-awkward but very tight hug without anything bleeding except for my mind and then we walk in opposite directions. I look back at the end of the block and he's standing on the corner watching me. I turn and tuck my head down, trying to carry my composure before it falls out onto the sidewalk and when I look back on the next block he is gone.

I should have said something.

(But at the same time interrupting everyone else's life so they can spend a moment feeling bad isn't what I set out to be. These things I am learning, only some of them seem like things I already know.)

Migraine breakfast, narco lunch, bathwater dinner and I'll try again tomorrow.

Well it's full speed baby
In the wrong direction
There's a few more bruises
If that's the way
You insist on heading

Please be honest Mary Jane
Are you happy
Please don't censor your tears

You're the sweet crusader
And you're on your way
You're the last great innocent
And that's why I love you

Softer music on the stereo this morning while I eat a banana and drink coffee, an ice-pack on the back of my neck and another on my forehead. Ben sits with me. I'm maxed out on medication and loath to top up in case I wind up with the cycling rebound pain I get when I take too much too soon. If I were less afraid of everything or less perfect in my personal morality I would snort some coke off the counter and call it a day, sleeping until early in the week as the world reduced itself to undone chores, post-binge filth piling up around me like a photoshoot from VICE. Fake as fuck and yet designed to make everyone currently sober wish they could just let go of their white-knuckle grip on life for five fucking seconds. Only life isn't a magazine, life has teeth and those teeth are sharp if you fall behind long enough for it to catch you and eat you slowly, one limb at a time.

This might be Ben's fault. Reformed junkies addicts rockstars have trouble sleeping and so he wakes me often in the hours where my sleep is deepest. He has to reach way down and fish around in the dark to find me and when he does my head breaks the seal, pain flooding into my skull. He feels bad but he also can't help himself sometimes. Rough as he can be, big as he is, he never leaves marks and so I don't think I mind, I just can't reconcile it with this. This pain. This day wasted on gingerly breathing, feeling my way around for oxygen, functional and yet not functioning. He's suggested we have a blisteringly hot bubble bath when we're done our coffee. That helps a lot, actually. Maybe I can relax enough to fall asleep again later if I can convince Ben and Loch to have a Saturday-nap.

Maybe it will go away. Like Jake. Like Cole. Like the Devil because I pushed back and I'm suddenly glad for these little lightning flashes of courage mixed with exasperation, everything colored with my endless selective integrity that actually makes me laugh even as I'm ashamed of myself most of the time. The keening that never ends inside my brain and seems to get loose all the time anyway, that noise that seeks out affection like a homing beacon, landing on the first savior it sees.

So coke would be better by far. Maybe in one of those edgy magazine photo shoots.

 I don't even recognize myself without sleep any more.

You're still you, Ben confirms upstairs as I look in the mirror and I turn to look at him, putting my back to my own face, which sounds painful in it's own right but it's kind of a relief.

How do you know? 

Because you're always inside out and you make no effort to hide that. Why don't you stay put while I go run the bath? Sit quietly with the ice pack. I'll come get you when it's ready.  

Black Rock doubts.

I'm the first person who will balk at playing Left 4 Dead with the boys and then be the first one rushing into the melee to hack away at zombies without pausing to follow the instructions of the leader.

I'm the one who insisted we stick with the midway, with the rides where it's safe and open and daylight and then dragged Loch behind the curtain into the circus and then the freak show becoming a somewhat extremely-local cult favorite for a few summers there. We had a good run.

I'm the one who tells you I'm not impulsive and then when you blink next I'm hanging off the ledge where I tried to jump because I realized I could so why not?

I'm the one with the fear. Fear of strangers, fear of familiars. Fear of crowds, fear of remote locations. Fear of deserts, fear of the open ocean. Fear of people on drugs because they're checking out on me, fear of those who are sober because they can dial me in.

I'm the one insisting we pack dried fruit and vitamins while the rest of them expect to exist on an unsteady diet of pickles (pickles? What?) and frozen tacos. Lochlan wants to bring whiskey. I say that's a bad idea with August and Duncan in the program. I'm the one wondering if I'm too old for this or maybe too uptight and August keeps telling me I'll be fine 'once I'm there'.

He's right.

I'm always fine once in the middle of everything. I am always okay. Sometimes I turn out to be legendary in my shift from hesitant wallflower to impulsive, direct centre of the known universe.

I suppose this is a bad thing, but I'll call it a good thing right now. It gives me comfort for what is an incredibly daunting endeavor: trying to bring a baked birthday cake all the way from Vancouver to Reno in a smallish RV that is already packed to the rafters with ten days of food for four people. Too much food but I'm a just-in-caser.

I'm excited as fuck. And now that we have the food sorted out and cooking planned for half of next week it's time to figure out what the heck I'm going to wear. Loch opened our bags on the bed and then looked at them for several minutes before heading to the closet and taking out one of his top hats,  putting it beside the bags.

There's the important stuff, he said and I could see that the fear is a little bit contagious. 

I'll give you a crown.

Loch and I rewatched Sense8 over the past few days. He's holding on tight but I'm holding on tighter. I'm disgusted by myself and sad that the little girl from the Midway is a puppy following the wrong owner half the time, only because she was busy looking at the backs of his heels thinking it was the right one without ever once looking up to see that the hair was the wrong color and this wasn't her owner after all.

(Oh, here, I'll save you the trouble of sending me those gentle, condescending emails reminding me no one 'owns' me. I know this. It's a perfect metaphor, though, don't you think?)

For this television show I'm always vaguely disturbed and mildly horrified by the birthing montage, with its graphic shots of babies crowning. I've only seen that in real life with cows and I'm not sorry about that. Lochlan said it's amazing to see a baby come into the world that way and then take a breath for the first time. I bet it is. I had two cesarean sections, nothing pretty, beautiful or profound about any of it but I actually don't harbour any real sadness or lingering regret over any of it because it was necessary for survival and so there you have it. I'm fighting tooth and nail to be here because I'm a goddamned fucking masochist.

He downplayed it and said I'm just messed up.

God love this man for he's perfect. He's ripped everyone else's face off but left mine intact so that he'll still recognize me and on we go. We can't figure out how to make life easier so we're going to be reborn in the desert next week (with the bugs, yes I saw the news) and then hopefully we can start over.

Again.

We're good at that.

Lunch.

I am a magnet for all kinds of deeper wonderment
I am a wunderkind
And I lift the envelope pushed far enough to believe this
I am a princess on the way to my throne

Destined to serve, destined to roam

Oh ominous place spellbound and unchild-proofed
My least favorite chill to bare alone
Compatriots in place they'd cringe if I told you
Our best back-pocket secret our bond full-blown

I arrive late and the champagne is warm. The Devil apologizes for this, saying he thought I would be on time. I was going to apologize but then I asked myself why and out loud I asked, Why champagne? What are we celebrating? Violence? Stockholm syndrome?

He looked at the floor for several moments before picking up his glass, drinking the contents and refilling it for himself. Then he passed me a glass as well and said we were celebrating his realization that he has a problem. That he thought all along that he was only leaving marks on me if he broke the skin when he bit me, that he is horrified, destroyed by this.

I let go of the glass and it shatters on the floor. Champagne goes everywhere. I shake my head once as if I haven't heard him properly. No way could I have heard him properly.

What is it? 

You're 'destroyed' because you leave bruises on me and didn't realize it? How could you not see the damage you've been doing since I was a little girl? Who's destroyed here again, exactly?

You come to me willingly.

You threatened to take my son away! You always use what means most. You started with Loch and moved on to Cole, then Jake and then the kids. What am I supposed to do, defy you? Then what? What happens if I don't do everything you order me to? Tell me because I'll take it now, whatever punishment you think you can dish out. Let's get it over with RIGHT NOW. 

I never had a plan, Bridget. I just wanted to be with you but you keep passing me over for someone else. Anyone else. Everyone else. The only way to control you is by exploiting your worst fears. 

At what point would a sane person have realized that someone doesn't want to be with them and move on?

If you had ever refused me I would have but you gave in every time. 

Because I was twelve and you told me you would kill Lochlan if I didn't. And then you told him you would kill me if he told! How are we not supposed to take that seriously? We were children. I believed you. I believe everything you've ever told me and so I did I was told to do.

But I didn't have to threaten you every time. Only when you resisted.

That doesn't make you any less scary or give you permission to act surprised that your actions leave permanent damage. Is this just another ploy? 'I've changed, Bridget. You'll see' to keep me home? Well, fuck you. We'll talk when I get home from my trip. We fucking fix one thing and break another and there's no need to keep going in circles. I've done my time. I'd like to be happy now. 

You faked it?

Faked what? 

Your contentment with me. Your peace with our situation. 

I fake everything now. It's the only way I can get through the fucking day, Diabhal. You can clean up your mess. I have to go pack for my trip.

Let me see you.

I shrug and unbutton my dress, letting it fall to the floor. PJ gets up and leaves the room. Matt follows.

Oh, Neamhchiontach.

I shrug.

How do you feel? 

I look at the floor and shrug again. I'm okay. 

This is not okay, Bridget. I didn't realize you were so badly injured. 

I stare at him blankly.

It's not okay, he repeats to the young child.

This is what you do, Diabhal. You and Cole.

I didn't realize my strength. 

You've seen me before. 

Not like this. Not covered with bruises just from my touch. 

Then you've been blind to match my deafness. 

His eyes fill up and he puts his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes. How do you hide them?

I have full coverage body makeup for when I cover my tattoos. It works on these too.

Doesn't it hurt to touch them?

Yes. But that's the game. 

This is not a game, Bridget. 

Sure it is. You bite, you hurt, then you retreat. I'm used to it now. You're like a snake.

Put your clothes back on.

I listen, picking up my dress and shrugging back into it as I button it up at the same time. A modicum of dignity from a man who allows absolutely nothing, ever and suddenly I have his full attention? I don't buy it but then again I don't care anymore. Loch tried to kill him, Ben isn't thinking it's all that big a deal really, the kids are mad that I wrestle with these giants and I just don't even care. I got my Cole-time, I made everyone feel things and yet it backfired because I'm supposed to feel things and I don't. 

Lampblack and baby blue.

Baudelaire said that humans were deluded if they thought they could wash away all their spots with vile tears, but Baudelaire was French and therefore knew nothing about hygiene or shower gel.
    ~The Horologicon: A Day's Jaunt Through the Lost Words of the English Language

I woke up in a daze yesterday morning, staring out the patio doors into the sky, more than a little surprised that he let me come back without a fight. And then Lochlan woke up and looked at me and yelled WHAT THE FUCK, Ben bolted upright and stared at me and then they looked at each other for a whole half a nanosecond before jumping out of bed, throwing on yesterday's clothes and running out the damned door. Loch headed to kill Caleb, and Ben to stop him, or perhaps to help.

Loch doesn't listen. He makes all these concessions to my face and then he goes right over my head.

And then I looked in the mirror. I looked as dazed as I felt. A little small. A little vacant. Perhaps no one is home. I had a nosebleed that stopped just before my lower lip and a strange linear bruise that begins in my hairline, blackens my eye and the bridge of my nose and ends on the opposite cheekbone. I had finger-tip bruises all over my neck and shoulders. My chin had the outline of a single hard bite, not enough to make it bleed, just enough to leave a perfect imprint of the Devil's perfect teeth on his little prizefighter.

I wondered what the rest of me looked like so I took one big step back to look.

Oh my God.

***

No one killed Caleb, but only because they reminded Loch he agreed to my behavior.

I don't have to like it, he growled. Duncan has been sitting on him for the better part of an hour.

If you did, you'd be as sick a fuck as the rest of us, Caleb told him from behind an ice bag. Lochlan had planned to kill him, using his fists to break through his face and then once inside he would have systematically destroyed the rest of the Devil for ever after.

The Devil can't call the police. I have enough to secure all sorts of worse scenarios if he does. And we're going to work on what instructions I follow and what ones I relay to the others and they changed the code on the alarm and didn't tell me what it was. Now they'll know if I leave, and apparently that makes everyone feel better. Batman called Caleb a coward and a thug and PJ isn't speaking to anyone but the kids again, who were told I had a wrestling match with Ben and fell off the couch and hit the drum kit and they believed us. Ben asked to take this on, taking whatever disappointment they feel as his own penance for whatever it is he thinks he didn't do that wasn't enough.

August and Sam are going to shift their focus working with me from grief to self-worth and familiar-danger. PJ is going to try to be civilized to everyone concerned, the majority of the boys are trying very hard to mind their own business, and Lochlan is going to let this go.

I can't. I see what he did to you and I can't get it out of my head, he tells me.

Good, then you can have a lobotomy too, I tell him. It's always better when you have company.

CXC/This is how they raised me.

Swift punishment yesterday as I was given a time and told to be there or he would make everything go away.

Including Henry.

Including Cole.

He loves to exploit my addictions and my fears, reminding me how fucked I am. That's why we live like this in the first place. It's not only because I can't manage my grief, it's because I can't manage my drive.

I sneak out at two-forty-five and he is waiting by the side door. I'm not even capable of navigating my own driveway now? His concern is that I'd just walk off the wrong side of the cliff instead of facing the consequences for being disrespectful to him and to his brother's memory in front of someone he has to do business with. Big business. It's a smaller, more compact offense if it were a cleaning person or Luke. But he's trying to buy some more property. His reputation has to be flawless.

Good luck with that, I tell him as he grips my elbow and steers me roughly to the boathouse. Once there the door is locked and I am shoved down the hall. The door is locked after we enter his room and for good measure he turns off the lights and ties me down.

Hello, Cole.

He calls me Baby Girl and I realize I don't have to give up a thing, I can still be their sugar baby and I'm not going to be punished so much as rewarded, so much as given a little time with the original number-one ghost and that no one's going to tell me I'm crazy, or making a mistake or wallowing.

Don't hold back from me, Bridget, he instructs and he finally lets me loose. Eyes blue-black, hands rough. In the dark the devil becomes the ghost and the hunted becomes the haunted. Cole looks so beautiful here in the dark. He is predictable and violent. He is affectionate and sick. His moves are deliberate. Just enough to hurt. Just a little bit, building on tolerance, biting back tears. My limbs shake as my hands explore. He smiles in the dark endlessly, as if it's carved upon his face while he encourages me. Just a little more, come on. Do this for me. When I explode into cries of relief he refuses to allow it, covering my whole face with his hand, turning me down and holding me there.

 By the time he is finished with me, ready to go back inside my brain where I keep losing him, I am destroyed and thrilled with it. But he pushes me hard once again and just as I start to break he pushes a little harder, making sure I do and then he backs off and returns to his gentle clasp, slowing to a crawl, affectionate to a degree that might just make me question everything I think I already know.

It isn't punishment, he tells me, shaking his head. Just memories.

He bends my head all the way back to kiss my throat and when he lets go and I look at at him again he has changed back. His hair is darker, eyes are lighter and he is bigger. Reality mixes with dreams and makes the color of night. Hope mixed with faith and buried in selfishness ends any chance of change for any amount of time and he fires up again, this time in flat-out brutal greed. This time when I go to cry out there's no sound, only his harsh breathing in my ear. He slides me back down until I am pressed against his chest and he laments how long six weeks truly was without me this way, in the grand scheme of things and that there most likely isn't anything I could do that could make him love me less, including withholding my love from him.

It isn't love, I tell him, shaking my head. Just memories. 

Even better, Caleb says as he stops smiling in the dark. He leads me back out into the early sunrise, unlocking doors, stopping to turn back and kiss my shoulder, kiss my cheek and then at the door he stops, not planning to go any further but watching to make sure I go the way I'm supposed to.

I turn back. What do I tell them?

Tell them I'm taking care of my brother's wife. 

I turn again to head across the drive. The response is futile but accurate. The fallout will be swift but it's still worth it. You can cut out sugar but it doesn't mean you'll lose your taste for it. I can cut out Cole but I still want him just as much as ever. I guess everyone wishes that could change. Sometimes I do but then again sometimes I don't and I'm fine with things just the way they are.

Oh hey then! Real estate agent shows up and I'm there in cut off shorts and a shirt that reads WHISKEY POLE ROCK AND ROLL, the words stacked up like shame, regret and invisibility-cloak-wishes.

But he laughed and declined to call attention to it, instead asking if Caleb was around. Caleb was coming down the steps of the boathouse and saw me and started to smile but then he saw my shirt and his whole face dropped like a stone. I made a mental note to thank Dalton again. I love this shirt.

He greeted the agent with a familiar handshake and offered tea in his kitchen. Then he variably dismissed me without an introduction.

So I introduced myself as his landlady slash sister in law slash submissive.

He laughed and said sister in law is correct and would I be a dear and go find Ben?

Ben's out, I tell him proudly.

PJ then. 

He's with Ben? 

We'll see you later then. 

Oh, I'm not busy. 

Bridget-

I get it. You're embarrassed. Okay, gotcha. I pull two pretend guns and shoot at him and then turn to head back to the house.

This is your family? 

My brother's wife. He died a while ago and I look after things for her. 

Oh, that explains it. 

She's a bit uneven with her moods. 

I understand. Well, you're a good man. 

HE'S THE BEST! I yell across the driveway, because fuck you too, Diabhal.

End of an era that began before I was even born.

You know when you're fussing around cleaning up the kitchen and very slowly you realize one of your husbands is trying his damnedest to keep his composure but his eyes are involuntarily turning pink and his nose red as he sniffles and clears his throat to indicate he's fine, it's probably a cold?

(What? This doesn't happen? Or you mean you only have one husband? I never know. I try to keep you in the loop and make this seem like it's all regular and everyday but it probably isn't. I don't know any other poly/communal people in real life. Committed ones, I mean. I don't know anyone who lives like we do. Maybe that means we're extraordinary or maybe it just means we're weird. I'm fine with either. Let's move along now.)

Lochlan? What's the matter?

He turns the iPad around so I can see that Pink Floyd is officially over. The band he lives and breathes by who unofficially went their separate ways years ago, and then Richard Wright died and mostly finished them off shortly before we moved out here. He still listens to them every single day, having begun long before I met him and then afterward using their music as a lullaby when I would be afraid of the dark (or the light for that matter). Fearless and Wish You Were Here in particular and oh, rats, my eyes are stinging now.

This happens with alarming regularity too. All the greats are moving along, dying or frankly getting old and wanting to do other things and sometimes gearing up thinking they can bring back the good old days only to discover it's exhausting and times have changed.

(Ben, for example. Ben keeps finding this out and he's only in his late forties. These guys are in their late sixties and seventies. Holy!)

Loch composes himself at last and wipes his eyes on his sleeves. Allergies, he mutters, and he heads outside to see to the woodpile. Fall is coming so the last of the pile from the previous year will be moved to the side of the house to make room for the next years'. And his neck and shoulders will double in size again and sue me, I really like that.

I go to the sideboard and fetch his headphones for him just as he comes back for them. I smile and he smiles back. They had a good run, they've given me a good soundtrack. 

Half beauty, half madness?

The way everything should be, love. He kisses the top of my head and out he goes.

Leave him alone.

I'm not your child
I'm not your paragon of just
I am by other means damned
Just who do you think I am?

Last night over drinks, Batman pointed out that maybe Sam was right, that the obvious solution would be to keep Duncan home and bring Sam instead. August staying away would never happen, he lives for this week out of every year (in spite of the fact that every time it ends he swears he's never going back). Duncan pointed out it's not his job to make sure everyone is comfortable with something he didn't plan but was invited to, and maybe if everyone has a problem with his presence here we should deal with it now. Chairs were scraped back across the patio as more than four of them stood up at the same time. Fighting words. Challenges laid out.

I stood up. So gracefully I knocked my chair over and everyone looked at me and I told them that this has nothing to do with their issues and that I'm taking Loch to burn on his birthday and so help me if they ruin it for us or more importantly HIM, they can go back to living in their shitty walk-up apartments and come visit here and there if I invite them.

I've never invoked the look-around-and-be-grateful-for-what-you-have-because-of-me tactic but at the same time it seems like if there's a war to be had they'll all sign up for it before they even realize what they're fighting for.  I know my reminder was far less than fair in the slightest. I was tired and fed up with the arguing and with everyone trying to either go or keep us home and it's just getting dumb now. I poured my drink on the lawn for Jake and Loch protested wasting the good stuff and I said my goodnights. I never heard a more morose and regretful chorus of goodnights back, peppered with some casual apologies that will be extended upon today, I hope. Because if you're going to say sorry, there shouldn't be anything offhand or serendipitous about it. It should be formal, deliberate and heartfelt.

Like me.

Who probably has no business going to this thing at all but I'm going to try anyway. Getting out of my comfort zone on the freak show took the same weird extension of courage. I'm not there yet but I will be soon and it would help if I had some support.

(I haven't even graced Caleb with an acknowledgment of his outright refusal to allow it. He doesn't get to choose either. This is ours and I'm not discussing it anymore with anyone, until it's time to pack.)

Break one thing and fix another.

I followed Sam right out to his car this morning, my pajamas still on, teacup in hand. He played Red and yanked the air conditioning up high and didn't say much as I sat and sipped my tea. He parked at the church and I followed him right into his office and sat down across from him and I took another sip and he laughed and asked who he should call to come and get me, because he had work to do and I was not only distracting but possibly gossip-inducing since I was obviously in pajama pants, a hello kitty t-shirt, no bra, messed up pixie hair and bare feet.

Um. Can I take your car and then come and get you later? 

Not today, Princess. 

(God. Rip my heart out with your Jacobisms, why don't you?) Okay, then PJ will probably be free to come. Or Loch. I looked out the window and when I looked back he had softened a little further.

How about this. We'll talk for thirty minutes uninterrupted and then you will be sent home so I can get on with my day, alright?

Deal.

Though we could have sorted this out at home.

You wouldn't talk at home.

I didn't realize it was a huge deal. I don't think it's a healthy place for you to be right now?

When?

Pardon?

When will it be a healthy place?

I don't know.

What if you went instead of August?

He sat back and took my teacup with him, taking a long sip, staring at me over the rim of the cup. That might not make it any better.

It's all just one big seething ball of jealousy, then, is it? Our collective.

Sometimes. I think it's inevitable, though some of the designs on you seem far more parental than romantic.

How do I sort out which are which?

You seem to be doing okay.

Yeah, until I get blindsided by a fatherly request for a one-off or something. You guys need to deal with your shit. 

A dynamic involving one woman we all adore and a dozen men is a recipe for disaster no matter how freewheeling or understanding we all are or proclaim to be. 

I daresay it doesn't extend to a dozen but thanks for making me seem like the whore-ly grail here. 

I daresay, Bridget, it extends far far beyond that and you just have no idea and oh my God the words you make up. 

My language goes well with my make-believe world, Sammy. 

Was reality so bad? 

Not until Jacob declined to remain in it. Once it blew apart there didn't seem much point in playing functional adult anymore, did there? I shrug. He's skating all over thin ice and I don't want him to break through right now.

I think you should go but with Ben and Loch and maybe someone less...volatile. 

I need a head shrinker on the run, Sam. That's a hard limit. 

Well then what about me? 

You said you weren't a good choice-

I'll bring Matt. Can we still get tickets? 

Oh, I can get you a ticket. 

You know people, right? 

No, but Batman does. And anyone he doesn't know Ben does. Or Dalton. 

See what you can do and I'll talk to Matt. Now who can I call for you? PJ? 

Loch's outside. Have a good day, Sam. 

You too, Bridge. How did you know Loch was outside?

I felt him get here. It's just a thing. 

That's a powerful thing, Bridge. 

Tell me about it. 

G-

Oh, it's not God. It's me. I do this. 

That time Sam and Caleb stood on the same side of an argument but for different reasons.

Ha. Caleb has forbidden me to go to Nevada. That's ironic considering how many times he has taken me there, albeit not to Burning Man but to Las Vegas.

In a fun twist of fate, Sam also threw his dissent into the ring where we shone a spotlight on it, wondering what the hell it was. The crowd held silent before a collective gasp heralded the confirmation that yes, Sam is jealous of August and this isn't anything we didn't already know. Same show, different town every night.

Funnily enough, Caleb doesn't have any issues with August. His issue is with Duncan and I'm not all that surprised. Duncan makes everyone nervous when it comes to me. Well, everyone except for Dalton, I guess. And Ben who really isn't picky as long as I'm happy and I'm all, Jesus, Ben. Don't say that. You'll probably regret it forever. 

Ben insists that he wouldn't but preferably he would like to watch.

Watch what? I ask innocently and he laughs and tells me he hopes we all have fun.

Me too. Even though it seems like my reputation will probably arrive before I do. Great.

Virgin burn (Black Rock Baby).

Lived for lies, lived for tales
Lived for good and hit the rails
Love you boy with what I know
Hid that love up with my bones

Found the fire in the rain
Burning drops drowned all my pain
Listen to the oceans brawl
I’ll find you and then I’ll crawl

Pierced your arrow through my heart
Wanted me, now want me gone
In your hiding you’re alone
Kept your treasures with my bones

For Lochlan's fiftieth birthday this year, I'm taking him to Burning Man.

In three weeks.

!!!!!!!

We're freaks and it's fitting that the year we can go the theme is Carnival of Mirrors. I have always wanted to go. He was always on the fence about it so I pushed him off and got tickets after Christmas and played dumb until a couple of days ago when he started making noises about maybe going to New York for his birthday this year, since it's a big one. So I had to cough up my plans before he bought plane tickets.

August and Duncan have been helping me all along. They're going too. Ben isn't sure but if he does decide he wants to go Duncan will give him his ticket. If he doesn't want to go we'll make it a friendly foursome. Or something.

*Snort*

I've spent six months openly, verbally wishing I could go just to keep up a front and it WORKED! And now my head can happily explode. He was rather stunned and then so incredibly excited about it,  that for the second time in my sweet life I've pushed HIM out of his comfort zone instead of the other way around (the first time was this whole plural marriage thing but that wasn't me, Ben talked him into it).

It's going to be amazing.

It's going to be surreal.

It's going to be really, really dirty. I'm used to dismantling, cleaning and (let's face it) burning most of August's belongings when he comes home from BM each year. Wait until it's multiplied by four.

Still in bed. Busted out a Relpax (?) sample that says if the first dose hasn't worked in two hours, take a second. That doesn't give me much confidence at all. This is why I hate triptans.

This is also why I hate being a guinea pig. And headaches. I hate headaches.

Psycho Circus.

My phone went off at five this morning.

Ben grabbed it right over my head and answered with a swear word I've never heard used in quite that way. He grunted a bunch of confirmations and then repeated a time. Then he hung up and left the phone on his bedside table. He said to stay put today. That he was going to go help Caleb out for a bit and he got up right away.

He came back and woke me up later to say goodbye and I asked him what the hell he was doing. He said Caleb needed me to do a couple hours of work early and that it was important so Ben said he would do it, calling him on his urgency. Ben used to be an insurance agent of all things. He can find his way around an office. He wasn't concerned.

I think he wants me though, I told him and Loch's arm tightened around my hips.

Then I'll wear lipstick. Where is it?

I smiled. There's seventeen or eighty of them in the drawer in the bathroom. 

Any particular color I should look for? 

Something like a blue-red? Go big or go home, Benny. 

I would love to stay here but I'll be damned if he's going to summon you this early. Time to teach him a lesson. I'll just go with full makeup. Want to help?

Oddly I want to see what you can pull off on your own. 

He came out twenty minutes later looking like the fifth member of KISS. Lochlan took one look at him and burst out laughing so loudly I'm pretty sure we woke up everyone with our howling and I lunged for my phone to take a picture, which I promptly sent to the whole group with the title of Caleb's EA for today.

I forgot Caleb was on the group chat as well and he replied Lucky me

With a sad face emoji.

Hahah.

Fucked.

Just when I think a dinner date is a death march or a life sentence or a big scary thing I should run from (I need large flashing cues) Caleb pulls out all the stops. The ones labelled charm, chivalry and Good Humanism and is sweet to me. Beyond sweet. Somewhat fatherly almost (SO CONFUSED).

He was good through dinner. He said he suspected I may be pharmaceutically enhanced and so he did not order wine or anything else, we had lemonade. And he asked me what I wanted so he could order for us. He asked for a short walk along the boardwalk after dinner and then he suggested an early night, that we both were tired and could use the rest and he released me into Loch's fiery gaze and protection at the stroke of nine o'clock.

Loch promptly poured us both a big scotch and we took them to the bathtub, Loch more riled than ever because when Caleb is nice and easy to deal with he is scarier than ever. But he wasn't scary, it's more as if he was disheartened that I was not looking forward to it and disappointed that I was afraid and so he made it as appealing as he could but cut it down to two hours/just a dinner in order to appease everyone involved.

Boy, that makes us wary. We trust few by default but it's easier if you don't play games in the first place, right?

This morning the money was in my account for Henry, With an equal amount for Ruth. He never fails to provide for both children when permitted to do so which is sweet and so I called him to thank him for being prompt and generous and kinder than usual last night.

I can be anything you need. 

Ha. Even you can't pull that off. 

Try me. 

Be Jake then. I hung up and wished I hadn't said that, because a) he probably could be and b) it's damned disloyal to Ben and Loch to feel this way all the time.

Pentobarbie Doll.

Good morning! Sense8 got renewed for a second season, Lochlan wasn't the least bit upset about sleeping alone (he didn't anyway) the night before last and Caleb's envelope was for tonight so...uh..I need a disguise and an alibi and possibly Nembutal.

(Oh and for those telling me Sense8 wasn't that great after seeing one or two episodes? Finish it. Profound and fun as fuck. And I'm NOT a Wachowski fan, truth be told.)

Caleb's request coincides with our monthly co-parent meeting in which we coordinate schedules, split costs, report on concerns and fill each other in on anything and everything concerning Henry. We make sure we're on the same page at all times, with regards to meals/friends/activities/rules/downtime and behavior.  We check in formally and nail it all down each month, every month. His idea was that we should have fun doing it. Get dressed up, have a fancy, multi-course dinner and spend the evening instead of sitting on hard stools at his kitchen counter going over dentist receipts and calendars under bright lights, a chore so far in this life.

It's hard to argue with that but in this house agreeing with the Devil about anything brands you a thief and a traitor and someone who should have her head examined. 

It has been. 

My head sits on a platter in the living room, if you're wondering. A living specimen being perpetually dissected, debated and debriefed. I won't need to bring it since it's usually busy or broken anyway. I was planning to float it in a barbiturate looking glass so that instead of having feels I could just have fun for once.

Of course it's wrong. Of course. But this week life I seem to be on a roll with doing things that way.

Psychic connections.

I'm watching Sense8 for the third time with Daniel, who wants to lie in bed in the air conditioned goodness of his and Schuyler's love nest and while away the hours in front of the television. Schuyler works a lot, Ben is completely disengaged and Daniel feels a little lost so I came to keep him company, trading my wet bikini for his pajamas in the safety of his walk-in closet and then snuggling down beside him in their bed where it was cool but so warm at the same time. He didn't want to show his pretty face today and so he doesn't have to. Sometimes he slips on the edge of his life too and we tie in and keep him from plummeting further. Lochlan is especially good with Daniel and maybe that explains why he's good with Ben too. But Loch is busy today so I'm it.

(Sense8 is perfectly amazing, by the way. A life-changing program. I adore it. It's on Netflix. It's worth the watch. Multiple times.)

We need food, Bridge. 

Chocolate and cuddles fix everything. I throw my arm across his chest and put my head down on his pillow.

So how do we get food if you're snuggling with me and I can't get up?

Call PJ. He brings me food in bed sometimes.

Over here?

Worth a try. 

He calls PJ. PJ answers and says fuck no, dude. 

Well, who else can we call? 

Schuyler! 

Schuy is receptive and promises to bring home takeout after work. Then he spends so long sweet-talking with Daniel while the television show waits on pause that the screen goes to sleep and then I do too. So warm. So worn out. Swaddled in almost-Ben. I can limp through the rough patch. I can make it. Just need one of Danny's mental-health days. Tomorrow will be better.

When Schuyler came home I was still out. They took their food to the dining room and ate, leaving me to sleep. They finally flagged Loch down and pointed out I wasn't going to be woken up if it wasn't an emergency and then they came to bed eventually and left me there still to sleep, the monkey in the middle. I woke up at seven-forty-five this morning and Daniel was up, in clothes with wet hair and Schuyler had gone again.

You missed some incredibly curry, little miss. And goddamn. I always forget how cuddly you are in your sleep. It's like spending the night with a magnetic octopus on speed.

Well, there's a description. 

I won't even tell you what Schuy said.

(When I fall asleep at night I make up micro-stories in my head to keep it busy. This is one of my favorites.)

Love showed up just as my eyes were getting heavy. It was long after dark and I had little strength to show for myself. An ambush, if you will. At such a young age, one wouldn't think it would be possible but it chose me and I wasn't about to hide behind anyone.

A fight, it cried. To the death! On the count of three!

Three. I postured and angled and pretended to be a worthy adversary but truthfully I let it win. The terms of the fight, the prize, as it were was that it would control me for the rest of my life.

And it has.

I apologize for nothing. I played the game and I played it to lose. I have lost. The wounds it left will never heal. I am riddled with holes and will wear them proudly.

Was it worth it? You bet. If I had it to do over again I wouldn't change a thing.

Redefining happiness.

Love of two is one
Here but now they're gone
Came the last night of sadness
And it was clear she couldn't go on

When I came down this morning in my pajamas I found August and Lochlan sorting out (Don't Fear) The Reaper. Trading lines because it's very hard to sing it alone. They pick a song a week and perform the shit out of it to the point where everyone begins to complain but I love it so much. Any relief from Wednesday's turn toward a new song will be swiftly dashed by Saturday morning when the repetitiveness begins to wear on everyone.

Does Lochlan care? Fuck no. He's the Pied Piper and we're the townsfolk and I don't think that's ever going to change. The only difference is he doesn't pass the hat here, he trades in absolutes only. Shelter, food, affection, acceptance, patience and redemption.

What else is there?

Oh, there are other things, I think to myself as I look at my phone. A new message from Caleb and the only thing on the preview window is a picture of an envelope. He's joined the twenty-first century at last or maybe he was just too frustrated to waste time finding a real envelope to use because he doesn't have an assistant anymore to replenish his supply.

August forth.

It feels like fall today. I am underslept, overmedicated and uncharacteristically clingy-feeling, as if I want to hide away, stop the world, gather arms close around me while I close my eyes and sleep for a whole day, maybe two until I can answer that stupid question without inexplicably tearing up.

How are you, Bridget?

It seems like such an innocuous thing but to me it's always a homing beacon or an invitation to say way more than fine in return. License to be honest. To be raw. A fork in the road that says Deal with how you feel right now and if you're successful we'll give you the map to the next part. That's how August plots out his counseling, you see. Each thing you deal with is a point on a map and the map is your life and he wants you to heal all along the way. More than once I have thrown a whole stack of papers up into the air and walked out, insisting that I am lost, that I'll never find my way back, and that he'll be waiting by the side of the road for a while still, I'm probably in a different but parallel universe. Go on ahead. Leave me here. I understand. 

But August asks me to shelve the drama I am concocting and to embrace the glorious east-coast-imposter wind as it ruffles through our hair, the sunlight as it dapples the leaves and and the cooler temperatures which promise level-headedness and easier sleep tonight. Things to look forward to, Bridget, he implores me and I know damn well he's right but I threaten the two days of sleep anyway as an unattainable reward. As a plan that I'll never fulfill because interruption is king. Distraction is the rule and Bob's your uncle. 

Wait, that isn't my phrase, it was August's, as he imitated Gage, who always says he can eat the whole _______ (whatever I put out for dinner) and Bob's your uncle. 

But what does that even mean? I ask, curious because I love words and I'm just beginning to figure a few of them out. 

He can't explain and he finds that funny and we all laugh because it's so absurd and yet I still feel like the sadness is right there on the other side of a door in my brain and if it gets windy enough the door will fly open by itself and I'll have to deal with what's on the other side so if it's all the same to you I'm just going to stay right here for a little while, spot marked on the map and when it's safe I'll move forward. 

Or not. 

(The sign had said 'For tune tell er' and I begged him for the answer. Which tune? Tell her what? Please explain, Lochie!)

Sometimes I think I just need to be reset. Not a single issue with my kidneys since I came back from the east coast or maybe the giant harsh antibiotics I finished in June did the trick. The younger Russian doctor is pleased and doesn't even bother mentioning his father's friends who do plastic surgery. Instead he takes my blood pressure, an action that makes it go up just by virtue of me looking at the cuff.

Stop moving, he commands and I am still.

One-twenty-nine over eighty-eight. He says blankly.

Is that good or bad? 

It's okay for now. I'll check again next week. 

He takes out the ear pieces and begins to pack up his bags. Mother of miracles,  I have a prescription for a new drug for my migraines that actually works. It's an NSAID. For all the triptan-pushing doctors in my life do it's nice to let them know a huge burst of potassium flooding my system at just the right time works better than anything I've ever tried. It's called Cambia and the only way I can remember that it is to call it Coheed & Cambia, which is dumb but if it works, then who cares?

Caleb figures I get the headaches because Ben picks me up by my head. I point out that's only been the past five or six years, I've had headaches since forever.

Well, it probably doesn't help then. He glares at me. He's worried and he's jealous and really, I can't help that. I have my own problems.

***

Don't let go
Don't let go
Don't let go
Don't let go
Don't let go
Don't let go
Don't let go

I climb up the steps and into the little camper. Lochlan follows. He smells like oil and sweat from fixing the motor (again) and he's filthy but he didn't want me to go home and go to sleep without seeing the finished result.

What do you think? He shows me the tiny kitchen area, pops down the table from the wall, and then steers me across the body of the camper to the 'bedroom' which is close enough that if the table is down you can stick your hand out and touch it from a lying-down position in bed. It's cozy and claustrophic and...and....PERFECT.

The bed has a beautiful crazy quilt on it. Which I'm one-hundred percent sure he stole from his mother's linen closet and will never admit it because I've seen it on their clothesline before.

Ooooh! The quilt! 

I knew you would like that. He smiles.

It's so neat in here! I want to live here!

Well, if all goes well, we will. He smiles more shyly now, like he has a secret. His eyes are almost black in the dark and he puts his arms around me and squeezes. What else do we need? 

A plant. 

Flowers?

No, a spider-plant. 

Okay. I will leave that up to you. We can put it outside on nice days and in the window on rainy ones. That's what I think he said, anyway. I don't know because he was kissing up my shoulder to my neck to underneath my ear and my heart was beating so hard I didn't think the camper would be able to contain it much longer. I wrap my hands up in the front of his shirt and brace for the full-body tremors as he reaches the sweet spot just under my jaw that almost makes me invariably burst into flames.

Oh. Yeah. That's it. BOOM.

He stands back up straight and welds our foreheads together. Green-eyed transfer of confirmations all around. This will happen and it will happen here. Soon. As long as we can hold out but soon.

My newly eleven-year-old completely unformed brain is yelling NOW NOW NOW NOW but only on the inside of my skull.

I wonder what his sixteen-year-old brain is yelling at him?

A head-on kiss feeds the fire and I no longer care about thinking or anything else for that matter. I'm glad breathing and heartbeats are automatic or I'd be dead right now. His strong hand comes up and holds my head just under that sensitive ear and he pulls away. I am breathless and ruined and so so happy to be alive right now right here. If this is love then I'm set. I never want to feel anything else or do anything else but be right here with him.

(Gosh. I wonder what he's thinking?)

But then he tells me and I don't have to wonder anymore.

I love you, Bridgie. 

But at the age of eleven I wasn't even sophisticated enough to know how to respond to this and so I whispered Yay! right into his mouth and he laughed and kissed me again and it took me days and days to remember that you always say it back and so I ran to the camper on a Thursday, late for dinner, rain pouring down, soaking me before I made it from my driveway to his. I threw the door open and he looked up and smiled from his seat on the floor, fixing a stuck cupboard door and I crossed to him, getting water everywhere and I threw myself down in his lap and kissed him hard.

I love you too, Lochlan. 

The grin he flashed still remains the biggest one I've ever seen him make.

It's barely sunrise and my legs are already rug-burning as I am pushed to the floor and then brought up halfway up by Ben, his hands wrapped around my whole head, bringing me in close against him in a vice-like hold, keeping me there while he moved and I was held still. I dig my thumbs in against his hips and square my own hips until he throws his head back, making the most unholy groan, squeezing his hands together around my head.

 I don't fear for my life, just my skin. He takes a step back and lets go of his hold on me all at once. I rock backwards away from him, landing on my hands and knees. He rushes back into the hold, pulling me up to a standing position using my head, smoothing my hair and smiling down into my face like I was his greatest experiment and then he becomes very serious.

I'd like to kiss you but I don't think I'm going to. 

Lochlan laughs from amongst the quilts (where we thought he was still sleeping). Me neither. Possibly not for days. 

Bah.

I had an early morning walk with Sam, our sweaters and a thermos of coffee to share. Down on the beach so he could administer private Saturday-church and after church counsel to me in his own unique way. He's very good at what he does and contrary to popular Internet lore, not interested in sabotaging or slandering Joel, nor is he trying to win points with me. He never pressures, we just wind up in the same place and then he steers me to see things I wasn't even looking at before. I don't think it's self-serving and I don't know if you can judge him based on arguments you haven't even heard but I love the fact that the Internet tries to be protective of me now.

Sam makes me cry sometimes with his words. With the fact that he had a front row seat for all of Jacob and I and yet he doesn't use it as ammunition. He worries. Maybe I don't blame him for that, maybe I do but he has his own thoughts about me and I don't agree with all of them and yet he is loyal and true and my dearest friend if you're counting the ones I can talk to without censorship. I know that sounds weird but they all have their own loyalties and preferences that get in the way of objective advice and constructive criticism, or they are fairly blinded by their own inner preoccupations with me or with each other. 

I know. Tough crowd. 

I did not say this collective living would be a walk in the park. It's a walk on the beach but a rocky, windy one. I have to take my time and hold tightly onto hands as they are offered and watch where I'm going. 

***

Internet rumors are swell, aren't they?

After leaving Sam I spent the remainder of the morning with the geniuses at Apple (swollen MBP battery and fucked up logic board that magically started functioning right there and then, dropping the price from a thousand for the repair to two hundred!) and then came home and threw myself in the pool where I floated face down until it got dark.

So I missed all the drama where you decided that since I was gone for half a day several things must be happening. For instance:

• I am pregnant.
• Ben is drunk.
• Ben has left.
• Ben is a specific Ben and you think you know which one.
• Lochlan is drunk or has left or is just an asshole, in case I didn't know.
• I am sleeping with Sam.
• I am sleeping with Duncan/Dalton/Daniel or August. Batman, John or Andrew. Gage. Keith. Matt! WTF. COREY. 
• I died and no one has my password to tell you. 

Except none of those things happened! I was just face down in the pool. Internet, you make me laugh. And you make me cry.

I'll break for you as I open up the sky.

Follow the sunlight down
Cry clear and loud
Heaven won't help us now
But it's better this way
Warm light wash me away

Piglet, I have ways of getting the information I need.

He grabs my ankles and pulls me up, holding me upside down over the bed. I squeal as the hem of my chemise falls toward the ground, over my head. I must look like a dog with a cone collar. Nice. He licks the back of my knee as I simultaneously try and hold my nightgown up around my hips with one hand and clutch at the denim of his jeans-covered leg with the other.

Jake! Put me down!

Not until you tell me. 

I can't explain it. We're kindred spirits in a way. 

You too fight constantly. You act as if each other is the worst thing you could encounter walking into a room. 

That's because he is immature. 

And you are?

Uh...less...immature. 

I see. So you and Ben just magically get along. 

Sometimes. 

I really don't understand this. 

We don't either but we have a very strong concern-bond for each other. 

How does that work?

He's been trying to get into my pants for a decade any way he can and I mostly worry that maybe he has a little escapism problem. 

Booze?

Sometimes. 

Well, I could offer to help him but I'm not getting any good information here. Can you be a little more specific?

He uses on the road. 

Toilet paper? A seeing-eye dog? What?

Drugs, Jake. Drugs, okay? 

Why is it hard for you to tell me these things?

Because I'm protective of him.

Mmm. Beauty and the Beast. 

Mostly. He's wounded. Don't push him.

I could help him. 

Ask him if he wants help. If he doesn't, drop it. 

Wow, I can't believe you enable him. 

I didn't say that. 

How about this? You have indicated that he may need a little more support. I will take that information and see that he gets it. Is that better?

Yes. But if you push him he'll shut you down so fast. 

Is this why you argue? You're trying to help him?

He needs me. He needs friends. He looks so huge but he's made of paper. Of glass. He's more fragile than...than anyone.

Than you?

No, we're the same now. 

From death?

Death. Yes. Death does this. It makes you clear and cracked and easily destroyed over dumb things like sunshine or pressure or frustration. Toilet paper even.

I could help you too. 

Then put me down!

He swings me once, sliding his arm under my back on the upswing, and gently deposits me back, albeit with my feet on my pillow and my head at the bottom of the bed.

Why do I get this feeling that Ben is far more complicated than everyone gives him credit for?

Because that's the way he wants it, but Ben is Ben. No one questions him, we just really really love him. 

Even though he's a giant toddler most of the time? 

It's part of his charm.

Triage.

Ben reminds me this morning that the last time he felt this way he dragged me off to Paris to put a halt to the perpetual tug of war and that when his ego takes a hit he tends to doubt life and everything in it. That leaving the tour due to the threat to his sobriety didn't feel like a milestone of comprehension, it felt like a failure and he came back expecting all the perks to be gone as well. Expecting it to the point where he still wakes up and figures he will see the unfamiliar walls of a cold hotel room and have no comforts whatsoever and he's amazed and humbled that we are here. That we waited and that we're not disappointed in him in the least.

I reminded him to get over himself and stop wingeing and let's get on with life. He laughed so gently I might have mistaken it for a sob but he agreed to find his way back before we all implode. The vultures are hovering, I tell him. 

I'll blow them right out of the sky, he whispers. 

Lochlan kisses the top of Ben's head as he goes by. He's on his way to negotiate a deal. Art for cash. Murals, this time in a big office lobby somewhere plain that should be pretty. Life imitates Cole. 

He gets to the door and then comes back and kisses my cheek for good measure and Ben and I wish him luck simultaneously without taking our eyes off each other. I feel like my gaze is a life raft and if I break it Ben will disappear under the surface again. I've almost got him back. Almost.

Pushing axioms off the cliff.

Close your eyes
Drive away the cloud that hides the light
And leave the pain behind
Dead alive
Find a way to bury all the lies
Escape the pain inside
‘Cause I don’t want to fall
Or let you go

Click. Boom. The moment when a record, like a person, crosses my guard and becomes familiar, anticipated. I still vividly remember when that happened with Ben. It was about an hour after I met him. Faster than Lochlan. Faster than Jake. Why can't I reach him now?

I've resorted to walking around the house behind him singing at the top of my lungs. I chose this album because it's a last-resort bitter-yet-hopeful, painful yet masterfully written account of how a heart breaks, precisely. Dark Before Dawn.

Indeed.

And he hates it because he can't hear the music (I have headphones), only the words and I'm singing them out as arrows, every one aiming for his heart but if you knew Ben he can block out an avalanche if he so chooses and today I'm the avalanche in his head.

Today? Lately. Since he came back. Probably since before he left but I didn't notice, I was busy having fun when I wasn't picking up the pieces of my heart. I keep tripping and I drop them or I smash into someone and they scatter everywhere. Under the jeep. Into the pool. Through the electric fence. Down into the shadows where I can't see them at all.

He is still sober. Not for long. Not at this rate, says everyone as if they know what's going through his head. But his head is thick. No one can see through it and I have faith that he hasn't reached that point and probably won't.

Oh good. A screaming, bitter song. They're punctuated with lovesongs and the timing is perfect.

He said yesterday that he wasn't prepared for the possibility that I would wait at all. I threw a book at him and yelled that he didn't know me, then. At all.

He said he did and that's why he's so surprised. And that he just doesn't know how to deal with it. I told him he could start by being Ben and that the rest would fall into place like it always does. He looked at me like I was crazy. I stood my ground until someone unhelpfully changed the subject to ease the tension. It didn't work.

It would have been easier. 

Unless you were waiting for an out, you mean. 

I wasn't though. I don't want one.  But I didn't think I would get a choice. 

But you did and it all worked out so what the fuck is this?

Dazed recognition?

Was I a stranger before?

Before? No. But you might be one now.

But I'm not. I'm me. 

My Bridget would have jumped. 

Well she didn't. But she still can if she has no other choice left. 

That's what keeps me paralyzed, Bee. That thought right there.

Time travel while I sleep.

Last night I didn't even wait to see if he really was going to live out there in the driveway in the camper (because somehow if he makes his space smaller things become clearer) when it got very late. I just took my things and went out to join Lochlan. He wasn't there so I locked the door behind me and tucked myself in and had absolutely zero problems drifting off. He put a thicker blanket on the bed so I wasn't even cold.

When I woke up at six this morning, I was in the middle of the big bed, face jammed against Lochlan's neck, Ben clutching my back to his chest, and Lochlan's arm resting on the side of my head, his hand wrapped around Ben's neck, his other arm tight around my back. Ben's chin was on the top of Loch's head and Loch had his head bowed as if he fell asleep kissing the top of my head and forgot to move.

Or maybe they were just comfortable this way. I know I was. It made it very difficult to get up because I didn't want to. I didn't even need to. Sam took the dog with him to church and the kids have nothing on today and so it was nice to drift back off for a while.

I try to keep those moments in my mind when we sit in front of qualified folk who ask us to reaffirm our priorities for ourselves, as couples and as a trio. I try to keep those moments in my mind when I detect things like doubt and mistrust and resignation in voices I love so much. I try to remember how it felt to wake up to such tenderness when they rip each other apart with words that must be the truth but weren't deployed to hurt, just to clarify, that they're sorry for the collateral damage done but it's inevitable, unavoidable. A shame.

I try to remember why I locked myself in the camper in the first place and how I can do things right from now on but I always seem to be up against more than I can handle, as if fate is a game and I am the dice, rolled, cursed at and responsible for every move they make.

Deja too.

Father forgive me cause I know
Exactly how I spread my soul
My idolatry is in the pocket of my coat
I make promises
I could never keep

Ain't it a ghost machine
Ain't she a ghost machine
I'm still haunted by the faces on her screen
I swear she's gonna make a dead man out of me

By the time I made my way back across the driveway Lochlan had moved to the camper, now freshly painted and then painted again from red to white. Five coats, lots of swearing but I would have taken that any day over absolute silence.

The worst part was when I went to bed to read. Ben was in his studio, oblivious to the entire world but Lochlan never showed up. I finally figured out where he was and I took my pillow and went outside and knocked on the door of the camper waiting, my pillow in my arms.

I thought you were getting all your affection elsewhere these days.

Not all of it. Just a little and it's poor quality.

Didn't stop you though, did it?

I'm sorry, Locket.

But you aren't. Get in here before you get cold.

He holds the door and I duck under his arm. He wasn't sleeping but he sees my pajamas and my pillow so he turns the light off, pulls his shirt over his head and then pulls back the covers on the little bed. I crawl in and he strips to his boxers and gets in with me, wrapping me up tightly against him but facing me away. I can feel his tension, I can feel the frustration and I tell him again that I'm sorry.

Are you sorry for seeing him or for hurting me?

Hurting you.

Then you haven't learned anything.

I didn't sleep with him and he wasn't there when I slept.

Such a small comfort, Peanut. I feel like I'm going to implode. Why can't you listen to me? Too many years of being told what to do? I ruined this love because I had to be a parent first, is that it?

You're not at fault for any of this, Lochlan and he gets credit for nothing. This is all on me. 

Then change it, Bridget. This gets harder all the time. Not easier to accept. Not familiar. It's just hard and it hurts and I don't know what I can take over what's already been done. Caleb can't save you. He can't even comfort you properly so why bother? Why keep the past around only to be destroyed by it time and time again? You survived Cole's anniversary. You didn't have to write about it, it wasn't causing issues, let him go already. Let Caleb go too. Give me a chance here to get ahead of the ghosts and the devils alike.

Give a cuddle, get a nap (currency isn't what it used to be or maybe it's just my lucky day).

Watching the rain like it's a fifty-cent novelty show at the theatre during the daytime. It's hard to believe my world will ever be green again, for it's always nuclear-sun these days, blown out bright white causing us to squint constantly. It hurts. It induces headaches and sun dogs and hallucinations that we're all okay because the sun is out.

Well, it isn't out anymore.

And no one is ever okay, are they?

When the rain started I lifted up my head, looking up through the skylight from where I sat tucked into the arms of the devil. He followed my gaze and then smiled and said Finally. He could have meant anything but I nodded and said we needed it badly and again I could have meant anything and he nodded back as if we were having the same conversation but we weren't.

I couldn't concentrate anymore and eventually he put me down alone and went to make some drinks and I stretched out flat to watch the water run down the glass. It was still dark for half light even, for once and my eyes relaxed and opened wide before closing to listen carefully for the sound and there it comes, quietly pushing into the room, into my head until I can hear nothing else.

When he comes back I must have fallen asleep because this morning I wake up to the big black blanket tucked around me tightly and a watered-down whiskey at room-temperature, weighing down a condensation ring that will ruin the finish on the bedside table permanently.

I could have prevented this, he said more than once, like he had all the answers.

Turns out he has the same amount as anyone else.

None.

I take the glass and take a huge swallow and then decide to just finish it. My insides sting and rebel against the sudden watering of my blood and I lie back and close my eyes again just for a minute while the empty glass makes a new ring on the table to finish me off.

Fighting back up to where I was before I fell in the hole in the garage.

Will you stop - will you wait a minute - please remember
Can you stop - can you just give me one minute to explain
I will not cause a fuss, I will not rock the boat - believe me darling
Oh what is, what was, it's all the same

They always tell me to say something when it gets really bad. I do and then no one listens. They say to tell them when something isn't working and they'll change it. They say to speak up when I feel something and they'll recognize it and alter it, fix it or show me how to work it.

I told them Joel isn't good, that all he does is dredge it all back up like seaweed on a perfectly clean beach and yet they continue to believe his charade over my gut feelings. They continued to insist that he was right, that it was a phase and that I would eventually come to a grinding halt against my grief-brick wall and that they were ready and waiting and that look, he was right. He was right. Insisting on it like Joel is the fucking moon.

But Joel is the wall and I ran into him at a million miles an hour and goddammit, I was doing great and then he walks in and it's 2007 all over again. I told him to go, that I would see him next at Halloween because I need to see who is right, me or them.

Sam apologized for not seeing things more clearly. Joel is a manipulator. I see that now.

Caleb apologized for not pushing harder for an RSVP of his perpetual, open invitations. I could have prevented all of this.

And Lochlan apologized for yelling at me for ruining my dress. Just stay put, would you? Would you just stay right here with me and this wouldn't keep happening?

Ben was busy and I don't think he noticed a thing. Hey, Bee. Where have you been?

Right here, Benny. Drowning in the tides of my own making.

If I sit on my knees in a pool of cold oil from PJ's parts-Jeep and raise my face up to the ceiling I'm probably looking through the floor right into August's sanctuary, a place I don't go because he reminds me of Jake and when I'm alone with him if I defocus just slightly, he is Jake and that's unhealthy.

Snort.

But if I unfocus right now, head thrown back, Jacob is here. Just off to my left, standing in a beam of light blazing in from the high windows in the garage doors.

I can't do this, Pooh. 

Can't what?

I can't hold my head up anymore. I can't breathe. I can't wait. I can't sleep. 

You're doing just fine, Pig-a-let. 

I shake my head and when I stop the empty garage swims into focus and so I lean back until my head cracks the concrete, adding stars, adding Jake, making it less terrible again. Pain is easy. It's familiar. It's real. Onward and upward, faking-it-til-I-make-it is exhausting and artificial and relentless.

He leans over me and tears begin to pour freely across my temples and into my hair. You won't be able to explain the oil all over your dress, Princess. Go and change and suck it up and you'll get through this. These moments are real but you can't let them destroy you. You're supposed to work through them, survive them, learn from them and then the next time they're less bad. 

Never less bad-

Because you won't let go, Bridget. 

I put my hands over my eyes but I'm not getting up. I'm going to lie here where it's filthy, hard and cold because it feels better to suffer and then I don't feel like I've left him behind in an unforgiving past that I don't even want to stay in anymore, but can't seem to leave because of him.

I lift my head up and slam it into the floor again bcause I know that will bring me complete outer-space darkness and when I wake up my head is resting in Lochlan's lap and Jake has already given up and left.

I'd ask why you're covered with oil and knocked out on the floor but something tells me it's explainable and I won't like hearing it.

Definitely one to watch with your (former) psychoanalyst.

We watched The Babadook.

I purposefully avoid reading things about movies once I've seen a trailer and decide I want to see something, in order to avoid spoilers. We're careful with spoilers here as it can take a while for the entirety of the Collective to see everything. But no one else had wanted to see this in any big rush, and so only Joel agreed to watch it with me. Maybe that was for the best, because I didn't know going into it that it was about a widow, and that the monster would be personified grief. 

(It can never ever leave.)

Other than the unintentional, shocking heartbreak of that, it was very good. Incredibly tense and awesomely produced. Loved it. The triggers are my own and so I try not to let them color my reviews but as you know, they will. They do. 

I still miss Jake, every second of every minute of every single day.

Joel thought the movie was great, though he stared directly at me for half of it and for the other half he sat there and shook his head, as in Oh, what have I done?

Feels like a Saturday today.

No, I don't worry too much if Caleb puts things in my drinks. He can roofie me all he likes, for most of the time it will result in a truncated evening for him. I don't even think he uses any actual drugs (anymore). Gravol puts me on the floor handily so there's no need to sound alarms. Suitably I stuck close to Lochlan and Ben for most of the past couple of days as a result, passing tools as asked and listening quietly to new ideas, forged in the creativity of homesickness and determination.

Loch sold another camper and is on the verge of a waiting list only via word of mouth. I'm so excited for him, except that it leaves him little time to work on ours, which is tiny and made up of a twelve year old's dream list of everything one would want in a tiny camper, including a library, tiny window boxes full of forget-me-nots and an actual, usable bathroom. I'll post pictures when it's finished, hopefully before I'm too old to remember we have one. 

The colors I chose are turquoise, sage and cherry red for the inside. Loch says we'll go blind and we may have to negotiate on the red so I replaced that with navy blue. Better, he said. 

But then he bought the red paint, thinking I wouldn't notice. 

Right now I have a scotch and tonic water and I'm planning tonight's movie extravaganza. I think I want to watch The Babadook, since I still haven't seen it yet. I only ever pick one movie because I'll have to fight to stay awake through it once it's dark and I stop moving. PJ picks three movies on his night to choose. I only ever make it through one of those too so I'll give away my picks to the rest to figure out what they want to see and I'll come upstairs until I get to the top of the house and then head down the hall to the end of our wing and I'll close my eyes and probably have nightmares for weeks. 

I love horror movies in spite of what some of them do to me. That's how I know they're really, really good.

Can anybody fly this thing?

Confidence in you
Is confidence in me
Is confidence in high speed

I stopped at the patio and choreographed the rest of my evening handily, directing Caleb to go and fetch that perfect whiskey and I would meet him back here with my best glasses and the giant ice cubes that we only use for these occasions. He was surprised but refused to show it to give anyone the satisfaction as a witness. He nodded and strode toward the boathouse quickly while I went inside in search of a slip dress and a warmer wrap. When I returned with a tray with cheese and bread and fruit on it with the glasses prepped and ready he was already there, having dragged both of the big chairs right to the edge of the grass overlooking the cliff.

He smiled when he saw the food. You're either very thoughtful or completely ravenous. 

Both, of course. Always. 

He grins and pours our drinks. An inch for me and slightly less for himself. He shouldn't be drinking with all the pills he takes for his heart and he shouldn't be getting me drunk either. But we are teenagers and we break all the rules whether they are designed for us or not.

I hold up my glass in a toast.

Here's to that pool being the only thing saving my sanity these days. It was flip and insincere. We all know I have no sanity at all. But he grins and says he is still waiting for that midnight swim for two.

I remind him he'll be waiting a while unless he wants to have it with PJ. I'm narcoleptic. I'm rarely awake after eleven and if I am I'm sick to my stomach because of it. If I ever got a whole night's sleep I would be better but these days I awaken if someone else dreams and am bolt upright if I hear a toilet flush five neighborhoods away or if Dalton pets the cat. Dalton sleeps on a different floor.

All that besides being woken up constantly by Loch or Ben or both and then they argue about letting me get some sleep, for fucks sake.

Yeah. None of that circus leaves much room for being up late on purpose.

He changes the subject. He wants to know what Sam is up to these days. He's digging for information casually, offhand. He's being sneaky but it's late enough and I don't know why. I put my feet up on his knees to distract him and it works. He starts stroking my leg absently and sits back with some cheese and his glass and stares out to sea.

Sam is helping Ben with me, I tell him.

Interesting turn of phrase. 

Well, it's not like Ben has the issues, is it?

Oh, Ben has issues. He's the one who took off like he was on fire. 

I gaze at Caleb with open hostility. He was, though. 

Touché. I don't know how he manages, up against Lochlan. 

You admit Loch is a force to be reckoned with. 

No. Loch's a vagrant, for fucks sakes. I meant his hold over you. 

Same thing. 

No, it isn't. 

Well, it's getting late. I crunch a cracker into my face and stand up, mainlining the whiskey like it's water and throwing the ice cube out onto the grass. Thanks for the company and the drink.

Why don't you take a break from the drama for the rest of the evening and come stay with me.

Because mine is the bed I made and it's where I must lie.

Or you could shut it the fuck down already and go where you'll be cherished. 

That's the only thing I've never had to seek out. I laugh. The heat is creeping into my cheeks, across my chest. I'm drunk because this probably wasn't whiskey after all. Goodnight, Diabhal. Sweet dreams. I blow him a kiss and by the time I drunkenly spin around and hit the ground Loch is there to catch me.

Saboteur de memoire.

He offers a hand and I take it, rising up out of the water, droplets running in rivers down my back and legs. He smiles as he wraps me into a towel like a big cotton burrito and then leaves me to dry myself quickly before holding out my wrap. His arm comes around me once again and he squeezes with his hand and bicep only, planting a kiss against my temple. His skin is flushed and singing against my cold wet skin. 

Neamhchiontach, he says. His eyes are high-tide, deep-end, night-sky. My faded sage greens stare back evenly. 

No, Diabhal. 

How can you give a refusal to a question that's yet to be asked? 

I know what you're asking. 

Cole's been gone a long time.

The floor opens, a faulty hinge letting go, leaving me dangling over the abyss. He squeezes tighter still and I feel as if when he lets go I might fall and die. 

I won't let you fall, he tells me and I look up into his eyes. They're so earnest. Earnest and blue. No deception. No evil. Patience with a tinge of frustration, hopefulness with a pinch of despair. He's a recipe for certain disaster, this one, and I don't know whether to demand he stop reading my mind already or hope that he already has. 

Too late. 

Come for a whiskey, he says. Let's get you warmed up. 

There's a voice inside that keeps him
On the path of righteousness
You can't break his stride
Or change his mind
'cause he won't second guess

We lay in bed this morning plotting a secret flight back to Nova Scotia to attend the Big Ex and go see the Trews at the King's Corner pub in my hometown.

Don't tempt me. I'll go in a heartbeat and I'll be early.

Next time I head home please remind me to do it with that weekend in mind, please.

***

I went for a walk on the beach this morning by myself, the sun blinding me, the heat already creeping up the backs of my legs and underneath my nose and ears the way it does. I went through my Sam-lists in my head in which he taught me to prioritize and neatly order my past, present and future on invisible white note pages I keep filed in my brain, lists he will raid later as his alter-ego, the Memory Thief.

He disagrees greatly with August and Joel at this point. He thinks I'm doing well and that it's not a phase of any kind, that I seem to have found enough comfort to be able to ride out Ben's existential crisis without going down with the ship.

It's probably due to Lochlan, who yells at my unchecked OCD tendencies and drowns my abandonment fears and somehow manages to not be awful at doing either. He makes me sleep. Makes me eat. Makes me stop moving and let things go when I'm clinging to them with everything I have.

I was always better with him. He never exploited my weaknesses nor did he demand that I balance on my strengths. He would just point out the obvious quietly or obnoxiously loudly and we'd get on with our day. It's a rustic kind of unfinished love, rough around the edges but the engine runs good and it's dependable.

Sam said it's the healthiest relationship I have. I don't disagree with him but I find it ironic that it was once the relationship the whole world didn't want us to have thanks to some possessive friends, a significant age gap (at the time, doesn't seem so bad now) and Loch's wanderlust, a trait that turned out to be contagious and incurable.

When I have enough for the thief I leave my head and shut and lock the door on the way out. Sam has a key. I don't need to be there when he arrives. I turn to go back to the house and I see him sitting at the top of the stairs, coffee cup in hand, curls all over now. He says they weren't this prevalent before the last few years. Loch always says the same thing, that I'm tightening his brain so his hair has to fight to grow, taking winding routes and ending up curly on the outside of his head. It made me laugh even though it was technically an insult. I didn't mind. He looks weird without curls so we're even.

Mark down that it's a good day.

The concert was great. Possibly greater was coming back to bed this morning and then waking up at ten all casual, like I do that all the time or something. Inwardly I soared. Outwardly I feel almost human at last. So far I may have texted everyone I know to tell them that not only is a sunny Saturday and we should all meet at the pool later but that I slept until ten!!

I got back seventeen Good girl!s, four Awesome!s and one Good job, kiddo. 

Kiddo? Gee. Thanks, Gage. 

Ben got up at eleven. I texted everyone that and everyone said Really? and then life exploded into chaos as it generally does on the weekends when instead of people eating breakfast in shifts it's a free for all with very few rules. The only rule being if there is a junky cereal with only enough for one bowl left it is saved for the kids. Also don't get between Ruth and whatever she makes because she gets amazingly hangry in the mornings. 

Jethro Tull is on the stereo this morning (Aqualung. I love this song. If I can steal Loch's phone from him I'll switch it to repeat one and be so happy. Or Heavy Horses but that one makes me sad) and Corey is drinking coffee. He doesn't even live here but he's off this week so he came to visit. At least he offered me a cup. I declined. I'm not going to drink it regularly though sometimes I want to. 

Joel is also here now because Ben invited him to swim. And talk. 

Christian is already getting some snacks ready for poolside. Every day is a big all-day buffet. Daniel refinished a bar cart while he was lame and they'll load everything onto that and carry it across the lawn. Or rather Christian and Schuy will. Caleb mentioned he could have a path or two paved so we can roll things down but then it degenerated into a plan to build some sort of racetrack for minibikes and Caleb deferred his offer because he doesn't want a racetack on such a beautiful property.

Sigh. 

Hahaha. 

This is what living with these guys is like. 

And it IS awesome.