I'm sitting on the quilt. It's some sort of designer Egyptian affair and cost more than my car. I love the embroidery, it should be scratchy and too beautiful to touch but instead it's soft, it's like being enveloped in a cloud. I don't know what it's filled with. He said something about Icelandic eiderdown, but I'm pretty sure this devil reached down the throats of every cherub for a thousand miles and pulled heaven out of them and used that instead. Still, I never want to move. Not even a muscle.
He brings me a tiny silver toy dart and tells me to throw it.
I laugh and my stomach growls. Time to go.
I close my eyes and throw it at the map on the opposite wall. When I open my eyes he is pulling the dart out. It landed somewhere in the vicinity of the Clyclades. Greece. He's been. Twice.
Want to go?
What?
A vacation. Maybe right after Christmas.
No.
Why not?
I have..commitments.
Remember what you told me when you were younger?
I'm thinking. Oh, right, it was 'Can't wait until you're in jail'?
Bridget-
Why don't you just tell me what I said, then? He's ruining what was a fairly successful, although truncated visit. It's lunchtime and I have things to do.
You said you were excited to travel the world when Lochlan joined the show and invited you along. You had such wanderlust. I don't think it's ever really gone away, has it?
I have to go. Thanks for the visit.
Anytime, princess. Generously, he drops the subject. He is devastatingly Cole-like today. Flannel, jeans, beard. Retired now, Caleb has no need for expensive suits here in the house on the verge of the sea. The lines around his eyes and the few silver hairs in his beard only serve to make him more appealing than he was once upon a time and I need to go now.
So I leave. I don't invite him up to the house for lunch.
When I come down the outside stairs and hit the pavement, movement stops me. Lochlan comes around the side of the camper. He's home again. Still so sick with this stupid cold that makes him cough all night long but he won't stop tinkering. He has a wrench in one hand. He's been trying to fix the seized wheel. He stops when he sees me, smilling slightly. He's glad to see me but he's mad because I am coming from the boathouse. Thankfully, curiosity trumps outrage.
Hey, peanut.
Hey, Lochlan. Do you need some help?
What? Ha, no. I'll get it. Not like I want to take it out. I like having a place to hang my hat. I can take my time and fix it properly, you know?
I smile but it tastes bad. My adventurous spirit, my potential for wayfaring was all but swallowed by his need to make something permanent for us in the midst of such a nomadic, tumultuous life. To find home on the road, to have familiarity when nothing was ever the same. A foundation that could be dragged along behind us, freaks that we were, one that we could set up house on in every new seaside town we emptied of gold and laughter before moving on to the next.
I've been busy resenting Lochlan while he's been busy trying to make things feel like home. For himself, for me too.
When he turned his back to give the tire another go I pushed up my sleeves, reached down and picked up the lifeless crow that rested at my feet. I took a huge bite, gristle, feathers and all. And I chewed and chewed until I almost choked to death while the tears streamed down my face and seasoned the meat nicely.
Without looking up, Lochlan proclaims that he will have it fixed shortly. I smile and say that he shouldn't worry, I'll go find find Duncan and send him out to help. Together they'll have it finished before dinner. I'll cook but I won't be eating.
I am too full.