When Ruth said she was relieved to be back here on the point I think I knew it's where we are meant to be. Does that make me horrible? Probably. I didn't uproot them overnight, though. We planned and plotted and schemed and fretted and even with my doubts I went ahead with everyone's blessing but one.
And then I came screaming back in the middle of the night and oddly once again there's a small fraction of the collective who are unhappy and the rest are almost convinced the whole thing was a dream.
Batman said there would be no strings and then he tied us up so tightly I couldn't breathe. What was supposed to bring relief brought a different sort of misery. Evil I can handle easily became evil I don't recognize or understand.
And I've done it before so it comes as no surprise. When faced with a choice between Batman and the Devil, I'll pick the Devil every time.
The mediators think I'm insane, I suppose but Caleb had already complained loudly about the transportation issues involved in collecting Henry for his time, and the issues with breaking down a perfectly good extended support network. Everyone had questioned our isolation in the woods coupled with Ben's issues and the need for the reassurance that came in living close to one another, as unconventional as it may seem.
And Lochlan even doubted that I would do as well away from the ocean again, though he is beyond angry today. Again, his angry is a tsk and an occasional unchecked shout and nothing that I can't soothe with some effort. He will blame everyone else before he gets it through his thick skull that I fucked up, because you can't fuck up when you're twelve, and that's as old as I will ever be to him.
So where does this put me? Squarely in the failure to thrive box, the loser corner, back to the starting line. It has nothing to do with fear. Fear sent me away. Courage brought me back. Living with the Devil is easier than living without. Facing Lochlan's epic frustration and perceived betrayals is better than letting Batman take a bigger role when it's too late to change the play.
I'll take the fall for all of this. And I'll do it with an ocean view. Some things just can't be replaced.
