Don't make me prove it.

Today is heavy on the Salt. And fucked. Up.

I used to sit in the park with Ben, his head in my lap and I would stroke his hair and sing him Veruca Salt songs. It was our quiet time, downtime, when everything got loud and busy we would usually happen upon each other somewhere slightly removed from the fray and embrace it together because he was a quiet wild man. Perverted as all get out, but quiet nonetheless. We had a lot in common and were so close at one time. So close.

    Take me away, I know
    I could use the rest.
    I wanna clear up this mess.
    I need a few days with my good sense.
    I need a few good days.
    Benjamin, no. Benjamin, no.
    where did you go?

    When you were falling from my tree, I was not scared.
    I thought you'd meet me back up there.
    It never dawned on me you were home free.
    It never dawned on me, no.
    Benjamin, no. Benjamin, no.
    where did you go?

    You said that I could tie you down
    Take me away, I know
    I could use the rest.

He beat me to the finish line and it still smarts, and I am sad. It's been a week.

Ben is moving in with his girlfriend, they're doing well, having been together for what, twelve weeks? Maybe sixteen. They're doing great, and life is good for Ben again. He seems to have found his direction, more importantly he seems to have found love.

Most of the guys eventually forgave him for his indiscretions concerning me, as I did and encouraged them to, he and Jacob were even hanging out a little bit together, probably a mutual parasitic relationship in which Ben could utilize Jacob's uncharacteristic expertise at motorcycle repair and his brawn for moving furniture and Jacob, well, Jacob could keep an eye on Ben.

Because Jacob forgives so easily sometimes, as very good people often do, but don't fool yourself into thinking he ever forgets anything. He never trusted Ben one hundred percent. I did. I still do.

Ben has even brought his girlfriend over a few times for some group dinners and she is wonderful, sweet and has him wrapped. She's so beautiful, dark hair and eyes and skin, tall and graceful, with a wardrobe from a magazine and a flair for putting the guys in their places. She's everything I am not
On the basis of doing everything he can to make his relationship work, Ben requested a private meeting, just me and him, no chaperones, no husbands or well-meaning friends. He was barely granted it, Jacob conceding to letting him close the porch door so we could have a private conversation while he and the other guys were out back having a beer. Of course, I didn't know that Jacob knew the reason behind the meeting, but Ben was smart enough to think ahead so that I would once again have support around me right when I fell. And I'm sorry, but everyone other than Jacob is going to find out here because for once in my life I haven't talked about it at all.

Ben told me he wouldn't be coming around anymore. Ever. Including group activities, if I was going to be present he would skip it. In order for him to give his relationship a fighting chance, he doesn't want to be distracted. He doesn't want my presence in his life because I make him have doubts, I make his mind wander and I make it difficult for him to concentrate on the one he should be with.

Nothing was ever the same between Ben and I when I left Cole. He tried to find his own common ground and be friends with both of us, and he remained close when Cole died and he no longer had to choose who to call first. We stumbled and he went as nuts as I did, understandably, it was a stressful period. There were a lot of dumb moves made by everyone, we all reeled. It wasn't just about me. Things came out during that time period that knocked everyone flat. Ben caused a lot of problems but he helped make a lot of things better.

Maybe I should have written more about the good things Ben did.

I won't even forget some of the memories between us, the times he took up the cause of Cole being a family man and tore a strip off of Loch the night that Loch and Cole drove all night after drinking and Loch wrapped the car around a tree. Ben couldn't believe he could be so stupid to put Cole, a husband, a father in that amount of peril. Uncharacteristic, Ben's driven like that idiotically often in the past and we all gave him hell, but he said, no way, this is Bridget's husband you're taking chances with. They've got kids. I heard Ben's voice echoing in my ears that night long after the police came and removed him from the emergency room for causing a disturbance, he was so far into Loch's face Loch pressed the button for assistance. Luckily, Cole walked away with few scratches and Loch's result was over fifty stitches and a DUI charge.

Ben spending hours with then four-year old Ruthie and two-year old Henry making ice cream from scratch because he said it would blow their tiny little minds. It didn't work but they had a blast. They proceeded to waste a lot of time doing that for the next three summers and never got a decent batch.

Approximately twelve hundred fistfights in front of my eyes because Ben always left his corner swinging at some perceived atrocity, whether he was in hockey gear or not, whether it was his fight or not. He had everyone's back. He was all heart.

And Ben taking time off work to help look after me and the kids and Jacob, who was struggling to keep it all together under a massive workload and a life-altering spring, a wounded and threatened girlfriend, two children who were suddenly his sole responsibility and a best friend turned worst enemy. I remember one morning about three or four days afterward I was struggling to get into a sweater with my sling on and I was so frustrated I had started to cry and Ben went and got one of Jacob's big zip-up fleece sweaters and he put it on me over everything and zipped it up and even left my hair inside the collar like I like it and he sat with me for hours, bored out of his mind while I stared out the window in shock. He made dumb jokes and gently forced me outside for walks as soon as I was ready and he dropped everything to help out until I was healed. He stole every sprig of lilac bloom he could find off the neighbors' trees because he knew they cheered me up. He did intimate things he had no business doing in life but things that caregivers do every day when someone is hurt or unable and I marvelled at his objectivity. It was the one time he skipped the jokes and was serious. I met a version of Ben last May that I didn't know before.

He was one of my favorite people and now he's kissed me off, written me out of his life in favor of a different one, probably a calmer one, one that is full of love without tension, and without history weighing down the days. Friendship without pain. Breathing without coveting Bridget. Moving on already.

I can't blame him, but I'm allowing it to hurt. I bet it felt good for him. I wrote him out more than one over the past year out of necessity and maybe payback makes it okay. I know this isn't a temporary exclusion, it's permanent and it involves Jacob too. Ben has asked that I include him in the long-distance email updates I send out when the kids reach certain milestones and so I added his address to that group and removed it from everything else. His number is gone from my phone, all of his books, DVDs and orphaned sports gear have been collected and returned.

Unlike everyone else who has drifted or moved away, Ben didn't tell me that if I ever needed anything to call him, he knows that role has been filled many times over. He told me he would always love me but now it was time for him to go and find his own new untainted happiness, just for him, and that I fucked him up hard, and he wished that he had never met me.

I can see what you're saying
But I don't hear you at all.

It wasn't a gracious exit and it was intended to cause pain. It did, some of what he said being positively unprintable in his need to twist until I bled.

I didn't cry until he was gone. And then I think I cried for the rest of that day and some of the next.

It was a predictable finish to a fucked-up friendship and though we found each other a few times, it still hurts to lose a friend. It hurts a whole hell of a lot. I did love him. I think I always will.

Now everyone in my world is going to nod and proclaim that this is good, that Ben and I were so bad for each other (yeah, at one point our nickname was the toxic twins and we liked it.) and should have gone our separate ways a long time ago. I don't have a lot of friends, and I can't make new ones, for I don't know quite how to keep them at arms length. It's becoming a trend, can't you see it?

I always hold just a little too tight, just a little too long. It wasn't Ben, it was Bridget.

It's me.

    Decembers all alone and he's calling me on the phone
    But he sounds so cold
    He says he loves me so
    But how would I ever know?
    Certain words grow old
    Its a vicious kind of catch
    It sides me blind now
    I'm out of my mind
    I want to scream
    Don't you want to be happy with me?

    I'm afraid if you don't come around soon
    I'll turn sadder than you ever were
    And you'll learn loneliness is worse

I will always love you, Ben.

Ledded coffee.

Hallo. Short and sweet entry, just like your Bridget. Ah, but I am not yours. Or am I?

    Tangerine, tangerine
    Living reflection from a dream
    I was her love, she was my queen
    And now a thousand years between

Hi! I'm positive. I really am. I have fresh Sumatra beans here to grind, some cake in the fridge, a Monday off from life and a list of house projects a mile long and my thighs ache this morning and I don't have to tell you about that because if you were here with me much of the weekend catching up on my entries you already know why.

Perverts. I love you, seriously.

I think sometimes Jacob lets me take life out on him there, or he uses good, crazy sex to distract me from everything else. It keeps me in my dreamworld and makes it easier to gloss when Bridget needs to gloss over . I can't delve too deeply into feeling blue about things that will conspire to pull me right down off my high. I really can't.

Not now.

I also have long bangs cut again and the world's cutest camouflage pants on and I swear to God I'm not fourteen, in fact I'm almost two weeks away from turning 36. Holy fucking shit.

What princesses dream about.

Last night's two a.m. awakening included Jacob kissing my neck until I moaned softly and rolled away from him, far off in a dream in which we were having a picnic by the medieval ruins of a castle I didn't recognize. He was picking forget-me-nots for me and wearing a cape.

I didn't say it was logical. But my God, it was so romantic.

When I finally tore myself away from my conjured image, Jacob whispered that it was thundering outside and raining again. He was kissing me, down into the hollow of my throat and then all the way back out again to the back of my shoulder. His rough but warm hands slid up my arms and found their rest under my ears as his lips found my eyelashes.

He loves sleepy sex, I can barely wake up let alone make requests we both know he'll rarely, if ever grant. And I went to heaven anyway, where coincidentally it was crashing with thunder and lightning too. Funny how that works.

And then he disappeared, just like the Jacob who was wearing the cape and I lay in the dim candlelight drifting in and out of sleep once more, my sore limbs and fingertips tingling, throbbing from his touch.

I found the caped version of my husband in my sleep again and we resumed our picnic, clinking glasses in a toast. So...realistic. Neat. Another kiss landed on my forehead and I opened my eyes with so much effort. There was the Jacob with no cape but the clinking of glasses was real. A middle-of-the-night picnic with warm chocolate cake and glasses of pineapple juice, on a tray in the middle of our bed. On our best dishes. Which are the same dishes we use every day because they're new but give me allowance for my fantasy.

Warm cake at four in the morning is a luxury that all princesses require, so much so that it comes before sleep. And unclothed princes with muscles in places you wouldn't expect to see muscles is also required in as much that the prince is the icing himself.

God bless men who climb, for they are the best-looking naked men around and have stamina that can't be matched.

And God bless cake for tasting so good, night or day.

And God bless pretty little Bridget, who deserves this at long last. Though we all know she would have settled for the cape and the imaginary picnic with nary a complaint.

Gentle evil (all shades of blonde).

 I promise you
    I will treat you well
    My sweet angel
    So help me, Jesus

I'll admit, watching Jacob walk around the house with Possum Kingdom stuck in his head, singing such sinister lyrics kind of has me liking today. I'll blame Guitar Hero. Or maybe I'll thank it. He is so sexy.

This morning I was woken up at two a.m. and he said listen. It was raining. He went and opened the window all the way up and we sat wrapped in a sheet together in the dark moonless night and listened to the drops fall through the tree branches and watched the curtains billow up like smoke coiling from a just blown out candle. It was magical. I couldn't fall asleep once the rain ebbed a little and I didn't have to, instead choosing to succumb to Jake's strong arms and insistent mouth, as he pushed me back down and pulled my hips up effortlessly into his lap and eventually I drowned out the rain with the sound of our ragged breathing filling my ears. It's very hard to catch your breath when you're upside-down.

In any event, we are doing nothing today. Nothing including pouring out the rest of Thursday nights' Stoli. Rather wasteful if you ask me but no one did so there you go.

I promised him a long walk this afternoon and he has promised a roaring fire and some cake tonight. And in between there will be some kite-flying and grocery shopping and not listening to people who tell me I am corrupting him after all. Jealousy does funny things to my friends. They turn into jerks.

And I haven't corrupted him. No sir, not me. Fragile Miss Bridget wouldn't hurt a fly. So says the gentle giant, who might, but not on purpose.

Trust (you belong to me).

(Oh God, don't read today.)

It's my problem and so I had to drop it. And now I'm confused because he picked it up again. And no one is going to understand very much of this entry. It isn't for you. It's for me.

    Down to the earth I fell
    With dripping wings
    Heavy things won't fly
    And the sky might catch on fire
    And burn the axis of the world
    That's why I prefer a sunless sky
    To the glittering and stinging in my eyes

Last night Jacob checked the kids, made sure everyone was asleep and then locked down the house and then he locked us in our room with the bottle of Stoli. I know how it sounds but it's not what it sounds like. It's a safe place to blow off steam, and to get a true barometer with no facades on my part. A personal one, just for Jacob.

Three things:

1-I have no tolerance anymore. Two shots and I was typing badly and had to stop working, even though I only sat down for a moment to dicker with a new idea. Two more shots upstairs and the world was my best friend. I'll give you anything.

2-When I'm drinking, I have no inhibitions (see #1). If you have wronged me you'll hear about it. If I have concerns, you'll hear about it. If I have needs, oh, man, you'll hear about it.

3-Alcohol no longer dulls my emotions, pain or any other ones. That was the one he's been waiting for. And he got it.

It's been a while since I wrote about our sex life. Don't cringe, okay, it's been one of the most difficult aspects of our relationship. We've run the gamut of therapy, experimentation, hell, humiliated each other and become so disillusioned we had resigned ourselves to one way only (his) and nothing more and god forbid Bridget asks for anything that's forbidden lest the spell be broken and he walks away from me.

I gave up under duress. Some things he would acquiesce to, but the majority of it has gone and it's never coming back and I'm forced to just let it go and it hasn't been easy. I meant to share it, I did. The continuation of Jacob's efforts that began that weekend he drank too much. An odyssey begun in earnest. He tried and we failed.

And last night was a test for Bridget. A test to see if when I was three sheets into the atmosphere would I rebel and fall back on my old habits, my brutal little demands that he can't stand for?

I'm not so sure anymore if Bridget's demons are stronger than Jacob's angels. He may have extended my faith to the point where I never thought it would stretch so far and I have succeeded in slightly corrupting him. Over the years I developed my own fetishes. Being held down, being restrained. My submissiveness. It has a charm all it's own. Jacob was more than reluctant to go there, but at the same time always thoroughly intrigued by it. He's a wildly adventurous, enthusiastic adrenaline junkie every place but one. Or he was anyway. He isn't quite so wild and I'm glad, honestly. I just wish my head would fall in line.

We've had arguments at four in the morning in which I have backed him right up off the bed and out the door with my tiny, desperate requests of him, we've had professional help, we've tried everything. I'm freaky, I have an abundance of energy for crazy vaguely violent sex. I instigated it in the first place with Cole as a way to turn something that was violent into something that was okay, something I could live with. I turned it and then surprised myself by liking it and I won't apologize for saying that because it's me.

Sort of like how a piece of chocolate cake is really really yummy but then ice it and it's heaven. Okay, now throw some very sweet sprinkles on the top and it's the most decadent treat you have ever had. That's me. I want the sprinkles when Jacob thought the icing was perfect. Don't misunderstand me, he's insane, incredibly gifted, patient, energetic and a lot more creative than I ever expected. Just not as sick and depraved as I want him to be consistently.

He's still worried I'm going to get hurt somehow. He's worried he's going to turn into Cole and wreck everything. The fragility with which I exist in his head knows no bounds, and so he reiterated how much safer I'll be if he's in full control of our experiences, based on our striking size differences (his 6'4" to my 5'0"). Better slow than sorry, he said, hating every moment of it, if only for a moment. My twisted brain heard full control, stopped listening after that and smiled very wide.

Trust me, just trust me, princess.

Last night I went with it. I didn't do anything he wasn't comfortable with and I didn't ask him to do anything I know he won't. And as soon as I let go of the past he stopped being so goddamned perfect and let loose on me.

I passed the test.

He said the hell with it and held me down and stopped being so gentle and then when we were finished he kissed me again, checking me all over for injuries.

And then Jacob smiled and drank his first shot and said,

You belong to me.
Because it's not perfect until it's ruined. Kind of like Bridget. He passed the test right there and then.

And then my head exploded.

Oh shit, there IS Stoli after all, becuase he is not as sweet and innocent as he appears. I kne wit.

This is my 'something better to do.'

Snapshot. Because Loch keeps bugging me to post more daily-type stuff. Right now Nina Gordon is serenading us with her beauty, Jacob is contemplating dinner ingredients with his head bent down into the freezer, which is almost empty anyway, as I need a lot of groceries but I never go until Saturdays anyhow.

There's no cake and no Stoli. I am now medication-free and cleared to drive again. I will not be going to buy alcohol with that freedom, in fact, I'll probably use that freedom to drag my butt to Home Depot for the three millionth time this year.

I'm doing well. I should be cleaning a few rooms upstairs. We're shifting some stuff. Jacob has decided he wants us to live in the summer bedroom. I don't blame him, it's the nicest room in the whole house. A sunny alcove slightly removed from the rest of the house with windows on three sides of the room and lovingly freshly painted in white and dark green. It's a romantic room. The door is tiny. I don't see how he'll fit our bed in that room but he told me to leave it to him. He has to duck to go in. On second thought I don't see how he'll fit in there on a regular basis.

How did we spend today? Working on the house. Being funny. Sitting in the sun. Making tandem grilled cheese at lunch and ignoring the phone. Walking the kids back and forth and a morning rescue in which I ran down to the river and was in too much pain to run back. I couldn't walk back, actually so I phoned my pace car for backup. That would be Jacob in his truck (with lots of scolding because I shouldn't be running until I have another checkup to make sure my ribs have healed).

Did I tell you his truck is leaving us? Another day I will.

Did I tell you he is the most stubborn man on the planet? Tomorrow, then. Which means porn.

And for Chase, who asked twice and seems impatient:

BR: Bridget Rebekah.
RB: Ruth Bailey (for my favorite sister.)
HJ: Henry Jacob (on purpose.)
JTF: Jacob Thomas Finnian. (Tell no one. He HATES it. Shhhhhhhh!)

And no, I am not over his new tattoo yet. I still can't believe it or him half the time.

Forever man.

    How many times must I say I love you
    Before you finally understand?
    Won't you be my forever woman?
    I'll try to be your forever man,
    Try to be your forever man.

An aside first off, yesterday Jacob left on a vague errand and came home in time to take me out for a quick coffee so that I wouldn't fall asleep during the movie.  He came home empty-handed and made some reference to seeing a friend about a long-overdue project. He needs irons in the fire to keep busy, it makes him happy. I salvaged yesterday with help, I'm okay. I'm always okay now.

It wasn't until we were home from the movie that was so bad it was funny and PJ had been dispatched with the rest of the chicken pot pie that I had made for him that we were getting ready for bed and I discovered the nature of Jacob's errand. He unbuttoned his favorite flannel shirt and there was a white bandage on his chest, right over his heart.

I was staring at it. I knew what it was. He followed my eyes and looked down.

Oh, right. I completely forgot.

You didn't.

Of course I did.
He went into the bathroom and took a quick shower and came back without the bandage but with my name tattooed on his flesh. He already has a BR on his back, in his angel wings, along with his own JTF, Ruth's RB and Henry's HJ initials plus the baby we lost, already named, but this...this said Bridget. Right there clear as day on the front of his body.

It's bad luck, Jacob.

No, princess. It's statement of fact. My heart belongs to you. It has nothing to do with us, it's just the way things are, the way things have been, since the night we met. You control the speed of my heartbeats. Did you know that?

I'm forever grateful he turned out to be this romantic. Oh you have no idea. He is marked with my name. He's mine. All mine. It goes both ways, I am his.

Thank you God.

A year ago today, I jumped. I bent my knees very low and summoned every ounce of power and courage I could muster and I jumped

I didn't have a clue where I would land. I couldn't see. There was no firm ledge, no guaranteed soft fall, no promises of anything, contrary to popular belief.

I didn't know what would happen to my kids, my finances, my house or my heart. I didn't know if jumping would really make me happy or just give me something new to think about. I hoped that it would save my life.

Jumping out of a burning building, off a crumbling ledge, or across a crack in the ice as it widens is almost like being pushed. If you don't jump, you know you'll die standing still. It's a fear and a relief all mixed up together and it makes you feel like you're going to throw up. I can touch myself all over today and know that I made it. I'm in one piece, more or less. My battle scars seem invisible, my war wounds are fading, my heart is mending, my soul feels full.

I still smile hugely every time I see him. I miss him when he goes to the other room, I yearn for him when he's not within reaching distance, I want for nothing now.

It was like landing in a giant pillow. And I didn't have to fear for my life because in the instant that I jumped, I was spared, flaming skirt hem and all. And I could say the same for him, so let's reverse it for a moment. He stood on the edge of a cliff, below the flaming building, on the safe side of the iceberg that was breaking away and he opened his arms wide.

He stood on his faith and held his arms up and waited, not knowing what he would catch, if he could hold it, or what it would be. He caught the girl with the flaming skirt and a broken heart, two children who needed to be protected at all costs, and a solid and square hundred year old Victorian house. He also caught the ire and judgement of his very best friends in the process and he put his own heart and his own soul on the line, with the patience of Job and the shoulders of Atlas.

He saved my life. He put me down and touched me all over and he knew that I made it, with few scars and invisible wounds and a heart as brittle as a snowflake and a wide open emotional playground inside my head. But his soul is full now, he's helping to heal me, he's getting to know me. And he loves what he sees. He still smiles wide when he sees me, he misses me when I brush my teeth and thinks of me while he walks or drives.

He became a giant soft landing, a human resounding buffer zone, a collective force built into one man designed to withstand flaming broken-hearted girls seeking refuge.

We fell together, maybe, in a way. Yes.

One year later I thank God that for once I felt reckless and desperate and scared enough to make the leap even though it seemed scarier than standing still. At least with Cole I knew what to expect. I knew that we were provided for and he hurt me privately so the kids were safe and we were still a nuclear family. Cole had his sterling reputation as an artist, we lived a dream on the outside and for so long that imaginary dream was a security blanket I wasn't going to give up.

Until faced with a choice. Lose Jacob forever or blindly jump into the arms of a friend, knowing full well he was a Good Man but otherwise not getting any guarantees. I like guarantees. I like warranties and extended service plans and insurance and when I do something I want it to be forever. And I never told you that I knew damn well he would always rescue me but I was never sure if he could love me forever, if he was cut out for a long term life with me because he is a runner, an impulsive, adventurous guy or if I was a challenge for him, his faith and his curiosity. The moment I landed, however, I think I knew.

Jacob is my forever man.

I used to turn up my nose at people who joked about their 'starter' marriages, or people who seemingly divorced without having tried hard enough.But then again I still scoff at people who insist that opposite-sex best friends can be just friends, without tension of any kind. Because if there is one thing that did change drastically during the past year, it would be our friendship. Once consummated legitimately everything changed and the laid-back friend I could cuddle with became so intense, a formal protector/judge taking over where the hands-off little-input friend left off. Jacob took the power he was given and wielded it with enthusiasm and it was so difficult for us to both become used to how that felt. To say that it didn't swell his ego and bring a confidence to all aspects of his life would be underestimating his weaknesses. He can't let go of me. Ever.

I love it.

I am his weakness but in my love he finds his strength. I belong to him now and I am not strong enough to stand on my own but when I stand beside him I can do anything.

Such is my life, the way I want it. With Jacob.

A whole year behind us now and a hundred left to go.

Brief moments now.

I had a brief few moments late this afternoon in that I thought I was losing it, ever so fleetingly. Life got overwhelming, just enough for the panic to begin. Will the backyard ever be finished, can I ask my folks not to come out for a visit this year, how many parents will be supervising Ruth's friend's birthday party this weekend, why do I never want to cook or eat, can we afford to spend a little extra on some building materials, what am I so afraid of all the time and oh my God, could I please just drive myself to the store and buy one bottle of Stoli?

I can work myself into a lather over so little. You would see me and nod your head in agreement, yes, she's a mess.

The biggest question of all, why is the affection never enough? I could eat Jacob alive, I can spend entire days and whole nights in those arms and the moment he lets go I am lost, cold, feeling abandoned and cast aside. He had to run out for a couple of hours just now, before dinner and the moment he was gone I felt alone in the world, going through my motions, struggling to just learn how the fuck to be alone. I am never alone. Ever. I never have been. I love to be by myself in the house but if there is no one else in the house then I can't handle it.

It's an irrational fear, losing Jacob is. I have been asked to face it, embrace it and plan for it, by my doctor, because my doctor doesn't believe that any amount of need placed on Jacob is healthy.

I never said it was healthy. Not once. I know what it is. I know how devastating it could become and I know simply that it can't be fixed.

I also know that I have a date tonight thanks to PJ who is flexing a little counselling muscle of his own and declaring that a two-hour distraction in the form of coffee and a movie is just what Bridget needs to reign her fears back in and keep the demons away so that Jacob and I can enjoy this momentous week of ours without the bottom falling out like it always seems to. He offered to babysit yet again. He's adorable.

We're ignoring the lack of medication, ignoring the absence of my cathartic running that I desperately need and ignoring all ghosts and cogs in the machinery of our life right now and just living moment by moment.

Some of them are just tougher than others.

But it's being fixed as we speak. And I lean heavily in the meantime. And hope. Because it's better than it used to be.

Bye, I'm headed to change. I'm looking forward to our time tonight, out in the stars and the cool spring air.

I'm breathing.

Odds and evens.

Today is a day so special I woke up early and went and got the champagne, and woke Jacob up with a glass and a toast, but he was awake anyway. He always wakes up when I stir in the mornings.

A toast to us. To him.

Today is the very last day of year one. Our first year together as a couple. As a couple of I-don't-know-whats, but a couple nonetheless. The final, three hundred and sixty fifth day of a long, arduous, perilous trip around the moon with detours to heaven a good six hundred times and back again. A journey of epic proportions in which I think my heart was dropped and picked up and broken and stitched and glued back together so many times I am a human mosaic from the inside out.

A year in which I tried to destroy my best friend and yet he is still here and as strong as ever and hopeful and full of his goofy faith-branded goodness that keeps him going even as I'm pulling so hard on the brakes I have permanent burns on my fingers and heels from digging in.

A year in which I was threatened, pushed and goaded past every insurmountable obstacle that sprang up one after the other and when I screamed for a break he simply set his mouth and pushed me more. If you think I am so hard on him just know that I rarely talk about how hard he is on me.

A year that saw a tiny bloom on a plant long left for dead flourish and expand until it outshone everything else in the garden. Our love, long denied, allowed to fly free like a bird and oh my fuck, have we ever soared. Sometimes we crash and burn and we pick ourselves up or we pick each other up and keep going.

I am the most perfect and the most imperfect human bean alive.

And I am loved.

And I love. Still. In spite of life I fell so hard in love I expected to shatter when I hit bottom. I'm still falling though and it won't stop.

So hard it floors me. Daily. And I've come to write about fights and awkward times and difficult moments and yet at the end of almost every single one of those three hundred and sixty five nights, give or take a couple of hospital stays, a business trip or two and some really stupid arguments I have fallen asleep in Jacob's arms, safe and warm and lucky and well aware that he is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with and I'm glad I get to live with him. And so crushed that I have ever hurt him, made him sad, made him angry or made him regret his choices. I write the trouble that I am for him as penance sometimes.

He maintains he wouldn't have it any other way, that despite the hardships this year has held, despite the ups and downs and the heartache and the pain when he looks at me he is filled with joy, with hope and with gratitude, but most of all with love.

Big love, he says, for his little Bridget. And through most of the past decade, everything aside, he says he is happy, because he got exactly what he wished for, so hard for so long.

Me.

But he is not the lucky one. I am.

We're spending this final day of our first year together, like we spend all our days now, hand in hand. In arms. In love.

I know. God, Bridget, the cheese! Enough.

Oh you think there's excitement today, just you wait until tomorrow.


    Section chief: Are you damaged?

    Condor: Damaged. No.