Meant for greater things.

I forgot to tell you something.

The strangest thing happened in my dream last night that I was sure was real and it might very well be.

I puffed my cheeks out full and held my breath. I squeezed my eyes closed and forced my hands into tight fists and I concentrated. I concentrated so hard I think I broke something in my soul.

And then in a blinding flash of white nuclear light and total silence and the absence of all earthly forms, something extraordinary happened.

A tiny white feather popped out of the skin on my right shoulder.

It hurt like hell but it was there. Because this morning when I woke up Jacob's hand was there. And he was stroking it and praying softly, wide awake for no reason at all.

Control of nothing.

Then touch my tears with your lips
Touch my world with your fingertips
    And we can have forever
    And we can love forever
    Forever is our today

Reality resumes when Jacob pulls me in against his chest and wraps his arms around my head, rocking back and forth because the simplest of unconscious comforts reveal themselves when everything else gets stripped away. It's why a mother hums and rubs her child's back in times of crisis, why men pace in emergencies and why people offer mere hugs when your world has been ripped away.

He resorts to praying aloud. Beautifully, endlessly. He never wanted this for me. He tried to stop it the whole time and I wasn't ever aware.

This opens up wounds that I haven't had time to get used to the rawness of yet, let alone heal. Bad memories that I thought I had cast out were waiting for me and come flooding in, ready to drown anything in their path. I should have known Cole could still have this kind of power over people and control from hell. Why wouldn't he?

It's a Hitchcockian zoom in all the way back to square one but in my water-filled soundless cage I reached out and told Jake it doesn't matter because he is here and I am so grateful and could he please do something because I can't breathe. The panic makes it hard to breathe because I know waiting behind the panic for a turn is more sadness and oh God I can't take anymore.

Jacob. Help me.

I may have to take a few days away from writing. I'm not in charge anymore so I don't know for sure. Who am I kidding? I've never been in charge.

I can't breathe. Why can't I breathe?

Every time I try to write my eyes fill up and I can't do it.

I've gotten good at taking pills and writing distracted and playing the music so loud I miss the lyrics again because it's distorted. I've gotten good at blocking out harmless conversations and grief that goes on far too long and anything remotely uncomfortable. I'll never be good at being alone or dealing with bullshit or making do.

Send me an email. I could use some love. Yes, you.

Sweetness.

A bright spot in the day for this actress. Ruth and Henry are delighted that the boys are going to be here later. Especially at the same time. This was in between Henry telling me all through lunch that he would eat it only if I would let him have two "think noodles" afterward. He meant fig newtons. He can have whatever his little heart desires, he's maybe the only guy I trust anymore. There's a fun cross to bear for a six year old.

Resignation.

Ben and Loch are coming out this weekend for a family meeting. So far it appears that only Ben, Loch and Jacob were recipients of this letter. Surprise. No one else will admit to having one and Ben said that the letter itself spells that out clearly.

I did say bad things happen in threes, right?

Jacob refuses to say a word about it for now.

But now I think I know why Ben left and why Loch has been the way he has and why Jacob is on such a mission to win this imaginary fight.

Because it wasn't imaginary after all.

Oh fuck, scrap that. He just called again and said they'll be here in time for dinner. Tonight.

Well you bunch of.

I want to call you every name in the book.

I want to throw things and break stuff and scream.

But not until I have a few more facts than a drunken Ben can provide before lunch. Poor Ben, he was doing so well. Was that a lie too? My God, you're the ones who are fucked up.

I want to know who got them and who decided to keep it from me and don't say you don't know what I'm talking about. I'm talking about Cole's goddamned fucking LETTERS.

I think I hate all of you right now. Forever and ever. Prove me wrong, please. I'm begging you to tell me this wasn't orchestrated the way I know it was. Prove that you didn't just fuck up my life even more.

Unexpected.

I'm wearing the t-shirt Christian brought over for me. It didn't fit him and he would be the smallest of the guys so the next logical wearer is me. It's huge and it says Fabbing Fuckulous on it. Jacob laughed and asked if I was planning to wear it in public and I said yes, but only to church and PTA meetings. Of course I was kidding but the look he shot me was worth it.

Ben has not called back. Instead I lunged at the phone at 9 pm and it wasn't what I expected at all.

It was Sophie.

She'll be the only one relatively unscathed by the mess made because she wasn't even engaged when it happened. And it was a fluke that Jacob wound up at the conference, there was a last-minute opening that he was able to grab as a favor repaid. They haven't had contact since, no, I'm not worried that it's going to happen again, from what I know and have seen, while he admires her togetherness as much as he abhors my chaos, she doesn't move him nearly an iota as much. He fell for me hard, he is all mine in a way that has surprised, and continues to surprise everyone.

She called to apologize to me and to wish us a happy belated anniversary and to ask me if I had anything I wanted or needed to say to her. That she didn't want me to hate her. That she was surprised by how not into it Jacob turned out to be and how grief-stricken he was and how she assumed he had admitted his mistakes long ago.

This is how civilized adults mend fences. We're all in our thirties. We should all know better. We keep trying to do better, and that's all we can do.

God, am I this magnanimous?

Not on your fucking life.

She apologized and asked me not to forgive or let her off the hook but just to know she wouldn't hurt me again. Or Jacob. She also had told her fiance before they were engaged. I wasn't kidding when I say she is pulled together and so not that type of person.

I'll never be that self-assured or that pulled together. She is the tight chignon, the business formal and I am the wispy mess, the day at the fair hair, undone and unkempt.

Soft and wild. Sweet and certifiable.

Everyone rushing in to assure their absolution from me is astounding. Since when did the world ever revolve around me? Apparently it always has, and my happiness has come to command a king's ransom. One that was paid for when I asked for it. I took Jacob's heart back because it belongs to me and it stays with me, from here on out.

She said she probably won't call for a long while, maybe at Christmas to wish us well, or not, but that I should know, if I don't or if there's any doubt, just how much Jacob truly loves me, that the time she has spent with him whether before their marriage or after, was filled with my presence and his preoccupation with me. With his obsession for me that supersedes everything he does.

But here's a little deviation from the way everyone expects Bridget to react to all the reassurance that Bridget's the one he wants and he'd never do it again. Maybe it's cold, maybe it's a result of diluting my emotions and anticipated reactions from all the drugs, which were increased recently, did you catch the shift? Maybe I wasn't born yesterday and maybe I never saw this coming, I thought I had him wrapped but I was sure I did before he married Sophie so maybe she takes up just as much of him as I do and maybe, like me, there's more than enough room for more than one soulmate. Maybe we're lucid and acting and feeling but we're not stupid in never putting all our eggs in the one basket because you never know when it'll get kicked over and you'll have a mess left to deal with. Alone. Human beans weren't meant to be alone.

We weren't meant to be so fragile either.

Was I meant to be so cold?

I think I know exactly how Jacob feels in that when he thinks about me going to Loch he feels an uncontrollable sadness, and a panic and a rage that threatens to eat him alive. So it's better not to think about it all. We talked it out privately, we've dealt with it in therapy, it's done. Sophie calling now just seeks to undo me again and I'm not going there. I'm no longer naive and I don't care that *I* haven't fully dealt with it, preferring instead to take my knocks for my own betrayals and not touching Jacob's.

I can't. I'll die if I think about it and so I don't. Why in the hell do you think I happily agreed to upping my drugs to the highest dosage ever yet? Because I will put it off forever. It's how I deal with things. I just keep on going and pick up the pieces of my heart along the way and pretend everything is fine.

I told her I wished she hadn't called. That it wasn't fair of her to use me so that she could move on and feel better and soothe her own guilt. I think that's what surprises everyone now, how much rage can fester inside of such a tiny package unchecked for much longer than most people can carry that load.

I can. Indefinitely. And that can't be healthy. And I refuse to talk about to the right people. Because I simply feel like holding all the cards right now and making them nervous and maybe the stupid fragile girl is less stupid and even more stupid than we all previously thought.

Because I really have no idea what I'm doing here. What's sad is how comfortable this feeling is.

What's even more sad is how unfeeling this feeling is.

Swords drawn.

I'm currently NOT falling in love with one of the Eagar brothers. Cursed Outdoor Life Channel. To spite you I won't even say which one. Probably the one who looks like Jake. This is why I don't watch TV. I'm all like Oooooh, cuuuuuute. I saw ten minutes of Heroes and Milo Ventimiglia and his gorgeous hair were lodged in my dreams for a month afterward.

Incorrigible girl.

Speaking of heroes, Jacob went back to see Mark early this morning for a bit of repair on one of his wings. Comes home with Protector in a gorgeous script above the now-fixed wings, clearly visible if he's only in a T-shirt. I'm floored and little bit cautious. He believes it goes well with my fragile tattoo. I have my reservations. However, he can pull it off in the way that only a 6'4", 200 lb guy can.

It smacks of another show of force, maybe. Another claim to ownership, a permanent statement, not as much for me as for everyone else. I think that's what I don't like. He doesn't need it.

Then he headed off to work, half days this week, department meetings and organizing his new office (shoebox, don't know where he's going to put his long legs when he sits down) and he's so excited, even though classes don't begin for a little over two more weeks.

He was cautious in leaving and has called five times. I don't see how he's going to get anything accomplished at this rate. He worries about me. I'm doing okay today, we went shopping. We're going shopping tomorrow too. I'm a little worried about me being alone too.

I'm a little more worried about the four times Ben called and didn't leave a message for me when he's been gone a whole twenty-four hours and usually he doesn't call for the first whole month or so.

The rest of this week is going to be as long as the previous hundred or so. I can tell.

It really is a nice tattoo. I'm going to ask Jacob if I can post a picture of it later. Maybe he can have it engraved on his imaginary shield to match, since no one's ever going to see it underneath this fortress he's built around us now. Proverbial or not, the armor's on, the flag is raised, I can't wait to see what sort of upset all these phone calls are going to cause.

I'm sure it goes both ways. Wait until the guys see that tattoo.

Fresh preacher karaoke.

Our kitchen is too busy these days for Jacob's favorite solitary pastime, there are four pairs of hands now committing effort to make meals and clean up. He has moved his one-man band to the backyard patio and sings and strums in the evenings, dedicated in a different way from the manner he follows singing through his days.

Last night I barely got one step over the threshold with his tea before I was moved to tears. It's been a while since he could do that with just a song (click the link to play, it will begin automatically and it's worth it to hear.).

    Rain rain go away,
    Come again another day,
    All the world is waiting for the sun.

    Is it you I want,
    Or just the notion
    Of a heart to wrap around so I can find my way around

    Safe to say from here,
    You're getting closer now,
    We are never sad because we are not allowed to be

    Rain rain go away,
    Come again another day,
    All the world is waiting for the sun.