Chills.

Hark how the bells
Sweet silver bells
All seem to say
Throw cares away

We are standing in the front hall in the dark. I am tired. It's been a long day. I rest my head against Ben's chest. I can feel his heart beating. Slow. Steady.

Lochlan returns from the kitchen with orange juice in a glass. He takes a sip before handing the glass to me. I'm not paying attention so Ben takes the glass and lets go of me, steering me forward. Straight into Lochlan's arms. I shake my head just once, a useless protest, pointing out how late it is more than anything. This is when they are both awake, fired and confident. This is when I am beginning to fall away from the day, vaguely combative and yet well aware of how far we will go before sunrise.

Lochlan brings his hands up to my head and kisses my cheek. I am breathing him in. As soon as he starts he is finished, turning away, reaching back for my hand and pulling me with him from memory. I follow him up the stairs. We are silent. The house is asleep. Ben is right behind me. I always fight the urge to run up the stairs as fast as I can because they have always chased me under threat of a tickle war. It occurs to me that it's good we are still so silly after all these years.

And sometimes so serious too.

The door to my room stays locked behind me to keep our secrets inside, stacked neatly beside the memories, cataloged and arranged in chronological order. Ben's hand slides over my face and I am left to his inclinations now. He becomes a part of me and I am so grateful and so exhausted tears mix with joy on my face though it's almost too dark to see. Truth and trust take center stage together. The spotlight burns out, taking away any remaining shame and I am soaring now, safe in arms. Safe to do what I want, safe to make mistakes, safe to divide myself right down the middle. A dotted line. Sign here with no excuses, please and thanks, take what you want with no apologies. And just never ask me to choose because I won't do that ever again.

My lips burn and my flesh is raw as we work our way through to blissful sleep, to the rest of that orange juice, in the glass beside the lamp. The alarm goes off too soon and I can't reach it, not for the rubber limbs but for the fact that I wake up locked in Ben's arms, my head on his chest. I have to wake him in order to reach the button to turn off the music. Only I don't want to turn off the music and so I put my head back down and listen as Ben's heart beats in time with the song, with the rain, with Lochlan's heart and with my own and I am struck by how perfect imperfect love is.

Electrocute.

Let us beware of common folk, of common sense, of sentiment, of inspiration, and of the obvious.
~Charles Baudelaire

There's a steady drone today, an undercurrent competing with the drumming of the rain on the windows today. The glass electrified, dangerous, the view of the deadly seas comforting if only for the color, this beautiful dark green-grey shade that only makes itself known when you stare directly into it and allow the waves to wash over you, drowning you and teaching you to float all at the same time.

They were right about the rain here.

But I still think things are better overall.

Tonight is Ruth's very first band concert. Everyone is going to cheer her on and hear her play with her entire group. It's going to be mayhem and it could be fun too. After bedtime I have a date with my two favorite boys for a late supper. We need to get back on track. We need to chill together a little more. Maybe a lot more. I need to chill out altogether.

A lot. A whole lot.

More than a lot.

Tons.

Oodles. Boatloads. Meh, you get it.

Made in heaven.

Even angels have their wicked schemes
And you take that to new extremes
But you’ll always be my hero
Even though you've lost your mind

I'm telling you Ben is different. You're not listening.

Jake always refused to indulge Lochlan. Jacob met Lochlan and based on what I told him about each and every friend, Jacob refused to buy shares in history and instead kept his savings invested in the present, painstakingly reminding me to live for now, because the past is just that, the past.

I failed.

I failed spectacularly, elisting Lochlan to pay Jacob back. I've had Lochlan pay back everyone who's ever wronged me and yet I'm pretty sure I drove them all to madness because of Lochlan in the first place. Rather than be outraged, you should be used to this. This is the way things are and that's one of the most amazing things about Benjamin. He wrote me a free pass and I became his boomerang girl and it works and I'm happy (in relative terms) and things are good.

Oddly Jacob believed in Ben. And Ben was a spectacular mess in the Jacob-days. Spectacular with a capital B. Holy fuck. Jacob must have been one hell of a visionary to see past what Ben presented to the world as himself.

Ben is the polar opposite of everyone. Every single one of them. They say white, he says black. They say light, he says dark, they say steaks, he says lipgloss. They tell him to be quiet, he'll blow the roof off. They tell him to relax, oh, Jesus, don't ever tell Ben to relax. He'll revolt. Implode. Break things. But only when you tell him to calm down. He's lost the most here and he wears it on the outside.

But they can't push Ben the way Jake got pushed around, second-guessed and ignored. Ben has nowhere to go but up, he's got nothing to lose by rebelling against the entire collective and they learned a long time ago he's going to do what he wants and no one's going to be able to stop him anyway.

Not sure if it's the constant exchange of bodily fluids or some sort of marriage-osmosis but it seems to be contagious. Healthy emotional cooties we've been sharing now for years. Hey bee, what do YOU want? Do that, and don't worry about what they say.

That's why I quit. I took a page from Ben's big book of Personal Anarchy for Dummies and I said enough. I said I was never fucking going back and I was rude and unladylike and I may or may not have thrown a BlackBerry (not mine, do I look like an idiot to you?) and I made a bit of a scene in the lobby when Caleb had the completely scary and unexpected nerve to chase after me when I left.

As usual, Caleb refused to accept my resignation. As usual he blamed everything on Lochlan because in case you didn't notice, they don't interact with each other. As usual Ben feigns disinterest in everything EXCEPT my bodily fluids. As usual Bridget spent the day having a tantrum. As usual it accomplished nothing.

As usual Lochlan is throwing down his customary ultimatums and as usual they're not going to last long enough to take hold. Ask Ben. I'll be in the library chewing on pages, choking on words. Call me when he comes home.

***

Ben came home two hours later, throwing the front doors open wide, his giant boots tracking wet leaves all the way across the foyer. I felt the vibrations of his footsteps from where I sat on the floor in the library. He threw the doors to that room open too, switched on the lights, took one look at me and crossed to where I sat against the glass, my back turned against the evening's black skies. He stopped when he reached me, crouching down in front of my face. He smelled like leather and forbidden cigarettes. He lifted up my chin and smiled at me. Gently and not like a monster. Not like everybody else.

You decide what you want to do.

No ultimatums, just letting me figure it out. Not because he's spineless, not because he's a pushover (God, sometimes I hate you, Internet), but because he watches. He watches fucking everything, and he's smarter than the rest of you by far. I have to figure this out and he knows it. I am not his child, I'm an adult. As depraved as he is, I am a grownup in this relationship too. An equal.

A match.

Ben reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, and then plugged his headphones into it and put them in my ears. Then he pressed play, put the phone in my hands, and kissed my forehead hard. Then when the music started he stood up, turned around and left, shutting off the lights and pulling the doors closed behind him. He knew what I needed. No one else ever does.

Unpredictable (louder than you).

What the FUCK, iTunes? You took away my play count?

I give up.

Unless he did something. It wouldn't surprise me. I know how to set it up to play one song on repeat infinitely, cranked up to forty so that the windows flex and he gives up on trying to make calls because 'his assistant is doing some high-volume editing today'.

Yeah, of her BRAIN.

Sheesh.

I'm still damp just from going from the car to the door this morning and back again in the rain. I'm still annoyed that I had to be there even though I can do all of that from home and I'm frustrated that on our territory (the house), he is cordial and emotionally level and on his territory he is manipulative and willing to push me so hard I slid all of the glass out of the windows so the whole city could enjoy the October Rust album but just that one song and I kept sticking my head out into the rain dozens of stories up in order to feel less dead and less afraid around him.

I don't think Caleb even noticed, he was too busy picturing my O-face or maybe plotting to pump deadly noxious gas into Ben's sound booth and give me that hat trick that will make everything okay for him. Then he can do something to Lochlan's bike and Lochlan will go out in a ball of fire and then frankly, Caleb would have everything he ever wanted. Except my mind would be long gone and the shell would be just that, a shell. A corpse. Probably pretty at the beginning but when pretty things die you're better off with the memories because the rest will fade, the color running down onto the floor, shades of grey left behind. Everything growing stiff and unrecognizable.

Yeah, all that and I stood beside him waiting for a fucking signature while he looked out the window and choose to ignore me and I choose not to go any closer so we were even and eventually he turned and walked away, not signing my work so I could have it sent to the bank and he TURNED OFF THE MUSIC and I left. Because really, who the fuck needs a boss like that?

And who the fuck needs an assistant like me?

Find someone else, asshole. This asshole quits.

Of course, Ben thinks this is hilarious. Because he said the poison gas thing only happens in the movies, and Lochlan would know something was wrong with the bike before he left our driveway, and I'm never at Caleb's loft as his employee but rather as his muse and he doesn't need me to or care if I actually get any work done, as long as he can be near me. Like Cole. Like Jacob. Like everyone.

Ben put my song on. At a volume of eight-five. It is so loud I can't even hear it. Awesome. I get my own glass booth just for fun. The big headphones. I'm going to bring a bed and live in here. No interruptions. Just music.

I will have lunch here with Ben and then head home so I'll take my knocks later.

The new favorite song. (Sorry, Lochie).

Now like a bird
She flew away
To chase her dreams
Of books and praise
Still I miss her
Yeah I miss her
Since she's gone
At JFK
Who played the fool?
Self pity sick
Jet fuel perfume
Still I miss her
Yeah I miss her
Since she's gone
Girl I want to die with you
In each others arms
We'll drown in flame
If this time were the last time
Could I hold you all life long?
Since this time is the last time
Can I hold you all night long?
Lay your head down for the last time

Trust (suum cuique).

'Round the bend and headed into the winter now at full speed. Head first.

The stocking are hung but who cares?
Preserved for those no longer there.
Six feet beneath me sleep.
Black lights hang from the tree,
Accents of dead holly.

Whoa mistletoe
(It's growing cold)
I'm seeing ghosts,
(I'm drinking old)
Red water
Red water
(Red water)
Red water chase them away.

Ben is eating the little packages of Graveyard body part gummies from the bowl of leftover rejected Halloween candy. He is calling the inventory out loud. So far he has eaten a nose, two thumbs and a pair of lips (I won't tell you the comments he was making as he opened those. Goddamn. Hilarious). We're not big on gum-thingies here. Bears on rare occasion and sour patch kids and sour soothers always, but digits and facial features? No fucking way.

Here's an ear for you, baby. Try it out.

Oh, Jesus, Ben. Can't you eat the rockets like everybody else?

He drove me all the way out to the Metaphysical shop in the valley this afternoon. I now have a winter supply of nag champa and patchouli incense now and some other assorted trinkets. The owner of the shop reminded me to clear the space of heavy imprints and we would be good to go.

I know. I am the world's most prolific skeptic/cynic and here I am with all of the lucky charms and feng shui and pseudo, bastardized Wicca to cleanse the house of negative energy. Life experience harvests the doubts and superstition assuages them. I don't dare ignore any chance I have to make everything turn out okay.

The boys humor me because they treasure all things eclectic and strange and beautiful, including, especially Bridget.

Now I just have to find a brick and mortar Doc Marten shop for my boots and I'll be fucking gold here. Homesickness, take that. I am figuring this place out at last, filling in the last few gaps. Filling up the holes and patching the worn spots. It isn't easy setting up home in unfamiliar territory, it can take a long while to truly feel comfortable. I still painstakingly walk through the new grocery store in my head as I update my perpetual shopping list because everything is in a different place. I still count intersections through town and ask for help everywhere because it's all New with a capital N, and different by far. Where is the watchmaker, what's the best pool? Where do you get your dog clipped? How come no one goes to this little shop? Oh, dammit, we've been stopping at the Starbucks in the next town over because I didn't go that extra street or I would have found this one, on the edge of my neighborhood. Ha.

Different. Yes, by far.

But in a better way.

Quality of life has taken on new meaning. This week we have had changes. Lots of them. Kind of a literal stock taken, at one year after the routine of Prairie life was disrupted for good. The new incense ceremony and the solemn attempt to do personal inventories and pull up our bootstraps at last means we are holding ourselves accountable for the state of the Collective right at this minute.

Last night there was zero trust extended to Caleb. He asked again to take me for a drive down the mountain, a final spin in his 350z before it is put into storage for winter and again he was denied, but not by me. Our unified energies have been strict and strained as of late and I have done nothing to change that. The boys were solid black in their rejection of Caleb's attempts to make further peace with me and I was obedient to my boys. I ignored all of them, studying the pewter goblet in front of me. The goblets are so ancient, the engraved poems (different on each) are worn almost smooth. I pretended I wasn't listening and they dealt with it and moved on. Subject changed.

Consequently, in a bizarre twist of devotion this evening, Ben was relaying a particularly violent story as he removed dishes while I talked quietly with Andrew and he came up behind me, gently grabbing a handful of my hair and he pulled my whole head back and drew the blade of a knife across my throat and I didn't even break the conversation. When I was finished my thought I turned and asked him what that was and he just smiled and ate a pinky finger, chewing it with his super wide oh-fuck-I'm-up-to-no-good-again-watch-out grin that makes my knees cave in and my heart thud so hard it hurts. Dull side in (on the knife AND the heart) in case you didn't realize. Obviously the princess isn't dead yet. Sometimes I'm halfway to breathing normally, even.

It wasn't a normal weekend by any means. It hardly ever is and I like it that way, imaginary murders, disgusting candy and weird traditions included. To each their own, I guess.

Incense and alcohol.

Today marks the very first time there are neither of the above in my house. I ran out of nag champa a long time ago. Lochlan ran out of beer last Wednesday.

He has made no move to get more. On the other hand, once the cold weather comes I like to have the nag burning late into the mornings while I work with my words. It's atmosphere, the same way Lochlan blurs the edges of his atmosphere so very slightly with hops and barley. Just enough to take the edges right off the throb of pain when he gives me back to my life, gently dropping me out of history, hanging me by the hands to be let go at the last second to fall the final distance down into the real.

The real.

Now. Present. (Unscented.)

Now with one hundred percent sober.

I'm not jumping guns or sharks saying that, I know how Lochlan thinks and when he stops, he just stops. He's self-regulating. Everything with a reason. I am not, I'm working hard to make my wishes known instead of transmitting them via invisible brat-waves and not throwing tantrums but forcing myself to pick up a book when I can't get my way and appreciating things like a roaring fire or a lit gingerbread candle or a hot cup of tea. Simple. Good. It works. Well, for now it works so cross your fingers, like I have crossed mine.

Cooking simple meals. Cranberry juice. Drawing the curtains before dinner, when the sun drops down behind the treeline and the mountains cast their shadow over this warm house. Look around you, Bridget. We made it. We have everything at last.

(Knock wood. Knock your head. Knock everything, just in case.)

A year ago this week Caleb offered us the move. The one we couldn't refuse. Tonight he is coming for dinner to celebrate our relative intactness. Or maybe he is coming to curse it. Either way I invited him if only to say Ha. Look. We did it and I didn't depressurize or implode or lose my mind. I packed it lovingly in wads of paper and bubble wrap and sealed it in a small box marked FRAGILE. When we landed they poured beer all over it to rehydrate it and look, I was good as new.

Loaded memories (I know I am cliffhangering a lot lately. Patience.)

Here I lay
Still and breathless
Just like always
Still I want some more
Mirrors sideways
Who cares what's behind
Just like always
Still your passenger
Chrome buttons, buckles and leather surfaces
These and other lucky witnesses
Now to calm me
This time won't you please
Drive faster
Roll the windows down
This cool night air is curious
Let the whole world look in
Who cares who sees anything

Some motions you know by heart. That much I know. I watched Lochlan slip on a mask of concentration, and then over that he placed his facade of theatrical hesitancy mixed with charm. He always played his doubts to the crowd and then at the end he would act relieved that nothing went wrong. This would elicit a collective relief and a round of heavy donations from the dispersing crowd. It was my job to start on the outside and run to the first folks to break away from the circles and convince them to appreciate the entertainment with a little silver or maybe a paper bill or two, working my way back to Lochlan who would be pouring water on the batons and packing up his gear, slowly because he would keep one eye on me.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Lochlan stood up and winked at me and then asked the children if they were ready. He turned around and checked the sunset, which was happening right on schedule and then he lit the torches.

Then he put them out to a chorus of disappointent. He thought for a moment, telling the kids that maybe it wasn't a good idea, he was rusty and something could go wrong. He winked at me again. Ruth caught the wink and egged him on. So did Ben, with loud encouragement. Henry had a moment where he wasn't sure and then he realized that Lochlan was joking and he clapped his hands and called for fire.

So Lochlan lit the torches once more, with his first warning, as always, to not try this at home and also to consider putting something in the hat, if even for a moment, we found this entertaining. And then he began.

He was not rusty. It was like riding a bicycle, or he never would have tried at all. He has no interest in losing his beautiful strawberry curls, or an eye for that matter, or messing up his hands, or scarring the children emotionally. He threw fire for almost a decade. Talents you hone become like breathing after a fashion and the challenge falls away leaving only muscle memory and a keen eye.

I lost twenty-five years of my life in a single instant, when the first baton flew up into the night air, somersaulting over itself, flames mesmerizing every last one of us. I saw it in slow motion and when it landed in Lochlan's other hand, I was fourteen years old again.

Oh, hell.

Not this.

I've been waiting for this. it stalks me around every corner. It beckons to me to come closer, just for a moment. Remember, Bridget. Close your eyes and smell the corn dogs and the gasoline and grease. Open your eyes and see the pretty colored lights, just like Christmas but never sad like Christmas is. The anticipatory excitement of every single sunset at the midway, a handful of incredibly specific mollifications reamin dear to me and here he is conjuring these memories on a chilly November night as far away from the fairgrounds as we will ever get, and happily so, in the place where he was born. All of his history was written far from here, maybe so that when he returned, the slate would be clean. A quarter of a century later and never in between.

Lochlan would do that. He was always like that. He planned ahead for us. And I skipped forward down the road, ruining his plans with my impulsiveness at every bend, knowing that when the last ticketholders had gone home and the darkness was complete I would turn and throw myself back into his arms for sleep, for love. For his approval.

Tonight as I sat on a lawnchair wrapped in Ben's hoodie with the lights of my brand-new giant oceanfront house blazing behind me, my belly full of warmth from dinner, my healthy, perfect children clapping their hands with delight it occurred to me that this was what he was waiting for. Coming around that bend in the road and seeing the future from the past. Everything turned out okay. We did eat. We didn't freeze or wind up stranded or in jail. We weren't ripped apart (though we have tried. Oh, have we tried.) We still have all the time in the world for each other and if given a choice will give the same answers and think the same thoughts. We still plot escape first and list needs in order of emergent necessities. We still think like carnies and I was only ever a summer girl, leaving each fall to say goodbye and return to school, arms bound, legs kicking mightily, screaming in indignation. I would stare out the window in misery all day (except for Creative Writing class) only to hear the bell ring and fly out of homeroom, down the hall, down the steps and through the doors to Lochlan's truck because he had been out of school for a while now.

Little ever changes. I still hate regular routines, I hate it when he isn't around, and I hate that life has obligations beyond keeping an eye on showtimes and where to sleep but at the same time, you can take a girl away from the midway without taking the midway away from the girl. There is still a value to a green paper dollar that to me runs far beyond what most people in this day and age place on one and there are still many tiny thrills to be had when the only person you can rely on is a teenage boy who tells you the names of the stars in the night sky and makes sure you get enough food so that you don't cry later when you are hungry. The same boy who shakes you out of nightmares and rocks you back toward dreamland, the very first watchful sentry who made a promise and kept it, the only one so far.

I asked Lochlan once if he still felt as though he were the same teenaged boy who lived with the show, traveling to seaside shows and living on a shoestring, if he felt as if he ever progressed past those years maturity-wise. He cocked his head and squinted at me slightly, in his usual way, wondering where I was going with my questions, wondering if this conversational road was the right one to go down right now, weighing his words as comforting lies versus his usual logic, his pragmatic sense. He weighed while I watched him.

Finally he said no, that he didn't feel like that anymore. That those experiences helped him to always see the big picture and not take the little things so seriously, that he grew up so fast, being responsible for me, and he made so many mistakes that he is far beyond that boy from the cornfields, from the circus. That he is a man now and not a boy pretending.

This is probably why he didn't bring the fire until tonight. He advanced into adulthood by necessity and left me behind. Not in the abandonment sense but in the sense that he was forced to grow up and take charge and he did just that, so I wouldn't have to. So he could watch me flit down the road like a foolish fluttery butterfly and know for certain I would still be waiting for him when he caught up to me.

This time I was there. Right where he knew I would be. I stopped moving. I stopped running ahead. I understand now that his reluctance to display any of his former surprising gifts had nothing to do with competing with Jacob or out-egoing Ben, he just didn't want to unlock the part of my brain that he secured such a long time ago. He locked it up and hid it well. I don't think anyone was prepared for what was supposed to be a milestone in the family. The children were finally old enough to sit still and remain far back enough to enjoy a fire show. Or so we have told ourselves all along.

We thought we were far enough away from it, far enough away from history and definitely far enough away geographically to risk it. But Lochlan smelled like gasoline and nostalgia, and it proved to be too soon.

Here I lay just like always
Don't let me go
Take me to the edge

The boy who juggled swords.

One of the joys of having spent years in the circus means eventually your talents will spill out over the edges of fantasy into the dimmer, sharp reality of life itself. You will bring your gifts with you when you watch the final tent come down and embrace all of the people you called family, even though some of them didn't seem to have proper names and even fewer of them had a plan to withstand the outside world, as we called it. How do you transition from traveling with the show to having a regular job and paying regular bills? It's akin to being released from prison. You must assimilate back into a society you rejected before. You must roll up your magic tightly with your showmanship, stuffing it far into a dark corner and not speaking of it in public because you want to fit in, not be the freak where no one pays you.

Until children are involved, that is.

I came downstairs this morning and Lochlan was teaching Henry how to juggle knives. Henry was using paring knives and Lochlan had his short swords. IN THE KITCHEN. Henry was mostly thrilled to be holding a knife, period. I'm not big on knives. I will happily toss my children into the ocean and tell them to swim but no, they can't cut that tomato, because I can barely cut that tomato, having a long history of issues with knives. They just gravitate toward my flesh.

Anyway,

Lochlan said this afternoon we might go outside and he'll toss the fire batons around for a bit for the children. Which is sort of insane because he hasn't picked those up in over twenty years but something tells me it's a lot like riding a bicycle. And not at all like being normal. Being normal is not second nature, it's not something you learn once and remember forever. It's an uphill battle every day.

We are still learning. We are still freaks. We will always be the freaks.

I'll be passing the hat. Be ready with your dollar bills.

Because nothing rhymes with 'secret'.

I am biting my tongue as he pulls my shirt gently over my head. He's either going to accidentally bump my arm, since Ben is not known for his grace offstage or off ice for that matter, or make some sick joke that will have me laughing and clutching myself in pain.

To my surprise he does neither.

He turns the shirt right side out again and lobs it toward the laundry basket. Then he crosses to my closet and asks me if I have a preference. Like we're talking about the weather, only I am naked from the waist up.

The stretchy pink one, I say. He shakes his head. Long sleeves, little bee. How about one of Jake's shirts instead? One of his flannel ones? I nod. I've already switched to staring out the window. The painkillers make it hard to keep my mind on anything. I want to sleep but it hurts to lie down. It's better to stand. I pace a lot, mostly. When I close my eyes I see Cole's face, full of rage.

Ben is feeding my good arm into a sleeve. Good as new, he whispers, and kisses the end of my nose. He is so brave. I'm glad Jake asked him to look after me. This would not work if it were Lochlan. Lochlan is in shock and tends to turn off in emergencies. Ben will crash but strangely enough this is working.

We'll head for a walk in a little while, Ben is talking and I'm barely listening again. The lilacs are in bloom. The smell is heady, glorious.

Ben's pretending that the palms of his hands hold great mystery to him. I'm waiting for him to button the shirt. Both arms are through it now and one is in a sling but the shirt. It's wide open. Hello.

He absently pulls the front closed and begins to button. In the middle. The buttons don't match and the right side of the shirt hangs lower than the left. My OCD wants to ask him to fix it and pay attention but my heart is just thankful that he wasn't here the night Cole came over. Had Ben been in the house I imagine Cole would be dead. The only reason Jacob didn't kill Cole is because the police pulled him off. It took three of them but they pulled him off.

Ben blushes when he gets to the end of his buttoning chores. The crooked shirt is hanging to my knees. It looks ridiculous. He tells me I look like a supermodel and I burst out laughing and then I start to cry.

He puts his arm around my good shoulder and kisses my ear. I flinch and squeal and he jumps back.

Sorry! Sorry, bee, oh, Jesus.

He frowns at my accusatory expression and I can see how much this has affected him. He has lines on his face. He's grim. He matches Jake in seriousness. I am still reeling. The boys are heartbroken and angry. Caleb is nonexistent. I'm sure he knows everything that is going on. He's a lawyer. His brother has lost his family and is in jail and PJ has left about fifty messages for him but he hasn't contacted us.

Which means he is reeling too. I have no idea how Caleb copes in a true crisis because I never stay close enough to him to find out.

It's four and half years later and I have just found out how he dealt with things. On one hand I'm grateful and on the other hand I'm really not surprised after all. Even more surprised it didn't come out sooner.