Better left.

Is that what it is? The grand gestures? The fact that they fall all over themselves to see to your happiness?

There's no magic formula so you should save your breath.

You don't believe in second chances?

No and don't tell me you do. You never gave me any.

I'd like to, now.

It's too late. I mourned you first.

You got in over your head and couldn't get back out. It wasn't your fault. And I should have done something.

You should have done a lot of things.

You were supposed to come back.

No, I wasn't.

Look me in the eye and say that.

No.

No because you don't believe the words coming out of your own mouth. Peanut, what did you talk yourself into this time?

He had asked me that question once before, the day I spent all of my pin money on blue cotton candy and ate nothing else for a whole day and then had a single warm beer and spent the remainder of the evening behind the trailer, barfing up blue foamy surprise. He laughed then and walked away, back to the bonfire. I crawled back into the camper, wiped my face on his last remaining clean t-shirt and fell asleep fully clothed in the center of the bed. I never did figure out who he was more angry with that night, me or himself.

He takes care of me.

I took care of you too, once upon a time.

You took a pass, that's what you did. You hung me out to dry and you let Cole take over and look what happened.

If you love someone, set them free. He laughed bitterly and took a sip of his drink.

It wasn't meant to be, Lochlan.

Sure it was. The fortune teller told you so.

You never told me what she said to you.

Because she was a sham. Because it's not important.

Then you can tell me.

He took a longer drink this time. Courage, it meant and I regretted asking. I am done. I don't want to talk anymore.

She said that I would forever be watching you fall and be unable to help you. And that it was my punishment for what I have done.

But nothing had happened yet, Loch.

He nodded. Cold blood ran through my veins as I took the glass right out of his hand and finished his drink. It was pure whiskey and I was wholly unprepared.

I coughed hard and pushed the glass to him. I don't need this. I don't need him. I don't need these feelings bubbling up all the time like air bubbles trapped beneath the surface. But they do, and I have to get used to it. Just like he does.

Soap and glory.

I sat quietly on the edge of the bathtub while he dipped the facecloth into the nail polish remover. My skin is slightly pink and raw now, but he is gently working to remove the last of his words. I wanted to let them wear off gradually but he is somewhat sheepish about people's opinions of Bridget as his own personal canvas.

He paused and smiled at me and then went back to slowly scrubbing the back of my knee, head tilted to the side. He is concentrating on removing as many letters as he can without causing any undo amount of suffering but my skin tingles and burns.

It's the best love letter I've ever gotten, Ben.

I didn't do it to win a competition, bee.

I know that. I just wanted you to know anyway.

He stopped and dropped the cloth into the tub.

There, I think you're good as new.

I wish I was new sometimes.

Me too, bee. But it won't stop me.

He reached over his head and pulled his t-shirt off and then slid down his jeans and stepped out. Starting the shower with one hand, he checked for the hot water and then turned off all the lights in the bathroom. He took me by the hand and pulled me into the spray against his chest and smoothed my hair back from my face. His hair is dry. He is above the spray and I am drowning.

He proceeds to wash off all the caustic chemicals he had to use on my skin and he promises not to do it again, that next time he will paint the words in chocolate, or maybe in icing or lip gloss and eat the results, that he forgets I'm not so tough, that I am accountable and I am so done with his unwarranted apologies so I pull his head down, pulling myself up around his neck and I kiss him. He stops talking. It's like a miracle and I'm in control for a few blissful seconds until he pushes me into the wall and I am his object once again to be used and admired and ruined.

And ruin he does. :)

By the time we are finished my skin is wrinkled and throbbing. Heck, everything is throbbing. He turns off the water and wraps me in a towel and bursts out laughing. I am pink all over. A little lobster.

He pulls the towel off and bends down around me. A long hug. A never-let-go hug. An I just totally destroyed your dignity and everything is just fine now hug and I reach up and hold on so hard. I think I could almost fall asleep if I wasn't practically hanging and he whispers in my ear,

Okay, maybe it was a competition. And I nailed it. Just like I just nailed you.

He makes his letch-face and I can't help but laugh out loud. Ben is like that. From class to crass in the blink of an eye.

I still wish he had left the words. I wasn't finished taking pictures yet.

The safest road to Hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.
- C. S. Lewis

And quoted by my dear friend Sam from his favorite book:

Be sober, be vigilant because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.

Heavy sleep.

I've lost all that I wanted to leave
I've lost all that I wanted to be
Don't believe that there's nothing that's true
Don't believe in this modern machine

This morning I followed Lochlan into the kitchen. I can't seem to open my eyes, sleep clings to me like a shroud, reluctant to burn away with the sun. I move past him and head straight for the brew button on the coffeemaker when I hear him swear. He walks over to me and pulls back the neck on my t-shirt and looks at my skin. Another curse and he turns me around to face him and lifts up the front of my shirt. It's then that I realize what he sees.

I am covered.

Head to toe.

In Benjamin's words.

The only things he didn't write on were my arms from the elbows down and my face and neck. He wrote in black sharpie over tattoos and over blank places alike. When the black ran dry he switched to purple and kept on writing until he was finished. It took me all morning to read it, to the point where I was standing on the counter in the bathroom to see the hard to reach places.

On my toes it says BENLU VSBEE.

And here I said I was a light sleeper.

The late shrift.

Take a breath
Hold it in
Start a fight
You won't win
Had enough
Let's begin

I know how he thinks, how his mind has twisted the present into a blend of the past and the future, a dreamworld in which he doesn't have to be absent in the moonlight or center stage in the circus instead of watching from the back, fingers laced with mine, or arms tightly wrapped around me while I stand tucked into his coat, clapping my hands, jumping up and down, banging the top of my head against his chin, making him swear like a gentleman pirate or just a highly irritated teenage boy. Ow. Owowow.

This was in the days before beard growth seemed very successful at all, something that doesn't seem to happen until one's late twenties, it seems. It's okay though, he was always chewing gum on top of my head, grinding his chin against my skull gently but endlessly so if I jumped up and he bit his tongue then it was what he deserved. His chin is softer now. Did I mention I love beards? Because I do and that is partly why. They hurt a hell of a lot less.

The nickname Lochlan gave me was the very first. Had I started this journal before 1997 it would have had a vastly different name. Hell, I'd have a whole different identity, perhaps.

I've never shared it with anyone because it evaporated suddenly along with my dreams of living my life out on the road with the show. Lochlan stopped using it the day he broke up with me when I was still too young to fully understand heartbreak and I haven't heard it since. Apparently it was something he continued to use under his breath or in his head, much like I'll walk around calling Ben a shithead but never OUT LOUD because that isn't nice, right?

Right. So out of the blue Sunday night Lochlan said it, and I'm not sure if he slipped (but he doesn't slip, for he is perfect) or if it was a calculated attempt to undermine Benjamin (which he does, we're just not bright enough to catch him) but he came into the dining room last night long after dinner was finished, dressed in his armor, ready for battle with the road, jacket not zipped up yet but two helmets threaded up his forearm. One was mine.

Want to go for a quick ride, peanut?

Ben's fist hit the table and the dishes jumped six inches, causing Ruth to call down the stairs to see if we were finally having an earthquake and was she missing it? And PJ put his hand on Ben's shoulder as in, get up and I'll step in if I have to.

Because the children had already gone to bed for the night and the last thing they need is to bear audible witness to any more violence or sadness or anger, ever. I'm dreaming when I say I want to shield them from all of it and sadly they understand how emotions can get the best of people but they also know that we all need to work harder to keep ours under control, and to control our outbursts and impulses. Being human, this is hard. Being in a complicated environment such as this, harder still.

Lochlan didn't move a muscle, he just kept staring at me, waiting for my answer, waiting for nostalgia to kick in and point out to me that he had just called me something he called me every ten minutes for six years straight and something I may have missed dearly but had filed away for all eternity up until that moment last night. Ben saw my face. I was horrified by how I felt, hearing it after so long.

Ben didn't let me say anything though. Instead all my efforts were focused on getting out of the way as he upended the dining room table, dishes and all but only half of it came away because the leaf is out and I couldn't get the two halves to click back together properly last week. He was in Lochlan's face in two seconds flat, PJ holding him back but barely. You can't hold Ben back. He's a locomotive with a chip on his shoulder, anger-management classes be damned, all this damage over one little insignificant circus peanut.

Only I am not insignificant, nor am I exclusive. Anymore, anyway.

PJ's grip on Ben put him at a disadvantage and Lochlan clocked him with the helmets. Reflex? Opportunity? I'll never ask. I'm not sure Ben even felt it as badly as everyone else heard it, since he is singularly focused in his jealousy and impervious to pain besides. Lochlan isn't strong enough to hurt him but for that awful moment I doubted that fact and I thought he had hurt Ben and I kind of zoned out and Daniel was there by then and he took me out of the room, upstairs and we told the kids the table fell and the boys were arguing over the best way to put it back, shucks, you know how loud they are, sorry, and I pushed away from him and ran back downstairs to the dining room and Schuyler had invited Lochlan to get his sweet face out of Ben's universe and he put the helmets aside and PJ was standing while Ben was sitting with his elbows on the table. Working to keep control.

It's just a name, Benny. I said it quietly but I don't think he heard me.

PJ shook his head in warning. I ignored it. Ben exploded up out of his chair once again and this time he didn't get a pat on the shoulder from PJ, he got tackled from behind. My poor Ben. Everyone is hurting him, he just wants to be happy.

PJ put him on the floor and Ben flipped over and stood back up and asked him if he was fucking insane, that he wasn't going to hurt me or anyone else and what the fuck, who decided whether or not he could touch me when Lochlan seemed to get a free pass from everyone under the sun. To do whatever he wants, all the time, with no one second-guessing him or evaluating him or telling him to back off/cool down/step back/give up.

Exactly.

So PJ took a step back and Lochlan threw another one of those stupid unpredictable punches and Ben grabbed the front of his shirt and it was on. They brawled for a good minute on the floor as if it were the rink and I think they both came out of it hurting, judging by the amount of blood I spent the morning washing out of clothing and the pile of buttons here to be sewn back on their shirts.

I did not find any teeth this time. Huh. They must have gone easy on each other after all.

They made up under threat of being sent to live in the garage, together. Forever. Because I can't have this in the house. I can't have this near the children, asleep or awake. I can't deal with this and I can't really deal with Lochlan choosing to space out his attacks on my heart like this. I think I like it better when they just throw everything they have at me and I can reject it and things return to a quiet simmer.

Lochlan used my nickname again last night and I'm not really sure if he has a deathwish but Ben's fingers tightened around his fork and he just kept on listening to the idle chatter around the table. Later in the dark he held on to me as I gave myself up to the night. Dreamless sleep. No circus, no music, no nightmares and no ghosts. As long as he's touching me I can fall hard, like a peanut onto the hard-packed dirt of a circus tent floor. I'm certain I'm not deserving of the amount of attention I get from either of them, but they seem convinced that I am.

Peanut. What the fuck.

Found a distraction in my inbox. You're welcome.

(You can click to make this bigger, I think.)

Here. Someone wanted to know what I carry in my purse. The now-infamous Maggie Bag from Coach, joined by the Poppy Groovy wallet, both in a strange sparkly black leather that gets softer and more fluid every week that I bash them around, because I'm hard on things. I don't mean to be, maybe I just finally have things of quality that can stand up to a little enthusiastic use.

So...inside the bag? A map of metro Vancouver. Because I get lost a lot. Covergirl pressed powder (I am so NOT a makeup snob) in vampire-pale. Clinique Mascara in blacker-than-night, Covergirl eyeliner. I forget what color, either green or black. A brush to separate my lashes in case I actually use the mascara, because I am messy.

Lanolin hand cream because nothing feels better than innersheep-grease (says Duncan). Sexy Motherpucker lipgloss (which is painful, holy shit), two Peaceful cause-metics balms (one chocolate, one rose), Tokidoki lipgloss, 2 Loreal and a Kat Von D gloss (AKA snacks for Ben), a pill bottle containing a bunch of Advils for grownups, a couple of children's Advils and a few Lactaids. Bandaids.

My apple noise-canceling headphones. A pen. Too Cute mints that have a slide-out mirror. Bach's rescue remedy. Various bobby pins, hair ties and a ouchless clip for my perpetual twist. Cough drops, my vampire picnic cosmetic bag from Kukubee and my key ring. If you look to the far right you can see the baby blue glittery enamel Princess charm that Jacob bought for me seven billion years ago on a lark.

There, one mystery solved. I bet you were hoping that the contents of my purse were far more sinister than they are. Actually you would be right. Missing from this photo at my lawyer's request are the condoms and sex toys, lit fireworks, monogrammed guitar picks, pocket fire extinguisher, dozens of stolen still-warm human hearts I have begun to collect, and a live goat. Just in case.

I wonder if you are sorry you asked?

(This boy does not care what's in the bag, unless I'm carrying his feed bag, in which case he knows I have apples and sugar in my pockets and he gets right down against the fence and gives me the eye. )

Baudelaire Sundays

Because nothing says a darker, sunny Sunday like very good French poetry.

Je suis belle, ô mortels! comme un rêve de pierre,
Et mon sein, où chacun s'est meurtri tour à tour,
Est fait pour inspirer au poète un amour
Eternel et muet ainsi que la matière.

Je trône dans l'azur comme un sphinx incompris;
J'unis un coeur de neige à la blancheur des cygnes;
Je hais le mouvement qui déplace les lignes,
Et jamais je ne pleure et jamais je ne ris.

Les poètes, devant mes grandes attitudes,
Que j'ai l'air d'emprunter aux plus fiers monuments,
Consumeront leurs jours en d'austères études;

Car j'ai, pour fasciner ces dociles amants,
De purs miroirs qui font toutes choses plus belles:
Mes yeux, mes larges yeux aux clartés éternelles!

Joining millions of bloggers everywhere by taking a picture of my lunch.

The snow trimmed the neighborhood in white but we went out in force anyway. Dry pavement, full sun, the promise of a round of chowder for lunch and people-watching, turning the tables on those who think just because they've seen someone in a magazine they have earned the right to eavesdrop on their existence. Cold wind on the motorcycles, my face was red under my helmet, hair making a halo around my collar where curls would escape from where they were left tucked in. Ben did a last minute inspection of me and told me to signal him if I was too cold. I believe he still thinks I am made of glass by day and opaque indestructable marble at night.

I did not signal. I should have signalled. Okay I had one truck ride with Schuyler when the traffic crawled to a virtual standstill when a nearby neighborhood was cleared of traffic and inhabitants due to an IED found in a park (Hurt Lockerish photos from the news) so our plans were actually truncated by the ridiculous wait times on the highway but still, it was enough over a break from ducking under rainclouds that I feel somewhat sated and less wanderlustish tonight.

Until the morning, anyway.

Lochlan did not pull rank when I did not join him. He took his fast bike anyway and I'm generally nowhere near it because he's a bit of a maniac on it but I still think he was hoping for a little time. He doesn't need time, he is home all week, working from his little home office off his bedroom, close by to have all the time in the world so this day was about time with Ben. Scrunched in beside him in the booth. I had given up my crackers to the kids when the waiter lost our order (I think he was a little overwhelmed by the boys) and Ben shared his crackers with me to crumble into my chowder.
It was good (and OMG I am so messy). The whole day was good. Except for the IED part. That was completely unnecessary and a little over the top.

Even for us.

Sentimental circus (no sideshow).

And if you think real beauty's on the outside
Well that's a far cry
From the truth

Maybe all the information you received
Well you should not believe
There's no proof

PJ returns to the house after a brief holiday and the house returns to a completely comical version of its unbridled self. PJ runs a tight ship. PJ lives in my boathouse, so no surprise there.

But he is never down there. Instead he stands behind me as I navigate my days, giving Caleb these looks that just stun him into total silence or incredibly obvious subject replacements because for some reason PJ's word is gospel where no one else has ever set their hands on such a scripture before. Maybe it's because I do so well when he is around. Maybe it's because of the full moon/impending spring. Even Lochlan follows PJ's directions like a spoiled but compliant little boy and Benjamin wouldn't question PJ even if PJ told him to go naked bungee jumping for a good cause.

For the record..we're not going. We do give a lot to causes we believe in, and we keep the organizations and the donations closely guarded for obvious reasons. It makes it easier to deflect those who flat-out ask for money (don't).

Besides, Bridget (at almost forty) versus gravity? Are you out of your mind? There's a risk I won't take and I won't even get started on the whole leaping willfully off a high place because it's just not the way today is and so let's close the flap on that tent and move along to the larger, more colorful, bustling hard-floored tent that you've been watching us raise up in the dust for days.

Which is that I've been taking a lot of supplements lately.

Not a lot, just a few. But many days have since passed and I've been noticing something amazing that sort of surprised me and pleased me at the same time.

Mental clarity.

(Oh, God. There's PJ, reading over my shoulder like a nosy transit rider, chortling to himself over precisely how much mental clarity I could possibly have left when my head is so freakishly small and I stumble over the children's names fourteen times a day usually and I write every single thing down so I don't forget and really at this point he is becoming a thug, like a volunteer bouncer/well-compensated security guard looming behind my shoulders snarling at everything in sight so what exactly would he know about mental acrobatics and really, you want to see something amazing, PJ? Come over here and hold this rope and I'll show you the trick where I slide down to the knot with one leg locked on it and then turn myself around in mid-air, supporting my own weight, while it swings at fifty miles an hour. Dizzying, hey? Now shut the fuck up.)

No, really! It's uncanny. I haven't missed anyone's name in three days. I have remembered to take my vitamins/put the laundry in the dryer/walk the dog/send a thank you card/call the dentist without writing down a single thing.

That doesn't happen, but it's happening. Now. To me.

I can't imagine the fun of being able to retain the pages I read or the continued success in having random conversations without fluttering, stuttering, pausing to conjure up the right words or that thought I had right before I heard Ruth/the helicopter in the sky/the windchimes/doorbell/ringing phone.

I also feel happy without a specific reason. Stupidly so.

So it's definitely either spring fever or the thought of a full-frontal before-and-after shot of any naked bungee jumpers in my vicinity, with their newly stretched-out limbs and distorted naughty parts.

I'll figure it out eventually. I'm off to infect the big lunk with a little 'clarity'. Because he's walking around singing that stupid Britney Spears song. The new one. Because he knows I don't appreciate popular music in the way most people do.

I'm fine with that, too. (<--Not Britney Spears but also a new video on the scene this week. It's awesome).

Jacob would tell me, Just say the day was challenging, Bridget.

The day was challenging, Bridget.