Back fire.

His eyes were bright. I told you, it's a surprise.

Is it safe?

I am suspicious these days and that makes Lochlan sad. Instead of spending our days working for extra money to get through the lean times between towns toward the beginning of autumn, we are preparing to go home at the end of this run. Usually we would stay on for another few weeks, almost right up until school but things have changed. I tremble in my sleep. I have black circles under my eyes. I am afraid when he leaves the camper and I hold my breath until he comes back. He has shifted all of his energy into keeping me distracted.

You're going to love it. That's all I want to tell you so that I don't ruin this.

He turns into the field abruptly. We are on an unmarked dirt road off the highway, rutted and pocked with holes. We bump along forever, jarring our teeth against our skulls, rocking deliriously as the truck shifts and heaves over the bumps, falling into the dips and highlighting a total lack of remaining suspension.

Finally he says There! He leans over and presses his head against mine and points his finger out in front so that I can follow it.

There is an upright piano in the center of a field of lavender.

I gasp. My first thought is he engineered this, only Lochlan doesn't have a piano and he hasn't left me alone for weeks now and this has clearly been here for a while. He lies anyway. I didn't do this, Bridge. I heard about it on the line.

He keeps driving until we are closer and then he turns the truck off and I am out the door, running straight through the tall flowers until I reach out and put my hands on the top.

It's real.

I bring my hands up to my face and then drop them to run my fingers across the weathered cover. I don't dare open it. Maybe it's empty. Who leaves a piano in a field? It's from the forties, says the faded remnant of the maker's dated signature.

Play for me.

He opens the cover to reveal yellowed, cracked keys. They are ruined but intact. I reach out and press middle C. Clear as a bell. Someone has tuned this. This is no accident. I smile breathlessly, ducking under to see if there are pedals. Yes. He tests other keys and laughs. This is amazing, isn't it?

Look at this. Can you imagine playing outdoors, Locket?

No. I can't. You should show me.

He smiles and winks. He totally engineered this. I'm sure he thinks I am dying. I've said twelve words in three weeks, up until now. I don't eat. I'm becoming a ghost. His insistence that the show go on (someday he will run the show, I'm sure) rings of comfort in times of great difficulty. (Through them, you will be entertained, Bridget and that will help you forget.)

But it didn't help, it just kills more time. That's why we're leaving early this year, with a promise to be back next summer. Hopefully by then I will understand what has happened because as it stands now, I don't. I only know that I became collateral damage in a war between Lochlan and Caleb. Everything will be different now. Everything is different now.

Dutifully I play the beginning of Fur Elise and a smile lights up his face.

Keep going! I wish I brought a camera.

I shift gears and give him a little of Heart and Soul and he grins and slides me down the bench, pushing in next to me. We used to play that song on the piano at my house once I taught him how. I play bits and pieces of a few more songs. I feel happy suddenly.

I like this, Bridget. It sounds so poignant.

What does that mean?

Touching. Special. Intense. Like you.

I shake my head.

Yes, you. Keep playing. We have to be back at four.

You go. I'll be staying here.

I can't do that, Bridget. Oh, here we go.

You don't get to decide. I hold my tiny patch of dusty, sun-baked ground.

Yes, I do.

You don't own me. I'm staying.

He looks up to check the time, using the sun. I'm a little bit sure he isn't human, he's good at too many things and even completely sure of his doubt, if you can believe it. He squints through his curls and then looks back at me. He does own me. He has the temporary paperwork to prove it but he doesn't say that. Instead he scolds me gently. Half-father, half-lover, it's no wonder we were doomed to fail.

We're leaving in fifteen minutes. Play until then and we'll come back tomorrow.

I sit and stare at him. We won't be back. Tomorrow has no free time scheduled. His touching plan has backfired and now he's taking this small bit of happiness away the moment I get my hands on it.

Did you do this just to hurt me then?

Jesus, Bridget, no. I did it to make you happy. To give you a little break.

But we have to leave and I'm not ready!

How long did you want to stay then?

I don't know.

You don't want to go back at all, do you?

No.

If we leave the show you go home, peanut. I won't be there when you have nightmares.

I burst into tears. I am twelve years old, I don't know why I have to make these decisions. I don't want to be at the show anymore but I want to stay with Lochlan. You are my home. Maybe we can figure something out. Maybe we can just run away and find a place to live.

And do what to make ends meet?

Hustle, Locket.

He laughs and it breaks the tension. I am encouraged.

We could do it, Lochlan. We'd probably be okay.

He shakes his head. We wouldn't be okay. But do you see? He walks away and comes back, kissing me hard on the cheek. This is why I love you, Bridget. Your dreams. You live inside a perfect world you created in your head. Your dreams are real.

I shiver when he turns around. Gosh, I hope they aren't. Every dream sees the big bad wolf coming for me. Lochlan steps in front of me and is eaten first. When Caleb takes off the wolf's head and licks his lips I start screaming and wake myself up. When my eyes open again Lochlan has set the piano on fire with his mind and is walking away. I run after him yelling his name above the roar of the flames and he stops and waits for me. He keeps saying he's sorry but I don't know what for.

Devoted.

I have been sitting on the floor, my back resting against the side of the bed. He sleeps easily, tangled in sheets and contentment. I sip red wine from a big goblet and eat Cracker Jacks out of the box. Once, a thousand years ago when I was eight I told Caleb I wanted to find a compass at the bottom of a box. He still buys boxes of Jacks for me to keep the hope alive, and still I have that hope that when I find that stupid compass I will know the way home.

I grow tired of the candy and shake the remainder of the contents out on the floor. At the bottom is a paper pouch. I open it and find a sticker of an Irish flag. I peel it off and stick it on my forehead.

Diabhal, I say under my breath.

His sleepy, gentle hand traces my hair.

Neamhchiontach, he whispers back.

The broken tellurion.

And I will be good at making bad
And I'll light the way for the fucking mad
I will defeat what I'm heading for
And I will be here for evermore

I close my eyes. So hard to stay awake this afternoon.

Then what happened?

He taught himself to eat fire.

Why?

He wasn't scary enough.

Caleb stifles a laugh. No, the other part.

If you were going to breathe fire he would consume it, just to show that he could overcome you. Or overpower you. I forget which.

And then what happened?

I tried to balance all of you at once on my tightrope.

The low one with the blindfold while he threw the flaming hoops up and you'd jump through them?

Yes.

Were you scared?

No. If you trust the person responsible for your safety, then there is no fear. Besides, it's nothing compared to the highwire.

But you are afraid of me, Bridget.

Do the math, please.

Why don't you trust me?

You've used everyone you've ever met, yourself included. Self-sabotage is such an amazing redemption, I couldn't find any more suitable penance for you if I tried.

He puts his head down against my shoulder and pushes against it.

I don't think I ended up too bad off.

Is that proper grammar?

I have no idea, I'm a lawyer, not a writer.

He laughs and drinks Dom straight from the bottle. We have been in bed for two days, celebrating his call to the bar. Well, that and he loaned Cole a whole bunch of money and Caleb decided the interest was due up front. The interest being in me.

Am I a capital gain or a dividend, then?

What are you talking about? He laughs and takes another drink. I daresay he isn't really paying attention to the words anymore, whether they are used correctly in a sentence or not.

I have given up keeping everyone straight at this point. I am in my mid-twenties and they all think they're so smart, double-crossing one another. Lochlan has spent the better part of a decade telling people I am too much work and therefore he was finished forever ago, only he never actually went away. I pilfer time with him from Cole as a respite for the time I am forced to spend with Caleb.

Only I have come to a place where I only act like I hate what Cole does because it is my absolution too.

I get up and go outside and curl up in the lounge chair on the balcony. It's thirty degrees in the sun. Beautiful. Caleb follows me out and readjusts the umbrella so that I am in full shade. I frown and he just says you burn.

I do. I burn. I burn for everything.

The heat and the exhaustion and the champagne put me to sleep in seconds and I pull the sheet up around my shoulders and let it happen.

When I wake up it is late afternoon, twenty years later and the sunny day has turned overcast. I frown at the sky while my stomach growls. My mouth tastes like cotton batting and my head hurts so I go inside to get an aspirin and some juice. When I step inside I hear him on the phone.
He sounds frustrated. He's talking in his Secrets voice. Quietly. Adamantly.

I go away for a few years and I've been fighting my way back in ever since. He does the same thing but then picks up right where he left off without acknowledgement of the absence on her part. He conducts his life expecting her to just be there for him and she IS. He doesn't notice husbands or time, for that matter. Every time there is great difficulty he vanishes, deals with it and then he comes back strong, ready to take over again. I think it's that distance that keeps him grounded so he can help her cope after the fact but she blames him for abandonment and that's what keeps her doubting him, to my credit. But they are one soul divided down the middle. That I know for certain.

The devil is counting his roster. We have denied him whole numbers. Part of me smiles at the description. One soul. Two bodies. Part of me cries because he is still obsessed with both of us, moreso than I hoped. How many casualties will there be from those who try to break this bond? The more success that is gained, the higher the price that is paid. They have learned nothing from Cole or from Jacob. After all.

Who is the devil now? I'll give you a hint. She's standing wrapped in a sheet, listening at the door and she looks as if she couldn't harm a fly. Caleb walks out of the room abruptly, tucking his phone into his shirt pocket. He is dressed. He is leaving. He turns and smiles at me (a lie) and kisses my cheek gently.

An investment, Bridget. That's what you are.

And he walks out the door.

Smoking is only cool if you do it ironically.

This is what Duncan says when I come out with a lemonade for him. The temperature cracked a balmy eight degrees today, we are celebrating. He holds up his cigarette in offering to me and I shake my head.

Are you a hipster now, Duncan?

Possibly. Though you make me seem more like Hunter S. Thompson when you write about me.

Oh holy shit, you're a blog reader. It's even worse than I suspected.

Ben walks out onto the steps. What's worse? That Dunk's a hipster now?

No, a blog-reader. Ben, get the children. I think we can escape in the night. Leave everything behind.

Do...do blog readers take children?

I don't know but it's creepy.

Yay. Duncan becomes the creepy one for once. Ben jumps into the air and claps his hands, his voice a frighteningly funny falsetto.

At least I don't eat my wife's makeup all fucking day long, Frankie. Duncan lands a punch against Ben's arm as he comes down to the patio. Ben picks up Duncan's lemonade and drinks it all. He gets down with his hands on Duncan's shoulders and says, That's not all I eat, baby and runs his hands through Duncan's hair.

Duncan swats him away as I shake with laughter. I'm trying not to egg them on.

Seriously. What's wrong with hipsters now, Bridget?

Their pants. They look like they hurt. So tight. On dudes, no less.

You're just jealous because they don't make skinny jeans small enough for you, babe.

She'd never be in them for long anyway, Ben says and puts the glass upside down on Duncan's head and licks the side of his face. Duncan swats it off and asks Ben if he's ever serious. Like, ever.

Not anymore, I keep my emotions underground, man. Ben says it somberly and I can't hold my giggles in any longer. I crack up laughing out loud. It feels good.

Elusive character(istics).

The coughing started almost immediately, uncontrollably. I covered my mouth with both hands. Lochlan put his hand on my back and waited patiently. Then he handed me his bottle of pop and told me to drink it. I drank some and started coughing again. He thumped my back twice, gently and then rubbed it hard. I twisted away from him.

So the second I look away you decide to try cigarettes for the first time?

No, I was...choking. Ate a peanut. I look down. Such a bad liar.

My hair is burning. It gives me away. He uses his hands to put it out. It smokes. Just the one lock that was still sitting in the ashtray that I dropped the cigarette on when I began to cough.

Nice, Bridget. Light yourself on fire trying to sneak a drag. I love the smell of burning hair. He makes a funny face at me. His features are goofy, elastic.

Sorry. (Said between fits of coughing and laughing)

Nine is too young to smoke, okay?

When did you start?

This year. He laughs. But I only have one a week. Sometimes. He leans back and hooks his hands into his pockets, assuming a casual stance. He instantly becomes the coolest teenager I know. He was anyway. I cough again.

Drink some more and don't ever do that again. I will show you how to do it right in five years.

Five years?

Yes. When you're as old as I am now. Fifteen.

***

The day I turned fifteen, I walked to Lochlan's. I had stolen a cigarette from Cole's pack the night before and hidden it in the case with my sunglasses. I knocked on the door and Lochlan opened it and said Happy Birthday, peanut! He reached out and pulled me into his arms. He remains by far the most affectionate of all the boys even though we've been broken up for almost a year and I go out with Cole now. But Cole is too busy being insane. Lochlan grounds me. He always has time for me even though if you ask him he will point out all of my flaws and no one can argue with that. It doesn't bother me much since I know he's lying. It will bother me in a few years but not right now. Little has changed for us, honestly.

He kisses my forehead hard and tells me he just woke up.

Perfect timing. I want to learn to smoke, Locket. I pull out the case and hold up the cigarette.

What? No, Bridget.

You promised. I drop between us like a divide. It rests up against the other promises that will take the rest of our lives to play out.

I did, didn't I? But you've been smoking here and there, what am I supposed to teach you exactly?

How to like it.

If you don't like it don't do it.

But I want to look cool!

You do. He stands there and smiles and breaks my cigarette in two. I frown at his expression. I don't understand what they see. Maybe it's the vantage point. I stopped growing at twelve and can't see the world from up where they can. Lochlan kept growing and is way taller now at eighteen. The view up there must be better somehow.

***

He is standing outside on the patio, one hand jammed into his pocket for warmth, shoulders hunched, shivering slightly. It hasn't been a warm March here. He takes a drag as I hand him his coffee and says thanks.

How is quitting going?

He holds it out, offering me a drag. I decline. Cigarettes give me massive headaches. That and I am no longer determined to look cool. I don't think I ever managed it a day in my life so I'll settle for just looking unusual and hopefully still pretty.

As well as ever. One a week or so. He frowns comically which makes me laugh out loud. He is forty-six and a half. He will never change.

Still want to learn to look cool? He asks as he exhales away from me, out the side of his smile.

Yes! Maybe I do still want to learn to pull it off after all.

Okay stand there...relax your shoulders, Bridget. Geez, you stand so tightly. Don't ever try and juggle.

I loosen up and wait.

Now smile...

I smile and wait some more.

There you go. You got it. He winks at me, puts out his cigarette and turns to go inside. I watch him until he disappears and then I see this girl standing in the reflection of the glass doors. She does look cool. Must be the smiling. I hardly ever do it, unless ordered to, or tricked.

Chasm.

I am facing the open ocean. The plan was simple but I didn't know it yet. Conquering my fear of swimming in the deep, where the water holds mysteries in the most amazing shade of dark, sparkling teal. Out where the dolphins play and where the shipwrecks begin. We would never come close to the edge of the continental shelf below but that did not stop my sixteen-year-old imagination from conjuring up a leviathan of epic proportions coming up from the depths to swallow me whole.

The water numbs my thighs and licks at my hair. The wind is fierce today. Whitecaps. An undertow which twice already forced me to pinwheel my arms and grab for Lochlan, standing just to my left. It's an unconscious, habitual action not lost on Cole, who stands to my right. They don't have any problem holding ground as the waves pull back from the shore.

I am tempted to pack it in. The water is freezing and black. The wind is too strong. My bathing suit is too spare. I am old enough to push every boundary that I can these days with my wardrobe choices. String bikinis are my usual attire. I have three. White, baby blue and green. I wear nothing else, unless we are in town and then the green hoodie and cut off shorts will make an appearance over them. I might wear shoes if I absolutely must. My hair is down to my thighs now, habitually twisted into a low bun because I have decided it makes me look older than the braids ever did. I am probably wrong.

On three? Cole shouts across the breeze and I nod and dive in before he begins to count. After a moment I feel his hand on my ankle briefly as he follows me. I swim underneath the surface until my lungs crush in. Then I surface, gasping. His head pops up almost at the same time. He looks proud of me. You're doing great, doll. Come on! He flips back under the water and I follow above. I am not looking down, I have decided I will swim until I hit Ireland. At least I think I will. I see Lochlan swimming fifteen feet away, his easy crawl making me jealous suddenly.

Thirty feet from shore and he is closer but still ahead of us. Ten feet ahead and to the left. He has dropped his pace to stay nearby. He knows I am dumb enough to accept Cole's challenges whether I can manage them or not. He knows that Cole is a more renegade version of Caleb. We're a recipe for disaster but we've been together every day for a year now and so far so good.

Cole swims beside me. Breaststroke. He begins to tell me that huge fish are circling below us in the abyss. He thinks it's hilarious. Fear weighs my limbs down and I begin to swim in dog-paddle fashion, like I did when I was little and the boys told me if I wanted to swim out to the raft at the lake I would have to do it myself but then I would freak out once the water was fifteen feet deep and Lochlan would come back and pull my arms around his neck and bring me the rest of the way. There is no helping hand at fifteen. I'm not a baby anymore but the way I'm swimming and panicking is beginning to use up all of my energy and I falter and stop, treading water.

I look down and the large rocks below us are monsters, ascending from trenches below and I freak. Cole's face goes from jubilant to regretful just as Lochlan's hand closes around my arm. He pulls my arms around his neck, swearing at Cole and turns back to shore. I bend my elbows until I am pressed against his back. I feel his muscles repeating as he swims quickly back to shore and once we touch bottom he paces through the water and punches Cole. Cole goes down and then recovers and shoves Lochlan right back. They are evenly matched in size.

Jesus, Loch. She wasn't in any danger.

Panicked people drown.

How could she drown when we're both right there? He is incredulous and maybe Lochlan jumped the gun. My loyalties waver. Flitter flutter. I don't say anything. I stand there shivering in my green bikini and wrap my arms around myself. I'm staring at both of them. Back and forth.

Did you feel afraid, Bridget?

Yes.

Then you're LIVING! Cole shouts the word. He is proud that he scared me. I nod obediently but I don't know what he means and I'm anxious to prove loyalty. Lochlan gives us the worst look and storms the rest of the way back to the beach. He doesn't wait for us, he just picks his belongings up as he passes the blanket and goes straight to his truck, peeling out into traffic without looking back. Cole laughs and then turns serious.

I keep thinking at some point he's going to stop thinking he owns you but it doesn't seem to be happening.

I dismiss his words, since Lochlan dropped me into Cole's life and let go anyway. It was a fluke that he brought me back to shore. If he hadn't been there, Cole would have. I am angry suddenly, defensive. He's fine. Maybe he had a bad day, okay?

It's ten in the morning.

Bad night then.

He stares at me. Or rather, through me and I look out to sea. It's freezing. Let's go in. I turn and leave him there and wade in laborious strides through the shallow breaking waves until I can wrap my towel around myself. The sun has disappeared behind the clouds and the beach is sombre and empty. I wait by our belongings as he takes his time coming in. When he reaches me he has already made up his mind.

I guess next time we just won't invite him. He can't save you if he isn't here, right, dollface?

Three years ago Caleb said the same thing. I'm in over my head.

I'll never go out into the deep water again.

Harm less. Worth less.

When I make it across the drive Satan is awake. Dressed, possibly from yesterday, since he remains in his bespoke pinstripe shirt with the french cuffs and his braces after more endless meetings kept him mired downtown, far away from me. I saw the car pull in. I was not waiting but I was not sleeping either.

He does not smile. There will be no lies today.

He strings his words out slowly. His voice is shaking, the trembling matches mine. Only his is rage and mine is fear.

You never loved my brother.

You're wrong.

You engineered your false distance from each other in order to screw me over and everyone since. Cole, Jake. BEN.

On this point I remain perfectly silent but I shake my head when he gets to the second and third names. He stares at me. I stare at him.

You do realize none of the blame falls on you. You can't make life decisions at such a young age.

You can't make them at twenty either.

What is the threshold of adulthood then, Bridget?

Salary. Independence.

Oh and the fucking carnival doesn't count?

No. It's a hiding place in a life game of hide and seek.

Yes it is, isn't it? And it's a place where you lose your innocence.

You should know.

I took advantage to prove a point. He can't take care of you.

You're a predator. He was doing just fine.

And then look at the convoluted mess ever since, Bridget. Is that my fault? I walked away. I protected my interests from him and clearly he has done the same and hung you out to dry over and over again. A few attempts at adolescent sabotage on both ends and three decades later we're still having a pissing contest over an insolent, ordinary little girl who isn't worth this much effort, frankly. There are women out there who know how to behave to get ahead, who have a little sophistication and style and aren't any trouble at all. Instead I have wasted my life on you and you are nothing.

I go to my knees because his words are correct and it has been a waste and there's nothing here that I have to give anyone. Never was.

Lochlan's voice cleaves the tension in two and both halves slide down to the floor and dissolve. I go clawing through my memories until I find the sunny road and I go running down the middle at full speed, flying on the wind in my cowboy boots and ragged sundress, straight to Lochlan, who is leaning up against his motorcycle, holding a bag with our lunch. He reaches down with one arm and grabs me up.

Not many men get a welcome like that when they leave for an hour to go into town.

I laugh when he describes himself as a man. He is still a boy in my eyes. He kisses my bangs and tells me he will cut them later tonight so that I can see and I scrape them back and smile purposefully. He tells me that has ceased to be effective and he laughs and tells me to run ahead back to the camper to sweep the clock parts off the table so we can eat. He is making me an orrery. I am so excited I could burst. But I am hungry first.

Can't we go to the picnic tables by the lighthouse? I give him my worried face. Only few hours off from the show so we need as much beach as possible.

Okay, peanut. Just let me stop and wash my hands.

I reward him with a hungry grin and take the bag. If I am fast enough there will be a table left. We no longer sit on the same side, he is big enough that it tilts the whole bench and we wind up bumped to the ground. I take my seat across from him and am startled when I begin to fall anyway. He has let go. I stare up at Caleb from the floor and I do what any little girl does when wronged. I ball up my fists and screw my eyes shut and I scream TAKE THAT BACK! at the top of my lungs.

I wake up in tears to the sound of his laughter. I am safe in my bed, with fitful dozing playing out on the left, and light almost-wakefulness to the right. I sit up, startled, and wipe my eyes. One hand from the left goes around my head and one arm from the right goes around my shoulders, extended to protect me but all I can do is wonder if Caleb is right.

Miss a turn.

He's teaching me words, today.

Thesaurus:
1.desideratum - something desired as a necessity; "the desiderata for a vacation are time and money".- anything indispensable; "food and shelter are necessities of life"; "the essentials of the good life"; "allow farmers to buy their requirements under favorable conditions"; "a place where the requisites of water fuel and fodder can be obtained"

I have one, he wrote. A desideratum. To see you. To speak with you. Today, please.

That was all it said. Nothing else. An email, unsigned and sent at five in the morning, three or so hours after he returned to the compound, his car purring quietly into place beside mine near the house. I knew when he came home because I have not slept. Much anyway.

I need to see him too. If we're going to continue on our path of dismantling history one memory of mine at a time then we should be reading from the same page.

Wish me luck.

On not playing fairly.

He wrapped his arms around my head and kissed my lips goodnight. No words. Just locked together in the dark, flush and exhausted.

I fell asleep so easily. It was unreal. Dreams are getting better, nightmares less frequent. Waking up sporadically if at all. He is there each time, he hasn't moved.

Thirty-six messages on my phone when I wake up and Ben is gone. All of them are under Caleb's name so I delete the thread unopened and stretch. Ben comes in with coffee for us and some croissants on a plate. I am famished, ravenous but I can't choke back anything. I stick to the coffee instead.

So many messages.

I know, Bridge.

Did you read them?

No. Did you?

No.

Bridget, I don't think I can stand by and watch this and not do something about it.

Ben-

Lochlan is being just as stubborn. Why won't you let me help you?

You are.

He rolled his eyes and left again.

At noon I found his untouched coffee still on the night table so I took it down to the kitchen and poured it out.

Whiskey clicks.

Yes, I'm up. And I was awake last night up until the point where tea and toast took away the fumble-fingers and uncensored observations. I'll leave the post below up as a good reminder of how not to navigate fear and/or worries. Alcohol solves nothing.

It does help eradicate budding respiratory illnesses though, so the night was not a total loss and I did not wake up this morning with the pneumonia-rattle in my chest that has been making a sunrise appearance for several days now.

So...onward and upward, as Jacob used to say. Keep your mistakes so that you never forget how far you've come.

Caleb will be angry. There's one more thing gone that he thought he could somehow use against Lochlan and really there are only bits and pieces left if you ignore the whole outrage over whether or not I went on the road as an innocent child and left as a worldly freak.

Maybe I never really left at all.