Pathos.

Please teach me to breathe
Remind me how, I can't remember
Please read me the theme
You've lost the plot, the story's dismembered

Lochlan called it a moment of mellow drama and I laughed when I stopped feeling sorry for myself. He's clever with words, teaching me pretty much everything I know as I learned slowly, succinctly to the point of using words for sport now, for entertainment.

Now I get these great litanies from him, spat out hard in his delightful Scottish invisi-brogue, too impatient to work lyrical magic. And I'm not sure anything ever changes. I don't feel like I've achieved much more than an ability to shut down into nothing, duck my head and weather the storms as they hit, one after another.

He came flying out of the house during the shoot-out in overtime, boys glued to games (Canucks won and so did my Leafs, so they say), cursing me straight to hell and back for missing that, and he grabbed a hold of the ribbons on the back of my dress and hung on through the worst of it and I didn't know he was there until I leaned forward but didn't get anywhere. He puts a lot of misdirected faith in the stitching of my clothing. I'm not surprised in the least.

He also called Batman to consult because he didn't like the way things were going and he didn't quite know what to do. They didn't like Caleb's abrupt shift to not wanting to see me when half the time he seems to gain oxygen by my very presence. They didn't like Ben's refusal to talk to me and throw in Duncan, TJ and Andrew being gone and then my heading out to take up sentry position close to one absent ghost (but not the other because he showed up again unannounced this week) and a recipe for disaster is baked and then held in the oven on keep warm.

Does Lochlan ever know what to do? I don't know. He panics inwardly. He shuts down too and he's trying so hard not to do that when I already have. It must be harder than it looks keeping the lot of us contained and alive and together. He's been doing it since before I even met him. I think a lot of the time he is exhausted and under too much pressure and things slip. I just don't know why he holds so much responsibility for everyone.

What if we fended for ourselves?

Oh, right. Things get worse when that happens. See, uh...that eight year period when we all moved to the Prairies and he didn't. Well, he did for a little while toward the end of our time there.

When it began to rain last night he finally started pulling me in by my ribbons, hand over hand until he could grab hold of me. He took the headphones away and pulled me right into his arms.

You ever wonder, Peanut, why I make you listen to silly love songs all the time? You ever put it through your thick fucking head that maybe it's because you absorb all the other stuff like a sponge and then you wind up in a puddle of fucking misery and I have to wring you out and dry you off and you take fucking forever to dry, you do. It's better if you just don't go in but you're like a magnet to that stuff. Before I can turn around you've run off and gotten in right over your head again. You gotta stop doing this, I swear, we're getting too old for this shit and I love you too much to see this happen over and over again. 

Ignore me, I'm about to feel sorry for myself.

At precisely six minutes and forty-five seconds in to An Offering of Grief by Pallbearer the song changes into something so beautiful and hopeful that I could listen to it on a loop for the rest of my life, headphones jammed in so deeply to my skull they've permanently altered my personality. I have a new copy of Sorrow and Extinction and I've just about worn it out here, guys.

It works best standing on the cliff overlooking the sea in the pitch dark, trust me. Also you would do well to replace whatever blood runs through your veins with something that burns.

Ah yeah, there we go. Everything's okay now.

Except it's probably not. Let's give reality a chance here, shall we? Ben called again tonight and still he did not want to talk to me. He's doing great. Guess I mess that up something awful, don't I?

So I'll be where I usually am, doing what I usually do, which is wondering what it is about me that makes them disappear.

No bird.

Meh. Say what you will, the redhead is not only one of the few men on the planet who will sit through one of the oldest film adaptions of Jane Eyre, but one of the few who can quote extensively from the book at will.

I have for the first time found what I can truly love–I have found you. You are my sympathy–my better self–my good angel–I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my centre and spring of life, wrap my existence about you–and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one.

(We had a lot of time to read on the midway. Did I mention we stole library books? Well, we did. And I'm not sorry. A background in classic literature is an absolutely essential ingredient in the recipe for Good Humanship. But the kicker is we would leave the books behind at the next library we visited on our travels. To be fair.)

Satan preempted my morning routine with a surprise day off without explanation. I think he's angry. He looks a lot like Colin Clive too. But not Colin Clive as Edward Rochester. No, he looks like Colin Clive as Henry Frankenstein. Egomaniacal, deluded creep that he is.

I said it. I can say it because I'm barricaded in the living room behind a blanket and a boy. I wouldn't say it to Caleb's face though, no way.

Wax nefarious.

And you belong with me

When I went into the garage yesterday the harsh, grating flutter of black wings startled me, making me press my back into the door until I caught my breath.

Because I forgot and Cole is still in there, and I kept him away until Lochlan took my light. Lochlan doesn't see him anymore but once the flames were gone and Lochlan was too Cole stepped out into the darkness, disapproval written all over his handsome face.

You forget about me the same way Preacher got sent away, Babydoll? 

Maybe. I hold Cole's eyes with my own. He can't scare me now, I think as I fight not to tremble outwardly. He sees this and softens, smiling almost, his dark blue eyes so clear and deep without his glasses.

I want to ask him about my hearing, if it will be perfect again like his eyes. I want to ask him if he'll hate me less when I'm dead. I want to ask if he'll get along with the others better after they're dead. I want to ask if he knows how long some of them even have. I want to know if he loves me. I wonder if he hates me for the fact that he was never a father by biology but when I open my mouth I'm too afraid to say anything.

It doesn't matter. As brothers, they share certain gifts and he has read my mind, just like Caleb does. If Cole could do it in life no wonder things turned out like this.

Come with me and I can show you. His mouth is so compelling. I want to bite into it. I want to keep him here. But then I look at his eyes and his eyes say run. Distance and experience have left him little more than a pure blackened nightmare, one I can't see past to see my Cole. So long I spent with him and he is reduced to a spectre of unease and longing.

And I listen. I run outside into the bright light where there are no ghosts and no truth, no folded stolen cash, no hearts remaining unbroken, no newborn metal, no belief.

There is no nothing, it's all been burned away.

Two truths and a lie.

Rise from the dead you say,
Secrets don't sleep till they're took to the grave,
Signal the sirens, rally the troops,
Ladies and Gentlemen, it's the moment of truth.

I was treated to a rousing singalong of Shadow Moses, surprisingly by the easy-listening boys, who have been exposed to this song on a near-criminal basis the past week or so. Lochlan and August traded off some pretty impressive metalcore vocal licks while PJ and I stood and appreciated their efforts like nothing you've ever seen. When it was done I clapped and said Again! Lochlan winked and refused, saying his career as a thrasher has to be kept fairly quiet or the floodgates will burst wide open and once they do, we can NEVER EVER close them again.

***

There was a knock on the side door, just down the steps from the kitchen where the driveway turns into a high wall that becomes the backyard. PJ went to get it and I kept washing dishes. Washing and washing until I felt eyes staring into the hole where my soul used to be and I turned my head to see the Devil standing there.

Bridget... It was a drawn-out, expectant word.

Yes?

He smiled. Have you seen my money clip?

Hmmm? Oh, yes! I found it in the driveway.

In my pocket as I stood in the driveway you mean?

Oh, possibly, yes.

May I have it back please? His amusement turns pained and I dry my hands and go to the desk in the hall, fetching the clip. I bring it to him and he holds it up.

And the bills?

What bills?

The money that the clip was holding.

I didn't see any money.

Bridget...

What!

Are you going to give me back the cash?

If I had any to give you, I would. I hold his gaze and he finally lets enough doubt creep in to let me off the hook. Fine. If you see a folded stack of bills, can you check with me? They must have fallen out when you stole the clip.

I nod slowly, raising my eyebrows.

He leaves, nodding at PJ on his way out.  Once the door closes PJ looks at me.

I like the way you told the truth by saying you didn't have any money to give him because you already spent it. That's really good.

I didn't spend it, PJ! I put it in the bank yesterday. I'd feel unsafe walking around with all that cash. Yeesh! Don't you know me better than that?

***

I am sitting in the middle of the floor in the garage flicking Lochlan's Varga Girl lighter on and off. It's almost out of fuel. It lights up the dark.

He opens the door, walks across the floor to me and takes the lighter back. He tells me he's going to put mousetraps in his pockets if I don't stop this, and walks out the door, closing it behind him. Leaving me in the dark where I belong.

He's just mad because I always take the lighter instead of his wallet. His wallet is always empty, that's why. The lighter is worth more than nothing.

So am I.

Ochre and pitch.

And I found myself in a bitter fight
While I've held your hand through the darkest night
Don't know where you're coming from
But you're coming soon

I find it hard to watch him work but here I am, standing in the doorway long after bedtime, not wanting to disturb his efforts but needing to find some sort of resolution to his feelings, such as they are.

He was angry on Monday when I took Ben's truck and went for a drive alone. He was angrier still Tuesday, that I chose to share a memory that he would prefer to keep under wraps. (It doesn't matter how it all happened, he said, what matters is that it DID, and we're still here with each other.) And then by Thursday Lochlan had stopped talking to me altogether while I traded playful barbs with Satan, exchanging very little work for a big paycheque. Sometimes, when he's in a playful mood himself, Lochlan says he needs a Sugar Daddy too and I remind him he has Batman. He HATES that as much as he hates my working arrangements. But it all stands and we wind up on the other side of every week just like we always do.

And so I stand here in the door between heaven and hell and watch Lochlan paint, which is pretty much the same as it was when I watched Cole paint, right down to the fire burning close by and the curls that flip out against his neck.

He's listening to West Coast quiet-pop and singing along and not doing it for me, he's concentrating. He doesn't even know he is singing, I'll bet.

Come on and we'll sing, like we were free
Push the pedal down watch the world around fly by us
Come on and we'll try, one last time
I'm off the floor one more time to find you

I smile in spite of the long week that rests between us. I keep the wedge in place. He put it there and now I hold it. If I give it up I'm doomed. If I trust him, I might die. I keep it there because I'm brave and because I'm so afraid so I proceed through life by touch. Even if it means making those I love angry, even if it means everyone winds up on a different side and I'm the Bridge in between.

What do you need? He says it over the music without looking up.

You.

Sure about that?

Lochlan-

Look, I don't do so well with him, okay? Especially without Ben in between as an intermediary.

I know.

Then don't expect me to like you spending time with him. And don't expect me to approve of the things you write either. Jesus, Bridget. It was so hard. So hard and you didn't see.

I know.

Not with the same gravity. You were too young. You need to keep that off. It makes me look so wrong.

All of it makes me who I am now.

He stops and puts down the brush and the cloth. He smiles to himself and finally he looks at me. Yeah. I know it does.

You going to talk to me again?

I might.

Loch!

Yeah, Peanut. Come here.

Sustainability.

I'm working and having a breakfast date on a Saturday and Caleb is all admiration and stars in his eyes. Perhaps he is still dreaming. 

It's your capacity to endure. 

You or your brother?

Everything you have been through. 

Including you and your brother. 

I'm going to change the subject now. 

To what? Cheese? 

Possibly, he says. He is fighting a smile now.

My capacity is that of your standard, shorter-than-average human and nothing more. 

On the contrary. You're extraordinary. 

You like words that end in -ary. 

Oh do I? 

Sure. Exemplary. Revolutionary. Weary.  Blah. Let's get going. I'm starving. 

Patience, Babydoll. I'm waiting for one more call and then we can leave. What are you going to have? Did you decide yet?

Nothing with cheese, if that's what you're wondering.

***

For those of you via email wondering how it's so 'easy' (WHAT the fuck.) to joke around with the Devil or wax nostalgic about past and present love while my husband rots in a rehabilitation program in the US (one with a five-star chef), please remember that Ben did this to himself and I'm not supposed to stop living, nor would I do anything that I wouldn't do if he were home.

Also remember that the Devil and I have a mutual love/hate relationship and this is how we do things and finally please, if we're going to go there, open your life to me so I can judge what you've done.

There are thousands of other blogs to read. You don't have to be here. I like that you are, though.

X&Y/pressure-sensitive.

This will not be funny to anyone except for me. So there.

And I could write a song
A hundred miles long
Well, that's where I belong
And you belong with me

It's death by Coldplay today.

I really need to call in sick most of next week or my wee little brain won't survive. I've already had one nosebleed this afternoon. That's my brain, exploded against the inside of my skull, leaking out in tiny crimson increments.

He's singing along with Swallowed in the Sea. He intuitively sets me up and I fall for it every time. I hope the letter opener is sharp for I intend to throw myself on it shortly. But Caleb knows me well. He's hidden the goddamned thing and now he keeps offering to make us some coffee because we both have headaches. Our work is just about done for the day.

Sure, but before you go do you have the letter opener so I can deal with the mail?

I smile sweetly and he hands me the choice instrument of my death today.

He turns back at the door. Bridget, it won't kill you, just probably require you to have stitches and possibly antibiotics so unless you want to spend the afternoon being fussed over by the Russian physician I think you should perhaps choose a different method. I'm partial to erotic asphyxiation if you're interested. I can't guarantee success but we could have fun trying.

I can't believe you just said that.

I can't believe you're trying to get out of work by maiming yourself with office supplies.

Not like you haven't used the duct tape for a similar purpose before, Caleb.

Duct tape has no business being in the office. It's purely for pleasure.

Maybe you should be the face of duct tape, then, and change the image people have of it.

Maybe you should, since it's usually your face it's on.

I'm going to go home now.

Can I come? I'll bring the tape.

Naw. You stay here and open envelopes. Alone.

DAMN YOU.

And when you find it, you keep it.

I watched her leave again this morning. Peyton, or whatever her name really is. An interesting look on her face. Maybe her financial dreams are slowly coming true as Caleb settles up. Maybe she's glad she's uninjured, unscathed. Maybe she sees what he is and is relieved to leave. Maybe she likes him. I don't know. I don't care.

I thought you said you weren't going to see her again.

He glares at me and says nothing. I go to work, sneaking looks at him all morning. After lunch I am caught up on the mountain of work that grew so tall as I dawdle and daydream through life waiting again. I go back to watching him work and finally I can't hold it in any longer.

What is it like? I blurt out.

Caleb looks up, eyebrows raised curiously. What do you mean?

What is it like to sleep with someone you don't love? 

He stares at me for several moments establishing whether I am serious in my curiosity or simply seeking an argument. He chooses wrong. Why don't you tell me, Bridget?

Because I've never done it so I want to know what it must feel like.

That is the best news I've heard in years, he says quietly.

Siucra.

Keith is reading another one of his grim dystopian-future books.

What would you bring to the apocalypse, Bridget?

I bite into my fluffernutter and take a sip of my coffee that is laced with toffee syrup.

Guns, Keith. Guns and sugar.