No navigators on board.

(Aside from the fifteen minutes I'm about to share, today was a good day. Mostly because I found the ghost I thought I lost.)

You pray to stars that can help you get by
And all at once you forget to try

I'd go there if you let me
They're never gonna find me now

Someone went out and left The Grace on the stereo. Heads are going to roll right into the hole they're going to have to fish me out of when time permits because I took one step away from that song and the ground gave away beneath me. I spiralled around and around down to the bottom faster than it took me to turn around and widen my eyes at Lochlan, who dove for the knob on the receiver and missed. (He's smart enough not to reach for me, as one would think one would do when music that liquifies my mind comes on. No. Always turn the music off first.)

Life is a bit of a minefield in that regard, and that's why I fall in these holes. I blow up when I don't look where I'm going and fall in a hole put there by a previous explosion.

It's fine. It's better down here. I don't have to be beholden to the demon with the gun perpetually held against my skull who ruined my past and my future and has now started in on my present. It's fine because I have lots of company down here. Jake was sitting up against the wall when I landed. He winced as my cast glanced off the floor and he asked if it hurt. I said yes and he kept his face very neutral because with me hurting is better than feeling nothing at all.

He asks about Ben and I wave my hands to defer. His whole face changes to despair and I assure him Ben is doing well, I just don't try to explain him anymore.

I pull my arm up to my chest and bite my lip. Fuck, it hurts. This is not a good hurt, this is an agonizing throb and he tells me to have someone get me out. He doesn't call Lochlan by name, which means he's mad about how Lochlan isn't very good at checking music before I hear it and I think that's a bit of a tall order in a house where half a dozen people share a vast and eclectic music collection, and they try to do what everyone does, not coddle me by ignoring songs that trigger falls into holes.

I shake my head in refusal. I haven't seen him in forever and he wants me to leave? He says purgatory is getting difficult to navigate. That every time he leaves me it gets harder and harder to find his way back and he didn't think he would have to anymore but here he is and he can't explain it.

I told him that means he made a rash decision. He shakes his head. It wasn't. It was planned. Calculated. Unavoidable. Inevitable. I just made him delay it by several years.

My cast thrusts itself through my ribcage, splintering bone, cracking ribs with an ungodly racket. My hand grasps my slippery, broken, stitched-up heart and pulls it out. I hold it up to him in offering and he tells me he lost that honor when he followed through.

I don't care. Just take it, it's yours.

What about Loch?

I don't know! He'll be okay. He's resourceful. He has Ruth.

Bridget, you have to climb up now. Right now.

I can't do it with one arm.

I can help. You can stand on my shoulders.

If I touch you again I think that will be it for me.

I know. Build a magic carpet out of my letters and float out. There should be enough. Have you finished them all?

I haven't touched them.

He did one of those indignant double-takes, as if he's completely disgusted and shocked all at once. It's the goofiest thing he ever did with his face and I loved it.  I realize I'm about to throw up, everything hurts so much suddenly, it washes over me, a tidal wave of memories that begins to fill the hole. I rise to the top eventually and Lochlan fishes me out by the back of my shirt. He's got a way with that, and yet all the seams are intact as he stands me firmly on the living room floor.

You could have drowned, Peanut.

Yes, I know.

You can't swim with one arm.

I know.

Jake isn't here anymore.

For you, he isn't.

Maybe you should read the letters.

No.

Bridget-

He stops abruptly, biting his lip, checking himself, refusing to go any further with his attempts to force progress where progress isn't to be had, and he pulls me in, kissing my forehead, wrapping his arms around me tightly.

Your heart. What did you do with it?

I left it in the hole, Locket. 

I'll go back and get it for you tonight.

You don't have to do that, you know. 

No, I think I should. He nodded, more to himself than to me. Yeah. I think I should be the one to get it this time. I said I'd try harder and I will. I am, I mean. 

Irreverent.

I'm in a long ruffle-y sweater, very tall knee socks that almost reach up to my neck (the joys of being five feet tall, NOT), a tank top and shorts. Basically pajamas with added things for warmth. I'm curled up in front of the roaring fireplace beside Lochlan, who decided to catch up on his reading and won't let me leave because every time I do something bad happens.

Not sure that yesterday was so bad but he's going to keep me with him nevertheless.

Caleb calls me and Lochlan's face twists slightly but not enough to admonish him for.

Bridget, you need to sign these papers. 

Send a raven. I will look them over when I feel up to it. 

Oh my fuck. This isn't Game of Thrones. You're keeping everyone hanging. Lawyers are expensive. 

So are princesses, Diabhal! 

Yes, I'm well aware. I'm trying to keep the peace, make you happy and get you better,  I would have thought you'd be more willing. 

Hey, you said the same thing in Vegas once, only instead of trying to get me better, you were trying to get me drunk and wondered why I wasn't more willing. Do you remember?

What does that have to do with this? 

More than you realize. 

I hang up on him and Lochlan bursts out laughing. 'Send a raven'. You do realize he could have easily countered with 'Send a dwarf'. 

Dissolute (no one's project girl).

Are you finished with your voice lessons and ready to get some very important things looked after today?

Yes, Mr. C____. 

He paused but he didn't look amused. Bridget, I'm not in the mood for the brat today. I know that's a rare occurrence but now is not the time for your nonsense. This isn't the circus, this is the boardroom. 

This isn't the boardroom, this is the boathouse. Oh! By the way! Did I tell you I'm drawing a map of the property?

You can tell me later. Let's go, we have a lot to get done. 

I walk into the living room and there are lawyers everywhere. One of them is mine. Oh, wait. Two of them are mine. My heart sinks. He's taking Henry.

But Caleb sees the look on my face and is almost as fast as my anxiety is loud.

This has nothing to do with our arrangement. Except to say I tried to keep you shielded from this and I've reached a place where that is no longer possible. 

What do you mean?

He took me back outside to tell me privately, holding my hands, watching my eyes as I went from sure he was lying to sure he was dying within minutes.

Although he assured me he isn't going anywhere, he really has to take better care of himself. The stress of trying to manage all of this isn't helping and so he's going to take some of my unending suggestions and simplify, liquify and rearrange his holdings so that it's easy to handle but perfectly secure. The board will be dissolved. My proposal comes to me as a done deal even though I've done nothing to deserve it.

I nod and then tears are rolling heavily down my cheeks and I make no move to hide them. Every time I cut him off it seems he hurts a little more. This is my fault. I must be the heartbreaker.

You are, he laughs with glassy eyes, answering my reasoning out loud. And the fact that you continually defer or bank, ignore and sometimes outright refuse my money only serves to confirm that you are the one who should have it. 

Are you dying. I don't ask questions anymore, I just brace myself for the worst with statements, dry and bitter. I literally square my shoulders and lock my knees and when I look at him he is a bit covered with glitter and with sad and with resignation too.

Someday yes but not soon, if that's what you're worried about. 

You can't die ever. You're not allowed. I bend over to pick up all of the pieces of Bridget that are suddenly popping off everywhere and scattering all over the floor.

I know. I know I can't but I will someday and I'm going to see that when the time comes you are well-equipped to deal with it.

What do you mean?

Bridget, it's begun to dawn on me that no one has been able to fix you yet. So I'm going to. I have things at my disposal that no one else does and a history with you no one else shares or even knows all that much about. I figure I am the best suited to helping you get better.

Better?

Less prone to burst into tears and run off to sit on the rock wall in the pouring rain when you catch a surprise memory of Jacob. 

Hell, I do that when I have a rough time flossing my teeth these days, I think it's a universal-Bridget-thing, not a Jake-thing. 

Then I have my work cut out for me. 

Oh, this sounds relaxing and stress-free for you! Yay!  What about Loch?

What about him? I am entitled and encouraged to spend time with you. He can retch and moan all he likes, that won't change. 

It won't work, you know. 

I've tried everything else. Literally everything, Princess. Let's just take it as it comes and see what happens. 

You can't fix me. Besides, I'm not yours to fix. 

You as much mine as anyone's. A group project. Collective effort. 

No, I'm not. 

But you are.

Cover me.

And through it all
He offers me protection
A lot of love and affection
Whether I'm right or wrong
And down the waterfall
Wherever it may take me
I know that life won't break me
When I come to call
He won't forsake me
I'm loving angels instead

Caleb asked me to come down and go over even more paperwork yesterday and after all manner of threats, coercion and yelling between he and Lochlan both I finally just went, just to keep the peace. Just so the kids don't have to come home and find their fathers at each other's throats once again because some things never change and all of their attempts to get along are nothing more than selfish means to ends.

I went but further assuage the hearts at home I wore red and I refused to look at anything. I lay on the floor in the living room and blasted Angels on repeat, practicing my singing and God help the Devil, he didn't touch the stereo, instead eventually leaving. I remained there until the sun went down and then I sat up and went home. I left the song on just so as not to go quietly into the night and all that.

He sent a message to me late tonight ordering me to try again tomorrow but to leave Jessica at home.

I'm still deciding if I'm going to do that. Maybe I'll bring Robbie instead. Because it's his song, not Jessica's. Yeesh.

Wool & wood & frost.

He has a thirty-five-year-old cableknit sweater in a shade of oatmeal-ivory that I can't replicate in order to properly darn the elbows and underarms and when he wears it his hair is virtual fire. Today is definitely a sweater day as he comes in from chopping wood. They take turns, mostly but Lochlan is the one who seems to actually look forward to it. He comes inside with bits of wood hanging off his sleeves and mixed in his curls but he looks energized, puffed up. PJ walks past him and squeezes his arms, letting out a high-pitched squeal and a giggle and then the rest of us begin to laugh because we did not expect that.

He shakes PJ off and comes over to hug me. He smells like cedar and hemlock and salt. I don't think there's a better smell out there for a man and five years ago I would have said something else, perhaps.

Wood's done. I'm not stacking it though.

I don't blame you. You didn't have to do all of it.

We're good until spring.

I pour him a hot cup of coffee. I can hold things again. I can manage a little better each day.

He ignores the coffee and pulls me back in against him. He's a solid wall. I don't know where the muscles came from. He's always been ridiculously strong-armed but it was invisible strength and that's no longer the case. His neck is wider, his shoulders impossibly hard. The sweater is doomed.

We should go back to bed.

Still got some wood to finish up, do we? I swat him with the dish towel and forget there's a row of boys at the island eating breakfast. They are all studying their dishes and trying not to laugh. I blush pink and try and be really busy cleaning up for a few minutes but it's still frustrating, it takes forever.

Everyone's been great, almost better since Asher came and went only he didn't actually go, he's still here, but as a guest and not an employee until I figure out what to do. Batman is patiently waiting for my decisions and I don't actually think Asher has anywhere else to go, honestly so we've been including him at dinner and for movie nights and morning patio lounging though it's cold enough for frost here so the heaters have been on outside. I still go out and so does everyone else. The sunrise is so late so why not?

Hence all of the wood-chopping because it's always so dim and dark here. I could pay extra to have it delivered already split but if the alternative is Lochlan looking like this then I think next time I'll just tell them to bring us the trees whole.

I figure I will last about a week. Two, tops.

(Thoughts on formal resolutions this year tended to fall on a helpless kind of ennui about whether or not it's effective to get fired up about some big change only to find out it's an unwelcome, unsustainable chore. 

Or bore, as it were. 

So instead I'm trying something different.)

In 2014 I will have:

A little less structure: An effort to not follow a schedule, pick up every dirty dish I pass or plan meals within an inch of my life. Over Christmas we skipped lunch on purpose two days in a row and the world didn't end or anything.

A little more time with Sam working away at anxiety now that we (I?) have grief under control (NOT SURE WHO JUST WROTE THAT): He's going to help me figure out how I can think myself into a panic just by being me and how to not be me anymore. I can't wait to see who I am when all this is done. I hope they like her. 

(Of course they'll like her. Bridget, but without all of her debilitating doubt? Hell, I might just steal her for myself). 

A little less: alcohol 

A little more: sleep. 

A little more time spent on doing exactly what I want to do: For example, I want to make a little felt case for my headphones. I've wanted to do this for weeks but I got sidetracked making little felt ornaments for Christmas and then I didn't want to see any fucking felt after that. 

A break from the Devil: The last time I attempt this I made it five years and would have made it further but then Cole's heart stopped and my plan went out the window. I didn't say I don't need Caleb, I just need him to be less like Cole, if that makes any sense at all. Cold turkeys aren't the best turkeys but I am minding my time carefully with him.

Some new shirts: because comfort and also skulls. I need new skulls. They all have names, did you know that? I use the boys' middle names mostly but sometimes I make up new ones and then everyone is suspicious until they realize I'm talking about a sweater. 

A drawing a day: I did it before and filled two sketchbooks. Now I have five new sketchbooks and haven't done a thing. 

More walks on the beach, dinners out and special time with each child and boy: Ruth seems to need me and hardly ever need me, Henry needs me to direct him a little more and bail him out less, as in he needs man-chores without the inevitable list of questions that I answer instead of letting him solve on his own. If I remove myself from his available list of answers he tends to figure things out quite nicely. I feel like I don't even know half the people I live with anymore from trying to bite around the edges of my own reality for so long. And I've hardly been down to the beach these past few months at all. 

It ain't right, I tell you.

More breathing deeply: less blacking out! This is purely a selfish plan on my part.

More coffee: Because fuck it, coffee's good and trying not to drink it just leaves me...well, cold and sort of sleepy.

Resolutions tomorrow.

Today I actually got up, put on some clothes, helped untrim the Christmas tree and drank the last glass of cheap champagne. We took the wreaths off the doors and garage and the antlers off PJ's jeep (he doesn't know yet) and put them on New Jake's motorcycle (he doesn't know either). Lochlan helped me with laundry and Andrew and Gage looked after vacuuming and scrubbing bathrooms.

Which...they should have left the vacuuming until after Ben drags the tree outside but I didn't have the heart to point that out because they're helping. 

Helping's good. 

Henry won't share his Christmas chocolate, Andrew has a worse cold than mine and Lochlan's accent seems thicker than ever. Every time I ask him to repeat himself as he mutters into his collar he barks at me to put my ears on. Then he smiles, as if he's being helpful, sweet cad that he is. 

He sounds like Jake. I should tell him, but I don't have the heart for that either. I drowned my heart yesterday and it hasn't recovered so I left it on the shelf to dry and decided I would go up and fetch it before dinner. Maybe it will shrink. Maybe the color will run. God knows it hasn't behaved in any expected fashion since I sewed it back together with the thick black cord so I should expect any manner of surprises. 

Ben is awake now, it seems. He goes through weird stages where he seemingly sleeps for days and in my condition I basically said fuck it and joined him. 

And it was lovely. I sneezed into his chest and it all came back and showered me. He laughed in his sleep as he clutched me against him, also a rare treat since he sleeps like a corpse. We didn't move from that for hours. I needed it more than I realized. I need him more than I realize. I need them both, wrapped around me like a cage made of everything I ever wanted. 

We have a date to meet back there at nine tonight, once the day has wound down to a soft tick on a forgotten clock, the soft thump-thump of a rain and champagne soaked heart and the never-ending, always-present sound that seems like ghosts breathing but probably just means I should put my ears in already.

Fire eats oxygen (and blood runs red).

When the future's architectured
By a carnival of idiots on show
You'd better lie low

If you love me
Won't you let me know?

A blur of illness, injury, emotional tidal waves and hesitant touches saw 2014 ushed in this time around with copious amounts of pink champagne keeping me from choking on the weather all around me. The cold pushed back against the abbreviated light, putting a frost on the fires that threatened to burn so bright we might all go blind.

The waves crashed relentlessly against my heart as I lay in my bed at the very top of the house on the cliff this time and I let them. I failed to climb out from under the fur blankets and I failed to acknowledge whole days and I slept little but mostly escaped. I failed to engage, as they call it.

And I'm not sorry.

Luminous and wired.

Caleb didn't wait for me to acknowledge his envelope as it was, messaging me during supper. I slipped out the side door but remained there to wait for him, pressed against the cold steel door. He walked down and stopped at the bottom of the boathouse steps.

Are you coming over? I want to talk to you.

No. We're making tea and dessert. What is it?

Can you come later then?

No. You know this. 

Tomorrow is New Years Eve, Neamhchiontach.

Yes, I know. 

Any plans? 

Yes. 

And?

Happy New Year in advance.

Bridget, what are your plans?

Why? 

I'm curious. What's the matter? Come here. 

I told you, we're getting dessert together. I have to go in. Did you need anything else?

I'll speak with you in the morning. 

I doubt it. 

The look on his face was frightening. I don't. You have obligations to meet. Shutting me out is a fool's errand. Tell him that. He turned and went up the steps.

I remained in the cold until PJ opened the door and then the warmth of the house hit me like a wall. Got enough fresh air? Matt made you a tea that might set fire to your soul, if you're interested in getting over that cold. Not surprised you're still sick though, you're out here without a jacket. 

Okay Dad. 

I was on the other side of the door the whole time, Bridget. With my hand on the knob. I think it would probably be better if I was on the same side as you. 

You are, PJ. Don't worry about that. Where's Loch? 

Duncan's sitting on him. Couldn't you hear him yelling for me to open the door and not just try to listen in?

No. 

I think your hearing is selective, you know that? He was fucking loud.

Wisely clinging to the ground.

Lochlan is sitting in the big chair in the corner by the fireplace picking a melody on a guitar, singing just barely audibly over the music. His face looks angry but he's still holding it together while I argue with Batman on the phone.

***

I made it all the way until around fourish on Christmas day when I went to do something that had already been done and a drink was fixed and left out for me besides and I had to go look into a mirror to tell the girl who looked back that I didn't know her and so I couldn't let her in, sorry, and then I went back and told Asher that he was off for the rest of the day and we would discuss employment tomorrow but this sort of ambush on Christmas Day isn't exactly a good idea on Batman's part and I'm not sure this sort of life for Bridget is a good idea on anyone's part, frankly.

On Thursday I would not let Asher make breakfast or coffee. The others locked me out of the house while he made lunch, only letting me in when it was ready, and then by midafternoon pretty much all of the boys were convinced that Asher is the best thing since sliced bread and did much to alleviate their guilt.

Lochlan hasn't said a word about it but I know he thinks all of this is so ludicrous. He thinks paying more than a dollar for a loaf of bread is outrageous when the rest of the world has moved on and doesn't blanche at paying $3.99. He thinks all kinds of things and only says half of them out loud because he chooses the hills he will die on and leaves the rest be.

It's very difficult to argue the actual need for Asher. No one wants to see me struggle. I don't know how not to, though.

By Friday I suggested he do no further unpacking and instead go and stay with Batman in Ben's recently vacated room or any one of the other rooms there and we would work out a schedule in which he could maybe come down and help for a couple hours a day to start.

Maybe.

Yesterday I fired him, telling him to go and get a life. He smiled impassively at me because he knows damn well I'm not the boss.

So I swore at him and one eyebrow went up and it was a little bit hilarious that he was standing there taking it when most people would have walked out and never looked back.

How badly do you need this job, Asher?

I was told not to make this personal. 

If you live here on the point you do it without skin. It's one of the perks and one of the drawbacks. 

I heard and I'm cool with it, I just don't want to guilt you into keeping me here. Did you really spend time with a circus?

Yes. Why do you need the job so badly?

Nothing tragic. I fucked up my chances at a corporate job on purpose because wearing a tie makes me gag. Batman is doing damage control on my behalf. 

He needs to let you fall. He's not doing you any favors. 

No, the whole domestic help thing in which I scrub toilets and sort mail and schedule appointments for the nouveau riche is absolutely not a favor, by my standards. 

Trust fund kid who lost his way?

Maybe. 

That's hilarious, Asher. Now tell me the story of your name. 

He looks at the sky and then squeezes his eyes shut. Oh fuck. My folks named me Holden and no one ever let up with the Catcher in the Rye references so when I started Grade eight in a new school I campaigned successfully to change it. 

To Asher? Why did you pick that?

It was different. I don't know. I was fourteen. It was Judd Nelson's middle name. I had just watched the Breakfast Club. 

Fair enough. Holden was fine though, trust me. Every kid gets teased for their name in school. 

Did you? 

They still call me Midget and Fidget when the mood strikes. Widget. Bitchet. Frigid. Hatchet. You name it. 

I thought they called you Princess. 

They do but it was never meant to be a compliment. 

*** 

Batman has agreed to be a little less rash in trying to throw Asher into the fray here. Caleb hasn't said a word, preferring to let Batman take any consternation full on because tomorrow is New Year's Eve and he's hoping for certain appearances to be made. Just after two he slips a pewter envelope through the door and leaves without a word. Two minutes after that Lochlan picks up the envelope on his way from the library to the kitchen and goes back into the library, throws the envelope in the fireplace and continues on his path without a word.

He sees me watching him and he doesn't say a word.