'What rhymes with soul?' He asked and before I could answer he said 'Cole.'

The Devil drowned in my nostalgia this morning after reading yesterday's entry and I let him. I stood in the kitchen of his house while he held me and let himself be sad, let himself miss his little brother. He let himself float on a wave of history for a little while and then he stood up straight, wiped his eyes and thanked me for letting him just have a moment, that it was just what he needed. He invited me for lunch after church and then over tonight maybe to watch home movies. I agreed to lunch (it was delicious) and am considering tonight, but I'm hoping I can talk him into watching The Babadook with maybe a little more gravestone juice. Maybe not. We shall see.

'Behold, I know not anything' is how it goes.

Care to...lick some gravestones? He says it with a smile. He gives in to my lack of sophistication. The Lagavulin has an amazingly specific smell and taste in that all I could ever imagine is that someone took the bottle and poured the liquid out across the head of the angel lying on Mary Nichol''s grave at Highgate and then caught it in another bottle and that's what I now hold in my hands.

I know what gravestone tastes like. I grew up with boys. I can still remember it clear as day.

It was nighttime. I was ten. We stood under the trees at the center of the cemetery and Lochlan passed me up as they took turns having a swig of bravery from Caleb's flask. Caleb is eighteen, Loch is sixteen and I am not going to get any bravery in a jar, which makes me braver than all of them by default. I ran after them all all night while they played Do or Dare, and when it got late and I got desperate I finally yelled PICK ME!!

Caleb turned and laughed. If I have to lie on this one then you have to lick the death date, trace it with your tongue. 

Oh, that's EASY, I boasted.

He lay flat on his back on the grave, arms crossed on his chest, feet together, pointing to the moon. Okay, go for it, Bridget. He sounded so uneasy.

I sat by his head and leaned over him slightly and stuck my tongue in 1938.

It tasted like the Lagavulin of my future. It tasted like moss and death and iodine and it wasn't nearly as awful as last week's game where Christian told me if I really wanted respect and entry to the Dare Club I would eat the dead ladybug he found.

I did that too except that I swallowed it whole so it only tasted a little bit bitter and then I threw up because he told me if I left it there it would come back to life and hatch and grow ladybug babies inside me then when I opened my mouth and eyes they would come flying out of my face.

At least I don't have to eat anything dead this time.

Also? Boys suck.

When I sat back and spit out the moss from my tongue, Lochlan put his hands out to pull me up. I think you just won the game, he tells me. He's plastered.

Caleb closes his eyes and pretends to stop breathing so we leave him there and start to run flat out across the cemetery. Cole is vaulting over headstones, Chris does slaloms. Loch throws out his hand for mine and we stay between the rows so we don't run over anyone. When we get back to the cars everyone is laughing and out of breath and I look back into the dark. Where is he? Maybe we should go back and get him. 

He'll be along. Loch lights a cigarette and blows smoke over my head so I don't breath it in. He hands off the smoke to Cole and then Caleb comes staggering out of the darkness and I scream.

He puts his arms out and drops the flask. What? What is it?

I didn't think you were that close. 

I like that Bridget is the only one who wanted to go back there and get me. You got my back, Bridgie. For that, you can have a drink. He goes hunting in a circle in the grass and finds the flask. There's a little left, he says as he shakes it. This is good. You're only little. He brings it to me and Loch shoves him backwards.

Naw, brother. She's too young. 

She's as old as we were when we tried it. 

And half our size. 

She's tougher than any of us. 

But I just keep staring at Caleb because he's alive, he's okay. I was worried that maybe he died for real and we were just going to leave him there in the dark. It's still a relief when I see him every time because he's still here. I didn't know at the time how final death is but maybe I did all along. That night stayed with me and we were just kidding around. Amazing how it feels when it's not for fun but for real and they don't get up. They don't come back into the light. They don't talk anymore. They're not there.

I finish my gravestone-drink and he pours me another. That's what this is for. Numbing everything. Maybe he knew all along what it would be like and this is just good practice, except it's not practice anymore. The dark is all around us, and the quiet and the weirdly-cold grass.

Lunch was extra special.

Lochlan now calls the company PepperBridge Farms.

They have my back, apparently.

(And my front. I ate the whole bag.)

Over a billion.

Well, based on the endlessness of Caleb's laughter when I inquired sweetly just how much sugar was in the bowl, I'm not bidding on Cirque du Soleil.

I can't afford it.

I knew that but if there was a shot it wasn't like I wouldn't have taken it, you know? Life is about taking chances and I'd give anything to go back to that life, but on my own terms. I'd also have to bring everyone with me whether they like it or not and for that sort of influence you need to own your own show, as clumily as that reads.

I'll settle for ruling the roost, or at least pretending to. PJ won't let me give orders, Lochlan makes sure no one listens to me and really I'm here for decoration, I think. Like the colored Easter eggs, of which we had two dozen but then Ben saw them and now there are five.

He said sorry and that he would make more.

They now have plans to put on aprons and pin their beards back and decorate some more eggs for the upcoming Easter weekend. This time we'll blow the contents out so that they aren't awesome, colorful hard boiled eggs to eat but little fragile works of art instead.

(Like me.)

I usually make an angelfood cake around when we wind up with a lot of eggs without shells. Ben will eat that too. He'll growl and pick it up with both hands and pretend he is celebrating a great victory. We won't actually get any of the cake. And it's fine. He does more to try and make me laugh than anyone I have ever met before. He doesn't take things so seriously. I could learn a thing or two from him but I'm too busy being stubborn and trying to run away again and trying to exist as a square peg in a round hole. Trying to be a norm when it's so glaringly plain that I'm not.

He will pretend not to notice all of these flaws of mine.

I like that too.

Dreamcatchers.

I asked Caleb and Batman to pool every resource they have between them and bid on Cirque du Soleil.  Batman waited for a heartbeat or six and then sighed heavily and said it wasn't the type of thing he financed.

Caleb stared at me for the longest time and then he said he would see what he could do. I'm pretty sure that was a very gentle way of letting me down without having to say no without concrete reasoning. That's sort of what you do with a willful child.

Somehow I don't think they would buy a whole circus or I probably would have had one by now.

Loch will inevitably point out that it's not quite the traditional circus I am used to. I know that. I'd like it anyway. We'll make changes when the dust settles. Just like we always do on a show.

Ladies, the time has come.

August and Lochlan have a new favorite song to lipsync to. They've got the dance down and everything. They recruited Duncan and Sam for this one. They called themselves...Little Dicks (But not really, said Lochlan).

(I knew we all missed August something fierce. He brings out the virtual insanity, and by that I mean the very best in Lochlan like no one else can.)

Ruth nearly died of embarrassment. She's a complete stranger to watching her father make an ass of himself and would prefer he be cool and mysterious instead. Fatherly. Together.

Henry thought it was a goddamned riot.

I think maybe someone mixed up their test results and Ruth is Caleb's child, while Henry maybe should belong to Loch. If she didn't have flames in her hair just like Lochlan I would seriously consider another round of tests but really their looks preclude any other possible outcomes.

Their personalities though.

Makes you wonder.

Five by five.

Ben showed his face long enough today to seek out the huge bag of Cadbury mini-eggs I bought while grocery shopping. He ripped the top off, opened one side and poured the whole thing into his face.

That was thirty-six ounces of chocolate, for the record. Which is two and half pounds. I wonder if he'll want dinner tonight.

Oh, wait. Of course he will. This is Ben we're taking about here. If there isn't food on the table for him, he'll just eat the table itself.

***

I finally got to see Interstellar last night. Maybe it was a little Contact-y. Maybe a little 2001-y too. A tiny bit of Gravity-y too. And then a whole lot of scientific crap about space, time and 'Gargantua' (which is a ridiculous name for a black hole anyway) and I fought hard to absorb the pseudo-science and then gave up completely. I was like arghhhhhhh gravity! Time bending! Relativity means the time is local to where you are in space and moves at different speeds! And ahhhhghghhh this is where we cry! Right? Right? Okay, yup, now I'm crying. 

So it wasn't life changing except in a sense to remind me that I'm too curious to accept scripted explanations for complicated forces of nature and also hype kills movies dead for me. It was okay. I wouldn't watch it again but wouldn't you know now I own it on iTunes. I wish they would take trades. I'd rather have Contact. I think my copy is VHS.

***

Sam and Matt aren't getting along presently. Matt has moved up to Batman's house and is providing space because he thinks that will win Sam over. I've been instructed to stay out of it or I would point out that Sam isn't going to be won over by leaving. Sam is too much like me. Leave me? I'll write you off. When I'm done being sad I'd be so angry. I never got a chance to be angry at Jacob. Granted, Matt isn't done-done, he's just being stubborn.

Sam is being more stubborn but I'll side with him always because he's one of our own.

***
I went up to Batman's to drop off some papers for Jasper, as per Caleb's request, because Batman is away but Jasper was in his home office doing some odd bits of work and New Jake ambushed me on the way in. He loves company. The more the merrier. He is freakishly social and intense and I'm always surprised at how perfect the storm of tension is between us.

Hey, Beautiful. 

Hey, yourself. Where is Jasper?

Under a rock, probably. Naw, he's in Batman's office. 

I laugh and New Jake stands there grinning at me. (So cute. Don't touch him. He's perfect. Don't ruin him.)

Hey, Bridget?

Yes?

I was wondering if you would stop calling me New-Jake and just call me Jake. I'm not really new anymore. 

I hear what sounds like glass shattering but it's on the inside so he doesn't react at all.

I'll think about it. 

No, you won't. 

I smile so I don't cry. I can't. Not yet. I'm so sorry.

Maybe someday then. And don't be sorry. 

Someday. He kisses my cheek and he's gone again and I'm left to face Jasper. There's no tension there except for pure hate for each other. Jasper has had a thing for Batman for years and resents the very air that I breathe.

I don't actually care.

***

This morning marked my first stab for the season at gardening which consisted of me getting a start on weeding the lawn. Caleb came out twice and told me to stop, that he'll call someone but I insist. If I'm not going to run anymore and we're going to ingest chocolate by the pound, then I need a physical outlet and sex isn't enough, contrary to popular belief. Why? Because I get held up or held down and am restrained so I don't get to move at all. With anyone.

That's not a complaint.

Not even in the least.

(I swear.)

(Snort.)

We bury the sunlight.

Breaking Benjamin superfans will appreciate this. We're all alike. That's right. I got up at five this morning to preorder an album because I was so excited. It didn't come out until seven.

Har.

East coast bands. Right.

I got up again at seven and it wasn't for sale in Canada.

NO.

After freaking out and digging around I found a different link that said it was. Be patient. They'll fix it. I got it in spite of the technical issues. The album comes in June but the first single is here now and everyone's going to hear Failure on repeat because WOW.

The last thirty-five seconds go from cookie monster growling (that's what I call it now, stop laughing) to power ballad and are like someone stroking my brain and saying Shhhhhhhhhhhh. I don't know why that is but I love it.

This is your Chase on drunk (with random comments by Dalton).

Bridgie, yu're like...Hufflepuff or something. 

Wrong fandom, Dude. She's probably Factionless.

Screw you both. I'm the last Word Bender. 

Did they even bend words? 

I 'm sure they had to bend more than just air. That would be such a waste if they didn't. 

Wind at least. Windmelons. Water? Elemelons.

Well, didn't you see the movie?

I slept through it. 

Did you sleep through Harry Potter?

Some of them, yes.

You're a stain on popular culture, Bridget. You know this, don't you?

Oh, probably.

Waiting for requitement.

I'm fine in the fire
I feed on the friction
I'm right where I should be
Don't try and fix me

Back into the fire, pinned between his hands, face to face so that this time I couldn't pin my ignorance on a scrap of a miserable hearing skill. Face up staring into hell. Hell looks a little like a cross between Richard Armitage and Clive Owen. Hell is a god-dammed handsome motherfucker and hell now seems to want to tell me he loves me every chance he gets.

If only he could control my mind the way he controls everything else, Christmas would come in March, heralded in on a matte-flat equinox just like spring, muted by the chill of the nights, decorated with snowdrops and crocuses and soot.

Instead of responding in kind, I warn him.

You shouldn't. 

Don't tell me what I can do. He lobs it back gently, threateningly.

I'm pointing out the obvious. That's all. I bite my lip to stop it from trembling and he puts his head down against mine. Somehow in the past ten days he's figured out what he missed in the first three decades. How I am driven by affection, swayed and bribed, fuelled by it. He pulls me up into his arms and says he wouldn't be able to help himself even if he could. That maybe if he just leaves it there it will become accepted. Even by Loch.

And I laugh because I don't have time to check myself. No, it won't. It never has so it never will. 

Never say never, Princess. 

I wait until he is in close against me and I repeat myself in case we both missed it. Never, Diabhal. Not in thirty years so not in a million, either.