OH and this.

Hockey season starts....right now. :)

(Progress not perfection, August. I got it.)

Oh, I am a lonely painter
I live in a box of paints
I'm frightened by the devil
And I'm drawn to those ones that ain't afraid

I remember that time you told me
You said, "Love is touching souls"
Surely you touched mine
'Cause part of you pours out of me
In these lines from time to time

Wet curls and damp flannel in the dark. Relief. I got us on the last hayride of the night.

The 'hayride' is a one-way trip down the highway on a wheeled wagon pulled by a very noisy tractor and it's the only way tonight to return to the campground from the lake. Summer's over. The parking lot at the lake was closed so we walked in in groups but now it's dark and I don't want to walk back. I believe the tractor driver is the Funhouse operator. She's from this area. She said it's full of bears. She said to make sure we were on the truck by eight. We will be.

I smile in the dark. I'm anxious to get back anyway, bears notwithstanding. It got cold so fast.

Loch jumps up on the back of the wagon into a veritable company full of strangers and reaches down his hands to pull me up. We stay at the back. Everyone is older, louder and ignoring us. Passing a few flasks around. Talking about their families, their homes. This is normal.  Lochlan settles back against the wooden bench and pulls me in close against him. He's warm. I close my eyes and he throws his head back. We sleep every chance we get.

Then I hear an owl and get spooked. Halloween is still a couple months away. Loch's birthday is in a week and a half. School is in a week. It feels like fall. I don't want to leave him. Something big changed last summer and something bigger changed this summer. I don't know if I can wait until next summer to see what happens next.

My eyes are open wide now, watching the dark sky. Counting streetlights. I lift my hand to mark them and they go out as we pass.

Stop that. He squeezes.

Stop what?

Putting out the lights.

You can see that?

Of course I can. I can feel your energy from here. You're too small to keep it all inside so it leaks out and turns things off. It's like a poltergeist. But it's an emotional one. Tonight it's your fear shutting off those lights.

I thought you didn't believe in that stuff.

Bridget, what I tell people I believe in and what I know for certain aren't always the same.

Why?

I don't want people to know anything about us. Mystery is safer. 

Why is it safer?

It just is, he says with all the conviction of a soon-to-be seventeen-year-old boy. And with all of the determination of an eleven-year-old girl, I believe him.

Deep sea diving.

I poke my head into the hole, pulling the day down over me like a sweater. It gives my hair static cling but I'm ready. The sleeves are too long and the bottom is unravelling. Kind of like my life, I guess, except I can't just fix it so easily. This color might not be good on me. The wool is a little bit itchy and the cut barely flatters and-

Yes, I know.

Stop with the allegories and get to the dirt.

There's no dirt today unless I feel like pointing out that the Devil has congential assholery and has been trying to weaken Ben's confidence by walking around talking about how Lochlan may have (*may* have, there's your disclaimer straight from the Devil's mouth) won the game against Caleb. That I might be settling in at last, having made a conscious or unconscious choice here and am content with it, something surely the Devil doesn't buy for a sweet second but wants Ben to be aware of. You know, to help out.

Seriously. Some days I fantasize that I ask my army to toss Caleb over the wrong side of the cliff and I don't cry when they do.

(Some days. Other days he has a heartbeat flutter in his sleep and I lose my ever fucking mind.)

Ben tells me not to worry, that he stopped listening to the Devil years ago, that he humors him as an old man who wanders the property meddling in our business. He makes me laugh and then he picks me up off my feet and kisses me hard before he goes off to a meeting so he can actually learn how to make more courage because he gave away what he had on hand.

Lochlan is too busy today to run interference, too busy to throw punches. This is deliberate thanks to Batman who sees, who knows more than he ever lets on.

Sam tries to keep it all together.

Cole threatens to tear it all apart.

Jake just doesn't want to be here.

And I'm trying to see if maybe there's another day that fits better than this. Something softer, smaller, better-constructed and in a more flattering shade of black.

Default Protector/Don't take it (personally).

If I can get through tonight,
I'm waking up with my wings.
There's no way I can sleep my way through a fight,
And I think I'm gonna like what tomorrow brings.
Look at my eyes,
Don't even know who I am.
That's how I spend all my worthless time on the floor,
Waiting for you to tell me I'm a man.

But you and your face of light.
It's a brilliant roman candle that separates the day from the night.
It's that clean, clear truth that sorts our the wrong from the right.
You and your face of light

 It must be hard to be a man. Especially one in my life.

Here, take this. 

What is it?

It's my heart. Can't you tell? Maybe if you rinsed it off it would be more evident. 

I'm honored. 

Don't be. My hands are full. Thanks for helping out. 

(Much later)

Hey. So. I'm going to need that back. 

I thought it was mine?

No, remember? I asked if you could hold it. I can't put it down on the ground. Last time I did that it got rocks and sand embedded in the surface and it doesn't work right anymore. 

Oh. 

But don't worry. You can have it again soon. You did a really good job taking care of it.

But Bridget-

Shhhhh. I know. This is hard, isn't it?

Lying in the dark last night, both hands wrapped around Ben's neck I fell asleep so fast when I woke up my arms were rusted and my neck was painfully stiff. Ben was smiling in the post-dark. Teeth bright. Eyes black. Cool skin, warm heart. Tightest hold he could keep me in without crushing the air out of my lungs.

We never ever sleep like that. Something's wrong. Maybe he felt one more piece of my puzzle snap into place and he got scared. Maybe he realizes he drifts farther than I do sometimes. Maybe we don't make enough effort but I don't want to weigh him down and he doesn't want me to worry.

Maybe we're dumb about that and we probably already know.  I pull myself tighter into his arms until I can only breathe a little bit and I feel his arms leave me as Lochlan presses himself against my back. Ben's arms make a cage as they wrap around Lochlan's shoulders and I close my eyes and sleep a little more. Something's right.

This morning things don't look so bad. Lochlan and I may be sorting things out but we're making sure Ben stays on the same page with us. He's keeping up quite nicely.

And because of that I slept like a baby, until after ten this morning.

Saturday morning cartoons.

I'd have loved you with grace

Caleb made us cheese toast for breakfast round nine o'clock when he wandered over as I was gathering up the dishes we left in the grotto last evening. Loch offered to bring them in but I was wanting to go out and greet the sun anyway after the rain yesterday.

I jumped fifty feet when Caleb spoke behind me.

Have you eaten yet, Princess?

OH. You scared me. No, but I want to bring these in before I forget. 

Come over for some cheese toast and tea? 

Sure, okay. Just let me put these things away and I'll meet you there. 

When I arrive he makes breakfast and we take it outside to the bistro table on his front walkway, fifty feet above the water. It's delicious. I never turn down his cheese toast. Not sure I could, that's how good it is.

He waits until I finish and then tells me he spent most of last evening watching me dance in the rain with Lochlan, wondering if Lochlan finally won the game.

The magician saved his greatest trick for last. 

What trick was that? 

Time travel. Year in, year out. He was so patient. He didn't rush and eventually you came back to him. I really didn't think it would end this way. 

What did you expect? 

That you would eventually grow up and realize he is rigid, controlling and stubborn. But you didn't grow up and he turned out to be less controlling than I somehow and you are the stubborn one, as it turns out. Unwilling to take your eyes off him for a second because every time you do something bad happens. 

God, I really hope you're right and maybe things can be okay now.

Tidal flux.

(One of those magical days.)

The two jellyfish found each other (and made a bloom!) in spite of the fact that they have no brains and painted a mural on the tiny wooden shed this morning, in the rain with a haphazard tarp rigged up over the roof and attached to some garden stakes. It was like a yard fort only it was necessary instead of purely recreational and yet we got some neat effects when the paint began to run. It's like a surrealist masterpiece in some places, as weaker colors bleed out over strong ones and the first crisp lines soften and blur.

Sam put his fall construction on hold but he still put on his surrender plaid and came and helped Loch add more wood to the pile near the house from the pile behind the garage and then he asked if he could steal me away for the remainder of the afternoon and he did. We painted and went for coffee (too much coffee, here I go again but the headaches, you see) and then we sacked out in the theater and watched a little television and then we napped, my head jammed against his bony shoulder cap, his arm flung wide across my back. I missed dinner. Which was called off anyway on account of a lack of participants and the fact that Caleb took Henry and Ruth out.

When I did wake up on my own Loch was back and the plaid jellyfish was telling him about our antics putting up the tarp. Loch said he'll help us finish if the weather clears up over the weekend and then he stole me back, not content to leave me there in Sam's arms, but loathe to take me out of a place that was some of the best comfort I've had all week.

But it was a means to an end. The rain was heavier than earlier in the day and he took me out front, across the yard and into the tiny wood to the grotto where he had candles blazing and dinner for us laid out on the tiny writing table. It doesn't rain in there, the tree cover is so thick above. There was some cheese melted on bread, wine, olives, sliced tomatoes, warm chicken pasta salad and there was chocolate cake.

And there was music. He slow-danced with me as a prelude to eating because it was one of those nights where you forget you're hungry because the company is better than the event. Because his green eyes had gold flickering in them from the light and yet he is the constant, a beacon that brings me safely home when I drift so far away I feel like I'll never get back. He's the lighthouse, Ben is the storm. Why I try to force them into roles they aren't suited for I'll never understand but I try to do it less.

We did eat, eventually. All of it. Until we were too stuffed to dance anymore and had to go inside and fall asleep with all the windows open and the sound of rain pouring down outside. Only I've had coffee and so I can't sleep yet. Maybe later. I'm going to go back and watch him do it though. He makes it look so easy.

It's too cold for you here.

PJ is miffed that I don't like the new Megadeth single. I'm fine with his attitude problems. He's bitchy because mercury is in retrograde so I fed him a chocolate bar, turned the music up and slowly backed away.

I went for a walk on the beach with New Jake because no one else would go. It's my favorite time of year, the jeans, bare feet and a sweater time when I'm never too warm to be in the sun but the sun is still so bright when I open my eyes that the inside of my skull is bleached and whitewashed and all of the dark shadows vanish. The autumn sea is louder than in the summer and the water itself darker and warmer. It will be my favorite until at least April.

New Jake doesn't say much. He's quiet today, content to let me prattle a little or not at all and we collect a multitude of ready-glass and eventually he motions for us to go back. My phone is ringing off the hook in his pocket and his own phone worn down with messages returned to let everyone know where we are. I'm ready for my GPS microchip if it lets them track me without the noise and formalities of having to reply but Sam said it would have to be more like an astronaut suit in which they would be able to see a readout of my body temperature and heart rate too or it wouldn't be good enough.

He thought he was being clever until I said, then next time don't be busy when I want to go to the beach. 

Ow. We're stinging each other like lonely satellite jellyfish lately and it isn't fair but he tries to be objective and helpful and I need him to be my affection friend before all else.

Ben says Sam just wants to be useful, that he has some training and he's always felt bad for not being able to manage me the way Jacob could.

That makes two of us, though Jake had a lot of help behind the scenes from God, Claus and Joel, ironically. They're the holy trinity now: The father, son and the holy pest. I don't think I would love Sam as much as I do if he pulled hard-nosed-counselor-mode on me most of the time. But he did let New Jake off the hook to join me. New Jake was supposed to be cleaning gutters and furnaces today with Sam. He took Keith with him instead as Keith has Thursdays free.

Ben went to a meeting with Duncan. They're two big peas in a giant pod. Two big dry peas who aren't much fun at parties and we're very grateful for that but at the same time Ben seems like he's still flickering in and out of a room when he should be a fucking beacon, a lighthouse by now. I guess I have to remind myself that he falls harder, because he's bigger.

And as PJ told me, I bounce.

First Ghost Problems.

They're like first world problems, only they're about ghosts. Claus brought up Jake this morning for the first time unbidden, and I took Jake from him, turned him over in my hands, shook him like a snow globe until all of his values began to rain down on the pretty scene inside the glass and then I tucked him on the shelf behind me, words scattered around his feet like faithful, loyal, adventurous, nurturing. Courageous. 

Claus waited for me to say something and instead I changed the subject. I asked him about his future travels and past lives, anything so that I didn't have to disturb Jake again. Not right now. He seems happy where he is. Peaceful even. He's probably dead. I should go check but I'd rather pretend otherwise so just leave me be.

Claus asks about the new house.

Again I change the subject and ask him if he thinks the collective is a healthy environment for us. I know it's fine for the children but I worry about things like PJ's emotional health as a monk and Duncan's sobriety as a monk, too. I worry about Ben's attention span and John's bottomless plaid flannel wardrobe. I worry that days and days go by and Christian doesn't check in but then he's right here and everything is fine. I worry about the Devil breathing down my neck,  snapping it by mistake.

I worry, period. Always will, always have.

The snow globe makes me dizzy. It's fragile but compact, an ecosystem of all the things about life with Jake distilled down into this beautiful little decoration. The glitter is our emotions, like fireworks but in water instead of air. The base is our foundation that we thought we built that caved in. It still looks sturdy from here though. Four feet and a tiny gold key that you turn and it plays Dust in the Wind. I'd throw it at the wall if I wouldn't miss it so it's still surprisingly intact.

Have you ever thrown anything, Bridget?

Whoops. Yes. I throw food if Ben starts a food fight (or a snowball one) and I once threw an entire set of dishes, one at a time, at Sam, coating a room with shards of stoneware. 

Boy, did that ever feel good. Not. Here, you can read about it. Some days I've come to question why I'm detailing my own slow-motion demise, here. I can't even read that. I remember that.

And I'm not a thrower by nature. I bring the tears like the tide in the Bay of Fundy. We've established this time and time again.

Claus finally let me off the hook. He'll find some other way in to those places. Perhaps there's a trap door under a table or a loose board in a fence that will let him in. Until then I'll leave Jake covered with heaps of glitter and drowning in my need to keep him so close.

When Claus hangs up at last I turn and Jake is not a snow globe any more, but a tall memory, fading into the sunlight as he continues to refuse to be confined to the places I try to stuff him into, like the garage, or the snow globe, or, you know, my head.

Roser, Jasper, Opal.

Regular season hockey starts in ONE WEEK! What a long summer.

My car arrives on Thursday. Why so long? Yeah, that was my question too. It will be worth it though.

Ten Days until the premiere of season six of The Walking Dead. I've been so patient. I even caved and watched Fear the Walking Dead. It's really good but it's not the original.

Eventually Outlander and Game of Thrones will return too. Oh and American Horror Story, though I didn't like Freakshow all that much after the first episode and am not excited about Hotel either.

I started Christmas shopping, if you can believe it.

My head is still so congested when I sniff really hard my face contracts and makes a sound like a very sweet duck and then the resulting sinus pain is tremendous. At least the coughing has lessened a little. I fought to be functional right through the weekend and I think I mostly succeeded. As they say, I'm a little trooper.

Indeed.

Caleb and Lochlan locked horns about my condition on Sunday. Caleb insisted we bring the doctor back in and Lochlan told him if he knew anything about being a parent, he would have some instincts as to what is a regular cold and what isn't getting better. She's run down, she doesn't sleep through the night, so it takes her longer to recover. That's all. That's Loch's reasoning. Caleb didn't appreciate the parenting dig, and thinks any illness that extends past a day is bad for business and should be fixed with money.

I'm not sure how. Do you boil the cash and make a poultice? Steep coins and drink the tea? Invest in eucalyptus extraction companies?

Don't be a smartass, it doesn't become you, he said to me.

Sure it does. And I sneezed on his lapels and he shook his head and removed his jacket and Loch picked me up under both arms and wrestled me upstairs. I had a hot bath and a long sleep and what do you know, I actually am feeling a little better today for the first time in over a week.