Standing room only.

Church this morning was packed to the rafters, and boy was Sam ever pleased, as we were three rows deep, me in the front, smack in the center and two rows more behind and around us, as every single man I know was there just to make sure I had no more unwelcome visitors and then everyone else seemingly came out too from the surrounding areas and yet they all seemed to be familiar faces, people I see all the time in the neighborhood and at church though I go two or three times a month, tops. So Batman is right. If his people are there, I would never have known.

What a gong show though. It was fun, as Sam took the extra attendance to embark on one of his rare call and response sermons that Jake used to do too, telling him it kept people awake, engaged and excited. The boys love that. They embellish the heck out of response. It's very entertaining.

Afterward we went out to eat but since the whole crew went we were divided on where to eat and so broke into smaller groups to find restaurants all over the place. I opted for a hole in the wall that makes epic Monte Cristos and we jammed into a booth in the back and I cleaned my plate. Then we came home, changed and I went out into the garden to putter around, cut some roses, tie up some branches and tidy up a little from the storms that seem to have passed, for now. From the corner of my eyes, more than once I saw Caleb on his front deck or in a window. If I caught him directly I would wave even though he would disappear before he would be able to respond. It's only polite.

After an hour or so of necessary vitamin D Lochlan wandered out to find me.

Caught up? 

Yes. I think. 

Good. You'll burn if you stay out here any longer. 

I'm not sure if he means without sunscreen or under the watchful eyes of the Devil and I smile at either scenario. I hand him my bucket of tools and he takes them and holds his hand out for mine. We need to do some relaxing apparently. It's all the rage. 

I know. 

The pills are being unkind. I am anxious, jumpy, breathless and really tired. Doctor's orders are to take it easy until I catch up and hopefully the side effects will ease up soon. I run full bore all the damn time. I do too many chores. Work too hard. Stay up too late. Wake up too early. Let people get away with too much. I'm trying so hard to get used to letting things go and I'm failing miserably so he's taken over at doing it for me, or at least making sure I do a little, here and there.

Let's go then. Have a plate of snacks and some Netflix waiting for you. 

Is it Chef's Table???

It is! 

Yay!

In which my army gets its instructions from an old book in a nightstand in every hotel across America.

I'm touched that she chose a life with me in your little exercise the other day. 

I'm listening inside the door as Caleb and Sam sit on the covered front porch in the rain.

She didn't. I asked her to visualize a life with you and tell me about it and the first thing she did is conjure up Lochlan, inserting him into it, pushing you into the background, and letting her emotions overwhelm her. No time had passed between them in spite of actual years going by. 

I know who's corner you're in, then. 

Bridget's. I'm in Bridget's corner. I want to help her heal from what you've done to her. 

I had a little fun with her. She's a big girl now. She can give as good as she's gotten at this point. 

I'm not going to split hairs with you on this today, Caleb. It's a beautiful day out. God's giving us rain to ease the fires you seem to stoke up around us and for the moment things are peaceful in her worried mind. Let's leave it at that and work together to make the second half of her life more tranquil than the first. 

It's not just me, Sam. 

I'm aware of that, Caleb. Will you help, is what I'm asking?

I'm doing everything I can here. 

That's a gift in itself. Take heart in your efforts and God will shine a light within you. 

I roll my eyes and walk back through the house. God won't be shining any lights on his forsaken son any time soon. Not sure why Sam chose now to pretend to encourage Caleb but Sam likes to keep the peace all the way around. He likes to feel useful. He likes to minister to us even as we buck and arch and spew pea soup all over him, our heads spinning three hundred and sixty degrees around in a comical display of gentle censure.

We wouldn't actually. We're very respectful toward Sam, just as we were toward Jake. Some of us more than others. Some of us are very spiritual. August, Andrew, Dalton. Maybe I used to be or maybe I tried to be because of Jake. He framed God in a way that made me question how I saw the world and not how I lived the bible. Very open to interpretation. Sam is a little tiny bit more literal and I resist ever so slightly more and he knows it. Sam is an aw-shucks God-fearing very old-fashioned kind of sweet baby preacher. I love him to pieces and I'd follow him off the cliff any day but when he yells IN LEVITICUS... and pauses I turn and start running away, I swear.

Princess of Stockholm.

And then what happened?

Oh, he recognized me instantly but since he's a professional he finished his exhibition and thanked the crowd, passed the hat and packed up his things before he came over.

And then?

And then he said "It's you". He recognized me in my McQueen dress on an unfamiliar street in yet another unfamiliar country in an unfamiliar time. Maybe he felt the Devil before he saw me. I don't know. I'll never know, I guess.

And what did you say?

I asked him if he was okay and he did that thing he always does where he looks off and upwards, squinting at the sun or the stars, whatever happens to be handy and he said "Still singing for my supper, as it were. How about you?"

"Still burning in hell. I like the clothes though."

"But are you happy, Bridget? Was the grass greener? Was it all less painful with the promises that money could buy that one thing you wanted? Did he stop hurting you? Did he make up for the past? Did he brainwash you just a little more so you could forget all about the part where you loved me more? Did you actually move on or did you think about me every time you lit a candle like you always said you did?" He recognized me. In his mind twenty years was the same as a week.

And then Caleb is beside me, having straightened out the issue with the restaurant valet and he's all shits and grins and fake delight. "Who do we have here? Lochlan! How long has it been? You're still busking for a dollar? Well I'll be!" And he pulls out a hundred and tucks it into Lochlan's breast pocket and steamrolls the conversations back to the good old days on the point and then they both look at me with horror and I didn't even realize that tears had begun to roll heavily down my face in a death march off the edge because they didn't want to exist suddenly either-

And abruptly Sam snaps his fingers.

Your imagination is a force to be reckoned with, Fragile Miss b. No wonder he worries so.

But I can't catch my breath.

Bridget. Sam puts his hands on my arms and starts to count so I don't hyperventilate.

Why does my head want one thing when my heart knows exactly what it wants, Sam? 

Bridget, Jesus Christ! Caleb's been brainwashing you for three decades. You are programmed to go to him. This is how he's designed your brain from a young age in going back to him time and time again not matter what he does to you. It's just lucky that you imprinted on Lochlan before that so he can call you back. The problem is I think it's going to take the rest of your life to undo the damage. 

I don't think I have that long, Sam. 

You don't have a choice. The longer you resist conventional therapy the longer it takes. No magic bullets, just hard work.

Give me the bullet instead. I can be a vegetable. Lochlan can spoon feed me and then I'll never argue with him. 

Bridget, keep talking like that and I'll quit this gig too.

Name one thing that's been easy to come by in this life of mine and we'll call it a day. End on a high note for me, please. I need a cheer-up. 

Love. You fall in love in the time it takes most people to brush their teeth. 

This is not a flaw, Sam, it's a perk.

It's the reason you're in this mess, Bridget. 

Which mess?

I rest my case.

Hold the door.

We're talking, the Devil and I.

Because for years, he cared for my son, out of a sense of duty. Out of a need to watch over us. Because for years he's furnished a means for me to have this collective, to keep the circus going, keep it close. Because for years he's provided me the good parts of Cole. Because for years he made the world smaller that anyone else. Because for years he taught me to be brave. To face my monsters. And that the scariest monsters sometimes wear Tiffany cuff links and Valentino suits, and call you Sweetheart, and offer you the moon.

And because even if I continued to cut him off cold it won't bring Jacob back. Jacob isn't coming back. Jacob made the choice that he did and I don't agree with it. How could a technicality overshadow what is right in front of you? And then I remember how easy it is to become overwhelmed by what we feel and I don't blame him at all.

But you're supposed to find a coping mechanism. He had so many. God. Friends. Getting drunk and quoting Winnie The Pooh. His band. Singing all the time besides. Sex. Good. hard. sex. Running, even though he HATED running. Take out food. Long drives. Camping. Horses. Motorcycles. Helping others. Hospice. Chaplain duties. Teaching. Jesus. He had so much to take his mind off his own troubles, it's hard to believe he had time to be troubled.

In contrast to cope Caleb sits in a chair and looks at his brother's artwork.

Which is all of me, I might add.

Healthy.

But he's still here. And he needs more than a chair. More than some photographs and paintings and a dead brother and a surrogate not-your-family-after-all but we used to be related by marriage and a bunch of sometimes/former friends (they're trying, bless their hearts) and I am generous as always because to be anything else at this point just breaks more hearts and we've had enough of that. I have to set an example. I'm the toughest, so it makes sense.

“And I know it seems easy," said Piglet to himself, "but it isn't every one who could do it.” ~A.A. Milne

The man with a song for everything who sings for no one but me.

Don't think sorry's easily said
Don't try turning tables instead
You've taken lots of chances before
But I ain't gonna give any more
Don't ask me
That's how it goes
'Cause part of me knows what you're thinking

Especially if it's progressive rock, and distantly related to Pink Floyd, or so I was educated after his acoustic arrangement of the song, sung as I washed my hands at the sink in the half bath just off the side door where you enter from the driveway. I was marched there in tears after being caught in the garage lying on the floor trying to sort out guilt, obligation, and rage.

Sort it out with me, Lochlan tells me.

You won't let me. I tell him.

Right. Don't sort it out. Leave it be.

I can't leave this be!

Do it anyway! He yells in my face and we burst into fresh sets of tears for each other to admire and regret.

Try not to worry you.

I will try not to breathe
I can hold my head still with my hands at my knees
These eyes are the eyes of the old, shiver and fold

I love the internet when it serves as a dysfunctional respite, a mirror to my crazy, as since it's spring again the requests for a rundown of my beauty/makeup/fashion routine outweigh any concerns that a mafia henchpin-lynchman-kingturn-head of some syndicate something or other that Caleb is used to be messed up with found me alone and offered me their services after once trying to take me as a payment on a loan Caleb was paying back (on time, I might add. They now say it was all in good fun. What the fuck.), somehow deciding they can protect me better, obviously because, heh, where is everyone?

Newsflash. I don't require bodyguards. 

Maybe you do, they suggest.

Maybe you do, I counter, trying to tilt my head in a slight display of danger that might give them a little doubt but instead they see it as endearing and I can't win so I stamp my feet and that brings laughter. Laughter all around.

My comic instances, always so charming.

Ben, who finds gravity in nothing and nihilism in everything, thought it was sweet that they want to protect me. Like the rest of us, he said in stark contrast to the way he usually talks. Lochlan wants to know why they're back now, what they want, what angle they're working, if they're watching us/me/Caleb. Caleb no longer cares about them and tells me not to worry, that I haven't done anything wrong and he stopped all dealings with them anyway the moment I became a target the very first time and that if I would sleep easier we could go together and explain our history and explain our present and they would know that we've sorted it out.

Batman tells everyone he has it covered.

Does it involve even scarier people?

Oh, probably, he laughs, but they won't come visit you at church. You'll never see them, he promises and I believe that too.

Victoria Day plans.

Brrrrr. It's a jeans and flannel shirt and boots kind of day. Too wet to mow. Too wet to garden. Too wet to hike. Too cold to ride. Too miserable to play with the bears.

A perfect day to spend in bed with Netflix and pizza and just t-shirts, Ben says and he lifts his eyebrows waiting for my response while I sip my tea.

Danny and Sky made me the same offer an hour ago, I tease him and laugh and he reacts with mock horror and then waggles his tongue and tells me to message them and find out the times.

I push him off and tell him I don't think he was invited, just me and he pouts, saying I'm not going anywhere, lifting me up into him arms, pinning me against the counter, placing a tiny kiss underneath my ear with a smile. We had a rough week. Hit and run. Touch and go. Torch and flee. Flay and pray.

He sets me back to the floor and waits for confirmation that I'll stay with him.

I nod.

I'll go order the pizza then, he says. You get the redhead.

Went for God, found the Iron Curtain.

I went to church early with Sam this morning. He likes company, I get free coffee.

Once there, he turns up the heat and leaves me to pass out bulletins and set up while he runs for the coffee. We're a good team. I'm still a preacher's wife and a damn good one. The door opens far too soon, no way he could have made it all the way to Starbucks and back so I head down the sanctuary to help him with his purchases and just as I make it through the door I'm greeted by two Russian bodyguards and the kingpin himself, or whatever they call him. Papa is actually what they call him but I don't think any of them are related.

I take a step backwards but then one is taking my arm, walking me back toward him.

Don't be afraid, Papa orders as we reach him.

I'm not. 

Such a firefly, he says softly.

Caleb is on his way. 

No he isn't. 

Are you here for the service? 

No, this is personal, actually. I need to know if you need help with him. 

Caleb? No. 

He hurt you as a child. Does he continue to hurt you? Think carefully before you answer me. 

No. And I have no reason to protect him. 

Bridget, I'm going to give you a card. 

I have one already. 

This one is different. It reaches me directly. 

Who does the other one reach? 

My people. 

Oh. 

If you need anything you call the number on it. Anything. Twenty four hours a day. You call me. I will send someone or I will come myself. Twelve people have this privilege in the world but I like you. You ask for nothing. 

I nod.

Don't let him hurt you. You're worth more than that. 

I nod again.

How much are you worth?

More than that. 

Good girl. Have a nice day, okay? Don't show that card to them. I don't care if you tell them you saw me but the card stays with you at all times okay? It's not for them, it's for you.

Okay. I whisper. He bends down and kisses both my cheeks, the left one twice and then they're gone.

I'm still standing in the hall shaking like a leaf when Sam comes in with coffee and croissants ten minutes later.

Bridget, you're as white as a sheet! What's wrong?

Nothing. I just had a visitor. 

Who? 

Papa. 

The Russians?

The Russians. 

What did they want?

They apparently have my back.

What?

'Save the Bridget, save the world', I guess. 

Man, you charm everyone. 

But I DON'T. That's the thing!

Vicarious Dalecarlian.

By eleven thirty the party has wound down and everyone has wandered off into small groups. Dalton has stuck close by me and I him. Good. Three months without this one was rough, though I'm not sure who had it worse, me or him, or possibly Duncan, who shed every ounce of cool and had tears in his eyes for most of the evening as he hung on his little brother's every word. We abandoned the cold table in favor of the warm and cozy fire pit early on in the evening while Dalton regaled us with stories of..kale salads and bed every night by eleven alone. No women. No Netflix and no merch. Free days were spent in art museums and cathedrals. Free nights he had his Kale early and got extra sleep.

Wait. What? Where are the girls? Where are the broken hearts scattered all over Europe? Where is the love? 

Here with my family, he smiles. I'm so happy to be home.

He already got an offer to go back in the fall. He's not sure. 

He brought us all Dala horses from Sweden, in colors and sizes that correspond to our sizes and favorite colors. Ben's is the size of a cat and dark. Mine is palm-sized and teal blue. Loch's is red and covered with the most ornate filigree and about ten inches around. The rest of the boys got horses in their favorite colors somewhere from the same size as Ben's down to Lochlan's. The children's horses have inlays of enamel in them with their initials. He did amazingly well. They're just beautiful.

***

One forty-five and I have been summoned by the Devil, briefly for a check-in. Loch waits in the driveway, not because of the bears but for the demons. Caleb sits in his candlelit kitchen, all windows open to hear the roar of the surf washing over the rocks, and feel the cool night air washing over our skin. He's got three fingers of bourbon warming at his hand, the bottle close by. It doesn't look like it will be a pretty night (for him anyway). My night is almost over. I'm hardly awake still and Ben waits for me upstairs. A nice surprise after a week of veritable strangeness.

Neamhchiontach. 

I'm expecting a verbal flaying. Maybe some legal threats. I went where I haven't gone before.

Yes?

Are you...okay?

Pardon?

I mean...do you need anything?

I'm..okay. Are you...okay? Is there something I can do for you?

I'm...are you going to list my mistakes now for all to see?

Absolutely not. It serves no purpose. But it also serves no purpose to sugarcoat our relationship. 

Like we do now. 

Exactly, like we do now. 

We do, don't we, Bridget?

It works best, I think. I need to go. Loch is waiting-

How is he with this-

He didn't do anything-

He was there too-

He wasn't an adult-

Oh. I forget sometimes how much younger he is. 

He was seventeen. You were twenty, Diabhal. 

I'm so sorry, Bridget. 

Goodnight, Caleb. 

When I get back outside Loch is right there with his head pressed against the cedar shakes waiting for me, out-loud counting seconds into minutes, eyes closed.

Locket. Let's go.  

What did he want?

He asked if I was okay. 

Really?

And he wanted to know how much I was going to write about. 

There's the lawyer. Gearing up, I suppose. 

Of course. He tried to implicate you as well. 

Me?

Until I reminded him of how old you were. 

Lochlan thinks for a moment. And then what did he do?

He apologized. 

And?

I left.

Loch puts his arm around me and pulls me in close. He's going to try all sorts of approaches now to keep in your good graces. Run your own show, Peanut. 

I nod. I don't know if that means actually run my own show or let Loch run my show but it's late and I'm done thinking about anything save for colorful horses and the fact that tonight, we're all home and the gate is closed and it's my favorite moment of all when that happens.

One. Single. Theme. and it's sex.

Dalton just called from Denver. He and Dilly are almost home! Just three more hours and then freaking long weekend Friday afternoon traffic and they're mine.

And look. I need to address something. I don't often give a voice to things in the past between Caleb and I unless it's to complain about the amount of time I have spent bored in Vegas. I don't often point out that one of the hazards of being a little girl anxious for approval in a sea of close-knit teenage boys is that she often becomes a target for inappropriate behavior or far, far worse. What good comes of that? Want me to make a list of those who touched me without asking? Or who still does? I daresay it'd be easier to list who didn't/doesn't.

Here:

1.

Let's move on from there because it escalated anyway, because things like that always will and Lochlan couldn't always protect me. He had to work. He tried so hard. He lied to everyone we knew, including parents, teachers and bosses. He changed his life. He brought me with him to keep me safe and still it wasn't enough. He holds so much guilt for trying to save me and instead putting me in the line of fire. He can barely breathe some days because of that guilt but we manage and we'll be alright because we're so much tougher than we look. I love him. I always will. Like I said, we're tough.

We must be as I suddenly realize it's noon on a Friday and I'm about to throw a homecoming dinner for twenty people on four hours notice. I asked PJ to take me to the store. I can't drive on these pills, these ones make me ridiculously zonky-quick-sandy. He agrees and I wonder out loud what Dalton brought me home for souvenirs from Europe.

STDs. Really exotic ones though, because...Europe.

Nice. 

I know, right? Tres beaucoup!