One week to daylight saving time and I might not make it.

I opened the curtains this morning and yelled MOTHERFUCKER! at the snow falling in thick flakes all over the point. Then I turned to apologize to Sam who was finishing his coffee at the sink. He grinned at me and told me to accept what I cannot change and I said I'm going to move the patio heaters all around the yard today to melt it all. Ben laughed and asked me who was going to move them again since they are exceedingly heavy and hardly as 'portable' as they are advertised to be, and I told him he was. He frowned in mock disappointment and told me to wait a few hours, that the rain will follow the snow and wash it all away.

Oh, great! More rain! This is not mock disappointment from me, but despair.

Bridget-

I'm not complaining! 

Yes, you are. August laughs and then his eyes drop to study his coffee intently when I turn to look at him.

This sucks! I hate winter. I hate rain. 

Tell us how you really feel. Lochlan's going to gang up on me too. Hey, they treat me like a kid I can act like one. February and March are hard months to be a Canadian, probably not for most British Columbians, but I'm not a British Columbian, am I? And this isn't even normal weather for here. I'm beginning to think the snow just follows me around from province to province like a big white annoying shadow.

On the upside, it's light out for almost twelve hours a day now. Right, Bridge?

Did I mention PJ is my favorite? I nod, suddenly comforted. At least that shows me we are indeed still turning toward spring and not stalled out, a big blue ball stuck in space in an endless season all around.

There you go, he says. Stop riling her up, guys. 

We didn't make it snow, it does that on it's own. It's called weather, Ben points out unhelpfully.

Well, it needs to stop that, I tell him.

I'll tell it you said so. 

Thank you!

Thrall.

I am home. Home to sort recycling and turn back into a scullery maid. Off with the diamonds and the Lagavulin and the television that just plays whatever you want it to play and the man who agrees with absolutely everything you say because he had no stake in raising you and therefore is not worried about your manners or your emotional wellbeing or your fears and your dreams alike. Home to the one who worries about everything but who loves in a hard, visceral way, a permanent way, a beautiful way.

Home to a house without birthday cake or the fear that a mood might change or a word might trigger something buried deep underneath. Home where our monstrousness is right up front and we check each other regularly for attitudes and issues. Home is where I crawl back under the microscope, back in front of the two-way mirror, back to the future of the past. Home to relative safety from the demons.

Home.

My demon was very good. On his best behaviour but then at the last minute, this morning when his time was up he tried a half-hearted soft threat that I thought about and then didn't acknowledge. He did though.

This is harder than I thought, Neamhchiontach. Thank you for coming to spend my birthday with me. You are the best present a man could hope for.

I'm a world of trouble.

Not to me. I know how to keep you in line. 

I paused there, not moving, thinking about his words and all of the incredible history between us that between Caleb and Cole made me who I am today. I let it slide. It serves no purpose now.

I'm sorry, Bridget. I just want to keep you here and if you won't-

You know something? I had a wonderful time with you. Thank you for sharing your birthday with me. I kissed his cheek and left him there. This event is too sacred to drag all the mud in behind it. Let's leave it clean.

54. 321.

One of the significant things about Caleb's birthday is that he is the oldest out of everyone and so I spend a lot of time thinking about his age as a number, how he will forever be the oldest and what it will feel like almost a decade from now as I reach those same numbers. I used to think that this age would be old. Washed-up and infirm. Done. Now I think it's hardly started, precious, fleeting and solid gold.

He asked everyone to join him on the beach at sunrise in the pouring rain for a toast, handing out bottles of good champagne but no glasses and so we danced in the deluge and drank straight from the bottle (some had sparkling water) before quieting into a low rendition of Happy Birthday, sung by all. A day that starts off that special will be a good day.

Ice-cold turkeys.

Joel is staying with us for a few days, mostly because I can't seem to regulate the beat of my heart anymore. It's either frighteningly slow or thumping so fast I can't keep up. So I've either spent time crawling inside my own body to trying to outrun it and he's not surprised. That's why he was there in the first place, because drugs don't work for me in the way they're supposed to. They work, they just do it unpredictably and then I quit and coming off is suddenly an issue and I feel like this whole place looks familiar. Ah, there's the sign. It reads SQUARE ONE.

Lochlan and PJ got lectured for letting me once again run the show.

August got lectured for leaving.

Sam got lectured for everything else.

I'm still being lectured. But Joel is doing it graciously. I pointed out he's here under duress anyway because I've quit sugar for Lent and they thought quitting the drugs cold turkey was a bad idea, wait until a few more days without cake go by.

Or cookies.

Or Nutella, straight from the jar with a spoon.

Marshmallow fluff, Lucky Charms, Reeses, Three Musketeers, and sour patch kids. Licorice. I can't have any of it. I can't have a Shamrock shake. I can't have a Peanut Buster Parfait. I can't put sugar in my coffee. I have to face my cravings by praying with Sam, who practically implodes, shaking with silent laughter as he listens to me wax and moan to God that if His Son was so awesome, church would have a dessert bar, and it just might after Easter if we get to vote on the use of the new funding and I'm terrible, I know. I just haven't done this before. Recently, I mean.

But I'm mostly back on track now, just in time for tomorrow's festivities with Caleb, who will be celebrating his fifty-fourth birthday and the only thing he's asked for is the entire day with me.

Maybe someone should warn him.

I DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW OTHER PEOPLE COPE WITH LIFE.

Everyone seems so organized, focused, disciplined, pulled-the-fuck-together and I feel like a haphazard blonde tornado made of anxiety instead of wind. 

CATEGORY FIVE, BABY. 

Fml.

Is endarkenment a thing though?

Big teeth ate all of the big bread and came back for more. It's gone now and tonight is the annual Shrove Tuesday pancake dinner from hell in which I try to feed twenty people pancakes and sausages and by the time I'm dishing up the last few plates the first few are finished, cutting in line for seconds. It's sort of like being a pancake machine and I've threatened more than once to send them all to McDonalds for hotcakes because in case I haven't made it crystal clear, they serve breakfast all day now.

And that's really wonderful.

I organized this Friday too. Made sure I planned ahead, not stepping on any hearts or fingers or toes in the process and it's mildly begrudging anyway and I'm watching that. Caleb's birthday. During Lent. Everything old is new again and then it will be Easter, as soon as we navigate these next forty days of rain. Build me the ark and I'll sail it all the way home, floating on a tidal wave of my fears and daydreams, held back from reaching shore not by a lighthouse but by a net floating free, made of the strong arms of all of these men, who took the bread last night and broke it with their hands, dipping it into the gravy of the stew, talking with their mouths full, rolling their eyes at the comfort of such a meal, content to be together around the big table where there is hardly enough room and yet tonight will be even more crowded still.

What are you giving up for Lent, Bridget? Sam asks. He asks every year as if it's his personal duty to see that you make a worthy sacrifice for Jesus and stick to it. No heathenism on his watch.

Not this, I think to myself but out loud I say Sugar. I've never been able to do it. I love sweet things. Cake. Cookies. Chocolate. This time I have the pantry stocked with protein snacks and the fridge is stuffed full of fruits and vegetables. It's the least I can do, I think. Surely I can navigate forty stupid days. Besides, I'll probably save my own life in the process and be so much healthier-

But then I realize he thinks I mean the other kind of sugar and his face falls before he catches it and rallies round.

That so?

Actual sugar, Sam.

The relief is there behind the mask. That's a good sacrifice, Bridget. I'm proud of you.

Jesus loves you more than you will know.

Poor PJ. It's all Simon & Garfunkel here today. I've got three crockpots going full of beef, potatoes, carrots and garlic and there's two loaves of bread rising in the oven. We'll have beef stew on homemade bread with last summer's pickles and call it supper.

They're positively hovering for this meal hours ahead of schedule and yet Lochlan put on his choice for music today and PJ let him because they all crush on Lochlan and he asks so nicely for things. Ridiculously formally.

(That's a holdover from busking days. He was never that polite on the Midway circuit. He would damn-near goad people into spending money. Provoke them until they suddenly felt they had to prove him otherwise. He was a bully.)

His arm is a bit better. Bone bruises fucking hurt. Hot compresses and pain pills and very little activity are helping. There won't be any wood-chopping, bat-swinging, fist-throwing or holding Bridget up in the air with one arm in the middle of the night either for that matter.

That's okay. Dalton's looking after the woodpile, the bat was hidden ages ago, Caleb currently is on his best, and Ben can hold me up just fine.

I don't think the bread is going to rise. I'm hovering too.

And it's snowing again.

Carnies are better than angels.

Jacob put his lips against my forehead, whispering a prayer as I slept, or pretended to. When he was finished I threw my arms around his neck to keep him there.

Ach, Princess. You're breaking my back. 

Then stand up. 

He laughed and pulled me up against him and then stood up fast. It made me dizzy and I shrieked. He walked us over against the door and slid me up until we were eye to eye. His pale blue eyes were laughing at me.

Now what are you going to do, Piglet? You're stuck here.

I have some ideas. 

Oh yeah? He leans in and kisses me. Nice and hard. I can't breathe. It's just the way I like it. Share a couple with me. 

I think we should have a vacation. 

Where? 

On a beach. 

Which beach?

Any beach. 

Tropical beach? 

No, Canadian beach. 

Why? He laughs.

They're cold. It's what I know. 

This is true. But what are you going to do in the meantime, while you're trapped here? 

I'm going to bless you. 

Okay, I'm ready. 

I reach up to his forehead with one hand and draw a cross on his forehead and I say In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. 

Thank you, he whispers.

Then a hand gently moves across my face to wrap around my head and pull me to the side and I lash out hard, fighting to stay in the moment but then I open my eyes and Lochlan has me pinned against him so I don't hit him.

Nightmare, Peanut? 

No! I push off from him and sit up.

What was it? 

Nothing. I was just sleeping. Why did you wake me up? 

It's getting late. I thought you might be hungry. 

Won't kill me to miss a meal, Loch! 

It might. Are you even over a hundred pounds? 

Maybe you should keep better track if you guys are going to pour drugs into me that make me have dreams like that! 

Like what? You haven't said anything. You just woke up murderous! 

I'm sorry! I'm just pissed off! 

Then I won't wake you up anymore. 

It's not that! 

Then what is it? I can't fix it if you don't say. 

Stop with the drugs. I don't need to be sedated. 

You panic and-

And you know what to do. This isn't it. I can't take it anymore. 

It's only been a little while, Peanut. Stick it out? 

I can't. It's like my personality has changed and I feel so mad and frustrated all the time and the dreams are killing me and-

Okay they stop right now then. Maybe you won't chew my face off anymore. I just want to see you happy. 

You make me happy. 

I'm so glad to hear that. Sometimes I think the only people you pay attention to are your angels and your devils. It's nice to know I'm in there somewhere. 

His relief made me cry but his hug made me strong. It got tighter and tighter and never stopped until I asked to breathe.

Better? 

I nodded. Yeah. So much better. 

Stick by me? It'll be worth it. He smiled and broke my heart.

No in-between.

The dead reign in the Godless dark

He wants the pedestal and he's lucky if he gets one night instead. I don't know what he gave me but I like it. I like trying to worry and not being able to. I like not being afraid. I like the sharp clarity of my daydreams and I like that I slept for seven hours straight, here and then woke up without feeling like I needed a running start just to open my eyes. There is noise I can hear save for light rain on the skylights and his quiet, even breathing.

He left a fire burning so I'm not cold this time. No more slip-ups. No more pink pajamas and helpless child-Bridget. No more abject disapproval from the rest. Mild distrust remains and now the only argument fought is over time. It seems as if there is too much. I get into trouble. I can work myself up. I think too hard. I can't distract myself from within boredom. I have too many hours to fill and then suddenly I blink and it's Saturday and there are civilized negotiations (She isn't going to August. I'll burn the loft down and you can take the blame for it but she isn't going. Not today.) and not a moment to breathe.

My tension awakens him and he moves closer without opening his eyes.

You never sleep, he says.

(Observation is the purest form of obsession, I guess.)

No, I say simply.

Why?

Death frightens me. 

What else? 

I shouldn't be here. 

Where should you be? 

Looking after Lochlan. 

He's sleeping too. He needs more sleep to heal. This is a good thing. 

His logic is unarguable. I close my eyes again and he pulls me in tighter. His skin is warm. He tucks his face down against my cheek and my cheek reddens from the razor stubble on his face.

Ow. 

So fragile, he says in almost-sleep.

Grow a beard! I complain and he laughs.

Maybe I will. But then I have meetings and I feel like a savage. 

Savage in a three-piece suit. It's a look, you know-

Aaaaaannnd she's awake. 

Inevitable, Diabhal. 

Like the tides, Neamhchiontach. Run along home and nurse your Dóiteáne back to health. I'll come visit later and bring him some treats. 

French fries? 

What? No. What is with your McDonalds love?

I don't even get fries any more. They have breakfast ALL DAY now, did you know that? 

Yes, you've told me eighteen or forty times. 

Because it's AWESOME.

In the woods by the sea.

(Nothing here is new.)

I'm trying to deep-breath it, trying to find the way back when my mind takes off running down any road that leads to Jake. Trying to separate the man who is here (August) from the man who is not (Jacob) and the extent of what pretending has done for my mental health thus far.

I've been absolved of what they thought was some sort of attempt to drown myself. I just wanted to feel the cold, feel the rain, be near the sea but there's in or out and I screwed up.

And no, Andrew and Christian's little surface love affair (or so they make it out to be) didn't set me off. Something else did. And that's okay. That's going to happen sometimes. I'm going to reel and yaw from things I can't control, things I find, things people say and do. It's how I react that makes the difference.

And I'm a runner.

Flight. I turn and take off. That's the plan. That's been the plan since I was young and it was drilled into my head:

If you get caught, Peanut, break free and run. 

If you feel scared, run and find me. 

If you need me, run and fetch me. 

And then later:

If you feel overwhelmed, running is good to clear your mind. 

And on and on. Now there's only so many places to run, and I am housebound and mostly feverish with cabins and claustrophobia and the general weirdness of being packed into the side of this hill with the parking lot out front and the houses peppered across the hills like afterthoughts and most of the time the beach, the ocean is the only release from that but it's not enough here. I can go down when I need to and survey my flat watery kingdom for miles and then I turn and everything catches up with me.

I made August into a clone of Jacob. I put him up on a pedestal and I demanded things of him he shouldn't have had to deal with and yet he keeps me in check. He pushes me away. He leaves in perfectly healthy intervals and it somehow destroys me, dredging up all of the heavy weight I'm always trying to shrug off so I can just keep running.