Because you can't actually fix anything with a sandwich and an orgasm, contrary to popular belief.

I'll be the one to protect you from
Your enemies and all your demons

I'll be the one to protect you from
A will to survive and a voice of reason

He tried, I guess.

Dinner was beyond decadent. Vertical food. Probably plated with tweezers like I've seen on Chef's Table so it was cold by the time it made it to me, and then I didn't know how to eat it.

You haven't touched your food. 

(Sorry, I'm busy savouring this six hundred dollar wine instead. Tonight's going to hurt, better anaesthetize myself while I can.)

I don't know what it is, Cale. 

He rolls his eyes. Chicken. Mushrooms. Risotto. 

Which part? I squint at my plate. I see no chicken. I can identify a green bean and what I think is shaved parmesan. The rest is roasted beige something. It's a poultry inukshuk. We were here alright.

Tell you what. Finish your glass. We'll go find some Monte Cristos. 

Really? I light up. I'm starving and pretension robs my appetite.

Tension robs everything else. Including common sense. As I never saw the shift in him, the one that took him from trying to please, to expecting to be pleased. There's always a price for a six hundred dollar bottle of wine. I should have stayed in Vegas. At least then it wouldn't have been the same monster over and over again. It would have been a different one every day.

Bridget. 

Mmmm? My attention is drowning in oak-aged grapes and wrath.

You're preoccupied. 

Sorry. Just thinking. 

About what? Be honest with me. He's got our coats now, helping me into mine, the familiar roughness taking over where his gentlemanly efforts are beginning to wear away. He leads me out by the hand and we are in the car and then we're in a more-brightly lit but far less affected restaurant where he orders cokes and sandwiches and then he smiles but only with his mouth and we eat quickly (he eats the half I leave) and then we're in the car again. It's late. Deciding you chose the wrong place for dinner and having to choose again takes time.

Oh, nothing. I was just thinking about how Joel said Lucic makes one-point-five million every time he scores a goal. It made me laugh.

I didn't think you followed Edmonton. 

I don't. I follow Lucic though.

And then we're home and it's hardly lit at all, the outside lights are mostly off. It's later than I thought and the house is quiet. The kids' doors are closed and no one is around and there are a few lights burning in the library and Lochlan is there but I don't even know if he followed as I am led upstairs, still with my coat on. Still with my buzz on. Still with no lights on and I stumble against furniture as we make our way to my room. He wastes no more of his precious time, stripping me down, again without the gentleness of before, now with barely-concealed need leaking out from the darkness of his eyes, the strength of his hands and the bent of his brain that has to do this.

(Why does he have to do this?)

And then he has already begun, his hip bones grinding against mine, his fingers in my mouth, my buzz heading out the door. Lochlan isn't coming. No one's going to save me now. I can feel doors closing in my brain as history takes over and a ten-year-old starts calling the shots in the best way she knows how.

Don't shut down on me, Bridget. It's a warning I can't heed. It's too late.

He shines a flashlight directly in her eyes. You're safe. Everything's okay. I'm here. He slows down, no longer grinding down my bones, instead bearing down hard enough to break them instead. My jaw unclenches and he holds my head in his hands, hard enough to squeeze my brain. I cry out and he loves that and his fingers go back into my mouth and I can't move a muscle. But I don't have to, the Devil is working my limbs, trying to touch my brain, trying to reach my soul so he can have it back. And the ten year old suddenly steps away and he sees my hiding place and I can't help it anymore and I give in.

This is his reward, the one I never want to give him anymore.

Go, baby, he whispers. Go get it. 

Harder, I cry and he twists my arms up over my head as I arch my back. I can't reconcile anything anymore but goddamnit I'm going to get something out of this fucked-up life too.

But the moment it's over she steps back in to hide me, my hands start shaking and the look of certain victory on Caleb's face in the dark makes me want to throw up.

This is why I would give you the moon if you asked, Neamhchiontach. 

Can you just get Lochlan for me instead? I need him. The look of victory and all of the air is sucked right out of the room with that request and I can no longer breathe at all.

The only thing darker than my last death.

In these diamonds we're left with coloured glass
As pressure takes its toll, we will outlast
But you can't break my heart
As long as I can be myself, I'll never fall apart
And you can't take me in
If I'm not broken, break me down
So I will never feel alone again

Have to get in the mood. Have to breathe evenly. Have to delete the message just like the good old days when several hours prior to a date, he would tell me what I should wear. Have to stop my hands from shaking as he pulls out old triggers and new risk. Have to button all of these stupid buttons but I can't breathe. I can't breathe. Can't let Lochlan see this fear after I said I was fine. In control, even. So not in control. Why did he agree to this? My terms are simpler. My ways are safer. You let him call the shots they'll be aimed right between my eyes.

Or worse. At my heart.

This is frustrating (and no I'm not drunk.) (Okay, I'm not drunk YET.) (Okay, maybe a little.)

New Jake is growing a beard (omg what's wrong with my knees?)

John just shaved his off. (I might have cried out in alarm when I saw him, as I didn't know who he was at first.)

PJ plans to grow his to his knees. God love my metalhead.

Ben has his customary-scary winter one.

Lochlan just looks weird and homeless with one. It doesn't work for him. 

Caleb looks like a serial killer hiding in plain sight with his. 

Daniel will never ever grow one and waxes. 

Schuyler shaves twice a week, sometimes only once. 

Christian also looks downright strange with one. 

Batman always looks like a Wall Street financier down on his luck with one. 

Sam looks like a... a Hobbit now with his. 

And I have been trying to grow one for years and years and it never happens, and they won't tell me the secret of how to do it. 

Hold my planner.

Caleb comes around this afternoon after I get home, trying once again for a date. He's less lonely than before but also makes twice as much effort to cement his place in the house (and my  life) but he's doing it sweetly, at least. 

Can I borrow her...just for a meal? 

She's not very high in calories. Lochlan is amused, playing with words like he plays with fire. Actually he's doing that too, as Caleb is running down a sensitive subject and sometimes when you joke with him when he's feeling like this he has a tendency to get violent. 

Except he knows that I don't permit violence in my house (much) and that it won't win him any dinners, lunches OR breakfasts. He needs to play nice to play at all. 

I'll let them figure it out. I'm too happy to be home and head first in Lochlan's shirt, his arms around me tight. He smells like goatsmilk soap and coffee and he's nice and warm. 

Thursday. When she's off work. Then you can come back with her. 

My eyebrow goes up and bumps into Lochlan's collar. Did he just set up my date and then invite him home afterward? 

I was thinking a late dinner, so eightish and back around eleven? 

Sounds fine. 

Yes. Yes he did.

Continuity errors.

If you knew me (you're so lucky you don't), you'd know that the only thing I want to do after sex is go to sleep for a bit. And by a bit I mean hours and hours, preferably overnight or at least for the remains of the day.

So when Ben gently turned me out the door I contemplated not doing my jean-buttons back up but I did and then boy, was I surprised when I ran into Caleb coming down the basement steps and I quickly tried to casually fix my Ben-hair, as he had it gripped good and tight in his hand and it's a disaster.

Oh, I was just looking for- He stopped. No amount of surprise casual-ness will hide what I was just up to. Jesus. You can't even wait until dark? 

Did you need something? Ice will cover my fluster. Ice will freeze it in place forever and I'll never ever change. I'll never be as cool and collected as the devil, I'll never have a poker face or be able to hide a thing. I'm clear. See-through. A jellyfish.

A well-fucked jellyfish.

I was hoping to steal you away for some brunch but now I feel as if I should just go back upstairs and pretend I never saw you. 

You could do that. 

Do you want to get ready and go out? 

No. I need to lie down. I start laughing. I'm the man. Don't men always want to fall asleep right after sex? Yeah, that's me. I'm a dude. So happy. Be right back, going to pee in the snow.

What's so funny? 

Nothing. 

Are you laughing at me? 

No, I'm tired. Maybe brunch tomorrow. 

You work tomorrow. 

That makes me laugh more, only it doesn't sound much like a laugh. More like a sob. True. Maybe later, when I get up. 

Are you alright?

Oh, I'm good. I'm so good. 

Benterludes.

I got to sleep in. Sam conceded that since I heard the sermon, live and up close, and that I live it already, trying to protect myself against all of the things that threaten to tear me down, that I was cleared to not attend.

He didn't let Lochlan off the hook and after a lot of grumpy swearing and even some indignant hollering down the hall at Sam's back as he went home to find a suit (and the famous Argentinian flag-bucked belt) Lochlan also put on a suit, a plain brown belt and brown shoes and went to church.

It almost made me laugh except that I was so damned surprised that he followed through the laughter ended up far behind me. I went down to see Ben instead. Ben sometimes still disappears for too long and it's one of the thorns that stuck into our relationship and let it bleed out so slowly nothing hurt and he is always, always there when I need him mind you. He's just distracted and always caught up in wonderful projects.

I snuck in through the door and up behind him as he sat in his chair. I didn't know he was asleep or I would have left him be but I wrapped my arms around his head and he startled fifty feet and shouted. AH!

WHAT?

WHO IS IT?

It's MEEEEEEE!

Oh my God, Bridget, you scared me. 

Probably because you forget what I look like. 

I just look for the short blonde blur. 

Nice. 

Have I been down here too long? 

I didn't nag. 

Maybe you should. 

I'm not that type of person. 

He snorts and I make a note to follow up on that. I am persistent, though I won't harass you if you're busy unless I'm kidding and you're clearly not busy.

Where's Loch?

He went to church. 

Huh. What'd he do? 

I just told you. 

I mean to go alone? Did he kill someone? 

Sam guilted him into it. 

Sam is everyone's favorite sitcom wife. 

True. But Loch went that's good. 

And you're bored. 

Yup. I'm just using you for entertainment. You know, til he comes back. 

How much time do we have? He's not in his chair anymore, crowding the spot where I stand, head down, lips against my hair, hands absolutely all over.

What's time again? Oh, that thing we don't measure. 

Lock the door, Bridge. 

Already did. My smile is wicked, my intentions crystal-clear.

Bones are not enough armour for a heart.

Sam is road-testing his sermon on us today about the difference between forgiveness and self-protection. Using himself as an example, no less. Beginning with a parable of a samaritan who puts his own safety at risk to save another's life and ending with dealing with lies in a relationship and when to cut the cord in order to save oneself is going to be an interesting sell to the congregation tomorrow but will also put to rest the rumours which will no doubt fly when Matt's fresh reappearance turns into a glaring absence, noted by the people who seem to find sport in noticing such things, under the guise of concern. 

(It's not concern. We see right through you.)

I think he should take the day but he incorporated that into the sermon as well, in that no amount of outside influence will weaken his relationship with or need to be close to God. 

He is a living lesson sometimes, with a strength I don't understand sometimes as he can seem small and vulnerable but then he's weathered storms that would break a lesser man at the same time. Sam's demons are fought to fucking ash and then he steps over the remains into the light. Sam's a hero. No question. 

The question is not if I can manage, but if you will bear witness, he asks. He is sleepy and gorgeous and I just got that sermon face to face, morning-breathed and half-awake, cuddled under all the quilts in my bed, Lochlan still sleeping against my other side, slumbering right through the entire homily (possible as usual?).

But I've already heard it now! Doesn't that mean I can sleep in? 

Snap your fingers, snap your neck.

PJ's entire existence has been devoted to doing things like playing Prong or Amon Amarth at top volume while I eat my breakfast, nodding along while he headbangs through loading the dishwasher or pouring cereal for milk. He's so earnest. He said the heavy holds our worries, the notes weighing them down in order to drown them in this endless, soaking rain. He says that it's liberating. He says It's necessary, Bridget. And you should try harder.

God Bless him. I just finished a night in which I was reminded of being ten years old and not understanding the incredible heartbreak in the music of artists like Air Supply, Journey, Bon Jovi and countless others.

Lochlan took a gamble playing endless ballads and now they all run with it, including Sam, force-feeding it into my brain, making a whole new kind of hurt as I hear the words with fresh adult ears, always jolted by the pain, the emotion in the voices of singers I can belt along with in my sleep at this point.

But that, my friends, is a far cry from nodding sleepily along with fucking Prong while I enjoy toast with crunchy peanut butter and coffee in the huge BB8 mug that I always grab first, crumbs on my cheek, curly tips of a bedhead bob making me feel ten years old again, in which case this is definitely not the right music.

My kitchen is Wacken, my bedroom a smoky pub on the right side of town where they play soft pop and mourn their busted tickers til the sun comes up and then we'll start all over again, won't we, because that's what people do.

Sam is okay. I've passed on all of the positive encouragement you've emailed and I thank you readers, for understanding how much it hurts when the love of your life walks the fuck out for a third time without warning.

(He's not sad at this point, just angry at himself for falling for it all over again. But he's not too angry to take comfort with us, and I think I may just keep him here until Easter all the same.)

Holiday Matt.

(For the record that I don't even know who is keeping, Lochlan already pinky-swore to make up New Years Eve to me, as if it was his fault or something that I chose to work both days, and so Friday night we're going to go out for a fancy dinner and a show (this usually morphs into a stack of pizzas brought home in the truck followed by a stack of boys draped all over the place in the theatre room at home, though, so be warned. It's my favorite thing. Well, one of them anyway.)

When I get home with groceries (a quarter of a load. We'll go back out Saturday or Sunday but I needed a whole bunch of things that couldn't wait) this morning in advance of the impending storm, Sam is standing on the second step down. Not underneath the porch roof but just beyond reach of it. Soaking wet. An expression that would be unreadable if I didn't know Sam so well. I load up on bags and head up the walkway. He hasn't even noticed me yet even though I drove the big truck and parked it badly right in front of him.

When did he leave?

Sunday night.

Oh, Sam. Why didn't you say something?

What was I supposed to say, Bridget? You were right? Again? We got caught up in the wedding, I guess, and didn't see that nothing has really changed.

So what have you been doing the past few days? Instead of looking to your friends to support you. I don't want to be right, I want you to be okay.

I'm okay. Mended my ego, shined my pride back up, prayed for a solution to being lonely. You know, the usual. Well, YOU don't know but some of them get it.

I guess the look on my face walked back his attitude just enough to bring my Sam back.

Sorry, Bridget. I'm just trying to deal with it.

Let us help you.

How can you possibly help me?

By giving you perspective. And grace. 

Is your grace stronger than God's?

Of course it is. I'm local. 

He snorts laughter. Finally, a smile. A soaking-wet smile.

I should have come around days ago. 

You can move back. 

Good luck convincing Caleb to go home. He's so content to watch your every move. 

You can live in my room. But you can never ever bring your overly-complicated wedding dates there. 

That's perspective alright. Thanks, Bridget. I get a hug that's half-rain, half-Sam.

You're welcome. Just a note though, I go to bed these days at like eight and I'm usually fairly cranky by then. 

Flushed.

My work week is finished, the cook gave me a huge piece of cake to bring home (it was broken and he knew I would love it so he didn't throw it out) and when I get home I sit in my Porsche in the driveway in my spot to the left of the garage beside the steps to August's loft and I eat the cake with my fingers.

It was a good plan until Caleb knocked on the window and I dropped a fistful of cake all over my lap. What a waste. But secondary win, my car now smells like chocolate cake.

Eating sweets in secret usually means someone is cheating on their diet.*

What diet? I ask through a mouthful of cake.

He frowns. I don't understand how he managed to raise you with zero manners. 

I have manners! I'm supposed to use them for important people. 

He misses the burn completely, apparently distracted by the fact that it's three in the afternoon and no one's claimed my attention yet. They don't even know I'm home. Actually they might if they heard the car but sometimes they sit outside too, in their vehicles. I always thought they were probably listening to the end of a song or something but from now on I will assume they're also eating secret cake. That must be why Caleb is out here waiting. He's either the nutrition police or he's hoping I will share.

Well I won't and I'll go to jail if I must. Sugar is worth more than oxygen to me.

I agree to come over after dinner. I can stay up a little later, as I don't have to work tomorrow, and he's been great about not trying to monopolize my time. New Year's eve technically didn't exist except I did indeed wait up for Henry and then texted with Ruth around three in the morning and then I got up at five and went to work.

We did absolutely nothing. Loch dozed off. Ben only came upstairs at twelve ten to say Happy New Year and PJ never even made it past ten-thirty. New Jake was a no-show (he said he was on a phone call) and Matt and Sam didn't come over. I haven't seen them in days. So it was sort of a non-existent celebration in which we didn't celebrate but I did make a few resolutions. I gave up pop. Makes me have to pee, never makes me less thirsty, and is always far too sweet anyway. I rarely have it as it is. I'm going to treat myself to more water plus more hot drinks like tea or an afternoon hot chocolate instead (not too sweet since I put a half-teaspoon of mix in for a huge mug). No drugs and by that I mean I went off the shit the doctor put me on. I threw out all of the pills that make me miserable and I plan to keep advil and decongestants in my medicine drawer and the rest is going away. Part of the reason I always feel so tired and energy-less and nauseous is the endless cocktail of birth control (that isn't for preventing pregnancy, long story), sleeping pills, headache pills, cold pills, stomach pills, stress pills, depressing pills, fucking pills holy fucking jesus no more pills so there you go.

I'm just going to eat cake all the time instead. So far so good. Also, it's GOING TO SNOW TONIGHT. Finally! Wait! I HATE snow. But I don't care since I don't have to go to work. Muhahahaha.

*(Edit: Oh, dear readers. Caleb was not fat-shaming me, he was making a gentle joke. I weigh a massive ninety-four pounds and am always working to gain. It hardly works. And no, I don't need tips. I've tried them. I'm not a stress-eater, rather, the stress eats me.)