Changing the subject.

It's for Groundhug Day. Ben holds up a new flannel shirt. His old ones are all on nineties life-support.

I am trying so hard not to laugh. And what is this groundhug day, exactly?

A day where you get a lot of hugs and if you get enough, spring is just around the corner.

Around the corner, like six weeks away?

Yes. About that.

I wonder what a groundhug looks like.

I can give you an early preview, if you want.

Yeah, I could use one right now. The hug part anyway.

I'll try and get a picture of the elusive groundhug before Thursday though. So you know exactly what to expect.

Oh, thank you. I bet it's cute.

It is. Just like you.

Haha. Do I have to be dragged out into the light to confront my shadow every year?

Pretty much, little bee. It's quite a spectacle, actually.

Death by pop lovesong from the king of fire and easy listening. Christ.

I warned you. Criteria for living here is that you must be thoroughly and hopelessly afflicted with Romantic Tourettes.

I just want you to know who I am.

He's been singing all day, at top volume, from his place flat on his back on the floor. Every twelve minutes he raises himself up on his elbows and takes a big gulp of whiskey* and he makes that stupid noise, some sort of Scottish click-version of tsk, and then he flattens himself to the floor again.

So he can keep singing Iris.

I think I hate this song. I didn't used to but I do now.

*(For the record Lochlan isn't drunk anymore, the kids did not see him, I would have started drinking too had I been told what he was told (nothing to do with the children, in case you were jumping to conclusions) and Caleb is still evil.)

Das modell.

I'm a little bit insolent today.

I'm shooting another single cover this morning for a band, friends of Ben's (and sadly Caleb) from overseas (Industrial death metal. I can't spell or pronounce their name. I don't even have those characters on my keyboard.) Same group as last time though, they want to keep the theme.

I don't know why they don't just use any picture they already have from the last shoot and change it in post. They add so much I never recognize myself. I'm fascinated that the photographer can take a relatively pretty photograph of me standing on a cliff and then it goes off to Los Angeles or Berlin and a team makes it into the angel of death or the harbinger of pain or something totally freaky and I become unrecognizable.

I like that. I really do. So today I'm in concrete false eyelashes and hair blown out to the rafters and some white gauzy number that I have been sewn into because it was miles too big when I tried it on. The makeup artist is a poet. I'll give him that. I've been put into a raincoat and given a cup of coffee for a quick break while they see if the snow will come back or if we can resume working outside. Oh yes, being outside on the cliff edge in zero-degree wind, rain and snow is total fucking glamorous.

While fourteen total strangers take over my house and driveway no less.

While Lochlan stands in the kitchen drinking whiskey for breakfast and frowning at the spectacle.

Soon he will be the spectacle and I will be scrubbed of my look and returned to the house while the boys remark that people will think it's someone's child on the cover of the album. And what happened to using tall models? The tall models cost too much, let's just use Bridget again.

Thank you. So much. Really. Herzlichen Dank. Clearly discount death metal is the most hardcore of all. Didn't you know that?

Yeah, let's just use Bridget again. Forever the prize of consolation only I'm the one who needs consoling most of the time because I may look like the creepy little angel of death in the record store but out here in the rain I am soaking wet with a freakishly sweet scowl and a massive terror that I'm going to slip. That's what the wire is for. Just like the circus only I'm not permitted to walk on this one. Instead of holding me up, it holds me down.

That's probably the only thing that fits today. That sentence, right there.

Outsider (thirty two years and three months in).

I need something to fly over my grave again
I need something to breathe

I will try not to burden you
I can hold these inside. I will hold my breath
Until all these shivers subside,
Just look in my eyes

Yesterday morning he wordlessly queued up Automatic for the People on the stereo, since he gets easily tired and tense of the endless heavy metal, the endless noise I perpetrate against the relative solitude of the house. He wants to hear more beautiful words today. I don't hear anything and so I block it all out of spite. He sings it under his breath, accent unmasked. Not often that happens. I believe it's only detectable now in his frustration. People are surprised when they hear it, still.

Ninety days since the last big shift in the collective and not enough has changed except that he has kept most of his promises and others he broke deliberately, immediately. I am left in awe of his ability to rule the emotions of the whole household with such few words. Surely there's a name for a gift such as this. Surely it means something so very important it's starred in red and marked at the top. Confidential. Top Secret. Keep this, but we don't know why yet.

Yesterday morning in the cold wind I turned my face into the neck of his hoodie, and his arms came up around me out of habit, a kiss landing on the side of my head. I'm sure the scowl from across the driveway came and went unnoticed as Caleb waited for the children to buckle themselves into his car for the short trip to school. I was turned out again just as quickly and rushed back to the house behind Lochlan as he walked faster than I ever could. Once inside I asked what day it was. Not quite yet, he laughs, three months being a sort of hallmark, a date anticipated on the calendar in which we would be settled and organized and not frustrated anymore.

That has not happened as of yet. Maybe one hundred days. Maybe a thousand instead. Maybe never. I know the thought of that made him want to run. I know him through and through. Family keeps him here. Promises keep him here. Otherwise he would already be gone. He is a balloon tethered to the ground by his heart strings and nothing more.

I can't breathe with him here, Bridget. When did you start being able to exist with him so close all the time?

When I stopped fighting him.

Fire flooded his eyes with light and then as quickly as I saw it it was gone. Bridget-

But I have already turned and gone back outside to the wind. We don't finish conversations anymore. Caleb's car is back already. I told you it was a short trip to make the loop to drop the children off outside the school grounds. I walk around the truck parked closest to the garage. PJ's big red Ram. It's a darker richer red than Jacob's flaming cherry one was. PJ parks so that I have to hold my breath to get the key in the lock of the garage door, as I stand wedged between the filthy bumper and the cold morning.

I slip inside.

I can hear Lochlan calling my name and I step back out. He comes around the side of the truck with relief on his face.

Let's get out of here.

What do you mean? For lunch?

Forever. Let's just go. Cash in our chips. Find something better. He said this word for word when I was thirteen and look where it got us. Fractured. Lost and never found again.

Who?

You, me and the kids.

Henry-

I can raise another man's child. I love Henry. You know this stuff, Bridge. Let's just go. We can start again and do it right this time.

Have you been drinking?

No, nothing. Why?

You always ask me this when you're drunk.

I know. He says it steadily. Uncomfortable as the truth is he's owning it right now. I give him credit for that.

You only want the fun parts of life, Lochlan.

That's not true.

You told me yourself you can't take the way my brain works most of the time now.

I said that to hurt you. He winces but holds his ground.

We need to talk about this later. I take a page from his best habit and start to head back to the garage but he grabs my shoulders and stops me.

We need to talk about this NOW, Bridget! Color me surprised. This NEVER happens and I am rendered speechless. Again.

Caleb steps to the bottom of the stairs from the boathouse but lingers there. Everything okay, Bridget?

Lochlan turns and starts to head toward Caleb but I grab onto the front of his hoodie and try and pull him back. You need to go back inside. This doesn't concern you.

You just yanked someone far smaller than you off her feet, and you won't let her leave. That's my business, Loch. Caleb says it with measured control.

She's safe with me. Can't say the same for you.

Let her go. Now.

Or what? What are you gonna do? You're in over your head here, you know that? You're not welcome here. She'd be better off if you just went away.

Last time I went away Bridget spiraled into a tailspin because none of you are capable of looking after her. How many chances would you like, Lochlan? Do you want to risk her life like you used to? Does nothing ever change for you?

We would have been fine if it wasn't for you, Caleb.

Caleb laughed and I braced myself for Lochlan in ballistic missile form. Only he never launched. He left. He's predictable like that. He won't engage. He makes his point and walks the fuck out and that's why I won't go with him. I've done that. I've been there. All he does is leave a thousand frayed loose ends and a lot of unfinished business, a lot of unfinished conversations filled with unspoken beautiful words. I am still waiting for those, in spite of knowing they'll never come.

For thirty two years and three months now.

(You're not the only one, Locket. )

Late night + Redhead + REM = Certain Disaster.

I will try not to worry you
I have seen things that you will never see
Leave it to memory me. Don’t dare me to breathe
I want you to remember, oh (you will never see)
I need something to fly (something to fly)
Over my grave again (you will never see)
I need something to breathe (something to breathe)
Baby, don’t shiver now. Why do you shiver now?
(I will see things you will never see)
I need something to breathe
Something to breathe
(I have seen things you will never see)
I want you to remember

Come stand a little bit closer.

Oh, hey, a little bit of everything.


Ben is just fine, thanks for your concern. For the record he doesn't believe in that sort of thing and just says he felt so incredibly sick for a moment he thought it was the end and also for the record he didn't want to go to the ER. I did. He's so strong and brave and capable all of the time I didn't know what to do when he had a minute where he just needed to sit down and catch his breath. Point taken.

The fairy boys are here today. They've been around more now that they've had a few months to settle into their cozy home (or as we say, they're coming up for air at last. Snort.). It makes me laugh. Though I'm going to start referring to them as Savage Garden because...the haircuts. It's just...uncanny (photo is of the actual band. I'm still trying to talk Schuyler into letting me post a pic because oh my God, it's so awesome how much they look like those two.)

What can I say? The boys like their privacy. That's why I write a little about all of them, instead of everything about one or two of them. I learned my lesson with that, once upon a time.

Speaking of lessons, yes, my brain indeed chooses to make Jacob age in my head because I couldn't deal with keeping him at 36 forever because no one else gets to stay the same age forever.

But that's a tangent and clearly this is how the day is turning out. One big deviation called Wednesday by name, featuring sun, rain, some epic wind and the bitter end of the snow I didn't want in the first place. And I can't make my brain stop long enough to focus. Or my eyes, but I don't want to talk about that because they will worry.

And I don't like to make people worry.

Made sense of it myself, since no one else could.

(Over the weekend Ben had some sort of episode. An acute anxiety attack, they say. He had some tests and he's fine. Fine. Still 95% goofball, 5% big scary metal rocker. I thought he was having a heart attack and I'm afraid I did not deal with things very well at all.)

I've been watching you with my terminal view
As you struggle to rise to your end
I laughed hard at the insults we threw
As the weight of the world found revenge
Revenge
Revenge

I sit on the floor, my back up against the concrete wall, one bare light down at the end by the door swinging gently, failing to cast enough light for warmth or safety or vision. In my arms he sleeps. Sprawled across my legs uneasily. Maybe he doesn't know I am here. My chin hits my chest and I bounce awake abruptly. I will not sleep for as long as it takes.

I will remain here with my hands pressed over his heart and search for the pattern that allows me to breathe when otherwise I will hold my breath tightly until the room turns black without even realizing it. Right now my hips and my head ache but you can't take him. Oh no, not on my watch. He may be, we both may be beaten down and tested and scarred and ruined and afraid and maybe you won this round but you will not take him from me.

On the other side of a sunny afternoon the showman removes his hat and grins. He'll be fine, it wasn't anything, he reassures. I shake my head and turn away from the bright lights. I don't believe you, I say. He laughs and fades from the moment.

In his place sits Jacob. I am startled. He is sitting in a chair. New lines extrude from his eyes and mouth. Today his shirt is grey, bringing out the ashes in his hair, muting the twenty-four carat gold crown that fits perfectly. He is silent and serious. The chair is new, I didn't put that here.

I did, he says gently.

Oh, I think. You can do that?

You need to let go of him, Bridget.

Don't even fucking start with me, Jacob!

Put your arms down. You think that declaring vigilance over the spacing of Ben's heartbeats will give you comfort? In order to have that you need to accept what God gives and what he takes away.

God doesn't interest me tonight.

God gave him back to you, as he does each and every morning, and you fail to appreciate your gifts because you are too busy making up stories and worrying about the wrong things.

I was scared. My voice is defensive and annoyed. Jake laughs and rakes his fingers through his hair. It's so long. How did it get so long?

You react with the knees of a jerk, princess.

It's an old in-joke and it stings to hear such funny words from him after all this time. I clutch my arms tighter around the heart I am holding and Jacob shakes his head. Your energies are misdirected.

Did I ask for help?

Sure. I heard you pray to God for a break. You have it. So let go.

And then what?

Then take a breath.

Why would I listen to you? You bailed, preacherman.

I'm the only one rooting for the two of you, princess.

That actually makes three of us.

It won't be enough. You're outnumbered, and I don't think some days that he's as tough as he wishes people think he is.

You don't know him like I do, Jake.

I can't protect you from here.

Protection? I'm not asking for protection!

YOU SHOULD BE! He roars and I flinch a thousand miles away and back. Life doesn't hold any guarantees, Bridget. Shit happens. And you need to let go so you don't get hurt.

I put my head back against the cold cement and closed my eyes. He keeps going.

Are you listening, Bridge?

You need to stop talking now, Jacob. I got to my knees and then stood up shakily, leaving Ben sleeping on the floor. You need to stop telling me what I should be doing and just help me.

I am. I'm trying to help you. You don't listen.

Surprise. No, I don't. Is everybody happy now?

Passive archaeology (moment for the thief).

Today?

A place high in the mountains with the streets made of stone and the sunshine and the bunting flags strung across the laneways. There is a lot of laughter and songs but not in English.

What will we eat?

Pizza. With garlic and goat cheese.

Drink?

Lemonade. Homemade. With ice. In a tall clear yellow glass.

What else do you see?

I'm wearing a ring. It's a pale pink faceted stone and a gold band. And a sundress. White with pastel drawings. Braids. A lady did these elaborate braids in my hair.

And?

You. You're in all white and you're laughing and entertaining a group of children near the goat pen. You're juggling eggs for them. And their hats.

How many goats are there?

I don't see any.

Anything else?

There's a old blue bicycle with a basket on the back. Three fat baguettes stick out. No one seems to own the bike, it's been there the whole time, but no one has stolen it.

Why not?

They don't do that here.

Would you stay?

No, it's a little too perfect. It's better as a brief memory. Passing through, that's all.

Do you remember that we stole the bicycle and ate all the bread?

Yes. Did we ruin that place for them?

I don't think so. What's one bicycle?

And the food for a week?

Do you think that was food for a week for them?

No, maybe just bread to go with food they already had.

So does that make it okay?

No, but we didn't have a choice.

How does that make it okay, peanut?

Call it the price for an afternoon's entertainment?

Good girl.

We should have taken a goat instead.

An absence of sound.

Listen, hear, he is inside
One who lives while others lie
I close my eyes and walk a thousand years
A thousand years that aren't mine
It seems he's near me as I walk
One who loved what love denied
He lives these years that I walk blind
All these years cannot be mine

Softly, I hear him begin counting. Under his breath the whispers are dispensed in turn, in order. It's a simple system. He starts at six and works backwards, and I have until he gets to one to be in his arms, nowhere else. It's a game that makes my blood run so cold I shiver. It's a game that absolutely no one approves of but we do it anyway.

I extricate myself from the loose grasp of the sleeping circus and slip into his arms before he reaches four. Woken up out of a sound sleep by a scarcely spoken number I am mindful and quick, obedient to a rash degree.

My reward is a long hard kiss, squarely on the mouth, his breath held, senses alert, skin flushed, eyebrows tensed. Envy wakes him in the night, nightmares that masquerade as a potential new reality forcing him to seek confirmation in spite of the hour or the desperate dwindling supply of rest I fight for every night.

His hands slide up around my neck, fingers locking under my ears, thumbs under my chin. He forces my face up to his for another long and breathless kiss. I could die here, I think to myself, but he has other plans. I am turned away, turned over, rearranged in the position of the perfection he creates for himself. I am disarmed and fragile now.

The night shifts from his demand for my loyalty to his need to prove his worth. His breath catches in my hair now, held fast as his hands slide down over my legs. Searing pleasure takes me over. I can't breathe. His hands are everywhere at once. Pulling my hair back, sliding over my lips, digging into my ribs, locked around my neck and finally they settle, one between my shoulder blades and one around my hip. He holds such an incredible balance here between forcing me out of consciousness and holding me on the cusp of heaven, burning me against the rim. I hold my breath and let him make the decision on my behalf. I am rewarded with a gasp of rich oxygen and unimaginable bliss. A bliss that lasts for the time it takes the stars to work their way across obscurity. A bliss that wears us to pieces.

Slowly he labors to a standstill and I am pulled over onto my back to face him. His shaking fingers trail down my face and I smile in the dark and kiss him softly on the cheek. He pushes me away and then pulls me back in against him, chin on top of my head, goosebumps fading quickly from my skin, cool flesh replacing fire. Sleep substituting for reality, dreams taking over from their unwelcome counterparts, numbers returned to their lull until tonight.

Never make a companion equal to a brother. ~Hesiod

I found the first three Great Brain books by J.D. Fitzgerald in with Lochlan's boxes of artwork. Lochlan used to read them to me at the lake. Yes, I could read when I was ten but I always thought it sounded better coming from him. I have put them on the shelf in Henry's room and can't wait for him to 'find' them. I'm not sure if he'll be able to, Henry's room is all planets and magic tricks. A magician's tophat rests on a post near the door and everything inside is mysterious and eclectic. He is so not a typical boy, instead he is an old soul borrowed from a different, darker time, perhaps.

Maybe we're all that way and we're living out the same lives over and over, our interpersonal relationships predetermined and...

No, I'm not drunk, but thanks for wondering. I should be, after such a long week but I didn't even steal a glance at the wine and poured a glass of ginger ale instead, failed to taste my food even though it was right in front of me, abandoned the plate half-finished for a doorbell rung in the pouring rain and stood in the front hall staring at an envelope held by a face who only told me scary stories I didn't want to hear and pretended he would make everything better but I am still waiting.

The envelope was white and I didn't take it, I just stared at it as he held it out to me.

Your mail. It was in my mailbox, princess.

Oh, thank you, I am finally shaken out of my reverie. I look at the envelope. It's an interest statement. It isn't important so I roll it up in my hand and raise my gaze to him once more.

Bridget-

I shake my head again.

What's the matter?

I'm tired! I snap at Caleb. It's been a really long week.

Do you want to come down to spend a little time? Unwind a bit?

I put my hands up to my eyes and spin in a circle. He puts out his hands and stops me. Bastard.

No! I just want to be left alone.

He stares at me for a long minute. An endless minute. I alternately want to dig a hole and bury myself in it to get away from the uncomfortable misery of his gaze and hit him over the head with the shovel until he falls into the hole and stops staring at me.

I'm sorry.

Don't be. He's right.

Who is?

Batman. We spread you too thinly and put too much pressure on you. And I knew you didn't like toast. I've known since that time in Breckenridge when you threw it off the balcony and asked if you could have a croissant because toast was boring and you needed to go the extra mile because breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

Caleb?

Yes?

Stop showing off.

I turned around and walked back to the kitchen to my now-cold plate and an empty table. If Caleb and I knew each other in a past life, I wonder if we are fixing things as we go or making things worse? Do we follow the same steps to the same dance every time or do we make improvements in some areas and forget the moves in others and change everything? Maybe the music is different and maybe the love is all rearranged and backwards and unexpected.

Maybe I broke something major, this time around.

Oh, right, nevermind. I remember what was broken.

My heart.