Page 76 of Wherever You Are

Age 18

“Please go outside, Garrison,” my mom begs from the kitchen. The smell of freshly made Christmas cookies wafts through a ten-foot archway—straight into the nearby living room where I sit.

The ornately tufted furniture, including this taupe couch my ass is on, should honestly exist inDownton Abbey. Not Pennsylvania.

I don’t pause or turn off my game console. “Maybe later,” I say, more than disinterested.

During Thanksgiving last month, my mom guilted me into joining Davis, Hunter, and Mitchell for a “brotherly” dinner in the city. Unbeknownst to our parents, they really planned some Turkey Pub Crawl thing, and with my fake ID, I could accompany them.

On paper it sounds great. Bonding time! Brothers! Beer! But I’d rather cut off my big toe than be around Davis and Hunter when they’re piss drunk.

I tried to leave when Davis started shoving my head with “brotherly” aggression, but Mitchell convinced me to hang around for a while longer. I should’ve bailed because at the next pub Hunter waved a hundred-dollar bill in the air. The consequence, of which, gave me a bruised kidney and dislocated shoulder. For a whole week, it hurt to piss.

I still hear my brother’s stupid voice and see that pub and those fucking men.

“I’ll give anyone a hundred bucks to fight my brother here,” Hunter decreed, smacking my shoulder hard, cash between his fingers.

I jerked out of his hold. “No,” I spit. “Fuck that.”

Davis laughed and chugged his beer. Mitchell hung back, texting some girl he started dating.

Hunter raised his voice to announce, “He needs to become a man.” He slapped my face hard enough to leave a handprint. “You’re such a little cock-sucking pussy.”

I shoved him towards a high-top table, and Hunter almost flipped a switch, his eyes flashing murderously. I raised a hand for him to stay put.Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me.My heavy pulse could’ve busted my eardrums.

Davis laughed more. “Why are you running away from him?” he asked me. “Push back.”

Fuck that shit.

“Don’t be a pussy.”

If I pushed back, I would’ve ended up with two black eyes. Hunter outsized me, and he had Davis on his side.

“Going once!” Hunter hollered at the crowds, still waving the bill. “Twice!”

Two leather-clad biker guys—way older than us—exchanged a look and then hopped up from their bar stools.

“He’s joking,” I said, backing up towards the exit.

“I’m not,” Hunter retorted. “Come on, Garrison. Fight back!”

“Be a man,” Davis shouted, hands cupped around his mouth like he was cheering me on. Pumping me up. Encouraging me. To be a man.

Bullshit.I shouldn’t have to bear my fists in a drunken brawl to be called a motherfuckingman.They’re the immature ones.

I kept backing up.

The bikers followed me. Step for step. Not slowing.

Not hesitating.

“I don’t want to fight!” I screamed furiously and desperately, hoping someone—anyone—would hear me.

The bikers sped up to a sprint, and I spun around to run away. I fled the pub, reached the sidewalk, and was kicked in the lower back. Right in my kidney. I fell to my hands. The man grabbed onto my arm, and my shoulder popped out as I fought against him. Freeing myself, I ran as far as I could and then spun back around to my parked car.

I offered to be the “designated driver” for that reason. I wanted an escape in case I needed one. My brothers found their own way home. Took a cab or something. And then they complained to our mom how I bailed on them.

I didn’t tell anyone what really happened. Not even Willow, who was having a shit time in Maine already. Apparently, her little sister threw a tantrum about Willow moving away to Philly, and she refused to be in the same room with Willow the entire holiday.