“It’s fucking bullshit! One of you got me banned from the Brew & Browse.” Hawthorne storms into Salinger’s living room.
I scrunch down on Salinger’s couch and kick my shoes off because I know it will piss my oldest brother off.
“You.” Hawthorne rounds on me.
I look up at him, pointing to my chest. “Me? I didn’t do anything.”
“What did you do?”
“Blame Faulkner.” I gesture at our youngest brother. “He has anger management issues.”
“No, I don’t.” He takes a swing at me.
I laugh, ducking him.
“McCarthy’s the one with a criminal record.”Salinger snorts.
We’re all byproducts of our father’s polygamist cult. In the irony of ironies, he seemed to be only able to create sons. Not what you want when you’re running a patriarchal doomsday cult. Boys are a liability for obvious reasons.
Our handful of sisters live in Manhattan. “Spirited” is what their school called them before expelling them for fighting.
Love my girls.
Our younger half brothers live upstate in New York. Christmas with dozens of younger siblings? It’s chaos of the best kind. I buy mounds of presents. Kids are so awesome. I want ten of them.
Hunter and Greg are always pissed, though, for some reason. I make a mental note to add loud, obnoxious toys to my Christmas shopping.
“He’s not even paying attention,” McCarthy, the third youngest, sneers.
“Fine, be a dick. I’m not putting your name on any of the Christmas presents I buy for the kids.”
Salinger sighs and rubs his face, like he’s old or something. “You know it pains me to say this because I live for making Hunter and Greg’s lives miserable, but you have got to tone it down for the holidays this year.”
“No one cares about Christmas.” Hawthorne, the second oldest, pulls out a folded flyer. He ignores my indignant noise. “I tried to take my newest VP to the Brew & Browse after a meeting, and imagine my surprise when the cashier told me I was banned from the premises. I didn’t even get my smoked swordfish BLT. They only sell them once a month, and I fucking missed it.”
“Oh man, sounds like Faulkner really screwed you over.” I stare up at Salinger’s ceiling. He should really think about painting that green.
“This”—Hawthorne slaps the flyer to my chest—“is you.”
“Nooo,” I drawl. “That looks just like Salinger. See the gray hairs, the wrinkles?” I ball it up and throw it at my eldest brother.
“That wasn’t me.”
“Wait, is that why they were mysteriously out when I tried to order a coffee?” Whitman is pissed now.
“So he got everyone banned.” Faulkner sneers.
“Oh, look. It thinks it’s a real boy. Salinger, children shouldn’t drink coffee. Faulkner, geez, why do you have to ruin everything? Since the day you were born.”
“Me?” My little brother has that eat-shit glint in his beady demon eyes. “You’re the one stalking a poor innocent girl.”
“Um, okay, I didn’t raise you to be a snitch. And Winnie’s not a girl, and based on her internet search history, she’s not that innocent either. She’s got a kinky side.”
“Dude, I thought you were going to stop stalking people,” Salinger snaps. “Fucking idiot.”
“I’m not stalking. It’s not stalking. I’m doing nice things for someone. She likes it,” I protest.
“…disturbing pattern of behavior…”
