Unravelling

Chapter 1 - Road Trip

Today, my brothers are taking me to Six Flags for my birthday. It is a compromise.

I have wanted to go to Disneyland ever since I was a little girl. Unfortunately, various circumstances – and here I am quoting Alex, my oldest brother – prevented this from happening, despite me being quite vocal about my birthday wish every year. I guess, the main reason was money, or rather, lack thereof. Which I can accept, now that I have become older and have started to understand certain things a bit better.

But for a long time, it bugged me enormously that my brothers were not even willing to fulfil my one and only true wish. I thought they were denying me my dream simply because they did not fancy taking me there. Something about that place being too girly, or whatever. Of course, other than the twins, none of my brothers had ever said this to me. I was purely making assumptions based on the experiences that I made growing up surrounded by only boys.

A week before my twelfth birthday, they surprised me by telling me that we were going to be spending my special day at Six Flags. Alex sounded slightly apologetic when he announced that. After all, it was not Disneyland. He argued that I had grown up quite a bit since I initially voiced my wish and surely I would appreciate the more grown-up concept of Six Flags compared to walking amongst Disney princesses, listening to sickly-sweet music and going on kiddie rides. I have to admit, it was a pretty sound strategy to get me to agree to their plan. After all, for the past year, I have been relentlessly reminding my brothers that I am not a little baby anymore. And the closer I get to my teenage years, the more insistent I become about it.

I also quickly realised that this was probably the only compromise my family was willing to make with regards to this topic. Apart from the money angle – I found out soon after Alex' announcement that he apparently got a really good two–for–one deal on tickets as part of some special employee work benefit or something – it became immediately clear to me that most of my brothers would simply have refused to come along if it were Disneyland.

Part of me considered to put in a request that we could go to there with only a few of my brothers instead, since that would save money while I still got my way. But the other part was quite happy to compromise on the choice of venue if in return I got to spend a day with all of my brothers. Or at least with those who could make it, for logistical reasons. Jordan would not be able to join us, of course. He is currently deployed abroad and has been for the past six years, on and off.

I also don't expect Will, Luke or Sean to show up. Will generally refuses to take part in anything resembling a family outing, Sean lives 2000 miles away in Chicago and Luke is god knows where, trying to become famous. At least that is what Jack says. Luke usually denies that this is his intention when I ask him about it. Anyway, that still leaves me to deal with seven guys. Since it has been like this all my life, I don't really know any different and I don't mind. But sometimes, when I think about it, it does seem kind of crazy. It probably is quite a miracle that I have not yet gone insane.

Long story short, true to Alex's word, I was roused from my deep slumber way too early on my birthday morning, and before I had even managed to completely wake up and comprehend what was going on, someone had already man-handled me into the backseat of Ben's car...

"I'm almost certain it is considered child abuse if you don't feed a minor breakfast," Noah complains next to me.

I have not even noticed him being there. That could be due to me still keeping my eyes closed, desperately trying to get some more sleep in. If I don't get at least 9 hours a night, there is no predicting how my mood will be during the day.

I think I am normally a rather placid and agreeable person. But if I am sleep-deprived, there is a good chance that things will go south quickly if someone just looks at me the wrong way. Leave alone that I will be dead on my feet pretty fast, as my batteries will be running on almost empty. My brothers have learned this the hard way over the years and they are very anxious to make sure I get the necessary amount of sleep. Hence, Alex sent me to bed at 8pm the night before, since we had to leave the house at 6:30am.