He felt small and weak in comparison to the other workers. He was the youngest by far — almost twenty, but most of the other young men from the college went to the red barn, it seemed. The men here in the green barn were rough-and-tumble types, would-be cowboys and brawny bikers, men who looked like they struggled to come in to work sober every day. Now that they were getting naked, Charlie could see their muscles and the military, sailor or maybe even prison tattoos they had, reminding him yet again that he was youthful, pitiful and frightened. Charlie’s father said that tattoos were a sin and that sailors were not trustworthy.
Yoder placed one hand on Charlie’s shoulder. “You can still go to the red barn, if you can’t handle the green one,” he said. “You see… The green barn is for men who want to…” He chuckled and ran his fingers through his hair, making his rattail shake. “Well, it’s for men who got big ol’ balls.”
From The Green Barn Is for Men