Текст книги "Every Frat Boy Wants It"

Автор книги: Todd Gregory

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Chapter 9

n, ensory deprivation has to be the worst torture ever thought ._)up by a human being.

Blindfolded, with a rag tied around my hand, I sat on the floor in what I thought just might be the Great Room, but couldn't be sure. The floor was hard under my ass, and all I could hear was this horrible noise that sounded like a cross between whale songs and shattering glass. It was loud, so incredibly loud I couldn't hear anything else.

I was also incredibly tired. It was the Thursday night of what the brothers euphemistically called "Inspiration Week" in a nod to the university's (and the national chapter's) stance on hazing-but it really was Hell Week.

The week started with us arriving on Sunday night and lining up under the basketball hoop. We stood out there in our dress clothes, holding paper bags from the grocery store with the supplies they told us to bring: a toothbrush and toothpaste, a brick, a T-shirt, a pair of jeans, a pair of white socks, a black magic marker, a pack of chewing gum, and our black books. We also had a bag with clothes for the week. We stood out there silently, all twelve of us-somehow Ted had managed to make it through the whole semester, no matter how much we wanted him to quit-waiting until, at six P.M. on the dot, Marc Kearney came solemnly walking out of the house to us.

"I keep waiting for that music from The Good the Bad and the Ugly to start playing," Chris whispered to me out of the side of his mouth, and I suppressed a laugh.

"Will you two shut up? You're going to get us all in trouble," Ted hissed from my other side.

We just looked at each other and rolled our eyes.

I don't know really what I was expecting out of Hell Week, but the reality was nothing I could have imagined. Marc led us into the house single file, and like on Big Brother Night, we lined up against the wall in the Great Room.

The brotherhood stood in a crowd facing us. I swallowed. Marc stepped out in front of the crowd, holding a clipboard, a whistle around his neck.

"Welcome to Hell Week, pledges," he said, smiling as he walked up and down in front of us. As he passed me, I shifted from one foot to the other. Ever since the night I'd fucked him, he'd been noticeably cool to me. Sometimes I thought I was just being paranoid, and others I thought I was right. I tried to find Blair's face in the crowd, but couldn't. I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. This is not going to be good, kept running through my head. "Will your big brothers please step forward and stand in front of your pledge?" I felt some relief when Blair stepped in front of me, his face was solemn, but he winked at me. "Please remove your little brother's pledge pin." Blair reached up and removed mine. "Pledges, you no longer will be required to wear your pledge pin in public. It is now a thing of the past. However," he paused, "you will be replacing your pledge pin with the brick you were told to bring with you. You will carry it with you everywhere-as long as you are on Beta Kappa property. When you are at class or at work you will leave it with your other belongings in the chapter room-it will be safe as long as you are off property. However, when you return to property, you must have it on you at all times-or your entire pledge class will suffer the consequences."

He continued with the rules of the week, and my heart sank with each new one. We were not allowed to eat or drink or sleep until we were released on Thursday morning. As long as we were on property, we had to wear the jeans and white T-shirt. Whenever the whistle blew, no matter where we were in the house, we had to run down to the Great Room and line up in alphabetical order on the wall. While we were on property-unless we were studying for a test-we were at the disposal of the brotherhood; anyone could make us do anything they wanted us to. We would be cleaning the house in preparation for the Initiation Ritual on Friday night-provided we made it through the week. At any time during the week, any one of us could be bounced from the program at any moment by a vote by the brotherhood. We were a unit; and the transgressions of one were visited upon the whole. And when the whistle blew, we not only had to lineup on the wall, we had to hold it up-which meant flattening our back against it, bending our legs at the knee until they were at a ninety degree angle, and holding our pledge brick out in front of us with both hands until we were told to stand up.

"Now, put all of your things in the chapter room, and put on your pledge uniform," Marc went on. "That will be your home until you are released Thursday morning; unless of course you are dismissed any time before then. You need to take your magic markers, and on the front of your T-shirts you are to write Beta Kappa Pledge Class, Fall 2006. On your bricks, on one side you will write Beta Kappa, on another your pledge class. And when you hear the whistle, you need to get to the wall as quickly as possible and hold the position."

And so it began, four nights of mental and physical abuse. I learned to loathe the sound of the whistle; I was certain the sound of it would haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. Brothers I'd considered to be benign and friendly turned vicious and sadomasochistic, screaming in my face for not being properly deferential or some other imagined transgression. We were forced to do push-ups and hold that damned wall until our legs ached. I cleaned urinals with a toothbrush, gagging over the foul smell of sour urine. I would finish one only to have a brother come in and use it, and then scream at me to clean the one he'd just used. What I really wanted to do was knock him down and shove the filthy toothbrush in his mouth, but instead I simply shouted "SIR! YES SIR!" back at him and went to work. And finally, at around three in the morning, they finally dismissed us and let us go into the chapter room to sleep for a few hours-they would be waking us at six in the morning.

When we were on campus, we were supposed to avoid the brothers-and if it couldn't be helped, we weren't allowed to make eye contact. After I finished my last class at noon that Monday, I was starving. I'd managed to get some drinks of water out of fountains on campus when I was certain no brother was anywhere around. As I trudged back to the house, a car pulled up to the curb. Inside were three brothers, including Rory Armagh. "Hey, Jeff, get in the car." Rory opened the back door. A bit hesitantly, I climbed in, and once I'd shut the door they drove off and headed for the Carl's Jr. about five blocks away from the house. "What do you want to eat?" Rory asked as we idled in the drive through.

"Nothing," I replied.

David Jensen, a senior who was driving the car, started laughing. "This isn't a trap, Jeff. Nobody really expects you to starve yourself till Thursday morning. Didn't your big brother tell you? Brothers and little sisters will feed youyou just can't get caught or turned in by anyone. And we're not going to turn you in."

I took a deep breath. "Western bacon cheeseburger, large order of fries, and large Coke." My stomach growled at the thought of food. Once we got our order, they pulled over into a parking spot and I scarfed it all down in record time. Rory patted me on the leg as they drove back to the house, letting me out exactly where they picked me up. "It's all a game, Jeff," Rory whispered before I got out of the car, "just remember that. And before you know it, it's all over and you're a brother."

I got out of the car and stood there for a moment, watching them as they drove off. Why didn't Blair explain any of this to me? I wondered. Ever since the incident with Marc Kearney, we'd seemed so much closer. Every time we were together, Blair would tell me how much he loved me. So why didn't he explain to me how I was going to survive Hell Week? Maybe he's punishing you for fucking Marc Kearney.

I didn't like that thought.

But knowing I was going to get fed and given something to drink from time to time made the asshole behavior of the brothers while I was in the house somewhat easier to take. The irony was that I actually wound up eating more during Hell Week than I would have if I'd been eating normally. You could never tell a brother or a little sister that you weren't hungry-stupid ass Ted made that mistake, and the brother got him to admit he'd been fed by a little sister half an hour earlier, and the brother ratted him out. That cost us all five minutes holding the wall and one hundred pushups.

Needless to say, this didn't increase Ted's popularity with his pledge brothers.

Monday night we were taught a lesson.

At one in the morning, we were sent to the chapter room and told to strip naked to wait for the whistle. "What do you suppose they are going to do to us?" Ted asked in a whimper.

"Maybe we're going to all take it up the ass," Eric said nastily, and a couple of the rest of us laughed.

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Ted shot back.

Eric's face turned red, and there was no telling what would have happened next. Fortunately, there was a knock on the chapter room door, and then Marc opened it. "No laughter in the chapter room," he said severely. "When you're in here, you should be quiet and thinking about what you can bring to the Brotherhood if you get initiated."

We all looked down.

"Pledge Amundsen, come with me."

Tommy Amundsen, the sophomore from Mission Viejo, who'd once told me his ambition was to one day be White House Chief of Staff, looked like nothing more than a terrified country mouse going to his doom. We sat there in silence, straining to hear what was going on out in the Great Room. We couldn't hear a thing, other than Marc knocking on the door before sticking his head in and taking the next pledge in alphabetical order.

When it was my turn, I swallowed and stood up. I made my face neutral, void of expression, and held my head high as I walked out there behind Marc. The brothers were standing in a circle, each holding a candle. Marc led me to the center of the circle. "Brotherhood of Beta Kappa, I present to you Jeffrey Morgan, a candidate to join your circle." He intoned, and then took a candle and joined the circle.

"Candidate Morgan, why do you seek to join the Brotherhood?" someone whose voice I couldn't recognize asked from behind me.

I cleared my throat. "Because I believe in what the Brotherhood stands for."

There were murmured sounds of approval.

"Candidate Morgan, what do you have to offer to the Brotherhood?" This question was unmistakably from Jerry Pollard, who was directly in front of me.

"My lifelong devotion and commitment to the preservation of the Brotherhood's ideals," I replied, trying to keep my voice from shaking. Worldpeace flashed through my mind and I struggled to repress a nervous giggle. Somehow, standing naked in front of the brothers, I didn't think laughing was appropriate.

"Candidate Morgan, what would you be willing to do to prove to the Brotherhood that you want to become a part of us?" There was no mistaking that voice. It was Blair.

"Anything, sir." I raised my chin defiantly.

Again, murmurs of approval.

"All right, Prospective Brother Morgan, please follow me," Marc said, and led me to the kitchen where my fellow pledges were all standing. "And be quiet in here!" Marc said, before closing the door behind him.

"Man, I had no idea what to say in there," Chris whispered to me. "But you did okay, I made an ass out of myself."

"Well," Eric said on the other side of me, "no matter how bad any of us might blow it, no one will blow it quite as bad as Ted is going to."

Sure enough, it wasn't long before we heard the Brotherhood hooting and hissing. The group of us in the kitchen let out a collective groan. "Maybe they'll throw him out," Eric said hopefully.

"We should be so lucky," Tommy Amundsen said venomously.

A few moments later, the kitchen door opened and a redfaced Ted came in. Marc's face was thunderous. "Maybe," he spat out, "you should talk to your pledge brothers about what Beta Kappa means to them, maggot, and maybe later we'll give you another chance."

The door slammed shut behind him.

"What the fuck did you say?" Chris hissed, grabbing Ted by the arm.

"Let go of me!" Ted whined, pulling his arm away. "I answered them honestly, like we were supposed to." He stepped away from us. "I didn't suck up to them the way you all did, obviously."

I took a breath and counted to three. In that moment, all I wanted to do was smack him across the face. I've never hated anyone in my life as much as I hated Ted Norris in that moment. I would have cheerfully strangled him to death right then and there, and my pledge brothers would have cheered me on.

Instead, we all just shook our heads and looked away from him.

After Rob Ross, our final pledge brother, was led in, the Brotherhood left us in the kitchen for what seemed like hours. We could hear them talking out there, and occasionally there would be a chorus of finger snaps. The clock on the wall read one-fifteen when Marc finally came back into the kitchen.

"Prospectives, eleven of you answered the Brotherhood's questions to our satisfaction," he said in that solemn voice he'd been using to address us since Sunday night. "However, one of you did not. As I explained to you on the first night of your journey, you are a unit. If one of you fails, all of you fail. Therefore, the Brotherhood has collectively decided as one that your class has failed your test this evening." He held up his hand for silence as all of us began talking, swearing, or muttering. "However, rather than depledging your entire class and having you start over next semester, the Brotherhood has decided that if one of you agrees to take punishment for the entire class' failure, this will be an appropriate show of unity, and you may all continue."

"Do it, Ted," Chris snarled.

Ted just stood there for a moment, looking down at the ground. He didn't say anything.

"Only one of you is required," Marc said after a few moments.

"I'll do it." I stepped forward. "I will take the punishment for the entire class, Brother Kearney."

"You are certain?"

"Yes, sir."

He nodded. "The rest of your pledge brothers will return to the chapter room and dress. We will come for you when we are ready for you."

He held the door open as they filed out. Ted was the only one who wouldn't meet my eyes-everyone else touched me on the shoulder or arm to thank me.

To be honest, I was absolutely terrified. I had no idea what was going to happen, what kind of punishment I was about to take-but one thing was for sure, if it took the rest of my life, Ted Norris would pay for it somehow. After they had all gone, Marc came over to me. "I'll be back in a little while for you. Are you sure you want to do this, Jeff?" he said in his normal voice.

I raised my chin. "Yes, sir."

"I'm sorry, Jeff." He put his arms around me and squeezed me. "I know I wasn't really friendly to you after, well, you know"-he hesitated-"but Blair was so mad about it,I didn't really want to give him any reason to think, well, you know" He swallowed. "But you're a great guy. Jeff. I wish you were my little brother instead of Blair's. You really understand what Beta Kappa is all about. I respect you, man." He shook his head. "I can't tell you how disappointed I am in Ted. I really expected him to step up to the plate after he screwed up. He is so not a true Beta Kappa, but now it's too late to do anything about it. How many chances do you have to give someone, you know?"

"I'm sorry, too, Marc." I replied, my heart swelling with pride. My pledge master thinks I am a true Beta Kappa! And at the same time, I felt sorry for Ted. I couldn't imagine how awful it would be to have the pledge master disappointed in you. I couldn't understand why he even wanted to be in the Brotherhood. He didn't seem to understand the con cept of brotherhood, of selflessness, of being a part of something that was greater than the sum of its parts.

"Good luck, Jeff." He hugged me again and brushed his lips against my cheek. "I'll be back in a little bit for you."

Afterwards, when my pledge brothers asked me about it, I told them honestly that the waiting was the worst part of it. As I stood there, naked, in the darkened kitchen, my mind raced through a million possibilities of what my punishment would be. There was realistically no telling what it could be. All I could hope for was something benign. But then again, there were all those paddles hanging on the walls of the Great Room-and no matter how many times the brothers told me they were symbolic of the hazing days of the past and had no real modern day significance, I always wondered. I tried to focus on remaining calm, mastering my mind and not letting it think dark thoughts like that. This was a sacrifice I was making for my pledge brothers, so we wouldn't have to start over again in the spring semester, and that was the most important thing. I cleared my mind of my anger and animosity toward Ted.

And when Marc came back for me, I was ready.

When he led me back into the Great Room, it was impossible not to notice the big round wooden object mounted on the wall where we always lined up. There were four straps, two up high and two down low I inhaled sharply. "Pledge Morgan, are you ready to take the punishment on behalf of your entire pledge class?"

"SIR! YES SIR!" I shouted as loudly as I could, even though I felt like I was going to faint at any moment.

"Please approach the Wheel." Marc said.

I started walking over to it, and the Brotherhood parted to let me through. It was also impossible not to notice that every paddle had been removed from the walls, and every brother I passed was holding one. I am going to be beaten, oh my God. When I reached the Wheel, I stopped. "Step up to the Wheel," Marc ordered. I walked right up to it. "Raise your arms." I did, and two brothers stepped up, strapping my wrists to it while two other brothers strapped my ankles to it. I was completely spread-eagled. My entire body was pressed up against the cool, polished wooden surface. "Bring out the prospective brother candidates!" Marc shouted, and I heard the door to the chapter room being opened. "Candidates, step to the front!" Marc shouted. "Behold your brother, Jeffrey Morgan, who is about to take the punishment decided upon by the Brotherhood for your collective failure! Behold the justice of the Brotherhood!" In a lower voice, he went on, "His big brother will strike the first blow. Step forward, Brother Blanchard. Strike whenever you are ready."

I was conscious of someone behind me, and my entire body tensed. Blair leaned forward and whispered in my ear, "Relax, Jeff. If you're tense it will hurt more. Trust me. Let your ass go limp."

"Okay." I managed to gasp out. My heart was racing.

The Brotherhood began to hum, a low sound that built until just as Blair touched my ass lightly with the paddleat which point they all shouted "WHAP!"

Blair whispered, "Most of the brothers will not hit you any harder than that. But some will-some are sadistic assholes when it comes to this kind of thing."

And so it began. Blair was right-the next three people who swung at my ass just lightly touched it. But whoever the next brother was, put everything he had into it. My entire body went rigid from the shock and the pain, and I couldn't help it, I cried out, and my eyes started watering. I didn't think I was going to be able to catch my breath, but as I struggled the next brother swung, even harder than the one before. My brain could not comprehend the excruciating pain, and my knees buckled, and I hung there from my wrists, and pain tore through my shoulders. Through the blinding agony I could hear the Brotherhood murmuring, and the next few hits were very mild. But that was how it went; a few minor taps followed by full-strength swings. Tears streamed down my face, but I refused to cry out again. I refused to allow my knees to buckle. I tried to channel the pain into anger-anger at the assholes who were hitting me so hard, anger at Ted who was the cause of this torture-and after a few more brutal blows the stinging in my ass seemed to fade as it went numb. I somehow crossed a border from intense pain to pleasure, and I began to look forward to the next blow. I don't know how it happened. It was as though the pain synapse in my brain overloaded and blew out, and the pleasure synapse opened up in its place. My cock grew hard, and I began to look forward to the next major blow I couldn't keep quiet, I began moaning when I was struck-but it wasn't moans of pain. It was pleasure, pure pleasure, and my cock throbbed, my balls swelling with every stroke. I gave myself in to the feeling, not knowing what it meant, and the next thing I knew it was over.

And oddly, I wanted it to go on.

A soft robe was wrapped around me, and then someone was undoing the straps. When my arms came free, they were completely numb and I almost fell. In the distance, I heard Marc shout at the pledges to return to the chapter room, and as I collapsed, someone caught me and picked me up in his arms. I opened my eyes and saw Rory Armagh's face, and his eyes were filled with tears.

A million miles away I heard Blair say, "Take him to my room."

I was vaguely aware of being carried through the darkened hallway, and then gently set down on Blair's bed. As soon as my ass touched the mattress, I cried out, and Rory rolled me over onto my stomach. "Here, take this," someone said, and a pill was pressed into my mouth, and a bottle of water held up to my lips. I swallowed the pill with a big gulp of water.

"Look at his ass!" Blair said, his voice shaking with rage as he pulled the robe off me. "He isn't going to be able to sit down for a week! This is such bullshit!"

"Look, Blair, I agree with you." I recognized Marc's voice through the fog. "I can't believe people actually swung so hard-"

"They should be drummed out of the Brotherhood," Blair went on. "We should probably take him to the emergency room!"

"And then what? Lose our charter when the dean finds out?" Marc said.

Whatever pill they'd given me was starting to take effect. The throbbing was fading away, and my head felt like it was free from my body and I was floating above it all. I opened my eyes and saw Blair, Marc, and Rory. The three brothers I've had sex with, I thought and started giggling. Marc and Blair were still arguing somewhat, but when they heard me giggling, they stopped and stared at me.

"It's the Vicodin," Rory explained. "Must be hitting him now"

"I don't care what anyone says," Blair went on, reaching down and stroking my head. "He's not sleeping in the chapter room tonight, and he's not answering the whistle tomorrow morning."

"I'll have to talk to the Executive Council-"

"Tell them it's an important lesson to the pledge class," Rory interrupted Marc, kneeling down and patting my forehead with a wet cold cloth. "Don't tell the pledges anything about him. Let them wonder all night and all tomorrow morning. Not a word about him to any of them."

"That's good, Rory." A smile spread over Marc's face. "They'll be terrified, and maybe Ted will learn something from this whole thing."

"And if they don't go for it," Blair replied, "you can tell them I'm calling an ambulance, and my next call will be to the fucking police."

And I fell asleep.

I stayed in Blair's room until the middle of the next afternoon, and unlike my pledge brothers, I was treated royally by the Brotherhood. Several brothers came in with food and sodas, looked at my ass, and apologized for hitting me so hard. (I later found out that the brothers who had taken real swings were placed on a two-semester probation by the Executive Council-another infraction and they would be tossed out without trial by the Brotherhood. Also, this incident almost split the house in half, the Brotherhood had met and argued for hours while I slept.) My ass was sore, and Marc came in to tell me that the Executive Council had decided to excuse me from holding the wall until Hell Week was officially over. "No," I said, "I won't be held apart from my pledge brothers. I will do whatever they do."

I returned to the chapter room around three o'clock that afternoon. I could walk-a little slowly, and sitting down was difficult, but Rory had given me the rest of his Vicadin prescription, all the little pills broken in half. "Just take a half," he'd whispered when slipping me the bottle, "if you need to. Half will dull the pain but won't fuck you up so bad that it's noticeable."

When I walked in, only one of my pledge brothers was there, of all people, it was Ted Norris. He looked up when I opened the door, and just as quickly looked away. "Hey, Ted," I said, wincing as I slid down by my stuff. "How you doing?"

When he didn't answer, I looked over at him and saw that his lower lip was trembling. "Ted, are you okay?"

"No, I'm not," he replied in a shaky voice. He still wouldn't look at me. "I don't even know why I'm still here. Everyone hates me!" He spat the words out, and then he did actually start to cry.

"No, they don't," I lied, and hated myself for lying to him.

He wiped at his eyes. "Yeah, they do, but thanks for lying. I know I don't deserve it." He looked at me, his eyes filling again. "I'm sorry about last night, Jeff, really I am. I didn't know they were going to do-that to you."

"Ted-"

"Oh, I know you all hate me. Everyone does. Everyone always does. I try so hard, you know, to make friends but nothing ever works. You all hated me almost from the start." He kept sobbing. "I wanted to belong somewhere. I wanted to have friends. I didn't want it to be the same as it's always been. But I should know better. No one ever likes me. My own big brother can't stand to be around me." He laughed bitterly. "But why am I telling you? You don't care. It's always easy for people like you and Chris and Eric, everyone always likes you. And if you didn't hate me be fore, you do after last night. I'm a loser. A total loser." He buried his face in his arm.

I didn't know what to say. I felt like a complete asshole. I couldn't imagine what it would be like to be Ted. He was right, it has always been relatively easy for me to make friends. And my big brother? My big brother was in love with me.

As my pledge brothers began showing up after class, they all gathered around me and asked me how I was doing, how I felt, and I couldn't help but notice the dark looks they gave Ted. Ted had pulled himself together, and his face was an expressionless mask, reading his Biology textbook.

But when all twelve of us were in the chapter room, waiting for the six o'clock whistle, I announced, "Can I have everyone's attention please?"

Ten faces turned to me-everyone's except Ted's.

I cleared my throat. "I have something I want to say." I swallowed. "The first thing the Brotherhood said to us on Sunday night was that we are one unit. They have told us that all semester, over and over again. The reason they have said that to us so many times is because the Brotherhood itself is a unit; a greater whole than its parts. One of the tests they have set for us this semester was to see if we could pull together as a unit-to see if we would be able to become a part of the bigger unit that is the Brotherhood. And much as I hate to say this, we have failed that test, over and over again."

"What?" Tommy Amundsen burst out. "How can you say that?"

"Because it's true," I went on. "We have excluded Ted almost from the very beginning. Rather than helping him, pulling him along with us, we've gotten mad at him, we've treated him badly, we have not made him a part of our unit. Last night was a perfect example ... every single one of us should have volunteered to take the punishment. Because that's what a brother does; he steps in and takes care of his brother. And I believe that if the rest of us had volunteered-none of us would have been punished. Ted didn't answer the questions properly-but the rest of us failed afterwards, and we have failed Ted all semester."

And that's when the whistle blew, and everyone grabbed their bricks and went scrambling out of the chapter room. I tried to move as quickly as I could, but I still couldn't walk as fast, and I felt terrible-knowing they were all going to have to hold the wall till I got there.

The last person out of the room before me was Ted. "Fuck you," he hissed at me as he elbowed me out of the way. "Thanks a fucking lot."

I was stunned. That was the thanks I got? For having my ass beaten to a pulp so I could barely walk? For standing up for him with the rest of the class and pointing out how wrong we'd been treating him? Well, fuck you too, Ted. You're on your own from now on.

Despite my protests, I was excused from the wall for the rest of the night, and I also wasn't allowed to participate in anything, and was even allowed to go to sleep at eleven o'clock. But when I woke up on Wednesday morning, the soreness was pretty much gone, and I reported to the wall at the seven A.M. whistle.

There were times Wednesday night when I wished I'd taken the Brotherhood up on their offer to take it easy on me. By the time we were done at three A.M., my body ached with exhaustion, and I was grateful to sink down on the floor with my pillow.

"I'll be down to wake you all in a few hours-around five," Marc said with a smile. "Nice job, guys. Tomorrow morning you need to clean the chapter room-it has to look like you were never here. If you see a brother on campus tomorrow-you cannot speak to him. Tomorrow night, you must be dressed up and lined up underneath the basketball hoop. In a paper bag, you have to have your pledge uniform. Congratulations, guys, on making it through the week."

By six in the morning I was curled up in my own bed, completely exhausted. I slept until three-screw class, I decided to take the day off, and at promptly six P.M., I was lined up underneath the basketball hoop with my pledge brothers.