The Best Four Years of Adam Becker - 33. Sophomore Year - Chapter 11

I logged onto ManFind, which I hadn’t been on in almost a year.

Staring back at me was my old photo, pre-Kevin: neck-down, shirtless in a swimsuit, in the Outer Banks, summer of 2006. Age: 18. Height: 5’10”. Build: Swimmers. Out: No. Dick: 7”, Cut. Position: Top/Vers.

It was like senior year at the Harrington School, when we dug up the time capsule from fifth grade? And everything just seemed awkward and dated, too recent for nostalgia.

Part of the post-Kevin rebuilding of Peter Adam Becker: updating the profile.

New photo, uploaded: neck-down, shirtless in a swimsuit, the Outer Banks, summer of 2007, startlingly similar to the one it had replaced, except I’d filled out a little more. Grew into myself, looked less like the emaciated teenager I had been a year and a half ago.

Age: 19. Updated. Height, same. Build, same. Out, same. Dick, same, though I could probably remeasure and see if I could squeeze out that extra half-inch between “above-average” and “sizeable.”

Position.

Well, obviously, I wasn’t “Top/Vers,” but I wasn’t ready to admit--even in this anonymous forum--that I was a bottom. I thought about Luke Avery, the lackluster moment or two of flip-fucking, before he bent me over the bed and pounded me into next week.

Position: Versatile.

Save.

Greeting me back, my reward: rows and rows of faceless torsos, maybe some the same, maybe some different, than last year, but they were all indistinguishable. A vast expanse of chests and stomachs, most of them fit, most of them toned.

Thought it was depressing, wasn’t it? To be back, trolling for sexual gratification in a suspect lineup of shirtless men--when two months ago, I would be knocking on the Becker Door at the house on Broadway, waiting for Kevin to come and sweep me off my feet?

New message: “Hey, sexy.”

Kevin would’ve quoted St. Thomas Aquinas.

But the message came from the owner of a particularly appealing torso: a nice body, broad chest and shoulders, a V aimed towards the waistband of his camouflage pants.

I was in bed, under the covers--I angled my laptop slightly further towards the wall. I glanced over at Tripp and Erik, who were sitting in front of the TV playing Battlescar. And Patrick, who was sitting in the red papasan chair on his laptop.

None of them seemed to be paying attention to me.

I clicked back to his profile. Age: 21. Height: 5’11”. Build: Athletic. Out: No. Dick: 7.5”, Cut. Position: Top/Vers.

Seemed promising.

“Hey,” I replied. “How’s it going? Tulane or Loyola?”

“Doing well. Tulane, you?”

I debated lying, for a second, but I honestly didn’t have the energy to fake being from Loyola.

“Tulane too.”

“On campus?”

“Yeah, you?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Leadership Village.”

I tried to think about anyone I knew who lived in Leadership--a junior and senior dorm, but most of the upperclassmen I knew lived off-campus or in Aron. And it seemed safe: safe that I wouldn’t, necessarily, know who this guy was. That he wouldn’t know who I was, that he wouldn’t have ties to Iota Chi.

“Cool,” I replied. “Unlock?”

There was a longer pause than had been usual between his messages. But then came the reply: “Sure.”

I clicked back to his profile. He was cute. Short brown hair, a big smile, Army ROTC uniform.

Sexy.

And a picture of his dick. Sizeable. Thick and cut, with a big head.

I felt myself, under the covers in my bed, starting to firm up. Starting to think about how badly I wanted that dick inside my mouth, inside my ass. Sexy military man.

“Loving the uniform. And the dick.” And I unlocked too.

“Thanks,” he replied. “You’re really cute too. What are you up to?”

“Nothing until tonight,” I told him. “What are you up to?”

“Roommate went to the mall,” he said. “Figured I’d take advantage of the empty room. If you’re interested.”

“Definitely.”

“Room 205. If you want to come by. Maybe I’ll wear my uniform for you.”

“You’d better.”

I closed my laptop, and announced, “I think I’m going to go to PJ’s real quick. Grab some coffee.”

Erik and Tripp were locked in an especially fierce battle, didn’t acknowledge me, but Patrick looked up at me. “You know we’re leaving for dinner at seven, right?”

We had the final night of rush week: a sit-down dinner downtown, the last chance for our rushees to receive and accept their bids before pledge induction tomorrow. We had a confirmed pledge class of sixteen, which Erik as rush chair considered “adequate” even though it was basically everyone we wanted: Austin Berkowitz, Sachit, the rest of the Beards.

The only person we hadn’t heard back from, either yes or no, was Logan McClendon. Erik’s white whale.

Regardless, it was only five o’clock and the dinner wasn’t for two more hours. I had plenty of time.

“I’m in the mood for caffeine,” I told him.

Patrick looked at his watch. “Maybe I’ll go with you.” I gave him a terse, very stilted head shake, and he seemed to figure out what was going on immediately. With a knowing smile, he added, “Or I’ll just stay here and let you buy me an Americano and bring it back?”

Asshole. I grumbled affirmation, and I left the room.

It was a cold day, beginning of February, but Leadership Village wasn’t far: it was a row of gray student townhouses, tucked behind Willow Residences--two-story shared rooms on the top, single rooms in the English basement.

Room 205. I climbed the half-flight of stairs, and knocked on the door.

Military Man--whose name I realized I didn’t actually know--answered it right away.

In uniform. Full uniform: a camouflaged hat, beige t-shirt under a camouflaged jacket, camo pants.

Immediately, I felt myself growing a little bit hard. Tenting my jeans just a little bit. Damn, this guy was sexy--cute face, shoulders that I just wanted to grab onto. That uniform.

“Hey,” he replied, with a smile, with a big smile, quickly hurrying me inside. “Sorry, I’m Connor. I don’t think I gave you my name.”

“Adam,” I told him. “Nice to meet you.”

I hadn’t been in Leadership Village before: it was a two-story dorm room, with a pair of desks and a gray couch on the first floor, a spiral staircase in the middle leading up to the shared sleeping loft. But he didn’t lead me upstairs.

“Your pictures are really cute,” he told me, putting his hand on my bicep. “And you’re cute in person, too.”

“You’re pretty hot yourself. Especially in your uniform.”

He smiled. “It’s hot when a guy finds it sexy.”

“Can’t wait to see what you look like with it off, though.”

His smile grew, and he unbuttoned his jacket. I could see his flat stomach underneath his beige t-shirt, but he didn’t give me much time to admire his body.

Instead, he leaned in. Both hands on the side of my face, and kissed me. A hard kiss, a passionate kiss, a kiss I wasn’t expected, but loved. I loved his tongue wrestling with mine. Loved his lips.

Connor the Military Man wasn’t one to waste time, either. His lips moved to my jawline, just below my ear, like Kevin used to. And he immediately started unbuttoning my shirt, kissing down my neck, and down my chest. Down my stomach. Until my shirt was completely unbuttoned, and he was on his knees in front of my bulging jeans.

“So fucking hot, man,” he told me, kissing my bulge.

I was rock hard at this point. Rock hard over this sexy guy in uniform, kneeling in front of me.

He pulled off his unbuttoned jacket, but kept his shirt, his pants, his hat on.

And he turned his attention to my jeans: undoing my belt, unbuttoning, pulling down the fly. He pulled on the waistband of my boxer briefs, and everything came down--my dick flopping out in front of him.

He knew what he was doing.

He licked the tip, licked around the head. I let out an involuntary moan as he took the entire head in his mouth, and slowly made his way down the shaft.

He had both of his hands on my bare ass cheeks. Was pushing me into his face as my dick went further and further down his throat, until he had the entire thing in his mouth.

He began sucking me off. And one of his fingers wandered to my hole, to beg for entry, and that’s when I really lost it--when I let out a deep moan, and I watched as Connor smiled through the blowjob.

Watched this sexy Army guy on his knees, sucking my cock.

And damn, he was good at sucking cock. His mouth was wet and his tongue was working me over, and he was taking me so deep down his throat that I kept thinking he’d gag but he didn’t--he just kept coming back at me with incredible enthusiasm.

His finger breached my hole, just slightly, and I let out another moan--I was getting too close for him to have command of both sides. And I didn’t want to cum: I didn’t want to leave here without taking his dick in my ass.

“Let me suck you for a bit,” I told him, and he didn’t have to be asked twice: my dick quickly fell from his mouth, his finger dropped from my ass, and he looked up at me with another smile.

“Get on your knees,” he said, as he stood up.

I dropped to the carpet, switching positions, and he pulled off his beige t-shirt. He had silver dog tags hanging between his toned pecs, like the ones Kevin wore--like the ones that had belonged to Kevin’s dad.

He had a great body--a toned, the beginnings of a six pack, a deep V, a light dusting of brown hair on his chest and stomach.

Connor unbuttoned and unzipped his pants, but didn’t pull them down--he wasn’t wearing any underwear, and he thrust his dick out through the open fly.

He was big. Definitely the 7.5 inches he had described on the website, but thicker than I thought. He wasn’t as big as Kevin--who was as big as Kevin?--but he had a beautiful cock.

And there was something sexy about this. About him keeping his pants on, as I kneeled in front of him, ready to suck him off.

I took his dick in my hand, and he threw back his head in ecstasy. I did what he did: I licked the tip. I played with his balls, just a little bit. And I sucked on the head and worked my way towards sucking the whole thing.

I didn’t love giving blowjobs to Kevin. Kevin was so thick, so long, that it wasn’t easy to take all of him. He’d always be banging up against the back of your throat before you wanted him to, he’d always be making your jaw sore.

Connor was a perfect size. I could take just about his whole dick in my mouth. Slowly move my lips up and down that great cock, listening as he gave a chorus of expressive moans, feel his strong hands as he grabbed the back of my head and kept pace with the rhythm of my mouth.

Until he finally glanced down at me. “Do you want me to get a condom?”

I took the dick out of my mouth, held it in his hand. It was rock hard, and leaking just a little bit of precum.

“Absolutely.”

He grabbed my hand, which I also wasn’t expecting, and pulled me up. And he came in for another kiss: grabbed me by the small of my back, romantic almost, and pulled me into him. More passion, his eager, aggressive lips. Still holding my hand.

And then he broke the kiss. Smiled at me. “You’re good at that.”

“You’re an amazing kisser,” I replied, and he pulled me towards the spiral staircase, led me up to the sleeping loft.

He pulled me over towards his side of the sleeping loft, on the left side of the open staircase pit, farthest from the window. But he didn’t set me down on the bed; he turned me around, and pushed me up against the wall next to his nightstand.

And fuck, this was hot. I put both of my hands against the wall, stuck out my naked ass, and I didn’t look behind me as I heard him fumble in the nightstand for a condom and lube.

I heard him tear open the condom wrapper, and then I felt one lubed-up finger stroking my exposed asshole.

I gave him a moan as his finger entered my ass, and I could feel his breath right against my neck. “You like that, Adam?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell me how much you love it.”

“I fucking love it.”

I felt another finger go in, and I gave a slight shudder. He knew just where to put his fingers--knew just how to steer them directly to my prostate. And I was in heaven--moaning and grunting as he slowly finger-fucked me, with two fingers, with three fingers.

Until he stopped, and he slowly pulled out his fingers, and I knew it was time.

I stuck my ass out just a little bit further, and I felt his dick rub up against my awakened hole.

“Want my cock?”

“Fuck me.”

Connor grabbed both of my hips with his hands, and I slowly felt his dick push into me.

It had been a few weeks since I had been fucked, since Luke Avery had torn up my ass, and I was tight. It took a second for the pain to subside, but I wasn’t going to tell Connor to take it easy on me.

He finally sunk his dick deep into me. His thick, nice dick, that felt like a perfect fit inside me. A comfortable fit--not like Kevin’s hung cock that always stretched me out, always took long to ease into my hole.

Connor didn’t wait. He didn’t gear up--once he was in, he started fucking me fast, almost immediately. Fucking me fast, fucking me hard, slamming my hole without forgiveness.

He moved one hand up to my chest, and pulled me up towards him, so my back was arched, arched like a bottom in a porno, and I turned my face towards him. He was still smiling, he was already dripping with sweat, he still had his camo pants on, though they had fallen down towards his thighs.

He craned over, and without missing a beat, without slowing down his assault on my ass, pulled me in for another hot, heavy, passionate kiss.

I moaned again, and he gave me a breathy laugh, before going back in for another kiss.

And when he broke the kiss, we were both moaning, and he let go of my chest, and moved both hands up to my shoulders. Connor started fucking me harder, harder than he had before, a merciless pounding of my ass, and we were both loud--he was grunting, and I was moaning, and I felt one of his hands grab my rock hard dick, begin stroking it.

I couldn’t last. It was all too much. I let out one more guttural moan, and I shot my load against the wall next to his night stand.

I was breathing heavily. I was sweating, but Connor had unleashed a torrent of sweat against my back.

I kept breathing, as he pulled his dick out of my ass. I heard the condom come off, and I craned my neck towards him just in time to see him quickly jacking his dick, his head thrown back, biting his lip. And he came--three long, hard volleys of cum--on my ass crack.

“Fuck,” he said, through breaths. I turned around. Connor’s camo pants were around his ankles, his dick was still engorged, just beginning to soften. His hair was wet, his body was glossy. Sweaty mess.

He looked over, beyond me, at the big load of cum on his wall.

“Sorry,” I told him.

“It’s hot,” he said. “I’ve never fucked a guy against a wall before.”

He took a step closer to me, grabbed me by the waist, and gave me another kiss. Our softening dicks rubbing against each other.

“So fucking hot,” he said, again.

I left Leadership Village, probably looking more than a little ravaged, but I had to stop at PJ’s to get coffees for me and Patrick--the decoy. I looked at my watch: forty-three minutes had passed, and I wondered if Tripp or Erik had noticed my absence, noticed that I was going to spend about an hour running down the block to get some coffees.

I walked across the quad between Leadership Village and Willow Residences, still feeling a tingle in my hole, where Connor’s dick had been moments ago. Still feeling that little bit of lube slowly leaking from my freshly-fucked ass.

And it was hot. It was hot walking through campus, this secret oozing out of me, all mine.

I thought about Kevin. If Kevin knew that I had just boned a sexy ROTC guy, that I was carrying around his lube deep inside my ass still. Kevin could have all the French twinks he wanted, but were they Connor the ROTC guy?

No.

Two could play at this game.

I got into PJ’s, in the lobby of Willow, ordered two Americanos to go. And who was standing in the pickup area, ready to shatter my buoyant, post-sex mood: Logan McClendon, holding a receipt.

“Hey, Peter,” he said, with a smile, as I approached.

That awkward moment.

It was always awkward with Logan, because of his entanglements with Justine.

Because he called me “Peter.”

It was even more so recently because of his “undetermined” status in our fraternity. That every conversation I’d had with Erik over the past few days had been about Logan McClendon.

Logan was already dressed in a suit, but there was nothing to read into that: every fraternity had rush week dinners tonight. He was either coming to ours or Zeta’s.

“And where are you off to?” I asked, sweetly.

Logan gave a deep sigh. That he knew this topic of conversation was going to happen, but he absolutely didn’t want to go too far down this road.

“I still don’t know,” he said. He grimaced. “Is that bad?”

I smiled. “Kind of, yeah. Dinner’s in an hour, and whichever fraternity you turn down is going to figure it out when you ditch their rush week dinner.”

He did not smile in return. “I think it’s going to be a game time decision, you know? I thought I’d just get coffee and walk for a bit. Figure it out.”

“So basically, you’re going to be standing in the middle of Freret Street, debating which bus to get on as they’re about to pull away?”

Logan gave a slight giggle. “Pretty much.” He paused. “What do you think I should do?”

“I mean, Zeta’s dinner is at Commander’s,” I said. “And ours is only at Copeland’s Cheesecake Bistro.”

Logan’s face slackened in to a smile. “You know what I mean.”

“Well, I’m not exactly an unbiased party.”

I chose not to tell him which bias I had: that I didn’t want the guy who was fucking--maybe dating?--my sister to join my fraternity. Not just because of the constant comments by my fraternity brothers, but the fact that Justine would be at everything: at date parties, at formals.

Go Zeta, young man.

“Well, I know,” he said. “I don’t know. I know Austin wants me to go Iota Chi, and I know Justine does too—”

“Justine does?”

“I mean, it’s your fraternity,” he said. “She likes the Iota Chi guys.”

Some she liked a little too much, like Matt Rowen, but I didn’t say that.

“Well, our older brother’s a Zeta,” I told him “Well, he was, at Yale.”

“Did he want you to go Zeta too?”

Philip was just stunned that I had gotten a bid to a fraternity in the first place. And, based on my brief interactions with his fraternity house in New Haven, the Zeta at Tulane seemed night and day from their brothers at Yale.

“He didn’t really care,” I told him, “but it’s a different school. It’s different.”

“Tate really wants me to go Zeta,” he said. “He’s my older brother, and he’s always been my best friend growing up. And he really wanted me to come to Tulane, and I did. And I know he really wants me to go Zeta. But other than him, I just don’t know if… you know?”

“If it’s a fit?”

“Right,” he said. “And you know, I’ve been Tate’s little brother my entire life. And I know I’d be like that in Zeta.”

He stopped talking. Waited for me to say anything.

And what could I say? How long had I been “Philip’s little brother” at Harrington? How badly did I want to come to Tulane so I could get away from all of that?

I pictured myself at Yale. With Philip. Pledging Yale Zeta, if they’d have me, which they probably wouldn’t have in the first place without fierce intervention from Philip.

Philip’s little brother. Tate’s little brother.

“You shouldn’t care what people think,” I told him, finally. “You are you, and you have to do what makes you happy. Not what makes your older brother happy.”

In walked Connor.

Wonderful.

Looking freshly-showered, hair neatly comed, wearing a Tulane sweatshirt and track pants. And, presumably, no underwear again, because I could see a faint outline of his dick, swinging back and forth.

God. That dick.

I looked back to Logan, and braced for impact. Braced for the guy who had just ravaged my ass ten minutes ago to run headlong into thew guy who was fucking my sister. And it was almost too much to bear--the stress of this, all the worlds colliding that shouldn’t even be in the same orbit.

I tried to look like I was just staring at Logan, but I was watching Connor out of the corner of my eye: he’d changed back into jeans and a t-shirt, looked freshly-showered. Clearly wanted a little post-sex jolt of energy before braving the Thursday night.

But I got a break: as Connor hit the register, they called Logan’s order. Logan stepped over to the counter, grabbed his coffee.

“Well,” he said, looking down at his cup, and back up at me. “I guess I’ll see you in an hour,” he said, “or not.”

Connor had taken out his Wavebucks card. Time to go, Logan, get the fuck out of here.

“You’ll figure it out,” I told him.

He nodded, wistfully, as Connor headed dangerously towards us. “Yeah. Well, thanks for listening to me ramble on.”

But really, get the fuck out of here, Logan.

“No worries,” I said. “Bye. Good luck.”

“Bye, Peter,” he said, and he turned around to make his way towards the door, just as Connor approached.

“Hey,” he said. “Peter?”

I grimaced. “So, I go by Adam, which is my middle name. But my family calls me Peter, and that’s my sister’s boyfriend.”

It was maybe too robust an explanation, considering the circumstances, that this was a hookup that I had uncomfortably run into at the coffee shop fifty feet from the entrance to his dorm room.

“Oh,” he said, smiling. “Fair enough.”

This was incredibly uncomfortable, and he kept standing next to me, showed no inclination of disappearing out of close contact.

I craned my neck over towards the counter, tried to see where my coffees were in the production process.

“So, uh,” he said, “I can trust you to keep this quiet and all, right?”

“Oh, of course.”

“Because,” he said, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and all.”

“Got it.”

“Cool,” he said. “But it was fun though.”

Stop talking, for the love of God. I glanced around, but the two other people in the pickup area had headphones in, seemed completely detached from the pounding reality.

“Yeah, it was,” I told him, succinctly.

“I actually don’t think I got your number,” he said. “If you want to hang out again or something.”

I hadn’t been expecting that.

I hadn’t been expecting taking this past one hookup.

I glanced over at the two people still on their headphones. How no one seemed to be listening.

And fuck it: Connor had that great smile. And a great dick. And an Army uniform.

And now he was asking for my phone number, for a potential reprisal, and sure. That sounded fine.

Because Kevin wasn’t coming home for four months anyway. He was sowing oats. I could sow oats.

“Okay,” I said. “Give me your phone.”

And I plugged it in. “Adam ManFind.” No last name. No decernible characteristics whatsoever.

I handed it back, and he pressed Send. My phone started ringing, and I saved the number: Connor ManFind. “Where’s 816?”

“Kansas City,” he replied. “What’s 301?”

“Maryland.”

We both stood there, another handful of feverish seconds dragged past, until they called for my order.

“I’ll see you around, maybe,” he said. “Adam.”

“You have my number. Connor.”

I got back to Mayer, where no one had moved from nearly an hour before. I tried to gently fix my hair in the closet mirror, before heading any further into the room--making myself look at least something other than freshly-fucked.

“Long-ass PJ’s trip,” Erik scolded, without taking his eyes off the screen. “We have the dinner in an hour.”

Luckily, I had a good excuse: “Well, I ran into Logan McClendon.”

Erik’s eyes shot over to me. His avatar was prompty riddled with bullets by Tripp, but he didn’t seem to notice or care. “Fuck, dude. What did you say?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, he still hasn’t decided between Iota Chi and Zeta,” he replied. “And the dinner is tonight. What did you say? Oh, God, I wish I’d been there.”

“What, you think I fucked it up?”

“No,” Erik said, unconvincingly. He looked nervous. “Did you?”

“No,” I told him. “I talked to him. I told him not to worry about what Tate thinks. To do whatever he thinks is right.”

Erik looked slightly relieved, but still largely irritated that I had called an audible. “Well, that’s better than nothing. Though I wish you would’ve told him, ‘Iota Chi, Iota Chi, Iota Chi.’ Did he tell you which way he was leaning?”

“No.”

Erik grimaced, looked over at Patrick’s alarm clock. “Well, we’ll find out in an hour. Seriously, this guy is going to give me a heart attack.”

“This is the most bent-out-of-shape I’ve ever seen Erik,” Patrick said, from behind his computer screen. “Like, seriously, even when he was dating Erica and she was fucking half of Sigma, he handled it with more aplomb.”

“She was not fucking half of Sigma,” Erik told him, acidly, “and besides, we were never exclusive so it doesn’t really matter to me who that bitch fucks.”

“Lots of aplomb,” Tripp agreed, opening fire on Erik’s respawned avatar.

 

We had our answer when we arrived at the bus pickup on Freret, next Howard-Tilton Library.

Waiting by the bus: Logan McClendon.

Still in his suit, looking a little more haggard than when I’d seen him an hour ago.

But he was smiling, at least. Had that look of relief on his face, the kind of relief that came from knowing you’d done something for yourself. That you were happy with your decision, because it was your decision, and not your family’s.

I couldn’t help but feel happy for him. Even if I thought about him and Justine.

“This guy!” Erik exclaimed, clapping Logan on the shoulder. “You made the right choice, dude.” He paused. “You’re going to formally accept, right?”

Logan nodded. “Right.”

“Baker!” Erik screamed, into the crowd. “Baker! Baker, get your ass over here now.”

Chris Baker pushed his way through the crowd, holding his hand over the microphone on his cell phone. “I was the one waiting for you, asshole,” he told Erik. “I’m on the phone with the restaurant.” He turned to Logan. Lowering the phone just slightly from his ear, he said, rote memory from doing this all week: “Logan McClendon, as president of Iota Chi fraternity, Sigma chapter, I’d like to formally extend to you an invitation to join our exalted circle as a pledgeman of our Pi class. Do you accept this honor?”

Logan looked momentarily speechless. “I do,” he stammered, nodding resolutely.

“Okay, you’re in,” Baker said, putting his phone back to his ear. Erik glared at him for abruptly cutting through the mystique. “Induction’s tomorrow at seven. Meet at the tree.”

“I’ll give all the prospective pledges a full rundown on what to expect tomorrow,” Erik said, stepping in as the authority, as Baker disappeared back into the crowd. Allowing himself a smile, “I’m super stoked for you though. It’s going to be a blast.”

“Yeah, well,” Logan said, his smile faltering just a little, “if Tate doesn’t massacre me between now and then.”

“It’s too late!” Erik said, gleefully. “We’ll see you tomorrow.”

Except it wasn’t too late, really, because Tulane didn’t care who verbally accepted bids: they cared who was formally inducted into the fraternity.

Which gave Tate until seven o’clock the next evening to snatch Logan away, and we all knew he would try to do exactly that.

Had Philip been launching an all-out push on me--doing all he could do to get me to change my mind on something--I didn’t know if I’d have the backbone to actually stand up to him for that long.

“Oh, of course Zeta’s still trying,” Michaela told us, over lunch. “I called Logan. Tate called Logan. Like, fifty brothers called Logan. Then he turned off his phone, so Tate called Austin, and it turned out Logan went with Justine to the Tchoupitoulas Wal-Mart, and then Tate started calling her, but then she turned off her phone…”

“So basically, Logan’s going Iota Chi,” Jordan interrupted, “is how this story ends. Does anyone want to split an ice cream sandwich?”

And yet, we hadn’t heard anything from Logan either, beyond what he had told us last night: that he had accepted his bid, that he had a nice time at the dinner, that he had disappeared back to Monroe Hall for the rest of the evening and hadn’t been seen since.

Erik had been in a slow-motion, silent panic all day, because he also hadn’t been able to reach Logan’s turned-off cell phone.

“He’s good for it,” Tripp said. “Come on. He’s not the kind of guy who would just not show up to induction.”

“It’s a good pledge class,” Baker told him, wearing the ridiculous presidential velvet cape I remembered Rob Winslow wearing from the year before when I was getting inducted. “It’s a good pledge class even if Logan winds up Zeta. Be happy. You done good.”

Erik exhaled, ominiously.

“We need to get this cape dry-cleaned,” Baker added, to Matt Rowen. “It smells like Katrina. Wouldn’t that fall under your job description as Sergeant-at-Arms?”

“You wear it twice a year for an hour,” Rowen replied, rolling his eyes. “I’m not shelling out $4.99 so you can smell like a fucking meadow.”

Baker ignored him, Rowen opened a beer, and rejoined the crowd.

“Okay,” Baker said, opening the heavily-worn paper script. “So here’s how it’s going down. Fontenot’s going to go get the kids at seven when they’re here. Berate them a little bit.” He turns to Erik. “But not too much. Then Fontenot lines them up, knocks twice, introduces himself, and asks to be let in. We all yell, ‘Yes!’ in unison when I go like this.” He raised his hand over his head, swatted it downwards. “So let’s try it.” He did it again.

“Yes,” came an anemic reply from about half the brothers in the room.

“Convincing, you guys,” he scolded. “It’s got to be loud. We’re trying to put the fear of God into them.” He raised his hand and swished it again. This time, no one said anything, but Baker decided not to pick a fight. “Okay, then, blah, blah, I come down the stairs, I give them the oath. They turn right, Sergeant-at-Arms--Rowen--does the first reading; we turn again, and Historian--that’s Connors--does the second reading; and then they turn to me, and I do the blessing. Then Fontenot, you help me pin all of them, and then they go upstairs with the Pledgemaster and Deputy Pledgemaster: Morton and Fontenot.”

Baker seemed much more anxious about all of it than anyone else, other than Erik. He was taking president seriously, but he clearly wasn’t used to be speaking to a room full of Iota Chi brothers. And he certainly didn’t elicit the quiet respect that everyone gave Rob Winslow, which would’ve helped.

He glanced up from the script. “Where’s Tweety?”

Tommy held up the scepter with the stuffed vulture on top. “Got him.”

Baker took the scepter from Tommy. “Okay, throw your beer away, Tommy.” He looked around. “Everyone throw your beers away.”

“Mine’s full!” called Weinman.

“Leave it in the kitchen, then,” Baker hissed. “Smoke and mirrors, everybody. This is fucking induction. I’m not dicking around. If they think we’re all full of shit, they’re not going to do what we say for the next four months.”

Tripp, who had been stationed by the window, looking through one of the black curtains that now covered every inch of the foyer walls, turned back to the group. “I can see them crossing Maple. Thirty seconds away.”

“McClendon with them?” Erik asked.

“Yup,” Tripp replied.

The stress of the last few weeks escaped Erik’s face, and he smiledas he slipped out the front door. Morton flipped off the light switch, drowning us in only the light from Rowen’s cigarette lighter as he tried frantically to light all of the candles lining the room.

“Somebody help him light these fucking candles,” Baker hissed, and another two cigarette lighters spontaneously came aflame somewhere in the crowd.

We waited, in silence.

I could hear Erik, doing the some-but-not-too-much berating, from the porch: “Fuck, you guys were about fifteen seconds away from being late, and the whole brotherhood was about to shut the whole thing down. Two lines. Quickly. I’m not outside because I wanted some fucking fresh air.”

Patrick nodded approvingly, gave me a thumbs up.

There were two sharp knocks on the door.

Rowen opened the door, just a crack. “Who asks to enter the Mystic Realm of Iota Chi?”

“Brother Omicron Eta,” Erik said, from outside. “And seventeen outsiders to Iota Chi, if you’ll allow it.”

Rowen turned back towards us and, as loudly as he could, “Brothers, will we allow the outsiders entry to our mystic Realm?"

We all looked at Baker, who looked utterly ridiculous in the shadowy candlelight, with that stinky velvet cape and bird-topped scepter. And yet,he looked more serious than I’d ever seen him, nervous, almost like he had that night he came to Kevin’s room to ask for a ride to get Charlie.

Which he didn’t know I had witnessed.

He looked at us, raised his hand, then looked back to the door, and then his hand tore downwards.

“Yes!”

It was amazing--as Baker put it--how much the brothers were able to put on a production.

I remembered being terrified when I was getting inducted. I remembered the majesty of everything: the candles, the cape, the pledge pins, the utter stoicism of the brotherhood.

And we still had that. The pledges were still terrified of us. But it was all a show.

They took their oath, in Latin. We did the readings. They got their pledge pins.

And then Morton and Erik rushed them upstairs for their full briefing on what being a pledge would initiate.

Curtains immediately started being ripped down from the walls, like a scene change.

“Okay, quickly, before they come back down,” Baker said, as the non-working majority of the brotherhood trickled into the kitchen, where the keg and the vat were.

Baker handed his cape and scepter to Rowen, and looked powerlessly as people left the room. He turned to Eddie and Will, who were bucking the traffic and coming into the chapter room with three cases of champagne on a dolly they had stolen from the front desk at Warren Hall. “We have to arrange the flutes to form an I and an X.”

“We know how to spell Iota Chi,” Eddie Darien said, handing him a bag of plastic champagne flutes. “Where are the girls, most importantly?”

Baker checked his watch. “It’s 7:28. We said between 7:30 and 7:45.”

Like clockwork, the door opened, and it was the DMV: Veronica, Dana, and Maddie.

“First ones!” Veronica greeted. “Did you get all your little pledgekins inducted?”

Baker didn’t answer. He handed her the plastic champagne flutes. “Can you arrange these in an I and an X on the pool table?”

“We’re supposed to be guests, you know,” Veronica said, taking them from him. “Becker, come help me.”

I followed her over to the pool table. “Baker’s a little stressed.”

“Gee, you think?” she replied, handing me a stack of cups. “You do the X.” She paused for a second. “Have you heard from Kevin?”

There wasn’t anything I could say. Not really.

I hadn’t heard from Kevin Malley. Not since before he left for Paris, not since we had sexted on Christmas Eve.

I didn’t have words. I shook my head.

“I emailed him the other day, but he didn’t reply,” she said. “I suppose you know as well as anyone how awful he is at keeping in touch.”

As well as anyone?

Why would I know as well as anyone?

I tried to study Veronica, to find some clue if she knew about me and Kevin, but she betrayed nothing, went back to arranging the flutes in an I.

Had Kevin told Veronica? I didn’t know. I didn’t think he would do that--it seemed like, up until the very end, he was not going to do that. And I trusted him. I trusted that he wouldn’t out me, especially to someone so connected to the rest of our orbit.

And yet: the fact that he had hooked up with Austin Berkowitz was never far from my mind. That he most likely did it after we broke up, but maybe didn’t. Was never far from my mind.

Who even knew Kevin anymore? I thought I knew him so well, but then he broke up with me, then he slept with Austin Berkowitz--I had to believe, in that order--and I hadn’t spoken to him in about four weeks.

Darien popped open a bottle of champagne, and began filling some of the flutes on the table.

Baker was lording over all of us, looking deeply concerned but not actually doing anything helpful.

“Keep filling,” he said, nervously looking up to the stairs. “Aren’t there supposed to be more girls?”

“Baker,” Veronica said, sternly, looking up at him. “It’s going to be a great party. You’ve got to chill. Half of Tri-Gamma’s on the way.”

“Half?” he said, nervously. “Do we have that much booze?”

Veronica tossed me irritated eyes, then looked back to Becker. “Half was an overstatement.”

“So, what, like just you guys then?”

Veronica let out a long sigh. “We need to get you a drink.”

Baker seemed to calm down after that. And after the newly-minted pledges came racing down the stairs, and we started spraying them with champagne--the jubiliant mood of celebration that I remembered from last year.

“Pledge!” Morton screeched. “Get me a champagne glass.”

 

“Happy with your decision?” I asked Austin, when I caught him at the keg several drinks later. “I know you were on the fence.”

“I was waiting for Logan, I think,” he said, with a shrug. He was slurring his words a bit: he had just been forced to do a line of shots by one of the brothers. “And then I decided, fuck it, I don’t actually want to wait for Logan. You know? I’m doing me.”

Austin was adorable, in a royal blue suit cut to fit his muscular frame.

Openly gay. As a freshman.

And he carried it off so well: he was dashing and handsome and just a little bit noticeably gay. Though I didn’t know how that dynamic would play in Iota Chi.

Certainly, we had Ryan Wyatt already--who didn’t hide his sexuality, even slightly--but one was different than two. What was the consensus? Two was incidental, three was the X fraternity?

And it was three of us, then. At least three of us.

The X fraternity.

Though Ryan Wyatt was different than Austin Berkowitz, because he hadn’t either fucked around with my boyfriend or fucked around with my ex.

Went there.

Not that Austin would have been aware of either, not that I could lay blame at his feet, but fuck it, he did it, didn’t he?

“You should do you,” I told him, affirmatively. “It’s still strange being at an Iota Chi party with Kevin Malley abroad--do you know Kevin Malley?”

Austin’s face crept into a smirk. “Oh yeah.”

I didn’t have anything else to add, without being direct: without actually asking Austin the exact date that he had screwed around with Kevin.

I tried, instead, to feign incredulity. With a smile, I said, “Oh God, are you saying…”

Austin giggled, clapped me on the shoulder, and sauntered back into the chapter room.

I followed. Waited for my opening, but suddenly Ryan Wyatt appeared from nowhere, and slapped Austin’s pledge pin with his hand. “Pledge, I have a request.”

“Nothing gay, Wyatt,” said Morton, passing by with his hands full of shots, no doubt destined for some of the other pledges.

“What kind of degenerate do you think I am?” Ryan shouted back, as Morton disappeared into the crowd. He turned back to Austin. “Though I am going to make you come with me to the Pub or Oz sometime soon. But no, right now, I have to send someone to get ice from the basement freezer.” He pressed Austin’s pledge button again. “Move it.”

Austin nodded, as if this was some incredibly important instructions rather than what it was, and scurried down towards the door to the basement.

Ryan turned to me, with a smile. “How you holding up, Becker?”

“Wonderful.”

He looked as if he was going to say something, but didn’t. He drunkenly nodded, and then disappeared into the crowd to find everyone else.

Chris Baker, standing by the back wall of the chapter room, was looking far more relaxed.

“It’s a good class,” he told me. “Right?”

“It’s a great class,” I replied. “Seventeen people? And we snatched Logan McClendon away from Zeta.”

Logan was across the room. Talking to Justine, who had come by once the pledges were allowed to start inviting their own friends into the room.

Justine, who was getting inducted into Tri-Gamma tomorrow morning. Logan, who was an Iota Chi pledge.

And somehow, it seemed crazy.

“Well, we had eighteen last year.”

“We lost two, don’t forget. We started with eighteen but we only initiated sixteen.”

“You always lose a couple,” he said. “Who do you think it’s going to be?”

“Can you ever tell?”

“No,” he said. “It’s never who you’d expect.”

I looked at him. We exchanged tilted, drunken smiles. “Who’d you expect was going to drop out last year?”

“Patrick I thought was a goner once Lance dropped out,” he said. “Rodrigue, I called though. He was a weirdo.” He looked at me, and smiled. “Not you. Because I know that’s what you’re really asking. I never thought you would--not once.”

I stiffened. Because that is what I was asking. “Why not me?”

“Because you wanted it as much as I did when I was a pledge,” he said, looking away from me, staring off at his debaucherous kingdom. “You and me--we both thought we had something to prove by being here.”

I knew it was a compliment. Obliquely. I didn’t know exactly what he meant--that I could hang with the straight guys, without anyone realizing or batting an eye?

No. He wouldn’t have meant that.

He meant that, like him, I wasn’t much in high school and I got thrown a lifeline by Iota Chi, and I wasn’t going to fuck it up. Not for anything.

That’s what he meant.

I smiled at that. “Well, I guess we proved it, didn’t we?”

“No,” he said, slumping his shoulders against the wall. “Because we never actually did have anything to prove.”

 

I woke up, light streaming through the window at around eleven o’clock, to three interesting pieces of communication:

First, a text from Connor ManFind, sent at 4am.

“How’s it going?”

And second: another text from Connor, sent twelve minutes ago: “Sorry about that. I was a little drunk last night.”

I didn’t exactly know how to respond to that. So I didn’t. I put my phone back on the nightstand, and reached down to the floor to grab my laptop.

Where I found the third interesting piece of communication: an email from Kevin Malley.

Subject line: “Bonjour a Paris.”

I didn’t know what to do. I was silently panicking—was it going to be friendly? Regretful? I miss you so much? I hate you so much?

I glanced over to Patrick’s side of the room--he was still passed out, sprawled out on top of the comforter in a pair of boxers. He would’ve been the perfect person for advice in this situation, because he was the only one who knew the situation.

I opened it. It wasn’t to me specifically: to a group of us.

I felt simultaneously relieved and hurt and happy, that I was hearing from him for the first time in nearly a month.

From: K. Malley

To: C. Baker, M. Rowen, B. Morton, T. Pereira, B. Farber, M. Weiner, D. Schwartz, V. Tandy, P. Becker

Subject: Bonjour a Paris

Bonjour mes amis de la Nouvelle-Orleans,

Sorry I’ve been out of touch. Veronica yelled at me yesterday and told me to send you guys an update email. So here goes!

Just about to start week four. Classes are keeping me busy. Everything’s going well, except French. You’d think four years of Latin would help, but no. But overall, I’m finally getting my bearings. Being in a foreign country and all. For the first time.

It’s almost like freshman year. You just kind of fall into the life and can’t imagine what happened before. You all know how often I’ve moved around. Old pro at this point.

They have us living at this place called the Hotel le Ye-Ye. Very fancy, almost as nice as Wall. Not that any of us ever lived in Wall. There’s a bar downstairs. Communist-themed (So, Becker, you’d hate it.)

I’ve been busy, otherwise. Classes and shit. They actually make you work on study abroad. Everything’s going well, except French. Turns out, I’m terrible at French. You’d think four years of Latin would help, but no.

Program is full of interesting people--about 30% Tulane kids, but really, people from all over. A couple people from NYU. A girl from Berkeley. Who actually knows my best friend from high school: small world. And I’ve made friends with some locals too. Here and there.

Other than that: lots and lots of wine. Table wine, not pink champagne in a riverbed, but it gets the job done. I’m becoming a wine snob, I decided, so be prepared for me to sniffing your Franzia next time we play Slap the Bag on the porch of the Iota Chi house.

I’ll try to keep you guys updated more often, though. Hope everything’s going well, and hope you remembered to smoke a bowl in my honor at Mardi Gras!

Gros bisous,

Kevin

I stared at the screen, trying to decode this.

The shoutout to me, directly. “Communist-themed (Becker, you’d hate it.)”

Which I would’ve hated. He was right.

It hadn’t escaped my attention that I was the last email address listed. As if he had added me, then removed me, then added me again. As if he was thinking of me, as if he was worried about what this email might contend.

I really wished Patrick was awake, but he’d probably think I was a crazy person anyway. Trying to find hidden messages from my ex when, very clearly, there were none.

It was just a pleasant email. Just a pleasant email that recapped a pleasant experience in a pleasant study abroad in a pleasant continent.

“It’s not pink champagne in a riverbed.”

Did anyone else know what he was talking about? Would they ask?

Had it only been two months ago that Kevin and I were standing under the overpass in the dry riverbed near his house in Colton, drinking Veuve Cliquot rose?

That he had pulled down my pants, that he had fucked me senseless, right there against the concrete pillar?

When he told me he was coming out to his family?

Maybe that was the start of everything: the start of him starting to imagine what it’d be like to be out of the closet, to be free, to be unincumbered by me.

But I got two references. In one email--more than anyone else. And the fact that he included me on the email with his closest friends in the world.

Was he still thinking about me? Was he still thinking about me like I was still thinking about him?

When he went to bed with some sexy Frenchman, was he still thinking about how it felt to be inside my ass? Thinking about how it was fun, but different--how it was fun but it wasn’t love, it wasn’t romance, it wasn’t us?

I liked to think he was thinking that. I needed to think he was thinking that.

We had the rest of February, then March, then April, then May. Four months until Kevin was back in the country, when I could text him, when I could see him, when I could hold him.

Four months, and we could both live knowing that we sowed our oats, that we experienced other men, that we ultimately belonged together.

I set out to write my reply:

Dear Kevin,

I had nothing beyond that. Dear Kevin. Dear?

I erased Dear.

Kevin,

And still, nothing. I threw my head back, tried to think of what I could say to him that would sound profound and romantic and intoxicating, but respectful of the fact that we were no longer a couple.

Glad everything’s going well.

Glad everything’s going well? I wasn’t glad. Did I want him to think I was glad? I erased it. Which just left me with:

Kevin,

Again. Kevin. Kevin. I couldn’t send him an email full of just Kevins, because that’d be creepy.

I googled the Hotel le Ye-Ye Paris, and it came up on the map. Rue Drouot. Between the Richelieu and the Le Peletier metro stations, and I wondered which one was his. Which one Kevin would be racing down, to catch a train with his friends from Tulane and NYU and UC Berkeley and the various locals, on his way to meet sexy French men.

There was a phone number. One of those long, foreign numbers. And I debated calling it, but I didn’t. Because that would have been creepy too.

Kevin--great to hear from you, and glad you’re having fun. Don’t think I’m not quizzing you on your wines when you get back. Study up.

Becker

Short. Simple. Witty.

He could spend his own hours reading into the subtext.

Becker. Love, Becker?

No.

Just Becker.

Sent.

I closed my computer. I didn’t want to think about the specifics of Kevin, about the specifics of his life in Paris. I focused instead on one thing: that somewhere, on the other side of the world, Kevin was receiving my email and, for at least a moment, he was thinking of me and I was thinking of him, and in four months, our worlds would collide again.

That was enough for now.

I got out of bed, and went into the bathroom. Tripp was already in there, brushing his teeth.

“Morning,” I told him.

He grumbled something through the foam, then spit in the sink. “Morning,” he said, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “Want to go to breakfast at Bruff? Erik’s arranging some pledges before they go to steal pins.”

Had it been a year ago that Jackie Hughes had stolen my pin? That I’d gone on a date with her, that I’d had to apologize to Kevin, tell him I only wanted to be with him?

We’d had such a messy start to our relationship. Didn’t we.

But everything was so good when it was good.

“Yeah,” I said. “Bruff sounds good.”

“Five minutes,” he said. “Wake Sleeping Beauty too, while you’re at it.”