The Freshmen - 29. Chapter 29

September 14, 2004

Harvard University

Cambridge, MA

Will

“I have vodka, and I have tonic,” I said to my suitemates. We’d all been unpacking, but when 5:30 pm hit, we decided we’d had enough and opted to take a break.

“If we mix them together, I hear they’re pretty good,” Thor said sarcastically. We found glasses, got some ice, mixed some drinks, and kicked back in the main area. As I drank, I studied these guys while I recalled my conversation with Marie about which one was the hottest. I had originally told Marie that Thor was the most handsome, and now that I’d met them, I was sure of it. He looked kind of like Ryan Gosling but with thick blond hair. Niko’s looks were driven by his charisma, but even then he was handsome. His features sort of resembled Joshua Jackson. Scotty had a bit of that Jesse Bradford look. I hadn’t noticed how pretty he was in the pictures. It was like his mop of hair totally took away from that. Poster ended up being the least attractive, looking kind of like a dorky version of Orlando Bloom. He should do one of those online dating deals, because he definitely looked better in photographs.

“So there are two things I need to talk to you guys about,” I said, taking the floor.

“So talk,” Scotty said.

“It’s my birthday, there’s a party with good food, and you’re invited,” I said.

“Happy fucking birthday,” Niko said, then high-fived me. “Where’s this party?”

“At my brother’s house a couple of blocks away,” I said. “There will also be women there.”

“Women?” Poster asked with a leer.

“My cousin will be there for sure, and she’s fucking hot. She’s going to try to drag a couple of her roommates along, so we’ll see,” I said.

“I mean, I’ll go, but I didn’t get you a present,” Thor said, cracking me up.

“Tight-ass bitch,” I teased. “We leave at 6:30.” I made a mental note to call Wade and tell him we didn’t need a ride.

“What’s the other thing?” Poster asked.

“I’m not into women,” I said. It was interesting to watch their reactions, or at least the reactions of everyone but Thor, because he already knew. First it was one of nonchalance, as they took in my words. They acted almost like I had just given them the weather report. Then as they started to digest my statement and realized that I’d just outed myself, their expressions began to change. Niko’s reaction was to shrug, while Scotty just sat there like a statue. Poster was clearly struggling with it, flailing between freaking out to being calm then back to freaking out again.

“Are you saying you’re gay?” Poster asked, and not all that nicely.

“That’s what he’s saying, dickhead,” Thor said.

“Cool,” Niko said. Poster looked at him strangely. “Dude, I know a lot of gay dudes. What’s your deal?”

“I mean…” Poster began, but Niko cut him off.

“Here’s to Will sucking dick,” he said, and raised his glass. I laughed and drank with him, as did the other guys.

“I just wanted to let you know,” I said. Thor and Niko were totally cool with it, Scotty was still being quiet, while Poster was obviously trying to deal with my big announcement.

“I thought they tried to put gay people in the same room,” Poster said nervously.

“That wouldn’t work. If they did that, everyone would spend all their time fucking,” I replied, acting like I was serious.

“So,” Niko said. “That’s what I thought college was all about.”

“You cool with this?” Poster asked Scotty. I thought Scotty was being quiet because he was upset that I was a fag, but I was starting to realize that he was just quiet in general.

“Why the fuck would I care who he fucks, as long as it isn’t me?” Scotty asked Poster.

“I mean, if you guys are uncomfortable, we can try to change room assignments,” I offered, just to be a gentleman.

“Dude, we are all cool with it except for Poster,” Thor said. “And if we have to pick one of you, you’re staying.”

All of us laughed except Poster, who frowned. “Fuck you,” he finally said.

“We leave at 6:30,” I announced again, then spent the next thirty minutes working on my appearance. I got a text from Marie telling us they’d meet us outside our dorm, so I rounded up my posse and we exited through our ‘entryway’ into the Yard.

“They meeting us here?” Scotty asked.

“They are,” I said. I looked out and saw Marie with two other girls heading toward us. One of them wasn’t all that pretty, she could more appropriately be labeled as cute. She had dark brown hair that was artfully messy, and dressed almost as well as Marie, but she wasn’t even close to Marie when it came to hotness. The other one was really beautiful, but had clearly not put any effort into her appearance. She had hair that was brown, hung straight down from a middle part, and looked like it had never met a real stylist. Her clothes were a mixture of bohemian and lumberjack, so it was no surprise she was wearing Birkenstocks. “Hey!” I said and waved. Me and my boys started walking toward them while I chuckled to myself, thinking it was like one of those Wild West gunfights where two groups slowly converged.

“Hey there, birthday boy,” Marie said, and gave me a big hug. She then turned to talk to her stylish friend. “Megan, this is my cousin, Will.”

“Nice to meet you,” I said, and shook her hand.

“Well it’s such a pleasure to meet you,” she said, with a very obvious Southern twang.

“OK, where are you from?” I asked. “I’m trying to place the accent.”

“Mobile, Alabama,” she said proudly.

“And this is Sarah,” Marie said, directing my attention to the mountain woman. Up close, I could tell she wasn't wearing any makeup.

“Hey,” I said in a friendly way. She frowned at me briefly then shook my hand.

“Nice to meet you,” she said. “And before you ask, I’m from Vermont.”

“You mean the home of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream?” I asked, and raised an eyebrow in an attempt to flirt that fell completely flat.

“Exactly,” she said. “In fact, that’s why my last name is Greenfield.”

“You’re related to Jerry Greenfield?” Niko asked.

“I call him Dad,” Sarah said coldly. She was such a sarcastic bitch that I was tempted to flame her, but then I decided that maybe she’d warm up after she got to know us.

I introduced them to my suitemates, which was pretty funny. Niko pumped out some real charisma, Poster put on a lame game, Thor smiled shyly while the women lusted at him, and Scotty was quiet even with the ladies. After the intros were done, we started walking to Matt and Wade’s house.

“Sarah is my roommate, and Megan has the single in our suite,” Marie said. “For now.” Megan frowned.

“Thor’s stuck with me,” I said.

“Dude, I am sorry,” Marie said to him sympathetically, which made all of us laugh.

“How far is it?” Thor asked, changing the subject.

“A couple of blocks,” I said dismissively. I decided to change the subject again. “So what do you guys want to do with that open room?”

“I mean, we’ve got desks in there,” Scotty said.

“Do you want it to be a study room, or a hang-out place?” I asked them.

“Ours is going to be a study room,” Marie announced.

“Dork,” I said, getting a laugh from our group. “We definitely cannot do that.”

“Asshole,” she responded playfully.

“If I’d known we were going to make it a hang-out place, I could have brought my television with me,” Poster said, starting on one of his bragging trains. Marie looked at me knowingly. “It’s a 42-inch high-def plasma. It’s got the best picture around.”

“I can study in my room or in the library,” Thor said. “Be cool to have a room where we can kick back and hang out, maybe watch a game.”

“Dude, party central,” Niko said. “I am all in.”

“Poster doesn’t have his television, and all we have is shitty furniture,” Scotty said.

“I can have my parents ship it out,” Poster said.

“Leave it to me,” I said confidently. “I’ll handle it.”

“How are you going to do that?” Thor asked.

“Our grandfather loves to decorate,” I said as I looked at Marie. We smiled as we thought of how much fun Stef would have with that. “He’ll do it.”

“Holy shit,” Marie said, laughing. “Stef is going to have a field day with this project.”

“We’re not going to have insane shit, are we?” Niko asked.

“Quite possibly,” Marie answered, then giggled.

“Cool,” Niko said nervously, then started flirting hard with her. He was too funny.

“How much is it going to cost?” Scotty asked. I got the feeling money was tight for him.

“He’ll cover it,” I promised.

“What did you get for your birthday?” Poster asked me. “I got $18,000 in spending money, a grand for each year.” He was so full of himself; I got tired of his bragging.

“I got money too,” I said, since I had.

“How much did you get?” Poster asked, which was blatantly rude, but I decided to blow his mind.

“200 million dollars,” I said. Stef and my father had given me control of a few more of my trusts. They’d told me they’d done it so I’d be richer than Travis, but they were just giving him shit.

“Right,” Poster said, rolling his eyes.

“I only got $15 million when I turned 18,” Thor grumbled. That kind of surprised me, because I had no idea he was rich. I’d pegged him as upper middle class.

“Peasant,” I teased, then we laughed. “How much did you get, Princess?” I asked Marie.

She frowned at me. “I only got $100 million. Your father is richer than mine.”

“Dude, I love dating rich girls,” Niko said. He was hilarious.

“Alright, what did you get?” Marie challenged.

“My dad just gave me three credit cards and told me to enjoy college,” Niko said. “So that’s what I’m going to do.”

“Cool,” Poster said in an annoyed way, since he suddenly seemed to realize that most of his roommates were way richer than he was. I decided that now might be a good time to lay things out for him.

“Look, there are a lot of wealthy people at Harvard, so if you were the shit in high school, let it go, because this is a whole different world,” I said to him seriously. “Our other grandfather talked about learning that when he went to school here. He came from a wealthy family in Ohio, so he was used to being the rich kid, then he got here and realized he wasn’t shit.”

“Whatever,” Poster grumbled. “You don’t have to make fun of me.”

“Dude, you have spent all this time peacocking about all your shit and how loaded you are,” Thor said. “No one is making fun of you; we’re just telling you we don’t give a shit about that stuff.”

“Fine,” Poster said, desperate to drop the conversation.

“It works out well this way, because we can have the most kick-ass dorm in the Yard,” I said.

“Yeah, well I barely managed to pay for school, room, and board, and I had to get loans even to do that, so just don’t dream up things that will cost me extra cash,” Scotty said.

“Dude, you have nothing to worry about,” I said. “If something comes up, I got you covered.”

“I can pay for my own shit,” he replied, which was pretty ironic since he’d just been saying he couldn’t.

“That’s fine too,” I said. We walked up to Matt and Wade’s house, and they paused to look at it. There weren’t many houses this big in Harvard Square, and there sure as fuck weren’t any this big that looked as good.

“Nice house,” Poster said grudgingly.

“The people inside are even nicer,” I said, and led them through the front door. The first person to greet us was Wade, appropriately enough.

“Hey,” he said, letting his Virginia drawl out a little bit to make himself seem more casual. “Glad you guys could make it. I’m Wade Danfield.”

“Nice to meet you,” everyone said, as they introduced themselves to Wade individually.

“The bar is this way,” he said, leading us back to the ‘television room’. Matt was in there, mixing what looked like shots. “This is my partner, Matt Carrswold.”

“Hey!” Matt said exuberantly, and just pumped energy into the room. “I hear one of you assholes thinks you can play hockey.”

“Yeah, that’s me, eh,” Scotty said. And with that, Matt and Scotty started talking about skating while Matt made kamikazes. Rosa came in, smiling, so I introduced her to everyone.

“We decided to have dinner catered,” Wade said. “That way Rosa can join us.”

“That is the best present ever,” I said, and gave her another hug. The entire mood changed again when I heard footsteps that sounded like a cavalcade.

“Will!” Maddie said, although it came out more like ‘Wee-owe’.

“It is so good to see you!” I said, then picked her up and hugged her while I spun around. I put her down, then dropped down to my knees to hug Riley and Bobby. “Guys, this is my sister, Maddie, and my nephews, Riley and Bobby.” Thor, Sarah, and Niko were the best with the kids. It was really cool to see the softer side of Sarah. It was no surprise that Poster was the worst.

“I see you’re here,” Tiffany said, but she was smiling and she gave me a big hug.

“I knew you’d be excited because you missed me so much,” I countered back.

“I didn’t say I missed you; I said I noticed you were here,” she replied. After that comic moment subsided, I introduced her to everyone as well.

“Is she like your older sister?” Scotty asked.

“No, she hangs out and has threesomes with Matt and Wade,” I said deadpan.

“Asshole,” Tiffany said, and glared at me, which of course made me start laughing.

“Mommy said a bad word,” Maddy noted, which made things funnier.

Dinner was a blast, with great food, lots of alcohol, and everyone in a good mood. It was at times like this that I was so glad JJ was out of my life, because he was always such a buzzkill. They all sang “Happy Birthday” to me, then they brought out the cake. “Make a wish!” Riley ordered.

I smiled at Riley, but I didn’t have to think about my wish because I knew exactly what it was. I closed my eyes briefly and begged whatever deities might control us that Travis and I would make it through these next four years and end up together, then blew out the candles. Rosa jumped into action and cut pieces of cake for everyone while Maddy, Riley, and I delivered them. “Time for presents!” Matt announced. He was like a big kid, in that he got excited about things like that in the same way that Maddy and Riley did.

“I am all over that,” I said.

“I’ll get you some Legos later,” Thor said.

“Cool,” I answered, chuckling.

“This is my attempt to do as good for you as you did for me,” Marie said, and handed me two boxes.

I unwrapped the first present and saw that the box said Tiffany & Company. I looked at her and raised an eyebrow, because what jeweler was better than them? Inside the box was a massive blue stone, and when I picked it up, I discovered that it had been turned into a tie pin. “Holy shit. This is beautiful!”

“I’m glad you like it,” she said. “You only get to open the second box if you guess what kind of stone it is.”

“That’s easy,” Megan said. I thought she was looking at it with disdain, but in fact she was majorly jealous. “It’s a sapphire.”

“It is not,” Marie said, then focused on me.

“It could be tanzanite,” I said, “but I’m betting that’s not it either. You wouldn’t make this that easy.”

“I would not,” she replied. I gazed at the stone, totally stymied, then my brain finally kicked in.

“This is benitoite,” I said. “That is my guess.”

“What the fuck is benitoite?” Poster asked, then got embarrassed because he’d sworn.

“He said a bad word,” Riley pointed out, just like Maddy had done to Tiffany, which made us all laugh.

“Benitoite is the state gem of California, and is only found in one county,” I explained.

“It would be worth more if it were sapphire,” Megan said, still seething with envy.

“Not necessarily,” I said. “Most benitoite stones are less than two carats. The bigger ones are much rarer.”

“How the…,” Niko began, then remembered not to say ‘fuck’. “How do you know all this? I’m a Californian, and I know nothing about it.”

“That’s why I got into Harvard,” I said, being cocky and getting laughs. “How many carats is this?”

“Seven,” Marie said.

“That is an amazing present,” I said, trying to shoot love out of my eyes at her. “Thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome,” she said, then pulled out her necklace to admire the coin.

“What’s that?” Niko asked and used that question as an excuse to move his face towards her chest. He was so funny, but what was cool was how he pulled that off without seeming creepy.

“Will got me this for my birthday,” she said, then playfully pushed his head away. She might not ever date Niko, but I was pretty sure she’d end up hanging out with him a lot. “It’s an Eid Mar coin.” She explained to them how it was struck by Brutus after Caesar was killed.

“By the way,” Wade said to Marie and me, “If you have things you want to store over here, we have a safe.”

“That would work out really well,” I said, thinking of all the valuable shit I’d brought with me.

“It will,” Wade agreed. “If you need something, you just have to come over and get it.”

“Cool,” Marie said, probably doing the same thing I was doing, which was mentally running through my shit to decide what to lock up. Marie gave Wade her Eid Mar necklace, and I gave him my benitoite. Wade took them and vanished into his office, then came back after he’d put them in the safe.

“Dude, your gifts are just a little too intellectual,” Thor said.

“Maybe this one isn’t,” I said. I opened the second present and found an unmarked box. There was a piece of paper inside with a picture of a Segway. “You got me one of these?”

“Just a minute,” Matt said, then vanished. About a minute later he came whirling out on the Segway.

“Dude, that is the bomb!” Niko said excitedly. “You have to bring that back to campus, and you have to let me borrow it.”

“That’s exactly what I’m going to do,” I replied, then got up to check the thing out. Before I could try to ride it, Wade stopped me.

“You have one more present,” Wade said. “This one is from Matt and me. I’m hoping you’ll share it with Marie.”

“I’ll think about it,” I said grumpily, then winked at her. Wade handed me a box that was about as big as the ones Marie had given me.

“Guess that isn’t a trampoline,” Niko joked.

“Could be,” I said. “Probably a picture of one in here.”

“That would be awesome!” he said excitedly.

“You going to open that?” Thor asked impatiently, reminding me of Darius.

“Right now,” I answered, then tore off the paper and opened the box. Inside were a set of keys with the Porsche logo on it. “What is this?” I asked.

“You and Marie will need something to drive while you’re here and it will need to handle snow,” Matt said. “It’s in the garage.”

I got up, followed by my fellow Harvard students along with Matt and Wade and the kids, and went out to the garage. It was big enough to hold four cars, but I knew that they had another garage offsite to house their other vehicles. The garage door was open, and inside was a green Porsche Cayenne Turbo. I clicked the key and the car blinked. “Are you kidding me?” I asked. “This is awesome.”

“Well, you’ve had too much to drink to drive it tonight,” Wade said.

“Thanks, Dad,” I said to him sarcastically, which Matt thought was hilarious. We all checked it out, then went back inside. “That is an amazing present. Thank you, guys.”

“We’re just glad you’re here,” Wade said, smiling softly at me. Our eyes connected, and our bond just drew us together like a tractor beam until I finally blinked and ended it.

We headed back to campus, with each of us taking turns on the Segway. When we got back, I strolled in the Harvard Yard while I called Travis.

 

September 15, 2004

Harvard University

Cambridge, MA

Will

I stretched out as the noise and the sun woke me up. There was no air-conditioning in the dorms, so we had to leave the windows open, and that meant that the noise from the Yard just blasted into our room. I didn’t know if it was from the tourists or the other students, but it was annoyingly loud. The other part of leaving the window open was that there was nothing blocking the sun, which seemed to have a beam aimed right at my eyes. I sighed then sat up, still forcing myself to wake up.

I looked at the other bed where Thor was going through the same thing I’d just gone through; he was just a couple of minutes behind me. His chest was smooth and muscular, and when he stretched his arm back he revealed a big bicep and a sexy patch of blond hair under his arm. “Morning,” he said sleepily.

“Morning,” I responded. “Dude, we need to get a fan for our room.”

“It’s not bad,” he argued.

“It’s not bad today,” I responded, emphasizing the word ‘today’.

“You make a good point,” he agreed, then sat up so he was facing me. “So last night you didn’t snore, and you didn’t perv on me.”

I chuckled. “Was I supposed to?”

“It’s loud enough without snoring,” he grimaced, grappling with the noise just like I had.

“Alright, well I’ll just perv on you instead,” I said.

He rolled his eyes at me. “You see how big the room is that Niko and Scotty are sharing? It’s at least twice as big as this one.”

He was right. “We probably should have paid more attention to that,” I grumbled.

“I was thinking that we could offer to trade with them,” he suggested.

“Like they’d go for that,” I said.

“They might if we offered to give up our time in the single,” he said. “I’d rather have the extra space.”

“I would too,” I agreed. “Then when my grandfather shows up to decorate, he can rig it up for us.”

“That’s probably going to be a fucking nightmare,” he said.

“You’ll like him,” I promised. “I’m good with that if you think the other guys will go for it.”

“Let’s get breakfast then talk to them,” he suggested. He stood up and I got my first view of his naked torso, and it was incredible. He only had hair under his pits and the rest of his body was smooth, but I didn’t know if that was because he shaved or if it was natural. He had the muscle tone of a true athlete. He frowned at me.

“Dude, you are fucking hot,” I said. “Don’t get mad at me if I notice.”

He smiled and shook his head. “Don’t make me regret this.”

We found Scotty and Niko hanging out. “Breakfast,” Thor said.

“I am all over that,” Niko said.

“Where’s Poster?” I asked.

“Still sleeping,” Niko said flatly as he rolled his eyes. We started walking toward Annenberg Hall.

“I was kind of wasted last night,” Scotty said. That prompted us to relive the party we’d had when we’d got back here.

“I need to stock our bar,” I said, making a mental note.

“Hey, if I give you a list, will you get me some things?” Niko asked.

“I can do that,” I said. We got to Annenberg and it first reminded me of the Great Hall at Escorial, but after I really took it all in, it was more like a cathedral. I gazed at it, so taken in by the stained-glass windows and the massive chandeliers.

“Nice,” Thor said. We went through the line and got food, then found a table kind of in the front of the hall so we could see everyone when they walked in and out.

“I can eat and scope out chicks at the same time,” Niko said. Unfortunately, I had my back to the door, as did Thor, so we couldn’t appreciate that sight.

“Tell them about your idea,” I prompted Thor.

“Idea?” Niko asked.

“Your room is bigger and we need space,” Thor said.

“So he doesn’t reach over and give you a handjob?” Niko asked. That kind of pissed me off, but at the same time the thought of it was pretty hot.

“Fuck you,” Thor said in a pretty aggressive way. “He didn’t do anything, so don’t go implying that he did.”

“Okay, I’m sorry,” Niko said hastily. That interaction had totally blown my mind. Niko’s comments didn’t really bother me, but they’d bothered Thor. I knew Niko didn’t mean anything by it; he’d just put his foot in his mouth, but I was really flattered that Thor stuck up for me.

“We’re good,” I said to him, and fist bumped him, then he and Thor did the same thing.

“Anyway, we were thinking of trading with you…” Thor said, but then Scotty interrupted.

“That’s bullshit!” Scotty said loudly. I was kind of shocked, because that was the first time he’d shown any emotion at all when he was talking.

“Indoor voices,” I growled at him. “We were thinking that if we traded with you, we’d stay there for the year, then let you guys and Poster split the time in the single between the three of you.”

“So we’d get three months in a single, not two, but when we weren’t there, we’d be in a smaller room,” Niko mused.

“Dude, I don’t know,” Scotty said.

“That, and I’ll buy all your books this semester and next semester,” I offered. He gave me a dirty look, then thought about what I said.

“I’m good with that,” Scotty said.

“So you’re not giving me extra cash?” Niko asked, pretending to be outraged.

“I’ll take you surfing,” I said.

“Where?” he asked excitedly. We’d bored everyone else last night talking about all the places we’d surfed. I was betting he was pretty good.

“We need to find someplace close to here,” I said. “So do we have a deal?”

Niko and Scotty looked at each other, nodded slightly, then turned back to face us. “Deal,” Niko said, then the four of us shook hands to seal our arrangement.