The Punishment Club

by D. A. Maddox

  A friend will contact you, the email had read. She’ll tell you what to do.

  It was Wednesday. It would have to happen soon. And what had they meant by “friend”? Was it possible she already knew someone in The Select?

  That possibility was unaccountably exciting. Crazy things like this didn’t happen in Savannah’s sheltered world of books and exercise, writing and online gaming. She’d only had one underage drink in her life. She had a license but rode a bike or took the bus instead of buying a car. She saved money instead of spending it.

  I’m the most boring person I know, she suddenly realized. I have to do this, even if it’s totally stupid. Even if I regret it for the rest of my life.

  She fingered the heart-shaped pendant at the end of her necklace. It was the only golden thing she owned. She rarely took it off, but her hand went to it regularly. Sometimes, she imagined her mother’s patient, reasonable voice speaking through it. Today, it seemed to dare her.

  Take a chance, Vanna. Maybe they won’t be as stuck-up as you think. It’s not like you have anything else going on this Friday.

  The system screen on the exercise bike beeped the fifteen-minute mark and switched to Level 1 difficulty. Warmup complete. Savannah considered pedaling through the two-minute cooldown but let her feet rest idle in the pedal straps instead. She sipped from her water bottle.

  “Hey.”

  Savannah almost choked.

  It was Puppy Dog Eyes, and he was standing right behind her. “Oh, hey,” she fairly spluttered, then instantly said, “I’m sorry. Kind of caught me off guard.” Climbing off the bike, toweling off around the neck, she remembered to smile.

  “No, my fault,” the boy said, extending his hand. “Scott Lachance.” Then, when she didn’t immediately answer, he added, “Architecture.”

  “Savannah Miles,” she said, shaking hands, painfully aware of the dampness of her palm—and either feeling or imagining the hint of a mildly pleasant electrical charge through the sweat. “Secular Archaeological Studies of Religious History. Okay, that’s out of the way.”

  Up close, it was clear that Scott Lachance was as nervous as she was, even though he was trying to play it cool. He chuckled. “That’s, um … very specific. So, what happens to the secular part if you … I don’t know, dig up God, or something?”

  She shared in the laugh. “Then I start going to church, I guess.”

  Reflexively, her brain went into panic mode—Oh, God, what if he’s super religious? Savannah, you idiot—and started formulating another apology.

  “I’ll hold you to it,” he said amiably enough. “’Til then, how about a beer at Finney’s?”

  He’s asking me out. Holy cow, Mom, you said this would happen one day and now it is.

  Actually, she’d been asked out before—more than once—but this was the first time she thought she might…

  “Sounds like a good time,” she said, hoping her face wasn’t as pink as it felt. Then she remembered. “Oh—damn it. Listen, Scott, I’ve got a birthday thing going on later tonight…”

  That wasn’t the only thing, either. She wasn’t looking forward to her wellness visit later this morning. She got them twice-annually, like everyone else on campus, but having to report to the med labs on a school day made for nothing but stress. There’d be work to make up later, and she’d have to trust Mandy Jameson to record the lecture for her.

  “Yours?”

  “Yes,” she said, exasperated with herself and more than a little embarrassed. She’d brought up her damned birthday, like a little kid expecting an instant present. “Just turned twenty-one.”

  “In that case, maybe this afternoon?”

  “Really?” she said, surprised and rather flattered by his tenacity. That was when she had planned on making up the notes, but…

  “Oh, hell, yeah,” he said. “I’d be honored to buy your first beer.”

  “Well,” she ruefully admitted, “first legal beer, anyway.”

  There you go again, she thought. If he didn’t think you were a total heathen before—

  “That’s what I meant,” he forged on, undaunted. “One o’clock okay with you?”

  She smiled at him. She nodded.

  “Great,” he said. Then, looking all around himself as if wondering what came next, he finally went on, “Okay, I’m gonna jet. Finney’s, though. One o’clock.”

  “Looking forward to it,” Savannah said. And she was. She let it show. “See you then, Scott.”

  You can’t be very far into your workout, she thought as he ambled off to the changing rooms. But she understood why he was leaving. If both of them had stayed at the gym at that point, they would have turned the place into Awkward City.

  “Happy birthday,” he called back to her, then passed through the locker room door.

  ****

  Unchaining his bike from the stand outside the gym entrance, Scott allowed the elation and expectation to wash over him. I did it, he thought. I asked her, and she said yes. He was grateful neither Rusty nor Zeke had been on hand. God only knew what they would have said right there, out in the open and in front of everyone. But he could imagine it.

  From Rusty, something like: “Finally, Scotty steps up to the plate!”

  Scott hated being called “Scotty”. Which was why Rusty called him that.

  And from Zeke, who fancied himself something like an older brother, “Shy boy makes a move! Good for you, man. Now, here’s what you do…”

  They were seniors, and they’d actually been a real help back when he’d been new. Pedaling back to his dorm—which he occupied alone out of choice, and it stretched his modest budget to its limit—he wondered if he would tell them. There was no harm just in letting someone know he’d offered to buy Savannah Miles a beer, and she’d accepted. Zeke would be the better choice. He’d be encouraging, if a bit of a know-it-all. Rusty would tease him all through Scaffolding and Safety, which was a two-hour class. Maybe all the way to one o’clock.

  Not until you’ve done it, he decided, turning onto University Way.

  It was almost six in the morning. The plaza was lit with the burnt orange glow of the rising sun. Just past the low-roofed brick buildings of the Golden Tech and the campus police was the Jam and Java. He could stop for a quick coffee and bask in his success for an hour or so. The mock-up floorplan of his make-believe middle school wasn’t due until…

  Monday. Before that would be Friday—and he still hadn’t decided what to do about Friday night. The fucking SCS. The Select. Why had they decided to pick on him?

  This is your choice, the email had said, but one does not refuse us lightly.

  If he did stay home that night (or maybe go out on a real date with Savannah, as an alternative), he’d be wondering what he missed for the rest of his life. But he was still inclined to skip. Scott Lachance did not like being told what to do, especially by his peers.

  He passed the coffee shop. Best to get done what he could, leave his options open.

  Why do you hang around with Zeke, then? he asked himself. But the answer was obvious. Zeke was a friend. So was Rusty, in his way. They were jerks, but they were his jerks.

  Outside the dorm house, he took off his helmet, walking the bike in with him. He took the stairs, carrying his bike the whole way. He’d ducked out of his morning workout, so he’d have to make it up as he could throughout the day.

  In his room—third floor, Dorm 5—the first thing he noticed was that he’d accidentally left his computer on—and he never did that. Powering down the old desktop monstrosity on his way out of the door was something he practically did from muscle memory, like rowing at crew.

  The second thing he noticed was the white cardboard box in front of the computer desk. It was a perfect cube and occupied the whole seat. It had a removable top but no tape to secure it, no string. Nothing.

  “What the hell?” he said to no one.

  Call the cops, his common sense demanded. Someone just broke into your personal space. At leas
t call Rick.

  Rick was the dorm supervisor—another one of those older brother figures. But, knowing Rick, he’d just defer to campus police anyway.

  Instead, Scott went to his desk, to the box.

  You shouldn’t open that, he thought, hearing nothing but the whir of the computer fans as he took off the lid and dropped it to the floor.

  Inside, there was a collared white dress shirt, black pants, a pair of black running shoes without laces. On top of them was a single sheet of paper. The note was typewritten, and short:

  This is what you will wear. This is all that you will wear. We will provide everything you need for the night’s entertainment.

  Scott was glad he hadn’t called the campus police. They wouldn’t interfere with SCS shenanigans—or so he’d always been told. It was just part of life at Bridgemont.

  He took them out, finding each article was the correct size for him, or near enough.

  And two more things at the bottom: a plain white undershirt—and a jockstrap.

  “You’re kidding me,” he muttered.

  The whir of the computer fan…

  Scott thumbed on the monitor. There was a new email there, sent at 5:45 this morning. And it was from the same sender.

  Let us know if anything doesn’t fit.

  While he was still contemplating that, a third email popped into his inbox.

  “Jesus, stop already.”

  But he opened that one, too.

  Congratulations on your success this morning. Hail, the conquering hero. And, Scott?

  She’ll be there.

  End of sample chapter

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