by W. R. Bolen
“That chick is licking his forehead, so it seems to be working for him,” I said as we walked past.
We were approaching the staircase when suddenly a lunatic in a cowboy hat and toga came flying down the stairs at 20 mph riding an ironing board like a sled. He hit the ground and skidded into the wall, spilling his drink everywhere and knocking his head. Behind him followed ten guys with black trash bags full of mischief.
“That’s the president,” said Atwater. “Sean Harvey.”
“What’s in the bags?” I asked. The volume of the party forced us to raise our voices.
“Tubes of paint,” said Atwater. “Those bags will be spread out on the dance floor, so once the band starts playing you just grab some and go apeshit.”
“I never want to leave this place!” Monte proclaimed to no one in particular. A fascinated smile stretched across his face as the booze began to loosen him up.
We made our way up the stairs and down a long corridor with bedrooms to the left and right. Everything on the second floor was covered in tarp as well. The house was even bigger than I initially realized, and we turned a corner down another long hallway before finally reaching Atwater’s room. There was a sign on his door written in sharpie that read RUSHEES AND TITS, OTHERWISE: GET THE FUCK OUT. He kicked the door open and there were already several guys inside drinking and talking.
“All right, y’all go around and meet the other rushees and take some shots or whatever,” said Atwater as he headed toward his bathroom. “Help yourselves.”
Monte and I ended up shooting whiskey with Nathan Johnson and Tim Rumsen, who were both rushing as well. They both had the same look of eager readiness on their faces. After briefly taking part in standard introductory protocol, Nathan cut to the chase.
“You can call me Nate,” he said. “Tim here has some blow if you’re into that.”
I had ingested my fair share of illegal substances in high school, but I wasn’t totally sold on hitting party powder at my first collegiate event. Just as I opened my mouth to tell them we appreciated the offer but no thanks, Monte chimed in.
“Why not?”
Then Atwater came out of nowhere and put his arm over my shoulder.
“Nose candy? I’m in.”
It was the perfect snowstorm of peer pressure. My mind wandered for a split second as I wondered if my parents had safely completed their journey home, and then Atwater handed me a rolled-up $20 bill. I looked over at Monte, who was already wide-eyed and smiling like a white-nostriled Jim Carrey, nodding his approval.
Fuck it. If Monte’s punk ass can handle it, so can I.
I leaned over, put President Andrew Jackson to my nose, and railed a line off Atwater’s iPad.
Just as my brain went into overdrive, I heard the band kick off the night through the floorboards with “Born in the USA,” and suddenly Tim sprinted out down the hall without saying a word.
“Well, Tim is fucking awesome,” said Monte, rubbing his nose.
We looked to Atwater for our next move. His bloodshot eyes darted around the room while he searched for meaningful words to motivate us, and then he delivered an eloquent speech I’ll remember for the rest of my life.
“If you get lucky and my room is unlocked you can fuck on the floor. Otherwise just try random doors.”
He bent down, inhaled another line, put one fist high in the air, and marched out of his room like a general leading his troops into battle. I gulped down the last of my whiskey drink and followed him out to plunge headfirst into a lifestyle that I would maintain for over half a decade.
We made our way downstairs and over to one of the makeshift bars where beers were being handed out like United Nations survival packs in an African war zone. I noticed Atwater grabbing cans and shoving them down into his toga.
“You’re going to want extras!” he yelled over the music.
I followed his lead, tucking two into the pockets of my shorts under my toga and taking two in each hand. I turned to hand one to Monte, but he was gone. After stocking up, we pushed through the crowd, which had tripled in size since our arrival, and made our way toward the massive dining room where the band was located. I saw Tim out the corner of my eye scooping a cup full of reddish-pink liquid from a twenty-gallon trash can.
“Pink panty-dropper punch,” Atwater explained. “It’s really just for girls, but some real degenerates who like blacking out immediately are into it.”
Tim was obviously the latter. I was already shit-hammered, so I had no need for girly pink disaster liquid. We maneuvered through one last wave of people and turned the corner into the giant party room. Girls were frolicking in circles and squeezing entire tubes of paint onto each other’s heads. Guys were full-sprinting across the room and sliding headfirst like Pete Rose at high speeds across the paint-covered canvas that protected the wood flooring.
Suddenly a multicolored person raced past me, flailing both arms wildly in a figure eight across his body, and paint splattered across my face and chest.
“It’s go time!” yelled Atwater as he wiped a glob of green from his cheek and took off in the direction of the stage.
“We need some fucking paint!” Nate shouted in my ear.
I nodded in agreement and we made our way through the madness toward the closest trash bags, our togas becoming less white with every step. Soon we would be part of a drunken rainbow race like the rest of the room. The look of joy that this decadent environment put on my face would’ve made my hometown pastor’s head explode.
As I reached into the bag and grabbed from the assorted tubes of color, someone’s hands covered my eyes. My drunken reflexes kicked in and I turned swiftly, ready to extinguish my attacker with a barrage of red and blue paint. My counterattack paused when I realized it was a girl. Her face was like every other in the crowd, purplish brown from the mix of primary colors, but Allison’s ample mounds were easily distinguishable.
“It’s me, stupid!” she screamed. “Let’s go dance!” She took hold of my hand. “You need to get dirtier!”
Yes, we do.
She playfully ran her paint-covered hands through my hair and then pulled me toward the gathered masses. As we stumbled along I polished off one of my beers, handed another to her, and reloaded. We were in the middle of the dance floor when the band sent a flurry of piano keys through the air that caused everyone to crank up their intensity another notch into the code-red danger zone. It was Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’,” and I was immediately swept up in the craziest dance party I’d ever been a part of.
Allison and I jumped up and down like little kids in an inflatable castle filled with booze. I chugged half of my beer and then swung the can wildly over my head, spraying everyone within a ten-foot radius and causing a chain reaction that resulted in around thirty other people beer showering simultaneously. I was performing a series of terrible white-guy dance moves (a combination of the twist and the classic water sprinkler) when I slipped on a slick puddle of paint, lost my footing, and landed on my back. I couldn’t feel a thing, and alcohol refused to give awkwardness a chance to set in, so I embraced the moment and flailed around on the floor like I was having an epileptic seizure while Allison poured beer straight into my mouth like a fountain a few feet above me. It was pure glory. Nothing else in the world mattered. There were no parents, no rules, and no worries.
I stood back up when I’d had my fill, and the next thing I knew Allison and I were moving toward each other in drunken slow motion as I stiff-armed strangers blocking our embrace. What ensued on the dance floor could not be considered “slow dancing” by any legal definition, but was sloppily paced grinding that would’ve made her father regurgitate his dinner. An unopened beer fell from my waist to the tarp floor, and as I bent over to retrieve it I realized Allison had gone to grab it too, and I was inches from her face. This was my second “fuck it” moment of the night. The kiss that followed swapped a mixture of spit, beer, and paint. When our lips parted ways, the amount of alcohol in m
y system caused me to lose my footing and tumble to the ground again, pulling Allison down on top of me.
“You’re crazy!” She laughed.
I ignored the accusation and decided on a game plan.
“You wanna go take some shots?” I asked, helping her to her feet.
“Absolutely! Where?”
“Atwater’s room. He said I could help myself.”
She took my hand and we headed out of the crowd toward the stairs. Right before we reached the steps I noticed another couple against the wall making out, except this time it wasn’t Scott McCandles in his kilt.
The girl’s toga was hiked up around her waist. The guy had apparently lost his toga, wearing only khaki shorts that were now badly stained, and claw marks on his back that were apparently from her nails. While he shielded the dirty action of his hand below her waist from the wandering eyes of passersby, I noticed he was performing an act usually reserved for the privacy of a bedroom. Normally I would’ve laughed it off and kept to myself, but I came to a sudden, alarming realization. It was Monte.
“Holy shit, Monte, is that you?” I interrupted.
He looked back over his shoulder with a blank stare. There was no shame in his eyes as he attempted to form a smile with the alcohol-sedated muscles in his face. Any speck of remorse that he normally would’ve shown was hidden behind a curtain of booze and drugs.
“Are you fucking serious right now? In the hallway?”
I laughed hysterically as he finally realized who I was.
“Townes!” He faltered backward toward me. “What the fuck is up?” His slurred words were barely understandable.
“Monte?” His female companion was confused. “You said your name was Peter!”
He turned back to her to attempt an explanation as Allison tugged on my hand to lead me upstairs.
“Take it to a room, you fucking wildebeest,” I yelled as I walked away.
Each step of the stairs was like a hurdle, and when we reached the top I decided there was no time to waste and took aim for the kill shot. We made out intermittently as we headed down the hallway and I said a mental prayer that Atwater’s door would be unlocked. When we reached his room it was wide open, and someone was passed out facedown in his bed. Allison stopped outside and I walked in on a reconnaissance mission. His face was completely purple, but I knew it was Tim. Atwater’s bed was covered in smears of paint, and his pillow was dribbled with Tim’s punch-stained drool. He was still breathing, and I decided there was no reason to wake him. After all, Atwater had said to fuck on the floor.
“He’s out cold,” I informed Allison as I grabbed the closest bottle from the dresser. “Vodka?” I asked as she shut the door.
I poured a glass, but as I turned to hand it to her she pounced on me like a rabbit in heat. She pushed me up against the dresser and we tore at each other’s togas, desperately searching for mutual nudity. When we were totally disrobed she slid to her knees and started fellating the only inches of my body not tainted with paint. Tim let loose a drunken groan in his sleep. I reached behind me and grabbed the glass to take one last swig of vodka before going in for some floor fucking. I didn’t even have time to consider the fact that Atwater probably kept condoms in his dresser; things were moving too quickly.
I was only a few thrusts in when a loud Kaboom shook the ground like an earthquake, causing Allison to scream and Tim to shoot up suddenly like a zombie arisen from the dead.
“What the fuck was that?” Allison shrieked as she grabbed for her toga to cover herself.
“Shots fired?!?” Tim asked, only half conscious.
Just then Atwater kicked open his door.
“Some fucking idiot loaded the cannon with paint tubes and fired it!” he yelled.
He quickly realized I was popping my college cherry in his room.
“Townes? Nice!” He turned and looked at his bed. “Tim? What the fuck?”
I quickly helped Allison to the bathroom so she could get dressed and slammed the door behind her as I pulled up my shorts and tried to find my bearings.
“There’s a cannon? What the hell is happening?” I asked Atwater.
He briefly explained that the chapter had an old Civil War relic in the backyard, and someone thought it would be a good idea to pack it with gunpowder and tubes of paint before throwing a flaming piece of toilet paper inside. I was trying to digest the absurdity of the situation when Monte stumbled into the room behind him. He stood in the doorway, maintaining his stance with one arm on the wall, wearing his boxers, a few layers of paint, and a glob of drool hanging from his chin. Atwater took one look at him and decided we were a liability.
“You guys better get the fuck out of here, the cops will show up any minute. Take the fire escape.” He grabbed Monte by the arm and ushered him toward the window.
I looked at the bathroom door, considering Allison’s fate, but Monte had already begun his descent and there was no way I was letting that slapdick wander home alone. Atwater noticed my concern.
“Dude, I’ll take care of her, get the fuck out of here!”
I was in no position to argue, so I headed for the window and looked out. Monte was about halfway down the ten-step ladder, and motioned for me to follow him. I climbed down and as my feet touched the ground I saw the flashing of red and blue lights coming from the front of the house. I crouched with my toga over my shoulder while Monte swayed in his boxers. Tim made it halfway down the ladder before losing his grip and flailing through the air like a wounded duck. He landed square on his back with his legs pointed straight up, bouncing his head off the grass.
“We’re going to have to take a back route,” whispered Monte. He was down on one knee, scanning the area and licking his lips furiously while he flashed his hands in different directions like a covert Navy SEAL. Tim got to his feet, unfazed by the fall, and gave Monte a thumbs-up in response.
A flashlight beamed around the side of the house, so we scrambled into the bushes.
“We’ll jump the fence in the backyard and head for the alley behind Manor,” I strategized.
“You think they’re gonna shoot that cannon at us?” Tim asked.
Monte tapped my shoulder and we eased our way out of the bushes, but after a few feet I turned back to see Tim rooted to the ground with a look of pure horror on his face. A group of people covered from head to toe in red paint had turned the corner, followed by flashlights.
“Jesus Christ, it’s a fucking massacre!” Tim cried out. “RUN! EVERYONE RUN!”
A flashlight beam hit Tim in the chest.
“Tim! Let’s go! Now!” I yelled.
The flashlight hit me and I looked over at the cop standing directly below Atwater’s room.
“Stop! Do not attempt to run!” he commanded.
The thought of calling my dad from jail less than twenty-four hours after leaving for school set off an alarm in my head. I ran back to Tim and jerked him by the arm. He tripped through the bushes and toppled into me, sending us both to the ground in a paint-stained heap. We were just feet away from the cop, tangled up and totally exposed. It was all over. But then fate took a turn.
The officer’s eyes hardened as he reached for his handcuffs, but out of nowhere a colorfully coated and unidentifiable Alpha walked up and tapped him on the shoulder.
“This is private property,” he said boldly. “Where’s your probable cause?”
The cop spun around, taken off guard by what sounded like a lawyer and looked like a member of an art cult. The Alpha’s legal rant continued as the officer’s hand moved swiftly to his Taser holster.
“Where’s your warrant?” he asked with a cocky head tilt.
“Step back and calm down,” the cop said firmly.
The Alpha ignored him. “This is unconstitutional. I’m taking down your badge number.”
He reached for the badge pinned to the cop’s chest as the Pop of the Taser being fired echoed into the night sky.
“Arggghhhhhhh!” He went stiff and toppl
ed toward the ground as the voltage coursed through his veins and spittle flew from his lips.
The cop dropped his knee into the guy’s back as I pulled Tim to his feet and turned to sprint. Monte was already running like a bronze medalist in the Special Olympics for giants. Tim and I took off after him. We jumped a few fences and eventually found our way into an alley that led directly to our dorm. When we were a safe distance from the house I stopped to catch my breath.
“Holy shit!” I said, gasping. “Whoever that was, he saved our asses!”
“Sarah is going to disown me.” The cannon fire, police, and adrenaline had brought Monte to the sobering reality that it had taken him less than twenty-four hours to fuck up.
“Man… you really did get carried away.” I attempted to ease his mental anguish with a pat on the back. “She’s never going to know.”
We finally reached our building as a girl was swiping her ID to get inside. She looked at us like we were completely insane.
“You guys have a good night?” she asked, smirking.
“You have no idea,” I responded.
When we were finally inside our room I immediately lay down on my bare mattress. My sheets and bedding were still in boxes. Monte face-planted onto his own bed, and Tim curled up on the floor using a trash bag filled with Monte’s clothes as a pillow, still in shock from the gruesome scene he thought he’d witnessed.
“Welcome to college, Monte,” I said.
“Fuck you, Townes,” he said back.
Adrenaline still had me wired, so I stared up at the ceiling and waited for it to fade, listening to Tim violently snore in his sleep. Serenity washed over me knowing everything in my life was going perfectly according to plan. I’d gotten into school, moved into my dorm with my best friend, and been recruited on the first night by the fraternity I knew I wanted to join. Not to mention I’d managed to lose my collegiate virginity, even if just for a few pumps. I was ready to spend the rest of my time on campus racking up as many nights like this as I possibly could.
