Total Frat Move

by W. R. Bolen

  Just like the rules, pledges were made to be broken. TFM.

  We may have the worst pledge class in chapter history, but it’s still the best one on campus. TFM.

  EDITORS’ NOTE: For obvious reasons, nobody takes pictures of hazing.

  Hell Week

  WE HAD LOST THREE PLEDGE BROTHERS ALONG THE way. One had a complete emotional breakdown during week six, withdrew from the university, and was never heard from again. Another’s dad told him he could choose between quitting pledgeship and paying his own tuition after he dropped a class halfway through the semester. The third made the mistake of telling Mr. Weston he planned on transferring to another school his sophomore year. Mr. Weston chased him out of the house and told him if he ever saw him on campus he’d rip out his “fucking traitor spleen.” The actives made us vow never to mention their names again.

  For the thirty-nine of us who remained, after eleven long weeks of misery, the light at the end of the tunnel was finally visible. The idea of initiation should have served as motivation to finish strong, but the collective morale of our group had been completely shattered. Misery and exhaustion warped the faces that had arrived on campus just months before with bright eyes and excited smiles. We were bruised, scratched, scarred, and worn. Even Tim’s personality had dulled from the erosion of mental torment. I tried to convince myself that the worst was over, but it wasn’t, and nothing would compare to the living hell that awaited.

  It was storming hard on the twelfth Monday night of our pledge semester, and rain pounded against our window as Monte and I sat awake on our beds, staring at the TV with dead eyes. Thunder shook the very foundation of Manor Hall, but neither of us flinched, too exhausted to give a shit if the building collapsed, but unable to sleep because we had been told to expect a call. It was past midnight and still no word.

  My head bobbed as I nodded off for one sweet second before the phone rang and sent me scrambling to my feet. Mr. Weston’s name popped up on the screen with a high-definition picture of his left nut that he’d forced me to use as his photo ID. I froze while it rang again and again until Monte reacted.

  “Fucking answer it!” he yelled. I snapped out of it and grabbed the iPhone off my dresser.

  “Sir, Alpha pledge Townes Prescott, how are you today, Mr. Weston, sir?”

  “Wake the fuck up,” he said. “Blue jeans, white T-shirt, and work boots. Pack your backpack with your pledge handbook, the books you need for class this week, and nothing else. Be lined up in the basement by 1 a.m., and bring a copy of your schedule.”

  “Sir yes sir,” I said.

  “Tell Montgomery too.” Click.

  I knew exactly what was going on. It was no secret. The actives had been strategically holding it over our heads since the beginning of pledgeship.

  “You think this is hard? Wait until Hell Week, you fucking pussy.”

  Hell Week was the final stage of pledgeship. Unfortunately, the definition of a “week” seemed to vary wildly throughout the history of Alpha. Some actives said it was five nights, others said seven. Atwater told me about one pledge class in the 1980s that fucked up so royally, their Hell Week lasted two full weeks.

  I forced speculation to the back of my mind as I put on my jeans and boots, then stuffed my backpack with the books I needed for class.

  “Am I allowed to bring contact solution?” asked Monte. “My toothbrush? Toothpaste?”

  “I don’t know. Mr. Weston said nothing else.”

  “Fuck Mr. Weston,” he said. “I’m bringing it.”

  We zipped up our bags and I hit the lights on the way out of our room, oblivious to the fact that I’d soon be begging for the comfort of my shitty twin-sized dorm bed. On the way down the hall I noticed that Monte’s jaw was clinched tight, and he had fear in his eyes like a fighter about to step into the ring against an undefeated opponent.

  The thunderstorm raged on as I drove toward the house with my windshield wipers on high. I found myself praying for a wreck or some kind of traffic obstacle to slow our approach to inevitable pain, but nothing came. When I pulled into the parking lot I saw Mr. Harris sitting in a lawn chair under a giant umbrella, wearing a yellow poncho, holding a clipboard and flashlight. Mr. Harris was one of Mr. Weston’s best friends, and as a result was always highly involved in hazing, like a top-ranking demon in Satan’s army. He stood up and directed me into a tight spot between a Range Rover and an F-150.

  “Give me your fucking keys,” he yelled over the rain as I slammed my door shut.

  I tossed them to him, and he dropped them into a plastic bag filled with dozens of others.

  “You know where to go,” he yelled, pointing up toward the house.

  Monte and I ran through the downpour and joined most of our pledge class who were already waiting under the veranda as shelter from the shower. We were ordered never to enter the basement until every single one of us was present, and rain didn’t change that rule.

  Rogers and Trendall jogged up behind us while Parsells did a head count.

  “Can’t we just go in?” asked Trendall, wiping his face with his sleeve. “This is ridiculous!”

  “No, Trendall, we can’t, and you fucking know it,” said Parsells.

  A bolt of lightning lit up the sky.

  “I’m going to get fucking electrocuted!” Trendall squeaked, ducking down behind Monte.

  We ignored him and waited in silence.

  A few minutes later all thirty-nine of us were there, and we headed down into the basement together.

  There were candles burning in each corner, giving an eerie light to the normally dark underground room, and a large, solid wood table in the middle. The air was even thicker than usual thanks to the rain, and the old couch and other broken furniture that were usually scattered around the basement were piled at one end, like someone had tidied up the place to make room for more people. As we lined up in our positions there was no need to shout names. We knew where to go. We had done it so many times that getting in alphabetical order took less than ten seconds.

  “Well, we made it this far, right?” joked Rogers as he filed in next to me.

  Another blast of thunder killed the small talk, and then the door at the top of the stairs swung open into the wall like it had so many times before. Mr. Weston walked briskly down the steps with a clipboard and pen in hand. There was a sense of purpose and urgency in his stride. Mr. Harris, Mr. Stevens, and Mr. Brewster followed closely behind him.

  “Take off your fucking backpacks and put them at your feet,” shouted Mr. Weston as he stopped at the table, never looking up from his clipboard.

  We all swung our bags around and dropped them to our feet as the actives spread out among us. Mr. Brewster immediately grabbed my bag, unzipped it, and turned it upright, spilling my books on the floor.

  “Did you pack me anything special?” he asked. He kicked my books around and looked up at me with disappointment.

  “You bore the shit out of me, you know that, Prescott?”

  He moved on to Parsells’s backpack. Mr. Harris and Mr. Stevens were busy checking others.

  The mixture of sweat and rainwater dripping from my hair stung my eyes as their search continued, and another blast of thunder shook the room as Mr. Stevens tore into Monte.

  “Mr. Weston said to bring your books and class schedule. He didn’t say anything about your fucking toothbrush, toothpaste, or your fucking stoner eyedrops!”

  I could tell he wasn’t joking. Mr. Stevens genuinely assumed Monte’s contact solution was drops used to cure the redness that comes with smoking weed.

  “Do you need your wittle eyedroppies to stop the burning in your bloodshot hippie eyes?” he asked condescendingly.

  Mr. Stevens unscrewed the cap and splashed the bottle out onto Monte’s crotch, then picked the toothpaste off the ground and squeezed the entire tube onto the top of Monte’s head before moving on to the next person’s backpack. Other actives were heading down the stairs to get a piece of the action.
/>   “I know at least one of you dumbasses packed something interesting!” yelled Mr. Harris.

  Just then, Mr. Brewster found something.

  “Are you fucking kidding me, Trendall?”

  Suddenly all the actives in the room were focused on Trendall, laughing with amusement. Even Mr. Weston let out a chuckle.

  “Jesus Christ, that’s the biggest bag of Skittles I’ve ever seen,” said Mr. Stevens.

  “Look… look at the size of this fucking bag!” said Mr. Brewster, fighting to stifle his laughter. “You jackasses can stop looking at the ceiling. Look at this!”

  I looked over at the two-gallon Ziploc bag, packed to the brim with Skittles.

  “Were you planning on eating fucking Skittles until you got diabetes, then using that as an excuse to go to the health center?” asked Mr. Harris.

  Laughter filled the room again.

  “You think that’s funny?” Mr. Weston boomed over the others.

  He stomped over, snatched the bag from Mr. Harris’s hand, opened it, and stared directly into Trendall’s eyes while he took a handful of candy.

  “Everyone thinks your snack is funny, Trendall,” Mr. Weston said. “Let’s see if you find this amusing.”

  He picked up one leg like a pitcher on the mound and flung Skittles into Trendall’s face as hard as he could. Trendall recoiled and dropped to the floor, shielding himself while Mr. Harris took another handful and peppered him in the back.

  “Is this fucking funny?” Mr. Weston shouted as he took another handful. “Is everyone getting a good fucking laugh?”

  He wildly flung another handful down the line in my direction. One Skittle struck me in the cheek. I was fifteen feet away and it still stung.

  Mr. Weston dropped to one knee and pulled Trendall’s head back by the hair.

  “Open your mouth! Open it and look at me!”

  Trendall let out a pathetic whine as he opened his mouth and Mr. Weston slapped in a fistful of Skittles.

  “Is this satisfying your fucking sweet tooth?” Mr. Weston yelled in his face while he covered Trendall’s mouth with his hand.

  Trendall coughed and tried to chew, and then Mr. Weston pushed his head into the dirt while the rest of us looked on in horror.

  “God damn it!” Mr. Weston yelled, standing to his feet. “You don’t give a shit if we initiate you, do you?”

  He dumped the hundreds of remaining Skittles from the giant bag into the dirt.

  “You want to prove that you care about this fraternity?” he asked loudly.

  “Sir yes sir!” we answered.

  “You have one minute to have every single one of those fucking candies in your stomachs,” he said. “Now!”

  Imagine thirty-nine starving rats fighting over crumbs of cheese. That’s exactly what we looked like for the next forty-five seconds. Guys were scooping handfuls of Skittles and dirt into their mouths like it was water from the fountain of youth. At one point I was down on both knees pushing Monte’s foot out of the way so I could grab for a Skittle he had accidentally covered with his shoe. The actives rained insults down on us as we finished them all, and then we scrambled back to our spots, faces and teeth freckled with dirt, fingers sticky with sugar.

  “Welcome to Hell Week, boys!” Mr. Weston yelled, smiling menacingly.

  The actives filled the room with sarcastic claps and cheers that made my stomach churn with anxiety.

  “I hope you worms enjoyed that, because it was the last fucking meal you’re ever going to have,” someone toward the back yelled.

  Mr. Weston raised his hands to silence the growing crowd.

  “During this week our house is your home,” he said. “The only time you leave this house is to go to class, and when class ends you’ll sprint back here immediately. Stack your class schedules and your cell phones on this table one by one in order. If you’re not back within ten minutes of class there will be hell to pay. If anyone asks why you look like shit, why you smell like shit, or any other questions, you tell them it is house appreciation week and you’re working on a major project. Do we understand each other?”

  “Sir yes sir!” we responded.

  “You will not sleep. You will not eat. If you’re caught doing either I will make you wish you never escaped from your mother’s snatch. To start house appreciation week you’re going to clean the fucking house until it tastes like lemons, smells like daisies, and looks brand-fucking-new.”

  He took a piece of paper from his clipboard with ASSIGNMENTS scribbled on the top and stuck it to the wall with a thumbtack.

  For the rest of the night we cleaned nonstop without a wink of sleep. I swept, mopped, and dusted like a fucking houseboy for seven straight hours. Other guys painted, made repairs to the house, did the actives’ laundry, and cleaned their rooms. They were hounding us in shifts, and I never went more than a few minutes without being verbally harassed.

  “You mop like shit, Prescott. Put your fucking back into it! How can I trust you as a brother if you can’t even properly mop my fucking floor?”

  We were spread out all over the house, but so were they. When one guy got tired of yelling, another replaced him. As the hours passed my mind kicked into autopilot and I lost track of time completely. We weren’t allowed to wear watches, our phones had been taken, and all the clocks in the house had been changed to wildly disagree.

  After I finished mopping the dining room I headed to the kitchen to refill my bucket and heard Turbo talking to Mr. Stevens while he swept.

  “Sir, I have class at eight o’clock. Do you mind if I ask what time it is, sir?”

  “It’s time for you to eat everything in that dustpan,” said Mr. Stevens.

  I stopped and watched as Turbo picked up the dustpan, slowly tilted his head back, and opened his mouth as if he were waiting for Mr. Stevens to tell him he was kidding. Then he poured the dirt, sand, and dust into his pie hole, coughing it back up all over himself.

  “We’ll tell you what time it is when you need to fucking know,” said Mr. Stevens.

  They had completely brainwashed us. We were totally under their control.

  As the sun came up I was raking the volleyball pit for the third time when Mr. Weston came outside in his white bathrobe, holding a cup of coffee.

  “Good morning, boys!” he said, condescending sarcasm dripping from his every word. “Don’t you love waking up to a clean house after a great night’s sleep? It’s seven o’clock, time to gather up in the dining room for a little powwow.”

  Once we were all inside he told us that he would be broadcasting the time every hour on the fifty-minute mark with a megaphone to make sure we attended class. I had history at 9 a.m. and spent the rest of the morning passing time with mundane task after mundane task, waiting for the 8:50 announcement.

  When it finally came I ran down to the basement, grabbed my backpack, and headed out into the real world. Other students eyed me curiously as I walked through the quad in my grimy off-white shirt and filthy jeans. We were on the same campus, but we were in two totally different worlds, and they had no fucking idea.

  Before entering the lecture hall I stopped in the bathroom, washed my hands, splashed water on my face, and dried myself off with a paper towel. In the mirror I could see tired bags of stress forming under my eyes. I had only survived one night of Hell Week and already looked like a bum who’d been sleeping under a bridge for months.

  During my first class I let the sweet serenity that came with being out of the Alpha house wash over me, but I didn’t hear a single word my professor said. After history I headed to my ten o’clock English class, sat in the back row, and passed out immediately. I woke up when the kid next to me stood to leave, wiped the drool from my face, and shuffled out.

  I power-walked back through the quad. There was no way I was going to be the one to find out the punishment for taking more than ten minutes to return to the house. When I jogged up I saw two guys using push mowers on the lawn, two others wielding weed eaters, and seve
ral others reinforcing the balcony with hammers and nails. Some of the guys who didn’t have morning classes had been working since 1:30 a.m. the night before. None of them so much as lifted an eye to acknowledge my arrival.

  I headed down to the basement, put my backpack in my spot, and checked the posted paper to see what my assignment for the day was. I was to paint the entire second-floor hallway a new coat of white.

  That took around six hours, but I worked relatively undisturbed except for the passing jests of actives headed to and from class. Later that evening Mr. Stevens gathered the entire pledge class in the dining room and began testing us on the pledge handbook. It wasn’t so bad, and I caught myself thinking that maybe tonight would be easy. But night came too soon, and with it, Mr. Weston.

  He stumbled into the dining room with a dip in his bottom lip and a bottle of Jim Beam in his hand, staggered into the wall, knocking off an old paddle, and spit out a string of curses.

  “God damn it bullshit fucking pledges!”

  He picked up the paddle, squinted and swayed while he extended his arm, pointing the wooden weapon at the thirty-nine of us sitting cross-legged on the dining room floor.

  “Basement!” he yelled. “BASEMENT!”

  I had never seen him so enraged, or so obviously shitfaced. Mr. Stevens shut the pledge handbook as we scrambled to our feet and sprinted out down the hall.

  We were lined up in the dark for five minutes before Mr. Weston finally rammed through the basement door and slammed it shut behind him. I could barely make out his shadowy figure against the light coming through the crack at the bottom of the doorway as he walked slowly down the stairs, either taking his time to torture us or making sure he didn’t fall. I lost sight of him when he blended in with the darkness, but I could hear his heavy, angry breathing as he paced back and forth in front of us without a word. For several minutes we stood in silence, wondering what we’d done, what our punishment would be, and what was coming next.