by Mark Tufo
“That was fucking close,” Mike laughed.
“Now what?” Paul asked, not sure what was going to happen. All he could think was that Gert might be mildly surprised with the clatter of change and would be seven cents richer for their effort.
“We wait.”
“This seemed funnier when we were talking about what we were going to do.”
“Wait, buddy, it gets better.”
As it turned out, it wasn’t too long of a wait before Gert decided it was time to go to the cafeteria and get some food. At first, there was nothing and then came the struggles of someone beating on their door. If it had been anybody else besides Gert, they would have received a violation. Nearly every door on the floor opened to see who had the balls to make that much noise.
Gert was beating on his door with closed fists, swearing in his native tongue of German.
“I always wondered how to say that,” said a pretty, little brunette named Debbie, who Paul remembered was taking German as her language of choice. “Interesting.”
“Someone needs to call the Fire Department! I am locked in my room!”
“He can’t get out?” Paul asked, turning back to a laughing Mike.
“No man! The pennies wedge the lock up against the slide; he can’t even turn the handle.”
“That’s brilliant, man.”
The ranting, cussing and general screams of fear continued for a full two minutes longer until a junior who had seen the prank before recognized it for what it was. He told Gert to move from the door. He then pressed against the corner of the door, and the pennies fell to the floor.
“What the hell is going on!?” Gert screamed as he came through the door.
Most of the meek freshman retreated back into their rooms.
“Was this you?” Gert asked the junior who had helped.
“Screw you, man, I just helped you. I should have left you in there.” And then he walked away.
The hallway was clear, save a few students, who decided this might be a good time to go get some food. Gert honed in on Paul and Mike like an eagle to a mouse.
Mike quickly pulled Paul in and shut the door.
“Do you think he knows?” Paul asked, smiling.
“I’m sure we’re on a short list.”
“Kind of like Spindler?” He was the boys’ old high school principal, who followed them around relentlessly, at least, until his car mysteriously burst into flames.
“Kind of like that, but by the time we’re done, we’ll make all that look like child’s play.”
For two weeks, Mike and Paul had harassed Gert to no end. On a particularly eventful evening, Paul gained illegal entry into Gert’s dorm room via a credit card and some precision maneuvering. Paul had hooked up Gert’s Bose stereo system to a timer set to go off in the wee hours of the morning. At precisely three-thirty-eight am on the morning of Tuesday the eleventh of October, “Runnin’ with the Devil” by Van Halen ripped through the night like a fire truck through a sleepy village.
“Fitting song,” Mike told Paul as they sat at their doorway. They were careful to only open their door when they heard the rest of the floor doing the same.
The music and Gert’s resultant cursing had been heard on the floor below and above. Despite Gert’s protestations, he had received his first written warning since he had started school four years previous.
“How much more of this do you think he can take?” Paul asked Mike after they had seen a hangdog expression on Gert as he exited the student lounge.
“I guess we’ll see,” Mike had answered. “The good thing is he’s been too paranoid to write anybody up.”
“He doesn’t look like he’s slept in days,” Paul said. “I’d almost feel bad if he wasn’t such a prick.”
“If who wasn’t such a dick?” Debbie asked. She was working the counter at the snack shop.
Mike looked up guiltily. “What did you hear?”
“That Gert’s a dick,” she said, flashing a smile.
Mike and Paul quickly rewound through their conversation trying to see how much they had given away.
“We never said Gert,” Paul said. Mike was inclined to believe him, but they had just shared a particularly large joint and Mike wasn’t entirely too sure what they had said. He had been so fixated on the large, frosted, chocolate chip brownie, he hadn’t even noticed Debbie working the counter.
“I saw you working on Gert’s door two days ago,” she said to Paul.
“Shit,” Paul answered her. “But that was two days ago, if you knew, and we’re still at school.”
“Relax! I can’t stand him either. He asked me on a date on the first day of school and when I told him no, he wrote me up the next day for having a candle in my room. Didn’t matter to him that it wasn’t even lit.” Debbie handed Mike two brownies.
“I don’t have enough for two,” Mike told her, brushing the dust off his wallet.
“They’re on me,” she said, flashing another smile.
“Sweet, thanks,” Mike told her, doing his best to smile back, but the munchies had taken a serious hold on his social skills and all he could do was concentrate on the treat.
“What do you want?” Paul asked cautiously.
“Nothing much,” Debbie answered coquettishly.
“Huh?” Mike asked, looking up, half a brownie in his mouth, chocolate on his cheek.
“You don’t get out much,” Debbie said, smiling. She wiped his cheek with a wet towel she had behind the counter.
“She wants in,” Paul said.
“In what?” Mike asked.
“Dude, get your face out of the brownie.”
“Sorry, man, I’m pretty hungry.”
“We just had dinner.”
“Yeah, but that was before.”
“Before what?” Debbie asked.
“Ah nothing,” Paul told her evasively. “Mike, Debbie here thinks we are up to something with Gert.”
“No,” Mike said, looking around. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I don’t want to play hardball, but I saw Paul trying to get into Gert’s room the night we all listened to a very loud rendition of ‘Running with the Devil’.”
“It’s ‘runnin’,” Mike corrected her.
“So you know what I’m talking about?” Debbie asked him.
“All I said was that it is a common misconception that the title is ‘Running’ when there is actually no ‘g’.”
“It’s your word against ours,” Paul told her.
“Do you think Gert’s going to need much more than that to get you two kicked out?”
Mike was busy finishing off his second brownie when Paul agreed to let Debbie in on the next prank.
“When?” Debbie asked, joining them at a small table tucked away in the shadows of the small shop.
Mike could not get over the feeling that they were spies in German occupied France during WWII as they discussed their plan. Some was due to the subject matter they were studying, but a larger portion revolved around the magic bud they had enjoyed fifteen minutes ago.
“We have to lay low for a couple of days. He’s so high-strung right now that whenever someone’s door opens, he yanks his open. It’s pretty friggin’ funny,” Mike said, having a hard time not snorting.
“He scared the shit out me the other morning,” Paul said. “I was going down to take a shower, I don’t even know how he heard me, but I was right next to his door when he jumped out and told me he ‘Got me.’ Dropped my shampoo and everything. I know he’s close to losing it because he actually apologized.”
“Don’t you feel bad?” Deb asked us.
“A little, but it’s him or us, and I’d rather it was him,” Mike said, and Paul nodded. “I don’t want him to go all Hara Kari on himself or Texas library roof., I just want him to relinquish his job as dorm douche. Oops! Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Deb laughed. “Both of my parents were in the Navy.”
They h
ad left it at that point and promised to reconvene their clandestine meeting two days hence. Either that was too long or Deb was too amped up, but she decided to take matters into her own hands.
“What’s going on?” Paul asked Deb as he came up to the dorm room after his Sociology class.
The entire population of the dorm occupants were milling around outside.
“Hey, buddy,” Mike said, tossing a football in the air. “I was sleeping, and someone pulled the damn fire alarm.”
“Didn’t you have English Lit?” Paul asked.
“Was that today?” Mike asked, throwing the ball back up in the air.
“I know it was you!” A soaking wet, towel-clad Gert yelled at Mike as he dropped the ball from the distraction. “I can’t prove it, but I will. You super-glued my lock and I couldn’t get in after my shower!”
“Whoa! Hold on there, boss! I didn’t even think you European types showered,” Mike said.
“You think this is funny? You freshman turd! I’m freezing my ass off in a towel.”
“I actually think it’s hilarious, but I still don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, Jert,” Mike said.
“It is Gert, Gert Hans. And I promise you that I will have you and your roommate thrown out of this school.”
“Listen, Hansel, I was sleeping. I was having this weird-ass dream about huge Pop-Tarts. I have no idea why you are out here soaking wet and in a towel. And why do you not have flip-flops on? Oh, please don’t tell me that you go into a public shower without footwear? That is just disgusting. That’s how people get foot fungus. Man, you’ve been in school long enough! Haven’t you learned anything?”
Gert was so sure that he had nailed Mike, that he was completely put off by Mike going on the offensive.
“I know you did it,” he said weakly. “I know you did everything.”
“I’m a little sick of your accusations. You’ve written us up five times for puissant violations and now our academic careers hang in the balance because you’re a control freak. My roomie and I have walked the straight and narrow for almost three weeks. I was hoping for some congratulations, but instead, you accuse us of even more trouble-making. I’m sure the list of folks who loathe you is a relatively long one. Maybe you should go back and rethink who else would do this to you.”
Gert stood there, anger flaring, his skin tone changing hues, from blistering blue to raging red. Paul was certain Gert was about to go ballistic.
“Um,” Debbie interjected into the testosterone fray.
“What?!” Gert spat.
“Umm, you’ve got a little something hanging out,” she said, pointing down.
Gert was so lost in his anger, he did not know what she was talking about.
Mike looked down and then made his pinkie finger fold and unfold. “The lady said you have a little something showing,” Mike laughed.
Paul almost went to his knees, tears running from his eyes as Gert’s red rage turned to a fevered flush when he realized he had just exposed himself to a girl.
“You know, I’d say you could get in a lot of trouble for that if we had actually been able to see anything,” Mike yelled to Gert’s retreating back.
“What did you do?” Paul asked Mike.
“Dude, I’m serious. I was snoozing hard,” Mike answered his friend.
Paul turned to Deb who was now wearing a wicked smile. “What did you do?”
“Pretty much everything he said Mike did. I waited until I saw him head for the shower, then I went and shoved half a tube of super glue into his door lock. Then I waited until I was pretty sure he had just lathered up his head in shampoo, then I pulled the fire alarm.”
“That’s kind of risky; what if someone had seen you?” Mike asked her.
“I went to the third floor lounge and did it. No one ever goes there unless it’s to study and nobody does that at three on a Friday afternoon.”
“I thought we agreed to wait a couple of days?” Paul asked her.
“I did, but I changed my mind.”
“Nice.” Mike said, shaking his head in disbelief. “He looks like he’s about to cry.”
Gert was over by the fire truck, yelling at whoever would listen that someone had pulled the alarm on purpose and that they just wanted him to come out into the cold weather in merely a towel. The fireman was hardly even acknowledging his existence as he checked on the truck equipment.
“I need to get back inside before I catch pneumonia!” Gert was screaming now.
“Listen, kid,” the fire captain was saying. “We’ll let everyone including you in when we are convinced it’s not a real alarm.”
“I’m telling you it was not. It was pulled specifically while I was in the shower so that I would have to come out here like this. I even tried to go back to my room, but I could not get back in.”
“Dankins,” the chief yelled over to one of his subordinates. “Could you please get this kid a jacket and shut him up? I’ve got better things to do than play baby sitter with him.” And he walked away.
Gert looked like a war refugee, all wrapped up in an oversized fireman jacket, huddled up on the stoop of the truck. Paul and Mike didn’t know if Gert’s winning charm had won the captain over, but it seemed to them to be one of the longest fire alarm resets that they had ever been through.
“Man, he is never going to take a shower again,” Paul said, as the three of them sat in Debbie’s dorm room.
“I wasn’t kidding when I called him on the whole taking a shower thing anyway,” Mike said. “He always smells like ripe sauerkraut.”
“That’s so gross,” Deb said, holding her nose.
“Great prank by the way,” Mike told her, and she blushed slightly.
“Thank you,” she said, doing a small curtsy, that did not go unnoticed by Gert.
He did not know for what reason she had performed the small bow, but that she was flaunting her body to those two good-for-nothings infuriated him.
The trio laid off Gert for close to two weeks. The guy was wound so tight, he wouldn’t even go out anymore to get food. He had delivery come two weeks straight.
“I don’t think he’s even been to class,” Paul said to Mike as they watched the Chinese food deliveryman leave the building.
“Was that for Gert?” Deb asked, catching up to the two boys and pointing back towards the driver who had gotten in his car and was getting ready to leave.
“Yeah, that’s the third order of Chinese this week,” Mike said.
“I almost feel kind of sorry for him,” Deb said.
“You should. You’re the one that gave him the flu,” Paul said.
“He should have gotten a shot like the rest of us,” Mike said, absently rubbing his arm where the vaccine had been administered a month prior.
“Are you going to keep messing with him?” Deb asked.
“Hey, you’re the one that brought it to a whole new level,” Mike told her.
“Maybe we should stop, maybe he’s finally figured out that he can’t just do whatever he wants around here because he has a clipboard,” Paul said.
“That’s two warnings!” They could hear Gert yelling from the hallway. “One for keeping an excess of garbage in your room and the other for not making your bed!”
“Not making your bed? What the hell is he talking about?” Paul said as the three went over to the door and looked out.
Residents up and down the hallway were looking to the fuss, Gert was walking into rooms and going ballistic, writing students up for infractions that he seemed to be making up as he wrote.
Most students got the message and began to close their doors, hoping to escape the wrath of Gert Gone Mad. Paul was one of them.
“Leave it open,” Mike said.
“What are you doing, Mike? Look at him; he’ll write you up for your shirt,” Paul nearly whined.
“What’s wrong with Ozzy Osbourne?” Mike asked.
“Fine. I’m going to start packing my things.”
&n
bsp; Gert was making a beeline for the only door still open. Mike stepped in his way just as Gert was about to enter.
“Whoa there, pardner,” Mike said with a Southern drawl. “Where you going in such a hurry?”
“Mandatory room inspection!” Gert was nearly frothing at the mouth, his pen was already making contact with the clipboard.
“On whose authority, Gert?” Mike asked him.
“What?! You dare to stop me!? On my own damn authority!” Gert raged, and then made a motion to push past Mike.
“Listen, asshole,” Mike said, pushing Gert across the hallway to the far wall. “I’m going to say this real soft so that you can’t subpoena any witnesses, so pay attention.” Mike got right up to his ear. “You ever try to enter my room without my permission, I will beat you to within 2.58 centimeters of your worthless existence.”
The rage in Gert’s eyes cleared for a moment as he looked into Mike’s eyes, trying to ascertain if this were an idle threat and whether he should continue with his mission as planned.
The tension in Gert’s bunched muscles eased as he realized this might not be the best time to make his last stand.
“This isn’t done, Talbot, all I need is one more infraction and you and your halfwit friend are out of here. And I’ve got a feeling that neither of you idiots will make it another week.”
Mike released Gert from his grip and left him to weasel away to another unsuspecting victim.
“What happened?” Paul asked, pulling Mike in the room and closing the door.
“We’ve got to keep pressing his buttons,” Mike said. “One of us is close to leaving and we need to make sure it’s him. That dude is a whole suit short of a standard deck.”
“Looks like all you get when you stretch an asshole to its limits is just a bigger asshole,” Deb said.
Mike stopped what he was thinking about, he looked over at Deb before he busted out laughing.
“What?” Debbie said, blushing, not sure exactly what she said to elicit such a response.
Paul had joined in with Mike and once tears started to flow, Deb joined in, not even sure what for.
It was the seemingly least innocuous prank that finally pushed Gert to his limit and the trio had nothing to do with it. The local chapter of Iota Gamma Upsilon sorority (or more commonly known by the call letters of their house as I Go Upstairs, a reference that many had found to be a truism much to the delight of all the party goers) saw to that. As an initiation right to their pledges, they had given each one a giant container of Vaseline and told them to use it around campus in any manner they saw fitting, but to not come back until the tub was empty.
