Page 40 of The Bro-code

Her smile, the sound of her voice, her mere presence makes me happy.

Of course there’s also her hotness.

The general attraction I would feel for any gorgeous woman, is amplified with her because I care. I live to hear the ring of her laugh, I want to be the one who makes her laugh.

When she’s sad, I’d do anything to make it better. And I’ve offered her a shoulder to cry on when she’s had trouble with Topher this past year.

I thought he didn’t deserve her even before he cheated on her. The fact that he did, does nothing but confirm that Topher Mumford is the biggest idiot that ever walked this campus.

I’m right behind him though because when I was there for her, day after day, I slipped into the fucking friend zone.

It happened almost without realizing it. I kept telling myself that it was for the best. I’m not a relationship kind of guy and if Bay and I had ever crossed the line, I would have found a way to fuck things up. There was also Topher. As long as Bay was with him, I knew my dreams of being with her as more than friends would never come true. Because one of Bay’s best qualities is her loyalty. So I’ve been her friend and I’ve been biding my time. At first I kept hooking up with a string of meaningless women to take my mind off the only one I wanted and couldn’t have. Since last year, even that wasn’t enough. After an embarrassing incident when first I couldn’t perform unless I got drunk and then I called the bunny in my bed “Bay,” I decided to quit while I was ahead.

So in the last twelve months I’ve been pretending that it was business as usual. I would either take a girl to my room and then find an excuse not to go through with the hookup part of the deal—too tired, too drunk, you name it.

Or I would hang out with Bay when, more often than not, Topher was drunk. Either way, I haven’t gotten laid in about a year. I feel like an idiot but before I fell for my best friend all I was looking for was meaningless sex. Now that I caught feelings for the one woman I can’t have? I can’t even bring myself to do it just for the sake of getting off.

Until I get over her, I guess my left hand will be my only source of release.

“Hey Cole,” Jagger and Ryker walk toward me. “Wanna go check out what the other houses are doing? Maybe get a couple of tokens and take back that Olympic Trophy?”

“Sure,” I shrug. “The Eta Psi Pi guys have an arm wrestling challenge we should have no problem winning.”

Jagger slaps me on the back. “We’ll wipe the floor with those guys.”

Tucker joins us with Corey in tow. “The Pi Omicron Sigma have a pie eating contest I’m gonna crush.”

I can’t help but snicker. “How funny, the Pi eating pie. You better hope no one films you bro,” I warn him. “Next week we have the first home game of the season. If Coach catches you stuffing your face with pie, he’s gonna put you on a diet.”

Tucker slaps his washboard stomach. “Do I look like I need to count my calories?”

In all fairness, he doesn’t. We all consume an insane amount of food, we need it because of the strenuous training we endure during the season. But there’s eating and then there’s Tucker. I don’t know how he does it and keeps in the shape he does. The man is a human garbage disposal, there’s no other way to put it.

“Hey brothers,” Topher catches up with us before we leave our front lawn. “Wait up. I want to try a couple of activities too.”

“What about the slip and slide?” Jagger asks. “I thought it was your turn to man it.”

Our president shrugs. “I delegated. Hunter, Paul and Barry will take care of it. The sophomores can pay their dues, I’m up for some fun.”

Topher has been giving me a wide berth since I practically kicked him out of the Zetas’ property last night.

Even now, his eyes skim over me as if I wasn’t even there.

If this is how he wants to play it, it’s fine by me. I’d prefer to break every bone in his body, but last night Bay made me promise that I’m not going to do anything stupid and ruin my future over Topher Mumford.

After an hour, we have a very respectable amount of tokens in our possession.

His ear to ear grin is contagious and I don’t have the heart to tell him that the dunking game wasn’t supposed to feature white t-shirts. But since it’s the Yucks we’re talking about, they all decided to give the school an eyeful every time the ball hit the target and a sister would get dunked.

“So guys,” Corey is looking at his phone. “I’ve got the fair app here and it keeps a tally of how many tokens each house has. We have six but so have the Zetas. We need one more token to win the Olympic trophy.”

Topher’s laugh is more like a bark. “We’ve got that trophy in the fucking bag. We don’t have an election this year, but if we did? You’d have to vote for me. I’m the fucking best president in the history of this fraternity.”

He holds a golden poker chip, showing it to us as if it were the Holy Grail.

“I don’t know this campus that well yet, but I think we’ve been up and down the entire Greek Row. Does any of the houses have a roulette or a craps game?” Ryker asks, confused.

Topher’s smile widens. “Nope. But there’s one house we haven’t visited yet. We haven’t been to Zeta Theta Beta.”

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