Page 223 of Burn Bright
It actually startles Tom. To where Beckett busts out laughing, and Charlie has a rare smile. Eliot ruffles Tom’s shaggy golden-brown hair in brotherly affection, then touches the back of my head with the same sentiment, and I hang on to this effervescence filling my lungs. I don’t want to lose this. I don’t want to lose any of them. Not even Charlie.
Maybe I never have to.
51
BEN COBALT
The frat house is trashed from the all-day football tailgate that’s switched into a drunken afterparty. Remixed hits blast through the first floor. Sloppy hands glide down my shoulders in greeting as I weave through the college students and step on so muchtrash.
Beer cans, Solo cups, empty liquor bottles, pizza boxes, paper plates, plastic silverware—I almost grab a garbage bag to clean up and separate recyclables from waste. No way will they go through the effort.
I had to personally buy a recycle bin for the frat house because “it’s not in the budget”—which I understand, but barely anyone uses it. Most treat it like it’s just a second trash can.
If I go through initiation, maybe I can gradually change their habits. Maybe I can have a better, greater impact, and honestly, the thought makes me second-guess if I’m choosing the right path. If I’m doing good by de-pledging, or if I’d do better by remaining here.
The vein in my temple is throbbing as I overcomplicated this.In and out.I need to get in and out. My brothers are waiting in anoticeably expensive SUV, and I’m hoping no drunk idiot bangs on their tinted windows to figure out who’s inside.
In and out.
“Ben, man, buddy, you gotta see this!”
“Later, Reggie!” I call out to one of the Kappa brothers.
“Hey, Ben!”
“Ben!”
“Ben!”
I politely bow out of the interactions and ask around for Leif. Getting conflicting answers.
“I think I saw him upstairs.”
“He’s been in the backyard.”
“Basement, I heard, bro.”
I’m about to cycle through each spot when I run into a freshman pledge in the kitchen. Iggy mops up what looks like piss all over the sink with a sponge. Thank fuck Beckett isn’t in here. I should also be a grunt-working pledge, but they’ve treated me more like a trophy they don’t want scratched.
“Hey, Ben,” he up-nods.
I nod back, about to pass him into the backyard just as he asks, “You see your sister yet?”
I freeze to solid ice. “What?”
“Your little sister.” He drops the sponge on the counter. “She’s been here for at least fifteen minutes.”
I can’t process fast enough. “Audrey Cobalt? At this frat house?”
“Red hair. Blue eyes. I think she said she was surprising you.”
I’m instantly starved of oxygen. This can’t be real.While I take out my phone, I glance up at the ceiling. Toward the second floor where the bedrooms are, then I think,they’re fucking with me.This is a sick joke.
I send Audrey a text.
Ben Cobalt
Are you at the KPD house?
