Page 19 of Puck Shots
“There’s not really any foolproof tricks, but once you get the hang of it, you’ll give him a run for his money.”
“That would be awesome. He’d probably be thrown off his game just by seeing me know what I was doing. Pledges don’t compete, because they are the ones running everything, like being the bank in Monopoly and that. You’ll see. It’s still fun. I did it last year. It can get pretty full on. If you haven’t noticed, most of the guys in here can get pretty competitive.”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed.” I chuckle, and he smiles that wide smile that sends a flurry through my stomach.
“Okay, so tomorrow, my room, you bring the board.”
“Sounds good to me. Oh, when I play Sam, should I be playing to win or going easy on him for brownie points?”
“You’re asking a jock if you should play to win? Always.” He laughs and I slip the fully peeled label into my pocket, and turn my attention back to lining up the last of the chairs in the great room. Five rows of nine, all set perfectly centered on the mantle where the Pres’s lacrosse stick lives when he’s not playing or training, only it looks a little different. I walk through a couple of rows and have to laugh when I see the tiny fake plastic butterflies scattered in the net.
“Was this you?” I ask, looking over at Cosmo who’s still lingering in the room talking with Gareth. He weaves through the chairs to join me.
“I have no idea what you’re… ohh, aren’t they pretty. Looks like Leo finally caught something with this thing.”
I shake my head.
“You know I can’t leave them there now that I’ve seen them,” I say, and he scoffs.
“Sure, you can. Besides, think of how funny it will be when he picks it up during his speech tonight and those things fall out.”
Tonight, we’ve got our first round of trivia where they’ll randomly quiz the pledges on house history, rules, and thebrothers. The rules and history I’m good with, but I’ve only been able to get to know a handful of the brothers so far.
“What’s wrong? I mean, if you’re that worried about them, we can take them out,” Cosmo says, reaching for the net.
“No, it’s not that. I was just thinking about tonight and the questions about the brothers.”
“You’ve been getting to know a few of them, though, right?”
“Yeah, but probably not as much as the other guys. I don’t suppose there is, like, a book of facts on them I could study up on?”
“Not a book, no. But I could go over a few fun facts on each of them if you want.”
“Thanks, but you’ve probably got better things to do with your time.”
He shrugs. “Not really. We had morning training, and my classes are done for the day, so I’m all yours.”
I feel my cheeks start to burn, and I guzzle down the water in hopes it will quench more than my thirst.
“Umm, sure then, okay,” I say. “That would be great. Do you want to do it here or…”
He shakes his head. “Let’s head to my room. Yo, Gareth, you done with this one? My bathroom needs cleaning.”
“We’re done,” Gareth replies, and I follow Cosmo up the stairs to the attic, where he shares a room with Luka, his best friend. I managed to figure that out from just observing them on the first day. They’re always together, well, almost always. They’ll rush to sit beside each other at dinner, are always finding each other in the house at events, and take almost all the same classes, not to mention they’re both on the hockey team, too. I’d kill to have someone I could connect with like that.
We get to his room, and he goes straight for a small bookcase on Luka’s side.
“He won’t mind if we borrow this,” he says, pulling out a photo where it sat on the bottom shelf.
“Okay, not everyone is in this pic, but we’ll start here and then move on to the rest.”
I take the photo and smile at the sight. It’s got about fifteen of the guys standing with their arms around each other’s shoulders, bunched together in a group in front of a giant inflatable bounce house. They’re covered in something shiny, and bubbles cling to them in places.
“That was last year’s summer fundraiser. Each house had a different challenge, and we spent the day moving between them trying to win ribbons like those,” he says, pointing to the red, blue, and green ones around his neck in the photo.
“Looks like you had fun.”
“It was amazing. Once you’re one of the brothers, they stop bossing you around, and you get to join the fun.”
