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“You crazy?” Vysell answered. “I got no insurance.”

“What if the faggot leaves?” Batman asked straight-faced. “Am I supposed to kill him?”

“Let him go. Anywhere, except back to the pier.”

“How am I going to do that? We got to be at the house most of the time.”

“Buy him a plane ticket to somewhere that won't return until Monday,” Vysell suggested eagerly.

“Maybe.”

“Yeah, well, no matter what,” he said stubbornly, “I'm not crashing my car into anything.”

_____

The morning sunlight pierced my eyeballs, waking me up in the car with a jolt.

“Wake up!” I yelled at the other two. “What time is it anyway?”

“Almost 11:15,” Batman mumbled, squinting at his watch.

Shit! I opened the passenger door, quickly getting out. “Let's check them again. Maybe with a little luck they both died of alcohol poisoning.”

A fast check of their big, metal shoebox showed that Gussie and her houseguest-with-a-dick were gone!

“Back to the pier!” I yelled, darting for Vysell's car.

My cell phone rang a minute later. It was Gussie.

“Last chance, sonny boy,” she purred, sounding sober as hell. “Your friend, the PO who got beat up, and another guy was here already. Told them to come back in an hour. You going to pay the fifteen hundred first?”

This cunt knew I had no choice. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“Better be here before they get back.”

“On my way now.

_____

After paying Gussie, we stopped for coffee at Starbucks on Washington and Pacific. It was nearly noon.

While sipping his latte, Batman snapped his fingers. “Jesus, almost forgot. Our final grades, the official ones, come out today.”

“What time does the mail get there?” I asked, knowing my letter-of-execution will finally end this nightmare.

“Around one,” he answered, as I thought of my week-long fantasy: blowing- up the fucking post office.

12:45
P.M.

S
INCE BOOKIE TOOK GAMBLING BETS FROM GUYS
in all the fraternity houses: the Betas, Sigma Chi, SAE, KA, Sammies, and Sigma Nu, everybody heard about his stupid twenty thousand dollar bet and wanted to see, in person, who won. Most of the guys probably rooted for anybody against Bookie since he usually won most bets. Within the next half hour, the anxious crowd numbered at least a hundred.

Grossberg walked over to me. “Don't want to know how, but did you take care of what we talked about last night?”

“Yeah. Again, thanks a lot.”

“But now I got some bad news for you.”

“What now?”

“As
The Jewish Connection
,” he said sarcastically, “I spoke to Hasse and Brimmer about not blackballing you.”

“Yeah? So?”

“Brimmer still hates you. And Hasse isn't crazy about you either.”

“Hasse? I saved that ungrateful son-of-a-bitch from getting kicked out of school.”

“He mentioned that. But he says that if you're an active, you'll probably do something next semester to get the entire
fraternity kicked out of school and he still won't graduate.”

“That bastard.”

“Anyway,” he said quickly, “it's pretty unlikely that you'll get a 2.0 so the whole thing's academic.”

“Look. I really appreciate last night's tip-off. But this is something altogether different.”

“What do you mean?”

I flunked out of charm school in kindergarten. My voice got hard. “We got a deal, remember? If I win, you keep the money. But you'd better deliver your end.” I turned around and walked away toward Vysell and Batman who, like most of the other guys there, were standing around drinking beer hidden in paper bags.

From time to time I spotted Stovepipe's still-injured, puffy-lipped face staring daggers at me. A couple of times his fingers traced a noose around his neck before he yanked the imaginary rope upward toward the sky. Then he pointed a finger at me. He snickered back when I blew him a kiss each time.

Finally the mailman lady turned the corner of the cul-desac, wheeling the brown mailbag containing its lethal message for me toward the house despite my silent prayer that she'd step on a land mine and blow up her cargo.

Bookie tried to clear a path for the hefty woman. “Make way!” he yelled. “Make way, or she'll go postal!”

The crowd parted like the Red Sea as the nervous woman pushed the silver tripod onward toward the front steps, finally stopping in front of Bookie.

“What's going on here?” she asked.

“Waiting for an important letter.”

She looked around at the mob and laughed. “Must be damn important.”

Bookie flashed a weak smile. Always a big shot, he actually looked a little nervous. Maybe he realized that putting up twenty grand just to win two hundred was a stupid bet. Especially after he saw me manipulate so many people already.

“Give me all the mail, please,” he asked.

“Fine with me.”

The muscular lady reached into the bag and pulled out two large stacks of mail, each circled with a rubber band. She handed everything to Bookie.

“Make way!' somebody shouted. The woman turned around and wheeled her remaining cargo through the parted mob and out of sight.

Bookie stood on the top step, looking down at us like an actor on the stage starring in a one-person performance. Naturally I was standing at the front of the crowd along with Grossberg and Vysell and Batman, only a few feet away from Bookie. Immediately, he started shuffling through the envelopes, no doubt searching for my grade transcript. He was silent and seemed to be more nervous as he leafed through each of the envelopes.

From the second pile he pulled out a white envelope. He held it up. “Easiest two hundred I ever made!” he screamed triumphantly.

My heart was thumping loud and fast. Here it was. Now or never. The whole fucking semester's climax. In Bookie's grubby hand. I started feeling sorry that I even started pledging. I knew right then, the Marines couldn't be worse. Even if I got sent to Iraq I'd find some way to scam everybody there. On either side.

Bookie was still holding the envelope in the air. “I'm going to open it now,” he said dramatically, like he was announcing the winner of the Academy Award for best picture.

Taking as much time as he could for the full theatrical effect, he ripped the short side of the envelope open, letting the thin edge of paper slowly drift downward onto the steps. He pushed up his shirt-sleeves to his bony elbows. Then held the left edge of the envelope in his left hand and with his right hand slowly slid out the white piece of paper, folded in thirds. He straightened it and his eyes quickly scanned the document.

“What the hell's this?” he blurted out, looking down at me. In one quick motion, he wadded the paper into a ball and threw it at me.

I bent down and picked up the squished paper ball next to
my right shoe.

“What is it?” a bunch of people demanded.

I hurriedly flattened out the paper and read it. I DECIDED NOT TO BUY YOUR WATCH. PICK IT UP AT MY OFFICE. PROFESSOR CHESTERFIELD.

FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! That cocksucker wouldn't take the bribe! He was giving me an F! I was out of here!

Grossberg grabbed the paper from me. “What is it? Your face is white.” He read the letter. “So what's the big deal?”

All enthusiasm for anything to do with this fraternity or even the school finally drained out of me. I didn't answer him. Instead I turned around and walked to the back of the crowd burying myself between strangers. Better to hear my death sentence from a distance.

“Where's Stafford's grades?” Grossberg yelled out.

“I'm looking, I'm looking,” Bookie snapped impatiently, quickly rifling through the letters again. Half a minute later his shit-ass smile returned. “Got it.”

Somehow Lyman and me locked eyeballs. He smiled, then waived the fingertips on his right hand gesturing good-bye.

With the same melodrama as before, Bookie peeled down the side of the envelope and removed the transcript with his right hand. He let the envelope drop. Slowly he straightened out the paper that was also folded in thirds.

He looked at the audience. “Grades for Kurt Stafford!” he called out loudly with renewed fanfare. Then he looked down and slowly started reading them off: “Sociology, D. English, D. Economics, C. Man & Civilization, A?”

“A 2.0! You lose asshole!” some guy screamed from the middle of the crowd that suddenly erupted with laughter.

I couldn't fucking believe it! An A and a C equals two B's. And two B's and two D's equals four C's. It was a 2.0 average!

After a split-second of silence, Bookie's eyes opened extra-wide and his mouth stayed open like a shell-shocked victim. He read the transcript again. “This is bullshit!” he screamed in a cracked, uneven voice. “Stafford faked it!”

Christianson, with a big smile, pushed through the crowd
and walked up to Bookie. “Let me see it,” he said, grabbing the paper from Bookie's quivering hand. Half a minute later he said, “Looks official to me.” He turned it over. “School seal's imprinted on the back side. Transcript's real. Bookie, you lose.”

Adams squeezed his way over to Bookie and took the rest of the mail. “Pledges,” he yelled, “in the house, and I'll give your grades.”

Christianson grabbed Grossberg's arm. “Come get your money. I don't want to hold it any more.”

Bookie rudely shoved through the crowed, ramming people aside like a blocking fullback until he stood right in front of me, his gut less than an inch away from mine. His face was still red with anger. With his sour-smelling breath he screamed, “You son-of-a-bitch! My personal mission is getting you out of the fraternity!”

“You agreed not to blackball me if I won the bet,” I calmly reminded him.

“This has nothing to do with the bet. I'm getting you out for having faggot sex!”

I smiled. “But you've got to prove it.”

He answered smugly, “We'll all see him tonight.”

_____

Once inside the house, Grossberg was totally in shock, quickly stuffing the ten grand into the front two pockets of his jeans. He shrugged his shoulders. “I don't know what to say.”

“Deliver.”

About fifteen minutes later every pledge was notified that they had passing grades.

Still smiling, Christianson gave Vysell Bookie's IOU for all the electronic shit in Bookie's apartment.

Bookie was waiting for us on the porch. “On Monday when I get the cash and repay you for my home theatre, you guys will be strangers here; neither actives or pledges.” He turned away and snapped over his right shoulder, “Meanwhile I'm going to Kinko's.” Then he flashed a crooked smile. “Be at the pier in half an hour. You'll see why.”

_____

Around an hour later me and most of the fraternity were wandering around the pier again, staring at about a hundred large posters, each with Jody's color picture, stating Bookie's thousand dollar offer for information locating Jody within 24 hours, complete with Bookie's cell phone number.

_____

4:00
P.M.

Rainey walked into Jerry's Famous Deli in the Marina and joined me and Batman and Vysell in a large, semi-circular booth in front of one of the TVs showing a basketball pre-game show. We were nearly finished with our pastrami sandwiches and third Heineken.

“Grossberg said you guys were here,” Rainey explained, taking a menu from the middle-aged, obese waiter who lisped worse than Elmer Fudd. Rainey looked directly at me. “Stafford, you got a major problem.”

“What's it now?” I asked weakly, doubtful that things could get any worse.

Since I was never particularly good friends with this guy, my antenna for trouble started beeping loudly.

“I'm only here because of what Batman and Vysell said you did for them last night on the pier with the photos. Pretty impressive. You didn't have to do it. In fact if they hadn't personally told me how you saved their asses with those pictures, I wouldn't have believed it.”

“Why?”

“Because your reputation with the pledge class is lower than whale shit on the bottom of the ocean.”

I was really surprised. “What do you mean?”

He snickered. “Start with Watson, trying to blame him in jail for supplying liquor to you guys.”

Both Vysell and Batman fidgeted uncomfortably while avoiding my eyes.

“That cop got me wrong.”

Rainey smiled, obviously enjoying my discomfort. In fact, almost everybody seemed to enjoy my discomfort.

“Then Ovary and the letter about his father. You deny that?”

“Hell yeah. I had nothing to do with him quitting.”

“Or Higgins?”

“That crip couldn't take a little kidding, that's all. Besides, I think he was a faggot.”

“Yeah,” he scoffed. “Something's always the matter with everybody else but you.”

I didn't like the way this conversation was going. “So anyway, what's my newest problem?”

“You know this
Survivor
game we're playing tonight, where we vote out one of the pledges?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, Lyman's mounted a pretty strong campaign to get enough pledges to vote you out.”

I was totally taken by surprise. “What're you talking about?”

“Besides himself, he's got Holmes, Dung, Castle, Rickshaw Boy. Five votes for sure. But probably six. Rawlings. If Lyman gets him, that'll finish you off.”

“How do you know?” Batman asked.

“Because Rawlings called me this morning, trying to get me on their side. He told me all about it.”

“But after what you did last night for these two,” Rainey said, “I'm voting on your side.”