Almost Perfect (23 page)

“Hey, Laura!”

“Hi, Mike!”

And then they were kissing. I think Laura only meant to give him a hello kiss, but Mike smashed his face into hers, making growling noises and grabbing her butt. I wasn’t aware I was lunging at him until Sage grabbed my arm.

Laura pulled away with a laugh. “Mike, this is Sage, and my brother, Logan.”

Mike’s smile froze, then shattered. He stared at me with raw panic, then extended his hand.

“Pleased to meet you, Logan.”

We shook. I tried to play the hand-crushing game, but he quickly yielded.

Laura didn’t realize I was about to throw down with this guy. “C’mon, Sage, there’s some people I want you to meet. Mike, why don’t you get Logan a drink and introduce him around.”

Laura took Sage by the hand and pulled her toward a group of laughing girls. She glanced at me over her shoulder, but I had something else to do at the moment. Mike and I stared at each other for a couple of seconds. I did not smile.

“So, Logan. You’re coming here next year?”

“Yes.” I folded my arms and leaned toward him, demonstrating that I was the taller one. I fought an impulse to beat my chest.

Mike nodded rapidly. “Nice, nice. Got your housing assignment yet?”

“Yes.”

“Did you ever consider going Greek?”

“No.”

Mike stood there, trying to make eye contact and failing. When someone waved at him from across the room, he took off like a shot. I’d kick his ass later.

It took me a moment to locate Sage through the haze of smoke. She was standing with Laura and two other girls. I couldn’t make out what Sage was saying, but when she bent
and gestured at her shoes, I realized they were speaking Clothes, the universal female language. My friend seemed quite fluent. Since I only spoke conversational Clothes, I decided not to join them.

I was thirsty, and tradition dictated that I have a beer. The keg stood in a large common area, surrounded by a bunch of smokers. I grabbed a cup and tried to fill it, but nothing came out.

“Dude, you gotta pump it. Here.” A skinny guy in a backward cap filled me up.

“Thanks.” I was never much of a drinker and couldn’t identify the brand of almost orange beer in my cup. I chugged it.

“Dude, you with the Deltas?”

“No.”

“Tau Omega?”

I swilled the rest of the beer. “I’m still in high school. I won’t be here till next year.” I waited for him to blow me off.

Frat man emptied his cup, then refilled us both. “You ought to pledge with us next year. Kappa kicks fucking ass!” Around the room, guys raised their cups and whooped in agreement.

Huh. He actually wanted me to join his frat. I felt like much less of a hick.

“I’m Logan.”

“Dalton.” We smacked fists. “So, is that tall chick your girlfriend?”

Down the corridor, I could just make out Sage’s back. She was talking to someone, but I couldn’t tell who.

“She’s just a friend.” I downed my drink.

“Whoa, Logan,” said Dalton. “Take it easy. Beer before liquor, never sicker.”

I filled my cup again but just held it. The two beers I’d slammed suddenly hit me, and I felt less steady. I made my way back to the main room.

Whoever was in charge of the sound system must have been worried that people in Omaha couldn’t hear the music. I could feel the sonic waves echoing off my lungs. I couldn’t locate Sage in the hazy crowd, and she was not usually hard to pick out of a group.

Laura emerged from the shadows, grabbing my arm. “Hey, Logan!” she hollered.

“Have you seen Sage?”

She either didn’t hear or was ignoring the question. “Come over here. I want you to meet someone.”

She dragged me over to a couch held together with plywood and duct tape. A couple of girls sat there sipping mixed drinks. Laura propelled me to an empty cushion.

My sister leaned toward the nearest girl, one of the few female guests in jeans and a T-shirt. “Erin, this is my brother, Logan. Logan, Erin.”

Erin was short, even sitting down. Her brown hair was long and almost impossibly straight. She had such dark eyes that I couldn’t see her pupils. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, though that accentuated her naturally pretty face.

“Hi, Erin.”

Laura took a drink from someone else’s cup. “Logan’s
coming here next year. He’s quite the track star. I’ll be right back.”

Erin scooted toward me, I guess so I could hear her over the noise. “Laura’s told me a lot about you.”

Normally, your sister is the last person you want to describe you, but this whole situation had setup written all over it. I glanced around, but still couldn’t locate Sage. What the heck, she could take care of herself for a few minutes.

“So, Erin, are you a freshman?”

Erin, I learned from our screaming yet intimate conversation, was a psychology major from the Kansas City suburbs. She knew Laura from work. She didn’t usually go to frat parties, but my sister had asked her to come.

I popped open a beer from a cooler near the couch. It must have been about eighty degrees in the building. Erin’s hair was damp with sweat. Over the next six-pack, we exchanged bellowed life stories as the Greeks around us danced, smoked, and made out.

When the stereo began pounding out “Y.M.C.A.,” the crowd joined in, slurring the chorus and doing the dance. Conversation was impossible. Erin, whose face grew cuter with every beer, smiled shyly at me. Someone collapsed at the other end of the sofa, shoving us together. We didn’t attempt to separate.

Just as I was raising my arm to drape over her shoulders, a loud squeal of electronic feedback split the air. I looked up to see a man in a Kappa sweater standing on sort of a dais, talking half into a microphone.

He hollered incoherently for several minutes, but the
audience cheered anyway. Eventually, someone turned down the stereo, cutting off the screech from the speakers.

“… third annual Tex-ASS hold ’em contest!”

The frat boys lifted their drinks and howled like wolves on crack.

“What’s he talking about?” asked Erin. “Poker?”

“Nah,” said a man who was busy holding up a doorway with both arms. “They get chicks to try to hold up cups of beers with their knockers. It’s hilarious.”

By golly, he was right. Already, a girl in a low-cut sweater was supporting a plastic cup, using only what God had given her. The MC poured a bottle of Heineken into the container until it overcame her assets and spilled down her front. She giggled, her face somehow expressing
Oh my gosh, I just spilled beer all over my enormous chest! How wacky!

“C’mon, who’s next?”

Erin had a look of intense distaste on her face. I tried to look equally disgusted as the next two contestants competed shirtless, in just their bras. I noticed a girl who looked suspiciously like Laura walking toward the stage. She glanced in my direction and quickly ducked into the kitchen. I’d pretend I hadn’t seen that.

“Logan, let’s go for a walk.” Erin was standing, trying to take me by the arm.

A walk. Away from this noise and smoke. A stroll through Greek Town in the cool night air, a chance to clear my head. Me and Erin, alone under the streetlights. I got up.

We were almost to the door when I heard a commotion over the many other commotions in the building. Two guys
had grabbed a girl by the arms and were dragging her toward the stage while another one pushed her from behind. She was protesting and trying to twist loose, a look of fear on her face.

It was Sage.

Without a word to Erin, I dashed through the room. My experience with the hurdles paid off; I was at Sage’s side in seconds. I’d been prepared to threaten her kidnappers and fight all three of them if I had to. But right before I reached them, they all let go of Sage and ducked off in different directions. Apparently, I’d looked frightening.

Sage grabbed my wrist with a look of profound thanks. Her makeup was smeared and her hair messy, but she seemed okay. I led her to a quieter part of the house to make sure she really was all right.

“Logan …” Sage suddenly stopped, and I realized we were not alone. Erin had followed me. She seemed unsure if I was a hero who’d rescued a woman in distress or a jerk who was ditching her for someone else.

Luckily, my awkward explanation was cut off by the appearance of Dalton. He was now wearing a giant foam
#1
hand on his head. The stench of alcohol in the air informed me that he had forgotten his
beer before liquor
advice.

“Logan!” he sang, and embraced me. Booze had turned me from a complete stranger into his brother. He hugged me to the point of awkwardness, then jerked away.

“C’mon, we need more players.” He gesticulated wildly to another room. Sage immediately followed. With an apologetic look to Erin, I followed Sage. Erin walked after me. I could feel her angry stare at the back of my neck.

We arrived in some sort of a dining area, where six other people sat around a table (seven, if you count the guy facedown in the onion dip). Various bottles covered the tabletop.

The four of us took our seats. The girl at the head of the table began reading from a pile of cards.

“Player number three, pass an ice cube to another player, using only your lips.”

Another participant slurped a cube from his glass and popped it into the mouth of the girl sitting on his lap.

Ah, a drunken party game. There was a board and spinner, but I think everyone was beyond such details.

“Player number four, chug your drink while humming ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’”

My brain felt like it had been massaged with Elmer’s glue. I found a mostly full bottle of cola and poured drinks for myself and the two girls. Being a gentleman, I took the cup with the cigarette ashes.

We’d sit here for a few rounds. A nice, silly game, and a safe place to leave Sage when Erin and I took our walk. Erin, in fact, didn’t look like she was enjoying herself at all, so we’d have to go fairly soon.

“Player number five, kiss another player on the lips.”

I turned to see who would be doing the kissing. Just to the left of the guy who’d drunk to the national anthem sat … Sage.

Everyone was staring at her. She didn’t look panicked, but she didn’t look comfortable, either. Several guys at the table were trying to catch her eye.

Sage smiled a naughty smile and kissed me rapidly on
the cheek. As the game master picked up another card, Dalton objected.

“On the lips. C’mon!”

In order to avoid further argument and humiliation, I leaned in to give a quick kiss to the air in front of her face, figuring no one would know the difference. Sage zigged when she should have zagged, unfortunately, and our front teeth cracked painfully against each other.

Erin stood up, annoyed, and looked at me intently. That was my cue. Exit Logan, stage left. I guess I hesitated too long, because she turned and stormed out. Sage stared at me, then gestured after Erin with her head. I could follow her if I wanted to.

But I didn’t. The thought of chasing after a girl I barely knew, apologizing for something I wasn’t sure of, and walking off to a nonspecific location suddenly seemed like a dull task. It was easier just to stay here with my new friends and act silly with Sage. Sage was comfortable, familiar. At the moment, that’s all I wanted.

“Player number six”—Dalton pointed his finger hat at me—“do your best belly dancer impression.”

I groaned and attempted to stand. Sage cracked a smile. Something told me this would be a night I’d remember for a long time, whether I wanted to or not.

T
HE PARTY BROKE UP
around four in the morning out of sheer inertia. Bleary-eyed Greeks halfheartedly attempted to remember where they’d left their jackets, keys, and girlfriends. A tearful sorority chick screamed, “Don’t talk to me!” to her boyfriend, who was passed out in another room. A man in a football jacket stumbled across someone’s attempt at a beer can pyramid.

Dalton had become horizontally drunk by the time we’d finished the game. I helped one of his frat brothers drag him to his room and deposit him, fully clothed, on his bed. When I returned downstairs, I found Sage waiting at the front door. Her hair was brushed, her makeup more or less in place, her jacket hung neatly over her arm. She was mostly sober; I think she’d been nursing the same rum and Coke since we’d all gone to the backyard to watch two drunks attempt to fistfight.

I’d been less discriminating. While I hadn’t pounded
back the shots like Dalton, there’d been a beer in my hand throughout the evening. Several beers. I had no idea where my sweater was, I suffered from temporary hearing loss, and I had the strongest desire to drink a gallon of ice-cold water.

“You ready to go, Logan?” Sage was smirking at me. I ran my fingers through my hair to make sure I didn’t still have that bra on my head.

“Yeah. No. We have to wait for Laura.” I hadn’t seen my sister for several hours.

Sage danced from foot to foot. “I’m sure she’s fine. C’mon, it’s late.”

“We need her to let us back in the dorm. Laura?” I called to the nearly empty front hall. “Hey, Laura?”

Sage opened her purse and pulled out a plastic card. “Laura gave me her ID. It’ll get us back into the building.”

“Why do you have it? How’s she supposed to get back in?”

And then it hit me. Laura didn’t need her ID because she’d be spending the night
somewhere else
.

I began to quake. “Mike’s a dead man.”

Sage placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Your sister’s a grown-up, Logan. She likes this guy.”

“Will she like him when his jaw’s wired shut?” I looked around for a weapon. There was a paddle embossed with the fraternity’s logo hanging on a wall. It was no Louisville Slugger, but it would have to do.

Sage leaned down until we were eye to eye. “Do you want your sister to be happy? Or do you want her to be
some kind of nun so she can live up to this Polly Pure image you have of her?”

“That second one!”

“Logan …”

I deflated. Sage was right. “C’mon, let’s go,” I whined. Laura and I would have a long talk later.

The night air was almost cold. I shivered in my short-sleeved shirt. Sage and I said goodbye to the man loudly vomiting into the bushes and trotted toward Laura’s dorm.