Foster's Fall (Foster's Life)

by Jake Williams

  We all hopped into the car and I was surprised when Rob didn’t start moving immediately. “Here’s the deal—and you’ve got all of about thirty seconds to make the call, Foster. There’s a local news crew out front, and I think some other reporters are hanging out in the lobby, too. It may be some local interest in the seminar or whatever. But I’m guessing they’re snooping around for you or your father. Maybe Dawn or Susan or somebody else called them, it doesn’t really matter. You can go ahead and give a quick statement and maybe draw the press away from Hawthorne, or we can head out and they’ll never be the wiser. They’ll just see a big black car flash by the entrance and we’ll be gone. It’s up to you, I’ve got your back either way.”

  The other guys nodded at me and it only took a second to say, “Drive it like you stole it.”

  With all the red-light running, curb hopping, and the car’s giant engine screaming like a fighter jet we made it to the airport with only one police car and no press in pursuit. As soon as we pulled around to the private aviation terminal Rob hopped out and flashed his credentials at the cops in the car behind us. I was shocked as hell when they ran up and helped us carry the luggage to the plane. I made a mental note to tell Officer Douchebag back at the house how nice these guys were. I tried to picture him helping Spence and me haul a keg into the backyard and my mind went blank.

  As we walked up the steps of the jet I told Rob, “Those cops were really nice, much better than the ones at Hawthorne.”

  Rob shook his head. “I had to guarantee them that we were leaving for good and that your father and Megan weren’t hiding out here. They said the faster they could get you out of town the better. They have tickets to the game on Saturday—on the fifty yard line, the lucky bastards!—and they don’t want to have to pull overtime. That’s why they loaded your shit onto the plane so fast.”

  The pilot’s voice came over the intercom. “You guys buckle up until I tell you otherwise. Looks like we’re going to hit some nasty shit on the way to cruising altitude. Remember what you’ve learned on a commercial flight in case we crash—I don’t have time to go over that crap. Besides, don’t let those flight attendants fool you, if we go down we’re probably not going to live, anyway. A flotation device isn’t exactly going to cushion a fall from forty-thousand feet.”

  After we taxied to the runway I heard the engines wind up, and the jet felt like a panther about to pounce and then we shot up off the ground. I watched out the window as blue sky turned into a clusterfuck of gray-black clouds shooting by and rain started to pound the plane. Shit rattled and we dropped and rose and leaned and twisted our way up. I began to agree with the pilot, there really wasn’t anything an oxygen mask or a flotation device would do to help the situation if we dropped out of the sky right now.

  Rob turned to me and said, “The pilots checked every inch of this thing for signs of sabotage or explosives, I even had TSA come over and run a dog through it this morning. But I guess if lightning hits us it doesn’t really matter.” Finally light started pouring through the windows and the ride smoothed out.

  The pilot’s voice filled the cabin. “We’re good to go all the way back. Sit back and enjoy, there’s plenty of beer in the fridge—just don’t smoke any weed.”

  Spence and Dave swiveled their seats to face me and Rob on the couch. Spence told me, “The bros want to know the theme for the party this weekend. They wanted to do a kind of...different theme but I told them you need to make the final call on that. You’re the social director.”

  I frowned. “Since when?”

  “Since you got elected at the beginning of the semester. You may not remember, I’m not even sure you were there.”

  I nodded. “What do they want, what’s different about it? I mean if there’s alcohol, sorority girls, music and miscellaneous pharmaceuticals who really cares? What’s their great idea?”

  “Get Out the Vote. Kind of a right wing versus left wing thing.”

  I felt my brow wrinkling up. “Yeah. Over my dead body.”

  Spence studied my face. “I’m not sure how people would dress for an Over My Dead Body party.” He paused and then said, “We could make that happen, I guess. Go to Costco and pick up a coffin—and party cups, I think we’re out. We could put some dirt around it. Let people climb in and get their picture taken, like a photo booth kind of thing. Maybe hire the bagpipe geeks from campus to play in the living room, just when the DJ takes a break.”

  I stared at Rob. “That sounds like fun, it actually sounds fuckin’ awesome. But it sounds like something we should maybe do at...Halloween. But what I meant was we’re not going to start a Republican versus Democrat riot in the house. We’re talking about a liberal arts college, Spence. There would be five people on one side of the room and about a thousand on the other. Ella would kill us—she’d never get all that blood out of the carpet.”

  Dave spoke up. “Spence, let’s let Foster think about it. He’s probably not in a party mood right now.”

  I shrugged and walked up to the little galley. I came back with a bunch of beer and passed out the bottles. Rob left his unopened and set it in a built-in cup holder on the armrest of the couch. He pointed at the bottle and said, “Now, this is an example of why your car really isn’t practical, look at all the cup holders built into the furniture.”

  “Okay, Rob. But I think if you’re buying a seventy-million dollar plane the cup holders are probably standard equipment.” I finished my beer and opened another. “It’s probably optional on my car, I just never thought to ask.” I thought about school and I remembered my history exam. “We need to watch Saturday Night Fever tonight, it’s going to be on my test.”

  Dave looked happy. “I have an old DVD of it, we’ll watch it in your room tonight. Order some pizza, take multiple bong hits, drink enough hard liquor, and you’ll think it’s the best movie ever made.” He was staring at me and asked, “So, in between partying and your exam and whatever are you going to talk to Levi about the reporters? I mean, at some point in the next decade you’ll need to graduate, and I don’t think they’re going to leave until they get a quote from you or take some video of you looking emotionally destroyed.”

  For the rest of the flight we all checked our phones and responded to messages. I barely noticed the jet touching down and followed everybody out onto the tarmac, where they had Spence’s car waiting. The air was brisk and cool and wherever we had been last night was fading from my senses. Rob got behind the wheel and when we hit the highway I cracked my window and lit a joint. He swerved up an exit ramp and as we came up to the stop sign I asked, “You know Hawthorne’s at the next exit? This is the wrong one.”

  He shook his head. “I want you to make like a magician and hop into the trunk before we get any closer.” He nodded at the convenience store at the corner. “And I need to take a leak. Plus, we never had breakfast, I’m starving.”

  He ducked into the store and Spence followed me around to the back of the car. He raised the deck lid and I shook my head. “Nope, I just got off a private plane. Putting me in the trunk is just cruel.”

  He started pushing me in and I half-heartedly resisted. “C’mon Foster, you’ve got to do this. You’re not going to make it into the house if you don’t.” He kept pushing me and I threw my legs into the space.

  “What the hell are you doing to that kid?” This old guy was walking over to us and frowning.

  I explained, “He’s kidnapping me.” Without blowing my cover it seemed like the best explanation. I sat down in the trunk and looked at the two of them with a fair amount of boredom on my face.

  The old man punched Spence on the arm. “Don’t you know it’s illegal to kidnap somebody? And in broad daylight? You didn’t think somebody would notice this going on right here in the parking lot?”

  Spence pointed at me and shook his head. “It’s not like that, it’s...hazing. You know, a harmless fraternity prank.”

  The guy looked at me and snorted. “I was in a fraternity about f
ifty years ago. In my day hazing involved tons of liquor, light bondage, and the occasional farm animal. This kid’s in the back of a luxury car, he seems too sober to be in the middle of a hazing—”

  “You’d be surprised at how hammered he actually is,” Rob interrupted him. “It takes a lot more toxic chemical mix to actually get him completely wasted.” He handed me a honey bun and a cup of coffee and I thanked him.

  “Wait a damn minute! Friggin’ coffee and a bun? Son, are you pledging a frat or a sorority?”

  Spence pointed at the trunk. “It’s just really not that simple, it’s not that cushy or whatever. There’s a badger that we trapped and drugged stuck in that trunk somewhere. I believe by the time we get back on the road it’ll wake up, and more than likely it will have a headache and a seriously bad attitude. I guarantee that this hazing will involve bloodshed, if it makes you feel better. But we need to get moving, it wouldn’t be any good if it wakes up here and escapes.”

  The guy nodded. “That’s better, that sounds like real hazing.”

  Spence shut the trunk and I tried to unwrap the honey bun and sip my coffee in the dark as we shot back onto the highway. I realized we had made it to the house when I heard Officer Douchebag hassling Spence. I felt the car move into the parking lot and then I heard the click-thunk of the trunk release. I climbed out and we all gathered our shit up to head into the house. I looked over at my car and noticed how dusty it looked, and I wondered when it would be back out on the road.

  We walked through the house and the rest of the guys headed upstairs, but I heard Ella’s voice and detoured through the kitchen. She was sitting at the table with her laptop and tons of paper files laid out neatly in front of her. She looked over her reading glasses and smiled when she saw me. “Do you know anything about spreadsheets?”

  I shrugged. “What’s a ‘spreadsheet’, I mean, is it a laundry thing?”

  “You need to stick to running around a field with a ball, Foster. Use your God-given talent, don’t try to expand your mind too much. I mean, you’d think you were paying for some kind of practical education here.”

  “I tried to tell my political science instructor that, it really is a lot of money for nothing.”

  “Somebody put your rant in class up on YouTube and it’s gone viral. Word around campus is that his parents kicked him out of their guest house and took away his Porsche.”

  I leaned over her with a gentle hand on her shoulder. All I saw were numbers neatly laid out in handwritten columns, and the one she had labeled with her name and personal salary had a mind-blowing amount of six-figure numbers in each column. Then I noticed one with all of the brother’s names and some kind of scoring marked by each name. “What’s this one for?”

  She was patting my hand on her shoulder and gently squeezed it before she pointed at the sheet. “It’s my own personal project.” She ran her hand over the headings on the sheet. “That’s why I need help. I’m keeping charts on the boys’ GPA numbers compared to their level of hangovers, arrest records, overdoses, blackout sex, and slip-and-fall accidents. I’m trying to predict mortality rates among fraternity members versus the general public. I’m just about the only adult who see’s what goes on in these houses, and I wouldn’t be able to show my face in church if I didn’t send some anonymous notes to the parents of the at-risk kids. I’m just not seeing the exact equation or algorithm or whatever to put it all together.”

  “You’d probably be safe in sending out letters to all of them, but everybody needs a hobby. I’d ask Spence, or you could go to Sheldon—but that would be like asking Einstein to show you how to tie your shoes.” She nodded and I headed upstairs.

  “Hey, Jake, just to let you know,” she called out to me. “I don’t have the exact formula right, but I can tell you that you’re headed to the top of the chart. Do me a favor and slow down a little, you’re one of my favorites.”

  When I got upstairs Rob was sitting on the couch with an enormously round guy seated next to him. He had multiple chins and a five-o’clock shadow all over his skull, and he had one arm draped over Rob’s shoulder. He was shirtless and had bizarre patches of body hair sprouting all over his chest and arms. Rob nodded at his cuddle buddy and whispered, “Who the hell is this?”

  “That, Rob, is a Yoda. I don’t remember his real name, that’s just what we call him.”

  Yoda barely opened his eyes and a grin of wisdom spread across his face. “For all you know, Foster, my real name is Tickle Me Elmo.” He tweaked Rob’s nipple and stood up. “I like this guy, he has a little more cushion on him than all you nothing-but-muscle jocks. Anyway, I came up here to ask you about the party this weekend. Nobody seems to know what we’re doing for a theme.”

  Rob was pulling on a Don’t Judge Me ‘til I Fuck You t shirt and Yoda nodded in approval. My Secret Service agent looked thrilled. “This will probably be the only frat party I’ll get to go to while I’m here—do something classic! A toga party, so I can see Brittany and her sisters like that. Or a Come As You Sleep party, that would be awesome.”

  Yoda frowned. “I think we’re banned from having toga parties anymore, it’s a town ordinance or something. And don’t kid yourself about those sleepover parties, you’ll basically be wading through a hundred swinging dicks to find one girl in flannel pajamas.” That didn’t sound so bad to me but I kept my mouth shut.

  Like magic Dave walked in and said, “I like that theme, but with a thousand reporters outside it sounds like a mass arrest for public exposure just waiting to happen.”

  I peeked out my window and saw he was right, a couple of the news trucks had flat tires from being parked for so long. The group of reporters sunning themselves on the lawn had tripled and a few guys were tossing a Frisbee back and forth. There were three Port-o-Johns lined up on the sidewalk. I noticed grad-student douche wandering in a circle by himself and holding a ‘Will Work for Food’ sign.

  I turned back to Yoda. “If Rob wants to see near-naked sorority girls why don’t we just have a Dress Like You’re Going to Class party?”

  Yoda beamed through squinty eyes and nodded. “You, young Foster, are heading over to the Dark Side, and I’m proud of you.”

  I cringed as Rob tugged on the front of his shorts and drooled a little as he said, “That works for me.”

  Spence was standing in the doorway and spoke up. “If this is a party weekend then all of us need to get out and tan and work out and shit—I need to get laid, it’s been days.”

  “Here’s the DVD, Foster.” Dave put it on my dresser and told us, “I’ll meet you guys downstairs. I need to get Rob’s sunscreen.”

  I put on my required boxer briefs and some old Carolina Blue lacrosse shorts. I handed Rob a pair of white ones with a Hawthorne logo on them. “Here, you’ll blend in better. Those invisible board shorts you wore last time were making people nervous, I think.”

  On our way out to the pool we ducked down to the basement. Sheldon was sitting in a recliner with Shannon on his lap and they were crunching on party mix as he monitored the screens. Quinn was sitting in his seat sipping a beer, his screen was frozen on a little patch of grass. He tipped his bottle at me and said, “Glad you’re back, Foster. I was hoping I could show you my stuff.” He paused and turned red. “You know, my flying skills. But I just finished my tour.”

  Sheldon noticed us and nodded. “We’re only trapping drones every six hours or so, I think we’ve just about accomplished the mission. Plus, some of these guys want their TV’s back.” He turned to Quinn and said, “You can go ahead and take off—ha! I mean leave, if you want to get out of here for some fresh air. I’ve got Scott signed up for the next tour, he’s on his way down here.”

  Quinn turned to me and Rob. “Are you headed out to the pool? I heard about the party. I need to work on my tan and my abs.” He raised his shirt and ran his hand across the perfect washboard thing he had going on. Shannon stared and got so flustered I thought she might fall out of her boyfriend’s lap.

 
; Rob almost looked concerned and asked Quinn, “Man, are you like one percent body fat? What do you eat?”

  Quinn grinned and told him, “Normally I eat pounds of chicken breasts and broccoli, to compensate for the gallons of beer and occasional fast food binge. I stay active, I guess. Plenty of crunches, gym time, sports in general, and of course,” he looked at me, “lots of sex. And look around you, I’m not the only one who’s on that plan.”

  When we got out to the pool it looked like most of the frat and Britt’s sorority were on the same mission to tan and exercise. There were teams on the volleyball court, the basketball court, and people swimming around in the pool. Dave and Spence waved us over to some lounge chairs they had saved. After things sorted out Britt was at the end of the line with Rob between us, Quinn was on the other side of me talking to Spence, Hunter was chatting with Yoda, and Dave was at the other end staring over Yoda’s gut at the rest of us and scowling.

  I said, “Let’s move around, Rob. I feel...stagnant.” We joined the bros on the basketball court and the game got increasingly physical as the guys all tried to show off for the sorority girls watching. I was getting a little too aggressive myself with my use of hands and needless body contact against the other guys. Rob took a nice elbow to a kidney and we bowed out of the game. I sprinted over to the pool and dove in, when I came back up Rob was leaning against the edge with Brittany sitting on the deck in front of him.

  Britt had her hand on a folded towel next to her and said, “I was just scolding Rob for leaving his gun unattended—I found it in that towel.” She looked around the backyard and said, “With all these hormones flying around I’m not sure we want to have firearms just sitting around on the deck.” She stood up and started walking back over to our chairs.

  Rob was staring at her leave and it was pretty obvious he was trying to tug her thong off telepathically. He looked down into the water and sighed. “I’m not sure why you thought white mesh shorts would be better than those other shorts. I may be stuck in the water for a long time.”