Scandal

by Lauren Kunze

  “Let’s go,” Callie said. Grabbing Alessandra by the hand, she followed Tyler, Vanessa, and what seemed like the last remaining students down the stairs through a haze of smoke.

  Coughing by the time she reached the first floor, Callie glanced down the hall, over the arm of a member at the foot of the stairs directing people outside.

  Flames flicked over the huge stuffed bear, blackening the white wall behind. Armed with a fire extinguisher, several guys gathered around it and worked to contain the blaze, which despite their best efforts continued emitting an enormous amount of smoke. A sudden shower of sparks shot up dangerously close to the staircase’s winding wooden banister, and Alessandra shrieked loudly—

  “You need to get her outside with the rest of them!” a guy screamed at Callie over the wail of approaching sirens.

  Nodding, Callie tugged at Alessandra, who remained transfixed by the blaze. “Come on,” Callie managed between coughs, finally leading the older girl outside.

  From the looks of it, they were nearly the last to leave the party; students clad in outrageous costumes littered Mount Auburn Street, making room for the fire engines as they pulled up outside the Spee.

  “Jessica!” Callie screamed, spotting her best friend in front of Schoenhof’s Foreign Books next door. Matt, Vanessa, Tyler, Mimi, and OK stood with her. “Are you okay?” Callie cried, running toward them with outstretched arms and nearly toppling Jessica with the force of her hug.

  “Yes, yes, I’m fine,” Jessica replied, gripping Callie tight. “Matt and I were actually already on our way outside to take a break from all the dancing—”

  “Oh, thank you!” Callie hugged Matt.

  “I didn’t really do anything,” he mumbled while Callie embraced her friends in turn, save for Tyler whom she gave a tentative pat on the arm. Alessandra hovered awkwardly in the background, tottering unsteadily on her feet.

  “C’est la chose la plus exciter en quelques semaines!” Mimi declared, clapping her hands rapturously and staring at the smoking building.

  “Hey!” cried OK.

  “What?” asked Vanessa. “What did she say?”

  “Nothing,” muttered OK.

  “QUIET PLEASE!” A firefighter had just emerged from the Spee’s red front door. “If I could have your attention,” he continued. The crowd drew silent. Callie joined hands with Jessica and Vanessa, who stood on either side of her. “We have succeeded in putting out the fire. Fortunately the damage appears to be minimal, and no one sustained injuries beyond very minor smoke inhalation. Upon closer examination, the fire appears to have started due to an unattended cigar left near the taxidermic décor.”

  Several other firefighters exited the building and gathered behind him, crossing their arms or removing their hats.

  “Is it wrong that I feel slightly aroused right now?” Vanessa whispered, leaning in. Tyler grunted derisively.

  “Not at all!” Jessica whispered back at the exact same second Callie said “Yes, it is.”

  The firefighter who had been speaking continued. “We cannot stress enough how important it is to remain vigilant in the event that you choose to partake in indoor smoking, particularly in a party setting. Even small accidents like what probably happened tonight can lead to devastating consequences. Obviously tonight was an exception—but next time, you might not be so lucky. So please, in the future, be careful to watch where you throw those cigarettes.”

  “Okay, party’s over!” barked another firefighter as the previous speaker descended the steps. “Time to stop hanging around and head home! Now, folks! HUPD will be here any minute for a follow-up investigation, and I’m sure they’d hate to find any intoxicated, underage individuals loitering in the streets!”

  “You heard the man!” the club president yelled as the firefighters began loading up their trucks. “Clear out!”

  “To Daedalus!” someone cried, naming a popular bar across the street while the fire trucks revved their engines. “Because this party’s not over till we say it’s over!”

  A handful of students cheered. Callie turned to her friends. Alessandra still lingered nearby. Callie caught her eye. But before either of them could say anything, Tyler muttered, “Oh, crap on a stick…here we go again.”

  Following his gaze, Callie saw Lexi and Clint standing several dozen yards away, visible now that the fire engines were leaving. Even with all the commotion, their words were still audible.

  “Maybe,” Lexi shouted, “if you had listened to me and given up cigars like you promised, none of this would have happened in the first place!”

  “Maybe if you hadn’t been bitching about it so much,” Clint bellowed back as everyone in the near vicinity turned to stare, “I would’ve been paying closer attention when I set it down!”

  Callie’s eyes grew wide. She had never, in all the months they had dated, seen this side of Clint. Even when she’d practically torn apart his bedroom searching for signs of an affair with Lexi and he’d caught her red-handed, he had remained disturbingly, robotically calm. And even when she’d admitted to having spent the night with Gregory when she and Clint were on a break (technically a “fuzzy gray area”), he had barely raised his voice. She glanced at Tyler, recalling with new appreciation the times he had described Clint’s relationship with Lexi as volatile, characterized by a can’t-live-without-driving-each-other-crazy kind of love.

  “So let me get this straight,” Lexi was screaming. “You broke your promise, and you could have very well set your lit cigar down near that highly flammable eyesore, and somehow I’m responsible for trying to burn down the entire Spee?”

  Clint opened his mouth to shout a reply but suddenly stopped short, noticing the crowd that had begun to form around them, including several Spee members who watched them closely. “Er—nobody tried to burn anything down,” he called loudly. “Though I can’t say for certain, since we were on the second floor the whole night!”

  “Is that so?” Lexi demanded, ignoring the crowd. “Maybe we should stick around until HUPD shows up and see what they have to say about that!”

  “You would try to have me arrested, wouldn’t you?” Clint yelled. “That is just so typical. So. Fucking. Typical!”

  “Excuse me, ladies,” Tyler said quietly to Callie, Alessandra, and Vanessa. “Duty calls.” Dashing over to Clint and Lexi, he grabbed his roommate and attempted to drag him in the direction of Adams House. Lexi followed them, calling insults all the while.

  “I take it back,” Mimi said breathlessly. “That was definitely la plus excitant thing to happen all evening!”

  “I should go,” Alessandra murmured, looking shell-shocked.

  Callie turned to her. “Uh…do you think you can make it home okay?”

  “Yeah—fine,” Alessandra muttered, backing away. “Thanks—and sorry. About…everything.”

  “That’s all ri—” Before Callie could finish, Alessandra had disappeared into the crowd.

  “Whe-wee!” Jessica whistled, throwing an arm around Callie’s shoulders. “Just another normal night on the old Harvard campus, eh?”

  Callie blinked, staring at the spot Alessandra had vacated. For some reason she couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that she was forgetting something.

  “Tell me about it,” Vanessa answered Jessica. “I can’t decide if I need a nap or a drink.”

  “Buvez, buvez!” Mimi cheered in favor of option number two. “Je vote pour que nous allons à Daedalus. Monsieur?” she asked, turning to OK.

  “Fine,” he said stiffly. “If everyone else is going.”

  “I’ll go,” said Jessica. “I couldn’t possibly sleep right now after all of that. Matt?”

  “Sure,” he said. “Callie?” he added.

  “Caaleeee,” Jessica repeated, waving a hand in front of her face. “You coming?”

  “Where?” asked Callie.

  “Daedulus, duh!” said Vanessa.

  “Oh…um…” Callie stared at her friends. Her eyes roved over each of thei
r features, one by one. OK and Mimi, Matt and Vanessa, and Jessica, whose presence in the group—amazing as it was to have her—served as a stark reminder of another member’s absence.

  Gregory.

  Callie closed her eyes. If he hadn’t gotten tangled up in his father’s hedge fund scandal or everything at Bolton and Stamford Enterprises was business as usual, would he be here now? Would he have broken up with Alessandra as promised—and would he finally be hers?

  Callie swallowed. Yes. He would have been there, devastating and disheveled with five o’clock shadow and the top buttons of his shirt undone. Navy blue, she decided, to match his eyes, which would have stayed on her the entire night, filling her with that same sense of security and anticipation she’d experienced on the ferry. And when the fire broke out, he would have taken her hand and led her outside, instead of her having to help Alessandra, and only when he knew she was safe, would he act as if he’d never been worried at all. He would lean in so close they were almost touching and ask her, with that signature smirk, if she knew anyone klutzy enough to have started the fire. She would feign offense, insisting on her innocence and asking if he knew any smokers, and then his lips would brush up against her ear as he whispered, “Caliente, do you know the Spanish word for fire?” And then—

  “—she used to space out like this all the time during last period back in high school,” Jessica was explaining to the others.

  “Ow!” Callie cried, rubbing the spot on her arm where her best friend had pinched her.

  “Had to do it,” Jessica said with a grin. “Now are you coming or not?”

  “Actually,” said Callie, “I’m sort of exhausted…. Would you murder me if I said I kind of just wanted to go home and crawl into bed?”

  “Not at all,” said Jess. “I’ll go with you,” she added with a sidelong look at the others.

  “Er, excusez-moi, s’il vous plait.” Mimi planted her hands on her hips. “Sa va pas te tuer, but I will murder you.”

  Jessica laughed.

  “Je suis très sérieuse!” Mimi insisted. “How often in life will your best friend be visiting while your neighbors are wearing ces ensembles absoluement ridicules?” she finished, pointing at Matt and OK’s outfits. “We must stay up all night tonight at the very least. Probably tomorrow night, too. Ce feu, c’est juste le commencement!”

  Matt shifted nervously. “What do you mean, ‘that fire is just the beginning’?”

  “Exactement ça!” Mimi cried delightedly. “It is going to get a lot hotter before la fin due weekend.”

  OK grinned. “Oh, it’s already getting hotter, baby,” he said, undoing another button on his shirt. Vanessa howled like a wolf while Matt laughed.

  Jessica looked at Callie, her eyes gleaming with anticipation.

  “Okay, fine,” Callie conceded, eliciting cheers from Mimi, OK, and Vanessa. “Let’s get crazy and stuff. But not too crazy, okay? I have a paper due on Monday.”

  “Famous last words, my friend,” said Mimi, taking her by the hand and leading them all down Mount Auburn Street. “Fameux mots de la fin.”

  SEVEN

  The Hangover

  * * *

  Dear Party Animals in Training:

  Sunday morning in college: a less than holy time that far too many of us spend praying to the porcelain gods. So what do you do when Saturday night becomes Sunday morning, your rage face becomes your worst face, and the contents of your stomach are about to become the contents of your toilet or (yick) your roommate’s shoes? And where are your keys? Your phone?? Your dignity???

  I won’t insult your intelligence by telling you that you could have easily prevented that hangover by hydrating, knowing your limits, and never exceeding more than one drink—accompanied by one glass of water—every hour. Nor will I inundate you with crazy hangover cure concoctions like Grandma Thorndike’s classic for the “Overindulgent Evening of Bridge” (essentially a Bloody Mary). No, this simple guide will not address the physical, Sunday morning pain that you all brought upon yourselves but rather this simple fact:

  Sometimes even the smartest people do the absolute stupidest things.

  And sometimes they don’t even remember doing them. So in order to solve those Sunday morning mysteries here is my foolproof, five-step program (and here’s to hoping you never encounter a certain other twelve-step program later in life):

  Piecing Together the Previous Evening’s Events

  1. Check your phone. This is absolutely the number one, most important step. (Assuming you already checked under your covers, under your bed—assuming that you’re in your bed—and, in some cases, your closet for any forgotten overnight guests.) Check your outgoing calls. If you drunk dialed any particular number in excess of three times: send a mass text apologizing for a smartphone software malfunction. Check your outgoing texts. If any of your exchanges resemble these:

  * * *

  COME OVER!

  WHERE?

  HERE!

  ! WHERE’S “HERE”?

  WHERE ARE YOU?

  HIDING!

  …ARE YOU IN YOUR DORM ROOM?

  HIDE N SEEK, LITTLE BO PEEP!

  HAVE YOU BEEN DRINKING?

  HURRY UP! DADDY’S NAKED AND DON’T LIKE TO BE KEPT WAITING!

  GOOD NIGHT, SARAH.

  CALL ME IN THE MORNING.

  LAKJSFLAKDSFKJAASF!!

  ?

  !#$!ASDKFJKL%$#&258Q98??

  HUH? WHO IS THIS?

  !#$TASLKJFLAKSJDOUSERKJA;KJF!?!?!?

  IS UR PHONE MALFUNCTIONING?

  ;0 ;) ;)

  I DON’T GET IT.

  …YOU STILL THERE?

  BABY IM SRY!

  HA. IT’S OK. BUT SRSLY, WHO IS THIS?

  I LOVE YOU.

  YO

  UH…HI?

  ’SUP?

  NOT MUCH. IT’S 2AM?!

  ‘S COOL.

  DID YOU WANT SOMETHING?

  NAH. DID YOU?

  YOU TXTED ME!

  RLX. NBD.

  ?

  G2G. GTL. YKHII. TTYMBL.

  * * *

  Then you should send the following follow-up text:

  SORRY FOR PARTYING…SORRY I’M NOT SORRY.

  Or if you are sorry (though you shouldn’t be—don’t ask for permission, ask for forgiveness, and never apologize if you can avoid it), log on to Facebook and update your status to: PHONE STOLEN LAST NIGHT! MSG ME IF YOU’VE SEEN IT! Then wait a few hours and repost: FOUND IT! THANK GOD! ROOMIES MUST’VE STOLEN AS A JOKE. APOLOGIES FOR ANY WEIRD CALLS OR TEXTS!

  If any of your calls were actually answered…well, there’s nothing you can do but pray. Do keep in mind: playing the I don’t remember card makes you sound like even more of a mess.

  2. Check your wallet. Are all of your credit cards still there? No? Whoops—go find them. Yes? Good. Now go online and check your bank statements. They will likely tell you where you were last night, what you bought, and in many cases, what you should not have bought. Drinks for everyone at the bar? How generous. Seven pairs of new shoes from Zappos? I’m sure you needed those! (Though far safer than drunk driving—duh!—Drunk Shopping can still be a dangerous game. Remember: “Beer goggles + browsing often = serious retail regret.”) Three extra large four-cheese pizzas with extra cheese? Wait, really? So gross. Let’s hope you shared.

  3. Check the trash. Uh-oh. Sorry, kiddo: three empty pizza boxes just don’t lie. At least that baby bump you woke up with is a food baby, not one of those screaming, crying poop machines.

  4. Check your relationship status. Another risky subcategory of boozing + browsing behavior includes Drunk Facebooking. While sometimes alcohol facilitates bonding, it can also lead to fighting, often with your roommates or significant other. You might be surprised how frequently an exchange of angry words leads to a Facebook update—either from “In a Relationship” to “Single” or “It’s Complicated” or to a good old-fashioned Defriending. Or worse, an actual status update along the lines of “So-and-so is a grots
ky little biatch.” Oops. Undo the damage as best you can, apologize, and if all else fails, pull a Jamie Foxx and “Blame it on the a-a-a-a-alcohol.”

  5. Check the mirror. Do not leave your room without assessing the damage done to your face/hair/person. Trust me: you don’t want to show up for Monday morning class with a ginormous penis scrawled across your forehead (thanks a lot, roomies). Also, take a shower. You’re not Ernest Hemingway, and that smell does not become you.

  Here to help as always,

  Alexis Thorndike

  Interim Managing Editor @ The Harvard Crimson

  The Nation’s Oldest Continuously Published Daily College Newspaper since 1873

  Advice Columnist @ FM Magazine

  Harvard University’s Authority on Campus Life since 1873

  * * *

  A tiny triangle of light suddenly stabbed at Callie’s face. Moaning involuntarily, she rolled over on a hard surface, causing the book that she had spread pages-down across her face in place of an eye mask to topple onto the hardwood floor. Groaning again, she forced open one eyelid.

  Persuasion by Jane Austen, she managed to read upside down. Scrunching up her eyes in pain at the now unmasked, early-afternoon sunlight streaming in from a nearby window, she wondered, What the hell had a book been doing upside down on her forehead? How did it get here? How did she get here? Where was here? Blinking warily, she reread the title of the book—a volume that belonged to…Gasping, she bolted upright.

  No Gregory. There were, however, several other individuals lying fast asleep and, in some cases, snoring, spread out, like she had been, at various odd angles on the floor of the boys’ common room.

  Slowly she heaved herself up onto one of C 23’s two black leather couches so as to better survey the scene before her.

  In the corner under the potted plant Matt and Jessica were spooning. Correction: Jessica spooned Matt, assuming the role of big spoon to her foot-taller little spoon counterpart.