Read Online Secret Society Girl by Diana Peterfreund - Free Book Online

ritziest student-friendly address. She held champagne-tasting parties. At eighteen.

    I was still getting used to keggers.

    My first Tory‘s Night with the Lit Mag had been going on for about an hour and a half when the almost-empty trophy cup was passed to me. ―Finish it,‖ Glenda Foster, then a sophomore, had whispered to me, and the whole table lifted their voices in song. Now, the rules of the Tory‘s Cup Game are a little bit complicated (especially considering it‘s a drinking game), but here‘s a short list.

    T ORY ’ S N IGHT R ULES

    1) The Tory‘s Cup can never touch the table.

    2) The players pass the cup to the left, making a half turn every time, and everyone takes a sip.

    3) When it gets down to a low enough level of mixed alcoholic beverage (identified only by color—i.e., a Red Tory‘s Cup, a Gold Tory‘s Cup, a Green Tory‘s Cup), the person holding it is obliged to chug the rest, wipe the inside of the cup out on her hair and/or clothes, and rest it, upside down, on a napkin. If there‘s any ring of moisture imprinted on the napkin, she has to pay for the next cup. (Tory‘s Cups are prohibitively expensive, hence the not ordering food at Tory‘s Nights. We can‘t blow our budget on cucumber sandwiches.) 4) All this is done while the other people at the table sing ―the Tory‘s Song,‖ which is an incomprehensible mix of letters, hand-clapping, and general drunken revelry, into which they insert the unlucky drinker‘s name. Students aren‘t ever taught the Tory‘s Song, we just pick it up through osmosis as soon as we get on campus.

    These cups probably hold more than a gallon, so even when they look nearly empty, there‘s still a highly deceptive amount of liquor, juice, and other people‘s backwash swishing around on the bottom of the polished-silver bowl. And I had to drink it—without drowning. For a second I thought I‘d have as much luck trying to swim in it. But I rallied, and chugged, and did my best to dry the rim and interior off on my hair and clothing. The price of a Green Cup is about sixty bucks, which was my freshman-year spending money for a month, so I had to win the game.

    And I did, but I paid the price. Woozy, sticky, and already regretting my future dry-cleaning bill, I excused myself right afterward to go to the restroom. I wobbled down the stairs into the main dining hall and practically tripped over a table containing Clarissa Cuthbert, her father, a few people I didn‘t recognize, and Galen Twilo, dressed unaccountably in khaki dress pants, a shirt and tie, and a blue blazer with gold buttons on the cuffs.

    They looked up from their watercress salads at my sticky, green-stained outfit, and Galen‘s eyes (I will never forget this) showed absolutely no recognition. For a moment there, I thought maybe I was seeing things and it wasn‘t Galen after all. Galen wore black pants with chains hanging off them and Clash concert T-shirts he found at thrift stores in the Village. Not blue blazers with gold buttons and—I looked down at his feet—brown loafers with little leather tassels.

    Just then, that pint and a half of Tory‘s Cup in my stomach got the better of me and I rushed to the toilet. I was still in the stall, trying to erase the image of violent green alcoholic vomit from my mind, when the door to the ladies‘ room opened and in walked Clarissa and one of her friends. (I peeped through the crack in the stall door.)

    ―—he says they went out a few times,‖ Clarissa was saying as she popped open a Chanel compact and brushed bronzer on her nose. ―But he never thought she‘d just show up here.‖

    ―Following him around like a devoted puppy, huh?‖ The other girl made a clucking sound with her tongue. ―And what was that stuff in her hair?‖

    Clarissa shrugged. ―You know how Galen likes slumming.‖

    W HAT I L EARNED T HAT N IGHT

    1) There‘s a restroom near the private banquet halls that Tory‘s prefers its student Tory‘s