the cell phone call did not give adequate information about the location of the accident for the paramedics to find it until it was too late to assist the victim.
After that, Shelly Lockes quit reading articles about the accident, and not long after that, she quit buying the newspaper altogether.
Still, she imagined there would be a trial, or some sort of investigation having to do with Craig Clements-Rabbitt, and that she might have a chance then to deliver the facts.
But by the end of the summer, she’d quit expecting that as well.
7
“O mega Theta Tau,” their resident advisor, Lucas, said, nodding drunkenly at the house on the hill.
Lucas owned about fourteen flasks, and had four of them on him that night—one in each pocket, except for the one in his hand. He stumbled on a sidewalk crack, and Craig laughed like it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen. Perry just kept walking. The two of them kept falling behind, and if they stopped again to piss on someone’s lawn, Perry had already decided he’d just keep walking back to the dorm.
“They’re virgins. Every last one of ’em.”
“No,” Craig said, and slapped his hand onto Lucas’s shoulder. “No,” he said again.
“Yep,” Lucas said. “And they’re the most beautiful fucking bitches on this campus, too.”
“ No. ”
“Yep.”
“That oughta be illegal. That oughta be fucking against the fucking law.”
“Yep,” Lucas said.
Perry looked up at the house on the hill. It was a dark, tall, rambling, and formidable brick edifice—one of those turn-of-the-century mansions with a carriage house out back and hundred-year-old oaks and elms in the yard. A white banner with black Greek letters on it fluttered between the pillars that held up the front porch. There were lace curtains in the front windows, and maybe a candle flickering behind them. Otherwise, the house looked so quiet it might have been empty—completely different from most of the fraternity and sorority houses on the row, which looked used up, neglected. Plastic cups in the driveways. Towels hung in the windows.
Perry had been at the university for only two weeks, but he’d already gotten used to seeing the parties spill out of those houses and onto the lawns. The girls, wearing soft sweaters and miniskirts, would be stumbling drunk, sprawled on the grass or in the mud. He’d seen those girls hobbling down the sidewalk back to their houses after a party—one high heel in a hand, the other on a foot, laughing or crying. The week before, someone had set fire to a frat house with a barbecue grill. One of the frat brothers had been passed out on a couch on the porch as the Fire Department sprayed down the front of the house with water, and no one had realized he was there until the fire was out and he’d been burned over 60 percent of his body.
Perry had no interest, he already knew, in Greek life. He did not want to be a fraternity brother, or to have any. Still, this sorority house on the hill seemed a part of some better, older, more elegant tradition, he thought. He could picture the sorority sisters sitting around some large oak table speaking seriously of the traditions of their house. They’d be wearing dark and sober clothes. There would be some sort of Oriental rug on the floor, a Siamese cat asleep on it. Maybe a tapestry on the wall. That candle flickering he saw from where he stood on the sidewalk, looking up at the house, would be at the center of their circle. There would be a large ancient book on the table, opened to a page that held some message from the Founding Sisters. One of the girls, her long hair falling over the text, would be reading aloud in a respectful tone.
“Somebody better go fuck those sluts, don’t you think?” Lucas asked.
Craig was fumbling at Lucas’s back pocket, trying to retrieve one of his flasks, and didn’t answer.
“I said ,” Lucas shouted, and then held a hand to his mouth, shouting toward the house on the hill,
After that, Shelly Lockes quit reading articles about the accident, and not long after that, she quit buying the newspaper altogether.
Still, she imagined there would be a trial, or some sort of investigation having to do with Craig Clements-Rabbitt, and that she might have a chance then to deliver the facts.
But by the end of the summer, she’d quit expecting that as well.
7
“O mega Theta Tau,” their resident advisor, Lucas, said, nodding drunkenly at the house on the hill.
Lucas owned about fourteen flasks, and had four of them on him that night—one in each pocket, except for the one in his hand. He stumbled on a sidewalk crack, and Craig laughed like it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen. Perry just kept walking. The two of them kept falling behind, and if they stopped again to piss on someone’s lawn, Perry had already decided he’d just keep walking back to the dorm.
“They’re virgins. Every last one of ’em.”
“No,” Craig said, and slapped his hand onto Lucas’s shoulder. “No,” he said again.
“Yep,” Lucas said. “And they’re the most beautiful fucking bitches on this campus, too.”
“ No. ”
“Yep.”
“That oughta be illegal. That oughta be fucking against the fucking law.”
“Yep,” Lucas said.
Perry looked up at the house on the hill. It was a dark, tall, rambling, and formidable brick edifice—one of those turn-of-the-century mansions with a carriage house out back and hundred-year-old oaks and elms in the yard. A white banner with black Greek letters on it fluttered between the pillars that held up the front porch. There were lace curtains in the front windows, and maybe a candle flickering behind them. Otherwise, the house looked so quiet it might have been empty—completely different from most of the fraternity and sorority houses on the row, which looked used up, neglected. Plastic cups in the driveways. Towels hung in the windows.
Perry had been at the university for only two weeks, but he’d already gotten used to seeing the parties spill out of those houses and onto the lawns. The girls, wearing soft sweaters and miniskirts, would be stumbling drunk, sprawled on the grass or in the mud. He’d seen those girls hobbling down the sidewalk back to their houses after a party—one high heel in a hand, the other on a foot, laughing or crying. The week before, someone had set fire to a frat house with a barbecue grill. One of the frat brothers had been passed out on a couch on the porch as the Fire Department sprayed down the front of the house with water, and no one had realized he was there until the fire was out and he’d been burned over 60 percent of his body.
Perry had no interest, he already knew, in Greek life. He did not want to be a fraternity brother, or to have any. Still, this sorority house on the hill seemed a part of some better, older, more elegant tradition, he thought. He could picture the sorority sisters sitting around some large oak table speaking seriously of the traditions of their house. They’d be wearing dark and sober clothes. There would be some sort of Oriental rug on the floor, a Siamese cat asleep on it. Maybe a tapestry on the wall. That candle flickering he saw from where he stood on the sidewalk, looking up at the house, would be at the center of their circle. There would be a large ancient book on the table, opened to a page that held some message from the Founding Sisters. One of the girls, her long hair falling over the text, would be reading aloud in a respectful tone.
“Somebody better go fuck those sluts, don’t you think?” Lucas asked.
Craig was fumbling at Lucas’s back pocket, trying to retrieve one of his flasks, and didn’t answer.
“I said ,” Lucas shouted, and then held a hand to his mouth, shouting toward the house on the hill,
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