BLACKBALLED by Cindy Rosmus

1979

“You see that?” I asked my roommate, Juanita. “Or am I crazy?”

As Juanita peered around the dining hall, Katie got closer.

  “’Judge Baker’s daughter?’ With her fat ass? What about her?”

“She’s wearing makeup . . .” I stood up. “On just the right side of her face!”

Those tragicomic masks, I thought of. But Katie’s whole face looked tragic. On the made-up side, black tears rolled down her cheek.

Juanita dropped her fork. “That damn CUNT.” 

She meant Chi Upsilon Nu Theta. CUNT: Liberty State’s sorority for bitches.

“Katie,” I said, when she reached our table. “Is it worth . . .”

“Don’t talk to them!” Sara said. Out of nowhere, she’d appeared. Katie’s “Big Sister.” Chi Upsilon’s “Queen” or some shit. And she didn’t even live in our dorm! 

I lost my appetite.

“That’s disgusting,” Carolyn said later, at the pub. “How they treat Katie.” Our friends nodded. 

All science nerds; or at least, nerds. Carolyn was the coolest. Blonde, and so pretty, the Chi Upsilon bitches had invited her to pledge. 

“Are you crazy?” Carolyn laughed right in Sara’s face. 

 Being Carolyn’s best friend got me, an English major, “adopted” by her nerdy pals. Science-wise, all I knew was that Claudius poured mercury into Hamlet’s dad’s ear to kill him. 

“No excuse,” Carolyn said, “pledging for Chi Upsilon.”

“Or any sorority.” In his thick glasses, Nathan looked the most scientific. “Sadistic, power-hungry females.”  

At the campus pub, we drank beer in the corner. On the jukebox, Billy Joel’s “Just the Way You Are” was playing. Rico, who dug Carolyn, played imaginary sax for her. Stevie (who we guessed was gay) held two empty plastic cups over his chest, to make tits. We all laughed.

The pitcher was empty. “I’ll buy,” I said, getting up. 

Jack the bartender was so into some blonde chick, he ignored me. A “CUNT” sister. Figures, I thought. With her feathered hair and tiny waist.

Katie would never make it. Judge Baker’s daughter, or not.

She’d be blackballed first.

I wasn’t the “sorority” type. Not fat like Katie; at least, not anymore. Mad, without the scientist part. Grieving over Joey, the “bad boy” poet from Professor Steele’s class. Joey, who’d never be mine, even now that I’d lost weight. 

Joey, who’d died in a ski accident. 

When Jack finally saw me, I raised the pitcher. 

Professor Steele’s table was empty tonight. How life had changed. I pictured us, months back, at that same table: generous Steele, with his chestnut-brown toupee and gray beard, keeping us all drunk. Loyal to our “god.” Scruffy-cheeked Joey in his leather jacket. Me, wishing Joey would grab and kiss me. Steele’s slutty young wife Lisa . . . 

“Joey doesn’t want you,” Lisa had said bluntly. 

And CUNT, I thought, smirking now, didn’t want you.

Jack slid the full pitcher over to me. “Three bucks.”

“Three?” I said.

Smirking, he took my singles. For Chi Upsilon sisters, I bet it was two.

“Shelley,” Carolyn said, as I set down the pitcher. “Guess what we’re forming?” Before I could answer, she said, “A frorority!”

“A what?”

“Fratority,” Nathan said. “I believe that’s—”

“Just us . . .” Carolyn pointed around our table. “A new club. Guys and girls. Not a fraternity, or sorority, but co-ed! And with fun people.” Still holding his plastic-cup tits, Stevie beamed.

“No sadistic, power-hungry females,” Nathan said. 

“Or asshole guys. Just us.” Rico squeezed Carolyn’s shoulders.

“You mean, like an ‘official’ club?” I said. “Don’t we need permission, from the dean, or somebody?”
Carolyn waved that off. “We’ll get it later.”

Stevie’s squinted eyes said he was calculating something. “We’ll be . . . Omega Tau Alpha!”

“Is that a real name?” I asked. 

“Who cares?”

“Is five enough members?” Nathan said.

Stevie poured out beers. “Think we need six.”

“Just to be sure,” Carolyn said, “We’ll find one more.” And got up.

Life, I thought, can be perfect, sometimes. 

In the pub doorway, Mark had appeared. This certified genius, with bulging eyes, he looked like John Belushi in Animal House. But he was crazier. 

Tonight, he had a lasso. Like a cowboy, he waved and twirled this long rope higher and higher, then farther, finally encircling Carolyn where she stood at our table. “Hey!” she yelled, as he pulled her toward him.

We were too shocked to laugh. “How about . . .” Stevie asked. 

“No,” Rico said sullenly.

“Jealous?”

“He’s crazy!”

“Then, who?” 

Life, I thought, can be fucked-up. Dead silence, as Katie walked in. However crudely it was made, we all knew what protruded from her face. Or, what it was supposed to be. To make it worse, she was all in gray. If she was skinny, it wouldn’t be funny.

Still, none of us laughed. 

Through the pub’s glass walls, Sara and Tabitha, another CUNT sister, watched, snickering. I wished the floor would split and swallow them up.

When Katie reached the bar, she burst into tears.

“Hey, Mark . . .” Carolyn rushed to untie herself. “C’mere!”

It happened so fast, Sara didn’t see it coming. Open-mouthed, Tabitha watched, as Mark’s lasso expertly looped around Sara’s waist. “You asshole!” Sara yelled. 

Then Mark was running down the hall, with Sara in tow. 

From the pub doorway, we all cheered, especially when Sara lost her balance and fell. “I’ll kill you!” she screamed. 

Seeing her dragged down the hall, legs thrashing, knowing her bony ass was nearly scraped raw, made us howl with laughter.

 
Only Katie stayed behind. When Carolyn and I got back inside, Katie was sipping a beer at our table. The “elephant trunk” lay discarded next to the empty pitcher. 

“Number six!” Rico announced, when Mark came back, chuckling. As he rolled up his rope, the applause was deafening.

For the next hour, Mark’s beers were free. When Toto’s “Hold the Line” came on the jukebox, he waved his clenched fists like a victorious boxer. Again, we cheered.

“Great job, man!” Jack carried our next pitcher over, himself. “Hate that bossy bitch!”

“And Sara,” Carolyn said, “hates us!”

Katie looked down at her beer. “Guess I’m blackballed.”

With fresh cups, Stevie made a new set of tits. “Not from Omega Tau Alpha.” 

“Who’s that?”
Mark smiled. “Maybe us.” As he touched his cup to Katie’s, their fingers touched. “And maybe . . . you.” 

Carolyn kicked me under the table. 

Without that stupid trunk, Katie was cute. Especially with makeup on both sides of her face. When she smiled back at Mark, she even had dimples. 

She paused before raising the cup to her lips.

THE END

 

Cindy originally hails from the Ironbound section of Newark, NJ, once voted the “unfriendliest city on the planet.” She talks like Anybodys from West Side Story and everybody from Saturday Night Fever. Her noir/horror/bizarro stories have been published in the coolest places, such as Shotgun Honey, Megazine, Dark Dossier, Danse Macabre, The Rye Whiskey Review, Under the Bleachers, and Rock and a Hard Place. She is the editor/art director of Yellow Mama and the art director of Black Petals. She’s published seven collections of short stories. Cindy is a Gemini, a Christian, and an animal rights advocate.