—That’s it—the preacher said as he slammed his palm on the dinner table causing the antique crystal vase in the china cabinet to rattle and the dog to bark. Every member of the room, except Mary Beth’s newest boyfriend, immediately looked at the vase and prayed it wouldn’t fall. It had been in the preacher’s family for generations. He was neurotic about it. The preacher, after checking the vase and seeing it unharmed, looked at his daughter with a calm eye—I will not have that kind of talk in this house. Please take this person you’ve brought with you and leave—Mary Beth’s newest boyfriend was a greasy-headed mop top with a pimple under his left nostril and a barb wire tattoo that wrapped around his right bicep. His best friend told him it was, bitchin.

Mary Beth recoiled from her father’s verbal front—Oh Daddy, don’t take it personal. I just mean that if Jesus really cared about the suffering of other people, then why didn’t he stay here on earth and suffer with them? Wasn’t it a bit idealistic for him to assume that because he suffered one day of intense agony, it would make up for the billions of people that had been killed already? Not to mention the billions that were eventually slaughtered in his name?—She sat back, assured that her father had no comeback for this recently acquired Philosophy 301 supposition. She had got an A. The whole time in class, she was giving her father the mental finger. Every word she read was a possible bullet to fire into the heart of her father’s faith.

The preacher’s face grew red as the ass curve of a rose petal. He threw his napkin on the table, scooted his chair back, and turned to walk away, tripping over the dog that always lay at his feet waiting for an edible handout—son of a bitch—he landed face down on the wooden floor. Restrained laughter hung in the air like wet smoke. He collected himself and left the room as diligently as he fell.

Mary Beth looked at her mother, who was already looking at Mary Beth—You know how your father is, Mary Beth. It’s best just to let him have his say without arguing, like I do—As she looked at her namesake, Mary Beth’s face contorted into the campus friendly feminist arguing pose—Mother do you have any idea how completely submissive you sound right now? I am so sick of daddy telling me that the world is his way only and everyone else is going to hell—She paused and added—I don’t even believe in hell—Her mother looked down at her lap and said in a hushed tone, like she didn’t want anyone to hear, maybe not even herself—Now I have to go repair what you’ve done—She pushed her chair back, got up, grabbed her dishes and pushed her chair back in. She turned to walk up the steps, stopping to empty her plate in the trash and rinse it in the sink. The dog began barking again.

Mary Beth asked her newest boyfriend what he would like to do next. He was not concerned with the present moment. His mind was on later tonight and the panties Mary Beth might or might not be wearing—Do you want to see something funny—He shook his head yes, not hearing what she asked him. Mary Beth’s dog was a miniature collie named Rain. When someone would repeatedly smack his butt fast and hard, he would take off running around the house, barking and yipping his way through his own personal maze of ass slaps and close calls with the furniture. The preacher abhorred such behavior and forbade anyone to participate in the dog’s psychological ass slapping disorder. But Mary Beth was upset with her father and had no remorse about trying his nerves.

She smacked the dog’s ass with multiple slaps and being used to the drill, he rocketed away, barking and yipping. There were different patterns he ran. Sometimes it was the figure eight; sometimes he opted for the straight circle. But this particular time, it was a Euclidean nightmare. He attempted to run the infamous, two-dimensional dodecahedron in between the living room, kitchen, and dining room. He was unsuccessful. With one lap left to complete the twelve-face geometrical Holy Grail, he was determined to avoid the ass slap. He juked left under the table, became ensnared in the long lace tablecloth, and bolted out directly into the china cabinet. The vase tipped left. Then right. Wobbling on its base like a top. It fell in an arch, drawn out like an Olympic diver. The dog, sensing an impending disaster, ran from the room just as the vase crashed. He wasn’t seen for the rest of the night.

Mary Beth’s mother ascended the stairs with the knowledge that she was the bridge builder, the pontiff, tonight. Her husband bridged the gap between God and people, but she bridged the gap between her husband and the family he estranged at God’s expense. She entered the room. He was sitting on the edge of the bed with his hands covering his face. There was a half-empty rocks glass of Alka-Seltzer on the nightstand. The preacher was crying.

She went to him and held him. She knew that Mary Beth didn’t hate Jesus and she knew Mary Beth didn’t hate her father either. She thought that her daughter was just confused right now and that was okay because Mary Beth’s mother had a great reservoir of patience. Her husband’s bridges were strong, but his wife’s patience was the water that flowed underneath them, always warm and always moving. She knew her husband had a rough day. He had been pushed to his breaking point. She could do more for her husband by just holding him. She hoped Mary Beth would eventually learn this art. A high decibel crash of breaking glass destroyed their healing embrace. The preacher’s head jerked up towards the door—Oh don’t tell me. Son of bitch. SON OF A BITCH—He ran out of the room and down the stairs.

Mary Beth’s mother stared at the rocks glass. She picked it up and finished the rest of the Alka-Seltzer. She put the glass back on the nightstand and listened patiently to the rising voices as they echoed off the hallways and doors of the house. She would wait for the voices to settle before going downstairs to patch whatever rip had been made. She lay back against the pillow, thought of her own mother, and listened to the voices fence each other into the night.

The Night Mary Elizabeth Burnt Her Mother’s Moses Cookies

—Mary Elizabeth, do you mean to tell me that the whole time you’ve been dating this boy you’ve neglected to mention that he’s not Jewish? And suddenly after all this time, you tell us that not only is he a Gentile, but he’s a Christian minister as well—Mary Elizabeth looked at her fifty-year old mother with her twenty-four year old eyes—Mom, he’s a wonderful man. I don’t care what you say about him. He will be here in a half-hour and so help me, you’d better not do anything to ruin this—Her mother’s jaw clenched—I told your Father that we never should have given you a Christian name—Her mother turned her back, which infuriated Mary Elizabeth. She turned her own back to her mother and left the room, smacking the doorframe on her way out.

Later that evening, at the dinner table, just after Mary Elizabeth had announced her engagement to her boyfriend who was not only not a Jew, but a Christian minister as well, her father grabbed her and her fiancé’s hand with tears in his eyes—You have both made me so happy. All I ever wanted was for my daughter to marry a nice man. One that would love her, and take care of her—And her father smiled a wicked smirk—And take these bills off my back. She’s like a full time payment—He looked to the young man—I hope you know how to swindle your congregation young man. She’s a regular down payment weekly—Mary Elizabeth smiled at her father because she loved him. It was that simple. She looked at her mother and her mother was looking away.

Her mother bent down to pet the cat, mumbling incohesively. She took her hand away from the feline, swiveled forcefully in her chair and banged her shoe on the table leg. She did not reply when asked if she was alright. Her mother got up from the table and went into the kitchen. Her father called after her—Where are you going, you haven’t even finished your meal yet—Mary Elizabeth’s mother called back from the kitchen—I have to put my cookies in the oven so they’ll be ready for dessert—Mary Elizabeth’s mother often made cookies during Hanukkah. The family called them her Moses cookies.

Mary Elizabeth got up and followed her mother into the kitchen—Mom, why can’t you be happy for me? Why do you always have to spoil everything—Her mother had her back turned as she was sliding an aluminum tray of blobby dough into the oven. She refused to answer her daughter—So help me mother, if you don’t speak to me now then I don’t want you to have ANY PART OF MY WEDDING—Her mother whipped around and stared at her daughter with horror—You would do that, wouldn’t you? On top of everything else, you would just cut your own mother off. What did I birth? What did I do to deserve such a hateful child—Mary Elizabeth had heard enough—YOU ARE NOT WELCOME AT MY WEDDING MOTHER—She tore open the back door and ran into the night, leaving a hole in her mother’s home that remained even after the door had been shut.

Mary Elizabeth’s mother ran sobbing, back into the dining room where her husband and her daughter’s fiancé had been listening in disbelief to the argument raging in the kitchen—She hates me. She hates me. Her own mother—Her husband asked the fiancé if he would please excuse them. He took his wife upstairs and held her as she sobbed. They fell asleep only to be woken by the smell of smoke. The Moses cookies were blackened. They looked as if they had been hit by raining fire from one of the ten plagues of Egypt. For years, her mother blamed Mary Elizabeth for the burning of her famous Moses Hanukkah cookies.

The Day the Preacher Understood the Shame of Jesus

The Preacher shuffled up to the pulpit. He was wearing a white silk robe. He had no pants or undergarments on underneath. He arranged his Bible and poured himself a glass of water from a crystal pitcher, a gift from the Women’s Auxiliary. He cleared his throat and addressed the congregation—Ladies and Gentlemen, God is angry. God is upset. He has given us laws to live by. Simple laws, yet so many of us seem to fall prey to temptation and sin—His erection was beginning to stir underneath the robe—For so long God has been patient with us, and I ask why Oh Lord. Why do you have such precious patience with us Heathens? What did we possibly do to deserve this infinite gift of your attention and salvation? That you would send your only begotten Son, Jesus, to die on the cross for our wicked and sinful ways and yet we still refuse to give them up, Oh Lord I’M SORRY. I’M SORRY WE HAVE FALLEN INTO THE DEVIL’S HANDS—He grabbed himself down there as he spoke. Oh God, give me strength not to do this. Please. I can’t continue doing this. It started off innocently. A scratch. An adjustment. But then he got worked up. Spittle flew from his mouth as he spoke of the infinite love of God by sending Jesus. It was the same speech every week, just different words. He took hold at a moment of great passion. One moment he was damning the Devil and the next he was jerking for Jesus.

He continued with his one-handed sermon—We are living in the modern day Sodom and Gomorrah. Whores on every street corner. Porno directors without scruples. Why, even the institution of God has become corrupted by the Devil’s seed—Oh God, please no. Don’t let me do this in your home. I can’t stop, it feels too good. This had been going on for about six months. The Preacher rationalized it by believing that his acts of Holy Masturbation were a covenant between himself and Jesus, something sacred only both of them knew. But there was someone else who knew. The Preacher glanced at his wife, sitting in the front row with a decent viewing angle behind the podium.

The Preacher realized, with horror, that his wife was watching him. They both remained frozen. He stopped speaking. The congregation became uneasy. Murmurs rose to a cacophonous roar. His wife stood up and ran into the Preacher’s office, behind the pulpit stage. His jaw locked. His tongue wouldn’t work. He turned to run after her, but his robe caught on a broken piece of lamination from the ply wood pulpit. The robe tore off and there he was, his back to the congregation, bare ass exposed, looking up to the wooden crucified Christ that hung on the wall highlighted by track lighting. He fell to his knees and raised his arms to the wooden idol as if to say—Why have you forsaken me Lord—The congregation was disgusted. They rose in rotting masses and filed languidly into the receiving room. Some took their offering out of the collection plate on the way out.

The Preacher lay on the couch in his office with his head in his wife’s lap. She was stroking the locks of hair that lay across his forehead. She was completely calm. He was staring at the ceiling as if waiting for a bush to grow out and light itself on fire, telling him he was redeemed. His wife looked at him like he was a child—You know, sometimes you’re like that damn vase you love so much. So fragile. Sometimes that’s what I see you as, a human crystal vase. Something that needs to be guarded against falling and breaking—The Preacher turned his gaze from the ceiling to his wife—You know that vase has been in my family for generations, Mary Elizabeth. It was the only thing left standing after my family was raided by Indians on their voyage west. And that was only because my mother was using it as bedpan for fear of peeing in nature—His family had actually been robbed by other white settlers, but the story sounded more in tune with American History when he told it this way.

His wife continued to look at him with pity—Well, all I have to say about this incident is that you’ll recover. Apologize to the people that decide to come next week and they’ll forgive you. They are Christians, after all—The Preacher’s lips pursed because he doubted his own congregation’s ability not to judge and to forgive, particularly since he judged every person he saw at every opportunity he had. He also held very little forgiveness in his heart. His wife gently pushed his head off her lap, got up, strung her purse over her shoulder and began to leave. She turned around and looked at him, still lying on the couch—Make sure you’re home in time for dinner tonight. Mary Beth is bringing her new boyfriend. And please be cordial—The Preacher shifted on the couch and closed his eyes—Is this the kid with the barbwire tattoo? The one that doesn’t go to church—His wife nodded her head—I know, I’d like to say something to her too, but I’d feel just like my mother. Mary Beth will learn. She just needs time—She opened the door and left. The Preacher rolled over, facing the back of the couch. Shuddering violently, he wrapped his arms around himself and began to cry.

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The Birth of Triangular Diplomacy

By this time, Terry and Jerry had found a new hook up for weed. Terry had dumped his young girlfriend and was entertaining a new female every other night which meant he needed lots of weed. This was back in the day before roofies, where half-attractive boring dudes had to resort to getting their dates stoned and wearing them down through pointless conversation. Terry’s new hook up had a lot of weed and a sense of perversity to match; he told us the guy had offered to give him pound of weed in exchange for some original amateur college porn. Now, Mark didn’t really want to have anything to do with this because when you’re talking about that kind of weight in dope, you’re talking about jail time. I tried to explain to Mark that the real concern with that sort of activity is when money was involved. Magistrate business involved no exchange of money—goods and services were what we bartered in—the cornerstone of all free trade.

Bart owed us a big favor and he was still banging that little Italian broad left and right. I suggested to Mark that we combine all circumstances and allow everyone to profit. The plan was to set up a camera in Bart’s room, in a hidden location, to film various sexual acts between him and his little Italian. Bart agreed to record ten sessions over three weeks. We would then allow Terry to broker the deal for the porn tape with his hookup in exchange for a quarter pound of kind bud, this would be the birth of phase two growth for the Magistrates.

The new plan was to supply small quantities of weed to individuals in exchange for favors to be cashed in at a later date, when needed.  These small, no charge transactions, would only take place after an interview with the client by Mark and myself, to ascertain what exact attributes might be useful (or if they were Narcs).

Notes were taken and Goat, in exchange for free weed, agreed to use his superior computer prowess to concoct a program that would cipher the notes we took on each individual in case they should fall into the wrong hands. Tim, Darren, and Malcolm weren’t in on it at this point because there was no need for them to be but we’d all be balls deep by the end of the semester.

By this time, the sub-structure and foundation of the Magistrates had been established. We were officially a campus Cosa Nuestra, trading favors for favors, dealing in drugs, pornography, and vicious beatings, all without one cent of money changing hands.

In theory we were untouchable but the difficulty always comes with the application.

This is the Business We Have Chosen

We were serious business by Halloween, with weed heads, chronic trouble makers, small claims bullshit, and a strong-arm network working together to make the lives of the Magistrates as comfortable as possible. I had acquired a kick ass stereo system from a kid who was about to fail out because his second English class assignment had received a no pass grade. I rewrote his paper and did his final project in exchange for his stereo system, a $500 Aiwa shelf deal with surround sound and we were now kickin’ it in Dolby Digital. Things were good, smooth, until we got the rape case, that one Mark took personal.

The little girl came to us the weekend after Halloween. She had been at a fraternity party near Kohl Hall and was walking back through the alley, the house located off campus because of a prior rape charge (go figure). While in the alley, she was accosted by two kids from the fraternity coming back from the bars, around 2:45. They ripped off her party pants, her thong underwear, and sodomized her behind two large plastic trashcans on wheels. She didn’t look either one of us in the eye when she told us the story.

Mark asked her if she knew who did it and she nodded. She had met both of them earlier that night, before they went to the bar, and she stayed at the party, their names were Ron and Jason. They were seniors graduating at the end of the semester—they probably thought she wouldn’t recognize them. Ron had a Playboy bunny earring and Jason’s little finger on his right hand was minus a fingertip, both of these character traits blazed into her memory. Mark hugged the girl and told her we’d do what we could. She winced at his touch.

He knew her from his Criminal Justice class, helped her study for their last quiz. He was pissed and told me he wanted to handle this one alone. As soon as he said this, I knew he had a thing for her and the vengeance was going to be ugly. I consented but begged him to constrain himself.

Mark didn’t tell me what happened, didn’t want to make me an accomplice, but I heard rumors. The kid with the missing finger was found in the same alley he raped the girl in, beaten so bad they had to take him to the ER and drain his leg of fluid. He was in the hospital for three days and, although I didn’t see the doctor’s report, I’m sure the words several harsh blows with a blunt object probably appeared on there somewhere.

The other rapist was in even worse shape when they found him a week later, caught coming out of the rec center, just as he got to his car, which unfortunately for him was parked in the outer rim of the parking lot no-man’s land. He was hit on the head and knocked unconscious. When he woke, his arm was broken and one of his testicles had been smashed from a brutal nut stomp without reservation of force. He’d be lucky if he could father children.

When I heard what happened, I felt a kind of Old Testament justice descended upon the campus. People who lived their lives sucking off the tit of apathy had better watch out because the Angels of Justice now held dominion over the raped, the abused, and those just wanted a little marijuana in their lives.

The pot would be free and the penalties always more severe than the crimes they followed.

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That Old Love Challenge

I thought the Magistrates were dead until Bart came to Mark’s room the night he picked up Death Row’s Greatest Hits, seven 40 caps twisted off on the floor and Bart begging us to help him with his impending dorm trial over the girl in the bathroom, this was two days after the copy of his write up had been passed around the floor. Bart said, I hear that you guys can get things done?

Mark, slipping back into power mode, said, We might be able to help. What do you need?

Bart said, Well, I need some help with this bathroom thing.

I immediately thought there was no fucking way we can help this kid with this but Mark said there might be something we could do, and asked Bart to give us a couple days to figure it out. Bart left the room, satisfied that his fate was in the hands of professionals. I packed up the rainbow-sheen two footer graphix bong I had picked up at Phil Man’s in Dayton the previous summer and asked Mark how the fuck we were supposed to affect a dorm trial. We both knew Bart was desperate for help and the payoff was sure to be tremendous in the long run. Mark had inside knowledge of this RA who wrote Bart up, that she came from the same hometown as Snowplow. Mark had spoken with another RA on the second floor about the Bart situation as he sat on the smoke bench the previous night. When they got to the part where Bart said he’d go down on her for a pardon, the other RA told Mark that the girl wouldn’t have accepted that offer from anyone but Snowplow.

Snowplow? I said with disgust.

Mark said, I know. I know. I guess they went to the same high school together and she was two grades above him. She’s had a thing for him ever since.

I said, And you mean to tell me they ended up in the same college, in the same dorm, and even on the same fucking floor?

Yep.

I said, Well, shit man, it must be fate and who are we to fuck with fate?

Mark said, That’s exactly what I was thinking.

No way man, that chick is whacked! Snowplow was wearing his traditional boxer shorts as we sat in his dingy second floor room. It was almost noon the following day and the shades were still drawn, a musky odor soaking the room in a net of stink that you couldn’t get away from no matter where you moved. Mark looked pensive. I was pissed.

I said to Snowplow, Listen man, we went out of our way to do you a fucking favor.  Now you need to do something for us, right? Remember the deal?

That must have gotten the best of his sense of honor because he said, Goddammit, you’re right. You’re right. He looked serious for about five seconds and said, Alright I’ll do it, but this squares us.

Mark said, Yeah, sure it will. Just make sure you get both copies of the write up from her room.

He said, If they’re in her room, I’ll get ‘em. What’s the kid’s name?

Alexander. Bart Alexander. Don’t forget.

The RA on the second floor told Mark that all RAs turned in their exception reports and write-ups to the Hall Director on the final Wednesday of the month, which left us only about a day or so to get the report out of her room. Every form had two duplicates for a total of three copies. Bart had one copy with his signature, one went to the RAs file, and the other went to the Hall Director for use in the formal hearing. The RA generally filed the report and never worried about it again until they were called in to testify on the incident. Sometimes there was no need for testimony and the whole incident was forgotten in the campus stretch between Orientation Day to midterms to finals. If Snowplow could get the two copies out of her room before the meeting on Wednesday, my boy Bart would likely be home free and would owe us one hell of a favor.

The quick skinny is that Snowplow did it but he got into more trouble doing it than what we were trying to solve. The plan was for this bulbous-nosed meathead to call the RA on Sunday night, ask her to go out and get some dinner, come back to her room, and start drinking. We weren’t sure how exactly that would be accomplished on a Sunday night but Snowplow was adamant he could do it and we left it to him.

We didn’t tell the ass not to get butt fucking drunk before he even got to her room. He got there, sloppy as hell, the door open, and she must have been in the bathroom which was six doors down from her room. This gave him about four minutes to investigate her room for the write-ups. He found them in her desk drawer in a folder marked Hall Meetings. There were four other sets of write-ups in there. Snowplow grabbed Bart’s papers, folded them up and shoved them into his pocket just as she walked back in the room.

He woke up naked next to her Monday morning. She had no roommates so no one but the Magistrates knew and since it pertained to official Magistrate business, a secret was a secret and something we held deadly serious. We didn’t hear anything from Snowplow until finals week, when he told us the RA was pregnant with his baby. He came to us for help with the situation but there were levels that even the Magistrates wouldn’t sink beneath. Bart was home free and we wouldn’t waste much time in collecting on the favor. I heard a few years back that Snowplow married the RA and they’ve been together ever since, plowing the snowy interstate routes of Eastern Ohio. Life take some jagged turns sometimes.

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The Others

The plan involved Phil and his girlfriend. The poor guy had run up a three hundred dollar phone bill his first month there, talking to her about her stupid high school life, trying to explain what college was like to her, both of them speaking totally different languages from totally different countries. It turned out that the nights she wasn’t home talking to him (every other one), she was out with the starting senior quarterback, giving the guy blowjobs in the backseat of his Cavalier after every Friday night football game. Phil heard from one of his good friends who still went to school there and he was crushed. Mark still had Snowplow’s key fob and we were going to put it to use.

We talked Phil into going back to Columbus for his high school’s Homecoming weekend. On the ride there, Mark and I got high and Phil ran through his collection of Metallica CDs. Mark stayed busy cleaning his potato gun and fashioning a new pipe weapon out of a steel bar he had pulled from a campus dumpster. The strapping tape was wound, the music was cranked and we were all feeling good. The late night phone calls had stopped.

We sat in the stands of the Homecoming game where Phil’s girlfriend wiggled her little cheerleading ass and her quarterback boy toy threw for eighty yards. Phil hadn’t told her he was coming and we sat on the visitor’s side so as not to attract any attention. With one minute left on the game clock, we headed out to the player’s parking lot, stopping off at the truck for the potato gun, the wrapped pipe, a flashlight, and Phil’s Polaroid instant camera.

There was a dense growth of trees that we hid in until about an hour after game time when, sure as shit, here comes Phil’s girlfriend and the master jock. The guy’s walk telegraphed that it was his sole responsibility for the team’s win that night, a prideful ambulation that began from and ended at his penis. We waited until they had been in the car for about ten minutes, seeing her head occasionally bobbing up, Kurt Cobain belting out My girl, my girl; don’t lie to me through the cracked back window. Mark readied the potato gun and after the calibration was complete, he passed the gun to Phil. He said aim at the back window and when you’re ready, push the button on the butane torch. Phil nodded, those ten minutes had been damn hard on him.

Mark and I snuck up to the car; it was the only one in the lot by that time.  We were ducked down and waiting.  We waited for about two minutes that felt like twenty and finally the itch got the better of Phil.  The window exploded, startling me and moving Mark into action.  From inside the car came a masculine, What the fuck? The girl opened the door and ran toward the school, gone with the wind.

Mark opened the back door of the car, pulled the grunting meat head out by his hair, jerked his head up to his mouth and said Hello, motherfucker. The kid struggled as well as he could, even managed a decent shot to Mark’s neck. But Mark, built like a panzer, wasn’t fazed. The pipe went up, down, up, then down. The white strapping tape was muted red by the third descent. Phil’s girlfriend was screaming from the school, making a hell of a racket. We needed to speed things up and I looked over and saw Phil, still hidden in the bushes like we told him to. I told Mark to get the flashlight.

Mark pulled a small flashlight from his pocket and shined it on the kid’s face.  I picked up the Polaroid from the grass by the back tire of the Cavalier. I pointed the camera at the bloody dumbass, knocked out cold on the grass, and fired off a picture—proof.  I looked to the bushes again and said come on dude! Vengeance had once again been served and we all headed back to the truck.

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The Arrival, Cont.

Mark extended his hand and told me his name, not bothering to ask for my own.  I have found that if someone is worth their salt as a future friend, you can learn what you need to know about after three minutes of dialogue and I liked Mark instantly, a complete sense of comfort that would grow into a love between friends that can’t really be expressed except to say that if I tried here it would only come across as a bad narrative poem, so I’ll leave it at that.

Phil extended his hand and gave me his name, confirmed we both lived in Columbus, and asked if I could buy him some beer that night. I told them my own name and we shot the shit while I helped them finish putting up their posters.  Mark brought out a neon beer sign and plugged it in, a sign that would create a distinctive glow, serving us as a lighthouse beacon the many times we were to walk Main Street inebriated, looking for the way back home. Mark would always say, that’s me up there and point to the purple room on the third floor. My own room distinctive only in that Malcolm and I put our cold drinks on the ledge in the winter because we didn’t have a refrigerator. That’s me, I’d say and point to the ledge with the half-empty Mountain Dew and Arizona Iced Tea bottles.

I had been in their room for about 45 minutes when my roommate came back. The three of us had put up their wall decorations, pushed the clothes into two more respectable piles, and hooked up the Sega to the 13” combo TV/VCR. I cracked open one of the sodas Phil brought and was sitting in the puke brown easy chair Mark’s mom got at the Goodwill the day before. The first thing I thought when I saw my roommate was black was, cool. Malcolm walked with an air of dignity that can only belong to those who’ve been told they were beautiful their whole lives. I eventually learned he was from a good family with strong moral roots, they looked out for each other, gave what they had for what was needed, the stuff that makes America work after all the bullshit about pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps fades from the echo.

I walked back across the hall to my room and said, Hey man, my name’s Jeremy.  I’m your roommate. He would later tell me that when he saw my full name on the roommate cards they send in late summer, he knew I had to be white. I laughed and we hit it off like champs. He was happy to hear I’d be turning 21 in a couple of weeks and would be able to buy him liquor. After a couple comfortable minutes of conversation, I excused myself and told him I’d let him get settled. We shook hands and the rest is what follows.

The Pep Rally

I talked Mark and Phil into going with me to the opening day pep rally. I had never attended campus events when I went to the University of Cincinnati, the fraternity taking up all my spare time as far as things like that went. I thought I’d be a true member of the campus community and Phil and Mark were both as ignorant as I was about what this whole college living thing was all about. So, we went.

We walked in that hot August sun that scorches grass albino and on the way there I pulled out my dugout and lit up. After taking a hit, I offered it to Phil who put his hands up in a, I don’t mess with it gesture, but Mark accepted. We were both stoney G by the time we got to the pep rally and being in the presence of all those people really started making me paranoid. By the time the band came in whomping and banging, I was ready to leave. Phil was watching the crowd for cleavage and Mark and I were both red eyed and I could tell he was thinking the same thing I was. I gestured toward the open double door and he nodded. I nudged Phil and shouted in his ear that we were leaving. He nodded and said something incomprehensible because the horns started up. We pushed through people, some a little too hard when they wouldn’t give, and eventually we made it out of the gymnasium. When the door shut behind us, the absence of noise was completely welcome. I looked at my two comrades and they smiled back at me.  Phil said, I didn’t see any decent bitches in there, man. I nodded back and said, let’s walk. I patted my pocket with the Dugout and Mark smiled.

By leaving the auditorium,  we made a fork in the road choice that day, the question before us was are you a constituent member of this campus; one that will follow directions and cheer when a sign is raised, speak when your hand has been recognized, smile at your professor superiors and vote in all campus elections? By leaving the auditorium we were saying, no we will not to all of those things. We were breaking away and finding our own path, the true mark of the hero’s journey. The Third Floor Magistrates, as we would come to be known, would walk the BG campus like the Tribe of Abraham in the Old Testament and that rainy night when Mark died face down in the mud we would all understand exactly what the price of being the hero was.

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