Chapter XI – Fallout
In a house with no privacy, some secrets still burn louder than the rest.
The semester lurched forward, though for Ethan it felt less like weeks passing and more like the same day on repeat. Wake up groggy in McClintock, shuffle through classes, pledge duties, study hall, line-ups, sleep too little, do it again.
Except nothing felt steady anymore. Not after Eli. The line between ordinary and impossible had blurred, and Ethan walked around with the secret buzzing in his chest like a trapped hornet.
The library fluorescents hummed above the long table where six pledges slumped with notebooks and half-dead pens. Ethan tried to focus on his Biology diagrams, the Krebs Cycle this time, but the lines blurred. His pen drifted into loops and spirals that turned into accidental initials.
Connor leaned so close their arms touched. “You’re out of it, Harris,” he whispered, smirking.
Ethan shook himself. “What?”
“Self-brain last night?” Connor said with a conspiratorial grin.
Marco groaned. “Jesus, Connor, not everything’s about your dick.”
Teddy snorted, socks off, big toe poking through a hole. “He’s just mad he can’t go five minutes without jerking it.”
Connor raised his hands in mock surrender, but his knee kept bouncing against Ethan’s. Ethan tried to shift, but there was nowhere to go. Six bodies jammed together in one row, elbows touching, knees bumping, breath sour with cigarette smoke.
“Anyway,” Connor pressed on, “you see who Travis went upstairs with last night? Anne, that Kingston brunette—one of Catherine’s crew.”
Teddy rolled his eyes. “She went upstairs with Luke two weeks ago. Trav’s just mopping up.”
Marco smirked, chewing his pen cap. “She’s been upstairs with half the house. Don’t act like you wouldn’t.”
Connor leaned back, grinning. “I heard she’s the type to narrate while she’s blowing you. Like Dick Vitale giving a play-by-play.”
Laughter shook the table. Teddy clapped his hand over his mouth, shoulders shaking. Ethan kept his eyes fixed on his notes, barely registering who Anne was. But the others lived for it.
Connor jabbed Ethan’s ribs suddenly. “Bet Harris has a crush on Anne.”
Ethan’s stomach flipped, but he managed a weak laugh. The others roared, convinced they’d found his secret.
It was cover. They didn’t see him watching Eli.
That Thursday night Ethan carried a sack of McDonald’s up to the house, grease bleeding through the paper. The place was already alive: music thumping, girls laughing too loudly, brothers barking orders.
The hallway upstairs was a crush of bodies. Doors half-open, smoke curling out, pledges sprawled on the floor in undershirts, shoulders pressed, feet tangled. Someone snored against a doorframe, shoes still on.
Jason’s room stood cracked. Inside, Jason leaned forward at his desk, hand brushing past Tyler’s side. Tyler stood shirtless, towel slung around his neck, posture taut. Jason’s arm lingered just long enough to mean something before he pulled back. Tyler didn’t move. Their eyes met, unreadable, and then the door closed.
Ethan kept walking, pulse in his throat.
At the far end, Travis bellowed at a video game, sweat dripping down his chest. Luke laughed so hard he toppled backward, legs tangled with pledges wedged together on the couch. One sprawled with his head in another’s lap, too tired or too drunk to care. Limbs crossed, breath hot, the whole scene soaked in sweat and beer.
This was what passed for normal the weekend before Thanksgiving, the football games over, the bands done for the semester. The row still thrummed, but the parties moved upstairs.
Friday night, Connor sat cross-legged on the kitchen counter, pizza box balanced on his lap. “We’re basically unpaid butlers,” he announced, waving a crust like a pointer.
“Speak for yourself,” Teddy said through a mouthful, grease shining on his lip. “I’m a Zen master of cleaning toilets.”
“Jersey guys don’t clean,” Marco added, leaning against the fridge. “We supervise.”
They cracked up, voices bouncing off tile. Empty beer cans rattled on the counter when Connor stomped his heel for emphasis.
“Don’t drift off like that in lineup, Harris,” Connor jabbed Ethan in the ribs with the crust. “Clay will have you puking into a trash can before you can blink.”
“You’ve probably got it worse,” Teddy said, pointing his slice at Ethan. “Harris has a thing for that Kingston brunette, right? Catherine’s friend.”
Ethan froze for half a second, then managed a weak laugh. Connor whooped, convinced he was right. “Knew it! That faraway look when she’s around—always the girls that get you.”
They all howled. Ethan let them. Better they thought it was Anne. It was safer that way.
As he was making the rounds upstairs the bathroom door banged open and the smell hit first: bleach mixed with something sour. A brother sat on the toilet in the stall with no door, pants around his ankles, flipping through a dog-eared Barely Legal. There were stacks of old magazines balanced on the back of the tank — Perfect 10, Maxim, covers curling from steam. Ethan kept his eyes forward and headed to the sink. Another guy stood there shirtless, razor buzzing as he trimmed hair at the porcelain. Dark stubble speckled the basin. He caught Ethan’s eye in the cracked mirror. “Big date tonight. Gotta stay groomed. Don’t look so shocked.”
Steam poured out of the shower room. Two brothers stumbled out wrapped in towels, one snapping the other’s ass hard enough to echo. Both laughed like it was nothing.
Nobody flinched. Nobody questioned it.
It was frat-normal. Absurd. And Ethan couldn’t stop the hum under his skin.
Back in the Living Room, Catherine perched on Eli’s lap like she owned him, head tipped back in laughter, pearls flashing under the light. Eli leaned into her, mask in place, cigarette perfect between his fingers.
“…swear she told me to choke her harder,” one bragged, laughing at his own story.
Catherine swatted Eli’s arm. “Listen to them,” she said, voice carrying. “God, boys are disgusting.”
The group roared. Eli grinned wider, but when his eyes flicked across the room, they landed on Ethan. Just for a second. The corner of his mouth twitched like he’d forgotten to hold it steady.
Eli grinned wider, but when his eyes flicked across the room, they landed on Ethan.
Ethan dropped his gaze, pulse quickening.
Later, after Catherine announced that the boys were “too sketchy” and led her crew to see what was going on at the other houses, Eli quietly drew Ethan upstairs.
The door clicked shut. Eli pressed Ethan back against the desk, mouth urgent. They had a rhythm now, each knowing how to get the other’s heart racing. Eli pulled Ethan over to the bed, pushed him down hard and began taking his clothes off. In between removing his own. Ethan still couldn’t help to stare. It was fast, but sweet.
Afterward, they lay side by side, breath ragged. Eli stared at the ceiling, smoke drifting from his hand.
Ethan turned to face him, studying his profile while Eli played with the lighter. He started, but hesitated before finally speaking. “Can I ask you something?”
Eli’s jaw tightened. “Let’s not do this.”
A beat. “Go ahead.”
“What’s going on with Catherine?” Ethan whispered. “What does it mean?”
Eli tapped ash into the tray, eyes still fixed upward. “It doesn’t. Not really. It’s… what they expect. My parents. Her family. Everyone.”
Ethan’s chest ached. “Doesn’t it get exhausting?”
Eli laughed once, bitter and small. “All the fucking time.” He finally turned his head, but only halfway. “You don’t get it. I graduate in May. I’ve got interviews, family watching. I can’t—” He stopped, shaking his head. “Not here. Not now.”
Ethan’s voice thinned. “But what if—”
Eli cut him off quickly, too quickly. “Don’t.” Then softer, almost pleading:
“Don’t make this harder. Just…stay. Like this. Please”
They lay quietly, the distance between Eli’s public mask and private truth hanging painfully in the air, heavy with unspoken words and possibilities they both knew were likely unreachable.
When Ethan finally slipped out, pulse still hammering, he nearly collided with Tyler in the hall. Tyler stood damp from the showers, towel hanging around his neck. Their shoulders grazed, igniting a spark of panic in Ethan’s chest. Tyler’s eyes lingered, filled with cautious curiosity and a flash of recognition Ethan couldn’t ignore.
They both froze, caught in the awareness that something was dangerously close to surfacing, yet neither could risk speaking. Ethan wanted to say something, anything to dispel the tension, but fear clamped his throat shut. Tyler’s jaw tightened, silently acknowledging their shared discomfort. After a tense moment, Tyler looked away first and moved past, leaving Ethan rooted in the hallway, heart racing.
Back in McClintock, Ethan lay stiff, staring at the ceiling fan, replaying Catherine’s laugh, Eli’s cigarette smile, Tyler’s loaded glance.
He slipped a hand around the quarter and held it until the edge bit painfully into his palm.
Ethan sat up slowly, chest aching with contradiction. For a moment he believed Eli wanted it, for a moment he believed he didn’t. But beneath the masks and the fear, one thing was certain—Eli hadn’t been pretending.
The house roared faintly across the quad. Doors slammed, laughter carried through the night. Somewhere someone shouted a name that wasn’t his.
Ethan pressed the quarter deeper into his skin. He didn’t whisper this time; he just knew it. Whatever came next, it had meant something.
Want to know what Tyler and Jason were up to?
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OK, I have to say I really do not like Eli. He seems to just be playing with Ethan. I absolutely get that this is set in the 1990s and they are all closeted but Eli is shady.
I'm intrigued by Tyler.