She had just passed her first weekend of college. On Saturday she, Jill, and Megan had hiked the Poplar Fork Trail, watched part of the football game from their dorm window, and in the evening gone off campus to Sweet Frog for customized yogurt sundaes.
Megan had gone to an early mass on Sunday morning, but the subject of church attendance had been avoided by the two Protestants. Holly and Jill had slept in, and all three had spent most of Sunday studying. Late in the afternoon, they went next door to the McGinn Recreation Center and worked out. Now it was Monday again, and Holly was hoping Kevin would appear, along with his helpful questions. As she opened the loft door, she saw him already waiting for her.
She sat down next to him and was soon caught up in an explanation of the bones, tendons and ligaments of the foot and ankle. She exhausted her notes and knowledge well before time to leave for freshman comp, and he started a new subject.
“I live in a fraternity house over on Orchard Street, just the first right off Grand Boulevard. My frat brothers and I are having a little party on Friday evening. Would you like to come? It may be a bit boring,” he admitted, “and totally drug and alcohol free, not even a DJ.”
The word “fraternity” raised red flags like poppies in spring. She had been warned about frat parties by her older brother, Darren, who was at Chapel Hill. He was definitely overprotective and had unilaterally demanded that she “never go to frat parties.” Her father had heard Darren’s imperative and seconded it. At orientation she had heard many rules pertaining to “Greek social events,” but she didn’t remember them now. Kevin was a clean-cut sort, and not at all bad looking. He was obviously a serious student, and had specifically stated no drugs or alcohol. Last week he mentioned that he attended the Baptist Church adjoining campus on College Street. But those mental red flags fluttered still. So Holly responded noncommittally. “If I did come, I’d want to bring my friends, Jill and Megan.”
Kevin liked the idea. “My frat brothers won’t mind; bring them along. I’d like to meet your friends.”
Holly Billingham, Jill Kelly, and Megan Clery were old friends. They grew up together in an upper-middle-class neighborhood, Asheford Green, in Concord, a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina. They had often gone to different schools, and did not share many of the same special interests. They had, nevertheless, been friends as long as they could remember. During the school year they had often gone weeks without seeing one another. But they had always spent a lot of time together during summers. Their parents were friends, and Holly’s brother, Darren, dated Jill’s sister, Katie.
During their senior year of high school, they were delighted to discover that the others were also applying to Blue Ridge State. Holly wanted to be accepted as a nursing major, Jill was hoping for interior design, and Megan sought a place in the Reich College of Education. They decided that they would try to room together if they were all accepted, but they worried that two of them would get in and not the third. Amazingly, they had all been accepted, and now they were suitemates, along with a girl from Asheville, Lauren Davis, in Gorman Hall. They had loved their dormitory right away. They were on ninth floor and just across the street from Kidd Brewer Stadium—right in the middle of football hoopla. Their parents liked that they would be together, for there existed mutual respect among these families. The three girls had survived high school together relatively unscathed. The parents thought they would be good for one another.
About six thirty Monday evening Holly brought the troubling subject up. The three were eating in Privette Hall, the dining commons near their dormitory. Before placing the forkful of mashed potatoes in her mouth, Holly said, “Do you remember me telling you about the guy I’ve been studying anatomy with in the solarium? Well, today he asked us to a fraternity party on Friday evening.”
In the silence, Holly recognized the two other fields of red flags springing up. Jill eventually said, “I’m pretty sure my Dad would blow a gasket if he knew I went to a frat party.”
Holly reassured her with, “Kevin said that there wouldn’t be any alcohol or drugs, and it would be just a small, quiet event” (borrowing the PC term from orientation and carefully avoiding “party”).
Megan, likewise leery, asked, “Where is the frat house?”
Holly replied, “It’s just behind King Street. I know a little trail between Hubbub and Poplar Bagelry. We could quickly walk over. If we cross the Raley parking lot, walk the half block up Blue Ridge Street, and up the little shortcut, we’d be in the house’s backyard in five minutes.”
Jill asked, “What’s Kevin like?”
Holly looked more confident than she felt. “He’s cute and clean-cut. He seems like a nice guy. He takes anatomy seriously.”
Then Megan offered the persuasive facts when she said, “My dad was in Kappa Gamma Pi, and he’s still good friends with those guys. To hear them talk, they must have been pretty nerdy. They’re all serious Catholics, and I know the fraternity volunteered together at a soup kitchen in a church basement. They were at East Carolina, but they were not rowdy.”
Megan’s father was now the principal of the large Catholic high school in Charlotte, where her stepmother was a reading specialist. None of the girls could imagine Dr. Clery as anything but law abiding and responsible. If Meg’s dad was a frat boy, they couldn’t all be bad.
In spite of a unanimous sense of reluctance, they agreed to go. But they pledged to each other that if any one of them wanted to leave, they would all go with no questions asked. It was also agreed that no one was to speak of the “event” with anybody from Concord.
Chapter 6
But you shall do nothing to the young woman; there is in the young woman no sin deserving of death, for just as when a man rises against his neighbor and kills him, even so is this matter . . . The young woman cried out, but there was no one to save her.
—Deuteronomy 22:26–27
All four girls from Gorman 924 had sushi together in Privette on Friday around six o’clock. They invited Lauren, their roommate from Asheville, to go the frat party with them. But she was a flutist and had her first college performance that evening. Reaching River Street after dinner, Holly, Jill, and Megan crossed, heading for the Raley parking lot. Lauren went left toward the Troyhill Music Center.
In less than five minutes the three were off campus, through the restaurant parking lot, up the fifty feet of trail through some dense trees, and knocking on the front door of a large brick house on Orchard Street. The frat house had a well-used look, but was in decent repair and very tidy. Kevin Parsons answered the door, and when the girls were shown in, all red flags were lowered. Some good bluegrass was playing at a modest decibel. They could see into the living room where a group of seven student-types, with their backs to the newcomers and facing a large TV, were playing Scene It? Kevin said, “I’ll introduce you in a few minutes when they finish this game. Would you like some punch?” He was already drinking some.
A large cut-glass punch bowl and matching cups were on the dining table, along with a bowl of hummus and a basket of pita chips. Megan recognized the punch bowl as one just like her grandmother’s, surprisingly old fashioned for a bunch of young guys—but certainly cheap in a thrift store. Jill was impressed by the presentation, she couldn’t imagine her brother, Trevor, making things look this nice. Lemon slices were floating in the bowl of carbonated punch, probably some soda and orange juice, thought Holly.
Kevin served Holly first, and she took a sip. Jill and Megan watched for any sign from Holly of its being spiked. They all planned on drinking modestly after they were 21, but they didn’t want to get in trouble for underage drinking now. Holly simply smiled reassuringly, and they all had some. As Holly was taking her second sip, she had a fleeting remembrance of a warning given at orientation. Kevin began passing around some high quality darts, and invited them to throw at the big, pub-style board on the dining room wall. After a few minutes