March 2022 - College Gas 101 (Chapter 5) (Patreon)

Dickinson University didn’t genuinely have “sororities” and “fraternities”. Instead, if one wanted to have a good party, one would go to a suite. The suites typically housed anyone who was a junior or senior. A sophomore could get a suite, but that was relatively rare. Unlike the usual dorms with two people in it, the suites had four people – two rooms for two people connected by a common area. Suites were much more spacious and even had their own bathrooms. They were more like small apartments, and Emilia was enthralled by this when she walked in. She didn’t feel like she was in college anymore, but in a penthouse somewhere in the city.

The music was so loud that it was difficult to hear anybody, but Julie somehow managed to introduce them to the other freshmen. There was Tess, an Indian girl who wore short-shorts and a tank top. Rebecca, wild red hair with freckles. Shannon, a white-haired girl with nose rings and tattoos. Emilia didn’t catch the names of the rest of the team, as it was all jumbled up and she was too nervous to focus. The men in the suite were all from the men’s rugby team. This guy named Rob right away took notice of Emilia and asked her questions. Emilia was, again, too nervous to focus, but she knew he was hitting on her. He was a towering 6”2 and looked more like he should have been a basketball player. He looked a bit dopey, wearing his baseball hat backwards and having a few zits. He wasn’t at all rude. He didn’t hit on her like most guys did. He asked things like, “Where you from?” and “What other sports do you play?” and “What do you like to do?” almost like he was intentionally speed dating.

Then he said, over the loud bass, “WE’RE PLAYING BEER PONG! WANNA PLAY?”

He and some other guys were playing beer pong in the center of the common room. They had set up a large white table and filled it with red solo cups. Emilia had heard of this legendary game before, but never knew how to play. She nodded. “YEAH!”

Rita had been by Emilia’s side this entire time. She gripped Emilia’s arm and said, “ARE YOU SURE THIS IS A GOOD IDEA?”

Emilia said, “I’LL MAKE SURE TO SET UP THE CUPS MYSELF!”

She went over to where the cooler was and picked out the Miller Lites herself and helped Rob fill up cups for the game. She made sure Rob didn’t do any funny stuff when pouring, and was observant the entire time.

Beer pong was fairly simple but varied in specific rules from place to place. You lined up solo cups in a pyramid formation at each end of the table, and filled up each cup with about halfway or a quarter of the way with beer. Teams of two took turns throwing a ping-pong ball into any of the opposing team’s cups. If they succeeded, someone from the losing team had to drink all the beer from that cup. There was also a separate solo cup filled with water to clean the ball if it fell on the floor or anywhere else that was dirty. If the ball bounced on the table and rolled between the two teams, anyone could reach and grab it. Blocking was possible in some forms of the game, but apparently the Dickinson rugby team didn’t recognize blocking.

Rob already got a ball into one of their cups on the first round. Emilia and Rita exchanged a glance, wondering which of them would drink the beer. Emilia decided to go for it and started drinking. She misunderstood at first and only took a couple sips and put the cup down.

Rob yelled laughing, “Na, na! You gotta drink the WHOOOLE thing.”
 “OH,” Emilia said. “The WHOLE thing?”

“Yeah!”

Rita gave her a worried look, biting her lip over and over. Emilia shrugged and smiled at her. She drank the Miller Lite, and it wasn’t exactly the best-tasting beer in the world. She wished they had Corona. It wasn’t a lot of beer, so she slammed the cup down in seconds, wiped her chin, and said, “Alright, let’s go.”

The game went on, rather painstakingly compared to most other games, but Rob was patient. His roommate Lawrence wasn’t as patient, and kept saying things like, “Man, this is taking forever. Girls suck at this.” But Rob would retort, “Shut up, man. It’s their first time.” Emilia was glad for that at least.

Rita’s first chug didn’t go so well. She choked and coughed and burped out loud. Thankfully, nobody heard her over the music.

“You okay?” Emilia asked.

Rita nodded. She continued chugging, and looked like she wanted to prove herself by finishing.

“Oh my God,” she said. “I don’t know how you drank three of these already.”

Emilia felt a little full but other than that was surprisingly sober. It may have been the fact that she already had a big dinner earlier. They said that eating a lot would slow the effects of alcohol.

The girls were losing quickly. Rita had to pick up a cup but stared at it with a frown. She leaned to Emilia’s ear and said, “I don’t think I can do this. Can you drink for me?”

Emilia nodded. An excuse to drink more!

But before she downed it, she said to Rita, “But you have to PROMISE me to be the one to look out for me. Got it?”

Rita nodded.

Emilia downed the drink. She was getting the hang of chugging, but at the last second it nearly went down the wrong pipe so she started coughing. She belched aloud, but then realized that the music was so loud that nobody could hear her.

I could rip ass right now and nobody would hear it, she thought. Well, unless it stank. But that means cropdusting then!

The layout of all the beer looked intimidating at first, but in reality, they just used up roughly 3 cans of Miller Lite to fill up all of them halfway. Emilia ended up drinking the rest of their cups, while Rita had drunk only one and a half.

They ended the game only having scored three cups on Rob’s team. Despite this, Rob nodded and said, “Cool!”

Emilia belched as a response, but she covered her mouth and nobody heard how monstrous it was. It was deeply relieving. She had built up a lot of gas while playing the game, and was finally letting it all out. She had three more equally as loud and long belches, and her stomach deflated like a balloon.

This is amazing!she thought. NOBODY knows I’m burping right now! Well, maybe, but everyone is too drunk or not really paying attention and can’t hear me either way!

Just then, the music stopped. Emilia was in the middle of letting out one final relieving belch, when everyone heard her. She was still letting it out and she made heads turn all around. Rita’s eyes widened and she gasped.

BOOOOORRRRRRREEEEeeeeEEEEEoooOoOOOoOOORrrrrPPP!

It was her most relieving belch yet. She was now empty and could drink more, but she was devastated by the music suddenly stopping and everyone looking at her. She turned red and clasped her mouth, ready for all the chastising.

Instead, what followed was a loud cheer. Both guys and girls raised their cups and said, “Yeah!” and “Good one!” and “Whooo!”. A few others clapped. Then they simply moved on and turned to the reason the music stopped – Julie was standing on a chair ready to make an announcement. She laughed at Emilia and said, “Perfect. Nice. Anyway. Welcome to the first rugby party of the year. WHOOO!”

Everyone cheered to the point where Emilia and Rita had to cover their ears.

“You know what that means? Freshmen line up here. Tradition has us do…THE ULTIMATE CHALLENGE!”

“Oh God…” Rita murmured.

Emilia regretted playing beer pong. Had she known they were going to do something else, most likely involving drinking, she would have waited.

They lined up in front of Julie along with Tess, Rebecca, and Shannon. They all looked nervous and cowered a few steps from each other.

“Come on, fill in, don’t be shy,” Julie said, urging them to get closer.

The boys cleared the table where they played beer pong and placed it in front of the freshmen. They then lined up 8 solo cups filled with beer down either end of the table, for a total of 16 cups. Several other boys also set up a new white table similarly next to that one. As Emilia watched them set the table, she realized that they were turning the entire common room into an obstacle course. Across the two tables with all the solo cups was a smaller, wooden table that they had set up with four bongs. Emilia’s heart jumped when she saw them, starting to get really nervous. Adjacent to that table were several unopened cases of 12-packs of a beer called Beer30. Then across THAT in the hallway leading to the bathroom were four boxes of jigsaw puzzles. They seemed to be setting something up in the bathroom, but Emilia couldn’t see, and neither could the other freshmen.

“Alllright,” Julie said. “Here are the rules. First round is Flip Cup. If you haven’t played it, it’s fairly simple. Each of you line up at the head of the table here and when I say GO you have to chug each drink down the line. BUT the catch is that after you finish the drink, you have to place it upside down with the edge hanging slightly off the table like Rob is showing you there. Then you have to flip the cup from the edge so that it stands right-side-up on the table. If you fail, you have to put the cup upside down back on the edge and try again. You CAN’T move to the next drink unless you flip it right-side-up.”

“What?” Rebecca hissed. “That’s impossible.”

Rita turned to her. “I mean, the probability is not that--”

“Shush!” Julie yelled. “Next, you will have to go to the second table and take ten hits of weed from the bong. After that you have to drink 12 cans of Beer30.”

“Oh my God,” Rita murmured. “That’s impossible.”

Rebecca turned to her. “Beer30 is really diluted beer. It’s practically made of--”

“SHUSH! The second to last challenge is to finish a jigsaw puzzle. The moment you finish the jigsaw puzzle, you will run to the bathroom and chug a full 12oz beer that was poured into a sneaker.”

All four girls turned to Julie with a disgusted look on their faces.

“What the fuck?” Tess shouted.

“That sneaker belonged to the previous captain. Every year the senior captain leaves behind her shoe for the new freshmen to chug beer out of. The first person to reach the shoe and chug from it wins.”

Emilia asked, “What do we win?”

Julie smirked in a way that made her nervous.

"You should be worried about what happens when you lose.”

Rita looked like she was freaking out at this point. She stared at the ground; eyes wide.

In the midst of all the cheers and jeers, Rob came up to the girls and said, voice shaking, “H-hey, if any of you can’t do this it’ll be okay too. It’s not like we’re going to fuck with you or anything.”

“Aw, shut up, Rob!” Lawrence shouted from the back.

Julie then jumped down from the chair and spoke to the girls. In a very chill voice she said, “Yeah, I mean, whatever. If you fail, you fail.”

“Really?” Rita said.

Julie winked. “Maybe. You’ll see. Just make sure to win. There can only be ONE winner.”

Rita gulped hard. When Julie was out of earshot, Emilia said, “Go against me in Flip Cup. You won’t have to feel weird about losing. And you can always keep failing Flip Cup on purpose in order to lose.”

“Do you really trust her? She won’t tell us what happens if we lose. What if it’s something horrible?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think she’s that--”

“GO!” Julie shouted.

The two girls jumped and faced each other off at Flip Cup. Tess and Rebecca were already downing their drinks. Emilia and Rita looked at each other in acknowledgement, and then started.