Greek (Palm South University)

The decision I made long before I was ready to admit it to myself, if I were being honest.

Talking to Skyler earlier was the first time I was ready to admit it out loud, and Erin took her place tonight, asking me all the hard questions and not letting me change the subject until I answered them.

I know what I have to do.

But I also know it will kill me to do it.

In my daze, I don’t realize Erin is screaming and Cassie is having a full-on panic attack until I snap out of the trance my phone has me in. I close the screen and drop it to the cushion beside me, popping up and running over to Erin first.

“It’s not fucking fair! This whole system… this whole world is fucked!” she screams.

“Will you bitches shut up?!” Ashlei yells from inside the bathroom. “It’s impossible for a girl to poop with all this racket going on!”

Skyler gives me a look that says she’s got Cassie, so I grab Erin’s hand and lead her to the edge of the balcony, letting the fresh sea breeze calm us both. I don’t say anything, just hold her there and smooth my hand over her arm, letting her take a moment for whatever it is that’s going on.

She opens her mouth to say something when my ringtone sounds from the chair I was sitting on, and Erin and I both look at the screen, stilling at the sight of Jarrett’s name in bold above the new message.

My chest caves in on itself, and I close my eyes for a long moment before I open them to find Erin staring back at me.

“What are you going to do?” she asks, her voice just a whisper.

Before I can answer, Ashlei clears her throat from where she’s now standing in the middle of the balcony between us all. Her hair is a mess tied loosely on top of her head, her arm still slung up from the accident, and her face is ghostly pale.

She doesn’t say a word.

But when I spot what she’s holding in her hand, she doesn’t have to.

Her eyes lock on mine, and I exhale, stomach roiling for a whole new reason. Skyler is the first to say what I know we’re all thinking.

“Oh, shit.”

And Ashlei smiles, smiles so wide her eyes water in the process. She shakes her head, staring at the stick before finding my eyes first. Everything is silent somehow, the music from below muted, the ocean waves quiet, the universe balancing in the wake and waiting along with the rest of us.

“I’m pregnant,” she whispers.

And then she covers her mouth and cries.

Season and Series Finale

“PLEASE SAY SOMETHING.”

Cassie’s voice is weak, hoarse, pained as if she’s being tortured and I’m the one holding the whip.

All I can do is stare at the string of Christmas lights hanging above me in the Alpha Sigma courtyard, somehow immune to how freezing it is, and unable to hear the party raging inside. With finals next week, the brothers are letting loose and trying to have a little fun before they’re chained to their textbooks.

I imagined this call so differently.

I’ve been anxious to talk to Cassie since Thanksgiving, since I hit it out of the park meeting Chandler’s grandparents. Mr. Simmons was in a fraternity, too, when he was younger, and we bonded over our love of brotherhood. He had also been raised by his grandfather, so sharing stories about the lessons we learned and how we grew up only strengthened our easy friendship. Pair that with the fact that his wife, Mrs. Simmons, thought I was absolutely adorable and nearly fainted when I helped her clean up the kitchen and washed every dish instead of joining the other guys in the living room watching football?

It was a smash hit, a home run, an all-around win.

I had a job offer by the time we got on the plane to head home Sunday night.

I’d tried to call Cassie then, eager to share the news, but her service had been shoddy at the resort and I wasn’t surprised when the call didn’t go through. She was exhausted after her flight home yesterday, so our call had been short and sweet, and I told her I got the job with all the intention of filling her in on every single detail today.

This call was supposed to be excitement and celebration. It was supposed to be let’s shop for an apartment and oh, my God, we’re going to live together. It was supposed to be our Thanksgiving sacrifice paying off, and a new date marked on the calendar for when we’d be together again, and a moving truck rental and…

It was just supposed to be so happy.

Instead, it’s a heavy, hard fist to the gut.

“Adam, please,” she begs again when I don’t answer.