Within two weeks, Susannah was floating on a cloud. None of the minor grievances of life bothered her anymore. Her shower still ran out of warm water in the morning and the dryers in the dorm laundry room still sometimes ate her quarters. Her chemistry professor still insisted on assigning seats, which meant that she had to sit in the back of the room where it was hard to see what he wrote on the board. But none of that seemed to bother her much anymore. She was always smiling.
Susannah talked to Ben at least once a day, often on the phone but sometimes through texts and e-mails. Whenever she walked out of a classroom, her hand went straight to the phone in her bag, and her heart would leap whenever she saw a text message waiting from him. They had gone on three more dates, and while they weren't nearly as adventuresome or intimate as their second date, each was still just as thrilling in its own way as the time Ben had touched her naked breasts with his finger tips. When he took her hand in his at the movie theatre, she loved that he was willing to be so openly affectionate in public. And when he remembered her love of Cherry Coke during dinner on the 5th date, it showed he cared enough to pay attention to her.
Of course their dates weren't entirely PG rated. Ben had developed an obvious fondness for her breasts, something she liked to encourage for her own purposes by wearing tight or low cut tops. At every one of their dates, he had found some way to get her breasts free from her clothing, even if he had to be creative. After their fifth date, he had lifted her large, full breasts through the top of her dress while they were standing in front of her doorway. He suckled on her bare nipples right there in the hallway, before she finally got scared that they would get caught and pushed him away. But Ben was never pushy or insistent. Susannah made it clear that she didn't want to go any further with him, and he was always respectful of that. She hoped Ben's restraint demonstrated that he really didn't think she was easy.
But Susannah was too young and inexperienced to know that happiness always attracts your enemies like sharks drawn to blood in the water. If something makes you happy, it can also make you sad, and the worst kind of person always remembers that. At the point in Susannah's life where she had found her giddy happiness with Ben, Olive was that worst kind of person.
Olive was waiting for Susannah when Susannah arrived at the sorority house for her weekly meeting with her pledge class. Susannah had barely gotten in the side door used by pledges when Olive startled her by saying, "Well if it isn't Miss Prude, all smiles thinking about her boyfriend."
Susannah blinked, her eyes adjusting to the dimly lit hallway, and she found Olive waiting with one of the older sisters. The sister with Olive was one of the seniors who loved to be a real jerk to pledges. Every time she talked, it was all about how freshmen didn't know anything and irritated her all the time because they hadn't learned as much or done as much as she had. The two sisters were trying to look casual, lounging in the hallway, but it was clear they had been laying in wait for Susannah.
"Hello Olive," Susannah replied, trying to be as respectful as possible.
"Oh, why so serious all of a sudden?" Olive asked mockingly. "Does Miss Prude not like talking about her boyfriend?"
"No," Susannah replied uncertain, "it's just I'm not sure if he's my..."
Susannah had wanted to try to walk past the two sisters and get to the safety of her meeting, but the other sister stepped in front of Susannah and called out, "Whoa! Where you trying to go in such a hurry? You still have time. We're just trying to talk to one of our pledges, who should be really pleased that us older and wiser sisters want to make sure she's doing okay."
"Yeah," chimed in Olive. "We're just trying to look out for you. I mean, that stupid Beta pledge could just be filling you with a line of garbage because he thinks it'll be easy to get you to suck his cock again."
"Ben's not like that," Susannah tried.
But Olive just spat back, "Ben has a penis like every other boy I know, I've seen it. And every other boy I know lets their little head do their thinking instead of their big head. I mean, he said he was a virgin. What if you're just the first female to ever touch his penis, and now he'll say anything to get you to do it again?"
"Yeah, has your BOYFRIEND told you if he'd every gotten a blowjob before?" asked the other sister.
Susannah hesitated. She had promised Ben that she wouldn't repeat anything she had told him in confidence. But she had also been told that sisters kept no secrets from each other, and pledges were especially not supposed to keep secrets from the sisters. She figured it might be okay because this wasn't really sharing something specific that he had said, so she responded, "I guess he's said it wasn't his first time." She had thought she was defending Ben by showing that their accusation about his intentions were false.
But seeing the indecision on Susannah's face, Olive sensed a weakness. She decided to press by asking, "Well how do you know he's not making it up? What did he tell you about his supposed other blowjobs? Did he tell you how they happened?"
Now Susannah was completely torn. She knew Ben wouldn't want these self-serving, mean spirited bitches to know about his embarrassing encounter with Maggie. But she wasn't supposed to withhold information when directly questioned by a sister. Her mind raced to try to come up with some sort of half answer that might satisfy Olive but wouldn't betray Ben's trust in her. Seeing the wheels behind Susannah's eyes racing out of control, Olive decided to press further. "Come on, pledge, what did he tell you about these other blowjobs that he got?"
Flustered, Susannah pushed past the two sisters and walked as quickly as decently possible to the room for her pledge meeting. She breathed a sign of relief when she had walked through the doorway and into the safety of the meeting room. But her relief was short lived. Just before the meeting, Susannah heard Olive's voice coming loudly from just outside the meeting room door. She was arguing with Mary, Susannah's pledge mother. Susannah could only make out pieces of the conversation.
"I don't think it's such a big deal that she wouldn't tell you..." Mary said, trying to defend her pledge.
"She shouldn't have secrets from us!" Olive hissed.
"Honestly Olive, why do you care..." and that was about all Susannah could hear. The rest of the pledges didn't know what was being discussed outside of the room, so most of them didn't care. Their conversations kept Susannah from hearing what was happening outside.
When Mary entered the room, she made no mention of her conversation with Olive. The meeting proceeded as normal. Susannah thought she had been spared, at least for a little while. But after the meeting, Mary caught Susannah before she exited the room.
"I guess you know why I wanted to talk to you," Mary began after the rest of the pledges had left. "Olive told me you refused to give her some details about your new boyfriend." Susannah tried to say something, but Mary cut her off. "He seemed like a nice guy to me, considering the circumstances of how we met. And I know you like him. I also know Olive can be difficult sometimes. I have a real sister, back home, as you know, and she can be difficult too. But I know all my sisters, by blood and by sorority, have my best interests at heart. Sometimes they can be difficult, but I know in the end they want what's best for me.
"So even though I may disagree with how strongly Olive feels about this issue, I have to recommend that you tell her what she wants to know." With that, Mary gave Susannah a squeeze on the arm and then walked out of the room.
Susannah's heart fell, not just because she was upset that her pledge mother had disagreed with her. She was upset because she had already decided during the meeting that she would never tell Olive what she had promised to Ben she would keep a secret.
Susannah tried to leave the house before Olive could find her again, but Olive was waiting once more at the side door.
"I don't know what you're thinking about doing, Miss Prude," she hissed maliciously at Susannah when she saw her, "but I do know that Mary agrees you should tell me."
"And what are you going to do? Torture me until I talk," Susannah replied angrily.
"Don't get smart with me pledge," Olive responded. "I'll just get you bounced right out of this sorority. After all your hard work, you'll be done, just like that."
Susannah sighed. "What do you want, Olive?"