This is (likely) the final chapter of Katie's story. If you're just now tuning in because (like me) you don't have patience for multi-chapter stories, this is the backstory: Katie is a nerdy new graduate student who arrives on campus hoping to finally make friends, but she ends up with a roommate, Maddie, who's more sadistic than her worst high school bullies. Maddie humiliates Katie with wedgies and spankings that become more humiliating and devastating with every passing week. In Pts. 2 and 3, Maddie's similarly attractive and cruel friends get involved. Those humiliations ultimately feel tame compared to those that follow in this chapter.
It would be a happier story if we could say that Katie's torments ended with the humiliations of that fall afternoon; indeed, it is difficult to imagine how things could have gotten much worse for her. But this story would sadly not be the truth.
In the aftermath of Maddie and her friends leaving a naked, humiliated Katie behind in her bedroom, things did seem to improve -- and rather drastically, at that. Katie spent that night in her room and did not leave until the following morning, petrified of what would be waiting for her on the other side of the door, but when she did, the apartment was quiet. Noting Maddie's absence, she did not leave the apartment that weekend, convinced that a more public humiliation would greet her if she stepped onto campus.
It was only that Sunday night when she encountered Maddie for the first time since her friends had hung Katie up by her underwear. She was standing in their shared kitchen, making a cup of tea; Katie, who had stepped quietly out of her room to go take a shower, instinctively clutched her towel, fearing Maddie would tear it from her and expose her naked body once more.
"Oh, hey Katie -- what's up?" Maddie said sweetly, and there was none of the taunting cruelty in her voice. Katie muttered something indistinct, staring at the floor, but as she washed her hair and later settled into bed, she contemplated Maddie's tone. Over the days thereafter, when Katie saw her roommate across a lecture hall or in the library, Maddie only smiled amicably, sometimes giving her a little wave. There were no embraces or invitations to hang out, no -- but nevertheless something had changed. After an adolescence of humiliation at the hands of cooler girls, Katie was adept at parsing tones and expressions for mock kindness, and here she heard none. Could it be that Maddie in fact felt
guilty
over how she'd embarrassed her roommate, and was seeking in her own passive way to make amends?
Over the weeks that followed, Katie felt some of her old confidence return to her. By early November, it had been nearly a month since the afternoon when she'd been brought to orgasm in a hanging wedgie, her most shameful fetishes exposed to a gaggle of cruel, gorgeous girls, and miraculously there had been no wedgies since -- not from Maddie, not from any of her friends.
On top of that, she had found herself spending several evenings a week in the library with Charlie Broadman, studying for the semester-end exams that were beginning to undeniably loom. It had been Charlie who had texted her in October, inviting her to come review their midterms together, and it had been Charlie who'd texted her many of the evenings since. He often brought snacks that the two of them shared, and as Katie's confidence slowly returned, she found herself making jokes and sharing droll observations as they ate Pringles and Reeses Cups -- jokes that Charlie unfailingly laughed at. Sometimes, she thought he seemed to be shifting closer to her in his seat; once or twice she could have sworn that their knees touched.
So it was not with dread but with tentative excitement that she sat in the first-year cohort's weekly seminar one afternoon in early November and listened to what Dave Carpenter had to say at the end of class.
"Alright, settle down, settle down," he said as the students stood to leave. "Before you get out of here -- some news." Katie's classmates fell quiet and looked up at him. "As some of you probably know, the American Association for Management Studies is having its annual conference on campus in two weeks. Some of you have research that you might feel prepared to present -- check the website for information on submissions. But more importantly for us as members of the Stanford department, we'll be hosting hundreds of our colleagues from across the country, and I use the word
host
sincerely."
Those around Katie fell quieter with shared intrigue. "They'll be on campus for the long weekend," Dave said, "and on that Saturday night, we'll be hosting the capstone event in the event hall on campus. It's tradition for one first-year student to be invited to make the introductory remarks, after which we'll be having a dinner and dance of sorts -- a social hour, they call it."
Excited murmurs erupted around Katie, and before she realized it she found her eyes looking across the room to where Charlie sat thoughtfully. A dance. She'd never been to a dance before -- she'd been too nerdy in high school to go to prom, and never attended any fraternity events in college -- and she had a sudden mental image of herself stepping down from the stage after giving the introductory remarks and meeting Charlie in the middle of the dance floor, where they would lock in a tender embrace. As if connected by some serendipitous telepathy, she looked across the room to Charlie to see him look up at her and give her a conspiratorial smile. She felt her face turn hot and did her best to give a playful smile back, and on the walk back to her apartment she felt as if she was floating on air.
Maddie's warmth toward Katie seemed to grow over the following week. The kind hellos and waves became more frequent, and the pleasantries they exchanged in their kitchen or living room came to feel more organic, more expected. Katie realized she was no longer stammering or blushing when Maddie addressed her, and that she no longer reflexively clenched her buttocks within her jeans when her roommate entered the room out of fear that she'd find herself yanked up off the ground by her underwear.
On the Tuesday afternoon before the weekend of the conference, Katie was standing to pack her backpack at the end of the first-year seminar when Maddie approached her. "Hey Kates, a few of us are going to grab drinks off-campus -- wanna come?"
For the first time, Katie did not even briefly pause to gauge her roommate's words or expression for deceptive cruelty or mockery. The casual kindness in them felt completely unscripted, and for the first time since she'd stood before her mirror two months earlier, dreaming of her new social popularity, her heart skipped with a new beat of confidence.
She likes me,
Katie told herself.
All of the bullying, all of the wedgies and humiliation -- she was clearly just going through her own stuff and taking it out on me, and now she feels guilty about it. People aren't so bad.
The two roommates crossed campus together beneath a gorgeous autumn sky. Alyssa, Kaitlyn, and Lindsey were waiting for them at the gates.
"Hey Kates!" Alyssa said, hugging Katie and kissing her cheek, and again there was no trace of vicious intent in her warmth. Katie's heart skipped a happy beat again. The five girls crossed the street together and entered a loud, crowded bar, settling into a booth by the window. They ordered a round of drinks and then another, and in the spinning warmth of the alcohol Katie almost laughed at herself for ever believing that these girls despised her.
They're probably too self-conscious or guilt-ridden to explicitly apologize for the wedgies and stuff, but actions speak louder than words.
"So I noticed that one Charlie Broadman can't keep his eyes off of you in our marketing lecture," Lindsey said, and Katie felt herself blush.
"Charlie -- really?" she said nervously, and again her heart thrashed against her chest.
"I think he totally digs you, Kates," Maddie said, reaching for the pitcher of margaritas and refilling Katie's glass. "And I have the perfect idea for how you can impress him."
For a moment, Katie thought she saw in the other girls' faces the same glint of eager excitement she'd seen the day they'd hung her up by her underwear, but under the tequila's confidence she told herself that her imagination was taking advantage of her -- probably out of nervous excitement over what they'd said about Charlie liking her, she figured.
"So, you remember what Dave said about one first-year giving the opening remarks at the Saturday conference party?" Maddie continued. "Well -- I've talked to a few of our cohort-mates -- and we think it should be you."
Katie couldn't believe what she was hearing. "M-me?"
"Absolutely," Maddie said, and the certitude in her expression was genuine. "Not me -- people think I'm a bitch -- for some reason," she said with a wink, and in this acknowledgment of her past cruelty Katie heard a sincere if indirect apology. "It's usually a dude, and I know Dave thinks it's a girl's turn. I know Charlie would be thrilled for you -- and afterwards I bet he won't be able to resist himself."
The other girls murmured their enthusiastic assent, and with another sip of her margarita Katie's insides seemed to sing. The first-year speaker -- her. And sure enough, it was in an all-department email that night that Dave announced that she, Katie, would be giving the opening remarks that Saturday night. She thought she couldn't be any happier -- until two minutes later, when her phone hummed with a text -- from Charlie.
Congrats!!!!!!
, he wrote.
Can't wait for u to blow me away :)
