| platonic |
[3843 words]
Only a few days remain until Punz and his friends are scheduled to throw their biggest fraternity house party of the season. Such a large social gathering will require lots of preparations, so every member of the fraternity agrees to participate in the arrangements. One fraternity member volunteers to buy the food and beverages, another member volunteers to decorate the shared house's interior, another member volunteers to string colorful lights upon the house's exterior, and other people sign up for other tasks.
Punz's role sounds simple, but with the days counting down, he dreads fulfilling the job that he signed up to perform: impulsively he volunteered to handle the invitations.
Punz does not need to invite the other members of his own fraternity. Instead he scours the Greek Life section of his university's website. He does not want to exclude anyone by accident, so he simply copies and pastes the entire list of fraternity and sorority members onto a spreadsheet, including former members who currently live elsewhere. Although the list's size should intimidate Punz, he reminds himself that not everyone who receives an invitation will decide to attend the party.
Initially Punz plans to draft a general email and send it to everyone's university accounts, until one of his fraternity's members interrupts his concentration by knocking on his door.
"Uh, yeah?" Slightly annoyed, Punz looks back over his shoulder as his roommate Sapnap enters their shared bedroom. The other student carries a piece of binder paper in his hands.
"Here, the other guys wanted you to look at this." Handing Punz the piece of paper, Sapnap describes, "It's a list of people who they don't want you to invite."
"Why not?" Punz's confusion deepens when he scans the lined paper and notices that the handwritten "list" only contains one name: a single person who the fraternity does not want him to invite.
Their close-knit neighborhood contains several hundred people spread out among a total of ten fraternities and sororities. How bad can the person on the list be if they stand out from so many other troublemakers and party animals?
Finally raising an eyebrow, Punz asks, "Someone used an entire sheet of binder paper just to write down one name?"
"Yeah, I know it's a weird request," Sapnap admits. "But hey, I guess that person is just... you know." He makes a vague hand gesture, then he completes, "Too much. I don't know him personally, but I heard that he's bad news."
Accepting Sapnap's explanation, Punz glances at the handwritten list again and nods. "Sure. Okay. I'll keep that in mind."
Once Sapnap gives him a thumbs-up and exits their shared bedroom, Punz returns his gaze to his laptop's screen. He debates the morality of inviting every single fraternity and sorority member except for one. Punz knows that he would hate to be the only person not invited to a party, so he is reluctant to impart a similar experience upon someone else.
Heavy with conflict, he decides to text his girlfriend for advice. Technically he could just walk downstairs and cross the street to visit her sorority house, but he wants an immediate answer. Therefore he turns on his smartphone and opens her contact.
Punz: hey are you free? I need some advice
Ara: Sure, I'm free, what's up?
Instead of texting the entire story to his girlfriend, Punz simply calls her instead. The phone rings for several seconds until she answers.
"Hi, Punz!"
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Inexplicable Dream Team one-shots
FanfictionA compilation of Dream Team fiction stories that were too short to have their own stand-alone books. Some are angsty, some are light-hearted, some are romantic, and some are just bizarre. Content warnings will appear at the headings of chapters cont...
