Under the Rose

“Because memories are short and there’s a 24-hour news cycle that needs filling,” Odile said.

“Even though we would freak, in the end it wouldn’t make a difference.” I marveled at the deviousness of the angelic Je

“See?” Odile gave us a megawatt smile. “I think we can make this work.”

George leaned in. “Trust me, Boo. This will fix us.”

Trust him? Trust him? Now I knew I’d entered Bizarro World.

“Come on, Boo. With one fell swoop we can pay back Micah Price, who’s not only been working to bust open the secrets of our order, but has completely screwed over one of our own. And we can get the Diggers back on track. All three of our tenets. One little punk. What do you say?”

I looked at them. Smart move, putting the most beautiful people in the club on this particular campaign. Odile and George stood there, looking like a cross between a beer commercial and an ad for face wash, and silently encouraged me to let them do their worst.

Three oaths. One caper. And it would make Micah miserable?

“Have at it.”

21. The Game

I hereby confess:

It’s good to be knight.

Those of us who have chosen to spend our college years within the Gothic, ivy-spattered walls of this New Haven institution, who have bathed ourselves in blue and baptized ourselves “the sons and daughters of Eli,” who have aligned our academic and collegiate philosophies with this university, who have proclaimed our allegiance and sung, full-throated, our alma mater—to us, there is only one Game. The Game. Eli vs. Harvard.

Every November, on our campus or theirs, on the Saturday before Thanksgiving, we play the last football game of the season against them. Every time, it’s epic. It doesn’t matter if the results have no bearing on the championship standing. It doesn’t matter if their record trounces ours all season long. We rally, and scream, and cheer, and sing songs for the glory of our team and school, as generations of Eli students did before us.

This year, it mattered, as Eli was up for the Ivy League Championship. If we won The Game, we’d take first place. It was my senior year, my last Game, and we had home field advantage. But on this overcast Saturday, my mind was focused on loyalty of a different sort: Today was the day the Diggers got their pride back.

In the week following our meeting with Odile and George, they’d done everything they’d promised, and more. (I spent the time hacking out a new thesis topic. Jury’s still out on whether Burak will accept it.) We’d been told the revenge scheme would serve as penance for the disgraced knights. What we hadn’t realized was that the pla

Today, that dislike was focused on the blond head seated seven rows down. Most Eli attendees in the stadium had been sectioned off into groups according to their college affiliation. Near the forty-yard line, I caught sight of the Prescott College contingent in their su

At Eli, school spirit is every bit as valid in college colors as in Eli colors, unless, of course, your college colors happen to be Harvard crimson. Edison College colors were red, so the shirts of the people seated around me were gray with red accents, and everyone waved Eli Blue ba

“How’s it going?” I asked her.

“Fine.” Her thumbs moved beneath her anorak, which was letting off a series of very unanorak-like beeps. “Just keep your eyes on that scoreboard. He’s still there, right?”

I looked over Ben’s hat. “Yep.”

Micah, of course, was not doing anything so dull as sitting with the rest of Calvin College. (Perhaps it was because they weren’t behaving in a ma

Above me, a brown-shirted member of Hartford College made a play for the Edison flag (flag stealing being a favorite pastime at The Game), and the whole section rose in revolt. Someone jostled Je

“Watch it!” he shouted at the squirming mass of Edisonians. “You okay?”

“I think I screwed up the sequence,” Je

“And miss the look on his face?” I asked. “Not a chance, hon. You deserve this more than anyone. This is the only part we can’t catch on camera. So we’re here.”

“We won’t be catching anything, camera or otherwise, if I screw up the sequence.” Je

Elsewhere, people paid attention to the action on the field, sang along to the school hymns the marching band banged out, or sneaked out flasks for a quick swig; all were oblivious to the chaos about to be unleashed.

Harun appeared behind us. “How’s it going?”

“We started.”

“Already?” He put his hands on Je

Je

“Not guilty, right?” He smiled down at her. “Personally, we’re all excited you’ve decided to hang on to your vengeance card for a little longer.”

“Vengeance is a lofty goal,” she said. “One I’d never think of usurping. I try to keep it simple.” And then she smiled. “Just a little reminder that payback, when indeed it comes, is going to be a bitch.”

A gasp rippled through the crowd and we all looked up. Here it goes. The scoreboard began to decay before our eyes, the digital numbers falling from screen to screen.

“Show-off,” Harun whispered.

“This is hilarious,” said an Edison junior nearby. “Someone hacked it. What do you think, MIT?”

“This wouldn’t be the first time,” said the guy’s girlfriend. “But I bet it’s one of our guys. Who else would have access to the scoreboard?”

All the Diggers hid their smiles.

The a

This is what they saw:

MICAH PRICE

WE’RE WATCHING YOU

BEST BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU DO

And then the words exploded into a shower of tiny hexagons and roses.

“Nice touch,” said Harun.