Cappie was rummaging through the cabinets in the kitchen trying to find a snack. All he wanted was a s'mores Poptart. Casey used to make sure that all of his favorite snacks were in the house. Why couldn't his brothers be that good?
After having a pile of other foods fall out of the cabinet and onto him, he was so frustrated that he threw the snack close enough to what he wanted across the room.
Rusty and Ben Bennett walked over when they heard the commotion.
"Would it kill any of you pledges to clean out the damn cabinets every once in a while!" Cappie yelled.
The two pledge mates stared at each other and figured it was better to let it go than to argue about no longer being pledges. They started cleaning up the mess.
"What's up with the food tornado Cap? Which of the brothers pissed you off? Or is it an Omega Chi issue?" Ben Bennett asked.
Cappie rolled his eyes. "All of them Ben Bennett! Everyone knows my favorite Poptart is s'mores! Why are there only chocolate ones in the house?"
Cappie threw the chocolate Poptart back at Ben Bennett. Getting even more annoyed by the second, he leaned back against the counter, resting his elbows on it.
"You know not everyone knows your favorite things!" Ben was about to argue, but stopped himself.
"But we know who does..." Rusty said, knowing exactly what happened. "Why isn't Casey here?"
"Damn, I knew something felt different around here." Ben Bennett finally put it together. "What the hell did Casey do? Do us Kappa Tau boys have to teach her a lesson?"
Cappie slid down the cabinet, now fully sitting on the floor. "I appreciate the enthusiasm Ben Bennett, but no need. She didn't screw up. I did. And now my life is a mess because of it."
Rusty and Ben Bennett joined Cappie on the floor.
"She loves you, so it had to be pretty bad for her to just up and leave." Rusty said.
"And take your kid with her." Ben Bennett added.
That's the part that stung the worst for Cappie. He and Casey had broken up before and it sucked, but this felt like his heart was ripped out of his chest. There was a whole other little person in the world that he hated being away from. It had already been more than a week and Cappie began to question if he would ever get to spend time with his little boy again.
"So, what exactly happened?" Rusty asked.
Cappie took a deep breath before explaining. "It was New Year's Day. We had had a great night New Year's Eve. Your sister wanted to continue the festivities and talk about the one thing you know I hate talking about…the future."
The two boys listened intently while starting to snack on some of the food that fell on the floor.
Cappie continued. "Well Casey started talking about how she was graduating in the spring like a supposed normal college kid our age. And then she asked if I had even chosen a major, which I haven't."
Ben interrupted, "Yeah but that's not out of the ordinary. My cousin had three different majors before settling on Marketing."
"Exactly." Rusty added. "My sister has to know that not everyone's college experience is the same. It takes some people a little while to figure out what they want to do. I mean four years is a short amount of time to figure out how you're going to live the next fifty."
Cappie smiled a little. "See Spitter, that's the reaction I was hoping for. Basically your sister accused me of never wanting to pick a major, and the truth is she's right. Picking a major meant putting a timestamp on my college experience. And why would I want the best years of my life to end?"
Ben Bennett and Rusty both looked confused.
"Because your drop-dead gorgeous girlfriend just had your baby. And you said yourself you love being a dad." Ben Bennett said.
"And I know how much this place means to you and how us guys are basically your family, but now you have a chance to make your own family." Rusty added.
"Yeah, but why can't I have both?" Cappie complained. "I told Casey that we could continue to raise Kevin here, but then she yelled at me and said she would not be ok with her son's embarrassment of being dropped off from school in front of a frat house."
"Well she's not wrong. That would be pretty embarrassing." Rusty said, knowing the amount of bullying Kevin would face.
"Not helping!" Cappie argued.
Ben Bennett squelched a potential argument. "I think what Rusty is trying to say is that Casey is clearly dead set on her life plan, to the point of raising Kevin by herself if she has to. So basically you have to decide what is more important to you, your old life here at KT or the new life that you could have with that amazing girl and the little legacy you made."