Disclaimer: see chapter 1
Jeff was in a daze but he soon snapped out of it. "All because someone yelled at her cat?" Jeff was terrified by the Deans answer.
The Dean nodded, "so if I were you I'd leave her pussy alone."
"What?" Jeff looked at the Dean in horror again, "Oh the cat, right! Got ya!"
Jeff was sitting in the rain outside the frat house, 'I can stay out here and get sick or I can go and face the witch who already hates me. The agony of choice.'
"You look deep in thought!"
Jeff jumped a mile in the air. Scott jumped higher.
"Sorry dude I thought you heard me." Scott was acting like Jeff would at any moment snap and rip out his spleen (isn't that a lovely visual).
Jeff recovered, "no don't apologize. I'm having a weird day that's all. I'm jumping at my own shadow."
The wind howled past them and both involuntarily shuddered looked at the other and laughed.
Scott held his umbrella over Jeff's head, "if you don't want to go back you're welcome to share me and Fish's room. It's small and messy but it's home, you know."
Jeff stood up and rubbed his arms they were covered in goose bumps. "Thanks, I appreciate that but I'm sure I'll be fine."
The wind howled again, Jeff looked at the sky it seemed to be clearing up but none the less he shuddered again.
"Man someone just walked over my grave." He laughed.
"Not now but soon." Lisseth walked past.
Both Jeff and Scott jumped back. Lisseth had Butcher hanging off her shoulder bag and Banshee following behind. Banshee hissed at both of the males before her. Scott hissed back. Jeff caught him in a headlock and pulled him away. They stopped about 40 ft away. Jeff let him go.
"Sorry man, but…"
"No it's cool. I should know not to make her mad. I mean I'm only next door I have no-where to run."
"Did you see that? Shit, how long was she listening to us…"
"Not as long as you two think!" some one shouted jumping out of the bushes that surrounded the dark rooms and photography studio.
Jeff and Scott leapt into the air yelling, "oh Jesus!" and "f-ck!"
Jeff had grabbed at the tree above him and was still hanging on (and shaking like the leaves he was surrounded by) when Fish stepped up, a confused look on his face.
"Greetings, my name's Phil but everyone calls me Fish."
Jeff let go of the branch he had been clinging to sheepishly. And put his hands in his pockets. "Hi." Suddenly Jeff didn't feel quite as good as a superstar on campus should feel. He hadn't noticed the whole of α α α (sorority house, Alpha Alpha Alpha) watching him screaming like a girl and embracing trees.
Fish and Scott glanced at each other Jeff looked really bummed.
"You got Lisseth didn't you." Said Fish, "maybe instead of calling you Jeff we should call you dead meat."
Scott shoved him, "Fish! Come on man that's not cool!"
Fish was suffering from an internal debate, one half of him was laughing the other half had to admit that Lisseth was no laughing matter.
"Dude I'm sorry I didn't mean it."
Jeff looked up, the most wonderful thesis had just come to him.
"No dude you're right. If I cower or rebel she'll kill me or spirit me away but if I just ignore her and her freaky animal subjects…"
"Then she'll kill you faster! Good plan!"
Scott looked at Fish, "dude you did it again."
Fish shrugged, "I'm late for medical physics anyway." He turned to walk away.
Scott looked at Jeff, "dude I am so sorry he just has his days, you know."
Jeff laughed and smiled broadly, "dude honestly it's cool." He cleared his throat and yelled, "hey Fish! Say hi to the ice queen for me, will ya!"
Fish stopped and turned around, "sure dude who's the ice queen?"
Jeff's smile got broader and he started to laugh. Fish quickly caught on.
"GODDAMMIT!"
Scott and Jeff laughed until tears ran down their faces and they had to go back to the frat house. They sat in the house common room for 2 hours telling every guy that came in about Fish's blasphemous outburst in front of the theology professor who happened to be a brother at the local parish.
Fish walked in and stopped, the sound of laughter was deafening. He had that sinking feeling that the laughter was directed at him and the incident earlier. He turned. He was right. At least 40 guys were in the Σ λ δ common room and their faces (no matter the original color) were bright red and covered in smiles.
Jeff stood in front of the crowd and there was silence.
"Did you say hello to the ice queen for me?"
Fish looked at the floor, "yeah I did."
Everyone started laughing again. Jeff was forced to shout over the noise.
"And what did she say?"
Fish looked behind him and started walking quickly up the stairs. Jeff was confused. The door slammed and everything suddenly became clear. So clear that all 40 guys in the common room took about 2 seconds to clear off.
Lisseth walked in and beckoned to Jeff, he cautiously walked closer.
Then he stopped about four feet short of her. She did not look impressed. She beckoned again and he cautiously stepped forward again. Not cautiously enough.
**SLAP**
"Ow Jesus! What was that for?" Jeff dropped his books and held his face.
Lisseth appeared to grow as she leaned over him, "don't ever send me messages especially through your idiot friends! It's bad enough that I got stuck with you but now everyone in the college knows about it. Stay away from me if you want to continue with your life."
She turned and walked up the stairs.
Jeff stood at the bottom of the stairs people were starting to re-emerge and they looked bored. Jeff looked at them all again. No way was Jeff Hardy going to lose a crowd.
"HEY BITCH!" Jeff bolted up the stairs taking them two at a time. Until he was behind Lisseth, she was standing in front of the room they had been forced to share. She was waiting for him to continue.
The crowd surged up the stairs to watch the drama unfold.
"What the hell do I have to do to get you to leave me be? What will it take for you to cut me some f-cking slack, huh? You just name it."
She didn't turn, "and you'll do it, will you?"
Jeff was shaking, he was so riled up now, "yeah I will! Any thing to get you to stop making my life hell."
Still Lisseth didn't turn around, she simply reached for the doorknob.
"You're on. I want you to jump off the frat house…"
The crowd laughed and jeered.
Jeff smiled, 'is that all?' he didn't dare say it.
Lisseth turned around and there was silence. She looked him dead in the eye.
She got real close, "no that's not all, Hardy. You have to jump stark naked. tomorrow when alpha alpha alpha have their sorority picnic right in front of this frat house."
Lisseth walked into the room and calmly closed the door behind her. She waited.
There was silence from outside. She settled in for a quiet night. Banshee was hunting swallows in the tree outside the window. Butcher was drinking the blood of a fat white rat the biology professor had given her for her participation in an 'animals of the Brazilian rainforest' lecture. And Lisseth herself had stacks of homework to do. "This is going to be an all night-er guys", she walked downstairs past the crowd and the frozen form of Jeff to the common room which emptied very quickly, to the phone to order dinner. When the pizza boy arrived people crowded the common room in hope of getting a slice. That is until Lisseth and Banshee walked down the stairs. She stood for a while talking to the delivery boy, he was a past acquaintance. Scott, Fish and Jeff stood at the top of the stairs watching her.
"Well I hope you have a large talent or you might as well pack your bags now. Those girls won't let you forget it."
Scott hit him, "Fish! Dude not cool!"
Jeff looked at the pair of them, "you guys don't think she's serious about the 'continue with your life' thing. Do you?"
"Well," Scott said, "I hissed at her cat and nothing's happened to me yet."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when he backed up to the stairs and fell over Banshee.
*&#% Thump thump SNAP! %#&*
When Scott landed Banshee hissed at Fish and Jeff and walked back to Lisseth, next to him at the bottom of the stairs. Scott was lying on his back holding on to his left leg. His ankle was at an odd angle to the rest of his leg.
Jeff and Fish were speechless. Lisseth bent down to him, "does this hurt?" she poked his ankle.
"ARGH! YES IT DOES!" Scott screamed it.
She stood, collected her dinner and her cat and announced loudly, "it's broken and isn't your all important state competition tomorrow? What timing."
She strode over his body. Fish and a couple of guys ran to Scott's side and carried him outside to someone's car. Jeff was frozen at the top of the stair well. 'she's going to kill me. Really slowly.'
Lisseth was walking towards him. She paused at his side, "a nasty coincidence. Isn't it."
When Jeff turned around, she was gone.
"She said what?" Fish was uneasy.
Jeff sat in the emergency room with Fish and a bunch of the frat house guys. He had just told them what Lisseth had said and now they were all uncomfortable. Scott was brought out in a wheel chair.
"She was right," tears welled up in his eyes, "it's a break like they've never seen before. I won't be able to go to state or wrestle for 8 weeks maybe more."
His wrestling buddies stood by his side. No one could speak. All of them drove home in silence. They couldn't even speak when they got back to the frat house.
Everyone except Lisseth had been waiting in the common room for when they got back. They couldn't speak when they saw the nasty big blue cast and crutches either.
Jeff walked into 211 and started to yell. "I hope you're happy. Do you know what you did to him? You destroyed his dreams and his life!!"
She was lying in bed with her back to him. "I was right, was I. What a pity he won't be able to compete tomorrow."
"you don't care do you?"
Lisseth rolled over and sat up, "in a word, no."
Jeff almost lost it, his voice could be heard all over the frat house, "HOW DARE YOU! IF I WASN'T A GENTLEMAN I'D…"
"YOU'D WHAT?" Lisseth was on her feet in a second.
Jeff's bluff had been called, so he raised his fist beside his head.
Lisseth stepped forward, "YOU DON'T HAVE THE EQUIPMENT!"
Jeff was starting to re-think this. 'Man, if I was the undertaker, she wouldn't still be standing here. That's a grim thought.' Jeff thought.
He lowered his fist and stepped back.
"No. I'm better than that. I don't hit women. I never have and I never will."
Without a further explanation Jeff took off his shirt and got into his bed. He turned his back to her.
Lisseth was standing there trying to scrape her lower mandible off the floor. Not only was Jeff a decent guy but wow the boy was built like a god!
Jeff was lying there waiting for her to hit him with some thing blunt and heavy. Instead he heard her get back into her own bed but he also heard her speak. What she said nearly made him pass out.
"It takes a real man to back down from a fight. I respect that Jeff… By the way I expect you to jump tomorrow. Sweet dreams."
To be continued…