During this scary couple of months, Laura tried to limit her time on campus as much as possible, which meant that her weekly sorority meetings had all but disappeared from her life. In October, she was informed that she had missed too many meetings and the next one she missed would result in disciplinary action, so she made arrangements with Steve to be dropped off at the campus in the morning and picked up from the sorority house that evening, just so she would not have to walk from the sorority house back to her car by herself at night.

She walked over to the sorority house early and made sure everyone saw she was there when they started to show up for the meeting. She introduced herself to some new members. She spent some time catching up with each member of their leadership board. When her friend, Charice, arrived, she was thrilled to see her again. In this return to normalcy, she was starting to feel like herself again, which is why she practically skipped up to Charice and hugged her tightly. "CHARICE! GIRL! I've missed you!"

Charice pulled back and gave her the stink eye. "Excuse me? Do I know you?"

Laura felt, for a moment, a roller coaster sized emotion hit her hard. It was like any interaction that broke her out of this spell of normal crashed down on her like a ton of bricks. Not only was Charice mad at her, but she was obviously mad because Laura hadn't been around, and Laura hadn't been around because she was being stalked and was fearing for her safety. Charice had no idea how much pain she had just piled back onto her friend. Laura's face fell deeply and she immediately felt tears stinging in her eyes, but she did what she could to tamp down that reaction. It wasn't Charice's fault. Laura bit her lip and nodded. "Ok. I deserved that," she said softly.

Charice rolled her eyes. "You deserve a lot worse, Laura. Where have you been? Remember August? When we had a whole big heart to heart about me wanting to see you more even though you're married? And me wanting to be more than just sorority friends? Clearly, you don't. You're ignoring my calls and emails. You're still never here. You're even skipping mandatory meetings now! When I run into you on campus, you totally blow me off every single time so you can just go home. You obviously don't want to be actual friends, and you're not even a good sorority sister anymore because you're never here, so you can just go home. I'm sure you'd rather be there anyway."

Laura stared at her for a long moment. "Yeah," she replied. "Yeah, ok. I'm sorry I bothered you." She turned quickly and fled to sit on the other side of the room as their president banged her gavel against the podium to get everyone's attention.

"Ok, ladies! Ladies, settle down!" she ordered. As Laura was the only silent person in the room, Mandy grew flustered. "LADIES, I SAID SHUT UP," she screamed, finally silencing them. "GOD." She smiled brightly as she realized she had their attention. "That's better," she chirped. "Thank you. Now, I'm glad you all could be here today. As you know we are deep in the process of planning our Halloween party!"

There was an eruption of hoots and hollers from the crowd. Laura was too distracted by the interaction she'd just had with Charice to get excited about a stupid party, but she did her best to play the part.

"And I have some very exciting news about our Beta Theta Booooo-sy Shake Your Booooo-ties Bash!" She paused for an extended period for dramatic effect. "We won't be throwing it alone this year! Our brothers at Delta Tau Epsilon will be joining us to act as our bartenders, costume contest judges, and our designated hookup partners in case of emergency!"

Again, the crowd cheered, but Laura rolled her eyes. Even before Laura was married, Mandy had always been too much for her. If Laura hadn't just gotten married, she might have run for president for her senior year, but that wouldn't have been fair to Steve or to the Beta Thetas, so this was now the level of leadership they were stuck with.

"All right, so… We've got some party planning to do, so we're going to divvy out some responsibilities to some committees, but we're not gonna do all this work alone, ladies! C'mon in, Deltas!"

Laura's eyes widened as the door slammed open and a slew of men started to tumble inside. Quickly they spread out and began to disperse themselves amongst the women, most of them immediately starting to flirt, which seemed to be what always happened when their brother frat was invited. Being in a relationship for basically all of her time in college, first with Stefan and then with Steve, Laura had never been a fan of these joint meetings, but the impropriety of flirting with some random guy today didn't even cross her mind. Instead, her eyes started to search for Alex. As her heart started to pound, her head began to throb and her vision blurred. She thought she saw him three separate times before she managed to stumble out of her folding chair and into the aisle. She rushed out of the room as quickly and subtly as possible. She found herself in the pantry before her brain caught up with her flight response. She stood in the dark for several seconds just trying to catch her breath.

Just as she was beginning to calm down, the door swung open. Laura gasped and turned back around to face it, immediately swinging her book bag into the intruder with all of her might.

"Ow! Laura! Stop!" Charice exclaimed as she backed away from the backpack that had just hit her.

Laura's eyes widened as she saw who she had just walloped with all her textbooks. "Oh, God! Charice, I'm so sorry. I thought you were someone else!"

Charice glared at her. "Who did you think was going to attack you in a pantry?!"

Laura looked away. She had a very real answer to that question, but she wasn't sure how many people she should share it with. She had managed, up to this point, to avoid a lot of victim blaming, and she wasn't sure she was ready to give someone who was once such a good friend the chance to disappoint her. Laura pursed her lips and shook her head. "It's nothing. I'm sorry."

Charice stared at her. "It's nothing, but you're hiding in the pantry?"

Laura looked around nervously. "No," she squeaked. "No. Not hiding. Just looking for this bag of chips!" she explained, grabbing a bag at random from the shelf.

Charice raised an eyebrow at her. "You came in here and didn't turn on the light while looking for Deb's diabetic potato chips?"

Laura looked at the bag she had grabbed. "Yup!"

"Ok… So are you gonna come out now?"

Laura held her breath. "In a minute," she promised.

Charice blinked a few times. "Ok. So. You want me to walk out of this pantry, close this door, walk away, and leave you here in the dark?"

Laura nodded. "Mm-hm", she mumbled.

Charice stared her down but gave in quickly. "Whatever," she grumbled as she turned and closed the door behind her.

Laura exhaled finally and felt her chest tighten as her breathing started to come too fast and her tears finally started to pour. She reached the shelving behind her and leaned against it, bracing herself on the middle shelf. She started to sob as silently as she could.

Then the door flew open, and she jumped again, this time seeing Charice before she tried to defend herself.

"You know what, Laura?" Charice froze as she saw Laura rush to wipe her tears. She stepped into the pantry with her and closed the door behind her. She finally turned on the light. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Laura lied again.

"Laura, what's wrong?" Charice yelled.

"Nothing," Laura snapped.

"Laura, I followed you out here in the first place because you looked upset. Then you sent me away with the lamest excuse. I'm not going anywhere until you tell me why you bolted out of that room and ran in here crying. Who did you think followed you into this room? What is going on with you?"

Laura took a deep breath and sat on the floor. Charice sat beside her. Laura reached out and took her hand, squeezing it tightly. "There's a reason I haven't been around here much lately."

———————————————————

"I only came today because Mandy told me I'd be booted if I didn't. I worked so hard for this sorority for three years, and I want to graduate as a member of it, but I can't do that if I'm too afraid to step on campus. This just isn't sustainable. I need to just focus on school. Go to my classes and go home in between and immediately after."

"No, Laura! You can't do that! You can't miss all the fun stuff your senior year!"

"What am I supposed to do, Charice? If he weren't in our brother frat, it might be different, but we see these people all the time."

"Can't you get a restraining order? Then he'd be the one who had to skip mixed Greek life events, right?"

"We thought I could, especially after the pictures, but he's been covering his tracks. They couldn't prove he took them. It's my word against his. It has been this whole time."

"I'm so sorry, Laura," Charice said softly, taking her hand again and squeezing it.

"Thanks, Charice," she replied, squeezing it back. "And, girl, I'm sorry I haven't been around. I know I said I-"

"No, Laura," Charice interrupted. "Stop. I was being petty. You clearly have had too much goin' on to even think about reaching out. I'm sorry I gave you a hard time!"

"It's ok. You didn't know. I should have told you."

"No, Laura. That's not your job. I should trust my friend, and I hope you know that even though it's not your job to reach out to me when you're going through something, you can. I would be glad to help in any way I can."

"I know, Charice. Thank you." Laura leaned forward and hugged her tightly.

When Laura let go, Charice pulled back slightly to look at her. "Ok. So tell me the truth. Do you want to go to this party?"

Laura took a deep breath. "I would, if he weren't going to be there, but-"

"No but's. I'm going to talk to Mandy. I'm going to make sure he's not gonna be here, and when I'm sure, I'm gonna call you so you know it's safe to come."

"She'll never go for that."

"Oh, yes, she will! I'm sure I can convince her."

Laura contemplated this possibility for a moment. It would be nice for her and Steve to be able to really go out without fear of running into him. Steve's birthday party was nice, but it wasn't like being at a party with mostly people their own age. "If you really think she'll go for it…"

"She has to! We need to prioritize our sisters over guys. Even guys in our brother frat."

Laura half-heartedly smiled at her. "Ok."

"Ok. So go home. I'll give you a call later today."

Laura nodded and stood with her. She hugged her tightly and thanked her a couple more times before she actually managed to sneak out of there.

———————————————————

And Laura did get a phone call later that evening, but the first one she got wasn't from Charice.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Laura! It's your Beta Theta President!" Mandy's cheery voice chirped on the other end.

Laura cringed. "Oh, hey, Mandy. How are you?"

"Better than you, Boo," she pouted. "Charice told me what you got goin' on, girl."

Laura tried to take a deep, calming breath. "Um. Yeah. It's been a lot."

"No wonder you've been such a terrible sister lately!"

Laura's face twisted in disgust, and she repressed a scowl, fearing it would be heard in her voice. That wasn't a very sensitive thing to say. "It has been really hard to be on campus," she said eventually.

"Totally!" Mandy chirped.

Laura rolled her eyes.

"So, listen, if you would feel more comfortable if Alex didn't come to the Halloween party, we can make sure he doesn't."

"Are you sure?" Laura asked uncomfortably. "I mean, I would also be fine with just skipping the party."

"Yeah, but then I'd have to kick you out. You know, bylaws are bylaws," she laughed.

"Um…" Laura hesitated while she tamped down her rage. "If going to this party is the only way to stay in good standing with the sorority, then yeah, I need you to make sure my stalker isn't invited."

"Well, don't you worry, Sweetie! I'll take care of that for you. This time, anyway!"

"Ok. Well, thanks, Mandy."

"You're welcome, Laura. Now, about your dish to pass…"

———————————————————

"So… I guess we're going to a Halloween party then, huh?" Steve asked over dinner that night.

"I guess," Laura shrugged, playing with the food on her plate with her fork.

Steve frowned at her. "You don't have to go, you know. Your law school applications will all be in by the time anyone could really kick you out. There will be literally zero repercussions to you not being in the sorority anymore."

Laura looked back up at him. "But I want to be in my sorority, Steve. I don't want to get kicked out."

"I know," he replied, "but if you're scared, you don't have to go." He looked at her for a long moment while she avoided eye contact again. "And if you're scared, but you still wanna go, you know I'll be there with you all night. I'll be your bodyguard."

"He's not gonna be there, Steve," she said, "but thank you."

"So… we are going to a Halloween party then?"

"Yes, Steve. We are."

"Can we do a couple's costume??!" he squeaked excitedly.

Laura laughed out loud at his evident delight. She had needed that release. "If you want?" she chuckled.

"Abso-toodle-utely!"

"Ok, but nothing too lame!"

"No promises."

Author's Note: I know my update schedule has gone completely off the rails, but thank you to those of you that check in, read, and review occasionally. That's what makes this still work doing a couple of times a year. Thank you for being interested in these stories and my head canon in this tiny fandom!