Chapter 1

Late August--Sophomore Year--Rush Week.

Gunshots!

Blood!

Screams!

Jay Wells' eyes popped open to behold ... the digital numerals 5:13 glowing on the clock face next to his bed in the still dark room. That damned dream again. He felt the woman behind him move in bed and roll the other way.

Damn! His body must have twitched and disturbed her.

Now that he was back on campus--well, adjacent to campus anyway--he had been able to lay claim to one of the basement single rooms in the Sigma Lambda Tau house. Sophomores and some juniors lived in the basement private rooms, and the rest of the juniors and the seniors got the third floor private rooms. The new Pledges would be occupying the multi-person suites of the second floor after they moved in later this week.

'Man! It has been a year already, ' thought Jay, 'and already, I've been a porn star, been part of an incident involving a deadly shooting, enjoyed the sexual favors of over two dozen women, and... ' Now he rolled to look at the sleeping form of his bed companion. She had her own private room down the hall as well, but had chosen to spend whatever time she could with Jay in his. 'I seem to have acquired the most smoking hot girlfriend I could ever imagine having.'

As he remembered the exciting times of the previous year, highlighted by the adventures of Spring Break just a few months ago, during his freshman school year, Jay began to drift back off to sleep for another couple of hours; or at least until after sunup.

Early August--Just Prior to Sophomore Year.

Over $55,000 in comprehensive fees for the whole upcoming academic year at Middlebury College...

What was that Korean guy's name again? Oh, yeah ... Ho ... Lee ... Shit! That was over twenty-seven-five per semester. Then you had to pity the fool who found it necessary to do makeup work or take unplanned electives during the J-term (January term). He or she had to pay even more; and lose his holiday fun; and any partying and just-plain-chill time as well!

And the fifty-five grand still did not include the almost $400 for his student activity fee. Add to that amount about a grand for books and supplies and another grand for the semester's general expenses and for traveling in and around, and for trips home and back a couple of times. Pretty soon, you started getting into the realm of 'Real Money.'

'Well, ' thought Aaron Shankles, 'at least I was able to drop off a couple of grand a year by being allowed to live full-time in the Sigma Lambda Tau house.' The Sigma Lambda Tau Society owned outright a three-story house with basement and pool area with privacy fence that sat just adjacent to the campus. It was not actually on the property of Middlebury College. And Aaron had yet to get a bill for living there.

Aaron did pay a monthly fee out of pocket as a partial offset for the cost of his meals at the house. But that cost was very reasonable, considering the great quality of the meals he and the other members enjoyed there (eat your hearts out, you Eating Club pansies at Princeton).

Aaron was still amazed--almost one year later--at how unusually easy it had seemed for the powers-that-be within the Sigma Lambda Tau Society to arrange for him and his other seven fellow freshman new Society members to move immediately into the Sigma Lambda Tau house during the fall of the previous year. Usually, only seniors were allowed to reside off-campus at Middlebury College. And only those lucky enough to get in on--and win--the Housing Office's so-called lottery for the available spaces for off-campus residence got to do so. The need for being entered into the lottery "somehow" missed the residents of the Sigma Lambda Tau house.

And it was almost eerie just how little flak came from the campus administrative offices about the unusual housing arrangements for the obvious underclassmen members of Sigma Lambda Tau. It was almost like Election Day in Chicago where the fix was always in.

Yes, Aaron was most definitely a resident of the Sigma Lambda Tau house now. And he could not suppress a little grin at his knowledge of the requirements and "privileges" of membership and residence there.

Now, he just had to find a place where he could safely park his car, yet not have to walk three miles just get to it.

Aaron had gotten summer work through his connections with Andrea Steadman--one of his Sisters in Sigma Lambda Tau. She was also a student at Middlebury College, but one who was married to an executive at J.A.M. Aluminum that oversaw operations at the company's Salisbury plant. Aaron had worked all summer at the plant, learning the manual trade of an aluminum fabricator.

Aaron smiled to himself at the thought that he had learned what Kyle Evans did for a living at the Middlebury plant of J.A.M. Aluminum--Kyle was the boyfriend of another one of his Sisters in the Sigma Lambda Tau Society, Dee Rivers. And the money at J.A.M. was really pretty good.

Aaron's dad had surprised him by purchasing a vintage 1976 Datsun 280Z in its original chocolate color at an estate sale. He had given Aaron the car, but had insisted that the boy would have to get a job to pay for gas and insurance. Aaron had been glad to go to work for J.A.M. for the summer in order to have his own classic wheels beginning sophomore year.

"Son, I have always gotten a bad case of sticker shock whenever the time comes for paying the college fees each year for my kids," said Ira Shankles, Aaron's father, as he looked now at the bill for tuition and fees. "I cringed when I had to pay them for your brother, Dave, when he was at UVM, and that was a state school. When it came to the first year of your fees last year at Middlebury, I almost had a stroke," continued Ira as he sat at the family breakfast table in their house in Salisbury, Vermont. The paperwork for his son's return to Middlebury College for another year was spread out before him.

Ira looked over at his younger son and smiled. He said, "By the way, I don't think I ever told you enough, Aaron, about just how proud I am of you for getting into Middlebury in the first place. I know that with only about a fifteen percent acceptance rate, they are very selective; and they only take those they consider to be the very best."

Aaron smiled and blushed under the rare direct loving gaze of his father and upon hearing the equally rare ebullient praise from the older man. His dad was usually a pretty serious guy who was sparing in his praise. Ira Shankles tended to use more of an I-dare-you-to-do-it approach to life as opposed to one of constant higher-that-necessary praises or over-the-top encouragement.

Ira Shankles definitely did NOT buy into the modern self-esteem movement. In his eyes, you built your own self-esteem by succeeding on your own; or from learning from your temporary setbacks and moving forward. He was definitely a follower of the what-doesn't-kill-you-only-makes-you-stronger philosophy.

"Now, before your mom gets in here with the checkbook so I can write out the check for this semester, I need to clear up something that I was not expecting. I'm not upset, mind you; I'm just surprised; pleasantly surprised at that." Ira flipped the pages of the financial paperwork that had arrived earlier in the week from the Office of the Registrar of Middlebury College to a page within the stack and showed it to Aaron. He asked his son, "Just what is this thirteen-thousand-five-hundred-dollar credit labeled as 'Stipend--Pearl Foundation?' I'm glad to get the reduction in school fees, but where the hell did you get a stipend; and one that large?"

At the name 'Pearl Foundation, ' Aaron visibly blinked and almost jumped in his seat. Then he realized immediately what that credit meant to him. What it represented should have been pretty obvious to his father. It was money going directly to the school on Aaron's behalf and in his name, saving him quite a chunk of change on his tuition and fees this year.

It also represented definitively to Aaron the fact that he had now moved officially from the category of 'Simple Student' to that of 'Student Male Whore.' Wow! Thirteen-thousand-five-hundred dollars! He was not yet to the accomplished level of Cavalier Servente--a professional paramour, the ultimate outcome for all graduating male members of the Sigma Lambda Tau Society--but he was now formally on his way in the business of engaging in sex for a living; and getting paid well for it; if only indirectly.

Aaron had to fall back on the cover story provided by Jack and Melanie--Aaron's elder member Brother and Sister, and two of his mentors within the Society--and Irina Mirkova, the Society's version of 'House Mother' and their Primary Trainer.

"Dad, you remember how I told you that I had been signed up for a part-time internship during Spring Semester; and, as part of that, I spent this past Spring Break involved with that trade show in Boston, as well as a business outreach in the Rutland-Killington area, near where Dave and Jamie live? Well, during that time, I was actually interning for a Vermont-based company that is affiliated with a charitable outfit called the Pearl Foundation, based out of Boston."

Ira's eyebrows went up. This seemed plausible, but something was out of synch somehow. "I thought," he said, stroking his cheek, "internships were longer, like over a whole summer, and that they gave you academic credit. And a lot of these internships just want labor that is either free or cheap. I'm not disappointed in the money, you understand. It is just that this doesn't fit with what I had pictured when I always thought about internships. Hell, this is enough to be almost a salary or a commission; much less a stipend.

"You remember how your brother, Dave, spent that one summer in Tanzania with that bunch, teaching the locals how to source and distribute potable drinking water?" Ira asked. "He got three academic credits as well as a very small stipend that was tax-exempt." Looking back at the papers in his hand, Ira said, "I'm glad to see the money, and to know that Uncle Sugar and the leeches in Montpelier don't get a penny out of it into their greedy little hands, but I would have been really happy to see some academic credit along with this."

Aaron, who was majoring in Economics, thought quickly and said, "Well, Dr. Michaels, my academic advisor, tells me that, even without the academic credit, I can still use this in building my résumé," Aaron replied, feeling slightly guilty for feeding his dad a line of bullshit.

Ira looked into his younger son's eyes for a few seconds in silence, and then smiled and nodded as Cheryl Shankles, Aaron's mother, came into the den and handed Ira the checkbook so he could write the check for Aaron's sophomore year fees. Aaron watched the transaction and listened to the light scratch of the gel pen on the check as his father wrote out and signed it. Aaron just shook his head as he watched ... and remembered this past Spring Break and the months preceding it.

Mid-January--Freshman Year (The Year Before).

Jack and Melanie were waiting for the returning freshman members in the library on the first floor of the Sigma Lambda Tau Society house where they gathered all together for the first time since returning from the Winter Break. These two seniors, who would be graduating in about four-and-a-half months and moving on into real life, smiled at the returning members of this year's new crop of novice Courtesans and Cavalier Servente.

As they all milled around, sipping hot cider and munching on freshly-baked-today cookies from the deli just up the road, the eight freshmen chatted about various things. They shared stories from the holiday break, most notably about where they had gone and what they had done; and how they had dealt with friends and current or former relationship partners.

But they all shared one particular common sentiment. They all missed their former Pledge Captain and friend, Andrea 'Andi' Steadman. They had seen her around campus and in classes the previous semester, but it was not the same as having her still living here with them in the Sigma Lambda Tau house; or, as the guys remembered with racing pulses--sharing their beds.

It had come as a complete surprise to all of them--except one, Deirdre 'Dee' Rivers--that Andi, although just a young seventeen-year-old freshman here at Middlebury College, was actually married; and to a very open-minded millionaire businessman in his thirties at that! Andi had initially kept it a secret from all of her fellow classmates, except Dee, with whom she had been already acquainted, and her husband, Dean, of course. Andi's husband worked as an executive in a company presided over by the second husband to Dee's formerly war-widowed mother, the former Helen Rivers--now Helen Morris. Thus, Dee saw Andi at various times when she visited home as well as around campus, often catching a ride to and from home and school with her friend.

Irina Mirkova, the late-twenties overseer of affairs at the Sigma Lambda Tau house--the equivalent to a 'House Mother' in a sorority or fraternity house at other colleges, where single gender societies were allowed, unlike here at Middlebury College--entered the room. She immediately moved to be nearer to Jack and Melanie, the senior mentors for this year's class of novices. The raven-haired Ukrainian-born beauty with the ice-blue eyes was still feeling the glow of having only two hours before been vigorously fucked to her fourth orgasm of the day by her current--and quite possibly her last--boyfriend; the Chief of Campus Security at Middlebury College--William 'Pete' Peterson.

'Let them enjoy the gathering for a few more minutes before we start to get down to the business at hand for this semester's studies and preparations here within the Society, ' Irina thought. 'We will need to get them to focus on more important things soon enough. After all, they are only young once. And even though we have them studying the strongly adult topics associated with becoming experts in sexual activities, and their accompanying gratification, they are still such young people at heart. It would be a shame to dampen their enthusiasm or disrupt the simple pleasures of seeing friends and talking about home and the other things important to them at this stage in their growth and development.'

During the past fall semester, their first at Middlebury College, the group of new Sigma Lambda Tau Brothers and Sisters had started with twelve promising freshmen Pledges. Two, Steve and Sarah, had departed rather quickly after the first week. Then another, Trevor, had not been able to deal with the sexual pressures involving practices outside of his personal boundaries. And finally, Andi Steadman, the Pledge Captain for the group, had felt the need to deal with other responsibilities associated with her husband's career and personal well-being, as well as the demands of being a full time student and wife. These had caused her to suspend her active participation in the Sigma Lambda Tau class; but only after having completed all of the initial training and becoming a full-fledged Society member.

The initial Pledge training had run the gamut of initial immersion into suddenly living and working together in the nude and rooming together as rotating mixed-gender couples and being encouraged to engage in sex from the start; all the way up to a controlled gangbang/reverse-gangbang, a multiple-partner-multiple-penetration orgy for the girls, a sexual endurance drill for the guys, a mild bondage and cuckoldry event, and a fun-filled sexually-charged scavenger hunt.

This had all culminated in a formal induction ceremony where each of the remaining Pledges had been given his or her symbol of full membership--a beautiful silver pinkie ring adorned with a magnificent miniature pearl for each of their right hands.

The remaining eight members of this year's class were now talking animatedly among themselves--Dee Rivers, Jay Wells, Tylea Mercer (the only freshman member of color), Lee Summers, Catherine Morrow, Brooke Cavanaugh, Jeremy Winter, and Aaron Shankles. They all shared their experiences of the holidays and brought each other up to date on any relationship news.

Dee Rivers told the others about her and her boyfriend of the past four-and-a-half months, twenty-five-year-old Kyle Evans. They were still going strong and growing in their intimacy and even--yes, it can happen--love for each other. This was despite Kyle's full knowledge about Dee's ongoing training to learn to become a world-class Courtesan and sexual expert. Dee had been completely honest with Kyle about her ongoing training in sexual skills, her rotating weekly male roommate assignments, and the required nudity and expected sex as part of the living conditions within the house.

Kyle, quite honestly, was still not one-hundred-percent pleased about that, especially knowing she was sharing her body with other men; and with a male roommate each weeknight. But Dee more than made up for it on the weekends, and even during some weeknight dates--ensuring that Kyle got first rights to her body on those nights. And she stayed in touch via text messaging or phone calls almost daily, reminding Kyle that he was foremost in her mind among the men she knew.

Kyle was mollified somewhat by having met all the guys that Dee was rotating through each week as roommates and bedmates. He knew about the Society's rules concerning Dee's not becoming emotionally entangled with her fellow Society members, and they with her.

Thus, Kyle was reasonably sure that he had captured Dee's heart and mind, if not her body, exclusively. In any event, he was slowly getting more and more comfortable with the whole idea. He had honestly stated his misgivings to Dee early on, only to have her reassure him continually of her devotion to establishing and exploring her relationship with him, despite the odd sexual nature of that relationship.

Kyle was even becoming a welcome frequent visitor to the Sigma Lambda Tau house (but only in those areas open to non-members), and on one occasion each, away from the house, Dee had even arranged for Kyle to have sex with Catherine and Brooke--with Dee present, naturally, to ensure that her claim to him remained firmly staked. Catherine had been happy to oblige, and Brooke had enjoyed her experience with Kyle as well. Brooke had asked Dee to make it up with a threesome with Brooke and Trevor, Brooke's boyfriend and former Sigma Lambda Tau Pledge, sometime soon.

For her part, Brooke Cavanaugh, while not feeling as if she was lesbian or bisexual, also wanted simply to experiment more with the girl-on-girl sex practices covered in the Sigma Lambda Tau Training Manual. But she felt more comfortable with Dee as a partner than with any of the other girls in the Society.

Jay Wells and his former high school sweetheart, Kempi (now a student at UVM in Burlington), had renewed the old fires of their high school relationship a bit during the past semester and had spent a lot of time together during Winter Break, including several nights of hot sex; but it was a somewhat off-again-on-again deal. Kempi still knew NOTHING about the details of what went on here; simply that Jay was a member of something called the Sigma Lambda Tau Society.

Jay and Kempi were actually trying to see if they could make a go of things and remain in touch electronically, with infrequent visits, while agreeing NOT to be exclusive in their dating. Jay was more relaxed with Kempi dating and possibly fucking others at UVM than Kempi evidently was with him doing likewise here at Middlebury College. But they were taking things slowly and feeling their way along. Time would tell, but the distance and time apart were becoming a problem for both of them. Jay was starting to feel a little pessimistic about the whole thing, but he realized that he would not be entirely heartbroken if things between them did not ultimately work out.

Chapter 2 »