He handed me the key to his room and gave me permission to have some private time with the girl.

I’m in a fraternity, but I’m not a “frat guy.” I have a 4.0 GPA, I’m involved in campus organizations, I have a job, and education is the number one reason I’m school.

However, I do enjoy the occasional beer or twelve. This is the story of how I ended up pledging during fall semester:

I knew some of the guys in this fraternity before I entered school. I had gone to high school with them, and I knew they were good guys. I thought the organization might be good for me, but I wasn’t really sure what else the university had to offer. The guys definitely wanted me to join, but I wanted to pledge during spring semester after I had been acquainted with my new city and community. That didn’t end up happening.

The summer before my freshman year, I met a younger girl through a friend. She was cute, single, and (for some reason that I’ll never know) had fallen for me after we had hung out a couple of times. She was still finishing high school when I entered college, but lived in a neighboring city, so I figured it wouldn’t be too difficult to continue the relationship.

I moved into the dorm the week before school started. The guys at the fraternity helped me move in, and I spent a lot of time at their house partying and getting to know people. I felt really comfortable there, but still wasn’t willing to make a commitment to the organization.

My first real weekend of school also happened to be this fraternity’s first big party, so I was stoked. I invited my girlfriend, thinking I could be the “cool college boyfriend” and show her how frat boys throw down.

She came up that night, and I brought her to the house and introduced her to the guys. She thought I was cool because I had so many new friends (little did I know they were just trying to get me to pledge), and the guys thought I was lame because I was still with a high school girl (little did they know what she was like behind closed doors).

We spent the evening playing beer pong, meeting new people, dancing like white people, and drinking as much crappy beer as we could stomach.

Eventually, the girl and I make it to the couch, and drunkenly start making out. One of the executive board members at the fraternity saw a golden opportunity, and I’ll never forget what he did for me. He interrupted us and took me aside. He handed me the key to his room, told me where it was, and gave me permission to have some private time with the girl.

I drunkenly accepted, caused both of us injuries we wouldn’t remember getting, and eventually made our way downstairs to the still raging party.

I handed my friend his key back, told him I liked the fraternity, and I would probably be willing to make the commitment to be there. Five minutes later, I’m standing in the backyard, covered in beer, being welcomed as a pledge.

I, a former high school nerd, had managed to get drunk, get laid, and pledge a fraternity in a night.