“Yeah man the first time it was really, really funny”, said Sam Kennedy, a brother at the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity….
“Welcome week two years ago he was in the party and drinks were flowing and I don’t know how the idea came into his head, but he grabbed the goldfish from the house tank, and announced to everyone he was gonna eat it, and then he fucking did yo, hahahaha”…. “Brendan was so mad cause he had like, you know, raised it from the point it was a fry, but we told him to calm down and take a seat or whatever”.
The anecdotes you have just read relate to an incident which occurred in the fall of 2023, at the Lambda Chi Alpha house, during the times of welcome week when the frats are open and welcoming to all young men; shortly before the time when all frats will insist on beating you to a pulp if you step within the vicinity of their homes. During one of these fateful nights, Casey Auratus, a then sophomore, assumed the night would be like any other debauchery filled underclassmen outing at WVU.
“So we were all hyping him up afterwards and bringing him to girls to introduce him or whatever, he was lowkey the man that night”, Kennedy told us. “He probably would’ve had an instant bid if he didn’t keep going…”. “The next party he came back and we were all dapping him up cause he was like, like a player dude I don’t know how else to say it”.
“Then he got a few beers in him and tapped be on the shoulder and said ‘hey pussy watch this’, then shoved me out of the way and beamed for the tank”….”Brendan had just gotten another fish to replace the last one he lost and Casey straight grabbed it from the tank, ran to the DJ booth and chugged that shit down with a Keystone Light he brought from home”.
“I don’t know why he did it again. But it wasn’t the last time. The guys at A sig are telling me that he was caught doing the same thing at their house. I don’t really wanna talk about it anymore to be honest. We lost a lotta good fish over those few weeks.”
When prompted for questioning on the issue, Casey responded with a 15 page letter that is as essentially as follows. For sake of your reading experience, we chosen to remove about nine pages of text from his writings:
Dear reader, I begin with heavyheart, long-since humbled. It was the best of times, but alas, do fret, it soon became the worst of times. We begin. I, forlorn as any sandsunkenseastar, was but a starstruck Sophomore fixated on the soaring heights of mythic High St. Frat row– campus celebrities with cheerleader companions and bustling suit-laden rushing recruits painted the incline of our great setting. I wanted to be in the shoes passed down from their fathers, their too-tight ties. I so badly desired to be a note in the roaring ensemble– as crashing crescendo or as simple, tiredtrite flat a. It didn’t matter to me. I didn’t care. But hear ye, dear reader. Once mustn’t dance with their desire. A gruesome cocktail of anguishshame lied in my eventual wake. It was cold. Or was it brisk? No. Cold. Decidedly cold. A most dreary nightfall of middlemarch marked my seeming christening, as my very own personal sacrament took the form of a trepidatious sort of kind of transubstantiation. Dear reader– for the lowlow price of fifteen meagermeasly dollars (and the accompaniment of my older sister and her friends) I had actually managed, for the very first time, to be granted admission into one of the highly coveted bashbonanza’s of an esteemed fraternity whose name it remains essential to redact for semi-legal reasons. I’m assured you are aware of the importance of this event splayed amongst the barebrief backdrop of my browbeaten, downtrodden life. Mere mortal ascending jilted steps, steadysummiting Olympus. Godspeed. It was lavish– a Pollockpiece array of frumpy furniture and kicked-over kegs and doordash gonebad and empty crushed-up little cans and so on and so forth and whatnot and whathaveyou. A Warholian splattering of familiarface and wellknownname. The Met Gala blushed. And but so, naturally, as if on stage and in supernumerary character, I assumed a position that would afford me nonvisibility. I was all shiverquakes and goosepimples. Donning naught much more than cargoshorts and crocs, a degree of mental flagellation followed. Outcasted by my very own self before my glorious imagined life had but sliverslit chance to begin. I studied the ways of the partygoers from the assured safety of my dark corner. Adapted to their language as modern Saint Jerome. With wideweary eyes I picked up on what got some the bad side of things, what got others the good kind of things. There had emerged a golden heuristic– act not as man, but as Dionysian. Drown in the plentypleasures of animal instinct. This read was initially monumental, touting a sort of historical and frankly kindof famous success– but lest you forget, dear reader, all is temporary. The all night extravagance had come to slowsimmersighs. Feet walking out of doors. Randian greats are born in moments such as these, I had learned upon my fourth skimming of Atlas Shrugged. Any impact left would have to be accomplished posthaste, but with lights dimming, it had to be the sort of thing people tell their children about. I’ll pause for a brief moment to make note of something rather important– this frat, you see, unlike any others on campus, had a house pet. It was adored by all, truth be told. A common Goldfish, big as a fist. A sort of proud insignia of the bunch. You may have been led to what happened in the following moments by the previous reveal, but, I feel it’s in the best interest of all parties involved if I’d just so very kindly spell it out for you. I swallowed the Goldfish. Whole. What seemed like the silence of millionmoons and side glances I wouldn’t wish upon just anyone, the President elect erupted with a shortsweet, “I LIKE THIS GUY!” I won’t insult your intelligence and assume you can’t imagine how the rest of the night went. There were many, many firsts of mine. Irrespective, Icarus rose, waxwings kissed the beatburnt sun that night. I had found myself a spot to rest on cloud nine for the foreseeable. The party trick of dreams, a stunt most daring. Knievel brought to his knees. But, dear reader, try your best not to get too far ahead of yourself. You should be well aware, this is not the end of my story. No fairytale, this. Not at all. The trouble with feeling so good about yourself, it became overoverwhelmingly evident to all around me, is that you would very much so like to feel that way all of the time, indeed. And granted the fact I happened to be such a smash hit with what was basically quasi-royalty– I thought to myself, why wouldn’t classmates, teachers, my parents, etc., like me just as much? The solution was simple. I had tried the method on about two more occasions in front of my newlyfound brothers, with only rave reviews to boot. I had even earned a nickname, “pesc”, short for pescatarian. They hadn’t seen me eat anything other than three live Goldfish, so I wasn’t quick to correct them. In fact, I nearly instantaneously adopted the lifestyle. Results varied. I would be sent out of class or asked to have a sit down talk with the teacher after class to see if I was “alright”. My peers looked at me like I was just some freak or something, nearly all psspsswhispering and some gollygullgagging. My parents wanted to institutionalize me. It didn’t help that for whatever reason, I had begun to imagine that the bigger the Goldfish, the better the reaction. Keep this in mind. This was all worth it for a time, indeed. Indeed it was. I was sort of sickly, given the diet, but! I had felt true, true love from my new brothers– for about a week or so. You see, dear reader, I may have sort of overestimated just about how long this trick would work. In what was notime, notime at all I found myself questioned in constant— e.g., “How are you not fuckin banned from petsmart yet, dude?”, “Do you eat anything else at all? Like ever?”, “What’s your name?”, “Goldfish grow to be this big?”, and worst of all, “Do you wear that every day?”. One slightsip of heavensweet ambrosia had tickled my hubrisbone to the point of no return. There were posters all over campus planted by the self-righteous Animal’s Rights Club detailing my supposed “nefarious affront to the dignity of these poor fish and of myself”. There was an organized Fish Have Feelings Too protest in the commons. I was failing eachevery class, too scared or otherwise banned from entering most lecturehalls on campus. Like Tanutulus reaching, both my simple life before this brave endeavor and lifeliving as collegiate-Caliphate seemed nevereverendingly beyond my dumb fingertips. But I was close, I was so very close, dear reader. I owed it to myself to explore the chances of the latter, at least, I reckoned. I was no longer allowed at the frat house, or much of anywhere, but, what choice was I given, truly. For three consecutive latemarch nights of chillbrisk I snuck in through invariably elaborate, complex, bodily compromising and generally just outright sorrysad ways. Each night I would, like usual, bring my lucky little clear pouch complete with a generous amount of water and Goliathsized Goldfish. The effect my continued display carried was horrifying. Nobody laughed anymore. Nobody whispered. Just staring hollowed out looks of genuine bonedry dread. Upon the third night, after evading a newly prompted nightwatch, I found myself a sideladder to climb. The jump from the roof to the mastersuite bigfuckyoubalcony was only about ten paces of feetfall, so I figured it was worth it. Another fatal decision. Bagbroken, waterdrained, Goldfish pishpatpattering about on the gritgrime and birdshit painting the crackstricken concrete. Holding steadfast with both hands, I dashed downstairs before the fish’s little glubgills would give out. With no water to wash it down, however, my grand finale was spoiled sour. With fishfrenzy smacking uvula and adamsapple alike, it was time to flee. It was a throatlump caught up in the bottle-neck of a skinsmooth redwine. Down from the cuppong centertable with a tweak to the ankle tendon amidst the hurrypanic. A few restraining orders later my picturesque and downright illustrious reign of reigns had come to a sputtering, faltering, blunt, blunt end. Louis XIX blushed.
So with this cautionary tale I leave you, dear reader, from the hospital bed, with heavyheart—
