You make it

There's a tense moment as the ping pong balls fly through the air. The gathered crowd of nearly a dozen falls quiet, watching to see if you really will have to run the Naked Mile around the dorm.

Marlena's throw shoots over the cups on Greg and Alaina's side. She curses, and your heart drops. It's over, you think.

And then your ball sinks into the cup nearest Alaina. You throw your head back in relief. "Oh, thank God!" you yell. "Woo!"

Marlena turns to you and throws up a high-five. "Nice!" she says. "You saved us!"

You high-five her gladly. "Wow, that was a close one," you say.

"You two aren't out of the woods yet," Alaina teases. She sips from her flask, since you got the ball into one of her cups. "That's only one cup. You guys're still gonna lose, right Greg?"

"Right," Greg says, standing up again. It looks like he's recovered Marlena's ball, and they're both ready to throw again. Based on their track record for their last couple of throws, you guess that this game is going to be over quickly.

Neither of them make their shots. Marlena lands her next one, but you miss yours. The game goes back and forth for a few turns, with none of the players successfully getting a ball into a cup, until finally one of Alaina's goes in. The crowd cheers and then disperses quickly, back to their own conversations.

"Well," Marlena says with a shrug. "We did our best." She's looking a little tipsy, much like you're feeling.

"Not good enough," Greg laughs, pushing you a little bit. "Still, though, good game. Even if you only ended up knocking out two of our cups."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," you say. "Funny guy."

You, Greg, Marlena, and Alaina chat among yourselves for a little while. As the conversation goes on, you find your eye drawn more and more to Alaina. She's gorgeous, and her laugh is pretty cute. She's telling a story now about the time her sister got caught doing mushrooms in her dorm, back when she was in college.

"Hey Andrew," Salja says, coming up behind you.

"Oh, Salja!" you say. You hadn't noticed her come in. It must have been at some point during the beer pong game. Aside from Greg, Salja is probably the person you're closest to on the floor. She's an Asian girl with short dark hair tied back into a ponytail. Her brown eyes are calm as ever and welcoming, despite her apparent edge. The only makeup she's wearing is a light stroke of black eyeliner. Tonight, she's wearing a loose baseball tee and a baggy old pair of jeans, covered in holes. A plaid sweater is wrapped around her waist. "How's it going?"

"Good," she says. Her face is already looking a little red, and she's swaying slightly in place. "I'm, uh, I'm doing pretty good."

You laugh. "Yeah?" you say. "You're looking pretty gone, man."

"I am pretty gone," she says. "I managed to score a few shots off of John."

Marlena looks over her shoulder. John is talking to some guy from another floor, but every once in a while, he looks back at your conversation. If you know John, and you think you do, you'd bet that he's watching Salja to see how drunk she's going to get. "C'mon Salja," Marlena says. "You know why he gave you those shots."

Salja shrugs. "It's not like I'm going to sleep with him just because he gave my five bucks' worth of vodka. I'm not Ashley."

"Hey!" Alaina says. "Don't be mean to Ashley! She's really nice." In fairness, Alaina is right. Ashley is more than a little bit promiscuous, but all of your interactions with her have been really nice, even when she isn't trying to sleep with you.

"Where is Ashley anyway?" Greg says.

You look around the room. The twins are talking to some girls from the lower floors who look like they're interested in the idea of sharing two identical guys. John is talking to another guy, although it looks like he wishes he was your position. Tough luck, guy, you think. But Ashley and Wally are nowhere to be found. Where did they end up going off to?