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"I can't believe we get to room together, bro!"
"Yeah! Room 111 for the win," Mike cheered.
Jerry frowned. "Nah, man, it's room 211."
Mike frowned. They both opened the folders the campus RA had passed out, only to find that, indeed, Jerry was in 211 while Mike was in 111.
"Think we can switch?"
"Ugh. It says here floors are determined by major. So unless you want to switch to engineering..."
Mike laughed. "Bro, you know I can't do math on a good day. I wonder who we're roomies with."
The answers to that were, for Jerry, a fellow Linguistics major named Tom, and for Mike, a guy from the middle of nowhere, Illinois named Danny. Oh well. Hopefully, he wouldn't be too awful.
-
Danny said 'ope' a lot, something Mike thought was a stereotype, was incredibly weird although not in any way that affected Mike, and had the kind of hatred for the Green Bay Packers that implied a story. And oh boy, it was.
"Why do you hate the Packers so much? I mean, you said you don't have a favorite team?"
"Oh," said Danny, in the midst of texting someone named 'Fruitloop MF Wannabe' in his phone that the Packers were losing. "Yeah, no, my uncle ruined them for me."
"Oh. Big football nerd?"
He laughed. "Did I ever tell you about the time he recreated the Green Bay Packers stadium and used it to stage a fight with my sister in a robot suit and- ope, mom's calling, sorry."
What? He couldn't just leave him hanging like that! Evidently, Danny could. When he returned, the mech wasn't brought up again. Rather, it started with, "sorry about that. Anyway, we were talking about the New Years' party, right?"
No. No, they were not, Mike wanted to know what his sister was doing in a robot suit, and- "right, so it's going to hell in a handbasket already with my parents arguing, my dad's switching between arguing with my mom and trying to be friendly to my uncle. Next thing you know, my uncle roofies him, and-"
"What?!"
"Oh yeah, crushed up one of his sleeping pills and put it in his drink. My uncle has a crazy high metabolism, so it's a strong one, too. Anyway, then-"
This made no sense whatsoever. "Wait, why did he drug your dad?"
"Well, he didn't want to hear him talking, you know? Anyway, at that point, the turkey is on fire and the ham's walked off, so-"
"Hold on," he said, raising a hand. "How is he not in jail? You called the cops, right?"
"Nah, he was fine. Besides, mom shot him after she found out, so-"
"She shot someone?!" Mike demanded hysterically, "was she calling you from prison?"
"What? No, she didn't kill him, it wasn't a lethal one, just in the leg. Your mom's never shot someone before," he asked with a laugh.
Mike gaped at him. "No, Danny. That's- no. My mom would be in prison. Why didn't your uncle call the cops?"
"Oh, he's obsessed with her in the most creepy way possible," Danny said with a roll of his eyes. "He thinks she'll fall in love with him for some reason. Even named his cat after her."
"Please please please tell me your uncle isn't your mom's brother."
To his relief, Danny shook his head. "Nah, no actual blood relation to either of my parents, he's just an old family friend."
What kind of old family friend did that sort of shit?
"Total fruitloop," Danny added, "absolute nutcase."
"Sounds like it. So your uncle drugged your dad, your mom shot your uncle, and your sister was in a robot suit somewhere?"
"Oh! No, the robot suit's a different story, but I've got class in 10 minutes. See you later!"
-
Mike: Jerry rescue me
Mike: my roomie is nice but his family is NUTS
Jerry: how nuts?
Mike: Ok let me tell you about New Years 2 years ago.
-
Danny was ridiculously nice. But as a California native in California's Institute of Technology, he had no way to verify how much of the absolute insanity that was Danny's home life was normal for a backwater town (Amity Province or something?), Illinois, and how much was just weird all around.
He had to sleep facing the door. Walked out in the coldest days of the year in shorts and a t-shirt. Went swimming in February. No fear of heights. Big on gun safety, and was that a gun in his bag?
It didn't fire bullets. It did, however, fire radioactive lasers. Mike wasn't sure if that was better or not.
-
Danny didn't mind sharing his family stories in exchange for food, shoulder rubs, and beer, so for better or worse, Sunday afternoon was Danny's story time. Within two weeks, Mike and Danny's room was filled with about 20 students. After six, they had to move to the floor 1 common room.
"Ok, so where was I? Right, so by this time, my mom and I are in the plane, and the pilot makes us wear parachutes, which shoulda been our first sign something was up. Anyway, we get kicked out- and I do mean that literally- in the middle of a Colorado forest."
"Was it your uncle," one of the Biochem majors asked.
"Well, we find this trail and head up it, hoping for civilization- and I'm lucky I didn't get my growth spurt till 16, because I broke my ankle, so mom's carrying me- and we find this real fancy hunting cabin in the woods."
"You're literally the white boy in a horror movie," breathed the RA.
Danny laughed. "It's the uncle! $20 bucks," cried another.
"There's power lines, so maybe a phone, my mom knocks on the door, and who opens it? My creepy uncle."
"I fucking knew it, you owe me $20."
The RA elbowed the other student, and asked, "then what happened?"
"He invites us in, and all sorts of alarms are going off because hell no, that's too convenient, but my mom's chill. She's talking to him, he says the phone lines are down- spoiler alert, they were not- says, 'oh, I wasn't expecting Danny', and he's got wine and shit out, he planned this."
-
By the time their first spring, summer, and fall semesters were over, Mike thought he knew Danny pretty well. He'd met the insane but friendly (probably) mad scientist parents over skype, and the frighteningly sane and normal older sister in person.
No one had ever met Uncle Fruitloop (or Uncle Nutjob, depending on the person) before. So, of course, when Danny announced his creepy uncle was picking him up for winter break, they had to swing by to see him.
Mike was prepared for the fancy car, as Danny called him a bougie bastard all the time. He was not prepared for multi-billionaire business mogul, the face of whom was on his Business Administration textbook, to step out of said car.
Clearly, his uncle was someone else. Surely, someone as wealthy and powerful as Vlad Masters wouldn't be so unhinged as to-
"What's up, fruitloop bitch?"
Silence in the crowd of students pretending to wait for pickups.
Vlad Masters- a guy he'd admired for his wealth for years- frowned. "Daniel, you're an immature fruitcake of a human being."
"Ok, but at least I'm not so insane I'm made up of seven lifetimes' supplies of fruitloops," Danny immediately fired back.
No. No, the man on the front of this month's People Magazine could not possibly be Uncle Nutjob. Not the Uncle Nutjob who'd become the campus joke. The guy won't take no for an answer? Uncle Fruitloop's behavior. Anyone who was just pathetically desperate for romance with no redeeming qualities or narcissistic was deemed an 'Uncle Nutjob wannabe'.
"Oh, what was that?" Masters asked, cupping a hand around his ear, "it sounds like I'm paying your tuition."
The RA collapsed. No one reacted.
"Yeah, and I didn't ask you for that. Who did, again? It wasn't my dad- oh, right, it was my mom!"
Jerry gasped and grabbed his shoulder.
"If you would just cooperate-"
"I'm not becoming your apprentice, you washed-up old hack!"
Kim sat down on the grass, staring wide-eyed at the train wreck. Mike started reevaluating everything he knew about Masters, combining it with stories of Uncle Fruitloop.
"Take that back!"
"Vampire-looking creep! Old enough to be my grandfather looking-"
"Hey!"
"Mother-fucker wannabe! Obsessive asshole!"
"Oh, oh, you want to play that game? Fine! Remind me who can't stand others being in 'his town'," Masters demanded. Neither he nor Danny seemed to care about the crowd.
Danny put his hands on his hips, turned his head sideways, and pouted mockingly. "Oh, I'm sowwy, who can't stand his so-called best friend being married to 'his' Maddie?"
"Fuck you," the older man snapped.
"Putting aside I'd never fuck a slimy old rich bourgeoise-looking, thieving capitalist scum-sucker like you because I have standards you homicidal maniac, thank you very much," he began, flipping the bird at Masters with both hands,
"After you cloned me?! You'd have better luck getting in my dad's pants!"
Wait. Cloning. Was that- was his baby cousin who looked like his twin his clone?!
Vlad gagged. "Did you have to put that image in my head?! Why couldn't you just say Maddie?"
Danny laughed mockingly. "Because you have a better chance with me than you will ever have with her! And you should know that since I know for a goddamn fact that Maddie 63.2-"
63.2??? That implied at least 62 others!
"Went AWOL with all the other AI's you modeled after my mother, you dumb fuck!"
They argued- loudly- for about 10 more minutes before the fight abruptly stopped and Danny, still flipping Masters off, got in the car.
Long after they left- still bickering- Mike stared blankly at the car area. He opened his phone.
Mike: Mom you will NEVER guess who Uncle Fruitloip is
Ma💝: Ooh drop the tee
Ma💝: that's how you say it, right?
Mike: close. It's spill the tea
Mike: anyway, Dannys uncle picked him up and they had a fight on campus grounds
Mike: it's Vlad Masters
Ma💝: wait the rich one?!
Mike: yeah, and apparently he cloned Danny at some point. I'll have to ask next semester
Ma💝: the bridge club is going to love this