ALPHA BETA TRAITOR

Kathy Moffet


In her mind Sarah had the votes counted.
She would beat Sue Reventlow by one vote
fourteen to thirteen
and be president of the sorority
for the second year in a row.
She thought.
Now with the girls all gone
and her roomie Beth sound asleep
in their cozy quarters
she was reconciling 
the harsh reality of being runner-up.
Where had she miscalculated?
Who had jumped ship,
detrained-- mixing metaphors--
from her campaign express?
Then.
It came to her.
The votes,
the anonymous ballots.
Mrs. Halkemp, who owned the sorority house
had wadded them in a plastic bag
and taken it into the kitchen.
Sarah crept quietly there, 
lifted the cover of the wastebasket. 
The small plastic bag was on top.
She removed it, untied it,
emptied the identical-sized ballots
onto the small breakfast-nook table.
And found at once the root of her miscalculation.
The slip of paper read Sue
in Beth's inimitable print
with the tall "S" 
and the three-dash "E" without a spine.

Beth had betrayed her.

Sarah re-stuffed the other ballots into the bag
and returned it to the wastebasket.
Then she marched back to her room
and switched on the overhead light.
Beth was already sitting up,
her head propped on the upright pillow.
"You were too much into it,"
she stated with matter-of-fact candor.
"We weren't spending the time
together we used to."
Sarah looked across at Beth,
crushed the small slip of paper in her hand,
said:  "Thank you.  Being president 
wasn't fun anymore anyway.
Sue can have the job."
Sarah tripped the switch,
laughed into the darkness.
"Get some sleep.  I missed you, too."