Prank War

 I wasn't a bad student. I wasn't a great one either. I was one of those kids who was, academically speaking, a little better than average. I was, however, a shithead. I was good at being a little shithead, and the adults in my life during those years didn't appreciate it as much as my peers did. 

If there was any type of minor shithead activity that could be performed, you better believe I would be the first one to sign up. I'm not proud of these little dalliances, but I did them, so I have to own it. I didn't steal things, or cause any permanent damage, I was just a little shit. 

If there were snippy comments to be made, I would make them. Need someone to fake cough any time the physics teacher said "gravity?" Pick me. I was such a little bastard that one time, in the 4th grade, I got under my teacher's skin so badly she just up and dumped out my desk in the middle of class. Nobody else got that kind of special attention. Just this fucker. For the record, I'm not necessarily proud of that particular incident. But it happened, so whatever, it happened.

The peak of my asshole adventures (youth division) came in my freshman year of college. I was away from home for the first time, as we all were, and I was far enough away that I couldn't just go home for the weekend. With that in mind, I was ready to really open up the floodgates of being a problem.

My floor was in the basement of the dorm. My campus was on a bluff, so there were hills and slopes everywhere. My dorm was built into a hill, so the bottom floor was part underground, part at the ground, and always musty. We also had a storage room that took up half of the area, so we had fewer residents than other floors. It was cozy, if dank.

Somehow, a prank war started between us and the 4th floor. They had twice the kids, so a larger roster of talent to choose from. But I was in the basement, a secret weapon living below decks. It began innocent enough, with the random ceiling tile being swiped to replace a broken one. Slowly, the inevitable escalation happened. More tiles, moving common area furniture, swiping toilet paper. The toilet paper thing was huge, as our bathroom was half the size, and we only had three stalls. Two were designated as "poop only" and the other was where we went if we drank to the point of barfing, so a "poop at your own risk" stall.

The 4th floor stole our toilet paper, so we took off the doors to one of their stalls. They had more than us, so it wasn't as big a deal. Then they took all our stall doors. Then we took their trash cans. Then they took all but one of our shower curtains. We had three showers, each with two curtains, an outer one for privacy and an inner one to keep water in the shower. They left us one. Total.

Now, we had convenience stores on campus where a student could get snacks, ramen, better than industrial toilet paper, etc. They had Jell-O boxes there, as well. So I bought some. And in the dead of night, I, with my 6 boxes of red flavored Jell-O, went to work. 

The next morning, red tinted students came to our floor, waving a white t-shirt. During the peace summit, I explained my deed. They were red because I unscrewed each shower head and filled it with a pack of red Jell-O, causing the water to come out of the head in a color reminiscent of a horror movie. We came to a tenuous cease fire, as we all came to the realization that if we kept going, something might get out of control. It was a good thing, too. The war had gone on for weeks, and the Jell-O shower was our nuke. Our last chance to come out victorious. 

It worked. 

As I didn't want to be a sore winner, my team and I invited them down to our floor that evening for a party, funded by us. One of the combatants had a brother who was unscrupulous enough to get us liquor, so we took full advantage. As we were all 18 years old and shitty, we went hard. 

Turns out, they won the war by barfing in all three of our stalls, and not taking care enough to aim. A noncombatant, one of the good students who took life seriously despite being a teenager, was also a narc, and tattled on all of us.

The war was over for real now. We had to sit down, not dyed red, with the RA's of both floors and sign some bullshit document of reprimand and stop pulling pranks, not just with each other, but in general. It sucked. Fucking federales got to us.

As a post script to the whole ordeal, our RA, despite making sure we didn't reignite the war, was happy with us because he hated his 4th floor compatriot. As a reward, he got us a case of beer to enjoy quietly and without guests. We obliged.

As a result of this whole ordeal I learned the importance of extra toilet paper. And not being a little shit, but I don't know how well I've adhered to that bit.