Sanctus Dominus....Hawkins Watch!

I take pride in the fact that I have been a member of many groups/factions/stables. Since I was a child, I helped form many "gangs" as we used to call them.

THE Gang
The Crew
The Boys
The Jobless Crew
The Four Horseman

Clearly you can figure out that these groups weren't SUPER intimidating. Most of us were nerds who just enjoyed talking about pop culture and video games. One of the last groups I was a member of was in college. There were several groups around the campus, but I helped establish a group known as The Council.

Pretty badass right? Well, once again it was made up of a very diverse group of people who one might classify as nerds. The group came together during my year as an R.A. (which I'm sure you'll hear war stories from those days as well). One of my best friends, Ryan, was an R.A. on the third floor of Lawless Lawton (the place we would call home for two years). I was the R.A. of the first floor with my suitemates: Jonesy, John and my roommate Sam (codename: Samwise). Samwise, Jonesy and Ryan made up the founding members of The Council. Steven would join later as a refugee from Stringer Commons (yet another tale that will no doubt need to be told). We formed as a means to help each other out during times of great distress. Whether it was women, school or life in general, when a Council member called for a meeting, you answered. Even today, if any one of my brothers in arms was in need, I would immediately stop what I was doing and make sure they were ok.

This story is one of those times....

Going to school in the South meant that you had to deal with certain harsh realities. As the philosopher Kanye West once said, "Racism's still alive, they just keep concealing it." Even at a Christian school. This was especially true when it came to interracial dating. It was pretty much unheard of at Anderson unless you were a basketball player and you were a basketball player's groupie trying to make her dad angry. However, this story includes one of the few exceptions to the rule...sort of.

Prior to Sophomore year, Ryan dated a girl who will be named "Becky" Hawkins for the duration of this story. Becky was a nice girl. I thought she was pretty cute due to her red hair (my kryptonite, admittedly) and I thought she was a cool since she dated my friend Ryan. However, after a year together, the two broke up for reasons I can't fully remember. Don't worry though! You only need to know Becky's existence and her connection to Ryan for this story!

Fast forward to a year later and Jonesy is in my dorm room, as he was want to do back then, and was telling us about his new girlfriend... Becky's sister, "Susan". Susan, Becky's twin sister, to me was the more attractive of the two (she also had a redder shade of hair...that might have played a factor). Susan seemed to make Jonesy happy, which was great since we had always wanted Jones to meet someone who could make him happy. I did not know much about Susan, though, since she lived at home about 30 or 40 minutes from campus. My first encounter with Susan was when Jones brought her over for what is known as RSVP on Anderson's campus.

What's RSVP, you may be asking? Well... RSVP is the designated time that girls could be in guy's rooms and vice versa from 6-10:30 or 11 (depending on your dorm) every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. I was not working RSVP by checking girls into the dorms, but as an R.A. in the exclusive R.A. suite, I was alerted when Jones brought a girl into his room. The two sat around on his bed watching movies (Superbad!) and listening to Jonesy's music collection.

It was a pretty nice date and one that Sam and I talked about all night. There were a few times I had to tell Jones to leave his door open a little more, but he was very obliging which was strange because I knew what he wanted...

Now, you may remember that I mentioned the name of John who also stayed in our suite. Well, John worked at the local Gamestop and wouldn't be home until RSVP ended. I guess John must have gotten off early since he interrupted Jonesy's date. The two had a strange relationship. They seemed to like each other, but some days were a little too much for the other. John came to our room to vent about Jones being in their room with the girl. Apparently, Jones...requested that John come back later after his date was finished.

Sam and I found the whole situation hilarious, but we didn't John know. He needed a sympathetic ear and not one that was going to antagonize him. John decided he had enough so he left our room and approached Jones when Susan went to the bathroom which is where Sam and I heard the funniest conversation ever.

"Hey Jones. Are you almost done with this date of yours?" asked John.

"Yeah, man. We're almost done," said Jones. I could tell just from his voice that Jones was probably giving his patented glare over his glasses.

"Alright, well...how much longer are you going to be because RSVP is almost over and she's not going to be able to stay in here." said John.

"Look man... you know how it is. I just need about... 20 more minutes."

"20 minutes!?" asked John. "Look Jones, I'm going to give you five minutes. Just take her to the bathroom, do your thing and get her out!"

I imagined Jonesy standing dumbfounded.

"Five minutes?!" he asked. "What am I supposed to do in five minutes, John?! Get my **** hard!?"

THAT'S when I lost it. I laughed so hard that I winded up on the ground crying. Sam was lying in his bed, equally as in tears. Jones poked his head out.

"Ayo Marc!" he said. "You hear dis $%&#!?"

Sam and I closed the door shortly after that. The week had ended and we were beyond tired.

Now, you're probably wondering how does The Council play into this. Well, about two weeks later, Jones and Susan broke up for reasons unknown. The Council was assembled for an emergency meeting because rumors were beginning to spread that Susan was possibly cheating on Jones. Jones, wanting to get to the bottom of this, called in the Council and his other faction, The B.O.A.R.D. (meaning: classified). Both factions worked tirelessly to get to the bottom of these rumors, but every time we did...a new bit of information would come about:

"Susan was dating Jones to make her dad angry at her!"

"Susan hated Jones because he was black!"

"Susan was dating a B.O.A.R.D. member!"

Each new rumor was discussed at nightly meetings we code named: Hawkins Watch! Every night, Jones would open the door chanting a strange latin chant: "SANCTUS DOMINUS! DOMINUS SANCTUS! SANCTUS ROMY RUSE! ROMY NOOSE SANCTUS!.....HAWKINS WATCH!"

Ryan was especially invested in this since he, by that time, HATED Becky and HATED Susan even more. Ryan and Jones took point on the Hawkins Watch affair, but I would find myself brought deep into the mix when I was walking home from class with Steven. We were going over a lesson we had just sat in on for an education class when who should be leaning over to talk than Becky. Becky and I had never really spoken to one another even when Ryan dated her, but here she was leaning over, touching my arm and clearly flirting with me!
"Oh Marcus! You're so funny! I don't understand why we've never hung out before?"

"I mean, I'm pretty busy with theatre nowadays." I just became a Double Major.

"Really? Are you in any shows? I'd love to see you in one... Maybe we could hang out after you're done with rehearsal one night?"

I laughed and said maybe before. I made a bee line for our suite with Steven following behind me as I sent a text saying:

"Sanctus Dominus.... Hawkins Watch Update! Council Meeting after dinner!"

She almost got me. Had she not needed to redye her hair red, I might have fallen into the honey pot. As it was, I was loyal to a fault. Ryan would never forgive me if he thought I was flirting with a girl he considered his arch nemesis!

After dinner, we sat down in Sam and I's room and I told everyone about what happened just outside. The boys agreed that she was indeed hitting on me, but the true question was...to what end? We began to theorize as if we were all descendants of Sherlock Holmes. For what reason would Becky, who had no ties to Jonesy, be after me? The answer: she wasn't. My thought: Becky was using me as a way to get back not just at Ryan...but at the entire Council.

Jones had let it slip to Susan of the Council's existence and she was, until their breakup, very interested in it's inner workings. It was at this time, that Jones revealed that Susan was trying to hook up with a few of the single members of The B.O.A.R.D.

It was incredible. We never thought it was connected since The Council and B.O.A.R.D. were separate entities. Yet here we were... looking at two tricky dames who were trying to bring down two of the most dominant factions on Anderson's campus!

We theorized what their end game must have been, but in truth we did not care. Our pride had been hurt. We had been compromised by our largest enemy.

S.H.I.E.L.D found its HYDRA.

The Justice League met the Legion of Doom

We never had anymore issues with the Hawkins girls. They had moved on and found boyfriends who would soon get engaged with them. Perhaps they were bored and wanted a bit of excitement. Perhaps they wanted to see if they could tear our friendships apart. What the Hawkins Twins failed to realize was that we became stronger as a team. We worked together, sought out our enemy and defended ourselves.

The Battle with the Hawkins Twins will forever go down as one of our fiercest battles and while you may hear more stories of The Council, nothing will ever compare to....

SANCTUS DOMINUS...DOMINUS SANCTUS...HAWKINS WATCH!!!