America 1982-Chapter 213 - 76: My Days at the Fraternity Have Just Begun

Stanford University’s Freedom Boulevard, a sunny morning.

"Tommy! Can you sign your autobiography for me?" A cheerful, brown-skinned girl, waving a book in her hand, jogged up to the two men, handed Tommy her pen and the book, and asked with a smile.

Tommy took the book and pen from her and said, "Of course, it’s my honor."

"May I ask quietly, where can I buy that indie film you were part of?" As Tommy unscrewed the pen cap, the girl bit her lip for a moment before asking in a lowered voice.

Jason’s eyes bulged at this, walking beside Tommy towards the garage: "Young lady! Have you seen some pirated news or something?"

As he spoke, Jason flexed his right bicep: "The actor is me, Jason White, look at my biceps! Look at my biceps! I’m the one who acted, I got the Best Actor award, you should be getting my autograph."

"Sorry, I thought it was Tommy," the girl sighed with regret upon hearing Jason’s words.

Tommy laughed and signed his name on the title page of the book, which was promptly published following the court verdict, then handed it back to her, saying warmly, "Thank you for buying my book, miss."

The girl, ignoring Jason’s incessant grumbling, happily turned and left after receiving Tommy’s signature. Watching her walk away, Jason White turned his head to Tommy, dissatisfied, and asked:

"Even though it was my irresistible good looks that saved Actor Corporation, why do these women either regret not seeing you in the indie film or simply credit me for the most critical turning point in the history of Actor Corporation’s founding?"

"Maybe it’s because..." Tommy, aware of Jason’s increasingly murderous gaze, carefully considered his distance from Jason, not enough to escape his friend’s beating, and reluctantly said, "Ladies might worry that your ’large golf club’ would scare them off, considering your physique could very well enter a bodybuilding contest. The one man at Stanford University qualified to profit from his body is you, big daddy Jason." 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Jason nodded in satisfaction: "Very good, son, that answer just saved you and also resolved a puzzling question in my mind just now."

"What question?" Tommy Hawk breathed a sigh of relief and asked Jason.

Jason put his arm around Tommy’s shoulder and said casually:

"It’s nothing. I was just thinking about which wrestling move I would use to finish you off if you hadn’t given me a satisfying answer just now. Whether I should land a Jawbreaker to knock all your teeth out, or use a Guillotine Drop to rip off your head."

When the two reached Garage No. 9, most of the items inside had been cleared out, with only a few untransported packing boxes remaining. Holly, Susan, Mark, Sophia, and Garry Good, the part-time customer service team leader at Actor Corporation, were all sitting on these boxes, laughing and chatting. When they saw the two Stanford roommates walking in arm in arm, they all stopped their conversation and looked at them.

Or rather, they looked at Tommy Hawk, even Jason let go of the arm around Tommy’s shoulder to look at him.

Actor Corporation had already rented a larger office space in Silicon Valley, and the staff had rapidly expanded to more than seventy people and was still recruiting. The garage was no longer sufficient to hold the soaring dreams of Actor Corporation.

Today, this place was going to be completely emptied, and then the keys would be returned to Stanford University.

"Time suddenly seems precious, doesn’t it?" Tommy looked around the garage, kicked a packing box a few times with his foot, then turned to the others and said with a sigh:

"Jason, Holly took a leave of absence, Susan is busy with community college, Mark is in charge of that Hope Human Resources Company, and Sophia is lately occupied being Ms. Delia Case’s assistant during her guest professorship at Stanford Law School. Everyone has a bright future, everyone has changed, except for me. I’m still that carefree, innocent college student, Tommy."

Jason took out a cigarette, lit it with his head down, then looked at Susan, Holly, and Mark, who were casting inquiring glances at him, and eventually shook his head:

"I couldn’t convince him to take a leave of absence, guys. He, on the contrary, made me throw up because he said he wanted to further his education at Stanford, to change his destiny with knowledge. Whoever can listen to that crap without the urge to vomit should try again, because I can’t do it."

"Apart from your shares in Actor Corporation, you’ve already almost a million in your bank account from just the book sales, Tommy. You could even teach a course at Stanford on how to get rich quickly," Holly sighed and said to Tommy, "You must have other reasons for insisting on completing your studies, right?"

Tommy Hawk is now a bona fide millionaire, not a penny taken from Actor Corporation, but this guy, keeping it from everyone, had Delia contact a publisher she knew early on to plan the book. He even secretly had a ghostwriter finish the manuscript.

So the day after Actor Corporation won the lawsuit, bookstores had a new book called "I Should Be Executed," telling the story of Tommy Hawk’s childhood, adolescence, how he got into Stanford, and the original intentions behind starting Actor Corporation, and so on. To put it another way, they jokingly called the book by another name, "The Modern American Redemption of Jesus."