Debunked Part IV
(Or, the one in which date-hunting commences and a binder full of men is discussed)
Amy, of course, completely disregards Sinead's warnings and goes full-on Emma on her. Every boy who passes by them is scrutinized and judgement is passed on whether he can be an acceptable date for Sinead to the cotillion.
But Sinead can't bring herself to be annoyed- no, she's rather gratified by how attentive Amy Cahill, the most popular girl in school, is being towards her.
Plus, it's quite amusing to watch unfold.
For one, the amount of scheming involved is insane. Sinead had thought junior prom last year in her old high school was a whole production, but cotillion in the New York prep school scene is on another level entirely.
It starts on Tuesday during lunch.
"Okay," Amy says without preamble as she slides into her usual spot between Cara and Sinead, "we need to get you a date before Friday so you don't have to dance with another partner-less girl during the first practice."
"What's wrong with that?" Sinead asks, and she is met with horrified looks from Amy and Cara.
From Amy, who heaves a long-suffering sigh: "Because the first practice is a time to scope out everyone else's date. You don't want to be an outcast even before you meet the rest of the debutantes."
From Cara, piping up: "Which is why the optimal window for securing a date is between late Tuesday and mid-Wednesday."
From Amy: "So now's the time."
From Sinead, incredulous: "Do I even want to know how you came up with that one?"
From Cara, smugly: "Word will obviously get around about who your escort is, so if you get one too early, you'll seem easy, and too late makes you look desperate."
From Ian, who has just sat down and says sarcastically: "Yes, because this is the fifties and girls are obviously still judged by how 'easy' they are."
From Amy, not flinching: "Your words, not mine, babe."
From Cara, consideringly: "Although, nice try combating institutional sexism."
From Ian, confused: "Wait, am I 'babe' then?"
From Jake, just arrived and frowning: "Isn't this a little too much?"
From Sinead, at the same time: "Do you guys actively spend time thinking like this?"
From Jonah, having chosen this moment sit next to them and issue a theatrically ominous: "It's kill or be killed, baby."
From Amy, who only shrugs while the rest of them struggle not to laugh: "He's not wrong."
From Cara who pulls out a large binder with a dramatic flourish: "Which is why we have… this."
From Sinead, groaning and covering her face with her hands: "Is that really a-"
From Jonah, helpfully: "A binder full of men? Yes."
From Jake, sarcastically: "Better than a binder full of women, am I right?"
From Amy, snidely: "Nice Romney reference, Boston."
From Cara, impressed: "You guys really are on a feminism kick today, aren't you?"
From Jake questioningly: "So am I 'Boston' now?
From Amy, flipping the binder open: "Okay, what about Ruslan Radov?"
From Jonah, immediately: "Too bolshie"
From Sinead: "Is that a thing?"
From Hamilton, nodding fervently: "For Rus, yes."
From Ian, delivering the final blow: "For one, he already has the vodka habit and questionable loyalties part down."
From Cara, craning over Amy's shoulder to flip the page: "Spencer Grey?"
From Jonah: "HARD PASS."
From Ian: "I had no idea you had strong feelings about him."
From Jonah, back to his chaotically serene self: "I don't."
From Hamilton, explaining: "Meaning he's irrelevant in the greater scheme of things."
From Amy, thoughtful: "Good point. We should make relevance more important."
From Cara: "So that takes Jose off the list."
From Ian: "Who?"
From Cara, victorious: "EXACTLY."
A comically profound pause, then-
From Amy, in a hushed whisper: "Evan Tolliver."
From Cara, wonderingly: "Oh my God how did I not think of him?"
From Sinead: "Who is he?"
From Hamilton: "He's on the tennis team."
From Jake: "Captain of the robotics team."
From Sinead, frowningly: "I mean like personality-wise?"
From Jonah with a condescending pat on Sinead's head: "That doesn't matter- it's all about pedigree, Sinead."
From Amy, nodding in agreement: "His grandma is literally the queen of the social scene in the city, plus his parents are really connected. Going with him will do wonders for your cred around here."
From Sinead: "I feel like a medieval bride being sold off for three cows and a chicken."
From Ian, slyly teasing: "Come now, you're worth at least five cows and two chickens."
From Sinead, secretly pleased but externally Not Amused: "Ha".
"If you really want to suss him out, he's right there." Amy jerks a thumb in the direction of a guy who is making his way to a table near them,
Sinead's eyes widen. Okay, so she knew she would have to get herself a date at some point, but this is moving way too fast and-
"Evan!" Cara calls out. Evan turns his head towards him, his eyes comically wide as if to ask, "who, me?"
But Cara only waves a hand to beckon him over.
"Come sit with us," Amy smiles disarmingly at him once he's close enough.
"Okay," he nods, taking a seat in the empty chair next to Cara.
"How's it going?" Cara asks him breezily.
"Good," Evan says as he attempts a smile, clearly cowed to be in the presence of Amy Cahill and her friends.
But as far as first impressions go, it's not a bad one. While he doesn't exactly have the brash overconfidence of Jonah (or the more attractive self-assuredness Ian has, Sinead thinks guiltily), he's not bad to look at. Evan is tall, blonde, broad-shouldered, with pretty blue eyes partially obscured by those oversized glasses that are so trendy these days. His clothing errs on the more hipster end of the spectrum, but she's not going to hold that against him.
Cara plows on. "Did you get a chance to look at the lesson plans for the coding club? Thanks for volunteering by the way."
Evan brightens up almost immediately. "Yeah, I did. They're solid, although I think maybe you should start with C++ instead of Java. I think using C++ can allow kids to make a lot of connections for themselves instead of just feeding them Java right off the bat, you know?"
His earnest gaze meets Sinead's somewhat impressed one, and Amy takes over right away.
"You know Sinead, right- she moved this year?" She asks, and Sinead has to hand it to her. Amy has made it sound like everyone knows Sinead, or at least, everyone should know Sinead.
"We haven't met officially," Evan tells Amy, and then looks expectantly at Sinead, who internally sighs, knowing that the burden of conversation is on her.
"You must be super into coding," Sinead blurts out, wincing slightly because of the stupidity of her statement- of course he is! Robotics team and coding club, what else?
But she has no time to berate herself because Evan takes the bait.
"Yeah," he nods, looking more relieved than anything, probably because he gets to talk about a topic he's fluent in. "I started reading these old Oracle books my dad had from the nineties and sort of figured it out on my own- kinda nerdy, I know."
"No!" Sinead grins. "It's cute. I mostly stick to the liberal arts end of things," she adds, feeling that she should add her own bit of self-deprecation for the sake of reciprocity.
But Evan only says, "that's cool... ". Sinead is a little disappointed that he didn't catch on- after all, there was an abundance of untapped discussion material in the great STEM vs. liberal arts debate.
Amy quickly jumps in.
"How's your grandmother doing?" She asks. "I just heard from Grace she's the chairwoman for the cotillion committee this year."
"Yeah, she is," Evan says fondly. "You know Grandmother- she always has a project or event she's chairing."
"You know, Sinead is debuting at the cotillion next month and she needs a date," Amy says, (to Sinead) mortifyingly straight-forward. "Would you like to escort her?"
Sinead now wants to crawl into a hole in the ground and die. What was she thinking? She probably looked like some kind of loser, making her friend ask a guy out for her!
"Of course," Evan says- eagerly? "Grandmother was hoping I'd escort someone anyway, but I've been so busy…" he trails off, somewhat embarrassed.
What.
"Don't worry," Cara says sweetly. "I can reduce your coding club duties so that you can focus all your energy-" she winks- "on Sinead."
Sinead flushes a terrible, bright red at that, but clearly Evan doesn't notice when he turns to her to ask, "I know the first practice is on Friday- do you want to go together after school?"
"Yes," she manages to get out. "Yes, I'd like that."
Just then, she swears she hears Hamilton mutter to Jake, "he has a type, doesn't he?", but she forces herself to maintain eye contact with Evan.
"Great," Evan says, smiling easily for the first time since she met him. "I'll see you then."
He then leaves.
It's all done in an alarmingly straight-forward manner- surely she should have had to at least bat her eyelashes or twirl a lock of her hair or something?
But no, a simple question (or command, if you think about it) from Amy Cahill was enough.
Well, Sinead Starling now has a date.
"He's cute," Cara says, watching his retreating figure, completely unaware that Jake is scowling beside her.
"Too bad he didn't last longer," Jonah jokes and nudges Ian.
"I had nothing to do with that," Ian says a little too smoothly, and all of them smile as if it's their own little private joke- except for Sinead.
The bell rings, and half their group leaves. Sinead hangs back, urging Cara and Hamilton to go ahead to class without her.
Amy eyes her curiously as Sinead approaches her.
"Were you and Evan together?" Sinead questions Amy, fighting to keep her voice casual and unaffected.
"For a a few months," Amy shrugs, and then adds a little pointedly, "back in ninth grade, Sinead."
"Oh."
She really doesn't know what else to say- but something about it makes her a little uncomfortable. Was she getting Amy's cast-off on purpose (she's fairly sure Amy must have broken up with Evan- not the other way around)? Or was it just a happy coincidence?
"Besides," Amy continues, "he's a friend of the family- and you like him, don't you?"
"Yeah," Sinead nods, wondering if she's convincing herself more than Amy. "Yeah, I do."
Happy belated New Year!
I really wanted to make one note about the chapter above- the "binder full of women" thing is something Presidential Candidate (Now the Senator from Utah) Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts said in a debate during the 2012 election, and he was hella roasted and it turned into a meme. Anyway, it's a reference I made with great glee, mostly for myself.
To amy - Thank you for the review on the previous chapter, and I will be sure to write more Amian, since that's my main ship.
To Rival Argentica - Thank you for taking note of the character development. I think as we grow older, we all begin to understand our parents and their motives more and more, and this was a heartbreaking example of it.
To zola - I've missed you and your super insightful thoughts too! And congrats on gaining entrance to your top choice uni! It's crazy how time flies. If you want to get in touch, you can DM me on here, or just email me at magictreehousenj at gmail . com . I can give you my insta handle if you'd like.
Anyway, let me know what you all think in a review and follow, favorite, etc. etc. :)