Chapter Text
The days were getting shorter, the nights were getting colder, and he had begun to partake in his seasonal sweater collection. Which could only mean one thing in his still-quite-young life: the season of Mock Trial was officially upon Sam Seaborn.
A week prior to the informational session, Josh had texted and Sam’s eyes had instantly filled with tears of joy to the point where he was concerned that he hadn’t read the two am text correctly.
Josh: dude have you seen the case yet???
Sam: holy shit it’s UP?
Josh: yup
Josh: kate texted will who texted donna who texted me
Josh: and now i’m texting uuu
Sam: tysm!! finding it rn
The Classroom Law Project had been one of Sam’s bookmarked sites both on his iPhone and his school-issued Chromebook since freshman year, but right before school got out in June, their ill-defined and ever-growing gang of mock-trialers had designated Kate Harper, a sharp and tactless (but an absolute beast on cross) ROTC girl to monitor the site and report with as much news as she could find as soon as she could find it.
It was also becoming increasingly apparent to Sam that they all needed to find other, less life-consuming hobbies.
Which reminded him! He had to make the rounds. Being promoted from JV to varsity had given Sam a much more vested interest in making sure that the Landingham Academy dream team were all returning. If they wanted to even make it to state, let alone the pipe dream that was Nationals, they needed to have their A-team well and truly assembled.
…
“Donna!” He ran up to her in the halls, their lockers conveniently spaced three apart. He’d been slightly and dickishly pissed when she’d chosen her boyfriend to be her locker partner over her best friend of five years (which was an especially melodramatic hill to die on, given that Josh also happened to be his second-best friend), but Toby had quickly smacked him upside the head and offered to be his partner instead.
“Sam,” she grinned.
“I think you know what I’m going to ask.”
She sighed deeply and gave him a look that told him everything he needed to know, but she said it out loud anyways, like the excellent friend she was.
“No, Fall Play shouldn’t interfere with Mock Trial; yes, I know how to balance my schedule: and of course I’m coming back, you dummy! You don’t actually think I’d let anything come in the way of our first year on varsity together, do you?”
Sam held out his hand for a high five, which Donna accepted with gusto, rolling her eyes and smiling widely at the same time. He adored that about her.
“I knew I could count on you, Donna Moss.”
“And I’m gonna kick Our Town’s ass, too!” She shouted after Sam as he ran down the hall, searching for his next victim.
“Slay, girl-queen!” He shouted back, catching the tail end of her spitting out her iced coffee and shrieking with laughter before he disappeared down the next hallway.
…
“Why, Your Highnesses, might a mere mortal trouble you for a moment of your time?” Sam skipped up to Will and Kate and bowed deeply. They looked at each other and raised their eyebrows, exchanging a whole conversation through a medium Sam wasn’t yet familiar with.
“Sorry, what, Sam?” Kate finally said.
Sam faltered. “The, uh, the crowns,” he gestured to the tops of their heads, where too-big Party City crowns were nearly turning into necklaces and slipping past their ears. If they both weren’t very gay, Sam might have pegged it for an early Halloween couples costume that he just wasn’t cool enough to understand.
“Oh, right,” Will nodded in recognition. “Well, we’ve had these ready for a good three years. Figured it would be worth the wait for when the Queen finally died.”
“And it definitely was,” Kate finished, not bothering to look over at Will before they high-fived in perfect sync.
Now Sam was confused. “Why… the Queen dying?”
“Well, our names make it pretty funny.”
He continued to stare blankly.
“Will and Kate,” Kate prompted slowly. “Jesus, Sam, do you not pay attention to any news stories outside of this country? Do you not have social media? Are you not at least a loose acquaintance of Josh Lyman’s?”
The switch flipped on. “Oh! The monarchy people!”
Will nodded resignedly, most likely regretting the life choices that led he and Sam to date for the better half of sophomore year. “Yes. The monarchy people.”
“Right.” Sam blinked, then, not remembering why he’d even approached them in the first place, spun on his heel and walked away.
Ten paces away, he realized his mistake. “Wait!” He spun around again. “Are you guys-”
“We’re doing Mock Trial,” they replied in unison.
“Great!” He flashed them a quick thumbs up and quickly walked away.
…
“Claudia Jean!” Sam opened his arms to her, a la stereotypical-mafioso-patriarch.
“Sammy,” CJ replied dryly, not yet looking up from what appeared to be her summer reading book. Leave it to Kazuo Ishiguro to have you turning pages until five minutes before class. Sam wasn’t all that perturbed by the lack of direct attention; he knew she loved him.
“You get one guess what this is about,” Sam grinned.
CJ finally looked up and pressed her lips together in a vain attempt not to laugh. “The season of mock trial is upon us,” she recited with the most wide-eyed faux-severity Sam had ever had the honor of bearing witness to.
“You know it,” Sam shot her some hesitant finger-guns. “Can I count on you?”
“Always.”
Sam’s eyebrows shot up like rockets. “Really?”
“No. Just in this specific regard. Sorry.”
Sam shrugged. “Eh, that’s alright. That seems a little intense, so I’m almost glad you didn’t mean it.”
CJ’s eyes glittered slyly. “Emphasis on ‘almost.’”
“Well, a guy can hope.” Sam chuckled, “That’s still better than Will and Kate’s answer.”
Her eyes widened ever-so-slightly. “Is Kate— are the two of them not doing it this year?”
“No, they are.” Sam tilted his head. Interesting. But the curious thoughts quickly left his head. It was mock trial season, after all. Much more pressing matters at hand.
“Mm. Okay.” CJ perked back up. “Well, Norman—“
“Ugh, don’t call me that.”
“—Norman, I will see you in Biology. Ciao, honey bunch.” She sauntered off, towering over all the tiny freshmen and incurring a fear in them that Sam knew very well.
…
“Why the hell would you want to do two fall sports? Are you trying to send me a message?” The slightly-shorter-than-average Helen Miller paced frantically after her freakishly-tall boyfriend, Matt Santos.
“No, Helen. I just… couldn’t choose.”
Helen crossed her arms. “So you picked the only way out that’s going to make it fully impossible to have a social life and equally impossible to even think about being Homecoming King with me?”
Sam assumed this would be the optimal time to butt in.
“Hey, guys! I just wanted to check in and make sure that you two are coming to the info session in 205 today at lunch. We need all hands on deck this year if we’re going to make it to Nationals, and you guys are an essential part of the team!”
Okay so maybe it was the canned version of the impromptu speech Sam had given his other friends— he didn’t really know them that well— but it certainly wasn’t bad enough to warrant them moving on from arguing to just fully making out and ignoring his presence entirely.
After some noises that would have driven Sam to fully run away in the other direction had he been just an ounce less determined, the two finally pulled apart. He still wasn’t fully sure if they’d heard him or…
Matt raised an eyebrow. “I take it this means you don’t care about Homecoming Queen anymore?” (A line that made Sam very much want to puke, but apparently the guy was a gifted orator, when not orating to his girlfriend, that is.)
Helen chuckled, saccharine-sweet, then spun to face Sam with her usual intense, frosty expression.
“Yes, Sam, we’re in. Now leave before you pass out.”
…
“Sam! Did you hear?” Margaret yelled from across junior hall, eyes wide with the look of a bloodhound freshly sated. In other words, she had a truly excellent piece of gossip to share with the world.
Sam paused, expecting her to continue speaking. She did not.
“…No.”
“Alright.” She nodded briskly. “I know who the sophomore is for varsity this year.”
Sam rubbed his hands together excitedly. “Yes! Who is it?”
“Charlie Young.”
“Oh, I love him!” Sam grinned. He had a certain level of brotherly affection for the smart and level-headed sophomore, having done his part to mentor him as captain of JV the year prior.
“I do too,” Margaret smiled, and Sam nodded appraisingly. That was a big deal. There was no doubt that Charlie would find his way if Margaret was on his side. Sam genuinely wasn’t sure how they were going to live without her next year.
Wait.
“There are two empty spots. Who’s the second sophomore?”
Margaret leaned in conspiratorially. “She’s not a sophomore. She’s a transfer.”
Cue the classic horror movie dun-dun-DUN!
Sam found himself physically unable to formulate a response as Margaret sort of drifted away in the haze of his mind. Transfers never made varsity their first year at Landingham. Mr. McGarry— and, more realistically, Mr. Bartlet— abhorred letting new kids bypass those who had put in the work at Landingham. It was one of the binding principles of Mock Trial that Sam had adored and respected about this specific program, and, frankly, he was a little disappointed.
And a lot angry.
Unlike many of his friends, Sam hadn’t been chosen for varsity as a sophomore. He’d had to put in the work for another year on JV, barely missing out on the glory of Nationals when the varsity kids got the top spot at State, just for some fucking transfer to come in and make varsity— no questions asked.
“Margaret, I’m going to class.” A beat before he remembered his manners. “Thanks for telling me.”
“I think Mr. McGarry’s in a meeting.”
Sam didn’t really give a shit, thank you very much. “I’m going to class.”
…
Sam was ten minutes early to AP Gov and very much hoping to be alone with his anger in peace. However, that was not to be.
In all the inner batshittiness of his mind, Sam had completely forgotten about who it was exactly that taught AP Gov. No wonder Margaret had felt the need to mention the meeting.
“Really, Miss Hayes, there’s no need,” he heard Leo McGarry say kindly.
“Well, I just feel the need to thank you, Mr. McGarry. I have so much respect for your team, and I will do my absolute best to make y’all proud.”
“I know you will. Welcome to Landingham.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Sam’s tunnel vision hadn’t quite cleared enough to pay attention to who Mr. McGarry was talking to, but he sort of had to pay attention when the bearer of the distinctly Southern drawl walked right by, snapping him out of whatever rage coma his mind had placed him in.
And Sam definitely knew he was back and wide awake when a long blonde ponytail with a purposeful stride sat down right in front of him in what appeared to be her new seat.
Josh’s seat, actually. Not that she seemed to realize that; it made sense— she was probably a… transfer.
Oh fuck no. Fuck no. Fuck no. Fuck—
“Hi, I’m Ainsley,” Ponytail turned around, blue eyes piercing his fucking soul. “What’s your name?”
…
Clearly this guy was having some sort of early-morning-mind-F right now.
Ainsley quickly debated the merits of buying him Starbucks or something. That might make him stop staring at her like she’s suddenly been chopped in two.
“What’s your name?” she repeated, chewing anxiously on her lower lip. Was this how every first introduction was going to be? Maybe it was her accent? Or her stare? (She’d been told it could look frightening and manly—the first one she reveled in, at the second she raised her nearly translucent eyebrows.)
“I’m Sam.”
And nothing else. Okay.
“Cool.” She decided to try again. “Do you like Gov?”
That seemed to be the wrong question. “I love it,” Sam replied, though the jury was still out on whether he’d managed to stop grinding his jaw during any of that three-word sentence.
Ainsley nodded carefully. “Me too.” Third time’s the charm. “You know, I’m wondering if you do Mock Trial; I’m joining the team this year, and I actually did it back in North Carolina; we were pretty good, we actually went to Na—“
“Yep. I do Mock Trial.” Sam glared at her, then looked down, effectively ending the conversation.
Okay. Ainsley had officially done something wrong. Was she blocking his view of the whiteboard or something?
“I’m not sure what I’ve done to offend you—“
“You know, some of us actually had to work for varsity,” Sam interjected quietly, which felt oxymoronic, but somehow he pulled it off.
Wait, what? “I had to work for it too.” Excuse him for just thinking that she’d waltzed into this school and demanded to be gently placed at the top like a freaking sugar cookie! (Darn it, now she was hungry.)
She’d worked for this, yes. She’d worked very hard.
But Sam just scoffed. He literally scoffed!
“There’s a policy here about transfers having to start at JV, no matter who they are,” Sam fumed. “So I don’t know who you think you are that you can just supersede that, but, let me tell you, you’re starting off on a great foot with this one.”
“Well, it couldn’t have been too integral a policy because I didn’t ask. Mr. McGarry just placed me there.” Ainsley took a deep breath. She couldn’t resist a final jab. “Probably because my team back in North Carolina placed fourth at nationals last year.”
If she’d thought it would feel good to win whatever the hell kind of battle that was, she was dead wrong. Sam’s face crumpled, and as jerk-face-y as he’d seemed, she could tell he cared about that stupid piece of high-school-pseudo-intellectual bragging rights. But she didn’t really regret telling him.
“Whatever. But don’t think that we’ll just, like, accept you immediately.” Sam crossed his arms like a pouty toddler and turned away— an impressive feat given he was sitting directly behind her.
But, yet, a jerk face, he remained.
And now she really didn’t regret telling him.
…
Sam scoffed internally and maybe a little externally too. God, pretending to be nice and then showing her true, power-hungry colors.
(But maybe it was just the slightest bit cool that she’d placed fourth at Nationals. California hadn’t even made it to the quarter-finals.)
Sam’s attention faded elsewhere when Mr. McGarry called them to attention.
“Alright, class,” he grinned. “Today, we’re going to be talking about one of my favorites and what’s probably old news to you all by now: the Bill of Rights.”
Score. Sam practically lived and breathed a combined chemical mixture of Mock Trial and the Constitution.
McGarry continued. “But before we dive in, I would like to hear from some of you if there is a particular amendment you think is the most useful.” His eyes twinkled, and Sam knew instantly that, obviously, there wasn’t a right answer— but there was definitely a right answer.
Sam raised his hand.
“Yes… Ainsley.” McGarry’s eyes continued to twinkle. Dammit.
Sam turned his head to look at her. Her eyes were shining with naked ambition, and he began to realize that he might actually have some serious competition for the title of most invested student.
“Well,” Ainsley began, “I believe that the most important of the amendments in the Bill of Rights has to be the ninth.”
Ninth? Sam scoffed. Talk about amateur hour. And a totalMock Trial pander. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted, he recited from memory.
But McGarry nodded. “Why?”
Ainsley nodded sharply and took an audibly deep breath. “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. Other rights. The ninth, it lays the foundation for all other rights that the Constitution doesn’t cover. Without the ninth amendment, we wouldn’t have most rights of today, nor any of the other amendments included in the rest of the Constitution past the Bill of Rights. The 20th; the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments— other rights retained by the people— all of which relied on the ninth for the Constitutional precedent for all to attain rights central to the foundations of liberty and justice imbued in this country.”
“And it acknowledges the fallibility of humans, to which the founders never claimed to be immune, and tells the country that there is somewhere to go from where we are today. That we can keep changing and evolving as a country and as a citizenry to give our citizens rights that the framers of the Constitution never even dreamed of.”
Sam couldn’t help but be moved by her speech, but that didn’t change the fact that she was wrong. Completely wrong. She wasn’t talking about the ninth amendment; she was talking about the eighth, and he had no idea why Mr. McGarry hadn’t called her on it yet. He was probably just trying to be nice, Sam thought with an internal eye-roll.
This time when Sam raised his hand, McGarry called on him.
“Ainsley, that’s a great speech, but you’ve got it wrong.”
He watched as she blinked. Slowly. Once. And then one more time. She tilted her head. Tilted it again. Until finally, she said, “No, I don’t.”
Really? That was her defense? All her idealistic speechifying about the power of Constitutional precedent, and she gave in so easily when actually questioned on it. He was almost disappointed.
Almost.
Sam narrowed his eyes. “You must mean the eighth amendment.”
“No, the eighth talks about excessive bail,” Ainsley replied slowly. “The ninth talks about having foresight that extends farther than the eighteenth century.” She spoke with such conviction that Sam couldn’t help but balk.
He was almost tempted to keep arguing— excuse me, debating— when Mr. McGarry cleared his throat. Sam looked over dutifully, and what really hammered that final nail into his coffin of self-aggrandizement was the look that McGarry gave him.
Fucking shitballs.
“Ainsley’s correct, Sam.”
Yippee.
“Now, do you have an amendment you feel is most important that you’d like to share with the class?” McGarry fixed him with a shrewd look of warning.
Sam cowered like a coward, his Seuss-ian brain crowed. “I was going to say the ninth,” he damn near whispered as he slinked down in his chair.
The worst part? That wasn’t just a stupid excuse; the ninth was genuinely his favorite.
He barely stopped to think about Ainsley during his moment of shame, but if he had thought of her, and if he had— by chance— looked exactly where the positioning of his chair and desk might suggest that he would, then he would have seen the expression on her face, and he would have gained a lot of respect for her.
Her eyes were wide and concerned about someone who had been nothing but a jackass to her in the entirety of the fifteen minutes she’d known him, but, in that moment, there wasn’t a spiteful bone in her body.
But Sam didn’t know that.
So he just kept on silently seething.
…
Donna Moss would always refute the accusation that she was a gossip, because she wasn’t, thank you very much.
But if she happened to hear information relevant (having a tendency to make an important fact more or less probable than the fact would be without the testimony— take that, Josh) to one of her friends and tell that friend or other friends for the sake of honesty and friendly advice, then, well… that's just how life went sometimes.
There was a reason why Donna landed the lead in the Fall Play as a junior: she was damn good at fooling people. Herself included.
(In other words, she was a total gossip.)
But that had its benefits. Namely, with the school’s student newspaper (that Donna happened to have founded).
But also when she was stuck at a lunch informational session that she’d heard for three years straight now just so she could find out when Mock Trial practices started. But this had been the first year she’d finally nabbed a seat instead of having to sit on the floor of the disgustingly-carpeted classroom, so she was most definitely revelling in her newfound upperclassman privileges.
“CJ, what have you got for me?” she whispered slightly so as not to disturb Mr. McGarry and Mr. Bartlet’s legal Abbott and Costello routine.
“Well, Donnatella— and don’t you dare put this on the record— did you hear what happened to Sam?”
“Oh, my god, no! What happened” Donna chewed anxiously on her lower lip. She meant it, too. She wasn’t going to put Sam’s shit all over the front page of the closest thing Landingham Academy had to a tabloid, but he was still her best (platonic) friend. She wanted to know what happened, and she was a little surprised he hadn’t told her himself.
“Okay, so, did you hear how there’s going to be a transfer on varsity this year?” There was no need to clarify varsity of what? with CJ and Donna. Varsity of the only thing that mattered.
“Yeah?”
“Well— she’s in his AP Gov class, and she totally kicked his ass on the Constitution this morning.”
Just as Donna gasped, Toby chimed in from the row ahead, “It was the Bill of Rights, actually. Most important amendment, eighth versus ninth or something, yadda yadda yadda.”
“Okay, never refer to anything in reference to the Bill of Rights as yadda yadda yadda,” Josh cut in from down below on the floor. He’d been late, per usual.
“Is yadda yadda yadda really an adjective ‘cause I always considered it more of a noun,” Toby countered.
“Well, given that it’s not a real word,” CJ said sarcastically, “I guess we can just be content for it to exist in life’s little gray areas.”
“Okay, but guys!” Donna nearly shouted. They all swiveled their heads her way, and Josh quickly planted a greeting kiss on her cheek. “Hi, babe. We still don’t know: is Sam okay?”
At their blank stares, she sighed deeply. Her friends were all lovely, if not a bit obtuse.
“You know this had to hit him hard. Especially with his first year on varsity, to have a transfer join the team and show him up in his favorite class is a little badass but not exactly good for his self-esteem.”
“What’s not good for my self-esteem?” Speak of the devil. Sam magically materialized, squished between CJ and Toby, the whole group sitting in too-small desks.
No one spoke; they all just stared at him in what must have been a very freaky way, but Sam didn’t show it. He just kept smiling his Family Smile— the one they all saw right through but pretended not to. Yeahhh, this hurt him.
Josh finally spoke up and laughed awkwardly. “Nothing!”
Sam just smiled some more, thoroughly stretching the boundaries of what looked genuine versus what looked maniacal. “Okay!”
…
The info session had been funnier than Ainsley was expecting. Who knew that an economist and an attorney could single-handedly make John Locke not only intriguing but hilarious? (Ainsley certainly hadn’t.)
In between fits of laughter, she’d noticed that a whole clump of students had amassed by Sam. His friends, she supposed.
Ainsley felt a slight twinge of regret; maybe she shouldn’t have shown him up, intentional or not. Maybe she should have just kept her big mouth shut. She was still new, after all— she hadn’t had many opportunities to make friends just yet, and with a few lousy minutes in the first class of the day, she had probably blown her best chance at making friends with anyone in this school who really understood her ambitions.
After all, burn one bridge in Mock Trial and you burn them all, as literally nobody used to say.
But, alas.
Instead of cursing her luck and her stupid mouth, she focused on the looming practice dates (next Monday, holy shit) and keeping her head down in her other classes. (She’d already accepted that AP Gov was a lost cause.)
“Hey.”
Ainsley looked up from where she was hunched over her desk in Honors English, her last class of the day, desperate to get some Oliver Twist read before class started— material that should have been read a week prior, but, hey, we live and we learn.
A fellow blonde with a huge backpack and earbuds plugged into a phone that seemed to be shoved haphazardly into her bra waved a cautious hello. “I’m Donna.”
Ainsley attempted a smile. She liked the look of her already. “I’m Ainsley.”
Donna grinned and set down her stuff at the desk next to Ainsley’s. “Isn’t Dickens boring as fuck?” she asked, presumably as some sort of segue.
“Kind of yeah. Usually I’m able to get books read for class, no problem, but it’s like this one’s the opposite of a page-turner,” Ainsley rambled.
Donna laughed loudly. “Like a… page-staller!”
“I like that,” Ainsley snorted.
“You know, I’ve never been able to understand why English teachers always shy away from my girl, Jane Austen,” Donna mused. She seemed to be a fan of the abrupt subject change. “She’s a brilliant comedic writer, and all of her books reflect significant cultural and sociopolitical themes of the time; it just feels like she’s an academically neglected genius, y’know?”
“That’s a good way of putting it,” Ainsley nodded.
Donna smiled again. “Thank you.” Then she paused, looking lost in thought. “Um, you seem cool, so I’m going to propose something that might seem weird, but I want you to go with me here—”
“No, I won’t have a threesome with you and whoever else you want me to have a threesome with.” Ainsley had never been propositioned as such in this particular regard, but there was no harm in just making sure.
Donna’s eyes got as wide as saucers, and she remained seemingly unable to speak for a good thirty seconds.
“You know, you were spot on with the me-having-a-boyfriend part, but unfortunately I don’t think a threesome is in our collective futures.”
And then she burst into laughter.
Which caused Ainsley to burst into laughter.
Wheeze. “I just,” Wheeze, “had to check.” Wheeze.
“No, I appreciate it,” Donna giggled hysterically.
Ms. Schott finally called the class to attention and instructed them to turn to page 42, when Ainsley leaned over, causing another huff of laughter to slip through Donna’s lips.
“Wait… what were you going to ask me?”
“When you thought I was asking for a threesome?” Donna whispered.
“Yep.”
“Do you want to come to Mock Trial practice with me after school?” A beat. “I promise it’s more fun than it sounds.”
“Okay, if I hadn’t already been going, I definitely wouldn’t have gone if you tried to sell me on ‘it’s more fun than it sounds.’”
Donna squealed, prompting a shushing by another student and a bemused eyebrow-raise from Ms. Schott. Donna gestured her apologies, then squealed even more.
“Oh my god, thank god you’re going. We need some new blood.” She narrowed her eyes and looked intently at Ainsley’s face. Did she have a particularly wild pimple or something? “Unless I’m being an oblivious bitch and completely forgetting that you’ve gone here for three years or something…”
“No, you’re right, I’m new.”
New to the school, not new to Mock Trial, Ainsley didn’t have the heart to explain. She didn’t doubt that her new friend had heard the rumors by now. She could only hope that Donna would forgive her when the truth was revealed, by Sam at practice, if not before. But she didn’t want to be the one to do it.
“Thank god.” Donna let out a big sigh. Then she peered at Ainsley over her well-worn copy of The Elements of Style. “Any chance I can get you to join theater?”
“Mm, maybe,” Ainsley laughed and decided to take a chance. Her social skills might be shit but it couldn’t hurt to at least try. “Want to walk to 208 after class?”
Donna looked over, grinning widely. “Absolutely.”
And here Ainsley had been worrying about if she’d make friends.
(Her naïve and panicked worries of yesterday melted into the background of English class as her heart seemed to settle contently in her chest.)
…
“Okay, Sam, you know I love you, and you also know I’m a sucker for playing devil’s advocate—”
“You’ve never played devil’s advocate willingly in your life.”
“You know I love playing devil’s advocate, but you mixed up your amendments. Happens to everyone. She just happened to call you on it.” Josh threw his hands in the air. “Why is it such a big deal?”
Sam huffed as he saw Toby and Will nod pointedly in his periphery as they not-so-subtly eavesdropped. He got the message. But it wasn’t that easy to let go.
It was a big deal because… because— because it was his thing. Social science had always been his thing, his favorite, his speciality. He always knew the most about the Bill of Rights— he had always cared the most about it, gotten the most excited whenever it was brought up in class. It was a little stupid (a lot stupid), but Sam almost felt possessive over it. Like, on this level, it was his to cherish alone.
So it wasn’t that easy to have someone else swoop in and prove themselves equal to the one aspect of school Sam knew he would always have to fall back on.
Except all of those were pretty pretentious, shitty reasons that his second-best friend would definitely see right through. So he didn’t say any of those.
He didn’t say anything, really. Because thank god—
“Guys, I have a new friend!” Donna announced loudly, hands stretched out and filling the doorway like the theater freak she was, drawing Sam’s attention away from both his pre-pre-law books (his and Josh’s affectionate name for their Gov textbook) and Josh’s perfectly valid points.
—saved by the bell.
“Welcome back, Miss Moss,” Mr. McGarry said dryly, handing Donna a bag of Cheetos, the crunchy cheddar jalapeño kind. It was the only part of the singer regimen Donna refused to obey as the staunchest of theater kids. Dairy? Sure. Caffeine? Fine. Spice? Never.
Donna had the decency to look the slightest bit ashamed as she popped her first Cheeto. But Sam’s eyes were drawn to the other figure in the doorway. The familiar blonde ponytail swished as his first period rival glanced around the room.
“Donna—”
“Oh, yeah, guys, this is Ainsley. She’s a transfer from North Carolina, and she’s super excited to be here!”
Josh raised his eyebrows at the ‘super excited’ line, and Donna (predictably and rightly) smacked him on the shoulder.
“Ow! I mean, nice to meet you, Ainsley,” Josh recited dutifully. Then he turned back to Donna and cracked a devilish smile, which she returned.
Ainsley watched all this with a slightly raised eyebrow but a hint of a smile. Pretty much the only appropriate reaction to Josh and Donna’s lovesick antics, Sam would admit. “Good to meet you.”
And then Ainsley turned to him, and, well… Sam froze.
All of his stupid pride about amendments and government and passion came and went, quickly replaced by a fierce, sharp anxiety that Ainsley Hayes could bring Sam’s world crashing down with a breath if she wanted to. She could tell everyone just how fucking idiotic Sam Seaborn really was.
After all, she was a transfer who made varsity just by snapping her fingers and placing fourth at Nationals the year prior— that had to take some level of skill. Sam was a junior who hadn’t made the varsity cut as a returning sophomore; she was way out of his league… in Mock Trial, of course.
So, when she waved hello and stared at him quizzically, Sam barely registered it. He nodded mechanically and turned away, engaging with the world at the lowest levels of human functioning just to keep from passing out. Was it a little stupid to make his whole world a high school competition? Maybe. But that didn’t change the fact that it mattered to him, so Sam attempted to ignore the absurdity of his circumstances in favor of a temporary, blanket acceptance.
That was until it was his turn to be smacked in the shoulder by one Donnatella Moss (thankfully much more conspicuously than Josh had gotten it).
“Sorry about this, Ainsley,” Donna sent him a concerned glance masked under teasing syntax. “Josh is usually the weird one.”
“Hey!” Josh looked up, indignant. “Who are you calling weird?”
“You, honey bunch.” Donna leaned over and planted a firm kiss on Josh’s right cheek, blooming bright red under her touch. “But there’s a reason I love you.”
“Just one?” Josh teased.
“Mm, maybe two if I’m feeling generous.”
Ainsley smiled again. Sam wasn’t sure why he kept noticing these things. “Oh, it’s alright. Sam’s—”
His breath hitched.
“—probably had a long day. I know an hour of Dickensian orphans right before I’m meant to extoll the virtues of the legal system doesn’t exactly get me in the mood.”
Josh cackled, and Kate and Will both snorted from where they were comparing AP Bio answers in the corner with their feet in each other’s laps. How the hell they managed to overhear the conversation from across a noisy, crowded classroom was well beyond Sam.
Sam’s chest was removed from the vice-like grip of his raging imposter syndrome, and he breathed a sigh of relief.
“Alright, everybody, let’s pay attention!” McGarry called them all to attention, his commanding tone silencing even the rowdiest of freshmen. He shut them all down to a silence as a conductor would an orchestra. “The first practice of the 2022-23 Mock Trial season has officially… begun!”
The cheers that rang through the room were nearly deafening— a little extreme, Sam realized, but he didn’t particularly care— and Sam let himself get lost in the noise for just a few seconds. Until—
“How many of you kids take Latin?” Jed Bartlet asked the crowd with a wicked gleam in his eye.
Sam laughed and knew to tune out. It was the same speech Mr. Bartlet gave every year, without fail. And while it was a good one, all about the language of law and the basics of what they would be studying, Sam knew to look to the board instead to jot down initial case notes.
He looked towards the front to begin taking notes and found Ainsley’s eyes on him. She looked away quickly but not before Sam got to wondering: why didn’t she just say something? Why didn’t she just rub it in their faces? Mock Trial to many could be boiled down to oratorical street cred, and one-upping another student in a debate— about the Bill of Rights, no less— could be worth a great deal to a certain kind of person.
Evidently, Ainsley Hayes was not that kind of person.
…
It was a good practice. Ainsley could be a bit of a pessimist, but even she knew: it was a good practice.
Donna laughed at something Josh had whispered in her ear, and as the two began to walk off together, she snapped her fingers and whirled back around to face Ainsley.
“You should come get boba with us.” She said it like it was a fact, not an offer, and Ainsley smiled. Donna was a bit of a whirlwind, but she could already tell they would be good friends.
“Who’s ‘us?’” Ainsley had to know.
Donna worried her lip consideringly, counting on her fingers and whispering under her breath. Ainsley was beginning to wonder if it was even worth asking. Clearly, it was a lot of people.
“About… twelve of us. The new varsity team, really. Celebratory first practice of the year drinks!” Donna paused, reading the pensive expression on Ainsley’s face. “I can give you a ride home if you need one? Or pay for your drink?”
That practically sealed the deal. “Sounds wonderful. The ride, not the drink, but thank you.”
And it did sound wonderful. She’d met just about everyone, and Sam’s extreme reaction seemed to be more of the exception than the rule. They’d all been more than welcoming, explaining inside jokes and letting her sneak bites from their snack bags. (Ainsley was always a fiend for Takis.)
“Hey, Ainsley, can we talk?” Sam’s voice cut abruptly through the chatter in the hall as everyone was getting ready to embark on the boba adventure.
“Um, yeah, sure—” No sooner had she agreed than he’d walked off to the end of the hallway. Okay, Ainsley thought curiously.
“What’s up?” She tried again.
He looked concerned. Not angry, or particularly upset, just confused and a little worried.
“Why didn’t you just tell everyone?”
“Tell everyone what?”
Sam scoffed, but it sounded less like an intentional insult and more of the sound just flying out of him as an inner reflection of what he’d been telling himself all week. Or maybe Ainsley was just big-time projecting.
“That I’m an idiot, that I mixed up the eighth and ninth amendments, that I don’t know the basic laws of this country, take your pick.”
Ainsley’s eyebrows flew up to her hairline. Her immediate urge was to marvel at how opposite the truth was from the lie he created around himself, but she quickly realized that might be awfully akin to the figurative pot calling the figurative kettle the figurative shade of a night with no moon.
(All jokes aside, Ainsley’s heart, gasping for breath, saw a similar vise and the squeeze eased just a little.)
So she played it off a bit.
“Alright I’m gonna have to number my responses because there’s a lot to unpack in this. One: thirty-three percent of those statements were accurate. You pick which one you think it is. Two: I’m a good person. Three: why the hell didn’t you say anything?”
“Oh, because I totally want to admit that I fucked up basic Bill of Rights stuff in front of Mock Trial kids.”
“You’re still on that?” It didn’t come out as harshly as Ainsley meant it. If anything, now she was the one sounding unduly concerned. “No, I meant why on earth didn’t you accuse me of being a rule-breaking, thunder-stealing carpetbagger? It might not be true, but it sure as hell ain’t false.”
Sam actually laughed at that. “Well, because it wouldn’t be historically accurate. And because you don’t deserve that.”
“Like you don’t deserve me shaming you in front of your friends because you had a weird morning.”
Sam blinked. “It was kind of a weird morning.”
“Sounds like it, yes.” Ainsley paused for a moment, waiting to see if he had any other burning questions to get off his chest.
Silence.
So she proceeded. “Now, I don’t want things to get awkward and I feel like we’ve maxed out our time in the hallway, so what do you say we go get some boba?”
“Yeah, why not?” Sam grinned.
They walked back to the group together, unconsciously traveling at a pace that might best be described as snail-like.
“Do they even have boba tea in North Carolina?”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, don’t start with the Southern jokes now, Sam. Not when I’ve just started to like you.”
“But do you?”
“Of course we do, Sam!”
…
At the same time and down that same hall, literally every single person on varsity was silently watching them leave; necks all straining, eyes wide, heads tilted at exceedingly odd angles, the works.
Finally, they couldn’t see them anymore, and the silence was broken by a too-loud, “I don’t know how stupid they think we are.” Obviously, from Josh.
“They are really angling for some privacy,” Kate muttered.
“We can’t possibly be that scary, right?” Donna looked legitimately concerned.
“I don’t know,” Charlie, the new guy, chimed in. “You guys are a little… weird.”
Josh scoffed. “Says the only sophomore to make varsity. Face it, you’re now contractually obliged to be weird with us.”
“Dude, we’re literally learning contract law right now, and that’s very much not how it works.”
“Can it, sophomore.”
“Okay,” Charlie grinned. It was practically a rite of passage— once Josh told you to shut up, you were legit.
“Okay, but, guys!” Donna interjected, straining her voice in that anxious way of hers that always got their attention. “We all know who she is, right?”
Will raised his eyebrows. “As in: Ainsley Hayes, the chick who kicked Sam’s ass in Gov or fourth-place-at-nationals, Outstanding-Attorney-Award-record-setter Ainsley Hayes?”
“Are they really that different?” CJ asked dryly.
Toby rolled his eyes affectionately. “Yeah, I think we all know.”
“Which begs the question, why the hell are they freaking out about this so much?”
“I don’t think any of us know that,” Toby responded with finality.
“Mm, twenty bucks says their own individual insecurities that they definitely have to work on in therapy but most likely won’t,” Helen piped in from the corner where she and Matt were doing their homework in each other’s laps. (Seniors, am I right?)
“Okay, I counter. We all know that.”
Donna tilted her head thoughtfully. “Well, if we can’t beat it, we might as well resolve to never bring it up again.”
“Fascinating strategy, Donnatella.”
“Shut up, Josh.”
Josh grinned.
“Ah, what the hell,” Kate shrugged. “He’s good, and she’s apparently even better. If zipping our lips about their secret shame keeps them from self-imploding in shame before we even make it to invitationals, I don’t see the harm.”
“I agree,” CJ said quickly.
“Same.”
“Yeah, sure.”
“I don’t really care.”
Donna nodded. “Okay, seems like we’re all in agreement. We are never talking about the Great Bill of Rights Smackdown ever again.”
“Okay, but with a name like that, it’s gonna be hard.”
“Margaret! We all agreed!”
“Fine.”
“Good. Now, for fuck’s sake,” Will said with distinctly Toby-like exasperation, “Let’s get some boba.”