#70: Stacey and the Cheerleaders
Gimme an S! Gimme a T! You know what? Just give me all Stacey, all the time. Y’all know she’s my favorite.
Anyway, in this installment of Stoneybrook-in-a-time-loop, it’s early December and Stoneybrook Middle School has been swept up by basketball fever; their bball team is undefeated and the players are treated like gods. Star player RJ Blaser accidentally hits Stacey with a snowball (HOW DARE HE) and then invites her to go see a movie called Mall Warriors II that Friday. Stacey says sure and is then like, holy shit… because RJ is cute and really popular. (SEE YA NEVER, SAM THOMAS!) Actually, I think RJ seems like kind of a douchebag, for three main reasons: 1. don’t throw snowballs, 2. he didn’t laugh at Claudia’s jokes, and 3. he basically told Stacey they were going out instead of asking her.
“I do like boys, but they’re not the only things in my life.” - Stacey, page 6
Stacey has what I think are very reasonable expectations for a boyfriend: “just a gorgeous, smart, considerate guy who takes [her] breath away and happens to love [her] even more than [she loves] him” (page 8). I don’t think RJ meets those qualifications, but by going out with him, Stacey also hopes to be introduced to some of the other basketball players and the cheerleaders; she says they’re the most popular and sophisticated group at SMS. The BSC calls them The Group. After RJ asks her out, a few of the cheerleaders (Sheila, Margie, Penny) start being nice to Stacey.
Stacey’s date with RJ is a dud. She’s perfect, but he’s kind of dumb and boring and they don’t have much in common. After the movie, though, they go to Pizza Express where the rest of The Group has convened. Stacey is welcomed pretty warmly, except for a couple of snide remarks by Corinne, a cheerleader who basically calls the BSC babyish. But Stacey is distracted by Robert Brewster, another cute basketball player who seems just as distracted by her. Their meet-cute happens when their pieces of pizza are stuck together by a string of gooey cheese. I think all good things in life are cheese-based, so I can hear the wedding bells now.
Stacey fights off the urge to be embarrassed by the BSC and reaffirms that she has the best friends ever, but she still enjoys being in the spotlight when she hangs out with The Group. When Sheila and some of the other cheerleaders tell Stacey that Robert like likes her and that they want her to try out for the cheerleading squad, she’s a bit dazed. But when Robert calls and asks her out for that Friday, she’s on cloud nine.
Stacey’s date with Robert is way better than her date with RJ - Robert is considerate and kind (she feels comfortable telling him about her diabetes), funny, charming, smart, and a great listener. Robert is also a sensitive angel, and talks about how he doesn’t like the status element of being on the basketball team - how teachers will let them cut corners and kids will do favors for them as if they’re gods; he acknowledges how unfair it is. Stacey and I are both smitten. There’s only one problem: Corinne, one of the cheerleaders, is smitten with Robert too.
Robert asks Stacey out again for the next Friday, and they get dinner and go to a rock concert in Stamford, where Stacey learns that Robert is “a very cool dancer.” Me? I’m picturing Karen Filippelli sitting behind them cheering them on.
Mary Anne and Logan invite them to double date on Saturday, too, and they all go bowling and then get ice cream and nachos afterward. She has an amazing weekend, and on Sunday practices her cheerleader tryout routine with Jessi one last time. She nails it. (Obv.)
Stacey is very clearly the best one to audition for the squad, but she’s still nervous about making the cut. Then she overhears a bunch of the cheerleaders talking about her - they make fun of the BSC a bit, but they also say she did a great job and that she’s even better than most of the cheerleaders already on the squad. The only one who isn’t a fan? Corinne, the one who has a crush on Robert. And when the results are announced and Kathleen Lopez, not Stacey, makes the squad, Stacey suspects that Corinne may have had something to do with it.
Corinne tells Stacey they didn’t choose her because she was too talented and the other girls felt threatened. Stacey takes it as a warning from Corinne: “don’t you dare try to be better than me.” Robert, incensed by the unfair tryout, marches into the basketball coach’s office and quits in protest. (We stan a supportive boyfriend.)
Someone writes a nasty editorial about Robert in the SMS newspaper (shit is getting real in Stoneybrook) and, by association, Stacey. But (unlike in real life) the people in charge took swift action, revamped the eligibility and policies around sports and athletic tryouts, and worked to make positive change. Robert is asked to re-join the basketball team and he says no. Kathleen Lopez quits the cheerleading squad after finding out what happened, and Stacey is asked to join but she says no. Then power couple Stacey and Robert co-write an editorial for the school paper:
MY HEART.
