Free Pledged by Alexandra Robbins Page A

serenading. It was their traditional song: sweet, Daddy’s-girl lyrics about love under the stars.
    Then came the drama. The girls, about equally divided, started to compare Zeta Sigma and Omega Phi.
    A senior cleared her throat. “Let’s not rule out Delta Lambda.” The younger sisters were perplexed. Some of them snickered, thinking it was a joke. They had just done Greek Week with Delta Lambda last year.
    But the other seniors backed her up. “Yeah, girls, we really need to go for Delta Lambda.” Some of the underclassmen stopped smiling as they wondered if the seniors were serious. Nobody had so much as mentioned Delta Lambda all week.
    Now Whitney, the most crotchety of the seniors, spoke sternly. “It would be awful,” she said, “if our chapter thought that the best thing for us would be to choose a fraternity other than the Delts.”
    The room fell hushed for a few beats as the underclassmen’s jaws dropped. Delta Lambda hadn’t even registered on their radar that week. The Delts had serenaded Beta Pi, the Alpha Rhos’ next-door neighbors, that evening, and Beta Pi hadn’t sung back. Word was that Beta Pi had rejected the Delts for Kappa Tau Chi, a bigger, more traditionally popular house. Groups weren’t allowed to serenade more than one house per night, so Delta Lambda was scrambling to find an acceptable house to sing to on Sunday. But the underclassmen hadn’t realized until now that Alpha Rho would be the target of the Delts’ desperation. Delta Lambda had called Charlotte a few minutes before the meeting to tell her that the boys wanted Alpha Rho. Until now, the president had shared this information with the seniors and no one else.
    Now there was chaos as the juniors shouted at the seniors, and the sophomores looked on in bewilderment. “Delta Lambda didn’t give us any gifts this week! They don’t want us, so we don’t want them!”
    “Why would you drop this on us at the last minute?”
    “We did Greek Week with the Delts last year!”
    “They haven’t even serenaded us!”
    “Just because you’re seniors doesn’t mean you can do this!”
    “Okay, everybody quiet!” Charlotte broke in, smoothing her Armani skirt and tossing her meticulously highlighted hair as she tried to drown out the girls’ side conversations. “Seriously, everybody shut up!” The room quieted, though sisters still glared at each other. “We’re going to have to two-two-one.”
    Known in some houses as “Dissension,” 2-2-1 was the way many sororities across the country ran debates and discussions. Amy sat next to Sabrina and settled in for what she figured would be a long meeting. During a 2-2-1, five girls were allowed to speak their opinions, one at a time: two positive points (pros), then two negatives (cons), then a positive. But the president was the one who chose exactly which girls would get to speak—and Charlotte was known to play favorites. Amy knew Sabrina, who was busy examining her braids, wouldn’t bother raising her hand. Charlotte never called on people like her.
    First up was Delta Lambda. Amy waved her hand, newly painted nails flashing, but Charlotte pretended she didn’t see her. Amy was good at these; and Charlotte must have known she would be a negative.
    “Pro: According to Greek politics,” one senior said as she stood up, “Delta Lambda is a stronger house than both Zeta Sigma and Omega Phi.”
    “Pro: Delta Lambda has more brothers than the others,” said another sister.
    “Con!” a junior shot back. “The Delts didn’t show any appreciation or interest in the form of presents.”
    “Con,” another junior said. “Beta Pi was clearly their first choice. Why would we want to be someone’s second-choice house—especially when their first choice was Beta Pi, of all people?”
    “Pro.” A senior sneered at the junior. “All the seniors want the Delts for a reason. It will look better for Alpha Rho if we match with them. Obviously,” the senior sniffed, “the