The Sisterhood

The founders’ motto used to be “If a woman can learn Cicero she will learn a recipe,” and Latin, which Menina had as soon as been uncool adequate to confess she enjoyed, had remained an front requirement. because of filthy rich alumnae, the school had additional a good artwork historical past division. Being ladylike had its rewards. In her first 12 months at school Menina had stuck the attention of good-looking Theo Bonner III. whilst Theo’s activities automobile started to appear within the Walkers’ driveway within the evenings, the complete city took observe of the actual fact. Theo was once the single son of 1 of the oldest and wealthiest households in Georgia. He might have been a belief fund layabout, yet in its place used to be completing legislation institution on the college, making plans to paintings for a legislations heart for the indigent rather than becoming a member of one of many prestigious Atlanta legislations businesses, and used to be ordinarily licensed of as a “boy together with his ft at the floor who’d quantity to whatever. ” there has been hypothesis he could cross into politics, as the Bonners were inquisitive about kingdom politics backstage for generations. And in a scandalous age whilst unmarried men and women lived jointly to work out if the connection labored sooner than getting married, Theo had performed the old fashioned factor and proposed inside of a yr of assembly Menina. In espresso mornings, at Bible classification, garden-club luncheons, and church suppers the Walkers’ pals congratulated and envied Sarah-Lynn who by no means uninterested in regaling them with the tale of ways Menina and Theo first set eyes on one another. at school Menina had persevered to paintings two times every week on the Hispanic group middle, and some weeks into her first yr at Holly Hill she was once speeding to 1 of her tutoring periods without time to alter from paint-spattered denims and an previous sweatshirt choked with holes she had worn for studio paintings. To her mortification, the center’s director referred to as her into the place of work and brought her as their hardest-working volunteer to Pauline and Theodore Bonner, who had come to work out the heart in operation. Feeling awkward, Menina shook fingers with a distinctive gray-haired guy, a slender and well-dressed older girl, after which their son, Theo Bonner III, who shook Menina’s hand and acknowledged he was once in legislations university and had come alongside to determine if the center’s clients might be mentioned their unfastened legal-advice periods. Theo used to be taller than Menina, good-looking in an agreeably scruffy approach, tanned with sun-bleached hair that seemed like it wanted slicing, and donning a frayed game coat that should have been inherited from a fraternity-house seize bag. The director requested Menina to offer the Bonners a journey and Menina did, flustered via Theo’s presence, not able to forestall herself sneaking glances at him. anything approximately Theo made her suppose like she had an electrical present operating via her bones. She attempted to act quite often till Theo stuck her him, grinned again, and winked at her. whilst the Bonners left, Menina cursed the actual fact she gave the look of she had crawled out of a trashcan. Then she sighed and advised herself to not be an fool. Theo Bonner used to be method out of her league.