Stevie’s buddies guffawed. Roby cradled his head in his hands.
Stevie strode to his desk, grabbed a book, and returned to the front of the room. “And I quote,” he said. “‘On noting the alpha male’s dominance, the female lobsters shed their hard shells to become soft, vulnerable, and inviting. They fill the air with fragrant mists and offer themselves to the alpha.’”
Matt and some other guys hooted. They said things like “Yeah” and “Ooo, baby, release those fragrant mists!”
Stevie snapped the book shut. “The alpha lobster gets all the girls, and that is why being a winner at life means being a winner, period.”
He bowed. Kids whistled and clapped. This set off Ernie Korda, a special needs kid. He laughed and began hitting his thigh with his fist.
Gertrude thrust her hand into the air. “So in your fantasy world, you would get all the girls?”
Stevie gave Gertrude a blatant up-and-down look. “Did I say that? No. What I said is that all the girls want the alpha male. How many he decides to claim is up to him.”
“So girls are just objects to be collected?”
Stevie coughed into his first. “Not just collected.”
“Ms. Summers!” Gertrude cried.
Stevie held up his hands. “Don’t blame me. Blame biology.”
“Tone it down, Stevie,” Ms. Summers warned.
Roby lifted his head. “Actually, failure is more valuable than success,” he said.
“Dude,” Stevie said.
“Care to elaborate?” said Ms. Summers.
“We learn from failure. What do we learn from success?”
“How to keep succeeding,” said Stevie.
“And it’s a cop-out to say we’re governed by biology,” Roby said. “Once upon a time, maybe. When we were cavemen.”
“And cavewomen,” Gertrude interjected.
“Maybe lobsters behave according to lobster biology, but aren’t humans smarter than that?” Roby shot Stevie a glance that said, I am, anyway. As for you . . . ?
“Burn!” crowed Matt.
“I’m not talking about intelligence,” Stevie said. “I’m talking about basic primal urges.”
“Urges,” Matt echoed. He wagged his big woolly-mammoth head.
“Shut up, Matt,” Stevie ordered. He turned back to Roby. “Let’s say a girl, a pretty girl, walks up to you and takes off all her —”
“That’s enough,” Ms. Summers said sharply. At the back of the room, Ernie had gotten pretty loud. Usually he was accompanied to his classes by an aide, but today the aide was absent.
Ms. Summers walked to his desk. “Ernie, can you calm down? Or do you need to go to the resource room?”
Ernie was a sweet kid. He loved those white powdered donuts that come in a bag, and he was always offering them around and wanting to share. But now he laughed and banged his thigh, over and over.
“Okay,” Ms. Summers said, urging Ernie to his feet. She looked frazzled. “I’ll be back in two minutes,” she told us. “But this discussion is over. Sadie, you’re up next. Be ready.”
“Yep,” said Sadie. She waited until Ms. Summers left the room, then pulled out her phone, stuck in earphones, and closed her eyes.
The rest of us turned back to Stevie and Roby.
“So, Roby, as I was saying: pretend a pretty girl walks up to you and takes off all her clothes,” Stevie said.
“Why does she have to be pretty?” Gertrude demanded.
“Fine, any girl,” Stevie said. “But if you’re a guy, if you’re a red-blooded American male, and a naked girl offers herself to you . . .”
Stevie had to have known that all the boys in the room were now envisioning this imaginary naked girl. It felt wrong, especially since half the kids in the class were real live girls, and beneath their clothes, they were naked as well.
Why is a naked girl so much more vulnerable than a naked guy? We guys were naked beneath our clothes, too, but it didn’t mean the same thing.
“Drop it, Stevie,” Roby said.
“Listen, man, you can be as politically correct as you want,” Stevie said. “But at the end of the day, you’ve got this girl — pretty or not, I don’t give a shit — and she’s saying, ‘Come and get it’ . . .” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “You’re telling me you wouldn’t be all over that?”
“I’m not telling you anything,” Roby said.
“So that’s a no?”
“Screw you.”
“Bro, you’re missing the point,” Stevie said. “I’m not on the menu.”
It was so stupid. Stevie was so stupid. But kids laughed, and Roby flushed and slid lower in his seat.
Stevie turned to Matt. “What about you, buddy?”
“Would I have sex with a naked chick?” Matt said. “Um, duh.”
“Torin?” Stevie said.
Torin stretched his legs and crossed one foot over the other. “I mean, if the girl is willing . . .”
“She is.”
“I’m not going to turn her down. That would be rude.”
They slapped palms.
“Paul,” Stevie said, “you’d say yes to free sex, right?”
Paul as in me.
“Paul, please,” said Gertrude.
“Ooo, d’you hear that?” Matt said. He adopted a falsetto. “‘Paul, please!’ She’s begging for it!”
Spots of color rose on Gertrude’s cheeks.
I wondered what was taking Ms. Summers so long.
Stevie gazed at me, eyebrows raised. Sweat dampened my pits. Fear sweat. I try to come across as confident, but the truth is I’m awkward and lonely and, more often than not, I feel like a scared little kid.
“Paul?” Stevie pressed.
Saying nothing wasn’t good enough. Saying nothing was like watching from a crowd as some guy got beat up and not doing a thing to help him.
So, okay, I decided. I’d tell Stevie “no.”
And I would have. I swear. But Stevie was already sauntering back to his desk. He clapped me on the shoulder and said, “Good man, Paul.”
“Yeah,” said Matt. “Get you some!”
“You’re a dick, Matt,” I said.
Stevie chuckled.
I really hate it, the way certain guys chuckle.
I’ve only eaten lobster once. I’ve for sure never eaten it in Brevard, the North Carolina mountain town where I live with my mom.
I was born in Brevard. I’ve lived here all my life. But Mom grew up in Atlanta, and my grandparents live there still. They belong to a fancy country club, which is where I tried lobster, which was delicious. It was covered in crushed saltine crackers, all drenched in butter and baked to golden perfection — the tackiest white people appetizer ever, according to Mom.
I love my grandparents a lot. Granddad takes me to Waffle House every time I visit, as well as Krispy Kreme, where we pick up a dozen glazed originals to “bring back to the ladies.” He has an app that lets him know when the doughnuts are ready. It’s called Fresh Off the Grease.
Grandmom likes art, so she and I go to museums and art shows. I’m hoping one day she’ll take me to New York. New York has a Gucci store and Louis Vuitton and a brick-and-mortar Off-White boutique. Going there would be dope.