CALVIN

twenty: the strip-tease

It was Patrick, Schneider, Denis and I on the little hill just off campus, with a red bench and a view of the lake in the distance. It was twilight. Denis was sharing his blunt; Schneider took a bottle of Smirnoff out of his Canada Goose parka. "Here," he said, handing the bottle to me as he took a hit.

"You forgot Elias doesn't drink," said Denis.

"Oh, right. Here." He gave the bottle to Denis, and I sat back on the bench, hands deep in my pockets. It was dry and frigid, and as the sun was going down the wind was beginning to pick up.

Schneider blew out smoke. His cheeks were bright red from the cold, and he kept sniffling. "Do you guys ever get the feeling that some things aren't worth saving?"

"I mean, if my dorm was on fire, I wouldn't go out of my way to save my five pairs of underwear."

Denis looked at Patrick. "You only have five pairs of underwear?"

"That was just... no, Denis, I don't only have five pairs of underwear. I was just making a... Elias, what do you call it?"

"Figure of speech," I said dryly.

"But I mean, people. And... feelings, and states of mind. I mean, everyone tries so desperately to save these things. To be happy all the time and to... preserve their intellect or their wokeness or whatever. And when you fall in love, you try so hard to keep it that way. To keep feeling good. And we try so hard not to die. It's constantly on our minds. When we go to the water park, Don't die, when we go to the beach, Don't get eaten by a shark, when we get in a plane, Don't crash. But I'm just... I'm just saying... if we think about it, maybe these things aren't worth saving."

Patrick had a very serious look on his face, as he peeled a mandarin he'd found in his pocket. "I think it all comes down to the value of human life. Inherently, most people value human life. It's why in movies, when the villain has a gun pointed to the good guy's head, he doesn't shoot right away. There's always room for the good guy to try and persuade the villain that what he's about to do is wrong. If the villain didn't value human life, even a little bit, he would have shot the good guy straight away, without flinching. As soon as he gets the chance. And I think that shows more of the screenwriters' personalities than the villain's. That empathy and humanness that makes us want to save each other, and save ourselves."

"I just think that there's a lot of importance placed on our lives. Even though we're not important at all. Like, I heard or read something from Carl Sagan, and he said something about a pale blue dot, I don't know, but he meant it about the Earth, and he was trying to say that we are practically just dust particles. Or even better, we're practically nothing. In comparison to the universe. We're absolutely nothing. So why do we care so much? I mean, we can go on and on about empathy and humanity and all that bullshit, but from a logician's point of view, one person dying means less than nothing."

"Not everyone is a logician," I said. The three of them looked at me. I shrugged. "They're just not. What's the point of... pondering the value of human life when most people just live their life and die. And it seems to work out fine. Like, one person cares a lot about not dying and about being happy, but why's that important to you? They're going to die, either way."

Patrick and Schneider sat solemnly in thought. Then Denis said, "Who's Carl Sagan?"

Schneider snatched the joint from him. "You're such an idiot, Denis."

I stood up. "I can hear the clubhaus music. Let's go."

...

About three minutes after entering clubhaus, I'd lost Patrick, Schneider and Denis. This was routine. I was alone near the DJ table, where Polina and Lennard were arguing between which mumble rap track they should add to the queue. "Play something dope," I yelled over the music. Polina gave me a look. "6ix9ine is up next."