November 5th, 2016

Kinsky, California, USA

Whitney

Maurice was sleeping soundly when he suddenly heard a light knock on the bedroom door. Upon hearing the familiar sound he shot out of bed and opened the door, a look of concern marked across his face. His sister was standing in front of him.

“It’s time to leave,” Emily said, rather calmly.

Maurice, still frenetic, scratched his curly hair. “Shit, am I late?”

“No, not by too much. I figured your alarm didn’t go off again.”

Maurice looked over at his tabletop. Sure enough, the clock was past its alarm time.

“Well, thanks for the backup.”

Emily shrugged, a partially eaten cereal bar in her right hand. “No problem.”

The two kids tip-toed past their mother’s bedroom and down the stairs. From the pantry Maurice grabbed a cereal bar for himself, and then they both grabbed their backpacks and waited outside for the bus. 

While the two stood waiting, Maurice considered what had happened two days before. Isaac’s jersey was tucked neatly into his closet, out of view. The truth is that Isaac really was the first person he had ever told about the relationship. He wasn’t quite sure why he had not yet told Emily. There was no rational reason why she wouldn’t support it, and in reality she probably already had her suspicions. Yet there was some invisible force stopping him. He took a few glances at his sister, who was on her phone for most of the time. Yet when she put the phone away, he looked back down to the concrete sidewalk. The bus came not that long afterwards.

…

Emily sat down in her usual spot at the morning table. Unusually, two people had already gotten there before her — Rose and Sadja. Rose waved at her as she sat down.

“Hey, Em.”

The two early girls had been peering at Rose’s phone. Once Emily had sat down, Rose explained.

“We’re thinking of going to Mount Oswald for fall break. There’s a cute little Airbnb cabin that’s available for five people. Aaron, Sadja, and I are all thinking about going.”

Emily looked skeptical. “Don’t you need to be 18 in order to rent those things?”

“Aaron is already 18, remember?”

“Oh, right,” Emily rested on her own arm. “Well, I’ll be busy for the break unfortunately. But I hope you guys have fun.”

Sadja shook her head. “Girl, you grind too hard.”

Emily shrugged. “You know what they say. No rest for the wicked.”

Some time passed. Aaron had also found his way to the table, and so had Rodrigo (he was asked if he wanted to go — said no, had “other commitments”). The Mount Oswald party had begun to see their luck fade, when finally Kat approached the table. Aaron waved at her. 

“Yo, Kat!”

Kat slanted her head. “What’re you so excited about?”

“We’re planning to go to Oswald for fall break. Me, Sadja, and Rose. We need two more people. You wanna come?”

Kat passed her eyes over the three. Rose gave her best pleading face. The blonde girl thought for a moment, then nodded.

“Sure, sounds fun.”

Sadja gave her an excited hi five. Aaron breathed a sigh of relief.

“Alright, that means we just need one more person.”

Kat looked over at him. “You could ask Cole. I don’t think he has any plans yet.”

Aaron smiled. “I’ve got second period with him. I’ll ask him then.”

…

As it would have it, the next relevant scene would occur in that very second period Spanish class. Aaron passed over to Cole’s desk, while the boy was leaning forward in his chair, checking out his phone. Aaron knocked on the desk’s wooden surface. Cole pulled out his earbuds as Aaron sat in the seat next to him.

“Yo,” Cole called out as he put his phone back in his pocket.

“Yo, we’re planning a trip to Oswald for fall break. You in?”

“Depends. Who’s on?”

“Well… right now, we got Rose and I, plus Sadja and Kat. There’s one spot left for the Airbnb.”

Cole opened his mouth, but suddenly stopped. “Wait, wait wait wait. Let me get this straight: you’re going to a secluded cabin for two days, in the middle of the beautiful mountains, with two single girls in tow, one of which being Kat?”

Aaron gave him a confused look. “Where are you going with this? You’re starting to sound like Isaac.”

A smug smirk began to cross over Cole’s countenance. His arms crossed behind his back, as he looked up to the ceiling.

“Well Aaron, I’d love to go on such a pleasant-sounding trip,” he replied in extreme exaggeration. “Alas, I’ve already made plans during the full duration. However, I heard my good friend Lukas has been trying desperately to find something to do during that time. Have you considered asking him?”

A smile came to Aaron’s face as realized what was going on. “So you’re trying to play Rodrigo, huh?”

Cole turned to face him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Aaron took out his phone. “Alright, Lukas it is then. I’ll try my best to make your wingman move a reality.”

The two boys put their faces back to their phones for a few minutes while they waited for class to start. However, something would happen that caught their mutual attention.

On the other end of the room was Carmichael, Ash, and one other girl they vaguely recognized. What they heard first was a line by Ash.

“But you get the difference between the two, right?”

Carmichael nodded. “Sure I do. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t change the biology of it all. If you were born a male, you’re always going to prefer more male things. You can change your gender to whatever you want, but there’s certain traits that always stay with you.”

Ash was sitting on the desk next to Carmichael. Her female companion sat in the seat adjacent. Ash sighed.

“It’s not that simple. There’s plenty of cases where people are born with the sex of a male but the gender of a female, and vice versa.”

“I know about gender dysphoria, Ash. I know it exists. But do you really think all the people now are doing it because of dysphoria? I mean, there’s been a massive growth in gender reassignment that…”

As the three continued to argue, Aaron leaned over to Cole. “Damn, if I knew getting girls was this easy, I’d debate that trans shit more often.”

Cole smiled. “Why don’t you try it?”

“Are you kidding? Rose would kill me.”

The two turned back to the argument. It was the other girl’s chance now to debate Carmichael. He wasn’t having it.

Aaron turned once more to Cole. “But he’s got a point though. Right?”

Cole faced the speaker. “What do you mean?”

“I mean like, there’s things that make us guys, and them girls. Things tied to our biology, but move on to other stuff. Think about it — we have more testosterone than them, right? And testosterone makes us more aggressive. So we, like, enjoy violence and action and stuff. They don’t. That’s science, but it applies to our personalities. You get me?”

Cole looked away, briefly, in thought. “If it was that simple, I doubt we’d be discussing it for so long.”

Aaron shrugged. “You might be right. Then again, people debate about solved stuff all the time.”

Not long after he said this, the bell rang. Ash and the girl returned to their seats. 

…

It was now the last period of the day, and Cole, Lukas, and others shuffled into their English room. Mr. Vince stood at the front of the class, writing something on the board. He turned to his students, and smiled.

“Good afternoon, everyone. I’m assuming everyone read chapter eight for today?”

Most of them didn’t. Cole was among this group, but he didn’t mind. His head was wrapped up in more important things than a few homework assignments. He thought about them even now.

Of course, Mr. Vince knew this was the case. It was more of a rhetorical question — he was much more interested in getting to the subject he wanted to discuss. 

“Now, chapter eight all centers around a single discussion that Werther has with the other sailors. Werther — who, remember, embodies Daniel Whitney’s younger self — is complaining that this younger woman who he’s met, owes him something. That all their time together is meant to symbolize a permanent trade to him, of something he wants. It’s at this point that Whitney interjects, and addresses this dialog…”

Mr. Vince turned towards the writing on the whiteboard. At the time there were only two words — BROTHERHOOD and SISTERHOOD — which sat on opposite lines of the metal dividing line.

“Whitney, as we already know, is somewhat of a defeatist. He believes that gender conflict is destined to last forever. Part of this, he believes, is because of the power of love. Love is a yin-yang sort of concept. When it goes right, it goes perfectly right. But when it goes wrong — as we see in the novel — it goes perfectly wrong. This already generates some tension.”

At this point, Mr. Vince’s eyes tracked the room. In particular he looked at Ash, who gave him a mild look as she occasionally jotted down some notes in a plain binder.

“Of course, I already know that some of you are ready to point out to me that love isn’t explicitly  between a man and a woman. And that’s true. Therefore, we need something else to fill the hole.”

Mr. Vince, moving his body out of the way, pointed to the words on the whiteboard. “This is when Whitney brings up the idea of brotherhood and sisterhood. You see, it’s more common for people to bond under a certain similarity. Gender is no different. No doubt when you walk around these halls, you see the girls with the girls and the boys with the boys. There are some exceptions, but this is a general rule. And you see it outside this school as well. Now, the question then becomes, why did things group out this way? In order for similarities to exist, there must be differences. That means that just as girls go with girls, girls do not go with boys.”

The room began to tense up. Mr. Vince smiled. “Don’t worry, I won’t be getting political. Let me phrase this differently: why do we make groups? Well, we make groups to protect against the elements. Because two is better than one, and three is better than two, et cetera. And what are the elements? Well, part of it is uncertainty. That’s why when you got to this high school for the first time, you tried to find the in-group you best belonged to. And certainly that’s part of it. But it can also be because of fear.”

Cole’s pencil stopped in the middle of his doodling. He suddenly began to pay attention.

“In all animal groups, male and female pairs evolve differently. Typically one is more aggressive and dominant, while the other is more docile and submissive. This is due to a pairing structure where one part of the pair cares for the young while the other hunts for food. In humans, the hunter is male and the caretaker is female. But we’re more complicated than our counterparts. We’ve been gifted the ability to think, and one of these things we’ve thought much about is why this pairing exists. If it should exist. And we’ve been able to think more about the other side of the coin as well. I can assure you that men think very much about women, and I imagine that women think very much about men. But what Whitney is insinuating here is that they think about each other in vastly different ways. Men primarily see women as sexual objects – or, to put it more kindly, as symbols of caretaking. But women… women don’t think about sex nearly as much. And the reason that Whitney hypothesizes as to why this is… is that women fear men.”

The tone of the room changed. All the boys had begun to avoid eye contact with the girls in the room. The girls, on the other hand, looked down at their notes, or otherwise off into space. The only person who seemed immune to this was Mr. Vince.

“Now, do we have any thoughts?” The teacher asked his class. “A female student in particular might help us with this.”

The room took some time to generate a response. Eventually a girl in the back of the class raised her hand. Vince called on her.

“Well, I don’t think I agree because… I mean, it’s true that women are taught to be careful and stuff, but I don’t think it’s about men specifically. It’s more like… like, women are more susceptible to crime and stuff like that. But I don’t think I’m afraid of men, or anything. I mean, I have two brothers — one older and one younger — and I get along with them really well. And I have some guy friends in school. So I don’t see it as that big of an issue.”

Mr. Vince nodded his head. “You raise a good point. And remember, just because Whitney is theorizing something, doesn’t mean you have to treat it like the word of law. But let me poke at your response, if you allow me. You mentioned that women are more susceptible to crime. And I imagine that is the case because women are considered to be much weaker than men, correct?”

“Well… on average.”

“On average, of course. It could also be because women are perceived to be weaker than men, but that’s a topic for another time. And onto your other point, I have to ask you… excluding your brothers, since you can’t really get rid of them… would you say you spend more time with your male friends, or your female friends?”

“I think it’s about even.”

“Sorry, let me rephrase that question. Who would you say you spend more quality time with? That is, who are you more willing to confide to?”

“Um… that would be my girl friends, I guess.”

“And why is that?”

“Well, I mean… it’s easier to talk about girl problems, and stuff like that-”

At this point the girl caught on. Mr. Vince smiled, snapping his fingers and pointing to the board.

“Because you can talk about things men won’t understand. That’s Whitney’s Sisterhood, correct?”

The girl looked down, her cheeks red from embarrassment. “Y-yeah, it is.”

“Don’t be embarrassed! I gave you a few seconds to think up an answer to something people have been discussing for centuries. In fact, this gives us a perfect example of how Whitney’s theory works. Now, do we have any other brave volunteers?”

He began to walk, carefully, along the perimeter of the desks. Suddenly he stopped at the seat of Ash. She looked down at her notes, no longer writing, her neck scrunched to her shoulders and her fingers roughly rubbing against her pencil.

“Ms. Monticello, you often have insightful comments on subjects like this. Do you have anything to say?”

Ash suddenly snapped out of it, pivoting her head up towards the teacher. Her eyes widened, as she stumbled over her words.

“O-oh, I… n-no, I don’t have anything. Sorry.”

Mr. Vince gave her a comforting smile. “That’s fine, you don’t need to.”

The teacher walked back down the desks and towards the whiteboard, where he stood next to it once more. “Now, not all philosophers have such a pessimistic outlook as Whitney. For example, Nietzsche too believed in the categories of brotherhood and sisterhood. But he, rather, believed that men and women simply danced at different tempos…”

…

Kat looked up at the clock on the study room wall. She was back home again, and struggled to stay awake while finishing assignments. Suddenly the door opened behind her, and jolted her back to focus.

But it wasn’t who she was expecting. Instead, a young latina girl with a navy blue polo and rosy cheeks greeted her in a gentle bow.

“Ms. Wilkins, I hope your studies are going well.”

Kat took out her headphones, shaking her hair out of the way and getting up from her seat to greet the girl. “It’s going about as good as it gets, Emilia. Is something up?”

The girl raised her head, the bangs of her bobbed cut going just past her eyebrows. “Mr. Wilkins requests your presence at his office.”

Kat gave out a heavy sigh. “He knows he can just… you know… tell me himself?”

“Well, Mr. Wilkins is a very busy man, and-”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I didn’t… it isn’t about you, or anything. I’ll go talk to him.”

As the young maid began to leave the room, the daughter of the baron made one last comment.

“Emilia… you know you can just call me Kat, right?”

Emilia turned around, giving a bright smile. “I don’t mind, Ms. Wilkins.”

Kat couldn’t help but smile back. “Alright then. Thanks, for everything.”

A few minutes later Kat walked her way up the stairs, to the large door that symbolized the entrance to her father’s domain.

With its high ceiling, the room felt more like an expanse than a single person office. The walls on each side were lined with filled bookshelves, all leading to a large set of windows at the far end, draped in fine light cloth. And, the center of those windows, looking out, was a man. His imposing tall stature could be detailed even as the shadow covered him. Without looking back, he took a puff of the cigar in his hand, and the smoke floated on past, its opaqueness penetrated by the light rays which entered the room. 

Slowly, steady, the man turned. His movement revealed a chiseled face, a head of blonde hair cut almost in military form, and crystal clear blue irises that matched — if not exceeded — that of Kat’s. He wore a neatly pressed gray suit vest, with a spotless white dress shirt beneath it. Once he had finally turned around fully, he pointed his cigar-hand at a chair on the other side of his desk.

“Have a seat, Katherine.”

Kat didn’t seem particularly impressed. She followed over to the chair, collapsing down casually on it and looking up at the man with expectant eyes.

By contrast, the man gently pulled out his seat and sat up, his hands together with the cigar poking out.

“I wanted to talk to you about school.”

“You mean college?”

The man didn’t respond. He simply kept his blue eyes locked into the girl’s.

Kat sighed. “Listen, I know you’re not up to me going to a state school-”

“I have no issues with you going to a state university, do not mince my words.”

Kat stopped, and looked back at the man. She leaned forward carefully, the bangs of her hair dangling in front of her.

“Oh, you just have a problem with me going to Oregon, then?”

The man’s eyes widened. He gave a light cough.

“I just think that there’s a lot more opportunities that you’re missing out on with your narrow focus. You have solid grades, and a good set of extracurriculars. If you wanted to, you could get into a top 25 school-”

“If I wanted to. I don’t want to, dad. I don’t want to go to Northern Cal, or Simpson-”

“I’m not suggesting you do.”

“Oh, I know that. But I don’t want to go to some pretentious private college either.”

“Isn’t your friend going to Dartmouth?”

“Well, I mean, maybe! We don’t know! But I don’t see why her life has anything to do with mine.”

Mr. Wilkins sighed, resting his head with one arm and moving the cigar to a tray with the other. He picked out a piece of paper from the side of the desk, and handed it over to Kat.

“I printed out a list of colleges you might consider. They’re all similar to Oregon, in environment and programs. I just ask that you at least give it a look, see if anything interests you.”

Kat’s eyes skimmed down the page, then looked up at her father. Her eyes turned from those of harshness to those of pity. She sighed again.

“Alright. I’ll check them out.”

Kat got up from the chair. As she left the room, her father called out to her.

“Good luck on your exam.”

Kat stopped, and turned towards him. Her eyes didn’t change, and she spoke no words. She continued and walked out the door.

For a few moments after, Mr. Wilkins was still stuck in his thoughts. But he quickly snapped out of it, grabbing his reading glasses and continuing to read the business documents that lined his desk.