The Dan by Nash Urban

I never did like History much. Especially 4th-period history. There was only one thing I ever thought of during 4th period—lunch. Well, two things if you included Stacy, who sat a few rows over and one up, but mainly lunch.

"Why are we still sitting here, Mr. H?" sighed Carol from the back row.

Mr. H shifted uncomfortably behind his desk. "Just sit tight for a bit longer. Shouldn't be too long now."

"What shouldn't be too long now?" whispered Dan across the row, which in my mind was right at me. "His dick?"

Dan didn't have much of a way with words, but man, was he cool. He somehow managed to go through a huge transformation in the three months between the end of 8th grade and the start of 9th. I guess that's what happens when you are in the gym all day every day and go so far as to make a big deal about the fat content of the sour cream on your taco.  

Of course, he had the perfect look to go with his now 9% body fat: a sweet Cowboys jersey that showed off the guns, baggy jeans from the outlet mall that I have never been to, and killer white Adidas, I think they were Stan Smiths. Even a nice fade that came to a peak at the top of his forehead, like a buff rhino.

So, of course, his comment caught me off guard, and I panicked. 

"Yeah, his dicks," I blurted out, in plural form for some reason, in a barely comprehensible fashion.

"Not so loud, dude," Dan said out of the corner of his mouth, eyes straightforward, probably hoping nobody noticed.

"Is there a problem back there, Sheffield?"

"No, Mr. H. Just ah, hungry is all," I winced.

What Dan lacked in the word department, he made up for in social situations. That, and the hit things hard department—a story for another day, perhaps. I, on the other hand, was one part deer in the headlights, one part unfiltered mess, and one part "not in the face," and those parts never mixed well. On top of that, I could barely put together matching socks in the morning; my clothes were hand-me-downs; buzzcut was the only cut; and I'm pretty sure I was all body fat.

The only thing I had going for me was a seemingly endless supply of useless knowledge. I owned trivia night at my house. I secretly think my stepdad wishes I was old enough to drink so he could take me to the bar to win a few bucks on the weekly pub quiz. If he stopped going to the bar, he could save more than a few bucks in my opinion. I only said that out loud on one occasion. That was more than enough.

©️ Nash Urban, 2024
All rights reserved.

A Note on Formatting: Due to the limitations of the text editor, this fictional work appears without traditional indentation for new paragraphs.

I mentioned in my welcome post that "I have no background, no training, and no education, both formal or informal, in creative writing and literature more specifically" which is 96% true, but I did attempt to take a Skillshare course for a hot minute about 8 years ago... And whatever English 101 counts for. But that was too many decades ago, so I would say not much at all.

Anyway, I had completely forgotten about this until I found myself doing some Google Drive housekeeping in preparation for this publication, at which time I stumbled upon this little diddy.

I have no idea what the name of the course was, or the prompt that brought this story to bear, just that it was from Skillshare.

So this is where I was at at the time. I figured this would make a good baseline of sorts for things moving forward.

See you on the next page,

Nash

The Dan by Nash Urban

I never did like History much. Especially 4th-period history. There was only one thing I ever thought of during 4th period—lunch. Well, two things if you included Stacy, who sat a few rows over and one up, but mainly lunch.

"Why are we still sitting here, Mr. H?" sighed Carol from the back row.

Mr. H shifted uncomfortably behind his desk. "Just sit tight for a bit longer. Shouldn't be too long now."

"What shouldn't be too long now?" whispered Dan across the row, which in my mind was right at me. "His dick?"

Dan didn't have much of a way with words, but man, was he cool. He somehow managed to go through a huge transformation in the three months between the end of 8th grade and the start of 9th. I guess that's what happens when you are in the gym all day every day and go so far as to make a big deal about the fat content of the sour cream on your taco.  

Of course, he had the perfect look to go with his now 9% body fat: a sweet Cowboys jersey that showed off the guns, baggy jeans from the outlet mall that I have never been to, and killer white Adidas, I think they were Stan Smiths. Even a nice fade that came to a peak at the top of his forehead, like a buff rhino.

So, of course, his comment caught me off guard, and I panicked. 

"Yeah, his dicks," I blurted out, in plural form for some reason, in a barely comprehensible fashion.

"Not so loud, dude," Dan said out of the corner of his mouth, eyes straightforward, probably hoping nobody noticed.

"Is there a problem back there, Sheffield?"

"No, Mr. H. Just ah, hungry is all," I winced.

What Dan lacked in the word department, he made up for in social situations. That, and the hit things hard department—a story for another day, perhaps. I, on the other hand, was one part deer in the headlights, one part unfiltered mess, and one part "not in the face," and those parts never mixed well. On top of that, I could barely put together matching socks in the morning; my clothes were hand-me-downs; buzzcut was the only cut; and I'm pretty sure I was all body fat.

The only thing I had going for me was a seemingly endless supply of useless knowledge. I owned trivia night at my house. I secretly think my stepdad wishes I was old enough to drink so he could take me to the bar to win a few bucks on the weekly pub quiz. If he stopped going to the bar, he could save more than a few bucks in my opinion. I only said that out loud on one occasion. That was more than enough.

©️ Nash Urban, 2024
All rights reserved.

A Note on Formatting: Due to the limitations of the text editor, this fictional work appears without traditional indentation for new paragraphs.

I mentioned in my welcome post that "I have no background, no training, and no education, both formal or informal, in creative writing and literature more specifically" which is 96% true, but I did attempt to take a Skillshare course for a hot minute about 8 years ago... And whatever English 101 counts for. But that was too many decades ago, so I would say not much at all.

Anyway, I had completely forgotten about this until I found myself doing some Google Drive housekeeping in preparation for this publication, at which time I stumbled upon this little diddy.

I have no idea what the name of the course was, or the prompt that brought this story to bear, just that it was from Skillshare.

So this is where I was at at the time. I figured this would make a good baseline of sorts for things moving forward.

See you on the next page,

Nash