The Fable of Nathan Gooch

College students NATHAN GOOCH and LEW HANDY, both 22, share a one-bedroom apartment. Nerdy Nathan can’t get a date, and often has to sleep on the couch while womanizing Lew has the bedroom for his latest conquest. In his biology studies Nathan has learned about animal courtship techniques, such as male bowerbirds doing songs and dances, male peacocks spreading their tail feathers, and male lizards doing push-ups. The males are telling females, “Look at what good genes I have.” So Nathan decides to try such animal techniques himself, and to Lew’s annoyance and envy Nathan is soon sleeping with a parade of girlfriends, with Lew relegated to the couch. But Nathan becomes disillusioned, telling Lew that women all go for his show, but it’s only ephemeral animalistic attraction. The techniques work, he believes, because they’re vestiges from our evolutionary past—behavioral leftovers, still in our genes, from the lower life forms we evolved from. “No one wants me for me,” Nathan laments. He also realizes that using those animal courtship techniques is not a level playing field, since the targeted ladies don’t know their reaction’s genetic cause. The way they react to the techniques is not exactly voluntary. Nathan resolves to stop being a phony and “acting like an animal.” He’s content with the belief, while he plans for a career after graduation, that someday someone will want him for who he is. And he sees that really, while relegated again to the couch, he may be better off than Lew, who lives for now and gives no thought to tomorrow.