Body Odor and Friendship

Reading Time: 6 minutes

The bell rang to dismiss our 5th-period English Lit III class.

“Caitlan, Olivia, Emma, and Noah. Can you stay for a moment, please?”, Mrs. Murphy asked.

That was weird. Olivia, Emma, and Noah were my smart friend group. We were the model UN and debate team nerds. We were taking college credit trig together.

I ran a tight ship managing my double life. I drew a wide dividing line between academics and parties/poor decisions. Or at least that is what I told myself. In any case, this was not my can-I-speak-to-you-after-class crowd. And Mrs. Murphy wanted to see all of us, except for Lucas, the 5th trusty member of our egghead brigade who didn’t have 5th period English Lit III.

She waited until everyone else had shuffled out of the room to close the door and turned to us.

Gulp.

“It’s about Lucas.”

The insufferable teacher-pleaser in all of us let out a collective sigh of relief, selfishly unconcerned for Lucas because at least we weren’t in trouble.

Our yellow-bellied perfectionist fear turned to curiosity. What about him?

Reading our minds, she said, “You spend a lot of time with Lucas, you must have noticed he has body odor.”

Jesus Christ. I think we would have been less shocked had she slapped us across the face with a live trout. Three minutes ago we were wading through the Scottish General MacBeth’s blind political ambition. Wasn’t that enough drama for the day?

Everyone was shocked speechless for the second time in a conversation that we hadn’t even participated in yet. We were floored by 1) How someone could be so frank about something so…insulting, and 2) Because we all knew it was true but none of us had ever put it into words and formed an audible sentence around it.

Lucas’ aroma was the smelly elephant in the room of our friendship that we had swept so far under the rug for so long that it was turning into fossil fuels. We all met each other’s gaze and then our teacher’s once more. No one wanted to be the first one to admit it even though everyone knew the fragrance she was talking about.

So what if Lucas was stinky? Didn’t Hollywood teach this woman that friend groups need diversity? There is always at least one asthmatic kid with big glasses, a fat kid, a dunce, etc. In our case, we had a smelly kid. Even Charlie Brown and the gang had Pigpen.

As long as you didn’t get too close to him, it wasn’t an issue. I just avoided being his lab partner. Problem solved. He was funny, smart, and nice. I wasn’t slung around his neck or living life in his armpits, so what did it matter?

Mrs. Murphy slowly looked at each of us gathered around her in a semi-circle, our eyes on the floor. Having concluded that none of us were going to volunteer ourselves to sacrifice our friend on the altar, as if stinking up the place were a crime anyway, she went on,

“You have noticed, right?” 

I don’t remember who admitted it first, but one by one we Judas’ed our stinky Jesus and admitted that yeah, we all knew he reeked.

There were only 5 minutes between classes, and two of them already lost, so she spoke quickly.

“As his friends, I think you should be the ones to tell him. He will take it better coming from you. And I want to give you that opportunity. But if you’re not going to, I’m going to talk to the nurse and ask her to have a conversation with him about personal hygiene.”

A year later, at a high school graduation celebration at Lucas’ house, I would discover that Lucas was not a lazy high school boy neglecting his pits. He lived with a hoarder grandmother that collected cats, litterboxes, and cigarette butts. The smell was on his clothes, not tucked under his arms. But how was Mrs. Murphy to know?

We all looked at our shoes as if eye contact would be interpreted as raising a hand to take the friendship bullet. As the silence drug on, we started to give each other the side eye.

Eventually and reluctantly, we all made a decision (the same decision) and spoke almost in unison, declaring,

“I do NOT want to tell him.”

I could think of so many other things I would rather do, like clean the boys’ locker room with my tongue, shave off my eyebrows, or renounce my youthful freedoms to start a life in a convent.

“Alright,” she responded. “I’ll call the nurse to have a talk with him.”

“Ok!” We almost shouted, rushing out the door, relieved that we wouldn’t have to have that awkward little talk. How would it even go? We were 17. What did we know about the truth, difficult conversations, effective communication, and tough love?

Didn’t Mrs. Murphy know this kind of moral dilemma was a thing you watched on Full House and not actually something you experienced? She really needed to spend more time with her television. Or less. Maybe those high-minded, feel-good series were the things that were giving her a false impression that high schoolers had a sound moral compass and a capacity to deliver (and receive) constructive feedback. Either way, it was a nice offer, but she was delusional.

We hurried down the hall asking each other how that conversation would even go… Hey Lucas, you know, the gang and I were all thinking, you smell like moldy cheese. How ‘bout doin’ somethin’ ‘bout that? And he would respond, Oh, thanks, guys! I love your honesty! I can’t wait to name my children after you valiant heroes.

Of course not. He would be hurt! And we didn’t want to hurt him. We cared about him enough to accept him despite “the details”. Maybe our educator had something to learn from us. The moral of the story is that even though people love you, you can’t expect them to tell you the truth. Maybe especially when they love you. Either that or we were just shitty friends.

Whatever. We opted out. The bullet was dodged. We went on our merry way, unconcerned with—and completely forgetting about—the upcoming conversation Lucas would have with the school nurse…until 7th-period art.

———

The intercom beeped to life, “Lucas Wilson to the nurses’ office, please.”

Oh shit. That’s right. We were all reminded of the uncomfortable chat we had had with Mrs. Murphy not even two hours prior. Good God, that woman moved fast. Was she really that offended by Lucas’ funk?

Lucas furrowed his brow in understandable confusion. It really is an odd thing to be called down to the nurse’s office. What would the nurse want with anyone? He looked at us and shrugged as he stood up. We returned his shrug with feigned confusion. Our performance probably only matched David Beckham’s acting in anything in which he has made any an appearance ever. Just horrendous.

But I’m an eternal optimist. By this point, I’m beginning to think that maybe Mrs. Murphy has done a fine thing for all of us. Maybe this is the motivation that Lucas needed to turn his stinky little life around. Maybe the nurse would give Lucas the tools necessary to solve this little issue and the next time we would be forced into a confined space with our friend, it wouldn’t feel like an escape room challenge. I was beginning to imagine a friendship with unoffending smells!

In about 30 minutes, Lucas walked slowly back into the art room with a blank stare on his face, looking forward, emotionless, and slowly slid into his seat at our table. His mouth hung ever so slightly open from the shock of the conversation he just came from. He was clearly bothered and we all tried not to meet his eyes. I acted more interested in watercolors than I had ever been in my life. Everything is normal here, Lucas, and we are totally ignorant about what you were doing at the nurse’s office.

By not asking, “hey, what was that all about?”, we were giving him permission to take his conversation with the nurse to his grave. I mean, who would admit to being called out for an unsavory scent?

To our surprise and horror, Lucas opened up to us, almost immediately.

“Guys,” he said in a low voice, leaning toward us to be discrete with his story. He dove straight in.

“The nurse said I have body odor.”

He spoke uncomfortably.

“What?!” We all asked in angry disbelief.

He told us the whole story, how he had gone down there, sat down to wait his turn, and when called back, the nurse told him that based on complaints from educators and peers she needed to talk to him about personal hygiene. She then offered him a bar of deodorant.

As he shared his story, his voice began to get louder and angrier, and his back straightened. He grew more offended as the story went on and the reality sunk in. He was processing what had happened with us along for the ride. The hurt was wearing off and rage was taking its place.

And then he said,

“And do you know what I told that bitch? You know what I told that BITCH?”, he asked, waving his index finger angrily to simulate pointing it at the school nurse’s face.

“I told that bitch that if I stunk, my friends would tell me I stink!”