Sag Harbor

“I remember one day in the seventh grade when an old white man stopped us on a corner and asked us if we were the sons of a diplomat. Little Princes of an African country. The U.N. being half a mile away. Because—why else would black people dress like that?” 

When the Coopers summer in Sag Harbor, where all the families are African American and middle-class, they do not stand out from their neighbors. It’s a different story during the school year in Manhattan. The Cooper boys, dressed in their preppy clothes, are marked as different because of the intersection of their race and privilege. Even in a cosmopolitan city like New York City, stereotypes abound about how Black males dress. Benji goes to a mainly white private school where he is usually the only Black student, and while he enjoys his white social circle for the most part, he is aware of society’s gaze and stereotypes.

“How does one measure infinity in a roller rink?”

Benji remembers a birthday party held at a roller-skating rink when he was in middle school. The tallest girl in his class, Emily Dorfman, asked him to skate during “couples skate,” and he is excited by their proximity as they circle the rink, seemingly endlessly. As the music plays, he feels exhilaration and glee at finally being a part of the “big boys club,” and he imagines many future episodes involving girls. His world seems infinite. However, the sense of the infinite is an