"How much is there to go over?" Beth asked. "Can't we just use our in-class time?"
"I've read about this online," I lied, having a good idea what my wish had brought into being, "it's as much an economic game as it is a social one--" I started to explain.
"Game? Really?! Humans owning eachother is a game to you Rogers?" Beth spat out.
"Geez, Beth, what crawled up your twat and died?" Erica asked.
"That's disgusting! You're disgusting! Both of you--"
I grabbed the envelope out of Beth's hand and glanced inside. Like mine the first card listed some vital statistics: name: 'Mathilda,' role: upstairs maid, a bio and a list of skills.
"Give that back!" Beth snatched back the envelope.
"Okay, 'Mathilda' don't get your panties in a bunch." I turned to Sonya. "May I see your envelope?"
She put her hands on her hips and cocked her head to one side. "Never heard it called that before." She said rubbing her thumbs up and down her thighs.
"Lick it and stick it and put a stamp on the other side, makes sense to me!" I said holding eye contact with her and smiling. "But actually I just wanted to see your character information."
"Andrew Rogers, what has gotten into you?" Sonya asked, blushing slightly as she handed me her envelope.
"Maybe it's what he's gotten into?" Erica asked. "Check his collar for love-bites!"
"That's what she said!" Dawn chimed in happily.
We all paused to look at Dawn for a minute, then at eachother.
Claire rolled her eyes. "Moving right along..."
I glanced inside, then handed Sonya's envelope back.
"Okay, here's the thing; you know I play a lot of computer games, right? And that my mom takes minutes for the curriculum committee? Well the games I really enjoy aren't the shoot'em up, capture the flag kind, they're strategy simulations, so she thought I'd be interested and told me about this a while back. I found an analysis of this project written up in an educational journal, so I know how it's supposed to work: each of us has certain skills, and can divide our allotted game time between those skills. We each turn in a form online and it tells us what resources we get back and lets Mr Winthrop know how well we're doing. The thing is that the game is rigged; none of the plantations can produce everything they need, so we'll have to talk to other teams and buy or barter what we can't make."
I glanced around the room and lowered my voice.
"It's supposed to teach us that slavery isn't economically sound, and highlight the inequalities in the system: the plantations are all supposed to fail and the slaves rise up in rebellion, and as long as we write a decent essay about the experience we all pass."
Erica and Sonya looked at eachother, then at me. Claire was looking at her shoes again fidgeting. Beth was opening her mouth to speak, then closing it again.
"You're right," Erica said, "we need to meet outside of class to talk about this."
"Hey, we can, like, all sit together at lunch!" Dawn said, obviously excited by the idea.
"I don't think that's a good idea," Beth said, "someone might overhear us."
"Besides," Sonya chimed in, "Erica and I have a drama club meeting today." She turned and put her hand on Claire's shoulder. "I'm serious, think about joining, you've got a flair for it."
Claire glanced at me, blushed and looked away. "I'll think about it." She muttered.
"We could meet at someone's house after school," Jim suggested, "no chance at being overheard then. It should probably be Andy's place, since his Mom already told him about the project she won't get upset if we chea--" His eyes bugged slightly as Sonya pressed against him and put her hand over his mouth.
"Ix-nay ain-bray," She said rubbing gently and making Jim's face turn bright red, "It's a strategy session, nothing against the rules about that...right?" She breathed the last word in his ear as she took her hand away and stepped back.
"R-right. Strategy." Jim was trembling and sweating slightly.
I wished silently that neither Jim nor I would suffer from unwanted erections, premature ejaculation, or inability to get erections when we did want them. He immediately glanced down and looked relieved.
"Okay, my place tonight, bring your laptops or tablets." I said. "Oh! and if you can snap pics of other people's role cards that'd be awesome, but be sneaky about it so they don't suspect anything."
The rest of the group nodded as the bell rang, releasing us to lunch.