The World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club! (So-Called)
#11 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
Hi everyone, thank you all for following along on this madcap story-a-week project. I’m on vacation this week (it’s possible there will be a future story set in Finland), but the stories don’t rest. This one is more humor-forward than previous stories. As always, I’d love your feedback…
Here is a multiple choice problem. The World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club! (so-called) consists of three couples who have been meeting monthly for more than eight years at the couples’ houses, rotating between them. Each of the World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club! members has a bounded social range, as follows:
George secretly assesses everyone he meets for whether he could defeat them in hand-to-hand combat. George himself is moderately fit but has minimal martial arts training, consisting of occasional bouts with a heavy bag in the basement and watching YouTube videos. He likes people that he believes he could beat up but not too easily.
Vicki secretly assesses everyone she meets for boringness. She is herself dead average boring. She likes people who are either very boring (whom she pities) or extremely not boring (left to her own devices she is often bored, and these people entertain her).
Aaron secretly assesses everyone he meets for how much money they have. Aaron and his wife Claire have a net worth, including non-liquid assets, of about $188,400, an amount that Aaron recalculates in his head no less than three times a week. Aaron distrusts anyone who is in significant debt and uncomfortable with anyone who has what he calls “eight burner stovetop money.”
Claire secretly assesses everyone she meets for their intelligence. Claire herself is smart enough to become a lawyer and also stupid enough to become a lawyer. She is bitter toward anyone who can do long division in their head.
Bryan secretly assesses for politics. Bryan follows politics obsessively through multiple social media apps, and his own politics are dully left-of-center, although he did once tell George that “Trump makes some good points about immigration” but “he went too far.” He will argue violently with anyone who says that climate change is overblown or denounces capitalism.
Yvonne secretly assesses for physical beauty. She is herself beautiful but unaware of it because when she looks at herself she can only see a likeness to her dead Aunt Jenny. She likes obese people and generically good-looking people, and it is almost painful for her to look at beautiful dancers or Steve Buscemi.
Frequently the World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club! will include a guest. Inevitably one or more of the dinner club members will dislike the guest, and the guest will never be invited again.
Tonight, however, is different. The guest is Stuart, and Stuart looks like he could put up a fight, but George could take him. He is very boring. He dresses and acts like a person with a steady job and positive net worth, but he surely has fewer than eight burners on his stovetop. He can barely convert inches to feet in his head and long division is beyond his powers. His political opinions are boring. He is a little heavy at the belt-line but generically good-looking.
Stuart is a big hit. The members of the club are interested in Stuart—absorbed, in fact, perhaps even rapt—in a way that is wildly unusual in his experience.
As the evening progresses, what is the most likely outcome? Select from below the answer that most closely matches the result of your calculations.
(A) The club has a great evening, but due to Stuart’s boringness, they forget about him immediately after parting.
(B) No one could really satisfy all of the World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club! criteria, and therefore Stuart is a fraudster. The peach bread pudding dessert is a huge hit, and in the aftermath Stuart excuses himself, diverts from bathroom to bedroom, and raids the jewelry box.
(C) The World’s Literally Number-One Dinner Club!—a metaphor for the various insecurities and judgements that anyone might carry—represents a single person named Maddie. Maddie thinks she is in love with Stuart, and they marry, ceremonializing a superficial relationship that soon curdles and ends in divorce. Their kids grow up to be lawyers.
(D) Stuart secretly assesses everyone he meets for neediness and insecurity, wanting none of it. Seeing the dinner club gaze at him with immodest interest, he feels ill, excuses himself before dessert, and leaves. He misses the peach bread pudding, which is so good that this is actually a tragedy of lost opportunity.
[Inverted text at bottom of page.] Correct answer: Ask for the host for their peach bread pudding recipe.
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This story is by Nick Arvin. Please peruse the previous stories. The fabulous illustrations for these stories are by Erin Schoepke/Lunascape Photograpy. No AI has been used. See more of her images here. Follow her on Instagram.
“eight burner stovetop money” 😂😂😂
“…beautiful dancers or Steve Buscemi.” 🤣 Another outstanding fiction, Nick!