"I'd say it's your best one. It's funny - when I was in high school, I wanted a girl that was kind of ... well, naive. I'd have said stupid then, but now? I think a naive girl would've suited fine. But now, I want someone to tell me when I'm stupid, to one up me." John took a sip of his latte, sighing happily.
All of that was a lie. Well, except for the happy sigh of pleasure from the latte. John hadn't cared for girls in high school even though he'd done research and lost his virginity perfectly at the mean age of seventeen. He didn't want a woman to one-up him, either.
But he did like Lydia. She was on the high end of attractiveness for women that he'd observed, and she tipped the scales on a measure of survival instinct and intelligence. He wanted to observe her. And for John Clegg, that was as high a praise as he could internally manage.