Apples and Peanut Butter
by Gabe KaiserCategory: ponderous
Disclaimer: I know it ain't mine and it ain't never gonna be mine, so if I borrow it every so often,
just deal!
Spoilers: Isaac & Ishmael
Summary: A short continuation of Isaac & Ishmael
Rating: PG
Notes: I wrote this more for my sake, then anyone else's. It served well as therapy for the recent events.
"Sir?"
"Yeah?" Josh did not look up from the apple he was so delicately peeling.
"Should we be afraid?" That did it.
Josh dropped both the apple and the knife on the counter. He grabbed a chair, turned it around and sat down to face the kids. A group of thirty looked back at him. Eyes betrayed hidden emotions, primary among them fear. Josh did not need to be a psychologist to determine that.
"How do I convince you?" Josh paused, unsure of how to proceed. "Most of you guys no longer have nightmares. You are too old to have to digest reality through REM. But yet, you have never seen something like this before. Unlike your parents, you were not alive for Vietnam. I'm sure less than half of you remember the Gulf War. So where does that leave you? You mind feels developed enough to handle the truth, but your heart doesn't."
"I remember being a teenager, back when the chisel first hit the stone. The one feeling that is universal to all teenagers is immunity. You drive fast because accidents don't happen to you, they happen to the next guy who is not paying attention. You smoke because you have an uncle who is 90 and still chugging. I'm no psychiatrist, but I think what happened was that you just lost that feeling of immunity and it was replaced but something much worse: vulnerability."
"Should you be afraid? You ask the question as if it were an obligation. I don't want you to feel afraid. Not I, not the President, not your mother, and definitely not your dog. That being said, when I go home and watch the news in the evening, I'm afraid. And the reason is not because I'm privy to more information than you. It's not because I listened to the CIA brief the President this morning and I know what is going to happen. I'm afraid because I know you guys are sitting at home watching the same evening news as I am instead of going out on the town with your friends." He stopped his preaching and looked around at the faces. "Am I right?" he asked. They looked at one another and slowly nodded.
Josh smiled, "The first step towards recovery is admitting you have a problem." It was met with nervous laughter. "You guys have actual lives, unlike the rest of us industrious folk who work our butts off the feed the ranks. So have fun, and along the way learn a bit. Then get your own asses up through the ranks to come help us out. And that's what your country needs. We don't need your fear nor the three bucks in your piggy bank. We need you to graduate and then, only, then do we need you to save the world."