Commandant Michael Part 2
"I can't believe you just did that, man!" Finley hissed to Francis. Giving the new Commandant the finger was definitely not the brightest idea Francis had had. In fact, it was down right stupid. Everyone had a clean slate with Michael, and now Francis was making them all look bad.
Michael turned to face Francis. "Come with me, cadet. I'd like to have a word with you."
Francis smiled and shrugged at his friends as he followed the Commandant down the hall to what used to be Spangler's office. When they entered, Francis was shocked. When it was Spangler's office, everything was spotless and white. No color, no friendly clutter, no knick-knacks. Just a dark, empty, impersonal room. But now the room looked completely different. The windows were open so that air and sunshine could stream in. Silly posters of animals decorated the walls. The desk was buried under piles of junk. Little knick-knacks were everywhere. The plain old falling apart couch had been replaced with a sky blue overstuffed couch. 2 large reclining easy chairs sat in front of the desk. The room had undergone a face-lift. It looked great.
Commandant Michael sat in his own easy chair behind the desk. He gestured to Francis, "Sit down, cadet."
Francis plopped himself down in the comfortable leather chair and hit the reclining lever. When the chair had reached its lowest reclining point, Francis's feet were in Michael's face. Michael chose to ignore this fact.
"Now cadet- what's your name, son?"
"Francis."
"Francis, do you know why your parents sent you here?" asked Michael.
"Because they're totally psychotic." Francis replied.
"I don't think that's the reason. I think that they sent you here because they believed that you have an attitude problem. And from I've seen; it looks pretty clear that you do. Commandant Spangler and I have different beliefs. He believes that punishment should include hard physical labor and humiliation. I however, believe that instead of doing physical work, you should be doing mental work." Michael smiled at Francis.
"What do you mean by mental work?" inquired Francis suspiciously.
"Well, I used to be a psychiatrist. What you and all the other students here need is some good old fashioned therapy!"
"Therapy?!" Francis yanked his chair into the upright position. "I'm not crazy, and neither is anyone else at this academy!"
Commandant Michael gave him a long, hard look. "Seeing a therapist does not make one 'crazy', cadet. It simply means you have some issues. I myself was in therapy for quite a number of years," Michael's face suddenly turned dark. "They sure thought I was crazy. Oh, how they laughed and taunted me! But I showed them. I showed them all!"
Michael
chuckled maliciously. Francis stared at him. Whoa, Francis thought to
himself. This guy is totally psycho! What a freak. How am I supposed to
stand this? Therapy? Oh man, this dude is really full of it. Spangler would
never put me in therapy. And what's up with that weird look on his face? He
keeps muttering things about "getting even". I wonder what he's thinking. He's
been laughing and talking to himself for the past 10 minutes.
Finally, Commandant Michael stopped his little dissertation. He turned and looked shocked to see Francis staring at him. It was if Michael had completely forgotten that Francis was there. He cleared his throat loudly and sat back down in his seat, so that he was facing Francis head on.
"What are you thinking, Francis?"
"I'm thinking that I'd really like to get out of here." Francis turned his bored expression towards the ceiling, refusing to meet Michael's eye.
"I mean what are you really thinking, cadet? What are your innermost thoughts? Your feelings? Your dreams?" Michael leaned closer to Francis.
Francis rolled his eyes. "I don't have any dreams, sir. They were all crushed when I first arrived here at Marlin Academy."
Michael looked outraged. "That's awful! Don't ever let them take away your dreams, cadet! Never, ever let them take away your dreams! Just like they killed mine. I dreamed of being a professional ping-pong player. And I was good, too! But then one day my father said to me, 'Son, you're the worst ping-pong player I've ever seen in my entire life. Stop fooling around with this ping-pong crap and do something useful with your life. Go into the army!' Damn you, Dad! I was good! I wanted to be a ping-pong player! Why couldn't you have just been happy for me?! Why did you always have to be so mean? I trusted you, Dad, and all you ever did was try to kill my spirit! Well you can't kill me, Dad! My spirit isn't dead!"
At this point, Francis left the room, shaking his head. As he shut the door behind him, he heard the Commandant rambling away to himself loudly. "I've gotta get rid of this guy."