The Required Pain and Suffering

“A detention?” my mother asks, handing the slip back to a space two feet away from me. Her eyes never deviate from the television.

“Can you sign it and not tell—”

“Your father is not going to like this,” she says, interrupting me with her next programmed train of thought. She jabs the remote with her pointer finger to increase the volume.

“Go wait for him in your room,” she half-yells over an I-Can’t-Believe-It’s-Not-Butter commercial, still not turning her head.

I snatch back the sheet and drag myself upstairs, making sure the toes of my boots scrape and screech against every stair. I sit on my bed, the detention slip resting neatly beside me. The clock ticks. I keep my eyes on my shoes noticing the loops in the lace of my right boot are slightly larger than the ones on my left. A door opens and then shuts heavily downstairs. A long scratch glares at me from the toes of my now-dulled boots: a souvenir from my earlier pouting. Feet land sharply on the stairs: thump, thump. Tobacco smoke drifts into my nostrils; the blood rushes around my eyes. There is no time to hide the boots—Sergeant Howard Peterson stands in my doorway taking a long drag from his cigarette. His eyes roll from the detention slip to my boots, and he turns around, blowing the smoke from his lungs. “Shine those shoes boy, then report to me,” he orders into the hallway, tapping the ash off his cigarette and onto the floor, walking back down the stairs.

My father’s office is a military office. The walls are covered with aircrafts in flight and pictures of men standing tall next to other men. Two swords cross over the door frame that leads to the solitary desk with the solitary green lamp on top of it. The shades are half drawn and my father sits in his leather chair, facing the window with his elbow resting on the desk. One hand twists a cigarette into an ashtray; the other lightly taps his thigh with his removed belt. I shuffle towards the desk, watching my socks slide on the hardwood, my detention slip in one hand and my boots in the other.

After placing my boots on the ground and my slip on the desk, I unbutton my pants and pull them down. His grip is firm on the back of my head as he bends me over his knee. Whack! I clench my teeth and breathe in sharply. Whack! My legs flex in anticipation of the next blow. Whack! The chair slides backwards. Whack! Tears begin to drip onto my newly polished boots. “Get up,” he orders, wrenching me by the neck into standing position, my legs red and wobbling. He takes a pen from his desk and signs my detention slip. “This is the responsibility, this is the required pain and suffering,” he barks, bending me back over his knee.

“You crashed the car?” My mother asks, trying to close a pop-up window on her computer.

“Is there anyway we can—”

“Your father will not be happy about this,” she warns, clicking the mouse at the unresponsive computer.

Frustrated and hopeless, I elephant march up the stairs into my room and slam the door. I need something hard underneath me, so I lay on the carpet, digging my fingers into the fibers. A door opens and then shuts heavily downstairs. I watch My palm turn white as I bend my fingers back. Feet land sharply on the stairs: thump, thump. Tobacco smoke drifts into my nostrils; the blood rushes around my eyes. As I look up, Sergeant Howard Peterson swings open my door, a Marlboro hanging from his lips. “Get up and follow me,” he coughs, almost spitting the cigarette into my face.

We drive for about an hour and a half in complete silence. Every time the electric clock ticks off another minute my hands clench tighter and tighter around sleeves of my sweater. It’s dusk when we finally stop, and my father turns off the engine of his Jeep. “Get out,” he says calmly, pulling another Marlboro from his shirt pocket. I open the door and stand up in the late summer mist, stretching my stiff arms and legs. Sergeant remains in the car. The doors lock. I spin around in disbelief, looking wide-eyed into the window. He pulls his Zippo out of his pocket and lights his cigarette, his eyes looking straight ahead. I spin on my heels, looking in all directions—all I can see is the outline of a sign in the distance. My father rolls down the window a crack and barks before driving off, “this is your responsibility; this is the required pain and suffering.” I walk over and examine the sign. It reads ‘West Military Academy.’

“Come on, your the only family he has left,” the nurse pleads, seemingly pulling my arm over the phone. I grew up following orders, I told myself, so why stop now? The elevator did not play music. My father’s room is in the terminal cancer wing and there are no smiles in that place. Closed eyes and steady breathing tell me that he’s asleep when I walk in.

Fifteen years look like fifty on his frail body. I walk in and sit next to his bed, leaving the nurse outside, making the impression that I care. I am here for me, not for him. The clock ticks, the machines buzz and whiz; the whole place smells like urine and cough syrup. Squirming in my seat, I try get up to leave when a withered hand clutches mine. I look down and my father is looking back up at me with wide eyes. “Please, I don’t want to die,” he wheezes, squeezing my hand with all his might. I lean down and put my mouth next to his ear so he would be sure hear me and I tell him, “this is your responsibility; this is the required pain and suffering.”

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