The “S” Word

Hav­ing sat there in silence, for a few moments, I finally blurted out, “I didn’t know what else to do. I was so dis­ap­pointed by the Navy’s fail­ure to sat­isfy the insa­tiable long­ing for self-​​fulfillment, that has afflicted me since puberty, I could not bear the addi­tional pain of the remorse I felt after hav­ing made such an irre­versible choice as to go on active duty. Or so I thought, until the day I decided to starve myself, to dra­ma­tize how the Navy is starv­ing me, that is, depriv­ing me of the means to ful­fill myself. I had to do some­thing to stop the bouts of sex with my self, I fall prey to when­ever I’m held cap­tive, like an ani­mal in a cage, and made to do the bid­ding of a taskmas­ter as unsuited for the job of man­ag­ing my soul as the Navy is.“

As soon as he heard the “s“ word, he honed in on it like a vul­ture on a fly, as if the real rea­son for my fast were hid­den in some dark dirty lit­tle secret sur­round­ing my sex­u­al­ity. “Have you ever desired sex or had sex with any­one onboard this ship?“ he asked.

Bewil­dered by what I thought was the most bizarre ques­tion I’d ever been asked, I finally responded, “No, I can’t say that I have ever desired to have sex with any­one onboard the ship. I have a girl friend back home in St. Louis, whom I love very much and dream about mar­ry­ing some day. Occa­sion­ally, I have fan­tasies of hav­ing sex with her. As far as hav­ing sex with other guys, why I have never heard of such a thing! I can’t even imag­ine how that would work. I assure you, Lt. Smith, my prob­lem with sex has noth­ing to do with any­one else onboard this ship but my self. I just can’t seem to find out where I fit in.“

“Mr. Drury, I fail to see any­thing in what you’ve said that’d war­rant tak­ing such a dras­tic step as to refuse your­self food,“ he concluded.

“I feel sorry for you, Sir,“ I rejoined, “that you’re so obliv­i­ous to the pain and suf­fer­ing you inflict upon the souls under your com­mand. In choos­ing to live blindly, you can’t see beyond the bread you eat.“

It became clear to me that we weren’t talk­ing to each other on the same wave­length. At that point, I wasn’t sure where the hell I was com­ing from. Nor­mally, I didn’t talk like this, espe­cially to a lieu­tenant. Besides, I wasn’t sure I saw much beyond the bread I used to eat.

In an attempt to regain con­trol over the sit­u­a­tion, the Lieu­tenant resorted to his power as a supe­rior offi­cer. “Mr. Drury,“ he snapped back, “I order you to eat.“

Chuck­ling to myself, I shook my head in dis­be­lief. “Sir, nei­ther you nor the whole damn Navy can make me eat if I don’t want to.

“Do you know the con­se­quences, Mr. Drury, for refus­ing the direct order of a supe­rior officer?“

“No, I’m afraid I don’t, Sir,“ I answered.

“A court-​​martial,“ he replied with a grin when he saw me squirm in my seat. “And brig time,“ he added. Hav­ing suc­ceeded in stir­ring up a great deal of fear within me, he again ordered me to eat.

“You can’t make me eat,“ I insisted as I strug­gled to stay on top of the fear that, by now, had my whole body trembling.

“You leave me no choice, Mr. Drury, but to refer the mat­ter to the Exec­u­tive Offi­cer,“ he snapped back. “Come with me,“ he com­manded as he jumped up from his seat and hur­ried out the door, only to dis­ap­pear through another just down the passageway.