The Boo by Pat Conroy Page B

and all the fury of sergeantdom was released on the heads of the freshmen, several people choked back thoughts of homicide when someone noticed O‘Brien laughing in the middle of the sweat party. One sergeant pulled O‘Brien out of the shower room and stood him up against the wall. By this time, O‘Brien was laughing hysterically. The upperclassmen momentarily forgot about their party. They sent all the other freshmen to their rooms. O‘Brien quit bracing suddenly, tilted his cap over his nose in a rakish angle, leaned against the wall, and lit up a cigarette. The upperclassmen stood aghast, too mad to speak, too surprised to respond in a legitimate manner. O‘Brien smoked his cigarette slowly and thoughtfully. Then he looked at a platoon sergeant—an emaciated, spindly platoon sergeant—and said, “Smith, you are so ugly. I bet you never had a date in your life. Look at your body, Smith. My god, son, you have the worst body I have ever seen in my life.” O‘Brien took another drag on his cigarette. He then turned to another sergeant and said, “McMillan, you are big crap around this school, but you would be nothing in any other school in the country. Wouldn’t that be a damn joke. McMillan in a fraternity.” O‘Brien did fairly well in his denunciation of the powers above him, until he called the company commander a “fat pig.” Then the rulers of Fourth Battalion closed their broken ranks and swarmed all over O‘Brien once again. Yet it was one of O‘Brien’s finer moments as a cadet.
    From the initial moment he walked on to The Citadel’s campus, O‘Brien’s one purpose in life was to leave Lesesne Gate as quickly as possible. Demerits piled up on him like ants on a dead grasshopper. The Boo looked at scores of white slips on O‘Brien every day. The Boo and the rest of the Commandant’s Department knew that O‘Brien’s days within the Corps were numbered. When The Boo talked to O‘Brien, the boy stated that he despised the school, but his father refused to let him leave. Finally in sheer desperation, O‘Brien walked out of his room on a Saturday when he was supposed to be serving confinements. The guard tried to stop him, but O‘Brien said he was going to watch a tennis match. The guard pulled him for skipping confinements. When O‘Brien had to write an ERW explaining his actions, he stated that he was in his room and had served all confinements that day. Seventy cadets saw him at the tennis match. O‘Brien won his freedom from The Citadel by committing an intentional honor violation.
    The man who stormed into Courvoisie’s office the day of O‘Brien’s resignation was a tall, handsome soldier. He was square-shouldered, well-proportioned, and angry as hell. A silver star hung from his blouse. Colonel O‘Brien foamed in repressed anger.
    “My name is O‘Brien,” the Colonel said.
    “Courvoisie, Sir,” The Boo replied.
    “Why does my son have to resign. He’s made it this far. Why don’t you let him finish the year?”
    “Colonel, your son has been in trouble all year long. He’s been trying to leave The Citadel ever since he got here.”
    “Well, why wasn’t my wife or I notified about it. We thought Mike was doing well up here.”
    Colonel Courvoisie challenged. “I have personally sent four letters stating that your son had exceeded the limit of demerits, and asking that you encourage your son to shape up, so he could remain at The Citadel.”
    “You never sent those letters to my house,” Colonel O‘Brien replied angrily.
    Colonel Courvoisie asked Mrs. Petit to bring in the file on Mike O‘Brien. In the file were four letters concerning excess demerits and three letters concerning punishment orders. Colonel O‘Brien looked at the letters and mumbled something about the wife “always taking the boy’s side.”
    Courvoisie told Colonel O‘Brien that The Citadel is not the right school for every boy. Mike O‘Brien left The Citadel that day without a single regret and