The Fire Forest

[laxdude95]

Ok, well I had inspiration to write something so I decided to give it a try. I've never really written anything creative before, so tell me what you think. Constructive criticism is appreciated.

The Fire Forest

Chapter One

I sat in front of the principal with a conceited smirk on my face, not afraid of the punishing glare he was giving me. I knew what I had done was somewhat wrong, but I didn’t really care. Why the hell should I? It hadn’t hurt me. Well, I guess it would if I was suspended, but it wouldn’t be the first time.
The principal swirled around in his fancy leather chair and opened up the brand new filing cabinet behind his desk and started sifting through the contents. It made me mad that the school could spend a bunch of money on a new filing cabinet and a leather chair for an idiot principal yet couldn’t fix the stupid drinking fountain down the hall. They don’t freaking care about us, and I sure as hell don’t care about them. My eyes drifted to the window, and I looked out of it into the genuine Michigan old growth forest that surrounded our school. I thought to myself: here we go again.
I live in the middle of nowhere. It’s a tiny little port town on the northern coast of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan called Hansk. It’s named after some Finnish dude that came here sometime in the 19^th century and made a fortune. The one high school, Rutherford High School, has about 400 students, all classes counted for. I don’t know how I remember these things, but that’s the only reason that I’m pretty smart. I remember almost everything people throw at me. I’m like a sponge that can indefinitely soak up knowledge.
Suddenly, I was brought back to the current situation. Mr. McJeremy had found what he was looking for, and he held it in his hand. It was a small, wrinkly, yellow pamphlet. The school code of conduct. He flipped to the page he was looking for and turned it over to me so I could read it. Great! I thought to myself. Now what could this idiot possibly gonna throw at me? I’d heard it all before.
“Do you know what this is, Mr. Faulkner?” The sarcasm and arrogance showed way too well in Mr. McJeremy’s voice. He knew damn well I knew what that was. I’ve seen it more than once before. Man I hated that guy, I could go the rest of my life not seeing him again and be perfectly happy. I swallowed my spite and put on a cheerful voice. Smiling, I responded.
“Why, of course I do, Mr. McJeremy! It’s the school code of conduct.” My voice gained a sarcastic tinge to it. “Not like I would ever do anything that would violate its strict and absolutely necessary rules.” I was laughing at myself in my mind. I could put on a great show of bullshit when I wanted to. I looked at his face and smiled. He was clearly not in the mood.
“Mr. Faulkner, we both know that you have a lot to explain. Now please, will you read this paragraph out loud for me? Thank you.” He handed me the pamphlet, and I looked at the paragraph he was pointing to. I’d seen it before. With a fake smile on my face, I began to read in a very slow and loud voice.
“Any student found harassing another specific student in a malevolent way, whether it be physically or mentally, shall be subject to either detention or suspension at the discretion of the principal.” I stopped reading and closed the pamphlet. Innocently, I said:
“You know Mr. McJeremy, what did I even do that was so bad?” Of course I knew that I had done, but why should I acknowledge it?
“You’re asking me what you did wrong? You need to open your mind and think about it young man! What do you think you did wrong?” His face was beginning to match his red hair. It was actually kind of funny. Knowing it was pointless to just keep bullshitting him, I answered him truthfully.
“Fine, I’ll tell you what I did wrong. Me and my friend were bored, so we went on the computer and made a poster with a picture of Ashley Smith.” I shut my mouth, and started to look out the window again. Mr. McJeremy was still looking at me, obviously expecting more of an explanation.
“And?” he said.
“And what?” I asked.
“We both know that there’s more to the story Mr. Faulkner. Please, grace my ears and tell me.” I’ll tell you, that man could drive the sanest man crazy. I think that the only reason that he decided to become a principal was because he’s a pedophile who likes little boys.
“We made some copies of it and posted it around the school.” I stopped for a second, and then added without thought “Oh yeah, and we called her a lesbian in bold font under her picture. How’d you guys find out we did it anyway?”
You should have seen the look on that guy’s face. He was getting mighty angry. Better make sure he doesn’t rape me. I thought to myself with amusement.
“You amaze me Mr. Faulkner. Are you even sorry for what you did?”
“No, why should I be? That slut made up rumors about Kyle a couple months ago so we got her back. She deserved it. How’d you find out we did it anyway?”
McJeremy took a deep breath and was about to say something, but then he stopped himself. In the seconds he found the words he wanted to say, I looked around the small office. It wasn’t anything special. It had white cinderblock walls with a poster of Garfield saying “Homework, do it then review it.” Yeah right, I thought. I think his desk was maple, stained a bright cherry red. It matches his hair! I thought with amusement. Maybe he came with the furniture, as sort of a bonus.
“Young man I won’t tell you how we know you did this, but please listen to me,” he said. He startled me; he said it in a way I can’t quite put my finger on. It wasn’t kind, per se, but he was genuinely concerned. This was the first time that he didn’t just yell at me and dish out the punishment. He continued.
“You can’t fight fire with fire, because in the end all you’ll end up with is… is a forest fire, you see? Are you listening to me?”
“Sure Mr. McJeremy, of course I am,” I said automatically. I was over my initial shock and was back to apathy. It was obvious that this was just some sort of technique the government taught him to make me feel like he cared about me. I was more interested in the crack in the wall to my left than his little speech.
“You can’t go around starting forest fires, because one day you’re going to get trapped. Maybe not today, but one day. When somebody wrongs you, you don’t have to fight back! It’ll start a never-ending chain of hostility! If I remember correctly, the incident with Michael Halbringer ended with you getting a black eye.” Man, this guy was really chocked full of shit. How could he know what it’s like to be 15?
“How couldn’t I fight back? That bastard was trash talkin’ my girl! That black eye was worth it, because he ended up with a broken wrist. I’ll tell you the trick, Mr. McJeremy. What you’ve got to do is hit them back so hard that they can’t get back up.” I said this like a grandpa teaching his grandson tricks about fishing. He sighed,
“Well then, Mr. Faulkner I wish you luck. If that’s your mindset you’re going to have a hard time in life. I can tell you don’t care about what I’m saying, so we’ll get back to talking about more immediate matters.” Finally! I thought.
“Good,” I said, “Because I really don’t care about what you have to say,” he made a look, but he didn’t say anything, “Let’s get to the punishment, no point in dragging it out any longer, eh?”
“Just wait a minute, Mr. Faulkner; I still have one last question for you.”
“Stop calling me Mr. Faulkner; I do have a name you know. What’s your all-important question?” I rolled my eyes and started tapping my finger on his desk. One of my biggest pet peeves was when people called me that. He probably knew that.
“You’re not in a position to request anything of me Mr. Faulkner. Now, who came up with the idea of putting up the posters? You’re on the honor system now.” I clenched my teeth and took a deep breath. Of course! It wouldn’t be complete if the bastard didn’t ask me to rat out my best friend. The way I see it, I have three choices. The first choice was I could lie and say it was all me. That would be unwise; my mom would get pissed at me because I would probably get suspended. The second choice was I could tell the truth and say that Kyle Tarrag had come up with the idea and I had gone along with it. That would also be unwise. I wasn’t going to blame it all on him. The third choice was that I could lie and say we came up with the idea together. He probably already has Kyle lined up to come down to this prison after me anyway I reasoned.
Screw the honor system, I thought. I’d probably get a worse share of the punishment, but it didn’t really matter.
“Kyle Tarrag and I both came up with the idea. Now can I go?” I stood up and made a mocking gesture to shake hands with him, but he stayed put. I withdrew my hand,
“Fine, be that way,” I said.
“Sit down.” Something was sterner in his voice, so I did. It was against my nature, but I did anyway. I kicked myself later for it.
“Before I give you your punishment, I want you to think of how you could’ve hurt Ashley. How would you like somebody to post posters of you calling you gay? I want you apologize to her the next time you see her, and I mean it. She didn’t deserve this.” I could tell by the look on his face that he was deathly serious. I wasn’t.
“Fine, I’ll say sorry to her. Now just give me the punishment so I can get back to Chinese.” I couldn’t care less about the well-being of Ashley Smith; to me she was just some slut who put down Kyle.
“Mr. Faulkner, you’ll be serving detention with Mrs. James for after school every day for two weeks. I was thinking about a week and a half, but your extreme disrespect during this little chat has convinced me otherwise.” I was sort of amused. He was planning on giving me two weeks of detention from the start, no matter how great I had acted.
“That’s a little bit much, don’t you think?” I said just to make it seem like a cared.
“You should have thought of that before you did what you did Mr. Faulkner,” he said as he filled out a dozen detention slips. He finished filling out the slips and handed them to me. He put a genuinely happy grin on.
“Have a nice day Mr. Faulkner.” He turned to his phone and dialed a number. Probably my mom. Great, I’ll have hell to pay when I get home. It didn’t really matter though, nothing I’ve never dealt with before. I put on the phoniest smile I possibly could and said,
“Have a joyous day Mr. McJeremy, and may a choir of angels sing to announce your presence when you enter a room. See ya sometime next month!” I didn’t stick around to catch his reaction, because honestly I was sick of that guy. I walked out and shut the door behind me, not even slamming it. I have more important things to deal with.
I can’t say I’m sorry for what I did to Ashley Smith at all. She decided that she was gonna fuck around with my best friend. Not a good move on her part. Because I’ll tell you, when you fuck with my friends you’re fucking with me. And when you’re fucking with me, you’d better believe you’re fucking with the best.

END CHAPTER

[custodis]

Pretty interesting read. Like the character you have developed. I want to see where you go with it.