I Was Shaking So Badly I Could Barely Stand

As soon as I was done speaking and this wave of reality came over me, I slowly stood up straight, took a step back, brought myself to the proper position of “At Ease” (because snapping to “Parade Rest” at this point seemed over kill) and waited for the wrath. I was shaking so badly I could barely stand.

From the very moment I first stormed into the Commandant’s office, my eyes were fixed squarely on his face. Though all these emotions were swelling up inside of me and adrenaline was my driving force like cels of an animation scene, I had these frozen split-second shots in my head of the Commandant’s expressions. It was as if his face said:

WHAT IS GOING ON?
WHO DOES SHE THINK . . .WHO IS . . .WHAT IS SHE . . . .
I’M GOING TO TEAR HER APART FOR STORMING . . . .
WHAT? Again? Really? What idiots. . . . . .
Now what do I say?

I suddenly became keenly aware of the fact that I was wet –all over. My hair was still dripping and my clothes were quite damp and sticking to me. I wondered how I looked standing there before a Command Sergeant Major, a rank deserving far more respect than I had to give at this particular moment. I was swimming in all these thoughts of regret and then I thought to myself, "but you have the right to take a shower without being walked in on by male soldiers. Stand your ground, Melissa, now is not the time to back down."

I don’t think the Commandant knew what to say. He sat there for a few moments then asked me to tell him exactly what happened and all the while he had a look of disbelief on his face. He finally just calmly said, “I will look into it.” Then sent me on my way. As I made my way back to my room those same male soldiers that had stood in my pathway yelling at me now stood there with their jaws dropped open wondering how is it I was able to storm my way into the Commandant’s office and just freely walk out. How come I wasn’t in trouble?

Getting back to my room, despite the situation with my lovely roommates, seemed like a place of solace for me. I wanted to get away from the stares and whispers, “She’s the one?”. As I approached my room I heard my roommates talking. The one “ring leader” against me was trying to convince the others both of these situations were my fault or that I was making both stories up to get attention. I over heard her say, “But it’s only happened to her twice. She’s either lying or setting herself up for this to happen.” Then the roommate that had been in the shower with me the second incident said, “Yeah, it does seem strange she’s the one it keeps happening to but I was there this time too. I sure didn’t plan it or make it up. It happened and well, she was surprised. I could tell. It’s not like she was expecting it.” I walked into the room and all talking stopped instantly. Everyone was uncomfortable –the tension was thick and the silence was deafening. Everyone tried to pretend to busy themselves with shining their boots or whatever until I broke the silence and said, “I didn’t plan it, I didn’t make it up. I don’t know why it happened to me twice but it did. I don’t care how much you hate me, if you guys don’t stand with me and demand something be done, it’s going to happen to you too. This isn’t about me or you but it’s about all of us and we have a right to our privacy.”

The one “ring leader” just looked down and put all the energy of hatred for me into shining her boots. Her hands were going a mile a minute fiercely circling the toe of her Jump Boots with her polishing rag. Her face was deep red with anger not about the situation but just –I don’t know –just my mere presence in the room, I guess. She intently stared down at her boots, breaking her line of vision only to spit in her cup as she had a huge wad of tobacco stuffed into her bottom lip.

Under normal conditions, PLDC is a tough course to get through. Its very demanding and fast paced. You either cut it or you don’t. Pass or fail –no in between. The whole point of the course is to turn out Leaders, not sissies. Not babies. Not whiners. Not incompetent soldiers –LEADERS. Getting through the course alone is tough enough but doing it with the crap my roommates wanted to dump on me and the situations that kept coming up, this was becoming more than I could handle. It didn’t seem important any more to me to finish the course.

I didn’t care.