Masters, Part 2

While Mel went into the laundry room to mix up what I'm sure was going to be a potent cleansing potion, I went to Brian's room to wake him up. He earned some work details overnight because the Night Awake caught him trying to crawl into the kitchen and steal some Pop-Tarts.

"Brian, wake up. I want you to get these work details done before you go to school. Time's a-wasting, let's go."

"Can I please just have another 10 minutes or so? I'm tired," he whined.

"No way, dude, if you had gone to bed when you were supposed to you woulda had plenty of sleep. Instead, you wanted to run around and play Pop-Tart Commando. Get up."

"Please, Stokie? I'll do the work details later."

"Remember when I said 'No'? Now get up."

Brian reluctantly slithered out of bed and washed his face. He approached me with unkempt hair, bleary eyes and he was scratching his ass.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked.

I said, "Mel is in the laundry room making some mop water. Go get it, mop all the bathrooms and showers, the hallways, the kitchen, dining room and laundry room. Do a good job, not a half-ass-I-mean-hearted job and you might be done after that. Check in with me when you're done."

Brian liked it when I cussed and pretended not to and said, "Okay Stokie, thanks."

I walked through the other boys' rooms and got them up. I could hear Brian from the laundry room, "Jeez, Mel, what'd you put in here? This mop water is hecka-strong!"

"Hee-hee-hee," came Mel's voice from somewhere across the house.

As I suspected, Brian slopped mop water all over the floor as he struggled to control the mop bucket and bring it to the places I told him to mop. He dutifully followed directions and wiped mop water all over the designated floors and bathrooms. When he was done he said, "Stokie, do you think we should open a window?"

I said, "What for? That's a nice pine scent. That's what we're shooting for." At that moment, Miyako walked in the house.

I said, "I'm gonna give Miyako a crossover then you can check in with her for the rest of your work details."

This irritated Brian. "What? You said I'd be done after I mopped! Aww, man!"

As I walked up to Miyako, I noticed that her eyes were watery. I thought the chemicals in the water were awfully strong, too.

"Hi Miyako. Brian here has just one more work detail to do. Can you tell him to set the table and put out the cereal and milk? I have to go drop the kids off at the pool."

As I walked toward the staff office I heard Miyako ask Brian, "The pool? Before breakfast?"

Brian started up immediately with his patented sassy attitude. We called it 'throwin' out the sass'. "He means he's gonna go take a dump. You newcumbers don't understand anything."

I walked into the staff office, shut the door behind me, but opened it just a crack so Mel and I could watch what would happen next. We were giggling like a couple of school kids.

Miyako said to Brian, "Umm, ok, so... Can you set the table and put cereal and milk on the table?"

"Nope. Stokie said I was done with my work details, so I don't have to."

"He told me you have to set the table and put cereal and milk on the table so you better do that."

"Oh, ok. Fine," Brian said as he walked into the kitchen and opened up the refrigerator. "You want me to put milk on the table? Then I WILL GODDAMMIT!"

Brian grabbed the gallon of milk in the fridge, opened it and shook it upsidedown onto the table. "There! See that? Think you're so smart? Look, I'm putting milk on the table because the newcumber told me too..."

Miyako, obviously didn't know what to do. She was looking around for help, stumbling over her words and panicky. I walked out of the staff office and feigned shock.

"Oh my God, Miyako! What did you do? All he had to do was set the table! I can't believe it Miyako, if you weren't sure, you should have asked."

I turned to Brian, "Into the Quiet Room."

I turned back to Miyako, "Me and Mel are gonna take Brian to the Quiet Room because he's violent. Can you clean up this mess? The mop bucket is in the laundry room. Then after that you're gonna have to write an incident report."

As Mel and I walked Brian across the house, I asked him, "Brian, why did you do that?"

"I always do that to damn newcumbers. They don't understand shit."

I spent about 5 minutes with Brian in the Quiet Room. I never had to shut the door and lock him in it because he was pretty calm. I said, "Well Brian, I think you should apologize to Miyako. I have to get the other kids ready for school."

Brian, unwilling to relinquish this valuable one-on-one time said, "No way, she should apologize to me."

"Well, I'll go get her so you can apologize anyway."

I walked out and called Miyako, "Hey, can you come here and sit with Brian for a while? He wants to apologize. Thanks." She came over and had a seat next to Brian. As I left, they were just sitting, staring at each other silently.

Mel and I went about our business of helping the kids get up and eat breakfast. I noticed my eyes were burning and I could practically taste the chemicals in the air. "Damn Mel, one of these days you're gonna have to give me the recipe for that mop water."

"Little bit of this, little bit of that," said Mel. I opened up all the windows. This was getting painful, even for me.

By now, most of the kids were ready for school and I decided to check on Brian and Miyako, since I hadn't heard anything in a while. I rounded the corner to the Quiet Room and was surprised to see Brian and Miyako sitting in the same positions facing each other, still quiet, only this time, Brian was casually, yet continuously spitting on Miyako. Now I'm all for hazing, but this was way too much.

"Oh hell no, Brian!" I walked up past Miyako, picked up Brian and shoved him into the Quiet Room and locked the door. "Miyako! You need to call for help when something like that happens! Go to the staff office bathroom and get cleaned up." She scampered off. Mel poked his head in to see what was going on.

"Dude, this is worse than I thought," I said. "Don't do anything else, she really doesn't have a clue." I was feeling pretty bad that we had taken Yolanda's bait. I felt like a pawn in someone else's battle. But this day was just beginning.