Aunt Sarah's Slippering: and other short stories

by Stanlegh Meresith

  Indeed, my own brother eschews all ritual, cannot be doing with notions of punishment or of submissiveness; he just likes a bloody good whacking on the bum because it feels good. This example, from a close family member, would certainly suggest therefore that the male enjoyment of chastisement is not solely a matter of psychological influences, but can be entirely physiological. I would venture to suggest, however, that in most cases the bliss that is obtained is the result of a subtle conjoining of both aspects - psychological and physiological.

  As for we disciplinarians, whilst there are some who will claim their desire to chastise arises solely from a desire to correct the wayward and to enhance the moral standing of society, don't believe a word of it. We luxuriate in that same fine balance of pleasure and pain as does the recipient - we desire to hurt and please in equal measure.

  Furthermore, we indulge ourselves in the aesthetic beauty of the changing colours of the glutimus maximus under chastisement, its contortions and gyrations, its softness yet resilience. Moreover, to complete the son et lumiere, we are further stimulated by the cries and moans and yelps and groans of the punished one as she expresses her experience in vocal form.

  Thus we see how the multifarious aspects - psychological, physical, aesthetic, balletic and phonological - combine to make addicts of us all.

  I remain, my dear Cecile, your most gratified correspondent,

  Randolph Henderson

  ---oOo---

  Letter 4: Cecile Clithero - Size

  Dearest Randolph,

  Once again I must thank you for a detailed and very well-considered response which clearly shows your scholarship in these matters which we discuss.

  If I can be so forward, I must confess that the discussion does leave me feeling just slightly titillated. With your expertise in all aspects of this practice, I could not help but lie in bed last night thinking of how it might be on the receiving end of your cane.

  You will note my judicious choice of noun there - your 'cane'. I must admit that I take umbridge at your continued insinuation that my previous notes had a sexual connotation. I have always been under the impression that the English have a strong undercurrent of deviance in their blood, and I can only put this misunderstanding that you and I have had down to this sordid thought process which permeates those of English descent.

  I really do not wish this misunderstanding to sour our relationship, so I trust that we can put it behind us and mention it no more?

  And talking of behinds, there is actually another bit of insight I would like to seek of you. I think it is a well-accepted fact that, generally speaking, ladies' posteriors are, in the large, much more prominent than boys'. It is evident that this offers the spanker a much better target. My question is: do you think that the larger area provides more nerve endings, making a spanking more painful for a female; or does the increased padding provide her with an increased defence against the pain?

  Very kind and fond regards,

  Cecile

  ---oOo---

  Sir Randolph Henderson's Response:

  Dear Cecile,

  Let me commence by thanking you for your kind compliments regarding my scholarship. One seeks, of course, always to expand the horizons of one's learning, a search I am delighted to see you appear to be undertaking yourself by means of our continued correspondence, each of your gladly welcomed missives presenting fresh questions to be considered. And this is, I believe, as it should be. It is surely right and proper that a young lady - so eager for knowledge and experience of the world, yet so often sheltered in a cloyingly protective milieu from whose cloistered walls she yearns to free herself - should turn to one whose scholarship is both grounded in, and adorned by, the bitter-sweet fruits of experience.

  As to the unfortunate misunderstanding between us regarding what you referred to as my 'continued insinuation', I shall accede to your wishes and forebear to comment further, save to acknowledge the sad yet saucy truth of your observations on the salacious, deviant and sordid character of the English, among whose number I must count myself and of whose character thus defined I must confess myself an abject example.

  Turning to a not unrelated matter, your forwardness, my dear, delights me entirely and I shall endeavour to express my gratitude by pressing home that source of titillation to which you referred. That the receiving end of my cane intrigues you, and at such a sensitive hour (in those nocturnal moments when our thoughts release themselves to wander through vales of pleasurable fancy), only exacerbates those English tendencies within me against which Morality's constraining urges have been so hopelessly ineffectual. I cane! And I delight in it! That you, whilst prone in your chamber, give your imagination to the thwipp and sharp sting as my cane's tip digs into your soft behind, is deeply gratifying to me. Surrender on, my dear, and savour the stripes!

  Let us turn, penultimately (for I have a mildly distasteful admonishment yet to deliver), to your latest enquiry, once again of an anatomical nature, as is only to be expected in our field of study. Your observation that the female posterior is characterised by a more voluminous and protruding prominence than that of the male is, as you say, an accepted fact, though we must always caution against excessive generalisation - that way a facile fascism lies.

  As to whether the additional fleshiness found in the female constitutes either a greater sensitivity or a greater protection against the ravages of the punitive implement, I would ask you to consider the possibility that both might not simultaneously be true.

  I remember a boy with whom I was educated (at one of those notoriously ritualistic English boarding establishments so gloriously responsible for perpetuating worship of the deliciis flagella) - he was, let us say, plump in the rear, and I recall to this day his sad complaint that he felt the sting of the cane far more painfully than those of us endowed with the more conventionally slimmer set of male buttocks. Now whether his observation was true or not we cannot establish - how do we measure the relative experience of pain betwixt one and another? Such an instrument (an 'ouchometer' perhaps?) has yet to be fashioned. But his sorry condition would seem to lend credence to the notion you advanced: the more bulbous the bottom, the more searing the sting!

  Turning then to the view you posed as alternative but which I am endeavouring to suggest may in fact be congruent - there is a clue, I believe, in the very word you employed: 'padding'. Does this not in itself suggest protection? Is the very fleshiness of the woman's backside not a source of safety when the rod blazes its inexorable path across her cheeks? Do the prominent buttocks not shield her heroically from more fearsome damage?

  In conclusion, dear Cecile, I submit for your consideration that you are both blessed and cursed: blessed by the Deity's merciful bequest of a roundly plump bottom that can withstand the sadist's worst without serious harm; but cursed that it hurts like the effects of a swarm of angry African bees (which, let us not forget, in her wisdom She also created).

  Finally, I find myself embarrassed, yet obliged, to draw to your attention an unfortunate lapse in those escritorial skills that, no doubt through no fault of your own (chaperoned, as I imagine you to be, by instructresses of dubious provenance), appear to have passed you by, yet which surely must form the basis of any sound education: 'umbridge' is more likely to be a village or small town nestling quietly in the Home Counties. The malcontent you meant to express would more conventionally be given as 'umbrage'.

  I remain, humbly but delightedly, your most fortunate correspondent,

  Randy Henderson

  ---oOo---

  Letter 5: Cecile Clithero - Kicking against the Pricks

  My Dearest Randy,

  Once again I must thank you for your insights. I think that you have most certainly correctly assessed the relative severity of discomfort felt by the male and female bottom.

  As I lay in bed this morning, contemplating your response, I once again have to admit to a level of arousal which this topic brings about. That this level increased was only parti
ally attributable to an increase in activity from my fingers as they gently caressed those areas of which a gentleman like you can only dream, but it caused me to have an additional thought which I would like to share with you.

  What came to mind was that the level of arousal that accompanies a spanking is only partially attributable to the physical stimulation in the target area. I think we can agree that the mind plays an enormous part in this arousal. And it is on this point that I propose that a female, given both her sensitive nature, as well as her physical build, which causes her private parts to be so lewdly displayed during the punishment, is seriously disadvantaged. Any given punishment must surely impact her significantly more than an equivalent laid on a male miscreant?

  It is on this note that I must now turn my attentions to other business, and thank you once again for the insights you have given me during this correspondence. You can be assured that, should my work be published, I will ensure, with my publisher, that you receive full acknowledgment of your contribution.

  Yours fondly,

  Cee-Cee

  ---oOo---

  Sir Randolph Henderson's Response:

  My dear Cee-Cee

  Thank you for sharing those mental appendices to your morning's digital caressing of areas to which, gratifyingly, I am myself indeed privileged to attend with similar digital and (when duty most pleasingly calls) oral attentions. Again, I am gratified that the humble efforts of this my quill should have shaped our field of enquiry in such a way as to elicit the arousal of which you spoke.

  However, I regret that I must, and not for the first time, take up a position contrary to that espoused in your thoughtful message. Whilst agreement binds us on the matter of the profound and inestimable significance of psychological factors before and during a spanking, I must take issue with your claim that the female possesses a more 'sensitive' nature, an assertion which, though commonplace enough, I find of dubious worth. Whatever degree of greater sensitivity (and again, how is such a quality to be measured in practice?) might be said to accrue to the female is surely due only to its construction in our perception by the demands and expectations of social convention? If Venus is so sensitive, how come she's the one who gives birth?

  Having at first tried to kick against the mental pricks, as it were, with regard to your latter argument, upon greater reflection reason prevailed and I find I must concur that the female is indeed subject to a more intensely punitive 'impact' due to the lewd display to which you refer and is thus, as you assert, 'disadvantaged' by the physiological imperatives of her anatomy. However, dear lady, I would caution against too ready an identification amongst your fair sex with the soubriquet 'disadvantaged' - that way lies a self-fulfilling powerlessness which will serve only to enhance the mental slavery all too abroad in our world already. And anyway, I thought you liked being spanked?

  In parting, let me state that our correspondence has provided me with many hours of delightful amusement. I would venture to suggest that the 'mere chick' in the coop of corporal punishment with whom I first bandied words has now blossomed into a hen whose fine plumage presages literary eggs of assured success, and

  I remain your humble yet admiring correspondent,

  Randolph

  ---oOo---

  Mrs. Kingston folded the letters carefully and gently pushed them back into the envelope. Flushed and excited, she turned to "The Oyster" and began to read.

  Mary's Brush with the Law

  Mary sighed. So many presents still to buy for Christmas, and so little time! As she peeled off her pyjamas, she was going over in her mind which shops to visit, and where she might find suitable gifts. So preoccupied was she in her plans that she hardly noticed the way the jets of warm water massaged the top of her head as she lathered the luxurious locks of her brown hair, or the lovely scent of the lavender gel as she reached behind to soap her luscious firm buttocks.

  Two hours later at the shopping centre, immaculate in freshly laundered blouse and slacks, her glorious hair glistening with body and health, Mary took stock: she had purchased an assortment of useful boy and man things - socks, after-shave lotion, tissues, all safely packed into her voluminous shopping bag - so she decided she'd just pop into one last emporium before struggling home through the pre-Christmas traffic. She wanted to find something for herself, something that might come in handy when the kids were fast asleep and Richard was in the mood.

  As she wandered down her umpteenth aisle of the day, she spotted the hairbrush section. Her heart did a dainty flip, and she felt a tingle in her fundamentals. Putting on her most innocent serious-shopper face, she sauntered as casually as she could over to the display where a variety of hairbrushes hung from hooks. She didn't need one, but could never resist having a quick look. She placed her shopping bag on the floor and reached out to feel the weight of a rather fearsome-looking item of dark brown wood. She lifted it off its perch and tapped its hard back against her palm. She felt the mild sting on her skin, and her subterranean tingling grew; her mind wandered to any number of the lovely firm spankings she'd administered to herself in her younger days, and bent for since marrying.

  "Can I help you, madam?" The deep voice at her shoulder made her jump. She blushed furiously, disturbed from her lustful reverie.

  "Oh! Um ... no, thanks. I'm just looking."

  The man was tall, about mid-forties, rather handsome, and dressed in a dark suit. His brown eyes searched hers for a moment before moving down her body and then up to admire her hair. Then they crinkled into a mesmerising smile.

  "Of course, madam. Please, take your time."

  Still holding the hairbrush in her hand, and blushing furiously, Mary felt it would seem suspicious if she moved away too quickly, so she stood, pretending to survey the choices, while the man moved off down the aisle. Her mind drifted to that weekend in October when the boys had been with their granny, and Richard had taken her to the very edge and further with his own trusty hairbrush. God! It'd been the most intense spanking she'd ever had ... the way the stinging had built and built as he'd walloped her, climaxing with at least a dozen to each her sit spot, had left her breathless and in ecstasy.

  With a faint smile on her face, she replaced the hairbrush on its hook; unfortunately, in doing so she tripped over the bag at her feet and fell forward into the display, dislodging a number of other brushes along with packets of hair pins and other accessories.

  "Damn!" she muttered, quickly kneeling to retrieve the items and replace them as best she could. I'm so clumsy! she thought. God, I need a spanking!

  Luckily, there was no sign of the man she'd just spoken to; nor was anyone else around, so it was with a sense of relief that she finally stood up, picked up her bag, and headed for the exit.

  She nearly jumped out of her skin when the shrill alarm blared like a demented cat; it seemed to come from all directions at once. She turned, wondering why it had gone off - there were no other customers leaving. Suddenly, there was a uniformed man at her elbow.

  "Excuse me, madam, step this way, please." His request was really an order as he held her elbow and she found herself being led back into the store and over to a counter on one side.

  "Hey! What? ... let me go!" she protested. He ignored her.

  "Place your bag on the counter, please, madam."

  Mary was shocked. It had all happened so fast. She couldn't believe this man was suggesting that she could possibly have stolen something.

  "But ... surely you don't think ...?" she spluttered, her indignation rising in self-defence.

  "On the counter, please, madam," said the guard, calmly but firmly.

  Reluctantly, Mary lifted the shopping bag onto the counter. She felt a mixture of aggrieved annoyance at the unnecessary delay, and acute embarrassment that people might see her being 'checked' in this manner. Her feelings turned to outright shock, however, when the man produced from her bag the very same dark brown hairbrush she had held earlier - or, at least, one very like it: it had the same labe
l, attached with green string, with the price clearly marked. He held it up before her, a grim expression on his face.

  "Do you have a receipt for this, madam?" he asked in a tone that suggested not only that he already knew the answer to his question, but also that she'd be a fool to try to pretend she'd actually bought the item.

  "I ... I ... no, I don't, but ... it must have fallen into my bag when ... I knocked..."

  Mary's face burned as the guard gave her a look of infinite scepticism.

  "Now look here, my man," she said, thinking maybe a dose of middle-class assertiveness might sway this ignorant dogsbody from his inevitable duty. But he turned away, ignoring her, and picked up a phone.

  "Mr Williams? I'm bringing a suspect ... yes, sir ... a hairbrush, sir ... immediately, yes, sir."

  "I am not a suspect!" she cried. "How dare you suggest that I..."

  "If you would come with me, madam," he interrupted. "The manager will deal with the matter from here." Picking up her bag and the hairbrush, he came round the counter, took Mary firmly by the elbow once more, and led her away towards the back of the store. She tried to shake herself free from the shameful implication of his custodial grip, but he kept a firm hold on her. It was so humiliating - not only treated like a thief, but suspected of being likely to make a run for it!

  The guard opened a door marked 'Manager' and ushered her in, following with her bag. Mary was surprised to see standing before her the same tall, handsome man she had met earlier. The guard put the bag on the desk between them, and placed the unfortunate hairbrush carefully next to it. The Manager looked at it, and then at the guard.

  "Is that the stolen item?" he asked.