“O.K., I’ve done what you told me,” she mumbled, sensing Annie’s laugh deep in her mind.
“What was that?” he kissed her tearstained cheeks. “What was that, Tammy?”
“Nothing.” She shook her head, reached for tissues from her bag, dried her face. “Take me home, Uncle Phil. Annie’s waiting for me.”
Chapter Twenty Three
Q. What did Annie say when you got back in?
A. She was torn up between being furious her plan didn’t work, that I didn’t end up with a stranger but a family member, and delighted that we had yet another hold over Phil. “He’ll be so useful,” she kept saying, and I didn’t know why or understand why, not for ages. She was red faced and a little breathless, so I knew she’d been jthere when I got spanked. I envied her that ability, imagine, being able to dominate and submit at the same time! Must have been multiple orgasms going on, while I only had the one.
Q. And your parents never found out?
A. Do you know, it seems odd these days to hear them called ‘your parents’ when we knew they were adoptive parents. But never mind, no, they never found out.
Q. Don’t you find that odd?
A. No, of course not! I told you, they had no real interest in us, we were decorations, additions to their perfect lives. Mother had her salon visits, her afternoon soirees, her Oxfam hunger lunches and all the other fund raising things she was in to, and Father either had ‘conferences’ in the evening with clients, or he was at the golf club. Mother joined the Golf Club too, became part of a ladies team, and we saw hardly anything of them. She got our cleaning lady to come in more days and to cook dinners as well, would you believe, the days Mother was playing golf. Mind you, we didn’t mind, we got to eat things like sausages and chips, beans and beefburgers, Mother would have had a fit if she’d known! But we enjoyed it. I even got to put on a little weight.
Q. I assume Annie hadn’t stopped the vendetta?
A. Oh no, it increased. She switched tactics, having made sure old Gran Webster was on her way out, she started on the other grandparents, we had both of them still, Gramps and Gran Livitt, who after all were responsible for our Mother not being able to have children, or so Annie reasoned. She began a campaign against them, the whispering phone calls, the occasional pizza delivery in their home town, the brochures through the door, the whole bit. We knew about it because they would come round and complain bitterly about the campaign being waged against them. They blamed it on next door, because they’d fallen out with them, or Gramps had, shouting over the fence, all that kind of thing, all over the cars they insisted on working on in their front garden. All right, it lowered the tone of the neighbourhood but - there are other ways of dealing with it rather than shouting over the fence for half the street to hear! Gran said she had never been so ashamed in her life as that day.
Annie said later she wished she’d been there, she could do with learning some new swear words. I didn’t agree with her there, I thought she knew plenty. I’d heard most of them usually directed at Niall when he knelt at her feet after a whipping, and she did give him some terrible whippings!
Q. Where were these?
A. In the garage as before. Worked quite well, nice overhead beam to string people up. In a manner of speaking.
Q. Did you get whipped?
A. What a silly question! Of course I did, it was what I lived for!
Q. You said when you came back Annie was angry but pleased, because she had another hold over Phil. Did she make use of that then?
A. Not immediately, what she did was –
Chapter Twenty Four
“And you see Mr. Wrayland, I need somewhere to have the mail sent.” Annie was all innocence, standing primly in her clinging jersey wool dress of emerald, the deep green making her blonde hair look even blonder. The dress clung to her curves, and she was aware of his eyes, knew he wasn’t so much a rigidly controlled man as he liked to make out.
“Sit down,” he indicated the overstuffed richly upholstered settee and sat down in an armchair opposite her. “Now, tell me what this advertisement is?”
“A contact ad, we want to get some guys to write to us about sex, and stuff like that.”
“And no doubt you’re going to offer yourselves as submissives.”
“Of course!” Annie giggled, an erotic sound starting deep on her throat, convulsing her face, rippling her neck muscles. “But only one of us is, I go along for the ride, as it were.”
“Just what hold do you have over your sister?”
“Nothing you need worry about.” She told him tartly, wondering where the question was going.
“I’m just curious, you seem to enjoy her coming as much as she does.”
“No point in not telling you. Tamasine and I are telepathically linked, I can sense what she is feeling, and so I get double enjoyment from her discipline sessions. I get the dominant side of me thrilled to pieces, and the submissive side of her to balance it. Nothing like it.
“Curious. You’re a very forthright young lady, aren’t you?”
“I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”
“And you’ve brought me a lot of pleasure.”
“I know that.”
Annie tilted her head to one side to look at him, let one of her smiles turn up the corners of her mouth, let him look at her crossed legs, uncrossed them so her panties winked at him.
The doorbell rang and he got up.
“That’s the other reason you’re here, isn’t it? To watch someone else getting theirs. Go on, in the kitchen with you.”
Annie snatched up her bag and disappeared into the old fashioned almost quaint kitchen area. She looked around in disbelief as she did every time. A gas cooker nearly 50 years old, had to be, all rounded edges and worn away knobs and rings. Wooden draining board, whoever had wooden draining board these days? Old fashioned square sink with one cold water tap, a battered old kettle sitting on the stove, waiting for someone to light a match and set it going. A table covered in some kind of plastic cloth with a material backing, a coconut mat under the table, and scuffed chairs.
Old. Old as Wrayland. Nothing changed. Living alone, he had no reason to change anything.
Annie moved closer to the door and looked at the mirror. Alfred Wrayland had all but shut the lounge door but there was enough of a sight line for her to see the man who had called, a thin bookish looking man, glasses and long floppy hair, twisting his hands round and round in nervousness as Alfred Wrayland lectured him. It was apparently part of the service, this lecturing, Annie could swear she saw a gleam of pleasure in the man’s eyes.
The lecture went on, interminably, a jacket was discarded, then a sweater, then the trousers were lowered, and he bent over as Annie heard the inevitable swish of the cane through the air and saw the man flinch even before the cane came near him.
It was a long and severe caning, Alfred Wrayland landing each one perfectly across the taut cheeks, underpants up and then down, caning hard, leaving distinct fine lines across the skin, bringing a howl of protest every now and then as they overlapped, blood specks springing to the surface. Annie counted 24, 30, then a further six. It was the most she has seen Alfred Wrayland give anyone, 36, and the man was clearly suffering. And clearly aroused. His erection thrust up in front of him and it was all he could do to pull up his pants and stand, zip up the trousers and pretend nothing had happened.
He left, red faced and walking stiffly, as Annie slid out of the kitchen and back into the lounge.
“Magnificent performance,” she said, with a small bow in Alfred Wrayland’s direction.
“Glad you thought so, my dear, nothing like praise from a connoisseur. Now, about this advertisement -”
“Tammy and I want to put an ad in a sex magazine for men to contact us who want someone to spank. We want to mull over the answer
s, see if anyone is worth responding to. We need an address to have the mail sent, even though it’s a box No. Would you oblige?”
“If that’s all it is -”
“Good.” Annie snatched up her coat. “Didn’t he wonder who’s this was?”
“I don’t think he even noticed!”
Alfred Wrayland slid the money from the table into his wallet and restored it to his jacket pocket. “Let me know when to expect the letters.”
“Oh I will.” Annie went to the front door and opened it. “Take care, Alfred.” and said it with a touch of menace so he would be sure she meant what she said. She had a hold now, and nothing but nothing would make her let go.
On the way home Annie stopped off at Phil’s house to ask Uncle Phil if he would be so kind as to teach his nieces to drive - to save Father the money for a full course, you understand. While she was there the phone rang, and they learned that Gran Webster had died that afternoon.
Chapter Twenty Five
Q. So you had a funeral to go to.
A. We did. Very demure we were too, in matching black dresses and little hats with veils and black handbags hanging with black ribbons - oh Mother knows how to dress for a funeral, she excels at it! One day she’ll make a wonderful widow. When Father finally dies, I mean. Uncle Phil was very subdued, as if it was all his fault. In part it was, but we know whose fault it really was, don’t we? Anastasia Webster. And I wanted to shout it to everyone - I liked the old lady.
Q. What else happened around that time, Tammy?
A. Oh you’ve heard! Or maybe you haven’t, you’re just guessing. Well, we found out we were being pretty damn stupid, Annie and me. We thought - and don’t ask me why we thought it - that our original parents had no idea who or where we were. It should have occurred to us to wonder why they came back to Salldown! It wasn’t just because they had some relatives there, was it? No, it was because they knew we were. All the time we thought we were spying on them they were spying on us!
Q. How did you find out?
A. Danny gave it away. We were at a disco one night, Annie, Mark, Niall and me, and Danny was there with a guy we didn’t know. No girlfriend around. Anyway, Annie saw him and started her usual pouting and come-on looks and he came over. He pulled her to one side, where no one was at that moment and said ‘listen little sister, it’s no good me getting involved with you, is it? It’s illegal,’ and walked off. Annie could have fallen down on the spot! All I felt was a rush of fear/shock/amazement and then fury.
Q. What did she do?
A. Typical Annie. Stalked after him, grabbed his arm, pulled him round and said ‘explain yourself, Mister Gibling.’ So they went to the bar, got Cokes each and sat and talked. That was when we found out they knew who we were, he knew he had twin sisters, he had been told the day someone told his mother who he had been seen with. She’d warned him off. And told him why. And admitted they’d moved back to Salldown so she could see the two precious girls she’d had to hand over.
Q. What did you and Annie make of all this?
A. I was amused, to think the old lady cared enough to come back, but I don’t believe that was all there was to it. I don’t think somehow that was the true reason for coming back. After all, if you were heartbroken at giving away a child, would you want to see that child grow up? Worse when it’s two girls, surely!
Q. So you were amused, and Annie?
A. Even more furious, if that were possible. To think her plans had been thwarted in that way, that her moves toward revenge were being wasted, that the time spent gluing the letters, was wasted, not to mention the phone calls! We had a whole evening of her ranting and raving around the bedroom, driving me mad, she was. Vengeance, that was all she was after. “How could they live here and us live her and they not care to try and see us or anything?” She slammed my books around, nearly damaged my new hi-fi until I stood in front of it to guard it with my life. Then she quietened down and sat on the bed, and said, “we’ll get them, Tams, we’ll get them. Kiddo, I tell you, we’ll do it if it’s the last thing I ever do.” Prophetic words, weren;t they?
Q. And your parents still knew nothing of this?
A. Nothing, and it was just as well. I feared Annie more in that quiet mood than in her ranting and raving, I can tell you.
Q. And?
A. Annie went to see them.
Chapter Twenty Six
“Hello, I’m Audrey Gibling,”
The words sounded harsh, alien, Annie had to spit them out to the drab woman in curlers standing in the doorway.
“Yes, I know,” the door didn’t move, the fixed blank look didn’t move, only cigarette smoke drifted upwards and out into the sharp Spring breeze.
“Well, aren’t you going to let me in, Mother ?” Impatient, stamping her foot, tossing the glittering blonde hair back. Mrs. Gibling moved away from the door, threw the cigarette into the weed incrusted garden and motioned with her head.
Annie stepped over the muddied doorstep and into a smell of smoke, bodies, old musty furniture and cheap food, grease and cabbage somehow combined. She sniffed and looked around her. The wallpaper was stained, peeling here and there, marked with shoulders and possibly even greasy heads, a patch gave away the Gibling’s secrets.
“Come in.”
The lounge door was thrust open, the smell stronger. A two bar electric fire glowered in the grate, worn flex trailed across the carpet. A kitten played with the torn remains of the frill around the armchair, a dog looked up as she entered and looked back at the rug again.
“Are you alone?” Annie looked round, saw no one. “Where’s Mr. Gibling, Danny and everyone?”
“Football.”
“Oh yes, it’s Saturday, isn’t it?” Annie sat gingerly on the edge of a cushion. The kitten looked at her and fled under a dining room chair, staring with slitted eyes from the safety of the legs.
“Cuppa tea?”
“No, thank you, I don’t drink tea.”
“Gin, sherry, whisky?” another cigarette appeared as if by magic, a cheap plastic lighter flicked, a stream of smoke directed toward the brown ceiling.
“No, thank you. I just -”
“Wanted to see what we looked like. Well, you’ve seen us.” Mrs Gibling sank into the other armchair and stared at Annie through eyes slit against the smoke. “Wondered how long it’d be before you came around, after I done told Danny to keep his hands off you, that you was his sister and all.”
“Good of you.”
“Wasn’t it?” a harsh laugh broke through the smoke barrier and cleared it away. Annie could see in the ruined remains of a face drawn down by poverty work and probably drink outlines of her own fine bone structure. Once Mrs. Gibling would have been a fine looking woman. Once.
“Where’s your sister?”
“Mary?”
“Nah, you ain’t Audrey and she ain’t Mary, is she? You got some fancy names your fancy mother made up.”
“We’re Anastasia and Tamasine.”
“Like I said, fancy names.”
“They mean something, you see. Anastasia, reborn, new name new life. Tamasine - little twin which she is. Smaller than me, weaker than me. We like out names, they make us different.”
“Better than Audrey and Mary.”
“Of course.”
“Upper class accents and all. Fancy, my little girls all fashioned and fancy talking. You’d never have made it without that fancy mother of yours.
“Well, who’s to say?”
“Agreed.” Mrs. Gibling nodded. “Agreed. You might have made sommat of yourself, looking like you do. Does your twin look like you an all?”
“She does. Identical we are, in every way except she’s slimmer and smaller and less strong, like I said. Stand her next to me and you’d know who we were, alike as two peas. Same blonde
hair - “ Annie lifted a strand, let it slide though her fingers, let a corner of her mind go walking, created a mouse. It ran across the carpet, the kitten ran after it. Mrs. Gibling shrieked and burned herself on her cigarette. Annie let it go, smiling. “Scared, are you?”
“Don’t like the things,” hand on heart which was probably pounding like mad, she sank back in the armchair. “Don’t like snakes much either.”
Good, thought Annie. I’ll remember that. She stood up suddenly, unable to bear another moment in the awful house. Her abrupt move startled the kitten and Mrs. Gibling all over again.
“I’d better be going, Mother doesn’t know I’m here. If I can, I’d like to come again, bring Tammy with me, will that be all right?”
“Of course. Let me know, I’ll make sure to have Danny here, and perhaps Mr. Gibling would like to see his girls.”
“That would be nice,” murmured Annie moving toward the door, letting the mouse run again, bringing another shriek. “It’s all right, I’ll see myself out.” And in a moment she was gone, standing outside, breathing deep lungfuls of fresh Spring air. The house had smelled worse than ever after being in there for a while, she hadn’t adjusted to it at all.
The curtain moved, Annie waved and hurried down the road, anger pulling at every part of her. So casual, so offhand, they didn’t care for us at all! Couldn’t care less! Not a real offer of hospitality, nothing! Tea, gin, whisky, pah! You’ll pay, she vowed, standing staring at a damaged lamp post. You’ll pay all right and it won’t be just mice and snakes. I’ll work out something for you. Something you’ll never forget.
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