Corbin's Bend Homecoming

by Ruth Staunton

  He pressed the button and answered the phone just before it would’ve gone to voicemail. “Landry.”

  “What do you know, you are alive after all,” Ben said jovially. “We were beginning to wonder. You’ve fallen off the face of the earth these past few weeks.”

  “Had some stuff going on,” Caine said by way of explanation. “Got a new client in Denver too, a couple of them actually. I’m doing some work for a guy that sells out of the flea market in Henderson, and a new boutique opened up that picked up a few of my tables, for sale and display.”

  “That’s great,” Benjamin replied. “Why don’t you come by and have dinner with us? I know you’re going to be here today. Jim told Jon you were meeting with one of the new residents. We can celebrate your business success.”

  Celebrating was the very last thing Caine felt like doing. “I don’t know about that,” Caine hedged. “I’m already on my way out of the community. I just met with the new resident, and I need to put his paperwork together.”

  Benjamin went on as if he had not spoken. “You’re already here. There’s no reason for you not to come by, and don’t give me any lame excuses about paperwork. I can tell you with absolute certainty that none of that paperwork will be processed before Monday. Jonathon is done working until then.” There was a certain note of grimness in Benjamin’s tone that suggested Jonathon might have been getting over-worked again. That had happened once or twice before, and Benjamin never took it well. Not that Caine blamed him. Jonathon meant well, but the man had no concept of his own limits. If that was going on, Caine’s one legitimate excuse not to stick around had just gone out the window. There was no way any of this paperwork would get processed until both Benjamin and Brent agreed that Jonathon was in a fit state to work on it. Not to mention Benjamin got increasingly impossible to argue with when he got all protective about Jonathon. Caine would be better off just to bite the bullet and do what he wanted.

  As if Benjamin could hear him vacillating, he added, “Jonathon’s been asking about you. He’s missed seeing you around. We both have.

  Cain knew when he was beaten. “Ok,” he agreed, “I’ll come by for a little while. I may not stay long enough for dinner, but I’ll come by.”

  “Great,” Benjamin replied. “See you in a few.”

  When he arrived, Jonathon was already in the kitchen. He came out long enough to say hello and chat for a minute, but from the looks of things he was about to embark on an epic cooking spree. After a few minutes, even Caine could see that he was getting antsy to get back to it. Ben smiled fondly and told him to go ahead. When Jonathon ducked back into the kitchen, Ben led Caine into the living room. Caine took a seat on the sofa, and Benjamin pulled up an armchair facing him.

  “Okay,” Ben said, blunt as usual, “let’s have it. What happened with Norah? I thought everything was going well.”

  “So did I,” Caine said dryly. “Apparently Norah didn’t feel the same.”

  “How so?” Benjamin wanted to know.

  Caine shrugged. “I couldn’t give her what she needed. She needed someone who could discipline her physically, and I couldn’t do that.”

  “Couldn’t or wouldn’t?” Benjamin asked.

  “Dammit, Ben. That’s not fair. You know I can’t and you know why I can’t.”

  “I know why you think you can’t,” Ben agreed. “What I want to know is how long you’re going to keep letting that bastard win.”

  Caine gaped at him. “What the hell you talking about?”

  “It’s bad enough he already ruined your childhood,” Ben said. “How long do you intend to keep letting him ruin your life?”

  “What do you mean letting him?” Caine demanded. “Do you think I would be like this if I had any choice?”

  “But you do,” Ben told him.

  “The hell I do,” Caine flared. “You think I like walking around with all this shit in my head? You think I like ruining the best relationship I’ve ever had?”

  “No,” Ben said, “I don’t think you like it, but I do think you let it happen.”

  Caine sighed. “I guess you’re right there. I should’ve known better than to get involved with her in the first place.”

  “No that’s where you’re wrong,” Ben insisted. “It wasn’t getting involved with her that was the mistake. It was letting your fear get in the way of having what you want.”

  “You say that like it’s so simple,” Caine shot back bitterly. “Don’t you think I would’ve done anything to make things different? You just don’t know what it’s like.”

  Ben raised an eyebrow. “Don’t I? I spent the majority of my adult life in the military. I’ve seen things I never wish on another human being in a million years. Don’t you think I might possibly know what it’s like to have scars you’d rather not have? Trust me. I do but you can’t dwell on those things. You can’t let what happened then control your life now. It’s not always easy, and yeah, sometimes there will still be flashbacks and nightmares that wake you up screaming in the dark, but you can’t let that part of your life control you. If I had, I would’ve probably done myself in long before now.”

  “That’s different,” Caine said.

  “Maybe it is,” Ben replied. “None of the things that happened to me were done by someone who should’ve loved me and who I trusted to take care of me so maybe you’re right. Maybe I don’t know, but my partner does. With all that happened to him, no one would have blamed him if he had run screaming from this lifestyle and never looked back. He could have, but that would’ve been letting the fear control him, letting it take away from him something that he wanted and needed. He made the choice not to let it do that. That’s what I’m saying to you. How long are you going to let your bastard of a grandfather keep taking these things away from you?”

  “I’m not like Jonathon,” Caine countered. “This lifestyle isn’t something I need.”

  “No, but Norah does,” Ben said, “and you need her.”

  “I don’t need her,” Caine said stubbornly. “Did I enjoy the time I had with her? Yes, absolutely. Do I miss her? Yes. Do I wish it could’ve been different? Yes. But I don’t need her.” Even as he said the words he knew them for a lie. He needed Norah like he needed water and missed her with every breath in his body. The pain should be long gone by now, but it lingered on. It was a bit duller now than the first few days when it had been fresh, but it was still there, aching constantly in the back of his consciousness like a lingering bruise.

  “Will you listen to yourself?” Ben told him. “You keep saying you wish it could be different. I’m telling you it can, if you have balls enough to confront your fear and learn to give her what she needs instead of running scared. The question is does she mean enough to you to try or are you going to keep letting him win?”

  “If I’ve got balls enough?” Caine repeated aghast. “What the hell do you think I’ve been trying to do all this time? I’ve done everything I knew how. I tried everything you and Jerry suggested—the rules, the consequences, everything. I was still trying to do it five minutes before she broke up with me. Hell, I even let her convince me to try what she called ‘sexy spanking’”

  “You did?” Ben broke in, eyebrows raising up into to his hairline. “How did that go?”

  Caine shrugged. “I thought it was okay. The sex was good afterwards. Amazing actually. I thought Norah liked it, until that last night when she started saying stuff about it not being enough.”

  “And did you like it?” Ben asked.

  “Parts of it,” Caine admitted. “I mean, she was naked and squirming over my lap. What’s not to like about that? Hurting her… I could have done without.”

  Ben settled back in his chair. “What makes you think you hurt her? Did she say you did?”

  “She was whimpering, and I left handprints on her ass. I’d say it was pretty obvious. I didn’t need to be told.”

  “Is that what Norah said though?” Ben pressed.

  Caine shook his head.
“She said she liked it.”

  “Sounds like she didn’t think you hurt her at all,” Ben countered.

  “Maybe not,” Caine conceded, “but she made it clear that wasn’t enough for her. She needed me to ‘really spank her’ whatever that means.”

  “She needed it to be more than just sexual,” Ben explained.

  “Yeah, I got that much,” Caine said. “I was desperate enough I even considered trying it, but I just couldn’t bring myself to hurt her.”

  “And you don’t think leaving her hurt her?” Ben asked.

  It had hurt him, that was for sure. It still nagged at him like a throbbing toothache. He missed her constantly. He wasn’t sure he would ever stop missing her, but he supposed eventually he would just have to learn to live with it. “What was I supposed to do? She told me to leave.”

  “That wasn’t the question,” Ben insisted.

  “Yeah,” Caine admitted. “It probably did, but it’s for the best I guess. She deserves a chance to find someone who can give her what she needs.”

  “And that’s not you.”

  “Obviously not,” Caine retorted.

  “What if I could teach you how to give her the kind of spanking she needs safely?” Benjamin questioned. “I can’t promise you it won’t hurt. She needs it to hurt to give her the release she needs, but I could promise you that done right, it would never do her harm.”

  Could it possibly be that simple? Could it really be something he could learn? A skill, like installing shoe molding or building a bookcase.

  Caine sighed, shaking his head. “I wish it were that simple, but that won’t stop how I feel.” It wouldn’t stop the memories, the sounds, the voices, the fear, even if he wanted to.

  “You’re right,” Ben agreed. “On its own, it’s probably not enough, but if you were to see a counselor to work through the memories, and let me teach you, you could probably learn. If you really want to.”

  “No way. You’ve got to be kidding me,” Caine blurted. “I could barely tell all that shit to you. I’m not talking to some shrink. I’m not crazy.”

  “You are crazy,” Ben shot back. “Not in any clinical sense of the word, but anybody who would rather keep walking around with all that in your head rather than trying to get help to manage it is clearly crazy. Look, man, I’m not saying it will be easy. It won’t, but I can help you find people who will understand. None of this is your fault. You didn’t do this to yourself. He did it to you. It’s on him, not you. The only thing that’s on you is whether you keep letting it hold you back from what you want. Even if you won’t do it for yourself, I think Norah is worth it. Don’t you?”

  Caine glared at him and got up to pace the floor, too full of swirling emotions to keep still. “Fine,” he said finally, “set it up. I’ll talk to someone, but if he treats me like I’m crazy I’m leaving.” He’d had his fill of that years ago. The few times he had tried to tell, he had been brushed off. They had dismissed him and sworn that his grandfather was only trying to raise him right. He wouldn’t be treated like that again.

  “Fair enough,” Ben said, spreading his hands in capitulation. “Once that’s going well enough you think you can handle it, we’ll start the lessons. It probably won’t be easy, but nothing worth doing ever is.”

  “Ain’t that the damn truth,” Caine muttered. “You’re right though. She is worth it.”

  “So are you,” Benjamin said. “Even if things don’t work out with Norah—and I honestly hope they do—you deserve to not live with this fear either. Don’t forget that.”

  Caine smiled. Then he punched Ben on the shoulder and grinned. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t be getting all mushy on me. You’re getting sentimental in your old age.”

  “I’ll show you old,” Ben shot back, getting to his feet. “I’ll have you know I can outrun you any day of the week.”

  “Prove it,” Caine challenged.

  The weather was cold but clear. The sidewalks had been cleared and a short run should pose no problem. Ben stuck his head in the kitchen and spoke briefly with Jonathon, letting him know what they were doing and then shot out the door before Caine had a chance to realize what was happening. Caught off guard, Caine took off after him, slamming the door closed in his haste and leaving Jonathon chuckling in their wake.

  Norah didn’t see Caine again after that night. To her surprise, he didn’t even come back to finish the work on the shop. Jim O’Brien had shown up a day or two later and told her Caine had asked one of his crews to take over the interior work. He agreed to finish the furniture that Jim had specifically hired him for but so far, he had managed to get those delivered during times when she wasn’t around. If she didn’t know better, she’d swear he was deliberately avoiding her.

  She supposed that was probably for the best. She didn’t know how she would’ve handled seeing him anyway. Even without being confronted with him face-to-face, the loss of his presence felt like a missing limb. She felt like she was walking around in a shell of herself. Yes, with Caine she had been missing spanking, which was vitally important, but now it felt like she was missing something else that was just as important. Caine had left a tangible hole in her life.

  It shouldn’t be possible to miss him this much. After all, she hadn’t known him for that long. It wasn’t like with John where they had years of marriage behind them so why did it feel so much the same?

  She threw herself into preparing for the bookstore's grand opening celebration. With it only a few weeks away, she was working flat out trying to make sure everything was ready. While Jim’s team finished up the last bits of construction and structural work in the store proper, she spent days on end sorting and categorizing books and logging them into her computerized inventory. Her social life, or at least what little social life she had ever had in the first place, all but disappeared. Her life revolved around the bookstore. She lost herself in the monotony of going through the routine: categorizing, organizing, labeling, sorting and pricing, setting up the nuts and bolts of her business almost on autopilot. She should be enjoying this. She should be excited, but she wasn’t. She couldn’t be. The best she could do was insulate herself and keep busy. That at least held the hurt at bay and gave her some kind of peace.

  She should have known that couldn’t last. After all, Corbin’s Bend was, at its core, a small town, with all the small town values and foibles that went along with that, including everyone being in everybody else’s business. She should’ve expected it. It was a testament to just how far she was wrapped up inside her own bubble that she was completely surprised the morning that Dina showed up and insisted on knowing what was going on.

  “Okay,” Dina said, settling herself on the floor and beginning to sort and categorize books from a cardboard box with the ease of long practice. “Spill. What’s going on with you?”

  “Nothing,” Norah replied. “I’m fine, just busy.”

  “Bull,” Dina said bluntly. “I know you’re busy, but in the last few weeks, you’ve turned into a hermit. You’ve missed the last two book club meetings, and from what I’m hearing, you haven’t been anywhere else either. You’ve barely been out of this building for days. Quincy and Abby say they haven’t heard from you, and I know I haven’t. What’s going on? Does this have anything to do with the fact that Caine is no longer coming around either?”

  Norah sighed. She loved her friends, but why couldn’t they just leave her alone? Couldn’t they see she just wanted to lick her wounds in private? “We broke up,” she admitted softly.

  “I thought that might have something to do with it,” Dina admitted. “I’m sorry.” She wound her way around the boxes of books and pulled Norah into a hug. “What happened? You guys seemed really happy.”

  “We were for a while,” Norah told her. “He still was, I suppose, but I wasn’t.” Wasn’t that the irony of all ironies? She hadn’t been entirely happy with her relationship, but even with its problems—and she couldn’t pretend that Caine’s inability to spank her wasn’t
a problem, it was. She’d meant everything she said to him about that—she’d been far happier than she had been the last few weeks.

  “Really? I mean, I could tell you were getting edgy and stressed, but I figured that was just the bookstore. Was there something else going on?” Dina asked.

  “Mostly, it was just getting stressed,” Norah agreed.

  Dina’s brow furrowed. “We have ways of dealing with that around here, don’t we? Isn’t that at least part of the point of most DD relationships? We have ways of dealing with problems so they don’t blow up and become a major problem that kills the relationship.”

  “Usually,” Norah concurred, “but that was the problem. We didn’t exactly have a traditional DD relationship. Caine wouldn’t spank me. He tried to be my HOH, but couldn’t bring himself to actually spank me.”

  Dina’s eyes widened in shock. “Isn’t that kind of the point?”

  Norah laughed, tired and fragile. “You know, it is. I managed to convince myself it wasn’t. I convinced myself that the structure and leadership were what mattered, and we did have that. Caine might not have understood or even approved of what I needed, but I can’t say he didn’t try. He tried really hard, but in the end, no matter how much corner time gave me, or how many lines he had me write, it wasn’t enough. Sometimes only a spanking will do, you know?”

  Dina nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

  “I don’t know what I was thinking,” Norah told her. “I guess I’m just too much of a romantic. You know, love is supposed to conquer all and all that jazz. I really thought it would, or at least I let myself hope it would.” She looked down, studying her hands and trying to will away tears stinging her eyes.

  Dina scooted around beside her and put an arm gently around her shoulders, offering a tentative but very sincere one-armed hug. “I’m so sorry,” she said quietly.

  Norah scrubbed the heels of her hands over her eyes. “Thanks,” she said, managing a somewhat watery smile. “It’s been a long month.”

  “I’ll bet it has,” Dina said. “I wish you had told me sooner. We could have drowned our sorrows in ice cream and chick flicks or even better, horrible book to movie adaptations.”