Over the Knee (28 page)

He finished reading and laid the letter aside. With a sigh he removed his glasses and regarded me with a look of such disappointment that I thought I would burst into tears. Several seconds passed in unbearable silence while he shook his head sadly.

‘I always had such high hopes for you, Harker.’

I opened my mouth with no idea of what to say. What
could
I say? Any attempt to explain myself would be hopelessly inadequate. It would only reinforce the awful reality that I needed stricter discipline.

‘You’ve been punished before for neglecting your schoolwork. But now it seems you’ve resorted to deception in a misguided attempt to avoid further punishment.’

Deception
. The word was crushing. All the more crushing because he was right. My lower lip quivered like a child’s and tears welled behind my eyes. Defeated, I shut my mouth and stared in despair at the floor.

‘And yet,’ he continued. ‘There is no question you deserve further punishment. Such flagrant dishonesty demands it.’

Again I searched for words, but nothing would come. Huge sorrowful tears rolled down my cheeks and I scrubbed them away, too ashamed to make eye contact.

He glanced once more at the letter. ‘I’m afraid this has its roots in your time at Ravenscroft. Your misbehaviour didn’t receive the punishment it warranted, and you came to think you were immune. You got into bad habits.’

I sniffled piteously, my fingers twisting and twining in anguish. I couldn’t believe this was the same man who had let me off truancy and outrageous insolence with a scolding and a suspension.

‘Look at me, Harker.’

Reluctantly, I raised my head, wiping my eyes with the back of my sleeve like some wretched Dickensian orphan. I had never felt so forlorn.

‘Things are different this time. This time I have the authority I need to teach you a lesson.’ Mr Chancellor looked over at Peter and they exchanged a meaningful glance. My headmaster’s grey eyes, once so sympathetic, were now flinty. ‘In a few minutes I am going to cane you.’

I’d been waiting all my life to hear him say that to me. And now it felt like the fulfilment of a prophecy. Lightheaded, I clasped my hands in an attitude of penitence. I opened my mouth to protest, but I didn’t have the courage to speak.

He continued. ‘But first I want you to spend some time thinking about it. Turn around and face the wall. Now kneel. Hands on your head. Nose touching the wall.’

Through it all I hadn’t said a word. When I finally spoke it was in a dead voice. ‘Yes, sir.’

My sense of shame deepened as I adopted the ignominious position. The parquet floor was hard and unyielding against my knees and I hissed with pain. I laced my fingers on top of my head and leant forwards to put my nose against the dusty wall, terrified of what I knew was coming.

‘It is often the case,’ said Mr Chancellor, ‘that a girl learns to manipulate authority figures. She talks her way out of deserved punishments and takes advantage of lenience, exploiting any weakness she finds. It’s impossible to maintain discipline under such circumstances.’

My skin grew cold as I listened. This was not the
Ravenscroft
that I had known as a schoolgirl. My headmaster had become a strict disciplinarian.

He didn’t acknowledge me further. My tears continued to flow freely and I felt them trickling all the way down my throat, into my collar. I didn’t dare break position to wipe them away.

Uncomfortable as his reprimand was, the floor was worse. And I felt it ever more intensely as the minutes dragged on. My thighs trembled from the effort of balancing on my knees and my shoulders ached from the position of my arms. I wanted more than anything to beg him to let me up, but his talk of manipulation made me hold my tongue.

I heard a scrape as Mr Chancellor pushed back his chair and stood up. His soft footsteps crossed the room and a cabinet door creaked open. Some muffled sounds followed and my heart begin to race.

I gritted my teeth and tried to think of anything but the degrading position and the distress it was causing me. But I knew that once he let me up it would be time for the caning. And, just when I thought I couldn’t take it any longer, Mr Chancellor ordered me to my feet.

I stood awkwardly on legs of rubber, bracing my hands on the wall to keep from falling. The headmaster flexed the cane in his hands. Then he beckoned me forwards. Part of me expected him to don a black cap and sentence me to death. Part of me wanted him to. I could have climbed the steps to the scaffold more easily than I could cross the few feet between us.

‘Please …’

‘It’s no use pleading with me, girl. You are the agent of your own disgrace.’

The undeniable truth heightened my shame and underlined the inevitability of what was about to happen. My tears had stopped. Despite his austere displeasure I could see his fondness for me, his genuine desire for me to succeed. I was overcome by the fierce desire to show him that he could be proud of me again.

His focused intensity compressed the room, creating a
bubble
around us, tuning out everything but my unworthy behaviour and the means to correct it.

I had come full circle; this was my second chance.

Standing before Mr Chancellor in my Ravenscroft uniform, in the same office where years before I’d tried to provoke him, I submitted at last to my fate.

He indicated the edge of the desk and I placed myself behind it obediently.

‘Remove your blazer,’ he said.

The buttons proved a challenge for my unsteady fingers, but I untangled them enough to perform the simple function and slipped out of the blazer. At his instruction I folded it and placed it on the desk. I was acutely aware that each carefully choreographed step brought me one step closer to the caning I had always deserved but never received.

‘Raise your skirt.’

My hands fluttered to the hem of my smartly pressed bottle-green skirt. Trembling, I lifted the hem at the back, revealing my regulation school knickers. My knees bumped against each other nervously and I locked my legs in place to still them.

Mr Chancellor moved one step away from the desk. ‘Now take down your knickers.’

A rush of heat swept through my entire body. It was the penultimate step. I faltered.

He frowned.

A medley of words and phrases jostled for place in my brain.
Deception. Flagrant dishonesty. Disciplinary action
.

With a moan of surrender I slid them down to my knees, unveiling the vulnerable unmarked bottom he had never seen.

The headmaster offered no further direction. He simply stood silent, waiting, the cane flexed in his hands.

I blushed deeply and took hold of the desk, gripping it tightly to still the shaking in my hands. I looked up at him, a soundless entreaty.

‘You know what comes next, girl.’

At last, leaning forwards, I stretched myself out across the expanse of smooth polished wood.

The meticulous ritual was familiar and reassuring. A dance I knew by heart, but that still challenged me. While my bottom was no stranger to exposure or to punishment, the process was always powerful and it always affected me. The preparation was the hardest part, concentrating my mind on both the punishment and the reason for it. With Mr Chancellor it was even more powerful. The dread I felt was profound. The hesitance, fear and embarrassment. And I knew my submission was all the more alluring for my reluctance.

I had gone back in time to reclaim an experience that should have been mine years before. Lying across the desk, my bare bottom was helpless before Mr Chancellor at last. An offering.

He raised the cane and tapped it gently against the smooth pale skin. I tensed involuntarily and he waited for me to relax again.

‘How many, girl?’ he asked suddenly.

I released the breath I’d been holding in anticipation of the first stroke. ‘Sir?’

‘How many, girl?’

I blanched and stared up at him. What was the correct answer to that? Too many and he might give me all of them. Too few and he was likely to add more. I floundered, trying to decide what was fair.

How many would Peter give me?

I’d almost forgotten he was there. My eyes stole across the room, where he stood by the door, watching my face intently. But he offered me no assistance. He was merely a silent witness to my punishment. He wouldn’t interfere.

My eyes watered again as I contemplated the seriousness of the offence. Deception. It was a test. Peter had deliberately regressed me to the Ravenscroft girl who’d toyed with her headmaster out of morbid curiosity. A schoolgirl who made promises and didn’t keep them. A girl who deserved severe punishment. And knew it.

With a shudder of guilt I suddenly knew the answer. I took a deep breath.

‘All I’ve ever deserved,’ I whispered. ‘Sir.’

Mr Chancellor nodded gravely, understanding. He took up his position and laid the cane against my bottom. He tapped once, twice, and then drew back.

The cane whipped down faster than I’d have thought possible and I sucked in a breath as it struck. Hard. Harder than any stroke I’d ever felt before. The searing parallel lines began to form, blazing, across both cheeks as I fought to steady myself, breathing deeply. I didn’t count. I didn’t want to know.

He measured out another stroke and it lashed into me with the fearsome velocity of a snake striking, so fast I didn’t have time to flinch. I cried out, writhing as the pain washed over me, engulfing me.

Mr Chancellor used his whole arm, stopping the downwards swoop at the last moment and ending with a ruthless little flick of his wrist. Each stroke landed with laudable and terrible precision.

With consummate skill, he aimed and struck again. I managed to swallow my cry as it lashed into me, but the next tore a strangled sob from my throat. The one that followed was harder still, staggeringly severe. I kicked wildly, throwing my right leg up and arching it high over my back, sheltering my agonised bottom.

Mr Chancellor didn’t speak. He simply waited for me to compose myself. Embarrassed at my display, I dropped my leg and rooted both feet in place, determined not to move again. I lifted my head, finding Peter’s gaze across the room and holding it. I would make him proud.

In complete silence the caning continued and I accepted each stroke as my due. I hissed through my teeth and couldn’t suppress a yelp at an exceptionally hard stroke, but I did not break position. It was a matter of honour. I had my second chance, and I was determined to take it. But it wasn’t Peter or even Mr Chancellor who would judge whether I had.

A strange calm settled over me as I surrendered to the battering waves of pain, riding the peak and trough of each one, separate and unique. I locked my eyes on to Peter’s, and was convinced I could see my pain reflected there.

The cane rose and fell and my mind unfolded its wings. I felt myself climbing, flying, soaring high above the pain. And, when at last it became so intense that it morphed into pleasure, I threw myself off the edge and flew. It carried me up and away, out of my guilt, delivering me.

‘
Twenty-three,’ I count, my voice ragged and hoarse from crying. ‘Th-thank you, s-sir
.’

My words are barely intelligible through my unrestrained sobbing. The floor in front of me is wet with my tears. I writhe and gasp over the block, sniffling pitifully. One more to go. Just one more
.

It falls at last
.

I have to take several huge gulping breaths of air before I can count. ‘Twenty-four. Thank you, sir
.’

I flinch as Peter’s finger traces the punished flesh, inspecting the marks. I don’t need to see to know it’s a thorough job. It feels as though I’ve been flayed alive and I know I’ll be marked for days. I can picture the scores of red welts criss-crossing my backside, speckled with angry purple beestings where the buds have cut me
.

‘
All right, Angie,’ he says. ‘You may get up
.’

I stumble to my feet, unable to stand without help. Disoriented, I blink helplessly at him for a moment before falling into his arms. Tears stream down my face, soaking his shirt as I pour out my suffering and contrition
.

He holds me tightly, resolutely, my tether to reality. The catharsis is nearly as intense as the birching. It leaves me feeling completely drained. But purged. The punishment was severe, but I can’t argue that it wasn’t deserved. And now that it’s over I can begin again with a clean slate
.

As my tears subside, he guides me to the bathroom, where he’ll clean me up and care for me. The worst of the pain is diminishing and soon there will be a pleasant warmth beneath the burn. I’ve learnt my lesson
.

But discipline is a process. No single punishment elicits a permanent change. I’ll slide again. And be brought back in line. And in between we’ll play and I’ll hate it and love hating it. And, when another severe punishment session is needed, I’ll cut the switches and present him with the rod. I’ll assume the position and take my stripes, shedding my guilt as I yelp and cry under the strokes. And afterwards I’ll thank him. The pain in my bottom tells me he cares
.

In spite of everything, it’s all I’ve ever wanted
.

Afterword

Apparently I’m the first Nexus author to pose for the cover of her own book. I blithely tossed the idea to the editor one day, expecting that he’d say no. But to my delight he thought it was a great idea – ‘unprecedented and radical’ – and encouraged me to do it.

I thought it would be simple: just find a friendly lap and someone else willing to push the button on the camera. A cute outfit. A little smacking to pinken my cheeks. Piece of cake, right? Ha.

Positioning the hand went something like this: ‘OK, raise your arm a bit. Now turn it out. No, angle it down. Further. A little more. Can you flatten it a bit more? No, that’s too much. I know it doesn’t feel right; it just has to
look
right.’

We finally got the pose right, but the camera flash kept washing out our efforts. In order for the colour pink to show up at all my bottom had to be glowing red. It was proving a very painful endeavour. Especially once we realised the camera had been set on the wrong speed and we had to start from scratch.