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Happy Friday! As promised we have the second part of Ami wonderful story, Beating the Bounds. The first part of then story can be found here. These stories are long - you're getting a short book for free with these two Fantasy Fridays. You can read more about Ami and more of her writing at Ami's Star Song. Ami is not only a great write, she is also a warm, funny friend and blogger that I know everyone would enjoy getting to know better. For now settle in and enjoy...
Beating the Bounds
part two
We stood at
the back of the small, but rapidly growing, crowd of people outside the Parish
Rooms. We had arrived laden with two
quiches and a large chocolate cake, which we placed carefully inside on a long
table, that was beginning to groan under the weight, as our contribution to the
parish lunch. There were many villagers
there that we were already acquainted with, some of them fledgling friends. The clergyman wore his ecclesiastical attire,
and I noticed he was equipped with a fair-sized birch branch in his right hand,
and three green willow switches, tided together with a piece of hessian ribbon,
in his left hand. A number of young
people from the parish clustered around him, making saucy comments and daring
each other to be the first to volunteer to sample
their delights.
I shivered and
my hands went automatically back to rub my bottom. I caught Daniel’s eye and he grinned at me
and gave a small shake of his head. My
hands returned to my sides. Although the
rosy redness had gone by morning, I hadn’t had the most comfortable of nights,
and my poor butt still retained some of the bruises left as a legacy from that
horrible hairbrush.
Finally the
vicar decided no more people would be joining in the ceremony. He cleared his throat halting chatter and
gaining the villagers’ attention. He
welcomed everyone, drew their attention to matters of safety, and explained the
old tradition of checking the parish boundaries as a way of preventing
encroachment by neighbours, and determining the true extent of the parish. He bent his head and said a short prayer to
bless his flock.
“We will now
begin the perambulation of the bounds of the Parish.” He nodded to his two churchwardens who taking
up an incense burner and a cross marshaled the six young people, four boys and
two girls, who had volunteered to take part in the ceremony, into a small group
to follow directly behind the vicar. Singing a well-known hymn, they all set off
for the first boundary marker, which was a large oak tree.
Daniel and I, swept
along with the flow, laughed at ourselves.
It took about
ten minutes to reach the oak tree. The
vicar turned and passed the ‘switches’ to the nearest churchwarden. He took the incense and a small silver
sprinkler containing ‘holy water’. He
swung the first, and sprinkled the latter liberally around the tree, saying “Cursed
is he who transgresseth the bounds of doles of his neighbor.”
He passed the
incense and the holy water back and the switches were returned to him. He looked at the young people, and said “Now
it’s your turn!” and set about switching them around their legs and rear ends. He gave each of them a couple of good swishy
swats, and I was glad, on their behalf, that they were all wearing jeans. I couldn’t begin to imagine what it must have
felt like years ago to be whipped on bare legs, or even, I shuddered, bare
behinds.
The vicar now
recited psalm 103, and we moved off towards the next boundary marker.
“The
youngsters seem very eager to take part” I mentioned to Daniel as we
walked. “Do you think they can feel it
through their jeans?”
Daniel was
looking pensive, but he laughed. “Of
course they’re eager to take part” he informed me. “Wouldn’t you be if you were going to earn a
pound at each marker? When we were
waiting outside the Parish Rooms, Sam told me that’s the going rate. They only earned half pennies years ago, although
they were all allowed to partake of some beer when they finally got back to the
starting point. Some of those
perambulations took several days apparently.
The boys might have earned their stripes, but they were well fed en
route, and they all had some money to take home to their mothers.”
“Well you live
and learn, don’t you?”
“You certainly
do.” Daniel no longer looked
pensive. He was looking speculative
instead.
The psalm was
finished, and another hymn took its place.
By the time
the vicar and churchwardens, together with the flock of St Stephen’s poured in
through the doors of the Parish Rooms, we were hungry and tired, and our feet
hurt. We all collapsed into plastic
chairs that had been set up around more long tables the down the centre of the
hall. The ladies had put out cups and saucers,
and soon everyone was tucking into the food and drinking large cups of
tea. It was well earned. I looked around. Everyone was so happy. I smiled up at Daniel, who was deep in
conversation with the vicar. What an
interesting and unusual way to spend a Saturday.
***********
It was
Wednesday once again. How I had managed
to successfully navigate my way through the week was beyond my capacity to
understand. I’d had one or two raised
eyebrows thrown in my direction, but nothing I couldn’t field.
My friend
Polly, from a nearby farmhouse, sat on an overstuffed cushion on the swing
seat, alternatively pushing her left foot on the decking, and then holding it
up in order for the seat to complete one swing forwards and one swing back. I watched the deep red glint of the wine in her
glass adjust itself like the liquid in a spirit level.
“So what do
you think? Are you up for it? We can catch the 9.30 train, dash into town,
do Marks and Spencers, and Debenhams in style.
Do a quick gallop down London Street and visit Lush, return to the
station by way of John Lewis, catch the 4 o’clock train, and you can be back
ready to get dinner by 4.30.
“If you hide
your purchases for a few days, Dan’ll never know you’ve been away from the
house. We can have a leisurely lunch at
that little Italian restaurant on Castle Hill.
It’ll be wonderful to have a whole day to ourselves.” Polly was very convincing.
“Why
not?” Having refilled my glass, I sat
down on the swing seat next to Polly, leant back against the cushions, and
closed my eyes. “That would be
wonderful, Poll.
“Men are so
hard to go shopping with. They know
exactly what they want, and where to get it, and they make a beeline straight
for the shop, buy the first item they see, and then they’re ready to go back to
the car. It’s no fun at all. It’d be so good to have a change of scenery,
and I like the thought of travelling together on the train and having a ‘girly’
day visiting just the shops I like, in a leisurely way.”
Polly surveyed
the garden for a minute before looking back to meet my eyes. She hesitated before speaking.
“Hmmm. Actually Ami, I’ll only be able to travel
back as far as Deighton. Mike has to
visit the Landrover dealership there, and he doesn’t know how long it’ll
take. If you need to be back before Dan
gets home, it might be better if you stay on the train. It’s only another ten minutes after all, and
we can leave your car in the station car park, so you can just leap off the
train and into it. It’s not as if you’ll have to walk anywhere, and the sun
will probably still be shining at that time.”
Oh! I thought.
There always
seemed to be conditions to everything
I did with Polly. At least she was
correct in that I wouldn’t have to walk miles to get to my car, and it would
still be afternoon for goodness’ sake.
It wasn’t as
if Dan objected to me having a day out shopping, it was just that the last time
I had done so had been a disaster in more ways than one. I’d spent more than budgeted for on our joint
credit card, been stopped by the police for speeding, and as icing on the cake
had received a parking fine from an officious little Hitler who, despite the
fact that I was only ten minutes over my time allocation, insisted on writing me
a ticket. This time I would be
travelling on the train, so at least speeding wouldn’t be a problem. I shrugged.
I would just have to keep a tight rein on my expenditure.
“Okay. I think it’s a great idea. If I’m going to be tempted by all those
shops, I’d better make a list. I’m not a
millionaire you know.” We had both
laughed.
*********************
The train
journey into town was trouble free. The
only slight hitch was that Polly had been on the drag when I had arrived to
pick her up, which had resulted in a mad dash down to the station with Polly
acting as ‘lookout’ in case of being gunned by a speed camera. There were certain locations where traffic
police loved to hide in people’s driveways and behind hedges. However, we had made it down to the station
car park successfully and Polly went to buy our tickets whilst I parked the car
and fed the machine for a parking ticket to place in the windscreen.
We sat on the
train laughing and chatting as it sped through the green countryside, cottages
and farms passing like a blur. I
stretched my legs as far as the seat in front allowed, and breathed out,
letting go of my cares. The sun was
shining, which was nothing short of a miracle, and I knew we were going to have
a terrific day.
******************
It was the
shoes that were to prove my downfall.
They were, as
often seemed the case at the time, the most mouth-watering and delectable shoes
in the world. As I walked past the shop
window on the way back to the station I stopped and reversed so quickly I
nearly got whiplash. Then I just stood
wide-eyed, speculatively biting my bottom lip, and wondering whether they would
have any in my size.
Polly, who had
continued to walk on along the street, came back when she realized she was
talking to thin air.
“Oh no, Ami” she
gulped. “Dan’ll kill you. You can’t possibly spend all that money on
shoes you couldn’t even walk in.”
We both stood
there as shoppers flowed past us like a river dividing to avoid boulders in its
path, staring at the glorious pale green silk sandals in the window. The heels were high wedges, and the shoes had
silken bands that were made to swathe over the arch of the foot and end in
small bows on the outer side. The
insides were embroidered in the palest of pinks in a delicate floral design, and
the same design continued around the backs of the sandals and down the
heels. They were stunning.
And expensive.
In fact, they
were so expensive they would have gone a long way to paying off the debt of a
small country.
Polly was
regarding me with a mixture of horror and concern. She had seen me getting into trouble over
shoes many times since we had first met, and was still incredulous that I had
over a hundred pairs at the last count.
After all, how many shoes could a person wear in a week?!
“I have to
have them, Polly. I’ve never seen
anything quite like them. They are
amazing. So different. And they look very comfortable.” I slowly inched my way towards the shop
doorway. I could hear what Polly was
saying, but chose to ignore her.
“Ami, you’ll
have to leave the country. Dan’ll go
mad! You can’t possibly spend all that
on a pair of shoes. When will you wear
them? What have you got that they will
go with? How will you walk in them?”
She noticed
she was talking to thin air again. I was
already in the shop, pointing out the shoes to a sales assistant.
*************
Polly had to
admit, as she watched her strut, imitating the way models walk on a catwalk, that
the shoes set off a person’s legs like no other pair she had ever seen. Ami was perfecting her walk, swinging her
hips slightly and crossing her feet over at the ankles. Okay, she wobbled a little on the turns, but
the shoes still looked pretty damned good.
If it wasn’t
for the price, she would’ve been tempted herself.
**************
“I’ll hide
them at the back of the wardrobe and bring them out in time for the autumn,
when hopefully I’ll have found a dress to go with them. Dan’ll never know. I’ve done it loads of times over the
years.” I waved a hand in the air nonchalantly. “They are just the shoes for a wedding, or a
dinner at a posh restaurant.” I wobbled
again. “Naturally they’re not the type
of shoe you would walk in. What a stupid
thing to say. How on earth could you
walk in shoes like these?”
Polly arched her
eyebrows. She could see I wasn’t going
to be dissuaded from my objective. “I’ll
prepare the spare room then?” She said to my back.
I hunted
through my credit cards (all two of them) until I came to the card I shared
with Daniel. I took a deep breath and
held it out as if it were an everyday occurrence to pay over two hundred pounds
for a pair of shoes. Suddenly my neck
and upper back felt a little stiff.
The salesgirl
wrapped the shoes very carefully in tissue paper before slipping them into a
special soft material shoe bag and then laying them in a black and gold
shoebox. She then slipped the box into a
special paper carrier bag with the famous brand name emblazoned diagonally
across it.
I carried the
bag carefully out of the shop. My neck and
back were still stiff, and my legs also suddenly felt a little weak. Strange.
We sat on the
train once more, our purchases stacked around us, drinking large Costa
lattes. Polly had the most bags. She’d taken the opportunity to shop for her
holidays, and had bought three pairs of shorts, two bikinis, two sun dresses, a
skirt, three tee-shirts and a pair of flip-flops with faux gemstones glued on
them. She also seemed to have copious
bottles of suntan lotion of varying ‘factors’ as well as aftersun and some new
makeup.
I had bought
two linen tops, three pairs of lace-trimmed knickers, (if you bought two pairs,
you got one pair free!) and the shoes.
The beautiful, gorgeous, far too expensive, shoes.
Fifteen
minutes passed in no time at all, and Polly was leaving the train to go find
Mike. She hugged me. “Let me know how you get on” she said. “I sincerely hope you get back before Dan
does. I’d put them away for a whole year
if I were you.”
Neither of us
had given a thought as to what would happen when the credit card statement
arrived.
I rested my
head against the headrest. A few more
miles and I would be home. The train
jerked. I glanced out the window. It jerked again and came to a rapid and
screaming halt. My purchases slid off
the seat next to me and on to the floor.
I nearly followed them, but fortunately I only pitched forwards into the
back of the seat in front of me. The few
people in the carriage were muttering and looking concerned. Some of them even stood up to look
around. However, it wasn’t long before
the conductor came trotting down the aisle on his way to reassure everyone.
“It’s all
right” he told us. “A young woman has
collapsed, and someone else has pulled the communication cord. It doesn’t look too serious, and fortunately
there was a doctor in the next carriage who is checking her over, but until we
know how she is, we will just have to sit here.”
He moved off in
order to repeat his message to other people, and a quiet buzz of conversation
broke out. I gathered up my shopping and
replaced it on the seat. I looked
outside, and then looked at my watch. It
was nearly 4.30. Dan wouldn’t be back
till 5.30 at the earliest, so I still had plenty of time, even if the train was
delayed for a while.
At 5.30 the
train eventually pulled into my station.
I knew I looked harassed. Even if
I could grow wings and fly home, I would be very lucky indeed to arrive back
before Dan. I felt very hot. The sun was still shining although it was
beginning to arc downwards. The evenings
were just starting to draw in though it was still light at 9.30. I hated the thought of winter approaching and
all the darkness. At least with the
light evenings we could get out into the garden to do some weeding, lawn
mowing, or even to sit on the decking and drink a gin and tonic and watch the
fish in the horse pond.
After tussling
with the door, and almost crashing down the steps to the car park in my hurry,
I reached my car. An ominous yellow
plastic envelope was lodged firmly under my windscreen wiper blades. I stared at it in shock. Glancing quickly around I wrenched it off the
glass, glaring at it. I unlocked the car
and threw my bags none to gently on the back seat, before slipping in behind
the steering wheel and ripping the top off the envelope.
It was a £40
fine for being over my time limit. I
snatched my parking ticket from where I had placed it on the top of the
dashboard where it could be seen. “There must be some mistake” I
thought. I studied it carefully. My ticket ran out at 5 o’clock. A quick glance at my watch told me it was now
5.40. The ticket must have been left recently,
but I could see no one in the car park.
Apart from cars, it was deserted.
With a
grimace, I threw it over my shoulder into the back seat to join my
shopping. Once again my day had plunged
rapidly downhill.
*******************
Dan’s big
black super shiny car was already sitting in the yard when I reached home, as I
had known it would be. Rats! I thought.
I sat for a
minute composing myself before swinging my legs out and then letting my body
follow them. Dan poked his head round
the side of the cartlodge where we kept our cars.
“Good day?” he
asked, leaning his rake against the wall where he’d been strimming under the
apple trees.
“You didn’t
tell me you were going out. When you
didn’t ring me at lunchtime, I was a bit concerned. I tried to ring you but it went to voicemail.”
I felt myself
go red. Oh crap, I thought. I
should’ve phoned him. I was so busy
having a good time I forgot all about it. Could things get any worse?
“Um. I’m sorry, I know I should’ve phoned you. I went out shopping with Polly. It was one of those spur of the moment, last
minute things.
“She wanted to
do some holiday shopping and I hadn’t been shopping with her for years. We didn’t get much further than John Lewis,
but it was a great day.” I stretched up
to give Dan a quick kiss on the cheek.
“What sort of day did you have?”
Daniel reached
and took my bags. He glanced at them
with only perfunctory interest until he came to the bag containing the
shoes. I saw his eyebrows go up and the
nerve in his cheek twitched.
“Not more
shoes, Ami” he grumbled. “You’re going
to run out of storage space soon. Are
they really necessary?” He gave me what I
thought looked a bit like a malevolent grin.
“The bag looks expensive. I hope
you didn’t pay over the odds for these.
I suppose you used my credit card?”
I saw the nerve twitch again.
I turned and
headed towards the back door. “No, they
were on sale” I lied, not daring to turn and look at him. I didn’t notice the plastic packet that
fluttered down behind me like an over-sized piece of confetti landing at Dan’s
feet.
Dan did. He bent down and picked it up. His grin became even more malevolent.
“Ami!”
Oh dear. The tone of his voice had changed. “Come back here.”
I ignored him
and walked through the kitchen and continued on and up the stairs. I needed a little bit of thinking time. Events were getting out of hand with alarming
rapidity.
I changed into
comfortable jeans and a tee-shirt.
“Ami, come
down here now!” Dan didn’t sound
amused.
I was going to
have to go and face the music. I
retraced my steps back down to the kitchen.
“Well?” I
asked him, and stupidly rolled my eyes.
“So it’s a parking fine.” I gave
what I hoped was a Gallic shrug.
“It’s not my
fault someone fainted on the train and we ended up waiting in the middle of nowhere
for nearly an hour. For two pins I’d
have walked home” I told him angrily.
“You always
think the worst of me, Daniel. You
never, ever give me the benefit of the doubt do you? If it had happened to you, it would have been
fine, but because it was me, you think I engineered it on purpose.”
I knew my
voice was getting higher and higher but I couldn’t help myself. I started opening and closing cupboard and
fridge doors and getting the ingredients out to start dinner. I put a jar down just a mite too roughly on
the granite work surface and watched as a crack appeared down it.
Daniel took
hold of my hands and turned me around to face him.
“Ami, if I
didn’t know you as well as I do, I’d think you were picking a fight with
me. But something tells me that there is
more to this than meets the eye. You
look as guilty as hell.” Daniel wouldn’t
let go of my hands. I was forced to look
at him as he stared at me and waited for an answer.
“There you go
again.” I could feel my face getting
redder by the minute. “I’m just hot and
tired and I hate it when you accuse me of things that are beyond my ability to
do anything about.”
“You could’ve
given me a call. That might have been
nice. I hadn’t heard from you and didn’t
know where you were, except you weren’t where you were meant to be.” I tried, unsuccessfully to free my hands.
“It wouldn’t
have been any problem at all to have gone down to the station and put another
ticket in your car window for you, if you could have been bothered to let me
know where you were.
“Now you have
a fine to pay. Because as sure as eggs
are eggs, I am not going to pay it for you!
“And if you
can’t speak to me pleasantly when I meet you at the end of a day, perhaps you
need a bit of encouragement.”
Before I had
time to draw breath, Daniel turned me around bending me over the work
surface. Too late I realized what
dangerous places kitchens could be as a large wooden spoon connected with my
backside. Despite wearing jeans, I felt
every single smack and Daniel showed no signs of stopping.
“I’m sorry
Dan” I blurted out. “It just felt as if
you were blaming me without asking for any explanation. Like you assumed I hadn’t put enough money in
the meter in the first place.”
Daniel stopped
and turned me around again to face him.
“Ami, what was
I supposed to think. You strutted off
into the house hardly bothering to say hello, and never even mentioned a
parking fine.”
“Well, did you
give me a chance?” I asked him, tilting my chin.
*****************
Daniel
narrowed his eyes. She had been
defensive from the moment she arrived home.
Now what was it all about? He was
determined to get to the bottom of the matter.
Literally.
A thought
occurred to him about then. He went over
to where he had plopped her bags down on a kitchen chair. He started to go through them. A couple of
tops and some underwear. He studied the
receipts. Ami always stowed the receipts
in with her purchases in case she had to return something. He arrived at the shoes. He pulled the shoebox out of the bag and fished
about for the receipt. He noticed Ami
had retreated to the other side of the kitchen island, and had started chopping
celery for a salad. She was watching him
like a mongoose watching a snake, and he felt quite anxious she’d miss the
celery and chop off a finger instead.
At last he found
what he was looking for. He pulled it
out and glanced down at it. He nearly
choked. Now he understood her
reticence. Ami had gone outside and was
marching up and down on the decking near the pond. He looked at the total on the receipt again,
just to make sure, and breathed deeply.
He felt like pushing her in the damn pond. He went and got himself a glass of lemonade
and swigged it back, wiping back of his hand over his sweaty forehead as he
considered the situation.
Ami continued
to pace.
Dan leant
against the kitchen counter. There was a
lot at stake here. Firstly Ami hadn’t
even bothered to mention her shopping trip to him, and as the day had worn on
he had become more than a little worried as to her whereabouts. They always spoke for a few minutes at
lunchtimes.
Then, not only
had Ami tried to brush off the parking fine when she could have so easily called
him to take care of it, but she had flagrantly lied to him about the
shoes. There wasn’t a sign of these
shoes being on sale. The sales hadn’t
even started yet. £265 for a pair of
shoes. He couldn’t believe it. He loved Ami’s taste in clothes and
shoes. It was impeccable. But these hadn’t been bought for an ‘occasion’. They hadn’t been bought because she was
desperate for shoes. She had simply
bought them because she liked them. To
add them to the other hundred or so pairs she owned.
Daniel
breathed deeply, sucking air into his lungs and letting it go with a
whoosh. He turned and made for the
stairs striding up two at a time. He
entered their bedroom and flung open the doors to Ami’s wardrobe. He scanned the shelves above where she hung her
clothes. They were jammed full of shoe
boxes, wedged in so tightly that when he reached up he could hardly move
one. He managed to lever one out and he
noticed that behind the front row there was another, similarly packed in. He began to pull the boxes out, depositing
them on the bed. He was horrified to
discover that the row he had thought to be at the back of the wardrobe had a
further row behind it. The boxes were
two deep and there were three rows. He
could hardly comprehend what he was looking at.
Daniel
selected and opened some boxes at random.
There were shoes of every type and every colour, and several pairs
looked either brand new or hardly worn.
He shook his head in disbelief.
He knew Ami had a shoe fetish, but he hadn’t realized how out of hand
things were getting.
This situation
had to be dealt with. Somehow he had to
set some limits. Ami was buying shoes
and squirreling them away like an alcoholic might hide whisky bottles. He had to ensure that she knew this kind of
behaviour had to change. It was causing her
to become deceitful, and that was selfish, hurtful and unacceptable.
About then an
idea occurred to him, and he smiled grimly to himself. He knew they had never had much in the way of
rules, but maybe now was the time to start enforcing one or two. He watched Ami pace the decking, and he moved
towards the door.
“Ami” he said. “You and I are going to discuss
‘boundaries’.”
******************
We stood at
the far end of the garden, with the larger of the two horse ponds on one side
and the spinney on the other. Daniel’s
hands were on my hips and he had me facing a tree. A silver birch. My feet were rooted into the ground and he
had frog-marched me through the garden until we stood in the middle of a
triangle of birch trees. This one had
branches that swooped down nearly touching the ground. I’d thought he had been meaning to trim
it. Now he looked pleased that he hadn’t
gotten around to it.
I gazed at the
tree in disbelief. Surely Dan couldn’t
be intending to cut some switches.
Surely not. I couldn’t imagine
how much they would hurt. I had
inadvertently ridden into a birch grove once, at speed, on horseback. I knew all about how it felt as if my face
was cut all over. Fine birch twigs rarely cut, but they burned like fire. I tried to pull away, but Daniel wasn’t
having it.
He handed me
his pocket knife. “Cut four” he
instructed me.
“You must be
mad if you think I’m going to do that.
Completely off your rocker!” I
shuddered and did my best to pull away.
“Okay. Then we’ll do it the hard way.” Holding on to me tightly, Dan reached around and
quickly cut four small branches that divided and sub-divided into what looked
like a maze of twigs. “Now we’ll go find
some willow. It’ll be interesting to
compare the two. I wonder which’ll sting
the most.”
He manhandled me
around the far end of the pond where there were several young willow
trees. “Cut four” I was told again.
I backed away,
trampling on Dan’s feet in the process. I
had become totally speechless, my mouth dry and my throat closed up. “Don’t you even think you are coming near me
with those bloody things” I warned him.
To my
disquiet, Daniel sighed and shook his head slightly.
“Not only am I
coming near you with them, but we are going to have a little stroll around our
boundaries with them” he informed my.
“But first we are going to go back to the house so you can prepare
yourself.”
****************
I stood in the
middle of our bedroom. I couldn’t
believe this was happening to me. It had
to be a joke. He couldn’t possibly be
meaning to spank me with those birch and willow switches. That sort of thing only happened in
books. No shoes were worth that. I would take them back. It would mean another trip into town, but so
what?
I pulled open my
wardrobe door and gloomily studied the contents. Daniel had requested I put on a certain pale
green, floaty dress. It had a low
neckline, and was ankle-length. Grecian-style.
He’d also
forbidden me any underwear. I
huffed. The bra was no problem, I never
wore one with this dress, but going without knickers didn’t bode well.
I pulled the
dress out of my wardrobe and laid it on the bed while I removed my jeans and
tee-shirt. I slowly took off my bra and
knickers and left everything in a heap on the floor. In fact I felt angry enough to kick it half
way across the room.
“Ami, I’m
waiting” Daniel called up the stairs.
“All this fuss
over a pair of shoes and a parking ticket” I fumed to myself. “My life’s not my own anymore. Maybe I’ll withdraw consent. That will serve him right!”
I descended
the stairs careful not to tread on the hem of my skirt, as I had been told to
wear flat shoes and it was rather on the long side, and intended to be worn with
high heels. In fact, now I was thinking
about it, it was exactly the same shade as the wretched new shoes! I thought about Daniel and frowned to the
best of my ability.
Daniel watched
me come into the kitchen. I could tell
immediately that he had remembered the colour of my dress correctly. It was written all over his face. But I was worried that now he would feel the
need to drive the point home, and ensure it stayed there.
My eyes
couldn’t open any wider as I saw what he had placed on the granite top of the
kitchen island. He had removed all the
leaves off the small birch branches and left a very fine tracery of twigs. He’d removed all the sharp nubs and leaves
off the willow, and peeled the switches so they were white and smooth. He picked one up and flourished it. It made a horrid whistling sort of a swish as
it cut through the air.
I lifted my
chin and glared at Daniel. “If you think you are using those on me you are
joking” I told him. “I’m not a dog or a
horse.”
“If you were,
there would be no need to use them” he answered me quietly, shrugging his
shoulders.
“Don’t you
remember telling me about those four “Ds”?
Wasn’t dishonesty one of them?
Aren’t we meant to be honest with each other at all times? You seem to have forgotten that in a
hurry.” Truth be told, I could tell he
was still feeling somewhat annoyed with me, but now he had a plan of action, at
least his anger had abated.
He caught me
by my left wrist. “Right, Ami. You and I are going for a little walk around
our boundaries. The exercise will do you
good.”
He dragged me
out of the kitchen and started across the lawn and towards the gate to one of
the meadows.
“Daniel let go
of me! I am warning you. This isn’t even remotely funny. You’ve had your joke, now let me go!” I was
furious with him.
“I assure you
it’s no joke, Ami, and you know it deep down,” he replied. “I may not give you nightly spankings. I may not give you many punishment spankings
at all. But it occurs to me that this
one is long overdue. It’s something I
should have tackled a long time ago.
This ‘shoe fetish’ of yours has become a problem. You could supply the world with the bloody
things. But to go out for the day
without telling me, and then to lie about your purchases. And if that wasn’t
deceitful enough, to react with nonchalance to your parking fine, is not
something I find amusing after all these years of marriage. So it is going to stop now. And your bottom is going to pay the penalty. And there will be other penalties too.” Daniel had a firm set to his jaw. He pulled me through the gate and started off
down the meadow.
I was
seething. I tried unsuccessfully once
more to jerk out of his grasp. For two pins I would have kicked him, except I
was having trouble not tripping up.
We arrived at
the bottom left-hand corner of our land. Daniel swished the birch branch through the
air. There was a large ash tree in the
hedge, with a curve to its trunk and a smaller branch reaching out from
it.
“Bend forward
and grab on to that lower branch, and stick your bottom out.”
His voice was
so sharp that I realized that Daniel was as serious about this as I had ever
seen him. The fact that I had lied to
him and deceived him had shocked him to the core. I had never, to my recollection, been
instructed to do this before and my breathing quickened. I debated running back up the meadow and
locking myself in the house, but that would only make the situation worse, and
with this stupid long dress Dan would catch me easily. And then what if he gave me extras?
I,
unwillingly, bent forward and grasped the branch.
“Move yourself
backwards a bit.”
“Daniel, I…”
“Move! Now!”
I took a step
back which made me bend forward more.
The low neckline on my dress gaped and I had a perfect view of my own
boobs and right down the front of my body to the grass.
“Feet shoulder
width apart” he commanded.
******************
Daniel knew Ami
was hating every minute of this, but he didn’t want her to lose her
balance. He was ready to catch hold of her
if she did. He was determined to make it
very stingy, but he didn’t want her to come to any harm. He lifted her dress and tucked the hem into
the neckline at the back exposing her legs, bottom and most of her lower
back. He placed the switches on the
floor and selected a birch branch first, before placing his left hand on her
waist holding her in position.
“I’m going to
give you five swats with the birch and then five with the willow Ami, and I
expect you to stay in position and not let go with your hands. If you let go you’ll get extra. I mean this.
I’m planning on you remembering this spanking for a very long time.”
He raised his
hand. This was a massive stride forwards
for him, but he couldn’t back out now.
Whatever happened, he had to see it through.
*****************
I heard the whistle
of the birch through the air. For a split second nothing, and then it felt like
it had cut my bottom to shreds. I
shrieked loudly and danced on the spot, but Dan prevented me from letting go by
holding me tightly in position between his arm and his hip. The horses in the neighbouring meadow lifted
their heads and started to trot around looking across and trying to see what
was happening.
The birch lashed
down twice more in rapid succession. I screamed
both times and tried to pull away. The
pain was like nothing I had ever experienced or wanted to again.
The fourth
time was too much. Tears overflowed and
flooded down my face and I yelled loudly at Daniel.
“I withdraw my
consent” I choked. “You’re killing
me. Stop it and stop it now, you bastard!”
*****************
Daniel hadn’t
liked those screams, but he managed not to lose his grip. The birch twigs landed a fifth time, and then
he threw them in the bottom of the hedge.
Ami sprang upright and whirled around madly rubbing her bottom and
swearing at him. She checked her hands
to see if there was any blood on them. She
seemed astonished to see there wasn’t.
Daniel had
anticipated a reaction like this, and if anything, it strengthened his
resolve. He picked up one of the willow
switches and swished it through the air.
Ami backed
away, her skirts still tucked into her neckline at the back. “Don’t you dare come near me! Don’t you come near me ever again!”
Daniel merely
pointed at the tree. “Back into position,
Ami and stop complaining. Boundaries are
boundaries, and this boundary is being enforced whether you like it or not. You can scream and yell and disagree all you
want to.”
******************
I looked
around wildly as if help was going to arrive in the form of a knight on a white
charger at a gallop. All I could see
were the horses who had quickly grown tired of the excitement and had gone back
to grazing and swishing flies off their rumps with their long tails.
“But I
withdraw my consent!”
“No you don’t”
Daniel disagreed. “You only think you
do. The sooner you bend over the sooner
we will be done here. There are always
penalties to be paid for misdeeds, and the sooner you pay them the
better.”
He grabbed me
by the waist once more and pushed me back towards the tree, forcing me to bend. Initially I tried to resist, but then bent
and took hold of the branch, calling him all the names I could think of and a
few more. Daniel rubbed my lower back
and raised the willow switch roughly to shoulder height. This was new to him as well and I could see he
intended to get it right.
The switch
landed across the middle of my bottom.
He watched as a line appeared, white at first then a bright red. In those few seconds that it registered with my
brain, I leapt upright and danced around in a circle shrieking. This time Daniel manhandled me and bending me
over got in another two swats fairly quickly, each one slightly below the other. I squealed loudly with each one and broke
into a series of loud sobs.
“I hate
you! I hate you!” I yelled. “You’re a sadistic bastard!”
“Well hate
away. This bastard now intends to give
you two more and one extra for running around!”
I could
scarcely believe the pain. I was never
going to be able to move after this, let alone sit down. I loved and trusted Dan and now he was
hurting me like this. The first thing I
was going to do when I eventually made it back to the house, if I made it back
to the house, was to pack my bags. We
were finished.
The switch
landed two final times. Daniel threw it
next to the birch twigs and picked the unused switches up ready to proceed to
the next corner of our property. He
grabbed me unrelentingly by the wrist and dragged me behind him once more. I was still crying and refused to look at him
let alone speak to him. It was a long and
tortuous journey being towed across the meadow and then into the field where
the horses were grazing.
****************
The horses
thought they were going to be given some horse nuts, and followed in us in procession
to the corner. This time a tree stump
was partly on its side, left from the storms the previous winter. Daniel didn’t try to order her into position
this time. He pushed her across the
stump, arranged her skirts, and then sat next to her holding her down. He’d seen her get angry before, and he knew
he was just going to have to work through it.
He couldn’t stop now.
She fought and
fought, screaming at him and swearing like a trooper. It took all his strength to hold her firmly
in position.
He raised the
next birch branch and let it fall across her bright red buttocks. She screamed like a banshee, her fingers
clawing at the bark and her sobs increasing in volume. He quickly followed the first swat with the
other four. He couldn’t see the point in
delaying the action as they were barely half way through. Her bottom was now a spider’s web of thin,
raised, tangled crimson lines.
When he paused
to reach for the willow switch she stood holding her bottom, sobbing, and
telling him how much she hated him.
“What I hate,
Ami, is when you deceive me and tell me lies.
If you’ll lie about buying a pair of shoes, getting a parking fine, and
in fact, just going off out for the day with a friend, what other lies could
you be telling me? Do you care for me so
little? I just find it hard to believe,
and I’m telling you, it stops now.”
****************
The switch
lines continued to appear a couple of centimetres apart down both my
buttocks. The last couple landed across my
sit spots. I screamed so loudly the
horses leapt into the air and galloped the length of the meadow, snorting and
stamping their feet. I was stamping my
feet too. I couldn’t believe how
terrible this felt. I had never endured
such pain in all my life. It was far
worse than giving birth. Or, at least,
it felt like it at this moment.
I was
beginning to get exhausted. Daniel had
no trouble grabbing my wrist this time and heading for the other side of the
farmhouse. It was quite a walk, and I
did manage to calm myself down a little.
Strangely the gravity of Daniel’s words began to sink in. We’d come so far, done so well, yet I still
found it necessary to lie to him. Just
thinking about it made me start to cry again.
This time there
was a water trough in the corner of the meadow and Daniel perched on the edge
of it taking a birch branch in his hand.
He pulled me over his left knee and put his right leg over mine keeping me
secure and preventing any kicking. I had
to put my hands down on the grass to keep my balance, my hair hanging down in my
eyes mixing with my tears and perspiration.
My boobs were practically falling out of the neckline of my dress, which
was still tucked up at the back. I felt
sick with pain and misery.
The birch
still caused me to scream loudly as it landed.
The network of fine lines had nearly fused together and now looked very
red and angry although they hadn’t broken the skin even slightly. The dark red and raised lines of the willow formed
a neat pattern of parallel lines on top.
The final stroke of the birch landed rather quicker than I think Dan had
anticipated, and caught me right across my tender and puffy lower lips. I screamed so loudly I nearly deafened him,
trying to scissor my legs and almost upending him in the water trough. I was sobbing steadily now, my chest heaving
with hiccupping sounds as I tried to get my breath.
*********************
Daniel laid
the willow lower down across Amis sit spots leaving very small gaps between
them. The final two cut across the tops
of her thighs, immediately leaving raised red and purple weals. She put her hand back to try to rub away the
awful pain. Daniel released her legs and
she fell to the floor in a heap.
“I’ve had
enough Daniel. Please don’t make me have
any more. It’s just too much. It’s killing me. I can’t stand it” she implored him.
Daniel knew,
through experience, that she was softening.
The hard edge she had assumed, was disappearing, and the woman he loved
was returning. But there still remained
one more corner.
*******************
I don’t know
how I had made it to the final corner of our land. I certainly don’t remember much of the walk
through the long grass of the hay meadow.
I stood forlornly gazing at the post and rail fencing that ran along the
boundary. Dan had told me to lean
forwards and grasp the top rail and keep my bottom well out. At this point I didn’t think I had much of a bottom
left. It had fused together in one
painful pulsating throb. I didn’t care
if I never saw those vile shoes again.
How could I ever consider wearing them after going through all
this? I would never forget this
punishment if I lived to be ninety. I’d
read all about barn warmers and decided
this fit neatly into the very top of that category.
Daniel rubbed my
back. He told me afterwards that my
bottom looked truly awful and he was worried he had overdone it. There were no bruises, just lines over lines,
and that very accurate pattern of welts that reached midway down my
thighs.
He brought the
final small birch branch down on those thighs once, twice. I squealed and kicked, but managed to keep my
hands on the fence rail.
“They are
beautiful shoes, Ami” he told me. “They
go with this dress a treat. It’ll be
just the outfit to wear at that garden party next week. I look forward to seeing you wear it.
“But until
then, you are just going to wear these flat sandals, you hear me, all the
time. No fancy shoes allowed. And you are banned from driving for a week as
well. If you need to go anywhere, I will
take you. Are you listening?”
I met him with
silence, so he landed two more swats across my crimson thighs.
“This one is
going to be the hardest. It’s so you
remember not to lie to me ever again in the future.”
It swept down
right across the middle of my bottom, encompassing both cheeks and stinging my
soft underneath bits so badly my knees nearly buckled. I let out a thin sort of wail that seemed to
go on and on until I ran out of breath.
“I am so sorry,
Daniel. I won’t ever lie to you
again. I don’t even know why I did. Please, no more. Please…..” I begged him between sobs.
“Just the willow
left, and then it will all be forgotten.
I will pay for the shoes and you’ll get the fine paid immediately. If you pay straight away you get it half
price.” He actually chuckled. He was thinking that he’d never been able to
understand that rule.
“Next time if
you want something that is so expensive, ask me and we’ll discuss it. After all, it’s your money too. You have as much right to spend it as I
do. It’s the lying I’m upset about.
“Surely that’s
better than being spanked?”
I was almost
too exhausted to reply. I simply nodded my
head limply.
The willow
swept down on my thighs leaving livid red weals almost immediately. Once.
Twice. Three times.
“I’m
sorry. I’m so sorry. I’ll never, ever deceive you again
Daniel. Not ever” I sobbed out, almost
incoherent with pain. This was more than
a barn warmer, it was a spanking of
epic proportions, a spanking of the type to be avoided at all costs.
Daniel then
changed direction and created two lines that crossed over leaving a vivid
scarlet X on my buttocks.
He threw the
willow switch down and caught me before I collapsed in a heap. He freed my skirts and let them fall back
into place.
I had leapt
about so much that one of my boobs had escaped the confines of my dress
completely, and he gently tucked it back where it belonged. Then he bent and carefully picked me up and
carried me home.
I cried and
sobbed all the way. I felt aflame from
waist to knees although I knew Daniel never spanked as high or as low as
that.
****************
Dan carried Ami
upstairs, although it was a struggle, and he was worried he would put his back
out. He laid her down on the bed on her
stomach and lifted her skirts once more.
Her whole bottom and the tops of her thighs were an angry red and
extremely swollen. He left her for a
minute and went downstairs to the kitchen.
He opened the freezer and removed a large pack of frozen petits pois. Then he poured a large glass of cold water
and found a couple of paracetamol tablets from the cupboard. He returned upstairs. Ami was lying exactly where he had left her. Her sobs had subsided into tears and hiccups
and she was moaning.
He stepped
inside their bathroom and picked up the tube of arnica gel. He knew it usually took care of any bruising,
although he didn’t think he could see any, but it would help the weals to heal.
He rubbed it
very gently into her bottom and thighs. She
hardly moved, just cringed away from his touch.
Her bottom felt as if she had sat on a hot stove.
Daniel laid
the pack of frozen peas across the worst of the redness. He scrutinized Ami’s bottom and was thankful
to see that there wasn’t a single cut and that he hadn’t broken her skin anywhere. He had been careful not to use anything like
his full strength. He’d intended to
cause maximum sting, not to harm her.
He glanced at
the clock in the bedroom. They had only
been trailing round the fields for little over a half hour. The switchings themselves, had taken mere
minutes.
“Have a drink
love” he encouraged her.
Ami was very
thirsty from all the crying. Despite her
exhaustion, she raised herself up on her elbows and took the glass of
water. She must have been thirsty
because she completely drained it. Apart
from the occasional hiccup she seemed mostly recovered. How long it would take her scarlet bottom to
recover was another matter completely.
By the time
the peas had defrosted on what amounted to the slopes of Mount Etna, Ami was
fast asleep. Daniel left her on her
front, and covered her with a light mohair throw, before tip-toeing carefully
out of the room.
**************
I slept for
just over two hours. When I awoke the
sky was pink and gold from the setting sun.
For a while I felt disorientated, wondering why I was up here on the bed
lying on my stomach. Then, as I rolled
over I yelped and remembered. I lay there,
careful not to move another inch. I couldn’t imagine my bottom ever feeling
normal, not ever again.
It amazed me
how Daniel had managed to change my mind on a number of points.
I would never,
ever tell another lie if I lived to be a hundred, and neither would I ever be
the recipient of a parking fine. I also
decided that I would not only ensure the battery on my mobile phone was charged
up on a regular basis, but that I would take advantage of the aforesaid fully
charged mobile to make copious phone calls and/or texts to Dan. I would explain where I was and always notify
him of any desire I had to spend his money on frivolous items like pale green
silk sandals. In fact it was strange,
but my desire to shop for shoes seemed to have evaporated like early morning
mist under the hot rays of the sun.
Beating the Bounds would always carry a deep significance for me in the
future.
Daniel must
have heard my thoughts as he chose that moment to enter the bedroom. Seeing I was awake, he crossed the room and
sat down on the bed next to me. He
lifted the throw and inspected my bottom.
The arnica had already calmed the bright scarlet to a more acceptable
shade, although the stripes from the willow and the fine thatching from the
birch still looked on the angry side.
He gently gave
my sore globes another coating of the soothing gel.
“So do you
want me to lift your suitcase down from the loft?” he asked me quietly, a
worried look in his eyes.
“I’m so, so
sorry, Daniel” I told him. “I wish I
hadn’t bought the shoes at all. Perhaps
I should return them to the shop.
“But most of
all I’m sorry about all this lying to you.
I don’t know what’s gotten into me.
I’m a horrible person.” I
shuddered. “All those shoes. Do you still love me? I don’t really hate you, you know. And I’m not going anywhere. Where would I go?”
I rose and clambered
very carefully up on to his lap putting my arms around his neck and holding him
tightly to me. Daniel reciprocated.
“You’re not a
horrible person, Ami,” he told me.
“You’re just too impulsive for your own good. This is why you’ve got a wardrobe full of
shoes, many of which rarely see the light of day.” He dropped a kiss on my forehead.
“Of course I
still love you. I’m still around after
all these years aren’t I?” He kissed the tip of my nose. “I’m just not prepared to put up with
dishonesty any more. I don’t want to go
back to how we used to be, Ami.
“Remember how
you would bring out a pair of shoes, or a new bag or dress, and swear you’d had
them for months? I always knew you were
lying, but I chose to ignore it. Now,”
he looked away out of the window and across the meadows for a moment, “it seems
more important that we are truthful with each other, and that we communicate.
“There will be
times when we can’t agree…”
“…and then you
will make a judgment?”
“Let’s just
say my decision will be final. Sometimes
I’ll make the wrong decision. You’re
just going to have to live with it.”
“I’ll happily
do so, Daniel.” I wriggled a bit to try
to get comfortable. I gave up. “I needed that spanking.” I shook my head and frowned.
“I needed it a
lot. It didn’t feel like it at the
time. At the time it felt like I was
being forced to sit on top of a cooker!
I feel thrashed within an inch of my life.”
“Oh, Ami, it
wasn’t that bad. You don’t have a single
bruise, just a few lines and welts. It
may have felt as if I used my full strength, but I can assure you I
didn’t. I never would.” Daniel was rubbing my back. I didn’t entirely agree with his description
of my bottom. I knew what it felt
like. But somehow my eyes filled with
tears again.
“Come on. I cooked us some tea.” He lifted my gently off his lap. “Now that’s something you don’t get every
day. Me, cooking.”
I gave him a
watery smile. “You go on down. I’ll follow in a minute. I need to use the bathroom and I want to put
my dressing gown on.”
Daniel moved
to the doorway.
“And
Dan?” I called him.
“Yes?” He turned back to face me, his hand on the
door jamb.
“I’m glad you
put those boundaries in place even though I know there will be other times when
I feel the need to test them.” I thought
a minute. “They’re like boundaries of
love, keeping me safe and warm in your arms.”
He smiled at my,
his eyes full of that love. “They are
Sweetie, they are.”
He went
downstairs to the kitchen, getting plates out of the warmer. He hoped he would
never have to administer such a severe punishment ever again, but he knew Ami
wouldn’t be able to stay on the straight and narrow for very long.
Life in the
country with Ami was never going to be boring, and he wondered fleetingly what
lay ahead.
It wasn’t too
long before he was due to find out.
______________________________________________________________________________
Thank you so much Ami. This was a wonderful story and I've loved hosting you. I hope you will keep writing for a long time. Now you know my theory - everyone reading here has a Fantasy Friday story in them (you know the scene in your head as you go to sleep every night) now write it up and send it to elisspeaks@yahoo.com
