Our story continues.
It was the end of the first day and Mary was buzzing. Her ‘homework’ was to get to know the island and see if she could dig up a story for the next issue, which was just four days away.
As she passed the inn she saw signs of life and contemplated a beer to celebrate the end of the first day, but there was a man on the porch that looked decidedly shady and she had visions of entering the bar only to have the piano stop playing and swift hand card-sharps training their derringers on her. Mrs Bonham had said that she went to lunch there sometimes, so Mary decided to wait for company before she investigated the inn. So instead, before heading home she decided to check out the shop and wondered if Kelly might still be there.
As she had noted before, the shop had no plate glass window like the Herald had, instead it had been converted from a normal house with more usual windows with books and various knick-knacks in one window and what looked like kitchenware and hardware in the other.
As she entered the door rang a bell to alert the storekeeper of customers and Mary was immediately assailed with the smell of mixed dried goods and lavender. Inside, the store was laid out ‘mom and pop’ style, although some attempt had been made to organise along the lines of a supermarket. The counter and the daily goods like groceries were in what had been the front room of the house and through the door-less entrance to the back room she could see clothes and hard goods.
A woman appeared at the counter with a broad smile.
“I’m Clara Pope and you must be Mary Rossington, the new intern at the Herald,” Clara gushed. “Oh my, what a time you’ll have. Are you looking for Kelly?”
“Yes and eh… yes.” Mary took a step back and spread her arms in response to the welcome. “Eh… thanks.”
“Kelly is in the back room. Oh… and don’t mind Kate.”
Mary nodded and pointed in casual agreement to the other room as she strolled on through.
Kelly was sitting cross-legged on the floor sorting various items from boxes and putting them into small blue stack boxes. By the looks of it the islanders got through a lot of can-openers, corkscrews and plastic re-use caps.
“You here much longer?” Mary asked.
Kelly looked up and grinned. Her eyes flicked to her right at something behind Mary and then back at the stack box she was filling to toss another corkscrew into it. “About 10 minutes.” Her eyes returned distractedly to whatever she had been looking at.
Mary turned to see and gasped. There in the corner was a red-headed young woman standing face-in with her skirts tucked up and her panties around her ankles. Although her bare skin was well-tanned it did not disguise the fact that her bottom held hard dusky shade of red that could only have been caused by a sustained spanking.
“What the f… I mean…” Mary whipped round to confront Kelly with the obvious question frozen on her lips.
“Kate Pope.” Kelly shrugged as if that explained it all. “She’s Mrs Pope’s daughter… you know my boss…”
“Yes but…” Mary turned for another look. Even from this angle she could see that Kate’s face was almost as red as her bottom and the girl shifted nervously, knowing she was being watched. “That’s so humiliating. What did she do?”
Kate began to fidget and a loud groan escaped her lips, barely muffled by the corner.
“She swiped a few dollars from the till to play slots over at the inn. Didn’t you Kate?” Kelly seemed to be enjoying the girl’s embarrassment. “Then she tried to wheedle a beer out of Ned the barkeeper. She’s only just turned 20 so he ratted her out to her Ma…” Then Kelly lowered her voice and glanced towards the other room where Clara Pope was presumably standing at her counter. “I expect she shined him on a little to get her own way, if you know what I mean.”
Mary blushed and felt an odd frisson at the spectacle. Her eyes were on Kate even as her ears were on Kelly, drinking in every detail of the story.
“You wanna wait for me?” Kelly asked with a grin seeing the effect of Kate’s spanking was having on Mary.
Mary just nodded and pawed the sleeve of her cardigan absently. After a moment she realised she was staring and took a slow walk of the shop pretending to examine the goods. Yet all the while her whole attention was taken with the spanked and cornered Kate.
*
“Does that happen often?” Mary asked Kelly as they were walking home.
“What?” Kelly frowned. “Oh Kate, often enough, she used to get teased something cruel when we were in high school together. Stuff like that ain’t so unusual around here for big kids and the unmarrieds; for the womenfolk anyways.”
Mary remembered Erin and her public exposure on the porch after her spanking. Back in Iowa she would have been shocked, but here she guessed it was part of island life and anyway who’s to see, a distant cousin or a life-long family friend? Mary felt like an anthropologist studying some long-lost remote tribe and her journalist instincts cut in. Her mother had said before she had left Iowa that she reckoned island folk would be strange “cut off from other folks like that, you should go with the flow. Who knows maybe you’ll see another side to life.”
Mary doubted that her mother had envisaged anything quite like this, but nevertheless it was good advice and far from being scared off, she was intrigued. Lanark Island had secrets and she wanted in.
*
The next day she finally met Lisa, a small sparky twenty-something woman with pixie-cut hair and overlarge dungarees that were rolled half-way up her shins.
“You were busy yesterday.” Mary said casually after the introductions.
Lisa glanced sideways at Mrs Bonham who had returned to her downstairs desk to sit at her PC. Mary saw that Lisa was blushing a little. “Oh yes, I… something needed my attention, I was kinda… stuck with it.”
Mrs Bonham peered at them over her reading specs with an amused look and then came to Lisa’s rescue. “How are you getting on with your homework Mary?”
“Oh I… I haven’t had much of a chance to get around yet. Oh but there was one thing… I was in the shop yesterday and Kate Pope, well she… it seems she got herself into some trouble. She was…”
“I can imagine,” Mrs Bonham said, but not without some amusement. “The Popes’ personal domestic arrangements, no matter how much… public spillage, shall we say, there is… it is not our concern. We need to be mindful of the neighbours. Remember?”
Mary looked sheepish and wondered how much Mrs Bonham knew. “What about the youth angle? You know, underage drinking, the problems of limited chances for the young in an island community…”
“Certainly, it will be expected,” Mrs Bonham agreed.
“Expected?”
Mrs Bonham and Lisa laughed.
“Every new intern comes up with the same angle for their first article at the start of every summer. It’s a tradition.” Mrs Bonham was grinning.
Damn. Mary should have known that, she really needed to raise her game.
“Read the cuttings from the last 20 or 30 years. You’ll find my smug little piece somewhere, I fell into the exact same cliché,” Mrs Bonham said kindly. “See if you can come up with a fresh angle.”
Mary pursed her lips and pouted. “I’ll get on it.”
“Not this morning. I want you to go through the press releases from the mainland and see what Lanark angles you can find. The fishing industry news is usually the most productive and maybe tourism. Also education subsidies, State politics, well I think you get the idea.”
“Yes Ma’am.”
Later that day, Mary again had a chance to take a peek in the other room upstairs. She was going through the cuttings library looking for back stories about youth unemployment when she heard someone go out. Glancing out the upstairs window she saw Mrs Bonham heading for the shop, with Lisa busy in the print room, Mary sensed her chance and crept over to the door. It was locked.
“You’ll see inside soon enough, I shouldn’t wonder,” Lisa said coming up behind her.
“I was just…” Mary blushed with a full body flush and fluttered like a bird caught in a hunter’s net.
Lisa laughed and wagged her finger mockingly. Mary shrugged and minced sheepishly back to the cuttings table.
*
The weeks went by as summer gained momentum and Mary took every opportunity to scour the island getting to know it and its inhabitants. The inn proved a rather duller place that she had imagined, although it was the only place in town to get a coffee or a beer. It was frequented mainly by old men and fishermen and Mrs Bonham and Lisa were the only women she ever saw near the place.
Mary also never missed an opportunity to drop in on Kelly at the shop, although if she had been honest her real motive had been the hope of seeing Kate in the corner again.
However life at the Granger’s was far more eventful in that regard. It seemed that barely a week went by when one of the sisters wasn’t in trouble. It was usually the more adventurous Erin, but Hazel wasn’t immune and sometimes both the twins got it together.
One such occasion was about a month after Mary’s arrival and the twins had decided to borrow a boat from one of the neighbours without asking.
“We thought we would be back before they knew it was missing,” Erin explained with a touch of defiance.
Mrs Granger placed her hands on her hips and gaped at her daughter in disbelief.
Ever the more timid of the two, Hazel looked a little pale and kept her eyes fixed on the ground. Kelly licked her lips and moved further up the porch for a better vantage of what was coming.
“Right my darling daughters, shorts and panties folded neatly on that chair.” Mrs Granger pointed at the porch rocker and then folded her arms.
“But Mom…” Hazel whined.
“Do it now. One… two…,” their mother growled.
Erin seized her waist button and pushed her shorts down in one easy motion. Her panties soon followed and by the time Mrs Granger said three she was stooping over the chair to carefully place her clothes completely heedless of her naked display.
Hazel looked more sullen and had only got as far as folding her shorts with her panties still in place. Her mother glared at her and with a last rueful glance at Mary and Kelly, she too stepped out of her underwear.
Both girls were stood before their Mom nude from the waist down with their hands clasped in front of them and even the usually defiant Erin looked downcast. Then Mrs Granger began the mother and father of all scoldings.
“Taking something without permission is stealing… and I don’t care if the Hensons see the funny side…” She began. “By the time I am done with you both, I will be very surprised if you can sit down any time this week.”
Mary swallowed and crossed her legs nervously as she watched the two bare-bottomed girls becoming increasingly cowed.
“Tomorrow you will both go over there to apologise and you tell them exactly how you were punished…”
“But Mom,” Erin protested, no doubt thinking of the Hensons two sons and teenage daughter who would be present at such a humbling explanation.
“Don’t you ‘but Mom me,’ you can both cut along to the other side of the creek as you are and bring back a switch a piece. Now scram.”
Mary watched as both girls hesitantly crept along the path, looking about them like two meerkats scanning for predators. Kelly followed them a short way clapping at herself with glee.
“Won’t somebody see?” Mary gasped.
“Probably not, but you never can tell. The Henson boys might guess what’s coming and be hiding in the woods over yonder.” Kelly sounded decidedly pleased at the prospect, making Mary wish that she wasn’t so curious, or if she could but admit it, excited herself.
The twins didn’t dawdle and returned with the switches in less than 15 minutes.
“Alright, you can wait on the porch facing the wall and don’t you dare move,” Mrs Granger ordered.
“Oh Mom…” Erin bucked her knees as she did a brief dance on the spot. But Mrs Granger just growled by way of reply and both girls scurried to do as they were told.
Mary watched as they took their places with their arms clasped behind their backs still holding the switches.
“Aw, don’t they look cute?” Kelly observed with a giggle after her mother had gone back in.
Mary gaped and blushed for the twins, but didn’t move away. “How long will they…?”
“Oh I think they’ll be there a while yet, maybe long enough to let the Henson boys come a calling,” Kelly tittered.
“Drop dead Kelly,” Erin spat, but Mary noticed she didn’t dare take her nose form the wall.
Mrs Granger poked her head out of the door and scowled. “Keep quite.” Then turning to Kelly she growled, “and you.”
The twins were kept waiting for a good hour or more before Mrs Granger walked out onto the porch wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. The sun was red by then and the heat of the day had begun to melt away.
“Both of you turn and bend across the rail.”
“Mom you can’t it’s not…” Erin rounded on her mother and stamped her foot.
“Over,” Mrs Granger barked.
Looking over her shoulder Erin held her mother’s gaze for a moment longer and then she pouted and followed her sister to the rail.
As the twins obeyed, both folding over so that their bare bottoms were elevated, Kelly swallowed and shifted in her seat, drawing her legs up under her. Mary responded by hugging herself, as she felt a tingle in her lower belly.
Mrs Granger took the switches from her daughter’s hands and examined the two identical pert round bottoms propped up for their punishment.
“Let me see now,” she murmured tapping the first target, Hazel’s bottom.
Mary leaned back in her chair, which was set to the side. From this vantage she could see something of the girl’s faces as well as their bottoms in profile.
Hazel blinked rapidly at each twitch of the switch on her bottom as her mother sized it up for the coming stroke. When it came Hazel winced and drew her mouth into an O.
Mary watched as the switch sliced a dozen red lines across the girl’s bottom as it danced in little circles which matched the gurning motions of her woeful wincing face.
Then Mrs Granger switched to Erin’s bottom and Mary saw at once that the other twin was determined to win out in this contest. Nevertheless after a dozen swipes to her behind she was moist-eyed and wincing as convincingly as her sister.
Twice more their mother assailed their bottoms until they were both whimpering and gently crying; a testament to the red rash of welts that by now marred their behinds.
“I won’t have you stealing,” their mother whispered icily as she tossed away the used up switch.
Mary thought Mrs Granger was done, then she remembered the other switch.
“Please Mom we’re sorry.” Gone was the defiant brat that Erin had tried to be at the start of the punishment and Mrs Granger almost relented.
“It’s all your fault,” Hazel said miserably and the moment was gone.
The second switching was as harsh as the first, only this time all resistance was crushed and long before their mother was done both of the twins were sobbing hard with their bottoms bobbing up and down in agitation.
“I think we’re done,” Mrs Granger tossed the other switch away. “Now, into the parlour both of you and go to the corner; you can stay there until bedtime.”
After a moment Erin got unsteadily to her feet, only pausing to help her twin up and then they both walked dejectedly into the house.
For decency’s sake Mary waited for a while before heading inside for the rest of the show, although Kelly displayed no such scruple.
*
The summer went on and although Mary settled into her work and life on the island she got no nearer to discovering the secret of the other room upstairs at the office. Occasionally she would try the door when no one was around, but it was always locked.
Every once in a while Lisa and Mrs Bonham would disappear inside, but on those occasions Mary was sent on a long errand away from the office. Once she even tried to sneak back to listen at the door, only to find that the front door had been locked behind her.
Then one day Mary met Kelly after work.
“Say why don’t we get a beer?” Mary suggested.
“Oh sure, I’d love to, but it ain’t exactly allowed.” Kelly kicked the sand and crinkled her nose up.
“Well I’m over 21, I’m sure I can get some and we can go over the dunes until supper.”
“Mom’ll skin my hide if she finds out,” Kelly said pointedly.
“Well you get some mint-candy and I’ll get the beer and we’ll make sure she doesn’t find out.”
“OK.” Kelly slapped her thighs in glee and danced off sideways to return to the shop.
The beer was easy, although her purchase at the inn had been greeted with suspicion. But the innkeeper wasn’t exactly swamped in customers and Mary had ID so he let it go.
Kelly said she knew a high vantage in the dunes by the creek where they could set for a while and Mary agreed.
The sand was warm but up on the dunes there was a breeze. The two girls settled in where they could watch the path to the house where they wouldn’t be disturbed.
Mary had only brought two beers each, although back in college she had been used to more, but Kelly seemed more than impressed. The younger girl stared at the bottle a while before pouring into the paper cup she had fetched from the store. The liquid went immediately white and frothy and cascaded over the sides.
“You’re pouring it too fast.” Mary rolled about and laughed.
“I’ll get it,” Kelly insisted and took a sip.
It didn’t look as if she was enjoying it at first and the froth gathered on her upper lip like a milk-moustache.
“It’s bitter,” Kelly said.
“Haven’t you ever had beer before?” Mary was amazed.
“Nope, but I like it.” Kelly said, still sounding uncertain.
Mary fixed her with a stare.
“Well I almost like it.” Kelly burst out laughing.
The girls finished the beer and made their way home sharing out the mint candy as they went.
“You been eating candy before supper?” Kelly’s mom remarked as they got home.
“Just a little,” Kelly replied sheepishly.
“What is that smell?” Mrs Granger took a step forward and took Kelly by both hands and pulled her close. “You’ve been drinking?”
Kelly’s jam dropped and she worked her mouth to deny it even as he eyes confessed.
“Kelly Granger who do you think you are? Do you remember what I said about drinking? The very idea.”
“Oh Mrs Granger it was just two small beers, really it was I… well it was all my idea.”
“That’s no excuse, Kelly knows my rules. You and I will talk later,” Mrs Granger snapped. “Now Kelly go and wait for me on the porch.”
“But Mom… yes Mom.” Kelly scampered away and Mary noticed that the twins were nudging each other and giggling.
Mary herself had a little sinking feeling at the prospect of a telling off from Mrs Granger later, but she also felt a little guilty about feeling a little excited about the fact that Kelly was going to get a spanking.
She ambled out on to the porch and found Kelly with her skirts tucked up and her nose turned to the wall. Her panties were halfway down her thighs leaving her bottom bare and Mary saw that there was more than just a hint of a blush on Kelly’s cheeks.
Mary wanted to say sorry, but that would have been futile and any way she wasn’t. She sat down in a wicker chair that had a good vantage and waited for Mrs Granger to come out. She was fast getting beyond the point of being embarrassed about the Granger girls’ spankings and had decided that it was way better than TV.
She didn’t have long to wait and Mrs Granger came out holding a hairbrush followed by the smirking twins.
“Come here,” Mrs Granger barked and Kelly went to her without fuss.
It seemed odd still that Granger spankings were carried out on the porch, but the Hensons were a way off and wouldn’t normally pass this way to town and so a chance audience was unlikely. But Mary suspected that it didn’t greatly matter to Mrs Granger and the possibility of a public shaming was part and parcel of her disciplinary method.
As she watched Kelly was jack-knifed over her mother’s lap so that her bare bottom was angled up to receiving the brush with which Mrs Granger tapped the proffered cheeks. The girl darted an uncomfortable look at Mary and then hugged her chin into her chest.
In that moment Mary could see that Kelly’s face was thunder red and when the first spank landed with a bit thwack, she made an involuntary shift in her seat. In fact Mary couldn’t help squirming all the way through Kelly’s spanking, which began hard and got harsher.
By the time Mrs Granger’s oldest girl’s bottom matched her face Mary could see that Kelly was making heavy weather of it. Her breathing was ragged and her feet kicked in a parody of escape. Then to Mary’s surprise Kelly began to wail like a siren with tears spilling from her eyes.
“Hush…” Mrs Granger soothed. Then to no one in particular, “she always takes on so.”
Mary was dizzy and damp. This was a classic spanking with all the unnameable elements coinciding to form a true art.
“You know I ought to have you cut a switch after,” Mrs Granger said, her voice taking on an edge. “I should see that you don’t sit for a week, really I should.”
Only as Mrs Granger said it, her eyes flicked up to glance at Mary and the intern quailed at the ambiguous nature of the threat.
Finally Mrs Granger said, “You’re done. Go and stand in the corner while we eat supper. Then you’ll go to bed without yours.”
“Yes Ma’am,” Kelly sobbed.
The evening meal was a trial for Mary. She finally felt a little guilty and Kelly’s presence standing to attention in the corner prevented the matter from being closed. To make matters worse, all the way through the meal Mrs Granger kept looking at Mary accusingly.
“Can we…?” Erin began a question after the meal was done.
“No. I want you in bed. All three of you.”
“Yes Mom,” they all chirped and Kelly seized the welcome release and fled.
“Come on to the porch Mary, I want to talk to you.”
“The dishes, I could…”
“They’ll keep,” Mrs Granger said kindly.
Once the two women settled on the swing chair outside, it became obvious that Mrs Granger wasn’t in a hurry to speak. Mary looked up at the Kaleidoscope of stars and supressing an unformed thought wished she could be on one of them.
“You must have realised that although Kelly is almost 20, she is an immature girl.” Mrs Granger said at last.
“I suppose, but…”
“You must also know that it is illegal to give alcohol to someone under 21 in this state?” Mrs Granger continued, ignoring Mary’s interjection.
“Yes,” Mary said quietly.
“I know you meant no real harm, but I also know that you feel a little guilty about what happened.”
“I suppose.” Mary looked down and blushed.
“You heard what I said to Mary, to both of you, when she was getting her spanking?”
Mary looked up at Mrs Granger her eyes dancing in her head. Mrs Granger waited, willing the girl to acknowledge the question with her eyes. There was a long, long pause.
“About the switching…?” Mary said at last.
“About the switching, about making sure you wouldn’t sit down for a week, you heard me.” Mrs Granger allowed an edge to creep into her voice.
“But you can’t…” Mary fell silent.
“If you ever do that or anything like it again, that is exactly what will happen. And if I have to send you bare-assed all the way to the Henson’s yard for a switch in order to make my point, then I will.” There was certainty in Mrs Granger’s voice and Mary swallowed.
“Now Mary Louise Rossington I am going to give you the spanking of your life and tomorrow you will apologise to everyone and go to bed without supper as Kelly has tonight.”
“But Mrs Granger…” Mary began a half-hearted protest, but her heart was pumping and she was already becoming overwhelmed by the situation’s gravity. Even as Mary fluttered like a trapped bird, Mrs Granger pulled her gently across her lap and began to unbutton her shorts. Mary squirmed rather than struggled, appalled at her own submission, her head whipping round as her shorts and panties slid down her legs together.
“Please Mrs Granger you can’t do this…” Mary had been obliged to say it even though she knew it was a lie.
The spank was sharp and had real bite, far worse than her mother’s efforts. Mary could feel the sting dance across the divide between both her buttocks. As she considered this and tried to garner her thoughts, time hung on end and seemed to slow and race at one and the same time.
The second spank came soon after and then another, so fast in fact that the biting strokes soon merged leaving Mary panting and clawing at her landlady’s thighs and seat cushions.
“My you colour well,” Mrs Granger said as she spanked on, “I know a grown woman like you won’t surrender easy, but you will, we have all night.”
The swing seat began to rock as if two tigers were locked in combat, but this was no contest. If there had been witnesses they would have heard that the angry grunts soon gave way to bitter mewling as the panting gave way to sobs.
After minutes beyond counting Mary began to be wracked with great hiccoughing sobs and mutter incoherently.
“What’s that dear?” Mrs Granger asked softly.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Mary began her refrain.
“Are you? Truly?”
“Yes,” Mary wailed and it was true.
“Then you can take the rest on account, I am not done young lady, you need this.”
Mary was done and she collapsed in surrender, she could take no more, but she must. It was entirely Mrs Granger’s call and clearly the woman wasn’t finished with her.
*
The next day sitting at work had been nigh on impossible and that evening Mary stuttered and blushed through her apologies. The situation was made worse by the fact that her whole demeanour shouted that she had so been spanked. Even as she offered her shambling apology her hand massaged her bottom. Then apology over, Mary had been sent meekly to bed while Kelly and the twins tried not to laugh.
It had been hard to sleep and not just because she was restricted to lying on her belly. It was still light outside and the sounds from the house downstairs where everyone else was still very much up and about only served to underline the fact that she was being punished.
The previous evening the spanking had continued for a geological age, until well past the point Mary was broken and it did not end until Mrs Granger herself had been spent. Then for an hour or more Mary had been set facing the porch wall for a good cry while her bare bottom cooled in the night breezes. Then with Mary still at her penitent vigil, they had talked.
Then as now, gradually a feeling of cosy belonging had stolen over Mary and instead of resentment, she felt as she sometimes did back home in Iowa. Only now the punishment had been upgraded and the spanking had actually hurt instead of merely being an uncomfortable annoyance.
This she realised it was exactly what she had needed; someone to really take her in hand occasionally, instead of the routine of going through the same motions that hadn’t really worked since she had been 12. It was still an embarrassing childish punishment, but stepped up enough to get the attention of a grown woman.
Had this been what she had intended all along when she gave Kelly the beer? Mary wondered. She didn’t know and she realised that she didn’t care. She didn’t want to think about control or what she had intended, she just wanted to embrace the feeling of belonging and adventure that was opening up to her.
In her mind she relived the spanking, every humiliating swat of it. Only this time her anger and pain were overlaid with the final comfort of submission that she had felt towards the end of the ordeal. And something else; the tightening in her lower belly that she had experienced while watching Kelly and the twins spanking returned and blossomed. She had known all along what it was and it had confused her. But now she embraced it, as she slipped her hand between her legs to explore the wetness she found there. What if Mrs Granger discovered her now, she thought and the possibility seized her and she was lost, biting hard into her pillow so that she didn’t shout out.
To be continued.
