supplicium post mortem

—Four o’clock, is it?

—That’s what it says here.

—Well, it was inevitable, wasn’t it? Had the cane before? …What, never?

—It isn’t exactly my fault!

—No one’s said it is… Ri-ight. Eyes front, listen to me… Listening?

—Yes.

—Do sport beforehand. Eight or nine circuits as fast as you can take.

—Why?

—Nerves. Two: look smart. Shower, comb your hair, polish those shoes, make sure there’s a crease in those trousers.

—You make it sound like going to church.

—Don’t mock. Three: It sometimes helps to count backwards in your head. Only four more to go. Etcetera.

—What if you’re told to count them out?

—Then disregard, obv!

—Obv.

—Where was I? Oh, yes: Be on time. Unless you want to go for extras, which I don’t recommend first time out.

—No fear.

—Five: Don’t clench. Makes it hurt more. Trust me. Try breathing in when you hear the swish.

—What if… ?

—What?

—What if you can’t stay down?

—Hold onto something, rail of the chair, your ankles, anything. Do not get up until told to. Like I said, don’t go for extras.

—What if…

—You can take it. Believe me. It’s bad, but not as bad as you think.

—Ha.

—Oh yes, six: When you’re told to stand up, don’t forget the thank you.

—Check.

—Cheek under duress. There’s hope for you yet. Right then, off you go.

—Thanks.

—You’re welcome. See you at four.

---

A slight twist on this week’s theme of teacher. Read it as you like, of course, but for the first speaker, I recommend cf. with the unnamed prefect in Dawn. Thanks to Ang for Microfantasy Monday!

She wasn’t a rower. Those people were beyond her in every way, more fit, more popular, more everything. She could scarcely do pull-ups at PE. He didn’t row either – that boy Andrew, from her class – until this summer.

From the slope above the tow-path, she watched as he dragged himself to the boathouse at dawn and every afternoon at four. She’d gone initially to watch him, but now she set her alarm as much to see the one who met him there. This other boy’s name she knew; everyone knew it – James. He’d been star of their rowing team until he left to row for Oxford. Now he rowed beside Andrew, his muscles flexing beneath the singlet he wore, held together at the shoulder with a safety pin. Through the binos she could see the scar on his forearm. There’d been a motor accident in his Upper Sixth year. He’d been dragged three hundred yards along the M25. He was lucky, they said.

She killed the mosquito on her cheek and trained the binos down into the boathouse. The sun cast long shadows through the windows. The path was clear, the evening still; their voices carried up the slope. He was berating Andrew now, as he often did, for his lack of effort. Andrew’s father hadn’t hired him to waste time, but to train Andrew up. Andrew shuffled and bent reluctantly over the scull. James held the back of his neck and raised a slipper. She watched.

---

What is Flash Fiction Friday?

Read other folks writing this week:

• Travis
• Frenchie
• PapaTomLA
• Rafi

—God…

—Quite.

—For something so bloody…

—I didn’t think it was.

—Painful, that was bloody terrific.

—It gets easier.

—It’s very wicked, isn’t it?

—Yes.

—Is it the wickedest thing you can do?

—Absolutely.

—And you made me do it.

—I did.

—I didn’t want to.

—No.

—And then you made me spunk.

—I did.

—Is that what happens to naughty boys?

—It is.

—What else happens to them?

—You know perfectly well.

—Do they get the cane?

—They do.

—Then do they get buggered?

—Good and hard.

—Is it very naughty?

—The naughtiest.

—Do it again.

—We ought to have some sleep, you know.

—I don’t see why.

—You’ll look like a raccoon at Chapel, for one.

—Do you suppose there’s something wrong with us?

—The game, you mean? It’s only pretend.

—But other people…?

—Damn other people. Other people do worse, and call it…

—What?

—Ordinary.

—I don’t want to be a pansy.

—You aren’t. We aren’t.

—What are we, then?

—Friends.

—Friends?

—And if two friends can’t be naughty together, what can they do?

—What if we’re caught?

—There’d be trouble.

—Would we be whacked?

—Oh, yes.

—Hard?

—Very hard.

—Before the whole school?

—And their mothers and sisters.

—Not that!

—Oh, yes. And then we’d be sent to Borstal, and you know what happens to boys there.

—Tell me.

—It’s late.

—We can sleep when we’re dead. Tell me…

---

Those schoolboys have been at it again. They really aren’t safe for work. Make of them what you will, but I thought these were the same who appeared in “Dawn,” and they certainly attend the same school as those in last’s week’s “Cricket.” I simply cannot explain their rudeness except to say they appear to inhabit an era different from our own.

Microfantasy Monday is the brainchild of Sweltering Celt. The theme this week was sleep.

— So what do you make of the new boy, day two?

— Titchy one? Not much.

— Really?

— Haven’t had a chance, honestly. Second XI are driving me right round the bend.

— Ah.

— Clearly you’ve made something of him, though. Speak.

— Promising, we think.

— On or off the pitch?

— Both.

— Go on.

— We-ell…he gives off like he doesn’t know he’s born, but.

— Mettle?

— In spades, I’d wager. Had to umpire the Third this afternoon.

— Oh, and you suffered.

— Hideously! But as for yon tadpole, he’s a straight bat.

— Wake me in a year’s time.

— Should’ve seen his face when he was dismissed.

— Oh?

— Positively sulked. Scrumptious.

— Dear me. We can’t be doing with poor sports in this house.

— Certainly not.

— Where’s he now? At nets?

— Bound to be.

— Send him up. As he is. And before you think it, you can make yourself scarce.

— Glutton! If you’re going to get those flannels down, the least you can do is let me watch.

— Filthy boy. Impatient boy.

— Guilty.

— The flannels may or may not come down, but the only thing he’ll feel today is the sole of my slipper.

— Today.

— Vive hodie. Leave tomorrow to develop itself.

— Oh, the developments!

— Get out, you. Out.

---

Microfantasy Monday is the brainchild of Sweltering Celt. The theme this week was sports.

Still exploring the local footpaths, she took a new route back from the river, one winding through trees along the quarry. Footsteps crunched behind her, and although dark would not fall for hours, she felt uneasy and crouched down to empty her shoe of sand.

A tall man strode down the footpath, wearing grey trousers, dress shoes, white billowy shirt, and a black-and-red striped tie. He nodded as he passed, purposeful.

A few minutes down the path, she glimpsed him at the edge of the quarry, trimming the leaves off a thin branch with a pocket knife, a bundle of clothing at his feet. Below, a boy her age treaded water, his voice echoing up the bank.

“Sir, can’t we discuss it?”

“Certainly,” said the man. “Out you get.”

She watched as the boy hoisted himself, naked, from the water. The man tucked his tie into his shirt, gripped the boy by the shoulder, bent him over the tree trunk, and applied the switch.

“You do not swim alone.” Thwack-thwack-thwack. “You do not swing from this rope.” Thwack-thwack-thwack. The boy yelped. “As previously discussed.” The man tightened his grip and continued.

Afterwards, he handed the boy a handkerchief and told him to dress. She dashed away before she was seen.

After supper that night, the Rector brought a visitor into the garden.

“Casey, say good-evening to Mr. Carrstairs, your summer tutor.”

She stood, trembling. He wore a jacket now, and a silk handkerchief. “I believe we’ve already met,” he said.

---

As it happens, I came upon this very spot on a footpath in sunny Shepperton this week (photo not local, obv). There was in fact a pile of apparently abandoned clothes by the broken rope-swing, but no-one else in sight. Been wondering about it ever since…

What is Flash Fiction Friday?

Check out the other writers this week:

• Rafi
• PapaTomLA

They lounged on the chapel roof together, smoking, as a grey light faded up around them. A gradual enchantment, he thought, nothing like the abrupt arrival of Faerie in the MacDonald he’d been reading. Dawn for them was not rosy-fingered, promising sun, but rather suffocating, extinguishing stars.

He pinched the cigarette but refrained from flicking it over the edge. Certain fellow prefects were going through a zealous phase; finding it would only encourage them. He wished such people could wear their power more lightly. His colleagues could never understand the lack of contradiction in delivering a sharp and deserved sixer to a daring-do fourth-former and then passing unofficial hours with him as he just had. Why did people so insist on categories and absolutes? He massaged his jaw. His fingers smelt of cheap tobacco and sex.

Billy (as byzantine nicknaming called him) lay along the leads, his eyes bloodshot but relaxed around the edges for a change. Nothing like a good buggering to dissolve the arrogance and tension.

“God,” Billy groaned, “I can’t bear the hols.”

Mention of the holidays seemed as brash and intrusive as the notion of Latin. How he would himself endure the long, sterile summer he didn’t know. On second thought, he did know – as he had the last four years, with longing. Longing for sensation, charge, the real McCoy. Longing for return of the enchantment now obliterated by the dawn, for the return of good things.

He traced Billy’s eyelid with a fingertip: thin, alive.

---

What is Flash Fiction Friday?

Check out other stories from this week:

• vanimp
• PapaTomLA
• Rafi’s World

When Father Donne stopped outside the open-windowed choir-room, he could see Dr. H was in a lather, broken blood vessels in his cheeks, about to start ejecting boys. With graduation only three days away, this was undesirable. Donne listened, unseen, as Dr. H. raised his voice to instruct them in macaronic verse.

“Macaroni!” Rex Traherne interrupted. “Stuck a feather in his [muffled] and called it macaroni!”

“Sir!” Theodore Marvell broke in. The laughter occasioned by Rex Trahere subsided.

“Yes, Theo?”

“Sir, isn’t it true that Britten was a flautist?” Suppressed snickers.

Dr. H, flustered: “Not that I’m aware of. Why?”

“I heard he was a very accomplished flautist!”

The snickering exploded into a peal of giggles, from the eighth grade no less. Donne may have spent recent decades in the cloister, but he knew puerile innuendo when he heard it.

“Boys!” he said, bursting into the choir-room, “I can hardly believe what I am hearing.” The eighth grade tried unsuccessfully to contain their mirth. “I believe,” Donne continued, “that some very dark clouds are approaching.”

“But, sir,” Felix Marvell replied, straight faced, “Isn’t it true that Britten was a flautist?” At this, Theodore lost his battle with laughter.

“I’ve no idea,” Donne replied, “but I can say with some confidence that rain is headed this way. Pouring rain.” The eighth grade blushed and fell silent. “Carry on,” Donne said lightly, departing.

He resumed his perambulation, pleased to have instructed the eight grade, that year, in the virtues of rhyming slang, if nothing else.

Confused? Try the glossary.

---

What is Flash Fiction Friday?

Check out other stories from this week:

• vanimp
  
• Rafi’s World
• PapaTomLA

On a tip in the “Book chat” area of the MMSA forums, and after previewing it on Google books, I borrowed from the library Novel Gazing, Queer Readings in Fiction. This ridiculous waste of time considers itself a very serious academic tome, an anthology of “queer” readings of literature. [Politically incorrect opinion #1: Queer, Feminist, Marxist, whatever-ist readings of literature are bullshit, self-absorbed, and entirely miss the point.] The essay of interest, “Flogging is Fundamental: Applications of Birch in Swinburne’s Lesbia Brandon,” was very silly but had good subtitles and quotes and was grappling, I think with a worthy question, namely: if Swinburne’s flogging scenes aren’t dismissible (as many literary critics over the ages have dismissed them), and if they are compelling and somehow powerful, what is that power and how does it work? In other words, why is Swinburne so hot? Now that would be a worthy essay.

I did enjoy the quotes from Swinburne’s letters, particularly the one that “addressed” deSade and explained why Justine was so tediously over done – ha, ha, I agree! So, why is Lesbia Brandon so f-ing hot?

1. The massive pent-up emotion of it all; the heart; the transferred and frustrated love and lust.
2. The heightened tension of talking about it all. The dinner party, for instance, is hot because it is so excruciating for Bertie to have his flogging (and his heroism) discussed and alluded to in public. Reading it, I enjoy seeing the sensitive, pretty Bertie squirm; and, I also relish being him and experiencing that pleasing, burning shame.
3. The relationships are all so intimate and raw, unlike the endlessly-discussed, endlessly-analyzed relationships of today.
4. The birch itself is severe without being brutish. It cuts and draws blood (especially from sensitive Bertie), without wounding or injuring deeply. It’s rather surface. Anyone can recover from a domestic birching. In some contexts (sauna?), the birch can even be stimulating and therapeutic.
5. The bareness required is also hot. The birch nicely combines spanking with caning – sharp, uncounted strokes; necessariliy undressed application; area and point weapons, as Marky used to say.
6. There is also, in Swinburne, the powerful bonding relationship between the one who gives (here the tutor) and the one to whom it’s given (Bertie). It’s a big event between them. Not all big, intimate events involve sex.
7. The lushness of the language also makes it hot (as the queer essay author remarked, the use of flogging language for everything else, the sea, etc).

But the pent-up emotion is the nub of the matter. Imagine, for instance, that Bertie were merely flogged a la Charlie Collingwood (which is sillier and less hot; its only charge, imo, comes from saying forbidden things – bottom, birch, etc.) by someone who didn’t have feelings for him (even displaced feelings like Denham has). Imagine it was like deSade – hundreds of yelling strokes, blood all over, etc. SNORE.

And what if no one spoke of it? Or if they spoke endlessly and directly of it? Oh yes, sister, I was flogged today, on my bare bottom, oh hundreds of strokes well laid on. Did it hurt? dear me yes, how I howled the place down, the blood oh my did it run, and it still hurts most frightfully even now. — Ah, Mr. Denham, tell us all about it. — Certainly, sir. I began with ten firm strokes to the left flank, then I switched sides and gave ten to the right (the ambidextrousness, you know), Bertie howled thrice, “yelped” he would term it, but I gave him a stoke to draw blood at last, that raised the pitch but also likely signaled some release, if only of blood, ho ho. ETC…

Tedious, we say, esp. when you can have this:

The magnetism of the sea drew all fear out of [Bertie], and even had there been any discomfort or peril to face, it was rather desire than courage that attracted and attached him to the rough water. Once in among green and  white seas, Herbert forgot that affliction was possible on land, and in his rapture of perfect satisfaction was glad to make friends with the man [Denham] he feared and hated in school hours. The bright and vigorous delight that broke out at such times nothing could repress or resist; he appealed to his companion as to a school fellow and was answered accordingly. “He was a brick in the water,” Herbert told young Lunsford [a friend]; “like another fellow you know, and chaffs one about getting swished, and I tell him it’s a beastly chouse and he only grins.” This intimacy was broken by one tragic interlude; bathing had been forbidden on all hands one stormy day before the sea had gone down, and Herbert, drawn by the delicious intolerable sound of the waves, had stolen down to them and slipped in; having had about enough in three or four minutes, he came out well buffeted and salted, with sea-water in his throat and nostrils and eyes; and saw his tutor waiting just above watermark between him and his clothes. Finding him gone, Denham had quietly taken a tough and sufficient rod and followed without a superfluous word of alarm. He took well hold of Bertie, still dripping and blinded; grasped him round the waist and shoulders, wet and naked, with the left arm and laid on with the right as long and as hard as he could. Herbert said afterwords that a wet swishing hurt most awfully, a dry swishing was a comparative luxury. He did not care to face again the sharp superfluous torture of these stripes on the still moist flesh; and from that day he was shy of facetious talk in the water or out: thus the second stage of his apprenticeship began.

A. C. Swinburne, Lesbia Brandon, ch. II

*sigh* always wanted a whacking like that…