The man at the cafe by the window looked nervous. ‘No, not exactly nervous,’ Deborah thought, ‘but nervous mixed with excited anticipation. More trepidation.’ She wouldn’t have noticed him if she hadn’t had a flash of that agitated expression as she entered the café. Otherwise he was a nondescript looking man who wouldn’t particularly draw the eye, but there was something about his demeanor which interested Deborah briefly, until thoughts of her morning supervened.
She had had a frustrating morning, having traveled to London for the last day of the conference, only to hear of the sudden illness of the American ecologist she had waited to hear present his paper in her own research area. Rather than hang about, she decided to come back to her Aunt Andrea’s house, in which she had been staying for four days. It was very convenient to the conference venue, and moreover it gave her a chance to get to know better Aunt Andrea and her friend, Nicole. Andrea was her mother’s younger sister, and she was something of a mysterious character in the family. Not mysterious in that she was a subject of active speculation and discussion, but rather a person as to whom there was some question, which prompted the feeling that there was a lot more to know than was known. Andrea’s relationship with Nicole was open to speculation, but it was a tired, stale and well-chewed question that hadn’t advanced very far from its opening when the two women became all but inseparable at university. They were now about forty, and lived together, but while much was assumed as to their private lives, nothing was known.
Deborah always had been fascinated by Aunt Andrea. She had seen very little of her while growing up, so she maintained the appeal of the exotic, but there was something more to attract the growing girl’s interest. She didn’t know what it was, but now that Deborah was mature and had more experience of life, she recognized the quality as an understated but smouldering sensuality. To Deborah, Andrea was warm and welcoming, and great fun. She had enjoyed the last few days of her company in the evenings; and Nicole was friendly and entertaining too. There was something unsettling about her, though, and with very little real observation to pin the feeling upon, Deborah thought the older woman had a cold, even ruthless streak.
Deborah was not thinking of the ladies now, though, but rather of her upcoming field trip to the Great Barrier Reef to study green sea turtles for her PhD project. It was an exciting prospect, but a worrying one too, as there was so much preparation to face, and the uncertainty that always accompanies data collection and its ultimate contribution to her thesis. So deep were her thoughts in warm, clear and coral bejeweled waters that she did not notice the man leave the café a little ahead of her, and she’d never have thought of him again had she not been just in time to see him, to her considerable surprise, enter Andrea’s gate and approach the front door. By the time Deborah reached the gate the man had disappeared, so he must have been admitted to the house. This aroused some curiosity. She wondered if he could be a lover of one of the ladies. That would be consistent with his air of anticipation in the café, but it would also explode the accepted views of the family on the relationship between Andrea and Nicole. Deborah was not such a scholar that she was indifferent to base curiosity and the attractions of being able to report a tantalizing erotic bombshell to her family upon her return home, so she approached the house quietly and somewhat furtively.
There was a mystery in the house, of course. That much was perfectly clear, and had been posed on Deborah’s first day with Andrea. There was evidently a cellar, and when Deborah had absent-mindedly tried the knob of the door that led down to it from the hall, Andrea told her that it was a private place always kept locked, and that she was not to concern herself with it. This was all very Mansfield Parkish, and naturally it evoked a curiosity as to the nature and contents of the room. This curiosity was almost satisfied the following evening when Deborah, in doing some desultory weeding in the garden bed beside the house, came upon a small window almost at ground level. It was all but covered with ivy, and the glass was opaque with the dust and grime of years. Deborah wiped a small section and applied her eye to it, but as the space overlooked was in darkness she could gain no more intelligence than that there was indeed a space.
Deborah entered the house quietly, and prompted by a titillation that had her heart in her mouth, she went upstairs to her room where she deposited her bag and jacket. She first listened, then cracked the doors of Andrea’s and Nicole’s rooms, for the resident ladies maintained separate rooms, whatever else they shared, but the house seemed to be empty. It was then Deborah thought of the cellar and the small window.
Sure enough, a light was on in the cellar. Deborah could see that much through the ivy and grime. When she crouched down and parted some ivy sprigs she caught her breath and her eyes flew wide. There was strong light illuminating the cellar and the first thing Deborah saw was Aunt Andrea’s bottom. She shook her head and it took a moment before she could accommodate the fact of what her senses were telling her. Andrea had her back to the window and was naked from the waist to her knees, her lower legs being encased in long leather boots with high heels. Her upper body was enclosed in a black leather looking corset, of a type that only existed for fancy dress, as far as Deborah had thought. ‘What on earth,’ Deborah wondered, but then Andrea moved and the watching girl’s heart, until then beating furiously, stopped, and she gasped with what breath she could muster. Strapped to a sort of wooden frame was the café man, quite naked. It was like a narrow table with a lower plank on which the man was kneeling, with each leg strapped to the bench legs with Velcro strips. His upper body was secured flat and tightly against the bench top. The man’s bottom and legs were facing Deborah’s vantage point, so she had a view that fascinated her, even while her mind reeled in confusion and astonishment. It was a nice bottom, of a mannish sort, and that was the sort Deborah liked. It was muscular and small, though well-rounded, and best of all, the skin was smooth and hairless. The contrast to Andrea’s bottom was marked, and Deborah unconsciously compared the two in her mind. Aunt Andrea was a woman of about five foot seven in stature, Deborah’s own height. Slim when young, she had put on a little weight in maturity, though to call her plump would be to say too much. Her legs were smooth and shapely, but her bottom was full and generous. The corset covered her lower breasts, but revealed ample cleavage. To Deborah’s surprise, her aunt was completely devoid of pubic hair, as far as the limitations of her vantage point allowed her to judge.
Just when Deborah was assessing this view and its numerous sources of fascination, she was electrified by another vision. It was Nicole, entering her view from the end of the cellar. She too was in a corset, also black, and her lower body was similarly exposed, with the difference that the corset was cut away in the front to expose her breasts. They were lovely. Nicole was a striking figure, about five foot ten tall, and almost as slim and willowy as a cat-walk model. She was beautiful enough to be one, though a touch old. In her almost naked state, the charm among many that first drew the eye was the thick and unruly bush of bright red pubic hair, all the brighter for the contrast to her milky skin. ‘That’s the thing about red-heads,’ Deborah thought, ‘they have such lovely skin colours,’ her eyes going to Nicole’s breasts for confirmation. They were small but beautifully shaped, with aureole and nipples of a gorgeous shell pink. Her hair was in a stylish short cut, but Deborah thought that were she to have hair of that colour she’d make the most of it with long cascades falling below her shoulders. Nicole’s bottom was by no means the least of her attractions. It was small and tight, almost boyish, but a little too round and smooth for that. After examining the scene with wonder, Deborah finally looked about what areas of the cellar her view commanded. It was like the set if a very odd film. There were several pieces of furniture that variously resembled the bench, but they were of diverse design. One was like a slatted barrel set on a saw-trestle, with straps at its corners. There was a flat bench, and a ladder-like arrangement against one wall. Upon the walls were rows of hooks from which hung a great variety of implements of punishment: canes, straps, leather and wooden paddles, and a variety if whips. Deborah’s head swam in examining this collection and imagining the uses of each implement. Imagination was not long called upon to supply her impressions, as demonstration was introduced at that moment.
Nicole has holding a whip and running the lash through her left hand. It was about four feet long, and as thick as a thumb at the handle end, tapering to little finger dimensions at its tip. It was black, and looked to be composed of plaited strips. Andrea fondled a cane, of about three feet in length. These tools were immediately put into use, most vigorously. Andrea stepped towards the immobilized man and with a full swing of her arm lashed his offered bottom with the cane. He jerked back, but could achieve no real movement owing to his bonds. No sooner was the cane drawn back than Nicole swung the whip from the right of the bench. It was a cracking blow which set the man to bucking and wriggling. Angry red lines began to stripe the white bottom as the beating continued with very little pause between strokes. While the man squirmed to the utmost that his bonds would allow, no sound came to Deborah in the garden bed. ‘The window must be double-glazed,’ she thought to herself. Deborah could scarcely credit her senses as to the reality of the scene before her. It was so shocking and completely beyond anything she’d imagined about her aunt’s private life. She knew she should withdraw and leave the occupants of the cellar to privacy, but while she felt acute embarrassment and shock, she also felt a growing excitement of a type she had not before experienced. She was flushed and her breathing was rapid and shallow, while she had a hollow sensation in the pit of her stomach. She soon became conscious that what she saw was arousing her in an erotic way, and she felt some dismay at this. At twenty-four, Deborah had some sexual experience, but not a lot compared to friends her age. She’d devoted most of her time and energy to her studies, but she enjoyed sex and liked men. She’d always felt, however enjoyable the experiences she had with men, some vague feeling of incompletion, and that somehow there had to be more. Now, her growing arousal was making her uncomfortable. One part of her mind urged her to withdraw to her room for the relief of sensations that were becoming urgent. The other part wouldn’t permit her to miss one stroke of the whip or cane. The trouble was that her awkward position and clothing did not admit any fondling of that part of her person that was beginning to throb and demand urgent attention. She was in classy conference clothes, a dove grey short but elegant blouse, and black trousers of fine wool. They were neither loose nor tight, but just right for both comfort and movement, and while they revealed her fine figure, they did not spoon it into the eyes of those who saw her.
Deborah was amazed that the two ladies continued to flog the wretched man. She had lost any notion of the time that had elapsed since the whipping began, and had no clear idea of the number of strokes delivered, but it must have been a lot. The man’s bottom was now covered with red and purple welts, many oozing droplets of blood. How he endured it, she could not imagine, but he appeared to be more composed than in the beginning. He did not jerk about, but lay passively on the bench while Andrea and Nicole took turns lashing him. Deborah thought they should stop, but was becoming increasingly excited by the scene, and wanted the ladies to strike harder and harder and never to stop. Suddenly they did. Both ladies undid the man’s bonds, and they very gently helped him to stand. He was unsteady at first, and Andrea supported him with an arm around the shoulder. Deborah gasped when a change in position allowed her to see that the man had an almost vertical erection. His cock wasn’t huge, but certainly was making the most of itself, and it was something the watching girl could not but admire, and desire. She was thrilled to see Nicole casually grasp the straining cock and give it two or three pumps. They were enough, and were answered by a lavish ejaculation of five or six squirts of fluid, the second of which hit Nicole’s thigh and ran down her black boots onto the high heel.
That was enough for the voyeur. She eased herself up, and quickly repaired to her room. As she did so, Andrea turned to Nicole and said ‘we have a mouse, I think.’
‘A very flustered mouse I think she is too,’ the redhead replied. ‘Do you think she should be given a closer look at the equipment?’
‘A very close look is required, but we’ll let her compose herself first. I think it would be cruel to interrupt her for a while.’
The ladies, while cruel in the cellar, were compassionate and hospitable above. The man was treated with every courtesy, and given a cup of tea to assist his revival. He was well known to the ladies, as he visited at intervals of two or three months. Presently he left the house. The ladies had not changed from the cellar outfits as they had further business there.
‘I think,’ said Andrea, ‘that we could interview our mouse now. Will you ask her to attend below?’
Deborah had not long composed herself after the tumultuous experiences of the last hour, and was lying on her bed, her clothing still in disarray, when her privacy was broken by the sudden entrance of Nicole. ‘Forgive my dress’ Nicole said, ‘but don’t pretend any surprise at my costume. If you’ll accompany me, your aunt requires your attendance in the cellar.’
Deborah could only stammer, blush and avert her gaze. She was overcome with mortification, embarrassment and apprehension in about equal measures, so she meekly followed Nicole downstairs. Her distress did not prevent her studying Nicole’s bottom as she went before her, and wondering what it would look like after a thrashing such as she had meted out. Deborah was trembling when she entered the cellar room and stood chastened before her aunt. Her downward cast gaze took in at close quarters Andrea’s bare pussy. It seemed huge in its brazen exposure. The mound was large and protuberant, while the labia were full and pouting, with a deep cleft. Deborah unconsciously assessed all this in the part of her mind not occupied by the anxiety of her predicament.
‘Your sneaking has violated our privacy and is a poor return of our hospitality’ Andrea began. ‘No doubt it was an unlucky accident that acquainted you with the morning’s events, but it is too late to worry about that now. I’ll discuss our activities with you later, but now, having become aware of our proclivities, you must partake of them, and join us in this particular closet, lest you blab to the whole family. We are not ashamed of our fetish or lifestyle, and we are quite open about it in our own circle, but I have no wish to be the chief object of tittering gossip around the family Christmas turkey.’
‘I wouldn’t say’ the cowed girl stammered.
‘No, well you won’t after this. Understand clearly that we won’t assault you without your consent, but unless you submit to a sample of corporal punishment here and now, you must leave this house and not return. You and I will necessarily be alienated from real affection and sympathy.’
Deborah felt acutely the difficulty she was in. She dreaded what must surely be to come, involving those fearful canes and whips. She had never been thrashed and she was not brave physically. On the other hand, she felt she deserved to pay for her rudeness in spying, and she longed to maintain and increase her aunt’s affection – especially now that Andrea appeared so fascinating and deep in dark secrets. The feeling that mainly prompted Deborah’s submission to her fate was the recognition that she was aroused and excited by the prospect of being stripped and thrashed by these two dazzling women. She feared it, but she knew she wanted it, while doubting her ability to endure anything like what she had witnessed earlier.
‘Very well, aunt. I’m sorry I spied upon you and Nicole, but curiosity overcame me and I couldn’t help myself.’
‘I couldn’t have either’ Andrea replied, ‘so I can’t blame you too much. We will give you a sound spanking, however. You’ll be tied to that horse, more for your own safety than anything else. If you really can’t bear it, tell us and we’ll stop, but I expect you to take a severe thrashing. Now, take off your slacks and knickers and bend across the horse.’
Andrea indicated the round-topped, slatted apparatus on legs. In exposing herself, Deborah felt shame, pride and arousal all at once. Nicole’s eyes lit up with admiration and desire upon her first sight of Deborah’s bottom. It was sublime. While not small, it was beautifully contoured, curving well to her rear in the way of an African woman’s bottom. The creamy whiteness negated that similarity, however. Her pussy was obscured by the natural growth of curly hair, dark brown in shade. Deborah had never bothered with the pubic topiary fashionable among her contemporaries, but she had thought she’d have to do something about it before her trip to the reef, where she’d spend a lot of time in swimwear.
Nicole very happily fastened the straps to Deborah’s wrists and ankles and knees, and cinched her waist tightly with a long strap. Deborah was naked from the waist down and fully exposed with her thighs well parted. The cleft of her bottom was spread, and her slit was slightly open and in clear view. It was a view that delighted and excited Nicole, and Andrea was equally sensible of its charms.
‘We will not use the whip as this is your first time,’ Nicole said. ‘We will both use canes, but I doubt you’ll feel that you have got off easy.’
Deborah had no time to feel relief that she’d escaped the dreaded whip when a loud swish interrupted her thoughts. In times of extremity the mind seems to have infinite time, and she wondered what the noise was until she felt the shock of the cane’s impact across the middle of her distended bottom. She felt the impact before she registered the pain. It exploded, not only in her bottom, but throughout the universe. It was everywhere, numbing her mind, vanquishing thought, stopping time. Deborah screamed, though where she got breath for it, she couldn’t imagine. Two facts registered in the tattered shreds of Deborah’s mind: it hurt like fury; and she loved it. She dreaded the next stroke, but was hungry for it. Of course it came.
Andrea lashed her slowly and deliberately, with increasing force. ‘She’s taking this well for a novice,’ she remarked to an admiring Nicole.
The burning, stinging and throbbing built up in Deborah’s bottom until she thought she’d faint, but her excitement and arousal grew too. She was amazed at her reaction, she’d never imagined anything like this in her wildest fantasies, yet she was responding to it more ardently than to any previous experience.
After ten strokes Andrea gave way to Nicole. That lady quickly made Deborah feel that her ordeal was beginning afresh. She had a different style from Andrea, with more flick in the wrist. The lashes stung in a different way, and at once Deborah was howling and bucking. Nicole was transported in bliss. The sight of the girl’s deeply welted bottom was intensely gratifying, and she could scarcely endure the glimpses of her open slit that was animated by the bucking and wriggling of the stricken girl. Too soon Nicole’s ten strokes were expended, and Deborah, at once relieved and disappointed, thought her punishment was over. It was not so.
Nicole was not ready to surrender so delightful a prize, and she nodded at the ravaged bottom. ‘She can take a lot more. Look at her slit, it’s positively drenched. She loves this. How about the drum-roll?’
‘Yes, she’s taking it well, and that fine bottom of hers still has white strips. We can’t waste those. Drum-roll it is.’
Deborah could make nothing of this code, except that she knew she was loving it and could feel how wet she was becoming. The rest became clear soon enough. Andres took her position to Deborah’s left while Nicole was stationed to her right. On a nod from Andrea they both struck the offered bottom simultaneously, Nicole employing a precise back-hand. Both tormenters caned as quickly as they could, delivering twenty strokes each in nine to ten seconds. Deborah lost her mind, lost her body, lost herself. She was swept into a river of pain, submerged and buffeted in its rapid courses, unaware of anything but the rush of the current and her helplessness. She was outside herself, outside time, outside space, in a different place the existence of which she’d previously had no power to imagine. The place enfolded her, embraced her and fulfilled her for the first time in her life. She became light and expanded like an exploding star, only to fall back into herself, limp and exhausted. Ten seconds are only ten seconds, but in that other place Deborah’s altered mind had a vast stretch of time to experience and examine her sensations. The interval seemed to be as long as her whole previous life, yet was gone in a flash.
Too soon for Nicole. She was almost hyper-ventilating when she threw down her cane with a sigh. ‘My word, what a girl she has proved to be,’ Andrea remarked breathlessly. ‘Imagine her taking that.’
‘She is a rare treasure’ Nicole enthused. ‘It was such a lucky thing that the morning turned out as it did. Help her up, for God’s sake, she needs to recover. We’ll put some ice on that bottom. My goodness, have you ever seen anything like it.’
‘I did once,’ said Andrea, ‘in a club in London years ago I saw a woman of about fifty five take a drum-roll of two hundred. She was remarkably passive for most of it, but shrieked her head off towards the end. She had a large bottom, not that there was much left of it at the end.’
‘No, I imagine not. That would be beyond even me,’ Nicole conceded.
Deborah was soon face down on her bed with Nicole applying a large ice-pack to her afflicted bottom. It was very sore, but the ice helped alleviate the burning, though it all but froze her and frequently had to be taken off. Nicole was a different woman, being very solicitous and gentle, soothing her quietly. Presently she brought her a cup of tea, which was surprisingly restoring.
A little later Deborah put on a dressing-gown and went down to the parlour where she found Aunt Andrea, who had made more tea. ‘How are you feeling, my dear?’ she asked. ‘I know how your bottom feels, but how are you feeling within yourself?’
‘Actually, I feel very well,’ Deborah replied, sitting in an armchair as she did so. ‘I can’t explain it, but I feel cheerful and somehow expanded. It has made me slightly euphoric and given me a sense of well-being.’
‘I can see you are able to sit down. It’s all nonsense about not being able to sit for a week after a spanking – it’s part of the build-up ritual, I suppose. You know, Deborah, you surprised me today. I’ve never seen a sign of it in you, and believe me, I’ve looked.’
‘I didn’t see it in you, either. I thought you and Nicole were lesbians, but I never imagined anything like this. How could I?’
‘You couldn’t, but then, you haven’t spent a lot of time with me, and really don’t know me very well. We are not really lesbians. We do have sex a good bit, but I consider myself a flagellatrix. Sex is secondary to that, so it hardly matters what sort it is, as long as it relieves the desire that dishing out a thrashing builds. We both have sex with men occasionally too. I like that just as well.’
‘You are full of surprises, Aunt. Tell me, how did it begin? Did you have a sudden revelation, as I have had today, or what?’
‘No, I always was conscious of it, ever since I can remember. Even as a little girl, I was fascinated by spanking, and was excited to hear about it. I wasn’t spanked, but many of my friends were, and I longed to see it. I confess, I used to spank my dolls’ Andrea laughed.
‘Well’ tittered Deborah, ‘you had more than dolls under your cane today, and we were a great deal more responsive, I imagine.’
‘Indeed, you were most gratifying. Back to the beginning, though, I thought I was very peculiar, and one of a kind. Then at university I met Nicole. We knew each other, as we were on the same netball team, but we weren’t friends. Then one day after a game we were in the showers, and each of us noticed that the other was being coy, backed into a corner and waiting for everyone else to leave.
When we two were left alone, I went over to Nicole and said “ this is my problem, what’s yours?” I turned and showed her my bottom, which had half a dozen red stripes. If you can believe it, I’d lashed myself with the bamboo stake from a pot plant!’
Both women shrieked and Deborah clapped her hands in delight. ‘Nicole turned, and I saw that her bottom had two large white patches with red margins. She’d spanked herself with her hair-brush. We giggled and hugged, naked as we still were, and that felt good, I can tell you. We dressed and went straight to a pub, and we talked for five hours.’
‘Goodness, you must have been blind after that!’
‘No, we only had two drinks, I think. It was a quiet day, and no pub was going to throw Nicole out, the way she looked then, me either for that matter. No, we just talked. It was as if a dam had broken and we had so much to say after being isolated and secretive in our feelings for so long. We’ve been inseparable since that day, and of course, at once began to spank each other.’
‘You also like to be spanked, rather than just dishing it out?’
‘Oh yes, but I prefer the top role. I can’t explain it. I don’t think I’m cruel, and I don’t really want to cause pain, but I really need to lash people, and I get great satisfaction from doing so. Nicole is a great enthusiast, in either role. We fit each other splendidly. I’m delighted that you have inherited it too. I’ve seen no signs in the rest of the family.’
‘Oh, you think it’s inherited?’
‘What else? If we both had red hair, like dear Nicole, people would say it runs in the family. With this fetish, they’d say I somehow corrupted you. You are a biologist, you know about genetics and inheritance, and the way genes affect quite detailed aspects of behaviour.’
‘I know about natural selection, so I’d want to see some selective pressure for spanking and other paraphilias. I can’t see that. Sure, an enhanced sex drive will lead to enhanced reproductive success, or would have before contraception, but this fetish is as likely to deflect energy and drive from copulation. I don’t see how genes for it would spread through the population and be maintained, even if at low frequencies.’
‘Come on. You know about pleiotropic genes, and how a gene selected for one thing has other, quite different effects. It’s very complicated and I can’t begin to explain how it works, but I’m convinced sado-masochism and other fetishes are inherited at birth. They have been around in every nationality as long as people have written about their lives.’
‘I can agree with that,’ said Deborah. ‘I don’t suppose it matters much. I’m still coming to terms with what you’ve uncovered in me today. I know that I want it again.’
‘You’d better wait, my girl. You’ll be in no condition for more for a while yet. It’s a fact, though, that the mind wants more before the body is ready. Still, you are young, and you’ll lose those impressive marks quickly. They take longer with me and Nicole than they did twenty years ago, but that’s age for you.’
‘Who was the man this morning?’
‘He’s a client. We see a few of them, and a couple are women, but mostly men.’
‘Do you prefer spanking men or women?’
‘I’m not sure. It varies really. Some days I want a man, but I feel more in tune with women, so can share the experience more. Men aren’t so subtle, and it’s a matter of whacking away, hard and fast. I love that, and so does Nicole.’
‘Can men take more severe punishment, is that it?’
‘It is not a hard and fast rule. Some men can take ferocious beatings and hardly murmur. But so can some women- Nicole, for instance.’
‘Can she? I thought she’d be strictly a whipper, not a whipped.’
‘If you stay a few more days, as I hope you will, you’ll see. Nicole is overdue a really good thrashing. Her need has been building up, and the excitement of today will have her furnace raging. I’d say tomorrow we’ll see Nicole strapped down on various of our benches. You may even care to administer a few strokes. Do you think you’d like that, or do you feel you are solely a receiver of the lash?’
‘Oh Aunt, I’d adore caning her, but I’d feeling awkward about hurting Nicole. She’s so sweet – or can be, when she’s not being a Tartar.’
‘You couldn’t do anything to please her more than to flog her soundly, the way she is presently. Believe me, I know her. That sweet little bottom of hers can take astonishing punishment. It’s quite indestructible and inexhaustible. Mind you, you’ll need to practice cane strokes first, by hitting a cushion. It is not as easy as it looks to cane accurately, especially when hitting as hard as Nicole needs. Cane strokes going astray can do real damage. I suggest you spend some time in the cellar this afternoon getting the feel of a cane and thrashing a cushion.’
‘I have always been diligent in my studies, dear Aunt, and I promise that no course of study so far can rival the dedication and enthusiasm I will bring to the acquisition of a skill that I anticipate will be the delight and fulfillment of my future life.’
‘Oh dear, poor Nicole!
