During their previous get-together (a hunting trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan), the group decided that their next trip should be a father-son thing. Not all the men had sons, but all agreed that it would be good to do some bonding across generations. So now they found themselves, six men in the late 30s to middle 40s and seven boys ranging in age from 11 to 18, in a cabin in the woods in mountainous western Pennsylvania. You know the sort of place: a great room with a big fireplace and a moosehead over the mantlepiece, a combined kitchen and dining room with rough wooden furnishings and a perennial aroma of coffee, a smaller game room stocked with Monopoly, cards, Risk, worn-out paperbacks, and lots of other fun stuff, a too-small bathroom with a stand-up shower, and two bunk rooms, one for the grownups and one for the boys.
The first day was nothing but fun. A wonderful hike in the morning, some fishing, a lot of fooling around, a hearty dinner of burgers cooked over the grill. Some of the boys found a deep spot in the stream and went in swimming. Unlike boys of yore, they kept on their shorts while swimming. Boys these days are much more modest than they used to be. Maybe this is because they often do not have communal showers in gym class any more.
The next day, tempers were a little frayed. The boys had stayed up half the night gabbing, and everybody was short of sleep. The real trouble started when Stanley, the 11-year old, came into the great room with torn clothing, dirt all over his face and chest, and red eyes from crying. "What happened to you?" his father, Richard Durham, demanded to know.
"Tommy beat me up for no good reason," Stanley said, in a sort of half speech, half wail.
Tommy's father, Dale Jensen, was all ears, and in a matter of moments extracted the necessary information about the altercation between Stanley and Tommy. It seems that Tommy got mad at Stanley for singing some stupid song over and over, and when he wouldn't quit he tackled him and rubbed dirt in this face and under his shirt. Jensen was both embarrassed and furious that his son was acting like a bully. He did not want his friends to think he tolerated misbehavior of this sort. He could tell that Stanley's father was not amused by the incident, and he was determined to show that he took the matter with equal seriousness.
"Dylan, you go find your brother and tell him to get his tail in here real fast," Jensen said to his older son, who was in the great room with the men trying to keep up with the adult conversation. After Dylan left the room, Jensen too went out, returning a few minutes later with an oak sapling branch. He laid the branch down on the table in front of the hearth, poured himself another cup of coffee, and resumed conversation as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened — or would happen. The other men gave each other knowing looks, and exchanged a smile or two. Jensen obviously was a father who knew his business.
Perhaps twenty minutes later, Dylan returned with his 15-year old brother. Tommy immediately broke into a rapid explanation of his version of what had happened. "Wait a minute, son," Jensen interrupted. "You'll get a chance to talk all you want. But first let me tell you what's about to happen."
Tommy quieted down, and his father continued to speak. "By my watch it is exactly 2:43. You have five minutes. At the end of five minutes I want to see you down here wearing nothing but your undershorts, with that branch stripped of its leaves and branches and carved smooth. Frankly, I don't really care whether you do a good job on the branch. If it has sharp edges or points, it won't be my ass feeling them. That's up to you. But you'd better not be late. You get an extra stroke for each thirty seconds you get here after 2:48."
"But, Dad, you said I would have a chance to explain."
"Take all the time you want. But the clock is running. You can spend your time explaining or you can spend it making that branch smoother. Your choice."
By now, several of the boys had joined their fathers in the great room, listening to this exchange. They, too, exchanged glances. The men's looks were a combination of admiration for Jensen's masterful approach and satisfaction that justice would be done. The boys' looks were part pity and concern for Tommy, and part sinister pleasure at the thought of what was about to happen. Boys can be cruel.
Tommy looked around the room and realized that he was the center of attention. He blushed, started to stammer out a few words of explanation, thought better of it, and quickly exited the room, pausing to pick up the branch from the table.
At 2:48 sharp, he reappeared in the doorway, clad in a pair of blue striped boxer shorts, and nothing else. Was it his imagination, or had the "audience" increased in size while he was gone?
"Come in son, and let's see your, um, handiwork."
Tommy eased into the room and handed his father the switch. He was blushing furiously, and tried not to look anyone in the face. As near as anybody could tell, the branch was now a smooth switch, without bark, branch, or protrusion. His father barely glanced at it.
"I was in the middle of a conversation with these men," he said, "and I don't think it would be right to interrupt it." He made his son stand in the corner of the room until he was ready. The other males in the room, both men and boys, stole long glances at Tommy's body. He was in fine adolescent form, with a narrow waist, no stomach to speak of, a hairless back and chest, and developing muscles. The boxer shorts, unfortunately, shielded other parts of his anatomy from view.
Jensen was in no hurry, and after a while the conversation returned to normal and the boys drifted off to the game room, where a round of Monopoly was engaging their attention. Jensen suspected that Tommy's thoughts had not returned to normal. Standing in the corner clad in his boxer shorts, with a newly prepared switch not two feet away, Tommy would be able to concentrate only on one thing.
After an eternity had passed (from Tommy's point of view), he heard his father's voice, in a soft and normal tone. "Maybe we'd best get this over with, hey, son?"
"Okay, Dad."
"Now, Tommy, are you sorry you were such a bully to Stanley?"
"Yes, Dad."
"Then don't you think it would be nice to go in the game room and invite him to watch your punishment?"
"NO!! That'd be awful!"
"What you did was awful, too, son. But it is your choice. You can ask Stanley to come (and ask him nicely, too) or we can repeat this procedure every day for the rest of the week."
Tommy thought about this and realized he had better ask Stanley. "And while you're at it, don't you think you should ask Mr. Durham to watch, too?"
"Yes, Dad," the boy said in a tone of resignation.
Tommy trudged into the game room, where the other boys were crowded around the table. They immediately shifted their attention to the half-naked young man.
"Nice duds, Tom," one kid said with a smirk.
"Not much protection, dude."
"Don't you think red would be a more appropriate color?" (There was general laughter at this witticism.)
Tommy interrupted the teenage banter. "Stanley, I would like to invite you to come watch me get punished for beating you up."
Stanley looked up with a huge grin on his face. "No fooling?"
"That's right. My dad said I have to tell you I want you to come."
Stanley needed no second invitation. In a trice, he was on his feet behind Tommy. He glanced back at the other boys, made an excited gesture with his hands and displayed a look of exultation. He was going to get to watch Tommy, the great and powerful, get switched on the bottom. He hoped it would be on the bare. He wasn't sure which he looked forward to more: seeing Tommy get punished for what he did, or seeing Tommy's shorts come down. He had never seen a boy Tommy's age without his clothes, and Tommy was a pretty good specimen.
After a silent reminder from his father, Tommy walked over to Mr. Durham, and repeated the invitation. "Sure, I'll come along for the show," Durham said with an attempt at humor, which Tommy did not exactly appreciate.
The party of four walked out of the cabin. Jensen and Durham led the way, walking with a determined stride. Tommy had trouble keeping up. The small rocks on the drive hurt the soles of his bare feet, and he was almost dancing as he walked along. This only added to Stanley's pleasure, as he walked behind Tommy, his eyes roving over the older's boy's back and backside. He liked the way Tommy was dancing and bobbing along.
Jensen looked back. "Move it, Tommy," he said. "If you think your bare feet hurt now, just wait until you feel this switch on your bare bottom."
Bare bottom? Tommy hadn't realized the switching was going to be on the bare. He had been spanked bare before, but never with a switch and never in front of witnesses. This was TERRIBLE. What had gotten into his dad?
The foursome entered a small clearing, where a large tree trunk lay across the ground. Jensen instructed his son to remove his boxers. ("Would you take care of those, Stanley?" he asked the younger boy. Stanley did so willingly.) Then he told Tommy to rest his hands on the log, supporting as much weight as possible, and to arch his back so that his posterior was displayed at an angle convenient for receiving the switch. He presented a target excellent in every way. The boy's tanned back provided a pleasing contrast to his milky white bottom, which was neither too skinny nor too plump, but just right. In fact, Tommy looked a bit like the statues of young Greek athletes you sometimes see in museums.
Then, over the next five minutes, the silence of the secluded clearing was broken by a succession of swishing sounds, as the switch descended through the air, smacks as it connected with Tommy's unprotected buttocks, and increasingly noisy yelps from the miscreant teenager. It is doubtful that the swishes or the smacks could be heard in the cabin, but the yelps became increasingly audible. The men in the cabin nodded and smiled knowingly at one another as they listened to Tommy's yells. The boys winced at the sounds, but could not repress smirks and grins, too. They wished they were in Stanley's shoes, getting to watch. But they were sure glad they weren't in Tommy's. Not that he was wearing shoes. Or anything else.
When the punishment was complete, and Tommy was bawling his eyes out, Jensen suggested to Durham and Stanley that they leave Tommy alone to nurse his wounds. "Come back in when you're ready, son," he said to Tommy. "It's all over."
Stanley accidentally "forgot" that he was carrying Tommy's boxers, and Tommy was in too much pain to think of a detail like that. So his punishment was not over, after all. About 45 minutes later, the door of the cabin opened, and a naked Tommy had to pass under the gaze of six men and as many boys on his way to the bunk room to get on some clothes. Embarrassed at being seen like this, he held his hands in front of his genitals. As he moved across the room, he heard several comments about the red stripes on his backside, and he instinctively moved his hands to cover the evidence. That was a mistake. By moving his hands back and forth, he managed to give everyone in the room a complete show. A series of red stripes now decorated his cream-colored posterior. No hiding the fact that he had been well and thoroughly switched!
With a sense of relief, he entered the bunkroom and pulled on a clear pair of boxers. Then he lay on his cot, on his stomach, hoping the excruciating pain would go away. He realized he had provided entertainment to the entire group. The men and boys in the room had tried not to smile at the sight of him walking through, but they did not succeed. Even now he could hear loud laughter from the room below, and suspected that he was the butt of the joke. Why did it have to be him?
Tommy wondered whether he would be the only young man to receive unwelcome attentions before the trip was through. But the answer to that question will have to await further installments of this story.