Steven had always been a difficult child - his history of foster homes always reflected that he was hard to control, and as these unfortunate people could not legally turn to what Steven really needed - a good hiding, his behaviour never improved.
That was until my wife and I adopted him at age eight, and were free to bring him up the way we chose. Steven entered into the regular routine which he needed. He had set rules, and he knew that when he overstepped the boundaries, retribution would be swift, and painfully focused on his bare bottom. Naturally, he hated bending over for a hiding, but within six months he had settled down remarkably. He was back in mainstream education, and his unusually high intelligence meant that he was doing superbly. By age eleven, he was openly admitting to people that our love was the thing that helped him come right, and he told his fifth grade teacher that he was glad I gave him the occassional hiding, because that helped him stay on the right track and showed that I cared.
There were the odd throw back to his unpleasant behaviour of the past. An example followed in that same year (age 11). Steven initiated a little shoplifting expedition with some friends, and the boys were caught by a naturally very angry shopkeeper. The leader till the end, Steven convinced the shopkeeper that he was the only one involved, so it turned out that I was the only parent called to the shop to sort out the problem, and I took a very downcast youngster home. He knew that his little bottom would soon be feeling the strength of my arm.
I lectured the guilty child in the living room, and he hung his head in shame, ready to take his punishment. I got to the important part finally,
"You know the procedure, Steve," I concluded, "go to your room and get ready for a hiding."
Steven dragged himself upstairs, and I sat and chatted to my wife. I'm a great believer in making boys wait and contemplate their coming thrashings, so it was nearly an hour before I followed my young son up to deliver the painful consequences of his actions. I entered his room and closed the door behind me.
Steven had placed his high backed desk chair in the centre of the room, with a folded towel over the back of it for him to rest his hips on. On the seat of the chair, the boy had laid the thin cane that I had put in his cupboard the day after his eleventh birthday, to replace the strap that had formerly been used in this room to administer justice. This would be his first ever hiding with a cane, and I knew that he was dreading it. Steven himself was standing, nose pressed to the wall, next to his bed. Although he was small for his age, his little body was muscled and hardened from his many sports, chiefly swimming. His pale skin complemented his blond hair. Of course, as is the punishment rule established years before, he had taken off every sticj of clothing and neatly put it away. He looked terribly vulnerable standing there stark naked - especially his perfectly proportioned bottom, almost impossibly whiter than the rest of his body, the centre of my coming attention. Soon I would be drawing neat red stripes across that rounded, pale little canvass.
I picked up the cane and flexed it experimentally. It flexed almost completely round - perfect for the young rear that I was about the thrash with it.
"Come here and bend over, Steven," I ordered, and the little fellow turned around. He had appeared naked before me often before, and was not even slightly embarrased, and I noticed his red face and puffy eyes. He had already been crying in anticipation of his hiding. I was going to be giving him a lot more to cry about though.
Careful to do this correctly, Steven bent over the back of the chair. He was slightly to short to do this comfortably, so he had to lift his heels a little off the floor in order to reach all the way forward to grab the front of the chair with both hands. Of course, this meant that his legs were absolutely straight, and most of his weight rested on his arms. He widened his feet until they were in line with the legs of the chair. He had always taken his strappings over a pillow on his bed, and when I had spoken to him about the cane, I had told him that he was big enough to chose his own position for canings. I had expected him to bend over his pillow again, or touch his toes, but his current position showed how ashamed he was of his behaviour, and how he was submitting completely for his punishment. I was presented with two round little bottom cheeks, offered up for a sound caning.
I placed my hand on the small of Steven's back, and tapped the cane gently on the bare little target. He tensed as I drew my arm back and administered the first lash, hard, right across the centre of the boy's exposed bottom. Steven gasped in pain - I think it was a lot worse than he had imagined - first canings, especially bare always are. I waited for him to come to terms with the new agony, then gave him another stroke, just below the first. I had determined to place the strokes one below the other, until I reached the point where his bottom met his legs. The third lash drew a hiss of pain from the bent over boy, and he squirmed his naked body, unconciously trying to move his bare bottom away from the "flight path" of the cane. I waited for him to settle, then gave him another hard stroke. This time, the boy sobbed loudly with pain. My attentions were getting closer and closer to his legs, and he was really suffering as I attacked the most sensitive part of his naked bum with the cane.
I carefully, but firmly, smashed the cane as low as I could on the curve of Steven's bottom twice more, with a lengthy pause between each stroke, bringing the child's punishment so far to six cuts - the traditional schoolboy punishment, but I was far from finished. Cane in hand, I stepped back to admire my work. Steven remained in his self elected punishment position, and I admired the way he stood there, head down, strong young legs still straight and well apart, pushing his well whipped bottom up for further thrashing. The only evidence that he was receiving the most painful hiding of his young life so far was the quiet sobbing and of course the physical signs. Six evenly spaced thin red welts decorated the lower half of his white bottom.
I put the cane on the bed, and walked back to the boy. I placed one hand again on his back, and with the other I gently rubbed his backside. I could feel the heat coming off the thrashed flesh, and the individual welts. My hand fitted over both cheeks of his little tail, so that I had a handful of firm, yet pliable young bottom. Steven's sobbing grew softer as I kneaded some of the immediate pain from his bottom. He was not allowed to stand during a hiding, so this was the only relief that he would be getting.
"Well, Steven," I asked, "have you anything to say?"
"I'm sorry I stole, daddy," the little chap sobbed.
I continued rubbing his bottom, "Are you ready for me to finish your hiding?"
Steven took a deep, ragged breath, "Yes sir," he tried to say with conviction, but it came out as a little boy sob.
I gave his bottom one more squeeze, then retrieved the cane from the bed. I tapped on my son's already bruised bottom, and the boy squirmed in anticipation of the pain he now knew to expect. I waited for him to settle, then whipped the cane down, between the first two stripes of the first six that I had given him. I continued in this manner, filling in the areas that had not been whipped on his lower bottom during the first part of the hiding. This time I had to wait longer between strokes for the squirming boy to stand still. For most boys, six strokes would have been sufficient, but Steven was an incredibly tough youngster, with a high pain threshhold, and it was his loud sobbing and squirming that was the sign that this whipping was hurting enough to teach him a good lesson. I was not fooled by his small stature, and I was certain that only by thrashing his bottom this severely, could I have the desired effect on Steven.
After five strokes, I was unable to hit any lower without hitting my son's legs, which I didn't want to do. I believe that a boy's bottom is the only part of his body that may be beaten. So I changed my stance slightly and delivered a mighty stroke diagonally across his scarlet, welted little backside. For the first time in his whole dozen strokes he howled, and let go of the front of the chair. Quickly, he regained his position, but this display showed me that he had had enough.
I put the cane back down, and continued rubbing the now very tender bottom of my eleven year old child. I waited for him to settle, before ordering him up.
He stood up slowly and gingerly grabbed his aching rear end. When he turned around, I saw that his face, framed by his light hair, was almost as red as his bottom, and tears stained his cheeks. Carefully, legs still apart he shuffled to me, and, hands still clutching his sore bottom, amidst apologies and promises, he buried his head in my shirt. As I hugged the boy, I ruefully remebered hidings from my youth, and knew of one boy who would sleep on his tummy tonight - and it would be some time before he would even put his pants on over his tender bottom, let alone even think of stealing.