Shortly after my 13th birthday I started high school. It was a 15 minute walk from our house to the main road where I caught the school bus. The trip took over an hour with the bus deviating from the main road to pick up children from other rural settlements. The bus was unheated and, on cold winter mornings, George, the cheerful, efficient driver stopped and let us out to run a short distance on a frosty country road. George picked us up again, puffing but now warm, on his way back to the highway. The bus was old but reliable - just like George himself.
At 8.45am the bus pulled up outside my new place of learning. Over 700 boys attended the high school. Boxing, considered to be character building, was compulsory. Order was maintained by a dozen teachers and the head prefect. All used the cane. On my second day there, a small boy was hauled to the front of the class, bent over a desk and thrashed. Thirty pairs of eyes watched him endure six stinging cuts before being allowed to return his own desk. The teacher had shown us what we could expect by making an example of the boy. Afterwards, the teacher filled out a form to advise the boy's parents he had received corporal punishment. This form had to be signed by a parent or guardian and returned to the school. Big brother Matt had already warned me that if I got caned to expect a double dose from him as well. 'Getting into trouble at school' was now on my growing list of punishable offences.
Despite my good intentions, within a week I was caught talking in assembly for which I was 'invited' to visit the head prefect's study. Perkins was Captain of the rugby XV, built like an ox and 19 years old. I waited outside his study and could not help overhearing the sounds of another boy being beaten. He soon emerged, pale faced, desperately trying to rub both the tears from his eyes and the stinging hurt from his backside.
Perkins closed the door behind me. My eyes were transfixed by the thin, whippy stick in his right hand. It was designed to wound and there was not a boy in the school who did not respect its power to hurt. I bent over submitting my small clothed bottom for the head prefect. The stick landed and, for a moment, I felt nothing but then a narrow strip of flame scorched my boy-flesh. Every nerve in my body urged me to flee but I stayed down. The hurt was just reaching its peak when the second of the two strokes landed, intensifying the pain 100%. I left his study with my backside on fire.
That afternoon the school bus deposited me at the junction and I walked the last half mile home. Mum gave me something to eat and a glass of milk. I did my chores and started on my homework. When I opened a book the punishment slip fell out. I handed it to Mum who sighed and put it with the newspaper, ready for big brother Matt.
I heard his cheery whistling first and then his firm tread on the porch. He smiled and ruffled my hair when I took him a basin of water. Matt rinsed the lime from his manly flesh. He was 21 years old, Not for the first time I wondered if I'd ever get to be as big as him. Matt worked in a quarry to provide for our small family.
Dinner was good country fare but I was too anxious to do it justice. Matt had read the punishmsnet slip without comment. My bottom was still very sore and I doubted it could take one of his hidings. All too soon Mum and my older sister left to work for an hour at the country store. There was a long silence before Matt looked up over his paper and quietly asked me to fetch the razor strop.
The leather was heavy in my hand as I walked with my big brother to the bedroom I shared with him. He watched while I took down my shorts and jockeys. Matt whistled when he saw the two purplish-red welts the head prefect had slashed across my rump. Matt's finger gently traced the puffy ridges and he decided it was not safe to give me a regular hiding because the leather might split the welts open. My spirits soared thinking I was to escape further punishment. However, relief was short lived when he reached under his bed and pulled out a three foot length of rattan cane! I don't know where big brother had obtained this new implement for my correction - probably through a mail order catalogue.
For the second time that day I bent over and presented my bottom for an older male. Matt pushed my shirt tail well clear of his target. There was a thud! and the stick landed, kindling fresh flames in my still smouldering bottom. The searing hurt was much more intense without the added protection of two layers of clothing. Matt held the stick against my rump, patiently waiting for me to recover enough to take the next cut.
His thick cane made a dull sound on my pink, bare flesh - quite unlike the earlier 'rifle shots' of Perkin's cane connecting with the tightly stretched fabric of my school shorts. I thought no caner could hurt my bum more than the head prefect but that was before Matt rolled his sleeves up and got to work.
Thud! AAAAAGH! the stick tortured an untouched part of my small behind. I slumped forward but, after a minute to recover, slowly pushed myself back up into position.
Thud! AAAAAAGH! the cane brutally violated another narrow strip of my trembling boy-flesh. I wondered how I could possibly survive another one?
Thud! AAAAAAAAAAGH!! The worst cut of all. The flog-stick had landed diagonally, cutting a fiery new path through the forest of very painful welts. AAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!
I heard Matt say the punishment was over. I flung myself face down on my bed and sobbed my heart out. Then I felt a soothing lotion being applied to my wounds. The heat subsided as Matt's big man's hand gently massaged my poor bum. His finger slipped inside the crease and lingered on my boy-hole. He pushed until his finger was inside me. I squirmed, unsure of this strange invasion. It felt good to be joined in such an intimate way to Matt. Nothing was said and he stayed inside me for a long, long time. His finger was eventually removed and the tight muscle plopped back into place. All the while Matt's other hand did its best to rub the sting out of my bottom.
Then Matt left my side and soon his bed springs squeaked that curious jangled rhythm which I sometimes heard late at night and always just after Matt had given me a hiding.
Much later, Matt signed the punishment chit and left the room. I checked my bum in the mirror. There were six awesome stripes and matching technicolor bruises. I pulled my shorts back up over my rapidly swelling behind making a silent vow to be good. That lasted slightly longer than the stripes which took almost three weeks to fade ....