Brad's Diary
3.30 PM.
My devoted old-world amanuensis received my students' graded assignments from me. She seemed swallowed up by the mountain of paperwork on her desk. She was going to put in overtime today. Not me; it was the trysting hour.
It was also Jeff's fifth week in therapy, eight weeks since he was found. I had been briefed concerning his progress since the therapy began: as Tristan and Matthew had pointed out, Jeff's memory had been detained on matters that had been traumatic and sorrowful for him. Otherwise, his linguistic, motor and most aesthetic and general cognitive knowledge was unscathed. What didn't survive the catastrophic event that transported his memory, almost wholesale, into a dreary interregnum: family, friends, school and the whole caboodle of our shared life.
Which included the whole caboodle of our shared spanking life. Always, it came back to this, addling my thoughts with utmost gloom.
4.15 PM.
I eased my Catera into the garage. Home again. In the memory stakes, my time with Jeff had been rather unremarkable so far. Even though we enjoyed the bonding, he remembered nothing of us.
As always he'd had his daily 3 o'clock nap, so he was quite ebullient. I liked to take our time doing things outdoors. Yesterday, we dug up the montbretia bed to plant more seeds. This afternoon, however, it had rained, so we stayed in and shopped for books on Amazon. com.
9.20 PM.
Things started to go our way from this point. I had gone upstairs to give Jeff a simple physical exam Tristan had taught me to do.
He was reading a book.
"Oh, no," he groaned, "not yet, Brad. I've just one more chapter."
Jeff had always professed a dilettantish interest in the arts. However, unlike other dilettantes, he devoured my prodigious collection of the classics the first year he moved in with me. He knew poetry and ably quoted Nobel laureates in everyday rigmarole. He was even familiar with the Italian libretto: He could make sense of a Giacomo Puccini or Leoncavallo obliquity, making up convincing ratiocination of the exhaustive opus and notching up urbane notoriety for being read in the New York Times. At parties, he would astonish friends and chalk up an ovation with an untrained recital of the 'Il Tabarro'.
Except for the paltry snippets of a Shakespearean sonnet, a Joyce narrative or a Bersmann Epithalamia, most of the works he had loved are now scepters of the past. He would have to catch up. Just recently, he started on Tolstoy's collected works, reading first my own favorite, 'The Death of Ivan Ilych'. It became a mission to read a story a night just before turning in. Last week we had read together, but he had criticized my diction and incorrect register. So these days, I leave him alone.
I took away his book and closed it, to his chagrin.
"Finish it tomorrow – or during your free time," I suggested. "You've got plenty of that and you're always complaining about being bored."
"I am bored," he said. "There's nothing to do all Wednesday and Friday. I've studied the wall paintings to death. The fish are overfed...."
"You leave the fish alone," I chided.
"And," he continued, ignoring me, "there's just so much pumping with iron one can do at the gym. Besides, Tristan said my heart can't take too much strenuous activity at this time."
"Okay, okay, I get the point," I exclaimed.
"How did I use my time before I lost my memory?" he asked.
"You were very busy with school, for one," I answered.
"Yes," he nodded, "and I'm missing so much even as we speak. You think I'll ever go back to finish my course?"
"Of course. You're brilliant," I replied, peeling the plaster he'd had on his left cheekbone for the past week.
"Eeow!" he winced. "Be careful."
"Gee," I scolded, "you're testy this evening. Carry on and you'll find yourself over my knees...."
Realizing my near error, I stopped myself in the nick of time. But he was too sharp, too alert, to let that escape.
"What's that?" he asked.
"Nothing," I replied, fishing out his thermometer.
"You said something about .... " he persisted.
"Never mind that," I said hushing him. I stuck the thermometer under his tongue.
"I'm not Humpty Dumpty, you know," he mumbled.
"What's that?" I asked.
He removed the tube from his mouth. "You know, Humpty Dumpty," he said. "He couldn't be patched up. I'm not Humpty Dumpty."
"You remember that?"
He nodded, and then said, "You're always protecting me from the truth. I'm not afraid of the truth, Brad. Did you use to spank me? That was what you almost said -- I'll find myself over your knees and spanked? I'm right, aren't I? Please tell me if I'm right. I've been seeing images – a body on your lap. It was I, wasn't it? I was on your lap. Tell me, please, or I'll go mad."
He had flung his arms over his eyes. All my instincts told me to cradle him but to act on them meant offending him. What he wanted was the truth, not more babying. Perhaps this opportunity was providential. I'd been searching for the chance to ease him into a clearer understanding of our relationship. The time had come to see this opportunity for what it was and prospect on the topic that had been bothering me for so long.
"How did you remember?" I asked.
He pointed to a book on the shelf.
"'Long Day's Journey into Night', by Eugene O'Neal?" I said.
"Yes," he explained. "I'd picked that first to read tonight. I got to page 33 and the whole storyline came into sudden memory. It happened just like that. So I turned to this one instead, 'Equus'. It's Latin for horse you know. I almost imagined I was Alan Strang and Tristan's Dr. Dysart."
"You're nothing like Alan, darling," I said. "But how did that book, 'Journey', make you recall that I spanked you? What's the connexion?"
"There isn't one," he replied, "but like the book's theme, I was reminded of family and inherent conflicts within it and ourselves."
"What else did you remember?"
"Feeling very proud of myself. I had accomplished something and, just as in the book, it had to do with exorcising a personal demon."
I nodded. But my body was trembling with a mystical feeling. "Go on."
"I saw a tree lit up with lights and I think I was on it. I also saw myself later in your arms, actually on your lap. Naked. You were punishing me even though I did something good."
"Yes, you did something very brave, quixotic but brave. It scared me and I had to punish you."
"Tell me more, Brad, please. I need to know more. I only get images but they're so disconnected. Just this once, please tell me."
(God, he was suffering. How could I endure?)
I nodded, picked him up and went behind him, letting him fall back against a part of my chest. My boy, my surrogate son, snuggled up, making himself cozy.
"I'll tell you," I said. "You've earned the right to know and I won't be making an exception. You remember a lot of it already. I'd say this qualifies as your own memory."
Thus I began.
"It was Christmas Eve. We'd driven out to my folks' place in Philadelphia a week before. We were up getting drunk on eggnog and song-singing till late. My father got too tipsy and retired to bed. Ethan Senior always had a hard time accepting who I was. I think, seeing you with me made him realize there was no turning back, I was who I was. Still, it would be some time before he ever truly accepted that his only heir was not going to have children.
"Anyway, you had said goodnight to Ethan and suddenly went down on your knees, crawling a bit of the way under the settee to pull out a tote. It was the size of a breadbox. Inside it were loaded all kinds of baubles and lights. You nodded to my folks, my mother, Joanne, sister, Sarah and cousin, Christopher, and they did the same, as if you had all learned the art of communicating by telepathic waves and had omitted me. I asked what was going on but you simply took my hand, leading us to the front yard. We stopped some distance from the oak tree that had stood on our yard for as long as I'd been alive.
""Wait here," you said bossily, and started toward the tree. But at a short remove near the gazebo, you halted, turned back to me, blew me a kiss and hollered, "And please, don't worry." You ran to the tree, but you were noticeably hesitant as you drew near it, standing there armed with a stockade of Christmas decorations and mixed emotions.
"I turned to Sarah and asked her what was going on, but she had only hushed me.
"The mist was rising with the cold front, but even in the sensual mist, you appeared visibly shaking. You were looking out into the darkness for a long time, contemplating something. Then, you slung the tote over your head and under your arm. As soon as your hand gripped a low branch, I knew what you were up to. I started after you but felt Sarah's hand on my solar plexus, stopping me.
""You know about this?" I asked her.
"She nodded.
""And you let him go through with it?" I continued.
"Sarah said that it was very important to you, what you wanted to do, and you had wanted it to be my Christmas present. I told her a sweater would have been good enough.
"You had reached the lower canopy, moving among the boughs with a cat's stealth and caution. You stopped to sit on one of the boughs. And then you started to dip into the tote, pulling out the ornaments and lights to hang around the boughs and branches.
""Dear God," I remember praying as I watched you, "please, protect my precious one."
"A half hour passed. I was breaking out in a nervous sweat, and you were playing Tarzan of the Apes fourteen feet above me, your survival odds in a parlous position because you wanted to prove some obtuse point to me.
"When you almost slipped at some point, I thought enough was enough. As far as I was concerned, you were not sacrificing yourself to some obscure spirit, never mind that it was Christmas. I thought the spirit of Christmas had possessed you, you know, that as well as its all-consuming sorcery which provoked once-a-year exaltations of the will and dreams of greatness.
"Besides, you already had much of the tree well covered. I walked towards you, quietly, for I thought if I spooked you, you'd accidentally slip and fall. Soon as I caught your attention, I ordered you down. But Sarah had joined me and was stopping me once again.
""He'll be okay," she said, "as long as nothing startles him, and you're startling him, for Pete's sake!"
"I got her hint and retreated. Joanne later joined me on the grass, putting her arm over my shoulder.
""You must mean a lot to him," she whispered to me.
"A warm feeling came over me. Nevertheless, I worried, the way an old man worried over a hacking cough that lingered.
""You know Jeff's afraid of heights?" I said. "You know he suffers from vertigo? He could fall." All that time I kept my eyes on you, my lone angel atop his own Christmas tree.
"Joanne nodded. "He's in good hands," she said, her index finger pointed heavenward.
"Another half hour passed. During that time I had left my spot on the grass and had been pacing pensively to the fence that bounded the irregular perimeters of our lawn. How ephemeral and frail your life had seemed, and how powerless I was to do anything just because your mind had been made up on the madcap scheme.
"Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw something drop from the tree. Thinking the inevitable had happened, I raced back to it and stood under it. I found you among the foliage, your legs swinging over a branch. You told me that you'd just discarded your tote. You were interlacing the trunk and boughs with a long wire of lights.
"Finally I heard your voice, shaking but ecstatic: "Okay, I'm done."
"That had been your cue for Christopher to join you. He found a toehold on his first ascent, stabbing the toe of his shoe into the trunk like a mean machete, and he easily levered himself up to you. At this juncture, I was wondering when you had intimated your scheme to my family without my knowing. I was peeved but kept an eye on you until the force of gravity carried you and Chris to the ground.
"Like some pantomime harlequin on cue, Chris removed the tarpaulin over a generator. I hadn't even realized he'd brought it out of the house. He installed the conduit and waited for you.
"My rheumatic waiting over, I was relieved to be reunited with you. I held you silently in my arms. I was both proud of you and furious with you. What you had put me through! What you had put yourself through!
"But you were too absorbed to notice my ambivalence. You jerked your thumb up to Chris, he activated a switch on the generator, and, suddenly, the entire oak tree metamorphosed into a whirling kaleidoscope of running lights and reflecting baubles. The breeze was gently blowing, making in the branches and leaves and all those lights and baubles music like that of aeolian harps, so exigible it enhanced my aesthetic enjoyment.
""It's beautiful," I said to you. I was stoking your nose that had turned red from the lashing of the wind.
"But I was also thinking that your present joy would soon be curdling into an inspissated gloom. I'd made up my mind to spank you over my knees when this was over. A part of me didn't want to put a damper on the spirit of the festive season for you. It was valorous of you to want to confront your fear of heights. But another part of me was adamant about carrying out your punishment. The reason was simple: you had recklessly put your life in danger and, in loco parentis, I felt disposed to spank you."
Here, I paused to monitor the time he'd been sitting up. My darling boy sought me anxiously.
"Don't stop now," he pleaded. "Did you carry it out?"
It had seemed so important for him to know if I had spanked him. I kissed him and nodded, resuming: "We admired the tree for a long time and one by one we went back into the house. It was almost two o'clock when we reached the guestroom.
"I found an old hairbrush in the bathroom – it was Joanne's. I carried it into the bedroom and sat on the bed, calling you over. I stopped you from taking a shower, and instead, made you stand in front of me.
""Okay, take all your clothes off," I ordered. "It's time."
""Time?" you replied. "For what, Brad?"
""For your spanking," I said, visibly putting out the heavy wooden hairbrush in front of you.
"You glared at the implement, your smile slowly diluting.
""Spanking? But why, sir?" you asked, fear etched on your brows, eyes beginning to water. Oh, you were always very good at recognizing an occasion for what it was. You always knew when to call me 'sir'.
""You know why," I replied. "I was worried sick for you. I thought you were going to get yourself killed. So, that warrants a spanking, and immediately. Now, take off your clothes, everything you've got on, your underwear as well, and put yourself over my knees. Do it right now, Jeff, or I'll strip you naked myself."
"You tilted your head at a slant. You started to look confused, and then I told you I was proud of you and loved you for being my brave little man but you were never to scare me like that again, so the spanking was to teach you that.
"You nodded, and got yourself in the usual appearance for your spanking – completely naked. Actually, you had halted at your underwear, so I gladly removed that for you. I helped you over my lap, adjusted your naked bottom the way I liked it, high up with your buns spread so that I could spank every part of you, if I felt in the mood for it, your anus and sac included. I gave you 35 of the best, first with my hand and then with the hairbrush."
I paused once more, searching for a way to end the story. Once again, he beseeched me. He was looking up at me, his face looking concerned. "Did you turn my bottom red?" he asked.
(What an oddity he was.) I chuckled: "Oh, it was very red, and you were dancing on my lap like the lights in the oak tree."
"Did I, you know, come?" he asked, blushing.
"Not this time."
"Do I come, usually?" he asked sneakily.
(Clever chutzpah.) I studied him, aware of his trickery. But I loved him enough to concede to him.
"That's contingent upon the context of your spanking. In a punishment context, I wouldn't allow you to reach that level of pleasure. But in the context of _s_e_x_, yes, I ensured you 'came'. But, whatever the context, you always had an erection by the time your underwear was removed," I told him.
"I was right all along," he whispered. "You do spank me."
"Yes, all the time."
"And I like it."
I nodded.
He rested his head boyishly on my chest. "I thought something was wrong with me," he said, "because I had found pain erotic. Despite the unblanketed reality that Pa, I mean, Coutts, and Stoner, had assaulted me, I hadn't always repudiated their kind of authority, their brand of pain. That's why I couldn't have told Tristan how I felt about being spanked by them. Later you became the pivotal point of the whole idea of my identification with the eroticism of pain. That I always had this sense of your love, a love that seemed to thrive on memories of having been spanked, provided me a shadowy identity of what I was."
I nodded, but added, "Don't apportion Tristan the blame for what was my curiosity, sweetie. I was the one that had put him up to it: when he asked you how you had felt to be spanked by Coutts, that first day you were brought home, it was I who had wanted to know. And three weeks ago, in the car coming back from Tristan's place, I had also wanted to know how you felt about his boys' being spanked. I needed to know if you'd lost your predilection for spanking together with your loss of memory.
"That aside, I can't see eye to eye with your ready forgiveness of Coutts and Stoner. Forgive me. Look, Jeff, this may sound a bit strange because of your amnesia. But you belong to me. In our relationship, you're my boy and I am pledged to be your mentor, your master, your provider. Nobody spanks you but me. The only hold barred is your memory loss. Had your memory not been recessed, you wouldn't have let anyone else spank you. As you nearly pointed out, there is a magical element that flows from this issue of marginality, of _s_e_x_ual pain. The very idea is as rarefied as inexplicable. But what those men did and what I do: there's a world of difference. I'm not happy they touched you. They caused you grave harm. That's the line I never cross. That's the line beyond which all masters protect their boys from going over. The pain stops when the harm begins."
"Yes, there was no harm that night," he said.
"Hmm?" I asked.
"That first night when I slept here," he explained. "I thought I dreamt it. But it wasn't a dream. You were spanking me. "
"I was patting your bottom," I explained. "You were having a fitful night, and I patted your bottom to calm you down."
"Pat. Spank," he ruminated. "Same difference. And no harm in them at all."
10.55 PM.
He had been quiet for some time. But his mind had been active. All of a sudden, he sat up. He threw off the quilt and fell out of my arms.
"Jeff," I called, "where are you going? You'll catch cold."
I rolled my eyes to the ceiling, thinking, "My God, the boy's naked."
Snatching his robe, I went after him. This was getting to be a habit – his affinity for the starker qualities of life. I found him on the bottom floor landing looking at the countless number of picture frames hanging on the wall. Just as if his memory was skidding forward, his eyes were darting about to keep up. He scanned the photographs quickly while I descended the staircase at leisure.
He found what he was looking for and lifted the picture frame off the wall. He brought it to me.
"This," he said breathlessly, pointing to the elderly man and woman in the photograph. "It's your Mom and Dad. It's Joanne and Ethan Hunt."
I nodded. We traded smiles.
There was optimism in his smile.
© 1998, 2001, JRK & BWK.