"Dear Mr Martins," the letter in my hand began, "Your son, Ryan, has been involved in a group of boys who have been caught stealing examination papers and selling them to other boys. Please consider this letter as a warning – Ryan is now on probation. Should a similar incident occur, I shall have to ask you to remove him from our school".
The rest of the letter was just as formal, but the gist of it was simple. Ryan had been part of a syndicate of "A" class boys at his primary school that had got hold of some exam papers and had been distributing them, at a price, to boys in the less intelligent classes.
I looked up at the ten year old grade five lad before me. He stood in front of my desk, dressed in his short cotton summer pyjamers, short cropped blond hair, strong young suntanned body. His body language summed it all up – head down (so that his bright blue eyes were not visible), feet together, hands clasped behind his back. Very ashamed of himself. A very bright boy – and I was concerned. This type of thing and only ten years old! This was seriously anti social behaviour, and very out of character for the boy. I loved him dearly, but would have to literally thrash this kind of nonsense out of him.
"This calls for a very severe hiding, Ryan," I spoke softly.
"Yes daddy," the child responded, mumbling at the floor.
I was no stranger to giving my son thrashings, and, although we didn't have this kind of appointment often, there was a set procedure.
I held out my hand, and, without saying a word, Ryan slid off his pyjamer top, then shorts and handed them across the desk to me. I pointed to the corner, and the stark naked youngster crossed the room and stood there, nose to the wall, legs together, hands nervously clasped in front of him. I folded the little light shorts and shirt carefully while admiring the figure of my son. His muscular little back was deeply tanned by the summer sun, and his bronzed legs (slightly lighter than his back) were beginning to show some muscle definition, but it was his bottom that was the center of my attention. It was startlingly white, beautifully rounded and in perfect proportion with the rest of his strong young body. The tension in his body was evident from the tense way in which he stood, his knees shaking slightly. His head was still bowed, unusual for this boy. He must have been really ashamed of himself. The air-conditioning also cooled the study down significantly, so that goose bumps stood up all over the naked lad's body. Ryan hated getting his bare backside whipped by me – he knew that I had little mercy, and would do a very thorough job indeed.
After letting the lad stand in position for about twenty minutes, I stood,
"Let's go," I commanded, and left the room. The bare little boy padded along behind me.
At the kitchen door, I waited for the lad, then gently guided him outside. He waited for me to close the door, then, my hand on his slender shoulder, we marched towards the workshop that I had converted from an old garage on my property. I took long strides, and the bare bottomed lad had to almost trot to keep up with me. Although my wife approved of the discipline techniques that I used on Ryan, she did not like to hear the cracking and crying that always ensued when the child got a hiding. That is why the workshop was where Ryan was punished.
I unlocked the door, turned on the lights and the two of us entered. It was a large area, neatly set out with a workbench against one wall, and tools neatly in their places. Knowing the procedure, Ryan lifted a light, old rocking chair up from the corner of the room and placed it in the center. Then he stood, as always, hands in front of him, head still bowed, shoulders hunched and knees tightly together (I think to stop them knocking together) waiting for me.
I walked over to a closed cupboard and upon opening it, ceremoniously extracted my cane. Taking a slightly oily rag, I swiped the cane down, reviving its healthy pale yellow glow, then I flexed it and whipped it through the air. It was still in good shape. Ryan hadn't felt its bite for months.
Still flexing the cane and swinging it through the air, I stood in front of my son. Looking down at the little blond head that was still bowed, I offered up the boy's usual chance to appeal for mercy. At this stage of our "sessions", Ryan usually was able to give me a very carefully thought out appeal for a reduction of the severity of his caning. His above average intelligence for a boy his age generally allowed him to present very feasible arguments. But today was different. The boy seemed to bow his head even further in shame.
"I'm sorry daddy," he murmured, "what I did was very naughty, and I deserve the hiding of my life. You'll have to really thrash my bottom tonight,"
I couldn't believe it! Ryan must really have been feeling terrible about letting me down like this today, and was actually asking to be severely punished. He clearly understood hidings as atonement for bad behavior, and would consider the pain of my cane across his backside as a cleansing process. I felt proud of the little boy in front of me – he had decided to take his thrashing as stoically and bravely as he could.
"Good boy," I reached over and patted the top of his cropped head, "I am going to give you a very big hiding, but you know you deserve it".
Ryan sobbed quietly in response, and I noticed a lone tear drop off his nose onto the floor.
"Hold this," I ordered, holding the cane out to the boy.
He grasped it with both hands, trembling slightly as he held onto the instrument of his own correction. He looked up and watched as I slowly took off my tie and rolled up the sleeves of my shirt. Then I held my hand out again, and Ryan gingerly handed me back my cane.
Gesturing toward the chair that the boy had brought into the center of the room, I uttered those two words that little boys all over the world fear, "Bend over,"
Nervously and slowly, the child turned around and bent his naked little body over the back of the chair. His hips just reached the top of the back of the chair, and he had to stretch forward to grasp the end of the seat. Naturally, now Ryan wasn't allowed to keep his feet together, and he had to spread his feet an even sixty centimeters apart ensuring that he would not be able to clench his buttocks during his hiding. Being a rocking chair, the chair rocked forward as Ryan transferred his weight onto his hands, causing him to have to rise onto his toes. This lifted his little rear end up so that the most sensitive part – the lower half – was at the perfect angle for the cane.
The little ten year old looked so vulnerable naked over that chair, and I felt a tinge of pity for the little pre-teen. I gently rubbed and kneaded his soft little bottom in order to bring the nerve endings to the surface, and although I worked each rounded buttock in turn, I could easily wrap my hand around both together.
Then it was time to begin. Swinging the cane once more through the air, I loosened up my shoulders, then lined the stick up across the twin small white mounds of boy flesh. Ryan shuffled slightly at the feel of the cane on his bottom, but knew better than to move. I waited until he was still, then lifted the stick back, and sharply snapped it exactly where I had aimed, deep into the lower half of the ten year old's lower bottom. Ryan cried out almost at the same time as the cane made its satisfying crack across his naked bum, and his body jerked with the pure agony of it. That sharp snapping sound of the cane meeting boy-flesh and the cry of a boy – the traditional sound effects of a lad being well punished by a man.
As always, I didn't lift the cane immediately, allowing it to continue with a hefty follow through, the stick staying pressed into the boy's yielding flesh for a couple of seconds. This allowed Ryan to feel and absorb the complete impact of the cane as it bit into his bare bottom.
I lifted the cane away from the child's buttocks, and examined the results the first stroke of the hiding. As mentioned earlier, Ryan's bottom was startlingly white in contrast to his bronzed legs and lower back, so my actual target area was very clear. Just below half way down his little backside, where the curve of the boy's buttocks start to move downwards towards his thighs and flesh is fullest, a thin white stripe had formed, surrounded on either side by thin red stripes. As I watched, the white impression that the cane had made turned to an angry throbbing crimson, and the first welt started to rise up across my son's young bottom.
Raising the cane, I lashed Ryan again, as close as possible below the first stroke, and the little boy cried out, the force of the stroke pushing him slightly forward. When I lifted the cane, I complimented myself on my accuracy. I couldn't have placed the second stroke any closer to the first – the two parallel lines were almost touching.
The third lash whipped across the ten year old's bottom just as accurately, right below the second, and again Ryan cried out in agony, his little knees buckling slightly with the pain. Although I was hitting him pretty hard, I was proud of his fortitude – most boys of twelve or thirteen would have been leaping about holding their bottoms by now, but not Ryan. He knew how to take a good hiding, despite his age.
I waited for the boy to straighten his trembling knees again, before delivering the fourth stroke. I ensured that I put my body behind the force of the cane, of course hitting the lad with the end of the stick, and always following through fully. Ryan sobbed, and then, still clutching the chair with both hands, raised his head slightly. Four had thus far been the most strokes that I had given the child at his age, and he was expecting the command to stand. But I was far from finished.
"Put your head back down, my boy," I instructed, "we've still got a way to go with this hiding,"
With a little sob, Ryan slowly dropped his head, straightened his legs and braced himself.
I caned the boy again, snapping the cane deep into the low, fleshy and sensitive area of his under bottom. Ryan cried out louder than ever, and it took him even longer to put his head right down again and raise up what must by now have been a very sore little bottom indeed.
For the sixth time, I lashed the boy, now cutting the cane with a mighty stroke upwards into the curve of the lad's backside, closer than ever to his sturdy young legs. Ryan screamed, and then came the sign that I had been waiting for – the sign that the little chap had truly had enough,
"Please daddy," he begged, "I've learnt my lesson, please stop!"
"Nearly finished," I assured my son, remembering that he was only ten, and deciding that he had indeed been well enough whipped this evening.
I caned him as low as possible this time, right in the crease where his little bottom meets his legs. Ryan cried out again of course, and really struggled to keep down, but I had one more stroke to give him. Stepping back, I took careful aim, and lashed the boy vigorously, placing the final stroke of Ryan's hiding diagonally across his little backside. To my surprise, the boy took this stroke well, still screaming, but making no attempt to get up and soothe his bottom, which must have really felt like it had caught alight with that last lash.
Taking my time, as always, I put the cane away, leaving the naked and well whipped little boy bent over the chair. I went back to the child, and gave him the next set of orders.
"You may get up, Ryan," I began, but before the little boy was fully up I continued, "put the chair back before you rub your bottom,"
Ryan already knew the rules, so my final instruction was not necessary – I had given them just to remind the lad of his duty in case the pain across his pre-teen backside was too much. Still sobbing, the little blond carefully carried the rocking chair back into the corner of the room, and then, breathing a sigh of relief, started to rub his bottom.
He thanked me for his hiding, as he always had. But this time the gratitude was real. He was able to meet my eyes and smile at me through his tears. Ryan knew that although his hiding had been the most painful thrashing that he had ever experienced, his sins were paid for and forgiven.