I always felt nervous coming home in the small hours, crossing the footbridge and turning left into my street. It was not a long street but it was very straight because they used to make the ropes there - well, every little seaside town at the mouth of a river had one, they stretched out the strands and twisted, twisted till it was thick and as strong as a steel hawser. Pity it was the wrong side of the river though, boatyards and mobile homes, and alongside a lot of very decent people some of the dregs of the community, divided from the more solid citizens by the second fastest flowing river in the country.
Half way along I could just see by the feeble light of a street-lamp or two someone sitting on the low brick wall outside the disused cafe. I knew at once it was Matthew because he affected all the latest American fashions, all the young bucks did, and he had his baseball cap on. Bits of his smooth dark hair escaped from it. He was somehow celtic-looking. I drew level with him, trying to walk purposefully.
"Hi, grandpa!" That was an illusion to my age.
"Hello!" I said, endeavouring to sound confident, although I knew, as he did, there was a crack in my voice. Just a step or two further and I would be safe.
But he whipped out his hand from his pocket and caught me by the wrist. "What you doing out so late, grandpa?"
I mumbled something, but his grip was like iron. "Bad boy" he said. "I think you ought to have your little bottom smacked, you nasty little stop-out." Oh, God! He was going to do it too. My arse is a bit prominent, well-muscled because I do a lot of cycling, but he had never given more than a glance at it before.
I smiled, weakly. He swung me over from his right, and before I could do a thing, there I was over his right knee, while his left leg was in turn swung over my back, holding me in a vice. Was that a light coming on in a window? I started praying, but God was not on my side. And there was no time for entreaty.
A sudden pain, first on my right buttock, then ,as he adjusted himself, the next on my right. I could feel the warmth, some of it engendered by the sudden throbbing contact, but also from his hand as ,after each smack, it lingered and followed the contours, up and down and round and round. Thank goodness I had thick trousers and underpants on, I thought. But now he was feeling round my bottom in a rather purposeful way, and I knew he was thinking. Another light came on. He groped for my belt, yanked the trousers down and paused. He was going to expose me as well! Then, the humiliation set in as he pulled my underpants down to my ankles. Yet another light went on and I could imagine the pale, illumined streaks of my legs - I have very pale skin, it goes with gingery hair, which mine used to be before it was grey - and the curve of my bum with, I suppose, one red area on each of my buttocks. Nothing was going to stop him. He pulled up my shirt and my back and everything below it was exposed as well. I could feel something stirring.
He fingered the arse. He was rather pleased with himself, I could tell. I knew now that people were looking out furtively form behind their curtains, doubtless tut-tutting but enjoying it no end. Was he bowing to them? The spanking began in earnest. The pain was sharpened with each blow, and my arse felt on fire - yet, strangely, all down my legs I could feel the cold air of the early morning. Was my face as red as my bottom with the humiliation of it all, or was it pale and drawn with the ever-worsening pain? When was it going to stop?
The answer was only after a good ten minutes. He rubbed his hand over each of my poor swollen buttocks, each as raw, sore and pulsating as overripe fruit shaken from the tree. He let it slide down the crack and lightly fondled what he found.
"You needed that, grandpa." He let me up and I struggled to clothe my private parts, well no longer private of course. Who else would take it into their head to do likewise? I realise I was crying, not with the pain, but the shame of the punishment meted out to me by this Adonis, and a fear for the future. Or was it longing? No, it could not be that.
I did not have long to wait. Not long after beakfast, which I ate standing up, there was knock on my door, and I reluctantly inched it open. There he was, tall, handsome in a way, smiling quite warmly and displaying his very white even teeth. Two of his side-kicks were with him, grinning.