Spank & Correct: Bursting Bubbles

The last pop of the paddle was followed by a wailing sob, pulling at my heart strings, hardened as they were, and bringing forth a wave of sympathy or empathy for my sister in law. From the sounds of it, Steve had done a good job imitating Dad's efforts on my own backside from a few hours earlier. My fingers twitched on top of my head with a renewed desire to rub away the stinging burn still throbbing in my naked buttocks. I shifted my stance for the umpteenth time, wishing I was brave enough to use the cool walls behind me to help soothe the pain. It was incredibly tempting with the focus of everyone else in the house turned toward Jenny, but something told me Dad would know if I cheated and all he would have to do is look at my face.

"Here, dry your tears," Steve said and I imagined him handing a box of tissues to Jenny.

Her sobs rang through the house until finally she managed to regain some composure and keep it down to a few sniffles. Steve said, "Why don't you make yourself useful and help Mom by setting the table." His voice was loud enough, for a moment I thought he was talking to me, but then Jenny said, "Yes, Steve."

I listened to clunk of plates being laid out on the table and the clink of flatware set in place next to each plate. Outside, I could hear the passage of cars, the heaviest traffic of the evening with most of the neighbors arriving home from their long days at work. I stared at the windows with a view of the street and hoped no one looked inside through them and if they did, I hoped I would not see their face as they did. A closed blind or curtain would have been kind, but it had not been a day for kindness.

"Are you ready for dinner?" Mom asked, coming to stand behind the far side of the couch where she could easily look me in the eye. It was a rhetorical question in all respects, but I knew it was invitation I would have readily declined given any choice in the matter. Mom's raised eyebrows at my silence told me she expected a response even though there was only one acceptable response. I said, "Yes, Mom."

"Kitchen," Mom ordered and turned her back to me, walking off. I left my corner with a mixture of relief and dread as I walked, blushing as I passed my brother on the way and stopping just inside the threshold of the kitchen. Mom turned toward me from next to the sink and with her index finger, beckoned me to her. It was the last place I wanted to go, but I put one trembling foot in front of the other until I was standing next to her.

My eyes locked on Mom's hand, resting on the counter. Next to it was a freshly unwrapped bar of soap and it did not take any imagination to figure out what plans Mom had for it or for me. My eyes might have pleaded a little, the thought of having my mouth washed out with soap made me weak in the knees, but Mom was not feeling very sympathetic after my slapping fest on Dad's face. It seemed like a month ago that it had all happened, but in reality it was just that very morning.

"You know what to do," Mom said, as if it was necessary to remind me this was not my first mouth soaping. "Lather it up under the water."

With shaking fingers I turned the facet on and picked up the bar of white soap. I swiped it under the water stream and slowly rubbed it between my hands. The lather rose quickly despite my best efforts to make it a slow process. Mom just watched with a half stern, half amused, look on her face. She could be amused, it wasn't her mouth in danger.

"That's good enough," She said, looking at the soap in my hands. "Open wide and stick that tongue out. Give it a good scrubbing, I'll tell you when you can stop."

I gave her one last pleading look, hoping reality would suddenly kick in and make the nightmare vanish, but there was no such luck. Mom started to grow impatient at my stalling and said, "Now, young lady."

I opened my mouth, stuck my tongue out and closed my eyes. The worst part of having my mouth soaped was that I always ended up doing the job myself. It's one thing to bend over get spanked by someone else, even to stand in a corner on someone else's order, or strip naked, but to actually take your own hand and insert a wretched tasting bar of soap into your mouth is more humiliating and demoralizing than just about anything else I can imagine.

Tasting the sudsy soap against my tongue, tears burned at the corners of my closed eyes. My hand slowly moved the soap along the length of my tongue, dipping in and out of my mouth. I fought the sudden, but expected urge to gag and kept moving the soap with as little force as I thought I could get away with until a fit of coughing overtook me. "Ugh, Yuck!" I said.

"Keep going," Mom said, a stern resolve in her voice but an amused expression dominating her face. She was enjoying every second of the humiliating punishment. "And put some effort into it unless you want me to reheat your buns."

I glared at her for a half second reconsidering rebellion, but the sudden return glare from Mom had my mouth flying back open and the soap back to work in an instant. I pushed harder against my tongue with every stroke, feeling the texture of the bar soaking into my tongue. My taste buds became saturated with the silky starch of soap and still Mom let me keep going. Real tears streamed down my face.

"Alright," Mom said, "That's enough. Give yourself two good rinses, but that's all. Understood?"

I nodded my acknowledgement, unable to speak with a mouthful of suds and streams of soapy saliva running down my chin dangling and clinging to my naked chest. I turned to the sink and spit out as much of the soap as I could manage before turning the water back on and rinsing my hands clean of the soap. The process could not go fast enough as I waited for my hands to be pure enough to scoop a mouthful of water and swish it around, futilely attempting to rid myself of the awful aftertaste. Two mouthfuls of water were nowhere near enough to purify my mouth, but Mom knew that. I shut the water off and turned back to face her, hoping it was over, yet knowing it was not.

Mom nodded at the bar of soap where I had dropped it in the sink and said, "Now you can stick that back in your mouth and make sure to bite down real good." I wanted to argue, plead, beg, but pride kept me from doing any of it. I grabbed the soap and shoved it inside my mouth, biting down as expected. Mom said, "Now you can go stand at your place at the table, hands on your head, dear."

A few minutes later I was standing in my prescribed place while the rest of the family sat at the table at enjoyed their evening meal. Except for Jenny of course, she was also standing as naked as me at her place at the table. She was just lucky enough to be able to eat still. With nothing to do but wait for the end of the meal with yucky soap in my mouth and soapy drool running down the front of me, I let my mind wander back to the morning in Joseph Candle's office.

"So you're saying I don't have a choice," I said to Mr. Candle, my hands resting on my hips in an attempt to display my discontent with the situation. A hint of a smile flickered across his face and disappeared all in an instant as he studied me from a few feet away. I felt myself begin to frown as my own gaze hardened on his face, searching for the things he was not saying.

Mr. Candle said, "You have a choice, but are you prepared for the consequences?"

"You said before, they would be better off if I separated myself," I said, recalling the day I had become two people. He shook his head and turned away, walking to his desk on the other side of the room. Glancing over his shoulder as he went, he said, "That was before and now it's too late to go back. A consequence of your previous choice and one which I warned you about as well."

"But you can protect them," I said, searching for a way around his logic. "My presence in their house doesn't effect that or are you unwilling to do so if I don't bow to your wishes?"

He stopped walking and turned toward me with anger flashing in his eyes. I had never seen rage in his eyes before and I hope I never do again. I trembled wondering if he was about to do something we would both regret. His voice was quiet when he said, "I will do what I can to protect them regardless of your recklessness. If you draw attention to yourself and thereby to them, what I can do may no longer be sufficient and it will be for both of us to live with."

"Fine," I said, realizing I would regret any decision I made, but some more than others, "I'll go back."

"Good," Mr. Candle said, sitting down behind his desk. "It's the right decision for everyone."

I followed him to his desk, sitting down in one of the two chairs in front of it. Mr. Candle raised an eyebrow, obviously thinking we were done. I said, "What do you know about my grandmother?"

Faking a casual air, he focused on the computer screen before him and said, "Is there something I should know about her?"

Crossing my legs and leaning back, I said, "That's just the thing, you shouldn't, but I think you know a lot more about her than I do."

He glanced over at me and said, "What would make you think that?" His fake casualness was slipping into fruitlessness. I smiled, enjoying a fleeting moment of control and hoping to turn it into something a little more beneficial and a lot longer lasting.

"She did," I said pausing just long enough for him to connect the dots, "Or more accurately, my mother did. She was your secretary or that was her cover story I guess, wasn't she?"

"You're jumping to unfounded conclusions," Mr. Candle said, giving me his full attention once more.

"Yes, but that doesn't make me wrong and you aren't denying anything," I said.

"Would you believe me if I did?" He asked.

"Without some straight answers?" I said, "Probably not."

"If you have questions," He said, gesturing toward himself, "Ask."

Shifting in my seat I said, "Is she my grandmother?"

Tilting his head, He said, "What do you think?"

I huffed, frustrated by his manner of answering and yet not surprised by it at all. "I think you are hiding things from me and I'm getting tired of wandering around in the dark when you have a flashlight in your pocket," I said.

A wry smile broke onto his face as he nodded and said, "More like a book of matches, but you are right, she is your grandmother. However, she never worked for me."

Closing my eyes and shaking my head, I said, "But you did know her?"

"Yes," He said.

I waited a moment expecting him to explain, but instead silence fell between us. I laughed and said, "That's it? You don't think that requires some explaining?"

He said, "I'm not going to sit here and guess at what you want to know."

Uncrossing my legs, I leaned forward in my seat, hands resting on the front edge of his desk while I stared into his passive eyes. I said, "I want to know the truth. I want to know if she's dead or alive or something else. I want to know how I'm connected to all of this beyond the mere fact I'm related to her and I want to know how you fit into everything with her, with me, with my family. I want some answers and if you don't start giving them to me, I'm going to start asking elsewhere."

We stared into each other's eyes like a battle of will playing out in tense silence. He blinked, but did not look away as he said, "Much of what you want to know I do not know and what I do, you may not want to hear."

"Try me," I said.

"We were partners," He said, "Explorers, adventurers, whatever you want to call it. We were young and reckless and we stumbled onto a mystery that became our obsession. In chasing it, we wound up in a cave during an earthquake and when it was over, she was dead, buried underneath collapses rocks where I couldn't get to her. I brought what I could of her home, nothing physical just a few personal belongings, and buried her."

He stood up from his desk and walked to the window behind him, turning his back to me and gazing out over the city. I waited for him to continue forcing patience in order to keep from prompting him. After a moment, he said, "I thought she was gone, you see. I was lost, all my dreams washed away and I gave up on the quest. Your mother was barely more than a teenager at the time and her sisters still needed a mother, so she became that to them. I was a mess for months, it's not an excuse, but the truth. I should have been there to help them, but I indulged myself in self pity."

He turned to face me and said, "I might have spent the rest of my days wallowing, but Alex Kemp, he was a friend then, found me and showed me something very odd he had found. He'd been diving off the coast of Greece, exploring some ancient ruins washed into the sea. In their midst, he found a tablet with a map and a cryptic message. At first I shrugged it off, swearing I was no longer interested in those sorts of things, but then Alex pointed out the signature on the tablet. It was signed by your grandmother."

Pausing, he studied me for signs of disbelief I think, but I remained silent, waiting for him to continue. He said, "Impossible? Coincidence? A hoax? I thought it all, but the mere possibility she was alive in some fashion was all it took to kick me out of the stupor I'd been in and start living again. While Alex started making preparations to follow the map and it's strange instructions, I decided to go and check on your mother and her sisters. I arrived at the old house to find the front door kicked in and men with gas cans inside. It was my first encounter with the man in shadows, the very same man who nearly got you in Chile."

I nodded slowly and asked, "Who is he?"

He shrugged and said, "I've been trying to answer that question ever since. He always shrouds himself in darkness and despite numerous close encounters with him over the years, I have never caught even a glimpse of his face. It took me many years to figure out he was the architect behind all of the serious competition I encountered in chasing down your grandmother's clues and I knew of his existence. Needless to say, I was impressed when you theorized his existence before ever having encountered him directly."

"My mother and my aunts, were they?" I said, trailing off, not wanting to think about the possibilities of what the man in shadows might have done to them.

"No," Mr. Candle said, "They were gone long before he got there. Your mother put together what money she could from your grandmother's estate and relocated herself and her sisters. I'm not sure what drove her to do it, but I can guess it was too painful living in that house with all those memories. Our shadowy friend took me captive, questioned me about the whereabouts of the girls, but I didn't know anything and he eventually realized it was the truth. I was left for dead, unconscious and tied up in a closet while they set the house on fire. If it were not for Alex, I would have died there."

"What did he want with my mom and my aunts?" I asked.

Mr. Candle turned back to the window and began to pace a short distance in front of the window while he said, "At the time I had no idea. I thought he might have been a collection agent for one of our more shady financiers come looking for what collateral could be found in the wake of your grandmother's death. It wasn't until we stumbled upon a genetic code hidden in the composition of a lost symphony that I realized there was a more specific reason. He was looking for you."

I stood up and walked closer to the place where Mr. Candle was pacing. "But I wasn't even born yet from what your saying," I said.

"True," He said, "He might have been seeking out your mother, she has a significant portion of the genetic code, but as far as I can tell an incomplete portion of the code is only a slight improvement over none. Most likely, he knew she was a carrier and would be capable of producing offspring with the full code. Taking off like your mother did kept the man in shadows' attention divided between seeking out the clues being left by your grandmother and trying to find you. At the same time it gave me the necessary time to learn I needed to find you as well."

"So I have this genetic code," I said, understanding or at least thinking I was understanding, "But what does it mean? What's it for?"

He shrugged once again and said, "Nearest I can determine, it gives you a certain affinity for extra-dimensional awareness. I suspect it is what allowed your grandmother to slip through a doorway into this place where she can manipulate people and events throughout history. If that's the case, someone with this code might be able to reopen a doorway in the right time and place to allow your grandmother to come back through. There is probably more, but because we've been communicating over the gulf of time, much is lost to the sands."

"Okay," I said, "If I have this right then our friend in the shadows is also trying to open the doorway for some reason."

"I have come to the same conclusion, but I'm not sure whether he wants to crossover himself or bring something else through to here," Mr. Candle said.

"Either way, he needs me, because I have this rare genetic code, right?" I said.

"Yes," Mr. Candle replied, looking at me with a curiously raised eyebrow.

"Then if I'm exposed as both Allison and Virginia, wouldn't he just come after me?" I asked, thinking I might have found a good way to keep from facing my father's wrath too soon.

"If you were the only one, perhaps, but he might just as easily use your family to insure your cooperation," He said and then stared me straight in the eye, "However, once he discovers your family it won't take him long to figure out your nephew also possesses the code and being such a young boy he would be far easier to control."

Snap!

I blinked as Dad's fingers appeared in front of my face and the memory faded away. I realized I was still standing at the dinner table, but the soap had slipped from my mouth and was laying on the table where my plate should have been. Everyone was staring at me and the dinner plates were empty save the crumbly remnants of a well prepared meal. Dad was looking quite annoyed, which was nothing new for the day, as he said, "Have you even been listening to me?"