Spank & Correct: From The Corner

The walls were cool against my shoulders, but rather than providing support, they trapped me in place with nowhere to run and no place to hide. I stared downward at the place where my toes curled into the rug and waited. There was nothing else to be done, everything had already been said and the consequence were all which remained. The tick of the grandfather clock to my side kept my nerves on edge and my thoughts never too far from the moment at hand. Memories from the morning floated on the surface, distracting me temporarily from the harshness of the present.

Mr. Candle's voice had warbled when I exited the elevator and he said, "I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but you're going to have to patch things up with your parents."

I stared at him, questions spinning around in my head and our eyes locked in a tense silence punctuated by his sudden lack of motion. I nearly forgot to breathe, the implications of his words filtered their way through the questions leaving my heart pounding in my ears while a frigid wave of nausea washed over me. Everything had been going perfectly, a new start fortuitously dropped in my lap when I needed it the most and yet there Mr. Candle stood suggesting the steps forward would require a step back. And not any step back, but the one thing I was certain could not be taken back.

"I can't," I said and a frown settled on his face before he looked away and resumed his restless pacing. I might have stepped back into the elevator and left him alone, but the doors slid closed, cutting off my escape. My eyes turned from Mr. Candle to the window beyond and I walked to it, peering far below at the gardens in the plaza.

Mr. Candle said, "Things have become infinitely more complicated."

"Because I left?" I asked, still staring below rather than facing him. His footsteps grew closer to me and I could feel his eyes on my back as he considered how best to answer. In the silence of his uncertainty I said, "The truth would work best."

"I've never given you anything else," He said causing an ironic smile to settle on the lips of the woman reflected in the glass. Was it Virginia or Allison? I said, "The whole truth."

A car drove by on the street outside the window, shaking my thoughts from the morning in Mr. Candle's office back to my present. A hot flush spread across my face at the possibility I might have been seen if someone had glanced inside the house as they drove passed. The instinct to cover my exposure with my hands was nearly overwhelming to the point my arms began to ache from the strain of keeping my hands folded on top of my head. I focused on the ticking once more and allowed it to fill my existence until a calm returned and my thoughts drifted back to the morning.

"You've been compromised," Mr. Candle said. He remained standing behind me while I stared out the window at the blue sky and white, puffy clouds. I watched our reflections in the glass, seemingly standing side by side, eerily different than reality.

"Because of the picture?" I asked.

"Mrs. Elliot's actions have had serious repercussions, but the picture is not the most serious," Mr. Candle said.

"Say what you need to say," I said resting my hands on my hips and watching my reflection do the same, "I'm not in the mood for twenty questions."

"Someone on the outside knows all about Allison Beaumont," Mr. Candle said, his tone suggesting I should react in a panic.

"Surely you don't mean they know I am both Allison and Virginia?" I asked, glancing behind me as my words resonated between us and then back out the window when silence returned.

"Unlikely, from our analysis of the data they stole," Mr. Candle said walking closer to me and gazing out the window as well.

"Then why should I be concerned?" I asked.

"If Allison Beaumont were to disappear right now, it would be a relatively simple matter to connect the dots from Allison Beaumont to Virginia West," Mr. Candle said trying to catch my eye from the side by leaning forward and looking back toward me, "If that happens, your family will be in danger."

"You aren't making sense," I said purposefully avoiding his gaze, "If they don't know Allison and Virginia are one and the same now, why would the disappearance of Allison make it obvious?"

Mr. Candle gave up trying to get my direct attention, resuming a more rigid stance and said, "As long as both persons exists, the correlations between the two files are likely to be interpreted as nothing more than coincidence, but should one or the other suddenly disappear, the connections between the two would solidify in any analysis."

"I can't be in two places at the same time," I said. "No matter what I do, either Allison or Virginia don't exist at certain times as far as the outside world is concerned."

"That's not strictly accurate," Mr. Candle said, turning around and walking away from the window and me, "While you are here at work, I have arranged things so that Allison Beaumont is for all intents and purposes, working as an Administrative Assistant. When you leave at the end of the night, I've had to take precautions to make it appear Virginia West goes to her home and drives her car. To the outside world you both exist, at least on the surface."

"Okay, but none of this tells me why I would need to go back to my parents." I said.

The sound of car doors slamming, shook me from the memories once more. Shuddering at the thought of visitors coming in the door, I glanced out the front window, but there was no one in sight. I listened for voices and footsteps for a long quiet moment filled with only the ticking of the clock. Nothing happened and my thoughts slowly drifted back to the conversation which had resulted in my current situation.

"Your apartment is no longer yours," Mr. Candle said, as if it were the answer to my previous question.

Turning my back to the window and our reflections, I faced him and said, "You know way too much about my personal life. How is it you even knew about the blow up with my parents in the first place?"

"I have security monitoring you whenever you are outside of Q5," Mr. Candle said.

"Listening in on my personal conversations at my house? What gives you the right?" I said.

"You did. It was all in your contract, but as is painfully obvious, you barely read any of it," Mr. Candle said.

"Fine. Whatever," I said, "Now why is it I can't just go and rent another apartment as Allison Beaumont? I'm still not seeing why I would need to go back to my parents."

Mr. Candle said, "Where else would you go?"

"Anywhere," I said.

"Your financial resources are limited and if I were to assist in anyway we would attract the exact kind of attention we are trying to avoid," Mr. Candle said, taking a few steps back from me, "And on top of that, I can't say I exactly approve of your behavior toward your parents in the first place."

"So you want me to go home to them because it suits your perception of justice," I said.

"I admit it does, but my reasoning is based in the logistics of your situation," Mr. Candle said, "Something you should have given more thought to before storming out."

"I got an apartment once, I can get another," I said.

"Without a cosigner you would never have qualified and your credit situation is worse now, having skipped out on your lease," Mr. Candle said.

"That was my father's doing," I said.

"Arguable, but it makes little difference who is to blame when it shows up on your rental history," Mr. Candle said.

"I'll manage on my own," I said, knowing I was arguing a losing battle, "I have friends if necessary."

"Cherise?" Mr. Candle said, "She has financial troubles of her own and she's made her feelings about rooming with you clear in the past. Your boyfriend Mark is unlikely to assist once he learns about your actions which, given his close relationship with your brother, is only a matter of time. None of your other friends are likely to provide assistance and if they did it would never be more than few days on their couch. You may be able to delay going back to your parents, but I see no way in which you can avoid it without utilizing the assets belonging to Virginia West."

I said, "It might not be easy, but I'll figure it out."

"You should be realistic," Mr. Candle said, "You might not feel like it today, but eventually you will regret leaving as you did. Fixing the mistake now, will be less painful for everyone and face it, in the end you are going to have to correct this situation."

The sound of a key sliding into the front door's lock ripped me back into the moment at hand while I belatedly wondered if "less painful for everyone," included me. As the knob turned and the door swung open, I decided it definitely did not. My brother walked inside and our eyes locked for an instant before I found myself staring back at my curled toes, unable to overcome the embarrassed shame of my situation.

"About time you got here," Mom said, leaning out of the kitchen and sounding far too bubbly for my taste, "Dinner is almost ready."

"What did she do this time?" Steve asked.

"Oh don't even get me started," Mom said, returning to her kitchen while her boisterous voice carried itself through the house, "Woke up with the worst attitude I've ever seen this morning."

"Worse than the time Dad dragged her home from that concert she snuck off to back in high school?" Steve asked.

"Much," Mom said. "The little brat went so far as to hit your father, twice."

I could feel the disapproving eyes glaring at me at Mom's news. If I could have shrunk anymore into the corner I would have, it was no doubt the reason Dad left me facing the room instead of the corner for a change; No place to hide my face. I stared intently at my toes, my cheeks burning with red hot embarrassment. It all sounded so much worse when Mom explained it, but what really made me ashamed was her version of the events stuck to the inarguable facts.

"We expected her to be upset of course," Mom said over the clinking of pots and pans, "But with all her irresponsible behavior lately, we just could not see keeping your father's credit in danger with that apartment of hers. She already missed one rent payment and never gave us any indication she understood how serious it was. I mean, if your father hadn't been right on top of that our credit could have been marred for years."

"Unbelievably irresponsible," Jenny said walking into the kitchen with the obvious intention of helping Mom.

"You should be one to talk young lady," Mom said, surprising me with the disapproval in her tone toward Jenny. Mom always seemed to think Jenny walked on water, but apparently things had changed. "You should have reported your friend the very first time you received one of those disgraceful pictures. What on earth were you thinking allowing yourself to be associated with illegal activity like that? If someone at the company wanted to press charges you could have gone to jail or even prison. Did you even think for one second about how that would effect your family or your son?"

How I wish I could have seen Jenny's face at that moment. I had thought of privately confronting her with my knowledge of her involvement later, perhaps even threatening to tell my brother, but it was infinitely more satisfying to hear my mother finally speak to her in that harsh, judgmental tone I had assumed was reserved for me alone. For a moment, my personal situation seemed a little less lonely, although I was still in fact alone in the corner.

"I didn't know what to do," Jenny said defensively, "She was my friend and I didn't want to cause any trouble. I thought if I just ignored them, she would just stop sending the stuff to me."

Mom said, "If you were ignoring them, you would never have taken notice enough to send me the one of Allison."

"I thought you would want to know," Jenny said with an enjoyable whine in her voice.

"It was fortuitous, but don't pretend you weren't studying the picture," Mom said. "It took me five minutes to recognize Allison in it and I'm her mother."

"Don't worry Mom, I've taken steps to insure this doesn't happen again," Steve said.

"No offense Steve, but you've never taken a very firm hand with Jenny," Mom said.

"This time I have," Steve said, "I spoke with this Mrs. Anderson Dad suggested and found out the company has these Disciplinary Retreats they use with some of their more extreme problems. She helped me get Jenny enrolled for one starting next week."

Jenny said, "You said you wouldn't—

Steve said, "I'll tell whomever I like and if you know what's best, this will be the last time you give me any attitude about it."

"It's better than nothing, but a few days away hardly seems sufficient," Mom said.

Steve said, "It's three weeks and if the discipline is anything like Mrs. Anderson indicated, she'll be begging to come home before the end of the first day."

"Well still, I don't think she has anymore right to be sitting at the dinner table than your sister," Mom said.

Cooking was the only sound in the house for a long moment as I imagined my sister in law standing next to me at the dinner table, naked with tears rolling down her normally pristine cheeks. It was all very enjoyable until my mind's eye insisted on placing me next to her in a similar pose. Then it was not so fun or funny.

"Mom's right," Steve said, stunning me and I am betting Jenny too, "Put your things over the back of that chair, just like Allison's."

Jenny said, "Steve—

"Easy way or the hard way," Steve said, "It's your choice."

A few moments later Steve said, "Touch your toes, legs straight." The air was thick with tense apprehension as we waited for the only sounds could possibly follow such an order. I jolted, pushing back into the corner for a moment as the loud smack of Lexan against bubbly flesh permeated the house. I thought I heard a squeak from Jenny, but before I could be certain Steve followed his first swat with a second and then a third. In the wake of the third swat I recognized the sniffles of falling tears and the squeaky moans of an embarrassed girl with a sore backside. Too bad I was stuck in the corner and could not see the long overdue spanking.