Scarlet Lines

I'm not a bad girl, but I play one in the bedroom.

But sometimes, I am.

I have this very bad habit of being a flirty drunk. Now, I'm a huge proponent of personal responsibility, so I never blame the drink. The decisions I make under the influence are ones I would make while sober... I just have a little (or a lot) of extra nudging.

So while on vacation I kissed a boy. It is not in my nature to make out with boys at bars, but he was absolutely adorable. He was tall, cute and you guessed it, donned a pair of spectacles. It's inexplicable, but I am a sucker for a man in glasses. I alluded to some foul play in my correspondence with the Englishman, but was not specific. During our play he was able to get it out of me...it didn't take much of an interrogation. The burden of the truth was lifted off of my shoulders, but I would soon rediscover it on my bottom.

"How many strokes do you think you deserve?", he asked.

"He was 25 years old, so 25 strokes," I replied.

"Very Well." His tone was firm.

I draped myself over the spanking horse, waiting to be cleansed of my sins.

"Such big infractions deserve the big cane."

I sprung up and my eyes widened. He noticed.

"These won't be love taps," he warned.

In a panic I quipped, "Actually, I think he was closer to 16."

"27." Period.

I'm looking at him in the mirror, looking at me. He gently takes his hand and places it on the small of my back. He slowly moves it up my back and as he gets to the nape of my neck I take his cue lower the upper half of my body. It's time to accept what is coming to me.

The strokes were quick and there were no loving pauses for me to catch my breath, only the briefest of moments when I managed to whisper the count. I couldn't determine which was worse, the fiery lines I felt on the surface or the thuddy pain buried deep in my bottom. Of course, none was worse than knowing how shamelessly I acted that night...and how embarrassed he would have been had he been there to witness such behavior.

A weekly caning has given my bottom an invisible callous. I stopped using arnica long ago, seeing how if any marks were left, they usually disappeared by the morning. By the time I got home the marks were faint and it looked like I would wake up this morning to a clean slate of a bottom. I was wrong. Like a scarlet letter, I wear a badge of shame. I differ from Hester Prynne as I wear mine hidden in secrecy, underneath my clothes and it will fade as I forgive myself as he has forgiven me.