Spank Bingo: Alex Theobald

I hated the last period before lunch. It was the first day back after the Thanksgiving holiday, and it was hard enough to teach the little beasts. In the period before lunch, I always lost the last five minutes anyway. The only good thing was, it was late enough in the day for them to be pretty well awake, and not after lunch, so they weren’t logy and ready for a nap.

"All right, monsters. Put your stuff away. If you’re quiet and orderly, you can go stand by the door. You should have about a minute before the bell rings."

As always, some of the kids acted like they were trying for pole position at the Indy 500. Others just didn’t care that much. To be honest, as long as they didn’t draw another teacher’s attention, I didn’t really care either. I kept half an eye on them until the bell rang, but was mostly putting my things away. I’d decided to skip leftovers today, figuring there’d be a fight for the microwave in the teacher’s lounge, so I was just going to eat a cold turkey sandwich and catch up on my reading during lunch. Or that was the plan at least.

I almost didn’t notice that there was one last student in the room until he headed towards my desk instead of the door.

"You got a minute, Mr. Wells?"

"Sure, Alex. What’s up?"

"You said that we could talk to you if… I mean, do you have a little time?"

I certainly did have time, and if I hadn’t, I would have tried hard to make some for this fellow. I’m sure that when I describe Alex, you’ll recognize him. Not that you’ll have known his identical twin or anything, but you’ll have known a boy just like him.

Alex Theobald was the kid that almost everyone would secretly like to hate, but they just can’t bring themselves to do it. He was a great student and all the teachers seemed to like him, but he managed that without seeming like a suck-up or teacher’s pet. Most of the kids liked him, which you could tell both by the way they reacted to him and because he was the sixth grade class president.

He was also a good athlete. While sixth graders couldn’t play for the school, I know he’d done well in peewee football, and, more importantly, had really loved it. He was stoked about getting to play for the Bull Pups next year. While Alex loved football, it seemed to me that he would be more of a natural at basketball, baseball, or even soccer, since he had a rangy build. Of course, he’d only recently turned twelve, so he would probably fill out a lot. I don’t think it mattered too much, though: when I’d covered the P.E. classes one day, I’d really watched Alex, and even at ‘just-turned-twelve’, he moved with a natural confidence and grace. I’d also watched him after the workout, and he was as good looking out of his clothes as he was in them.

And he looked very good in his clothes. He always dressed nicely, usually in Levis or slacks (he seemed to love Bugle Boy) and a nice shirt—as soon as the weather had cooled down, he’d started showing off a collection of rugby shirts.

He probably wouldn’t be voted most handsome or anything, but he had strong, regular features that were going to serve him well when he started looking for a girl—or boy—friend. His face was a perfect oval, with a strong chin and cheekbones. His eyebrows were the same thick, dark brown hair as the hair on his head, and he had such long lashes, you know the ladies were all jealous. He had light blue eyes that weren’t quite grey, but tended to catch the colors around them. His nose was straight and proud without being overlarge. His mouth was a little small, but was a perfect, deep red bow. To me, his only problem was that he wasn’t quite boyish enough to be cute. He was very nice to look at, though.

His body was just another reason to hate him. He was tall (for someone who’d just turned twelve, at least), but not huge, standing about 5’2" or 3" and weighing maybe 105 pounds. Even at that young age, he had a slight waist, some hips, and was starting to show some definition in his chest. His only real problem was, probably due to a recent growth spurt, his rear end was a little too flat to be really nice, which isn’t to say it was bad, just not great. And if his backside wasn’t impressive, his front side certainly was. When I’d seen the kid in gym class that day, I’d thought, even though he was still nearly bald, he was hung like a porn star. It took me a minute to realize that, since he wasn’t too much over five foot, he was probably hanging just a bit over five inches, but that was in what looked like that quarter hard state, where you’re getting full, but still hanging down, not poking up, and it wasn’t skinny either. His balls weren’t quite that impressive, but still nice. They were a decent size, but he was still pretty tight up to the legs rather than dangling (and maybe that made him look a little longer, as well).

Overall, he was one of those kids that everyone loved having around, and I wondered what he wanted to talk about. I’d briefly met his parents, and he seemed to have a happy family life, so I assumed it must be a school problem. He quickly disabused me of that notion, though.

I’d gestured for him to sit by my desk, and I’d pushed back a bit to open up the space between us. "What can I do for you, Alex?"

"Well…." he said, uncomfortably, then looked around for a minute. "Are there different kinds of child abuse?"

That was a shocker for me. While I’m a firm believer that different people react to things in different ways, it’s also pretty true that abuse victims tend to show certain signs. If Alex was being abused (at least on a regular basis), he was either the best actor I’d ever seen or suffered from multiple personalities. After a few seconds, though, during which I held up a finger so he’d know I was thinking, I decided he was probably worried about a friend.

"Yeah," I explained to him after the pause, "I guess there are probably three types. The one most people talk about is physical, which is like beating a kid. That one’s kind of hard to define because there’s a lot of question about what’s a spanking and what’s abuse. When I was a kid, the idea of having bruises after your dad got through whipping you wasn’t a big deal, and you had to really hurt a kid—like put him in the hospital—for it to be considered abuse. Nowadays, it seems to take less to be considered abuse."

I paused to see if he had any questions, but he just waited, so I went on after a few seconds.

"Then there’s sexual abuse. Most people…."

"It’s nothing like that, Mr. Wells," Alex interrupted me.

"Are you sure, Alex? Because it’s not just dirty old…."

"I’m sure." If he was sure, he was also a very dark red, so I decided to skip it for then. He’d wanted to talk to me about something, so I guessed I should let him guide the conversation a bit.

"Okay, well the third kind is the hardest to define, but it’s emotional abuse."

"Is that like embarrassing a guy really bad?"

"I think there’s more to it than that, Alex. If it was illegal just to embarrass a kid, I know my mom would have been in jail years ago."

He barked a laugh, then nodded. "Yeah, mine too." Then he paused for a second and his face went serious. "So how do you know if it’s…?"

"Abusive?" I suggested and he nodded. "I’m not sure, Alex. It’s hard to say for sure. I think it has to be a pattern of…."

"So not just once?"

"No, I’m pretty sure it would take more than just once to be emotional abuse. Do you think a friend of yours is being abused?"

His eyes went wide, as if he was startled by the idea, then he went red and looked away from me. "No, sir, nothing like that. It’s just that…. Well, something happened last week, and I was hoping that…. Well, I thought that if it was abusive, maybe… I don’t know," he finally trailed off.

"Hey, Alex," I said softly, leaning forward to pat his upper arm. "Is there something you’d like to talk about? If it was abusive, I might be able to tell you that or suggest some way to deal with it. If it wasn’t, you might feel better just to talk about it."

He slumped down into his chair and looked like he had to think about it for a minute, but finally nodded. He sat back up, took a deep breath, then looked away from me as he began.

"We go to my grandparents’ house for most of the holidays. Mom doesn’t have much family, and my dad comes from a big family. Plus, Grandma and Grandpa live up in the Ozarks—they have a big place and it’s really nice up there."

I was just quiet, nodding in the right places so he’d know I was listening, and let him tell the story.

"Anyway, that’s where we went for Thanksgiving. As soon as Dad got home from work last Wednesday, we threw the stuff in the car and took off. My Uncle Joe lives in Missouri, so he was already there when we got there, but it was pretty late, so I had to go right to bed." I said Alex isn’t really cute, but right then he made this face full of disgust at a boy his age being sent to bed, and I almost laughed.

"Aaron—he’s my cousin and he’s the only kid in the family older than me—he’s thirteen—he was already in our bed and asleep. He’s really great, but I hate him sometimes. He woke me up with a pillow in the face the next morning." He sounded like he wanted to be aggrieved, but he was smiling fondly as he told me about it.

"So everybody was there this time. Me and Aaron are the oldest, but we got a bunch of younger cousins. We stayed there all weekend and had a really great time, but the parents expect me and Aaron to watch out for the younger kids—especially the boys.

"Like I said, my grandparents have a big place and there’s always a bunch of stuff to do and places to explore, so we always have a good time unless the weather’s really bad and we have to stay inside. Even then, Grandma still has a bunch of board games and we play cards and dominoes and stuff.

"But the weather wasn’t bad this time, so Dad and Uncle Joe chased us out. The thing is, there’s this really neat pond up there. It’s at the bottom of this little hill and the creek runs into it, and it’s loads of fun. Sometimes, during the summer, me and Aaron sneak out there and go s… swimming," he finished in a blush, that let me know what they really did do up there.

"We’re really not supposed to do down by the pond, though. Grandma thinks it’s not safe, and they talk about how it’s not on their property, and it needs to be cleaned up, and she always worries about snakes in the summer, then when it rains the creek gets up…." He was saying all this like any (pre-) teen repeating his parents’ ridiculous worries, then went quiet for a minute, as if not sure how to broach the next part.

I finally spoke up to help him over the hump. "So you went out there anyway," I suggested.

"No!" He said, looking straight at me, then he looked suddenly abashed and turned away. "We just went out to the hill and were looking at it."

I had to fight not to smile, as he continued.

"We woulda been okay, but we had the little guys with us. I can’t remember how old they are, but Dean’s about nine, and the other guys are like six or seven. Anyway, we were playing around and throwing rocks to see if we could get ‘em in the pond, and Darrell, he’s six, slipped and slid down the hill and got all muddy."

"Well, me and Aaron got him and we took him back to the house and were trying to get him cleaned up, but Aunt Alice came out and saw us and yelled for the other parents. That was it. Darrell’s mom was getting his clothes off so she could take him in the house and get him cleaned up, but Uncle Joe was there and he heard Darrell tell his mom that he fell in the pond. Now Uncle Joe knew that was wrong ‘cause Darrell wasn’t even wet, but he wouldn’t listen, and he told us all to get into the garage. Oh man, I knew then we was in trouble, and Uncle Joe spanks like my dad does, so I was pretty worried. Aaron was trying to be cool, but I knew he was too."

"Anyway, when Uncle Joe had us in the garage, he started chewing us out. Me and Aaron tried to explain that we weren’t really at the pond, but he didn’t care. He said we knew we weren’t supposed to go down there, and we didn’t have to get into the dam… darned thing to be disobeying. Then he sat down on this stool and grabbed Mike—I think he’s the same age as Darrell—yanked his pants and shorts down, put him over his lap, and spanked his butt hard! I mean it turned really red and he was howling before Uncle Joe let him up."

"When Uncle Joe let Mike up, he started jumping around, rubbing his butt, and he was still crying real hard, but Uncle Joe grabbed Sandy and started pulling his clothes down, and he told Dean to get his own down too."

"Well, he spanked Sandy and Dean just as hard as he had Mike—I think he spanked Dean harder—and then he just sat there and watched Dean while he was jumping around and all that stuff. It actually looked kinda funny with his… with him flopping around like that, except I knew I was probably going to get it next. I was worried, but confused to, since I knew Uncle Joe used the belt. Aaron said he hadn’t got a spanking with his dad’s hand in a long time."

"Well, when Dean finally settled down a little, Uncle Joe told him and the other two guys to pull up their clothes and stand by Grandpa’s work bench. When they were out of the way, he got this sawhorse and put it in the middle of the garage, then threw one of those packing quilt things over it. Then he walked over, took this thing off the wall and told me and Aaron to get our clothes off. All our clothes!"

"What kind of thing?" I asked, when he slowed down.

"Well, it was leather, and.…" He held up his hands to indicate a size. At first, I thought he might have been talking about a barber shop-model razor strop, since he indicated it was about two feet long and three inches wide. Then he mentioned the double rows of holes that were about a quarter-inch each. Whatever it was, it must have been worse than Dad’s belt (I only later learned that what he described resembled a reform school strap, though whether replica or authentic, or if that was even what it was, I had no idea).

"Anyway, we both begged him not to make us take our clothes off in front of the little kids, or at least not whip us in front of them, but he ignored us and told us to get moving. Then he made us bend over the sawhorse and spread our legs. That thing hurt bad, Mr. Wells. I’ll bet me and Aaron was howling as bad as the little kids had been. I don’t know how many I got, but Aaron says he got thirteen and I got twelve, like our ages."

"When he finally finished, Uncle Joe hung that thing up, then took the little kids and told us we could get dressed and come inside when we felt like it.

After a while, Uncle Ricky—he’s Dad’s youngest brother, and he’s still in high school—came out and helped us get up and get dressed. He said Grandpa used that thing on him and our dads and everybody and it’s only been a coupla years since he got it."

I waited to be sure Alex had run down, then asked wryly, "So how’d the rest of the vacation go?"

He snorted, but he answered seriously, "Except that it hurt to sit down the rest of the day, it was okay. We didn’t do much running around or playing the next day, though."

"Still sore?"

"Not really, just kinda…."

"Tender?"

"Yeah!"

I thought for a minute, then finally said, "Alex, I like you, and I’d like to help you, so let me make sure I’ve got this right; okay?"

He nodded.

"You didn’t say anything about physical abuse. Did you look to see if you had any marks on your rear?"

The boy blushed but answered, "Uncle Ricky said we were really red and we had these lines where it hit, but we weren’t bruised or anything. Me and Aaron looked when we got in bed that night, and we were still kinda reddish and I could see those lines, but I couldn’t see any bruises either."

"Well, it does sound like it was hard but not abusive. Have you checked since Aaron looked?"

He shook his head.

"As for emotional abuse, it sounds like what’s bothering you is that you disobeyed—don’t tell me you didn’t! Even if you didn’t go all the way down to the pond, you went close enough for your cousin to get muddy, so I don’t think your uncle was being real unfair. Do you?"

He shrugged, then finally shook his head. I guess he was willing to admit it, now that the whipping was over and done.

"Your real problem was that your little cousins got to watch you getting it, after you watched them. Since you didn’t seem to have a problem watching them—you did say it was almost funny, didn’t you?—I think your real problem is that you’re growing up and you hated having your… um, your hair," I said, gesturing at the front of his pants, "exposed to the little kids and having them see you get whipped hard enough to make you cry like they had. Is that about it?"

Hearing it described that way, Alex seemed pretty embarrassed, but he was honest enough to admit it without too much argument, so he nodded.

"I don’t think you have too much room to argue here, Alex. The only thing I can suggest—and you’ll hate to hear this as much as I did at your age—is that if you don’t want to get punished, don’t earn it. At least try to stay outta trouble with the little guys around."

His snort let me know he thought that advice was worth as much as he’d paid for it.

"The only other thing I can offer is to take you over to the nurse’s and have you drop your clothes and see if there are still any marks. If there are, maybe I can talk to your dad and suggest he asks his brother to take it a little easier, but I doubt that’ll get you out of any more whippings you earn."

The boy sighed but admitted that it probably wouldn’t be helpful and assured me his rear felt fine anyway. Which was really too bad. I would have liked an excuse to examine him close up and see if his rear was starting to fill out yet.

We’d talked so long that Alex ended up eating his bag lunch in my classroom with me, while I gave him some hints for dealing with younger cousins when they become real pests.



Remember me mentioning what a pleasure it was to have Alex in class? Well, the little ingrate never returned the favor I’d done of listening by earning a paddling. Oh well, I did get a little bit of revenge for that.

When school started after Christmas, I stopped Alex on his way out of the classroom.

"How were the holidays?" I asked.

"They were great."

"Did you go back to the Ozarks?"

"Yeah."

"Did you stay out of the garage this time?"

The dark red color that rushed into his face let me know the answer, but he managed a level voice as he replied, "No, sir; but I did take your advice. When me and Aaron got in trouble this time, it was just us—no little kids."

With that admission, I chased him off to lunch.



Why can’t these kids get spanked simply. Alex’s story had three possible squares for me: In the Garage, Anyone but Parents, or Witnessed. I dropped the second choice right away, since it only added to one line, and finally went with Witnessed. Not only did it add to two lines, but this was my second story in a row (second in a week!) when the spanking was witnessed, so I decided it must be a sign.







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