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#Post#: 16536--------------------------------------------------
It Happened One Christmas Chapter Eighteen
By: Jack Date: December 22, 2019, 5:18 pm
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“Gee,” I said, unable to stop the sarcasm. “Thanks for
reminding me of that.”
We’d started walking again while I’d been remembering. I hadn’t
been paying that much attention to where we were. I stopped for
a second and looked around. I didn’t recognize the houses
around us, but I had a general feeling of where we were. Not
that it really mattered. I’d ridden my bike around enough that
I was pretty sure I could head north and find my way home in
just a few minutes.
Or wherever I was going to go.
“You’re welcome,” Charlie said calmly, as if he hadn’t noticed
the sarcasm.
“If you were trying to remind me of how unfair getting spanked
can be, you didn’t need to bother.”
Charlie just shook his head.
“You’re making two mistakes, Bailey. First, is that you’re
thinking just because the same thing didn’t happen to both of
you, that makes what happened to you unfair.”
I wanted to argue. I still felt it really wasn’t fair for Dad
to spank me because I got in trouble at school. I tried to
ignore the fact that I’d been dishonest, and not to wonder if
that’s the real reason he’d spanked me. It still felt like
Charlie was wrong, and that if two guys did the same thing, they
should get the same punishment.
We walked another block. The big, two story houses covered in
lights and with decorated yards were behind us. This block was
all one-story homes, and the decorations weren’t as extensive,
but there were still lights up on most of the houses.
It was funny, because I realized I’d lost track of time. It
must have only been about 7:30 or 8pm at the lastest, but I
couldn’t remember the last person I’d really seen, unless it had
been David taking out the trash. Everything felt muffled and
quiet, and not just because of the snow, but more like it was
way after midnight.
Another block past, and the houses seemed to be a bit less nice
here, the decorations not as extensive. On the other hand, I
had a feeling I knew about where we were - away from the bridge,
but approaching the highway side of town.
“You said there were two things - two mistakes I was making,” I
finally said, as much to break the silence as anything else.
Bailey nodded, walked on a few more steps, then stopped and
turned to me.
“Yes. The other one is a mistake that many people make - you’re
coming to a conclusion without enough information.”
Without saying another word, Charlie turned and pointed.
I looked down a side road. For a second, there was nothing,
then I saw a car turn onto the road, coming towards us. The
headlights approached much faster than they should have as we
seemed to rush towards the car, and then suddenly it was moving
beside us, and I could see the passengers and hear their
conversation.
Somehow, I wasn’t surprised that it was Kevin and his mom, nor
that it seemed much earlier in the car, like it was late in a
winter afternoon, not well after dark. I also wasn’t surprised
that, even though I hadn’t seen Kevin since I’d started King’s
Academy after finishing seventh grade, he still looked exactly
as I remembered him.
“Please, Mom, can’t you sign it,” Kevin said, almost in a whine
that was much unlike his regular voice.
“You know what your father has said, Kevin,” his mom replied
quickly. “You know how important it is to him that you get a
good education.”
“But this wasn’t even in class.”
“Then you can explain that to him,” she replied.
The rest of the trip was silent.
Equally silently, Charlie and I moved along behind them,
following as they pulled past where I actually stood and turned
into a house. It wasn’t a bad house, but it wasn’t the big,
fancy house where I’d pictured Kevin living either. There was a
funny kind of double image as I saw the house as it was - at
night, with Christmas lights around it, and as it was when Kevin
and his mom arrived home and walked in.
Things seemed to speed up a bit as we stood there. The sky
blackened, street lights came on, and another car pulled in. A
man stepped out. He was tall - taller than my dad, though not
hugely so. He was lean, but looked strong. I tried to remember
if I knew what Kevin’s dad did for a living. As he walked into
the house, Charlie and I followed him.
By the time we slipped into the house, the three of them were
gathered around the dinner table. Mom and Dad seemed to be
chatting easily, but Kevin was clearly nervous. While they
talked, I noticed that Kevin’s father had a heavy accent. I’m
not sure why, but it kind of reminded me of those guys who
worked for Sean Connery in that submarine movie. His father
finally noticed Kevin’s silence and commented on it.
Kevin was silent for a long moment, until his mom prodded him.
“Go ahead and tell him, Kev.”
Kevin took the detention note from his back pocket and shoved it
across the table. His father gave him a serious look, then
unfolded the paper. His eyes flicked across it, then he set it
down and went back to eating. A few moments went by with no
noise but a TV in the other room. As they all seemed to finish
eating, the man spoke again.
“Did you and that other boy… Bailey?.. finish your project?”
“Almost, we have to type it up. Well, he’s going to type it up,
because he types better than me. Then I have to proofread it.”
He went quiet.
“We don’t have to turn it in until Monday.”
“Any other homework tonight?”
“Just math. I already finished it.”
“Good, why don’t you go get ready? I’ll be there in a minute.”
“Dad, please, this wasn’t even….”
His voice trailed away as his father stared at him.
“Yes, sir.”
Kevin rose and slunk off. The two adults stood and started
clearing the table. They worked quietly for a few moments.
“Don’t be too hard on him, Pasha,” the woman finally said.
The man was quiet a moment as he transferred some leftovers to a
Tupperware bowl. Finally he looked at her.
“Always you say this to me. Do I ever beat him? What is ‘too
hard’? Compared to how I was raised, he is treated like a
spoiled poodle dog.”
I noticed the man’s accent had grown heavier, but I still
understood him, though I had to listen a bit harder.
“He has to learn, Magda. School is important. I want him to not
have to do what I have done. He is so smart, but he has to
learn.”
She was silent a moment, then nodded her head, and went back to
loading the dishwasher. He put a couple of plastic bowls into
the fridge and left in the same direction Kevin had gone.
It was like I was looking from the same space the man - Pasha -
Kevin’s father - was looking as he walked down the hall to a
mostly closed door. He pushed it open to reveal Kevin sitting
on his bed. At first I thought he was shirtless, but he stood,
and I realized he was completely n‍ude.
He was beautiful.
Not like I’m gay or anything, but he just looked so… so…
I already knew he was tall for our age and that he was pretty
athletic, but seeing him like that was so different. His chest
wasn’t just flat. There was this line that started in the
middle of it, went down a bit, and separated out, so you could
see he was getting real pecs. His stomach was flat and had
these lines on it. From his chest, his waist got narrower, but
then flared out a bit at his hips. He really had some body hair
- not just a few short things like I did, but this thick bush at
the lowest part of his stomach that was starting to spread
around his balls. And his balls were big, and they dangled
down, but his p‍enis still hung down further, so the head
of it was a bit lower than his balls. At 13, I’m pretty sure he
was already bigger than I am now. And his legs were just as
muscular as the rest of him, and you could even see the swell of
his calves from in front of him.
I’d never wanted him as a boyfriend or anything, but I knew a
lot of boys messed around together, and I couldn’t help wishing
I’d been able to see him like this in real life.
Of course, that was nothing to do with why he was like this now.
“Dad, please,” he pleaded. “It wasn’t in class. It was after
school. We were just messing around a little. We didn’t hurt
nothing.”
His dad spoke, but his English seemed better, like he wasn’t so
upset now or something.
“No, Kevin Kolya, it’s you who don’t understand. You say this
wasn’t in class so it doesn’t matter, but it does. Teachers are
people upon whom you must depend. And they are people and
people talk. You say you meant no harm, but how do they know
that? What they know is you were caught sneaking. Why? They
are people, so some ask and wonder. This does not affect your
grade, but it could follow you. I have told you how important
school is so you can get good job, not like me, having to work
so long and hard. School is important, so teachers are
important. You must depend on them, so you must not make them
not like or trust you. Understood?”
“Yes, sir,” Kevin mumbled.
I have to admit, I did as well. What his father was saying was
much like what my own had said back then, yet it suddenly made
more sense to me - maybe because my own butt wasn’t on the line
this time.
His father didn’t say anything else, but just pointed. A sound,
almost a sob, escaped Kevin, but he marched over to his closet,
where his father had pointed. I couldn’t help but notice that
Kevin’s back dimpled in before the swell of his buttocks, which
were full and round, not at all flat, and with only slight
dimples at each side.
The closet door was slightly ajar, and he pulled it open. On
the back of the door was a rack from which hung several ties to
the left and a couple of belts. To the far right side hung
something I didn’t recognize. It was a piece of leather about
two feet long, but only about an inch wide. It was black. It
hung down loosely, almost like a belt, but stiffer - like a new
one that hadn’t been broken in yet, but I had the feeling it had
been broken in, since Kevin didn't seem happy at all to be
fetching it.
Kevin walked slowly across the room to where his father waited
by the bed. He handed the narrow strap to his father, then
turned and took the pillow from the head of the bed, moving it
to the center. Placing the pillow crosswise in the middle of
the bed, Kevin kneeled on the bed and laid himself across the
pillow so his butt was lifted into the air. He reached under
himself and pulled his balls up so they weren’t between his
legs, then stretched out. He spread his legs so his toes were
nearly at each side of the mattress, then he reached up, spread
eagling himself and grasped one of the upper corners of the
mattress with each hand.
His father seemed to weigh the strap in his hand for a moment,
then he lifted it, but stopped. Instead, he knelt down on the
bed, and rested his hand on Kevin’s shoulders.
“Kevin, you are my son. The way I was raised, it is hard to
say, but I do love you. But it is very important you do good.
I worry for you, and it is my job to help you learn. Do you
understand?”
“Yes,” Kevin said though he sounded rather choked.
“Then we make sure we don’t have to repeat this lesson soon.”
Saying that, he gave Kevin’s shoulder a pat and stood.
The strap rose up.
It fell much more quickly, and it whistled when it did.
Kevin’s back arched up, and I could see his jaw clench tight as
he struggled to hold in whatever noise was trying to escape. I
could see his eyes were clenched tight.
His father stood patiently behind him. I was on the far side of
the bed from the man, but I could clearly see a line of white
where the thin strap had landed, and I watched as red rushed in
to color the stripe.
I’m not sure how much time passed - it seemed like hours -
before Kevin slowly lowered his head and feet back to the
mattress. Almost as soon as he was back in place, the strap
whistled down again. This time Kevin cried out, a loud, sobbing
yelp.
The same thing again. The third time the strap c‍racked
down, Kevin’s head didn’t come up, and I realized he’d taken a
bite of sheet as his outcry was smothered. The sheet nearly
came untucked as he thrashed his head around, though.
Again and again, the strap whistled down through the air and
snapped across Kevin’s butt. The only things that changed were
how loud Kevin cried out, how much he thrashed around, and how
long his dad waited before laying the next lash.
I found myself crying as well, though silently, unlike Kevin, as
I watched. Yet he took each stripe. No longer able to keep hold
of the mattress, he beat his fist against the mattress, covered
his head, and pulled the sheets loose, yet his hands always went
back to those same spots. His feet beat a tattoo against the
mattress, shoving him up enough that his father finally had to
take his hips, pull him back down, and resettle the pillow. Yet
still it went on.
Finally, the strap came down, but didn’t come back up. The man
stood behind the son, and it was easy to see how upset and sad
he was at the mewling mess to which the boy had been reduced.
His mouth opened, then closed and opened again before he finally
turned away. He walked to the closet, re-hung the thin strap,
then left the room without saying another word.
“Thirteen.”
I jumped at the voice. Despite Kevin’s broken sobs, it still
seemed like Charlie had violated a sanctuary when he spoke.
I had to swallow twice to get my heart back into my chest, but I
finally did.
“What?” I replied.
“It was only thirteen stripes. You can probably count them
yourself, if you’d like. And it was barely fifteen minutes -
barely a quarter of an hour, not multiple ones.”
“Why did you show me this? Are you trying to tell me this
wasn’t cruel?”
“Was it cruel? As hard as this seems, did you even suspect it
had happened the next morning? And what if Pasha was right? As
hard as this might have been, what if it kept him from trying to
steal stuff again and kept him from getting suspended or sent to
an alternate school where he wouldn’t have much chance of
getting a good education?”
He was quiet a moment, and I had to think. Wasn’t cruel cruel
whyever it was done or whatever the result. I had to force
myself not to think of that old song Mom sometimes listened to -
Cruel to be Kind.
After a moment of silence spread between us, becoming deeper as
Kevin’s broken sobs died away, Charlie spoke again.
“But no, that’s not what I wanted you to see. I wanted you to
realize that you don’t know everything, and that sometimes,
someone else’s punishment can be worse than your own - for you,
not just for them.”
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#Post#: 16551--------------------------------------------------
Re: It Happened One Christmas Chapter Eighteen
By: db105 Date: December 23, 2019, 9:39 am
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I get Kevin's dad's reasoning, but it is rather harsh.
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