I remember one particular occasion when my sister Cristina really got her bottom warmed well by our mother. She was nine years old at the time.
We had just experienced the first snowfall of that winter and we begged to be allowed to go out and play in it, which mother agreed to. Predictably, for two young and energetic young girls, we started fooling around a bit. Cristina was throwing snowballs at me, while I was doing my best to avoid being hit.
Cristina’s luck ran out one at about the fourth or fifth shot. She aimed for me as usual, and I managed to dodge the snowball. Unfortunately, it sailed past my head and hit an elderly neighbour of ours, who was just coming out of his house, right in the face.
Naturally, the man was furious. He shouted over to my sister: “You naughty, naughty girl! Your mother is going to hear about this right now!” Cristina tried to apologise, but the man ignored her and walked straight up to our house and knocked on the front door.
Mother answered the knock and was dismayed to be greeted by a bawling, begging elder child and an angry old man. He told Mother what had happened and her face turned to flint. “Cristina, get inside right now!” she told her daughter. Cristina begged but Mother just said: “You will obey me right now!” Reluctantly, she loped through the front door, me not far behind her, craving the safety and warmth of my own home.
While all this was happening, the man had been ranting on about out of control children, his face red with either anger or the impact of the snowball – maybe both. Mother told him: “Please calm down. She is going to be beaten for this, and she will have a very sore bottom once I’ve finished with her.” That seemed to mollify the neighbour, who stomped off down the street. However, the words also brought a scream of fear from Cristina, who had overheard sentence effectively being passed.
Mother closed the door and turned to my sister: “Go to the lounge, pull down your pants and panties, and wait for me.” Never one to miss enjoying my sibling’s misfortunes, I followed Cristina into the lounge, watching her rather gloatingly as she lowered her clothes as directed to reveal her rather chubby and pale bare bottom.
Very soon, Mother came back with the hairbrush she kept for spanking us when we were really naughty. Cristina’s face turned white when she realised she was going to get the more serious option. “No, Mom, please! Not the brush! It was an accident!”
“I realise that, Cristina,” Mother replied, “but what happened was the result of you being reckless and careless. This is to teach you to be more careful next time.” She sat down. “Now, get over my knee, right now!”
Cristina reluctantly bent over the parental lap and Mother adjusted her position so my sister’s bare bottom was in the perfect place to receive the brush. Then she began to beat her, slowly but deliberately, red marks quickly engulfing my sister’s previously pale buttocks. By the time Mother finished, Cristina’s bum was completely cherry red. Needless to say, she was crying copiously. Then Mother put her in the corner, hands on head, smacked bottom on show, for about half an hour.
Both us children remembered that beating for a long time. Cristina, of course, because of the pain and humiliation it caused her, particularly when she next saw the neighbour, who asked her quite intimate details about the spanking. But also me, for two reasons. Firstly, this demonstration of parental discipline had the required effect of being a deterrent for her younger sibling. But also, in truth, because I had frankly enjoyed every minute of seeing my sister’s bare bottom bounce up and down under the attention of Mother’s hairbrush.
Contributor: Laura