“Please, please don’t, I have just got my hair straight.”

And she did try very hard not to tut at him as he ignored her pleas and tipped her forwards making her flat, shiny hair tumble and twist over her head.

He spanked her over her knickers at first, one of those short sharp spankings where he just used flat of his hand, she never knew which hand. It seemed wrong to ask at the time and she never wanted to ask later in case he gave her a demonstration.

But then he stopped and jerked her knickers down to her knees and left her panting and pink cheeked bent over his knee.

“Tell me why I am doing this,” he demanded his hard tone belied by the gentle way he stroked her bottom.

Jayne resisted the twenty responses that leapt to her tongue and chose the better path. She sulkily stroked the seam of his jeans as she pouted out, “Because you said I am not to be nervous about meeting your friends who are all grown up and important and I have to be good and pLuke of being good is being relaxed and happy and because everything is alright and I know it is because you said it is.”

“Good girl.”

And he tightened his grip around her waist, pulling him closer to her and gave her thirty hard spanks that caused Jayne to kick and squeal and totally forget her hair.

When he stood her up again he kissed her fully on the lips and felt her arch her back to better offer herself. Luke knew his point was made and he smiled as he watched his girlfriend go back to the mirror to undo the imperceptible damage he had unleashed on her hair.

*

The pub was one of those ones London excels in. Thoroughly modernised in the seventeenth century and left well alone since then, the floors were uneven, the ceiling too low and the chairs and tables mismatched.

Jayne watched Luke beam before he ducked down to enter the bar and she shared his smile, watching the man she loved being so happy made her happy too. He had wanted to take her out to this pub for months but for some reason they had never found the opportunity and meeting Anna and Mark was perfect. It was his favourite pub and now Jayne had seen it she could understand why

Luke and Mark had met in secondary school, and had met ever since once or twice a year for a meal and a pint or two. They would talk and chat together about mutual friends whose paths still crossed and those that didn’t and to reflect as only old friends can.

Jayne was nervous. Mark and Anna had been together for an eon, married and with children at university they settled with ease into any situation but for her it felt different.  There was the age gap for start, she was almost fifteen years younger than any of them. Her career was still green compared to theirs, they had no music references to share, politics was difficult and as much as Jayne  tried to be witty or urbane, she always felt like the fool at the party. As such she would smile a lot and, unusually for her, let the others lead the conversation and dip into it as she felt comfortable.

The good news came in the form of a bottle of Shiraz which was open and waiting on the table.  Mark and Anna had cleverly grabbed the corner booth. It was just big enough for the four of them and encased on three sides by dark oak that went from floor to ceiling.

“Come on in!” Anna called to her, “Look- we snagged it just as another couple was leaving- isn’t it perfect? The locals call it ‘The Confessional’- so you’ll have to confess interesting stuff in here! ” and so the conversation began. Every one spoke at once at first, greetings exchanged, men discussed which ale was best and Luke went to get a couple of pints in while Anna glugged ruby wine into Jayne’s waiting glass.

“So, how have you been? Did you get that job?” Anna had the best memory which Jayne cursed.

“No, but its no bad thing. I don’t think I wanted to move up really” Jayne nodded to Luke at the bar, “I like having the time to spend with Luke and it would have meant travelling for a week every month. You know how it is.” She smiled too broadly at Anna who was no doubt thinking that Luke could have done better than someone who stuffed up a promotion on an internal interview.

Jayne picked up her glass and tilted it towards Anna, “Anyway, cheers,” she drank, “Good choice. I am starting to love Shiraz.”

To her relief Luke returned and she made room for him by her, sitting close to him when he sat so that their thighs were tight together. He gave her a surreptitious squeeze and after a brief hint diverted Anna from the conversation about Jayne’s non-promotion.

Conversation segued from jobs to family catching up – the rise and fall of children and parents and on into some introspection about the NME. The NME (New Musical Express) was the music informant of choice when Luke, Anna and Mark had left school and first travelled into London. They had bought a copy every week and had many happy memories of the humour and shared musical taste.

This was Jayne’s cue to listen. She hadn’t a clue about some of the bands they referred to and was well aware that she had been reading little girl comics when they had been drinking pints and swapping stories from the NME. She let the words wash over her and instead watched Luke’s lips as he spoke and laughed.

He had beautiful lips.

And that was how it happened.

It is just that she did not know what.  The booth went quiet- one moment they had all been talking and then they were not. Jayne cursed her lack of focus. What in hell had just been said?

She looked at Luke first, he was looking serious, a face that could have been mistaken for impassive but not by her. He was looking right at her. Her eyes looked right back at him, and she inhaled, a start of a sentence because she had no idea what she had done r how she could have done it. His face  was filled with the lines that would tell her she was in serious trouble but how could she be? And how come here? Not here. Her bottom clenched at the thought of it. But he couldn’t. Not here.  She gave up and looked at her glass, bewildered and afraid.

And that is when she heard it.

“You know I will not have that. You know that don’t you?”

Jayne’s stomach sank and her mouth went martni dry. She was searching for the words with which to respond and she heard them.

“Honey, I know,” the voice was quiet, soft and deep as a pool. It was not her voice.

It was Anna.

“But please, can’t we do this … just not now. Please?” It was still Anna. Her with the expensive hair style and cashmere top, Jayne knew that tone. Anna was begging not to be spanked.

Jayne out her fingers to her mouth and started to chew a nail but did not resist when Luke pulled her hand back down. Instead she took hold of his instructive hand and stroked it as she looked at it.

“Up.” The instruction was neat and clear. It was from Mark. Jayne was desperate to look up and at the same time looked longingly at Luke’s lap and wished she could sit in it to hide. She looked hard at his hand still and watched his thumb stroking the back of her hand.

“Over.”  He was not even giving her the choice.

Over what? Over the table? Over my dead body? Oh God, she was going to laugh- the incredible awfulness of this was making her stupid. Jayne bit the inside of her lip very hard to keep herself safe and quiet.

Every time she tried to imagine what on earth could be going on she just got a blank page in her mind, as though she were a cartoon character who had run off the edge of the page.

She felt Luke shift closer to her, pushing her into the corner as he made way for Anna to lay her top half over the table.

Jayne could hear herself breathing, she sounded out of breath; she sounded like a pervert. She should stop breathing she thought as she watched Anna’s hands spread out on the dark oak, her  rings tapping on the surface.

“I’m going to use my belt on you until I think you can behave appropriately. Do you understand?” Mark sounded hard, and unforgiving.

Jayne looked up at Luke, shouldn’t he stop this? This is illegal – and it was terrible, confusing, wrong. She watched the curve of his chin and the start of stubble on his cheek. She imagined how it would feel t kiss the cheek. She tried to imagine she was doing so and did her best to block out Anna’s quiet response of, “Yes, Sir.”

Sir! She called him ‘Sir’! Why wouldn’t Luke look at her? He was looking at Anna and Mark. He was just sitting there.

Jayne caught the edge of Mark’s belt in her vision. She saw it whip itself back from view and forward again, like a leather snake at its victim.

The crack was the loudest thing she had ever heard and without thinking she picked up Luke’s arm and tucked herself underneath it. Although his arm was next to her ear she could hear everything. The crack of the belt, the strangled cry of Anna, and the steady beat of Luke’s heart.

As though it were a scary film she could still see through the block his body made, the slope of Anna’s back, the curve of her bottom as it disappeared off the table and the insistent brown leather belt as it assalted her.

No one knew she was watching and Jayne shuffled closer into Luke but somehow she could just see more, the drop of Anna’s thigh, the belt biting around the edge of it, even Mark’s determined face as he worked at the punishment.

Jayne had forgotten her hand, left it behind on the table until she was reminded of it.

Anna grabbed it. She grabbed it and held on. She did it as though for comfort, support t get her through what she endured.

All the time the belt went back and forth and Anna rolled on the table and begged him to stop. But Jayne knew that begging. She knew the way that Anna’s reached for her. She understood.

She leaned away from Luke and looked for the first time at Anna, taking in the tableau as though she were its equal. She laid her hand flat under Anna’s and closed her cool fingers around Anna’s burning ones. She joined with her as she watched Anna’s face struggle and accept the beating.

And then it was over. A crying shaking Anna stood up and buttoned up her jeans, pulling them up with a puff of pain over her bottom and sat quickly in the corner of the booth, the shudder of humiliation weighing out the pain.

Jayne picked up the wine bottle and started to pour a glass for Anna. Her hand shaking so much that the wine spilt and she looked at Luke in alarm. He smiled down at her, shaking his head softly with a smile and as he did she felt Anna take the bottle from her and pour for them both.

The men were talking again, something about a shared friend who had moved away, something about something. She looked at Anna, flushed and shaking but saw how her hand was in Mark’s and her body pointed at him.

Jayne listened to the conversation across the pub, gentle and flowing and it was only then she realised. The conversation never stopped. For the first time she looks up at Luke who smiles down at her and pulls her towards him. She listens to his heart, steady as time.

“You be good now,” he whispered in her ear.  She is all wide eyes and heart beats as she nods and looks all around her seeing everyone and everything for the first time.