Chapter Seven
Be Careful When You Spank The Monster, That The Monster
You Do Not Become
Sitting on a beaten ass for six hours is like a whore vacuum cleaner: it fucking sucks. Every inch of my glutes were bruised, plus cane marks of such number that they overlapped into one welt which covered my sitter and bruised all the way to my tail bone, so there was just no way to get comfortable on a wooden chair while Henderson droned on about tax deductions. Cold cream should be tax deductible. And so should puppies and rainbows and Jimmy Page’s music and anything that eats wood. Wood was the bane of my existence. Hairbrushes, canes, armless chairs, sweet and horny Chemists I didn’t want… I hope advanced space alien termites conquer the world.
But the hours did pass and I made it to Snuggle Bunny’s room so she could ‘spank’ me into ‘proof reading’ her ‘homework’, or so everybody thought. Cruelly fully clothed, I lay on my stomach with her sitting at my side, rubbing my back, and we talked about normal girl stuff. You know, boys. Actually we didn’t talk about boys. We planned our first day out of this joint. Unless a boy was making Chinese food (Evelyn) or Chicago style pizza (moi), handing out popcorn at a picture show, selling lingerie, or tending bar, boys were not a part of our plan.
I did still miss boys. I’d like to have a few around, and perhaps one or two old men to impart paternal wisdom and forgiveness a la Yoda, but D Day- PIZZA! Do the Chinese in America make pizza these days? I’ve been out of the loop a long time, and maybe they do because they’re pretty clever. ‘We’ll have a large, full crust, extra sauce, with pepperoni, peppers, and Kung Pow Chicken and a side order of Mazerella Egg Roles please. For here. Do you have forks?’
KnockKnock… KnockKnockKNOCK. Two seconds. KNOCK.
‘Stay put, tough guy. Just Alexia.’ Evelyn was good with such things. I suspected she gave each one of her goonlets a different code. Type A, Type A, Type A. However, Evelyn, like all members of the constabulary, didn’t understand the subtly of crime. I made it to the desk, sat on the WOODEN chair, at great personal sacrifice, and pretended to prey on comma splices. Personally I don’t care about comma splices. A comma represents a pause in speech, but I also didn’t care to be spanked by my English teacher, so I learned how to spot them. When I get out of here, to, Hell, with, comma, splices.
‘Hey, Evelyn, Gregor is going nuts on St. Croix in… Lauren’s room. She’s screaming, and I don’t think she’s in control of herself.’ My heart stopped. ‘I thought you’d like to know. I… I’m not going to talk her down.’
‘What about?’ Evelyn morphed into Evil-Lyn, professional.
‘I don’t know; I just heard the screaming. Something about “where is it, St. Croix!” She didn’t ask for any of our help.’ Alexia left and I watched Evelyn stand in the middle of her room, having her own dinkum thinkum. I had to grab the seat of the chair to pull my aching and swollen bottom down to keep from sprinting to my room. She grabbed her hairbrush.
‘Can you control yourself?’
‘YES!’
‘OK, let’s go.’
My dorm room lay in shambles. Ash stood, indifferent, while Matron Gregor tore my room apart. Lauren sat on her bunk, clutching Dr. Featherstone the teddy bear, terrified and bent like a worm that just got stepped on. Gregor marauded like a crazed titan. Her hair swung loose and wild as snakes, like a Gorgon, to keep the Greek Myth motif. She scared me, and she hadn’t even noticed me yet. I’d moved most of my contraband out of the furniture she tore in half with her hands, putting most of my stash in… ahem, someplace, dear reader, just because everything was crazy these days, so I wasn’t scared of exposure. I was only scared for my life.
Gregor looked like murder.
‘Can I be of assistance, ma’am.’ Evelyn was cool, much cooler than I felt. ‘Perhaps I could…’
‘Shut it! St. Croix, you took it. I turned my back for five seconds, dealing with that thug from Praxis, and I’ve torn your dorm apart! Apart! It’s here! It must be here! You come here so often… Your game is up! Now answer me!!!’
Ash seemed not to have noticed. She stood there and looked dumb and distracted. Lauren whimpered a little.
‘Oh… I haven’t looked in there.’ Gregor, twice the height of Lauren, grabbed Dr. Featherstone, and yanked. I could see it in Lauren’s eyes. She was afraid to clutch because the tug-of-war might damage her stupid stuffed bear that got her through the day since the day her husband mailed it to her. Her husband wrote her every single Goddamn day, and called whenever allowed, on the dot, to tell her to talk about anything because he just wanted to hear her voice like a total sap. Gregor clutched Dr. Featherstone by his fluffy neck.
I wanted to throw up.
Ash slapped Gregor in the face, took the bear, and tossed it to Lauren. She then stepped between the woman and the girl and the bear, cocked her head to the side with her arms folded, and gave off the expression of a girl who just wants an excuse to give a beat down.
Everybody else froze in time. I’ve heard that term, “unthinkable” before, but never believed in it. People can think of truly horrible things, in fact people often think of truly horrible things; horrible things enter the mind out of nowhere—but sane people don’t seriously contemplate doing them. Those are just intrusive thoughts, and a sane person dismisses them as weightless Freudian nonsense.
Ash slapped Gregor. Gregor had been slapped. That was unthinkable. But it existed, and I saw it, so I had to deal. I think I internalized that before Gregor, cheek stinging, did. She did internalize eventually.
‘Evelyn, give me that hairbrush. All of you give me and Ashley the room, please, and shut the door.’
‘Ma’am, perhaps we should discuss this…’ Gregor gave Evelyn the look of death. I was terrified. She didn’t look angry. She looked insane. A little drool seeped out, and the sank, and then hung. ‘Ma’am, I will be happy to correct St. Croix while you…’
‘Get out!’ The drool dollop snapped as Gregor punched Evelyn in the shoulder and snatched the dreaded hairbrush Ash repaired out of Snuggle Bunny’s limp hands. I wanted to burn Gregor alive and I saw in my mind how a leg broken from a chair on the floor would fit into her neck if I jabbed at the right angle, but I stepped back instead. I was so scared I had to give my brain time to play it smart, and from that moment I never thought an army general in history a fool, no matter how stupid he acted or bad he lost. It’s an horrible decision to think first when your blood cried out for blood now. But that’s what some people have to do sometimes, if they’re unlucky.
In the aisle we heard the door lock, and not long after the sound of the fastest, hardest swats I’d ever heard. It was inhuman to me, and my lover spanked me with that very same hairbrush. I blanked during the disaster. My brain escaped me. Fortunately Evelyn snapped out of it.
‘Lauren, look at… look at me! You know where the Praxis guy is? Good. Go get him, tell him a girl is… hurt. Hurt bad. Do it now! Run!’ Lauren ran, happy for something to do.
‘We have to…’ Evelyn thought. The whacks kept coming. Sounded like three thunder cracks per second. ‘He’s all the way on the other end of the building.’ Evelyn knocked on the door. Nothing changed. She gave up on any semblance of etiquette and racked her knuckles on the door, but it didn’t pause the spanks. I couldn’t believe the sounds seeping under that door. Evelyn kicked, but only hurt her foot. I counted two hundred cracks before running away. Evelyn didn’t notice. The door was her enemy.
I turned a corner, covered the glass with my vest, then punched it. I then put my hand on the fire alarm lever. All I had to do was pull down. This is a confession. I knew my friend was being tortured by an insane woman that wasn’t capable of thinking about permanent damage to a girl’s bottom. I knew that. I knew Ash had no idea what she was being spanked for, but wouldn’t yield even if she did, so she would fight back and take a beating no girl in the FA should take. No girl anywhere. I knew Ash suffered terribly for being a good person. No, a great person. I knew I knew what I had to do. But I also knew that a false alarm for a fire would cost me an extra two years, minimum. Damn my weakness to the abject pitch of fortune, I paused because of the threat of those two years. As far as I know I’m the only person on the planet angry at me for pausing, but I’m angry enough for a thousand people and more. I am to the very hour I type these words.
I pulled down but an iron statue grabbed my wrist before I could lock the lever. I used both hands, but somehow Evelyn’s hand was too strong for me. Then I turned, to push her back, but she wasn’t there. Taggart, and Taggart’s arm, controlled me.
‘Where’s the fire?’ His eyes were blue. His face was strong but kind, but I knew he was a bastard.
‘There is a secret room you don’t know about. If you get Gregor off of Ash, I’ll show it to you.’
‘Gregor off of Ash? Ashley St. Croix? I already agreed…’
‘Gregor’s gone insane! She’s going to hurt Ash! For real hurt!’
‘Where?’
‘My room. Number 3…’ but he was off before I could even get the number out.
I ran after him but he was a freaking gazelle. Halfway we ran past Evelyn, who limped by us.
‘What’s going on?!’ Then my bunny made a 180 and followed, but it took her time to catch up because she limped and was built for upper body work while I was built for running the mile like a jackrabbit with Coach’s paddle at its ass. Taggart was built to war on Troy. I turned another corner to see Taggart kick down the door. It snapped like a little bitch before him. I gulped and ran, refusing ever again to show fear in the face of bullshit.
I heard some profanities from Matron that would have had me sleeping on my stomach for a month, and I also heard a thud. I made it to the sill and saw Ash on her hands in knees before an armless chair, gasping and red faced. I couldn’t see her bottom as it pointed towards Taggart, who pushed Matron Gregor to the back of the room like she was an annoying drunk at a bar. She grabbed at him, so he flicked her in the eyeball. That was a new one on me.
The eye burst with crocodile tears. I mean burst. She recoiled in shock, not pain, and had to sit on my bed with a hand over her flooding peeper. Her fingers couldn’t seal enough to keep tears from spurting out in streams. The scary agent forgot about Matron and grabbed at Ash, who resisted out of instinct. I don’t think she even knew what was going on. Ash was formidable, but Taggart was professional, and after only thirty seconds of getting scratched and punched he sat with the crazy penned over his knee as if to spanked her. Instead he inspected her wounds.
Ash continued to struggle. I ran to her face, too afraid to look at her other end, and talked her down. Her brilliant red hair was in the chic style they called “La Savage” I think. I whispered low until the humanity returned to her eyes.
‘You back?’
She nodded, gasping.
‘You going to sue? Cuzz I got this cousin that just passed the bar.’ She coughed out in pain. She tried to tell me not to make her laugh because she couldn’t breath but she couldn’t because she couldn’t breath.
‘How is she?’ I could see Evelyn out of the corner of my eye. She retrieved her hairbrush and hid it in a hamper while Gregor wept without emotion.
‘Fine.’ He still inspected. ‘She’s going to be just fine in a couple of weeks.’
‘I’m…’ The mad woman jabbed between huffs. ‘right(puff) here(wheeze).’
‘You’re going to be just fine in a couple of weeks.’ They were a Vaudeville act. He kept poking her here and there, I guess testing for internal bleeding, but I’m no doctor. He didn’t look like he was taking advantage, if you know what I mean, but you can never tell with men, if you know what I mean. He would have looked cruel if I’d only glanced at him, but after a few seconds I could see deep thought on an unpleasant matter. He was hard to read and I was emotional. In any case, Ash didn’t like it.
‘Let me up.’ She still hadn’t caught her breath.
‘Just relax I’m—‘
‘You said (gasp) I was fine!’
‘Then call me Captain Cautious!’
An impressive growl. I felt it in my spine. The option of dissent never existed. Most impressive of all is that it shut Ash up. She popped her eyes up to feign embarrassment like she likes to do to mock the Man or the concept of guilt. She took on a passive stance and focused on breathing. They must train agents to use that growl to settle down soccer rioters.
* * *
Ash’s legs were still weak from the torture, so me and SB(that’s an acronym for Snuggle Bunny, see how that works? Actually, I’m not going to use it, because I like typing Snuggle Bunny almost as much as I like saying Snuggle Bunny. I used to hate people like what I have become) each took an arm and walked Ash to Snuggle Bunny’s room to use three or four bags of suspect cold cream on her battered buns.
Lauren caught up all in a tilly. I don’t know what that means either. My grandmother use to say I ran up “all in a tilly” all the time to describe my arrivals, and now it’s my turn to confound others. ‘I couldn’t find…’
‘OK, Lauren; he found us.’
‘He rode in on a horse.’ Ash muttered, then sort of half laughed. ‘I like horses.’ We dragged her along.
‘Ash?’ Lauren was all heart. She clutched Dr. Featherstone and followed us like a puppy. ‘Are you ok?’ Ash did sound a little goofy.
‘What Ash is experiencing, Lauren,’ SB began to go pedantic on us, droning on and on like the big know-it-all she was. Adorable. ‘Is euphoria from an overabundance of endorphins and adrenalin the body dumps into our systems during times of stress. She’s not fit to ride a horse.’
‘Yeah, I feel overabundanced alright.’ Ash did seem all hopped up on goofballs. I think maybe I always have an overabundance of goofballs in me because of the rational fear I have of my luck. ‘We should do this every millennium. You know, like a pagan sacrifice.’ She turned to Evelyn, looking at her as critically as a drug doused brain could, then at me. ‘Say… something’s different around here.’
‘Not at all, St. Croix. Your brain chemistry is incapacitated by hysterical body fluids. Now try to conserve your strength by shutting up.’
We rounded a corner.
Ash looked at me, then back at Snuggle Bunny, then me again. ‘No… I’m certain that—‘
‘I changed my haircut.’
‘No you didn’t. It’s…’
‘Ash,’ Lauren decided to be useful, bless her. ‘I’m so sorry, no grateful… I am sorry, but more grateful, and so is Dr. Featherstone, but sorrow exists.‘ Poor thing was taking after me more everyday.
‘Lauren, I love you, and I love Dr. Featherstone. I love everyone. I slapped the bitch because I wanted to make her mad; saving Dr. Featherstone was a good excuse. Don’t worry about it.’
‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome. Love is like a… like a… balloon. Anyone got a cigarette?’ Ash got heavier. ‘I’d like to stop talking for a little while.’
‘I think that’s for the best.’ Snuggle Bunny took on more of her weight, so I felt the need to do the same, but then she took on even more and gave me a look and I decided to graciously accept the silver medal.
Ash took a nap on Evelyn’s bed while I played M.A.S.H. Her sitter was just one giant bruise, and I knew it would be purple by breakfast, but no break in the skin. I’d never heard of such a beating, but she would be fine soon enough. What the Three Dollar Bill was she made off? Her ass is as the air, invulnerable.
Evelyn rubbed my neck while I painted Ash’s wounds with my ever shrinking supply of Gentle Cloud. This went on for hours, and would have been a peaceful time for me if I knew what Taggart and Gregor were doing.
It got dark. Something about the planet rotating, but I’m no astrophysicist, I only play one on TV.
