From the notes of Dr. Kelsey Ransom, PsyD

Bertie and Rachel have been making excellent progress in session. As of my seventh meeting with them, I’m finding that I am able to listen more and mediate less. Bertie has been conciliatory in giving Rachel room to speak, and Rachel has been more direct in speaking her mind. And as has been my experience in these cases, I am now being asked if they are ready to leave the program.

While the decision is theirs to make, I reminded them that the hard part of recovery is not in making changes, but in maintaining them. This has given the pair some food for thought, and in the end we reached a compromise – our next sessions would be on an individual basis, to better gauge how each of them were doing and identify problem spots that they were uncomfortable bringing up in front of the other.

The first date was reserved for Bertie, but he was forced to cancel the session to deal with a work-related matter. Rather than wait for her turn the following week, Rachel offered to take his place, and I agreed.

As I expected, Rachel is far more talkative in a one-on-one setting. She’s identified avoidance as the trait she most needs to overcome. She sees this trait as one that was instilled from a very young age – her parents were of limited means, but believed that their children should be free to follow their passions. What this meant in practice was that she could do anything she wanted, provided she could do it by herself.

Moving out at nineteen, Rachel found that her unsupervised childhood had left her without the necessary skills or discipline to function as an adult. Avoidance became a coping mechanism: if she couldn’t handle her finances, she didn’t pay her bills. If she hated her job, she’d quit. She fears this mentality extended to her relationships as well, prioritizing security over compatibility and always ending up on the lesser end of a skewed power dynamic.

I asked her if she felt her relationship with Bertie was a continuation of that dynamic. She reasoned that Bertie was different on account of his age and life experience – he was twenty-four when they began their relationship, she was twenty-eight, and she saw this as starting fresh.

Pointing out that regardless of age, she was once again involved with a man who had control issues, I repeated my question.

 I’ve had patients break down at these moments of clarity. Some have even turned hostile. To my relief, Rachel did neither of those. She summarized the difference between Bertie and her exes in one word: Accountability. She’d recognized in Bertie a strong sense of responsibility, but a lack of lived experience, and that meant that she could support him as much as he would support her.

Curious, I asked her what that accountability looked like – say, what would happen after an episode like our session a month ago, where Bertie, by his own admission, relapsed and tried to take control of the conversation. Rachel candidly replied that she had “lit his ass up for that” and that the matter had been settled. I casually asked if this meant that the pair was involved in a BDSM relationship.

It was immediately clear that Rachel had revealed more than she intended. Trying to placate her embarrassment, I pointed out that kink-aware therapy is part of my practice, and that my only concern is that their activities are not being used as a substitute for our sessions. With a little coaxing, she explained the dynamic as one where the top/bottom distinction had become interchangeable, that spankings were ordained but consensual, and that sex commonly followed the act.

As the hour drew to a close, Rachel nervously asked if I would have to tell Bertie that she had shared their secret. I informed her that if I was expected to keep confidences from her partner, that I would have to remove myself as his therapist.

I have declined thus far to mention my own background in BDSM. It does not strike me as professionally appropriate at this time.

She’d gotten word when she got home that Bertie would not be coming home that night – what the late shift barista had described as a leak instead turned out to be a burst pipe, and Bertie had stayed for hours past closing to work with the plumber, a man he described as unreasonably surly despite making double his usual rate for an emergency job. He would be staying with his mother overnight, and expected to be back by 10 AM the next day.

She glanced at her phone. Given how punctual her boyfriend tended to be, that left her about ten minutes to apply the final touches. After the session with Dr. Ransom, she’d been too jittery to go to bed, and had instead spent the following hours dusting, and then reorganizing their DVD cabinet. She hadn’t like the new arrangement, and spent another hour putting it all back.

Anything to distract herself from the fact that she’d accidentally told the therapist what Bertie had taken such pains to avoid.

Never mind that the secret was a poorly kept one – Ransom had jumped on her word choice so quickly that they had to suspect something already – or that that it was ridiculous to keep such a part of their relationship from their couples counselor.

She’d worked up her apology, as it was, sometime in the wee hours. Now in the light of day, she was beginning to have her doubts. But as she heard the muffled click of the front door deadbolt, she knew that the time had come to commit. Resigned, she hitched her leggings and panties down to her knees and waited.

Bertie would be arriving full from breakfast at his mom’s, as Alicia couldn’t help but roll out the red carpet any time her son came to visit. Given the time, there was a fifty-fifty chance of him having already bathed at her house, and if he hadn’t, he would walk right past the closed bedroom door.

She’d prepared for that likelihood. As the knob turned, she knew it had worked.

“Honey, why is there a sign on our door that says “Me and My Big Mouth”….” His voice trailed. He cleared his throat. “Did you do something to your hair?” he managed.

She loved that he could come home to his girlfriend kneeling on their bed with her bare butt in the air, and the first thing he’d notice was that she’d tied her hair back. She would have laughed if not for the duct tape.

He stepped experimentally around the frame, regarding the placement of the pillow cushioning her lower half. He gave her bottom a light pinch, making her squeal and finally causing him to notice the improvised gag over her mouth. His hand brushed her face…

She shook her head furiously, but not before he’d caught a corner of the tape. Already lubricated with her sweat and spit, it tore off with ease.

“Ow! Can’t you just take a hint?”

“It just makes me suspicious, actually.” He plopped down at at the foot of the bed. “Care to tell me what this performance art is actually about?”

Rachel rolled into a sitting position, furiously pulling up her pants. “I over-shared with Dr. Ransom. I told them about… the spankings.”

“You’re mumbling, honey.”

“I told them about the spankings.”

The silence that greeted her sucked the air out of the room. Finally, “The spankings.”

“Yeah.”

“Is there anything else you’d like to get off your chest?”

She hated that tone in his voice, even though she’d knowingly provoked it. But there was something else, and after making the arrangements over the phone an hour ago, she wasn’t going to be able to back out of it now.

“If you don’t have to go back to work today… how do you feel about going to see my parents?”

*** 

She shifted uncomfortably in the car seat, not for the first time.

“Quit it,” Bertie warned, watching the road.

“I can’t help it,” Rachel whined. The address that her mother had given her had sent them down over an hour’s worth of ice-encrusted dirt roads, and being off the beaten path had disagreed with Rachel’s newly warmed backside.

The car bounced, having struck yet another hidden pothole. She hissed audibly.

If Bertie sympathized, he didn’t show it.

She murmured a quiet, “Thank you, by the way.”

“What for?”

“I thought I was going to get… more. So thank you.”

“That was for dropping this road trip on me, so don’t get your hopes up. I still haven’t decided what to do about your ‘over-sharing’.”

Rachel pouted. “Come on, they acted like they knew already. We would have had to say something eventually.”

“Maybe we would have, but since we didn’t, your butt is going to answer for it at some point this weekend.” He glanced to the instruction sheet Rachel had scribbled out before they left. “And if you don’t want to have this conversation in front of your parents, I suggest we leave it here. We’re almost to the place.”

The place turned out to be called “Recreation Valley”, and consisted of nearly forty mobile homes in two lines between the road and the river. As they approached the address they’d been given, Rachel could make out three figures waiting outside the RV. Her mother and father she could recognize immediately, but the third…

She groaned. “It’s Leanne.”

Bertie winced. Rachel hadn’t seen her sister, five years her junior, since shortly after her first year with Bertie. Leanne had spent the evening stoned, called Rachel a cradle-robber after learning of their age difference, and pushed Rachel to the ground after she’d refused to give her sister fare for an Uber.

The years had not been kind to Leanne, either. While she had never shared Rachel’s curvy figure, she looked almost emaciated now. Mismatched bracelets dangled from her scrawny wrists, and her weathered frame, pockmarked with old tattoos, peeked out from under loose-fitting puffy vest. She waved at her sister’s arrival, grinning through a mouth of broken teeth.

“She doesn’t look well,” Bertie mused, as they rolled into a parking spot beside the trailer.

“That’s because meth’s a hell of a drug.” Rachel bit down her irritation and disembarked from the car, glad to be rid of the vinyl rubbing against her sore bum, and went to greet her parents.

Greg wrapped her in a great bear hug, nearly swallowing her in his folds.

“I see you’ve decide to ditch those lavender locks and join us here in the grey cadre,” he said with a chuckle, rubbing Rachel’s head, then laughed again at his own mispronunciation.

Bertie got to her mother first, and got the first hug in. “Yassou, Marina.”

“Ooh, you charmer. You know I don’t speak the old tongue, but I appreciate the effort. So Rachel, how do you like our new digs?”

Rachel shrugged, “To be honest, I really liked the beach house.”

“We bought that place before we knew what the property taxes were going to be like,” Greg huffed. “The beauty of this place is if the landlord decides to be a jerk, we can pack up and move!”

“This is our second trailer park since the pandemic,” added Marina, “It’s comfy, but it’s no place to be stuck during a lockdown.”

By this point, Leanne had joined them, waving her hands in the air. “Speaking of lockdowns, you know what’s the worst place to be during a pandemic?”

“Leanne, dear…”

“No takers? Really easy one.” She beat a staccato into the aluminum siding. “It’s prison! You know I caught the damn bug twice, because when it comes to public health and you’re in prison, nobody gives a sh-“

“Leanne, listen to your mother.”

Rachel watched for a tense moment as Leanne considered how to finish her sentence. Finally, her sister smiled and kissed her on the cheek. “Glad to have you home, sis.”

Greg broke the awkward moment with a joke about how his girls got along better once their periods were synced, and led them toward the picnic table under the trailer’s canvas overhang. Rachel’s offer for a get-together had caught them by surprise, as Marina had noted with some passive-aggressive emphasis, but they had been able to whip up a quick lunch of salad, quinoa and veggie dogs. And if that wasn’t enough, her mother winked; they also had some of her uncle Stavros’ “old family recipe.”

When Marina’s back was turned, Rachel leaned over to Bertie and warned him that Stavros was the kind of man to sample his own supply, and that care should be taken when drinking the deceptively potent kombucha.

Leanne, lighting up a cigarette, interjected that she’d already committed to meeting friends in town, but that she’d be back before seven o’clock.

“Six o’clock,” Marina retorted.

“Fine, six!” She threw up her hands and stamped away.

Rachel wondered what was implicit in the conversation between her sister and her mother, but was mostly grateful to be able to spend time with her parents without Leanne’s antics interfering. She gingerly took a seat on the hard wood and took the plate Bertie had put together for her.

Minutes became hours, as the older couple proceeded to fill Rachel and Bertie in on the eventful last few years. Marina credited a divine hand in the feast before them, as she’d suffered a near-fatal heart attack shortly after they’d last spent time together, and had forced herself to give up smoking and eat healthier. She even lost twenty pounds.

For his part, Rachel’s father had been forced to find new outlets for his time during a months-long layoff and promised to show them the fruits of his labours. Marina took a swig as he waddled back into the trailer.

He emerged seconds later, holding an accordion over his belly.

“Here’s a little Acadian sea shanty I picked up on the YouTube,” he said proudly as the bellows strained.

Rachel’s father spoke no French, and his lyric substitutions ranged from nonsensical to obscene. Still, Rachel picked up the melody and sang along as best she could. By the time Greg finished, she was laughing to the point of tears.

At a quiet moment, Marina turned to Bertie and Rachel, her eyes slightly bleary from the kombucha. “What have you been up to, dears?”

“It’s been a rough couple of years,” said Rachel, so quickly that she surprised even herself. “I wasn’t able to DJ for awhile, and Bertie changed jobs – he’s finally a store manager, but it’s even further away than the last restaurant.” 

“I’m working again though,” she added hastily. “We’re both working. We’re working through it.”

Greg wrinkled his nose. “You mean like couples counseling?”

She nodded. Bertie laid a hand on her shoulder.

“I’m going to take a walk, if you’re ready,” he said softly.

Marina perked up. “Watch out by the river’s edge; it’s very muddy this time of year.”

Bertie thanked them both, but Rachel couldn’t hear him over the beating of her own heart. Once he was gone, she let out a deep breath and turned to face her parents.

“Mom… Dad… there’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”

***

Her father was the first to reply after Rachel had said her piece.

“It sounds like you’ve really done the work with this therapy.”

She nodded miserably. Her parents had looked so betrayed as she related what she’d uncovered after putting her childhood under a microscope. But she’d forced herself to say her piece, and by the time she wrapped up, Greg had begun to nod along.

Marina had remained impassive throughout. She put down her drink and spoke for the first time since Bertie had left.

“You understand… when I was growing up, my father was Sir. It was understood that his word was law, and the penalty for breaking that law was harsh. It was still acceptable in those days for parents to spank their kids, and I’m glad you don’t know what that was like.”

Rachel bit her lip and bade her mother continue.

“Greg and I had very similar upbringings, and when we had kids of our own, we decided we weren’t going to be that kind of parent. We left you and your sister to be yourselves, to find your own joy and make your own mistakes.”

“We basically raised ourselves,” muttered Rachel.

“That was our mistake. Not that we gave you too much free reign, but that we took it on faith that you’d grow up at your own pace. But I don’t think anybody really wants to grow up. Your sister certainly didn’t.”

Greg leaned in. “Don’t tell her we told you, but she’s living in the trailer with us, at least until this custody thing gets sorted out.”

“Custody?” asked Rachel, now hopelessly lost.

Exchanging conspiratorial glances with her husband, Marina dug her phone out from her coat. She scrolled for a moment and then showed Rachel the photo of a smiling, curly-haired little boy.

“That’s BJ. He’s about eight now.” She replaced the phone. “Leanne resents you because you outgrew your mistakes, even if you had to get help. But you’re working again, you have a roof over your head, a good man, and you don’t take any of it for granted.”

“But that’s just… being an adult,” Rachel protested.

Her mother patted her on the shoulder. “Harder than it looks, isn’t it?” She swirled the last vestiges of her drink and downed them in a final gulp. Setting the glass on the table in front of her, she added, almost sadly, “I think sometimes that we had it easier when we were young.”

Greg snorted. “Yes, because those welts on our asses built character!”

“Knock it off, Greg. Rachel, why don’t you go find that boyfriend of yours before it gets dark and he can’t find his way home?”

Grateful for the excuse, Rachel hugged her parents harder than she intended and took off in the direction she’d seen Bertie leave. A hiking trail stretched out from the corner of the property, the gravel giving her knock-off Uggs some grip on the wet ground.

The path led her toward the river, the rolling thunder of the water nearly deafening her. She could see Bertie slouching over the rusty old pedestrian bridge, just quietly taking in the scene.

She nestled into his side, drawing his warmth.

“You had the talk, then?”

“I did,” she confirmed. “I’m starting to think my parents didn’t screw me up after all.”

In spite of herself, her hands trembled. Bertie took them in his own.

“Do we need to be getting back?”

“Not yet,” she contemplated the trail that continued on the other side of the riverbank. “Does that lead anywhere?”

“Just up the next hill and down to the road. There’s an old building at the top.”

“Can you show me?”

The cabin was small and unremarkable. Built slightly off the ground, its stair railing had broken off and lay rotting on the ground. Patches of asphalt lay on either side of the angled roof, and the sun peeking through the trees had over the years had bleached strange patterns into the wood.

Rachel tested her weight on the stairs. “Did you go inside?”

She gave the door a cautious push – it wasn’t even closed, just wedged in place, and it loosened with little effort. Inside, it was no more than Bertie had described, plus some empty beer bottles and damp leaves spread across the floor. She trod carefully around the remnants of smashed windows and tested the closer of the chairs. Even with half of its splats missing, it held firm.

It would do.

She heard Bertie’s footsteps climbing the steps behind her. “I don’t think you heard me, I said we’re not supposed to-“

For the second time that day, he entered a room to the sight of a full moon. Rachel stuck out her tongue for emphasis. Bertie shook his head, but made no move to resist her invitation this time. Instead, he took up the chair she’d selected, though he sat down with a grimace.

“My butt’s going to get dusty.”

“You’re worried about your butt?” she returned with a laugh.

He drew a hand up her back, cradling her. “Are you sure?”

“We’ve got the road on one side and the water on the other, Bertie. Nobody’s going to hear us.”

“That’s not what I mean. Are you sure?”

“…yes.”

He grinned wickedly. “Good enough for me, then.” The same hand that had held her so gently before, suddenly pushed her forward into his waiting lap. She kicked out for balance but her feet flailed uselessly, trapped in her bunched-up pant legs.

His hand flew down to her cheeks and landing with a pronounced whack that she thought was more shock than impact – and then the sting set in. When she’d impulsively dropped her drawers a moment before, she’d thought that the cold air would soothe that particular feeling.

She’d thought wrong. And Bertie was just getting started.

Years of apartment living had choked down Rachel’s urge to scream. Even now, she wouldn’t let it out, wouldn’t open that door. But they were out in the woods now. And when it came to tooth-gnashing, moaning, whining and carrying-on…

… those she could do to her heart’s content.

She heard the hitch in Bertie’s breath as she let it all out, but he didn’t let up. She could barely hear herself over the crack of flesh on flesh, not so much words as raw animal noises, being drawn from some inner part inside her where they’d waited since before she was a woman.

The fire in her bottom flared and spread out, and her breath started coming to her in gasps. Confined by her half-shed jeans, she danced over his knee, forcing him to hold her tighter lest she writhe out of his clutches.

His energy began to dissipate, with more being used to hold her than spank her. A single tear, glistening in the afternoon sun, slid down the side of her nose. A ragged breath shook it loose, and it fell to the aged floor, splashed, and died.

And as the ritual ended, the chair that had held for so many seasons after its abandonment finally collapsed. Bertie and Rachel both were summarily dropped in a cloud of dust and compost.

Rachel wiped her eyes. With a groan, she reached a hand behind her to inspect her flaming tail. While she couldn’t see the damage, she was surprised to discover it was nowhere near as sore as she remembered it feeling from only seconds ago in her perspective from Bertie’s lap.

He lay on the floor beside her, exertion and confusion fighting for dominance over his features. Wheezing, he merely gave her a thumbs-up to her apparent concern. He’d be up in a moment.

Pulling up her jeans – to her painful and immediate regret – Rachel stepped outside into the setting sun. From atop the hill, she could see all the way down to the river and to the trailer park beyond. The first few stars of the evening could be seen peeking out from above the horizon. She tightened her coat against the chill.

She could see herself coming here again.

The smell of nicotine warned her, too late.

“Wow. My ‘grown-up’ big sister still needs a spanking to keep her in line. Have you been a bad girl, Rach?”

A dozen cruel and spiteful responses tempted Rachel, but to say any of them she’d have to turn around and say them to Leanne’s smug, gap-toothed face. No, she told herself, I just exorcised these demons…

“Awkward as it is to say… I’m afraid you’ve got that mixed up.” Bertie shuffled through the door, his breath still short, rubbing at the seat of his pants. He didn’t elabourate, and it took a moment for Leanne to catch his implication.

“You mean, you… she… you do this for fun or something?”

Rachel felt a sudden new investment in seeing the look on her sister’s face, and it took every once of discipline for her to remain still.

“I don’t want to over-share,” Bertie continued, “but your sister has big ‘mommy’ energy. Um… you’re not going to tell your parents what kept us, are you?”

“Buddy, I don’t even want to think about this. You tell them whatever you want.”

She tossed her spent cigarette onto the cold ground and spun on her heel. Rachel only caught a glimpse of her face as Leanne started downhill, back toward the park. Only then could she let out the laugh she’d been holding in since Bertie’s unexpected confession. He shrugged helplessly.

“You two-faced liar,” she choked out through giggles, “You know what I ought to do to you?”

“Oh, but you already did. Even Leanne knows now.”

Rachel had to admit that his coming to her rescue had more than made up for his impertinence. She gave him a quick peck on the cheek, then gestured with her eyes to the path below. Much as she wanted him all to herself at this moment, they would need to make their goodbyes and begin the long drive home.

As they descended the hill, Rachel winced with each step, and fell behind as she took each step slowly and deliberately.

“Did you hurt yourself?” asked Bertie.

“No, these jeans are just really rough on my butt. Maybe you could carry me the rest of the way?”

“How do I say this… no.”

“Bastard.”

“I love you too.”