"Janice you're my wife and, by god, if I have to whip you every night of our marriage I will if it teaches you to mind me."
The new bride cried out as the heavy leather strap connected with the tender round hills of her bottom once more. His wife for barely a day and already he thought it necessary to turn her on her stomach and punish her across the end of the hotel bed. Awash in self-pity, her tears flowed. How would she manage a lifetime of such treatment?
Oh sure, she felt her father's hand across her backside countless times growing up, even had the privilege of feeling the switch on her bared rump as she reached her teenage years, but never would she think the man she was bound to, the one she loved more than any other and loved her even more would treat her the same way as her father.
Remembering how it had felt when her father last spanked her less than a year ago, her legs kicked involuntarily as her husband laid into her soft, unprotected rear. Unable to restrain herself, she began crying out with each loud snap of leather on her flesh.
She was the youngest of three daughters and, as such, was privy to her parent's methods before experiencing them on her own. Her father believe in time tested old fashioned theories of raising children. Having been raised by strict parents that survived the depression he was no stranger to the rod, switch or paddle and believed the same upbringing for his three lovely daughters would produce similar positive results.
Before puberty she was already accustomed to waking early and helped her family on their small farm. Many days she would spend hours picking corn, spreading seed or cooking meals and cleaning the home when the weather was less than favorable. It fostered in her a determination to better herself through hard work, callused hands and exhaustion come sundown. By the time she was old enough to attend the dance socials at her school, she was no longer able to hide her place as the progeny of her father- a resolute, fair haired midwestern girl like the woman he married.
She wore this fact with pride, often thinking of herself as a "Daddy's girl". Even her closest friends teased her when she excused herself from their weekend get togethers to make her curfew. She had broken it too often to forget what happens to girls that stay out late.
She was proud of her upbringing, proud of her family's reputation in the town, even if that reputation came with the belief in corporal punishment. When she was a toddler, she first watched her older sister cry at the stern hand of their loving father and when she came of age she took part in the family tradition.
When she turned eighteen both her mother and father thought it best if she began to date. Though she had noticed boys long ago, and developed an affinity for them, she never had the chance to meet any. When she wasn't spending long days in the fields she attended an all girl's school run by an order of nuns. She could count the number of males she knew besides her father on one hand, including the stablehand, mailman and the man that owned the drug store- Mr. Harrison.
One evening, late in the summer as she was lying on her bed she heard the all too familiar sounds of the strap against a bare bottom. A woman's voice cried out after each application though she couldn't place it the deeper and slightly breathy voice. The woman sounded resigned to the punishment, rather than urgently protesting as she and her sisters did all too often. The next morning at breakfast all were solemn except for father who addressed his wife with authority when he spoke. She responded meekly and Janice noticed her slight wince when she made to sit. Looking up at her older sister Rosalyn, she saw she seemed unsurprised by her actions. Later, when the adults had left the room and father was in the field she told her, "Momma got a seeing to last night. She must have upset daddy something terrible. I heard her crying afterwards."
The words sent a chill down Janice's spine. Her mother got whipped just as she did? Just the idea of her childish punishments continuing into adulthood filled the girl with dread and she vowed she would never allow it when she grew up.
Yet here she was, naked from the belly down, bawling louder than she did half a lifetime ago. She imagined her mother's bottom, full and round like her daughter's, and imagined how her father felt as he looked upon it to apply discipline the best way he knew how. Her body took after her mother's, strong and lean from years of work though round and feminine, the perfect combination to attract the attention of many would-be suitors.
She did just that when she came of age. Days past her eighteenth birthday, when her father allowed her to keep the company of men, she mad met several and grown a liking for a few. Travis was the last of the men she met. Almost ten years her senior, he had a background similar yet vastly different from her own. Having grown up in the same county, he learned the benefits of a long day's work with his hands at an early age. A tall boy, he was blessed with a muscular build, as well as the talent for throwing a perfect spiral that allowed him to go to college. There he studied environmental science, which he hoped would help him improve his family business. He stayed longer than he expected and earned his Masters at a school on the East Coast. After a period of years spent advising food companies to comply with regulations, he found he had gone too far from what he loved most about his profession was working with the land. With that, left his position to return to the home he missed.
With his knowledge, the family farm prospered, allowing him to purchase more land and eventually aid those nearby farms struggling to survive. During an agriculture and farming equipment exposition arranged by the fertilizer company he worked for he met her father. He was a large man, with hands dried and worn from time spent in the fields but he carried an air of serenity about him. He was well known locally and often helped out his neighbors when their harvests came up short.
Travis met him on the last day when he spoke about soil variances throughout the country. He found him to be an intelligent, friendly man, perhaps the nicest man he'd ever come in contact with. Since he was passing through his hometown on his way to his meeting the next day, the elder man invited him over for dinner to show what a "perfectly managed" farm can yield.
He accepted without a thought and the next day found him introducing himself to each member of the family. Margaret, his wife, was a foot shorter than the stout man though she didn't look like a stranger to working in the fields. She had hair the color of cornsilk with strong legs, strong arms and the slight extra weight in the middle that most women her age starved themselves to defeat. She wore it proudly. Her daughters, on the other hand, were all taller than most young ladies and fitter than most young men.
Elise, the oldest at twenty, still lived at home and took courses at the nearby city college. She had blonde hair the color of a dust devil and skin tanned from the mid-afternoon sun. Cassie was the middle child at nineteen and the only one in three generations to possess red hair. They believe she inherited it from her great grandfather, one of the first settlers in the town that purchased the land they now resided on by selling the cattle he brought over from the west. She had a temperament that lived up to the expectations her hair color had set for her. At nineteen she had been over her father's lap and in the woodshed twice as much as both girls put together. She knew the feel of the leather strap, wooden spoon and switch against her bare behind and feared them appropriately.
