I love autumn. Cooler temperatures and bright foliage make being outside during the days so much more pleasant. And in the fall, my students tend to be a little more focused than in the spring. You see, I teach at a small Midwestern university. It is my second year here and I am also a student myself, working on my PhD. Also, because of my age (barely three years older than some of my students) I tend to run a pretty tight ship in the classroom. Of course, part of my stern classroom demeanor can be traced directly to my upbringing.
My homelife was a model of order and discipline, one not normally seen in a middle-class WASP household in Springfield, Illinois. In my senior year of high school I became friends with an exchange student from Japan. She came home with me after school one day to work on a history project and afterwards claimed that her life back home near Nagasaki wasn't as regimented as mine was. While my parents weren't ones to beat us black and blue, they were firm believers in the old adage of 'spare the rod and spoil the child'. I was far from perfect as a child and received my share of spankings. As with everything else in my life, they were regulated almost to the point of being ritualized. Certain infractions merited a certain number of whacks on the butt. Children under the age of ten got spanked with a hand. After that, the old ping-pong paddle came into play. A long hug always followed a spanking along with an admonition to behave better the next time.
The combination of high expectations and the butt-warming I got when I failed to meet them served me well. I was able to graduate high school a year early and finished my bachelor's degree in three years by taking a full load every semester as well as summer classes and being able to test out of some required classes. Though I hadn't actually set out to become a teacher, I enjoyed it quite a bit and I tried to share my sense of discipline with my students. I taught two sections of Introductory Psychology and tutored undergraduate students as well. Generally, those students needing one-on-one help were majoring in one of the social sciences and just needed some short-term assistance.
Ron Matthews, a senior majoring in Chemical Engineering didn't fit that mold. He came from a discipline where either your equations balanced or something bad was likely to happen but I was assisting him with Abnormal Psychology which is known as much for its exceptions as for its rules.
I did some digging and found out why he had been assigned to me. He was a forward on the basketball team and needed to maintain his GPA in order to keep his scholarship and his position on the team. I then checked his academic records and verified that he had taken a section of introductory psychology as a freshman so he'd at least been exposed to the basic concepts. However by the end of the fourth week of class, it was becoming apparent that he was out of his element, which I suppose, was why he had been assigned to me.
When I first got the assignment, I went to his class to introduce myself and set up a time to work with him. I'd tutored jocks before and had found them to be notoriously unreliable when it came to making first contact. The professor pointed him out to me and I watched him carefully in class. He was tall and nicely built with dark eyes and brown hair; though I learned later I would rarely see it since he seemed to wear a baseball cap everywhere. His sense of humor appeared to be permanently 'on' and he was always ready with a joke that made it appear he understood far more of the material than his test scores reflected.
That same cavalier sense of humor carried over to our tutoring sessions and I soon became exasperated with him. I knew he wasn't dumb by any stretch of the imagination. His grades in his major subjects were all well above the the university's minimum requirements but it appeared he felt he could bluff his way through this class. When I finally had enough of his wise-ass remarks I tore into him, not caring that we were in a study room of the library where we should have been quieter.
"What the hell is your problem, Ron? Professor Donigal has told you that you're in danger of a failing grade for the mid-term and yet you still walk in here unprepared. Granted I'm supposed to be helping you but I can't do the work for you. When are you going to wake up and realize that your scholarship is on the line? God, if I were Coach McKinley, I'd take you over my knee and paddle that message into your butt."
He looked absolutely stricken. I had tried pleading and cajoling since day one and that hadn't worked but losing my temper seemed to be having an effect. His face turned very red and I thought I saw perspiration break out on his upper lip.
"You would?" The words were barely audible as he looked at the floor and I was certain his mouth and throat had gone dry.
"Well," I said, a bit softer and now blushing myself as I was about to reveal something rather personal. "It was how my parents got the message through to me."
"Maybe you should try that some time."
His words were so soft and with his head hung low, I wasn't entirely sure I heard him correctly.
"Ron, look at me," I said sternly.
I could see a slight tremble in his hands as he raised his head.
"Are you suggesting that a spanking would improve your performance in this class?"
He half nodded and half shrugged and I was thoroughly confused by the mixed message I was getting. I had never even considered meting out corporal punishment to a student. Not only did I feel that it was rather silly at this age, I couldn't see myself striking someone. On the other hand, it seemed he was almost looking forward to this. I gave myself a mental shake to divert my thoughts away from possibility of giving his well-muscled ass a spanking.
"Well, let's hope it doesn't come to that," I finally managed to say. "Now, your mid-term exam is next week. Tomorrow, we're going to review anxiety disorders and I expect you to be prepared." I was thankful that I was able to suppress the tremble in my voice long enough to sound assertive and authoritarian.
I remained seated in order to jot down some notes on my calendar while he stood up and so I was surprised to see that he didn't leave immediately but instead stayed there on the other side of the table.
"Thank you, Cindy."
"You're welcome," I replied looking up at him.
As I turned my attention from his face, I became aware of the tightness in his jeans right at his crotch. I could feel my face turn red and I quickly looked down to my calendar, refusing to look up again until long after I heard the door to the study room snap closed behind him. Was it possible that the threat of a spanking actually turned him on? Well, of course it was possible. I had, after all, studied all sorts of fetishistic behaviors while working on my Masters degree. Though I supposed that for most people who enjoyed this kink, the actual spanking was the turn-on, not necessarily the anticipation, it couldn't be discounted that the build-up could be exciting as well. I knew I couldn't dwell on this subject or my thoughts would end up someplace completely inappropriate.
The next morning I had class until noon and as soon as I was finished, I checked my voicemail. There was a message from Ron saying something had come up which would prevent him from showing up for our tutoring session. I wasn't happy to hear it, as I knew he really needed the help but found a way to occupy that hour of my afternoon. The following day I got a similar message from him. I checked with Professor Donigal and found out that he had been in class that morning but had been subdued and didn't really participate other than to ask a few questions about the mid-term exam. Really steamed now, I marched to Coach McKinley's office and let him know that his star forward was not only in danger of getting a failing grade for mid-term but that he'd also missed two scheduled tutoring sessions. Unfortunately, he wasn't there and I had to content myself with leaving him a message that I wanted to talk to him about Ron's grades.
Friday morning, Ron called me before I went to class and asked if we could reschedule for after dinnertime. While I didn't have a problem with it, I wasn't sure we'd be able to get a study room in the library and told him so.
"I'll make arrangements for a room. I've got a friend who works in the library and he'll help me out. Just meet me by the main circulation desk at 7:00."
"All right," I agreed hastily, ending the call and getting to my own class.
At 6:55 that night I walked into the library and went to the circulation desk. Ron was easy to spot as he was clearly the tallest person in the area. While I don't consider myself short at 5'8", it still felt like he towered over me, especially since I was dressed so casually in sweats and tennis shoes. I felt almost underdressed when I realized he was wearing a blue oxford shirt and khaki chinos with nice leather loafers. I wondered what he had been doing earlier in the day that required this kind of attire. Every other time I'd seen him, he was always in jeans and a t-shirt. It took a moment for me to realize that he was also bare-headed. That was truly a surprise for me since I had never seen him without his baseball cap.
"Well, don't you look nice," I said as I approached him. "You must have a date after our session tonight so let's get started. What room are we in?"