It was late in the summer when a somewhat new dynamic opened up in Gwen and Henry’s relationship. On a Tuesday morning, as she was leaving for work, Gwen told Henry that when he did the laundry today, he was to separate out her good blue silk blouse and run it on a gentle cycle, by itself, and hang dry it. Henry, not naked but dressed in painting clothes that day, told her that he would.
That was in the morning. And had Henry started the laundry right then, as he was normally wont to do, things might have been fine. But he was in a hurry to get to his painting work. He had a week left before he had to start preparing lesson plans and report to work in anticipation of the new school year–and he still had two rooms to paint. He would make it, but not with any time to spare. The laundry slipped his mind.
When he stopped for lunch, he went to the laundry room to wash up and noticed the pile.
Oops, he thought, forgot to do that. Better get to it.
He quickly loaded the machine, closed the lid and went to eat. In his hurry, he forgot about the blue blouse. He did not think about the laundry again until Gwen got home.
He was cleaning up the day’s work when she popped in to see him. She could already tell dinner wasn’t made. Normally, that was against the rules she had laid down, but she recognized Henry was doing a lot of work, so it was fine if he made the meal now that he was clearly cleaning up. But she did ask about her blouse.
“Did you wash my blouse and not hang it up yet? I didn’t see it in the laundry room.”
Henry’s face immediately betrayed a look of panic.
“Uh-oh.”
Gwen’s face darkened a bit. “What? Did you forget to wash it?”
“Uh, no, that’s not it. I did forget to run it separately on a gentle cycle. I accidentally tossed it in with the rest of the laundry.” His face wincing as he said that.
Gwen said nothing, turned and went back to the laundry room to find her blouse, still wet in the machine, with the rest of the laundry. The abrasion with the rest of the laundry, which had included some jeans, had ruined it, at least for professional purposes. Now Gwen was angry and at that moment Henry appeared there to see his failure of the day.
She simply, but quietly said, “it’s ruined.”
“I’m so sorry. I forgot to start it this morning and then when I remembered at lunch time, I forgot you wanted me to separate that out. I’m truly sorry.”
Gwen said nothing at first. But finally, she said, “just go get dinner ready. That’s something you also didn’t do today that was supposed to be done by the time I got home.”
The rebuke stung, because he had been working all day, but that didn’t make her rebuke any less valid.
Gwen went to the bedroom and changed into her evening clothes. Then she pulled out a large hard wooden paddle with holes drilled throughout. This was something she had bought months ago because she thought it might be fun to use with Henry, instead of the crop or her hand. Turns out, he didn’t like it. It stinged too much and was too difficult to use “gently.”
When Henry called and said dinner was ready, she told him to turn everything down to low and come upstairs. She was sitting on the edge of the bed when he came in. He looked at her and then at the paddle and got very nervous. Before he could offer his apologies again, Gwen started speaking.
“We agreed you would not have a job this summer but would take care of the house and household chores.” (She glossed over the fact that it had in fact been an order–by her–to him, though one he easily obeyed.) “That means you have to do your jobs and do them correctly. Today was pretty much a failure, Henry. There was no dinner when I came home and you ruined one of my best blouses. I would add that this comes on top of some other, smaller things, that I have let slide. I am disappointed. So very disappointed. But I can’t have this. This won’t do.” The perfectly calm and even voice Gwen was using revealed how angry she was.
She stood up and picked up the paddle. “You need to be taught a lesson today Henry. You need to experience something sufficiently unpleasant that it burns into your brain as a reminder on a daily basis. You need to be punished, but not in a fun, foreplay way.” She couldn’t help but smirk a bit at that–punish him she must but she still loved him deeply.
“Come over here, drop your plants, and bend over the bed.”
“Gwen! Please! I’m very sorry! It won’t happen again!” Henry pleaded for his behind.
Gwen said nothing. She just stood there and waited. Henry knew he had no choice. He had to obey. What could he do? It’s not like he can outrun her long legs–for a big woman Gwen was shockingly fast–even if he wanted to, which he didn’t. He certainly couldn’t physically resist her–she was far stronger than he was. He sighed and walked over to the bed and lowered his pants, lying down on the bed with his feet on the floor. He realized that, ultimately, this is what he signed up for when he implicitly accepted that Gwen was the boss of him. He steeled himself for what he must endure.
Before she began, Gwen explained one more thing. “Do you know why this is necessary, Henry, why you need this punishment?”
Gwen’s feelings of disappointment hurt more than anything she had ever said to him in their relationship, but he gave the only answer he could think of. “So I won’t ruin your clothes again?” Henry was almost sobbing in anticipation.
“No, definitely not. I imagine you are perfectly capable of not ruining clothes again without this,” she said smacking the paddle loudly against her hand.
“No, this is necessary because [and she gave the first hard SMACK to Henry’s butt and got a satisfactory howl in return] our marriage, our life planning that we discussed [the second hard SMACK struck home] is going to be highly dependent [the third SMACK, followed by the howl] on your time management skills. [A fourth SMACK] How will you be able to be the ‘housewife’ if you can’t manage your time and chores?!?” A fifth SMACK hit home and Henry’s ass was already turning red. Ten more hard hits had Henry in tears, begging her to stop, which Gwen did only because that was the number she had settled on before she began.
Gwen then sat down beside Henry, as he lay there weeping from the pain. She reached over and caressed his cheek. “I love you and forgive you, Henry, but I expect you to figure this out. This will never work if i have to micromanage you. I have to do enough of that at the office!”
“I will, I promise, thank you!”
“All right! Let’s go eat! I’m starving. Leave your clothes off. I want you to feel that sore bottom when we sit to eat as a further reminder!”
The rest of the evening ended pleasantly, although Henry did indeed have a hard time sitting down for a while. They didn’t have sex that night as neither were all that interested. It had been a long, hard day. But they embraced in their sleep as they always did, their love undiminished–but with an updated understanding about how their relationship was going to work. If he didn’t before, Henry now fully understood and fully accepted that physical discipline was going to be part of his marriage to Gwen for misdeeds and misbehaviors–a disciplinary element that was unrelated to their sex life.