Chapter Six
The storm left fourteen inches of snow in its wake, and it took six days to get power and phone service restored to most of the island’s residents. Considering the tension and the stressful way the storm began between Rey and Alan, the rest of the time they spent cooped up together ended up being quite enjoyable. Alan taught Rey how to play cribbage and she showed him some of her ideas for hand painted folk art designs and stencils that she thought would add a touch of charm to the guest rooms and bathrooms.
Though she felt subdued and inhibited facing Alan the next morning, Rey was quickly able to relax with him again. Just like the time before, it was almost as if the spanking had never happened, only better. The mood between them was lighter somehow. She could laugh more easily, and so could he. What had become testy sarcastic comments, seemed now to be funny, because they were. The edge of irritation that had infused her comebacks and remarks was gone.
The spanking seemed to transform them both back into people that the other could like.
For her part, Rey liked being back in Alan’s good graces. The traitor within her was placated with a recent spanking to fuel fantasy, not to mention the mildly painful bruises and marks that could be inspected by lamplight. With that part of herself subdued, she could enjoy being an adult in his eyes again.
For his part, Alan was amazed by the transformation a sound spanking produced in the young lady working in his home. Even though Rey was young, at nineteen, only just over the legal age of consent, in many ways he found her more mature than most of the women his age that he’d spent time with. Her tendency to revert to adolescent crankiness when stressed or tired was less a product of her maturity than it was a side effect of her personality. Alan had an inkling that Rey would continue to become petulant and saucy whenever pushed and frustrated until she was well into her nineties. That knowledge didn’t diminish her in his mind either, especially given how well she responded to good old-fashioned discipline. In fact, her feisty nature had its own allure and interest for him.
As the weeks they’d been working together passed, Alan found himself becoming more and more attached to Rey. Her easy laugh and unaffected openness was captivating and very attractive. Everything she felt and thought was written all over her, in her expressions and mannerisms as well as in the things she said. And most of the time she was happy, enthusiastic and excited by the things she wanted to do, and the things that interested him. Alan had never met anyone quite like her before. But the strength of his growing feelings for her was becoming a concern. The near nine-year age difference wasn’t as big a barrier as the fact that she was only just out of high school. A year ago, she could have been a pupil in his classroom. In Alan’s mind, the sexual feelings and emotional connection he was beginning to feel for Rey approached a taboo he did not want to let him self contemplate.
Alan kept a reign on his feelings. He had time. His choice to stay on and re-open “The Spray” wasn’t made with any plans to bring a wife into the picture. If Rey decided she wanted to stay on and work after the renovations were complete, he would welcome the prospect. If she didn’t, and like most of the Island kids set out to find a life in the world on shore, he would manage. If she did stay he imagined that in a few years she’d be old enough that he could give more thought to something more serious with her. He hoped and prayed she would decide to stay, but he wasn’t going to invite scandal or scorn by letting another soul on earth in on his hopes. He also wasn’t going to intrude on her dreams of life on the mainland if she had them. Knowing all to well from his own experience, just how desperate the need to get off the island could be for some youngsters.
*********
Not having electricity except to run the boiler and emergencies slowed down some of the progress on the renovations, but they were still able to keep to most of their schedule by rearranging stages of the projects. Winter brought three more nasty storms, and a total of seventeen days without power. Even so, by the end of March when the sun began to provide warm days, the ice in the harbor began to break up, and the sap in the maple trees began to flow, “The Spray” only needed minor touches inside and a few coats of paint on her clapboards and trim before she would be ready for her first guests.
In mid January, with her internet discovery in the back of her mind, and a desire to find a legitimate reason to get regular access to the computer, Rey came up with an idea to design a website for the Inn, and clamored and cajoled Alan until he relented and agreed to let her work on it. That gave her a reason to surf the Internet and spend hours into the evenings on his computer. Rey made good use of the time, coming up with a quaint and inviting theme for the site. She built pages with island lore, history and activity information. She planned to create a slide show of photographs of some of the sights as soon as the snow cleared enough that photographs would show the island’s beauty.
Rey also made time almost daily to surf the spanking world on line. The website was ideal cover, legitimizing the hours she was parked at the computer. Some days she found herself lost in those sites and the stories and discussions she read. When that happened, a carefully uttered expletive or well-timed complaint allowed her to construct white lies. Power flickers that caused whole page files and designs to get corrupted or lost and need re-doing, was all she needed to explain why some afternoons produced nothing to show Alan.
The skeleton of the website went up in mid February, and it began getting hits almost immediately. Phone calls and e-mails were sporadic initially, but when they were able to get links up on the main New Brunswick and Nova Scotia Tourism sites inquiries began coming in daily.
The week of Palm Sunday through Easter was going to be the grand re-opening and “The Spray” was fully booked.
In late March, the “Quilting & Knitting Shed” was ready for the guild ladies to move back into. Alan had been amazed at the reception his offer to refurbish and re-open the building had received. The ladies were excited, and full of gratitude. They were also very proprietary and had their own ideas about the project. When Alan didn’t move fast enough with fixes and painting, he heard about it. More than once one of the ladies brought a husband around to help out so this or that project could move forward.
Cottage crafts were one of the main sources of bread, butter and pin money for many of the wives of the men in the lobster, weir fishing and seaweed harvest industries. The prospect of being able to gather in one place to work on them again appealed to everyone. Alan’s plan that the “Shed” double as a storefront for the guild’s wares was a bonus the ladies hadn’t had before.
When the ladies moved in, Rey began work on a segment of “The Spray’s” web site where the guild crafts could be displayed. In time, they hoped that there might be enough traffic and interest to use the guild’s pages for Internet sales of some of the quilts and sweaters as well. Some of the ladies had become quite well known for their sweater patterns and all of the quilts were exquisite.
One of the unanticipated pluses of having a group of mother’s and grandmother’s occupying a building on the property was that Alan acquired a regular cook and several willing and able reserves without having to advertise. The wheels turned, and the opening of “The Spray” approached. Yet in all the arrangements nothing firm had been decided about whether Rey would stay on after the last of the finishing touches had been completed. Alan was waiting for a signal of interest from Rey, and she was waiting for him to offer her a job in the opened Inn.
By mid March, Rey began to let her self dwell on the looming ‘end’ of the project. When Alan happily accepted Mrs. Beatty’s offer to take on the job as The Spray’s chief cook, Rey felt herself becoming sad and a little angry. Why hadn’t Alan even thought of asking her if she wanted the job? After all she was the one who put a lot into helping make the place perfect and she had worked for a lot of years for her Aunt and Uncle. She knew this business well enough! If he was going to go hiring people, he could have at least opened up the job to applicants. These thoughts and other quietly grumbled around in her mind over the course of weeks.
The same old restless sense of loss that had made her so cross and cranky when she first met Alan began to creep back in to her heart. The reason was the same now as it had been then too. Rey was going to have to face her biggest fear, and that was, what to do with her self in the adult world. She didn’t want to go to college she didn’t want to work down at one of the canneries or Dulce factories. More than anything though, she did not want to have to face making good on the promise she’d been boastfully making since the day she arrived on Grand Manan. She didn’t want to leave the island. The job with Alan had taken the pressure to decide on a path for her life off of her for a while, and now Rey felt it building back up.
When her Uncle began asking her what Alan’s plans were for her when the season began and the renovations were complete, Rey became even more on edge.
“I don’t know, he hasn’t said anything,” was the only answer she could give.
“Ask the man, or g’down and put your name in down at the canneries,” was the advice she was given. “You’ll have to get on wid' it soon Rey. You can’t be lolling rount’here all your life. You’re a big girl. Time to get out in the world and make your own way.”
Aunt Wanda spoke up on Rey’s behalf saying there was “plenty of time,” the first few times her Uncle brought the question up in March. But George finally silenced his wife with the threat of a “good walloping” if she ‘stuck her nose into it’ in one more time.
Her Aunt made a good sounding board for Rey’s worries on the subject. She didn’t know what to do. But Rey could not bring herself to tell anyone, not even her Aunt that more than anything in life she wanted to stay on the island. If that was a hard thing to share, the secret she kept closest and most secret was the one that was becoming an almost painful desire. Her deepest wish was that not only could she keep working for Alan, but that he would love her and choose her for his wife.
It surfaced in her daydreams and fantasies when she was alone working on moldings or stencils at the Inn. Fear that it could never be, crept in and colored her mood more and more often, as early April, and the end of the renovations got closer and closer.
At night, when she was in bed alone, Rey’s mind wandered over fantasies and dreams of being with Alan. She wanted him to kiss her and need her, and she fantasized about him spanking her and then making love to her again and again and again. If she could marry Alan, not only could she stay on the island, she could be with him all the time. She could kiss him and touch him the way she wanted to so badly. Rey wanted Alan to love her so badly she ached all over.
The fact that he was just so maddeningly indifferent to her and treated her like a sister and a kid was beginning to make her mad as hell.
Tension began to build again. It started with saucy quips in response to instructions Alan gave, and progressed to sarcastic answers to his questions. Rey was careful to save the worst of her sass for moments when Mrs. Beatty was around, or for when she was headed out the door at the end of the day. Though most of her motive wasn’t conscious, the anger she was feeling was, and it got worse with every day that passed that Alan made no mention of Rey’s future at The Spray.
On the Wednesday before the Inn would receive its first guests, things came to an inevitable head. It began when Mrs. Beatty finally spoke up after Rey made a saucy comment to Alan in response to his instructions that trim work in the largest guest suite be finished before she devoted any more time to the work she preferred to do on the computer. Rey’s comment had the desired effect, which was to turn Alan’s face a deep shade of crimson. If Mrs. Beatty hadn’t been in the room, Rey had little doubt it would have been the last straw. That knowledge gave her a smug sense of power, and a raw desire to press harder. The traitor within her was doing the pushing. The traitor helped her discover that aggravating Alan to the point where she knew he wanted to spank the living daylights out of her, in situations where he couldn’t follow through, was even more satisfying and secretly thrilling, than doing it when he could act on it had been.
“If I didn’t know better lass, I’d say you were pressing that man to fire you,” the woman turned to face down Rey when Alan left the large kitchen to get busy outside.
“Yeah right? Fire me from what? I’ll be done here in another day. And you want to bet your measly paycheck, he won’t even notice when I’m gone,” Rey couldn’t help betraying some of the hurt she felt with the way she phrased her answer. The old woman picked up on it immediately.
“Someone should take you both out and whip you! Any fool can see you’re waiting on him, and he’s waiting on you.”
“What do you know about it?” Petulance took over again and over rode the hurt Rey was feeling.
“I know you should just tell Alan it’s about time the two of you decided on what’s what when the guests arrive. Damned idiot thinks you’ll just show up day one and know what to do, and here you are figuring you’re out when they’re in? Fools both of you!” Mrs. Beatty’s face was the one turning crimson now.
“It’s not up to me to beg him for a job! He’s the damned boss of the place!” Rey put her hands on her hips. She was the picture of obstinate rebellion.
“You back your little saucy self right on down young lady! There’s no face lost putting your cards on the table. Just say it outright. You want to know what’s what when the guests arrive.” Mrs. Beatty was formidable, and the force of her will did deflate some of Rey’s defiance.
“No. If he wants me he’ll have to ask me and offer me a job,” was the only answer Rey could come up with, and to end the conversation, she left the kitchen to collect the paints and stencils and climb the stairs to the last real job on her list.
Frustration and temper boiled. “If ‘any fool’ could see, then Alan must be the world’s thickest fool!
“And just how dare that old biddy tell me I should be the one to speak up. He’s the one who’s got to decide if he has a job he needs me for or not. It damned well is not up to me to tell him he’ll need help with the housekeeping and keeping guests entertained. What does he think? He can just let them in, show them a room and expect everything to just work? Stupid fool’ll probably park himself on the sofa with a newspaper and let the house take care of itself. All he has to do is look at Aunt Wanda and Uncle George and he’ll know it’s going to take more than just him and a half crippled old woman to keep a place this size going.”
Rey filled the next two hours arguing with an invisible Mrs. Beatty and Alan in alternating rounds.
As mid morning approached, Rey’s temper was at a full boil, and by then, Mrs. Beatty had had words with Alan. He had to laugh with the old woman, and agree that Rey’s recently escalating foul mood was ample evidence that she had strong feelings about her job coming to an end. He agreed that he could have broached the subject of staying on after the renovations with Rey sooner, but he’d been hoping she’d give him a more direct clue that it was what she wanted.
“I’d say what you’ve got is about as direct as that child will give you right now. Now! For the sake of peace and my tender old ears, I’m asking you to set her straight, offer her the job formal like, and get this house back on even keel. I’m about up to here with the foul language and saucy mouth.” Alan smiled under the old woman’s dressing down. It had been too long since he’d had a stern talking to like that. The experience made it easy for him to map out how he would lay the cards out for Rey.
She didn’t know it yet, but Mrs. Beatty or no Mrs. Beatty, Miss Rey was going to come down a peg if she really did want to stay on. First he would have to choreograph the circumstances of a formal job offer. He decided it would probably go over better if it came up casually while they were working, so when Rey came down to get a cup of coffee, Alan told her he needed her help outside after she took a few minutes for herself.
Rey’s answer was terse. “I’m taking a break right now. When I’m ready I’ll be out there.”
She saw Mrs. Beatty’s posture stiffen as she leaned on the counter polishing old silver. The old woman was shaking her head, but Rey could not see her expression. Alan let the retort pass. He would deal with it in due time.
Rey took her time, stretching her break into a full half hour, until Mrs. Beatty intervened.
“It’ll soon be time for lunch, now get out there and help the man with whatever it is he’s up to. If either one of ya’s late for lunch you’ll both go hungry till supper. I’m not running no restaurant!”
“Oh be quiet! I was just going anyway,” Rey huffed as she delivered her empty coffee cup to the sink.
“Rinse it!” Mrs. Beatty warned, turning on Rey as she attempted skip out on half the task.
“Alright! Alright! You don’t have to bite my head off!” Rey made a production of running the water and scrupulously rinsing the cup.
“Git!” Mrs. Beatty finally chased the saucy girl out of the kitchen with a long backhand gesture that suggested she’d cuff her a good one if she didn’t get moving.
She found Alan up on a ladder painting the ginger bread along the gables.
“How’s that look from down there?” he called down when he saw her coming.
“OK, I guess.”
“Go on down to the road and look back up here. Tell me if the burgundy trim shows against the moss color well enough.”
“Is that all you wanted me to do? Critique your paint job? I already told you it was OK!” Rey crossed her arms and shifted her weight defiantly to one leg. Her right foot poised to punctuate her irritation with several impatient taps. The expression on her face was calculated arrogance.
“Go on out to the road and take a look at the colors from a distance. There’s no point in taking all this time making a contrast band if it’s too narrow to see properly.” Alan remained patient, but firmly restated his instructions.
Rey sighed, straightened and stomped down to the road. When she got there, she turned back and resumed the same defiant stance she’d had moments ago. Her mood not withstanding, she had to admit the picture her eyes took in was impressive. The house was a soft sage green, trimmed with three progressively darker shades of sage and moss green and then a striking deep burgundy. It blended beautifully into the spruce and pine behind it. And it looked like it belonged to the dark gray-green water and of the Bay of Fundy with its rust red cliffs and shoreline. “The Spray” was beautiful.
“Well?” Alan called when Rey gave him no hint of her opinion.
“It’s fine!” Rey called back.
“Alright, come on back up here then.”
Rey shifted her weight with a huff, as if she’d been asked to do the impossible, and made her way back up the still snow edged lawn.
The sun was making steady but slow progress melting away the snow drifts. The once twelve-foot mountains of piled white snow were now only two or three foot lumps of rust and black encrusted ice. Most of the grass and brush were uncovered and sprouts of fresh deciduous green were beginning to peak through. The crocuses next to the foundations of the houses had also begun sprouting. It was a sure sign of the changing season. The maritime winter was jealous though. It was probable that it would come out and interrupt spring’s takeover once or maybe twice more before it gave up. For now, with the noonday sun high, spring was in charge.
Alan set his brush down on the paint tray perched against the ladder, and climbed down to meet Rey when she made her way back up.
“So Rey? Have you given any thought to what you’re going to do to keep busy around here once you finish that last room?” The question was clean and simply put, and it blindsided Rey.
“No,” she lied.
“Why not?” Alan acted casual, if a bit surprised.
“Just haven’t,” another lie.
“You’re not going to just come here and hang out on the computer if that’s what you think,” the comment was made to bait her as much as to express that he expected she was going to stick around.
“I never thought that,” Rey took offense to what she perceived as insinuation that she’d stop pulling her weight, and that what she had done with the website was not real work.
“I thought you said you hadn’t given it any thought?” Alan’s smile was coy. He could play with her a little, but he decided since she was already in for a serious reckoning that he’d concede the game quickly.
“So?” Rey stiffened. “I didn’t plan on being a slacker so there! If I didn’t think about one, it’s only reasonable I didn’t think about the other any how.”
“You want to stay on I take it?”
“Depends”
“On what?”
“I’m not going to end up with all the dirty jobs like toilets and dishes all the time!”
“Nobody said you would. You haven’t had all the dirty work yet have you?”
“Some of it. Yes I have.”
“Is that so? Were you the one priming the septic tank in three feet of snow?”
“I hauled all the wood for practically the whole winter!”
“You’ll have some scut work to do, so will I and so will Mrs. Beatty, but I’d say it’ll probably come out even in the long run. So are you interested in staying on or not?” Alan stopped the round about and cut to the chase.
“Will you get a scanner and let me keep up the website?” Rey put the only real terms she had in mind into the negotiation.
“I’ll get a scanner, a fax and a color printer in one. Maybe even upgrade the whole system if we have a good 1st season how is that?”
“OK. Then I’ll stay.” Rey nodded closing the deal from her perspective, and relaxing significantly in the process.
“Two things on my end now,” Alan held up his cards next.
“What?” Rey eyed him warily. His expression had taken on a dark “I mean business” air.
“First, until we have cash flow, I can only support your board and keep. You’ll need to be here early and late some mornings, so it’ll be best you live in anyway. If the season goes well you’ll get $100.00 a week and keep, paid in October, not before. Alright?”
“OK? Is that it?” she nodded.
“Second, your attitude. You’ve spent the better part of the last two and a half weeks acting like a snotty little brat. We won’t have any more of that.”
Rey’s eyes narrowed. “You can’t tell me when I can be mad and when I can’t.”
“No I can’t,” Alan nodded in agreement. “But I can and will tell you how you will express it in this house. And it won’t be with foul language, the cold shoulder and snot nose sarcasm, unless you want to make a trip over my knee.”
“Fine!” Rey put her hands on her hips, and accepted his terms.
“Fine! Now you go on upstairs into your room and wait for me to come up and tidy your attitude properly.”
“No way!” Rey felt a shock of anticipation pulse through her.
“Yes way! I said it and I meant it. You just agreed to my terms too if my memory serves.”
“That’s not fair! I agreed to them for ‘from now on’ not for now!” Rey complained.
“You’re still under the old contract young lady and you’ve already had a dose or two of those terms applied. Get up there now.” Alan turned away, and started back up the ladder. He fully expected her to obey. She might fume and sputter over it for a few minutes, but he knew she’d be in the bedroom when he made his way up in an hour or so.
If Rey could have put her hands on a rock in that moment after he arrogantly turned his back on her and left her to contemplate his order, Alan might have been injured. As it was she had to struggle against the urge to push the ladder and topple him with it.
Rey went into the house, and stomped through the kitchen.
“Wash up! Lunch will be ready in fifteen minutes!” Mrs. Beatty issued an order as Rey passed by.
“I’m not having lunch! So you can just stuff it where the sun doesn’t shine!” Rey hissed. She mounted the stairs and took them three at a time. The force of the slamming door that followed shook the whole house. Alan felt it from the ladder outside, and decided that letting Rey stew was not going to serve any purpose except possibly giving her temper time to get her in deeper trouble. He grimaced, dismounted the ladder, and made his way into the house.
“So? Is she staying or going,” Mrs. Beatty growled through clenched teeth when Alan entered the kitchen and went over to rummage through the drawer by the main cook stove.
“Staying,” Alan growled and answer and then lifted a hefty old walnut scraper out of the drawer. He smacked his left hand with it, and then turned and made his way up the stairs.
Mrs. Beatty chucked, knowing exactly what was coming. “About damned time!” she told the stovetop. As she ladled herself a bowel of soup, she heard Rey cuss a few words signaling that Alan had opened the door, and then the voice sounds muffled when the door closed again. A few thumps and bumps disturbed the ceiling, and then the unmistakable sounds of wood smacking bare backside and very sorry girl could be heard quite well. “That’s the way it’s done,” she nodded in approval, and sat down to relax with her lunch.
“No fucking way!” Rey cussed, when Alan’s sudden entrance surprised her.
“We went over this already,” he answered. “Yes way, now get your pants down and get over here.”
“Fuck you!”
Alan didn’t give her any real option. After pushing the door closed behind him, he advanced on Rey trapping her against the side of the bed. Pulling her around by her shirt, he tugged and pulled the snap and zipper of her jeans undone.
“Get them down and let’s get this over with now,” his determination and purpose was a force unto itself. Even though she tried to pull away, Rey found herself cooperating by pushing her clothes off her backside as Alan pulled her down across his lap.
The spanking started immediately. No lecture, no preamble, just hard, determined smacks. The broad walnut scraper made a very effective paddle. The dense hard wood packed a sting that had Rey howling from the first few spanks. After barely a minute, Rey was desperate to get away and make it stop. Her struggles were easily matched. Alan had no difficulty securing her flailing hands and pinning her legs between his. The spanking would stop when he thought she’d had enough. In another minute Rey was crying and pleading with him to stop, and in another, she’d reverted back to struggles and curses. The battle of wills and the punishment lasted only about three and a half minutes altogether. When it ended, Rey’s voice was stripped raw, her bottom burned white hot, and she was sobbing inconsolably.
Alan helped her stand, and pulled her jeans up for her, and then tugged her down to sit on his lap. He let her cry it all out, with out saying a word.
When she did manage to settle, he took her chin in his hand, and tipped her face up to look at his.
“No more saucy attitude, got it?” he smiled.
“OK,” Rey hiccupped and shook her head. “No more.”
She leaned against Alan for a few more minutes of comfort. Being close to him like that felt thrilling and peaceful at the same time. She wanted him to love her so badly her chest ached more than her bottom did.
“Time for lunch or Mrs. Beatty will skin us both,” Alan chuckled.
Rey nodded, and pulled away to stand up.
“Wash your face and collect yourself, then come on down quickly alright?” Alan instructed as he pulled open the door to make his way back to the kitchen.
Rey sniffled and nodded and followed him into the hallway, stopping at the bathroom before following him the rest of the way to the kitchen.
They had lunch in relative silence. Rey was self-conscious, knowing Mrs. Beatty had probably heard or at least had a pretty good idea she’d been spanked. Alan and the old woman exchanged smiles and winks, aware that embarrassed the silence was partly defensive. Finally Mrs. Beatty broke the ice so they could all put it away.
“Guess you’ll think twice about slamming doors in this house now won’t you ‘Missy-May Rey?’”
Alan couldn’t help himself. He let out a belly laugh.
Rey couldn’t help it either. A smile creased the shy crimson blush that washed across her face. “Stop it! It isn’t funny,” she complained.
“You got what you deserved and that’s an end to it. Nothing more will be said about it you hear?” Mrs. Beatty nailed the point, and it ended.
Again Rey’s mood turned a one hundred and eighty degrees. And work at “The Spray” turned forward. The first guests would arrive in three days. |
