Thirty-Five of The Blest

There was movement at the station
For the word had passed around
That the First Capital Connect apologises for the late running of this service.

“All the time that happens.” Kirsten was not happy. She and her house-friend Catherine had planned a daytrip down to Brighton for Kirsten’s birthday, and once again the trains were running late. They were stood on the platform at Harpenden as Hannah DeKievert, (Kirsten’s friend from school), awaited their arrival on the platform at the next station down the line, St Albans City. And there were no trains.

“You’d better tell Hannah.”

“I just texted her: @hpdn tran L8 cu soon ihop k”

“So they don’t teach spelling at your school Miss Ellison?”

“Not in the RE department Ms House.”

“What’s the book?”

“ Songs from the Banjo . It’s a collection of poetry by A.B. Paterson, known as ‘Banjo’. He was the Australia-based correspondent for The Times and wrote for The Bulletin in Sydney, but he also wrote poems. This one is called The Man from Snowy River...”

“Like the Kirk Douglas film?”

“Uh-huh, although I think Jack Thompson is far sexier in that. The film was based on the poem. Anyway Banjo’s the one responsible for the words to Waltzing Matilda; the tune is English folk-music. The book was a birthday present from my Nana Saoirse in Auckland.”

“Cool, oh, train sear.”

Kirsten smiled. “Train sear? I’ll make an Aussie out of you yet.”

“Just don’t make me sing about jolly swagmen.”

“Oy that’s our Miss. Hey, Ciara!”

Kirsten was looking absently out of the window at the passing array of Hertfordshire and not listening to the conversations around her. Hannah and Catherine were catching up on all the gossip, ostensibly swapping stories of “what is Kirsten really like at home/school”, things Kirsten wasn’t really interested in hearing.

“Ciara! Miss!”

Kirsten looked around when the disembodied voice began to come into focus, and to wave in her direction.

“Ciara Miss!”

“Oh, Michael,” returned Kirsten to one of the boys from Lower Seven, “what are you doing on the train?”

“Going to London Miss, with my dad.” Michael indicated the reading figure seated across from him. “We’re going to the Museum of London; I really want to go after what Juffrou DeKievert said about your trip to London a few weeks ago.”

Kirsten smiled; Hannah hadn’t mentioned everything about that visit to the nation’s capital.

“I hope you will enjoy your day as much as Juffrou and I did. But why are you calling me Ciara?”

“I’m not Miss; your name is Kylie isn’t it? Isn’t that the kiwi-way to say hello?”

“Ah. No, that’s kia ora. Besides which, I’m Australian. And not every Aussie woman is named Kylie you know, only the short ones.” Hannah looked up at Kirsten, smiled, and turned back to Catherine who had continued speaking. “My name is actually Kirsten.”

“Oh, g’day then Miss. Kirst-en: so that’s why Mr Roberts keeps calling you ‘the blessed Miss Ellison’ then. I thought that was just because you are the RE lady and you go to church.”

“Does he now? I’ll have to have a word with him. Kirsten Blessed. I might use that. Enjoy your day Michael: thank you for saying hello to me.”

“Good on you Miss. Hello Miss DeKievert.”

“Goie more Michael.” The train entered a tunnel. “Where are we Kirstie?”

“Umm, just after Boring-wood and before Mill Hill Bored-way.”

“I like that Miss, Boring-wood.”

“Thank you Michael, you may keep it if you wish.”

The remainder of the journey to Brighton was uneventful: Catherine and Hannah continued to talk the entire way down, and Kirsten looked out of the window as London, Surrey, and finally Sussex flashed past. She was looking forward to her day out “with the girls”, she and Catherine had not been to Brighton for such a long time and Hannah had never been there. In fact Hannah had never been to the coast of England: it was an amazing statistic that a girl born and raised on Cape Town’s beaches had not seen ocean for almost three months to this point.

Catherine took the lead as the party left Brighton station for the downhill stroll into town. They had agreed to a lunch at the pub before going shopping in The Laines, (for Catherine), a visit to Brighton Pavilion, (for Kirsten), and dinner of fish and chips on the East Pier, (for Hannah).

“Walkie?” asked Catherine

“When in Rome…” began Kirsten

“…do as the Antipodeans do,” completed Catherine.

“And throw up in the road?” asked Hannah.

Catherine laughed as Kirsten punched her South African friend in the shoulder. “Such cheekiness from a Saffa, we shall not allow you in.”

The Walkabout Pub is both the saviour and the bane of existence for Australians in Europe. Here are themed pubs with Australian beers on tap, (by which is meant beers that Australians drink at home, which are not the ones English people think they do: remember, ‘fosters’ is an ‘f-word’), and Australian music and sport prominent in the ambience, balanced out by that horrifically nasal way that Strayans have of talking when in groups of their own kind. Still, Kirsten enjoyed these places and hoped that she might meet some of her countrymen inside, especially ones happy to buy “the lonely girl from Hobart” a few birthday drinks.

“Woohoo, what a walk!”

“At least it’s downhill.”

“Yeah, going down to Brighton and the beach, it will be uphill home.”

“That’s why they have taxis.”

“Ah, here we are: chateaux bushpig. Abandon culture all ye who enter in.”

“What’s a bush pig?”

“In Australia it’s like a ‘chav’. In South Africa it’s Roast of the Day.”

“Rudeness like that, Miss Ellison, deserves a smack!” This from Catherine, Hannah merely smiled, “but we shall let you off with buying the first shout.”

“First shout? Who made you talk Strine? And ‘first’, how many drinks are we expected to consume prior to shopping?” Kirsten walked over to the bar.

“Hannah, I want to ask you something about Kirstie.”

“Ja, go ahead.”

“Have you read her stories?”

“The Curtseygirl ones, ja I have.”

“All of them?”

“All of the ones Kirstie has showed to me. There is that one about you at Finisagua and…”

“Don’t call it that please, she made that name up.”

“It is rather clever though, and it is a nice pub, I’ve been there with her.”

“But don’t you think she’s just a bit too clever? I mean, it’s great that she’s found a creative outlet for herself, and I’m happy that the amount of actual ‘maintenance spanking’ has gone down in our house now, but I wonder whether she’s getting just a bit too full of her own importance.”

“Ja, she is coming back now.”

Kirsten returned with the pints. “I love that I found some girls to drink beer with. Four-ex for the Scotty, a first Snakebite for the Saffa, and Guinness for the Aussie of Irish-Kiwi extraction. Slainte ladies.”

“Do you see?”

“Hmm.”

“Hmm what?” Kirsten looked up.

“Nothing.”

The Laines in Brighton is a warren of shops and alleys full of all the smelly and pretty stuff that girls will spend hours looking through, before walking away with nothing. Catherine and Kirsten’s friend Paul used to wait in the garden of the Royal Pavilion for the girls to shop without him when the three of them would come down for days out: but Hannah was in her element. Kirsten went across to buy entry tickets to the Pavilion, (she expected a queue), whilst her friends continued to browse and buy.

“Don’t get me wrong Hanie, I like Kirstie very much, she’s quite lovely much of the time, but sometimes she can seem so stuck up with cleverness that I just want to slap her face in.”

“That surprises me Catie, really.”

“No, I mean, well as I say she’s nice and all that, but I wonder whether her stories are turning her away from who she really is.”

“No I get that, jislaak I’ve only known her two months and she’s already saying ‘do you like my stories’; I mean that I didn’t think that you’d resort to such violence.”

Catie smiled. “Ah em Scottush ye noo it: we be a terrible brootil pipple when necess-ree.”

Hannah sighed. “And is it necessary just now?”

“She’s thirty-five, unmarried, and homesick. She should know better. Do you know she keeps naming her stories after Crowded House songs? I mean I really liked her goodbye message with the U2 lyrics in it, very apt with ‘in the mud in the maze of her imagination’ and the ‘baby’s got blue skies up ahead but in this I’m a rain cloud’; I mean that’s meaningful and clever, but ‘Te Awamutu’ and ‘Sister Madly’? Who does she think she is? Okay Kirsten, you’re Australian and New Zealander, we get it!”

“‘Into Temptation’ is Crowded House as well, so is the line ‘you in your new blue dress, taking away my breath.’ It was playing in the Walkabout before.”

“Yeah, that boy from Milton Keynes noted that in her footnotes, but I thought that was a proper-clever story. And Janice liked it.”

“True.”

“Do you mind Kirstie trying to speak Afrikaans?”

“Not at all, I’m rather flattered that she’s trying to be nice to me, I think it’s genuine: but if I were Martin in Watling Street I’d have pulled her across my lap for a few more with her skirt up. Does she try to talk Scots with you?”

“Noo, but she kipsa writing me with a foony accent in her stories.”

“Ag, shame man, but at least she lets you speak Engels. Jislaak, she’s coming back!”

Kirsten was having a lovely day. It was the weekend of her birthday and she was in her favourite place in England; the place she had come to for her first escape from London soon after her arrival in 2001, the place where she had had her first (drunken) kiss from an Englishman. He had asked her where she was from; she had said “Kent”, (which was true since she lived in Gillingham). He had asked her the advantages of living in Kent over London; Kirsten still remembered her reply, “living in Kent means never having to say you’re Surrey.” She’s a clever girl our Miss Ellison.

Following an uneventful tour of George IV’s Royal (Brighton) Pavilion, the girls headed out to the pier for some seaside action and a dinner of the national dish of England: fish and chips and ale. (Minus the ale, eugh, warm beer anyone?)

“There used to be an amusement park like this near my nana’s house in Auckland. We left New Zealand when I was five, but I still remember my dad taking me on the bumper-cars: my mum nearly killed him when she saw me sitting there in his lap while my uncle tried to knock us into the harbour.” Kirsten was having a homesick moment, to which she felt entirely entitled upon the occasion of her forthcoming birthday. She turned to see that her two friends had wandered on slightly and were settling into two of the deck chairs, chatting to each other. She smiled to them and turned back to look past the amusements and into the English Channel beyond.

“My nana’s house in Auckland.”

“Well, that is where her nana lives; you can’t blame her for actually being a New Zealander.”

“But she isn’t. According to her she’s Australian, Tasmanian even.”

“Hmm.”

Kirsten walked across to her friends.

Dinner was uneventful, although Hannah joined Kirsten in her ongoing amazement at the concept of mushy peas. “How can you English eat that crap, it looks like play-dough?”

“Hey, less of the name-calling, I’m not English.” Catherine feigned distress, Hannah feigned contrition. Kirsten just laughed.

“And now to the business of the day,” began Catherine, turning to Kirsten. “On Monday our well beloved Miss Ellison, clever beyond words with more degrees than a compass: spinster of Arts and mistress of Teaching…”

Kirsten laughed, “that’s the sort of thing I’d say!”

“Or put in a story,” added Hannah.

“T’is truth.”

“…is, is to celebrate her thirty-fifth birthday. So we say happy birthday to you our dearest Kirsten, we wish you love and happiness.” (Since Catherine pronounced this last blessing more like “lerve and a penis” in a dodgy European accent a dirty laugh erupted from Miss E, spraying a small amount of white wine across her own plate.)

“God bless our good Kirstie!”

“And all who sail in her!”

“Hoorah for Kirstie!”

“Hoorah!”

Kirsten blushed: out of delight rather than embarrassment as a table of Americans looked around and clapped. One of the men yelled across “birthday? I hope she got her spanks.”

“Still to come my good man,” called Catherine.

“Let us know if you need a hand,” the man replied. Kirsten blushed deeper.

“No time like the present,” indicated Hannah with a conspiratorial wink towards Catherine.

“Hmm. Oooh,” replied Catherine, connecting to Hannah’s veiled suggestion. “Yes, that might work.” Hannah smiled and nodded.

“Kirsten, you heard the man: O-T-K Miss L-S-N!”

“But I’m K-L-, oh I see. Clever!”

“Something you might have said yourself? Or perhaps written on 360?”

Kirsten smiled happily. “Maybe.”

“Maybe. Bend over…umm…over Catherine’s knee.” Hannah having made the suggestion took charge of proceedings.

“Hannah no, not here in the restaurant. I know in London we…”

“Kirsten, bend over. Or shall I ask our American, oh, sorry, ‘Merican’ friends to join us?”

“No thank you Hannah.”

“Right, then you must do as Auntie Johanna asks and bend over Ms House’s knee.”

Kirsten did as she was asked; it was her birthday after all. Spanking was not something usually associated with celebration in Australia…unless it involved the national cricket team, but that was only between consenting friends.

“Help me Catie?”

“Of course mo cara.”

Kirsten was worried, Catie never spoke Gaelic and she knew it was the one thing she herself did that annoyed her Scottish friend. Why this would worry Kirsten was uncertain, but there was more than a suspicion that what was to follow for her would not be as nice as it first may have appeared. Hannah addressed the restaurant, which was really just the three girls and the table of Americans at that point.

“Our Miss Ellison, known to her friends as Kirstie, is thirty-five on Monday, and consequently deserves a jolly good seeing to for her past twelve months of naughty. One per year Ms House, you may begin when ready.”

Catherine flipped up Kirsten’s skirt and began her task with a single instruction to her horizontal house-mate: “counting aloud please.”

SMACK

“One. Oh Catie that really hurt.”

SMACK

“Two. Umm, Catherine, please?”

SMACK SMACK

“Eek. Three, four.” Kirsten had cottoned on. Why she was actually being punished was still a mystery to her, but that was obviously what was going on as Catherine was hitting very hard. “Whatever it is Cath…”

SMACK

“Ooh. Catherine I’m…”

SMACK SMACK

“Kirsten you need to count.”

“Oh, that’s seven.”

“No, that’s four, you need to count.”

SMACK SMACK SMACK

“That’s seven.”

“Thank you Catherine. I’m so sorry for …”

SMACK

“Eight, for what I’ve done to deserve…”

SMACK SMACK

“Ooh, nine ten, whatever I’ve done to deserve this.”

“Shut up and count, we’ll discuss this when we get…”

SMACK

“Eleven”

“…home.”

“Wow, she’s really blistering that poor girl’s butt.”

“Yeah, but she’s still got her pantyhose and panties on so it can’t be too bad.”

“I don’t know about that Marvin, those are some pretty hard smacks she’s getting there.”

“Nineteen.” Kirsten began sobbing, not from the flame in her hindquarters, (although there was one), but from confusion, embarrassment and shame. What had she done?

“Get up.” Catherine had stopped her rain of blows (reign of blows?) upon Kirsten.

“That’s only twenty, are we finished?” Kirsten was crying now, and hoping twenty of the best substituted for thirty-five of the fun.

“Johanna’s turn.”

“Oh.”

“Oh look, she’s stopping now. No, it’s just the other girl taking over, the German one. She’s really getting it big-time that young lady there.”

“Tights down Kirsten.”

“But the men…”

“Kirsten.”

“Umm. Yes, yes of course Hannah.”

“Johanna to you, or Juffrou DeKievert. And you just see what happens if you mutter one word of Afrikaans in the next few minutes.”

“Yes Johanna. I’m so sorry.” Kirsten had it figured out now: hadn’t she been told since school she was too clever by half and you have such skill Kirsty but you let everything else get in the way. “I’m so very…”

“The tights, Kirsten.”

“Yes Johanna.”

Kirsten rolled her tights down to mid thigh and looked up at Hannah. Hannah patted her lap.

“Bend over; you are still owed fifteen years worth.”

“Yes Johanna. A hand please?" Kirsten leant across Hannah and took her hand as she lay herself across the waiting knees.

“Counting from twenty.”

SMACK

“Twenty-one.”

SMACK

“Twenty-two.”

The blows from Hannah were not as hard as they had been from Catherine, but then Catherine had had more experience of hitting Miss Ellison’s backside. Still, Kirsten noted that the hits were sent with feeling, even if not with maximum force. The tears returned almost immediately: these were her two best friends and she had had such a lovely day out with them, was this really how they felt about her?

SMACK

“Twenty-nine.”

And what did they feel about her anyway? Was this about frustration and humiliation, or was it just a warning that she was getting too close to the line that separates cockiness from simply being pleased with one’s own talents? Kirsten didn’t think herself rude or pushy, indeed she was mortified to think that anyone would suspect her of such baseness, but the thumping going on behind her indicated that not everyone shared that opinion.

“Oh look, she’s pulled down her pantyhose now; you can see the pink on her thighs real clear from here.”

“Poor thing, that’s really mean.”

“Maybe that’s just how they do it in England.”

“Yeah.”

SMACK

“Oh hoo hoo. Thirty-five.”

“You must stand up now Kirsten and replace your underwear and your dress.”

“Oh hoo hoo. Thank you Johanna.”

As had been the situation on the journey south, on the train home to Hertfordshire Kirsten sat looking out of the window at the passing landscape while Hannah and Catherine chatted happily to each other. The girls had returned to Brighton town for a drink before travelling home, but not at the Walkabout, and Catherine and Hannah discussed their motives with Kirsten. Kirsten had been very appreciative. Now as the train pulled out of Gatwick Airport and continued towards Croydon and then London Kirsten smiled towards her reflection in the carriage window. She wondered to herself what the other passengers might have thought had they known of the condition of her bottom, how it had come to be that way, and who had been responsible. She dropped her gaze to the hands folded neatly in her lap and burst into a grin and allowed herself a slight chuckle. She raised her head again and returned her gaze to the reflection.

“Happy birthday Curtseygirl,” she said to the reflected image and to no-one in particular.