‘I can look though. And dream.’ The two friends fell into ribald laughter and I cut the last of my bunch, handing them over to Evan, who was leaning against a tree watching me through heavy-lidded blue eyes, his expression inscrutable.
The measuring tape was produced and the switches assessed for length, thickness and durability. Two were discarded as unsuitable, leaving Evan with three candidates.
He gave them back to me. ‘Trim them,’ he ordered. ‘We need them nice and smooth. Don’t want to cut that peachy skin, do we?’
It seemed topsy-turvy that I was expected to prepare the rod for my own back, or rather, bottom. I sliced off the knobbly buds with a growing sense of humiliation, imagining my three observers later on, watching me writhing underneath the lashing willow. There was more to it than simple humiliation, though, and the doughty denim crotch of my jeans began to dampen as I hacked.
‘They look ready now,’ commented Evan, who had noted my not-so-subconscious efforts to drag out the task, perhaps in the hope of some postponement further down the line. ‘Let me have a look at them.’
Three slender wands of pale green-brown, looking so delicate, so pretty, so harmless.
‘What do you think, guys?’ He passed them around the trio, who bent them and whipped them through the air, testing them for flexibility, durability, speed of swish, vicious velocity.
‘Hard to tell,’ said one of them slowly. ‘Think we need further tests. In a bit more depth.’ His eyebrow was tipped towards me. I backed unthinkingly into the trunk of a tree.
‘Good idea,’ said Evan disconcertingly. ‘Turn around, Faith. Stretch your arms up above your head.’
‘Evan!’
‘It’s all right, love. You can keep your jeans on. It won’t hurt. Much.’ He tapped the end of one rod in the palm of his hand, narrowing his eyes as if making mathematical calculations.
I hesitated.
‘We could always use all three. Extend the ritual.’
I turned around, displaying my rump in its spray-on skinnies to their practised eyes. My hands reached upwards, tracing the patterns of the bark. I pressed my palms into it, firmly, and laid one cheek against the rough texture, gazing off sideways towards the river.
‘I think if we all have a go at all of the rods, that will give us an idea. Then we can vote,’ suggested Evan. His voice wafted closer, the ground crackling beneath his feet as he approached. ‘I’ll go first.’
Before I even knew it, in the space of no more than a second, the air was singing, the willow swinging and my bum was stinging. ‘You LIAR!’ I shouted indignantly, once I had caught my breath. ‘That HURT!’
Even through the denim, the switch had painted a streak of fire, and I dreaded to think how it would feel on bare flesh.
‘This is a good one,’ Evan surmised, and then, heedless of my yelps, he laid the next two on quickly. Neither of them were as painful as the first cut, but they were certainly deeply felt all the same. My torso danced against the tree trunk, but movement simply caused my sore bum to rub the rough denim, so there was no relief to be found that way. I brought a hand down to soothe and pat the affected area while Evan handed over the weapons to the first of his friends.
‘Thing is,’ said my next experimenter, ‘will she be standing for the ritual? I thought the girl was bent over?’
‘Good point,’ mused Evan. ‘We might be diluting the effectiveness of the willow. Faith, see that tree stump over there? Can you put your palms down flat on it for us?’
‘You want me to bend over? Do I have to?’
‘Yes,’ he said firmly.
I did as I was told, stretching my jeans so taut in the process that my buttocks were spread and separated by the seam that ran between them. The crotch rode up between my slick sex lips, rubbing against my clit and my soaked knickers. I badly wanted to unzip and push my hand inside but not with an audience.
‘Mmm.’ It seemed the picture my straining denim backside presented met with universal approval. ‘Now that’s a target.’
The three lines left from Evan’s efforts were throbbing now; the idea of six more to come was hard to bear. But the next man was merciful, after a fashion, and struck me less hard, though the position I was in did intensify the effect.
The final willow-wielder had no such delicacy, though. Three full-powered swishes fired up my vulnerable behind, and at the last, I had to leap to my feet, clutching my bottom and yowling.
‘Definitely this one, I think,’ he grinned, slicing it through the air one more time.
‘Yes, I vote for that one too,’ agreed Evan. ‘It seems to produce a strong reaction.’
The third man simply nodded, and the two losing rods were discarded.
‘I’ll see you later,’ said Evan, dismissing them. ‘As for you, my lady, who told you to stop bending over?’