Watch Siobhan's Assessment

Well, the notice did say spectators were welcome.

You walk into a tired vestibule with flaking peach paint on the walls and battered wooden furniture that looks older than the building. Through a pair of double doors, a large rectangular room with water-damaged laminate floor has been converted into an auditorium by a horseshoe of plastic chairs surrounding a portable bondage frame flanked by two straight rows of similar chairs. The limp form of a thin young girl is hanging in the frame and it's from her that the occasional howls of anguish emanate.

You're by no means the only interested onlooker; there are a couple of dozen others sitting in the outer ring of chairs and all but one of the seats in the two inner rows is occupied. They're mostly older men, but some are younger, along with a handful of women. Even the youngest is a few years older than the poor unfortunate facing the lash, who looks barely old enough for a spanking. You assume that the one empty seat in the middle belongs to the middle-aged man currently standing at the back, selecting a whip from one of five open cabinets containing what seems to be every type of spanking implement known to man. Each cabinet has a different type, paddles, straps, canes, whips and other, uncategorizable items. You take a seat near the door just in time to see the man walk back to the bondage frame with a long, stiff crop.

A woman in her thirties stands up from her place in the right hand inner row and speaks loudly.

"When I used to babysit you after school, you often forgot to say 'thank-you' when I made you dinner."

"Ohhh, I'm sorry, Auntie-aaaiiii! Unnngh, thank-you, Daddy." The restrained girl's wail turns into a scream when her father lashes the crop across her right buttock and down the outside of her thigh. Her creamy flesh is already covered in a lattice of livid weals and swollen welts, indicating that the punishment has been under way for some time.

"Sometimes, when you were talking to your friends or playing a game or watching television, I would have to tell you two or three times to do something," the aunt continues and Mr. O'Kelly steps round in front of his daughter and whips her breast and ribs, causing an even more agonized cry than the one before.

The woman sits down with a nod of satisfaction and after a second, the elderly gentleman next to her surges to his feet.

"When you were walking home from school one time, some of your friends threw empty beer cans and fast food wrappers into my garden and you didn't do anything to stop them," he exclaims indignantly.

"Oh no, oh no, oh why was I so naughty?" The teenager's words don't receive any reply. Instead, the man holding the whip asks the neighbour whether he'd like to administer the lash himself, which it turns out he very much would!

"Er, whereabouts should I do it?" he asks, tentatively.

"Oh, anywhere at all. Wherever would give you the greatest satisfaction," is the other fellow's reply, so the old chap adjusts his position a few times, plainly unused to administering discipline in this way, before whipping the girl's left heel and instep, which are held just above the floor by the straps round her ankles.

The effect is even greater than from the previous two blows, so that their recipient is barely able to thank her new chastiser, thrashing helplessly in her bonds whilst her father promises to send Siobhan round to the neighbour's house to tip him as soon as she's recovered from her assessment, then takes the crop back to the cabinet and selects another whip.

So it continues, with each lash being used for two or three strokes and then being replaced. The girl's mother is the next to give the reasons for her punishment and she has an extraordinarily long list of past transgressions, some dating back to when her suffering offspring was just a toddler. You quickly work out that the star of the show is being disciplined for all the misdeeds she performed before reaching spanking age.

About ten or fifteen minutes later, the whip cabinet is expended and the father retreats to the back of the room, along with the neighbour and a couple of other men. After a short discussion, he takes one of the lashes from the cabinet and closes the doors, then makes an announcement.

"We have selected the forty-two inch double braided lash," he intones, holding up the item is question. From his daughter's near hysterical response, it seems their choice is not very popular with her, which causes a ripple of mirth from the other onlookers. He hooks the fearsome whip on the front of the cabinet doors and then continues: "We're going to take a short break now, while Siobhan's mother puts some lotion on her weals, then we'll get started on the cane testing. There are some refreshments in the kitchen if anyone wants to stretch their legs." He points to another set of doors in the left hand wall and you, along with most of the others, rise and make your way over.

As you leave, you hear Mrs. O'Kelly say "Siobhan, take a deep breath because this is going to sting a lot, but it's going to help keep your skin intact for the next round," then her daughter's screams redouble in intensity.

In the kitchen are tea and coffee urns (just instant coffee), along with several platters of party food, but you make do with chilled water. The conversation revolves around what implement will finally be chosen for Siobhan to carry round with her, most people favouring some sort of cane, like her older sister and their mother before them. You gather that each family of implements will be tested to find the one that is the most effective and then these group winners will have one final comparison to pick the overall champion.

You're about to return to the auditorium, when you notice a collection of birthday cards on a side table and stop to take a look. Most say something along the lines of "Happy 18th Birthday" and are decorated with spanking-related images, often illustrations of young women in various states of deshabille, bottoms reddened by stern-looking older men. Some of the cards are designed to be humorous, with references to how much tidier girls keep their bedrooms after they turn eighteen or jokes about getting a present they really don't want to receive.

One large card is from her classmates at school. On the front is a cartoon-like drawing of a girl in a white underbust corset and stockings, kneeling with her ridiculously oversized torpedo-shaped breasts sticking out, red nipples erect, pointing at the schoolteacher standing in front of her, wielding a cane. A speech bubble from the girl reads:

"Cane my gluteus maximus? I don't know about gluteus, but these are definitely maximus, sir!"

It's not a very good joke and you didn't think the redhead in the other room had particularly big boobs, but it's the thought that counts. Opening the card, you find that it's been signed by dozens of names, some of whom have added personal messages. Most are supportive—Good luck with the Assessment, Hope you get a nice implement and so on—but there are a couple of meaner notes, such as You deserve to be whipped raw and I hope you earn hundreds of extras! You return the card to the table and go back into the main room, just as several of the spectators are thanking the parents for the show and saying they're leaving to fetch younger children from school. Some of them promise to be back for the finale because they have friends who've agreed to watch their kids whilst they're out and the rest just wish them all the best.

You could stay to watch, but it occurs to you that eighteen year old schoolgirls finish school at the same time as the other pupils and now might be a good chance to find a pretty young girl in need of discipline that you can administer yourself, instead of being relegated to the status of spectator.