It was so unfair! It didn’t matter what Winona did, it could never be right. And she tried so hard. But whatever she did was judged to be wrong. Her parents thought so. Her teachers thought so. Her headmistress thought so. Her fellow school pupils all agreed. And her bum always had to suffer as a result.

It was a rare day that Winona didn’t get a spanking. And usually not just a spanking, but also a caning or a paddling. And every night when she went to bed, her arse was red, often raw and on occasion striped by welts from the teachers’ or the headmistress’ cane. It was rare that Winona could sleep comfortably on her back. And usually there was a further spanking, usually with a hair-brush, administered before going to bed, after her mother had inspected the proof etched on her arse of her naughtiness, tardiness, slovenliness, inattentiveness and inability to gain good grades,. And sometimes on occasion, her mother would slide a brush handle into Winona’s anus to encourage her to further reflect on the error of her ways.

Of course, Winona was far from the only girl at school to be treated so sternly. Discipline was taken very seriously at St. Charity’s Church School for Girls. From the moment of coming to school in the morning, where a girl might be disciplined for late arrival, to the time of departure, a pupil could expect chastisement for the infringement of any one of the many codes of conduct enforced by the school. This was a school where standards of good behaviour were set at a very high level. The most likely cause for punishment was to contravene the school’s strict dress code. The skirt had to be the right length: not too short and not too long. The hair had to be regulation length and plaited in the required style. There was no licence for colourful ribbons, short socks, gaudy buckles, immodesty, scruffiness or bad posture. Punctuality was rigorously enforced. Poor performance was also sufficient cause for punishment. And woe betide a girl who chatted in class, showed insufficient respect to teachers and other staff, who behaved during school hours in a way that reflected poorly on the school’s reputation, or contravened any of the more important school regulations for which a dozen of the best was quite simply not good enough.

Punishment, however dealt, was administered publicly and harshly according to the degree of severity. And every day those reprobates whose behaviour most warranted it—generally the three or four whose sins were deemed most worthy of punishment—received additional public chastisement from the headmistress’ cane at assembly in front of the entire school. And to protect the school uniforms, especially the knickers, it was mandatory that the punishment was administered on the pupil’s bare bottom which would bear witness of any other punishment received earlier that week or during the weekend.

It was impossible for a schoolgirl to conceal the evidence of her punishment. During the calling of the register, each girl was required to turn her back to the wall with the dress hitched up and the knickers pulled down. And when her name was called out, the girl would not only acknowledge her name when called by the teacher but give an account of the punishments she’d received since last time she’d answered the register. The teacher could easily determine from the redness, rawness and the number of raised welts across the buttocks whether the pupil was telling the truth. Frequently the teacher would add a couple of extra slaps of her own to the bums of those pupils who’d shown themselves deserving of punishment, which would cause especial pain for those who’d already suffered the most.

This was how Winona could be sure that the pain and humiliation she suffered at school and at home was shared by almost all the other girls in her class and, given that there was nothing exceptional about her class, by all pupils at St. Charity’s. It might perhaps be true that Winona had more welts and bruises than most other girls and it wasn’t simply because she had more tender skin. She was so careless in her appearance, so often late to class, so often tempted by small acts of mischief and, worst of all, plainly not one of the most academically gifted in her class. But there were other girls whose arses betrayed that they’d also been subject to treatment just as severe, just as there were some girls who miraculously managed to escape any punishment at all. These star pupils excelled at sport, shone at study, were prim and proper in their appearance, were never tempted to misbehave in any way, and were never less than punctual. And of all these pupils the one who excelled the most was Chrysanthemum White.

She was a pupil who every morning when she tugged down her knickers and pulled up her skirt revealed a bottom wholly untarnished by punishment. Chrysanthemum’s bum was white, perfectly formed, unscarred and unblemished. In short, it was the envy of every other girl, especially the ones who knew only too well the perpetual discomfort of trying to sit on the hard wooden seats with a bum that never had time to heal from one spanking or caning to the next.

Just what was the secret of Chrysanthemum’s success? How did she manage to navigate each day’s worth of possible rule infringements that tripped up the more unwary such as Winona?

Of course, those who most often caught the attention of the teachers most assiduously seeking out a pupil to admonish and thereby maintain a deserved reputation for uncompromising strictness were most likely to be those girls for which there was prior form. And in this regard, Winona was a pupil with a long and persistent record for misconduct and misbehaviour, whereas Chrysanthemum had no such history of any kind whatsoever.

It was on a Thursday and after a particularly punishing Wednesday that Winona was once again summoned up onto the school stage to be one of those the headmistress had chosen to make an example of. Her name was announced by the Senior Prefect for Form 6A for having repeatedly and without sufficient remorse offended against several approved rules of good conduct.

“It is inconceivable,” Jenny Carruthers said portentously, “that Winona Churchill should ever set a good example to others unless her bad behaviour is firmly addressed.”

Winona had dreaded this for so long. It had been several weeks now since her last public chastisement at assembly in front of the entire school. And it was so unfair! She’d been late for school on the Wednesday as a result of a caning on the Tuesday. She’d got little sleep as a result of the stinging pain across her buttocks that her father had made no better by the additional vigorous application of his slipper. And the rest of the day got no better. After a brisk spanking by Miss Vangotha for lateness, she received another during bottom inspection for allowing a sock to slip down to her ankle. She was assured that this spanking which left her bottom red, hot and stinging was administered for her own good. Mrs Pitcher insisted that in some mysterious way the punishment that continued for nearly ten minutes hurt her more than it hurt Winona; which seemed entirely unlikely. It wasn’t Mrs Pitcher’s bum that was now blushing red and radiating enough heat to poach an egg,

Winona’s misery mounted as Wednesday continued. She was caned by the Deputy Headmistress for being in the corridor when she should have been in class: a crime that earned her the standard dozen of the best (made a baker’s dozen by Winona’s neglect to say “Thank you” between the tenth and eleventh stroke). This sin was the result of her spending longer than she should have in the lavatory following her earlier spanking. Then Winona earned a brisk two-minute spanking from Mrs Balham for restlessness in class as she wriggled around on her seat to avoid putting pressure on her swelling welts. There was also a very peremptory half-dozen strokes of the cane that Miss Smith administered in Physical Education for Winona’s slowness and lack of attention.

And finally, when it seemed that no more punishment could be possible, Winona was dealt another dozen strokes of the cane on her injured buttocks by the headmistress for having gained less than 60% on the weekly Latin comprehension test along with five other similarly challenged students.

“I do hope this is the last lesson you will need to learn on this matter,” said the headmistress on that occasion, although as became apparent the following day this was quite clearly not going to be the case.

It didn’t come as a total shock to Winona for her to be singled out for punishment at the school assembly, even though she’d made every effort to ensure that she didn’t arrive late that morning. In fact she’d arrived some fifteen minutes early. And this was despite a very severe beating from her mother the night before in which the over-used hair-brush broke and a new one had to be found to continue the beating.

“It doesn’t surprise me at all to see you in this position once again,” said the headmistress to Winona as she roughly tugged her knickers down, hoisted her skirt up and stood her in front of the trestle that had been set up on the school stage. “You will say ‘Thank you Miss’ after each of the next dozen strokes of my cane. If at any time you neglect to do so, I shall commence again from the beginning. Do you understand me, Miss Churchill?”

“Yes, Miss,” said Winona not sufficiently audibly.

“Excuse me, Miss Churchill. What did you say?”

“Yes, Miss,” said Winona somewhat louder and bolder.

“And do you understand why you must be punished?”

“Yes Miss.”

“Tell the assembly the reasons, Miss Churchill. And please speak loudly.”

Winona turned around to look at the other pupils ahead of her: hundreds of school-girls who felt both sympathy for her plight and fear that they might find themselves in the same situation. Her skirt at the front covered her crotch though from behind it was hiked up and her welted black and blue arse faced the headmistress and the senior staff behind. In a line beside her were three other girls also waiting to be punished: their hands clasped behind their necks, skirts up, knickers half-way between the knees and thighs, and bare arses on display.

“I have been late to school. I have been careless in my appearance. I was lax at P. E. I should have been more attentive to my teachers.”

“And…?” said the headmistress.

“Yes Miss?” Winona asked.

“Your Latin marks,” the headmistress reminded her.

“I failed to achieve the required marks in Latin Comprehension.”

“Very good, Miss Churchill,” said the headmistress. “Please assume the position.”

“Yes, Miss,” said Winona obediently as she bent over the trestle, her arse in all its bruised ugliness on full display to all the other pupils.

“I hope you will learn by this lesson never to misbehave again,” said the headmistress as she lovingly stroked Winona’s battered bottom.

And then followed stroke after stroke for an unbearable twenty-five strokes in all brought about by Winona neglecting to say ‘Thank you’ between the tenth and eleventh strokes in the first administration and between the fourth and fifth strokes in the second. When it had at last come to an end, she said a final “Thank you” to the headmistress and presented the cane to the next reprobate pupil. She returned to her place at the back of the school stage and silently sobbed as waves of pain from her ravaged arse pulsed through her body. She knew from experience that these welts would last for many more days and that there would be a distinct imprint in her flesh that would ensure that this most certainly would be something that she’d remember for a very long time.

“If only you girls would learn your lesson then this wouldn’t be necessary,” said the headmistress in a manner that suggested she truly regretted having to administer such strict correction. Winona wasn’t so sure about this. It often seemed to her that the headmistress, like so many other teachers, took rather more pleasure than was strictly necessary from dealing out such chastisement. And she wondered (as she so often did) whether the punishment wasn’t several times more severe than the supposed crime.

And as always, Winona envied most those girls like Chrysanthemum whose bottoms remained forever spotless.

And it was later that day in column with the rest of her class that she marched together silently side-by-side with Chrysanthemum on the way to the school playing fields for a game of hockey, each girl dressed identically and carrying a hockey stick. Just as they were very nearly through the padlocked gate, the teacher, Miss Jacobson, who was known for being somewhat scatty, stopped in her tracks and appeared quite distressed.

“My goodness!” she said in alarm. “I’ve forgotten the key to the playing field.” She addressed the Senior Prefect. “Please keep the girls in order, Miss Carruthers, while I return to school to fetch the keys.”

“Excuse me, Miss,” asked Amanda, who was Miss Jacobson’s favourite pupil. “Are we allowed to talk to one another in your absence?”

“Talk to each other?” wondered a flustered Miss Jacobson, who was no doubt concerned whether her forgetfulness might earn her a fine from the headmistress (usually administered as a voluntary donation to a charity). “I don’t see why not. But only to the girl standing next to you and only in whispers. We don’t want the general public to hear you gossiping.”

And with that, Miss Jacobson rushed off, while Jenny Carruthers, as was her character, ensured that any conversation between the waiting girls was no louder than a whisper despite there being no member of the general public anywhere in sight.

“So, Winona, how are you feeling after your punishment?” Chrysanthemum asked in a kindly solicitous voice. “I hope it’s doesn’t hurt too much.”

Winona was startled to be addressed. She and Chrysanthemum had never spoken before. “It stings but it’ll get better,” she said, speaking with the wisdom of experience.

“It must be terrible for you to be caned so often,” said Chrysanthemum.

“It hurts so much!” Winona admitted.

“Do you always cry when you’re beaten?”

“I try not to, but I can’t help it. Especially when my bottom is already sore.”

“I feel so sorry for you,” said Chrysanthemum.

Winona snivelled. “I wish I were like you,” she confessed.

Chrysanthemum seemed quite startled. “Why do you say that?”

“You never get punished.”

“That’s because I don’t break any of the rules.”

“And your bottom is never spanked, caned or paddled,” said Winona. “I wish mine was as pure and welt-free. You bum isn’t even blush red like you get from a spanking.”

“My parents have never spanked me,” said Chrysanthemum. “I suppose they’ve never had cause to.”

“I wish I had a bottom like yours.”

“You are fascinated by bottoms,” remarked Chrysanthemum with a strange smile on her face.

Winona nodded. Although it had never crossed her mind before, Chrysanthemum was right. But who wouldn’t be when her bottom had been spanked and beaten so many times. It wasn’t her fault that her life had become so much bottom-fixated.

“Would you like to see my bottom?” asked Chrysanthemum.

This was a strange remark, but perhaps not so peculiar given that after a caning or a spanking, Winona had often compared bottoms with other girls who’d been punished. And the bottoms she’d sniffed, stroked and kissed were black and blue, sometimes red and welted, with signs of earlier beating being overlaid by the fresh scars of more recent punishment. It was comforting in a way to be able to compare her own bottom with those of her fellows. It made her feel that she was part of a community who shared equally in the injustice of an overly strict regime of corporal punishment where the only licence seemed to be in the teachers’ imagination in identifying instances of misconduct.

But she had never seen close before a bottom as pristinely pure as Chrysanthemum’s, so without really thinking Winona nodded her head again.

“Tomorrow lunchtime at a quarter to one in the girls’ toilets on the top floor of Block 25,” said Chrysanthemum as if this were the most natural thing in the world. “Don’t be late.”

And after that Chrysanthemum turned her face away from Winona’s and looked straight ahead, while Miss Jacobson scurried back from the school with the key to the playing field padlock.

Winona wondered all afternoon and the following morning about what this rendezvous in the toilets with Chrysanthemum might mean. What she hoped above all was that Chrysanthemum was in a curious way reaching out to her. It was Winona’s opportunity to make friends with a girl who never got punished. And she hoped that by doing so, she might in some way learn those habits by which she could avoid being spanked or caned. Perhaps she would even learn how to study more productively and assiduously. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if she too could average 90% in Latin Comprehension? Wouldn’t it make her parents proud of her if her school report was speckled with the letters A and A+, rather than C, C+ and D? Then no more hair-brush spanking. No more visits to the headmistress’ study. No more caning in front of the entire school assembly.

And after a while, her bottom would lose that disfigured, blotchy appearance that made her feel so mortified during the daily bottom inspection and she would have a bottom as smooth and pretty as Chrysanthemum’s. But so distracted was she by thoughts of her rendezvous with the star pupil that she earned three slaps on the palm of each hand during Poetry Appreciation and six slaps on the bottom from Sister Wendy during Religious Studies. But at least that was better than two dozen strokes of the cane in front of the whole school.

And so, despite her unarticulated reservations about keeping the appointment and inculcated into punctuality as all pupils at St Chastity’s were, Winona arrived at exactly 12:45 at the girls’ toilets that Chrysanthemum had specified. She gingerly pushed open the door to see whether there was any other girl there. It was unlikely, of course. Chrysanthemum had chosen the toilets well. Even though they were open to all girls, they were only ever used by those who ever had a need to be on the top floor of Block 25 which was mostly reserved for unpopular subjects like Mechanics and Geometry.

“Hello!” said Winona nervously. “Is there anyone here?”

“Are you by yourself?” Chrysanthemum asked. She was inside one of the toilet cubicles to which there was of course no door as such privacy only encouraged sinful habits and naughtiness.

“Yes,” said Winona as she strode over to the cubicle.

Chrysanthemum was sitting on the toilet seat in a prim and proper manner with her hands clasped over the lap of her skirt.

“So you want to see my bottom,” she said in a matter-of-fact way.

“Erm…” said Winona for which this was by no means the only reason she wanted to meet Chrysanthemum. In fact it was the least of her reasons. What she most wanted was to become more closely acquainted with her fellow pupil. She’d already fantasised about being able to visit Chrysanthemum at home and to meet her mother and father. Wouldn’t it be something to meet parents who didn’t regularly spank their daughter? And perhaps, if all went well, she and Chrysanthemum could study together and perhaps even be privileged a sleep-over. And her ambition was that soon she would be one of those girls whose backside was a good example to all during the regular morning bottom inspection.

“Well, here it is,” said Chrysanthemum, as she stood up, turned around, hitched up her skirt and pulled down her knickers.

And what a bottom it was too. White, pale, unmarked, firm and tempting.

“Do you want to kiss it?” asked Chrysanthemum.

“Can I?”

“It’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Winona hesitantly, still not really believing in what was happening.

She knelt down behind Chrysanthemum in the cubicle with the pristine bottom in front of her. It smelt just as pure and unsullied as it appeared to be. There was a small wobble in the buttocks that was delicious to her eyes and so tempting for her lips. So very different from the bottoms she’d seen before at such close quarters. And even if her friends’ bottoms hadn’t been the victim of so much maltreatment, they would never have had the perfect proportions of Chrysanthemum’s bum.

Winona put her nose to the proffered cheeks and skimmed it over the barely visible hairs of the cheeks and between them. And this being what was so clearly expected of her, she tenderly pressed her lips to first one and then the other cheek.

“Your bottom is so beautiful!” Winona exclaimed.

“Which won’t be the case with yours, young lady,” said the stern voice behind her of the deputy headmistress.

Winona stood up abruptly, while Chrysanthemum in no hurry and with no sign of alarm pulled up her knickers and smoothed down her skirt.

“Miss,” said Winona automatically.

“I was told that you were misbehaving in this disgusting manner, Miss Churchill,” said the deputy headmistress. “And now thanks to Miss White, we know for sure. I hope this shameless show of depravity has not harmed you in any way, Miss White?”

“It has been a very painful experience for me,” Chrysanthemum admitted.

“Not as painful as it will be for Miss Churchill here,” said the deputy headmistress as she grabbed Winona by the ear to drag her to the headmistress’ study.

And as a weeping, humiliated Winona was pulled along, suffering the jeers of her fellow pupils, she knew for sure that for as long as she remained a pupil at St Charity’s she would never have a bottom as pure, pristine and pretty as did Chrysanthemum.