Once upon a time, in a land not so far away....

.....there was a green young girl of 17. This innocent young thing went along with her beau to the 18th birthday of a friend. At the party, the couple did party things like sipping tea and eating cucumber and watercress sandwiches, and discussing the weather. Things proceeded as they usually did at such events, with the girl getting bored of talking about Metallica with her beau and his friends, so she wanders off to mingle.

Now the birthday girl of this party was known for being wild and having somewhat out of the ordinary interests. Our protagonist knew of this, and was intrigued by it- her present to the birthday girl had been a book of somewhat risque literature-our protagonist having some specialised knowledge of such things.

In addition to the literature and many other gifts, the birthday girl was given something that was rather a hit at the party- a lovely black leather riding crop.

Now, you may be surprised to learn that the birthday girl was not fond of horses, and that in fact the crop was intended for rather a different kind of riding.

At the time our protagonist began to mingle, this implement was being wielded by a certain young man; rather expertly in fact, on the backsides of other party guests.

Our protagonist lingers at the edges of proceedings until the young man in question notices her.

"Your turn?" He asks, holding out his hand. Our protagonist flushes, embarrassed but intrigued and emboldened by Malibu mixers, so she nods and steps forward.

He leads her out of the crowd and directs her to bend over. She does, and feels his hand warm and firm on her back, leaning her further foward. She giggles nervously and nods as he asks her if she's ready.

She bites her lip and trembles as the first of the warm up strokes falls on her jeans. She hears the crowd giggle and murmur, but keeps looking shyly at the floor.

She jumps with a start as a small spot of burning pain blossoms on her skin- and a nanosecond after her brain manages to process the whooshing sound of the crop slicing through the air.

More spots blossom, and she shivers, pain and the watching audience setting her primal reptilian brain on fire. A few more strokes and it's over- the moment has passed, and she smiles and stands, chatting briefly with her punisher and the audience before going back to her friends, her boyfriend, and her life.

******

Well, motherfuckers, guess who that riding crop wielding young man was? Yep, you guessed it, Gray!

That incident started a huge shit-fight with my boyfriend of the time (my first, actually) as he wasn't so impressed with the whole 'letting strange boys spank me with a riding crop while he was outside' thing. Unfortunately, loveable as he was he was terribly vanilla in the bedroom, so he was a little threatened by the whole situation.

Anyway, I had forgotten this little incident. (Oh, obviously, our protagonist = me.) However, Gray and I have some people in common- we discovered in one of our early conversations that he went to the same highschool as my first boyfriend and a girlfriend of mine, in the year above them, so that caused a nice 'Aww, isn't Brisbane a small place!' moment. In conversation he mentioned a friend of his, and I said "Oh, Friend, I know her, I went to her 18th." Gray looks at me and says "Hey, me too!" and I think, how odd, we were at the same party once and I don't even recall. There were plenty of people there so I guess it's not that odd. We chatted on about inconsequential things for a bit, as you do, and then he pauses, and looks at me.

"Were you a lot blonder then than you are now?" I nod and grin and say yes.

"Were you wearing blue jeans at the party?"

"I don't know. More than likely, they were my uniform back then."

Gray's face lights up, he grins and I can see the memory rushing into the front of his mind.

"I spanked you with a riding crop at that party!"

(At this point my brain implodes in an Amelie style moment of electrical signals whizzing between synapses as everything in the whole world seems weirdly connected.)

"Oh my lord, I so remember!" I freak out. We discuss, giggly and flushed, (mostly me) and pleased. What do you call that? Serendipity? Luck? Freakish coincidence?

I liked it, anyway. And the longer I go for the more I remember- the feel of his hand on my back, more importantly, the lovely dark things that stirred in my mind as he bent me over. What a lovely auspicious start to our interactions.

*grin*

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