Jim eyed his wife thinking, “My eternal Little Girl, my joy, and yes, sometimes my complete frustration.”

Tears welled up in Julie’s eyes while she watched her husband fold his leather belt in half. Dropping her purse into the puddle on the floor she did not dare to look him in the eye. Her fists, tiny like the rest of her, bent out from her waist as though pushing her embarrassment into a box. She knew what came next and shuddered at the memory of the last reminder for her disobedience. “But I wasn’t really disobedient, was I? Not if it was an accident!”

“Don’t keep me waiting, Julie.” Jim’s voice pierced Julie’s terror. His belt tapped softly into his left hand.

“Yes, Daddy.” Complete contrition. She pulled her sweater over her head and dropped it on the floor. The sweater was followed by her skirt. When she dropped her bra on the floor her nipples were already hard nubs on the tiny mounds of her breasts. She pushed her panties and tights down her hips, past her knees then let the wet fabric crumple around her ankles. A small, short struggle between her feet and the sopping undergarments ended when she stood triumphantly between her clothes and her husband, the man she called Daddy.

Jim smiled only in his mind. By now he was gently slapping his belt against his right thigh.

“I … I am so sorry, Daddy,” Julie whimpered. “It really was an accident.” Her brown eyes seemed to sparkle with the tears that kept threatening to overflow.

“I know, baby girl,” Jim said motioning her forward, “and you know the rules.”

Julie moved timidly towards Jim, afraid but also excited. There was something about her husband’s disciplinary methods that made her want to run away and, at the same time, cling to him, even beg for it.

She stopped when she was within that circle of personal space that made most people uncomfortable, even with intimate friends. Any other time she might have been permitted to touch him, but never when discipline was imminent. He called it discipline, but Julie named it what it was, punishment. Looking straight ahead she focused on the fourth button down from Jim’s shirt’s open collar.

They stood so for a full minute, then another. This she hated, the waiting, the silence broken only by the short in and out rushes of air from their lungs. As always, despite ever-longer waits, surrender came.

“Please, Daddy, punish me.” She raised her head and tried to look him straight in his black eyes.

“Punish you for what, little angel?” Jim gently laid his left palm against her cheek covering the entire side of her face.

Julie froze. She could not move; she could not think. “What did Daddy say? Think, Julie, think!”

Her mind reengaged, but at a speed she had never felt before. Memories raced through her mind, images of being bound, spanked, tears, abject fear, complete bliss, and on and on. Her naked body could not keep up with the images and began to quake. “No, not for wetting myself or even peeing on the floor. What was it?”

Stalling, she looked at the clock on the wall, then back up at Daddy’s face. Was he angry? She could not tell. Her eyes darted to the clock again. “What’s so important about that damn clock?”

The clock!

“Oh, Daddy, I’m so so sorry! It was an accident, honestly.” Julie’s legs started to give out and she grabbed Daddy’s shirt to hold her upright.

Before she could bury her face in his white cotton shirt, Jim grasped Julie’s shoulders and pushed her back.

“Confess, baby girl.”

Julie inhaled, looked into Jim’s face, then whispered, “I was late, Daddy. I wasted your time by not coming home when I was supposed to.”

“That is what you said last time.” Jim kept his distance simply because he did not want to give in to his own feelings. Rules were rules, and when Julie violated one, she had to be disciplined, not coddled and cuddled.