I kind of like lying. There's something about stringing some sucker along, knowing that your are fucking with him the whole time, that is pretty damn awesome.

Christ knows, Dad never cared about us lying; in fact he encouraged it, "Learn to lie like you fuckin' mean it boys. You never can tell when you are gonna have to hide the body in the trunk if you get pulled over for a busted tail light." He'd chuckle then but I'm pretty sure he meant it. Hell, I am sure he meant it. The body wouldn't be human of course, but a body is a body is a body and civvies just plain don't have a clue about the shit we hunt. So yeah, lying in our job? It was a skill set that the my dad wanted us to have.

Apparently though, that didn't include lying to him.

Found that out one night when the old man caught me climbing in the second story window of our rented house. Now any kid will tell ya that kind of shit just makes you fucking lie. Which is dumb because there ain't no real good reason to come climbing in your window at oh two hundred. There just isn't - so lying is as much reflex as anything.

"I uh, just uh…" I had stammered and damn if all that shit about lying like you mean it – went out the window when I was faced with Mad Dad. Dude wrote the book on intimidation.

"Just checking on the salt lines." I said with as much confidence as I could muster. I knew even as I said it wasn't even a plausible lie, but like I said my dad's look alone could scare grown men and I was just a dumb ass kid.

"Outside the house?" He had growled.

I gulped then because true, I could have run salt around the whole fucking house but that wasn't how we laid salt lines. Even my little brother knew that. And there was no way I needed to scale the damn roof to do it.

It was a shitty rental house but it had a front door.

The killer is, if I'd just told him I'd been making out with Suzie O'Dea he probably would have given me a lecture, maybe grounded me or something, I don't know but I had to fucking lie.

And it was a piss poor lie at that.

He was all over me like white on rice.

Dude…my old man could whip some ass. I'm not even joking. He'd pull that fucking belt off like it didn't even have a damn buckle! Like some one armed ass-beating ninja.

And you could never get away from him. He'd grab your arm and be walloping you before you even realized what was going down! Then again, that wasn't really true because my dad was always pretty clear about what was an ass beating offense. The man just didn't start pounding on you for no apparent reason. It wasn't like I wasn't aware.

But when he did decide you were gonna get your ass beat; well it was going to be memorable.

That night was memorable.

I remember feeling like maybe I was too old to get my butt tanned but he proved me wrong. Smacked the hell out of me that night, right over my jeans. Which I guess I should have been happy about – at least he didn't wallop me bare assed. But I didn't feel happy at the time though – I felt like my ass was on fire!

I don't know how long he spanked me but it seemed like an eternity. Ass kickings from my dad always felt like that. Truth be told, they were never really all that long although they were sure as hell intense.

When he got finished he just shook me a bit like terrier with a rat, I fuckin' felt my teeth clatter with motion. Then he threaded that damn belt back in his jeans with deliberate slowness, like he was making a statement that I better damn well listen to.

Believe me I was listening.

"You gonna lie again to me, boy?"

"No, sir." I'd managed to say it without too much whimpering but it was a close thing.

"Doesn't take all that much to ask permission to go out." He'd said a little softer, "Or hell, at least tell me what you are doing before you do it."

I'd nodded then because I just plain couldn't think of anything else to say.

"But no matter what, you better damn not lie to my fucking face again."

That was a little rougher.

"Yes, sir." I agreed.

Then he'd kind of shocked me because he dropped his arm around my shoulder, I can't say I flinched but I remember thinking, hope to hell this ain't round two. Instead he hugged me tight, the kind of one arm hug my dad was prone to do sometimes.

"I don't like licking you but I'm sure not gonna let you get away with lying, son. Next time just tell me you were with a girl okay?"

Well, crap.

End.