Luc noticed his father's demeanor change and his own shoulders relaxed. Luc rolled onto his side propping his head up with his hand. His elbow resting on the pillow Luc had to scrunch up to find a comfortable place.
Tim waited until his child had stopped moving and was paying attention to him.
"Once upon a time" Tim began before being interrupted with Luc's frustrated "Daaaaaad". "What?" Tim smiled before continuing.
"Ok… So I had been away at MIT for my first semester and the only reason I had come home was for Christmas break. Having had several months of living on my own, making decisions about where, what, when and how I was going to do things I wasn't really prepared to have to ask to permission for anything."
Luc nodded his head in understanding.
"I had made plans to meet some of my class mates over the holidays. I told my father about the plans not to request his blessing but simply to let him know why I wouldn't be home later that night. When he told me I wasn't allowed to go I scoffed pretty loudly and stormed off to my room. Now you have to remember Luc that I was only 16 at the time. It had taken me some time to build my social network at school as most of them were 19 or older. I wasn't about to call them up and tell them I couldn't go out for the night because my dad said no."
Luc clenched his teeth and sucked in air. He completely understood how his "teenage" father was feeling but he had also met the admiral and he wasn't a man that would take kindly to his own son going against his orders. "Oh dad that's nasty" Luc said before Tim continued.
"Ya… I thought so too…problem was I never asked why he said no…." Tim raised his eyebrows in such a way that Luc understood that there was more to the story.
"So my father went out later that afternoon and that is when I decided that I needn't heed his instructions. I had lived on my own for almost 5 months and had no interest in being told what to do. Therefore I packed my overnight bag and left."
Again Luc sucked in air through gritted teeth. He could see the error of another person's ways much easier than his own and sympathized with teen in the story.
Tim just nodded to his son. Happy that his son was engaged enough in the story to maybe take away something from it. Continuing his story he explained "I went to a friend's place for the afternoon and that night we went out as we had planned. We crashed at one of the guy's places after having been out for the night." Tim was hoping to just skip over the particular details of where they were as he didn't want to give his kid any ideas that spending the night out at clubs at 16 would be acceptable. However Luc asked where they'd been and why he hadn't just gone home.
"We had gone out to a couple of the clubs in town that weren't particularly careful about looking at ID's and I didn't want to go home having been out drinking. I didn't go out and get drunk or anything just hang out but I was pretty sure the admiral wouldn't approve. " Tim smiled when Luc answered "Ya think?"
"During the entire evening and next morning I never thought of home, my father or anything but myself and my friends. I was an adult in my mind. I was making responsible decisions, like not drinking and driving, having one or two drinks and nothing more. Yet I never thought about the why, why he'd said I couldn't go out."
"When did you find out why he didn't want you to go?" Luc asked skipping ahead in the story needing to know, the suspense too much.
"After sleeping in and taking my sweet time to get ready and return home" Tim explained.
Luc squeezed his eyes tight together and pulled his shoulders up to his ears feeling the stress that the younger version of his father was about to walk into. Luc would have hated to be in his father's shoes in that moment. He knew how the situation would go if it were him and he also knew that the admiral had a reputation that would make his own dad seem like a playful puppy even when angry.
Tim ruffled Luc's hair and smirked before continuing "I walked into the house through the back door and found Penny standing at the sink. I was so happy to see her I rushed over and gave her a big bear hug. But when I put her back down the look on her face wasn't what I was expecting. I thought she'd return the joyful sentiment. Instead she asked 'Timothy what were you thinking?' sounding very disappointed".
"Penny would have been worried about you dad" Luc explained as if Tim hadn't been able to figure that out. "I would be worried about you too, that is if I didn't know you had lived through it…. 'cause otherwise I would have believed that grandpa would have killed you". Tim let himself laugh before he asked "Can I keep going? Or do you want to go and eat supper now?"
"No … finish … sorry" Luc answered his free hand making circular motion as if encourage his father to continue.
"I assume it was that he heard my voice that brought him to the kitchen. He stood in the doorway looking very big and very angry." Tim sat up straighter and used his own hands to show the size his imagination had remembered his father to look like. "His voice was like steel and very very quiet" Tim whispered and Luc shuddered involuntarily. " 'Room. Now.' was all he said. I stood in the kitchen frozen, having finally realized that there were consequences to making the decision I had. Penny had to gently push me in the right direction to get me moving. I ran past him and into my room. Once I got there something happened. I snapped! I started to think 'why should he be mad at me?' and other such things. By the time he stormed through my bedroom door I was in such a mood. Angry that he was upset about me making my own choices. Angry that he thought he could boss me around. Angry that he thought he could punish me for something he had no right to ask me not to do in the first place."
"Bad idea Dad… bad idea man…. I don't think it's a good idea to be mad at the admiral… or at least tell him that…"Luc added.
"Well not only did I get mad …. I told him so…. and I wasn't exactly polite…he just stood there listening for a few seconds before he stepped forward and smacked my ass so hard I choked on my next word… I'd been spanked before… but never that hard… I had to stop myself from crying… how was I supposed to prove I was grown up to make my own decisions if I was crying like a baby with one swat?" Tim paused long enough to let Luc take a breath as he had been holding it and was turning a funny colour.
"Then in his calm but definitely furious voice he explained that he was beyond disappointed in me. He explained that he had arranged for an early Christmas dinner out at a restaurant with extended family and friends. Due to the other people's responsibilities it was the only time that we could all get together. I deflated only slightly as I felt that if the event had been so important than he should have told me. I told him as much as well." Luc covered his face with his hand and shook his head whispering "Dad… Dad… Dad… bad idea…bad idea.."
"The thing was, as I stood there I somehow forgot that he was more than willing to make his point on my backside. I was 16. I was in university. I was man. He couldn't punish me…not like that… I was too old for a spanking… or so I thought."
Luc's cheeks blushed slightly and his eyes dropped to the pattern on the sheets while Tim finished his story.
Tim then explained how the admiral then made very clear that when he told his son to do something he expected Tim to follow through. Although Tim felt slightly embarrassed, describing how his father had removed his belt, instructed him to bend over the desk and then administered the most memorable of whippings in his life, he still did it. He wanted Luc to comprehend that even as an adult he remembered what it was like to be a teen. To feel something so strongly and then have your beliefs turned upside down. He told Luc that he could still remember how much that licking hurt but that it actually took him longer to get over the fact he wasn't too old for a spanking then the sting of the belt.
Luc couldn't look at his father's face through the ending of the story, he was too uncomfortable. When Tim had been quiet for a while and Luc hadn't said anything in response he patted him gently on the arm and jovially announced "We had better get down to supper before your mother feeds it to the birds in the backyard!" Smiling both Luc and Tim descended the stairs to eat supper with the rest of the family.
Luc missed the shared non verbal exchange his parents had across the table. He was too busy filling his plate with food to notice. He was back to his usual self with a smile and a laugh. Feeling understood was so important almost nothing else mattered.