BEXHILL SCHOOL FOR GIRLS, Assembly

By Tom Simple

Copyright 2012
Tom Simple

Smashwords
Edition

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For Carrie, who turns
fantasy into reality at

www.subcarrie.com

Preface

Chapter 1 Debbie

Chapter 2
Catharine

Chapter 3 The dinner
party

Chapter 4 Miss
Holloway

Chapter 5 Anna

Chapter 6 Sally + Linda =
Mischief

Chapter 7 The French
Connection

Afterword

The Bexhill
School for Girls was one of any number of private educational
establishments seeking pupils in the late 1950s. It had a
reputation for discipline and academic achievement which appealed
to the parents of more wayward girls and those youngsters who
didn’t appear to take their responsibilities as seriously as their
mother or father would like.

The Academic
Year starts in the autumn, so there would always be a flurry of
activity during the summer months when school reports arrived,
informing parents that their little darlings were not doing as well
as might be hoped at their present establishment. The search would
then begin for a sterner alternative. Sometimes this would lead to
Bexhill.

Thus, on a
certain day each September, a few score girls would assemble at the
redbrick edifice on the outskirts of town. The ‘old hands’ would
greet each other noisily; the new girls would look on
apprehensively. The staff would cast a calculating eye over their
charges, and a new term would be underway, with all the trials and
tribulations that these intertwining inhabitants would bring to
it.

Preparation, as
any teacher knows, is essential. Thus, before embarking on the
story of how the next year unfolds, it will be as well to become
familiar with some of those who will comprise the rich tapestry of
school life.

Debbie
sauntered down the oak staircase and into the elegant dining room.
It was ten o’clock. The remains of breakfast still cluttered the
polished mahogany table, although only one member of the family
still sat there. Pat, Debbie’s mother, occupied a ‘carver’ - a
chair with arms - at one end. She was a handsome woman whose looks
belied the imminent arrival of the ‘Big Four O’. She greeted her
daughter perfunctorily.

“Hello dear. I
wish you wouldn’t go around the house dressed like that.” Debbie
was wearing only a short, ‘Baby Doll’-style nightie. “Couldn’t you
put a dressing gown over the top?”

“Dressing gown?
Oh Mum, that’s so uncool!”

“And I don’t
like having your bare bottom on the seats of the chairs.”

“I’m not having
a period, if that’s what’s worrying you.”

“Well, what if
someone comes in and you’re only wearing that nightdress?”

“Then they can
feast their eyes, can’t they?” She wiggled her bottom
provocatively.

“Debbie, I’m
expecting a colleague. Please just go and make yourself
decent!”

Debbie ignored
her, went over the hotplate and opened one of the silver-topped
dishes. It contained a few scraps of congealed scrambled egg. The
other dish had evidently once held bacon.

“There’s
nothing left!” grumbled Debbie.

“Well it
is
ten o’clock. Your father and brother finished breakfast
almost two hours ago”.

“They might
have left something for me!”

“And you might
have got yourself out of bed a bit earlier and helped prepare
breakfast!”

“Oh come on,
Mum! You know Julian was taking me to Annabelle’s last night. I
didn’t get back until well after dawn.”

“I thought we
told you to be home by two?”

“Mum, for
Christ’s sake! I’m not a kid anymore!”

“You’ll still
do what you’re told while you’re living in our house.” Her tone
hardened.

“You’re so
old-fashioned! I’m not just a little schoolgirl any longer. I’m
virtually an adult now.”

Her mother
looked at her pouting daughter and then gently tapped an envelope
that lay open on the table in front of her.

“What’s that?”
asked Debbie, a note of uncertainty replacing the petulance.

“Last term’s
exam results - the mock GCEs.”

Oh shit. Debbie
paled and put down the piece of toast she had been raising to her
mouth.

“Are
they...OK?” The question was nervous.

“Not exactly.”
Her mother held her with an icy gaze. “Perhaps you’d like me to
read them to you?”

“If you
want.”

Pat pulled a
sheet of paper from the envelope. She carefully unfolded it and
smoothed it out on the table. Debbie’s mouth had gone dry.

“I think I’m
right in saying that grades one to six are passes, aren’t they?
Anything more than six is a failure in that subject?”

“Yes, Mum, I
think so.” She reached for her coffee cup, but she found her hand
was shaking so badly she put it back on the saucer with a
rattle.

“Very well.
Physics, seven. Chemistry, seven. Biology, seven. History, eight.
Geography, seven. English, six. Maths, five. Two passes - neither
distinguished - and five failures.”

Debbie looked
glumly down at her plate.

“You realise
what this means? If you don’t pull your socks up, no university, no
third level education of any sort at all. You’d be lucky to get a
job as a waitress or a salesgirl.”

“But I want to
go to uni. All my friends are doing so.”

“You should
have thought about that a few years ago, when we sent you St
Mary’s. This is where four years of fooling about and not studying
gets you.”

Suddenly, a
flash of the old defiance. “Anyway, it’s all your fault for sending
me to a stupid school like St Mary’s. The nuns are useless, they
can’t teach anything!”

Pat coloured
just slightly but maintained her calm. “I don’t think you’re right.
I called Sister Joanna at the school and told her we were very
disappointed with your results. I asked her how the other girls had
done. You were the only one to fail so many subjects. No-one else
dropped more than one paper, and the average for your class was a
grade 2. The Headmistress pointed out that your end-of-term reports
regularly mention a lack of effort.”

“Sister
Joanna’s a stupid bitch. All she does is blather on about religious
gobbledygook. She’s just so square. She needs to get real. Anyway,
you can pay for me to go to university! Offer them enough and I’m
sure they’ll be glad to grab your money and take me. Problem solved
- all you have to do is cough up!”

“We’re not
throwing good money after bad, and anyway that’s not how
universities work. You’ve been wasting your time at school and now
you’re well on the way to blowing your future. We’re really
disappointed in you!”

“’Did you say
‘we’? Does Dad know about this?”

“Yes he does,
and I imagine he’ll have a few things to say to you on the subject
when he gets home.”

“Why do you
always have to drag Dad into these things? Can’t you ever keep
anything to yourself, for God’s sake?”

Enough is
enough, even for an even-tempered person like Pat.

“That’s enough,
Debbie. I’m sick and tired of your attitude. You’re behaving like a
spoiled brat and I’m going to treat you like one. Go upstairs to
your room!”

Debbie gulped.
She knew she’d gone too far, that her temper and immaturity had got
the better of her, and that she was going to have to pay for it.
She’d been here before.

“Please, Mum.
I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

“Get upstairs!
Prepare yourself. I’ll be up in a minute.”

“Please, Mum,
can we just talk about this?”

“We can talk
afterwards. Now go to your room
immediately
!”

Debbie knew
there was no point in further argument. Indeed, when she’d tried
this line before it had resulted in an even worse outcome. She
stood up and slowly climbed the stairs. In her room, she smoothed
the sheets and blanket on her bed. Then she took her two pillows
and placed them in the centre of it, one on top of the other. She
kicked off her slippers and lay down with the pillows under her
hips. She reached back and eased the thin material of her nightie
up until she could feel the cool breeze from the window on her bare
bottom. She reached forward and gripped the end of the
mattress.

Back then,
political correctness hadn’t been invented, but heavy,
wooden-backed clothes brushes had. Pat fetched one from the closet
and climbed the stairs. To Debbie, her steps sounded like the
footfalls of doom. Pat came in and stood beside the bed. Debbie
glanced up at her mother and the brush in her right hand.

“I’m sorry...”
she pleaded.

“So am I. So is
your father. Your attitude leaves a very great deal to be desired,
young lady. Now, keep still until I tell you to get up.”

With that, she
laid the brush across the centre of Debbie’s pert, pink cheeks,
raised it high, and brought it down with a loud whack. Debbie
yelped. A rosy glow started to spread across her backside. Pat
raised the brush again.

The advantage
of being a doctor - a surgeon, actually, as Pat was - is that you
can judge better than a lay person just how much pain you are
causing and how much damage you are inflicting, unbiased by the
yells and cries of the person whose backside you are tanning. Thus,
Debbie’s mother gave the wriggling, squirming girl many more swats
than a lesser expert might have done. When she finally finished,
Debbie was sobbing and her entire bottom, from the top of the
cheeks to the join with her thighs, was puce.

“Right. I’ve
finished. Now stay in your room until lunchtime. And when your
father comes home, I think he may have something to say to
you.”

It wasn’t what
he might
say
that worried Debbie. What concerned her was
what he was likely to do with that awful, heavy leather strap.

Debbie stayed
in her room, intermittently massaging her aching cheeks, until she
heard her mother go out after lunch. Then she slipped downstairs
and called Julian. They agreed to meet in the Café des Artistes, a
popular hangout in Fulham road. Julian, who was training to be
something in the City, was glad to have an excuse to get away and
see Debbie, whom he hadn’t yet managed to bed, although he thought
that event was imminent. He listened to Debbie’s account of her
wretched morning.

“Your poor
bottie must be awfully sore,” Julian said with keen insight.

“And there’s
worse to come. I’m sure dad will strap me when he gets home. That
hurts like anything!”

“Oh well, chin
up old thing! Soon be over, I suppose. I say, I’m going to Quags
tonight with my parents. First night of the grouse season. Should
be rather jolly!”

Debbie wasn’t
sure that she was getting quite the sympathetic hearing she’d been
hoping for. Julian had bags of money and there was a title floating
about in his family somewhere, but she did wish that he could be a
bit more, well,
concerned
about her.

“You going to
Tessa’s coming-out do on Saturday?” asked Julian. These events were
always loaded with vacuous debutantes fishing for the rich and
titled. Julian usually fancied his chances when he offered one of
them a lift home. It didn’t matter much to him whether Debbie would
be there or not, but he might as well know for planning purposes.
If he brought Debbie back to his flat, he reckoned a bottle of
medium white would be enough to get her into the sack, whereas the
debs usually needed champagne.

“Ooo yes! Will
you take me? I’ve got a lovely dress: you’ll adore it!”

“OK, pick you
up at seven?”

“See you then”,
she got up to leave.

“See you.
Bonne chance
with your little bummie tonight!” Julian caught
the waitress’ eye and ordered another Pimms.

***

Debbie waited
listlessly for her father’s return. He was a partner in a firm of
solicitors and sometimes worked late. Debbie hoped that this would
be the case tonight: he might be too tired to get involved in
discussing her dismal results. She decided, a trifle unwisely, that
she needed something to fortify herself. Her mother was still out,
so she crept down to the pantry and helped herself to a strong - in
fact, very strong - vodka and tonic. She had almost finished it
when she heard the sound of her father’s car on the gravel of the
drive. She gulped down the rest and hurriedly rinsed and dried the
glass. Then she shot up to her room and closed the door. Maybe her
father would think she was asleep.