by Louis Woodley
"The Defendant will rise."
Despite the bailiff's order, Bethany Robertson remained seated in the courtroom until Mr. Biggers, her attorney, hissed, "Stand up for the Judge, dammit, unless you want to be held in contempt."
Bethany already held the entire process in contempt. It wasn't her fault that the cretins didn't appreciate art. Her boyfriend was an incredible graffiti artist and she'd been helping him with his latest creation. Unfortunately the owner of the building called the cops and they had to flee. The cops acted like she'd been playing 'Grand Theft Auto' the way they carried on. Fine, she might have been driving a bit fast and a few lights might have been really yellow, but that old bat should have seen her coming before she turned.
Pointing guns at her while she got out of the wreck seemed excessive, so she had some choice words for the cops. Next thing she knew she was face down in handcuffs, still cussing. She tried to claim that the paint in the back seat wasn't hers and the police were setting her up, but that didn't explain the paint on her hands. Meanwhile, her boyfriend was being the model of cooperation and letting her take the heat.
When they were brought in, he had no prior record and was released to his parents. But this wasn't Bethany's first run-in with the authorities and earned her a night behind bars until her mother had shown up this morning with her lawyer to smooth over the damage.
The situation was made worse because the whole thing had been captured by one of those live action cop shows, so viewers across the country had watched her making an ass of herself and earn the nickname of Graffiti Girl. The local media picked up on it as well; a reporter was there just to watch her hearing.
She grudgingly got up and pretended to act interested in what the judge and her lawyer were saying. Just get to the point and say how much it was going to cost to make it go away.
"...$2,500 fine or three days incarceration."
No problem; Mom wastes more money than that on her frequent shopping trips. Let's go! But when she looked behind her, her mother was walking out of court. Wait, where's she going?
That's when her attorney informed her that Ms. Robertson had instructed him that she would not be funding this latest escapade. If Bethany wanted to avoid cooling her heels in jail she could pay the fine herself. Otherwise, her mom would see her in three days time. It became four days after the judge added a contempt of court citation for the profanity-laced tirade she threw.
The local station played an exclusive bleeped out version of her performance that night. By the morning she was a social media celebrity but she didn't have internet access where she was currently sitting around and fuming at her mother. There was going to be hell to pay when she got out of this place.
She couldn't have anticipated her mother's preemptive strike to change the game completely.
Kathleen Robertson was mortified at the latest humiliation her daughter had caused her. It was already hard to show her face at the country club thanks to Bethany's previous stunts, and now this? If this continued she'd never play tennis or make catty remarks about the trophy wives with her club friends. Instead, the vultures would be picking at her carcass.
Something had to be done; she refused to sacrifice her social stature because of her daughter. She'd already bailed Bethany out of previous jams, but she'd only given her lip service about changing. Maybe getting her away would get her out of everyone's minds. She'd debated for days but finally had the phone call made for her...
Four days later Bethany was brought home by Mr. Biggers. She'd been waiting to eviscerate her mother for leaving her in jail. However, her mother unloaded a preemptive strike.
"Hello Bethany; how nice to see you on national television. You can't imagine how proud I was to see and hear all about your performance. Now pack your bags because your flight leaves in three hours."
"Flight? Where am I going?"
"Since you can't stay out of trouble here, you're going to live with your father for a while and see how you like it."
WHAT? "What do you mean? Dad is dead...isn't he?"
Her mother snickered. "My parents made up that story because they didn't want to admit their daughter got knocked up by a married cowboy."
Married? That she could believe. Her mom was forever finding Mr. Right Now and some of them had worn wedding rings. But a cowboy?
"They shipped me over to Europe as soon as they found out I was pregnant. There I fell in love and 'got married' to Giovanni. It happened so quick that my parents didn't even get to come. Then you were born and everything was wonderful. But my husband got killed in a car crash and we came back to the States. And I took back my maiden name and voila."
"But my picture of Dad..."
"Girl, they paid Giovanni to claim to be your father, and I was going back to America so why would he care?"
Bethany wanted to throw up. The guy she'd thought was her father her entire life wasn't. "But how did a cowboy..."
"We got this wild hare idea to try playing cowgirls at a dude ranch. That place was boring so we snuck out one night to a bar. Well, there was this handsome cowboy, and he was having marriage problems and I'm a sympathetic listener and next thing I know I'm riding a bucking bronco..."
"MOM! Please stop!"
"Anyway, afterwards I talked him into reconciling with his wife. Then I came home and the line turned blue, so your grandparents got me out of the country before anyone could tell I was preggers. Surprise! Your daddy's name is Pete Matthews and you're going to go live with him!"
"Are you crazy? Where does he even live?"
"Oh, Montana, Wyoming, one of the Dakotas maybe? I can't remember, but Mr. Biggers has all the information."
Bethany decided that Mom was right; a change of scenery would do her some good, because otherwise she was going to strangle her! But why did she have to go out in the middle of the godforsaken wilderness? And this guy better not think he was all-of-a-sudden going to start laying down rules on her.
Bethany was tired and irritable by the time her third flight landed. This day had sucked, and now she was literally in the middle of nowhere, about to meet the father she never knew she had. A rugged looking guy called her name; she could understand why Mom had spread her legs for him, but that didn't mean she was going to kowtow to him.
"Bethany, I'm Pete Matthews and I'm your father."
Bethany snapped, "No, you're just some married guy that fucked my mom, which hardly makes you special. Then you went skipping back to your wife after knocking Mom up and you've been hiding from me for 17 years. That doesn't make you my father."
"First of all, watch your language. Second, it's obvious that your mother never told you what happened. Yes, it was bad judgment on my part, but we were separated at that point. Your mother and I got talking and..."
"She threw herself on your dick!"
"Bethany! It just happened spontaneously and your mom said she was on the pill."
"Nope, Mom is always on pills plural."
"But she also convinced me I needed to fix things with my wife. Then a year later I got a letter from your grandparent's lawyers, saying 'you're a father and if you waive paternity rights we'll pay you to stay quiet about it.' So, nothing personal against you, but we'd already reconciled and were expecting our own kid by then.
My wife Cathy wasn't happy to find out I had another kid out there somewhere but no one was ever supposed to know about you. My parents were hacked off when they found out, but they agreed that I couldn't fight your family for custody. So we signed the paperwork, took the money, and pretended we never knew you existed. Frankly, your mother seemed pretty self-centered, so I was surprised she went through with the pregnancy. But I'm happy for your sake that she did."
Bethany frowned as she digested this. Well, he'd sure plugged Mom right; she had the attention span of a gnat. Once she figured out how much work was involved in raising a kid she'd basically dumped Bethany onto a series of nannies and continued on her merry way. She'd been quietly stashed away as Mom's bedroom became a revolving door; it had taken her years to realize that all the 'uncles' visiting at the breakfast table were Mom's latest conquests. Her grandparents never tried to rein her mother in and now she had their inheritance. Luckily it was parsed out at intervals or else she would have blown through it all by now.
During the drive, Pete admitted that his family was apprehensive to learn that their newly-discovered half-sister was moving in. So things would likely be awkward for a while, but they were making the sacrifice and Bethany would need to as well. Her sarcastic snort wasn't well received.
"Young lady, I know you're spoiled rotten, but around here we work hard and you'll be expected to do the same. When we get home the girls will be doing their after-school chores. It's early to bed, early to rise, with plenty that needs to be done every day."
"Sir, yes sir!" She snapped off a military salute.
Her flippant attitude was already chafing Pete, and they'd barely been together 10 minutes. She was pushing to earn what would obviously be the first licking of her entire life - the only question was whether they'd make it home before he'd be forced to adjust her attitude.
"I won't tolerate you becoming a negative influence in our home. I'm giving you a chance to straighten out your life but not at our expense. I know you don't want to be here but you brought this on yourself, so you've only got yourself to blame."
"No shit Sherlock. Who wants to be stuck in West Butt-Fuck?"
"Bethany, I won't ask you again to watch your language."
"I don't give a fuck. What, are you afraid that if your daughters hear the word 'fuck' they're gonna spread their legs like my mom did?"
"THAT'S ENOUGH! Since you don't listen I'll have to get your attention."
He pulled over onto a side road, slammed on his brakes and killed the engine. Then he pulled out a knife from the glove box. Bethany froze; what was he going to do? He hopped out of the truck and came around to yank open her door. She tried to lock herself inside but he forced her out. She fought hard, but he wrangled steers and broke horses, so he dragged her into the woods and stopped by a fallen log.
"You aren't in the city anymore and this is how we deal with brats like you here. Pull your jeans and underwear down to your ankles and then lie across that log with your butt hiked up!"
"WHAT? Are you fucking crazy?"
"Missy, you're part of our family and spankings are always given on a bare bottom. Now get that butt of yours ready while I find a switch to whip you with."
"No, I won't do it!" But Bethany was getting afraid.
"It's either a switch or my belt, but either way you'll be getting back in the truck with a striped butt."
Bethany looked around, wanting to run but knew she'd never escape.
"I'll scream."
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