by Frank Martinet
Esther woke up excited. Today was the sixteen-year-old's first day of school. Real school, that is. Until now she'd been home schooled while she lived with her missionary parents in a remote part of the Amazon. But her folks had decided that she needed socialization with girls her own age, so they'd made arrangements for her to attend the prestigious St. Sophia's Conservatory near Lausanne, Switzerland.
She awoke before dawn, showered, and dressed in her spiffy new uniform. She'd never worn anything like it. At home - what she thought of as home - she wore cutoffs like a tomboy. Here she was to be a lady. The navy blazer and crimson tie looked like something out of a fashion catalog, and Esther thought the pleated blue skirt felt like a fancy gown, she was so unaccustomed to wearing dresses.
There was a vase at her bedside table with dozens of tiny white and yellow flowers in it. She took a few and placed them in her hair, which she'd secured with a purple band.
She spun around in front of the mirror, admiring her new outfit. The white stocks and ebony pumps were grand, but felt strange for a girl used to flip-flops and sneakers. Still, she couldn't help but be thrilled at her opportunity to go to a real school and meet girls her own age. She blushed a little as she imagined meeting boys, but, of course, that wasn't going to happen at a girls-only institution like St. Sophia's.
Still giggling at her naughty thought, Esther made her way downstairs for breakfast.
"Well, don't you look lovely," exclaimed M. Françoise, the head of the host family where she was staying. He studied her over his newspaper, nodding to his wife for agreement.
Céleste beamed at the girl and stepped away from the stove to straighten Esther's tie. She gave the young blond a strong embrace. "He is right, you know. You are a beautiful young lady."
Esther blushed happily, looking at her toes. "Thank you, Madame Françoise," she said politely. "But it's just the outfit, not me. It makes me feel like a princess!"
The woman laughed and began dishing eggs onto plates. "You won't feel like a princess very long, not at St. Sophia's. They're a strict, old-fashioned institution, experts at bringing a girl down to earth. Now eat your breakfast. Gervais needs to leave for work soon and he'll take you to your school."
Most of the other cars in the drop-off lane in front of St. Sophia's were gleaming limousines driven by chauffeurs in dark uniforms and handsome caps. They opened the doors to allow their wealthy charges to emerge, each dressed the same as Esther. Most girls in her position would have felt the difference at being dropped off in a ten-year-old white BMW in need of a washing, but Esther didn't notice things like that. She just saw beautiful cars and even more beautiful schoolgirls, and marveled at the castle-like structure that was her new school.
She leaped out of the car, thanked M. Françoise for the ride, and hurried toward the front steps, her grin as wide as her face. She felt as light as air, and so elegant in her new clothes and carrying her brand new leather satchel with her schoolbooks, paper, and writing instruments inside.
"Hello!" she said cheerfully to a group of girls huddling on the steps before the giant French doors which were propped open to welcome in the students. "I'm Esther Zita."
The girls turned to stare at her. "What are you so fucking happy about?" snarled one.
Esther gasped, her face turning pink at the profanity. She looked around guiltily, as though expecting an authority figure to pounce, but there were only dozens of girls milling about and no one was paying them any attention.
"It's my first day of school," she offered. She looked up the awe-inspiring building. "It's fantastic!"
Two of the other girls laughed as though she'd made a joke. The first one, with long dark hair that matched her scowl, muttered: "It's shit. They ought to tear it down and start over. It's a hundred years old and smells like it."
"That's just the dead bodies in the basement," said a snooty blond girl, glancing at her friend with a telling grin.
"What!" gasped Esther. "Bod-bodies?"
"Oh sure," said the first girl. "The Head always executes a few students at the start of each term, to set an example for everyone to behave."
"That's ridiculous," said Esther, but there was doubt in her voice.
The third girl gave her an ominous look. "They usually pick one of the new girls first. Bummer to be you."
"They'll give you the cane, too," said the scowling one. Her grin was evil. "Before they execute you. Right across the bare bum!"
Esther looked at the three, worry on her brow, and when the girls started laughing she realized she was being teased.
"That wasn't very nice," she said, but she was sighing with relief. The story had sounded absurd, especially in retrospect, but she didn't understand the ways of the world. Where she had grown up in the remote Amazon, death was common, and tales of murder and revenge among the local tribes were rampant. Cannibalism was rare now, but not so long in the past as to be forgotten.
At that moment a bell from inside the building sounded and the trio reluctantly got up and headed inside. Esther followed, not sure where she was going. Inside the large main lobby, she spotted a door labeled "Administration" and decided to start there. She talked with the receptionist and soon had been given a printed sheet of her class schedule. She wandered through the halls looking for room 210, which was with Mademoiselle Clark, for Geography.
Esther's first class was uneventful. Though she lived far away, she'd always found maps and stories of other places fascinating, and she excelled at geography. She had no trouble following the lesson and was delighted.
She likewise expected the same in Algebra, for her mother had taught her well. Unfortunately, Esther pointed out a small error by the teacher, Madame Thomas, in a problem she'd written on the blackboard. It was just a careless transposition of numbers, but it irked the teacher to be corrected by a new girl. Esther's angelic appearance also didn't help, for the girl had such a sweet face and innocent expression that Thomas assumed she must be mocking her.
"Yes, yes," she responded brusquely, hastily erasing and rewriting the numbers on the board. "It was just a typo. You all know what I meant."
"But it wasn't correct," said Esther, puzzled.
The woman turned and faced the pupil. "Excuse me?" she said icily.
"It was wrong. The way you had it."
"What's your name again?"
"Esther May Zita," said Esther politely. "Born Sept. 3, 2001 in Charlottesville, North Carolina, though I hardly lived there as my parents moved to Peru when I was just two years old."
"I didn't ask for your résumé! You've got quite the lip on you, don't you."
"I don't think so," said Esther, confused. "My lips are regular-sized." She looked around the room, studying the lips of her classmates.
Madame Thomas was not amused. "Young lady, you are just asking for the slipper!"
"I didn't ask for any slipper. I don't know what you're talking about, Madame."
The teacher, who'd been about to return to the board to continue her instruction, now paused and studied the young blond beauty. "Is that how you're going to play it?" she asked. "Pretend you're naive and don't know what's going on?"
"I'm sorry, Madame. But I'm lost."
"Well, let me give you some guidance. Step right up to my desk. Put your hands on the side, palms down. That's right, just like that. Now I will reach into my desk here and get my slipper."
Esther saw that indeed the woman had produced a sort of rubber-soled gym shoe, which didn't quite match her idea of a slipper. The slipper was huge, far too big to fit any of the girls in the room, and it was so worn and beaten down it hardly looked usable in the classic sense. She was at a loss as to what the teacher wanted to do with it, and equally puzzled as to the woman's critical tone. She sensed she'd misstepped, but didn't know how.
Madame Thomas gripped the heel of the slipper and moved behind Esther. When the teen started to turn around, she was smartly rebuked. "Don't you move a muscle, Miss Smarty Pants! You keep your hands on that desk and look straight ahead until we're done."
Alarmed, Esther obeyed. Her astonishment had no bounds when she felt the teacher grasping the back of her new skirt and raising it up onto her back. The entire class could see Esther's white panties snuggly gripping her pert little bottom. She flushed in shame and started to object, but before her open mouth could speak, there was a loud, slightly muffled whack! sound and a sharp, stingy pain erupted across her left buttock.
"Oh! Ow!" cried Esther.
The smack was instantly repeated on her right cheek, and this time she was more conscious of just how noisy and uncomfortable the blow felt. She realized then that she was being struck with the flat sole of the "slipper" and the awful truth of her situation finally penetrated.
"Oh please! Ouch! Madame Thomas, I don't like this at all! Ow! Ow! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be bad. I don't know what I did - ouch! - but please stop, ma'am. I'll never do it again, I swear!"
Her cries fell on deaf ears, for Madame Thomas was annoyed. Nothing peeved her more than smart-mouthed children who didn't know their place, and she was determined to snuff the rebellion out of this cherubic brat right from the start. She dutifully delivered several more sound spanks to each quivering buttock until Esther had gotten six whacks per side. It was harsh for a first spanking, but the teacher felt it justified as she sensed true impertinence from the girl.
"There," she announced when she was finished. She allowed the skirt to fall back down over the shuddering panty-clad bottom. "I bet you're 'smart' now!"
"Oh, Madame!" moaned Esther, tears of shame trickling down her face. "I don't understand why you beat me!"
"I spanked you because you mocked me, plain and simple. I won't put up for insubordination, young lady. I know it's only the first day of school, but you need to learn to respect your superiors."
"But I do! Mother always taught me to be polite and obedient, especially to my elders."
Madame Thomas stiffened. She had been teaching for nearly forty years, many of them at St. Sophia's, and lately she was becoming more aware of her advancing years. To her ears, Esther's last word had come out emphasized. Was the girl being sarcastic, making fun of the woman's age? It certainly sounded that way to her.
"You're doing it again!" she cried. "Was one slippering not enough? Do you need another?"
A bewildered Esther stared at the teacher in horror and backed away in fright, her hands seeking to protect her backside. "No more slipper, I beg you!"
"Then apologize to me, right now!"
"I... I'm sorry, Madame Thomas, if I offended you in some way. I didn't mean to say the wrong thing. I've never been to a real school before. Maybe I don't understand how things work here."
The teacher softened. She frowned, still suspicious, but wondering if she'd misjudged the girl. "What do you mean you've never been to school before?"
"I was home-schooled in Peru by my mother."
"Since you were a child? You've never been to any school at all?"
"No, ma'am."
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