Foster Forest (16): As Seen in the Mirror

"I'm telling!"

At a place like Foster Forest, the sound of those words carried throughout the nearby area, and Cody looked up from where he was standing at the "playground" next to Carly. His eyes narrowed as he raised a hand to his brow and looked toward the porch. The little boy, Jackson, was cornered, his back against the wall of the house, and Lizzie had a wild look about her, from what Carly could see.

She'd been at Foster Forest for a grand total of three days. The atmosphere in the house during that time had been strange. Cody had spent two days in his room, not talking to anybody, and Peter seemed quiet after the first night's dinner. She and Felicity were in Feliticy's room when they'd heard a spanking happening on their floor, and that only left Lizzie. The younger girl seemed to have been strangely hateful in the few days that had followed. Quiet and broody, she refused her meals in spite of being made to sit at the table, and she wouldn't speak to anybody. It seemed to Carly that Lizzie had been doing a lot of chores over the past couple of days, and she never seemed to catch a break. She almost felt bad that she'd had some time to sit out here and chat with the fourteen year old for a while instead of helping inside the house.

So far Felicity had kept herself out of trouble, and Carly was relieved. She didn't have to step in and try to mediate or explain her sister, and she didn't have to try to get Felicity to stop before she made matters worse with her big mouth. How many times had Carly stood up to calm Felicity down before she did something she would regret? And now the twelve year-old knew that her older sister harbored a lot of regrets, now that their father was gone, the victim of his own handgun. The thought of it all made Carly shiver. She thought Felicity might still be in shock, since she'd hardly said anything since the night she found their father's body in his office. Carly knew that Felicity would never be the same. Neither of them would be.

"Busybody!" Cody said next to her. "I guess you know what she's like." He glanced at her, giving a shrug of his shoulders. "Betsy. You've met her, right?"

Carly frowned slightly, squinting in the direction of the house as she had done a moment before. "You mean Lizzie? Sure. I met her the day I got here," she said. "She's okay."

"Busybody," Cody grumbled again. "I'm going to go see what's going on and try to keep the kid out of trouble. Whatever he's done, she's gonna make it sound like it's a lot worse than it is, and I'd hate to see him get in trouble for something he didn't do, or something that's not that big a deal," he said with a shrug.

Cody darted off across the yard so quickly that Carly took a moment to realize what was happening. She leaped off the swing and jogged toward him. His movements were stiff, but he was quick, and there was a redness around his ears that she recognized. Carly put her hand on Cody's arm and gave him a gentle tug to pull him back. "What's going on?" she asked with concern. If he was anything like Felicity, there was about to be some serious trouble, and Carly didn't want to have to watch while Cody got his butt spanked. She'd already heard one of Lizzie's, and she didn't want to hear another.

"Betsy!" Cody snapped. The ten year-old turned her head when she head the diminutive of her name called, and Carly's cheeks grew hot as she turned her face back to Cody. "She's always got something up her sleeve, always has her nose in somebody else's business, and somebody else is always getting in trouble because of her meddling. She's going to go in there and tell Mr. Peter that the kid did... whatever, and then he's going to get a spanking. Guess who will make it off without any trouble?"

"Maybe you should mind your own business," Lizzie spat as Carly and Cody reached the porch together. "I wasn't talking to you or about you so shut up!"

"What is wrong with you?" Before Carly could stop him, Cody was hovering over Lizzie, and the ten year-old was backed up against the wall the same as Jackie had been just a moment ago. "Can't you have fun without getting somebody else's butt whipped for no goddamned reason? What the hell is your problem?"

"You're my problem!" Lizzie spat back.

Carly quickly got between the two warring residents, pushing Cody back slightly and then pulling Lizzie by her arm so that she wasn't cornered. Jackson, free from his cornered position, sped around them and into the house. There were tears on his face, and Carly could hardly blame him for wanting to be out of there as quickly as possible. The hostility was quite apparent, and it made her heart beat far too fast. She didn't like this, not one little bit.

"Calm down," Carly said, trying to remain rational. Her voice was cool, but her hands were shaking as she put them back down at her sides.

Carly opened her mouth to ask what happened, but before she could say anything Cody piped up, "Yeah, well you're just a little bitch who likes to get other people in trouble instead of minding her own business."

"Stop!" Carly cried, but before she could speak her own mind, Peter Grisson allowed the screen door to slam behind him as he came out onto the porch and put his hands on his hips.

"What is going on here?" Peter asked. His voice was stern, and Carly took a step back. Cody moved immediately away from the blonde-haired man, and Lizzie looked up at him with wide brown eyes. Her cheeks were red, and when Carly glanced at Cody, he was white as a sheet. "Well?" Peter asked.

"Excuse me sir," Carly said. She looked up and met Peter's steely blue eyes as they locked on her, and she felt a shudder go down her spine. Out of the corner of her eye she caught the approach of Becky, and she glanced over at her for a moment. The presence of both adults made her feel cornered, and Carly had to force herself to stay in place instead of stepping back and out of the line of fire. "They were just... Uh... disagreeing with one another," she said, her eyes focusing on the young redheaded woman who had joined them on the porch. "It wasn't a big deal," she added, though she realized that it was almost pointless. From the expression on Peter's face, he had already decided the outcome of this situation.

"What happened?" Becky asked, her eyes focused on Peter.

"I don't know," he told her, keeping his eyes on Carly. "Carly was just saying that these two were having a disagreement, but Jackson came into the house to get me, saying that Lizzie was yelling at him and threatening him about something. It was hard to understand, he was crying."

Becky crossed her arms over her chest and looked at each child in turn, then turned her attention back to Cody. "Cody," she said in a soft tone. "What happened?"

The teenager just shrugged, and Becky shook her head. Her eyes focused on Lizzie, and she repeated her question. "Elizabeth, what happened?"

"Jackson was snacking," Lizzie said, her voice snapping with sass. Carly winced and took a step back, surprised to hear the ten year-old talking to a grownup that way, but she pressed her own lips together to keep quiet. Why was it any of Lizzie's business whether or not Jackson had food? "He was eating a cookie," Lizzie added, looking up at Peter as though she hoped for some help from him.

"So Betsy started yelling at him and had him all shoved up in the corner," Cody chimed in, then shut his mouth, his cheeks turning a deep crimson as he turned his head away instead of meeting any of the  multiple pairs of eyes on him.

Lizzie's hands clenched into fists as she stared at Cody. "Stop calling me Betsy!" she cried loudly. There were tears in her eyes, and the little girl turned on her heels and stormed off into the house.

"Great," Peter muttered, shaking his head. He turned toward Carly. "Well? What's your part in all this?"

Carly's mouth felt like she had cotton wool shoved in it. She swallowed, then moistened her lips and finally looked up into his pale blue eyes. "I was trying to get them to stop fighting sir," she said. She gave a small dip of her head, wishing that she was anywhere but here, being questioned by one of the grownups. Authority never sat well with her, and even the mildest of scoldings could  cause her to tremble.

Becky's hand fell on her shoulder, and Carly turned her head to look at the woman, who was giving her a reassuring smile. She relaxed slightly as Becky put her hand on Cody's shoulder. "Come on everybody. Let's go into the house and we'll talk about this in there. It sounds like things got a little bit out of hand out here, and it's time for us to start working on supper. Peter, you're cooking tonight, right?"

"He called me a witch!" Lizzie cried as Cody passed her and headed into the house, his head down. Carly was right behind him, but she caught it when the younger girl added, "with a B!"

"Into the house," Becky said briskly, and then Carly was joining Cody in the Great Room.

Cody leaned against the fireplace and crossed his arms over his chest. "I can't believe her!" he muttered, shaking his head. He looked up as the front door opened and the ten year-old followed them in with Peter close behind her. Lizzie flopped down on the couch nearby and Carly gave her a long, appraising look and then went to stand next to Cody in an effort to show him her support. He had been right: Lizzie needed to keep to her own business and not put her nose where it didn't belong. Everybody, it seemed, got along better when there wasn't somebody to stir the pot. She'd learned that last year in school. Unfortunately she was the one others felt was stirring the pot that year.

Once they were all gathered, Becky stepped into the middle of the loose circle they had formed. Even Jackson wandered over and sat down on the far end of the couch, staying as far away from Lizzie as he could while still sitting down. "Alright," Becky said, her tone stern as she looked around at the gathered faces. First of all, Jackson: Lizzie says that you were eating a cookie. Where did you get it?"

The little boy flushed slightly and looked at Lizzie, then pleadingly at Becky. It was obvious that he thought he was going to be in major trouble, and there were already tears in his eyes. "There was a pack of cookies on the top of the refrigerator. I like the lemon ones," he said in a small voice.

Becky nodded curtly. "Alright, then you've had your dessert for the week and while the others have theirs on Friday night, you will get none. And I won't forget," she added, giving the little boy a stern look. Then she turned her attention to Cody. "Did you use the B-word?" Becky asked, her eyes narrowing slightly as she watched the teenager.

Cody looked pale, but he nodded his head slightly, keeping his blue eyes locked on Becky's gaze. "Yes ma'am," he said. His voice broke on the second word, but he cleared his throat and kept his composure.

Becky turned toward Peter. "Peter, show Cody where the poster board and the permanent markers are. It's time, I think, for our rules to get a re-write." Turning back to Cody, she went on. "I want the rules re-written on poster board in clear block lettering. If I can't read it, you'll have to do it again. On the original, I want you to underline the rules you broke. We'll discuss this later. Sitting down," she added finally, and Cody visibly relaxed.

Finally she looked at Carly. "What was your part in this?" she asked, her voice still firm.

Carly felt her cheeks grow hot as Jackson, Lizzie and Becky watched her. Peter and Cody were headed off into the kitchen, and she watched them go, unable to meet the green eyed stare of her guardian. "I was trying to get everybody calmed down and to stop fighting. I didn't want anybody to be in trouble," she said weakly.

Becky nodded. "Alright. Jackie, why don't you go find some toys to play with?" she asked, gesturing to the box that was off to one side of the fireplace. "Lizzie, go up to your room. I need to talk to you about some things. Carly, you're free to go," she added. "You might go find your sister. I haven't seen her at all today," she added, then turned as though to follow Cody and Peter into the kitchen.

"Why do I have to go to my room?" Lizzie huffed, even as the got up and followed behind Carly.

The twelve year old could hear the heavy footsteps on the stairs behind her, and she turned her head over her shoulder. She opened her mouth to speak but then quickly shut it again, reminding herself that it was none of her business what was going on with Lizzie. Whatever choices the younger girl made, they were hers to make, including the consequences that went along with them. Then, thinking twice, she said, "You must not have very many friends." At the top of the stairs they both went to their rooms, and Carly left hers open as she sat down on the bed with her legs crossed.

She didn't feel like talking to Fissy. It wasn't that she didn't like her sister: she did. But even before their father died Felicity had been a pain to live with. Now she didn't talk much at all, but when she did it was an outburst of sudden, angry emotion. She hadn't turned on anybody since they'd been here, but it was because of the anger problems that their aunt could no longer handle them. If it wasn't for that, they'd still be with family, and Carly would have felt a lot more secure.

Pulling her diary out from under her pillow, Carly turned to her current page and grabbed her pen. For a long time she just sat there, staring at the blank page in front of her. She had no idea what she should write down, or what she was feeling at that moment. Her overwhelming thought was that Lizzie didn't like her (or anyone) very much at all, and she worried that Cody was going to withdraw from her now too. He was in trouble, and she couldn't help but feel as though that was somehow her fault. Honestly it was only her and Felicity who had skated by without a problem that day, and she wondered at that for a moment.

Carly's pen was about to touch the paper when she heard footsteps on the stairs. Instinctively she snapped the book shut and craned her neck, watching as Becky headed into Lizzie's room across the hall. She left the door standing wide open, and Carly's cheeks grew warm as she realized that she (and perhaps Felicity too) were about to become privy to what might otherwise by a private conversation.

"Did you hear what that new girl said to me?" Lizzie was raging across the hall. "She's so stupid! She says she thinks that I probably don't have any friends at all. I hate her!" the ten year-old snapped.

Carly's ears became even hotter, and she quietly slipped off her bed and crept to her door. From there she could see into Lizzie's bedroom, though the only things visible across the hall were the ten year-old's dresser and the small, empty bookshelf there.

"Well Elizabeth," Becky's voice said gently. "If you don't change the way that you relate to the other people who live here, you may find out that she's right." There was a pause and Carly could hear some shuffling noises from inside the room across the hall. Quietly she crept out of her room and moved so that she could just see what was going on. If Becky or Lizzie looked in her direction, she would be caught, but she breathed shallowly in the hopes that neither would have a reason to look toward her.

"But I didn't do anything wrong!" Elizabeth protested. Becky's hands were on the waistband of her jeans and she was tugging the ten year-old toward her. Carly shivered as she remembered what it felt like when her father did that to her, but it was fascinating to watch it happen to another girl, especially one who was younger than her. Her blue eyes widened as Becky's long, slender fingers unhooked the button and then pushed the zipper down.

Becky sighed, and her shoulders heaved visibly. Her head rose and she looked Elizabeth in the eyes. Her brow twitched into a frown and then back to a neutral expression. "Elizabeth, I can't think of any other way to get it through to you that you are hurting other people, and that ultimately that's going to hurt you as well. I could ground you, but then you get what you want: the opportunity to be alone. I could give you extra chores, but you fight me at every turn with the jobs that I give you, and we'd wind up right here in the end anyway. I don't have any privileges to take away from you since you burned all of your own books." There was a pause, and then Becky sighed. "I could allow the natural consequences of your actions to catch up with you," she said, her voice gentle. She reached out and touched Lizzie's cheek and then dropped her hand again. "But I don't think that would be fair," she finished. "Already Cody doesn't trust you and Jackson is afraid of you. It won't be long before Carly and Felicity catch up with them. If I can help you change first and avoid you hurting more later on, I'm going to do that."

Then the talking was over for at least another moment as Becky pushed Elizabeth's jeans down all the way to her ankles. She sat back again and regarded Elizabeth for a long time. "Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

It hadn't been apparent before that Elizabeth was crying, but now the slender shoulders shook and the brunette ten year-old shook her head from side to side, her ponytail bobbing. "I didn't do anything wrong," she choked half heartedly.

Becky sighed again and reached down to push Lizzie's panties down the way of her jeans. The ten year-old started to look toward the door, and Carly took a quick step backward so that she was out of sight. She couldn't see anything now, but she was sure that the younger girl hadn't seen her standing there. "Can't you close the door?" the little girl asked.

"No," Becky said. "The boys aren't going to be on this floor at all and I think that it will do some good for the girls to be able to hear you getting your bottom spanked. For one thing, I think you upset Carly earlier. For another, Carly came very close today to the line you crossed," she said in a stern voice that made the twelve year-old wonder whether or not she knew she was standing there.

Carly quietly crept across the hall and back to her own room, where she stood near the door to listen to what was going on in the other room. In spite of herself, she was more than a little bit curious as to what a spanking meant at Foster Forest. Her father had always been very strict, but he was also very kind and incredibly loving with both of his daughters, even when Felicity had one of her tantrums. Carly didn't know what she was expecting, except that she hoped that Ms. Becky was the same. Though she felt she was too old to want it so much, she hoped that the woman loved the children in her care as much as her father loved her and her sister.

The woman's voice was kind, and her demeanor had always been kind as far as Carly was concerned, but she'd only been there a couple of days. She couldn't talk to Elizabeth; the younger girl alienated everybody who tried to get close to her, that much was very obvious already to Carly. She didn't want to talk to Cody about it because he seemed to be bitter, and Jackson was just so... Happy go lucky. She couldn't imagine him seeing anything as it really was. Instead, she thought he would probably gush about how great Ms. Becky and Mr. Peter were even if they fed him gruel every night.

Listening in on another child's punishment was proof of nothing. The real proof would come if Carly was ever in the position that Elizabeth found herself in now. She planned on staying off the laps of the grownups, but even Carly was known to make an occasional mistake, and that would be when she would really get to know what Becky or Peter were like. She'd learned things about her father during punishments that she'd never wanted to know.

The first smacks could be heard a moment later, and Carly winced. She was sure that Becky was using something wood, and something wide at that. No wooden spoons, at least not for this spanking. Wood, and hairbrushes in particular, seemed to make a peculiar popping sound when they were used. She'd heard one time and again when Daddy spanked Felicity with her own hairbrush. Carly felt hot around the collar when she remembered listening in on those sessions between Daddy and her older sister. She breathed deeply for a moment, and then shifted her focus back to Elizabeth's spanking. Her head was hanging halfway out the door, and then her eyes caught sight of the mirror above the dresser. Surprised that she hadn't noticed it before, Carly checked her position to make sure she couldn't be seen, and then turned back to the mirror.

In the reflective glass she could see everything. Becky's shoulders were stiff. Her body was tight as she tucked the ten year old up against her body. Elizabeth was already squirming with her legs kicking out behind her, and her hands were gripping the comforter tightly. Becky scolded the ten year-old to lie still and take the punishment that she deserved. "If you can't lie still and take this, I will pin you down and it's going to wind up being a lot worse. Not because I want it to be, but because when you make it hard for me I can't focus the way that I want to. So calm down and be still!" The woman's voice was sharp, but not unkind.

She'd only given the little girl three solid pops to her backside with the wooden hairbrush, but already Elizabeth's backside was becoming quite pink. Carly pressed her palms to her cheeks to feel the heat there, and shifted her weight at the strange feeling in her belly. She swallowed several times and wet her lips, finally turning her attention back to the mirror. Becky had the ten year-old pinned down now, and was applying the brush again in brisk, crisp strokes. Carly was fascinated by the way that the woman snapped her wrist down. Elizabeth's bottom responded accordingly by turning a shade of pink, and Becky  moved on to covering other areas of the slender, trembling buttocks.

Elizabeth was crying, of course. She'd started even before she'd gone over Becky's knee, but now she was really sobbing, and she had pulled the comforter off the end of the bed and fed it up between her hands. Her face was buried deep in the purple fabric. "No!" she cried, shaking her head from side to side. Carly could see all of it in the mirror. "I wuh-won't..." she squealed, twisting her body over the correctional lap. "Not again! I wuh-won't!"

"No, you won't," Becky said. "If you do I hope you know that this spanking is going to be the least of your worries. I won't talk to you about this again, but I hope that this is enough to remind you that respecting the other residents of this home is about a lot more than the rules, and is for your benefit as well as for them."

"Nuh-no!" Elizabeth cried, but the spanking continued briskly, and she dissolved into sobs. Speaking was too difficult during a spanking. Carly knew that much from her experience with her father and later with her overly strict aunt. She cringed as the mirror showed Elizabeth's bottom turning to a darker pink.

With her face hot, Carly withdrew to her own room. She'd seen enough and heard enough, and she had things to think about herself. She closed the door behind her and went to sit down on her bed. Her own bottom was tingling, and she drew her legs up under her, putting her diary in her lap and picking up her pen. Now she had plenty to write about...