Paddling Team (chapter one)

Alex wasn’t known for being punctual, but this afternoon he made sure he was at the gym five minutes early. Today was the last day of tryouts, which meant he had to make damn sure he was on top of his game. For the millionth time, he cursed himself for procrastinating this long; now that time was running out, he was dangerously low on options…and the ones that were left didn‘t exactly play to his strengths. Sadly, aside from hiking and bike-riding he wasn’t too much of an athlete. He just hoped to god that he was enough of one to make the team.

The nineteen year old college freshman had gotten himself into a bit of a pickle. Due to his impressive grades and exemplary citizenship in high school, the institution was willing to waive 75% of his tuition…on two conditions. The first was that he maintain a Grade Point Average of 3.5 or higher; no problem, he was going for a history major. The second was that he participate in at least two official extracurricular clubs or activities per semester, one of which had to be a competitive, intramural event. This shouldn’t have been a problem either, had he not listened to the drunken frat boys who assured him that there were always plenty of open slots and that he shouldn’t hurry. Note to self: avoid the Greek scene from now on.

“Alex?” A female voice came from behind him. “Hi!”

Alex turned to see Jill striding up to the gym. Jill’s was a very distinctive appearance. She was the tallest woman Alex had ever met, her 6’2’’ frame giving her four inches over himself, along with almost everyone else. Hell, she was probably one of the tallest people he had met. With her blue eyes and long, platinum blonde hair, Alex thought she looked like a Valkyrie out of some Norse opera. The first thing he had said to her, when they met in Classics last week, was “Hello, I’m Alex. Wow, you’re really tall.” Jill had blushed and shaken her head at him, but she didn’t seem to take it in a bad way. She had continued sitting next to him, and usually provided conversation on the way out of the building.

“Oh, hey there!” Alex replied as she came up to the door. “Here for paddling tryouts?”

She shook her head. “I’m already on the team. Its, like, my favorite sport.”

She smiled broadly. Jill had this wide, full-cheeked grin and freckled, girlish face that looked almost out of place on her stature. Alex smiled back. “I used to be pretty good back in middle school,” he said, recalling his sea-kayak trips around Pudget Sound, “but…uh…its kinda been awhile.”

“Oh, don‘t worry, I‘m sure you‘ll do fine.” She sounded like she meant it, which honestly confused Alex a bit; his arms were not exactly bulging. “You want to work together?”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “Together? They don’t have the new people together for tryouts?”

“What?” Jill gave him an incredulous stare. “Is that really how they do it in Washington? You can get really hurt if the top isn‘t experienced.”

Alex had never heard the word “top” used in association with paddling. Granted, it was several years since he’d touched a rowboat, but he could have sworn the two positions were “front” and “back.” Maybe it was an east coast thing.

“I guess I‘m just a super badass then,” Alex shrugged.

Jill chuckled, looking at Alex in what almost seemed an appraising manner. “I guess we’ll see.”

“So,” Alex said, deciding to change the subject before he made himself look too ignorant, “how‘d the cupcakes turn out?”

Jill’s eyes lit up. “Oh, they were great! I made that mocha frosting you told me about, and…here, I took a picture!”

She eagerly fished out her cell phone and showed him the cupcake platter she had been planning earlier that week. They talked about baking until the rest of the team started to arrive, at which point Jill started introducing Alex around. Strangely, almost all of them were girls. For a moment, Alex was afraid he had accidentally showed up for women’s tryouts, but there were a couple other guys. Finally, the gym door opened, and they filed in.

“Locker rooms are that way,” Jill pointed when Alex tried to follow her. Alex was confused.

“We‘re not changing up at the lake?”

“Lake?” Jill looked at him blankly. “Why would we go there?”

…

The men’s locker room was nearly empty - just Alex and two other guys, both of them upperclassmen. In it had been a hamper containing a number of one-size-fits-all uniforms that looked nothing like the wet suit Alex had worn in middle school. A white muscle shirt with a black number “05” on the front, a pair of skintight white polyester shorts that Alex felt embarrassed just looking at, and slippers. The hell? He had asked one of the older guys about the uniforms, to which he replied “what about them?”

No wet suits, and no lake. Were they just going to be paddling across the gymnasium swimming pool or something?

Alex looked at himself in the mirror before following the others out into the gym. The muscle shirt hung loosely around his torso, displaying his none-too-great arms and upper chest. The swimming trunks (or whatever they were supposed to be) were the exact opposite, squeezing his hips and upper thighs like a constrictor snake. Turning around, he saw a shamefully prominent bulge at the front; damn, it hadn’t looked so noticeable from above! The other two boys had the same problem with their own uniform bottoms, but they seemed nonchalant about it. Alex decided he should try and act the same, but it wasn’t easy. He just hoped he could avoid paying too much attention to the girls…

After trying in vain to adjust the front of his trunks, Alex gave himself one last look in the mirror. A tan-skinned (from his Mexican half) and reddish-brown haired (from his Irish half) young man, broad shouldered and on the tall side, was framed half-nakedly against the wall of lockers. His arms and legs were on the thicker side, and there was a bit of a pectoral bulge over the low collar of the shirt, but his torso could still hold a lot more muscle mass than it currently did; overall, he was a lot fitter below the waistline than above it, which did little for rowing a boat. The bits of white cloth and polyester didn’t look right on him - like he was too small for the shirt and too big for the trunks - and the bright white was too vivid against his complexion.

He shook his head. There were just too many things about this practice that didn’t add up.

…

Everyone paired up as soon as they entered the gym. Most of the girls were coupled with another of their kind, aside from the two who had snapped up Alex’s peers. It didn’t take him long to spot Jill, on account of her being almost half a head taller than the next biggest person. She smiled encouragingly as they crossed the room toward each other.

“It looks good on you!” She insisted.

Alex snorted. “I guess you‘re more into baking than fashion.”

She gasped in mock offense. “Oh, shut up!”

However ambivalent Alex was about his own uniform, there was no denying that Jill looked absolutely stunning in hers. Her shirt and trunks were pale gray rather than white, and fit her just tightly enough to show off her strong, buxom figure without squeezing too tight. As his eyes fell over her tall, well-highlighted body, Alex felt his trunks getting tighter; he carefully reminded himself to stop checking out his teammates and get back to worrying about tryouts.

Judging by the presence of Jill’s name emblazoned in black letters next to the number 09, this suit had been fitted for her. Hopefully, Alex would be granted the same privilege when he made the team. Well, if I make the team.

“What’s with the different uniform colors?” Alex asked as he peered around the room.

Jill gave him that incredulous look again, like she couldn‘t believe he didn‘t know this. “Gray is top, white is bottom.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. There had only been one hamper in the men’s locker room, and it had been full of white uniforms. The women, from what he could see, were divided pretty evenly between white and gray. While Alex didn’t especially care which side of the canoe he sat in, he couldn’t help but feel just a little discriminated against. Maybe the coach is some crazy feminist or something, and she wants the girls to steer? The more he thought about it, the less likely that seemed.

“Here she comes,” Jill whispered as the door opened again, “ready to blow Coach Johnston away?”

“I’ll blow out every candle on her cake,” replied Alex in the most ridiculously macho whisper he could produce.

Jill laughed, shaking her head and putting a hand over her eyes. “That sounded so dirty.”

“Well you sound like you’ve got your mind in the gutter.”

She rolled her eyes with a bit of a blush. Jill seemed to blush as easily as she smiled.

Coach Diane Johnston turned out to be an African American woman, big boned and thickly built, with heavyset features and an impressive musculature that showed through her full gym suit. Alex guessed her age at a very fit and athletic forty.

“Good morning,” her voice was deep and throaty, “welcome, newcomers, and welcome back team. I was very glad to learn how many new faces there would be for this year‘s women‘s paddling team, and I‘m even gladder to see you all for myself. As some of you know, this is only the third year we‘ve had a team, and I hope with this many of you we can finally go all the way to nationals.”

Alex did a double take. Did she just say women’s paddling team? He could have sworn she said that. He quickly looked around at the other two guys; they looked kind of nervous and jumpy, but they hadn’t left the room. And there was a hamper of uniforms in the men’s locker room, wasn’t there? Alex felt the uncomfortable, visceral sensation that comes with not knowing if you’ve just made a major screw-up.

“Most of you know that we compete in three separate events,” Coach Johnston went on, pacing in front of her lined-up protégés, “timed, endurance, and skit paddling. Every pair is expected to participate in at least two of those events, but as your coach, I‘ll appreciate it if you try for all three. There are some different skillsets involved in each one - especially the skits, which take a little drama acting - but when you‘ve gotten yourself into the right headspace, you‘ll find they can all be mastered.”

Alex wasn’t sure he understood three consecutive words that she was saying. All this talk of acting skits and headspace, and still not a drop of water in sight? The writhing in his stomach got worse when Johnston walked past him. The more he watched her, the more Alex realized what an impressive figure of a woman Diane was. Her very dark complexion and classic, African lips worked a strange kind of chemistry with her domineering voice and body language, reminding Alex again of just how tightly his trunks fit him. Great, Alex thought as he tried to get ahold of himself, my arms are skinny, I look like a dork in this suit, and now if I‘m not careful I‘m going to burst out of these goddamned hotpants things in front of the whole bridge club, or whatever the hell this is.

Alex was grateful when Diane clapped her hands sharply and told them to start doing warmups. After however many stretches, pushups, jumping jacks, and situps, Diane told them all to pair back up, each veteran team member making sure that there were no free neophytes before picking another of their own. Jill happily took Alex by the arm and led him to the right side of the gym, where the other newbie teams were concentrated. Leaning against the bleachers were a number of armless folding chairs, and before them was a large, white box. Diane positioned herself by these before speaking again.

“Since some of you haven‘t done this before, I‘m going to demonstrate before you start. Everyone watch me very carefully, especially prospective tops. If you don‘t pay attention, you could end up hurting your bottom, and then its off the team.” She looked much more serious as she said this bit, looking back and forth to make eye contact with every single student. Despite apparently being a “bottom,” Alex recoiled a bit from her stare.

“Courtney, come here.”

A big, slightly chubby girl in a gray uniform reading “01: Courtney” came forward. She was only around average height, but with a very thick, heavy figure; a stocky mixture of muscle and pudge. She was cute, in an unconventional way: Greek features, big bust, and - most apparently from where Alex was standing - what had to be the largest rear end in proportion to the rest of her body that Alex had ever seen. Despite having a fitted uniform, her gray trunks were tight in the back, making each mighty bounce and wobble only too visible as she walked. Alex mentally slapped himself again and looked back up. He noticed Jill watching him coyly out of the corner of her eye. It was now his turn to blush.

“Courtney Aniksos is your team captain. Courtney’s normally a top, but as captain she’s going to play the bottom for me.”

Courtney grinned and curtsied. A few people laughed.

“Since this is our first practice of the term, we‘re going to spend most of today doing counting exercises. Courtney, set up a chair.”

Courtney grinned sheepishly and looked at the floor. “Yes, ma’am,” she said, before taking one of the folding chairs from the wall and opening it facing the others.

“Ma‘am,” the coach repeated meaningfully, looking into everyone’s eyes again, “from the moment you start the routine, bottoms must address their tops as ‘ma’am’ unless they’re told to do something else. That’s going to be very important for skits, so you’d better get into the habit now.”

As Diane seated herself on the chair, Alex turned his utterly bewildered face up at Jill.

“What the hell is this?” He whispered.

“Shush,” Jill shushed him, looking surprised at his interruption, “this is important, watch!”

Before Alex’s disbelieving eyes, the older woman gave Courtney a cross look and urgently patted her thigh. “Bend over.” Still grinning sheepishly, Courtney leaned over Diane’s lap and planted her hands on the floor, so that she was arched over the coach’s thighs. With a bit of help from Diane, she was soon positioned so that her oversized bottom was resting right over the center of the coach’s lap, its immense, tightly-clothed underside open to Diane’s right.

“Over-The-Knee is the standard position used in American Paddling Association meets. OTK is comfortable for the bottom and gives the top plenty of room to work. If the bottoms can‘t hold still, their tops can restrain them by resting their left arms on the lower back, like this, and leaning in. As you can see, I don’t lean too hard; I want to hold Courtney down, not crush her.”

Leaning over her “bottom,” Diane’s face was held closer to her audience, giving her powerful body an almost predatory silhouette. Courtney was taking deep breaths, as if preparing herself for something strenuous. Diane waved her free right arm a few times to warm it up.

“For longer exercises, we‘ll use a safe word, but to start we‘re just going to do a thirty count warmup and a ten count paddling. For warmups, you cup your hand just a little, and bring it down while flicking your wrist, like your arm is made of leather.”

And then, before Alex could convince himself that this was really happening, Diane brought her slightly-cupped right hand down against Courtney’s upturned buttocks.

Snap!

Courtney jerked a little and let out a soft “ooh…” Alex’s eyes snapped open wide. He looked around at the others. Everyone else was either watching closely, with a mystified excitement or apprehension, or (in the case of the veterans), tapping their toes waiting for the demonstration to be over. Paddling team, Alex thought, paddling team. On the website there was a boating team, and there was a paddling team.

Damnit, I thought it was a typo!

“Remember, the warmup starts out light, just hard enough to sting. Each slap should be just slightly harder than the one before. For beginners, its good technique to switch cheeks every time you slap. Like so.”

Snap! The other side of Courtney’s bulging ass was paid a visit by Coach Diane Johnston’s palm. Courtney’s body shivered again as each ample bottom cheek shook and jiggled under her gray trunks. Alex felt his eyes gluing themselves to Courtney’s besieged backside as its owner gasped. The way Diane made it shake was hypnotic.

“Count your strokes,” Diane advised, “if you have trouble doing that, count out loud. Start with two seconds between strokes - one Mississippi, two Mississippi - and speed up after fifteen. Remember,” she slapped Courtney’s bottom again, “each stroke is just a little harder than the last!”

Her hand came down again on the opposite cheek, and then - almost exactly two seconds later - revisited its twin. Courtney’s trembling and gasps made it clear that these were getting more painful. Five…six…seven…

Alex looked up at Jill. She looked excited, and impatient. Oh god. He was a bottom wasn‘t he? It really was a women‘s paddling team; only women could do the paddling! For Alex, everything seemed to slow down into a waterlogged dream-time. His brain was locked in disbelief. His heart was racing. His eyes were captivated. The only sensation in his body was a growing discomfort down below, as his penis fought to stand up against his tight shorts; he tried to avert his gaze from Courtney’s bouncing ass and Diane’s domineering face, but they wouldn’t obey.

At fifteen, Diane doubled her speed, striking the captain’s big ass every second. Courtney was writhing now, gasping sharply after each loud slap set her immense buttocks dancing. The spanking grew harder, as did the resulting vibrations, and soon Courtney was kicking her legs a little and wincing painfully. The younger girls present all pressed in, eager to see the details of their captain’s chastisement. Some gray-garbed applicants looked excited. Their white-clad counterparts did not. When the thirtieth smack landed, Diane left her hand on Courtney’s quivering, oversized ass and addressed her.

“Fetch me a paddle and get back in position. No rubbing!”

While Diane explained that rubbing or grasping one’s own hindquarters was not permitted during the exercises, Courtney opened the box and took out a big, plastic spanking paddle. It was rectangular, about twelve inches long, and had “American Paddling Association” printed on the blade. Her face hardly betraying the sting she must have felt, Courtney handed the paddle to Diane and climbed obediently back over her lap.

“I want you to count these,” she commanded her victim. Courtney nodded reluctantly. Before Alex’s still-widening eyes, Diane raised the paddle and brought it down right on the very center of Courtney’s fat bottom.

“ONE!”

Courtney’s entire body buckled under the paddle as her massive tush shook like two scoops of jello in a tight, gray wrapping. She was still grimacing with pain from the first stroke when the clear plastic cut into her bottom again, sending the flesh splashing away from the part that it flattened in a great wave. The instant the paddle cracked into her ass, Alex felt the tension in his shorts skyrocket. He tried to stand at an angle that made the bulge less visible, as the coach raised her arm again.

“TWO!”

Diane delivered each paddle lick as soon as Courtney was finished counting the previous one. After five, she stopped for a moment and gently fondled her student’s ass with her left hand, taking her weight momentarily off of Courtney’s back.

“This is why the warm up is important. If I swing like this without getting the blood flowing, I could bruise her for weeks.”

She emphasized this point by making the sixth stroke the hardest so far. Alex’s eyes were glued to the scene as the demonstration came to its end. He had actually lost the sensation in most of his body by the time Diane lifted the paddle after the tenth stroke and told Courtney she could rub now. Jumping to her feet, the team captain quickly enjoyed her new privilege.

“Owww…” she muttered, giving her mentor a look of half-serious reproach as she furiously kneaded her own behind. There was some deliberate drama in the way she conducted herself, but the pain was clearly genuine. Alex winced. Jill looked frighteningly peppy.

Diane stood up and placed the paddle back in the box. “Set up the chairs in a line. New people on this side, veterans over there. There’s enough chairs and paddles for everyone. I’ll be walking past to help you out.”

Courtney hotfooted it back to her partner, hands still clutching her hindquarters. Before Alex knew it, Jill had unfolded a chair toward the end of the line, and was beckoning him toward it. She was already holding a standard issue APA paddle.

“Come on,” said Jill, smiling coyly as she pushed some platinum blonde bangs out of her eyes, “you‘ve got some birthday candles to blow out.”

Alex stammered. Around them, other duos were getting themselves into position. One of the veterans was already positioning someone over her knee.

“Um…”

Jill raised an eyebrow. “Are you feeling alright?”

For a moment, Alex was stuck staring into Jill’s concerned face, trying to articulate the many, many problems he had with this situation. Her large, blue eyes were waiting.

“I…um…I think I may have come to the wrong practice.”

“What?” She gave him a funny look. “You told me you did this in junior high!” She thought for a moment. “Do you mean you thought it was coed? I know, there should really be a boys’ team, but the board of-”

“No,” he said sharply, making her recoil a bit, “I didn‘t think that.” He felt momentarily bad about interrupting her, but the fact that she was about to gleefully beat him with a paddle made Alex less concerned about cordiality. Alex just hoped she didn’t notice that his penis was doing its best to rip his shorts out of its way; watching the demonstration had effected him in a way he wasn‘t comfortable with watching someone in pain effecting him. “I…”

As he looked up into Jill’s curious, blue eyes, he thought carefully. If he explained his mistake, it was doubtful that he would be able to switch into a different team in time for the scholarship cut. While he could probably stall for a few days by visiting the office and making appointments with whatever Dean was in charge of this stuff, that would mean a LOT of hours dealing with the bureaucracy and an even metric fuckton of frustration and headaches. He could tell Coach Johnston his problem and hope she would let him stay on the team without participating until he could switch into something else, but something told him Diane would not appreciate that. And really, it was his own fault he was in this situation. He hadn’t bothered reading the description of this so-called “sport” before signing up for it, and he hadn’t bothered getting his extracurricular taken care of back when everyone else was doing it. Did he really want to start off his college career by throwing his stupid mistakes at other people?

“I…”

Jill looked like she was starting to worry about his health.

“…I didn’t think they were birthday candles. I was expecting more of an anniversary cake.”

For a moment, Jill stared at him in open mouthed disbelief. Then, with a most unladylike snort, she doubled over and started chuckling into her palm.

“I don’t even…” she said between chuckles, her platinum hair rippling around her head, “oh, I‘m going to make you sorry!”

Still giggling and shaking her head, the brobdignagian blonde seated herself in the folding chair, put the paddle down on the floor, and pointed at her lap. “Bend over, goofball.”

Alex stared at her thighs like a political idealist at the guillotine. Was he really going to be…beaten…paddled…oh, enough beating around the bush…spanked by one of his fellow students? By the cupcake girl? Unfortunately, “yes” was the only answer that wouldn’t put his life plans in jeopardy.

Trying not to betray his shame and trepidation, Alex stood to Jill’s right and awkwardly lowered himself over her thighs. He hesitated before putting a hand on her exposed knee (her shorts stopped just above them); she nodded encouragingly, so he put down his hand on her skin to support himself. Just before lying down, he stealthily pulled out his waistband so that his dick could uncoil itself and rest along his belly. Damn, the head was poking out from his waistband, wasn’t it? Praying to every god he had ever heard of that Jill wouldn’t feel that, he put his hands on the floor and let his body rest on her lap. I hope all this blood rushing to my head will drain some out of my cock. After a few seconds, Alex was mortified to learn that it wouldn’t.

“Alright you bad little boy,” Jill chimed as she shifted him over her thighs into just the right position, “I hope you‘re ready for this.”

“Don‘t worry, I want that cake too.”

“Oh please…”

She pushed him a little bit further forward, so that the mysterious protrusion wasn’t digging into her thigh as much. The ill-fitting trunks held Alex’s nates high above his thighs, forming a prominent dome that pointed at the ceiling. His legs and butt really were better toned than the rest of him; Jill had caught occasional glimpses of this in Classics class, but this was the best look she had gotten. She caught herself humming a bit under her breath, and hoped Alex didn’t notice. For his part, Alex felt himself being ground against Jill’s thick lap, her soft skin and the taught musculature beneath very perceptible under the thin fabric. His erection wasn’t going away - being mashed against her legs just seemed to stimulate it. Alex winced. Getting a boner during a presentation in class or something was an acceptable hardship that came with growing up male, but in this situation? Much more unfortunate.

“You comfy?” Jill asked as she rested a firm hand on his back.

“As close as I‘m going to get,” he replied, holding his head a little higher to minimize the dizziness. He was becoming aware that his buttocks were currently the highest part of his body, making them just embarrassingly conspicuous. And vulnerable. A strange shiver whose nature Alex couldn’t quite grasp ran through his flesh.

“Alright!” She said excitedly, “Warm up time!”

The first, forceful handprint appeared on Alex’s right butt, sending a wet, smacking sound into the air. He jumped a little in place; he hadn’t been expecting it yet. The burn took a second to start, but once it did his first impulse was to reach back and grab his mistreated cheek.

“Hey, that‘s not allowed!” Jill intercepted his hand and gripped his wrist, startling him with her strength. “Hands stay on the floor until I say.”

She released his hand, leaning more strongly on his back to remind him who was in charge. As she leaned in, Alex felt a faint glimmer of warmth on his back, which he knew was body heat from her overhanging chest. His face burned as he replaced his hand on the hard floor, but his manhood grew stiffer against her meaty lap.

He was more ready for the next slap, which imparted its sting on his left cheek, and for the third which came again on the right. After that, Jill started spanking harder, and the two Mississippi’s that Alex was counting in his head started being cut off as her pace increased.

“Hey, you‘re speeding up!” He protested, looking back over his shoulder to see her smiling over his helpless body.

“Oh, that‘s just my technique. Diane has the new tops start with doubling speed after fifteen, but once you‘ve learned that you can do all kinds of things.”

She then slapped him three times, very fast, in a row, presumably to make up for the interruption. Alex almost grunted out loud - it was really starting to hurt!

Ten…eleven…twelve…by fifteen, she wasn’t even waiting a second between wristy slaps. Alex grimaced as he felt his body starting to involuntarily cringe away from her hand, grinding him forward into her lap. The thin, soft fabric of their uniform bottoms tickled him as he rolled over it, and the topography of her thighs created an uneven surface that created a kind of massage. If it weren’t for the pain in his ass, the sensation might have even been pleasurable. Seventeen…eighteen…Alex thought she must have been using her full strength now, and Jill was every bit as strong as you’d expect a towering Viking lass to be. He felt her weight crushing him against her thighs as she leaned on her left arm, locking him in place as her right arm swung harder and faster, each burning palm falling on the ones before.

“Awww,” she said as she slapped him twice, very hard, right in the center of his sit spot, “didn‘t - SLAP - you say - SMACK - you‘ve been - SMACK - doing this - WAP since middle school?”

Alex tried to think of a snappy answer, but the merciless smacking and growing pain interfered with his thoughts. By the time she reached thirty, he had lost count; it was all he could do not to cry out or start struggling like a baby.

“I’ll bet your all warmed up,” Jill said, teasing the undersides of his buttcheeks with a gentle fingertip, “now we do some paddlin‘. You ready?”

She leaned over toward his head, causing her thighs to shift under him, which made him twitch electrically. He felt her soft, blonde hair falling lightly on his upper back, and just a trace of breast grazing him further down.

“Um…yeah, ” he shifted his hands around, trying to get his confused body back under his control, “paddle. Like we‘re going up the Mississippi.”

Jill didn’t catch the bitterness or wishful thinking in that last sentence. She just affectionately ruffled his hair and leaned over further (ooh, yes) to grab the paddle from the floor (oh no…). He had an obstructed, over-the-shoulder view of the transparent, acrylic blade being lined up behind him before he felt it press against his stinging buns. The flat of the paddle pushing against his beaten cheeks felt good, for a moment; the pressure helped keep the sting away. An instant later, however, the pressure was gone, and Jill was lifting the American Paddling Association Standard Issue up to shoulder height.

“Playtime’s over,” she half said, half sang as she pushed her considerable weight back onto her left arm, holding him down, “hope you‘re nice and warm back there!”

Alex reflexively tensed his buttocks when he heard the paddle whoosh through the air. When its unbreakable surface impacted his taught flesh, he was immediately sorry he had done that.

CRACK!!!

Alex immediately raised his body like a cobra, legs twitching with the force of the impact. He heard Jill announce “one!” and barely had time to register the second whoosh before a second CRACK landed. The spanking had been painful, but being beaten with something hard and flat on top of already burning flesh?

The third crack came quickly afterward, flattening his buttocks against his hips and forcing those down into Jill’s thighs, crushing his manhood against her thinly-garbed legs more strongly than ever. He felt a shock of stimulation, but it was drowned out by the pain from the other side as she landed another paddle lick, and then another. Alex looked over his shoulder, then around the gym; everyone was busy with their own exercises. Thank god at least no one was watching him like this…

“How are you two doing?” Coach Johnston’s voice came from behind him.

“Great!” Jill exclaimed, mercifully giving her right arm a rest as she looked up at her mentor. “Alex is as a great bottom.” She took her left hand off his back to give that part of his body a playful swat, making him gasp and tighten up. Even a light smack was like pouring gasoline on the raging fire. His eyes felt watery.

“Hmmhmm,” he heard Diane chuckle, “careful you don‘t overdo it. Pace yourself more; give him another second after each lick.”

“Right. I’m sorry, I know this; its been all summer, and I’m out of practice.”

“Don’t worry,” Alex saw Diane flash a brilliantly white smile at Jill, “everyone is. You‘re one of the bests on my team, you‘ll do fine.”

“Thanks.” Jill did her cute, easy blush again.

Alex was about to report on how he was doing, but, at a motion from Diane, Jill raised the paddle again and brought it down for the seventh stroke.

“OW!!!” He finally lost it, shouting in pain at the unexpected, full-force lick. Jill giggled. Diane glared at him disapprovingly for a second, making him turn his burning face back to the floor, before speaking to Jill again.

“Give it a moment now. One…two…eight!”

CRACK!!!

Alex shut his eyes, not wanting to know if the pitiless, older woman was still standing beside his upturned bum, watching it head on as Jill introduced it to the paddle for the ninth and tenth times. His elbows were trembling. His eyelashes felt wet. His underside felt crushed and winded, and his backside was a holocaust of fiery pain.

“Get up and rub.”

Alex awkwardly pried himself out of Jill’s lap and put both hands on his ass. The skintight fabric was holding in the heat, further irritating his inflamed skin with its pressure. It was only a moment before he looked down and noticed that the waistband of his shorts wasn’t quite touching his belly in the very front. He turned his side to jill, praying she hadn’t noticed. How the hell could he still be erect? Perhaps more to the point, why?

“How did I do?” Jill asked excitedly as she stood up.

“Ahhh…” he continued to ruefully rub his ass, turning so that his front was facing the wall, “…great. Best top I‘ve ever had.”

“Awww. Think we can paddle up the Mississippi?”

More like the Amazon.

“Yeah. And back. In..ow…in an evening.”

Alex was relieved that they were given fifteen minutes to recover before the next exercise. He was much less please, however, at the end of that period, when Diane marched in front of her lined up team and announced that it was time for “thirty-lick technique paddling.” No practical demonstration this time; she just explained what had to be done and set them back to work. Once again, Alex found himself across Jill’s ample lap, this time for an unbearable thirty swats from the acrylic paddle. He thought his bottom has been on fire before; now, it was almost numb. On the bright side, his boner at least was starting to lose its enthusiasm. On the dark side, Jill was doing the exact opposite. Toward the end of the exercise, Diane reappeared to watch Jill beat his helpless ass and tell him to keep up the good work. Goddamnit, why did she have to sound so smug when she commented on the mistreatment his lewdly presented butt was enduring?

For the final ten strokes, Jill stood up and put her foot on the chair, making Alex bend over her thigh so she could paddle him over her knee. When she was done, he veritably flew to his feet, stamping his feet and furiously kneading his ass, almost crying with embarrassment. Thank god Diane wasn’t watching at the moment, and everyone else was occupied.

“That’s it for this afternoon,” Diane announced, “I’m happy to say all the newcomers have made the team; you’ll get an email asking for your measurements so we can order fitting uniforms. Bottoms, you’ll each find a cushion in the locker rooms that you can bring to classes with you while your booties are still stinging. I’ll see you all next week!”

…

Alex avoided the other two guys in the locker room. He retreated into one of the shower cubicals and inspected his hindquarters in the mirror. Pink. His skin was bright pink and swollen, with lines battered into the flesh where the edge of the paddle had left its impression. Most embarrassingly, he thought he could make out a number of large, reddish handprints, like some personalized cattle brand, spread out across the rounded undersides of his burning nether cheeks. The shower water stung his beaten ass when he turned on the cold, and burned it when he turned on the hot. He had to grit his teeth and suck in his breath as he quickly went through the shower. Getting dressed again was no fun either; it was all he could do to avoid yelping when he pulled his jeans back up.

As he hurried out of the gym, he thought frantically about how to get out of this. Will they let me switch out before next practice? It’s the early season, people are still adding and dropping activities, right? I swear to god the next time someone tells me the deadlines aren’t important…

On his way out the door, Jill appeared beside him.

“Hey, do you feel like dinner?” She asked, playing a bit with a strand of light blonde hair as she gave him a sideways look.

“Maybe tomorrow. I…uh…have homework.” He avoided making eye contact; he was too humiliated to meet Jill’s gaze after what she had just done to him.

“Oh. Okay.” If he had been looking her in the face, he would have seen her disappointment. “I‘ll Facebook you.”

Jill joined up with Courtney and some of the other girls and headed off in a different direction. Alex power walked back to his dorm, looking around to make sure there was no one looking so he could rub his bottom from time to time. Before he rounded the corner away from the gym, however, he looked back over his shoulder. Jill was walking away with some of the other girls, her tall, broad-shouldered silhouette, trailing platinum hair, and rather large, fleshy bottom bouncing as she stepped. As he watched her retreat, a number of conflicting sensations were felt in Alex’s body. He saw her innocent, girlish smile in his mind’s eye, and then felt the sting of her palm against his ass as she held him down and teased him. For a moment, he wasn’t sure exactly what he was thinking.

He rounded the corner and shook her out of his mind. When he got home, he was going to spend the afternoon on his laptop, trying to determine how and if he could switch out of this so-called “sport” before next week’s butt burning session. After that, he would try and get some sleep. On his stomach.