daisy3

"Hey, pissy pants!" the girl across the table from Daisy jeers as Shanna
Collins passes on her way to put up her lunch dishes. "Need a diaper
change?"

The redhead stares at the floor and bites her lower lip, which has already
been chewed bloody.

"Shut up, Brenda!" Daisy snaps.

"Huh?" Brenda says, puzzled. "She wet her bed last night. I know it for a
fact because Debbie Murphy had laundry duty this morning, and--"

"And I said lay off!" Daisy snarls, much to her own surprise. "Enough is
enough!"

"Who died and made you God?" Brenda demands. "Since when did you start
sticking up for Shanna anyway?"

"Since now. The next chick who gives her any crap gets a faceful of
knuckles. And you can tell that to Debbie Murphy and all your bitchy little
blabbermouth friends."

Daisy doesn't make threats she won't back up, and Brenda knows it. So the
bewildered blond grabs her lunch tray and storms away from the table,
leaving Daisy to wonder why she had come to the rescue of a girl who had, up
till now, been her sworn enemy. Is she going soft or something?

No, she decides, it isn't that. But Shanna looks totally licked, and when
somebody hits the ground and stays down, the fight is over.

It isn't over for Mrs. Rice, though. Daisy's eyes and ears have been open
all morning, but she still hasn't found a way to get even with the teacher
who tanned her hide in math class yesterday.

Then Mrs. Bradwell, the school shrink, plunks herself down with a cup of
coffee beside the math teacher at the staff table.

"I love your blouse, Sheila." The shrink stirs sugar into her coffee.
"Where did you get it?"

"From the new boutique over in Hunterville." Mrs. Rice smiles. "I picked
up a ton of stuff there last weekend."

"Are the prices good? Maybe I'll pop in there after work," the shrink says.

"Oh, Liz, you have to!" The math teacher giggles like a teenager with a hot
secret. "There's a grand opening ad in the latest issue of the local style
magazine. In fact, I think I have the magazine in my top desk drawer."

"I'll come by your classroom later to check it out." The shrink sips her
coffee, then dumps in more sugar. "You know me, always on the prowl for a
bargain."

"My last class ends at four-thirty." Mrs. Rice sighs. "I need a day off.
I'm not teaching girls in this school, I'm teaching monkeys."

"Well, honey, this monkey is about to teach you something," Daisy mutters.
She carries her lunch dishes to the bus cart and hurries out of the dining
hall.

Daisy glances back to make sure nobody is following her, then dashes down
the basement stairs. She tries the door to the storage closet at the foot
of the steps. She's kind of disappointed when the knob turns easily. No
challenge.

She flips on the light in the closet. Working fast, she pushes aside a
bundle of rags on one of the high shelves. She stands on tiptoe and grabs a
box of trash bags that had been hidden behind the rags. There are a few
black plastic bags in the box--but underneath, yes. Daisy lifts out a half
a dozen magazines with dirty pictures on their covers.

Her friend Karen had been right. After a trip to reform school last summer,
the klutzy shoplifter had told stories about gray-haired Mr. Jephers, the
janitor, getting his thrills out of raunchy magazines in the basement
cleaning closet. Daisy hadn't touched his stash before today. If all the
poor old geezer did for fun was sneak off during his coffee breaks to gawk
at nasty pictures, he might as well be left to drool in peace. But Daisy is
in need now. She takes the smuttiest mag of the bunch, resolving to return
it if she gets a chance.

She tucks the other mags back in the box, covers them with the trash bags,
and slides the box into place on the top shelf. She arranges the pile of
rags in front of the box so it looks like nothing has been messed with.
Then she stuffs the borrowed magazine in her backpack and rushes back
upstairs.

By the time the school bell rings, Daisy is in the library, trying to work
on a book report. Eventually, she gives up and watches the black hands on
the wall clock crawling around its white plastic face. When the class is
well under way, she walks up to the counter where the librarian is sitting.

"Miss Barber, I need to hit the restroom. How about a pass?"

"Daisy, you really should have taken care of that during your lunch break."

"I know, I know. But please, can I have a pass?" Daisy flashes her best
smile. "It's sort of a female thing."

"Well, all right then." The librarian scrawls something on a slip of paper
and hands it to Daisy. "That's good for ten minutes, not a second more."

Daisy gives Miss Barber a curt nod of thanks and heads out the door. She
peeks into the staff lounge across the hall from the library and sees her
math teacher marking up a thick stack of papers with a red pen. Fine, Mrs.
Rice won't head back to her classroom for a while.

Daisy sprints down the empty hallway. Glancing quickly over her shoulder,
she ducks into the math room and eases the door closed. She makes a beeline
for the top desk drawer.

There it is, the style magazine with an ad for the new boutique in
Hunterville right inside the front cover. Daisy slips the fashion mag into
her backpack and takes out the one she borrowed from the janitor. Won't
Mrs. Bradwell, the shrink, be shocked at what the math teacher keeps in her
desk!

The classroom door bursts open. Daisy jumps at the sudden sound and looks
up, horrified, to see a pair of irate black eyes boring into hers.

"Don't move!" The principal, Mr. Landon, charges across the room toward her
like a speeding freight train. "Exactly why are you snooping in that desk
drawer?"

"I--I, um, I was just--" Daisy falters and trails off. She curses herself
silently for getting caught like a mouse in a trap.

Mr. Landon snatches the magazine out of her hands. One look tells him
everything he needs to know.

"You were going to plant this piece of filth in the drawer, hoping it would
get Mrs. Rice in trouble!"

Daisy doesn't say a word. She has regained her composure, and she stares
coolly at the red-faced Mr. Landon.

"Answer me, Daisy Lane!" He waves the smutty magazine under her nose. "You
decided to set up your math teacher, didn't you? I heard about the way she
spanked you yesterday!"

"So what about it?"

"What about it?" A pair of pulsing veins pop out on the neck of the furious
principal. "Just this, you sneaky little lowlife! The thrashing you have
coming will make the one you got yesterday look like a Sunday picnic!"

"Chill out, man. You're liable to burst into flames if you turn any
redder."

"Where did you get this vulgar magazine?"

"I can't tell you that."

"Really?" Mr. Landon grabs Daisy by the shoulder. "You damn well better
tell me before you take another breath!"

Daisy presses her lips together. She's dead meat, no doubt about it, but
she won't snitch on the janitor.

"I asked you a question!" the principal thunders, shaking Daisy savagely.
"Do I have to whip the truth out of you?"

"I wish you wouldn't, Mr. Landon."

The principal throws the magazine on the floor. He unbuckles his belt and
yanks it from around his waist. Daisy doesn't move. The rage in the eyes
of the principal roots her to the spot. It isn't frustration or
disappointment or even simple anger--it's deep, disgusted fury.

Mr. Landon bends Daisy roughly over the teacher's desk. He pins her upper
body in place with one hand and strips the clothes off her lower half with
the other. In an instant, her skirt and slip, as well as her hose and
panties, are bunched around her ankles. She tries to protest as the cool
air raises gooseflesh on her bare buttocks and legs, but the words jam up in
her throat. Her brain is scrambling around in her skull like a squirrel on
steroids.

"You think you're tough, don't you?" Mr. Landon raises his belt past his
shoulder and cracks it down across Daisy's quivering bottom. Daisy gasps
and shudders. "How many times have I punished you in the last three months?
you haven't learned a thing, have you? Not a thing!" Again the strap
lands. Daisy whimpers, and a third scorching blow sets her flesh ablaze.
"And how many stupid stunts have you pulled around here that nobody knows
about?" Mr. Landon smacks the belt rapidly, six or seven times in a row,
onto first one of Daisy's cheeks and then the other. "Sooner or later,
young lady, you have to pay the piper!"

"Okay, I paid! I paid!" Daisy cries out. "Oh my God, it hurts! It hurts
so bad!"

"Good! You need it!" The principal cuts loose with another volley of
blows. "Where did you get the magazine?"

"Please, I can't say, Mr. Landon!" Daisy wails. "Oh, stop, stop! It burns
like hell!"

"I don't know why I waste my time on girls like you! You'll never amount to
anything, no matter what I do!" The belt rises and falls, rises and falls.
Daisy can hardly catch her breath between her moans and squeals. "I knew
from the first day I saw you that you were a lost cause! If you won't clean
up your own act, by God, I'll do it for you! And the state of Texas will
thank me!" The blows rain down, faster and faster. "The world doesn't need
sleazy little gutter rats like you running around! No better than vermin!"

Daisy writhes and strains in agony, pounding the desk with her clenched
fists, and her feet kick free of the panties and hose to do a dance of their
own on the linoleum floor. Mr. Landon is in a frenzy now, putting all the
force he can muster behind the swinging strap, layering dozens of wicked red
welts on top of the day-old bruises left by the math teacher.

Somewhere in the furnace of his wrath, the principal loses touch with
reality. He no longer sees a juvenile delinquent with a lousy attitude bent
over the desk in front of him. He sees the hundreds, maybe thousands, of
girls who have passed, unchanged, through the reform school over the years.
Waves of discouragement pour out of his heart, down his arm, through the
thick leather belt, and into the skin of the bawling teenager on the desk.

Daisy crosses a line, too. She goes beyond regret, beyond fear and anger,
to a place where there is only bitter hatred. She shrieks and howls as blow
after merciless blow descends upon her, but inside she has gone numb.

Finally, weariness overtakes the principal. The muscles in his shoulder
ache, and his arm feels heavy. He lets go of Daisy and mops the sweat off
his face with his shirt sleeve. Then he puts on his belt and stalks
silently out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Daisy crumples to
the floor in a haze of tears.

She has no idea how long she huddles, trembling, next to the desk. Time
seems to have stopped. She curls up like a caterpillar and clasps her hands
around her knees.

The girl feels someone touch her gently on the shoulder. She looks up into
a pair of concerned brown eyes. A well-built man in boots and blue jeans is
squatting beside her.

"Sweet Jesus!" he says. "Your backside is as raw as a hunk of hamburger."

Daisy reaches involuntarily out to the stranger, who takes her in his arms.
He holds her tightly and strokes her hair while she cries, long and hard,
with her face buried in his faded work shirt.

"Okay, honey, dry your eyes now," he tells her when she runs out of sobs.
"I need to get you dressed before anybody else walks in on you."

Daisy starts to come to her senses as strong hands slide her panties and
hose over her feet and up her calves. She yips and jerks away from her
rescuer as the cloth touches the seared skin on the backs of her thighs.

"I know, sweetheart, it hurts. Can you stand up? That's it, now put on
your slip and skirt."

"Who the hell are you?" Daisy asks, snatching her clothes from the stranger.
"I don't need nobody babying me."

"I'm a security guard, usually on the night shift." The man holds out his
hand. "Stan Brown. And your name?"

"None of your business!" Daisy ignores the outstretched hand. "What are
you doing here?"

"Just making my rounds. Don't worry, nobody has to know I found you like
this."

"Good, because I'm leaving!" Daisy is suddenly hacked off. "You shouldn't
have barged in on me while I was half naked!"

"It's lucky I did, because two or three dozen math students will fill this
room in less than five minutes." The guard straightens the collar on
Daisy's blouse. "Who took a strap to you?"

"Mr. Landon."

"And was it because of this revolting magazine?"

"Yeah, sort of. Why do you care?"

"Because my daughter is about your age, and if I caught her looking at trash
like this, I'd warm her buns for it." The man rips up the magazine and
tosses the pieces into the wastebasket. "But the principal went way too
far. Shall we go to the infirmary?"

"No!" Daisy stares the stranger straight in the eye. "And don't you tell
anybody! Don't you dare!"

"All right, your secret is safe, though I'd give my next paycheck to have
Dwight Landon by the throat right now." The guard hands Daisy a tissue.
"Go wash your face and get on with your afternoon. And stay out of trouble,
at least till your skin cools."

Daisy shoots the man a dirty look and then, with her chin high, she grabs
her backpack, slips into her loafers, and walks out of the room. She's on
her own. Mr. Landon had kept whaling on her long after she was totally
licked, long after the fight was over. So from now on, it'll be Daisy Lane
against the world. Daisy might not win, but she'll put up a hell of a
scrap. And she better forget the comfort she found in the calm heartbeat of
the security guard as he cradled her against his chest. She'll never let
anybody get that close to her again. Trusting people isn't worth it, she
decides, because all they want to do in the end is break you.

Daisy Lane, 10-2000