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| Preface: | Written in response to the aptly named “Tea Room’s Holiday Prompts Challenge.” I’m grateful for the invitation and for the prompting to provide another seasonal tale.  The story is a standalone, but it will mean much more if you read the first Christmas story I wrote, “Season’s Heatings.”As always, feedback is both welcome and appreciated. |
Once again, we come to the Holiday Season, a deeply religious time that each of us observes, in his own way, by going to the mall of his choice. ~Author Unknown
by Alyx
Perhaps it was her hormones, but Noelle just hated the Christmas season. The horrible crowds, the terrible parking, the frustrating salespeople – when you could find one!
“But you LOVE Christmas!” her partner Paige had said disbelievingly.
“I used to love Christmas,” Noelle corrected her. “That was before this horrible recession.”
Paige had nodded in sympathy. Their good friend Sara had recently gotten laid off from work, and Paige knew Noelle was feeling a bit depressed about it. They’d agreed not to exchange Christmas gifts with her this year, but it affected Noelle’s normal enthusiasm for Christmas shopping.
“We shouldn’t be buying any gifts either,” she grumbled now as they wove between the crowds at the nearby mall. “One of us could lose our job at any moment.”
Paige gave her a bracing hug. “Sweetie, you know our jobs are perfectly secure. And I feel as bad about Sara as you do, but we can’t boycott Christmas because of it. Can you imagine how disappointed your nieces and nephews would be not to get anything from their favorite aunty?”
“They have too much stuff already,” was Noelle’s reply. “Spoiled brats.”
Paige ignored that, because she knew under normal circumstances her partner doted on those kids. “If you like, you and I could not exchange gifts this year.”
Noelle stopped short and stared at her with an outraged expression. “What! You’re not going to get me a present???”
Paige bit back a smile. “It was just a suggestion,” she said mildly. “But I can see you don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“There better be a big package from you with my name on it under the tree, that’s all I’m saying,” Noelle responded, menace in her tone.
“Stop worrying about your present and start worrying about the ones you have to buy for your family,” Paige said. “I’d like to get all our shopping done today, if possible.”
Noelle winced as a piercing shriek cut through the air. Nearby, a child pulled out of his mother’s grasp and collapsed on the ground, screeching and flailing wildly. He had clearly reached his own shopping limit.
“Me too,” she said, trying to be heard over the din. “Why don’t we split up and meet back here at 12:00 for lunch?”
It was just after 11:00 when Noelle emerged triumphantly from her third toy store with several shopping bags. She was frazzled and tired, and her arms were being pulled from their sockets by the weight of the bags she carried, but she had managed to buy presents for all her nieces and nephews. She had even had some time to pick out Paige’s gift.
Paige wasn’t easy to shop for, because she tended to purchase what she needed when she needed it. But when Noelle passed the little apparel shop and saw the gorgeous cashmere sweater on the mannequin in the window, she knew she had found the right gift. It was soft as a caress, in a rich dark teal that would suit Paige’s coloring perfectly. Best of all, it would keep her girlfriend warm and feel yummy to snuggle up against on those chilly winter afternoons.
She’d gone in and purchased it immediately, then left it to be wrapped while she finished her shopping. Now back an hour later, she walked to the back of the store where a lone employee was doing the wrapping. She was disturbed to see her bag lying on the counter where she had left it, apparently untouched.
“Hi, I came to pick up my purchase.” Noelle said, crossing her fingers. “I left it here an hour ago?”
“What?” The young woman behind the counter looked up through bleary eyes which were heavily mascara’d. She had magenta hair and a pierced eyebrow, and was nearly hidden behind a pile of shopping bags and wrapping paper. “Uh...oh yeah...it’s here somewhere.” She searched through the mess surrounding her, stopping several times to remove the bits of tape and ribbon which stuck to her fingers.
“You should keep your work space a little neater,” Noelle couldn’t help remarking.
“Huh?” The young woman stopped what she was doing to gape at her.
“Never mind. Just give me my package, please.” Noelle tried to keep her tone polite.
“Here.” The young woman – whose nametag proclaimed her to be “Tatiana How May I Serve You?”– handed over a long narrow box which might have contained a necktie or belt.
“That isn’t mine.” Noelle frowned at her.
“Are you sure?”
“I bought a sweater. Does that look like it’s big enough to hold a sweater?!”
Tatiana gazed at it for at least half a minute. The ticking of her mental mechanism could almost be heard between slow blinks. “Um.....no?”
“No,” Noelle confirmed, through gritted teeth. “Besides, I can see my package over there.” She pointed.
The young woman made her way over to the bag and gazed inside. “Yep, that’s it,” she confirmed. “It’s a sweater.” She pulled it out to show Noelle. “It’s not wrapped yet.”
“I can see that,” Noelle replied tartly. “Well, when do you think it will be? I dropped it off an hour ago!”
Tatiana’s face settled into an expression that made Noelle’s palm itch. “I’m like, very busy,” she complained in a put-upon tone. “I’m the only wrapper here and I have masses to do and like, I barely had time for my break this morning and—“
Noelle held up her hand, hoping to forestall the list of complaints. “Spare me. Just let me know when you’ll be finished and I’ll come back.”
“Uh...like...40 minutes?”
“It’s going to take that long?!” When Tatiana took a deep breath and appeared about to launch into another rendition of her trials and tribulations, Noelle continued hastily. “Never mind, that’s fine. I’ll be back at 11:40.”
She exited the shop and tried to quell her annoyance. “’Tis the season to be jolly,” she reminded herself. But really, the incompetence of saleshelp these days!
Noelle attempted to do a bit of window-shopping while she waited, but soon found herself collapsing on a nearby bench and simply staring into the distance. She had the same shell-shocked expression found on the faces of her fellow shoppers, all of them on overload from the crowds and garish colors and cacophony surrounding them. She really hated Christmas shopping.
Eventually she looked at her watch and saw that it was time to pick up Paige’s gift. She stood up with difficulty, as her packages now seemed twice as heavy as before, and made her way back to the store. Tatiana was just as Noelle had left her, rummaging under her mess with the speed of a snail.
“Hi, I’m back again for my package.”
“Huh? Oh yeah, here you go.” She handed over the same narrow box she tried to give Noelle earlier.
“That’s not my package! I told you, I bought a sweater.” Noelle counted to ten under her breath.
“Are you sure?”
“Am I sure I know what I bought?! Of course I’m sure!” Noelle glared at her, not bothering to hide her irritation.
“Well, ‘cause...like...that’s the only box left.”
“What! What do you mean? Are you saying you don’t have my package?!”
“It’s not this one, is it?” Tatiana lifted up a bag which contained several pairs of trousers. “Because I haven’t wrapped this yet.”
“No, I told you, it’s a SWEATER!”
The salesgirl frowned in puzzlement as she went through the remaining packages, none of which had been wrapped. Noelle leaned over the counter and searched with her, a growing sense of dismay developing in the pit of her stomach.
“I don’t believe it, you’ve LOST my package!”
Tatiana scratched her head. “That’s impossible. Are you sure you didn’t pick it up already?”
“If I had picked it up already, would I be back here NOW, you idiot!?!” Noelle’s voice breached the upper registers, and the other customers in the store looked up in surprise.
The younger woman flushed defensively. “Well, you might’ve forgotten.”
“I haven’t forgotten what I bought, and I haven’t forgotten whether I picked it up already. YOU have either lost or stolen it, and I won’t stand for this! Where is your manager?!”
“Can I help you?” No doubt drawn by the commotion, a kindly-looking older woman appeared suddenly at Tatiana’s elbow. “My name is Ms. Natale, and I’m the store manager.”
“Yes, I bought a sweater here two hours ago, and left it to be wrapped. And now this...this...employee of yours has lost it!”
“Shall we go into my office to discuss this?” Ms. Natale said soothingly. “I’m sure we can straighten this out.”
Noelle looked at her watch. “I have to meet my partner in 10 minutes.”
“Don’t worry, I will make sure we get this settled before then,” the manager assured her.
Noelle followed Ms. Natale off to the side, preceding her past a door which indeed confirmed her status as “Store Manager.” Noelle took a seat on the other side of the desk, loaded her shopping bags on the seat next to her, and prepared to launch into a diatribe about the ill-equipped, unqualified, and inept Tatiana. Instead she found herself gasping in shock.
Across from her, on the other side of the desk, was not the short, stout, gray-haired woman she had followed earlier. Instead, the woman facing her was younger and slimmer, with full lips and eyes the color of raw umber. There was a very familiar gleam in them, a gleam that made Noelle’s breathing hitch.
“You!” She looked around wildly for the manager. “What happened to Ms. Natale?!”
Kris regarded her with a raised brow. “I am Ms. Natale. Among other names. But you don’t really need an introduction, do you?”
“But you didn’t look like her! I mean, she didn’t look like you! I would never have—“ Noelle broke off as she realized the thought was better left unsaid: I would never have followed if I had known it was YOU!
For although this time Kris was attired in a designer business suit rather than a Santa’s costume, Noelle remembered her all too clearly. She also remembered what happened the last time they had met...not quite a year ago.
“You’re not supposed to come till Christmas Eve!” Noelle said in an aggrieved tone.
Kris sat down and placed her elbows on the padded armrests, her hands coming together till her fingertips touched, and looked over at Noelle thoughtfully. “I will be making my usual visit at the usual time,” she said. “However, I had a suspicion that you might not be waiting for me this year.”
Noelle blushed. It was true that this time she had vowed not to leave the safety of her bed till Christmas morning. “I’ve been good this year!” she burst out.
“Have you? We’ll see about that.” Kris stood up then and walked around to Noelle’s side of the desk. Noelle rose up in alarm and tried to back away, but there was nowhere to go. Before she knew what was happening, Kris had her bent over the desk, arms splayed out in front of her.
“Hold onto the opposite edge,” came the instruction. And suddenly Noelle found herself grasping the edge of the desk for dear life, unable to let go. The desk was a large one, and being stretched over it meant her feet barely touched the floor. Nevertheless, when she was told to “Raise your hips a bit” she felt her hips lifting in response to that authoritative voice, almost as if she was being aided by unseen hands.
But the hands which unzipped her jeans and tugged them down to her knees were familiar enough – last year they had made short work of her pajama bottoms and then lit a fire in her hindquarters which could still be felt the next morning! Those hands returned to the waistband of her panties. Noelle could not hold back a groan as the last vestige of her dignity and protection was drawn slowly but smoothly down to join her trousers. She felt her hips held firmly as she was lowered back down and settled on the desk.
Noelle lay propped up, bare-bottomed and miserable, awaiting the recounting of her transgressions of the past year. Things could not get any worse. At least that’s what she thought until the taller woman left her to walk back around to the other side of the desk. Before Noelle’s horrified gaze, she pulled open a drawer and extracted a ruler. Not just any ruler. This ruler was made out of a thin strip of stainless steel, backed by an even thinner strip of cork. Noelle actually used one like it in her own office – it was indestructible and stung like hell. That is, it had stung like hell the one time Noelle couldn’t resist testing it on her palm. After that she had no desire to discover what it felt like anywhere else, but it appeared that Fate, in the form of Mother Christmas, was determined that she should find out.
Kris returned to Noelle’s side. She put down the ruler and reached for something on the desk which Noelle had not noticed till now – a large book, covered in brown leather. When Kris opened it Noelle could see it was filled with handwritten entries, script flowing in beautiful penmanship across the page, thick black ink and neatly lined columns.
“Now then, let’s just see how good you have been, shall we?”
Noelle’s eyes widened. She strained to get a better look, but it was impossible to read from her angle. She could barely make out two column headings: “Naughty” and “Nice.” Her heart began to thump in her chest.
Kris was shaking her head and tutting. “Oh dear. I would’ve thought that you’d’ve learned your lesson from last year, Noelle.”
“But I have, I have!”
“There seems to be a definite problem with losing your temper,” Kris continued, turning the page. “Especially when,” she frowned, “driving.”
Oh-oh. “It’s those other drivers on the road,” Noelle protested weakly. “I’m just trying to make sure I get to work on time!”
“That doesn’t explain the number of incidents in parking lots,” Kris said.
Noelle winced. Parking lots were a particular downfall of hers.
“There was some loss of temper in fights with Paige, as well.”
“She started it!”
Kris sighed. “I can see our chat last year made very little impression on you. Let’s hope we can get to the bottom of things this time, mm?” She picked up the ruler. Noelle felt a warm hand pressing down on the small of her back, and the coolness of the metal as it was measured across the crown of her derrière. Then it left and a line of fire took its place. THWACK!
“Oooow!” Noelle barely had time to squeak her distress when the second stroke fell, just a few millimeters below the first. And then a third, and a fourth. Kris’s timing was deliberate...and relentless. A few seconds between swats insured that the maximum amount of scorching heat had time to blossom before the next one landed. It took six strokes to cover the area from the base of her spine to the crease between buttock and thigh, and by then Noelle was yelling outright. She knew from past experience that no one would hear her cries, which was a blessing in this case because with the office door behind her, the sight she presented wasn’t one she wanted to share with anyone.
“You will not drive recklessly, nor lose your temper in parking lots,” Kris was saying sternly, as the ruler traveled inexorably back up the way it had come. THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!
“I won’t, I won’t!” Noelle shouted, as her hips churned to escape the terrible burning.
“You will watch your tongue when arguing with Paige.” Another six lines of flame licked her bottom before Kris paused for her answer.
“I will, I will!” Noelle shrieked, her legs kicking, their movement hampered by her jeans and underwear. The punishment resumed.
“No more shirking your share of the housework.” THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!
Noelle had no words left, she was howling in a red sea of pain. The steel ruler was thin enough to flex like a whip, but wide enough to impact a solid swath of flesh. There was almost no weight behind it – it was pure sting. After a few minutes, Noelle realized the whacking had ceased, the ruler coming to rest against her flaming buttocks.
“I am being harsher this year than last,” Kris was saying quietly, “because I’m really disturbed about your temper. Whatever the reason or reasons for it, you need to take care of it. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, yes, I do,” Noelle wailed hastily. “And I will, I definitely will!”
“The way you shouted at Tatiana out there, for instance, was really shameful,” Kris reproved her.
And then Noelle learned just how bad her recklessness had gotten, because the words which emerged from her mouth were completely outside of her control.
“Oh, give me a break! Even you have to admit the girl is an absolute moron!”
A thousand alarm bells went off in Noelle’s head in the silence that followed, but of course it was already too late. Kris sighed deeply.
“Haven’t quite learned your lesson, I see. All right, up you get.” And suddenly Noelle was able to release her hold on the desk and stand upright. But before she could even think about rubbing out the inferno in her backside, her world tilted again and she found herself staring at the industrial gray carpet from her position over Kris’s lap.
“No, wait! That was a mistake!”
But her words were barely heard over the walloping that followed, the sound of flesh against flesh. No more lecturing, just a flurry of smacks that increased the heat in her cheeks even more, if that was possible. Kris’s palm was softer than the ruler, but heavier, and her hand molded itself to Noelle’s curves in such a way that no inch was spared her attention. The spanking was forceful, and thorough, and the ringing of the swats, along with Noelle’s cries, filled the office.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it! I’ll apologize! Pleeeease!”
When the spanking ended Noelle lay there, breathing hard and fighting tears. Her bottom was throbbing violently, but the tears were more a release than anything else. Kris was rubbing her back gently.
“Slate’s all clean for this year,” she said in a comforting manner. “And next year – I’m expecting just to be dropping off presents....do you hear me?”
A mode of address Noelle never used before slipped out. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Good.”
Kris helped her back to her feet, handed her a tissue, and assisted her in restoring her clothing, smiling sympathetically at Noelle’s whimper over the scrape of fabric against her smarting bottom. The taller woman examined her face, ran her fingers through Noelle’s hair to tidy it a bit, then stepped back with a nod. “You’ll do.”
Noelle gathered up her packages, feeling very vulnerable and unable to look her admonisher in the eye. She glanced at her watch and stared in disbelief. A mere five minutes had passed!
“You still have plenty of time to meet Paige,” Kris confirmed. “And here, I believe you’ll want to have this with you.” She handed over a beautifully wrapped package.
“Is that....?” Noelle couldn’t finish.
“The sweater. And she’ll love it.”
“Thank you,” she said weakly.
Noelle was still feeling rather shaky when she met Paige a few minutes later, but her partner didn’t seem to notice anything amiss.
“Wow, looks like you got a lot accomplished – good for you! I’m starving, where do you want to eat lunch?”
“How about the coffee shop downstairs?”
Paige looked puzzled. “I thought you said their food wasn’t very good?”
“They have very soft chairs.”
Paige chuckled. “Your feet giving out on you, huh? Mine too. Okay, let’s go.” She headed cheerily off toward the escalators, whistling along with the Christmas carol which was being piped over the mall speakers. Noelle stifled a groan as she recognized the song being played: “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.”
Jolly Old Saint Nicholas, my foot! She blew a mental raspberry in the direction of a certain apparel shop. And I used to love Christmas. Bah humbug.
The End