The Outsider
Copyright 2009 by EC
EC's Erotic Art & Fiction - http://www.ecgraphicarts.com/
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(warnings: language, adult themes, public nudity, sex between adults)

Chapter 16 – Black Friday

During the four days she spent in Salinas over Thanksgiving break, Ruthie got 
very little rest.  She spent a good portion of Thanksgiving Day looking after Rosa 
and trying to make sure she didn’t get a hold of any more Tequila.  Ruthie plied 
her with water and Coke, trying to get her to sober up before she went to sleep.  
She became very angry at her cousin, not only for being drunk at a family 
gathering, but also for her decision to join the military.  Still, Ruthie realized that 
dealing with Rosa gave her something to do for the rest of the day, something to 
keep her occupied and away from her family’s other problems.  

At sundown Ruthie figured that her cousin was sober enough that she could be 
safely put to bed.  Rosa stumbled into the bathroom one last time, and then passed 
out on her bed.  Ruthie was both worried and disgusted, never having seen her 
cousin so drunk before.  She lay down on top of the room’s other bed, but had a 
hard time getting to sleep because of the noise from outside.  Besides being 
bothered by the noise, it was hard for her to get comfortable because she was not 
used to sleeping in her clothes.

Ruthie knew that she needed to get as much rest as she could early on, because at 
2:30 am her mother woke up both younger women and told them to get into one 
of the cars.  They groaned in protest as Do?a Lisette shook them awake.  Rosa 
still was hung-over and Ruthie dreaded the day that lay ahead.

A few minutes later, two carloads of Ruthie’s family and an extra pick-up truck 
joined a long line of cars moving towards the Watsonville Mega-Center.  Yes, 
indeed…Ruthie had been drafted by her mother to participate in the most 
disgusting holiday spectacle of all, shopping on Black Friday.  

Ruthie had gone through Black Friday shopping enough times to know what to 
expect.  There would be a two-hour wait in line in a dark parking lot before the 
doors opened at 5:00 am, then the mad dash to the electronics section to try to get 
sales items “while supplies lasted”, then the endless pushing and grabbing in the 
clothing department, a stop at the Christmas decorations, and finally a stop to buy 
cartloads of food.  The whole day would consist of standing in line and jostling 
other people.  For someone like Ruthie, who tended to be claustrophobic in 
restricted crowded spaces, Black Friday shopping was pure torment.

The family took their places in a very long line that wrapped around the Mega-
Mart.  She looked at her cousin’s pale sick face, then listened to several people 
ahead of her group argue whether or not it was “fair” for a person to leave the line 
and expect to get back in.  She listened to unhappy children whining or crying, 
and to several arguments in both English and Spanish.  

Rosa was in a horrible mood from her hangover, Ruthie was in a horrible mood 
because she did not want to be anywhere near a Mega-Mart at 3:00 in the morning 
on Black Friday, and the older women were in bad moods because they felt their 
daughters were being ungrateful and uncooperative.  Ruthie looked around.  
Already there were thousands of other uncomfortable and irritated shoppers lined 
up in the parking lot.  The mood of the crowd was not pleasant at all.  

The minutes dragged by and the line behind Ruthie’s family grew ever larger and 
ever more restless.  Shoppers jostled at the building’s entrance and began pushing 
to better position themselves to get in quickly.  Ruthie started having a bad feeling 
about what was going to happen the moment the Mega-Mart employees finally 
opened the doors.  She wanted to beg her relatives to give up on the shopping trip, 
but the only person she felt she could talk to was her cousin.  Rosa replied:

“When we get in there, the only place I’m going is the bathroom.”

“Rosa, I don’t like this.  Too many people…and they don’t have any security out 
here.”

Rosa waved off her cousin’s concerns.

“We go through this shit every year.  It’s always the same.  Nothing’s gonna 
happen.”

A half an hour later the doors opened and the crowd surged forward.  There was a 
crush as the group pushed towards the entrance.  Bodies pressed ever more tightly 
against Ruthie and Rosa.  It became hard to breathe and Ruthie lost sight of her 
mother.  She could tell that Rosa was frightened by the sudden pressure on her 
body from the crowd.  Ruthie was apprehensive as well, but she was not 
surprised.  Her pessimistic outlook had prepared her to expect that something 
could go very wrong once those doors opened.

The next few minutes were some of the scariest of Ruthie’s life.  As the crush of 
bodies tightened, she found breathing increasingly difficult.  She also realized that 
she and Rosa would be in very serious danger if either of them tripped.  The 
crowd swayed back and forth and her feet constantly were bumping up against the 
feet of her neighbors.  Once Rosa did trip, but Ruthie held on to her arm and with 
all of her strength managed to help keep her on her feet.  

Finally Ruthie and her family made it through the door, but the crush of bodies 
only seemed to get worse.  Shoppers continued to push through the door, but the 
crowd no longer was moving forward.  To her right she heard someone shouting:

“Get off!  Get off!”

A group of people next to her fell suddenly.  Just as she lost her balance and was 
about to fall, Gerardo grabbed Ruthie’s arm and pulled her to the left.  More 
people fell and started to scream.  Gerardo grabbed Ruthie again and pushed her 
towards the window.  A second later Rosa stumbled against her.  Gerardo 
shouted:

“Keep moving!  Away from the door!”

Ruthie grabbed Rosa’s hand and pushed through a cluster of people that slowly 
were moving forward again, towards the pharmacy.  The crowd emerged into an 
open area of the store and thinned out.  Once they got past the danger, many 
people ignored the disaster and started running towards the coveted sales items.  
Ruthie and Rosa stepped back towards the window, waiting for the other 
members of their group to come out.  Ruthie saw the top of Gerardo’s head in the 
mob.  Gerardo emerged with his own mother a second later, along with another 
family friend.  He pushed several panicky people aside and extracted the final 
member of his group, Do?a Lisette.  Ruthie’s mother was gasping for air and had 
a thoroughly horrified expression on her face.  Her purse was gone and a shoe was 
missing, but otherwise she was OK.  Ruthie hugged her.  

Ruthie’s relatives moved past the checkout area, along with dozens of other dazed 
shoppers.  There was no time to think about running towards the “while supplies 
last” deals, because it was obvious that things were terribly wrong near the main 
entrance.  Security guards were frantically trying to disperse the crowd and get to 
a group of people who had fallen.  The scene became increasingly chaotic as more 
and more shoppers were pushed through the doors and fell on top of the ones 
lying on the floor.  There was screaming, yelling and cursing.  Alarms in the store 
went off, but the noise only added to the panic among the crowd.  Ruthie looked 
through the window, noticing shoppers still outside pushed against the glass.  
Those people were only a few feet away from her, but there was not a thing she 
could do to help them.  Anyhow, the only thing on her mind was staying close 
behind Gerardo and not letting go of her mother’s hand.

The family continued moving away from the front entrance in the midst of dozens 
of other frantic people.  Gerardo shouted at the others to go to the gardening 
department at the back end of the Mega-Center.  The crowd surrounding Ruthie 
had dispersed, but the screaming coming from the front of the store seemed louder 
than ever.  As they exited into the fenced area containing gardening supplies, 
Ruthie’s family could hear sirens in the parking lot.  Firemen and paramedics 
came in through the back of the store and rushed past them.  They heard 
loudspeakers announcing that the Mega-Center was closing.  That announcement 
was accompanied by shouts of anger from many of the shoppers who had already 
made it into the store and had picked up sales items.  Ruthie heard several things 
inside breaking.  She correctly assumed the crashes were from disappointed 
shoppers smashing things they had picked up but would not be allowed to buy.

They exited through the gardening center, after being checked by a Mega-Mart 
security guard to make sure they were not carrying any merchandise.  Ruthie’s 
family walked around the back of the building, passing the loading docks to return 
to their cars.  Everyone was badly shaken up.  It was clear that Rosa no longer 
needed to use the restroom, because her jeans were soaked.  Ruthie’s mother still 
was missing a shoe.  Her aunt had twisted an ankle and needed to be helped as she 
walked.  They were a forlorn group as they slowly made their way in the pre-
dawn fog towards the front of the store, their shopping trip a total disaster.  

It took hours to get out of the parking lot.  The exits had to be blocked off to give 
priority to emergency services.  Ruthie and her relatives noticed ambulance after 
ambulance leaving.  Later Ruthie’s family would find out how lucky they were, 
given what had happened only a few feet from where they had come in through 
the entrance.  The tragedy started when a Mega-Mart employee was pushed to the 
floor by the first wave of shoppers entering the store.  For several seconds the 
people coming in managed to step over him, but then a woman was pushed over 
the employee and fell.  Several more people fell on top of her.  Eventually more 
than 100 shoppers and employees lay piled on the floor, eight of whom died and 
60 others who were seriously injured.  Another man had a heart attack when he 
was pushed against the front window and his pace-maker quit working.  Among 
the people pressed against the window there were several other serious injuries.  
Gerardo told his relatives that he was standing right next to several shoppers who 
fell and that it was only by pure luck he did not go down with them.  There was 
another piece of good fortune.  Gerardo’s wife planned to accompany the group 
on the shopping trip, but at the last moment felt sick and changed her mind.  No 
one wanted to imagine what would have happened if a woman who was eight 
months pregnant had been with them during the stampede.

It was well past sunrise, but finally the three cars of Ruthie’s group turned onto 
the highway going south, to return to Salinas empty-handed.  Do?a Lisette chatted 
incessantly about the need to be grateful to Jesus for having spared them.  Ruthie 
sat quietly in the back seat, viewing the experience from a totally different 
perspective.  As she sat listening to her mother rattle on about Jesus and smelling 
her cousin’s piss, Ruthie resolved that she would never set foot in a Mega-Mart 
again.  She always had hated the store anyway, but she “went along” to avoid an 
argument.  Well, now she had a perfect justification for not “going along” 
anymore.  

As much as she’d like to avoid it, she would have to tell Mike what had happened.  
Undoubtedly he would hear about it on the news and wonder if she had been at 
the store.  She’d have to fess up and admit that yes, not only had she been at the 
store, she had been right in the middle of the stampede.  His reaction would be 
predictable: he would say that Mega-Mart brought out the worst in people because 
it was the world’s worst manifestation of rampant capitalism.  He was right, of 
course, because the company’s sales tactics, designed to bring hoards of panicky 
shoppers to the store to be the lucky “winner” of a wide screen TV that was being 
sold at a loss, fed on greed.  As Mike would always say, greed will turn any 
person into a demented savage.  He now had nine deaths and 60 injuries to back 
up that statement.

Greed will turn any person into a demented savage.

----------

Mike and his family never went anywhere near a store on Black Friday.  Instead 
they went for a drive towards the Napa Valley and had a picnic with the remains 
of the previous day’s turkey.  It was a chance to forget the present and pretend 
that the more pleasant years family’s past had continued uninterrupted.  Mike’s 
sister was, as usual, a bit uneasy, but even she was able to set aside her worries 
and just relax.  The family did not bother to let anything serious enter into their 
conversation…they kept to light subjects such as the various points of interests in 
the valley.  It was dark by the time they got back.

Upon returning to his room, Mike had a message on his cell phone.  It was a call 
from Ruthie, telling him that she was OK and her family was safe.  They had a 
bad scare at the Mega-Center, but they got out unhurt and were safely back in 
Salinas.  

A bad scare at the Mega-Center?  Mike immediately turned on the TV.  Sure 
enough, the headline news was the morning’s tragedy at the Watsonville Mega-
Mart.  There was footage of columns of ambulances leaving the parking lot and 
interviews with witnesses.  There also were interviews with company officials, 
whose responses ranged from blaming the shoppers for being careless to praising 
the “great American consumer” for being so determined to shop, no matter how 
adverse the conditions might be.

“This incident, while unfortunate, shows that American capitalism is the best 
system there is and how people are looking for value in their purchases…The 
American consumer is the most determined consumer in the world…Nothing will 
stop the American consumer, not even an unfortunate tragedy like what happened 
today...”

Mike stared dumbfounded at the news report, horrified that the woman he loved 
had been right in the middle of all that.  He called her, but she seemed somewhat 
irritated:

“It’s like I told you, Mike.  I’m fine.  Everyone here is fine.  I mean…we’re a bit 
shaken up…but we’re all fine.  I’ll tell you about it when I see you on campus.  I 
don’t wanna talk about it over the phone.  I’m fine.  Really…”

Mike hung up, a bit bewildered.  Obviously Ruthie was traumatized and not 
“fine”.  However he knew that it would be better to wait and talk to her in 
person…as she had requested.

----------

That night, Mike finally got around to reading Ruthie’s favorite book, “Pedro 
Paramo”.  It was one of the most depressing narratives he had ever read, but from 
the beginning he could see why the story had been so influential in Latin 
American literature.  And to think, that no gringo, apart from the ones who made 
it three years into a Spanish major, had ever heard of the novel or its author Juan 
Rulfo.

More importantly for Mike, by reading “Pedro Paramo”, felt that Juan Rulfo was 
giving him a good glimpse into Ruthie’s unhappy soul.  The hot, desolate, 
abandoned setting of the story matched her perceptions of how the future of the 
world would play out.  As for an insight of how she viewed herself, Mike read the 
following:

“I don’t know, Juan Preciado.  After so many years of never lifting up my head, I 
forgot about the sky.  And even if I had looked up, what good would it have 
done? The sky is so high and my eyes so clouded that I was happy just to know 
where the ground was.  Besides, I lost all interest when Padre Renter?a told me I 
would never know glory.  Or even see it from a distance … It was because of my 
sins, but he shouldn’t have told me that.  Life is hard enough as it is.  The only 
thing that keeps you going is the hope that when you die you’ll be lifted off this 
mortal coil; but when they close one door and the only one left open is the door to 
Hell, you are better off not being born … for me, Juan Preciado, heaven is right 
here.” 

“And your soul? Where do you think it’s gone?” 

“It’s probably wandering like so many others, looking for living people to pray 
for it.  It probably hates me for the way I treated it, but I don’t worry about that 
any more.  And now I don’t have to listen to its whining about remorse.  Because 
of it, the little I ate turned bitter in my mouth, it haunted my nights with black 
thoughts of the damned.  When I sat down to die, my soul prayed for me to get up 
and drag on with my life, as if it still expected some miracle to cleanse me of my 
sins.  I didn’t even try.  ‘This is the end of the road’, I told it. ‘I don’t have the 
strength to go on.’ And I opened my mouth for it to escape.  And it went.  I knew 
when I felt the little thread of blood that bound it to my heart drip into my hands.”

Mike read through “Pedro Paramo” in a single sitting.  It was 3:00 in the morning 
when he finished.  The book’s bleak message of hopelessness deeply moved him, 
because in that story he saw Ruthie’s soul.  He got up and put on a pair of shorts 
and a jacket.  He wouldn’t be able to sleep and he couldn’t stay in the quiet house.  
He’d have to go out.

Mike walked around the decaying neighborhood, more aware than ever that he 
was part of a United States that was passing into memory.  The middle class, 
suburbia, the work ethic, small businesses, and the independent spirit that had 
been central to the United States was fading out, the spirit of its people crushed 
under the indifferent phenomenon of corporate globalization.  Mike was part of 
that past.  Even though he was only 20, he knew that he had been born to live in 
world that no longer existed.  The planet of the future, the world being 
consolidated under Mega-Town Associates, was not a world that he could, or 
would, want to live in.  Ruthie’s right about that…there’s no hope.  She knows…

Mike walked along the deserted sidewalks in the chilly pre-dawn darkness.  He 
passed several “for sale” signs, including ones that had the added description 
“bank owned”.  “Bank owned”… foreclosure properties…the fruits of a credit-
based economy.  

The majority of the houses that were still occupied had SUV’s sitting in 
driveways.  SUV’s…the past decade’s most prominent symbol of an era of debt, 
wastefulness, and conspicuous consumption that had finished off the hope that the 
US could look forward to any future other than a painful decline.  

Mike’s thoughts returned to the desolate words of “Pedro Paramo”.  Just like the 
fictional Comala of Juan Rulfo’s novel, the suburb of Mike’s childhood was 
becoming ever more abandoned…ever more lost and hopeless. He was reminded 
of a passage from Ruthie’s book:

“From that day the fields lay untended.  Abandoned.  It was a sad thing to see 
what happened to the land, how plagues took over as soon as it lay idle.  For miles 
around, people fell on hard times.  Men packed up in search of a better living.  I 
remember when the only sound in Comala was good-byes…”

Mike’s thoughts turned to his girlfriend.  He reflected that exactly 24 hours 
before; she had been at the Mega-Center waiting in line with her relatives.  
Hopefully at the moment he was thinking about her, Ruthie was safely in 
bed…not standing out in some godforsaken parking lot.  He badly wanted to see 
her…because he loved her more than ever.  Through spending a night reading her 
favorite book, he felt that he really understood her.  Her soul was much darker 
than he had imagined, but in that darkness was the real truth behind life.  She 
understood that life had no meaning, and there was no hope.  The only meaning 
he would find in his own life would come from the time he shared with her.

----------

Over the next two days Do?a Lisette gave her testimony in church, thanking Jesus 
for the miracle at the Mega-Center and the blessing that spared her and her 
daughter from the clutches of Satan.  The fellow church-goers loudly concurred 
with “Amen!” and “Praise Jesus!”  Of course, Ruthie had to stand next to her 
mother as she spoke as a living testament of Jesus’ generosity.  She held her 
tongue and played along…forcing a smile and trying to be patient.  Her mother 
needed to have her moment…even if it was her cousin Gerardo, and not Jesus, 
who deserved the credit for saving them from being trampled.

Ruthie’s relatives did not try to do any more Christmas shopping that weekend, 
much to her relief.  The Mega-Center re-opened on Saturday with the same long 
lines and hoards of shoppers pouring into the store in the pre-dawn hours.  The 
store hired more security and had better crowd control, so the panic from the day 
before was not repeated.  However, Do?a Lisette had no desire to “test the Lord’s 
patience” by repeating her trip to the store; while both Ruthie and Rosa flatly 
stated that any new foray to a Mega-Mart would have to be made without them.

----------

Over Friday and Saturday night Ruthie slept in her old bedroom.  She had been 
away from home for only three months, but she felt uneasy sleeping in that room, 
as though she didn’t belong there.  Already she was changing…leaving behind the 
person she had been in Salinas: she had changed and the room had not.

Still, the bedroom had many memories for Ruthie.  For six years it had been both 
her refuge and her prison, where she spent most of her time hiding out from the 
gang-life of her neighborhood.  It was the place where had made all those 
discoveries through her reading, where she had progressed through her knowledge 
of the outside world, and ultimately where she had acquired the facts she needed 
to abandon her faith.  There were other memories, brought back to her by a full-
length mirror on the door.  She had spent endless hours standing in the nude, 
looking at herself and sinfully exploring her own body.  

She looked through her meager possessions, wondering what she additional items 
she might want to take with her to Davenport…and perhaps show to Mike.  There 
were a couple of books she decided to put in her backpack, and a few pieces of 
clothing that she had forgotten to pack in August.  Not much else…just a picture 
album of some photos from Nebraska…might as well take it and show Mike what 
she looked like when she was in grade school…and her grandmother…and her 
father…

She slammed the album shut when she saw her father’s face.  She tossed it back 
into the drawer.  She did not want to be reminded…at least not now.  Then she 
reconsidered.  She took the album out and put it in her backpack.  At some point 
she’d have to face her memories…maybe the best way to do that would be to 
share them with Mike…or perhaps with Dr. Hartman.

There was another item from her past that Ruthie came across…an old-fashioned 
wooden bathbrush that her mother had brought up from Mexico.  The implement 
was heavy and made from solid wood, with a smooth wide back.  It was totally 
different from the flimsy plastic bathbrushes normally sold in the US.  Ruthie held 
the brush and ran her palm over the uncompromising surface.  She touched the 
bristles with her fingertips, noting that they were almost new.  The bathbrush had 
spent most of the past four years in a drawer hidden behind her clothing, and had 
not been used for its intended purpose.  Ruthie grabbed the brush by the handle 
and tapped the flat side against the palm of her hand.  She closed her eyes for a 
moment…remembering how, for about a year, it was a very important part of her 
“me time”.  

She first saw the brush when she was in the ninth grade.  She was cleaning the 
apartment and saw it under the bathroom sink, pushed behind some bottles of 
detergent.  She knew that her mother must have left it there and forgotten that she 
had it.  For several weeks Ruthie gave the brush no further thought, but one day 
she overheard a classmate talking about her sister being spanked over the 
weekend.  Ruthie sat quietly and listened with fascination as the other girl 
described how her mother forced the girl to pull down her shorts and hit her on 
the bare bottom with a “big long brush”.  Ruthie’s heart beat faster as she listened 
to the classmate’s casual remarks.  She so badly wanted to ask the other girl for 
details, but she had to stay quiet because she was merely overhearing the 
conversation, not participating in it.  

The next morning, after her mother had left for work, she got up and retrieved the 
bathbrush.  For a long time she stood with it in front of the mirror, touching it to 
her bottom and masturbating.  The thought of being punished on the bare bottom 
with a brush like the one she was holding was a total turn-on for her.  She 
fantasized about being punished along with her classmate’s sister, being told to 
bend over with her bare bottom on prominent display and her knees trembling, 
waiting for the agonizing swats.

Ruthie’s punishment fantasies never included any thoughts about her own mother.  
Do?a Lisette was very strict with Ruthie and frequently grabbed her hair or 
slapped her, but always struck her across the face.  To punish Ruthie by pulling 
down her panties and forcing her to expose herself was something she never 
would have considered doing, given her views on modesty.  Anyhow, at that time 
Ruthie hated her mother, so the girl’s fantasies always involved other authority 
figures…never Do?a Lisette.

For several days Ruthie contented herself with masturbating in front of the mirror 
and taking pictures of herself posing with the brush.  Finally, she decided to start 
punishing herself.  She knew that she was a sinful girl who needed a proper 
punishment.  She was full of religious guilt over her constant sexual adventures in 
the apartment, so if she could figure out how to spank herself…

She tried to give her bottom a couple of swats with the brush.  Her aim was bad 
and she hit herself on the hip instead of the bottom.  She tried several positions 
before she figured out that the best way for her to reach her bottom was to hold 
onto the arm of a living room chair and bend over slightly, but not all the way.  
She learned the best grip, one that would allow the brush to hit both sides of her 
bottom with equal force.

After several mornings of trial and error, Ruthie finally was ready to give herself 
a proper spanking.  She struck hard 10 times, alternating bottom-cheeks and 
wincing at the hot sting.  The pain was scary, but she was totally aroused.  She 
rubbed herself but did not allow herself to climax.  She struck her bottom another 
10 times…took a deep breath, and then hit herself 10 more times…as hard as she 
could.

She gasped at the pain and her eyes filled with tears.  She looked at herself in the 
mirror.  Already her bottom had changed color and was a deep pink, almost red.  
She set the timer on the camera and posed for several pictures, with her reddening 
bottom on full display in the shots.

Ruthie was totally aroused by what she had just done to herself.  The red color on 
her skin and the warm burning sensation coming from her backside excited her in 
a way she had never experienced before.  She spent the next several minutes 
enjoying the best orgasm of her life.  Finally she calmed down, totally scared of 
what had just happened.  God had seen all of that.  Surely she would suffer for her 
sick behavior.  Frightened, she put the brush away, got dressed, and prayed for 
forgiveness.  Badly shaken, she went to school.

A month passed before Ruthie worked up the nerve to spank herself again, but the 
excitement and guilt from that first self-inflicted punishment never left her 
thoughts.  She hid the electronic card from camera so she would not have to delete 
the pictures she had taken.  During her “me time” she looked at the images and 
replayed the memory of the swats in her mind.  She felt guilty, but not guilty 
enough to delete the pictures.

The second time she spanked herself, Ruthie was determined to take 50 swats.  
The second spanking was different, because the pain was so intense that she found 
it very hard to finish.  When she completed the fourth set, tears were running 
down her cheeks, her arm was cramped, and her knees were shaking.  She did not 
really want to continue, but she realized that she would berate herself if she did 
not give herself the full punishment.  She took a deep breath, positioned herself, 
and hit as hard as she could.  She hoped that, maybe if punished herself hard 
enough, she’d get over this sick desire.

POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  POP!  

She looked at herself in the mirror, admiring the deep red color left by the 50 
swats.  Her bottom was swollen, numb, and much darker from the second 
spanking.  She couldn’t resist taking more pictures.  The familiar sexual desire hit 
her, stronger than ever.  She stood in front of the camera and played with herself, 
masturbating as the flash went off.  She set a new goal for herself: to photograph 
herself having an orgasm.

Over the next year Ruthie’s thoughts and sexual desires went through the same 
cycle.  About once each month she would spank herself with the brush, take some 
pictures, and enjoy a series of intense orgasms.  Then she would feel guilty for 
being such a pervert and worry about God punishing her.  Eventually, when 
nothing happened and there was no Divine punishment, the desire for another 
spanking would build up.  

Each spanking was more severe than the previous one.  She learned to hit harder 
and space out the swats to prolong the punishment.  She was strict with herself: if 
a swat landed badly or was not painful enough, it did not count and she would 
repeat it.  As her endurance improved she committed herself to more swats.  She 
was especially proud of herself on her 15th birthday, when she managed to give 
herself 100 hard smacks.  She loved it when she could get welts to form on her 
bottom.  When she went to school after each spanking, she enjoyed the secret 
sensation of sitting in class, feeling the bruises on her backside.

----------

Ruthie’s exploration into self-inflicted punishment ended as quickly as it began.  
One morning about three months after she turned 15, Ruthie managed to give 
herself the most severe spanking ever, 150 hard swats.  She knew that her bottom 
would be badly bruised from the punishment for several days, but that was what 
she wanted.  However, the bruises were meant for her eyes only, she had no 
intention of letting anyone else see them.

Unfortunately for Ruthie, on the same day that she spanked herself, the school’s 
female gym teacher conducted a body-mass test and weigh-in for all of the 10th 
graders.  The girls had to line up in the hallway, go one-by-one into the medical 
office, and strip to their underwear for the weigh-in and body mass index 
measurement.  Ruthie’s heart pounded as she stood in line, but she could not 
figure out how to get out of doing the test and stripping to her underwear in front 
of a school official.  She was too much of a “good girl” to simply get out of line 
and run off the school property.  

When she entered the medical office, she reluctantly followed the order to take off 
her shirt and skirt.  She tried to keep her back against the wall, but the more she 
resisted moving to the center of the room, the more suspicious the teacher 
became.  Finally she snapped:

“Ruthie, this physical is a school requirement.  You will move to the center of the 
room.  Now.  If you don’t, you will flunk Phys Ed and you can just repeat the 10th 
grade.”

Ruthie did as she was told.  She gasped and went white when the older woman 
saw her bottom and whispered:

“Oh my God…”

Ruthie’s underwear consisted of normal white panties that covered most of her 
bottom, but the dark bruises and welts were clearly visible around the garment’s 
edges.  She knew that.  Her secret had been discovered, by her gym teacher, no 
less.

The teacher let her get dressed without doing the weigh-in or body-fat test, but 
told her that during lunch time she needed to return to her office for a “private 
conference”.  Two hours later a tearful and terrified Ruthie returned and took a 
seat in front of the school official.

“I need to take a report from you and find out who it was that hit you.  You 
understand that we are required to report cases of physical abuse to California 
social services.”

Raw terror swept through Ruthie.  She was panicky and fidgeting wildly. What on 
earth was she going to say?  She couldn’t tell the truth, because that would sound 
too bizarre.  She thought about inventing a boyfriend and blaming him, but it 
wouldn’t take much to figure out that story was not true.  So she made up a lie, 
saying that it was her mother who had punished her because she had caught her 
with a CD that she had shoplifted.  At first it seemed that Ruthie had just made the 
situation much worse, because the teacher replied that her mother would have to 
be ordered to get some counseling.  In a panicky voice Ruthie begged the gym 
teacher not to say anything.  She added another lie to her story, claiming that her 
mother was undocumented, and if she were deported, Ruthie would have no 
where to live.

“Please…please…you can’t get her in trouble!  It was my fault!  Really!  I stole 
the CD!  Please don’t get the INS on her!”

The gym teacher realized the girl was in a no-win situation.  It was true that any 
possibility, no matter how slight, of her mother being picked up by the INS and 
deported would ruin her life.  She was one of the school’s best students, one of the 
few who did what she was told and would definitely graduate if her life was not 
disrupted.  Suddenly the teacher decided to back down on her plan to file the 
report.  She contented herself with telling Ruthie that if she needed to talk about 
her troubles at home, “her door was always open”.

The crisis passed, but the panic Ruthie felt that day stayed with her.  She was 
weighted down with guilt for what she had done to her mother; blaming her for 
something that was not her fault at all, and on top of that lying about her 
immigration status.  In spite of the gym teacher’s assurance that she would stay 
quiet unless there was another incident of abuse, Ruthie was terrified that Do?a 
Lisette would somehow find out what had happened and what she had said about 
her.

Ruthie resolved never to spank herself again.  It was not hard to keep that 
promise, because the memory of the terror and humiliation she had felt in the 
teacher’s office would totally ruin the experience in the future.  Besides, Ruthie 
knew that the gym instructor would be watching her and would tell other teachers 
to keep an eye on her as well.  She pushed the brush to the back of her dresser, 
buried it under some clothes, and forgot about it for three years.

---------- 

As Ruthie examined the brush, she thought about putting it back in her dresser, or 
perhaps finally returning it to its proper place under the bathroom sink.  However, 
in the end, she decided to sneak it into her backpack and take it with her.  Like the 
photo album, the brush was part of her experience growing up and was associated 
with some of her most intense memories.

----------

On Sunday afternoon Mike called Ruthie and asked if she wanted him to give her 
a ride back to Davenport.  She eagerly accepted.  Gerardo had offered to take her 
back in the evening, but Ruthie was more than ready to get out of Salinas, after 
having spent two days at church trying to humor her mother and her friends.  
When Do?a Lisette overheard Ruthie talking to her boyfriend, she told her 
daughter that she wanted Mike to come into the apartment.  Ruthie cringed, but 
dutifully relayed the request.

Do?a Lisette was still excited about benefiting from God’s mercy and still 
convinced that Jesus had spoken directly to her by saving her and her daughter 
from the stampede.  She was eager to share the miracle with anyone willing to 
listen, which made Mike an obvious target.  Ruthie fidgeted nervously as Do?a 
Lisette recounted, in graphic detail, the stampede and the family’s narrow escape.  
Ruthie noticed her mother exaggerating some of her facts.  For example, Ruthie 
knew that the real danger had lasted only a few minutes, but to listen to her 
mother would make one think that they had been crushed and trampled for hours.  
Ruthie knew that her mother was not lying; that she believed what she was 
saying.  However, as soon as they were out of earshot of Do?a Lisette, she’d have 
to set Mike straight on what really happened at the Mega-Center.

As they drove northward, Ruthie filled in some details and corrected her mother’s 
exaggerations.  She also repeated the promise that she and Rosa had made to each 
other, that neither would ever set foot in a Mega-Mart again.  For a few minutes 
she sat quietly, watching the vegetable fields pass by.  Mike could tell that, in 
spite of her calm retelling of what actually happened to her on Black Friday, she 
still was traumatized.  He said nothing, thinking it would be better to let her talk 
again when she wanted to.  Finally she did have something to add to their 
conversation:

“Mike…I uh…kinda have a favor to ask from you.”

“OK.”

“You know your Mega-Town t-shirts?  With the pig insult?”

Mike looked at her and nodded.

“Can you get me a couple?  I’m gonna guess I’d take a size medium.”

“Sure…you bet!  …and you’ll wear ‘em?”

Ruthie nodded.  Like her boyfriend, her hatred of Mega-Town Associates now 
was personal.  After what she had just lived through and observed, she too would 
wear the infamous slogan:

MTA - The Pig is your Mistress!  Treat her well!


