Finishing School - The Head Girl's Tale

I haven't got round to writing my follow-up post to Finishing School yet. Have been too busy having a love-in with all the other FS participants where we've been commenting on each other's blogs and tweeting round the clock at each other, holding on to the magic that was last weekend. It's so lovely to be a part of and I think I am not the only one still floating!

So I'd urge you to check out these great accounts from my fellow bloggers:

Leia's Finishing School Stories 1-3
Eliane's It gets into your head
Pandora's The First Night at Darling's Academy
Haron's Finished Off or To Be a Lady
Amy's Finishing School Introduction

And even more of a treat below is a post from our very own Head Girl, Catherine Thomas! It's quite a rarity that she talks of her scene experiences and I feel quite privileged that she's letting me post it here.

Sometimes – no, actually, quite often – I feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

In September, Lucy of Northern Spanking mooted the idea of a Finishing School on Twitter.  Immediately, she received a flurry of enthusiasm from far more girls than she could accommodate – in fact, she was forced to change venue to cope with the number of responses!

Fortunately, I was among those accepted to Mrs Darling’s Academy, essentially a CP version of “Ladette to Lady”.  We were told who our classmates would be, and much plotting ensued, with Caoilfhionn at the forefront, as she often is when mischief is being planned.

On arrival in Scotland, we were met by Miss Hammond Grant, who led us to our minibus.  After a long drive, we drew up to a castle.  The stiff bolts to the imposing door were drawn back and we were greeted by Mrs Darling herself.  She led us to the drawing room where Miss H-G read us a long list of rules.  We unpacked and tidied our rooms, finding uniforms on our beds: pencil skirts, neat pink blouses, grey or pink cardigans, slips, suspender belts and two sets of seamed stockings.

Saturday started with Assembly.  Neatly attired in our new Darlings Academy uniforms, we sang the School Song “To be a lady”.  Then Mrs D announced that she had appointed me as head girl, apparently for being the Twittersphere’s “voice of reason”.  This was worrying: in most CP-based roleplay schools, the Head Girl’s punishments are automatically doubled.  And we were in trouble almost immediately, as “Pantygate” was discovered: Caoilfhionn had brought each of us a pair of Little Miss Trouble knickers, and someone had snitched.  The staff had us all bend over in a line, exposing said knickers, and then moved up and down the line briskly, hairbrushes in hand – ouch!

Next came deportment, in which we had to demonstrate the art of walking in high heels.  One of my bugbears is women who totter in heels, so I was hoping to do well, and was pleased when Mrs D complimented me on my relaxed poise.

Moving on, we were split into two groups, and my group learned baking: shortbread, chocolate brownies, and lace wafers, to be served at teatime the following day.  Happily immersed in our work, we behaved impeccably, more than could be said for the music group whose lesson was regularly punctuated by staccato noises.  Perhaps they were learning percussion?

In the afternoon, my group prepared our own offering for the evening’s entertainment, with Miss H-G.  We were to read a passage from A Child’s Christmas in Wales, and then a poem each.  Some of the poems were fairly complex and required considerable concentration: once again, there was no fooling about in class and we were smugly aware that none of us had yet earned a punishment.

Meanwhile, the other group was outside, collecting foliage with which to make centrepieces for the dinner table.  We heard afterwards that naughty Caoilfhionn had been unable to resist the lure of the snow-covered trampoline, for which she was spanked in the snow by Mrs D.

After this, Mrs D explained that we were to prepare a formal dinner for the bachelors, who were due to arrive in an hour.  Alexandra –experienced in mass catering – was in overall charge of the meal, with others taking charge of individual courses.  We also had to change into our evening dresses ready to line up in the hall to greet the bachelors, show them to their rooms and provide a guided tour of the castle.  Most of us scrambled down to the hall just in time.

Largely thanks to Alexandra’s hard work and manic pacing around the kitchen, the dinner went extremely well, a superb feat considering that there were two starters and three choices of main course.  Alexandra spent most of her time in the kitchen overseeing the girls’ efforts, but still managed to get into more trouble than anyone.  In fact, I’m not sure how she found time to eat, as she spent so much time being strapped and caned!

Dinner over, we moved to the music room for coffee, where the real trouble began.  Caoilfhionn had thoughtfully brought after-dinner mints to hand out with coffee.  Unfortunately they were willy-shaped, and having already been in trouble during the day, she was scared to hand them out alone, so asked me to support her.  And what’s a girl to do when a friend asks for support?

The helpful bachelors brought “Willygate” to Mrs D’s attention immediately; to say she was shocked would be an understatement.  She quickly identified Caoilfhionn as the culprit, but I also owned up to my part, and thus discovered the down side to being head girl!

Caoilfhionn was made to bend over and each mistress took a cane, Mrs D being left-handed.  She was given twelve hard, fast strokes.  And then I was awarded twenty-four!

Now, I’m usually fairly hardy when it comes to CP, but I like thud and I like the strokes to be well-spaced out in tempo.  These canes were whippy and the strokes delivered at top speed.  It felt like a “real” punishment.  (Fortunately this is one of my kinks.)

We then had to demonstrate what we had learned in class: the “music” girls singing two songs in harmony, and the “poetry/prose” girls reading our pieces.  We were all very earnest, very well-behaved; and most of the bachelors seemed to appreciate our efforts.  I couldn’t help recognising the absurdity of the situation, though: twenty kinksters assemble in a fabulous castle for a spanking party, and they end up arranging parlour entertainment! 

Later, we were told that lights-out would be at 1.30.  At 1.15 I realised that I hadn’t yet told all the girls that we needed to get up early to wash up the dinner things and prepare a cooked breakfast, so did a quick tour of the dormitories.  Visiting Alexandra last, unfortunately we started chatting and were caught, still awake after 1.30, by Mrs D.

In the morning, we did get up early to wash up and provide a full cooked breakfast for the bachelors and girls.  As we were supposed to learn the School Song for Assembly, I made Jemima find her copy of the words and teach it to us, line by line.  As we sang, girls I had not been able to find the night before came running down, worried that they might be missing Assembly!

At Assembly, although we performed the School Song with aplomb, each of the girls was dealt with for overnight misdemeanours.  My offence - being in Alexandra’s room after lights-out - was taken very seriously, and I was awarded a massive 8 strokes of the tawse on my hands.  Mrs D’s tawse isn’t the heaviest, but my goodness she knows how to use it: another “real” punishment.  I felt as though she had removed all the skin from my palms and had numb fingers for about 10 minutes afterwards!

Miss H-G then took a very entertaining class in sexual etiquette, in which Violet neatly demonstrated the art of sheathing a banana and Caoilfhionn demonstrated table dancing to the St Trinian’s theme.  One of the bachelors taught the waltz (Sir Aden and I dutifully practised not stepping on each other’s toes) and another taught the history of CP in penal institutions.

And then the snow came down in earnest, forcing the Sunday leavers (Tombola, Caoilfhionn and Jemima) to depart sooner than expected, while the rest of us were taken individually for an evaluation interview with Mrs D, Miss H-G and the teaching bachelors.  Although complimentary about my deportment, leadership, reading and baking, they pulled no punches with regard to my faults and I was told that – in addition to having let myself down by joining in with Willygate and breaking the lights-out curfew - I needed to be less self-assured.  Ouch!  However, when the final placings were read out, I was delighted to be second overall and to win one of the two coveted Senior Girl brooches.

As I said, sometimes I think I really am the luckiest girl in the world.  This weekend was so far up my street that it could have been designed with just me in mind.  I loved every second of it and am so incredibly grateful to Mrs Darling and Miss Hammond-Grant for all their hard work, to the bachelors for being up for a laugh, and to my fellow pupils for being brilliant fun and mucking in.  A weekend in a cold, damp, draughty Scottish castle could have been a disaster, but it was an absolute triumph.