The Road Not Taken

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The Road Not Taken

Life is full of choices, inescapable choices, some truly life-changing. Poet Robert Frost expressed this massive ineluctable fact of life as a simple concept, easily visualized:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both.

Life can be visualized as an endless series of forking roads, each fork representing a choice that must be made. Because life is a one-way nonstop journey through time, making decisions isn’t optional. When you come to a fork in your road, you must choose, because failing to make a conscious choice is itself a choice. However, those earliest forks are the most important ones. For example: In the grand sweep of your life, your choice of career is almost surely more important than your choice of which retirement village to decline in.

It's a shame that some of the biggest decisions in our lives are made at an age where we are less equipped to make them, to grasp their importance, or even to recognize that they exist! Take the example of two bored teenage boys who decided to visit a military enlistment office. That decision, made on a whim, changed their lives forever. You see, they had chosen a road that led them away from their homes, away from college, and into the unknown.

As our boys neared the door to the enlistment office, one stood aside and gallantly waved the other in first. That boy stopped at the closest desk to the door, which happened to be occupied by the Navy recruiter. Our second boy walked the five feet to the next desk, where he joined the Army. One boy had chosen one road, whilst the other boy chose a totally different one. Both decisions were made without the slightest deliberation!

Five years later, that first boy was a petty officer on a ship, happily married to an exotic lady whom he had met in a foreign port. The second boy? Tragically he deployed with his regiment a mere six months after his enlistment. He was the regiment's first casualty.

Roads taken, roads not taken. Each involves a choice. Seemingly simple choices can have life-changing consequences.

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Beverly Williams sat on a bus outside her high school. Next to her sat her friend, Susan Giller. It was near their graduation date, but neither girl had made any firm decisions concerning college. In fact, neither of them had applied to any universities, since both trusted that their local community college would suffice. The bus, an ordinary school bus, was there to take them on a tour of that little college. When they arrived, they found not the tour they expected, but instead were merely dropped off at the registrar's office, where a bevy of guidance counselors waited at temporary desks to handle the busload of prospects.

Since they were friends and had shared classes together, Beverly and Susan stuck together until they finally reached the head of the line, where they were directed to different counselors. Beverly's counselor was a dried up old bitty with a permanent scowl on her face. Ignorant of college, Beverly explained that she was only interested in taking computer courses. “I'm a bit of a nerd” Beverly explained happily.

The counselor “tut tutted” and then explained “That's not how college works. All Freshmen here start with mostly the same basic classes. In your first semester you will take Literature, Freshman Communications, and Music appreciation.”

“Also,” she said brightly, “You're allowed up to two electives, but unfortunately no computer courses are among them.”

Having taken an instant dislike to her counselor, Beverly soon ascertained that the lady wasn't a guidance counselor at all. Actually she was an English professor standing in to help the guidance office for the day. Worse, she was the person who would be teaching the class that Beverly dreaded most of all, Freshman Communications!

Without enrolling, Beverly left the office and boarded the bus for the ride back to her school. Beverly didn't fully realize it until a decade later, but that had been a fork in her life's road, and she had chosen precisely the wrong direction!

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Ten years later, Beverly was a single mother making a living as a waitress in a working man's cafe. She had chosen that particular cafe because it was a male-rich environment. But men lost interest in Beverly the moment they learned she was a single mom. Besides, considering her long hours on the job, she barely had time left to mother her child. Dating was almost out of the question!

Shortly after high school graduation, Beverly had married Dave. To an unsophisticated eighteen year-old girl, Dave had looked like good husband material. After all, Dave had a good job at a gas station. Besides that, he had a cool car that he planned to fix up. When the car was running, Beverly enjoyed tooling around town with Dave. She loved the roar of its loud mufflers.

They married young, renting a tiny garage apartment close to Dave's job. Without college, the best Beverly could do was a job at a McDonald's. But she hoped to make manager some day.

Beverly's pay barely covered their rent. Dave's pay went mostly for food and for car parts. He continually told Beverly they were lucky because he was able to buy parts at a discount, plus he installed them himself for free. He never seemed to notice that his car was broken more than running, despite the constant drain on the couple's meager budget.

At first marriage seemed like a fun lark to Beverly. For starters, the sex was great! It took two years for Beverly to notice that her marriage to Dave was based on a simple, yet age-old duality of biology. Namely, Dave had a penis, and Beverly had a fun place to put it!

By now, Beverly realized that their marriage needed some deeper meaning than bedroom action, dead end jobs, unpaid bills, and a broken car. So Beverly had arrived at a metaphorical “fork in the road”. But, yet again, she made a wrong choice; she secretly flushed her birth control pills.

Dave was childishly proud of his own virility. “I'm so potent that I knocked her up right through those birth control pills!”

However, shortly after the birth of his daughter, he discovered that fatherhood wasn't for him. Their marriage lasted for two more miserable years. Inevitably, Beverly ended up a single mother. Over the following years, she kept a job, but still required public assistance to make ends meet. Oh sure, Dave sometimes paid child support, but more typically all she got was sob stories about his poverty.

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For several years, Beverly was simply too young and busy to see the forest for the trees. But gradually, her thoughts began to focus on memories of that bus ride, and of her interview in that guidance office. Increasingly, Beverly realized that was the precise moment that her life had gone astray. If only she had enrolled in college! With a college education, there could be a world of better paying jobs available to her. Perhaps more importantly, in college she would have met a better class of male, males with far better prospects than Dave.

One day, almost exactly ten years after that bus ride, Beverly was walking through the mall, hand-in-hand with her little daughter. Fortunately, Beverly had kept her looks. Poverty, plus the hours of hustle that her job required, combined to keep Beverly slim and shapely.

Whenever she was out in public with her child, she noticed men looking at her approvingly. But then they would see her daughter and then look away, interest gone. Perhaps the right man was out there somewhere for Beverly, but it didn't look good.

As Beverly walked, she passed a woman her own age who also had a young daughter with her. Beverly took three steps after passing, when something clicked inside her head. She stopped and turned, only to see the other lady do the same.

The lady spoke, “Beverly?”

In shock, Beverly responded, “Susan?”

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It was the first time that Beverly had seen Susan in ten years! They sat in the mall coffee shop to “catch up”. She soon discovered why she hadn't seen her friend since graduation. Susan had suddenly married the summer after graduation. Her husband was a Marine, and Susan had dutifully followed him from base to base. That ended when he was killed in a training accident.

At first the Marines had been supportive. There was insurance money, and she was allowed to remain in base housing for two years. But eventually, both the money and her welcome at the base evaporated. Then things went downhill for her rapidly. So finally, in desperation, she had returned to her home town.

Beverly asked the obvious question, “Why couldn't a good looking woman like you find another man on a Marine base?

Susan's answer was vague.

Finally Susan came clean with her immediate problem, “Beverly, I'm desperate. I'm walking my daughter around this mall because it's cold outside and we don't have a place to go.”

Suddenly Beverly felt like the fortunate one. She felt fortunate because she at least had a job and an apartment, and fortunate because she was in a position to help an old friend. She took Susan and her little daughter to her apartment.

Over the following weeks, the “roads” of Beverly and Susan's lives converged.

At first, Susan slept on the couch. The two little girls shared a bedroom.

Beverly landed Susan a job at the cafe. There were problems at first until she learned to hustle, but she turned into a good waitress. Starting with her first paycheck, Susan shared expenses with Beverly. That worked out well! Within weeks, both of them had extra money.

There was another small change, Beverly talked Susan into sharing her bed. “It's not sexual,” Beverly had carefully explained, “It's a big bed. You get your side, I get mine. You will be much more comfortable than on that couch, plus we get our living room back.”

She found Susan strangely resistant to this arrangement, but Beverly finally prevailed. So they slept in the same bed, if not together.

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Of course, the two women talked, and they certainly discussed memories of that tour to the community college. Beverly and Susan agreed that they both had made a terrible choice by skipping college.

It wasn't long before their talks became more specific. Why not go back to school? They couldn't carry a full load of classes, but working together they could at least make a start.

If was several weeks before the new term started, giving them time to discuss details. One day Beverly remarked, “I wish my parents had kicked my ass and made me go to college. My life would be so different now!”

“Me too,” Susan agreed, “And that brings up something I've been worrying about. You don't see it on the job too much because I've got no choice except to hustle, but I have a lazy streak a mile wide. I wish my parents were here to watch over my shoulder to ensure I keep up with my schoolwork.”

After thinking for a long time, Beverly finally said the obvious, “We don't have our parents but we've got each other. I won't kick your ass, but I can spank it if you start goofing off on your schoolwork. But only if you do the same for me.”

Gradually, over the next few days, they worked out a specific agreement. Specific “sins” such as late homework or skipping class would result in an honest-to-goodness bare bottom hairbrush spanking, just like they both remembered from their teens. They both agreed that there would be no hard feelings caused by a deserved spanking.

They agreed that spankings would be the real thing, tough hairbrush spankings producing a red bottom and genuine tears, just like they used to get from their parents.

They solemnized their agreement in an unusual way. They first purchased an appropriate hairbrush. And then, using a felt marker, they each signed the smooth back of that heavy plastic brush!

So they registered for one class each. Beverly would attend on Monday and Wednesday nights, while Susan would take Tuesday and Thursday. Naturally, they would share child care duties.

The first term went well. Beverly registered in the class that she most dreaded, Freshman Communications. Her idea was that if she could pass that class, she could pass anything. Susan took a Literature class. They worked together, sharing Beverly's old laptop and proofreading their work together.

At term's end they both received good grades. That proved they could do this! They celebrated their success with cheap champagne.

So the two ladies had made a conscious choice to improve themselves. It was a choice that made their life's “roads” branch in the direction of a better life.

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By now, the two ladies had been together nearly a year. They could have replaced Beverly's big bed with twin beds so that they could sleep individually, but neither suggested it. They always started the night on their own sides of the bed with space between them. However, whilst asleep it was natural for their bodies to seek the warmth of another human. So they were sometimes embarrassed to awake with their limbs tangled together, or with somebody's hand touching a private part of another person's anatomy. Always they would spring apart with a mumbled apology and the mutual reassurance, “It's not sexual, it just happens”.

Each knew that the other sometimes became aroused at night. Sometimes it passed, but sometimes that person would sneak into the bathroom to “take care of business” while the other pretended not to notice. It was a civilized arrangement.

From a million small clues however, Beverly pieced together something about her bed partner, something Susan avoided talking about. Beverly chose her time carefully, but finally one day confronted the “elephant in the room” by asking, “Susan, you don't like men, do you?”

Susan buried her face in her hands, “This is so embarrassing, You'll kick me out if I tell the truth!”

“Will I?” Beverly asked, “I've suspected since the day we met at the mall. Heck. You couldn't find a man you liked in an entire Marine base? That say's a lot.”

Susan spoke sadly, “OK, truth time! At first I thought that I was bisexual. I was attracted to you back in high school! That worried me, but I figured that marrying a manly man would would fix me. So I married a big strong Marine. Sex with him wasn't bad, but it didn't make me straight. After he died, I realized that I'm gay. Like you though, I'm too busy working and mothering, so I suppress that part of my life.”

She spoke beseechingly,“Please don't kick me out Beverly!”

“No chance!” Beverly soothed, “Our relationship has never been about sex, so there's no problem.”

“OK. A least it's out in the open,” Susan agreed, “I just hope it doesn't change our relationship. Apartment sharing works for us, and you're the best friend I ever had!”

“Yep,” Beverly agreed, “We're 'best friends'. Just not lovers.”

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Life went on for Beverly and Susan. They registered in the next term. Beverly took Freshman Communications II and Susan took math. That's when the trouble started. Susan did well in math, but Beverly ran into obstacles in her class, mostly mental ones!

Beverly's class tasked her with her first big multi-week project, a real research paper! Although you are supposed to systematically tackle a project like that part-by-part, Beverly was discouraged by the enormity of the whole. Unfortunately Beverly's response to such discouragement was procrastination.

Beverly always had a reason for each delay, some quite rational sounding. Patiently, Susan guided her friend through each step of the project, choosing a topic, writing a proposal, and finding sources. Beverly procrastinated on writing the outline, but finally, at Susan's constant urging, she got her outline done and approved by the professor.

But now the end of the term was nearing and Beverly had only two weeks in which to write the body of her paper. Again, she procrastinated. So Susan issued a firm warning, along with a goal. “You have all evening while I'm at school. You will write five hundred words before I get home, or you will feel that hairbrush! Fair enough?”

Beverly ardently promised that she would send the girls to bed early and then write all evening. “You'll be proud of me.” she swore.

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Surely by now you've guessed; Susan arrived home from class that evening to find that Beverly hadn't written a single word. She offered excuses, but none could explain zero progress. Beverly even claimed writer's block, but all she needed to do was restate her outline in the form of full sentences and paragraphs!

Susan spoke firmly, “Beverly, you're obviously crippled by procrastination. So tonight I'm going to apply some incentive in the form of our hairbrush, and then we will spend the weekend together making some real progress.”

Beverly didn't argue, she simply nodded miserably, “I'm sorry. You're right Susan. I don't know why I can't seem to get a start on this. So I guess I need that spanking.”

First, Susan went into the daughter's bedroom. She kissed the two little angels to assure herself that they were asleep. She didn't want them hearing what was about to happen in the next bedroom.

Then Susan entered the adult bedroom to find Beverly standing nervously. To ensure that the children couldn't walk in on them, she locked their bedroom door.

Susan spoke in a firm voice that Beverly seldom heard, “OK young lady, take off those pajama bottoms. If you're wearing panties, them too.”

Hesitantly, Beverly obeyed. Then, with cheeks damp with tears and naked from the waist down, she faced her best friend in the world.

Even before Susan had admitted being gay, Beverly had made it a point to not flaunt her body in front of her, so it really felt odd to be showing herself this way. She guessed that it was also awkward for Susan, but awkward in a different way.

Indeed it was awkward for Susan! Viewing her friend's body, and thinking of the coming spanking, she felt a surge of arousal. Privately, she was glad that women don't get erections like men. That would be embarrassing!

She sat on the bed and then spoke in a voice that invited no argument, “Bring me the hairbrush Beverly.”

Visibly shaking, Beverly obeyed. She handed over the weapon, which Susan tucked behind her on the bed.

Beverly spoke, a sob in her voice, “I'm sorry I disappointed you Susan.”

Susan smiled, “You're a friend, not a disappointment. I'm about to spank your bottom because I'm your friend and you need this. It'll give you the shock you need to restart your project. Plus I'll be there to encourage you and help you finish your project. OK?”

Beverly nodded, “Yes ma-am.”

Susan patted her lap.

“It's not sexual”, Beverly told herself as she laid her bare bottom across her bed partner's lap, “It's just a spanking, and goodness knows I deserve it.”

Susan remembered a spanking position that her mother had used to reduce the embarrassing noise of her spankings. So she twisted herself slightly on the bed, allowing Beverly to lay at an angle with her torso on the bed, but with her legs dangling to the floor. With just a bit of adjustment, Beverly's bare bottom was presented at an advantageous angle. The sight of those firm twin peeks almost took Susan's breath away.

“Grab a pillow,” Susan commanded, “Bury your face and hug it tight. That will restrain your hands and will muffle whatever noise you make.”

This was the first time that Susan had ever spanked anyone. However, having been spanked regularly growing up, she was familiar with the process.

Almost reverently Susan touched the proffered cheeks, feeling their roundness, gauging their firmness, seeing them cringe at her touch. Then she delivered the first flurry of spanks, little slaps that barely stung.

Copying her mother's technique, she started by hand, warming up Beverly's bottom with deceptively mild spanks that briefly allowed the lady false hope that she might tough this spanking out without crying.

But gradually, Susan's spanks became more serious. First she lightly spanked Beverly's buttocks, sit spots and the backs of her thighs to a uniform light pink, but then she started out fresh, only with harder spanks that left her bottom slightly pinker.

When Susan started the third repetition of Beverly's warm-up, the lady started to seriously squirm. Only then did Susan wrap a restraining arm around Beverly's waist. It was during that third “pass” of spanks that Susan heard unmistakable sobs escape from the muffling pillow.

By the end of the third pass, Beverly's bottom was quite red. Now Susan finally spoke, “Do I have your attention Beverly?”

“Yes Ma-am,” the lady sobbed, “I'm sorry Ma-am.”

“You're not sorry yet,” Susan explained firmly, “But you will be. Hug that pillow tight, because now it gets serious!”

Without further warning, Susan started spanking hard and fast. Beverly shrieked into her pillow, her legs levitated, and then her thighs parted, giving Susan a distracting view. Fighting erotic thoughts, Susan gamely spanked on, guiltily enjoying the view of the bouncing, roiling, rapidly coloring bottom so perfectly presented across her lap. This time, Susan only spanked buttocks and sit spots. Their waitress uniforms were short, so Susan was careful to cause no lasting marks down low.

By now Susan's hand was sore, but not nearly as sore as Beverly's bottom. Fortunately, for that hand, she had decided that Beverly's bottom had been suitably “warmed up”. It was time to graduate to the hairbrush!

Brandishing the brush, she started peppering Beverly with questions, demanding answers. Between each question, she would deliver two hard blows with the hairbrush for punctuation. She started out at her sit spots. After each swat, Beverly would screech and then curl her legs in back. Each time, Susan would patiently tell her to move them, explaining that Beverly was just making it harder on herself by prolonging her own punishment.

Gradually, two hard swats at a time, Susan spanked her way from Beverly's sit spots up to the top of her buttocks. As she spanked, she continued to talk to Beverly, forcing her to confront the reason she was being punished.

Finally it was time to end it. Susan locked down down her friend's legs with one of her own.

“Remember what this is about,” Susan warned, “so we don't have to spank you again.”

Adamantly, Beverly nodded, “Honest, Susan, I will. Honest!”

“OK then,” Susan answered, “One last little session, and then we'll be done. Give me your right hand.”

Susan gripped Beverly's wrist, and then pushed down hard on the small of her back to pin her down. She raised the hairbrush and then applied a finally flurry of spanks, these not so hard as before, but much faster. In fact, they came too fast for Beverly to count! Of course, counting was impossible because she was much too busy shrieking into her pillow. Beverly ineffectually bucked, tried to twist, and tried to kick her legs, but her only option was to absorb the punishment.

As suddenly as that last flurry started, it was over. Susan dropped the hairbrush and devoted her attentions to comforting her distraught friend.

When finally allowed up, the still bawling lady quickly accepted the invitation of Susan's wide open arms. Like an oversized child, she crawled into her friend's lap for a final cleansing cry.

But Beverly was no child, she was actually a red-bottomed mostly-naked adult lady. And Susan wasn't Beverly's mother. Actually, she was a gay lady who had always secretly wanted the woman who was now suddenly hugging her, emotionally, vulnerably.

As Beverly gradually came back to her senses and calmed down, she felt a great wave of gratitude towards her friend. But then, she began to notice that she was receiving strange vibes from Susan. Susan was breathing hard and squirming. Several times Susan touched her, but then suddenly removed hands as if she had been burnt.

Finally Beverly recognized the symptoms, Susan was aroused!

Beverly spoke without thinking, “Oh you poor dear. I didn't think about how hard this would be on you. We must fix this.”

And then, still not considering the consequences, she eased her friend down onto her back. Then she unbuttoned Susan's slacks, and pulled them off along with her panties.

By now, Susan's eyes were wide open, wondering what was next. Beverly kissed her dear friend, and then laid next to her.

Beverly had never pleasured another woman, but she certainly had diddled herself enough to know the process. Susan's thighs opened welcomely as Beverly's hand sought out the target. A few minutes ago it had been Beverly writhing under Susan's ministrations, but now the situation was reversed. Susan's pelvis pumped and her bottom worked as Beverly's finger did its magic. It was all that Susan could do to keep from screaming out the good news about her wonderful orgasm!

Afterwards, they cuddled together on the bed.

The ice was broken, so soon they were naked. Inevitably Susan decided to both return the favor, and to raise the ante. So she slid her hand down into her friend's lowest curls. Beverly's thighs opened encouragingly. Susan's finger found a slickness and began to tease. But then Susan put her face down there and began to kiss inner thigh. Moments later, with a first-hand knowledge of female physiology that no man can match, Susan engaged her tongue. Unexpectedly, Beverly received the most sublime sensual experience of her life, ending in a memorable climax.

It was several minutes before Beverly returned to earth. “Gawd!” she enthused, “Is that what we've been missing for the last year? We're idiots.”

“Don't get too excited,” Susan purred, “You still have that research paper to finish. But I'll be there with you.”

Still naked and with limbs entwined, the two friends drifted off to sleep.

In an unexpected and unintended way, Susan and Beverly's roads had truly merged. A new family had just been born.

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