Overheard at the airport

I’ve been travelling a fair amount lately. Actually, strike that: I’ve been travelling a ridiculous amount. Abu Dhabi, Egypt, France – and that’s just the past ten days. Hey, I’ve even managed to make it home for a few hours at a time before heading back out of the door.

You’d think that all of this travel would have inspired numerous spanking fantasies, but it’s hard to feel kinky when one’s visits to a new city constitute airport – taxi – hotel – course and not much more. Certainly, there are delegates who should doubtless be spanked (“you’re late back from lunch”?); the staff in hotels might deserve to be pulled over my knee (“my pillows weren’t straight after you’d made up my bed”?). But by and large, I’ve been too tired to summon up that much kinky energy.

Until, that is, I sat at Orly airport in Paris on Wednesday. Orly? Think a downmarket version of London Gatwick, with worse food and fewer shops. Quite horrible. Anyway, where was I? So, I’m sitting eating lunch – or not eating, the food I’d purchased being too revolting to consume (in a country so proud of its culinary standards) – and two gentlemen behind me strike up a conversation in hushed tones.

Now, I’ve forgotten most of the French I used to know, so could only snatch snippets of their dialogue:

“You’ve given her a final warning?”

“Yes.”

“And she understood the consequences?”

“Indeed.”

“Then it would be quite wrong of you not to go ahead with her punishment.”

The young lady in question was to be called into the study that evening. She’d be shown the letter that had been sent home from her headmaster. Asked for an explanation. Her excuses – for there could be no valid justification for her continued misconduct – would be dismissed, and she’d be instructed to go to her room and wait. A dozen strokes of the martinet would be administered – hard – and she’d emerge from proceedings a sorry, reformed girl.

At least, I think that was what they were saying. They might have been discussing football, politics, their holiday plans… I don’t know. But I enjoyed eavesdropping and corrupting their doubtless quite-innocent dialogue.