“Henry, hurry up, please, Dear. We want to be away in half an hour.”
“No Mum, please. It won’t happen again. I promise.”
“Henry! Get ready NOW.”
“But what if something happens?”
“Your sister’s only downstairs. She’ll keep an eye on you. There’s always the web-cam and the baby alarm.”
“Muuuum! Pleeeease! This is embarrassing.”
“Henry! Swimming trunks! Now!!
Henry read the signs correctly and slouched off to his bedroom to get changed. He returned about ten minutes later clad only in his long, green swimming shorts.
He knew his mum and dad had such things; he’d found them by “accident” a few weeks ago. He just never believed they’d use them on him. Until now.
Henry made one last desperate attempt. “Please, I’m sixteen now, I can be trusted, you know.”
“Explain that to Mrs. Ross; I wonder how those eggs got onto her windows. And that parcel of dog’s mess that someone put on poor David’s front step and set fire to it before ringing the doorbell and running away. And as for dying Margaret’s King Charles spaniel green. . . . ”
“But Chester deserved it, he farts.”
“That has nothing to do with it. Turn around.”
“Please! I haven’t invited Nick round this time. Honest!”
“The longer you delay, the longer you’ll stay like it when we get home. Now turn around, please.”
Henry tried a change of tack. “I could always come with you.” And he flashed one of his disarming, boyish smiles. Now that WAS a desperate offer.
“If you think I’m taking you to your grandma’s just so you can behave like that again, you’ve got another think coming.”
“Please. I promise to be good.”
“Yes, OK then, and I promise to let your father smoke those awful cigars of his in the house in future.”
“Oh, great! Thanks, Mu . . .”
Henry’s shoulders drooped; there was no mistaking either the look or the sarcastic tone. He turned around.
“Now before we start, I’ll have your phone.”
“I haven’t got it.”
“Then you won’t mind me patting you down once they’re on, will you?”
Henry produced his mobile from somewhere inside his shorts and handed it over his shoulder before putting his hands behind his back. Very shortly afterwards the tall, skinny teenager was handcuffed and there was no sign of the characteristic dimples that always showed when he smiled.
“Now up you go.”
Henry climbed up to the loft conversion accompanied by his mother and father. Not only was this going to be embarrassing, it was going to be the most boring Saturday ever. Other than a velux window and an old mattress there was nothing in the room. They hadn’t even finished the en-suite except for plumbing in the toilet.
“Oh, and just in case you think that you can slip those hand-cuffs in front of you, Millie knows that she has permission to tie your elbows together if you so much as try it.”
His father’s words were scarcely welcome but there was worse to come as Henry noticed the other set of cuffs. He hadn’t fully realised quite how kinky some of his parents’ games were.
“I’m going to ring Childline when I get out of here.” He knew it was a hollow threat even before his dad pointed out that not only did his mum have all the dirt on him but that his sister was in charge of the web-cam until they returned.
So, Henry was cuffed hand and foot and wearing only his green swimming trunks while being imprisoned in a bare room at the mercy of his big sister until his parents returned.
His parents felt that, for once, they could leave Henry at home without any danger of local mayhem being caused by him and his waster friends in their absence.
“Goodbye, love, won’t be late. Be nice to your sister.”
Henry heard the key turn in the lock and his parents going down two flights of stairs. He could just about see out of the window as their car pulled out of the drive and headed off down the road.
After about two hours spent counting the floor boards and the tiles on the walls of the en-suite, anything was worth a try. Henry looked up into the web-cam and shouted.
“Millie! Help! I need the loo!”
Henry repeated his feigned alarm cry several times until his sister appeared and unlocked the door having crept silently up the stairs.
“Hiiii!”
“Please, Millie, I need the loo.” It’s quite impressive how desperate Henry can sound when he tries.
“OK. Just go. It’s only just in there. Dad plumbed it in a couple of days ago.”
”How am I supposed to get my shorts down and . . . you know . . . afterwards? I need a number two.”
“You’ll manage.” And Millie untied the drawstring of her brother’s swimming trunks before he could back away. “OK, go on.”
“You fucking bitch!”
“That wasn’t really a very nice . . .”
“Neither are you, you skanky cow!”
“I was trying to say, ‘That’s not a nice thing to call somebody who’s got one of these.’”
Millie had obviously been exploring their parents’ toy box as well. Her grin as she dangled that pink oval gag in front of her brother’s eyes rivalled Henry’s own renowned smile.
“You don’t think I’m going to let you put that on me, do you?”
“No.”
“Oh, you have got some sense th . . .”
Before he had finished, Millie trod on his ankle cuffs and rammed his head against the sloping section of the wall as she forced the humiliating device into place. There were times when Henry forgot that his big sister was working towards her black belt in whatever martial art she was following at the time.
“Now I only need one hand to hold this in place. What do you think I should use the other one for?” Henry saw her left hand moving towards the crutch of his shorts and his eyes got wider as he felt his precious assets starting to be restricted. “Bow, slave!”
Those eyes, that could normally charm the birds out of the trees and would certainly charm them into his bed later; had no effect at all on his sister. Henry bowed his head and Millie threaded the buckle and pulled the gag too tight for Henry to be able to expel it.
“Wise decision. For that, I won’t bother to padlock it.”
What Henry was trying to say was, “Some favour!”, but Millie seemed content that his speech was sufficiently quenched to meet her requirements. She backed off.
Whether the colour of Henry’s face was more due to fury or embarrassment was difficult to tell but his usual pallor was certainly no longer in evidence.
“You know? I often wondered whether you’d blush all over.”
“Wiiif’!”
“No, I’m not one of them. You’re the only one round here who dates dogs.”
“Nnnnggghhh!”
“I’m going to check over the web-cam stuff now. If you’re VERY nice to me later, I might give you something to eat. There again, I might just go out. Y’ never know; do yuh?”
A defeated Henry slid down the wall and was nearly sobbing by the time his backside hit the floor.
Over the next couple of hours, Henry’s tears of rage subsided, which is more than could be said for the ache in his arms and the growing pain in his jaw.
He looked at the web-cam and blushed again as he imagined that bitch looking at him and revelling in his humiliation. But suppose she had gone out? Why shouldn’t he slip his cuffs under his arse and get at least some relief from his torment. No, it simply wasn’t worth the risk: she’d probably just be trying out makeup, listening to gayboys singing, stuffing her mouth with junk food and ringing round her lame friends. Christ! Suppose she’d already shown them some of the video?
Henry reluctantly decided to be a good boy. He hoped that his sister would then be merciful upon her next visit. Have you ever heard of the power of hope over expectation?
Eventually, Henry was honoured, as she put it, with another visit from his sister. At last. He’d have that gag removed. She’d give him something to drink. You never know, she might even feed him. But how much would he have to humble himself before that would happen? Henry’s life held few certainties.
Millie was enjoying herself. This was the most fun she’d had since she managed to photograph her brother in the shower. He’d had to pay for those photos for the next two months but, being an honest trader, she did delete the most embarrassing ones - eventually.
Just as she was about to force her brother to beg for food, water or anything else he needed, the first phrase of Justin Bieber’s latest outrage rang out.
“Yes. Oh, Hi Mum.”
Henry could only hear one side of the conversation but what he was hearing wasn’t encouraging.
“Yeah, I’m good. - - - - - He’s good too - - - - Well, no he can’t speak to you at the minute. - - - - I’ll show you a photo. Hang on a minute.”
Millie used her phone to take a photo of her brother and called her mother back.
“Well no, I can’t really take it out. Somehow he managed to open the window and he was shouting down to one of his pathetic friends in the road. I had to keep him quiet somehow. The neighbours might have heard.”
Millie’s lies were worthy of Henry himself.
“Yes, I’ve fed him. - - - - Yes, don’t worry, mum, he’s alright.”
All the while Millie’s foot was on his neck, Henry couldn’t really contradict his sister.
“Bye. - - - - Love you too.”
Millie closed her phone and slipped it into the pouch on her belt. She could never bring herself to carry a bag indoors and couldn’t be bothered to carry it in her hand wherever she went. The girly “elbow in, forearm out and phone prominently displayed” wasn’t for her.
“Well, Mum and Dad said they might not be home tonight.”
“Nghhh!”
“No, it’s a bit icy and they say that they know I’ll look after you OK.”
Henry saw his immediate prospects of release disappearing so far into the distance that they vanished.
“Now, I’m a bit worried: I have to keep checking to see that you haven’t managed to slip your hands in front of you. I know what Mum and Dad told me to do.”
Henry found his feet whipped from underneath him but at least his sister ensured that he would land face down on the mattress.
“Nnnngh, eeee!”
“It’s no use begging. I’ve got better things to do than watch over you all weekend.” So saying, Millie produced yet another of her parents’ toys and cuffed Henry’s elbows, not too tightly but firmly, trapping his wrists inescapably behind him. She could have used his skinniness against him to a greater extent but, as she explained to him, she was feeling generous and she loved her little brother.
Millie helped Henry to sit up. She took his jaw in her hand, shook it and declared, “You know, I think this weekend is going to be so much fun!”