Spanked by Robin Byrd, or not that innocent

I'm sitting across a table from Robin Byrd. We're wearing microphones and ostensibly taping a podcast for heretv, but it feels like we're just talking. She's very easy to talk to and as she says when we first sit down, "I feel like we should've met before." So we're talking about erotica and s/m and spanking and she says that she wants to spank me. I giggle politely, totally thinking she's kidding. And I blush. She tells me I come off as shy and I blush more.

I feel like people are always expecting me not to blush, yet they don't seem to realize that I've got things a bit backwards. Well, not completely, but maybe the dirtier I can get in my writing, the more it makes me nervous in real life, especially now. Sometimes I’m so self-conscious of who I’m not, that I forget that it’s okay to be who I really am, which isn’t such a simple equation, or one you can figure out from a MySpace profile or website. That’s me, but not all of me. There is more than a bit of the totally dorky, geeked-out, chess-playing, head-in-a-book nerdy girl of my childhood in me now, to the point that I never know when people are serious about liking me. That, coupled with all that I do for a living, and that whole year or two of almost nonstop rejection, and I feel like I get my signals all mixed up all the time. I still never know what’s a come-on, what’s a date, what’s flirting, what’s not, nevermind not being sure how to react.

"I'm can't tell if X likes me," I tell A. "You mean you don't know if he likes you, or if he likes likes you,” she responds. The latter. And I'm not even sure it matters, but you would think that by now I would know. I usually can only tell when it's Elise, and that's usually because my hands are in her cleavage or she's kissing my breasts. It's kindof a mutual fondling appreciation society when I see her, but it's more than that. I feel completely comfortable with her because she’s a real friend, not someone you just call your friend because you happen to say hi when you run into them. She notices things that other people wouldn't think to and it's always the people who give me the unexpected compliments, the ones that show they've been watching me when I didn't realize it, that I adore.

Usually, I feel like I'm either too confident and fantasizing way, way into the future about people or not confident enough, or at least, uncertain. Sometimes I like the uncertainty, though, that up-in-the-air tension that lets me have my little fantasies, but never have to figure out where they might go beyond that. But ultimately I wish things were a little clearer. I wish I had a little more of a clue so I wouldn’t look so dumb in either case.

Back to the podcast. The room isn’t sexy, but the conversation is getting increasingly heated, not really in content, but I can tell that Robin gets it. She’s not just going for the prurient interest, but wants to know what makes me tick, about the nitty-gritty of what makes a scene hot, what makes it work. So we keep talking, and then Robin says it again, in a way I can’t ignore. And it's totally surreal but awesome because I not only haven't gotten spanked since my book party, but I'm totally right there with her. I don't think that's the kind of thing you can plan. If the producer had been like "Robin wants to spank you…on her podcast" that would've been weird. But bending over a desk, trying to answer interview questions while Robin Byrd, who was a very good spanker indeed, slammed her hand against my ass, was hot. And fun. And made the half hour speed by.

She got really into it and at first was just giving me pretty hard, solid smacks on each cheek but then she just went bam-bam-bam-bam-bam and I couldn't talk at all. She told me I have a good ass for spanking and I tried to play that off as my high heels but really I was thrilled. It was one of those moments that was intimate even though it was public, even though we had to wrap up fast at the end and I had a brief second of embarrassment that I had done that instead of chatting politely across a table. What I love about being spanked is that it can convey a lot; you can tell if someone’s into it or just going through the motions. You can tell if they’re trying to make you feel slutty and dirty (in a good way), if they know precisely what they’re doing with their smacks. I was so, so glad that wasn’t being filmed, and a little disappointed that we couldn’t continue. I could’ve taken a lot more, that’s for sure, but it was actually perfect.

Walking out I felt refreshed, like she’d given me back this part of myself that I keep managing to lose or cover up or pretend doesn’t exist. It’s partly that fear of being “too slutty,” or, as Carol Queen calls it in Real Live Nude Girl, which I just started rereading, because I need its message, erotophobia. I’ve got plenty of that in me and sometimes it overtakes me, and the spanking made me realize that that is part of me too. Not all, but definitely part, and I liked slithering onto the subway, even the ultra-crowded 6, with people who, I’ll just take a wild guess, weren’t just spanked (or whatever the equivalent is for them) on their lunch hour (though if they were, that’s awesome too).

After the taping, we took Polaroids (so fun and old-fashioned!) and she was saying how I’d looked so innocent. And I guess I do, sometimes. I feel innocent sometimes, in a good way, in a way that lets me know I’m not jaded, hopefully. I’m probably the opposite of jaded; I’m so hopeful, when I’m not moping and nervous and psyching myself out. I’m starting to feel more confident, so that maybe the next time I’m in one of these weird situations, I’ll know how to read it. I will certainly say yes if Robin Byrd ever asks to spank me again. (I don’t know when the podcast is airing, but as soon as I find out, I’ll let you know, so you can listen to her hand connect with my ass, and how I try to talk in between.)