It was the same phot that mum kept on top of the piano. The one when I appeared in 1976 in our local paper.
I was five, nearly six.
I had been chosen out of many local schools to present a small picture of the town to the retiring mayor. I was pictured stiing on a table with the picture in my left hand, the arm of an adult supporting me.
He had seen the picture and that is how he first came to know me and mum.
The article told the whole town my story. I had been chosen to present the picture as I had been so brave since my dad was killed in a car crsash. Mum and I were alone.
I was wearing shorts, in 1976 they were very short. When I looked at the photo as an adult I could see what he had liked. There I was in a teeshirt and shorts. The whole of my thighs were visible, and although I was slim my thighs quite fleshy because I was seated on a hard table, the shorts were almost like underpants. The picture showed the outline of my bottom clearly, the bottom he came to like so much. The photo is still there on the top of the piano. He is long gone. I don't blame mum for what happened. She only wanted what was best for us.
I remember liking him at first. He brought me presents and sweets and was kind. Then we moved into his jouse and things changed.
I can't remember the reason I was sent to my room or much of what happened except the pain. I do remember the small stick that he brought in with him. A few years ago when I was tidying out the lift for mum I found it. It was still very plaible and thin, so thin you would not think it would hurt like it did. When he came to me all those years ago, I was still only five or six I think, he was whipping it about. It was very bendy and very thin. I was very scared as I had never been hit with anything before, except sometimes by mums hand.
I know I cried a lot and that the stick hurt me. It always hurt. I used to stand up afterwards gripping my bottom as gard as I could, the tears falling down my face. Once or twice I actually relieved myself during the whackings, when I did he whipped me longer and then took me for a bath. The worst hidings were reserved for whan mum was awy staying with my aunt who was ill.
I told my mum about the stick many times but she told me that he would not whip me if I was a good boy.
Now I look at that photo I can see that I could have been an angel all the time but he would still have sent me to my room as often as he did. He loved watching the stripes rise on my small soft white bottom and the sight of me holding my buttocks tightly to relieve some of the sting.
When I was older he left mum and me. I guess he went in search of another young boy.