Wedding Memories and Regret

March 29, 2004

The memory is a funny thing. It softens some edges, sharpens others, and paints the past in hues that maybe weren't quite so vivid at the time. But this one… this one I remember. It's mostly true. The feelings, especially. They’re etched into me, a permanent part of my history.

Twenty-two years ago, I stood in a small, sun-drenched chapel, the scent of lilies and old wood thick in the air. My dress was simple, not the poofy confection some of my friends had chosen. It was silk, and it whispered against my legs as Daddy walked me down the aisle. His arm was solid, an anchor. I was trembling, a cocktail of exhilaration and pure, unadulterated terror.

I wasn’t just walking toward my future. I was being handed over.

I could feel it in the way Daddy’s grip tightened just before he let go. In the way he placed my hand in his—my husband’s—and gave a slow, solemn nod. No words were needed. The message was clear in the set of his jaw, the gravity in his eyes. She is your responsibility now. It wasn’t a loss. It was a transfer of custody. From one man who loved and protected me, to another who had promised to do the same.

The reception was a blur of smiling faces and clinking glasses. Then, we were alone. In a modest hotel room that smelled of lemon polish. The wedding night.

I was a virgin.

The fear came back then, cold and slick in my stomach. He was patient. So patient. His hands were gentle, his voice a low murmur against my skin, telling me I was beautiful, that he loved me, that it would be okay. It did hurt, a little. A sharp, surprising pinch that made me gasp. But he was true to his word. He was gentle. And afterwards, curled into his side, feeling the strange, new ache between my legs, I felt a profound sense of… arrival. This was my life now. He was my life now.

The next morning, sunlight streamed through the cheap hotel blinds, painting stripes across the bed. We ordered room service coffee, still in our robes, and began the tedious, wonderful task of going through the wedding gifts we’d brought back from the reception.

It started pleasantly enough. We oohed and aahed over the crystal bowl from my aunt, the set of luxurious linen sheets from his college roommate, the generous cheque from his parents. We laughed at the predictably bland silver picture frame from a distant cousin.

Then I opened the box from Cynthia.

Cynthia was an acquaintance, a friend of a friend from my book club. She had money, and she had opinions, and she loved to make sure everyone knew both. The box was heavy, expensively wrapped. I tore the paper with a little thrill of anticipation.

It was a vase.

Not just any vase. It was a monstrous, garish thing. Swirls of puce and mustard yellow in a clashing, asymmetrical pattern. It was thick, clumsy, and ugly as sin. A small, tasteful card was tucked inside. “For your new home! I saw this and just knew it was your style. Love, Cynthia.”

My style.

My style?

A hot, irrational anger flooded my veins. It wasn’t about the vase. Not really. It was the condescension. The assumption. The sheer, audacious wrongness of it. This ugly, expensive eyesore was a symbol of her completely misunderstanding who I was. On the most important day of my life, she’d gotten me a trophy for a person I didn’t even know.

“Can you believe this?” I hissed, holding the vase aloft like it was evidence in a crime. “She knew my style? What, does she think I live in a carnival funhouse?”

My husband looked up from examining a new set of steak knives. “It’s… certainly bold,” he said, his voice carefully neutral.

“Bold? It’s hideous! It’s insulting!” My voice was climbing, that shrill note of hysteria I hated but couldn’t control tightening my throat. “She did this on purpose. She’s always making these little digs. This is a dig wrapped in ugly ceramic!”

“Lisa,” he said, setting the knives down. His tone was calm, a rock in my rising emotional tide. “It’s a vase. We’ll donate it. Or put it in the garage. It doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter!” I slammed the vase down on the table harder than I intended. It didn’t break, just gave a dull, stupid thunk. “She thinks she knows me, and she doesn’t! She thinks this… this thing… is something I would want in my home! Our home!”

I was pacing now, my robe flapping. The rational part of me, a very small and distant voice, knew I was being absurd. But the larger, more wounded part was in full control. The vulnerability of the previous night, the monumental shift in my identity, it all seemed to funnel into this one, stupid object.

He stood up. He was taller than me, broader. In his simple white t-shirt and sleep pants, he looked solid, immovable. “You need to take a breath,” he said, his voice still calm but firmer now. “It’s a gift. You don’t like it. That’s the end of it.”

But it wasn’t the end of it for me. I launched into a tirade—about Cynthia, about pretentious people, about the injustice of ugly home decor. Tears of pure frustration pricked my eyes. I was whining. I heard it in my own voice—a petulant, childish cadence I hadn’t used in years.

“Lisa. That’s enough.” The command in his voice was new. It wasn’t the gentle coaxing from our wedding night. This was different. Clear. Unyielding.

I ignored it. “And the card! ‘Just knew it was your style’—what is that supposed to—”

“I am warning you,” he interrupted, his voice dropping lower. A shiver, completely separate from my anger, went through me. “You are acting like a child. If you don’t stop this tantrum right now, there will be consequences.”

Consequences. The word hung in the air. It was so parental. So definitive. A fresh wave of rebellious anger washed over me. “Oh, consequences? What are you going to do, ground me? We’re married, not… not…”

I didn’t get to finish the sentence.

In one smooth, decisive motion, he closed the distance between us. His hands were on my shoulders, not rough, but implacable. He guided me, my protests dying in my throat under the sheer weight of his certainty, toward the armchair in the corner of the room.

“What are you doing?” My voice was a squeak.

“What I should have done the moment you started,” he said, his voice terrifyingly even. He sat down in the chair. And then, before my brain could fully process what was happening, he pulled me across his lap.

The position was so sudden, so undignified, that my mind went blank for a second. I was lying face down, the terrycloth of his robe under my cheek, my legs dangling. I could feel the hard muscle of his thighs under my stomach.

“Stop it! Let me up!” I squirmed, but his left arm came across my back, pinning me in place with effortless strength.

“You have been acting like a spoiled little girl,” he said, his voice close to my ear. “And spoiled little girls get spankings.”

My heart hammered against his leg. This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening. We were married adults. But the firm hand settling on the seat of my robe felt very, very real.

The first smack landed.

It wasn’t brutally hard, but it was startling. A sharp, crisp crack of sound in the quiet room. A bloom of heat spread through the fabric.

“No!” I gasped.

The second smack came, on the other side. Then a third, and a fourth, in a slow, measured rhythm. Crack. Crack. Crack. Each one sent a jolt through me—less of pain, though there was a building sting, and more of sheer, shocking reality. This was really happening. My new husband was spanking me.

“For the tantrum,” he said, his hand falling again.

Crack.

“For the disrespect,” another, slightly harder.

Crack.

“For not listening to me when I tried to calm you down.”

The sting was accumulating now, a warm, throbbing heat. But worse than the physical sensation was the psychology of it. The complete powerlessness. The juvenile position. I was a woman, his wife, and I was over his knee getting a spanking. Hot tears of shame, real ones this time, spilled onto his robe.

He paused. His hand rested on my now-warmed backside. “Are you ready to behave?”

I couldn’t speak. I just nodded, a miserable, jerky movement.

“I need to hear it, Lisa.”

“I’m sorry,” I choked out, the words muffled. “I’m so sorry. I was awful.”

“Yes, you were.” His hand moved, but not to strike again. To the tie of my robe. He undid it. Then, his fingers hooked into the waistband of my silky sleep pants and my panties beneath them, and in one swift motion, he bared me.

The air in the room felt cold on my exposed skin. The humiliation was absolute, total. I squeezed my eyes shut, a soft sob escaping me. This felt infinitely more serious, more consequential, than the spanking over the fabric.

His palm, warm and broad, came down on my naked flesh.

The sound was different—sharper, more intimate. The sting was immediate and intense, a bright, biting heat that made me cry out. He delivered half a dozen more, each one landing with deliberate force on my tender cheeks. I kicked my legs helplessly, my tears flowing freely, all my anger and frustration melting away under this acute, shameful correction.

When he stopped, the only sounds were my hiccupping sobs and our breathing. The heat in my backside pulsed in time with my heartbeat.

Slowly, carefully, he pulled my panties and pants back up, then retied my robe. His hands were gentle again. Then he lifted me, not as a sack of potatoes, but as something precious. He gathered me into his lap, cradling me against his chest as I cried.

I buried my face in his neck, trying to figure out what had just happened. He held me tightly, one hand stroking my hair.

“I love you,” he murmured into my hair, his voice back to that deep, soothing rumble. “More than anything. But that behavior is not acceptable. Not in this marriage. Do you understand?”

I nodded, clinging to him. “I understand. I’m so sorry, sir.” The honorific slipped out, unbidden, feeling oddly right in the aftermath.

He kissed my forehead. “It’s over now. It’s done.” He held me for a long time, until my tears subsided into shaky breaths. The ugly vase sat forgotten on the table. The world had narrowed to the circle of his arms, the throbbing reminder on my backside, and the profound, unsettling shift in the foundation of our brand-new life together.

He finally spoke, his lips brushing my temple. “Now, what do you say we go get some real breakfast?”