School

"And you will sleep here."

Miss Maguire stopped by the foot of the bed and looked at Alasdair, for a response. He looked back at her, uncertainly, then looked round the rest of the room. Three other beds; all decorated with articles of a distinctly feminine nature.

"Here?" he said. He let his bag slip from his shoulder and fall onto the bed that had apparently been designated to him.

"Do we have a problem?" Miss Maguire asked. She was very stern. Alasdair wasn't easily intimidated, but he could tell that she wasn't the kind to take any nonsense. He came from Edinburgh -- a town that was populated by women just like her. The "Miss Jean Brodie" types, he had always thought. Confident, self-assured, walked like Sergeant-Majors. Gentile and perhaps a little prim, but with an iron core.

"Am I sharing a room with... with three girls?" he finally asked.

"Three girls, yes... Alison, Lorraine and Yvette. You will belong to them for the next week. After that, we will come up with a fresh sleeping arrangement for you."

Alasdair found himself being swamped by a fresh wave of confusion. Miss Maguire's choice of words seemed to be almost deliberately confusing -- seemed to hint at more than she was letting on. After a moment of contemplation he decided to let the "belong to them" slide and concentrated on a more pressing problem.

"What about privacy?" he asked. "Where do I get changed?"

"Privacy won't be a problem," Miss Maguire said crisply. "Now, hurry up... you have a class to attend in ten minutes and Miss Wilson cannot abide lateness."

"Do I have time to get changed?"

"Yes, of course. But hurry."

Miss Maguire folded her arms and studied him sternly. He turned away from her, opened his bag and pulled out the clothes he planned on changing into. Ostentatiously, he laid them out on the bed; fully conscious that Miss Maguire hadn't moved at all. She was still waiting and still watching him. When he had selected his fresh clothes, he looked back at her helplessly.

"Well?" she said sharply. "What's taking you so long?"

He could feel his face burning. Clearly she wasn't going to allow him any privacy. So he turned his back and started getting stripped. His shirt came off first, then his shoes and trousers and he quickly pulled on the clean clothes -- constantly aware of her scrutiny. When he turned back, she was smiling slightly.

"Good. Well done. Now, let's go."

They arrived at Miss Wilson's class with little time to spare. All the girls were trooping in and Alasdair followed them without question, while Miss Maguire drew Miss Wilson aside to talk about something.

Two things occurred to Alasdair at the same time. First was that there were no other males in the classroom -- it was full of girls. In fact, he realised, he hadn't seen any other males since arriving at the school. Not in any positions of responsibility, anyway. Had there been janitors, caretakers, gardeners, perhaps? Had he just missed them? He wasn't sure. The second thing he noticed was that all the girls were wearing uniforms... and he hadn't been informed of or provided with one. He wondered if that was going to cause a problem.

Miss Wilson stepped into the class.

"Our new student has arrived at last," she said crisply. "Alasdair Munro will you step to the front of the room, please?"

Alasdair stood up self-consciously and walked up to Miss Wilson's desk.

"Face the class, please."

He turned and looked at the sea of curious faces.

"Now... perhaps you might tell us a bit about yourself?"

"Umm... well... My name is Alasdair Munro, I'm 23 years old and I was offered a place at this school as part of a social experiment," he said. "I had been unemployed for a long time and someone at my local jobcentre took me aside and said that if I was prepared to go for further education, then I would be guaranteed a life-changing experience and a job at the end of it, should I want to stay on here. She was very vague about the details -- said that was a necessary element of the social experiment -- but seemed very positive about it. She said I would have a crucial role to play and took care of all the details. I've been offered a generous allowance, but to tell the truth I think I was sold when she showed me the pictures of the school."

"Good, good. Well done." Miss Wilson said. She turned back to the class. "A social experiment. How wonderfully melodramatic. And how foolish of Mr Munro for not questioning further." She turned back to Alasdair. "Why didn't you question further, Mr Munro?"

"I, um... I suppose I was a bit scared to."

"Scared? Of what?"

"Of... well... of talking myself out of it. I needed a change."

"A change from what?"

"From the lifestyle I was already in."

Miss Wilson didn't answer. She just looked imperiously at Alasdair and waited for him to continue. After a moment, he did.

"I live in a town called Greenock, near Glasgow. It's not a nice town. Unemployment is high and IQs are low. I heard once, that there was a tree there a long time ago. An oak tree... a green oak, to be precise. That's how it got its name. Well, it seems that people used to be hung from that oak. So the town is named after a place of execution.

"Anyway, I live in a very grim tower block at the top of a hill where the wind whistles in from all directions and every single window leaks. The stairs are dark and grimy and smell very bad, there's constant vandalism and a lot of the people there just keep their heads down in case they catch the attention of the resident morons.

"There is a stair security and intercom system that hasn't worked in the three years that I've lived there. There are cameras that have never worked. There are store-rooms that are constantly being set on fire. There is a launderette that people are scared to hang around in. And there are thugs who roam around stabbing each other and looking for fights.

"I felt... I suppose... that anywhere had to be better than that."

"And you felt that you were ready for a life-changing experience?" Miss Wilson asked.

"Yes, I did."

"And how much did you want your life to change?"

"I want... purpose. Something constructive to do. I want to feel like I have a future. A better education. And a job."

"And you ended up here. Well done. I think you'll achieve all of that... if you can cope with the extent to which your lifestyle will change."

"I was warned that this wouldn't be easy on me. I have been anticipating a strict and... possibly harsh... regime. I don't know what to expect, but I'm not expecting luxury... but I didn't have luxury before, either."

"Quite right. Well... as long as you stay here, there are going to be certain things expected of you and we might as well start now. First of all, I'm sure you must have noticed that you are the only student at this school who isn't wearing a uniform."

Alasdair nodded. "Yes, I have."

"Good. Time to rectify that. Get undressed."

A very, very deep silence settled across the room. Alasdair blinked. He looked sideways at Miss Wilson, but she simply sat still and smiled tightly at him. He looked at the girls and noticed the subtle excitement and anticipation on their faces and in their postures. They were all slightly flushed and were leaning forward intently.

"Umm... what? I mean... ahh... what?"

"Such a lack of coherence all of a sudden," Miss Wilson said mockingly. "I told you to take off your clothes. Why aren't you naked yet?"

"My... muh my clothes? Here? N-n-now?"

"That's right."

He laughed; suddenly sure that it was just a game. A joke. An initiation. One that could get a teacher into a lot of trouble, of course. Making demands like that in front of a room full of witnesses would almost surely get back to the governing bodies and have repercussions. It was a very, very foolish joke.

"Mr Munro, let me clarify something to you. These girls have all been sent here by their parents to learn and experience certain ideologies that are not generally condoned in the mainstream world. For the most part, in fact, they have been sent here by their mothers, since their fathers have already been thoroughly indoctrinated into that ideology and wouldn't think of upsetting the status quo they have become accustomed to. Isn't that right... Anne?"

One of the girls stood up and smiled. "Yes, Miss Wilson. My dad is very aware of his place. He is a powerful lawyer, but my mum controls the finances and controls him. I've never personally witnessed the repercussions, but I've heard them every time he steps out of line." A pause -- clearly intended for dramatic purposes. "They sound very painful."

"Good." Miss Wilson nodded in approval and Anne sat down. Miss Wilson turned back to Alasdair. "You see, Mr Munro, you are a very privileged person. You -- and these girls -- are just the first of many students to pass through these doors. Yes, this is indeed a social experiment. Anne's mother -- and many other mothers -- knows where the true control in a relationship should come from and they have seized that control for themselves. Gradually, these women have formed a small community and compared notes and experiences. These experiences have varied widely -- many men have strongly resisted the power dynamic their wives have set about instigating. And so... this school was established purely in order to educate young ladies as to the best means of establishing and maintaining that power dynamic in their future relationships.

"You are especially privileged to be involved in this 'social experiment' from its very earliest stages. This is the first term of our first school year. This is our first group of students. And you are our first male student. Just one male among 12 girls... a far from satisfactory mixture I'm sure you'll agree, but your help will be invaluable to us. It is through you that we will identify any logistical problems that will need to be addressed next year if we are to keep learning. And then we will recruit more male... students..? Employees..? Whichever term you are most comfortable with, will do for now.

"However, we must maintain a certain standard of decency. That is why you won't find a single student under the age of 21 in this school. In the future, we may establish another school where we will teach the more theoretical elements of our philosophies to younger students as part of a wider-ranging curriculum which will encompass all of the regular classes of a more mainstream school.

"For now, though... student or employee... you have been given a direct order that you have so far failed to act upon. You are important to us, Mr Munro, but you are not indispensible. So you will either be dismissed from the school within the hour, or you will take your clothes off, right now."

Alasdair still hesitated. He was having a very hard time absorbing all the ramifications of what he had just been told. Miss Wilson said nothing, however. She simply reached into her desk drawer and pulled out a small object, which she placed on a shelf where it was prominently visible to anyone facing in that direction. Alasdair had to turn round to see it himself, but he instantly understood its meaning when he did.

It was an egg timer and the sands were rapidly draining -- he made his decision.

The girls in the class giggled as he fumbled with his shirt and two buttons came flying off. He pulled the remainder of it over his head, then unbuckled his belt. His shoes were kicked off and then he slipped off his trousers and kicked them aside, too. Socks followed and suddenly all that was left was his underwear. He paused once more and looked again at the egg timer, then back to Miss Wilson. She raised an eyebrow pointedly, then they both looked at the egg timer together. The last of the sands were draining away. He steeled himself, then hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his boxers, pulled them down and stepped out of them.

There were a few gasps from the girls as he straightened up without making any attempt to hide himself. Alasdair had always thought that any man who tried to cover himself up with his hands if he was caught in the nude was simply compounding his own vulnerability. He had never been able to comprehend the notion that it was so terrible for someone to see his penis, simply because she didn't own one herself. The logic had always escaped him. Yeah, it made sense that nudity in certain situations -- such as this one right now -- equated vulnerability. But clamping both hands over his knob to hide it from view was going to enhance, rather than diminish that vulnerability. So he didn't bother.

A further bonus was the fact that he considered himself to be in such good shape. He was no narcissus, though. He never spent much time preening himself in front of a mirror and he didn't consider himself to be excessively attractive. He was fully aware that physical attraction was in the eye of the beholder and he knew that some would consider his face to be too angular, his features too sharp, his eyes to be a shade of blue just that touch too cold and shrewd. His hair was almost shoulder length right now, and while it might be too long for some, there had been times when it had been too short for others. He wasn't fat. He didn't have an ounce of spare fat anywhere on his body, in fact -- something that was plainly clear to everybody in the room. But he wasn't particularly muscular, either. Athletic, perhaps... but then once again, there were others who might consider him to be too skinny. So although he generally hoped that he might offer a pleasant countenance to anyone who looked upon him, he took no offence when someone didn't find him particularly attractive.

And then... there was that one detail that causes so much distress and so much self-consciousness to so many men. Alasdair wasn't exactly packing a monster between his legs, but with a girth and length that was above the average, he had nothing to be ashamed of and he was well aware of that fact. He strongly suspected that there were few men in the world who hadn't -- at some point in their lives -- looked down and felt that an extra inch would be sheer perfection. But on sober reflection, he had always concluded that he was happier without that inch.

Miss Wilson gave the girls a few moments to drink in the sight of Alasdair's body, before reaching into her drawer again, and producing a few scraps of leather that she threw onto her desk. "This -- Mr Munro -- is going to be your uniform for the duration of your stay at this school," she said.

"In this room, you mean?" he asked, looking at the scraps. There wasn't much there at all.

"Are you having difficulty understanding me? I meant anywhere in the entire school, unless certain provisions are made for you. Shoes, perhaps, for outdoor activities. Or protective clothing, should you need it. Activities will dictate your dress sense, to a certain extent. At all other times, however..." And she picked up one of the scraps. It was a collar. She held it out to him.

He took it and read the tag on it, then buckled it round his neck without further question. The tag bore the legend "Property of Blake School. Answers to Alasdair." Privately, he was pleased and impressed that his name had been spelled correctly. That didn't often happen.

Without being told to, he reached out and picked up one of the other scraps, then buckled it onto his right wrist. It was a leather cuff; fur-lined and surprisingly comfortable. There was a hoop attached to it with a catch - similar to one on the end of a dog's lead, but "double-headed" -- presumably intended to lock to the hoop on the other cuff to restrict his hand movements.

This only left a couple of the more arcane-looking scraps and he reached for the first of these, but Miss Wilson swept them aside before he could pick one up. "You will be introduced to those later," she said with a slight smile. He felt a stir of fresh trepidation at what that implied, but he asked no questions. There were times when you just had to restrain your curiosity and wait to see what was going to happen next.

"Well, now," Miss Wilson said, addressing the girls once more. "Who is scheduled to own Mr Munro first?" A hand went up. "Ahh, Miss Yvette McKenzie... step forward, please."

The girl who stood up was clearly both nervous and excited. She walked between the desks and approached Alasdair, giving him plenty of time to look at her. For the first time, he found himself particularly appreciating the school uniform that the girls were all wearing. A short, black skirt that stopped halfway down her thighs and a thin, white blouse. She wasn't wearing a bra -- clearly, that wasn't compulsory. And she wore boots, rather than shoes. Boots that were jet-black and very, very shiny with buckles all the way up the side. To his dismay, Alasdair felt that familiar throbbing that heralded the early stirrings of an erection. He tried to quell it. Clearly this was the wrong moment to begin appreciating the finer points of the school dress policy.

Miss Wilson rose from her desk and stepped to Alasdair's side. "As you can see," she said, "the girls are given a certain amount of liberty with their uniforms. There are certain rules, but so long as those rules are followed, there is room within them to personalise the details. I see you have already noticed Miss McKenzie's boots. Well done. Black footwear, black skirt and white blouse... all very much in order. The lack of a bra is commendable, too." Her eyes flicked downward, briefly. "It certainly hasn't escaped your attention, anyway."

Yvette's eyes flicked down as well, and she blushed slightly, but couldn't prevent a smile twitching the corners of her mouth. A giggle rippled through the room and Alasdair diverted more of his mental resources towards stemming that traitorous rising.

Miss Wilson pulled up a chair and instructed Yvette to sit down, facing the class.

"Now... how many of you have seen a naked man before?" Miss Wilson asked. Most of the girls raised their hands. Yvette didn't. "Hmm... not all of you. Well, that's hardly surprising. Most of your mothers have been almost as strict with you girls as they have been with your fathers, and I know for a fact that many of them wanted to restrict your sexual involvement with men until you had been to this school. A very commendable attitude.

"Which means that even though you might be familiar with the appearance of a man's body, you might not be familiar with the mechanisms of it, or with male responses to certain stimuli. Although I'm sure that most of you have recognised that Mr Munro has been evidencing the early stages of an erection. He has, however, very commendably been able to restrain that erection -- at least so far. Well done, Mr Munro. Very well done.

"Now, I had originally intended to leave the actual disciplinary section of the class until later, but I think a little rescheduling might be in order. Miss McKenzie... if you would be so kind?"

"You! Across my knee. Right now."

Alasdair looked at Yvette in confusion. The commanding tones had been delivered with nothing more than the faintest tremor in her voice to betray her own tension.

"A bit more confidence if you please, Miss McKenzie. And you shouldn't have to shout to get his attention. Remember... men and dogs respond to low voices. And Mr Munro, I shouldn't have to remind you that we expect instant obedience from you at all times. Do what you have been told to do, right away and without question."

Alasdair reluctantly moved to Yvette's side, knelt on the floor and bent over her knees. He tried to position himself so that his penis didn't come into contact with her bare thighs -- anything to actually minimise the skin-to-skin contact.

"Now, remember what you were taught in last week's class," Miss Wilson said. "You know how to manoeuvre him into position, don't you?"