As soon as I was in bed, I burst into tears. The punishment, I felt, had been excessive for the crime. A few smacks for swearing might have been in order, but this was a serious beating. Felipe agreed, for he was not tearful but angry. I heard him muttering curses under his breath, and he later furiously complained to dad. Of course, father took his sister’s side.

It was the last time we ever swore at our aunt’s house, but not the last time we were to be punished.

Felipe was the next of us to be slippered, for an incident at school I had nothing to do with. Although I did not witness his thrashing directly, I heard it all right. It was severe, more severe than the first one. I sat on my bed and listened from my room as the slipper strikes resounded through the otherwise silent house. I winced at each one, for I loved my brother and hated to hear him suffering. I know there are siblings that take a malicious pleasure in hearing their brother or sister punished, but I didn’t feel that way. I actually lost count of the number of strokes he received. It was more than twenty for sure. When it was over, he raced to his room and shut the door. I knocked and offered to come in and comfort him but he told me he wanted to be alone.

The next slippering had my name on it. Felipe and I were eleven, and just over a year had passed since our first experience over the kitchen table. To cut a long story short, I had a fight in school. It was with a girl called Pilar who, for some reason, had taken it into her head to be mean to me that week. She’d called me names. She’d started giggling when I was speaking in front of class. She’d drawn on my notebook. At lunchtime, she cut in front of me in the lunch queue and that was the final straw. I pushed her out of the way. She reacted, pushing me back and we fought. Kids, and trays, went flying, but we were totally oblivious, hitting and kicking each other.

Of course, we were only eleven-year-old girls and it was not difficult to prise us apart. We were marched directly to the school director’s office and our parents were called and told we were suspended for the afternoon. My mum came and picked me up and she did NOT look happy.

I spent the afternoon in my room. I was torn. I was partly proud that I had stood up for myself. I was partly angry with Pilar for winding me up. And, of course, I was nervous about what my punishment would be.

Felipe had heard of the incident at school, of course, and when he got home he told me he was proud of me. He also warned me that my punishment was likely to be a thrashing, which I had guessed.

Sure enough, my dad came home from work. Mum had called him at work, so he knew the whole story. He did, to be fair, allow me to explain my side of the story.

He listened calmly, and then told me that I should have walked away and told a teacher. How easy it is for adults to say things like that when they don’t have to face the other kids!