Chapter 1: Niespodziewane wezwanie
The sunlight streaming through the salon windows was too cheerful, too bright. It highlighted every dust mote floating in the air and made the room feel like a museum diorama: The Traditional Polish Household, circa Now. I was curled on the sofa, trying to make myself small inside my oldest, softest sweater, my phone a useless, cold brick in my hands.
My parents sat across from me in their matching armchairs. My mother’s knitting needles clicked a steady, judgmental rhythm. My father, Andrzej, just stared. He didn’t need to tap his fingers; his silence was louder.
“This bill came today,” he finally said, his voice a low rumble that vibrated in the quiet room. He held up a white envelope between his thumb and forefinger like it was contaminated. “For your phone. The one we pay for.”
I knew where this was going. My stomach tightened. “I thought the autopay was set up.”
“It is. From my account.” He set the paper down on the coffee table with deliberate slowness. “For data overages. Again. What were you doing, Wiktoria? Watching films all night?”
“It was just a few clips. I couldn’t sleep.” My voice came out thin, childlike. I hated it.
My mother sighed, a sound of profound disappointment. The knitting never stopped. “At your age, you should be thinking of practical things. Not wasting money and time on nonsense.”
“It’s not nonsense. It’s just…” I trailed off. There was no ‘just’ they would accept. Anything that wasn’t productive, that wasn’t directly leading to a better job or a suitable husband, was classified as nonsense.
Andrzej leaned forward, his broad shoulders blocking the light. “This is not the first conversation about responsibility. About respect for the money we provide. You live under this roof, you follow the rules of this house. Yes?”
“Yes, Tata.”
“’Yes, Tata’,” he echoed, his tone flat. “You say it, but the words are empty. Your actions are a different language.”
He stood up. The sudden movement made me flinch. He walked around the coffee table, his shadow falling over me. The familiar, cold dread began to pool in my limbs.
“You know what this means,” he stated. It wasn’t a question.
A hot lump formed in my throat. I stared at the Persian rug, at the precise pattern of vines and flowers. “It was an accident. I’ll pay you back. I can transfer—”
“With what money?” my mother interjected softly. “Your part-time job at the café is for your ‘personal things’, you always say. This is a personal thing. A very expensive personal thing.”
Andrzej’s hand, large and calloused, entered my field of vision. He pointed, not at me, but at the space directly in front of his polished leather shoes. “Up. Now.”
The tears were immediate, blurring the rug pattern. I didn’t want to cry. It made everything worse, made me feel even more like a foolish child. But the panic was automatic, a physical reaction I had never been able to control. I slowly uncurled myself and stood, my legs feeling weak. I was taller than my mother, but my father still loomed.
“Please, Tata. I’m twenty-six. This is… I’ll do extra chores. I won’t use the data at all.”
“Twenty-six,” he said, nodding slowly as if considering the number for the first time. “And still needing the same lessons as when you were sixteen. That is the problem, córcia.”
He sat down heavily in my vacated spot on the sofa. The cushions sighed under his weight. He smoothed his trousers over his thighs, a casual, methodical gesture that sent a bolt of pure humiliation through me. He then patted his left knee. The instruction was clear, absolute.
The world narrowed to that gesture. The sunlight felt accusatory. The ticking of the antique clock on the mantle was unbearably loud. My mother’s clicking needles had stopped. She was watching, a silent witness.
There was no physical fight in me, only a deep, shuddering resignation. This was the transaction. Disobedience or irresponsibility on one side, pain and shame on the other, and after it was done, the account would be settled. The debt paid. At least for a while.
With a hitched breath, I took the two steps forward. The space between us felt like a canyon. I lowered myself over his lap, the wool of his trousers rough against my cheek. The position was awkward, demeaning, leaving me feeling exposed and utterly powerless. I gripped the opposite sofa cushion, my knuckles turning white.
“Ten,” he announced, his voice calm and matter-of-fact. “For carelessness. And for the lie of omission.”
“I didn’t lie,” I whimpered into the fabric.
“Silence.”
His hand came down. The first smack was always a shock, a sharp, stinging crack that echoed in the quiet room. It wasn’t about injury; it was about sensation, about focus. The second followed, then the third, each deliberate and measured, spreading a burning heat through the thin material of my leggings. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to detach, to go somewhere else in my mind. But the pain was an anchor, tying me mercilessly to the present.
The spanking was rhythmic, relentless. It was the physical punctuation to their lectures. With each stroke, the numbers of the phone bill, their disappointed faces, my own perceived failings, all flashed in my mind. Tears soaked into his trousers. I tried to stay still, to be quiet and take it, but a small, pathetic gasp escaped on the sixth blow.
“You will learn to mind the limits we set,” he said, not even breathless. The seventh and eighth landed on the most tender, already-stinging places. The discipline was in the consistency, the inescapability. There was no anger in his actions, just a cool, brutal correction. That was somehow worse.
When the tenth finally landed, he let his heavy hand rest on my back for a moment. The silence returned, thick and hot. The only sounds were my ragged, choked attempts to breathe through the tears.
“Up,” he said.
I pushed myself up, my body trembling, my face a wet, hot mess. I couldn’t look at either of them. I stood there, hands clenched at my sides, the aftermath of the burning throbbing through me, a vibrant, shameful reminder.
“Go to your room. Think about where your priorities should be,” my mother said, her voice resuming its normal tone as if we had just discussed the weather. The clicking of her needles started again.
Andrzej adjusted his watch, his face impassive. “Dinner is at seven. Do not be late.”
I turned and walked out, each step sending a fresh pulse of pain. It was a contained, private pain, one I would have to sit with through the afternoon. I climbed the stairs to my room, the childhood room I couldn’t afford to leave. I closed the door and sank onto my bed, pressing my face into the pillow to muffle the sobs that finally broke free.
Downstairs, life continued. The clock ticked. The needles clicked. The settlement was complete. For now. But lying there, the physical sting slowly fading into a deep, bruising ache, I felt a different, colder emotion solidify beneath the shame. It was small, a tiny, hard knot in my chest. It was the silent, desperate calculation of what it would finally take, and what it would cost, to never have to walk across that rug and lower myself over his knee again.