Chapter 1:Reflections

"Only four more days of this bloody solitary confinement," muttered Alan as he pushed the supper tray through the hatch in the door to the silent guard waiting outside. He knew there was no point in speaking to the man as not one of them had spoken more than a singe word on the six previous days. The hatch slid noisily closed and the bolt clanged into place. Again he was alone, completely isolated and utterly bored. "I've reflected all I need to," he yelled at the camera in the corner but as before nothing happened. He didn't even know if anyone heard him.

Gloomily he sat down on the plastic covered mattress on the single bed, then lifted himself slightly and placed the small hand towel under his bottom to relieve the sticky suction between his bare flesh and the plastic. He hated having lie on it but there was nowhere else to sit or lie down, and no sheets or other bedding. His cell was purposefully as austere as they could make it. Nondescript grey painted walls, a stainless steel sink, mirror and toilet with a limited amount of basic toiletries. No chair, no TV, no books and no writing material, in fact the only reading material was the small laminated card giving a few details of the Marriage Revival Programme, commonly called the 'Marriage Boot Camp', he and his wife had been sentenced to undergo.

Wearily Alan rolled on to his back and lay down, his head resting on the raised bolster built into the mattress and his eyes roaming, but unseeing at the smooth white painted ceiling; not even a crack to provide interest in its surface. The subdued lighting behind the coving, sent a pattern of shadows across the whiteness and in the first day or two he'd tried to create images from the shapes but now his eyes did not even notice them. Angrily he threw the card across the room, he knew it by heart, having read it at least a hundred times, swore at the camera, and then settled back to gently massaging his prick and, without wishing too, once more began going over the events that led to his lonely incarceration.

A little over two months previously, for the second time in as many weeks, the police were called to his house to break up a fight between his wife Margaret and him. Fortunately his sixteen-year-old son Raymond, fearing the fight could end in serious injury for one of them, dialled 999 and let the police in to quell the disturbance. They found the kitchen littered with broken crockery, Margaret had bruises to her arms and breasts and he had a cut face from when he didn't duck quick enough to avoid a plate. Both were hauled off to the police station and charged with disorderly conduct.

At the court appearance the magistrates decided they would be good test subjects for the proposed new Marriage Revival Programme. It wouldn't start until there were enough participants and the organisers had done the interviews but in the meantime, they were put on probation with an injunction to keep the peace. Until then Margaret had the use of the house from 6 p.m. on Monday until 6 p.m. on Friday and Alan had it for the weekend. In the 'away from the house time' they stayed with her parents who actually quite liked Alan and hoped the new programme would have the desired effect of getting them back together. "Some hope of that!" Alan muttered when the thought ran through his mind.

"It's difficult to fix a date when our relationship started to deteriorate," Alan went over the facts he told the counsellor in his interview, "Things gradually went down hill after about eight years into our marriage and soon after I was appointed to manage the local supermarket. Times are difficult for a small supermarket having to compete with the big boys, but I do what I can to keep the store afloat even if it means working long hours. She started to mistrust me and accused me of staying late just to have one or other of the cashiers in my office. At that time I was completely innocent although I'd looked at a few of the girls that came in showing rather a lot of bare flesh, but two years ago I had sex with Kate, a young girl who I knew was only doing it to gain promotion, after all why would she want to be fucked by a bald, pot-bellied man in his late thirties? I knew the reason and she knew I knew, but I strung her along for a while before giving her the job." Alan's prick started to rise at the thought of what they did together and he gently began to stroke it to full hardness and eventually to an emission regardless of who was watching the screen at the end of the camera feed.

"It wasn't long after when one of the other girls wanted to get up the promotion ladder and had heard from Kate how to do it. Again it wasn't for love, just to satisfy my lust. Jane seemed to enjoy it more than Kate and we fucked with enthusiasm. I'm certain that Margaret was getting her cunt filled too but it certainly wasn't by me. We slept in the same bed but for the last few years her legs were always tightly closed against me. They formed a mental as well as a physical barrier. We never kissed or had a kind word to say to each other and I suppose if it weren't for Ray we'd have divorced years ago. It wasn't much of a life for him either to see us at each other's throats all the time and whenever he could, he was out or shut in his room. Perhaps this programme will do some good, one way or the other. In the early days of our marriage we got on well enough and even loved each other but then I suppose we just got bored with the same routine."

Like I'm bored now. Why the hell are they giving us so long to think about things? One night was enough! Much more of this and I will go bloody insane. It's hardly living when the major events of the day are the lights going up in the morning, waiting for the hatch to open for the three meals we get and then trying to anticipate the dimming of the lights at night. The monotony is only relieved by using the loo and washing."

At that point, for the third time that day, he went to the sink, wetted a flannel and wiped the sperm from his belly and off the mattress before returning to the bed and continuing his musing.

"I wonder what this corporal punishment bit is all about? Sounds like I might get to spank her fat arse, and she mine. I'll certainly lay into her arse good and hard if I get the chance. Wonder what the controlled conditions are? Across my knee? Tied down to a bed? And then it sounds as if we get to fuck, that will be the first time for years but I doubt it will be as good as young Jane. It also seems that we'll see others do it too and watch them spank their partners, so I daresay I will get a hard-on and be able to perform well enough even though the sight of her overweight body has put me off lately. I still like her big tits though." The thoughts started his prick rising again, and for the second time that evening and the fourth time that day, he masturbated himself.

In a similar cell in another wing, Margaret lay with her back to the camera and quietly cried as she surreptitiously fingered her clit. Like her husband she was bored stiff and couldn't wait until they moved on to the programme proper, although she had many reservations about that and would have opted out if she could. "At least the hatch is closed for the last time today and I won't have to show my body to whichever woman is on duty when I walk to get the tray. I'm sure those dykes stare just to humiliate me, and I wouldn't mind betting they'd just love to come in and play with me. Probably want to feel my titties. Not that they'll get the chance." she muttered and then reviewed her life and what she thought might happen in the coming weeks. "I suppose the punishment will be a spanking like a naughty schoolgirl, doubt they'll be allowed to do anything worse, and I'll give that bastard as good as he gives me. If I have to let him have sex with me, then I'll just lie still and let him get on with it. Wonder if they'll let us have sex with others? Will I be attractive enough for them? I sure could do with losing a few pounds and probably have lost some after eating the healthy stuff they give us. My bleached blonde hair is beginning to show darker at the roots and I doubt if I'll be able to get it done while I'm here, so even if the conditions are better, I'm not going to be able to look my best. I'm not sure that I want to return to Alan at the end of it although that's what they're hoping. I would rather bring Bob Kingston, the factory engineer, home with me. He fucks well, pity about him having a wife to complicate things. I'm sure there were times when Alan could smell I had sex when we went to bed but he either didn't notice of chose to ignore it. At least with Bob we did it a variety of ways and not in the one position with the lights out. Wonder if Ray is all right living with mother? He knows all about us now and I suppose it was a good thing he phoned the police otherwise one of us might have been on a murder charge."

Her sobbing eased and she remembered the embarrassment of the police arriving with sirens going, alerting the neighbours. "I hated being handcuffed and dragged out when Alan wasn't. That picture of him holding a tea towel to his face to staunch the blood flowing down his face and over his white shirt in the local newspaper made it seem like I was the aggressor and the later report of our sentence let all my friends in the factory know and I had to put up with their comments until the time came to come to this place. Fortunately it looks like they will hold my job until this is all over. Then there was the further embarrassment when we finally got a date to start the programme and they sent a marked police van to bring me here. I suppose it was something that it didn't have its blue lights flashing. They picked that sod Alan up on the way but didn't allow us to speak to each other on the journey, which was just as well as we'd only gotten into a slanging match. Must try and sleep to pass the time, don't want to keep thinking about it."

Her mind wouldn't go to sleep though. "That wasn't the worst of it either, they checked me in and took me to the toilets and showers. I think those warders are all dyke lesbians; they looked at me all the time I sat on the loo and watched while I showered. No privacy at all. And when I came out all my clothes had been taken and a slip of a girl, gave me one of those stupid hospital gowns that hardly hid anything, certainly not on a woman my size, and everyone I passed knew I was naked underneath it. Those men we passed in the corridor certainly had a good look at my tits flopping about. God, I must have blushed dozens of times when we passed a man or woman on the way to the doctor's office. Bloody Alan was already there and naked and a nurse stood taking a blood sample from him. I did have to smile though when she sent him to a cubicle to give a sperm sample! He came out looking very sheepish and his prick looked a bit red and sore. They had my gown off by then and the doctor had his stethoscope to my chest. He did the rest of my bodily examination in front of the sod and even asked personal questions about my body functions. I thought professional ethics should have kept that private. Then I had to wait and watch while they examined him. Perhaps that was all part of a softening up process to get us interested in each other again but I was real glad when our gowns were returned and they led us away separately, me here and him to the men's part I suppose. The warder girl didn't even leave me with the gown. Bitch! Ever since they've kept me naked and I know they watch me all the time even when I shit. That's disgusting." The lights dimmed and she felt safe enough to caress her clit with more vigour. "Shit! Being naked and knowing they're watching, does make me horny as hell." Finally she fell asleep.

Karen opened the file on the next couple. Terry James Forsythe aged 28, 5" 3". Quiet reserved and feels inadequate. Junior civil servant in council office and Elizabeth Kathryn Forsythe, aged 28, 5' 11". Attractive well built brunette. Likes social events. Very demanding and domineering.

Unbeknown to Alan and Margaret, they weren't alone in their boredom, six identical cells in mirror image pairs were built in each wing to accommodate up to six couples, the maximum the programme would take for the time being, A doubling of the accommodation was planned, but only five couple were in this programme.

In the Male Cell 2 alongside Alan, Terry Forsythe lay worrying as to what was likely to happen. In his interview he told Frieda, "I realise now that I should have stood up to my wife, Elizabeth, much earlier in my life, really I shouldn't have married her at all and probably wouldn't if she hadn't falsely told me she was pregnant. We'd only had sex once before we married and she said she was in her safe period when she instigated it and that's how she trapped me for reasons I don't fully understand. I suppose it was because I have a fairly good regular job that brings in enough to keep her and I have a place of my own that I rent for less than the going rate due to it being owned by a grandparent so I can be considered reasonably well off. Perhaps it was because she wants someone to dominate and I'm a pretty meek guy and a lot smaller than her so she mostly gets her own way. Our interests are not really compatible either. I like staying at home reading and doing crosswords or watching TV while she wants to go out clubbing several times a week with her girlfriends. Not sure that they're all girlfriends either. We did have sex several times a week for the first year or so but since then it's dropped off and I've almost had to beg for it once a month, that isn't enough for me. I know I'm well endowed in that department and thought I could satisfy her, but her verbal answers and sometimes the physical violence, always shuts me up quickly. I don't believe it is enough for Elizabeth either but I'm sure she hasn't gone without and I know her job in a hotel brings her into contact with many men looking for the chance of sex while they are away from home. I'm sure they rewarded her with gifts which I suppose makes her a prostitute. I wonder if she thinks of me while she's being fucked by another man?" Like his neighbour in the adjoining cell, he began to wank his prick and those watching soon realised that it was quite large for the size of his body.

"It was when she began to stay out all night, that I knew she was cuckolding me even though she said the hotel manager had asked her to do some night shifts. Of course I didn't believe that and for weeks I debated what to do but before deciding to seek a divorce and to give our marriage a chance, I suggested counselling. Elizabeth argued and argued against it but for once I stood firm. She must have thought it better to go along with the idea but I guess that was only until she found a man that would provide a permanent income and a home better than my salary allows. I didn't want a divorce either so when the counsellor suggested the new trial programme, I went along with it, not knowing exactly what it entailed."

Both voluntarily entered the centre and were surprised, to say the least, at it being a prison regime. Elizabeth cursed herself, cursed Terry and most of all, cursed the counsellor who recommended the programme, "Give it a try my dears," the elderly woman suggested, "You're much to young to wreck your lives with a messy divorce."

In her interview with Frieda, Elizabeth admitted most of her husband's suppositions as to her behaviour were correct. "He has a good job and has the qualifications to get on but makes no effort to get a better position and to earn more money so I decided to earn a little extra on the side and learn a few new ways of having sex. I took the usual precautions and only had sex with a condom and I'm on the pill and don't really want a squalling child. He wants children though so maybe that's why he wants to get rid of me and find someone else."

Karen read the terse summary in the next file.

Michael Sidney Mellors (Sid) a 30 year old stocky and rather aggressive builders labourer. Likes boozing and angers quickly. Lesley Rachel Mellors 31. Overweight. Stocky with short black hair. Likes pubs too. Dresses shabbily. Works on assembly line at factory.

Sid and his slightly older wife Lesley, occupied the next cells in their respective wings. He was an inveterate beer drinker and most nights would find him in the local pub, sometimes with Lesley, and coming home well tanked up. Stocky with short black hair, Lesley was a match for her husband and often fought with him but usually managed to keep out of harm's way. Neither worried overmuch about having extra marital sex; he because his physique and aggressive manner could dominate many women, at least he could a few years ago but now the excessive amount of alcohol in his blood made it difficult for his to get and maintain an erection, and she, because of the extra cash it brought in. She, though, was more of a binge drinker, and, mainly on Saturday evenings would get herself drunk. In the early years of their marriage the attacks on each other were mainly verbal, however, over the last few years their attitude to each other and their fighting became more physical and when they both ended up in casualty, the police stepped in. Like Alan and Margaret, they were sentenced to attend the programme but unlike them, they were allowed to live together with certain conditions imposed, until picked up to go to the centre.