Domestic and household scenes
These are the ones that happen in your own house, in your own clothes, with nothing to remember and nobody pretending to be anybody. They are the easiest scenes to run and the hardest to keep clean, because the offence is usually real and so, sometimes, is the irritation.
Consenting adults only. Everything on this page is about adults over 18 who have freely agreed to it.
In short
- No costume, no lines to learn, and no equipment beyond what is already in the house.
- Decide before you start whether the offence is real, invented, or real and agreed in advance.
- Anything you are genuinely angry about gets dealt with as yourselves, on a different day.
- Short and immediate suits a house rule. Keep the long form for a weekly review.
Domestic scenes have one thing in common: the setting is doing none of the work. There is no office, no costume and no summons, so what carries the evening is the ordinariness of it. A kitchen at half past nine on a Tuesday, with the dishwasher going, and two consenting adults over 18 who live there.
The scripts below are a starting shape and not lines to memorise. I would read them, take the rhythm, and then use your own words, because a sentence borrowed from a website in somebody else's voice sounds exactly like what it is. What matters is that the first line is decided in advance, so nobody has to invent the opening while feeling self-conscious.
All of it assumes the usual groundwork: negotiation done beforehand, a working safe word, and an ending that somebody announces. The other sets of ideas are at scene ideas.
On choosing between them, the useful question is how much ceremony you want. Most are immediate and unadorned, which suits people who want the whole thing over inside half an hour and no atmosphere hanging about afterwards.
Sunday accounts and the last two are the ones with ritual in them, and ritual is what turns a series of incidents into an arrangement. Most couples I know end up running one of the weekly ones as a spine and the immediate ones as they come up.
The state of this kitchen
A job that was agreed and has not been done, with the evidence sitting in the room. This is the simplest domestic frame there is and it needs no fiction at all, because the pan is right there. It suits couples who find roleplay excruciating, and the whole thing can run from first word to finished in twenty minutes.
Top: "Come here and look at this."
Bottom: "I was going to do it after."
Top: "That is what you said yesterday. Kettle is on. You can stand there until it boils and then we will sort this out."
The late return
An agreed time, missed, and somebody sitting up with the lamp on. Almost all of the effect happens before anyone speaks, on the walk from the bus stop, which makes it one of the cheapest scenes to run and one of the most reliable.
Agree in advance whether a message changes anything, because the answer to that question is most of the arrangement. Agree too that nobody rushes home in a way that is unsafe, and that a missed last train is not an offence, which sounds obvious at four in the afternoon and less obvious at midnight.
Top: "What time did we say?"
Bottom: "Half eleven."
Top: "And?"
Bottom: "It is ten past one."
Top: "Coat off. We will do this now, and then bed."
The unopened post
A small repeated failure with paper behind it: a bill on its second reminder, found in a drawer with four others. It works because avoidance of admin is something a great many adults are quietly ashamed of and nobody has ever held them to. Keep the scene about the letters rather than about the person's character, which is the line between useful and unkind.
Top: "This one is dated the fourteenth of last month."
Bottom: "I know."
Top: "And it is the second reminder. Open the rest, put them in date order on the table, and then come and find me."
Sunday accounts
A weekly review at the kitchen table with a written list, cumulative rather than about one thing. The list is what makes this work, and it works because it has been visible on the fridge all week. I find the reading out matters more than anything that follows it.
Top: "Four things on here. Do you want to read them or shall I?"
Bottom: "You read them."
Top: "Thursday, the car. Friday, the phone again. Sit down. We will go through the lot, deal with it, and then it is finished and off the list."
The spare room
A task avoided for months and finally called in. The offence is the avoidance itself, which both of you have watched happening, and that shared knowledge gives the scene an unusual amount of weight for something so mundane. End it with the job either done or booked in, otherwise you have replaced a task with a ritual.
Top: "How long has that been on the list?"
Bottom: "Since March."
Top: "It is August. So: twelve now, and tomorrow morning you are in there with the radio on until it is cleared."
Ruined dinner
Mock-severe, warm, and faintly comic. A burnt pan and a smoke alarm, handled with a straight face that neither of you can quite keep. Light scenes need the same groundwork as heavy ones, and the laughing is not a substitute for a safe word, which people forget precisely because it feels like nothing.
Bottom: "It is not that burnt."
Top: "The smoke alarm disagrees with you."
Bottom: "The smoke alarm is oversensitive."
Top: "Over the arm of the sofa. Six, and then we are getting chips."
Guests at seven
A standards check with a clock running. People are arriving in an hour, the bathroom has not been done, and there is no time for ceremony. The time pressure is the entire engine, and it produces a briskness that is hard to manufacture any other way. Keep marks where clothes cover them, for obvious reasons.
Top: "They are here at seven. Bathroom, hall, and you have forgotten the glasses again."
Bottom: "I will do it now."
Top: "You will. Four first so you remember next time, and then get on with it."
The phone at the table
A house rule enforced on the spot, over in ninety seconds. Immediate consequences suit small rules, because the whole value is in the speed: nothing is discussed, nothing is scheduled, and the meal carries on afterwards.
Save the long form for things that deserve a conversation. The version I like best has no impact in it at all, just the phone taken away and a few minutes standing at the end of the table, which is more effective at the table than anything louder would be.
Top: "Phone."
Bottom: "Sorry."
Top: "Face down on the side. You can stand at the end of the table until I have finished eating."
Reading the house rules
The first evening of a new arrangement, with the rules read aloud from paper and agreed line by line. There may be no impact in this at all, or a token six to mark the start. Four or five rules is the working limit, and the ending gets read out alongside the beginning, which is the part people leave out. There is more on writing them at rules and agreements.
Top: "Five things. I will read them, and you tell me if any of them are wrong."
Bottom: "All right."
Top: "One, we talk about it on Sunday. Two, you tell me the same night if something goes wrong. And the last one matters most: this stops the moment either of us says stop, and nothing about that is a surprise later."
The Sunday night reset
No offence, no list, nothing to answer for. The same time each week, unhurried, and deliberately different in tone from anything punitive. Say out loud that nothing is wrong, every single week, because a person bent over a sofa will invent a reason if you do not give them one. The argument for and against this is at the maintenance session.
Top: "Nothing is wrong. You know that."
Bottom: "I know."
Top: "Same as always, then. Over you go. Twenty minutes and we will put the telly on."
Implements, dress and position
Suggestions rather than prescriptions, and all of it assumes the target map on where it is safe to strike and the general notes at implements.
| Scene | Implements | Dress | Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| The state of this kitchen | Hand, wooden spoon | Whatever you already have on | Over a chair |
| The late return | Hand only | Coat off, what you came home in | Against a wall |
| The unopened post | Ruler | Ordinary clothes, sleeves up | Over the table |
| Sunday accounts | Leather strap | A plain slip kept for Sundays only | Kneeling on a chair |
| The spare room | Slipper | Old clothes for a dirty job | Over the sofa arm |
| Ruined dinner | Hand | An apron and nothing ceremonial | Over the knee |
| Guests at seven | Hairbrush | Dressed for the evening, nothing that will show | Touching toes, briefly |
| The phone at the table | Hand | Whatever you are eating dinner in | Over the knee |
| Reading the house rules | Hand, a token six | Ordinary clothes, no costume | Over a chair |
| The Sunday night reset | Belt or a wooden paddle | Nightclothes | Across the bed |
Real annoyance. A domestic frame sits so close to your actual life that a genuine grievance can walk into it without anybody deciding to let it in, and a scene delivered while you are properly cross is a different event from the one that was negotiated. My rule is simple: if I am annoyed, we are not doing it tonight. Have the conversation as yourselves, and put the scene back on the calendar for another day.
Common questions
What do people actually get spanked for at home?
Ordinary domestic things that were agreed in advance: a job left undone, an agreed time missed, admin avoided for weeks, or a house rule broken at the table. Between adults it is a frame both people have chosen, and the size of the offence has very little to do with the effect of the scene. Small and real works better than large and invented for most couples.
Should the offence be real or made up?
Either works, but decide which before you start. A real offence carries weight and needs care, because the person delivering it must not be genuinely angry while doing so. An invented one is safer and close to as effective, since the machinery does not much care whether the washing up was actually left.
How do you start a domestic scene without feeling ridiculous?
Use a fixed opening line and a fixed place, so neither of you has to improvise the first thirty seconds. Something as plain as "come here and look at this" is enough. The awkwardness lasts about a minute, and by the third or fourth time the shape of it carries you.