Selling Christian

Daphne was a regular churchgoer until her little boy was five. She took him to church with her every Sunday without fail. She even named him, appropriately enough, Christian. When he was little she sat him on her knee during the service. When he was older he sat quietly beside her in the pew. When Christian was five, her husband left her and ran off with a blonde lawyer who was earning four times as much as her and she stopped going to church. She figured that there probably wasn't a God up there looking after all the good people on earth. She had been a good person, a loyal and dutiful wife, and look where it had got her: a single woman on an average salary and a 5-year-old boy to bring up.

So instead of going to church every Sunday, she got up, made herself a cup of tea and a juice for Christian, settled them both back in her big double bed and read the Sunday papers while her son played with whatever toy he was into at the time. It was much more enjoyable than listening to the preacher telling her that salvation lay somewhere else and half-hearing the members of her community whispering about what a bad person she must be to make her husband go off with that woman.

Sunday mornings in bed became such a regular ritual that it continued well into Christian's teens. Even when he was eighteen years old and 6 feet 2 inches tall he slid into Daphne's big bed every Sunday morning in a t-shirt and boxers after one or other of them had got tea, juice and the papers, and together they idled away the morning. Of course, by then Christian had grown out of his toys - though occasionally he brought a computer game into his mom's bed with him, until the various noises emanating from it drove his mother so mad that she would tell him to 'either switch that damn thing off or get the hell out of my bed.' At which he would laugh and call her 'square' and she would laugh and agree that she was, but he would switch the game off anyway and read the bits of the paper she wasn't reading or just lie back and close his eyes and think how nice it was not having to do anything that day if he didn't want to.

There was a problem, though, and it was becoming more of a problem with every week that passed. The problem was that he kept getting erections. Not that they were confined to Sunday mornings in his mother's bed; he kept getting erections all the time. He got them in class, on the bus, in the car, watching TV, doing homework, sitting reading, in movie theatres, in cafes, everywhere. And it wasn't as if he had to be thinking about sex. No, sir. He'd be thinking of a difficult maths problem to solve, or just looking out the car window at the landscape rolling by, and suddenly he'd feel this big boner in his pants. His cock seemed to have a mind of its own. It was damned embarrassing. And it was particularly embarrassing when it happened in his mom's bed on a Sunday morning.

Most of the times it happened he quickly excused himself and, keeping his back to his mom, took himself off to the bathroom and either doused his cock with cold water - which felt excruciating - until it subsided or, if he thought he could do it quickly enough, jerked himself off into the basin. Then, hoping he wasn't blushing too much, he'd climb back into his mother's bed and resume reading the paper. Sometimes his mom would grin at him and ask, 'Better now?'

'Yeah, thanks,' he'd mumble, unsure if his mom was hinting she knew damn well what he'd been up to or if it was just an innocent question.

Sometimes, when he couldn't be bothered to get up and go to the bathroom, he'd just lie there and hope that it would go away. Sometimes, however, his mom made that option particularly difficult. She had got into the habit sometimes of putting the paper down after a while and snuggling close to him and putting her head on his shoulder and saying, 'I really like our Sunday mornings together, don't you?'

'Sure, mom,' he'd say, all too conscious of his mother's breasts resting against his arm and the huge boner bursting to get out of his shorts. Not that he entertained any sexual thoughts towards his mother. He was far too embarrassed to feel any desire towards anyone, let alone his own mother. All he wanted, all he fervently wished for, was that his damned erection would go away. If his mother had the slightest inkling of what he was going through, she gave no sign. As far as he could tell, she thought he was as happy lying there as she was.

One Sunday, it almost got too much to bear. At first, he'd gone to the bathroom and doused it with cold water. That had worked and he'd been able to walk back to the bed without having to hold something in front of his crotch. But about five minutes after he'd got back into bed, his mom had put her head on his shoulder and five minutes after that his boner was back, if anything bigger than before. Now what?

Christian lay still and tried to think of something completely non-sexual. The trouble was, as soon as he tried to think of something that wasn't to do with sex, he immediately thought of sex, as if his mind were on some kind of elastic band: no matter how hard he stretched the band his mind always sprang back to his erection. It was as if his cock had taken over his brain. Lying there with his mom's head on his shoulder was a kind of torture. He could feel his entire body tensing up.

'Are you OK, Chris?' Daphne asked. 'Is my head too heavy?'

'No,' he said quickly. 'I'm fine.'

He consciously made himself relax, picked up a section of the paper and tried to read it. The print swam in front of his eyes. He couldn't concentrate. All he could feel was his swollen cock. His free hand, the hand away from his mom, drifted down underneath the covers. He had to touch his cock. He just had to. If he didn't, he might explode.

His fingers found his cock beneath his boxers, but he couldn't grip it. It would have made too much of a bulge in the bed-covers and his mom might have seen it. But he couldn't move his hand away, either. He surreptitiously moved his fingers up and down the trunk of his cock, desperate to touch the crown.

'Are you sure you're OK, Chris?' asked his mom. 'You're awfully tense.'

He shifted position, using the movement to disguise putting his hand inside his boxers and round his cock. Ah, that was better. 'No, I'm OK, mom,' he mumbled. 'Just getting comfortable.'

He started stroking his cock, slowly at first so as not to disturb the bed-covers. But then his need got the better of him and he started moving his hand more vigorously.

'What are you doing?' Daphne asked almost immediately. Of course, she guessed what it was her son was doing. She'd been married for nearly ten years and she knew what men liked to do in the mornings. She didn't want to embarrass her son, but she couldn't just lie there pretending nothing was happening, not when he was almost shaking the bed to pieces. She wanted to give her son the opportunity to lie, but more importantly she wanted him to stop what he was doing. She was damned if she was going to have her Sunday spoiled by her son jerking off. 'Have you got an itch or something?' she suggested helpfully.

'Yeah,' said Chris, blushing. 'I just had to scratch it.'

Although he was as embarrassed as hell, his mom's interruption did the trick. His cock immediately started to deflate. He sighed with relief.

'OK now?' asked his mom.

'Yeah, thanks,' he said.

The rest of the morning passed without incident, but the next Sunday the same thing happened. He got a hell of a hard-on through thinking about nothing. It just happened. He told his mom he had to go to the bathroom and almost had to bend double to conceal his erection from her. In the bathroom he was so hard he figured it wouldn't go down just with cold water. He'd have to jerk off and hope he could get it over with quickly enough so his mom wouldn't guess what he was doing. He slipped his boxers down his legs and stuck his erect cock over the basin.

His mom knew very well what he was up to. She knew he masturbated fairly often. She had the evidence in his boxers every time she did the weekly wash. Wasn't he a normal teenage boy? Even so, she marvelled at the number of times he seemed able to do it. He seemed to get the urge every day, sometimes more often. She only hoped he wasn't thinking of her when he gave himself a hand-job.

He came back to her bed and got in. He'd come pretty quickly, so he didn't think his mom had guessed what he was doing. His cock had deflated, thank Christ. Now he could enjoy the rest of the morning.

'Feel better,' said his mom, 'now you've got rid of your erection?'

'What?' he exclaimed. What the fuck? He could feel the blush creeping over his face.

'It's all right, honey,' said his mom. 'You don't have to pretend you don't know what I'm talking about.'

He hardly dared look at her, he was that embarrassed. 'Mom.' He heard himself wailing, a bit like when he was a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Daphne looked at her son's stricken face and almost regretted what she'd said. But it was too late now. She'd brought up the subject and now she'd have to go through with it, no matter how embarrassing it might be for both of them. 'Honey,' she said, clasping his hand affectionately in her own. 'There's no need to be embarrassed. I know you masturbate. It's nothing to be ashamed of. All men do it.'

'That doesn't mean I like to talk about it with my mom,' said Chris, wishing he were anywhere but in his mother's bed.

'I don't suppose you do,' said Daphne. 'So we won't talk about it if you don't want to. I just wanted to tell you that it's nothing to be ashamed of.'

He gripped the section of the paper and tried to read. 'OK,' he mumbled. 'I've got the message.' Why didn't his mom just shut up about it?

The rest of the morning continued in a tense silence. Next Sunday he brought her a cup of tea as usual but, instead of climbing into bed with her, announced he was going for a run. Before she could protest, he was out of the room and gone. Daphne spent a miserable morning in bed wondering how she could make things right.

The following Sunday and the Sunday after that, the same thing happened and Daphne still hadn't worked out how she could put things right. She only knew that she missed their Sunday mornings together something awful and she had to do something about it or she knew she would be miserable for the rest of her life. So one Sunday, when he brought her a cup of tea and turned to go, she blurted out, 'Don't go, honey, please.'

He stood still but without turning round. 'I'm going for my run,' he mumbled.

'I miss our Sunday mornings together,' she said, feeling herself near tears. 'Stay with me.'

He turned to look at his mother. She had put her hand flat on the bed beside her, as if making a space for him. The Sunday papers were strewn about her. The truth was he missed their Sunday mornings together too but he wasn't going to admit it. He thought at eighteen years old he shouldn't be crawling into bed with his mom like a five year old. Then there was the business of his boners. What if he got one again, like he always seemed to? How would he deal with it? He could hardly go to the bathroom like before. His mom would know he was jerking off and that would be just too embarrassing.

'Come on, honey,' his mom pleaded. 'Just for five minutes. Keep your mom company.'

Well, OK, just for five minutes. He could handle that. But if she so much as hinted at his jerking off, he was out of there for good. 'OK, just for a while,' he said and slid into the bed.

'Which section do you want?' she asked, thinking to keep things on a mature level. The last thing she was going to talk about was young men masturbating. That subject was closed for good.

Chris settled down and read the papers with his mother. Sure, he got an erection, but he lived with it. With a great effort of will he got his mind onto other things and eventually it went down of its own accord. Pretty soon he was relaxing and enjoying the lazy Sunday morning just like before.

The next day Daphne was having coffee with her best friend, Holly. Holly was another divorcee. She was forty, the same age as Daphne. They'd been friends for years and shared all sorts of confidences.

'How are your girls?' Daphne asked. She didn't really want to know. She wanted to talk about Chris, but felt it only polite to ask about Holly's kids first.

Holly knew damn well that was what her friend wanted. They'd known each other for too long to be fooled by conversational niceties. But she played along for the sake of their friendship.

'Teenagers,' said Holly. 'Pure hell.' Her two girls were fourteen and thirteen years old and she was bringing them up largely on her own, with her ex-husband having them only on alternate weekends. She was exaggerating, of course. She was an excellent mother and her two girls were perfect in just about every way, but it suited their friendship for the two women to regularly complain about how difficult it was to bring up a family on their own.

'How's Chris?' she asked Daphne on cue.

'Oh, he's fine,' Daphne said offhandedly. 'Getting big, you know.'

'I know,' laughed Holly. 'I saw him a week ago downtown and I thought how handsome he's grown. If I was twenty years younger...'

This was just the opening Daphne wanted to be able to talk about the thing that was really on her mind. 'Well, you'd better watch out. He certainly seems to be highly sexed.'

'Aren't all men his age?' said Holly.

'I mean,' said Daphne, lowering her voice to a whisper so that she wouldn't be overheard by the other customers in the café, 'he has erections all the time. And he's always masturbating.'

Holly raised her eyebrows. 'How do you know? Do you spy on him?'

'Of course not,' protested Daphne. 'But I see plenty of evidence when I do the wash.'

'So?' said holly. 'What's the big deal? All men jerk off. It's natural.'

'That's what I told him,' said Daphne before she could stop herself.

Holly's jaw dropped. 'You mean you talked to him about it? Daphne! What was his reaction? What did he say? My God, I bet he died with embarrassment.'

'So did I,' admitted Daphne, blushing at the memory. 'I can't think why I said it.'

'So what happened? Did he confess all?'

'Of course not. It took me weeks to get him back to treating me normally again.'

'I'm not surprised. Honestly, Daphne, what were you thinking?'

'I don't know. I suppose I just wanted him not to be ashamed of doing it. You know, just treat it as a normal part of growing up.'

'Instead of which you've scarred him for life,' laughed Holly. 'Either that, or he thinks you fancy him.'

'Don't,' said Daphne, blushing even deeper. 'That's not funny.'

'Well, it wouldn't surprise me,' said Holly. 'I fancy him. He's gorgeous.'

Daphne laughed. 'Honestly, Holly, you're impossible. He's probably got loads of girlfriends.'

'Why's he keep jerking off then?' asked Holly. 'You know what young people are like these days. They're more interested in their mobile phones than the opposite sex. Not like when we were their age. I used to spend all day checking boys' packages.'

'Don't lie,' laughed Daphne. 'You were like me, pure as the driven snow.'

'Well, I'm not like that now,' insisted Holly. 'I swear I'm more interested in men now than I ever was, particularly since I became single. You know what it's like, Daphne, don't pretend you don't. I haven't had a fuck for months and it's driving me nuts. I've started eyeing the arm of the sofa I'm that desperate.'

Daphne was almost in hysterics, but wasn't going to admit she felt the same. 'Maybe you ought to get together with Chris then. That would solve both your problems.'

She meant it as a joke, so Holly dutifully laughed. But the truth was, Holly had been thinking along the same lines ever since her friend had mentioned his constant erections. Try as she might, she just couldn't get the image of Chris sporting an erect cock out of her mind. 'Huh,' she shrugged, 'I don't suppose he'd look twice at a woman my age, more's the pity.'

'Never say never,' said Daphne, wanting to continue with the joke. 'Do you want me to ask him?'

'Don't you dare,' said Holly. 'He'd probably throw up.'

'Don't be ridiculous,' said Daphne. 'You're still a sexy woman.'

'So are you,' said Holly. 'Now let's change the subject before we become lesbians.'

Over the next couple of weeks Daphne found her mind returning to her chat with her best friend. She tried to look at Christian with Holly's eyes, with the eyes of a woman other than his mother. He certainly was a handsome boy - well, man. He was six feet two and had no fat on him. She had to admit he looked pretty good in t-shirt and shorts. She couldn't understand why he didn't have a girlfriend. One Sunday she decided to bring it up.

'How come you never invite any girls over?' she asked him when they were sipping their drinks and reading the Sundays. 'I hope you're not ashamed of your mom.'

'Of course not,' he said. 'But a guy has to be careful who he invites home.'

'Why's that?'

'Cause it's like virtually a declaration of marriage.' He spoke as if it was obvious. 'The next thing she'll be knitting me a sweater and planning her hen night.'

'I didn't realise it meant so much.'

'It does,' he said. 'Besides, I don't have a girlfriend right now.'

'Is that because none of them come up to your exacting standards?'

He grinned. 'Something like that. Actually, they're all a bit immature. I don't like all the giggling and texting and bitching they go in for. See mom, you've spoilt me. I just want a girl like you.'

She dug him in the ribs. 'Oh you.'

He squealed in mock pain and grinned at her.

'So you go for the more mature type, do you?' she said.

'I guess,' he said, picking up the paper. 'Trouble is, older women don't look twice at guys as young as me.'

'Huh, don't you believe it,' said Daphne. 'Check them out. They're looking you over just like the girls. It's just they do it more subtly.'

'That right?' He was losing interest, Daphne could tell. She left a pause.

'So you know my friend Holly?'

'Sure.' He was about to add 'the one with nice tits,' but managed to stop himself in time.

'What do you think of her? Do you think she's attractive?'

'I guess,' he said. He thought for a moment, picturing her the last time he'd seen her. She'd been wearing a tight top and jogging tights because she and his mom had just been for a run. The outfit left little of her figure to the imagination. He remembered that he'd got one of his damn erections and had to go to the bathroom and jerk himself off while imagining what it would be like to fuck her. 'Yeah, she's pretty hot,' he said.

Daphne sought out Holly the very next day. She could hardly wait to tell her friend the good news.

'Chris thinks you're hot,' she said. 'What did I tell you?'

Holly was appalled. 'You didn't tell him I fancied him, did you?'

'Of course not,' said Daphne. 'I just asked him what he thought of you, It was part of a general conversation about young men and older women. And he said you were hot.'

Holly blushed a little. 'He really said that? You weren't putting words in his mouth or anything?'

'No,' protested Daphne. 'He really rates you.' She lowered her voice to a whisper. 'I reckon he's probably jerked off thinking about you.'

'Stop it,' laughed Holly. 'You're making me all hot and bothered.'

They sipped their coffee in silence. Daphne looked at her friend expectantly. Holly looked back.

'Well,' she said, 'what do you expect me to do about it?'

'For a start,' said Daphne, 'you could go out on a date with him.'

Holly spluttered into her coffee. 'Go out on a date? Are you kidding? He's eighteen years old. I'm old enough to be his mother. And he's your son, for Christ's sake.'