Someone said that to live a good life, the most important thing was to 'Know yourself.' Even though I wasn't twenty yet, I knew myself enough to know that I wanted and needed her.
I found her curled up in the den, listening to a blues singer telling a thousand year old story, told thousands of times before. I approached her and stroked her hair. She looked up at me in anticipation of my desire.
She stood and came into my arms. We kissed, and then I held her until she exhaled a long relaxed sigh. She said, "I'm safe when you hold me like this Danny...we're together, and I'm not afraid."
For most people, saying that they felt safe in another person's arms might just be a nice thing to say, but for my mother it would have been unimaginable for her to utter those words only six months earlier. Six months that took two minutes and a life-altering eternity to pass. Up until then, we'd spoke and touched and acted as most mothers and sons did, except when the panic came, and struck the terror into her. There was never any warning, a thought perhaps, a sound, a flicker of light, and then the sweats, the shaking, the fear, and the tears.
On an ordinary day, a simple question was a spark that lit my old life on fire and turned it to ash. I'd said, "Mom, you look strange, are you okay?"
"Oh sure, honey. It's...you know...'That time.' I just have some cramps and I'm sore and...jeez Danny, why am I going on, you don't have to hear about all this."
"Mom, it's not such a big deal to talk about your period, is it?"
"I guess not," she laughed. "I guess I'm still stuck in the Middle Ages about that kind of stuff. I'll tell you though, when I get like this, I feel uncomfortable in my own skin. It just seems to be getting worse; my breasts are so sore, I just feel like a wreck."
That's when I said something you could say to almost anyone, but not my mother. "Why don't you let me take you to a doctor; he could give you something and..." That's when I knew I'd made a mistake. The symptoms came quickly; just the thought of leaving the house and sitting in a doctor's office set her off. Her medication wasn't helping much. She'd been going out less and less over the years and I couldn't remember the last time she went out of the house. I could see the sweat on her face, I could hear the heavy breathing, and I could feel the darkness that enveloped her.
I put her in my arms and said, "It's all right; you don't have to do anything you don't want to." My hand made slow wide circles on her back and she calmed a bit. I told her to rest on the couch and she went onto her stomach. I continued the stroking. Her sweater had come up, exposing the small of her back. I put my hand on it and continued the petting up under the sweater to her shoulder blades. In ten minutes she was quiet and breathing easily; I couldn't tell if she was asleep.
To this day I don't know what possessed me to do what I did. Sure, I'd always liked looking at my mom's body, because her curves were in those places your hands just wanted to go to, but I never expected to act on it. I know that if I'd thought about it I wouldn't have done it, but I just acted.
My two practiced fingers just unsnapped her bra. She didn't move or say anything and I continued stroking her smooth skin. In the minutes that passed, my heart drummed a beat to accompany my racing thoughts. As if it was the most commonplace thing for a son to do, I ran my hand over my mother's ass and down her legs to her calves. I was in the throes of desire, and reason had taken a distant second place. Her breathing was deep, but even.
I massaged her that way for a while, unmistakably caressing the fleshy curve on my hand's journey, up and down the length of her body. I urged her over and she turned with a sigh. She wasn't asleep. I repeated the soothing strokes beginning at her legs and over her thighs. I crossed her belly and when I got to her waist, I slipped my hand under the thin sweater. Her eyes stayed closed.
I stroked and fondled her swollen breasts for a long time. Her body was young enough for them to still have a girlish spring to them. They felt full and the nipples became erect when my palms passed over them. By then, my heart was pounding so hard you could have heard it in the next room. I drew my mother's nipples through my fingers, savoring the stiff resistance. When I ran my fingertips over her skin, it was warm and velvety. She hardly moved, but I could tell how sensitive they were by the sounds emanating from her throat.
I wanted to look at her breasts and I wanted to watch as I fondled them. At that point, my erection was directing me. With my wrists, I forced the sweater to slide up and bare the full globes. They looked big on her slim body, and they looked beautiful in my hands. A few fine bluish veins made them look even more sensuous. I bent over and took one of her nipples into my mouth. I drew on it and kept it warm with my tongue. Before I got to second one, she was whimpering and her hand was in my hair.
As I suckled on the elongated tips of my mother's breasts she said, "I wanted to do it for you baby, they wouldn't let me...they wouldn't let me." I had no idea what she was talking about, or whom 'they' were. Her sounds got higher pitched as I drew more of her tit into my mouth. It only added to the surrealism of the moment when all at once she took a breath, raised her hips, and put her hand between her legs. The pants she wore were thin enough to allow her fingers to stimulate her pussy and she began coming almost immediately. The "Oh...Oh...Oh..." that she kept repeating were more whimpers than words. I kissed her, and my mother kissed me back.
When she opened her eyes, her face was crimson. She sat up and said, "Oh my God, what's wrong with me? I'm sorry Danny, I shouldn't have let you...nobody's touched me like that for so long...Danny forgive me...I'm so ashamed."
I put my arms around her and said, "You have nothing to be ashamed of, if it's anybody's fault, it's mine. You felt so good to me, and when the panic passed and you calmed down, I...mom, all that happened was that it made you better, and that's nobody's fault...that's the best thing that could happen."
The few tears stopped and she stayed on my neck without looking at me. "Thank you baby; you're so sweet...I'm glad you're here."
That was the door that opened to allow similar holdings and touchings over the coming weeks. That was what developed into 'Medicine' for mom, and the source of my greatest pleasure up to that point. We had our 'code words' about her feeling scared, or not feeling well, and we would go into her bedroom to make it better, for both of us. Comforting her brought comfort to me.
Not that I wouldn't have welcomed it, but it was okay that she was reluctant to let me touch her between her legs, and reluctant to touch me when I gave her thinly veiled opportunities. I think at that point, we both probably knew that the sexual stimulation that we were both experiencing would inevitably progress.
What also progressed was the level of intimacy we shared. Mom told me about her experience of a sheltered childhood. I knew that her mother had died when she was very young, but I had never heard the details. They were horrific. That didn't prevent her father from repeating them to her time and time again in what mom called, 'His loud warning voice.' "You know honey," she said, "It seemed like he told me the story every day."
We sat on the couch, I held her hand, and she told me what had happened. She said, "I was only two and my mother was out shopping. It was winter, and it got dark early. In the corner of the parking lot, two men waited. Maybe my mother resisted and maybe she didn't, all we know is that they beat her with a hammer, for a hundred dollars and some credit cards. My father said he couldn't recognize her face when he had to identify her. That hammer forged the rest of my life."
"I'm sorry mom," I said. I stroked her hair and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She gave me a weak smile before continuing.
"My father hardly ever let me leave the house and he never stopped telling me how dangerous it was 'Out there.' I know that he loved me and he wanted to protect me, and unfortunately, he had enough money for home schooling and for Lucia, who was always with me, so I ended up in the house most of the time. I was so lonely baby, I think I cried every night."
I stroked her hair and face and said, "I'm sorry mom." The sadness colored her words.
"You didn't really know your grandfather, he meant well, but there wasn't much anyone could tell him, and he had enough money to always get his way. He had enough money for a lot of things. I didn't realize that this house is what most people would call a mansion, until I was older. I guess I thought every home had huge fireplaces, pools, gyms, and media rooms. And I guess I thought people had enough money, because after he died, the check from the lawyers came every month."
Hearing her open up led me to ask about the topic I could hardly get her to say a word about. "Mom, what about my father, all you ever say is that his name was Paul, he was a nice man and he died after you got married. But I haven't believed that for a long time, that's not what happened is it?" It had always upset her whenever she had started to tell me anything about him.
"No baby, that wasn't what happened...oh God, all right, I'll just tell you and get it over with." She hesitated and then said, "We were never married...I got pregnant right in this house. That was what sent my father over the edge I guess, because after all he did to protect me, it still happened. I didn't meet many boys and all my ideas came from books and TV, and I guess it was like one of those bad TV shows...he was a carpenter, a handyman...Paul who was nice to me...and I liked him."
Her mood shifted and she said as if it were only a matter of fact, "I was very young and when I realized I was pregnant, I had to tell Lucia...and she told my father. They sent him away...he never even knew..."
Then she smiled at me. "I had you right here in this house...and when you were three, daddy died, and then it was just you, me, and Lucia, until six years ago when she had to go back to her family in Italy...she loved you a lot...you can still hear it in her letters, can't you honey?"
"Sure mom, I still miss her."
