Pulse

In her mouth, it felt like he was still alive.

***

He was alive in the strictest, most clinical sense, but Ms. Harcourt had long since given up hope that she would ever speak to her father again. The stroke had not come as a surprise given the Harcourt patriarch's lifestyle of decadence and excess, but no one ever expects tonight's ribeye to be the one that pushes a brittle artery beyond its limit.

As expected of a man of his stature, he was strong; he did not simply lay down and die. His usually-toothy grin lopsided as the paramedics hoisted his gurney into the ambulance, he slurred reassurances to his family. He'd be alright, he said, as the doors closed and the vehicle disappeared down the drive. He lost consciousness on the way to the hospital and never woke again.

His body did not die, but the spark of the man who had been her father had been snuffed out, and all that was left was the antiseptic-smelling husk existing on a bed in a private hospital room. The family spared no expense to ensure his comfort, expecting a swift recovery. The doctors were initially optimistic—they had been able to remove the blockage in his brain before catastrophic damage had occurred—but as the months whiled on, the family's visits became less frequent and they stopped setting a place for him at the dinner table.

***

Ms. Harcourt had been surprised to learn that comatose men could get hard. In her research, she'd even learned that the cocks of the recently-deceased would also sometimes stiffen. The lengths that a body would go to ensure reproduction fascinated and horrified her.

Each time she marvelled at the vitality of a man supposedly dead. His cock throbbed against her tongue with an intensity rare even in men her own age. He was so big that she could fit only the head into her mouth, so she compensated for her lack of coverage with manual stimulation. She had grown accustomed to slowly working her hand up and down the length of him as she massaged what she could with her mouth, and when she sensed he was close she would cradle his balls in her other hand, squeezing gently and releasing again and again until he would spill his cum down her throat. As she gulped it down, she would often muse that she was swallowing a hot, bitter brother or sister. How many had passed through her belly?

She knew how it looked, but no one would really understand. Though the door to his room did not have a lock, she knew that no one would check in on him for hours at a stretch, and she planned her visits around this schedule. She didn't enjoy it. At the same time, she reasoned, service was something that was rarely enjoyed; it was simply done. The elder Harcourt had given her everything—the education, the houses, the cars, the family—and it was in deference to that fact that she diligently provided what service she could.

***

She could hear her mother and sisters making arrangements in the hallway when she saw it. As he laid there, a bulge under his blanket caught her attention. She immediately averted her gaze back to her magazine, her eyes tracing over words without comprehending them. Her face felt hot. From the other side of the door came the muffled sounds of the discussion.

"I can't believe we're finally going through with it," sulked the youngest daughter.

"It's time. He wasn't going to last forever. We have to do him the last kindness of saying goodbye." The mother's words were sweet, but her voice lacked the appropriate affect—her ability to express it had eroded as each day he did not wake up provided another needling sorrow.

Ms. Harcourt was moving toward the bed, though she told herself that she was not fully in control of her actions. Curious and mortified, she gingerly adjusted the blanket to attempt to conceal her father's erection. Her family would rejoin her any minute, and it would be an awkward interaction if they saw a comatose family member's cock perked up. She tried to smooth the sheets, but this made the bulge even more prominent. There was no waistband to tuck his dick into and there was no way she could see to hide it.

She heard the door crack. "Hey, we're going to get something to eat," said her mother from the hall. "Are you coming?" Ms. Harcourt startled and nearly knocked over the IV drip.

"No! No. I'm not hungry. I'll catch up with you all later."

"Okay. We'll see you."

Her heart tried to claw its way free from her ribcage as she heaved out a sigh. As the moments passed, her eyes drifted back to the bulge under the blanket. Her revulsion overcome by curiosity, and she peeled back the linen and exposed his tumescent cock. She just looked at it for a long moment, occasionally stealing a glance at the blank face resting at the head of the bed. Tentatively, she took him in her hand and he was firm and hot and her terror was rivalled only by her disgust. She got up to leave many times, but sat back down on the bed each time, once again holding her father's stiff cock. She chewed her lower lip as she began to stroke him.

The nurses would make their rounds and when she was sure no one would come in, she would slip into the room and climb up onto his bed. He was rarely hard when she arrived, but she would lightly run her fingers along his dick until he was. She had come to imagine that he was profoundly backed up in the month between her visits, and that the massive amount of cum that would dribble down her chin was causing the warm corpse some discomfort as it yearned to be released into an eager hole.

She considered it her duty to relieve that discomfort, and her service was efficient. Her pace was methodical, but jacking him off slowly was sure to finish the job. She had learned enough about sucking cock during her own escapades to take care of any man, conscious or not. Without fail his balls would tighten and rise and he would explode into her mouth, pouring the only essence his body could muster into her stomach. She loved her father, and in her mouth, it felt like he was still alive.