[This story contains themes of incest and explicit sexuality. If such material offends you in any way, please don't read further. It is a work of fantasy and all characters depicted herein are over the age of eighteen.
As always, comments are most welcome and I always appreciate your votes. I hope you enjoy.]
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Ryan never screamed, not once. I guess that's what I remember most about the accident, a twenty foot tumble from a rickety wooden ladder. I was working in the kitchen when I heard the creak of dry-rot giving way, then the sickening thud of my son's body impacting the sidewalk. His face was a knotted mask of pain when I got out to him, sweat beading over his shock-blanched features, his eyes pooling with tears.
But he never screamed. Not so much as a whimper.
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"I've written down everything I could think of for you," Carol said rather absently, sliding the notepad across the kitchen table to me. "You know you'll have your hands full."
I glanced at her scratchy writing and nodded.
"Now without him being able to use crutches, you are going to have to assist him getting in and out of the chair. You have to watch your back with that. I don't want to come out here someday next week and be calling an ambulance for you."
She offered a smile, a nurse's smile, a warm and wry crinkle of her lips.
"Thanks," I answered, feeling better about it for a second or so, then seeing the break again in my mind, the shin bone jutting almost through my Ryan's skin, the right wrist bent so weirdly out of angle.
"Now you said your husband will be able to help out in the evenings, so let him. You're going to catch eighty percent of the work, so trust me, and let him do as much as he can when he's here. Okay?"
Again I nodded, wanting to beg her not to leave.
"I'll be coming by every other day, so if you want, I'll take care of the showers for him. If you need to ask any questions, my pager number is on the bottom there. ...Once you get the drill down, you'll be fine."
I stood in the doorway until her car disappeared down the block. I paused a second to collect myself, to get my "chipper" up, as it were. Two weeks ago I was teaching summer school English at my high school and Jack was an overly energetic teenager addicted to soccer. Now he was a convalescent, and I was, for better or worse, his nurse.
"Honey," I called as I climbed the staircase. The ambulance attendants had carted him up on the gurney and as we only had a full bath on the second floor, Ryan would be pretty much confined there for the next six to eight weeks. Carol and the therapist from rehab had warned me that boredom would be our biggest problem.
"Yeah," he answered, the TV we'd put in his room turned up too loud.
"How're you doing," I asked, halting in his opened doorway.
"I'm good, Mom."
Ryan never was one to complain, always a quiet, serious kid, a kid who read a lot and didn't have too many friends outside of his baseball and soccer. Shy and too often blushing, no girlfriend yet...a late one to blossom, just like me. I caught myself wondering if he'd even made out with anyone yet, hoping he had, which I guess is an odd thing for a mother to reflect on.
"If you need anything, just holler."
"I'm good."
"Okay."
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A week and a half crawled by. My lower back was nearly wrecked after the first three days, my thighs and shoulders quivering like Jell-O when I'd finally collapse into bed at night. Till you take care of someone like that, someone who can't get around on their own, you never really appreciate what a nurse does.
Carol saved me when it came to his shower, which was an even worse ordeal than she'd made out. The bench in the tub routine, the trash bags and duct tape on the plastered casts. The obvious embarrassment of having a woman seeing him semi-naked like that, the towel wrapped around his waist till she pulled the curtain around him as best she could.
I did the alcohol rubs twice a day like she's said, seeing him so tense those first few times I did it, then visibly relaxing as he got used to the physical touch. I massaged his back and legs, the alcohol cool on my palms as I kept kneading away on his young muscles, feeling the tension drain from him as I worked. It was strange that this was the only part of the daily grind that I looked forward to, as if that contact, that physical communion was a fresh bond with us, a bond that cut though his bleak isolation up in that damned room.
My husband, Richard, was able to help out on some nights, but often he didn't get home till after nine at night, the summer being his busy season. There were just too many times I could see him starting to doze as he wolfed the late dinner I'd prepared for him. He was tense a lot of the time now too, some of it easy to attribute to Jack's injury which he blamed himself in part for...he was the one who'd told our son to clean out the gutter that day. I gradually started doing more of the work in the evenings, letting Rich relax on the couch, waking him during the late shows if he'd fallen to sleep.
I was drifting into a pattern, I can see now. I was isolated as much as Ryan in some ways, pampering him, making him the absolute center of my attention. I actually found myself growing jealous of Carol's efforts, while at the same time being dearly appreciative of all she'd do.
And I could see the awful loneliness too. A couple buddies of his dropping by to play video games in the evenings, sometimes two or three of the boys he played soccer with coming by to watch an afternoon match on ESPN. Small breaks in a bleak monotony, one day leeching into the next, sounds and laughter from outside the house a mean taunt.
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Three weeks of it and I was snappish with everyone, including Ryan. I was moody and could taste the resentment in the back of my throat.
It was a Tuesday morning. I was relaxing for a few minutes that morning, staring blankly at something on television, trying to enjoy a cup of tea and a few minutes to myself. The patio door was open and I could smell the garden. That's when I heard the crash from upstairs. I took the steps two at a time, calling Ryan's name as I went.
The nightstand was tipped over, the bulb of the reading lamp shattered, my son dangling half out of his bed, his casted arm catching the floor to keep him from tumbling out completely. I remember hearing myself asking "what happened" as I stepped around broken glass and hefted my son back onto the mattress.
"What were you doing," I wheezed angrily, winded by my race up here, looking over the toppled furniture, the drawer jammed open—the papers, the gloss of a magazine cover. I reached down for it without thinking.
"Mom, don't..."
Playboy, a dirty blond on the cover with her breasts strategically covered. I saw the damned rabbity ears up in the top corner.
Without meaning to I glared at him, probably venting at the release of fear I'd felt as I came up here a mad woman. He turned away, cheeks burning to crimson.
"Are you okay," I said after a second. No answer. "You could've hurt yourself...broken something else."
He wasn't going to look back at me, I could see that. I bent and righted the nightstand, mindlessly setting the magazine atop it as I closed the drawer.
"Sorry," he croaked, the fact that he was crying evident. My anger, such as what was left of it, dissipated instantly.
"It's okay, Ryan," I said feeling tired all of a sudden. "I'll clean this up."
"I'm sorry."
"...Don't worry about it. Just think next time. Be more careful, okay."
I went for a broom and dustpan and quickly swept up the debris, the corpse of the light bulb going into the wastebasket.
The magazine was still sitting there, the perfect little cutie all ready for the newsstand. I opened the drawer and stuffed it back inside and asked if he wanted anything to eat, getting just another shake of his head.
I milled about downstairs for maybe an hour or so, not doing much of anything, but using up a lot of energy. One of his buddies probably brought the book up for him. That is unless he had it there as his personal stash for a while. And I felt bad about how I'd yelled at him, shaking my head at the memory of how he'd turned away, what my expression had to be like.
I was raised in a pretty puritanical house...well, an Irish Catholic house in Pittsburgh which had to be as close to some dour Pilgrim abode as you could get. I remember the day my Mom found a Playboy secreted away between my youngest brother's box spring. Holy fucking hell broke out, that poor magazine torn to shreds and tossed across our small foyer so that Danny could pick it up scrap by scrap when he got home from school.
And I hadn't acted much better, had I?
Without any real thought, I stopped in my tracks and started back upstairs, a soft knock to announce my entrance.
"Sorry," he said immediately.
I didn't say a word, but rather went over to the nightstand and took out the magazine, Ryan instantly averting his eyes, absolutely chagrined, ready for another outburst.
I stepped up to the bed and looked at the young cover-girl again...she was legitimately pretty. I put the magazine atop his chest as gently as I could.
"Don't try to get it on your own again, okay. Just ask me when you want it. ...I don't want you doing trapeze tricks on the floor."
I let out a chuckle, or more aptly, forced one to the surface. Ryan was blushing, not touching the mag, a flash of surprise on his youthfully handsome face, maybe even a glimmer of awe. I turned and closed the door behind me, feeling better than I felt in weeks.
The next day was Carol's visit. The shower, the therapy she'd take him through. Carol moved with an efficiency that always impressed. And she made us both laugh, even with her weakest jokes. After she left, I helped get my son arrayed on the bed, the pillows tucked in just right. And without asking, I opened the drawer and took out the magazine, smiling a bit as I handed it to him.
"Don't I get a thank you?"
He nodded, red-faced, not giving me his eyes.
"You're welcome," I said as I strolled.
Four more days, each day the same routine. I'd take it out and hand it to him and then wordlessly put it back in the drawer in the late afternoon.
That evening I was out shopping, Richard staying with Ryan, a cousin of mine in for a visit. I bought what I had too and stopped for a coffee, savoring those few quiet minutes alone, thinking of the odd enjoyment I was deriving from this simple deal of giving him that thing. I knew he was masturbating to it. At least that's what I figured...a boy his age, no girlfriend yet. And then I just stood up, leaving my coffee half finished, and walked out. The convenience store was just down the street, the glossy magazines arrayed behind the counter.
"A Playboy," I said as I came up to the clerk, knowing that I was now every bit as red cheeked as my son had been. God, I hoped no one I knew would walk in.
"Which," the clerk answered with a thick accent.
"The..."
He was pointing, I squinted...one like he had at home and a Lingerie one.
"Both."
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