The Matrons of Regal Bay

Xiao Li's Tales - Part 3

October was drawing to a close in Regal Bay. For Xiao Li and her husband Gang, it would be the first year away from Hong Kong, and away from their ancestors. This was more significant for Xiao Li, whose entire family for generations had lived in the southern China region. She herself had seldom ventured outside the boundaries of the great city, imposed so many years ago by the British. Even when the region was returned to Chinese rule, she had little reason to leave Hong Kong. So it was that when the time for the Chung Yeung Festival arrived, Xiao Li was understandably upset.

On the ninth day of the ninth lunar month, it is customary for observers to climb a high mountain, wear

shan zhu yu

flowers, and drink chrysanthemum liquor. Upon her arrival at her son's home, she was delighted to find that her son had added the

shan zhu yu

to his wonderful garden and therefore Xiao Li had the flower on hand. The chrysanthemum liquor was a little harder to come by, and as Xiao Li hadn't a taste for it, she ignored this part of the ceremony. The climb into the mountains that morning was an ordeal, as her husband enjoyed better fitness than she did, and with the near-constant drizzle of rain, Xiao Li did not enjoy the walk nearly as much as she had in Hong Kong. The worst part of the day, however, was being unable to visit the graves of her ancestors, in particular her mother and grand-mother. Tending to their markers had always given Xiao Li such inner peace. For the first time in her life, she would not be there for her mother or grand-mother. This in of itself brought about a melancholy mood over her that she wanted to retreat to her room and avoid her family. Instead, Xiao Li escaped to the library, where she was able to get onto one of the computers and correspond with several of her friends and family, back home in Hong Kong.

For the next two hours, Xiao Li video chatted with two of her dearest friends, as well a cousin, all who still lived in Hong Kong. Xiao Li missed them dearly, as they were a group of four that had grown up together, and had shared nearly everything. She and Yongxing, her cousin, shared a grand-mother, and Xiao Li was assured that both her mother's and grand-mother's graves had been tended to.

"

Qin'ai de biao di, xiexie. Wo feichang xiangnian ni

," Xiao Li thanked her cousin in their familiar language.

"

Wo ye xiangnian ni, Xiao Li,

" Yongxing replied, fighting back tears of sorrow that they were so far apart. So it went with both Qing and Nakia, her girlfriends from long before she met Gang. When she left the library, Xiao Li had mixed emotions. Leaving her home had been hard, but reuniting with her son and his family had eased that pain somewhat. When she talked with her friends back home, however, she wanted nothing more than to return to Hong Kong.

Her drive home was peaceful, even as she navigated the traffic that never seemed to ebb around the mall and along that stretch of four-lane road that was lined with fast-food restaurants, car dealerships, and all sorts of stores selling everything from music to body glitter. To Xiao Li, this was the only area of Regal Bay that actually reminded her of home. The part that she didn't miss.

It was well after nightfall when Xiao Li pulled her little car into the carport alongside the garage. The back-yard lights were on, she saw, and expected Gang to be sitting under the umbrella enjoying the star-filled sky. However, as she headed for the front door, the cold drizzle began again. If her husband was in the back, he would be retreating inside now.

The house was quiet as she entered. Only a single lamp was on in the front room. Beyond, the dining room was lit by the overhead and she slipped quietly through after hanging up her coat and head scarf, and leaving her shoes beside the door. She quietly padded barefooted through the dining room and into the family room, where she found only her son.

"Good evening, Jian," she greeted her son formally. After-all, she was living in his home, as a guest. It was how she had been brought up, to show proper manners at all times.

"Evening, Mom!" Jian replied. "I was beginning to worry about you."

Xiao Li giggled. "You're such a silly boy!" She took notice of the television program her son was watching, something with lots of cars, guns, and half-naked women she imagined, and then asked, "Where is your father, Jian? Is he outside?"

"No. Dad had his meal and went up to bed a while ago," Jian replied. "About the time Vania took the kids out to that new play house in Van Winkle Park. Tonight's some sort of grand opening or something, so there'll be dozens of little kids running around and screaming and I wasn't about to stand around in that mess."

"Well then, I shall make myself something to eat," Xiao Li told him. "And then I will retire to bed, as well."

"You can eat in here, keep me company if you want," Jian suggested.

"I don't think I will be able to eat, watching that," she replied with a wave towards the television.

"I'll turn on one of those cooking shows you like," her son offered. "I think that Top Chef show is on."

"I believe you are thinking of

Iron Chef

, Jian," she corrected. "And that would be nice, thank you." She started for the kitchen. Before she had her bowl filled with the rice stew that Vania had made for the family that evening, Jian had called for her to bring him a fresh beer when she returned. Obediently, she did.

Getting comfortable at the low traditionally table, Xiao Li began to eat while paying little attention to the Food Network program. Instead, she took notice of her son, and how he was dressed. Jian was seated in the traditionally American arm chair, with his feet kicked up on an ottoman. He had on baggy red shorts that he usually wore when he jogged or played basketball with his friends at the gym. Above that he had on a t-shirt with the Golden State Warriors logo on the chest, her son's favorite team. He had socks on his feet as well, but what had drawn her eye was the fact that, from her angle seated on the floor, she could see that her son was not wearing underwear. In fact, from the way his shorts had bunched on his thigh, she could plainly see his scrotum and penis, and even some of his dark pubic hair.

"Are you okay, Mom?" Jian asked hurriedly when she started to cough. When he sat forward, the gap in his shorts closed mercifully.

Xiao Li recovered a moment later. "I took a bit of rice down the wrong pipe," she answered. She didn't mention that it had happened when she attempted to swallow while looking at his manhood.

"Want me to get you some rice wine?" her son offered. "Or maybe something stronger?"

I'm fine with this tea," she smiled, and took a sip. It was fresh and warm, and served to sooth her. It also helped relax her and turn her thoughts from where she had been headed.

Xiao Li finished her meal and rose to return her cup and spoon to the kitchen. Somehow, she caught her foot on her gown and stumbled. "Oh!" she gasped as she fell into her son's lap, and by some uncalculatable chance, she planted her right hand full onto her son's crotch. "Oh!" she gasped again, as Jian moved to catch her, that same chance served to bring his hand up to grab her right on the left breast. For an infinite moment, Xiao Li held onto her son's manhood, while he cupped her breast. In that moment, their eyes met and she felt lightning jolt between them, from mother to son or vice versa. Either way, something popped deep inside her soul.

"Are you okay, Mother?" Jian asked. She regained her balance and stepped back, their hands falling away from each other.

"I am fine. I only stumbled." She bowed to her son, ever so slightly, and rushed to the kitchen. There, she placed the empty bowl and spoon into the sink. She stood before the counter and looked out through the window into the back yard. The rain was falling and she could see the splashing in the artificial pond Jian and his father had built. Suddenly, she felt a presence behind her.

"Are you sure you are well, Mother?" Jian asked as he stepped up close.

Xiao Li was afraid to turn around, knowing that her son was so very close. Her heart suddenly raced in her chest. What was going on, she wondered? "I am fine, Jian. It was silly of me, that is all." She saw his reflection in the window, and he was very close to her. His eyes were on her, and then she saw them turn to her reflection. For a brief moment they held once again.

"I want to apologize for touching you," he told her, his voice soft and gentle in her ear. She could feel his breath on her neck, and it tingled.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

Jian paused before answering. "When you stumbled into me, I reached out to catch you. I grabbed your breast." His eyes and hers still held their gaze. And then his hand slipped around to again cup her left breast. "Like this."

Xiao Li felt her entire body shiver in that moment. The nerves in her breast exploded under her son's touch, even though several layers of fabric separated their flesh. She suddenly wanted them gone, to feel his heated flesh against her own. But she was his mother, and he her son. It was forbidden.

Xiao Li reached up to take his hand away from her breast. She turned to face him, looking up into his handsome face to see both his eyes and mouth slightly grinning. "It is alright, Jian. I'm fine. It was an accident, after all." She paused, and added, "I should be the one to apologize. It was my carelessness. I fell into you, after all."

Jian laughed. "You about racked me, you know, when your hand landed on my cock." The way he brandished the word, with such carefree abandon, made her want to scold him. And yet, she couldn't. She had enjoyed that touch, both of them. She should be the one to be admonished, not her innocent son.

Xiao Li realized that they still remained very close together, standing in the spacious kitchen and yet mere inches apart. She could almost hear his heart beating, and she wondered if he could hear hers. When he next spoke, the words very nearly sent her into shock.

"Have you ever fantasized about me, Mother?" he asked casually. "Have you ever thought about having sex with me?"

Xiao Li felt as if she'd been slammed with an iron fist. "What do you ask? Why? Why do you ask such things?" she stammered, and yet it was as if her son had pulled something from her mind, from the deepest depths, and was even now reading her very thoughts. She tried to move away from her son, only to find him guiding her to sit upon one of the kitchen table chairs.

Jian dropped into one as well, and holding her hands now with his, he admitted to his mother, "I know that you have watched...that you have seen Vania and me making love." Her eyes dropped to their hands and she shook her head wordlessly. "It is alright. I don't mind." He saw his mother's head shake, as if she could deny the facts.

"That first week when you and father arrived," Jian explained. "Vania and I were...um...engaged in the family room. You watched us then."

She shook her head. "No, I did not, Jian," she insisted.

"Yes, you did. You stood in the doorway watching as Vania enjoyed my manhood. I saw you in the wall mirror, Mother! I saw you watching intently, for many minutes. I exploded because I saw you watching!" Xiao Li looked up finally to meet his gaze. She saw his wide smile and wanted to smack him, to make him stop, to release that memory from his mind.

Instead, she replied, "I'm so very sorry for intruding upon your privacy. I know that I am a guest in your home, and that you should not have to adjust your life to suit mine, or your father's." She paused, awaiting his reply. When none came, she continued.

"Yes, my son, I admit that I have...inadvertently seen you and your wife engaged in love-making."

Jian interjected with, "Several times, I might add!"

She shook her head, disagreeing. "No, Jian. It was only the one time."

She could tell from his face that he wasn't buying it, and yet, instead of bringing up any other times, he changed course. "Have you been the one reading my stories on my computer, Mother?"

Xiao Li was startled. "Why do you ask?" was all she could manage.

"Again, it is alright. I don't mind if you read my stories. They are my fantasies and it is only fitting that they be read by someone other than myself, isn't it?" She met his eyes again. "I think you enjoyed them, didn't you, Mother? Did they provide for you some stimulation? Did you masturbate to my words?"

"Jian Gang Yau!" she huffed suddenly. "You do not talk to your mother in such a manner!" She rose and pulled her hands from his. "You have such sin in your heart, young man! America had indeed changed you!" She started out, and could feel him behind her. Heading up the stairs towards her bedroom and the comfort of her husband, she hoped that Jian would leave her be. She was upset, more with herself than her son, for her very well knew from her reaction that what he had asked was indeed the truth.

"Mother!" Jian hissed from behind. "I want to show you something." She paused and he took her arm. She was guided past the bedroom she and her husband occupied to the next room. This room was the upstairs storage as well as having access to the attic above. It was little more than a large closet, as Jian had installed racks and shelves long ago. He guided her on inside, but did not turn on the light, leaving the door open instead and using the hallway light to show his mother his secret.

Xiao Li watched her son pull back a row of hard-bound books that sat on a shelf, right at his eye level. Beyond was the wall, which she noted was shared with her bedroom. In the center of the space was a small door, hinged at the side with a knob in the middle. Her son reached for the knob and pulled. A small circle of light appeared.

"Here. I want you to see this." Jian pushed a stool over with his foot and waved for his mother to step onto it. Xiao Li reluctantly did, already knowing what she would see. When she looked through the small hole, her heart thumped in her chest hard. For what she saw was her husband, asleep on their bed. The bedside lamp was on, giving her plenty of light to see that anyone watching from this point had a full view of what took place upon that bed.

"Yes, Mother," Jian admitted. "I've watched from here, as you and father make love. And I've watched from here as well, when you make love to yourself."

Xiao Li felt her son behind her, very close behind her, as he admitted his sins. She was trembling, more so when his hands came up to her hips, to hold her steady while he continued. "I've heard you as well, Mother. I've heard you, when you're all alone and pleasuring yourself right there, I've heard you call my name. I've heard you moan my name as you climax."

Xiao Li pushed the spy-hole closed and turned to face her son. "Why do you show me this? Why do you tell me such things?" She was poised on the brink of breaking down, of bursting into tears. "Why do you watch me, Jian?" can her last question in a voice quivering with fear of what he would say.

Jian took her in his arms. With his face an inch from hers, he answered, "Because I love you, Mother. I have loved you, as a man loves a woman, for many, many years now." His lips brushed hers, and she relaxed into him. They kissed, but without passion. That was to come later.

"Let us leave this room," she pleaded, and Jian let her lead the way. He followed his mother back down the stairs and into the family room once again. She returned to her spot, seated at the traditional table in the center of the room, while Jian retrieved the tea pot and cups. Without word, he poured two cups full, and then joined his mother on the floor.

Xiao Li was fearful of what she wanted to say. Her son had told her such things that she would never have imagined. "Why do you watch me, Jian? You have such a beautiful wife in Vania. She makes you happy, does she not?"

Jian shrugged his shoulders. "That's something I can't explain, Mother," he admitted. "I have always loved you, as my mother of course, but sometime when I was in school, back in Hong Kong, I began to see you differently. I accidently saw your nudity on a couple of occasions, and then I began to hiding places, to see you."

"You always seemed to be popping up," she smiled.

Jian nodded. "I found a place in the wall, a crack in a board, where I could watch you dress and undress from the closet in Mai Lin's room. And I could watch you and father make love."

"That was very wrong of you," she told him, and yet she felt a tingle of excitement from the knowledge that her son had been watching her twenty years ago.

"If you have read my stories, then you know that I have fantasies about older women, and of you," he admitted. "I don't know why, but I've always looked at women much older than myself as being sexy, more so than women my own age."

"But, what about Vania?" she asked.

"I married Vania because I wanted to be able to be nearer her mother," Jian admitted. "You've met Maria. She is so very beautiful. I have fantasized about her for many years. I want to one day make love to her as well."

"Jian! That is your mother-in-law that you speak of!"

"Is it so very different from wanting to sleep with my own mother?"

Suddenly, the room was very quiet. Until then, it had all been a voyeur's fantasy. Now that he had admitted his sinful lusts, there was no turning back. "Yes, Mother. I want to make love to you. I have for many years, and having you here, in my house now, has sparked my desires for you ever higher."

"How can you? How can you want me? I am so old. I am your mother!"

Jian took a breath. He was past the point of no return, he knew. He explained, "When I take my business trips, to Portland or Seattle, or even to San Francisco, I stay with other women. I don't stay in hotels. I stay with other women, and not women like Vania. I stay with women like you." He paused to let his mother absorb what he says. "I visit women, Asian woman, who remind me of you, Mother. And I sleep with them. I make love to them. I have sex with them! It makes me feel so good, imagining that it is you that I am ramming my hard cock into, that I have bent across the arm of a sofa, or on her hands and knees on the balcony, or have riding my dick in the bathtub. Every time I make love to one of my many lovers, Mother, it is you that I am making love to!"

After a long pause, Xiao Li recognized that her son had finished. She was trembling, her eyes on her own hands in her lap. She looked up to see him looking at her, and she didn't see her son then, but a young, strong, passionate man, someone from long ago. She saw her husband in Jian's face, and yet it wasn't Gang she saw, because Gang would never have said such things. He was a quiet, conservative man, in all things. Their love-making, though still as frequent as ever, was plain and unmemorable. Just as sitting down with a cup of tea, or washing out the clothing. A part of life for her that never changed, nor ever excited her.

She looked into Jian's eyes and felt excited. She suddenly admitted, "I've thought of you, Jian. I have thought of you at times when I should not. I have imagined what it would be like if your father showed for me the passion that you show for Vania. And sometimes, when he is atop me, inside me, I think what it would be like if it were you, atop me and inside me." She had said it. She had admitted to her son that she had fantasies of him, just as he had for her. And in that moment, she recognized that their relationship would never be the same. It had changed the moment she and Gang had arrived in America to live out their lives. It had changed the moment she took in the sight of her son and his wife making love. And it had now changed once again, in the moment that she admitted to her son that she felt the very same sinful desires for him that he had for her.