Corinth lay motionless and sobbing for a long time. Not that she was physically hurt, but the assault had left her weak and overwhelmed.
He had caught her at a completely vulnerable moment. She had struggled as he sought to penetrate her, but he was too young and strong and his need too powerful.
As she felt him gain entry, she gave up opposing him physically. She had appealed to him, "Please darling, you mustn't … you can't …you'll make me pregnant … please, don't…" But he persisted, and as she felt him spurting into her she submitted.
When he had finished, he lay inside her for a while, as if reluctant to separate from her. Neither of them spoke or moved. Then, he suddenly looked down at her, and seeing her tears, he gasped, withdrew from her, and with a gulping sob he grabbed his discarded shorts and fled from the room.
As she lay there, Corinth gradually gathered her thoughts, striving to understand and come to terms with what had happened. But initially she was still too confused, and only baffling questions arose.
"How have things reached this point?" How could she be raped by the last person she thought would commit such and assault on her? Was she somehow at fault? Why had she not known? What had she missed in their relationship, so loving and supportive of each other, not to have seen the sexual aspect developing? Or had she seen it and refused to acknowledge it?
Striving to get her mind in order, her thoughts went back to when he first showed signs of entering puberty. As his sexual needs had developed, had there been signs of his desire for her?
At that point in Francis life, she recalled, Steve, her husband, had callously announced that he was leaving them. "I'll make sure you're all right for money," he had told her (he could well afford it), and departed to join, as she later found out, his buxom new woman.
Francis had been shattered. At a point in his life, his father might have become especially important, that father had departed. Francis saw this, not so much as his father leaving his mother, but as a rejection of himself. His ensuing bitterness turned to a hatred for his father. He had refused to see him, speak to him on the telephone or answer his letters. He had turned to Corinth, and in the following years the mother-son relationship became ever more intense.
"Had it become too intense?" Corinth pondered. Obviously, it had. It would be easy to lay the blame for the assault at Francis' door, but was she partly at fault?
She recalled the times when Francis, putting his arms round her, had said things like, "If I was married to a beautiful woman like you, I'd never leave you."
Flattered, she had received these compliments in a coquettish, almost teasing manner, responding with, "I know you wouldn't darling," and similar rejoinders.
Francis was a very affection young man, and he frequently hugged her, and she recalled how often his hands had wandered near her breasts. She herself was a very tactile person, and enjoyed the body contact with a healthy, handsome young man, even though he was her son.
They had lived a very casual life-style around the house. They had not been averse to being only scantily clad, or even naked, in each other's presence. They wandered into each other's bedrooms or into the bathroom when one or the other was there, in a completely uninhibited manner.
Corinth had thought that seeing each other naked in this casual manner would make it a commonplace thing that would cease to have provocative sexual overtones. Or had this been her real reason? Had she in fact enjoyed – even rejoiced – in being able to view his strong, powerful body?
A pang of guilt speared through Corinth. Of course, she had seen his erections when he came upon her naked, and felt the throbbing in her clitoris as she thrilled to his arousal. These things she had pushed away deep down inside her. They lurked within her as unacknowledged feelings … nameless desires.
When Steve left her, she declared her sensual self to be a closed shop. In the following years there had been plenty of offers. Everything from one-night stands to marriage had been suggested.
She was thirty-seven when the break with Steve had come, and Francis was not wrong is seeing her as an attractive woman. Men had desired her, but she was not going to risk another relationship. The pain of Steve's desertion had been too great.
Despite the close bond between them, Francis had difficult teenage years. Folk wisdom claims that the teenage years are "The best years of your life." Such sayings take no account of those teenagers who find those years lonely and depressing.
Francis had been involved sexually with a number of girls, but none of these relationships had lasted. One relationship that had gone a bit longer than most was with a woman some twenty years older than Francis.
The woman lived in the same street as Corinth and Francis, and was a widow with two children. It had proved to be a bit of a scandal at the time, as neighbours, as well as Corinth, could not help noticing the frequency of Francis' visits to the lady.
The relationship had apparently ended about six months prior to this night of Francis' sexual assault on Corinth, and the widow now had an older man living with her.
Throughout these relationships, Francis had not ceased in his affectionate attachment to Corinth. If anything, he had become more persistent in his physical interaction with her. In addition, she knew he masturbated frequently, and this should have alerted her to the fact that for all his sexual relationships with women, he was not fulfilled.
His main activity outside his work, was attendance at the local gym. This had given him a strong and excellent body, and Corinth was very proud of his fine appearance, and was inclined to boast about it to anyone who would listen. It was also to prove the main element in her physical struggle against his assault.
Despite her renunciation of male relationships, Corinth had sexual needs. Like Francis, she masturbated frequently, but unlike Francis, she was more careful to keep this activity out of sight and sound of him. She was fairly sure that Francis knew nothing of her self-stimulation and release.
The thought of her masturbation recalled the immediate situation that led up to her being raped.
On the evening in question Francis had gone to the gym. This usually meant he would be away for at least a couple of hours. Just prior to leaving, he had come into the lounge to tell her he was going, and as usual, he was dressed in his gym clothes. These displayed his manhood rather forcefully and had the effect of arousing Corinth.
After he left, Corinth felt the need to relieve herself of sexual tension and removing her clothes, she lay on the couch, and began to masturbate. As usual, she tried to tell herself it was not Francis in her sexual reverie, but in truth, it was.
She had plenty of time so she was in no hurry to bring her self to a climax. She gently fondled her breasts as she slowly moved her fingers over her clitoris. She hung suspended in a beautiful daydream of tender sexual arousal. Her female sexual fluid began to soak her vagina, but she refused herself an orgasm, just teetering on the edge, drawing back each time she felt it beginning.
This withholding her self from orgasm was a mistake. Francis, on arriving at the gym, found it closed for maintenance work, so he returned home. He entered the house quietly, but in any case, Corinth was so lost in her sexual preoccupation she failed to hear what sounds he did make.
Francis came upon her lying on the couch, legs parted, her hips rotating slightly as she moved her fingers over her sexual organ, and giving out with low passionate moans. He stopped at the door, but this was in Corinth's line of vision. She saw him and froze. Her mind was in turmoil of embarrassment and shame. She simply lay there, one hand on her breast, the other in her vagina, unmoving.
Francis stood staring for a few moments, then came across the room to her crying out, "mother!" Corinth tried to speak, but no sound would come. She saw Francis' enormous erection as he removed his gym shorts and come down upon her. Her legs were still parted and she was soaked with her own self-stimulation.
Such was her state of mind that at first Corinth did not grasp what was happening. It was only as she felt the head of his penis push up against her opening that full realisation struck. She managed to pull back briefly, but as she tried to close her legs, it was too late. Francis had his body between them, forcing them further apart.
Now began the physical struggle that she was bound to lose. She might have torn at him with her nails, but somehow she could not bring herself to inflict such damage on her son. She pummeled him with her fists but this seemed to have no effect. The strength she had been so proud of was now her undoing. He was too strong for her.
As she felt his penis reach her opening once more, she changed from physical resistance to begging and pleading. She used no contraceptives, and certainly, Francis was not using anything. Although in her forties, she was still capable of getting pregnant – pregnant to her own son!
Her imploring him to stop had no effect. His need was too desperate now for him to even hear her. He slid into her warm moistness easily and thrust in deep. She felt his urgency, and realising there was nothing further she could do or say to stop the inevitable, she submitted to him.
Quickly he was filling her with his sperm.
Now it was over and Francis had fled the room. Corinth rose slowly from the couch and on trying to stand felt her legs shaking so that she dropped to her knees.
She knew Francis had possibly impregnated her, and because of the time she had spent deliberating over the why's and wherefore's of what had happened, she knew she should make some attempt to wash out his sperm in the vain hope of avoiding pregnancy. But something inside her did not want to get rid of his sperm. It was as if she wanted to hold it in – to love it.
Never the less, she made the effort and got to her feet and staggered to the bathroom to carry out the ablutions. When she had finished, she went in search of Francis. He was nowhere to be found. Not only had he fled the room, he had also left the house.
Corinth decided that he would stay out until he thought she was safely in bed asleep, and then creep in, thus delaying the recriminations, or worse, until the morning. Drained, she went to bed, lying there confused and wretched, alert for Francis's return.
