Three Sons (Part 1)
Kathryn M. Burke
James Wilkinson knew something would have to be done about his mother.
It wasn't that his mom, Jenny, was physically ill; but she seemed on the verge of lapsing into chronic depression. God knows she had a lot to be unhappy about. Two years ago her husband, Cal, had abruptly left the household for no reason—at least, none that his wife or his three sons could understand. James didn't think there was another woman in the picture, although there might be; and no one had heard much from Dad since his departure.
Meanwhile, Jenny had to run a household full of boys who were turning into young men. There was the eldest, James, now twenty-one, who had gotten a toehold in the construction industry but really wasn't making a lot of money. The second son, Peter (who was just a wee bit on the autism spectrum), was getting by working at a hardware store. The youngest, Daniel, had graduated from high school and turned eighteen at almost the same time; and now he was looking forw`ard to going to college. Jenny had decided that her "baby" would be given the opportunity to make a better life for himself by attending the local college, which was within walking distance from their house. But the end result was that all three boys were still at home, living in the family house that Jenny had gotten in the divorce settlement. Her own low-level job—as a receptionist at a soulless corporation downtown—didn't bring in much money either, so finances were pretty tight.
Probably the three boys, being boys, didn't contribute as much to the running of the household as they should have. So Jenny was stuck doing the dishes, washing everyone's clothes, and in general being something of a drudge whenever she wasn't at work. And it didn't help that she didn't seem to want to go on dates with men of her own age. She claimed that there were few prospects in the mid-size town in upstate New York where they lived; but going out to dinner with her own sons at the local Applebee's or Olive Garden wasn't exactly the stuff of romance.
So, over the past two years, Jenny had lapsed more and more into an attitude of beaten-down sadness and resentment. She never blamed the boys—she loved them too much, and knew they loved her—but she seemed stuck in a pattern of unchanging misery. No woman looks better frowning than smiling, and that definitely held true for Jenny Watkins.
And the crying tragedy of the whole business, in James's view, was that his mother really was a knockout.
Of course, it wasn't right that he should think of her that way. But he'd had enough experience with women—both of his own age and, in a few instances, of some who were a bit older—to know that Jenny was, or would have been, regarded as radiantly beautiful by almost any sane man. Having just turned forty, she looked at least ten years younger. She had lustrous black hair framing an oval face that, because of its melancholy air, made her look like a model for those pre-Raphaelite painters of nineteenth-century England. Although slender and petite (five foot four), she had luscious curves at bust and hips; and James, when he'd been out running errands with his mother, had noticed many males of all ages giving her the once-over as she walked by. Once James had exchanged glances with a guy in his mid-fifties who had actually licked his lips as Jenny heedlessly passed him.
But she'd look a whole lot prettier if she smiled more.
One of her few pleasures in life was listening to classical music. She'd inherited from her mother an impressive collection of classical LPs, and she always made sure to have a good turntable to play them on. So on this lazy Saturday afternoon in late August, after she'd done some work in the garden, she was sitting demurely on the sofa in the living room, listening to a Mozart piano concerto with her eyes closed and her mouth slightly open.
James (whom nobody, even his mother, ever called Jim) thought he'd never seen anything so beautiful.
He quietly sat down on the sofa next to her. Peter and Daniel had gone off somewhere, he couldn't remember where. The house seemed almost eerily empty, except for the heavenly strains of the music. It seemed Jenny didn't even notice the slight movement of the sofa as James lowered himself on it, inches from her. For a time he just watched her. He wasn't a classical music fan, but he was transported by her appearance—not just the heart-rending beauty of her face and figure, but the sense of peace and tranquility that came over her as she communed with the music.
So James bent forward and, without touching his mother, gave her a quick kiss on the mouth.
Jenny's eyes popped open in surprise and puzzlement. It took her a few seconds to realize her eldest son was sitting beside her. She smiled uncertainly at him and said, "What was that for, dear?"
All of a sudden James's heart began pounding hard in his chest. He knew that something momentous was about to happen.
"Oh, nothing, Mom," he said with faux casualness. "I just thought you looked so pretty sitting there."
Her smile broadened—and that somehow gave James permission (in his own mind) to go farther. He took both hands and placed them on either side of his mother's face, and then pasted a long, wet kiss on her lips. At first she let out a stranged, inarticulate cry ("Mmmm!"), but after a while she seemed to relent. James had already learned that women have a kind of natural instinct to kiss back if they're kissed, even if in their conscious minds they feel the kiss isn't appropriate or allowable—as this kiss certainly wasn't!
When James finally released his mouth from Jenny's, he could see a small amount of moisture on her lips. He saw her own chest heave with emotion, and her face turn crimson with a deep blush. She looked at her son as if she'd never seen him before.
"You—you shouldn't kiss your mother like that, James," she said in a shaky voice.
With deep emotion James replied, "I don't know who I want to kiss right now more than you."
And with that, he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and began showering kisses all over her face—her rubicund cheeks, her slender nose, her high forehead—and worked his way down to her neck and shoulders.
"James, you naughty boy!" she cried—but at the same time she threw her own arms around the back of his head and held on tight. Maybe that was instinctive too. Women are just made for expressing and inspiring emotion, and James had rarely felt more emotion—love, tenderness, and, yes, desire—than he felt at that moment.
James himself was a good five foot ten, and the muscles in his arms, chest, and legs were well developed. He had little difficulty placing his mother on top of himself as he reclined at full length on the sofa. She tried to push away from him, her arms extending themselves on his chest; but it was useless, and she gave way to the inevitable and buried her head in the crook of her son's neck—as if not being able to see what he was doing meant it really wasn't happening.
At this point, James realized that he was going to throw caution to the winds.
He kept kissing Jenny wherever his lips could reach, holding her tight around the waist. She endured his caresses in a resigned sort of way—until he slid a hand down her back and placed it on her bottom, over the thin print dress she was wearing.
At that point she let out a squeal of protest. "Young man, you mustn't!"
But James had crossed the Rubicon. He grabbed fistfuls of the dress and pulled it up, revealing the pink cotton panties beneath it. His hands gloried in her wondrously curved bottom—soft but firm at the same time—even as he felt it over her underwear. Then, in a quick motion, he peeled those panties down to her knees and touched her bare bottom for the first time in his life.
He waited for his mother to object to this definitive sexual gesture—but not much happened. She was continuing to squirm, but at the same time she was pressing her lips against his neck, almost like a female vampire wanting to drink his blood. Little tremors were running through her, especially in her thighs; and that's what led James to take bolder measures.
He'd had enough experience with the female of the species to learn one vital and undeniable fact:
A girl is a whole lot more pliant if you make her come.
Mom wasn't a "girl," but the principle held true for her too. So he slipped his hand between their bodies and, after only a brief hesitation, covered her sex with it.
Those squeals of hers had turned to moans, and no wonder: she was getting wetter by the second. She even parted her legs to allow him better access. In the midst of his unutterable excitement, he felt an overriding pity for the long drought his mother had gone through. At least two years without a man touching her down there, to say nothing of—
She was now clutching him frantically, actually licking his neck as he began to fondle her. A previous girlfriend had taught him a lot about how to stimulate a female, and he put all this knowledge to good use as he stroked his mother's labia up and down, stuck his fingers into her vagina, and then—as a sort of culmination—began rubbing her clitoris in a circular motion with his thumb. A series of strangled cries were coming out of Jenny's throat, largely muffled by the fact that her mouth was still attached to James's neck; but then, sooner than he expected, she let out a sharp, shrill cry as her whole body began quivering uncontrollably.
