Chapter 1

Mom had been on a health kick for almost a year. It was fairly intense for the first three or four months, then petered out until Dad announced he had arranged a vacation package for their 20th anniversary which at the time was three months away. Mom seemed thrilled but at the same time apprehensive because the destination was a beachside resort. Mom had lost some weight but her target was another thirty pounds away.

Apprehension turned to anger when she found out Dad got the idea from Cody, our neighbor across the street and two doors up. Cody had booked a trip for him and his wife Sheila. That wasn’t the issue; the problem was Dad had made a reservation at the same time and the same resort.

Cody and Sheila were friends of my parents but especially Dad. Cody was six or seven years younger than Dad but Sheila was easily eight years Mom’s junior and, having had both her children by caesarian, still in possession of a young woman’s figure. Dad wasn’t aware that this wasn’t the best anniversary present he could have given Mom: two weeks in close proximity to a younger woman with a penchant for bikinis that displayed the best body in the community.

Dad loved block parties because Sheila always wore something revealing, typically a tiny bikini. He always got the cold shoulder from Mom after these parties because he inevitably admired Sheila when he thought nobody was looking, but after a few drinks lost any semblance of discretion, even to the point of directing frank compliments her way. Sheila seemed to enjoy Dad’s comments and Cody simply seemed amused by them, but they were less well received when delivered within earshot of Mom.

So, the thrilling surprise turned sour but Mom didn’t blow up, she simply went quiet, which was her way. Of course, Dad didn’t notice and made things worse every Saturday when he counted down the weeks until the big holiday, and when Cody and Sheila were over for a barbecue, his eyes were stickier than ever.

In addition to her workouts, Mom took up hiking, something else Dad didn’t notice. Hiking was convenient exercise because we lived on the edge of a popular wilderness area with lots of trails. Mom didn’t run because of her knees but she walked at a brisk pace. It worked, because within two and a half months she had shed the thirty pounds she was aiming for and another five. Mom now looked like an older version of the girl in her wedding pictures.

Dad did notice this obvious fact but he didn’t make the fuss about that the accomplishment deserved. I witnessed Mom surreptitiously modeling the outfits she had bought for her new figure but Dad was oblivious. She even went so far as to pose in awkward but sexy postures that must have been difficult to hold for more than a few seconds. I could only imagine what she did when I wasn’t around though, I have to admit, Mom wasn’t very adept at ‘flashing’ because more often than not she adopted her poses when he wasn’t even looking or when I was in a better position to take advantage of the view. It made me wonder how she had attracted Dad in the first place. Anyone, what was available to my father’s view was nevertheless lost on him.

I could tell Mom was hurt but, true to form, she didn’t say anything. She just hiked more often and for longer each time, leaving late in the morning and often returning until three or four in the afternoon. I asked her once why her hikes were taking more rather than less time and she replied that she stopped to tan so she looked good and wouldn’t burn on their holiday. Imagine that, trying her best to look good for a husband who not only didn’t appreciate the effort, he didn’t even recognize it!

One day, Mom left just when I came downstairs for a late breakfast. Gazing around while munching on my cereal, I spied her two water bottles on the counter. She had taken the small backpack she usually wore but must have forgotten the bottles. I didn’t have anything to do since I hadn’t yet found a summer job so I decided to follow her and deliver the bottles. I finished my breakfast without hurrying because I knew I could catch up to someone that was walking, however quickly. About twenty minutes after Mom had left, I grabbed the bottles and ran down the block to the start of the trail.

I loped along the trail farther than I would have thought before I caught sight of Mom ahead of me. I was running along a ridge and she was off to my right about forty-five degrees and below me, having run down the hill and turned around the end of the small lake. She had stopped and looked like she was taking a breather. I veered off the trail a few feet and was about to call out when something about her behavior made me hold my tongue.

Even from a distance, I could see that Mom didn’t look tired or out of breath. She looked down the trail ahead of her and back the way she had come several times, then quickly ducked off the trail into a thicket. The brush shook for several seconds and then was still. I waited for a minute or so, thinking she was having a necessary visit with Mother Nature, but she didn’t reappear, so I ran on.

When I got to the thicket Mom wasn’t there. No trail led off, as I had expected, where people might go to take a nature pee. There was only a small hole in the thicket that a medium sized dog could squeeze through. Discreetly, I called Mom several times but, receiving no answer, I ran on down the trail. Five minutes later I hadn’t caught up to her. Worried, I returned to the thicket where I’d seen her disappear.

After several more unanswered calls, I crawled through the hole and emerged on the other side. There was still no trail but I could see faint footsteps in the moss between two glacier-deposited boulders. I squeezed through the two large rocks and behind them discovered a faint deer trail leading up a hill into the forest.

Obviously, Mom wasn’t lost so I didn’t call out again but, curious about where she’d gone, I followed the trail as it threaded up the hill lining the other side of the lake. About halfway up, the trail split, one branch to the right paralleling the lake trail and the other climbing up toward the top of the hill. Thinking that Mom was probably going up to a lookout, I took the steeper trail. It was a tough one but after a series of switchbacks, I attained the summit and was blessed with a vista I hadn’t known existed and had never heard about in my nineteen years of living in the only neighborhood I’d known.

What a discovery, Mom I thought, then wondered why she hadn’t told anyone. I guess everyone needed a respite and, God know, Mom needed one. She had found a secret place she could enjoy, her own little world, and a beautiful one at that. The lake stretched out below me and I could see heads bobbing along the trail on the far side of the lake. I imagined one could see the trail below and moved toward the edge to look over it but almost fell when I foolishly looked to the side wondering where Mom was. Catching myself, I carefully knelt down near the grassy edge and peered over.

Yep, the trail was a hundred feet away and though there was nobody on it I could have easily seen them through the trees if there was. I stretched out onto my stomach and inched my way closer to the edge until I could hang my head over to look down the sheer face of the cliff. I was surprised by what I saw.

A platform made of old, sun-bleached timbers, was perched on a ten foot ledge projecting from the cliff about thirty feet below me. I was surprised because, in years of walking around the lake I had never noticed the old structure, but then, the foliage probably hid it from the trail. What an intriguing find.

More intriguing was the woman sitting on the platform in a bright blue, nylon running suit, feet stretched before her and hands clasped around bent knees, gazing at the vista in front of her. It was Mom. She must have taken the goat track to the right that I had ignored in favor of the climb to the summit.

I was about to call out but decided to play a game instead. I looked on either side of me and found an old, dried up acorn. When I turned back, Mom had removed one running shoe and was in the process of taking the other off. She set both down beside her small backpack with her socks. I held the acorn in front of me and aimed it at Mom’s back. One, two, three...

Mom stood up. Instead of releasing the acorn, I tightened my grip on it and yanke my hand back. Mom stretched, then progressed through a series of Tai Chi moves. I hadn’t seen her do that for years. After five minutes or so of this, Mom stretched again and bent down to open her pack, extracted a large towel, and then spread it out on the platform. I waited for her to sit down so I could line her up in my sights again, not wanting to startle her into possibly falling off the platform which was set above a heavily forested, steep slope down to the trail.

Instead, Mom straightened up and stretched languidly in the sun, then unzipped her running jacket and peeled it off uncovering, to my surprise, a bra instead of a t-shirt. I could tell it was made of stretchy material because it outlined her tits really well. Even from this far above, I could discern two little bumps resting upon the slope of her breasts. Tingles buzzed around the tip of my cock upon the realization that Mom’s nipples were both prominent and positioned high on her breasts rather than pointing down like I had seen in pictures of some older women’s saggy tits.

Mom bent over to push her running pants down and slipped them off her feet, revealing another surprise: it looked like Mom was wearing panties instead of shorts. Sitting down on the towel, Mom folded her legs into a yoga position and sat still, gazing at the lake for another five or so minutes, though I was sure her eyes were closed to take in the sounds from the forest. The buzz of the insects and the singing of the birds seemed to rise in volume, as if to support my hypothesis.

Eventually, Mom leaned back on her elbows and stretched out her legs, then resumed her casual surveillance of the lake. I squinted in the sunlight, trying to confirm my first impression that Mom was wearing panties. Yep, definitely panties. My close examination made me realize how much all that running had benefited Mom’s body. Man, she had a real nice one.

Mom eased herself down from her elbows onto her back raising her arms and crooking her elbows over her face to shield her eyes from the sun. Forgetting myself, I almost whistled. Mom was well tanned and the bright sunlight accented the gentle slopes, crests and valleys of a body too supple for her age. Why hadn’t I noticed this before?

This far away, she didn’t just look like an attractive woman sun tanning in her underwear, she looked like a picture in a magazine. I felt a bit guilty conducting such a clandestine observation but I couldn’t look away. Her legs were long and tapered, gradually widening out to hips which dipped sharply in to a narrow waist. Her underarms appeared to be shaved and her arms were slender and lightly muscled which made me wonder if she was working out too.

My eyes couldn’t help grazing over Mom’s breasts. She didn’t have big ones but, though I couldn’t tell for sure from this far away, they did seem larger now that they weren’t covered by a blouse, sweater or jacket, even lying flat on her back like she was. Could the weight loss have increased the contrast between her breasts, waist and tummy?

I tossed the acorn behind me and settled in to watch Mom suntan, aware of a squirrel chattering loudly behind me as if giving me hell for ogling my own mother. Five or ten minutes must have passed without any movement from Mom below or me above, except that my hand managed to creep under my shorts to cup and massage my cock and balls. Mother or not, Mom did have a sexy body.

She sat up all too soon and I almost cried out my disappointment but was quickly relieved when she simply turned over onto her stomach and crossed her arms to form a pillow for her head. A couple of twitches and she was again still.

Man, I wished I was closer. Those panties were quite small, not much more than a triangular patch that ended in two straps, one rising up and over each hip. I had never seen so much of Mom’s skin. Her cheeks bulged a little beyond the edge of the panties and, real or imagined, the thin material seemed to crease down the center. I doubted that I could actually see the crack of her ass from this distance so I knew that my imagination was embellishing what I saw. Whatever, my cock felt good.

From the top of her buttocks, Mom’s tanned skin gradually sloped into the small of her back, bracketed by two large dimples on the border between back and ass. I had never noticed that Mom’s butt was so well formed and promised myself I would check it out more closely if I got a chance when we were home. For now, I ogled it from a distance as I ground my genitals into my hand.

Mom reached behind herself with both hands to undo the bra. Yes! Yes! Oh, this was too good to be true. She pulled the backstraps out to her sides and let them drop. I couldn’t see more than a little bare back but just the thought of her tits lying bare on the towel caused my cock to lurch into my palm.

Instead of returning to form a pillow for her head, Mom’s hands stretched down beside her hips. My eyes were so focused between Mom’s shoulder blades, imagining I could actually see her tits through flesh and bones, that I barely noticed her hands slide over her bottom to tug the straps over her hips, dragging them down until they were lying atop the backs of her thighs. Mom had just bared her ass!

My cock hardened, stiffening so much I had to dig into my shorts to let it straighten out. I twisted onto my side, straining to keep my eyes on Mom’s ass, as my hand closed over my bare cock and started stroking it. Jeez, Mom, who knew you had such a nice ass?

As I pulled my pecker, I imagined rubbing it over those soft cheeks and then nudging it between her rubbery globes. Oh, yeah. Imagine sliding it through that sweaty crevice. Mom twitched, lifted her ass up a bit, settled down onto the towel, wiggled about, and then lay still.

Stroking faster now. Mom lifted her ass up again. Yeah, like that, push it up against my cock, rubbing, pushing in, shoving, between her legs. Faster, faster. I looked away, my head crunching down as my hand moved to lightening speed. Yeah, oh yeah. Ahhhhhhhh, yeah, ahhhhh. I shot my load into the grass, breathing heavily, yet restrained, like I did when I beat my meat at night in case someone could hear.

I looked over the edge of the cliff again, half afraid Mom would be gone, but she wasn’t. I remained prone on the grass, lazily stroking my dick as I casually surveyed Mom’s body, well, mostly her ass. I must have daydreamed because I suddenly realized I was looking at Mom’s stomach. She had turned over without me even noticing. Christ, her tits were bare now, the top having stayed on the towel when she turned over. I was too far away to see very well but I imagined Mom’s nipples were stiff and erect. I thought about sucking them and sliding my cock between them. My hand began moving more rapidly up and down my freshly-hardened rod.

Yeah, scraping over that nice, soft belly, dipping into that big navel, between her tits and down again to chafe over her spongy tummy flesh. Oh yeah, oh God ... What the fuck was that? Of course! Mom had turned over and her panties had stayed wrapped around her thighs, barely covering her private parts in front.

I thought I could see a tuft of light brown hair, the same color as Mom’s shoulder length mane, sticking out of the small triangle that stretched taut between the bones of her pelvis. Real or not, I definitely wanked my dick faster now. Wank, wank, wank. Mom shifted, pushing her pelvis up and throwing her pussy into a brief upward thrust that forced her mound against the triangle that almost didn’t cover it. Jerking harder, jerking, oh yeah, yeah, yeah ... ahhhhhhhh, shit. I unloaded into the grass again, then slumped down, gasping.

Pervert. You’re a fucking pervert. Spying on your mother and whacking off in the grass. What a fucking dildo.

I twisted onto my back. What a fucking wiener I was.

After a few minutes, my guilt receding, I turned back and peered over the edge.

Mom was gone.

The squirrel scolded me all the way down the trail as I made my way home.

Mom was making dinner when I came in the house. She looked at the water bottles when I put them on the counter but didn’t say anything. Even so, I thought I should explain why I had them.

“You left these behind,” I said. “I tried to bring them to you but couldn’t catch up.”

I was mentally kicking myself for bringing attention to the fact that I had been looking for her.

“Which way did you go?” Mom asked.

“I followed the main trail,” I replied.

“Did you walk backwards?” Mom laughed.

“No, I couldn’t find you so I cruised through the beach and then checked out some of the other trails.”

That deserved a hard smack up the side of the head. Why hadn’t I just left it with crusing through the beach?

“I went down the MacDonald Creek trail,” Mom said.

“Oh. I went that way too but after the beach. You must have already gone through before I got there.”

Why did I insist on pushing it, forcing my possible nearby presence upon her?

“Probably,” Mom said. “You sure you weren’t checking out the girls on the beach?” she teased.

For sure, I was checking a female out. If only she knew. I went beat red and denied it.

Mom opened one of the water bottles and tipped it up to take a long drink, her head tilting back as it emptied. She was still wearing the blue running suit and the jacket was unzipped almost to her waist, exposing the stretchy bra. I enjoyed the view as the thin material stretched tightly over her breasts. Her nipples definitely sat high on her tits. Mom’s head abruptly tipped forward and she brought a hand up to her mouth as some water spilled onto her chin. I barely pulled my eyes up to her face in time. Well, almost. Mom giggled and a few drops of water dripped onto her chest.

“Oh my goodness,” she cried, looking down and seeing how exposed she was. Despite her alarm, however, Mom calmly wiped the trickle from the inside of the upper swell of her left breast but didn’t zip up her jacket. She looked up at me and smiled. “I can’t keep anything in my mouth.”

An image of me putting something in Mom’s mouth filled my head. Distressed at having such thoughts while standing right in front of my mother, the color in my face, which had started to fade, returned with a vengeance. I mumbled something and turned, beating a hasty retreat from the kitchen.

Mom kept the running suit on for the rest of the evening. I couldn’t help following her everywhere she went though I tried to be discreet. Twice during dinner she got up from the table to get something from the kitchen. My eyes followed her, noting the slight sway of her hips as she walked, the slenderness of her legs, and, of course, the press each cheek alternately made against the shiny blue material of her pants with each step.

I gave my head a shake but was similarly incapable of averting my eyes when Mom bent over to get a bowl out of the buffet only a moment later. As the material stretched over her buttocks, I noted the lines made by her panties as they defined a wide but narrow triangle across her behind. My head was flush with hot blood and my genitals were so swollen that my shorts bulged with their presence, forcing me to eat slower than usual so I could stay behind at the table when Mom and Dad got up to leave. And yes, I did ogle Mom’s ass as she walked away, and remembered how fine it had looked when bare.

That night, after I bid my parents good night, Mom motioned me into the living room to give her a hug. As I approached, I could see she had been trying to attract Dad’s attention again because the running suit jacket was unzipped to the bottom of her breasts and her bra was in plain view. As I leaned down for what turned out to be a long hug because Mom kept her arms curled around my neck, I was treated to a satisfying close-up of her breasts, tightly wrapped in the stretchy bra, poked up nipples clearly demarcated. I wondered if they were ever soft. That sight, and the memory of her butt, kept me busy for an hour after going to bed.

“Don’t forget your water,” I yelled to Mom as I opened the door and ran outside the next day.

She was almost ready to leave and I wanted to dispel any worries that I would be looking for her to bring anything she had forgotten. I also wanted to run ahead and get positioned so I didn’t have to risk making noise as I climbed to the top of the bluff.

I sat on the grass at the top of the cliff, waiting for Mom. I had made myself a lunch, including few of beers I had sneaked out of the fridge in the garage, and had laid binoculars ready-to-hand near the edge of the cliff. I paused every few seconds between bites from the first sandwich to listen for signs that Mom was coming and, hearing none, frequently peered over the edge to confirm that she hadn’t already arrived. Where the hell was she? It had already been fifteen minutes.

I finished the sandwich and the first beer, checked my watch, and peered over the edge again. Shit! Where was she? After the second sandwich, and many more peeks, I resigned myself to the notion that Mom must sometimes run around the lake and didn’t visit the platform every day. I opened a second beer and quickly brought the can to my mouth as it fizzed and overflowed. Taking a large swig and wiping my mouth, I leaned over for a casual glance, not expecting to see anything but ever hopeful.

I jerked my head back. Mom was standing on the platform, half twisted around and craning her neck up to look at the cliff, one hand shading her eyes. I’m sure if it hadn’t been for the bright sun, she would have seen me. Cautiously, I set the can down and stretched out on the grass. I debated for several moments on whether it was safe to look over. Desire won over caution and I finally peeked over the edge.