Chapter 6C

That night while she typed a report for her classes I put together a small dinner in her kitchen. When it was ready she came to the table with two big textbooks, sat down, opened one of the books, and kept her nose in it while she stuffed two spoons of food into her mouth and chewed ravenously. I watched her. She chewed and read and chewed and read. After a moment she glanced at me.

She said earnestly, "Hon, I'm sorry. I'm not ignoring you. I told you it would be a rough week."

I shrugged. "It's okay."

"It's not okay. This is your vacation."

I said, "I want you to be able to get out of the Lauderdale Courts."

She stared at me. Then she gave me a wry smile and slowly shook her head back and forth. "And now I'm gonna be real mean and inform you that I don't even have time to clean up these dishes."

I sipped from my glass of soda. "I'll clean up."

"Your mom and dad are paying me this week to look after *you*, not the other way arou--"

I said coolly, again, "I want you to be able to get out of the Lauderdale Courts."

She didn't say anything. She just looked at me, and I couldn't tell if that dark look in her eyes was anger or frustration or if she was simply tired.

She said grumpily, "I'm very irritable right now, and this has been a crappy, hectic week, and I'm having--" She stopped short, closed her eyes, took a breath, and said more slowly, "And I'm having a terrible time with this report, and I--I don't know if I can do all of it. I don't know if I'm that smart or that quick to do it all and do it right." She stopped again, looking down at the floor. Then she winced, hard, and the skin around her eyes reddened, and she whispered angrily, "And I'm getting scared!" Then she sniffed and cried, one hand covering her eyes.

I rose from my chair and crossed to her side of the little table and stood behind her and held her by her lovely, supple, womanly shoulders and cradled her head against my tummy. She sniffled and wept for a minute, and then abruptly she sighed and relaxed and said with a very controlled, firm voice, "Okay. It's over. I got it out of my system and it's over." She patted me on the hand and said, "Okay, hon. Sit down, now. Let's eat."

How confusing, I thought. Her behavior wasn't totally unfamiliar, as my mother had mood swings like this on a daily basis. I sighed resignedly and returned to my chair. Martha Jane stabbed her food and ate -- somewhat sullenly, but calmly.

She said, "You're very sweet to fix this up for me. God knows I wouldn't have time to do it myself. Just ignore me. I don't feel right about having you baby me."

I joked, "You baby me."

She threw me little smooch across the table.

Within a minute she was again eating and studying at the same time but without frowning and fretting. When she was finished she said quickly, "Okay. Thank you. Gotta get back to that typewriter." She grabbed her book and sped into her bedroom.

I cleaned up and put the slim leftovers in the refrigerator. From her bedroom I could hear the tap tap tap of her portable typewriter. I knew she was heavily into the books again, so when I was ready to leave I lingered briefly in the doorway to her bedroom. She was on her knees on her bed, hunched over the typewriter with a pencil in her mouth.

I called in, "Hey. Thanks for the library today."

She said with her pencil in her mouth, "Okay, hon. I liked it, too."

"Well... I'll talk to you later."

She removed the pencil and said quickly, "Hon! I'll call you tonight. Okay?"

"Sure."

She winked at me, unsmiling. "Thanks for putting up with me."

"Any time."

She said, "Hmp. Careful. You'll bite off more than you could chew in a lifetime. G'night, hon."

"G'night."

I left, and just as I was closing the door I heard her smack the typewriter and swear mildly, "Damn. I hate machines. I hate *all* machines."

I got into bed at a quarter to nine with a pad of note paper and was struggling with a mushy little poem about Martha Jane when the telephone in the living room rang, as usual, at precisely nine o'clock.

"Hello?" I said.

She said tonelessly, "Hello." On the other end of the line I heard what sounded like Martha Jane inhaling from a cigarette and blowing smoke. "Are you awake?"

"Yeah."

Another drag on the cigarette. "You've been very sweet to me today. All day."

"You needed a little help, I guess."

"Yeah. I guess. You know, I don't like needing help."

"I know."

"Just like you."

I said, "I know."

Another drag. "Speedy, you're not so dumb. You know?"

"I have good taste in women, too."

She snickered. "Well... maybe." Another drag. "I'm really tired, but I still have a lot to do."

"I hope you'll have a little something left for Saturday."

"Now, don't forget, your Aunt Frances is taking the afternoon off from the restaurant tomorrow to take you to Oak Hall's for some new clothes."

"Yech!"

"Now, Speedy."

"Okay, I'll be nice."

"She'll shoot me if I let you forget." She inhaled and exhaled. "This paper work is due Saturday. It'll be finished by then, and we can have a good time for a change."

"Would you like a little help?"

"What?"

"What you like a little help?"

"What do you mean?"

"I can type."

There was a pause. Another drag. She said "Hon, you're sweet. But no. I have to do this myself. I make so many changes, it would never get done. But thank you."

"Well... okay. Anything I can do, let me know."

"Okay." I heard her give a long sigh and there was a rustle of clothes, as if she were shuffling around on the bed. "Look at this place. Books everywhere. I erased so much I have eraser shreds all over the bed." Another pause. She was speaking very softly and wearily. "I've been working too hard, taking a little break now. I can't stay up much longer, though. I have a job interview tomorrow." Another drag on the cigarette. "Hon?"

"Yes?"

"All this work has put me in such a crazy mood. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry."

"I'm still sorry."

"I want you to be able to get out of the Lauderdale Courts."

Another pause, a long one. She said, "Are you going to sleep soon?"

"Yeah."

A pause. A whoosh of smoke. "Would you like a little help?"

"Hm?"

"Would you like a little help?"

My brain melted. I was hoping that she meant what I thought she meant. I said, as evenly as I could, "Okay."

"Are you in bed?"

"I will be."

"I'll be there in a minute."

It seemed like a very long minute, during which I got naked and waited for her in bed with no light except the small lamp on the bedside table. In a short time I heard the key turning in the front door. Soon she stood in the bedroom doorway wearing her fluffy, quilted bathrobe, looking tired and drawn. She pouted, "I can't stay, you know. I mean I still have stuff to do. But you've been so sweet..." She moved to the bed table and turned out the light.

She said, "Come here. Just sit on the edge of the bed, hon."

I did so, sitting upright with my legs over the side. I expected her to remove her bathrobe. Instead, she simply nestled into me, still standing, and put her arms around me and hugged me with my face cuddled into her bosom. After a moment I raised one hand to cup her robe-covered breast, but she said, "Hon, no, don't squeeze. Just touch. It feels okay if you just touch. I'm really very... just too sensitive right now. Everything's, y'know, kinda sore from all this pressure and work. Just hold me, hon."

She stroked my back with one hand and my hair and neck with the other, and she placed little kisses on my forehead. She whispered, "We can't do much tonight, I'm so tired and everything. But I'm in this mood, and I... want to do something... special. Something we never did before."

I couldn't imagine what that could be. I thought that over the years we had shared every pleasure imaginable. With my mouth against her bathrobe I asked, "Never?"

"No. Not really. Not exactly." She started placing little nips and kisses along my neck and then my shoulders, and then she knelt to make a trail of nips and licks down my chest and then my tummy. She whispered, "You feel good." And I whispered, "You do, too," which was quite true.

When her lips reached my groin she paused and laid her cheek on my thigh and with one hand used two gentle fingers to squeeze off the drop of fluid that had oozed onto my tip. She rubbed her wet fingers together and then she delicately wrapped her hand around my erection and held it, motionless.

She asked, "Does that feel good?"

"Yes."

"Do you remember the first time you used your mouth on me? The very, very first time?"

"Uh, yeah."

"The way you did it was so slow, so... loving and so gentle. And it was so good when I came." She gave my cock a single, soft squeeze. The delicacy of it made my cock arch upward. I could feel her smiling against my leg. Then she whispered, "I want to do it to you that way tonight. I want to make it very nasty. Is that okay?"

I swallowed hard. What in hell would make her think it wouldn't be okay? I wet my dry lips with my tongue and whispered back, "Yes."

"Good."

She settled onto her knees and placed her face over my cock and gazed up at me with a heartfelt expression. "I can't let you inside me tonight. I'm just too... tired, and I'm such a mess. But I can fuck you with my mouth." She paused, looking at me. "Is that okay?"

"That's a silly question."

She grinned. "I just want to know if that will be... enough."

"Anything you do is always more than enough."

Still gazing at me, she gave my cock another one of those torturing little squeezes. I felt it throb and send up another bubble of pre-cum. I gulped, hard. "That's good."

"Like it?"

"Yes!"

"Hon, have you -- have you masturbated since you were with me?"

I shook my head no. "I never masturbate."

She looked down at my waiting cock and said, almost as if to herself, "Then I'll do it really slow. So it'll last." She squeezed again, and it throbbed and I gasped and gripped the edge of the bed. She grinned at my cock, squeezed again, and looked up at me when I moaned.

"Are comfortable, sitting that way?"

"Want me to move?"

"No. I just want to know if it's comfortable."

"Yeah. It's good."

"Good." Then she added with a naughty whisper, "It's easier for me to swallow this way." She opened her mouth and placed it over my cock and lowered her head. Then she closed her warm mouth around me and held still.