Part XVII - 10: Aid for Heartaches

"Tim?"

"Jennifer? What's wrong?"

<incomprehensible response due to sobbing>

"Jennifer, please... Where are you?"

"I'm... I'm home... "

"Are you hurt?"

"No... My mom... "

"Your mom did something? Did she hit you?"

"NO!" <more sobbing>

"Honey, please stop crying long enough to tell me... What is WRONG?"

"She... she cut her thumb... "

"What? You're mom? She cut her thumb?"

"Yes! And then... "

"And then what? Jennifer! Tell me!"

"She's DIED!"

"What? From cutting her thumb?!? Oh, honey... I didn't mean to make it sound... I'm coming over. Okay?"

"Please?!?"

That's all I needed to hear.

Even though it was dark out, I didn't hesitate to jump into Midge and push her as fast as she could go, which on a calm day was close to 100 MPH. What usually took me over a half an hour to drive, took me probably less than ten minutes simply because I had gone in a straight line and didn't have any stop signs or traffic lights to deal with.

I had never attempted to fly at dark before, and it's a wonder I wasn't killed myself from doing something so reckless. Midge and Beany were never meant to fly at dark, and had no lights on them other than the few indicators on the instrument panel. However, I hadn't been completely without some sense, for while I grabbed my winter coat, gloves, and hat, I also grabbed two of those 6 volt lantern/flashlights and a roll of duct tape.

I lost one of the lights somewhere around the outer edge of Jennifer's subdivision, but I made do with the other one still hanging on to Midge's hull. All I really needed them for was to make sure I didn't hit something in the air anyway.

That had been the first time I had used my telepathy on Jennifer in any way. You see, I had locked onto her mind before hanging up the phone, and had used that as a beacon to guide me directly to her.

Even though Jennifer had only seen or heard Midge that one time in the balloon, she knew it was me when I was approaching her back yard and struggling to slow down so I wouldn't pass it up or crash or something. I ended up having to circle around, but not before I buzzed the top of one of their trees, and very nearly their roof too.

I cut the power to Midge's engine ten feet off the ground and to my surprise dropped like rock instead of settling down like I had expected her to do. Despite their grief, Lee, their father, and a few other people stood there with their mouths a gap when it appeared as if I had just dropped right out of the sky.

Once my organs had moved back into their proper positions, I struggled to undo my safety harness as Jennifer stood there in the cold three feet away, sniffing and looking absolutely pitiful.

I don't remember actually getting out of Midge. In fact everything between trying to get out of my harness and finding myself holding my Jennifer in my arms is a complete blank. But I do remember feeling her shivering from the early December cold and half carrying and half dragging her inside.

All of my attention was focused on Jennifer while her dad guided us to a kitchen chair, for she was holding on to me closer and tighter than she had ever done so before. Despite the fact that she was hurting, I couldn't help but enjoy how much she needed me like that.

I have no idea how long we stood there before Jennifer finally let go long enough for me to sit down and retake her in my arms and across my lap.

She wasn't crying really, just kind of whimpering with sudden spurts of sobs. Neither one of us spoke a word the whole time we were like that, and it wasn't until a familiar voice asked if we wanted anything to drink that I did.

"Scott? What are you doing here?" I asked in surprise.

"We're cousins," Jennifer said softly moments before Scott said the same thing.

"I didn't know that," I admitted before giving Jennifer another kiss on the side of her head.

"My mom and her mom are sisters," Scott explained.

Jennifer turned herself around so she was facing Scott, then asked, "How do you two know each other?"

"Tim helped me with his... " Scott began.

"Hypnosis," I managed to blurt out in time.

Scott gave me a very confused and questioning look, but kept his mouth shut anyway while I stretched the truth a little to satisfy Jennifer's curiosity.

When Scott's mother came over to us and told Scott and Jennifer they would be going home in little bit, I took a good look at her, finding that she did resemble Jennifer's mother, but not really all that much.

However, there was this... familiar aura about her that I couldn't quite put my finger on right away too. I shrugged it off for the time being, figuring I had more important things to focus my mind on.

I didn't recognize Scott's dad until Scott playfully gave him a couple of punches in the gut. Apparently Scott hadn't been the only one punching the ole punching bag. His dad's beer belly was almost gone, and every sense I had told me he was a much healthier person than he had been before.

Even Tracy, Scott's sister, looked different, but for some reason I still had trouble recalling her image from before, so that might have had something to do with it too.

Just before they left, I remembered what Scott had asked me about her at the beginning of the school year and did a quick scan of her mind. The commands I had inserted to make her enjoy her brother and his friends watching her masturbate were very much still in place, but I decided that they really weren't doing much anymore since Tracy and Scott had already fucked a number of times since Scott and I had last talked.

It was while I was removing my commands in Tracy's head that I recognized the aura I had noticed about Tracy's and Scott's mother. It was the same one Tracy and Lee had, although much less intense, with Lee having the strongest of the three.

Their sexual hunger literally glowed about them, and as I tuned into this range of my empathic senses, I discovered Scott had a similar glow about him, not quite the same, but fairly intense like his sister's was. And while I was checking out the others there, I found that of all of the people there, mine and Lee's were the strongest, while Jennifer's was virtually nonexistent.

It was about eleven o'clock before anyone actually did start to leave, and even though no one said anything to me about leaving, I decided I had better follow the others example, especially since Jennifer had sat down on a chair of her own an hour earlier and was fighting to stay awake.

But as it turned out, Midge wouldn't start, and it was too dark and cold to try and figure out why. Mr. Corrigan offered to let me sleep on the couch, and I was sorely tempted to accept, but decided the best thing to do was just call a limo and come back tomorrow after school to collect Midge, and see Jennifer too of course.

I learned the next day that Mrs. Corrigan had died of blood poisoning from cutting her thumb pretty badly on a piece of metal in the basement while working on the laundry. No one is really sure what it was she had cut herself on, for that had been all she said before passing out and never waking up.

I learned a lot about Jennifer's mom the next few days, mostly from Jennifer herself from the need to talk about all the things she loved her mom for.

Apparently, Jennifer's mom had been extremely jealous of her sister's good looks and popularity with the guys, and despised how sexually active her sister was. She had sworn to herself that none of her children would ever be that way, but Lee rebelled against her strict rules of conduct, although not openly at first.

After finding Lee in bed with a boyfriend, Rose Corrigan focused her attention on Jennifer, realizing she had lost any chance with Lee, but still could help Jennifer to grow up to be a good girl like she had been. That had been four years ago, and it was obvious that Jennifer had accepted her mother's rules and was now determined to live by them for the rest of her life.

You see, Lee's rebellion had made their mother realize that you can't just make up rules like that without offering something in return for following them. And with Jennifer being so insecure about herself, it was easy for the two of them to find things to do together that they both could enjoy.

Jennifer spent a lot of time telling me of all the things they had done together. I'm not going to list them here because... Well, I have my reasons, and I don't need to explain them either. Just accept that Jennifer had every right to love her mother like she did, even if she did appear to rule her family with an iron glove.

The funeral was that Thursday, and I was very disturbed by how distant Jennifer was trying to become with me. She felt guilty for disobeying her mother's wishes, and that day of all days she felt she had to follow them. I can't tell you how... confused I felt. No. Not confused. Just...

Unhappy. Unhappy with a capital U. And Miserable with a capital M. And after the final words were said at the gravesite, Jennifer left with her family without looking at me or acknowledging that I was even there.

I went straight to the North mansion to be with my own mother, and after explaining everything to her, I broke down and Cried with a capital C.

"Oh Timmy," my mother said as I finished letting out the emotions I had been struggling to control. "You've never had to deal with death before so you don't know how it is to lose someone like that. Right now, Jennifer feels she needs to stay loyal to her mother to honor her memory. It's a natural reaction, but that's all it is. I'm sure she'll want to spend time with you again once she has some time to adjust."

"Was your mom the first for you?" I asked after that had soaked in.

"No, dear," she said, rapping her arms around my chest from behind. "My Uncle Tim was my first. I was just a little older than Jennifer I think. Yes. I must have been sixteen because I just started to drive... <sigh> It didn't make my mother's death any easier, but in a way I suppose I was better prepared to deal with it. She'll come around, Timmy. I know she will. Don't hold it against her when she does, not that I think you would. Just be there for her if and when she wants you, and be patient with her when she doesn't. That's all you can do for now."