Chapter 5

The assembled daughters of the Reed clan were huddled around a table at the soda shop, each digging into a tower of ice cream in assorted unnatural shades of pastel. As was their usual custom, they were dishing assorted friends and relatives. The topic du jour was a friend of Georgie's whose husband was having an affair -- Georgie knew, her friend didn't, and should she tell?

"Well," Teddy said, licking a drop of vanilla off the side of her mouth, "I think you should. I mean, why should the wife always be the last to know? Besides, if you don't tell when you know something like that, aren't you becoming an accomplice yourself?"

"Hah! You should talk!" Alex exploded, letting her spoon clatter onto the table.

Teddy stared at her. "What are you talking about?"

"Like you don't know!"

"I don't, I -- uh, oh."

Frankie, the youngest, was in between Teddy and Alex. Her eyes had been bouncing back and forth between them like a spectator at a tennis match, but when she saw the look in Teddy's face she quickly looked down. "Oh, you..." she let it drift off.

"You know, too?" Alex demanded. "How did you find out?"

"Well, I -- um, that is..."

"You -- you didn't..." Alex said, in a stage whisper.

Georgie managed to get a word in edgewise. "What are you talking about?"

All three of her sisters stopped talking and stared at her for a second. Simultaneously, they all blushed a deep red.

"What is it," Georgie demanded. "What -- oh, God, no, it's about me, isn't it? It must be, because none of you will look me in the eye. But -- John? John's having an affair? I can't believe it!"

"No, it's not John," Frankie said, quickly.

"Then who? What? Honestly, I don't understand. What's the big secret?"

"It's nothing. There's no secret," Teddy said in a rush.

"That's right," Alex chimed in. "No secret at all. Nothing."

Georgie grimaced. "Frankie," she said, turning her big-sister glare on the youngest, "come clean."

Frankie remembered a similar situation, many years ago. She could almost see it now, a younger version of herself in pigtails, hiding behind her two other sisters as Georgie, hands on hips, stared right into her eyes. She could remember squirming under Georgie's gaze, desperately trying to keep in the secret -- though what that secret had been, she couldn't remember. Her alter ego seemed to be speaking to her; at least, that's what she called it when a corner of her mind tried to buck up her resolve. "Don't be a snitch," her younger self insisted. "Besides, you did it, too."

But the voice of a younger Georgie seemed to be in her head, too, demanding that she come clean, appealing to her conscience. Ooh, that hurt. It always stung when Georgie mentioned her conscience.

Desperately, Frankie tried to remember how she had gotten out of that long-ago dilemma. She couldn't have stood up to Georgie, could she? But how had she avoided getting smacked by Alex and Teddy for squealing?

Now she remembered! She'd made up a story, something good enough for Georgie to swallow but not nearly as bad for Alex and Teddy as the truth would have been. It worked then, maybe it would work now!

"OK, I'll confess," Frankie said. "But it's really no big secret."

"Frankie!" Alex exclaimed.

Frankie shook off her sister's frantic gestures. "No, Alex, I have to tell."

"Tell what?" Georgie was insistent.

Frankie tried to stall for time to come up with a good story, mashing her ice cream into a vaguely gray mush and then twirling it up into spiked mounds on her spoon.

"Frankie!" Georgie was growing increasingly impatient.

What could I say, Frankie thought. We've already said it wasn't her husband, and if I say it doesn't involve Georgie at all she'll see right through me. Quick!

Georgie's eyes seemed to bore right into her brain. Frankie panicked. She couldn't think of a thing. She decided to toss the ball to one of her sisters for help.

"Alex..." she blurted out.

"Oh, sure, rat on me," Alex shot back. As soon as she said it, she slapped her hand across her mouth. It was too late.

"You?" Now Georgie turned her gaze on Alex. "What did you do? And who did you do it with?"

"Me? It was all Teddy's fault!"

Teddy scooped out a spoonful of ice cream and flipped it across the table at Alex. "Thanks a lot, Alex. We'd never be in this mess if it wasn't for Trevor."

"Trevor!" Georgie's eyes bulged like the cherries on top of her sundae.

"Oops," Teddy said, staring down into her dessert.

"My God, Alex -- you slept with my son?"

"Well," Alex said, staring down as well, "I might have -- but it was only for punishment."

Georgie only gasped.

"For sleeping with Reed, of course."

"And Cat," Frankie said.

"Cat? Trevor slept with Cat?" That was Alex; Georgie was still sitting there with her mouth wide open, not saying a word. Alex, however, couldn't stop talking. "My God, Teddy, you knew Trevor slept with your own daughter and you made up that lame excuse to cover up for it? What kind of a mother are you?"

"Me? You slept with your own nephew as punishment?"

Frankie gulped down a spoonful of ice cream so fast it made her head ache. "Teddy, who are you to criticize Alex? You made it with him, too."

"Teddy!" Alex exclaimed.

"Frankie!" Teddy barked.

Finally, Georgie found her voice. "Frankie, just how do you know all this?"

All eyes turned to the youngest Reed daughter. She suddenly discovered a thread loose on her blazer and spent an inordinate amount of time plucking it out. When she finished, however, she looked up only to find all her sisters still staring.

"OK. Me too."

Georgie didn't faint, exactly, thanks to the fact that as she started to go under she fell face forward and the instant the ice cream hit her nose she sputtered back to consciousness.

The discussion that followed was long and at times rather heated. It ended only when Georgie admitted she was too exhausted to go on.

"But," she said, reaching for her purse, "at least will you promise not to have sex with my son again? Either of my sons?"

"Absolutely," Alex said.

"I guess so," Frankie said, reluctantly.

"Nope," Teddy said.

They all stared at her.

"Well, he's pretty damn good in bed," Teddy said, defiantly.

"Mmmm," Frankie sighed, "you can say that again."

"Now that you mention it," Alex chimed in.

The waitress had already cleared away their dishes. So that time Georgie's head hit the table with a solid-sounding smack. Luckily, Alex had smelling salts in her bag.

=== === === ===

Trevor was up in his room doing the reading for his biology class when Evan tore in. Trevor thought once again that for a kid in such bad shape, Evan had an awful lot of energy. He put down his book for a minute to watch his younger brother burrow through a pile of dirty clothes before pulling out a tattered sweatshirt.

"Whatcha doin', kid?"

Evan's face beamed. "Dad's gonna take me to the zoo, and then we're gonna go out for ice cream!"

"Sounds good, but when did all this happen? I thought we were supposed to be going to Grandma's tonight?"

Evan shrugged his shoulders. "Yeah, but Mom said it was canceled. It was her idea for Dad to take me, anyway." The little boy stubbed his toe into the carpet. "I said you should come too, really I did, but Mom said for Dad to take me. She said you had homework to do."

"It's OK," Trevor said. "So long, kid."

"Yeah -- hey, want us to bring something back for you from the ice cream store?"

"Nah, it'll melt."

"Oh, yeah." Evan was just out the door when he turned around. "Oh, yeah, I almost forgot. Mom said for you to come downstairs when you're done."

"What for?"

"I dunno." With that, Evan was thundering down the stairs.

Meanwhile, a cold prickling sensation was moving down Trevor's neck. Had she found out somehow? Had she found out about all of it? That he had fucked his cousins and all his aunts? He'd been worried if she just found out about Reed and Cat -- What would she do to him now?

To his surprise, he found that he was not really as scared as he thought he should be. Not scared at all, in fact. So he had made his aunts and cousins -- so what? Each time he had been petrified at being found out and afraid of the punishment, and each time it had turned out better than before. Besides, he was sick and tired of being afraid. He made up his mind not to apologize. He'd done it, and Mom would have to live with it.

Perhaps in the back of his mind there was still a tiny bit of hope that she just wanted to ask him to take out the garbage or something, but that faded when Trevor walked into the kitchen, said hi to his mother and sat down -- and she didn't say a word. She was standing at the sink, staring outside. When he spoke, her hands moved down and clutched at the rim of the sink. She stood there, frozen, for almost a minute, before she spoke, still turned away from him.

"How could you?"

The three words hit Trevor right in the stomach. He knew it was coming, but he still didn't want to face it. He said nothing.

"How could you, Trevor?" His mother was still turned away, talking to the window. "How could you possibly -- with your own aunts? And your cousins? Is this how I've raised you?"

Trevor could see his mother's knuckles growing white as she gripped the sink. He kept silent while she continued to rail at him, running through a list of every thing she'd ever done for him. It tore at his heart, but he didn't say a word. She moved on to describe in great detail just how awful the things he had done were, and "incest" was the nicest word she used. Trevor's cheeks were hot and he had a strong urge to run away, but he kept telling himself that he had nothing to be ashamed of.

In time his mother's tirade slowed and stopped. Through it all she had never once moved, not even turned her head slightly. The whole thing had been delivered straight into the window.

Then, though, she spun around. Her hands, twisted tightly into fists, dug into her hips as she glared down at him.

"Don't you have anything to say for yourself?"

Trevor stared down at his lap.

"Aren't you even ashamed of what you did?"

At last he looked up, looking her right in the eye. It took almost all his strength not to look away, but he managed to whisper a one-word answer.

"No."

His mother sagged back against the counter as if someone had suddenly removed half the bones in her body. Trevor started to get up to help her, but she waved him away with a glare on her face.

"Don't," she said. "Don't touch me, don't talk to me."

Trevor sank back into the chair. "Don't you even want to know why?" he asked.

Her mouth fell open. "Know why? I know why. Because you're a foul, evil boy who can't control his lusts." She spat the words out, but she wouldn't look him in the face.

Trevor kept talking, quietly. "No. It's because I love them. I love Reed, and Cat, and Aunt Teddy, and Aunt Alex, and Aunt Frankie. I love them, I care for them, and I'm not ashamed that we -- that we loved each other. That's what we did, Mom. We didn't have sex, we made love."

His mother turned away again, but Trevor went on. "I know that people say you're not supposed to love your cousins or your aunts that way, but -- but why not? You know what a close family we have. Why deny it? I've thought about this a lot. Sure, at first, I thought it was a sin. But it doesn't feel like that anymore. I know that it wasn't just an animal thing. I really loved them, and -- and they loved me. What we did -- well, it probably will never happen again..."

He saw his mother's head bob up. "That's not what your aunts say," she told the window.

Trevor ignored the interruption. "But I'm not going to apologize because it happened once. There's nothing wrong with it, no matter what everybody else says. We all were willing to do it, you know."

As he finished, his mother had turned and walked out of the kitchen. Almost out, she turned and looked at him without a sound. Then, all at once, she crumpled back against wall, sobbing quietly into her upturned hands. Trevor wanted to run to her, to make her feel better, but he thought she'd only slap him away.

After a little while, his mom rubbed her face in her hands and turned away again. As she left, she spoke softly, almost a whisper, over her shoulder. "I do... I do still love you, Trev."

Then she was gone. He could hear her muffled footsteps going up the stairs and down the hall, fading away. Then there was silence but for the quiet ticking of a clock. Trevor put his head in his hands, his mind filled with anguished thoughts.

Through the fog, something seemed to call to him. There was something he was trying to think of, but he couldn't quite grasp it. Through the mist, little by little, it came to him.

His mother said she loved him.

Trevor got up slowly and went upstairs. Down at the end of the hallway he could see a thin sliver of light spreading out from underneath his parents' bedroom door. He walked toward it, his thoughts awhirl.

He knocked. There was no answer. His heart pounding, Trevor reached for the doorknob. It was not locked. His hand, already clammy, slipped on the knob before he gripped it tighter and opened the door slowly.

His mother had been sitting on the big bed. Without thinking much about it, Trevor noticed that the comforted had been folded down to the end of the bed, leaving the sheets exposed.

His mother got to her feet, facing him. She still wore the simple blue cotton dress she'd had on downstairs, though she'd tossed aside the gingham apron. They stood facing each other, silent, like gunfighters in an old Western.

Trevor drew first. He swallowed and spoke.

"I love you too, Mom."

Perhaps there was a moment's hesitation. It seemed like an eon to Trevor. But then they were both rushing toward each other, embracing, holding onto each other for dear life. Their lips met and crushed together. Trevor had kissed his mother many times, but never like this. Never with this intensity, a kiss so deep he could feel their souls meeting.

And then his mother slipped her tongue into his mouth, and he met it, and he knew his life would never be the same again.

None of the feelings he'd experienced with Reed or Cat or any of his aunts, not even Aunt Frankie, were a tenth as powerful as the emotions that surged through him now. He pulled his mother's body to his. His cock lay between them, engorged to its full size already, rubbing against her flat stomach as they kissed hungrily: wet, hot, sloppy kisses. His mother's hand slid down his side and when she pushed it in between their bodies and cupped his cock through his jeans, Trevor almost came. He answered by letting one hand grope her bra-encased breast while the other pawed at her firm round ass, tugging up her dress until he could slip his fingers underneath it and slide them under her panties and hose, grabbing a handful of her warm flesh and pressing her hard against him. They spoke only in moans as they wrestled together, his mother's leg sliding with a sizzle up and down his thigh, her tongue flicking out at his ear and sending an electric shock through his whole body.

Even as Trevor was lost in lust, he never forgot for a second that this hot, sexy woman in his arms was his mother, the woman who had given him birth, nursed him, fixed his meals, sent him off to school. He felt no shame, though; the thought that he was about to make love to his mother just made him more passionate.

At last they broke their embrace and stepped apart. They were both breathing hard, faces flushed, clothes askew. Trevor panted out a question, though by now he was sure of the answer:

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

In reply, his mother reached behind her back and slowly unzipped her dress. As it fell to the floor she stepped out of it and stood before him in her demure white bra. He could see the white of her panties underneath the dark brown crotch of her pantyhose.

Her body was not as perfect as Aunt Frankie's -- her legs not as long or lean, her stomach flat but not as firm, her breasts not quite as big. But Trevor didn't notice any flaws; he saw only a vision of beauty, a goddess with a crown of brown hair. He swiftly unbuttoned his shirt, yanked off his jeans.

Meanwhile his mom slipped out of her bra, freeing her melon- sized breasts capped by already-erect nipples standing out from small, dark circles. As Trevor kicked off his white socks, his mother peeled off her pantyhose, wadded them up and tossed them aside.

Now he could see the dark stain already spreading across the front of her panties. She could see, he knew, the stain on his own shorts, at the top of the massive bulge that was his erection.

They didn't hesitate. As Trevor pried his shorts off his aching cock, letting it hang free, his mother slid her panties to the floor.

And there it was, just below the patch of soft brown hair: his mother's cunt. His birthplace. He stared at it, mesmerized from a distance, until she spoke.

"Well," she said, and there was a smile in her voice, "are you just going to look at it, or are you going to do something about it?"

He laughed and moved toward her. His prick prodded her pubic mound as they embraced again and kissed. This time their hands had no obstructions in their way and they eagerly explored each other's body. His mother sighed deeply when Trevor first held her breasts, rubbing gently against the nipples with his thumbs. He groaned in delight when she took firm hold of his rigid cock and massaged it up and down in her warm hands.