The sound of a basketball dribbling on the driveway snapped his thoughts away from her.
“Hey, Hunter!” his little brother yelled through the open front door. “Let’s play HORSE.”
Hunter walked down the hall and out the front door. Frankie was eight years old, a little chunky with a round face covered to his eyebrows in bangs. After a few games with his brother, Hunter heard his mother call him.
“I need you, Hunter.”
Hunter tossed the ball to Frankie and walked inside. Where was she?
“In here, Baby.”
He walked to her room and saw her standing in front of her dresser mirror, the back of her red dress open and her bra unclasped.
“Can you hook me up and zip? My nails aren’t dry and I don’t want to smear them.”
Her dress plunged in the front. Just as he moved behind her, she bent over to pick something off her dress. Hunter saw her breasts swaying, barely covered by the bra. She looked up and saw his gaze through the mirror.
“Thought you weren’t interested, Baby.” She smiled as she pulled the front of her dress up. “It’s nice that one man in this house likes my figure. Your father could care less. Hook my strap, please.”
Hunter felt her warm skin against his fingers as he stretched the ends toward each other.
“OK,” he said. “Done.”
“Now zip. Go slow. This dress is tighter than the last time I wore it.”
Hunter reached for the zipper and noticed the top edge of her panties. His heart pounded as the top of her butt crack disappeared. He zipped slowly until he reached the top.
“Can you see my bra strap?”
He wanted to avert his eyes, but he couldn’t. “Yes.”
“Well, that won’t work. Guess I’ll have to go braless. Unzip me and unhook it.”
Hunter did as she asked. She looked at him through the mirror. “You can watch if you want to.”
He turned around and looked at the wall. He heard the sounds of her dress being moved.
“You can turn around, Baby.”
He turned and noticed the bra on the dresser. “Zip.”
“Are you going somewhere?” he asked as he reached the top.
She turned around and put her hand on her hip. “How do I look?” He saw her tongue on her teeth.
“Pretty. Beautiful.” She was. He had never seen another woman as beautiful.
“You are so sweet.” She put her arms on either side of his neck. “You’re such a handsome young man. Gonna be quite a catch for some lucky girl.” She kissed his cheek and pulled his head against her chest.
Her perfume made him dizzy. “Where are you going?”
She pulled away. “I’m going out. I need a break, so I called a girlfriend and we’re meeting for a girls’ night out.”
“Who is she?”
“Don’t be so nosy. No one you know.” She grabbed her purse off the chair and walked to the door. “C’mon. Out of here. I want to talk to you and Frankie.”
They walked down the hall to the front door. “Frankie, come here.”
Frankie and Hunter stood before their mother.
“You two will behave. I should be back around ten.”
“Yes, Ma’am,” the brothers said.
“Frankie, do what your brother says and get to bed by nine.”
Frankie groaned.
She kissed each boy on his forehead and walked out to her car. She backed away waving at them.
At 11:30 that night, Hunter sat at the kitchen table, waiting for his mother to return home. He knew she wasn’t meeting a girlfriend. She and Dad had argued before he left for Prudhoe Bay two days ago. Hunter remembered her yelling, “If you’re not interested in me, I’ll find someone who is.” So he figured that’s what she was doing.
What if she found another man? Would she leave him and Frankie with Dad? Was he worried about his mother or jealous? Maybe she was doing this to make him want her more.
Did he want her to stay because he would miss his mother, or because he wanted her to keep seducing him until he gave in? Then it wouldn’t be his fault, would it? How despicable was that?
The idea of her leaving made him feel hollow inside. He bit his lip. What would people think if they knew his thoughts?
He saw lights coming toward the house—from two cars. Why two?
They pulled into the driveway. A man got out of his mother’s car and ran over to the passenger door. Hunter walked onto the porch.
“Hey, kid. Come help your mother.”
The man opened the car door to reveal his mother, slumped back in the seat, her legs spread apart. Hunter ran toward her. She flopped her head toward him and smiled. “Hunter, baby! You should’ve seen your mother dance. Every man in the bar couldn’t keep his eyes off me.” She laughed.
The man looked at Hunter and shook his head. “Jack and I brought her home because she was going to drive even though she’s pretty drunk. Can you help her out? She’s already got me in trouble with my wife.
Hunter leaned into the car. “Mom? Can you walk?”
“Sure, Baby.” She put her right foot onto the driveway, hiking up her dress to mid-thigh. She laughed. “Not the most lady-like move I’ve ever made.” She dragged her left leg out as Hunter held her up.
“Here are her keys.” The man put them in Hunter’s hand.
“Thanks for bringing her home,” said Hunter.
“Do y’all want to come inside?” his mother called.
“No, Ma’am.”
“Cowards!”
“C’mon, Mom.” He helped her walk up the stairs to the porch.
“Not a pair of balls between them.”
Hunter held one of her arms around his shoulders and held her waist with his other hand as she staggered up the porch stairs and into the house.
“Baby, you’re so strong.” She kissed his cheek long and hard. “And so handsome.” She kissed again.
He couldn’t help feeling pride from her praise. No one else paid any attention to him. “I’ll take you to your bedroom.”
“That’s what I was trying to get a man to say to me all night. But they were all look and no touch.”
Hunter opened her door and flipped on the light.
“Will you be all right?” asked Hunter as he sat her down on the bed.
“I’m not ready to go to bed, yet. The night’s young!” She stood up and kicked off her heels. Then hiked up her dress and pulled down her fishnet hose. “Hang these on my chair, Baby.” She tossed them to Hunter. She tried to reach her zipper but staggered too much.
“Baby, unzip me.” She turned her back to him and held up her hair. Hunter pulled the zipper down. She pulled her arms out of the dress and dropped it to her waist. Turning around, she said, “Baby—”
“Mom!”
Savannah looked down then covered her breasts. “Woops! Forgot I didn’t wear a bra tonight.”
Hunter looked down and away.
“Please, Hunter. Don’t look away. Please.”
Hunter couldn’t get enough air into his lungs. He slowly lifted his head and his eyes to her chest.
She dropped her arms. Hunter stared. “Come here, Baby.” She hugged him to her. “You used to touch them every day. Now you’re not supposed to, but I so yearn to be touched.” She pulled back from him. “Will you touch me, Hunter?”
Hunter moved his hands from her back to her sides and then to her breasts.
“Yes, Baby. That’s what I want.” She kissed him on each cheek then pulled his hands up to her lips and kissed them. “Your mother is so lonely, so lonely. I lay awake at night, crying. We all need to be touched, Hunter.” She placed his hands on her breasts.”
Hunter thought he would faint.
“Do you love me, Baby?”
“Yes.”
“You’re making me so happy. I haven’t felt happy in a long, long time. Do you want to make your mother happy?”
“Yes.”
She kissed his forehead and pulled him to her.
“I need a drink. Why don’t you get the bottle and bring two glasses of ice and some tonic. I need to change. Go.”
Hunter turned, and walked out of the room. He’d made drinks for his mother before, and he’d stolen shots off and on. He sliced a lemon and inhaled its aroma—tart and clean. Then squeezed lemon over the ice in each glass, hearing the crack of each cube. He added shots of vodka, pouring the drops at the bottom of the shot glass into his mouth, feeling the slight burn. The tonic water fizzed and bubbled onto the counter after he unscrewed the top. He poured another shot of vodka and downed it. After putting everything on a tray, he carried it back to her room. Just before he entered, “Whole Lotta Love” blared out from her speakers.
She had her back to him, juking her hip to the rhythm. She was dressed like the time she emerged from the mirror: braless, short shirt, yoga shorts. He handed her a glass, which she drank in three gulps. He drank his quickly and felt the mixture burn down his throat and into his chest.
Then they danced the same way as before, her hands raking across his crotch, moving under his shirt, all the time smiling at him, enjoying what she was doing to him, staring at his growing erection. He couldn’t stop watching her body.
“Make us another drink, Baby.”
He poured more shots and more tonic water. She went to the CD player and pushed a button until Hunter heard the opening guitar riff of “Stairway to Heaven.” She turned on her dresser mirror lights then flipped the switch for the room. When he handed her the glass, she was swaying to the music, backlit by the lights, looking like a woman in a dream.
She drank then put her glass down, holding out her arms, summoning him to her. She pulled him close. Hunter could feel every part of her touching him. They didn’t move their feet, just pressed as much of their bodies together as they could. She was so warm, so soft.
He melted into her. He loved his mother. She loved him. Most of him felt warm and comfortable. But another part felt desire. And that scared him.
She rubbed his back. He rubbed hers. She pulled his butt toward her. He could feel his erection against her as she moved her pelvis against his. After the guitar solo, she lifted her hands above her head, swaying her arms to the rhythm, still pressing her thighs and pelvis against him.
When the song ended, she whispered in his ear, “You’re the most beautiful boy. I love you, Baby.”
“I love you, too.”
She kissed his forehead and pulled him toward the bed. “I don’t want to sleep alone tonight. Will you snuggle with me? Like you used to?”
He nodded.
She pulled back the sheets and climbed in. He slipped in next to her. She faced him, smiled and kissed his nose, his cheeks, his neck. She put her hand underneath his shirt, rubbing his chest, then his stomach.
Hunter’s heart pounded. He tried to swallow, but his mouth was so dry.
“I need you, Baby. So badly.” Her hand moved to his stomach. “Do you want me, Baby?” Her hand moved lower. “Do you want me as much as I want you?”
She touched his erection.
“Yes, you do, Baby. Oh, God, Hunter, I love you!”
She pushed her hand into his underwear. Hunter felt a surge of panic. He pulled away.
“No, Baby. Give it to me.” She grabbed him.
“Mom. No! Please!” He pulled away.
“You want it as much as I do.” She grabbed.
Hunter was so conflicted. He could easily give in to her, but deep inside he knew this wasn’t right. His mother was drunk. He was drunk. He had to leave.
“Mom, no. Please.”
“Why?” she pleaded.
“No.” He reached down and pulled her hand away.
“Dammit, Hunter!”
“Mom, this is wrong. Please.”
“You fucking bastard. Just like your father. Get the hell out of my bedroom!”
Her anger stunned him. “Mom, please.”
“Get the hell out. Now!”
Hunter scrambled out of the bed. She glared at him, breathing heavily, her lips curled back from her teeth.
“I’m sorry.”
“Bring me my drink.”
He hurried to her glass and brought it to her. She drank and held it to him. He filled it again and gave it to her.
She drank half of it. “I got to find somebody who wants me. I got to get out of here.” She leaned back against the headboard.
Hunter didn’t move. Had he done the right thing?
“Take the bottle with you. Otherwise I’ll drink it all.”
Hunter put his glass, the vodka bottle and the tonic water onto the tray and headed toward the door.
“Hunter.”
Would she be angry? Or apologize? Or cry? “Yes.”
Her voice froze him.
“We won’t talk about this ever, you hear me?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
“Ever.”
Hunter staggered as he left the room. He closed the door and leaned against it. Did she hate him now? In a fog he walked to the kitchen and sat at the table. He drank three more glasses before he collapsed.
The next morning, his mother banged the table to wake him up. She said nothing and looked at him like he was a stranger. No smiles, no “Baby,” no hugs.
Frankie ran into the kitchen and hugged her around the waist. He claimed he’d had a nightmare, that he’d been scared.
“Oh, no!” said Savannah. “If that happens again, come to my room and snuggle with me.”
She wet his hair and brushed it down while glancing at Hunter blankly.
The message was clear: never speak about the incident, no more dancing, no more touching. No more anything. His brother was now preferred. Hunter was the pariah who wouldn’t submit to his mother.
Chapter Twenty
Jazz held the towel around her body as she stepped toward the full-length mirror hanging on the bathroom door, covered by a robe, which she always kept hanging to block the view. Her heart pounded as she lifted the robe and dropped it to the floor, shutting her eyes as she opened both hands.
After a few seconds of hesitation, she forced herself to look— so much skin covering her thick arms and legs, soft folds around her waist, and mounds of milky flesh perched over her ample torso. She remembered looking at herself at twelve, fascinated at how large her breasts were compared to the rest of her. Now after years of weight gain, she was large everywhere. But what overwhelmed her eyes were the welts and scabs marking her skin, most shriveled to white among the goosebumps forming as the shower steam dissipated, and the cold embraced her. Jagged zig-zags and cross-hatched lines stared back at her from shoulders to wrists and down her legs—the most recent along her hip, red and ridged, angry at the exposure.
She touched the lines on her hip lightly, wincing as the razor blade flashed into her mind, forcing her heart to race. Not from pain but memory of the steel opening her skin like mouths smiling with blood. She watched her finger trace the random lines along her upper thigh. Her breathing sped.
Before emerging from the bathroom, Jazz struggled with what to wear, whether to show all her scars and hope he still wanted to kiss them rather than turn away, or worse, run away. She pulled on a loose tank-top t-shirt with no bra. The welts on her shoulders and arms glared at her through the mirror. How could anyone stand to see them? In the end, she wavered about her legs, deciding to pull sweatpants up over her boxers.
Jazz took a deep breath and opened the door. She entered her room and saw Hunter curled up on her bed, his back toward her, hard sobs wracking his body and his eyes clenched shut. His arms were wrapped around himself, looking so small and vulnerable, tearing at her heart.
“I remembered, Jazz.”
She sat next to him, touching him gently, feeling his body heave. “What happened?”
“My mother came home drunk after trying to seduce men at a bar
. She exposed herself to me. She said I was the only man in the house who wanted to touch her or look at her. I drank with her, then we danced. She wanted me aroused and asked that I sleep with her. She tried to have sex with me, but I said no.”
He sat up, staring at the far wall. “After that, everything changed between us. She invited my little brother to sleep with her. I don’t know what happened after that.”
“I’m sorry.” She felt exposed and hugged herself.
He turned toward her. “She tried to seduce me, but I said no. Maybe that’s all there is.”
“Maybe.” She hugged him.
“I drank with her. Vodka tonics. But I drank more after she rejected me.” He stood up.
“She messed with your head, Hunter. She could’ve pretended the event never happened because she was embarrassed and decided to never seduce you again, but she chose to taunt you and make you feel jealous of your brother. She was still manipulating you. I don’t think that was the last time she tried to have sex with you.”
“Great. Something to look forward to.” He moved toward her and touched the welts on her shoulders.
Jazz flinched slightly.
“Thanks for trusting me to see these.”
“I’m still afraid you’ll turn away in disgust.”
“I’ll never do that.”
He touched her shoulder again, but this time Jazz didn’t flinch and felt the soft pads of his fingers move slowly along several scars.
“Can I see your legs?”
Jazz breathed deep a few times then slipped off her sweatpants. She saw the welts across her thighs, some thin, a little lighter in color than her skin. Others were dark red, some slashing across old scars.
Hunter dropped to his knees and slowly moved his fingertips down her thighs.
“When was the last time?” he asked.
She felt dizzy. “I think two weeks ago.”
“Where?”
She swallowed then lifted up the bottom edge of her boxers on her left side near her hip. Hunter touched the two scab lines. He looked up to her face.
“Why?”
“Bad dreams.” She raised her hands to her ears. “I kept hearing all of Mom’s men taunting me, trying to get into the house.” She paused to slow her breathing. “I couldn’t sleep.”
Someone To Kiss My Scars: A Teen Thriller Page 16
