BOATHOUSE REVISITED

by Holly Rennick

AUTHOR'S NOTES

Here's yet another re-re-write of one of my early stories.  Same sex, more thought, I suppose.  I long ago ran out of ideas regarding the first, but there's no end to how we think.

The title derives from Evelyn Waugh's "Brideshead Revisited" popularized as a PBS miniseries.  The American release was cropped to reveal a little less of Diana Quick, a shame.   Not a problem for my story as I'm no Diana Quick.  If this remains a little obtuse, you can call the story "Indian," or maybe "Cookies at the Lake."

Enough expounding as if I'm on a book tour.  Do ask Borders if they might schedule it, though.

OUR FAMILY TREE

You'll need a little genealogy.

My uncle Robert was born in 1935, my mother in 1938.

My brother Terry was born in 1961 and I was born in 1963.  (Whoops!  I'm no longer 30-something.)

I've two kids: Jeremy, born in 1986, and Rochelle, the following year.

Jeremy says the odds of three generations being boy-girl are 1:64.  I didn't learn anything that interesting in high school, because when I took biology from Mrs. Thornton, it was without-numbers to not be hard.

I read about this lady who had nine daughters in a row.  I'll bet the last one never got a new jumper.

So here's our part of the family tree.

Robert - Mom

         Terry - Me

                 Jeremy - Rochelle

Three pairs of siblings, one line per generation.  Shove the second line to the right so Terry's under Mom.  Shove the bottom line so that Jeremy is under me.  That's us, stair-steps, so to speak.

This is a story about the over-down-over-down-over links of our diagram.  Five links total.

Well, five's perhaps an exaggeration, something we Midwesterners avoid.  Terry and I can attest to only three links -- those stepping from Mom to Jeremy.  But we're pretty sure there was a first and I'm betting on the next in a year or so.

BASIC PRINCIPLES

Midwestern families are best understood as the product of basic principles.  We don't need to keep reinventing ourselves.

Midwesterners vacation at the lakes.  Wherever we live, not too many hours north lies a hole scraped by a glacier.  At least that's how Mrs. Thornton explained it, but science back in the Seventies was more about blacks being excluded from chemistry, so I'm not sure we actually got to geology.  "Black" was their post "Negro", pre "African-American" designation, rarely their actual color.  Scandinavians are "white", equally strange, as we're hardly colorless, other than what some say about our personalities.

Got off the subject.  Sorry.

Basic Principle # 1.  We love lakes.

A thing about the Midwest is that it just keeps going.  As only rich folks owned the flat places where our great-grandparents hailed from, a level farm in the middle of America looked pretty good.  Fact is, it turned out to be that way, why we're still here.  Just our given names distinguish today's Midwesterners from those of a century past.

And that's Basic Principle # 2.  Generation succeeds generation.

Just before World War II, Grandpa picked up some lakefront acreage where there were too many rocks to plant more corn.  A good place for when things got hot and a great place to ice fish, he said.

Grandpa built a cottage with some lumber he'd bought for a machine shed that never got framed.  Grandma wanted a front porch, a living room with a stone fireplace (the price was right for stones) and a kitchen situated for central command.  A Midwestern family is like a brigade; the Captain manages her troops from a command post.  It's just that from this type of command post, she can bake cookies at the same time.

But as far as we stray from the sea, our nautical heritage tags along.  So Grandpa built a boathouse with the left-over lumber.  What we'd want for a herring lugger, he advised, as if any of us grandkids even knew what a herring lugger was.  We did know a lot about rowboats and canoes, though.

When it got hard for Grandpa to look after the place, Dad and Uncle Robert took over, brother-in-law bonding we'd call it today.  Maybe there's a book on the subject at Borders.  Now that Dad and Uncle Robert are gone, my husband Steve and my brother Terry do the upkeep.  Jeremy and whomever Rochelle marries will get the tool kit someday.  Craftsman.  Break one and they replace it, they say.

Usually we're up here for a few weeks, Rochelle, Jeremy and myself.  Steve's maybe with us for the first week, but has to head back to work.  Part of our stay usually overlaps with Terry's family.  Midwesterners can share property, not like New Yorkers.

So that's Basic Principle # 3.  The lake links our generations.

Okay, enough background.

CONFESSION

Starting the story backwards is pretty simple.  I've had sex with my boy Jeremy, link number four in the family tree diagram.  (Over, down, over and down equals me and Jeremy, right?)

Seduction's just a sequence of minute advances, defenses outflanked, a gradual imposition of will.  Success isn't ending in intercourse; it's the shift of perception about who wanted it first.   That part's easy; 17-year-old boys give themselves lots of credit, even if they're virgins.

Virgin at 17?  You thought that kids take care of it by about 13 these days, right?  Well, then maybe you're from California.  Jeremy wasn't ready at 13, or 16, for that matter.  We Midwesterners don't rush what's important.

The term "great sex" has been co-opted by Californians.  Let's just say that this story is about very good sex, if you catch the difference.  Good things last.

All teenagers want to do it, you say.  Well, of course they do, but they shouldn't have to rush it.  Midwestern kids take the time to figure things out, at least usually till the Junior Prom.

Some of us, though, don't date that much.

What follows isn't sequential.  Call it five acts, if you wish, as each link in the diagram I showed you is indeed an act.  I'll add some 2003 update later on, but we'll start by rolling back a few years.

Okay, going back to 1978 isn't perhaps "a few years", but to me it's yesterday.  You remember your first time exactly.  How you started kissing.  What the music was.  Who took what off when.  How it felt, him inside you, though you usually don't admit it wasn't everything it's put up to be.

It's your third time that draws a blank.

So we'll stick to first times.

ACT 3.  THE BOATHOUSE, 1978

(If you're still trying to decipher that stair-step diagram, this one's over, down and over.  The third link -- Terry and me.)

Kids need something to while the hours when station-wagoning to the lake.  You feel like you're on vacation, but there are not yet the trees.

From the rear seat we would see enough out-of-state plates to play License Plate.  I won four to three with a Tennessee.  Just because Terry was 17 didn't mean that he could see better than me.  Terry's opinion that License Plate is just a baby game didn't come till he lost.

For real competition, though, we'd switch to Toe Attack, slipping off our sandals and battling away until Dad said to pipe down back there.  That's when Mom would suggest something like if it gets breezy, there's the blanket.  She wasn't like Dad, telling us what not to do; she was more into management.  Keep it quiet so Dad can drive.

We'd resume undercover, so to speak, Dad again focused on the road, Mom at her knitting.  She'd zero sense of fashion, but her sweaters were warm.

It was the blanket, actually, that got us to improve the rules, to make it less about flailing and more about sneaking.  The game became quieter, Mom's point, and maybe less something for little kids.

It wasn't as if we discussed the rules; siblings just know.  Maybe it was just that we were getting older; I was 15, after all.

As Terry's legs were the longer, he could score more easily, but Toe Attack's still a good deal for the girl.  There's not that much for him to toe unless you're wearing a skirt, which you wouldn't on a vacation.  When you score on him, however, you absolutely know it through his jeans.  You'd never let a boy score on you under the Cafeteria table, but it's different if he's your sibling and it's vacation.

When you got scored against, you had to freeze for a 10-count of torture, "torture" being however the victor chose to apply his foot.  All it took was moving my foot back and forth and Terry would get a boner usually by the count of six.  I already knew about boners, of course, from what my girlfriends said about making out, but I was still surprised when I discovered it happened to my brother in Toe Attack.  It's not like I could tell much more than it was big, but that's enough.  It's always well to have some goods on your brother.

I was intrigued by the anatomy, of course, but that's not to say that at first I wasn't cautious about toeing it.  I'm sure he was embarrassed to death at my knowing, but being a good sport, he let me count to ten.

Most girls know about boners from going steady, but as my personal knowledge was just from my brother, I'd act dumb during girlfriend conversations.  Any anyway, it wasn't like Toe Attack allowed more than just a general confirmation.

Mom's "Cookies when we get there" interrupted my concentration, a weakness adroitly exploited by Terry, but I didn't mind as I was still ahead in points.  I wrinkled the blanket so Mom wouldn't see my torture if she turned around.  It wasn't really that tortureful - if that's a word -- but maybe it was a little giggly.  At 15, some games become a little more fun.

It wasn't as if Mom didn't always start the oven upon arrival at the cottage.  Fresh cookies were as much a part of the lake as the water.

"Chocolate chip," I requested as Terry's toes exacted ten counts of tribute.  I maybe gave him eleven.

"Oatmeal," voted Terry, apparently pleased that my shorts were loose enough for the cuff to push up.  Had I know we'd be playing by these rules, maybe I'd have chosen peddle pushers, but then again, being 15, I didn't mind the pursuit.  And like I said, it wasn't as if I were wearing a skirt.

On the other hand, given that we had the blanket for cover, maybe I'd have chosen a skirt.

I retaliated with no stealth whatsoever, just frontal force with my arch.  As my boldness took him off guard, it was fair and he'd no choice but to count to ten while I worked him like a windshield wiper.

I'd said that it usually took till about six before he'd get his boner, but this time it was already there, more or less under his left pocket, though I couldn't get my toe into it.

It puffed up my ego, knowing that I could make Terry hard.  His acquiescence -- you could pretty much tell that he didn't mind by how he scrunched toward me -- made victory even sweeter.  How many girls my age can even tie their older brother?

Even under the blanket, the action of my leg was pretty obvious, but Mom was busy pointing out to Dad something on the highway ahead.

I wasn't even to eight before Terry crept his foot back against me, totally against the rules, but not really an attack -- more like how Toe Attack enemies might interlock for a temporary truce.

It was likewise exciting -- read whatever meaning you like into that word -- feeling his toes snuggling so close.

When I pointedly yawned that I was going to take a nap -- it's better to be tortured when you're not looking at each other -- maybe Mom guessed there was still some sort of game going on.  I wasn't one to take naps and Moms are guessers.  But more importantly, Dad didn't hear when Terry kept working his toe exactly where he shouldn't and I had to slap it.

That's not to say I made him extract his foot, or that I retreated mine for that matter, but a girl shouldn't get too closely Toe Attacked for an extended duration, say not as long as 30.  Why that's so isn't exactly a public subject, however.

I didn't see our game as sexual -- what it might have been, had we not been related -- though of course it was the gender aspect that made it fun.  I thought of it more as crafty.  You know he's aroused, but it's not about you precisely.  It's erotic for you as well, but only in a sibling sense.

It's the best of both worlds, actually.  You're almost playing with fire, but just to get a little warmth.

Geesh, did the tickle of his toe seem close!

***

It was late that evening before we finished unloading the car, but Mom did indeed whip out the cookies -- gingersnaps, Dad's choice since he drove.

Terry and I shared the upstairs bathroom and I just wore my underwear -- my violet panties and new bra from Penney's -- to brush teeth beside him.  He'd seen my underwear forever, of course, but maybe not this pair.  He noticed, I was sure, even if his comments were about my spitting toothpaste.  I wasn't 14 any more.

As Terry was in his underpants, I figured, he'd exit as fast as he could, but as I said before, a boy's distinguishable and I'd take whatever information I could gather.  You use the mirror to your advantage.  Totally fair, because it works the same in reverse.

Ten strokes top right inside, top middle inside, twelve places in all, what the dentist recommends.  Contrary to my prediction that he'd rush out, he was as thorough in dental hygiene as was I.

So why'd I brush teeth in my underwear?  Hard to say.  We were on vacation.  We'd played Toe Attack.  Special panties.  I wasn't 14 any more.  Or should we leave it that who cares if you're just brushing your teeth?

In bed -- the first night at the cottage always seems the beginning of an adventure -- I recollected Toe Attack's changes of fortune.  It was fun scoring, but then again, it was fun getting scored on.  The funnest part was at the end when we'd simultaneously done each.

It was fun brushing our teeth, eyeing each other's underwear.  I was only his sister, of course, but it was fun imagining him getting a boner and leaning over the sink to hide it.

My thoughts returned to Terry's foot, where he'd gotten to.  I pretended to be his toe.

Being 15, it was kind of a fun way to begin a vacation.

***

Terry and I would have to occupy each other for a week until Uncle Robert's and Aunt Clella's family rolled in.  Then it would be crowded and there'd be more to do.  Aunt Clella would have a new million-piece picture puzzle and Uncle Robert would have his fly-tying paraphernalia.  My cousins would have their new records, which our folks always bemoaned was what being at the lake's exactly not about, but they didn't know anything about disco.

(I realize in retrospect that Uncle Robert's stay rarely overlapped with Dad's, but that's a later chapter.)

The next morning Terry and I worked on the rowboat.  Where the craft needed attention, Terry had me reach around his arm to wedge open the laps.  I could tell he liked my help by how deliberately he drew the caulk-gun back and forth.  He wasn't really feeling me up, I figured, because we were working.  I figured he knew I had on my new bra, but I leaned extra to make sure.  I was 15, after all, a Midwestern girl at the lake with not much else to do.

"Better caulk that one again," Terry deemed.

"Don't want a leak," I agreed, situating my chest within an elbow's reach.

We couldn't take the boat out till tomorrow, but there was the canoe for the afternoon.  Mom packed us a lunch and off we paddled to the sand spit on the lake's far side.

As changing into my swim suit couldn't be completed under a towel, I held the top against me and had Terry do the hooks.  I couldn't tell if he peeked.  I'd peeked the other way when he wrapped the towel to change, but it hadn't fallen off or anything.  Brothers and sisters always peek, just in case.

Lying on the sand like lizards, I'd stick a cookie between his toes.  It's fun to feed a foot.

It was fun getting buried.  Terry made me lie with my arms straight out, a position I didn't mind since I knew he wanted to look at me better.

I pretended not to notice how he smoothed the sand over my chest -- two hills in the Sahara, from my vantage point.  I puffed up to give him more to smooth.  It's instinctive.  Maybe a million years ago we started puffing our chests to look bigger to dinosaurs.

"Don't," I ordered.

"Don't what?"

"Feel me."

"I'm not," he grinned, grading enough off to transform the scene to two tents in the Gobi.

"Liar!"

"Besides, what's there to feel?" taking his time with the grains on my left cup.

Maybe I'm not that developed yet, I wanted to tell him, but there's enough of me that you know where to grade the sand.  And anyway, if there's nothing to brush the sand off of -- in his opinion, that is -- why should I even care?

Plus with my arms and legs buried, it would have been really difficult to escape, even if he admitted it.

What could he feel?  Maybe not much.  Maybe everything.  How do you know?

I'll shut my eyes to keep the sun out, I decided, not unlike how I'd dozed in the car.  Sometimes you want an excuse.

When he excavated the plain between my breastbone, I thought maybe he'd brush out where the sand got into my suit.  But he didn't, leaving me just feeling sandy.

Terry left my middle uncovered till the very end.  I kept my eyes shut as he dribbled sand onto my bellybutton, then brushed it onto my suit, and then, when he realized that my lids were still closed, on downward.

After a while, though, there was more brushing downwards.

"Hey, cut it out!"  I didn't mind that much when he'd done my top, but touching that low was different.  It kind of makes you twitchy.

"Cut what out?" too innocently to be innocent.

"Doing that."  He knew exactly.

"I'm just burying you," remounding my stomach as evidence.

"You sure?" having now stated my protest.  Like I said, I was trapped by the sand, a helpless prisoner!  Everybody knows that a captive gets tortured.

"Just relax, Indian."  That's what Terry called me, "Indian."

Relax?  It was super exciting, touches sweeping grains this way and that!  I guess there was sand involved, anyway, as my eyes were closed.

Unlike a foot under a car blanket, though, here on the spit, he could see what he was doing.  It wasn't that my suit was tiny or anything -- this was 1978, not 2003 -- but it was a lot less suit than Mom's.  A girl's shape down there isn't as distinguishable as a guy's, of course, but a suit shows how you're constructed.

"Relax, Indian," he repeated, now sweeping the nylon in concert with my twitches.  I'd have died if he knew what it did to me when a fingertip tested the give of the fabric.  If I moved a tiny bit, it wasn't my fault.  I just hoped he didn't see the connection.

You'd not let just any boy do this sort of thing, but one that's related is maybe different.

The heel of his hand pressed downward each time his finger pulled up, my ply of nylon bunching and unbunching between the two.  You tell yourself that it's all accidental, but you know that he knows.

"Right there, Terry," I almost blurted.  Right where your toe was yesterday.  Right where I did it last night.

"Do it, Indian," I almost heard him say, but I'm sure he really didn't.

When I recognized how close I was to orgasm -- for being just 15, I was well self-educated -- I bit my lip and shook myself free.  It's one thing to let him goose you.  It's entirely different to let somebody watch you climax.

When I buried Terry, his condition was like when I scored in the station wagon.  The consequence of goosing me, I decided, a little bit smirky about my effect, and piled enough sand on his chest so he couldn't see how much he showed.

Maybe Toe Attack vs. getting buried was the same for him as it was for me.  Toe Attack's about feeling your opponent; getting buried adds the seeing part.  His boner was held flat by his trunks, but not flattened enough to be mistaken for anything but what is was.

I'd thought that Susan and Pam, my friends who'd gone all the way, had been trying to outdo each other in their reports.  But maybe they weren't.  A boner is a big thing indeed.

I'd been pretty sly to block his view, I told myself.  If he knew what showed, he'd hop up the way I had.  I tried to be circumspect as I piled the sand, but how could he not notice the path of his little sister's wrist?

They're called hardons for a good reason.

Should I go ahead and squeeze it to get even for how he'd rubbed my suit?  I'd claim it was an accident, that I'd be more careful in the future.  It wasn't like I'd be reaching inside or anything.

But I just used my eyes, not my hand.

The foretaste of rain provided us an excuse to disengage.  I was a bit relieved, actually.  Maybe when we were wrestling around sometime, I'd sneak a rub he wouldn't notice.

I had Terry unhook my suit and promise to close his eyes while I faced away and swapped on my bra.  I switched my suit bottom for my panties under the towel since his promise was suspect.  I didn't bother with the towel, though, when I pulled on my shorts.  It wasn't like he hadn't seen my panties a million times.

***

Paddling homeward, we splashed each other wickedly, fun because we were about to get drenched in any event.  By the time we made it to the boathouse, we were soaked.

We sat on the pile of life cushions, waiting for the storm to abate.

"Stuck here till it stops, Indian," Terry decided, rearranging the life cushions and patting where to sit.

"Could be a while," I concurred, offering myself for a foot rub.

I counted the rafters.  Six.  My feet were on his lap, my left big toe high enough to roll against his belt buckle.  Well placed, that is.

Terry massaging the soles of my feet made me giggle.

"I thought you Indians had feet like leather," running up my calves.

"Not a Sioux princess," I revealed.

Was I so sneaky he didn't realize that my toe was scoring?  Maybe so!  Bolstered by success, I aligned my foot along the ridge, hard like a piece of wood.  Him doing my calves, then knees made my score even more direct.

Maybe it was sneaking the feel that got me thinking more about the two of us.

The sand spit had offered an excuse of sculpting, but here in the boathouse, his hand on my thigh was just that, a hand on my thigh.  Sure, he was just warming me up from the cold, but the way he slid to the inside made it feel a little different.

On the sand spit, he'd the excuse of burying me.  But here in the boathouse, can you massage onto someone's shorts?  I started to shiver, too new at this sort of brinksmanship to recognize the tremble when your body's nearing a line.

But rather than making me decide, Terry pulled me up and onto his lap.

"You're cold."

Sitting up revived my earlier scheme.  Maybe now's when I can get even, goose him when he'll not notice.  After you've shivered, I realize now, you can trick yourself that you're yet in control.

Terry traced the line of my bra strap.

Okay, if that's what it takes to distract him, fair enough, I decided, settling lower in his lap to confirm what I was after.

I'd not processed the possibility of doing what we were doing with less attire, so I was a bit surprised when he squeezed at the hooks.

"What are you doing" I challenged.

"Nothing," he lied, pinching the strap the wrong direction.

Though I would have claimed the opposite if asked, I was somewhat disappointed that the hooks stayed clasped.  Alice Jean said a guy can unhook you with a pat on your sweater, right there by your locker.  You flex your shoulders back.

Either Terry wasn't that good at hooks or I wasn't that good at flexing.  In any case, nothing got undone.  Not that I'd have let him, you understand.

He followed my straps up and over my shoulder blades, making me think of these horror movies where the girl gets strangled.  Unlike Terry, though, a real murderer wouldn't then work down your collarbone.

"Don't," I suggested.  Had I said, "Please don't," he'd have ceased, but a brother can read the difference.

"Nobody's here," he guaranteed, as if I thought someone were.

I inhaled when Terry's hand slipped into my neckline.  I wasn't sure if he could feel my nipple through my bra, but he did seem to center right over it.

There's no way I should be letting him do this, I decided, but like he said, nobody's watching.

Maybe a bra made it too complicated, as after a moment he pulled up my shirt and reached behind to see how the hooks actually work.

Now was the time to pull another escape, I realized, but like I said, it's got him distracted, and like he said, nobody's watching.

The rain pattered on the boathouse shingles and Terry's hands came around, one from each side.  Had my bra not been wet, maybe it would have just fallen forward, but as it was, it clung until his fingers mined under.

No other boy had ever seen my breasts except for Stanley Christiansen when he was my lab partner.  We were dissecting corn to see if each kernel had its own tassel.  It had to do with corn sex, I remember.  Stanley was so obvious, the way he'd peek, but then maybe so was I, the way I'd lean.  I could see right down, so figured that he could, too.  People sex is much more interesting.

I'm not counting the boys at camp who spied on us, because they were way up in the bushes.  But we showered in our panties, just in case they had a telescope or something.

And of course I wasn't counting Terry when we were little.  Back then, he saw them all the time.  Of course I was different now, being a lot more grown up, but since he'd seen them before, maybe it was still a little okay.

It was way past time to make my own move, I judged.  If Terry gets to take off my bra, I get to feel what's poking my butt.  Fair's fair.  Like he'd seen my breasts way back when they weren't anything, I'd seen his penis when he wasn't much himself.  Being older made it different, I'd agree, but it wasn't as if it was really new.

Well, maybe it was a little more exciting, being our ages and everything.

But maybe I didn't have to be so secretive.  He wasn't, anyway, his hands running all over my chest.  I wiggled extra to check.

He let me wiggle, as indeed we were playing a two-way game.  It would be weird, making out with your brother, but on the other hand, a brother's pretty good for practicing the different parts.

It's a bit unsettling, feeling your brother's penis, especially when it's hard.  It's fun, though, knowing you're sort of the reason why.

"Geesh!" I allowed, subject unspoken.

After a moment of fishing for how to reply, he selected his excuse.  "It just happens."

"Because you're my boyfriend," I agreed with a bounce, rather pleased at having already put him on the defensive.

"And you're sitting on it," as Terry re-encircled me to re-establish his offense.

Actually I rather liked him in that role.  I was the girl, after all, and could pretend to be his prisoner.

"It's natural," he assured.

What's natural? I pondered with a 15-year-old's uncertainty.  My breasts?  Him rubbing them?  His boner?  Me sitting on it?  All of the above?

My breasts ached, they were so hard.

I rose to better place my butt.  I could tell he liked me doing it by the way he pushed up when I got aligned.

"You wanted to goose me," Terry encouraged.

"Did not!"

"Liar!  Your nose is getting longer."

"So's your you-know-what," playing a trump.

Talking about it made it easier to reach down with my hand.  Nothing secret about it.  It felt bigger than in Toe Attack, bigger even than the shape I saw on the sand spit.

"Don't!" his protest fairly feeble, in my opinion.  Maybe he thinks he's the prisoner, too.

"Told you so!" bettering my grasp.

I'd never touched a penis before, just the little eraser heads of my friends' baby brothers, not long thick thing like my brother's.

Kathy got caught playing with Jeff's and got grounded, but they shouldn't have parked in her driveway.  But Terry and I weren't in front of our house, right?  This was the boathouse.  Maybe Kathy's mom sneaks around with a flashlight, but ours is up baking cookies.

As fiddling with the buckle would have given him opportunity for protest, I reached under his belt.  As he'd gotten my top off, it wasn't like I was changing the rules.

And it's not like I was making him do something.  He was the boy and older at that.  If he really minded, he'd have blocked my hand.  Maybe we were about even-steven, dodging the rain in the boathouse, finding out a few things about each other.

It was like a fat carrot with sliding skin.  A warm cucumber with a cap, maybe.  Big enough that when I reached the bottom, its end rubbed my wrist which wasn't even in his jockeys.  I didn't look, though.

It made me realize why boys need underpants.

Can one of these really fit in you when you date a lot?  Terry wasn't my boyfriend, of course, so I shouldn't have thought of his in me, but the idea still passed through my mind.  Not actually in me, of course, just sort of there.  They say you expand.

In any case, Terry's was the subject at hand, if you get my joke.

"It doesn't hurt?" securing my possession in what I hoped to be a cozy but inescapable manner.  It didn't feel that delicate, but I wasn't sure.

"No," spreading his legs to help.

So what do you do after you've captured your prisoner?

I knew he masturbated.  We'd the upstairs bedrooms at the cottage and I could hear.  Sometimes I'd do it at the same time, even.

My friends said it's gross, but doing a guy with your hand is a way to not get pregnant.  Alice Jean kept her plaid skirt in the back of her closet to show us what she did to Ronald.  Just a spot was all it was, actually.  Had her skirt been pink, maybe it would have been more impressive.

Probably Sandy Lewis had masturbated Terry because she wears a black bra.  That she didn't blab proved it because she knew I'd whack her for talking about my brother.  It wasn't like he took her out or anything, but maybe she did it in the band room since they both played trumpet.  She probably was trying to set a school record.

But unless they're going steady, most Midwestern girls rarely take the initiative when it comes to penises.  It's one thing to Toe Attack your brother on a trip.  It's another to advance where there's nobody else around.  Besides, even if I got proof on my shorts –- I had the feeling that maybe I could -- it would rinse away before I could make up a story and show it off.

And, heck, let's face the facts.  I had no idea of what to do since even Alice Jean didn't describe the details.

On the other hand, it was maybe worth a try.  I didn't actually ask permission, as that might sound a bit out of place, but it was easy enough to pants him for direct access.

I'd already felt his penis, his balls, his hair, but not all at the same time.  His pants off gave me a picture of the entirety.  Not that pretty of a picture, but worth knowing about.  Not pretty, but fun to inspect.

"If the folks find out, it's your fault, though," my demand, since by now his agreement seemed obvious.

"They won't," he promised.

We kissed to seal the deal.  I really didn't know much about kissing except what my girlfriends said, so I more or less made up the tongue part.  I guess I was okay because Terry did it back.  As I was holding his penis, he kind of had to do what I wanted.

"You're ready, too?" he asked after we both ran out of breath at the same time.

Too?

Sure, but not here.  Girls don't discuss it, even to each other.  Letting your brother watch you on the boathouse floor was definitely out.

"You're almost sixteen."

Sixteen?  I'd been experimenting with myself, one way or another, for five years already.

Only then I realized where he was going.  Midwestern siblings don't have to explain everything, but it can take a moment to realize why he's letting you play with his penis.

He was talking about us going all the way!

Absolutely not!  I hadn't even taken off my pants.  We weren't going steady.  Mom would catch us.  It's against the law.

"Really?" was how I phrased my objection.

"We'll go really slow."

More kissing bought time to process my situation.  A boathouse isn't where you have to make snap decisions.

It wasn't like I hadn't thought a million times about doing it.  I could have done it with Stanley Christiansen.  Maybe after school, as his mom's a librarian.  He'd probably pull the blinds so I wouldn't see him naked.  Afterwards, I'd tell Mom I had play practice.  I was a pretty good Thespian.

But a girl's first time's a one-time deal, so no thanks, Stanley, even if you ask me to the prom or something.

You don't want to be a virgin, but you don't want to be like the rally squad.  You want it to be with a guy you like, but you don't want one who'll blab.  Everybody says it's fun, but you still know it's going to hurt.  Your body says yes, but your head's confused.  You shouldn't before marriage, but that's so far away.  Mom will know right off, but then again, you've fooled her a million times.  You're toast if you get pregnant, but that never happens the first time.

Terry had his plusses and minuses.  The minus, of course, was being my brother, but maybe (as I'll get to later) that's not such a big deal.  The plus was the same thing -- being my brother.  As much as it's a pain to have one around, your brother's part of you.  Maybe it sounds corny, but you do love the guy.

Every girl's going to do it sooner or later, except for old maids and nuns and I wasn't planning to be either.

Ultimately, it's a matter of choosing who.

I could have stayed with my hand, as I was again in charge.

So why didn't I masturbate him, right then and there?  I'd have figured out how.  Maybe Midwestern girls don't take the initiative that often, but we can learn on the fly, so to speak, or in a case like this, in the fly.

Why didn't I?  Maybe because we were in the boathouse.

Terry returned me to the immediate.  "If you tell me to stop, I will."

A sibling doesn't lie about that sort of thing.  Just about license plates.

"We could dry off our clothes," I allowed with another shiver which he didn't catch.

He'd probably not seen me naked since we had our little plastic pool, but one thing was certain -- if we were going to do it, we had to be naked.  None of this skirt-up, pants-down messing around like you're behind the bleachers.

I draped our wet shorts on the canoe, but our underpants I just left on the floor, a dripping pile of white on violet.

Terry's hair was brown like mine and his penis stuck straight out.  You can toe attack as much as you like, but you still won't know how it looks, especially the veins.  Very strange.

It was stranger knowing he was seeing me.  For a while I held my legs together, but sort of gave up and we both laughed.

"You'll stop if I say so, right?"

"Promise."

I lay on the cushions, sensing that Terry knew what's next.  It was probably Sandy Lewis who he'd learned from.  Maybe on the sofa in the church basement.

It was best to keep kissing.  His finger slipping into me felt really odd.  With my solo history, I knew what to go for, but I wasn't too sure that he did.

It turned out that he knew exactly.  Surprise made it even better.

Out on the sand spit I'd worried that he'd known I was wet.  Here in the boathouse, his knowing was a positive.

Geesh, did what he was doing make me need to come!

After what seemed an event in itself, he asked, "Okay?"

I replied in the affirmative, even with some certainty.  Once you decide, you want to.

His boner was so big, but it wasn't like I was too small.  It wasn't that comfortable, for sure, but I'd known that Susan and Pam had lied about their first time.  On the other hand, it didn't really hurt, what other girls said.  It's funny not being in charge of your own body, kind of like when your nipples come out, except more.

This is the real deal, I realized.  What everybody talks about all the time.

What I didn't know was how fast, like bang, bang, bang, or more slowly, like slide..., slide..., slide...  Maybe it depends on the situation.  With Terry and me, anyway, the situation was the boathouse, a place where nothing happens in a hurry.

Maybe it's not that comfortable, but it only takes a moment to get used to.  He puts it in, but you can help him move.

Like I said, Midwestern girls are quick learners.  And maybe Midwestern boys know some things better than the ones from California.

The boathouse echoed the swish swish of boy plus girl.  I remember the swishing like I was listening from the outside.

They say a girl never orgasms her first time, but I know I did.  Not as much as a good masturbation, maybe, but absolutely real.  In our times afterward, Terry's made me come a million times wilder, but that doesn't make the first one less real.

When Terry climaxed -- I could tell by his breathing -- I knew we'd done it right.  Afterwards you just want him to stay there.

"Geesh!" when I got my breath.  I'd just had honest to goodness sex, I told myself.  Right here in the boathouse.  With Terry.

"I really came," I assured.  You'd not want him to wonder.

"Our secret," Terry reflected, equally pleased with the outcome.  The "our" made me pleased even more.

I rested my head on his stomach.  That was my excuse, anyway, as I wanted a better look at his balls.  I'd tell my friends, except actually I wouldn't tell them because they might think it was Stanley.

Pam and Susan were lying about getting a penis big again right away, I realized, but it was fun feeling its sponginess.  It made me rather fond of the guy.  A boyfriend probably wouldn't let you take your time.

Girls brag that sex is so much fun, but in an initial sense, anyway, it's a little awkward.  What isn't?

He'd been primed too long to protract his performance.  I'd been primed not enough to discern the potential of mine.  But I was already envisioning sneaking down the upstairs hall like an Indian.  His room had a bed with an orange quilt which we could put on the floor to eliminate the bed squeak.

"Terry?"

"Huh?"

"Were you a virgin?"  I was already the self-appointed historian, an assignment I've kept.

He weighed his response.  "Not exactly."

"Sandy Lewis?"

"No."

"Who then?"  Not Susan or Pam, I hoped.  I'd be so pissed!

"Somebody older."

"Oh."

It must have happened at camp.  The session before I went, Linda the archery instructor screwed every boy in Antlers.  She spread a target on the ground and the bull's eye was at the bull's eye, so to speak.  That's what they said, anyway.  Nothing liked that happened in my session.

"Terry?" inspecting the kink of his hair.

"Yeah?"

"I don't care."  Actually I did a little bit, but a girl can't go complaining that her brother had sex first.

"You've got cool balls," I added, as if I'd some background in the subject.

As nobody wants to wear wet underwear, I stuffed ours in my pack.

***

Mom was mixing dough at her command post when Terry and I returned from the boathouse.

When I opened my pack, I'd not anticipated the wad of underwear rolling out.

"You two are soaked," Mom observed, spreading our underthings on the kitchen chair to dry without blinking an eye, without asking why we'd shed them.  "Cookies will be out by the time you get into something warm."

"Great!" I said, relieved at her lack of curiosity.

My brother wondered what kind.

"Special recipe for a rainy day," Mom said, spreading my panties, a violet banner of virginity surrendered, to the spot next to Terry's triumphant jockeys.

"Good thing you made it to the boathouse before the worst of it."

"Yeah," I allowed.  How'd she know that?

After Terry disappeared up the stairs, Mom looked my way.  "You doing okay, Indian?"

You don't have to be an Indian to know that Indian girls have Indian mothers.

I nodded.

Stealing into Terry's room that night, maybe I wasn't as Indian as I should have been, but did it even matter?

Next day, Mom sent Terry to town to pick up groceries and he stopped at the Rexall and bought rubbers.  They're not that difficult to use.  The hardest part was when my girlfriends talked about brands, I couldn't chime in because I wasn't dating.

Mom would tell us that she'd be in town for however long.  How many moms tell their kids that they'll be gone for "at least a couple of hours?"  Like I said at the start, she was a manager.

One afternoon Terry went out of my room in his underpants and there was Mom in the hall.  Maybe she'd only said "an hour" and we'd misunderstood.  Terry mumbled something about going to the bathroom, but he wasn't even heading that direction.  Not a question did she ask.

At night I'd float like an Indian to Terry's room, but then he'd blow it by bouncing too much.  The quilt on the floor solved the bed-squeak problem, but maybe not the thumps against her ceiling.

I was in Terry's bed when Uncle Robert's family arrived and Mom sequestered the cousins in the kitchen long enough for me to exit.  When I came down, she was warning them about a bear sighting.  We'd already heard that actually it was just a dog, but that would have made the warning shorter.

I figured myself pretty apt at intercourse by the time our cousins arrived.  Of course I wasn't, but it's all relative.

With them around, we had to be extra sneaky.  Once, for example, all the kids stayed out to watch for shooting stars and it was so cold so that my brother and I bundled into a sleeping bag.  Your cousins can be so clueless.  The hardest part was getting our pants down.  The easiest part was me on my back with a leg lifted and Terry on his side.  The best part was how long he stayed.  When he finally pulled out -- we didn't have a rubber -- he squirted slimy goo all over my leg, but that was okay since it was his sleeping bag.  Even now when someone says "shooting stars," the two of us remember.

Maybe in California, getting together presents no challenge whatsoever.  "Hey, bro, Tony's in LA for a power lunch.  New HBO season, you know.  Stop by and try out our new pool after we have wild sex.  You'll love the floating bar."

But wherever you are, it's easy enough for siblings to have sex.

I say, "having sex," as that's what it amounts to when you start.  It's not long, though, before it's about making love.

I wondered back earlier if making out with your brother would be weird.  It would be weird.  Why would the two of you bother to make out when it's so easy to go to bed?

So why'd Mom let us keep doing it -- our transparent excuses for afternoon absences, our errant giggles and wiggles after lights out?

For it to make sense, maybe we need to go to Act 2, family vacation the year prior.

ACT 2.  THE BOATHOUSE 1977

(You got it.  Over and down, the connection between Mom and Terry.)

I was reading a novel about a Sioux princess when the thunderstorm hit.  The coincidence of storms and suppertime is very Midwestern.  We studied meteorology with Mrs. Gilmore, but more in the light of it being another plot for dead white males to decide everything.

Having the cottage to myself that afternoon, I got a lot read.  Mom didn't even try to drag me on her and Terry's hike.

Okay, partly true about the Sioux princess book.  I'd found Terry's magazine.  At 14, girls know the vocabulary, but here were the illustrations.

And now, 20-odd years later, Terry and I were talking about it.

Mom died of lung cancer in 1990 when she wasn't even 52.  She never even smoked.  I was 27.  Jeremy and Rochelle were a handful.  Steve was traveling more.  The times Terry and I were together weren't that frequent, but by now an integral part of who we were.

I'd guessed that Terry was also sleeping with Mom a couple of years after we'd gone to the boathouse.  It was hard not to trip over the evidence.  Sometimes I'd even return an item of her clothing forgotten in his room.

Did I like that they did it?  Of course not!  Accept it?  Well, I suppose.  But who was I to intervene?  It wasn't as if Terry were two-timing, since the relationships were equally familial.  Dad would have had issues, but he never saw the clues.

It was always strange to note Mom's quietness in the hours after she'd made love to Terry.  She surely had sex with Dad more often, but it didn't register in her demeanor.  But then maybe it was as odd for her to look at me after Terry and I had done the same.

It was better for me not to know too much, but it was impossible for an Indian to know nothing.  But knowing doesn't mean talking, at least not where I'm from.  Live and let live, the Indian way.

***

After Mom was gone, though, Terry and I had more to say, more to discover.

Steve was in Des Moines, an all-day trip, the kids were at school and I'd called Terry about my computer.  I needed a new ink thing, perhaps.  My computer being in the bedroom would explain things if someone came home and we got dressed fast enough, but it never happened.

We'd make love before lunch, I figured, then have some soup.  I'd made chicken noodle.  You shouldn't think that just because we went to bed, we did it whenever we could.  On the other hand, maybe we didn't often waste leisurely opportunities.  The boathouse was both an exciting place to start and a fond place to revisit, but it's hard to beat your own bed for comfort and convenience.  Remember, though, to set your alarm before your husband gets off work.

But I guess we just got talking while taking off our shoes.

"Tell me about Mom," was what I said.

"What about her?"

"Was it in the boathouse?"  I didn't know how else to start.  She'd been my mom, after all, and he was still my brother.

I think Terry was glad to unbind the story.  Lovers should share them.

He and Mom were almost back to the cottage, Terry recollected.

  (The fact that Terry could share this tells you that we're close.  But you knew that.  Not many brothers would tell their sister they had sex with their mother.  Not many sisters would want to know.)

Sharing Mom's poncho made the pair march lockstep through the puddles.  They didn't care.  Finally they'd whooped and sprinted toward the boathouse, soaked anyway.

  (Terry never wondered why they didn't sprint up the hill to the cottage.  Mom just led the way.)

The boathouse was piled with the same paraphernalia from when Mom was a girl.

  (Ditto for today, I'll add. Boathouses are as traditional as English castles.)

"Safe from the storm," Mom had laughed, reaching into her pocket to produce a flattened bag of cookie crumbs.  "But at least they're fresh," she added somewhat apologetically, stuffing a fingerfull into Terry's mouth.

"Uhmm!"

She'd laughed again and given her boy a kiss.  Through her wet jersey, he could see the stitching of her brassiere.

Moms kiss sons all the time, but this time Terry noticed how firmly her chest pressed his.  He could feel her breathing.

  ("You kissed her back, right?" I added and he grinned.  In Terry's mind, Mom was really stacked, but such endowment doesn't really run in the family.)

"Better dry off," Mom decided without ado, peeling off first her shirt and then her shorts.  Around the house Terry had seen Mom in her slip, but he’d never watched her disrobe.  She'd hung the garments on the canoe and acted like being in just brassiere and panties was perfectly normal.

  ("Like it's not?" I chided, but I understood what he meant."

At a distance, her panties looked white.  But as she moved closer, Terry could discern the darkness within.  Surprised by her casualness, he'd tried to not stare, but how could he not?  She was just his mom, Terry told himself, but even still...

  (If I weren't his sister and she weren't our mother, could he have told me any of this?  If he could see the hue of her hair, he'd have been able to see the cling of the damp cotton.)

"You're soaked, too," Mom noted, indicating his shirt and trousers.  "Nobody's looking," as if she wasn't somebody.

The shape of her nipples showed through her brassiere -- a telling hint of Mom's state of mind, it seemed to me, as bras of those days would have taken more arousal to show through.

Terry hunched to shed his pants, his undershorts damp and clingy like everything else.  Probably Mom didn't notice, he hoped, but that didn't make him not shy about it.  He wished he'd worn bigger undershorts.

He had to face the reality of her seeing, though, when she had him help move the canoe to one side.  Well, he decided, she's my mom and maybe it's not a big deal.

"Let's make a nest to get warm," Mom decided as she spread life preservers on the floor.  "This rain's gong to last," almost as an afterthought.

  ("To get warm?" I wondered, but Terry hadn't.  Their nest was wedged amongst hulls, paint cans, tarps and coils of rope.  Terry knew that I knew.  "Copycat," I accused when I heard the nest part.  "That's how you spread the cushions for me!"  He flopped out his palms sideways, like what's a guy to do?  I gave my best pout.)

"Like this," Mom commanded as she wrapped Terry's arm around her shoulder, then dismissed it as if had been Terry's idea.

"Maybe warmer this way," sliding onto his lap, her knees bracketing his like an oarlock.  Terry was ill at ease with her being there, but what could he do?

He tried not to look over her shoulder.  He'd sometimes seen Mom in her brassiere when passing her room, but never so closely.  The valley between her breasts looked so smooth.

  (Mom's have eyes in the backs of their heads, I told him.  She knew you were peeking.)

"It's freezing," Mom reminded him.

He rubbed the outside of her arms, up and over.  When he did her shoulders, she tugged her straps outward and when he returned to her arms, the straps slipped further aside.

  ("Like Mom didn't notice her bra was coming loose?" I challenged and Terry shrugged a maybe.  He remembered her underwear better than some details of what happened afterwards.)

When she pulled his hands to her stomach, almost to the hem of her panties, Terry knew that this was something that Dad shouldn't know about.  Sitting out the storm in the boathouse was one thing.  Stripping to your underwear and getting this close was another.  He wasn't quite sure that he should be looking at Mom, but trying to make his erection not happen just made it happen quicker.  He hoped Mom couldn't feel it.

  (Just remembering made Terry hard.  I reached over and he grinned about being in denial.)

"Keep me warm."  Mom shivered, but not the shiver associated with ice fishing.

  (I snuggled closer in his telling, feeling that way too.  By now, I knew exactly about such shivers.)

As Terry massaged her stomach, Mom whispered, "It's raining harder, honey."

  (I put his hands the same place.)

As he dared not venture lower, he traced along the hem of her brassiere.  Didn't she notice, Terry wondered?

  (He of course knew she had, but kids wonder about everything.)

At first he'd only gone onto the fabric when his hands were under her arms.  From how she'd raised her elbows, though, he knew more was allowed and stayed on the underside of her bra when he returned to her front.

It was difficult, however, to keep his thumbs from wandering above the horizontal seam on the sides of her cups, and once that high, to keep his fingers from inching forward.

He thought he'd surely ventured too high when he edged a nipple.  Rather than a rebuff, thought the contact caused her to lay her head further back on his shoulder.

After a hesitant moment, he'd run his hand fully over her front.  When she'd still not objected, he'd gone back and forth and then far enough around to find his way into the plunge of her brassiere.

  (I imagined the contact, how he'd have curled his fingertips under the cloth towards her nipple.)

It was when Mom drew forward her shoulders to loosen the bind of her bra that he knew she'd let him expose her.  The lower half of her cup was tight, but the dropped straps made it easy to tug the top downward.

  (I drew his hands to my front as Terry recalled feeling her areola.  Terry called it, "her colored part," but I'll use the right word.  Always use the right word if you know it.)

He'd seen Mom's breasts before -- what boy hasn't? -- but he'd never thought he'd see them so near, so accessible.  The girls in the magazines had bigger and darker ones, but Mom's were prettier.

  (Smaller ones are prettier because they hold their form, I wanted to advise my brother, but I know that guys have a thing about size.  One thing I can say about Terry, though, is that he never again teased me about mine after the sand spit.)

For the longest time he just held his palm against her heartbeat, almost feeling a responsibility to shield her.  After a bit, though, he rolled her breasts in circles, intrigued by their give and take.  He liked how it made her nipples yet more erect.

  (No, because it was cold, I explained, and for a moment Terry believed me.)

He wasn't sure why she'd allowed him, other than that this was a thing very special between them.  It was exciting, discovering Mom was excited, too.

  (It's so much like a boy, seeing his mom erotically, yet amazed by the possibility of her seeing him in the same light.  Male self-esteem clicks in latter than they'd have us think.  I didn't tell Terry this, but it's true.)

Mom guiding his reach onto her panties fostered a more specific excitement.  Touching her breasts was perhaps a little related to being a boy.  Touching lower was more about being older.  He didn't want to know why Mom had drawn his hand to where he could sense the hair below; it was safer just to comply.

..("Like follow the leader," I chided, sure that he must have known, and he pointed out that he'd said "didn't want to know, as opposed to "didn't know."  Of course he'd been thinking sexually, he admitted.  What boy doesn't?  Maybe not exactly about having intercourse, but about all the things that happen before.)

At first he only vaguely touched the cotton, but once he allowed himself, he increased his press.  Between her breasts, he could watch his fingertips accentuate the form within her panties.  Her rocking motion showed that she liked him doing it.

  (I so much wanted to ask how much form he was talking about, but I didn't care to talk about Mom that way.  When he'd done the same with me, I'd not been able to see how much form showed, but at least I'd been in my suit, not panties.)

When she reached back, he was glad she stopped on his ribs; a few more inches and she'd have discovered his condition.  How would he have ever explained that?

  ("Big surprise!" I joked, but Terry was serious.  Back then, he didn't know what she'd think.  Maybe it was okay for him to touch her, but maybe it shouldn't go the other way.  What if she got upset with how he was?  Boys can get so self conscious.)

It was only when she slid further back to wedge his underpants into hers that he let himself push back.

  (I allowed him similar opportunity.)

How could Terry not have been aroused?  Doesn't every boy dream of his mother almost naked?  And there were Mom's more-assertive signals, too, her showing where she wanted to be pressed.  How could Terry not have reacted?

He was helpless when she lifted off him to make room for her hand.

  (Terry didn't say so in words, but I think by now, he liked being helpless.  Mother knows best.)

When she pushed off her underpants, then his, how could he have resisted?  He may have been just a boy, but he was her boy.

  ("Just like you may just be a brother, but you're my brother," I added in truth, disposing of our undies in similar manner.)

Still looking over her shoulder, he could see the black hair.  He knew her butt was feeling the flesh of his erection and to his surprise, he liked her knowing.  He knew about sex, of course, but only to a point.  Was he supposed to fuck her?  Fuck his own mother?  Things were happening so fast!

  (He'd have thought otherwise?  He grinned when I asked.  I didn't tell him not to say "fuck", since it was his story and he'd have used such terms back then.  The fact is, though, that family members don't fuck.  It's so much more.)

When Mom turned to face him, her knees now around his hipbones, Terry dared not look at his penis angled across her abdomen.  Maybe he was supposed to do something, but probably not to see.

  ("Like this?" I asked, situating myself accordingly and rolling him against my stomach.  "But don't look!")

Mothers kiss sons and sons kiss mothers the world around.  Their kiss, however, never broke as she leaned him back.  Only when his head rested on the cushions did she reach down to take him.

  (He let me do it Mom's way, slipping around him, then taking my time downward.)

He didn't have to do anything, actually, except lift to help.  Her gasp surprised him for a moment, until he saw it was what she wanted.

  (I don't remember what sounds I may have made our first time, but my guess is that I stayed Indian quiet.  Mom, on the other hand, knew more about communication.)

The indestructible, indecipherable, inconsiderate tags sewn into the seams of Coast Guard approved flotation devices must have poked Terry's butt.  At the finish, though, cushions are of little concern.

Terry was astonished by the unabashed intensity of Mom's orgasm.  He'd never quite believed what he'd read, and the fact is, what can be reduced to words isn't half of it.  He was just glad he'd lasted long enough.

..(For a long time I wished that I'd come more our first time, that I'd acted older.  I know now, though, that it's not the first time that keeps you going; it's the last time.)

Terry didn't say it was wonderful or liberating or use any kind of superlative.  He'd known that he wanted to come and felt the euphoria when it happened, but it wasn't as if doing it made him a new person.  He'd had sex and it was with someone really close.

When Mom quieted and lay forward, he could feel her heartbeat again and knew that they'd do it many times more.

"Rainy days are for lovers here," Mom reflected as they dressed.

How was Terry to dispute the weather?  If it hadn't been raining, they wouldn't have come inside and he'd still be a virgin.  Her use of "lovers" made him feel adult.

  (He totally missed the meaning of "here," I realized.  She was referring to where they were, the boathouse.  When lovers dress, they have nothing to conceal.)

"War makes your first time more real," she'd reflected as they climbed the porch steps.

After Terry thought about it, maybe she'd done it with him because he'd get shot somewhere and she didn't want him to die a virgin.  He wasn't planning to enlist, but if she wanted to make sure, he was happy to help out.

   (In my brother's telling, I also missed the significance of "war", but we'll return to that in Act 1.)

And here's the epilogue that Terry never knew until I told him.

When Terry and Mom got back to the cottage, I was buried in the stuffed chair, absorbed in Terry's magazine, teetering on the edge of my own bliss.  Fortunately they didn't notice me when they passed through.  It was a little strange how they almost tiptoed; Indians remember such things.

Terry snagged some of the Cheerio cookies I'd made as an experiment, but I didn't care.  They weren't that good.

Mom's whispered good-night reference to life preservers confused me, as I'd thought they'd been on a hike, but maybe I'd misunderstood.

Mom glided to her room, Terry up to his, and when the coast was clear, silent like an Indian, I to mine.

One might think that the promptness of my personal success that night stemmed from the illustrations, but that wasn't the case at all.  My finger pretended to be Terry's toe, not as much attacking as sneaking its way up my leg.

I didn't pay much attention when the two went on a hike again the next morning.  Or was it rowing?  They were a little vague.  I was pleased, as my personal agenda required being on the stuffed chair.  Once you start imagining scenarios, there are so many variations.  Probably how lots of sisters think about older brothers at personal moments.

There was food for fantasy in Terry's magazine -- that's for sure -- but my brother seemed more real.  Indian intuition about Terry?  Maybe from the way he liked to play Twister.  About Terry and Mom?  Not yet, having missed a clue or two the night before.

But now, these years later, I had to ask two things.

"Terry?"

"Yeah?"

"You think Mom planned it?"

"I don't know.  Maybe."

I believed that, that he didn't know.

"Did you plan to with me?"

This one merited more thought.  "Not exactly."

"Ha!  Your nose is growing longer," I warned.  A brother can't lie to his sister.  When he’d started my foot rub, way back when, he was already erect.

He grinned his grin.  "Not until I almost made you come."

"No way!  Where?"

"On the sand spit."

I thought about it.  Had I twitched that much?  "Well, it’s not like you could have made me."

"Yours is growing, too," he observed.

A sister can't fool her brother, though what I'd told was something of the truth.  There's no way he could have tricked me to climax out there on the sand if I didn’t want him to, but on the other hand, maybe I'd have let him try longer if I'd been a little braver.

I smiled at the picture of poor me, arms straight out shackled by heaps of sand, eyes shut, hips lifting, and Terry, my executioner.  French for orgasm is "tiny death," so maybe they'd call him that.

As Terry was smiling as well, I suspect that his recall was along similar lines.  When I caught his eye, we both laughed.  How many brothers can laugh with their sisters over such memories?  It makes the years that follow even sweeter.

"Anything besides your nose growing, Buddy Boy?"

"No way!  Where?"

We never got out of bed to eat our soup.

***

"Oh, one more question," I asked afterwards.

"Fire away, Indian."

"That magazine?  Where'd you get it?"

"I don't know.  How come?"

"Maybe I sort of owe you half what it cost."

"So what's new?"

As I said, this was what got said when Terry was at my place years later.  Shared memories can keep making sex new all over again.

One thing I didn't find out was about Mom and birth control.  Terry never had to do anything and, as the stair-step diagram indicates, she'd no more babies.  She must have been doing whatever they did back then.

What I realized was that Terry had gone to the Rexall for my sake.  Mom didn't need them.  Terry kept me safe till I got on the pill for Steve.  Only a brother would do wear a rubber a million times so you didn't have to worry.

I do remember when Terry could quit wearing the darn things.  Since that day in the boathouse -- and, okay, that night in his room -- we'd never been truly skin to skin.  His penis felt like it did when I was a virgin.

ACT 1.  THE BOATHOUSE 1953

(You don't need the diagram for this one, do you?  Top line, Mom and her brother Robert.)

Neither Terry nor I knows the particulars about Mom and Robert.  All we can do is reconstruction from clues as faded as life cushions.

I think Mom also learned in the boathouse.  Her "Rainy days are for lovers here," seemed based on more than the moment.  Why the "here" if she and Terry weren't at the same place?

When they'd walked up to the cottage, Mom was probably afraid they'd send boys back to Viet Nam.  Moms think about futures.  At 17, Terry didn't think as far as 18.

But maybe her cryptic "War makes your first time realer" wasn't about that war at all; maybe it was about herself.  She knew Terry wasn't going to join the Army.  He wasn't that dumb.

Mom had her first sex, she seemed to imply, when there was a war.  And the way she'd steered Terry from the storm suggested a fondness for the boathouse.

So you put the clues together.

The only war that might coincide with her first time would be the Korean one which ended in 1953.  She'd have been about 15.  She could have had first sex with a boyfriend, but that wouldn't have involved the boathouse.  Her male cousins would have been too young.  Grandpa could have been the one, but Grandpa wouldn't have.  Granddaughters know.

Uncle Robert was a couple of years older than Mom.  He never joined the Army or anything, but I can imagine a little sister worrying that he might.

So put it together and what have you got?  Robert in the boathouse -- sort of like playing Clue, except about sex, not murder.

But that's so speculative, isn't it?

So let's turn to observation, the better way to uncover history.  Three memories come to mind.

My first is from when the grownups probably didn't know that even the littlest Indian is always on the lookout.  I was arranging my leaf collection on the cottage floor after dinner.  Mom, Dad, Aunt Clella and Uncle Robert were playing cards, Mom across the table from her brother.  I could see their legs.

As he dealt, Uncle Robert pushed off a shoe and reached his foot to Mom's ankle, then calf.  He had on blue socks.  When Mom, all the time gabbing away, slid forward, the foot went higher, but as this was in the days when vacationing moms wore dresses, I couldn't see how far.  I knew it had to be some sort of secret, the way Mom inspected her cards like nothing was going on.  Nobody but me noticed when she blushed.

That's where I learned Toe Attack, though perhaps their version was more an alliance than a war.  Now that I know more, I can imagine Uncle Robert attacking too long and Dad having to pound Mom's back, thinking she's choking.  It never happened, of course, but it would have been funny.

My second memory is one evening when I was about ten, coming upon Mom and Uncle Robert exiting the boathouse.  They made a big point how they'd been straightening things up.  The reason I remember was the paint can that I'd left open; they hadn't even bothered to put the lid on.  The only thing straightened up was the cushions.

My third recollection was probably the following year.  Dad had gone back to the city.  "Insurance waits for no one," was his motto, why he had so many engraved plaques behind his desk, I imagine.  Aunt Clella must have gone to town for groceries.

We kids were Cowboys and Indians and I was the best Indian.  Easily eluding the noisy Cowboys, I was behind the cottage, behind my folks' room.  Aunt Clella and Uncle Robert had one room upstairs and the boys, the other.  We girls got the attic where we could hardly stand up.

I could see above the curtain rod that the bedroom door was closed as if Mom were taking a nap, but there were noises.  I couldn't sort out the words, but Uncle Robert's whisper isn't that quiet and your mom's muffled giggle sounds exactly like your mom's muffled giggle.

Mom and Uncle Robert trying to be secret made me listen more.  After a while, Mom said, "There's not much time," plain as day, and then it got quiet.  Then she giggled again.

Then there was creaking like a rocking chair, except I knew the cottage's only rocker was on the porch.  The creaking got faster and with it were little sounds from Mom, ohhs, uhmms, an occasional uhh.

An 11-year-old's mind can be simultaneously smart and confused.  I'd begun to develop and knew how babies are made, the generalities, anyway.  I knew that going to bed with a boy wasn't about taking a snooze.  I knew that going to bed could get you in big trouble.  Most of all, I knew that it was done in secret.

Mom and Uncle Robert were in her bedroom doing something in secret, for sure.  Making a baby?  But it would be Dad, not Uncle Robert, who'd make babies in Mom, would it not?

What they were doing -- and after listening more, I was pretty sure exactly what -- they were doing not for a baby, but because they liked doing it.

It was hard to imagine them naked, but I realized that being naked together is a big part of doing it.  I didn't see a particular issue about Uncle Robert being her brother -- they loved each other -- but I hoped they'd not get caught naked.

By now I could hear Mom's swooshes of air and once she said, "Ahh, ahh, ahh," in rapid succession.

I was afraid that they'd catch me spying, so I returned to ambush the Cowboys.  Unfortunately, the posse trapped me and voted to torture me with pine needles.  Terry had my cousins tickle my feet which I kicked to occupy them so they'd not see him tickle my breasts.  My cousins might have told their mother who'd for sure tell mine.  Indians exert revenge without parental knowledge, thank you.

When you're eleven and a boy notices your development, even if he's your brother, you're first embarrassed and then you're pleased.  And it wasn't as if Terry's pine needles were scratchy.  I knew he'd choose the soft kind.

The connection eluded me at the moment -- I wasn't that old, after all -- but having just spied on Mom and Uncle Robert gave Terry's tickles a new kind of excitement.  Mom's maybe still making her little noises, I decided, as I twisted my torso to better block my cousins' view.

I never told about spying on Mom and Uncle Robert until years later when Terry and I stopped having secrets.

I'd called Terry about my computer; I'd never say to come over for sex in case someone else lifted a receiver.  It would only take him a moment to restart the thing -- that's all it ever took -- and Steve wouldn't be home till dinner.  Terry was always good about helping remake the bed.

I recalled my spy story in the lull when you're slipping away from the day's concerns, knowing that there's nowhere you'd rather be than sitting as you are on the edge of your bed.   Lovemaking has its own timeframe.

"No way!  You were flat as a pancake," argued my sibling who has a selective memory in reference to pine needles.

"Wrong.  I already had a bra, but not at the lake."

"One of those practice ones, maybe.  You hardly had anything at, when, fifteen?"  He'd crept his hand around my sweater the way I liked.

"Almost sixteen," I corrected, sucking in air, my long-time habit.  We'd no need to say why we were referring to five years later.  As for his reference to my "practice bra" at eleven, it wasn't called that at all.  It was a "training" one.

His finger traced little circles over the knit as if he wasn't sure what was beneath.  "Miss Indian Princess."

"Size B, I'll have you know."  Where I stopped, unfortunately, but you get by with what you're given.  "Now some of your own medicine," I announced in my judicial voice.  "Pine needles!"

Terry feigned terror.  "Oh no, Pocahontas!  Any torture but the itchy pine needles!"

I was resolute.  "Pretend ones, anyway," palming his fly.  If he were going to tease through my clothes, he'd get the same in return.  Indian law.

"So I don't have to vacuum," I explained, bringing us to the current date.

As I look back, the time spent in foreplay when we didn't even know what foreplay was is what keeps us now so primed.

Full intercourse that afternoon would have muddled our pre-boathouse memories.  Two 30-somethings who don't even undress isn't much of a story for Californians.  It's pretty sexy for Midwesterners, though, not even using your hands, reading each other's eyes for the timing.

We orgasmed fully-dressed on my bedcover, my brother and I, Cowboy and Indian.  It's something maybe married couples never do, but they should.  You don't realize he's not even in you.

Even in that afternoon of childhood recollections, though, I withheld a tiny postscript from my brother.  It was having heard Mom's tiny sounds and having Terry tease my breasts with pine needles that helped me discover how to masturbate.

Sorry for the digression.

Perhaps because I envisioned Mom and Uncle Robert on the rocking chair, even today I don't equate the sound of lovemaking to that of bedsprings.  That particular chair, though, has seen lots of two-person rocking since.

And I'm pretty sure there were all sorts of other clues.

Like the time I saw Mom and Uncle Robert in the station wagon with the windows rolled up.  I'd thought they were talking, but maybe they were like Terry and me, able to do it almost by thought.  They'd parked half way down the road and it was just happenstance that I was in the trees.

How Uncle Robert steadied Mom on the kitchen stepstool, his hands on her ribs, but never when Dad was there.  She'd blush and shoo me off on an errand.

When we'd swim, how she'd dogpaddle with her back against Uncle Robert's chest, just their heads above water.  I've done the same with Terry, his grip keeping me from sinking, except that's not why it was where it was.  Mom's suit involved more fabric, but I expect it wasn't any harder to peel down.

The clearing in the woods where somebody stashed an army blanket.  As an Indian, I used dry grass to tell how often it got unfolded.  Two or three times, some weeks.

The blanket was my favorite place to practice my new-found pleasure.  I'd watch the trees sway as I did it.  Did Mom watch the tree tops, I wonder now, or was it Uncle Robert who faced the sky?  I think the latter, the way she did taught Terry.  At summer's end, Mom stored the blanket for next year.

Recollections are fleeting, perhaps sifted by our search for pattern, and can't prove a conjecture.  But sometimes an Indian just knows she's right.

Back home, after I started to guess, I'd walk to the library whenever Uncle Robert stopped by while Dad and Terry were off playing golf.  I'd not return too soon.  Mom never said she appreciated my timing, but she'd have noted it was always at least an hour.  I never asked why he'd stopped by.  I never announced when Dad and Terry returned, "You guys missed Uncle Robert."

I could have spied -- there was a hedge well situated by my folks' window -- but an Indian doesn't need to hear everything.  To make sure, though, she can do the grass-on-the-Army-blanket check on her mother's bed, except that being in the house, she uses a strand of thread.

I'm sure I could have gathered all sorts of incriminating evidence, but they weren't criminals, Mom and Uncle Robert.  They were doing something that went way back in time.

Mom watched out for me and Terry.  I watched out for her and Uncle Robert.  Moms and daughters don't have to discuss the details of a deal.

A MAYBE

What about Dad and Aunt Clella?  I imagine Uncle Robert reaching under the table to footsie Mom's calf and bumping into Dad who's aiming for Aunt Clella's knee.

Would the four have laughed and paired up accordingly?  That wouldn't have been their nature.  No, they'd have pretended that nothing was mutually discovered and continued with the game.

Or how about this?  A line I might have used:  "Gee, Aunt Clella, Mom and Uncle Robert just went rowing.  The sand spit, I think.  Us kids are going for a hike, but Dad's around here someplace.  I went ahead and baked these cookies.  Bye."

Mom and Uncle Robert all morning in the boathouse, Terry and me all morning in the woods and Dad and Aunt Clella all morning on the downstairs bed.  Wow!

Or how about this one: "It says there's a meteor shower tonight.  Let's all go watch.  Mom and Robert, you two go over there and watch west.  Dad and Clella, you get the other side.  Terry and I watch south.  There's just the three sleeping bags, though, so we'll have to double up.  The ones that spot the biggest comet get these cookies."

Swish swish.  Swish swish.  Swish swish.  Three rustling bags and lots of shooting stars.

With an insurance-agent propensity for risk aversion and a picture-puzzle-assembler's patience, Dad and Aunt Clella would never have been caught, not even by an Indian.  Given their Midwestern restraints, one might speculate that when clandestine opportunity knocked, their pent-up urges would have lead to countless delights.

But let's stay with fact, not speculation.  While Dad and Aunt Clella in all fairness should have gotten to have their own secret, that pair probably wouldn't have used the boathouse.

ACT 0 (PERHAPS).  THE BOATHOUSE, MAYBE 1951

Did I miss anybody?

Our cousins aren't part of this story, but maybe they have their own.  They're as Midwestern as us.  Like with Dad and Aunt Clella, you can't fit cousins to our stair-step diagram, so probably the diagram's different for the extended family.  In any case, I've never had sex with a cousin.

If we back our own diagram up a line, though, Grandma could have initiated the top step with her teenage Robert.  It stands to reason.  Uncle Robert didn't seduce his little sister out of the blue.

Even if Uncle Robert had one, girlfriends in those days weren't like girls today.  They meant no when they said it.  He wouldn't have even known where to find a hooker, I'd bet.  He was just a shy kid who probably knew what little he knew from the locker room.

His mom would have seemed safer.

My difficulty was with Grandma.  She was always old.  Having sex doesn't fit the image.

But let's face it.  She and Grandpa conceived Robert and Mom from more than two matings.  As nothing new's been invented in the intervening years, maybe she was even on top.  Grandma would have been no older than I am now and three guys know I'm great at that position.  Well, actually just two.  Jeremy's no judge.

When Grandpa was out on the lake, maybe Grandma wasn't that careful about changing with her door shut.  Young Robert had eyes, just like everybody.

It wasn't that much after World War II, so maybe Grandma's sewing circle senior members winked about their boys when their husbands were in Germany or wherever.  Maybe she'd even their heard stories.  It's hard to think of ladies in their girdles talking about sex, but why wouldn't they?

You might think that sleeping with your son wouldn't have been discussed a half-century ago, but the Greeks did it way before that.  We read the Odyssey in Mrs. Sander's English class, but knew about Oedipus from the Classic Comics.  The Biblical stories are even older than that, if you want something to read during the sermon.

By the time you know your grandmother, sewing circle is a 40-year tradition.  They maybe don't always remember where they put the needle, but they remember every detail of when they were young.  Imagine their conversations!

Sewing Circle Member 1: "Did I ever tell you girls about Hubert's first driving lesson?"

Sewing Circle Member 2: "We love that story.  He's such a nice boy.  Did he ever marry that Italian girl?"

Sewing Circle Member 1: "We motored out to the airfield and I got on his lap."

Grandma: "Just like with Robert, except we did it in our boathouse."

Sewing Circle Member 3: "I like the part about him asking you not to tell."

***

In 1951, the boathouse would have been new, a few war surplus tarps probably, but mostly things clean and bright.  Certified life preservers, Grandpa would have insisted, since lives may depend on them.

Robert would have managed her complicated undergarments, her bombshell brassiere, for example, because he was pretty mechanical.  Or maybe they'd been swimming and Grandma was in her bathing cap.

The rafters would have looked newer, but the sex would have been the same.

Given regular maintenance, as Steve's prone to remind us, marine gear lasts forever.  Paddles need varnishing and hulls need scraping.  As much a part of summer as watching the weather.

What I'd add to the maintenance list is to bounce the life cushions.

ACT 4.  THE BOATHOUSE, 2003

So we're back to today, the summer of 2003, a scorcher.  What happened with Jeremy wasn't planned, yet of course it was.  He was old enough.  A mom can tell from the way her 17-year-old looks at her figure.

Maybe I lingered just a fraction of a second extra when I gave him his goodnight kiss and maybe he didn't pull back the way he would have in his more-awkward years.  A mom notices.  Maybe she even tingles a little, thinking about it alone in her downstairs bed.

It was windy the next morning, Rochelle, Jeremy and me in our pajamas.  Rochelle wanted to bake cookies, a great project for a blustery AM.

It wasn't like I had my own plans beyond cookie-making, not then, anyway, but I let my robe gap as I gave the dough an extra roll.  Not enough to reveal much, but enough to show something.

I'll be the first to admit that Jeremy's peeks egged me on and probably my robe parted a bit longer as the baking progressed.  Arousal isn't something you can deny when you feel pretty.  You're telling yourself that nothing's going to happen, but then you feel your panties.  By the time the last batch was in the oven, I was as giddy as a teenager seducing herself as she dresses for the prom.

I situated the kitchen stool to deny myself a back-step when Jeremy passed.  Given his interest in my robe, I knew he'd take that route.

He was old enough to try the accidental elbow, but not old enough to disguise it.  Maybe he thought that moms don't think sexually, that we don't have nerves in our bust.  Oh, Jeremy!

"Cookie power," he laughed, grabbing a handful to disguise his accomplishment.

"Get 'em while they're warm," I agreed, my nipple hard like an acorn.  Like I said, I felt pretty.

There'd been the kiss last night, the brush this morning.  You think about little things, how his arm slipped against your side, then over.  Did he wonder why you were erect?

Your head asks what it all means?  Another part of you is already deciding, but you can't help that part.

Dressing for the rest of day, I chose my lacy bra.  Steve hadn't even noticed I'd brought it, but I hadn't expected him to.  So why did I choose that one?  Why did I even pack it?  Would a 17-year-old even take note?

The kids and I frittered away the morning and made tuna fish salad for lunch.

It wasn't clear to me that today would be the day until Jeremy again brushed by and I instinctively tipped his way.  Like I said, sometime's your head's the last to know.

Mom's bra makes her more firm, maybe he was thinking, but I didn't know if he'd think that good or bad.  The telling sign, though, was his pursuit.

As I let him pass, the tingle spread downward.

Yes, today would be the day!

***

Clouds were forming by early afternoon.  Before heading back to the city, Steve suggested varnishing the oars and paddles.  That's why I sent Jeremy down to the boathouse, I could always claim.

"You know where's the varnish," as I shooed him out, not caring how much I was showing.  Rochelle probably noticed as well, as she'd my Indian nature, but probably she'd figure it due to the drop in temperature, the foretaste of rain.

The rain started not long after and the memories flooded in.  What had it been, maybe 25 years ago when Terry and I went to the boathouse?  I'd been so young when we went in, so much older when we came out.

I busied Rochelle with some knitting and told her I needed to check on Jeremy's progress.  If you want a snack, there's some popcorn.

I may be a lot older than when I first went to the boathouse, I realized, but I still felt nervous.

Nervous or not, though, now was the time.

It wasn't as if I'd really planned ahead, but maybe the thought of your boy comes easier to those of us who've had sex with our brothers.

Not to my surprise, my boy was sleeping on the life cushions.  As the implements were laid out for painting, he'd sort of started, anyway.

When Terry and I went to the boathouse, the two of us were soaked, needed to get dry.  It made sense how things got started.

Is today going to make any sense at all?  I took a breath and moved forward.  Maybe just doing it is what gives it sense.

The blanket was folded on the shelf.  Terry and I can schedule a rendezvous with but a raised eyebrow.  A blanket in the boathouse, another in the woods.  One in the back of the minivan if we're running errands.

I spread the cover over Jeremy, then scooted in beside, our shoulders not quite touching.  The drumming on the shingles would make it easy to say I was sleepy too.  Natural things should begin naturally.

This is natural, I reminded myself.  Natural for us, anyway.

I counted the rafters.  Six.  How many times had they looked down at Terry and me?  Now it was Jeremy and me.

"Mom?"  Jeremy startled me.  Had he even been asleep?

"Hi, honey."

"I sort of got started."

"There's lots of time," I scooted slower to supply the excuse.  "Listen to the rain."

We did that, not moving for a full minute.

"I brought you a cookie," I offered.

I gave him the biggest, nibbled on one myself, pulled the cover higher, my breast now nuzzling his arm.

I asked if he were warm enough.  It felt warm to me, but I'm not sure if it was due to our blanket.

"Sure."

I snuggled closer, so close in fact that my knee was on his leg, and waited another minute.  "Jeremy?"

"Huh?"

I couldn't turn back now.  "Did you mind when I kissed you last night?"

He thought a moment.  "It was okay," looking away.

"Just okay?"

"I mean, sure," with a sheepish grin.

I weighed the risks.  There's maybe a legal aspect related to age, I guessed, but it wasn't that.  Was there a law about being a bad mom?  Probably, but I wasn't bad.  It wasn't about Steve finding out, as whatever happened this afternoon, Jeremy wouldn't tell.  The risk was about leading Jeremy where, despite all indications, he didn't want to go.  You don't want to risk that.

There was so much to think about, way too much for someone like me.  But knowing how it worked between Mom and Terry, maybe I didn't need to even do the calculation.

"Want another?" my confidence restored.  My confidence and my female urges.  It wasn't as if my deliberation was solely in my head, after all.

Jeremy paused, maybe weighing his own risks.  "I guess."

I raised my head and gave him one, a nice one.  "Like that?"

"Yeah."

We're just kissing, I reminded myself.  Nothing that can't be stopped.  He's old enough to say if he's not interested.  Old enough to help things along if he is.

I gave him another, yet a bit longer.  He even kissed back a little, the effort pressing us more together.

"Uhmm," letting him know I liked it.

Maybe the next one, one with my mouth open, was a bit teenage and we giggled when we bumped tongues.  Why shouldn't we?  Jeremy's teenaged.

It was raining cats and dogs.

"Mom?"

"Uh huh?"

"Is it okay, us being here, I mean?"

"We're just cuddling to stay warm."

Cuddling?  Kissing?  Roughly the same thing, I guess.  A boy believes his mother more than anyone else.

"Kind of kicked back, right?"

I ran my tongue as far as I could into his cheek.  "'Zactly."

"You sure?"

"Want me not to?"

"No, I just..."

"Well then it's okay, right?"

When I touched Jeremy's ribs where his shirt had slipped up, he took the initiative to put his hand on my back.  I'd practiced my invitation so many times in my head, but never really knew if it would work.  I guess I shouldn't have doubted the genetic propensity.

"Uhmm," flexing my fingers just a fraction.

I doubt he yet had intentions beyond kissing, but his hand was against the strap of my bra.

"Uhmm," I repeated, enough encouragement for him to follow the strap for maybe an inch.  I remembered when Terry had done the same.

"The hooks," hoping not to sound directive.

"What hooks?"

"Help me get comfy."  It didn't fit too well with the bit about us staying warm, but I doubted he'd be hung up on logic.

"Really?"

"It's just a strap, for heaven's sake."  It's just a strap, of course, but it's how we're again and again seducible.  Unsnap our bras and unfetter our inhibitions.  It's usually the guy who initiates the process, though.

His fumbling required a few seconds for the fasteners.  I was glad I'd chosen my pretty bra, even if he couldn't tell.

Jeremy seemed unsure what to do next, but the fact was that his hand was on bare skin and I wasn't objecting.

I had only to run my fingers along his spine to get him doing the same.

"That's better," I encouraged when he reached up and tried to make slipping the straps off my shoulders seem unintentional.

It only took a little roll on my part for the heel of his palm to brush the side of my cup, pushing it loose.

"Maybe you shouldn't," I lightly protested, hoping he'd come to see himself as the seducer.

"I didn't mean...," an apology not at all what I had in mind.

"Unless you want to," I clarified.

"You sure?" maybe expecting me to change my mind.  Fat chance of that!

"Nobody's around," I assured when he reached underneath and found my nipple.

What must he be thinking, his hand on my breast?  That I'm letting him?  That I want him to?

"Gentle," I admonished as Jeremy enhanced his discovery.  You have to start these things slowly, make him work for it.

Who'd have believed it could be so easy getting your boy to feel you up?  You'd have thought it was of his doing, not yours.

"Silly boy," I chided.

Embolden by the corrugation of fingers, I pulled off my shirt.

He'd seen my breasts in my robe this morning, but here they weren't pretending to be covered.  I tried to act casual about my disattire.

An advantage of exposing your breasts, of course, is that it gets you closer.  It took a bit of work to get my thigh between his legs.  At first he just twisted away, but I pursued with the side of my knee.

"Mom!  You can't..." when he couldn't escape.

"Can't what, honey?" unrelenting.

"You know...  Can't..."

"Oh that?  It's totally natural," successfully nuzzling what was obviously erect.  You want him to know that you approve.

"But you're my mom."

"It's what happens, sometimes," the constancy of my leg beginning to elicit compliancy.  Once you've got it, you've got it, as they say.

"Yeah, but..."

"We'll be careful."  Though I'd have delighted in more foreplay, I suspected my son had limited capacity for extended preparation.

He sucked in his gut when I touched his belt.  Good sign.  I slipped him another kiss and found the buckle.

He lay motionless as I undid first the prong and then the snap, but when I got to his zipper, "Maybe you better not."

Better not what?  You don't tell your mother, "better not," at this stage!

"Nobody's going to know," as I lifted the elastic until my thumb brushed his hair.

Were he unwilling, he'd not have his hand on my thigh.

Not too fast, I told myself.  Not quite yet to full arousal, he looked plenty big, and I'm not saying that because I'm his mother.  I hope my looking wasn't too obvious, as everyone's shy the first time, but he'd get over the naked part.

When I first saw Terry's, right here in this same boathouse, I'd thought it looked sort of silly, a drumstick swaying in the air.  I still do.  Silly, yet not too silly, of course.  How can a piece of anatomy be so compelling?

But a bird in hand isn't a bird in the bush, if that makes sense.

Come on, Jeremy, I wanted to say.  Move your hand higher.  Make little circles.  See how I react.  My touching your penis must tell you something.  Touch me back.  Find my weak spots.

But Jeremy wasn't yet sure where this was going.  "Are you going to, you know, jack me off?"

I knew all about that bit, evidence-wise, that is.  You don't do the laundry without noticing your son's underwear.  From the upstairs hall, you hear his bed squeak.  That's why you walk barefoot, though you find another excuse.

But no, my dear boy, I'd not come to the boathouse for something so one-sided.  I'd have to be careful to not overplay my hand, I realized.

"Something more special," I clarified.

He processed what might be more special.  Once he figured out what, "No way!" he informed me with teenage guilelessness.

I knew, though, that the thought of something more special had already crossed his mind. "You want to, right?"

"You're my mom!" as if I weren't very aware of the fact.

"Uhmm," pleased with his now-complete erection.

Maybe Jeremy thought me slow on the pickup.  "I mean, you know, we can't..."

"Can't what?" pushing a bit of the responsibility in his direction.  Pushing a bit on his penis, too.

"You know, go all the way," his hesitancy waning as I pulled back then pushed again.

"You mean have sex?" I queried as if the idea were his.

"I guess, but..." his pushes increasingly matching my pulls and his pulls increasingly matching my pushes.

"Like we're on a date?" I supplied as if I needed a more-conventional context.

"You can't take your mom on a date!"

I pictured us at the movies, one with enough sex to show I wasn't old fashioned.  How much sex, I'm not too sure.  Maybe just a long scene with lots of surround sound.  We'd be in the back row and I'd slide my knee against his.  But even if I scrunched down into my seat, guided his palm to my knee and stroked his knuckles, would he then move up?  Probably not, but he'd like how my leg felt smooth.

Jeremy was right about it not being a date, though.

I revised my example.  "Maybe a practice date, let's say."  I'd have chosen an evening when Steve was away and Rochelle at a sleep-over and we've not even bothered with a movie.  We'd have practiced dating on the couch, I suppose.

A boathouse has its advantages, though.  Everything else seems so far away.  Not being in the back of a theater or on your bed back home makes what happens seem more spontaneous.  Here you're a little less the mom and a little more just a summer resident.  Sort of like when I was maybe a little less a little sister and a little more a giggly girl on the sand spit.  I'd prefer sheets, of course, but I'm never going to complain about having to arrange the life preservers.

The fact -- the only fact that mattered, actually -- was that while he was weighing his practice dating options, his erection got even harder.  How often does a guy in such condition end up with more than one option?

We listened to the rattle of raindrops, me more and more wet, but not from the weather.

Jeremy seemed to be forgetting the dating pretext and considering the male requirements for a successful date.  "I'm not very good, maybe," as if he didn't want to misrepresent his qualifications.

That one was easy.  "It's not about being good right off the bat, honey.  It's about being together."  "Right off the bat" was of course my way of saying there'd be more, but I doubt he was looking past the present.

"You'll do great," I added, hoping to sound more confident than I may have had reason to be.  Being together is of course very important, but there's "together" and there's "together."

He lacked a response, but silence at this stage is a good sign.  Silence plus hardness, that is.

I slowed my hand, as excess encouragement on my part could leave me with less than I had in mind.  Well, probably not less, but in the wrong place.

"You're sure it's okay, you know, us being...?" he finally managed.  It was his first time, after all.

"It's because we love each other," was how I put it.

Sensing a need for more than words, however, it took but a snap, zipper and tug and I was naked.  I'd rather it had been darker, but you don't have a choice in the afternoon.  I could have made my bedroom pitch black, but here in the boathouse, each of you gets to see.  Maybe it breaks down the last barriers.

It probably would have worked just to take him from above, but the boathouse way isn't one of forcing things.  A mom, a Midwestern one, anyway, thinks of more than herself.  When you love each other, it's a together thing.

Jeremy watched everything.  "You're pretty," his way of progressing past the permission phase.

"We're both ready," I guaranteed, surprising myself by how much I liked him looking.  You've nothing to hide because you're family.

In the end I guided him home, sort of literally, I guess.  Probably I should have let him do it all himself, but it's hard for a mother to stay uninvolved.  Mom did the same for Terry, as I recall.   It wasn't that I doubted Jeremy's instinct -- I always try to keep a positive outlook -- but a boy could very well have trouble his first time.  Once he was in, though, I let him figure out the motion part.

By the time he'd found his stride, so to speak, maybe yet barely believing the turn of events, he was grinning.  I must have felt like butter.

"That's how," I affirmed.  How what, though?  There's a million ways to have sex.  Maybe more like, "This is how we carry on, generation to generation."

Rain drumming on the boathouse roof.  Jeremy bouncing me into the life preservers, each push more confident.  How many times had these cushions felt the rhythm?

The first time with your brother, you're basically thinking about yourself.  The first time with your boy, though, you're thinking a lot about family, how you never planned it this way, but you'd always known it would happen.  It's more than just having sex, but maybe sex is the best way to prove it.

I could have gone on and on for so long.  When you're young, the longer you've thought about it, the shorter it's going to last.  When you're older, the longer you've thought about it, the more you get out of each moment.

"I'm going to come!" Jeremy warned, still young.

"Keep it there."  You want his first experience to feel everything all the way to the end.  You want to feel it, too, but that's not the point.

As he came, eyes scrunched and penis pounding, I held him tight against me.  I'm not one to claim that you can feel the sperm, but you can feel the pulses of semen.

Jeremy was already riding the down elevator while I was still on the way up, but so what?  Like I said, there'd be opportunities to get better.  And anyway, you still feel pretty special.

***

"Mom?" after he'd regained his breath and slipped free, slick and spent.  Even still, though, I could tell he was a little apprehensive.

"You did great."  The mother in me, I suppose.

"Really?"

"Really."

After a moment's assessment, "You were pretty right," he added.

"How so?"  Of course I was right, but that's a mom's job.

"I kind of knew you wanted to..."

"What?"

"...when we made the cookies."

He knew what when we made the cookies?

Jeremy continued without my asking.  "From how you bumped me."

From how I what?  Did he think me bumping back meant I was willing?  I'd been more circumspect than that!

"It was sort of crowded," the only defense that came to mind.  I could have noted that he'd already been looking down my robe, but I didn't want to open up the chain of events.

"And then you followed me down here," he cemented his thesis.

Why deny it?  Here we are, the two of us, just had sex.  What's there to deny?  But at the same time, it's best not to admit too much.

"I was sleepy, same as you."  And thinking about sex, same as you, too, I didn't add.  Maybe that's the best way to leave it for now.  We both got sleepy and viola, we woke up having intercourse.  Nobody's fault.  We should be more careful in the future.  Or at least not let it happen too often.

Predestination maybe would be a better defense, but that one's more complex.

Twenty-four hours from now, he'd have the sequence framed in terms of male conquest, how he'd lured me to his lair, lowered my guard, sneaked a hand under my shirt and made me beg to be his lover.  Fine.  It's good for a growing boy's ego to think that he can seduce his mother.

We listened to the thunder, only now starting to let up.  When Jeremy's hand returned between my legs, I wiggled to tell him, yes, right there.

Jeremy beamed at my reaction.  "Kind of like when I run down the goalie," I expected him to say, as if he scored breakaways all the time.  His finger was already running down this goalie again and again.

Maybe I should have held back a little, made him work a little to win me, but geesh, did it feel good!

"I'm your mother," I warned, shutting my eyes and directing him more toward my front, as he hadn't a clue about the finer points of female anatomy.  I could pretty much tell when he realized he'd found an effective location.

"We're on a date," he reminded me, my wiggles telling his finger how fast.  Most boyfriends would want to stay being the boss, but when he's your own, he's doing it for your sake.

I was probably as surprised as Jeremy when my orgasm hit.  This part for sure hadn't been my plan, but who can argue?

The boy must be overwhelmed, I realized when I regained my composure.  Mom brings him a cookie and not that many minutes later relieves him of virginity.  Then he masturbates her on the life preservers.

My boy seemed rather pleased with himself, actually.  Well, maybe he should be.

"Nice," I allowed.

"I sort of thought you liked it."

"It's this place," I reflected after a silence, not sure where my thought was headed.  After sex, your mind ventures strange directions.

"This place?"

"The boathouse."

I watched the dots connect.  "You came down here before, right?" he concluded.

"Sure," unsure where he was going,

"When you were a girl, I mean."

When I was a virgin was what he meant.  I didn't anticipate the sleuthing, but you can't fib to a boy who's guessed part of the story.

"We were soaked and..." I tried.

"You wanted to," Jeremy supplied.  But he didn't leave it there.  "You and Uncle Terry, right?"

How did he know it was my brother?

"One time I came home from practice and you and him were in your room," answering my look of admission.

"Oh."

How long had he listened?  You're not thinking about other ears when you're with your brother.  Were Terry and I making love or were we just talking?  I suppose it didn't matter.

"'And he,' you mean," I corrected, reaching for grammar to bury the substance.

"Plus up here, you two take off together," Jeremy added to the indictment.

So much for Indian stealth.  A boy can read his mom.  Thank God that Steve wasn't as astute.

You'd think it would be devastating, being found out by your son, but maybe it was a relief, too.  Secrets need to be let out.

"Don't be mad at Terry," I asked.  "He was only..."

Jeremy looked quizzical.  "Why'd I be mad at Uncle Terry?"

"You know, for..."

"No way!" he clarified.  "I pretended I was him."

"Pretended you were Terry?" maybe a dumb question.

"You know," offering a grin.  "Like now."

Like now?  Like having sex with me?  What do you say to a boy who's imagined that?  Before you told him he could, that is.

I guess you don't say too much, as it wouldn't add anything.  Some things only make sense when you see the family pattern.  Maybe it was in his genes, if you get the joke.

"I still love your dad, though," I clarified.

"Me, too," Jeremy agreed.  "I won't tell."  An understatement!

It was past time to find my clothes and change the subject.  "Know what, kiddo?"

"What?"

"You've got some varnishing to do."

He looked at the paddles.  "Want to help?" a bit hopefully.

If we worked quickly, we could linger a while after, but I didn't say it.

"We don't have to just paint," Jeremy bettered his invitation along my exact line of thought.

They say at 40, we're at our peak.  Add a 17-year-old's enthusiasm.  We'll maybe varnish one paddle, so we don't have to lie.  "Deal."

It would be tomorrow, though.  Let him clear his mind, think about what works best on life preservers, not just rely on hormones.  Same for me.

Probably Terry had lots to learn when he'd started with Mom.  You're not born smart; you get that way as you get acquainted.  Jeremy would do the same.

It's pretty unfair, though, how our sort of acquaintance -- Jeremy's and my kind, I mean -- is almost always a male's story.  Everybody's heard about Oedipus, even if they think Shakespeare wrote it.  Freud made the subject so heavy duty that he missed the main point.  But who even knows the name of Oedipus's mother?  Her story's just as valid, her climax just as real.  (Jocasta, so now you know, and she was good enough in bed to snag a handsome young Rex.)

"Uh..."

I could tell that Jeremy had a question that probably wasn't about Greece.  "What?"

"I hope, you know, we didn't, didn't make a baby or anything."

Fine time to think of it, buster -- Oedipus didn't either on at least four occasions -- but I phrased it more maternally.  "Don't worry, honey.  I'm covered."  An Indian always keeps her cover.

Jeremy judged my bra as I fastened the hooks.  "My favorite one."

As I said, he'd been ready.

ACT 5.  THE BOATHOUSE FORESEEN, next summer, 2004

Rochelle of course mustn't discover about her brother and Mom, or Uncle Terry and Mom either.  She's only 16, wouldn't understand yet.

With his sister's soccer, basketball and track, Jeremy and I find the time we need, but our best times are when Rochelle overnights at a friend's and Steve's on a trip.  Then my boy takes charge.

Rochelle's still my baby.  She'll still snuggle, as she knows that being my baby makes me happy.

But this baby's growing up.  Maybe she notices this or that, but she's not put the pieces together.  I don't think so, anyway.

A tee-shirt doesn't disguise emergent womanhood as she bakes cookies.  I think she's concentrating on sprinkling the sugar, but who knows?

Jeremy moves the cookie cutter for better vantage, a move only a boy would think not obvious.  Someday Rochelle and I will laugh about his furtive eyes.  I'd hope for that sort of mother-daughter confidentiality, anyway, though I never had it with mine.

Paddling off with her brother this morning, she'd not bothered with a bra.  It's not that she really needs one and it's just her brother in the stern, she probably justifies.

Things change and things stay the same.  I'd at least worn a bra.  Maybe not when I came out of the boathouse, but at least when I went in.  Is she wearing violet panties?  She has about every color, little wisps of nothing.

They jump laughing into the frigid water and let the sun dry them.  She's beginning to understand boys, how clinging things draw their attention.  She has a sibling to practice on, she tells herself.

***

Next summer Rochelle will be 17, ready for the rest, I expect.  Some of her girlfriends are sexually active -- Tami, for one -- so she'll have encouragement.  She'll have all the facts, so to speak.

I'd like more years as Jeremy's sole lover, but who am I to stop them?  It's not like I've not seen my two share the afghan when they watch TV.  They leave it bunched to play their little games.

The boathouse is where they'll head.  I'll leave a blanket forgotten on the paddle rack, but a mom can't control every little detail.  Rochelle won't mind those pokey tags of life preservers.

Jeremy won't initiate her like some pimply boyfriend with pants at his ankles, but as a brother would a sister.  The right way.

From my command post I'll see the two docking in the rain and tell Steve that the kids must be sitting it out across the lake.  Lightning danger, you know.  They'll not be back for a while, I'll predict, so I'll wait on the cookies.  Want to slip back to the room, honey?  We've got time.

I'll pretend an Indian outside our window is listening to the bedsprings.

Or maybe when they go to the boathouse, I'll be with Terry.  He'll guess what my two are up to and we'll go upstairs where there's still the orange quilt.  Or maybe we'll use the rocking chair since Steve's gone.

Or maybe I'll be alone and sneak like an Indian to the boathouse, listen to the swish swish and feel a twinge of age.  Given that my girl's ready, a boy I can vouch for is my choice for the honor.

I got a virgin of her age, too, of course, and if everybody gets just one, there’s just enough to go around.  But even Midwestern culture is interested more in stories about a girl's cherry than about a boy’s whatever.  You see, we don’t even have a name for it.

The male’s first experience is treated as a non-event, kind of like getting gangly arms.  A girl (well, not me and not Rochelle, though) detail’s every underwear tug to her friends the following day.  A guy wants his buddies to think last night was just old hat.

The act of intercourse with your boy may be physically similar to the act with your brother, but the sharing's different.  Jeremy's never going to tell me what went through his mind that first time.  Terry and I, on the other hand, laugh about who thought what when, teasing out the details.

The longer it takes Rochelle to figure out about me and Terry, the better.  Girls have enough problems with their mothers as it is.  It takes a while to realize that loving one family member doesn't diminish loving the next.

Mom surely saw it coming with me and Terry.  Keeping Dad from catching onto Toe Attack merits some sort of maternal medal.  She'd have felt a little passed by, too, but Terry didn't let her down.

Jeremy and I will still rendezvous, just maybe not as often.  Or maybe more often.  Who knows?

For sure I'll have cookies ready for their return.

I'm projecting all this as next summer's story.  But maybe I'm kidding myself.  It could yet happen in this one.

Oh God!

***

At least Rochelle knows about birth control.  She had me sign a permission form to get aspirin "and stuff" from the school nurse.  I acted dumb when I added my John Hancock.

The nurse doesn't suggest girls engage in intercourse, of course; she just helps them not get pregnant.  Jeremy could get condoms the same way, but don't leave it up to boys of his generation.

Midwestern girls aren't like California movie stars who have babies when they're not even married.  Safeway gets those magazines where we live but I just read the headlines in the check-out line unless it's about Brad Pitt, and then I buy it.  I'd have his baby if he had a nearby cottage.  Just kidding.  I've had my two and Brad probably already has ten cottages.  Midwestern humor, there.

"Know your partner's history," is probably the nurse's advice.  Exactly why some of us are family historians.

REFLECTIONS

What Mrs. Thornton said about nature keeping things in balance is pretty much correct for being at the lake.  What if Jeremy motions me down to the boathouse, Terry winks me up to the woods and Steve suggests a little nap?  Midwestern gals like multiple orgasms, of course, but maybe not from running between partners.   Vacation's about spreading things out.

Remember my old lab partner, Stanley Christianson?  Stanley majored in education and got Mrs. Thornton's job after she retired.  Both kids had him and he'd always peek at my bra at parent-teacher conferences.  I could have laid him in a minute.

But shoot!  I can't fool you.  I'd not sleep with anybody but the ones I've got.  Midwesterners keep things manageable.

Stanley married my classmate Susan and it's their Tami, Rochelle's friend, who's on the pill.  Susan thinks it's so great how they talk about side effects.  Not at all Midwestern, though, in my opinion.

***

So why did Mom let Terry and me keep doing it, other than that she'd gotten away with the same with Uncle Robert?

She probably wasn't too surprised when our underwear rolled out of my backpack.  She'd have been less than exuberant at the thump, thump, thump later that evening from the room above, but she'd have recognized our enthusiasm.  She was, as mother's tend to be, realistic.  As life rolls along, we try to keep the changes manageable.  With love sprinkled in, things will work out.  Very Midwestern.

Maybe Mom was like the nurse at Rochelle's school.  You can't tell them not to; just do what you can to keep it safe.  Your kids are safer when they stay together.

And today I'm in the same boat.  Mom, 41.  Enjoys baking and family ties.  Very Midwestern.  2 children sexually active.  Mutually.

At the end of Act 1, I said, "Mom watched out for me and Terry.  I watched out for her and Uncle Robert.  Moms and daughters don't have to discuss the details of a deal."

I'll watch out for Rochelle and Jeremy and Rochelle will watch out for me and Terry.  That's the way it works.

Fancy cookie recipes are fun, but not what vacation's about.  Stick with a few tested ones -- gingersnaps, for example -- and they'll keep stopping by the kitchen counter.  Same thing for sex.  Stick with what works well and they'll be by as often as you like.

There's one more Basic Principle -- #4.  Important messages are best communicated by fresh cookies.

THE END

****

Holly on the Web

Wherever you found this story on the web, thank you to the server.  My problem is that I've no systematic way to update the various servers.  As literary errors (or just lame word usages) are made known, I'll repair that which is salvageable on http://www.asstr.org/~Holly_Rennick.  If you take the time to read me, don't wade through an early version.

You can contact me via the site's message form.

Holly

