Carl Tatem: Daughter_s little friend

Her mother slipped silently back to her room and into bed, still trembling violently from what she had seen and heard. She tossed and turned knowing that it would be better to face Sandy in the morning after both their ragged nerves were soothed by sleep, and they could talk a little more rationally. Talk they must, she could see that clearly… but would it do any good? Wasn't it painfully evident that her daughter resented her? Alice suddenly realized that she didn't understand Sandy as she had thought she had, and that there was a communication gap between them that perhaps was too wide to ever be able to bridge.

She sobbed to herself, hearing the front door close and her daughter slowly walk to her bedroom. Tommy Edgars was gone, at least for tonight, and the house settled into black silence once again. But the muscular, handsome boy wasn't gone from the tortured mother's thoughts, and even after she finally drifted into an uneasy slumber, she dreamed of him. His almost animalistic body so graceful and masculine beneath his clothing… the way he had crushed Sandy to him and had almost taken her like a savage in some prehistoric jungle… Alice Murphy whimpered in her sleep, starting to perspire wetly all over her lovely naked body…

Alice awoke shortly past eight the following morning. The brilliant Florida sun streamed in through the large open window, and the same breeze of the night before rustled the leaves of a rose bush sprouting beneath it. She rubbed the thick cotton of sleep from her eyes, reluctantly facing the new day, remembering as her mind focused clearly the events of the previous night. Her own wanton exhibition while envisioning her dead husband making love to her… the lewd and obscene sight of Sandy and that horrid boy, Tommy Edgars, in the kitchen… she shuddered, and quickly slipped out of bed, padding across to the sliding doors of her closet. Naked before the rack of clothes, she remembered again with scarlet shame her searching hand moving up into the velvet softness of her pubic triangle, and the intense delight of her fingers rubbing the swelling pink flesh of her vaginal lips, sliding in and out frenziedly as she brought herself to almost screaming orgasm. Then, shaking her head and shoulders as if struck by a sudden chill, she dressed quickly in a simple beige sheath and left the room to enter the kitchen.

Sandy wasn't up yet; she liked to sleep late on Saturdays, and after last night, Alice could certainly understand why. The normally vivacious widow made herself some coffee and toasted a couple of slices of whole-wheat diet bread, then sat at the dinette and moodily contemplated her life, her only company the throaty whirring of the refrigerator beside her.

After witnessing the near lovemaking between her daughter and Tommy, she knew that she was going to have to act. But how? she asked herself disconsolately. How could she get through the resentment and defensiveness Sandy had admitted was between them? She wasn't even sure she could find the reserves to treat the subject with rational calmness herself, much less instill it in her child.

Alice was pondering these questions when Sandy entered the kitchen, tousle-headed, yawning, but dressed. She wore a tangerine-colored miniskirt, pleated and high-riding like the kind worn when playing tennis, which accentuated the tanned leanness of her long, firm legs, and a thin jersey that her bra-encumbered breasts molded curvaceously. She went over to her mother and gave Alice a slight, automatic peck of a kiss on her cheek.

"Morning, Mom. Any coffee?"

"In the percolator," Alice replied dully. "I made it fresh."

Sandy paused, sensing the cool, vague distance behind her mother's tone, and she pursed her lips, a frown replacing the last of the sleepiness in her sparkling eyes. "Gee, is something the matter?" she asked with concern. "You look awfully pale this morning. Are you feeling sick or something?"

"No," Alice said. She blinked a couple of times, then looked up into her daughter's face. "No, I'm all right."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Well, if you say so." The lovely young teenager shrugged, and poured herself a cup of steaming coffee from the chrome percolator on the drain board. She brought it to the table and sat down, and for a long moment it was utterly still in the kitchen, though tension crackled in the air. It made her uneasy, and finally she burst out: "There is something wrong, Mother. Don't try and kid me. Tell me, will you?"

Alice looked across at her daughter and slowly ran the tip of her tongue around her lips to moisten them, steeling herself for what she had to say. She said, "Sandy… last night…"

"Yes?" Sandy interrupted sharply. Oh God, is she going to bitch at me first thing this morning? "Is it that I came in so late? I couldn't help it, Mom. You know we all went out for something to eat after the dance; I told you we would before I left!"

"No… It's not about when you came in."

"Well then, what?"

The concerned mother took a deep breath and blurted out, "I heard you come in, Sandy. You woke me up, and… and I heard some noises, so I came out to see… and there you were, with Tommy Edgars."

Sandy stiffened, and a veil seemed to drop over her eyes, her face setting stonily, belligerently. "You saw us together?" she whispered in a deep tone. "You were here when…?"

"Yes, and I saw everything. Everything, Sandy, and I heard everything, too."

"You spied on us!"

"I did no such thing!" Alice retorted, shaken. "But it was a lucky thing I did happen to want to see you were all right, because… because…" Her throat suddenly parched so dry that she was unable to force the words through it.

"Go on, Mom, say it!" Sandy flared back hotly. "Go on, say that you saw us kissing. Isn't that true? He was kissing me, hard, and what's more, I liked it. I liked it a lot!" Her embarrassment was acute, but her young pride turned it to indignation rather than shame, and her cheeks burned with anger, her eyes flashing darkly across the table to her mother. "Can't you stand the idea of a boy's lips on your sweet little daughter's? Is that it?"

"Sandy, it's not only the kissing, but he was fondling you! He had his hands on your breasts, child, and on your… on your…" Again she choked on the words.

"On my ass, Mom," Sandy answered crudely. "But since you were so damned interested in what was going on, then you also know that's as far as he got!"

"And his foul language," Alice moaned, now shattered by the violence of her daughter's unleashed emotions. "His profanity…"

"He calls it as he sees it," Sandy rebuked. "Tommy doesn't believe in the hypocrisy of your world, Mom; that's what our generation wants to end. But what difference does it make what he said to me? I'm still a virgin, remember? Don't worry about that, or do you want that dirty old Dr. Webster to go poking around inside my pussy with his crawly old fingers again to prove it?"

"Sandy, calm down! Honey, I only want what's best for you. If your father were here, he'd be able to…"

"But he's not here!" Sandy cried derisively. "Dad's dead! Killed in a war that should never even have been started! Can't you get it through your head that he's gone?"

"Sandy!" Alice's face blanched a sickly color of bleached flour, and her hand flew to her open mouth in horrified shock.

"At least I'm the healthy one around here!" Sandy suddenly stood up, almost knocking over her coffee cup with her surging movement. "You want what's best for me? Leave me alone, Mom, that's the best thing you can do for me! Go find yourself a man and leave me alone with mine!" And with those final, bitter words, young Sandy Murphy turned and ran out of the kitchen, impervious to the cries of her mother behind her. A moment later, the rear door slammed with a note of finality, and Alice was left alone.