Underwater Love

This story was inspired by the book, "Underwater Love" by Mark Yasenchak.

My father died when I was 15. His family had a history of heart problems causing early death--a condition he undoubtedly passed on to me. My mother had complications when I was born, precluding a second child. Since the family had moved to the west coast when I was quite young, it became just the two of us. It seems Mother's family and Dad's brothers' wives had no interest in leaving Illinois even for a vacation. Our contact became irregular phone calls. Mother's family wasn't much better.

I was close to both my parents as a child, but when I became a teenager I drifted away a bit. It didn't seem deliberate on my part; I assumed it was typical. When my father died, I became "the man of the house." Mother and I quickly regained the closeness we had had before; Mother seemed to really need me and I guess I was smart enough to step up. I was more than happy to play comforter and consoler, too. It seems dad had shut out everyone his last two years, including Mother. Unhappiness and confusion had made Mother shut down. In our many talks about it, I reasoned that rather than living every moment, dad had decided he was already dead since he was already older than his family's average. I vowed to myself and Mother that I would never repeat his mistake.

Every year, we had spent a week at a small cabin by a private lake in the woods. It was really just a pond, but we liked it. I swam, we went for walks in the woods, and just unwound. It was a fishing cabin belonging to one of dad's old co-workers, and when he passed on, his family continued to rent it out in the summer. I remember sitting on Mother's lap in the Adirondak chair when I was little. We continued going after father died. At least, we did until I left home after high school.

I'm ashamed to admit I wasn't the best in visiting Mother over the next four years, only seeing her for two Christmases, but we did talk regularly on the phone. When I graduated, Mother came to the ceremony. I realized she hadn't changed a bit since I left home! Didn't she age at all? We decided to go back to the pond—if the old owners still had it and still lived at the number Mother had—as I had a couple of weeks before I started my new job.

***

I went back to the old town with Mother, and we spent a couple days getting ready. The old phone number was still good, and they were happy to hear from Mother again. So we bought provisions, packed up her car, and headed into the hills.

Two days later, I was sitting in the big Adirondak chair with my legs apart while Mother sat between them. She lay back against my chest with her head on my shoulder while I wrapped my arms around her stomach and my back settled into the cushion. It felt a little strange, like roles had been reversed, but I liked it. I liked holding this beautiful woman that was my Mother.

"So, are you still seeing Susan? That was her name, wasn't it?"

"No. I decided she wasn't what I needed. Short term or long. What about you? Have you been dating?"

"Are you kidding? Who would want to date me?" It was the response I'd heard every time we had talked on the phone, but seeing her now I couldn't drop it anymore. Knowing her, and looking at her from a new perspective, I just had to stop her from putting herself down.

"Get real, Mother! You're still gorgeous, you're intelligent, have a great sense of humor... If I had a shot, I'd date you even though you ARE my Mother. Rules of society be damned!"

"That's nice of you to say, sweetie, but you're just being nice."

"I'm serious! Have you never noticed the way men look at you?"

"No."

"I've been watching; they lust after you. Anyone that's hit puberty and isn't gay. I've watched women following you with their eyes. At my grad ceremony, half the guys there were drooling over you, and some of the women."

"But I'm 45!"

"So? You've still got a firm, fit body. I never really noticed before because you always wore a sweatshirt and jeans or a sweater and slacks during my Christmas visits, but when you showed up for my convocation, you looked fabulous! Judging by Grandma's photos, you always will. And you KNOW you're smart, and you're always laughing. You're everything a sane man wants in his partner. You're certainly everything I want in a woman! You're every man's wet dream. I'm telling you, if you want proof I'll give it to you. Say the word and I'll carry you to the bedroom and give you a night you'll never forget!"

I was worried I'd stepped over the line with my blatant sexual offer, but if I had Mother didn't show it. With a big exhalation, she settled back against me like a person settling into a blanket. We fell silent after that, but sat together for another hour in the big old chair. Just watching the world go by. Mother seemed disappointed when she finally got up and said she'd better start making the salad for supper.

The next day, Mother went in to town to get fresh groceries and 'window shop.' I decided to finally go for my first swim of the holiday, but one look at my trunks told me that wasn't happening. Not with them. They had not held up well being in a drawer for four years—I must have put them away still damp. "Fuck it. I'm on my own out here." I stripped, grabbed a towel, and went skinny-dipping. After half an hour, I was treading water watching a loon at the far shore, when I felt someone stroke my cock a couple times.

"What have we here? Someone being naughty?"

After I climbed back into my skin, I turned around. "Don't start something you aren't willing to finish!"

But Mother was gone again. I looked around, but didn't see her. Suddenly, my cock was engulfed in a mouth as hands grabbed my ass to hold me steady. After a few moments of playing with my cock with her tongue, Mother surfaced in front of me laughing. "Forget your trunks?"

"They're dead. I went without."

She quickly swan to the narrow dock and got out of the water. As she sat on the dock with her legs in the water, she winked at me. "I saw them on your bed. I decided to go 'au naturel' as well."

I swam up to her, pushed her legs apart, and dove in. I ate her to two screaming orgasms before I realized I was getting cool. "Move back a bit."

As she scooted back two feet, I lifted myself out of the water. When I kneeled on the dock, Mother hooked her feet on either side of me and pulled me forward and down. She grabbed my still-hard cock and, as she aimed it for her love tunnel, she wrapped her legs around me.

As I started pumping, she smiled up at me. "You got two things wrong. After our talk yesterday, I was eager, not just willing. And, if you like this as much as I do, nobody has to 'finish' anything."

"I love you, Mother!"

"And I love you, son. Now fuck me, and then you said something about carrying me to the bedroom, I think?"

So I did. Other than taking a break for supper, we fucked and made love late into the night.

The next morning, I woke up shortly before Mother. I watched her sleeping with a smile on her face. As she slowly awoke, she blinked her eyes a couple times and then looked at me with a neutral expression. As she saw me looking at her with my eyes full of love, she smiled.

"Any regrets?"

"Other than hoping I haven't set up my son for decades of therapy, no. You?"

"None. Remember when I said that I broke it off with Susan because she wasn't what I needed in my life? I've realized that what I do need is someone like you. I was thinking about it while watching you sleep just now, and that's exactly it. It's quite a revelation for me. But that's the truth."

"My sweet boy, that's so nice of you to say!"

"Well, I mean it. You're the perfect woman for me. In every way imaginable."

"Sexually too? I am old enough to be your mother...."

"Sexually, too. Maybe partly because you are my mother. A beautiful MILF."

"Mmmm. This is going to be the best vacation ever! If I don't wear you out, that is. Hmmm. Maybe even if I do..."

***

"We've been fucking for a week now. You CAN call me 'Marie' you know."

"And I will. Especially when we're in public. But 'Mother' is how I show my love, respect, and reverence for you."

"Why do you always know the right thing to say?"

"Because we were made for each other. We're soul mates."

***

"Mother, we have a problem." We were sitting in the big Adirondak.

"What might that be?"

"I don't want this to be a 'flash in the pan,' or something that just happens a couple times a year when we visit. I want this permanent. Long term. Always."

She squeezed my arms around her. "Oh, son, I'm so glad to hear you say that! So, what's the problem?"

"You know there's nothing for me at home. My future is in Berkeley."

"Yes, I know. But that isn't a problem. You're right—I need a new challenge. You've been saying it for over a year now, and I've been thinking lately you're right. Now that things have changed between us, I've made up my mind. Find us a house, and I'll sell and move up with you."

"Are you for real? Seriously? You aren't doing this just to make me happy, are you?"

"Yes I am, and no I'm not. I've been giving this a lot of thought in the past two months, and I think it's the right choice for me. Us living together is a bonus I couldn't have even dreamed of before."

"'Living together?' As a couple? Or as mother and son?"

"As a couple, of course. One bed, one bath, one whatever. If you want, of course."

"Oh, Mother! I love you so much!"

"I love you too, son. And I trust you to find us a place I'll like. A new home for the two of us."

"Where we can live as husband and wife?"

"Mmm. I like the sound of that. Yes, 'husband and wife.' I hope I can sell the old place quickly, husband."

"I do too, my lovely wife! You've just made me the happiest man alive. My Mother and my wife, the best woman I could ever wish for."

***

Within two months, we were in our new home, I was settled in my new job, and Mother had started a new job at the university. Mother had taken my comments to heart, and had paid attention to how people looked at her. Her sweaters and slacks did not make the move. Neither did any but her tightest jeans, and a few sweatshirts for "grubby work". I was quickly taken shopping to help her pick out garter belts and stay-ups. She had decided pantyhose weren't appropriate for living with her lover. I was ecstatic. She taught me how to dress better too. While we weren't fashion plates, we dressed well. I loved it, and I constantly showed Mother just how much and what she meant to me.

We could not have been happier. We became real partners in life. Mother made it immediately clear that we needed to be complete equals. I agreed. While we still used 'Mother' and 'son,' they were terms of love and respect. Any implication of parent and child or relative authority were gone. We shared every task of running a household as total equals.

She found a new, more challenging yoga program that kept her slim, fit and flexible. She always looked incredible! We got wedding bands, which kept most men from actually hitting on her when she was on her own.

And through it all, we fucked each others' brains out for hours. We spent days making tender love. We spent a lifetime snuggling and just holding each other. And we talked. We talked about everything. No other woman on the planet could have been such an equal life partner. I once said this to Mother, bringing on a long bout of crying. She had thought the same; I guess sometimes guys can say just the right thing. If there was something more than 'soul mates,' we were it.

And every summer, we spent two weeks at the cabin by the pond. We never took swim suits and we never cared what the weather was like.

***

One day, I spied a book of photographs called "Underwater Love." After a quick look through it, I knew I had to get it. When I got home with it, Mother was a little disappointed. "Am I no longer enough for you?"

"Of course you are. It's because of my love for you that I got it. Here, sit down on the couch with me."

As we flipped the pages slowly, she got more and more excited. "Some of these pictures are like they're from a typical holiday at the pond for us!"

"Exactly! This could be us!"

"How much does an underwater camera cost? I'd love pictures of us like this in the bedroom."

"So would I. Let me look into it."

I found a camera with a remote trigger, and built a mount for a dock pylon. The next summer, we took dozens of shots of us in the lake. We copied some of the positions in the book as well as doing our own compositions, and framed the best ones for the bedroom wall. We did this every year after that, the clarity of the water making the pictures beautiful. The images are all in our favorite photo album. One of the permanent wall pictures is of me ejaculating into the water, Mother's smiling face inches from the ropes of sperm.

***

Mother had a heart attack and died when she was 72. I think our love kept me going a little longer than average for my dad's family, but two months after Mother died, I followed. I think my heart held out just long enough to deal with all of Mother's final wishes. But I'm not afraid of what comes next. You see, Mother is standing 100 yards down the path, smiling with her hand held out to me. She is waiting for me in a light summer dress with the light behind her, looking like she did 35 years ago. But as in love with me as that first summer on the pond.