A Bottle of Wine

The absolutely splitting headache came first. It was quickly followed by the intensely-bright early morning light. The gummy eyes. The unresponsive limbs. The horrible taste on the inside of my mouth and the stickiness on the outside. I was… in a bed. It was soft and it was comfortable but it wasn’t mine. The bed. The furniture, the pictures around the room. None of it was mine. Not my bed. Not my room.

God, my head hurt.

I was having such a hard time thinking straight. Everything hurt, not just my head, but that was definitely number one on the list. I couldn’t remember where I was, how I’d gotten here. Why did everything look so familiar? This wasn’t my stuff. So why did I recognize it?

Think, Justin. Retrace your steps. What do you remember?

The weekend. It had been the weekend. Yes. Ssssssunday night? Yeah, that sounded right. Something about… a special occasion? Not a happy one, but… not a normal night, either.

Mom. I remembered it had something to do with Mom. C’mon, Justin, you can do this. Christ, what was wrong with me? Was I sick? Concentrate. Mom. Not… not a birthday. It was…

A low moan, and definitely in a female voice, came from my immediate left.

I froze. Oh, shit. Shit shit shit. What the hell was going on? What had I gotten myself into?

Moving my head as little as possible, I turned – slowly, so slowly, gotta be quiet, gotta find out what’s going on – towards the sound.

I was in a big bed. A big bed that wasn’t mine. And there was someone else in it beside me. Covered with a blanket, couldn’t see who it was. Had to be a woman; men don’t have curves like that. And they were really good curves; she was on her side, facing away from me, and my eyes – shit, they were so dry and itchy! – couldn’t help but follow the intriguing shape… down the slope of her side, into the valley of her waist, and then back up again over that nice round hip. She must have one nice ass. Wonder if they matched the legs. Or the tits.

What the fuck happened last night?

Where was I? Who was this? My cock was responding to the sight of a woman’s body and giving me a big helping of morning wood. And I could feel by the way it moved so freely about that I wasn’t wearing anything underneath the covers. I was naked. Oh, shit, I was naked in a bed that wasn’t mine but that looked disturbingly familiar next to a woman who might or might not also be naked. Possible naked woman beside me. Yeah, I’ll bet she’s not not helping! I didn’t even know who this woman was. All I could see was her hair.

Long, blonde hair, with a natural curl to it. Slightly frizzy. I knew that hair. Just as I knew this bedspread, that dresser, and those pictures on the wall.

Goddamn it, think, Justin!

Fuck, my head.

My throat burned. I tried to swallow and found my mouth was too dry; when I opened it to smack my lips and move my tongue around, the foul taste left there magnified instantly. I made a face, tried not to breathe in. Jesus, what was that? Sour… burning…

WINE.

I remembered! Wine. I’d had wine last night. Mom had given it to me. Said… I was only sixteen but she said it was okay as long as I was doing it with her. She… didn’t want to be the only one. Wanted someone to drink with her. I was the only one. The only one. Her friends were busy. She wasn’t seeing anyone. She never saw anyone. Hadn’t, ever since…

The woman beside me moaned again, and stirred, and her foot slid under the sheets until it met my leg, and I lost my train of thought. She was naked under there. I knew she was. She had to be. Was she sexy? I bet she was sexy. Fuck, who cared, she was naked!

Naked. I was naked, too. Did… did we…?

Oh man. We must have.

That wasn’t my girlfriend.

I winced, as I realized that I didn’t immediately recognize that hair or that body, but they certainly didn’t belong to Rachel. Sweet, shy, skinny Rachel, with the chin-length brown hair that she peered through with those piercing green eyes. Rachel, who I’d been seeing for almost two years. Who I’d had quiet, rushed sex with only a few times while parents were away and none the wiser. I was naked, in a big bed that wasn’t mine, hung over from wine, with a probably-naked woman beside me that wasn’t my girlfriend. Fuck. I was in such deep shit. FuckfuckfuckfuckFUCK.

What the fuck happened last night?


I swung my legs down to the floor and sat up, and immediately regretted it. I clutched blindly at the headboard, holding myself up as the room swan. The blankets had come away from me, and I looked down at myself to confirm what I’d already known – I was indeed naked. Any my cock, my treacherous, traitorous cock, was proudly swollen at almost-full attention.

Goddamn it.

I heard the woman in the bed groan once more, louder and deeper, and I felt her roll over. I didn’t look back at her; couldn’t. Jesus, I’d just had sex – probably – with another woman. And I didn’t remember a thing. That somehow made it worse. Rachel was going to kill me. I’d have to tell her. I couldn’t keep a thing like this from her. I’d just have to man up and admit that I’d gotten drunk and slept with…

With…

Who?

I tried to remember. Tried hard. I definitely remembered Mom, and the wine. I definitely remembered losing clothes. I was getting flashes here and there of that. How had I gone from one to the other? Where had I gone, where was I now? Her hand reaching for my cock, ooooo, yeah, I remembered that.. Remembered her panties dropping out of her skirt, and then her spreading her legs so I could see her pussy. Oh, man. Now that I remembered it the image was burned into my memory. I seemed to recall telling myself to memorize it, because I might not ever get the chance again.

More and more images were coming, now, faster and faster. Like I’d held a box of puzzle pieces, and had slowly been tipping it. At first just a few had fallen out, here and there, but now gravity was taking hold, and they were all tumbling out. I snatched at them as they fell, tried like mad to fit them all together. I remembered ducking my head under her skirt to nuzzle her bush and taste her pussy. Her back, as she knelt on all fours, rocking back and forth as I took her from behind. Mom, now, looking up at me from the couch with her wineglass in hand, as I stood with one foot up on the coffee table, shouting to the ceiling about… something. The woman, pressing me up against a wall and nibbling at my collarbones. My discarded left shoe. Taking a swig directly from the nearly-empty wine bottle. Walking. Yes, walking! I told myself to concentrate on that. I was with Mom, drinking wine. Somehow, I’d ended up here. Focus. Where was here? Walking. Stairs. Discarded clothing, bare skin, shouts in the lamplight. Jesus, we really did have sex. Kisses and hands on my bare hips.

Eyes.

Eyes looking up at me, smoldering with lust, from beneath that blonde, frizzy hair. Eyes that moved. Because her face, her whole head was moving. Bobbing. Back and forth. Because her mouth was around my dick. Because she was giving me oral sex. A mouth, a face, eyes, hair, that I remembered, I knew. I knew that face. That body. Just like I knew this bedspread, that dresser, that picture, this carpet, this room, that face…

Oh, God.

I felt a hand, warm from beneath the covers, settle lightly on the back of my hip. I heard a smile on playful lips as the woman in bed with me spoke. “Good morning, Justin.”

I turned, slowly, terrified at what I knew I’d see, but unable to stop myself. I turned, slowly, and settled my eyes into the ones I remembered from last night.

The eyes of my mother.

————————————————————————————————————

“Oh God,” I said. “Oh God oh God oh God oh God…”

“Justin,” said Mom, “Justin, honey, calm down, it’s okay…”

“Okay??” I nearly screamed. “How is it okay! I just…” I started breathing faster and faster. “I just… I just… I just had…”

“Sex?” Mom finished. “With your mother?”

“Oh God,” I groaned, bending over with my head in my hands.

“Justin,” she said, scooting closer and putting her hands on my shoulders, “sweetie, listen to me. Try to calm down. Do you remember what happened last night?”

“No!” I cried without sitting up. “I don’t remember anything! Just… bits and pieces!”

“Okay. It’s okay, sweetie,” she soothed. “Just breathe. Calm down. It’s not the end of the world.”

My eyes flew open. “Not the end of the…!” I stopped. Forced myself to take a deep breath, and release it slowly. Then a second. I sat up, and twisted back around to look at my mom, lying behind me with concern in her eyes. “Tell me what happened. How on Earth did we end up…” I couldn’t finish the sentence.

Mom smiled a little smile; it seemed she was a little embarrassed about it, too. “Well… do you remember what night it was?”

I tried to think. It had been hard with just the headache; now, I was fighting a headache and the knowledge that I had slept with my own mom. “Some sort of… occasion. That’s why we were drinking. You were sad. Didn’t want to be alone.”

“It was the, um, anniversary,” she said quietly, her gaze dropping.

Oh. Oh, of course. Now I remembered. Mom hadn’t wanted to drink alone. Her friends were busy and she hadn’t been seeing anyone… not since Dad left. Oh, Jeez, it was all coming back. Last night was the anniversary of the last time she’d seen him. Eight years ago, he’d just up and left. No warning, no signs, no note, no goodbye, no explanation. He’d just taken a few hundred dollars out of their shared bank account and we’d never seen him again.

Mom hated to be alone on that night. Sometimes she was sad. Sometimes, angry. Once or twice, happy – but not really; sort of a forced happy. She’d say things like “I’m glad he’s gone,” but with tears in her eyes. Last night had been one of the sad nights.

“You opened a bottle of wine but didn’t want to drink alone,” I said, in a daze. “I wasn’t sure, but you said it was all right.”

Mom nodded. “We drank the entire bottle.”

“By ourselves?” Shit. I didn’t know much about alcohol, but that seemed like kind of a lot for just two people. Had we eaten anything? I didn’t think so. Nothing to help mitigate the alcohol. Half a bottle of wine. Jesus.

Mom nodded again, this time with a wry expression. “Yeah. We… got pretty drunk.”

I glanced significantly at the blanket covering her, and at my own lack of clothes. “You think so?”

She ignored it. “Do you remember what happened then? As we were drinking?”

“We… talked. But I don’t remember what about.” I shook my head. “It all gets kind of fuzzy from there. I just remember…” I swallowed, felt myself blushing at the fragments of memory, and cleared my throat. “Bits and pieces,” I repeated.

“Okay,” Mom said, “well, let me tell you what happened.” She sat up against the headboard, modestly keeping the blankets pressed close to her chest. “Yes, we were talking. We talked about all sorts of things. The conversation eventually came around to you and Rachel.”

Uh oh, I thought.

“I asked if you two were… well, I said ‘intimate’ at first but after you were reluctant to answer, I eventually told you that you wouldn’t get in trouble, all I wanted was a straight answer, were the two of you sexually active. You said yes. I asked… I asked if it was good. If you liked it. If she liked it.”

She paused. “And?” I pressed, apprehensive.

Mom sighed. “You said that you liked it. But you didn’t know if she did or not. I told you… I told you that of course she did. That you’re so handsome, and so sweet, that of course she liked it.”

I dreaded asking, but I had to know. “And then what?”

Mom smiled, a little self-consciously. “Well, things get a little fuzzy for me, too, there. Somehow we got on the topic of… um… our…” She cleared her throat, tried again. “On the topic of our… parts.”

“Our parts?”

“Well. Mostly yours. I… was curious.”

I didn’t like where this was headed. “You asked about… my…?”

Mom nodded “You’d had a bit to drink by then, too,” she said, almost defensively.