Chapter 9

When he finally got home from work he knew he would find his mother in the living room parked on the sofa watching Entertainment Tonight or Hard Copy as she did every night. He bundled the package inside his blue ski jacket and zipped it up before he entered the house. It was one thing to try sneaking in something legitimate into the house when his mother was in the living room, but to try bringing in what Charley had bundled into his jacket would only serve to set mother off. The trick was to enter the house, close the door quickly, bid mother a quick hello-how-are-you while heading toward the hallway. It was a routine they went through at least a once a week.

Charley entered the house just as he did nearly ten thousand other times in his life.

Mother was seated on the living room sofa, the TV tuned to the Channel 2 News. She looked up at him as he closed the door behind him. “Hello, Charley,” she said. “How was your day today?"

“Fine, mother,” Charley said, already heading toward the hall that led toward his bedroom. “How was yours?"

“Humph!” She sniffed, drawing into her robe. Her gray hair was tied in a bun, long wisps sticking out of her head as if it was unbrushed. “Same as always. That damned When Fan Fong, or whatever the hell that gook's name is that lives next door, is up to his old tricks again."

“Really?” Charley had reached the entrance to the hallway and stood there to engage in this bit of conversation with his mother. That way she wouldn't feel he was brushing her off totally. “How so?” Nyguen Phan Houng was a Vietnamese immigrant who had been living in the neighborhood for over twenty years. He was retired and his favorite hobby was repairing electronic equipment; everything from stereos, to transistor radios. “Up to his old tricks again” probably meant he was working on an old radio and mother couldn't stand the sound of the static coming out of it as Nyguen fiddled with it.

“He's screwing around with those radios again,” mother complained. “Making an awful racket. Damn near kept me awake from my afternoon nap."

“Well, I'm sure he won't do it anymore."

“I've heard that before,” she huffed.

Now it was time to beat a hasty retreat. “Well, I'm going to go to my room and change. Is there anything you need before I turn in for the day?"

Mother appeared to think it over, then waved a hand at him. She picked up the remote control of the TV and began flipping through the channels. “No. Go do whatever the hell it is you do in there. I don't even want to know anymore.” She turned to the TV, her attention fixed glassy-eyed on it. Charley was dismissed.

Charley turned and headed toward the room at the end of the hallway. He opened the door with a key and went in, closing it softly behind him. He was hot beneath the ski jacket and his blood pounded in his veins. Go do whatever the hell it is you do in there. I don't even want to know anymore. Like you always wanted to know what I was doing every goddamned day of my life. Like you know that statement is bullshit because whenever I do try to live my life as an adult, you give me the third degree. You've always disapproved of everything I did anyway. What makes you think you'll stop now?

He unzipped his jacket and set the package from the liquor store down on the end table by the couch. His living quarters were fairly large, resembling a small apartment consisting of the back three rooms of the small house he shared with his mother. His living space was essentially two bedrooms that connected with a common bathroom. The first bedroom he had converted into his main living area; it was about five hundred square feet, one side consisting of a makeshift living room, the other as his bedroom. Beyond the bathroom lay another room that he used mainly as a work-room. In the far corner of the main living area he had a small refrigerator. The wall closest to the door was lined with bookshelves and an entertainment center of which the main feature was the wide screen TV. A small futon sofa sat against the wall across from the TV, along with a small end table. A single bed flanked one wall, while at the other end of the room there was a slight dip to the right, which led to a walk-in closet and the bathroom. The room was more home to Charley than the rest of the house was.

He hung his jacket up in the closet, took his tennis shoes off, and went into the bathroom to wash his hands. When he was done he dried them with a white towel and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked the same as he did ten years ago; he was of above-average height, about six foot one. His brown hair was wavy, slightly balding along the top, and cut short along the back and sides. He had a narrow, pinched face; the kids at school used to call him sphincter face. He wore glasses with very thick lenses and wide frames, which actually improved his looks. His body was typical of a lot of guys in his age group—at forty years old, Charley had a healthy spare tire around his mid-section, and he definitely had a second chin but he hadn't gained much fat in other areas of his body. He supposed a regular regimen of exercise would trim inches off the spare tire and the chin, but he had neither the time, nor the patience, for such mentally unstimulating tasks. He'd much rather be at home reading a book or watching a movie.

Charley moved to the bedroom and began to undress. He threw his shirt, a red and blue plaid long sleeve, on the sofa, then pulled the white T-shirt he wore beneath it over his head. He slipped his jeans down his legs and stepped out of them, shucking his boxers as well. Wearing only a pair of white gym socks, he stepped toward the end table where he had set the package on the TV and took out his purchase.

It was two video-tapes and a bottle of Dr. Pepper. He opened the Dr. Pepper and took a healthy swig. He belched. That hit the spot. Looking forward to the evening's activities, he turned his attention to the video-tapes.

Both videos were geared toward his particular fetish: the first was called Big Boob Bonanza, and claimed to feature over two hours of women with Double D breasts or over engaged in all manner of physically challenging activities. The second was called Tie Me Down, and the title was enough to clue the potential viewer as to the activities chronicled within. He picked the latter box up and began stroking his member, which had retreated into his groin during his brief confrontation with mother. The cover showed a brunette with large breasts—they always had to have large breasts because that's what he liked in a woman—with her hands tied behind her back, lying on her stomach, ass sticking daintily in the air. She was dressed in black leather bondage gear and a black studded collar. She was gagged and blindfolded. A faceless man was drilling her from behind, and from the expression on her face her male partner was quite large. This looked like one of the good ones.

He turned the TV and VCR on with a few clicks of the remote control.

Inserted the tape in the VCR.

Sat down on the sofa, Dr. Pepper within easy reach, along with the small box of Kleenex and a squeeze bottle of lotion.

The tape started.

Charley's breathing quickened.

He squirted lotion into his palm.

And delved into his fantasy.

Charley was just on the verge of reaching orgasm when his mother began to call for him, shattering the illusion.

“Charley!” Faint, but insistent.

He stopped stroking himself, reached for the remote control, and turned the tape off. He pressed the mute button on the remote control and listened, irritated that his reverie had been shattered.

“Charley! Where are you?” He recognized the tone of voice. She was using her Sick Voice. Mother was taking pills for a wide variety of ailments and it never failed her to lapse into a semblance of illness whenever she wanted attention. Charley, would you please put my legs up on the sofa? Charley, will you get me my magazine? Charley, will you get me glass of ginger-ale? She always claimed that she was getting one of her sick spells, which was why she couldn't do these simple tasks herself. In reality she was really fine. Charley knew women who were twenty years older than mother who were in better health than he was. Mother wasn't sick at all; years ago, her doctor told him that mother's ailments were all in her head. “Humor her,” he'd told Charley one time when he had taken her to the doctor. “She's perfectly healthy but she just wants attention."

He had humored her for awhile, still did at times. But his patience with her when it came to her resorting to her “sick voice” was beginning to wear thin on him. When she first started pulling this on him he would oblige her, getting her drinks of ginger-ale, making runs to the store, whatever she wanted. What she really wanted was to nag at him, ask him the same questions: what are you doing with your life, Charley? Why haven't you met a nice girl that you could bring home? Have you been going to Church like you're supposed to? What kind of friends do you have? What do you do when you go out with them? You know I don't like you going out with people I don't approve of. Yadda yadda yadda.

The answers to the questions were simple. I'm working a stupid, boring fucking job at a giant conglomerate corporation to supplement your social security so we can pay the bills. The reason I haven't met a nice girl to bring home is because women think I'm repulsive, no thanks to you and the way you raised me. The only reason I go to church is to take you and when you don't ask to go, I don't go. I have nice friends, and what I do with them when I go out with them is none of your fucking business.

Oh, and as for that last comment, that's the reason why I stopped bringing my friends to the house. If I brought Mother Theresa home for lunch you wouldn't approve of her. You bitch.

The truth was, his mother had controlled Charley's life for as long as he remembered. Telling him what to wear, what to eat, what to watch on TV, what to think.

While on the one hand she would encourage him to meet new people, make friends, bring them home anytime he wanted, the reality was that when he did she always disapproved of them. He had four or five friends from work who were all movie buffs and book worms like himself; they got together every other Friday evening at somebody's house to watch old movies and shoot the shit. Sometimes they went on book hunting expeditions.

Most of the guys were bachelors, save for one. The few times the guys had come to the house to watch movies, mother had carped and complained about them for two weeks straight. “I don't like them,” she had muttered. “One of them has hair down to his ass and is covered with tattoos and looks like a devil-worshipping biker, the other two are fat slobs, one is so skinny he looks like he's going to keel over dead any minute. He must either have AIDS or is on drugs. And the other one wouldn't talk to me at all, that wavy-haired fellow with the glasses. I knew he was laughing at me the whole time you were watching that godawful movie; I could tell by that smirk of his. He must be a pervert because he's the one that brought that filth into the house for you to watch. I don't like them, Charley. I think you could pick much better company for you to—"

And it had gone on until he stopped inviting the group to his house for Friday Night movies. Now he went to their homes, but mother knew he was still socializing with them. She still disapproved.

“Charley!” her voice whined again from the living room. Charley raised the remote control and turned the channel to MTV. Billy Corgan screamed that he was just a rat in a cage. He turned the volume up just as mother let loose another pleading

“Chaaarrrllleeeyyy!"

Shut the fuck up!

He couldn't even live a normal adult life around his mother. At forty years old and self-sufficient, he not only made enough money to pay the mortgage on the house and the utilities and groceries, but he had more than enough left over to splurge on gifts for himself and mother. It hadn't always been like that. For awhile, he had to work two jobs to help out. His brother, John, helped out financially when he was able. Two years ago he and John had refurbished the detached guest house that had been built onto the garage that fed into the alley. John had found a tenant to rent the place, all under the table money, and that had really helped a lot. Mother hadn't seemed to mind—after all, it was extra money, and besides, they hardly ever saw the tenant, a young woman that John assured mother he'd met at church. Charley rarely saw her, but the monthly rent money was always there, on time, in an envelope tucked behind the screen door that led to the rear of the property. It was extra money that went a long way, especially when Charley got that promotion at work.

Now that he was making better money, he spent it on gifts for he and mother.

Mother usually offered no resistance when he came home with something for her—a new book, a bouquet of flowers, one time a new TV to replace the twenty-four inch Minolta that had finally burnt out. But when it came to buying items for himself that he wanted, she gave him the third degree. “Why do you need a TV that's so big? That's too big. You don't need a TV like that! Who has TV's that big? You surely don't need one,” or “why are you buying a computer? You don't need a computer. You're just wasting your money, throwing it down the drain,” or “why did you buy a pickup truck with a campershell in the back? Why not just buy a little economy car like an Escort or something? That's a lot of money for a young man like you to spend on a car."

It's my fucking money, mother!

He turned the volume back down and listened. Nothing from the living room.

Maybe she had gotten tired. He pressed the PLAY button on the VCR and the movie started back up again, stimulating him back into lust. He was just getting back into working himself back into hardness when she started again.

“Charley! Charley, what are you doing in there?"

Trying to jack off in peace, mother, since I can't get laid like normal guys. You want to know why I haven't met a nice girl, mom? Because you've made me afraid of them! First always carping at me to never think impure thoughts or I would go to hell, or to never masturbate because I'll go to hell, or to stay away from the tramps at school because they would lead me to sin—and your definition of tramps fit pretty much every woman of child bearing age—to asking why I'm not dating, or how come I don't have girlfriends. Why the fuck do you think I don't have any? The images you gave me about sex when I was growing up, and women in general, weren't very good to begin with despite my interest in members of the opposite sex, and combined with my nerdish appearance and shyness made me not very attractive to women. I wish I could be like other guys and have a girlfriend, but frankly it's not going to happen. If you hadn't been such an overprotective, overbearing bitch when you were raising me, I could have been happy with a nice woman. I know I will never be able to have that. And that's why I have to relieve myself this way, with the tapes. Because it's the closest I can come to being with a real woman.

Oh, but there were other ways ... there were always other ways.

“Chaaarrrllleeeyyyyy!"

“Shut up,” he muttered. He turned the volume up on the television, the panting sounds of passion rising from the speakers. “Just shut up, shut up, shut up."

She called out to him a few more times, punctuating her cries of “Charley!” with

“What are you doing in there? Why don't you answer me? Are you playing with yourself again? I thought I told you that you were to never do that to yourself, your body's a temple of the Lord and—"

He drowned out her litany by turning the volume up louder. Now the sounds of the pornographic tape drowned out her voice, cradling him back in the cocoon of his fantasy. He got up off the couch and crossed over to the door of his bedroom to double-check that it was locked; it was. Then he went back to the couch and knelt in front of it.

He squirted another dollop of lotion into the palm of his right hand, and ignoring the fact that his mother might very well now be calling out to him louder, transported himself back into the fantasy unfolding on the screen.

...in his mind ... ?

His cock plunging into the woman on the screen.

The orgiastic cries of their passion fueling him on ... ?

As he reached climax with a shuddering moan.

He leaned back against the sofa, letting the tingles of his orgasm spread through his body, the scenario moving over to another scene, another couple, another position.

Charley smiled, feeling spent. He had all night to indulge in his fantasies.

Even in the ones that didn't involve the scenarios on the tapes.

And as Charley delved into his night of fulfilling his fantasy, he kept the sound of the television up to drown out the muffled sounds of his mother crying in the living room.