But as time passed, and I lay undisturbed in my bed, I began to wonder exactly why she had not reacted. Had she not noticed? Was she still asleep but with her eyes open? Was she waiting till the morning to chastise me? Why had she not simply exploded with anger and rage at seeing her own son lusting after her? Gradually I began to calm down and relax into sleep, and I have to confess (to my eternal shame) as my mind retreated into unconsciousness it’s last images returned to visions of mother lying there exposed in her underwear.
The next morning I remained in bed till the last possible moment. Eventually I had to had get up, and I admit I was terrified as I went into the kitchen and saw mother making some porridge.
“Morning,” she said in her normal, slightly disdainful, voice.
“Morning Mom,” I half whispered.
And that was it! No screaming or shouting. No anger, no telling-off, in fact no riposte of any kind. It was as if it never happened.
For the next few days I tried to act normal as possible. No close cuddling my mother, no visits to her underwear draw, and definitely no staying up late in the hope she would lie on the sofa and reveal something. Oddly though mother was still much more friendly and less abusive than usual. It was more as if I’d done something right and not something disgustingly wrong. That said, I counted myself lucky and had no intention of pushing my luck.
I guess it was about three or four days after the above events I noticed something unusual. My mother started wearing stockings all the time, not just when she went out. I knew they were stockings because they were seamed and they looked shear. I’d seen her wear these before but only on high days and holidays when she went visiting. Seeing her in them all the time was both unusual and (dangerously) provocative.
It started early one morning. I’d just got up and I remember her standing there in the kitchen doorway as I came round the corner. She was facing into the kitchen and bending over slightly and my eyes were drawn immediately to the perfectly straight seams down the back of her legs. Even with all my self-depreciation, and my stringent resolve never again to look at mother in a sexual way I was immediately hard at the sight. Slowly she stood up straight and continued whatever she was doing, and I just stood there imagining my way up her legs to the top of those seams. Then she turned suddenly around and looked at me and I’m sure I blushed bright red.
I hurriedly went on into the lounge, on the left before the kitchen, my eyes down on the ground. Again she said and did nothing out of the ordinary even though I was certain she’d seen me looking. I was sure her dressing up meant she must be going out somewhere but she didn’t. In fact she started to wear those wonderful seamed stockings every day as if it was totally normal. However as much as they fascinated and attracted me I kept my distance.
That’s not to say there were not strange thoughts and wishful suspicions wandering around in my head. Why the seamed stockings I kept asking myself? Was she wearing them for me? Had she seen what I liked and was she giving me some kind of adult ‘come-on’? Or was it just a coincidence and I was reading my own lustful desires into her actions?