When I told my father I wanted to be a writer, he was in the middle of devouring a huge dish of spaghetti and meatballs. Usually he'd roll his eyes and shake his head -- usually, that is -- but this time he growled at me, and flung a large meatball at me across the long table. It hit me in this chest and then Mom lit into him, yelling about wasting food and did he know the price of food these days, and why didn't he give her more food money every week. I was in college ostensibly studying computer science.
That made my father proud because he had only a 6th grade education. I did not consider computers as scientific and told my father in simple English -- that the average man could understand -- one's and zeroes were like pissing in the wind. Writers could not easily find work at that time, and my father felt anyone without a job was a bum.
My father was a cabinet maker, and made beautiful furniture. He was usually slow to anger. Dad worked with his hands. He had beautiful hands. Women can tell a lot about a man by his hands. Most important, he was not given to hysteria. That was mom's job.
Mom was a curvy woman, with an ample bosom. I never saw my father actually hug my mom, but once at Christmas he did give her a smooch. I don't remember why, but my sister was born nine months later. Mom was of medium height, with a creamy complexion, and child bearing hips and she designed her own clothes. She had taken a course in fashion design and created dresses designed for the mature woman. A busty woman.
Our family wasn't into romance and shit like that. We lived just outside of Boston, and Mom was always screaming at Dad about money and calling him a momma's boy and then he'd take off and go to see his mother. The drive was about 30 miles to Lawrence, and he'd ask me if I wanted to go for a ride. Usually I went along, because I knew Mom would be on a crying jag, and needed to be by herself. Being only nineteen at that time, I knew next to nothing about how a woman feels when she's crying and how she gets wet between the legs.
It was during those rides with my father in his old Pontiac that I could talk to him about what men usually talk about. Besides, he needed two hands on the steering wheel and he wasn't about to slug me. Since Mom never came with us to visit Dad's mother, it was a good time to satisfy my curiosity.
"Hey, Dad, how did you meet Mom?"
"Why do you want to know that?"
"Well, you two seem to be a mismatch ... you're always fighting."
"Junior, you don't know the half of it ..." His nose was running because he was coming down with cold. "Your mother is a very passionate woman. And you know the old saying, 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'."
I laughed, uneasily. "Yeah? Like how?"
"Your mother needs to get laid -- excuse the expression -- every day, and twice on Sunday."
"Jeez", I countered, "She doesn't seem --"
"When you get older you'll know what I mean." He went on. "When I first saw your mother, she was only a kid. Our families knew each other back in the old country. When I first took her out on a date, she was 22. I was 25."
"What did she look like?"
"Well ... she was slim, medium height, with long hair, that she tied up in a bun. It was the style back then."
"I bet she was very pretty ..."
"She was. Kinda shy, you know, because in those days a girl needed to be chaperoned."
"Oh, that's too bad ..."
"I didn't own a car, so I had to take the train and then a bus ... but she was worth it."
"Yeah?" I kept my eyes on his hands.
"We went for walks, and the chaperone would look the other way, and we'd hold hands and she could tell I really liked her."
I was all ears.
"It wasn't until our third date she let me feel her up ... you know, grab her tit. She had nice tits. Big tits!"
My breathing got erratic. I could visualize mom's tits because they were fodder for my wanking sessions at night.
"I don't want to disrespect your mother, but she was hot ..."
I listened.
"Yeah ... she was hot. She was not shy about that stuff ... she grabbed my dick on our fourth date, and told me to take it out. "
I knew my father was well hung.
"Well, I had to make sure Paulina -- the chaperone -- wasn't looking and she wasn't. She was pretending to fix her stockings. In those days women wore garter belts .."
"Yeah, Dad, go on ..."
"Well, she liked the foreskin, and she'd slowly roll the foreskin up and down -- over my knob, and around and tug on it! She loved it!"
My father felt maybe he was telling me too much and he stopped talking. He sniffed and went on, " Junior, I didn't last long. I shot all over her arm and over the front of her white dress. Thank god, the dress was white ..."
"I bet you had a lot, huh, Dad?"
"You bet. By the second date I was going home with blue balls. You know about blue balls?"
"I think so, Dad. What's that?"
"Let me tell you. When you're real horny, and you don't get some relief. Your testicles hurt."
He wiped his nose with his sleeve. His hands were back on the wheel. "Today, you kids have sex early. You don't hear much about blue balls these days ..."
"How long did it take to get into her pants? I don't mean to be disrespectful ..."
"No problem, Junior. It wasn't long after the hand job that we finally did it. She practically begged me to do it to her ..."
"Wow! I would have liked to have seen that!"
"She's a Sagittarius, Junior. She's a fertile woman. It was barely nine months later, when you popped out!"
"So you got to see her naked?"
"Almost naked. She was wearing a cashmere sweater, and no bra. But from the waist down she was naked. She had a mole on her right hip ..."
I was almost panting, while Dad kept going.
"In those days women didn't shave their snatches. She had a lot of hair, dark brown hair, and it went all the way back to her ass. I love hairy women, Junior."
So do I, but I kept listening.
"She let me run my fingers through that hair ..." His eyes had a faraway look, and I could see he was back 20 years.
Before we knew it we were at my Grandmother's house.
Chapter 2
Mom was reading her Bible when I happened to glance into her bedroom. She wasn't terribly spiritual, but like most of us, when she needed comfort she liked to read the Psalms. She looked up when she heard me outside her door.
"Well, hi, Junior. Did you have a nice visit with your Grandmother?" She and Grandma did not get along.
"It was okay."
"What did you and your father talk about?"
I had to break into a sheepish smile when she asked me. Mom was like that, always wanting to know what was going on.
"We talked about how he met you ..."
"Oh?"
"He told me what you were like back then. Actually, I asked him to tell me."
"And what did he tell you? Did he tell you he almost raped me?"
"Not quite, Mom. He told me you begged him to do it ..."
"The sonofabitch ..."
