My Mother the Succubus
This was written for Literotica's
Literotica Halloween Story Contest 2024
. If you like the story, please consider rating it!
I'm afraid of my daughter.
I know it sounds bad. And believe me, it's not that I don't love her. I love her so much that it hurts every time I see her slink into the room, her eyes on the floor and a new strange book clutched against her chest.
Luna's always been a bit... different. As a kid, she loved ghost stories. Instead of wanting to go to the park like a normal kid, she'd beg me to take her to the local cemetery, or to one of the creepy abandoned houses on the edges of town. For her birthday, I'd buy her Halloween decorations instead of dolls and dresses. She loved plastic skeletons, tiny statuettes of devils, books that promised to teach her real magic. I was just happy to make her happy. I thought it was adorable. She had such a huge imagination. If she couldn't find something to scare herself with, she'd invent it, making up stories about the real ghosts who haunted our generic suburban house. And I loved playing along with her stories. When she got older, I took her on an actual ghost tour for her thirteenth birthday. She spent the entire next day hugging me, telling me over and over how lucky she was to have me as a mom, how much she loved me.
I think that might've been the happiest moment of my life.
But lately Luna's been acting really, really
off.
Up until the last year or so, the two of us were close. Closer than any of my friends are with their kids. She never had a moody phase, mostly because she was naturally a bit of a moody, macabre girl. Instead, I was pretty much her best friend for all of high school. She had trouble making friends with the other girls, since they all thought she was weird. But I was always there for her. It felt good, to be her partner in crime during her ghost hunting adventures, to listen to the stories she made up, to buy her things that made her happy, to try and watch scary movies with her on Friday nights, even though I'd always get scared and have to hide my eyes.
Ever since she turned eighteen, though, she won't even look at me. She stays out late and doesn't seem to sleep at all during the night. Every time she comes home, she brings another book. They're all the horror-movie kind: big leather tomes with old paper and gilded lettering. The kind of books you use to summon evil things.
And look. I don't share my daughter's belief in ghosts, or demons, or any of it. I don't think Luna's
really
going to summon Lucifer into our house. But if she's even
trying
to do something like that, then something must be wrong. Playing around with witchcraft is one thing. But she's spending so much time with her books that she doesn't even have time for me anymore.
I guess... I'm not really scared of her. I'm worried about her.
And I'm lonely. Selfishly, terribly lonely. Because even though I do have my little social group of other moms, none of them are Luna. I miss her.
Right now, I'm sitting on the couch in our living room, my hands folded in my lap. There's a glass of wine in front of me that I haven't touched. My heart is fluttering in my chest. It feels like being a teenager again, trying to subtly confess my feelings to my crush. But no, I'm just a sad middle-aged lady trying to relate to her daughter. My hair's still wet from a shower, and I'm dressed only in a loose robe and a pair of slippers.
It's past 10 at night. My eyelids are getting heavy. But I'm determined to wait up until Luna gets home.
As I'm thinking of her, I hear the sound of our garage opening. I sit upright, my throat suddenly tight. A moment later, the door opens and my daughter shuffles in.
She takes a few steps into the living room, sees me, and freezes. She's still wearing her school uniform, a plaid skirt, vest, and knee-high white socks. But it's disheveled, and it looks unwashed.
My poor Luna doesn't look very good. She's always been skinny; it's hard to get her to eat most of the time, poor thing. And spending so much time inside has left her ghostly pale. She and I have the same thick black hair. But I keep mine cut chin-length, and it's fastidiously neat at all times. Hers has grown out into a wild mane that spills down past her butt. It's lank right now, and greasy, a sure sign that she hasn't been showering lately. Her eyes are sunken in from lack of sleep, and there are dark bags under them from lack of sleep.
The second she sees me, she looks down at the floor. "H-hey, mom..."
"Hey, sweetie. Where were you?" I try not to sound confrontational. I'm just curious. Just
worried.
But Luna only shuffles past me. "Fine. Everything's fine. G-goodnight." She walks downstairs into the basement, where her room is.
She didn't even look at me!
Okay, no, I'm not scared of my daughter. I'm worried, yes, but I'm also starting to get a
little
bit mad. I spend all day thinking of her, and she ignores me!
I stomp over to the stairs, and I'm just about to go down there and yell at her when I realize that, no, that's obviously not going to go over well. I take a few calming breaths, leaning against the wall while I wait for my heart to settle back down.
"Easy, Tara," I mumble to myself. "Even if she's an adult, she's still a teenager. Let her work through things on her own. When she's ready, she'll talk to you again."
And it sounds so easy when I put it like that.
The thing for a mature adult woman to do
would
be to mind my own business and let my daughter reach out to me.
But even if I'm a mature adult, I'm still selfish. I still have needs. And my daughter is one of them.
I linger at the top of the stairs, agonizing over what to do. Eventually I walk back to the couch, pick up my glass of wine, and drain it in a few quick messy gulps. A little bit runs down my chin, and I wipe it with the back of my hand. The warmth of it spreads through me, making me feel a bit more daring.
I'll go downstairs and try to talk to her, I decide. I won't yell. I'll just ask if she's okay. That's a normal mom thing to do, right?
I head back to the stairs. The lights are all off in the basement. In spite of myself, I feel a lump forming in my throat. The air wafting up from down there feels unnaturally cold. But... there's no way she's
really
summoning ghosts, right? There's no such thing. But as I stare down into the basement's depths, I feel icy dread spreading through my chest.
I shake my head.
Get it together, Tara!
I take the first step. The stair creaks under my foot, making me wince. I creep the rest of the way down, terrified to make a sound. When I reach the basement, I push the door open and pad past the couch and the TV. Luna's door is at the far end of the room. It's cracked slightly, and I can see flickering candlelight coming from inside.
I scowl. She
knows
she's not supposed to bring real candles into her room. It's such a fire risk!
But I forget about the candles when I hear my daughter's voice. She's whispering something under her breath.
"Oh mistress of desire... queen of dark dreams... please grant me your presence..."
She's really trying to summon something!
I tiptoe right up to my daughter's door. And I can't help it. I peer inside.
My daughter is kneeling on the floor of her bedroom. And all of her clothing: her shoes, socks, uniform, and even her panties are piled haphazardly next to her. A ring of candles is set up on the floor in front of her, and their soft yellow light flows over Luna's slender pale body. It's... been a long time since I've seen her naked. My first thought is, wow, my Luna's way more of a beauty than she realizes.
