The Other Amsterdam

Previously...

Incest Erotica Writer Julianne took her adult son to Amsterdam to celebrate the publication of his debut novel. After an intimate private conversation about sex and culture, she asks if he'd ever consider consensual sex with his own mother. One day later they are in bed together at a chateau in France enjoying the thrill of a lifetime.

This chapter takes place after they get back home to the new reality of what they've done and how it's affected them...

1

We returned home on the Sunday evening, tired and speechless. It wasn't for any sense of guilt or regret between us. We weren't sorry. We just hadn't fully accounted for what it would feel like to do what we had done and then to have to live with it, once again within the confines of normality.

Julianne, my mother, and now on top of that my one-time lover, was more than happy on the journey home. There was no shortage of fleeting, knowing, glances, and of flirtatious brushes here and there. But when we arrived back in England, something seemed different. We had left this place for a fantasy. Leaving the fantasy behind came with a slight depression, and a niggling feeling that nothing could ever be the same again.

And as we warmed up the house again, turned on the lights, dressed down, and settled into our usual routines, the gravity and the pure incredibility of our intimate experience in France also had to be left to settle.

Mum ran a bath and soaked alone with a book for a while, or at least that was what I was to believe. I trusted her no matter what and went about my own duties. I showered, dressed to lounge around, and fixed a simple supper of tomato soup with grilled cheese for the both of us when she came back down.

When she did, her eyes met mine, again knowingly and with a hint of daring mischief. The colour was high in her cheeks and I had to wonder if it was the heat of the bath, or something else. I pursed my lips to prevent from smirking, and unconvincingly, and we took our supper to the dining table to eat in relative silence. But, by God, I had wanted so badly to kiss her then. To let that opportunity lay waste hurt. I could only refuse my lovesickness, or at least hope to. And I knew that's exactly what it was.

'Well,' she started, when her bowl was empty. She sat back in her seat and fixed her gaze on me once again, but with a more sober eye. 'I could sleep for a week, but we'll be back to work tomorrow, I suppose.'

'Good and proper, I'm shattered,' I chatted along agreeably, not knowing what else to say. My eyes then fixed on the bookshelf across the dining room, by the patio door into the back garden. On that shelf were all of the fantasies my mother once wrote, and in those, the one that we had lived out until only a matter of hours ago.

I allowed myself a daydream to drift through, a series of memories still fresh in my mind really, remembering the both of us conjoined as lovers, lost in the heat of lovemaking, of glorious, hot, hard, pornographic sex. I fucked my mother, and I loved her equally, for all that I was worth, and I know that she gave as good as she got, too. To see hers and mine sliding together in the act of mating was the greatest experience, the greatest fantasy realised. It was the greatest mindfuck a man could hope for, were his mother as beautiful as mine.

And this was the comedown, left wondering if she felt the same way I did. I worried that if I went to her now and dared to cross that line, would she reject me?

"Live and think not," as Jocasta once said.

I could feel my eyes glaze over, and only on the periphery of my line of sight did I see her quietly get up out of her chair and disappear. And then she was sat warm in my lap, cradling my head against her shoulder, her soft lips pressed to my temple.

'You are an amazing son,' she whispered. 'I love you more and more.'

'And so are you,' I requited and made my own feelings known before we kissed. It was different; different from before Amsterdam and France, and different since then too. I couldn't put a finger on it.

'How does normality feel?' she asked me. But she didn't really. This was a manifestation of my mind trying to make sense of everything.

'It feels horrible knowing that I'm not supposed to want what I know I can have,' I replied. But not really, because this conversation wasn't even happening. What did happen was that we hugged for a very long time and didn't say a word.

'I'm a scatterbrain right now,' I did say. 'I'm neither here nor there.' And then after that we parted ways and went to our ordinary, lonely beds.

2

Monday morning came around after little sleep. When I returned to the kitchen for coffee, it became apparent that I wasn't the only one dragging. The weekend had caught up in full and we both moaned without shame about how shitty we felt. It was justified. You couldn't get so high and not come down sailing. Lovers only came crashing down in the wake of reality.

'Back to the fucking grindstone, I suppose,' mum groaned into her coffee cup, and then, 'what are your plans?'

I wondered if she was feeling guilt or remorse now. To be honest I was a little worried, and yet just enough to stop myself from asking. Quickly I went about assessing my priorities. And of course my debut novel was now with the house editor. 'I suppose I should get onto my sequel to impress the publisher. If I can get my arse into gear...'

That earned me a knowing look from her, which although fleeting went no less acknowledged. I flashed her an innocent smile from my sleep-creased face. 'Did you not sleep?' she asked.

'I tossed,' I admitted sorely. She stifled a laugh then, for fear of choking on her morning caffeine. 'And turned...'

In the beginning, when I decided that I wanted to follow my mother into the world of the published writer, she stressed the importance of the professional approach. We both had our own studies to work out of, which we did during ordinary working hours, usually between 9am to 5pm, or sometimes 4, but never starting later than 9am.

It was at 9am most mornings that we both went our own ways to work - mum in her study, and me in the converted spare bedroom on the second floor. We treated breakfast in the kitchen like coffee in the office cafeteria, applying the business mode so not to be in the mentality for procrastination. There was no time for that. I learned from living around Julianne as she worked at home, that just because she was my mother, that didn't make her my entertainment. Work had to be done and on a professional routine.

That didn't stop us from walking in on each other with any problems we might have. We often counted on each other for help, if it couldn't wait until the designated break. It was a good system. Even the worst writer's block could be solved like any other problem at the office, with a little team support. That was how I got through my first novel, at least.

We would stop either at 12 noon or 1pm for a lunch break and a brisk walk around the park to ease out the aches of sitting at a desk for so long. So I wondered if something was amiss as she appeared in my doorway at half eleven.

'How's the romance novel coming along?' I asked enthusiastically, welcoming the distraction.

'Shit!'

'Oh?'

'I can't get back into it,' she said. I mistook that for "my computer is being a dickbag" but that wasn't what she meant. 'I think I want to start something else. Another story's speaking to me right now.'

I suggested that we stop for lunch early, and that she could tell me all about it in the park. Julianne accepted, and so we rehydrated and ate, and then grabbed our coats to go take a stroll.

'I think I need to tell another mother and son story,' she said when we were alone. The day was dark but for silver linings on a blinding horizon and the air crisp and cool. We held hands as we walked at the same idling pace.

I grasped, or pretended to. 'You mean...'

'You know what I mean,' she said in a light-hearted way but without irony, nudging playfully into my shoulder with hers. 'Since it's on my mind,' she justified.

'So you can't get back in the zone because you're still in the other zone,' I gathered.

'I am so still in the other zone,' she said quietly. 'I hope it doesn't bother you for me to bring it up.'

'No, not at all,' I comforted her and with a hand around her waist. 'If you're sure that's what you want to do, I'm sure it'll be amazing as yours always have been. But if you want to talk about the weekend, or anything else, you can tell me.'

She squeezed my hand briefly, brushing the hair out of her face with the other as the cold wind kissed her. Her glassy eyes were watery as she looked off into the distance. 'Where are we? This is all so new to me,' she contemplated. 'I never thought everything would seem so different...'

That stuck with me, what she said last.

3

Mum called me to dinner at 6pm. When I headed into the kitchen I saw her dressed down into her pyjamas and smiled at the sight. I adored her. I really did. And I showed it with a little song and dance, twirling her around the floor, like we'd stepped under the spotlight of an impromptu musical. It seemed to be the beginning of normality again - or at least I hoped - with no other intentions, until we were sharing a bottle of white wine after the plates were cleared away.

We were reading for a while, only I wasn't really reading. Instead I was stealing glances at her every now and then, because I just couldn't go five minutes without basking in her beauty. Regardless of anything, that had always been the boy I was.

And during those stolen glances I began to notice that she wasn't really reading either. Gradually her attention and her fixed gaze moved away from the written word, and towards that same old bookshelf by the patio door.

'What's the matter?' I asked, seeing that her eyes had glazed over. Her apparent level of concentration was too high for any old daydream. 'Mum?'

'Hmmm,' she responded, barely snapping out of her mystical interlude.

'What's on your mind?' I rephrased. Again, the slightest hint of a blush coloured her cheeks.

'You don't want to know, surely!'

'Please,' I said reaching across from my side of the couch and lowering her book into her lap. 'What is it?'

'Why did we have to leave France so soon?'

My heart exploded. I made a damn good job of hiding that from her, and then chose my words wisely. 'We didn't have to.' Well whoever said I was the wisest young adult?

'And we shouldn't have,' she declared. 'I feel kind of, I don't know, twisted up,' she struggled to say.

'But how so? I feel fine...'

'I don't know,' she grasped apologetically, picking at the corners of the open pages. 'I understand that we rushed into it. I liked that, it was exciting and so impulsive. But we sort of rushed out of it too and now I feel like it wasn't really over.'

I understood now. I could easily relate. It wasn't just that I was feeling loved up and randy since then. It had the chance to be something more and like the briefest of flings, afterwards the both of us were each left in two minds - or maybe in limbo.

'Yeah,' I responded thoughtfully and nodded. 'Do you get the feeling we weren't finished?'

'I do,' she agreed.

'But do you wonder if maybe that's because things are different now, and we've yet to carry on where we left off?'

'Would you want to carry on?' she asked, her curiosity piqued.

'Can I be honest?' I asked as a prelude to what I knew we both needed to hear. She nodded cautiously. 'I didn't even want to stop!'

That night I heard her pleasuring herself from her room across the landing. After I'd uttered those final words, a huge part of me having wanted to take her into her bed at that moment, but somehow not being so disappointed that I couldn't, she'd excused herself for the sake of an early night and parted with a kiss on the lips, and some final words of her own...

'Let me go give that some thought...'

I listened to her moans then, carried on the silent night air of the house in slumber, and gripped the throbbing girth of my erection, and began to pleasure myself, knowing that our thoughts were mutual in that moment. A devilish thought occurred to me then; a dare if anything.

"Go to sleep, nympho", I texted. Silence followed; almost impenetrable, deafening silence. And then a return message...

"What? I was just giving your suggestion some thought!"

"And?"

"Et tu fais l'amour comme un champion!" she called out.

It took every ounce of willpower not to go to her bed that night. Instead, with eyes wide open in the dark, I prolonged my own arousal and pleasure for as long as I possibly could, imagining what could have been, and what might still be.

Thoughts of tasting her, of pleasuring her with my probing, teasing tongue, and of seeing her hanging on every word with anticipation, impaled on my hardness and at the mercy of my absolute lust for her; I needed her, I wanted her, and yet I was so afraid to do her wrong or harm that I couldn't bring myself to.

Eventually I took away my hand, left my business unfinished, and resolved to be a gentleman, not to make a habit of obsessing over her this way.

4

'Good morning, sweetheart,' Julianne greeted me bright and early the next morning. I cracked open one eye to a room filled with sunlight, and there she was lying beside me on the bed, dressed to go places. She kissed my forehead. 'Slept better?'

'You mean better than you?' I asked, relating to our final-final words. She caught onto my sarcasm quickly.

She quipped, 'not possible,' and then, 'I'll be out for the day, catching up with a few friends. Why don't you treat yourself to a lie in?'

'I'll see how I feel,' I croaked, still adjusting to the blinding light of the day. But then, voicing my concern, 'when you say catch up...'

Ever so slightly she slapped me across the shoulder with the palm of her hand. 'Not that kind of catching up. And sorry for keeping you awake last night,' she added somewhat unnecessarily, after some thought.

'No you're not,' I said, managing a suggestive grin.

'Neither are you, clearly,' she said, now grinning back. I shook my head and rolled my eyes absently, to which she unexpectedly teased, 'sweet dreams?'

'You'd know, mum, you were there,' I said before mauling her with kisses. She yelped her surprise and braced herself to me as I rolled out from under the covers and on top of her and nibbled at her neck. She shuddered and began to laugh.

'Stop it! You're acting like a love-crazy adolescent.'

'It's not like I'm forty,' I said, rolling off and covering myself up.

'No, most definitely not,' she said, escaping my clutches, then the bed, before heading for the door with, 'au revoir.'

'J'aime tu, Julianne, and au revoir,' I bode and rolled over. Still I was back to work for half of eight that morning and didn't miss a beat. But instead of writing my novel, I wrote my mother a love letter, describing everything in detail that I loved about our weekend between the Netherlands and France.

5

Later that evening, Julianne brought a friend back with her. It had been a while since I last saw Helena, a fellow writer of erotica from back in the day. When I was younger, but likely no less enchanted by my mother and her imagination, the world was still a much more vivid, colourful, new place.

Everything in it had just a little more mystery and wonder to it. It was a little more unpredictable and requiring instant investigation and adventure. That was, everything except Helena, who always was to the senses what an octopus is to a fish in a bottle. She may have been one of us, not so out of place in the world you know, but only up close do you realise that you're too close, and that the prospect of being eaten alive is a starkly real possibility. Ironically, she moves quite like an octopus too, but looks more like something out of the mind of Tim Burton.

And in mum's own words at one time, Helena seemed to be into writing tacky romance purely for the purpose of thriving as a socialite. She lived in the shadow of Joan Collins and attempted just as tackily to live by her standards too.

Unexpectedly having to welcome her into the house when I went to greet my mother, I was instantly assaulted by the smell of fags, booze and perfume. The smell, thankfully, hadn't worn off on mum so much, though she seemed in much higher spirits, and it was very possible that those spirits included gin.

Both women greeted me with tight hugs and kisses, latching onto me the moment they realised just how cold they were from the effects of the chilly season outside, freezing me rigid stiff in the process. Then Helena started on me, chatting about how I'd grown, while behind her Julianne silently mouthed her apology. I was roped in.

We sat and talked about our careers, theirs long-lived and mine barely beginning. Helena had her reason to celebrate with yet more booze, like she needed a reason, welcoming me into the business family of selling stories to women on trains morning, noon, and night.

Mum went to fetch another bottle of wine. And that was when Helena pounced - startling wide eyes, blood-red lipstick, and wild brunette pixie hair - and whispered at me with all the subtlety of a hissing cat; 'who's the new man in your mum's life?'

'Sorry?' I asked, not deaf - merely taken aback and slightly worried for my safety.

'He must be something. I haven't seen her this happy in years,' Helena pressed.

I let out a dry chuckle. 'You haven't seen her in years,' I corrected.

'Come on, tell me! Who is he?' she persisted.

'What is she saying?' Julianne asked on her return, screwing the cap off a fresh bottle of pinot.

'Apparently there's a new man in your life, mum,' I explained, much to her amusement. So I played off her reaction. 'I thought I was the only one. What is this?'

Up until shortly after 11pm the three of us steadily got drunk, and drunker, while my mother and I braced ourselves for the slightest chance of a Freudian slip. It wasn't easy with Helena going on about some secret boyfriend. I could have died, not knowing whether mum had read my letter or not, which I had posted to her via email. I'd wanted some time to talk to her at least before the night was over.

6

'Ready for bed?' I heard her ask from over my shoulder. It was nearly midnight. I was sat at the side of my bed facing the window, the door at my back, and kicking off my sweatpants. And with that, I was buck naked in front of her, hanging proud. Not one to be prudish, I turned to face her in all my glory, nodded and slipped casually under the duvet while she not so covertly gave me the once over.

'Everything okay?' I asked. She herself was dressed in her black kimono and looking rather sultry - sleek figure, long legs, long red hair - a picture she pulled off more than just competently with those all-knowing eyes.

'May I join you for a moment?' she asked, approaching the bed.

'Of course you can,' I told her. Who was I to refuse?

'I was just writing some quick notes on the new story and I wanted some help. Well,' she hesitated, and I could feel my heart instantly begin to beat a little harder. 'Actually I just wanted to talk.'

Had she read it?

'Anything,' I assured.

'I feel like I'm trying to push the envelope here, so I don't quite know where to start,' she said, and then sat at the side of the bed, facing me. 'And I wonder if I'm just thinking about writing this story to step outside of the situation. It's been a funny couple of days.'

'Funny is a good way of putting it,' I joked, 'but really I haven't had anything to worry about, I don't think. Do you really want to write this, or do you just want to investigate it?'

'The latter sounds closer to the truth,' Julianne said with a grateful glance. 'But I just don't know.'