"Forget All That 10-12" {Pendragon} (MF rom wl lact)
FORGET ALL THAT
by Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net
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This material is Copyright, 1997, by Uther Pendragon. All
rights reserved. I specifically grant the right of downloading
and keeping ONE electronic copy for your personal reading so long
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If you have any comments or requests, please E-mail them to
me at anon584c@nyx.net.
All persons here depicted, except public figures depicted as
public figures in the background, are figments of my imagination
and any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly
coincidental.
# # # #
FORGET ALL THAT
by Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net
Part Ten:
Continued from Part Nine.
"That was the best time that I've spent in that house since the
woman I love moved out," Bob said. We'd spent some awful times
before then, too. "It's a shame that I got the respite, and you
didn't."
"You're supposed to think of your daughter's welfare first."
"Would your going out to breast-feed her have been that much
worse? You could have used the cape." Which keeps anybody from
seeing anything at the cost of keeping The Kitten and me from
seeing one another. I used the cape on the train, but not in
church. On the other hand, most people in church were facing the
other way. Which reminded me of the boy.
"That poor kid in church," I said, "he'll be traumatized for
life."
"Damned voyeur, traumatization is the least of what he
deserved." But we both chuckled.
"I'm glad that that's over for another year," he said.
"Or forever."
"You don't mean that."
"I mean it," I said. "The question is whether I will mean it
next year. Dammit, we don't have the right to bring The Kitten
into that situation."
"Well, your seems more hostile towards the world
every year."
"Do you want me here, or away?" he asked when we got home.
The Kitten wanted only Maman just then.
"Go eat," I told him. "We'll lie here on the couch." Messy
diapers don't affect Bob's appetite at all, his fight with his
father didn't seem to touch it. Two things diminish it. Colds
reduce it to nil, and he eats very lightly at my parents' house.
So he joins his at their late supper afterwards. Usually I
do too, though I don't eat much.
The Brennans were still at table when I put a sleeping
Kitten on her quilt. I wandered into the kitchen and came back
with a glass of milk. The never seats more than four at
the kitchen table, and that crowds it. After the first year of
Bob's and my visits to my family, they moved the light supper
that the three of them eat into the dining room to let Bob and me
join them when we come back. "You know," I said, "I'll be
happier with that in the past than with it in the future. I'm
glad that our feast is after theirs. Discommodes you three,
though."
"Not particularly," Bob's said. "You know that we
kept the schedule the year that you were stuck in Michigan."
"Sorry," I said, not for the first time.
"Don't be, dear," Katherine said, not for the first time.
"You know that we missed you, and it was horrible that the
died, but you did your duty. You can't be sorry for that." I
don't think that it had ever occurred to any Brennan that Bob
could have come home without me.
"You know, dear," she continued, "The feast schedule is
written in stone the moment that the turkey goes in. It's
flexible now. I can't figure The Kitten's new schedule. Do you
have any hints as to what time we should start eating." I looked
at her for a minute and burst into tears. I ran for my room.
Up there, I bawled for an hour. My couldn't cuddle
her grandchild on the grandchild's schedule. Bob's would
schedule a day around The Kitten's schedule and mine. She didn't
think of it as a choice, even. It was just a technical problem.
Bob knocked and entered.
"Just remember that everybody in this house loves you," he
said. "That goes especially for me. Do you want hugs or
solitude?" Both really. I didn't answer. He came over to the bed
and knelt there. He hugged me around the shoulders. I enjoy
having him touch the sexy parts most of the time, but not
touching them at all means that the hug is a gift for me.
After a few minutes, I answered his question. "I think I
want solitude first." He kissed me on the temple, got up, and
went out.
When I came down, everybody was in the living room. "I
didn't mean...." Katherine started.
"All you did was express thoughtful concern," I said. "I
just couldn't stand thoughtful concern just then. I haven't the
foggiest idea what our schedule is right now. I don't know
whether I can pull off another jar-feeding tonight. All I can
tell you is that she will get cranky after four."
"We'll do it early, then. We can always turn off the oven
but leave it in, dear." Which would mean a dry turkey. There
wasn't one person in that room who wouldn't ruin the main dish of
a feast to have me with them.
"If you say one more kind thing, I'll start bawling again."
"Sit down and shut up!" said Bob.
Saying that I didn't want kind didn't mean that I wanted
nasty. He had broken the tension, though. I went over and plunked
myself in his lap. He hugged me. A while later, I sidled off his
lap and onto the couch. I leaned into his hug. When he wasn't
talking, he occasionally kissed me very gently on my head. I
unwound.
The conversation idled along. In the past year, the Senior
Brennans had acquired a CD player and a CD of "A child's
Christmas in Wales." Kathleen suggested that the first purchase
was only to facilitate the second. "Now, we do have other
recordings, dear. It's just that the record was getting quite
scratchy."
Memories led to memories. "I'll miss Aunt Amy," Kathleen
said, "though not to the extent of wishing her back for a visit.
I'll bet that we still have a ton of her inevitable home-made
candles around the house."
"No, dear, Bob and Jeanette took most of them in their first
years of marriage."
"Sorry now that I took yours, Kathleen," I said. "Candles
provide a really romantic light for intimate meals and such."
Especially such.
"Not wanting to nag, dear; but I hope you are careful with
candles around The Kitten. I always worried about those candles.
You don't ever want to fall asleep with one burning, it could
start a fire." Damn! Was nothing secret?
Kathleen moved from the end of the sofa to another chair. I
stretched out and lay with my head in Bob's lap. Junior stirred
under me, and Bob played with my hair.
"Hello, dear," said Katherine. "I'll bet you're wet." Then
somewhat later, "My! Do you like Grandma Brennan's necklace?"
"'Brennan' is unnecessary," I said. The bitterness of my
tone shocked even me.
"Did I do something wrong. dear?"
"She only has one grandmother."
"Now, dear, that isn't correct. However you feel about the
other one. Do you mind if I use the term I choose?" Put that way,
how could I object.
"Use the term you choose."
Katherine's attention being mostly taken, the conversation
was reduced to three Brennans. This being two more than strictly
necessary, it rattled along. Junior was semi-hard under me, and I
knew what Bob was thinking, though we looked innocent as The
Kitten from anywhere in the room. I slowly rolled my head in
Bob's lap, and felt delightfully lewd.
"Do you want me to feed The Kitten her baby food, dear?"
Katherine asked. The rest of Bob stiffened under me. He didn't
want me to get up just then.
"Please do," I said. She would do a better job than I would.
More time passed. Bob softened. Katherine returned. The
conversation moved from Christmas to politics. "Weld and Lee may
come to nothing," Bob said. "But in two cases the Senate was
prevented from hearing material by fossil chairmen. I expect
Republican Senate candidates to have to carry that baggage. It's
one thing to vote no, it's another to not listen."
"Yes, dear, but will that fit inside a sound bite?"
"By not watching network news," his said, "you have
really cut yourself off from the political arena. If it hasn't
happened on TV, it hasn't happened as far as political
consequences go. Now, real-world consequences are another
matter."
"Maybe, sir, but this is not my century, after all. is
all telling the audience, and I'm rather past the stage of taking
lecture courses. I *teach* seminars, now. Anyway, Jeanette has a
take on TV."
"I figure that The Kitten will want one in a few years. She
can ask for it and learn that it is a childish toy, not the
center of adult life." Bob's thought that as funny an idea
as Bob had. I was perfectly serious.
"As both members of the firm have spoken," he said after he
stopped chuckling, "I take it that this is a firm decision."
There was a chorus of groans. "Let him who is without pun cast
the first groan."
"Oooh," said The Kitten, as if on cue. We broke up.
"Mais non, mon enfant, dis 'Decembre,'" said Bob, a little
late to claim any of the laughter as his.
"Dears," Katherine said, "are you really determined that we
take the two of you as a unit?" Bob raised his hand off my
forehead, and I opened my eyes to look. He was raising three
fingers. "Now *that* is hardly fair, dear. On average, the three
of you are incredibly cute and cuddly. I'm *not* going to change
your pants if you mess in them."
"Been there," said Bob's father. "Done that."
Later in the conversation, The Kitten got fussy. Katherine
tried changing her and enticing her with the necklace. Then she
handed her over to me. The Kitten settled down on my stomach.
Bob's stomach rumbled right next to my ear. They could have been
talking Greek above me, I didn't care.
Then Bob's put *A Child's Christmas in Wales* in the
new CD player. Dylan Thomas's voice, marvelous on the
scratchy record, sent chills through us on the new digitized
version. We listened to the silence for a few more minutes after
it was over, but it was approaching Network News time. Kathleen
stayed down to watch with her parents. I tore a sprig off the
mistletoe before we three went upstairs.
By now, both my were feeling full. I would have to
express some -- not too much, throw it away, and feed The Kitten
off the other breast. That was all to facilitate a visit to a
woman who made less fuss over her grandchild than the strangers
on the train had.
The hell with all that. I had a husband who cared for me.
Bob would tolerate any experiment. "I'll go first," I said.
I came back from the bathroom clutching my robe around my
nightgown with one hand and carrying all my clothes the other.
"Your turn," I said. I found the sling in The Kitten's suitcase.
I hung it over the back of the rocking chair.
Bob came back shaved. I think he didn't want the prickles to
bother me that night. The Kitten was on her quilt, not looking
very hungry. That was fine. "None of this may work," I said.
"The lovely thing about marriage is that there's always
another chance." I had a philosopher in my bedroom. Not, however,
the marquis's.
He came over and kissed my hairline. Sated with non-sexual
comforting, I raised my face for a real kiss. Our mouths met in a
sweet, still comforting, kiss. Then our tongues met, and the real
kiss began. Bob kneaded my seat through robe and nightgown. I
finally broke the kiss to say, "Don't all those layers of cloth
impede your touch?"
He stepped back to remove my robe. "You've lost the belt
somewhere," he said. No I hadn't.
"I'll look tomorrow."
"The nightgown?" he asked.
"Please." I lifted my arms and he drew the nightgown over my
head until it was half off. At that point, he found the sash to
my robe. It was around my waist and knotted low in front. The
sprig of mistletoe was tied in the knot. Bob howled in laughter.
Farewell romance. I was standing there with a nightgown
tangled in my arms and covering my face. My husband was doubled
over laughing his fool head off. This roar of laughter filled the
house, and probably the block.
Nobody pounded on the door asking what was so funny. I
managed to untangle myself. A quick check on The Kitten showed
her to be interested but unworried. She had heard papa laugh
before.
She had seen maman naked before, as well. But the sight of
my might persuade her that she was hungry. I hurried over
to the foot of the bed and dropped down. I flipped enough of the
spread over me to hide me from The Kitten, and waited for Bob to
quiet down. "Get the light when you're sober," I said.
He switched off the overhead light and dropped to the bed
beside me. "You are," he said between gasps, "indubitably, ...
the most lovely, ... luscious, ... lascivious, ... woman
in ... all North America.... Love you, ... love every
twist ... in your mind ... and every curve ... in your body.
Let's make love!" That last is Bob's version of "All roads lead
to Rome." His kiss was hot but brief. He still hadn't caught
his breath, hadn't stopped laughing, really.
"I don't want to do anything serious until it's time for The
Kitten to eat," I said.
"We can wait until after she's eaten," Bob said. He is
patient, if not particularly attentive. "What is 'serious?'"
"Anything involving Junior. And stay away from my breasts."
"The Firm is growing already," he said. "There are three new
members." It took me a minute to figure out that "The Firm" meant
our in distinction from the larger Brennan clan. Just as
the "Senior Brennans" were his parents.
"The question isn't whether Junior is a member of The Firm,"
I said.
"But whether he is a firm member," Bob responded. "I love
your mood tonight. Were you trying to embarrass me in front of my
family?"
"Just returning a greeting from an friend. If I were
interested in embarrassing you, I would have gotten up."
"It would have been worth it," he said, "to have you in this
bawdy mood. One more kiss above the mistletoe." We had that, and
a warm, wet kiss it was too. He ended by gently my
tongue.
Then he clambered down and started on the inside of my right
knee. Most of our intercourse is "missionary," and I have never
understood the people who regard that as bland. A little more
than half the rest is rear entry from the "spoon" position. This
is also very satisfying from a physical perspective, but I think
the emotional connections are more important to Bob. A couple of
times a month (unless he's being assaulted by all the stored-up
adolescent libido of his room), Bob likes to add a little
variety. He'll let me reject positions, and he makes a point of
making these sessions special to me; most of the time, though, I
would just as soon spend the time with my husband above me in the
bed. When I feel otherwise, as I did this night, Bob is always
eager to accommodate me.
Once upon a time, kissing me down there was one of the
occasional variations. Since The Kitten's displacement of ton
papa from my breasts, it has become more-or-less standard. Bob
seems to love it, and I certainly enjoy it. It does extend the
time of our love-making sessions, but I can afford the time as
long as I don't have to go to an outside job in the mornings.
That is something that Bob will never tell his father; we
don't watch because our time is spent in love-play. I'm
happy about that. Bob is ecstatic about that. The Kitten is
around two very happy adults who have time for her. What we'll do
when she gets enough to figure out what papa is doing to
maman is another question. Move to a two-bedroom apartment, we
hope.
Anyway, when Bob began kissing my thighs, he was trying to
put icing on a cake that we serve fairly frequently these days.
Which is not to suggest that he failed in that task.
Without the impediment of The Kitten on me, I writhed as his
ticklish tongue and lips crept upward on my thigh. When he
reached his goal, he returned to the inside of the left knee.
This trip seemed to take even longer. "This stage ends when The
Kitten gets hungry," I warned him.
"It doesn't have to," he said. I sometimes have The Kitten's
mouth on my top parts while Bob's is on my lower parts. She likes
this less than the quiet times in the rocker, but much more than
the times that I nurse her in the sling while doing the
vacuuming.
"Oh yes it does." I had plans for my tonight.
Bob kissed upwards a little faster. I grabbed a pillow just
in case, but he slowed back down when he got the outer lips
apart. He licked over the outsides of both inner ones. This
teased me without getting me close to satisfaction. "Bob,
please," I whispered. I was afraid of my voice carrying outside.
"I thought that I was pleasing," he said. Then he licked me
open with one stroke of his tongue. This shot a thrill like an
electric current right through me. I moaned and pulled the pillow
over my mouth. He slowed again, taking what felt like five
minutes to stroke his tongue up the inside of one lip, then what
felt like ten minutes to stroke it down the other lip. He teased
me so much that the first stroke over my clitoris tightened me in
preparation. I let go of the pillow and grabbed his head.
As I pulled his mouth against me, he licked the entire
length of my valley several times very slowly. Each time he
reached the top, I stiffened further. "Bob," I called through the
pillow as the stiffness became pain. Then fire shot through me. I
writhed under his sweet mouth, threw my head from side to side,
and moaned aloud without benefit of the pillow's muffling. I
pulled him as tight against me as I could while I shook in
ecstasy.
Then it was over.
He came up on the bed beside me. "My darling, my love," he
said. "Oh wonderful girl, oh darling. I love you. You are so
luscious. You are so fine. Wonderful Jeanette." He trailed off
into a long string of "Love, love, love, ..." When I think about
it in the cold light of day, I sometimes wonder how *his*
tonguing me to ecstasy becomes an accomplishment on *my* part.
However, this was neither cold, light, nor day; and I luxuriated
in his praise and his love.
Finally, I asked, "How is The Kitten doing?"
He raised himself quietly and looked at her in the night
light. "I think that she has four toes in, but her whole foot
won't fit." The Kitten can get her foot up to her mouth, but it
doesn't quite fit inside. This leads to a certain amount of
discussion about which parent is more prone to put their foot in
their mouth. We weren't in the mood for that just then. I did
look. She can be *so* cute.
"Do you think that you could change her just before she gets
really hungry?"
"I can try." He tried after a while, and actually got her on
the table before she emitted a cry. I had a dry baby in the sling
and a willing husband in front of me. That was the easy part.
"Sit down in the rocker," I told him. "We are going to try
something."
"I love you." He'd said that earlier. On the other hand, he
certainly lusted after me. The fourth member of The Firm was a
firm member.
I straddled him and adjusted the sling. The Kitten wasn't
particularly happy, but she was in her first gluttonous phase.
"Warn me before opening your legs," I said while I perched on his
knees. He nodded. We weren't going to be able to kiss in this
position, I could tell that already. We weren't going to be able
to fit together, either. All my plans went for naught.
"Do you want to face the other way?" Bob asked.
"I thought that you might drain the right while she
drains the left. Not all the way, but it is too full to last
until her next feeding."
"Come sideways," Bob said. Well, that defeated one of my
purposes, but not the other. I got up and Bob moved back a
little. When I sat down on his legs, I could lie back on his left
arm. Then he could reach my right breast. "Talk to your child,"
Bob said. The Kitten had been a bit disturbed, but she went back
to her regular pattern of a few sucks and a pause. Bob's right
hand moved over my legs.
"Ta maman t'aime," I said. "Ton papa t'aime, ... et ta maman
aime ton papa...." When The Kitten paused, I spoke; when I
spoke, Bob paused. He was licking and kissing my nipple very
gently, not having yet drawn milk. I extended the love pairs to
"... et ton grand-pere t'aime, ... et ton grand-pere aime ton
papa." Bob made no sign of disagreement. My seat was pressed
against Bob's thigh. Every movement of the rocker brushed my
outer lips very gently against that warm support. Meanwhile,
Bob's hand was teasing my thighs apart.
I switched to English. "Your grandfather was patting you...
He recited a poem.... Maman thought that it was ... just like
papa.... Maman said so.... Grand-pere said that, ... maman
saying so ... was a great compliment, ... but that anyone saying
so ... was a compliment.... Maman hadn't meant ... a compliment
at all.... She thinks papa et grand-papa ... were both being
silly.... But she couldn't say so.... Now could she?"
With every cycle of the rocker, Bob was able to spread my
legs a little further. This gave him greater access, but it also
pressed my lips a little more firmly against his thigh. Bob was
sucking harder now, and tiny sips of milk. He had also
got into The Kittens rhythm, anticipating her pauses.
"Ton papa veult ... recueillir les contes ... que ton
grand-pere ... raconte...." I went on to tell her how tapes of
those would give her access to his voice, and her
children and her children's children access to his stories.
I had problems keeping my voice level. Bob's hand was on my
mound, but the greater excitement was from the motion of my
sensitive lips against his thigh.
Bob paused in the rocking for a moment and straightened,
removing his mouth from my breast. He nearly lifted me with his
supporting left arm while he spread his legs. When he relaxed,
his hand was cupping me down there. "Je t'aime," he said before
resuming his sweet sucking. Soon The Kitten's sucking, and Bob's,
and the chair's motion, were all synchronized again.
His fingers began stroking me in the same rhythm, and the
only thing keeping this rhythm together was my speech. Now I like
to think that I am *good* at French, and nowise worse for
speaking it several hours a day to my daughter. I was reaching a
point, however, where even speaking coherent English was a
problem. I settled on one English phrase.
The Kitten and Bob stopped sucking, almost together. "Oh
love," I said, Bob's finger stroked down between my inner lips.
The chair rocked forward. Bob more milk out. The chair
rocked back. The finger stroked slowly up my valley toward the
magic spot. The Kitten resumed her lip play with my nipples.
Bob's finger stopped a little too soon. The Kitten and Bob both
stopped sucking. "Oh love," I said.
Then The Kitten took a long breather. She was almost done,
but I wasn't. "Oh love," I said. I said it as Bob was still
sucking. The tempo picked up.
"Oh love," I said more quickly. The chair moved more
quickly, the finger moved more quickly, Bob for shorter
periods but with more force. As the rhythm grew I had to breathe
when I should have been speaking. The chair rocked further
forward; Bob's finger, moving more rapidly, didn't stop. A thrill
shot through me. "Oh love!" I shouted.
I stiffened in his arms, and he kept up all the motions
without waiting for my speech. I shuddered then as my passion
flamed within me.
Then I sagged in the arms of my love. He had to remove his
hand and use it to support the sling. The Kitten, who had been
done a bit ago, decided that all that shaking was an attempt to
starve her and clamped on again.
Now it was Bob's turn to say "Oh love." He said it over and
over, very softly. The pillow was across the room; I suppose that
the whole house knew what we had been doing. I couldn't manage
much worry about that, I was mostly worried that I couldn't help
Bob hold me up, much less The Kitten. Then I could, and
straightened in his lap.
"Could you take The Kitten," I asked.
"If you can support yourself." The Kitten, having discovered
that her tummy was full after all, was finally finished. Bob got
his right hand on her through the cloth of the sling and his left
hand on her inside the sling and lifted. I removed the sling from
around me, and Bob extricated The Kitten. I even managed to get
up.
Bob put a spit-cloth on his shoulder and patted The Kitten
to a minor burp. "Do we want the next feeding as late as
possible?" Bob asked. When I nodded, he changed her again before
turning the Kitten-goes-to-sleep tape on. Extraordinarily tired
after *that* adventure, she dropped right off.
I looked at the rocker. We'd had enough adventures that
night too. It was time for bed. "Put a piece of paper over the
diaper in the wastebasket, will you?" I said.
"You know," Bob said. "It may simply have been that the
position made me more conscious of swallowing, but I don't think
I've ever had so much of your milk." I felt a little guilty. I
tell Bob that his nursing on my evens out The Kitten's
demands. The truth is that sometimes I want the extra bit of love
play, sometimes I want Bob in an extra state of arousal. Most of
the time, my are a little too sore for me to enjoy it.
This was the first time that the amount of milk that he took
mattered. Should I feel guilty for leading him on? I decided that
I shouldn't. It's like having him assigned to dishes all the
time. He would much rather be invited to suck my milk
occasionally than be told that this bit of love-play doesn't
interest me this night.
"You know," I said climbing into bed. "Your missed
the whole point. I'm grateful for what Bob-my-husband has done
for me. He created an entire nurturing environment; he led me
into the realm of passion and fulfillment. He taught me oh so
much. He gave me a daughter. But it was Bob-my-boyfriend that
saved my life." How was that for a nonsequitur? I'll be a real
Brennan yet.
Bob climbed into bed after me. He cuddled me.
"I had a whole program," I continued, "of wild, passionate,
sex planned. It didn't work out, and now I'm tired. It will have
to wait."
"It can wait," said Bob, although Junior pressed hard and
hot against my seat. His voice showed disappointment but not the
slightest hint of resentment.
"Do you think that we could manage a little slow gentle love
while we're waiting?" I asked.
"I love you," he said. I reached for the three Kleenexes
that we would need. After what we had done that evening, I didn't
need much foreplay. Bob needed none.
When I thought that I would break if he kept teasing me, I
turned away from him. Our shoulders on opposite sides of the
narrow bed, our loins meeting in the middle, we lay still as he
made the necessary adjustments with his hand.
Then he slid into me slowly, sweetly, gently. He pressed
forward until he was nearly enclosed, then I pressed backward
until I was totally full. "Tell me!" I said while we rested that
way.
"There in the forest," he began. He meant on one night in
the middle of our camping-trip honeymoon. "I already loved you. I
was already committed to you. I believed that there was no
possible way that I could love you more. But, there in the
forest, you responded to me in a new way. There in the forest,
you gave me your passion while I was in you. There in the forest,
I discovered a new depth of love." That is the story. He began
moving.
I don't want to suggest that I lay there unmoving. I pushed
back as he pushed in; I reached back to feel the hard muscles in
his leg flex as they drove our connection. Still, most of the
action was his. His hand roved continually over my side; his hips
alternately pressed against me and receded, filling me with him
and then almost leaving me. He was stroking me inside and out.
Mostly I was receiving him, welcoming him, basking in his loving
motions. And he, I could tell, enjoyed that welcome.
For a long while, his motions were slow. He would pause
after every dozen strokes or so and let his hands provide all the
stimulus. At first the motions were soothing sensuous pleasure.
Inevitably, however, the time came when I wanted more. When I
tightened his favorite muscle, he sped up. I grabbed his hand
from where it was smoothing a path from my elbow to my thigh; I
didn't even need to guide it. He caressed down my belly to my
mound and between my already-spread legs. There, his finger
ignited the fire that the slow loving had fueled. As he stroked
within me faster and faster, his gentle touch doubled the
sensation.
Our timing couldn't have been better. I felt him press
against me, raising me to new heights. He groaned somewhere far
behind me. I grabbed the pillow against my mouth. He drove in,
filling me. Then he pulsed and spurted, filling me more. That
spiraled me upward until I fell, quaking and moaning and glorying
in the release.
I landed in his arms, as I had so often. As soon as I
returned to my senses, I passed him one of the tissues. I held
another between my legs as he came out. Getting the tissues ready
beforehand isn't the most romantic preparation for sex; but we're
stodgy now, not romantic honeymooners.
Part Eleven:
I clutched my robe around me as I dashed across the hall to
the bathroom. Somehow I had lost the sash. Mostly I put on a
nightgown before leaving the room when I am visiting the Senior
Brennans and put on a robe over that. (Bob is horrified at the
idea of my actually wearing a nightgown to bed. By this time,
I'm not used to it either. My nightgowns and Bob's pajamas last
a long time.) This morning I was in a hurry. Bladder empty, I
decided that I might as well shower at that time. The Kitten
hadn't awakened before me, which gave me a nice long time before
she decided that she was famished.
Bob had put on his pajamas by the time I returned. The
Kitten was on his shoulder getting a few more minutes of sleep.
"There are now two diapers in the wastebasket above the paper,"
he said.
"Oh, do you remember changing her?"
"Just now. Do you?"
"Not in the least." This is a minor mystery. We know that
The Kitten wakes in the middle of the night and demands a meal.
We know that I feed her, and that one of us changes her.
Sometimes we remember doing that, and who did the change. More
often, neither of us remembers it. Occasionally, we check to
make sure that it actually happens; it does. Changing a baby is
a rather complex action to do in your sleep. Oh well.
"I like your outfit," Bob said, "but The Kitten will too."
I can't go topless around my daughter, not because she is a prude
at the tender age of seven months, but because she wants to suck
on my any time she sees it. This may be typical of
breast-fed babies, but it just might be hereditary.
"That's all right, we're almost on schedule. Have you seen
the sash to my robe?"
"It's over on the bookcase where I threw it." Bob pointed,
which was helpful since the walls of the room were mostly low
bookcases. I slipped it back through the loops and hunted up
clean clothes. By the time The Kitten had reconciled herself to
a new day's beginning, I was dressed below the waist. I nursed
The Kitten while Bob watched with his patented combination of
beam and leer. Which finally reminded me of why Bob would be
throwing around the sash to my robe.
"Did my really say he was proud to be compared to
me?" he asked.
"Bob, you should have seen his face. Pure ecstasy. He
looked like you did the first time The Kitten clenched your
finger."
"You still should have approached us as adults."
"Somehow the concept didn't leap to mind," I said. Then I
ignored him to coo to my and tell her that "Les hommes
sont fous." "Prends garde aux," I told her, "... hommes
empoisenne ... du testosterone." It's probably the same in
French; it's that sort of word. Bob wandered off to shower and
breakfast.
"I think I'll run a wash load today," he said when he came
back. We didn't pack enough for two weeks, and this was about
the midpoint of our visit. "Is The Kitten done?" I handed her
over. "Voyons ton grand-pere!" I went downstairs moments later.
I could have carried The Kitten, but it was better that his
father get this treat from Bob.
Dinner was already in preparation when I reached the
kitchen. Kathleen handed me my breakfast plate and I took it
into the dining room. Katherine stopped her when I
returned. "Does two o'clock seem good enough, dear?" she asked.
I thought. "That should be fine. If I foist The Kitten off
with a meal from a jar, she'll probably be hungry well before
one. Two would be almost perfectly safe."
"Or would two-thirty be safer?"
"That would be more likely. The only danger would be that
I'd have to leave the table a little early."
"Two-thirty it is, dear. We'll have Bob bring down the
rocker; you won't have to leave the room. Or would you rather
talk to The Kitten than listen to us. I know that I would."
"The Kitten is getting a little less French this trip than
we're used to, but she's getting much more English. I have her
most of the time at home, so don't worry about that. The thing
is, we spilled something on the rocker and it didn't quite come
out." If "coming out" is how you describe cleaning a spill off
varnished wood.
"Nothing which hasn't been spilled on it before, dear.
Don't worry. After a while, the stain darkens and pretends it's
part of the pattern of the wood." If only she knew. Then I
thought.
She kept that rocking chair in her bedroom, their bedroom.
They moved it back and forth for us every visit, but it stayed in
their room fifty weeks a year. Bob and Kathleen had been nursed
in that rocker, but not recently. Katherine spent very little
waking time in that room. Maybe the Senior Brennans used the
rocker for the same purposes that Bob and I did. Katherine was
looking at me. "Nothing which hasn't been spilled on it before,
dear."
This proved nothing, but it did give me a more attractive
vision of my life when I get to my fifties than the discussion
around the table the night before had given me of my life in my
sixties.
"Do you think that I could bathe The Kitten once the
turkey's in?" I asked.
"There will be space for you, dear. Whether you can wrest
her from the hands of her grandfather is another question. Are
you available to peel potatoes?" I was, and she set me up across
from Kathleen.
Katherine started a of her great-great-aunt Hazel and
her wonderful recipes. "And, you know dear, when the had
almost gone to court over who would inherit her set of recipe
cards, almost all of it came down to 'a pinch of cinnamon,' or
whatever, or -- even worse -- 'season to taste.' That was before
the age of Xerox, dear. One person got that sort of
information." Kathleen and I sat with enthralled minds and busy
hands as that led to another, then we looked at each other.
I don't know who had the idea first, but we both had it before
Katherine came to a stopping place. "Is Bob still opposed to
sweet potatoes dear?"
"He still is, and my foisted a double helping onto
him yesterday. But we have a question."
"Would you mind terribly," asked Kathleen, "if we taped
you?"
"I think that you shouldn't have done that to your father,
dear, whatever your motives. I don't know how I would have felt
if you had done it to me."
"No," I said. "We mean out in the open. We want tapes of
these stories. Who cares about the company politics of Ward
Tech? We want to have The Kitten's grandchildren hear about
great-great-aunt Hazel."
"It seems lots of people are interested in company politics,
dear. Whether you think they should be or not."
"By the time that it would be safe to publish those
stories," I said, "no-one will care about them. That's what
would make it safe. Look, we aren't asking you to invest in the
publication of some book. We are asking you to let us turn on a
tape-recorder while you tell those stories. *We* are interested.
Whether anyone else would be isn't relevant. When is The Kitten
going to hear this treasure trove?"
"Why sitting in the kitchen, dear, and peeling potatoes. Do
you think that I was involved in the struggle over great-great-
aunt Hazel's recipes?"
"Are you prepared to come to Michigan to tell her these
stories?" I asked. "Anyway, are muddled and lost."
"Dear," Katherine said, "if it will make you two happier, we
can make the tape. But I think that it would make the kitchen a
duller place for your next visit."
"Oh mother!" Kathleen said. "You have lots of that
I've heard dozens of times. I still enjoy them."
"Go get your tape, then." Kathleen left. I picked up
another potato.
"You know, dear," Katherine said, "the real shame is the
stories that are a bit too private to tell your children. My
great-grandmother came from Germany as the fiancee of a in
Minnesota. Neither of them had seen the Atlantic before she
started that journey, if I'm not mistaken. They certainly hadn't
seen one another. I wonder what that wedding night was like.
She wouldn't have minded my knowing, but it isn't a that
you tell in the kitchen to people who really know you.
"You'll either tell your daughter, 'A honeymoon in a tent is
the worst idea that we ever had,' or you'll tell her, 'If you
love the man, sharing a tent with him makes a marvelous
honeymoon.' You won't tell me either one, and I don't think you
should. And you won't tell *her* any details. Her
granddaughters, however, will hear only that you went hiking for
you honeymoon, and wonder. It's a pity that you can't tell
them."
"Why can't I?" I asked. "Your great-grandmother may have
lived in a verbal culture, but I use a word-processor on a daily
basis. I could print it up, and leave it with the instructions:
'To be opened a century after my death,' or whatever. What would
you write about?"
"Well, I could hardly tell you, dear. That's why we're
talking about privacy. And it wasn't entirely a verbal culture,
you know; they had become engaged via letters. I'll tell you
what, though. If you promise to write something about the
rocking chair, I'll promise to write something about it, too."
"You type, don't you? Uh!" I felt so stupid. "You send me
those marvelous letters, of course you type."
"We need to get back to cooking," she said, "but I feel that
I can't start another until Kathleen gets back. You know,
dear, I can cook perfectly well in silence when I'm alone in the
kitchen."
"You don't have to wait," I said. "Tell me the one about
when Kathleen was a baby and your husband came home from the
trips. Anything which she doesn't capture on tape, she can fill
in from memory."
"Am I *that* bad, dear."
"Bad?" I was genuinely shocked. "She loves that story.
It's as much a part of these sessions as 'King John' is of
Christmas."
"Every bit of it is true, dear."
"I'm sure it is," I told her; and I am sure. "I just wish
that Bob had heard something similar."
"Am I really that transparent?" she asked. But then I saw a
motion in the doorway.
"Hurry," I told Kathleen. "She won't talk until it is set
up, and the dinner is on hold."
Soon the tape was running. Katherine had the natural
shyness that anyone develops when they are being recorded, but
she was -- after all -- both a school-teacher and a Brennan. She
was used to talking.
As she got into the story, she went back to cooking, which
made her less self-conscious. Soon, she was running along as she
had the year before. "... For the rest of the weekend, I got to
hold her while I was feeding her, period. I'd be talking to him
and he'd turn his back, not because he'd stopped listening, dear,
but so she could see what was doing. Disconcerting all the
same...."
We peeled potatoes, cored apples, and occasionally checked
to see if the tape had run out. There was no reason to stop
Katherine for the tape changes. *All* the information would have
been lost if the machine hadn't been running.
I fed the Kitten while this was going on, staying in the
kitchen where she could hear Grandma Brennan recite the
accumulated wisdom. As for me, I want each individual's
personal, uninterrupted, version of Bob's ultimate package. But
that could wait for next year.
We got the turkey in, and the rest of the meal at a holding
stage, just before Bob walked in. "I'm going to run two loads.
I'll fill up the whites with sheets."
"That's kind of you, dear."
"Are there any other requests?"
"Thanks, Bob," said Kathleen, "but I don't think so."
"Wait ten minutes, won't you," I said. "I'm about to bathe
The Kitten, and I don't want to run out of hot. Indeed, could
you bring down the soap and shampoo? I'll go pry her away from
son grand-pere."
"My doesn't want you rubbing sham-poo in her hair"
Bob said. "She wants to rub in real poo." That is dangerously
close to the truth.
Three of us managed to bathe The Kitten with only a little
more difficulty than it would have taken one. Kathleen carried
her away, while I washed out the sink. We dressed in relays, one
always in the kitchen. I wore a skirt and my Christmas-gift
shirt from Lands End.
Well into the meal, Katherine said, "Russ, you'll never know
what the have been doing with me."
"Those two are as likely as not to be taping you." Bob's
father seemed in a remarkably dour mood considering the
granddaughter time that he had received.
"Why, dear. How did you guess?"
"What?!"
"And," Katherine continued, "we are going to put all the
stories that I can remember on tape. For The Kitten if nobody
else. Kathleen hasn't decided yet whether she'll have any
daughters...."
"I've already decided against sons. Look what happened when
Mom had one."
"... And Jeanette, after all, won't have enough time in my
kitchen to learn them all to pass down to her daughter."
"Besides," I put in. "I mostly talk to The Kitten in
French, and some of these don't translate well."
"And, dear," Katherine said while I was still talking, "we
thought that Jeanette and Kathleen could add their own to
the cache, and later The Kitten and whoever. Their stories, and
stories from other families, and that they have heard
from others."
"Ann told some marvelous stories," I said. "Some you heard,
Bob, and many you didn't."
"When," Bob asked, "did this oral history project change
from the memories of one to those of dozens of women?"
"Well," I pointed out, "there didn't seem to be a whole lot
of enthusiasm on the part of the subject for that one. And we
have hours of recordings already for our project. While the
assets offered were those of the firm, it was my typing; I should
get some vote. Anyway, at this time we're pushing the idea of
tape. Transcription would be in the future."
"And it isn't dozens of women, dear," Katherine said.
"Except for the ones that are filtered through my memories, there
are only four or five. And I doubt whether I know a from
more than ten women all told."
"The Kitten and whoever," I said, "(and doesn't Kathleen
have original taste in children's names?) won't have *memories*
to contribute for an awfully long time. Anyway, that isn't the
problem.
"We got talking about saving some memories that might
our contemporaries. Those would be put in writing, not tapes.
That could be kept for a century. 'My honeymoon on The
Appalachian Trail, to be delivered to any of Catherine
Angelique's granddaughters on their eighteenth birthday.' And we
didn't know how to handle that."
"You'd have to ask a real lawyer," Bob said. "There is the
so-called 'Law against perpetuities.'"
"Is that why the US doesn't issue consols?" his
asked.
"No sir," Bob responded. "Different thing. Same name. A
lawyer's 'perpetuity' is like the English entailed estates. You
can't leave money to be shared by The Kitten's grandchildren. (I
mean now. You can wait until she has some.) I'm sure that you
*could* leave papers to be *publicly* available in one hundred
years. I'm sure that you could *not* leave property to be
divided among people not yet born. (I think that the limit on
private trusts is one person's lifetime. But don't quote me, I
*didn't* go to law school, remember.) Whether one can legally
bind someone to keep papers secret for a century and then
distribute them privately, I don't know.
"But that's legality. If you left me some papers to be
turned over to The Kitten, I might be able to open them with no
legal penalty. On the other hand, would I keep her respect after
she found out that I had done so?"
"You might find," said Bob's father, "that having the
respect of your child is an impossibility whatever your
behavior."
"Well," I said. "You have retained the respect of your
children. Bob is enough like you to make it a reasonable bet."
"I think, dear," Katherine said, "that the proper verb is
'regained' with a 'g,' not 'retained.' Children go through a
stage of rejecting everything before they reach a stage of
selection."
"All the more reason," I said, "to behave in a fashion that
would lead them to select respect. Besides, I knew Bob from
sixteen. He never talked of his with disdain. Now, his
father's generation...."
"I can remember," his said, "some comments about
never understanding him at all."
"Well," I said, "that's entirely different. When he told me
that I didn't understand him, I told him that nobody in the world
could possibly understand him." Kathleen's loud agreement helped
lighten the discussion.
"I suspect," said Bob, "that there are more intellects lofty
enough to recognize my genius than you four might think."
"There," Katherine said, "could hardly be fewer."
"They would have to be experts in abnormal psychology,"
Kathleen said, "and nobody is doing work on anything *that*
abnormal."
"The Kitten, at least, loves me."
"We all *love* you, dear," his told him. "We were
talking about understanding you."
"If she understood you," I pointed out, "she'd say
'Decembre.'"
"She doesn't know what month it is," he said. "*My*
daughter can speak French, but *your* doesn't know what
month it is." Now I ask you, which parent is more likely to help
The Kitten's French, whether we are talking genes or environment?
"Tell me true, Kate," Bob's said. "How much of this
is conspiracy?"
"Not on my part, dear. But the sprang the original
idea with suspicious speed and unanimity."
"It occurred to the two of us at once, sir," I said. "It
really did. We were sitting there with Katherine's pouring
over us. And we couldn't talk, but it occurred to us almost
simultaneously. *These* should be saved.
"Now let me delay speaking for the firm and even as a
of my later. Because the idea occurred to me as
Jeanette. (Things don't always occur to you under all your hats,
you know.) My husband is a historian and thinks of the ages; I'm
a and think of my child.
"The Kitten would be interested in hearing your voice, as
Bob said. We'd be more interested in having her hear it,
assuming -- as your seems morbidly to do -- that she won't
hear it from your mouth. But she'd be *fascinated* by
Katherine's stories. They are, as Katherine pointed out to us,
mostly intended as compensation for staying in the kitchen and
peeling potatoes.
"Transcription is another kettle of fish. These
should be transcribed someday. (And I just switched hats.) What
you did around the dinner table is try to educate your kids.
Those lectures would go down more smoothly for being transcribed.
I couldn't speak for the firm without consultation, but it's
possible that I might find some transcription time this year. I
mean this coming year.
"If I do, I'll only spend a little time. For the oral
history project, I listened and listened again. Instead, I'll
send you a rough draft, and *you* can put in the word that I
missed."
"You got one thing wrong," Bob said, "these are stories.
They just need a little understanding to (um) understand them.
They just need a little grounding to understand them."
"Well," I said, "of the women in that kitchen, only I
belonged in a kitchen. Katherine has what? an MAT?" She
nodded. "And Kathleen has an MD. They have both worlds. I want
my to have both worlds. Your does, and who can
swear that the around the table didn't help. But I think
that those stories, or at least the grounding, are best conveyed
on paper."
"You know," said Bob's father, "That's the longest speech
that I've heard from you since the wedding." The Kitten cried in
the other room. It was a hungry cry.
"It's the longest speech that you'll hear from me for a
while. I'm being summoned."
Bob got up. "Rocker?" he asked.
"Please," I said. A moment later, the cry was stifled in
the other room. I stuffed my mouth and started unbuttoning my
new while I chewed. A sensible woman would have eaten
while she had the chance. I managed to get in a slice of turkey
and all the remains of my mashed potatoes (I love gravy, but I
hate *cold* gravy) before Bob called from the other room.
"Coming," he said.
Part Twelve, Conclusion:
"Coming," I replied. I moved to the rocker and adjusted my
bra. Bob handed me The Kitten and sat down. She began to feed,
but I paid more attention to the conversation than I normally do
while nursing. That was lucky, as my sister-in-law addressed her
next sentence to me.
"You know, Jeanette, you shouldn't put yourself down.
You're not a housewife locked in the kitchen. You're a
translator of scholarly works." I decided that there was no way
that The Kitten was going to get French during this meal.
"Y'know, Kaytoo," Bob said, "you *think* you're a feminist.
You're really an imperialist.
"You know, dear," Katherine said, "wrapping an insight in an
insult is hiding your light under a bushel."
"He means, Kathleen," I said, resisting the temptation to
start my sentence with "You know," "that you're projecting. You
don't want to be a housewife; you want to be a psychoanalyst. I
don't have dreams of a career in translation; I'm building a
family. If that means translating and I'm able to translate,
fine. I really enjoy it. If that means changing an
pile of messy diapers, so be it. Though I *don't* really enjoy
that.
"You aren't in any position to talk, you know. Your present
job pays less than my first job paid for forty hours a week; and
you are on call thirty-six hours out of forty-eight. You're
building something, but so am I. For that matter, I had four
jobs over ten years, not counting a few second jobs. I left two
of them to follow my husband into another state and one to have a
baby. I have references from all four, and glowing references
from the last job where I was secretary to the president of a
small company. Ask your if Brewster would hire me."
"Not Bob's wife, of course," he said. "And you may be
overqualified for any available position. But personnel would
drool over that sort of record."
"I'm not," I told her, "just-a-housewife. I wasn't just-a-
secretary, either. But I was a very good secretary, and I think
I'm a good and mother. I'm an adequate housekeeper."
"You're the finest a could ask for," Bob said.
That wasn't what he'd said the night before. "I think that
you're a wonderful mother. You're a very good housekeeper, but
too compulsive." If Bob found that people could write their
names in the dust on a table, he would start an autograph
collection.
"Remember the three on the same job," he said to his
sister. "One said that he was laying brick, one said that he was
earning a living, one said that he was building a cathedral."
"You Brennans don't know any more about families than a fish
knows about water," I said. "Bob says that he never gets any
support from his father; and he believes that he believes that.
But when push comes to shove, he says 'my will back me.'
And his parents, both parents, will back him. And back you. And
will back me because I him." I broke down in tears then.
Bob looked over, decided that coming over would be a
mistake, went back to eating. I think that The Kitten's next
message, when she paused and looked up at me, was "Don't be sad,
Maman."
"Quelquefois on doit," I told her. Her next look wasn't any
happier; well, I didn't like the news either. "C'est-une partie
de la vie." That didn't persuade her. "Et la vie est tres
bonne." I glanced over at the table.
Katherine was speaking to me. "My children might be
ignorant of family, dear, but Russ and I built our own
cathedral." Bob was looking down at his plate. Odd. His
was glaring at him. God, my husband loved me! He would walk
through fire for his father's approval; but he sat there under
his father's disapproval instead of coming over to me. And he
did it because that was slightly better for me.
How *dare* that bastard put his son through that, I thought.
I would have liked to tell him what I thought of him. Why not?
He had done that to me two days ago. Then the reason why not
came to me. It wouldn't build that I was claiming as my
goal a minute ago. I needed a better approach. I thought;
indeed, I schemed.
"She built a cathedral, Jeanette," Bob's said
blithely. "I mostly carried hod." And swung a wrecking ball. I
had thought of my lever, and he *was* addressing me.
"Well, sir," I started. "I don't know much about
management. And I know less about medicine. So this free advice
may be overpriced. But *I* would think that a who has had a
bypass operation would ... learn to delegate." Bob sputtered. A
particle or two of food escaped, and I was glad that The Kitten
couldn't see.
"Now, Bob tells me what a great manager you are. It may be
simple hero worship, it may be true of the office. What I see
here at this table is a Dilbert cartoon."
He winced.
"The who knew me better than you ever will fourteen
years ago, a who has bent his considerable intelligence to
finding out what makes me happy for those fourteen years, checked
on me. He decided that I *didn't* need his presence. Then you
put him through agony because he followed his knowledge rather
than your guess.
"I appreciated your glare when you used it to protect my
modesty from the in church. I *don't* appreciate your glare
when you use it to punish my husband because he cares more for my
feelings than for your ephemeral opinions. I especially resent
it because I know how important those opinions are to him."
And *that* was now the longest speech he had heard from me
since the wedding.
"I'm sorry, Jeanette. I just worry about his making the
mistakes that I made."
"And you worry about his not having your virtues, especially
your prime virtue of loyalty. (I don't think that is the essence
of manhood, though Bob has tons of loyalty, especially to me. I
just think that it is the essence of Russell Brennan.) But don't
you see the catch twenty-two? You worry about his being like
you, and you worry about his being unlike you. That doesn't
leave him a whole lot of options." I needed to look to The
Kitten again, who hadn't appreciated the anger in my voice.
Bob leaped into the breach. "I'm not making your mistakes,
sir. I'm busy making my own." That brought the tension down a
little.
"As long as we have a little creativity, dear," Katherine
said, "we can pretend that we're making progress. You know, when
Kathleen came along, I had a whole list of the mistakes that I
had made with you. I wasn't going to repeat them. The problem
was that Kathleen wasn't Bob."
"Problem!" Kathleen was playing incensed. She was probably
actually incensed, as well.
"The mistakes that I made with Bob, dear, weren't at the
level of dropping him on his head, whatever you claimed later.
They were things that could be right for *a* child, but were dead
wrong for *that* child. They might have been okay for you. On
the other hand, some of the things that worked best for Bob
didn't work at all for you." The subtle Brennan had spoken. If
the others picked it up, well and good; if not, I could use it
later. "You know, dear, it is really unfair to sit there nursing
a child." What did she expect me to do? "It's like holding a
hostage. Nobody's going to zap Jeanette when it might disturb
The Kitten."
"I didn't choose when he would glare at Bob." Nor did I
care about fighting fair. I was protecting my family.
"I'm sorry, Jeanette," Bob's said. "Will you forgive
me?"
"Why Mr. Brennan," I said in my *very* sweetest voice. Bob
looked up. He knew that voice. "You already know the answer to
that. Since you ask me in that way, of course the answer is ...
no!"
"What?" Aside from the way he handled his son, the was
no fool. He was Bob's father, after all.
"You weren't glaring at me. It wouldn't have if you
had. You were glaring at Bob. I can forgive the *past*, but I
can't make peace with you while you are at war with my husband.
Ask his forgiveness first."
"Of course I forgive you," said Bob.
"Not even your omnipotent God can forgive the unrepentant,
Bob."
"Son, her theology may be shaky, but her take on people is
correct. I most humbly beg your pardon."
"You have it," said Bob. He sincerely meant it.
"And you have mine," I said, not particularly sincerely.
For thirty seconds, I thought that we would witness the millionth
hug in the Brennan household and the first between two men. They
went back to their plates, but they had *looked* like a hug was
possible. Bob, in particular, looked extremely huggable.
"It ain't The Firm," said his father. "It's damn-well La
Compania." That wasn't good French if it were intended for
French.
"Anyway, dears," said Katherine, "does this idea of
collection of tapes look viable?"
"I don't see why not," said Bob. "It's just as I was saying
about Father's tapes. Only your list goes deeper. It is
important social history. Try to guess at a date for those
stories. For your own memories, of course, you don't have to
guess.
"On the other hand, I might become a real historian, after
all, if I can keep off my family. The rise and fall of
the Hamiltonian system in Ward Tech would be a nice piece of
institutional history. It couldn't be told today; it wouldn't be
acceptable if it were based only on your memoirs, sir. It could,
however, be pasted together over time, and told in twenty years."
Have I mentioned that Bob thinks in the long term?
"Not your century is it?" his asked.
"Not my century, but I sat at a dinner table for five or ten
years hearing nightly lectures on the strengths and weaknesses of
the twentieth century American corporate system. I think I
could navigate those waters without too many blunders. Indeed,
with your guidance and a few letters of introduction, I might be
able to write the without quoting you at all. I would
dedicate the book to Grand-pere Gorge Profonde."
"That's deep throat," I put in.
"Sounds wonderful," said his father, "Meet me in the garage
Monday."
"Give me a slice of white, please," Bob said. "and a bit
more dressing too." He passed his plate down.
"Wonders will never cease," said Kathleen. She sounded more
shocked at that request from her than at anything else
which had been said at the table that day. I was sorry to
disappoint her, but I knew what was coming. Bob cut the turkey
up into small pieces, mixed a little gravy in with the stuffing,
and brought the plate over to me.
"Nod when," he said. Then he held out a small piece of
turkey on the fork. I nodded. "Your daddy loves you, Kitten,"
he said. "Your loves you.... And your daddy loves your
mommy...." I ate, the table conversation finally resumed, The
Kitten got her food and her message.
Much later, Katherine got her granddaughter while the rest
of us got our dessert. The Kitten played with the beads. When
Bob's had finished his pie, Katherine said, "Want her,
Russ? I warn you she needs a change."
"Better a wet Kitten than a lonely chair. Before I go,
though, I want to say something to Jeanette. I don't withdraw
one word of what I said about your *actions* of taping Bob. I
did over-react, though, when I talked about *who* you are. You
still have my deepest admiration."
"That's terribly kind, sir," I said as he hauled The Kitten
off towards the changing table. "And, in return, I really want
to express my respect for the way that you handle the tax
accounting at Brewster."
"Really, dear," Katherine said after he walked away.
"Neither of us is a fool you know. Where do you think Bob got
his genes? I don't say sarcastic things about your husband."
"Between your husband and your son, you have to maintain
some degree of neutrality. Between my husband and my father-in-
law I don't."
"I think," Katherine said, "that you have delivered more
than Russ is capable of hearing right now, dear. Why don't you
let that sink in this trip. See what happens through this next
year. He has heard you, but he'll turn defensive if you say
more. I say this as a person who loves them both very much."
"I only have two more messages, anyway," I told her. Well,
two that I'd thought of yet. But ignoring Katherine's advice
about her husband would be idiotic. "I'll give them to you and
you can deliver them in a few months."
"I certainly can, dear. Perhaps I will."
"Bob's has to be an expert on budgeting," I said.
"He does it for a whole damn company. When the two of us were on
a tight budget, he never asked to see what we were spending money
on. He trusts Bob's judgment on everything that he trusts *his*
judgment on."
"I'll think about that dear," Katherine promised. "You
think about who needs to hear that message. And the other?"
"Would it really be so wonderful," I asked her, "if Bob was
precisely the husband that his wants him to be, and I was
precisely the that Bob's wants him to have. Would
that be so wonderful if we then got divorced because we weren't
meeting the deepest needs of *each other*?"
"Thank you, dear. Now I believe that I should have a little
quality time with *my* while we do the dishes. Will you
excuse us, dear."
"Mom!" Kathleen said. "I spent the day in the kitchen."
"You haven't done the dishes this whole visit, dear. Get
all your work out of the way in one swell foop. Besides they are
my grandmother's dishes and I can trust them neither to the
dishwasher nor to Bob."
"I notice," Bob said to me when they had taken out the first
load, "that you didn't try to defend me from *that* accusation."
"You're an excellent husband, mon mari. You are a bull in
the china dishwater. Let's go upstairs."
"Now you're talking!"
"Keep your libido under control," I told him. "I just had a
heavy meal, and your mother's right. We have to talk."
Upstairs, I dropped down on the stripped bed, my head on the
foot end. Bob put the pillows in new cases and passed me one.
He lay down on the floor with the other pillow, lying in the
opposite direction from me so that our right hands could meet
easily.
"I just wish that I could defend you from your as
well as you defend me from my father," he said.
"My did its worst damage before I even met you," I
pointed out. "You can't defend me from that, you can only heal
me. You've done a marvelous job of that."
"Thank you."
"Thank *you*. I love you."
"I love you, too," he said. "Even if you have just had a
heavy meal."
"Your was right, as always."
"About what? I've known her to be wrong."
"Your doesn't distrust your judgment in
matters."
"He gives a damn good imitation."
"He sees what everybody else sees. That you are so much
alike."
"I think of us as opposites."
"That's right," I told him.
"What did Whitman say about 'I contain contradictions'?"
"*You* are asking *me* about poetry? Anyway, that doesn't
matter. What your sees is someone who looks spookily like
Russell Brennan. He thinks Russell Brennan fouled up royally in
the department, now your thinks differently...."
"My mother," Bob said, "says differently."
"But what she says, or what she thinks, or what the reality
is.... Is there any reality in such situations?" I was getting
lost.
"That is the 'absolute truth' question," he said. "The
people who say that there is no absolute truth have a point, even
if their certainty is a logical contradiction and their tactics
border on the fascistic."
"Can we leave faculty wars 'til next week."
"You asked."
"Anyway," I went on, "no one else's opinions on that subject
matter to what your sees. He sees someone who looks
spookily like Russell Brennan, and whom he loves. He sees
Russell Brennan as a horrible failure in the department.
*Thus*, he sees the person he loves in imminent danger of being a
horrible failure in the department. The particular thing
that you do doesn't matter in the least. You might try plastic
surgery on your chin."
Bob laughed at that. The Brennan chin was a trait.
It looked good, and almost identical, on the two of them.
Kathleen could have done without it, although she was pretty even
with it.
"No way," he said. "The Kitten has it already." He is,
unfortunately, right.
"Anyway. Bob Brennan looks like a disastrous husband and
father to him because Bob Brennan looks like Russell Brennan to
him. Now I get the impression that he was a fine when he
was there."
"Anybody could be a fine as often as he was there,"
he said, a bit unfairly. Bob's had a remarkably intense
job; he *could* have come home expecting his to neglect the
children briefly so she could soothe his aches and needs. But
Bob's impression of that past is just another impression. I
wanted to deal with the present and future.
"And you are trying to be as fine a on a three-
hundred-sixty-five day basis."
"Not yet."
"Goofus!" I said, and he is a goofus. "Three-sixty-five a
year, every year. You are a fine husband and a fine father.
Just remember that your doesn't worry about your fouling
up in the department because of anything you do, and he
won't be persuaded that you are a good husband and by
anything you could do. He looks at you and sees his younger
self. It's his younger self that he sees failing."
"I love you."
"And I love you too. Will you think about it?"
"Loving you?" he asked. "I think about it all the time. I
used to lie for hours in this room and think about nothing else.
Of course, in those days, *I* got to lie on the bed." I decided
to let him have his diversion. Bob can't *not* think about an
idea once it's raised.
"I could always go downstairs and lie on the couch," I said,
knowing that he would never take me up on it.
"I fail to see the advantage," he said. "In the first
place, it's much narrower and we'd be even more crowded. In the
second place, we'd have an audience."
"Can't you think of love apart from lust?" I asked him.
"Easily. I just can't think of Jeanette apart from lust."
I suspect that he can't breathe, let alone think, apart from
lust.
He took my hand and kissed each finger. I took it back
after a while and said, "Can you find the volume with the article
about Gide?" He groaned theatrically, but handed it to me.
After a bit, he got out the print-out and went through it some
more. Working side-by-side is awfully companionable. Too bad we
never could get in the hang before we were married. I actually
got the next volume for myself. I wasn't going to get to Verne
before returning to Michigan.
The book was closed beside me on the bed when Bob woke me.
He said, "Dad's calling. Here? down in the rocker? or should I
bring the rocker up?"
"None of the above. Do we have a clean bib?"
The Kitten, once deposited in the highchair, settled down
for the game. She even opened her mouth one time without my
making the face. She still tried to grab the spoon, but I have
the reaction-time in our family.
I remembered to stop when she was half full. We played a
little "This little piggy." When she was done, I washed her off.
She was half an hour from her cranky time, but nobody was around
to notice that. I snuck up the stairs, and we lay down on the
quilt together. When Bob came back, he took the rocker. "We
only want Mommy, eh," he said.
"Bob could we have another name?"
"Other than Brennan? other than The Kitten? other than?"
"Mommy and Daddy," I explained, "are what I still call my
parents most of the time."
"How about 'Dad,' did you ever use that?" he asked. "Or I
could be 'Pops.' Unless we move back to Boston. We could just
use 'Maman' all the time, but it is going to sound a lot like
'mommy' to a lot of people."
"Let me think about it. You are a sweet, accommodating,
husband."
"Darling, if it's important to you, and not to me....
Actually, I want to be 'Dad.' I just felt we should wait.
Terminal consonants are going to take a while."
He wandered over to the bed, and made it with the newly-
washed sheets. He lay down on top with the print-out. After The
Kitten fell asleep, I joined him. I decided to read the Verne
article and actually stayed awake straight through it.
Just before dinner, we tried out the baby monitor. Bob
stayed upstairs. When I was in the dining room I could hear his
voice saying, "This is Deforest's prime evil," quite clearly.
His shouted for him to come down. The Kitten didn't wake
until the table was being cleared.
Rested, dry, and fed, The Kitten went to Katherine and from
her to Kathleen. Bob carried the rocker back upstairs. The
Kitten really doesn't get *cranky* at night, she just is very
possessive of Maman. Which is fine; Maman, although she tries
not to show it, feels very possessive of The Kitten. Indeed, I
was tempted to call our friends and cancel the party on Sunday.
I reconsidered. We would be back in Michigan in a week. I
would have The Kitten to myself for most of the time, (and her
best times) most days. I lay with The Kitten on my belly and my
head in Bob's lap. The conversation above me solved the problems
of the world. Bob explained why strict censorship of any
pictorial or voice media, combined with absolute freedom of the
printed word, would reverse the decline in literacy. "Are we
boring you, dear?" Katherine asked. I shook my head. I wasn't
paying enough attention to be bored. My was barely
stirring on my lap, and Junior was barely stirring under my head.
We went upstairs early. The Kitten was tired of Maman, too.
She played on the quilt, if throwing all ones toys away and
crying because there is nothing to play with can be called
playing.
Soon, I was nursing her in the rocker. I talked to her
disjointedly. Bob lay on the bed going further into the printout
until The Kitten was quite done. "You know," I said, "with the
door locked, there is no rule that you have to change all her
diapers."
"I think this business of giving you a break is a good
thing. Besides, I would rather have you lie there and think lewd
thoughts." There is a grain of truth in that. Bob changes his
share of diapers, but much more than half the ones just before we
lay The Kitten down to sleep and begin our own bed-time ritual.
That was a fair trade. He changed The Kitten; I thought of
all the ways that we had made love this trip. I remembered
straddling him in the rocker, and of his hand playing with me in
that same rocker while he tasted my milk. I remembered my moving
above him on the bed, and of his moving behind me on two separate
occasions. I remembered all the times that he had tongued or
kissed me to a climax. Those sort of merged together, as I
remembered one climb to glory after another. (I can never
remember the actual climaxes more than moments after they
happen.) I remembered lying between the end of the bed and his
lap. I remembered him moving above me and within me and against
me. I thought that this was the sweetest time of all.
"Thinking any lewd thoughts?" he asked, after The Kitten was
safely ensconced in her crib.
"Nothing lewd," I answered, "only licit, unexceptionable,
practices with my lawful wedded husband."
"You make it sound so bland," he said while just touching
one nipple, "but look so enticing." My nipples were standing up,
and a nursing mother's nipples stand rather tall.
"Kiss me first," I said, meaning my mouth before my nipples.
He pecked my mouth, pecked a nipple, and came back for a real
kiss. His tongue was exciting of itself, but more exciting as a
promise. His hands passed over me as our tongues played tag.
My thighs spread as he stroked them. "Oh, how I do love
you," he said as he took the invitation. Then he pressed his
mouth more firmly to mine. My hips rose to press against his
clasping hand. He parted the lips and touched me within. "Oh,
how I love you!" he said as he felt my slickness.
"Both together tonight," I asked, "Please!" He could easily
have pushed me over into my climax, but I wanted him along with
me.
He kissed me with love and petted me with lust. I thought
that he had forgotten my request when I stiffened under his hand.
He had remembered; he just enjoyed my readiness. Leaving the
most sensitive area, he urged my legs farther apart as he climbed
between them. Then the strokes up and down my valley were not
from his fingers. Soon, he placed himself.
His entrance was slow, and steady, and filled me, and then
pressed me down. "Oh!" he said. "I love you!"
I think half his weight was supported on that pivot for a
minute. Then his strokes followed one regular beat. The
sliding, the filling, the pressing excited me until the
individual sensations were lost in the blissful warmth. I was
just aware of his hand sliding between us. Then the warmth
burned to fire, and the fire consumed me. "Oh! Love *you*," I
heard through my own moans as a writhed beneath him and flared
around him.
Then his motions sped, sped again, and ended in a driving
thrust. "Oh love," he said, in time to each spurt. "Oh love, oh
love. *Oh* love!" He lay on me, in me, coming out of me, for
minutes afterward. Then he moved over and we cleaned ourselves
off.
We turned onto our sides and nestled into a spoon. He
hugged me as our breaths eased towards sleep
"Love," he said.
And so it was.
The End
FORGET ALL THAT
Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net
1998/01/01
1999/12/30
2000/11/12
This is the last (so far) in a series of about the
Brennans.
The first segment of this is:
fat_a.txt
Parts 1-3
The first in the series is:
forever.txt
"Forever"
The list of the entire series is:
brennan.txt
Brennan Directory
The list of all my can be found at:
index.txt
Index to Uther Pendragon's Website
Another with another perspective on another three-
generation is:
gully.txt
"Gully Washer"
End of File
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